Ranch War

by J. T. Edson

  “I’d say they was expecting trouble,” she commented sotto-voce.

  “Then don’t you go starting it,” warned the Kid in no louder tones.

  “As if I would!” Calamity whispered.

  Going past the hound, they halted their horses in front of the couple. The Kid took off his hat and addressed the man and woman.

  “Howdy, folks. We found this sabino ’n’ bay straying back down the trail a ways and was wondering if they’d come from here.”

  Looking at the two horses, the man paid most attention to the sabino and its distinctive Mexican-style saddle. There was a strong hint of suspicion as he swung his eyes from the horse. He seemed to be studying the land behind Calamity and the Kid before he answered, and when he spoke, his voice was cold, unfriendly.

  “They don’t belong here.”

  That appeared to end the matter as far as he was concerned. Which struck the Kid as peculiar, if not downright suspicious. A saddled, riderless horse had always been a cause of grave concern in the West. Left afoot, a man could be in serious danger. So folks mostly displayed interest on being told that a horse had been found straying. The man did not appear to care, although two such animals were involved.

  “Coffee’s on the boil,” the woman put in, running her eyes over Calamity’s travel-stained, hard-ridden appearance. “You look like you could do with a cup and a hot meal.”

  “Thanks,” Calamity replied. “I could use both, happen you’d let me help you make ’em.”

  “Light and rest your saddles,” the man offered, just a touch reluctantly. “Water your hosses at the trough, then come on in.”

  “He knowed that sabino,” Calamity told the Kid as they went to follow the man’s instructions. “And he sure don’t act sociable.”

  “Maybe he’s got his reasons,” the Kid replied. “So don’t you go letting on who you are and maybe we’ll find out what’s up.”

  With their horses’ welfare attended to, Calamity and the Kid rejoined the couple before the house. The bluetick sat between the man and the woman, looking as unfriendly as a buffalo-wolf. Glancing around, the Kid saw that the cowhands had resumed their interrupted work.

  “That’s a real fine horse, mister,” the man said, nodding to the Kid’s stallion. “He wouldn’t be for sale, would he?”

  “Had him so long he’s plumb ruined for decent company,” the Kid answered.

  “You look as if you’ve covered some miles,” the woman said, directing her words to the girl.

  “Come up from Mulrooney,” Calamity replied. “I’m meeting my boss’ freight outfit when it comes through. I’m Calamity Jane and this’s the Ysabel Kid.”

  The man and woman looked from one to the other of their visitors. If anything, Calamity was the better known to them, although something of the Kid’s fame appeared to have spread to Nebraska. Some of the suspicion left the man’s face, but it still held a wary look.

  “I’m Cash Trinian,” he said, with a hint of challenge in his voice and his right hand dangling by the Colt’s butt. “This’s my wife, Corey-Mae.”

  “I won’t make out I’ve not heard of you,” drawled the Kid, holding forward his right hand. “But the War’s long over and best forgot.”

  For a moment Trinian hesitated. Then he nodded and took the offered hand in his. “Like you say, Kid, it’s long over and best forgot. Only there’s some on both sides haven’t forgotten.”

  “Cash rode with Lane’s Red-Legs in the War, Calamity,” Corey-Mae explained.

  Not that she needed to do so. Calamity remembered stories of Cash Trinian during the War between the States. In those days he had won a reputation as a fast-drawing, hard-riding member of Lane’s band of Union guerillas, an outfit every bit as vicious, bloodthirsty and murderous as Dixie’s Quantrill’s raiders. Yet there had been decent youngsters riding with each of the outfits, believing that they were serving their side’s cause. Cash Trinian had been one of them. After the War, the fast-gun name had stuck. Such a man might be wary when a strange Texan, of a breed noted for being gun-fighters, came calling unexpectedly.

  “The Kid was with Mosby,” Calamity replied disinterestedly. “Anyways, men’re allus doing some fool thing like going to fighting where us women’d set down and talk it out peaceable.”

  “Yeah, Cash,” grinned the Kid. “She is Calamity Jane. Even if she just said that mouthful.”

  “Come in and rest your feet.” Corey-Mae smiled. “I agree with Calamity.”

  “Now she won’t be fit to talk to for a week,” groaned the Kid.

