McAllister Rides

by Matt Chisholm

  Ike said: “Der end you haf not heard of zis, poy.”

  Two

  McAllister could always eat like a horse. After a fight his appetite became that of a ravenous wolf. He cadged a meal from Ike, hurled it down him, drank the whiskey Ike grudgingly gave him, washed up at the pump and, feeling a little better disposed toward the world, lay down in the shade of the stoop to sleep.

  When he awoke, it was night and the moon was up. He stretched himself, found that he was as stiff and sore as all get-out and wished he used a gun instead of his fists to settle his differences with the more hostile members of the human race. If his old man could see him now, he’d laugh himself sick. He sat up and discovered something – he was hungry again. He also discovered that somebody was sitting in Ike’s old rocker not a spit away.

  “So you finally woke up,” a deep voice said.

  Without looking at him, McAllister thought: Pushing fifty. Hard.

  “It comes to all of us,” McAllister said.

  “I’ve been waiting for a word with you.”

  “Be my guest.”

  The other man drew a deep breath.

  “You’re sassy,” he said. “Young. I expected something different”

  “That’s life,” McAllister said, “One disappointment after another.”

  The older man made a noise like an engine about to blow a gasket. It was an unhappy sound. When he had simmered a little he managed to say through his teeth: “I heard you wanted work.”

  “I want money. That ain’t quite the same thing.”

  “I heard you’d been around Indians, ain’t afraid to take a few risks.”

  “I been around the abergoins some. I like my hide whole as much as the next man.”

  The man cleared his throat.

  “I ain’t the kind to beat around the bush. You heard we been hit by the Comanch’?”

  “Sure.”

  “They took a woman.”

  “Killed a boy.”

  “The woman was my wife.”

  So this was the big rancher, Bourn. McAllister took out the pipe that was his pride and filled it with tobacco. Not a word was spoken as he fired it and puffed contentedly, sending clouds of foul smoke in the direction of the man in the rocker. Bourn coughed pointedly, but McAllister was indifferent. Finally, he said: “I want her back.”

  “There’s the Rangers,” McAllister told him. “Comancheros.” Bourn gave a snort of disgust at the mention of the infamous Mexican go-betweens the Comanches used for contact with the Texans. Through them the Indians traded with the Texans in human merchandise. If the price was right and the Comanche captor did not wish to retain a girl or a woman, she might get back to her frontier family a year or two after her capture. If the captive were a healthy boy, the chances of his being returned were rather more slender, for it was said that the Comanche bands were running short of fertile males and there was a serious lack of warriors.

  Bourn said: “I could try both, but they both take time. I want to get her back before …”

  He let the rest hang in the air and it did not have to be spelled out to McAllister. Bourn wanted his wife back before she sired a halfbreed child. A woman given back by the Indians was a wretched thing, regarded generally as tainted and unclean. Unless her family were generous, her future life back among her own folk could be bad. McAllister had known one such woman down on the Pecos; she had been regarded as something different from other folk and unmarriageable.

  McAllister thought about the woman in Comanche hands. It was said that she was young and pretty. One thing was certain – she wouldn’t be young and pretty much longer. She didn’t have a chance unless her captor was an exception to the rule. If she was given to the women, she would become a slave, a drudge to fetch water and fuel. She would be beaten savagely. Thinking about her wasn’t pleasant. He liked to think himself hard, but he had a soft spot for women and kids.

  “It’s quite a chore, you got there,” he said, thinking.

  “I’m willing to pay generously,” Bourn told him. McAllister pricked up his ears. Risk was risk, but money was money and he needed a stake. But a stake was no use to a man who died with a short Comanche lance through his ribs. This could do with a little thought.

  “How generously?” he asked. He couldn’t see this Bourn giving money away.

  “Three hundred dollars,” Bourn said. “On one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “That she ain’t been touched.”

  McAllister got to his feet, stretched and groaned with the pain of the exercise.

  “I don’t like the price and I don’t like the condition,” he said.

