The 7th Western Novel

by Francis W. Hilton

  “We’ve meant so much to each other. Nothing must end it. I want you to know that.”

  She stirred him with an irritable violence. “That’s past, Joy. We aren’t children any more. You’ve grown up and what I have is not a brother’s feeling.”

  “I know it.” Her voice was hushed.

  “Look here!” He put his hands roughly on her arms and pressed them against her sides. He hurt her and wanted to hurt. “You’ve got one man. What do you think? You can still offer some little part of you to another?”

  “No. It’s only—” She faltered.

  His grip tightened. “Joy, this is nothing you can play with. You’d better not try!”

  Her breath was quick. He could feel the tremble of her body beneath his hard hands. He let her go and stepped back.

  “Anything you want from Doan’s store?”

  She didn’t answer but only shook her head, staring at him. He wheeled from her, shaken by the violence of the feeling she had aroused.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Behind The Buffalo Bones

  In five miles he reached the bend of the river shelf and saw an unexpected sight beyond. Behind in camp he had left Owl-Head Jackson as busy as a monk, shaping up the night’s meal, with a towel around his bald pate against the sting of black gnats and his arms powdered with flour up to the elbows. There was a fire burning beneath the cross rods of a six-foot trench.

  Every pot and Dutch oven the cook had was full.

  It would be something, and he had wanted to get his scouting done and get back. But he saw now he would have to take a more cautious way.

  Far on east of the bend a dozen trail herds flood-bound south of the Red made dark blots against the grass. That was the crowd he had missed by taking an unknown route. He could not judge the number from this distance, anywhere up to forty thousand, a bare fraction of the longhorns pouring north.

  The Indian Supply Company’s Open A might be among them. Or they might have crossed before the rains. He wanted to know some way without his own presence being known. Unless there had been a spy or a leak he hadn’t seen, his Cross T had vanished completely as far as the Open A knew. It was good to leave it like that.

  He slid his horse down the high riverbank and then on the gravel shore rode at a lope again. Little side ravines began to cut the red wall in half an hour’s riding. He came to Doan’s flatboat ferry tied up because of the flood. He had seen no one. He rode on to a point that would bring him up behind the store and hid his horse in the willows.

  Noise of the crowd that had gathered here floated off the rim. He walked directly up into it, the wild, mingled voices of two or three hundred restless men spending their time and money in the only two ways that Doan’s store offered.

  All tree growth in a circular area of a quarter of a mile had been cut for buildings and firewood. The dusty clearing was jammed. Saddled trail horses rimmed it in a solid line near the trees. In the shade of high Pittsburg freight outfits men squatted around card games and dice. He didn’t see a bottle. They drank their whisky out of kegs.

  One group of horses separate from the others made him shake his head with an old disgust. They belonged to the army. He looked at the small hornless McClellan saddles, hung with enough gear of canteens, rolled tents, hobbles and gun scabbards to weigh a horse down without carrying a man, and he thought again it was no wonder that the Indians, riding bare-back and themselves half naked, could run circles around these troopers of Uncle Sam’s. Then this knowledge that the cavalry was here turned him sober. There had to be good reason to bring a patrol this far south.

  He made a wide tour of the other horses but saw no Open A brand, and all the gambling men he passed were strangers to him. He nodded to some and walked through them toward the store. Near it a pile of bleached buffalo bones stood as high as a haystack. That meant the hoe-men were trading here now. They gathered these skeletons left by the old-time hunters and brought them in—the only crop many of them would ever harvest on their dry homesteads.

  He saw some of these men in front of the doorway, mild-looking farmers in their straw hats and bib overalls. But he was not deceived by that mildness. They could fight for their little patches of land. More than the Indians, or any other cause, it was these hoe-men with their shotguns and fences that had crowded the Texas trail drives farther and farther west each year. The day was coming, he knew, when they would swarm on like a plague of locusts the full length of the Red River Valley and the longhorns would never go north this way again.

