Cowley drew up short, his huge chest heaving, fists held at the ready. “Do that, Benjamin, do it! Go on, damn you!”
Sully Benjamin stood frozen, his face working, burning anger in his black eyes. He held Cowley’s testing look for a long moment, then he sighed and lifted his hand clear.
“You got no damn right to maul a man, Cowley,” he muttered.
“I got any right I like to take, Benjamin, and don’t you ever forget it. Now we’ll start all over again and Briller will do the tellin’. And, by hell, if you messed up things worse than I’ve heard so far, I’ll kill you and have you buried alongside Pearl and good damn riddance!”
Benjamin wiped blood from his mouth and swayed away from Cowley. Then, face hidden in the dark near the porch overhang, he shot a bitter look Briller’s way. Briller gulped and fumbled at the reins across the pommel of his saddle. His face was strained as his gaze shifted, from one man to the other.
“Tell me, damn you, mister!” Gus Cowley barked.
Briller nodded and wiped sweat from his face. “Like Sully said, Mr. Cowley, we was jumped. We was restin’ after a hard day, figurin’ to have us some fresh meat in the cool before bringin’ what was left back to the boys as a treat. Then, after Will got gunned down, this here jasper told us to dig out our money. He took twenty dollars of mine and gave it to—”
“Twenty dollars? What in hell for, Cowley?”
“The calf, Mr. Cowley, the one we butchered.”
Cowley’s brows lifted to reveal the cold shock in his eyes. “Twenty dollars for a yearling calf, mister? You loco?”
“That was this jasper’s price.”
Cowley wheeled on Benjamin. “A cowpoke and a snotty-nosed kid took you for twenty dollars Benjamin? You got a generous streak in you all of a sudden?”
Benjamin’s mouth tightened but he said nothing. Cowley punched the porch rail and swore violently under his breath. Then he breathed in deeply, trying to get control of his temper. Succeeding in part, he swung back onto the porch but still regarded Sully Benjamin disdainfully.
“Okay, Briller, let’s have the rest of it,” he said wearily. “For what it’s worth.”
Briller, appearing relieved at the change in Cowley’s tone, said, “Well, Mr. Cowley, that was about it, ’cept this jasper made us throw away our guns and then put Will’s body on his horse. After that he hit leather. The Gray kid had already gone home, takin’ the other calf and my twenty dollars.”
Cowley shook his head in disgust and clapped both hands onto the rail. “You’re damn fools, both of you. Can’t I take my eyes off any of you without you ride into trouble? I got to wet nurse you all the damn time?”
Benjamin stood beside his horse, eyes down. Briller sat rigidly still in the saddle.
Cowley shook his head slowly. “So you locked horns with the Gray kid when I told you to leave him and his ma alone. Then you got Pearl shot and paid up twenty dollars for a yearling calf. That’s great, just real great.” He moved about, scowling at Benjamin all the time. “If I got twenty dollars for every calf on my range I could buy up a good slice of Texas.” He breathed in deeply again. “Well, no matter now, it’s done. But hear me out, Sully—you’re ridin’ close to the wind. I don’t like slackers on my payroll. Briller, get a shovel and bury Pearl.”
Briller wasted no time pulling out, plainly glad to be on the move. Cowley then let Benjamin walk his horse off, but he sent some curses after him. He wondered if there would ever come a day when trouble of some kind was not on his doorstep. He went inside, studied the whisky cabinet thoughtfully for a moment then crossed to it and poured himself a double slug of whisky. He tossed the drink down in one gulp and relaxed as it warmed his insides.
Ten minutes later Sully Benjamin opened the door, leading a tall, lean man wearing double gunbelts. When Benjamin hesitated, the tall man brushed past him and came casually across the room. Benjamin turned to leave.
But Gus Cowley snapped, “Keep comin’, Benjamin. I ain’t finished with you.”
The tall man went to the wall near the cabinet, moving with the effortless grace of a cat. He leaned against the wall, black eyes sleepy.
“Trouble?” Slater asked.
“Of a kind, Jud,” Cowley said. “But nothin’ we can’t handle.” Cowley filled his glass a second time and then related Briller’s story.
