First Principles

: 'firebrand' Trevison

Judge Lindman shivered, though a merciless, blighting sun beat down on the

great stone ledge that spread in front of the opening, smothering him with

heat waves that eddied in and out, and though the interior of the

low-ceilinged chamber pulsed with the fetid heat sucked in from the plains

generations before. The adobe walls, gray-black in the subdued light, were

dry as powder and crumbling in spots, the stone floor was exposed in any

places; there was a strange, sickening odor, as though the naked,

perspiring bodies of inhabitants in ages past had soaked the walls and

floor with the man-scent, and intervening years of disuse had mingled

their musty breath with it. But for the presence of the serene-faced,

steady-eyed young man who leaned carelessly against the wall outside,

whose shoulder and profile he could see, the Judge might have yielded

completely to the overpowering conviction that he was dreaming, and that

his adventures of the past twelve hours were horrors of his imagination.

But he knew from the young man's presence at the door that his experience

had been real enough, and the knowledge kept his brain out of the

threatening chaos.



Some time during the night he had awakened on his cot in the rear room of

the courthouse to hear a cold, threatening voice warning him to silence.

He had recognized the voice, as he had recognized it once before, under

similar conditions. He had been gagged, his hands tied behind him. Then he

had been lifted, carried outside, placed on the back of a horse, in front

of his captor, and borne away in the darkness. They had ridden many miles

before the horse came to a halt and he was lifted down. Then he had been

forced to ascend a sharp slope; he could hear the horse clattering up

behind them. But he had not been able to see anything in the darkness,

though he felt he was walking along the edge of a cliff. The walk had

ended abruptly, when his captor had forced him into his present quarters

with a gruff admonition to sleep. Sleep had come hard, and he had done

little of it, napping merely, sitting on the stone floor, his back against

the wall, most of the time watching his captor. He had talked some, asking

questions which his captor ignored. Then a period of oblivion had come,

and he had awakened to the sunshine. For an hour he had sat where he was,

looking out at his captor and blinking at the brilliant sunshine. But he

had asked no questions since awakening, for he had become convinced of the

meaning of all this. But he was intensely curious, now.



"Where have you brought me?" he demanded of his jailor.



"You're awake, eh?" Trevison grinned as he wheeled and looked in at his

prisoner. "This," he waved a hand toward the ledge and its surroundings,

"is an Indian pueblo, long deserted. It makes an admirable prison, Judge.

It is also a sort of a fort. There is only one vulnerable point--the slope

we came up last night. I'll take you on a tour of examination, if you

like. And then you must return here, to stay until you disclose the

whereabouts of the original land record."



The Judge paled, partly from anger, partly from a fear that gripped him.



"This is an outrage, Trevison! This is America!"



"Is it?" The young man smiled imperturbably. "There have been times during

the past few weeks when I doubted it, very much. It is America, though,

but it is a part of America that the average American sees little of--that

he knows little of. As little, let us say, as he knows of the weird

application of its laws--as applied by some judges." He smiled as

Lindman winced. "I have given up hoping to secure justice in the regular

way, and so we are in the midst of a reversion to first principles--which

may lead us to our goal."



"What do you mean?"



"That I must have the original record, Judge, I mean to have it."



"I deny--"



"Yes--of course. Deny, if you like. We shan't argue. Do you want to

explore the place? There will be plenty of time for talk."



He stepped aside as the Judge came out, and grinned broadly as he caught

the Judge's shrinking look at a rifle he took up as he turned. It had been

propped against the wall at his side. He swung it to the hollow of his

left elbow. "Your knowledge of firearms convinces you that you can't run

as fast as a rifle bullet, doesn't it, Judge?"



The Judge's face indicated that he understood.



"Ever make the acquaintance of an Indian pueblo, Judge?"



"No. I came West only a year ago, and I have kept pretty close to my

work."



"Well, you'll feel pretty intimate with this one by the time you leave

it--if you're obstinate," laughed Trevison. He stood still and watched the

Judge. The latter was staring hard at his surroundings, perhaps with

something of the awed reverence that overtakes the tourist when for the

first time he views an ancient ruin.



