The Max Brand Megapack. Max Brand
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obeyed, sweating with shame. He felt a hand pat his pockets lightly in search for a hidden weapon, and then, with his head slightly turned, he sensed the fact that Dan was dropping his revolver into its holster. He whirled and drove his clenched fist straight at Dan’s face.
What happened then he would never forget to the end of his life. Calder’s weapon still hung in Dan’s right hand, but the latter made no effort to use it. He dropped the gun, and as Calder’s right arm shot out, it was caught at the wrist, and jerked down with a force that jarred his whole body.
“Down, Bart!” shouted Dan. The great wolf checked in the midst of his leap and dropped, whining with eagerness, at Calder’s feet. At the same time the marshal’s left hand was seized and whipped across his body. He wrenched away with all his force. He might as well have struggled with steel manacles. He was helpless, staring into eyes which now glinted with a yellow light that sent a cold wave tingling through his blood.
The yellow gleam died; his hands were loosed; but he made no move to spring at Dan’s throat. Chill horror had taken the place of his shame, and the wolf-dog still whined at his feet with lips grinned back from the long white teeth.
“Who in the name of God are you?” he gasped, and even as he spoke the truth came to him—the whistling—the panther-like speed of hand—“Whistling Dan Barry.”
The other frowned.
“If you didn’t know my name why were you trailin’ me?”
“I wasn’t after you,” said Calder.
“You was crawlin’ along like that jest for fun? Friend, I figger to know you. You been sent out by the tall man to lay for me.”
“What tall man?” asked Calder, his wits groping.
“The one that swung the chair in Morgan’s place,” said Dan. “Now you’re goin’ to take me to your camp. I got something to say to him.”
“By the Lord!” cried the marshal, “you’re trailing Silent.”
Dan watched him narrowly. It was hard to accuse those keen black eyes of deceit.
“I’m trailin’ the man who sent you out after me,” he asserted with a little less assurance.
Calder tore open the front of his shirt and pushed back one side of it. Pinned there next to his skin was his marshal’s badge.
He said: “My name’s Tex Calder.”
It was a word to conjure with up and down the vast expanse of the mountain-desert. Dan smiled, and the change of expression made him seem ten years younger.
“Git down, Bart. Stand behind me!” The dog obeyed sullenly. “I’ve heard a pile of men talk about you, Tex Calder.” Their hands and their eyes met. There was a mutual respect in the glances. “An’ I’m a pile sorry for this.”
He picked up the gun from the ground and extended it butt first to the marshal, who restored it slowly to the holster. It was the first time it had ever been forced from his grasp.
“Who was it you talked about a while ago?” asked Dan.
“Jim Silent.”
Dan instinctively dropped his hand back to his revolver.
“The tall man?”
“The one you fought with in Morgan’s place.”
The unpleasant gleam returned to Dan’s eyes.
“I thought there was only one reason why he should die, but now I see there’s a heap of ’em.”
Calder was all business.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
“About a day.”
“Have you seen anything of Silent here among the willows?”
“No.”
“Do you think he’s still here?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I dunno. I’ll stay here till I find him among the trees or he breaks away into the open.”
“How’ll you know when he leaves the willows?”
Whistling Dan was puzzled.
“I dunno,” he answered. “Somethin’ will tell me when he gets far away from me—he an’ his men.”
“It’s an inner sense, eh? Like the smell of the bloodhound?” said Calder, but his eyes were strangely serious.
“This day’s about done,” he went on. “Have you any objections to me camping with you here?”
Not a cowpuncher within five hundred miles but would be glad of such redoubted company. They went back to Calder’s horse.
“We can start for my clearing,” said Dan. “Bart’ll bring the hoss. Fetch him in.”
The wolf took the dangling bridle reins and led on the cowpony. Calder observed his performance with starting eyes, but he was averse to asking questions. In a few moments they came out on a small open space. The ground was covered with a quantity of dried bunch grass which a glorious black stallion was cropping. Now he tossed up his head so that some of his long mane fell forward between his ears and at sight of Calder his ears dropped back and his eyes blazed, but when Dan stepped from the willows the ears came forward again with a whinny of greeting. Calder watched the beautiful animal with all the enthusiasm of an expert horseman. Satan was untethered; the saddle and bridle lay in a corner of the clearing; evidently the horse was a pet and would not leave its master. He spoke gently and stepped forward to caress the velvet shining neck, but Satan snorted and started away, trembling with excitement.
“How can you keep such a wild fellow as this without hobbling him?” asked Calder.
“He ain’t wild,” said Dan.
“Why, he won’t let me put a hand on him.”
“Yes, he will. Steady, Satan!”
The stallion stood motionless with the veritable fires of hell in his eyes as Calder approached. The latter stopped.
“Not for me,” he said. “I’d rather rub the moustache of the lion in the zoo than touch that black devil!”
Bart at that moment led in the cowpony and Calder started to remove the saddle. He had scarcely done so and hobbled his horse when he was startled by a tremendous snarling and snorting. He turned to see the stallion plunging hither and thither, striking with his fore-hooves, while around him, darting in and out under the driving feet, sprang the great black wolf, his teeth clashing like steel on steel. In another moment they might sink in the throat of the horse! Calder, with an exclamation of horror, whipped out his revolver, but checked himself at the very instant of firing. The master of the two animals stood with arms folded, actually smiling upon the fight!
“For God’s sake!” cried the marshal. “Shoot the damned wolf, man, or he’ll have your horse by the throat!”
“Leave ’em be,” said Dan, without turning his head. “Satan an’ Black Bart ain’t got any other dogs an’ hosses to run around with. They’s jest playing a little by way of exercise.”
Calder stood agape before what seemed the incarnate fury of the pair. Then he noticed that those snapping fangs, however close they came, always missed the flesh of the stallion, and the driving hoofs never actually endangered the leaping wolf.
“Stop ’em!” he cried at last. “It makes me nervous to watch that sort of play. It isn’t natural!”
“All right,” said Dan. “Stop it, boys.”
He had not raised his voice, but they ceased their wild gambols instantly, the stallion, with head thrown high and arched tail and heaving sides, while the wolf, with lolling