Part 56 (1/2)
He drank the coffee slowly, with evident enjoyment.
”Nothing like coffee when your cork's pulled,” he rambled on, slos.h.i.+ng round the last of the coffee in the bottom of the cup. ”It beats whisky, but now that I've had the coffee I don't care if I do. Got a bottle tucked away somewhere, li'l girl?”
She was still unable to speak. Her mouth had an odd, cottony feeling.
She shook her head in reply to his question.
”Is that so?” he said in the chatty tone he had been using. ”I guess maybe you're mistaken.”
He set the cup down on the table, reached down and twisted his fingers into her hair. With a yank that brought the tears springing to her eyes, he said:
”About that bottle now--ain't you a mite mistaken? What's the matter?
Cat got your tongue?”
Again he pulled her hair, pulled it till the tears ran down her cheeks, and she moaned and cried in purest agony.
”C'mon!” directed Dan Slike. ”Quit your bluffin', you triflin' hussy!
You ain't hurt a-tall. And I can't stay here all night while you sit on the floor and beller. Stand up on your two legs and bring me that bottle. And no monkey business either. Say, have you got a six-shooter? Answer me, have you?”
”No! No! I haven't! I haven't another gun.” She told him this lie in such a heart-breaking tone that he was constrained to believe her.
”I'll have to take your word for it,” he grumbled. ”But you remember, girl, the first false move you make with a knife or anything else, I'll blow you apart. d.a.m.n you, get up!”
With which he gave her hair such a terrific twist that the exquisite pain expelled all her initial fear of him, and she leaped at him like a wildcat, her nails curving at his eyes.
Dan Slike dodged backward, set himself and swung his right fist without mercy. He was no boxer. The accurate placing of blows was beyond him.
So it was that the swing intended for her jaw landed on her cheekbone, a much less vulnerable spot. Nevertheless the smash was enough to send her spinning sidewise over a chair and piled her sicker and dizzier than before in a corner of the room.
She lay still and panted.
”You see how it is,” he pointed out. ”You ain't gainin' a thing by fighting me. Might as well be sensible first as last. But lemme tell you if you keep on a-fussin' at me thisaway, I'll sure have to be rough with you.”
He sat down on the edge of the table and rolled a cigarette. Lighting it he drew in a slow luxurious lungful.
”One thing I gotta say for your sheriff,” he observed behind a barrier of smoke, ”he gimme plenty of tobacco while I was his guest. I can't say but he took right good care of me--for a sheriff.”
His incarceration having deprived Dan Slike of conversational opportunities, he was now experiencing the natural reaction. He was talking too much.
”Fed me well too,” he resumed. ”Oh, I ain't complainin'. I--h.e.l.l, your grub's beginnin' to burn. I'll just move those frypans back.
Feelin' any better, girl?”
He came and stood over her, hands on hips, and looked down at her grimly. She shrank away, her wide eyes fixed upon him in fright and loathing.
It was evident that he found his survey of her satisfactory, for he kicked her in the side. Not hard. Simply as an earnest of what lay in store for her in case she chose to continue contumacious. ”Get up,” he commanded.
The nausea and most of the dizzy feeling had evaporated. She was perfectly able to get up, but it was intolerable that she should do the bidding of her uncle's murderer. She continued to lie still.
”Get up!” he repeated, and kicked her again--harder.
She got up, gasping, a hand at her side. She felt as though one of her ribs was broken. His long fingers fastened on the tender flesh of her shoulder. He shoved her across the room. She brought up against the stove. Instinctively she thrust out a hand to save herself. Her bare palm smacked down upon the hottest stove lid.