Bad Man's Gulch

by Max Brand

  A bullet would have ended him quickly, but a devilish fury rose in Melendez at the sight of the other. He leaped like a tiger and struck down with knees and fists. A shriek of despair and fear rose beneath him. The fellow writhed about and lay face upwards, striking a knife at the throat of Melendez. The knife hand, however, was seized by the wrist, and, straight into the upturned face, Melendez smashed the butt of the rifle, once, twice, and again.

  The screaming ceased. The man lay inert. Melendez rose to his feet and raced back to Berenger.

  XV

  AT THEIR MERCY

  Neither of the unwounded pair in the shack had attempted to leave it, yet. But by the noise they made, Melendez guessed that they were breaking through the flimsy wall of the side farthest from him and his rifle. Then they would hurry out and skulk down his trail—carefully, oh, very carefully—after the things that had happened to Jerry and Bert. For all the world he would not have been in the shoes of Judge, who had indirectly brought all these disasters upon them.

  He went on with Berenger. The older man was weak, very weak; he walked with one hand clutching the shoulder of Melendez’s coat. His head was thrown back, his teeth were set, and his lips grinned in the agony of his effort. What the four devils had done to their victim, Melendez would not even guess, but he longed to turn back and crush the remaining two—Judge in particular! Surely there was no justice under heaven if that consummate villain were allowed to carry his life away freely. But he had other things to think about than mere vengeance. Up the valley he could hear the drumming of hoofs, as horses galloped hotly toward them.

  Perhaps they were coming in response to the noises of shooting that they had heard, or to the sounds of screaming. Yet men around Slosson’s Gulch had heard shots and screams before, and they were more apt to remain all the closer beside their own campfires when they heard such sounds.

  It was no riding of open-hearted preservers of the peace. On the contrary, these must be friends of Judge who had been sent to help him in time of danger by the cripple. They had not taken long to get ready and ride. Surely Melendez had come fast, and he had not remained long seconds in front of the shack. Yet the rescue was nearly here—rushing up from the trail, turning straight toward the lean-to of Judge and his companions.

  At the same instant Berenger crumpled up like a loosely hinged thing, across the arm with which Melendez turned to catch him. There was no time to ask questions and to offer sympathy. He merely slung the older man across his shoulder like a sack of wheat and ran with all his might through the trees, toward those poplars where he had left Rob. If only the rescue party did not spot the gelding in the shadows of the poplars.

  They did not seem to be waiting, or approaching, with any caution. They came in a single, storming volley—half a dozen hard riders, it seemed to Melendez, as they crashed through the underbrush and hurtled up the hillside.

  Above them, frantic voices were screaming: “Go back! Block the down trail! Melendez is clear!”

  The jangle of the screeching voices and the sound of their own pounding horses kept them from understanding. They rode on, and Melendez offered a gasping thanks to God and gained the side of Rob. There he had to pause again. He pried the teeth of Berenger apart and poured a stiff dram of moonshine whiskey, 100-proof, down his throat. It brought the older man back to his senses, coughing and spluttering.

  Melendez swung his helpless man into the saddle, mounted behind, and urged Rob into a gallop. He was a stout horse, built not so much for speed as for the patient bearing of burdens, but this double load was too much to expect anything more than a cart horse at a walk. He ran stoutly, but his forehoofs rose high and struck hard, his quarters sagging a little at every stride. Moreover, fast as he might go, at his gallop, it was nothing compared with the rush of the avengers who would soon be at his heels.

  Presently Melendez saw them coming—the six who had newly arrived from Slosson’s Gulch, together with Judge and his remaining companion from the shack. He could thank the kind heavens now for the night that was covering him, for otherwise their bullets would be humming about him. They gained fast; they gained with a terrible speed. He saw that he could not keep away from them for another half mile.

  Perhaps he could have kept them back a little by using his rifle, had he been alone, but he could not handle the sagging body of old Berenger and his own, at the same time, so he saw that one part of the game was surely lost.

  Straight ahead of them hung a wall of shadow, where the sides of the gulch drew close together. Through this narrowed mouth, the waters of the creek went crashing onward toward Slosson’s Valley. The throat consisted of the white waters of the creek, and just ten feet of trail in a ledge at the foot of the next slope. In the black mouth of the narrows, Melendez called to Rob to stop. Then he quickly dismounted.

  Straight behind him came eight black shapes, streaking through the night. Melendez dropped upon one knee, drew a true bead, and fired. The rider pitched silently, headlong, from the saddle. His companions swirled, screeching to one side or the other, breaking for shelter from before that deadly rifle.

  If heaven would only send that horse with the empty saddle straight on through the narrows, where Melendez could catch it, and then whirl on again with redoubled speed for Slosson’s Gulch. But the horse feared the crouched figures in the darkness. It wheeled about, also, and went up the hillside with jack-rabbit jumps.

  Melendez saw what remained to him to do.

