The Spider, he of the shriveled heart and body, did the most human thing he had done for years.  At the little table opposite the bar he sat with brandy and a glass and deliberately drank until he felt neither the ache of his old wounds nor the sting of this fresh thrust of fate.  Then he knew that he was drunk, but that his keen, crooked mind would obey his will, unfeelingly, yet with no hesitation and no stumbling.

He rose and hobbled to the outer door.  A vagrant breeze stirred the stale air in the room.  Back in the patio his Mexican, Manuelo, lay snoring, wrapped in a tattered blanket.  The Spider turned from the doorway and gazed at the sanded spot on the floor, leaning against the bar and drumming on its edge with his nervous fingers.  “He’ll see her in every night-fire when he’s alone—­and he’ll talk to her.  He will see her face among the girls in the halls—­and he’ll go cold and speak her name, and then some girl will laugh.  He will eat out his heart thinking of her—­and what she did for him.  He’s just a kid—­but when he comes out of that room . . . he won’t give a damn if he’s bumped off or not.  He’ll play fast—­and go through every time!  God!  I ought to know!”

The Spider turned and gazed across the morning desert.  Far out rode a group of men.  One of them led a riderless horse.  The Spider’s thin lips twisted in a smile.

CHAPTER XXV

“PLANTED—­OUT THERE”

Malvey, loafing at the ranch of Mescalero, received The Spider’s message about the posse with affected indifference.  He had Pete’s horse in his possession, which in itself would make trouble should he be seen.  When he learned from the messenger that Young Pete was in Showdown, he fumed and blustered until evening, when he saddled Blue Smoke and rode south toward the Flores rancho.  From Flores’s place he would ride on south, across the line to where he could always find employment for his particular talents.  Experience had taught him that it was useless to go against The Spider, whose warning, whether it were based on fact or not, was a hint to leave the country.

The posse from Concho, after circling the midnight desert and failing to find any trace of Pete, finally drew together and decided to wait until daylight made it possible to track him.  As they talked together, they saw a dim figure coming toward them.  Swinging from their course, they rode abruptly down a draw.  Four of them dismounted.  The fifth, the chief deputy, volunteered to ride out and interview the horseman.  The four men on foot covered the opening of the draw, where the trail passed, and waited.

The deputy sat his horse, as though waiting for some one.  Malvey at once thought of Young Pete—­then of The Spider’s warning—­and finally that the solitary horseman might be some companion from below the border, cautiously awaiting his approach.  Half-inclined to ride wide, he hesitated—­then loosening his gun he spurred his restless pony toward the other, prepared to “bull” through if questioned too closely.