Kitabı oku: «Deadwood Dick Jr. Branded: or, Red Rover at Powder Pocket.», sayfa 4

CHAPTER X.
DICK IN A DEATH-TRAP

Deadwood Dick was again left alone.

A grim smile came over his face as he looked at the door that had just closed.

"It is a bitter pill for him to swallow, this giving me a chance for my life," he said to himself, "and I'll bet ten to one that I don't get it on the square."

The chances were that he would not.

"I was a fool, perhaps, to take the risk I did with the fellow, when the law was all on my side, but I took him so utterly by surprise that it did not seem exactly fair. The trouble is, my heart is entirely too big and too soft for the profession I am following."

It was not that; the trouble was, he was too honorable with the desperate characters with whom he had to deal.

But, that was Deadwood Dick's way.

The day waned and night came on at last. Dick had been well fed, by the old negress, and he felt grateful toward her.

He had seen nothing more of the young woman, but had heard her singing at different times during the afternoon. He had no reason to look for any assistance from her.

In the evening she and Captain Joaquin sang together in the main room, and it was singing well worthy attention.

It caused Dick to sigh for a life so misspent.

Finally, after some time, the door of the room Dick was in opened, and a flood of light streamed in.

Captain Joaquin entered, and Susana came as far as the doorway, where she stood framed in the light, clad in a gown that made her appear beautiful in the soft radiance.

"I suppose you are still here, eh?" said the outlaw.

He could not see at once, coming out of the lighted room.

"You might be sure of that," said Dick. "I would remain, even were I free, to listen to your singing."

"I have not come in for flattery nor praise, but to make sure that you are secure. Let me feel of those handcuffs before I retire for the night. My men may not be here till morning."

"Here they are; feel to your satisfaction."

He did so.

"No getting out of them," he said. "You are as safely my prisoner as I was yours once to-day, if not more so, Deadwood Dick."

"You need not remind me of it," said Dick.

"Well, good-night. If the men come, I will call you up, for some deeds are more agreeable in the dark than in the daylight."

"Yes, I suppose so."

"I mean, if you should have the ill luck to draw a black."

"I understand you, I guess, captain. You will find me here when you want me. I may be a little hard to awaken, but shake me hard and you will bring me out of it."

"You will be awakened, never fear."

The outlaw withdrew and closed and secured the door, and after a time the cabin was dark and silent.

A little longer, and Deadwood Dick rose silently to his feet.

Lifting his wrists to his face, he was occupied for some moments at something, and presently there was a faint click.

He removed the handcuffs from his wrists and put them into his jacket pocket, and took a key from his mouth, where it had long been concealed, and put it into the pocket of his vest.

Taking care to make no sound, he moved to the window and carefully worked the sash open to its widest extent.

That done, he put a chair under it and prepared to take leave.

He listened.

No sound was to be heard within.

Putting his head out he listened again, and all was silence the most profound.

Satisfied, he began to worm his body through the small opening, and presently had succeeded in getting his head and shoulders through, with his face upward.

Pausing a moment, he continued pressing through, and at last came as far as his knees, holding fast to the lower sash with his hands the while.

In that position he stopped a moment to rest and listen.

Hearing nothing, he let go with his hands and swung down, hanging by his legs, and his hands came in contact with the ground.

It was an easy thing, then, to let go with his legs and turn over and land upon his feet, and he did it with scarcely any more noise than a cat would have made.

He was without his weapons, but he was free.

Knowing the direction he must take, he set forward immediately, taking the greatest care that his steps were too light to be heard.

In a few moments he was out of hearing distance from the cabin, so far as his steps were concerned, and he then struck out at a rapid pace in the direction of the gulch.

He was going straight to the treasure cache to secure the treasure, and would then put all the distance possible between himself and the outlaws before daylight.

He could cache the money again, and in due time return with a posse and secure it.

"There will be something of a surprise when they find that I am gone, I imagine," he said to himself. "I would like to be there to see Captain Joaquin's face at the moment."

Not as a prisoner, however. He knew he would have no chance whatever for his life, or so, at any rate, he believed.

The night was dark, but there was enough light to see general outlines.

He pushed on, keeping to the trail as he remembered it, and he had taken good care to fix it well in his mind.

At length he came to the place where the duel was to have been fought but where he had been cut down by the bullet that had plowed the gash in his scalp.

Still on, and at last he came to the rough way that led to the top of the little peak on which the treasure had been cached, and here he had the hardest climb of all.

