the Rider Of Ruby Hills (1986) (8 page)

"What makes you think he'd be here?" Kinney demanded. He was pale and taut, but completely self-possessed. He might have been addressing a class in history, or reading a paper before a literary group. "I know Burt, but I haven't seen him."

Chapter
VIII

Help Needed

Unobtrusively, Ross Haney was lounging against the door to the kitchen, his mind working swiftly. They would find him, and there was no earthly way to prevent it. The only chance would be to avert the hanging, to delay it. He knew suddenly that he was not going to see Roily Burt hang. He didn't know the man, but Burt had won his sympathy by winning a fair fight against two men.

"What are you so all-fired wrought up about, Pogue?" he drawled.

Walt Pogue turned square around to face him. "It's you! What part have you got in this?"

Ross shrugged. "None at all! Just wonderin'. Everywhere I been, if a man is attacked an' kills two men against his one, he's figured to be quite a man, not a lynchin' job."

"He killed a Box N man!"

"Sure!" Ross smiled. "Box N men can die as well as any others. It was a fair shake from all I hear. All three had guns, all three did some shootin'. I haven't heard any Reynolds men kickin' because it was two against one. Kind of curious, that. I'm wonderin' why all the RR men are suddenly out of town?"

"You wonder too much!" It was the man from the springs. "This is none of your deal! Keep out of it!"

Ross Haney still leaned against the door, but his eyes turned to the man from the springs. Slowly, carefully, contemptuously he looked the rider over from head to heel, then back again. Then he said softly:

"Pogue, you've got a taste for knickknacks. If you want to take this boy home with you, keep him out of trouble."

The rider took a quick step forward. "You're not running any bluff on me, Haney!"

"Forget it, Voyle! You get to huntin' for Burt. I'll talk to Haney." Pogue's voice was curt.

Voyle hesitated, his right hand hovering over his gun, but Ross did not move, lounging carelessly against the doorpost, a queer half-smile on his face.

With an abrupt movement then, Voyle turned away, speaking quickly over his shoulder. "We'll talk about it later, Haney!"

"Sure," Ross Haney said, and then as a parting he called softly, "Want to bring Dahl with you?"

Voyle caught himself in midstride, and Voyle's shoulders hunched as if against a blow. He stopped and stared back, shock, confusion, and puzzlement struggling for expression.

Haney looked back at Pogue. "You carry some characters," he said. "That Voyle now. He's touchy, ain't he?"

"What did you mean about Dahl? He's not one of my riders!"

"Is that right? I thought maybe he was, although I'll admit I didn't know."

Walt Pogue stared at him, annoyed and angry, yet puzzled, too. The big man walked back to the table and poured a cup of coffee from the big pot on the stove. He put sugar in it and then cream. He glanced once over his shoulder at Ross.

Haney felt a slight touch on his shoulder and glanced around and found May at his shoulder.

"He's gone!" she whispered. "He's not there!"

There was dust on her dress and he slapped at it, and she hurriedly brushed it away. "Where was he shot?" he asked, under his breath.

"In the leg. He couldn't go far, I know."

Pogue turned around. "What are you two talking about?" he demanded. "Why the whispering?"

"Is it any of your business?" Haney said sharply.

Walt Pogue stiffened and put his cup down hard. "You'll go too far, Haney! Don't try getting rough with me! I won't take it!"

"I'm not askin' you to!" Ross replied roughly. He straightened away from the doorpost. "I don't care how you take it. You're not running me or any part of me, and you might as well learn that right now. If I choose to whisper to a girl, I'm doin' it on my own time, so keep out of it!"

Pogue stared at him and then at the girl, and there was meanness in his eyes. He shrugged. "It's a small matter. With all this trouble I'm gettin' jumpy."

Voyle came back into the room accompanied by two other men. "No sign of him, boss. We've been all over the hotel. Simmons an' Clatt went through the vegetable cellar, too, but there ain't a sign of him. There was an empty box under those spuds, though, big enough to hide a man."

