Son Of a Wanted Man (1984)

by L'amour, Louis

  Kim caught his breath when he saw the horse.

  It was a beauty. ““The man who owned that horse,” Chantry said, “I sent to prison. He’ll do twenty years if he lasts that long, and as he’s a sick man now neither of us believes he will.

  I asked him what to do with his gear. was “Keep my guns, rope, and saddle,” he told me. “I never sold my saddle and never will.” was “What about the gelding?”’ I asked.

  was “That’s the finest horse I ever rode, and I wouldn’t want him in the wrong hands,” he told me.” Chantry said, “I knew how he felt, and I told him I had a man who loved horses and would care for him as long as he lived. He asked me who, and I told him “Kim Baca.” “He laughed, Kim, laughed real hard.

  “Kim? Well, I’ll be damned! Sure, I’ll write a bill of sale for him. I’ll bet that’s the first bill of sale Kim ever had, and I’ll bet it was the first horse he was ever given!’ was “You mean he gave that horse to me?” “He surely did. Here’s the bill of sale.

  And Kim?” “Yes, sir?” “When you ride that horse, carry the bill of sale with you. Anytime the law sees you on a fine horse they are apt to ask questions.” Kim had caught up the gelding and saddled it.

  Across the pasture, bunched together like they were old friends, were five other horses, all of them fine stock.

  “That them?” he asked, knowing the answer.

  “That’s them, just waiting to be picked up when somebody is traveling fast and needs fresh horses to outdistance a posse.” He turned as Chantry followed him outside.

  They rode out of town together.

  “Take me a few days to get to Denver,” Kim suggested. “Take the steam cars. They’ll put your horse in a stock car, or if there isn’t one, I’ll get him in the baggage car.” .

  “Why didn’t I think of that? I can’t get used to thinking of trains and railroads and such.” He turned his horse away. “See you in about a week.” Borden Chantry sat his horse, watching Kim ride away. The sky was clear and blue, the air fresh and cool with morning. From the low hill on which he sat his horse he could see the distant Spanish Peaks far off to the westward. Some day he’d ride over that way again, a beautiful country.

  Closer, he saw a coyote trotting across the distance, stalking some antelope.

  The coyote was wasting his time unless there was an old one or a cripple amongst them. No fawns yet that he had seen, but several of the antelope looked about ready, which was probably why the coyotes were closing in, waiting until the does were down and helpless.

  No wolf or coyote could catch an antelope running, and several times he had seen antelope run right away from the fastest greyhounds and stag hounds.

  He looked around slowly, drinking in the vast distances. Bess wanted him to leave this. He loved her, but could he do it? And she did not realize what a position she was putting before him. She had always seen him in a position of strength, as a rancher and then as a town marshal and sheriff. Back east he would have none of the needed skills, nor had he the education required there.

  He started his horse and walked it slowly down the slope. Kim Baca vas, of course, right. He should be paying more attention to counterfeiting. For years now it had been one of the major crimes in the west, and a comparatively safe one. A bogus bill might be months or even years in reaching a bank where it could be identified, and a lot of queer money had been showing up. Both he and Baca believed the source was close by First, he must prepare for an attempted robbery.

  The Ben Curry boys had refrained from killing, but he knew that if capture appeared to be a possibility, they would fight. He was going to alert the town and select a couple of deputies for the emergency. If Hen Curry wanted his bank he would have to get it the hard way.

  This new man Baca mentioned? What about him?

  Who would he be? Whoever it was, they could expect a shooting fight, and with the kind of men Ben Curry recruited that meant somebody would get killed.

  Unless he could figure out a way, a plan.

  He didn’t want to kill anyone or see anyone be killed, but the choice might not be his.

  At the Red Wall it was quiet. A few cows grazed on the meadows below the house. Dru Ragan stood on the wide porch and looked broodingly down the canyon. There had been nothing friendly about that rider she had seen. Nor was he an Indian. An Indian might not have approached the house and out of curiosity might just have looked it over, but it had been a white man and had he been friendly he would have come on up to the ranch for a meal or at least for coffee.

