Harry Meadows smiled. “That will put you in Strawberry in time. You take care of Coburn an’ we’ll take care of the stage, an’ you’ll get your piece right off.”
That was the way they left it. Before sundown it was Scarff, the dark, hard-faced young man, who rode up to the ranch.
“Light an sit,” Laurie said. “It’s hash-time.”
“Got to make Confusion t’night. Got some mail for Fife an’ Buckwalter.” He glanced at the brands on the horses, indicating them. “Seen some stock o’ yours clean over by Sacramento Pass…just this side of Strawb’ry. Seems a far piece.”
“Rafter stock?” Laurie Shannon stared. “How many head?”
“I on’y seen eight or nine brands…there was about fifteen in the bunch, though.”
Scarff hung up the dipper and swung to the saddle. “Got to be ridin’, ma’am. Thanks for the water.”
Joss Ringgold came up from the stable as the rider was leaving. “Who was that?” he asked.
Laurie explained, and Joss was obviously puzzled. Dorset strolled up and stood listening. “Seems odd,” Ringgold commented. “Water’s good here, and so’s the grass.”
“Do you suppose that old blue cow would try to go home? I bought thirty or forty head from Steptoe Valley.”
“No accountin’ for critters,” Joss said thoughtfully. “That man was ridin’ a mighty fine horse for a cowhand,” he added.
“He’s carryin’ mail for Confusion. At least for Fife and Buckwalter. He would need a good horse for that.”
Laurie turned on Dorset. “Free, how would you like to take a ride? Bring that stock back from Strawberry? You could spend the night there and start back the next day.”
“All right. Sure.” Free turned away quickly, then stopped. He seemed about to speak, then walked on without saying anything.
Joss Ringgold watched him go frowning a little, but he made no comment.
Neither did Laurie Shannon, but when a girl has lived most of her life among riding men and stock, she notices things. Something was disturbing her, but she could not decide exactly what it was. Several times during the evening she caught herself pausing in whatever she was doing, and looking off into space with a frown on her face.
It was not until she awoke the following morning that it came to her, and at first she could make nothing of it.
Chapter 8
*
MATT COBURN DID not believe that it was when his time came that he would die. With the harsh realism that was typical of him, he believed he would cash in his chips whenever he became careless.
He was always aware that speed and accuracy were not enough, for one had to live with the kind of awareness a wild creature develops, sensitive to every change of shadow, every alteration of mood in those about him. His natural liking for his fellowman was tempered by a cynical knowledge that all men were liable to temptation.
Now he turned again to glance at the back trail, but still there was no dust, and the fact worried him.
His thoughts reached ahead, searching out every mile of the trail, considering the most obviously dangerous spots, and those which were potentially dangerous. Knowing that Harry Meadows was in the area was reason enough to expect the unexpected, for the man had a foxlike cunning as well as a vanity as easily offended as a woman’s. And Dandy Burke had outwitted him, left him standing in the road while the stage disappeared around a curve.
Strawberry was a possibility, but by changing teams at Silver Creek Ranch he could bypass the stage station and gain several minutes on his time. His big silver watch told him that Dandy was already running a good five minutes ahead of schedule.
If an attempt was planned for the pass, they would be waiting either just before the crest of the ridge or near the bottom of the pass. The latter would be typical of Meadows—to hit them just when they were breathing a sigh of relief at escaping trouble.
Beyond, there was a wide-open stretch which was relatively safe, and then came Connors’ Pass.
The Silver Creek ranch house was a long, low-roofed building with three doors opening into the ranch yard. One end of the house was the bunkhouse, the center was the kitchen and dining room, and the other end housed the family. The house was built of logs with loopholes for defense. In every direction there was a good field of fire.
There were several corrals, and Drumright always kept stock ready for use. He employed half a dozen hands on the premises, and his place had been a stopping point for travelers long before the stage line had started operation.
