Shadow on the Trail

by Zane Grey

  “Pencarrow has the range. You have the experience.”

  “Shore. I figgered thet out myself long ago. But it’ll take money. Not a hell of a lot. All the same—money! Wal, thet’s the third need. An’ all three needs don’t sum up what the fourth will take. Thet’s the guts an’ the power to kill or drive off these rustlers an’ thieves hidin’ down in the brakes.”

  “My job, Lightfoot!”

  “Hell, man! You alone agin a dozen outfits, some of them bad. It cain’t be done.”

  “It can be done!”

  The homesteader stared mutely at Wade, powerfully impressed by the fire and force of Wade’s assertion, perhaps more so by his presence.

  “Are you with me?” queried Wade, sharply.

  “Wal, if you want to know, I haven’t felt so happy in years. Reckon I’m loco about them twins. An’ I shore like Pencarrow. I don’t savvy the old lady. An’ Jacque—she jest sweeps me off my feet. Queer about how she effects men! Have you felt it, Brandon?”

  “She’s very beautiful and alive.”

  “Shore. But thet ain’t sayin’ nothin’. She jest sets these Arizona rangemen crazy. An’ she’d do it the same if she wore a Mormon hood. . . . Wal, what’s yore idea about runnin’ Cedar Ranch?”

  “My word! Now you’ve stuck me. I made up my mind to do it without thinking how.”

  “Thet’s the way to do. To hell with obstacles an’ difficulties! The harder the job, the madder we’ll get.”

  “You’ll take me as a pard then on sight?”

  “I shore will. I’ve felt somethin’ big in me tryin’ to bust ever since Hal was heah.”

  “Elwood, I mean you will never regret this. . . . Now that’s settled. Let’s get our heads together.”

  “Wait a minnit. I’ve got a condition, Brandon. An’ it’s thet you let me be the dark horse in this race—the silent pardner in this deal.”

  “Why? I don’t like that idea.”

  “Wal, as a matter of fact, all I can do is to be a kind of scout for you an’ advise you on matters that pertain to cattle raisin’. The brunt of this tumble job will fall on you. All I want is to keep this homestead an’ make it pay a little for my old age.”

  “Elwood, we can make it pay more than that. Alfalfa alone will yield you a good income. You must have help.”

  “I know a Mexican and his son. Sheepherders. They’ve been done out of work by these thievin’ riders who hate sheep. I can get them for their keep until we begin to produce. Thet’d give me time to scout for you.”

  “Scout? You mean ride the range and the brakes to get tab on these parasites?”

  “Yes, more than thet. To find out where the stolen cattle goes— the stock they don’t drive to the railroad. I’ve always stood in with some of these outfits. Not Drake’s nor Harrobin’s. They’re the kingpins of this range an’ they’re rivals. We could make ’em enemies. My idee of bein’ a dark horse is to keep on apparently as I’ve always done—never takin’ sides.”

  “Seen from that angle it’s a fine idea,” replied Wade, thoughtfully. “I accept. You’re my silent partner.”

  “We gotta go slow. No quick improvements heah. An’ to throw in new stock up on Cedar Ranch would be fatal until you get these hombres scared or on the run. For the present it’s a big enough job to round up all Pencarrow’s stock an’ get it back in the open. A thorough search of brakes an’ timber might fetch surprisin’ results.”

  “I’ve already proved that in only four days.”

  “You might run across some of the stolen cattle. Reckon I can guarantee thet. But you’ll need cowboys. There’s the rub heah. Riders thet won’t steal you out of hide an’ hair! Riders thet’ll ride fer their keep until we get on our feet! Brandon, I reckon it’s impossible.”

  “Not to me. I can run any bunch of cowboys that ever forked horses,” retorted Wade, grim-lipped.

  “You can? Did you every try it?”

  “No. But I can.”

  “Would you mind tellin’ me how in the hell you can do what no cattleman heah ever could?”

  “Give me a few young riders. I don’t care how lazy, onery, tough, crooked, they are. I believe I could build up an outfit. I’ve got to, El wood! . . . I’d make big promises, I’d prove that rustling never paid in the long run. I’d work on each one individually. I’d make them like me. I’d make them see the guts Pencarrow has, to stick it out here. I’d excite sympathy and respect for his game family. . . . Elwood, I’ve lived among bad men, outlaws, outcasts. Every last one of them had some good in him. I’d work on that principle. All the same I’d be a hard driver. I’d shirk no job myself. Lastly I’d tell them I’d shoot whoever made a false move—and I’d do it!”

