Robber's Roost (1989)

by Grey, Zane

  "Jack, gimme Jeff's gun an' belt," he said, and receiving them he buckled them over his own. Next he opened his pack to take out a box of rifle shells, which he broke open to drop the contents in his coat pocket on the left side. After that he opened his shirt to strip off a broad, black money-belt. This was what had made him bulge so and give the impression of stoutness, when in fact he was lean. He hung this belt over a projecting point of wall.

  "In case I don't git back," he added. "An' there's a bundle of chicken-feed change in my pack."

  There was something gloomy and splendid about him then. Fear of God, or man, or death was not in him. Rifle in hand, he crept to the corner on the left and boldly exposed himself, drawing a volley of shots from two quarters.

  "Ahuh. I'll upset thet little party," he muttered, and crossing the front of the cave he passed his men and started to glide along the zigzag wall on that side. He had to dodge out around the end of the corral, which move, however, did not draw fire. Then he disappeared.

  "Wal, we set the old devil up, didn't we?" said Smoky, his tragic mien softening. "Hangin' thet money-belt there showed Hank with his back to the wall. I seen him so far gone once before. Gawd Almighty! . . . Heeseman is standin' on the verge this minnit, Jim."

  "What's Hays' idea?"

  "He must know a way to sneak around on them. . . . Jim, if he makes it an' they git to shootin', I'm gonna try my plan."

  "You'll cross around on the other side?"

  "Shore. One day I figgered out the thing I mean to do now."

  "If Hank gets them all shooting, you might risk it, Smoky. But wait. Let's see what--"

  A metallic, spanging sound, accompanied rather than followed by a shot, then a sodden thud right at hand, choked Jim's speech in his throat. Before he wheeled he knew that thud to be a bullet striking flesh. Happy Jack had been cut short in one of his low whistles. He swayed a second, upright, then, uttering an awful groan, he fell.

  Smoky leaped to him, bent over.

  "Dead! Hit in the temple. Where'd thet bullet come from?"

  "It glanced from a rock. I know the sound. Was that an accident?"

  "Shore. How else could a bullet reach us in hyar, unless from straight across behind that mound?"

  "No. The bullet came--"

  SPOWW! The same sound--another shot, and another heavy lead, deflected in its course, struck the stone above Jim's head and whined away to whip at the gravel.

  "Thet rock thar," shouted Smoky, pointing. "See the white bullet mark. . . . Jim, some slick sharpshooter has figgered one on us."

  Twenty feet out, a little to the left of the center of the cave, lay a huge block of granite with a slanting side facing west. This side inclined toward the cave. On its rusty surface showed two white spots close together.

  Another SPANG and shot followed, with a banging of another heavy bullet from wall to wall. It narrowly missed Mac, who was quick to flop down with a surly yelp.

  "Come on, Jim, it ain't healthy hyar no more," said Smoky, hugging the wall and working to the extreme left-hand corner. "It do beat hell. Thet's Heeseman. He's a bad feller to fall out with. I remember once hearin' Hank tell when he an' Heeseman was pardners in cattle-raisin'. Funny, ain't it? Wal, some rustlers made a cattle steal. Hank trailed tracks into what's called Black Dragon Canyon. There was a cave high off the bottom, an' Hank told how he an' Heeseman, an' their riders, shot ag'in' the wall of the cave an' shore routed out them rustlers."

  "Smoky, if they're loaded with ammunition they can rout us out, too. That infernal rock! We couldn't move it, even if we dared try."

  "We gotta kill Heeseman."

  "I had somewhat the same hunch myself. . . . BING! There's another."

  "I seen the smoke then. Look, Jim. There's a rock sticks up like a owl's head. An' it come from left of thet, out of thet wide crack. He's back in there, the bugger. Let's give him a dose of his own medicine. We got shells more'n we'll ever use."

  "Wait till he shoots again. Then you empty your rifle and give way to me."

  Soon the little white cloud puffed up, and a crack instantly followed. Smoky, on one knee, fired deliberately, and thereafter worked the lever of his rifle steadily until the magazine was empty. Jim saw the red dust of bullets strike here, there, everywhere in that crack on the rim. And before that dust settled Jim emulated Smoky's feat.

