Novel 1973 - The Man From Skibbereen (v5.0)

by Louis L'Amour

  Cris let his eyes run along the train. Two passenger, cars, the stockcar for the horses, two freight cars, the mail car. Where? Where?

  He walked down and watched Rep tying the mare in her stall. The car was not a regular stockcar but was fitted with stalls for several horses, and usually used to carry animals belonging to railroad engineers or Army officers. The stalls had been knocked together quite hurriedly.

  He looked toward the engine. Nobody in sight. He felt hollow inside and his lips were dry. He could feel deadly danger all about him. His nape crawled with it.

  He put his hand in the front of his coat and took hold of his gun, then walked slowly along the cars. The freight car nearest the engine was not sealed. He walked on past it, then stepped over to the sergeant.

  “They’re in there, I’d stake me life on it! And there’s somebody on the tender or hidden in the cab who has a gun on the engineer. Look at him, man! Not even down here to stretch his legs!”

  “Not much of a place to hide in that cab,” the sergeant was doubtful. “I’ll speak to the lieutenant.”

  He strolled away without haste toward the rear of the train, and Cris watched the freight-car door. They must have some place from which to watch: a crack in the door? At the door’s edge?

  Suddenly, the whistle blew. The train stirred, started to move. Cris glanced down along the train. McClean and Barda had disappeared into their car.

  The sergeant was talking excitedly now to the lieutenant, and the train started to move. Cris knew instantly that the order had been given to pull out, and fast. He turned sharply and grabbed a ladder on the end of the car nearest him, pulling himself up.

  Rep, who had descended from the stockcar, jumped for another one and made it.

  The lieutenant suddenly started forward, but the train was already moving and he had twenty steps to get to the last car. By the time he reached it the train would be rolling too fast, for it was pulling out at a rapid clip. He might order the troop to pursue it, but would probably balk at assuming that much authority on the mere suspicions of an Irish gandy dancer—he’d more likely shrug it off as an idiosyncrasy of the engineer, pulling out fast to make up time. But a squad was supposed to accompany the McCleans! Surely he’d order them, at least, to chase after the train?

  Cris climbed to the end of the car next to the suspected one, and sat down near the brake wheel. How could the enemy get out while the train was moving? Or were there horses waiting somewhere ahead, where they planned to stop? Some place where they could ride at once into the Medicine Bow Mountains?

  There were doors on either side, but getting out would not be easy while the train moved, unless there was a steep grade like that on which they had originally planned to attack the train, near the little red station where he’d first found himself involved in this devil’s dance.

  He knew nothing about the grade ahead of them, but Parley would have had it scouted.

  There was something else. In the far end of the car there was a small door, large enough for a man to crawl through. Emerging there, they could come down the walk atop the cars to where McClean and Barda were.

  He stood up. Walking atop cars was no problem for one so accustomed to the unsteadiness of a ship’s deck. He rolled along the catwalk toward the rear of the train and passed over the second freight car. He glanced back once … no pursuit so far.

  To pull the pin and disconnect the cars would be no advantage, as the freight car in which he believed the outlaws to be was connected to the engine, which would simply back up and make the connection again.

  He went down the ladder and entered the car where McClean was. Rep was standing near the colonel. Barda was seated beside him, her face strained, her eyes very large. Only two soldiers had made the train, two of the squad who were supposed to be riding as a guard.

  “She pulled out too fast,” Rep said tensely. “They were all comin’ up to board, but that there engineer, he really taken off. Suthin’s wrong.”

  “Sir,” Cris said to McClean, “I believe the enemy are in the car next to the engine. They either plan to come out of the small door in the end of the car nearest the tender, and then back along the catwalk, or else they have horses waiting for them somewhere ahead.”

  “The engineer?”

  “They have him, sir. I know it. He never came down at all… . I mean, they must have a man or two riding the front end of the tender, and they’ve got the drop on the engineer. He does what they say or he gets a bullet in the back.”

