The Hell Bent Kid

by Charles O Locke

  About a mile from home heard horsefeet and turned and saw Nita riding on that little mare of hers. I stopped and abused the girl. Abused is the word. I am ashamed of what I said to her, but the objective was reached and she turned back. But if looks could have killed …

  I went on. The sky was getting bright and the sun was rimming up real good, and it looked like a nice day. I pushed Jake the first miles and then heard a shot ahead and then some more. Next I saw sitting on his horse George Beaton, with whom I had never been good friends since he grew 400 cows taller, with consequent damage to his formerly sweet personality. So I was not in the mood to more than howdy him and not too warm at that. He started to say something possibly about my sour looks but I staved him off. I knew what he was there for—to watch the back trail in case Lohman foxed to the rear. Ahead of me was the big prone finger of gradual rise, masking the steep slope beyond and this, of course, I could not see yet. This rise jutted out enough to make my forward trail curl like a snake, first sharp right around the base and sharp left across the flat beyond. I knew when I rode around that dirt finger I would probably see what I came for. And did.

  There spread across the big down end of the funnel was quite a party. The other end of the funnel reached the sky and the target seemed to be up there, but right before me lower down was what looked like two dozen mule and wagon trains scattered by Sioux. All the elite had come out for the show. There was horses and men on them, and spring wagons and buckboards. Over to the left was the brave cattlemen surrounding Hunter Boyd. They were looking very serious-like and scanning the rise with fancy glasses now and then. In the middle was us common people, and to the right was the saloon gentry of Santa Rosa. Most of these people was trying appear that they had not carefully posted themselves out of rifle range and trying to act nonchalant, with their hands in their pockets, or on hips, chewing tobacco and spitting careful.

  Situation was easy to read at first glance. Up toward the top with blue sky behind, was a boulder, big as a church, behind which Lohman was making his stand. Might have been a mile up the rise. Sprinkled like sheep-marbles down the slope was about four or five men including young Tom Boyd (I found this out later) and they were whaling away at the boulder in a kind of stupid way at the rate of about a shot a minute. Tom was using a big rifle that carried a heavier weight of grain than I knew existed and made a lot of noise against the clean, thin plunk of the other guns and now and then a shotgun blast like dry sticks rattling.

  Apparently no shooting from the other end—Tot was saving his shell, as always. It seemed likely to me that the boy was depending on his own supply, having left my cache at the house untook from. Some people are too damned independent.

  I cut my sights over to the left where Hunter and his people were directing the operations. “Well, gentlemen,” I says. “The fox is up the rise but where are your fine, red coats.” Hunter’s face at this point would have colored a coat all right.

  Nothing else happened, so I sat my horse and listened to the boys up the hill bang away. It went on for quite some time, with every once in a while the shots getting thicker when some attacking gent decided it was well to show enthusiasm.

  I turned my attention for a while to the Santa Rosa crowd, which included some of the most outstanding drink cadgers in the region, congratulated them on their feeling for law and order and suggested that somebody ought to hire a hall and make a speech or if the show kept up for a reasonable time it might be good to mule-tow a bar out here and serve drinks.

  I saw Ferdy Maxwell edging to me across from the cattle crowd, looking apologetic. He pointed out to me the three men Tot had hit so far. Two had their right arms shawled up around the shoulder with bloody rags. Naturally they had been on the left-hand side of the slope. But the cowpoker who was on the ground with gray death in his face had picked the bad side—the right, and he had got it slantwise and long and mean in the left leg, seeing how a man getting off shots from a reclining position up a high rise will throw out his left leg natural to brace a bead on the target.

  Ferdy said in his soft-voiced apologetic way that so far the Kid had done good. He said as far as they could figure he’d gotten off only five shots and badly damaged three men. He explained then that Hunter Boyd had everything well organized and even had a man keeping a shot tally on the Kid, as they were pretty sure he was due to be starved out on cartridges.