  Stepping aside, the Trinians let Calamity and the Kid enter the house’s parlor. The room had good-quality furnishings and was clean, but not to the point of discomfort. Clearly Corey-Mae took as much pride in her home as her husband appeared to in the upkeep of the ranch. Telling her husband to make their guests comfortable, Corey-Mae bustled off into the kitchen.

  Trinian removed his gunbelt and hung it on the magnificent spread of wapiti horns fixed to the wall by the door. Following their host’s example with belts and hats, Calamity and the Kid exchanged glances.

  “I’ll go lend Corey-Mae a hand,” Calamity announced and left before Trinian could agree or object.

  Waving the Kid to a chair at the table, Trinian sat across from him. The Kid offered his makings and they rolled cigarettes.

  “You found them two hosses straying back there?” Trinian asked, after they had lit up their smokes.

  “Yep,” drawled the Kid. “Shouted some, fired off a couple of shots, trying to get an answer from whoever’d lost ’em. Even tried to back-track ’em but couldn’t. So we reckoned we’d best take ’em into Hollick City and hand ’em over to the sheriff. Only we saw your place and wondered if they belonged to your hands. Reckoned you’d want to know if they did.”

  “They don’t.”

  “You know who does own ’em? There can’t be many folks riding Mexican saddles up this way.”

  “I’ve not seen one for some time now. Mexican called Ruiz used to ride a sabino, with a saddle like that, but he’s not around anymore that I’ve seen.”

  “We’d best take ’em into town then,” drawled the Kid. “Only there’s some tin stars who’d just keep, or sell the hosses, without trying to find who owned ’em.”

  “Day Leckenby’s not that kind!” Trinian stated flatly. “If you found them in his bailiwick, he’ll do everything he can to learn where the riders are at. He’s a straight lawman. I was his deputy until I come out here and I know him.”

  “Like you say, you’d know him,” the Kid replied. “Anyways, all Calam ’n’ me want to do is hand ’em over and find some place to bed down until Dobe Killem’s freight outfit gets here.”

  “Are you going in for freighting now?”

  “Nope. Only Calam’s done stood by us floating outfit boys in a couple of mean fusses and I reckoned I’d see her settled safe with her folks afore I headed back to Texas. Somebody tried to kill her in Mulrooney.”

  “They did?” Trinian asked, looking interested.

  “Twice. Once in her hotel room and again on the streets, that’s how I come into it.”

  “Did you get the feller who tried it?”

  “Sure did.”

  “Why’d he want to kill her?” Trinian asked.

  “Had to kill him to stop him doing it,” the Kid replied, watching the other’s face for some emotion. “So we couldn’t ask. Kail Beauregard was looking into it when we left.”

  If Trinian knew anything about the attempts, he hid it very well. Not wanting to arouse the other’s suspicions by taking the matter further, the Kid changed the subject to the ranching prospects of Nebraska.

  In the kitchen, Calamity peeled off her jacket, washed her hands and face, then went to help Corey-Mae make the meal.

  “Nice place you’ve got here,” the girl remarked. “I bet you’re real proud to own it.”

  “We don’t own it,” Corey-Mae corrected while setting a skillet on the stove.

  �
��You don’t?”

  “No,” the woman answered, sounding a touch bitter. “We only rent it from the feller who owns it.”

  “Doesn’t he run it?”

  “That shows you don’t know Howie Canary. He was a nice enough feller, but a foot-loose drifter. Afore he left, he put the title deed to the ranch in the name of his daughter back East. That riled Cash, I can tell you.”

  “How come?”

  “Cash wanted to buy the place. We was getting set to be married and he knew I wanted him in a safer job than a deputy sheriff.”

  “You wound up here, anyways,” Calamity pointed out.

  “Sure,” Corey-Mae agreed. “We wound up here. Howie wanted hard cash for the place to send to his daughter back East. We didn’t have it right then, so he told us to come out here, work the place and pay its taxes and, when we could afford it, buy it from the gal.”

  “Looks like you got a bargain.”

  “You should have seen it when we first moved out here. The whole place was tumbling apart. Cash and the boys’ve worked real hard to make it look this good. And it doesn’t just look good, it’s a paying proposition. What riles me is that we’ve done all this work and some Eastern gal who’s never seen the place can take it and sell it out from under us if she feels that way inclined.”