  “I see.” McClean glanced around. “That’s an intelligent theory. Well, there are at least five of us here who are armed.” He stood up and faced the other passengers. There were three men and two women. He raised his voice. “Are any of you men armed?”

  A long, lean old man with steel-cold eyes looked up. “Cunnel, I never seen the time sinct I was knee-high to a toad-frog when I didn’t carry a shootin’ iron.”

  McClean explained briefly, and the old man spat into a brass spittoon. “I’m headed for Californy, an’ I done paid m’ fare. I figure to go right through on this hyar train to Hell-on-Wheels and then on the stage, an’ nobody ain’t goin’ to mess up m’ ride. Sinct I was a boy I been aimin’ to ride these steam-cyars. If them fellers are fixin’ to worry us, or to cause trouble for the purty young lady, you count on me. I figure to fetch one or two of ’em.”

  Rep looked at Cris and grinned. There was an ally worth having.

  McClean turned to the others. One, a fat-checked drummer with a pearl-gray derby, pulled a six-shooter from under his coat and waved it. “Yessir. I’ll be standin’ by.”

  A buxom blonde with a tightly cinched waist took a .44 Remington from her valise. She laid it in her lap and smiled up at them. “The soldier boys always stood by me when there was trouble, so you can deal the cards, Colonel. I’ll play them like you say.”

  “My compliments, ma’am,” said McClean, bowing.

  The third man stood up. He was the man in the English-cut suit and his face was flushed. “You think there will be shooting?”

  “I hope not,” McClean replied, “but it does look possible.”

  “I have a shotgun,” the dude suggested. “I brought it out hoping to try it on prairie chickens or quail, but if you think—”

  “When the time comes,” McClean suggested, “just point it at them and squeeze off your shots. You’ll get some birds, all right, some very tough birds!”

  The second woman was Hazel Kerry. Without speaking, she showed them a pearl-handled derringer.

  “Mayo, my lad,” said Colonel McClean almost gaily, “it’s a regular army we have here! Ten guns! Parley can’t have figured on that!”

  Cris laid his rifle on a seat and checked his pistol again. The train rumbled over a trestle, then curved through a cut in the hills and emerged into open country. Up ahead the whistle blew … now what was that for?

  He peered from the window, squinting his eyes against the cinders and the blown smoke. The smell of coal smoke was thick in his nostrils. He could see nothing moving up ahead; the country was rugged with much brown grass, many thrust-up rocks. The train whistled again, a long, drawn-out whistle that sounded lonesomely across the hills. The train rumbled over another trestle, and he shifted his feet restlessly.

  “I am going up there,” he said to McClean. “I think that was a signal. Maybe I can keep them bottled up.”

  He started for the end of the car and Rep and the old man followed him.

  “If they got the ingin,” the old man said happily, “mebbe we can dust ’em out o’ there.”

  Cris led the way, stepping from the front of the car to the coupling, then, catching hold of the ladder on the next car, he climbed up. He walked along the swaying catwalk, stepped over space to the next car, and suddenly a man raised up on the tender holding a Winchester. The fellow took his stance and lifted the rifle to his shoulder.

  From behind him Cris heard the ugly crash of a gun, and the man with the rifle took a slow step backwa
rd atop the coal, sat down, and then did a somersault and vanished.

  The train whistled again, and began to slow down. Cris moved forward again along the swaying top of the car.

  Out of the hills to the left came a small group of riders and eight or nine led horses.

  Cris jumped to the tender. He saw the body of the man who had been shot and a second man raising up, turning toward him. Unwilling to risk shooting the engineer, Cris shoved his gun into his holster and leaped.

  The man tried to step back and Cris’ shoulder hit him in the chest. The man went backwards down the steps and Cris, unable to check himself, plunged after him, hit the ground atop him, and rolled over with him while the train went racing on.

  As it swept by, Cris heard the passengers shooting from the coach, a barking, roaring volley; and when he staggered to his feet, momentarily groggy from the fall, he saw the horses rearing and plunging and a couple of the riders in full flight toward the mountains.

