by Elmer Kelton
“Maybe you won’t need them, maybe you will. They’ll be here, anyway.”
Then Gorman said, “I’ve been listening a little while I’ve been here. I don’t think we’re apt to have a lot of trouble, except from this man Ebeling, maybe. He sounds to me like one who won’t take it lying down.”
Kyle said, “He’ll take it lying down. Dead, I hope.”
Gorman grunted again. “This Ebeling sounds like a man after my own heart. I almost wish I had him with me.”
Kyle shot him a cutting glance. “You try to make a deal with Ebeling and you’ll both be dead. I promise you that.”
The color rose in Gorman’s face, and he knew that Kyle meant it. Dropping that subject, he reached into a handbag and took out a map and a sheaf of land certificates. He handed them to Kyle.
“Which one do you figure on starting with?”
Kyle studied the map, seeing every ranchman in his mind’s eye. Brook Emmett. Well he had already told Emmett. Lester McLeod. Lester might fight. Yes, he probably would. Milt McGivern, maybe? Thomas Avery? Ferman Olds? They weren’t likely to fight. They would stampede easy, with just a little push.
His finger traced down the creek to Clint Ebeling’s ranch. There it stopped. Ebeling. Kyle’s fist tightened, crumpling the land certificates.
“Careful there,” Gorman said sharply. “They’re valuable.” Then he looked at the map and saw the name penciled above Kyle’s finger.
“Ebeling, eh? You’re starting with him?”
Kyle shook his head. “I’ll save him for the last.”
Gorman shrugged disinterestedly. “Makes no difference to me where you start. I’m interested in the finish. We’ve got no time to fiddle. I’ve got a herd already on its way up from the Rio Grande. They’ll be here in two weeks, three at the most. These people have got to be off the land. I’ll need every acre they’ve got.”
Kyle said, “They’ll be off.”
Gorman didn’t offer to get them a room at the hotel. Probably because of Enrique, Kyle thought with a touch of anger. So they’d sleep at the wagon yard. Enrique didn’t care, anymore. He had been at the top, and he’d been at the bottom.
As a boy Kyle had thrilled at Enrique’s stories of his years as a rebel in Mexico. It seemed that whenever there was a revolution, Enrique was in it, always as a rebel. There was so much to fight about, a man could always find a reason. But mostly it had been the adventure, the wild freedom, that had called Enrique.
“Insurrecto or bandido,” Enrique had once said. “The difference is not always a great one.”
But time had tamed him down, and he had escaped across the Rio Grande one night with nothing but his horse and saddle, the clothes on his back, and an old hat with two fresh bullet holes in it.
He liked to talk about the old times, but to go back to them—that was no longer to be considered.
Enrique seemed always to be able to take it in stride when men looked down on him the way some were wont to do with a Mexican. But somehow it was different when the man was someone like John Gorman.
“Don’t ever be bothered with what another man thinks or says,” Enrique had advised Kyle a long time ago. “You live with yourself. Listen to your conscience, not to other men.”
Kyle didn’t sleep much that night, thinking about what he would do. In the morning, when he and Enrique shook the hay out of their blankets, he said, “We’ll start with Lester McLeod.”
He rode into McLeod’s ranch yard shortly before noon. Enrique followed two lengths behind him, like a reluctant soldier following his lieutenant.
Kyle swung down and looked around for McLeod. A cotton-headed boy of seven or eight came poking out from behind a shed. He looked just like McLeod.
“I’m hunting your pa,” Kyle said. “Where is he?”
“Out getting a horse. He’ll be in directly,” the boy answered.
Waiting, Kyle led his horse down to the creek and watered him. McLeod, like Sam Whittenburg, had done a lot of work since the last time Kyle had been here. There was a new house now, built of rocks hauled from farther down the creek. Out in back, a small irrigation system had been gouged out of the earth, and vegetables stood green and fresh. A woman’s work, no doubt.
McLeod wouldn’t want to leave this place, Kyle knew. That made it better. He had felt something of a letdown at the way old Brook Emmett had taken the news. There was no satisfaction in running out a man who didn’t care anyway.
