“Don’t be silly, you young fool. Throw out the bills of sale. We know exactly what she stole. We trailed her, and you.”
“Come in and get ’em,” Slim challenged, wrathful at having ridden into a trap. The enemy had craftily lurked to learn the entire sense of that baffling alliance they thought it was.
There was a furtive stirring outside, but gloom still protected the besiegers. Slim did not realize what was in the wind until he smelled burning hay. Flames first yellowed, then reddened the gaping door of the barn.
Dry as it was, it would go up like gunpowder. Worse than that, the first gray of dawn brightened the open ground. If he or Madge tried to make a break on foot, they would be hunted down.
The barn was smartly ablaze. Choking fumes billowed in through the broken window. Gusts of furnace heat lashed the besieged. At any moment, Slim expected the shingles to catch afire over his head. And the flames would now expose him, whichever direction he tried for flight.
“Honey,” he choked, catching her hand, “you try slipping out yonder whilst I go out, shooting, tother way. You got a chanct!”
“I won’t,” she said. “It’s my father’s fault all this is happening. If you’re killed, I’ll feel like a murderer, and he’ll be one!”
That whipped Slim to desperation. He caught her shoulder, shook her violently. “You damn little fool, get out! Your pappy’s dead. I shot him the night you was in Paso del Norte. I didn’t know ’twas him that was beefing our critters, but I kilt him!”
Horror widened her eyes. He repeated, “I kilt him. Now git out; you got no call to stick with me. Git, you fool, I’m going out a-shooting!”
He had found and loaded a second .45. Gun in each hand, he bounded toward the side furthest from the fire. He had thrust the evidence in his shirt. Grimly he saw that his death would still nail Kenyon. The’d not search his riddled carcass; they’d assume the evidence had gone up in smoke. But when the old man found him, they’d be sunk, the _____s!
Though four men had circled to await his break, regardless of direction, he still caught them momentarily off guard. His long legs seemed to cover yards at a stretch as he zigzagged, ducked, guns blazing for an instant, then silent during another bound. The enemy fired as they concentrated to cut off his flight.
Lead whipped past him. One of the raiders jerked back, and lurched into the open. Then Slim caught a glimpse of big Burt Kenyon. He shifted, spraying lead. He missed, and a hammer impact from the other flank made him spin, numb and helpless; his guns would not work any more.
Kenyon shouted, “Where’s the girl? You, Hubbell! Doran!”
“Watch it!” someone howled above the roaring flames.
Kenyon ducked. Somewhere, Madge screamed, but no one heard. Pounding hoofs shook the ground. Slim, recovering a little, saw two riders charging hell bent. His old man and Whitey Harris, a cowpuncher, had been attracted by the flames. They could not have distinguished pistol shots from the crackle of blazing wood, tinder-dry.
They were riding into a trap. Slim tried to yell, tried to shoot. God, wouldn’t they see it was more than just a fire!
Kenyon, thinking Slim finished, was turning his fire on old man Crane. Hubbell’s gun was dancing. The two riders piled from their saddles, pulling iron as they dropped; but the roll of the ground was their only cover. The raiders’ slugs kicked up spurts of dust. Answering fire whistled over Slim’s head; the buffalo gun was roaring.
Then Slim cocked his gun with his teeth. He yelled a challenge, and as Kenyon jerked up, the kid’s .45 did its work. And the smack of a Winchester, tying into the roar of the Colt, cleared the deck.
Madge, coming out of the house, flung the rifle on the ground.
“It was empty,” she cried, “and I fumbled the shells till the last second. Why didn’t you wait?”
Slim, staggering toward his father, hailed Whitey Harris. The cowpuncher, wounded by that first volley, was clawing a red splash on his chest.
“We seen the blaze,” he choked.
Madge caught him as he sagged. He thrust her aside.
“Look to Dad Crane, he’s damn neart finished.”
Slim knew that, even before Whitey spoke. The old man forced a grin, tried to speak, then slumped in a heap. Madge, now at Slim’s side, caught his arm.
