The Collected Westerns of William MacLeod Raine: 21 Novels in One Volume

by Unknown

  The yellow teeth of the bow-legged man showed in a snarl of rage and pain. "I'd 'a' got Dillon if you'd let me be."

  "Didn't you hear this guy say Harshaw sent them here? Use yore horse sense, man." Houck turned to Hollister. "Yore bronc's with the others. The saddle's over by that rock. Take 'em an' hit the trail."

  In sullen rage Houck watched Dud saddle and cinch. Not till the Slash Lazy D riders were ready to go did he speak again.

  "Tell you what I'll do," he proposed. "Get down off'n yore horses, both o' you, an' I'll whale the daylight outa the pair of you. Bandy'll stay where he's at an' not mix in."

  Hollister looked at Bandy, and he knew the fellow's trigger finger itched. There was not a chance in the world that he would stand back and play fair. But that was not the reason why Dud declined the invitation. He had not come to get into trouble. He meant to keep out of it if he could.

  "Last fellow that licked me hauled me down off'n my bronc, Mr. Houck," Dud answered, laughing. "No, sir. We got to turn down that invite to a whalin'. The boss gave us our orders straight. No trouble a-tall. I expect if it was our own say-so we might accommodate you. But not the way things are."

  "No guts, either of you. Ain't two to one good enough?" jeered Houck angrily.

  "Not good enough right now. Maybe some other time, Mr. Houck," Dud replied, his temper unruffled.

  "You want it to be twelve to one, like it was last time, eh?"

  "Harshaw will be lookin' for us, so we'll be sayin' good-evenin'," the rider for the Slash Lazy D said quietly.

  He turned his horse to go, as did his companion. Houck cursed them both bitterly. While they rode into the gloom Bob's heart lifted to his throat. Goosequills ran up and down his spine. Would one of his enemies shoot him in the back? He could hardly keep from swinging his head to make sure they were not aiming at him. He wanted to touch his mount with a spur to quicken the pace.

  But Dud, riding by his side, held his bronco to the slow even road gait of the traveler who has many miles to cover. Apparently he had forgotten the existence of the furious, bitter men who were watching their exit from the scene. Bob set his teeth and jogged along beside him.

  Not till they were over the hill did either of them speak.

  "Wow!" grunted Dud as he wiped the sweat from his face. "I'm sure enough glad to have that job done with. My back aches right between the shoulder blades where a bullet might 'a' hit it."

  Bob relaxed in the saddle. He felt suddenly faint. Even now he found himself looking round apprehensively to make sure that a man carrying a rifle was not silhouetted on the hilltop against the sky-line.

  CHAPTER XXVII

  PARTNERS IN PERIL

  Into the office of Blister Haines, J. P., a young man walked. He was a berry-brown youth, in the trappings of the range-rider, a little thin and stringy, perhaps, but well-poised and light-stepping.

  With one swift glance the fat man swept his visitor from head to foot and liked what he saw. The lean face was tanned, the jaw firm, the eye direct and steady. There was no need to tell this man to snap up his head. Eight months astride a saddle in the sun and wind had wrought a change in Robert Dillon.

  "'Lo, Red Haid," the justice sang out squeakily. "How's yore good health? I heerd you was d-drowned. Is you is, or is you ain't? Sit down an' rest yore weary bones."

  "I took a swim," admitted Bob. "The boys fished me out while I was still kickin'."

  "Rivers all high?"

  "Not so high as they were. We noticed quite a difference on the way back."

  "Well, s-sit down an' tell me all about it. How do you like ridin', Texas man?"

  "Like it fine."

  "All yore troubles blown away?"

  "Most of 'em. I'm a long way from being a wolf yet, though."

  "So? B-by the way, there's a friend of yours in town--Jake Houck."

  There was a moment's pause. "Did he say he was my friend?" asked Bob.

  "Didn't mention it. Thought maybe you'd like to know he's here. It's not likely he'll trouble you."

