Novel 1969 - The Empty Land (v5.0)

by Louis L'Amour

  “Jim Gillette, Jeff Milton, Bill Tilghman…men like that never drew a gun unless they had to. Hickok…I knew him well. If you came to town huntin’ him or huntin’ trouble, you’d better not make any wrong moves or he’d shoot. Dave Mathers didn’t wait for you. If you came to town talkin’ loud about what you intended to do, Dave would find you and shoot you before you even got started.

  “Confusion, now—Matt don’t want the job, and he shouldn’t have it. To run Confusion you’d have to use a gun. There’s no other way. Some of that crowd know Matt and would pull out if he became marshal, some would sit quiet, and there’s a good many would try to kill him. Big Thompson would—he’d have to. He’s made his brags and he’s made his stand, and he’s run marshals out of town elsewhere, so he’d have to tackle Matt.”

  “What about Nathan Bly?”

  “He’s cold…like ice. The most dangerous man around here, leaving out Matt Coburn and Calvin Bell. And he’s made the switch. He’s no longer just a good man with a gun. He’s a killer.”

  They were silent for a few moments, and then Laurie said, “Joss, is there any red clay on the ranch? Have I missed something?”

  The older man’s eyes hooded. He got out his pipe and began to fill it slowly. “I guess you ain’t missed a thing, ma’am,” he replied quietly. “No, there’s no red clay on this ranch.”

  “But there is, over west. I seem to remember a water hole over in the Schell Creek Mountains where there was red clay.”

  Joss Ringgold’s eyes twinkled, but the expression faded. “You’re canny, ma’am, right canny. You noticed the hocks of those horses, too, didn’t you?”

  “Freeman and that man who was supposedly carrying the mail to Confusion. Joss, is Free getting into trouble?”

  “He’s a hard-headed youngster. Thinks he knows it all. And he figures he’s pretty handy with that gun.”

  “Is he?”

  “Oh, he gets it out pretty fast. He might kill somebody. He’s just a-achin’ and a-sweatin’ to be a big man. If he killed somebody he’d likely turn mean and even more big-headed than he is now. But he won’t—not ’less the man’s drunk. He wouldn’t last out the year.”

  “That man who said he was carrying mail…did you know him, Joss?”

  “I’ve seen him around. Nobody I know of would trust him with the mail. Took me a while to recall him—name of Scarff. Last I heard, he had joined up with Harry Meadows.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of. Will he listen to you, Joss? Freeman, I mean?”

  “I doubt it.”

  Ringgold got to his feet. “Ma’am, it ain’t my place to get personal, but I’m old enough to be your pa. If you’re gettin’ a case on Matt Coburn…don’t. He’s turnin’ bad.”

  After Joss had gone back to work, Laurie Shannon sat for a long time, thinking.

  Was she getting a case on Matt Coburn? Laurie prided herself on being a cool-headed girl who stood for no nonsense from herself, and now she faced her feelings squarely.

  Was she? That was just it—she did not know. At first it had been his sheer masculinity that impressed her, that and his quietness, the easy way he moved, the gentleness with which he treated his horse. And then it had been his loneliness.

  During the time when he was out in the hills alone she had often found herself lying awake at night wondering what he was doing, where he was, and how it must feel to be always alone. She had been much alone herself, and thought she knew but there was a difference.

  After a few minutes she dismissed the idea from her mind. She could get a case on him, as Joss put it, but she was not likely to see enough of him. And she was not going to permit it—not for one minute.

  Yet an hour later she was thinking of him out there on the box of that stage, fair game for any sharpshooter with a good rifle.

  *

  MATT COBURN BUTTONED the two top buttons of his coat. It had been hot earlier; now the day was cooling off. In just a little while they would be changing teams again. For the last hour they had been traveling across the open country, but he had not relaxed the least bit. Almost automatically his hand went to his cartridge belt and loosened a pair of shotgun shells to have them ready if needed.

  They rode now with the sun before them, with the shadows rounding up in the secret draws of the mountains, and here and there a lonely stray behind some isolated butte. The team moved slowly now, Burke holding them in for the time later when he might wish to get speed from them. The sound of their hoofs, the jingle of harness, and the rocking, creaking, rolling of the coach, these were the sounds.

