Shadow on the Land

by Wayne D. Overholser

  They were still running swiftly across the seemingly endless rolling Shaniko Flats. Periodically the moon crawled out from behind ragged black clouds, lighting the lonely sweeps of bunchgrass and sage that somehow seemed timeless, and frightening. Now and then a strident howl sounded from some distant rock point.

  “Coyotes,” Highpockets said. “That one could sure stand tuning. Ever been in Bend?”

  “No.”

  “Great town and great people. Farewell Bend they used to call it when the pioneer wagons left the river there. Gonna be a big town if it gets a railroad. Got a right lively Commercial Club down there already. The way they’re boosting it, they’ll make it the met- . . . metrop- . . . the dad-burnedest, biggest town in eastern Oregon. Take fellers like Doc Coe and Clyde McKay . . . they want a real town, and my money’s on ’em getting one.”

  “Any other towns that might grow?”

  “Lot of ’em think they will. Prineville, that’s the county seat of Crook County, and Redmond, on this side of Bend. There’s Laidlaw. Madras. Shucks, to hear them tell it, they’ll all be big towns.”

  “Jepson City?”

  “Way out in the desert east of Bend. A few buildings and tents, and a couple miles of stakes. Jepson bet on a road coming east across the mountains, and, if he don’t get it, he’ll be sitting in the sagebrush with the jack rabbits. You’ve met up with Jepson?”

  “Met him in Biggs.”

  “He’s a funny critter. He can talk your leg right off about the way this country got made. Kind of sings about it, but he ain’t the kind of man it takes to build a town in this country. Leastwise, I don’t think so. Now that go-getting Bend bunch is different. Say, they put a party on in the Pilot Butte Inn one night that was a party. One of ’em was getting married, and it called for enough likker to wash Pilot Butte right off the map.

  “Had bottles arranged on the table so you could grab ’em from any position, including a prone one. One feller stepped outside, picked up a hose, and started wetting everybody down. Another gent crawled under the table, and every time he poked his head out he got sprayed with seltzer water. Had a big cake iced with gooey stuff an inch thick. Before the party wound up, one feller picks the cake up, and spreads it all over his neighbor’s face.”

  Highpockets chuckled. “Yep, they’re live wires. A couple of ’em got about halfway down Wall Street when they found a young wildcat asleep in front of a store. Reckon he’d just et . . . to be sleeping along so peaceful. Anyhow, they picked him up and fetched him a piece, and, when they got tired toting him, they packed him into a friend’s house and put him into bed with the friend. Well, when the cat woke up along about dawn, he was hungry again, and there was a nice hunk of back meat waiting for him, so he helped himself.” Highpockets laughed and slapped a leg. “Well, sir, next day them fellers had to come back and shingle the roof where their friend went through it.”

  They rode in silence for a time, the horses keeping an even fast pace, the blackness unscarred by light until a campfire gleamed ahead of them. “Somebody live there?” Lee asked.

  “Nope. Just a freighter’s sagebrush fire. Somebody about like Bull, except he wouldn’t be so dad-burned ornery.”

  “Bull goes to Bend?”

  “Goes to Jepson City part of the time. Fact is, he’s freighted for Jepson ever since Jepson staked out the town site. Jepson’s got a store that takes care of what few homesteaders settled out there.”

  “This country around here isn’t worth much, is it?”

  “Just for stock. Gumbo mud that’d mire a snipe in winter, and dust in summers that’d choke a mole. Don’t get much rain. When it does, the bottom falls out of the road. The wind she blows and blows. Feller back there a piece dug himself a well once, and I’ll be dad-burned if the wind didn’t come up and blow the land away. Yes, sir, left that well sticking up in the air. Sure was a funny sight.”

  Lee grinned. “I’ll bet it was.”

  “It’s a fact. It was hard water, but it wasn’t hard enough to stay there. Over in Antelope they’d been toughing out a dry spell. One windy night they snuck over and blasted it. Got themselves a dandy little rain.” He spat over the wheel. “Good thing it was winding, or they’d ’a’ drowned sure.”

  It seemed hours later to Lee when they started down the wicked steepness of Cow Cañon. They emerged from the narrow, winding passage, and passed Haight’s Station. Coming now onto the floor of the narrow valley, the buggy picked up speed.