  "Mebbe thet'll hold the sucker fer a spell," muttered Smoky, as he reloaded.

  But it increased the ricocheting of the bullets, to the growing embarrassment of the besieged.

  "I'm goin' up in thet hole," declared Mac, furiously, after another leaden missile had chased him around the cave.

  "Mac, it ain't any safer up there," warned Smoky.

  "All I'm lookin' fer is to kill one of them cusses."

  He laboriously climbed up out of sight, and presently Jim heard him shooting. No volley answered him, only a single shot. Conditions were changing up on top. Mac fired again, then bellowed down the hole:

  "Smoky, I crippled one runnin'."

  "Don't cripple nobody, Mac. Kill 'em!" yelled Smoky. "Keep your head down."

  Other shots pattered out from the cliff. Jim heard a scuffle above, then the clang of metal on stone. Mac had dropped his rifle. A shock of catastrophe affected Jim, and flattening himself against the wall, he stared at the aperture. A sodden crash did not surprise him. Mac had fallen back into the hole to lodge upon the shelf. His shaggy head hove in sight over the edge. It dripped blood. Then he slid heavily off the shelf to fall like a loaded sack into the bottom of the notch.

  An instant later, before either Jim or Smoky could comment on this further diminution of their outfit, another spanging, zipping, spatting ounce of lead entered the cave. It actually struck both walls and the ceiling before it droned away into space.

  "Jim, the only safe place from thet--is hyar, huggin' this corner," declared Smoky. "An' there ain't room enough for the two of us."

  "Keep it, Smoky. I'm not going to get hit. This is my day. I feel something in my bones, but it's not death."

  "Huh! I feel somethin' too--clear to my marrow--an' it's sickish an' cold. . . . Jim, let's both sneak out an' crawl back of them.

  Thet's my idee. I don't have wrong idees at this stage of a fight."

  "Leave that girl here alone? Not much."

  "Hell! I clean forgot her," declared Smoky, his hand going up.

  "I'll go an' you stay. . . . Jim, it'd be a pity to let Heeseman's outfit git her. Why, they'd devour her alive, like a pack of bloody wolves!"

  "It would, Smoky, by Heaven!"

  "Wal--wal! . . . Hank is goin' to raise hell out there, an' if I do the same on this other side, between us we might stave Heeseman off. But if we don't an' there's no chanct fer you to take thet poor gurl back home--"

  "Smoky, you forget."

  "Aw! . . . But if you see the fight goin' ag'in' us--Jim, you could kill her. Thet'd be merciful."

  "Smoky, I promised her I would," returned Jim.

  "Wal, thet's all right. . . . Now! . . . Another glancin' hunk of lead. ---- thet sharpshooter. I'm gonna snip off the top of his head. . . . Jim, there's only one thing more thet sticks in my craw."

  "And what's that?"

  "Hays. I'd never be comfortable in hell if he lived on, crucifyin' thet gurl. . . . I had a sister once. Gawd! it seems long ago!

  She had gold hair, not so gold as this one, though."

  "He sticks in my craw, too, Smoky. And in my throat and brain and blood."

  "Wal, then, it jest ain't written thet both of us could croak an'

  Hays be let live. . . . Jim, I reckon we understand each other."

  "Yes. . . . Smoky, I'd have liked you as a pard, under happier circumstances."

  "Wal, it's too late, 'cause we can't both git out of this mess.

  But I'm sayin' you shore air a man after my heart."

  That was the last he spoke to Jim. Muttering to himself, he laid a huge roll of bills under the belt Hays had deposited on the little shelf of
rock. The act needed no explanation. Then he took a swig of whisky from the flask beside Bridges' ghastly form. And as he dug into his pack for more shells another spanging, ricocheting compliment from the sharpshooter entered the cave.

  Jim wheeled to see if he could return the shot. There was no sign even of smoke. When he glanced back again Smoky had gone. Jim caught one fleeting glimpse of him darting round the corner of the corral, and then he vanished.

  Scarcely had he gotten out of sight when Jim thought of the field- glass. Smoky should have taken it. Jim risked going back to his pack to secure it, and had the fun of dodging another bullet.

