Callaghen (1972)

by L'amour, Louis

  Bolin took a step back and stared up at Callaghen, stared right into the bullet that killed him. There was an instant when he saw it there before him... knew it for what it was.

  There had been other firing too. Callaghen took a step back, and looked. Barber was down, shot twice through the chest. Spencer was staring at him, dazed, and suddenly aware for the first time of what had happened.

  "That was a good job, Spencer," Callaghen said. "You're a good man."

  He turned swiftly and ran up the trail and into the cedars.

  Champion heard the shooting, prowling among the trees and searching for the women. He'd have them. If that Callaghen would just hold the others off...

  He stepped for a moment out on high ground with a long view off to the northeast. He could see Table Mountain, he could see... It was a column of blue-clad soldiers, riding rapidly toward the head of Wild Horse Canyon.

  Soon they would be coming up the mesa. They would have heard the shooting, and they would be coming fast. And there were a lot of men down there maybe fifty or more.

  Champion was not a man who wasted time making up his mind. The mesa was all of three to four miles long and there was a good horse down yonder. If he made it to the end of the mesa, left the horse, and went down the steep side and disappeared into the Providence Mountains yonder they wouldn't have much chance of finding him.

  He knew where there was water and a cave or two, and... He went for the horse with a rush.

  Callaghen came up the slope and saw his horse standing before him. Hit rifle was empty, and he reached up to slide it into the scabbard when he heard a scramble of feet. Startled, the horse sprang forward, and Callaghen found himself, empty-handed, face to face with Champion.

  He did the logical thing. He swung a left to the head and followed it with a plunging dive that knocked Champion back into the cedars. Champion's rifle was knocked from his grip, and he went down fighting. Both men rolled free and came up fast. This was the sort of thing Champion loved. At a dozen trappers' camps he had never been beaten, at rendezvous and barroom he had been tested, by cattle camp and buffalo pit, he had fought. He went in swinging, a bear of a man, mostly rawhide and iron by the feel of him.

  Callaghen was up and Champion's rush swept him backward. Unable to brace himself, he caught Champion's shoulders and let himself fall, letting the drive of his opponent's lunge carry him on over. Champion hit hard, but rolled over and came up fighting. Callaghen split his lips with a straight left, but Champion came on in, slugging and clawing for Callaghen's eyes. It was a fight for life. Callaghen went down again, but hooked both hands hard to the face as he hit on his back, then smashed upward with his head to meet Champion's descending face.

  Champion stabbed with thumbs for his eyes, and clamped him hard with a scissors-hold on his ribs, slashing with his thumbnails, allowed to grow long for just such a purpose. Callaghen felt a stab of pain as one slashed at his cheek, then threw up his legs and hooked them under Champion's chin, forcing his head back.

  He tried to grip Champion's legs to hold them tight so he could break the man's neck, but the mountain man was too old a fighter for that. He suddenly released his grip on Callaghen and rolled back, turning his head slightly to sink his teeth into the calf of Callaghen's leg.

  Callaghen let go his hold, and then again both men were on their feet.

  Champion was shorter, but much heavier. He wiped the blood from his lips and came in swinging. Callaghen caught him with both fists as he came in, but Champion wasn't even slowed down. Callaghen met him head-on and they stood, toe-to-toe, slugging viciously. Both men were cut, both were bleeding. Callaghen's breath was coming in great gasps, for he had just run up the trail and the fight had caught him unawares.

  Champion was grinning. He landed a right in Callaghen's midsection and Callaghen felt his knees going. Champion took a step back and hit him on the chin. Callaghen went to one knee, and as Champion stepped closer he lunged forward, throwing his right arm around Champion's leg for a single-leg pickup.

  Champion's leg was swept high and he fell, coming down hard into the dust on his shoulder blades. Callaghen backed off, glad of a chance to catch his breath, but as Champion got to his feet Callaghen went in again, ducked under a right swing and, thrusting an arm between Champion's legs, he dumped him again with a fireman's carry, slamming him into the rocks.

  Champion got up more slowly this time. For the first time he was aware that this was a fight he might not win. The soldiers would be reaching the rocks, and although the horse was there, he would need a moment's start. He had to get this man, and get him quick and good. Hands held high to protect his head and face, crouched slightly to offer less of a target, he moved in, and Callaghen feinted. Instantly, Callaghen brought up a whipping right uppercut that snapped Champion's head back hard. A swing with the left to the exposed head, and Champion staggered, almost going down.

