Novel 1978 - The Proving Trail (v5.0)

by Louis L'Amour

  “Not with me. I came east on the cars.”

  “All right.” The food was served and we ate. “Where are you staying? The National or the Planters?”

  When I told him, he nodded again. “If you’ve got any gear, get it and pay your bill. Don’t waste any time. I don’t know what the trouble is and don’t want to know.”

  “It isn’t the law,” I said.

  He shrugged. “That’s what I figured. I know Ben Blocker and he’s a straight shooter. Saved my bacon once, but that’s awhile back.” He looked at me quickly. “Anybody I should be looking out for?”

  So I told him about the L’Ollanaises and about the women. He flashed his teeth at me over that. “Beautiful as that? I’d let ’em catch up.”

  “You wouldn’t,” I said. “They fancy poison and have no hesitation about using it.”

  “Come down Fourth Street,” he said. “It will be the old red barn setting back off the street. Better move fast.”

  At the National I picked up my blanket roll and my rifle. A quick glance around the lobby showed no familiar face, and nobody was paying attention. As I had paid when I took the room and had nothing more to say, I walked swiftly into the street and headed for Fourth. There had not been time for them to get here, yet I was worried. Suppose they had guessed which way I’d run. And expected me to run.

  Hobie Jackman was standing outside the barn and he had a saddled sorrel horse standing ready. It was a handsome animal, looked to have some Morgan strain, which spoke well for him.

  “What do I owe you?” I said.

  He waved a hand. “Any friend of Ben’s is a friend of mine. The hostler at the Drover’s Cottage will take the horse. If you need him further, keep him.”

  Swinging into the saddle, I shoved my rifle into the boot. “Thanks,” I said.

  “One more thing. Stay off the trail when it gets close to the railroad. They can see you from the cars and be waiting up ahead.”

  Turning the sorrel, I rode out of town. Glancing back, I saw Hobie Jackman standing there, looking after me. I wondered about him. There was something quiet, sure, and deft about him. Whoever he was, he was a dangerous man, a skilled man at whatever he did. There was no waste motion about him, and no wasted words.

  The saddlebags were stuffed. Opening the flap on one, I saw it was packed with food. A square of bacon wrapped in brown paper, some coffee, some biscuits. In the other bag was about four handsful of .44 cartridges. Mr. Hobie Jackman was a knowing man.

  Twenty miles west I made camp under some cottonwoods in a hollow off the road.

  Abilene was no longer a cow town. The trail drivers had long since worn out their welcome, and the railroad had gone on west. Turning into the street, I glimpsed a slim, blond man in a black, flat-brimmed hat standing on a corner. He wore a tied-down holster with no gun in it. Abilene no longer cared for pistol toters. Turning the sorrel around, I rode into an alley and along it, and then I simply rode out of town. That night I stopped at a farm well off the road and out of sight.

  Probably that man was an innocent stranger, but I was taking no chances. That he was not a resident was obvious from the holster.

  He just might have been the blond man I was to watch out for. If that girl had been telling the truth, and if it was a man she had meant.

  Chapter 19

  *

  AT THE LIVERY stable in Hays City I asked the hostler if he knew Hobie Jackman. He looked at me, tamped tobacco in his pipe, and said, “I know him.”

  “He loaned me this horse. Will you hold it for him?”

  “Surest thing. You need never worry about no horse of Jackman’s, not in this country.” He spat. “Hobie Jackman’s knowed all up and down the country, mister. Minute you rode in I knew that was a Jackman horse. Even before I seen the brand.”

  “I’ll need another horse.”

  “Got me another Jackman horse here, young man. He’s a black…fine horse. Do you?”

  He indicated the horse, and I nodded. I should not have needed to look, for I was beginning to understand that a Jackman horse could not be bad.

  “You know Bill Tilghman?”

  “Everybody does, mister.”

  “He’ll have the horse, if there’s any question.”

  “I never answer questions of that kind, mister. Who rides through here passes in the night as far as I’m concerned. Anyway, any friend of Bill’s is a friend of mine.”

