From Hide and Horn (A Floating Outfit Book Number 5) (21 page)

‘
How did it start?’ Dawn
demanded.

‘
They—they followed
me,’
Barbe replied hesitantly. ‘I had come to the wagon to help
Edmond collect his camera so that we might photograph the fun. I
thought that they wanted to help—’

‘
So did
I,’ de Martin went
on. ‘When I said I wanted to go into the bushes, Vern loaned me his
Colt—’

‘
Who started the fight?’ Jacko
interrupted.

‘
Finding out now won’t do anybody any
good,’ Dusty put in. ‘Burle Willock’d been drinking. Where’d he get
the liquor?’

‘
Could he have had it with him all the
time?’ asked de Martin. ‘Waiting for a chance to celebrate, I
mean.’

‘
Not him,’ Ahlen grunted. ‘He wasn’t a
booze-hound, but he liked it enough to have drunk any he’d brought
long afore tonight.’

‘
None of the others in the crew had any
either,’ Dusty said. ‘Except Rowdy. Go see if your stock’s still
there, Rowdy.’

‘
Sure, Cap’n,’ answered the cook and
went to obey. On his return, he held out a partially filled bottle
of whiskey. ‘That’s what there was left in it after I yanked a
tooth out for Sherm Sherman.’

‘
Which leaves you, Edmond,’ Dusty
drawled.

‘
How dare you imply that
my brot
h—!’ Barbe started hotly.

‘
Dusty is right, dear,’ de Martin cut
in. ‘I do have liquor in my wagon and this is a serious matter
which needs clearing up. You can inspect my stock, Dusty. I have
kept it under lock and key since Charles explained his no-drinking
article.’

With that the photographer led the way to his
wagon and insisted that an inspection be made of his liquor supply.
As he had claimed, it was securely locked in a trunk to which he
carried the only key. Leaving the wagon, Dusty remembered something
he had seen earlier and turned to Heenan.

‘
You took Burle a cup of
coffee
—’

‘
Sure,’ agreed
the
hardcase. ‘Two of ’em. Hell, it was all part of the
running, us treating the heifer-brands like they was for-real
womenfolk.’

‘
Mr. Heenan has no liquor with him,
Dusty,’ de Martin stated. ‘He was broke when he came to work for me
and I refused to advance his wages to buy a bottle.’

‘
It—it’s all my fault!’
Barbe put in, sniffing and looking
pathetically at the men. ‘You all
blame me—’

‘
No, ma’am!’ Jacko hastened to assure
her. ‘We ain’t none of us blaming you.’

‘
Those boys’ve been
fussing over you
—’‘ Dawn began.

‘
And I did my best to stay
away from them after that fight!’ Barbe whimpered. ‘You all know
that. I never went near either of them. And tonight it was I who
suggested that they played
at being women so that I wouldn’t have to
dance with either of them. You all know that.’

‘
We all saw it,’ Sodak agreed. ‘Ain’t
nobody blaming you, Miss Barbe.’

‘
There for sure ain’t!’ Jackie
confirmed, directing a grim, challenging look around
him.

Barbe threw the young cowhand a look of
abject relief and complete gratitude. Then she clasped her
handkerchief to her face, turned and ran to her wagon. Sobs shook
at her as she climbed inside.

‘
You’d best see to her, Edmond,’
Goodnight said. ‘Rowdy, take some of the crew and have two graves
dug. We’ll have to bury—Vern—tonight, Dawn.’

‘
I—I know!’ Dawn replied.
‘Oh Colonel Charlie, he was
only a boy—’

Showing a gentleness known by only his
closest friends, Goodnight took the girl in his arms and led her
away from the bodies. Quietly Rowdy assembled a working party and,
for once, none of the cowhands objected to riding the blister-end
of a shovel. Watching them go, Dusty let out an angry growl which
brought Ahlen’s eyes to him.

‘
Damn it, Swede!’ Dusty said. ‘Where
did he get that liquor?’

‘
I wish I knew,’ the big cowhand
answered. ‘Whoever gave it to him near on blew this whole drive
into the air.’

