E. Hoffmann Price's War and Western Action

by E. Hoffmann Price

  For such close range, the shooting light was perfect. Ballard made his move.

  There was a hiss, a blast, a cry of pain. “Don’t shoot!” Epstein shouted, but only after his whip had paralyzed Ballard’s gun hand and disarmed him. Then Hurley pounced and clouted him, dropping him in his tracks. Emily cried out, as though there had been an exchange of shots.

  The whine of the wind, combined with the dry rustle of sand blown against his sheltering rock made a curtain of sound which might have soaked up the less regular noises of the night, had Epstein not been so thoroughly at home in the desert. Presently, a mule snorted, making a sound which put Epstein more on edge. After some moments, he noted motion in the solid shadow. There was a dim glint of metal at a mule’s forefeet. Some one was cutting the hobbles. Epstein was certain only of one thing—an Indian was at work.

  Epstein drew his gun. Then the show opened as though at a signal, before Epstein fired his first shot. From his right a flight of blazing arrows thudded into the side of the wagon. Simultaneously, arrows with flaming heads raked the browsing mules.

  Epstein’s gun roared. The prowler jerked upright, then fell, kicking and clawing. The mules with fiery arrows sticking in their hides stampeded. Then the raiders turned on Epstein.

  Several had muskets. Epstein’s sheltering buttress of rock stopped a dozen arrows and several bullets. He let out a yell, and lurched into full view, to lie there, exposed.

  * * * *

  Seeing Epstein apparently finished, the Indians checked their rush. One said in pale­face English, “Watch out for the other one.”

  His advice came too late. From beneath the wagon came the whack of a Winchester. The marauders scattered. The muzzle loader boomed again. Epstein, popping up from an unexpected quarter, had drawn the attention of the raiders long enough to give Hurley and the others a chance to gather their wits and fight back.

  The wagon sides, tinder dry, began to burn from blazing arrows. Jubal Garlock, who was sleeping on the cargo, grabbed a blanket to swing down at the flames.

  “Keep down, Jubal!” Ballard shouted, and Hurley called, “I’ll slosh it with water! Keep down!”

  Taking heart, the raiders made a rush. Emily screamed a warning. Epstein saw his chance to come into action. He took the enemy from the rear, now that they were bunched up and silhouetted by the blaze they had started. When his gun was empty, the show had ended: the survivors raced after the animals they had stampeded.

  Once the fire was out, Epstein learned that while Hurley and Ballard had suffered only scratches, Garlock had been nailed with an arrow, and drilled by a bullet.

  Once they got Garlock down from the wagon, Hurley demanded, “Saul, you can doctor a fellow. Get busy!”

  “For bullets, I can’t probe. But that arrow is so near through that if I drive it on, while he is unconscious, and cut off the head, I can pull the shaft out.”

  As Epstein set to work by the light of the lantern, Ballard demanded, “Let’s round up enough mules to pull the wagon without cargo.”

  “Keep your shirt on, Lucky! Mules are as good eating meat as anything else, and them Injuns’d fight to the last man to keep ’em!”

  Epstein, meanwhile, lost little time. He had the arrowhead cut off and the shaft withdrawn before Jubal Garlock regained consciousness. Then he said, “I have some laudanum for cholera medicine. It will keep him resting easy.”

  No one had thought of getting a look at any of the fallen raiders. As far as Epstein knew, he was the only one who had heard the use of English. He paused when he came to those that had dropped when he had caught them from the rear and it was not until he came to his cart that he found the one who had crawled to the shelter of the outcropping. He had been winged. And that man was white.

  Pistol drawn, Epstein knelt beside him and took the renegade’s gun. “Who are you?” he asked. “Why do you run with Indians? I’ve seen you in Poplar Junction. Or maybe in Silver Bend. Who set you on this job with Indians?”

  The man cursed. Epstein cocked his pistol. “Two things I can do. First, what a man deserves for running with Indians, I can fix it for you. Or I can give you something for the pain. And put some rocks on you when you are done so the coyotes won’t scatter your bones.” He hefted the big S&W, and resumed, “Not with a bullet. Just with a good pistol whipping—”

  “Ballard, the dirty son! He said—only two—only two—” The man choked and went limp. The face relaxed.