  “Look over there to the right. That big gap is where Trout Creek cuts down to the river. Harriman’s Deschutes Railroad will pull out of the cañon about there.”

  Lee straightened, fully awake and interested. “How far to the Columbia?”

  “Seventy miles. Eighty maybe. If you’re going to have anything to do with building that railroad, you’ll have to practice bending your bones. About the only way you can look is up. The river’s so crooked in some places that the trout they pull out are shaped like corkscrews.”

  “I won’t be doing any of the building,” Lee said dryly, “so that won’t worry me.”

  Under the seat, Willie stirred in his slumber, and laid his muzzle across Lee’s foot. Remembering the distance he had traveled since he had passed the mouth of the Deschutes, Lee had a more stirring impression of the magnitude of the job ahead of the Oregon Trunk. Seventy or eighty miles of vast cañon that was to be disputed foot by foot, in addition to the natural problems inherent in such terrain.

  “Where’s the Racine Ranch?”

  “That where you’re heading? It’s past Madras. Part way to Trail Crossing on Crooked River. I’ll get another team in Madras and take you on.”

  “I’ve put you out enough.”

  “Nope,” Highpockets said emphatically. “You stuck with me to the end, and, if you hadn’t, them ornery devils would have made mincemeat out of my handsome mug. Never would have looked the same again. Besides, I’m hungry for some of Hanna’s cooking. She’s been gone for quite a spell. I used to go out there and chat with her every week or so.”

  “Gone? Where to?”

  “Oh, Portland. Salem some of the time. She was down there when the legislature was meeting, and I guess she did a lot of good getting that people’s railroad thing passed.”

  This, then, might be the reason for Mike Quinn’s hurry. If Hanna had been away, Quinn would have had no opportunity to see her, and, hearing that she was on her way home, he’d hurried south from The Dalles. But it still gave Lee no explanation of Hanna’s haste.

  “Is Hanna pretty friendly with Jepson?” he asked.

  “Not what you’d call thick, but they see this people’s railroad the same way, so they work together on that. Hanna fell heir to a lot of notions from her daddy, but she’s got her heart in it, too. Herb Racine was an old friend of mine. Someday they’ll get the man that bushwacked him, and I’ll sure dance at his hanging.”

  “Got any notion who did it?”

  Highpockets didn’t say anything for a time. Then he cleared his throat. “I got a notion, but I ain’t for hanging a man on a notion. Herb had a way of making enemies. He’d speak his piece, hell or high water, and he’d tromp on the toes of his best friend if he figured it was the right thing to do. He was coming home from Redmond one night, and somebody drilled him from the rocks when he was coming across Crooked River. They found his body right in the middle of the bridge.”

  “I heard he was pretty set in his ideas about the railroads.”

  “Well, I think he had a good idea. He wanted the state to build the railroads, seeing as Harriman wasn’t doing it. He figured there should be one crossing the Cascades, maybe come up the Santiam and go on through Bend and Jepson City. It’d hook up with the spur that comes into Vale, so our freight would go right on east over the Union Pacific. Anyhow, that’s how come Jepson and Hanna got tied up with it. They’re against a north-south road, and Hanna’s got a fistful of aces. If your outfit . . . or Harriman’s either . . . is gonna cross Crooked River, you’
re gonna buy a right of way through Hanna’s place.”

  “We can condemn a right of way,” Lee said dryly.

  “Yeah.” Highpockets chuckled. “But can two railroads do it? Maybe you’re a little worried about which one is gonna get that right of way. Another thing is the ranchers around her place look to her to call the turn. She’s a smart girl, and her neighbors know it. Start condemning, and you might kick up a piece of real trouble.”

  “You say she’s got a lot of influence?” Lee asked with quick interest.

  “Plenty. Her neighbors will sell right of way if she does, and, if she won’t, they won’t.”

  A knot tied itself around Lee’s stomach. Gone was his neat plan for buying up the property around her, boxing her in, and forcing her to come to his terms. He cursed softly to himself. The only thing left was to argue with a head-strong girl, and Lee had a feeling Hanna Racine could take care of herself in any kind of argument.

