Delphi Collected Works of Edgar Rice Burroughs (Illustrated) (Series Four Book 26)

by Edgar Rice Burroughs

  To come upon them directly up the trail in the bottom of the canyon would have been to expose himself to the fire of one side, and possibly of both, for in this untamed country it was easily conceivable that both sides of the controversy might represent interests inimical to those of his employer. With this idea in mind the ex-foreman of the Bar Y Ranch clambered cautiously up the steep side of the hill that hid from his view that part of the canyon lying just beyond.

  From the varying qualities of the detonations the man had deduced that five and possibly six rifles were participating in the affair. How they were divided he could not even guess. He would have a look over the crest of the hog-back and if the affair was none of his business he would let the participants fight it out by themselves. Bull, sober, was not a man to seek trouble.

  Climbing as noiselessly as possible and keeping the muzzle of his rifle ahead of him he came presently to the crest of the narrow ridge where he pushed his way cautiously through the brush toward the opposite side, passing around an occasional huge outcropping of rock that barred his progress. Presently the brush grew thinner. He could see the opposite wall of the canyon.

  A sharp report sounded close below him, just over the brow of the ridge. In front of him a huge outcropping reared its weather-worn surface twenty feet above the brush.

  Toward this he crept until he lay concealed behind it. Then, warily, he peered around the up-canyon edge discovering that his hiding place rested upon tire very edge of a steep declivity that dropped perpendicularly into the bottom of the canyon. Almost below him five Apaches were hiding among the rocks, arid boulders that filled the bottom of the canyon. Upon the opposite side a single man lay sprawled upon his belly behind another.

  Bull could not see his face, hidden as it was beneath a huge sombrero, but he saw that he was garbed after the fashion of a vaquero — he might be either an American or a Mexican. That made no difference now, however, for there were five against him, and the five were Indians. Bull watched for a moment. He saw that the Indians were doing all the firing, and he wondered if the man lying across the canyon was already dead. He did not move.

  Cautiously one of the Indians crept from cover as the other four fired rapidly at their victim’s position, then another followed him and the three remaining continued firing, covering the advance of their fellows.

  Bull smiled, that grim, saturnine smile of his. There were some redskins in the vicinity that were dike for the surprise of their lives.

  The two were working their way across the canyon, taking advantage of every particle of cover. They were quite close to the hiding place of the prone man now — in another moment the three upon Bull’s side of the canyon would cease firing and the two would rush their unconscious quarry and finish him:

  Bull raised his rifle to his shoulder. There followed two reports, so close together that it was almost inconceivable that they had come from the same weapon, and the two, who had already risen for the final attack, crumpled among the rocks beneath the blazing sun.

  Instantly apprehending their danger, the other three Apaches leaped to their feet and scurried up the canyon, searching new cover as they ran; but it was difficult to find cover from a rifle holding the commanding position that Bull’s held.

  It spoke again, and the foremost Indian threw his hands above his head, spun completely around and lunged forward upon his face. The other two dropped behind large boulders.

  Bull glanced across the canyon. He saw that the man had raised his head and was attempting to look around the edge of his cover, having evidently become aware that a new voice had entered the grim chorus of the rifles.

  “Hit?” shouted Bull.

  The man looked in the direction of the voice. “No,” he replied.

  “Then why in hell don’t you shoot? There’s only two of them left — they’re up canyon on this side.”

  “Out of ammunition,” replied the other.

  “Well, you were in a hell of a fix,” mused Bull as he watched the concealment of the two Indians.

  “Any more of ’em than this bunch?” he called across to the man.

  “No.”

  For a long time there was silence — the quiet and peace that had lain upon this age-old canyon since the Creation — and that would lie upon it forever except as man, the disturber, came occasionally to shatter it.

  “I can’t lie here all day,” mused Bull. He crawled forward and looked over the edge of the cliff. There was a sheer drop of forty feet. He shook his head. There was a sharp report and a bullet tore up the dirt beneath him. It was followed instantly by another report from across the canyon.

