The 7th Western Novel

by Francis W. Hilton

  Beer turned to Rylan. “Got a couple of men on hand, sergeant?”

  “Well, I made militia out of a few townsmen—” It was obvious that Rylan was enjoying this.

  Beer turned back to the lady. “I’d hate to have to use force.” Phyllis Sydnor came apart then. She grabbed at Beer’s shirt. “You’ve got to let me go, go back to the store!” She shook him, and her voice rose to a scream. “My husband just let me go home to put on these clothes, he’s waiting, I have to go…”

  People, mostly women, were crowding out of the lobby, staring curiously, as Phyllis Sydnor shook Beer. “I tell you, I have to go back, got to, gotta…”

  Beer made a motion with his hand. Rylan, no longer grinning, reached out for the lady’s shoulders. She evaded him and grabbed Dan this time. “Dan, make him, make him let me go back, lemme, lemme…”

  Dan twisted loose, and Rylan grabbed her. He thrust her towards the lobby door. “Miz’ Lea, some of you women, get her in there, keep her. She’s not to get out.”

  Phyllis Sydnor screamed, piercingly. Her hair was coming down over her eyes, a button had burst open among the lace on her bosom, the heavy serge riding skirt had swiveled around and hung draggle-tailed from her hips. But her eyes were dry. “You got to, got to, lemme go—”

  Ellen Lea had her now. The girl, slimmer than Phyllis Sydnor, was showing remarkable strength. She twisted Phyllis’ arm behind her and clapped the other hand over the older woman’s mouth. “She’ll stay here if I have to tie her,” Ellen Lea said, panting. Her blouse had pulled away from one shoulder, disclosing a series of silk straps. But suddenly she grinned at Dan Younge, and then, more briefly, at Beer. “Don’t worry,” she said. “She’ll stay here—and quiet—if I have to put her in Mr. Shurtz’s icebox.”

  Beer was telling the wide-eyed women in the doorway that Mrs. Sydnor was under arrest, that he’d explain it later.

  Rylan had gone back to the command desk. The women had drifted back into the lobby, craning their necks up the hotel staircase. No doubt Ellen Lea had taken the lady up there and was now tying her to a bed.

  Dan Younge said, “Beer, let’s put a little strategy and tactics to this mess.”

  They pulled up porch chairs on either side of Rylan’s. Dan said, “With your permission, gentlemen, I’ll review the situation.”

  Rylan’s expression was one of complete amazement.

  Beer said, “Sergeant, our gambling friend’s got a resurgence of hope.”

  “It’s a long word for going daft,” Rylan said. “Hope’s not a thing I’d look around for just now. Not in Rock Spring.”

  Dan Younge said: “It’s nothing to you and me, sarge. Just our lives. But to Mr. Beer, now, it’s a chance to take a step towards that generalship he aims for.”

  “For a noble defense of the town of Rock Spring, Second Lieutenant James V. Beer is hereby posthumously brevetted First Lieutenant, and his grave shall be marked accordingly.”

  “My gawd,” Rylan said, “I’ve soldiered with this officer for a year and over, an’ he finally made a joke.”

  Dan Younge said intently, “We’re on the bottom. We’ve got no place to go but up, to victory, to use a fancy word. We can be reasonably certain of one thing: the miners are going to come into town, probably tonight, certainly within a night or two.”

  “Make it tonight,” Rylan said. “That’s my department.”

  Beer said, “I can take two troopers and wipe them out as they come out of the tunnel under the rock, the cave, whatever it is. Incidentally, you’d better show it to me.”

  “Yes,” Dan Younge said. “Now, leave that enemy alone for the minute; take the next one.”

  “The Indians?” That was Rylan. His voice was heavy again. “Too many and too scattered for the men over in the livery stable, supposing they’d fight.”

  Dan Younge said: “The second enemy is Sydnor. And his force, which, so far as we know, consists of Jack Romayne, and a sad-eyed weeper named Willows.”

  Beer said: “We can tie them up with one length of clothesline. And that leaves the Indians.”

  Dan Younge said at once, “We don’t bother Sydnor and Romayne, we don’t bother the miners. We use them as bait to draw the Shoshone off.”

