It was a short walk across a meadow and into the willows. Nothing stirred except the nighthawks which dipped and swung in the air above us. Somewhere a wolf howled. The sun was down, but it was not yet dark.
We turned south. Wearing my moccasins, I made little sound in the grass, and the appaloosa not much more. There was a smell of smoke in the air, and a gentle drift of wind off the high peaks.
All I could think of was Cap Rountree. If that crowd at the town site were the wrong bunch--and I had a feeling they were--then Cap was bad hurt or killed. And if he was killed I was going up to that town and read them from the Book. I was going to give that bunch gospel.
The first of the three men who came out of the brush ahead of me was Kitch.
"We been waiting for you, Sackett," he said, and he lifted his gun. He thought sure enough he had me.
Trouble was, he hadn't seen that Winchester alongside my leg. I just tilted it with my right hand, grabbed the barrel with my left, and shot from the hip. While he was swinging that gun up, nonchalant and easy, I shot him through the belly. Without moving from my tracks I fired at the second man, and saw him go spinning.
The third one stood there, white-faced and big-eyed, and I told him, "Mister, you unloose that gun belt. If you want to, you just grab that pistol . . . I'm hoping you do."
He dropped his gun belt and backed off a step.
"Now we're going to talk," I said. "What's your name?"
"Ab Warren ... I didn't mean no harm." He hesitated. "Mister, Kitch ain't dead ... can I do for him?"
"He'll get another bullet 'less he lies still," I replied. "You want to help him, you talk. Where's my partner?"
The man shifted his feet. "You better high-tail it. The others'll be down here to see."
"Let 'em come. You going to talk?"
"No, I ain't. By--"
By that time I'd moved in close and I backhanded him across the mouth. It was a fairly careless blow but, like I said, my hands are big and I've worked hard all my life.
He went down, and I reached over and took him by the front of his shirt and lifted him upright.
"You talk or I'll take you apart. I'll jump down your throat and jollop your guts out."
"They ambushed him, but he ain't dead. That ol coot Injuned-away in the brush and downed two before they pulled off. He's back at your camp, but I don't think he's doing so good."
"Is he alone?
"No ... Joe Rugger's there with him." Warren paused. "Rugger took up for him."
Kitch was moaning. I walked over to him. I didn't run, did I, Kitch?" I turned on Warren. "If he lives, and I ever see him carrying a gun, here, in Texas or Nebraska, I'm going to kill him on sight. That goes for you, too. If you want to stay around, stay. But if you wear a gun, I'll kill you."
Taking up the bridle, I added, "You go back up there and tell that outfit that all those who didn't make a deal with Cap for their lots can move, or be moved by me. We staked and claimed that town site and we cut lumber for the buildings."
"There's forty men up there!" Warren said.
"And there's one of me. But you tell them. I hope they are gone before I have to come read them from the Book."
Scooping up his guns and the others, I started off.
It was full dark by the time we got to the camp, and I heard a challenge. The voice sounded familiar, but it wasn't Cap.
"Sackett here," I said, "and I got a lady for company. I'm coming in."
Falling back beside her, I said, "Ma'am, I'm sure sorry about back yonder. Folks never reckoned me a quarrelsome man, but I'd trouble with these men before."
She did not reply and suddenly scared, I said, "Look--you ain't hurt, are you?"
"No... I'm not hurt"
Her voice sounded different, somehow, but I didn't think much of it until I reached up and helped her down. She felt stiff in my hands, and she wouldn't look at me.
A man stepped up beside us. "Sackett? I'm Joe Rugger. Remember? I spoke of coming back to see you. I've been trying to keep them off Cap."
Rugger was the square-set man who had ridden with Kitch. Brushing past him, I went to the lean-to. Cap was lying there on his blankets, and he was so pale it scared me.
"Most times we haven't dared have a light," Rugger said. "They've been pot-shooting around here at night."
"Put the light out."
