by Zane Grey
“Sam’s shore tearin’. … What’s he runnin’ his hoss like thet for?”
Terrill tried to rise, rose to one elbow, slid back again. She recognized that horse. Cinco! And shuddering death seemed to run along her reviving nerves out of her body.
Sawtell leaped out of the door, off the porch, to face up the canyon. His legs stood wide and bowed. His hair bristled.
Terrill whispered: “It’s—Pecos!” And she got up on one hand. Suddenly her stunned faculties reasserted themselves. But she was still so weak that she could scarcely slip into the two halves of the split shirt, and hold the front together.
That swift clatter had become a thrumming roar.
“My Gawd, it ain’t Sam!” yelled Sawtell.
Terrill’s sight caught the black Cinco against the gold of the sunset sky. He scattered dirt and gravel against the cabin. Then Pecos leaped out of the very air, his spurs jangling, his boots thudding, as he hit the ground to confront the stricken Sawtell.
Pecos was hatless. A white band spotted with blood bound his head. He was also coatless, vestless, and there were other stains of blood visible. His face was stone gray, except the leaping terrible eyes.
“Who’n hell are yu?” queried Pecos, piercingly.
“Sawtell. Breen Sawtell,” replied the other hoarsely. He licked his lips.
“What are yu doin’ heah?”
“We come down to arrest one Hod Smith.”
“Ahuh. Who’s we?”
“Haines there, an’ my men. Maybe you met Sam—up at the gulch trail.”
“Mebbe I did. Who shot these men?”
“There was a hell of a fight. Young Lambeth was in it.”
“Terrill!”
“Oh, Pecos—I’m—all right,” replied Terrill to that devastating call.
“Sambo, you daid?”
“No, boss. I ain’t daid atall. But I’se damn near daid.”
“Watson! … Who killed him?” flashed Pecos.
“Must have stopped a stray bullet,” replied Sawtell, his voice huskier.
“Haines, yu called him. … Shot to pieces. Who did thet?”
“Wal, me an’ Bill had a little duel.”
“If yu came down heah to arrest me, why’d yu fight?”
“We come to arrest Hod Smith.”
“There’s no Hod heah. I am Pecos Smith.”
“Pecos—Smith!”
“I said so. Are you hard of heahin’?”
“Did you shoot my brother—at Healds’ Ranch?”
“I beat him to a gun. He forced me to draw.”
“Was you a partner to Williams an’ Adams?”
“Yes. I’m the man.”
“Then—Pecos Smith, you’re the man I’m after.”
“So I reckon. What’re yu goin’ to do aboot it?”
“Pecos, he swore he’d hang you,” rolled out Sambo, passionately.
“Wal, Sambo, I’m wastin’ a lot of time in gab, but I’m shore curious.”
“Boss, dis white trash sho treated our Rill turrible low down.”
“Terrill!—Yu said yu were all right?”
“I am, Pecos … only scared—and weak. He tore me—to pieces … and he found out I—I’m … Oh, Pecos, I can’t tell you.”
Sawtell quailed. His eyes had been locked with Pecos’. At last he sensed what Watson had hinted at and Haines had warned him of.
“Can’t tell me what?” called Pecos.
Terrill was mute. If she had not been frozen there, leaning on her hand, she would have flopped down. But Pecos did not see her. His dancing gold-flecked eyes never oscillated a fraction from Sawtell.
“Smith, I’m on to your dodge,” spoke up Sawtell. It was the brazen voice of desperation. “This Terrill Lambeth is a girl. You been livin’ with her—pretendin’ she was a boy. Don Felipe had a hunch. … If any more comes of this meetin’—you’ll be spotted all over the Pecos country. … But you ought to marry the girl. She must have been a decent little thing once.”
“Are yu—talkin’ yet?” queried Pecos, in a strange, almost inaudible voice. And perhaps that weakness spurred the desperate Sawtell on. Perhaps his mind grasped at straws. If he infuriated this Pecos Smith beyond control he might gain an instant’s advantage.
“But whatever she was—she’s shore a hussy now,” rasped on Sawtell, his body flexing.
“Ahuh.”
“She knows you’re a rustler—a brand-burnin’ cow thief. She admitted that.”
“Terrill—believed—thet?”
“Shore. She’s on to you. That money now.”
“Ahuh!” There might have been, to the strained sight of a madman, an indefinable break in Pecos.