“Are you hurt bad? What can I do?”
The kid’s drawn face twitched.
“Fix Whitey. I just got a rib knocked loose and my shoulder drilled. And what the hell you doing here? I told you—I told you what I’d gone and done. Get out, I can’t stand looking at you. You know what I done!”
“I know.” Her lovely face was pained and weary. Tears gleamed in her eyes, and cut white paths through the dust and smoke stain of her cheeks. She shook her head, very slowly. “First I couldn’t believe you. Then I went wild, but when I got the gun loaded—Slim, I couldn’t hate you enough, so I fired at them, instead.”
“Uh—what!” He couldn’t believe all the implications.
“No,” she solemnly went on. “All this, tonight, is what my father’s pardners led him into, using his resentment for their own gains. Look what you’ve lost—from our fault—”
Slim scratched his battered head. “Honey, you forgiving me, you mean!”
“You didn’t do it on purpose, and he was in the wrong. You and I can’t carry on a feud. We’ve no relatives to keep it up.”
Something told Slim that some day she could smile at him, and that she would. His own grief left him too numb for hatreds, and perhaps she felt that way, too.
“Honey,” he finally said, “you can’t fight a woman, so the feud’s off, if you see things thataway. Orphants ought to stick together.”
SHORT-CUT TO HELL
CHAPTER I
“Lock him up, Sheriff!”
Pete Barlow, sitting among the emigrants of the Red Fork Company, watched firelight play on the tanned faces of the men and on the canvas covers of wagons. Barlow, not yet discharged from the army, was conspicuous in his uniform, but no one noticed him. No one noticed anyone or anything but Kirby Swift, second in command of the emigrant wagon train.
The sodbusters, squatting in a half circle, had the same look Barlow had noted at political meetings when a spellbinder tricked his hearers into agreement, not because he spoke sense, but because he wished them to agree. Horace Parker, with the wheat colored beard and grave face and kindly eyes was still captain of the emigrant company, but his flashy segundo, Kirby Swift, had stolen command. Tall and swarthy and good looking, he filled the eyes. He had a daredevil swagger even when standing still. The tilt of his head, the set of his shoulders, the roving glance convinced the others that they could be like him simply by agreeing with him. He had them all wishing they were Kirby Swifts, admired by all men, and eyed fondly by all women.
Parker, trying to regain the attention he had lost, got to his feet and began, “All in favor of hauling out at dawn—”
Kirby Swift broke in, “Well, now, gentlemen, when do you think we want to haul out?”
The interruption was bravado, small boy showoff, and outright rudeness both to the speaker and the speaker’s office, yet the younger men and some of the older ones chuckled appreciatively as though they had heard rare wit and brilliance. But Barlow, who had a snootful, got up to speak his own piece.
He was tall, and coffin faced, and lanky; a good soldier, yet he did not look it. Though carrying himself well, there was nonetheless a suggestion of awkwardness and self consciousness in his posture and manner. He did not have presence, and he was setting himself against a man who did.
“Mr. Parker,” he began, gesturing with an oversized hand.
“Sit down, soldier!” they shouted. “Sit down!”
But Barlow’s earnest face and voice encouraged the outpointed emigrant captain. “Yes, Pete? What
is it?”
Kirby Swift remained standing. He gave his admirers a meaningful glance. Barlow’s ears got red from knowing that half the company regarded him with derision and contempt, of a good humored sort simply because Swift wanted them to. Barlow cleared his throat, which seemed funny enough to get a fresh crop of grins.
“Mr. Parker, everything is done by vote. That’s the way the articles were written up, and that’s what we signed for. These here men all voted the other night to take a week more to finish refitting wagons and swapping for better oxen and horses, and then having a short shakedown run. They voted thattaway because it was good sense. It is just as good sense tonight!”
“What you say is true enough, Pete, but the majority—”
“We’re hauling out in the morning!” they chorused, drowning the captain’s words. The meeting broke up without formality of adjournment. The presiding officer stood there, no one giving him heed. Women appeared from among the wagons. Banjos plink-plank-plonked, and someone began to sing, “Oh Susanna!” Herd guards quit their posts to come in for fun and coffee. No one would do any thieving right at the outskirts of Kearneyville, they reasoned.