  Callaghen came in fast, feinting again and kicking the shorter man on the kneecap. Champion started to fall and Callaghen hit him again; but suddenly Champion lunged and Callaghen tried to sidestep, but he was not fast enough and Champion's hard head smashed him in the belly.

  He felt himself falling, glimpsed Champion stooping for a big rock, and as he hit the ground he rolled over and came to his hands and knees. Champion was lifting the rock over his head, but Callaghen picked up a short, thick chunk of dead cedar and threw it at Champion's face. Unable to duck because of the huge stone he held, he threw it at Callaghen. It fell short, but the flying stick struck him on the arm as Callaghen went in.

  He caught Champion with hands down and threw a hard right to the chin. The trapper backed up, blinking, and Callaghen followed, feinted, and hit him in the solar plexus. Champion bent over and Callaghen slammed a knee into his face. He fell forward on hands and knees and then there were blue-clad soldiers everywhere.

  Callaghen backed up and sat down on a rock, gasping for breath.

  "Are you all right?"

  Callaghen looked up to see Captain Marriott. He started to rise, but Marriott said, "Sit still. You've done a good job, Sergeant."

  He paused a moment. "I have been ordered to place you under arrest."

  "Arrest?"

  "Yes, Sergeant. Major Sykes is under the impression you deserted your command to join the ladies in their coach. That you coerced them into leaving the route to Vegas, and that you have, in effect, deserted."

  "But that's nonsense, Captain. Lieutenant Sprague will tell you "

  "Sprague is dead, Sergeant. He died at Marl Springs. The stage driver is dead, and so are most of his command. I doubt if any of the others will know anything about it."

  Callaghen got up slowly. Dizzy from punches, still panting from the fight, he was trying to understand what exactly had happened. "What about MacBrody?"

  "He knows nothing. He understood Sprague had sent you on a scout, from what Sprague had said, and that you located the stage and led it to Marl Springs. He did not actually hear Sprague direct you to accompany the stage as an escort."

  "The Delaware knows."

  "Good. Although I doubt if Major Sykes will accept his word for it. Both the Delaware and MacBrody are known to be friends of yours."

  Captain Marriott put his hand inside his coat. "There is this, of course. It had arrived, and I believe it was to be delivered to you at the earliest possible moment, so I took it upon myself to do so."

  His face was expressionless. "You have been a good soldier, Sergeant, and I respect that. From all I have heard, if Sprague were here he would add his word to that. I believe you will have no trouble."

  Callaghen glanced at the paper... his discharge... dated almost three weeks earlier. Allowing for time for it to arrive at Camp Cady...

  "Thank you, Captain," he said. "Thank you very much."

  He started to move away slowly, for he was sore in every part of his body, and he was only now beginning to realize what a rough go Champion had given him.

  Champion, guarded by two
soldiers, his face battered and scarred, stood still when he saw him. "Hear you're gettin' out soon. If you ever need a partner... say to hunt for a lost mine or somethin', you just call on Champion."

  "Sorry." Callaghen shook his head, smiling. "I might have to lick you again, and I'm not sure I could do it."

  The desert was still. They saw no Indians on the long ride back to Camp Cady. The air was hot, but it held no malice. They made stops at Rock Springs, at Marl, Soda Lake, and Cave Canyon.

  Callaghen nodded toward the walls of Cave Canyon. "There are places back yonder where a man can stand and look up three or four hundred feet. You'd think you were in a cathedral."

  The fluted columns were pink, beige, and gray, with darker shadows where the hollows were filled with mystery.

  Malinda rode beside him. "Mort, what now?" she asked.

  "Why, maybe I'll find a town where they need a marshal, and while doing that job I might study law. You had a point there."

  "There's the desert," Malinda said.

  "Yes, and I'll wake up in the night and remember it. As it is now, and as it should always be."

  "What about the River of Gold?"

  "I'll think about it from time to time. I am sure it is there, and I think I know where it is, but when I follow a dream for thirty years like some of these desert rats, there's got to be more at the end than a pot of gold."

  The mountains stretched their shadows over the desert, a wind played with the sand on a slope, wearied of it, and let it fall. The Mohave River, along which they rode, from time to time made a ripple over rocks, hurrying onward to its destiny in the Sinks far ahead. There it disappeared in the sand, and reappeared in the dark, silent caverns far underground. Here and there on its way it dropped a few flakes of gold.

  "I hope nobody ever finds it," Malinda said. "It should always be there, just to be looked for."

  The End

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