Ralph Compton: West of the Law

by Ralph Compton

  ‘‘Kit Carson, Wild Bill Hickok and a bunch of mountain men traveled this country,’’ Prescott said. ‘‘And a lot of outlaws still do.’’ He smiled. ‘‘Myself included.’’

  ‘‘You on the run from the law?’’ McBride asked.

  Prescott nodded. ‘‘Yeah. Sometimes after you kill a man all you can do is run. It’s either that or face a vigilante necktie party.’’ He hesitated a heartbeat, then said, ‘‘And you, John, what are you running from?’’

  McBride was taken aback. ‘‘Is it that obvious?’’

  Prescott shrugged. ‘‘You claim you’re not the law, so you got to be running. You didn’t come to High Hopes to save a woman. You came because you figured you’d run far enough.’’

  ‘‘I killed a man,’’ McBride said.

  ‘‘Back in the city?’’

  ‘‘New York.’’

  ‘‘I’d say you’ve skedaddled a fair piece off your home range.’’

  ‘‘Could be I haven’t run far enough,’’ McBride said, remembering Gypsy Jim O’Hara. ‘‘The father of the man I killed has a far reach.’’

  ‘‘Then watch your back trail, John. Them’s words of wisdom.’’

  They camped that night in a grove of mixed juniper and piñon, beside a stream that bubbled clear from between a cleft in a sandstone parapet that stood taller than a man. The wall, shaped like the prow of a ship, jutted from the side of a hill and it had been undercut by centuries of floodwater, forming a deep hollow.

  ‘‘I reckon we’ll be glad to sleep in the cave tonight,’’ Prescott said. He lifted his head and tested the wind. ‘‘I smell lightning.’’

  ‘‘All I can I smell is the salt pork frying,’’ McBride said sourly, hurting from the jolting misery of the poorly sprung trap.

  ‘‘Maybe so—but listen.’’

  Prescott, possessing the instincts of a hunted animal, had heard the thunder long before McBride. But now, as he stepped away from the sizzling fry pan and crackling fire, McBride heard it too.

  The storm was blowing in from off the rocky backbone of the Sangre de Cristo range, and by the time McBride squatted by the fire to eat, the sky to the west was flashing silver.

  ‘‘Be here in an hour or less,’’ Prescott said. ‘‘And it sounds like a big one. Summer lightning storms in Colorado can put a scare into a man. After we eat we’ll bring the horses into the cave.’’

  Thirty minutes later the wind began to blow strong. It tossed the branches of the juniper, tattered the flames of the fire and threw up crimson sparks that rose bright into the darkness, then winked out like dying stars.

  As McBride and Prescott moved into the meager shelter of the cave, thunder bellowed like a monstrous bull as lightning branded the sky. Rain hammered down, hissing like a snake, and around them the fragile, crystal air shattered into a million shards, catching the lightning flare, shimmering with fire.

  The night was being torn apart to a mad symphony of thunder and lightning and the demented counterpoint of the howling wind.

  And John McBride did not like it one bit.

  ‘‘Not like the big city, huh?’’ Prescott said, raising his voice over the din. He was grinning, building a cigarette, a man completely at ease with his environment.

  ‘‘I’ve never seen it real close like this,’’ McBride answered. ‘‘In New York the thunder was always above the rooftops, up where the pigeons live.’’

  Prescott thumbed a match into flame and lit his cigarette, the blue smoke he exhaled immediately snatched away by the wind. ‘‘We’ll be safe enough so long as we stay right where we are.’’

  McBride smiled. ‘‘Luke, at this moment wild horses couldn’t drag me out of this cave.’’

  The storm was directly above them now, a colossal, scarlet-scaled dragon that roared and breathed blue fire.

  McBride was blinded by the searing intensity of the lightning strike, deafened by the accompanying bang of thunder. Beside him he was aware of Prescott jumping to his feet, a curse on his lips as he ran to the horses. His stud recoiled from him, reared and backed out of the cave. The big horse then swung around and ran into the night.

  The trap was upended, the wheels blasted away. A few feeble flames fluttered on the woodwork like yellow moths, then died in the rain.

  Prescott cursed long and loud. He turned and looked at McBride, his eyes blazing. ‘‘It will take me all day to round up that damned stud. He’ll keep on going until he outruns the storm.’’

  ‘‘The trap’s done for,’’ McBride said, realizing he was piling misery on misery.

  ‘‘See that,’’ Prescott said without interest.

  The little mustang was standing head down, seemingly oblivious to the thunder and the loss of its companion. ‘‘We still have a horse,’’ McBride said.

  Prescott nodded. ‘‘You could call it that.’’

  McBride could see that the other man was seething mad, and he let it go. He sat down, wrapped in a cocoon of gloomy silence as the storm raged around him. At some point in the night he fell asleep. He dreamed of Shannon and horses.

