The Overlanders (5 page)

“How far ahead?”

Grete shrugged again.

“We ought to hole up while we can see what the chances are.”

Farraday scowled at him. “Pick your own place,” he said. “I figure you and me have got no fuss that can’t wait.”

“My notion, too.” Staring at Grete, Idaho seemed to be trying to make up his mind to something. He finally brought out four shoes from the slicker strapped back of his cantle. “I’ve got nails if you need ‘em.”

Grete took the shoes and looked a long while at the barred one. Then his glance bit at Idaho. “How’d you get them?”

Idaho showed a cruel flash of teeth. “That bar was a giveaway if anyone went back.”

“Why didn’t he just drop them?”

“And have somebody see him doin’ it? We’ve talked before. If anything busted I’d be the one wigglin’ around on the hot spot.”

“So you slip them to me.”

Idaho’s raw-red cheeks showed contempt. He kicked steel at his horse and rode off toward the front again. With the iron in his hand Grete stared after him, wondering. This could be on the level or it could be another peg they hoped to drive in his coffin.

The kid had the rifle when he presently caught up. There was excitement in his stare and an on-the-prod set to the forward hunch of his shoulders. “All right,” Grete said, “you’ve seen it. Now take it off somewhere and lose it.”

Barney Olds looked astonished. He opened his mouth, halfway angry.

“If you’re found packing two saddle guns
and
these plates,” Farraday said, “you’ll be grub for a coyote before you’re many hours older.” He held out the shoes that had been pulled from French’s horse.

Barney’s eyes goggled.

“Take them,” Grete told him. “Soon’s you find a bush that looks tall enough to hide in, get them on your bronc and start laying down tracks.”

The kid was eyeing him queerly. “They won’t fit this mare —”

“They’ll stay on her long enough to get the job done if you’re careful. I want a trail laid off toward those mountains. There’s tracks all over this dirt around here. Pick you out a good batch and leave that shod sign on top of them. Keep going until you’re riding on rock. Pull these shoes and leave the rifle. We’ll be somewhere off there —” Farraday pointed north. “Think you can handle it?”

“You’re goddamn right!”

Pushing the drag through the miles-long shadows bent down from the mauve and cobalt shapes of the mountains, Grete, coming onto the first jumble of lava rock, derived a mordant sort of humor from the thought of Bill’s robbers gustily tracking French’s plates into nowhere. It made an enticing picture but he did not permit himself to be fooled into thinking this ruse would rid them of danger. It would buy them a little time perhaps and maybe siphon off some of that kill-crazy crowd into places Grete had no intention of going, but it would not get them scot-free into Willcox. Bill was too crafty for anything like that; portions of his gang would already have been sent to close off every outlet into the west.

In his mind now, like the
segundo
he had been, Grete traced the probabilities to their inevitable conclusions. Somewhere ahead this drive would run into trouble; he was as certain of this as he was of Ben’s enmity. Just why Hollis should hate him he could not quite fathom but he had no doubt at all concerning the inevitability of gunsmoke.

In a way he could almost welcome this for it would shake down the crew and show him what he had to work with. Crotton’s bunch were as solidly rugged as anything Bill was like to throw against them and intrenched, besides, in a tradition of past victories. Crotton’s empire was no greater than his ability to hold it and he would know that once the bars came down every neighbor and pushed-out squatter would throw their weight against him. Thus Grete could see in the imminent prospect of bracing a fragment of Bill’s owlhoot legion a very real value to the plans he had shaped; but there was also grave danger. This crew might run out on him. They might not be willing to defend horses with their lives. They might not be able to, and they might — it was certainly possible — use the confusion of any conflict to put a bullet through his back.

These were things he had to think about.

He was still thinking about them without having reached any useful conclusions when he came at early dusk upon the camp to discover Idaho, with folded arms, sardonically eyeing a pair of angry-faced strangers. “There’s the boss,” Idaho nodded. “Dump your troubles on him.”

“What’s gnawing you?” Grete said, staring down at the pair.

Both were chunky-built men, heavily armed and cocked for killing. There was enough facial resemblance for Grete to mark the pair as brothers. Each had a fist belligerently spread within short reach of a pistol. The younger of the two, tipping up his scrinched face, threw his words at Grete in a voice that gave notice to nothing but rage. “You fellers have got your guts, by grab!”

“What’s the rub?”

“We don’t want no outside horse stock in here. We’re ranchin’ this valley!”

Farraday said reasonably, “We’re heading for the pass. I’ll be out of —”

“You’re gettin’ out right now! Get them animals turned around! You’re goin’ back where you came from!”

The man was riled enough to die for it. Grete, considering him solemnly, shook his head. “That’s not hardly possible, mister. We’ll be gone in the morning —”

“I don’t doubt that! And with half our stock! I know you damn Texicans! By grab, I tell you right now —”

“You ain’t tellin’ nobody, Fatso.” Idaho had a gun in his fist and no hold on the hammer but the tension of his thumb.