  During the last of Wade’s passionate exposition, Lightfoot rose slowly to his feet, his eyes like glints of pale blue sky, his gray worn face lighting with inspired fire.

  “Brandon, I know yore cowboy an’ his bunch air the outfit you want,” he declared, forcibly, and he cracked his big hands together. “Doggone! It’s shore queer how things work out—when the right man shows up.”

  “Elwood, you’re saying a lot without telling me anything. Come on. Explain,” returned Wade, in eager impatience.

  Lightfoot resumed his seat. “Son, I’m not used to bein’ het up. Listen an’ you’ll see I shore had cause. . . . A year or more ago a cowboy rode down heah, bad shot up. I took him in without askin’ questions. An’ I pulled him through. He was about the likeablest cuss I ever met. We got to be good friends. Wal, his name was Hogue Kinsey an’ he come from a good western family down below Ashfork somewhere. His father had a couple of bad years with drouth thet most cleaned out his cattle. They got pretty pore. Hogue had a sister he must have been plumb fond of. She fell sick an’ to get her into a less high an’ cold climate, Hogue stole a bunch of cattle an’ sold them. Thet must have been several years ago. Anyway he got found out an’ had to leave home. Hogue had a meek an’ easy-goin’ disposition, but he was quick tempered an’ thet coupled with a handy knack with a gun put him on the road to the bad. If I’d had any money to hire thet boy, I could have saved him from livin’ off this range. As it was I kept him heah a while an’ then he drifted over Pine Mound way, where he hangs out with half a dozen boys slated for hell. Hogue hasn’t been heah lately. He used to come often. Guess I cussed him an’ argued with him too much. Shore they’re stealin’ cattle but in a two-bit way thet’s not botherin’ the ranchers yet. I reckon his outfit have stole a few haid from Pencarrow. But I’ll add this in Hogue’s favor. He’s the only cowboy I know who never rode up to Pencarrow’s door an’ asked for a job.”

  “How do you account for that?” queried Wade, intensely interested.

  “Wal, I reckon Hogue hasn’t become hardened yeti He wouldn’t ride for a cattleman an’ steal behind his back. He remembers his sister an’ mother too wal to be a cheat to the Pencarrow girls. Thet’s how I figger him, Brandon. An’ it’s jest the time to get Hogue. Between us we can do it.”

  “Where is Pine Mound?”

  “About thirty miles across country by trail. Much further by road. It’s a sleepy little cattle town in winter. But shore hums in summer. All the outlaw outfits buy their supplies there, loaf an’ drink an’ gamble there. Fights an’ killin’s common. Pine Mound is on the stage road thet runs into Mariposa an’ New Mexico.”

  “Locate the trail for me and I’ll ride over there tomorrow,” said Wade.

  “Hadn’t you better let me get hold of Hogue first?” asked the homesteader.

  “I just want to take heap look round, as the Indian says. I’ll not force my acquaintance upon Hogue or anyone. Still time and opportunity must not be slighted. . . . Can you get your Mexican friends here today?”

  “I can call them from the rim. They live in a log shack not far from heah.”

  “Well, call them. Tomorrow you come to the ranch and stay until I get back.”

  “I was thinkin’ of thet. . . . It takes a good rider five hours to make Pine Moun
d from heah. Ride east from the ranch till you pick up Dry Canyon. Go along the rim till you can get down. You’ll find a trail. Foller it an’ make yore time while it’s not so rough. It haids out of Dry Canyon an’ through the timber an’ rock country down to Pine Mound. You cain’t miss it.”

  “All right, Elwood. I’ll rustle back now. I don’t mind telling you that Hal and Rona did me a good turn when they talked about you.”

  “Bless them twins! An’ what do you reckon it means to me? . . . Wal! Wal! Brandon, you’re a stranger, but you strike me deep. May these good things be!”

  “Put on your thinking cap, old-timer,” replied Wade, as he halted with his toe in the stirrup and gazed straight in Lightfoot’s troubled blue eyes. “These good things are going to be!”

