CHAPTER VIII
An unpretentious log-hut erected apart from the others and owned by a miner, served as a lodging for the famous gunman. Sudden found him seated at the door, polishing one of his pistols with a silk handkerchief. Hickok paid particular attention to his weapons, which was hardly to be wondered at, for his life might at any moment depend on their being in order. He looked up as the man on the black horse dismounted, threw the reins, and walked unhurriedly towards him.
'Mornin', seh,' the visitor said. 'I've had word yu wanted to see me.' Hickok gathered the import of the greeting, noted the brown nervous fingers hanging loosely over the gun-butts, the effortless, panther-like motion of a body ready to become instinct with action at a second's notice. He gave his gun a final rub, looked at it critically, slipped it into the holster, and stood up.
'Mister Green, I have always held courage to be the greatest of human virtues,' he began, 'because, in this ill-contrived world of ours, it is shorely the most needed. I am pleased to meet yu.' Then he added gravely, 'I could have killed yu five times while yu were addressin' me.' Sudden's eyes twinkled. 'Once would 'a' been a-plenty,' he replied. 'I had to take the chance.'
'The sun is fierce,' Hickok observed. 'It is cooler inside--an' more private.' Seated on stools in the rudely furnished living-room of the hut, these two men who carried death in their hands faced one another.
'I was told that yu had come to Deadwood to kill me,' Wild Bill said.
'Berg has been busy,' Sudden suggested.
'Yes, it was Berg,' the gunman admitted. 'I'm guessin' he brought yu the same story about me?' He saw that his surmise was correct, and went on, 'What's his game?'
'Obeyin' orders,' the puncher stated. 'He offered me a thousand dollars to get yu.'
'One--thousand--dollars,' Hickok repeated softly. 'Not very flatterin' to either of us, Mister Green; I should have said the job was worth more. Yore refusal made him sore, I expect?' Sudden smiled. 'It certainly did,' he confessed. 'Berg was all shook up.' Hickok smiled too, and then his expression became thoughtful again. 'That vermin is of no account--he's on'y bein' used,' he said. 'I must find out who is behind him.'
'In the meantime, yu'll need eyes in the back o' yore head, seh,' the puncher warned. 'I was told that however it was done there would be no trouble--after.'
'I'll be careful,' the big man promised, hesitated for a moment and, with a smile, said, 'I've heard surprising statements about yore speed in gettin' yore gun workin'. Now that's my best suit an' I've yet to meet the man who is faster. Call it vanity if you like but--I'm curious.'
'Shucks, I expect yu can give me a start,' the puncher replied. 'I'm willin' to try.'
'Good,' Hickok said.
Standing face to face, a few paces apart, Hickok gave the word. With a speed which baffled sight, the guns flashed to the men's hips and the snap of the falling hammers sounded like one. With something like a sigh, Wild Bill thrust his weapon back into its holster.
'Lucky it was on'y play or we'd have crossed the Divide together,' he said. 'I've never seen a quicker draw. Mister Green, if the town knew of this ...' He paused in embarrassment, conscious that he, Wild Bill, was almost asking a favour. 'Forget I said that,' he finished.
'I don't advertise,' Sudden replied. 'Anyways, I was fortunate, four times outa five yu'd get the edge on me.' Hickok shook his head. 'If I can help yu, don't hesitate to ask,' he said. 'Yu'll find me here or at Bizet's--he's a good fella, that Frenchy; yu can trust him.' He watched the black horse and its rider turn into the street.
'An' it wasn't that I'm gettin' old an' slow,' he muttered, his mind still on the astonishing fact that he had found a man as fast as himself.
Some days later, Paul Lesurge and Reuben Stark foregathered in the latter's private room at the Monte.
'So Berg's plan failed, as I feared it would,' Lesurge remarked. 'Hickok is too old a hand to tumble into such a trap, and this fellow, Green appears to have intelligence; they will now both be against us--a dangerous pair to draw to.'