Kyle watched the boy playing with a matty-haired little brown dog. The boy was swinging a slingshot back and forth while the dog trotted ahead, testing every bush and weed. Presently he flushed a jackrabbit. The boy quickly fitted a rock into the sling, swung, and let fly. The rock kicked up dust at the rabbit’s heels, and the dog kept on coming. Then the rabbit darted down a hole. The dog stood over it, barking furiously.
Then he gave it up and went trotting on after the boy, who was looking for fresh game. Watching them, Kyle was able to relax, at least a little.
Enrique saw it. “Like this, hijo, you are the boy who used to live up the creek. This way, I like you. But this bitter Kyle Rayford, this boy eaten up with hate—I don’t know what to think about him.”
Kyle didn’t answer, but the spell was broken. He was frowning again when McLeod finally came riding in, leading a horse at the end of a rope. McLeod put the horse in a corral and slipped the rope off its neck. It wasn’t until he was close that he recognized Kyle.
They stared at each other, Kyle afoot, McLeod still on his horse. Kyle could well remember, and a hard knot grew inside him. This was the man who had pushed his father’s body out of the saddle, letting it fall in the mud. Kyle’s voice was edged with steel.
“I’ve been waiting for you, McLeod.” McLeod could see the smoldering in Kyle’s eyes and misread its meaning. “I’m not armed, Kyle.” He raised his hands so Kyle would see there was no gun at his hip.
“I didn’t come to shoot you, McLeod.”
McLeod loosened, letting out a long breath. “What did you come for?”
Kyle didn’t answer directly. “How much land you running now, McLeod?”
“About thirty sections.” McLeod’s voice was wary.
“You’ve got about six sections along the creek, isn’t that right?”
McLeod nodded.
“I’m here to tell you to get your cattle off the creek. That land belongs to another man now.”
McLeod’s face fell, then flushed red. For a moment he was obviously turning this over and over in his mind, desperately looking for a hole in it.
“I can’t do that. The rest of my country would be worthless.”
Kyle nodded grimly. “I know that.”
McLeod sat numbly staring at him. “Look, Kyle, I know you got it pretty raw four years ago. I know you’ve got something coming to you. But not this. Everything I’ve got is here—home, cattle, years of work. I’ve even got folks buried up yonder on the hill. You don’t think I’m going to pull up and leave all that!”
“You’re going to leave it, McLeod. You’ve got three days. Get your cattle off the creek by then or we’ll put them off. And if you’re not gone from here, we’ll put you off, too. The same way you did it to me.”
Kyle turned his back then, stuck his left foot in the stirrup, and mounted his horse.
McLeod sat straight in his saddle. He was a tall man with a sharp, strong, determined face, a hard eye. Of all the bunch, besides Ebeling, Kyle knew McLeod was the most likely to fight.
McLeod said, “You’ll have to kill me first.”
Kyle answered evenly, “It’s your choice.”
He turned his horse around, glancing once back over his shoulder. “Three days, McLeod. We’ll be back.”
From McLeod’s, he angled across to the Ferman Olds place. With Olds, it was much the same except that he could see the fear crawl in behind the man’s eyes, and he knew there would be no trouble with him.
That day, and the next, he saw the rest of them. Thomas Avery,
Milt McGivern, and the others.
Then Clint Ebeling.
Kyle’s stomach drew up in a knot as he rode through the open gate that led to the Ebeling headquarters. It wasn’t fear; it was an excitement that had grown from the long anticipation.
Even Enrique didn’t seem to object to this visit. He had hung back on the others, taking no part except just to be there, and keep his hands clear. He would have helped Kyle if there had been trouble. But he had made it plain from the start that he didn’t like it.
Now Enrique rode beside him, stirrup to stirrup. And early this morning Kyle had awakened to find the Mexican cleaning and polishing his old Colt.
Kyle smiled. This was the Enrique of old, the fearless vaquero who had helped Earl Rayford rear and train Kyle, who had taught Kyle how to hold and throw a rope, and more than once had busted Kyle’s britches when Kyle had been thrown off a horse and didn’t want to get back on. This was the old warrior, the old rebel, not anxious for battle any more, but ready for it if it came.
Clint Ebeling was waiting for them. He stepped out in front of his sod house and stood there, thumbs in his gun belt. He rocked back on his heels a little, defiant, evidently not worried. He was even grinning. Ebeling always had that grin. It used to remind Kyle of a wolf.