  The dawn broke gray and soft, with a redness streaking over the sage. Bird and beast of the wild were out in force, scarcely moving to evade the approach of the fast-trotting horse. By the hour the sun rose Wade had descended into Dry Canyon and had found the trail.

  Though water evidently ran there only in the rainy season the canyon was verdant and rich, full of pines and sycamores, and patches of scrub oak and thickets of manzanita. Fresh bear tracks on the dusty trail showed fresh deer tracks in their rounded depressions. Mockingbirds and jays and squirrels made music and clamor. Small bunches of cattle, wilder than deer, crashed into the thickets at Wade’s approach.

  The head of Dry Canyon closed almost abruptly with a jumble of splintered and weathered cliffs, through which the trail climbed in zigzags and loops. Once out on top Wade faced a slow descent through timber and sage. Arizona taught Wade its infinite variety of scenes, yet all characterized with that singular red and gray and purple, with a dry fragrance that was as exhilarating as wine, with a brooding solitude, a wilderness of space.

  Wade could not have exercised more hawk-eyed vigilance had he once more been in familiar flight from pursuers. He saw the flash of the wings of birds far ahead, the movement of brush, the gray rump of a deer entering a thicket. Whenever he came to an open flat or a long line of trail ahead or the descent of a slope, he slowed his horse and took distrustful measure of rock and bush and tree.

  Yet all the while, despite his habit of vigilance and the magnifying of his alert faculties to fit this new phase of his life, despite the grim hard deadliness to survive and to win, which he had deliberately heightened and intensified, he rode as one who had at last come upon the glory and dreams of fulfillment, of atonement, of salvation. The sacred promise to his father, which had so often spurred him on to heroic efforts, gained in the glamour of an adventure that called to all a man could feel. Fight and romance and love! It would take a terrible clash with the evil forces of that range to retrieve Pencarrow’s losses and to make his range prosperous, his person safe, his family happy. It was romance because of its setting, its drama against the purple background of that wild sage country, its inevitable fierce and bloody action, its relation of one man to a persecuted girl. Wade confessed his love, breathed it out to the open and the solitude, revelled in all its dawning and exalting transformation, blessed the god of his wandering rides—the unerring fate that had given him the chance and power to pay his debt to the girl who had saved him. He asked no more than to save her if it cost his life.

  A few squatters’ cabins, and then a long-unused sawmill, and at last a ranch in a green valley, told Wade that he was approaching Pine Mound. At last he saw down its long wide street, with its irrigation ditches on the outskirts and lines of cottonwood trees, leading to the center of the town. Sleepy was the word to describe Pine Mound. Wade rode half the length of the street before he saw horses at the hitching rails, a couple of muddy-wheeled wagons, and several rough-clad men who stared curiously as he passed by.

  A few more pretentious structures, old and weather-stained, and some sign of bustle and life, persuaded Wade that he had reached the center of Pine Mound. Dismounting he tied his horse and clanked stiffly into a high signboard-fronted merchandise store. Letters on the signboard had long been obliterated. The size of the store inside and the jumbled mass of its wares attested to the fact that it did business with a relatively large number of customers. Wade saw one woman and several men being waited upon. Then he was accosted by a sloe-eyed individual whose bland smile could not hide his curious interest.

  “Mawnin’, sir. What can I do for you?”

  “I’m Brandon, from Cedar Ranch. Pencarrow’s new foreman. Called to make acquaintance.”

  “Brandon! You’re the——Aw, yes. Pencarrow. We used to do business with him. Fact is, he still owes us a little bill.

  “Yes. He sent me to pay it. I’d be obliged if you’ll make it out.”

  “Glad to. New foreman, eh? Pencarrow on his feet again?”

  “Solid. But he’s not asking for more credit. From now on he’ll pay cash. . . . I’ll drop in again after I get a bite and a drink.”

  Wade strode out, aware that his presence had been noted and commented upon by the other occupants of that store. He had worn a cool brazen aloofness, not inviting either curiosity or civility. He strode down the gravel sidewalk, which was on a level with the street, and he did not miss anything there was to be seen. The old buildings were constructed of stone and adobe, and the newer ones of clapboards, some with the bark still on. There appeared to be only one other large store, which Wade entered. It contained a stock of merchandise similar to that of the first, only the amount was small by comparison. A proprietor or clerk sat by the door, tipped back in a chair, smoking a pipe. He looked friendly where the other merchant had been negative. Wade accosted him without preface:

  “Do you know Pencarrow?”

