Oliver Strange - Sudden Westerns 09 - Sudden Makes War(1942)

by Oliver Strange

  “I’ll see if Dad will take that,” the salesman replied, and disappeared into the rear of the shop.

  Yorky looked disconcerted; he had been showing off, and much as he would have liked to possess the weapon, had no intention of buying it. He was seeking a means of backing out without loss of dignity when Dover came in, and brought an inspiration.

  “Say, Boss, c’n you let me have an advance?” he asked anxiously. “I’ve offered fifteen bucks fer that gun an’ I’m shy th’ coin.”

  Dan picked up the six-shooter. “She’s good an’ cheap at the figure,” he said. “Here’s the necessary.”

  “Thanks a lot, Boss,” Yorky replied with great relief. “I didn’t want ter eat dirt afore this kid. He don’t know me; ain’t it a scream?”

  The “kid” returned and, after a very respectful greeting to the owner of the Circle Dot, addressed his other customer: “I can accept yore offer, sir. Will you be needin’ any cartridges?”

  “Them I got will do—she’s a forty-four, same as my rifle,” Yorky said, and paid over the price. “Yer needn’t to wrap her up, an’ yer can’t int’rest me no more, neither.”

  He thrust the gun under his belt, pushed his hat back, and stood rocking on his heels.

  Goggle-eyed, the beefy boy on the other side of the counter gawped at him, remembered and suffered. The ragged, sick little tramp he had fought and beaten—as he maintained—had now beaten him, by becoming what he would have given his ears to be—a cowboy. He could strut into the store, and he—Evans—would have to serve and be polite to him; only a lad could plumb the bitterness of this. His job, of which he had been so proud, became as dust and ashes in his mouth.

  And then, unable to bear those triumphant eyes any longer, he bolted.

  “I guess that levels up some with him,” Yorky said. “I’ll be outside.”

  “The durn li’l monkey,” Dover muttered. “Fancy him thinkin’ up a game like that.”

  The storekeeper came in, and his orders given, the rancher rejoined the boy. A little way along the street they met Foxwell, who stopped, his beady eyes alight with malice.

  “‘Lo, Dover, gittin’ ready to quit the Circle Dot,” was his greeting.

  Dan suppressed a start. “Any reason why I should?” he asked.

  “Well, everybody knows yore of man was up to his neck in debt, an’ it’s said now that the bank won’t give you no more rope,” came the insolent answer.

  “Lies,” Dan replied airily. “Big, fat lies which no respectable representative o’ the Law should be passin’ on. Lemme see, Sheriff, how long have you managed to hold office?”

  The officer’s not too acute intellect missed the innuendo. “Goin’ on four year,” he said, even rather pridefully.

  “Yeah, I remember; it was you who found the murdered man on the Cloudy trail—the man who had neither money nor papers on him, not even a letter addressed to someone else, huh?”

  The sheriff’s gaze shifted uneasily. “That’s so; the fella what downed him took everythin’.”

  “I don’t doubt it.” Again the implication passed unobserved. “A month or two later you were elected by a small margin, one provided—so some folks said—by the Wagon-wheel outfit because you had done Trenton a considerable service.”

  “What are you drivin’ at?” Foxwell cried, his face crimson.

  “Lies, Sheriff, big, fat lies like I was tellin’ you about,” Dan retorted, and then, “God Almighty!”

  They were standing a few yards from the Parlour Saloon. On the opposite sidewalk, Miss Trenton had apparently made up her mind to brave the terrors of the rutted and hoof-torn strip which was Rainbow’s only thoroughfare; just past this point, the street took one of its uncertain turns. She was halfway across when, with a stertorous bellow, six wild steers, enveloped in a cloud of dust, charged down upon her. The girl saw the cruel branching horns, fierce eyes, and lolling tongues, and made a despairing effort to hurry. But this only led to disaster; her feet slipped in the powdery sand and she fell to her knees right in the path of the infuriated animals, behind whom now appeared a perspiring horseman, shouting and gesticulating.