  Far off across the basin, a last dust devil died in the valley, and a cool wind came down from the peaks, rich with the smell of cedar and pine.

  Dandy Burke guided the six horses as if they were one, easing the coach over the worst of the bumps, rolling into the dips, walking up the slopes beyond.

  He pointed toward the mountains with his whipstock. “I’m going into those hills someday, and I’m going to stay. I’m going to trace one of those canyons back to the high country beyond, and make myself a home there.”

  “I’ve been thinking of it, too.”

  “You eat dust for twenty years, you eat it behind trail drives and stagecoach teams, and finally you’ve had enough. I want to go where there’s tall pines and cool water. I’ve had enough of alkali and dodging lead.”

  “I’ve found a place I’m thinking about, back there near the foot of Jeff Davis,” Matt said. “There’s always water.”

  “You ought to find yourself a woman. A man should marry, Matt, and you should.”

  “Why me?”

  Burke lifted the reins and let the horses trot down an easy slope. “You’re getting mean, Matt. You’ve lived with a gun too long.”

  “What was I supposed to do? Let Bob Longer jump me in a saloon some day? Or take a shot at me in the dark? I could read it in him. He had to kill me…and he’d have tried. Then or later.”

  They were silent then, and after a while, Coburn took out his pipe. “You’re right, Dandy,” he said. “I’m too touchy. I’ve seen it building up in me, but I sleep with a gun, I eat with a gun in my lap, I never take a step without one. I never go to sleep at night that I don’t expect to wake up shooting. And I almost never sleep in the same place twice…not if I can help it.”

  “I know,” Burke said. And he did know. He had seen it in Matt, and in others, too. It was easier to give the advice than to carry it out. Once you’ve lived that life, once you’ve had it to think about, you never quite lose the feeling.

  It was like hunting Apaches, or traveling in Apache country, and Matt Coburn had lived that life, too. You learned never to sleep soundly, no matter how tired you were. You learned to cook your food, put out your fire, and move on a few miles before settling down for the night. You learned to look for shadows where shadows should not be, to watch for the out-of-the-way thing, to expect the unexpected.

  The day passed, and a long night, and then another day. The trails were dusty, the passengers tired, and short-tempered.

  While the horses rested at the top of a steep grade, the passengers got down to stretch their legs. The country was wide open in all directions. Dandy Burke checked his harness and the horses, then bit off a chew of tobacco.

  Matt Coburn found himself standing beside Madge Healy. “Where are we going to stop, Matt?” she asked. “I mean, so we can rest a little?”

  “In Eureka,” he said.

  “It’s a lively place. I played the opera house there. And I played it a few years before that when the stage was four planks laid over some barrels.”

  “Why did you quit.”

  “I just got tired of it, Matt. I wanted a home so bad I cried myself to sleep many a night. I used to hide money the miners threw to me, and whenever my aunt found it, she’d whip me. But I still did it.

  “Once, when I was only fifteen, I grubstaked a prospector I met in Austin. Everybody was turning him down…I heard them and felt sorry for him. I grubstaked hi
m with just thirty dollars I’d held out, and later I sent him forty more.”

  “Did you ever see him again?”

  She smiled. “That prospector’s name was Charley Ramona,” she said quietly. “He struck it pretty good, sold out, bought stock in the Denver & Rio Grande, and made a mint of money.”

  “How did you make out?”

  She looked up at Matt. “I own half of it,” she said, smiling at him. “Willard & Kingsbury don’t know that, Matt. When they picked a fight with me they thought I was just a little girl with a fluttery head. I didn’t ask for the fight, but I’ll own them before I’m through, Matt, and that’s the first boast I ever made, I think.”

  “Serve them right. But you be careful. Willard is mean enough, but I know Kingsbury—he’s worse.”

  They stood close together, watching the shadows creeping over the land.

  “Matt, what about Pike Sides?” Madge asked suddenly. “Do you know him?”

  “Enough.”