“Wait a minute,” Grete said. They could do it this way and likely make it stick, but not for long. The mares needed rest, they had to have grass and water. If he ran this wild-eyed pair off now they’d be back before morning, and probably with help. There was a better way. He made himself smile. “Have you looked over our stock?” he asked conversationally.

The older man nodded. “You’ve got some good blood there. We don’t like to be so feisty mean but we’re in horses ourselfs and we don’t aim —”

“You won’t lose any stock to us,” Grete cut in. “As a matter of fact, if you’ll privilege us with a stake of grass and water and room for these mares to rest up a few hours, you can have your pick of any pair takes your fancy.”

Sary had come up with Ben while they were talking but Grete didn’t look to see how she was taking this. He didn’t look at Idaho, either, but prayed like hell the pistoleer would string along, at least to the extent of keeping his mouth shut.

Idaho did, but Ben Hollis chucked in his two and one half cents worth. “Over my dead body!” he snarled, thrusting himself forward like an overgrown lout of a kid in front of company.

Farraday could cheerfully have brained the sonofabitch. Instead, he ignored him, appraising the older brother’s curious stare, observing the younger brother twisting about for another look at the mares he’d come in with which Rip was chousing off now toward where Frijoles and cook were loose-herding the rest of them.

The older man said, “We’d like to be neighborly…”

“We’ll undertake to ride herd on them,” Grete smiled persuasively, noting the curl of Idaho’s lip. “I can keep the whole crew at it if that’ll ease your mind any. We’ll take them over to the seep and bed them down or up into that stand of blackjack just this side of the pass if you’d like that better.”

Idaho turned away with a snort and got onto his horse and rode after Rip.

“What’s the name of this place?” Sary asked, and the younger brother came around to stare at her.

Grete said, “Happy Valley,” and found the older man giving him a sharper scrutiny.

“You’ve been here before.”

“Worked cattle all through this country,” Grete nodded.

The younger one said, “If they’ll ride herd on their stock I vote we take ‘em up on it. There’s a sorrel filly in that bunch would suit me fine.”

Ben’s face flushed darkly for the fellow was looking at Sary when he said it. Grete was surprised to discover resentment in himself; this piled flesh fuel on the rage smoldering in him. But he kept it off his face. “If that’s all right with you,” he said to the other one, “go ahead and make your pick. I want to get these mares to water.”

The older brother didn’t like being rushed. You could see it. He paid no attention at all to the girl but kept looking around at Ben. Now he said, “You got the right to do what you want with these horses?”

“I’ve got the right of a trail boss and a half interest on top of that.”

The bold eyes of the younger one kept ogling Sary with an open lust that was hard to take. Ben caught hold of her arm and towed her away and the older one said, “We’ll want bills of sale for them.”

“In the morning,” Grete nodded.

“We’ll make our pick now.”

They rode over to where the band was being held and Grete was starting to break a lantern from a pack when the older one said, “You’ve got to take them past the ranch. We’ve got chutes. We’ll pick ‘em there.”

Just short of full dark they sighted the buildings. There was a horse trap and chutes and three stout corrals made of blackjack oak, one of them a round one with a post set in its center. The two brothers went on ahead to make ready. Sary came up to Farraday then. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” she said.

“We’ll have trouble enough without fighting them. How’s French?”

“For a hardcase,” she said, “you’re not much of a shot.”

“You give him back his pistol?”

He couldn’t catch her expression in the failing light but could tell by the stiffening set of her shoulders it had been a fool thing to ask. He was disgruntled to find himself saying, “Been no point in me trying to kill him after he shot off his mouth.”

“I didn’t think so, either.”

They rode a few strides before that one caught up with him. She knew when it did by the sharp look he gave her. She said, “What have you done with Barney Olds?”

He was riled enough then to ignore her completely. He was minded to bad enough. Instead he said curtly: “You’re welcome to ride back and look if you want.”

It was childish, he reckoned. She had no reason to trust him. And why the hell should he give a damn! He discovered he did and that hacked him still more. He spun the gelding away from her.

They’d got a light at the chutes and Ben’s handpicked crew was getting the stock strung out toward the wing. The brothers had hung lanterns onto posts above the squeeze and now were scrambling up. If they worked help there wasn’t any in evidence. A dozen horses in the trap were sending quips at the mares but the latter had caught the smell of water and were letting the crew know it, kicking and biting, raising general hell. Idaho caught one’s rump with a rope’s end. “Send ‘em through!” one of the brothers yelled.

Ben and Frijoles up at the front got them started. They had to crowd them against the fence and even then they kept trying to break around, so wild had they become. Grete gave Rip and Idaho a hand. Then Sary was calling, “They’ll founder if you let them get at that water!”