'Bah! they don't know about us, an' anyway, Bill is past his best,' Stark said. 'The other fella can be-- attended to. What's his interest in the game?'
'I've no idea, except that his partner, Mason, has the infernal impudence to admire my ward, Miss Ducane,' Paul replied.
'I expect he ain't alone in that,' Stark laughed, and as a rap sounded on the door, 'Come in.' It was Berg who entered, or rather, crept into the room, his evil, ferrety face more malignant than usual. He slid into a chair, and, at a nod from the host, helped himself from the bottle on the table.
'It's the man I thought,' he began. 'Calls hisself `Rogan' but he's 'Lefty' Logan, the Californy killer, shore enough.'
'Never heard of him,' Stark said. 'Is he fast?'
'He's here because he ain't knowed in these parts,' Berg pointed out. 'Yeah, he's fast a-plenty, but he fools 'em--uses the hand they ain't watchin', which is usually the left; that's how he come by his name.'
'We don't care how he does it. Will he tackle the job?'
'He won't take on Hickok, though he's workin' for day wages.'
'Afraid of him, like the rest o' you,' Stark sneered.
For once the rat showed his teeth. 'Like the rest of us,' he snapped. 'He's willin' to tangle up with Green for a thousand.'
'A thousand bucks?' the saloon-keeper cried. 'Tell him to go to hell.'
'No, tell him to send Green there,' Lesurge interposed, and turning to Stark, 'If he succeeds it will be worth the coin; if he fails--' he shrugged his shoulders--'it will cost you nothing. I feel in my bones that the puncher is going to be--awkward.' The other assented, but with an ill grace; he had an insatiable lust for wealth, and all it would bring, and it was upon this passion that Paul was playing.
'Very well,' Stark told his go-between, 'but you tell this friend o' yores'--there was an insulting emphasis on the three last words--'that we don't want no raw work. It's to be done at Bizet's, an' I ain't needin' to see him before or after, savvy? You'll pay him, keepin' a rake-off for yoreself, I s'pose. That's all.' Without a word, Berg shuffled out. Lesurge refilled his own glass, his dark eyes rather contemptuously studying the bloated figure before him.
'The town seems all stirred up over the latest robbery,' he remarked. 'Something ought to be done.'
'Yeah,' Stark said irritably. 'Have to hang someone, I s'pose.'
'Having first caught your hare, of course,' Paul reminded. 'Someone, I said,' Stark replied. 'lt don't much matter--Gosh! That's an idea.' Lesurge smiled superciliously. 'You are not, by any chance, thinking of making Wild Bill the culprit, are you?'
'Why not?' the saloon-keeper demanded.
'My dear fellow, I have no more use than yourself for James Butler Hickok, but even his worst enemy would not believe him capable of putting a knife in a miner's throat to steal his dust. You would be laughed at, my friend, and ridicule kills. We shall find a better way.' Stark grunted. He could not fathom this polished, satirical person, who, through his handsome sister, had so quickly gained an ascendancy over him, and who--though apparently deferring to him--always contrived to get his own way.
'Why did you come to Deadwood, Paul?' he asked.
'To mind my own business, Reuben,' came the cool retort. 'And, incidentally, to double your fortune.'
'Up to now I done nothin' but pay out,' the other grumbled.
'You can't expect to reap unless you sow,' was all the comfort he received. 'The harvest will be heavy. Listen. Sooner or later, the Government must recognize the settlement. If it finds Deadwood an organized, well- equipped city, under efficient leadership, it will leave the man who has brought it about in charge, may even give him a governor ship. You have to be that man. Get control of the place, hold all the strings, but to do that you must be firm, implacable, prepared to crush opposition of any kind.' Stark's eyes glowed at the alluring prospect, for next to gold, he loved power, and was a bully by nature. But he was not entirely a fool.
'An' where do you come in, Paul?' he inquired.
'You'll need me,' was the smiling answer. 'And you'll have so much to give away--offices, town-sites, mining rights, plenty of pickings for the friends who have helped you, believe me.'
