Lister said solemnly: ‘An’ welcome. I’ve seen him at work. I want no part of him.’
Halliday looked at Lister in amazed discovery.
‘By God,’ he said in hushed tones, ‘I do believe he’s spooked you, Harry.’
‘Spooked me!’ Lister said. ‘Man, I learned to be scared of men like Blade as soon as I learned to wipe my nose. When you live by the gun, Halliday, you’re scared of men like Blade or you’re dead. The only way to kill him is back-shoot him. I’ve seen two men try that. It looked simple as kiss your hand. Only it didn’t work. Them two is kickin’ up the daisies.’
‘Ain’t that strange now?’ said Halliday. ‘I ain’t scared of Blade worth a cold piss in the dark. You know why? Because he’s gotten me mad. Back-shoot, front-shoot, I’ll bury that whore’s whelp before I’m done.’
They stayed there till noon, when the rest of the party caught up with them. They didn’t say anything to Halliday, just stared at him. Lister had cooked them a meal. If they ate well now, they could maybe ride on through the hours of darkness. Lister knew that Blade was escorting the girls to Denver City. He wanted to come up with them well short of the place. Somberly, he wondered if they would have to kill them. He didn’t like the idea of killing women, but if it had to be done.
These women were not like ordinary women. He thought of Lon Flaherty. He hadn’t been there when they shot him, but Lister reckoned they’d murdered him in cold blood. No, these were not ordinary women. Thought of them sent a shudder through his powerful body. What he couldn’t fathom was why Blade had thrown in with them.
And who was the man he had siding him? That was the real puzzle of the year. Dim in his memory there was a man who reminded him of Blade’s new partner, but he couldn’t dig out the circumstances or a name. He had never heard that Blade had any kind of a partner except maybe there was that Cheyenne half-breed, George McMasters. A dangerous man, that one. A loner. But he had been seen more than once in Blade’s company. Lister smiled wryly to himself—he wouldn’t like to meet with those two together.
Stig Moresby approached Lister. He was a tall slow man with a narrow face, sad eyes and the ability to move very fast indeed when the need arose.
‘What do you aim on doin’, Harry?’ he asked. ‘Get ahead of ’em an’ jump ’em?’
Lister said: ‘I thought to try talk just the once more, Stig.’
‘All right by me,’ Moresby said and sloped off to his horse.
They rode out in single file, one behind the other with Lister in the lead. By rights, the Indian should have been there. They trusted that Indian to get them wherever they were going. But Lister had grit and brains. He would have to do. Each man thought about those two women. Each man got a little hot. A man didn’t see women like that in a year’s riding. Maybe if they got what they wanted from the girls, they would also take what they needed. Halliday licked his dry lips. Maybe when he had all the gold he wanted, one of those lovely women would throw in with him. He could think of worse fates. They both needed strong men to tame them. Kill Blade and then maybe they’d take the girls before anything else. That seemed like a very nice idea.
Chapter Eight
For the tenth time in an hour, Harry Lister had allowed his mind to drift to thoughts of that big golden girl, Salome. Then he reined in his horse so abruptly that Stig Moresby immediately behind him cannoned into him.
‘What goes?’ Moresby demanded.
Lister looked shame-faced. ‘I lost the trail. I lost the goddam trail.’
The riders bunched. They looked at each other and then at Lister. They wished they had the Indian with them. There was too much at stake not to have a reliable guide along.
Halliday said: ‘Christ, Harry, you can’t just lose a trail.’
Lister said: ‘You can when the man you’re followin’ knows his business. An’ Blade knows his business. How many times do I have to say it? Blade is good.’
Halliday looked bright: ‘The only way to lose a trail is to take to rock or water.’
‘So?’ said one of the men.
‘So we cross the rock and look for sign,’ said Halliday. Lister snarled: ‘There’s rock all around us.’
