10cAprilTWO-GUN WESTERN NOVELS MagazineQUICK TRIGGER STORIESWHEN A TEXAS TOWN GOES GUN-CRAZY smashing
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THRILLING SHORT STORIES EMPTY SADDLES MEAN
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WHEN A TEXAS TOWN GOES GUN-CRAZY by George M. Conklin
8
Those who live by the trigger, men born with gun-magic,
headed by the fastest lead-slinger of them all. the tamer of Abilene,
Wild Bill Hickok! This was the notorious company young Hallock craved to
ride the raw red trails with, forgetting that this first killing would
send him on the dodge, to regret instead of glory in each new notch he
cut in his Colt!
THUNDERING FEATURE-LENGTH
NOVEL
EMPTY SADDLES MEAN WAR! Morse Chandler
71
Hole-in-the-wall for cattle rustler, road agent and killer,
the Soldados would welcome Kid McCord only when he'd hardened his heart
and his gunhand!
THRILL-PACKED FEATURE-LENGTH
NOVELETTE
THE KID FROM DAMNATION VALLEY James P. Olsen
87
Satan King ramrodded seven salty, wanted men when he rode
out of Damnation Valley, and the seven or Satan would fog back through
powdersmoke finally but not both!
2 FAST-ACTION SHORT
STORIES
NO MANBREAKERS WANTED! W. H. B. Kent 62
They
were two hard-bitten badmen with plenty of blood on their backtrails,
and the posse that staked out the bounty on their heads would probably
be a human Colt-arsenal the name of John Stark!
BORROWED
BULLETS Ralph Berard 103
Cutting sign on a notch-hunter of the
Jack Rabbit Kid's calibre, any Range City son but Race Cordon would have
thought first of the two thousand dollar reward offered for the bandit
dead or alive!
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TWO-GUN WESTERN NOVELS MAGAZINE published every other
month by Western Fiction Publishing Co., Inc. Office of publication,
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"HAIR-TRIGGER" HALLOCK stood sidewise at the
mahog- -any, one arm on the polished top, his back to the wall, in the
Elk- horn Bar. He always stood or sat thus, facing doors, windows,
people. Vivid in his memory was the scene in Jerry Lewis's saloon,
Deadwood Gulch, when Wild Bill Hickok lay with his
cheek in his own gore;
because, for once, Wild Bill had exposed his back to a door, the
rear-entrance of Jerry's. Tom Hallock had been a gangling kid then,
tending bar at rush time, sweep- ing and doing odd jobs most of the
time, and the rest, which he had to himself, he spent in worshipping the
tamer of Abilene and practicing with a six- shooter. He aspired to
expert gunman- ship, Wild Bill his pattern, though the fact was unknown
to Hickok. Tom didn t realize what a career he was aim- ing at (with two
sixes, when he had
SMASH BOOK-LENGTH NOVEL OF THOSE WHO LIVE
BY THE 8
Until the kid saw a man die from one of his bullets,
Wild Bill Hickok would remain his pattern until his first killing sent him
forever on the dodge, young Tom Hallock would count Colt-speed king, and
choose for his saddlemates only those hellions who lived by the
gun!
mastered the handling of one), until he saw a man die from one of
his bullets, a center shot, and a fair enough killing, according to
frontier code; that is, he gave his opponent an even break. The dead man
had been a half-baked des- perado and his demise was no loss to the
community; nor was that of his
two friends whose toes the
trigger-ex- pert youth turned up when they essayed an eye for an eye.
But the triple kill- ing had sent Tom on the dodge, regret- ting his
notches rather than glorying in them. He had anticipated a feeling of
elation, out-triggering men who lived by the gun, and was
disappointed.
Conscience was a pestiferous thing.
But gradually it hardened and the number of his victims mounted and his
guns became as much a part of him as his hands; now, at thirty, he found
him- self haunted with faces of the past, some blurred by time, but none
of them missing from his mental gallery. Of necessity he lived where the
law could not reach, or was farcically represented. Derringer, Montana,
was a hotbed of desperadoism; it had tamed down not a peg since it
appeared on the time- tables of the Northern Pacific. Yet even in the
midst of men as law-shy as himself, Hallock must be eternally vigi-
lant, for like a champion of whatever, there were plenty who would kill
him for the notoriety it would bring them; there was an "if" as
always—if they could get the edge. And remembering the lesson taught by
the passing of Bill Hickok, he was ever alert in the pres- ence of his
fellow men, with one excep- tion.
The exception entered the
Elkhorn at that moment, looking for Hallock, Hallock who had not been
"Tom" for ten years, but Hair-trigger, a two- handed gunfighter who had
put the "art" in artillery and daily cursed the fame that would not let
him act the normal man.
"Stranger just got off'n the west-
bound an' headin' this way. Looks like he might be a law-dog. No
hardware showin'." Thus spoke the "exception," otherwise "Reckless"
Brule, in the ear of Hallock.
The Northern Pacific station was
catty-cornered across the street from the Elkhorn saloon and Brule had
been occupying a chair on the stoop of the latter. Whenever a train
stopped or the old Concord swung in from the back country, passengers
who alighted were accorded careful scrutiny by the gun- toting tribe of
Derringer. The latest town marshal had joined his
predeces-
sors in "boot hill" but a week since— though not by the hand of
Hallock— and the minds of Derringer's denizens were temporarily warped
with unusual suspicion of unfamiliar faces. Any time the sheriff of
Missoula county might take it into his head to "clean up;" either come
himself or send a deputy. Therefore, Reckless Brule was moved to warn
his pal, who had a longer rec- ord of killings than any Derringer gun-
slinger, albeit "cleaner" killings.
STANDING together at the
bar, the two presented a strange contrast. Hallock, taller by two inches
than Brule, was wide-shouldered, lean- flanked, with frosty eyes,
aquiline nose and thin lips featuring a smooth- shaven face the color of
redwood. He was crowned by a grey Stetson, knocked into a "Denver poke,"
the loose ends of the raw hide chin-strap dangling over the knot of his
bandanna; wore plain leather riding-cuffs, thong-laced shirt and fringed
leather chaps; stood up in the inevitable cowboy boots. Crossed belts
supported his ordnance, two hol- stered Colt's equalizers. Brule, nick-
named "Reckless" by the man he had thrown in with because reckless of
the hazard linked to the association, was gorilla-like in form and so
bow-legged he appeared to be hairpinning the bar- rel of a horse even
when walking. Hair and beard were fiery red and of luxu- riant growth. A
battered, short- brimmed Stetson tilted over one ear; his forearms were
bare, his greasy vest flapped open; his trousers, worn out- side his
boots, were rolled up several inches above the ankle. A grotesque
figure, this Brule, but a cross-arm draw artist and steel-true to the
man he called "pal."
At Brule's whispered information, Hallock
nodded and his lips tightened. The gorilla-man oozed away from his side
and took spraddled stand near the
door, covering his purpose of
watching by digging up a blackened briar and filling it. Other "bad" men
were in the room, lesser lights in the triggerfinger "four hundred," but
only one paid par- ticular heed to Brule's trip to the bar. This hombre
leaned on the mahogany ten paces from Hallock. He was a cow- puncher
"gone bad" and no halfway about it; the disease known as "trigger-
fingeritis" had struck into his vitals, and from drifting about tough
camps and avoiding the open, his once tanned vis- age had begotten a
pallor which was the derivative of the name "Chalk" Gallatin. Chalk
fostered the hope of being pointed out as the gunpacker who had cut a
notch for Hair-trigger Hallock.
Hair-trigger apparently did
not no- tic when a quiet-looking stranger, som- breroed and booted, the
one who had dropped off the Northern Pacific and made a bee-line for the
Elkhorn, strode in and ranged himself suspiciously near the gunfighter.
Hallock's eyes nar- rowed. The newcomer nominated his "pizen" and when
the bartender turned to the back-bar, shot a glance to the left, in
which direction stood Chalk Gallatin, presenting his profile. Clink- ing
of bottle and glass as they slid across the bar drew the stranger's gaze
to the front again; the "rotgut" he poured between bearded lips made him
shiver. As he set down the glass he looked to the right, realizing
Hallock was staring hard at him. Before the stranger could wink
Hair-trigger had conjured a blue-barreled gun against his
ribs.
"Yuh lookin' for anybody, mister?" bluntly inquired
Hallock.
"No," replied the other, visibly rat- tled and
instantly raising hands shoul- der-high. "But" he added after the
briefest pause, fascinated eyes on the muzzling gun, "I'd part with
fifty bucks to know where the shootin'-iron
come
from."
"The trick's priceless," replied Hal- lock grimly. "If
I sold it to yuh I might go to 'boot hill' sooner'n I aim to. Stranger,
I'll hafta disbelieve you're not out gunnin' till I've pawed yuh over."
Hallock took no man's word but Brule's and, still holding the drop,
frisked the stranger's person, seeking a weapon—and a badge. In search
of the latter he turned back the lapels of the man's coat, pulled open
outing shirt and undershirt.
"Button up," Hair-trigger grunted
finally, and holstering his six-shooter, stepped back. "Drink on me,
pilgrim, to show there's no hard feelin's."
"I can see I'm off
my range consid- erable," said the "pilgrim," hardly re- assured by the
company he was in. "I won't linger after I've drank to yuhr health—an'
hired a hoss. I meant to ask where I could get one. Ridin' to look over
the Two Bar ranch."
HALLOCK mentioned a livery-stable on Main
Street. The stranger "looked at" the two-gun man over the rim of his
glass; then wheeled to de- part, throwing a second glance at Chalk
Gallatin, whose face was still averted. Halfway across the saloon floor,
the prospective ranch-buyer was halted by the vibrant voice of Hallock
and turned nervously.
"A word of advice, pilgrim, take it or
leave it," droned Hair-trigger. "Git heeled, if yuh figger to reach the
Two Bar healthy. She's not a peaceful trail out
thataway."
"Thanks just as much," returned the other, forcing
a faint smile, "but I'm slow on the pull an' I reckon I won't invite
attack if it's apparent I'm not packing iron; will show I've got nothin'
worth defendin'. For instance, yuh wouldn't believed I wasn't on the
shoot if yuh'd found a gun on me. Tell yuh, friend, those who live by
the trigger—
but I wouldn't want yuh should get
mad at me, so I won't say no more." "A fool has got to go his pace an'
find," declared Hallock; then under his breath as the stranger exited,
"Talks like a preacher not a rancher."
But Hair-trigger was
uncomfortably impressed. To date, the only law that he recognized was
that which rests in a holster. He lounged over to Reckless Brule, who,
with his head out the door, was watching to see that the stranger laid a
course for the livery stable.
"What yuh think o' his
sentiments, Reckless?" inquired Hallock, who val- ued the gorilla-man's
opinion.
"Huh?" Brule drew in his head and turned on
Hair-trigger, jerking up his flaming beard with a one-sided facial
twist, betokening disgust. "Hell, too pure for this world! A bebbe will
hold him up some day—an' buzzards pick his bones. 'Tain't tame enough
for the Gol'ding Roole, this Montanny." He snorted, letting his beard
fall.
Neither saw the sneer on the face of Chalk Gallatin,
"bad" cowpuncher, who was hoping the man bound for the Two Bar had a
defective memory for faces.
"I dunno, Reckless, if yuh're
right or not—an it's the first time," said Hair-trigger, and retired to
his corner at the end of the bar.
The redhead gazed after him,
so muddled and amazed that he opened his jaws and his pipe dropped. "No
savvy," he grunted and, recovering his pipe, went out and flopped in the
chair on the stoop.
Chalk Gallatin swaggered very short- ly
from the Elkhorn and paused by Brule's chair to ask, sotto voce: "Hair-
trigger talked kinda queer, didn't he? Losin' his nerve, yuh reckon?
I've heard tell gun-fighters do some—"
"Looket here," Brule's
eyes blazed up into the pale face of the ex-cow- boy, "yuh be damn'
shore he's lost it,
yuh dehorned spawn of a maverick
afore yuh stand up to him! He knows yuh're stalkin' him, that yuh'd like
the glory o' posin' as his killer, but don't make no fatal mistake. He's
got a mood on, like he gits sometimes, but his triggerfinger's 'iled,
yuh betche."
The twist of Chalk's lips was a fail- ure as a
smile. He lifted his head at the clipclop of hoofs, saw the stranger off
the Northern Pacific riding down the street from the direction of the
livery stable and promptly turned his back until the other had gone by.
Brule glanced at Chalk from under his shaggy red brows. He made a mental
note to tell Hallock of the incident.
"There goes a shorthorn
what's due to impede a forty-five slug afore he's many weeks older,"
Brule made a bet with himself as Chalk left the stoop and rolled up
street. Scarcely did he realize how far-sighted he was—and at the same
time, short-sighted.
CHAPTER II
He Kills His
Pal
DECKLESS BRULE thought he would go to bed. He sat on the
edge of his bunk in the shack he occu- pied with Hallock, several doors
above the Elkhorn Bar, and listened to a harangue on laziness from the
tall gun- man standing in front of him.
"Which yuh've done
nothin' but hold down a chair on the Elkhorn stoop all day, Reckless,"
declared Hallock, hook- ing thumbs in his belts. "Cash is gettin' low
an' we need ammunition for our stummicks if not our
guns—"
"Wal," said Brule with a grin, "why don'tcha go out an'
shoot somebody? There's that gunnin' job the Ox Bow foreman wanted
yuh—"
ger, his brow darkening slightly.
"Yuh know that squatter on the Ox Bowland had a family, an' I ain't
gunnin' no family men."
"Uh course yuh ain't. Kiddin', that's
all. But, honest to hell, Trigger, I'd ruther turn in than set
in."
"The five fellers that rode in at sun- down was the train
robbers that held up the Great Northern two weeks back an' they got
rolls an' want action for 'em."
"So yuh told me. Repeatin'
yuhself, Trigger, but I ain't gonna fall. Yuh hop along an' clean 'em,
with the help o' God an' a few brains." He had his vest off and his
flannel shirt; began to pull at his boots.
"Get ondressed in
the dark, then?" For revenge, Hallock blew out the lamp on the table.
"Yuh'll be jealous when yuh see my pockets bulgin' tomorrer mornin'
fireface. An' yuh'll be hongry but I won't—yeh, mebbe I'll start yuh to
breakfast. Reckless, yuhr too slow to grow fast!" Hair-trigger was
chuck- ling, his nearest approach to a laugh, as he opened the shack
door. A hearty "So-long, an' luck!" followed him from the darkness as he
shut the door.
An hour from the time he bought chips in the
"draw" session at the Elk- horn with the five train robbers, Hal- lock
arose, cleaned to his last dollar. Another man took his place and the
crestfallen gun-fighter swallowed two fingers of whisky at the bar, now
pre- sided over by the owner himself, Sam Brace, and walked out. As he
emerged on the stoop, the dim, moving outline of a man, almost abreast
of the hitch- rack, drove all thought of his "flat" state from his mind.
Coming from the lamp glare of the Elkhorn into the comparative darkness
of the starlit out- doors, Hallock did not recognize the figure. A word
from either would have prevented tragedy, but neither spoke it, the man
in the street forgetting that
Hallock's sight could trick him in
the circumstances. Hallock saw the man's hand drop toward his waistline.
One of the notoriety-seekers, possibly Chalk Gallatin, who had not been
in the saloon that evening, flashed through the gun- fighter's brain and
he acted simultane- ous with the thought, throwing his right-hand gun
with deadly accuracy. The figure sank soundlessly.
THE smoking
tube in his hand, Hal- lock leaped off the stoop and warily approached
the heap on the ground, hardly expecting it to move, for he knew about
where the bullet had hit, but cautious none the less. Eyes by now more
accustomed to the semi-dark, he stooped. A wild curse escaped his lips,
cold sweat oozed from every pore —the still face, turned up to the
stars, was that of his one and only friend, Reckless Brule, a hole
drilled almost in the center of his forehead. Horror and revulsion
gnawing at his heart for the first time in his life, and realizing that
nothing could be done, that death was instantaneous, Hallock happened to
glance at one out-flung arm of his dead pal and discovered, clutched in
the fingers, a handkerchief!
"Was pullin' his bandanna—an' I
reckoned he was mebbe Gallatin, aim- in' to fan a gun on me! " exclaimed
Hal- lock, stricken deeper. "Goddelmighty! He must've changed his mind
about sleepin' an' was cornin' to help me clean the train robbers! If
he'd only spoke—or I hadn't been so damned quick! Old hand," lifting the
head of Brule to his knee, "believe me, I didn't know it was yuh; I wish
I was in yuhr boots this minit!"
He pressed the head to his
chest and rocked on his heels in silent agony. Then he lifted to his
feet, heaved the heavy, lifeless body across his shoulder and carried it
up the stoop and into the well-lighted Elkhorn. Sam Brace
and
several loungers, who had drifted
to- ward the door as the shot boomed out, drew back as Hallock entered
with his burden. The card players had given no attention to the shot
because gun- play was such a common occurrence in Derringer. As a rule
no citizen moved any faster when one or more guns tuned up in Main
Street, unless he chanced to be in the line of fire. It was a gun-
toting town. However, the entrance of Hair-trigger Hallock, muttering
like a wild man, drew even the gaze of the poker-playing train robbers
and the groups at two other card tables. Hal- lock eased the body of
Reckless upon the bar-top, directly in the rays of a lamp, and, tossing
his hat on the floor as if its weight oppressed him, faced the
incredulous, staring groups of men. The card games were suspended; he
was the focus of all eyes.
"That shot yuh heard killed
Reckless —I killed my pal!" Hallock shouted, beside himself with
grief.
"The slow-draw pilgrim which oozed in here to-day, shy
artillery, was right —I'm the fool that had to go his pace an' find! If
I wasn't always packin' guns an' bein' so free with 'em, trouble
wouldn't be alia time campin' on my trail, makin' me watch sharp, day
an' night—I wouldn't have shot so quick an' sayin' nothin', mistakin'
Reckless in the dark for someun lookin' to cut a notch for me. Reachin'
for his hanker," he held up the bandanna, "an' I thought it was a gun he
was after. Chalk Galla- tin, I figgered it might be—he's been honin' for
my hair." He paused to draw breath, his eyes roving from face to face as
if seeking relief, his hands clenching and opening, truly displaying
more emotion than anyone would have imagined was in him. He had been
looked upon always as a ruthless, silent, nerveless man-killing machine.
"To hell with hardware an' gun-slingin'," he cried suddenly, "I'm done!"
And
with frenzied haste, unbuckled his gun belts and piled them on the
bar beside Brule's remains.
Instantly, to an accompanying hiss
of intaken breaths as his several ene- mies present realized the lion
had shorn himself of teeth and claws, hands darted to gun-grips.
Hallock, self-disarmed and likely to pay the penalty for an un- guarded
moment, did not cringe; in- stead, contempt and anger boiled up in him,
evident in the blaze of his eyes, the puffing of his lips. He shook a
hard fist.
"Damn' yuh for yellow-spined skulk- ers!" he
roared. "You wouldn't dast make that handplay if I was packin'
iron!"
THEY hesitated, all but one with fin- gers resting on
walnut butts; that one, "Blackfoot" Dixon, quarter-breed side-kick of
Chalk Gallatin, had half drawn the Colt from his holster, but an
invisible hand seemed to prevent him getting it clear of the leather.
His gun arm was rigid.
"Yuh, Blackfoot! Yuh aimin' to cheat
yuhr pal, Chalk, o' the glory o' salivatin' me? Why don'tcha draw,
Injun?" Hallock's tone should have precipitated action on the quarter-
breeds part, but it didn't. And he was not alone in his frozen state.
Hallock dominated them, as much without his guns as with them. One man,
display- ing a proper fearlessness, may out-face several more easily
than he can a single opponent.
Hallock continued, on a
contemptu- ous note, as furtive glances were ex- changed among the
hesitant bidders for fame. "He was a man to tie to, was Reckless—of yuh
all he was the only one would risk stickin' by me. An' to think I give
him his ticket! It's a curse on me for the bloody record I've been
settin up, that's what it is! An' I hate to let Reckless go on in the
dark alone; he'd never let me take any trail
lonesome—always to hand, joggin at
my elbow, ready to back me in whatever. Go ahead—shoot, somebody! Yuh'll
be savin' me a hull lot o' hell on earth. If I'm with Reckless I won't
mind so much, for I can tell him I made a damn' fool
mistake."
Hallock surveyed them one after an- other with a
taunting expression, wait- ing for the shots he would welcome to come.
But they did not. He was to be denied even the solace of forgetful
death.
"Every tail curled," he pronounced acidly. "Not a
thoroughbred among yuh with the guts to send me along o'
Reckless!"
"Here's your chance to join Reck- less! Yuh don't
have to ask me twice!" Chalk Gallatin stepped from the outer darkness
into the saloon with the utter- ance, his six-shooter lined from the
hip. It threw a long tongue of flame with a cannon-like noise as Hallock
turned toward the door. The gunfighter stared with filming eyes at the
evil, leering face of Chalk, did not look at the smoking gun at all; no
sound passed his set lips as his knees gave way; a moment he supported
himself on outflung hands, battling with the lead in his system; then,
with a sigh, stretched out on the floor.
"Well, he asked for
it, didn't he?" Chalk snarled at the stony-faced men, annoyed at their
silence when he had expected vociferous applause.
"Yeh, he
asked for it," nodded Black- foot Dixon, and he was the only one who
spoke.
"Others had paralyzed bazoos, Black- foot," observed
Chalk, and with swag- ger more pronounced than ever, ap- proached the
bad. He laid a hand on Hallock's discarded forty-fives and belts. "Bein'
I'm the only man had nerve enough to cash him," boasted Chalk,
half-turning toward the men, "I reckon I win the right to wear
his
flame-throwers—"
"Take your hands off those guns!" A
girl's voice issued the command. Chalk Gallatin, more startled than if a
man had spoken, jerked his head the other way. None had noticed the en-
trance, by the door to a back room, of Sam Brace's daughter, Sue. Almost
twenty, she was the Amazon type, not much under six feet, splendidly
pro- portioned. Her dark hair, which she could sit upon when unconfined,
was parted in the middle and in thick plaits coiled around her head;
features irreg- ular and handsome, rather than beauti- ful. Looks and
build were her moth- er's, a pioneer woman, for her father was stocky,
but broad-shouldered. She had the courage of both, and was bal- ancing
Sam's "sawed-off" as expertly as any man in the
bar-room.
Chalk wilted at sight of her, and not only because
of the shot-gun trained on his heart. If he was capable of loving anyone
besides himself, that other was Sue Brace.
"Sue," said Chalk,
"yuh tells me to hands off an' I obeys. But nobody, only
yuh—"
"Anybody with a grain of sand in his craw could back you
down, Chalk Gal- latin," interrupted the girl, scornfully. "You can
shoot from behind and from cover and your talk is bigger than a dozen
men, but it's just noise—that's the size of you! Think of you facing
Hallock if he'd had a gun—"
That moment Hair-trigger stirred
slightly and groaned.
CHALK'S hand flew to his pistol-
holster. "Not dead! " he exclaimed, stepping back and looking down at
the gunfighter.
Sue Brace breathed something which sounded
very much like "Thank God!" then lifted the shotgun for a fuller bead on
the hell-bent puncher. "Just you dare to draw!" she whipped
forth.
Chalk's lips curled back. He had flushed through
his white skin at her scathing arraignment; now the pallor returned,
intensified, not fear—though he knew she would execute her threat if he
did not take heed—but white fury, born of jealousy; her defence of the
helpless two-gun man would have been evidence enough to stake the fires
of that poisonous emotion without Chalk hearing, in addition, what she
said un- der her breath. The expression of his eyes was abysmal; it
looked for a mo- ment as if, in spite of the twin barrels, Chalk would
draw and extinguish that remaining spark in Hallock. But the ex-cowboy's
passion did not overmaster him to the point of recklessness; he loved
his entirely worthless life first of all, and relinquished his gun-grip.
Dis- trustful of him, even then, Sue Brace maintained her drop and
called to her father, who had viewed her interference with a proud
parental eye:
"Pa, you heard Hallock. Maybe Doc Bennison can
do something for him. Take him up to my room while 1 keep this
glory-hunter lined."
"No sooner said than done, sister!" Sam
Brace moved quickly, suiting ac- tion to his words. Hallock was a dead
weight and no slight one, but the sturdy saloonkeeper managed to shift
him on his back, and with the daughter cover- ing his retreat, staggered
to the stair- way at one end of the barroom. When Sam had passed up out
of sight, Sue placed the sawed-off on the bar.
"To show you,
Chalk Gallatin," she said, "that I'm not afraid for myself, only afraid
you might finish the cow- ard's job you started before 1 could daylight
you."
"Yuh'd shoot me—to save Hallock?" Gallatin's
rage-inflamed eyes burned into hers.
"In a minute!" she
replied in a tone
that admitted of no possible doubt,
her chin high. "If I'd had that gun handy when you stepped through the
door you'd never have unhooked a shot at Hallock. Hallock's shouting
brought me out of the back room and while I was listening you— Don't you
feel low- down, Chalk Gallatin?"
"Yuh—yuh," sputtered Chalk,
ad- vancing on her a step, "like that Hal- lock?"
"Like? I
love him!" Sue amended, unblushingly.
Chalk had nothing to
say. The dec- laration had the effect of a gun-barrel smashing him
between the eyes. He shot the girl one sinister look, then jingled to
the bar and poured himself a drink. And drink after drink!
Sam
Brace came down the stairs and over to Sue's side.
"Heart's
beatin' faint—but mighty faint," he informed in a whisper that was loud
enough for every ear in the silent barroom to catch.
"You get
Doc Bennison, Pa," di- rected Sue, "and I'll go and stay with Hallock."
She gathered up Hair-trig- ger's heavy belts with the dangling hol-
sters.
"Supposin' doc's jiggered?" hesitated Sam; and added,
"He bought a quart o' Scotch 's mornin'."
"You try him, pa. If
you can't bring him, I will!" The Amazon started for the stairs,
clasping Hallock's artillery to her breast.
Sam wheeled and
vanished through the front door, chuckling. That daugh- ter of his was a
royal straight flush— you met one of her kind in a
lifetime.
"All belly up!" commanded Chalk Gallatin, who had
not lifted his gaze from the bar while Sue remained in the
room.
ENSUED a concerted movement to- ward the mahogany; the
bottle slid from hand to hand. No word was spo-
ken. Ten minutes went by and in came
Sam Brace, followed by a big, unkempt, red-faced man in rusty clothes;
"Doc" Bennison, whose medi- cal and surgical skill was only equaled by
his appetite for whisky. He would have been celebrated had he not sold
John Barleycorn his rights to a name. Just now he was in an unusual
state— sober.
"Upstairs, doc—first room to the right, Sue's,"
said Sam, going around behind the bar. "If yuh boys has killed off that
quart by this time," addressing the bar flies, "I'll just collect the
price from yuh, Chalk."
And Chalk thrust a bill at him with-
out a murmur. Sam's shotgun lay handy. The saloonkeeper made change, saw
Chalk pocket it; then watched, through lowered lids, while Gallatin
fished a horn-handled clasp knife from another pocket, opened the blade
and drawing his six-shooter, deliberately cut a deep nick in the walnut
grip of the gun.
Bennison was upstairs more than an hour and
all that time Chalk Gallatin hung against the bar, neither drinking nor
talking. Just so much liquor si- lenced him, made him, to a degree, dan-
gerous despite his yellow streak. The others, including Blackfoot Dixon,
played cards half-heartedly at two tables. They were waiting, Chalk was
waiting. Finally came the slovenly doctor, carrying his worn medicine-
case. He got abreast of Chalk and the cowboy put forth an arresting
hand, and broke his silence:
"Will he live,
doc?"
Bennison's whisky-red face deep- ened in its ruddy hue.
"I think so, certainly, Husky maverick. I got the bullet out, glanced
off a rib. Smashed the rib, but it saved his life. Don't mean to tell me
you did it?"
"It's better yuh let him die, doc," was the way
Gallatin answered, his
sullen eyes full of menace. "I don't
want to carve off the notch I just cut for him!"
"Open one of
your veins and it would spurt yellow, Chalk Gallatin!" sneered the
undaunted Bennison; and brushing off the detaining hand and nodding to
Sam Brace, back of the bar, he slouched out.
CHAPTER
III
Romance Shoots Center
THE first words to issue
from Hair-trigger Hallock's lips when he regained speech concerned the
lamented Reckless Brule:
"My pal—what'd yuh do with him?" Sue
Brace, moving about the room and tidying up, unaware of his return to
consciousness until he spoke, turned with a smile that was as cheering
as morning sunlight.
"Well, if I'm not glad to hear that
voice—and so strong! Lie still now. Trigger. Pa buried Reckless back of
your shack. Don't feel badly about it —I mean, more than you can help.
You've been in a bad way yourself. This is the second day since Chalk
Gallatin shot you." She stressed the cowboy's name
scornfully.
"Yeh, the yellow dog!" Hallock nodded slowly, too
weak to be very emphatic. "Anybody else shootin', even Blackfoot Dixon,
I wouldn't have minded so much; fact is, I honed to have 'em ventilate
me just then—an' even now—pore Reckless! " He looked away from Sue who
had seated herself at the foot of the bed.
"But you didn't
mean to do it. It was a sorry accident, and guess as much Brule's fault
as yours. I heard you tell about it that night." She did not al- lude to
her part in the violent drama
nor, of course, to her confession
before the Elkhorn's patrons.
"I'm goin' to live, am I, spite
o' Chalk's bullet?" His question was fraught with no especial interest.
He was blind to the warmth in Sue's fine eyes now as he had been blind
all along, preoccupied with his notches and the first law of nature to
the exclusion, almost, of all else.
"Doc Bennison says you'll
be fine as split silk, just as good as ever. He removed the bullet. But
don't talk any more now, Trigger. Sleep if you can; rest
anyway."
"All right, though I wouldn't have a kick cornin' if
I cashed. Livin' without Reckless, my onliest friend, will be hell. An'
thinkin'—"
"Think of this," Sue put in, "that he was one
friend, but not the only one."
Hallock pondered the statement,
gazing at her queerly. "This yuhr room?" he asked
suddenly.
"Yes. And I'll be with you as long— as you need
me."
"Gimme a drink o' water, please," he requested, confused,
"an' I'll try an' corral some o' that sleep yuh recom-
mended."
His wound healed, his strength came back, rapidly.
Sam Brace dropped in on him two or three times a day and smoked a pipe
while Hallock rolled his own.
"Say Sam," said the gunfighter,
propped up on pillows, one afternoon, a week from the time he began to
con- valesce, "I'm runnin' up some bills with yuh an' the doc, an' I
dunno how I'm goin' to pay 'em. I'm done with gun-slingin', that's one
shore thing, an' it's the only business I ever follered. How to make
some honest coin is pes- terin'—"
"Yuh let me an' doc worry
about money, Trigger," Sam interrupted. "An' if yuh mention bills ag'in,
I'll
knock your block off, bein's yuh're helpless. If I can't do my
future son- in-law a turn when he's needin' it—"
"Son-in-law?"
Hair-trigger almost yelled, sitting straight up.
"Here don't
yuh get to buckin' an' open that there wound ag'in," remon- strated the
Elkhorn's owner. "I says 'son-in-law' an' yuh goes into the air like
yuh'd set on prickly pears. What's the matter? Don't yuh want Sue—or
what is it?" He was a trifle huffed.
"Why shore I want—but,
great guns, I never reckoned—" Then Hallock sank back and was briefly
silent. "I know now why she looks at me so—so funny
sometimes."
"Funny, huh? So that's the way it struck yuh." Sam
chuckled, his anger fled. "Trigger, I know yuh're a dinger in a fight,
but suspicion yuh're a pore lover—huh?"
"Uh-huh. But, Sam, I
never tangled much with women."
"Tangled with one now, all
right. Yuh been nursed by Sue more'n a week an' didn't wise up to the
fact. Hard to believe, knowin' yuh've been con-
scious."
"Can't blame it all on my dumbness, Sam. How was I to
know a girl as fine as yuhr Sue would take up with a low- flung killer
like I am—or was?"
"Well, mebbe yuh are excusable on them
grounds. But it's plumb fact. Yuh should've heard her tell that Gal-
latin, right before Blackfoot an' the rest the night yuh kil—was gunned.
Yessir, to their faces an' straight from the
shoulder!"
"What'd she say?"
SAM relighted his pipe
before answer- ing. "Yuh ask her, Trigger. It was shore plain enough an'
set Chalk most crazy. He's been hangin' 'round her, yuh savvy, but
couldn't p'int in anywheres. Seems yuh ain't knowin' nothin' about what
happened that night
after Chalk plugged yuh. It'll be
in- terestin' tellin'." And he related all the facts.
"I feel
different tonight, Sue," re- marked the gunfighter that evening, when
his nurse brought supper on a large tray.
"Different? Worse?"
She set the tray on a chair beside his bed and scanned him with anxious
eyes.
"No'm; that is, nothin's worse but my heart. That is
right bad."
She was instantly relieved by his quizzical
expression; and at the same time his words quickened the beat of her
pulse. It had been so like a game of blind-Harry trying to show this
iron- and-granite man she cared, and to what extent she cared; but the
bandage seemed to have slipped off. She came slowly closer, lips
parted.
Hallock was sitting up; he reached for and captured
her hand; drew her down beside him on the bed.
"Sue," he said,
eye to eye with her, "forgive me for makin' it so hard for yuh, but what
could yuh expect of a man whose mind was twisted with thinkin' murder
allatime—professional gunfightin' is just that, even when yuh give yuhr
marked man a show, like I always done. I wasn't driven into my first
gunnin', like some—I did it delib- erate, because I was crazy about guns
an' honed to imitate Wild Bill Hickok, who used to hang in a saloon
where I worked down at Deadwood. Had nat- ural ability, I reckon, an'
improved it with practice. My first killin' didn't make me feel like I
thought it would, high-chinned—but I'd made a begin- nin' an' had to go
on. An' with the tough rep I've got now I couldn't figger that a girl
like yuh—. But it's the truth," his grip on her hand tightened, "yuh're
the first girl I ever looked at twice. Seein' yuh when I first hit this
town, I said to myself, 'She's the woman I might've loved, but she ain't
for me,
with my blood-stained hands.'
"
"You said that?" Sue's face dropped closer. "Listen,
Trigger—"
"Tom's my name," he inserted, "though nobody's
called me by it for a long time."
"Tom, I want to say that I
hate bloodshed as much as the next woman and killing for hire is one of
the mean- est professions on the frontier—mur- der, just as you said.
But a certain amount of killing, not for money has been necessary to
tame this West, and I realize it and am not squeamish. Now that sounds
strange, perhaps, coming from a woman, but my mother crossed the plains
in a covered wagon, which was twice attacked by Indians; my father ran a
saloon in Nevada min- ing camps before he came here and in his younger
days was reckoned handy with a shooter. Your blood-stained hands, Tom, I
don't approve of, but— I just don't see them! "
He marveled,
speechless.
"If I'd half-guessed I'd spoken sooner, Sue," he
said at last, leaning toward her, which brought their faces very close
together. "But what had— what have I to offer yuh, except a name for
quick-gunnin'—"
"Is that all, Tom?" she smiled with
provocative eyes, provocative lips.
"No," he tensed, "not all!
I love yuh, Sue!"
HIS kiss burned and lingered on her firm,
full mouth; and she gave back with a passionateness that made him heady.
She struggled for release to get her breath. His sinewy arms fell lax
and he remarked:
"I'm no great shakes of a lover, Sue, but I
reckon yuh know I mean it!" "You don't realize your ferocity, Mister
Man," she laughed. "I did once doubt, I thought you could be nothing but
a cold-blooded killing-machine; you seemed to shun me, you never
more
than passed the time of day with me.
I thought you were too blind, too cal- lous, ever to see that I loved
you—or that you didn't care. And I couldn't throw myself straight at
your head." "Doubt gone?" he asked, still struck with the wonder of
woman.
"Entirely. When I spoke the other day of Brule having
been one friend, but not the only one, what held you back, Tom; didn't
you understand?" "Thought I did, but wasn't shore. Couldn't believe it,
just couldn't. Hardly can now. Wonderful Sue! I wanted to die last week,
hopin' to catch up With Reckless on the Long Trail an' tell him I didn't
do it a-purpose. Now I want to live—what man wouldn't, knowin' yuh loved
him?"
She beamed happily, then sobered. "I know you loved
Reckless, man and man. It was a sad mistake," she sym-
pathized.
"It cured me o' gunfightin'," he vowed. He turned
half-around and pointed to the cartridge-belts and hol- stered guns
hanging on the bedpost above him. "Yuh can take those irons an' junk
'em, Sue. I'll never put 'em on ag'in! Never!"
Her gaze
followed his pointing finger and for several moments she was silent. The
pause surprised him.
"Don'tcha want me to quit—?" he
asked.
"Certainly," she interrupted hastily. "You must start
all over, put your past behind and live it down. But listen, Tom: while
you're in this town you are practically surrounded by enemies, not the
least of them—though he is a coward—Chalk Gallatin. He's jealous of your
reputation, he'd do any under- handed thing to be able to swagger and
pose as the man who killed you. And not only that. He has made advances
to me, honorable enough, but I've al- ways repulsed him, detested him.
He knows that I love you for I told him—"
Hallock did not mention that her
father had informed him previously—"and it gives him two reasons for
jealousy, two killing reasons. He's that kind, you know it as well as I
do."
Hallock nodded and caressed his stubbly chin
thoughtfully. "Yuh think as long as I stay in Derringer I got to pack my
guns or he'll down me?"
"I know it. Leave as soon as you can—I
don't mean run away—and I will go with you. Anytime, anywhere. Could
Reckless Brule have said more?"
"He couldn't! It sounds like
Reck- less." The gunfighter caught up one strong, white hand and pressed
it to his lips.
"And Tom," said Sue earnestly, "don't forget
that Gallatin isn't your only enemy. He's the worst, perhaps, but
Blackfoot Dixon is another, and Coldiron McClintock—oh, there must be a
dozen."
"More than that, fellers that don't come into the
Elkhorn, an' I ain't over- lookin' one of 'em," replied Hallock grimly.
"An' yuh're plumb correct, Sue—I got to tote iron, much as I'm hatin'
to, till we've shook the dust o' Derringer. I wouldn't let myself get
laid low for nothin' now! Girl, can't hardly believe my luck droppin' my
rope on yuh."