Red-eyed from crying,
stiff-faced and tight-lipped, Dawn took her regular place among a
silent trail crew on the morning after the double killing. She had
seen her brother buried the night before and sobbed almost to
sun-up in the bed-wagon, but insisted at breakfast that she was
abl
e to take
her share of the workload. If anything, her brother’s death had
increased her determination to see the drive brought off
successfully.

‘
Ho, cattle!’ Mark and Ahlen chanted at
the point. ‘Ho! Ho! Ho! Ho!’

Showing satisfaction almost, Buffalo lurched
into motion. There was a short period of inevitable confusion until
the steers reassumed their positions in the line. Wending their way
to the banks of the South Concho, the cattle drank and crossed
without any trouble to resume their westward march on the other
side.

‘
We’ve not lost more than
half-a-dozen head,’ Dusty told his
uncle as they gathered to compare
their totals after making a trail count on the western side of the
river.

‘
You’ve done well, boy,’ Goodnight
congratulated.

‘
Not all that well,’ Dusty
said bitterly, thinking of the two grav
es close to their deserted
campsite.

‘
Very well!’ Goodnight insisted.
‘Including last night. A wrong word or move there would have seen
more graves on the Horsehead Crossing.’

Early in their stay, one of the hands had
found a horse’s skull near the river and stuck it up in a tree to
give the area a name it would bear in future.

‘
Swede did most of it,’ Dusty said. ‘If
he’d not backed us, there’d’ve been powder burned last
night.’

‘
Swede’s got a good head on his
shoulders, like you. That’s why I stayed out of it and let you two
call the play. I’m damned if I know what I’ll say to Darby
Sutherland when we get back home.’

‘
I know how you feel, sir. That was one
chore I hated in the War; and I only had to write letters, not tell
them face to face. It’d be best if we watched the crew real careful
for a few days, Uncle Charlie, and try to make sure that nothing
else happens to stir them up.’

‘
It would,’ Goodnight agreed. ‘Once we
get on to the Staked Plains, they’ll have more than plenty to keep
them occupied.’

‘
Sure. I wonder where Willock got the
liquor from?’

‘
He could’ve
car
ried it all along. After being off it for so long, he’d not
need much to make him drunk.’

‘
I asked Miss de Martin why she shouted
about not shooting,’ Dusty said. ‘She reckons she can’t remember
doing it. I didn’t push it, she likely feels bad enough about
what’s happened.’

During the day, Dusty kept a close watch on
the crew. They were subdued in their manner, but worked together
with no sign of remembering the split of the previous night. So far
they had not got on to the real Staked Plains, but the grazing grew
poorer while the heat increased. By good fortune they found a water
hole and let the cattle drink before bedding down for the
night.

Despite Dusty’s comments, Barbe
seemed to have recovered from her shock by nightfall. Returning
from a visit to the remuda, Dusty heard talking
be
yond a
clump of bushes. Recognizing Barbe’s voice, he would have walked on
but her companion’s words brought him to a halt.

‘
Colonel Charlie won’t let me do it,’
said Austin Hoffman. ‘He wouldn’t let Edmond take pictures close to
the cattle.’

‘
But you could do it, Austin,’ Barbe
answered. ‘And it would make both my brother and I so grateful if
you did.’

‘
They’d not let me do it either,’
Austin protested.

‘
Couldn’t you do it without them
knowing?’

‘
How?’

‘
Take the camera and hide close by.
Then photograph the herd as it comes towards you.’

‘
That’d mean being on foot,’ Austin
gasped.

‘
Are you afraid?’ Barbe asked and Dusty
could sense her bristling at the arguments.

‘
No. But I’m
not
loco
neither,’ Austin replied. ‘Any one of them critters’d
charge me on sight—’

‘
It would be worth the
risk, Austin,’ Barbe purred. ‘Just think what such a photograph
would mean. The first of its kind, taken at considerable risk.
Why
,
it would make you famous. Then, with the flair you show for
photography, you could open a studio in Austin, or even in some
Eastern city where I could live. Don’t you see, Austin?’

