the crowd to get Kilby’s unconscious form off the street, then followed Lance down Laredo Street in the direction of the railroad station.
“Dammit!” Lance growled when Oscar had caught up. “There wasn’t any other way out of it, but I do hate to hit a hombre that’s been drinking heavy.”
“Mebbe so,” Oscar said judiciously, “but they go out quicker in that condition. Now if you’d just get a mite more snap into your wrist as you hit——”
“Let’s forget it,” Lance cut in.
“You’re upset.” Oscar thrust a paper sack toward Lance. “Here, have a lemon drop. It ’ll soothe your nerves.”
Without realizing what he was doing, Lance thrust a lemon drop into his mouth.
“Ah, another convert,” Oscar chuckled. “You’ll be an addict in no time.”
Lance started to smile, then laughed. “Like I say, I hate to hit a drunk, but I was thinking about something else. It seemed to make Kilby madder ’n ever when I mentioned his new overalls. Danged if I understand why. I was speaking as friendly as possible.”
“Drunks are sensitive on queer points sometimes,” Oscar drawled. “I’ve known ’em to fight at the drop of the hat at the mention of a new one.
“New what?” Lance asked absent-mindedly.
“Hat. Don’t you know what we’re talking about?”
“I was thinking about overalls.”
“I certainly pick intelligent company this mornin’,” Oscar commented. “One talks about spiny plant life and t’other about everyday clothing. Forget it. Here’s the depot.”
They had reached the T.N. & A.S. railroad tracks that paralleled Main Street a block back. Beyond the tracks were scattered a line of Mexican adobe houses, strung along a rather crooked roadway. Between the tracks and the single line of buildings fronting Main were heaps of old rubbish, tin cans, littered papers. Oscar led the way toward the railroad station, a small frame building, painted red, with the T.N. & A.S. sign erected on its roof. The station stood about five feet above the earth on a platform constructed of heavy planks.
Oscar led the way up the short flight of steps to the platform. From inside the station came the clattering taps of a telegraphic instrument. Abruptly the sound ceased, and a fuzzy little old man appeared in the doorway.
“No, Oscar Perkins, I don’t want no lemon drops,” he stated in a cantankerous voice before Oscar had had an opportunity to say a word. He wore faded overalls with bib attached, and on his scanty gray hair was a stiff-peaked cap bearing the letters: “T.N. & A.S.R.R.” Spectacles rested on his sharp nose.
“Ain’t asked you to have one,” Oscar stated calmly. “Johnny Quinn, shake hands with my friend, Lance Tolliver. You know”—to Lance—“Johnny just about runs the T.N. and A.S. He’s the combination station agent, freight agent, telegraph operator, swamper, train dispatcher——”
“There’s more truth ’n poetry in them remarks,” Johnny Quinn squeaked. He gave Lance a limp hand, then turned back to Oscar. “What ye want?”
“Don’t want nothing,” Oscar said quietly. “Lance is new to town, and I was just showing him the sights. We didn’t want to overlook your depot.”
“I can ’preciate thet.” Johnny Quinn nodded. He seemed more friendly now. “Ye’d be surprised now to l’arn just how much freight was put off at this little depot. By the way, Oscar, ye didn’t catch them thieves whut took my bills, did ye?”
“Sheriff Lockwood is running down a hot clue on that right now,” Oscar said without batting an eye.
Lance said, “Oscar was saying you found your window open yesterday morning and certain of your papers missing.”
“Valyble papers they was, Mister Tolliver. I been a-maintainin’ right along we should have a night man on duty in the depot, but them brass hats back East won’t pay me no ’tention. Someday I’ll up and quit ’em, then they’ll see whut’s whut! And we should have better law enforcement in this town, too, whut with hoodlums spillin’ cre’sote all over my platform—right after I’d mopped the office, too—and it got tracked inside.”
“Where was the creosote spilled?” Lance asked.