  Epstein shrugged. “So? I scared him to death. He don’t need a pain killer.”

  Now Epstein knew why Ballard had been afraid: having sent a renegade to get Indians to ambush Hurley, the man naturally had shrunk from going into the trap. His proposal to trail the mule-stealers suggested he hoped to deal with his accomplices, and get back enough animals to get him out of his own snare.

  When Epstein rejoined the others, he was wondering about Garlock’s black bag; but they were wrangling about the best way out of their predicament. Hurley was saying, “The further we’d chase those varmints up into the piñons, the more advantage they’d have on us. And getting Garlock to Panamint comes first. This poker-faced jigger from nowhere got shot and riddled, fighting in the open, whilst the rest of us scrunched down behind cover. So we’re hoofing, and toting him in Saul’s wagon, to give him his chance.”

  Epstein gave Emily the bottle of laudanum. “He will soon be conscious. Give him a spoonful, no more.”

  Then Epstein got Garlock’s keys and hunted for the satchel. The shifting of the cargo had locked it among the boxes, so he could not release it except after prying with a pick-axe handle. He opened the bag, and when he saw the sheaves of currency and Government bonds, he said to himself, “No wonder he fought the fire to keep this from burning when he couldn’t get it out.”

  After locking the bag, he got down the shadowed side of the wagon. The water tank had been bullet-riddled. The barrel had been nearly emptied to fight the fire. But both canteens were full.

  Hurley said, “With nothing but water and a bit of grub to tote, I can move twice as fast as when we’re shoving the cart. Let me hoof it to Panamint, and hire one of those carry-alls with fast horses. You can wait here, if water holds out, or you can head south. If I can gain no more’n a day, it’s worth the gamble. Garlock drew the Injuns’ fire and sort of saved our hides, and I owe him any chance I can win for him by gaining time.”

  He stuffed his pockets with jerked beef and slung a canteen from his shoulder. “Head due south,” he repeated. “You’ll cut the wagon track from Bakersfield or else I’ll be meeting you with fast-stepping horses.”

  Toward evening, Garlock began muttering and mumbling.

  “Saul, hadn’t you better give him some more laudanum?” Ballard asked.

  “If it gets on your nerves hearing him, get away and I’ll sit out your turn.”

  “No, no, that’s not it!”

  Whereupon Epstein went to grab dead mesquite for the fire. When he had stacked up a heap, he let Emily help cook supper. “What do you want?” he asked her. “Wait here, where the water is not so good, or move on, and gain a day that way? If you sleep till moonrise, can you walk another stretch, like we’ve already covered?”

  “Walk it or drop from trying,” she answered, smiling away her weariness.

  “Then we move tonight. Hey, Lucky! Supper is ready.”

  Ballard ate as though swallowing blotting paper. Finally Epstein asked, “How is the patient?”

  “Resting. But I’m afraid he’ll be hard to handle when the fever gets bad. He’s got something on his mind.”

  “Right now, you better get some rest before we move on. I’ll watch.”

  * * * *

  When the night chill bit into Epstein’s bones so deeply he quit cat-napping, he knew it was time to strike out. After throwing wood on the coals, he shouted, “Coffee! Wake up!”

  Emily answe
red. Ballard did not. The blankets he had kicked aside were a dozen yards from the small circle of camp activity. Snatching a blazing brand, Epstein went over to the undisturbed ground—and saw footprints leading north.

  When Emily joined him, Epstein said, “Lucky went back the way we came.”

  “But why, Saul? Good lord, why?”

  Instead of answering, Saul said, “Hold the light,” and went to kneel beside Garlock. He raised the man’s eyelids, looked at the pupils, and asked, “How much laudanum did you give him?”

  “Saul, you know I didn’t give him any.”

  “Somebody did. The pupils of the eyes—they are like pin points, see? And the pale lips.”

  “Do you suppose Lucky made a mistake, and then realized what he’d done, and then got scared?”

  “If you made an honest mistake, would you run from Saul Epstein?”

  “Oh, this is crazy, crazy, crazy! We can’t go off and leave Lucky, so we’ll have to wait now.”