  When McBride woke, Prescott was gone. He stepped to the trap and saw to his chagrin that it was wrecked beyond repair. Ebenezer would charge him dearly for the lost wagon, he knew, and it would put a big hole in his dwindling supply of money.

  The sky was clear, the color of washed-out denim, tinged with red. The air smelled fresh of rain and piñon, and water hung on the leaves of the junipers, a point of morning light captured in each drop.

  But McBride took little joy in the dawn, the loss of the trap and the prospect of being forced to walk weighing on him.

  The ugly little mustang had left the cave and was grazing on bunchgrass as McBride filled the coffeepot at the stream and added a handful of Arbuckle.

  He had forgotten about the fire.

  Two hours later, when Prescott rode into camp astride his stud, McBride had used up his matches and all he had to show for his efforts was a few charred twigs.

  The little gunfighter sat his horse and grinned. ‘‘Coffee smells good.’’

  ‘‘The wood is wet,’’ McBride said defensively, irritated that the other man sounded so cheerful. ‘‘Damn it, everything is wet.’’

  Prescott slid off the stud and stepped to the ashes of the fire. He gathered up some twigs and leaves and within a few minutes had a fire blazing. He set the coffeepot on the flames and built a smoke, smiling, but saying nothing.

  ‘‘In New York,’’ McBride said defensively, ‘‘when I want coffee, I say to a waiter, ‘Bring me coffee,’ and he brings it.’’

  ‘‘Good way,’’ Prescott said.

  ‘‘I never had to light a fire,’’ McBride said, even more irritated at having to justify his city ways.

  ‘‘Out here a man should know how to make a fire,’’ Prescott said. ‘‘He just never can tell when he’ll need one.’’

  The implied criticism stung and McBride opened his mouth to make a sharp reply, but the other man headed him off, his eyes suddenly serious. ‘‘Saw something that might interest you, John.’’

  ‘‘What was that?’’

  ‘‘I started out to track my horse just after the storm passed, while you were snoring.’’

  ‘‘I don’t—’’

  ‘‘Anyhoo, he headed west, into the storm, knowing it would follow him otherwise.’’

  ‘‘Real smart horse,’’ McBride said drily.

  ‘‘Well, thank you. I reckon he is.’’ Prescott checked the coffeepot. ‘‘We’ll let it bile for a spell longer.’’ He set the pot back on the fire. ‘‘There’s a wagon road a mile to the north of where we are. It’s well traveled because the gold miners use it to haul out ore to High Hopes and bring in supplies. But about a mile west of here, a trail cuts off the main road and swings to the northwest. La Veta Pass is in that direction, but I don’t believe that’s where the trail is headed.’’

  ‘‘I’m not catching your drift,’’ McBride said.

  Prescott
grinned. ‘‘Good! You’re learning the lingo.’’ He was again busy with tobacco and papers. ‘‘What I’m saying is that the trail will eventually meet up with the Union Pacific road. If memory serves me right, there’s a watering stop for their engines around there. The rails come down from Denver, through Pueblo, then meet the Santa Fe road at Trinidad, just north of the New Mexico border. But that’s by the way. The main thing is that Gamble Trask’s Chinese girls and his opium could be loaded onto a Union Pacific freight in Denver, then off-loaded at the watering stop east of La Veta Pass.’’

  ‘‘But wouldn’t the train crew notice what was happening?’’

  Prescott smiled. ‘‘It’s been my experience that railroaders like money as much as anybody else. Trask can buy their silence.’’

  ‘‘Then the girls aren’t held at the mines?’’

  ‘‘I don’t think so. There are some decent men at the gold mines who wouldn’t hold with what Trask is doing. There would be talk, something he doesn’t want.’’

  ‘‘Then the girls and the opium must be taken to somewhere near the Union Pacific line. Either that or they’re driven straight from the watering stop to High Hopes.’’

  ‘‘That’s my thinking,’’ Prescott allowed. He picked up the pot, thumbed open the lid and glanced inside. ‘‘Coffee’s ready. Let’s have your cup.’’

  They drank coffee in silence, each man busy with his own thoughts. Then Prescott said, ‘‘I propose we go scout around that watering stop. That is, if my memory is correct and it’s really where I say it is.’’

  ‘‘I was thinking that myself,’’ McBride said. ‘‘Only we have a problem.’’

  ‘‘What problem?’’

  ‘‘How the hell do I get there?’’

  Chapter 16

  ‘‘Your charger is ready, Mr. McBride,’’ Prescott said, trying to hide the grin that flirted with his mouth. ‘‘I even fixed you up with a saddle on account of how the mustang has a backbone like the High Sierras.’’

  There was nothing about the ugly little horse that filled McBride with confidence.