Above all the jollity, Swift called, “Stick to your tin horn army, soldier! Wait for your discharge, or haul out in the morning like a man and let ’em whistle for you!”
One of Swift’s admirers began to count, “ONE two three four, hup! hup! One two three four—”
Barlow, not marching to cadence, measured his man as he made for him: for Swift, not the mocker. The instant the final springy stride brought him within reach, he popped Swift, one-two. The segundo, amazed and caught off guard by the agility of an awkward looking man, went glassy-eyed before he got his hands up. He had been knocked so stiff that he toppled like a tree, instead of lurching to his knees.
“Next man up?” Barlow invited.
Nobody came up.
“You silly sons,” he went on, quietly, “taking off before you are ready to march is a fine way to commit suicide.”
He turned and shoulder-brushed the pack as he cleared their front. Once in the shadows beyond the wavering firelight, he looked back to see if he could find Sally Clayton among the dancers; but before he could spot the girl on whose account he had planned to become an emigrant, Horace Parker came toward him.
“Pete, it isn’t as bad as it seems to you. Everyone is naturally interested in getting to Red Fork ahead of other companies that are forming. To get our first choice of land is really necessary.”
Barlow shrugged; he had not the heart to attack Parker’s attempt to salvage a little self respect by accepting Swift’s reasoning. “If Sally hadn’t become so attached to you and Mrs. Parker during the time you folks have been camping and resting at this jumping off place, I’d tell her to call it off, and stay here, and to hell with the money we paid in.”
There was nothing but kindness in Parker’s voice as he countered, “Do you really think you could talk her into backing out now? She’s got her heart all set on taking up land, having a home of her own. She’s been waiting on you for quite some while to get out of the army so she could marry you.”
“She and I, getting two adjacent homesteads! Now I am marking time while army red tape unwinds. I am as good as out, only I can’t jump the gun. That segundo of yours, that loud mouthed show-off, has been playing up to her, talking big, till I guess I couldn’t get in a word edgewise any more.”
“Oh, shucks, Pete! He simply has to get all the women admiring him, there’s so many of ’em that each one is safe enough.”
“What I aimed to say,” Barlow went on, with rising resentment coming into his voice, “is that this sudden vote to rush things is Swift’s personal dirty trick to get me to get desperate and desert, and get myself into a heap of trouble, or else sit here while he’s playing up to Sally. I’ve used up all my spare cash, mainly blackjack winnings, to get my discharge by purchase. Unless I stole a horse, to overtake you people when I do get out, I’d be hanging around here waiting for another company to arrive and take off. That foxy devil had it all figured out. He’ll stake a claim alongside hers. And you’ve played into his hands, Mr. Parker!”
“That’s why you hit him. It wasn’t his mocking the army.”
“Oh, all right,” Barlow exclaimed, helplessly; he could not begrudge this good hearted man the chance to forget his humiliation. “But you see where it has left me.”
“Pete, you don’t need to buy or steal a horse, nor desert either. Take my mare, Alezan. Even if we have a week or ten day’s head start, you can overtake us in no time at all. Come on, I’ll get her now and you can saddle up.”
Alezan was a Morgan, fast and durable; whether she was worth five hundred or a thousand dollars depended largely on how Parker felt at the time someone made him an offer. The colonel at the fort would give his right eye for such a mount. But Barlow said, “You’re mighty kind, only I’ll talk to Sally first.”
“Very well, Pete, I’ll be saddling Alezan.”
Before Barlow could protest at being waited on by a man old enough to be his father, Parker was making for the picket line. Then, while Barlow still looked about him, a woman said from the darkness of the captain’s wagon, “He’s doing the best he can for us, darling.”
The whitish blur in the darkness of the wagon cover was Sally. He extended his arms, caught her, and after holding her close for a long moment, he set her on her feet. They stood there in the half light, clinging to each other as though they had been separated for days and weeks, rather than hours.