For a few minutes I sat there, scared to death. That old man looked bad off, mighty bad off. We hadn't been together long, but I'd come to be fond of him. He was a solid, true-blue old man.
"They ambushed him ... four, five of them. They shot him out of his saddle and then went hunting him like an animal. Only Cap was clear conscious and he let them come in close where he couldn't miss. He killed two and the rest took off like scared pole-cats."
"Where's he hit?"
"Missed the lung, I think. Took him high, but he lost a lot of blood before he got here. I didn't know of it until the next morning. Then I came right up.
"When they came to finish him off, I stopped them before they could get to the trees. Cap, he came out of it and managed to get off a shot . . . they think he's in better shape than he is."
I walked outside and stood under the trees. If that old man died I'd hunt every man-jack of them down and gut-shoot them.
By now they had seen Kitch and they knew I was back. If I knew that crowd over there, tonight they would argue, they would threaten, and they would make wartalk, but unless I was completely wrong, they wouldn't come down here in the dark. Not after what happened to Kitch. Tomorrow I could expect trouble.
However I would be ready, and if they wanted it tonight instead of tomorrow, they could have it.
Last thing I'd wanted was trouble, but they'd called the turn, and now they would get a bellyful of it. If they wanted to start the town with a line of graves in boot hill, it would be that way.
Joe Rugger came up behind me. "You want I should ride south for Orrin and Tyrel?"
"No, sir. No, I don't. This here is myself, and I don't think there's going to be enough of it to go around."
They could have forty-eight hours. Then I was riding down.
Chapter X
Morning broke with an overcast sky and a hint of rain, and rain worried me because down here rain could mean snow in the mountains where the gold was.
First off, I walked out to the edge of the timber that surrounded our camp and looked toward the town site. There were several tents, one building already up, and a couple more on the way.
Nobody seemed to be pulling out.
Joe Rugger was squatting over the fire with a long fork, working on some venison steaks. Ange was helping him, but when she looked at me her eyes were bleak and frightened.
Not that I could blame her. It must have come as a shock to come out of the peace of those hills and run into a gunfight . . . and my way of doing things must have been a shock. Folks who live sheltered or quiet lives, away from violent men, have no idea how they have to be dealt with. And I never was one to stand around and talk mean ... if there's fighting to be done the best thing is have at it and get it over with.
Those men at the town site had had their warning, and I gave them time to think about it. In any such number of men a few of them with nerve will stand up to trouble; they will be tough, resolute men. A few will be talkers willing to ride along with the crowd; a few will be camp-followers ready to pick up the leavings of stronger men. And of course, there is always the kind who is himself a tough man, if given leadership.
Such a warning as I had given was apt to thin their ranks somewhat. A few of the camp-followers would shy from trouble, and some of the talkers would make an excuse and ride out.
Cap was in bad shape. He had lost a lot of blood, like Rugger said, and he was a thin, tough old man without too much blood in him. He ran mostly to bone and sinew.
It scared me when I looked at him. His cheeks were sunken in and his eyes were hollow. He looked a sight
"Ange," I said, "will you see
what you can do for him?"
"Yes."
"Ange, I'm sorry about last night."
"You didn't have to shoot those men. That was wicked! It was an awful thing!"
"They were mighty bad men. They came out there to kill me, Ange."
"I don't believe it. They were just talking."
"Ange, when men carry guns they don't just talk about killing. When a man mentions killing, and has in his hands or on his person the means to kill, then you have a right to believe he means to do what he says. I've helped bury a few men who tried to argue at times like that."
Ange wasn't doing any trading on that land of talk. She walked away from me and left me standing, and all that sort of nice feeling between us was gone.
Only girl I ever felt likely to care for, and she would have none of me.
And after I did what I would have to do, she was going to like me even less. But the fact of the matter is, no man can shape his life according to woman's thinking. Nor should any woman try to influence a man toward her way. There must be give and take between them, but when a man faces a man's problems he has to face them a man's way.