She tossed her head. "You can be- lieve a fact,
Mister Man." Her eyes fell on the tray. "There's your supper getting
cold. Let me go now," draw- ing away her hand, "and feed
up."
She placed the tray across his knees In the act of
lifting a cup of coffee, he paused, and set it down again, un-
tasted.
'Sue," he said, "yuh won't mind if I ask yuh
somethin'?"
"No, indeed, what is it?" She won- dered, his
manner was so different.
"Why, where at," he proceeded slowly,
"did yuh learn to sling language the way yuh do. Yuh're
eddicated.
Yuh don't talk none like other
frontier girls, leastways the ones I've seen."
"Oh," she
laughed, "mother had schooling and she taught me some. Then I went to a
little log schoolhouse in Nevada. There's no great mystery about
that—why?"
Hallock swung his head from side to side. "Me a
gun-throwin' hellion, no good whatever to nobody, no looks, no money,
never been inside a schoolhouse —an' the likes o' yuh takes to me.
That's the mystery, girl. But," he added, quickly, "I ain't goin' to pry
into it none!"
CHAPTER IV
Woman's Skirts
Between
TWO days later Hallock was out of bed and able to walk
within the confiines of Sue's room. When he tired of pacing up and down
he would sit near the open window, well back from it so that he could
not be seen by anyone in the street, yet could himself see from a
certain angle. It was by advice of Sue Brace that he took this
precaution; she argued the prud- ence of not letting his enemies know he
was on his feet again until his strength had fully returned and his
wound en- tirely healed. And Hallock readily acted upon this advice,
seeing that it was good. The lips of Sam Brace and Sue and Doc Bennison,
the only three who saw him, were sealed regarding his progress toward
recovery.
That night, despite his caution dur- ing the day,
Hallock was guilty of such negligence as nearly cost him his life after
all. When dusk descended on Derringer, he pulled down the window- shade
and lighted the gas. He had eaten, but was reluctant to go back to bed;
his old vitality had reasserted it-
self and he was doing nothing to use
up the excess of energy; therefore, he glared at the bed which had
befriended him in time of need and fell to walking from wall to wall,
incidentally passing so close to the window that his shadow was thrown
upon the shade. This fact he absent-mindedly overlooked. He had drawn
the shade for the purpose of cheating hostile eyes in Main Street, but
could not have exposed himself more dangerously had he left it rolled
up. His mind was traveling most plea- sant paths, all revolving about
Sue Brace, when a Colt banged in the street and, ripping through the
shade, a forty- five slug burned across his forehead and smashed into
the thin wall opposite the window!
Hallock sprang backward,
startled, dashing the sudden outpouring of blood from his eyes. His wits
collected in an instant, he leaped toward the gas-jet and snapped off
the light. Then, spring- ing by the window, spurred to haste by the
thought that another bullet might be launched upon the heels of the
first, he slid a gun from one of the scabbards on the bed-post. The
familiar feel of the gun-grip caused his blood to surge with the old
fighting lust; notwith- standing his renouncement of gunplay, he could
not conquer in a moment an instinct he had catered to, fostered to
perfection, for years. Sliding back to the window, he dropped to his
knees and lifted one side of the shade care- fully. His view was much
restricted. Seeing none on the visible section of sidewalk opposite—the
height at which the bullet had passed through the shade had told him at
a glance from whence it came—Hallock crawled around to the other side
and repeated the cir- cumspect performance of peeping. But not the sign
of a human being could he see to train his gun on.
"Scared,"
he muttered. "Figgered he'd missed when the light went out
so
sudden. Near fooled myself to death
that time. Forgot about my shadder." He turned at the swift opening of
the door to his darkened room. It was Sue, a light in the hall revealed.
Mak- ing out his form crouched down by the window, she imagined, with a
cold thrill of horror, that the shot from the street had accomplished
its treacherous pur- pose.
"My God!" she exclaimed, for once
in her life on the verge of fainting.
"Oh, I ain't hurt none,
Sue," Hal- lock's voice revived her sinking senses. "That is," he
amended, laughing as he got up and crossed to the unsteady figure, "I
got my eyebrows singed an' was lucky at that. Why, yuh're tremb- lin',
Sue." One arm was around her. " 'Tain't like yuh, girl, to bust up over
a li'l' thing like that."
"But—but," she stammered, pretty
close to tears from the reaction, "I thought they had got
you."
"Born to be a bridegroom yet," he reassured her, and
kissed her cool cheek. She noticed a suspicious mois- ture on her face
from contact with his.
"You said your eyebrows were singed?
That one of your jokes, Tom? Let me see them. Come over here un- der the
light, away from that window. How did they come to see you. You know I
warned—"
"Yes, yes, but I slipped up." He told her how, while
following her to the Dther side of the room.
WHEN, by
gaslight, she saw his en- saguined visage, Sue was stricken again with
apprehension. But when she had brought a basin of water and washed away
the blood, found to her relief that a strip of courtplaster would answer
as a bandage.
"Yuh got any idea, Sue, who the shootin' galoot
was?" Hair-trigger asked, while she was applying the court-plaster. "I
make a guess it was
Chalk, but wouldn't bet high on it,
there bein' others like him."
"It wasn't Chalk. He was at the
bar when the shot was fired," she replied. "I ran out of the back room
when I heard it and there he was, just pouring himself a drink. So that
lets him out. But Blackfoot Dixon wasn't there, nor Coldiron McClintock
— take your choice."
"An' I could guess Len Roper an' a few
more names, mebbe, before I hit it."
"Pa must have thought
your window was the target, for he was over by the front door. He called
as I came in, 'I don't see anyone. Better go upstairs.' I was already
heading that way. Here's pa now.
"Pa," she half-turned as Sam
Brace admitted himself, "this man of mine nearly scared the wits out of
me, but he's all right, barring a scratch." Sam chuckled as he came
forward. "Bet Trigger ain't never been so babied be- fore in his life.
How about it, Trigger?"
"I like it, doggone it!" Hallock
swiftly defended his nurse and him- self. "Sam, yuh'd enjoy gettin' hurt
if yuh was younger an' somebody like Sue—"
"Shore, I'd enjoy
it. Don't blame yuh a-tall." Sam looked at his punc- tured window-shade
and the identity of the would-be slayer was discussed.
"Don't
make no difference who," said Hallock, to end the discussion, "he plumb
failed. But it shows how careful I gotta be, as Sue said. Shore is a
pack o' wolves in this camp—an' I was as curly as any up to a few days
ago."
But his enemies were not content with failure. It seemed
to Hallock that his eyes had barely closed that night when voices
penetrated his dreamless sleep. He sat up. The voices—Sue's and
Chalk's—were in the narrow hall- way, right outside his door. Sue
was
saying, "I can get you through the
heart first pull, Chalk, and I will if you move another step!" And
Gallatin replied, "Believe yuh could an' would,
dammit!"
Hair-trigger's battle spirit soared. He flung out of
bed, pulled on shirt and trousers, and reached up in the dark for his
guns. The belts and holsters were hanging in place, but the latter were
empty. So, sans hardware or weapon of any sort, Hallock barefooted over
to the door and swung it wide suddenly. The low- burning gas-jet threw
light upon a most significant tableau. There were four figures, one
opposing the other three, and all of them poised tensely. Sue stood
nearest the door, presenting her back to Hallock. She gripped his miss-
ing six-guns in rock-steady hands, covering the precious trio halfway
down the hall, Chalk Gallatin foremost, Blackfoot Dixon and Coldiron
McClin- tock flanking him. Chalk's right hand grasped his belt near his
holster and the fingers twitched nervously with re- pressed eagerness to
complete the move to draw. As Hair-trigger stepped out of his room,
Coldiron McClintock, a six-foot, angular villian and no second- rate
artillerist, huskily exclaimed: "There he is!"
HALLOCK was in
plain view of the men, but Sue had to depend on sense of hearing; the
merest side- glance would give Chalk and pals their chance. This, in
fact, was the critical moment, for Chalk, sharp-spurred by twofold
jealous hatred of the man who loomed grimly just beyond, went so far as
to unclasp fingers from his belt and fasten them on his Colt-butt. The
wooden grip still boasted the notch he had carved for Hallock and,
resolved that it should never be removed, know- ing Hallock would
out-trigger him in straight-up fight if allowed to fully
re-
cover, Chalk had slipped upstairs with his two closest companions
while Sam Brace was in the back room, his office. The telltale shadow on
the shade had warned Gallatin, when informed of it by the author of the
close shot, Black- foot Dixon, that Hallock was getting dangerously
well, would soon be his old self and now or never was the time to act.
But, though the men had negotiated the stair-fiight undetected, they had
not reckoned on Sue Brace. She came out of the convalescent's room just
as the three desperados reached the top of the stairs, and, needing no
more than a sight of them to grasp their design, she flew back into the
room and out again, lugging Hallock's guns.
"Chalk," said Sue,
when Gallatin changed the position of his hand, "I'm watching and I
can't miss your so- called heart at this range. Not talking to hear
myself, either.
"Dixon!" on a sharper note, catch- ing the
quarter-breed inching behind Gallatin to conceal his purpose of stak-
ing the issue on a quick grab for his holster, "stand away from Chalk.
You can't put over any Indian slickness on me."
"Sue," broke
in Hallock at her back, "pass me the guns an' I'll fog 'em to a
finish."
"Tom," she replied evenly, "you'll oblige me by going
back in your room. I'm a corking good shot and they all know it. They're
going to about-face and head downstairs again, clear this hall by the
count of three, or they won't be able to go down at all."
And
she stubbornly refused to give up the shooting-irons, though Hallock all
but bent his knees to her. At the same time he thrilled over her grit
and deft handling of the situation.
"One!" counted Sue, and
Chalk visibly started. He perceived that she was going to be as good as
her word.
i taunted Chalk, glaring past Sue at
Hal- lock, and taking malignant delight in the red rage that distorted
the gun- fighter's features instantly.
"If yuh live long
enough yuh'll swallow that lie, Gallatin!" rasped Hair-trigger, taking a
step forward, one side of Sue.
"Sue, won't yuh please, as yuh
love me, gimme them guns?"
But she shook her head and counted
an ominous "Two!", and Chalk turned.
Dixon and McClintock had
started sooner, desiring no more than Gallatin himself to brave the fire
of Sue's bor- rowed artillery in the narrow hallway; and as "Three!" was
uttered the des- peradoes, spurs clinking, were descend- ing the
stairs.
CHAPTER V
Hallock Lifts
Trail
"I'LL thank yuh to send for Doc Bennison, Sue," remarked
Hair- trigger, next morning, after breakfast.
"Something the
matter?" she asked, though hardly believing there could be; he looked
like the Hallock of the days before Reckless Brule's
passing.
"No'm, feelin' fine. I want to ask him somethin'." He
paused, and when he spoke again it was deliberately, as if he were
carefully choosing his words. "Don't mind it, Sue, if I—well, I'd like
to see him alone."
Although she shook her head and feigned
indifference, she was a little hurt that he should want to keep any-
thing from her. But she saw to it that Bennison was
summoned.
"Doc," said Hallock, when the booze- fighting
physician had lurched into one of the two chairs in the room, "how soon
can I fight?"
Bennison arched his eyebrows, then
smiled with one side of his face. "Un- usual question, Hallock. You're
com- ing around fine; best specimen I've ever treated. Soon!
Why?"
"I can't let a girl go on protectin' me," rejoined
Hair-trigger, enigmati- cally; Chalk's taunt rankled deep. He perceived
the doctor was in the dark and explained. "That's twice she's stood
Chalk off—can't let it happen ag'in."
The doctor nodded. "Know
how you feel, Hallock, but it's childish for anybody to accuse you of
skulking back of a woman; and," he added bluntly, "childish for you to
let it rile you." Hallock started to snort, then abrupt- ly subsided.
"Doc, yuh can say that to me an' get away with it. Reckon it's true,
mebbe—but hereafter I'm aimin' to do my own fightin'!" An interval of
silence, then, "She's a mighty fine girl!"
"She is," readily
agreed the doctor. "An' say, she loves me," proudly de- clared the
gunfighter.
"Congrats!" Bennison extended a hand, still steady
despite the number of years his system had been absorbing whiskey. "I'm
only half-shot this morn- ing, Hallock, so I know what I'm talk- ing
about and am sincere."
"Uh-huh. Well, yuh ain't answered my
question, doc. How soon? I feel fit right now to lift a corner o' hell."
"Let me see that wound."
Hallock stripped off outing shirt and
undershirt and Bennison made careful examination. "Sore?" he asked,
press- ing the healed spot.
"No!"
"Fight when you're
ready, then. Take 'em one at a time. You're not in shape for a
free-for-all yet."
"Keno! Chalk's my 'ticular meat. Others can
wait awhile. Now, doc, yuhr bill—"
"or I'll be the first man you'll
have to lick. Fists, because I'm a rotten shot." "Be damn' hard for yuh
to coax a fight out o' me," laughed Hallock. "Tell Sam I'd like to see
him when yuh go down, will yuh?"
When the saloonkeeper came up
he found Hallock cleaning his guns.
"No," answered Sam, dropping
on the edge of the bed and viewing Hal- lock's occupation curiously.
"What the hell yuh up to, Trigger?' '
"Aiming to settle my
score with Chalk, Yuh heard about last night— the second
time?"
"Sue said she'd caught Chalk, Black- foot an' Coldiron
on the second floor. They sneaked when I wasn't in the
barroom."
"Yeh, an' she didn't make much o' her part in it, I
reckon. Her way, an' yuh savvy. But she's stood 'tween me an' trouble
for the last time, Sam. Give Chalk this message from me and when he
drifts in: an hour from the time yuh see him, I'll meet him back o' the
stage corrals an' shoot it out. Got that?" "Ye-es," drawled Sam, "but I
dunno about deliverin' it. Sue would give me hell!"
"If she
knew—but don't yuh let her know. I'm in good shape, asked the doc. An',
Sam, I wouldn't dare get my- self shot up after all the care Sue's taken
o' me. Only thing I'm afraid of is that Chalk won't grab a-holt the
other end o' the snake. He ain't got a chance in a hundred an' he's
wise. He may figger to win by a trick—he's a crafty coyote—but I'll have
my wits workin' an' my eyes open."
UNCOMFORTABLY the saloon-
keeper consented. "All right. I'll go along with yuh, as second, an'
tote my sawed-off to keep Chalk's friends from
interferin'."
Hallock reached over and clapped him
on the back. "Hop to it! Lemme know soon's yuh've seen him—but care- ful
Sue ain't around."
"Yuh bet I'll be, for my own sake," grimly
responded Sam, and went out.
Two hours later he brought the
sur- prising information that Chalk Galla- tin had accepted the
challenge, would, accompanied by Blackfoot Dixon to act second, meet
Hallock and Brace in an hour behind the Sundown Stage Com- pany's
corrals. Hallock leaped up and began pacing the room in front of Sam,
dominated by the old urge to kill. He even snapped his arm forward in
the motion of throwing a gun. Then he stopped dead and the flicker of
hell in his eyes faded.
"Blood-hongry as ever," he la- mented,
presenting a long face to Sam. "Death o' Reckless didn't cure me after
all, an' Ive swore reg'lar every day—" "But yuh can't kill off a thing
like that so quick, Trigger. Hafta tame yuhr nature by degrees. No
disgrace in failin' down, but in givin' up." Thus Sam, sagely. "I've
knowed gunfighters all my life an' lots of 'em reformed, though it was
uphill climbin' an' they didn't do it in a day or a month. An' this here
fight, thought yuh're the chal- lengin' party, is more in the way o'
bein' self-defense. Chalk's forcin' yuhr hand."
That hour of
waiting was the longest for Hallock since he had been down with his
wound. Ten minutes before the time set for the duel, Brace poked his
head in Hallock's room.
"Shove along here, Trigger. Sue's gone
to the store an' the coast is clear for a few minutes. Say, yuh're
lookin' prime! "
Hallock was the old Hallock, from hat to
spurred boots, and excepting his chaps; wore his low-slung guns with the
old careless grace. His confinement had not lasted long enough to pale
his
tan and he was hardly any thinner
now than he was before his confinement, for he had been well
fed.
Like a couple of mischievous boys, fearful of
encountering Sue, the gun- fighter and his second slipped out the back
door of the saloon and walking along the outskirts of town came, in five
minutes, to the stockade corrals in the rear of the stage-station. There
was a clearing north of the corrals which had been used many times in
the past as a duelling-ground by those who had not settled their
differences summarily in main street or the saloons and dance
halls.
"There's Happy Hoofs whistlin' to yuh," smiled Sam, as
a pinto thrust its head over the pickets of the high corral and shrilly
welcomed the approaching Hallock.
Happy Hoofs, the
gunfighter's sad- dle mare and pet, boarded with the stage horses. The
station-keeper, Cale Halpin, was a friend of Hallock's, there- fore
ignored the stage company's rules regarding horses other than those be-
longing to the line. Cale put in an ap- pearance at the back door of the
station while Hair-trigger was fondling the mare's handsome
head.
" 'Lo, Trigger, glad to see yuh lookin' so pert," Cale
came down to the cor- rals with his hand out. "Had a siege, didn't yuh?
Say, do you know that paint gal needs exercise a lot—an'— uh—Brule's
cayuse, too. Are you go- in' to ride the mare?"
"Not now.
Exchanging lead with Chalk Gallatin here in a few minutes. Stick around
and see the smoke," said Hallock, staring hard into space at the mention
of Reckless's name.
"Chalk Gal—where'n hell did he get the
nerve to fight yuh?" The station- man couldn't make it.
"Out
of a bottle, I reckon—or mebbe he's stayin' sober an' dependin' on his
tricky wits."
THEY lounged against the corral,
waiting. When the hour was up, Chalk had not appeared. Still they
waited. Hallock remarked that he could excuse Chalk for not being
punctual at his own funeral. Not until fifteen, twenty minutes had
passed did doubt arise in his mind, shared equally by Brace and
Halpin.
"Reckon he's comin'?" said Sam, the first to voice the
question in the minds of all.
"If he don't I'm goin' after
him, even if Sue sees me," Hallock rejoined, his eyes deadly behind
half-closed lids.
Neither hide nor hair of Chalk at the end of
a half hour. So Hair-trigger and the saloonkeeper left Cale chewing a
speculative cud and headed around into Main street. They had not pro-
ceeded far when Sam grasped Hallock's arm.
"Say, 'taint hoss
sense to go canterin' round in full bloom this way, Trigger. He might be
hidin' anywheres. An' it's just struck me what's his likeliest game: to
lay for you in the Elkhorn. Savvy?"
"Yuh mean," said the
gunfighter, "he'd figger on me gettin' tired waitin' at the corrals an'
goin' back to the Elk- horn, an' when I drifted in the front door he'd
bang me off?"
"Just that."
"Good head, Sam. And
yuh're right. We'll checkmate 'im—go in the back way. Turn down here,"
heading in be- tween two shacks; "he may have spies lookin' for us to
show up on Main street an' warn him we're cornin'."
They
entered the Elkhorn by the rear door and Hallock pushed ahead into the
barroom, expecting to catch Chalk off guard. But Chalk was not there,
only a few minor characters in the turgid life of Derringer. These men
manifested surprise at the sudden looming of Hair-trigger, panoplied for
war and wearing his fighting face, and
so dearly was it genuine surprise,
that the gunfighter surmised Chalk had not spread word of the challenge
issued by the man he packed a notch for.
"Anybody seen Chalk?"
Hallock asked standing behind the bar and sweeping his glance around; to
receive negative replies from every quarter. The bartender on duty
hadn't laid eyes on Chalk since the latter talked with his
boss.
Hair-trigger turned away from the bar and confronted Sam
Brace, who was leaning against the back-bar, cud- dling his sawed-off.
"Reckon he jump- ed the town?" the gunfighter asked.
"Dunno
what to think—he's cheatin' somehow, yuh can put yuhr gilt on
that."
Just then A1 Deering, the store- keeper, scrambled over
the Elkhorn stoop and staggered rather than walked into the barroom. He
had a handker- chief tied around his head and it was splotched with
telltale red.
"Gimme a drink!" he gasped, lurch- ing up to the
bar and clinging there. "Whisky — no chaser." He gulped down a drink
tall enough to oil his organ of phonation and stiffen his wilt- ing
legs, then shot a forefinger at Sam Brace, who jumped as if a gun had
been stuck in his paunch. "Yuh know where yuhr daughter is, Sam? No, yuh
don't, I don't need to ask, or yuh wouldn't be standin' there so ca'm.
Well, to make it short an' snappy, that lousy pup, Chalk Gallatin's run
off with her! Yep," as Sam leaped a foot off the floor and Hallock
called on his Maker to damn the soul of Chalk, "she was buyin' stuff in
my place half hour or more ago. We was the only two in the store. While
Sue was selectin' some canned goods off a shelf, I heard two hosses come
up. Chalk was rid- ing' one an' leadin' t' other. He stopped only a
minute to sling a look in the door from the saddle, then rode on
around
the corner, down the alley 'tween my store an' Spokane Harry's
dance hall. I didn't think much about it, not even when Chalk come
walkin' in the front door a few minutes after. But it did make me take
notice, yuh betche, when the son-of-a-gun shut the door an' dropped the
bar. He had a gun out an' told me not to move, me nor Sue either. She
gave him the scornful eye an' I betche she'd give him somethin' else if
there'd been a weppin handy. I know her spunk. 'Yuh ready to go ridin',
Sue?' Chalk says, hard, an' she asks him if he's crazy. 'Yeh, over yuh,
he says, gettin' closer to us all the time. I was out from behind the
counter an' wonderin' how I could turn the tables on the coyote when all
of a sudden he jumps on me an' hammers me on the head with his Colt
butt. 'Course my light goes plumb out an' what happened to Sue after it
did is only guesswork, far's I'm concerned. When I come to I was tied up
with clothesline from my own stock. An' stuff was scattered all over the
floor, showin' what a fight Sue had put up ag'in him. Say, if he hadn't
had a gun bet she could 'a' licked him bare-handed. Well, the door was
still shut, but unbarred, for pretty soon a customer come in an' found
me, an' I—"
HALLOCK and Brace were by this time going through
the front door on fast feet. The hangers-on in the barroom, under urge
of excitement rather than from any real desire to help, piled after the
gunfighter and Sam, but halted in close ranks when Hallock wheeled on
them and thundered:
"This is a two-man posse! Don't want none
o' yuh scum taggin' along, not knowin' how many of yuh might've been
wise to the dirty game an' kept yuhr lips buttoned."
And he
would have perked his guns and killed them for rats only that
he
anticipated need of all his
cartridges and every second of time was precious. Both he and Brace were
so stunned by the abduction that they exchanged but few words as they
hurried along the street.
"I'll get my hoss an' meet yuh back
the stage station," Sam said, suddenly directing his steps aside as they
came abreast of the livery-stable.
Hallock nodded, wordless,
and pushed on, half-running. He kept his eyes open, hoping to see one of
Chalk's side-kicks; wondered if Dixon and Mc- Clintock had quit town
with him. The thought of Sue helpless in such a crowd almost maddened
him. He derived some relief from the reflection that Chalk, worthless as
he was otherwise, doubtless had real affection for Sue and would protect
her—unless her continual rebuffs and of him and his knowledge of her
love for Hallock, had turned this regard to hate. That was
possible.
The gunfighter dashed into the stage station,
shouting at Cale Halpin; "I'm wantin' Happy Hoofs, damn'
pronto!"
"Think I'm up in Canady?" snorted Cale, putting
fingers in his ears. Then, as the full power of the blazing eyes shocked
him into activity, "C'mon, Trigger, right this way to yuhr hoss an'
saddle. I shore ain't danglin' nor askin' questions when yuh looks like
that!"
He plunged out the back door with Hallock on his heels
and ran to the stable where the horses were quartered in winter. From
the harness-room he dragged forth Hair-trigger's riding- gear, while the
gunfighter hastened over to the corral in which Happy Hoofs was
impounded. Sound of her mas- ter's voice brought the eager pinto
pounding up the instant Hallock un- barred the gate. He never had to use
a rope on Happy Hoofs—and rarely spurs. While he was deftly saddling,
Hair-trigger told the palpitating station
keeper enough to make him understand
the situation.
"When I see yuh ag'in, Sue will be ridin' leg
an' leg with me!" Hallock exclaimed, springing astride and rolling the
dust toward Main street. Sam Brace, charging along the thoroughfare on
his mettlesome nag almost collided with his prospective
son-in-law.
"Where'n hell we goin' to head?" Sam barked.
"Ain't nobody seen 'em, I reckon, 'nless it was Dixon or Me- Clintock,
an' mebbe they was in the party. S'pose we see if we can foller the
trail from the alley by Deerin's store."
Hallock was on the
point of agree- ing to tackle this uncertainty when his nervously roving
eye descried a fami- liar figure on the board sidewalk in front of
Spokane Harry's saloon and dance hall.
"Coldiron!" he roared.
"See, Sam? An' he's lookin' this way. We'll find out what he
knows."
HAPPY HOOFS was so crazy to run that all Hallock had
to do was slacken her reins a little and she was off at arrow-speed. In
a few jumps the gunfighter was alongside the angu- lar bad man,
McClintock; with Sam slashing along in his dust—to be in at the death,
if there was one. Holding up the paint mare's head with a firm hand.
Hallock leaned from the saddle:
"Mac, I can see from the grin
on yuhr ugly mush yuh know what's up. I'd know yuh was lyin' if yuh said
yuh didn't. Where's Chalk?"
"He ain't livin' here no more,
Trig- ger. Went over to Pinecreek to get married, an' he ain't cornin'
back." This Coldiron said with a leer, hands studiously held off from
proximity to the guns he packed.
"Here's a cure for that grin
o' yuhrs, Mac!" Hallock snarled, and his fist lashed out as he stood up
in the stirrups.
Coldiron's head rocked
backward and he staggered a few paces and fell, his nose and mouth
smashed to bloody pulp. He lay with his head and should- ers in the
hoof-marked street, the rest of his body sprawled across the board-
walk, while Hallock lifted the reins and charged away in swirling
dust.
"Gone to Pinecreek to get spliced," he bellowed at
Brace, as the latter spun his horse about and spurred it to keep pace
with Happy Hoofs. "There's a sky pilot there."
"Thirty miles,"
replied Sam. "Good thing our hosses is fresh."
A Colt boomed
behind them. The bullet did not fall anywhere near, but Hallock turned
for a brief glance rear- ward. The bloody-visaged McClintock swayed on
his feet on the boardwalk, a smoke-wisping gun in one hand. On a chance,
Hallock jerked loose a Colt and fired back; but the range was too long
for close shooting at the pace Happy Hoofs was traveling. The last
Hallock saw of Coldiron he was still upright.
CHAPTER
VI
The Footpath Way
"POUND leather!" gritted Hal-
lock as they lopped off a mile of the thirty to Pinecreek. "Might be
able to catch up this side if we don't pick no daisies. How's that
cayuse o' yuhrs travel, Sam?"
"Burns ground an' will go till
he drops, though I reckon yuhr mare has a mite more bottom." Sam was
thoroughly alive to Happy Hoof's fine points.
"If I'd thought
yuh could've hair- pinned Reckless's hoss. He wouldn't let the paint
pass him. But yuh'll hafta make out best yuh can."
"Don't hold
in for me, Trigger, if I
drop any behind. Sue's the one we're
thinkin' of now."
They were sweeping mountainward across a
plain tufted with bunch-grass, yellow and dead-looking, and scattered
patches of sage-brush.
"Strike yuh odd that Coldiron would
tell us where Chalk's headin' for? Don't think he was shootin' us off on
the wrong trail, do yuh?" Brace called across to the grimfaced
gunfighter.
"No, I reckon he talked straight," opined Hallock,
facing his companion. "He figgered Chalk had start aplenty to beat us
an' aimed to keep his own hide whole—knew I'd ventilate him short order
if he didn't come across. He wouldn't get himself shot up to protect
Chalk; ain't that much of a fool."
"I shore hope yuhr dope's
correct," said Brace, grabbing at his hat as the wind got under the brim
and threatened to lift it.
But Hallock had erred somewhat in
judging the reason for Coldiron's will- ingness to talk; in fact,
neither the gun- fighter nor Brace had given Chalk Gal- latin due credit
for the craftiness which existed behind his white mask of a face. They
knew he was tricky, but—!
"What's that smoke ahead, d'yuh
reckon?" Hallock pointed with his left hand.
They had covered
the eight-mile sweep of plain and plunged into a val- ley of the Cuddy
Paw Mountains. The lower slopes were thickly grown with tamarack, red
fir and yellow pine, and the men were riding the high trail on the
valley's rim, above the timber. But the smoke was not coming from the
di- rection of the trees; it plumed and writhed out and upward from the
lean- ing wall of the valley, right in their path when they should round
a bulging shoulder.
"Trigger, it might be anything burn- in',"
observed the saloonkeeper. "Tim-
ber's scarce this high up; mostly
noth- in' but grass. We only got a few yards to go an' then we can
see."
"By God!" Hallock swore suddenly, his eyes flaming as
the truth flashed home, and striking his saddle-horn with his fist. "By
God!" he repeated and showed Brace his distorted face, which awed the
saloonkeeper, accustomed as he was to the fiendish twists Hallock could
give to his features; "it's the bridge across the valley that's burn-
in'!" And he thrust in the spurs, somewhat to the paint mare's anger,
for she was doing her best.
HALLOCK reached the turn in the
trail many yards in advance of Sam Brace and pulled up. What he saw made
him tremble with anger, as the unnecessary spurring was making the pinto
quiver with a like emotion. The wooden bridge which spanned the val- ley
at this point—fifty feet across was in flames. The thick smoke drifted
to- ward horse and rider, enwrapping them. Happy Hoofs shook her head
and her eyes rolled with something akin to fear, but Hallock was grim
and statuesque. Brace came along, larruping his mount, while the
gunfighter sat thus.
"Yuh might say," he turned on the
appalled saloonkeeper, speaking husk- ily, for the smoke was not without
its effect on his vocal cords, "that Chalk burns his bridges behind
him."
It was grim humor, considering that the distance to
Pinecreek was seventy- five miles by any other trail and that haste was
imperative. The bridge, tinder-dry as there had been no rain in that
part of Montana for a month or more, had fallen easy prey to flame. To
start the fire, Hallock judged that Chalk had piled sun-cured
bunch-grass on the far end. The flames had eaten more than halfway
across to the side where they sat their horses and the middle, sagging
dangerously, gave way
of a sudden and, dragging even the
un- burned section from its moorings, the whole smoking, flame-shooting
mass rattled and crashed seventy feet to the floor of the
valley.
"An' the only other route is seventy- five miles, half
around the Cuddy Paws!" Sam Brace exclaimed, w-hite- faced. "A burro
couldn't make it down this side o' the valley an' yuh'd need wings to go
up the other side."
"Chalk shore is a slick article," con-
ceded Hallock. "Easy to see now why Coldiron talked—Chalk told 'im what
he was goin' to do, o' course. That Injun, Dixon, maybe with 'em, too,
an7 he ain't lackin' cunnin'. Might've been his idea. Say, Sam," he
shook himself, "no use sittin' here like a coupla bumps on a log. We got
to find another way across—no time to go down and
around."
"Just take the lead an' show me, Trigger. I'm willin'
to try anything," replied Sam, who was himself up a stump. "That bridge
bein' down cuts off the stage due s'evenin' in Derringer,
too."
Hallock did not hear the last. He had lifted Happy
Hoof's reins and was ambling on around the winding trail which hugged
the almost perpendicular valley wall.
"What's that—another
bridge?" Hallock turned a surprise face back upon Brace and pointed
ahead when they had ridden a mile or more up the valley. At that
distance it certainly did look like another bridge spanning the
chasm.
"Can't be—there was only the one." Sam was skeptical,
but kept his horse close at the tail-end of Happy Hoofs.
When
they got nearer they saw it was the huge trunk of a tree. The valley
norrowed at this point to about forty feet, but the drop below was just
as great as down by the fallen bridge. The log had not been placed in
its present
firm position by accident; the side
up- permost had been smoothed off with an ax, making a footpath about
four feet in width.
"Must've been used as a foot-bridge by the
miners up this way before the gold veins pinched out," Hallock re-
marked, as they sat their saddle, at gaze. "That other bridge was only
built a coupla years, wasn't it?"
"Yeh," said Sam. 'But I
never knew about this one—never came up this far, because when I went
anywhere across the valley, always took the reg'lar bridge. Miners was
gone from these parts long before I hit Derringer. That was a minin'
camp one time, yuh know."
"Looks as if it'd stood the weather
pretty well," Hallock remarked, his eye on the tree-bridge. "Pretty
narrow for a hoss, but if any four-legged critter can go across it's
Happy Hoofs. The both of us are willin' to try anything once, eh, girl?"
patting the sleek neck; "an' for Sue we'd try it twice. Sam, I'm
startin'. I'd say a prayer if I knew any."
It was going to be
a ticklish feat the gunfighter was well aware. He had tested the paint
mare's nerve frequently and always found it good, but not in just this
way before. Urged by her master's voice and rein-hand, Happy Hoofs
ambled to the tree, then halted and tossed her head as if in
misgiving.
"Now, don't be shakin' yuhr head, girl," rebuked
Hallock. softly. "Room enough for yuh to put yuhr hoofs if yuh do it
dainty an' careful. I'm right with yuh, even if yuh should slip— which
yuh ain't a-goin' to. Amble, girl. We're wastin' time."
ONE
would have thought from the movement of the paint's ears that she
understood every word; her actions manifested her nervousness, but so
strong was the love for her rider and her confidence in him, that Happy
Hoofs
held back no longer. She stepped cautiously forward, and with
Hallock talking to bolster up her courage, covered ten feet or so. Then
she hesi- tated. The dizzy abyss swam under- neath.
"Not
halfway, yet, girl," spoke the gunfighter, "but if yuh want to rest, go
to it. Don't look down, but straight across to where we're
goin'."
Presently the paint moved slowly on again. Another ten
feet and she stopped. The tree was shaking in a way calculated to freeze
the hearts of horse and rider. There was no going back, however; forward
was the only course. Hallock thought the motion of the precarious bridge
resulted from the strain he and Happy Hoofs were putting on the middle.
Partly that was the cause, but there was another. Looking behind, he saw
Sam Brace guiding his horse across. The saloon- keeper's face was white;
his mount was not doing even as well as Happy Hoofs. It would stop every
few feet and swing its head and Sam, evidently, was al- most incapable
of speech to urge it on. He should have waited until Hallock crossed
before starting, and the gun- fighter would have spoken to him had he
not depended on Sam's common sense. Two horsemen on the log foot- path
simultaneously might be more pounds of bone and flesh than the sea-
soned bridge could sustain. But this was not the time nor place to
remon- strate. The thing to do was to go on as rapidly as possible and
clear the way for Brace. And Happy Hoofs was suddenly averse to going
another step. She gazed into nothingness on either side of her and
snorted a little. That meant her nerve was failing. Hallock knew the
signs.
"Stand still, girl," ordered Hallock in his smoothest
tone, resolving sud- denly what was best to do. Clinging close to the
animal's body and holding
her head up by short-reining, he
eased out of the saddle, felt for the tree with one foot, then placed
the other beside it. Fortunately Happy Hoofs did not
move.
Hallock glanced back at the saloon- keeper, whose mount
had balked again, and called in a steady voice, "Better get off an'
walk, Sam. Choke the bridle, too, but if yuh feel his hoofs slippin' let
go an' save yuhrself."
Sam quavered an unintelligible reply
and imitating Hallock's method of dis- mounting as nearly as he could,
got down.
"Now take yuhr time, Sam. It's shaky business, but
not so hard, the gunfighter counseled, to steady him; then went to the
head of Happy Hoofs and gripping the bridle short, started to lead
her.
The mare did not balk now. Where her master could go she
could follow— it was application of a bit of horse psychology on
Hallock's part—and the firm hand at the bridle heartened the paint;
closer and closer loomed safety. Ten feet—five—Hallock and Happy Hoofs
tood on terra firma. But the gunfighter could not draw a long breath
while Sam was still en route. He faced the log, watching the slow and
hesitant progress of man and mount with nerves strung taut. Up until
today he had always imagined himself practically
nerveless.
"Welcome to earth, Sam!" the gun- fighter exclaimed
in a voice tinged with relief, as Sam and his horse stepped to safety.
"Foolish for yuh to start right after me, but—" He hardly had the heart
to be harsh with the man, he was patently so near collaspe, and now that
the danger was past. "That was a nerve-tickler, wasn't it, huh? When I
die I want my boots to be off, yessir! " A wish which would never have
been fulfilled had he continued to hell-pal- around with Reckless
Brule.
FOR answer the saloonkeeper dropped his horse's reins and
stretched him- self flat on the ground and closed his eyes. Hair-trigger
accorded his silent sympathy. His own nerves tingled un- comfortably at
the remembrance of how the bottom of the valley looked from the middle
of the bridge, how out- of-reach firm ground seemed.
"Yuh're
as white as Chalk, almost," he addressed the shut-eyed Brace, "an' mebbe
I ain't so nut-brown myself."
"Wish I had four fingers o' XXX
to start my heart pumpin' ag'in," said Sam slowly. "Systems full o'
floatin' icebergs. I ain't even sweatin'."
Hallock laughed and
sat down on a rock. "Take yuhr time but don't take too
long."
Sam opened his eyes and got up im- mediately. Sue
needed him just as soon as he could reach her. How could he have
forgotten for a moment and ling- ered? He was in the saddle ahead of
Hallock, swiftly impatient to be off. The gunfighter swung to Happy
Hoofs and they headed back to the place where the far end of the bridge
had rested. Way below them the saw the charred and broken timbers still
smok- ing. Following the broad road around the valley wall, which was
used by the stage as well as horsemen, they gradu- ally descended and
flicked through a pass at the base of the Cuddy Paws.
They
sailed into Pinecreek at a thundering gallop, drawing many an anxious
female eye to curtained win- dows, for it was not infrequently that
desperadoes from Derringer painted red their quiet neighbor town,
despis- ing its tendency to be law-abiding; and Pinecreek had had a very
recent scare. Eagerly the eyes of the two-man posse sought among the
horses hitched in the street for a glimpse of a hammer-headed bay. That
would be Chalk Gallatin's cay use.
peg his hat?" Hallock yelled at a
long- whiskered party who was making a doughty stand in front of the
general store while his cronies fled at the advent of the hardriding
Derringer man.
