Dead Aim

by Dusty Richards

  “We have lots to experience in the months ahead.”

  “I am looking forward to them all.”

  “Darling, I agree.”

  Carter met them at the mess hall.

  “I went up and saw your driller. He’s doing fine,” Long said.

  “Another ranch hand did well drilling for two years. He sounded interested when I said he could double his pay.”

  “Is the other drill ready?”

  “That was the one his partner ran. It needs a new cable.”

  “If you think he can drill, get it fixed and put him to work.”

  “Did you think that guy down there can design a house to suit you?”

  Long told him about the architect and the plans.

  Jan smiled. “Oh, he and I talked about it over my sketches. We have final say before he completes the plans.”

  “Carter, he asked about quarrying limestone on the ranch.”

  “They used lots of it in that big house. I wasn’t here then, but the quarry is north of here and I know there is a lot of exposed limestone to use.”

  “I had seen it riding by. I think that answers our question.”

  “Harry said next week the survey crew would start surveying east. No changes out there needed.”

  “Good. We are moving on.”

  “I had twenty-five purebred shorthorn bulls offered to me. They are sound, two years old, and they would be delivered here by the seller.”

  “How much?”

  “Four hundred apiece.”

  “Would he take less?”

  “Want me to offer three fifty?”

  “Money is still short. No one is back from Abilene, yet, with pockets full of money. Offer him that. And make sure they are sound.”

  “Oh, yes. I will try.”

  “If he has more we’d take a hundred sound ones at, say, three or three and a quarter.”

  “I will try for that.”

  “That would shed us of all the half-breed longhorn bulls?”

  “It should.”

  “Handle it.”

  “We have enough money in this account?” he asked her.

  Jan nodded, rocking her head back and forth. “Drill wells, surveying, building fence around the world, and we buy a hundred bulls.”

  “And we have money for the new house?”

  “Yes. I am teasing.”

  “We will have one of the best ranches in Texas.”

  “I don’t doubt that.”

  The three laughed.

  The next afternoon his neighbor Lloyd Hudson from the Rocking H came by to see him. He and a cowboy dismounted, and Long left his desk, trying to find a better way to keep track of the cattle numbers, and greeted him.

  Hudson was looking around and shook his hand. “You must be well drilling?”

  “That is for my wife’s new house.”

  “Didn’t I hear his widow left the mansion?”

  “Yes. Come on in. What suits one woman might not another. I offered it to the Methodist church as a school or training place.”

  “I understand. I came to thank you for surveying. They told me when I bought the land that I had nearly a mile of land when I built my house. Well yesterday I found out it was barely a quarter mile inside my place and a portion of the corrals are in the next Texas section.”

  “I went up there and discussed how it was with the surveyor. He said there was some land north of your line on the section next door.”

  “How did your brother buy that land you two have?”

  “He had a lawyer and an agent in Kerrville do that. I bet that agent would help you.”

  “Ten bucks an acre is the going price?”

  “I understand that. It means sixty-four hundred dollars. If you can buy it for that I’d loan you any part you can’t pay, and you can pay me back over ten years.”

  “That was my big concern.”

  Long clapped Hudson on the shoulder. “When you need it, just holler and we will loan it.”

  “I will write your agent and get started. Your man made a description of it, so if I bought it that would be the right one. I sure appreciate the help.”

  “I am glad it worked out so well.”

  “It will.”

  “How is your family?”

  “Oh, they’ll be fine after today.”

  “You had lunch?”

  “Oh, Mark and I just rode over to talk.”

  “My cook Sam will whip you up something. Get your cowboy and we’ll go over there.”

  “I didn’t come to bother you.”

  “No bother. Food is over in the large tent.”

  Hudson said he couldn’t believe he fed everyone every day.

  Long told him it made them all family.

  Jan came over from her sewing circle and told him to bring his wife next time.

  He agreed, and after a meal they rode home. Long went back to his project at the office. Soon they would need to do this on all the ranches they bought around Kerrville. Get everything under one brand.

  He heard the shouting and ran outside.

  “Long! They’ve got water up there.”

  He ran hard. The water was blowing fifty feet into the air. It looked like a gusher. Jan would be pleased. It would mean she’d get water pressure without a windmill set up.

  Nearly out of breath, he was high enough up and able to see the drilling crew dancing around under the falling water. What a day this turned out to be.

  CHAPTER 37

  The next day he was back at work figuring out how to cross-fence this ranch in a way to manage it the best. He had lots of trips to make, to draw the water sources on his maps. Someone rode up hard in front of his office.

  Jan came through from the house area to join him.

  A hatless teen boy, out of breath, stood in the doorway waving a yellow wire. “Mr. O’Malley?”

  “Yes. What do you have, young man?”

  “An important wire for you, sir.”

  His heart stopped; they had a wreck on the cattle drive. Oh, dear God . . .

  The paper straight, he began to read.

  Long, I had no one else to call on. We had a bloody raid on the CKH Ranch. Hoot was shot and two cowboys are dead.

  Three more are wounded. I am strapped. Everyone is north and cannot be reached.

