Sundown Slim

by Knibbs, Henry Herbert

  "Do you know who took the money—that night?" she asked suddenly, and Sundown straightened and gazed at her.

  He blinked and coughed. "Bein' no hand to lie to a lady, I do," he said, simply. "But I can't tell, even if you did save me life from that there steer."

  She bit her lips, and nodded. "I didn't really mean to ask. I was curious to know. Won't you take my horse? You can send him back to-morrow."

  "And you beat it home afoot? Say, lady, I mebby been a Bo onct, but I ain't hurt that bad. If I can't find me trail back to where I started from, it won't be because it ain't there. Thanks, jest the same."

  Sundown essayed a step, halted and groaned. He felt of himself gingerly. He did not seem to be injured in any special place, as he ached equally all over. "I'll be goin', lady. I say thanks for savin' me life."

  The girl smiled and nodded. "Will you please tell Mr. Corliss that I should like to see him, to-morrow, at Fernando's camp? I think he'll understand."

  "Sure, miss! I'll tell him. That Fernando man looks to be havin' some trouble with them sheep."

  The girl glanced toward the mesa. Fernando and his assistant were herding the sheep closer, and despite their activity were really getting the frightened animals bunched well. When she turned again Sundown had disappeared.

  Sundown's arrival in camp, on foot, was not altogether unexpected. One of the men had seen a riderless horse grazing on the mesa, and had ridden out and caught it. Circumstantial evidence—rider and rope missing—confirmed Hi Wingle's remark that "that there walkin' clothes-pin has probably roped somethin' at last." And the "walking clothes-pin's" condition when he appeared seemed to substantiate the cook's theory.

  "Lose your rope?" queried Wingle as Sundown limped up.

  "Uhuh. And that ain't all. You ain't got a pair of pants that ain't working have you?"

  Wingle smiled. "Pants? Think this here's a Jew clothin'-store?"

  "Nope. But if she was a horsepital now—"

  "Been visitin'?"

  "Uhuh. I jest run over to see some friends of mine in a sheep-camp."

  "Did, eh? And mebby you can tell me what you run over?"

  "'Most everything out there," said Sundown, pointing to the mesa. "Say, you ain't got any of that plaster like they put on a guy's head when he gets hit with a brick?"

  "Nope. But I got salt."

  "And pepper," concluded Sundown with some sarcasm. "Mebby I do look like a barbecue."

  "Straight, Sun, salt and water is mighty healin'. You better ride over to the Concho and get fixed up."

  "Reckon that ain't no dream, Hi. Got to see the boss, anyhow."

  "Well, 'anyhow' is correc'. And, say, you want to see him first and tell him it's you. Your hoss is tied over there. Sinker fetched him in."

  "Hoss? Oh, yes, hoss! My hoss! Uhuh!"

  With this somewhat ambiguous string of ejaculations Sundown limped toward the pony. He turned when halfway there and called to Wingle. "The cattle business is fine, Hi, fine, but between you and me I reckon I'll invest in sheep. A fella is like to live longer."

  Wingle stared gravely at the tall and tattered figure. He stared gravely, but inwardly he shook with laughter. "Say, Sun!" he managed to exclaim finally, "that there Nell Loring is a right fine gal, ain't she?"

  "You bet!"

  "And Jack ain't the worst…" Wingle spat and chewed ruminatively. "No, he ain't the worst," he asserted again.

  "I dunno what that's got to do with gettin' drug sixteen mile," said Sundown. "But, anyhow, you're right."

  CHAPTER XIV

  ON THE TRAIL TO THE BLUE

  In the shade of the forest that edged the mesa, and just back of Fernando's camp, a Ranger trail cuts through a patch of quaking-asp and meanders through the heavy-timbered land toward the Blue range, a spruce-clad ridge of southern hills. Close to the trail two saddle horses were tied.