  “No. I never had no dealin’s with him. You see I set up here after he quit buyin’ in Pine Mound.”

  “Pencarrow will be buying again. I’m his new foreman, Brandon.”

  “Hod do. My name is Hicks. I seen you come out of the Mormon store.”

  “Mormon, eh? Who runs it?”

  “Jed an’ Seth Bozeman.”

  “I take you for a Gentile.”

  “You’re takin’ correct. An’ here’s where you should deal.”

  “Agree with you. But how will the Bozemans like that?”

  “Wal, they’ve got aplenty of trade without newcomers to this range. An’ they’d just as lief you didn’t drop in.”

  “Oho, you don’t say?”

  “I do say, Brandon, but I’d be obliged to you not to let thet go further.”

  “I savvy. . . . Kind of a warm place for a Gentile, this Pine Mound, isn’t it?”

  “Pretty warm, yes. An’ what’s left of us will be movin’ some day.”

  “Same old story. . . . By the way, Hicks, have you heard what happened out at Pencarrow’s?”

  “Nope. Ain’t heared a thing for a coon’s age. What’d you do?”

  “I shot Urba and one of his gang.”

  “Urba! Hell you say? . . . Brandon, you won’t be popular here.”

  “I’d rather be unpopular. . . . Does Band Drake hang out here?”

  “About half the time, I reckon. Most all winter, anyway.”

  “And Harrobin?”

  “Wal, he’s here most of the time when Drake isn’t.”

  “They don’t get along together?”

  “Huh. Not so you’d notice it.”

  “Hicks, I want you to be a friend of Pencarrow’s and mine. Savvy?”

  “Thet isn’t hard to do. But you ’pear a pretty sharp-eyed gent. Not thet I’m not used to such! Only you’re different. Brandon, you’re not keepin’ out of sight. You’re lookin’ for somebody.”

  “You’re a bright fellow, Hicks. . . . I’ll drop in again.”

  Wade found a little restaurant, conducted by a jolly fat Mormon where good cooking, no doubt, accounted for a motley group of drivers. Wade looked them over while he ate, and he concluded that a couple of cowboys and a backwoodsman out of the round dozen occupants might be given the benefit of a doubt.

  “
Ridin’ through, stranger?” inquired the proprietress, as Wade paid for his meal.

  “No. Just scraping acquaintance,” replied Wade, in a voice that carried. “I’m Brandon, Pencarrow’s new foreman.”

  “Glad to meet you. Come again,” she concluded, heartily.

  “Sure will. You’re an awful good cook, lady.”

  Wade went out assurred of the fact that the name Brandon had struck hard on the ears of most of those men. His introduction to Cedar Range and Pine Mound had been one to incite hostility and caution in men whose vocations were doubtful. The success of his championship of Pencarrow depended on the fear he could instill and his ruthless reaction to every circumstance that arose. During his long rides he had thought out his best mode of procedure in every conceivable situation that might arise. In the past he had avoided gunplay until it was forced upon him; here on this range he must invite it. His strength lay in that alone. There could hardly be his match with a gun on this range. He had nothing to fear in an even break with Drake or Harrobin, or any of their crews. But that was only a small side to the risks he would encounter. Many a gunman had faced too many enemies at one time, or had been shot in the back or ambushed along the trails. Wade knew he had the training for this perilous job. And he had begun to feel mounting in him a passion of incentive that would become superhuman.

  Pine Mound boasted more drinking dens than stores. The largest had a crudely painted white mule on the high board front.

  Wade entered as if looking for someone. The saloon was like hundreds of others he had seen in the west, only there was a vague difference that did not come from the odor of rum and tobacco, or from the half score of noisy men lined up at the bar, nor from the rude drawings and letterings on the whitewashed adobe wall, nor from the card tables and gamblers at the back.

  No one paid particular attention to Wade, from which he deduced that his arrival in town had not yet been noised about. But not improbably a loud argument among the gamesters kept attention from the entrance of a stranger.

  At the moment two cowboys, young and lithe, with guns swinging and spurs jingling, their lean faces hot and hard, came striding forward, evidently in a hurry to get out.