  You are my last hope to lead a force to stop them. I am gathering the men now. Many will follow you.

  Your father, Hiram.

  “I wonder if Hoot is all right,” Jan asked.

  Carter was there. “I heard most of it. What will you do?”

  “I have worried about something like this—we’re spread out too thin.”

  “What will you do?”

  “I need to answer him, Jan, then line up a team and go down there to stop them.”

  His wife closed her eyes. “I expected you to do it, but you must be careful.”

  He hugged her. “How many men can you spare, Carter?”

  “How many do you want?”

  “At least four.”

  “I am thinking since we seem to have no armed threats here, I can get you six.”

  “I want them armed with good rifles and pistols. Ammunition enough for a war, camping and cooking equipment. Load the packhorses. We can get fresh horses down there. We leave at six a.m., and I have no idea when we will be back, but we will settle this matter.”

  “I can hire some day workers until you get back.”

  “Thanks.”

  Workers had watered the exhausted boy and his horse.

  Long told one of the men, “Take that young man to the mess hall. Sam will feed him, and have some boys cool down his horse so he’s ready when he wants to go home.”

  The worker and boy left.

  “I am wiring my father that the Three Star Ranch is sending a team to help and for him to get his men ready to ride.”

  Jan and Carter stayed in the office with Long.

  “Ira, Collie, Harry. That makes three right?” his forema
n asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Allan Jules?”

  “Freckled-faced strapping guy?”

  “Yes. Reed Walls?”

  “He’s the older short man?”

  Carter nodded. “Guy Holt?”

  “He should work.”

  Long might not have taken Holt, but Carter knew the man better than he did. If he had his reasons, Long felt sure it would work. The thing he hated the most was how his father would be feeling—that he had failed to stop the raid. Whoever they were, Long would find them and punish them for what they did.

  Jan packed some clothing into his bedroll. It was now hot Texas summertime, so he’d not need a jacket. That job wrapped up and tied, she turned and asked him where he would start.

  “The H Bar H to learn how many men Dad has lined up to ride with us. I will get all the information I can. I hope the raiders have not shot any more of our men.”

  “Lots to do.”

  “I will need some men who know the lay of the land. I also have to find out who is leading the raiders, and hopefully find out where they are hiding out. Then close in on them.”

  “You just remember Carter and I need you. This baby in my belly needs you, too.”

  He hugged her tightly. “You know I can handle myself. No one else can help my dad. They are up in the Indian Territory. That’s why they raided—to test our strength—and I aim to shock them.”

  “I wish I could go along and help you.”

  “Number one is the child. I fear I can’t protect you there. Stay here. Work on the house plans and I will return.”

  He gave her his kerchief to cry into. That cut him to his heart. He had grown so close to this cowgirl. Loved her and enjoyed her efforts to make life better for both of them more and more.

  He and his crew left in a long trot in the pinking dawn. His plans were to be there in two days. They pushed hard, taking short breaks. A horse went cripple but he stopped at a ranch, bought a fresh one, and they rode on.

  The men were in good spirits and laughed most of the day. At sundown they camped by a stream. The crew cooked the meal and turned in. The night was short. Day two was a hard push, but they reached the home ranch by dark.

  His mom, and the wives alongside of her, fixed them a big meal. Hiram’s stable help rubbed down their horses and promised him fresh ones in the morning.

  He answered his mother’s questions about his wife and her pregnancy. Yes, she was, all seemed good, and they were planning a Texas ranch house of her own design.

  Quietly he told her a little about the money and gold in the bank. Her eyes opened wide and, holding her hand to her chest, asked him, “Really?”

  “Really. I will tell you the whole story when we get time in private.”

  She swallowed, hugged him, and kissed his forehead. “Will this help you realize all your successes with Harp?”

  “It seems that things are falling into place, and we were there to use it.”

  “I lived in a log cabin in western Arkansas. If we saw fifty dollars in one year we were thinking we were rich.”

  “Times change. I need to talk to Dad about what we can do. How is Hoot?”

  “He’s going to be all right. He’s still laid up at the doctor’s office, but he is showing signs he will live.”

  “Good news.”

  Long and Hiram went outside onto the porch to be alone and talk. The night bugs were loud, and the day’s heat finally showed signs of falling.

  “There are rumors that Newman and Jennings are the source of these raids, but they also know how to keep hidden. Sheriff Coker sent ten deputies out there, and they found nothing. We have a camp of those black foot soldiers set up south of town, and they just marched around and quizzed the innocent folks. Several men said they’d join a posse if you led it.”

  “We must locate the men and get one of them to spill his guts.”

  “Friday and Saturday night let’s get our best cowboys into town buying drinks. Hopefully someone will be drunk enough and talk, and that way, I think, they will find us a lead.”

  “Maybe? What else?”

  “I am taking three good men and do some scouting. If any of us, or the boys in town, can find a lead I bet we can buy or force information out of one of them. There is someone hiding them, and it can’t be that big a secret. If we find the right person, we can learn their whereabouts.”