The pueblo seemed to be nothing more than a jumble of adobe boxes piled in

an indiscriminate heap on a gigantic stone level surmounting the crest of

a hill. A sheer rock wall, perhaps a hundred feet in height, descended to

the surrounding slopes; the latter sweeping down to join the plains. A

dust, light, dry, and feathery lay thickly on the adobe boxes on the

surrounding ledge on the slopes, like a gray ash sprinkled from a giant

sifter. Cactus and yucca dotted the slopes, thorny, lancelike, repellent;

lava, dull, hinting of volcanic fire, filled crevices and depressions, and

huge blocks of stone, detached in the progress of disintegration, were

scattered about.



"It has taken ages for this to happen!" the Judge heard himself

murmuring.



Trevison laughed lowly. "So it has, Judge. Makes you think of your school

days, doesn't it? You hardly remember it, though. You have a hazy sort of

recollection of a print of a pueblo in a geography, or in a geological

textbook, but at the time you were more interested in Greek roots, the

Alps, Louis Quinze, the heroes of mythology, or something equally foreign,

and you forgot that your own country might hold something of interest for

you. But the history of these pueblo towns must be pretty interesting, if

one could get at it. All that I have heard of it are some pretty weird

legends. There can be no doubt, I suppose, that the people who inhabited

these communal houses had laws to govern them--and judges to apply the

laws. And I presume that then, as now, the judges were swayed by powerful

influences in--"



The Judge glared at his tormentor. The latter laughed.



"It is reasonable to presume, too," he went on, "that in some cases the

judges rendered some pretty raw decisions. And carrying the supposition

further, we may believe that then, as now, the poor downtrodden

proletariat got rather hot under the collar. There are always some

hot-tempered fools among all classes and races that do, you know. They

simply can't stand the feel of the iron heel of the oppressor. Can you

picture a hot-tempered fool of that tribe abducting a judge of the court

of his people and carrying him away to some uninhabited place, there to

let him starve until he decided to do the right thing?"



"Starve!" gasped the Judge.



"The chambers and tunnels connecting these communal houses--they look like

mud boxes, don't they, Judge? And there isn't a soul in any of them--nor a

bite to eat! As I was about to remark, the chambers and tunnels and the

passages connecting these places are pretty bare and cheerless--if we

except scorpions, horned toads, centipedes, tarantulas--and other equally

undesirable occupants. Not a pleasant place to sojourn in until--How long

can a man live without eating, Judge? You know, of course, that the

Indians selected an elevated and isolated site, such as this, because of

its strategical advantages? This makes an ideal fort. Nobody can get into

it except by negotiating the slope we came up last night. And a rifle in

the hands of a man with a yearning to use it would make that approach

pretty unsafe, wouldn't it?"



"My God!" moaned the Judge; "you talk like a man bereft of his senses!"



"Or like a man who is determined not to be robbed of his rights," added

Trevison. "Well, come along. We won't dwell on such things if they depress

you."



He took the Judge's arm and escorted him. They circled the broad stone

ledge. It ran in wide, irregular sweeps in the general outline of a huge

circle, surrounded by the dust-covered slopes melting into the plains, so

vast that the eye ached in an effort to comprehend them. Miles away they

could see smoke befouling the blue of the sky. The Judge knew the smoke

came from Manti, and he wondered if Corrigan were wondering over his

disappearance. He mentioned that to Trevison, and the latter grinned

faintly at him.



"I forgot to mention that to you. It was all arranged last night. Clay

Levins went to Dry Bottom on a night train. He took with him a letter,

which he was to mail at Dry Bottom, explaining your absence to Corrigan.

Needless to say, your signature was forged. But I did so good a job that

Corrigan will not suspect. Corrigan will get the letter by tonight. It

says that you are going to take a long rest."



The Judge gasped and looked quickly at Trevison. The young man's face was

wreathed in a significant grin.