In daylight, it was not easy, but by night, and unfamiliar as he was with the ground, it was doubly difficult.

But it was at last accomplished, after an hour's work.

He stood on the plateau.

Sitting down on the edge of the table to rest, before proceeding further, a sound presently reached his ears.

It caused him a start, and he was on his feet instantly.

Again he heard it, and knew that he was not mistaken this time; it was voices.

With all haste he turned to the boulder and applied his shoulder to it at the point where Captain Joaquin had put his strength to it some hours before.

At first it did not move, but remembering how the Red Rover had put forth all his strength by surging against it, Dick now did the same, and presently the boulder moved and finally turned over.

Lighting a match, Dick looked into the cavity, and there was the bag of money exactly as it had been deposited.

He had it out in a second, and did not stop to replace the stone.

If he could get away from the top of the peak before discovered, he would have a chance.

It would take Captain Joaquin some time to climb up to look for the treasure, and while he was doing that Dick could be putting distance between himself and them.

What was the best of all, he would leave no trail that they could follow, having nothing but bare rock for his footing.

He readily imagined what had taken place at the cabin.

The men had come, and Captain Joaquin had entered the room to bring him forth and discovered him gone.

The first thought, naturally, would be for the money in the cache, and the Red Rover would lead the way thither with all speed – the very thing he was doing.

Moreover, they were even then nearer than Dick imagined, and just as he swung his legs over the edge of the plateau to begin the descent, the light of torches flashed out of the gulch below and his pursuers discovered him. With a wild shout, they opened fire upon him immediately.

Deadwood Dick was in a death-trap.

CHAPTER XI.
DICK'S ONLY DEFENSE

"Surrender!" called out Captain Joaquin.

"We'll consider that point a bit first," responded Dick.

He had drawn back out of range with considerable alacrity, for the bullets had come uncomfortably close.

"You will surrender, and that unconditionally, or we will riddle you with bullets!" was the threat. "You have now cancelled any obligation I may have been under."

"If I surrender at all, it will be under conditions," rejoined Dick. "We will make terms, or I will fight it out to the death."

"It will be to your death, then, not mine."

"Don't be too sure of that."

"You are not armed."

"No?"

"No, you are not."

"Do you want me to show you? You present a fine target there where you stand."

There were five men in the company, four besides the captain, and those four sprang to cover instantly, lest a shot might find them.

Captain Joaquin laughed.

"Don't be alarmed, boys," he said. "I tell you he is not armed. I took his guns away from him, and he has had no chance to get others. We must have him down from there!"

"There is only one way to get me," said Dick.

"And we will take that way."

"At your peril."

Captain Joaquin was no coward. He started forward at once, calling on his men to follow.

The men responded, reassured by the word of their leader, as well as by his own intrepid example, and followed the Red Rover up the steep ascent with their torches.

"Hold!"

Deadwood Dick so ordered.

They stopped and looked up, as men in their position naturally would do.

"You will advance another step at your peril," Dick warned them. "I am safe from your bullets, but you are in plain open sight there, and it seems a pity to pick you off."

"That be hanged!" cried Captain Joaquin. "You are talking to gain time, that is all. Come on, boys!"

"Do you want this boulder rolled down upon you?" cried Dick.

It was useless for him to pretend that he was armed, when he was not armed. A shot would have been the only proof of that.

"Ha! ha!" laughed the captain. "Four men like you could not roll that boulder out of the cavity in which it lies. I tell you we have got you, and you can't escape us."

There was not a doubt of it.

It was all true, what was said of the boulder. It weighed a ton if it weighed a pound.

The reason that one man was enabled to move it at all was because it was partly balanced in the little basin in which it rested, and could be tilted to another bearing in one direction.

"Hold!"

Dick's voice rang out again, more forceful than at first.

Again his foes stopped, for they were in no position to disregard such a command from a desperate man.

"Well, what now?" demanded the Red Rover.

"I told you that we would make terms, or I would fight it to the death."

"Bah! what care I for your threats? What position are you in to talk of terms? You are as good as in my hands already. Come on, boys!"

"One moment," cried Dick. "It is true that I have no guns at hand, as you well know, and it is also true that I cannot roll the boulder, but I have a weapon nevertheless."

"What is it?"

"This bag of money."

"Ha! ha! ha! What is that?"

"I will tell you what it is. It is a fortune in compact form. If I set a match to its contents it will go up in smoke."

