“I recall that place,” Murphy bit off a chew. “You goin’ huntin?”
“Uh huh. I don’t like bein’ shot at. I don’t like it at all.”
“Be a swell chance for them to get you, alone.”
“They won’t get me. But you might keep an eye open. If you or Ban see anybody startin’ to leave the train, you might stop ‘em.”
“We’ll do that!” Murphy said positively. “You got a theory?”
“Bain.”
Matt Bardoul swung into the saddle and turned the dun back toward the rim. Clive Massey watched him go, and his face was bitter. “Bat!” he said.
Hammer came up. “Go after him, Bat. I don’t want him to come back.”
Hammer touched his lips with his tongue. “How about some help? He’s a tough one, that Bardoul. Got eyes like a hawk an’ ears like a lynx.”
“Damn it,” Massey said sullenly, “can’t anybody do anything around here?” He wheeled, and his eyes fell on a loitering half-breed. Buckskin Johnson was part Crow and part white and all coyote. “Go with him!” he said.
Ban Hardy saw them go. He was glancing back from his wagon seat. Barney Coyle had just ridden up. “Take this wagon, Barney,” Ban said, “I’d better go have a look.”
Barney Coyle glanced around. “I’ll go!” he said eagerly. He wheeled his horse and started for a low hill where he might cut them off. Hoof beats sounded and he glanced around to see Murphy riding toward him. “Come on,” Buff said heartily. “Maybe this’ll be fun!”
They put their horses to a fast run, shielded from Massey’s view by the dust and wagons. Cutting down into a ravine they raced along its bottom, then around the edge of a wash and out on a hillside. Murphy reined in. “Now, just hold it,” he said. “Keep your rifle ready.”
It was only a minute until they heard horses, and then Bat Hammer and the breed rode into sight.
“Hold it, boys!” Murphy kneed his horse into the road, his rifle ready. Coyle was beside him, his heart pounding.
“You’re strayin’ a bit far from the wagons, better get back!”
“We’re huntin’ some fresh meat,” Hammer protested. His eyes shifted from Murphy to Coyle. He did not understand Coyle’s being there, and did not like it.
“Maybe,” Murphy agreed pleasantly, “but you’ll find the huntin’ better up ahead of us, or off toward the Belle Fourche. Suppose you start that way? An’ fast?”
Hammer hesitated, his face darkening, then with a curse he swung his horse and followed by the Indian, rode away.
Matt Bardoul took his time, he was quite sure Bain was his man, and there was every chance that he might circle around and rejoin the wagon train. If that happened it was sure to precipitate trouble. The trail began on the steep slope down which they had lowered the wagons.
Matt found the place where the man had been lying when he fired his shot. The shell was still there, and it was from a Winchester .44. He looked over the bank, and saw a place showing muddbaj boot tracks. Scrambling over the edge, he found the place where the man had landed after his leap, a little further on he found a spot of blood. “Winged him,” Bardoul said thoughtfully. “Well, that makes it more simple!”
Returning to the zebra dun, he led the horse down the cut in the rim, and then back to where he had found the tracks and the blood. For the next three hundred yards the trail was not difficult. The wounded man was getting out of there, but fast. It had been dark, and he was not concerned about his trail.
At the bottom of the slope down which he had come on an angle, the trail led up a winding wash. Mounting his horse, Matt followed at a walk.
The sun was up now, and already hot. In the bottom of the wash it was like an oven. Once Matt found a place where the wounded man stopped to bandage his wound. There was more blood here, and a piece of faded blue cloth had fallen to the ground, evidently a piece torn but unused. After that there was no more blood, yet the trail remained fairly easy to follow.
Yet after a mile, the man circled back toward the original place until they reached a small copse where there were a few willows and some cottonwood. Matt lost time here, approaching cautiously, and searching inch by inch through the bottom. Finally he found where a horse had been tied, and he studied the tracks of the animal.
The mounted man now rode rapidly, heading due north from the route of the wagon train. Matt settled down to following, keeping a wary eye on the terrain around him. He knew very well the manner of man he was following. Abel Bain was a fighter. The man had cause to hate him, and would never rest until he had killed Bardoul or was killed himself.