  What had become of Hays? A moment's reflection dissolved Jim's natural return to suspicion of further treachery. No.--When Hays forgot the woman, and under the flaying of Slocum's scorn went out to kill Heeseman, he had swung back to his former self. It was not only a flash back, but a development, perhaps a borrowing from despair. Heeseman's outfit would hear presently from this dethroned chieftain, and to their sorrow. Jim returned to his safest cover and waited. Sitting against the wall he used the glass to try to locate Smoky across the oval. But birds and rabbits were the only moving objects that fell under his vision.

  Meanwhile the sharpshooter kept firing regularly, about three shots to the minute. Jim became accustomed to the WHANG of the bullets.

  Next he attempted to locate the diligent member of Heeseman's outfit. This man evidently shot from behind the rim, low down, and not even the tip of his rifle could be seen. From his position, however, as calculated by the puffs of smoke, he certainly must be exposed from the west side of that cliff. Jim had a grim feeling that this fighter would not much longer be so comfortable. Before this, Smoky must have passed the danger zone below. He could work up the ravine on the north side, climb a ragged rock slope, go down into the valley beyond the oval, and under cover all the way, get high up somewhere behind those of Heeseman's riders who were still on that west side.

  What had become of Hays? Waiting alone amongst these deflecting bullets wore on Jim's mood. He decided to peep out of the hole again, making sure that his impatience would not result in recklessness. To this end he climbed to the shelf, rifle in hand and the glass slung round his neck. There was a great blood patch where Mac had fallen.

  He could command every point with the aid of the field-glass, without exposing his head. Through apertures in the brush the glass brought most of that west cliff, at least the highest third of it, clearly and largely under his eye.

  The sharpshooter had eased up a bit on wasting ammunition. Jim sought for the owl-shaped piece of rim-rock and got it in the center of the circle. Just then, up puffed a wisp of smoke--crack went the rifle, followed by the spanging and pattering in the cave below.

  An instant later a far-off shot thrilled Jim. That might be Smoky.

  Suddenly a dark form staggered up, flinging arms aloft, silhouetted black against the sky. That must be the sharpshooter. Smoky had reached him. Headlong he pitched off the cliff, to plunge sheer into the wash below.

  This tragedy heralded war on the cliffs. Dull booms of heavy guns vied with sharper reports, and between, in slow regularity that indicated cool and deadly nerve, cracked the rifle beyond the cliff. Smoky had at least carried out his idea. He was up somewhere, behind cover or in the open, as the exigency of the case afforded, and he was making it hot for the Heeseman gang.

  The rattle of rifles fell off, but still what was left was not the scattering, desultory kind. It meant a lessening of man power.

  One at least for every two shots of Smoky Slocum's! And those on the cliff grew louder, closer. Heeseman's gang, what was left, were backing from that fire out of the west.

  Jim swung the glass to the left and swept the cliff, and the rocky approach to it. Suddenly he espied Hays boldly mounting the slope at that end. Bold, yet he lunged from rock to rock, taking advantage of what cover offered. But it appeared that he had not been discovered yet. Those on top were facing the unseen peril to the west.

  Jim marveled at the purpose of the robber chief. Certain death, it seemed, awaited him there. But he kept on. Jim, transfixed and thrilling, waited with bated breath. Still another shot from Smoky-- the last! But Hays had reached high enough to see over. Leveling the rifle, he took deliberate aim. How menacing and deadly his posture! His shaggy locks stood up. His rigidity was that of resistless and mighty passion. Then he fired.

  "HEESEMAN!" hissed Jim, as sure as if he himself had held that gun.

  Hays, working the lever of his rifle, bounded back and aside.

  Shots boomed. One knocked him to his knees, and he lunged up to fire again. He made for a rock, gained it but it was not high enough to shield him. Again he was hit, or the rifle was, for it broke from his hands. Drawing his two Colts, he leveled them, and as he fired one, then the other, he backed against the last broken section of wall. Jim saw the red dust spatter from the rock above Hays, on each side, and low down. Those opposing him were shooting wild, or from difficult positions, or were retreating. Hays seemingly could not stand there long. He had emptied a gun. One more instant Jim watched, frozen to the glass. What a figure of defiance! From Jim's reluctant heart was wrenched a sullen respect and admiration. At the end, this robber had reverted to the man who had won Smoky and Latimer to extraordinary loyalty. He was grand in his disregard of his life. When he started up that slope he had accepted death. But it had not come.