There was a howl instantly.

"And I can do it before you can get up to a level where you can get a shot at me," said Dick. "All you will find will be a little heap of ashes for your trouble."

"You do not dare!" howled the Red Rover. "You would not have the nerve to destroy such a fortune!"

"No?"

"No! I defy you!"

"All right, come on and see. It will take you several minutes to get here, and by that time I can have destroyed it."

"But, what of you? By heavens, I would put pitch on you and burn you at the stake, Deadwood Dick! You do not know the tiger of my nature yet, or you would not rouse it."

"I am seeking rather to tame it," said Dick.

"And I swear that I will do just as I say, if you destroy that money before I can get hold of it."

"I would prefer a leap off this peak to the depths below, rather than that," said Dick, "and I could carry with me what of the money I might not have time to burn."

"You would not do that."

"There is one way for you to prove it, come and see."

"You have no matches there."

"Here is proof of that."

Dick struck a match as he spoke, and set fire to a piece of paper he happened to have in his pocket.

Captain Joaquin was dismayed.

Dick could hear him consulting in low tones with his men.

"What are you going to do about it?" Dick inquired, after a pause. "I am ready to offer my terms."

He had a potent weapon to use against them, and that was the possession of the fortune they had risked so much to get possession of that day.

"Ready to offer terms," sneered the Red Rover. "You mean that you are ready to accept such terms as you can get, I guess. We will be the ones to offer, if any terms are made at all. We hold the winning hand."

"And I hold the stuff. Don't make any mistake."

"Well, what would you call terms?"

"If I surrender to you, with this bag of money intact, will you allow me to go free?"

"Yes, we'll do that," was the prompt answer. And every one of them voiced approval. They were prompt and liberal with their promises, if he would surrender at once.

Deadwood Dick laughed at them.

"It is too plain a case," he said. "That is not the kind of a bargain I am going to make with you, however."

"You won't trust us?"

"Not a bit."

"You will have to, or we will starve you out. And at the first sight we get of you we'll pick you off."

"Try that, my friends, and every hour I remain here I will burn ten thousand dollars of this money. I have got money to burn, not only figuratively, but actually."

"Curse you! What terms do you want?"

"Ha! I thought you would presently recognize that I hold the better hand," said Dick.

"I recognize nothing of the kind," was the return, "but I don't want you to be fool enough to destroy that money – my hard earnings."

"That is precisely the little joker I hold," said Dick.

"Well, what do you want to do?"

"I want you to return my revolvers to me, in good order – "

"Say, do you take us for fools altogether? We have got the advantage, now, and, we mean to keep it. Forward, men, and at him!"

"Hold!" cried Dick yet once again. "You evidently forget the fate of this money if you advance another step. And more than that, if you keep me here one hour the pile will be ten thousand dollars less."

It was a peculiar situation.

CHAPTER XII.
CAUGHT IN THE TOILS

Deadwood Dick was in a desperate fix.

He did not see any way of escape, no matter which way he looked.

Having been there in the daylight, he knew there was no way down save in the one direction.

And in that direction the way was blocked by the outlaws, who would shoot him on sight as they would shoot a dog that might offend them.

They had the advantage of him in every way save one only. He held them in momentary check by his threat to destroy the prize they were after, and which, according to their code, belonged to them.

There was another consultation among them.

Then Captain Joaquin called out:

"Deadwood Dick?"

"Well?"

"We have to admit that you have got the best of it at present. We are willing to make terms with you."

"Well, you have heard one of the conditions."

"Yes, but that would be to place still more advantage on your side. We can't afford to arm you against ourselves, you know."

"That is one of the conditions, nevertheless, and I want to tell you that you are letting valuable time get away from you. I mean business when I say I will burn this stuff."

"Don't do that; we'll come to an agreement somehow."

"What do you propose, then?"

"You come down here with that cash, and we'll give you the chance I told you about."

"The drawing for a white bean?"

"Yes."

"What assurance have I that I will not be shot at sight?"

"None but our word. We'll respect that, if you are willing to meet us half way. We are determined to have that money."

"Joaquin?"

It was a woman's voice that called.

Dick recognized it as the voice of Susana, and wondered what had brought her there.

"What are you doing here?" cried Captain Joaquin, in something of anger. "I thought I told you to remain at the house."

"Yes, but I could not do that, with you in danger. I had to come out and find you. Do not be angry with me; I could not help it. Besides, I was anxious about your treasure."