We had come up here asking trouble of no one. We had staked a claim, measured out a town site, and staked out building sites. We had cut timber and prepared to build; and then strangers came in, jumped our town site, and tried to jump our claim. They had shot Cap, and they had tried to kill me.
Nobody talked much over breakfast. After breakfast I taken Blackstone and sat down under a tree where I could watch that town site, and I read. Reading was not easy for me, but I hooked both spurs in the girth and settled down for a long ride, determined not to let it throw me. When words showed up that wore an unfamiliar brand, I passed them by and went on, but usually they made sense to me after some study.
After an hour I toted my book back to camp and, rounding up a pick and shovel, headed for the creek.
Cap had sunk a shaft to bedrock and started a cleanup. Going down into the shaft I widened it out a mite and got out some gravel. At the edge of the stream I went to work with the pan, filling it with gravel, dipping it into the water, and starting the water swirling to wash the sand over the edge. I found color, but not much.
Several times I walked to the edge of the woods. Noon came and I could see no sign of work around the town, so evidently they were drinking and talking. Cap was breathing easier, and Ange was feeding him when I came into camp, but she paid me no mind and I sat down to eat what there was.
If they made an all-out attack on us, we might be able to hold them off, but if we had to get out of there our only chance was up the mountain, and with a sick man on our hands we weren't likely to get far.
Taking an axe, I went out to check our defenses. I added a few logs, and rooted out some brush here and there to give us a better field of fire.
Joe Rugger was worried, I could see that, but there was no rabbit in him. He had come in with us and he planned to stick.
"What led you to throw in with us, Joe?" I asked him.
"Drifted in here with the wrong crowd before I measured them for calibre. Seemed to me you and Rountree were more my type. Fact was, I figured to try leasing that store from you. Back in Ohio I operated a small store for another man, but it seemed to me I'd get nowhere working for the other fellow, so I quit. I've done some mining, but a store is what I always wanted."
"Joe, you've just bought yourself a lease. Cap and me, we want to build a town that shapes up to something, and we would be proud to lease that store to you."
Thanks, Tell."
It made a body restless, wondering what they were cooking up down there in town. Same time, I never was one to keep a serious view of things. Time to time folks get the idea I'm slighting my problems because ofttimes they strike me as funny. Now I kept thinking of all those men down there, arguing and drinking and drinking and arguing, and working up a nerve to come after us. It struck me, a man might sort of wander down there of a nighttime and have himself some fun.
Rousting around in our gear I found about a hundred feet of rope Cap had packed along, on account of rope is always handy. Joe had some more, and I knotted the two together and went inside and got my field glasses and studied that town.
There were four tents--one large, like the saloon
tents at the end of the tracks in railroad towns, and the others small. A couple of horses were saddled, with packs behind the saddles . . . some men were in the street.
Something about it bothered me. If there actually were forty men around the town, where were they?
I took my Winchester and scouted around the edge of the trees, studying the bench, searching every possible approach. It scarcely seemed likely that they would try another attack with me here, when Cap and Joe had driven them off alone. But they might
Thinking of it worried me, with Ange Kerry at the camp, and Cap Rountree a sick man. Looked to me like I was going to have to go after them, after all.
Come evening time, Joe Rugger came out to Stand watch, and I went into camp for grub. Cap was conscious and he looked up at me. "You've got it all on your hands, Tell. I'll be no help to you."
"You've been a help." I squatted on my heels beside his pallet, nursing a cup of coffee in my hands. "Cap, I'm going to take it to them tonight." "You be careful."
"Else they'll come a-hunting. We can't have them shooting around with Ange here, and you laid up." "That's a fine girl."
"You should see that country up yonder. Blessed if I can see how she made it ... months up there, all alone."
I could see Cap was done up. He would need time and plenty of good food to get his strength back... it was lucky Ange was there.
