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Table of Contents
About the Book
Copyright
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
TwentyOne
TwentyTwo
TwentyThree
TwentyFour
TwentyFive
About Piccadilly Publishing
About Matt Chisholm
Rem McAllister was a man alone. They drove off his precious horses. They burned his home. They chased him off his land. He had dared to use the open range claimed by the powerful cattle barons – and now he must pay the ultimate price. But they had overlooked one important fact of all – McAllister never surrenders!
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One
They came drifting up through the bottomland, a handful of riders, the grass belly-high to the horses. They came in the dawn, which is the right time of day to approach a man when you do not want to catch him at his best. Larned did not come himself, of course. He mentioned it to his range boss, Si Tallin, and Si detailed a top-hand to take along a few men and scare the living shits out of the greasy-sack up on Howard Creek.
The top hand was Fred Jolly, who liked this kind of thing. He chose his two drinking cronies to come along with him. They agreed to do so with some pleasure. Men who hire themselves out to rich and powerful men seldom have a liking for poor men who have remained their own masters.
McAllister spotted them as they rounded the first corner of the starve-out and he thought: Best throw some more bacon in the pan — here’s three for breakfast. I must be a success at last, I’m starting to feed grubline riders. He had come out to spit and scratch himself into the new day and he would have turned back into his cabin to fill the pan, but there was something about the men that caught and held his attention. Some subtle thing on which he could never put his finger.
Maybe it was the way they sat their horses, or stared at him without expression. Whatever it was, it held him there. They did not greet him as they approached nor lift a hand in recognition of his presence. They simply walked their horses straight ahead. Their horses knew better manners. They lifted their heads and whistled to McAllister’s own animals in the starve-out. McAllister always thought that a nice sound, horses exchanging views.
The three of them rode into what he laughingly called his yard and drew rein. When McAllister civilly gave them a “howdy”, they just looked at him. The man sitting the grullo horse in the middle was as hard and chunky as his mount. He had the complexion and eyes of a drinker. But that didn’t make him soft. Time enough for that as the years passed. Now he was hard and he knew it. He was one of those men who could swagger sitting in a saddle. McAllister did not like him. He had never set eyes on him before, but that did not make any difference.
The other two were of the same kind, but they lacked his brazen show of confidence. They were not raw boys nor were they middle-aged men. They were riders in their prime, hardened to the elements, used to their bodies being punished by cold, heat and hard work. Their hands were calloused and the fines of their faces showed they had spent most of their fives in the open air. Their eyes were pale and faded as though worn down by gazing long distances. They could spot a cow at a mile easier than they could read a book. They knew cows, horses, ropes and men. And there was a wild air about them.
The cocky one in the center said: “We’re Bar Twenty men.”
He said it as if it should mean something to McAllister. And it did. It meant a lot. The mere name of the outfit spoke volumes. It was like saying: “We work for Larned and you ain’t fit to lick his boots.” McAllister said: “I’m an Em Cee Connected man.”
The man gave a little snicker of laughter that was like a slap in the face. McAllister stayed still and kept his face the same way.
“You’re squattin’ on Larned range, boy. Mr. Larned ain’t a hard-hearted man. He says you can have till noon to pull stakes an’ get the hell out of here.”
“All right,” said McAllister.
The man looked a little surprised. They all went in the end, but it was usual for them to make a protest if only for their own pride’s sake.
The tall gaunt man on the right looked interested, even intrigued by this too rapid surrender.
“You mean you’ll go?” he asked.
McAllister said solemnly: “I ain’t a fool. I can see you’re the big guns around here. There ain’t no sense in tryin’ to buck a big wheel like Larned. Wouldn’t you boys do the same in my boots?”
The three of them looked at each other and they laughed. The cocky one slapped a chapped thigh and roared: “Christ, I never heard the goddam like of it.”
“Me neither.”
The man on the left laughed so much his horse started acting up. While he controlled it with an iron hand, this fellow shouted: “He’s a real spunky bastard. Ain’t he just! Christ, us two could be stayed in bed, Fred, an’ you could of run him off on your lonesome.”
They waited till his horse settled down, then Fred said: “Till noon, then. What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t say,” said McAllister, “but it’s McAllister.”
The tall man said: “I heard that name some place before.”
“I got a lot of kin all over,” McAllister said.
The cocky man said: “Are they all as tough as you, ole timer?”
They turned their horses then. They rode down to the corner of the starve-out and then they halted to look back at him and laugh.
They did not laugh for long.
McAllister, who had been unarmed when they spoke to him, now held a long-barreled gleaming Henry rifle and he was shooting. Right from the first shot they knew he could handle that gun and that he had no intention of hitting them. He gave them a shooting display that would have sobered them in two seconds flat if they had been in drink. The air around them seemed to be full of buzzing and whining lead. No three cowhands ever used their spurs more ardently than those. They knew if they turned back McAllister would pick them out of the saddle as easy as a man picks his nose. They went down through the bottomland as if all the heel flies in Texas were after them and they did not slow their pace until they were on the far side of the creek.
