One Man's Fire

by Ralph Compton

  “You’re ripping my arm off!” Mason moaned.

  “Stop yer bellyaching already,” Saunders said. “I’ve heard enough. You want to lie in the dirt instead of somewhere you can be tended?”

  “No.”

  “Then since none of the others who you had so much faith in are willin’ to help, you might want to accept it from whoever’s willing to give it.”

  Mason was moving his feet and standing up more on his own steam now, but was shaky after the gunshot wound. Once he placed some of his weight upon Eli’s shoulder, he could allow his arm to dangle so his bloody elbow wasn’t taking any undue strain. Before he could be moved another step, Saunders left him to lean completely on Eli.

  “Where are you going?” Mason asked.

  Saunders didn’t feel the need to answer him. Instead, he approached Myra and lowered himself to place one hand on her rifle and the other on her shoulder. “Take a breath,” he whispered to her. “It’s going to be all right.”

  “But he’s dead,” she sobbed. Her grip tightened once more around the hunting rifle, but the sheriff didn’t allow her to bring it up. Still she struggled to reclaim the weapon as if oblivious of what was preventing her from getting it. “He’s dead and I’ll never get him back!”

  “I know.”

  “It’s…empty,” she wept while gripping her chest just above her heart. “He’s gone and it’s so empty.”

  “I know, Myra.”

  Looking up at him as if she were seeing the lawman for the first time, she said, “Someone’s got to pay for losing him.”

  “Yes,” the sheriff told her. “But it’s got to be the right someone. He’s not it.”

  Myra looked over to Eli and then back to Saunders. Too weak to say another word, she nodded and allowed him to help her to her feet. She left the rifle where it had landed and shuffled away from the jailhouse.

  “Eli!” Saunders shouted. When his prisoner stopped and looked over his shoulder at him, the sheriff said, “If that loudmouthed, sorry excuse for a vigilante wants help to the doctor’s office, one of his so-called friends can give it.”

  Although he seemed irate at first, Mason redirected his scowl to Daniel and a few of the others who’d been with him in the crowd not so long ago. It took a few long moments, but Daniel eventually moseyed over to offer his assistance. “Git yer hands offa him,” he snapped to Eli.

  Before any more insults could be leveed at Eli, Mason growled, “Leave him alone. He’s the sheriff’s burden now. He’d best make sure not to bring him back into town.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Saunders sighed.

  Eli came back to the lawman’s side amid the rattle of the chain dangling between his wrists. He’d tucked the .38 under his belt so he could help pull Mason across the street, but he removed it now using just a thumb and forefinger to daintily pinch the handle. “You should probably take this before another mob forms up.”

  “Ain’t loaded, remember?” Saunders replied.

  Waving the pistol at him as if it were growing too hot to hold, Eli said, “Sure I do, but they don’t! Just take it. Maybe you’ll gain some favor by making a show of it. I’ll act like I’m real scared of you.”

  “First of all,” Saunders told him while snatching the pistol away with enough force to make Eli reflexively flinch, “you should be scared of me. Not only can I kill you at any time, but I’ve got a town full of folks who’d form a line just to pat me on the back for it. Thanks all the same,” he added in a lower voice. “It was good to see you help Mason despite everything that happened.”

  “And second?”

  “What?”

  “Second,” Eli repeated. “There ain’t a first of all without a second.”

  Saunders grinned as he thought back to his own recent words. “And second, I doubt I’ll be gaining any favor with this lot any time soon.”

  Chapter 10

  Their ride started off just as Eli had expected it would. They were headed toward Cheyenne using a trail that wasn’t as direct as the one he would have chosen, but would get them there well enough. Then again, being an outlaw who’d learned from several other outlaws, Eli knew plenty of trails that lawmen didn’t. That was a good portion of how thieves stayed alive for more than a week or so after firing their first shot. But even using a more established route didn’t account for them veering off course as they’d done a mile ago. He had let it go at the time because Saunders had removed the cuffs from his wrists and Eli didn’t want to annoy the sheriff enough for the restraints to be placed back on. Eli still didn’t say anything until he saw a fence marked by a wooden sign emblazoned with a V pointed slightly askew to the right as if it was in the process of falling over.

  “What are we doing back at the Lazy V?” he asked.

  Saunders steered his horse through the gate that was still hanging halfway open as it had been when Jake and the others were chased off the property. “Looking for tracks.”

  “Tracks?” Eli asked while casting his eyes back and forth. “What do you need to look for tracks for? Didn’t you tell me Hank was spotted in Cheyenne?”

  “He was.”

  “So?” When he didn’t get an answer after another couple of seconds, Eli raced a few paces ahead of the sheriff and brought his horse to a stop. The animal he’d been given to ride was a black mare that was either old enough or mangy enough to have patches where her coat was thinning out or simply lighter in color; she seemed more uneven than a poorly made quilt. One thing he’d learned early on was that she didn’t like to run. Getting ahead of Saunders caused her to whinny in protest and then breathe heavily when she was finally allowed to stop.

  The lawman could easily have ridden around Eli, but chose to give his horse a rest. “What’s the meaning of this? You’ll keep on riding and follow up on your end of the bargain.”

