It need hardly be said that Duke Morgan laid claim also to the Calabasas Spring. But on this the company, being a corporation, fought him. And after somewhat less of argument and somewhat more of siege and shooting, a compromise was reached whereby the company bought annually at an exorbitant price all of Duke, Satterlee, and Vance Morgans hay, and as the Morgans had small rivers of water in the mountains, and never, except when crowded, drank water, a modus vivendi was arranged between the claimants. The only sufferer through this was the Mexican publican, who found every Morgan his landlord, and demanding from him tithes over the bar. But force is usually met with cunning, and such Morgans as would not pay in advance at Calabasas, when thirsty, often found the half-mad publican out of goods.
The Calabasas Inn stood in one of the loneliest canyons of the whole seventy miles between Sleepy Cat and Thief River; it looked in its depletion to be what it was, a sombre, mysterious, sun, wind, and alkali beaten pile, around which no one by any chance ever saw a sign of life. It was a ruin like those pretentious deserted structures sometimes seen in frontier townsrelics of the wide-open days, which stand afterward, stark and sombre, to serve as bats nests or blind-pigs. The inn at Calabasas looked its parta haunt of rustlers, a haven of nameless men, a refuge of road-agents.
The very first time de Spain made an inspection trip over the stage line with Lefever, he was conscious of the sinister air of this lonely building. He and Lefever had ridden down from the barn, while their horses were being changed, to look at the place. De Spain wanted to look over everything connected in any way, however remotely, with the operation of his wagons, and this joint, Lefever had told him, was where the freighters and drivers were not infrequently robbed of their money. It was here that one of their own men, Bill McCarty, once scratched a mans neck with a knifewhich, Bill explained, he just happened to have in his handfor cheating at cards. Lefever pointed out the unlucky gamblers grave as he and de Spain rode into the canyon toward the inn.
Not a sign of any sort was displayed about the habitation. No man was invited to enter, no man warned to keep out, none was anywhere in sight. The stage men dismounted, threw their lines, pushed open the front door of the house and entered a room of perhaps sixteen by twenty feet. It had been the original barroom. A long, high,
elaborately carved mahogany bar, as much out of keeping as it possibly could be with its surroundings, stretched across the farther side of the room. The left end, as they faced the bar, was brought around to escape a small window opening on a court or patio to the rear of the room. Back of the bar itself, about midway, a low door in the bare wall gave entrance to a rear room. Aside from this big, queer-looking piece of mahogany, the low window at the left end of it, and the low door at the back, the room presented nothing but walls. Two windows flanking the front door helped to light it, but not a mirror, picture, chair, table, bottle, or glass was to be seen. De Spain covered every feature of the interior at a glance. Quiet around here, John, he remarked casually.
This is the quietest place in the Rocky Mountains most of the time. But when it is noisy, believe me, it is noisy. Look at the bullet-holes in the walls.
The old story, remarked de Spain, inspecting with mild-mannered interest the punctured plastering, they always shoot high.
He walked over to the left end of the bar, noting the hard usage shown by the ornate mahogany, and spreading his hands wide open, palms down, on the face of it, glanced at the low window on his left, opening on the gravelled patio. He peered, in the semidarkness, at the battered door behind the bar.
Henry, observed Lefever, if you are looking for a drink, it would only be fair, as well as politic, to call the Mexican.
Thank you, John, Im not looking for one. And I know you dont drink.
You want to know, then, where the Mexican keeps his gun? hazarded Lefever.
Not especially. I just want to know
Everything.
Whats behind the bar. Thats natural, isnt it?
Very complete fittings and compartments told of the labor spent in preparing this inner side for the convenience of the bartender and the requirements of exacting patrons, but nothing in the way of equipment, not so much as a pewter spoon, lay anywhere visible.
De Spain, turning, looked all around the room again. You wouldnt think, he said slowly, from looking at the place there was a road-agent within a thousand miles.
You wouldnt think, from riding through the Superstition Mountains there was a lion within a thousand miles. Ive hunted them for eleven years, and I never saw one except when the dogs drove em out; but for eleven years they saw me. If we havent been seen coming in here by some of this Calabasas bunch, I miss my guess, declared Lefever cheerfully.
The batten door behind the bar now began to open slowly and noiselessly. Lefever peered through it. Come in, Pedro, he cried reassuringly, come in, man. This is no officer, no revenue agent looking for your license. Meet a friend, Pedro, he continued encouragingly, as the swarthy publican, low-browed and sullen, emerged very deliberately from the inner darkness into the obscurity of the barroom, and bent his one good eye searchingly on de Spain. This, Lefevers left hand lay familiarly on the back of de Spains shoulder, is our new manager, Mr. Henry de Spain. Henry, shake hands with Mexico.