The Night Horseman

THE BUZZARD

Most animals have their human counterparts, and in that room where Jerry Strann had fallen a whimsical observer might have termed Jerry, with his tawny head, the lion, and O’Brien behind the bar, a shaggy bear, and the deputy marshal a wolverine, fat but dangerous, and here stood a man as ugly and hardened as a desert cayuse, and there was Dan Barry, sleek and supple as a panther; but among the rest this whimsical observer must have noticed a fellow of prodigious height and negligible breadth, a structure of sinews and bones that promised to rattle in the wind, a long, narrow head, a nose like a beak, tiny eyes set close together and shining like polished buttons, and a vast Adam’s apple that rolled up and down the scraggy throat.  He might have done for the spirit of Famine in an old play; but every dweller of the mountain-desert would have found an apter expression by calling him the buzzard of the scene.  Through his prodigious ugliness he was known far and wide as “Haw-Haw” Langley; for on occasion Langley laughed, and his laughter was an indescribable sound that lay somewhere between the braying of a mule and the cawing of a crow.  But Haw-Haw Langley was usually silent, and he would sit for hours without words, twisting his head and making little pecking motions as his eyes fastened on face after face.  All the bitterness of the mountain-desert was in Haw-Haw Langley; if his body looked like a buzzard, his soul was the soul of the vulture itself, and therefore he had followed the courses of Jerry Strann up and down the range.  He stuffed his gorge with the fragments of his leader’s food; he fed his soul with the dangers which Jerry Strann met and conquered.

In the barroom Haw-Haw Langley had stood turning his sharp little eyes from Jerry Strann to Dan Barry, and from Dan Barry back to Strann; and when the shot was fired something like a grin twisted his thin lips; and when the spot of red glowed on the breast of the staggering man, the eyes of Haw-Haw blazed as if with the reflection of a devouring fire.  Afterwards he lingered for a few minutes making no effort to aid the fallen man, but when he had satisfied himself with the extent of the injury, and when he had noted the froth of bloody bubbles which stained the lips of Strann, Haw-Haw Langley turned and stalked from the room.  His eyes were points of light and his soul was crammed to repletion with ill-tidings.

At the hitching rack he stepped into the saddle of a diminutive horse, whirled it into the street with a staggering jerk of the reins, and buried the spurs deep in the cow-pony’s flanks.  The poor brute snorted and flirted its heels in the air, but Langley wrapped his long legs around the barrel of his mount and goaded it again.

His smile, which began with the crack of Barry’s gun in O’Brien’s place, did not die out until he was many a mile away, headed far up through the mountains; but as he put peak after peak behind him and as the white light of the day diminished and puffs of blue shadow drowned the valleys, the grin disappeared from Haw-Haw’s face.  He became keenly intent on his course until, having reached the very summit of a tall hill, he came to a halt and peered down before him.

It was nearly dusk by this time and the eyes of an ordinary man could not distinguish a tree from a rock at any great distance; but it seemed that Haw-Haw was gifted with eyes extraordinary—­the buzzard at the top of its sky-towering circles does not see the brown carcass far below with more certainty than Haw-Haw sensed his direction.  He waited only a few seconds before he rolled the rowel once more along the scored flanks of his mustang and then plunged down the slope at a reckless gallop.

His destination was a hut, or rather a lean-to, that pressed against the side of the mountain, a crazy structure with a single length of stove pipe leaning awry from the roof.  And at the door of this house Haw-Haw Langley drew rein and stepped to the ground.  The interior of the hut was dark, but Haw-Haw stole with the caution of a wild Indian to the entrance and reconnoitered the interior, probing every shadowy corner with his glittering eyes.  For several long moments he continued this examination, and even when he was satisfied that there was no one in the place he did not enter, but moved back several paces from the door and swept the sides of the mountains with an uneasy eye.  He made out, a short distance from the door, a picketed horse which now reared up its head from the miserable scattering of grass on which it fed and stared at the stranger.  The animal must have bulked at least twice as large as the mount which had brought Langley to the mountain-side.  And it was muscled even out of proportion to its bulk.  The head was so tremendously broad that it gave an almost square appearance, the neck, short and thick, the forelegs disproportionately small but very sturdy; and the whole animal was built on a slope towards the hind quarters which seemed to equal in massiveness all the rest of the body.  One would have said that the horse was a freak meant by nature for the climbing of hills.  And to glance at it no man could suppose that those ponderous limbs might be moved to a gallop.  However, Haw-Haw Langley well knew the powers of the ugly beast, and he even made a detour and walked about the horse to view it more closely.