  If he mounted again behind Berenger and tried to make Slosson’s Gulch, he would be hopelessly lost. Both of them would go down. He stood at the shoulder of the horse and tied the legs of Berenger hard with the dangling saddle straps.

  “Do you hear me, Berenger?”

  “I hear you,” said a weak voice.

  “I’ve got you tied on. You can’t fall off. Now ride straight ahead. There ain’t any chance of missing the trail. It runs straight down the valley to Slosson’s Gulch. All that you got to do is to keep flogging the horse along. Do you understand that?”

  “I understand,” whispered the other.

  “When you get there, ask for Hans Grimm. Do you know his place?”

  “No.”

  “You don’t?” Melendez groaned. “Well, ask for Hans Grimm. Everybody else knows him. Tell Hans that I’m up here. He’ll send help.”

  “I can’t leave you, lad . . . ,” began Berenger.

  “Do you know better than me what to do? Ride on, and ride fast! Now, get out!”

  He stood back and slapped the gelding. The protest of Berenger was torn off short at his lips by the lurch of Rob as he fled down the road. There remained to Melendez only the dark of the night, with the cold, distant faces of the stars, and the departing rattle of the hoofs of the mare.

  That sound raised a fury in the seven men who were still here to press the attack.

  The eighth lay flat on his face in the deep dust of the trail, and he would never again ride in any hunt. But the others swarmed toward the narrow pass, shooting from behind every covert. It seemed as though the torrent of their bullets must surely sweep Melendez away and aside and let them through. But Melendez lay in the angle between two rocks. Partly the darkness sheltered him, and partly the stones were his shields. However he had his chance to strike back at them almost at once, for on the hillside above him and to the left, he saw the silhouette of a rider dimly against the stars. He fired quickly and heard a yell of pain, and then a steady stream of cursing as the rider scuttled back toward safety.

  After that, they could know that Berenger had galloped on toward safety. Their whole effort was not to reclaim him but to exact a sweet revenge upon the head of Melendez. For that purpose they pressed steadily up toward the pass.

  Now and again he saw the flash of red fire that indicated that a rifle was speaking to him. But he was contented to lie quietly, only firing now and again, as he shifted from his central little fort. For the distance was saving him.

  In the meantime, he saw a fi
lm of silver descending over the upper portion of the valley. It brightened rapidly. The rocks stood out in white and black. The brightness of the creek that foamed beside him became a flashing thing, and every moment the light increased. The moon had risen, and in a very brief time the watchers who were crowding toward him were sure to spot him. How long would it be, then, before they were able to strike at him with a sharply angled shot?

  He looked about him, but he could see no better way of fortifying himself. When he attempted to break for a loftier stone, whose sheer side might shelter him from a bullet from above more entirely, his break was greeted with three rifle shots, and he shrank back to cover. A moment later, a bullet splashed from the rock on his right side and thin splinters of liquid lead drove like needles into his flesh.

  They had him almost at their mercy, now. They could swarm above him at a safe height, and eventually, by the brightening light of the moon, they would be able to shoot with almost as much surety as under the light of the sun.

  He had no hope to advance or to retreat. There was only the chance, very remote, that old Berenger could send help to him in time.

  XVI

  IT ALL ADDS UP

  The people of Slosson’s Gulch ran toward the limp figure that feebly hung on to his horse. They cut the leather straps and placed old Berenger on the pavement. Water was thrown down his throat, and, in the meantime, strange discoveries were being made.

  Someone shouted: “What’s happened to this old man’s feet? Has the fool been walking on fire?”

  And another snarled: “His back! Did you see his back?”

  “It’s Berenger. It’s old Berenger that they say made the great strike. Will he live?”

  “He’s dead now! Look at his glassy eyes!”

  For the eyes of Berenger had indeed opened and rolled up, and they stared above him with no expression and with no feeling.

  “Try his pulse.”

  “There ain’t no pulse, and his hand’s dead cold already!”

  “Listen to his heart, will you?”

  “Aye, now I hear something. Stand back, half a million of you, and let’s see if he can get some air. No, he’s had enough to drink.”

  The lips of Berenger parted and whispered: “Hans Grimm.”

  “He wants Grimm. Go get Hans. Get him quick. Here’s a dying confession, or something. Somebody gimme a blanket to slide under him. This gent is about to die, boys!”

  They made the bed for Berenger down on the sidewalk and stood about half brutally curious and half genuinely moved. Someone had gone to find Louise Berenger and tell her that she was sadly needed.

  And then came Hans Grimm. He came in haste with men about him and he dropped to his knees beside the form of Berenger.

  “Are you Grimm?”

  “Yes. Where’s Melendez?”

  “Up the valley. Men . . . ,” Berenger quietly whispered, and closed his eyes.

  He had fainted away, but the wits of Hans Grimm were applied where the voice of Berenger had ended. He was told how this man had come to town, tied on the back of the mare that stood panting nearby. He recognized that horse as belonging to Melendez. He made up his own mind about the rest of it. Melendez had sent Berenger on ahead in this desperate plight; Melendez himself must be either dead or in sore straits somewhere in the rear. And Grimm’s influence made itself felt. The men were suddenly ashamed of their treatment of Melendez; they were incensed by the suffering the old man had undergone.

