CHAPTER XXI
THE JUDGE'S OFFICE
Loudon dropped off the train at Damson into the arms of Johnny Ramsay and Chuck Morgan. Bawling "Pop goes the weasel" they fell upon him, and the three danced upon the platform till a board broke and Chuck Morgan fell down.
Then, in company with the more sedate Laguerre, they jingled across the street to one of the saloons. An hour later they were riding northward, and Loudon was telling Johnny and Chuck what had occurred.
"O' course, just my luck!" complained Johnny. "All done, an' I don't have a look-in. It's all the fault o' that criminal Chuck Morgan. He's out on Cow Creek, an' I have to comb the range for him."
"Yuh act like I done it a-purpose!" barked Chuck. "O' course I knowed yuh was comin'! That's why I went out there. Think I'm a mind-reader?"
"Yuh wouldn't know a mind if yuh seen one," retorted Johnny. "How could yuh, not ownin' such a thing yoreself? Hey! Don't kick my cayuse! He's a orphan. Go on, Tom, tell us some more about Archer."
The four men did not push their mounts. There was no necessity for haste, and they spent the following afternoon playing cards in a draw five miles out of Marysville. When the sun had set, they rode onward.
Separating at the edge of the town, that their arrival might be unremarked, they met in the rear of Judge Allison's corral. Alone, Loudon approached the house on foot. There was a light in the office. He rapped on the door.
"Come in," called the Judge.
Loudon pushed open the door. For an instant he glimpsed the fat figure of the Judge and beyond him the surprised faces of Archer and Sheriff Block, and then Archer's hand flung sidewise and knocked over the lamp. Loudon's gun was out, but he did not dare fire for fear of hitting the Judge.
Bang! A tongue of flame spat past Loudon's chin. Burning powder-grains singed his neck. A hard object smote him violently in the pit of the stomach and knocked the wind out of him. Loudon fell flat on his back. He was dimly conscious that somebody, in leaping over him, stepped on his face, and that a horse had broken into the Judge's office and was kicking the furniture to pieces.
"Whatsa matter? Whatsa matter?" demanded Johnny Ramsay, stooping over the prostrate Loudon. "Who plugged yuh?"
"Ah—ugh—ugh—I—ca—ugh—can't—ugh—can't b-b-breathe!" gasped Loudon.
Johnny began to tear open his friend's shirt.
"Where's he hit?" queried Chuck Morgan, anxiously.
Laguerre squatted down and struck a match. None of the three paid the slightest attention to the terrific uproar in the office of the Judge.
Smash! A table skittered across the room and brought up against the wall.
Thud! Bump! Crash! A chair was resolved into its component parts. The horse lay down on his back and rolled to the accompaniment of falling books, pictures, and finally the bookcase.
Loudon suddenly regained his breath and, to the astonishment of his comrades who believed him to be seriously wounded, scrambled to his feet and plunged through the doorway into the office. Apparently the horse had gathered a friend unto himself and both animals were striving to kick their way through the wall.
Loudon felt his way across the wreckage and laid hold of a waving leg. He worked his way up that leg, and was kicked three times in the process, but at last his clawing fingers found a throat—a too fat throat. Loudon, realizing his mistake, groped purposefully for thirty seconds, and then closed his hands round another neck and exerted pressure. The tumult stilled.
"Thank you, friend," huskily breathed the Judge's voice. "Choke him some more, but don't quite strangle him."
The Judge wriggled to his feet, and Loudon choked his squirming victim almost into unconsciousness. A match crackled and flared. By its flickering light were revealed Loudon kneeling on Archer's chest, Archer himself purple in the face, the Judge, naked to the waist and panting like a mogul's air-pump, and in the background the intensely interested faces of Loudon's three friends.
Loudon eased the pressure of his fingers, and Archer breathed again. Eyes rolling in fright, the Judge's negro peered around the door-jamb. His master ordered him to fetch a lamp.
"Did the sheriff bring any deputies with him?" inquired Loudon, hopefully.
"Not a deputy," replied the Judge.
"That's tough. Well, maybe we'll find 'em later. No use chasin' the sheriff anyhow."
When the lamp arrived, Loudon introduced his friends. The Judge shook hands cordially, and recalled himself to Chuck Morgan's memory in a way to make that gentleman grin. One could not help but like Judge Allison even if he did fine one on occasion. His pink nakedness covered by a new frock coat, the Judge sat down on the overturned bookcase.
Came a knock then at the door, and the voice of the marshal requesting news of the Judge's welfare. The marshal entered and gazed about him with incurious eyes.
"I thought mebbe yuh was plugged or somethin', Judge," announced the marshal. "Need me?"
"No, Jim," replied the Judge. "A gun went off by accident, and I and my friends have been taking a little exercise. Have you see the sheriff anywhere in the vicinity?"
"I seen him leavin' the vicinity as fast as his hoss could carry him. If he keeps on a-goin' at the rate he was travellin' an' don't stop nowheres he'd ought to be in Canada inside o' two days. Some o' yore friends is outside, Judge. I'll just go tell 'em it's all right. If yuh want me later I'll be right across the street."
The marshal departed to allay popular anxiety. The Judge smiled. Archer raised himself on one elbow.
"No use feelin' for yore gun," said Loudon. "I've got it."
"Well, I'd like to know what yuh wrastled with me for, Judge," complained Archer. "You an' me's always been friends."
"Friendship ceases when any friend upsets my reading-lamp," countered the Judge. "You might have set the house in a blaze. It struck me, you know, that you might possibly leave without explaining your action. Hence my attempt at forcible restraint. I had no other reason, of course. What other reason could I have?"