  “Why don’t you try buying it off her?” Calamity asked.

  “We’re trying to,” Corey-Mae answered. “Lawyer Endicott in Hollick’s sent word East trying to find this Canary gal. If he does, we’re willing to pay her six thousand dollars for the place. Hell, I know it’s worth maybe three, four thousand more, but it’s our work that’s made it that way. And we’re having to pay Pinkertons to find her. It’s not a bad price, Calam, when all the ranch cost Howie was the time he spent in a poker game. He won it off the feller’s used to own it.”

  “Getting it this good cost you a heap more than that,” Calamity said softly and was about to disclose her identity when the woman’s face hardened.

  “It cost us too much to let anybody push us off!” Corey-Mae said harshly.

  “Is somebody trying to?” Calamity inquired. “I saw the way your crew watched us as we rode in.”

  “Florence Eastfield, up at the sawmill, wants our land,” Corey-Mae answered. “Don’t ask me why. There’s no timber on this side of the Loup. Not enough to make cutting it worthwhile, anyways.”

  “Has she been making fuss for you?”

  “Not fuss, exactly. Day Leckenby, the sheriff, keeps her boys and our’n apart in town, or they might’ve locked horns a couple of times. Eastfield offered to buy us out. And when we told her we couldn’t sell, even if we wanted to, she hinted that she could top any offer we made to the Canary gal. Damn it all, Calamity, I don’t know why I’m burdening you with our troubles.”

  “Sometimes just talking about them helps,” Calamity replied. “Food’s near on done. Can I start to setting the table?”

  “Go to it.” Corey-Mae smiled.

  Throughout the meal, the conversation was on general matters. At its end, Calamity offered to help wash the dishes.

  “Maybe you’d best get those hosses took into Hollick for the sheriff,” Trinian suggested.

  “It’d be best,” the Kid agreed. “Thanks right kindly for the meal, ma’am.”

  Leaving the house, Calamity and the Kid readied their horses, mounted and started to ride back along the track. Turning in her saddle, the girl waved. Corey-Mae answered, then went inside after her husband. Facing the front, Calamity told the Kid what she had learned.

  “You didn’t let on that you’re that Canary gal from ‘back East,’ which’s all to the good,” the Kid replied, then explained that he had not learned much from Trinian. “Maybe he’s just uneasy around Texans.”

  “I knowed there was something I liked about him, that being the case,” Calamity grinned, then lost the smile. “Those folks’re facing a raw deal, Lon.”

  “Maybe they felt like changing it,” the Kid hinted.

  “Not Corey-Mae!”

  “Maybe not her. But Lane didn’t have many angels riding with him and Cash Trinian didn’t strike me as a man who’d easy give up anything he wanted.”

  “You just don’t like Yankees,” Calamity accused.

  “I get on real good with some Yankees,” the Kid corrected. “Trinian’s not much of a talker. Unlikely as it is, us being so all-fired noble and easy to get on with, he mightn’t like Texans. Or he may be up to something sneaky, like that play in Mulrooney. That being so, he’d be real watching with his words to somebody who’d come up from there in a hurry and’d worn a deputy’s badge in town.”

  “You mean he hired them two jaspers?”

  “Could be. He let on that he knowed a Mexican who owned a sabino, but no more than that. Even with what he’d have to pay The Outfit, it’d likely come out cheaper and more certain killing you rather than offering to buy you out.”

  “There’s another player in the game, with an eye on the Rafter C,” Calamity commented. “Gal who owns a sawmill across the Loup.”

  “Trinian never let on about her,” the Kid said quietly. “Why’d somebody’s owns a sawmill want ranching country?”

  “Maybe we’ll get a chance to ask her when we hit Hollick City,” Calamity replied. “Cash recognized the sabino. I’ll be right interested to see if that Eastfield gal shows she does.”

  Chapter 11 I’M GOING TO STOP YOU DEAD

  A COUPLE OF TYPICAL SMALL-TOWN LOAFERS SEATED outside the Clipper Saloon took their eyes from the four horses at its hitching rail and looked at the two riders coming along Hollick City’s main, almost only, street. To make sure that Hogue’s and Ruiz’s mounts did not go unnoticed, Calamity and the Kid led them on the outside of their relays. Staring at the sabino for a moment, one of the loafers rose and passed hurriedly through the batwing doors.