"Up there, next to the church," re- torted the
old man, pointing with his cane. "If yuh'd ride in decent once in awhile
an' git some gospel, yuh wouldn't have to ask."
"O' course
he'd be livin' near the church—where else?" Hallock said to Brace,
half-grinning and ignoring the Pinecreeker's broadside. "Tell yuh the
truth I'd forgot there was one—an' that a church comes in the same pack-
age with a preacher."
They reined toward the lowly par- sonage
at the other end of Pinecreek's main street, adjoining the log-and-
frame church. But no horses were visible outside and Sam's face showed
deep disappointment.
"If he's been here he's gone on— that
burned bridge broke the trail for us," groaned Brace, who, unaccustomed
to much riding, was already saddle- galled, and almost pop-eyed with
anxiety for his daughter's safety. As ior Hallock he was as full of
energy as if he had never been sick and his late wound was entirely out
of his mind. He was prepared not to find Sue and her abductor in
Pinecreek. therefore did not experience the deep disappoint- ment that
his companion did. And if Sue was Mrs. Gallatin—a likelihood— she would
be a widow the minute he could get near enough to Chalk to sling a
gun.
Determined to learn the worst at once and, incidentally,
any other in- formation the preacher possessed which would aid pursuit,
Hallock flung Happy Hoofs reins over her head and ap- proached the door
of the parsonage.
"Stay in the saddle." he called back over
his shoulder, as Sam kicked off a stirrup, "we re only here a
minute."
A THIN, pale woman responded to
Hallock's knuckle tattoo; her pallor, he devined, was not natural, but
the outward sign of inward trepidation. He imagined himself the cause at
first, well aware of his forbidding aspect.
"I ain't meanin' a
mite o' harm, ma'am," he reassured the lady. "I'm just aimin' for to get
a li'l' information. Is the preacher about?"
"He's—he's
inside," she tremblingly replied. "I'm his wife. It wasn't you who
frightened me—it was the man who was h^re awhile ago and — and shot my
husband. No, he isn't dead," she hastened to say, as Hallock started,
suspecting he could give the killer a name. "Wounded in the arm. The
doctor says he'll be all right."
"Was the feller who did it a
tallish sorta cowboy cuss with a face as white as a Hereford's—an' was a
strappin'— I mean, ma'am, a big, dark-haired girl with
him?"
Mrs. Saunders, the preacher's wife, answered
affirmatively, as he had scarcely doubted she would. She looked him
straight in the eye, seemed on the point of saying something, then
hesitated. Fear struck him, turning him cold.
"Anything the
matter with the girl, ma'am—she's my promised wife an' it'd shore kill
me, tough as I am, to have anything happen to her. Just speak out,
ma'am, an' lemme know the worst."
Mrs. Saunders marveled that
his hardlined face could express such anxiety over the welfare of
another. He looked like a man who would ride blithely through hell and
bulldog the devil if necessary—all whalebone and rawhide and utterly
careless of him- self; but not a man who could feel genuine
apprehension. Yet there it was, stark in his steely
eyes.
"Lady," implored Hallock, lifting a hand when she did
not reply immedi-
ately, he mistaking the reason. Sam
Brace, sitting near at hand and an agonized listener, was ready to go
through the motions of assault and battery if she didn't answer
soon.
"Pardon me for staring," apologized Mrs. Saunders,
though Hallock hadn't noticed she was. "The girl was—well, she's quite
large and strong you know, and it looked to me as if she had fought the
man strenuously and he had—ah— beaten her with a quirt butt to subdue
her. There was blood on one side of her face, she was black and blue,
and she seemed exhausted to the point where she could no longer resist
and the man had to help her along. He was bruised and scratched
himself—"
"God Almighty!" shouted Hallock, thereby horrifying
Mrs. Saunders. "Yuh hearin'-all this, Sam?" whirling; and satisfied at
once by the bloated ap- pearance of the father's face. "We're out for
that wolf's pelt, ma'am," he panted ,turning again to the preacher's
wife. "That's the girl's daddy, hangin' to his horn. So yuhr husband
didn't marry 'em none? How come?"
"Mrs. Saunders knew
something was wrong, of course, as soon as he saw their condition,
especially the girl's. The cowboy—beast, I should say—" "An' yuh never
spoke truer, ma'am," Hallock was guilty of interrupting, his eyes
glittering.
"Ordered Mr. Saunders to get his book," continued
the woman, as if Hal- lock had not spoken, "and the girl, who was very
near swooning, declared she would not be married to him. The man saw Mr.
Saunders was going to balk and drew his gun and commanded, 'Do as I say!
If you don't I'll kill you.' Mr. Saunders told him to shoot and he
did—but only in the arm. Bad enough, of course, and I fainted, think-
ing my husband had been killed. When I came to they were
gone."
"Then," said Hallock, on a note of
disappointment, "yuh
dunno which way they headed? Mebbe, though," his gloom lifting a trifle,
"some other Pine- crackers saw—"
"My husband can tell you
which direction they took. He ran out after them, wounded as he was, and
tried to get some men to pursue them, but—" She paused, flushing with
sudden shame.
"Couldn't, eh?" snarled Hallock, startling her
by his vicious look and tone. "Not a man with the guts to go, huh? Say,
I'd admire to turn this snivellin' burg topside. Derringer may not be so
lily-white as Pinecreek, but it's got all the guts an' gall—no, ma'am,
parding, but it ain't. I was forgettin' yuhr husband. Might I see him?"
"Yuh hurry up, hear me?" bawled the anguished Sam Brace after Hallock as
Mrs. Saunders stood aside for him to enter. "My God, think o' that
honey-girl o' mine all beat up by that Goddam son—"
MRS.
SAUNDERS closed the door. She led the hatless gunfighter into a dim
little library, where the preacher, minus his coat and with bandaged arm
in sling, half reclined in an armchair.
"I want," said
Hallock, giving the Rev. Saunders his name when Mrs. Saunders turned
inquiringly, "to shake yuhr hand, sir, an' tell yuh yuh've al- tered my
idea o' preachers, which be- fore wasn't none flatterin'. Yuh helped my
girl best yuh could an' I'm yuhr friend for life."
"Here's my
hand, Mr. Hallock," said the preacher, raising his good one, "and I'm
glad to have earned your good opinion. Sorry I couldn't stop the ab-
duction—it was that, wasn't it?"
"Yes, sir. Now, reverend, one
thing more: which way'd they head?" "North."
"Thanks,
reverend; get yuhrself in shape soon. I'll be cornin' back
this
way with the girl an' she'll be
plumb ready to say 'I do.' "
He wheeled and almost ran from
the house. "North!" he shouted at Sam Brace as he hit the
saddle.
CHAPTER VII
Hallock Sees
Red
"SHOW'S we're on the right trail, all right. That's shore
his bay!" Hair-trigger up beside the inert carcass of a horse, lying
just off-trail, its hind legs sticking from a clump of bushes. The dead
animal was equipped with all its leather gear.
Hallock and
Brace were five miles out of Pinecreek and had followed the
main-traveled trail due north, not cer- tain they were on the right
track, al- though the Reverend Saunders had seen Chalk and Sue depart in
that direction, until they encountered the body of Gallatin's horse.
Slipping quickly from Happy Hoofs and crashing into the brush, Hallock
found on examination that the bay had broken its right fore- leg just
above the fetlock, stepped in a hole somewhere, which resulted in its
being shot.
"That slows him up considerable," said Sam
hopefully, as Hallock strode out of the bushes reporting. "His one
hoss'll hafta carry double now. It's a cinch Blackfoot Dixon didn't
decamp with him or he'd been along o'Chalk in Pinecreek, don't yuh
think?"
"Yeh," nodded Hallock absently. He wasn't caring
whether Dixon—or a dozen of his breed—was ahead of him, so long as he
reached end of trail in the shortest time Happy Hoofs could carry him.
He was squatting over the trail, looking for the hoofmarks of Gallatin's
remaining horse, the one Sue had been riding at the start.
Hallock
was not as good at trail-finding as he was squinting over a
gunsight, nor was Brace any better, his specialties being shotgun
expertness and the mixing of drinks; but it required little more than
good eyesight to pick out the deeper in- dentations of shoes, telltale
of extra weight put upon the horse.
"We can be shore, Sam,"
said Hal- lock, rising and lifting foot to stirrup, "that we're on his
track now. Trail's as open as print. An' he can't be so far away
now."
They pointed out, following the deep hoofmarks. These
led at a tangent from the road north; finally circled and strung
south.
"He's doublin' back," Hallock re- marked, leaning over
his horse's shoul- der as he galloped. "My guess is he's makin' for the
Cuddy Paws, where he figgers to hole up. Only about a thou- sand places
to hide in them mountains. Losin' that hoss, he had to change his plans.
Can't reach 'em before night, though, slow as he's hittin' it, an' we
oughta catch him."
The heartening words, however, did not
smooth the wrinkles of worry from Sam's brow. What the thwarted and
desperate Gallatin might do to Sue was an uncertainty which kept his
nerves strung to the breaking point. "I ain't used to callin' on God
except to damn me or my enemies," said the saloon- keeper, "but I'm
askin' Him to protect Sue."
"Yuh sound religious as hell,
Sam," commented Hallock, and was serious.
They flung down a
coulee with their horses at full stride, Sam's mount scampering at the
tail of Happy Hoofs, and emerging from the mouth of the dry ravine found
themselves on the stage trail. Involuntarily Hallock lifted his eyes
from the ground, glanc- ing south, and fires of mingled hate and joy
kindled in his heart. He shouted, no words, just shouted; and Sam
Brace,
seeking the cause of the outburst,
echoed him, and got a head start of Happy Hoofs by a wicked plunge of
the spurs. In the next moment or two, however, Hallock passed him,
leaning into the wind like a cyclone.
HALF a mile down the
stage road the battered and bullet-scarred old Concord, preserved from
early min- ing days in the region, was halted; the driver was leaning
over his heat, evi- dently arguing with Chalk Gallatin, who stood just
beneath him. Near the coach a horse with low-hanging head swayed on its
last legs. It fell over suddenly. At the roadside. Sue sat upon a rock,
her head bowed upon her arms crossed on her knees. While Hallock and
Brace sped nearer and nearer, Chalk Gallatin abruptedly pulled his gun
and pointed it up at the driver, who was evi- dently obstinate about
something. The driver's hands slowly arose to a level with his hat-brim.
Whether Chalk in- tended to pull trigger, anyhow, was problematical, for
at that instant he heard the charging horses and whirled. The stage
driver lowered his hands and stared.
Hallock, racing now far
in advance of Brace clung with his knees and yanked up both guns.
Simultaneously the tubes threw bullets, but the range was too great for
anything but a high- powered rifle. At the roar of the guns, Sue Brace's
head came up and she stood, waving feebly; but evidently the effort was
too much for her snapped powers, for she sank again upon the
rock.
With the avenger closing in, Chalk Gallatin, realizing
the futility of stand- ing up to him, did the unexpected. Sheathing his
gun, he sprang suddenly over the coach wheel to the box and wrestling an
instant with the driver, taken entirely unawares by the cow- boy's
maneuver, burled the old man off
the high seat to the ground. Chalk
then seized the reins from the foot- board, snatched the lash from the
whip- socket and cracked the leaders into a sudden plunge. The wheelers
were jerked along and getting their feet, imitated the pace set by the
frightened team in front.
Happy Hoofs, spurting valiantly,
shot by Sue and the cursing stage driver, as the latter was picking him-
self from the dust, a most amazed man to find no bones broken. So intent
was Hallock on overtaking his quarry that he never looked Sue's way as
he passed her. Her father, pounding up some minutes later, was out of
the saddle be- fore his mount had stopped running. He dashed for the
girl, horrified by her appearance. She arose, took several faltering
steps and was clasped in his arms.
Hair-Trigger drew near
enough to the racing stagecoach to shoot Chalk off his perch if he so
desired. Chalk realized what an inviting target he was atop the stage
and was leaning over as far as he could, the reins wrapped around his
arms, high heels planted firmly against the foot-board. But Hal- lock's
guns were suddenly stilled and Gallatin wondered why—couldn't be the
gunfighter had run out of ammuni- tion. As a matter of fact. Hallock had
changed his mind about the method of killing his enemy. A bullet would
be too ordinary, too easy. His bare hands must do the job.
To
do this he must first get Chalk alive in his hands, which presented a
problem. The coach was whirling along a trail that stretched almost
level for several miles toward the Cuddy Paw Mountains. Chalk was
high-lining the four-in-hand and really wasting energy, for they had the
bits in their teeth and would not have slowed up for a preci- pice in
their path. It occurred to Hal- lock first, of course, to shoot the
stage
horses, but this, as a lover of
horse- flesh and not from any reluctance to destroy property of the
Sundown Stage Company, he hated to do except as a last
resort.
HAPPY HOOFS, grabbing ground as if she had not been
run hard all afternoon, thrust her nose past the coach window. Hallock
pondering the problem of how to stop the stage and nail his quarry,
glanced involuntarily at the rapid-turning wheels. His guns, swinging
from the loose grip of his hands against his legs, came swiftly into
position, aimed low. They began to roar, a continuous volley. Hands that
never missed were streaming those bullets and the spokes in the
revolving rear wheels were split and broken by the hard-driven lead. The
felloes, denied the support of most of the spokes, slewed suddenly at a
forty-five degree angle and the coach lurched to one side, like a
drunkard thrown off balance. The ruined wheel lay down and the hub,
striking the ground, dragged along it several yards before the
four-in-hand gave up pulling. But Chalk Gallatin was no longer on the
driver's box. Puzzlement found place beside Chalk's cold fear when
Hallock's Colts began their incessant pounding which emptied both
cylinders—what was the man shooting at? He had never been known to waste
lead—and then the question was answered by the sidewise lunge of the
furiously driven Concord. Chalk, keyed up to take any chance, even the
slimmest, swung down from the leaning coach on the offside, a second or
two before it completely stopped. Either side of the stage road was a
steep embankment, covered with brush the height of a man's shoulder and
thick and tangled like jungle growth. Chalk, without hesitation, sprang
from the edge of the road into this gray and brown and yellow
maze
and headed straight down, he cared not where, so long as he
escaped his nemesis.
Hallock saw Chalk's figure whisk off the
box, but could not have shot at him if he would—he had shaken every load
from his guns in demolishing the wheel. He heard the crashing of the
brush as the "bad" cowpuncher drove into it; the gunfighter spilled the
twelve empty shells on the ground, shoved fresh cart- ridges into the
chambers, then swung off Happy Hoofs and headed around the end of the
coach. He was cautious about showing himself on the edge of the bank for
the good reason that, al- though it had taken him but a few seconds to
reload, the noise of Gallatin's descent had abruptly ceased, and it sug-
gested that he was lying in wait for Hallock's figure to loom above him.
Finding the proverbial needle in the haystack would have been child's
play compared to locating Chalk on the brushy slope without exposing
oneself. Hallock stood only a few minutes irresolute, racking his brains
to hit upon some scheme which would reduce the high degree of danger;
not that he was afraid, but he would have deemed it a disgrace to be
killed by Chalk Gal- latin, especially with his vengeance un- satisfied.
But the horns of the dilemma retained their needle-point at the end of
the five minutes, and, abandoning all attempt at caution, which was
useless anyway, he charged, yelling and brand- dishing his Colts into
the brush.
A six-shooter bellowed, about thirty yards down.
Hallock fell on his face. Not because he had been struck, how- ever. He
had tripped over a boulder which lay well hidden in the thicket tangle.
He did not curse as he raised himself on his hands, his fingers still
twined about the gun-grips; that rock, possibly, had been a providential
stum- bling block in his path, saved him a drilling—and something else!
This was
on second thought, as he sat up and
looked at the boulder. It was fairly round. Likely it would roll,
consider- ing the pitch of the slope. By ear alone had Hallock located
Gallatin's position, and it was far from being a reliable impression; he
had fallen ere he could glimpse the weapon's smoke, which would have
registered it exactly. The thought that came to him as he looked at the
boulder and noted its roundness, he carried out immediately. With one
hand he gave it a good start down the slope in the general direction of
the roaring gun. It met with stout resist- ance from the underbrush, but
because of the start given it and its own weight, was able to smash all
obstacles.
HALLOCK crawled after the rolling boulder, keeping
in the path it crushed, confident that any noise he made would be
drowned out by the snap and crunch and swish of twigs and branches.
Chalk's gun suddenly boomed out again, not ten feet away, and Hallock
heard him curse. He had fired at the boulder, then discovered what he
was shooting at and naturally felt foolish. But the boulder had ac-
complished all that Hallock had ex- pected of it, drawn Chalk's fire and
simultaneously covered Hallock's ap- proach to the cowboy's
vantage-point. The gunfighter sprang up and ran those last ten feet,
trusting to luck that neither rocks nor roots would trip him this time.
The steepness of the slope caused him to descend in long, stagger- ing
leaps and he would be at a distinct disadvantage when he came upon the
cowboy and tried to stop suddenly. The next instant the white face of
Gallatin flashed upon Hallock's vision; the puncher was on his knees,
eyes fastened upon the point in the brush where he thought Hallock would
break through. The gunfighter saw Chalk's six-shooter swing up for the
throw-down as he
dashed upon him; Hallock's left hand
gun spouted smoky flame and lead, the bullet tearing the cowboy's gun
from his fingers, the gun with the notch for
Hallock!
Hair-Trigger ran several feet beyond the kneeling
Gallatin before he could stop himself. He whirled and sprang back up the
slope, dropping his guns, just as Chalk was reaching with his left hand
for the fallen iron, the fingers of his right being momentarily para-
lyzed from the shock of the bullet on the cylinder. Chalk didn't
realize, in the cold frenzy of the moment, that his enemy's lead had
jammed the cylinder and the Colt was of no use, except as a club. Armed
with a dug against the vengeance-thirsting Hallock—as well to stab him
with a blade of grass! But Chalk's eager, curving fingers never closed
on that tantalizing Colt- handle—a powerful tug at the back of his shirt
collar lifted him from his knees; then he was hurled flat on his back
and Hallock dropped astride him, driving the breath from his body and
seemingly crushing his ribs. Before he could regain his breath, the
gunfighter's steel fingers, like the gouging talons of an eagle, were
fastened in his throat.
"Yuh woman-beater, yuh damned,
skulkin' coyote!" roared Hallock in the tones of a temporary madman. "A
bul- let was too good, too quick to buck yuh out, but these bare hands
o' mine shore fit yuhr scruvy neck. I got a mind," the terrible fingers
tightened, the eyes with the dancing devil in them drilled into the
glazing glance of Gallatin, "to tear yuhr windpipe plumb
out!"
The cowboy's hands instinctively, but weakly, futile,
pushed against Hal- lock's heaving chest. To the right wrist was slung
Chalk's quirt and the loaded end, uppermost, caught Hair-Trigger's eye.
It was coated a dark-brown, the color of dried blood. If possible. Hal-
lock went madder than ever at the
"Sue's blood!" he
screamed—a hor- rible sound, like the cry of a mortally wounded horse —
and he pounded Chalk's head up and down on the ground. Then suddenly he
took his hands from the cow'boy's throat and grew dangerously quiet.
Chalk sucked in the life-giving air with mouth agape. "Get yuhrself
together, yuh woman- rustier!" snarled the gunfighter, bend- ing forward
until their faces almost touched. "I'm a-goin' to quirt-bust yuh like
yuh did Sue Brace before I stop yuhr clock! "
When Chalk's
breathing became less labored—Hallock sitting on his chest and watching
the signs like a cruel-eyed eagle=—the gunfighter tore the quirt from
Gallatin's wrist and heaved up.
"On yuhr feet, now!" he
rasped. "Take it standin' like a man—no!" he snorted, "not like a man,
but stand up anyhow, yuh lowflung, woman-handlin'
hound!"
CHALK levered himself to a sitting posture with his
hands spread w'ide on either side of him. He knew that he must get up,
that there was no es- cape; yet he had not the courage to gather his
feet under him.
"I said up!" bellowed the avenger. "Well, I'll
shore help yuh then!" when Gallatin still sat and stared, speechless,
and with hand gripping the front of his shirt, yanked Chalk erect on his
wob- bly legs. "Damn'!" swore Hallock, surveying the cringing figure,
"if yuh ain't a sight to sicken a body!"
He stepped backward
to where he had let his guns fall and, eyes never wavering from the face
of the man he intended in the end to kill, stooped and slid one Colt in
the holster on his left leg; and, with the other in his hand, he walked
over to his enemy.
"Yuhr iron," said Hallock, shoving his own
in Chalk's empty bolster, "is
smashed to hell. I'm heelin' yuh to
see if yuh've got the guts to dig for can- non while I'm beatin' yuh—an'
if yuh have, well, go for it an' I'll show yuh!"
But the fact
that a sweet-shooting weapon had been put under his hand didn't hearten
Gallatin much. He was barely able to stand from fear and weakness, let
alone rise to the supreme demands of the occasion.
"Yuh're
sayin' I beat Sue Brace," quavered Chalk, not knowing what else to say,
his wits were so jumbled, an eye of dread on the lash Hallock was pull-
ing slowly through his fingers in wicked anticipation, "but I didn't,
Hallock, I—"
"That's for lyin'! snarled Hair-Trig- ger, and
cut him across the face, the course of the thongs marked in blood- red
welts on the dead white skin. In- voluntarily tears sprang to Chalk's
eyes; he yelped. "That shore matches the scratches Sue put on yuhr mush
try- in' to get away from yuh!" the avenger declared, pleased with the
result. "But I've only just started!"
With all the vigor of
his arm he at- tacked Gallatin's head and shoulders. The stinging,
biting, rawhide trailed one long welt after another across the pale
visage, until it was no longer pale but had the appearance of
fine-chopped meat. Chalk's hands and wrists were laid open, his sleeves
torn ragged, from trying to shield his face. Pain-mad- dened at last to
the point of forgetting his fear, he suddenly dropped his arms and
screaming curses to with a man, grabbed for the Colt. Hallock's red-
rimmed eyes glinted—with what emo- tion it would have been hard to say;
possibly a fiendish joy that he had whipped his cowardly foe into
showing resistance. Chalk had the gun almost clear of the open-mouther
holster when Hnllock, shifting his grip on the quirt, crashed the loaded
end on the cowboy's head, unprotected, as his sombrero
had
fallen off at the time the
gunfighter threw and choked him. A second time Gallatin fell, on his
side, arms outflung, entirely relaxed. The gun he had tried to draw
stuck half out of the scabbard; Hallock bent, jerked it up and thrust it
in his own. Blood from the wound in- flicted by the butt-end blow
coursed rapidly down Chalk's countenance and dripped from his
chin.
"Mrs. Saunders, that Gospel-sling- er's wife, spoke o'
Sue's face bein' bloody, yuh yellow cur," Hallock re- marked to the
insensible man, "an' so's yuhrs, to play hunk."
HE THREW away
the quirt and drew a sleeve across his sweating face, feeling the effect
of his strenuous session; but he was not yet free from the spell of the
ugly nightmare driving him to the consummation of his venge- ance. Chalk
continued to lie without movement and Hallock well knew that he was not
shamming unconsciousness. After a long moment the gunfighter reached
down, clamped iron fingers on one of Chalk's wrists and dragged him like
a sack of meal, trudged up the slope along the trail blazed by the
rolling boulder.
Lugging his limp burden over the edge of the
bank and around the end of the coach, Hallock propped the cow- boy, in
sitting position, against the front wheel. Choking Gallatin to death,
after trying it nearly to comple- tion, had appealed to Hallock as being
as prosaic as shooting—and he recalled the killing of an Indian horse
thief which he had witnessed in his younger days, around Deadwood Gulch.
A fit- ting death for Chalk Gallatin, yellow- spined bully, bushwacker
and woman- stealer, tool
Happy Hoofs came walking toward her
master, whickering softly as if in- quiring the reason for his prolonged
ab- sence. But Hallock had no affectionate
pat or word for her
now. He was in the clutch of that temporary insanity which, when proven,
sometimes means to a murderer the difference between a life sentence and
the electric chair or hangman's noose. Unfastening his coiled lariat
from the tie-straps on the saddle, Hallock returned to the side of his
victim, whose head hung forward, and gong down on one knee, fitted the
hampen noose around his neck. Then he squatted on his heels in front of
Gallatin, waiting for his senses to re- vive. He would have assisted
Chalk out of his oblivious state but no water was handy, nor had Hallock
a pocket flask. Well, he could wait, he had to bide his time until he
got his hands on this damned coyote; a few minutes longer wouldn't
matter. Happy Hoofs, inquisitive, missing her due caresses, sidled up
back of Hallock and chewed his loosely knotted neckerchief; then
playfully nipped his ear. But he did not respond, which, as well as
anything, manifested his mental state. He just squatted there, immobile
all but his eyes, like some grim demon.
Presently Chalk
stirred, groaned; then he moved his head a little; the rope did not
exert anything like a throt- tling pressure but it was tight, and the
feel of it at his throat did more than a dash of cold water in the face
to bring back consciousness. His eyes snapped open—to stare into the
Satanic countenance of Hair-Trigger.
"Been waitin'." said
Hallock, locani- cally; he straightened.
Both of Chalk's hands
went up to the tight hemp and he pulled at it, shrieking, "Rope! Good
Lord, Trigger, yuh goin' to hang me?"
"Yuh'll only wish I
was," replied Hallock. "I'm goin' to—drag yuh!"
Chalk raved.
"An' I always was afeared o' rope!"
"Yuh're scared like a
coyote pup at everything, deep down, 'ceptin'
mebbe
women, defenseless women. That don't
inclue Sue Brace. Yuh had to go some, go the limit, by God, to get
a-holt her. That's why, the way yuh treated her, I'mb makin' yuh die
hard. If 'twas only revenge for myself I'd put a bul- let in yuh an'
call it hunk."
Chalk Gallatin burst into unmanly tears, his
teeth clicking with nervous chill. His head had stopped bleeding, but
the half-dried blood imparted to the sudden flood of tears its sanguine
hue, and the side of his face which had been decorated only with
quirt-welts, became streaked and crisscrossed ap- parently with fresh
gore. He was a spectacle such as might have aroused the sympathy, a
spark at least, of most women, and many men, but not the tough-fibred
Hallock, whose brute na- ture was so strongly developed. Noth- ing but
disgust, plus hatred, had he for the wreck of a man against the
wheel.
"T rigger — yuh — yuh," blubbered Chalk, tugging on the
hondo to pull the noose loose, "yuh won't—shoot—me—
then?"
HALLOCK deemed it unnecessary to repeat that he
wouldn't; he had passed sentence; he was judge and jury of this court.
All he said was: "No use jiggerin' with that rope an' gettin' it loose.
I'll only put it on ag'in. Dunno any prayers, do yuh,
Gallatin?"
"Trigger," slavered Chalk, knowing that the
prayer-stage meant the end, "if yuh won't shoot—gimme—a gun an' I'll
kill myself. Rather than the rope, Trigger—I'll do it."
"Yuh,"
sneered Hallock, "ain't got the nerve!" Then he changed his mind,
dropped into his former position facing Chalk. "It'd be better'n
draggin' yuh, damned if it wouldn't, to watch yuh work up that much
guts. Try yuh— it's yuhr last chance remember. Here! " He slid a Colt
from one holster, shov-
ing the butt at the
cowpuncher.
Chalk clasped the handle and turned the blued
steel muzzle against his fore- head. The hammer lifted slowly as the
finger on the trigger exerted slow pres- sure. Then the hammer gently
low- ered. Chalk brought the muzzle down in range of his eyes and looked
into it long, visioning the burst of fire which would explode in his
brain—an instant of terrible light and sound, then com- plete darkness.
He shivered and drew an oath from Hallock. He thought then of the rope
tearing at his neck, his face being smashed by rocks, his whole body
mangled, heart and brain active the while, too long a while—and he
jammed the cold ring again to his head. The hammer rose; the hammer
fell—but he jerked the barrel up, so that the bullet whined upward
harmlessly. He tossed the gun at Hallock's feet with an ani- mal
cry:
"I can't—do it! I ain't fit to die!"
Hallock
filled the empty chamber; he holstered the Colt. He got to his feet.
"Yuh ain't got the nerve to die, yuh mean. Yuh'll never be fitter.
C'mon, I'm done foolin'."
The gunfighter reached over, jerked
the noose tight and Chalk to his feet simultaneously. Hallock did not
have to call Happy Hoofs; she was right at his elbow, a perplexed
spectator. Keep- ing the rope on his victim's neck taut, Hallock hooked
his left boot-toe in the stirrup and swung up. The mare started at a
lope as soon as she felt her master in the saddle, and Chalk, grasp- ing
the line with both hands to ease the strain on his neck, ran behind.
Hallock increased Happy Hoof's pace with a word, at the same time paying
out the lariat until he had only a few feet left on the home end, which
he twirled on the saddle-horn. Chalk was running now at top speed, his
feet scarcely seeming to touch the ground, his eyes protruding. Happy
Hoofs galloped.
Gallatin was jerked off his legs and
struck the trail asprawl and was dragged like a sled. He uttered no
sound, though maddened with pain; could not for the reason that his
mouth was choked with earth and pebbles. Gradually his hold on the taut
line, which he had retained with desperation and despair for many
hundred yards, loosened, and his arms jerked along
lifelessly.
Hallock was picking the roughest places in the
road to ride over, heading back to the spot where Chalk had stopped the
stage and then stolen it. The distance was a mile or more. Hal- lock
could see a horseman approaching, Sam Brace, no doubt despatched by his
daughter to learn what was detaining the gunfighter. Far beyond Sam,
Hal- lock could see Sue and the stage driver standing together in the
road.
CHAPTER VIII
Thick of the Fight
AS
SAM rode nearer, Hallock slack- ened the pace of Happy
Hoofs.
"So that's how yuh finished him, huh?" said Brace, his
eyes on the pitiful object at the end of the gun- fighter's rope.
"Well,it's a terrible death, but he shore earned it. Hold up, Trig-
ger," for Hallock was riding on, "he's dead ari yuh might's well unhitch
him. Sue's stummick ain't weak, but he ain't exactly a pretty
sight."
Hallock drew rein. He climbed down and walked back to
the bloody, ragged wreck. Sam edged his horse in and was nauseated by
what he saw.
"Say, yuh didn't only drag him, did yuh,
Trigger!" he exclaimed. "I'm mighty glad I stopped yuh from drag- gin'
him up to Sue. Say, she'd bawl yuh aplenty for this."
Hallock, while
freeing the noose, which was deeply embedded in Chalk's neck, related
the details of his encoun- ter with Sue's abductor. "For every blow he
give her I cut an' slashed him twice, I betche—an' I ain't seen her
yet!" the two-gun man declared, pas- sionately, rising and beginning to
coil up his rope.
"Yuh're a devil when yuh get started,
Trigger," breathed Sam. "I wouldn't want yuh should be campin' on my
trail."
"Yuh think I done wrong?" Hallock demanded, looking at
the saloonkeeper squarely out of eyes that were still flecked with red.
"She's yuhr daughter an' yuh was just as hot as me to pull him
down."
"I ain't sayin' yuh was wrong—that's yuhr way,
Trigger," replied Sam calmly. "I'd 'a' shot him—'nless he got me
first—that's what I'd done, an' left out the fancy work. But the way yuh
did it was yuhr way, yuh was seein' red—'nough said."
"Is Sue
hurt much?" asked Hallock.
Brace nodded. "Well, yes—but not
serious, yuh savvy. He knocked her plumb out once; in the store, after
he'd socked Deerin'. When she come to she was layin' across his saddle.
Said he'd let her ride the hoss he was leadin' an' leave her hands
ontied if she'd promise to go peaceable. She promised, an' kept it till
she felt stronger; then warned him she was goin' to break it an' fought
'im tooth'n nail. But he was too strong for her, strong as she is. She
didn't know nothin' about the burnin' o' the bridge as they'd got past
that before she got her senses back. When they rode into Pinecreek,
Chalk threatened to kill her if she asked any* body for help—an' she
says he'd done it, too. She was so weak she could hardly set in the
saddle—"
"I'm damn' glad," struck in Hallock, vibrantly, "that
Gallatin lingered to
know he was gettin' killed. A quick
bul- let he didn't deserve. Yuh oughta be thankin' me, Sam, 'stead o'
findin' fault."
"Mebbe, mebbe," said the saloon- keeper,
slowly nodding. "Whatcha go- in' to do with the body?" as the two- gun
man strode to the pinto and tied up his coiled rope.
"Leave it
to the buzzards!" barked Hallock. He tilted his head back and scanned
the blue vault. "There," he cried, pointing to several wheeling,
objects, "is some a'ready!"
Sam shook his head. When the gun-
fighter mounted and lifted the reins, Sam followed him.
"Tom!"
cried Sue, as he galloped up and flung down.
HE DID not speak
at first. Gathered her in his arms, held her close— then at arm's
length. Long he gazed upon the bruises and marks of the quirt- lash and
the bloodstains, which Sue had not washed off because there was no
water.
"I paid Chalk Gallatin for all this," he touched her
cheek gently with one finger. He dropped his hands from her shoulders
and gave her his profile. "Yuhr pa kicked some about it. He didn't
cotton to the way I killed him." He told the manner of Chalk's passing.
"Not tryin' to excuse myself," he de- clared at the end. "I got
wild—there's more'n a li'l devil in my system, Sue. I reckon I'm just a
barber—yuh know what I mean, girl."
"Barbarian? Yes, you are.
One side of your nature is savage, but there's an- other side, the side
you've shown to me, the same that made you take off your guns after
Reckless—died. And, Tom, if it's in the wood I'm going to develop that
better nature. I do not love you for that killing instinct, but in spite
of it."
"That love will cure me, if anything."
He was facing her
now, his eyes no longer bloodshot, the savageery eradi- cated. "Now that
I'm cooled off, I feel —well, not sorry exactly, but—" He halted,
groping for the words to prop- erly express himself.
"Now,
when you're not blind with murderous rage you feel ashamed of your
unnecessary cruelty, for having tortured him like—well, like Blackfoot
Dixon, who has Indian blood, would have done. Isn't that what you mean?"
"I reckon it is. Shore wonderful how yuh can read me."
She
laid one hand on his shoulder and with the other pointed down-trail. "Is
that Chalk lying there in the road? Must be, of course, for the buzzards
are dropping down. You meant to leave him for them—but don't you think
bet- ter of it, Tom?"
He nodded. "I'll bury him. Got no shovel
or anything, but a niche in the rocks somewheres an' other rocks piled
on top will cheat the buzzards an' coyotes. Sit down, Sue, an' rest till
I come back." He turned to Happy Hoofs.
"How about my hearse,
Hallock?" spoke up the stage driver, Rafe Sed- don, who, with Sam Brace
had kept silence and in the background until this moment. "The old
rattlebank looks broke down from here, though it's a good
ways."
"I leaded up one wheel for yuh to trump the getaway,"
Hallock informed him. "Reckon yuh'll hafta bring an- other wheel from
Pinecreek before yuh can finish yuhr run. An' the bridge is down across
the valley. Yuh'll hafta drive around the Cuddy Paws till an- other's
put up. How did we—oh, Sam and me used that log foot-bridge. You bet we
ain't goin' to cross it ag'in though; not hossback
anyway."
"I'll be gosh-fried!" Seddon ex- ploded. "Sam," he
turned to the saloonkeeper, "loan me yuhr nag,
will
yuh, till I go down an' look the
hearse over an' roundup my hosses. Yuhr daughter can ride yuhrs then an'
yuh can fork one o' mine—or Hallock, whichever. Be dark long before we
hit Pinecreek an' I'll bring out that wheel to-morrer. Double damn' that
Chalk Gallatin—but he's dead an' gone now, dead as his hoss there. Know
what he wanted me to do?" as Brace got to the ground and tossed him the
reins. "Why, take him an' yuhr daughter as far as the Cuddy Paws, 'cause
his hoss had give out an' he hankered to reach the mountains before
dark. What he was a-doin' with her, an' her all battered up, got me
goin', an' I told him so plumb plain. At which he sticks a gun onder my
nose an' warns me not to be too in- quirin'. Then yuh fellers heaved
along. S'prised I didn't break my neck or my back when Gallatin chucked
me off the seat."
"I was wonderin' why he'd held yuh up,
Rafe," said Hallock, who had lin- gered to listen.
"So was I,"
chimed in Brace, "but I forgot to ask."
HALLOCK and Seddon
clattered off together. Not long after Seddon returned with his horses,
mounted on one of the four. Hallock had left the rein-dangling Happy
Hoofs at one side of the road and gone down the embank- ment, carrying
the mangled clay of Chalk Gallatin. Twenty minutes later he reappeared
over the edge of the bank and, loping back, reported to the one women
that Gallatin was safe forever from scavengers. He then insisted that
she ride the paint mare, while he be- strode one of the stage horses and
with Sam and Seddon and the extra animals bringing up the rear, Hallock
and Sue set the pace Pinecreek-ward.
Arriving after dark,
Hallock said to Sue as he drew rein in front of the gen- eral store.
"Yuh're shore yuh feel all
right to go through with it
now?"
Her "Yes!" was vibrant.
"Then there's no use
puttin' it off. If yuh're willin' to take a chance on a cashless
good-for-nothing' like me, who even has to borrow money for a wed- din'
ring from his father-inlaw—" He paused, then added: "But I'll be able to
pay him back for that soon's we get to Derringger. Reckless—pore old
Reckless—won't never need his hoss an' outfit ag'in an' he'd want I
should have what I can get for 'em. It'll be enough, shore, to buy
railroad tickets for two to some place where I ain't known an' can start
over—but what at? I dunno nothin' but gunfightin'. Sue Brace," he had
dismounted and stood at the head of Happy Hoofs, looking up at the girl
in the light streaming from the general store, "yuh're takin' the
longest chance—"
She put fingers on his lips—and he seized the
opportunity to kiss them. "A long chance, perhaps, but I'm willing, oh,
very willing," she said bending to- ward him. "Where you will go, I will
go, and have no doubt that you will find honorable employment. Something
will turn up)—it always does for the man who tries hard, who won't give
up. And now, be happy for tonight—it's our wedding night, Tom." She
laughed softly. "I won't look much like a bride, but after I've washed
my face and fixed my hair, which I can do at the preacher's, I'll feel
like one!" Hallock took the hand he had kissed in both his own. He could
only squeeze it, speechless. His wonder of woman had so multiplied that
his mind was awhirl; he felt himself groping help- lessly, yet joyously.
"Ready, girl, to pick that ring?" he asked.