Through his field glasses, Matt Coburn surveyed the ranch with care before he approached it. Drawn up for a breather on top of a small knoll, he took his time studying the layout to see that all was as usual. A few minutes later they wheeled into the yard, and Matt dropped to the ground. Drumright and two of his hands had come out to meet them.
“Hank, can you give us a team?” Matt asked. “And give my people some coffee and sandwiches right now?”
Drumright was not a man who asked questions. If Matt Coburn was riding shotgun there was a reason for it. He turned swiftly, “Joe…Pete…get that brown team out. I want them under harness in ten minutes!”
He turned to the passengers who were stepping down. “Go on in,” he said. “There’s always something ready at Drumright’s.”
Charlie Kearns and Peter Dunning were crossing the yard toward the house when Matt helped Madge Healy down.
Hank Drumright turned sharply, his hard eyes taking her in at a glance. He started to speak, but Coburn was first. Matt had seen it coming, and headed it off. “Miss Healy is going to Carson with us, Hank. She’ll be coming back on the next stage. Sturd Fife an’ Newt Clyde were down to see her off.”
Hank looked at him, closed his mouth, and strode over to the corral.
Madge hesitated beside Matt, holding her skirt free of the dust with one hand. “You needn’t have said that, Matt. I can fight my own battles.” And then she added, “I always have, I guess.”
Matt grinned at her. “Forget it, Madge. Newt and Sturd won’t mind, and you’ll have to admit they were down at the stage when you left. Besides, there’s no two men in this country that Hank Drumright respects more.”
Pike Sides had moved up beside Matt, and now he said, “We aren’t stopping at Strawberry? Is that the idea?”
“That’s the idea.”
It was smooth and fast, as Matt had known it would be. He stood at one side, shotgun in hand, back to the wall and watching everything, a cup of coffee in his left hand.
Hank Drumright prided himself on being prepared for any emergency, and always had. You paid, but you got the service you asked for, promptly and without questions. Newt Clyde had commented once that Drumright could have and would have outfitted a war party of Indians if they had ridden up with the money to pay for it.
Madge was the first one outside, walking quickly to the coach. Kearns followed, watching her get into the coach. Peter Dunning came up more slowly and paused near Matt. “Is it true what they say about her?” Dunning asked.
Matt glanced at him, his eyes cold. “Mr. Dunning, you look like a gentleman. I expect that you are.”
Dunning flushed and started to speak, but Matt had walked away. He was standing off to one side, midway between the coach and the ranch house, when Pike Sides came out.
Pike hesitated, looking at the open space between himself and the coach, then at Matt Coburn. Deliberately, he took out a cigarette and lighted it, then he walked to the coach without another glance at Matt.
On the box when the stage was rolling, Dandy asked, “What was all that about?”
“Being careful. Pike Sides never rode a stage in his life unless there was a reason for it.”
“You think he’s goin’ to try his luck?”
After a moment’s consideration, Matt shook his head. “No. It’s something else. There’s too much going on, Dandy. I don’t know what it is. I can’t even guess why Madge is on the coach.”
Burke took the sta
ge around a huge pile of boulders while Matt held his shotgun up in his hands, eyes alert for movement. They stretched out on the trail with a straight two miles of open country before them. Matt let his eyes check the sides of the trail…he did not trust even the empty land.
“She’s packin’ a gun,” Burke said suddenly. “I saw it when she opened her bag at Drumright’s.”
Matt Corburn looked at him, his mind turning over the information, considering it. Why Madge’s sudden trip? Why the gun? Was she carrying it for herself? Or for somebody else? Somebody who might want to use it suddenly?
He had known of Madge Healy for several years. She was an unusually attractive girl, in a country where girls of any kind had been few. She had come to Eureka as only a child, with a traveling show, and she had left the show there with her aunt and her aunt’s lover.
For several months they had toured the mining camps, with Madge singing, dancing, and doing monologues for the miners, who had loved her and responded richly. During all those months neither Madge’s aunt nor her lover had done anything, living well off Madge’s earnings, and then one night while both lay in a drunken sleep, Madge bought a horse and rode out of town.
