Robber's Roost (1989)

by Grey, Zane

  Herrick looked at it with mingled feelings. "Why, there's no trigger!" he exclaimed, in utter astonishment.

  "I do not use a trigger."

  "Thunderation, man! How do you make the pistol go off?"

  "Look here. Let me show you," said Jim, taking the gun. "I thumb the hammer . . . like that."

  "By Jove! But please explain."

  "Mr. Herrick, the cocking of a gun and pulling the trigger require twice as much time as thumbing. For example, supposing the eyesight and the draw of two men are equal, the one who thumbs his hammer will kill the other."

  "Ah!--Er--Yes, I see. Most extraordinary. Your American West is quite bewildering. Is this thumbing a common practice among you desperadoes?"

  "Very uncommon. So uncommon that I'll be obliged if you will keep it to yourself."

  "Oh! Yes, by Jove! I see. Ha! Ha! Ha! I grasp the point. . . .

  Wall, you're a comforting fellow to have round the place."

  Herrick was evidently a free, careless, impressive man who had been used to fulfilling his desires. His eccentricity was not apparent, except in the fact of his presence there in wild Utah. He liked horses, dogs, guns, the outdoors, physical effort. But he had no conception whatever of his remarkable situation in this unsettled country.

  When they arrived at the barn he asked Jim to ride up to the house, where they would have a brandy and soda and look over some English guns.

  The big living-room had three windowed sides and was bizarre and strange to Jim, though attractive. Herrick had brought with him a quantity of rugs, skins, pictures, weapons, and less easily named articles, which, along with Western furniture and blankets, an elk head and a bear skin, made the room unique.

  "I've sworn off drinking," said Jim, lifting his glass. "But one more, Mr. Herrick. To your good luck!"

  The heavy English guns earned Jim's solemn shake of head. "No good at all here, Mr. Herrick. Not even for grizzly. Get a forty-four Winchester."

  "Thank you. I shall do so. I'm fond of the chase."

  Herrick had his head near a window, and upon it, standing out in relief from books, papers, ornaments, was a framed picture of a beautiful, fair-haired, young woman. The cast of her features resembled Herrick's. That was a portrait of his sister.

  Jim carried a vision of it in his mind as he rode back down the bench. He cursed the damned fool Englishman who was idiot enough to bring such a girl out to Utah. This was not Africa, where a white woman was safe among cannibals and Negroes, so Jim had read.

  Then he cursed Hays. And lastly he cursed, not himself, but the predicament into which he had allowed himself to become inveigled.

  "I'll have to stick it out," he muttered, that fair face and shining hair before his inward eye. "I might have chucked this outfit."

  Chapter 6

  "Wal, I run into Smoky's outfit over the divide," announced Hays, complacently. "Damme if they wasn't drivin' over two thousand head."

  Jim had nothing to say, though there were strong queries on his lips. Hays' plans were carrying through. The robber had a peculiar radiance.

  "Dumplin's! Dog-gone, Happy, but I'm a hawg. Gimme some more."

  "I'll have to hoof it up to see the boss tonight," he said, after finishing the late supper. "Put me wise to what's come off in my absence."

  "We've had no sign of Smoky's outfit. So we don't know where his camp is."

  "I do. It's not more'n a mile from where I showed you the brakes of the Dirty Devil."

  "Up or down?"

  "Up. Back up in a canyon. Good place an' out of sight. I gave Smoky orders to pack supplies back from Grand Junction every trip."

  "Hank, reckon you're figger'n on a long hole-up somewheres," said Happy Jack, with a grin.

  "Have you run into Heeseman?" went on Hays, ignoring Jack's hint.

  "Yes. He called on us," replied Jim, casually.

  "WHAT?"

  "I told you, Hank. Heeseman came down to see us."

  "Hell you say!" ejaculated Hays, certainly astounded. "Tryin' to pick a fight?"

  "Not at all. I think he was curious to look me over."

  "Wal! What satisfaction did he get?"

  "He's pretty shrewd, Hank. He sized me up. If that is why he called, he got satisfaction all right."

  "Did he say anythin' about me?" demanded Hays, sullen fire lighting his eyes.

  "That was the funny part of it," replied Jim, frankly lying. "He never mentioned you."

