Bulldog Carney

Carney stood for ten seconds watching Cranford's back till it merged into the blur of the night. Then he entered the hotel, almost colliding with Jeanette Holt, who put a hand on his arm and drew him into the dining-room to a seat at a little table.

"Where's Seth?" she asked.

"Over at the police shack."

"Poker?"

Carney nodded.

"Mr. Hadley there?"

Again Carney nodded. Then he asked, "Why, Jeanette?"

"I don't quite know," she answered wearily. "Seth's moral fibre – if he has any – is becoming like a worn-out spring in a clock." Then her dark eyes searched Carney's placid gray eyes, and she asked, "Were you playing?"

"Yes."

The girl drew her hand across her eyes as if she were groping, not for ideas, but for vocal vehicle. "And you left before the game was over – why?"

"Tired."

Jeanette put her hand on Carney's that was lying on the table. "Was Seth cheating?"

"Why do you ask that, Jeanette?"

"I'll tell you. He's been playing by himself in his room for two or three days. He's got a pack of cards that I think are crooked."

"What is this Shipley like, Jeanette? Do you suppose that he brought Seth those cards?"

"I don't know," the girl answered; "I don't like him. He and Seth have played together once or twice."

"They have! Look here, Jeanette, you must keep what I am going to tell you absolutely to yourself, for I may be entirely wrong in my guess. There was a marked pack in the game, and I think Seth owned it. This Shipley acted very like a man who was running a bluff of being angry. He and Seth had some words over nothing. It seems to me the quarrel was too gratuitous to be genuine."

"You think, Bulldog, that Shipley and Seth worked together to win Hadley's money – he had six thousand in Seth's strong box?"

"I can't go that far, even to you, Jeanette. But to-morrow Seth has got to give back to Hadley whatever he has won. I've got one of the cards in my pocket, and that will be enough."

"But if he divides with Shipley?"

"Shipley will have to cough up the stolen money, too, because then the conspiracy will be proven."

"Yes, Bulldog. I guess if you just tell them to hand the money back, there'll be no argument. I can go to bed now and sleep," she added, patting Carney's hand with her slim fingers. "You see, if Seth got that stranger's money away it wouldn't worry him – the moral aspect, I mean; but somehow it makes it terrible for me. It's discovering small evil in a man – petty larceny, sneak thieving – that pours sand into a woman's soul. Good night, Bulldog. I think if I were only your sister I'd be quite satisfied – quite."

"You are," Carney said, rising; "we are seven – and you are the other six, Jeanette."

As a rule nothing outside of a tangible actuality, such as danger that had to be guarded against, kept Carney from desired slumber; but after he had turned out his light he lay wide awake for half an hour, his soul full of the abhorrent repugnance of Seth's stealing.

Carney's code was such that he could shake heartily by the hand, or drink with, a man who had held up a train, or fought (even to the death of someone) the Police over a matter of whisky or opium running, if that man were above petty larceny, above stealing from a man who had confidence in him. He lay there suffused with the grim satisfaction of knowing how completely Seth, and possibly Shipley, would be nonplussed when they were forced on the morrow to give up their ill-gotten gains. That would be a matter purely between Carney and Seth. The problem of how he would return the loot to Hadley without telling him of the marked pack, was not yet solved. Indeed, this little mental exercise, like counting sheep, led Carney off into the halls of slumber.

He was brought back from the rest cavern by something that left him sitting bolt upright in bed, correlating the disturbing something with known remembrances of the noise.

"Yes, by gad, it was a shot!"

He was out of bed and at the window. He could have sworn that a shadow had flitted in the dim moonlight along the roadway that lay beyond the police shack; it was so possible this aftermath of card cheating, a shot and someone fleeing. It was a subconscious conviction that caused him to precipitate himself into his clothes, and slip his gun belt about his waist.

In the hall he met Jeanette, her great mass of black hair rippling over the shoulders, from which draped a kimono. The lamp in her hand enhanced the ghastly look of horror that was over her drawn face.

"What's wrong, Jeanette – was it a shot?"

"Yes! I've looked into Seth's room – he's not there!"

