James Beardley Hendryx - Black John of Halfaday Creek (James B. Hendryx) (Literary Thoughts Edition)

Black John shook his head solemnly. “Tch, tch, tch,” he uttered. “Don’t it beat hell how some folks carries on? It’s almost enough to make a man lose faith in human nature.”

“Sure it is,” agreed Beezely indignantly. “I could have got twice that amount out of those bonds if I could have stayed on for a few days longer in Chicago, or had time to slip down to Frisco. It’s a damn shame how they’ll take advantage of a man. But, of late, it seems that every man’s hand is against me. Why, gentlemen—I haven’t even a relative in the world to turn to!”

With his money locked in Cushing’s safe, Beezely shared Black John’s cabin, spending his days roaming up or down the creek inspecting the abandoned claims that the big man described to him, and his evenings in playing stud in the saloon.

One morning, a week after Beezely’s arrival, Cush asked Black John an abrupt question as the two stood drinking together at the bar: “How do you like yer lodger, John?”

Black John grinned. “Oh, about as well as the average man would, I s’pose. Why?”

“Nothin’—except that it looks to me like he could of found some place to suit him before this. Here he’s be’n pokin’ around amongst all the empty shacks on the crick fer a week.”

“Yeah, he went ’way up that feeder to look over Whisky Bill’s old shack today. I was tellin’ him about it last night.”

“Olson’s old cabin, down the crick, is the best of the bunch—best claim, too.”

“Yeah, that’s what I told him. But when I told him about Olson an’ Stamm an’ some of the others that’s sojourned in it, he claimed it was too onlucky to suit him.”

“Huh,” grunted Cush, “with his luck, it don’t look like he’d have to worry none. He ain’t made a damn losin’ at stud yet. Wins every night. Jest shoved ten thousan’ more in the safe fer him this mornin’!”

“H-u-m, that makes a hundred an’ thirteen thousan’, don’t it?”

“Shore it does. An’ I’m jest wonderin’ if he ain’t crooked.”

Black John’s grin widened. “Why, Cush! Shorely you wouldn’t suspect a lawyer that would do all he done fer his clients, of crookedness, would you?”

“Well, I don’t know. About the cards, I mean. It looks like he’s got jest too damn much luck fer one man to have. But we’ve never ketched him at nothin’. An’ several of the boys has be’n watchin’ pretty clost, too. Tellin’ you about me, I ain’t never seen no man yet which he had a couple of snake eyes set right up agin a thin nose that I’d trust him very fer. This here Beezely—every time he opens them hard, thin lips of his’n, I expect to see a forked tongue snick out an’ in. An’ another thing, I don’t like the way them eyes sort of lingers on the safe, neither.”

“Oh, he’s jest kind of interested in the safe, I guess. He’s got quite a lot in it.”

“Yeah,” answered Cush dryly. “An’ so’ve we.”

A form darkened the doorway, and a man stepped hurriedly into the room and advanced to the bar. Both saw that he was one Booker T. Breckenridge, a name-canner who had appeared on Halfaday some six months before and located a claim up the creek. He was a quiet man who minded his own business. Black John rather liked him.

“Hello, Book,” he greeted. “Jest in time to jine us in a drink. Cush is about to buy one.”

Old Cush slid a glass toward the newcomer and entered a round of drinks against Black John in the day book. Breckenridge downed the drink and turned to the big man.

“Kin I see you a few minutes alone?” he asked. “It’s important.”

“Why, shore. Jest step on over to my cabin.” When the two were seated Black John filled and lighted his pipe. “What’s on yer mind?” he asked abruptly. “I ain’t seen you around fer a couple of weeks.”

“No, I be’n workin’ pretty hard up on the claim. That stuff’s gittin’ better as she goes down. What I wanted to tell you—I come up out of the hole this mornin’ to crank up my bucket, when who the hell was standin’ there but old Quince Beezely, the crookedest damn skunk that ever walked on his hind legs! An’, what’s more, he claimed he was stoppin’ with you.”

“Yeah,” admitted the big man. “Beezely’s stoppin’ here till he kin look him up a location.”

“Location—hell! He’s got his location all right!”

“Goin’ into Whisky Bill’s old shack, eh? Well, that ain’t sech a bad proposition, if a man was to work it right.”

“Goin’ into Cush’s safe!” exploded the other. “Old Quince never got his claws on an honest dollar in his life.”

“What makes you say he’s crooked?” asked Black John mildly. “He told me he was a criminal lawyer.”

The other’s lips twisted into a wry grin. “He is,” he said. “Both. An’ the reason I say he’s crooked is because it’s the God’s truth. He’s crooked, an’ he’s smart—so damn smart that if he hadn’t be’n crooked he could have cleaned up a million.”

“Then he ain’t smart,” grinned Black John.

“That’s right, too—in a way. What I mean, there wasn’t a mouthpiece in the country that could keep a guy out of stir, like Quince Beezely could. He knows all the old tricks—an’ invented new ones. He’d have a jury wipin’ the sympathy out of their eyes fer some stiff that bumped off his gran’mother fer her insurance money. He’d grease everyone from the cops to the judge, an’ fix the jury, to boot. He’d git a yegg out on bail so he could pull some job that would pay fer his defense. Not only that, he’d lay out the job fer him, an’ case it, an’ then dispose of the stuff—an’ then he’d git the guy off when he come to trial.

“An’ not only that, but he’d work on the parole board fer some guy that was already doin’ a stretch. Oh, he was a lulu—Quince was—until he got to playin’ both ends against the middle.”

“Yeah,” observed Black John. “He told me that he always had the best interests of his clients at heart.”

“An’ that’s a damn lie, too,” retorted the other. “Here’s one he pulled a year ago—jest before I come away. He laid out a big mail-robbery job an’ got a mob together that was the tops. The job was pulled. The boys took that mail-car like nobody’s business an’ made a clean git-away to a bungalow Quince had rented over on the west side. There was about twenty, thirty thousan’ in cash . . . an’ bonds that run right around a quarter of a million. Quince took over all the stuff—the cash fer the fall money, in case anything went wrong—an’ the bonds to dispose of when the heat cooled.

“Well—somethin’ went wrong, all right. Two nights later the cops crashed the hide-out an’ gathered in the whole mob. One dick got knocked off—an’ that made two murders, countin’ the mail clerk. What happened? Quince had tipped off the bulls, see? But up to then the mob didn’t know that. They laid their hard luck to Dopey Dick Fliegle, ’cause he’d slipped out to the corner the night before to git a newspaper. The boys didn’t worry none. They figgered they wasn’t so bad off. Old Quince would sure clear ’em at the trial. But Quince didn’t. He lost every one of them cases. The whole mob—there was six of ’em—got life—an’ Quince got the cash an’ the bonds.

“The boys tumbled then. They squawked their heads off down in Joliet. But you know how much weight a guy’s squawk carries when he’s in stir fer the long stretch—an’ not a friend on the outside. They laughed at ’em.”

Black John’s brow knitted in a frown. “Didn’t they have no connections—no pals on the outside—that would sort of take care of Beezely fer double-crossin’ ’em?”