  "I'd be glad to be sure of that. Dud an' I had a little run-in with him last month. He wasn't hardly in a position then to rip loose, seein' as he had my horse an' saddle in his camp an' didn't want Harshaw in his wool. So he cussed us out an' let it go at that. Different now. I'm playin' a lone hand--haven't got the boss back of me."

  "F-fellow drifted in from Vernal yesterday," the justice piped, easing himself in his chair. "Told a s-story might interest you. Said Jake Houck had some trouble with a y-young Ute buck over a hawss. Houck had been drinkin', I reckon. Anyhow he let the Injun have it in the stomach. Two-three shots outa his six-gun. The Utes claimed it was murder. Jake he didn't wait to adjust no claims, but lit out on the jump."

  "Won't the Government get him?"

  The fat man shrugged. "Oh, well, a Ute's a Ute. Point is that Houck, who always was a t-tough nut, has gone bad since the boys rode him on a rail. He's proud as Lucifer, an' it got under his hide. He's kinda cuttin' loose an' givin' the devil in him free rein. Wouldn't surprise me if he turned into a killer of the worst kind."

  Bob's eyes fastened to his uneasily. "You think he's--after me?"

  "I think he'll d-do to watch."

  "Yes, but--"

  Blister rolled a cigarette and lit it before he asked casually, "Stayin' long in town?"

  "Leavin' to-day for the ranch."

  "What size gun you carry for rattlesnakes?"

  "Mine's a forty-five." Bob took it out, examined it, and thrust the weapon between his trousers and his shirt. If he felt any mental disturbance he did not show it except in the anxious eyes.

  Blister changed the subject lightly. "Hear anything ab-b-bout the Utes risin'? Any talk of it down the river?"

  "Some. The same old stuff. I've been hearin' it for a year."

  "About ripe, looks like. This business of Houck ain't gonna help any. There's a big bunch of 'em over there in the hills now. They've been runnin' off stock from outlying ranches."

  "Sho! The Indians are tamed. They'll never go on the warpath again, Blister."

  "J-just once more, an' right soon now."

  The justice gave his reasons for thinking so, while Bob listened rather inattentively. The boy wanted to ask him about June, but he remembered what his fat friend had told him last time he mentioned her to him. He was still extremely sensitive about his failure to protect his girl-wife and he did not want to lay himself open to snubs.

  Bob sauntered from the office, and before he had walked a dozen steps came face to face with June. She was coming out of a grocery with some packages in her arms. The color flooded her dusky cheeks. She looked at him, startled, like a fawn poised for flight.

  During the half-year since he had seen her June had been transformed. She had learned the value of clothes. No longer did she wear a shapeless sack for a dress. Her shoes were small and shapely, her black hair neatly brushed and coiffed. The months had softened and developed the lines of the girlish figure. Kindness and friendliness had vitalized the expression of the face and banished its sullenness. The dark eyes, with just a hint of wistful appeal, were very lovely.

  Both of them were taken unawares. Neither knew what to do or say. After the first instant of awkwardness June moved forward and passed him silently.

  Bob went down the street, seeing nothing. His pulses trembled with excitement. This charming girl was his wife, or at least she once had been for an hour. She had sworn to love, honor, and obey him. There had been a moment in the twilight when they had come together to the verge of something divinely sweet and wonderful, when they had gazed into each other's eyes and had looked across the boundary of the promised land.

  If he had only kept the faith with her! If he had stood by her in the hour of her great need! The bitterness of his failure ate into the soul of the range-rider as it had done already a thousand times. It did not matter what he did. He could never atone for the desertion on their wedding day. The horrible fact was written in blood. It could not be eras
ed. Forever it would have to stand between them. An unbridgeable gulf separated them, created by his shameless weakness.

  When Bob came to earth he found himself clumping down the river road miles from town. He turned and walked back to Bear Cat. His cowpony was at the corral and he was due at the ranch by night.