Allan Kinney had come back into the room. "What about that, Kinney?"

"Probably somethin' to keep the spuds off the damp ground, much as possible," Haney suggested carelessly. "Seems simple enough."

Pogue's jaw set and he turned swiftly. "You, Haney! Keep out of this! I was askin' Kinney, not you!"

This time Voyle had nothing to say; once Ross glanced at him, and the man looked hastily away. "He's scared," Ross told himself mentally. "He's mixed in some deal an' don't want his boss to know it. He's afraid I'll say too much."

Pogue turned and strode from the restaurant, going out through the hotel lobby, his men trooping after him. When the last man was gone, May turned to Kinney. "Allan, where can he be? He was there, you know he was there!"

Kinney nodded. "I know." He twisted his hands together. "He must have heard them and got out somehow. But where could he go?"

Ross Haney was already far ahead of them. He was thinking rapidly. The searchers would probably stop for a drink, but they would not stop long. Voyle was apparently in on the plot to have Burt killed, for he had been at the springs, and this had happened too swiftly. Too little noise had come from the RR for it to be anything but a plot among them. Or so it seemed to Haney. For some reason Roily Burt had become dangerous to them, and he was intended to die in the gunfight the previous night, but had survived and killed one of their men and wounded another. Now he must be killed, and soon.

Yet Haney was thinking further than that. His mind was going outside into the darkness, thinking of where he would go if he were a wounded man with little ammunition and no time to get away.

He would have to hobble or to drag himself. He would be quickly noticed by anyone and quickly investigated. He would not dare go far without shelter, for there was some light outside even though it was night.

Yet Haney was recalling the stone wall. It started not far from the hotel stables and went around an orchard planted long ago. Some of the stones had fallen, but much of it was intact. A man might make a fair defense from behind the wall, and he could drag himself all of a hundred yards behind it.

Ross walked swiftly out of the hotel through the back door. There in the darkness he stood stock-still at the side of the door letting his eyes become accustomed to the night. After a minute or two he could pick out the stable, the orchard, and the white of the stones in the wall.

Walking to the stable, he took the path along its side and then put a hand on the stone wall and dropped over it with a quick vault. Then he stood still once more. If he approached Burt too suddenly the wounded man might mistake him for an enemy and shoot. Nor did he know Burt, or Burt him.

Moving silently, Haney worked his way along the stone wall. It was no more than three feet high, and along much of it there was a hedge of weeds and brambles. He ripped a scratch on his hand and then swore. Softly, he moved ahead, and he was almost to the corner when a voice spoke, very low.

"All right, mister, you've made a good guess but a bad one. Let one peep out of you an' you can die."

"Burt?"

"Naw!" the cowhand was disgusted. "This is King Solomon an' I'm huntin' the Queen of Sheba! Who did you think it would be?"

"Listen, an' get this straight the first time. I'm your friend, and a friend of May and Kinney from the hotel. I've been huntin' you to help you out of here. There's a horse at May's shack, an' we've got to get you there just as fast as we can make it. You hear?"

"How do I know who you are?"

"I'd have yelled, wouldn't I? If I found you?"

"Once, maybe. No more than once though. This Colt carries a kick. Who are you. I can't see your face."

"I'm Ross Haney. Just blew in."

"The hombre that backed Syd Berdue up? Sure thing, I know you. Heard all about it. It was a good job."

"Can you walk?"

"I can take a stab at it if you give me a shoulder."

"Let's go, then."

With an arm around Burt's waist, Haney got him over the fence and then down the dark alleyway between it and the stone house next to it. They came out in an open space, and beyond it there was the trail and then the woods. Once in the shelter of the trees they would have ample concealment all the way to May's house.

Yet once they were started across that open space, any door opened along the backs of the buildings facing them from across the street would reveal them, and they would be caught in the open. There would be nothing for it then but to shoot it out.

"All right, Burt. Here we go! If any door opens, freeze where you are!"

