The man killer took no chances, at least no more than were necessary. It was quite on the cards, as he understood the business of murder, that his foe might lie in wait for him and shoot from ambush. He did not come down the road, but by way of an alley that brought him to the rear of his shanty. Quickly and stealthily the two men dodged inside. Once in, Dutch bolted the door and pulled the window blinds. Before going to bed he moved both cots so as to put them out of range of one who might crawl up to either window and take a wild shot at the place where one of the beds had been.
Dutch was slipping out of his long army coat when there came a gentle tap—tap—tap at one of the windows. The big bulk of a man stood crouched, eyes glaring, head thrust forward, every sense alert to meet the danger which threatened. He slid out of the coat and dragged a revolver from his hip.
Again there came a slow tap—tap—tap, this time on the opposite window. With incredible swiftness Dutch whirled and fired. His gun was still smoking when the tap—tap—tap, clear and measured, sounded a second time at the first window. Straight at the sound the killer flung another shot. He rushed to the window and drew back the sack used for a curtain. There was nobody at the window either alive or dead, nor was it possible for anybody to have slipped away in that second between the sound of the tapping and the moment when Dutch had torn aside the sack.
As he stood there, frightened and bewildered, there came a sound that turned his flesh to goose-quills. Down the wind was borne a sobbing scream like the wail of a lost soul. Dutch knew that no human voice had uttered that cry. It rose and fell, died down, broke out again, weird and unearthly as a banshee’s whimper.
Tiny beads of perspiration stood out on the man’s forehead. His hands shook. He had no thought but that his call from the world beyond had come, and with the blood of a dozen men on his atrophied conscience he yielded to the rising tide of terror in him.
The slow tap—tap—tap sounded a third time on the window.
The gun-fighter trembled. “Goddlemighty, Bill, I—I done got my call.”
Buckley felt none too comfortable himself, but he managed a laugh. “Sho, Sam! Nothin’ but the wind.”
“The wind can’t tap on the window for me, can it? It can’t——”
The sentence died out, for a second time the ululation of that sobbing shriek came faintly.