  Young Dillon's thoughts had been so full of June and his relation to her that it was with a shock of surprise he saw Jake Houck swing out from the hotel porch and bar the way.

  "Here's where you 'n' me have a settlement," the Brown's Park man announced.

  "I'm not lookin' for trouble," Bob said, and again he was aware of a heavy sinking at the stomach.

  "You never are," jeered Houck. "But it's right here waitin' for you, Mr. Rabbit Heart."

  Bob heard the voices of children coming down the road on their way from school. He knew that two or three loungers were watching him and Houck from the doors of adjacent buildings. He was aware of a shouting and commotion farther up the street. But these details reached him only through some subconscious sense of absorption. His whole attention was concentrated on the man in front of him who was lashing himself into a fighting rage.

  What did Houck mean to do? Would he throw down on him and kill? Or would he attack with his bare hands? Fury and hatred boiled into the big man's face. His day had come. He would have his revenge no matter what it cost. Bob could guess what hours of seething rage had filled Houck's world. The freckle-faced camp flunkey had interfered with his plans, snatched from him the bride he had chosen, brought upon him a humiliation that must be gall to his proud spirit whenever he thought of Bear Cat's primitive justice. He would pay his debt in full.

  The disturbance up the street localized itself. A woman picked up her skirts and flew wildly into a store. A man went over the park fence almost as though he had been shot out of a catapult. Came the crack of a revolver. Some one shouted explanation. "Mad dog!"

  A brindle bull terrier swung round the corner and plunged forward. With bristling hair and foaming mouth, it was a creature of horrible menace.

  Houck leaped for the door of the hotel. Bob was at his heels, in a panic to reach safety.

  A child's scream rang out. Dillon turned. The school children were in wild flight, but one fair-haired little girl stood as though paralyzed in the middle of the road. She could not move out of the path of the wild beast bearing down upon her.

  Instinctively Bob's mind functioned. The day was warm and his coat hung over an arm. He stepped into the road as the brindle bull came opposite the hotel. The coat was swung out expertly and dropped over the animal's head. The cowpuncher slipped to his knees, arms tightening and fingers feeling for the throat of the writhing brute struggling blindly.

  Its snapping jaws just missed his hand. Man and dog rolled over into the dust together. Its hot breath fanned Bob's face. Again he was astride of the dog. His fingers had found its throat at last. They tightened, in spite of its horrible muscular contortions to get free.

  There came a swish of skirts, the soft pad of running feet. A girl's voice asked, "What shall I do?"

  It did not at that moment seem strange to Dillon that June was beside him, her face quick with tremulous anxiety. He spoke curtly, as one who gives orders, panting under the strain of the effort to hold the dog.

  "My gun."

  She picked the forty-five up from where it had fallen. Their eyes met. The girl did swiftly what had to be done. It was not until she was alone in her room half an hour later that the thought of it made her sick.

  Bob rose, breathing deep. For an instant their eyes held fast. She handed him the smoking revolver. Neither of them spoke.

  From every door, so it seemed, people poured and converged toward them. Excited voices took up the tale, disputed, explained, offered excuses. Everybody talked except June and Bob.

  Blister rolled into the picture. "Dawg-gone my hide if I ever see anything to b-beat that. He was q-quick as c-chain lightnin', the boy was. Johnny on the spot. Jumped the critter s-slick as a whistle." His fat hand slapped Bob's shoulder. "The boy was sure there with both hands and feet."

  "What about June?" demanded Mollie. "Seems to me she wasn't more'n a mile away while you men-folks were skedaddlin' for cover."

  The fat man's body shook with laughter. "The boys didn't s-stop to make any farewell speeches, tha's a fact. I traveled some my own self, but I hadn't hardly got started before Houck was outa sight, an' him claimin' he was lookin' for trouble too."

  "Not that kind of trouble," grinned Mike the bartender. He could afford to laugh, for since he had been busy inside he had not been one of the vanishing heroes. "Don't blame him a mite either. If it comes to that I'm givin' the right of way to a mad dog every time."