She had come out into sight, while speaking.

Deadwood Dick was peering over the edge of the ledge, at a point where a shadow protected him.

He saw the young woman cast a swift glance around, saw that she was nearly out of breath from evident haste, and that her face was flushed.

"What danger am I in?" was the angry demand.

"No danger, I hope, but I could not know that. I could not remain there in uncertainty. Do not be angry, Joaquin."

"Well, sit down and rest yourself, and do not interfere in this matter. Now, Deadwood Dick, let me know at once what you will do or what you want us to do."

"If you will return my revolvers to me, in good order and loaded, I will come down and turn this money over to you, on condition that you let me escape with my life, or give me a fair chance to do so. It is for you to accept or refuse, as you please."

"We refuse."

"Very well, then; this money goes up in smoke."

"Heavens!" cried the young woman. "Do not burn the money, sir, I beg of you!"

"It is the only weapon I have," declared Dick. "Without it, I could not hold your cutthroats at bay for a moment. With it I must bargain for my life."

"Perhaps you regret the chance you gave me," suggested Joaquin.

"No, I do not. I was simply giving you the benefit of a possible doubt, though, in truth, I did not believe it existed."

"And what do you promise him now, Joaquin?" the young woman inquired.

"I have promised him his life if he will come down here with that money," the Red Rover explained.

"You had better accept it, sir," the young woman called out. "You are at a disadvantage, and cannot possibly hold out there a great while. That is your only chance."

"But I have only the word of an outlaw that my life will be spared."

"That word will be kept, will it not, Joaquin?"

"Of course it will be kept. But I told you not to meddle in this matter. Keep out of it, now, or return to the house at once!"

The young woman gave him a sharp glance, and leaned back against a boulder that lay behind the stone on which she had sat down. Dick believed that he caught a look of pain on her face as the torches lighted it up.

"It is all one-sided," said Deadwood Dick. "Arm me, and make me an equal, and I will leave the bag of money here and come down and go away. Refuse, and I will carry out the threats I have made. There need be no further parley about it."

"Well, I'll do it, but I have not got your weapons here."

"Send for them."

"It will take time to get them."

"No matter, we can call a stay of proceedings until your man returns with them."

"And you will destroy none of the money mean time?"

"No, I will not."

"Agreed."

Captain Joaquin spoke a few words to one of his men, and the fellow started off.

Deadwood Dick withdrew from the edge of the ledge then, and put on his thinking cap. The advantage lay with the outlaws, there was no denying it. He did not believe they would be fools enough to arm him.

There must be some trick in it, he believed, but what it could be he could not imagine. He looked around for a means of escape, but knowing full well that it did not exist. He would have to trust to the word of the outlaw captain, and take chances.

No word was passed between Captain Joaquin and him during the time the man was gone, and Dick waited eagerly for the fellow's return. He had a scheme in mind, but whether it could be made to work or not remained to be seen. It would be at the risk of his life, but he hoped to give them the slip and get away with the booty.

At last he came.

Captain Joaquin called out to Dick, and he responded.

"Here are your weapons, now, but how are they to be sent up to you? And what assurance have we that you will keep your word?"

"I have a plan to propose," said Dick. "Let that lady bring them up to me, and she may carry the bag down to you in exchange. Then, when you find that it is all right, all go away and leave me to come down when I please."

That, however, was not his scheme.

"What is the sense of that?" demanded the Red Rover. "I will bring them up myself."

"And perhaps shoot me the moment you come where you can get a bead on me. I will not trust you that far, Captain Joaquin, for I do not believe you mean to allow me to get away from here if you can help it."

"But you have my word that you shall be allowed to go away alive – that is, that your life will be spared."

"And he will keep his word, sir," spoke up the woman.

"You have nothing but his promise, the same as I," said Dick. "He must meet my terms, or I will carry out the threat I have made. It can only cost my life, anyhow and – "

A noise just behind him caught Dick's ear at that instant, and he turned his head to see what it was, when a man threw himself upon him and bore him to the ground. Dick, already kneeling, was taken at a disadvantage, and he was shoved headlong over the ledge.

Even as he felt himself going, the thought came to him to protect his head with the bag of money, and so he did, holding it tight to his head and drawing himself into as much of a ball as possible, for there was not the least use in his trying to save himself the fall down the rugged side of the cliff. And so he fell, over and over, landing at the feet of Captain Joaquin.