  Prescott had cut back the reins to a manageable length and stripped off an undamaged portion of the trap’s seat cushion. He’d tied the scorched cushion to the mustang’s back with the remainder of the leathers.

  ‘‘Just be careful how you get up on her,’’ he said. ‘‘The saddle is a mighty uncertain thing. It could slip and slide.’’

  Prescott read the lack of enthusiasm in McBride’s eyes. ‘‘Beats walking, John.’’

  ‘‘Maybe.’’ McBride stepped to the horse. It looked taller now that he was close. ‘‘How do I get up there?’’

  ‘‘Easy.’’ Prescott bent from the waist and laced the fingers of his hands together. ‘‘Put your foot in there and I’ll boost you up. Then ease down real slow into the saddle.’’ McBride lifted a foot. ‘‘Probably better to use the left one, John.’’

  Angry at himself for making the same mistake twice, McBride changed feet and Prescott, revealing surprising strength for such a small man, hoisted him effortlessly onto the mustang’s back.

  The gunfighter stepped back, rubbing his chin like an artist admiring his work. ‘‘Well, so far, so good, and you sure don’t have far to fall, John. Your feet are only about six inches off the ground.’’ He swung into the saddle of his prancing black. ‘‘Now, what say you, should we hit the trail and see if we can do some damage to Gamble Trask?’’

  McBride nodded and gathered up the reins. ‘‘Giddyup,’’ he said. The mustang stood where it was, its blunt hammerhead hanging.

  ‘‘Two things,’’ Prescott said. ‘‘First, squeeze the horse with your knees when you want it to go. Second, lay the reins against the right side of its neck when you want to turn left, left side when you want to go right. Got that?’’

  ‘‘I would have figured that out for myself,’’ McBride said, annoyed at being spoken to like a child. He kneed the horse and it walked forward, making him lurch ungracefully on the seat cushion.

  ‘‘Crackerjack!’’ Prescott said. ‘‘We’ll make a rider out of you yet.’’ Irritated as he was, McBride was oddly pleased. Compliments of any kind from Luke Prescott were rare.

  The man handed him his rifle. ‘‘Here,’’ he said. ‘‘I have a feeling you might need that . . . sooner than later.’’

  They reached the wagon road and headed west, riding through hilly, broken country, much of it forested with piñon and juniper. Here and there iron-wood and catclaw grew on the slopes of the rises, surrounded by streaks of pink daisies and bright scarlet paintbrush.

  After a mile Prescott found the cutoff and they swung northwest, the elevation climbing, piñon and spruce gradually giving way to aspen, fir and ponderosa pine on the slopes of the higher hills.

  McBride had finally relaxed, moving easily with the mustang’s choppy gait. The little horse was teacher and he student, and he accepted their relationship as such.

  By noon, after they crossed the reedy shallows of Apishapa Creek, the day grew hot, the sun a burning gold coin in a sky free of cloud. The two riders followed the wagon trail through a series of narrow arroyos, where the air hung still, the only sounds the creak of saddle leather and the soft footfalls of the horses.

  When they topped a shallow rise, Prescott drew rein. ‘‘If you look westward, you can just see the Spanish Peaks, John,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s beautiful country around there.’’

  McBride stared into the vast distance of the lonely land, stunned at its beauty, by the far blue mountains and the play of light and shadow among the hills. City born, city bred, he had grown accustomed to vistas reduced to the crowded clamor of dirty streets and tall brick buildings that rose so high they blocked the sun.

  This was so different, all that surrounded him. For a few moments he took delight in what he was seeing, breathing clean air, scented by pines.

  With a start, McBride realized he was swallowing hard. He had fallen in love with Shannon—was he now falling in love with the land that nurtured her?

  Luke Prescott was a perceptive man, his instincts honed to razor sharpness by the years he’d lived by the gun. Now he smiled at McBride. ‘‘Gets to a man, doesn’t it?’’

  McBride nodded. ‘‘I’ve never seen its like.’’

  ‘‘When this is all over and Gamble Trask is dead, you should spend some time in the mountains with your lady. Then you’ll really see something.’’

  McBride smiled. ‘‘Trask dead? Right now, that seems almost impossible.’’

  Prescott was not smiling and his eyes were cold. ‘‘It’s not impossible. If this little jaunt of ours fails, I’ll still get to him and kill him.’’

  ‘‘Then we’d better not fail. To save Shannon, I want him to lose all he has. I want him isolated and alone so he looks around and realizes he’s come out on the far end of what he’d once been.’’

  The little gunfighter nodded, his hard face grim. ‘‘So be it. Then let’s get it done.’’

  McBride’s eyes fell on a hawk riding the air currents in the far distance ahead of him. They rode in that direction.

  But McBride had no way of knowing that at the exact moment he’d seen the hawk, the bird’s sharp eyes were looking down on a scene that had transformed a very small part of the enchanted land into a place of unbelievable horror.