Riding the Line

by Will DuRey

  ‘Hold on a minute,’ Charlie Grisham said, giving himself time to think. He considered himself a good judge of men and he’d always assessed Jim Braddock as one of the best on the Broken Arrow; not only that, but the wrangling that had gone on over the years between himself and Hec Ridgeway had at last settled into a grudging friendliness. He didn’t want to rekindle past differences by riding on to the Broken Arrow range with unproven accusations against one of their top men.

  As though listening to Charlie’s thoughts the man spoke again.

  ‘There was bad blood between them,’ he said.

  Charlie raised his head to identify the speaker, a man called Judd Quarterstaff. Other men among his crew wore expressions that seemed to confirm Judd’s words.

  ‘Bad blood?’

  ‘There was a card game in The Garter,’ Judd told him. ‘Jim Braddock cheated and Zeb lost all his money – although,’ he added, ‘the problem might have had more to do with a woman than money.’

  ‘Nobody knows that,’ Pat Hunt said, ‘that’s just whiskey talk.’

  Judd Quarterstaff cast a glance in the direction of the body which was being carried across the yard to the cold outhouse.

  ‘Looks like more than talk,’ he said, the gruffness of his tone giving an indication of his reluctance to have anyone throw doubt on his views. ‘Zeb’s dead, isn’t he?’

  A question had been lurking in Charlie Grisham mind, now it came to the fore.

  ‘Wasn’t Zeb riding the line in the northern quarter?’

  ‘That’s right,’ Pat Hunt agreed, ‘him and young Harv Goode.’

  ‘Then what was he doing down here?’

  ‘Perhaps we should send someone up to the top cabin to question Harv.’

  ‘Perhaps we should all go up in the morning,’ suggested Judd Quarterstaff, ‘or ride over to Broken Arrow now and give Jim Braddock the justice he deserves.’

  Men shuffled their feet; much as they disliked what had happened to Zeb it was up to the Red Hammer boss to decide how the matter was settled.

  Someone shouted that a rider was approaching, but when everyone looked to the gateway it was a riderless horse that they saw. It was caught and brought to the place where the men were gathered, where a grim discovery was made.

  ‘This is Harvey’s horse,’ said the handler, ‘and there’s blood on the saddle.’

  There was a moment’s silence, then Judd’s gruff voice sounded.

  ‘Jim Braddock’s killed both of them.’

  Pat Hunt spoke up. ‘Perhaps I should organize a search,’ he suggested.

  Charlie Grisham’s response: ‘It’ll soon be too dark,’ was a thought spoken aloud. He was neither unaware nor uncaring of the fact that young Harvey Goode might be lying wounded somewhere between the ranch and the distant line cabin, but he didn’t want to risk the safety of the other men in his employ who might pass within yards of their stricken companion without seeing him.

  ‘There was snow in the hills today, boss,’ Pat argued. ‘We’ve got to look for him, can’t leave him to freeze if he’s still alive.’

  ‘Take three men,’ the boss told him, ‘but I don’t want you going into the high ground. Use your judgement and return when it becomes too dark to continue the search.’

  Charlie Grisham was still reluctant to take any action that would cause a rift with Hec Ridgeway. The argument between Zeb and Jim Braddock had been a private affair, nothing to do with the ranch, so there was no reason for pursuing a course of action that could escalate into a range war. If Ben Stone hadn’t been abroad chasing Frank Felton and his gang the matter could have been put into his hands, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to persuade his men to await the return of the sheriff now that there was the possibility that a second man had been killed. Judd Quarterstaff’s latest words had had an effect on the men. Some, though not all, were making noises that signified agreement with the gruff cowhand’s insistence on revenge.

  He tried to defuse the growing unrest by introducing a topic that would evoke a degree of reverence among the cowboys.

  ‘I guess I’ll have to ride over to pass the news on to Zeb’s wife and daughter.’ It was a rare thing for a ranch hand to have such family attachments and Charlie Grisham’s reference to grieving females had, for the most part, the effect on the men that he had hoped for. They shuffled their feet, bowed their heads and a couple even removed their hats, as though Alice Walters and her daughter Jane had suddenly joined their congregation. Charlie himself was contemplating taking his own daughter with him when he made the call on the widow, as she was a particular friend of Jane Walters.