  Lieutenant Beer’s reaction was simple. He asked one word, “How?”

  Dan Younge stared out at the deserted street. “They tell me Indians talk with those drums we’re hearing.”

  Rylan said, “That’s right. They can pass quite a message along.”

  “So all I have to do is get to one Indian camp—anyone with a drummer—and they’ll be able to send for that squaw man, what’s his name, Nate Allen?”

  Suddenly Rylan said, “Someone’s coming out of Sydnor’s store.” His voice snapped. “You, Strayne! Parley here! Cover it.” A trooper materialized out of the night, and brought his carbine up across his chest and stood waiting. “It’s Sydnor,” Rylan said. “I’ll wash the other up fast for you, Dan. I can give you the Indian’s sign for peace, the way to hold your hand, hold your horse’s bridle. I can give you the Ute word for the same thing, to shout, and I hear the Shoshone talk much the same as the Ute. I can give you no hope that it’ll work, and I’m a sorry kind of Indian expert at best.”

  Sydnor was not ten feet away now. Beer said sharply, “I’ll do the talking, and I don’t expect to be interrupted.”

  Charley Sydnor blustered up to Rylan’s desk, and slapped it hard with his beefy hand. “My wife went up-canyon to our house an hour and more ago. I want her back. Your damned tin soldiers won’t let me go!”

  Lieutenant Beer said, “Your wife is in the hotel. She’ll stay there.”

  Sydnor said: “I want her back. I…”

  Beer made an almost imperceptible gesture, and the guard dropped his carbine so that it pointed straight at Charley Sydnor. The storekeeper slapped out at the barrel of the gun. Strayne stepped back, and Sergeant Rylan said: “Ready! Aim…”

  Sydnor’s face was purple in the light that beamed from the hotel. He took a couple of deep breaths, then turned and pounced across the dusty street to his store.

  Beer said softly, “What do you make of that?”

  Dan Younge said, “There’s a desperate man. I think he thinks the miners won’t take him along if he hasn’t women, or a woman, to offer them. I expected him to demand Ellen Lea, too, and if he had, I would have…”

  Beer said, “And Sergeant Rylan would have broken your wrist. We need him alive and in his store. For the ambush of the miners.”

  Dan Younge said, “All right. I leave now, and then you let Sydnor and the miners go. Meanwhile, I’ll have gotten to the Indians, told them the men they want are coming out of town. It may hold them.”

  Beer said: “What do you need?”

  Dan Younge said: “Three things. In the first place, the Indian word and sign Rylan promised me. In the second place, your consent to go past the sentries.”

  “That’s two,” Beer said. “How about the third?”

  “I need luck,” Dan Younge said.

  CHAPTER XXV

  It is pleasant to lope a horse across flat country—in the daytime. Under nothing but starlight, when you know there are gopher holes and prairie dog burrows, it is not so pleasant.

  Dan Younge loped anyway.

  From time to time he glanced off to the left, towards the vague general direction of the malapie. He didn’t think starlight could show him anything there. At any angle that the miners came into town, they’d be a couple of miles away.

  Dan Younge looked anyway.

  Now he was in the old Indian camp. His muscles tightened between his shoulders, his fingers gripped the reins.

  Nothing. Nothing but dead fires, grassless circles where the tents had been. A dead dog. A pile of deer guts from which coyotes scurried as he came up. A couple of broken travois poles.

&n
bsp; Dan Younge loped on through the camp.

  There. Something had moved. He fought all the impulses of his body, that wanted to reach for the guns he wasn’t wearing, wanted to pull the horse up and dismount, take cover. He rode slowly toward the moving figure, his hands wide, his voice yelling, “Friend,” in what he hoped wasn’t a coward’s croak.

  When he was almost up on the moving figure, it stopped, and a voice said, “Beer, boss? You got whiskey, mister?”

  It was Blanket Moe, the Indian bum who had hung out on Sydnor’s porch. How he had gotten out of Rock Spring was a mystery, but not a very big one. He was an Indian, what was left of him, and an Indian was a good man to sneak past picket lines.

  The poor old beggar was shuffling along, hunched over. It was probably that he hardly knew what he had said to Dan Younge. He had just uttered his usual request to anyone.

