Gun For Hire

by Jory Sherman

  Clay lifted his drink and clinked his glass against Morfit's in agreement. The two men drank, and Morfit leaned his scattergun against the bar.

  "That's right new," Clay said, looking at the scattergun.

  "Brought it to go with the stage. Want to take a look at some good transportation?"

  The two men finished their drinks and walked through the saloon. Fresh sawdust marked the place where Jess Farrel had bought it. The crowd was still talking about the gunfight as they went onto the street. Clay looked around for signs of Jingo and Nat. Barstow was teeming with activity. It seemed like everyone had something to do, someplace to go. Morfit led him across the street and down to the livery stable. Inside, the new stage was being worked on by two men, greasing the axles, checking the rigging. It was a big coach, low, with a luggage area on top, a wide seat where two men could ride easily. The reins glistened with fresh oil. A team could move it right along, Clay thought. Four good horses could kick up some dust with it.

  "That there's what they call a Concord mud wagon. Heavy springs, good frame."

  Clay looked at the brass lanterns on the sides, the short wheels in front, the big ones in the rear. "It looks like it could do a job, all right."

  "It can. I run ore wagons down to Barstow and hook up with the trains going to Selby," Morfit explained. "But now Belleville's got near 3,000 people and some of them are rich enough to want to ride out of the weather. You'd be riding alongside whatever we send down and back up."

  "I'm not a shotgun man."

  Garrison laughed and slapped Clay on the back. "That's for the driver," he said.

  "You must be expecting trouble."

  Garrison's face darkened with thought. "Well, the diggings are rich. There's been some hard types come up there, like always when you have a good strike. Those men you tangled with in the Mohave, for instance."

  A man waddled into the stable. Clay caught his movement out of the corner of his eye. There was something familiar about it. He turned to see a short, grizzled man, bushy-bearded, wrinkled of clothes, a battered hat riding the upper part of his face.

  "There's my driver now," said Morfit. "Come on over, Pop."

  The man spat a stream of tobacco juice out of the corner of his mouth, squarely hitting a tin pail that clanged as though a chunk of shot had hit it. Brand broke into a smile. "Howdy, Pops," he said.

  "Well, by the great horn spoon, if it ain't Clay Brand!" cackled the short man.

  "You already know each other, then," said Morfit. "Mr. Brand's going to be working with you, Pops, on the wagon and stage runs," he added.

  "Good enough, by golly," he said, slapping Clay on the arms with both hands.

  "I'll leave you two to talk," caid Morfit. "I've got other business before we're ready to take the stage up. Can you meet me at Octagon House in three days from now? We can iron out the details of the job at that time."

  "Sure."

  "Here, Pops. A present for you." Morfit handed the new scattergun to the driver. "Ammunition's up on the seat."

  Pops Spinard, everyone called him that and Clay doubted if anyone knew his real first name, grinned as he took the shotgun. He spat another glob of tobacco juice just before he said "Thanks."

  "Fill Mr. Brand in on the route up the grade. Should be dried out by now. We'll see you in Belleville, Clay."

  After Morfit left the stable, Pops set the gun up on his seat and the two men went out back to talk. Clay followed Pops, knowing his friend had something to say that he didn't want the whole town to know about. He had known the driver up in the Sutter's Mill country, ten years ago when he'd been a boy of seventeen, fresh in the West, trying, like thousands of others, to make a stake. His handiness with a gun had gotten him out of that back-breaking job of panning for gold, shoveling gravel into sluice-box. He'd gotten some dust and nuggets, but he much preferred keeping on the move, sleeping out under the stars without some sneak trying to grab your poke.

  He and Pops had crossed trails since that time and the younger man respected the old-timer. He reminded him somewhat of his own father who'd been killed by the Sioux up in Minnesota a year before he'd left for California. His mother had died of grief not long after. Clay had no brothers or sisters.

  "So, you're totin' a gun for Garrison Morfit," Pops said in a low voice. "Well, he's a comer, all right. Got a good freight outfit, helped bring in Miller's stamp mill. A mite greedy, like most everybody else, but as long as he pays good wages and don't step on a man's pride, I guess I could do worse. You too, Clay."

  "Seen Andy O'Keefe up there?"

