Milo Talon

by Louis L'Amour

  Blackness. I’d been knocked out. Now it was night, hours later. Molly was at the ranch, he said, so he must have taken her to the ranch and come back here.

  He was just trying to help. He seemed a kindly old man, and he had been helpful and courteous.

  Yet why had he taken Molly all the way back to the ranch and then returned here? Had she been hurt? I felt a surge of fear.

  Molly? Hurt?

  I held myself very still. If not hurt, why had he come back alone? Why had he not kept Molly with him, to help in the search? Either she had been injured or he wanted nobody around when I was found.

  Why?

  Suppose it was he who shot me? He had known where I would be. He had known I had money. He had sold me two horses. But that was silly. They were such nice people. So clean and so neat.

  Something about that was familiar but I could not place it. There was a thought there, fleeting, tantalizing, something to be remembered, but there was no way I could put a rope on it.

  Something Ma had said once, commenting on how some visitor had referred to somebody as “clean and neat.” “See?” she had said. “People remember such things. Keep yourself looking nice, Milo. Dress well. Keep clean.”

  Ma was great on that. “What’s the difference between a rat and a squirrel?” she’d say. “Mighty little, but everybody likes squirrels and nobody likes rats. Why? Because a squirrel is dressed a lot better. He looks pretty, and he’s always around trees. A rat is always in the walls or the gutter.”

  It just seemed funny to me at the time, but the idea stuck, as she intended it to. But what had that to do with this?

  This visitor, and I’d been only a youngster then. Must be twelve, fifteen years back. He’d been talking about some folks. “Doing well,” this man had said, “got a nice place there. Clean and neat. Don’t see how they do it as he’s got no hands, doesn’t seem to be running many cows.”

  Lying still, I listened. He was still, too, listening, as I was.

  What else had been said back then? “Clean and neat,” the man had repeated, then he’d gone on to say, “Had a chestnut there, handsome horse. I tried to trade him out of it but he wouldn’t trade.

  “Handsome horse, one of the finest I’d seen. He’d traded for it, he said.”

  Pa had looked around at him, I remembered that, because Pa was different suddenly. “Chestnut with a blaze face? Three white stockings?”

  “That’s the one. I’d give plenty for that horse. Plenty. But he wouldn’t swap.”

  Pa was tapping his fingers on the chair arm, a way he had when he was thinking. “I know that horse,” he’d said. “I wonder how he ever got it? I offered Moon-Child a hundred dollars, and when she refused I doubled it, and she told me she would not sell. The horse had been captured from the wild by her man, just for her.”

  If there was more talk I did not hear it because Ma had come along, insisting I go to bed; but it had stuck in my mind, all this time. “Moon-Child”—I loved the name, and I expect I was romantic enough to think she wouldn’t sell the horse her man had given her, and how fine that was. An Indian could buy a whole lot with the two hundred dollars Pa had offered her.

  Maybe it was this same old man who’d had that horse. “Clean and neat,” well, they were all of that.

  “Talon? If you need help, I’ll help. Take you back to your girl.”

  He was impatient, I could tell it by his voice, but I lay quiet. It was so dark I’d no idea what kind of a fix I was in. This place where I’d fallen, it was down among the rocks somehow. Maybe it was a crack, maybe just a hole among some boulders. He either couldn’t get down here or didn’t want to try, especially as he did not know whether I was alive or not, or what kind of a mood I was in.

  After a long while I heard him moving around, muttering to himself, then his footsteps going away. But how far away?

  Putting out a hand, I felt of the grass, sand, rocks, then a drop-off. It might be inches, it might be fifty feet. I lay quiet, thinking.

  What was I? A damned fool? Why hadn’t I answered the old man? What had he ever done to me? He was taking care of Molly.

  Maybe I passed out. Maybe I fell asleep, but when I opened my eyes it was light. I could see around me. Maybe it was the light woke me up, and maybe it was that sixth sense a wandering man develops from living wild.