  “Which is what, exactly?”

  “Which is to do exactly what I tell you. Now git!”

  “What’s the point of wasting time looking for tracks? You think Jake is gonna stay in Cheyenne forever?”

  “So you know what he’s doing there?” Saunders asked.

  “Not exactly, but I guarantee he’s not fixing to settle down and raise a family.” Cocking his head to one side while studying the lawman, Eli said, “Wait a second. You think I’m holding out on you?”

  “Are you?”

  Eli let out a long, exasperated sigh. “What happened to all that talk about me being a good person and how well we could work together?”

  “I believe I said you weren’t a killer. That doesn’t exactly lift you into being a good person. As for the part about working together, make no mistake that I’m in charge.”

  “Oh, don’t worry. Nobody can forget that.”

  When Eli started riding back down the trail leading farther into ranch property, Saunders raced to catch up. It took considerably less effort for his horse to close the gap. She was a beauty with a tan coat and a mane that was mostly dark brown mixed with scattered portions of black. “Are you trying to imply something?” Saunders asked.

  “Why would you think that?”

  “Because of the tone in yer voice.”

  “That’s always there,” Eli replied with a shrug.

  “Then maybe because it sounds like you were talking about more than one person just then.”

  “I was. After the display you put on back in town, ain’t nobody going to forget who’s in charge. Well done.”

  Both men were riding slowly toward the spot where the fighting had taken place, but only Eli seemed to be paying attention to his surroundings. “Are you being smart with me again?” Saunders asked.

  “No. It reminded me of when Jake and I would ride into a town or step into a bank with guns out for all to see, snarling like dogs and putting the fear of God into folks. We used to call that raising a flag. Does a real good job in laying down the law.”

  “Let’s get one thing clear,” Saunders said. “I ain’t nothing like Jacob Welles, you hear m
e?”

  “Wasn’t meant as an insult. I was just saying you took that bunch of vigilantes and made them back down so good that they won’t rise up again.”

  “Using outlaw tactics?”

  “No…I…I don’t know what your problem is, so I’ll just put a cork in it and go wherever you point me. You want to look for tracks days after they’ve been blown away and beaten into the dirt by all them other men who chased the rest of the gang away from here? Be my guest.”

  The two men rode side by side for a few seconds that dragged like hours. Saunders didn’t want to go any faster than a crawl, and Eli was more than happy to tag along. However fast they went or wherever they were headed, it beat being locked in a cage.

  “Stop here,” Saunders announced.

  Eli pulled back on his reins, causing his horse to shudder more than a train engine that was missing half of its bolts. “I think most of the tracks will be farther ahead.”

  “The ones I’m looking for are right here.”

  Looking down to where the sheriff was pointing, Eli found imprints that had been pounded into the dirt and dried in place over the last few days. “You sure that’s anything important? How many men have ridden up and down this stretch since the shooting stopped?”

  “None. This property’s been abandoned since the owner died of some sort of fever a few months back.”

  “Some sort of fever?”

  “Yep,” Saunders said as he climbed down from his saddle to examine the ground more closely.

  “What kind of fever?”

  “Nobody knows for sure. First the old man went stark raving mad, bled from every hole in his head, and then keeled over dead. Then his two sons came down with it, only it was worse. One made it to town. Looked so bad that some folks thought he was the old man come back to life after clawing his way up from his own grave.”

  “Good God!”

  “Yeah. See why nobody cared to come back up here?”

  Eli squirmed in his saddle and swiped his hand across his forehead. “If you don’t know what fever it was, could we still catch it?”

  “Don’t think so.”

  “You don’t think or you know so?”

  “The doc in town says a fever can only infect a place for so long before it dies out. Since I ain’t much of a doctor myself, I’m inclined to believe what he said. Besides, those men who were to meet that rickety wagon didn’t seem sick.”

  “Not yet, maybe. I think I’m starting to feel warm.”

  “Take your hat off.”

  “That ain’t the point! Why would anyone want to gather here after something like that?”

  “They wouldn’t,” Saunders replied. “Those men from that shipping company or whatever it was didn’t bother with the whole story. They were looking for a place to store their horses and gear, and one of the only surviving relatives of this ranch’s owner rented it to them. Those shipping company fellas had money to spare and nobody talked ’em out of it.”

  “What about you?” Eli asked.

  “Me?” Saunders replied while running his fingertips along another patch of dried mud thirteen yards away from the one that had originally caught his eye. “I just found a set of tracks that split off from the rest.”

  “Good. Great. I meant what made you and your men decide to come here and crouch in that barn where…” Suddenly Eli lost some of the color in his face. “Fevers can hit animals too. Or if they don’t, folks tend to put someone who’s got something that might be spread out in the barn. What on earth were you thinking? What did you tell those men of yours to get them to squat in that infested barn with you?”

  “I’ve only got one deputy and he believed what the doctor said as well. None of them other men cared much about what I had to say.”

  Eli stared at the lawman with his mouth agape. When he saw that expression being leveled at him like the barrel of a gun, Saunders said, “I told you, I heard from a doctor that it should have been all right! What’s the matter with you? Are you one of them squirrelly types who thinks he’s always sick? My grandpa was like that that. Miserable old cuss.”