  Most of her life had been spent in the east, but she was instinctively western in her thinking. From first sight she had loved all this wild, lonely, wonderful country with its marvelous red canyons, its blue distance, its green forests, and the golden leaves of the aspen when autumn came to the hills.

  She loved seeing the cattle out there, and riding through the sage on horseback, topping out on a high ridge with magnificent views in every direction.

  This had long been sacred land to the Indians, and the great peaks they revered had become important to her, also.

  Now there was this other thing, this lurking danger. Or was it danger? Riding around she scouted the country, knowing little about tracking but looking for the obvious. She came upon the tracks of the rider she had seen, and followed them. Several times, from several positions, he had looked at the ranch. That was obvious enough, for she could see where he had stopped and his horse had moved restlessly, leaving many tracks in the one position.

  She wanted to follow the tracks, as they seemed plain enough, but the hour was late. She glanced off to the north where the great canyon lay. Someday she wanted to see it. Someday she would stand on its rim. Voyle Ragan was waiting when she rode up. He was standing on the porch where she had looked over the country before beginning her ride. He was worried, she could see that. “See anything?” “Tracks,” she said. “Somebody has definitely been looking us over.” With its shielding canyon walls darkness came early to the V-Bar. The Red Walls lost their color to shadows, and the night lay like velvet upon the meadows and the range. Only the stars were bright, and the windows of the house and the bunkhouse.

  They would need to keep watch again. Voyle walked back into the house and took his rifle from the rack.

  He would keep it at hand. He should put on a belt gun but hesitated because of the women and as he rarely wore one around the house.

  He had never thought of the night as an enemy. Now he was no longer sure. Ben had a means of crossing the canyon. How, he could not imagine, but it worried him that others might discover that route: Ben’s success had been due to keeping it a secret and to the fact that no one suspected he had a reason for crossing.

  He blew out the lamp in the living room, returning to the kitchen where the girls and their mother were already seated for supper.

  The night was very still. He sat down, and there was little talk where usually there was much, only a pleasant rattle of dishes and-an occasional low-voiced request for something. Voyle kept his ears sharp for the slightest sound from outside.

  Why couldn’t all this have waited until the roundup and trail-drive hands were here?

  That was why it was happening now. Or was he just worrying too much? Maybe that cowhand who was looking them over was just shy. He had known them to be. Maybe there was nothing to worry about at all.

  A soft wind blew down the ranges, whispering in the pines, stirring the leaves of the aspen. Out on the open country beyond the canyon an antelope twitched its ears, listening.

  A sound whispered across the stillness, a far-off sound as of something moving. The antelope listened as the sound faded, and then it rested again. A cloud blotted out the moon, the wind stirred again, and a tumbleweed rolled a short distance and stopped as the wind eased.

  Overhead a bat swooped and dived and searched for insects in the night. At the V-Bar the women had gone to bed. Voyle Ragan blew out the last lamp and walked to the porch to listen. The night was still.
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  Walking back through the house he went down the back steps and crossed to the bunkhouse.

  Garfield was sitting outside.

  “Better get out in front of the house or on the porch,” he suggested. “You can hear better.” Garfield got up. Taking his rifle he walked around to the front steps: This was kind of silly. What was Voyle afraid of, anyway?

  He put the rifle down and lit his pipe He looked at the stars. Mighty pretty. A man out in this country looked at the stars a lot. The trouble was a man was so busy he forgot to take time to enjoy.

  Garfield did not know he was looking at the stars for the last time. He did not know that within a matter of hours he would be dead, sprawled on the ground, cold and dead.

  Mike Bastian awakened with a start. For a few minutes he lay still, trying to remember where he was and why he was there.

  He sat up. His guns were there, and his rifle.

