Joe Gamble spoke for the first time. “Nobody said he had anything to do with it, ma’am. We were just wonderin’ why he was so durned lucky. Anyway,” he added, “we’ve got two rustlers, and maybe they can be persuaded to talk.”
“I seen that Cardoza!” The speaker was a blunt-featured 3F hand. “He rides with Sim Aragon.”
Cardoza said nothing. The cook shifted in the saddle and looked around at the gathering of cattlemen. His face was pale.
“Take me to the law,” he said. “I want to talk to a sheriff!”
“He wants to talk to a sheriff,” Gamble said. “Shall we let him talk before he hangs? Don’t make much difference, does it?”
“Not a bit.” Gillespie was staring at Bolt. “We’ll get every man Jack of ’em, anyway.”
“What happened to Cassidy?” Sue asked suddenly. “Where is he?”
“He started back before I did,” Gamble admitted. “I figure it was him stampeded this herd away from the outlaws.”
They sat silent, knowing what that could mean in the darkness. “Reckon some of us better have a look,” Monaghan agreed. “Who wants to come?”
“I’ll go, if Gamble will return to the ranch with Miss Sue,” Gillespie said. “Should be somebody there. Anyway,” he added, “Bolt will want to ride with you.”
Jack Bolt’s face flushed with anger. “Gillespie, you keep out of my affairs. You’ve talked about enough today. If you want trouble, start something!”
Gillespie smiled, but his face was cold. “Why, I reckon I’d like nothin’ better, Bolt!”
Monaghan shoved his horse between them. “Cut it out!” he snapped harshly. “Gillespie, you come along if you like. Let Bolt go back to his spread. No sense havin’ you two killin’ each other.”
He turned to Gamble. “Joe, you ride on home with Miss Sue. Stay there.”
Chapter 17
RED CONNORS REPORTS
As finally decided, the group numbered five men. Others took the cattle and started them back. Jack Bolt was suddenly left alone. Turning his horse, his face dark with fury, he started back for his own ranch. Yet within him a tiny pulse of warning was pounding. This was getting close. Why did they suspect him? And that confounded Gillespie! His eyes narrowed. When his chance came he would kill him, but not now. Not now.
What could have happened? Their big drive was ruined, the herd turned loose and his men scattered.
When he came in sight of his own ranch he saw the horses in the corral. Then the men were back! By the red-hot hinges, he would see what had happened! He would know the reason why!
They sat on the porch. Grat was tipped back in a hide-covered chair, his tough, stubble-bearded face still dusty and grim. Slim, the Breed, Bones, and Pod Griffin.
It was this last one who took his eyes, for Pod was standing wide-legged in the middle of the porch. “Sure, he was fast,” he sneered. “He was fast, but I beat him to it and downed him. If you don’t believe it, go look at him!”
Grat looked up as Bolt swung down from his horse. Bolt glared at them. “You sure played hob!” he said viciously. “What happened? How could you lose that herd?”
“Now, boss,” Grat began placatingly, “it was this—”
“It was Cassidy,” Pod interrupted. The realization that he had killed the great Hopalong Cassidy was big within him. In his own eyes his stature had suddenly grown enormously. Why should he take a back seat for Grat? Or for any of them? Lording it around, the way they had been! “It was Hopalong. He busted into us and stampeded the herd. It could have happened to anybody. Grat wasn’t at fault; nobody was. But don’t you worry, it won’t happen again! Not from Hopalong Cassidy!”
Pod Griffin ached to be asked why; he was standing there, his chest swelled, his eyes glowing. Jack Bolt did not notice. He was thinking only of the lost herd.
“Sheer incompetence!” he snapped. “And as for you, Griffin, when I want talk from you I’ll ask for it.”
Griffin was astonished. “You talk that way to me?” He was furious. “To me?” He took a step back. Already he was thinking of himself compared to Hardin and Billy the Kid. “You been comin’ it big around here too durned long, Bolt! Hereafter you speak to me like a gentleman, or—”
Jack Bolt’s fury suddenly focused. “Or what?” he demanded. He faced Pod Griffin, his hands ready. “Or what, you tinhorn?”
