The Project Gutenberg EBook of Gunman's Reckoning, by Max Brand

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Title: Gunman's Reckoning

Author: Max Brand

Release Date: November 22, 2003 [EBook #10066]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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GUNMAN'S RECKONING

By

Max Brand

1921

GUNMAN'S RECKONING

1

The fifty empty freights danced and rolled and rattled on the rough road
bed and filled Jericho Pass with thunder; the big engine was laboring
and grunting at the grade, but five cars back the noise of the
locomotive was lost. Yet there is a way to talk above the noise of a
freight train just as there is a way to whistle into the teeth of a
stiff wind. This freight-car talk is pitched just above the ordinary
tone--it is an overtone of conversation, one might say--and it is
distinctly nasal. The brakie could talk above the racket, and so, of
course, could Lefty Joe. They sat about in the center of the train, on
the forward end of one of the cars. No matter how the train lurched and
staggered over that fearful road bed, these two swayed in their places
as easily and as safely as birds on swinging perches. The brakie had
touched Lefty Joe for two dollars; he had secured fifty cents; and since
the vigor of Lefty's oaths had convinced him that this was all the money
the tramp had, the two now sat elbow to elbow and killed the distance
with their talk.

"It's like old times to have you here," said the brakie. "You used to
play this line when you jumped from coast to coast."

"Sure," said Lefty Joe, and he scowled at the mountains on either side
of the pass. The train was gathering speed, and the peaks lurched
eastward in a confused, ragged procession. "And a durned hard ride it's
been many a time."

"Kind of queer to see you," continued the brakie. "Heard you was rising
in the world."

He caught the face of the other with a rapid side glance, but Lefty Joe
was sufficiently concealed by the dark.

"Heard you were the main guy with a whole crowd behind you," went on the
brakie.

"Yeh?"

"Sure. Heard you was riding the cu