  Leaving the pop-eyed sheriff, Dover sprinted along the sidewalk, dragged out his revolver, and fired at the leader, a little in front of the herd. The brute hesitated, stumbled and went down, only a yard from where the girl lay. The fall of the foremost halted the others, but Dan knew it would be only momentary. Jumping into the road, he floundered to the spot, and raised the now senseless form. A man on foot has no terrors for range cattle, and the sight of him put them in motion again. By a superhuman effort, he regained the sidewalk with his burden; a grazed arm and a ripped shirtsleeve from a slashing, needle-pointed horn was the only damage.

  “Close work, boy,” Bowdyr said. He had come out to see what the noise was about.

  “Bring her into my place.”

  “Ain’t hurt, is she?” the sheriff enquired anxiously.

  “I guess not.” Dan replied. “If you wanta do Zeb another service, go an’ ask that butcher’s lout what he means by bringin’ cows through the town an’ drivin’ ‘em into a frenzy with his fool yellin’; must be mad or drunk.” He caught the saloonkeeper’s enigmatic expression, and added,

  “Might ‘a’ killed the pair of us.” The sheriff went; he did not enjoy the company of Mister Dover in this mood.

  When Miss Trenton returned to the world again, she was sitting in a strange room, with a rugged but kindly-faced man bending over her, glass in hand.

  “Drink this, ma’am,” he said. “It’s good stuff, an’ will put new life into you.

  She obeyed, and the strong spirit—though it made her cough—sent the blood racing through her veins. She looked curiously at her surroundings.

  “What place is this?” she asked.

  “The Parlour Saloon an’ I’m Ben Bowdyr, the proprietor,” he explained. “Dan’s gone for Doc Malachi, an’ to git hisself another shirt.”

  “Is Mister Dover hurt?”

  “Shore, no, just a spoilt garment,” Ben assured her. “Ah, here’s the Doc.”

  Malachi hurried in, the concern on his face giving way to relief when he saw the patient.

  “You are not harmed, Miss Trenton?”

  “I foolishly fainted,” she replied. “Mister Bowdyr kindly gave me some—medicine, and I am quite well again.”

  “Medicine?” Malachi echoed. He picked up the glass she had used, sniffed, glanced at the saloonkeeper, who had retired to his bar, and smiled whimsically. “Then Ben has done all that is necessary and robbed me of a case. And from the way Dover carried on, I really thought it was a serious one.”

  “It would have been but for his courage and prompt action,” she said soberly. “He also escaped injury I am told.”

  “Yes, these cattlemen are tough animals—very discouraging to a doctor,” he mourned.

  “Fortunately they are quarrelsome. But you have made a conquest, Miss Trenton.” He saw the colour creep into her cheeks. “That brandy—I should say, medicine—was laid down by Ben’s grandfather, ‘way back in Virginia, in the days when people of position had cellars, and he wouldn’t take fifty dollars a bottle for it.”

  Her gaze went to the saloonkeeper. “He was most kind,” she murmured.

  “The first thing I learned out here was not to judge by appearances. Ben is a fine fellow, and one day, when settlements like Rainbow become cities, such men will be sent to Congress, and have a word to say, not only in the affairs of our country, but of the whole world.”

  “Still your dream,” she smiled. “Why, isn’t that Yorky?” Malachi stared as the boy came to them. “By all that’s wonderful, it is.”

  “I’m hopin’ yer ain’t hurt much, ma’am,” Yorky said. “I seen it all an’ shore t’ought yer was a goner.”

  “Thanks to Mister Dover, I am not a—goner,” she smiled. “And how are you, Yorky?”

  “Fine, an’ I’m on th’ pay-roll,” he blurted out. “S’cuse me, I got a message
for Ben.”

  “An amazing improvement,” she said. “There’s a case to make you proud of your profession.”

  “Not my work,” he told her. “I prescribed a cessation of nicotine poisoning and fresh air—”

  “The breath of the pines,” she murmured.

  “Precisely, but I didn’t put it so prettily.”

  “No, I remember it was his friend, Jim.”

  “Really? After all, why shouldn’t a puncher be poetical—he’s at grips with Nature all day long. Anyway, Green saved that lad’s life, by supplying the missing ingredient in my treatment.”

  Her look was a question. “Yorky had lost his self-respect, and lacking that, my dear lady, a human being is—finished; he cannot fight disease.” Then, in a flash, his gravity was merged in a laugh, as he added, “I should be a preacher.”