  Bourn growled.

  “I’m being damned generous,” he said. “It ain’t every day of the week a drifter gets that much offered to him.”

  McAllister ignored the offensive tone. The sweet smell of cash overcame his anger.

  “We won’t never know if’n she’s been touched,” he said. “No woman is going to come away from the Indians and admit it.” But everybody would think it, he added to himself.

  “Leave that to me,” Bourn said.

  “Like hell I will,” McAllister snorted. “That means you welch on me too easy. No, my price is five hundred for the woman, alive.”

  “Five hundred!” Bourn’s voice almost rose to a scream. “You’re outa your mind, boy.”

  “Don’t call me ‘boy’,” McAllister snapped. “Now you go and think, Bourn. You think where you can find another man who’ll guarantee to bring your wife back into your loving arms. You’ll find ten men, maybe, or twenty who would go busting in there and maybe bring out a dead woman. But where’ll you find one man who’ll do it quiet and bring her out alive?”

  There was moon-shadow under the stoop cover and McAllister couldn’t see the man’s face.

  “No,” Bourn said. “You go away and think about it. Three hundred and that’s final.”

  “Five hundred,” McAllister said, “and a hundred advance.”

  Bourn stood up.

  “I’ll give you till noon tomorrow to come to your senses,” he barked.

  “Come noon tomorrow,” McAllister said calmly, “I’ll be drifting out of here, so it’ll be your last chance.”

  “Christ,” Bourn said desperately, “you could go in there and buy her back with a buck’s worth of geegaws.”

  “I could go in there and lose my hair,” McAllister returned. “You’ve only got one wife, I’ve only got one life.”

  Bourn made a violent sound of disgust and stormed away. McAllister watched him join several riders at the corral. They mounted their ponies and headed away into the east at a brisk pace. McAllister walked into the store and found Ike playing cards with his wife. Ike said: “Did Bourn proposition you?”

  “Sure did.”

  “He’s crazy that man.”

  “Five hundred dollars worth of crazy,” McAllister said, “How about something to eat, Mrs. Ike?”

  Ike raised his powerful voice.

  “You think I’m running a charity institootion or some-fink?”

  Fat Mrs. Ike protested: “Der poy must eat, my darlink.”

  “He’ll eat me poor. Py Gott, how he eats!”

  “Maybe you’re only staking me till noon tomorrow,” McAllister told him.

  In the lamplight, Ike’s great moon of a face turned blankly to him.

  “Py Gott,” he roared, “you’re crazy too.”

  * * *

  It was noon. And it was hot.

  McAllister lifted the saddlebags which Mrs. Ike had thoughtfully filled with supplies for him against her husband’s orders.

  “I’ll mosey along, Ike,” he said.

  “You owe me fifteen tollars,” Ike growled.

  “Pay you Christmas.” Ike struck his forehead with the flat of his hand and made a noise like a gun going off. Mrs. Ike creased her fat face in smiles and said: “Don’t make it so long next time, poy.” Ike looked as if he would weep. But when McAllister reac
hed the door he said: “Rem, dem Richards ain’t finished mit you. Zey could be over der ridge.”

  McAllister grinned.

  “And I thought you didn’t really care,” he said. He walked out to where the canelo stood hipshod at the corral rail in the simmering heat. It was too hot to travel and McAllister cursed his giving Bourn till noon to make up his mind. The canelo turned its head to nuzzle its owner and McAllister stroked the smooth neck. A whisker of dust showed on the ridge above the settlement and several horses and riders appeared out of it. McAllister took his time about tightening cinches and tying down saddlebags. By the time he finished, Bourn was by the corral with a couple of riders, getting stiffly out of the saddle. He stomped up to McAllister who now saw the man clearly for the first time. He was two or three inches shorter than McAllister, heavy in the shoulders, but slim in the hip like the habitual rider. A man nearing fifty, but still physically hard. McAllister didn’t doubt that he could use his fists and the gun that hung high at his waist. He had the face of a quick-moving and well-exercised bull.