  I complimented Ferdy on Hunter Boyd’s efficiency, and just at that minute the Kid got off a shot. It apparently came close to a shotgun toter with a sawed-off leg who was halfway up the slope, about even with Tom Boyd on the other side of the gut. I think the Kid maybe had drew blood as from where I sat my horse I could see Pegleg sucking at the back of his left hand. The shot was talked about considerable. I say this just to show you how simple-minded even growed men can get under stress of novel excitement.

  Economy was the Lohman motto, but not on the other side. As soon as the slug from yonder was duly tallied, commented on and discussed freely on the basis of “How many’s he got left?” the shooting enthusiasm on the downside hit a high mark. The boys blazed away at the rock, and twice in fifteen minutes a runty hunchback who portered a saloon owned by kin of the Boyds rolled himself up the slope like a crippled hoop with shell for the besiegers and a rifle for Peg-leg. He had a certain extent of guts, of course, moving in the open, but it was planned like that, it being as you know wrong to shoot a hunchback and considered beyond that the worse luck that can befall a man.

  Bang, bang, bang, it went on like that, with not a shot from Lohman. The besiegers, of course, were covering the fact that they were not moving up the rise and were scared juiceless, doing their best with noise to show they were conscientious men.

  About this time Boyd parted from the group and rode across my sights. I called to him, “Hunter, what are you trying to do, rock-drill him out from behind that dornick?”

  Hunter tried to make out he didn’t hear me and kept going over to the Santa Rosa people to say something.

  Trying to figure a way to help Lohman, I tried to figure what I would do in Boyd’s place. No chance of burning the Kid out, as there wasn’t enough brush on that rise to warm the south end of a northbound louse. I thought of a powder charge then with a fuse, and hated myself for it instantly, thinking I might have loosed the idea in the air, because either by coincidence or something else I heard Hunter say “keg” to one of the Santa Rosa people, then turn and wave to Snake Biller, his new foreman, and Hal Carmody, his old, who was attending the shindig with his arm in a sling. Right away they wheeled their mounts and ran for town.

  Hunter lingered with the Santa Rosa gentry.

  Bang, bang, bang, it went on up the rise with no shots from Lohman. Bang, bang, bang. Only the emphasis was a little different because of Tom Boyd and his sheep gun. Every time that son of a bitch let go, it shook the ridge and I knew for a fact if it ever connected with Lohman it would blow him to China.

  Now Hunter drifted back to his people across my front and I will say this, that I believe I killed Tom Boyd in the next five minutes just as if my hand had been aiming the rifle. I made a strong play to Hunter and this time he stopped without looking at me. As if he wanted and did not want to hear what I had to say.

  Gabby as I was with a half a hangover and strong coffee and all, I said: “Why, for goodness sake, Hunter, if you want the Kid this bad, I may be able to talk him out of there, but what’s the use of trying to ballast a mountain with lead. I’ve watched those boys up the rise now for half an hour and they merely bang off and don’t move a hair toward the target. ’Fraid to. They are yellowed out and I cannot say I blame them, knowing how Lohman can shoot. Why not let me argufy with him, rather than more get hurt?” Course, I had to shout all this.

  I could see Boyd wince, but the one who really did the wincing was Tom. It was plain, far as he was from where I sat my horse. He had heard every word in the lull and he could not stand that part about not moving. So now he moved possibly an inch, maybe
a little more.

  Upstairs there was another move behind the rock and a yellow dent in the blue. The shot’s impact or the spasm of death, whichever it was, cartwheeled Tom Boyd ass over teakettle into the clear. It was like a man being drug by a lyncher or a doll pulled on a string. With his back bowed in a horrible way, he jerked and jerked on his head and heels in full view of all of us, then started rolling down the slide and never stopped till he rolled a quarter mile. The heavy gun came clattering down on top of him. He reached the flat and stopped with one leg clamped under his body looking like a rag doll a child had thrown away. And his post-mortem wind came out of his mouth in a big whish like “Uh” and then “Uh-h-h-h-” dying off. Old Man Boyd sat his horse and stared, never moved.

