They talked it this way and that along these lines, the minutes ticked by and became hours, they grew drunker and they never seemed to get drunk enough to cross that forty or fifty yards to the cabin to bring out the two girls and drop them down a deep hole.
But they did get to thinking about the two girls in the way they always thought about girls when they were drunk.
Star Humbolt expressed the general attitude when he declared that Tm a-goin’ in there an’ I’m a-goin’ to show them lil ole gals how a real he-man is made.’
Billy Cross expressed his opinion – ‘Boy, when them gals see what I got for them, they ain’t goin’ to have no eyes for you-all.’
This was greeted by a shriek of laughter from Lin Shultz who shouted: ‘They’s good strong gals. They don’t have no time for an itty-bitty kid like you, Billy.’
That got Billy mad and he would have done something about it, but suddenly Lin Shultz, whose ears were sharp even when drunk, said: ‘Hush up. I hear horses.’
They all went still and listened.
Billy said: ‘Yeah. Sober up, boys. Maybe this is a rescue party. Hit that light, Star.’
The light went out. Hands found rifles and checked their loads. The three were not sober, but they were ready to shoot straight and fast. Cross softly pulled the door open and inspected the shelf as far as he could see east in the moonlight.
‘How many, do you reckon, Lin?’
‘Three.’
Cross said: ‘You two cover from here. I’ll cover the mine.’ He slipped out of the shack and they watched him run across the flat ground to the open mouth of the mine. Anybody advancing up the trail would now be outflanked.
As the three of them listened to the sound of the approaching horses, they heard far-off the popping of guns. ‘What in hell goes on?’ Star wanted to know.
‘Search me,’ said Lin.
They waited.
Slowly three riders came out of the moon-gloaming. They heard Billy call out: ‘Hold it right there.’
The three horses halted. A deep commanding voice boomed out: ‘This is Draper.’
‘Who’s that with you?’
‘Stavers and Stewart.’
‘All right,’ said Cross, ‘go ahead.’ He walked out into the moonlight and asked ‘What’s that shootin’?’
Draper dismounted and cursed his stiffness from the saddle.
‘If you’ve done your job up here, Cross,’ he said tersely, ‘you can get down there and do your bit. There’s a goddam Mexican rabble with that old fool Espada trying to get up here. Well, have you disposed of Blade and those damned women?’
Cross cleared his throat. Shultz and Humbolt wandered out of the shack with their rifles in their hands. They had the feeling their leader might need a little moral support.
Cross said: ‘Wa-al, Mr Draper, we ain’t kind of gotten around to that lil ole chore yet awhile. Kind of.’
Draper’s rage brought the words out in a hoarse blur – ‘God Almighty, do I have to do everything around here? What’s the matter, Cross? You getting squeamish on me? Huh? Bring out those goddam women and that Blade and I’ll settle their hash.’
‘Mr Draper, you ain’t goin’ to like this,’ Cross said.
‘What am I not going to like, Cross?’ Draper demanded.
‘That Blade and that Mrs Dimsdale didn’t never reach here.’
There was a terrible silence. Draper fought noisily for control. Then he asked with terrifying calm: ‘What happened?’
‘They got away from us on the road here.’
Draper walked away a dozen yards, then he walked back again.
‘But you have Miss Dunfield and Miss Clayton – right?’ he asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Now, I’ll tell you what to do. You get rid of the two you have. First light, you will find the tracks of Blade and that damn woman and then you will find them.’
Cross seemed to stand very still for a long while. Finally, he said: ‘Nobody ain’t never spoken to me this way before, Draper, not ever. Nobody never dared.’
‘Why not, Cross?’
‘They was always too scared because they knowed how I am with a gun.’
As he said these words, Cross’s right hand slapped down on the butt of his gun. To the astonishment of himself and his two cohorts, Cross never drew that gun. Draper’s right hand had caught him such a hard slap across his face that his light form was knocked clean from its feet. The other two gunmen started to go into action but were amazed to find themselves looking down the barrel of a gun in the big man’s hand. They stayed very still where they stood and Billy Cross stayed very still where he lay. All three gazed at Draper with complete awe.