Pod Griffin was not an intelligent man. All the way back to the ranch he had been going over and over the idea that he had killed Hopalong Cassidy. In his mind’s eye he saw himself acclaimed a great gunman. At first he merely realized that he could tell his own story of the killing and nobody would know the difference. Then he began to convince himself that Hopalong had seen him, had missed his chance. Back in his mind he knew the truth, but thinking over the times he had slung a gun and killed, he remembered that he had always been the fastest. How did he know he was not faster than Cassidy? Or Hardin, for that matter? Had he ever been beaten?
Bolt faced him along the length of the porch, and suddenly Pod Griffin knew that this was it—he had to show them. He could see their disbelief when he had told them. Now he would prove it!
“Why, you talk to me careful,” he said, “or I’ll kill you! I’ll gun you—”
Bolt’s hands flashed, and in that ghastly split-instant Pod Griffin knew the truth. It had come to him here, in this shadowed veranda smelling of old leather and tobacco smoke. In that flickering instant he saw Bolt’s gun hand flash, saw the barrel sweep up, the black muzzle stare at him, saw it blossom with flame—and then he backed up slowly, sat down, and he was dead.
Grat stared at Griffin, then at Bolt. He was shocked and amazed. He had never dreamed the boss could draw as fast as that. And Griffin? He looked again. The gun had never cleared the holster.
Jack Bolt stepped back, his glittering eyes going from one to the other. “What got into him?” he demanded. “What’s he been eatin’? Locoweed?”
Grat shook his head. “No, but he told us he’d killed Hopalong Cassidy.”
“Killed him? Killed Cassidy?”
Bolt stared at the dead man. “Where? How did it happen? Did you see it?”
“Nobody saw it. He went back after him. Pod was sore about the pistol whippin’ Cassidy had given him, and he went back gunnin’ for him. The next we knew, he pulled in here braggin’ that Cassidy was dead.”
“He was probably lyin’,” Bolt said.
“Nope.” Bones spoke up. “He sure must have done it, boss. You never saw anybody so blowed up over himself as he was. He didn’t get that way by accident. Cassidy’s dead, all right. I don’t figure he beat him to the draw like he was tellin’ us, but I figure he really got him.”
Cassidy dead! Then where was Red Connors? Bolt’s questions assured him that none of his men had seen Connors or any sign of him. Nor had Gamble mentioned him beyond the fact that Connors had taken part in the fight with Pete Aragon’s men. Had Cassidy’s friend been dead, he surely would have mentioned it, yet he had not. That meant that Connors was alive, and if not with Hopalong, where was he?
The answer to that was one that Jack Bolt did not at all like. Red Connors was logically the one to have followed the herd that was first stolen. In other words, there was every chance that he was now witnessing the transfer of the herd to his hands from the California ranch, and so was learning what not even his own men knew—that Bolt actually owned a ranch over the state line.
Impatiently, Bolt walked away from the conversation that had sprung up among the men. He heard them removing the body of Pod Griffin, and listened to the sounds of the picks in the hard ground as they prepared a grave for the dead man. A few hours before, all had been going well, and now his whole show was breaking up. If Cassidy was dead, then the sooner Red Connors was killed, the better. Could he rely upon Aragon for that?
Carefully he took stock of the situation. The big drive had failed, and the ranchers were alerted. The other cattle were being followed by Connors, and the very fact that Gamble had not mentioned it
indicated suspicion. Gillespie had openly implied his, and Monaghan was ready to listen, as were others. The situation here indicated that he had better pull in his horns and keep very quiet, then sell out when he had a good chance.
Four hours after the bullet had struck Hopalong Cassidy, the palouse began to grow impatient. He was a horse who liked to get somewhere, and standing around cropping the sparse grass did not appeal to him. The scattered cattle had gone on by themselves, heading toward home, and the palouse wanted to be moving on.
The fallen man lay unmoving, and the horse overcame his dislike of the blood smell and moved nearer. He pawed the earth, blew irritably, then nudged the fallen man with his nose.
Hopalong Cassidy’s eyes opened to find gray earth within an inch of his face. At first he lay still, not realizing where he was or what had happened. He could feel the dust under his fingers, the dull throb in his skull, and the beginning coolness of evening. Then he heard the palouse.