  Bull kept his eyes on the cover of the Indians. Not a sign of them showed. One of them had caught him napping — that was all — and ducked back out of sight after firing, but how was the man across the canyon firing without ammunition?

  “I got one then,” came the man’s voice, as though in answer, “but you better lie low — he come near getting you.”

  “Thought you didn’t have no ammunition,” Bull called across.

  “I crawled out and got the rifle of one of these you potted.”

  Bull had worked his way back to his cover and to the brush behind it and now he started up along the ridge in an attempt to get behind the remaining Indian.

  A minute or two later he crawled again to the edge of the ridge and there below him and in plain sight the last of the redskins crouched behind a great boulder. Bull fired and missed, and then the Apache was up and gone, racing for his pony tethered further up the canyon. The white man shrugged, rose to his feet and sought an easy way down into the bed of the canyon.

  The other man had seen his action, which betokened that the fight was over, — and as Bull reached the bottom of the cliff he was walking forward to meet him. A peculiar light entered the eyes of each other as they came face to face.

  “Ah!” exclaimed the one, “it is Senor Bull.” He spoke now in Spanish.

  “Gregorio!” said Bull. “How’d they git you in this fix?”

  “I camped just above here last night,” replied the other, “and this morning I walked down with my rifle on the chance of getting an antelope for breakfast. They come on me from above and there you are. They been shootin’ at me since early this morning.” He spoke English with scarce the slightest accent. “You have saved my life, Senor Bull, and Gregorio will not forget that.”

  “You haven’t happened to see a bunch of Crazy J cows hereabouts, have you?” inquired Bull, ignoring the other’s expression of gratitude.

  “No, Senor, I have not,” replied Gregorio.

  “Well, I’ll go get my horse and have a look up toward the head of the canyon, anyway,” and Bull turned and walked down to get Blazes.

  Fifteen minutes later, riding up again, he passed Gregorio coming down, the latter having found his pony and his belongings intact at his camp.

  “A Dios, Senor,” called Gregorio in passing.

  “So long,” returned the American.

  At the head of the canyon, where it narrowed to the proportions of a gorge, Bull examined the ground carefully and saw that no cattle had passed that way in many days; then he turned back and rode down the canyon.

  Meanwhile, entering Cottonwood from below, Jim Weller, looking for lost horses, passed Gregorio coming out and, recognizing him, loosened his gun in its holster and kept one eye on the Mexican until he had passed out of sight around the shoulder of the hill that flanked the east side of the entrance to the canyon, for Gregorio bore an unsavory reputation in that part of the country. He was an outlaw with a price upon his head.

  “Howsumever,” mused Weller, “I ain’t lost no outlaws — it’s hosses I’m lookin’ for,” and he rode on with a sigh of relief that there was a solid hill between him and Gregorio’s deadly aim. Ten minutes later he met Bull coming down from the head of Cottonwood. The two men drew rein with a nod.

  Weller asked about horses, learning from Bull that there was no stock above them in Cottonwood, but
he did not mention having met Gregorio. It was obvious to him that the two men could not have been in Cottonwood together without having met and if Bull did not want to mention it it was evident that he had some good reason for not doing so. It was not the custom of the country to pry into the affairs of others. Bull did not mention Gregorio nor did he speak of their brush with the Apaches; but that was because he was an uncommunicative man.’

  “I think I’ll have a look up Sinkhole Canyon for them hosses,” remarked Weller. Sinkhole was the next canyon west.

  “Keep your eyes peeled for them Crazy J cows,” said Bull, “and I’ll ride up Belter’s and if I see your horses I’ll run ’em down onto the flat.”

  They separated at the mouth of Cottonwood, Weller riding toward the west, while Bull made his way eastwardly toward Belter’s Canyon which lay in the direction of the home ranch.

  Three hours later the semi weekly stage, careening down the North Pass trail, drew up in a cloud of dust at the junction of the Hender’s Mine road at a signal from one of two men sitting in a buckboard. As the stage slowed down one of the men leaped to the ground, and as it came to a stop clambered to the top and took a seat beside the driver who had greeted him with a gruff jest.

