Chapter II: Knights of the Law

In the wild mountain district where Corporal Dexter and a few knightly comrades rode in the service of the King's Law, there was not more than one officer available to patrol each two hundred square miles of territory. In the back hills were certain inaccessible regions never visited by civilized beings. A crime committed in such an out-of-the-way valley as this might remain unsuspected for years.

The murderer of Constable Graves could have no inkling that a second officer had just ridden down through the passes. It probably did not occur to him that there was any danger of pursuit, and he did not try to mask his trail.

The tracks led for a distance through the thick timber, and then slanted down to the brook and continued northward along the unobstructed course of the stream. The killer walked with a free, unhurried stride, without pausing anywhere by the way to listen or glance behind. Particles of feathery snow still held loosely around the edges of the prints, and Corporal Dexter knew that the maker of the tracks was traveling not more than twenty minutes ahead of him.

For a distance of two miles or so the trail followed the meanderings of the winter-bound brook. But at last, near the banks of a forking stream, the hob nails turned aside and entered a dismal spruce forest that extended upward over the valley slope in an unbroken area of overweighted tree tops. The failing twilight scarcely filtered through the interlaced branches overhead, and Dexter found himself groping among the shadowy tree shapes in a purple-tinged dusk that thickened and deepened as he advanced.

He quickened his pace, hoping to run down his quarry before night overtook him. But he had traveled scarcely five hundred yards among the spruces, when he discovered open ground ahead, and stopped short at the edge of a stumpy clearing, cut in the midst of the standing timber.

Before him in the darkness, vague and unreal as the apparition of a wood troll's dwelling, there loomed the dingy outline of a low-roofed log cabin.

The horseman instinctively reached behind to grab his pony's muzzle. But the precaution was needless. Susy stood with drooping head, and apparently lacked interest to announce her arrival. Dexter eyed her sharply, with a passing glance at the burden she carried, and then turned back to reconnoiter the shadows.

He had not heard of any settlers living on this side of the range. Apparently the builder of this cabin was a newcomer. The logs showed recent ax marks, and the second growth of seedlings had not yet found time to spring up among the stumps.

The silence was like a weight upon the senses. Dexter heard no sound except the faint creak of saddle leather as Susy breathed. He might easily imagine himself alone in all that vast stretch of forest. But as he peered forth from behind his shelter of brush, a vagrant puff of air brought to him an odor of chimney smoke. And as he strained his vision to see in the gathering darkness, he was aware that the hobnail prints ran directly across the open ground to the cabin door.

He left the pony to drowse in the thicket, with the reins dangling from the bit, and strode forward alone into the clearing. Placing his own feet in the marks left by the other boots, he followed his man to the cabin entrance. For ten seconds he held motionless, his foot touching the outer sill. Still he heard no sound. But the line of tracks ended here, and he knew that Constable Graves' murderer was inside the cabin.

Between two men who had not yet seen each other, the door of spruce slabs held shut like the closed book of doom. Once it was opened, the warrant of death for one or the other must be read. If Corporal Dexter crossed the threshold, he would walk forth again to escort a manacled prisoner to the hangman's gibbet at Fort Dauntless; or else he would not walk forth again. It was the custom of the mounted to play for all or nothing, and ask no odds of fortune. The corporal's thin lips harbored a half cynical smile as he accepted the terms. He prayed only that the drawbar was not fastened.

The click of his carbine sounded fearfully loud in his ears as he thumbed back the hammer. He did not wait after that, but reached with his left hand to knock open the wooden latch. The door swung ajar, and he kicked it wide on its squeaking hinges.

Even in that moment one corner of Dexter's restless mind was absurdly detached from the rest of himself, engaged in trivial speculation. The cabin builder must have come there after the grizzlies holed-up for the winter, he reasoned in lightning flashes of thought. Otherwise he would have got a silver tip, and so had bear grease on hand to lubricate hinges. Dexter's orderly soul hated annoyances that could be prevented, such as squeaking doors.

He had crossed the snow-buried sill with crunching feet, and halted on the threshold, his glance sweeping the square, murky space before him. Details impressed themselves instantaneously: walls of peeled logs; tiny, four-paned windows; bare puncheon floor; a disorderly grouping of ax-hewn furniture; a smoldering fire in a clay-daubed fireplace; the pent-in odors of camp stew and wood smoke and steaming garments. A man with a shaggy beard knelt by the fire stirring a cooking pot. He whirled at the rush of cold air from the doorway, and then his stirring spoon rattled on the hearth as he stumbled to his feet.

Corporal Dexter had counted on the chance of there being more than one person in the cabin. And it was well for him that he was on his guard. Some intuitive faculty of the brain served the warning, and without seeing or hearing, he was aware of a gliding movement along the wall at his right. He caught the edge of the door and swung it back towards him as a buckler of defense. As he jerked his head aside a spurt of flame scorched his face, an explosive report slammed in his ears, a bullet plowed the door slab and deflected in spattering pieces.