  The shots thinned out, and ceased. Hays was turning to the left, his remaining gun lowered. He was aiming down the slope on the other side. He fired again--then no more. Those who were left of Heeseman's outfit had taken to flight. Hays watched them, strode to the side of the big rock, and kept on watching them.

  Soon he turned back with an air of finality and, sheathing one gun, took to reloading the other. It was at this moment that Jim relinquished the field-glass to take up his rifle. With naked eyes through the aperture in the brush he could see Hays finish loading his gun. Then the robber examined the top of his shoulder, where evidently he had been shot. His action, as he folded a scarf to thrust up under his shirt, appeared one of indifference.

  This moment, to Jim's avid mind, was the one in which to kill the robber. He drew a bead on Hays' breast. But he could not press the trigger. Lowering the hammer, Jim watched Hays stride up among the rocks to disappear. No doubt he meant to have a look at that enemy whom he had so deliberately shot with the rifle.

  A storm was imminent. The sky had darkened, and a rumble of thunder came on the sultry air.

  Jim leaped up out of the hole to have a better look. Far beyond the red ridge he discerned men running along the white wash. There were three of them, scattered. A fourth appeared from behind a bank, and he was crippled. He waved frantically to the comrades who had left him to fare for himself. They were headed for the cove where the horses still stood. And their precipitate flight attested to the end of that battle and as surely to the last of Heeseman's outfit.

  Jim picked up the field-glass, and slinging it in his elbow, he essayed a descent into the cave. On the shelf he hesitated, and sat a moment locked in thought. A second time he started down, only to halt, straddling the notch. The battle had worked out fatefully and fatally. Would he see Smoky again? Yet nothing had changed the issue. The end was not yet. With his blood surging back to his heart, Jim leaped down to meet the robber chief.

  Chapter 15

  Hays was not yet in sight. Thunder was now rolling and booming over the brakes, and gray veils of rain drifted from purple clouds.

  The storm, black as ink, centered over the peaks of the Henrys. To the west the sun shone from under a gorgeous pageant of white and gold. And over the canyons hung rainbows of vivid and ethereal loveliness.

  Between the intervals of mumbling rumble there was an intense quietness, a sultry suspension of air. Even in that moment the beauty of the scene struck Jim as appalling. It seemed unnatural, because death lay about him, bloody and ghastly; and down the arroyo stalked the relentless robber.
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  Jim strode out. The chief hove in sight. He walked slowly, with an air of intense preoccupation.

  Jim deliberated. A survival of the fittest entered into this deliberation, yet there was in Jim a creed born of the frontier.

  It was what Hank Hays had lived by before he threw everything to the winds for the beauty of a woman. Hays had reverted to it, in the hour of his extremity. He had gone out to bear the brunt of Heeseman's attack and he had expected to die. The fortune of war had favored him. Therefore, it was not Jim's confidence that forbade him to kill Hays at long range. Not even for the girl's sake would Jim force himself to such a deed, however justified by Hays' villainy.

  The robber chieftain neared the cave.

  "Where's Smoky?" called Jim, his lynx eyes on Hays' right hand.

  "Cashed in," boomed Hays, fastening great hollow eyes of pale fire upon Jim. "He had cover. He plugged I don't know how many. But Morley's outfit had throwed in with Heeseman. An' when thet gambler, Stud, broke an' run, Smoky had to head him off. They killed each other."

  "Who got away? I saw four men, one crippled."

  "Morley an' Montana fer two. I didn't recognize the others. They shore run, throwin' rifles away."

  "They were making for their horses, tied half a mile back.

  Where'll they go, Hays?"

  "Fer more men. Morley is most as stubborn as Heeseman. An' once he's seen this roost of ours--he'll want it, an' to wipe out what's left of us."

  "Heeseman?"

  "Wal, HE didn't run, Jim. Haw! Haw!--His insides air jest now smokin' in the sun."

  The chief strode to the mouth of the cave and stared around. Jim remained at the spot he had selected, to one side, between the robber and Helen's covert.