Without speaking Carney tapped on a door almost opposite his own; there was no answer, and he swung it open. Then he closed it and whispered: "Hadley's not in, either; fancy they're still playing." Jeanette pointed a finger to a door farther down the hall. Carney understood. Again he tapped on this door, opened it, peered in, closed it, and coming back to Jeanette whispered: "Shipley's not there. Fancy it must be all right – they're still playing. I'll go over to the shack."

"I'll wait till you come back, Bulldog. It isn't all right. I never felt so oppressed in my life. I know something dreadful has happened – I know it." Carney touched his fingers gently to the girl's arm, and manufacturing a smile of reassurance, said blithely: "You've eaten a slab of bacon, à la fry-pan, girl." Then he was gone.

As he rounded the hotel corner he could see a lighted lamp in a window of the police shack. This was curious; it hurried his pace, for they were not playing at the table.

He threw open the shack door, and stood just within, looking at what he knew was a dead man – Seth Long sprawled on his back on the floor where he had tumbled from a chair. His shirt front was crimson with blood, just over the heart.

There was no evidence of a struggle; just the chair across the table from where Seth had sat was ominously pushed back a little. The red-backed cards were resting on the corner of the table neatly gathered into a pack.

Cool-brained Carney stood just within the door, mentally photographing the interior. The killing had not been over a game that was in progress, unless the murderer, with super-cunning, had rearranged the tableau.

Carney stepped to beside the dead man. Seth's pistol lay close to his outstretched right hand. Carney picked it up, and broke the cartridges from the cylinder; one was empty; the barrel of the gun was foul.

Seth's shirt was black and singed; the weapon that killed him had been held close.

Carney's brain, running with the swift, silent velocity of a spinning top, queried: Was the killer so super-clever that he had discharged Seth's gun to make it appear suicide?

Subconsciously the marked cards that probably had led up to this murder governed Carney's next move. He thrust his hand in the pocket of the coat where Seth had put the discarded pack – it was gone. He felt the other pocket – the pack was not there. A quick look over the room, table and all, failed to locate the missing cards. He felt the inside pocket of the coat for the leather wallet that contained Hadley's money – there was no wallet.

At that instant a sinister feeling of evil caused Carney to stiffen, his eyes to set in a look of wariness; at the soft click of a boot against a stone his gun was out and, without rising, he whipped about.

The flickering uncertain lamplight picked out from the gloom of the night in the open doorway the face of Shipley. Perhaps it was the goblin light, or fear, or malignant satisfaction that caused Shipley's face to appear grotesquely contorted; his eyes were either gloating, or imbecile-tinged by horror.

"My God! what's happened, Carney?" he asked. "Don't cover me, I – I – "

"Come into the light, then," Carney commanded.

In silent obedience Shipley stepped into the room, and Carney, passing to the door, peered out. Then he closed it, and dropped his gun back into his belt.

"What's happened?" Shipley repeated. And the other, listening with intensity, noticed that the speaker's voice trembled.

"Where have you come from just now?" Carney asked, ignoring the question.

Shipley drew a hand across his eyes, as if he would compel back his wandering thoughts, or would blot out the horror of that blood-smeared figure on the floor.

"I went for a walk," he answered.

"Why – when?" Carney snapped imperiously.

"I quit the game half an hour ago, and thought I'd walk over to Cranford's house; the smoking and the drinks had given me a headache."

"Why to Cranford's house?"

Shipley threw his head up as if he were about to resent the crisp cross-examining, but Bulldog's gray eyes, always compelling, were now fierce.

"Well," – Shipley coughed – "I didn't like the looks of the game to-night; that ace being shy – Didn't you feel there was something not on the level?"

"I didn't take that walk to Cranford's!". The deadliness that had been in the gray eyes was in the voice now.

"I thought that if Cranford was still up I'd talk it over with him; he'd lost, and I fancied he was sore on the game."

"What did Cranford say?"

"I didn't see him. I tapped on his door, and as he didn't answer I – I thought he was asleep and came back. I saw the door open here, and – "

Shipley hesitated.

"Did you leave Seth and Hadley playing?"

"Yes."

"And you didn't see either of them again?"

"No."

"Did you hear a shot?" and Carney pointed toward the blood-stained shirt.

Shipley looked at Carney and seemed to hesitate. "I heard something ten minutes ago, but thought it was a door slamming. Where's Hadley – have you seen him? Were you here when this was done?"