“Get over by the springs,” Farraday yelled, “and snap your fish at them.” He looked around for Idaho. “Where’s French?” he growled.

“Said there was springs at the pass and grass where we could hold ‘em. I sent him on with cook.”

A big roan broke out of the bunch and Grete went after her but the dun was too weary; she got off into the dark before Grete could make his throw. He rethonged the rope to the fork of his saddle, looked around once again, and headed for the springs to give Sary a hand with the mares as they came larruping up after clearing the chute. “Where’s the stud?” he asked.

“Gone ahead with Patch.” She heard Grete swear. She said, “He’s tractable enough; you needn’t worry about him.”

Grete wasn’t. It was French and the man’s proximity to a fast and valuable means of transportation that made him swing down and pull her out of the saddle. “Use mine,” he growled and, catching hold of her reins, was up and slapping the filly into a run before Sary realized what he was up to.

As he’d suspected, this mount, though gaunted from travel and the day’s lack of water, had a lot more left in her than the dun he’d got off of. He put her into a lope and overtook one of the mares which, having been turned from the springs, was following her nose into the damp air from the pass.

Riding through oak brush, avoiding thickets of mesquite, he soon sighted Patch’s fire off ahead through the night. In the last hundred yards he reined down to a walk, seeing the black shapes of the men among the thirsty stock which had got there ahead of him. Cook was fighting the mares away from water while French eased them into it three or four at a crack, hardly giving them time to wet their muzzles before whacking them out of it to make room for others. Both men had their hands full. Neither of them spoke though he caught French several times eyeing him covertly. Patch said presently, when the worst of it eased off, “If you an’ Irv can handle this now I’ll try to get some kind of a bait throwed together.”

“Go ahead,” Grete said, and looked around for the stud. The big Steeldust, with several of the mares, was off to one side cropping at the standing feed which was here mostly salt grass and grama. The horse for some reason appeared to be nervous, looking up and around every couple of mouthfuls. Excited by all this chousing of the mares, probably. “I know,” Grete told French, “you’re busting to cut loose of this. Just don’t try it if you crave to stay healthy.”

They watered the latest arrivals and hazed them off toward the others, French keeping his mouth shut. Cook had already got the packs off one pair of the work teams and now, with French helping, Grete unloaded the other and got to work on the mares. The stud, he noticed, still continued to seem uneasy, frequently quitting the grass to prowl around with his head up, occasionally biting at a mare. Another batch came in whickering and French chased them away from the water before they could get enough to cause any trouble. Farraday made a rough count, deciding most of them were here. Coffee smell came from the direction of the fire, and he was twisting around to suggest to French they go try some when the stallion sharply bugled.

“Crew’s comin’,” cook grumbled, “an’ I ain’t got the damn stew het up yet. If you wanta —”

But Grete was suddenly discovering French had given him the slip. He’d got completely out of sight and Farraday, wheeling around, couldn’t find the stallion, either. He plunged into the oaks, hearing the crew plainly now and the crackle of brush in the black somewhere ahead of him. If French got away everything they’d done was useless.

Back toward the fire he could hear the growl of Idaho’s voice, the chinging of spur rowels, the slither of bit chains. He reached down, taking off his own spurs, which he wrapped in his neckerchief and thrust inside the front of his shirt while he listened, rummaging the night with his stare. Someplace to the left of him, deeper into the oaks, brush snapped again and a horse blew out a gusty breath and Grete, with nerves pulled tight as fiddle strings, lifted the pistol off his hip and went storming into the branch-black gloom.

Too late he glimpsed the solider dark of a man’s crouched shape lunging erect in his path, the in-swinging blur of an enlargening arm that he could not duck and could not stop short of. The world exploded inside his head, all falling lights, and he went spiralling down into a crackle of oak leaves and bent-over grass.

It was the shot pulled him out of it, its sound near enough to strike physically against him. He got a hand braced and pushed his chest off the ground, hearing the echoes break and run and, farther back, the shouts like dim whispers floating through the pound of feet.

He saw the grotesque dance of monstrous shadows and staggered up out of the clinging mists into a kaleidoscope whirl of brush, shapes, and faces. Blinding light fell over him and something pushed at his fist and something else tugged his memory; then the light fell away and became a held-up lantern, and a solidness directly in front of him was the accusing look of Ben Hollis. There was a ring of faces peering over Ben’s shoulder and a waiting sort of stillness which was indescribably ugly.

“Well,” Hollis prodded, “what have you got to say for yourself?”

Grete shook his head, trying to clear away the grogginess. He started to shove the girl’s brother-in-law aside and something came hard against his stomach.

Glancing down he saw the cocked gun in Ben’s fist and, under it, the twisted shape sprawled between them. French still looked like a character out of Scripture — and just about as dead.