Clay Nash 24

by Brett Waring

  Nash frowned. “Why Texas? It’s not his stampin’-ground.”

  “M-Mebbe th-that’s why.”

  Nash thought about that, then nodded. “Could be. Like Shannon to try somethin’ like that.” His voice and face suddenly hardened. “’Less you’re sendin’ me on a wild-goose chase.”

  “N-no. Nash. G-gospel. He men-mentioned Tex ...”

  The man broke off and went into a fit of coughing that convulsed him. He died a few minutes later.

  When Nash rolled him over, he saw there was indeed a bullet wound in his leg. A great chunk of meat had been chewed out of the calf and the blood on the crude bandages was dry. It had happened a long time before the attempted bushwhack in the draw.

  Not holding out much hope of success, he searched Smoke Reardon’s pockets and then the man’s saddlebags. In the bottom of one of them—caught in the hard leather seam—he found two pea-sized pellets of yellow metal.

  Gold.

  Nash nodded. It looked as though Smoke had been telling the truth about Shannon.

  And it looked as though Shannon, after killing Reardon’s men, had gone through Smoke’s saddlebags to recover the gold—but had missed the two small pellets.

  The Wells Fargo man stood back and thumbed his hat off his forehead. If that part of Reardon’s story were true, there was really no reason to doubt the rest of it.

  He turned towards the dead outlaw to drag his body over beneath a cutbank which he aimed to use as a burial ground.

  He decided that after he had completed the chore, he would return to Big Tree Crossing and get off a wire to Jim Hume, telling him he was bound for Texas.

  The Butterfield spread was a dirt-poor place, set way back in the remote hills fringing the disused Potter-and-Bacon Trail.

  The house was split logs in part, while sections were also made of clapboards, with the kitchen tacked onto the back. The iron chimney was pocked with rust holes and spewed smoke into the early morning.

  Amos Butterfield was a rawboned man, and stoop shouldered—as if he’d been weighed-down by the effort of establishing a spread in such a bleak area.

  That was true enough. He had arrived ten years back when the cattle trail to Abilene had been only a few miles away.

  Full of dreams, married to Effie, with three sons—all since dead with the blackwater fever—Amos had figured he had it made. It was good cattle country. The seasons were kind and he had plenty of grass. He took up free range, figured he could raise steers and when they were ready for market all he would have to do would be to drive them to The Trail, wait for a herd going north, and drive along with them or sell them outright.

  He also reckoned he could rent out his range grass to herds passing through after the long dry plains crossing ...

  The theory had been fine and for the first two seasons it had paid off. He had even been able to ship in a treadle sewing machine for Effie.

  Then their luck had run out.

  Leastways, that was always how Amos Butterfield thought of it. The winter was bitter and prolonged, and had killed off the grass down to the roots. Then the spring rains didn’t come as expected ... Summer arrived and the hot sun scorched the grass stubble ...

  What water there was on Amos’ holdings began to dry up as the drought continued without relief. Once the creek stopped flowing and became a series of waterholes, disease began to spread. Thirst-weakened animals died as they knelt to drink and their carcasses rotted in the water, sometimes unseen.

  Then blackwater fever hit the spread.

  It took the three children first—and almost snatched Effie away.

  He had had to sell off the sewing machine in the end to pay the medical bills—the machine and what remained of his dwindling herds.

  The spread simply never looked up after that.

  Because of the drought in north-west Texas, the cattle trail was abandoned and one with more permanent feed and water was chosen.

  Butterfield had no income. He tried to sell the spread, but no one was interested. He and Effie managed to survive somehow and, after a time, that became their life: fighting to exist from one day to the next.

  It dulled their senses, killed their incentive for anything else.

  They lived in a daze, just waiting to die.

  Then the stranger arrived.

  He was the first visitor they had had in over a year. He appeared on the hogback rise one morning, slumped in the saddle, weakened from lack of food and his mouth cracked and scaled with thirst. He led a mule that had canvas-covered tools and gear on its back.

  Obviously, he was a sourdough prospector down on his luck. It was something that folk like the Butterfields clearly understood.

