The Lone Ranger and Tonto by Fran Striker & Francis Hamilton Striker

Author:Fran Striker & Francis Hamilton Striker [Striker, Fran & Striker, Francis Hamilton]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: western
Publisher: Pinnacle Books
Published: 1980-06-15T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter X

TONTO IN THE ROYAL FLUSH

The town was only half awake despite the fact that it was past noon. Dawn had come before the majority of the townsmen left the row of cafés, or abandoned the hunt for the masked man. When the Sheriff and his men arrived after giving up their search, they were told about the robbery at Langford's place and the appearance of the masked man and his escape. Shortly after that, the crowds broke up. Men were tired and went to bed.

So at noon most of the men of Snake River still were in their homes. Tonto, riding Scout and leading Silver, headed slowly down the dusty street. Two men lounged on the porch of the general store and glanced at him as he passed them. He went by the two-story hotel with the false front, and noticed the clerk sitting in his shirt sleeves on the steps with a hat shading his eyes while he dozed in the hot sun. Butterflies and insects hummed and flitted and a four-foot snake lay in the middle of the road quite unmolested.

At the Royal Flush, Tonto halted. He sat before the hitchrack for a moment, studying the battered sign that was pock-marked with bullet holes from the guns of waddies who occasionally came into town to blow a three month's payroll in a three-day spree. The Indian dismounted and tied both horses to the split-rail bar. Then he entered the café.

The place was gloomy after the brilliant sunlight he had left. It reeked of stale liquor, and tobacco fumes still hung heavily in the air. The tables and chairs were pushed back against one wall and piled one atop the other. A red-haired boy slopped water on the floor in a somewhat futile attempt to clean it.

Tonto stood at the door for a moment, unnoticed by the barman or the other occupant who talked with him. The Indian surveyed the room in one glance and then directed his attention to the two men who leaned their elbows on the polished surface, the bald-headed man in the white apron behind it and the man with the deputy sheriff's badge in front. Tonto's moccasined feet made no sound as he took a position at the opposite end of the bar and waited patiently.

The Indian noticed that the deputy sheriff's eyes were red-rimmed and heavy-lidded. His hand made a rest for his chin as he listened to the bartender.

"Yuh shore put on a first-rate act last night, Eph," the barkeeper said. "If I live tuh be a hundred, I'll never forget the way yuh slid across the floor on yer stomach, showin' how yuh dove at the masked man when he made his getaway."

Eph Summers replied with a grunt.

"Yes, siree," the aproned man went on, "yuh should be one of them stage actors that come through here once in a while. I bet a hundred men offered tuh buy drinks fer yuh."

"I bet," replied Eph Summers in a gloomy voice, "that I slid on my stomach about twenty times.

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