  But he was a rat who’d left Rock Spring’s sinking ship; and he was an Indian trying to catch up with his people, so maybe he knew which direction to take.

  Dan Younge took a sight over Moe’s head, and loped on.

  Starlight and stunted sage, some rocks, some mesquite tree. And then, over a rise, firelight and the noise of drums, loud enough to be heard over the thudding of his horse’s hooves.

  Dan Younge stood up in the saddle, pulled the horse down to a walk, and did an extra-specially good job of keeping his hands clear. He started shouting, “Friend,” over and over again, shouting and counting three and shouting again.

  Abruptly the drum stopped, and the fire went out, all at once. Someone must have sacrificed a blanket or a buffalo robe to douse a campfire that fast.

  Indians don’t fight at night. Who said Indians don’t fight at night? How did he know?

  On the twentieth shout of peace, two sage clumps quickly came to life, and hands grabbed his bridle reins, hands grabbed him around the waist, and he was hauled off his horse.

  A voice—young, Indian, unfriendly—said, “Walk so!”

  Or maybe it didn’t. Maybe that was an Indian word—wauk-soh—meaning something like now you die or come eat supper. He didn’t know. He couldn’t tell. He went with the young Indian. He said, “Friend, I am a friend,” but there was no response.

  He was thrust into the firelight, surrounded by Shoshone men. There were no women, no children, no old men in this party, and it didn’t take a bright mind to read the meaning of that. Something glinted at a brave’s belt, and he looked and saw a freshly-taken scalp, looked further and saw that two other young men had taken trophies too.

  That was why Beer had declared martial law, of course; people had been slipping out of Rock Spring. And this was where they had ended up—ornaments on a warrior’s belt.

  He said: “Nate Allen. I want to talk to Nate Allen.”

  That got an answer, he guessed. At least one of the Indians said something to the others. Then a brave laughed, and stepped forward and slapped Dan Young across the face.

  He said: “Friend. I am a friend. I want to see Nate Allen.”

  That got an answer too, for what it was worth. A Shoshone grunted something to the others that sounded like Nate Allen’s name.

  Of course. Squawmen were never called by their names in the tribe. Nate Allen would be something like Grizzlehead or Mushroomeater or Man Who Shot the Bear.

  But he had had a little encouragement. They understood him. He said again, “I am a friend. I come in friendship. We have found the ones who killed your people. I can show these killers to you.”

  They weren’t laughing now. He had their attention, and he had to hold it. “Do you know the rocks we call the malapie? The big black rocks? That is where these killers have been hiding. But they will be in our town tonight, the town of the big rock and the spring. You know it. It is where the Indian agent was, Major Miles.”

  They understood him all right; one of the braves growled. It had been a mistake to mention Miles. The whole tribe was in trouble for killing an Indian agent. But he had to keep talking.

  “The soldier sent me out here, the horse soldier with the yellow legs. He says that you can have the killers; we want them dead, too. Then the war will be over.”

  A voice said, “You make much noise.” The accent was not bad.

  “I talk words. I am no coward to run away when my town is in trouble. I came to speak true words to the Shoshone.”

  Nobody answered him this time. He said, “If you would send word to your war chief, on your drums, I will take you to where these killers will be.”

  Suddenly his wrists were seized, dragged behind him, a rawhide thong bit deep into his flesh. His feet were kicked out from under him, and as he fell, another thong went looping and biting his ankles. He was rolled over on his face.

  Somewhere not far away men talked in the Shoshone tongue, and then a drum started talking, too. He was still alive, and the Indians were signaling. Maybe he had won!

  And maybe they had decided his scalp was so pretty they’d leave it on his head for some older man to harvest.

  CHAPTER XXVI

  Beer had had Haley bring the men out of the livery stable and line them up in front of the hotel. Haley called them to attention. Rylan looked them over, and then turned and saluted. “Sir, the command is mustered.”

  Beer said, “The enemy—the Indians—will attack from that part of the prairie that lies nearest the reservation. Corporal Haley will march you down there, and you will post sentries, form into squads, and in all respects obey Sergeant Haley. That is all.”

