19 - Alcatraz - Hervey Takes A Trick

None

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter nineteen of Alcatraz by Max Brand. This LibriVox recording
is in the public domain. Hervey takes a trick. The
night before, when Paris rode off from the ranch house
after defying Hervey and his men, His hoof beats had
no sooner faded than nothing than the cowpunchers swarmed out

(00:23):
from the patio and into the open, as though they
wished to put their heads together and planned the battle
which the command of Hervey to night had postponed. All
of that was perfectly clear to Mary Anne. Her call
brought Hervey back to her, and she led him at
once off the veranda and to the living room, where

(00:45):
she could talk, secure of interruption or of being overheard.
There he slumped uninvited into the first easy chair and
sat twirling his sombrero on his finger tips, obviously well
satisfied with himself and the events of the evening. She
herself remained standing, carefully turning her back to the light

(01:08):
so that her face might, as much as possible, be
in shadow, for she knew it was pale, and her
eyes unnaturally large. Hervey must not see, he must not
guess at the torment in her mind, and all the
self revelations which had been pouring into her consciousness during
the past few moments. Greatest of all was one overshadowing fact.

(01:33):
She loved read Jim Parris. What did it matter that
she had seen him so few times and spoke to
him so few words. The word might be a thunderclap,
a glance might carry into the very soul of a man.
And indeed she felt that she had seen that proud, gay,
impatient soul in Jim. What he thought of her was

(01:56):
another matter. That he found a bar between them was plain.
But on the night of his first arrival at the ranch,
when she sang to him, had she not felt him
once twice and again leaning towards her into her life.
And if they met once more, might he not come

(02:16):
all the way? But no matter. The thing now was
to use all her cunning of mind, all her strength
of body, to save him from imminent danger. And the
satisfied glint of Hervey's eye convinced her that the danger
was imminent. Indeed, why he should hate Jim so bitterly

(02:36):
was not clear. That he did so hate the stranger
was self evident. The more she studied her foreman, the
more her terror grew the more her lonely sense of
weakness increased. Mister Hervey, she said, suddenly, what's to be done?
Her heart fell. He had avoided her eyes. I don't know,

(02:59):
said Hervey. You seen to night that I treated him
plumb white. I put my cards on the table, I
warned him fair and square, and that after I'd given
him a week's grace, a gent couldn't do any more
than that. I guess he was right in a way.
At least the whole populace of the mountains would agree

(03:20):
that he had given Red Jim every chance to leave
the ranch peaceably. And if he would not go peaceably,
who could raise a finger against Hervey for throwing the
man off by force? But something more has to be done,
she said, eagerly. It has to be done. Hervey frowned
at her. Look here, he said, in a more dictatorial

(03:44):
manner than he had ever used before. Why are you
so interested in this Paris? She hesitated, but only for
an instant. Why did such a thing as shame matter
when the life of Paris might be saved by a confession?
And certainly Hervey would not dare to proceed against Paris
if she made such a confession. I'm interested, she said steadily,

(04:10):
because he he means more to me than any other
man in the world. She saw the head of the
foreman jerk back, as though he had received a blow
in the face. Mourn your father in a different way. Yes,
more than dad. Hervey rose and stretched an accusing arm
towards her. You're in love with Red Paris, and she

(04:34):
answered him fiercely, Yes, yes, yes, in love with Red Paris.
Go tell every one of your men shame me as
far as you wish. But mister Hervey, you won't dare
lead a gang against him. Now. He drew back from her,
thrust away by her half hysteria of emotion. Won't, I

(04:56):
growled Hervey, regarding her from beneath sternly gathered brows. I
seen something of this to night. I guessed it all.
Won't I lay a hand on a sneaking hound that
comes grinning and talking soft and saying things he don't
half mean. Why it's a better reason for throwing him
off the ranch than I ever had before. Seems to

(05:18):
me you don't mean that, she breathed. Say you don't
mean that. Your dad ain't here. If he was, he'd
say the same as me. I got to act in
his place. You think you like Paris, why you'd be
throwing yourself away. You'd break Oliver Jordan's heart, That's what
you'd do. Her brain was whirling. She grasped at the

(05:41):
first thought that came to her. Then wait till he
comes back before you touch Jim Parris, and let Paris
raise the devil. In the meantime, he laughed in her face.
At least she cried, her voice shrill with anger and fear.
Let me know where he is. Let me send for
him myself. Don't know that I'm exactly sure where he is.

(06:05):
Myself fenced Lou Hervey, ah moaned the girl, half breaking
down under the strain. Why do you hate me? So?
What have I done to you? Nothing? Said Hervey, grimly,
made me the laughing stock of the mountains. That's all
made me a joke. That's all you've done to me,
Lou Hervey and his boss the girl. That's what they've

(06:28):
been saying about me. But I ain't been taking that
to heart. What I'm doing now is for your own good,
only you don't know it. You'll see it later on,
mister Hervey, She pleaded, if it will change you. I'll
give you my oath to stop bothering with the management
of the ranch. You can run it your own way.

