Mountain Riders

by Brand, Max

  Other hands fell on Derry then, as the enraged townsmen reached for him. He tore himself free, fighting. His fists won a little opening for him, and into that opening the rescue charged.

  It was all very neat, the plan he had built up. Taxi and his three friends of the guns had gone down at the first yell of “Up, Cary!” The rest of the Cary clan inside the circle had made Barry Christian a free man and a fighting unit by slashing the ropes that held his arms behind his back and by putting revolvers into his hands. And the horse from which he was to have been hanged was now the power that might carry him away to freedom.

  At the same time, while the crowd began to show guns, here and there, the men of Blue Water heard the familiar yell ringing from the rear all around the outskirts, where man after man of the clan was bringing in the horses. “Up, Cary!” they shouted at the full of their power, and the townsmen could see the heads of the plunging mustangs and hear the squealing of the broncos as they were spurred and flogged forward. At the same time, from around the freed prisoner, from the very point where law seemed most secure, from the very clansmen who had been trusted to guard Christian, they heard the same wild yelling.

  “Up, Cary!” And guns were firing rapidly from all directions.

  It hardly mattered that those bullets flew high in the air. The important thing was that they made a noise. The crowd began to shudder and then to melt. Sheriff Walt Milton was tapped over the head, and his hands were tied behind his back, and then the horses came pouring into the open space beneath the Hanging Tree. In a moment the Carys were mounted. They formed into a flying wedge with Tom Derry at the point of it, and Barry Christian in the centre. That was the way they hit the men of Blue Water and ploughed a way out to freedom. And as they got into the street, when a rousing gallop was possible, Tom Derry saw the buckboard of the old man sweeping away in a cloud of its own dust. He knew it was the old man’s outfit, for he could see Maria Cary standing erect on the driver’s footboard and throwing the whip into the horses as they sprinted. And the buckboard leaped and flung like a fish on a hook, behind the rapid heels of the mustangs.

  13

  OUTLAWED

  OUTSIDE of the town, the Carys melted to this side and that, and waved and shouted farewells as they disappeared in groups among the rocks and the trees. What would happen to them in their valley, now? Would Walt Milton gather the force of the law behind himself and enter the valley and send the whole wild crew to prison?

  It could be done, undoubtedly. It seemed far more possible now that Tom Derry had in mind and memory the deep hate of the crowd in Blue Water for Barry Christian. They would want to leave no stone unturned to get at the rascals who had double-crossed the sheriff and set the prisoner free.

  But the valley was, after all, far away, and hard to win. It would cost a great deal of blood. There was still a chance that the Carys might continue their pastoral life until the last of their mob crimes had been forgotten if not forgiven.

  So the flying rout dwindled, rather suddenly, to no more than Tom Derry and his famous companion.

  Barry Christian said: “It took brains and it took nerve and a pair of hands. Nobody but you could have done that job, Tom Derry.”

  His voice was grave, and his eyes were deeply considerate. Tom felt that he had been praised by a king of men.

  “When I saw that venomous devil of a Taxi,” said Christian, “I was sure that it was the end. He almost never fails. He carries within an ounce as much poison as Silver has.”

  “Who is Taxi?” said Derry. “I’ve heard a little about him but not much. I’m new to this part of the country.”

  “Not very new, if you know Rainey,” said Christian, smiling, his eyes very keen above the smile.

  “Rainey is all I do know,” said Derry. I don’t even know why the Blue Water men wanted to hang you — except that Jim Silver had railroaded you into some trouble.”

  Christian cleared his throat. “Is that all Rainey told you?” he asked, in a somewhat constrained voice.

  “That’s all, and I’ve had no time to ask questions. But what is Taxi?”

  “Taxi,” said Christian, “is a gutter rat. He came out of New York because even that big town got too hot to hold him. Since then he’s been floating about, here and there, mostly here, with Silver. Taxi knows what any first-class yegg is always glad to know — how to pick a lock and how to blow a safe. He carries a set of picklocks around with him all the time.”