  Fadeaway, riding toward his home ranch on the "Blue," reined up, eyed the horses, and grinned. One of them was Chinook, the other Eleanor Loring's black-and-white pinto, Challenge. The cowboy bent in his saddle and peered through the aspens toward the sheep-camp. He saw Corliss and Nell Loring standing close together, evidently discussing something of more than usual import, for at that moment John Corliss had raised his broad Stetson as though bidding farewell to the girl, but she had caught his arm as he turned and was clinging to him. Her attitude was that of one supplicating, coaxing, imploring. Fadeaway, with a vicious twist to his mouth, spat. "The cattle business and the sheep business looks like they was goin' into partnership," he muttered. "Leave it to a woman to fool a man every time. And him pertendin' to be all for the long-horns!" He saw the girl turn from Corliss, bury her face in her arms, and lean against the tree beneath which they were standing. Fadeaway grinned. "Women are all crooked, when they want to be," he remarked,—"or any I ever knowed. If they can't work a guy by talkin' and lovin', then they take to cryin'."

  Just then Corliss stepped to the girl and put his hand on her shoulder. Again she turned to him. He took her hands and held them while he talked. Fadeaway could see her lips move, evidently in reply. He could not hear what was being said, as his horse was restless, fretting and stamping. The saddle creaked. Fadeaway jerked the horse up, and in the momentary silence he caught the word "love."

  "Makes me sick!" he said, spurring forward. "'Love,' eh? Well, mebby my little idea of puttin' Billy Corliss in wrong didn't work, but I'll hand Jack a jolt that'll make him think of somethin' else besides love, one of these fine mornin's!" And the cowboy rode on, out of tune with the peace and beauty of his surroundings, his whole being centered upon making trouble for a man who he knew in his heart wished him no ill, and in fact had all but forgotten him so far as considering him either as an enemy or a friend.

  Just as he was about to swing out to the open of the mesa near the edge of the cañon, he came upon a Mexican boy asleep beneath the low branches of a spruce. Fadeaway glanced across the mesa and, as he had expected, saw a band of sheep grazing in the sunshine. His trail ran directly toward the sheep. Beyond lay the cañon. He would not ride around a herd of sheep that blocked his trail, not if he knew it! As he drew nearer the sheep they bunched, forcing those ahead to move on. Fadeaway glanced back at the sleeping boy, then set spur to his horse and waved his sombrero. The sheep broke into a trot. He rode back and forth behind them forcing them toward the cañon. He beat upon his rolled slicker with his quirt. The sound frenzied the sheep and they leaped forward. Lambs, trailing behind, called dolefully to the plunging ewes that trampled each other in their terror. Again the cowboy glanced back. No one was in sight. He wondered, for an instant, what had become of Fernando, for he knew it was Fernando's herd. He shortened rein and spurred his pony, making him rear. The sheep plunged ahead, those in front swerving as they came to the cañon's brink. The crowding mass behind forced them on. Fadeaway reined up. A great gray wave rolled over the cliff and disappeared into the soundless chasm. A thousand feet below lay the mangled carcasses of some five hundred sheep and lambs. A scattered few of the band had turned and were trotting aimlessly along the edge of the mesa. They separated as the rider swept up. One terror-stricken lamb, bleating piteously, hesitated on the very edge of the chasm. Fadeaway swung his hat and laughed as the little creature reared and leaped out into space. There had been but little noise—an occasional frightened bleat, a drumming of hoofs on the mesa, and they were swept from sight.

  Fadeaway reined around and took a direct line for the nearest timber. Halfway across the open he saw the Mexican boy running toward him. He leaned forward in the saddle and hung his spurs in his pony's sides. A quick beat of hoofs and he was within the shadow of the forest. The next thing was to avoid pursuit. He changed his course and rode toward the heart of the forest. He would take an old and untraveled bridle-trail to the Blue. He was riding in a rocky hollow when he thought he heard the creak of saddle-leather. He glanced back. No one was following him. Farther on he stopped. He was certain that he had again heard the sound. As he top
ped the rise he saw Corliss riding toward him. The rancher had evidently swung from the Concho trail and was making his way directly toward the unused trail which Fadeaway rode. The cowboy became doubly alert. He shifted a little in the saddle, sitting straight, his right hand resting easily on his hip. Corliss drew rein and they faced each other. There was something about the rancher's grim, silent attitude that warned Fadeaway.

  Yet he grinned and waved a greeting. "How!" he said, as though he were meeting an old friend.

  Corliss nodded briefly. He sat gazing at Fadeaway with an unreadable expression.

  "Got the lock-jaw?" queried Fadeaway, his pretended heartiness vanishing.

  Corliss allowed himself to smile, a very little. "You better ride back with me," he said, quietly.

  Fadeaway laughed. "I'm takin' orders from the Blue, these days," he said. "Mebby you forgot."