  "Hmp!" snorted Mollie. "What would 'a' happened to little Maggie Wiggins if Dillon here had felt that way?"

  Bob touched Blister on the arm and whispered in his ear. "Get me to the doc. I gotta have a bite cauterized."

  It was hardly more than a scratch, but while the doctor was making his preparations the puncher went pale as service-berry blossoms. He sat down, grown suddenly faint. The bite of a mad dog held sinister possibilities.

  Blister fussed around cheerfully until the doctor had finished. "Every silver l-lining has got its cloud, don't you r-reckon? Here's Jake Houck now, all s-set for a massacree. He's a wolf, an' it's his night to howl. Don't care who knows it, by gum. Hands still red from one killin'. A rip-snortin' he-wolf from the bad lands! Along comes Mr. Mad Dog, an' Jake he hunts his hole with his tail hangin'. Kinda takes the tuck outa him. Bear Cat wouldn't hardly stand for him gunnin' you now, Bob. Not after you tacklin' that crazy bull terrier to save the kids. He'll have to postpone that settlement he was promisin' you so big."

  The puncher voiced the fear in his mind. "Do folks always go mad when they're bit by a mad dog, doctor?"

  "Not a chance hardly," Dr. Tuckerman reassured. "First place, the dog probably wasn't mad. Second place, 't wa'n't but a scratch and we got at it right away. No, sir. You don't need to worry a-tall."

  Outside the doctor's office Blister and Bob met Houck. The Brown's Park man scowled at the puncher. "I'm not through with you. Don't you think it! Jus' because you had a lucky fluke escape--"

  "Tacklin' a crazy wild beast whilst you an' me were holin' up," Blister interjected.

  Houck looked at the fat man bleakly. "You in this, Mr. Meddler? If you're not declarin' yoreself in, I'd advise you to keep out."

  Blister Haines laughed amiably with intent to conciliate. "What's the use of nursin' a grudge against the boy, Houck? He never did you any harm. S-shake hands an' call it off."

  "You manage yore business if you've got any. I'll run mine," retorted Houck. To Bob he said meaningly as he turned away, "One o' these days, young fellow."

  The threat chilled Dillon, but it was impossible just now to remain depressed. He rode back to the ranch in a glow of pleasure. Thoughts of June filled every crevice of his mind. They had shared an adventure together, had been partners in a moment of peril. She could not wholly despise him now. He was willing to admit that Houck had been right when he called it a fluke. The chance might not have come to him, or he might not have taken it. The scream of little Maggie Wiggins had saved the day for him. If he had had time to think--but fortunately impulse had swept him into action before he could let discretion stop him.

  He lived over again joyfully that happy moment when June had stood before him pulsing with life, eager, fear-filled, tremulous. He had taken the upper hand and she had accepted his leadership. The thing his eyes had told her to do she had done. He would remember that--he would remember it always.

  Nor did it dim his joy that he felt himself to be a fraud. It had taken no pluck to do what he did, since he had only obeyed a swift dominating mental reaction to the situation. The real courage had been hers.

  He knew now that he would have to take her with him in his thoughts on many a long ride whether he wanted to or not.

  CHAPTER XXVIII
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  JUNE IS GLAD

  June turned away from the crowd surrounding the dead mad dog and walked into the hotel. The eyes of more than one man followed the slim, graceful figure admiringly. Much water had run down the Rio Blanco since the days when she had been the Cinderella of Piceance Creek. The dress she wore was simple, but through it a vivid personality found expression. No longer was she a fiery little rebel struggling passionately against a sense of inferiority. She had come down from the hills to a country filled with laughter and the ripple of brooks.

  The desire to be alone was strong upon her--alone with the happy thoughts that pushed themselves turbulently through her mind. She was tremulous with excitement. For she hoped that she had found a dear friend who had been lost.