She was well shaped, solid, squarish of hip and shoulder, yet graceful. The smile of her upturned face was whole hearted; her nostrils had an eager flare, and the eyes, slightly prominent, radiated friendliness to all the world, though now they had an especial warmth and glow.
“Don’t worry, Pete,” she murmured, when their kiss finally ended. “That good looking fellow hasn’t impressed me with anything except the travelling salesman show-off manner that was just part of the day’s work, back in that hashery in St. Louis!”
They ignored the dancers, and set out for the willows of the creek which ran past the wagon park. There, watching the moon rise, Barlow tried to persuade her to withdraw from the Red Fork Company.
“Parker’s a fine man, but not tough enough to be captain of anything. Those fools might of a sudden vote for something to land the whole kit and caboodle in the worst kind of trouble!”
“Oh, don’t be such a worrier! Kiss me and quit frowning!”
The moon was high and the shadows short when at last they went slowly for the camp. Alezan was tied to the wheel of Parker’s wagon. Before Barlow boosted Sally to the tail gate, she whispered, “Think of me at reveille, darling. I’ll be up and moving by the time you hear first call…”
On his return to Kearneyville, Barlow left Alezan at the livery-stable, and said to the sleepy hostler, “Don’t skimp on the oats! I’m coming in every day to look at her and see how’s she’s doing.”
He was good as his word. He learned the following evening that Alezan liked ginger snaps and rock candy. He was engrossed in getting acquainted with the mount that would shorten his race when a man called from the corral fence, “Wait, it gives an apple, for nothing.”
The speaker had just let go the handles of a pushcart on the side of which was lettered in red, EPSTEIN WILL FIX IT. His nose, broad and curved and lordly, combined with sagging jowls to give solidity to a tanned and deeply lined face. The twinkle of his eyes suggested that his slogan was justified. He raised his Stetson, and with red bandanna mopped his high forehead. Except for a fringe of crisp hair to hedge his ears, he was gleaming bald.
“Where is it?” Barlow demanded. “If it’s free, I’m buying. Otherwise, you dicker with the mare!”
Epstein, dug under the tarpaulin which partly hid a tin smith’s kit, a cobbler�
��s kit, and a clutter of gear and merchandise. In addition to peddling odds and ends, the pushcart man repaired and patched his way from town to town. He got out a withered crab apple, which he offered Alezan.
Barlow nodded appreciatively, and joshed, “So you’re a one man covered wagon, eh?”
“No, this outfit is the cart before the horse. What time is it?”
Barlow glanced at his size sixteen watch. “Six five, exactly.”
“You need a chain, with a fob, for that beautiful time piece.” He produced both articles from his cart. “As good as new. Solid gold. Fourteen carats, and I guarantee it. Just what you need when you put on civilian clothes.’
“How the hell you know that’s what I’m going to do?”
“I was leaving the Red Fork Company yesterday, where I fixed things, and that young lady of yours, she told me. You didn’t see me when you came up and I left, you had something else on your mind.”
“I sure did! But look here—maybe I’d better sell you the watch, I have more time than money.”
* * * *
They ended by agreeing to have a beer, and not talk business until the following evening. Epstein, it seemed, would spend another week or so, working out of Kearneyville, and going to the farms and cattle ranches which surrounded the jumping off place. “Every time I sell, it means I got to buy,” Epstein compromised, amiably. “And every time I buy, it means, I got to sell some time. You see how it is? No matter which way, I am bound to lose, so I don’t care what is your choice, as long as it gives a little business.”
After an interminable week, the final mile of red tape was cut, and Barlow, at last wearing civilian clothes, rode from the post with a supply troop teamster. The sun was low when they reached town. He had to fight the crackbrained urge to mount up and ride, if only for the remaining hour or two of daylight.
The E. Hoffmann Price Spicy Adventure MEGAPACK ™: 14 Tales from the Spicy Pulp Magazines! Page 30