  “Maybe that is why he went away, just to make us wait,” Epstein said. “You go back to sleep. But first, let me show you this man’s watch. It is interesting. I looked at it some time ago. How do you read the initials on the case?”

  “Why, J. G., of course—no, J. C. Maybe it’s an heirloom.”

  “Let me open the back and show you. Here, see the engraving inside.”

  She read, “From the Directors of the First National Bank of Independence. Kansas, to Joash Carson, June 15, 1848-June 15, 1873. Well Done, Thou Good and Faithful Servant.”

  Epstein said, “Now, less than a year after he finished being a good and faithful teller or cashier he shows up in Nevada being an engineer. Is he making some kind of deal with Lucky?”

  “I don’t know. But if they did have any plans, I think Lucky ought to be on the look-out for crooked work.”

  “So? Now watch this.” He reached inside his shirt and brought out a bundle wrapped in a red bandanna. Opening it, he displayed high denomination currency, United States bonds and other negotiable securities. “Count this. You are a witness that this is how much he had.”

  With trembling hands, she counted the gold certificates, and the bonds. She exclaimed, “There’s over $200,000 here!”

  “Keep it until we meet the law. You fix it up inside your dress, so it don’t make bulges. Nobody must know, so there won’t be trouble between Lucky and Ben. Don’t tell anybody you’ve got it. No matter what happens.”

  * * * *

  Shortly after dawn, Ballard stumbled into camp. He had Garlock’s satchel. He asked, “How’s Jubal? He muttered so much about his bag, I was afraid he’d get up while we were dozing and start back for it.”

  “That makes you a Good Samaritan,” Epstein said. “But now we can’t move on—not before you have rested.” A few hours of rest, then Epstein aroused him, saying, “Time to shove.”

  They plodded through the blinding glare. Epstein would not halt until at last Emily protested, “Saul, Lucky is ready to drop.”

  They stopped. Epstein bent over Garlock.

  “This man, whoever he was, has taken a shortcut. Pick up rocks, while I dig.”

  When he had dug a shallow trench, he took Garlock’s watch, purse, keys and pistol, putting them in a compartment of his tool chest. After letting Garlock down into the trench and filling the grave, he reached for the pushbar, and they tramped on. Ballard cursed him. Epstein said, “Walking back was foolish. What good was a satchel to a dying man?”

  After three more cruel hours, Emily clung to him. “Saul, I can’t go another step.”

  Epstein picked her up bodily, and set her into the cart. “Then ride. And have a drink. The last, until I find water.”

  Ballard jerked along like a mechanical toy. When they got to a fringe of ironwood trees, he sprawled face down in the shade.

  There was water. Epstein drew some from the pool.

  * * * *

  Later, while Ballard still lay in an exhaustion which made him seem lifeless, Hurley drove up with a carryall.

  “Oh, Ben!” Emily cried, kissing him hungrily.

  Ballard seemed half numbed by the fierce punishment. His eyes, however, were unnaturally bright. When he aroused himself, his words and gestures were jerky. Hurley listened to an account of what had happened and then asked, “Saul, what was that name in Garlock’s watch?”

  “Read it,” Epstein answered, after getting the watch and the other things. “A bank man all his life until last year, and all of a sudden he becomes an engineer.” As he spoke, Epstein dipped into the satchel and brought out a packet of hundred dollar gold certificates. “No wonder he worried. Here’s more!”

  Ballard came to life. “He said he was Garlock,” the watch says he used to be Carson. What’ll we do with his property?”

  “We turn this over to the law,” Epstein remarked.

  “That’s crazy!” Ballard flared. “Money is money, and nobody knows who this man really was. Ben, you and Emily were hurt badly in the bank crash. We can call this salvage. You’re crazy not to do it! What the devil has Epstein got to say?”

  Epstein gave him a biting glance. “Maybe the desert plays this cockeyed trick to give you back what, you lost.”

  “Saul,” Hurley persisted, “you’re entitled to a cut.”

  Epstein’s eyes became more emphatic. “I want none. For you folks, maybe it is different. Anyway, I don’t know the law, and I won’t take chances.”

  “I’m not looking a gift hoss in the mouth!” Hurley declared “Dip in, Lucky!”