  He was in a small stone house and he could hear the river. He was supposed to cross that river, although from the sound he could not imagine anyone crossing it. The old Indian was seated by the fireplace, smoking. He glanced over at Mike. “You had better eat something. The moon is rising.” He paused. “Not even he ever tried to cross at night.” “You speak very good English,” Mike commented, thinking his own was none too good.

  The Indian gestured with his pipe. “I was guide for a missionary when small. He was a kind, sincere man, trying to teach Indians something they already knew better than he, although the words were different.” “He taught you to speak well, anyway.” “He did. I spoke English with him every day for six years. He taught me something about healing, and I think my mother taught him something about it. She was very wise about herbs. “He asked me one time why I never went to church, and I told him that I went to the mountains. I told him my church was a mountainside somewhere to watch the day pass and the clouds. I told him, “I will go to your church if you will come to mine.” I think by the time he left us he liked mine better.” The old Indian turned to Mike. “When you are tired and the world is too much with you, go to the mountains and sit, or to some place alone. Even a church is better when it is empty. So it is that I think, but who am I? I am an old Navajo who talks too much because he wishes to speak his English.” When Mike had eaten they walked together to a trail that led them up even higher and then to a place where there was a ledge. “Ben Curry needed two years to build this bridge,” the Indian said, “and nobody has crossed it but him, and only a few times.” Mike stared into the roaring darkness with consternation.

  Cross there? Nothing could. No man could even stay afloat in such water, nor could any boat live except, with luck, riding the current downstream.

  The river was narrow here. At least, it was narrower than elsewhere. The water piled up at the entrance to the chasm and came roaring through with power. Of course, this was spring and snow in the mountains was melting. “There l You see? There is the bridge. It is a bridge of wire cable made fast to rings in the rock.” He stared across the black canyon where two thin threads were scarcely visible, two threads of steel that lost themselves in the blackness across the canyon, one thread some five feet above the other. On the bare cold rock he stood and stared and felt fear, real fear for the first time. “You mean … Ben Curry crossed that?” “Several times.” “Have you crossed it?” The old Navajo shrugged. “The other side is no different than here. If there is anything over there I want I shall ride around by Lee’s Ferry or the Crossing of the Fathers. I have too little time to hurry.” A faint mist arose from the tumbling waters below.

  Mike Bastian looked at the two wires and his mind said No! He wet his lips with his tongue, lips gone suddenly dry. Yet, Ben Curry had done it.

  How far was it across there? How long would it take?

  He was deep in the canyon, deep in this vast cleft cutting to the red heart of the earth. Around him were rocks once bare to the world’s winds, rocks that had been earth, pounded by rain, swept by hail, crushed down by eons of time’s changing. Looking up he could glimpse a few stars, looking out across the deep he could see nothing but looming blackness. Somewhere, somehow, the cables were made fast, and if they were strong enough to hold Ben Curry, who was forty pounds heavier, they would be strong enough for him.

  He put his rifle over his head and across one shoulder. Again he hesitated, but there was no other way. Kerb Perrin was riding to the V-Bar. He must be there before Perrin arrived. Taking hold of the upper cable he put a tentative foot on the lower and eased himself out. A moment passed, then he glanced back. The old Navajo was gone.

  A slow wind whispered along the canyon walls, stirring the night with ghostly murmurings, then was lost down the blackness of the canyon. Mike Bastian took a deep breath. He had never liked heights and was glad the depths below were lost in darkness except where white water showed around the rocks, catching the few last rays of light. He edged out. It was not too late. He could go back. He could return for his horse and ride back to Toadstool Canyon, but what of Drusilla and Juliana? What of their mother? And the cowboys … would they be warned? Would they have any idea until death swept down upon them?

  He edged out further, clinging to the upper strand, not lifting his feet above the cable but sliding them. One slip and he would be gone. How far to the water? Two hundred feet? More like five hundred, although be was already deep in the canyon. He remembered now, hearing some talk of this when he was a small boy and. it was being done. Roundy it had been, he told Ben of finding an iron ring in the wall, wondering why it was there. No doubt the idea had come from that.