She came in, bringing a cup of soup for Cap, but she kept her eyes away from me. What did she expect me to do? Stand still and get shot? Sure, I got the jump, but Kitch had warning. And when he came out of the trees like that he wasn't looking to play patty-cake.
She was mighty pretty. A little thing, slim and lovely. Though the only clothes she had were wore-out things, and she was not likely to have better until one of us could cut loose for Silverton or Del Norte.
Her face had taken on some color, and she had combed out that hair of hers and done it up like some of those fancy pictures I'd seen in Godey's Lady's Book. I declare, she was pretty!
"See you," I said, and stood up. "You take care."
There was a moment there I thought of talking with her, but what could I say? Seemed to me she didn't want any words from me, and I went away feeling mighty miserable inside. Walking out to the edge of the trees, I stood looking toward the two or three lights and thinking what a fool a man could be.
What was she, after all? Just a slim girl with a lot of red-gold hair... nothing to get upset about.
The humor of what I'd been thinking of doing there in town went out of me. I looked at that town and felt like walking over there and shooting it out.
Only there was no sure way I could win if I did that, and I had to win. Joe was a solid man, but he was no gunfighter. First time in my life I wished I could look up and see Tyrel coming down the pike.
Only Tyrel was miles away and days away, and whatever happened now was up to me. Anyway, it never does a man much good to be thinking of what he could do if he had help . . . better spend his time figuring a way of doing it himself.
Gathering up that rope, I taken it to my horse and saddled up.
"Joe," I said, "yon be careful. They may come a-winging it over this way. If they do, and if I'm able, I'll come a-smoking, but you stand 'em off until I get here."
Ange was standing with the fire behind her and I couldn't see her face. Only when I rode out, I lifted a hand. "See you," I said, and let the palouse soft-foot if off the bench and into the stream bed.
It was cool, with no wind. The clouds were low, making it especial dark. There was a smell of pine woods in the air, and a smell of wood smoke and of cooking, too.
Nigh the town site I drew up and got down, tying the appaloosa to
some willows in the stream bed. I put my hand on his shoulder. "Now you stand steady, boy. I won't be gone long."
But I wondered if that was truth or not.
Maybe it would be just as well if I was to get the worst of them. That Ange, now--she had no use for me, and sure as shooting I was getting a case on her.
Not that it was likely she could ever see me. Girl that pretty had her choice of men. Nobody ever said much about me being good-looking--except Ma--and even Ma, with the best intentions in the world, looked kind of doubtful when she said it.
I didn't shape up to much except for size. Only thing I could do better than anybody else I knew was read sign ... and maybe shoot as good as most. Otherwise, all I had was a strong back.
That Blackstone, now. I'd been worrying that book like a dog worries a bone, trying to get at the marrow of it, but it was a thing took time. Days now I'd been at it, off and on, and everything took a sight of thinking out.
He said a lot of things that made a man study, although at the wind-up they made a lot of sense. If I could learn to read ... I would never get to be a lawyer like Orrin there, but...
This was no time for dreaming. Pa, he always advised taking time for contemplating, but this was the wrong time.
Taking that rope and my Winchester, I edged in close. Working soft on moccasin feet, I ran my rope through the guy ropes of that big tent, up behind about four guy ropes, and then a loop clean around one of the smaller tents and around the guy ropes of another. Then I walked back to my horse and loosed him, mounting up and taking a dally around the pommel with the loose end.
Everything at the town seemed mighty peaceful.
Inside I could hear folks a-cutting up some touches, the clatter of glasses and poker chips. Seemed almost a shame to worry them.
Walking my horse alongside the building, I stood up on the saddle and pulled myself to the roof. I slid out of my shirt, and shoved it into the chimney. Then I stepped back to the eaves and, about time I touched saddle, all hell broke loose inside. The room had started to fill up with wood smoke and I heard folks a-swearing something awful and coughing.
Sackett (1961) s-9 Page 7