  He was nearly delirious, and his skin was blistered from long days of crossing the badlands—so they took him in and gave him some of their precious well water.

  It often took all of Effie Butterfield’s strength just to wind up the wooden pail of muddy water from the bottom of the well. But she strained the liquid through cheesecloth, boiled it, let the sediment settle, and poured off as much of the clear liquid as she could—before straining the remainder and going through the tedious process again and again until not a drop was wasted.

  Day after day, that was the ritual.

  While she did it, Amos rode his bony bronc into the hills and shot a deer or a possum or woodchuck, even a coyote if there was nothing else offering.

  They had been living that way for so long they had forgotten there was any other kind of existence.

  But they still had their innate kindness for someone in trouble and they both found new energy reserves as they worked on the stranger, brought him out of his fever, gave him clean water and shared their meager food supply with him.

  He was with them for two days before he was able to speak intelligibly and the first thing he did was thank the Butterfields for their efforts at tending his needs.

  “Our pleasure, mister,” Butterfield assured him in his slow drawl. His mouth moved in a kind of twitch and the stranger only realized later that it was meant to be a fleeting smile. “I got so many questions to ask you I just had to get you well.”

  “That so?” the stranger asked warily, chomping on some tough sinewy meat in his plate of stew.

  “Yeah. First off I’d sure like to know what kind of rifle that is in your pack, with the brass prongs comin’ out of the butt the way it does ...”

  The man paused with his fork halfway to his mouth. His eyes narrowed and Effie Butterfield grasped at her husband’s scrawny arm, suddenly afraid of this man she had helped nurse back to life.

  “Amos,” she whispered. “Perhaps our ... guest doesn’t like to be—questioned ...?”

  Butterfield’s face straightened. “Hell, yeah! My ... my apologies, mister. Been so long since we seen anyone out this way I was forgettin’ my manners. Anyways, our name’s Butterfield. Amos an’ Effie.”

  The stranger nodded and flicked his cold eyes from one to the other. Then he stood up and walked across the room to where his war bag and packs lay against the wall. The big Remington-Hepworth rifle lay on top of the canvas.

  He picked it up and turned slowly towards the nervous couple. His thumb rested lightly on the curve of the hammer as he flicked his gaze from the man to the woman and back again.

  “My name’s Shelton,” he said flatly as he notched the hammer back slowly, swinging the Remington around in a short arc ...

  Clay Nash crossed from Colorado into New Mexico by means of the Raton Pass. He headed into the town of Raton where he figured he’d find a reply to a wire he’d sent to Jim Hume.

  He was wrong. There was no telegram.

  Jim Hume had arrived in person.

  The blocky Chief of Detectives stepped out of the shadow of the saloon porch opposite the livery stables and lifted a hand in greeting to Nash as the tall agent swung across the street.

  Nash was pleasantly surprised.

  “I sure wasn’t looking to see you down here, Jim,” he said as h
e approached.

  Hume turned and strode alongside, indicating that they should go into the saloon bar. Nash needed no second invitation. It was a blazing hot day and he’d put a lot of miles behind him during the previous twenty four hours.

  Making his way through the Pass had been like riding through a furnace. He dumped his saddle rig at one end of the bar and ordered a fishbowl of beer, a thirty-two fluid ounce bowl shaped glass.

  The bartenders packed their beer kegs with ice before drawing from them. Hume watched in amazement as Nash half drained the fishbowl glass at one gulp.

  “Man, I needed that,” he said, wiping froth from his lips. “Barkeep, can you rustle me up a beefsteak and French-fried potatoes, some apple pie and coffee?”

  The man nodded. “Take a spell, though Cook’s good at his job, but kinda slow. Only got one arm.”

  “Bring it to the corner table,” Hume told the man and led Nash away. They sat down and Nash drank more beer. Hume took in his dusty, trail-stained appearance. “Where the hell you been?”

  “You get my wire from Big Tree?” Nash countered, taking out tobacco and papers and starting to build a cigarette.

