The Trail Rider/Chapter 23
WINCH had disappeared when Texas started to the hotel. Texas believed he had gone to the livery stable to leave his horse, doubtless having returned to Cottonwood with the intention of making a considerable stay.
Mrs. Goodloe was in the hotel office, gasping and shaking her head, and laboring to express to herself her astonishment and grief over the shocking downfall of Cottonwood's financial pillar. She was wearing a new plaid waist that morning, with most surprising effect on her facial peculiarities, and this, together with the excitement under which she labored, had turned her into the homeliest human that Hartwell had ever seen.
"Ain't it awful about Henry Stott?" she said, as Texas appeared in the door.
"Not so bad for him, I guess, ma'am, as the folks he's robbed."
"No, hangin's too good for that man if they ketch him. Malvina, she's in her room cryin' her eyes out over the seven hundred dollars she had in the bank, and her slavin' nearly five years to git ahead that much over payin' for the house."
"You don't tell me, ma'am! I didn't know she was a depositor, but I reckon most everybody was."
"Ollie had ninety dollars, there, too. He's sorry now he didn't cut Stott's throat the last time he had him in his chair, and he'd 'a' done it, too, if he'd 'a' knowed what was in his rascally mind!"
"Has he gone out with the posse to hunt for track of Stott?"
"No, he's over at the shop. Zeb Smith's roamin' around agin, out of a job since Mackey sold and skipped."
"He's a mighty ornery man, ma'am."
"Yes, and Ollie says he ain't worth killin', but he knows he'll have to do it before he'll have any peace."
"Has anybody been in lookin' for me, ma'am?"
"No, Texas; nobody ain't."
"I'm goin' up to my room to write a letter, and I wish you'd call me if anybody comes askin'."
"Sure I will, Texas."
Hartwell had little business to leave behind him if he should be summoned suddenly from the world, but what there was he wanted to set straight. There was a shadowy possibility that something might come in time out of the present worthless investments in Kansas City. The deeds to these melancholy stretches of vacant fields he had carried in his blanket roll when he came to Cottonwood. Now he wrapped them and addressed them to his sister, with a letter for Malvina, directing her to post the packet in the event of his death.
That done, he polished his boots, put on his black coat, and prepared himself to quit this life with dignity and decency, according to the way that he had lived it. He was brushing his hat by the window when he saw Fannie ride by, just catching an identifying glimpse of her in the angling view that his window gave of the street.
He thrust the papers, which he wanted them to find on his dead body if he should fall, into the breast pocket of his coat and hurried down-stairs. When he reached the street, Fannie was half way to Uncle Boley's and, coming from the opposite direction a little way beyond her, Dee Winch, turning his head from side to side as he rode, as if searching for somebody among the people on the walks.
It was all to make a show and a parade of it beforehand, this riding around on the pretense that he had to seek him out, thought Texas, as suddenly resentful over the little gun-slinger's behavior as if he had slapped him in the face. Winch must have known where to look for him all the time. Even if his messenger had failed to return Hartwell's answer to him, he had only to inquire in passing where to find the man whom he sought.
Hartwell hurried along the comparatively empty sidewalk, keeping to the outer edge to make himself conspicuous in Winch's eyes. Fannie was about a hundred yards ahead of him, riding in a slow walk.
Texas noted that a considerable number of cattlemen had returned to town. Among them he recognized several who had been in the party that rode to turn the Texas invaders, and these looked hard at him, and stood together talking and watching him after he had passed. Their action and numbers concerned him little now. Winch was before him; the long waiting and listening were at an end. Up the street he saw Uncle Boley in front of his shop, his black alpaca coat on, his beard about him like a fog.
About midway between the old man and Hartwell, Fannie and Winch met. A moment before she passed him, Fannie jerked her horse sharply and rode in front of Winch, changing her course so abruptly that the animals almost collided. This threw her on the left-hand side of Winch, and, as she came face to face with him, she raised her quirt with her left hand and struck him a sharp blow across the face.