“It must ’a’ been that Soapy got hold of a dummy payroll, and that the gang couldn’t get in touch with the man who was to pull off the job to see if he had failed; so they shot Soapy and blew the mine safe to try and save themselves. They thought that I knew it was a dummy payroll and that I could trace ’em through the man who fixed up the dummy for Soapy; so they dynamited my office and burned half of the town of Marlin.”
Santel laughed hollowly, as if greatly amused. Leach shot a glance at Santel and his hands dropped to his sides.
“Didn’t trust me, eh?” said Santel.
“I seen you shoot Mostano today, Santel,” said Brick.
“Yeah,” Santel nodded, but did not look at Brick. “What about the frog on the holster? What did the kid mean?”
“He remembered that much,” said Brick tensely. “When his dad was shot and the stage swung off the grade, Whizzer was dumped off onto the grade. He was kinda badly hurt, but he remembers hearin’ the shot fired. The man who fired the shot wore a mask, but the kid remembers that he had a frog on his holster.”
“Leach!” Santel spat the name. “ you, I thought you was the one!”
As Santel spoke he whipped out his gun. But Leach was not caught napping, and two guns thundered almost at the same time. There was only a short space between them—too short for either of them to miss. It was all being done in split-second time.
Brick felt the burning shock of a bullet into the muscles of his left arm, which staggered him back against the bar; but his gun came up and he fired at Ike Welden, who was standing on the chair shooting at him. Leach was falling into Brick, who fended him away with his gun-hand. Santel was on his hands and knees, coughing his life away, and Silent, with Meecham clutched in a wrestling grip, came crashing down in the middle of the floor.
Ike Welden was still on his feet, trying to pull the trigger, a vacant look on his face, as he leaned against the wall. The crowd had scattered like a covey of frightened quail. Some of them were flat on the floor, several were behind the bar, and many of them had faded out through the rear exit.