"062 (B062) - The Pirate's Ghost (1938-04) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

SAGEBRUSH SMITH got to his feet, took a step or two in the direction in which Meander Surett had pointed. He stared. He bent over to see better.
The mesquite was tall and thick and cast black shadows. It was too dark to make out anything much. The cowboy licked his lips, then advanced.
Suddenly, Sagebrush jerked to a stop and snatched at his six-gun. He had heard a noise, a small, whimpering sound. He listened. His pulse was a-booming. Then there was a small movement. Something was really there!
Holding his gun in one hand, he advanced. It was very dark. His foot struck something, and feeling with his free hand, he found a chain. He tugged the chain. It jerked in his hand, and the low whimpering came again.
"Hey, feller!" Sagebrush Smith called softly. "How long has the old man had you a prisoner here?"
The whimper was his only answer.
Sagebrush Smith struck a match.
There was only a mangy and half-starved coyote pup on the end of the chain. And around about was bedding and odds and ends of clothing and enough of the kind of food that a man eats to show that old Meander Surett had been treating the coyote as a man.
Meander Surett was dead when Sagebrush Smith went back to him.
Chapter III. HOKE McGEE
WHEN Sagebrush Smith guided two donkeys up to the Lazy Y ranch house, he was not doing it because he wanted to, but because he had to have water. There had not been enough in Meander Surett's canteen. The Lazy Y had the only water on the route to the nearest railroad town.
The two donkeys had obviously belonged to old Meander Surett, for Sagebrush had found them hobbled in the Death Valley sand dunes after he buried the scientist and freed the half-starved coyote. He'd appropriated one donkey to carry the box, and one to carry himself, although the last hadn't worked out; after trying to ride for twenty miles, a habit of both mountain canaries of trying unexpectedly to take a bite out of his leg had led him to favor walking.
Hoke McGee, the Lazy Y foreman, looked on the advent of Sagebrush Smith with no favor at all.
"I thought we run you away from here once," he growled.
"Nobody ever run me away from anywhere," said Sagebrush.
He grabbed a donkey by an ear with one hand and held the animal while he unlashed the metal box with the other hand.
"Take your brothers"—Hoke McGee pointed at the donkeys—"and get the hell out of here!"
"Maybe you'd like to make me?" suggested Sagebrush.
Hoke McGee scowled.
"Maybe," Sagebrush said, "you and your whole danged Lazy Y outfit would like to try to make me go?"
Hoke McGee was a perfectly safe fellow to quarrel with—as long as you were looking at him. It was after dark, or when he was behind you, that he was dangerous. This was a fact that Sagebrush well knew.
Hoke McGee was not of the true west, not of cactus and purple sage. He was a product of crooked carnivals and low gypping. An old carney man of the never-give-the-sucker-a-break school. When the carney shell games went out, he took up cow-punching on the Lazy Y, the owner of which was a distant relative, as well as a bird of similar feather. They called him "Hoke" because he liked to brag about the hokum the yaps used to fall for.
Hoke McGee wasn't yellow, but he was cautious enough not to hit out when there was a chance of getting hit back. He thought himself quite a smoothie. Physically, he was short and broad and ran more to body and arms than to legs or head.
Sagebrush Smith always said that if you could find a he-toad five feet five inches tall and take the warts off him, you would have Hoke McGee.
"I'm stayin' for supper," announced Sagebrush Smith.
"The hell you are!" snarled Hoke McGee.
"The hell I ain't!" said Sagebrush.
Having unlashed the metal box, Sagebrush Smith got under it with both arms, and kneed the donkey in the ribs to make the animal jump out from under the case. Sagebrush staggered over to the shade of the bunk house and put the box down.
"What's that?" Hoke McGee demanded.
"That," said Sagebrush Smith, "is a gookus-wookus."
"A what?"
"Somethin' to make fools ask questions."
Ten minutes later, the owner of the Lazy Y appeared, in tow of Hoke McGee.
"You'll have to pay for your supper," the owner said shortly.
"You're dang tootin' I'll pay for it!" declared Sagebrush Smith. "I'm particular who I take favors from."
"It'll cost you five dollars," said the owner of the Lazy Y.
"It'll cost me two bits," corrected Sagebrush, "which is more than the kind of chow you serve here is worth."
And because he wanted to devil them, he whipped out his money belt and made them weigh out a gold nugget and give him change for twenty-five cents. He knew nothing would hurt them like letting them see that he had a nice gold dust stake. He figured he had them bluffed to a point where they wouldn't dare do anything about it.
That was a mistake.
HOKE McGEE and the owner did not eat in the bunk house with the rest of the rannys. They ate in the ranch house and had better food. To-night they had a conference.
"How much money did Smith have when he left here?" asked Hoke McGee.
"Not much more than forty dollars," said the owner of the Lazy Y.
"Now he's got a belt full of gold. Between six and eight thousand dollars' worth."
"What's in that box?" asked the owner.
"I don't know," said Hoke McGee, "but I bet you it's full of gold."
"Why?"
"I tried to lift it. The thing weighs anyway two hundred pounds."
"Gold, eh?"
"Why, hell, it couldn't be anythin' else, boss. This ranny goes off in the desert empty-handed and comes back with a belt of gold, an iron box and two donkeys. Now me and you both know that he either got the stuff by robbin' somebody, or he found somebody that had died in the desert. And either way it stands to reason there's gold in the box."
"Hm-m. That's too bad," said the owner.