"In the first analysis, this looks like a rather strange proceeding," said

Trevison. "But if you get deeper into it you see its logic. You know where

the original record is. I want it. I mean to have it. One life--a dozen

lives--won't stop me. Oh, well, we won't talk about it if you're going to

shudder that way."



He led the Judge up a flimsy, rotted ladder to a flat roof, forcing him to

look into a chamber where vermin fled at their appearance. Then through

numerous passages, low, narrow, reeking with a musty odor that nauseated

the Judge; on narrow ledges where they had to hug the walls to keep from

falling, and then into an open court with a stone floor, stained dark, in

the center a huge oblong block of stone, surmounting a pyramid, appalling

in its somber suggestiveness.



"The sacrificial altar," said Trevison, grimly. "These stains here,

are--"



He stopped, for the Judge had turned his back.



Trevison led him away. He had to help him down the ladder each time they

descended, and when they reached the chamber from which they had started

the Judge was white and shaking.



Trevison pushed him inside and silently took a position at the door. The

Judge sank to the floor of the chamber, groaning.



The hours dragged slowly. Trevison changed his position twice. Once he

went away, but returned in a few minutes with a canteen, from which he

drank, deeply. The Judge had been without food or water since the night

before, and thirst tortured him. The gurgle of the water as it came out of

the canteen, maddened him.



"I'd like a drink, Trevison."



"Of course. Any man would."



"May I have one?"



"The minute you tell me where that record is."



The Judge subsided. A moment later Trevison's voice floated into the

chamber, cold and resonant:



"I don't think you're in this thing for money, Judge. Corrigan has some

sort of a hold on you. What is it?"



The Judge did not answer.



The sun climbed to the zenith. It grew intensely hot in the chamber. Twice

during the afternoon the Judge asked for water, and each time he received

the answer he had received before. He did not ask for food, for he felt it

would not be given him. At sundown his captor entered the chamber and gave

him a meager draught from the canteen. Then he withdrew and stood on the

ledge in front of the door, looking out into the darkening plains, and

watching him, a conviction of the futility of resisting him seized the

Judge. He stood framed in the opening of the chamber, the lines of his

bold, strong face prominent in the dusk, the rifle held loosely in the

crook of his left arm, the right hand caressing the stock, his shoulders

squared, his big, lithe, muscular figure suggesting magnificent physical

strength, as the light in his eyes, the set of his head and the firm lines

of his mouth, brought a conviction of rare courage and determination. The

sight of him thrilled the Judge; he made a picture that sent the Judge's

thoughts skittering back to things primitive and heroic. In an earlier day

the Judge had dreamed of being like him, and the knowledge that he had

fallen far short of realizing his ideal made him shiver with

self-aversion. He stifled a moan--or tried to and did not succeed, for it

reached Trevison's ears and he turned quickly.



"Did you call, Judge?"



"Yes, yes!" whispered the Judge, hoarsely. "I want--to tell you

everything! I have longed to tell you all along!"



An hour later they were sitting on the edge of the ledge, their feet

dangling, the abyss below them, the desert stars twinkling coldly above

them; around them the indescribable solitude of a desert night filled with

mystery, its vague, haunting, whispering voice burdened with its age-old

secrets. Trevison had an arm around the Judge's shoulder. Their voices

mingled--the Judge's low, quavering; Trevison's full, deep, sympathetic.



After a while a rider appeared out of the starlit haze of the plains below

them. The Judge started. Trevison laughed.



"It's Clay Levins, Judge. I've been watching him for half an hour. He'll

stay here with you while I go after the record. Under the bottom drawer,

eh?"



Levins hallooed to them. Trevison answered, and he and the Judge walked

forward to meet Levins at the crest of the slope.



"Slicker'n a whistle!" declared Levins, answering the question Trevison

put to him. "I mailed the damn letter an' come back on the train that

brought it to him!" He grinned felinely at the Judge. "I reckon you're a

heap dry an' hungry by this time?"



"The Judge has feasted," said Trevison. "I'm going after the record.

