Part 24 (1/2)
”It wasn't anybody you could _see_. Don't you remember what I said about a knife in the night, or a shot in the dark? Man, do you have to be killed before you're convinced?”
”Well--uh--I--”
”Whadda you guess I was standin' alongside of you for while you was talkin' to that other feller, huh? Tryin' to listen to what you was sayin'? Think so, huh?”
”You sh.o.r.e had yore nerve,” he said, admiringly--and helplessly.
”Nerve nothin'!” she denied. ”He wouldn't shoot through me. I know that well enough.”
”Why wouldn't he? And how do you know?”
”Because, and I do. That's enough.”
”Which particular _one_ is he?”
”I ain't sayin'.”
”Do you like him as much as that?” Shrewdly.
”Not the way you mean.” Dispa.s.sionately.
”Then who is he?”
”I ain't sayin', I tell you!”
”You snitched on Nebraska.” Persuasively.
”This feller's different.”
”How different?”
”None of yore business. Lookit, I'm doin' my best for you, but I won't have the luck every time that I had to-night--nor you won't, neither.
Gawd! if I hadn't just happened to strike for a night off this evenin'
I dunno where you'd be!”
”Say, I thought you didn't dare let them see you have anythin' to do with me?”
”I didn't, and I don't. But I had to. I couldn't set by an' let you be plugged, could I? Hardly.”
”But--”
”'Tsall right, 'tsall right. Don't you worry any about me. I got a ace in the hole if the weather gets wet. But I wanna tell you this: If yo're bound to go on playin' the fool, keep a-movin' and walk round a lighted window like it's a swamp.”
She dodged past him and was gone. He made no move to follow. He pushed back his hat and scratched his head.
”h.e.l.luva town this is,” he muttered. ”Can't stand still any more without having some sport draw a fine sight where you'll feel it most.”
After she left Racey Dawson Marie diagonalled across Main Street, pa.s.sed between the dance hall and Dolan's warehouse, and made her way to the most outlying of the half-dozen two-room shacks scattered at the back of the dance hall. She entered the shack, felt for the matches in the tin tobacco-box nailed against the wall, and struck one to light the lamp. Like the provident miss she was she turned the wick down after lighting in order that the chimney might heat slowly.