“That money! By—Gawd!” Then Sawtell bawled and lunged.
There was a red flash, a burst, a boom. A cloud of smoke. Sawtell’s gun went flipping high. He staggered back to fall upon the porch, a great spurt of blood squirting from his heart.
Chapter XIV
PECOS leaped out of his set posture. He glared around, particularly toward the mouth of the canyon. And on the instant he espied two men runing along the thicket under the west wall. Their clumsy gait betrayed cowhands unused to such locomotion. They tallied with the number of saddle horses Pecos had counted.
“Ahuh. Thet’s aboot all,” he muttered, and slowly sheathed his gun, to turn to Sambo.
“Boss, if yo ain’t speculatin’ on nuthin’ particular, jest cut me loose,” spoke up that worthy, turning his head as far as possible.
Pecos drew a knife, and cutting the hard knot of the lasso he unwound it from Sambo’s long frame. There appeared to be considerable blood from a gunshot high up on Sambo’s shoulder.
“Hit any other place?” queried Pecos, sharply. “This heah is only an open cut.”
“Boss, if I hadn’t played ’possum I’d shore got more hits dan dat,” replied the negro as he stepped free. “ ’Cause dat black mustached gennelman was sho out to kill eberybody.”
“How many in the bunch, Sambo?”
“Five was all I seen.”
“There’s the last two—across under the cracked wall.” Pecos pointed until Sambo had located them. “We don’t want them hangin’ around. Take my rifle, Sambo. Go down an’ drive thet outfit of hosses up the trail. Let those men see you doin’ it. Then take a few shots at them just for luck.—Rustle now an’ get back pronto.”
Cinco had edged back from the cabin and now had his head up as he nervously pawed the ground.
“Whoa dar, Cinco—whoa, old hoss,” called Sambo, as he approached. The horse stood, allowing Sambo to unsheath the rifle. Whereupon Sambo lumbered away out of sight.
Pecos surveyed the ghastly scene, then he strode over Sawtell’s body into the cabin.
Terrill sat on the floor, holding to a chair. With her other hand she was holding rent garments together over her breast.
“Pe-cos!” she whispered.
“Yu all right?” he demanded, sharply, as he knelt to take her by the shoulders and force her head up to the light. There was absolutely no color in her face. He gazed piercingly into her eyes. Stark horror was fading. A rapture of deliverance shone upon Pecos. After that one swift scrutiny his tight breast expanded in passionate relief. For the rest, he could not trust himself to gaze longer into those exquisite betraying depths.
Terrill let go of the chair and clung to him wildly. Her head dropped against him.
“Pecos! Pecos!” she whispered.
“Shore it’s Pecos. What yu think? I reckon yu mean I didn’t get back any too soon. … There’s a bruise on yore temple.”
“He—hit me.”
“Ahuh. Hurt yu anywhere else?”
“My arm’s wrenched.”
“Yu fought him?”
“I threw my gun—on him,” replied Terrill, growing stronger. “Meant to kill him. … But he knocked it—up … grabbed me. … I didn’t quite faint. I felt him tying me—to the chair. … Later I worked my hands loose—and when he was drinking—I cut my legs
free—snatched your belt and ran. … But he caught me. … It was then he tore my—my coat and—shirt off … found me—out. … Oh, Pecos!”
Mauree interrupted this scene. Her eyes were rolling.
“Mars Pecos, dem debils sho turned our home into a slotterhouse. … Rill honey, say yo ain’t hurted.”
“I’m all right, Mauree.”
“Yu take charge of Terrill,” said Pecos, rising.
“Oh, Pecos—don’t go!” implored Terrill, hanging to his knees.
He could hardly look into the sweet havoc-shadowed face.
“Child, I won’t go far,” he said, hurriedly. “Thet mess out heah—an’ Sambo’s chasin’ what’s left of thet outfit.”
He disengaged his knees from clinging arms and got outside, feeling shaken and dizzy. It took strong will to counteract the softer mood, to face stern issues still, to fortify himself against the sickening reaction sure to follow.
Pecos scanned the opposite side of the canyon. Cattle and horses were running in fright. Then he heard Sambo shooting. It would be just as well, he thought, to have a look. Cinco came whinnying to him, whereupon Pecos remembered to scan him for a possible wound. There was a welt on his flank, sensitive to the touch.