  “Sure. ‘Headed for Texas’, was all it said. Texas? Hell, man, you’re a Texan. Shouldn’t be any need for me to tell you how big a State it is. Take a lot of work to find Shannon there. ’Less you got something more specific to go on?”

  Nash shrugged. “Not yet. But I figured things this way, Jim: Shannon was toting a mule loaded with that hundred-some pounds of gold. He needs that gold for a getaway stake. It’ll buy him freedom for a long, long time if he goes about it the right way. There’s so much gold, that obviously he’s aimin’ for it to be his nest egg. He’s gonna disappear for keeps.”

  “Like I was saying: Texas is a mighty big place. If Shannon disappears there, we’re gonna have a helluva time trying to locate him again.”

  “Well, Smoke Reardon says he mentioned Texas. No more. He mightn’t stop there. He might pass on clear through to Mexico—Now, hold up, Jim. Let me finish—way I see it, it hardly matters whether he goes to ground in Texas or south of the Rio. Because I aim to catch up with him long before that. And the way I figure it, there’s only a few trails he would take from Colorado down into Texas. And even if he’s headed for Mexico, he’s gonna go through Texas first.”

  “What’s wrong with straight down through New Mexico?” Hume demanded.

  “As I recollect that file on Shannon, there were extradition orders out for him from Socorro, Lordsburg, Alamogordo and Santa Fe. Too big an area for him to risk ridin’ through when so many lawmen are after his hide. So he could cut through a corner of Oklahoma Territory to north west Texas, but I figure he wouldn’t risk that, either.”

  Hume frowned. “Why not? That’s still badman’s territory, and he could get a lot of help along the way.”

  “And he could lose his golden nest egg, too. Much more chance of getting it stolen that way than keeping to more-or-less pilgrim trails.”

  Jim Hume pursed his lips, then nodded in slow agreement. “Yeah. Guess it’s the way Shannon would think. So that brings us to Raton Pass, huh?”

  “Easiest road into New Mexico, short trail south east and he’s in north west Texas. He’s got badlands’ country where folk are few and far between—and that includes lawmen and Texas Ranger patrols. He could hit the old Potter-and-Bacon Trail, mebbe head into Amarillo for supplies, then jump a freight to wherever he wanted. Once he gets south of the Brazos, he’s got a whole network of railroads and stage lines to choose from. We’d spend ten years searching.”

  “Which means we’ve got to stop him this side of the Brazos.”

  “That’s the way I see it.” Nash said with a sigh. “You been here long enough to find out if Shannon’s passed through?” Hume shook his head. “I got in last night. Wasn’t even thinkin’ of Shannon having enough gall to come this way, the most obvious ...”

  Nash smiled faintly. “That’s Shannon’s trademark. Doin’ the unexpected. It’s how he got away from me. I thought he was too exhausted, but he was a damn sight stronger than I figured. Right down the line, he did just what no one would expect him to do: like turnin’ up at Tomahawk Canyon and killin’ the squaw before she could cut Mary Lee Farrell’s throat ...”

  “Yeah,” Hume said with a wry twist to his mouth. “And finding out about that shipment of gold—then slaughtering the guards.”

  “How’s Tully?” Nash asked, grimfaced.

  “Lost his arm, but we hope he’ll pull through. We think we can pin down the man who blabbed about the gold shipment but it’s not likely he’s connected with Shannon. Just a big mouth. He’ll do a jail stretch, if I have my way.”

  “Well, guess the first thing to do is find out if Shannon’s passed this way,” Nash said. “Long as I know I’m on the right trail, it’ll only be a matter of time before I bring him in.”

  “You got rid of all that foolishness about you owin’ him somethin’?”

  Nash smiled without mirth as he dragged down smoke from his cigarette.

  “Yeah. Soon as he killed those guards and set me up with Carney and Smoke Reardon, I figured it was just him and me. He’s my responsibility, Jim, like you tried to point out all along. I was stupid not to admit it. I just felt Shannon wasn’t all that bad. I should’ve known better. He’s a cold-blooded killer—and I aim to bring him in.”

