The rock under the trail sloped steeply away into a dark, shadowy canyon now over two hundred feet down. He walked on, plodding wearily. For over an hour he walked, winding around and around to follow the curving walls of the canyon. Then he halted suddenly.
Ahead of him the trail ended. It ended and explained his difficulties in one instant. A gigantic pine, once perched upon the edge of the cliff, had given way, its roots evidently weakened by wind erosion. The tree had blown down and fallen across the trail. Pines had sprung up around it and around its roots until the trail was blocked by a dense thicket that gave no hint of the road that had once run beneath it.
Crawling over the pine, Kilkenny emerged from the thicket and walked back to his horse. Mounting, he rode slowly homeward, and as he rode he thought he had never been so utterly tired as he was now. But there was coolness in the breeze through the pines, and some of their piny fragrance seemed to get into his blood. He looked up, feeling better as he rode slowly along the grassy trail, through the mountain meadows and down through the columned trunks of the great old trees toward the Hatfield cup.
Yes, it was worth fighting for, worth fighting to keep what one had in this lonely land among the high peaks. It was such a country as a man would want, a country where a man could grow and could live, and where his sons could grow.
Even as he thought of that, Kilkenny found himself remembering Nita. King Bill Hale wanted her. Well, what would be more understandable? Certainly she was beautiful, the most beautiful woman in Cedar Valley and many other valleys. And what did she think? Hale had everything to offer: strength, position, wealth. She could reign like a queen at the Castle.
And Hale himself? He was a handsome man. Cold, but yet, what man ever sees another man as a woman sees him? The side of himself that a man shows to women is often much different from that seen by men.
Worry began to move through him like a drug. Nita nearby was one thing, but Nita belonging to someone else, that was another idea. He realized suddenly it was an idea he didn't like, not even a little bit. Especially, he did not want her to belong to the arrogant King Bill.
Hale wanted her, and regardless of what she thought, he could bring pressure to bear, if his own eloquence failed him. He was king in Cedar Valley. Her supplies came in over the road he controlled. He could close her business. He could even prevent her from leaving. He might. Jaime Brigo was the reason why he might not succeed. Brigo and himself, Kilkenny.
King Bill's lack of action disturbed him. Hale had been beaten in a fist fight. Knowing the arrogance of the man, Kilkenny knew he would never allow that to pass. He had refused them supplies, and they had come and taken them from under his nose.
Was Hale waiting to starve them? He knew how many they were. He knew the supplies they had were not enough to last long. And he held the trail to Blazer. Did he know of the trail through the Smoky Desert? Kilkenny doubted that. Even he did not know if it were passable. The chances were Hale had never even dreamed of such a thing. Aside from the Indian to whom he had talked, Kilkenny had heard no mention of it.
Saul Hatfield walked down from among the trees as he neared the cup. "Anything happen?" Kilkenny asked.
Saul shook his head, staring curiously at the dust-covered Kilkenny. "Nope. Not any. Jesse took him a ride down to town. They sure are gettin' set for that celebration. Expectin' a big crowd. They say Hale's invited some folks down from Santa Fe, some big muckymucks."
"From Santa Fe?" Kilkenny's eyes narrowed. That was a neat bit of politics, a good chance to entertain the officials and then tell them casually of the outlaws in the mountains, the men who had come in and tried to take away valuable land from King Bill.
Lance knew how persuasive such a man could be. And he would entertain like royalty, and these men would go away impressed. That King Bill didn't intend to strengthen his position very much would be foolhardy to imagine. Hale would know how to play politics, how to impress these men with his influence and the power of his wealth.
The audience would all be friendly, too. They would give the visiting officials the idea that all was well in Cedar Valley. Then, when the elimination of some outlaws hiding in the mountains was revealed, if it ever was, the officials would imagine it was merely that and never inquire as to the Tightness or wrongness of Hale's actions.
In that moment, Kilkenny decided. He would go to Cedar Bluff for the celebration.
Yet, even as the thought occurred to him, he remembered the thick neck and beetling brow of Tombull Turner.
For the first time he began to think of the prizefighter. He had seen the man fight. He was a mountain of muscle, a man with a body of muscle and iron. His jaw was like a chunk of granite. His flat nose and beetling brow were fearsome.