  "No, I haven't."

  "And I'm headed for the Blue," continued the cowboy. "Goin' my way?"

  "You're on the wrong trail," asserted Corliss. "You've been riding the wrong trail ever since you left the Concho."

  "Uhuh. Well, I been keepin' clear of the sheep camps, at that."

  "Don't know about that," said Corliss, easily.

  Fadeaway was too shrewd to have recourse to his gun. He knew that Corliss was the quicker man, and he realized that, even should he get the better of a six-gun argument, the ultimate result would be outlawry and perhaps death. He wanted to get away from that steady, heart-searching gaze that held him.

  "Sheep business is lookin' up," he said, with an attempt at jocularity.

  "We'll ride back and have a talk with Loring," said Corliss. "Some one put a band of his sheep into the cañon, not two hours ago. Maybe you know something about it."

  "Me? What you dreaming anyhow?"

  "I'm not. It looks like your work."

  "So you're tryin' to hang somethin' onto me, eh? Well, you want to call around early—you're late."

  "No, I'm the first one on the job. Did you stampede Loring's sheep?"

  "Did I stampede the love-makin'?" sneered Fadeaway.

  Corliss shortened rein and drew close to the cowboy.

  "Just explain that," he said.

  "Oh, I don' know. You the boss of creation?"

  Corliss's lips hardened. He let his quirt slip butt-first through his hand and grasped the lash. Fadeaway's hand slipped to his holster. Before he could pull his gun, Corliss swung the quirt. The blow caught Fadeaway just below the brim of his hat. He wavered and grabbed at the saddle-horn. As Corliss again swung his quirt, the cowboy jerked out his gun and brought it down on the rancher's head. Corliss dropped from the saddle. Fadeaway rode around and covered him. Corliss's hat lay a few feet from where he had fallen. Beneath his head a dark ooze spread a hand's-breadth on the trail. The cowboy dismounted and bent over him. "He's sportin' a dam' good hat," he said, "or that would 'a' fixed him. Guess he'll be good for a spell." Then he reached for his stirrup, mounted, and loped up the trail.

  Old Fernando, having excused himself on some pretext when Corliss rode into the camp that morning, returned to find Corliss gone and Nell Loring strangely grave and white. She nodded as he spoke to her and pointed toward the mesa. "Carlos—is out—looking for the sheep," she said, her lips trembling. "He says some one stampeded them—run them into the cañon."

  Fernando called upon his saints and cursed himself for his negligence in leaving his son with the sheep. Nell Loring spoke to him quietly, assuring him that she understood why he had absented himself. "It's my fault, Fernando, not yours. The patron will want to know why you were away. You will tell him that John Corliss came to your camp; that you thought I wanted to talk with him alone. Then he will know that it was my fault. I'll tell him when I get back to the rancho."

  Fernando straightened his wizened frame. "Si! As the Señorita says, I shall do. But first I go to look. Perhaps the patron shall not know that the vaquero Corlees was here this morning. It is that I ask the Señorita to say nothing to the patron until I look. Is it that you will do this?"

  "What can you do?" she asked.

  "It is yet to know. Adios, Señorita. You will remember the old Fernando, perhaps?"

  "But you're coming back! Oh! it was terrible!" she cried. "I rode to the cañon and looked down."

  Fernando meanwhile had been thinking rapidly. With quaint dignity he excused himself as he departed to catch up one of the burros, which he saddled and rode out to where his son was standing near the cañon. The boy shrank from him as he accosted him. Fernando's deep-set eyes blazed forth the anger that his lips imprisoned. He sent the boy back to the camp. Then he picked up the tracks of a horseman on the mesa, followed them to the cañon's brink, glanced down, shrugged his shoulders, and again took up the horseman's trail toward the forest. With the true instinct of the outlander, he reasoned that the horseman had headed for the old trail to the Blue, as the tracks led diagonally toward the south. Finally he realized that he could never overtake the rider by following the tracks, so he dismounted and tied his burro. He struck toward the cañon. A mile above him there was a ford. He would wait there and see who came. He made his perilous way down a notch in the cliff, dropped slowly to the level of the stream, and followed it to the ford. He searched for tracks in the sun-baked mud. With a sigh of satisfaction, perhaps of anticipation, he stepped to a clump of cottonwoods down the stream and backed within them. Scarcely had he crossed himself and drawn his gun from its weather-blackened holster, when he heard the click of shod hoofs on the trail. He stiffened and his eyes gleamed as though he anticipated some pleasant prospect. The creases at the corners of his eyes deepened as he recognized in the rider the vaquero who had set the Concho dog upon his sheep some months before. He had a score to settle with that vaquero for having shot at him. He had another and larger score to settle with him for—no, he would not think of his beloved sheep mangled and dead at the bottom of the cañon. That would anger him and make his hand unsteady.

