|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 10
"It was the Kid," some one answered, and was continuing, "He says it
was self-defense . . ." when Norton cut in bluntly:
"Was Galloway here when it happened?"
"Yes."
"Where's Galloway now?"
It was noteworthy that he asked for Jim Galloway rather than for Kid
Rickard.
"In there," they told him, indicating a second card-room adjoining that
in which the Las Palmas sheepman lay. Rod Norton, again glancing
sharply across the faces confronting him, went to the closed door and
set his hand to the knob. But Jim Galloway, having desired privacy
just now, had locked the door. Norton struck it sharply, commanding:
"Open up, Galloway. It's Norton."
There came the low mutter of a voice hasty and with the quality of
stern exhortation, the snap of the lock, and the door was jerked open.
Norton's eyes, probing into every square foot of the chamber, took
stock of Jim Galloway, and beyond him of Kid Rickard, slouching forward
in a chair and rolling a cigarette.
"Hello, Norton," said Galloway tonelessly. "Glad you showed up.
There's been trouble."
A heavy man above the waist-line, thick-shouldered, with large head and
bull throat, his muscular torso tapered down to clean-lined hips, his
legs of no greater girth than those of the lean-bodied man confronting
him, his feet small in glove-fitting boots. His eyes, prominent and
full and a clear brown, were a shade too innocent. Chin, jaw, and
mouth, the latter full-lipped, were those of strength, smashing power,
and a natural cruelty. He was the one man to be found in San Juan who
was dressed as the rather fastidiously inclined business men dress in
the cities.
"Another man down, Galloway," said Norton with an ominous sternness.
"And in your place. . . How long do you think that you can keep out
from under?"
His meaning was plain enough; the men behind him in the barroom
listened in attitudes which, varying in other matters, were alike in
their tenseness. Galloway, however, staring stonily with eyes not
unlike polished agate, so cold and steady were they, gave no sign of
taking offense.
"You and I never were friends, Rod Norton," he said, unmoved. "Still
that's no reason you should jump me for trouble. Answering your
question, I expect to keep out from under just as long as two things
remain as they are: first, as long as I play the game square and in the
open, next, as long as an overgrown boy holds down the job of sheriff
in San Juan."
In Norton's eyes was blazing hatred, in Galloway's mere steady,
unwinking boldness.
"You saw the killing?" the sheriff asked curtly.
"Yes," said Galloway.
"The Kid there did it?"
For the first time the man slouching forward in the chair lifted his
head. Had a stranger looked in at that moment, curious to see him who
had just committed homicide . . . or murder . . . he must have
experienced a positive shock. Sullen-eyed, sullen-lipped, the
man-killer could not yet have seen the last of his teens. A thin wisp
of straw-colored hair across a low, atavistic forehead, unhealthy,
yellowish skin, with pale, lack-lustre, faded blue eyes, he looked evil
and vicious and cruel. One looking from him to Jim Galloway would have
suspected that one could be as inhuman as the other, but with the
difference that that which was but means to an end with Galloway would
be end in itself to Kid Rickard. Something of the primal savage shone
in the pale fires of his eyes.
"Yes," retorted the Kid, his surly voice little better than a snarl.
"I got him and be damned to him!"
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|