  "Haw! Wouldn't you know? Sure enough, and his girl's up there with him. She came up after the snows melted last year in '61. Still got a shine to her, eh? Kathleen? Yep, Kathleen. Purtiest thing up in the hills, 'sides Belle Van Dusen herself, I'm thinkin'. She growed out'n her skinniness some. Andy's doin' okay."

  "I got a letter from Kathleen. That's my real reason for going to Belleville up in Holcomb Valley. She said they had a bad winter."

  "Yep. Everybody got flooded out last winter. Worst I've seed. Miners left like drowned rats. Claims washed away overnight. But they'll be back, some of 'em. And them that don't come back'll just see others take their place. This is a heap better'n the Sutter time, Clay. Not so many crowdin' and crazy like in '49 and '50. But, you still gotta mind yore back."

  "Yeah, I know."

  "Haw!" Pops cackled. "That you over to the saloon ? The town's buzzing with it. That Jingo now, he's a bad 'un. And the Sidewinder's just as tricky. You done good to get out'n that one, boy."

  "Know where they're headed?"

  "Shore! Belleville, where else? They lit out already. You watch yourself along that trail, ya hear? Them two's bad medicine. They rode down with a bunch of us from 'Frisco. Just ahead of us. Mean all the way, I heard."

  "Well, I'm riding out myself."

  "Road agents along the way," said Pops seriously, poking more tobacco in his already overloaded mouth. Stains of the juice lined his bearded chin. Clay noticed he still wore his rusty old Paterson. Probably hadn't shot or cleaned it in a year.

  "They robs 'em both ways in this country," continued Pops. "Goin' up and comin' down. They ain't much gold come out of Holcomb since late summer and the floods made a man hitch his belt up some. Men're hungry and they got the war scare. Some're Union men, some're seceshes, and you sometimes don't know who's yore friend and who ain't.

  "Now Stoddard's Wells is a place to stay shy of, 'bout halfway from here to Cushenbery Grade. Ride careful. Too many places a rattlesnake can hide. You can make camp at Cactus Flats, up past Whiskey Springs. Next mornin' you can go up over the hump and head for Holcomb. Keep yore Colt and yore Hawken ready. You still got that Hawken?"

  Clay grinned. "What do you think?"

  "By golly, you ain't changed much. Leaner, less baby fat on yore bones, maybe. Growed an inch or two."

  Clay shook Pops' hand, and turned to go to the livery stable where his own horse was boarded. "Time to saddle up, Pops."

  "Watch yore poke," warned the old-timer, "and you might leave a jar of whiskey at the springs for the thirsty men coming down off the mountains." He spat a cloud of tobacco juice on the ground. Clay had the feeling there was something else Pops wanted to say, but wouldn't just then.

  "I'll take a jar and leave it at Whiskey Springs," Clay promised. He shrugged and entered the stable, leaving the old man standing there alone. He knew from the map he had a hard day's ride ahead with the sun rising fast on the high desert.

  * * *

  He moved the chestnut along at a good clip, over the rise until the Barstow settlement where the Mohave River ran, disappeared from view. He had enough grub for two camps. A bedroll carried buckskins and a sheepskin coat for the high altitudes. His Hawken rode in a leather scabbard within easy reach. His cap and ball revolver was fresh loaded, cleaned and oiled. A Colt Dragoon, 2nd model, was wrapped in oilcloth in one of his saddlebags. The canteen rode full and easy on the saddle horn. He wore a full horn of
powder and his possibles bag, fringed deerskin, hung back of his pistol.

  The high desert was still cool, but warming up. The air was clear and he could see a long way. There seemed to be no signs of life, but he knew different. Lizards sunned on rocks or scurried across his path. Quail piped in the greasewood and he saw a sentinel eyeing him atop a yucca. A hawk floated along a ridge, his shadow racing ahead of him toward the west. The road was well-traveled, yet fresh horse tracks appeared in the earth. They pointed in the direction he was going. He dismounted and studied the tracks. They showed him two men had ridden that way not long before. One horse was heavier than the other. Its shoes were beginning to round on the edges. The other horse was lighter, its feet more narrow, the shoes slender. A man could tell a lot if he studied a track carefully, be it man or beast. Clay followed the tracks a ways, looking for something different, yet consistent.