"I'll corral these
nags an' meet yuh over to the preacher's folks," called Rafe Seddon, as
Sue gave herself into Hallock's arms, and hoof-clatter fol- lowed his
words.
Mr. and Mrs. Tom Hallock
rode side by side into Derringer next morning. They had spent the night,
by kind in- vitation, at the parsonage, and the saloonkeeper and Seddon
had put up at the hotel. Sam had elected to ac- company the driver back
to the broken- down stage, lending Hallock his saddle- horse. The couple
had started at dawn and taken the long trail around the Cuddy Paw
Mountains and although it was after ten o'clock when they turned into
Main street, the town that was run by bad men was just awakening. A1
Deering and his clerk were carrying out goods for display on the store
stoop when they heard hoofbeats. Recog- nizing the riders, Deering let
go an arm- ful, and flat-footed out in the street to meet them. His joy
at learning of the death of Chalk Gallatin was only equaled by his
delight at seeing Sue Brace alive and radiant, notwithstand- ing the
marks she bore of her recent experience. And when told that they were
man and wife, Deering pumped the hand of the gunfighter and ex- pressed
a wish to kiss the bride— which the bride did not deny him, leaning from
the saddle and presenting a cheek. Then they rode on past Spo- kane
Harry's honkatonk, in the wide doorway of which two dance-liall girls,
evidencing in disarrayed hair, ghastly faces and soiled attire the wear
and tear of the previous night, stood, arms about each other. They
blinked, for the morning sunlight was painful to their eyes, and flapped
languid but friendly hands at the newly weds. Hal- lock had never
frequented Spokane Harry's, but he was something of a hero in the eyes
of the women who lived on sensationalism; and Sue was even more popular
because she treated them as sisters, unfortunate, but sisters just the
same.
"You're a pair to draw to," called one, Mame, for they
had heard the con-
versation with the storekeeper.
"Chalk was a damned nuisance. Luck, you love-birds!"
WHEN they
neared the unpainted frame building where Doc Ben- nison lived and had
his office on the second floor, over a blacksmith shop, Hallock remarked
that his wife had better stop and have her scalp, laid open by Chalk's
quirt-handle, properly treated and bandaged. He would ride on, put up
the horses, and return for her.
Hallock turned Sam's saddler
in at the livery stable, forked Happy Hoofs and laid a course for the
Sundown stage-station. He had ridden by the door of the Elkhorn Bar with
danger farthest from his thoughts, when a bul- let crashed through the
saloon window and ricochetted from his saddlehorn. Stung to sudden fury
by the treach- erous attack, he did not even stop to dismount, but
whirling Happy Hoofs, spurred her across the stoop and through the
Elkhorn's door, throwing himself forward to escape the frame. As the
dancing hoofs rang on the bar- room floor, a second shot thundered,
seeming to rock the walls which con- fined the sound. The malignant,
bruised face of Coldiron McClintock peered through the smoke drifting
ceilingward. The bullet had carried away the lobe of Hair-Trigger's
right ear, the erratic motions of the paint mare, who had never been in
a saloon before, saving her rider's life. Hallock had unhitched both
guns as he charged in, and from his perch in the saddle, he swung one in
line with his enemy. Coldiron, bored through from chest to back by a
forty- five slug, tipped forward, firing as he went
down.
"Yuh'll be company for Gallatin!" shouted Hallock, and
saw other hands digging for iron. It was quite a gather- ing of his
enemies. His work was cut
out for him. Sam's bartender, while
he could not be numbered an enemy, could not be counted on for
assistance, as the first exchange of shots had driven him to cover under
the bar.
Hallock regretted riding into the saloon, realizing
his extreme disadvan- tage in being higher than the heads of his
enemies, a bull's eye for even poor marksmanship, which was unknown in
that gun-toting town, and he set about at once to rectify the mistake he
had made in a flurry of anger. To dismount, facing the foe and shooting
simul- taneously, was no small feat, rendered more difficult by Happy
Hoofs' attack of skittishness. She was ordinarily not gun-shy, but the
close quarters, the deafening volume of sound, the acrid, choking smoke,
all combined to craze her, and she "wilded up" at the critical moment.
Hallock had withdrawn his feet from the stirups and was drawing up his
right leg to clear the pommel when the iron-shod hoofs slipped on the
none-too-clean floor — though there were a half dozen brass cuspidors in
different parts of the barroom—and the paint mare crashed down on her
left side, pegging one leg of her rider to the floor and his back
against the bar. The aim of three desperadoes was thereby spoiled and
the bullets slammed into the side-wall of the saloon, so close to-
gether that they bored one large hole.
Nothing daunted by the
mishap, Hal- lock whanged away from the floor, get- ting two of the
ambitious artillerists in as many seconds. "Get up, girl, get up!" he
kept repeating and the paint mare, recovering quickly from the shock of
the fall, struggled hard. One black-bearded Patane, thinking to take
advantage of Hallock while he was down, stole forward on the balls of
his feet for a close shot, the mare's move- ments in trying to rise
being discon- certing. Patane imagined he was un- observed and had but
two steps to go
when one of the gunfighter's Colts
roared at him over Happy Hoof's shoul- der. The dying bad man, as he
dropped face first, struck the scrambling Happy Hoofs with his
out-thrown hands, which so startled the paint that she jumped, snorting,
and heaved upright on her feet. Hallock, mindful of his pet's danger,
even in the thick of the fight, denied himself the protection her body
might have afforded while he was get- ting up; slapped her flank with a
gun- barrel, which drove the animal outside.
A BULLET
splintered the bar close to Hallock's left ear. His left leg was
somewhat numb from the weight of the horse, but he planted his right
foot firmly and with back braced against the bar, slid to nearly his
full height, crouched in characteristic fighting pose. Lew Harney and
Sid Cobb cattle thieves, when they were working, ready gun-fanners
working or loafing, found themselves in direct line with Hair- Trigger's
leveled sixes. Harney al- ready had taken one shot at the two- gun man
and missed and Hallock knew it. Both waddies were standing near a poker
table. Lew whirled like a flash, upsetting the table and jerking Cobb
down as he threw himself behind it. Harney was just a fraction too slow
to save himself. A slug whined unerringly from one of Hallock's guns and
smashed between the rustler's eyes. Harney lifted to his feet with a
short yell, then fell against the barricade he had arrayed,turning the
table over on its top, the legs plumb, and exposing Sid Cobb. "Fanning"
his triggerless Colt, that is, striking the thumb of his left hand
against the hammer, Sid un- limbered but one shot before Hallock tucked
a "settler" in his chest and he slid forward, gasping, beside his late
partner in cattle raiding. But four of Hallock's enemies stood, unhurt,
avid, in spite of the destruction
he had wrought and, but for his torn
ear, his apparently scatheless condition, to compass his defeat. Now or
never, kill or be killed; they could never get to the door past
Hallock's guns, in fact, none of the four entertained a thought of
escape. They had reached a stage of desperation where death can be faced
eye to eye without a conscious quiver. Len Roper, a long-haired,
sun-smoked old rawhide, who had been a bad man for forty years, advanced
first on the bayed Hallock, tipping up hi3 holster to fire through the
bottom. He pulled trig- ger and so did Hallock, the shots roar- ing into
one. Knowing the deadly style of Roper's gunplay, Hallock had aimed to
cripple his hand and thus deflect the bullet; otherwise, even with death
tear- ing at his vitals, old Len might have the tenacity to send a
bullet straight as his last act on earth. Bellowing his pain and rage,
the long-haired bad man— who was no imitation, though he did affect the
lengthy locks which were so often an indication of the show-off, a
wild-looker who couldn't stand the acid—dangled his smashed paw, then
hand that for forty years had cut down good and bad alike according as
their politics were at variance with Mr. Roper's. Bang! roared Hallock's
right- hand gun in the midst of Len Roper's lamentation, cutting it
short. But Len, though old, proved tougher than some of the younger ones
who had gone down earlier. With a bullet lodged some- where near his
heart—Hallock was cer- tain of that—the long-hair took several steps
backward, trying to steady him- self after the shock of the lead injec-
tion. His good hand, flung out to aid him in regaining his balance,
struck a leg of the table overturned by Messrs. Harney and Cobb. Dying
on his feet, his brain seethed with one idea, to re- taliate on the man
who had broken his gun hand and given him his death wound; and the
contact of his hand
with the table-leg seemed to suggest
a way. Unable to utter a sound, but with strength to spare for his final
deed be- cause hate buoyed him, Len tore the leg loose and flourishing
it has a club, stag- gered at the man crouched back to
bar.
HALLOCK'S blazing eyes at that in- stand were glancing
over the sights at the three other desperadoes, advancing on him as one
man, with intervals of a few feet between them, to get him from in front
and both sides at once. As he threw down on the gun- packer sidling to
the left, Len Roper piled in, oblivious to the spurting gun, and took
the bullet himself. There was a loud thump. Roper had landed a blow with
his club, but not where he aimed for, almost instant death from that
second bullet shortening his reach. Instead of striking Hallock on the
head, the table-leg smashed him on the chest, yet with sufficient force
to hurl him backward, half across the bar. Len Roper slumped floorward,
unaware that he had not achieved his end.
Gasping for breath
and flat on his back, with legs hanging over the edge of the bar,
Hallock heard a sudden rush of feet. His last three enemies were closing
in, following up the advantage given them by the late Mr. Roper, over
whose body one of them tripped—and cursing, kicked it—in his blind
eager- ness to finish the battling Mr. Hallock while he was down. Mr.
Hallock may have been down, but he was by no means out. He raised up as
two of these desperadoes thrust guns within an inch of his body. As he
was employing one arm to lever himself upright, the gun in that hand was
temporarily, so to speak, spiked cannon. But Mr. Hallock had feet and he
did not let them stay idle in this extremity. The man he could not reach
with a gun he kicked full in the face—and the face disap- peared.
Thrusting the other gun into
the vest of the second bad man, Hal-
lock tunnelled him, the flame from the muzzle setting his shirt on
fire.
The third man of the trio, who had been delayed in
reaching Hallock by stumbling over Len Roper, was the first object to
loom on Hallock's wavering vision as he slid off the bar. He had
forgotten that man. He fired without aiming; saw him fall and the smoke
jerking from his gun-muzzle as he fell. But Hallock was sure he himself
had not been hit, for he felt all right, except for dizziness. On the
floor a man moved; accustomed to watching the hands of men, their hands
and their eyes, Hallock almost mechanically saw the hand of the man
lift—and mechani- cally he shot, wondering as he pressed trigger, if
there was an unused cartridge in the gun he pointed. He had lost count
of shots and men. The roaring explosion and the thump of the man's head
on the floor were both vaguely sat- isfying. That man must be the last
of them thought Hallock as he gazed around, seeming to look from another
world upon the shambles he had created with his two hands, lined with
iron; yes, he was the last, the fellow he had kicked in the face. He
remem- bered now. He sheathed his guns and turned to the
bar.
"Whisky," he said in a monotonous voice, though there was
nobody in sight to take his order.
The bartender, his face
pasty, crawled out from under. He fumbled the bottle and glass he placed
at Hal- lock's hand.
"Nerves ain't so good, huh?" the
gunfighter sneered. "Look here!" He stretched forth his right arm, the
fingers of his hand spread wide—steady as rock.
The bartender
nodded, shamefaced. "I ain't put together that way. Few is." He sniffed.
"Somethin' burnin'."
"Powder," suggested Hallock,
sarcas
tically.
"Somethin' else, too." The bartender leaned
over the mahogany. "There!" he exclaimed and pointed down. "Wes ty's
shirt's afire. Gettin' cremated."
Hallock glanced at the
little blaze started by the pistol he had shoved in Westy's vest and
whipping off his som- brero, beat it out. Then he poured and downed a
short whisky.
"Why'n hell didn't yuh warn me about Coldrion
layin' for me in here?" Hallock demanded. "Friend o' his, was
yuh?"
"Hadn't no idea he was up to nothin', Trigger," replied
the barman. "I don't think he was till he saw yuh ridin' by. Spoke about
yuh mashin' his face an' said he'd get yuh for it—but that was nothin'
new. That crowd yuh just cleaned up always did have it in for yuh. My
God, but yuh can fight!"
"Thanks, I am able to take care o'
myself some. It's plumb lucky I didn't need no help. About all I can
thank yuh for, yuh bar-swabber, is keepin' out of it."
The
"bar-swabber" was silent. Hal- lock turned to go; paused at the door and
looked back. "There's one face in 'ticular I'm missin' on that floor—
Blackfoot Dixon's. Know where he's at?"
"Ain't seen him since
last night."
Hallock strode out of the front door —into the
arms of his wife.
CHAPTER IX
Hallock
Kicks
"I'VE been fightin' ag'in," declared the two-gun man
idiotically, hold- ing Sue in close embrace.
Behind her stood
Doc Bennison, so- ber again, but shabby as ever. His smile was
expansive. "When I gave you
permission to fight. Hallock, I
stipu- lated one man at a time, and here you took on half the town. Not
to men- tion," he added, "the other capers your wife has told me
about."
"That so, doc, yuh did give me or- ders," Hallock
loosened the hold of one arm about Sue and scratched his head,
half-grinning. 'Danged if I didn't for- get 'em. But." with a
full-throated laugh, "I feel all right."
"In that case," said
the doctor, "I'd say we have no cause to worry. But how about that
ear?"
Hallock put up a quick hand to the mutilated member. 'By
golly, I do re- member gettin' hit, but it was so long ago, I'd plumb
forgot. Coldiron did that—but Coldiron ain't no more an' I'll hear just
as good."
"Come over to my office right away and I'll fix it
up."
"Soon's I corral my Happy Hoofs, doc. Say, girl," to Sue,
lifting her face, which all this while had been buried in his shirt,
"yuh don't say nothin'. How come? Yuh can't exactly blame me for that
fight. Coldiron fired at me through the front winder an' I went in after
him—an' was jumped."
"How many, Hallock?" interposed
Bennison.
"Well, doc, I just lost count, they kept coinin' so
fast, but both guns is empty an' I didn't sling much idle lead," replied
the two-gun man. Then, to his wife, "Sue, they was honin' to down me an'
I shore thought they would—"
She stopped his mouth with her
hand. "Why do you talk so foolishly, Tom! Blame you! I never was so
sea—"
"Hallock," cut in the doctor again, 'I didn't think Sue
Bra— Hallock could faint, but she can. Did, dead away, when we ran down
here to see what the cannonading meant. I differed in opin- ion with
your wife. I was that confi- dent you'd win through—well, I said to
myself if you didn't smoke your way
out I'd never touch another drop of
liquor. And that was a promise."
Doc, yuh shore must've had
confi- dence," 'Hallock remarked quizzically.
"I don't
suppose," said Bennison, "that anybody needs my attention in there." And
he waved toward the bar- room.
"No!" Hallock shook his head.
Then added: " 'Nless it's the barkeep. Yuh might prescribe him a nerve-
tonic."
That fight in the Elkhorn Bar was a source of
conversation in Derringer years after; hard-eyed old-timers, who had
survived the hectic days of the town, related Hair-Trigger Hallock's
feat with pride and heartily cussed the law that only allowed shooting
by man who wore badges. There had been no gunplay paralleling that of
Hallock's since Wild Bill Hickok, armed with a rifle, two six-shooters
and two bowie knives, shot and cut up the dreaded McCandlas outfit,
single-handed, in Kansas. Hallock did not realize that he had made
history for Montana, but he did not know he had stirred up Der- ringer
considerably, particularly when, on entering Spokane Harry's honka- tonk
that night, he was approached by the frock-coated, cat-footed
proprietor.
"Evening, Trigger," he said. "We don't often have
a visit from you, and while I want to make you welcome, I hope, at the
same time, you're not look- ing for anyone. I'm not a cheap skate, but
the fixtures in this place cost me plenty and if any such gunplay as you
staged in the Elkhorn was pulled in here—I'd burst into tears."
Spokane's poker face relaxed in as much of a smile as he ever permitted
himself. "You sure messed up the Elkhorn, you and your playful friends.
Promise me. Trigger, if you're aimin' to start some- thing you'll drag
it out in the street first."
HALLOCK rolled a smoke, licking the
flap and striking a match be- fore replying. "I can't promise, Spo-
kane, because I'm gettin' the bad habit o' keepin' my word. I know I
didn't clean up all the hard guys who'd like to get me an' most of 'em
hang up in here. But I ain't huntin' trouble, ex- cept with one:
Blackfoot Dixon, Gal- latin's sidekicker. He'll try to play hunk for
Chalk's toe-up from ambush. An' I'd just as leave see him
first."
"I would myself," said Spokane Harry, dryly. "But,
Trigger, he hasn't been in here tonight." And Spokane lied. Not that he
had any regard for the hide of the quarterbreed, but he feared that a
meeting between the two would mean a repetition of the Elk- horn Bar
shoot-up; there were several able gunmen present, he knew, who only
needed someone to take the initia- tive and they would jump Hallock.
Added to the grudge they already toted against him, he had gunned
friends of theirs that day.
Hallock, though he had no cause to
doubt the honkatonk owner's word— and did not—elected to circulate in
Spokane's joint "for a spell," as he put it. Blackfoot Dixon was likely
to am- ble in. Hallock had been on the look- out for him all day—but not
a sign.
Nodding to the many who spoke to him, but avoiding
conversation with anybody, Hallock was spectator in turn at the roulette
wheel and the faro lay- out and in this way passed a half hour. He took
no notice of the venemous stares of certain Colt-bristling gentle- men
in the big hall, though careful not to place his back toward them. He
de- cided suddenly that one of the gallery boxes fronting the small
stake would be an ideal lookout, safe from rear at- tack and obtaining a
view of every cor- ner of the hall as well as the stage. Go- ing
upstairs, Hallock entered the first box he came to, closed the door
behind
him, and pulling the curtains apart, sat down at the table. A
waiter thrust his head in at the door and Hallock ordered beer, then
turned his gaze on the crowded floor beneath. To the come- dian in the
limelight at that moment and convulsing most of the crowd with his jokes
and antics, the gunfighter paid no attention. His eyes, lifting from the
vivid scene of noise and movement and color below, ranged along the
boxes on the gallery opposite—and stopped at the third one. The curtains
were pulled back; a man, his back toward Hallock, and a familiar figure,
crouched against the thin wall separating his box from the next one,
which had its curtains drawn together, in an attitude of listen-
ing.
"Blackfoot!" Hallock swore, and clenched his fist. "Then
Spokane lied, for Dixon didn't come in after me. I was watchin' too
close to miss him."
At the same time he thought it strange
that the quarter-breed should have missed seeing him while he was
circulating in the crowd on the floor. The explanation, as it seemed to
him, must be that Dixon had other business on hand, and so engrossing as
to dwarf the importance of a meeting with Hal- lock, likely to be a
life-and-death mat- ter. It would have been of interest to the
gunfighter to learn the nature of that other business even if he had
none of his own to transact with Mr. Dixon. When the waiter returned
with the bot- tled beer and glass, the door of Hal- lock's box stood
open and he was gone.
HALLOCK was not many minutes making his
way across the thronged hall, up the stairs and along the narrow gallery
to the box in which he had seen Blackfoot Dixon. The door was ajar.
Plucking a gun from his belt and with his thumb slipped under the
hammer, he was about to jerk the door wide when a commotion started
in
the adjoining box. Scuffling,
bumping, panting of hard-drawn breaths and low, guttural curses these
last in Black foot Dixon's voice, not a doubt of it. Hal- lock strode
forward and tried the door of the box from which the sounds of strife
emanated. It was locked. He was going to call, but on second thought
closed his lips, jammed the muzzle of his Colt against the lock and
pulled trigger once, twice. The fastening was smashed, the door swung
inward an inch or two without Hallock touching a fin- ger to it. The
gunfighter was about to enter, pushing his gun ahead of him and puzzled
as to what it all meant, when the door was jerked wide open and a heavy
body catapulted into him, knocking him down. The man ran on down the
gallery and Hallock, recog- nizing the figure as Blackfoot Dixon's as he
scrambled up, reached hurriedly for the six-shooter he had
dropped.
"Leave it lay, pardner," drawled a man's voice near
at hand and Hallock looked for the first time into the box, lighted by
an oil lamp. The owner of the voice was a tall, lanky but broad-
shouldered young fellow with curly hair and a not unhandsome,
good-natured face. He wore semi-range garb and was training a sawed-off
thirty-eight in Hallock's direction, a lazy but daunt- less blue eye
back of the sight. Against the wall near the young man stood a
dance-hall girl known as Goldie, her dark eyes mirroring fright, one
white hand at her laboring breast.
"Boy," growled Hallock, as
he rose, flourishing his Colt in utter and con- temptuous disregard of
the young man's order, "I dunno who'n hell yuh are, but yuh're a damn
fool for one thing. If that li'l pop-gun o' yuhrs should go off an' hit
me anywheres I'd be real mad."
And he wheeled and plunged
along the gallery in pursuit of Blackfoot Dixon. The breed bad man was
still in sight for the gallery was long and
Hallock had been
detained but a min- ute or two, long enough to pick him- self and his
Colt up and bare fangs at the timorous young man. Hallock had never yet
shot a man in the back, so he held fire as he ran after his quarry.
Blackfoot threw a backward glance as he heard the thud and jingle of
Hal- lock's feet above the noise was making himself. Hallock wondered
why he didn't shoot back—then reasoned that the breed must have lost his
gun in the struggle with the curly-headed young- ster. What haven
Blackfoot originally had in mind, unless he meant to risk his neck by
dropping from one of the unoccupied boxes to the floor below, the
gunfighter could not guess, for the stairway was in the other direction.
Dixon seemed to be running into a "blind gulch." At the end of the gal-
lery was a window, overlooking Main street, and the drop was
considerable. Reaching the window, which was open, the breed desperado
slung a leg across the sill and turned a snarl-twisted face toward the
man rushing down the gal- lery, running awkwardly on account of his high
heels. To Blackfoot Dixon it looked as if he was
bayed.
Hallock shouted: "Gotcha, Injun!"
FROM the
street below came the thumping beat of galloping hoofs, the unmistakable
rattle, bang and creak of the stage—Rafe Seddon, accom- panied by Sam
Brace, was just getting in from his long drive around the Cuddy Paws.
Blackfoot Dixon turned his face from Hallock and looked down into the
street. In a flash, grasping the window- frame to steady himself, he
drew up both legs, crouching on the sill. Hal- lock was almost near
enough to put out a hand and touch him when Blackfoot launched his slim
body into the air in a pantherish leap. Hallock felt like a man left
holding the proverbial sack. He had been unprepared for the
ma-
neuver. Not at first connecting the
breed's desperate jump with the noise of the stagecoach, subconsciously
heard above the roar of the dance-hall activi- ties, Hallock was treated
to a surprise when he looked out. Instead of lying below with a snapped
neck or leg, Blackfoot Dixon was riding away on the coach roof, all
asprawl just as he had landed. He gathered himself to- gether, even as
Hallock glimpsed him, to meet the attack of Sam Brace, who had risen on
the seat beside Seddon and was facing backward. The driver, roar- ing at
his four-in-hand and sawing on the lines, brought the Concord to a
standstill at an acute angle, with the leaders prancing on the board
sidewalk. Dixon and the saloonkeeper locked in- stantly in a mutual
grizzly hug and lurched wildly back and forth, prevent- ing Hallock from
attempting a snap- shot.
"Hold 'im, Sam! Lend a hand there,
Rafe!" yelled Hallock from the win- dow, then drew in his head and
retraced his steps at speed over the gallery. He passed the box in which
he had encoun- tered the reckless youth with the short- barreled
thirty-eight. The man and Goldie were still there, he noticed— Goldie
was cursing the fellow. He wheeled as he heard Hallock going by, called
something which the gunfighter did not catch, nor stop to have repeated.
Hallock leaped down the stairway, swinging his gun, and the men and
women nearest him scattered. They had heard nothing of the set-to on the
gallery as they were making more noise than had attended that fracas
them- selves, and they thought Hallock was on the rampage and anybody
likely to stop lead. He did not have to clear a path to the front door,
it was cleared for him by willing enough feet. He passed close to
Spokane Harry, whose inward trepidation did not show in his
expressionless face.
"You lied to me, Spokane!" rasped
Hallock, grabbing the honkatonk own- er's arm and halting an instant. "I
'spose yuh thought Blackfoot would get me from behind, me believin' what
yuh—"
"I lied to keep the joint from being messed up,"
interrupted Spokane, boldly fronting the gunfighter though he feared
death. "I knew Dixon was here and I tried to find him and per- suade him
to get out. Where is he?" "Jumped out the front window onto the stage,"
replied Hallock, failing to metion the queer game he had bucked on the
gallery. He was forced to be- lieve the proprietor's alleged reason for
concealing the fact of Dixon's presence and released him, saying, "No
fight with yuh, then," and ran on. As he charged out of the front door.
Spokane sighed in relief and with the other hand brushed the arm Hallock
had roughly gripped.
RUNNING toward the stage, halted down the
street not far from the honkatonk, Hallock was greeted by a shout from
Sam Brace, who was sitting on the coach roof: "He got away:
Trigger!"
Hallock swore luridly. "Which way?"
"I
don't rightly know," answered the saloonkeeper, in the tone of one who
feels his failure deeply. "Twisted my gun away from me, hit me between
the eyes an' dropped off. An' Rafe, he had his hands full with the
hosses. Too bad, Trigger. I did my best, but he was a combination o'
steel spring an' breased hog."
"I reckon. Got away from me, so
I can't hardly say much to yuh for lettin' him repeat. Wouldn't be sense
to look for him up any dark alleys—he's got yuhr gun, ain't he?" The
two-gun man was standing by the stage now, looking up at the
saloonkeeper, and saw him
"If these four-legged
thunder- bolts—" Rafe Seddon, who had the four-in-hand well under
control after a stiff fight, began to apologize.
"Never mind,
Rafe," said Hallock, "I'll cut his trail ag'in—soon enough, likely. He
was so doggone nervy about it, I'm a'most willin' to say he deserved to
get away. How's yuhr wheel, Rafe? Runnin' on all four, huh? Sam, I had a
dinger of a fight in yuhr place today. The old barroom is cleaned up
pretty fair now, but it'll wear some o' the scars long as it stands.
Stay up there an' let Rafe put yuh down at the door," as Brace, mightly
intrigued by the news, although still groggy from the blow delivered by
the barrel of his own six-shooter, crawled jerkily back to the driver's
box, intending to alight. He hank down again at Hallock's words and
said:
"I reckon yuh're right, Trigger. Legs wouldn't carry me
this minute. See yuh at the Bar."
"Want a lift, Trigger?"
invited Sed- don. "More room than yuh can use."
"Thanks, I'll
walk." Hallock glanced at the crowd down in front of Spokane Harry's; at
the groups in the street, who had witnessed Blackfoot Dixon's
spectacular leap from the second floor of the dance hall. The people
began to disperse and go about their own busi- ness as Seddon, with a
mighty yank, got the leaders off the boardwalk and started in the right
direction.
Hallock left the street and jingled along the
sidewalk toward the Elkhorn Bar. His wire would be anxiously wait- ing;
it was a new and thrilling and al- together satisfying experience to
have a woman waiting for a fellow, with arm lips and soft arms and—real
love; then he thought, with a sharp pain of regret, of the pal who had
died under his hand. "Pore old Reckless," he muttered, "he shore
would've been right in the thick
o' things that's been happening',
whang- in' away with both hands. He shore loved to fight, the red-headed
cuss!" He had visited the lone grave behind the shack he and Brule had
occupied for the first time that day and erected a rule headboard,
talking to the man under the sod as he worked.
Engrossed in
his thoughts, Hallock was nearing the Elkhorn when on his right a figure
grew suddenly out of the darkness, stepping around the corner of the
barber shop. The light in the shop window reached just far enough to
dimly reveal the dark, Indian features of Blackfoot Dixon and strike a
dull plint from the long six-shooter with which he was covering the
gunfighter.
"Now, Hallock, yuh die!" snarled the
breed.
"By Sam's gun, too. Ain't that hell!" Hallock, though
taken by surprise, had his nerves well in hand. His eyes nar- rowed.
Dixon had a dead drop.
"Yuh killed Chalk, they been tellin'
me," continued Blackfoot, "an' other pals o'mine—old Len an' Coldiron
an' Lew Harney an' them. I wasn't in town or yuh'd been fightin' me,
too. Glad I'm livin' to get revenge for 'em. Hal- lock, I hate yuhr
guts! If things had broke different, if I had the time, I'd roast yuh,
Blackfoot style. But 1 gotta be satisfied killin' yuh ordinary. Hands to
the buzzards! An' watch the Ii'l hammer rise, watch 'er close, for when
she falls, yuh do. I said hands up!" he repeated tensely. "Yuh're too
slick to be trusted with 'em down!"
HALLOCK had been steeling
him- self for a supreme effort. He was thankful for that light at his
back, dim as it was. Dixon stood within reach of hand or foot, holding
Brace's gun low, nearly on a line with his hip. As if in obedience to
Dixon's rasping com- mand, Hallock's hands shot skyward and with the
motion of lifting them, he
kicked upward with his right foot.
The toe of his boot struck sharply the wrist of the desperado, who was
scarcely ex- pecting any movement from the region below Hallock's belts,
and knocked the gun out of his hand. Dixon loosed a white man's oath.
Hallock's hands dropped like a flash, his right one to the belt sagging
on the side and coming up with a gleam of steel.
"Yuhr turn to
watch the hammer Blackfoot!" the two-gun man hissed.
Dixon did
not cringe, his beady eyes did not waver as he looked at the slow-
lifting hammer. "Go ahead an' shoot an' be damned, Hallock!" he said
coolly. "I'm mostly white, but there's enough Blackfoot in me to make me
take medicine like an Indian."
Hallock swiftly sheathed his
Colt, stooped and recovered Sam's iron, which had fallen near his feet,
and ad- dressed the astonished breed: "Dixon, yuh may hate my guts, as
yuh say, but I'm admirin' yuhrs. Yuh shore ain't afraid, an' how yuh
come to pal around with a yellow pup like Chalk Gallatin gets me plumb;
but that's nothin' to do with us. Blackfoot, it's in the cards that I'm
to kill yuh—sometime—but not now. Can't do it after the way yuh just
looked into that muzzle an' not an eye flickerin'. We'll have to meet
ag'in an' finish it, an' likely I'm a fool for takin' a chance on
another time, for yuh, bein' Injun enough to die without whinin', are
also Injun enough to think ambushin' fair fightin'. Now, get the hell
out!"
The hatred had not died out of Blackfoot's eye, for all
that his enemy had spared him, as he turned and swiftly retreated up the
alley in which he had waited for Hallock to pass.
The
gunfighter proceeded on his way to the Elkhorn, shaking his head. He
knew he was a fool for giving Dixon another opportunity to get him, but,
lion-hearted himself, he could not break
the temporary spell of admiration
for similar courage displayed, under test, by the other. Had Chalk
Gallatin's backbone stiffened at the time Hallock faced him on the
slope, the bad cow- boy's death might have been less vio- lent—might
have been, for Chalk had committed the unpardonable sin, to the
primitive mind, especially the elemen- tal primitive mind of a man like
Hal- lock, of manhandling a woman, the woman he loved.
"I'll
tell Sue about that Dixon starin' down death an' paralyzin' my trigger-
finger for the first time," he reflected; "an' I won't tell nobody
else."
He was but a few steps from the door of Sam Brace's
saloon when he heard his name called: "Hallock—wait!" The voice was
somehow familiar. He swung on his heel and saw a man run- ning toward
him. Not until the man came up where the light from the open door of the
Elkhorn struck upon face and figure did Hallock recognize him— and then
he did so with a start. He had completely forgotten the young fellow in
the gallery-box at Spokane Harry's with Goldie, the curly-headed young-
ster who had had the presumption to point a sawed-off thirty-eight at
Hal- lock. Here he was, smiling brazenly.
CHAPTER
X
Hallock Opens a Door
"YUH don't look a heap glad
to see me, Mr. Hallock," declared the young fellow with a West- ern
drawl and in no tenderfoot tone, as might have been
expected.
"Yuh want to be careful how yuh go round pointin'
guns at folks," replied Hallock, not knowing whether to be angry or
otherwise. "Some of 'em might not take it as a joke like I
did."
Studying the youth in a calmer mood,
especially the eyes and the firm chin, the gunfighter decided there
might be more iron in his system than appeared at first
glance.
"I wasn't meaning' that as a joke, Hallock," stated
the young fellow boldly. "I made a mistake, that was all, thought yuh
were a friend o' Dix- on's, but the girl, Goldie, told me dif- ferent,
an' I called to yuh as yuh ran by the box that second time, but yuh
seemed in a hurry. Did yuh catch him?"
"Who—Blackfoot? He's
still foot- loose. Now, brother, before we swap any more talk, I'll just
break a rule o' frontier etiket an' ask yuh who an' what?"
A
deputy sheriff's badge, pinned in- side the youngster's vest, gleamed in
Hallock's eyes. "An' my label's Billy Edgelow, sent up here by Sheriff
Gran- ger to look—Stop!" he exclaimed sharply, lifting a palm in the
oldtime peace sign of the plains, to halt the downward sweep of
Hallock's hands. "I know who yuh are, Hair-Trigger, know yuhr record,
but I ain't after yuh!"
Hallock's suddenly tense body re-
laxed again. He even smiled a little. ''Yuhr rep as a gun-slinger ain't
un- known to me either, Edgelow, but I hadn't no idea yuh was so young.
My hat's off to yuh, boy, yuh've made a lot o' cagey ones lay down. An'
I notice now yuh're packin' a reg'lar forty-five in a reg'lar belt;
where's the li'l thirty- eight?"
"Inside my vest, the place it
always is when it ain't workin'. Havin' that short barreled baby tonight
just about saved my skin. From what I've heard of yuhr recent doin's,
Hallock, since I hit town, includin' the fact yuh've mar- ried," and he
smiled engagingly, "I reckon yuh've been workin' in the in- terest o'
law an' order, even if it was
personal scores yuh were settlin'.
F'r instance, yuh finished the job, the main job, that brought me here.
In my pocket I got a useless warrant for Mr. Chalk
Gallatin."
"The hell yuh have!" Hallock ex- ploded. "I mean,"
he corrected him- self grimly, "he's in hell now an' yuhr warrant shore
is useless; couldn't serve no paper there! Was it 'cause he ven- tilated
the last town marshal Derringer had that the law wanted him?" inquired
Hallock.
'For one thing, yeh," nodded Deputy Edgelow, "but
mainly for holdups on the Sun Canyon trail. Yuh remember several
passengers were gunned in those holdups?"
"Heard so. I never
figgered Chalk was that lone bandit. The stick-ups stopped about six
months ago, didn't they? Uh-huh. Well, that's about the time Chalk
drifted in here. How come yuh didn't nail him before, then?" ques-
tioned Hallock.
"Lost track of him. Several weeks ago Seth
Rawdon came up here to look over the Two Bar Ranch. When he returned to
the county-seat he reported to the sheriff that he'd seen Chalk in a
saloon in this town; he'd been a victim in one o' Chalk's holdups to the
tune of a thousand dollars. Met yuh the same day in the same place,
recogniz- ing yuh from descriptions he'd heard; said yuh could do
sleight-o'-hand with a gun."
"I remember him," Hallock nodded
slowly. "Didn't know who he was an' got suspicious he might be a deputy.
Found he wasn't carryin' a gun an' when I told him it was tough country
out to the Two Bar an' he'd best get heeled, he gimme a li'l sermon on
livin' by the trigger. Yuh bet, I remember him—he was pretty near right.
Name's Rawdon, eh? Came here to ask where he could hire a hoss. Did he
buy the Two Bar?"
"YEH, last week. He's there now, an'
that Dixon lifted—but I'll go on from the time Rawdon vis- ited Granger,
tellin' Chalk's where- abouts an' how tough Derringer was. Sheriff knew
about the toughness an' had meant for sometime to put the lid on up
here. As well as gun-totin' hom- bres makin' this town their headquar-
ters an' an honest man hardly safe in it, cow rustlers an' hoss thieves
was raisin' hell for the ranchers, 'specially the Two Bar, which was the
reason the former owner was anxious to sell. I was away in another part
o' the county when Rawdon called, but as soon as I came back, sheriff
started me on the trail ag'in. I got here yesterday; stopped at the Two
Bar to see if Raw- don had got hold of any more informa- tion that would
help me. He hadn't, but he was in a terrible stew an' his punchers, too.
Every last hoof had been rustled from the saddle-stock cor- ral. They
hadn't any hosses to follow a trail even if they could find one— which
they couldn't. Trail was pretty well covered, an' when I tell yuh that
Blackfoot Dixon was one o' the hoss thieves, yuh'll understand why — he
used his Injun tricks. Well, I hunted round an' hunted round, an' I
struck it. Good bit luck, although I've had a lotta experience trailin'
an' learned more from the sheriff. He's a wonder. The trail led toward
Derringer, an' as I was cornin' here anyways, it suited me fine. Sighted
the stolen hosses soon, an' the thieves, two of 'em. Was careful not to
let 'em see me, though. They took the hosses to a coulee about a mile
south o' this town, a place where two men could stand off twenty easy,
'count o' the boulders around it. I didn't tackle it. One o' the
thieves, when I got near enough, I recognized as Black- foot Dixon.
Mebbe yuh don't know it, but Blackfoot's wanted about as bad as Chalk
was — year ago or more he
roasted two placer miners at the
stake an' stole their dust, on Cougar Creek."
"That so! Well,
he expressed a heap o' sorrow he wasn't in no position to give me a
similar treat. Tickles the Injun spots in him, roastin'." Hallock
thought, with a twinge of the manner of Gallatin's deceasement and shut
up abruptly.
The deputy picked up the narrative. "While I was
watchin' the coulee from a distance, Blackfoot rode off, leavin' his
hoss stealin' pardner with the broncs. He headed for Derringer an' I
trailed after. It was gettin' dark. When we got here I saw him dodge
into that honkytonk. Trailed in, but couldn't see nothin' of 'im. So I
hung around, waitin' for him to show up. He must've spotted me while I
was waitin'; shore he didn't see me when I was trackin' him from the
coulee. As my badge was hid like it is now an' I hadn't no idea
Blackfoot nor anybody in there knew me by sight, never havin' been up
this way before, I wasn't none cautious about paradin'. Dance-hall girl,
the one yuh saw me with, come up an' asked me to buy her a drink. Not
suspectin' there was any plot afoot an' not wantin' to make any more
enemies than neces- sary, I treated. Then she suggested that we take a
box an' watch the show an' have more drinks. Well, she was kinda
goodlookin', but I don't care much for her kind an' I wasn't on no
pleasure trip, but it struck me that she'd know about Gallatin an'
likely could gimme a lotta useful information—if she would. I'd try her.