In Austin she hired the widow of an Irish miner and an old Negro who drove the rig for them and played a banjo. Madge had been fourteen at the time, prematurely wise, prematurely cynical.
Bookings or theatres were no concern of hers. For the next two years she had successfully eluded her aunt and her friend, doing her act wherever a crowd could be assembled, working from loading platforms, piles of lumber, stumps in the woods, in barrooms, cafés, even in livery stables.
She looked younger than she was; she laughed, she was gay, and she sang. She sang the songs the miners remembered from their earlier years. She brought back memories of home, and they loved her for it.
Most of the crowds had money, and they had few places to spend it. They filled the collection hat with coins, bills, nuggets, even small sacks of dust. Every boom camp in Nevada, California, Utah, and Colorado knew her in the next few years. And then suddenly she was no longer a child. She was a young woman, and it was obvious to everyone.
At that moment her aunt’s lover finally caught up with her. The aunt, so he said, had died of acute alcoholism, but she had turned over to him papers which made him Madge’s legal guardian. He then, as Madge told them in the courtroom later, decided to be her lover as well as her guardian. She refused, and he had moved to use force. And Madge Healy shot him.
She was promptly and enthusiastically acquitted.
Now the atmosphere had changed. No longer a child, she still received applause and money, and proposals as well, and other suggestions of a less permanent nature.
Suddenly and inexplicably, Madge Healy retired, buying a rundown ranch on the edge of Spring Valley, stocking it with a few cattle and some fine horses. Within the year she had gone off to Denver and returned with a husband.
Matt Coburn eased the shotgun on his knees. The trail was closing in. It might be coming up now. This could be the place. Strawberry was right ahead.…
With one part of his mind he was still thinking about Madge Healy. He had met her husband, Scollard, only once, in Pioche. He was tall, somewhat sly-looking, but handsome and with polish. He was connected with some banking family in the East, supposedly, and had met Madge through some business arrangement.
He had treated his wife with a kind of lazy contempt, had brought her to town, left her in her hotel room, and spent the biggest part of the night drinking and gambling. While drunk, he had put money on the table, boasting “there’s plenty where that came from.”
He lost, and lost heavily, and later that night there was a row in the hotel room, and before daybreak somebody reported that Scollard had come slipping down the back stairs, stuffing papers into a valise. He had rented a buckboard and driven swiftly away.
Two days later the buckboard, drawn by two gaunted horses, returned to the livery stable in Pioche. There was a pistol, a derringer known to have belonged to Scollard, lying on the floor of the buckboard near the seat, its butt bloodstained. The derringer carried two loads, one of which had been fired.
When the marshal back-tracked the buckboard he found Scollard. He was dead beside the road, shot twice in the chest. The valise stuffed with papers was gone.
“Didn’t you ride out with the posse?” Coburn had asked Burke later.
“Yeah. The way we figured was that somebody had stopped him, they talked it around a bit, judging by the tracks, and then there was this shooting. It didn’t look like a holdup, because whoever killed him had talked to him while he smoked a couple of cigarettes. It looked like Scollard tried a shot and missed…the other feller didn’t.”
“Feller?”
“Well,” Burke said with a sidewise glance, “there were some who said that Madge shot him. It looked like he was runnin’ out on her. His gear was in the buckboard, and it must have been all stowed there before he ever started gambling…looked like he’d planned on pulling out all the while. Only thing missing was those papers, and at least three people saw him with that valise.”
“Was there any evidence against Madge?”
“None whatever. As far’s anybody knows, she never left her hotel room. If she did, nobody saw her, or if they did they won’t talk. She didn’t know anything about it, or any reason why he should be out on the road at that hour, so there it lays.”
*
COBURN CLEARED HIS mind of any thought of Madge Healy. Strawberry lay right around the bend.
“Take her right on through, Dandy, at a dead run!” he said.