  “Can he be trusted? I mean, will he sell out?”

  “No. Once you’ve hired him, he’s your man, but don’t make a mistake, Madge. Pike is a whip that can be cracked to make people move, but don’t ever let him get a-hold of the handle.”

  “Thanks, Matt. And thanks again for back there. It was you who stopped them. They’d have killed me, Matt. I know they would have. Bob Longer was the one who would have done it—as if it was an accident.”

  He looked surprised.

  “Yes, I knew Longer was hired to do just that. Dolan didn’t know anything about that. It was purely Longer.”

  Now the stage started again, picked up its dust cloud, and rolled west. When they came to Eureka they found it was lively and wide open. There were a hundred and twenty-five saloons, fifteen tent shows, and twenty-five gambling houses, all of them going strong.

  Matt was tired. Every muscle sagged with weariness, and his eyes were red-rimmed from staring at the bright, sunlit land. When he swung down from the stage at the Colonnade Hotel, Pike was already helping Madge Healy to the ground.

  “Pike?”

  The gunman turned his eyes upon him. “They’ll be in town,” Matt said. “They still want her, and they want those papers.”

  “Thanks,” Pike said shortly. “You handle your business, an’ I’ll handle mine.”

  “That’s all right, Pike,” Madge said. “I value Mr. Coburn’s suggestions. What is it, Matt?”

  He stepped closer, so only she and Pike could hear. “Get a room, then move into a different one. They’ll come hunting, you can bet on it.”

  “All right, Matt.” She looked up at him, her face partly in the shadow. One hand touched his sleeve. “Thanks.”

  Dandy Burke helped Matt lower the gold box to the ground. Together they carried it inside and took a room on the ground floor, back of the office.

  “Go ahead and eat,” Burke said. “I’ll hold the fort. Bring me a sandwich and some coffee when you come back. You tap twice very light, then once hard. I’ll open up then if it’s your voice.”

  Matt handed Burke the shotgun and stepped outside, closing the door. He stood still and glanced in each direction along the corridor. At one end was the door to the lobby of the hotel; at the other end of the passage was a door that opened onto an alley. He walked back to it, listened, and then opened the door and, after a glance, stepped out.

  After studying the street with care, he walked down to a small restaurant, where he took a table in the back. Seated with his back to the wall, and facing the door, he ate a good meal.

  When he left he walked through the kitchen and used the back door to get out. He stopped by several of the saloons, merely glancing in over the doors, and then going on. With the quick skill of a man who had been marshal of more than one town, he was able to assay at a glance the people inside the saloons.

  As he went along the street, he almost automatically scanned the brands on the horses, and studied the rigs and their contents. Any town marshal worth his salt could in a few minutes detect the presence of strangers, of long riders, or drifters, even in a town that was strange to him.

  Matt knew Eureka from past experience, and the men who were here, like those who were now in Confusion, had been known to him in other camps, either by name or reputation. And each one bore the stamp of his kind, whether he realized it or not.

  Matt was looking for potential trouble, and he found it. In the fourth saloon he saw Harry Meadows leaning against the bar. He walked in and stopped alongside Meadows.

  “I’ll buy a drink, Harry,” Matt said.

  “Go ahead. It’s your money.” And Meadows straightened a little as he spoke, to stand taller beside the taller man. He turned, leaning one elbow on the bar. “You had you some grief.”

  “Was that you up on the rock?” Matt asked evenly.

  “Uh-huh.” Meadows picked up his drink. “I had me a Winchester, too.”

  “I figured you did. I’d never worry about you, Harry. Not that way. You’re just not the type.”

  Harry Meadows, who was honest with himself, was not sure just what this meant, but he was pleased. “Who was it down there?” he asked. “Bob Longer?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He’s been leadin’ up to it.” Meadows turned his glass, tracing a ring on the bar. “You goin’ all the way to Carson with it?”

  “Uh-huh. Pike Sides, too. He’s riding shotgun for Madge Healy.”

  Meadows was puzzled. “Madge? The kid actress? That dancer?”

  “Yeah, only she isn’t a kid any longer, and she has enemies. Her enemies are Willard & Kingsbury.”