At which point Dusty decided to let his
presence be known. So he gave a rasping cough and heard a hurried
scuffling among the bushes.

‘
Who’s there?’ Dusty called.

‘
It’s only us,’ Austin answered, coming
through the undergrowth with the girl trailing behind him. ‘We’re
just going back to camp.’

‘
I’ll come with you,’ Dusty said. ‘Hey,
I just now remembered, Austin. There was a Hoffman in the Texas
Light, maybe you’re kin to him?’

‘
My uncle,’ Hoffman confirmed, looking
just a touch relieved and showing no sign of yielding to Barbe’s
glances at the bushes. ‘What do you know, Miss Barbe, Cap’n Dusty
knowed my uncle in the War.’

‘
How interesting!’ Barbe said in a tone
which carried a knife’s edge.

‘
Say, Miss Barbe,’ Dusty drawled. ‘You
don’t know if Edmond’s figuring to take any pictures of the herd in
the next few days?’

‘
He may be,’ Barbe answered, darting a
suspicious glance at the small Texan and reading nothing on his
face.

‘
I’d
best ask him not
to,’ Dusty said. ‘Especially close up. That powder going off near
them might start a stompede and none of us’d want that to
happen—now would we, Austin?’

‘
We sure’s hell wouldn’t,’ Hoffman
agreed vehemently.

‘
I’m sure pleased that I met up with
you, Miss Barbe,’ Dusty went on in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘It’ll
save me looking up your brother special to warn him. You can do it
for me.’

‘
I will,’ Barbe promised, but her voice
dripped ice and she left the men as soon as they drew near to the
camp.

‘
How much did you hear, Cap’n Dusty?’
Austin asked as soon as they were alone. ‘Afore you coughed, I
mean.’

‘
Enough to figure it was my business to
cough,’ Dusty replied. ‘Don’t try it, Austin. Even if you don’t get
killed by a steer, you’ll stompede the herd. Either way, you’ll
never get that fancy photographic studio in some Eastern
town.’

After the cowhand had left him, Dusty stood
for a moment and looked at the de Martin wagon. However, he put off
his intention to see the photographer with a warning not to use
Barbe as a lure to get risky pictures taken. There would be time to
do that later. So Dusty walked across to the main fire and heard
Goodnight talking to the crew. One of the hands had just been
complaining about his bed being so rock-studded that he doubted if
he could sleep.

‘
Getting to sleep’s not going to worry
you for a spell after tonight, anyways,’ the rancher
announced.

‘
How come, Colonel Charlie?’ the
cowhand inquired.

‘
Because when we move out tomorrow,’
Goodnight explained and something in his voice brought all other
conversation to a halt, ‘we won’t be stopping until we reach the
Pecos.’

An almost numbed silence followed the words,
as the trail crew gave thought to the implication behind them. Even
the de Martin party had heard, for they approached the fire. Dawn
could see concern on the girl’s face and wondered what caused
it.

‘
You mean that we just keep the herd
going,’ Ahlen said. ‘Without bedding down, or for water, until we
get to the other side, Colonel?’

‘
That’s just what I mean,’ the rancher
agreed. ‘You saw the lie of the land, Swede. There’ll barely be
enough water for the horses and crew. So we keep the cattle going
for as long as it takes us to hit the Pecos.’

‘
How about food for the hands?’ Sherman
wanted to know.

‘
Rowdy’ll pull ahead with the wagon,
throw up a meal and you’ll eat it in the saddle. Those cattle have
to be kept moving all the time.’

‘
How about my sister, Charles?’ asked
de Martin. ‘Do you expect her to be subjected to such
conditions?’

‘
There’s
no other choice,’ Goodnight answered.

‘
What you could do,’ Dusty suggested,
‘is stop back at night, then catch up during the day. Your wagon’ll
be able to make better time than we can with the herd.’

‘
Would that be safe?’ de Martin
inquired.

‘
Safe enough,’ Dusty
replied. ‘There’re no Indians up this way and we’ll be leaving a
trail a blind man could fo
llow. If there should be a sandstorm, I’ll
get Lon back to guide you.’