  “Why did the people cheer for him then?” asked Derry, somewhat bewildered.

  “Ah, that’s because he belongs to Silver.”

  “And how does Silver hypnotize people, if he’s such a crook?”

  Christian laughed, but his eyes wandered a trifle.

  “If Silver would tell his secret,” said Christian, “we’d all be a lot wiser. But he’s simply the world’s greatest hypocrite!”

  “Ay, and that’s what Rainey told me,” agreed Tom Derry, more and more convinced. “Besides,” he added, “I don’t need any convincing. Only, when I heard the mob yell against you — you know how it is — it shook me up a little.”

  “I saw that it did,” said Christian. “When I saw your face change, I could almost feel the rough of the rope around my neck.”

  He laughed again, but added soberly: “The best of it all is that Taxi’s dead and done for! Without him. Silver is only a one-handed man, so to speak.”

  “Taxi is not dead,” said Derry. “I only let Dean Cary give him the barrel of a revolver along the head. He’ll sleep five minutes and wake up with a goose egg on the back of his skull. That’s all.”

  “Not dead?” cried Christian. “You mean to say that when you had a chance — you mean to say that you didn’t kill Taxi?”

  “Why, man, it would have been murder!” said Derry, opening his eyes.

  Christian said savagely: “It will be another kind of murder when Taxi runs you down on your trail. And that’s a trail that he’ll never leave unless Silver calls him off it. He’ll have you, one of these days, and he’ll have you hard! When he slides his knife into your throat — you’ll have time to think one thought, maybe, before you choke and die! Murder? What will you call it when you hear your door opening in the dark of your room and know that something had crawled in over the threshold? That’ll be Taxi — and that’ll be the way you die, my friend! Murder? You’ll know more about murder before that gutter rat is through with you!”

  The words came out of Christian in such a bitter storm that Derry was half overwhelmed.

  He could only mutter: “Well, it would have meant taking him by surprise — with his head turned. I — I couldn’t kill a man like that.”

  “You couldn’t?” asked Christian.

  “No, and I don’t suppose that you could either,” answered Tom Derry.

  Christian smiled, and the smile was almost a sneer.

  “You may learn some new things before you’re much older, Tom,” he said. “You may learn that when it comes to hunting certain kinds of birds, the only safe way is to be a cat.” He went on sombrely: “Not that I like it. I loathe it. But I have to play the game the way Silver lays down the rules!”

  Tom Derry said nothing. He merely shook his head.

  For his part, he was beginning to be sorry that he had taken upon himself the duty of keeping another man’s rendezvous. He had met Buck Rainey and owed his life to that man. He had met this strange and powerful nature, Barry Christian. But for all that, he began to wish that he had remained in more obscure paths of life, no matter how often he stumbled upon danger.

  He was outlawed, by this time. His description was being passed across the range by word of mouth. In every litle post office, there would soon appear a placard offering some sort of a reward for “information leading to the apprehension of Thomas Derry.” Perhaps there would remain for him no refuge except the wilds of Cary Valley, where he would have to live among those savages, in rags and tatters.

  Or, perhaps, the end would be what Christ
ian had prophesied — a knife in the slender, swift hand of Taxi, and the point of it driven into Tom Derry’s throat.

  He fell into a long silence, automatically leading the way across hills and through the ravines toward the place where they must find Buck Rainey — now doubtless well able to sit the saddle.

  But as Derry rode, a new and darker trouble came over his mind. For it seemed to him that he could feel the glance of Barry Christian repeatedly upon him, with a covert sneer lingering in the look of the big man. And the great doubt returned.

  14

  THE PARTING

  OUTSIDE the grove where Rainey had last been seen, Derry shouted. Almost instantly Rainey’s whistle answered him, and Derry rode with Christian in among the trees. They found Rainey brushing down the velvet black hide of his mare, Nell. He did not come to greet them. He merely seemed to pause in his work, as he turned and waved.

  “Good to see you, Barry,” he called, as he waved his hand.

  Christian dismounted. To be sure, he shook the hand of Rainey, but it seemed no more than a casual gesture. It was such a greeting as two men might have given each other after parting the night before.