You're to stay here with the Judge until I return. Then the three of us

will ride to Las Vegas, where we will take a train to Santa Fe, to turn

the record over to the Circuit Court."



"Sounds good!" gloated Levins. "But it's too long around. I'm for

somethin' more direct. Why not take the Judge with you to Manti, get the

record, takin' a bunch of your boys with you--an' salivate that damned

Corrigan an' his deputies!"



Trevison laughed softly. "I don't want any violence if I can avoid it. My

land won't run away while we're in Santa Fe. And the Judge doesn't want to

meet Corrigan just now. I don't know that I blame him."



"Where's the record?"



Trevison told him, and Levins grumbled. "Corrigan'll have his deputies

guardin' the courthouse, most likely. If you run ag'in 'em, they'll bore

you, sure as hell!"



"I'll take care of myself--I promise you that!" he laughed, and the Judge

shuddered at the sound. He vanished into the darkness of the ledge,

returning presently with Nigger, led him down the slope, called a low

"So-long" to the two watchers on the ledge, and rode away into the haze of

the plains.



Trevison rode fast, filled with a grim elation. He pitied the Judge. An

error--a momentary weakening of moral courage--had plunged the jurist into

the clutches of Corrigan; he could hardly be held responsible for what had

transpired--he was a puppet in the hands of an unscrupulous schemer, with

a threat of exposure hanging over him. No wonder he feared Corrigan!

Trevison's thoughts grew bitter as they dwelt upon the big man; the old

longing to come into violent physical contact with the other seized him,

raged within him, brought a harsh laugh to his lips as he rode. But a

greater passion than he felt for the Judge or Corrigan tugged at him as he

urged the big black over the plains toward the twinkling lights of

Manti--a fierce exultation which centered around Rosalind Benham. She had

duped him, betrayed him to his enemy, had played with him--but she had

lost!



Yet the thought of his coming victory over her was poignantly

unsatisfying. He tried to picture her--did picture her--receiving the news

of Corrigan's defeat, and somehow it left him with a feeling of regret.

The vengeful delight that he should have felt was absent--he felt sorry

for her. He charged himself with being a fool for yielding to so strange a

sentiment, but it lingered persistently. It fed his rage against Corrigan,

however, doubled it, for upon him lay the blame.



It was late when he reached the outskirts of Manti. He halted Nigger in

the shadow of a shed a hundred yards or so down the track from the

courthouse, dismounted and made his way cautiously down the railroad

tracks. He was beyond the radius of the lights from various windows that

he passed, but he moved stealthily, not knowing whether Corrigan had

stationed guards about the courthouse, as Levins had warned. An instant

after reaching a point opposite the courthouse he congratulated himself on

his discretion, for he caught a glimmer of light at the edge of a window

shade in the courthouse, saw several indistinct figures congregated at the

side door, outside. He slipped behind a tool shed at the side of the

track, and crouching there, watched and listened. A mumbling of voices

reached him, but he could distinguish no word. But it was evident that the

men outside were awaiting the reappearance of one of their number who had

gone into the building.



Trevison watched, impatiently. Then presently the side door opened,

letting out a flood of light, which bathed the figures of the waiting men.

Trevison scowled, for he recognized them as Corrigan's deputies. But he

was not surprised, for he had half expected them to be hanging around the

building. Two figures stepped down from the door as he watched, and he

knew them for Corrigan and Gieger. Corrigan's voice reached him.



"The lock on this door is broken. I had to kick it in this morning. One of

you stay inside, here. The rest of you scatter and keep your eyes peeled.

There's trickery afoot. Judge Lindman didn't go to Dry Bottom--the agent

says he's sure of that because he saw every man that's got aboard a train

here within the last twenty-four hours--and Judge Lindman wasn't among

them! Levins was, though; he left on the one-thirty this morning and got

back on the six-o'clock, tonight." He vanished into the darkness beyond

the door, but called back: "I'll be within call. Don't be afraid to shoot

if you see anything suspicious!"