Kyle looked at him, and an ancient hatred seeped through him like the spread of a poison.
Warily then he glanced around him for sign of any of Ebeling’s men. He saw only one, a dour cowboy who had worked for Ebeling a good many years. This man walked out from behind Ebeling and halted beside his boss, standing clear, his face tense.
“I’ve been looking for you, Rayford,” Ebeling said. “Heard what you’ve been telling the others, and figured you’d be here today.”
“Then you know what I was going to tell you.”
Ebeling nodded. “And you know the answer. I’m not leaving.”
Gravely Kyle said, “Suits me. I’ve been kind of hoping you’d want to put up a fight.”
Ebeling was still grinning. “The years haven’t taught you much sense, have they, Rayford? You know that was just a lucky fluke with Thatcher. You couldn’t do it again. You may bluff the others out with it; they’re a bunch of runny-nosed cowards anyway. But you’re not bluffing me.”
“It’s no bluff, Ebeling. Try me, if you think it is.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Kyle saw Enrique’s hand dip and come up. A split second after the blast, he heard a surprised yelp and a cry of pain from a window to his left, and a clatter of a rifle to the floor.
The man beside Ebeling started to move, then froze in place. Ebeling never budged, but his grin was gone.
Kyle’s gun was out. He saw a movement and squeezed the trigger. Splinters flew from the corner of the picket shed. Benny Ahrens jumped out, terrified, his hands in the air.
For a moment they all froze there that way, looking at each other. A deep anger purpled Ebeling’s face.
Kyle cocked the hammer of his gun back, the ominous click as loud as thunder.
“You see now it’s no bluff, Ebeling. The old Slash R is mine. Everything else on the water belongs to John Gorman. Be off of it with your stock in three days, or we’ll put them off. And we’ll run over anybody who gets in the way.”
They backed their horses a few steps, then turned quickly and left in a fast trot. Even when they were well out of six-gun range, Kyle half expected someone to send a bullet searching after them. It never came.
After they had ridden a while, Kyle turned to Enrique. “Thanks, compadre. I’m glad you were with me.”
Enrique shrugged. “Por nada. The other places, I was not glad. This place, it is different.”
The day of McLeod’s deadline, they left town before sunup. Riding with Kyle and Enrique, somewhat against Kyle’s will, were the three gunmen, Dangerfield, Hallmark and Lykes. John Gorman had not elected to go along.
“That’s what I hired you for,” he growled.
It was easy to see that McLeod had not attempted to meet the deadline. Riding to the creek, Kyle could see McLeod cattle up and grazing in the cool morning wind. The heat of midday would drive them to shade.
The corners of Kyle’s mouth turned down. If that was the way the hand was dealt, that was the way he would play it.
“If he won’t move them, we will,” he said. He made a signal with his hand. The riders fanned out and began to push the cattle ahead of them.
By the time they reached McLeod’s headquarters, they had three or four hundred head of longhorn cattle strung out in a dusty line, cows and calves bawling for each other, men shouting and pushing them on.
McLeod’s rock house rose into view as they worked down a gentle slope. Kyle looked toward the sheds and pole corrals, and his hand dropped to his hip.
Several horsemen stood their mounts there waiting. Even at the distance, he knew them. In the center, squared and straight in the saddle, Lester McLeod sat with a rifle balanced in front of him. The other men were McGivern, Avery and two more who had been given their notice.
Kyle was not surprised to see them here. He had half expected them. But he hadn’t expected to see Sam Whittenburg. Yet there he was.
Enrique pulled his horse up close to Kyle’s. “It is as I told you. They do not go without a fight.”
Kyle’s lips flattened. “Then that’s what we’ll give them.”
Enrique’s black eyes narrowed. “Wait, ichacho. Hear me first.” His voice was even and deliberate. “Too long I have ridden with you and kept the silence. Now you will listen. This is wrong. It has been wrong from the beginning. Will this mistake you are making bring back your father? Would he be proud of you today? He wouldn’t be. I’m not proud, either.
“Look, hijo, it has been four years now—four years. These people have changed, what happened here is past. Leave the past where it belongs. Bury it with the dead.”