As yet Bain did not know he was trailed. That was obvious from the route he chose and the way he travelled. It had still been dark when the wounded man had covered this country. He had moved fast once he got aboard the horse, and he was making no effort to swing around in a circle to rejoin the wagon train.
It was mid morning before Bardoul found any change in the trail. Then he reined in suddenly. Here the wounded man had stopped, dismounted, and walked up to the crest of a hill among some rocks. He had stopped to have a look at something.
Matt’s eyes narrowed. It was still too new a trail to have been made in daylight, so that meant that Bain could not have been looking back over his own trail. He would know he could not be followed until daylight made his tracks visible. What then had he been looking at?
It had to be a fire. Nothing else would have been visible at that distance at night. Yet what distance? Where had the fire been?
Suddenly, Matt recalled the light wagon and the two men who had been following the train, the two men he suspected Tolliver of knowing. Were they instead, friends of Bain?
Bain had remained here for some time, watching that fire. Three cigarette stubs lay on the ground among the rocks. Bain had been in Texas and like most of the men who had picked up cigarette smoking from across the border, he had. Anyway, the butts were fresh and had obviously lain there but a short time.
From the position of the stubs, Matt deduced the approximate location of the fire Abel Bain must have watched. Mounting once more, he started out over the prairie, riding back and forth to find that fire.
He found it a half mile from the rocks. A few charred bits of wood and some still smouldering buffalo chips. Nearby were the narrow wheel tracks of the light wagon, and the tracks of the mules. There were the tracks of three persons, but those of the last man, and Bardoul recognized them as the tracks he had followed from the rim, were those of Abel Bain.
Had Bain come to the fire during the night? Or the following morning?
The wagon had moved out, probably at daybreak. Scouting the area carefully, Bardoul could find no way of determining whether Abel Bain had stayed with the wagon or gone on, for here a number of tracks merged, part of them being the trail left by one column of wagons on the previous day.
Disgusted, he rode his horse under cover of some trees and rested, after loosening the cinch and removing the bit from the dun’s mouth. After an hour, he mounted and started on the trail of the wagons, moving very cautiously now.
If Bain was with that wagon, he would most certainly be keeping a sharp lookout, and if he was not, he might be trailing it at a safe distance.
Here was a confusing situation. Who were the two men in the light wagon? Were they friends of Tolliver? If so, what was Bain’s connection with them? And if Tolliver’s friends, why had not the young mountaineer approached him on the subject of their joining his company?
The trail now was following the Belle Fourche, and within a short time, Matt came within sight of the wagon train. The long hill ahead was a hard pull, but apparently the system adopted by Murphy at his suggestion was being followed by both Coyle and Reutz, for he could see most of them were doubling their teams for the long haul. Yet the absence of the light wagon worried him. Somehow he had missed it, and the wagon must have been concealed in the brakes near the river.
For a time he debated returning to search the wagon out, then decided
to wait, riding back to his own company.
They had surmounted the hill. Barney Coyle was there, sitting his horse near Murphy, and his face broke into a grin as he saw Matt. “Find him?”
Bardoul shook his head. He took out a handkerchief and mopped the sweat from his face. “No.” He offered no explanation except to add that he was quite sure where he was.
Later, beside Tolliver’s wagon, he said casually, “You ever know Bain before?”
Tolliver glanced up, surprised. “Me? No, I never knowed him. I ain’t been in this country no great time.”
Bardoul looked at him searchingly. If ever a man seemed without guile it was Tolliver. Yet he was connected in some way, Matt was sure, with the wagon trailing them.
When the column was lined out again … they followed a route a little to the right of the company ahead … he rode up alongside Murphy.
“We’ll make a long dry trip of it tomorrow unless he swings closer to the river,” Murphy suggested.
“I think he’ll change course a little. It looks to me like he was going to go north again, but that will leave the river to cross, maybe several times if we hold the route I think he’s figuring on.”