"Where you takin' me?" Supporting himself with a hand on Haney's shoulder, and Haney's arm around his waist, he made a fair shift at hobbling along.

"May's shack. If anything delays me, get there. Take her horse an' light out. You know that old trail to the badlands?"

"Sure, but it ain't no good unless you circle around to Thousand Springs. No water. An' that's one mighty rough ride."

"Don't worry. I'll handle that. You get over there and find a spot to watch the trail until you see me. But with luck we'll make it together."

Burt's grip on Haney's shoulder tightened. "Watch it! Somebody openin' that door!"

They stopped, standing stock-still. Ross felt Burt's off arm moving carefully, and then he saw the cowhand had drawn a gun. He was holding it across his stomach, covering the man who stood in the light of the open door. It was the bartender.

Somebody loomed over the bartender's shoulder. "Hey! Who's that out there?"

"Go on back to your drinks," the bartender said. "I'll go see." He came down the steps and stalked out toward them, and Haney slid his hand down for his left gun.

The fat man walked steadily toward them until he was close by. He glanced from one face to the other. "Pat," Burt said softly, "you'd make a soft bunk for this lead."

"Don't fret yourself," he said. "If I hadn't come, one of those drunken Box N riders would have, an' then what? You shoot me, an' you have them all out here. Go on, beat it. I'm not huntin' trouble with any side." He looked up at Haney. "Nor with you, Ross. You don't remember me, but I remember you right well from your fuss with King Fisher. Get going' now."

He turned and strode back to the door. "What is it?" A drunken voice called. "If it's that Roily Burt, I'll fix him!"

"It ain't. Just a Mexican kid with a horse. Some stray he picked up, an old crowbait. Forget it!" The door closed.

Ross heaved a sigh. Without further talk, they moved on, hobbling across the open, then into the trees. There they rested. They heard a door slam open. Men came out into the street and started up the path away from them. They had been drinking and were angry. The town of Soledad would be an unpleasant place on this night.

When Haney had the mare saddled, he helped Roily up. "Start down the trail," he said. "If you hear anybody comin', get out of sight. When I come, I'll be ridin' that palouse of mine. You've seen it?"

"Sure. I'll know it. I keep goin' until you catch up, right?"

"Right. Keep out of sight of anybody else, and I mean anybody. That goes for your RR hands as well. Hear me?"

"Yeah, an' I guess you're right at that. They sure haven't been much help. But I'll not forget what you've done, a stranger, too."

"You ride. Forget about me. I've got to get back into Soledad an' get my horse out without excitin' comment. Once I get you where I'm takin' you, nobody will find you."

He watched the mare start up the road at a fast walk, and then he turned back toward the town.

He heard shouts and yells, and then a drunken cowhand blasted three shots into the air.

Ross Haney hitched his guns into place and started down the road for Soledad. He was walking fast.

Chapter
IX

Baited Trap

The disappearance of Roily Burt was a nine- day wonder in the town of Soledad and the Ruby Hills. Ross Haney, riding in and out of town, heard the question discussed and argued from every standpoint. Burt had not been seen in Rico or in Pie Town. Nor had any evidence of him been found on the trails.

No horses were accounted missing, and the search of the Box N cowhands had been fruitless, if intensive. Neither Allan Kinney nor May asked any questions of Ross, although several times he recognized their curiosity.

The shooting and the frenzied search that followed had left the town abnormally quiet. Yet the rumor was going around that with the end of the coming roundup, the whole trouble would break open once more and be settled, once and for all. For the time being, with the roundup in the offing, both ranches seemed disposed to ignore the feud and settle first things first.

Second only to the disappearance of Roily Burt was Ross Haney himself as a topic of conversation. He spent money occasionally, and he came and went around Soledad, but no one seemed to have any idea what he was doing, or what his plans were. Curiosity was growing, and the three most curious men were Walt Pogue, Chalk Reynolds, and Star Levitt. There was another man even more curious, and that one was Emmett Chubb.