  A score of men tumbled into saddles and followed Hans Grimm as the gambler rushed up the valley. They were hardly clear of Slosson’s Gulch when they could hear the dim crackling of rifles in the distance.

  Like a good general, Hans Grimm headed for the point of heaviest firing, and so he turned up the valley of the creek with his men riding hard behind him, their guns ready. As they approached the narrows of the pass, they could see the flame spurting from the mouths of the guns.

  It ended suddenly as they came near, and then, as they drew rein in the throat of the pass, they could hear the departing roar of hoofs up the valley.

  At the angle between two stones they found Melendez, his rifle still at his shoulder and five bullets through his body. But there was still life in the body of Judge, found not a dozen paces away up the hillside.

  They brought them both back to Slosson’s Gulch and they brought, also, Bert and Jerry, who were found at the shack. The others of the party were gone, except for the unknown dead man who lay, facedown, in the trail. Him they buried beneath the neighboring rocks.

  Then the citizens of Slosson’s Gulch who were in the vigilance committee were given free rein to handle the prisoners. Judge and Bert and Jerry were driven out of town. Then the people of the gulch sat down to learn what was happening to the two men who lay in one room of the house of Hans Grimm, with Louise Berenger ministering to them.

  For a week the doctor could not return a sure answer, but after that the reports were all favorable. As the doctor said, each of them had too much to live for to allow himself to die at this moment. As for Melendez, there was the girl waiting. As for Berenger, there was the mine that hired men were opening for him now—finding the vein widening and deepening every moment, pouring forth riches.

  The most frequent visitor to the sick man was, of course, Hans Grimm. And when the brain of Melendez had cleared, Grimm sat by his bed and asked one day:

  “Can you see it now, partner? All adds up . . . fact to fact . . . and no chance in it at all. A man came out here to dig gold with a book, and no guns. Had to have a gunman to help. So his daughter goes out and collects the right fellow. Meaning you. Now what chance was there in all of that? Nothing but logic!”

  “Hans,” the sick man said, grinning, “I’m tired of arguing. Besides, I can afford to change my mind.”

  And he looked between him and the door, where Louise Berenger was waiting, and smiling patiently toward him.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Max Brand® is the best-known pen name of Frederick Faust, creator of Dr. Kildare, Destry, and many other fictional characters popular with readers and viewers worldwide. Faust wrote for a variety of audiences in many genres. His enormous output, totaling approximately thirty million words or the equivalent of 530 ordinary books, covered nearly every field: crime, fantasy, historical romance, espionage, Westerns, science fiction, adventure, animal stories, love, war, and fashionable society, big business and big medicine. Eighty motion pictures have been based on his work along with many radio and television programs. For good measure he also published four volumes of poetry. Perhaps no other author has reached more people in more different ways.

  Born in Seattle in 1892, orphaned early, Faust grew up in the rural San Joaquin Valley of California. At Berkeley he became a student rebel and one-man literary movement, contributing prodigiously to all campus publications. Denied a degree because of unconventional conduct, he embarked on a series of adventures culminating in New York City where, after a period of near starvation, he received simultaneous recognition as a serious poet and successful author of fiction. Later, he traveled widely, making his home in New York, then in Florence, and finally in Los Angeles.

  Once the United States entered the Second World War, Faust abandoned his lucrative writing career and his work as a screenwriter to serve as a war correspondent with the infantry in Italy, despite his fifty-one years and a bad heart. He was killed during a night attack on a hilltop village held by the German army. New books based on magazine serials or unpublished manuscripts or restored versions continue to appear so that, alive or dead, he has averaged a new book every four months for seventy-five years. Beyond this, some work by him is newly reprinted every week of every year in one or another format somewhere in the world. A great deal more about this author and his work can be found in The Max Brand Companion (Greenwood Press, 1997) edited by Jon Tuska and Vicki Piekarski.

  Additional copyright information:

  “The Adopted Son” by Max Brand first appeared in All-St
ory Weekly (10/27/17). Copyright © 1917 by The Frank A. Munsey Company, Copyright © renewed 1945 by Dorothy Faust. Copyright © 2005 by Golden West Literary Agency for restored material.

  “Billy Angel, Trouble Lover” by George Owen Baxter first appeared in Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine (11/22/24). Copyright © 1924 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1952 by Dorothy Faust. Copyright © 2005 by Golden West Literary Agency for restored material. Acknowledgment is made to Condé Nast Publications, Inc., for their co-operation.

  “Bad Man’s Gulch” by George Owen Baxter first appeared in Street & Smith’s Western Story Magazine (7/17/26). Copyright © 1926 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1954 by Dorothy Faust. Copyright © 2005 by Golden West Literary Agency for restored material. Acknowledgment is made to Condé Nast Publications, Inc., for their co-operation.