Riding for the Brand (Ss) (1986)

by L'amour, Louis

  Once inside, he found it fell away steeply in a mass of loose boulders. Scrambling over them, he came to a straight, steep fall of at least ten feet. Glancing at the sheer drop, he knew one thing once down there, he would never get back up!

  Holding his torch high, he looked beyond.

  Nothing but darkness. Behind him there was no hope. He hesitated and then got down on his hands and knees, lowered himself over the edge, and dropped ten feet.

  This time he had to be right, for there was no going back. He walked down a slanting tunnel.

  It seemed to be growing darker. Glancing up at his torch, he saw it was burning out. In a matter of minutes he would be in total darkness.

  He walked faster and faster. Then he broke into a stumbling run, fear rising within him.

  Something brought him up short, and for a moment he did not see what had caused him to halt in his blind rush. Then hope broke over him like a cold shower of rain.

  There on the sand beneath his feet were tiny tracks! He bent over them. A packrat or some other tiny creature. Getting up, he hurried on, and seeing a faint glow ahead, he rushed around a bend. There before him was the feeble glow of the fading day. His torch guttered and went out.

  He walked on to the cave mouth, trembling in every limb. Mac Marcy was standing in an old watercourse that came out from behind some boulders not two miles from his cabin.

  He stumbled home and fell into his bunk, almost too tired to undress… .

  Marcy awakened to a frantic pounding on his door. Staggering erect, he pulled on his boots, yelling out as he did so. Then he drew on his Levi’s and shirt and opened the door, buttoning his shirt with one hand.

  Sally, her face deathly pale, was standing outside.

  Beyond her gray mare stood Marcy’s moros. At the sight of him the grayish-black horse lifted his head and pricked up his ears.

  “Oh”… Sally gasped. “I thought you were dead drowned!”

  He stepped over beside her.

  “No”… He said, “I guess I’m still here. You’re purty scared, ma’am. What’s there for you to be scared about?”

  “Why”… She burst out impatiently, “if you his She caught herself and stopped abruptly. “After all”… She continued coolly, “no one wants to find a friend drowned.”

  “Ma’amst” he said sincerely, “if you get that wrought up, I’ll get myself almost drowned every day.”

  She stared at him and then smiled. “I think you’re a fool”… She said. She mounted and turned. “But a nice fool.”

  Marcy stared after her thoughtfully. Well now, maybe He glanced down at his boots. Where they had lain in the pool, there was water stain on them.

  Also, there was a small green leaf clinging to the rough leather. He stooped and picked it off, wadded it up, and started to throw it away when he was struck by an idea. He unfolded the leaf and studied the veins. Suddenly his face broke into a grin.

  “Boy”… He said to the moros, “we got us a job to do, even if you do need a rest.”… He swung into the saddle and rode back toward the watercourse, still grinning.

  It was midafternoon when he returned to the cabin and ate a leisurely lunch, still chuckling.

  Then he mounted again and started for the old waterhole that had been fenced by Jingle Bob Kenyon.

  When Marcy rounded the bend, he could see that something was wrong. A dozen men were gathered around the waterhole. Nearby and astride her gray was Sally.

  The men were in serious conference, and they did not notice Marcy’s approach. He rode up, leaning on the horn of the saddle, and watched them, smiling.

  Suddenly Vin Ricker looked up. His face went hard.

  Mac Marcy swung down and strolled up to the fence, leaning casually on a post.

  “What’s up?”

  “The waterhole’s gone dry”… Kenyon exploded.

  “Not a drop o’ water in it.”

  Smothering a grin, Marcy rolled a smoke.

  “Well”… He said philosophically, “the Lord giveth an’ He taketh away. No doubt it’s the curse of the Lord for your greed, Jingle Bob.”

  Kenyon glared at him suspiciously. “Yuh know somethin’ about this?” He demanded. “Man, in this hot weather my cattle will die by the hundreds.

  Somethin’s got to be done.”

  “Seems to me”… Marcy said drily, “I have heard them words before.”

  Sally was looking at him over her father’s head, her face grave and questioning. But she said nothing, gave no sign of approval or disapproval.

  “This here’s a man’s country”… Marcy said seriously.