Colonel Pearson and Massey both avoided him, remaining away from the train. Once, he saw Jacquine. The girl was riding with Barney, and when they drew near him she rode closer.
“How is your shoulder?” she asked. It was impossible to tell whether she was really concerned or merely being polite.
“All right,” he said, “it wasn’t much. Just cut the skin.”
“Do you think it was somebody shooting at you?”
“Sure, and he made a good shot of it, too. I turned in my saddle just then or he would have had me. I must have been outlined against the sky, and he could hear my voice from where I sat.”
“Do you think it was Bain?” Barney wanted to know.
“I’m sure of it. I trailed him a good distance. I think I know where he is.”
“In the train?” Jacquine asked quickly. Matt thought he detected a little worry in her voice.
“Not exactly.” He avoided the subject, not wanting to go on with it.
“Has your father said anything more about the route?” he asked Barney.
The younger Coyle shrugged. “No, he hasn’t said much. I believe the general trend is northwest, however. Around the northern end of the mountains and then south to this Shell Creek.”
They forded the Belle Fourche three times during the day, and then turned into an abandoned Indian trail which led to a vacant Indian camp, only recently abandoned. Despite the long hill the wagons had done well, and they made eighteen miles more.
Matt saw supper started, and then he swung into the saddle and headed off along the wagon trail. Just before he dropped over the crest toward the river bottom he saw a horseman cut out from the wagon train and start after him. His jaw hardened and his eyes narrowed with thought. It looked like Tolliver’s horse.
He smelled the smoke of a fire before he came up with the wagon. Instantly, he swung down, and loosening his guns in his holsters, he started moving carefully through the brush, leaving his horse standing. When he drew nearer, he heard voices. For an instant, he froze in place, sure that one of them was a woman. Then when they spoke again, he was sure he was mistaken.
The wagon had been drawn up in the trees near the stream, and one of the two men was bending over a fire. The other was gathering sticks. Seated on the ground, his back against a wheel, was Abel Bain.
Huge, hairy, and dirty, he lounged there with a rifle across his lap. His shirt was bloodstained, but from all appearances Matt’s shot had done no more damage, except in loss of blood, than Bain’s own bullet. His face bore the marks of the beating Bardoul had given him. There was a deep cut over one eye, and a blue swelling, two fingers wide, under the other. His lips were puffed and swollen, but there was a deep cut visible on one of them.
“Hey! You by the fire! Come over here!” Bain called abruptly.
Bardoul noticed the man picking up wood had straightened and turned toward Bain. Matt noticed that he wore no gun. From the look of things, Abel Bain was an uninvited guest.
The boy by the fire had not moved.
“Come here, I said!” Bain roared. Matt eased closer under cover of Bain’s diverted attention. He glanced quickly at the other fellow, and could see his face was white and tense.
The boy started a few steps toward Bain, then stopped. Bain got to his feet and put the rifle down. He stared hard at the boy. “Hell!” he exploded suddenly. “You don’t look like no boy! I think you’re a girl! Come here!”
“Don’t go!”
The man nearer Matt spoke sharply. “Don’t go any nearer!”
Bain turned and glared at him. “Keepin’ her all for yourself, huh?” he said. “Purty smart, dressin’ her like a man! Well, by … !”
The remark lost itself for Abel Bain was face to face with death. He had shifted his eyes to see Matt Bardoul standing just on the edge of the brush, feet apart, facing him.
Bain’s face lost the sudden look of triumph. He looked now like a trapped wolf, but one still full of viciousness and fight. He crouched a little. “So you trailed me, huh? I was a watchin’ for you!”
“And you tried to kill me, Bain. I don’t like people who sneak shots at me.”
“Well, you found me!” Bain snarled. “I hate your guts, anyway, Bardoul! I always did!”
Matt saw the sudden widening of Bain’s eyes as he went for a gun, and Matt palmed his own. He never knew when he drew, only his gun was out, and he drove two hammering shots through Bain’s left shirt pocket.
The big renegade’s eyes glazed and the gun slipped from his fingers. His knees sagged, and then he stumbled one step and fell.