  Fadeaway rode his horse into the ford and sat looking downstream as the horse drank. Just as he drew rein, the old herder imitated with perfect intonation the quavering bleat of a lamb calling to its mother. Fadeaway jerked straight in the saddle. A ball of smoke puffed from the cottonwoods. The cowboy doubled up and slid headforemost into the stream. The horse, startled by the lunge of its rider, leaped to the bank and raced up the trail. A diminishing echo ran along the cañon walls and rolled away to distant, faint muttering. Old Fernando had paid his debt of vengeance.

  Leisurely he broke a twig from the cottonwoods, tore a strip from his bandanna, and cleaned his gun. Then he retraced his steps to the burro, mounted, and rode directly to his camp. After he had eaten he told his son to pack their few belongings. Then he again mounted the burro and rode toward the hacienda to face the fury of the patron.

  He had for a moment left the flock in charge of his son. He had returned to find all but a few of the sheep gone. He had tracked them to the cañon brink. Ah! could the patron have seen them, lying mangled upon the rocks! It had been a long hard climb to the bottom of the cañon, else he should have reported sooner. Some one had driven the sheep into the chasm. As to the man who did it, he knew nothing. There were tracks of a horse—that was all. He had come to report and receive his dismissal. Never again should he see the Señora Loring. He had been the patron's faithful servant for many years. He was disgraced, and would be dismissed for negligence.

  So he soliloquized as he rode, yet he was not altogether unhappy. He had avenged insult and the killing of his beloved sheep with one little crook of his finger; a thing that his patron, brave as he was, would not dare do. He would return to New Mexico. It was well!

  CHAPTER XV

  THEY KILLED THE BOSS!

  Sundown, much to his dismay, was lost. With a sack of salt tied across his saddle, he had ridden out that morning to fill one of the salt-logs near a spring where the cattle came to drink. He had found the log, filled it, and had turned to retrace his journey when a
flock of wild turkeys strung out across his course. His horse, from which the riders of the Concho had aforetime shot turkeys, broke into a kind of reminiscent lope, which quickened as the turkeys wheeled and ran swiftly through the timberland. Sundown clung to the saddle-horn as the pony took fallen logs at top speed. The turkeys made for a rim of a narrow cañon and from it sailed off into space, leaving Chance a disconsolate spectator and Sundown sitting his horse and thanking the Arizona stars that his steed was not equipped with wings. It was then that he realized that the Concho ranch might be in any one of the four directions he chose to take. He wheeled the horse, slackened rein, and allowed that sagacious but apparently disinterested animal to pick its leisurely way through the forest. Chance trotted sullenly behind. He could have told his master something about hunting turkeys had he been able to speak, and, judging from the dog's dejected stride and expression, speech would have been a relief to his feelings.

  The horse, nipping at scant shoots of bunch-grass and the blue-flowered patches of wild peas, gravitated toward the old trail to the Blue and, once upon it, turned toward home. Chance, refreshing his memory of the old trail, ran ahead, pausing at this fallen log and that fungus-spotted stump to investigate squirrel-holes with much sniffing and circling of the immediate territory. Sundown imagined that Chance was leading the way toward home, though in reality the dog was merely killing time, so to speak, while the pony plodded deliberately down the homeward trail.

  Dawdling along in the barred sunshine, at peace with himself and the pleasant solitudes, Sundown relaxed and fell to dreaming of Andalusian castles builded in far forests of the south, and of some Spanish Penelope—possibly not unlike the Señorita Loring—who waited his coming with patient tears and rare fidelity. "Them there true-be-doors," he muttered, "like Billy used to say, sure had the glad job—singin' and wrastlin' out po'try galore! A singin'-man sure gets the ladies. Now if I was to take on a little weight—mebby…" His weird soliloquy was broken by a sharp and excited bark. Chance was standing in the trail, and beyond him there was something…