  He stopped again and squatted over the tracks. The lighter horse had a mark on its left front shoe. It was just like a man's signature. Satisfied, Clay mounted his horse again. The V, from a rock or a blacksmith's careless use of his trimmer, was enough to make him remember that particular track.

  Could these tracks have been made by the horses ridden by Leffler and Perez? Maybe. He didn't know. It was a thing to keep in mind.

  The sun rose higher in the sky, but Clay pressed on, skirting the road that led to Stoddard's Wells. He thought of Kathleen O'Keefe, Andy's daughter. Her letter was frazzled in his saddlebag, read a hundred times since he'd left Salt Lake. She had written it from San Francisco telling him of her trip to Belleville where Andy had built a cabin for them to live in while he worked his placer claim.

  He could see her long hair in his mind, like burnished copper, her green eyes like a lake high in the mountains, deep and cool. She was eighteen now, and he'd known her since she was a tyke up in the mother lode country. He wondered if she still had freckles. He could hear her laugh as he rode along, picture her even white teeth in a broad smile. It had been a year, and she was filling out then.

  There was something else he was carrying in his saddlebag. He hoped she would accept it. It was a ring he'd had made up for her, pure gold and a green stone they called an emerald set in it. It had cost some to have it made, but Kathleen was worth it. There was something about her that made a man want to give up the trail. Now that he was through guiding Mormons into California, well, he just might think of settling down. He had seen some fine cattle driven out and heard stories about the Rancho San Bernardino that sounded like it might be a good place to start a herd. He had enough in his poke to get started if it came to that. He wasn't a spending man: his needs had been few.

  He rode into more open country, the foothills converging on both sides. Mountains loomed up in the distance, solid and muscled like a grizzly's shoulders. Joshua trees in twisted shapes dotted the landscape of mesquite and greasewood. He took a noon stop about two in the afternoon and chewed jerky and hardtack sparingly, washing the food down with plenty of water. He filled his hat with water and let his horse drink. He might make it to Whiskey Springs or beyond if the coolness stayed on the land. It would be a forty-mile day if he did, fair enough and possible in March on the high desert. It would depend on how steep the grade was up through the mountain pass.

  The tracks of the morning had petered out at Stoddard's Wells. They didn't rejoin the trail and Clay kept looking back of him and off to the hills on his right. Some of them were close and a man could hide easily in any one of them, a long rifle shot away. He drifted to the right of the trail, but soon had to come back. Too much risk of cactus getting into his horse's hooves or fetlocks.

  He picked up speed as the mountains drew closer. He kept checking his backtrail, a feeling tensing up his shoulder muscles. Were Perez and Leffler behind him, keeping him in sight? He saw no dust, but the ground was still hard. They could be anywhere, if they were used to the country.

  He passed a grave marked by a weathered wooden cross. He'd passed a sight of those in his time. This one was at least a year old. The cross wouldn't last another year. A flash flood could wipe it out tomorrow, or the day after.

  Clay watched his horse's ears as he rode along. They would be the first indication of any danger ahead, anything unusual. Already he was acting skittery, shying at rocks, snorting, and looking off to the right. Clay was also looking in that direction.

  It was just a feeling, but he had learned to trust those feelings. They sometimes gave a man a warning that saved his life. More than once, he had trusted his instincts and had come out all right.

  He kicked his horse gently with the straight knobbed spurs. The animal laid back its ears and rolled into a gallop. Behind him he heard a sound. Looking back, he saw a puff of dust where he had been. A moment later, he heard a crack from the hills to his right. A long shot, but a good one. He scanned the hills, then spurred his horse once more, leaning over in the saddle to keep his profile low.

  Something had glittered up there, a mote of light where the sun hit among the rocks. It could have been an Indian, he thought, trying to make coup on a lone rider. They liked to pick off white travelers and brag about it later. Somehow, though, he didn't think so. The shot was too accurate. Perez, maybe. The shot would have caught him square in the back.

  CHAPTER THREE

  "You're a damn fool, Jingo. You had him dead in your sights and you let him get away!" Nat Leffler, Jingo thought, smelled blood, and his arm probably hurt him more than he liked to admit. "You should have taken him out, right there."