  Ballard dug eagerly into the bag. His face changed when, clawing again, he came up with socks, a shirt, a necktie. Hurley exclaimed, as he eyed the pile, “Something like thirty thousand bucks! Nice divvy.”

  “Thirty thousand?” Ballard echoed, dazedly. “Nice divvy?”

  Epstein said, “Ben, I’ll tend to the horses. You sit down. You’re winning again. Enjoy it.”

  He had the horses unhitched, and was busy grooming the long-legged sorrel when Ballard came up. The animals were some yards from camp, and Hurley and Emily were busy beside the fire.

  Ballard said, in an ominous voice, “You’re foxy, Epstein, pretending you wouldn’t touch that money, and spouting that stuff about surrendering it to the law. You took most of it. Make a good story.”

  “What do you mean?” Epstein countered. “You walked to get the satchel. I didn’t. If something is missing, you took it. Anyhow. How do you know something is missing?”

  “He told me how much he had. There’s $200,000 missing.”

  “I don’t have it. And let me tell you something. I said, don’t give him more laudanum, and you gave it. His eyes showed it. Hey, Ben! He says—”

  But Hurley was too much interested in Emily to hear; and Ballard cut in, “You lying son, what’s that you dropped over there?”

  He gestured toward something on the ground, and went for his gun. Emily cried out. Ben, belatedly aroused, shouted, “Hold it!”

  Guns blazed, one-two. Hurley, on his feet, lowered his weapon. Epstein looked through swirling smoke at Ballard, who was down and twitching.

  A PAIR OF QUEENS

  Originally appeared in Romantic Western, November 1938.

  “You dirty coyote, that deck’s stacked!” The snarling stranger went for his gun as he jerked to his feet, upsetting the table.

  Dexter Blaine remained seated. He did not even drop his cards. One hand snaked to his spring clip holster, and the blast of his .45 shook the Bull’s Head Saloon. The stranger stood there, gaping. It took him an instant to realize that a bullet had hammered the cylinder of his half drawn gun. The shock had paralyzed his hand.

  Blaine wore a black frock coat, a figured silk vest, and a fine white shirt; but his thin face was tanned, and so were his hands. Nothing about him was soft but his voice. He drawled, “Stranger, you oughtn’t to ri
sk more than you can afford to lose.”

  Baldheaded Tim Higgins, owner of the saloon, caught the dazed fellow by the arm. “Shake a hock, afore I bust yuh with a bung starter. This yere’s the only honest game in Tecolote.”

  New players came to match the cool Texan. Inwardly, Blaine was troubled. Ever since Smoke Radford had tried to induce him to run a crooked game—a straight one being unfair competition—out of town gun slicks had been coming in to accuse Blaine of cheating.

  * * * *

  Later, Blaine tapped at the back door of the Hoot Owl Restaurant. The girl who answered was fresh and lovely. Her copper gold hair was haloed by the lamplight whose warm glow picked out alluring reflections in the blue silken robe that outlined her lithe figure.

  “You’re early, Dex,” Eve Hollis murmured in his ear as he held her close.

  A straight flush could not change Blaine’s expression, but Eve’s exquisite curves made his heart hammer. And as he followed her to the rooms above the little restaurant she operated, his blood was warmed by her very nearness.

  But when Blaine seated himself beside her on the cushion decorated divan, Eve evaded his ardent kiss. She protested, “You’ve been catching me half asleep. So this time I sat up waiting for you.”

  “Honey, I might of knowed you couldn’t like me with your eyes open!” And Blaine caught her again in his arms.

  Eve wriggled from his embrace. “Don’t,” she protested. “I have to tell you something. You’ve got to quit gambling. I heard about that fracas tonight. Oh, I know you’re slick with a gun, but your luck’s bound to change. Being a gambler’s wife is bad enough, but a gambler’s widow is worse.”

  “Why—what ya’ll mean, honey?”

  “I won’t ever marry you, unless you quit.” Her lips trembled, but her pert little chin was held high and firmly.

  “Dawgone it all!” he protested, “I run an honest game. The highest court in Texas declared poker is a science, not a gamble.”

  “If you’re so scientific,” she countered, “I’ll sell the Hoot Owl, and take your stake and mine and we’ll raise cattle.”