“All right, boy,” he said quietly. “Just a minute.”
The horse’s ears came up and he moved nearer, relieved that he was not alone.
Memory returned slowly, flowing like thick molasses into all the convolutions of Cassidy’s brain. He had been driving a bunch of strays toward the 3TL. They were recovered cattle, recovered from rustlers. Then there had been a blow on the head. His fingers stirred and felt for his skull. There was blood on his forehead, and then he realized what had happened. The bullet had grazed the skin along his brow from side to side, striking a glancing blow as it struck, then skidding around. He squinted one eye then the other. Each could focus on the ground nearby and the horizon.… Maybe he was not badly hurt.
Was the ambusher watching now? Cassidy considered that, his wits sharpening. The chances were the man had gone on; hours must have passed since the shot was fired, as it was now quite late.
Carefully, testing his strength, Hopalong drew back and got his hands under him, pushing himself up, then to his knees. His head swam, and he looked around him. After an interval he caught the stirrup of his saddle and pulled himself erect. When he was on the horse he started south.
As he rode, his thoughts began to add up. Whoever had shot him believed him dead. He had fallen; he had not moved. Had they come near him they must not have examined him, or the job would have been finished. Hence he was believed to be dead.
There was a seep near the end of the rocks not a mile away, he recalled, and he headed for it. When there, he dismounted, stripped the saddle from the palouse, and picketed it. He built a very small fire, heated water, and bathed his head. Then he made coffee and fixed something to eat. It was almost ten by the time he could get into his blankets.
He awakened in the cold light of dawn and he was much refreshed. The ache in his head remained, and as he sat up it began to throb. He got up, fixed breakfast while keeping a sharp lookout, and just when he was breaking camp he saw a rider. Even at the distance he recognized Red Connors.
Connors rode up, stared at the broken skin across his brow, and chuckled. “That thick skull saved you again, did it?” he said. “I reckon you couldn’t drive a bullet into it no more than you could an idea.”
“What did you find out?” Hopalong demanded. “Stop complaining and tell me that.”
Red swung down and rescued the last of the coffee before Hopalong could throw it out. He drank from the pot. “Plenty! That Aragon outfit turned the cows over to some riders who were waitin’ for ’em in Surprise Valley. Seven cowhands, their horses all wearin’ Rafter D brands. The Aragon outfit turned around and headed back this way. I took to the hills and followed the cows. They went north and then west. They finally wound up in a little valley near Goose Lake. Fine range, good-lookin’ outfit. None of these hombres looked familiar, so I took a chance and drifted down on ’em from the north.”
Red drained the coffeepot and rinsed it out with hot water from a nearby spring. He dried the pot with a handful of grass, deliberately waiting.
“All right, you spavined, broken-down cow nurse,” Hopalong growled good-naturedly. “Give me the information. That is, if you learned anything.”
“Seems,” Connors said, building a smoke, “that a gent name of Jack Bronson owns the Rafter D. He is stockin’ up on cows, which he is buyin’ in Wyomin’ and drivin’ across Nevada. The spread has added fifteen hundred head this year, almost that much last year—and the old stuff has been sold off. This Bronson figures on movin’ in there to stay right soon. He has been driftin’ around buyin’ cattle in the last few years.”
Red Connors drew deep on his cigarette.
“It sort of seemed to me that I remembered a man named Bronson from Colorado. They didn’t think so, but they described him.”
“Jack Bolt?”
“Uh-huh.”
Both men were silent, then Cassidy asked, “How about these Rafter D hands? Were they rustlers?”
“Nope. I’d say they didn’t know anything at all. One of them may suspect. He’s a slim, gray-faced hombre with blue eyes. He just listened to them talk to me and said nothing. But once or twice I had the feelin’ that he was smilin’ and had figured a lot of things out.”
Hopalong Cassidy swung into the saddle. “All right, Red. I guess we know all we need to know now. There’s evidence to be had, and I guess we’d better head for Tascotal and the telegraph station.”
“Why there?”
“Wire the sheriff over there near Goose Lake. We’ll get him to hold those cattle for evidence. Let’s go!”