‘Now, boys,’ said Draper, ‘you know how I am with a gun.’
Cross climbed to his feet. He seemed to bear no resentment. He had merely met a man better than him.
‘You’re the boss,’ he said simply. ‘We’ll go get the girls out, Mr Draper.’
He and the other two turned and walked away towards the cabin where the girls were held. As he went, Cross said softly: ‘One day I’m going to blow that bastard’s head off.’
Star said: ‘Leave us get our pay first, Billy.’ They laughed softly to themselves.
Lin Shultz said: ‘I don’t know about you two, but I think it’s a cryin’ shame to waste good-lookin’ females this way.’
‘Who says they’re goin’ to be wasted, Lin boy?’ said Star Humbolt.
They slapped each other on the back and laughed some more. The drink seemed to be getting to them again. They heard the distant popping of guns again.
‘Say,’ Billy Cross said, ‘somebody’s havin’ them one hell of a fight.’
They reached the cabin where the girls were. The door was closed. Little Billy Cross strutted up to it and kicked it open with the heel of his boot.
As he walked inside, he sang out: ‘All right, girls, this is where you find out what real men is.’
He saw that one of them was standing by the window. The other two gunmen were close behind him. He checked the other girl was sitting on the floor against the wall. He turned to the girl at the window. She turned towards him and smiled right into his face. This puzzled him. His puzzlement turned to acute alarm when she seemed to flick her manacles over his head. She pulled him forward and his face was cushioned momentarily against her fine breasts. Then something seemed to break open the back of his head.
Lin Shultz, who was close behind him, experienced a somewhat similar disaster, though he did not have the pleasure of resting his face on a fine pair of breasts. He merely experienced the apparent breaking of his head and he fell almost alongside his leader.
Star Humbolt who brought up the rear heard a man call out: ‘The window, girls.’ By this time Star had a gun in his hand. But he never got to use it. There was a loud report and the gloom inside the cabin was stabbed by muzzle-flame. Something caught Star in the center of his chest and he was hurled backward. He landed on his back and heard the wind go out of him. He reckoned that was about his last gasp. And he was not far wrong.
Draper was running forward and calling out: ‘What the hell goes on here?’
A bullet sang past his head and he flung himself flat on the ground. He fired two shots quickly through the open door, not troubled that he might hit his own men. Even now, his mind was cool and his brain working. It was important to him that these women should not get away. Over his shoulder he shouted: ‘Stavers, get down off this goddam mountain and bring up some more men.’
Hugging the ground, Stavers yelled back: ‘They have their hands full of Mexes.’
Draper roared : ‘To hell with the greasers. Go get some men.’ A moment later, he heard Stavers’ horse pounding away into the night. He growled out to Stewart: ‘Move up to my right and cover me, Stew.’
Draper hauled himself up from the ground, exhilarated to find himself in a physical fight, doing the common chore he left these days to hired hands. He was pleased to keep his hand in
.
Somebody in the cabin snapped a fast shot at him and he felt the bullet tear through the skirt of his coat. He had intended charging the door, but now he changed his mind and swerved away to the left. Then he remembered that somebody had shouted an instruction for the girls to go out by the window. He ran on around the cabin and at once nearly ran into a shadowy form coming out of the rear window. He flung a massive arm around it and it screamed so piercingly that he nearly dropped it. Almost at the same moment, he heard a shout from behind him and turned with his gun ready. He fired twice, but the other man patently dared not fire because of his fear he would hit the girl. The man charged head down and caught the big man in the middle, driving him backward. Maybe the girl was on the ground, he didn’t know, but he tripped on something and went down very hard with the other man on top of him.
