Blood on the Hills

by Matt Chisholm

  His hope was that his quarry knew the country and would head for water and in this at least he was fortunate, for, toward evening, he found himself headed toward the foothills at the base of which he found some cottonwoods and, a little further on, mesquite and water. Not much water and what there was somewhat brackish, but the horses accepted it and drank willingly, even eagerly. He didn’t risk drinking it himself and restricted himself to sipping a little of the precious liquid from his canteen. As there was still some daylight left, he pushed on into the hills for a mile or more and to his intense relief came on a second source of water.

  He had climbed the last couple of miles through rising country and he came now on a pleasant spot where there was grass and birch growing around moving water. He decided to make camp near so that he could water the animals in the morning. He filled his own belly to capacity, lying on his front and sucking the cool liquid into him. To bathe his face in it was balm to his desiccated flesh. He drew back from the water for several hundred yards and camped on fair grass, hobbling the animals so that they could graze at will. As he was in a secluded and well-protected spot, he risked a fire and cooked himself a meal, lying back against his saddle and enjoying his coffee.

  In the morning, he was awake long enough before dawn to cook himself a good breakfast of bacon and beans. By daylight, he had caught up his two animals, saddled and packed them and was on his way back to the water and the sign. Now the tracks started to lead him south and the men ahead showed no inclination to conceal their tracks. Which seemed to indicate that they had no fear of pursuit.

  During the morning, he came on sheep under the guardianship of a Navaho herdsman and a boy. He stopped to talk with them and made coffee over their fire. Questioning them in Spanish, he learned that though they had found tracks of horses, they had not seen a single rider in a week or more. Leaving the man a small present of tobacco, he rode on across the shoulder of a hill, dropped down into a small valley and came into rocky country, losing the tracks completely on pebbly ground. It took him an hour or more of patient searching and this was the first indication that he had that maybe after all the quarry had decided they might be followed. The sign he found now turned south-east, leading him into a tangle of rocks and brush where the sign was hard to follow. His pace slowed accordingly.

  He paused for an hour at noon and chewed on some jerky, resting the horses. But they were holding up well. The going was easier on them in spite of the increasingly difficult country, for it was cooler in the higher country and there was a light wind blowing which refreshed all three of them.

  In the middle of the afternoon, he stopped because the riders had stopped. And they had not done so to make camp, but to wait for two other riders who came in directly from the east. So now they were four. Jody began to wonder if he would soon find the whole gang riding together.

  The men had stayed there for some time, maybe waiting for more of their bunch to arrive. But there were the signs of only four horses and only four horses had gone on. Jody followed along. He camped that night where they had camped. This was in a small natural fortress high in the rocks and he put his horse on the poor patch of grass where they had also grazed their animals. There was water near and he had no troubles on that score.

  That night as he cooked his meal, he felt himself to be in a different world to the one Froud lived in back there in town. He thought about the folks at home and wondered how Joe Widbee or Uncle Mart would have played this hand. He wondered whether he would have his father’s approval of the way in which he had behaved during the last few days. His final thought was that he would have to do whatever he did in his own way. And that went for all men. There was always a code bigger than himself which he respected, but the way in which he tried to live up to it had to be his own.

  The following day, the four men made a real effort to hide their tracks and Jody lost several hours circling and searching for them. This took him down off the hills onto a stretch of malpais that appalled him. It was several square miles in extent and the mere sight of it made him feel that it was hopeless to go on. He also faced the unpleasant fact that if his quarry was as wary as this, they might well leave a man behind to watch their back-trail. That seemed a sensible thing for them to do.

  If this was so, to cross the malpais could prove suicidal and once crossed there lay ahead of him a long search for their sign. He knew that they would not leave the bad country by the obvious way.

  He halted and had a good careful think.

  The first unpleasant fact that he faced was that one or more of the men he followed could have circled back already and had observed him. Right this minute they could be sure they were being followed. This gave him an uneasy feeling. From here on he would have to ride with a chin on either shoulder. But even the greatest caution, he knew, might not save him from the shot from behind.

  Why, he asked himself, was he doing this?

  There seemed no answer, except that a man had to prove himself to himself. But after a little more thought, he decided that there were some things that were bigger than an individual man. He had been raised to know the difference between right and wrong. Often enough he had ignored the axioms of his mother and father, but just the same, he respected them. And as the years passed, he found himself automatically moving toward them.

  There was something rotten back there in town and it was left to him, Jody Storm, who would have been happier riding the range and dabbing brands on calves, to cut out the canker. The only thing was that the same Jody Storm might end up dead and the canker would flourish.

  He rode on, heading around the northern edge of the malpais, intending to circle it and search for outgoing sign. He didn’t find it that day. All he found was plenty of stony trails on which the men ahead could have gotten out without leaving a single track. He knew that he would have to make a wider and time-consuming circle to cut sign on the following day. He camped in dry country, worried by the absence of water for his animals and with the depressing thought that he was wasting his time. He saw himself riding back into town with nothing accomplished so that Shafter and his crowd could laugh in their sleeves and Charlie could sneer. If Froud was strong enough, he might throw a sneer in too.

