'You should of thunk about that when you busted the law,' opined Ormond. 'Gimme yore gun and come along peaceable.'
A dozen men had their hands on their guns, but it warn't that which made me give in. Pap had always told me not to resist no officer of the law. It was kind of instinctive for me to hand over my gun to this feller with the star on his shirt. Somehow it didn't seem right, but I was kind of bewildered and my thoughts was addled. I ain't one of these fast thinking sharps. So I jest done what pap always told me to do.
Ormond taken me down the street a-ways, with a whole bunch of men follering us, and stopped at a log building with barred winders which was next to a board shack. A man come out of this shack with a big bunch of keys, and Ormond said he was the jailer. So they put me in the log jail and Ormond went off with everybody but the jailer, who sot down on the step outside his shack and rolled hisself a cigaret.
They warn't no light in the jail, but I found the bunk and tried to lay down on it, but it warn't built for a man six and a half foot tall. I sot down on it and at last realized what a infernal mess I was in. Here I ought to be hunting Black Whiskers and getting the gold to take back to Bear Creek and save the lives of a swarm of my kin- folks, but instead of that I was in jail, and no way of getting out without killing a officer of the law. With daybreak Joel and Erath would be at each others' throats, and Uncle Jeppard would be gunning for both of 'em. It was too much to hope that the other relatives would let them three fight it out amongst theirselves. I never seen sech a clan for buttin' into each others' business. The guns would be talking all up and down Bear Creek, and the population would be decreasing with every volley. I thunk about it till I got dizzy and then the jailer stuck his head up to the winder and said if I'd give him five dollars he'd go get me something to eat.
I had five dollars I won in a poker game a few days before and I give it to him, and he went off and was gone quite a spell, and at last he come back and give me a ham sandwich. I ast him was that all he could get for five dollars, and he said grub was awful high in Wampum. I et the sandwich with one bite, and he said if I'd give him some more money he'd get me another sandwich. But I didn't have no more and told him so.
'What!' he said, breathing licker fumes in my face through the winder bars. 'No money? And you expect us to feed you for nothin'?' So he cussed me, and went off, and purty soon the sheriff come and looked in at me, and said: 'What's this I hear about you not havin' no money?'
'I ain't got none left,' I said, and he cussed something fierce.
'How you expeck to pay yore fine?' he demanded. 'You think you can lay up in our jail and eat us out of house and home? What kind of a critter are you, anyway?'
Just then the jailer chipped in and said somebody told him I had a hoss down at the livery stable.
'Good,' said the sheriff. 'We'll sell his hoss for his fine.'
'You won't neither,' I says, beginning to get mad. 'You try to sell Cap'n Kidd, and I'll forgit what pap told me about law-officers, and take you plumb apart.'
I riz up and glared at him through the winder, and he fell back and put his hand on his gun. But jest about that time I seen a man going into the Golden Eagle which was in easy sight of the jail, and lit up so the light streamed out into the street. I give a yell that made Ormond jump about a foot. It was Black Whiskers!
'Arrest that man, Sheriff!' I hollered. 'He's a thief!'
Ormond whirled and looked, and then he said: 'Air you plumb crazy? That's Wolf Ashley, my deperty.'
'I don't give a dern,' I said. 'He stole a poke of gold from my Uncle Jeppard Grimes up in the Humbolts, and I've trailed him clean from Bear Creek. Do yore duty and arrest him.'
'You shet up!' roared Ormond. 'You cain't tell me my business! I ain't goin' to arrest my best gunman--my star deperty, I mean. What you mean tryin' to start trouble this way? One more yap outa you and I'll throwa chunk of lead through you.'
And he turned around and stalked off muttering: 'Poke of gold, huh? Holdin' out on me, is he? I'll see about that!'
'I sot down and held my head in bewilderment. What kind of a sheriff was this which wouldn't arrest a derned thief? My thoughts run in circles till my wits was addled. The jailer had gone off and I wondered if he had went to sell Cap'n Kidd. I wondered what was going on back on Bear Creek, and I shivered to think what would bust loose at daybreak. And here I was in jail, with them fellers fixing to sell my hoss, whilst that dern thief swaggered around at large. I looked helplessly out a the winder.