  He tried to keep his mind away from the awful depth below, and the roaring waters of the spring floods.

  Many times he had seen the river when it was like this, although never from this point. He moved on. At places the wire was damp from mist thrown up from the raging waters. Once he slipped, his foot touching some mud left from the boot of a previous traveler. His foot shot from under him and he was saved only by his tight grip on the wire. Slowly, carefully, he pulled himself erect once more, feeling for the cable with his foot.

  Now he was at the lowest point above the river, and from now on he would be climbing a little, pushing his foot along the slanting cable. Carefully, he worked him-, self along. He could see the loom of the cliff on the opposite side.

  Was there a good place to get off? Would the rock be wet and slippery? He remembered climbing out of a cliff dwelling once when the ladder stopped below the top of the boulder against which it rested, a smooth, polished boulder, and he had to work himself to the edge, turn himself around, and clinging to that polished surface, feel for the steps of the ladder with a five hundred-foot drop behind him. He had not liked it then, and would not now.

  Little by little he edged along until he was under the loom of the cliff, and he was trembling when he stepped off the cable into the safety of a rocky cavern at the cable’s end. He was so relieved to be safely across that he did not immediately notice the Indian who sat awaiting him. The Navajo got up and without a word led him along a trail to a cabin built in a branch canyon. Tethered at the door of the cabin was a huge bay stallion. With a wave for the Indian, Mike stepped into the saddle and was off, the stallion taking the trail it obviously knew. Would Perrin travel by night? Bastian doubted it. After all, what was the reason for hurry? His victims awaited him, practically helpless, and with no warning of what impended. The trail led steadily upward. No doubt Curry himself had ridden this horse. It obviously knew where it was going, and he was eager to be there.

  As the trail widened the horse broke into a swinging lope that ate up the ground.

  The country was rugged, red rock, cedar, and occasional flats where the purple sage grew, only not purple tonight, merely dark patches here and there. As for the cedar, he could smell it, and the pinions, too. Dawn came slowly, breaking through long streaks of gray cloud. He drew up at a pool of snow water and drank, then let the stallion drink. He took a strip of jerky from his small pack and chewed
on it while he unslung his rifle and edged it into the boot.

  His approach must be with great care. He was not sure as to the exact position of the ranch, and Perrin might already be there. As he drew nearer he must ride slower to make the beat of his horse’s hoofs less loud. He knew the men he was facing, and they were skilled and dangerous fighting men.

  The shadows were almost gone, but the sun was not yet up. Mike slowed the stallion to a walk although the animal tugged at the bit, eager to go. Now he must listen, listen for any sound, a movement, a distant shot Drusilla Ragan brushed her hair thoughtfully, then pinned it up. She could hear her mother moving in the next room, and the Mexican girls who cared for the house were tidying up. .

  Juliana was outside talking to the young blond cowboy who had been hired to gentle some horses.

  Suddenly Drusilla heard Juliana’s footsteps. She came into the door, cheeks glowing.

  “Aren’t you ready? I’m famished!” “I’ll be along.” Then. as Juliana turned away, she asked, “What did you think of him, Julie? That cowboy or whatever he was who got the buckboard for us? Wasn’t he the best-looking thing you ever saw?” “Oh? You mean Mike Bastian? I was wondering why you were mooning around in here. Usually you’re the first one up. Yes, I expect he is good looking.

  And you know something? He reminded me of pa. Oh, not in looks, but some of his mannerisms.” Drusilla was no sooner seated at breakfast than she decided to ask Uncle Voyle about Mike Bastian again.

  Ragan knew the girls had met Mike Bastian in Weaver, and he knew about the gold train, so he tried to keep his expression bland.

  “Did you say his name was Bastian? I don’t place it. You said he was wearing buckskins? Sounds more like a hunter than a cowboy, but you can never tell.” “He’s probably a hunter from up in the Kaibab. It’s unlikely you will see him again. It’s pretty wild up there on the other side of the canyon.” “The driver of the buckboard said there were outlaws up there,” Juliana said.