Now he again surveyed the darkening landscape and then turned once more to the house.  This time he entered with the boldness of a possessor approaching his hearth.  He lighted a match and with this ignited a lantern hanging from the wall to the right of the door.  The furnishings of the dwelling were primitive beyond compare.  There was no sign of a chair; a huddle of blankets on the bare boards of the floor made the bed; a saddle hung by one stirrup on one side and on the other side leaned the skins of bob-cats, lynx, and coyotes on their stretching and drying boards.  Haw-Haw took down the lantern and examined the pelts.  The animals had been skinned with the utmost dexterity.  As far as he could see the hides had not been marred in a single place by slips of the knife, nor were there any blood stains to attest hurried work, or careless shooting in the first place.  The inner surfaces shone with the pure white of old parchment But Haw-Haw gave his chief attention to the legs and the heads of the skins, for these were the places where carelessness or stupidity with the knife were sure to show; but the work was perfect in every respect.  Until even the critical Haw-Haw Langley was forced to step back and shake his head in admiration.  He continued his survey of the room.

In one corner stood a rifle and a shot-gun; in another was a pile of provisions—­bacon, flour, salt, meal, and little else.  Spices and condiments were apparently unknown to this hermit; nor was there even the inevitable coffee, nor any of the molasses or other sweets which the tongue of the desert-mountainer cannot resist.  Flour, meat, and water, it seemed, made up the entire fare of the trapper.  For cookery there was an unboarded space in the very centre of the floor with a number of rocks grouped around in the hole and blackened with soot.  The smoke must rise, therefore, and escape through the small hole in the centre of the roof.  The length of stove-pipe which showed on the roof must have been simply the inhabitant’s idea of giving the last delicate touch of civilisation; it was like a tassel to the cap of the Turk.

As Haw-Haw’s observations reached this point his sharp ear caught the faint whinny of the big horse outside.  He started like one caught in a guilty act, and sprang to the lantern.  However, with his hands upon it he thought better of it, and he placed the light against the wall; then he turned to the entrance and looked anxiously up the hillside.

What he saw was a form grotesque beyond belief.  It seemed to be some gigantic wild beast—­mountain lion or great bear, though of a size beyond credence—­which slowly sprawled down the slope walking erect upon its hind feet with its forelegs stretched out horizontal, as if it were warning all who might behold it away.  Haw-Haw grew pale and involuntarily reached for his gun as he first beheld this apparition, but instantly he saw the truth.  It was a man who carried a burden down the mountain-side.  The burden was the carcass of a bear; the man had drawn the forelegs over his shoulders—­his jutting elbows making what had seemed the outstretched arms—­and above the head of the burden-bearer rose the great head of the bear.  As the man came closer the animal’s head flopped to one side and a red tongue lolled from its mouth.  Haw-Haw Langley moved back step by step through the cabin until his shoulders struck the opposite wall, and at the same time Mac Strann entered the room.  He had no ear for his visitor’s hail, but cast his burden to the floor.  It dropped with a shock that shook the house from the rattling stove-pipe to the crackling boards.  For a moment Mac Strann regarded his prey.  Then he stooped and drew open the great jaws.  The mouth within was not so red as the bloody hands of Mac Strann; and the big, white fangs, for some reason, did not seem terrible in comparison with the hunter.  Having completed his survey he turned slowly upon Haw-Haw Langley and lowered his eyebrows to stare.

So doing, the light for the first time struck full upon his face.  Haw-Haw Langley bit his thin lips and his eyes widened almost to the normal.

For the ugliness of Mac Strann was that most terrible species of ugliness—­not disfigured features but a discord which pervaded the man and came from within him—­like a sound.  Feature by feature his face was not ugly.  The mouth was very large, to be sure, and the jaw too heavily square, and the nose needed somewhat greater length and less width for real comeliness.  The eyes were truly fine, being very large and black, though when Mac Strann lowered his bush of brows his eyes were practically reduced to gleams of light in the consequent shadow.  There was a sharp angle in his forehead, the lines of it meeting in the centre and shelving up and down.  One felt, unpleasantly, that there were heavy muscles overlaying that forehead.  One felt that to the touch it would be a pad of flesh, and it gave to Mac Strann, more than any other feature, a peculiar impression of resistless physical power.