  The shooting stopped. The four men left on the rise we had new respect for. No wonder they’d froze to base. They knew just how uncanny that little squirt was with his sawed-off Winchester. It would have been better for Tom if he had stayed yellow. He heard what I said and got a sudden rush of proud blood to the head and moved an inch. Dead.

  After all the shooting it seemed very quiet. The men on the rise had craned their necks as much as they dared to see where Tom went, but, of course, their view was limited. But still they didn’t shoot. Looked like men painted on the hillside. I half believe they were so concerned at the small move Tom had made which cost him his life that they were scared to move enough to pull a trigger. Or maybe they were just getting over the shock. I was, you might say, jolted out of my cogitations by somebody saying, “What’s he throwing away—empty cartridges? What’s he doing that for?” That turned my gaze up the rise and it was true, something was happening up by the big boulder, because I caught the glint of something bright in the air above the rock. Then there was more talk, then more quiet. It was like we knew in advance.

  Ferdy had been kind enough to lend me his glasses now and then when I asked for them. Not that I needed them for ordinary purposes for the day was clear and the sun hot and bright, making everything on the slope sharp and clear. Toward the latter end of the shooting party, though, the sun began to dodge in and out among clouds and the light on the slope changed now and then, first shady, then streaked, then dark, and then bright again but when the big thing happened the sun was direct and clear and you could see details on the high rise like a gopher hole or a loose rock or pebble bigger than the rest. And you could see rock seams and small shadows made by deeper cuts.

  Lohman came out from behind the boulder with his arms spread. He was the only one who was not surprised including me. I was speechless, so was Boyd, and there was a vague sound from some of the rest. As for the shooting men on the slope, they were so surprised that I am sure Lohman took about twenty steps and came out at least fifteen, twenty yards from cover before anyone exhibited presence of mind. Then all four let go and four slugs hit him in the chest, so that the shot pattern that I checked later was not more than two inches across. It lifted him off his feet and the sun did a curious thing. It seemed to hit him square and bright, as it had been hitting the boulder, so that his dark shirt for the minute seemed snow white and his chest seemed to cave. He fell down first on his knees, and then flat, with his hands now clasped, pushing the dirt and pebbles ahead of him like a plow as he slowly straightened out and was still.

  After the noise there was dead quiet. The breeze had died. I looked once quick at the faces of the cattlemen and they were a study. Except Hunter who was smiling to himself so that, having known him thirty years, he visibly began to get small in my eyes and once he had seemed pretty big. Yes sir. For as I saw him smile, he seemed to shrivel down to less than a fraction of a man. Hunter couldn’t change. He was still a born winner and could even rake in life’s chips over the body of his dead son. Sometimes it takes a long time and a particular set of circumstances to catch up with a man.

  I turned my horse as soon as I was able, moved Jake’s head around to the east and thus turned my back on the scene. My eyes was fixed on the view to the east, so that it was like I wore blinders. I saw nothing else but the far horizon over towards the Panhandle where Lohman had come from. Everything else was blotted out. But I recollect saying to myself—“Now will they just leave him there?”

  They left him all right. Behind me I could hear wagons creaking. I could hear horse movements. I could hear jingles and general movements. Some were a little slow in getting off and there was low-toned talk but they all moved out. When I turned around after I had made sure, and the only people left in the place were me and little Hank Harnish on his spotted pony who stayed like a kid would. I looked down and saw that I had Ferdy Maxwell’s glasses slung on a strap on my chest. He’d just handed them to me when the Kid came out, and I’d forgotten all about that and about them until this minute. They had helped me see the sun on Tot’s chest and the way his chest had seemed to suck the slugs in and the way he fell, but more than that they had showed me that he wasn’t surrendering, nor thinking maybe they’d give him an hour or a day. He’d come to take it, because he wanted it.

  I gave Henry a dollar and told him to ride his little pony in to Mel Parks, the undertaker, and get him out here in his spring wagon and to tell him if his own was busy he could ride over to my place and get our springer.