  Sometime close to dawn they wheeled into Madras. Highpockets rattled the door of a livery stable until a sleepy-eyed hostler came to open it. With the bays stabled and grained, and a fresh team hitched to the buggy, they rolled on. They were in a more heavily settled country now, and, as they spun on south, the first light of dawn spread across the earth, lighting it with alternate patches of red and purple shadow.

  “We’re almost there,” Highpockets grunted. “Just about in time for breakfast, and, the way my tapeworm is hollering for fodder, I sure could use some.”

  They left the road, turning westward toward the river, and presently, ahead, Lee saw the ranch buildings—a two-story house with a row of naked poplars along the front, a barn, corrals, and a scattering of outbuildings. Smoke lifted from the kitchen chimney, and, as Highpockets pulled the horses to a stop in front of the house, Lee was impressed with the neatness and care everywhere so evident.

  The kitchen door opened, and Hanna Racine stood there, a slight, cool figure in a cotton dress. She gave no greeting, her eyes moving from Highpockets to Lee as if he stood a great distance from her.

  Unabashed, Highpockets chuckled. “Back there about Madras my stomach collapsed. Does it danged near every morning. Sure hope that’s biscuit flour I see on your nose, girl.”

  Smiling reluctantly, Hanna came across the yard, still without greeting Lee, and he knew that the events on the Inland Belle had hurt her woman’s pride as badly as he had feared. Then there was movement under his feet, and an awakening Willie scrambled forward and stood with his forepaws on the side of the buggy. The dog yawned elaborately, and began to wag his tail, his head cocked, one ear up.

  “Why, Lee Dawes! How did you get him?”

  “Stole him,” he said amiably, “and rode all night so I could keep ahead of the lynchers and deliver him to you personally. Now that you have him, they can hang me.”

  The tension ebbing, Lee swung to the ground, and, after a moment of forced soberness, Hanna laughed. “Of course, I believe that. We hang dog stealers down here just like we hang horse thieves. Willie, we have trees, if you like junipers.” Willie had already made that discovery and dashed away. Hanna turned her gaze to Lee, her smile small and stiff. “You’ve earned your breakfast, Mister Dawes. The boys are eating, so you’ll have to put your horses away, Highpockets.” She nodded at Lee. “If you’ll come with me, I’ll show you where to wash.”

  There was a basin, a bucket of water, and a roller towel on the back porch. Hanna motioned to them, and went on into the kitchen where an Indian woman was busy at a huge range. Lee washed, and was combing his hair when Highpockets came from the barn.

  “Hey, Hanna!” Highpockets called through the screen door. “Did you go and buy yourself one of them dad-burned autos?”

  “No.”

  “Then who owns that rig in the barn?”

  The answer was drowned in a clatter of dishes. Highpockets led Lee through the door into the kitchen. Five men were seated at the long table, four of them members of Hanna’s crew.

  Lee paused just inside the door, his eyes riveted on the thick-shouldered man seated across the table from him. “Well, I’ll be damned,” Lee breathed. “I suppose you’ll be popping out of my beer next, Quinn.”

  Chapter Five

  The ranch hands paused in their eating, and Mike Quinn looked up with quick interest, a look of perverse satisfaction in his eyes. There was a moment of silence, in which somebody’s knife clattered loudly as it dropped from his hand to the table. Then Hanna, as if sensing the need to break this sharp unpredictable moment, said: “So you two know each other.”

  Quinn’s face relaxed into a sour grin. “We’d ought to.” Looking at Lee, he added: “Looks like you tangled with a grizzly, Dawes.”

  “Something like that,” Lee said.

  “Sit down.” Hanna motioned toward two empty places. “I did make biscuits, Highpockets.”

  Lee sank into the chair, glancing obliquely at Quinn, who had sobered, the old sense of frustration knifing through him. Across from him, Hanna was bending now to pour Highpockets’s coffee, the set of her finely chiseled features telling Lee that Quinn had probably gotten nowhere with her. She filled Lee’s cup, and in the steaming fragrance of the coffee was a sweeter scent that he knew was hers, and his senses stirred.

  “What did you do with your stage, Highpockets?” she asked.

  “Taking a week off.” Highpockets forked half a dozen sausages onto his plate. “Gonna sit right here till it’s over.”