In the catalogue of his features, indeed, there was nothing severely objectionable; but out of it came a feeling of too much strength! A glance at his body reinsured the first thought.  It was not normal.  His shirt bulged tightly at the shoulders with muscles.  He was not tall—­inches shorter than his brother Jerry, for instance—­but the bulk of his body was incredible.  His torso was a veritable barrel that bulged out both in the chest and the back.  And even the tremendous thighs of Mac Strann were perceptibly bowed out by the weight which they had to carry.  And there was about his management of his arms a peculiar awkwardness which only the very strongest of men exhibit—­as if they were burdened by the weight of their mere dangling hands.

This giant, having placed his eyes in shadow, peered for a long moment at Haw-Haw Langley, but very soon his glance began to waver.  It flashed towards the wall—­it came back and rested upon Langley again.  He was like a dog, restless under a steady stare.  And as Haw-Haw Langley noted this a glitter of joy came in his beady eyes.

“You’re Jerry’s man,” said Mac Strann at length.

There was about his voice the same fleshy quality that was in his face; it came literally from his stomach, and it made a peculiar rustling sound such as comes after one has eaten sticky sweet things.  People could listen to the voice of Mac Strann and forget that he was speaking words.  The articulation ran together in a sort of glutinous mass.

“I’m a friend of Jerry’s,” said the other.  “I’m Langley.”

The big man stretched out his hand.  The hair grew black, down to the knuckles; the blood of the bear still streaked it; it was large enough to be an organism with independent life.  But when Langley, with some misgiving, trusted his own bony fingers within that grasp, in was only as if something fleshy, soft, and bloodless had closed over them.  When his hand was released he rubbed it covertly against his trowser leg—­to remove dirt—­restore the circulation.  He did not know why.

“Who’s bothering Jerry?” asked Mac Strann.  “And where is he?”

He went to the wall without waiting for an answer and took down the saddle.  Now the cowpuncher’s saddle is a heavy mass of leather and steel, and the saddle of Mac Strann was far larger than the ordinary.  Yet he took down the saddle as one might remove a card from a rack.  Haw-Haw Langley moved towards the door, to give himself a free space for exit.

“Jerry’s hurt,” he said, and he watched.

There was a ripple of pain on the face of Mac Strann.

“Hoss kicked him—­fall on him?” he asked.

“It weren’t a hoss.”

“Huh?  A cow?”

“It weren’t no cow.  It weren’t no animal.”

Mac Strann faced full upon Langley.  When he spoke it seemed as if it were difficult for him to manage his lips.  They lifted an appreciable space before there was any sound.

“What was it?”

“A man.”

Langley edged back towards the door.

“What with?”

“A gun.”

And Langley saw the danger that was coming even before Mac Strann moved.  He gave a shrill yelp of terror and whirled and sprang for the open.  But Mac Strann sprang after him and reached.  His whole body seemed to stretch like an elastic thing, and his arm grew longer.  The hand fastened on the back of Langley, plucked him up, and jammed him against the wall.  Haw-Haw crumpled to the floor.

He gasped:  “It weren’t me, Mac.  For Gawd’s sake, it weren’t me!”

His face was a study.  There was abject terror in it, and yet there was also a sort of grisly joy, and his eyes feasted on the silent agony of Mac Strann.

“Where?” asked Mac Strann.

“Mac,” pleaded the vulture who cringed on the floor, “gimme your word you ain’t goin’ to hold it agin me.”

“Tell me,” said the other, and he framed the face of the vulture between his large hands.  If he pressed the heels of those hands together bones would snap, and Haw-Haw Langley knew it.  And yet nothing but a wild delight could have set that glitter in his little eyes, just as nothing but a palsy of terror could have set his limbs twitching so.

“Who shot him from behind?” demanded the giant.

“It wasn’t from behind,” croaked the bearer of ill-tidings.  “It was from the front.”

“While he wasn’t looking?”

“No.  He was beat to the draw.”

“You’re lyin’ to me,” said Mac Strann slowly.

“So help me God!” cried Langley.

“Who done it?”