  "Humph! I don't savvy that dodge. It's no good. Heeseman is the slickest customer in Utah. Just tryin' to scrape acquaintance, eh?"

  "I think so. It struck me that he might be wanting to throw his outfit with yours."

  "Ahuh. I had thet hunch. It might wal be," replied Hays, meditatively. "Won't hurt for us to lay low, lettin' him make advances. Heeseman's a slow cuss. But he's as sure as a rattler."

  "Herrick put Heeseman's outfit to cutting and peeling logs. He wants more horses, and a barn for them."

  "Thet's good. It'll keep that outfit from ridin' down Limestone way. An' the cowboys--where have they been?"

  "Plenty of work around, but little riding, except after the hounds.

  I had a chase after jack rabbits with the boss."

  "Hounds an' jacks! What next? However, it's not so bad. Anythin' for us but regular ranchin'. Haw! Haw!"

  "Herrick took me up to see his guns," went on Jim, easily, with furtive eyes on Hays. "Have you seen them?"

  "Shore. Cannons, I'd say. Worse than the old buffalo needle-gun."

  "I'd hate to be bored by that five-hundred express, I think he called it."

  "Humph! If I gotta be bored, the bigger the bullet the better."

  "That's a beautiful living-room of Herrick's. Have you been in there?"

  "Yes. He makes that his office. Funny lot of knick-knacks.

  There's one thing I'm a-goin' to own, though."

  Jim laughed. He did not need to ask any more. Suddenly then a tigerish sensation shot through his vitals. It was like an unexpected attack.

  "I'd like to own all that stuff," he said, carelessly. "Well, what's on the cards now? You're back. Smoky's outfit is on the job. Heeseman is stalled, I think, though I'll not swear to that."

  "We'll aim to keep everybody workin' hard around this neck of the woods. An' we'll pitch in ourselves. That's all on the cards for the present."

  Three days of genuine labor around the ranch, more especially in construction of the new barn, left Jim so happily tired each night that he would have liked it to go on indefinitely. Work was good.

  Jim could handle tools, and that soon became manifest. But on the fourth day, toward the close, Herrick approached Jim.

  "Wall, I want you to go to Grand Junction tomorrow after my sister," he said. "Take the cowboy Barnes with you. His home is in Grand Junction. Have him hitch the black team to the buckboard and start early. My sister will not arrive until the following day or the next. Usually that stage gets into Grand Junction before ten o'clock. Start back at once and come speedily."

  "Yes, sir," replied Wall, resuming his work. But out of the tail of his eye he saw Hays.

  "Boss, I reckon I'll go along with Wall," he said, coolly.

  "Hays, I did not ask your services," returned Herrick. "You are needed here." His tone as much as his words settled the matter.

  Jim purposely delayed his hour of quitting, in order to avoid Hays.

  His state, not improbably, was identical with Hays', but Jim did not care to have the robber know that. By the time he had arrived at their cabin, however, he had himself well in hand, though still perplexed and vaguely startled that he had been chosen by Herrick.

  He sustained some other feeling, too; and if it were not a crowing over Hays he failed to interpret what it was.

  Dusk was falling. The day had been warm for April. The spring frogs were shrilly peeping. Jim stopped a moment on the porch to gaze out over the darkening ranch. Cattle were lowing. This feeling he had now was evasive, but he sustained it long enough to r
ealize regret. He liked ranch work. For years he had missed it.

  Sighing, he went on to the washbench.

  Inside the cabin Hays appeared in a brown study, but he had nothing to say upon Jim's entrance. At Jack's cheery call they took their seats.

  Hays did not eat as heartily as usual. And at table, when he took a moment to speak, he was jolly. After the meal ended he lighted his pipe, and without facing Jim he said:

  "Jim, had the boss mentioned this here trip before?"

  "No. I was as surprised as you."

  "Wal, suppose you make some excuse an' let me go instead?"

  "What?" exclaimed Jim, blankly.

  "I could use a couple of hours in Grand Junction," rejoined Hays.

  "There was one buyer I didn't see. So this offers a good chance."

  "But Herrick won't like that, Hays," protested Jim. "He turned down your proposal cold."

  "Shore, he did. Damn funny, I take thet, too. But if you wouldn't or couldn't go, I'd be next choice."

  "He'd think it strange," said Jim, sharply, trying to pierce through the back of Hays' head.

