Savage Range by Luke; Short Page B

clearly see. He’d better take a good look, he thought, because that freight wagon was the last thing he’d see when he was at peace with the world.
    He climbed down and continued his examination of the cell. It was solid and had probably housed many men as desperate as he was until the hour of their sentence.
    Lying down on the cot, he rehearsed all the jail escapes he had ever heard of. But all of them precluded a situation that was not guarded by five grim men in the next room.
    He lay awake for hours, waiting for dawn, listening to the quiet of the town. If he ever got out of here, he would spend the rest of his life hunting down Max Bonsell and killing him. It was a wholly impersonal anger that did not include self-pity; it was an anger at injustice, at a frame-up.
    A sound drifted into his consciousness and roused him. He listened. A sifting of gravel rattled faintly on the screen. Rising, he stood on the cot and looked out of the window. There was no one there. Then, just as he was about to step down off the cot, Cope’s egg-bald head appeared.
    â€œWell, you done it,” Cope announced grimly.
    Jim said guardedly, “Done what?” because hadn’t he heard Cope out in the front room with those others?
    â€œDidn’t you suspect a damn thing about Bonsell?” Cope said angrily. “How old are you, Wade?”
    â€œA broke man can’t afford to suspect,” Jim retorted.
    â€œHe can’t afford not to,” Cope replied. He was silent a minute. “Can you get out of there?”
    â€œHow?”
    â€œI’m askin’ you.”
    â€œNot without a gun.”
    â€œThat’s out.” He paused. “I can get you out.”
    Jim hesitated. “Why should you?” he murmured.
    â€œYou’re too good a bucko to die on a cottonwood limb, for one thing,” Cope said gravely. “Another is, we need you.”
    â€œWho’s ‘we’?”
    â€œDo you want out of there bad enough to find out?”
    â€œI want out mighty bad,” Jim said fervently.
    â€œYou aim to run when you’re out?”
    â€œNot before I nail Bonsell’s hide to the wall,” Jim answered quietly.
    Cope almost chuckled. “Then you’ll stick?”
    â€œTill hell won’t have me,” Jim said.
    â€œAll right.” With incredible silence, Cope hoisted a huge logging-chain up even with the window. He slipped its big hook between the bars and the screen, then hooked it over the shank of the chain.
    â€œSee that freight wagon?” Cope asked.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œIn half an hour, Jody Capper will hook five teams to it and head for the mines at Tres Piedras. Those broncs will be salty and they’ll try to break harness the minute they hear his whip. This chain will be hooked to the rear axle of the wagon. When the window goes out you follow it. Cut across behind the hotel, then turn right, and make for behind my saloon. There’s stairs on the north side of it. Climb ’em and go into my rooms. I’ll be there.”
    Jim was silent a long moment. “How do I know this isn’t an excuse to avoid a trial by cuttin’ down on me the minute I get out?”
    â€œYou don’t,” Cope said, and vanished from sight.
    Jim watched. He saw Cope couple another length of logging-chain to the one at the window, then trail it over to the wagon. A third length he coupled to this, then, crawling under the wagon, he fastened it to the axle.
    What he did next fascinated Jim. He moved leaves from the ditch over onto the logging-chain. When he came to the boardwalk, he lifted a section of it out from under the chain and put the walk back on top of it. Then, taking a whiskbroom from his hip pocket, he carefully brushed out his tracks, working especially hard on the indentations his crutch had made. When he was finished, he waved to Jim and vanished into the night.
    The wait was interminable, but Jim never left the