  She was about to reply when Dover came in, and before the door swung to again, she saw Miss Maitland pass.

  “I must be going,” Malachi said rather hurriedly, and ashe departed spoke in an undertone to the rancher, “Not leaving town yet, are you?”

  “I’ll be here for a while,” Dan replied, and stepped to where the girl was seated. “Doc tells me you ain’t injured. I’m glad. Is there anythin’ else I can do?”

  His manner was stiff and distant, and she suddenly comprehended that the red-haired youth who so impulsively rushed to rescue her from the quicksand had—short as the time was—become a man. Grief and responsibility had brought about the transformation.

  “I think you have done enough, and more,” she replied. “It is hard to find words to express my thanks.”

  “Then don’t try,” he said bluntly. “I don’t want ‘em, an’ if it will ease yore mind, I would ‘a’ done just the same for any tramp in the town.”

  “Very well, but you cannot prevent me feeling grateful,” she said. “you risked your life.”

  “Which is no more than I’ve done many times for one o’ my father’s steers,” he told her.

  “I’m not meanin’ to be rude, Miss Trenton, but to be forced to help one o’ yore family is plain hell to me.”

  “I understand,” she said coldly. “But you must remember that to be forced to accept your help is also plain hell to my family.”

  With a slight inclination of her proud little head, and a smile of thanks to the saloonkeeper, she walked out. The rancher’s gloomy gaze followed her. What had possessed him to speak that way? He recalled how his heart had seemed to stop beating when he saw her in the path of the cattle. Perhaps it was the reaction at finding her unharmed when he had feared.

  Or maybe it was the encounter with the sheriff, which still rankled? Well, what did it matter—she was a Trenton anyway. He went to the bar, and Bowdyr’s first remark might have been an answer to his last thought.

  “She’s a fine gal—even if she is kin to Zeb,” he said.

  “Looks ain’t much to go on,” the young man observed cynically. “The meanest hoss I ever owned was a picture.”

  The saloonkeeper, being a wise man, kept his smile and his thoughts to himself.

  Malachi, returning presently, found them drinking together, and to the surprise of both, declined their invitation.

  “How’s the arm?” he enquired.

  “Fine, it was just a touch.”

  “Yes, touch and go; if you’d been two seconds later the horn would have pierced your heart,” the doctor said. “I didn’t tell Miss Trenton that.”

  “I’m obliged—she’s over-grateful a’ready. You ain’t here to ask after my health, are you, Phil?”

  “No, my errand concerns my own. When are you going away?”

  “So you’ve heard that damn silly rumour too?”

  “I pay no attention to idle chatter, and get it into your head that I’m on your side,”

  Malachi said seriously. “Listen: I happen to know—never mind how—that you have to raise a large sum of money in a short time.”

  Dan swore. “So my financial position is common property?” he said bitterly.

  “Whose isn’t, in this place?” was the rejoinder. “Where are you going for it? With the cattle business as it is, your chance with the Eastern capitalist is nil; north and south are only ranches in the same predicament as yourself; in the west, there is Rufe’s Cache—if you can find it.”

  “What do you know about that?” Dan demanded.

  “The story is common property also,” the doctor reminded. “Your father himself gave me the facts, and asserted that if necessity arose, he could go to the spot. Probably that is why he did not worry about his debt to the bank.”

  Dan was silent; it was disturbing to think his affairs and plans were known. Then he said,

  “Who told you I was leavin’ Rainbow?”

  “No one. Aware of the difficulty you are in, I tried to reason out a line of action, that’s all.

  The Cache would appear to be your best bet.”

  “What’s yore interest?”

  “The purely selfish one of wanting to go with you.”

  Bowdyr had been called away, so Dover got the full shock of the surprise, and it certainly was one. That this man, whom he liked, but had always regarded as an effeminate, should desire to undergo the danger and discomfort of a journey into the mountains seemed quite incredible.

