The End of the Trail (6 page)

Sam's face grew black with anger. “Looky here, Pat. I ain't in no mood fer funnin'.”

“You're drunk,” Pat said harshly, dragging him through the swinging doors. “An' a dadgummed fool to boot. Don't you know Kitty's sittin' at home pining her heart out 'cause you're not there?”

“Lot you know aboot it,” muttered Sam. “Seems like I cain't stand it tuh go home sober no more, Pat. I'd ruther be locked up in jail.”

“Don't you still love Kitty?” Pat demanded.

“Shore I do. That's thuh plumb hell of it, Pat. I love her so much that I dassn't go home sober 'cause we're liable tuh start fussin' an' I'll fergit an' tell her it's all her blame that we're stuck here an' I've turned into
Mister
Sloan. Coolin' my heels in a office all day instead of bein' out on thuh range where I belong.”

Pat stopped and planted both hands on his hips. “You're blamin' Kitty for that?” he asked incredulously.

“Shore, it's because of her. I reckon I shouldn't ort to've married her in thuh fust place. Me, I ain't no city man, Pat. You know I ain't. But I gotta do what's right fer Kitty an' thuh baby.
You
know how she never did like it down in Powder Valley. Cain't blame her none, thuh way she was raised. I gotta stay here an' keep on earnin' money so's I kin build her a big, fine house an' …”

Pat interrupted him with a whoop of glee. He linked his arm in Sam's and started hurrying him toward the little white house where Kitty was waiting for them.

“You an' Kitty had both ought to be hawsewhipped,” he snorted. “Keepin' secrets from each other is the surest way I know to bust up a plumb good marriage. You're resignin' that damned job tomorrow,” he went on explosively. “An' we're taking Kitty back to Powder Valley where she can breathe clean air again, an' then we're teaming up with Ezra just like old times.”

“But I'm tellin' you, Kitty won't …”

“What you don't know about yore own wife would fill a whole shelf of books,” Pat told him scathingly. “Hurry up 'fore she cries her eyes out.”

6

Sally Stevens was overjoyed when Pat showed up at the Lazy Mare ranch a couple of days later with Sam and Kitty and Sam, Jr. They arrived late in the afternoon, and Sally bustled around happily, putting an extra cot in the spare room for the baby to sleep on, and asking Kitty a thousand excited questions about Denver, and what the women were wearing, and so on, without ever asking the one question that was uppermost in her mind.

She didn't know why they had returned so unexpectedly with Pat, and she refrained from asking because she was afraid the answer might be bad news. They had brought a lot of things with them, more as if they planned a long stay rather than just a short visit, and Sally had an uneasy prescience that Sam had lost his job with the Pony Express. She hoped he hadn't, because she had thought it was wonderful when he got the job and was able to move Kitty to the city; and she thought it would be just too terrible if Sam had proved himself a failure on his first big chance to make good.

But she had to admit to herself that Sam and Kitty both seemed mighty happy to be back in Powder Valley, and she restrained her curiosity and didn't ask any embarrassing questions while she busied herself getting a big supper ready.

Immediately upon their arrival, Pat dispatched his twelve-year-old son Dock to Ezra's ranch to bring the big, one-eyed man over for a reunion, and the two of them returned to the Lazy Mare just in time to sit down to a table overloaded with Sally's good cooking.

After they had finished supper, when the two women had the dishes cleared away and all five of them were gathered in the long living room in comfortable chairs, Pat addressed Ezra with a sly twinkle in his eyes:

“I've been waitin' for Sally to get back in where she could hear this because I know she's just bustin' wide open with curiosity to know what Sam an' Kitty are doing back here.”

“I am not, Pat Stevens.” Sally sat primly erect with her hands folded in her lap. “Goodness knows, I'm always glad to have them come for a visit and stay as long as they can. They don't need any better reason than that.”

“I'm doin' plenty of wonderin',” Ezra rumbled in a disgusted voice, glaring at Sam with his one eye. “Thought I'd fixed ever'thing up fer yuh so's you could go along with thuh job awright after I he'ped you git thuh route straightened out an' started runnin'. You jest couldn't cut thuh mustard, huh? Got fired I betcha, an' come runnin' back home with yore tail 'tween yore laigs.”