  He turned sharply to stare at the man who had fallen ahead of him. The fellow lay on the ground, all sprawled out, his head cocked at an impossible angle. Cris stripped the body of its six-gun and slung the belt about his own waist. Then the body rolled over and groaned, feeling for its neck. Cris could have sworn that neck had been broken.

  The train was disappearing in the distance.

  He was alone, and somewhere across the tracks were the outlaws and their horses. The first thing was to get out of sight.

  The train might come back for him. Yet no sooner had the thought occurred than he dismissed it. Not with a carload of renegades waiting to strike, and all of them aware that their plan had again gone wrong.

  He glanced quickly around, then ran for the nearest rocks. It was a nest of boulders, but offered little in the way of shelter. Using it to conceal his movements from the sight of the outlaw he had left behind on the ground, he ran on toward a similar group of stones.

  Here were a few low trees and surprisingly enough, a ravine. He went down into it and hiked along, heading for higher ground. Cris had no idea of leaving the railroad where lay his one chance for help, but merely wished to be away when the enemy returned … if they did.

  He found a crack in the rocks and climbed inside it to the top, where he lay down in the brown grass and peered out over the country below.

  The outlaw was on his feet, looking around. How conscious had he been? Would he remember that somebody else had fallen with him? Or assume that he was alone?

  The man felt at his waist … his gun and belt were gone.

  That would give him away, Cris thought. But he had needed the cartridges.

  The outlaw started across the tracks, found the prints of the horses, and stood there, hands on hips, probably swearing. Cris Mayo was too far off to hear any words, but he knew the attitude. Soon the man started off, following the tracks of the horses. From time to time he paused and looked around carefully.

  Cris Mayo settled his square-cut derby on his head and watched the outlaw. The fellow would try to track down his friends, but he’d better hurry or they would be gone. After the failure of this final attempt there would certainly be no more, and it was likely that within a short time the whole lot would be prisoners.

  Yet his own situation was desperate. He was alone, without a horse, and in wild country. He was a long way from Fort Sanders, and perhaps even farther from the next station to the west.

  From his vantage point he began to examine the country along the tracks. He was well up on the side of a hill, and in such a position that his view extended for miles.

  Removing his coat with its heavy sack of coins, he slung it over his shoulder and plodded down the hillside to the tracks.

  There was nothing for it but to follow them.

  The sun was hot. He walked steadily, avoiding the unevenly spaced ties. He removed his collar and thrust it into his coat pocket, and, folding his tie, did the same with it. His eyes swept the country. They were much better eyes now than they had ever been, more accustomed to looking at the wide western lands and selecting what was important. He mopped his brow and marched forward.

  He was carrying two pistols, the one “inherited” from the dead telegrapher and the one taken from the unconscious outlaw. He had ammunition enough but it was heavy, as the guns were heavy. From time to time he paused, swiped at the sweat on his face, looked all around, then started on.

  He was thirsty, but there was no water. The earth was a powdery dust studded with sagebrush wherever his eyes went.

  The sun was past the nooning by more than two hours when he saw the cabin. It was built of native stone and it stood back from the right-of-way beside what seemed to be an old road. When he got closer he could see the remains of a pole corral.

  He put his ear down on a steel rail to listen for a train, but heard nothing. Seated on the railroad embankment, he gazed toward the stone cabin. It looked innocent enough, and there was a touch of green behind it … perhaps there was a spring.

  He rested, watching the cabin. He checked the pistol taken from the outlaw … it was loaded with five cartridges.

  He returned it to the holster, which was on his left hip with the butt facing forward. When he carried his coat over his left arm this gun was concealed, while his right-hand gun was fully in sight.

  The stone cabin was probably empty, and there was a chance of water. It was unlikely that anybody would have built here without it, and the green seemed an indication. He got to his feet, the coat over his left forearm, the second gun hidden behind it.