  “Do you want to break the outfit?” Hanna asked with mock concern.

  “Nope. Just get full. Eat up, Lee. Sure makes Hanna mad when a man just pecks at his grub like you’re doing.”

  “Not all men are as thoughtful as you,” Hanna said coolly.

  Lee’s gaze touched hers, and he felt the rebuke. He lowered his eyes to his plate, knowing that he would have to pay for his lack of gallantry on the Inland Belle.

  “We’re sure losing ground this morning,” one of the hands said. “Takes six months to raise a hog and five minutes for Highpockets to eat it. You ought to ride over to Bend and let Doc Coe look you over. If you ain’t got a hollow leg, I’ll miss my guess.”

  “Never mind, Chris,” Hanna said.

  “I ain’t minding him at all.” Highpockets serenely helped himself to the rest of the sausage. “A gent with a puny appetite like his ain’t much good on a ranch. Right nice of you to pension him off, Hanna.”

  Mary, the Indian girl, took the platter to the kitchen and brought it back filled. Conversation lagged, largely because Highpockets was too busy eating to talk. Lee noted the pleasantness of the big room, planned for utility with big windows for winter light and summer air, the large table so well supplied, the buffet running along the brightly papered inside wall. It was, he thought, like its slight-figured mistress, fundamental and stripped of useless refinements, yet wholesome and warm and appealing.

  The buckaroos left the table as soon as they had finished eating, and there were only the newcomers, with Hanna and Quinn, at the table. Quinn had pushed back his chair and was smoking. Watching him, Lee sensed the amusement that was in the man, the mockery. Irritation stretched Lee’s nerves as he remembered that the big Irishman had beaten him here, had beaten him to Deborah Haig. Curiosity stirred in Lee, then, as he remembered Highpockets saying Deborah had been in the automobile with Quinn in Cow Cañon.

  Regretfully Highpockets shoved back from the table. “Sure is a hard decision, Hanna, leaving all that good grub. What time’s dinner?”

  “You can have it now.”

  “Why, I guess I’ll just take me an appetizer.” He reached for another sausage, and popped it into his mouth as he went out.

  Hanna looked at Lee, her eyes questioning. “Quinn’s a Harriman man, so, Dawes, I suppose you belong to Hill.”

  Lee had filled his pipe, and took a moment to light it. “I work for the Oregon Trunk. I don’t belong to any man.”

  The girl shrugged. “I’ve been trying to tell Quinn this since late last night wh
en I got home, and I’ll repeat it for your benefit. I’m selling no right of way through my place. Neither are my neighbors. That’s why I hurried home from Shaniko. I haven’t been here for several months, and, when I heard rumors that Hill and Harriman were finally moving, I knew I’d better get back and talk to my neighbors again. I did, and found that I had nothing to worry about. They haven’t changed, and neither have I. So, gentlemen, unless you want to help Mary with the dishes, the meeting’s over.”

  “She does hold to that word no.” Quinn grinned wryly. “And her neighbors use it so much it gets monotonous. The Oregon Trunk won’t buy a right of way through here, my friend. So, unless you want to help with the dishes . . .”

  “I have two dishcloths, Mister Quinn.” Hanna looked at Lee sharply. “You are working for Jim Hill, aren’t you?”

  “The Oregon Trunk.”

  Quinn snorted. “Hill isn’t fooling anybody.”

  “He isn’t fooling me.” Hanna leaned across the table. “Mister Dawes, this talk about Jim Hill being an empire builder simply makes me sick . . . unless you mean Hill’s own empire! He comes with blandishments and stays to fill his pockets. Look what he did in Spokane. Look at his terminal rate scheme. You’re a railroad man, so you know that we pay more freight on goods from the East than they do on the coast. The railroads justify it by claiming they have to meet ocean rates, which the Panama Canal will make possible. Do you know anything about the finances of Hill’s Great Northern?”

  “Well, I . . .”

  “If you did, you wouldn’t want to admit it. They’re so afraid of revealing their profits by declaring them in dividends that they spend millions in expansion to cover them up. That might well be the very reason James J. Hill is now interested in building a railroad up the Deschutes. If he is.”