  When my eyes opened I heard something. Just the faintest whisper of something. Then I heard it again. Somebody wearing jeans or some rough cloth was crawling up on me. Crawling, working his way through the tumbled rocks, and me lying under an overhang not over two feet above my head. Lying where I could scarcely move and with one bad arm.

  Now if whoever was coming had been friendly he’d have come right along, paying no mind to what sound he made or didn’t make. But if somebody was wishful of killing me?

  He was coming from the direction my feet lay. What had happened was that I must have fallen down between these rocks and kind of rolled over, getting myself under this overhang; and here I was, flat on my back now, the bloody side of my head toward the opening, my left hand holding the bowie knife under my side, out of sight.

  Trying to move my right hand, I got a shot of pain so that I barely kept from crying out. No luck there. It was a tight squeeze, a bowie in my one hand, and if he stood off and shot into me I was a gone coon.

  Right then I began to sweat. The worst of it was, I couldn’t move. As far as my legs were concerned, I didn’t know what shape they were in. Maybe both of them were broke. I’d not been conscious long enough to know and they were hurting, like my arm was.

  Whoever was coming was coming to kill me. I closed my eyes to slits.

  He was no youngster, but he was wiry and tough. I’d known too many a sixty-year-old man who was tougher than most youngsters. I’d have to act quick, mighty quick.

  Sweat trickled down the side of my face. Why didn’t I try to move out of my crack? Because he would have a gun and he could use it. I had one, too, but my right arm was on the bum. I was in sore trouble. If I got out of this—

  I had to. They had Molly. And Molly would not know, until too late, what kind of a fix she was in.

  All was quiet. What had happened? Where was he? Was he some place where he could see me? Could study me lying there? Watch me to see if there was any flicker of life? Would he see me breathing?

  Through the narrow slits of my eyes, I caught a movement. He was there, not ten feet away, half in the sunlight, half in shadow. I could only see one hand of him. It held a knife.

  Better than a gun. With a knife I might have a chance. But there was no chance to move, to maneuver. The advantage was all his.

  He was closer now, edging in very quietly. He moved as easy as a snake. He was watching me. Intent. Every muscle poised.

  Of course, he did not know I suspected him. How could he guess?

  He was within four feet of my feet now. “Alive? Are you still alive, Talon? Or what was it she called you? Milo? We’ve needed somebody to do for us, Milo. Been a long time. By now Bess will have the irons on her. Bess is good at that. Irons on her ankles, handcuffs on her wrists, and she can still work around. Sometimes they get stubborn, but after you whip them a little, they change.”

  He was waiting, watching for some reaction. Suddenly his hand went up and he took a little dust from a tiny shelf of rock and, in the instant he threw it, I knew what he was doing. It struck my face, my closed eyes, but I did not wince.

  One moment of warning and I’d steeled myself against it. “Dead are you? Or close to it. Well, we’ll see.”

  Old he might be, but he moved like a cat. A quick step and the knife, and my arm hampered by being beneath me.

  I stabbed out with my leg, straightening it hard against his upper thigh. It caught him hard, knocked him back enough so the knife thrust missed.

  My own knife was out. He tried to step back and I cut hard with an upcoming blade and caught the underside of his arm. That old bowie was razor-sharp and it cut deep. He cried out
, staggered back, clawing for his gun with his good hand.

  He was going to make it. The gun was clearing leather, coming up—

  I threw the bowie. We were not seven feet apart and I threw it right into him.

  By that time I was out of the crack and on my feet and I threw the knife from low down and hard, off the palm of my hand. Now I’m a strong man and I’ve thrown a lot of knives and shoveled a lot of rock. That big knife went off my palm and caught him right below the belt and it went all the way to the hilt. Slick as a knife into butter.

  The blow of it stopped him. He gave a cry almost like a baby’s and dropped his gun. He took a half step back, staring down at himself like he couldn’t believe what had happened. Maybe it’s like that. Maybe when they kill so many they cannot believe it can happen to them.

  He clutched it, then took his hands away. His “Oh-h-h!” sounded more like a woman’s than a man’s, but he looked up at me and said, “No, you can’t! You simply can’t! It isn’t—!”