They felt foolish and they felt shamed. Because of these two emotions, they were also very angry. All Fred Jolly could do was pound his saddlehorn with his fist and shout: “The bastard. The dirty, sneakin’ bastard.”
The tall gaunt man, whose name was Slim Larkin, said lugubriously: “Hey, Fred, it just come to me where I heard that name before.”
“What name for Crissake?”
“McAllister,”
“Where?”
Larkin said slowly and distinctly: “Remington McAllister.”
The other man, Ed Smollet, said: “Aw, no.”
Jolly went very quiet.
“That McAllister,” he said.
“Yeah.”
Smollet said: “Aw, my Gawd.”
Without another word, Jolly lifted his lines and moved on. He led the others across an open prairie and they felt the heat of the rising sun on their backs. They did not exchange another word until they were in the trees beyond. Now Jolly halted once more.
“You seem to think, Slim, that this McAllister is a real tough cookie,” he said.
Larkin said: “Sure. You mean you don’t think he is?”
&n
bsp; “It don’t matter how damn tough a man is,” Jolly said with authority, “not if you’re tougher.”
“Now wait a minute,” Larkin said.
The top-hand turned on him with a ferocity that took him aback—“No, I ain’t waitin’ a goddam minute. You listen to me. Nobody, but nobody does that to me. Maybe to you, Slim, but not to me.” He drove his own forefinger hard into his chest several times.
Larkin eyed him coolly. He was a man slow to anger and had never been too closely acquainted with fear. Maybe he did not have much imagination. He said: “What do you aim to do, Fred?”
“I aim to clean that bastard’s plough for him, what else?”
“How?”
“Well, now. We know for sure he ain’t goin’ to pull stakes. Right? I ain’t honin’ to get back to headquarters an’ tell Tallin we was run off by no two-bit saddle-bum. McAllister put up a fight, didn’t he? Why, he was like to kill one of us, the dam fool. We didn’t have no choice, did we?”
“Choice?” said Smollet, who was fast enough in action but a little slow in everyday thinking and such.
“We had to burn his place to the ground an’ maybe shoot his butt off. He ain’t always goin’ to be takin’ us by surprise. Next time, we’ll do the jumpin’.”
Larkin said cautiously: “This could turn nasty, Fred. Hell, it ain’t come to this yet.”
It was on Jolly’s mind to call him yellow, but good sense prevented him. Nobody was further from yellow in his book than Slim Larkin. He’d seen the man in action. Fist, knife or gun, he knew how to look out for himself. Jolly said: “You ain’t tellin’ me, Slim, that you like bein’ shot at by some shirt-tail cowboy?”
“No,” said Larkin, who was a stickler for accuracy, “I ain’t tellin’ you that. I’m tellin’ you to play it right. Get home an’ tell Tallin just what happened. It ain’t no skin off our noses if McAllister took some shots at us. Hell, we’ll straighten him out in time an’ you know it. We’ll go in heavy-handed an’ we’ll cut him down to size. We done it often enough. Where’s the sense in riskin’ our necks? We work for wages.”
“How about your goddam pride, man? Don’t you have no pride?”
“Yeah,” said Smollet, who was trying hard to keep up with the subtleties of the conversation, “how about your pride, Slim?”
“You keep out of this,” said Slim, not offering him a glance. “Cool off, Fred, an’ let’s get back to headquarters.”
Jolly gave it some thought. Finally, he said: “Yeah, maybe you’re right, at that. The man has a reputation. He’s fast. Better men than us has backed up from him.”
He saw Larkin swallow on that. The tall man was proud of his accomplishments. “We known each other a good few years, Fred. You ever know anybody who could outdraw or outshoot me?”
“Not till today,” Jolly said.
Smollet said brightly: “Fred, you reckon that McAllister could brace ole Slim here? You really believe that?”
“Seein’s believin’,” said Jolly.
“I’ll put ten on it says you’re a liar,” Larkin said.
Jolly nodded with satisfaction. He could see the old wild light in his partner’s eye.
“Done,” he said.
Larkin smiled a long, slow smile and said: “You’re real sneaky, Fred. You always was.”
Jolly laughed and slapped him on his shoulder. “We’ll settle his hash for him, pard.”
“Sure will,” said Larkin. “Now let’s go at this like sensible men.”
Two
McAllister, when he thought about it afterwards, always reckoned that he did not really make up his mind to be stubborn until that moment up on the butte when he looked down and saw his little outfit and the surrounding country in true perspective. He had ridden his little canelo mare, Lucy, up there so he could see whether the three men he had run off had cleared out of his neck of the woods. He could see the three of them plain enough. When he looked directly down, it seemed that his little cabin and the barn and the horse corrals were right at his feet. Maybe until that moment he did not know how much the place had come to mean to him.
He was a little surprised to find himself wanting to put down roots in this northern country, he who had worked cows up and down the Chisholm Trail, brushed-popped the Nueces country and served as a lawman through the south-west. Now here he was in Wyoming with its hard winters and fine summer grass. In this country a horse would grow inches bigger than the hardy little mustangs of Texas.