  The new passenger carried a heavy sack which he deposited between his feet. He also carried a sawed-off shot gun across his knees.

  “The Saints be praised!” exclaimed a fat lady with a rich brogue, who occupied a seat inside the coach. “Sure an’ I thought we were after bein’ held up.”

  An old gentleman with white whiskers down which a trickle of tobacco juice had cascaded its sienna-hued way reassured her.

  “No mum,” he said, “thet’s the messenger from the mine with a bag o’ bullion. This here stage ain’t been held up fer three weeks. No mum, times ain’t what they uset to be with all these newfangled ideas about reform what are spilin’ the country.”

  The fat lady looked at him sideways, disdainfully, and gathered her skirts closer about her. The stage lurched on, the horses at a brisk gallop, and as it swung around the next curve the fat lady skidded into the old gentleman’s lap, her bonnet tilting over one eye, rakishly.

  “Be off wid ye”’ she exclaimed, glaring at the little old gentleman, as though the fault were all his. She had scarcely regained her own side of the seat when another, and opposite, turn in the road precipitated the old gentleman into her lap.

  “Ye spalpeen!” she shrilled, as, placing two fat hands against him, she thrust him violently from her. “Sure, an’ it’s a disgrace, it is, that a poor widdy-lady can’t travel in pace without the loikes o’ ye takin’ advantage o’ her weak an’ unprotected state.”

  The little old gentleman, though he had two huge guns strapped at his hips, appeared thoroughly cowed and terrified — so much so, in fact, that he dared not venture even a word of protest at the injustice of her insinuations. From the corners of his weak and watery blue eyes he surveyed her surreptitiously, wiped the back of his perspiring neck with a flamboyant bandana, and shrank farther into the corner of his seat.

  A half-hour later the stage swung through the gap at the foot of the pass. Before it lay the rolling uplands through which the road wound down past the Bar Y ranch house and the town of Hendersville on the flat below. The gap was narrow and winding and the road excruciatingly vile, necessitating a much slower pace than the driver had been maintaining since passing the summit.

  The horses were walking, the coach lurching from one chuck- hole to another, while clouds of acrid dust arose in almost vapor lightness, enveloping beasts, vehicle and passengers. Through the nebulous curtain rising above the leaders the driver saw suddenly materialize the figures of two men.

  “Halt! Stick ’em up!”

  The words snapped grimly from the taller of the two. The messenger on the seat beside the driver made a single move to raise his sawed-off shot gun. A six-gun barked and the messenger toppled forward, falling upon the rump of the near wheel-horse. The horse, startled, leaped forward into his collar. The driver attempted to quiet him. The two men moved up beside the stage, one covering the driver and a passenger on top, the other threatening the two inside. The fat lady sat with her arms folded glaring at the bandit. The little old gentleman’s hands touched the top of the stage.

  “Stick ’em up!” said the bandit to the fat lady.

  She did not move.

  “Sure an’ I’ll not stick ’em up an inch fer the loikes o’ yese,” she shrilled; “an’ lucky it is for ye, ye dhirty spalpeen, that Mary Donovan hasn’t the bit ov a gun with her — or that there ain’t a man along to protect a poor, helpless widdy lady,” and she cast a withering glance of scorn in the direction of the little old gentleman, who grew visibly red through the tan of his weather-worn countenance.

  The other bandit stepped to the hub of the front wheel, seized the messenger’s bag and stepped down again.

  “Don’t move, or look back, for five minutes,” he admonished them, “then pull yer freight.”

  The two then backed away up the road behind the stage, keeping it covered with their guns. The messenger lay in the road moaning.

  The fat lady unfolded her arms, opened the door and stepped out. “Get back there, you!” called one of the bandits.

  “Go to the divil!” retorted Mary Donovan, as she stooped beside the wounded messenger.

  The man opened his eyes and looked about, then he essayed to rise and with Mary Donovan’s help came to his feet. “Jest a scratch, me b’y,” she said in a motherly tone as she helped him to the stage. “Ye’ll be all right the mornin’. Git a move on ye inside there, ye ould woman with the artillery,” she yelled at the little old gentleman, “an’ give this b’y a hand in.”