  Hume studied him in silence, then said, “Dead or alive, Clay, dead or alive. That’s the order from the top.”

  “That’s the way it’ll be,” he said confidently. “You can depend on it, Jim.”

  Hume smiled. “Glad to hear it.”

  Four – The Butterfield Place

  The trail led to Clayton, on the New Mexico-Texas Line. It was a cow town that straddled the Goodnight-Loving Cattle Trail. The only way into Texas from Clayton was across the badlands known as The Cauldron.

  It meant that Clay Nash had no choice but to outfit for the crossing. The locals said he was mad, that he would never make it. They were amazed that two fools would attempt such a crossing within a week of each other.

  “Two?” Nash snapped as the storekeeper filled his order.

  “Sure,” the man told him, weighing flour into a small linen sack. “Big hombre. Sourdough prospector. Leadin’ a mule. But he didn’t stock up as much as you, so I figure the buzzards would’ve gotten him before he made too many miles.”

  “Can you describe him?” Nash asked.

  The man did so—and there was no doubt in the Wells Fargo agent’s mind: he was hard on the trail of Shannon.

  Nash paid for his stores, bought a packhorse from the livery and loaded up. He waited until late afternoon before he set out, figuring to push as deep into The Cauldron as he could during the night and to rest up during the day.

  The Clayton folk had told him not to expect to find shelter out there. Nash had merely smiled and had bought a large square of burlap, half a dozen broom handles, and a hank of twine. He was wise in the ways of desert travel. If a man couldn’t find shade, he had to learn to make his own ...

  The place was well-named. The Cauldron fitted it better than any.

  It was a vast, shallow depression where the sun’s fierce heat was reflected from the slightly raised sides—and hammered at any traveler from all sides with immense force.

  The horses were reluctant to move and Nash wasted a lot of energy just keeping them going.

  He didn’t travel far into the heat of morning: it was too intense for that. But he didn’t stop moving the moment the sun came up, either. He pushed on until it became unbearable, then he pitched his square of calico, raising it on the broom-sticks so that it was high enough for the animals to rest under, too.

  He slept fitfully, the sweat oozing out of his pores and caking his shirt with patterns of salt.

  Used to desert travel, and having learned about such survival from the Apaches he had once lived with, Nash had had the forethought to bring some rock salt with him. He allowe
d the horses to lick at one block while he sucked at small pieces himself. Far from enhancing his thirst, it helped to slake it, for it was essential to replace the salt lost from the body through sweat.

  Dehydration and heat stroke were the enemies. A man could survive long enough without food to make the crossing, but he needed not only enough water—but the means of retaining it. Nash had seen greenhorns head out into desert country—usually chasing gold—using a single burro packed with kegs of water—certain they had the desert beaten.

  He’d rescued several of them only two or three days later. They had plenty of water left, but they were weakened and withered from dehydration: they hadn’t known enough to replace the salt their bodies had lost through sweating.

  But the desert Apaches had known, and Nash, after being made a blood-brother of the tribe, had been initiated into such secrets ...

  He spent three nights on The Cauldron and, on the morning of the fourth day, came to some gray hills. Beyond them, rose other timbered ranges so he pushed on through without stopping until late in the afternoon when he made camp under a tree for the first time in days.

  He brewed up strong coffee, ate a big meal and turned in, preparing for the first thorough night’s sleep since leaving Clayton.

  Nash heard animals prowling around and gathered some manzanita scrub to build up the fire a little, then, weary, his senses dulled and dazed by the long grueling crossing, rolled up in his blankets ...

  He didn’t know how much later it was that it happened, but the fire had burned down almost to embers and the stars were fully out, glowing like jewels against blue-black velvet.

  Suddenly, he jerked up in his blankets.

  His small fire was erupting like a miniature volcano, scattering embers onto his blankets. There were two rifle shots—the bullets sending his coffee pot leaping wildly across the camp.

  Nash instantly threw himself backwards as the other bullet whined past his face.

  Palming up his Colt and blazing two fast shots into the darkness, he snatched his rifle and tumbled behind a deadfall.