  On impulse, I asked, “How about Hobie?”

  “He pays his bills. Takes good care of his stock.”

  Switching saddles, I stopped by the store for a few odds and ends, then rode down Big Creek toward the southeast for a couple of miles, then skirted a clump of brush and a few trees and headed off to the southwest. That night I made camp in Longout Hollow. Riding out before the stars faded, I was crossing the Smoky Hill when the sun came up.

  It was a long riding country with nothing anywhere you looked but distance, miles upon miles of grass with nothing in sight but occasional herds of antelope. Once I sighted a prairie falcon, and jackrabbits aplenty. There’d been scattered showers, so we made no dust, and I was thankful for it. I rode west, then turned up Wildon Draw, skirted the Round-House Hills, and made camp on Big Timber.

  Since the buffalo had grown fewer, the grass was growing up. This was mixed grass country I was in, western wheat-grass mixed with bluestem and patches of crazy weed, whose blossoms made great patches of pink and rose on the low hills.

  It was a fine country for riding, but I was riding wary of trouble. Felix Yant was somewhere about, and like all of that L’Ollonaise crowd, he had a gift for showing up when least expected. Yant had apparently not come east at all, just setting back there in Colorado waiting for me to come back like he knew I would. Yet if he was expecting me to visit Teresa, he was wrong. I’d put her from my thoughts, not liking the way she cottoned up to Yant while I was westward.

  Nobody needed to tell me I’d had the breaks. Sure, I could shoot and I could get into action pretty fast, but I’d been lucky, too, and I could not expect to be lucky all the time.

  Bill Tilghman was on the street when I met him. He recognized me at once. He smiled as he noticed the horse I was riding. “I see you have met Hobie. Well, you will be able to tell your grandchildren about him. Do you mind my asking how you met?”

  So I told him about Ben Blocker and Mr. Attmore, and also about the trouble on the railroad and the further trouble in Kansas City. He listened without comment until I finished and then he said, “I can have your horses brought in tonight.”

  “Thanks. I want to leave by daybreak.”

  “The men you mentioned,” he said, “came in shortly after you left. One of them went back toward the west. I have not seen them since.”

  “And I hope I don’t. I am not afraid of them, but I want no trouble I can avoid. I’ll get my horses and ride out. I’m heading for the western slope of the Rockies.”

  “I’ve heard of it.” I thought he sounded a bit wistful. “I doubt if I will ever get so far.”

  In the morning my horses were there, and I mounted up. My roan gave me enough of a workout to let me know he hadn’t lost anything, and then with a good pack of grub I headed west. At noon I had miles behind me, so I took a short rest and switched horses. That night I camped in a draw just back from the Arkansas River.

  In the middle of the night, I awakened suddenly. All was still, but the horses had their heads up and were looking down toward the riverbed.

  It took me only a minute to get my boots and pants on. I swung the gun belt around my waist and drew it to the right notch. A glance at my fire showed it was still holding a faint red glow, and I swore softly. If the wind was right, they could smell that…or at least I would.

  Moving like a ghost, I got my horses in close, rolled my bed, and saddled up, taking a moment every now and again to listen.

  A glance at the stars told me I’d slept about two hours. If that was Yant down there, he had been watching Dodge. Probably spo
tted my horses and figured I’d return for them.

  Careful to make no sound, I sifted dirt over my fire and rode out of there, walking my horses where I knew the soft grass was. Not until I had a quarter of a mile behind me did I start to run for distance. Turning southwest past the sand hills, I headed for the Cimarron. Striking another area of soft sand, I held to it until there were no tracks for him to find and then I rode due west.

  After a bit I turned sharply south along a shallow stream-bed and made dry camp that night in a buffalo wallow. Next day I came up to the railroad.

  A dozen empty cars, picked up from sidings here and there. The train had stopped at another siding, and they were coupling up to another empty freight car. There was an earthen ramp there for loading, and I rode up to the trainman. “How’s for a ride? The horses an’ me?”

  He glanced at me. “Cost you a couple of dollars,” he said.

