Action Stories, December, 1938
Action Stories
2
Howdy Harris was through! But before he pulled in his mossy-horns for good, the old Hellbender aimed to slap the Injun sign on Whispering Valley’s Boot-hill bunch!
I
shook his head.
Howdy eased one shoulder against the
YEARS of hell raising were done with, and
bench and scratched his back. He sighed
Howdy Harris was heading for the country of
contentedly.
a wild and misspent youth. He felt at peace
“Stop that!” the Court snapped. He
with the world as he rode Northward, and
went on:
reckoned the flight of the dove was easier than
“When the Reverend Jostlechin and his
the winging of the owl, or the headache Aid Society beseech you join church or leave producing pound on the trail of the elephant.
town, you promised you would leave. Are you
His decision had been made as he proud of the fact you rode your horse into the followed the sheriff of Sandog along the cell-meeting house?”
block corridor and into the stuffy courtroom
Howdy screwed his face thoughtfully
on the second floor.
and began to remember things. He said,
His trial lacked certain formality. The
“Jedge, I just come to tell them good-bye. Ol’
background was provided by numerous frigid-
Jostlechin, there, was poundin’ his pulpit an’
faced ladies, stiff in black taffeta. And a gaunt, tellin’ his folks to foller him, for he was a man pallid man of the cloth, who kept a certain
of courage as would rid Sandog of the devil
disdainful distance from the prisoner.
come amongst them.
The judge looked down at Howdy. He
“Hell, Jedge. Wasn’t no use’n him
saw a little banty rooster with leathery face,
crawlin’ under his pulpit just ’cause I rode in gray mustache, subdued blue eyes. Once, the
to say adios.”
judge reckoned, those eyes had been the light
The Court leaned to hide his face, and
called “killer blue.”
coughed.
Howdy’s hat, clutched in one paw, was
“Howdy Harris, it is the Court’s
battered, and his puncher’s boots were run
decision: If you will pay for the mirrors you
over. The too-tight, skimpy levis were bowed
broke, for the two plate glass windows you
and bagged at the knees. Howdy seemed rode through, and will leave this town within perpetually crouched and on the verge of the hour, fine and sentence will be taking a long leap.
suspended.”
His Honor didn’t ask Howdy. After the
“An’ how much do you figger is them
little old-timer had given the Court “Howdy,
damages?”
Jedge. Helluva hot day,” he told him, and The Judge named the figure, and
made it hotter.
Howdy grinned.
“You drift into Sandog, start cutting
“You cut ’er to a gnat’s teat,” he
cards with a gambler, and end up breaking
reckoned. The Ladies Aid gasped. “Wouldn’t
him,” the Court summarized. “It is understood
be no use finin’ me. Them damages clean me
he cheated you, and you, in turn, cheated him
plumb out.”
more so, and drove him out of town.
Shortly thereafter, Howdy and the
“Then, you proceed to get drunk. And
sheriff and two deputies reined up outside of
half the male population of Sandog with you.
town.
Men who were church-goers until you came
Howdy tugged a bottle out of his shirt
along. A man your age! Tch, tch.” His Honor
front and replaced it with the old Colt .45 the
The Gun-boss of Whispering Valley 3
sheriff handed back to him.
“Hell, she’s like the ol’ days, when the
“What was it that sky pilot called me?”
mines opened,” Howdy told himself. His heart
Howdy pulled the cork. The sheriff took the
beat faster and a wild eagerness urged him on.
bottle. “Said you was an incorrigible old He fought down that urge, remembering he sinner. So here’s a drink to whatever that is.”
was now a paragon of tranquil dignity.
“If she’s what it sounds like, it’s fine
The evening brought Howdy to
I’m goin’ on as a man of peace,” Howdy
Pinnacle Station, the highest point in the
assured them.
Orfree Hills. Howdy had been prepared to see
“They said it was terrible, a ol’ pioneer
this old halfway stage and freight station in a like you agoin’ on the peck like that,” a decayed state. Instead, it was in repair, and deputy chuckled.
there were horses tethered outside. A bawling,
“Hell, they oughta see me when I get
leather popping, long-line skinner was pulling
goin’ good.”
out, his fresh sixteen-up heaving to the collars.