  “How does the leg go?” asked Christian.

  “Pretty well,” said Rainey. “Hungry, Barry?”

  “Hungry enough to eat. Got anything?”

  “Venison,” said Rainey exultantly. “That fawn sneaked in here among the trees, this morning, and I just had time to put a slug through it.”

  He pointed to a dappled skin which hung at a corner of the clearing, hauled up to a branch of a tree.

  “If you can do that,” said Christian, “you can ride.”

  “I can ride better than I can walk,” said Rainey.

  “Then ride now,” said Christian. “We’ll cut up some of that meat and take it along with us.”

  “What’s the rush? asked Rainey.

  “Silver always makes a rush,” said Christian.

  “Silver?” exclaimed Buck Rainey. “What brought that devil into the talk?”

  “The whole of Blue Water is out on our trail,” said Christian.

  “Why, that’s nothing,” answered Rainey.

  “No, but Taxi’s with the rest of ’em.”

  “Taxi?” shouted Rainey, and his hand went instinctively to a gun.

  “He was there to see my neck properly stretched,” answered Christian, “and now he’s on the trail. And wherever Taxi is, he knows how to raise the ghost of Silver out of the ground. You know that!”

  “Know it? Of course, I know it!” exclaimed Rainey. “Let’s get moving!”

  He had a saddle on Nell in no time, and away the three of them went across the country, leaving the venison hanging behind them.

  They travelled hard all that afternoon. Once or twice the face of Rainey seemed pinched with pain from his wound, but this passed quickly, and he was as cheerful as the other two at the end of the afternoon. They halted late in the evening, in woods close to water. The first thing was the dressing of Rainey’s wound. It was only a trifle inflamed, and had endured the travel very well indeed. Christian attended to the fresh dressing, and Derry started the cookery.

  Afterward, they sat around the coals of the fire, almost always silent. The whole afternoon of riding had been nearly wordless, also. But that was not strange. It is the habit of men on the trail in the West to speak very little. The dust and the labour are enough to keep tongues quiet. But it was odd that the two old friends did not commune more freely when they sat by the campfire. There was only one moment of much conversation, and that was entirely on the part of Christian, who described in much detail, to Rainey, how Derry had talked to him in the jail, and how perfectly the plan had gone through, in spite of the presence of Taxi.

  When the narrative ended, Rainey smiled, and looked at Christian.

  “I wasn’t sending you a fool or a blind man, Barry,” he said. “The luck was that Silver didn’t show up at Blue Water to see the hanging.”

  “He wouldn’t do it,” Christian sneered, his pale face twisting a little with the intensity of his hatred. “He wouldn’t descend that far. The perfect man, Buck, is never seen gloating over a fallen enemy. Besides, Silver is too busy to come to a hanging.”

  “Busy catching rabbits, maybe?” Rainey chuckled.

  That bit of talk did not please Derry much. From ordinary men he would have received it with a great deal of suspicion, but from these two, both of whom he felt were much his superiors in mind, he felt that he could take much and reserve his opinion. So he endured the talk, only frowning down at the dying fire until the words ceased. Suddenly, and when he looked up, he had a feeling that a glance had passed between his two companions.

  He was very tired, so he went to sleep almost immediately, giving one twist of a blanket about him as he lay down. His eyes closed, and he was gone.

  It was hours later when he wakened suddenly. There had been no sound. The moonlight lay white on the grass of the clearing, and one thin twist of smoke was rising from the ashes of the fire into the moonshine, but off to the side he saw Christian and Rainey talking together, seated side by side.

  They were sufficiently far away so that by guarding their voices not even a murmur reached the ears of Derry. The only significance to him was in the gestures, and the way the heads of the men were put close together. Whatever they were talking over, it was of a great deal of importance to them. Rainey carried the lead, and now and again he drew on the moonlit ground little plans, which he afterward carefully erased. These plans Christian always stooped over and scrutinized with the utmost care. And finally, he made a swift gesture, high over his head, an unmistakable sign of triumph.