Kilkenny rode down into the cup and swung from his horse. Parson walked slowly toward him, Jesse and O'Hara beside him. They stared at the dust on his clothes.
"Looks like you been places, son," Parson drawled.
"I have." Kilkenny removed the saddle and threw it on the rail. "I've been down into Smoky Desert."
"Smoky Desert?" O'Hara stepped forward. "You found a way?"
"Uh-huh. Take a little ax work to clear it."
"Could a wagon get across?"
Kilkenny shrugged, looking up at the big Irishman. "Your guess is as good as mine. I know I can get a wagon into the desert. I know there used to be a trail. I could see it. There's parts of a wagon down there. Somebody has been across. Where somebody else went, we'll go."
"How about gettin' out?" Parson drawled.
"That," Kilkenny admitted, "is the point. You put your finger right on the sore spot. Maybe there's a way, maybe there isn't. There was once. But I'm a-goin'. I'm goin' over, an' with luck I'll get back. We'll have to take water. We'll have to tie cloths over our faces and over the nostrils of the horses. Otherwise that dust will fix us for good."
"When you goin'?" Jesse demanded.
"Right soon. We got to make a try. If we could make it soon enough we might bring the others back that way. I'll start tomorrow."
"Leave us shorthanded," Parson suggested.
"It will." Kilkenny nodded agreement. He looked at the old mountaineer thoughtfully. "The trouble is, Hale has time, an' we haven't. I'm bankin' that he won't try anything until after the celebration. I think this is not only his tenth anniversary but a bit of politics to get friendly with them down at Santa Fe. He'll wait until he's solid with them before he cleans us out!"
"Maybe. Ain't nobody down to town goin' to tell our side of this. Not a soul," Hatfield agreed.
"There will be." Kilkenny stripped off his shirt and drew a bucket of water from the well. His powerful muscles ran like snakes beneath his tawny skin. "I'm goin' down."
"They'll kill you, man!" O'Hara declared. "They'd shoot you like a dog."
"No, not while those Santa Fe officials are there. I'll go. I hear they want me to fight Tombull Turner. Well, I'm goin' down an' fight him."
"What?" Runyon shouted. "That man's a killer. He's a ringer."
"I know." Kilkenny shrugged. "But I've seen him fight. Maybe I'm a dang fool, but I've got to get down there an' see those Santa Fe men. This is my chance."
"You think you can do any good against Hale?" Parson asked keenly. "He'll be winin' and dinin' them folks from Santa Fe. He won't let you go nowhere close to 'em."
"But they'll be at the fight," Kilkenny told him. "I'm countin' on that."
At daybreak the labor gang had reached the thicket of pines covering the entrance to the road. Axes in hand, they went to work. Other men began bucking the big fallen tree into sections to be snaked out of the way with ox teams.
Once, during a pause when he straightened his back from the saw, Quince looked over at Kilkenny. "They should be there today," he drawled slowly. "I sure hope they make it."
"Yeah." Lance straightened and rubbed his back. It had been a long time since he'd used a crosscut saw. "You know Blazer?"
"Uh-huh." Hatfield bit off a chew of to
bacco. "Man there named Sodermann. Big an' fat. Mean as a wolf. He's Hale's man. Got a gunman with him name of Rye Pitkin."
"I know him. A two-bit rustler from the Pecos country. Fair hand with a six-gun."
"There's others, too. Ratcliff an' Gaddis are worst. We can expect trouble."
"We?" Kilkenny looked at him. "You volunteerin' for the trip?"
"Sure." Quince grinned at him. "I need me a change of air. Gettin' old, a-settin' around. Reckon the bore of that Kentucky rifle needs a bit of cleanin', too."
They worked on until dark, and when they stopped, the road was open. O'Hara, who had done the work of two men with an ax, stood on the edge of the canyon in the dimming light and looked across that awful expanse toward the distance, red ridges touched now with light from a vanished sun. "It don't look good to me, Kilkenny," he said. "It sure don't look good."