  “Yuh fork your own broncs an’ you get your own water.”

  Kenyon flushed. “Marcy, if you know anythin’ about this, for goodness sake spill it. My cows will die. Maybe I was too stiff about this, but there’s somethin’ mighty funny goin’ on here.

  This waterhole ain’t failed in twenty years.”

  “Let me handle him”… Ricker snarled. “I’m just achin’ to git my hands on him.”

  “Don’t ache too hard, or you’ll git your wish,”

  Marcy drawled, and he crawled through the fence. “All right Kenyon, we’ll talk business,”

  Marcy said to the rancher. “You had me stuck yesterday with my tail in a crack. Now you got yours in one. I cut off your water to teach you a lesson. You’re a blamed old highbinder, an’ it’s high time you had some teeth pulled.

  “Nobody but me knows how that water’s cut off and where. If I don’t change it, nobody can.

  So listen to what I’m sayin.” I’m goin” to have all the water I need after this on my own place, but this here hole stays open. No fences.

  “This mornin’ when I went up to cut your water off, I saw some cow tracks. I’m missin’ a powerful lot of cows. I follered the tracks into a hidden draw an’ found three hundred of my cattle an’ about a hundred head of yours all nicely corraled an’ ready to be herded across the border.

  “While I was lookin’ over the hideout, I spied Ricker there. John Soley then come ridin’ up with about thirty head of your cattle, an’ they run “em in with the rest.”

  “You’re a liar”… Ricker burst out, his face tense, and he dropped into a crouch, his fingers spread.

  Marcy was unmoved. “No, I ain’t bluffing.

  You try to prove where you were about nine this mornin”. An’ don’t go tryin’ to git me into a gunfight.

  I ain’t a-goin’ to draw, an’ you don’t dare shoot me down in front of witnesses. But you take off those guns, an’ I’ll his Ricker’s face was ugly. “Yuh bet I’ll take “em off! I allus did want a crack at that purty face o” yours.”

  He stripped off his guns and swung them to Soley in one movement. Then he rushed.

  A wicked right swing caught Marcy before he dropped his gun belt and got his hands up, and it knocked him reeling into the dirt.

  Ricker charged, his face livid, trying to kick Marcy with his boots, but Marcy rolled over and got on his feet. He lunged and swung a right that clipped Ricker on the temple. Then Marcy stabbed the rustler with a long left. They started to slug.

  Neither had any knowledge of science. Both were raw and tough and hard-bitten. Toe to toe, bloody and bitter, they slugged it out. Ricker, confident and the larger of the two men, rushed in swinging. One of his swings cut Marcy’s eye; another started blood gushing from Marcy’s nose. Ricker set himself and threw a hard right for Marcy’s chin but the punch missed as Marcy swung one to the body that staggered Ricker.

  They came in again, and Marcy’s big fist pulped the rustler’s lips, smashing him back on his heels. Then Marcy followed it in, swinging with both hands. His breath came in great gasps, but his eyes were blazing. He charged in, following Ricker relentlessly.

  Suddenly Marcy’s right caught the gunman and knocked him to his knees. Marcy stepped back and let him get up and then knocked him sliding on his face in the sand. Ricker tried to get up, but he fell back, bloody and beaten.

&nbs
p; Swiftly, before the slow-thinking Soley realized what was happening, Marcy spun and grabbed one of his own guns and turned it on this rustler.

  “Drop “em”… He snapped. “Unbuckle your belt an” step back!”

  Jingle Bob Kenyon leaned on his saddle horn, chewing his pipestem thoughtfully.

  “What”… He drawled, “would yuh of done if he drawed his gun?”

  Marcy looked up, surprised. “Why, I’d have killed him, of course.”… He glanced over at Sally, and then looked back at Kenyon. “Afore we git off the subject”… He said, “we finish our deal.

  I’ll turn your water back into this hole I got it stopped up away back inside the mountain but as I said, the hole stays open to anybody. Also “Marcy’s face colored a little “I’m marryin’

  Sally.”

  “You’re what?”

  Kenyon glared and then jerked around to look at his daughter.

  Sally’s eyes were bright. “You heard him, Father,” she replied coolly. “I’m taking back with me those six steers he gave you so he could get them to water.”