His face stung from the flying splinters, and there was a trickle of blood at the corner of his eye. Choked by powder fumes, half blinded, he flung the door against the wall. A crouching shape and the oval of a white face loomed in the smoke. He caught the blurred outline of a hand, and a pistol poked almost into his face. Lacking time to shorten the reach of his carbine, he did not try to fire, but struck, instead, with the heavy barrel.

The rap of the steel on knuckle bones gave a crisp, nut-cracking sound. He laughed aloud. There was a thump at his feet, and he saw the pistol on the floor. He could reach the weapon with the toe of his boot, and he worked it towards him and kicked it through the doorway. Then he backed away a pace, with carbine leveled. He spoke with restraint, keeping the excitement from his voice. "Take warning," he said. "I arrest you in the name of His Majesty, the King."

The light from the fireplace reflected upon the shadowy figure of his assailant. The man had clutched at his right hand with his left, and was glaring at the officer with the tense, sullen ferocity of a trapped animal. The position of the hands, partly extended, gripped together in pain, gave unwitting invitation. In a trice Dexter had brought a pair of handcuffs from his pocket. With incredible swiftness he reached forward, and there was a double snick as he linked the steel circlets about the man's wrists and sprang fast the locking wards.

The prisoner shuddered at the cold touch of metal, and shrank backward, an instant too late. He was an under-sized man, sallow of face, with short-cropped black hair, sharp, hawklike features, and dark, wide-spaced eyes that glittered with unnatural brightness in the firelight. The corporal's glance went down to the heavy mountain boots, which his prisoner wore tightly laced over the tucked-in bottoms of his trousers. The boots were wet with melting snow.

He nodded grimly. "Why did you kill Constable Graves?" he asked.

The man turned his head in surly defiance, and refused to answer.

"Who are you?"

The stranger breathed harshly through his open mouth, but still maintained his stubborn silence.

"Very well," said Dexter. "It's your privilege not to commit yourself. But I warn you of the facts to be submitted to the Minister of Justice. Young Graves murdered--thirty caliber bullet through the back of his head. Thirty caliber case in the snow. Queer pattern hobnails leading here--tracks that match those wet boots you're wearing." He glanced sharply about him, and stepped suddenly into the corner and picked up a rifle that was leaning against the wall. "Thirty caliber," he observed, and then threw down the lever to sniff at the breach. "Fired recently, and not yet cleaned," he added, and thrust the weapon behind the door, out of harm's way. "All complete! Not to mention the personal fact that you fired at sight, with murderous intent, when Corporal Dexter strolled into your doorway."

From the moment he had entered the cabin, Dexter had kept the corner of a wary eye on the shaggy-haired individual by the fireplace. The man had scrambled up from his cooking pot when the door banged open, but after that he had remained standing uncertainly on his stumpy legs without venturing to join in the hostilities. Now for the first time the corporal turned to look squarely upon his unkempt bearded countenance. And with the meeting glance the officer's eyelids flickered suddenly in pleased surprise.

Here, at least, was some one he knew without asking introductions. In the travel-stained man with the untidy whiskers, he recognized one of the fugitives whom he had been following across the ranges from Crooked Forks. "Well now!" he ejaculated. "Jess Mudgett!"

"Yes, sir," muttered the other, with a furtive, hangdog lowering of the head.

"Warn you also," asserted the corporal crisply. "You and 'Phonse Doucet assaulted and almost killed the trader at Crooked Forks. He foolishly tried to make you pay the last year's account, I understand. We needn't go into that now. This new matter is more important. Accessory in murder, perhaps. At any rate, you'll go with us to Fort Dauntless. I arrest you in the name of His Majesty, the King."

"I don't know what you're talking about," faltered Mudgett, his forehead paling under the grime. "That storekeeper--I can explain about that. And as for--anything else: I ain't had nothing to do with--anything wrong. I swear my Bible oath."

Dexter surveyed the man curiously. He knew him of old--a trapper in season, general ne'er-do-well at all times, sneak thief on occasion, notorious coward--he never would have assaulted anybody unaided. 'Phonse Doucet, of course, was the instigator in that affair--Doucet, the half-breed, braggadocio and bully, a giant of a man, with a dangerous habit of going amuck when liquor was to be had.

"Where is 'Phonse now?" asked the corporal. "I trailed you two as far as Wild Swan Creek, and then I lost you."

"'Phonse went north," asserted Mudgett. "He'll be far from here by now."

"Who's your new friend?" the officer inquired.

Mudgett started to speak, but at that instant he happened to meet the beady glance of the shackled man across the room; and he received a look of baleful warning that made his teeth click over the half uttered word. He rubbed his nose nervously to hide his confusion. "Never saw him before," he stammered. "Just came here a little while ago for shelter. Didn't tell me his name."

Dexter himself had felt the threat pass, like an electric discharge, and he knew that he could get nothing out of Mudgett while he remained under the malevolent eye of the murderer. He did not attempt to pursue the subject. "Whose cabin is this?" he asked after an interval. "It's new."