“A little feller.  He ain’t half as big as me.  He’s got a voice like Kitty Jackson, the school-marm; and he’s got eyes like a starved pup.  It was him that done it.”

The eyes of Mac Strann grew vaguely meditative.

“Nope,” he mused, in answer to his own thoughts, “I won’t use no rope.  I’ll use my hands.  Where’d the bullet land?”

A fresh agony of trembling shook Langley, and a fresh sparkle came in his glance.

“Betwixt his ribs, Mac.  And right on through.  And it come out his back!”

But there was not an answering tremor in Mac Strann.  He let his hands fall away from the face of the vulture and he caught up the saddle.  Langley straightened himself.  He peered anxiously at Strann, as if he feared to miss something.

“I dunno whether he’s livin’ right now, or not,” suggested Haw-Haw.

But Mac Strann was already striding through the door.

* * * * *

Sweat was pouring from the lather-flecked bodies of their horses when they drew rein, at last, at the goal of their long, fierce ride; and Haw-Haw slunk behind the broad form of Mac Strann when the latter strode into the hotel.  Then the two started for the room in which, they were told, lay Jerry Strann.

“There it is,” whispered Haw-Haw, as they reached the head of the stairs.  “The door’s open.  If he was dead the door would be closed, most like.”

They stood in the hall and looked in upon a strange picture, for flat in the bed lay Jerry Strann, his face very white and oddly thin, and over him leaned the man who had shot him down.

They heard Dan Barry’s soft, gentle voice query:  “How you feelin’ now, partner?”

He leaned close beside the other, his fingers upon the wrist of Jerry.

“A pile better,” muttered Jerry Strann.  “Seems like I got more’n a fightin’ chance to pull through now.”

“Jest you keep lyin’ here quiet,” advised Dan Barry, “and don’t stir around none.  Don’t start no worryin’.  You’re goin’ to live’s long as you don’t lose no more blood.  Keep your thoughts quiet.  They ain’t no cause for you to do nothin’ but jest keep your eyes closed, and breathe, and think of yaller sunshine, and green grass in the spring, and the wind lazyin’ the clouds along across the sky.  That’s all you got to think about.  Jest keep quiet, partner.”

“It’s easy to do it now you’re with me.  Seems like they’s a pile of strength runnin’ into me from the tips of your fingers, my frien’.  And—­I was some fool to start that fight with you, Barry.”

“Jest forget all that,” murmured the other.  “And keep your voice down.  I’ve forgot it; you forget it.  It ain’t never happened.”

“What’s it mean?” frowned Mac Strann, whispering to Haw-Haw.

The eyes of the latter glittered like beads.

“That’s him that shot Jerry,” said Haw-Haw.  “Him!”

“Hell!” snarled Mac Strann, and went through the door.

At the first sound of his heavy footfall, the head of Barry raised and turned in a light, swift movement.  The next instant he was on his feet.  A moment before his face had been as gentle as that of a mother leaning over a sick child; but one glimpse of the threat in the contorted brows of Mac Strann set a gleam in his own eyes, an answer as distinct as the click of metal against metal.  Not a word had been said, but Jerry, who had lain with his eyes closed, seemed to sense a change in the atmosphere of peace which had enwrapped him the moment before.  His eyes flashed open; and he saw his burly brother.

But Mac Strann had no eye for any saving Dan Barry.

“Are you the creepin’, sneakin’ snake that done—­this?”

“You got me figured right,” answered Dan coldly.

“Then, by God------” began the roaring voice of Mac, but Jerry Strann
stirred wildly on the bed.

“Mac!” he called, “Mac!” His voice went suddenly horribly thick, a bubbling, liquid sound.  “For God’s sake, Mac!”

He had reared himself up on one elbow, his arm stretched out to his brother.  And a foam of crimson stood on his lips.

“Mac, don’t pull no gun!  It was me that was in wrong!”

And then he fell back in the bed, and into the arms of Mac, who was beside him, moaning:  “Buck up, Jerry.  Talk to me, boy!”

“Mac, you’ve finished the job,” came the husky whisper.

Mac Strann raised his head, and his terrible eyes fixed upon Dan Barry.  And there was no pity in the face of the other.  The first threat had wiped every vestige of human tenderness out of his eyes, and now, with something like a sneer on his lips, and with a glimmer of yellow light in his eyes, he was backing towards the door, and noiselessly as a shadow he slipped out and was gone.