I did. I didn't drink much, though she coaxed me, makin' me some
suspicious; an' she didn't drink much, which made me more suspicious.
Couldn't guess her game, though, for she answered all my casual-like
questions in a way I couldn't disbelieve. Told me yuh'd killed Chalk
after he'd run off with the girl yuh're now married to an' about yuh
downin'
eight-ten hard ones in the Elkhorn
by yuhr lonesome. She didn't know where Blackfoot was, she said, when I
asked —an' that's where she lied. I know now he was listenin' in the
next box, waitin' for her signal."
"I was lookin' for him same
time yuh was, Edgelow, an' saw him with his ears to the wall from a box
across the hall. I went right over."
"KNOW what that girl
Goldie's game was? Seein' I wasn't goin' to get drunk, she pulled the
curtains shut an' come an' set on my knees an' started to get mushy.
I'm—well, I'm human an' I ain't an old man an' she was pretty an' soft,
like I say—soft on top, she was, but hard underneath. That skirt, while
I was kissin' her, both arms around her, slid one hand down an' lifted
my Colt. I felt it leavin' the hol- ster, tried to grab her arm, but she
jumps up an' backward, holdin' it an' calls, 'Blackfoot! ', sharp. In he
jumps, gun in his fist, lockin' the door quick. I made a dive for him as
he turned from turnin' the key. We clinched in a mighty lovin' clinch
an' I tore the gun away from him, throwin' it under the table. Goldie,
I'll say that for her, didn't try to help him in the fight an' she
could've easy. Mebbe she was sorry she'd helped a breed ag'in her own
race, I dunno. Well, we rassled all over that li'l box, yuh betche, an'
I was aim- in' to get at that reserve thirty-eight in- side my vest. The
breed, from bein' pressed so close to me had felt it, knew what I was
tryin' to do an' tried to pre- vent it. Just about then yuh blowed the
lock off the door. Dixon mebbe thought it was a good chance to escape or
that somebody was gettin' in to help me—I figgered it was somebody
cornin' to help him; anyways he jerked himself loose as yuh smashed the
lock an' stam- peded right over yuh, as yuh know even better than I do.
Got my thirty-eight
out, but he was gone before I could
fire. Then I lined yuh—an' yuh walked off I reckon yuh're wiser now than
yuh was before, eh, Hallock?"
"Keno. How come yuh stayed in
the box when I ran after Blackfoot?" "Why, Goldie told me who yuh was
—an' she'd told me before that, in speakin' o' Gallatin, that yuh an'
Dixon was deadly enemies; so I figured if any- body could corral
Blackfoot, yuh could. An' then I had a few gentle words to pour in the
lady's ear appertainin' to her part in the game to colddeck me. When I
told her she was liable to arrest did she wilt? Like hell! She called me
some names I ain't never heard before an' I thought I'd been dry behind
the ears long enough to know 'em all. 'Course I didn't intend to arrest
her— I pity the pore devils—but I reckoned to throw a scare into her an'
keep her from tryin' the game on somebody else. But she didn't scare an
inch. Sorry Blackfoot got away," he added. "When I went down to the
street I heard some talk about him tryin' to slope on the stage. I
looked for yuh, knowin' yuh'd know more about it than anybody an' final
I saw yuh walkin' along here." Hallock nodded. "The Injun's a
devil-darin' cuss. Jumped out the win- der o' Spokane's place onto the
roof o' the stage as it was passin' by. My father-in-law tried to hold
him, but couldn't an' he beat it somewheres." The gunfighter did not
speak of the second meeting with Blackfoot. He stood thoughtfully a
moment or two, the deputy imitating him. "Blackfoot's hoss gone from the
hitchrack in front o' Spokane's? That bein' so, mebbe he's rode out to
join his pardner in that coulee. I know where it is an' what it's
like—as yuh say, a pretty good fort. But they won't be stayin' there
long, I reckon, though, before yuh come, there wasn't any law hereabouts
to bother 'em none. Aimin' to drive 'em up to
the border an' across into Canada,
dontcha reckon?"
"Yeh," said Edgelow. "Take a sharp guy to get
'em by the Mounties, but Blackfoot's sharp enough even if the other
fellow ain't."
"Yuh want I should ride with yuh, Edgelow, an'
help get the Two Bar hosses back? If there's a way to do it, we'll find
the way."
The efficient deputy clapped a hand on his shoulder.
"Hallock, I've been hopin' yuh'd offer yuhr help. Ready to
go?"
HALLOCK glanced toward the open saloon door. "Yeh," he
said sud- denly. "I'll see my wife after we come back. Know where the
Sundown stage station is? Yuh must've rode past— Righto? Meet yuh at the
corrals. My hoss is there."
Ten minutes later they were riding
south on the moonlit plain. Deputy Sheriff Edgelow had been talking ever
since they threw the town behind.
". . . An' the reward money
for Chalk, dead or alive is yuhrs, o' course. One thousand offered by
the county; another thousand by Wells Fargo. I'll have the sheriff send
yuh a check soon's I get back."
"Well," said Hallock, "I ain't
yet reached the stage where I'll turn down cold cash; in fact, I'm
needin' it more now than I ever did."
"Shore yuh are, though I
can't say from experience, not bein' hitched. An' that's all the more
reason, Hallock, why you should consider serious that pro- position to
swear yuh in as a deputy o' Granger's. He wants yuh, man. Said he didn't
believe yuh was half as black as painted—"
"I was though,"
interrupted the two- gun man, severely honest, "till the girl who's my
wife took me in hand. Pretty wild yes, Edgelow, but she's goin' to
gentle me to the bridle in time. Yuh
see, I don't like the deputy idea
'cause it'll mean I've got to keep on packin' guns—an' since I killed a
pal by mis- take—" He paused and coughed to re- lieve the sudden
tightness in his throat at the recollection of old Reckless lying in his
grave.
"I know about that. Goldie told me." The deputy's tone
was sympa- thetic.
"Goldie," said Hallock, in a minute or two,
"shore must've poured her brains out of her mouth. Well then, yuh know
my reasons for wantin' to discard guns: I'm married an—the other
thing."
"Yeh," nodded the deputy, yet was undeterred. "But,
Hallock yuhr repu- tation is big enough for yuh to rest on it. Blackfoot
Dixon, I reckon, is about the last of yuhr real haters an' we'll mebbe
get him tonight. It ain't likely that many will want a run-in with yuh,
knowin' what mean lead yuh serve. Why, Hallock, I'd be willin' to bet
any- thing almost that yuh won't have to pull a gun half a dozen times
while yuh're in office. The bad men, rustlers an' all of 'em will take a
sneak out o' yuhr part o' Missoula County—it wouldn't surprise me. An'
if yuh do have to shoot, why, it'll be in the name o' the
law.
"Wearin a nickel badge an' killin' a man don't make no
difference in the fact that yuh've killed him," observed Hal- lock with
a logic that stunned but did not convince the younger man. "Not that I'm
gettin' ree-ligious," added the gunfighter with a short laugh, "though
I've lately scrambled acquaintance with a preacher who rings the
bell."
"Yuh ain't got any other job in mind, have yuh?" young
Edgelow asked, feeling that here was a clincher.
"No," said
Hallock, "an' it's that fact only that keeps me from turnin' yuhr deputy
sheriffin' offer down flat. But all I know is how to play opry
on
Colonel Colt's harp-distributers;
an' I got a wife to support. I'll se what she says, Edgelow, an' of it's
'Yes,' yuh can pin yuhr shiny badge on—"
The thutting crack of
a .30-30 finished for him. The bullet plunked in the hard ground in
front of them. Ahead lay the rockgrit coulee. At once Hallock swung down
and backed Happy Hoofs well out of range, leaving her standing with the
reins hanging.
"That's about as far as that Win- chester'll
throw 'em—where the bullet hit," remarked Hallock, expertly judg- ing
the distance to the coulee, "but bring yuhr hoss here alongside mine an'
he'll shore be safe."
"Hoss thief's got the edge on us,"
grumbled the deputy as he followed Hallock's advice. "I never thought to
bring a rifle."
"Nor me," said Hallock, "but even if we had
one I don't reckon it'd be much good. Feller's forted fine an' he won't
expose enough o' himself for us to nick —not in this moon light.
Daylight, mebbe. Wonder if it's Blackfoot— though I never seen him
handle any- thing but six-shooters—or the unknown guy by his lonesome.
Seein' two ridin' toward him he knew, even as far as we are from his
fort, that we wasn't friends. If either one of us, now—but mebbe Black
foot's joined him a'ready. He's had time enough."
THEY
squatted on their heels in silence. The Winchester in the coulee was
also silent.
"Say," Hallock exclaimed suddenly, "I think I
savvy how to get him! I'll keep him busy in front here—or both of 'em,
whichever it is—an' yuh crawl around to the other side o' the coulee an'
get 'em in the flank. How are yuh on snake imitatin'?"
"Good
at snakin'," replied Deputy Edgelow, without boast. "I'd thought o'
rear-attackin' myself, but we've been
seen, they know there's two of us
an' if one goes he'll be missed."
"Don't yuh believe it, boy,"
smiled Hallock, who could not forget Edge- low's youthful appearance,
though there was not five year's difference in their ages. "I'll make
'em think we're both here on this spot an' anxious to waste lead. Yuh
recollect the old-time scout trick o' shiftin' base with each shot?" And
at Edgelow's quick nod he finished, "Well, start crawlin' an I'll start
shootin'."
Hallock stretched himself on his stomach in the
bunch-grass, a gun in each fist. He fired with the right-hand weapon,
aiming in the direction of the coulee, though for all the damage it
would do, he might just as well have fired straight up in the air. The
Win- chester replied to the roar of the Colt, the lead thumping two or
three yards away. Hallock rolled over, rolled sev- eral feet, and he did
it so quickly that the detonation of the first shot had not died before
it was caught up and pro- longed by the throbbing boom of a second,
belching from the left-hand gun. Meanwhile, belly to the ground, Deputy
Billy Edgelow was hitching his long, slim body with painful slowness but
steady progress over the sea of bunch-grass, describing a wide semi-
circle. He could have wished for a moonless night for such work and
blessed every cloud which, for a mo- ment or two or longer, swam across
the face of the beaming satellite.
The gun fighter stuck to
his guns, literally, for over a half hour. He fired and rolled, fired
and rolled, left to right and back again, giving as good as imita- tion
of two men shooting from different positions, a few feet apart, as two
men could have done. His cartridge belts were getting lighter. He was
glad he had two to keep up the bombardment. Young Edgelow was a long
time mak- ing the trip to the coulee, but, of
course
"That buckaroo,' soliloquized Hal- lock as time ran
on, certain there was but one man coupla lulus slingin' away all this
good lead. He ain't so strong on brains himself," he remarked, on second
thought, "tryin' to make that rifle carry the few extra yards it won't
reach. He's dumber than I am, I reckon, 'cause I don't expect to get no-
wheres. If that angel-face deputy—"
The distant rumbling of a
Colt in the direction whence, heretofore, had sounded only the staccato
voice of the Winchester! Then silence. Hallock leaped up, whooping,
jammed his smok- ing guns in their scabbards and ran to the horses.
Hair-pinning the paint mare and with the reins of the deputy's mount
bunched in his left hand, he scudded across the plain. As he gal- loped
within hail of the coulee, the tall, lanky form of Billy Edgelow
appeared in the moonlight running along the rim and waving triumphant
arms.
"Got him!" he yelled to Hallock. "One man, but it wasn't
Blackfoot. All the Two Bar hosses is down there, twenty-five or thirty
of 'em."
MRS. TOM HALLOCK said "yes" in the matter of her
husband wearing a deputy sheriff's badge for seventy-five dollar a
month; thereby astonishing Billy Edgelow, whose hopes had gone
a-glimmering when Hallock left the decision up to his wife. Edge- low
thought he knew something about women—and maybe he did, something —but
he had never before met the kind of a woman Sue Hallock was. Sue's
reason for giving her consent were her own; she knew you couldn't cure a
drunkard by cutting off his liquor sup- ply all at once—you had to
diminish it gradually. Her husband was in simi- lar case and would
require similar treatment! his killing impulse couldn't be uprooted
suddenly, but must be
weeded by degrees. The responsibili-
ties of the deputy's office would teach him
self-control.
Hallock, having sold the horse and effects of
his late partner, Brule, turned up at the Northern Pacific depot one
morning, the day after Billy Edgelow departed for the county-seat, and
ordered two tickets to Deadwood.
"Ain't leaving us are you,
Hallock?" the agent asked, arching his brows. "I thought you were going
to be a deputy sheriff around these parts."
"Am," nodded
Hallock, smiling "Don't lose no time gettin' around, news don't. But I'm
goin' on my honeymoon first. Be gone about two weeks an' when I come
back the sheriff will be up here to swear me in. Ain't seen Deadwood,"
he added reminis- cently, "since I was pretty much of a kid. Got my bad
start there, but I've a hankerin' to see the place ag'in, 'specially
Jerry Lewis's saloon where I used to serve drinks to Wild Bill Hickok
an' Calamity Jane, too."
"Will be interesting," said the
agent, who did not seem at all interested in what Hallock was saying,
but in some thought of his own. "Say," he spoke abruptly and leaned in
the ticket win- dow, close to the gunfighter, "have you been talking
around about this trip to Deadwood?"
"Well, I haven't hollered
it from any roofs, but it's been no secret. Why?"
"You never
found Blackfoot Dixon?"
"No, ain't laid eyes on him since the
night he jumped out the honkytonk winder. I suspect he's hidin' close to
town an' his friends, what's left of 'em."
"Uh-huh. This may
be a good tip or not, Hallock, but Pat Brand—used to be a friend of Len
Roper's and none of yours—was here yesterday and bought three sections
to Deadwood on the same train you're taking. What do you think of that?
Maybe Blackfoot's one of the six."
"Mebbe he is." Hallock's smile did
not weaken. "Mebbe it's an exo-dus, like I heard a preacher say once.
The boys don't like the idea o' me deputy sheriffin', knowin' I'll make
'em behave, I reckon. Or mebbe," his lips tighten- ing, "they figger to
down me on the train when I ain't lookin'. I'll watch sharp an' thank
yuh for tellin' me."
THAT night when Hallock and his bride
boarded the eastbound, six undesirable citizens of Derringer got on,
too, thinking themselves un- observed. Sam Brace and Cale Hal- pin, who
were at the depot to see the couple off, did not remark then; nor did
Sue. But Hallock did, for he was watching and noted that they climbed
into the smoker. He smiled grimly; he had kept the agent's information
to himself.
"I reckon I'll take a smoke while our bunks is
bein' made up, Sue," Hallock remarked, about an hour later, as they were
roaring across the bunch-grass plains. Sue suspected nothing, though she
had wondered a bit why he wore his guns, as usual, under his
coat.
Hallock made his way to the smoker. The instant he
entered the car a shot rang out from the other end. It was so unexpected
that he could have done nothing, voluntarily, to save himself; but as
the gun spouted the train tore round a curve, jerking Hallock off his
feet. He went almost to his knees, then straightened, and sweeping back
his coat and pulling his guns in two flash- ing motions, he covered the
locality of his half dozen enemies, in seats close together. Blackfoot
was the one who had fired. He was kneeling on a seat, facing Hallock,
his gun arm resting on the back of it. Striding down the aisle,
six-shooters leveled, Hallock called to the other disturbed
passengers:
"This ain't a holdup, friends. Just hold yuhr
seats an' duck yuhr nuts,
lay plumb low. There's six gents in
this car that wants to get off, an' I'm invitin' 'em to step into the
aisle and mosey out to the platform before lead starts singin'.
Blackfoot, yuh can keep that gun—but not in yuhr
hand."
Blackfoot holstered it. Caught un- der Hallock's drop,
the six gunmen stepped into the aisle as directed and filed to the
vestibule. Hallock thrust one gun in its scabbard, closed behind them
the door into the car, then pushed by Pat Brand and Blackfoot and the
rest, and opened the vestibule door.
"One at a time, gents,"
purred Hal- lock. "It's take a chance or stand an' take
it."
Pat Brand, first in line, sprang out as Hallock's gun
prodded him. They heard no sound but the roaring of the train. Blackfoot
Dixon, next, cursed the gunfighter savagely—in the white tongue—and
hurled himself outward, to be engulfed by the darkness. An- other man
leaped A scream floated back to the men on the platform, three waiting
apprehensively to follow the man who had cried out, the fourth in
merciless mood again, inexorable. As the last man jumped Hallock slammed
shut the vestibule door, sheathed his other gun and re-entered the
smoker.
"Some passengers just got off," he said, when he stood
beside his wife.
"But—we didn't stop at any sta- tion." Her
eyes widened in surprise.
"They choosed, just the same, to get
off," persisted Hallock. "Blackfoot Dixon an' Pat Brand an' friends. Six
of 'em."
"Oh!" Comprehension filled her fine eyes; she
detected now the dying red flicker in his. She put a hand on his
shoulder. "Tom, do you realize this is our honymoon?"
And
Hallock, unable to fathom her expression, wondered if she were re-
proving him. He unbuckled his gun belts, one after the
other.
Beyond the brimstone border these two hard-bitten
badmen could test their deadly gunswift against Ranger John Stark, the human
Colt-arsenal from Arizona!
The girl stared,
speechless, horrified!
LEAN, dark, hawk-faced John Stark of
the Rangers, Arizona Terri- tory, sat on the counter of the Sacatone
Trading Company, Sacatone City. He rolled the rowels of his straight
shanked spurs up and. down the boards below and reached into the sugar
barrel for a lump of brown sugar. The sugar disappeared into a wide,
thin-lipped mouth and he cocked a dark
eye at his friend the clerk. "Well,
Fat," he asked, "what you been doing?" The clerk, short, fat and
intensely serious answered, "John, I been think- ing."
Stark
brought up another lump of sugar and told the clerk, "That won't get you
nowhere, Fat." The clerk stopped to look over his glasses, suspiciously.
He asked, "What
Then Stark said, "Don't tell me they bought cartridges,
canteens and canned tomatoes."
The clerk stopped wandering
around and looked at the Ranger. He asked, "They? Who?" Then he added,
thoughtfully, "There was only one of them."
There was a
lightning gleam in the Ranger's eyes. He asked, "Stranger? Slim? Middle
height? Light eye- brows?"
The clerk looked surprised and
asked, "How'd you know?"
Stark said, "I didn't know. I was
just hoping." Then he asked, "You didn't see the horse?"
The
clerk answered, regretfully, "No. I didn't John." Then he said, "But he
bought two canteens, and enough stuff for two."
Stark nodded
to that, "Guess he's what I'm looking for. They robbed the bank in
Tucson. Three of them. They shot the cashier. But somebody got one of
them as they was getting out of town. I lost them up in the foothills in
the dark and thought I'd make a try for here. One of 'em was
wounded."
The fat clerk's eyes had opened wide as he asked,
"You don't say? And shot the cashier? How much did they get away
with?"
Stark said, "I didn't wait to find out." Then he asked.
"How long ago and which way did he head?"
Fat told him, "Early
this morning and he pulled out for the river." He spoke thoughtfully,
"Canteens and tomatoes and there's water between here and the Mexican
border." He thrust a fat finger at the Ranger and pronounced, "They're
heading for the desert first!"
Stark nodded to that and slid
off the
counter. He said, "Get me some to-
matoes Fat."
The clerk nodded and walked around behind the
counter, muttering, "my, my, and shot the cashier."
The Ranger
spoke seriously, "Just the same Fat, some of these ginks you tip off to
me are going to get wise some- day, and then where'll you
be?"
Fat said, "Hump. Me?" in a vindic- tive voice, reached
under the counter and brought out a double barreled sawed off shot gun.
He said, "Take a look."
STARK spoke in mock seriousness, "But
don't put the butt against your stomach Fat when you let fly both
barrels."
The clerk ignored that to suddenly shout, "But my,
my, I forgot. Listen John Old Turkey Tracks, that old pros- pector, and
his granddaughter, they left for the desert yesterday! Was go- ing to
fill their burro kegs at the river and hit the desert last
night."
The Ranger's quizzical eyes sobered. He shook his
head, muttering softly, "That cooks it! They're two tough hombres. Bad
ones."
He started for the door, throwing over his shoulder,
"Adois, Fat. I'll come and tell you about it."
The clerk spoke
comfortably, "Sure you will."
John Stark of the Rangers pushed
open the screen door and his slitted eyes fought the searing glare of
the sun of southern Arizona. A great bay horse at the hitch rail lifted
a splendid head to look at him and nickered, softly.
The horse
walked along the one dusty street of Sacatone City, tossing his head,
rolling the curb wheel over his tongue. Men dragging spurs along the
uneven board walk looked at the big bay horse and the hawk-faced Ranger.
Some waved, calling out jovially, "Hi
John." Others whispered to each
other, "Who the hell's he after now?"
They went past the cool
caverns of the livery barn turned to the left and rode up a long slope.
Short, grey green live oaks stood around in the short brown grass. Up to
the right the tumbled foothills of the Cholla Range rose up to be the
gaunt ribs of the Great Peak of the Chollas. Far up blackish juniper
bushes ran up into the pinon belt and then the black band of the pines
was drawn, like a shawl, around the throat of the ancient, fire tortured
peak.
Stark talked to the horse, softly, "This will be four
times we chased somebody out into that damn desert. Mebbeso our luck
will hold."
A little later he spoke again, "We've known old
Turkey Tracks for years but I don't savvy the granddaughter. But mebbeso
we did hear about a daughter tucked away somewhere." The big bay flicked
his little pointed ears and stepped out briskly.
They came to
the crest of the long slope and looked down on the mesquite flats of the
Rio Sacatone and over a thin string of green leaved walnuts to the
desert. For mile on mile the desert rolled away to the horizon. Red and
brown with leperous white patches of alholi. The heat waves shimmered
and shifted and the desert seemed to roll and heave like some
treacherous, re- pulsive sea. Away off at the end of the world a blue
line lay between desert and sky. "The Faraway Hills," Stark was
thinking. "Little water. Only enough for a few head of
horses."
The horse went on down the Tuscon road, into the
mesquite flats along the river. Every footfall lifted little balls of
white dust that hung in the air. They turned off the road into a trail
that wound around through the mesquite and catclaw and over to the
river.
There was water there, a shallow
stream that sparkled
in the sunlight. Across the river Stark slid off the horse and began to
hunt signs. He quickly found the place where Turkey Tracks, the old
prospector, had stopped for awhile. The mark of the water kegs was plain
where they had been filled. "Four burros," he told himself and fol-
lowed the trail a little way. "Old Tur- key Tracks on foot and the girl
riding. The old fool, dragging his grand- daughter into the desert."
Then he grinned and thought, "If she looks like old Turkey Tracks she
might as well be in the desert as anywhere."
He came back to
the river bank and began casting about for the tracks of two horses. He
thought, "I know these horse tracks, followed them far enough to." It
was sometime before he found where two horses had come out of the river.
His lean dark face lightened with pleasure then darkened in disap-
pointment. They were not the same horses.
He thought, "They
could have got fresh horses out of the AN pasture." After a little he
shook his head, mut- tering. "But I've got to be sure."
He
found where a man had squatted on his heels by the river, perhaps to
fill canteens. He followed that back into the brush. There he found what
he wanted.
In the dust, under a mesquite bush, was the clear
print of the back of a man. A man had laid there at full length on his
back, waiting for the man at the river. What brought the gleam of
delight to Stark's eyes was that the man's left hand rear pocket had
been half torn down. The mask of the torn pocket was quite clear. STARK
walked briskly back to the big bay. "That's him," he told the horse.
"That's the wounded one. I saw that torn pocket in the dirt yes- terday
afternoon."
Stark slid up unto the horse, rode up out of the
brush, through a thicket of ocatilla cactus and the desert was before
him. He was thinking, "They haven't water enough to reach the Far- away
Hills, neither have I, but mebbeso they don't know it. Old Turkey Tracks
has enough though."
Then he thought of the grand- daughter out
there on the desert—and those two waterless killers coming on her. With
slitted eyes the manhunter rode out onto the desert.
Out in
the desert two men riding westward. Hard-eyed men with mean, tight
mouth?. A heavy-set man with a week's beard on a beefy face rode tilted
over in the saddle. He had rigged a rope sling that ran from the saddle
horn down under his left knee, holding it up. He held to the saddle horn
with both hands. His face was drawn with pain.
The other was
younger, slim, with light hair and eyes. His eyebrows were so light as
to be unnoticeable, giving the light eyes a curiously snakelike look. A
bundle in a grain sack was tied securely behind the
saddle.
The heavy one felt gingerly of his wounded leg,
cursed, and complained, "I'm thinking we'd a done better to have hit it
for the border. This ain't no good."
The younger one snarled
and cursed, "Oh lay off me. This is the way we planned it ain't it? That
damned Ranger has hightailed it for the border. We figured that all out
didn't we?" The wounded man grumbled again, "What'd you want to beef
that cashier for Slim? That'l get us in trouble yet." Slim cursed and
pulled up his horse to stare with mad unblinking eyes, "Will you shut
your yawp or will I shut it for you?"
The wounded man groaned
and tried to ease his leg. After a little he said, "What say we take a
little water?"
Slim yelled at him, "No! I done told
you we ain't drinking till night, and damn little then."
The
wounded man mopped his dirty, sweaty pain drawn face and mumbled
something. Then he looked back over his shoulder.
When Slim
saw the wounded man look back over his shoulder he, too, looked
back.
The wounded man mumbled, "Do you reckon we ditched that
damn Ranger?"
Slim said, "Sure," but there was no conviction
in his voice.
They plodded on into desert. The sun dropped
lower and lower ahead of them sending its searing heat into their red
faces. They rode up short rocky slopes and down the other side. They
rode around clumps of ocatills and pickly pear and past the whitish
groups of the poisonous cholla. Red lizards ran on hot red rocks and
stared at them from beady little eyes. They skirted while alholi sinks
and the white dust burned cracked lips and their red, in- flamed eyes
were painful.
The horses traveled with lowered listless heads.
Black streaks of wet sweat ran down from under the saddle
blankets.
The wounded man grumbled again, his mouth twisting
with pain, "By gawd this leg hurts." Then he said, "If you hadn't acted
like a crazy fool and gone to shooting we'd a got twice what we did, and
we wouldn't a lost Joe and I wouldn't a got this leg."
Slim
snarled, "Go on. Go on. Keep yawping."
Suddenly the wounded
man pulled up his horse. His voice was hoarse as he shouted, "By gawd I
can't stand it. I gotta have water, and I'm going to." He unslung the
canteen from his sad- dle horn, held it up by his ear and shook it. He
said, "gawd." an began to drink. He drank thirstily,
deeply,
Slim had quit shouting. He hissed at him now, "Go
on. Go on. Go on and drink it up. Then see what hap- pens to you." He
eyed the wounded man, hating him, telling him, "And if you think you
gets a whack at my can- teen you're a damn fool."
The wounded
man held the empty canteen to his ear and shook it. He turned it up to
his mouth again, waiting to see If more water ran out. Con- vinced it
was empty he took it away from cracked lips and looked around. He saw
only the empty desert and a hot red sun sinking in the horizon. His
bloodshot eyes came back to Slim. His eyes came away from Slim's glaring
eyes, quickly, and slid down to the canteen hanging on Slims saddle. He
muttered, "I'm wounded. And I'm going to need water."
Slim
snarled at him, jeering, "Sure you're going to need water. And try and
get it." THEY kicked up their listless horses and plodded on into the
sunset. From time to time they looked back over their shoulders. They
rode down a rocky slope and crossed a wide sandy wash. The wounded man
said, "There's been water here sometime."
Slim said, "Yeah,
mebbeso year be- fore last and mebbeso year after next. Why don't you
wait here?"
The wounded one muttered, "Damn
you."
They started up the farther slope and the wounded one
said, "You ride ahead Slim. My horse'll travel easier if you give him a
lead."
Slim snarled, "Me ride ahead of you! And get shot in
the back?"
The other man said, "Aw now Slim, what's the good
of talking that way? We're in this fix together ain't we?" Slim said,
"It's you that's in the fix.
I ain't in no fix."
The
wounded one said, "Well, damn you."
They went over the crest
into the sun and Slim half yelled, "Look!" The wounded one crowded his
horse up close to look down at a string of burro tracks.
Slim
said, "Burros!" He rode along the trail, peering intently. "Four
burros," he said, "Fresh." A little later he pronounced, "And a man on
foot. Some old desert rat of a pros- pector."
The two men
looked at each other, delight, and hope, growing in bloodshot eyes. The
wounded one half whispered, "There'll be water on them burros!" Slim
said, "Surest thing you know." Without another word they started
trailing the burros. Even the horses seemed to have taken heart from
some- thing. On occasional level stretches they trotted.
The
wounded man asked, "How far you think he is ahead of us, Slim?" Slim
said, "Can't be far. Them is fresh tracks and burros travel slow." They
kicked at their horses and got a little speed out of
them.
Just under the crest of a ridge they went slowly, edging
up to the top slowly, looking ahead, intently. The sun had dropped into
the head haze and seemed to hang here, blood red, enorm-
ous.
The wounded one cursed the sun, bitterly, for being
there, blinding their eyes to what they hoped to see. Up on the ridge
they sat their horses and peered from hand shaded eyes into the sunset,
searching the desert, looking for a little string of four plodding
burros.
Slim said, "We better ride. Follow the trail long as
we can see afore dark." The other nodded and turned his head to look
back to the east, relieved at turning his smarting eyes away
from
the sun. He started to turn his eyes away and then held them,
staring out over the back trail a long time.
Slim snarled,
"What's eating you? Come on."
The other muttered. "I seen
some- thing." He kept on staring and then spoke more firmly. "There
'tis."
Slim brought his horse up to the other, asking,
impatiently, "Where's what?"
The other pointed a dirty finger.
"See," he said. "Jest below that little red mesa. Can't you see it?
Moving. Now it's gone. Wait."
Slim spoke impatiently, "Oh
hell. Come on. You're seeing things."
The other pointed again,
his voice animated, "There! Look quick. You got him against that white
ledge."
Slim looked a long time. Then un- der his breath he
said, "I git it. It's a man horseback!"
The other spoke their
common thought, "It couldn't be that damn Ranger."
Slim said,
"Hell no. We didn't come that way. We came from off to the left. That
man ain't trailing us. More'n likely he's somebody like us, on the
dodge."
The other said, "Yes we did too. That's jest the way
we come."
They looked at each other, then the wounded one
said, "That damned Ranger is on our trail!"
They turned their
horses then to fol- low the burro trail. Slim said, "We gotta get that
desert rat's water. With plenty a water we can lay out and am- bush that
damn Ranger. With him gone and plenty water we are sitting
pretty."
The wounded one pleaded, "Now we're going to have
water, Slim, give me a mite of yourn."
Slim snarled at him,
"No!" We ain't got that water yet and I ain't aiming to take no
chances." He kicked up his
horse, spurring him cruelly,
carefully looking back to watch the wounded one, snarling at him, "Hit
some life in that plug, can't you? Going to be dark di-
rectly."
On another ridge they looked back again into the
dusky twilight shadows. The blood red sun after seeming to hang a long
time, stationary, above the horizon had dropped beyond the dim line of
the Faraway Hills. The long black shadows of sunset went out too and a
grey, silent dusky lay over the desolate land.
The wounded one
said, "Mebbe he'll lose our trail in the night."
Slim spurred
his horse again, sav- agely, snarling, "Come on. Damn that Ranger. He
won't lose nothing—'cept his life."
TWO hours after sunrise
old Turkey Tracks and his granddaughter made camp. A ledge of red
sandstone promised shade for all day. The little, white haired old
prospector stumped around, busily, unpacking four mouse colored burros.
He placed two water kegs carefully in the shade, talking more to himself
than to the girl, "Hell now Ann," he said, "which kag did we use of
last? Gotta keep 'em even." The girl smiled, saying, "Can't you talk at
all Granddad without saying 'Hell'?"
The old desert rat
answered, quite seriously, "Hell yes."
The girl threw up her
lovely head and laughed. The old man looked at her for a minute, then
chuckled.
The girl was dressed in blue jeans and heavy shoes.
A blue jean jumper covered a flannel shirt. She swept off a wide brimmed
black hat and the desert sun warmed her hair to spun copper. She busied
herself unsaddling her saddle burro, then walked around after wood. She
came back with an armful of dead ocatilla stalks,
remark-
The old desert rat chuckled, "Hell yes," he
said. "That's the way it is in the desert. But we'll pull out late this
afternoon and we'll be in them Faraway Hills come noon
tomorrow."
He went on, "You throw some grub together Ann while
I look after the burros." As he walked away he stopped and told her,
"You can have all the water you want now Ann. Plenty to last us through
from here. Hell yes."
The girl made a fire and fixed bacon and
coffee and biscuits in a Dutch oven. When it was ready she rested. It
began to seem a long time that the old man had gone. She put the
breakfast close to dying fire and walked around to the end of the red
ledge. The sun struck her a hot blow.
The four mouse-colored
burros stood half on a little hillside, completely in- different to the
world they were so used to. She called out, "Granddad."
There
was not even an echo. Her voice seemed to fall flat, dead, as if she had
never spoken. Suddenly she realized the vastness, the desolation, the
loneliness of the desert. She walked hurriedly back to the little bed of
white ashes. After a moment of uncertainty she pulled her grand- fathers
short 44-40 Winchester from the scabboard on her saddle and stood it up
against a rock. Then she smiled, saying, "Stupid. He'll be here in a
minute."
She stood listening intently then she heard a rock
roll and smiled with relief. She laid out tin plates and cups and heard
more rocks roll. She heard horses but had no time to sort out the
noises.
A horse snorted and she whirled, wide eyed, to see a
man on a horse. The man's lips were cracked and his bloodshot eyes were
fastened on the water kegs. He croaked, "Gawd!"
He began to climb off
the half dead horse, looking at the girl without seeing her. He croaked,
"Water! Damn you, water."
The girl continued to stare,
horrified, then her face flushed with quick sym- pathy. She said, "Yes.
Yes. There's plenty of water." She picked up a small pail and filled it,
hurriedly, from a keg. "But not too much," she warned.
The
girl watched the man drink, drink avidly, drunkenly, tipping the little
pail higher and higher. The water ran around his mouth and down over his
chin. She took hold of the pail warning him, "That's enough. Wait a
while."
The man took the pail from his mouth, his light eyes
went insane with rage and he struck the girl, savagely. Then he put the
pail back to his mouth.
The girl stood back, her face an angry
red. She put her hand up to her cheek where she had been struck and her
blue eyes turned purple. Then she thought, "The poor man. He's
crazy."
Another horse came on stumbling feet and a heavy set
man with his leg tied to the saddle horn was struggling with the rope.
He slid off the horse, his wounded leg collasped and he fell at full
length.
He got painfully to his hands and knees staring,
bleary eyed, up at the man drinking. He croaked, "Give me that water,
Slim." Then he began fumbling for his six-shooter and pointed it
unsteadily at Slim.
Slim took the empty pail from his face and
drew a deep breath. He looked at the man on the ground, yelled, "You
would, would you?" and kicked the man's six-shooter from his hand. Then
he brutally kicked the poor man in the face.
Slim held the
pail out to the girl, ordering her, "Fill it."
THE girl, pale-faced, looked at Slim with growing fear and
loathing. She filled the pail again, ignoring Slim, and walked over to
the man on the ground. She helped him to his knees and then held the
pail to his gasping lips. After a long drink she took it away and the
man reached for it roughly. He pulled it away from the girl, spilling
half of it and began drinking again in great gasping
gulps.
The girl picked up the six-shooter. The heavy Colt gave
her assurance. Slim looked at her with a crooked grin. Then his eyes
began to take her in. He noticed the long legs, the swelling breasts
under the blue jumper. He leered at her, asking, "Where'd you come into
this?"
The girl faced him. "My grand- father will be here in a
minute."
Slim leered at her, asking, "Will he?" The girl was
suddenly filled with in- tolerable fear. The man's voice carried an
assurance that her grandfather would not come back, would never come
back.
Slim stepped over to the wounded man and yanked the pail
away. He held it out to the girl ordering her, "Fill it."
The
girl said, "I won't," and lifted the pistol. Like a flash Slim was on
her, wrenching the gun from her hand, twisting her arms up behind her
back until she gasped with pain. Then yanked her back to his horse,
undid the rope and tied her hands, tripped her up and tied her
feet.
She set up and heard the wounded one say, "I seen him
back there. Did you plug him?"
Slim answered casually, "Naw. I
slugged him. But he'll croak out there in the sun."
The girl
struggled with her faintness and horror.
They watered their
horses and had to fight them, brutally, to keep them
from drinking
themselves to death. They looked at the breakfast waiting by the bed of
ashes. Slim said, "We'll have a big feed afterward. We got to git busy
now."
The wounded one hobbled around, groaning. He said, "That
water done me a lot of good. It ain't so bad." Then he asked, "What we
going to do with the gal?"
Slim answered, "We ain't going to
do nothing." He snarled, "The gal goes with me."
The other man
half closed his blood- shot eyes, asking, "Yeah?"
Slim said,
"Yeah."
Slim dropped that to say, "I ought to 'ave dragged
that old rat off our trail. Now we'll have to go out beyond him to
waylay that damn Ranger if he's still looking for us." They moved over
to their horses.
The girl heard them and a great hope came to
her. She heard them say "Ranger" and that they were going to waylay the
Ranger and kill him. She closed her eyes and prayed for the
Ranger.
A rock rolled and like a flash the men were behind
their horses, six- shooters ready, snarling like trapped
coyotes.
The girl opened her eyes and saw her grandfather
coming around the end of the ledge, coming on stumbling feet, groping in
the hot sunlight. His white hair was black with dried blood. He was
mumbling, "Ann. Ann. Annie girl."
The wounded robber
sniggered. "Well look who's here. We got com- pany ain't we?" Then he
snarled, "Thought you croaked him. This time we'll make it
stick."
The girl struggled frantically with the ropes that
held her. She was frantic with fear and horror, not believing that such
horrible things could really hap- pen. She yelled at the outlaws,
"You'll
pay for this. You let him alone. You
let him alone I tell you!"