  Henry disappeared and I rode Jake up as far as I could, then got off and led. I reached over and touched Lohman once, the back of his neck, where riding or walking ahead of me when we first met him near Clayton I had often sighted that tufted peak of hair growing down from his head. It was like a small boy’s hair, like they call it, a cowlick.

  I walked over to the big rock he’d been using for cover. Never thought at the time to look for his horse as it completely slipped my mind. At the rear base of the rock was Lohman’s rifle that would not shoot again. He’d smashed it several times against the rock face, so I could see the dim marks of the stock paint there.

  Then I saw the shell that we thought was spent shell scattered in front of the rock. The ones that had caught the light when he throwed them over. They were not spent shell. They were live, good cartridges. I think I got them all, counted them and stowed them.…

  Well, months have gone by and we’re slowly getting over it. Nita didn’t speak to me for a long time and I dare say it will take her even some more time to become resigned. To this day I don’t realize it. I don’t think any of us do. Shucks, I know there are killings and killings, for instance last week there was a sheepman torn to pieces by something wild—nobody seems to know what—up by the north Socorro hills. Word went all over. Then two months ago—maybe three—a man was shot in the Muleshoe downtown. But come to investigate—the sheepman he was a careless man who had been warned about certain chances he was taking with the country he was trying to get his stock to feed off. And the man at the saloon was just a bum, got too big for his size and stopped Trouble the wrong way.

  But the point is you don’t shoot up people like Lohman every day, and it would not surprise me if something don’t come of it. There’s still some talk of the federal people doing some investigating.

  I have developed quite a few busted friendships around and about. Am not too anxious to repair them. I saw to it that Mel did all right by Tot, and we put him in our plot where a Maxwell or two is buried and where nearly all of my wife’s people are. A few days later somebody over on the west ridge found that little Blacky horse of Lohman’s wandering around half starved with a broke leg and we had him shot. Then about two months later we went over to Socorro and dug up what was left of the old man and brought him and put him beside Tot. Seemed least we could do. As for his mother, we don’t know where she lies, or the brothers. The living one, Harley, I guess was not much beans. Well, it’s too bad. But it’s a tough country, big and tough.

  One thing sticks in my memory and keeps coming back about the Kid. Last time I saw him before he took death he was going up the stairs that last night. I was gabby-drunk and said something about, “Well, they gave you an awful chasing and you are still in tro
uble but you left your mark on them—”

  Lohman wheeled, the only time he was ever downright angry with me. His blue eyes smoked up. He said: “Mr. Bradley, can’t any people in the world understand that killing a man sickens a man?”

  Night we buried the elder Lohman, Ferdy Maxwell came over with a cemetery paper for me to sign and we got to talking. Ferdy had had a few drinks and on a few he can get very mouthy and said he figured Lohman yellowed out toward the last. You understand that even sober all the brains Ferdy has he will do well to hang onto.

  “Yellowed out?” I said. “Well, that is just plain foolishness.” First, I told him it was not dead cartridges but live ones Tot threw away and then, realizing the lack of logic in that, I showed Ferdy the letter Tot left me the morning of the day he took permanent leave of us.

  Dear Mr. Bradley, Sir: Am getting out of this as do not wish to mix you up with me further. You have been kind enough. Thinking hard, seems to me Nelson was the only man I shot in cold blood, as have been crazy since, but am getting to see things in a fairer light. Also, Nelson rocked my horse so that he bled freely. My father used to say only a crazy man will keep on killing. Nelson will haunt me to my grave but I was crazy at the grove. If I ever kill a man again in a state of sound mind, I surely believe it will sour me against myself for good. This is not only my people’s teaching but is normal.

  I am pulled this way and that by what has happened to me and my people. I am like my brother, Nevin, trying to get a brace of mules to pull abreast when all their life they had pulled behind and afore. My father called—“Nevin, let go those hamestraps, you can’t untrain a mule, they will pull you in two.” So I say, shall I go to meet my people with more on my conscience? Or try to reach Wyoming? So the two mules pull me. I certainly will meet my people. All except Harley have preceded me and thus I feel like a lone stranger in a strange land. Ever your friend,