The wagon was loaded with water-not heavily, but three good kegs of it. With Bartram on the driver's seat, they started. Kilkenny led the way down the steep trail, Quince behind him. He reined in once and watched the wagon trundle over the first stones and past the ruin of the great tree. Then he continued on. For better or worse, they were committed now.
Chapter XI
The Road of Death
He led the way slowly, stopping often, for it was slow going for the wagon. He watched it coming and watched the mules. They were good mules; Hale himself had no better. They would need to be good.
At the bottom of the road he swung down, and standing there with Quince Hatfield, he waited, listening to the strange, lonely sighing of the mysterious wind that flowed like a slow current through the dusty depths of the sink.
Bartram was a hand with mules. He brought the wagon up beside them, and Kilkenny indicated the mules. "Soak those cloths in water an' hang one over the nose of each of them. We better each wear a handkerchief over the nose and mouth, too."
He was riding the buckskin, and he got down and hung a cloth over the horse's nostrils, where it would stop part of the dust at least without impeding the breathing. Then they started on.
From here, it was guesswork. He had a compass, and before leaving the cliff top he had taken a sight on a distant peak. How closely the trail would hold to that course he did not know, or if any trail would be visible once they got out into the desert.
Walking the buckskin, he led off into the dust. The wind did not howl. It blew gently but steadily, and the dust filled the air. Much of it, he knew, was alkali. Behind him, Quince Hatfield rode a rawboned roan bred to the desert.
Fifteen minutes after leaving the cliff, they were out of sight of it. Overhead the sky was only a lighter space dimly visible through a hanging curtain of dust. Dust arose in clouds from their walking horses and from the wagon, fine, powdery, stifling dust.
Over and around them the cloud closed in, thick and prickly when the dust settled on the flesh. Glancing at Quince during one interval, Kilkenny saw the man's face was covered with a film of dust; his eyelashes were thick with it; his hair was white.
When they had been going an hour, he reined in and dismounted. Taking a damp cloth, he sponged out the buckskin's nostrils and wiped off the horse's head and ears. Quince had drawn abreast and was doing likewise, and when the others came up, they worked over the mules.
The dust filled the air and drew a thick veil around them, as in a blizzard. Saul drew closer. "What if the wind comes up?" he asked.
Bartram's face was stern. "I've been thinking of that," he said. "If the wind comes up, in all of this, we're sunk."
"Where are we now?" Jackie asked, standing up on the wagon.
"We should have made about three or four miles. Maybe more, maybe less. We're right on our course so far."
They rested the mules. The wagon was heavy, even though it was not carrying a load now. The dust and sand in places were a couple of feet deep, but usually the wheels sank no more than six inches into the dust. The animals would all need rest, for the air was heavy with heat, and there was no coolness here in the sink. The dust made breathing an effort.
Kilkenny swung into the saddle and moved out. The flatness of the desert floor was broken now, and it began to slant away from them toward the middle. Kilkenny scowled thoughtfully, and rode more slowly. An hour later, they paused again. This time there was no talking. All of the men were feeling the frightful pressure of the heat, and glancing at the mules, Kilkenny could see they were breathing heavily. Streaks marred the thick whiteness of the dust on their bodies.
"We'll have to stop more often," he told Bartram, and the farmer nodded.
They rode on, and almost another hour had passed before the buckskin stopped suddenly. Lance touched him gently with a spur, but Buck would not move. Kilkenny swung down. Ahead of him, and he could see for no more than fifty feet, was an even, unbroken expanse of white. It was not even marred by the blackish upthrust of rock that had occasionally appeared along the back trail.
Quince rode up and stopped. "What's wrong?" he asked. Then he swung down and walked up.
"Don't know," Kilkenny said. "Buck won't go on, something wrong." He stepped forward and felt the earth suddenly turn to jelly under his feet. He gave a cry and tried to leap backward, but only tripped himself.
Quince helped him up. "Quicksand," he said, "an' the worst I ever see. Must be springs under."
The wagon drew up, and then Saul and Jackie. "Stay here," Lance told them. "I'll scout to the left."
"I'll go right," Quince suggested. "Might be a way around."