  Whoever Doan was he didn’t know. This place was here before his first trip up the trail. But the man had built with certain knowledge of Indians and Texas weather. The store was long, narrow, with red earth mounded over the low roof. Oak posts, standing upright close together and their ends deeply buried, formed the walls. There was only one door, in front, and four small windows without glass along one side. Thickly scattered between the posts were slits no more than the width of a rifle barrel.

  As soon as he walked in, even while his eyes caught little at first in the dim light, he had a quick sense of something wrong. The room was not crowded. Trail men took their drinks outside. He saw mostly, among the fifteen or twenty figures, the blue, yellow-striped uniforms of the army moving across the damp clay floor. The talk was low; the smells of tobacco and liquor and oiled leather were right.

  Then farther inside he knew. It was the big Swede’s jovial voice he missed so quickly. Ole Soderlund wasn’t here. He had counted on Ole. They were friends and they could talk, and that talk would never leak out of the Swede’s head.

  A man he didn’t know was on a high stool behind the counter at the back of the room. He was small and wore a black suit with a white shirt, oddly out of place in this frontier store. Shrewd eyes in a pinched face were watching him closely.

  He reached the counter. “Soderlund gone?”

  Only a curt nod answered him.

  “For good?”

  “Sold out.”

  He could feel a guarded suspicion behind the shrewd eyes and he wondered. Did he look like anything but another trail hand?

  “Something you want?”

  “Maybe,” he said and turned away, putting aside for now the one question he had come here to ask.

  Tonight’s celebration called for a treat. He found the sardines on a shelf and took down fourteen cans. A trail crew always ran short of tobacco. He spread his rawhide coat and piled into it, with the sardines, a five-pound box of Honey Dip Twist for the old men who chewed and a dozen cloth sacks of Dixie Durham for the smokers.

  Three army men stood around an open cracker barrel. He turned to one who had a lieutenant’s gold bars. “What brings you boys so far south?”

  The lieutenant smiled. “Whisky.”

  “Well”—he grinned—“there’s plenty of it!”

  He looked at the smooth boyish face and thought the government never did show much sense. Like this youngster. A green West Pointer hardly twenty-two or three sent out here to cut his milk teeth on the Indians.

  Soberly the lieutenant was saying, “You’re right, there’s plenty here. Too much liquor too close to the reservation. I’ll warn you. If you’re going north don’t load up your wagons with more than you need. There’s a tribe loose. If they cut your herd for beef don’t trade them whisky instead.”

  He nodded. “I see.”

  What he saw was a reason for the new trader’s watchfulness. Ole Soderlund had never traded snake-juice across the Red. But it could be a good thing if a man wanted to risk it.

  “Comanches loose again?” he asked.

  “No, it’s the Dakota Cheyennes. They’re out on a hunting permit after antelope. Six hundred of them. But antelope are scarce. Trail beef is a lot easier.” The lieutenant looked stern. “Don’t ask us for help if you get caught. You Texans have got no right crossing the Nations. There’s a treat
y against that.”

  “Sure, a treaty!” This boy was talking out of a book. “Did any Texan sign it? I know. We ought to drive clean around by way of the Mississippi!” Lew grinned and started on. “No hard feelings, Bub. Come and get a good meal if you sight my camp.”

  The Cheyennes loose were bad news. He understood about the Dakota Cheyennes. By what fool decision the government was set on making Northern Indians live in the South he didn’t know. It wasn’t home and they wouldn’t stay. Only three years ago they had made a break in the dead of winter. Eleven hundred that time, leaving a swath of burned ranches and dead whites as far as Dakota. Troops brought them back.

  A great chief, Red Cloud, had led that break. Red Cloud was not here now; he was a guest at the capitol in Washington where ladies of the Indian Friends’ Society were making fools of themselves and a bigger one out of him. It was all in the papers. As good a way as any, Lew guessed, to tame a wild Cheyenne. But there were young chiefs with the tribe, more dangerous even than the old one because they knew white men’s tricks and had known white women. He could handle them if they stayed sober. Outtalk them and present a few old mossyhorns from the herd. But full of whisky—He was back again at the counter, spreading out his coat. He stacked five silver dollars on the boards. “Right?”