Old Quinn led the way to a place near the edge of the platform where a dark brownish-black stain had seeped into the heavy planks. “Lucky they wa’n’t much cre’sote in thet bucket. It ’d made a fine mess! I’m a-keepin’ thet bucket and next time when them section hands come back and ask for it I aim to give ’em Hail Columbia! Bein’ wasteful with company property is bad enough, but—and another thing”—Johnny Quinn was warming to his subject now—“if them hoodlums whut tipped over the cre’sote come back a-whinin’ for their cold chisel I ain’t a-goin’ to give it to ’em——”
“Was a cold chisel left here?” Lance asked.
Old Johnny nodded indignantly. “It’s my opeenion,” he said confidentially, “thet they figgered to pry open some of the boxes of freight and steal some-thin’. Yes sirree! But I reckon nothin’ was left for ’em. Folks usually come here and collect whut freight’s due, and I ain’t had no complaints ner an inquiry ’bout anythin’ that didn’t come when it should.”
“You mean,” Lance asked, “that folks just come and collect their freight when it arrives without signing for it?”
“Sartain, I know everybody here. I bring ’em the bills at the end of the month, and they sign ’em then. Only, this time I’ll be minus them bills thet was stole.”
“Can’t you check up and get duplicate bills?” Lance asked.
Quinn nodded. “It ’ll take a mite of time, though. I figure to get at thet right soon.”
“I take it,” Lance said, “that the same folks get freight shipped in right along.”
“Same folks,” Johnny said. “Cases of liquor for the saloons, canned goods for the general stores, small boxes for the barber shops and so on. Folks jest come down and pick up their stuff when it’s put off’n the train. Anything unusual is put off, I notice it, ye betcha!” He paused, then his mouth sagged a trifle. “Come to think on it,” he said slowly, “there was one box I never noticed before. From a company strange to me. Now I wonder who got thet?” He removed his cap and scratched his scanty hair in perplexity. “Shucks! Reckon it don’t make no difference. Whoever it b’longed to picked ’er up, or I’d had a complaint. Thet’s the trouble, with my bills missin’——Whut’d ye find, Mister Tolliver?”
Lance had suddenly stooped and retrieved from between two planks, clogged with dirt, a small pine splinter. There were two or three other splinters near by. Lance said, “Only this,” and held up the splinter to the old man’s view, after which he calmly commenced picking his teeth with it.
“Oh,” Johnny grunted, “I thought ye’d found somethin’ valyble.”
Lance laughed. “It might be to some people. You were talking about a box of freight that looked strange to you, Mr Quinn. What kind of a box was it?”
“Jest an ordinary pine box,” Quinn sniffed, “like freight is usual shipped in. Whut did ye expect?”
“I mean,” Lance said easily, “how big was it?”
“Oh, I dunno.” Quinn was vague in his ideas. “ ’Bout so big, I reckon.” With his skinny arms he mea sured the size of the missing box in the air. Lance judged the box to have been approximately one by one by two feet in size.
“Pretty heavy?” Lance asked next.
“Not turrible,” Quinn said, frowning. “I just remember puttin’ it on my truck with some other boxes and wheelin’ ’em over to stack ag’in’ the depot wall. Hefty enough though.”
“You don’t remember who it was for?”
“Consarn it,” Quinn said angrily. “Ain’t I told ye I don’t know? Now ye’ve got me thinkin’ on thet ye’ve spoiled my hull day.” His frown deepened. “I jest remember seein’ the label pasted on the box, tellin’ who it was from and where it was a-goin’. Folks was all around me, already pickin’ up their shipments. Thet address was writ in pen an’ ink. I didn’t have no time to stop and decipher writin’——”
“Was the whole address label in writing?” Lance asked.
“No, I rec’lect that was in print, like most labels.”
“Think hard,” Lance urged. “Where was it from?”
“Tarnation an’ damnity!” Johnny Quinn squealed angrily. “Ain’t I a-thinkin’? I’m concentratin’ like all get out and——” He paused suddenly, then, “Wait, wait—thet box had been shipped from——Cracky! I can see thet label