  “Perhaps your grandpa was a smart man.”

  “Smart or not, it don’t benefit anyone to worry so much about dyin’. The Reaper’s coming for all of us. Might as well enjoy whatever time you got until he gets around to finding you.”

  Shaking his head in a similar manner as he would if he’d been told the most ridiculous fairy tale ever conceived, Eli said, “Reaper’s coming for some of us sooner than others.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean? You got some sort of condition I should know about?”

  Eli deflected one question with another. “Did you find what you were after so we can get away from this place?”

  “What are you worried about? You were here just like I was. If there was a fever to be had, you’d already have it.”

  Somehow, Eli became even paler. “Maybe that’s why I felt so bad after being down for so long.”

  “I think me knocking you on the melon had more to do with it than any fever. These tracks I found are fresh and the rest were put down by your outlaw friends. There’s three sets coming from that direction,” Saunders said while pointing back toward the area where the shoot-out had taken place. “Two continue toward the fence line this way and the newer ones veer off thataway. There were only four of you who came in with that wagon, right?”

  “That’s right. Still, I couldn’t tell you if those tracks were put down by anyone I know or any of the other men that were here at the time. You were cooped up in that sinkhole of a barn, so maybe you didn’t see the men swarming around this place like flies on manure.”

  “I did see them. In fact, I saw plenty more than you did after you were lying facedown in the dirt. When the rest of your gang hightailed it out of here, they tore straight over this patch of ground and everyone else tore after them. Not directly, mind you. Your friends were shooting behind them to keep anyone from taking the straight approach, so the rest of us split up to try and circle around from both sides. One group charged for the fence line over there,” Saunders explained while pointing to a stretch of grassy terrain to the right of the trail. “And the other went in that direction.”

  The second route Saunders showed him was a bit rougher since it was studded with scrub and trees. Eli took it all in and didn’t have the slightest bit of trouble picturing the chase that had taken place after he’d been knocked unconscious. In fact, he didn’t have to stretch his imagination very far at all to be certain he truly had been left behind without a fight. Jake was practical to a fault, and getting killed to save one man wouldn’t make any sense to him. Hank didn’t need an excuse to cut the gang’s numbers down, since that meant his share of any stolen money went up, and Cody was a follower pure and simple. He did what he was told and didn’t bother with questions.

  “So,” Eli grunted as he chewed on the unpleasantness running through his mind, “what does all of this tell you?”

  “It tells me that the gang could have split up. Only one of them was spotted in Cheyenne. That means the rest could be meeting up with him later or could even be circling back around to see what you’re up to. Any thoughts on which it might be?”

  “Couldn’t it be that they split up to get away from this ranch before meeting up a mile or two down the road?”

  “That could be.”

  “Which brings me back around to this being a waste of time.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yeah. I just said so, didn’t I?”

  Saunders smirked like a man who had not only an ace up his sleeve, but three more in his hand to go along with it. “What if I could tell you that these fresher tracks can help us find at least one member of your gang and possibly the ones who set up this massacre in the first place?”

  “I’d be pleased as punch,” Eli grunted.

  “Perhaps you won’t be so smug or reluctant to go after them if you knew you were set up for a fall from the start.”

>   “What are you talking about?”

  Nodding with the certainty of a fisherman who’d felt a tug on the line he’d cast, Saunders said, “Those men who commissioned that wagon to be built have some deep pockets, but I’ll let you in on a secret. That wagon didn’t cost as much as you might think to be built.”

  “I’ve been up close with that thing,” Eli said. “That’s no surprise to me. I’m amazed it went as far as it did without rattling apart.”

  “Some of that money went to hiring the men to protect it, but all of that was just a ruse. The wagon, especially. When I was crouched in that infested barn, I had plenty of time to hear some of those guards talk. Now, they didn’t spell out everything they were doin’, but they let slip enough pieces of the puzzle for me to get an idea of what it’s supposed to look like when it’s put together.”

  While he talked, Saunders led his horse alongside the path that went to the barn. Eli noticed this and pulled back on his reins. “How about you tell me about that picture before we get closer to whatever disease is filling the air around that barn?”

  “For Pete’s sake! If you don’t have the fever yet, you ain’t gonna get it now. Will you stop being such a whiny little pup?”

  “What if I already have a condition?”

  Now Saunders stopped. “What sort of condition? You mean like an ailment?”

  “What if I had something like that and didn’t want it getting worse? Think that’s a good enough reason to steer clear of that barn?”

  “Do you have a condition?”

  Frustrated with the lack of progress in the conversation, Eli asked, “Is there a good reason to be moseying in this direction instead of toward Cheyenne?”

  “I was just getting to that,” Saunders replied. “That big clunky wagon is a lightning rod. It draws attention and it does carry money, but there’s more to it than that. The men in the barn were talking like they didn’t even care if that contraption made it out of here or not. I asked them about it and they told me that thing’s the finest piece of bait ever created. It draws outlaws either into ambushes or onto their company’s payroll.”

  “What?”