(06:48):
I'll leave if you say the word. But I know,
said Hervey. I know what you'd say. But Lord above,
miss Jordan, I ain't doing this for my own sake.
I'm doing it for yours and your He'll thank me
if you don't. Far as Paris goes, i'd he halted.
She sunk into a chair, collapsed into it rather, and

(07:10):
lay there half fainting, with one arm thrown across her face.
Hervey glowered down on her a moment, and then turned
on his heel and left the house. He went straight
to the bunk house, gathered the men about him, and
told them the news boys, he said, the cat's out
of the bag. I've found out everything, and it's what

(07:33):
I've been fearing. She started begging me to keep off
Red Jim's trail. Wouldn't hear no reason. I told her
there wasn't nothing for me to gain by throwing him
off the ranch, except that he'd been ordered off and
he had to go. It make a joke of me
and all of you boys. If the word got around

(07:54):
that one gent had laughed at us and stayed right
in the valley. When we told him to get out,
A fierce volley of curses bore him out. Well, said Hervey.
Then she comes right out and told me the truth.
She is in love with Paris, she told me herself.
They gaped at him. They were young enough, most of them,

(08:17):
and lonely and romantic enough to have looked on mary
Anne with a sort of sad longing which their sense
of humor kept from being anything more aspiring. But to
think that she had given her heart so suddenly and
so freely to this stranger was a shock. Hervey reaped
the harvest of their alarmed glances with a vast inward content.

(08:41):
Every look he met was an incipient gun leveled at
the head of red Jim. Don't make no bones about it,
he said, She plumed, begged for him. Well, boys, she
ain't going to get him. I think too much of
old man Jordan to let his girl run off with
a man killing vagabond like this Paris. He's good looking

(09:02):
and he talks dead easy. That's what turned the trick.
I guess the rest of you would back me up.
The answer was a growl I'll go Bus's neck, said
little Joe furiously, one of them heartbreakers. I figure first thing,
said the foreman, is to see that she doesn't get
to him. If she does, she'll sure run off with him.

(09:25):
But she's easy kept from that, Joe. You and Shorty
watch the horse corrals to night, will you? And don't
let her get through to a horse by talking soft
to you. They vowed that they would be adamant. They
vowed it with many oaths. In fact, the rage of
the cowpunchers was steadily growing red Paris was more than

(09:46):
a mere insolent interloper who had dared to scoff at
the banded powers of the Valley of the Eagles. He
was far worse. He was the most despicable sort of
sneak and thief, for he was trying to steal the
heart and ruin the life of a girl. They had
looked upon the approaching conflict with Paris as a bitter

(10:07):
pill that must be swallowed for the sake of the
Valley of the Eagle's outfit. They looked upon it from
this moment as a religious duty from which no one
with the name of a man dared to shrink. Little
Joe and Shorty at once started for the corral. The
others gathered around the foreman for further details, but he

(10:29):
waved them away and retired to his own bunk, for
he never used a little room at the end of
the building, which was set aside for the foreman. He
lived and slept and ate among his cowpunchers, and that
was one reason for his hold over them. At his bunk,
he produced writing materials scribbled hastily. Dear Jordan, hell has

(10:53):
busted loose. I played Paris with a long rope. I
gave him a week because Miss Jordan asked me to,
but at the end of the week he still wasn't
ready to go. Seems that he's crazy to get Alcatraz
talks about the horse like a drunk, talking about booze
plumb disgusting. But when I told him to go to night,

(11:15):
he up and said that there wasn't enough men in
the valley to throw him off the ranch. I would
have taken a fall out of him for that, but
Miss Jordan stepped in and kept me away from him. Afterwards,
I had a talk with her. She begged me not
to go after Paris because he would fight, and that
meant a killing. I told her I had to do

(11:38):
what I said i'd do. Then she busted out and
told me that she loved Paris. Seemed to think that
would keep me from going after Paris. She might have
known that it was the very thing that would make
me hit the trail. I'm not going to stand by
and see a skunk like Paris run away with your
girl while you ain't on the ranch. I've just given

(12:01):
orders to a couple of the boys to see that
she doesn't get a horse to go out to Paris
tomorrow or the next day. I'll settle his hash. This
letter may make you think you'd better come back to
the ranch, but take my advice and stay off. I
can handle this thing better while you're away. If you're here,

(12:21):
you'll have to listen to a lot of begging and crying.
Come back in a week and everything will be cleared up.
Take it easy and don't worry none. I'm doing my
best for you and your daughter, even if she don't
know it. Sincerely, lou Hervey. The letter when completed, he

(12:42):
surveyed with considerable complaisance. If ever a man were being
bound to another by chains of inseparable gratitude. Oliver Jordan
was he. Indeed, the whole affair was working out so smoothly,
so perfectly, that Hervey felt the thrill of an artist
sketch in a large and harmonious composition. In the first place,

(13:04):
Read Jim Parris, whom he hated with unutterable fervor, because
the younger man filled him with dread, would be turned,
as Hervey expressed it, into buzzard food, and Hervey would
be praised for the act. Oliver Jordan, owing the preservation
of his daughter from a luckless marriage to the vigilance
of his foreman, could never regret the life contract which

(13:28):
he had drawn up. No doubt that contract as it
stood could never hold water in the law, but Jordan's
gratitude would make it proof. Last of all, and best
of all. When Paris was disposed of, Marianne would never
be able to remain on the ranch. She would go
to forget her sorrow among her school friends in the east,

(13:51):
and Hervey, undisputed lord and master of the ranch, could
bleed it white in half a dozen years and leave
it a mere husk, overladened with mortgages. No wondrous song
was in the heart of the foreman. As he sealed
the letter, he gave the message to Slim and added directions.

(14:12):
You'll be missing from the party, he said, has he
handed over the letter. But the party we have with
Paris is apt to be pretty much like a party
with a wildcat. You can thank your stars. You'll be
on the road when it comes off. And Slim had
sense enough to nod in agreement. End of Chapter nineteen.