Riders of the Silences by Max Brand (top 20 books to read .txt) 📕

Outside, the wind had kept

up a perpetual roaring, and no one noticed the noise of the opening

door. Bud Mansie, facing that door, however, turned a queer yellow

and sat with his lips parted on the last word. He was not pretty to

see. The others turned their heads, and there followed the strangest

panic which Pierre had ever seen.

 

Jim Boone jerked his hand back to his hip, but stayed the motion, half

completed, and swung his hands stiffly above his head. Garry Patterson

sat with his eyes blinked shut, pale, waiting for death to come. Dick

Wilbur rose, tall and stiff, and stood with his hands gripped at his

sides, and Black Morgan Gandil clutched at the table before him and

his eyes wandered swiftly about the room, seeking a place for escape.

 

There was only one sound, and that was a whispering moan of terror

from Jacqueline. Only Pierre made no move, yet he felt as he had when

the black mass of the landslide loomed above him.

 

What he saw in the door was a man of medium size and almost slender

build. In spite of the patch of gray hair at either temple he was only

somewhere between twenty-five and thirty. But to see him was to forget

all details except the strangest face which Pierre had ever seen or

would ever look upon in all his career.

 

It was pale, with a pallor strange to the ranges; even the lips seemed

bloodless, and they curved with a suggestion of a smile that was a

nervous habit rather than any sign of mirth. The nerves of the left

eye were also affected, and the lid dropped and fluttered almost shut,

so that he had to carry his head far back in order to see plainly.

There was such pride and scorn in the man that his name came up to the

lips of Pierre: “McGurk.”

 

A surprisingly gentle voice said: “Jim, I’m sorry to drop in on you

this way, but I’ve had some unpleasant news.”

 

His words dispelled part of the charm. The hands of big Boone lowered;

the others assumed more natural positions, but each, it seemed to

Pierre, took particular and almost ostentatious care that their

right hands should be always far from the holsters of their guns.

 

The stranger went on: “Martin Ryder is finished, as I suppose you

know. He left a spawn of two mongrels behind him. I haven’t bothered

with them, but I’m a little more interested in another son that has

cropped up. He’s sitting over there in your family party and his name

is Pierre. In his own country they call him Pierre le Rouge, which

means Red Pierre, in our talk.

 

“You know I’ve never crossed you in anything before, Jim. Have I?”

 

Boone moistened his white lips and answered: “Never,” huskily, as if

it were a great muscular effort for him to speak.

 

“This time I have to break the custom. Boone, this fellow Pierre has

to leave the country. Will you see that he goes?”

 

The lips of Boone moved and made no sound.

 

He said at length: “McGurk, I’d rather cross the devil than cross you.

There’s no shame in admitting that. But I’ve lost my boy, Hal.”

 

“Too bad, Jim. I knew Hal; at a distance, of course.”

 

“And Pierre is filling Hal’s place in the family.”

 

“Is that your answer?”

 

“McGurk, are you going to pin me down in this?”

 

And here Jack whirled and cried: “Dad, you won’t let Pierre go!”

 

“You see?” pleaded Boone.

 

It was uncanny and horrible to see the giant so unnerved before this

stranger, but that part of it did not come to Pierre until later. Now

he felt a peculiar emptiness of stomach and a certain jumping chill

that traveled up and down his spine. Moreover, he could not move his

eyes from the face of McGurk, and he knew at length that this was

fear—the first real fear that he had ever known.

 

Shame made him hot, but fear made him cold again. He knew that if he

rose his knees would buckle under him; that if he drew out his

revolver it would slip from his palsied fingers. For the fear of death

is a mighty fear, but it is nothing compared with the fear of man.

 

“I’ve asked you a question,” said McGurk. “What’s your answer?”

 

There was a quiver in the black forest of Boone’s beard, and if Pierre

was cold before, he was sick at heart to see the big man cringe

before McGurk.

 

He stammered: “Give me time.”

 

“Good,” said McGurk. “I’m afraid I know what your answer would be now,

but if you take a couple of days you will think things over and come

to a reasonable conclusion. I will be at Gaffney’s place about fifteen

miles from here. You know it? Send your answer there. In the

meantime”—he stepped forward to the table and poured a small drink

of whisky into a glass and raised it high—“here’s to the long health

and happiness of us all. Drink!”

 

There was a hasty pouring of liquor.

 

“And you also!”

 

Pierre jumped as if he had been struck, and obeyed the order hastily.

 

“So,” said the master, pleasant again, and Pierre wiped his forehead

furtively and stared up with fascinated eyes. “An unwilling pledge is

better than none at all. To you, gentlemen, much happiness; to you,

Pierre le Rouge, bon voyage.”

 

They drank; the master placed his glass on the table again, smiled

upon them, and was gone through the door. He turned his back in

leaving. There was no fitter way in which he could have expressed his

contempt.