It was getting late, but the Golden Eagle was going full blast. I could hear the music blaring away, and the fellers yipping and shooting their pistols in the air, and their boot heels stomping on the board walk. I felt like busting down and bawling, and then I begun to get mad. I get mad slow, generally, and before I was plumb mad, I heard a noise at the winder.
I seen a pale face staring in at me, and a couple of small white hands on the bars.
'Mister!' a voice whispered. 'Oh, Mister!'
I stepped over and looked out and it was the kid gal Betty.
'What you doin' here, gal?' I ast.
'Doc Richards said you was in Wampum,' she whispered. 'He said he was afraid Ormond would do for you because you helped us, so I slipped away on his hoss and rode here as hard as I could. Jim was out tryin' to round up the boys for a last stand, and Aunt Rachel and the other women was busy with Uncle Joab. They wasn't nobody but me to come, but I had to! You saved Uncle Joab, and I don't care if Jim does say yo're a outlaw because yo're a friend of Wolf Ashley. Oh, I wish't I wasn't jest a gal! I wisht I could shoot a gun, so's I could kill Bill Ormond!'
'That ain't no way for a gal to talk,' I says. 'Leave the killin' to the men. But I appreciates you goin' to all this trouble. I got some kid sisters myself--in fact I got seven or eight, as near as I remember. Don't you worry none about me. Lots of men gits throwed in jail.'
'But that ain't it!' she wept, wringing her hands. 'I listened outside the winder of the back room in the Golden Eagle and heard Ormond and Ashley talkin' about you. I dunno what you wanted with Ashley when you ast Jim about him, but he ain't yo're friend. Ormond accused him of stealin' a poke of gold and holdin' out on him, and Ashley said it was a lie. Then Ormond said you told him about it, and he said he'd give Ashley till midnight to perjuice that gold, and if he didn't Wampum would be too small for both of 'em.'
'Then he went out to the bar, and I heered Ashley talkin' to a pal of his'n, and Ashley said he'd have to raise some gold somehow, or Ormond would have him killed, but that he was goin' to fix you, Mister, for lyin' about him. Mister, Ashley and his bunch air over in the back of the Golden Eagle right now plottin' to bust into jail before daylight and hang you!'
'Aw,' I says, 'the sheriff wouldn't let 'em do that.'
'But Ormond ain't the sheriff!' she cried. 'Him and his gunmen come into Wampum and killed all the people that tried to oppose him, or run 'em up into the hills. They got us penned up there like rats, nigh starvin' and afeared to come to town. Uncle Joab come into Wampum this mornin' to git some salt, and you seen what they done to him. He's the real sheriff. Ormond is jest a bloody outlaw. Him and his gang is usin' Wampum for a hang- out whilst they rob and steal and kill all over the country.'
'Then that's what yore friend Jim meant,' I said slowly. 'And me, like a dumb damn' fool, I thought him and Joab and the rest of you-all was jest outlaws, like that fake deperty said.'
'Ormond took Uncle Joab's badge and called hisself the sheriff to fool strangers,' she whimpered. 'What honest people is left in Wampum air afeared to say anything. Him and his gunmen air rulin' this whole part of the country. Uncle Joab sent a man east to git us some help in the settlements on Buffalo River, but none never come, and from what I overheard tonight, I believe Wolf Ashley follered him and killed him over east of the Humbolts somewheres. What air we goin' to do?' she sobbed.
'Git on Doc Richards' hoss and ride for Grizzly Mountain,' I said. 'When you git there, tell the Doc to light a shuck for Wampum, because there's goin' to be plenty of work for him time he gits here.'
'But what about you?' she cried. 'I cain't go off and leave you to git hanged!'
'Don't worry about me, gal,' I said. 'I'm Breckinridge Elkins of the Humbolt Mountains, and I'm preparin' for to shake my mane! Hustle!'
I reckon something about me convinced her, because she glided away into the shadders, whimpering, and presently I heard the clack of hoss' hoofs dwindling in the distance. I then riz and laid hold of the winder bars and tore' em out by the roots. Then I sunk my fingers into the sill log and tore it out, and three or four more along with it, and the wall give way and the roof fell down on me, but I shaken aside the rooins and heaved up out of the wreckage like a b'ar out of a deadfall.
About this time the jailer come running up, and when he seen what I had did he was so surprised he forgot
