Saddlemates by Max Brand

Author:Max Brand
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Published: 2018-03-05T16:54:42+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Two

He stood up and stepped straight toward me. He appeared bigger than a giant, coming with his head among the stars. When he was right at me, I decided that I’d give myself a swift roll, in the hope that he’d stumble and fall down when his toe struck me. And stumble he did, but it happened just before he got to me. I heard him catch his breath, and then he stepped high, right over the flat of my body. I’ve never had better luck than that. He went on a stride or two. I closed my eyes a second, but I had to look out again.

“Find anything, Socks?” said Lefty.

“I don’t seem to find nothing,” said Socks, his words rumbling. “That’s a funny thing, too. It was something that I could pretty near reach out and touch.”

I heard the steps of Lefty as he approached a little closer. “You know how it is,” he said. “Sometimes, when you turn your head sudden, you seem to see a shadow, or a lighter spot, move in the dark.”

“Yeah, I know how it is,” said Socks, still thoughtful.

“You just imagined something,” said Lefty.

I loved hearing him say that.

“I didn’t imagine nothing,” said Socks, getting a little angry. “I seen something come right up and stand here, doggone if I didn’t.”

He turned back and walked in a circle around me. He kicked his boots at the stones. One of them rolled and hit me in the mouth hard, but I didn’t yip. I was gagged by something stronger than a handkerchief.

“I’ll get the lantern, if you think there’s anything,” said Lefty.

“Yeah, there was something, all right,” insisted Socks.

“I’ll get the lantern, then.”

“Yeah, you go and fetch it.”

I could feel myself turn green. I didn’t need a light to tell what color I was, because only that color could explain just the way that I felt. I could hear the footsteps of Lefty as he walked away. Socks stood right over me.

“It’s damn funny,” I heard him say.

Then he made a cigarette. He was standing so close, I could hear the paper rustle in his fingers, and tobacco grains dropped onto my face.

When he lit a match, I looked straight up at him and saw a face black as murder, covered with a short, curling beard. His shirt was open at the throat, and I saw the light glint on the hair of his big, arching chest. He was a man with a pair of shoulders, too.

After he lit his cigarette, he held the match up and squinted. But I knew that he wouldn’t see me unless he bent his head downward. I thought what a fearless kind of a man he was to light a match when he’d heard something prowling around. He might just be holding a match for somebody to shoot him by. Pretty soon the flame burned his fingers, and he threw the spark of the match away with a curse. After that I heard him spitting loose tobacco grains off his tongue and lips, and the sweet, sharp smell of the tobacco loaded the air.

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