  Derry turned his head and closed his eyes. He had a feeling that he had eavesdropped, and he could not help the sense that he had overlooked a guilty moment.

  What could the guilt be? One thing was almost sure to him — if there were one vital thing wrong with these two men, then everything about them was wrong, and the crowd in Blue Water had been right when it cheered Taxi and Jim Silver and snarled like a great thousand-throated beast at Barry Christian.

  But the two men could not be wrong, he told himself; Buck Rainey, at least, had proved himself capable of risking his life for a friend, even for a new friend.

  The problem made a sad confusion in the mind of Derry. He was not a splitter of hairs or a great thinker. He decided, on this occasion, that all his manhood demanded that he should follow Rainey blindly, no matter where the trail took him.

  On that decision he fell asleep again.

  In the morning there was a quick breakfast of coffee and hardtack. Then they saddled. Christian said:

  “Derry, will you ride over to Little Rock for me?”

  “I’ll ride to Little Rock,” answered Derry, “even if you mean Arkansas.”

  “Not that far. North-east, through the hills. I’ll draw the trail for you. Go to Little Rock, or in sight of it. Just over the town you’ll find a bald-headed hill with just one tuft of forest in the centre of it. Go up on that hill and wait in those woods till you get word. You’ll reach Little Rock inside of two days, I suppose.”

  “What’s the main idea?” asked Derry.

  “The main idea,” said Rainey, “is to have a man on the spot to get a message from us. If you see a man with a rag of white tied on his left bridle rein, you’ll know that he’s our messenger. Is that clear?”

  “Clear as day,” said Derry.

  “If you need money,” said Rainey, “here’s a few hundred.”

  He took out his wallet and picked from it a few greenbacks. The size of the denominations made the eyes of Derry enlarge. He stared at the money without moving a hand.

  “It’s yours,” said Rainey, smiling.

  Derry took in a quick, gulping breath. Then he smiled in turn and shook his head. His breath exploded with the words: “Can’t take it, Buck. Thanks, but I can’t take it. I’ve been on the bum, I know, but I never took a hand-out that I didn’t work fo
r. I’ve never taken a penny in my life that I didn’t earn.”

  “Why, man,” exclaimed Buck Rainey, “haven’t you been working for Barry Christian — and me?”

  “Working?” said Derry, opening his honest eyes wide. “I thought I was just helping out a friend — I thought I was doing something to help you, Buck. I wasn’t doing it for pay.”

  As he stared, the glance of Rainey flickered away to the side. Apparently it crossed that of Barry Christian before it returned to Derry, and this angered Derry, he could hardly have said why.

  “Have you any money at all?” asked Rainey.

  “I have enough,” answered Derry, frowning.

  “All right, then,” said Rainey. “Let it go that way.” He added, with a sudden increase of heartiness: “I understand your feeling. But it’s not often that we run across your sort of man, Tom. So long. See you before long.”

  Christian and Rainey both shook hands in parting. Then Christian said:

  “Here, Tom. Take that black I’ve been riding. He’s worth ten of your mustang.”

  It touched Derry, both the offer and the hearty, casual way in which it was made.

  “And what about you?” he asked with concern.

  “About me? Oh, I’ll pick up another horse that’s as good or better before the day’s out While the law hounds are after me, I’ll have to have good horseflesh between my knees. But I’ll find another mount in three hours.”

  That was how Tom Derry happened to find himself possessed of the black horse on which Barry Christian had fled from Blue Water, and such was the unsuspicious nature of his mind that he mounted it without a single misgiving, and while he waved to his two departing acquaintances, he gloried in the long, free stride of the fine horse that was to bring such danger to his trail.

  15

  A GREY WOLF

  ALL through that day he saw no human being. He travelled through huge, broken country. Sometimes in one valley the north slope was soft and green and the south slope was covered with dry grass on which the sun flashed and the wind rustled. There were grass regions and forested places. He climbed above timber line and drifted among the bee pastures. He had a view from the highlands of lakes sunk in deep gorges, like great blue eyes.