The old man paid no attention to
the outlaws. He hardly seemed to see them. He came struggling on, his
eyes wavering around in search of the girl. He passed close to
Slim.
Slim raised his six-shooter, a crazy light in his
whitish eyes. The girl screamed and a cold voice snapped out of the air
to say, "Drop it!"
With incredible swiftness Slim whirl- ed
and shot from the hip, and shot again.
The wounded one sank to
one knee, shooting out from under his horse. The horse reared and jumped
and came down with both fore feet on the man, knocking him
down.
Slim was crouching, shooting at a tall dark hawk-faced
man who came forward with a gun in each hand.
The roar of the
shots echoed against the ledge and a little stream of sand poured down
over the edge. The man knocked flat by the horse got to his knees again
and began groping around for his gun.
THE wild sound of the
shots cleared old Turkey Tracks' brain and he grabbed up his rifle from
where the girl had left it. As the wounded man re- covered his gun and
began to lift it, old Turkey Tracks dropped him neatly.
Turkey
Tracks turned the rifle on Slim and then lowered it. Slim had dropped
his gun. He stood there, his hands at his side, looking profoundly
astonished, as though some incredible thing had happened to him. He was
dead before he hit the ground.
Old Turkey Tracks let out a
croaked yell, dropping the rifle to grab at the man. "Hell," he yelled.
"It's Stark. John Stark of the Rangers."
They talked it over
all day long in the shade of the ledge. Old Turkey Tracks with a bandage
around his white head; John Stark with his dark eyes following the girl;
the girl with demure eyes sometimes letting him see her
thoughts.
"No," old Turkey Tracks pro- nounced. "We're going
on. There's water enough to git us to the Faraway Hills and git you back
to the Sacatone. Hell, I've got something good this time," he
boasted.
The Ranger and the girl looked at each other and
smiled. These old prospectors always had something good.
They
packed and saddled at sunset, to go their own ways in the cool of the
night.
John Stark asked old Turkey Tracks, "When will you be
in Tucson again?" The old desert rat started to scratch his head and
remembered his wound. "Hell," he said, "Reckon we'll have to come in
after grub in about a month." John Stark was up on the big bay looking
down at the girl. He told old Turkey Tracks, "You report at Head-
quarters when you get in." He kept his eyes on the girl's eyes as he
said, "Those are orders."
Old Turkey Tracks chuckled, "Hell,"
he said, "why not?"
The girl flushed and her eyes clung to
his. She nodded her head as though agreeing to something yet unspoken,
"I'll see that he does," she said.
Author of "When a Colt-Loose Kid Hits Leather,"
etc.
The kid had been an outlaw only four hours and his heart and
his gunhand hadn't had a chance to harden!
The pursuit was hammering hard on his trail!
THE Soldado Mountains
were safe only for those outside the pale of the law, a kind of "Hole in
the Wall" of New Mexico. This thought was uppermost in the mind of Kid
McCord, as, standing beside his red roan in the shelter of a rocky out-
crop, he watched the covered wagon crawl up the steep grade, the
team
straining valiantly in response to whip and shout. Neither the
outfit nor its driver, a timeworn, Stetson-crowned individual, had for
McCord more than passing interest; what had magnetized his attention,
rowelled his curiosity, was the slim, girlish figure occupying the other
half of the wagon-box. The Soldados, haven of cattle rustler,
road
agent and killer, were no place for
women, especially one with such a face as the girl beside the old-timer
had.
As the wagon reached the top of the grade and rolled out
upon the level, the old man "whoa-ed" loudly and let the reins fall
slack on the backs of the sweating horses. Kid McCord swung into the
saddle and rode from his shel- ter toward them.
"Howdy,
folks?" he greeted, draw- ing rein beside the wagon and touching fingers
to hat brim. "I don't want to horn in none or tell you your business—
but ain't you off the trail a mite?"
"As to how?" issued
question from the driver's full-bearded lips, while he studied sharply,
from under shaggy brows, the fine-figured horseman, whose cowpunch garb
in such a neighborhood meant nothing; he might be a rustler, road agent,
anything. However, the old man's scrutiny was rather satisfy- ing,
particularly of the McCord level eyes and firm mouth. No hint of guile
or cruelty in either; he wore but one gun, and that untied, and a
rawhide riata neatly coiled in the tie-straps. He didn't look by any
means deadly and this was a domain of lawless men.
Replied the
Kid, almost unconscious of the inspection, by reason of a back- thrown
sunbonnet which disclosed masses, highly piled, of corn-colored hair,
"Why, these here mountains is hidin' place for most every sheriff-
dodger in two hundred miles. You ought've drove around 'em, mister, not
through 'em, an' better you'd turn round right quick—"
"I'm
headin' the right way—into 'em deep as I can gitl" The driver's state-
ment surprised McCord mightily, but his vehemence was wholly
convincing.
"You've done somethin'," said the Kid, "that makes
it necessary—"
"To run from the sheriff—yep!" The old man's
lips smacked out the affirmative sharply. Then, abruptly,
he
interrogated: "Ain't you?"
Kid McCord nodded and
loosened his lips in a grim smile. "You betche! Hangin' a
man."
The driver's eyebrows went up a trifle, while the girl
regarded him stead- ily, her glance unfathomable to the
Kid.
Quoth the driver: "That's a leetle somethin' new—mine's
shootin'. I was servin' justice, young feller, but the law wouldn't look
at it that way—so here I am. You call yourself—?"
"In the
Soldados," answered the Kid, "it's ag'in the rules to ask a man his
name—so I've heard. Only been here two—three hours myself. But I'll tell
you, it's Kid McCord."
The driver's hat brim bobbed. "Ezra
Earp. My darter, June," turning his glance toward the girl. "An' I will
say, McCord, the most loyal darter what ever a man had. When I had to
run she wouldn't stay behind. Hated to bring her into such a rattler's
nest as these mountings has the name o' bein'! "
"Well," said
the Kid, "the Soldados is all that's been said of 'em, an' mebbe some
more. Sun's goin' down. What say we camp yonder by that crick an' sorta
talk things over." He quailed in his heart to think what might befall a
girl of June Earp's appearance far back in the range where rustlers and
train robbers and hombres of like outlaw professions had their camps.
Earp himself could take chances, but it wasn't fair to allow the girl to
do the same. The Kid had been an outlaw only four hours and his
conscience hadn't had a chance to toughen—nor his heart!
EARP
agreed to the suggestion that they camp. Darkness found the three of
them gathered around a small fire. The girl did the cooking and it was
mighty eatable, thought the Kid. He watched her constantly, his wide
Stetson brim disguising the fact, and
wondered if her reticence meant that she had taken a dislike to
him. If he had killed, so had her father.
Earp waxed talkative
over his pipe, while June was clearing up. Crime of any kind was
evidently new to him and he was glad to have a kindred ear in which to
pour the details. "Feller ranchin' near me in Cactus Valley tried to
make up to June there. I always thought he was a snake an' 'bjected.
Warned him to let her alone. She didn't like him no mor'n I did. But he
kep' cornin' to see her now an' then. Final I told him I'd shoot if he
set foot on my premises ag'in. He didn't say nothin' when he went away
that time. It ought've warned me, but my skull was too thick. He waited
till I was off on the range 's mornin', come to my place an' put his
dirty paws on my June! Tried to carry her off, by God! Well, by luck she
got a-hold o' a gun an' drove him away. He han- dled her so rough she
fainted after he'd gone, an' that's the way I found her. She didn't want
to tell me what'd hap- pened, knowin' I'd swore to kill—but it was an
easy guess for me an' I oiled up my shooter. Went right after the
polecat, over to his ranch, havin' first some leetle difficulty shakin'
off June— for my sake, not t'other feller's. I found Gant at his place
an' I looked at him through the smoke. Then I rode back an' got my wagon
an' June an' hit the trail for here."
The Kid was looking at
him with a puzzled expression as he finished his narrative. "Gant, you
said, the hom- bre's name was—Joe Gant?"
"Yeh, Joe Gant. Know
him?"
"Some. What time you kill him?"
Earp hooked
the pipe out of his mouth, staring in turn. "What time? Why? Well, about
three hours ago."
"Joe Gant?" The Kid leaned for- ward. "Why,
Earp, I hung that galoot to the cottonwood front of his
house
easy four hours ago."
"Not Joe Gant, you didn't," Earp
shook his head positively. "I know!— what's that?" he broke off, as a
great clamor arose down by the pass that gave entrance to the Soldados.
Both Earp and the Kid cocked their ears. Numerous hoofs were beating on
the flinty trail, coming up and toward them. "Hossmen," said
Earp.
"An' cattle," added the Kid. "Rus- tlers drivin' in
swiped stock. That hap- pens right along in these mountains. They're
safe from the sheriff once they're through that pass."
"Ain't
it a danged shame," began Earp, himself a ranchman in a small way, and
then thought of his own loss of honest citizenship on the range, his
descent to the level, or below, of these cattle-lifters approaching. He
became suddenly silent and dropped his head.
June, standing by
and comprehend- ing swiftly, stooped and laid a com- radely hand on his
shoulder. She would share his exile, she who had been the indirect cause
of it. Earp lifted his head at her touch, his eyes warming with
affection.
THE Kid, witness to this brief bit of heart-play,
half rose to his feet as the trampling of the cattle, punctuated by the
lighter staccato of swift-footed ponies, drew nearer.
"They'll
pass by on the trail but they can see over here plumb plain," he
crisped. "Best they shouldn't know you're hereabouts, Miss
Earp."
At the Kid's words her father started up. "McCord's
right. Jump in the wagon, June. That'll sure hide you."
She
turned to comply, slowly, as if she did not share the apprehension of
the men. She didn't, thought the Kid, because she did not realize the
gravity of her position here in this stronghold of lawless men. As the
girl disappeared
through the rear opening in the
wagon cover, the hooking, lowing herd crowded past on the rock trail,
fifty yards or so from the camp of the Earps and McCord.
The
Kid and old Ezra were hunched over the fire, apparently conversing, but
in reality listening and hoping that none of the horsemen convoying the
herd would take it into their heads to ride over. Ordinarily the
Earp-Mc- Cord camp would not have been both- ered. It was an unwritten
law of the lawless who lived in the Soldados that none of the many camps
distributed through the mountains should molest or interfere in any way
with one an- other. One camp might be that of cat- tle rustlers, another
road agents, an- other smugglers, all engaged in separate criminal
callings, but all living to- gether, as in one great rock fort, for
mutual protection. But one member of this particular stock-stealing gang
re- turning from a raid was a curious in- dividual, a minder of other
people's business. The covered wagon caught his eye as he was riding by
at the tail of the herd. It looked like newcomers to the stronghold of
the hunted; a wagon was an uncommon sight here. He wondered what was in
it. Once his curiosity was aroused he must some- way satisfy it. He
spurred from his position in the drag, out among the boulders to the
open space where the fire burned.
The Kid and Ezra Earp turned
their heads as the horseman slashed in with a strident, "Howdy?" He
pulled up, got down, his glance trailing rapidly over the two faces that
were unfamiliar to him, then resting a long moment on the wagon beyond
the fire.
"Just get in?" said the rustler, push- ing back his
Mexican sombrero. "Gun- runnin'?" jerking his head toward the wagon.
"Well, snakes!" As he spat the exclamation, he bent over, his
eyes
lighting, fastened on something beside the fire to the left of
Earp.
Earp and the Kid shifted their eyes, following his
glance. A sun-bonnet— June's! She'd dropped it and they hadn't noticed.
The Kid could have kicked himself—and Ezra! Where had their eyes
been!
The Mexican-hatted waddy squatted down, mightily
interested. He was a white man, though he affected greaser gear, even to
Chihuahua spurs. "So!" he said, in an oily voice, "you're bring- in' a
moharrie in, eh? Where's she at? Don't be stingy, hombres, let's
see—"
THAT was as far as he got. He was next to the Kid who
suddenly lifted with a growl deep in his throat and falling on the
rustler, beat him flat and insensible with the barrel of his quickly
drawn pistol.
"You see," said McCord, standing above the
senseless form, "what would happen to your girl, Earp, if you shoved on
into the mountains. You—"
From out of the darkness uptrail,
the direction taken by the cattle thieves, a voice bawled, "Hey, Brazos,
you cornin'? What's keepin' you?"
A streak of fortune, thought
the Kid, who had acted on hot impulse, that the other tail-rider had not
seen his com- rade struck down. McCord was quick witted. He foresaw dire
calamity to the Earps—to June Earp—if Brazos did not rejoin his gang
immediately. Instantly the Kid called, "I'm cornin'," in the best
imitation of Brazo's voice he could muster: not a good imitation by any
means, but passable on account of the noise made by the cattle blun-
dering along in the dark. Stooping, McCord snatched the big sombrero
from the fallen man, tossed his own hat at Earp's feet and
hissed:
"Take it, my hoss, an' your girl, an' yourself, an'
quit these mountains pronto. An' stay out, if you got
any
love for her, an' I reckon you have. Hide somewheres near the pass
an' I'll join you later."
He stood up then, Brazos' conical,
bullion-trimmed hat down about his ears and jumped for the waddy's
horse, swung up and rode for the main trail, leaving a much perturbed
and marvel- ing Earp squatting by the fire.
CHAPTER
II
THE Kid could have made a get- away, aided by the darkness
and the confusion attending the drive over the rough, dark trail, at
almost any moment after he quit Earp. But he didn't try. He would be
chased, and the only way out of the Soldados, by the pass, led past the
late scene of his impulsive knockdown. He wanted the Earps to have ample
time to clear the dangerous neighborhood and hoped old Ezra would have
the sense to tie up Brazos before leaving the campsite. The outlaw would
not have remained unconscious very long.
Doing his part and
more, Kid Mc- Cord hung on as drag-rider of the stolen herd through
semi-darkness that some- times led up and sometimes down, but seldom
straightaway. There was a full moon, but little of its light reached the
twisting trail. Steep walls on either hand for more than half the
distance to the waddy rendezvous were respon- sible for this blocking of
the moon- light, but the rock formation was in another way an assistance
to the gang, keeping the cattle from scattering. The cows go only
forward or backward and the rustlers prodded them steadily for-
ward.
In less than an hour lights flashed ahead. It was a
little rockbound side valley, flooded with moonlight into which the herd
emerged. There were
two or three shacks, in the open
doors and windows of which the lights gleamed, and several large
stockade corrals. Into these latter the cattle were punched and penned
up. They filled two of the corrals, and the Kid, a top hand when he was
working at his regular business, estimated their num- ber at three or
four hundred. Quite a bunch at one swipe! Some rancher back in Cactus
Valley was sore that night, he'd bet on it!
The Kid, because
of the strenuous saddlework required en route to the waddy camp, had
been able to avoid conversation or contact with his com- panion in the
drag, a foul-mouthed hombre who had gone about his work with oaths and
obscenity dripping con- tinually off his chin. Now, in camp, and the
cattle safely impounded, prob- ably to await alteration of their brands
on the morrow, the rustlers would gather together and the Kid's thin
dis- guise would be penetrated. His eyes sought the dark avenue by which
he had entered this side valley. He might have made a dash for it, but
several riders were in between. Anyhow, a sudden dash might not be the
best way to go about it. He hadn't a doubt that the mounted men carried
rifles in their saddle boots and a bullet from a Win- chester would be
more effective in head- ing him off than horsemen across his path. Only
a novice could have missed in the strong moonlight. So the Kid debated
with a cool brain. He'd have to sidle nearer to the out trail before he
ran. Now the men were getting off their horses, which behooved him to
think and act quickly. If he didn't dismount too, they'd get suspicious,
but he must stick to the horse if he hoped to escape. He was riding by
one of the shacks while his mind churned over the situation and a man,
standing in the doorway, drew the Kid's atten-
tion.
" 'Lo, Brazos," called the man. "See
you made a pretty fair gatherin'. Point over here. I want to see
you."
THE Kid was in for it! But he mo- mentarily forgot the
pressing peril when he glanced at the speaker. The voice had sounded
somehow familiar, a glance in its direction well nigh stunned him. The
light from the shack revealed the owner of the voice as Joe Gant,
ranchman of Cactus Valley, the same man the Kid had treated to a
strangulation jig that afternoon, the man Ezra Earp declared he had
drilled with a six-shooter! There was no mis- take—Joe Gant as large as
life and in perfect health apparently, when two men could have sworn on
a stack of Bibles that they had put him over the jump!
"You
hear me, Brazos, or you got mud in your ears?" shouted Gant an- grily,
for the Kid was riding on.
The Kid made no reply—in words. He
acted: slid down Apache-style, on the far side of his horse, hanging by
hand and toe, and struck into a gallop. In the hand he wasn't using to
hold on he gripped his Colt and he fired under the horse's neck, but
missed. It would take practice to shoot accurately in this unaccustomed
position and before he could launch a second shot, Gant moved hurriedly
away from the door, realizing what a fine target he made.
From
inside the shack Gant shouted at the top of his leather lungs: "After
him, boys. If that's Brazos he's gone loco, but I reckon it ain't
Brazos; some- body else wearin his hat!"
The hat in question
had dropped from the Kid's head as he swung down. It was much too big
and he didn't need it any longer. What he wanted was room and he
proceeded to get it for himself by firing at the two rustlers, back in
their saddles at the first shot, who now tried to bar his way.
He
must have hit the right-hand rider, for the fellow doubled up in
the saddle. The other swerved and the Kid pounded by, shooting again
under the horse's neck. The upright waddy was swing- ing his gun as the
Kid sped on, trying to locate some portion of the flying horseman's
anatomy where he might place a bullet. By the time he had decided to
shoot the horse first and its rider afterward, both had vanished through
the dark outlet down the high- walled trail. But the vanishing of the
Kid didn't end it. Nobody had an idea who he was, except that he must be
an enemy, somebody masquerading in Brazos Slayden's hat. Every man had
remounted. One or two had had the saddles off their cayuses. They
slapped them on again. Gant ran down to the horse-corral and got himself
a horse. The pursuit strung out of the rockbound side valley and one,
two, three, up to a dozen, along the trail traveled by the
Kid.
On his part the Kid was exulting. The hard job had been
getting out; with them behind him he had a plan for jacking up the
pursuit; had no in- tention of leading them through the pass near which
he had told Earp to seek concealment. So when the pur- suing hoofs were
striking sparks from the rocks uncomfortably close in his wake, the Kid
executed his stunt. He dismounted with his horse going at full speed,
drove it down a draw and let the pursuit sweep after it, while he
himself proceeded on foot toward the pass.
It was about two
hours from the time he quit the waddy camp on the run that McCord, more
than a little footsore from walking rock in high heels, arrived at the
pass into—also out of—the Soldados. Passing the for- mer camp-site of
the Earps and him- self—he had seen from the trail that they were
gone—and quitting the
EARP had very
craftily secreted him- self in a hollow at the foot of the Soldados to
the right of the pass. The Kid found the camp because he was looking for
it, because he knew Earp must be somewhere nearby. Otherwise he never
would have suspected that three human beings, three horses and a wagon
were in the vicinity. Earp had had the sense not to light a fire, not
even his pipe. The hollow was deep and easily accommodated humans, ani-
mals and outfit: the blanket of night made it the most secure of
retreats, provided an enemy was not forewarned of their presence, and a
thick fringe of trees and brush on the rim rendered it an excellent
covert by day. As Earp could scarcely have known of the place
beforehand, the Kid complimented his careful selection of a hideout as
he finally fell on it himself and pushed among the trees and
brush.
"McCord?" hissed a voice in the black darkness
ahead.
"Sure," replied the Kid.
"Good you made a
noise cornin' in," said Earp's voice again, nearer this time, "for I had
a finger on the trigger an' I'd 'a' crooked 'er if you'd come sneakin'.
Well, you made out—or— you wouldn't be here."
"Skin o' my
teeth," declared the Kid, perceiving now the darker bulk of Earp against
a dark background. "You hadn't no trouble? Bueno! What about
Brazos?"
"He's down there in the holler," re- plied Earp,
turning as the Kid brushed him and falling into step. "Showed signs o'
cornin' to, just after you rode off, so I slammed him ag'in with a gun
an' then hobbled him with his sash an' hanker. He's got up all Mexican,
yet he ain't one."
They scrambled and slid now to the bottom
of the hollow, where the white
cover of the wagon somewhat relieved
the blackness. The voice of June Earp greeted the Kid from somewhere
near it, the first time she had addressed him
directly.
"I'm—we're awfully glad you're back. It was mighty
brave o' you to do what you did. I hadn't any idea, Mr. McCord, how the
outlaws in there would act toward me. I knew—when I heard that Brazos
talkin'."
"Yeh, he was—is—a sample. Kid, please, Miss Earp,"
said Mr. McCord.
"June, then," said Miss Earp. "Of all fool
things, droppin' my sunbonnet. If I hadn't—"
"I might not've
learned somethin'," the Kid was guilty of interrupting, fac- ing the dim
white oval that was the girl's face. "I found Joe Gant in there at the
rustlers' camp. Yes, sir 1 " as Earp at his side started to explode.
"Joe Gant, live an' kickin'—or his dou- ble. An' I reckon the Lord had
the hoss sense not to make only one o' his kind. I'm makin' no mistake,
Earp; he spoke to me, as Brazos, an' I saw him plain in lamp light. What
do you figger, Earp?"
"I just don't," replied the old man. "I
shot plumb straight, I'll take oath an' the bullet was made o' lead, by
grab! I seen him fall an' lay on the floor o' his office, plumb
still."
"An' he had stopped kickin'," said the Kid, "when I
rode away from the tree he was lookin' up—a hour before you shot him!
Earp, our trails is crossed a heap an' that's whatever. We both is sure
we killed Gant, an' yet he's alive."
"That reminds me," said
Earp, "that you didn't say what for you'd—uh— hung him. You want
to?"
"SURE," said the Kid. "It was jus- tice, in a way, though
not as strong as your case. I'd been punchin' for him a month, liked him
well enough
an' the outfit, too, thinkin' 'em
straight as string. Foreman complained o' rus- tlin', so did the men,
but Gant, though he seemed worried sometimes, didn't say nothin'.
Sheriff McKell at Fair- chance was keen to grab somebody for it, but all
trails led to these here Solda- dos, an' after they went in, it left him
hands up. Well, 's mornin' I was ridin' up the north end o' Cactus
Valley, where the Forty Mile River makes the big bend. A lot o' cattle,
JG's, had gone down the trail between the cut banks to drink. Noticed a
consider- able heap o' bawlin' goin' on an' lo- cated a calf out in
midstream, fightin' the swift current, which was slow but sure carryin'
it away an' it's mammy makin' most o' the noise, while tryin' to reach
the pore li'l* critter. Well, I seen the calf was losin', so unstrapped
my rawhide, left the roan top o' the cut bank an' avalanched down. I
wouldn't trust my boss' legs on that trail. Judged forty feet would just
about make the youngster an' slung 'er out an' snaked the li'l' feller
inshore, the oF lady follerin' an' tryin' to gore me for helpin' the
kid. I went up the cut bank a hanged sight faster'n I come down. But, by
golly, I forgot that cow critter's ingratitude when I looked over to
where I'd left the roan standin'. 'Stead o' the roan, a grey cayuse that
I never remembered seein' on the JG was trailing its reins, an' all
sweatin' an' fagged. Bug-eyed, I tracked over an' looked it up an' down.
It sure had traveled plenty hard an' I noticed the rope was missin' off
the saddle.
Just about that time I heard a bunch o' hoofs an'
lookin' back at the buttes, there came riders hellbent around the edge,
Sheriff McKell headin' 'em. Natcherel, I just stood still an' let 'em
come up. But what you think? Says the Sheriff, stem, 'So you're one o'
the waddies, huh, McCord?' I told him he's locoed, till he cut me short,
sayin'
him an' the rest had caught me an' a Mexican brand-blottin' in the
bresh an' chased us, that the color o' my hoss an' its condition gimme
away even though they hadn't seen my face. 'We got you,' says McKell,
'an' the greaser, what you parted from, we'll get later.' An' he got
down an' was gettin' out the come-alongs when I told him to listen, an'
I told him so hard he did listen, an' the others too. I showed him my
wet rope, told him what I'd been doin' told him how I'd been ridin' a
roan an' found the grey hoss when I come up the bank. But he wouldn't
believe me, none of 'em, an' theft along come Joe Gant, ridin' around
the buttes like the possay had, forkin' my red roan! Gant, bold as
brass, wanted to know what's goin' on when he rode up, an' after he'd
heard the Sheriff's yarn an' my yarn, he turned on me savage. 'So you're
one that's been wolfin' my stock I' he shouts, usin' a tone I'd never
heard before. 'You been with me just a month an' you didn't bring no
recom- mend, just yourself an' ridin'-gear an' a ton o' alkali you'd
picked up footin' it. Ought've knowed better'n to sign on a plumb
stranger, but I'm soft- hearted. This'll cure me. I wondered why you
rode the grey this mornin' when I found the roan you usually fork in the
corral; the grey's faster an' you figgered you might have to travel
fast. So you caught him red- handed, eh?' he says to McKell. 'Well, take
him.' But the Sheriff didn't.
I thought it queer Gant should
be brand-blottin' his own stock, but the whole danged deal was queer—an'
I knowed Gant was a crook an' tryin' to put the blame on me. He was
sittin' his hoss right close. I dogged sudden, jumped up behind him,
punched my gun into him an' promised to shoot if the Sheriff moved. I'd
noticed there was no rifles in the crowd, so ordered Gant to back the
roan. When we'd
covered about two hundred feet that- away an' the Colts was
useless, I ordered Gant to swing around an' dug in the spurs. We went
skimmin' around the buttes. After us come slashin' the possay. Soon seen
if I wanted to get away I'd have to dump Gant, which I did. I'd 'a' shot
him then, but wanted to bump him off the way he'd figgered for me—by the
rope. I played hide- an' find me with that possay on the JG range for
nigh two hours an' they didn't find me. I worked around to the
ranch-house when I'd lost 'em for good, meanin' to hide there an' get
Gant when he come in. But I didn't have to wait none. He was there. What
do you think? The yella dawg tried to make out he didn't know what I was
talkin' about when I stepped into his office holdin' a drop. I took a
rope off the wall, havin' too much respect for my rawhide to hang such a
kiote with it, an' put it round his big bull neck an' drove him out
under the cot- tonwood. Well," as he detected a little gasp from June
Earp. "I won't go into no more details. But I left him dan- glin'. He'd
branded me a cattle thief an' I might's well go the whole hog." "You
done right!" Earp declared, in vindictive key. "By grab, that's a
remarkable yarn. Puts anything I ever heard plumb in the shade. Ain't
so, June?"
"Sure is," agreed June. "And do you think,
Kid,"—McCord's blood raced a little faster—"maybe the Mexi- can the
Sheriff spoke of was Brazos?"
THERE was a pause before the Kid
replied. "That's headwork, I'd tell a man," he exclaimed. "No, I hadn't
thought of it, June. But I bet you're right. Where you got Brazos tied?
I'll—no, I'll wait '11 mornin' an' ques- tion him some. Folks, if we
work careful, we're just about goin' to bust open a big mystery. Puttin'
two and
two together—what happened to me on
the JG an' me findin' Gant in the moun- tains with that gang—shows him
up as workin' two characters, rancher in Cactus Valley, boss rustler in
the Sol- dados. Hell's bells! "
"Think we'd better risk goin'
back to town?" questioned Earp. "If Gant's alive—"
"We'll stay
here till mornin' any- ways," said the Kid. "We'll need a big batch o'
proof. Mebbe Gant will come out o' the mountains alone: if he does,
well, wait an' see if he does!"
CHAPTER III
AT DAWN
the campers in the hol- low under the Soldados were astir. They did not
have to go far for water; Earp had a two-gallon keg slung under the
wagon. The Kid risked building a tiny fire of the driest brush he could
find and June got out the coffee pot and frying pan. While the girl was
getting the breakfast, the Kid walked over to the prisoner who was
hatless and sitting on the ground with his back against a rear wheel of
the wagon, to which he was tied.
" 'Lo, Brazos," the Kid
greeted the gaudy figure. "How's all the Rio trim- min's this mornin'?
Say, boy, I got some questions to ask you after we've e't. You heard us
talkin' last—"
"Try 'n' get me to tell you any- thing!"
growled the rustler, fixing the cowpuncher with an evil
stare.
"I will," nodded the Kid, "an' if I don't make out the
first time, I'll try ag'in. That's me, a tryin' hombre."
"Hey,
Kid," called Earp from the other side of the wagon, "you want your hoss
unsaddled? I never thought o' doin' it last night an' the pore critter—"
"Never thought of it myself, by golly!" the Kid exclaimed. "Sure
I
want the leather off him. I'll do
it, Earp." He left Brazos and hurried around the end of the
wagon.
Earp was watering the picketed horses from a bucket.
The Kid af- fectionately greeted the JG roan, which whickered and
nuzzled him as he stripped away the gear.
"Come and get it,"
came from June, over by the fire.
"That's me!" chuckled Earp,
hugely sniffing the fragrant coffee smell. "In just a
minute."
The Kid swung his saddle on his shoulder and retraced
his steps to the wagon. He was a couple of paces from it when Brazos
Slayden, entirely free of bonds, sprang around the end of the vehicle,
swinging a nine-inch bowie. The Kid was taken by surprise, of course. He
couldn't readily get at his 'sun because it hung on his right hip and
the heavy saddle gear was weight- ing his right shoulder. Before he
could drop the saddle and draw, Brazo's knife would be exploring his
vitals. From the ugly gleam of triumph in his eyes, the waddy knew his
advantage. He crouched for a leap that would carry him to the Kid's side
as the latter paused, his knife arm held low against his leg for an
upward thrust at the abdomen.
"Greaser to the core, huh,
Brazos!" exclaimed the Kid, and with the words, as Slayden launched his
body, hurled the saddle which he was gripping by the horn. The
forty-pound gear of leather, wood and steel smashed into the waddy as
his feet left the ground, and Slayden fell, flat on his back. The Kid
figured on him being a trifle stunned from the solid impact as he jumped
forward, but Brazos Slayden wasn't. He was of tough fibre. He still
gripped the knife- handle and, scrambling up, throwing the saddle off
his chest, was already rising from his knees when the Kid forked him,
horsewise, and crushed him
down. Nothing would have been easier
than for McCord to draw and shoot, but he had use for Brazos alive. Yet,
striving to save the waddy for a future grilling, the Kid cheated his
own pur- pose. His sudden, forceful landing on Slayden's back drove the
waddy down on the blade of his knife—his choking cry appraised the Kid
of what had oc- curred. Instantly McCord pulled to his feet and turned
the man over. But too late; the bowie had bitten in up to the handle,
right over the heart.
EARP came running. And June! They knew,
from sight of the still, prostrate form and the Kid's crestfallen
attitude, standing over it, that death had visited the camp in the
hollow. But they thought the Kid had killed the
prisoner.
"Thought you wanted to ask him things—or couldn't
you help givin' him his come-up-with?" Thus spoke Earp, while his
daughter stood with pale cheeks, looking down.
"Accident,
tough luck," replied the chagrined cowboy. "When I jumped an' smashed
him down, his bowie must've been pointin' up. Didn't you search him,
Earp, or is that your knife?"
"Nope. An' I sure searched
him."
"His boots?"
"Nope!" Earp looked sheepish.
"That's where he packed it, o' course. Hell! Now how'd you reckon he got
loose?"
The Kid stepped around to the wheel to which Slayden
had been trussed. He pointed as Earp and June followed, to a bandanna
with two loops in it, on the ground, a sash cut in several pieces, and a
slashed rope, the last hav- ing been passed around the late pris- oner's
chest and through the spokes of the wheel.
"There's your
explanation," said the Kid. "Worked his hands out o'
the
bandanna, dug the knife outa his boot an' used it on the sash an'
rope. Bet he had his hands free when I was talkin' to him. Well, we'll
have to do without him."
They ate breakfast, though June's
appetite suffered somewhat from the knifing incident, and the Kid and
Earp buried the man they knew as "Brazos."
About half an hour
afterwards they heard hoofbeats out on the plain and the two men crept
up over the rim of the hollow and, through the screening brush, peered
out.
"McKell !" the Kid exclaimed and Earp echoed him
gutturally, for at the head of the five riders swinging across the
level, evidently following a trail by the frequent glances cast ground-
ward, rode the lithe-figured, iron gray sheriff from
Fairchance.
What had brought the posse to the foot of the
Soldado Mountains was not a hard guess for the Kid, though Ezra Earp
opened bearded lips to question.
"What—" he began, then the
Kid laid a hand on his arm.
"Listen!" he hissed. "McKell hol-
lerin'."
The posse had stopped suddenly and wrath fully the
sheriff's voice was raised, the while he shook a clenched fist. "Just
like always! The trail goes on into the Soldados. Your cows, Bar- ton,
is lost just like everybody's else's. Can't get 'em back 'nless the
gov'ment will lend us a regiment an' a couple machine
guns."
"Well, what the hell!" bawled Bar- ton, the ranchman
who had owned the four hundred steers, pushing his horse up beside the
sheriff's "No other way, Mac, 'nless we could catch some of 'em
outside."
"That's right enough," boomed Mc- Kell. "I'd stake
my hope to reelection next fall that lots o' the gangs in them mount'ns
come to Fairchance an' mingle with us, drink with us,
play
cards, but—if we dunno who they are, how can we lay 'em by the
heels?"
"You can't," agreed Barton. "Well, goodby, cows," he
flapped a disgusted hand at the pass before them.
The impulse
to break cover and in- form the posse of the identity of at least one of
the badmen of the Soldados seized Earp and McCord simultane- ously, for
they turned and stared at each other questioningly.
"We're
fugitives our own selves," said the Kid slowly. "I reckon we'd better
not chance it."
"I reckon not," agreed Earp, and sank
back.
SO THEY remained silent and hidden from sight while the
posse riders turned about and hit the back trail, slowly and in savage
humor.
"It's funny," said the Kid, as he and Earp dropped down
into the hollow again, "that McKell don't think o' hidin' a bunch of men
near the pass an' watch for outlaws to go in or out—like we're
doin'."
"You oughta be sheriff," Earp de- clared. "You shore
got more head than the one in office, though Mac's a good enough feller
if you ain't done nothin'."
Near noon, when they were begin-
ning to think of food again, men's voices and the measured click-click
of loping horses on rock, drew the Kid and Earp up into the brush
again.
"If that's Gant," hissed the Kid, as they hustled to
the edge of the brush, "he ain't alone. If the odds—" He forgot to
finish, for his eyes were doing duty now and what he saw scuttled his
hopes.
The pass was spewing horsemen, two and two abreast, and
continued until six had loped forth. One of the van riders, on the side
nearest the hol- low, caused McCord and Earp to face each other an
instant.
"That's the man I hung," said the
Kid, a half humorous twist to his mouth.
"It's the kiote I
shot," said Earp, his brow wrinkled.
Then they turned to look
again. The six rustlers, taking their time, pointed away from the
mountains over the trail recently traveled by the disappointed
posse.
"Hitch up your team, Earp," the Kid cried, sliding
backward. "We can't cut him out while he's with his gang, but mebbe if
we foller, we'll catch him by his lonesome. Betcha they're ridin' to
town."
CHAPTER IV
THE Kid's words were prophetic. To
Fairchance, cow town, the Earp-McCord party trailed Joe Gant and his
riders, June on the wagon box with her father and the Kid astride the
roan on the right. The Kid set the pace, one that kept them well in the
rear of the rustlers, whom they glimpsed only once or twice ahead. For
that matter the wagon, loaded with all the personal and household
belongings that Earp could cram into it, along with provisions, could
not have made the trip much faster even had it been necessary or
desirable. Earp had an- ticipated being absent from his ranch home a
long, long time and had taken everything he could lug or lay his hands
on quickly.
They approached Fairchance up a long draw, the
town was located on the £dge of the hills. The Kid suggested a plan of
action en route and Earp, having no better to offer and agreeing to all
particulars, the cowboy left them at the head of the draw and paced
smartly townward alone. He kept a wary eye out for the sheriff while
seek-
ing the mounts of the sextette along the hitch rails that fronted
the two saloons and several stores of Fair- chance. Thought it most
likely the saloon racks were where he would find them—and he was
correct. "The Howling Coyote" got the rustler trade, for there were the
broncs, switching flies, a buckskin, a bay, a pinto, two sorrels
and—where was the dun? Joe Gant had been riding a dun and it was not
there, strung along with the rest.
"He turned off the trail
somewheres," the Kid decided as he jogged over to the Howling Coyote.
"Last time I seen 'em was half a mile from town an' all was together.
Like's not Gant went around to his ranch. Now, le's see. These five
jiggers come first."
How to capture them, single-handed? The
Kid was a fair revolver shot, but had never had much practice on human
targets; rattlers, horned toads, rocks, even whiskey bottles had served
as such while he was trying to attain speed and accuracy. It was in the
use of the riata that he excelled, not only at work but at play, rodeos,
stampedes and roundups. He could make his rawhide riata talk His glance
now fell on the neat coil in the tie-straps and brightened. Just the
weapon to use, more effective than a pair of shooting irons in his
hands! But, how was he going to get the enemy bunched so that a single
throw would do the trick? If he missed one, that one would be enough to
put a hole in him and jack up the game. He couldn't just walk into the
barroom and chuck a loop at them, even if they were the only customers
at the bar, which the five horses at the hitchrack seemed to indicate,
for he would be seen and they would have ample time to dodge, one or
more anyway. His wandering gaze returned to the five broncs and down
from the saddle he swung, smiling. He had seen nothing of the sheriff
and at this blazing hot hour, Fairchancers
were taking more or less of a siesta, which cleared the stage for
the Kid's act.
He first untied his rawhide, slipped it over
his arm, went up on the stoop and walking beside the hitchrack, deftly
pulled loose the knotted reins of all five cayuses. Then he spread a
wide noose, jerked his gun and fired, close to the head of the nearest
untied horse, which was out of range of the doorway. The animal reared
at the sudden blast so close to its ears and plunged away from the rack
with a snort of fright, the four others, hardly less startled, dragging
reins in its dust. The Kid had slapped the gun back in his holster the
instant after he fired and, standing about five paces from the open door
of the saloon, was whirling the huge loop. He heard curses and a
stampede of jingling feet, and as the five rustlers squeezed pellmell
through the doorway, the big noose sang out and dropped, encircling
them. The Kid braced back, digging high heels into the boards of the
stoop. He had practically duplicated a stunt that had won him applause
and a trophy at more than one "Frontier Day" exhibition, the roping of
five horsemen at one throw.