Kilkenny turned the buckskin and let him have his head. He walked at right angles to the course and then at Kilkenny's urging, tried the surface. It was still soggy. They pulled back and rode on. In a half hour he reined in. There was still no way around, and the edge of the quicksand seemed to be curving back toward him. Only the sagacity of Buck had kept them out of it. He rode back.
"Any luck?" he shouted as he saw Quince waiting with the wagon.
"Uh-huh. It ends back there about two mile. High ground, rocky."
They turned the wagon and started on once more. They would lose at least an hour more, perhaps two, in skirting the quicksand.
Hour after hour they struggled on. Weariness made their limbs leaden. The mules were beginning to weave a bit now, and Kilkenny found himself sagging in the saddle. His sweat-soaked shirt had become something very like cement with its heavy coating of white dust. They stopped oftener now, stopped for water and to sponge the nostrils of the mules and horses.
At times the trail led through acres upon acres of great, jagged black rocks that thrust up in long ledges that had to be skirted. All calculations on miles across were thrown out of kilter by this continual weaving back and forth across the desert. Time had ceased to matter, and they lived only for the quiet numbness of the halts.
All of them walked from time to time now. Time and again they had to get behind the wagon and push, or had to dig out rocks to roll them aside to clear the only possible trail.
The world had become a nightmare of choking, smothering, clinging dust particles, a nightmare of sticky heat and stifling dust-filled air. Even all thought of Hale was gone. They did not think of food or of family, but only of getting across, of getting out of this hell of choking white.
Kilkenny was no longer sure of the compass. Mineral deposits might have made it err. They might be wandering in circles. His only hope was that the ground seemed to rise now, seemed to be slanting upward. Choking, coughing, they moved on into the dust blizzard, hearing the lonely sough of the wind. Dazed with heat, dust, and weariness, they moved on. The mules were staggering now, and they moved only a few yards at a time.
The black upthrust of the cliff loomed at them suddenly, when all hope seemed gone. It loomed, black and sheer, yet here at the base the dust seemed a little less, a little thinner.
Kilkenny swung down and waited until the rest came up. "Well," he said hoarsely, "we're across. Now to get up."
They rested there under the cliff for a half hour
, and then his own restlessness won over his weariness. He had never been able to stop short of a goal; there was something in him that always drove him on, regardless of weariness, trouble, or danger. It came to the surface now, and he lunged to his feet and started moving.
He had walked no more than a hundred yards when he found it. He stared at the incredible fact, that through all their weaving back and forth, they had held that close to their destination. The road looked rough, but it was a way up, and beyond the hills, but a little way now, lay Blazer.
It was dusk when they reached the top of the cliff and drew up under the pines. Digging a hole in the ground among some rocks, they built a fire in the bottom and warmed some food and made coffee. The hole concealed the flames, and using dry wood, they would make no smoke.
Kilkenny drank the strong black coffee and found his hand growing lax and his lids heavy. He got up, staggered to his blankets, and fell asleep. He slept like he was drugged until Saul Hatfield shook him from his slumber in the last hours of the night to take over the watch.
Lance got up and stretched. Then he walked over to the water casks, drew water, and bathed himself, washing the dust from his hair and ears. Stripping to the waist, he bathed his body in the cold water. Refreshed, he crossed to the black bulk of the rocks and seated himself.
In the darkness thoughts come easily. He sat there, his eyes open and staring restlessly from side to side, yet his thoughts wandering back to Cedar Bluff.
They wanted him to fight Tombull Turner. He had decided to take the fight. Sitting here in the darkness with the wind in the pines overhead, he could think clearly. It was their only chance of getting to the Santa Fe officials. He knew how men of all sorts and kinds admire a fighting man. The Sante Fe officials, especially if one of them was Halloran, would be no exception. He would be going into the fight as the underdog. Hale wanted him whipped, but King Bill's power was destroying his shrewdness.
Halloran, or whoever came, would know about Tombull. The man had been fighting, and winning, all through the West. Any man who went against him would be the underdog, and the underdog always has the crowd with him. Kilkenny knew there was scarcely a chance that he would do anything but take a beating, yet he believed he could stay in there long enough to make some impression. And between rounds- that would be his chance.
the Rider Of Ruby Hills (1986) Page 31