Archer looked his unbelief. The Judge winked at Loudon.
"Judge," said Loudon, "in the corrals o' Cram an' Docket in Piegan City are ninety-five head o' Barred Twin Diamond hosses, all stole from the Flyin' M ranch up near Paradise Bend. Them hosses was shipped from Damson by Bill Archer here, the two Maxson boys, an' Rudd o' the 88.
"The five hosses in Archer's corral an' the one he sold you was in the stolen bunch, too. My friend, Telescope Laguerre, an' I can swear to a few of 'em, an' any expert could tell yuh the brand was altered from the Flyin' M. How about it, Archer?"
"Nothin' to say," replied Archer, defiantly.
"This is a serious charge," murmured Judge Allison. "Do you wish me to issue warrants for Archer and the others, Mr. Franklin?"
"Issue all the —— warrants yo're a mind to!" cried Archer. "I ain't talkin'!"
"Now look here," said Loudon. "Turn yore tongue loose an' it won't go so hard with yuh. We know who's behind yuh. What's the use o' yore swingin' for them? Have sense, man. There's enough evidence against yuh to lynch yuh forty times."
"Bring on yore bale o' rope," snarled Archer. "I ain't worryin' none. If yuh know who's behind me, what's the use o' askin' me anythin'?"
The contumacious Archer had the rights of the matter, and Loudon realized it.
"We'd ought to lynch him," declared Johnny Ramsay with conviction.
"Not in Marysville, young man," said the Judge. "Having, as it were, been the means of preventing Archer's escape, I can not allow him to be hung without due process of law. I shall be delighted to commit him to the calaboose. Archer, you confounded rascal, I shall attach your dance hall until I recover the price of that horse you sold me! I thought you were a friend of mine, and you make me a receiver of stolen property. The best animal I ever bought, too. Damit, sir! I shall try you separately for each horse!"
"He might mebbe escape or somethin'," dubiously suggested Chuck Morgan.
"Chuck, the individuals whom I commit do not escape," the Judge said, severely. "And in the case of Archer I shall take particular pains to see that he does not break jail. Have no doubts on that score."
He broke off and cursed Archer with wholly unjudicial fervour.
"Damit!" he continued. "If I hadn't known that the rascal wanted the horse in order to conceal evidence, I'd have sold it back to him to-night. The five Barred Twin Diamond horses in his corral are no longer there. They vanished yesterday. But the sorrel won't vanish. He'll stay right in my corral till wanted. Gentlemen, last night someone endeavoured to steal him. Luckily, I was watching and with a couple of shots I drove off the would-be thief.
"To-night Archer and the sheriff came to me and wished to buy the animal. I refused, and they were endeavouring to persuade me when you entered, Mr. Franklin. By the way, if you run across Thomas Loudon, you might tell him that the warrant issued for him has been quashed. Tell him that I hope to meet him in the not-too-distant future. Understand—in the future? I shall see that the Maxson boys are put under arrest, and a warrant issued for Rudd."
"No need of issuin' one for him," said Loudon.
"Probably not. Still, the legal formalities must be observed."
"Shore, you've got the right idea, Judge. Well, I guess we might as well be weavin' along. So long, Judge."
"So long, Mr. Franklin. So long, gentlemen. On your way out I wish you'd request the marshal to step in."
"Wat ees next?" inquired Laguerre, when the four were in the saddle.
"Somebody's got to go north an' notify Scotty," replied Loudon. "You an' I'll scamper round the Lazy River country an' see what we can dig up."
"I know just what's comin'!" exclaimed Johnny Ramsay, disgustedly. "Chuck an' me are elected to travel while you an' Telescope have all the fun. Yo're glommin' all the excitement. It ain't right."
"Don't fret none, Johnny-jump-up," grinned Loudon. "Yuh'll have all the excitement on the map when yuh come back with Scotty Mackenzie an' the Flyin' M outfit. What do yuh s'pose'll happen when we go bulgin' out to the 88 to grab Rudd? Yuh don't think there won't be a battle, do yuh?"
"There'll be a skirmish, anyway, before we get back," complained Johnny, "or I don't know you."
"I can't help that, can I? If some 88 sport tries to ventilate me an' Telescope we can't wait for you fellahs. So that's the how of it. You an' Chuck slide up to the Flyin' M, an' when yuh come back yuh'll find Telescope an' me waitin' for yuh at the Cross-in-a-box. See?"
"Oh, I see all right," grunted Chuck Morgan. "I see yo're a hawg, Tom. All yuh need is bristles. Tell yuh what, send Johnny, an' let me stay with you. Don't need two fellers to carry one little message."
"Not on yore life!" cried the indignant Johnny. "Send Chuck by himself. I don't wanna go. I never did like the climate up on the Dogsoldier nohow. It ain't healthy, an' it'll make me sick or somethin'. An' I ain't a-goin' to risk my valuable health for no man. No, sir, little Johnny Ramsay ain't goin' to."
"When yuh see Scotty," said Loudon, totally unmindful of Johnny's tirade, "tell him to bring four or five o' the boys from the Bend besides the reg'lar outfit. He'll want to leave a couple at the ranch. With us four that'll be fifteen or sixteen men."
"We're elected all right, Chuck," said Johnny, mournfully.
"An' don't get rambunctious an' ride through Farewell," pursued Loudon. "Ride round it—ride 'way round it."
"An' be sure an' wrap up our tootsies good an' warm every night," contributed Chuck Morgan.
"An' take our soothin' sirup before each meal," added Johnny Ramsay. "Lend us yore teethin' ring, Tom. I done forgot mine, an' I'm plumb shore that careless infant, Chuck, has lost his."