  “Three,” I said, “if you let me off this side of La Junta.”

  We led the horses into the empty boxcar and tied them at one end. Then I went back outside and scuffed out the horses’ tracks. He watched me skeptically.

  “You dodgin’ the law?”

  “No. But I’m dodging.”

  He chuckled. “Better get that boot track yonder, then. No railroad man wears high-heeled boots.”

  When I was aboard, he gave the signal and the train slowly pulled away. I closed the car door so it was only open a few inches. Then I went into the corner of the car away from the horses and stretched out with my folded coat for a pillow.

  The train rumbled and bumped over the track, occasionally whistling like some wailing monster. From time to time I went to the door and peered out. It was night, and the stars were out. I talked to the horses a little bit and went back to sleep. In the chill of dawn I awakened. The train was stopped.

  When I reached the door, I heard the crunch of footsteps alongside and the trainman came to the door. “Ready for some coffee?”

  “Ready and willing,” I said.

  Swinging down, I walked along to the caboose with the brakeman. “Recognized you,” he said. “You went east with the Blocker cattle. He ships a lot of stock over this road.”

  A huge pot of stew was on the stove. He waved at it. “We killed a buffalo calf a couple of days ago and saved the meat. That’s the last of it.”

  “You grew the vegetables, I suppose?”

  “Nope. You’ll find that stew long on spuds. We gathered up a few off the top of several carloads we were carrying. The onions and carrots we picked up here and there.”

  The stew was excellent, the coffee black and hot. I drank a cup, and at their invitation had another.

  “You shoot mighty quick,” the brakeman commented.

  “I had to. They were fixing to kill me.”

  “Who were they?”

  “Relatives of mine,” I said. “Distant relatives, but not distant enough to suit me.”

  “Place this side of La Junta,” he said, “where there’s a loading platform and a chute. Like back yonder. Be the best place to get off.”

  We were silent for a while, and then the conductor asked me, “Known Blocker long?”

  “Not long. We’re partners in a cattle deal. Ranching.”

  “Money in that, I hear. I heard a lot about it from a German baron who had some fancy racing stock in Colorado. Before I took to railroading I worked for him a spell. His name was Baron von Richthofen. He had some of the finest trotting horses in the country, but he was always talking about the money to be made from cow ranching.”

  We yarned away the hours until the train slowed for the stop where I was to unload. I jumped the horses over the little gap between the earth platform and the car and sat my saddle waving as they pulled away.

  For a few moments I waited and watched the train pull away toward the westward, and then I came down off the ramp and headed southwest. Over there beyond the Spanish Peaks was the Wet Mountain valley, and I wanted to look it over before going on west.

  My enemies, I was sure, were far behind and had lost my trail. If they looked for me now, it would be in Denver or Georgetown…or maybe in Rico, where Teresa was.

  Nevertheless, I checked the magazine in my Winchester and the chambers of my pistols.

  A man couldn’t be too careful, and I remembered only too well the cold blue eyes of that man with the scar.

  And there was always Felix Yant, a cool, thoughtful, dangerous man who made few mistakes.

  Alone I might be, and maybe they were far away, but I pulled up and took a careful look around the country. It was mid-morning and already the heat waves were shimmering out there.

  It was going to be a long, hot day.

  Chapter 20

  *

  TOPPING OUT ON a ridge, I stood in my stirrups and looked all around the country. It was typical plains country, slightly rolling and here and there some staghorn cholla, a variety of cactus typical of this country. In the distance some mesas loomed against the sky, and the dark spots on them would be juniper.

  Settling back in the saddle, I came down off the rise and immediately turned down a draw, then up another one, and cut across a low divider between two more. It looked like nobody was out there, but I did not feel that way. I just had a hunch, and it kept spooking me…somebody was closing in on me from somewhere.

  Again I switched back and rode up a draw in some soft sand, then out upon the plains, where I let the roan run for a bit, then slowed him down. The country ahead was rimrock country, low hills rimmed with sheer faces of rock, some of them no more than four to six feet high, while the hills themselves varied around forty or fifty feet. There was a lot of juniper here and more cholla. The Purgatoire River was off to the west.