Burke nodded and, bracing his feet, curled the whip over the heads of the leaders with a crack like a pistol shot. They swept around the bend at a run. Strawberry consisted only of a small stone building with an awning roof, corrals, and a makeshift shed. The stage team was standing out, harnessed and ready.
Matt Coburn was not looking at the team. His eyes swept the yard. He saw the stage tender, the station operator, and another man, a lone cowhand who stood as if waiting for the stage, although his horse stood tied and ready at the rail.
The cowhand, Matt saw, was Freeman Dorset, who rode for Laurie Shannon’s Rafter outfit.
There was that fleeting glimpse, and then the stage was gone in a cloud of dust, plunging downgrade into a hollow, then mounting the other side. One more glimpse, and it was gone.
Freeman Dorset stood staring, unable to adjust to the sudden arrival and disappearance of the stage. He started forward, started to yell, then subsided.
He had been all keyed up for this. He was ready. He had decided to jump Coburn, just as Harry Meadows had suggested. Now Coburn was gone, the stage was gone, and there had been no chance. His first sensation was an overwhelming one, of sheer relief.
“What happened?” he asked. “Why didn’t they stop?”
The hostler looked disgusted. “They picked up a team at Silver Creek. I’d know those browns anywhere.”
Dorset stared after the coach. All that remained now was the dust settling…even the sound was gone. This was something Harry Meadows had not foreseen, so what would he do now? What, in fact, would he, Freeman Dorset, do?
Gone were his dreams of fame and adulation, gone all that twenty-five thousand dollars might have bought.
Unless…suppose, just suppose he could overtake the stage? Suppose he could beat them to the next stop?
No sooner did he think of that than he gave it up. The stage was traveling too fast.
He had missed his chance. He had missed it for now, anyway.
Chapter 9
*
HALF A MILE beyond Strawberry, Burke slowed his team for the climb up the pass. It was very hot, and the team needed a breather after their hard run. At this point there was small risk, for a cliff rose sheer from the road on one side, and the ground dropped off steeply at the other. To attempt a holdup along this stretch the thieves would have to wait for the coach right in the middle of the r
oad.
“Strawb’ry looked all right,” Burke commented.
“Uh-huh.” Coburn was wondering about Dorset. He was quite a distance from the home ranch.
Matt thought to himself that it was time he quit this business. He was getting jumpy. The necessity for continual alertness, the suspicion engendered by the work itself, these were changing him. He could feel it, and he did not like it; but he had the reputation and it was the best way he knew how to make a living.
Often he had wondered why others did not quit; now he could see it was not an easy thing to change the pattern of one’s life. He could quit and go East, but what could he do there? All he knew was the West, stage lines, freighter outfits, and cattle. Maybe a little about mining. But what they wanted him for was his gun and his knowledge of how and when—above all when—to use it.
At the top of the rise, Burke drew up to let his horses catch their breath, and Pike Sides swung down, standing in the trail, looking forward, then back.
He looked up at Coburn, a curious grin on his face. “The worst of it is ahead,” Pike Sides said. “You know that, don’t you?”
Matt shrugged. “Maybe.” He had dropped to the road beside Pike.
“Whatever happens between here and Carson,” Pike said, “you can count me in. I’m riding shotgun, too.” The two men walked ahead a little way.
“For yourself?” Matt asked.
“Let’s just say I don’t want to lose anything.” He turned his hard, flat eyes toward Matt. “I’m ridin’ herd on more than you. An’ more likely to get stopped.”
“Are you trying to tell me something? Or just talking?”
“Lettin’ you know that you’ve got another gun. A good one.”
“I know it’s good,” Matt said. “I’ve seen you work, and if you’re riding shotgun on something, that’s your business. I’ll be glad of the help.”
Burke started the coach toward them, walking the team to keep them from stiffening. Matt Coburn stopped where he had a view of the road ahead, but only in glimpses as it curved around among the hills. The trail appeared to be empty. There was no dust.
Novel 1969 - The Empty Land (v5.0) Page 7