Kyle started to pull away. Enrique pressed after him. “Sam is here. What if something happens to Sam?”
Kyle’s fist clenched against the saddle horn. What business was this of Sam’s? What did he want to come poking in here for?
“He shouldn’t have come.” Kyle turned away from Enrique and motioned to the nearest man, Jack Dangerfield. “I’m going on up to talk to them. If there’s trouble, you know what to do.”
Dangerfield nodded sullenly and turned back. Kyle said, “Coming, Enrique?”
In Enrique’s eyes was the same look Kyle used to see as a kid when he hadn’t done something the way Enrique had taught him. But the old man touched spurs to his horse and came up alongside Kyle. Together they loped ahead of the herd, to where the horsemen waited. They hauled up ten feet from them, the dust swirling into the riders’ faces.
Hostility passed like a spark between them. Sam Whittenburg was the first to speak. “You’re making a mistake, Kyle.”
Kyle shot him a quick, annoyed glance. “You shouldn’t be here, Sam. This is none of your business.”
“They’re my friends, just like you’re my friend. They made a mistake once. You’re fixing to make a big one now.”
“Looks like I’m entitled to it.”
Sam leaned forward, grasping for words. “It won’t right the wrong that was done before. It’ll just add to the misery that’s already been. You’ve still got time to stop it, Kyle. These men could be your friends. They could help you get back what you’ve lost, if you’d give them the chance.”
Enrique touched Kyle’s arm. “Listen to him, hijo. Sam talks good sense.”
But Kyle could still remember four years ago. And he could hear the bawling of the McLeod herd pressing in close behind him.
He shook his head. “It’s too late, Enrique. We’ve already made our deal.”
McLeod said, “Then I’m going to stop you.” His spurs tinkled as he touched them to his bay horse and started forward.
Kyle turned quickly in the saddle and waved his hand. The three gunmen fired their guns into the air and began to shout like uncaged demons. A s
hock wave of fear struck the herd like a bolt of lightning. In an instant the plodding cattle jumped into a run. For the space of two seconds the five horsemen in front of Kyle stared, uncertain as to what to do.
There was nothing they could do. With that start, and the three men still chousing them like the furies, the cattle wouldn’t stop running for anything.
Kyle caught the raw hatred in McLeod’s eyes. Then McLeod jerked his horse away and made a run toward the cattle. The other men followed him, but it would be futile.
Sam Whittenburg held back a moment. “You won’t be proud of this day, Kyle,” he said regretfully.
Kyle and Enrique drew aside, letting the flood of cattle pour past them. They watched the five horsemen in front feverishly trying to turn the cattle. But they were like rocks in a flooded stream. The cattle poured around them, unheeding.
The drags passed. Gorman’s men were still riding hard, shouting and firing their guns.
“Keep them running,” Kyle said. “Don’t stop till you’ve got them miles off the creek.”
He saw McLeod coming back in a lope now. McLeod’s face was purple with rage, and he had the rifle in his hand.
“Don’t do it, McLeod,” Kyle shouted. But McLeod jerked his horse to a stop and raised the rifle. There wasn’t time to think. Kyle ducked low and grabbed at his own gun. He heard the heavy crash of the rifle and the whine of the bullet going past him. As McLeod levered another cartridge into the breech, Kyle raised his gun and squeezed the trigger.
McLeod jerked back, dropping the rifle, then slid out of the saddle. Instantly Kyle was on the ground, running toward him. He kicked the rifle aside, then knelt by McLeod. He saw the splotch of red where the bullet had smashed through, high in the shoulder.
In fury McLeod weakly swung at him with his left hand, then slumped over, moaning. Kyle caught him and eased him to the ground.
“What did you do that for?” Kyle said, reproach in his voice. “Look what you made me do.”
From the house he heard a scream. A woman burst out of the door and ran toward him, her skirts flying. Another woman followed after her, trying to call her back. From somewhere McLeod’s boy appeared. He had the slingshot, and he reached down for a rock. Kyle heard the singing of it, then the rock struck him in the chest, taking the breath out of him and almost knocking him over. The youngster came running, crying and cursing in the imitation curse words a boy uses.