  The following day, he started a wider circle and toward noon to his surprise, delight and possibly dismay, he came on the tracks of at least seven horses. At first, he thought maybe he had found the trail of a completely different bunch of men, but, on close inspection, he knew that the men he had been originally following were among them.

  So he found himself following what was an absolute mess of sign. He realized with increasing nervousness that such was the tangle of prints in the dust in front of his horse’s nose that if one of them broke away from the trail onto rocky ground to come up behind him, he would be quite unaware of it.

  Right this minute, there could be a rifle pointed at his back.

  And, right that minute, as if his thought had triggered the rifle, there came a shot.

  Alarm exploded in him as the heavy slug struck the cantle of the saddle behind him.

  Hastily, he kicked his horse into action and looked around for cover.

  It was half-timbered, half-rocky country. Away to his left there was a fairly extensive stretch of scattered pine and toward this he headed, the pack-horse laboring along behind under its load and fighting to keep up. Just the same, as a second and third shot came, it started to hang back on the line and to slow Jody who at once let go of the line. He could scarcely hear the sounds of the shots above the roll of the hoofs, but he became suddenly aware of spurts of dust ahead of him and knew that he was being fired on from two different positions. This urged him to use the spurs mercilessly and to yell his horse on to a faster pace.

  It did not surprise him when suddenly his horse went from under him. Just the same the shock of it took his breath away. The animal did not even stagger. It simply dropped. It was only by a miracle that Jody managed to kick his feet free of the stirrup irons and
land on his feet. He did this awkwardly, however, and went down hard.

  A bullet kicked dirt in his face and breathless or not he had to keep moving. He got his legs under him and surged to his feet, darting as fast as he was able for the trees. The pack-horse lumbered past him and crashed into the timber. A bullet passed Jody and thudded into a trunk. Then he was in among the trees, zigzagging. Finally, completely bereft of wind he dropped behind a tree and lay still.

  The firing stopped.

  He drew his Colt, checked the loads and waited.

  He knew there were at least two men out there and they would come at him from two different directions. He didn’t like the idea of that much. He listened carefully to discover if he could hear them getting into action, but he heard nothing.

  Getting to his feet, he went stooping through the trees, looking for a good spot to hole up in. He knew he was at an acute disadvantage, armed as he was only with a belt-gun against at least two rifles. His own long-gun lay under the dead horse.

  The trees came to an end and he found himself over a brush-covered gully. Working his way along this, he went south, moving warily. Almost at once, he came under fire and threw himself down flat. Lead thudded and whined around him. There was a man among the trees behind him.

  He rolled himself over the edge of the gully, went at a scaring speed down the steep slope of its side and came to a stop in among some brush. Once down there, he knew he hadn’t been at all smart. Now they had him cornered. But, he comforted himself, at least there was some cover down here. Though the cover was brush and wouldn’t stop a bullet.

  Aw, Hell, he thought, suckered again. This was getting to be monotonous.

  He heard the scrabble of booted feet among rocks.

  “Storm, we know you’re down there. Throw down your gun and come out with your hands up.”

  That was a joke. As soon as he showed himself, they’d gun him down. They had to. There was no point in doing anything else.

  He crawled into some deep brush and it tore at his clothes and flesh. Waiting, still as death, he listened.

  There was a man walking along the edge of the gully, west of him.

  “Come on out Storm, or we come down there after you.”

  That came from the east. This was checkmate all right.

  But he wasn’t dead yet. He could be patient. He would wait for one of them to show himself before he gave his position away with a shot.

  One of the rifles above him was fired, but the bullet came nowhere near him.

  The man in the west shouted: “You know where he’s at?”

  “Do I Hell! But he’s down there some place.”

  Peering through the brush, Jody glimpsed a moving form dimly. He lifted the Colt and fired. It was a long shot and he needed a lot of luck. He didn’t get it. Just the reverse. They located him now. The firing started and the lead began to search him out. Hastily, he started moving. Something clipped the heel of a boot. Dust was driven up into his face. He knew he was scared half out of his wits. The sudden terror turned into a sort of insane rage. He was tempted crazily to rush out into the open, firing.

  Maybe he would have done that if something hadn’t happened to stop him.

  Luck, which had not exactly beamed on him lately, came down heavily on his side.

  He heard a shot. It was faint, far off. Much of the sound robbed from him by the depth of the gully.

  One of the men shouted something he didn’t catch.

  Then the man in the west yelled: “There’s a feller in the timber.”

  That was the last thing he ever said on earth.

  Jody heard his rifle clatter down into the gully. There came a rattle of loose rocks and, peering out of cover, Jody saw the man pitch forward into the gully. He crashed through brush, apparently fought his way to his feet, walked plainly into Jody’s full view and fell on his face.