They had another drink around, said
The huge wagon was loaded with mining
farewells, and Howdy Harris went his way
machinery.
alone. He carried himself proudly, and looked
Howdy dismounted and frowned into
upon a wicked world with eyes of pity and
night’s thickening gloom. Down the road, that
tolerance.
ran downgrade from here to Whispering
He aimed for Whispering Valley and
Valley, and on the other side, a new building
old friends. They’d find the years had changed
had been erected. As he looked, a stage pulled
Howdy Harris, he determined; a dose of in and stopped and while hostlers hooked up prison and smaller and more bitter pills of jail fresh horses, passengers piled out and went
terms, fights, benders, riotous living had not
inside to eat.
made of Howdy a Mary’s Lamb.
Howdy didn’t know if he should hang
But now age had made of him a around or sleep out tonight. He turned and pioneer, by damn! He’d sit on his tail up there drifted toward the stables in the rear of
at Whispering Valley, and show all the quiet
Pinnacle Station, to see if he could get
dignity the brand of pioneer implied.
accommodation for his horse.
“Comin’ back, Whispering Valley,”
He was almost to the stable when a
Howdy said aloud. “Peaceful, like that—that
bouncing, rattling buckboard drawn by a
turkey buzzard as packs a mesquite branch in
matched team coming hellity-tilt slammed off
his claws.”
the road and past the station and pulled up
near the stable.
II
Howdy turned. Men with lanterns were
coming from the station and the barn.
FROM
the rail-end at Grand Center, it was
A young man whose face was pleasant
sixty mountain miles to the town of under a coating of dust, tossed his leathers to a Whispering Valley. As, days later, Howdy hostler and jumped down.
Harris took that road, he knew that something
The man on the seat beside him stood,
had happened; but not what.
a rifle in the crook of his arm. A tall, thin-
He passed two high, heavy freight lipped man, whose fancy calfskin jacket, tight wagons, loaded to the sky. A stagecoach California pants, and ornate cartridge belt and rocked and jingled toward Grand Center, silver chased pistol, contrasted highly with the leaving a trail of white dust to settle over
blue denims the young driver wore.
cedar and shinnery.
“Why’n hell ain’t the other team
Action Stories
4
ready?” the guard roared. “Bigod, you know
lanterns’ yellow rays, came a tight, knifing
we’re carrying a gold bar.” He kicked the
voice. Howdy’s voice, and it made the blood
heavy iron, padlocked express box that was
of more than one hearer run more than a little
bolted through the floor onto the buck-board’s
cold.
frame.
“The world ain’t big enough for both
“You’re early,” someone growled. of us any more!”
“An’ don’t be passin’ us your blab. Bill
Dineen’s the driver. All you got to do is ride
III
an’ be fancy pants.”
Howdy moved forward into the lantern
WHITE dust hung heavy over the town of
light, drawn by thet name of Bill Dineen. He
Whispering Valley, shot through with burning
sort of remembered that name. Asia Logan
sunrays that brought down the choked, dry
had a nephew by that name. Had taken him in
scent of cedar. Howdy came slowly down the
and sent him to school when the boy’s paw,
long, twisting street, subduing the urge to
and Asia’s sister, the button’s mother, got
tickle his bronc with his spurs and make him
drowned in a cloudburst.
pitch while he, Howdy, yanked his old cutter
Now the kid was a man. How in hell
and blasted at the moon.
did Time keep it’s furious pace without
He ached to shrill a rebel yell and
slowing for wind once in a while?
scream “Cowboy’s in town!”
The gun guard, Dude Tern, angered by
Those actions, though, were for fools
the stableman’s name of fancy pants, spotted
and wild younkers. And Howdy was a
Howdy.
virtuous man these days. Why, he’d even tried
“Back, you!” he roared. He held the
to regret threatening that gun guard. Vain
rifle at waist level as he pulled the trigger. A effort, that.
splash of flame ran downward and the bullet
He held his mount to a sedate walk and
cracked into the hard earth too close to read the story of Whispering Valley as written Howdy’s feet.
since he’d left the town.
Howdy leaped aside, and Tern hit the
On the hills above the town, stamp
ground, coming at him. Hand on the gun mills crashed and thundered. There were new beneath his shirt, old Howdy ached to pull that buildings lengthening the street’s long,
old pistol and let this loud fool have it where crawling course. A few men in cowman’s garb
he lived. He bridled his flaring temper and
were on the raised board walks; and many
stood silent as Tern came to a halt, muzzle of
men whose dress and walk proclaimed them
his rifle almost touching Howdy’s chest.
off the creeks and from the mines.