The men sat their horses and stared mournfully at the great barren surface of the malpais that seemed to stretch endlessly before them and on either side of them. To the north they could see the fringe of brush growing green and thick, indicating the presence of water. They thought of the Indian and how he could track a shod horse over naked stone. It was now that they wondered about the gold and what it was costing them. Somehow this inhospitable sight of the great slabs of rock, baked by the sun, brought home to them just what they had committed themselves to.
‘Boys,’ said Lister, ‘let’s some of us go around this way and the rest go around the other way. When we meet to the north, then one of us will of cut sign.’
They nodded. The sweat was standing out on them as the heat reflected back off the malpais.
They split into two, some going one way, some the other. Slowly their horses plodded around the great table of bare rock Lister rode for about forty minutes when he halted and said this was a likely spot. Horses and mules could have climbed down off the malpais here. If they did, Blade would have covered their tracks. So the search for sign should begin some way out from the rock. They all began to circle to cut sign, but a half-hour later they had found nothing. They went on. Within fifteen minutes, Lister halted his horse and turned to the others with triumph on his face.
‘This is it,’ he said. ‘See those prints there. Mules. Plain as plain.’
Stig Moresby said: ‘You fellers stay here and give the horses a breather. I’ll go fetch the others.’
‘Fire a couple of shots,’ somebody suggested.
‘No,’ said Lister, ‘we don’t want to tell Blade where we’re at.’
Moresby rode off.
He was back twenty minutes later with the rest of the men. Lister could see at once that something was wrong. Wrong because these men were elated. Halliday who was in the lead could hardly contain himself.
‘Moresby tells us you found Blade’s tracks,’ he shouted. ‘Well, I’m tellin’ you you didn’t. We found ’em.’
Lister groaned. He knew Blade had done something smart. And right off Lister knew what he’d done. He had five mules and two horses. He had divided his numbers, either of people or of animals or both. What he, Lister, had to work out was which party he should follow. The Indian would have solved the problem without too much trouble. When Lister told the men what must have happened, they looked stunned. Lister stepped down from his horse, told the others to keep back and went to make a closer study of the tracks. He could not be sure, because the tracks were not dear, but he reckoned that he was staring at mule tracks.
Now, he reasoned, every normal man would prefer a horse to a mule. Therefore, if these were mule tracks that meant that the other tracks on the far side of the malpais must be horse tracks, or some of them should be, at least. It seemed logical. When he told the men, they nodded in agreement. So they set off to take a look at the other tracks.
Lister found the other tracks went through very rough country indeed. The ground was low-lying and damp, which you would think offered the opportunity of clear prints. But not so. First off, Lister found the ground either too wet or too rocky to see any clear tracks. The marks he stared at could have belonged to mules or horses.
‘I can’t tell,’ he said. ‘We need that goddam Indian.’
They followed along the tracks, thrusting their way through thick brush and boulders. It was miserable going and the men were soon depressed and short-tempered with each other. An hour of this hard going and there wasn’t a man there who was not surly and ready to find fault with his neighbor. Then, at last, Lister had a little luck come his way. Suddenly, there was clear ground before them, a slowly rising gradient that would take them up to a mountain shelf. Once again, the sky above them was vast and they could see the snow-capped heads
of the mountains. They could also see clear tracks ahead of them.
Lister leaned from the saddle and studied them.
‘That’s a horse,’ he said, ‘or I’m a Chinee.’
Men approached and stared at the ground. Yes, they all agreed, that was the track of a horse. A hundred yards on and they found some droppings. A man climbed down and broke them with the toe of his boot and said knowledgeably: ‘Pretty fresh. They ain’t no more’n a coupla hours ahead of us.’
Lister thought he could be right. He said: ‘We could push the horses a little and come up with them before dark,’ Halliday put in: ‘Best to catch ’em at dawn. Always the best time for an attack.’
Moresby said. ‘The time when everybody stands by for an attack.’
The vote was to push ahead as fast as the horses could go without failing under them. Most of them cheered up and they rode on more hopefully.
Late in the afternoon, Lister called a halt. Men called out to know what stopped him.