  Marcy was looking at Kenyon when suddenly Marcy grinned.

  “I reckon”… He said, “you had your lesson. Sally an’ me have got a lot of talkin’ to do.”

  Marcy swung aboard the moros, and he and Sally started off together. r Jingle Bob Kenyon stared after them, grim humor in his eyes.

  “I wonder”… He said, “what he would have done if Ricker had drawed?”

  Old Joe Linger grinned and looked over at Kenyon from under his bushy brows. “Jest what he said. He’d of kilt him. That’s Quaker John McMarcy, the hombre that wiped out the Mullen gang single-handed. He jest don’t like to fight, that’s all.”

  “It sure does beat all”… Kenyon said thoughtfully.

  “The trouble a man has to go to git him a good son-in-law these days!”

  HOME IN THE VALLEY

  Many of my stories are based upon historical incidents, such as the ride from Knights Landing to Portland reported in this story. I liked the story very much and felt that the ride should be preserved for history, so I used it in my novel Sitka as well. The ride was actually made by a man named Louis Remme, under much the same circumstances as repeated here.

  Western horses were no such pampered beasts as we have today. There are many splendid horses now, some of the finest stock a man could hope to see, but Western horses usually were mustangs or had a streak of the wild horse in them. They were accustomed to long runs across country under adverse conditions. To ride seventy miles on one horse in one day was not unusual, and more than one cowboy has ridden that far to a dance and then back the following morning.

  In the endurance race in 1903 from Chadron, Nebraska, to Chicago, each rider was to ride one horse and lead another. To make the distance in time meant covering seventy-five miles a day for thirteen days. Nice work if you can do it and have the horses!

  Home in the Valley Steve Mehan placed the folded newspaper beside his plate and watched the waiter pour his coffee. He was filled with that warm, expansive glow that comes only from a job well done, and he felt he had just cause to feel it.

  Jake Hitson, the moneylending rancher from down at the end of Pahute Valley, had sneered when he heard of the attempt, and the ranchers had shaken their heads doubtfully when Steve first told them of his plan. They had agreed only because there was no alternative. He had proposed to drive a herd of cattle from the Nevada range to California in the dead of winter!

  To the north the passes were blocked with snow, and to the south lay miles of trackless and almost waterless desert. Yet they had been obligated to repay the money Hitson had loaned them by the first day of March or lose their ranches to him. It had been a pitifully small amount when all was considered, yet Hitson had held their notes, and he had intended to have their range.

  Months before, returning to Nevada, Steve Mehan had scouted the route. The gold rush was in full swing, people were crowding into California, and there was a demand for beef. As a boy he had packed and freighted over most of the trails and knew them well, so finally the ranchers had given in.

  The drive had been a success. With surprisingly few losses he had driven the herd into central California and had sold out, a few head here and a few there, and the prices had been good.

  The five ranchers of Pahute Valley who had trusted their cattle to him were safe. Twenty thousand dollars in fifty-dollar gold slugs had been placed on deposit in Dake and Company’s bank here in Sacramento City.

  With a smile, he lifted his coffee cup. Then, as a shadow darkened his table, he glanced up to see Jake Hitson.

  The man dropped into a chair opposite him, and there was a triumphant light in his eyes that made Steve suddenly wary. Yet with the gold in the bank there was nothing to make him apprehensive.

  “Well, yuh think yuh’ve done it, don’t yuh?”

  Hitson’s voice was malicious. “Yuh think yuh’ve stopped me? Yuh’ve played the hero in front of Betty Bruce, and the ranchers will welcome yuh back with open arms. Yuh think when everything was lost you stepped in and saved the day?”

  Mehan shrugged. “We’ve got the money to pay yuh, Jake. The five brands of the Pahute will go on. This year looks like a good one, and we can drive more cattle over the route I took this time, so they’ll make it now. And that in spite of all the bad years and the rustlin’ of yore friends.”

  Hitson chuckled. He was a big man with straw-colored brows and a flat red face. From one small spread down there at the end of the Pahute he had expanded to take in a fair portion of the valley. The methods he had used would not bear examination, and strange cattle had continued to flow into the valley, enlarging his herds. Many of the brands were open to question.