  Why I said it, I don’t know, but it had been in my mind. Maybe it had been lying there for years, after hearing Pa talk about it. Maybe he had said more that I’d forgotten.

  “What about Moon-Child?” I said. “What did you do to her?”

  He stared at me. “Moon-Ch—? She worked,” he said, “worked until we got tired of her. Bess, she was kind of scared of her, too. Always watching, she was. Waiting. She had the irons on, too.”

  He sank to his knees and I stepped forward, pushed him back, taking his gun and then withdrawing my bowie.

  Most men I can feel sorry for, but not him. How many had he killed? And them thinking he was a friend? And Molly. His wife still had Molly, if she was alive.

  CHAPTER 23

  WHEN I CLIMBED out of the rocks, I took a careful look around. My horse had run off and might be halfway back to the old man’s ranch by now, but what about his horse? He must have left it tied somewhere about.

  Molly was with that woman and had no idea what trouble she was in.

  The old man’s tracks were scarcely visible but I found one, guessed at his stride because of his height, cast about some, and found another. To track him would ask for too much time, so I looked around, mostly in the direction the tracks seemed to come from. There was a clump of brush and some small trees not fifty yards off, so I walked toward them, managing to carry his pistol in my hand despite some pain.

  Sure enough, his horse was tied to a bush on the back side of the clump. Once in the saddle I started backtracking him until I found the way the old man had come.

  MOLLY WAKENED IN the cool gray morning, opening her eyes on a bare ceiling. For a moment she lay still. Last night she had been so tired that, worried though she was about Milo, she had fallen asleep at once.

  She turned her head. The room had no windows and the walls were bare, no pictures, nothing. She started to rise and something clanked.

  Startled, she sat up. Something clanked again and something cold touched her skin. She looked, stared, and stifled a scream. She was handcuffed.

  An iron band around each wrist, a thick chain of about two feet connecting them. Her ankles were also in chains, leg irons with about three feet of chain between them.

  She was horror-stricken. What in the—?

  The door to the room opened and Bess stood there. “Oh? You’re awake? Well, it’s about time! Land sakes, girl, but you can sleep! I never did know anybody in all my born days to sleep like that!”

  “What’s happened? What have you done to me?” Molly held up the irons.

  “Oh, those! We use those on all the girls. Sometimes they might try to leave if we don’t. I don’t know what’s come over girls these days! So restless! Always wanting to be going!”

  “Let me go, please. I have to find out what happened to Milo. He may be hurt.”

  “Dickie is taking care of that.” She smiled very pleasantly. “If he isn’t hurt, Dickie will take care of it. He always does. He’s very thorough, you know. Very thorough.

  “We’re so glad you folks came by. I’ve gotten used to having a girl now and don’t relish having to do for myself.”

  “You’ve had other girls like this?”

  “Oh yes! Of course. Not many. Three, actually. That Indian girl was the first one, but I was afraid of her. She was right mean! Always watching. I do think she planned to kill us, and after giving her a nice home and everything! People are so ungrateful.”

  Molly was cool, quiet. She was in serious trouble and perhaps, although she did not wish to believe it, Milo was dead. If so, she would have to escape from this by herself.

  For the first time she realized how much she had come to depend on him, but she had learned from him, too. Think, he always said, you can think your way out of anything, and if you have to be violent, do it quick, do it hard, make it work the first time.

  “People are ungrateful,” Molly agreed. “Have you had some coffee? Or would you like me to make it?”

  “It’s been made, but I’ll let you get it for me.” The blue eyes smiled. Why were they no longer so beautiful? “But don’t try throwing it at me or I’ll have Dickie whip you. He has a whip, you know, and to tell you the truth, he rather enjoys it.”

  She smiled again. “Don’t attempt anything. The other girls tried everything.”

  “Other girls? You mentioned an Indian girl?”

  “Oh yes, there was another, too. Rather a chubby little thing when she came. I will say she didn’t stay that way very long! She was angry with her parents because they hadn’t wanted her to see a boy she liked. Said he was no good.