“I reckon,” Red said briefly, “it’s all over but the shootin’!”
“Well, let’s hope we can do it without much of that.”
Red Connors snorted. “All right, you hope! I’ll keep my gun ready! If you get through this without shootin’, you’ll be mighty lucky! Mighty lucky!”
Chapter 18
CRUMBLING AMBITIONS
Tascotal drowsed in the sun of a bright morning with one eye open for trouble. Even those less perceptive than the inhabitants of the cow town would have noted the air of tension that hung over the streets. Tascotal had no theater and no carnival. Aside from the weekly dances or occasional ranch parties, the town was without entertainment except in the occasional outbursts of violence.
Some of the boys had drifted in from even such outlying spots as Sod House Point and Bottle Hill. Cowhands from the neighboring ranches found excuses to head for town. Hopalong Cassidy was dead—that story had gone the rounds. Pod Griffin had killed him, and the stories of how it was done were many.
The story had also reached town somehow that Griffin himself was dead, slain in a gun battle with his boss, Jack Bolt.
Old hands who knew the background of Cassidy began to wonder if any of the Bar 20 outfit would show up, and they recalled that Red Connors was still unaccounted for. So the town waited, talked low, and kept their ears tuned for the slightest sound. Meanwhile, other rumors added fuel to the growing blaze.
There had been a gun battle west of town, and several men had been killed. Cardoza had a broken leg. A couple of the others of Sim Aragon’s outfit had been wounded. A large herd of cattle had been found drifting, and much was being thought of the fact that no 8 Boxed H cattle were included.
Shortly before noon two riders appeared and rode swiftly down the street to the telegraph office at the railroad station, yet as they passed, men looked startled. Hopalong Cassidy and Red Connors! Abel Garson was leaning against an awning post before the express office. He stiffened, then mulled this new information over in his mind. If Cassidy was not dead, trouble was coming. He turned from the porch and ducked back for his saddle horse. This was news!
After sending his wire, Hopalong turned back to the street and stood there studying it for a long time. None of the outfit from the 8 Boxed H was in sight, and he could not see any of their horses. Nor were any of the Aragon crowd among the men along the street.
Sue Gibson came out of a store up the street, and Hopalong stepped down on the boardwalk and start
ed toward her. It was an old walk, the boards gray and silvery, yet worn wherever a man might find a place to sit. Sue was walking slowly, watching the street, and at first she did not see Hopalong. When she did she stopped abruptly, then gave a glad cry and ran toward him.
“Hoppy!” she cried. “We were afraid you’d been killed!”
“Not me.” He smiled at her excitement. “That must have been somebody else. How’s your dad?”
“He’s up. He’s been walking with a cane. Just a few steps, of course, but nevertheless he is up, and he’s fretting to see you. Where have you been?”
“Chasing rustlers. Is Bolt in town?”
“You mean Jack?” Her face suddenly sobered. “Don’t tell me you are like the others, Hoppy? That you think him a rustler?”
“I’m afraid I do,” Hopalong replied carefully. “I’m afraid there isn’t much doubt of it!”
“Oh, I don’t believe that!” Her eyes flashed. “You’re all too ready to accuse people. He seems so nice!”
Hopalong chuckled. “Ma’am, no man is all bad, nor is he bad all the time. There’s nothing about being dishonest that has anything to do with politeness. Some of the worst men unhanged are polite, and they can carry on a conversation that no lady would ever take offense at. But that doesn’t make them honest.”
“Well,” she retorted, “I don’t believe he’s guilty. Frank does, I know, and after we found the herd without any 8 Boxed H cattle, more of them were suspicious.”
“You found the herd, then? Good. We started it back but didn’t manage to stay with it. Red was off on another job, and—well, I got shot.”
“Shot?” Sue was horrified. “How? Were you hurt? I mean—”
Carefully he removed his hat, and she stared at the crude bandage that covered the wound across his forehead at the roots of his hair. “It was a close thing,” he said.
Red Connors had moved up beside him. “Hoppy,” he said guardedly, “here comes Bolt now!”
“Don’t say anything,” Cassidy replied quickly. “Not until after we’ve heard from over there. I want to be sure all that evidence is safe.”
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