  The hard years and losses due to cold or drouth did not affect him, because he kept adding to his herds from other sources.

  During the bad years he had loaned money, and his money had been the only help available.

  The fact that he was a man disliked for his arrogant manner and his crooked connections made the matter only the more serious.

  Hitson grinned with malice. “Read yore paper yet, Mehan? If yuh want to spoil yore breakfast, turn to page three.”

  Steve Mehan’s dark eyes held the small blue ones of Hitson, and he felt something sick and empty in his stomach. Only bad news for him could give Hitson the satisfaction he was so obviously feeling.

  Yet even as Steve opened the paper, a man bent over the table next to him.

  “Heard the news?” He asked excitedly. “Latch and Evans banking house has failed. That means that Dake and Company are gone, too. They’ll close the doors. There’s already a line out there a hundred yards long and still growin’!”

  Steve opened his paper slowly. The news was there for all to read. Latch and Evans had failed.

  The managing director had flown the coop, and only one interpretation could be put upon that.

  Dake and Company, always closely associated with Latch and Evans, would be caught in the collapse.

  February of 1855 would see the end of the five brands of Pahute Valley. It would be the end of everything he had planned, everything he wanted for Betty.

  “See?” Hitson sneered, heaving himself to his feet. “Try and play hero now! I’ve got you and them highfalutin’ friends of yores where I want “em now! I’ll kick every cussed one of ‘em into the trail on March first, and with pleasure! And that goes for you, Steve Mehan!”

  Steve scarcely heard him. He was remembering that awful drive. The hard winds, the bitter cold, the bawling cattle. And then the desert, the Indians, the struggle to get through with the herd intact and all to end in this. Collapse and failure. Yes, and the lives of two men had been sacrificed, the two who had been killed on the way over the trail.

  Mehan remembered Chuck Farthing’s words.

  He had gone down with a Mohave Indian’s bullet in his chest.

  “Get ‘em through, boy. Save the old man’s ranch for him. That’s all I as
k!”

  It had been little enough for two lives. And now they were gone, for nothing.

  The realization hit Steve Mehan like a blow and brought him to his feet fighting mad, his eyes blazing, his jaw set.

  “I’ll be eternally blasted if they have”… He exploded, though only he knew what he meant.

  He started for the door, leaving his breakfast unfinished behind him, his mind working like lightning. The whole California picture lay open for him now. The news of the failure would have reached the Dake and Company branches in Marysville and Grass Valley. And in Placerville.

  There was no hope there.

  Portland? He stopped short, his eyes narrowed with thought. Didn’t they have a branch in Portland?

  Of course! He remembered it well, now that he thought of it. The steamer from San Francisco would leave the next morning, and it would be carrying the news. But what if he could beat that steamer to Portland?

  Going by steamer himself would be futile, for he would arrive at the same time the news did, and there would be no chance for him to get his money. Hurrying down the street, his eyes scanning the crowds for Pink Egan and Jerry Smith, punchers who had made the drive with him, he searched out every possible chance, and all that remained was that seven hundred miles of trail between Sacramento and Portland, rough, and part of it harassed by warring Modocs.

  He paused, glancing around. He was a tall young man with rusty brown hair and a narrow, rather scholarly face. To the casual observer he looked like a roughly dressed frontier doctor or lawyer. Actually, he was a man bred to the saddle and the wild country.

  Over the roofs of the buildings he could see the smoke of a steamboat. It was the stern-wheeler Belle, just about to leave for Knights Landing, forty-two miles upstream.

  He started for the gangway, walking fast, and just as he reached it a hand caught his sleeve. He wheeled to see Pink and Jerry at his elbow.

  “Hey”… Smith demanded. “Where yuh goin” so fast? We run two blocks to catch up with yuh.”

  Quickly, Steve explained. The riverboat tooted its whistle, and the crew started for the gangway to haul it aboard. “It’s our only chance”… Steve Mehan exclaimed. “I’ve got to beat that steamboat from Frisco to Portland and draw my money before they get the news! Don’t tell anybody where I’ve gone, and keep yore eyes on Hitson!”