"Come on," Carney said, "we'll go back to the hotel and round up Hadley."

As they went out Carney locked the door, the key being still in the lock.

When the two men entered the Gold Nugget, Carney stepped behind the bar and turned up a wall lamp that was burning low. As he faced about he gave a start, and then hurried across the room to where a figure huddled in one of the big wooden arm chairs. It was Hadley – sound asleep, or pretending to be.

When Carney shook him the sleeper scrambled drunkenly to his feet blinking. Then the boy smile flitted foolishly over his lips, and he mumbled: "I say, how long've I been asleep – where's Seth?"

"What are you doing here asleep?" Carney asked, the crisp incisiveness of his voice wakening completely the rather fogged man.

"I sat down to wait for Seth. Guess the whisky made me sleepy – had a little too much of it."

"Where did you leave Seth – how long ago?"

"Over at the police shack; we quit the game and Seth said he'd tidy up for fear the Sergeant'd be back in the morning – throw out the empty bottles, and pick up the cigar stubs and matches, kind of tidy up. I came on to go to bed and – " Hadley spoke haltingly, as though his memory of his progress was still befogged – "when I got here I remembered that he'd got my wallet, and thought I'd sit down and wait so's to be sure he didn't forget to put it back in the iron box."

"Did you have a row with Seth when you broke up the game?"

Hadley flushed. He was in a slightly stupid condition. During his nap the whisky had sullenly subsided, leaving him a touch maudlin, surly.

"I don't see what right you've got to ask that; I guess that's a matter between two men."

Carney fastened his piercing eyes on the speaker's, and shot out with startling suddenness: "Seth Long has been murdered – do you know that?"

"What – what – what're you saying?"

Hadley's mouth remained open; it was like the gaping mouth of a gasping fish; his eyes had been startled into a wide horrified wonder look.

"Seth – murdered!" then he grinned foolishly. "By God! you Westerners pull some rough stuff. That's not good form to spring a joke like that; I'm a tenderfoot, but – "

"Stop it!" Carney snarled; "do you think I'm a damned fool. Seth has been shot through the heart, and you were the last man with him. I want from you all you know. We've got to catch the right man, not the wrong man – do you get that, Hadley?" The fierceness of this toniced the man with a hang-over, cleared his fuzzy brain.

"My God! I don't know anything about it. I left Seth Long at the police shack, and I don't know anything more about him."

There was a step on the stairway. Carney turned as Jeanette came through the door. He went to meet her, and turned her back into the hall where he said: "Steady yourself, girl. Something has happened."

"I know – I heard you; I'm steady." She put her hand in his, and he pressed it reassuringly. Then he whispered:

"I'm going to leave you with these two men while I get Dr. Anderson, and I want you to see if either of these men leaves the room, or attempts to hide anything – I can't search them. Do you understand, Jeanette?"

"Yes."

He came back to the room with the girl and said:

"I'm going for the coroner, Dr. Anderson, and for your own sakes, gentlemen, I'll ask you to wait here in this room – it will be better."

Then he was gone.

In twenty minutes he was back with Dr. Anderson. On their way to the hotel Carney and the Doctor had gone into the police shack to make certain, through medical examination, that Seth was dead.

Upon their entry Jeanette had gone upstairs, the Doctor suggesting this.

Dr. Anderson was a Scotchman, absolute, with all that the name implies in canny conservative stubborn adherence to things as they are; the apparent consistencies.

Here was a man murdered in cold blood; he was the only one to be considered; he was the wronged party; the others were to be viewed with suspicion until by process of elimination they had been cleared of guilt. So there was no doubt whatever but that Carney had as good a claim as any of them to the title of assassin.

In the flurry of it all Carney had not thought of this.

When the three stories had been told, Dr. Anderson said:

"Sergeant Black will be back to-morrow, I think; then we'll take action. I'd advise you gentlemen to remain in statu quo, if I might use the term. There's one thing that ought to be done, though; I think you'll agree with me that it is advisable for each man's sake. A wallet with a large sum of money has disappeared from the murdered man's pocket, and as each one of you will be more or less under suspicion – I'm speaking now just in the way of forecasting what that unsympathetic individual, the law, will do – it would be as well for each of you to submit to a search of your person. I have no authority to demand this, but it's expedient."