‘Run, girls, run,’ the man shouted and now Draper knew it was Blade. A kind of savage joy went through him. He would kill this son-of-a-bitch with his own hands. He’d choke the bastard till the eyes started from his head.
He drove his heavy fist up and forward with all this strength. The lighter man was knocked clear of him.
Draper heaved his weight from the ground with a speed which would have done credit to a man half his age and weight. He dropped his knees into the other man’s belly. Blade gasped like a landed fish. Draper rose to his feet and kicked Blade hard in the side. His inclination was to kill Blade there and then, but he could hear the rattling of the girls’ chains as they ran off into the darkness.
‘There they go, Stewart. After them,’ he yelled.
He heard Conrad Stewart running forward off to his left. He started running himself, gasping the night air greedily into his lungs.
Suddenly, he was right on top of one of the girls. He caught her by the hair, halted and yanked her off her feet. She started to scream, but he silenced her by striking her with the back of his hand in the face. He heard Stewart’s triumphant shout as he came on the other girl. A great relief went through him. With Blade and the two girls in his hands, he was nearly safe.
At that precise moment, something caught him around the knees and he was toppled from his feet. He hit the ground and kicked out savagely, but the man who had tackled him was no longer there. Draper hauled himself up to one knee. With blurred sight, he looked around for his assailant. But the assailant found him first. Something hard cracked into the back of his skull and he pitched forward on to his face. He was not quite unconscious. Vaguely, he heard a man yelling for the girls to run. A gun cracked not far off and he thought he heard Stewart cry out. Draper fought desperately to get to his feet, but the strength seemed to drain right out of him. He listened to the chains of the girls clinking away into the distance.
When he did manage to get to his feet, he stumbled into another man and found that it was Stewart.
‘Don’t just stand there,’ he bellowed. ‘Get after them.’
Stewart protested: ‘Where the hell do I look for them? There’s a whole goddam mountain up there, Milton.’
Draper stretched out his clenched fists to heaven.
‘Oh, my Christ,’ he wailed. ‘I’m plagued by goddam willy-wetlegs.’ He raised his voice to a furious shout: ‘Cross, where are you, man?’
A small figure stumbled through the dark, nursing his previously injured arm upon which he had just fallen.
‘I thought you caught them,’ he said in evident disappointment.
‘I don’t know why I ever offered you man’s wages,’ Draper said. ‘You can’t even hold two women.’
Cross seemed unworried.
‘I want Blade for reasons of my own,’ he said. ‘We’ll pick up his trail come daylight. I’ll give you his head on a dish, Mr Draper.’
‘By God you’d better,’ growled Draper. ‘But we won’t wait for daylight. When Mort Stavers comes up with more men, I want this whole area searched. The way I see it, Blade will have three women on his hands. That should slow him down.’
They wandered wearily back to the shack. They found Star Humbolt lying on his back staring at the night sky with sightless eyes.
Billy Cross said softly: ‘Star was a good man. This is something more Blade has to pay for.’
Lin Shultz came staggering out of the cabin, saying ‘My head’s broke.’
Draper went into the large shack and found some whiskey on the table there. As Stewart joined him he drank deep from the bottle and handed it to him. Draper stood, allowing the powerful spirits to course through his blood. He wasn’t sure it made him feel any better. For the first time since he had launched this business, a doubt crept into his mind. Was it possible that he had met his match in this man Blade?
That was nonsense. He was tired and overwrought. He must get back to Tucson and make sure Dimsdale toed the line. He lay down on one of the bunks that lined the wall of the building. Sleep with him was always the cure for anxiety. He would get the men looking for Blade as soon as they came up from below. Then he would head for Tucson, put the pressure on Dimsdale, then bluff Colonel Rally into using the troops. That was if he could get down the Tucson road with those damned Mexicans holding it.
The awful thought nagged at him – could this be the beginning of his defeat? He hated the weakness of such a thought and refused to contemplate it. Tomorrow his men would find Blade and he would be dropped down a deep hole.
