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Page 32
"It looks like a young revolution!" she cried, her gaze held, her eyes
fascinated by the unexpected.
"You've seen about everything now," he told her, the red ember of a
burnt-out match dropping to the floor. "Those boxes contain
cartridges. Now let's go back to Brocky."
"But they'll see that you have been here. . . ."
"I'll come back in a minute with the lantern; I want a further chance
to look things over. Then I'll put the blanket back and see that not
even that charred match gives us away. And we'd better be eating and
getting started."
With a steaming tin of black coffee before her, a brown piece of bacon
between her fingers, she forgot to eat or drink while she listened to
Norton's story. At the beginning it seemed incredible; then, her
thoughts sweeping back over the experiences of these last twenty-four
hours, her eyes having before them the picture of a sheriff, grim-faced
and determined, a wounded man lying just beyond the fire, the rough,
rudely arched walls and ceiling of a cave man's dwelling about her, she
deemed that what Norton knew and suspected was but the thing to be
expected.
"Jim Galloway is a big man," the sheriff said thoughtfully. "A very
big man in his way. My father was after him for a long time; I have
been after him ever since my father's death. But it is only recently
that I have come to appreciate Jim Galloway's caliber. That's why I
could never get him with the goods on; I have been looking for him in
the wrong places.
"I estimated that he was making money with the Casa Blanca and a
similar house which he operates in Pozo; I thought that his entire game
lay in such layouts and a bit of business now and then like the robbing
of the Las Palmas man. But now I know that most of these lesser jobs
are not even Galloway's affair, that he lets some of his crowd like the
Kid or Antone or Moraga put them across and keep the spoils, often
enough. In a word, while I've been looking for Jim Galloway in the
brush he has been doing his stunt in the big timber! And now. . . ."
The look in Norton's eyes suggested that he had forgotten the girl to
whom he was talking. "And now I have picked up his trail!"
"And that's something," interposed Brocky Lane, a flash of fire in his
own eyes. "Considering that no man ever knew better than Jim Galloway
how to cover tracks."
"You see," continued Norton, "Jim Galloway's bigness consists very
largely of these two things: he knows how to keep his hands off of the
little jobs, and he knows how to hold men to him. Bisbee, of Las
Palmas, goes down in the Casa Blanca; his money, perhaps a thousand
dollars, finds its way into the pockets of Kid Rickard, Antone, and
maybe another two or three men. Jim Galloway sees what goes on and
does no petty haggling over the spoils; he gets a strangle-hold on the
men who do the job; it costs him nothing but another lie or so, and he
has them where he can count on them later on when he needs such men.
Further, if they are arrested, Jim Galloway and Galloway's money come
to the front; they are defended in court by the best lawyers to be had,
men are bribed and they go free. As a result of such labors on
Galloway's part I'd say at a rough guess that there are from a dozen to
fifty men in the county right now who are his men, body and soul.
"With a gang like that at his back, a man of Galloway's type has grown
pretty strong. Strong enough to plan . . . yes, and by the Lord, carry
out! . . . the kind of game he's playing right now.
"A half-breed took sick and died a short time ago, a man whom I'd never
set my eyes on particularly. It happened that he was a superstitious
devil and that he was a second or third cousin of Ignacio Chavez. He
was quite positive that unless the bells rang properly for him he would
go to hell the shortest way. So he sent for Ignacio and wound up by
talking a good deal. Ignacio passed the word on to me. And that was
the first inkling I had of Galloway's real game. In a word, this is
what it is:
"He plans on one big stroke and then a long rest and quiet enjoyment of
the proceeds. You have seen the rifles; he'll arm a crowd of his best
men . . . or his worst, as you please . . . swoop down on San Juan, rob
the bank, shooting down just as many men as happen to be in the way,
rush in automobiles to Pozo and Kepple's Town, stick up the banks
there, levy on the Las Palmas mines, and then steer straight to the
border. And, if all worked according to schedule, the papers across
the country would record the most daring raid across the border yet,
blaming the whole affair on a detachment of Gringo-hating Mexican
bandits and revolutionists."
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