  The man nodded and he rolled his coat around the bundle once more, and then, casually, he asked, “Has an Open A herd crossed here yet?”

  A thin hand reached out for the cartwheels and dropped them into an iron cashbox.

  “Who’s looking for the Open A?”

  “I asked, didn’t I?”

  “You did. That’s what I want to know.”

  He shrugged, warned. “Never mind. My question wasn’t so important.”

  He walked out slowly, taking his time, yet even more guarded, and threw a long look around the clearing before he turned toward the river. He had seen nothing. But as soon as he was gone a man whom he might have recognized stepped from behind the buffalo-bone pile and hurriedly entered the store.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The Rattle Of Guns

  The late afternoon turned gray beneath a bank of thunderclouds. Dark thunderheads piled up, flat at the base, round on top. Loping back along the river bottom, that was his only troubling thought. A storm would spoil the evening’s celebration.

  Night fell swiftly. He climbed up into the darkness of the flat shelf. Campfires of those herds at the crossing were out of sight now, but ahead was a single huge blaze to guide him.

  Still a mile off, he could see figures moving in that wide circle of light. Trees stood up above them tall and red. He caught a drift of music and grinned. An organ had never been played in this spot before!

  Then someone must have heard his approach, for all of the figures stood suddenly motionless, until he yelled, “Let her rip, boys! Go on with the dance!”

  He picketed his horse and walked in with his bundle. The cook met him as complaining as a wife.

  “Where you been? Supper’s gettin’ cold!” A white towel stood up around his bald brown head like a chef’s hat. He wore a burlap sack for an apron.

  “Fishing,” Lew said.

  He dumped his sardines on the endboard of the chuck wagon. Part of the meal was stacked there in a deep pan, thin steaks floured and cooked quickly in hot lard. They made a golden pile, juicy meat coated with crisp batter. Over the fire pit two long combs of ribs were braising.

  Quarternight came in from the outer darkness and stopped to say, “I only left a two-man guard, Lew. Moonlight and Splann offered. Guess it’s safe enough for a while.”

  “I guess,” he said.

  The music had stopped. He turned and started toward Joy’s wagon, then checked himself, feeling suddenly unneeded over there. The canvas top was rolled all the way up at the sides. Joy sat at the cabinet organ, her hands idle on the keys now as she leaned over toward Clay Manning, who stood against the front wheel, one booted foot raised to the hub.

  In this moment, wholly unaware of him or anybody else, they made a picture very clear in the firelight which he did not want to watch and yet could not help watching. For he could see the long softening of Joy’s lips and her dark eyes filled with something grave and strange and sweet and meant for Clay alone. They were not speaking but only looking at each other, Clay’s face turned ruddy and faintly smiling beneath her searching gaze.

  They were like that long enough for him to feel the force of the thing that bound them. And then Owl-Head’s shout broke it.

  “Come on, you hogs!”

  He saw her straighten quickly. She caught his eyes and flushed as if with some guilt. Clay dropped his foot from the wheel hub. His big arms went up and brought her lightly over the wagon’s side and he came on, still hugging her up against him.

  “Lew”—he grinned—“you missed the singing.”

  He put her down at the end of a long cottonwood split in halves for a table.

  “Honey,” he said, “you sit right there. I’m going to serve you with my own lily hands!”

  The line of men was already moving past the fire pit. They loaded their tin plates with steaks and laid braised ribs on top. At the table they marked their places by dropping their hats on the bedrolls drawn up for seats, came back to the pit again for beans and cornbread out of the Dutch ovens and pickles from the chuck-wagon keg. They poured blackstrap molasses over their bread and grinned when the cook tossed each one a can of sardines. But all talk soon died. Eating was a sober business.