  Together they helped the wounded man to a seat.

  The bandits were still in sight, but they had not molested her — doubtless because she was a woman and unarmed; but no more had she deposited the messenger upon the seat than she turned upon the old man and wrenched one of his guns from its holster.

  “Drive like the divil, Bill,” she cried to the driver, sticking her head out of the window, and as he whipped up his team she turned back toward the two bandits and opened fire on them. They returned the fire, and the fusillade continued until the stage disappeared in a cloud of dust around a curve below the gap, the old gentleman and the passenger on top now taking part in the shooting.

  3. SUSPICIONS

  As the stage swirled through the dusty street of Hendersville an hour later and drew up before The Donovan House the loiterers about the hotel and the saloons gathered about it for the news and the gossip from the outer world. Gum Smith, sheriff, was among them.

  “Stuck up again, Gum, at the gap,” the driver called to him. “They bored Mack.”

  Mary Donovan and the little old gentleman were assisting the messenger from the stage, though he protested that he was all right and required no assistance. As the woman’s eyes alighted upon the sheriff, she turned upon him, her arms akimbo.

  “Sure, yese a fine spicimin uv a sheriff, Gum Smith, that ye are not!” she yelled in a voice that could be heard the length of the single street. “Three holdups in the two months right under yer nose, and all ye do is ‘depatize’ an’ ‘depatize’ an’ ‘depatize.’ Why don’t ye git out an’ git ’em — ye ould woman,” she concluded scornfully, and then turned to the wounded man, her voice instantly as soft as a lullaby.

  “Get inside wid ye, ye poor b’y, an’ Mary Donovan’ll be after makin’ ye comfortable ‘til we get hould uv the ould saw- bones, if he’s sober, which he ain’t, or I’m no lady, which I am. Come on now, aisy like, there’s a good b’y,” and she put a motherly arm about the lad and helped him to the porch of the hotel, just as Diana Henders appeared from the interior, attracted by the sounds from without.

  “Oh, Mrs. Donovan!” she exclaimed. “What has happened? Why, it’s Mack! The Black Coyote again?” she guessed quickly.

  “Shure an’ it was none other. I seen him wid me own eyes
— the black silk handkerchief about the neck uv him an’ another over his ugly face. An’ his pardner — sure now I couldn’t be mishtaken wid the rollin’ walk uv him — if it wasn’t that dhirty greaser, Gregorio, me name’s not Mary Donovan, which it is.”

  Together the two women helped the messenger into a bedroom where Mary Donovan, despite the embarrassed protests of her patient, undressed him and put him to bed while Diana Henders went to the kitchen for hot water and cloths.

  Mack had an ugly flesh wound in his side, and this they had cleansed as best they could by the time the doctor arrived — a drink-broken old man who had drifted in from the East. His knowledge and skill were of the first rank and Hendersville boasted that it owned the best doctor in the Territory - when he was sober.

  In Gum’s Place — Liquors and Cigars — the male population was listening to the account of the holdup as expounded by the little old gentleman and the other passenger, the latter being a stranger in the community.

  It was he who had the floor at the moment.

  “I never laughed so much in my life,” he averred, “as when the old woman calls the old man here the ‘ould woman with the artillery.’”

  The little old gentleman was standing at the bar with a glass of whiskey in his hand. Apparently with a single movement, so swift was he, he dashed the glass and its contents in the face of the stranger, whipped out both guns and commenced shooting.

  A stream of lurid profanity accompanied his act, yet through the flood of incoherent obscenity the nub of an idea occasionally appeared, which was to the effect that “no blankety, blank tin-horn could git gay with Wildcat Bob.” Almost instantly, as if a magician had waved his wand, the room, that had been comfortably filled with men, became deserted, as far as human eye could discern, except for the little old gentleman with the tobacco-dewed whiskers.

  The front door had accommodated some, while heavy pieces of furniture and the bar accounted for the rest — all but the stranger with the ill-directed sense of humor. He had gone through the back window and taken the sash with him.