The tall man eyed Benjamin bemusedly and said, “A kid and a drifter took you apart and hooked you for twenty dollars to boot?” His grin spread across his face, drawing deep grooves into the corner of his mouth and right down his lean, tanned cheeks.
“We was jumped, Slater,” Sully Benjamin muttered. “You couldn’t have done no better.”
“My paydirt against yours, Benjamin,” Jud Slater said, still grinning while he thumbed his hands under the shining buckle of his gunbelt.
Gus Cowley studied each of them coolly in turn before he gestured impatiently with his filled glass, and called, “Okay, okay. Let’s not complicate the issue. Pearl’s dead. Would have happened sooner or later the way he was always snortin’ for trouble. What worries me is this driftin’ jasper, Jud. If he’s workin’ for the Grays, they could be fixed to fight me off. I’ve got things sewn up with the bank and the Gray woman’s only got a few weeks left before her time’s up. Then I take over. Jud, what I’d like you to do is ride over there and take a look at the hand she hired.”
“Sure,” Slater returned, lifting his hands and flexing them. He straightened against the wall, his coarse shirt scratching noise from the bare boards. To Gus Cowley he looked as relaxed as a man could be.
“Be a waste of time goin’ to the widow’s place,” Sully Benjamin put in. “The kid headed home with his mangy calf but the tinhorn headed for town.”
“Tinhorn?” Jud Slater said. “And you didn’t take him?”
“Cut it, Jud!” Cowley said as Benjamin scowled darkly. “Sully’s had a hard day what with his friend Pearl shot down before his eyes.” Cowley walked to the door, opened it for Jud Slater and let him pass onto the porch. He leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness before he went on. “It’s town then, Jud. You know what to do, eh?”
Slater nodded, then jerked a thumb at Benjamin. “He rides with me?”
“That’s right,” Cowley said. “Sully can point him out.” He paused. “Just don’t step on the law’s toes, eh?”
“Not unless it can’t be helped,” the gun-handler said.
Cowley roughed his hair and breathed out tiredly, “Well, be careful. I’ve got the Gray business legally tied down, but I don’t like the idea of a stranger ridin’ in and killin’ one of my men. See he gets the message about that. Understand?”
Jud Slater smiled faintly. “Kill him?”
Cowley shrugged. “Leave it to you. When you meet him, try to think of Will Pearl as one of my best men, as loyal as they come and, like Sully here, always thinkin’ of the ranch first and himself second. A top hand, dead now, jumped by a drifter.”
Jud Slater nodded and went down the steps, walking with the easy manner of a man who had complete confidence in himself.
Cowley turned to Sully Benjamin. “Ride into town with Jud and see if you can do something right for a change.”
Then Cowley wheeled about, stepped into the house and slammed the door in Benjamin’s face. Benjamin spat a curse at the door before stepping off the porch and swinging onto his horse. While he waited for Jud Slater to come down from the stables, he let his horse pick its way along the barren clearing.
Cowley was having his third drink of the evening when Jud Slater came along the clearing and without a word to Sully Benjamin, worked ahead and let Benjamin eat his dust.
Five – Crimson Falls
Blake Durant reached Crimson Falls three hours after leaving the Gray place. The going through the valley had been easy and Sundown, after his rest, had made good time, getting skittish only once, when they passed a group of corralled mares. Durant himself was bone-tired and in need of a drink, so he hitched up
in front of a mid-town saloon and stepped through paint-faded batwings into a garishly lighted big room packed with cowpokes, gamblers, ranchers, townsmen, itinerants. The sudden noise was thunderous. He took a quick look around. It was the kind of a crowd which could, in a blink, erupt into a brawling, knuckle-crunching melee.
Durant edged himself between an argumentative group of cowpokes and dropped loose change on the counter. The barkeep, bushy-browed and sweating, hustled about urgently. The smell in the room was of men’s sweat, spilled whisky, dirty sawdust and tobacco smoke. The hanging lanterns gleamed yellow through the screen of smoke and gave the occupants of the room a vagueness which suited Durant.
In answer to the barkeep’s uplifted eyebrows, Blake said, “Rye.”