To this the three agreed; Hadley, with a sort of repugnance, and Shipley with, perhaps, an overzealous compliance, Carney thought. There was no trace of the wallet.

Carney had said nothing about the missing cards, but neither were they found.

No pistol was found on Hadley, but a short-barreled gun was discovered in Shipley's hip pocket.

The Doctor broke the weapon, and his eyebrows drew down in a frown ominously – there was an empty chamber in the cylinder.

"There're only five bullets here," he said, his keen eyes resting on Shipley's face.

"Yes, I always load it that way, leaving the hammer at the empty chamber, so that if it falls and strikes on the hammer it can't explode."

With an "Ugh-huh!" Anderson looked through the barrel. It was of an indeterminate murkiness; this might be due to not having been cleaned for a long time, or a recent discharge.

"I'd better retain this gun, if you don't mind," he said.

Shipley agreed to this readily. Then he said, in a hesitating, apologetic way that was really more irritating than if he had blurted it out: "Mr. Carney, as I have stated, was discovered by me standing over the dead man with a gun in his hand. I think as this point will certainly be brought up at any examination, that Mr. Carney, in justice to himself, should let the Doctor examine his weapon to see that it has not lately been discharged."

Carney started, for he fancied there was a direct implication in this. But the Doctor spoke quickly, brusquely. "Most certainly he should – I clean forgot it."

Carney drew the gun from its leather pocket, broke it, and six lead-nosed.45 shells rolled on the table; not one of the shells had lost its bullet. He passed the gun to Dr. Anderson, who, pointing it toward the light, looked through the barrel.

"As bright as a silver dollar," he commented, relief in his voice; "I'm glad we thought of this." Carney slipped the shells back into the cylinder, and dropped the gun into its holster without comment.

Then the Doctor said: "We can't do anything to-night – we'll only obliterate any tracks and lose good clues. We'll take it up in the morning. You men have got to clear yourselves, so I'd just rest quiet, if I were you. If we go poking about we'll have the whole town about our ears. I'm glad that nobody thought it worth while to investigate if they heard the shot."

"A shot in Bucking Horse doesn't mean much," Carney said, "just a drunken miner, or an Indian playing brave."

It seemed to Carney that Anderson had rather hurried the closing out of the matter, that is, temporarily. It occurred to him that the Scotchman's herring-hued eyes were asking him to acquiesce in what was being done.

Carney lingered when Shipley and Hadley had gone to bed.

The Scotch Doctor had filled a pipe, and Bulldog noticed that as he puffed vigorously at its stem his eyes had wandered several times to the platoon of black bottles ranged with military precision behind the bar.

"I'm tired over this devilish thing," Carney remarked casually, and passing behind the bar he brought out a bottle and two glasses, adding, "Would you mind joining?"

"I'd like it, man. Good whisky is like good law – a wee bit of it is very fine, too much of it is as bad as roguery."

The Doctor quaffed with zest the liquid, wiped his lips with a florid red handkerchief, took a puff at the evil-smelling pipe, and said:

"Court's over! A minute ago I was 'Jeffries, the Hangin' Judge,' and to-morrow, as coroner, I'll be as veecious no doubt; now, ad interim (the Doctor was fond of a legal phrase), I'm going to talk to you, Bulldog, as man to man, because I want your help to pin the right devil. And besides, I have a soft spot in my heart for Jeanette – perhaps it's just her Scotch name, I'm not sayin'. In the first place, Bulldog, has it struck you that you're in fair runnin' to be selected as the man that killed Seth?"

Carney laughed; then he looked quizzically at the speaker; but he could see that the latter was in deadly earnest.

"Mind," the Doctor resumed, "personally I know you didn't do it; that's because I know you devilish well – you're too big for such small-brained acts. But the law is a godless machine; its way is like the way of a brick mason – facts are the bricks that make the structure."

"But the law always searches for the motive, and why should I kill Seth, who was more or less a friend?"

"All the worse. As a matter of fact there are more slayings over strained friendships than over the acquisition of gold. But don't you remember what that foul-mouthed brute, Kootenay Jim, said when Jeanette's brother was near lynched?"

Carney stared; then a little flush crept over his lean tanned face:

"You mean, Doctor, about Jeanette and myself?"

"Aye."