  Cris plodded on. His feet were sore and he was tired. Some of yesterday’s pains had awakened to plague him. He looked along the tracks, and saw nothing. In the distance he glimpsed a small herd of antelope. He kept his face turned down the track but from the corners of his eyes he watched the cabin for movement.

  This was Indian country, but there were outlaws around too, and they might be anywhere.

  Opposite the cabin he halted, then turned down a dim path that led from the right-of-way to the door. Still he saw no movement there.

  The door sagged on leather hinges, one window gaped emptily at him. He walked around the cabin and followed a path evidently used by men as well as animals to a few willows and a small cottonwood. The latter grew in a slight hollow and was invisible from the track. At its base was a ring of rocks forming a tank, and the tank was filled with clear water, which trickled from a pipe above it.

  He bent his head and drank, waited, then drank again. The water was cold, a little brackish but good. He straightened up and glancing down saw some crushed shells under his feet. Idly, he stooped to pick one up and as his fingers touched it he saw a fresh boot track, in which a blade of grass was just springing erect.

  Slowly, his heart pounding, he straightened up. Whoever had made that track was close by, within yards of him, no doubt.

  A sharply cut boot track … no moccasin.

  He appeared to be studying the shell, while his mind raced. The path he followed had gone on from the tank, dimmer, but still there. Willows stood on the far side of the tank, and there was something behind them … a dugout or a cave, he believed, where horses had been kept.

  “Well, now!” He knew the voice. “What could be purtier than this? You come walkin’ right up to me, just like you’d been sent for!”

  He started to turn, and the voice hardened. “Hold it!” It was Murray. Murray, who had been after Barda, and who had been given a beating by Cris. Murray, who wanted and intended to kill him.

  “Now you take hold of the butt of that six-shooter, just thumb and finger now! You lift it clear and drop it. Then you can turn around. I want you to see me and this here gun. I want the last sight you have to be me, standing here shootin’ you down!”

  “Can’t we talk about this?” Gently, careful to make no mistake, he lifted the gun and dropped it. It thudded on the earth.

  “Now you step back one good step … that’s it. Now you can turn around.”

  Murray would
have a gun held steady on him, Cris was sure. Murray was set to kill him, and Murray wanted him to see it coming. And Murray would not talk long before he shot … he was too full of hate.

  Crispin Mayo knew that the movement might be his last, but he turned his left shoulder and side toward Murray and as he did so his right hand came up under cover of the movement and the coat. The six-gun slid easily into his hand, rested on his forearm.

  The time for talking, for thinking, for mercy, was past. The gun cleared his arm, and his finger closed easy on the trigger, the barrel pointed straight at Murray.

  The first thing Murray could have seen was the blossom of flame at the gun’s muzzle, and it was almost the last thing.

  His own six-shooter dropped from fingers gone suddenly dead, and Murray went to his knees. “You damn Irish tenderfoot! You—!”

  “I am no tenderfoot, Mr. Murray. Not any longer.”

  Murray sagged back, half-falling over. “I guess you ain’t,” he muttered. “Damn you, Irish! I shoulda left you alone! Your medicine’s bad for me, you—” Then he crumpled.

  Crispin Mayo, of County Cork and the great plains of the West, stood watching him for several minutes. The man was dead.

  Picking up the gun he had been forced to drop, he wiped the dirt away and then walked back into the willows. Murray’s dapple gray horse was there, with a freshly filled canteen on the saddle. He led the beast outside, let it water again, and then swung into the saddle and rode down the trail to the railroad.

  He was there beside the track when he heard the train whistle, no more than a minute later. He stepped down, removed the canteen, then held the reins until he saw that the train was slowing down for him. He threw the reins over the saddle and slapped the horse on the hip. “You’ve got a home somewhere. Go!”

  When the train stopped and a conductor stepped down, it was Sam Calkins. A dozen soldiers peered from the windows.

  “You’d better get aboard,” Calkins said sourly, “Colonel McClean and his daughter are waitin’ for you at Medicine Bow.”

  Crispin Mayo climbed into the car, lifted a hand to the soldiers and dropped into a seat.