He tossed the drink down before the barkeep had collected the price for it, pushed the glass forward. “The same.”
The barkeep scooped up the glass after a solemn look at Blake’s dust-covered clothes and trail-drawn face. He put the second glass before Blake, counted out more money, and tossed it into a can behind the counter. Then he went off, answering an impatient call from a group down the bar. Blake sipped his drink this time, letting it wash the trail dust down his throat. When he had his third drink he turned his back to the counter and glanced around the place. It was a large, high-ceilinged room, but the pall of tobacco smoke screened off the roof lanterns and gave it the cramped look of a cave. Card tables were lined along the far wall, and what space was left around them was filled to overflowing. A section no more than ten feet by twenty had been swept clean and the smell of kerosene came from its boards. Men moving about had to shoulder their way and curses came thick and often from the bulk of the crowd. Despite the swearing, Blake saw that the place was kept orderly and he wondered vaguely who was responsible. It certainly wasn’t the little barkeep with the round face and fat, sweating body. Blake’s gaze moved on. Saloon girls in feathered and frilled dresses were doing their best to make the customers feel at home. Blake caught the gaze of a slim girl who looked no more than twenty or so. Her immediate interest in him showed in a quick, flashing smile and a slight tilt of her raven-haired head. She kept looking at him until she was caught by the elbow by a cowhand who was unsteady on his feet. Blake saw a frown knit her brow before she was swallowed by the crowd pushing onto the cleared space reserved for dancing. In the background a piano threw out tinny sound which was soon nearly drowned under the stamping of many feet and the swish of skirts. Blake finished his drink and got another from the barkeep who leaned on the counter.
“Dust settlin’, stranger?” the little man asked.
Blake nodded. “On the way.”
“Well, no need to drown yourself, throwin’ it down so quick. Saturdays we stay open late, sometimes till sunup, now and again even after the church bell’s rung. Depends on whether the crowd’s got religion or not.”
Another call attracted the barkeep’s attention and he went away grumbling. Blake shifted to let a couple of cowpokes use his space at the bar, then he saw that he was being stared at by the pretty little redhead again. Her smile was invitingly warm this time, but the scowl from the man at her elbow was anything but companionable. As she was dragged from sight. Blake grinned, then began to thread his way across the room. When he saw the young girl again, she looked away suddenly and ducked out of sight, revealing another woman, a little older, with the sweep of the stairway behind her. She was strikingly attractive but some hard years had caught up with her and brought a light fretwork of lines to her mouth and eyes. She caught and held his look, then she, too, turned away, so he made his way across to the card area where a solid knot of men stood around a center table absorbed in the play. Heeling about on impulse, Blake saw the young redhead and the taller woman still together, no more than ten feet from him.
Once more his look clashed with the tall woman’s and he saw her mouth soften a little and a gleam come into her eyes. He heard her say, “Stick to the hardcase cowboys, Marie, they’re more your type.”
The young girl went off, pouting and throwing her head back, and was quickly claimed by a group of cowhands who boisterously welcomed her into their midst. For one brief moment the older woman studied Blake. When she lowered her eyes and turned, he returned his attention to the card game.
Four men sat at the table, heads bowed over large stacks of chips. The bets came fast. Blake’s attention went to the youngest of the four, a man no more than twenty-four years old. He had bright red hair, a blotched face and thin hands which shifted nervously. Now he hesitantly eased a stack of chips forward, but then he drew the chips back, cursed, and pushed his cards into the center of the table. His glance at the man on his right was heavy and sullen as the bigger man raked in the pot. The winner was dressed in the manner of gamblers Blake Durant had seen in the bigger towns back east and on the steamers which plied the Mississippi. He had the supremely confident look of a man who was winning and could visualize no end to his affair with Lady Luck.
As hand followed hand and the youth steadily lost, his mood turned sour. He kept counting his diminishing stake, grumbling now and again under his breath. Once he looked directly at Blake and scowled, as if blaming him for his run of bad luck. Blake held his look casually and sipped at his drink.