  "What'n'hell do I care what Herrick thinks?" retorted Hays, losing patience. "It you'll do what I say I'll get to go."

  "Hays, you surprise me. Here you are on the eve of a big deal--the biggest of your life. And you risk angering Herrick at this stage.

  Man, can't you think? It would be a bad move. A mistake. For heaven's sake, why are you so keen on going to Grand Junction?

  What for?"

  "I told you," snapped Hays, taking refuge in anger.

  "Hays, I refuse," declared Jim, shortly. He must keep up his pretence of cautiousness for all their sakes, but he wanted to flash out stingingly with the truth. "Herrick ordered me to go.

  And I'm going."

  Hays puffed his pipe. He was beaten. And now he must save his face.

  Jim turned to the surprised cook.

  "Happy, I'll want breakfast at daylight tomorrow."

  "Any time, Jim."

  Finally Hays veered around heavily, with traces of anger vanishing.

  "Wal, I reckon mebbe you're right, Jim," he said, honestly. "Only it didn't seem so."

  By sunrise next day Jim Wall was on his way to Grand Junction.

  Young Barnes, the cowboy, had his hands full with the spirited team.

  Frost sparkled on the sage and rocks; the iron-shod hoofs rang on the hard road; the swift pace engendered a stinging wind; deer bounded ahead to disappear in the brush on the slope; bold coyotes stood and gazed.

  "Are the horses gun-shy?" asked Jim, his lips near the driver's ear.

  "No. But they're feelin' their oats an' I reckon you hadn't better shoot yet, leastways fer nothin'."

  Jim had to wrap the robe about him, and then he felt uncomfortably cold, until a rising grade slowed down the team and the sun began to warm his back. Then he applied himself to a twofold task--that of winning the driver's confidence and gaining what information was available.

  He asked numberless questions about the country, in fact whatever popped into his mind. Trails, waterholes, ranchers, riders, the pass they were climbing, timber and game in the mountains--all these claimed their share of Jim's interest, but he did not yet touch on any other than casual things.

  The pass was long, of gradual ascent, and afforded little view.

  Once over, however, the scene ahead was superb, a great valley ending in a long red and black range. Jim kept sharp watch for a road coming in on the left. He was not greatly concerned about cattle tracks, however, because there were plenty under the wheels of the buckboard. And it was a hard, white gravel-and-limestone road, on which it was difficult to judge tracks.

  "I like the country powerful well," said Jim, frankly. "But I'm not so crazy about my job."

  "Bet you was a cowboy once," replied Barnes, with a grin.

  "You bet. And sure wish I was still. But I got to going wrong, and first thing I shot a man. . . . Heigho! I wasn't any older than you."

  "What's yer job hyar?" asked the boy, emboldened by Jim's confidence.

  "Say, didn't you know why Herrick hired Hays and Heeseman?"

  "All us fellers had idears."

  "Well, I think Herrick wanted some hard-shooting riders as a sort of protection."

  "You ain't long in Utah."

  "You're right there. So I don't know the ropes."

  "Wal, Mr. Jim, I'll say this. It was a good idear of Herrick's if you fellers play square. This neck of Utah is bigger'n all outdoors, an' it's overrun with varmints, two-legged as wal as four- legged."

  "Barnes, you've hit the thing plumb center," replied Jim, soberly.

  "Thanks for speaking right out."

  "Nobody much in Utah knows who's a rustler an' who ain't," went on Barnes. "Your neighbor might be one, an' your boss might be the boss of a rustlin' outfit. Thet's the hell of it."

  "How about Heeseman?" asked Jim. "Don't talk against your good sense, Barnes. I'm just asking. I don't know anything about this game up here, as you can see. And what you choose to tell me I'll keep to myself."

  "I had a hunch thet way. . . . Wal, some people says Heeseman's outfit rustles, an' some don't believe it. He has a brand, H bar, an' a range over back of Monticello."

  "That's straight talk. How about Hank Hays?"

  "I'd be up a stump if the boss asked me thet. I'd shore have to lie. Everybody between the Green an' the Grand knows Hank Hays, an' what he is. But nobody ever whispers it."

  "Ahuh. Darned interesting. I sort of liked Hank, first off.

  Rustler, then? Or just plain robber?"

  "I ain't sayin', Mr. Wall."