  The distant rifle sounded again and again.

  Who? Jody thought.

  He could hear the lead spatting against rock. The man to the east was running and the rifle was seeking him out.

  Then silence. The rifle and the beat of booted feet stopped. Jody stood up and found that he was shaking uncontrollably. He tried to think. Could the hidden marksman be a danger to him as well as the two bushwhackers? Surely that wasn’t likely.

  He climbed the side of the gully and came up into the open. He could see nothing.

  A man called out: “Storm, over here.”

  He walked toward the trees and, as he came closer, a man appeared among them.

  It was Bret.

  Jody stood and grinned shakily—“Don’t this beat all.”

  Bret said: “The feller that fell in the gully – is he dead?”

  “As mutton.”

  “The other lit out.”

  Jody’s legs were failing him. He sat down and rested his back against the bole of a tree.

  “What brings you here?” he said.

  “I want Shawn. You were followin’ him, so I followed you.”

  “Just as well for my sake you did. But we still don’t have him,” Jody said.

  “We will,” Bret said.

  Jody took a good look at him. The man was about his own age. He looked worn out and there were the signs of strain about his eyes. Under his hat showed the edge of the dirty rag tied around his head. Maybe that was where Jody had hit him with the chair back at the adobe. He noted the way Bret said “We will’. The man considered that they were together in this.

  “I have a pack-horse around here someplace,” he said.

  Bret said: “I’ll catch him up. You stay put.”

  Jody rose—“No, I’ll go get my gear from my saddler.”

  Bret walked off into the trees and Jody saw he had a horse tied there. He swung into the saddle and rode south in search of the pack-horse. Jody headed west through the trees and reached his dead horse. The sight of the dead animal saddened him. A link with home had been killed and he had been deeply fond of the animal. He managed to retrieve his rifle and then, using it as a lever, managed to raise the great corpse so he could remove the saddle. By the time he had taken his gear from the dead beast, he was deeply depressed.

  Bret came back through the trees, leading the pack-horse behind him. Together they took off the pack-saddle and threw the riding-saddle on it.

  “We have supplies, any road,” Bret said. “That ain’t to be sniffed at.”

  They both squatted down and talked.

  It was strange, but right off Jody gained the impression that Bret looked to him for leadership. Maybe it was because he held the office of deputy-sheriff, but Jody thought it was because of the reputation that Froud had provided him with and which no doubt had been spread through town by word of mouth.

  Whatever the reason, he knew it would have to be he who made the decision of what they would do next. It turned out that the other’s full name was Bret Armstrong. He rode top-hand for a man named James Struther, who, Jody gathered, was the rancher who had tried to gain entry to the sheriff’s office as a county commissioner. It also became clear that come hell or high-water Bret Armstrong aimed to marry Louise Mary Ann Shafter. Which brought up a couple of touchy points.

  “What makes her so strong against Shawn?” Jody asked.

  Bret looked mad and said: “If you don’t already know, I ain’t tellin’ you.”

  A nod was as good as a wink and Jody reckoned there had once been something between Shawn and the lady and Shawn had withdrawn his favors. Or something along those lines.

  “How does her old man come into this?” Jody asked innocently.

  “I don’t know,” Armstrong admitted. “There’s something pretty crooked goin’ on. Shafter’s tied in with Shawn some way. He owes him. What, God only knows.”

  Jody said: “A good start would be to go look at the dead man an’ see if you know him.”

  They distributed the supplies between the two horses and rode to the gully. When Bret looked down at the dead man, he said he’d ne
ver seen him before and Jody was inclined to believe him. The fellow looked like a saddle-bum. He was about thirty-five years of age and he had been killed by a bullet going through his back and entering his heart. They buried him under a cairn of stones.

  “I think I know the other feller,” Bret said when they rested, sweating from their labors.

  “You do? Why the hell didn’t you say so before?”

  “I wasn’t too sure,” the cowhand said. “But now I done a piece of thinkin’, I reckon I know.”

  “Who?”

  “I ain’t too sure of his name, but I reckon its somethin’ like Marler. I only heard the once.” He was thinking. “I seen him go into the rear of Shafter’s place. Not many men go back into Shafter’s office. Not from the front, that is. But I seen him.”

  “Know anythin’ more about him?”

  “He has a rep with a gun, is all.”

  They climbed out of the gully, stood by their horses, talking, debating whether to go back to town or continue with the pursuit. Jody had a feeling that the answer to everything was in town, but their job right now was to bring in Shawn. Bret agreed and they mounted, searched around for the sign of the man who had fled, found where he had mounted his horse and followed along it.

  “Don’t expect nothin’ special from me if it comes to a fight,” Bret said as they moved along. “I ain’t nothin’ more’n a thirty an’ found hired man. I ain’t no gun artist.”

  Jody put on his tough look.

  “I expect from you what I’d expect from myself,” he said and he thought that sounded pretty good. It might almost have been pa talking.