After a time, one of the other players rose and kicked back his chair noisily. “Deal me out. I’m in far enough,” he said tightly, and shouldered his way through the crowd, cursing under his breath as he went. The youth wheeled about in his chair and threw a challenging look Blake’s way.
“Strikes me the game has you interested, stranger. Like to buy in?”
Blake shook his head, finished his drink and deposited the glass on a wall shelf. He took a pouch from his shirt pocket and started to make himself a cigarette. The youth’s lips turned back scornfully. He picked up the pack of cards and shuffled them, his eyes fixed on the remainder of his chips.
He dealt. The betting started and gained momentum.
Blake kept watching the youth, seeing his nervousness increase, his mouth harden. He bought two cards and shuffled his hand before he fingered the cards into a fan, only the very corner of each card showing to his heavy-eyed look. His face remained expressionless but Blake noticed a deepening of the gleam in his hooded eyes. The betting went on until only the young man and the dude-dressed gambler were left.
Sweat gleamed on the young man’s upper lip. He packed his cards together and fingered his stake, uncertainty stamped on his face.
“The bet’s a hundred, Red,” the dude said. “Make up your mind.”
The dude sat very still, smoke from a thin cigar drifted past his cool, expressionless eyes. The fingers of his right hand drummed lightly on his face-down cards. The young man stole another look at Blake, then defiance glinted in his blue eyes and he pushed the last of his chips into the center of the table.
“Matched and doubled, Callinan.”
Callinan smiled wryly and went on drumming. He counted the young man’s stack, pushed his chips forward to cover the bet, and turned his cards over, “Three aces.”
The redhead turned over his cards too quickly, his blue eyes bright with excitement. The cards spilled forward untidily and he had to rake them back and fan them for view.
“Four deuces.”
The young man scooped in the pot while Callinan pulled on his lips and tidied his own money before reaching for the cards. The young man looked at Blake Durant again, triumphantly now. Blake gave him a wry smile and walked lazily across the room until he reached the bar again. He was digging up loose change when a woman behind him said, “Hap, fill the stranger’s glass. I’ll have one of the same.”
Blake looked into a bright-eyed, rouged face. The woman gave him a guarded smile and looked him over intently.
“You made quite an impression when you walked in, stranger,” she said. “Three of my girls almost forgot past friendships when they saw you.”
The barkeep brought the drinks and the woman went on, “Custom of the
house to buy a stranger a drink. Come a long way?”
“Some.”
“Figure on staying?” Her eyes went over him again and she made no effort to disguise her approval of what she saw.
“Might.”
“Well, the town can use a couple of new faces. Cowhand, by the look of you.”
Blake shrugged. “I’ve eaten my share of herd dust.”
The woman was silent for a time and Blake saw that his lack of cooperation nettled her a little. Finally she said, “I’m Belle Hudson. I’ve been running the saloon since my husband passed away two years ago.” Blake saw her stare deepen, as if endeavoring to gauge his reaction to this personal information.
“I’m Blake Durant,” he said.
“Durant.” The woman smiled. “Suits you, Blake. You’ve got the name of a man who knows what he wants and mostly gets it. Have I got that correct?”
Blake gave her a vague smile. Then there was a sudden roar from the card tables and he turned to see the young man shouldering his way through the crowd. Several cowhands followed him through, all talking at once, one patting the redhead’s back. He caught sight of Blake and Belle and pulled out a handful of money. He slapped it down between them and said exultantly, “I took Callinan, Belle.”
Blake saw mild surprise on the woman’s face. “Is that so, Red? Well, that’s fine, but don’t get too carried away. Mr. Callinan doesn’t stay a loser for long.”
“He’s a loser tonight,” Red said. “Took just one big hand. I called his bluff and cleaned him out to the last dollar.”
Red’s friends were grouped behind him, nodding confirmation. The young man studied Blake. “Have a drink, stranger. Seems you brought me luck.”
Then Red stepped back into his circle of friends and they went out, making a loud racket. Belle Hudson sighed wearily and said, “One night up, one night down. In the long run, though, Laslo Callinan will get all their money.”
Blake sipped his drink, pushed the change towards Hap and said, “The way this town is shaping, I could stay a week and come out in front.”
The Loner 2 Page 4