He raised his glass and took a closer look at the men. They were in among the trees now, talking. It looked mighty like war-talk to him. What he would have expected. At this point, he regarded the incident more of a nuisance than anything else. These men were an annoying interruption of his work. There were twenty horses down there in the pen, waiting to be gentled to saddle. There were more out on the range wearing his brand. This year he had been determined to break even financially. Any delay in shaping the animals up for market might ruin his chances. He swore a little, but he accepted the situation. He had had too many setbacks in his hard life to accept them sitting down.
He watched the men working their way along the edge of the trees, going northwest.
He walked to the mare and slipped on to her bare back. He rode her now down to the cabin with nothing to guide her but his knees. She was the most disciplined horse he had ever owned. Gentle, tractable, intelligent. Her offspring were as promising. When he rode her, he rode his whole future.
Back at the cabin, he saddled and bridled the four-year-old gelding, Oscar, marked much like his mother, cinnamon roan. A horse which would run all day on a handful of grass. What men called a long horse. Now he opened the pen gate and drove the horses out, heading them straight into the hills. He drove them into the breaks and threw them into one which he had used for this purpose when he had first come into this country. The brush fence was still there, waiting to be pulled into place. There was enough grass in there to keep them going for a few days. A mountain freshet would offer them all the water they would need.
Now he rode hard for home again, going a little recklessly, for he knew that time could be very important now. Inside the cabin, he filled a coat pocket with jerked beef. He put a box of Henry loads into a saddle pocket and saw that he had powder and shot for the Remington revolver at his hip. Going out to the horse, he slung the saddle and latched it firm with the rawhide ties. Then he rode the animal slightly to the east and dropped into a deep gully there. Dismounting, he tied the horse and waited. He would wait until the men came. Till the following dawn if necessary. He had the patience of the Indians who had fostered him in his childhood.
But he did not have to wait too long, for such men are always impatient to get at their villainy, like a drunk impatient for drink. Destruction is a heady thing.
They came in from the north, a little wary because they had seen how he could use the rifle. McAllister watched them through the leaves of the alders that sheltered him. He watched Jolly positioning his men like a general arranging a battle.
The tall man took the west and rode to slightly high ground there. Jolly himself took the center, getting down behind a deadfall which would offer him pretty good cover and a view of the rear of the house. Smollet was to take the gully from which he could cover the east and front of the cabin. McAllister took down his rope from the saddle and strolled along the gully. Taking cover in the brush again, he chose a couple of rocks and put them in his pockets. He built a noose and waited.
Within a minute or so, he heard Smollet’s horse come down into the gully and walk along it. When he caught sight of the man, he saw that the fellow’s whole attention was on the cabin. He might not be able to see it from the deep gully, but his ears were alert for any sound from the cabin. McAllister allowed the rider to pass him before he tossed his first rock. He aimed it carefully so that it landed at the top of a slanting series of flat rocks ahead and to the right of Smollet. It made a nice clatter when it fell, rolling down the length of the table of
rock.
Smollet’s attention was snatched from the house to the rocks. McAllister stepped from cover, made a neat underhand throw and dropped his noose over the man’s shoulders. By the time it reached his elbows, McAllister had tightened it. The horse jumped in alarm. All McAllister had to do to bring Smollet out of the saddle was to keep a firm hold on the rope. His victim came off clean as a whistle. He landed very hard indeed on the ground. The fall not only hurt him, but it knocked every ounce of breath out of his lungs.
McAllister flicked his rope clear and coiled it. He looped it over his gun-butt and stamped down on Smollet’s belly with his boot heel when the man tried in a kind of weary slow motion to draw his own gun. McAllister stooped, took the gun and tossed it into the creek. It landed with a loud splash. Next, he took Smollet by the scruff of his neck and dragged him to the creek. Smollet scrambled to his feet, some of his breath back and plenty of fight in his eye. McAllister hit him carefully in the belly, then hurled him into the creek. He walked back to the man’s horse, stripped the gear from it, tossed it all into the creek and slapped the horse so that it ran up out of the gully.
He didn’t doubt that Larkin would see the horse. He was right. At once, Larkin started yelling the information down to Jolly.
McAllister now showed his speed. He ran for his horse, vaulted into the saddle and, without waiting to place his feet in the stirrup irons, put the animal at a dead run down the gully. When he came opposite Jolly’s position, he dropped from the saddle, estimating that Jolly’s first instinctive move would be towards the gully.
He was right. The man came bulling his way through the brush, gun in hand, his face bright with fury. There was only one way into the gully at this point and he took it. He walked over McAllister’s noose as it lay open on the ground. When McAllister pulled, the reata closed on the fellow’s left leg, yanking it out from under him. The gun went off and Jolly hit the dirt. He did so mostly on his face. When he raised his head, his face was grimed with dirt which was mixed with blood.
He tried to say: “You bastard,” but the words were not too distinct.
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