  "You can call me Jim," returned Jim, thinking it time to change the subject. "Let me drive a little."

  He fell silent for a while. Curiosity might prompt him further, but he really did not need to know any more about Hank Hays. A dawning and impatient antagonism to the robber began to gain strength. It presaged events.

  About noon they halted at a wayside stream, and while resting the horses they ate the lunch Happy Jack had provided.

  Beyond this point cattle began to show on the valley floor, and green notches in the slopes across bore traces of homesteaders.

  Ten miles from Grand Junction, according to Jim's informant, was the Utah Cattle Company, a big outfit from Salt Lake.

  Presently Jim's ever-watchful eyes caught dust far ahead, and dots of riders getting off the road into the cedar thickets. They would be Smoky's outfit, Jim calculated, and gave them credit for seeing the buckboard first. They did not appear again, and Jim knew they were hiding on their way back to Star Ranch to make another raid.

  The country appeared to be flattening out, greener and more cultivated in the open places, though the red cedar-dotted bluffs stood up here and there, and far off white-tipped mountains loomed.

  At four o'clock they drove into Grand Junction, which was considerably larger and busier than Green River. Like all Western hamlets, it had a single, wide street, lined by stone and frame buildings.

  "Barnes, here we are," said Jim. "This is a metropolis, compared with Green River."

  "Fust I've been home fer long," rejoined Barnes. "I'll take care of the team at my Paw's. An' say, Mr. Wall--Jim--will you come home an' stay with us or hyar at the hotel?"

  "Thanks, but I'll stay here. Is this the hotel?"

  "Yeh. It ain't much on looks, but the grub's good an' beds clean."

  "Fine. Now, Barnes, you and I are getting along. Do you give me any hunch on how to conduct myself?"

  "Haw! Haw! Jim, you'll be looked over a heap, but nobody won't ask no questions. See you later."

  Barnes drove off down the road, and Jim leisurely entered the lodging-house, which, it turned out, was run by a buxom woman, who made herself agreeable and certainly was not above making eyes at him. As far as any curiosity on her part was concerned, he might as well have lived there always. She was loquacious, and very shortly Jim gained the surprising information that no cattle herds had
passed through Grand Junction this week.

  After supper Jim strolled out to see the town. It was still daylight. The street appeared to be practically deserted. He went down one side and up the other, and crossing to the overland stage office he found the door locked. There was a sign, "Wells Fargo and Co.," on the front. Evidently this town was on the stage line from Denver to Salt Lake. The big store on the corner was open, however, and Jim went in. He bought some things and incidentally corroborated Herrick's statement as to the arrival of the stage next morning. Finally Jim wandered into a saloon.

  To his surprise it was a large place, in which fully a score of men lounged at the bar or sat around as if waiting for something. Jim fitted this atmosphere. He felt at home in it and knew he gave that impression. And he had not been in there very long before he realized that well-armed strangers were really not strangers to that place and community. There were no drinking, hair-raising cowboys or any flashy gamblers or any drunkards. Some of those present had shifty eyes. A few were idle, tattered louts. For the most part, however, the occupants were dusty-booted men who did not radiate either civility or hostility. That suited Jim. He had expected just such a town.

  He read an old newspaper that he found, and after he had exhausted its contents, he watched a card game, but at a respectable distance with other onlookers, and passed a quiet evening without learning anything.

  That night he slept in a bed, the first time for so long he could not recall the last occasion, and the softness of it, or his nearing closer and closer to tomorrow's adventure, kept him awake till late. All this while he heard a roulette wheel, but he could not tell whence the sound came. Probably there was a gambling-hall above the saloon.

  Awakening early, he got up and leisurely shaved and dressed, paying more than usual attention to his appearance. This occasioned him a bitter smile. Jim Wall, erstwhile cowboy, bank bandit, train- robber! What was he now? He could not define it. But he was there to escort an English girl fifty miles across the wilderness to Star Ranch. One thing he was sure of, and that was that it would be vastly better for Miss Herrick than if Hank Hays had been sent. Suddenly this fact struck Jim as singular. Was he any better than Hank Hays? He conceded that he was. Still, there had never been a time since his wild cowboy days that sight of a pretty girl or a handsome woman had not made his heart leap. But for long years he had avoided women, not because he was not hungry for them, but because he seldom saw one that did not rouse his disgust.