“You’re too close to a gold shipment,
Howdy passed the Trompoose Bar. His
you old rat!” Tern snarled. “Grubliners and
horse turned toward the rail there. Howdy
saddle tramps ain’t allowed to hang around.
swallowed, tongued dry lips and urged the
Get going, you whiskered packrat. Vamose!”
animal on.
Howdy opened his mouth, closed it
“Want folks to think I got you trained
quickly. If he had words with this blabbering
so’s you smell likker an’ natchally stall in
dogie, he knew his temper wouldn’t stand.
before the first saloon we meet?” he growled.
He turned. Dude Tern swung a
He drew rein farther down, before a
polished boot and sent Howdy staggering large, false-fronted building. As he got down, forward....
his horse turned its head and eyed him in a
Then—from the dark outside the way that Howdy swore was reproachful and
The Gun-boss of Whispering Valley 5
surprised. It lifted its tail and pawed the dust.
who’d ridden and helled together in their
“An’ the same to you,” Howdy youth, until Asia Logan went into business, grunted, making a threatening pass with his
and Howdy—because of his own
old hat.
hellishness—went to the pen.
He put his hands on his hips and
They surveyed each other, each
looked up and the sign painted across the
thinking of the other: “Hell, he’s gettin’ old!”
building’s false front. “Logan.
General
And then they saw back through the layers of
Supplies. Freight Office,” he read laboriously, age Life had so lavishly spread on them. They
spelling out each word under his breath.
grinned.
He turned, then, and looked across the
Low, trying so damned hard to appear
street. A building twice the size of Asia casual, they gave their greetings.
Logan’s reared in opposition over there.
“Varmints that cross a man’s trail
It bore the painted information: Crake-
when the season’s closed!” Asia Logan said.
Norvell ... Merchandise & Machinery ... Stage
“Howdy, you soft, take-’er-easy town
Station.
boy,” Howdy answered.
Shaking his head, Howdy turned,
He licked dry lips again. Logan
climbed steps from street to boardwalk, went
pointed to a cupboard. “I got a busted leg.
under wooden awning with its rolled-up Rolling down a mountain with a freight wagon canvas that was let down to balk the hot sun of riding me. There’s a bottle there, and you
afternoons, and entered Logan’s place.
don’t care if you do. I can stand a snort
The interior was larger than in the past.
myself.”
Twice as much merchandise of all
Howdy got the bottle. He turned and
descriptions was displayed. The counter, with
sneered at Logan, and indicted him for
the window and panel of postoffice boxes was
softness by pointing to thin, small whiskey
gone. The corner the postoffice once had glasses on the shelf.
occupied had been boxed in to make a cubby-
“Never mind them. What the hell you
hole office.
think them tin cups is for?” Logan barked.
Howdy grinned broadly, mopped his
“Glasses is for special, soft customers.”
hand
s on his baggy britches, then settled his
They filled their cups half to the brim,
face woodenly. He ignored the yap of a clerk
drank, settled back.
who came toward him, telling him he couldn’t
“So you heard things was wild, and
go in Mr. Logan’s private office. He went in
you come raring back.” Logan shook his head.
and closed the door and stood with his back to
“Howdy, you and me is too old, I guess. There
it.
ain’t nothing you can do.”
The gray-haired, heavy man at a
“Ain’t aimin’ to do nothin’,” Howdy
kitchen table that served as a desk, didn’t
assured him. “I come back here to settle down
seem to notice him at first. He stared into
an’ live peaceable. I’m aimin’ to be a—a sorta
space, lost in worried thought. Crutches lay on pioneer.”
the floor beside his chair, and Howdy noticed
“Then,” Logan stated decisively, “I
Asia Logan’s left leg was in a cast.
know the days of miracles ain’t done.”
“You always was breakin’ somethin’,”
Howdy snapped.
IV
Asia Logan turned. His eyes widened,
his mouth gaped.
ASIA LOGAN toyed with his cup. “So you
They eyed each other ... this pair see,” he said, “after you left, business fell off.
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