  “It’ll be damned hard goin’, we’ll have to break trail a lot, live rough an’ sleep in the open, an’ its cold too, nights,” he warned. “Also, there’s a risk o’ fightin’ if—

  “Trenton gets the idea. Yes, he needs cash as much, and perhaps more, than you do. Well, I can ride and shoot, I’m fitter than I look, and I’ll obey orders. Also, if anyone gets hurt …” The rancher voiced his last and chief objection. “You’ll be a devil of a long way from a saloon,” he said pointedly.

  “Which is exactly why I want to come,” Malachi smiled. “It is an experiment, Dan, and I’m asking you to help me.” They shook hands on the bargain.

  Chapter XIII

  Beth Trenton returned to the Wagon-wheel sound in body but perturbed in mind.

  Naturally generous by nature, the attitude her rescuer had adopted distressed and saddened her.

  Coming from the East, she could not comprehend the stark animosity which could keep two families at war for years. And rude, primitive as he seemed, there was much that was likeable in Dan Dover. If only she could bring about a peace.

  Her uncle was alone in the living-room. As she related her adventure, she saw concern, relief, and then both were swept away in a gust of anger at the mention of her preserver’s name.

  “That fella again?” he stormed. “What cursed ill-luck arranges for him to be handy every time you get into trouble?”

  “I am afraid I cannot regard it as ill-luck,” she replied. “He saved me, and might have died himself.”

  “Bah! Only one thing kills that breed—a bullet,” was the brutal rejoinder. “I’m not ungrateful, girl; any other man could ask what he liked of me, but Dover …”

  “He does not want even thanks,” she said. “He threw my own back in my face.”

  “The insolent young hound,” Trenton growled. “He needs a lesson, an’ by Christopher, I’ll see that he gets one.”

  “Uncle, what was the beginning of the trouble?” she asked.

  “Oh, it’s a long story; I’ll spin it for you one day, but you can take this to go on with—a Dover murdered my father,” the rancher said, and stood up. “Yo’re a Trenton, Beth, an’ our enemies must be yores too; we don’t forget or forgive.”

  He had meant to tell her of the coming trip into the hills, but judged this was not the time; better to let the memory of this latest obligation to Dover fade a little. Women were kittle cattle, and he wanted her wholly on his side. He struck another blow.

  “Have you noticed Bundy’s face?”

  “Why, yes, he seems to have met with an accident.”

  “Yeah, the accident of runnin’ into three o’ the Circle Dot riders out on the range,”
/>
  Trenton said. “They threw an’ savaged him, stole his horse, an’ he had to foot it home, over ten miles, in the dark.”

  “Three to one?” she cried. “The cowards! Was Mister Dover there?”

  “No, but his new man, Green, was, so you can be certain his boss approved; probably it was a put-up job, an’ they were waitin’ for the chance.”

  “But why?”

  “Simply because he’s foreman here; it’s a blow at me.” She could not doubt, although she found it hard to credit that Green, of whom the doctor had spoken highly, could take part in such a sordid enterprise. But she was learning that the Westerner was a creature of fine impulses, strong in his likes and dislikes.

  “Isn’t there any law?” she ventured.

  “No, only a sheriff,” was the satirical answer. “Now, don’t you worry yourself about these things, my dear. Bundy can take care of himself, an’ so can the Wagon-wheel.”

  Dover also journeyed home in a worried state of mind. He had called on Maitland before leaving town, and the interview had been anything but helpful. It was, the rancher moodily reflected, a fitting climax to a thoroughly imperfect day. So Yorky, to whom it had proved exactly the opposite, found him a morose and pre-occupied companion. Jocular references to his encounter with young Evans met with no encouragement. In the bunkhouse, it was much the same;the boys listened to his story, but it failed to arouse the amusement he had looked for.

  “Got back on him for the lickin’ he gave you, huh?” Blister commented.

  “Never did lick me,” Yorky retorted heatedly. “He took as much as I did.”

  “Then you had nothin’ to square up for,” the cowboy replied.

  Even Yorky’s quick wits could find no answer to this, and he subsided into silence. It began to dawn upon him that he had not been so clever after all. This suspicion was strengthened when he showed his new acquisition to Sudden, with an account of how he had got it.

  “She’s good value,” the puncher said. “Told the boys?”

  “Yep, they didn’t seem to think it funny,” Yorky admitted, and repeated Blister’s remarks.