  “Well,” he demanded without preamble, “you thought about my offer?”

  “Yeah,” McAllister said. “I’m riding out.”

  “You’re being a fool.”

  “Ain’t I?” McAllister flicked a fly from the rump of the canelo with his quirt, put a foot in the stirrup-iron and stepped into the saddle. He lifted the lines and the horse turned daintily. One of the riders moved his horse in the way and said: “Mr. Bourn didn’t say nothing about you going.”

  McAllister looked at this young man with something like pity.

  “Tell this boy, Bourn,” he said, “not to meddle when men’re talking.”

  Bourn said: “You go when I say so, McAllister.”

  McAllister sighed. The other rider rested a hand on his gun. “I hope,” he said, “you boys know what you’re doing. You’re liable to get yourself hurt through this old man’s foolishness.”

  The man said: “I heard about you. You don’t faze me none.”

  “Bourn,” McAllister said, “you ain’t even half-smart. And if you wasn’t anything else, I’d of put you down as smart. This fool play ain’t going to make me ride clean into Comanche country and get your wife back.”

  “Three hundred is my offer,” Bourn said, “fifty dollars down now.”

  “Five hundred and a hundred now, take it or leave it.”

  Bourn looked quietly fit to bust.

  He said: “Four fifty and fifty now.”

  He looked surprised when McAllister said: “Done.” Then he had the expression on his face of a man who thinks he could have obtained a better bargain if he had stuck out. He looked as if he didn’t know which way to turn, gave his men a sheepish look as though ashamed that they had seen him bested and took a roll of bills from his pocket. He tossed them to McAllister who deftly caught them, stepped down from the saddle and tied the canelo. He walked past Bourn without a word in the direction of the store. Bourn got onto his own horse, his face grim, and headed back for the ridge.

  In the store Ike and his wife were surprised to see him. He threw the money on the counter, said: “Take what I owe you and give me supplies for a month. Enough ammunition for the Remington and the Henry to fight an Indian war.”

  “Mein Gott,” Ike declared, “der poy iss crazy in der head.”

  “Ain’t he,” said McAllister.

  Three

  McAllister reckoned he was crazy in the head too. He reckoned also he must have been born that way. Inherited it from his old man. He had done crazy things all his life and never got a tittle of profit from them. Ended up as broke as when he had started out.

  The canelo trotted through the cool of the evening and the big Kentucky mule trotted behind, carrying on its back McAllister’s investment for the future.

  He rode well into the night, westering all the time, knowing exactly where he was going on this leg of the journey, knowing that by midnight, if luck were with him, he would reach water by good grass for the animals. He didn’t hurry because he had a good many miles to cover and he wanted both horse and mule to be fresh for a good run when it was needed.

  He found the water all right, but there wasn’t much of it. Just enough to give men and beasts a good drink. With full bellies he moved them back half a mile from the water, for it was never safe to camp right on a well. You never knew who would be driven there by thirst. He felt uneasy and he slept light, wakening often to listen to the canelo and the mule crunching the crisp sun-cured grass. He was up with the dawn and in the saddle soon after, using the cool hours to ride in and for his breakfast chewing on the jerky he always carried as he rode. The land rolled away before him like a mighty sea, disappearing, as the sun rose high, into a shimmering haze of heat. Soon the heat made movement unpleasant and man and animals were shining with sweat, but steadily they pushed ever westward through the heat.

  Caution rode him heavily. He sensed that he was riding into danger; not the ultimate danger that he would be in from the Indians, but something nearer at hand.

  Ike had said: Zey could be over der ridge.

  They could be and they probably were. He should have made a detour of twenty or thirty miles and ridden clear of them. But he’d be damned if he did. He was young and his pride irked him. He wouldn’t ride one single mile to get away from three saddlebums like the Richards. He reckoned on them striking, but he didn’t have much idea how or when, though he had a fair notion that it would be soon. The Richards wouldn’t ride two miles when they could ride one. Nor would they stand up and challenge a man when they could shoot him from behind. So it would be today or tomorrow and it would come from cover.