  He turned away quickly, but not too quickly to escape hearing one of the men say, “We’re leaving the center part of the town, an’ the upper canyon wide open.”

  Rylan bawled, “Attention! Any more talking in the ranks, an’ Sergeant Haley’s got my orders to spread eagle the man that talks.” He cleared his throat. “Take over, Sergeant.”

  Private Haley—twice promoted since he had been wounded and therefore made useless for fighting purposes—made harsh noises in his throat, and the men turned raggedly and marched down canyon. He said, “Send Strayne and Lesser with them,” and Rylan nodded and thumbed the two nearest troopers after the column.

  Mustering the men had, of course, brought the women to the porch of the hotel again. One of them said, clearly, “Sending our men to be killed, and him and his sergeant hanging around here!”

  Beer walked slowly into the hotel. The cluster chattered at him, their voices unfriendly, and he cleared his throat. “Mrs. Lea?”

  One of the women indicated the staircase. He climbed slowly, to find her alone in the upper hall, sitting in a rocker that she must have dragged from one of the rooms. She looked up and said, “Have you heard from Dan, Mr. Younge?”

  He shook his head. “Doesn’t mean anything, though. It’s much too soon. Where’s Mrs. Sydnor?”

  Ellen Lea said calmly, “Tied to a bed in that room, and gagged.”

  Lieutenant Beer chuckled, despite himself. “You’re quite a girl,” he said. “Dan’s lucky.”

  “So am I,” Ellen Lea said, “if he gets back.”

  The hotel room was like all hotel rooms in the West: splintery tongue-and-groove ceiling, dresser with a cracked marble top, tarnished brass bed, and a wardrobe whose door didn’t quite stay closed. There was a smell to it of cheap strong soap and spilled water and sun-scorched resin from the lumber that had been nailed up green and allowed to shrink.

  Mrs. Sydnor was on the bed, and again the officer was impressed by Ellen Lea’s strength. The lady’s ankles were tied together, her wrists were tied to the head of the bed and there was a towel over her mouth. Ellen Lea said, from behind him, “I got tired of listening to her whine.”

  “Better take the gag out.”

  Ellen Lea shrugged and slipped past him to the bed. She looked down and said, “You’re much more attractive with your mouth tied,” but she took the gag
off.

  Phyllis Sydnor moved her mouth as though she wanted to spit. The first thing she said was, “This is fine gratitude for getting my husband to let you work in the store.”

  Ellen Lea chuckled slightly. “This is a good time to talk about jobs and stores. But since we are, I worked hard and cheap. The lieutenant wants to talk.”

  Mrs. Sydnor said, “Thank God you’re here.”

  Beer said, “I’ll make it quick. Your husband was here, demanding that you return to him. I think you will be safer here, but I’m leaving the choice up to you.”

  “Oh, thank you. I knew I could count on you.”

  He said, “I’m doing you no favor. If the town decides to lynch Sydnor, you will probably be hurt in the riot.” That’ll make sure he goes, he thought. It had occurred to him that with Sydnor’s ammunition the miners could take the town, could stay here, and Dan Younge’s plan would fail. Dan Younge would be killed.

  A woman bound spread-eagled on a bed is not at her seductive best; but Phyllis Sydnor managed to look alluring and knowing. “I’m not worried about that.”

  Ellen Lea said sharply, “Because a mob would be men?”

  “Why, thanks, Ellen. What a nice thing to say.”

  Beer turned and ran down the stairs, a spur banging against the steps once and sending a sharp pain through his ankle. He’d done the right thing. With the woman along, the miners would waste no time arguing with Sydnor; they’d be anxious to get back to the malapie and start their celebration. Fresh liquor, supplies and a woman—what bunch of outlaws ever delayed the use of things like that?

  CHAPTER XXVII

  Dan Younge was on the move. After he’d been thrown down and tied nothing had happened for a while but drumming and talking in the outlandish tongue of the Shoshone; a language that sounded as though every other letter was a K.

  Then he had been stood on his feet, pushed over again, kicked. Finally one of the braves had hauled him to his feet and said—in not bad English but with a throaty inflection that made it hard for a battered head to understand—“Why you come?”