  Judd Quarterstaff, however, was tenacious. Times were changing and people were turning more and more to law officers to settle disputes, but that wasn’t his way. He’d always ridden for outfits that made their own rules and fought their own fights. A crew had to have revenge for killings and their boss needed to lead them.

  ‘What about Jim Braddock?’ he asked.

  ‘In the morning I’ll ride over to the Broken Arrow, talk to Hec Ridgeway and hear what Jim Braddock has to say in his defence.’

  ‘Jim Braddock isn’t at the ranch,’ someone informed the boss. ‘Broken Arrow have a line cabin a few miles the other side of Fetterman’s Pool. Jim’s been riding the line up there for a few weeks now.’

  The implication that Zeb had ridden so far with such an awful wound riled some of the men and they watched as Pat Hunt and the search crew prepared to ride away from the ranch yard. Charlie Grisham stopped them and issued fresh orders.

  ‘Wait until I return from speaking to Zeb’s widow, then every man who wants to help find Harv can come with us. Make sure they are all properly prepared. It’ll be cold among those hills and we won’t be travelling quickly until we find the lad.’

  Alice Walters stood in the doorway of the small timber house that had been her home since arriving in Big Timber eight years earlier. A step behind her stood the slim figure of her daughter, Jane, who was holding a cocked revolver at her side, hidden from sight among the folds of her long skirt. The rumble of the approaching wagon had interrupted their evening meal and they had reacted guardedly to the male voice that had called to them from without.

  ‘It’s Charlie Grisham,’ the voice had declared, so, apprehensively, they’d gone to the door. Alice’s curiosity was heavy with foreboding; her husband’s employer had never had reason to call at the house before. Charlie and his daughter sat astride their mounts behind a long buckboard. The two men on its high seat barely turned their heads to acknowledge the women at the door; they gazed straight ahead in order to convey the fact that it was the bundle on the long, flat wagon that needed their attention. By the time Alice and Jane had reached the back of the wagon Charlie and Annie Grisham had climbed down from their mounts and were at her side.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Charlie Grisham said. He pulled aside the top of the tarpaulin that covered the body in the wagon, revealing the face of Alice’s dead husband.

  Later, when the initial impact of the death of husband and father had been absorbed by the Walters women and the body had been taken on to the undertaker in Big Timber, the Red Hammer boss imparted the little information he had. They were sitting around the table, the two daughters side by side with Charlie Grisham and Alice Walters opposite.

  ‘And you are sure it was Jim Braddock?’ Alice said. ‘I wouldn’t have taken him for the gunfighting type.’

  ‘We know there had been trouble between them recently. Zeb claimed he’d been cheated by Jim. We can only assume that that was the incident that led to the killing.’

  Jane Walters dried her eyes on a soft linen handkerchief. She wasn’t unaware of the flare-up in the Garter that had caused her father to be locked up overnight, nor was she unaware of the gossip that had followed. For several days little else had been talked about in the store where she worked and she’d been angered and embarrassed by the easy manner in which her mother’s character had been blackened by their neighbours. However
, the pain she experienced from their overheard remarks went deeper than resentment on her mother’s behalf. A greater concern was the fear that their vile comments were true.

  As a settlement, Big Timber was growing but, in Jane’s opinion, the increasing population was still devoid of suitable bachelors from which a girl could choose a husband. Although he was unaware of her regard for him, Jim Braddock was lodged in her mind as the best man in town. He was older than she, it was true, but that was often the case in these under-populated areas. In his favour, it seemed to her that he was polite, helpful, strong and good-looking. No one had a bad word to say about him and she had never heard him curse or seen him spit. Those restraints, she’d convinced herself, were a mark of respect for her, placed upon himself only when he was in her presence. Schemes for attracting his attention had begun to develop in her mind, something more than the smiles and side-glances whenever she saw him in town, but the gossip that linked him with her mother had changed all that. She felt betrayed, rejected in preference for her own mother, and the hurt had curdled inside her for several weeks.