“Wal, it’s darn good fer yu, old hoss, thet yu can run fast.”
When Pecos got beyond the trees where he could look up the canyon he espied Sambo trudging back down the trail. Apparently the negro had driven the horses clear out of sight. Pecos waited for him, straining his eyes to catch a glimpse of the last of Sawtell’s riders.
Sambo arrived presently, puffing hard.
“Boss—I—sho—winged—one of dem.”
“Thet’ll help, Sambo. But I reckon those cowhands wouldn’t hang around heah now. I shore peppered thet one who was layin’ fer me up the trail.”
“Pecos, I wuz worried aboot dat. How yo see him? Sam, dat Sawtell skunk call him.”
“I ran into fresh hoss tracks before I got within miles of our trail down the gulch. Those fellers had been to Eagle’s Nest. When they turned off down our gulch I got leery. An’ when I rose into the canyon Cinco either seen or smelled a hoss. So I cut off the trail by thet thorn-bush thicket. It’s good I did, fer there was one of them hidin’ in it, an’ he shot at me. Wal, I shot back, you bet, an’ plenty fer good measure. Then I loaded up an’ sent Cinco down the trail hell-bent fer heah.”
“All de time I prayed yo’d come. An’ den when I’d gone back on de good Lawd den yo come, yo sho come, Pecos.”
“Wal, I’ll heah yore story after a bit,” replied Pecos, thoughtfully. “I reckon we’ve gotta begin a graveyard on Lambeth Ranch. Some graves with haidstones, Sambo. Damn good idee— Up there on thet level bench. Shallow holes, Sambo, ’cause we shore ain’t goin’ to sweat more’n we have to to cover them stiffs.”
While conversing thus they had once more approached the cabin.
“Search ’em, Sambo. Take papers, guns, watches, money, anythin’ worth keepin’ an’ put them all in a sack. Relatives an’ friends of theirs might ride in heah some day. An’ if they don’t come a rarin’ fer trouble we’ll turn the stuff over. … Too bad aboot this cattleman Watson.”
“Boss, I’se a hunch dat was sho no accident,” spoke up Sambo.
“What?”
“Dis killin’ of Watson. ’Cause after all dat bunch shootin’ when I got my shoulder barked I seen Watson was alive. Den come anudder shot an’ he sagged in dat rope.”
“Wal! Wal! … Sawtell figgered this Watson had heahed an’ seen too much. Shot him an’ laid it to accident.”
“ ’Zackly. Dat Sawtell was a hell of a man, Pecos.”
“I reckon—among his kind. … But save yore story, Sambo, till our work’s done.”
“You some shot up yo’self, boss?” queried the negro.
“I stuck my haid up over thet Y Canyon rim, an’ one of them vaqueros grooved me. This other cut heah is from a snag ridin’ the brush. They won’t interfere with my appetite none. … Sambo, yu’ll want a pack-hoss, also an old canvas yu can cut up. I’ll take pick an’ shovel, an’ go dig the graves.”
“Yas, suh. Heah’s yo’ rifle, boss. Don’ leave dat behind. Yo can nebber tell. … ‘Kin sabby,’ as the greasers say.”
“Ahuh. … An’, Sambo, after yu move these men, have Mauree scrub away all thet blood.”
Pecos did not think he would need the rifle, nevertheless he took it, and burdened with this and the heavy tools he approached the bench he had chosen for the graveyard. It chanced to be situated where ambush from the rim above was out of the question.
Pecos applied himself vigorously and in an hour or more had three shallow graves dug. The labor had caused him to sweat and pant. Moreover, it had begun to operate upon the dark grimness of mind and the sick icy sensation in the pit of his stomach, reactions which always succeeded deadly passion. He kept on working even after the job was sufficiently done. Indeed, he would have welcomed much toil. There must be other ordeals after this mood had passed.
Presently he was interrupted by the arrival of Sambo, leading a horse over the back of which bent the body of a man roped up in canvas.
“Which is this heah one?” asked Pecos.
“Dis is Sawtell,” replied Sambo, unceremoniously tumbling the corpse off the horse. “Pecos, yo sho hit him whar he libbed. … An’ what yo tink! He wored a money belt chuck full.”
“Did he?—Thet reminds me of mine. Where is it, Sambo?”