Sixteen
Blade was worried.
Charity and Davida had climbed the mountain. There had been no stopping to remove their chains, so their climb was slow, noisy and painful. Blade wanted as much distance as possible between them and Draper. When they reached the spot where he had left Rose Mary Dimsdale, the two girls were exhausted and their wrists and ankles were painfully chafed by the steel. Plainly, before they went on, Blade would have to remove the irons. The delay while he did so when a hunt might be launched from below was worry enough, but on top of that was the fact that Mrs Dimsdale was no longer where he had left her.
He got to work at once on the irons. After ten minutes of trying to pick the locks with his knife and failing, he risked making a noise that would carry to the men below and laid the irons out on rock and attacked them furiously with a hand-held rock. After several vain tries he had success with Charity’s wrist irons. He seemed to be making a noise that would wake the dead.
It was a good thirty minutes before he was able to remove all the irons. By this time the girls were cold. Blade too felt the night chill of the hills. Mrs Dimsdale had taken his coat with her.
‘What wouldn’t I give for some horses,’ he said.
Charity said: ‘There was gunfire lower down the mountain. It sounded as if it was on the Tucson road. That’ll mean horses.’
‘That shooting is several miles off,’ he said. ‘Wait – what about the mine? Did Cross and his crew have horses?’
Charity replied: ‘They were in a corral between the big shack and the mouth of the mine.’
‘That’s why I didn’t hear them,’ said Blade. He debated with himself what he should do next. Mrs Dimsdale was very much on his mind. If Draper got his hands on her again, Draper would once more be in a position of strength and could put the pressure on the general. He made his mind up. ‘Charity,’ he said, ‘follow this goat track right down to the flat. You’ll find it forks. Take the left fork and go on till you come to the creek. You and Davida hide in the willows there. I’ll bring the horses. We’ll then head for the shooting. If somebody’s shooting at Draper’s men, they have to be our friends.’
Charity said: ‘For pity’s sake, Joe, you’re not going down to the mine again.’
‘If I take Draper’s horses that at least means he can’t raise a hunt till he gets more horses. Go ahead now, start walking and keep your eyes open for Mrs Dimsdale.’
‘You’re crazy,’ said Charity.
He laughed, patted her bottom and started down the hillside. A glance at the sky told him that there were at least three hours till dawn. That would give him plenty of
time to do what he had to do.
He angled down the side of the hill, going as quietly as possible. Every now and then, he stopped to listen so that he could be sure that no pursuit had yet been mounted. He came down off the hill near the mouth of the main tunnel. At once, he heard the horses in their pen. He now spent ten minutes listening intently, doing his best to locate the positions of the men. He heard the murmur of voices from the shack but heard nothing more.
He had started in the direction of the pen, when he heard a sound that stopped him in his tracks.
A number of men were coming up from the direction of the Tucson road. He at once sought cover again and waited. Before very long the men in the shack heard them also and Blade could make out their dim forms as they came out of the shack. Within five minutes four or five men rode at a brisk gallop along the shelf and drew rein.
Now an argument started. Draper wanted them to comb the mountain at once, Cross argued that they would make much better progress in daylight. The higher country was so rough and stony that no tracks could be seen by moonlight. Several other voices agreed with this and it seemed as if Draper were convinced. The newcomers unsaddled and threw their horses into the pen with the others. Blade reckoned that some luck had just come his way. All being well, he might deprive almost a dozen men of their mounts.
The men went into the shack. Blade waited a while, then once more headed cautiously for the horse corral.
His attention as he crept forward was on the shack. He thought that all the men had gone into it. He took enormous care in his approach to the horses. He did not want them disturbed until he got them on the move. Once they were moving, caution would have been a waste of time.
It took him a little time to find the gate, but he finally managed to do so without unduly worrying the horses. As he started to open the gate, the animals began to bunch on the far side of the pen and one trumpeted uneasily.
It was then that Blade was spooked almost out of his skin.
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