Carney nodded, holding himself silent in suppressed bitterness.

"The same evil mouths will repeat that, Bulldog. And here are the bricks for the law's building. Shipley will swear that he found you bending over the murdered man with a gun in one hand searching his pockets. And I noticed, though I didn't speak of it, there was blood on your hands."

Startled, Carney looked at his fingers; they were blood-stained. Then he drew his gun, saying, "God! and there's blood on this thing, too!"

"There is; I saw it on the butt. And though you broke it here before us to-night to show that it hadn't been discharged, Sergeant Black, while he's thickheaded, will perhaps have wit enough to say that you were off by yourself when you came for me, and could have cleaned house."

"And that swine, Shipley – do you suppose he thought of that, too?"

"I think he did: I did at the time, though I said nothing. You see, Carney, innocent or guilty, he naturally wants to clear himself, and he took a chance. If he's innocent he may really think that you killed Seth, and hoped to find the proof of it in a smudged gun and an empty shell; and if he's guilty, he was directing suspicion towards you, knowing that the clean gun would be nothing in your favor at the examination as you had had the opportunity to put it right. I don't like the incident, nor the man's spirit, but it proves nothing for or against him. I expect he's clever enough to know that the last man seen with a murdered man is, de facto, the slayer."

"As to the matter of the gun," Carney said, "I've an idea Seth was killed with his own gun. He was in a grouchy mood to-night – he always was a damn fool – and he may have pulled his gun, in his usual bluffing way, and the other party twisted it out of his hand and shot him. I only heard one shot." Carney remained silent for a full minute; then he said: "One doesn't care to bring a good woman's name into anything that's evil, but I fancy I'd better tell you: Jeanette was wakened by the shot that wakened me, and we talked in the hall before I went over to the police shack."

"That'll be valuable evidence to establish your alibi, Bulldog – in the eyes of the law, in the eyes of the law."

Then the Doctor puffed moodily at his pipe, and Carney could read the writing on the wall in the irritable little balloons of smoke that went up, the Doctor's unexpressed meaning that gossips would say Jeanette had sworn falsely to clear him. Anderson resumed:

"Hadley was evidently the last man playing cards with Seth, and there was considerable money at stake; that he was still up when the murder was discovered – these things are against him. Supposing he did shoot Seth, he might have come to the hotel and, seeing a light in the' upper hall and hearing Jeanette moving about, might have sat in that dark corner till things had quieted down before going to his room."

"Hadley isn't the kind to commit murder."

"To-night he was another kind of man – he was pretty drunk; and the man that's drunk is like an engine that had lost the governing balls – he has lost control. And the shock of the murder may have sobered him enough to make him a bit cautious."

"But Shipley was out, too," Carney objected. "Aye, he was; and he's got a devilish lame story about going to see Cranford. I don't like his face – ' it's avariciously vicious – he's greedy. But the law can't hang a man for having a bad face; it takes little stock in the physiologist's point of view." Carney sat thinking hard. The full significance of the attached possibilities had been put clearly before him by the astute, canny Scotchman, and he realized that it was friendship. He was certain the Doctor suspected Shipley.

"I wanted to get shut of yon two," the Doctor added, presently, "for you're the man that needs to get this cleared up, and you're the man can do it, even as you caught Jack the Wolf. Is there any clue that we can follow up before the trail gets cold?"

"There is, Doctor. There was a pack of marked cards in Seth's pocket, and they're gone."

"The man that has that pack is the murderer," Dr. Anderson declared emphatically.

"He is."

"And the wallet."

"Yes."

Then Carney explained to the Doctor that the marked pack had, evidently belonged to Seth, and told of the change in cards, and the possibility that Shipley had stood in with Seth on the winnings, letting the latter do all the dirty work, perhaps helping Seth's game along by raising the bet when he knew that Seth held the winning cards.

Again the Doctor consulted his old briar pipe; then he said: "Either Shipley or somebody was in collusion with Seth, you think?"

"Yes."

"If we could get that man – ?"

"Look here, Doctor," and Carney put his hand on the other's knee, "whoever has got that money will not try to take it out over the railroad, for it was in fifty-dollar bills of the Bank of Toronto."

"I comprehend: the wires, and the police at every important point; a search. Aye, aye! What'll he do, Bulldog?"