  Long divided his men up. Two pairs of his Three Star men went with the best two men selected by Hiram. He wanted them to circle around the sites of the attack. On the ranch maps he gave them areas to examine closely. He selected an area in the far corner for his own team.

  Long, Ira, and Collie, along with one packhorse and some food, went the back way and were far down in the ranch acreage by noontime. There was no activity on Horse Creek. They circled Oscar’s ranch and by late afternoon found the eight-acre lake Clyde Nelson spoke to him about buying while in Abilene.

  Before they came over a hill to see it, they heard voices. Long waved his men back immediately. He hoped the ones down there at the lake hadn’t heard or seen them. They hitched their horses back down the hill. Long grabbed his saddlebag.

  Ira shook his head. “We find them?”

  “Either that or some hell-raisers. I hope they were so busy they missed us.”

  Things had quieted down by the time they, on foot, had climbed back up the hill to see.

  “They did not hear us,” Long said.

  At the top of the hill, he brought his field glasses out of the saddlebag and crawled, hatless, on his belly and began to search through the trees and down to the lake. Were those men swimming and wading in the lake the raiders?

  He hoped so. They all looked under thirty. He counted seven of them.

  “You think that’s them?”

  “Yes. We need to get back to the horses and quietly circle this valley and come in from the west. We don’t need to be discovered. I want them alive and so we can get information out of them.”

  “It will be dark by then.”

  “Yes, Ira, but while I don’t know the terrain, I think we can still sneak up on them.”

  “You don’t own this section?”

  “No, Collie. It is so isolated no one wanted it. It was claimed by the Nelson family. His grandfather lived up here, but after he died, no woman in his family would live this far out.”

  Collie shook his head.

  The men chuckled, remounting.

  Long felt success might be coming as the sun set, and under cover of the darkness, they’d reached the heights west of the place. Guided by the campfire below that the men must have cooked on, Long and his men eased their way down the steep slope with only starlight and the fire’s flames guiding them. Ira lost his footing, his butt hit the ground, and he slid about ten feet down the steep slope.

  They regrouped almost snickering.

  “You hurt?”

  “My pride.”

  They moved on slower until they were at last on the flatter ground behind the house. Long eased up to sneak a peek at the men around the fire and listen to them.

  “Yeah, Newman promised us some Mexican women. I ain’t seen one of them yet.”

  “Hell, I bet he brings some tomorrow.”

  “He coming—”

  Long counted eight of them, the same number that earlier were wading in the lake.

  He gave his men a head toss.

  With Ira and Collie, their guns drawn, the three stepped out and he ordered the men to put their hands in the air or be shot. One of them jumped up. Ira shot him and he went facedown. The rest obeyed as the gun smoke drifted away. One by one they were disarmed and told to lie facedown on the ground.

  Ira went and found some rope.

  None of his crew answered the question the men on the ground kept asking. “Who are you?”

  The prisoners secured, Long told Ira to build up the fire.

  “I know you men ride for Newman. A week ago you killed two of my cowboys and shot my fore
man and left him and two more wounded men on the ground. I want the name of the man heading this up.”

  No one spoke.

  “Men, take one of these outlaws down to the lake and keep his head under water until he names their leader and where to find him. If he dies, leave him for the fish and come back and get another.”

  They picked up an outlaw and he screamed, “I’ll tell you. I don’t want to be drowned.”

  “Talk.”

  His name is Albert Newman. He lives with a ranch widow and he works for Fargo Jennings who lives in Dallas. They have a big boss pays them that they won’t name.”

  “Is Newman really coming tomorrow?”

  “Huh?”

  “I heard someone say he was bringing women tomorrow.”

  “He promised us some.”

  “Did he say when?”

  One said, “We don’t know to tell you.”

  They lowered their prisoner back down on the ground.

  Long waved his two men over.

  In a low voice, he said, “We may waste a day hanging around here, but I’d like to have him.”

  “So would we.”

  “Tie their feet. We will share the guard shifts tonight. Put them in the house and wait to see if he shows up.”

  “We’re willing.”

  “This guy they mentioned was in Dallas, you knew about him?”

  “I didn’t know where he went, but I knew Jennings was in this mess. That leaves the big man in Dallas who pays them. We get Newman, we’ll get who their real boss is out of him.”

  “We can do that easy,” Ira said, rubbing his hip, obviously hurting from his earlier slide.

  “If Newman doesn’t come tomorrow we’ll ride back.”

  Both men agreed, and the prisoners were allowed to relieve themselves and then their feet were tied. They knew that any effort to escape meant their death. He felt they were awed enough not to try. His men then brought their horses and packhorse down to the corral.

  Not much sleep for him and his men. The shot outlaw died in the night. Long wasn’t concerned about that.

  Two of their prisoners buried him the next day. Then the seven were held tied up in the nearly fallen-in barn. The day ticked away slowly. Long paced across the bare dirt floor in the living room. Collie guarded the prisoners. Ira had been scouting from the hillside using Long’s glasses. Long turned when his man quietly slipped into the house from the back door.