“He did not get fired,” put in Kitty quickly. “He's got the Laramie route running so smoothly that they don't need a good man like Sam on it any more.” She glanced across at Pat for him to go on with the story they had fixed up to tell Sally so she wouldn't worry about the trip Pat had planned for the three men.

“That's right.” Pat nodded expansively. “The Pony Express figures Sam's too good a man to keep him settin' in a city office doing nothing much. They're sendin' him out to make a pack trip over the Divide to the Western Slope to explore out a route from Denver down into Grand Junction.”

“There ain't no road across them mountains a-tall now,” Ezra ejaculated. “Not sence the old stage road went out twenty-five or thutty years ago.”

“That's right,” Pat agreed. “The last stage coach went over that road thirty-two years ago. Started out from Denver, that is, but never did reach Grand Junction. We got a newspaper clippin' about that from the Denver paper … Sam figgerin' he might run onto some trace of the coach or passengers up there in the mountains while he's blazin' out a new trail.”

“It's an amazing story,” Kitty told Sally with sparkling eyes. “The coach left Fairplay on schedule one morning and was never heard of again. It was late in the fall and there was a terrible blizzard and when searching parties went out they discovered that the road up to the pass was blocked by a terrible landslide. They decided the coach must have been caught under the slide.”

“Funniest part of the whole thing,” Pat put in, “was the way the other end of the road out of Sanctuary Flat went out just about the same time. If they had gone over the pass ahead of the landslide, like as not they'd been stuck right there on the Flat till the summer thaw and starved to death. That's what happened to the man runnin' the way-station on the Flat. Both ends of the road went out at the same time an' left him stranded there until a party skied in over the mountains next spring an' found him dead.”

“How did the lower road go out?” Sally asked. “Did they have two landslides at the same time?”

“No,” Pat explained. “Seems like the old road followed a ledge right alongside the river canyon below the Flat, an' the river had been eatin' at the ledge an' undermining it for a long time. It jest happened to give way at about the same time the landslide blocked the other end.”

“And there isn't any road over the mountains now?”

“There's a narrow gauge railroad up to the Flat from Pueblo,” Pat told her, “but no route from Denver straight across. The Pony Express thinks there oughtta be, so they're sending Sam out to hunt for one; sort of explorin' the mountains.”

“I've been up through that South Park country south of Fairplay an' I know where the ol' road usta run,” Ezra put in. “There's another pass south of there …”

“Sam really ought to take Ezra along with him,” Sally put in. “You've always said he has a sort of instinct for smelling his way across the mountains.”

“Sam an' me thought of that,” Pat told his wife easily. “I figured maybe all three of us would fix up a couple of pack hawses an' make a campin' trip out of it. Ain't much doin' here on the ranches right now. We figured Kitty could stay here with you to keep you company while we're gone.”

“Of course,” Sally agreed instantly. “I think that's a wonderful idea. I know you three are always dying to get off on a trip together, and I'm glad you're old enough now so you don't think it has to be a gun-slinging expedition to be interesting.”

Pat was afraid to look at Sam or Kitty. He kept a grave face and asked Ezra, “How about it? You feel like makin' a pack trip up through there with Sam an' me?”

“'Twon't be no fun fer me.” Ezra shook his shaggy red head lugubriously. “Want me along tuh wrangle thuh hawses an' do all thuh cookin', thass all.”

“Mighty good huntin' up there,” Pat offered. “We'll take our rifles along an' maybe trail us down a mountain lion or a she-bear.”

“With cubs, Dad?” Dock spoke up unexpectedly from his seat on the floor beside his mother's chair.

“Like as not,” Pat agreed. “Maybe we can tame one an' bring him back for you a pet.”

“Couldn't I go along, Dad?” Dock's eyes were shining. They were the same clear gray color as his father's, and at twelve he was strongly built and tall enough to reach his father's chin.

“Not this trip, I reckon, Dock.” Pat shook his head.