“Terrill got dat. … Boss, yo sho should hab seen ——”
“Rustle back after another daid man,” interrupted Pecos. Still he had not arrived at the state of mind where he could listen.
“Wal, Sawtell,” said Pecos, after Sambo had ridden away, “yu’ll rot heah because you had no good in yore heart nor sense in yore haid.”
Pecos had made a clean, swift job of killing the man, and he duplicated it in the burial. Then he searched about until he found an oblong stone, one end of which he imbedded at the head of the grave. Later he would cut a name in the stone.
Sambo made two more trips with gruesome burdens, and after the last one remained to help Pecos until the duty was accomplished.
It was mid-afternoon when Pecos wended a weary way back to the cabin. The shock had passed, as often it had before; the sickness lingered only faintly. Pecos had weathered another stern vicissitude of the wild Texas borderland. These things had to be. He counted himself a pioneer. He knew what had to be stood and done before a man could have peace along the length and breadth of that Pecos wilderness.
He must face another ordeal, a more difficult one for him, and he shirked it. He could not think how to meet the coming issue between him and Terrill. He could let only the exigencies of the hour decide for him. Only one certainty stood out clearly in his troubled mind, and it sustained him where otherwise he might have had no anchor at all. A wonderful affection for Terrill Lambeth as a boy had been transformed into a tremendous love for Terrill Lambeth as a girl. Pecos would far rather have had the inevitable revelation postponed indefinitely. He had grown happy with his secret. Terrill’s sex, no longer hidden, might make a difference—he had no idea what. Certainly as a boy she had looked to him, trusted him, relied upon him, cared for him in a way, but as a girl ——
The first stranger who had wrung from Terrill the truth of her sex had likewise instilled in her a belief in Pecos’ guilt. That was a blow. It stung, it flayed. It was bitter. It raked over the old sore. Perhaps his reasoning was vain, illogical, invalid, and he was indeed a rustler. That issue must be met, with himself and with Terrill; and he might as well face both at once.
To approach that cabin was now harder for Pecos than if it had contained ten men of Sawtell’s ilk. Pecos made a stupendous effort, and he did not really know exactly what the effort was for. But he had to go on; he had to go back to that cabin, to work there, to eat and sleep there, to face Terrill a hundred times a day. And the prospect filled him with breathless tumult.
Sambo and
Mauree had cleared and cleaned away every vestige of the fight. The old cabin looked as sleepy and lonely as always. Sambo had removed the rude bough couch that had been on the porch.
While Pecos lingered outside Sambo called from the door:
“Boss, what is I gwine do wif all dese waluables?”
Whereupon Pecos forced himself to enter. One end of the table was littered with guns, belts full of shells, watches, knives, wallets, and last a wide black money belt.
“Sawtell an’ dat no-good sheriff ’peared to be well heeled,” said Sambo. “But Watson had no money or nuthin’.”
“Sambo, do yu think thet fat feller was a sheriff?” queried Pecos as he weighed the money belt.
“Wal, I tuk it he might have been once. I heahed them say somethin’ aboot Kansas. But he sho wuz no mo’ sheriff dan me. Dey gabe demselves away, boss. Dat was a trick.”
“Ahuh. Wal, put all this stuff out of sight so we can forget the deal.”
“Boss, I sho don’t want to be ’sponsible fer dis money.”
“All right. I’ll hide it. Let’s see.” Pecos gazed about the room.
“Dere’s a loose stone in de chimley low down,” said Sambo, and kneeling he worked a large stone free.
“Just the place. Dig out behind it, Sambo,” replied Pecos. Between them they soon disposed of the belt, and the other articles Pecos stowed upon a triangular shelf in a corner. That done, Pecos breathed still more freely. Mauree had begun to prepare for the evening meal: there were iron pots and tin pots on the fire.
“Mauree, is that water hot?” called a voice, somehow Terrill’s voice, yet not the same.
“Yas, honey, it’s sho hot. An’ de salve yo ast fo is on de table. Yo better hurry, chile, an’ fix Mars Pecos up ’cause supper ’mos’ ready.”
There happened to be a chair close to Pecos, which he backed into weakly. He heard a step.
“Pecos, will you let me dress your wounds?” asked the soft changed voice.
“Wounds!—Aw, why shore, if they’re worth botherin’ with.”
“But you look so awful in that bloody bandage and shirt,” protested Terrill.
“So I must. Reckon I forgot.”