"Whoa, buckaroos!" he yelped, as
the men began to struggle against the rawhide, trying to get their guns
out. The Kid pulled his own to quiet them. "The first jigger—" he
began.
"What's to pay, Kid McCord?" de- manded a gruff voice,
not far away. THE Kid flashed a look. The sheriff unnoticed, had ridden
up, was sit- ting his horse by the stoop and regard- ing the scene with
a wondering eye. He gave the Kid a baleful look, the cattle thief from
the JG who had out- witted McKell, made him laughing stock
almost.
"I'd tell a man!" whooped the Kid.
"Mac, you're just the
hombre I want to see. I'm catchin' these buckos as a present for you.
Hold your guns on 'em, will you, an' I'll frisk their hard- ware. It's
straight goods, Mac, they're rustlers, hot out o' the
Soldados!"
He spoke so earnestly the sheriff was compelled to
believe him, and the fact that the peace officer didn't know the faces
of the five—hard faces enough— added weight in the Kid's favor. Mc- Kell
pulled his shooters as he swung out of the saddle to the
stoop.
"But you're a cattle stealer yourself, McCord," he
growled, edging up to the five roped men, furtive-eyed when they saw his
guns lining them. "Turnin' on your pals?"
"Not any," shortly
retorted the Kid, jingling close to the captives and whip- ping off the
rawhide. He fell to lift- ing irons from holsters right and left,
pushing the low-cursing men apart when they unconsciously hung togeth-
er, paralyzed to find themselves in such a fix.
"There!" said
the Kid, heaping the guns with a triumphant gesture at the feet of the
sheriff. "All yours, Mac, the guns an' the owners. I was hidin' out near
the Soldado Pass 's mornin' when you come along trailin' Barton's
cattle. I heard you ravin', you an' Barton, an' you said you bet the
wad- dies come into town an' played around right under your nose, but
not knowin' who they was, you couldn't nab 'em. Well, I waited there
near the pass an' these fellers come out—an' one other —an' I follered
'em. They're some o' the gang that stole Barton's cattle an' who do you
think's the leader? Ten guesses you wouldn't guess it, so I'll tell
you—Joe Gant! So hangin' him didn't work—an' I'm glad you can wipe that
off my record. An' I'll prove, be- fore I'm through, Mac, that Gant
changed hosses with me on the range yesterday an' that I'm no cow thief
I"
"What's that you said about hangin'
Gant?" The sheriff was evidently mys- tified, but did not let it
interfere with his vigilance over the rustler crew, and the rustlers
knew it and were passive as sheepherders.
"Well, I tried to
hang him for the dirt he done me, but—" The Kid paused. He saw the
sheriff had no idea what he was talking about, proving that Gant had
said nothing regarding the lynching that patently had failed. The Kid
might tell McKell later, might not, but just now he had other press- ing
business elsewhere.
"Where is Gant if he was with these
fellers?" asked the sheriff, thinking something queer about the way the
cow- boy had choked off.
"Out to his ranch, I reckon," replied
the Kid, busy coiling his rawhide. "An' that's where I'm goin', Mac, to
get him an' bring him back to you—alive! I'd tell a man I
am!"
And before McKell could remon- strate—if he would—the
lithe figure was in the saddle and galloping away, bent over and
fastening the faithful rope in its proper place on the
saddle.
THE Kid raced back to the draw where he had left the
Earps and after a few hurried words rode out again, with the covered
wagon creaking after him. He might have ascertained without question the
direction taken by Joe Gant when he cast loose from his five men had he
cared to backtrack. But the Kid didn't want to waste the time. He was
eager to corner Gant and would have bet anything he owned that the
renegade ranchman had returned to the JG. It would be about time for him
to turn up there, else his foreman and punchers, whom the Kid was sure
were ignorant of their employer's dual character, would wax suspicions;
un- less they were accustomed to him stay- ing away for long periods on
some lying
pretext. Maybe they were. The Kid
hoped, as he rode, with the wagon rattling close behind, that the JG
cow- boys would not be around headquar- ters; if they were and he
couldn't con- vince them of Joe Gant's crookedness, there'd be a tangle.
But Earp was along, Earp who had shot Gant and apparently missed, and
June on whom Gant had laid hands. The punchers would believe the
girl!
But his fears were groundless, he dis- covered on
arriving. Scouting ahead of the wagon, he left his horse by the
cottonwood, where he had tried to swing Gant into eternity, and stole
toward the ranch-house. He heard voices, very similar voices, so much
alike in fact, that before he peered around the door, which stood open,
he got the idea that Joe Gant was talk- ing loudly and angrily to
himself. The Kid was looking into the office which was occupied by two
men: one sitting —to be exact, tied down in a chair— the other standing,
facing the evident prisoner. The profiles of both were toward the Kid
and their likeness was so remarkable that, but for the fact that the man
standing was dusty from hat to boots, McCord would as readily have
picked the prisoner for Joe Gant. Yet tiie prisoner was now addressing
"Joe" as "Jim."
"If you've set your mind on killin' me, Jim,
you'll do it, so there's no use me makin' a holler. In all your devil-
ment, stealin' from me as quick as you would from others since you come
down from Zuni County, I've stood by you as I thought a brother oughta
Seems now I'd done better if I'd given you up to the
sheriff."
"Well, mebbe," grunted the other. "But he prett'
near had me yesterday, an' if that puncher, McCord's roan hadn't been
handy to swap the grey for, I'd been caught, shore. An' say, Joe, I
think McCord's hidin' in the
Soldados since he thinks he broke your neck." And he told of the
pseudo- Brazos in the mountain camp the pre- vious night and of the
unknown's clever getaway.
"Must've been him. Damn' shame. He
was a good feller an' a top rope," remarked the tied man. "You're shore
got a lotta hell on your shoulders, Jim."
"Botherin' me, too,
it is." Jim vent- ed a nasty laugh, then wheeled at the sound of a
tinkling step on the thresh- hold.
Kid McCord had taken his
rope from the saddle when he left it, mean- ing to take "Joe" Gant alive
if it were at all possible. The rawhide began to get busy on the person
of the standing man, manipulated by a master hand. His movement toward
his belt-holster was arrested by the swoop of the noose, jerking tight
about his arms and hold- ing them immovable. The rawhide rip- pled and
Jim Gant's bull neck was caught in a half-hitch. Ripping again and yet
again, each time noosing a wrist of Gant, the lively rope drew his hands
together. The Kid now stood but ten feet from Gant, holding what was
left of the forty feet of rawhide and grinning widely.
"I
reckon that'll do," said the Kid, while the man in the chair muttered
admiration of the feat.
"I'm chokin' to death!" snarled the
Kid's prisoner.
"Good thing if he was, but he ain't," remarked
the man in the chair. "But he will sometime."
"Who're you?"
demanded McCord, looking over at him.
"Joe Gant, your
employer, Kid."
"An' who's this?" the Kid turned a thumb at
the other man.
"Jim Gant, my twin brother an' a bad egg,"
declared Joe Gant. "Kid there's been a lot o' trouble account of us
lookin' alike an'—"
WAIT a minute," the Kid inter-
rupted, and he turned to go to the door. "Oh, there you are. Come in,
folks," he called as Earp and his daughter came up the porch steps; and
as they entered the office of the JG, wide-eyed at the scene, and
particu- larly the two editions of Gant, the Kid requested June, "Look
'em both over careful, will you, an' tell me which one was chasin' after
you."
June stepped slowly forward and re- garded each of the
men in turn, silently and intently. It was a difficult question to
decide, but her woman's intuition aided her.
"This man," she
pointed at Jim Gant, standing sullenly, "is the one, Kid. You'd hardly
notice it, unless you look close, real close, but there's a little
difference—the eyes mostly." "Is he the man you shot, too, Earp?" said
the Kid, turning to the old man, whose jaw was hanging
down.
"Damned if I know!" replied Earp, his gaze roving from
Joe to Jim, and back again.
"You bet he shot mel" snarled Jim
suddenly. "An' my watch saved me. Shock o' the bullet knocked me down
an' the watch was junk afterward." "So that's the reason!" exclaimed the
Kid, and Earp echoed him. "Old timer, you shot at the right one after
all."
"Was he pesterin' 'round you, Miss Earp?" asked Joe Gant
from the chair he couldn't leave; and at her nod, he continued, "Well,
that's like him. He always was a hotcake with the women. Called himself
'Joe' Gant, I s'pose, makin' out to be me because he couldn't appear as
his real self, bein' a no-'count thief an' a citizen o' the Soldados.
Folks, I can explain things that's no doubt been puzzlin' you a
heap."
"I heard you talkin' when I come to the door," said the
Kid. "Before that I thought there was only one
Gant
—you, Mr. Joe. An' all the time you
was straight an' your brother was doin' things that you got blamed for.
Was he goin' to kill you? Seems like—"
"Yes," said Joe Gant,
"he was, after I'd shielded him for months an' stood for him stealin'
from me to boot. Kid, you tried to lynch the wrong man. Bet you've been
racking your brains over that. It was Jim the sheriff chased yesterday,
an' he swapped horses with you while you was down on the Forty Mile
bank, snakin' that calf out. Then he rode in a circle an' come up around
the buttes while the sheriff was talkin' to you. He's told me about it.
When you come to the ranch afterward an' jumped me, I didn't sabe what
the hell was wrong, but you wouldn't listen an' you was like a tiger. No
wonder! But my neck's pretty thick an' tough—an' Jim's, too, an' I
reckon McKell will be testin' it soon—an' the limb' o' the cottonwood
you hung me on broke just after you'd rode off. That's what saved me.
Jim came along right after it broke an' carried me into the house.
Thought I was near gone an' hoped so, an' put me in the cellar to finish
it. But I didn't die, as you see. Jim was still here when Earp came over
to gun him for annoyin' his daughter, an' that's the how o'
that."
"Remarkable!" exploded old Ezra "I'm a free man
ag'in!"
June, who had stepped back to her father's side,
hugged his arm in ecstasy.
"Why," said the Kid, "did Jim want
to kill you, Mr. Joe, when you hadn't give him away? Hanker to get hold
of the ranch an' all?"
"Yep. It's a good payin' ranch, as you
know, an' he was tired o' livin' just a jump or two ahead o' the
sheriff."
"Well, he won't have to do but one more dance an'
that'll be on air,"
grunted the Kid ominously and facing
scowling Jim Gant, Soldado citizen. "An' I left the five other hombres
he quit the mountains with, with McKell at Fairchance."
"Say,"
burst out Jim, "was you the feller wearin' Brazos Slayden's Mex hat that
got away from our camp?"
"SURE was. Me 'n the Earps was in the
mountains hidin', an' your Brazos got too friendly an' I knocked him out
an' joined your outfit that was drivin' Barton's
cattle."
"Where's Brazos at?"
"Oh," said the Kid
with a grin, "he got tangled up with his own knife. He's buried in a
holler, foot o' the Sol- dados. C'mon, James, you an' me will go see the
sheriff. Where's your dun hoss?"
"Will somebody oblige by
cuttin' me loose?" requested Joe Gant, with a laugh.
Earp
stepped quickly to his side and began to work on the knots. "Jim had
about decided to sift a bullet under my skin, Kid, seem' I didn't die
from the bite o' your rope—or rather the bite o' my
rope."
"Say, I'm plumb sorry 'bout that. But you know it was a
mistake, Mr. Gant." The Kid was contrite.
"Sure, I know,"
replied Joe Gant, as he rose unsteadily, assisted by Earp. "Go ahead,
Kid, take that misfit out o' my sight. An' when you come back from
Fairchance, you can start right in ridin' ag'in."
The Kid did
not immediately an- swer. He turned to catch June Earp's gaze, full of
promise, upon him. The blood pounded in his temples.
"Well,
thanks—mebbe, Mr. Gant," he stammered. "It's mighty likely that I'll go
over to Earp's ranch, though."
Author of "Guns Up,
Range-Hog, It's the Kansas Kid!" etc.
Satan King ramrodded seven
salty, wanted men when he rode out of Damnation Valley, and the seven or
Satan would fog back through powder-smoke finally but not
both!
The ensuing scene was a blur of
motion!
DRAMATIC DARK-TRAIL NOVELETTE!
CHAPTER
I
Wolves at War
THE OUTLAWS, watching Buck Honor as
he patted the last piece of sod down on the grave, weren't thinking of
the dead. They were won-
dering, now that Estelle King was
gone, how long it would take Rom King to get at the throat of his quiet
twin brother, Rem.
Old Honor stood up. He swallowed a lump in
his throat and growled, "Reckon poor 'Stelle's better off. It wasn't
much of a life she led after Satan was kilt." He glared at Rem, and
added
Rom, thumbs hooked over his cart- ridge belt, regarded
Rem maliciously, his grief for his mother secondary to a feeling of
vicious joy. Estelle's death left Rom free to unbridle the hatred he
held for Rem. Rom moved belliger- ently, but Honor's, "Not here," stayed
him, postponing the inevitable clash. Turning, Rom led the men down the
slope toward Owlhoot House.
Big Mitch had watched this grave-
side scene with interest. Now, the big outlaw, disliked and mistrusted
by all save Rom, had a wicked smile on his lips as he followed the
others. Big Mitch looked like a cat with a fat can- ary in
view.
Alone, Rem King knelt beside the grave. He was glad
death had come to his mother in her sleep, and easily. Life hadn't been
any too good to Estelle King, he realized. Rom and he had been born the
same day Estelle got word of her wild, handsome husband's death. Satan
King had ramrodded seven salty, wanted men when he rode out of Dam-
nation Valley to rob the Sageburg bank. Of their number, only Big Mitch,
Buck Honor, and an outlaw doctor called Pill had
returned.
Pill did all he could, and saved Es- telle's life.
But the shock, grief, ordeal of bearing twins was too much for the girl.
After that, the mental pattern of her life became a crazy-quilt; she was
subject to bad "spells."
Well, that episode in life was done
with. Rem rose, and slowly, regretfully walked down toward Owlhoot
House, a long, log building beside Ripple River. Conversation ceased
when he entered the big main room. Rom turned from the counter that
served as a bar, a wicked, wild expression on his dark, heavy
face.
"Been waitin' on you, so I could give orders," he
sneered. "Them I don't pick for my personal bunch, start
payin'
double for supplies, likker, bunks an' cabins. Startin' with Honor
an' Big Mitch, I'm buildin' a crew to go down an' bust the skunks that
murdered my ol: man. I aim to rob the bank, an' fill the whole of
Damnation Valley with their beef!
"I'd done this before,
hadn't been for Estelle; same as I'd stomped out your guts a long time
ago, hadn't been she throwed real bad spells ever' time I even looked
cross-eyed at you."
Rem stood quietly, tall, slender, with
brown hair and eyes in marked contrast with Rom's glowering darkness and
heavier body. There was little similar- ity to mark them as brothers,
much less as twins. All that had been mean and vicious in Satan King,
nothing that had been good, had been passed on to Rom.
"Damn
you, say somethin'!" Rem's controlled attitude enraged Rom, as it always
did. "You afraid to talk?" "No. I ain't afraid of you, an' the fact
gripes you," Rem told him. "Your consideration for Estelle was one
decent thing in your favor, Rom. What should I say about your
plans?
"This place is as much mine as yours
__"
"Like hell it is!" Rom barked. "I'm the first-born by two
hours. I'm Satan's crown prince, an' don't you forget it. Why, damn you,
if you hadn't been born, Estelle might not've been so child- ish, an'
all, like she was."
"Yeah, you're Satan's crown prince, all
right," Rem admitted. He didn't waste time pointing out how unreason-
able it was to blame him for Estelle's condition. Pill had said Estelle
might not have been mentally unbalanced if twins hadn't arrived the same
time as the news of Satan's death.
HONOR had worshipped Satan
and the wild, outlaw bravery the name of King stood for. He'd loved
Estelle
merely because she became Satan's
wife, and then the mother of Satan's first- born—the crown prince. He
gave all his dislike to Rem, the second-born, because of Estelle, and
because Rem was as unlike Satan had been as Rom was like
him.
"You know how I feel," Rem went on. "The people around
the town of Sageburg ain't murderers. They was only protectin' what
belonged to them from men come to steal it."
"Hell," Honor
groaned. "A fine pass when a King stands up for his daddy's killers. You
ain't no king, Rem, an' it's a good thing Rom's ready to carry on, an'
make the name feared again." "It would be better if the name of King was
carried on to be knowed as law-abidin' an' respected," Rem said. "An'
that's what I aim to try an' do."
"So the name ain't
respected?" Rom yelled, working himself into a furious frame. "You
wouldn't talk like that if you had on a gun. You—"
"I didn't
feel called on to pack an iron to the burial."
"It's over
with, ain't it? Go get your cutter, you salve-mouthed dogie. This Valley
won't hold both of us. Go get your gun, an' I'll fix it so we can both
stay here. You savvy?"
"I do." Rem nodded. "An' I ain't sure
it'd be me buried up beside Estelle. But I ain't Cain—or Romulus. I
won't gunfight you."
"Will you give me a chance to bust your
neck with my bare fists, then?" Rom raged. "Will you, you yaller pup?"
"Shuck your gun," Rem said levelly, and peeled off his
shirt.
Tables and benches were pushed back and men shouldered
the walls. There was no talk, no bets were made Not an outlaw there but
sensed that Death's will was omnipresent in the room. And Rom King was
living per- sonification of Cain, and his namesake, Romulus.
Brother-slayers, both.
Stripped to the waist, Rom's torso
showed thicker, more muscular than Rem's. He was a cutlass, and Rem a
rapier type. Rem stood straight, hands as his sides. Rom crouched and
started slowly toward him.
"Anything goes," he snarled, and
leaped.
His charge seemed to halt against a stone wall. Rem's
right fist came up from his hip and crashed against Rom's jaw. It put
him to his haunches. It would have been fair for Rem to have kicked Rom
while he was down. He stepped back. Save for a diamond bril- liance in
his eyes, his expression did not change.
Rom was damnably
silent as he came up. He charged Rem, stopped, swung the toe of his boot
into Rem's stomach. Rem gasped, grabbed Rom's ankle, twisted and dumped
him to the floor again. He jumped astraddle of his back, wound his
fingers in Rom's hair and banged his head against the floor. Rom
shrieked an oath and rose with Rem on his back, and hurled himself on
over with Rem under him.
They came to their feet, stood toe-
to-toe and slugged. Blood smeared their faces, their ears. It was Rom
who finally gave ground. He grabbed a bench and swung it. Rem ducked un-
der, and it shattered against the floor. Rom raised his knee and drove
it against Rem's chin. Rem spun and dropped backward. Rom, teeth barred,
gleaming scallops in a bloody mask, panted as he leaped into the air and
tried to drive his high heels into Rem's kidneys. Rem rolled. One heel
ripped the hide down his left ribs. Rom dropped on top of him, got his
thick fingers around Rem's throat and blue- green lights flashed in
Rem's head.
He fumbled, found Rom's throat with his own
fingers and clamped down. The wheeze of their attempted breathing was
the only sound in the room. Rom
toppled sideways, thumping the
floor. Neither of them let go the other's throat. They squirmed, kicked,
rolled over and over and over, tried to surge to their feet and fell
apart. Rom went to his hands and knees; Rem swayed peri- lously, but he
had the bitter will to remain on his feet.
"Here, Rom!" Big
Mitch hissed, and the knife he tossed down clattered to the floor within
Rom's reach.
Buck Honor's gun slithered from the holster.
"Mitch, keep outta King busi- ness," he warned. "There's only one reason
I even stand for you cornin' to Owlhoot House. Don't press your
luck."
"The hell with you. I don't see you grabbin' the
knife," Big Mitch snarled.
"An' cross Rom? Get him on the peck
at me, him thinkin' I was sidin' Rem? That was your idea, wasn't it
Mitch, you son—"
ROM had grabbed up the knife. He leaped to
his feet and the murder- ous blade flashed downward. Rem swayed aside,
the blade's point leaving a sudden, bloody thread down one arm. Rom's
body followed the drop of the knife, pulling off balance. Rem raised on
his toes, locked his fingers together and brought both hands down on the
back of his brother's neck.
Rom flattened out, groaning,
unable to rise. He was partially paralyzed by the effects of the
rabbit-punch. Chest heaving, blood smearing him, Rem stag- gered and
leaned against the counter.
Rom, at last, rolled over and
tried to stand. His knees gave under him and he sat down. He squinted
hellishly at Rem, his eyes swelling nearly shut be- cause of his broken
nose.
"I'll kill you for this," he ground out. "No difference
where you go, I'll find you an' let my lead into your guts— even if I
got to hunt you to hell an! back to these Desertion
Mountains!"
Big Mitch's shoulders humped as Rem
answered Rom's sworn intentions. The outlaw's fingers made claws close
to his gun butts. The Colt in Honor's fist, Honor's dislike, his warning
to Big Mitch to stay out of King business, stayed the outlaw's
move.
Rem said: "You won't have to hunt so far, Rom. God
forbid I ever have to bend a gun on my own brother to pro- tect myself.
But if you go on with this idea of raidin' Sageburg, dirtyin' up the
name of King some more while I'm tryin' to scrub it clean, you'll see
that I'm easy enough to find!"
CHAPTER II
Tripled
Troubles
SAWTOOTHED ramparts of the Desertions were a blur in
the blue haze far back of Rem King. The immediate range was broken,
semi-bad- land. The country needed a slew of wet weather,
too.
Rem reined off the narrow ribbon of dusty road and went
down a draw toward a board-'n-batten house, a few head of cattle bearing
several different brands moving out of his path. He found the house had
been deserted a long time. The outbuildings were fall- ing into ruin,
the lot pond surface was sunbaked mud, cracked and curling. Rem stopped
in the short shade west of the house and made a cigarette. He was
lighting it when a girl rode around the corner of the
place.
Rem straightened, regarding her with the somber respect
of the man whose acquaintance with girls had been scan- ty. She seemed a
friendly little person, with a freckle-speckled nose, bronze toned hair
tucked under a man's J. B. and a generous mouth. Rem's owlis? wary
attitude caused her to smile.
"Why, hello, there," she
greeted. "I was riding from Asia Lane's, and cut into the road behind
you. But you wouldn't know Asia. You're a stranger, else you wouldn't
have come here for water, or food. I followed you to tell you, there's
water in a hole down there in Crow Creek."
She raised her arm,
a quirt dangling from her wrist, and pointed to a distant line of
cottonwood trees and bank wil- lows. Unversed in the proprieties, all
Rem knew to do was thank her and start for the creek. The girl put her
horse in motion beside his. She was without artifice. Her act was a
neigh- borly one, he knew.
"This's the old Naslet place," she
said, just to make talk. "The bank at Sageburg was robbed, more than
twenty years ago. The small outfits like Nas- lel, Lane, Gordons and Rep
Jones never have gotten back on their feet. But Naslet was the only one
to leave."
Rem stared straight ahead, cursing a blow that laid
men on their backs for such a time. "Seems like," he said aloud,
"they've had time to build back again."
"Hard luck follows
bad. There was blackleg and drouth. And," her voice lowered regretfully,
"other drawbacks, too."
She changed what seemed a painful
subject, saying, "But I imagine you're more interested in a job? The
pool of small outfits can't hire riders. Old Jack Hargish, of JH
Connected, needs hands, but can't always meet his payroll. Gurt Kruss,
of Bar 13, might put you on. I could speak to—"
Before the
girl could finish, trouble took to them with stomach-emptying
abruptness. A rifle rang flatly from somewhere along the creek ahead.
The bullet sounded like a gigantic wasp passing well above them. That
shot, Rem knew, had been a warning. An- other one might not
be.
"Come on!" Rem cried. "He can easy see us out in the open." He ran
his horse ahead of the girl, toward the creekside timber. As he reached
the dry, rocky creekbed, a rider dashed off of a liveoak flat beyond.
Rem glimpsed a fluttering yellow neckerchief and a big white hat as the
man disappeared around a point of brush.
"Did you see him?"
The girl didn't seem frightened, only worried as she reined up beside
Rem. He gave her a sidewise look. He had a hunch she'd also glimpsed the
man, and probably knew him.
"Barely glimpsed him," Rem told
her. "But it's plain why he tried to scare us back." He rode across the
creek and looked down at a cow on the ground beneath a liveoak. She'd
been looped by a foreleg, pitchpoled, her neck broken. Rem turned his
gaze to smoke coming through dust hastily kicked over a small fire. A
calf came out of the brush. It bawled of pain of the Leaning LX brand
just burned on its flank as it nosed the cow. The dead animal bore old
Jock Hargish's JH Con- nected brand!
Rem lifted his gaze
inquiringly. The girl had a harsh, lost expression on her face. "The
brand on the calf, Leaning LX, is Asia Lane's," she choked. "Asia's in
town today. Makes no difference, because I know he didn't do this. No
other pool man did, either."
"If you know who did it, all you
got to do is tell who," Rem advised.
"You don't understand,"
she mut- tered. "There's been so much trouble —and now, this. I was just
thinking. I don't believe it would be a good idea for you to strike Gurt
Kruss for a job. Couldn't you just ride on, and forget what you see
here?"
"I can keep still about this," he ten- tatively agreed.
"But how about them?" He nodded at the dead cow and the mavericked calf.
For answer,
she extended one hand, saying, "Give
me your knife."
WHY he acted as he did, Rem couldn't say. He
did know it was kicking dynamite around—especially for a son of Satan
King.
"I'll cut the brand off the cow," he said, getting down.
"You haze the calf back into the brush." He opened his knife and set to
work. He straightened, with a square of bloody hide in
hand.
"Just toss 'er up to me, an' keep your hands still." The
chill words, spoken from the willows behind Rem, were ac- companied by
the tap of a gunbarrel on a saddlehorn.
The girl cried, "Jock
Hargish!" as she wheeled her horse. Rem turned slowly, staring at the
lined, bitter face of the gray-haired man. Hargish seemed perplexed, let
down as he glanced at the girl. His eyes glinted evilly when he looked
back at Rem.
"The sound of the shot that killed my row brought
me here," Hargish growled. "You're a stranger, didn't know how sound
carries around here. I never thought the pool'd got to the point they'd
call in a thing as low as a cow-killing' mavericker!"
He
sighed and said to the girl, "Miss Kay, it just don't seem you could be
mixed up in anything like this."
"I'm not mixed up in
anything," she answered. "I was showing this stranger the way to the
waterhole when that shot was taken at us to warn us back. I'm positive
no pool man did this, and to keep down trouble, I asked this man to cut
out that brand."
"You'd go a long way to stop trouble, Miss
Kay," Hargish admitted. "Reckon, though, I'll just take that hunk of
hide an' this jasper, here, on to Lane's, an' have a li'l
talk."
"Asia's in town," she said. "As for this man—Why, I
don't even know his name! "
"Who are you, feller?" Hargish mo-
tioned with his cocked gun.
Rem steeled himself, groaning in-
wardly. "My name's King."
"King!" Hargish snarled. "The same
name as the black devil that robbed the bank that time. I hear he sired
a couple of whelps that was, aptly 'nough, called Romulus an' Remus, an'
sure was bein' raised up by wolves. King! Bigod, you couldn't
be—"
"I'm Rem King," Rem said quietly, bracing himself against
the shock of a bullet from the rancher's gun. But Hargish seemed either
too stunned or too enraged to command his trigger finger. It was the
girl who made a move against him. She rode forward, crying, "Rem King!
And I asked you for help!"
She raised the quirt that hung from
her wrist, slashed him across the face, put the spurs to her horse and
raced away.
Stunned, Rem raised his hand and touched the welt
the quirt had caused. He looked up at Hargish, as though for
explanation. Hargish motioned with his gun, snarling, "Fork your hoss.
Guess you ain't guilty of this. Lane'd never hire no whelp of the wolf
that wrecked this range an' give Younk Fraly control of things. Just the
same, you're goin' along when I show that piece of hide to Lane. An'
maybe you can explain what damn skunk's plan brought you down
here."
"No skunk's plan," Rem assured him as they rode off. "I
aim to live an honest life, try to make up for things charged against
the name of King. I figured this was the country to do it in." "Yeah?"
Hargish jeered. "Stop lyin'. First thing, you're all mixed up in
somethin' meanln' trouble."
"No," Rem denied. "But I can't
understand why the girl—"
"Quirted you when she learned who
you was? That's Kay Fraly, feller.
She's a fine girl, even if she is
friends of the pool folks, an' the niece of Younk Fraly, at the
Sagebrush bank—the skunk! Kay can't help that, though. No more than she
can help it her father, Mace Fraly, was killed in that bank robbery
battle in Sagebrush, seven months before li'l Kay was
born!"
Rem gasped. Hargish grunted. "Kay's mama never lived
long, damn you," the rancher snarled. "She's been dependent on Younk,
who's goin' to see her married to Gurt Kruss, or I miss my
guess."
A blue, hopeless funk possessed Rem King. Blamed for
his mother's weak- ness, hated by Buck Honor, despised by his brother;
now, blamed for a range being ruined, a girl's mother and father being
dead, and that girl in some diffi- culties now. What would it be like,
then, after Rom came down from the Deser- tions and set his guns and
gun-wolves on them?
Rem was on the point of telling Jock
Hargish of that danger, then withheld the words. A look at Hargish
convinced Rem that a warning could serve no good purpose at the present
time.
WHEN they reached Sagebrush, Hargish stopped before the
bank. The squatty sandstone building still bore the bullet marks of the
now his- toric bloody battle when the bank was robbed. The rancher
nodded at an old wagon and a team in wired, patched
harness.
"Asia Lane's," he grunted. "An speakin' of the
devil."
Hargish motioned to Rem as he slid down and confronted
a stooped man in faded, patched overalls. He raised his head and said,
"Howdy, Jock," in a questioning manner.
"It's this," Hargish
spat, holding out the grisly hunk of cowhide. "This out- law whelp of
Satan King, Rem King, here, cut it off of a JH cow. The
calf
runnin' with her was totin' a fresh L,eanin' LX brand." His gaze
leaped from Lane to Rem, then back.
Lane stiffened. "A King,"
he croaked. "An' you use him to try an' tag me with your hoddam lie!" He
moved one hand near the pocket of his old jumper that sagged with the
weight of a gun.
Rem, looked beyond the two men, was glad that
Hargish hadn't taken his smokepole away from him. A spidery, red-faced,
bleached cuss stepped out of the bank. A big, small-eyed, tallow- padded
man stopped in the bank door- way, nervously mouthing a cold cigar. Rem
glimpsed Kay Fraly on inside the bank, then turned to
Hargish.
"This Mister Lane, he ain't the man that run, down
there on the creek," Rem declared.
"No?" Hargish panted.
"Hell, you are in with Lane, you dirty King. You're lyin' for him. If
you never done it, an' Lane never—"
Rem stared at the spidery
man, who stopped with his hand on his gun, white Stetson pushed back,
yellow neckerchief dangling. . . .
CHAPTER
III
Skeletons From Hell
SILENCE seemed to pound the
street. The spidery man's right shoulder lifted, his eyelids nar- rowed.
"You accusin' me?" he spat.
"Yeah. You accusin' Gurt Kruss?"
Hargish demanded.
Now, the girl's reason for telling him to
ride on and not hit Kruss for a job was plain to Rem. Plain, too, was
the fact that the Bar 13 ramrod had faced this witness in order to
discredit him or gun him out.
"Never knew you was Gurt Kruss,
an' I ain't accused you of nothin'," Rem
stated, staring at the man. "How do
you know there's anything to be ac- cused of?" Rem softly
inquired.
Kruss twitched like someone had slapped him. "You
sneakin', outlaw pup," he rasped. "Who sent for you,
anyhow?"
"Nobody sent for him," the man in the doorway said
quickly.
"Quiet, Younk," Kruss snapped. "I'm askin' him.
Outlaw, did you come on your own, or did somebody call you, to cause
trouble by sayin' I done somethin'? Damn you, answer
me!"
"Hold on," Hargish inserted. "Kruss, it's funny you'd yap
about bein' ac- cused, when you wasn't told nothin', or pointed out.
There's too many cats hoppin' around. This King rubbish, you, an' Lane,
I mean. I figger I can settle this. Miss Kay. vou was with King. If he
saw Kruss, you must've, too. I don't figger you'll lie. Was Kruss the
man? Or is this outlaw lyin' in his teeth?"
"Kay saw nothin,"
Younk Fraly said, holding the doorway.
"Younk, I'm not askin'
you!" Har- gish almost yelled. "Kay?"
Everyone stared past
Younk Fraly at his niece. Rem's nerves tightened, his stomach crawled.
He sensed that Younk and Kruss were close. Kay Fraly wouldn't turn
against her uncle or the man she was, according to Har- gish, apt to
marry. She wouldn't side one of the tribe that had caused her father's
death—a man with the welt of her quirt still livid across his
face.
These men would turn on Rem, pos- sibly thinking he'd
done the branding job for trouble-stirring purposes of his own. Rem
perceived he was headed toward hell, riding Hobson's
choice.
Color left Kay Fraly's face. Rem felt sorry for her,
and his expression showed it. Hargish was making it damned hard for Kay.
She looked at her uncle, at Kruss, then at Rem. Draw-
ing a long breath,
she said, "I won't answer your question, Jock."
Younk Fraly
bit through his cigar. Kruss sprang backward like a mon- goose baiting a
snake. "You double- crossers! " he cried as he pulled his gun, bending
it on Rem, who, Kruss figured, was the swiftest of the
lot.
Rem winced as Kruss's bullet ripped his ribs, his own gun
leaping in his hand as the double explosion echoed along the street.
Kruss had sacrificed ac- curacy for all out speed, and thereby made a
sacrifice of everything. Rem's lead knocked an explosive breath out of
the man, turned him halfway around. Kruss dropped his gun and pressed
his hands to his chest. His right knee bent slowly, pulling him back
around. Twist- ing, he fell face downward,
Rem stepped back,
his wide-opened, sickness-revealing eyes shuttling to Lane, who had his
hand in his jumper pocket, to Jock Hargish, who let his gun slide back
into the leather under the menace of Rem's Colt. Younk Fraly had started
to finger a .41 der- ringer from his vest pocket. He jerked his hand
away and stepped close to his niece when Rem looked at
him.
"Kay's answer of no answer was an- swer he was," said
Hargish. "Which don't mean I'm pattin' this outlaw on the back! What I
want to know is, what'd Kruss mean by callin' out, 'Double-crossers' ?
"
"Hargish. Younk," the downed man gasped.
They
recoiled, staring down at Kruss. The walk beneath him was stained with
his blood, and blood wetted his lips. Despite the bullet in his chest,
some- thing drove him on to cling to a few more moments of
life.
"Younk," Kruss gasped, hitching himself forward. "Come
close. Some- thin' I got—to say—to you. Come
Fraly came
a step nearer. He screamed and leaped backward as Kruss reached out and
scooped up his fallen shooting-iron. He rested on his left el- bow and
fired almost point-blank at Fraly. Fraly fell backward, his scream
chopped short. His big body came down heavily. He rolled and kicked,
clawing at the gaping wound in his throat. Blood pumped between his
fingers as his life ran out. He tried to sit up, fell back and moved no
more.
MEN and a few women along the street moved up warily.
Kay gripped the doorframe and looked away, shaking her head at a woman
who came toward her.
Kruss grinned redly, hellishly. "Get me a
drink an' hold me up," he gurgled. "I want to talk, an' I ain't got
long." Lane raised Kruss to a sitting posi- tion against his knee.
Someone else held a bottle to Kruss's lips. He looked at Rem as he
gulped, then rasped, "Younk sent for you?"
"Of course not."
Rem was puzzled. "Why should he?"
"Listen, all you fools. I
gotta talk fast," Kruss gasped. "It started with Younk wantin' his
brother's gal, Kay's mother. He wanted to squeeze the ranchers, too, an'
Mace, his brother, who was over him in the bank, set down on it. Younk
somehow knew a young killer named Big Mitch, an' got him to join up with
Satan King an' talk up robbin' the bank down here."
Kruss
paused. Lane gave him an- other drink. Kruss continued:
"It
was a trap. Me an' two others— who happened to later be killed—was
ready. Younk had gold on top of bags of iron washers; bills outside
packages of paper. That was what he put in Satan's gunnysack, an' Satan
thought it was cash I When I shot Satan outta his saddle, Big Mitch run
to him, like
he was tryin' to save his life. We
was careful not to hit Mitch. He lit out with the sack, then got his
horse down in a flooded creek. He lost the sack so nobody'd know it
wasn't full of money. You ranchers never knowed that. I reckon King
never knew the sack didn't hold money."
"I never knew. I only
know Big Mitch was tolerated because it was thought he tried to save
Satan's life," Rem muttered dazedly.
"Anyhow, Younk bad the
bank money hisself. I had it on him, an' he made me the seemin' owner of
Bar 13 when he took it from Hargish. Younk hated me, but was afraid to
try any- thing. That's why that Big Mitch got outta several pen
sentences, too: It was Younk supplied the money,
secretly."
"Ahhh," Hargish groaned. "I lost Bar 13. I was a
heavy holder in the bank, an' I've stripped myself these years, payin'
back what I could to some of them that lost. An'—"
"An'
crowdin' us li'l fellers when Younk, through Kruss, crowded you," Asia
Lane pointedly reminded Hargish.
"The loan Younk pretended to
get from a city bank, after he took over," Kruss said, "was the money
Satan was supposed to have stolen. Younk was worried lately, afraid you
fellows would come out enough he couldn't bleed you for so much interest
or grab your range. He sent Big Mitch word to get a King whelp to come
an' raise hell, an' had me startin' trouble to split you all so it would
be easier. I heard Big Mitch aimed to work it so he'd be the big he-
coon of the outlaw diggin's when this was over with."
Kruss's
head jerked. "I still think —Younk sent—for you!" he gasped at Rem. His
eyes rolled and he slumped away from Lane.
Stunned silence
prevailed. Asia Lane cleared his throat and said, "Well, Har- gish,
considerin' the money you put in,
an' all you lost, reckon this puts
you in the bankin' business an' gives you back Bar 13. I hope you
remember how it is to be in a tight."
"I can remember—though
that ain't uncrowdin' the range."
Hargish turned to Rem. "As
for you," he said, "there ain't a doubt you're the devil Kruss meant.