  Only Joy said, “Lew, just like Christmas!” and smiled at him, her eyes lingering with a steady warmth as if to tell him something.

  He didn’t understand the look, but this meal was like Christmas dinner, that one time at home on the Cross T when crew and family ate together in the big front room. A ruddy glow from the pit flooded the bent dark and light and bald heads as if from the fireplace of the room, while branches of elm and oak arched a roof above them.

  He was halfway along the table with Rebel John, his inevitable partner, at his right elbow. Tom Arnold occupied one end, Joy the other. He watched Tom.

  It was a picture he liked to remember, for a quiet smile had crossed the old man’s stern and weathered face. Maybe it was the talk of Christmas carrying him back. Those were good days for him, when his children were small and his power on the Little Comanche was unbroken and none of them could imagine they would ever be leaving Texas.

  This was their last meal on Texas soil. He looked around the table and knew that some of these men, chances were, would never come back to it. He saw Joy watching him again.

  “What’s the news from Doan’s?” she asked.

  “Not much.”

  The dress she had on tonight was suddenly familiar, made of fine cream-colored linen with a high collar and long sleeves. A narrow red ribbon drawn tight above her waist shaped a woman’s full softness. She had worn that dress the night of the Ox Bow dance, when Clay Manning had told the world she was going to be his wife.

  “A dozen herds,” he said, “held up south by the flood. Hoe-men are crowding in along the river. Saw a troop of yellow-legs around,” he added but didn’t say what they were there for. No use bringing up about the Dakota Cheyennes.

  He saw Clay, around the corner of the table at Joy’s right, lift his blond head.

  “What outfits did you see?”

  “Strangers mostly.” He waited, feeling there was another question in Clay’s mind.

  But Clay dropped his head and went on eating.

  It was Steve, directly across the table, who brought out casually, “Didn’t see the Open A, did you? Guess they’re too far on.”

  “No,” he said, “don’t think they are, Steve,” and watched a change set instantly across the boy’s face. “They didn’t have enough start on us. The river’s been higher than it is now, maybe up for a week. You can tell that b
y ring marks on the trees.” He saw the tight look grow. “We’re even with them, I figure, and got a good chance to get ahead.”

  He had been feeling better about Steve these past days. The hounded look of watching his back trail seemed to have gone, as if Steve felt easier somehow as they approached the north line of Texas. But that look was there again now. In some way the Indian Supply herd being behind them, and not ahead, made a difference.

  Yet he was learning a man’s guard and that boyish giveaway passed quickly. Only Tom Arnold showed he had caught it. He paused with a coffee cup half lifted, his puckered gaze fixed intently on his son.

  Other talk started up around the table, of when the river might drop, whether they would swim or wait for a low-water crossing, and a long-winded discussion drawled out by Ash Brownstone, a lanky horse-faced man, about what you did when you couldn’t sleep—he carried a little box of pills he highly recommended. Nobody listened; they’d heard it all before. Then the meat pan and plates were empty and Owl-Head was coming from his wagon with a board cradled in his arms. He set it down and pulled off the flour sack that had covered it and stood up with all of his bald face beaming.

  “Judas priest!” young Jim Hope yelled. “Why didn’t you tell me? I done et my belly full!”

  He stared at the seven dried-apple pies with sugared crusts and groaned.

  “Jimmy,” Lew said, “never mind. I’ll take yours.”

  When Owl-Head had cut the pies exactly in halves and had given each man his piece he saw that the red-freckled kid was not the only one who’d had plenty. Tom Arnold finished part of his and sat there waiting, until the other plates rattled empty again. He stood up.

  “Lew,” he said, “it’s a shame to have anyone eat seconds at a meal like this. I’m going out to relieve Moonlight and Splann.” He looked down at Steve. “You want to come along?”

  “Say!” Steve objected. “Why me? What’s the rush anyway?” His back stiffened, his face going young and truculent.

  Never was a time, Lew thought, when the pup didn’t show himself at his worst to his father. He expected the old flare between them.