  Jingo smiled wanly, his dark eyes as mysterious as ever. A man could never tell what he was figuring. That's what made him dangerous. He had gotten the drop on more than one man because of his masklike face.

  "He moved. Like he had eyes in the back of his head," Perez said, pouring powder down the rifle barrel. He dropped the ball in a greased patch, started it down the barrel, then cut it off deftly with a small sharp knife. Then he rammed the ball home. He put a cap on the nipple of the rifle and got up, slipping the patch knife back into his holster. The operation had taken only seconds. Brand was out of range by then, his dust settling slowly in his wake.

  "He's just a man," insisted Nat. "I could've dropped him myself."

  "You had your chance, Nat. And I had mine. He'll be spooked now. More dangerous. We're just lucky Brand didn't get us back there in Barstow. He is one fast man, that pistolero."

  "Aw, shut up."

  Perez watched Nat get back on his horse. His arm must hurt something fierce for his mood was as black as pitch. He thought sure they would have taken Brand out back in the saloon. He still wondered if he should have backed off. But things had happened so fast, he might have bought it himself. The hell with Leffler. Brand had been too keen to their play.

  Perez regarded his partner with cold eyes. He wasn't worth much now, with his arm in a sling. The only thing was that Brand's bullet hadn't broken a bone. It had passed clean through the flesh, taking out a chunk of skin. A couple of weeks and Nat would be all right. Maybe a little stiff and slower to draw, but good enough for what they had to do. Still, Perez worried about the man's temper. Nat had no control. He was deadly, but he could make mistakes if he picked the wrong man at the wrong time. Like Jess.

  Jess had just been too damned slow this morning. Too much the big man playing a role, like an actor. You don't push a man like Brand. You brace him quick and get the drop on him. Jess figured he was backed up by a couple more guns and so he got too cocky. Now he was coyote meat, a hole through his stupid windpipe.

  "There was a couple of things you didn't notice about Brand, Nat," Jingo said.

  "Yeah, what?"

  "He didn't waste any lead."

  Nat chewed on that for a minute. "What else?" he asked dumbly.

  "That Colt of his had a hair trigger."

  The two men rode slowly, staying to the edges of the foothills, letting Brand get farther away from them. They were in no hurry. The man who had paid them could wait a while longer. />
  It was funny the way things worked out. They had missed the first time, but now Brand was riding right into a place where he didn't stand any chance at all. Perez liked that. He wanted to cut him down like a dog and make him scream before he died. Brand would pay for that business back at the saloon.

  Jingo didn't like what Brand had done to his face. He felt the fresh scar and his lips tightened. His eyes were dark and narrowed, full of the secrets behind them, deep in his scheming brain. He rammed his heels into his horse's flanks, the sharp rowels raking the soft flesh. The horse jumped with pain and a slow smile broke over Jingo's face.

  Nat Leffler, alongside, saw the look in his partner's eyes and shuddered. He'd seen that look before.

  * * *

  Clay's horse was winded and he pulled up to let him blow. Behind him, everything looked serene. Vagrant puffs of clouds drifted overhead, their shadows mottling the land. Dark was still a few hours off in the flatlands, but he'd be heading up the canyon from the looks of it. In there, the shadows could hold more than rock and brush. He had made some good time.

  He still wondered who had shot at him. Someone with a big rifle, .58 caliber, at least, he figured. Enough grains of lead to knock down a buffalo at 150 or 200 yards—about the distance he was when he spurred his horse out of trouble. Still, there was no pursuit, none that he could detect, anyway. It was puzzling.

  He jogged his mount into a walk. No use letting his muscles stiffen. The animal wasn't sweating much and he was sound of wind and limb. They could stretch out over some miles yet, before darkness fell.

  The mountains drew up before him, the road rising all the time. He could make out the shape of rocks, the scrubby brush that clung to the sides of the canyon. Whiskey Springs couldn't be far off. He watered his horse and had a few swallows himself just before he hit the canyon. Behind him there was not a sign of anyone traveling along the road. The sun was moving over the mountains. There was a gentle chill in the air and not a trace of breeze.