“I don't see why he shouldn't go,” Sally put in quickly. “You know how he loves camping out, Pat.”

“Sure. I'd wrangle the hawses an' do all the camp work, Dad. And Ezra could teach me to cook. Gee, Dad. Can't I go?”

“It'll be a hard, dangerous trip,” Pat began, “and …”

“Nonsense!” Sally spoke out strongly. “You've often bragged how Dock never tires on a trip. And you don't want him to be a sissy and stay at home with two women.”

“It ain't but a little while till school starts,” Pat protested. “You don't want him to miss out on his booklearnin', do you?”

“There are other things more important than school-books,” Sally said serenely. “It would be a wonderful experience for him, and for once you won't be going into any gun-fights or anything like that so I won't be worried about him going.”

“I sure don't know.” Pat threw an agonized look at Sam for assistance. “I reckon maybe the Pony Express wouldn't like us takin' a boy along … do you reckon, Sam?”

“I shore dunno,” Sam mumbled.

“I'd much rather have him here around the ranch,” Kitty Sloan put in quickly. “Think how it'll be without any man at all,” she reminded Sally.

“No.” Sally's chin was strongly set and determined. “Dock deserves a vacation too. I don't understand you, Pat. You're always wanting to take him places that I think too dangerous, and you're always arguing with me that he's old enough to do such things. And now when I give up and actually want him to go, you refuse. Are you sure there isn't some other reason for this trip than you've told me?”

Pat managed to look quite surprised and he answered indignantly, “What makes you talk like that?”

“If it's just a camping expedition into the mountains, I should think you'd
want
him along.”

“Shore we'll take thuh little tyke,” Ezra put in loudly. “Like he says, he kin wrangle thuh hawses an' firewood, an' mebby wash a dish er two at night. Neither of you'all will turn a hand tuh he'p, an' you both know it.”

“I'll ride Buster an' take my twenty-two rifle,” Dock said excitedly. “An' you kin teach me to catch rainbow trout an' fry 'em while they're still wriggling like you tell about, Ezra. And you can show me how to track a mountain lion, an' … an' …
can
I go, Mother?”

“You'll go if your father goes,” Sally Stevens promised him calmly. “It's the only way I'll be easy about him because I know he won't do anything foolish and go traipsing off on some dangerous stunt of his own if you're along.”

“Doggone it, ol' lady,” Pat began, but Sally compressed her lips and began talking to Kitty about something else and Pat knew he was licked. Well, he conceded wryly, that's what he got for trying to fool Sally about the real purpose of the trip into the mountains. A man never did get very far trying to deceive his wife. Somehow, women always seemed to come out on top no matter how smart a man tried to out-figure them.

7

Dock Stevens was as excited and as eager as a young beaver during the next few days while arrangements for the pack trip into the mountains were being made. He was determined to be helpful and show his father he wouldn't be in the way, and there was nothing he wouldn't do to help the expedition get started.

The very next morning after Pat's return from Denver, Sally drove into Dutch Springs and had a talk with Dock's school-teacher. She came back with the reassuring news that the teacher said he was doing well in his studies and that he could study some to make up for the time he might lose from school.

The partners decided to take three pack horses with them on the trip, and to be prepared to be out of touch with civilization for at least two months. They all knew the mountainous country well and realized it would be difficult to find a trail over the Divide into Sanctuary Flat; and after they reached their destination, they had no idea how long it might take them to discover who was trying to drive the syndicate out.

For that was the way Pat and Sam had planned it in Denver, with Kitty's enthusiastic approval. Instead of going up to the Flat openly by railroad and risk having the murderer guess their reason for being there, Pat and Sam had decided on the more difficult approach across the supposedly impassable mountains on the pretense of locating a new Pony Express route as Pat had explained to Sally.

That way, if they did manage to make their way down into Sanctuary Flat, they would arrive unannounced and unseen, and would have a chance to look the ground over and do some quiet investigating before the killer was aware of their presence in the Flat. Even if they did run into someone immediately upon their arrival in the valley, they had a legitimate reason for their presence by pretending to be a Pony Express exploration party.