  ‘I suppose he denies it,’ she said.

  ‘We haven’t spoken to him. It’s possible he’s up at the Broken Arrow line cabin near Fetterman’s Pool. I’ll be leading a party up there to arrest him but there is another man missing. Young Harvey Goode was with your father and his horse has come back to the ranch with blood on the saddle. We need to look for Harvey in case he’s lying hurt somewhere on the hillside.’

  ‘Then you’ll get Jim Braddock?’

  ‘It would be better if the sheriff arrested him.’ Charlie was still reluctant to take matters into his own hands especially if meant riding on to the Broken Arrow range. Hec Ridgeway wouldn’t let that happen without repercussions.

  ‘The sheriff is out of town,’ Jane said with the same sort of aggression that Judd Quarterstaff had shown earlier.

  ‘We’ll do what we can,’ Charlie said, hoping to appease the women without making any promises.

  Jane Walters placed on the table the gun she’d been holding since the sound of the rattling wagon had first interrupted their meal.

  ‘I’m coming with you,’ she declared.

  ‘That’s not a good idea,’ Charlie told her. ‘It’ll be hard riding. There’s no place for a girl in a group like that.’

  ‘He killed my father,’ she replied. ‘I want to see justice done.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The cave recommended by Jim Braddock as a place of shelter was almost two hundred feet above the spot where the girl and the old man had dug themselves into the snow. Under normal conditions they would have made the ascent in a few minutes but the weather had deteriorated to a near blizzard, turning the uphill trek into an arduous undertaking made more difficult by the girl’s stubbornness.

  Jim had told the girl to ride her pony while he shared his horse with the old man so that he could hold him securely in the saddle, but the girl had refused, had insisted on transporting the old man on the travois that had been used as the foundation of the structure in which they’d gone to earth. At first Jim Braddock had argued, insisting that they would all be frozen before they could get the contraption harnessed to the pony, but the girl had ignored him, setting about the task with uncovered hands.

  ‘We haven’t got time for this,’ Jim had yelled at her through the wind-blown snow, but she’d merely turned away from him, shrugged the blanket so that it dislodged the snow that was piling on her shoulders, then bent to the task of securing the long poles of the travois to the primitive horse trappings.

  Jim Braddock was about to repeat his exhortations but instead his attention was attracted to the old man, who was lying on the travois. His eyes were now open, they were black, surprisingly bright, and fixed on Jim’s face. They showed neither fear nor pain, but a depth of understanding that unnerved Jim. The Sioux’s face was small and lined with a thousand wrinkles that even creased his nose. If he was dying, and that was the supposition uppermost in Jim’s mind, he was doing so with a calmness that reflected contentment with all he’d achieved in life, an acceptance that his time had come to leave this world. There was also an expression of pride, but that, Jim suspected, was for the girl who was refusing to submit to a white man’s orders. For Jim there seemed to be a special message: not to hinder the girl and all would be well.

  For a moment he studied the slight form working at the pony, her back to him, the blanket that covered her head and shoulders heavy with snow. She moved as though unaffected by the cold but her hands and bare legs were almost blue against the whiteness of the falling snow. Her ankle-high moccasins were almost lost from sight. These people were no different from himself, Jim thought; the winter had come earlier than expected for them, too. He admired her fortitude but remained concerned for her well-being. He hoped that among the items in the pack she’d loaded on her horse there was some warmer clothing. Argument, he knew, was the last thing that was needed at this time. They needed to get out of the snowstorm quickly and, although that was not going to be achieved by using the travois, he reckoned that any delay would be halved if he helped instead of arguing.

  They didn’t speak; indeed the girl didn’t even acknowledge his assistance when he began to attach the second pole to the other side of the pony, but kept her head bent so that all he saw was the blanket covering it, but there was a sense of togetherness when they eventually began the uphill climb to their destination. Jim walked at the head of the Indian pony, guiding the way, head down, barely able to see more than a couple of steps ahead. The girl, leading Jim’s horse, walked at the side of the travois to ensure the old man’s comfort.