Matt fed shells into the gun and holstered it. Then he looked up sharply. “What happened here?” he demanded.
“My name’s Joe Rucker. This here’s my brother. This feller come sneakin’ up on us about daybreak. He got the drop on me an’ took our guns. Said as how he was figurin’ to ride with us for a ways. He had the drop, an’ there was nothin’ we could do about it.”
“All right. The sign read that way, so I’m takin’ your word for it.”
A horse crashed through the brush, and Matt wheeled, gun in hand. It was young Tolliver, and his eyes went from Matt to the body of Bain. His face was pale.
“These people friends of yours, Tolliver?” Matt asked kindly.
The young driver nodded, embarrassed. “Sort of,” he agreed. “I met up with them in Deadwood.”
“Why don’t you join my company, Joe?” Bardoul asked. “Be glad to have you.”
Joe’s eyes shifted to his brother. “Reckon I’d better not,” he said. “Reckon we better foller along to ourselves.”
“This is Indian country.”
“I know. We’ll stick it.”
“All right.” He glanced at Bain’s body. “Have you got a shovel? If you have, I’ll bury him.”
“You go ahead,” Tolliver suggested, “I’ll bury this hombre.”
Together they dug a grave on the bank of the Belle Fourche, and then Tolliver burned words on a board with a hot iron, and they put it up as a marker.
ABEL BAIN … OUTLAW
HE DRAWED TOO SLOW
Killed 1877
Matt Bardoul swung into the saddle and loped back toward the wagon train. He was circling toward his own wagons when he saw a group of men standing to one side. They all looked up as he drew near.
Colonel Orvis Pearson, Brian Coyle, Herman Reutz, Buffalo Murphy, Barney Coyle and several others, including Clive Massey and Logan Deane.
Matt pulled up, glancing over the group. Then his eyes shifted to Massey. “You might like to know,” he said grimly, “I just buried Abel Bain!”
Clive Massey’s face darkened, and Matt saw Logan Deane lift a tobacco sack from his shirt pocket and start to build a smoke.
“You what?” Massey demanded.
“I
trailed Abel Bain, the man who shot at me. I found him. He tried to draw. He’s dead.”
Massey’s face was a study of doubt and anger, then suddenly, his eyes changed, and he turned toward the group with a shrug. “See? This is what I meant! If such men are allowed to keep their guns there will be continual shootings, such as this!”
Reutz glanced up at Bardoul. “Pearson suggests we collect all the guns and keep them in a couple of wagons, under guard. To prevent shootings.”
“He’s got a lot of nerve,” Bardoul said flatly. “I wouldn’t give up my gun for any man! And what would happen if we run into hostile Indians?”
“We could deal them out, then collect them again,” Massey smiled. “I didn’t expect you to agree, Bardoul, but these others are peace loving men.”
“And what do we do for protection if some more of your law enforcing outfit start tryin’ what Bain did?” Matt demanded.
“Bain was rough, I’ll admit. You seem to have taken care of that, and it is scarcely liable to happen again. I think the guns should be collected and kept in a safe place.”
Matt stared thoughtfully at his horse’s head. There was more to this than appeared on the surface. Here, he felt sure, was a clue toward Massey’s ultimate plan. Yet what could he gain by disarming the entire wagon train? Except, of course, to put them completely in his hands, for his group of nine men would still keep their weapons.
“For myself, I say no. I think I can speak for those in my company.”
“That’s right!” Murphy agreed. “They are against it!”
“We can always take them!” Massey flared.
Matt chuckled. “Now wouldn’t that be sensible? Startin’ a war out here on the plains? No, if it comes to a strong division of opinion, we could split the train. I’d take my group an’ go my own way.”
“If you do,” Herman Reutz said, “count me in. I’ll go with you.”
Surprisingly, Massey smiled. “Well, maybe I was rather drastic. Perhaps it is expecting too much to ask you to give up your guns even if they could be distributed fast enough in case of trouble. It was just a suggestion, anyway. Something calculated to keep some men who have a natural bent toward killing from going too far.”
Novel 1950 - Westward The Tide (v5.0) Page 9