  Giving no hint of their awareness that the sabino had attracted attention, Calamity and the Kid rode by the saloon. They turned toward the hitching rail of the stone building with barred windows and a sign announcing “SHERIFF’S OFFICE, Hollick City.”

  “There’s somebody who knowed the sabino,” drawled the Kid. “Gone to spread the word it’s back, most likely.”

  “Them four hosses outside the saloon didn’t have ropes on their saddles,” Calamity replied. “Which means they don’t belong to cow——They’re coming, Lon. Four of ’em.”

  Dismounting, the Kid slid his Winchester from its boot before tossing the horses’ reins over the hitching rail. While Calamity swung down and secured her relay, he turned his eyes quickly toward the approaching men. All in all, they looked like bad medicine to run up against.

  Three of them wore range clothes, but they were not cowhands. All were tall. The one slightly in the lead was best-dressed of them, swarthily handsome, with black hair. To his right, was a slightly bigger, thicker-set hard-case with ginger side-whiskers. At the left rear, the third man was smaller than the others—which did not make him a midget—brown-haired and unshaven. One thing all had in common. They each wore their guns—a pearl-handled Smith & Wesson 1869 Army revolver in the leader’s case—in tied-down holsters.

  Which left the fourth of the party. Studying him as he slouched along in the rear, the Kid was willing to admit that he had a size and heft almost equal to Mark Counter. There the resemblance ended, for the man had neither Mark’s handsome features nor superb build. A shaved head, creased by a long scar, did nothing to enhance a brutal, bristle-stubbled face. He hardly seemed to have any neck, but spread out to bulky shoulders that strained at his tartan shirt. There was little slimming down at his middle. He wore Levi’s pants tucked into heavy, flat-heeled boots with sharp-spiked caulks in the soles. First thing to strike the Kid, though, was that he did not wear a gun. Instead, he toted a long-handled, double-headed axe that looked as sharp as many a knife.

  “Hey you!” called the handsome man as Calamity swung on to the sidewalk.

  “Us?” asked the Kid mildly, joining the
girl.

  At the sight of the rifle, held at the wrist of the butt with three fingers in the lever and the forefinger through the trigger, the man came to a halt. That was a position of readiness, allowing the weapon to be brought into action fast.

  “Yeah,” the man agreed. “Where’d you get the sabino?”

  “Found it straying, along with the bay there, back along the trail,” the Kid replied, facing the quartet.

  “How’d they come to be straying, cow-nurse?” demanded the ginger-haired man.

  “Best ask ’em,” answered the Kid. “They’ve not told us a thing.”

  “Don’t get smart with us, beef-head!” warned the handsome man and indicated the fourth member of his party with his left thumb. “Olaf don’t like folks who do.”

  “Olaf don’t like it one lil bit!” rumbled the giant, hefting his axe and pushing by his companions to advance along the sidewalk.

  Watching the almost babyish innocent expression on the Kid’s face, Calamity inched her right hand in the direction of the whip. When he looked that way, the Kid was at instant readiness for trouble. Unless those four yahoos backed off, there was likely to be an explosion and she wanted to be set to take her part.

  Studying the giant, the Kid figured that he would take a whole heap of stopping happen he meant mischief. However, the Indian-dark Texan reckoned that he held the means of doing the stopping—except that the other three hombres were likely to cut in the moment the big cuss made his play. Ignoring the rifle, the giant continued to advance.

  There was something awesome about the bald man’s behavior, hinting at a complete disregard for danger, almost animal strength and power, and a lack of fear. Behind him, the three gunslingers tensed. Maybe the giant did not recognize the Kid’s potential, but they did. Yet they made no attempt to warn their companion.

  “Just one more step!” thought the Kid, measuring the distance between them with his eye. “One more ’n’ I’m going to stop you dead.”

  Every instinct warned the Kid that he would have to do just that. Nothing else would halt that brute-man before him. And then all hell would pop. Most likely Calamity would take one of the gun-hands out of the game. Possibly the Kid could account for another; but the third stood a better than even chance of making Ole Devil’s floating outfit short of a member.