  He would have to rely on his own eyes and the nose and ears of the canelo, for the California horse was as good as a watchdog for danger.

  Toward night, the land started to rise almost imperceptibly beneath the pacing hoofs of his animals. He had passed not a living soul all day, nothing had moved except a herd of antelope and a distant caballada of mustang that fled at his approach with a roll of hoofs that was like the faint sound of drums. He camped out on the flat with nothing in sight. He gave the horse and mule a little water from his canteen in the crown of his hat and hoped that he would find water on the following day. The canelo looked hurt at such churlish treatment. The mule took it philosophically and contentedly munched on grass. McAllister slept deeper this night and he needed it.

  Again he was up with the dawn and on his way, taking advantage of the cool. He could feel the extra strain the animals were taking now as the country rose steadily. He did not know this stretch of country well, but he knew that, although he couldn’t see it, there was a break some time during this day’s ride. Brimble’s canyon lay ahead of him, a wide break of several miles in the rising plain. If they were waiting for him, they would be there, although it would not be an easy task for them to find him in this vast country. He had ridden no trail and they could have missed him by miles.

  Around noon, he knew that he was about an hour’s ride from the canyon and he reckoned if they were there and there was a fight in store for him, he’d fight on a full belly. He found buffalo chips, took tinder from a waterproof pouch and built a fire. There was little water left, but there was enough for a cup of coffee. He enjoyed this while he cooked bacon and beans. Then he was on his way again, moving his animals at a walk.

  As he rode he thought that the situation fitted him to a T. Ike was right – he was crazy in the head. No sane man risked his life for a woman unknown to him for the sake of five hundred dollars he would most likely never live to receive. On top of that he had to get himself in bad with three roughnecks who would most likely leave his dead body in a gully for the vultures and crows to pick. Like father like son. His old man had been born to trouble too.

  He halted.

  Two shots had been fired somewhere up ahead. They could mean anything of course. A hunter, a couple of fellows having a private fight. But two shots spaced as they were sounded to him m
ighty like a signal. Say some men were spaced out across country in search of another man and one sighted him. He would signal with a shot. They wouldn’t fear that McAllister would cut and run. They knew he wouldn’t duck a fight

  He waited and watched. The mule dozed and the canelo cropped the short grass. After a short while his sharp eyes caught a glitter of bright light, too bright to be the reflexion of the sun from the barrel of a rifle. Somebody was looking at him through a glass. He lifted the lines and went slowly forward, shifting his eyes to right and left as he went to get the lie of the land, looking for any faint chance the terrain offered. McAllister might not run from trouble, but he wasn’t such a damn fool he rode straight into it.

  He reckoned that the man with the glass was about two miles ahead of him. The other men would be strung out as far on either hand. So he had a little time to maneuvre yet. Not long, but if he had a little luck, enough.

  Five minutes and he saw what might be a chance.

  In front of him was a dip, something like a buffalo wallow, and away to the right was a gully a little deeper than the height of a man and horse. McAllister rode into the dip, halted and stepped down from the saddle. Then he led horse and mule into the gully and, walking along it, found that it bent around and headed roughly north-west. He followed it for maybe a couple of hundred yards till he came to a jumble of rocks and brush. Here he tied the patient mule and went on. Another five minutes and he halted again and climbed the side of the gully to take a look around, careful not to expose himself too much. The beat of a horse’s hoofs reached his ears and, turning his head, he saw a rider beating down from the north at a fair pace. The distance was great, but he thought it looked like Morny Richards. This man rode across McAllister’s front for several minutes before another man appeared from a hollow and met him. They sat their horses looking east, one of them pointing and apparently talking excitedly. After a while another horseman approached from the south and joined them. Even at that great distance it was possible to see that they were in something of a dilemma. McAllister reckoned they’d be in a worse one when he drove some lead up one of their butts.