You served a good purpose you never aimed to, because things went
haywire. But because of that, I'll let you off with your life. You ain't
stayin' here to point the way to wholesale rustlin', kill- in' an'
robbery, though I"
"It was my brother Kruss meant," Rem
protested. "That's another rea- son I come here—to warn you hellfire was
cornin'. I—"
"Get out!" Hargish roared. "You lead a wolf pack
back here, an' I'll see to you myself. I don't want any of your advice
to trick me or mess me up."
Rem looked at Kay Fraly. She'd
given in to grief and was sobbing piti- fully, terribly. Anyhow, she
wouldn't want him here. She probably blamed him for the swift turn of
events that had caused her so much grief. A wom- an stepped up and led
the girl away.
"You won't take my warnin'," Rem said to
Hargish. "Yet you'll blame me if anything happens. That's one hell of a
note."
"Y'darn shoutin'," Asia Lane sided in. "I can see right
now, Hargish ain't goin' to make things easy for us li'l ones. King, I
had a bad minute to- wards you, but you spoke up in my favor. I seen
enough I'm convinced you're fit to ride the river with, an' that you
might be needed around. You come along home with me."
"I warn
you," Hargish began, and got no further. Lane's self-control snapped
like a rotten cinch. His fist hit Hargish's jaw and Hargish hit the
dust. He sat up, emotions of bewil-
derment, pain and rage conflicting
within him.
"You see?" he cried. "More trouble already.
Lane—"
"Hell with you, you stiff-necked oP devU," Lane
snarled. "Come on, King, let's get goin'."
Rem followed Lane's
creaking wagon out of town. The color was draining from his face. A mile
from town, Lane called, "Ride up so we can talk." He looked around,
gasped, stopped and leaped from the wagon and ran back. Rem had fallen
out of the saddle. He sprawled in the road, the left side of his shirt
and jumper soaked with blood. . . .
CHAPTER
FOUR
Ravaged Range
WEAKENED by loss of blood, his
side inflamed and swollen where Kruss's slug bad fur- rowed over his
ribs, Rem didn't take to the saddle the next day. After get- ting Rem
home and in Mrs. Lane's care last night, Asia had taken word to other
pool members. This morning, they met at the Lane place and went to town
together, to attend Younk Fra- ly's burial out of respect to Kay, and
check with Hargish on the new order of things to be.
Lane was
in a sour mood when he returned home that evening. As he unhooked his
team, he told Rem, "Har- gish is genin' mighty a'ready. Called a meetin'
for tomorrow at the bank. His range is 'way overstocked an', while
Hargish is honest, he ain't fair. It's in him to be a range tyrant, an'
to hell with us little spreads."
Lane let the team into the lot, then said, "Kay
Fraly asked about you. Wants to see you as soon as you're able to
ride."
"Me? See me?" Rem blurted. "But, what
about?"
"Don't know what about, Rem. Do know Kay's liable to
need heavy help, though, before her affairs is all straight- ened
out."
Early the following morning, with- out waiting for Lane
or the others, Rem saddled up and rode to town. A dark- ening line on
the horizon showed thun- derheads banking; hot puffs of wind blew up
dust clouds. Maybe the range would get the rain it so badly
needed.
Rem had learned that Kay occupied a small house of her
own in Sagebrush. He went straight there, dismounting outside a picket
fence and walking up a path rimmed with dying flowers and shrubs. They
made Rem think of the water and trees and green grass up in Damnation
Valley.
He knocked on the door, wondering why his heart
knocked on his throbbing side. Kay Fraly came around the side of the
house.
"Why, hello, there," she greeted him, just as she had
at the old Naslet place —a moment that now seemed years ago. "I didn't
expect you so soon," Kay said, stepping up onto the porch. "How is your
side?"
"Fine," he lied. "But would you mind if we sit down
here?"
He sat down on the edge of the porch and she followed
suit.
An awkward silence fell between them. Finally, Kay said,
"I wish to apologize to you, Rem. For hitting you with my
quirt."
"Why, forget it," he told her. "Reckon you was in a
bad spot, an' all, an' had a right to be edgy. I—I was sorry ior
you."
"I saw that on your face, there be-
fore the bank." Kay's
voice was vi- brantly low. "Your expression told me a lot of things. I
want to be friends, Rem."
"Friends? With me?" he mumbled. "But
my father—"
"My uncle was as much guilty of my father's death
as your father or his men, Rem," she interrupted. "Younk was a far worse
man than your father was, in his way. I never knew, until
day-before-yesterday, though, how real- ly bad Younk Fraly was. It's a
terrible thing for a brother to kill or have killed a
brother!"
"Yeah," he agreed, twisting his hat in his hands.
Without knowing why he did it, he began to tell her of his life, why his
mother couldn't leave Damnation Valley, and about his brother, Rom. Kay
was silent for a long time after he'd finished. Then she laid a warm
little hand on one of his.
"I know what it is to be lonely,
and feel unwanted," she said in a whispery voice. "I feel sorry for you,
Rem. Even to the names given you and your brother, the pattern seems
laid against you two. I remember the origin of the names. Romulus and
his twin brother, Remus, were infants thrown into the River Tiber. They
were rescued and nursed by a she-wolf. Romulus was founder and first
king of Rome. Remus jumped the walls of the city and Romu- lus killed
him . . . Whoever gave you those names?"
"Estelle. Phil said
it showed the crazy consistency of the inconsistent. Phil was a funny
jasper, an' the only real friend I ever had. I often wish I could see
him again. He rode off one time, an' never come back."
"What
do you intend doing now," Kay inquired.
SHE drew back, then,
staring at him in amazement. Rem had risen, his
face gone suddenly bleak, his
attitude grim and quiet as the steel of a six- shooter is quiet. He
looked off down the road to where it widened and be- came the main
street.
"I'm goin' an' have a talk with the three men that
just come up an' left their horses in front of the Sagebrush Bar, across
from the bank," Rem said in a hell-hollow voice. "Buck Honor, Big Mitch,
an' my brother, Roml" "Wait, Rem!" Kay cried, clinging to his arm. "Get
help."
"No. Maybe this can be settled with- out another
pitched fight, with inno- cent folks gettin' killed an' wounded. An' you
stay here."
He shook her off and strode down the path, mounted
and rode down the street without once looking back at the girl. He
reined up and got down two doors from the saloon, pausing to glance at
Jock Hargish and three of his riders as they came in up at the feed
corral. Maybe Hargish expected trouble with the pool members
today?
Loosening his iron in the leather, then, Rem drew in a
steady, long breath, stepped quickly down to the Sagebrush Bar and
inside. Three long strides took him to the bar close to Buck Honor. Big
Mitch stood next, then Rom. The trio tensed, mouths wide open as Rem
faced them.
"Kind of early for you gents to be out, ain't it?"
he asked.
"Wait!" Honor forestalled Rom's move as his
shoulders hunched.
"Well, Mister King. An' your pleasure?" the
swamper and morning bartender inquired. "I was just start- in' to tell
these gents about the gunfight across the street. Funny, but y'know I'd
swear I'd seen the two on this end some'ere's before. An' the other'n,
too —unless I saw somebody looked like him. A long time ago, seems
as."
"We heard about that ol' fight," Rom snarled. "Get
away."
"Not this fight, you never heard about," Rem told him. "He meant
the fight a couple days ago, when Younk Fraly an' Gurt Kruss was
killed."
"Wh--whatl" Big Mitch blurted, and Honor gave him a
keen glance in the backbar mirror.
"Yeah. I shot Kruss, an' he
killed Fraly as he was dyin'. But he talked, Mitch. Kruss told a lot of
things . . . Hold 'er, damn you!" Rem rested his hand on the butt of his
gun. "Rom, don'cha draw."
"Let's hear this story," Honor
growled. "Y'see, Mitch was powerful set on lookin' things over alone! I
de- cided we'd leave the boys outta town, an' me'n Rom'd ride along with
him. We sure never reckoned to find you here—an' folks callin' you
Mister. Go on. ..."
Rem moved out a step, and poured out the
story.
"It's a lie!" Big Mitch snarled. "It's nothin' but a
trick to mess things up. This lard-mouthed—"
"I don't think it
is a trick, Mitch," Honor broke in harshly. "I always wondered about the
hot lead reception, that time; an' the way your hoss went down in that
creck."
"Stand aside, Buck," Rom rasped. "Gimme room to move.
I aim to blow Mitch's guts out then dump this but- tin'-in Rem's
innards."
"Hold 'er," Honor grunted. "Some- body's openin' the
bank, an' them three gun-packin' rannies loungin' around don't look
good. No—"
"Hell, yes!" Rom raged, leaped out and went for his
gun. The ensuing scene was a blur of motion. Rem freed his gun and
jumped aside. He could have gunned Rom in that moment, but something
stronger than his own neces- sity stayed his trigger finger. Rom's gun
roared, Big Mitch pulled a trigger, and, jarred up against the bar by
the shock of a bullet, Buck Honor's gun
Big Mitch was hammered off his feet and was dead before
he hit the floor. Honor yelled at Rom, "Run for 'er," and grabbed at
him. Rom screeched an oath and fired at Rem who, stepping backward, felt
the slug fan his face as he tripped and fell over a
chair.
"Ah, damn you. I'll teach you! " An- other bullet
ripped into the floor beside Rem's body. Honor shoved Rom, yelled at him
again, managed to make him savvy they had to run. They belted through
the doorway and hit their horses.
Hargish's riders went for
their guns, but a yell from their boss in the bank's doorway stopped
them. "It might be some sorta trick," Hargish yelled. "Stay where you
are!"
Rom and Honor pounded up the street. As they turned the
corner, they almost piled up on Lane and the other pool men. The pair
raced on, ran out of sight over a rise and were gone.
REM came
out of the bar as Lane and the rest ran down and got off their horses.
"Big Mitch's in the saloon, plumb dead," Rem called. "That was Honor an'
my brother run out. Get back on your broncs. They got a bunch out of
town, an' we got to keep them a-runnin'. Rom's so crazy mad, there's no
tellin' what he might do."
"No!" Kay Fraly cried, running up
and planting herself in front of Rem. "Let Hargish and the others go.
Don't ride after your brother—"
"He ain't goin' to. Nobody
ain't," Hargish snarled, motioning to his men. "I notice he never
stopped them in the bar. Well, we ain't ridin' after them decoys,
leavin' the bank easy to be robbed by the rest of that bunch. King,
you're stayin' right here!"
"You're a fool," Rem said quietly.
"Have it your way."
"Damn right. Now, some of you
men
get that outlaw outta the bar, so I can have a drink before we
call the meet- in' at the bank."
"Move him yourself," Lane
barked. "Who the hell you think you're givin' orders
to!"
"Move him, boys," Hargish snapped at his men. He
presented Lane and the others a stubborn, angry expression. "Givin'
orders, too? You'll mighty soon be findin' out. I—"
He stopped
speaking with his mouth open, his eyes getting larger and larger. Then
Hargish made a croaking sound and pointed out toward the
range.
"They—they've set fire to the range!" Hargish
screamed.
Stunned, the group watched a grow- ing smoke cloud,
filled with flying ashes, whip into the darkening sky. Now, the roar of
the wind-driven flames in pow- der-dry grass, grew in their ears. At
other points, fire sprang up as Rom and his followers ran, setting their
fires on the way.
"No human could stop that fire," Lane
croaked. "An' you're the one, Hargish, that wouldn't let us chase them,
keep 'em goin'!"
The street was suddenly alive with townfolks
as the sky became darker and ashes began raining down into Sage- burg.
The roar of the fire was loud, growing, then fading in the distance.
Lane, in the group before the bank, offered up thanks.
"Thank
God," he cried, "our families an' homes will be safe. There ain't enough
grass back in the badlands to carry the fire across the ravines an' cut
canyons."
A red-eyed, smoke-blackened cow- puncher raced down
the street. "Hey, Jock," he called out to Hargish. "Bar 13 house is
goin', an' everything at JH Connected is gone. A lot of beef bein'
baked, but not as many as you'd figger. They're stampedin' into the
bads."
"Baked or starved — what's the
difference?" Lane muttered.
"You'll find out," Hargish told
him. "You'll—''
"It's beginnin' to rainl" somebody
yelled.
"A li'l late," Hargish grunted. "All of you, come
inside. You can bring your damn outlaw along."
CHAPTER
FIVE
Honor For Honor
"I AIMED to make a different
sort of offer," Hargish said.
Lane glared at the man, then at
his men lounging nearby.
"I see," Lane growled. "It'd been a
good one, too—seein' you brought these gents with you to keep the peace
you figgered your offer would sorta bust . . . Well, get to hell on with
your offer."
"Miss Fraly," Hargish said, "you have somethin'
cornin' to you. It's up to me to say what. Here's the amount on this
paper.
"Lane, the pool's got notes due. Your beef won't carry
you because you won't have no range. You see, I'll need ever' bit of
free range that ain't burnt; I'll need the li'l bit of grass you owe the
bank on—an' then there'll be too many head on the range."
He
held up one hand to forestall Lane's angry retort. "I don't want to bust
you folks. I admit I don't want li'l outfits clutterin' things up. Miss
Fraly, what you have cornin' will be give to you in cattle, an' you'll
have to move them, of course. Lane, an' you others, I'm lettin' you keep
your beef if you get off your range right away. If you don't, I'll call
the notes on you, an' take ever'thing!
"Don't cuss me. Seein'
your outlaw
friend's brother had a hand in this,
maybe your outlaw can suggest some- thin'."
"There's no range
in several hun- dred miles, an' the beef ain't ready for market 1" Asia
Lane spat. "An' stop blamin' Rem. After all he done—" "Wait." Rem's
quiet word stopped Lane's rising tirade.
"I know where there's
range, about a hundred miles from here. Plenty of fine valley range,
with water an' grass an' timber. You'd live in peace there, an' prosper,
an' you could see to it no range hog rooted you out. You could build
your own town."
"Sounds like a dream," lanky Rep Jones
allowed.
"It's a dream I've had," Rem ad- mitted. "But the
valley ain't a dream. It's up in the Desertions, an' I got a right to go
there. The Kings still owe you folks somethin'. Maybe that'll pay
up."
"I understand." Lane nodded. "Damnation Valley. But the
outlaws will fight—"
"There ain't many there now. More will
leave after what took place down here," Rem interrupted. "The fight'll
be with Rom an' Buck Honor."
"We'll tend to that if you lead
us in," Lane avowed.
"No. You're married. Young Gor- don's got
a mother an' sister to think of. The others have dependents, too. It's
up to me to claim part of my own heritage. Maybe Rom'll listen to rea-
son."
"Y'know he won't," Rep Jones growled. "Me, I got nobody
dependin' on me. I'm traipsin' along for the ride."
"Rest of
us'll bunch the cattle an' start them movin'," Lane muttered. "If
anything happens, I mean, if we don't go into the mountains, we got to
move, along, anyhow. But before I go—"
Outside, Kay caught up with Rem and drew him aside
while Rep went after a pack of grub. "Rem," the girl muttered, "1 don't
know what to say. I can't ask you not to do this, because it is the only
chance the others have. But you don't owe us this. You've done so much
already. If you go there, you'll have to kill your brother, or, like the
other Remus who jumped the wall, he'll kill you. If it's the first way,
you'll never be the same again. You wouldn't want a wife, or children to
have to tell that you killed Rom."
"I know it," he
groaned.
"But no matter what happens, Rem, I'll pray while
you're going to make a place for our herd. If you care—I'll be
waiting."
She sobbed, rose on her toes and kissed him and
ran.
Rem carried that kiss with him on the way into the
mountains. It was in his mind the morning he and Rep Jones came through
Slot Pass, unchal- lenged, and part of the valley's spread lay before
them.
"To think of this layin' up here, with only outlaws
usin' it!" Rep Jones gasped. "Rem—Hell, it's heaven!" "We'll see if it
is," Rem answered soberly. "The tracks show Honor an' Rom ain't been far
ahead. Slowed down because Honor was packin' Mitch's lead, I reckon. . .
. Wait."
A rider hazed a packhorse toward them. He pulled up,
saying, "Howdy, Rem. Some of us figgered you'd be along. Most of the
boys have hauled 'er; the few down there won't side Rom, after he went
frothin' mad an' set fire to that range. Such things ain't no good, an'
most've us have been cowhands, one time or another,
y'see.
"Honor's pretty bad shot, an' since they rode in last
night, late, Rom's been drinkin', plannin' against you, runnin'
ever'body outta Owlhoot
House. You try takin' this valley,
it'll mean fights to come, Rem. But not today, not
today."
THEY rode on, then. Dismounting in the timber, Rem
told Rep, "You stay outside. If I'm downed, ride an' tell Lane an' the
others what to expect of this place. An' tell Kay I loved her,
Rep."
"You're the boss, an' I hope you can tell her yourself,"
Rep mumbled.
"I never will. If I ain't downed, I'll have the
Cain brand. That's one iron that can't be blotted, Rep."
Rem
drew in a great breath of the crisp, piney air and went toward Owl- hoot
House. When he rounded a cor- ner, Rep Jones drew a gun and moved to a
window where he could look in.
As he paused at the door, his
hand on the latch, Rem could hear Rom's voice inside. "Honor, you ain't
goin' to croak," he snarled. "You'll live to see me kill that cowardly
Rem, an' make the whole West run when they hear the name of King. Sit
up, Buck." "Rom, I got mine. I just hung an' rattled to get here to
die," Buck Honor groaned. "Rom, I maybe see things clearer now. Maybe
our way ain't the way to carry the King name on."
"Shut that
upl" Rom yelled, and in that instant, Rem went in.
Honor sat
with his back against the wall, his face ashen. There was a bot- tle on
the table before him. Rom sat on the counter, a half-emptied bottle by
his side.
Running the gamut of emotions at Rem's appearance,
rendered Rom speechless at first. He gulped, lifted his bottle and
drank, then hurled it straight at Rem. Rem ducked and the bottle crashed
against the wall.
Rom slid off the counter. Shaking his head,
Rem was the first to speak. "Wait, Rom," he begged. "Listen to me. I've
as much right here as you.
The poor devils you burned out down
below, have a right to this valley for their cattle and homes. After the
years they suffered on account of the trick of a King, it's up to
us—"
"Hush, damn you!" Rom bellowed. "Didn't they trick Satan?
You damn right. One of them did, anyhow. An' you throw in with them, go
against your own kind down there. You think I'd step out an' see them
come in here? Into a valley Satan King found? Cuss the name of King, eh?
Hell, they ain't even started havin' reason to cuss!" Rom settled his
feet apart as his mad rage ran hotter.
"I'm startin' with
you—"
"Wait, Rom!" old Buck Honor cried. Rom's gun was
flashing up. Every nerve and fiber in Rem cried out for speed. Yet he
was slow, held back by the damning fact that this was his brother he
faced.
"Rom!" Buck Honor screamed, and his gun thundered and
echoed in Owl- hoot House. The barrel rested back on the table top, then
the gun slid out of his hand.
Rom King raised both elbows,
stood on his toes. His gun thumped the floor. A ragged sigh passed his
lips, then, and he went down limply.
Rem didn't, couldn't
realize what had happened. His eyes wide, mouth agape, he shook his head
slowly and stared down at Rom. Buck Honor gave a despairing croak,
pushed to his feet. He staggered the distance to Rom and dropped down
beside him. He pulled Rom's head up on his lap.
"Rom, boy,"
Honor sobbed, tears streaming down his grayish, seamed face. "Rom,
listen. You died easy. Not like sufferin' with a bullet in the belly;
not like bein' caged up before they took you out to hang you up. An'
it'd been like that, boy. Maybe the name of King ain't stood for what it
ought. Maybe Satan'll savvy. Rom,
it all come clear to me. The best
way to make the name a proud one was to let Rem pack it on like he's
started. "Rom, you can forgive me?"
"Rem, you reckon Rom'll
under- stand," Honor begged. "He'll know why I done 'er, won't he,
Rem?"
Old Buck Honor shuddered and bent slowly forward. So he
died, his head on Rom's body, a smile on his lips.
THE three
outlaws, standing beside the graves, weren't thinking of the dead. They
were wondering how long it would take them to get out of Damna- tion
Valley.
Rem patted the last piece of sod down on the mound
above Buck Honor. He stood up. Swallowing a lump in his throat, he said,
"I reckon they're both better off. An' they never died without leavin'
somethin' good behind.
"This valley an' its tributaries ain't
goin' to be crowded for a long time. We'll see it ain't. After we get in
a road, we'll build a little town around Owlhoot House, along Ripple
River. We'll have just about all we want or need, down
there."
"Yeah," Rep Jones agreed. "An' what'll you call the
town? Kingville? Satan? Some name like that?"
"Why, no," Rem
answered. "We'll name it after a man who thought enough of another man's
name an' memory, he tore his heart out for it. A man who killed the
thing he loved above all else, in order that, at last, that name would
rightly carry on. Honor worshipped Satan, an' Rom, Sa- tan's crown
prince, meant more to Honor than life itself.
"Honor. That's
what we'll name the place. Honor!"
He moved down the slope
toward Owlhoot House, to get his horse and ride down to love, then back
to Honor, where it would be fine to obey the dis- tates of happiness. .
. .
Cutting sign on a notch-hunter of the Jack Rabbit Kid's
calibre any Range City son but Race Gordon would have thought first of the
two thousand dollar reward offered for the bandit dead or
alive!
Race's weapon had spoken
again!
THE body was sprawled face down in
the dust, arms out- stretched. Blood stained the dead man's shirt. The
stiff whitness of the clutching hands in the early sun- light told young
Race Gordon even be- fore he dismounted that the man was dead. His
horse, a nervous-looking high-bred grey mare, grazed some fifty feet
from the short-cut trail to Range City.
Race hesitated a
moment, standing there looking down at the still form. He finally
stooped and turned the body over, then stepped back, startled,
a
wild scatter of disconnected thoughts chasing through his
brain.
Anyone living within a hundred miles of Range City
would have recog- nized the Jack Rabbit Kid from the reward posters
stuck up all over the country. Most anyone except Race Gordon would have
thought first of the two thousand dollar reward offered for the bandit
dead or alive.
But Race thought of something else: Of the
Kid's reputation, of how the Jack Rabbit Kid had fought and killed.
Every man within a thousand miles was afraid of the Jack Rabbit
Kid.
All of his nineteen years Race had
wanted to be feared and respected like that. And in the last four years
he had had a specially good reason.
When Race had been only
fifteen, he'd heard his father tell how Gatz Blemming and three hired
killers had seized control of Range City and started to drive the small
ranchers out of the valley. Even then Race had sometimes brooded over
the thought of riding to Range City and shooting it out with Gatz
Blemming. But he'd known, of course, how foolish and im- possible it was
and the best he could do was to borrow his dad's gunbelt without his
permission and sneak to a draw in the hills where he practiced his draw
and his aim. His dad, hear- ing the shots one day, had ridden out and
surprised him there.
"Who're ya planning to kill?" Jake Gordon
had asked sternly.
Race had drawn his skinny six feet up an
extra inch and swelled out the strong frame of his sinewy thin chest and
said, "When I grow up, I'll kill anyone who steals from you or Mom or
Ritzy."
"You're mighty young for guns," his dad had said, "but
it's a hard country. Don't reckon ya can learn your shoot- ing any
younger." Jake Gordon had swung his horse and ridden slowly away without
looking back. Race had stared after him for a moment then had re- turned
resolutely to his practicing. That same evening Jake Gordon had given
the lad the guns and the belt and his blessing.
Now it had
been just two years since Cal Fetters, the loyal foreman of Jake
Gordon's Four Bar spread who had stuck by them through a long siege of
drouth and rustling, had found the hon- est old rancher's bullet-ridden
body far out on the north range and the full re- sponsibility of the
Four Bar had been thrust suddenly on Race's youthful
shoulders. Fetters
had told Race, "I know it was Gatz Blemming's men who killed your dad.
We saw the whole thing but it wouldn't be no use me claiming that. I'd
likely just get killed for my trouble."
Race had understood
how things were and he hadn't blamed Fetters for not talking. But as
long as Jake Gor- don was alive, the Range City Bank which Gatz Blemming
had also got con- trol of, had pretended leniency in re- gard to a past
due payment of fifteen hundred dollars against the Four Bar. Hardly,
however, had Race's father been buried before the bank filed fore-
closure notice.
"It means we'll lose everything," Race's
grief-stricken mother had said. And when he looked at her haggard face
he had felt a hot dagger of passion- ate hate stab him deeply. He'd
watched his kid sister, Ritzy, trying to comfort his mother and he'd
sworn in tight- lipped silence that he'd settle with Gatz Blemming
regardless of what happened to himself.
He had started this
day for Range City to make what he knew would be a last futile appeal to
the bank. Then he would try guns. Blemming's hired gunmen, Drag Shanto,
Kale Bletsin or Jake Fundy, might kill him. But some- how it hadn't
seemed to matter. He'd looked into his mother's anguish-filled eyes and
seen the pleading hopelessness in his little sister's face and nothing
much seemed to matter except the need to satisfy a kind of blind madness
like a red burning passion that spurred him on and augmented the
reckless deter- mination of his youth and increased his deep faith in
the rightness of his cause.
RACE recalled, as he looked down
at the Jack Rabbit Kid, how his father had once said, "As long as the
Jack Rabbit Kid lives us small ranch-
ers has
got a chance. The Kid ain't really against what's right even if he is on
the owlhoot. If ya notice right close ya'll see his depredations is
against them what got their positions by robbing and killing. They say
the Kid's dad owned a ranch that was lost almighty mysterious-like when
his old man died."
"Just like me," Race Gordon thought now as
he looked at the corpse. Then he let his bridle strap drop and he
kneeled by the Kid's body. It was still warm. The Kid hadn't been dead
very long. Race straightened the legs and the arms so that when the body
was cold it could still be put on a horse. A sort of wild scheme was
finding shape in his mind. He gave up the useless idea of talking with
Blemming's banker again.
Race unbuckled the Kid's guns, a pair
of perfectly matched pearl-handled weapons. He unbuckled his own, then
took off his trousers and shirt. It was a dank unpleasant business, this
strip- ping the outer clothes from a corpse and putting them on. He
folded his own things neatly and laid them on the ground. Then he tucked
them under the Kid's head so they wouldn't blow away and so they'd be
there when he came back. He grinned at himself mockingly: "When he came
back." What he meant was, "If he came back."
He straightened
and practiced a couple of times drawing those guns of the Kid's. They
balanced in his long fingers and leveled out fine. Race grinned, a hard
chiseled grin like men sometimes wear when they die. He clamped his
teeth tightly together and walked with slow, determined steps to where
the Kid's grey horse was graz- ing.
The mare raised her head
and moved her ears forward. Race spoke to her softly and it seemed odd
how calm and even his own voice sounded. It was
like he'd always
been a killer; as if he knew the horse would stand still and welcome his
weight in the Kid's empty saddle.
He mounted then and rode
toward Range City leaving his own horse graz- ing nearby. He fashioned a
mask for his eyes from a black cloth he found in the Kid's pocket. The
Kid was a tall skinny fellow like himself . . . and men were afraid of
the Kid.
It was noon when Race Gordon rode into Range City
with the black mask over his eyes. He sat straight in the saddle and
kept his face forward. The horse kicked up grey dust that lay in the
street and it drifted heavy in the hot air like a thick ominous cloud
fore- casting a storm.
The few townspeople who were about
ducked out of sight because they thought Race Gordon was the Jack Rabbit
Kid. Race rode to the Wildcat saloon and dismounted. It seemed to him as
if there wasn't much air in the town and he moved along easily as if
walking in a subconscious dream. The batwing doors seemed so light he
strode through hardly knowing he'd pushed them.
Inside, it was
dark and suddenly cool. It occurred to him then that may- be he'd seen
the last of the sunshine but he still kept a grin on his face down under
the mask and he looked a lot like the Jack Rabbit Kid.
There
was the long bar on the right with Blemming's spying white-sleeved
barkeep behind it. Empty chairs and tables cluttered the place. Perhaps
a dozen men were sitting about. Bletsin and Fundy sat at a far corner
table. He didn't see Blemming or Shanto any place about.
Race
knew that every eye was on him and he vaguely wondered why. He'd even
forgotten the mask on his face and didn't realize now that men who
peeked in from the crack of the
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door were watching to see what the
Jack Rabbit Kid was going to do. There was no more sound in the place
than in a graveyard at night.
Race kept looking for Gatz Blem-
ming. But the man he'd come to kill for dry-gulching his father was not
there. Race moved forward with measured steps and stopped by the bar,
then turned his back, hooking his el- bows on the hardwood, unmindful of
the pale-faced, taut-lipped barkeeper behind him.
But he heard
the faint click of metal and knew it was the hammer of a gun being
cocked.
Instinctively he whirled on his toes. A shot sounded
and lead whistled close.. Only his sudden movement had saved him from
the barkeeper's lead when he had tried to shoot Race in the back so he
could claim the reward for the Jack Rabbit Kid.
ONE of the
ivory-handled guns came into Race's hand as Fundy jumped up from his
chair with a weapon raised. Fundy's gun blazed as Race leaped and rolled
over the counter. He pumped lead into the barkeeper's stomach as he
dropped to the floor. He had drawn his second gun in the same movement.
He fired. Fundy stared, gulped and pitched forward.
Bledsin's
gun kept flashing. Lead thudded into the counter. The bar- keeper rolled
over and was still. Race saw blood on the front of the shirt he was
wearing. But the blood was dry. It was the blood of the Jack Rabbit Kid.
Race had sprung from the floor and rolled over the counter in the same
Jack Rabbit movement that had made the Kid famous. The set grin was
still on his face and he hadn't been hit.
He hunkered along
behind the coun- ter now. The shooting stopped. Bled- sin couldn't see
him. Then Race stood erect, got Bledsin squarely lined in
his
sights
and fired. He fired again. Bled- sin clutched at his waist. His gun spun
in the air as he fell.
New bullets hailed across the bar now.
Glass from the mirror and from broken bottles showered down. Men
crouched behind overturned tables. All who weren't cowards were trying
to kill the Jack Rabbit Kid and claim the reward.
Race
hunkered along toward the rear. He reached a rear window and felt a
bullet burn through the flesh of his hip as he toppled through in a
shower of glass. He came to his feet in the alley and found himself
laugh- ing crazily, laughing and running. He'd done for two of the men
that he wanted; he'd have to come back for the others.
A
shower of late lead whistled around the corner of the building as Race
got safely around it. He holstered his guns, ran along the far side and
stopped at the corner. He stood there a split sec-
ond to straighten
his mask.
A dozen men came running, yelling wildly, after the
reward for the Jack Rabbit Kid. Perhaps they thought they had winged
him.
Race held the Kid's guns firmly, one in each hand. He
stepped around the corner and faced them with the guns leveled deadly.
Taken by surprise, the men stopped as if they'd run into a
wall.
"The first man t' level a weapon dies," said Race
Gordon. He appraised them a moment with calm deliberation and knew they
were afraid. Sheriff Ballard wasn't among them and Race was glad of that
because he didn't want to mix with the law or kill any inno- cent
person. He held them off with one pointed gun while he got to the Kid's
grey mare and climbed up into the sad- dle. Bullets followed as he rode
out of town but he was low and skinny in the Kid's saddle and none of
them reached him.
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In the first ravine that would hide
himself and the horse he drew up. His wound was only a scratch and had
al- most stopped bleeding. But it made him feel stiff and it pained.
Still he was grinning and what he had done didn't seem anything
great.
Race waited there in the ravine. He kept thinking of
his mother and of his kid sister and of how his job was only half
finished. He wasn't much afraid of a posse because it seemed the sheriff
had been out of town. If anyone did follow him they'd never expect him
to stop this close to town.
Just after dusk he spurred the
horse out of the ravine and rode back to Range City. It was pitch dark
when he tied the grey mare behind an aban- doned building on the
outskirts of town. He ran eagerly to the rear of the Wild- cat and
found, as he'd expected, that the window he had leaped through had not
been repaired.
Peering through the broken glass he saw that
the place had been cleaned up. There was a larger crowd inside than
there had been at noon. A new barkeeper was serving the
drinks.
Race could only see behind the coun- ter and a little
past the end of it. Out- side the building, he was in shadow and there
was little chance of them seeing him. Suddenly he realized some men were
sitting at a table to his right. He couldn't see them but he could hear
their words.
"You weren't here during the fight at noon, still
ya got a bullet wound," an authoritative voice accused. "How'd it
happen?"
"I tell yuh, Boss, I shot it out with the Jack Rabbit
Kid just before day- light."
RACE strained closer, held his
ear to a glass next to the one which was broken.
about
getting the Jack Rabbit Kid. Suppose you killed him this time?" A low
satirical laugh followed the words. Then Race's teeth snapped together
and his right hand clutched a gun han- dle. He recognized Gatz
Blemming's voice.
"Don't guess I killed him," Shanto was
saying. "But he swayed a lot in the saddle and he didn't follow ... he
spurred out o' range mighty pronto."
Blemming's mocking laugh
rose louder. "Ya slipped, Shanto. Ya al- most admitted he didn't follow
when ya ran away."
The Jack Rabbit Kid's guns came into Race's
hands again, their ivory handles feeling warm and friendly in his grasp.
Their long barrels crashed the remaining glass of the window. He stepped
inside and faced the men at the table.
Shanto's coal black
eyes flashed mixed hatred and fear. He saw the black mask. He recognized
the Jack Rabbit Kid's guns.
The roomful of men stood watching.
Tense. Eager. But hesitant. Gatz Blemming was watching, his hand near
his gun, but making no effort to raise it.
Race let a quick
glance sweep the room. He saw the crowd standing si- lent, motionless,
like tintype pictures of men. Sheriff Ballard stepped suddenly out from
the others and began to move forward.
Race swung around to
face the law- man. He let the muzzles of his guns drop down, dropped the
weapons them- selves back to their holsters. He felt the cold crease of
his grin come back on his face as a plan came to his mind and he watched
with the tail of his eye to see Shanto slowly snaking out his gun. He
felt rather than saw Gatz Blemming shift in his chair. The sher- iff was
still a dozen paces away and Blemming didn't want the Jack Rab- bit Kid
to be taken alive.
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Shanto's gun came up almost level.
Blemming's weapons were ready in his hands. And when Shanto would have
fired Race jerked himself back as a jack rabbit crouches before it leaps
for- ward. As Shanto fired he threw him- self downward and forward and
came to his knees ansjvering the fire both Shanto and Blemming had
started. Race's weapons spoke again and again. They spat out the hate
and lust for vengeance that sprang from inside him. While his leads
drove deep into Shanto and deep in Blemming he felt their leads seeking
his own flesh. He stum- bled, fell, and rolled back through the broken
window.
He got somehow to those few quiet blocks at the edge
of town where he'd tied the Kid's horse in the blackness. Shouting and
the sound of horse's hoofs came from in front of the Wildcat. Race
didn't spur the horse into flight. He held it in check and let it pick
slow steps between the dark buildings that cast no shadows in the
absolute black- ness. The little sound his horse made was lost in the
greater noise of the sheriff's hastily organized posse. Race was a mile
away before the posse was ready, and then they didn't know which way to
follow because of the darkness. DUT the first streaks of dawn found the
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They were less than
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thin, tall youth on a cowpony came leading the grey. The youth looked
familiar to Ballard and a moment later he recognized
Race.
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Race said weakly, "Had quite a
fight, Sheriff, but I killed the Jack Rabbit Kid. I'm claimin' the
reward."
Ballard's eyes narrowed. "Yeah," he said doubtfully.
He rode up to Race and yanked his guns from his holsters. Then he drew
alongside the dead man's mount, drew the ivory handled guns from the
Kid's belt and frowned. Then he fingered curiously the red ribbons of
the Jack Rabbit Kid's torn left shirt sleeve and raised clear, honest
eyes to meet Race's. "You were wearin' the Kid's clothes when you got
yer hand busted up," he accused.
But Race's eyes had fluttered
shut. He reeled in the saddle and a deputy whose horse stood nearest
barely kept him from falling.
He got back his senses on the
way into town. He was riding in front of somebody's saddle and that was
about all he could tell. The jerking of the horse jarred his head and he
couldn't get coherence into his thinking. Pretty soon he passed out
again.
Then he was sitting in old Doc Reyn- old's office and
someone was sponging his face. Sheriff Ballard sat beside him. He felt
pain in his hand, in his arm, down in his leg and in his
hip.
"You're not going to die," the doc- tor
said.
Race tried to grin. He thought vaguely about Billy the
Kid and the luck that went with fighting for a good cause. "Didn't
figure I would," he said, then turned toward the sheriff. "Did you send
word to my folks?"
"I sent a deputy," Ballard said. "They
ought to get here after a little." Race raised on his elbow. He was weak
but he felt a little excited. "I killed the Jack Rabbit Kid, Sheriff. I
shot him in the right side under the arm. You'll find a hole in his
shirt where there isn't one in my body. I took his clothes and rode into
town and I killed four men that every honest man in
town
wanted
killed. And I never killed one of them till he shot at me
first."
The sheriff's face was stern. "You impersonated an
outlaw which gave 'em a right to shoot you on sight."
"They
had their rights," Race grinned. "Only they're dead and I ain't. I'm
still claiming the reward. I've got to have fifteen hundred dollars down
to the bank by tonight to save the Four Bar for mother and Ritzy." Doc
Reynolds put a kind hand on the lad's shoulder. "Son," he said, "Sheriff
Ballard asked me to examine the Jack Rabbit Kid and say how long he's
been dead. I haven't told him yet but I just came across the street and
I saw people standing in little groups and I heard them talking. They're
saying, lad, that the outlaw was the best friend this town ever had.
They're planning to give him a mighty fine fu- neral. They think the
shooting you did was done by the Jack Rabbit Kid. It's better I think
that they shouldn't know any different. You could have killed the Kid
after he did his shooting here. That way you'd be entitled to the reward
and folks couldn't stay mad at you long for killing an outlaw with a
price on his head." The old saw- bones sighed deeply and turned to Bal-
lard.
"Sheriff," he said, "no doctor can tell exactly how long
a man's been dead. If Race Gordon here says he killed the kid, I don't
see how you can prove that he didn't. The Kid was killed with a .45
bullet and that's the caliber of Race's guns."
Ballard smiled
slightly and nodded his understanding. "Guess maybe you're right, Doc.
Race ought t' have the reward."
Race lay back then with a
little sigh of relief. He had a feeling as if the Jack Rabbit Kid were
there in the room saying, "It sounds all right to me, Part- ner. It's
the way I'd want it to be."
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