  My trail led me up on the mesa again. It was very hot. Wiping the sweat from my brow, I looked all around. Empty…not even an antelope. Heat waves shimmered and danced. Mopping my face, I rubbed my hands down on my pants to dry the palms. No tracks but animal tracks. I drew up at a little seep and let the horses drink. Trotting the horses down the draw, I wove around through some juniper and then went up on the cap-rock for another look around.

  Off to the southwest there was a plume of dust, and it seemed to be coming my way. Walking my horses toward it, I suddenly sighted a well-worn trail and beside it a stone corral and a building. There was a faint suggestion of smoke rising from the chimney.

  Pulling up in a clump of five or six junipers, I stepped down, and rifle in hand, walked closer. There were several horses in a corral, and a harnessed team waiting.

  A stage station! Sitting down in the shade of the junipers, I watched the stage come in, saw some dusty people get down to stretch their legs, and watched the teams changed. I saw nobody whom I knew, but there were two horses at the hitching rail near the station.

  After a bit the stage pulled out, but nobody came near the horses. I was hungry and there would be food down there I did not have to fix for myself, and fresh coffee.

  Mounting up, I rode around the corral and down to the stage station, coming up on its blind side. I shucked my Winchester from the scabbard, tied my horses in what little shade there was, and walked around the corner.

  It was a low-roofed building with two windows and a door. The door stood open and I stepped inside.

  There was a man behind the bar with no hat on, and two men on the business side of the bar who wore hats. Both had been and were drinking. One was a stocky, barrel-chested man with thick legs and worn-down boot heels. The other was lean and tall, slightly stooped. He turned his head slightly and peered at me. Crossing to the one table, I pulled back the bench and sat down, laying the Winchester across the bench beside me.

  The man without the hat looked at me and asked, “What’ll it be?”

  “Coffee,” I said, “and whatever you have fixed to eat.”

  “Give you a chunk of pot roast,” he said, “if you like buffalo.”

  “I could eat a wolf,” I said. “Let’s have it.”

/>   The tall man looked at me again. I knew trouble when I saw it, and did not meet his eyes. “I’m a wolf,” he said.

  Under my breath I swore. The last thing I needed now was a quarrelsome drunk. I was hungry and I was a little tired and my patience was running short. The heavyset one had not even given me a glance. He was pouring another drink.

  “I’m a wolf,” the tall one repeated.

  Ignoring him, I watched the man bring in the meat from the kitchen. He put it on the table in front of me and said, under his breath, “Watch yourself.”

  The tall man had turned his back to the bar and was looking at me, a hard, ugly stare. I’d seen the kind before. Give them a drink and all their natural meanness comes out and they’ll pick on anything handy, preferably an Indian or a Mexican.

  “I’m a wolf,” the man repeated. “Let’s see you eat me.”

  The meat smelled good and I started to eat, ignoring him. Yet I’d had no more than two bites when he loomed over the table.

  “When I talk, damn you, pay attention!” He grabbed at me, and I knocked the hand aside and shoved the table into him. He staggered and went down. I walked around the table, and when he came up off the floor I hit him with my left hand.

  As I did so, I moved so that he was between me and the man at the bar, who had not even turned around. That way I could see them both. The tall man was four inches taller and had longer arms, but loudmouthed as he was, he knew nothing about fighting. He took a long, clumsy swing at me, and I grabbed his sleeve and jerked him toward me, kicking his feet from under him. He hit the floor hard and for a moment sat there, shocked and suddenly sober…or nearly so.

  “I’ll kill you for that,” he said, matter-of-factly.

  “I’d give it another thought,” I told him. “You haven’t done very well so far.”

  Without taking my eyes from him, I said to the stage tender. “You got a graveyard out here?”

  “We have. Nothing but Injuns in it, though.”

  “If you want to be remembered,” I said to the tall man, “you’d better tell him your name before you reach for that gun.”