"I built it this fall," said Mudgett uneasily. "Figured to trap marten and lynx over the winter."

"All alone?" asked Dexter, who knew that mountain trappers usually worked in pairs.

"No," said Mudgett after a moment's hesitation.

"Is this man here your partner?"

Mudgett shot a furtive glance at the other prisoner, and shook his head. "No," he replied, "I'm working with another man."

"Who?" asked Dexter, eyeing him sharply.

"A fellow named Stark."

"Who's Stark?" the corporal inquired. "Never heard of him."

"Trapper mostly. That's about all I can tell you. I met up with him last summer and we decided to throw in together."

"Where is he now?" asked Dexter with a quizzical stare.

"Somewhere up the valley scoutin' out lines for the traps. Don't know just where."

Acting on impulse the corporal brought out the Bertillon card he had taken from the pocket of Constable Graves. He exhibited the photographic likeness of the man known to the Chicago police as "Pink" Crill. "Is this your Stark, by any chance?"

Mudgett leaned forward to see the print. But if he recognized the ill favored physiognomy, he gave no sign. "Never saw him before," he declared in his whining voice.

The inquiry was leading nowhere, and Dexter decided he might better save his breath until some later moment when he had Mudgett alone. He buttoned the photograph into his tunic, and smiled acidly.

"I'm going out to look after my horse," he observed, "and meanwhile I'll truss you for safekeeping."

He had only the one pair of manacles, but a brief search of the cabin discovered a length of elkhide thong. Approaching Mudgett, he twisted the rawhide about his wrists, and knotted the loop tight. The cringing trapper protested his innocence almost with sobs, but his pleading went unheeded. Dexter glanced about with a speculative frown, and then motioned the man towards the double-decked bunk, built against the wall at the right of the fireplace.

"I'll feel more comfortable about you two if you're in bed," he said. "We all might as well sleep a few hours before we start south. So climb in, please."

There was something in the quality of the corporal's voice that schooled Mudgett to instant obedience. Without a word, the trapper shambled across the floor and hoisted himself into the bunk.

Dexter turned next to the handcuffed man. "You in the upper berth," he commanded.

The stranger stood backed against the logs of the opposite wall, with his shoulders drooping, his arms hanging limply. But as the officer addressed him he looked up with his somber stare. He must have appreciated the futility of resistance however, and after a second's hesitation he lurched forward, and moved towards the bunk on heavy, dragging feet.

"You still prefer to remain nameless?" inquired the corporal.

The prisoner made no answer, but as he stumbled past Dexter he shot him a glance so charged with venom that even the seasoned man-hunter was startled.

The officer refrained from further remarks, and stood by with compressed lips until the man had climbed into the upper berth. Then, in silence, he fastened the booted feet together with unbreakable rawhide. This done, he pushed the end of the thong between a crack of the foot logs, drew it taut, and secured it to the outer bunk post, where the knot could not possibly be reached by manacled hands. Mudgett's feet then were similarly bound, and lashed flat against the end of the bunk.

"I'll ease 'em up a bit when I come back," Dexter promised. "Meanwhile you'll have to make the best of it."

Serene in the knowledge that his prisoners would not escape during his absence, he walked out of the cabin and slammed the door behind him.

It was pitch dark outside, and growing colder. The corporal felt his way across the clearing to the thicket where he had left Susy, and was not greatly astonished to find that the pony had disappeared. His pocket lamp revealed her hoof prints leading through the timber, and he followed her for a half mile or so across the slope, and finally overtook her in an open ravine where she had smelled out a patch of elk hay that could be pawed up from under the snow.

She came back a few steps to meet him, and meekly nudged him with her forehead while she was receiving her deserved scolding. Dexter relieved her of the grim burden she carried. He made a hammock sling of his bed tarp and picket rope; and as the Indians protect their dead, so he hoisted among scented tree branches the muffled figure of his one-time comrade; and left him for the night. This melancholy service rendered, he took off Susy's saddle, removed the bit from her mouth, and permitted her to remain in the gulley where she had found shelter and pasturage for herself.

Then, with his thoughts on the savory pot that Mudgett had so opportunely set stewing in the fireplace, he turned back on the trail and retraced his steps to the clearing among the spruces.

He had been absent nearly an hour, and the unattended grate fire must have burned itself out. Not the faintest flicker of light showed from the cabin windows, and it was impossible to discern even the outline of the building in the all-engulfing darkness. He groped his path among the stumps, and finally reached the door.

Stamping the snow from his feet, he was fumbling for the door latch, when the deathlike silence was suddenly broken by a shrill, whirring sound, as though a bell were ringing.

He stood stock-still, with lips fallen apart, listening in blank astonishment. The bell stopped ringing; there followed a momentary hush; and then he heard a voice speaking. The tones carried to him from the darkness within, clear and distinct. His eyes opened wider, and for seconds he stood motionless on the outer threshold, tense and wondering. Incredulous at first, he knew at once that he could not be mistaken. It was a woman's voice he heard.