His face bore a blank puzzled look.
‘There’s something almighty wrong here,’ he said. ‘Can any of you fellers see the horse tracks?’
They all studied the ground and they admitted they couldn’t see the horse tracks.
‘My God,’ cried Halliday, ‘the bastard’s diddled us.’
Without another word, Lister spurred his horse and rode hard down the tracks, determined to come up with the mules and solve the mystery. They did, in fact, come up with the mules about three miles further on. They were on good grass in a small valley, contentedly cropping the grass. There were just three of them. Lister sat his horse, staring at the mules in a silent self-consuming rage. He knew now that a man riding a horse had brought the mules so far and then turned aside at some spot where he left no sign of his going. There seemed to be only one thing to do—go back and find where the horseman had abandoned the mules. Then he cooled a little and reckoned it might be wise to sleep on this. Maybe with a belly full of food and a short rest he might think of something.
When he suggested they camp for the night in this valley, the others were all for it. Lister had the presence of mind to catch up the mules. The horses were starting to show the strain of too much travel and three good mules would save them some wear and tear.
Sure enough, when he’d eaten and was sitting back smoking a stogie with a steaming cup of coffee in his hand, his brain began to function better. There was a small quick-moving man sitting alongside him. A quiet thoughtful man by the name of Mike Denning.
‘Mike,’ Lister said, ‘you know these parts pretty well. Can you tell me exactly where we’re at?’
The little man said: ‘Well, I can’t exactly put a name to it, but I have a general idea of where we are. I mean I could take you to Denver from here.’
‘Where’s the Denver road?’ Lister asked.
Without hesitation Denning pointed north-east. ‘Four-five miles that way.’
‘You know,’ Lister said, ‘Blade could know that. He’ll want to save those little ladies having a hard time of it. He headed for the road.’
Denning nodded. ‘Could be. There’s a hell of a curve in it. An hour after dawn, tomorrow, if you don’t mind some real rough ridin’, I could put you a mile or two ahead of ’em,’
Harry Lister gave a great shout of laughter—‘You could?’
‘I could locate a real nice spot where you could stop a goddam army,’ said Denning.
‘By God,’ said Lister, ‘we’ll have that gold yet, boys.’
They all sat and thought of the gold. Every one of them thought of the two women as well. Lister thought also of Blade and he wondered whether they would reach the point when one of them had to prove himself better with a gun.
Chapter Nine
Doke had to admit to himself that, while he hankered for a drink, he felt a different kind of man to the one who had woken up in the cemetery to find Blade ready to throw him into a new life. In the action that had come his way since that moment, he had for quite long periods ceased to feel pity for himself. During the few days he had ridden with Blade, no matter how much he disliked the man and how much he promised himself that one day he would knock three different kinds of shit out of him, he had even grown ashamed that he could experience anything like self-pity. Before he hit the bottle, such a state of mind would have been unthinkable.
He knew that Thora’s death had everything to do with it. His mind tried to shy away from the subject. He had left the mules as Blade had told him and now he was cutting across country at a fast clip to pick Blade and the girls up on the Denver road. He needed to keep his mind clear and his eyes open. Maybe Blade’s simple plan would work. Maybe it wouldn’t. If the latter turned out to be the case, he would have to have his wits about him, for there was no knowing when he might ride into the enemy.
But he could see Thora’s face before him. Her killing came back so fresh in his mind that he shuddered physically at the terrible recollection. They had told him it was his bullet that killed her. In his saner moments he knew that was highly unlikely because when she fell on the Laredo street the opposition had been shooting. In his worse moments, he told himself that he had killed the girl he would have married, just for the sake of a damn tin star.
After that, he had gone to pieces. Inside a month, he had been a drunken bum of no use to anybody, not even himself. He had hit rock bottom. But no amount of drink could wipe the memory of the girl from his mind and he knew it. He would either have to forget her or depart this vale of tears.