  “They were right, too. He’d said he would meet her and then got drunk and forgot all about her. She would not go back to her folks and she kept running. She got here one night, all tuckered out, so we put her up for the night.

  “He came after her, that young man did, wanted to buy her from us. I didn’t think much of him. He talked about buying her like she was a horse. Dickie didn’t like it, either, but they sat around and talked all evening and Dickie let him drink from the jug. Dickie doesn’t drink but he keeps a jug for those who do. I could see that young man getting drunk and I had to smile, knowing he had a fine horse and a good rifle.

  “Dickie waited until that young man was good and drunk and then he said he could have her tonight if he’d pay the money, and he paid it. Then Dickie took him out to the barn where he said she was.”

  “And—?”

  “Dickie had left his shotgun setting in the dark alongside the gate, and that young man stumbled through the gate, heading for the barn. We heard the boom inside here and that girl said, ‘What was that?’ and I said, ‘That was your young man. He’s not going to get any older.’ After that she surely toed the mark for the rest of the time we kept her. She surely did. Are you going to toe the mark, Molly?”

  “Of course.” Molly smiled brightly. “Why not? I’ve no place to go, anyway, and if those men come looking for me they won’t want me, they’ll just want my money.”

  Bess turned her head and looked at her. “Money?”

  “What do you suppose they’re after me for? It’s because they think I know where Nathan Albro’s gold is hidden.”

  Bess looked at her thoughtfully and then smiled. “I hope that’s not just some story you’ve made up. You could be whipped awful hard if it was.”

  “Might as well be you as them. Why do you think we were running? We told you part of it, even before Milo was killed.”

  She got the coffee, carefully filled two cups, and placed one on the table beside Bess. Then she crossed the room, chains clanking, and sat down.

  “If you can get rid of them when they come,” Molly said quietly, “we could talk business. Nathan Albro died and he left five million in gold that nobody has been able to find.”

  “How would you know where it is?”

  “My mother was his housekeeper. I was like a daughter to him.” She sipped her coffee. “Hide me. Don’t let them find me, and when they’ve gone,
I’ll tell you … for half.”

  Time, Molly told herself, time is what I need. If I can just stay alive—

  Time, and an opportunity. What had Milo said? If you have to be violent, do it quick, do it hard, and make it work the first time.

  But how? When?

  The old woman was not all that old and she was spry. She was quick when she wished to be, and she was very cool, very careful.

  As for her, what weapon did she have? She stirred, reaching for her cup on the table, and the chains clanked.

  Of course. She had her chains.

  The old woman got up suddenly. “Dickie’s coming!”

  Please, God! Not yet! There will be two of them!

  “No, it’s not Dickie. It’s some men.”

  “They’ll be looking for me,” Molly said.

  With surprising quickness Bess hustled her into the other room and drew the door shut. Only in time. There was a sharp rap on the door.

  Bess crossed the room and opened the door. “Yes?” she asked.

  Rolon Taylor removed his hat. “Ma’am, we’ve been lookin’ for some runaways. We tracked ’em this far.”

  “Of course. You mean the young man and the girl? Yes, they were here. They stayed the night. They rode out west, I believe, or was it northwest? I wasn’t watching but I believe it was northwest, toward Texas Creek.”

  Another rider came into the yard. “There’s tracks, boss, two horses, maybe three. They headed off to the north.”

  “There’s two trails,” Bess said, “the one by Texas Creek, but there’s another goes northeast up Copper Canyon toward Canon City.” She paused. “They didn’t get a very early start. They bought fresh horses from my husband, paid for them in gold.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” Rolon slapped the dust from his hat. “Let’s go, boys, they can’t be far ahead.”

  When the sound of their horses died away Bess walked back and opened the door. “A rough lot of men,” she said disapprovingly, “certainly not the kind who should be looking for a young girl.”

  “There will be more,” Molly said. “You haven’t met the worst of them. There may be a girl, too. A very pretty girl.”