  “She’s in trouble, then.” Meadows was silent for a few minutes, and then he said, “Matt, I always liked that kid. She gave a lot of entertainment where there wasn’t anybody else, and she’d dance until she dropped if the boys asked for it. And you’ve always been a squareshooter.”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “Willard & Kingsbury. They’ve been hiring. I don’t know what the deal is, but a couple of my boys have been approached. They want men who aren’t afraid of a fight, a dirty fight. Ike Fletcher has been hiring for them.”

  Ike Fletcher was a claim-jumper, a dangerous man in any kind of a fight. If he was hiring men, the chances were it was some kind of a mine fight.

  “Where are they going?”

  “I don’t know, but my guess would be Confusion. One of my boys doesn’t want to go to Arizona. He’s wanted there, and in Colorado, too. When he told them that they said he wouldn’t have to worry. He wouldn’t be traveling far.”

  Matt finished his drink. He had been in the saloon about as long as he ever allowed himself to be in one. “Harry, I’ve got to drift.” He put his glass down. “I hope I don’t see you again for a while.”

  Meadows grinned. “Now, that ain’t a threat, is it, Matt?”

  “You know better. Fact is, the way I think about you, I wouldn’t like to look over a gun at you.”

  “You won’t get the chance, Matt, not even for that hundred thousand you’re carrying. If anybody bothers you, remember this: it won’t be me.”

  Matt turned, gave a quick glance around the room and went out, looking neither to right nor left. Only a fool goes looking for trouble, and his life had brought him more than enough, and knowing how to recognize possible trouble meant knowing how to avoid it. Even to meet the glance of some men was an invitation to trouble, for to them it was a challenge to which they must respond.

  This watchfulness in Matt was no new thing, but it was something that had been growing in him with the realization that not only had he enemies, but that being a known gunfighter made him fair game for anyone. He knew that men who killed gunfighters or gunmen, no matter what the conditions, were rarely punished for it.

  Back at the hotel, Matt entered by the front door, and went along to get several sandwiches, a pot of coffee, and cups. With these he went back to the room and rapped at the door with the arranged signal.

  Dandy Burke was seat
ed in a chair tilted against the wall facing the door. The shotgun was across his knees.

  “Figured you’d forgotten me,” he grumbled. “It seemed a long time.”

  “I saw Harry Meadows. He won’t bother us.”

  Burke looked up sharply. “I didn’t hear any shootin’.”

  “We talked, that was all. Meadows wants to win. That’s why he’s still around. The man never took an unnecessary chance in his life. Too many crooks think things are going to be just the way they would like them to be. He’ll take the stage some day when there’s less money on it, and no guard—or somebody else than me or Eugene Blair. Nobody wants to deal with Blair.”

  “I drove with him a couple of times.”

  Burke ate, and then stretched out on the cot. Almost at once he was asleep. Matt tilted back in his chair, and kept the room dark. He finished the coffee, ate the sandwich Burke had left, and after that he took off his boots and coat. He was hanging up his coat when he heard somebody try the knob.

  “Go ahead,” he said quietly, “if you feel lucky.”

  The floor creaked, and there was silence. Prospecting, he thought—just somebody prospecting a little.

  Chapter 11

  *

  AT AUSTIN THEY were joined by Hank Weber, and the coach rolled on, with Weber driving and Burke sleeping inside. Thunder rolled, rains lashed the coach, flash floods ripped the trail asunder, but somehow the drivers found a way around and the coach kept moving. Through it all, Matt Coburn rode the top, sleeping when stops were made if it was possible, but always alert.

  They reached Carson City and the gold was delivered. Madge Healy got down from the stage, Pike Sides standing near.

  “Matt,” she said, “can I ride back with you?”

  He looked at her, his eyes red-rimmed and weary. “You know you can. And if you have trouble here you send for me.”

  “I’ll handle any trouble,” Pike cut in. “She won’t need anybody else.”

  “The offer stands,” Matt responded.

  “I’ll remember,” Madge said. Her eyes were soft as she looked at him. “Thanks, Matt. I don’t have many friends.”