  A smell hung about the cave that the horses didn’t like. Jim wondered if it was the lair of a hibernating bear, but a quick exploration proved that it was empty. He carried the old man inside while the girl dragged the unharnessed travois to the very back of the cave. The old man was wrapped in a bearskin and there were other stretched skins and woollen blankets on the travois. Jim urged the girl to take one for her own warmth, but she used them to make a resting place for the old man. There was an abundance of dry twigs scattered around the cave that had been blown in or carried in by prowling animals. Jim gathered some and built a fire, leaving the girl free to settle the old man on the rudimentary bed. He was aware that she watched him, cast curious glances as though humiliated by the assistance he was giving. However, they were all grateful when flames began to catch the larger twigs.

  Thoughts of Dean Ridgeway back at the cabin with the injured Harvey Goode flooded into Jim’s mind. He knew that it behoved him to get back there as soon as possible and he hoped that there would be a let-up in the snowfall that would enable him to leave. He went to the mouth of the cave and looked out on to the bleak landscape. Overhead the sky was grey and snow was falling in large flakes. There was no prospect of an early departure.

  He unsaddled his horse and rubbed the water out of its coat with a handful of twigs. Before doing the same to the pony he threw a look at the girl. There had been little indication that a truce existed between them and he wasn’t sure she would want him to groom her horse. There had been fire in her eyes when he’d first seen her and although they had toiled in unison to get to the shelter of the cave, Jim was sure that her animosity would resurface if his behaviour gave her cause for suspicion. But at the moment she had her back to him, was talking quietly to the old man, so he gave the pony a little attention.

  Later, when the fire had warmed the cave and the old man had fallen asleep, Jim approached the girl. He saw her hand rest on the rifle, a sign that she didn’t trust him and that she wouldn’t be afraid to use it if it became necessary to do so.

  ‘My name’s Jim,’ he said. ‘What’s yours?’

  ‘I am Waktaya,’ she said after a moment, ‘The One Who Guards.’ Her hand gripped the barrel of the rifle as if to emphasize the meaning.

  ‘How did you get separated from the rest of your band?’ Jim figured they’d been left behind bec
ause the old man was too ill to survive a nomadic life in winter, and the band, knowing they were being pursued, would expect the pair to be found by the soldiers and returned to the reservation.

  The girl, however, was clearly confused by the question and her brow puckered in a small frown before she replied:

  ‘There is no one else.’

  ‘No one else,’ repeated Jim Braddock, then he asked, ‘Aren’t you part of the group that left the reservation with Grey Eagle?’

  Waktaya looked at the sleeping figure beside her.

  ‘This is Grey Eagle of the Hunkpapa Sioux,’ she announced.

  Jim looked at the pair with astonishment.

  ‘You mean you’ve come all the way from Pine Ridge alone? With only one horse?’

  ‘We had another horse but it went lame five days ago.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Jim wanted to know.

  ‘Grey Eagle has returned to the land where he became a warrior. This is where he has chosen to die.’

  ‘He’s come all this way to die?’ Jim Braddock was incredulous. ‘The army think he’s planning to renew hostilities. There have been attacks on farms that are being blamed on Grey Eagle and his followers. They are the markers by which the soldiers are following you.’

  Momentarily the girl’s face registered alarm. Jim Braddock assumed it had been stirred by her learning that she and Grey Eagle were being pursued by soldiers, but when she spoke it was in defence of the farm raids along the route.

  ‘We were hungry,’ she told Jim. ‘I stole some eggs. Once I killed a chicken.’ The smile that touched Jim’s face only served to anger Waktaya. ‘You think it is funny that we were starving?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I think it is funny that a little farmyard stealing has the army fearful of a Sioux uprising. Grey Eagle must have been a formidable opponent.’

  Waktaya’s head lifted a little, a sign of pride.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘My grandfather has many scalps.’