Trevison saw a man enter the building, and the light was blotted out by

the closing of the door. When his eyes were again accustomed to the

darkness he observed that the men were standing close together--they

seemed to be holding a conference. Then the group split up, three going

toward the front of the building; two remaining near the side door, and

two others walking around to the rear.



For an instant Trevison regretted that he had not taken Levins' advice

about forming a posse of his own men to take the courthouse by storm, and

he debated the thought of postponing action. But there was no telling what

might happen during an interval of delay. In his rage over the discovery

of the trick that had been played on him Corrigan might tear the interior

of the building to pieces. He would be sure to if he suspected the

presence of the original record. Trevison did not go for the help that

would have been very welcome. Instead, he spent some time twirling the

cylinder of his pistol.



He grew tired of crouching after a time and lay flat on his stomach in the

shadow of the tool shed, watching the men as they tramped back and forth,

around the building. He knew that sooner or later there would be a minute

or two of relaxation, and of this he had determined to take advantage. But

it was not until sound in the town had perceptibly decreased in volume

that there was any sign of the men relaxing their vigil. And then he noted

them congregating at the front of the building.



"Hell," he heard one of them say; "what's the use of hittin' that trail

all night! Bill's inside, an' we can see the door from here. I'm due for

a smoke an' a palaver!" Matches flared up; the sounds of their voices

reached Trevison.



Trevison disappointedly relaxed. Then, filled with a sudden decision, he

slipped around the back of the tool shed and stole toward the rear of the

courthouse. It projected beyond the rear of the bank building, adjoining

it, forming an L, into the shadow of which Trevison slipped. He stood

there for an instant, breathing rapidly, undecided. The darkness in the

shadow was intense, and he was forced to feel his way along the wall for

fear of stumbling. He was leaning heavily on his hands, trusting to them

rather than to his footing, when the wall seemed to give way under them

and he fell forward, striking on his hands and knees. Fortunately, he had

made no sound in falling, and he remained in the kneeling position until

he got an idea of what had happened. He had fallen across the threshold of

a doorway. The door had been unfastened and the pressure of his hands had

forced it inward. It was the rear door of the bank building. He looked

inward, wondering at Braman's carelessness--and stared fixedly straight

into a beam of light that shone through a wedge-shaped crevice between two

boards in the partition that separated the buildings.



He got up silently, stepped stealthily into the room, closing the door

behind him. He tried to fasten it and discovered that the lock was broken.

For some time he stood, wondering, and then, giving it up, he made his way

cautiously around the room, searching for Braman's cot. He found that,

too, empty, and he decided that some one had broken into the building

during Braman's absence. Moving away from the cot, he stumbled against

something soft and yielding, and his pistol flashed into his hand in

sinister preparation, for he knew from the feel of the soft object that it

was a body, and he suspected that it was Braman, stalking him. He thought

that until he remembered the broken lock, on the door, and then the

significance of it burst upon him. Whoever had broken the lock had fixed

Braman. He knelt swiftly and ran his hands over the prone form, drawing

back at last with the low ejaculation: "He's a goner!" He had no time or

inclination to speculate over the manner of Braman's death, and made

catlike progress toward the crevice in the partition. Reaching it, he

dropped on his hands and knees and peered through. A wooden box on the

other side of the partition intervened, but above it he could see the form

of the deputy. The man was stretched out in a chair, sideways to the

crevice in the wall, sleeping. A grin of huge satisfaction spread over

Trevison's face.



His movements were very deliberate and cautious. But in a quarter of an

hour he had pulled the board out until an opening was made in the

partition, and then propping the board back with a chair he reached

through and slowly shoved the box on the other side back far enough to

admit his body. Crawling through, he rose on the other side, crossed the

floor carefully, kneeled at the drawer where Judge Lindman had concealed

the record, pulled it out and stuck it in the waistband of his trousers,

in front, his eyes glittering with exultation. Then he began to back

toward the opening in the partition. At the instant he was preparing to

stoop to crawl back into the bank building, the deputy in the chair

yawned, stretched and opened his eyes, staring stupidly at him. There was

no mistaking the dancing glitter in Trevison's eyes, no possible

misinterpretation of his tense, throaty whisper: "One chirp and you're a

dead one!" And the deputy stiffened in the chair, dumb with astonishment

and terror.