He wondered why Blade had wasted his time on him. Was the man up to something that he could blame on Doke? Doke’s brains had not been completely drunk away. The one idea about Blade that never entered his head was that Blade might be doing this for no selfish motive at all. No, in his mind, Blade was a devious devil and needed watching. And those girls—they needed watching too. There were times when they fooled Blade—Doke could see that. He knew they were up to something. Blade said they carried gold, but Doke wasn’t born yesterday. Now they had left the wagon, there was no way they could have gold about them.
Then a thought struck Doke. If ordinary gold amounting to an amount worth having were being carried, it would be too heavy for girls like that to carry. But what if it were something made of gold? So ancient and so beautifully worked that it was worth a fortune? That was a different mess of fish altogether.
Doke chuckled to himself.
Then he stopped because he heard something. At once, he slipped from the saddle and held his horse’s nose. He knew he had heard a human voice. A white man’s. He crouched down, still holding the horse’s nostrils, and peered through the bush. Now he heard the soft jingle of a bridle-chain. A moment later, he glimpsed the riders going in the opposite direction to him in Indian file.
Now Doke smiled to himself and he felt proud. Those damn fools were following the trail he had made for them. He stayed still till they were safely past him and then stepped into the saddle and lifted his horse to a brisk trot. He’d out-smarted the great Harry Lister. The girls would not be able to look down their noses at him when he caught up with them.
He was getting worried that he had missed Blade and the girls on the road somehow, when he heard Blade calling to him. He drew rein and they came out from cover. Blade had spotted him coming and, not being sure of his identity, he and the girls had pulled off the road till they were sure of him.
Delighted with himself, Doke told them: ‘If I pulled it off. I passed them followin’ them fool mules.’
‘You sure they didn’t spot you?’ Blade asked.
‘Sure I’m sure. By the time they come up with the mules, we’ll be half-a-day ahead of ’em. Denver City, here we come.’
Salome coughed.
Roxanne said: ‘We changed our minds, we’re not going to Denver City, boys. Sorry an’ all that.’
Doke looked stunned. Blade said: ‘What changed your mind? Lister and his crowd are still after you. Aren’t you scared of ’em anymore?�
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Roxanne dimpled nicely. Her eyes lit up when she smiled like no other woman Blade had ever known. She said bewitchingly: ‘We’re afraid of nothing with you two men to guard us.’
Doke said: ‘Aw, shucks.’
‘Can a man ask,’ Blade said, ‘where you’re going instead of Denver?’
‘You’ll know when we get there,’ Salome told him.
‘You’d best tell me how far at least,’ Blade told her. ‘These animals won’t hold up forever.’
‘They’ll hold up for another day, won’t they?’
‘I reckon.’
‘Then let’s move it.’ Then the half-flirtatious smile on Salome’s face dropped away. Her eyes were cold. ‘And don’t let’s leave any tracks Lister can follow.’
The two men felt the chill of those eyes. Roxanne tried to supply the warmth that Salome’s manner lacked. She said: ‘Joe and Doke’ll look out for us, Sal. We both know that.’
‘Sure,’ said Salome. She led the way off the deeply rutted dirt trail that passed for the road to Denver. She struck out west and Blade could see that she knew, or thought she knew, exactly where she was going. Doke followed immediately behind her and Blade did not miss the fact that Roxanne brought up the rear. From there on, he kept his eyes open and his mouth shut. He watched the red-gold girl as closely as he could, noting that she kept a tall narrow peak almost always to her front. She also seemed interested in the peaks on either side of them.
The country now started to break up before their eyes, vast shoulders of rock, deep stony gullies, ravines that seemed to cut into the heart of the earth and then right in front of them some giant steps that seemed to climb massively into the heavens themselves. Ancient trees, gnarled and bent, crouched in dark menace, growing out of the rock itself. The whole giant scene seemed to lean in upon them. On either hand were rugged walls of gray rock that refused the reflection of light. A chill dank stream of air seemed to flow through the chilled canyon in which they found themselves. Blade glanced back at Roxanne. He could see the awe on her face.
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