The deputy had not seen the opening in the partition, for it was partly

hidden from his view by the box which Trevison had encountered in

entering, and before the man had an opportunity to look toward the place,

Trevison commanded him again, in a sharp, cold whisper:



"Get up and turn your back to me--quick! Any noise and I'll plug you!

Move!"



The deputy obeyed. Then he received an order to walk to the door without

looking back. He readied the door--halted.



"Now open it and get out!"



The man did as bidden; diving headlong out into the darkness, swinging the

door shut behind him. His yell to his companions mingled with the roar of

Trevison's pistol as he shattered the kerosene lamp. The bullet hit the

neck of the glass bowl, a trifle below the burner, the latter describing a

parabola in the air and falling into the ruin of the bowl. The chimney

crashed, the flame from the wick touched the oil and flared up

brilliantly.



Trevison was half way through the wall by the time the oil ignited, and he

grinned coldly at the sight. Haste was important now. He slipped through

the opening, pulled the chair from between the board and wall, letting the

board snap back, and placing the chair against it. He felt certain that

the deputies would think that in some manner he had run their barricade

and entered the building through the door.



He heard voices outside, a fusillade of shots, the tinkle of breaking

glass; against the pine boards at his side came the wicked thud of

bullets, the splintering of wood as they tore through the partition and

embedded themselves in the outside wall. He ducked low and ran to the rear

door, swinging it open. Braman's body bothered him; he could not leave it

there, knowing the building would soon be in flames. He dragged the body

outside, to a point several feet distant from the building, dropping it at

last and standing erect for the first time to fill his lungs and look

about him. Looking back as he ran down the tracks toward the shed where he

had left Nigger, he saw shadowy forms of men running around the

courthouse, which was now dully illuminated, the light from within dancing

fitfully through the window shades. Flaming streaks rent the night from

various points--thinking him still in the building the deputies were

shooting through the windows. Manti, rudely awakened, was pouring its

population through its doors in streams. Shouts, hoarse, inquisitive,

drifted to Trevison's ears. Lights blazed up, flickering from windows like

giant fireflies. Doors slammed, dogs were barking, men were running.

Trevison laughed vibrantly as he ran. But his lips closed tightly when he

saw two or three shadowy figures darting toward him, coming from various

directions--one from across the street; another coming straight down the

railroad track, still another advancing from his right. He bowed his head

and essayed to pass the first figure. It reached out a hand and grasped

his shoulder, arresting his flight.



"What's up?"



"Let go, you damned fool!"



The man still clung to him. Trevison wrenched himself free and struck,

viciously. The man dropped with a startled cry. Another figure was upon

Trevison. He wanted no more trouble at that minute.



"Hell to pay!" he panted as the second man loomed close to him in the

darkness; "Trevison's in the courthouse!"



He heard the other gasp; saw him lunge forward. He struck again, bitterly,

and the man went to his knees. He was up again instantly, as Trevison fled

into the darkness, crying resonantly:



"This way, boys--here he is!"



"Corrigan!" breathed Trevison. He ducked as a flame-spurt split the night;

reaching a corner of the shed where he had left his horse as a succession

of reports rattled behind him. Corrigan was firing at him. He dared not

use his own pistol, lest its flash reveal his whereabouts, and he knew he

would have no chance against the odds that were against him. Nor was he

intent on murder. He flung himself into the saddle, and for the first time

since he had come into Trevison's possession Nigger knew the bite of spurs

earnestly applied. He snorted, leaped, and plunged forward, the clatter of

his hoofs bringing lancelike streaks of fire out of the surrounding

blackness. Behind him Trevison heard Corrigan raging impotently,

profanely. There came another scattering volley. Trevison reeled, caught

himself, and then hung hard to the saddle-horn, as Nigger fled into the

night, running as a coyote runs from the daylight.