Riders of Judgment

by Frederick Manfred

  Ike drawled, “I’ll take my chances with this one.”

  “But I can’t ride this puppy,” Clabe said. “If I step across he’ll fall down sure.”

  “Try it,” Ike said.

  Clabe did. The second Clabe settled into the saddle, the pony spraddled out all four legs and let out a great groan.

  Clabe touched the pony’s flanks lightly with his spurs. “Hup-a, sport, let’s see how you do.”

  The pony groaned again, took a few staggering steps, and fell to the ground with a crash of bones, Clabe just barely having time to hop to one side.

  There was a gleeful shout from the Texans. Ike drawled, “Three men all inside one hide. No wonder the bay gave up.”

  Walrus came riding over. Walrus sat high. Balancing in his saddle he looked more like a boar on a horse than a man. “What’s the matter here? A horse down already?”

  Clabe looked down at his fallen pony. “Major, how about putting me aboard a real hoss? I can’t ride this puppy.”

  Walrus looked the crowd over, the Texans, the cowboys, the cattlemen. “Well,” he finally snapped, “will no one offer to trade with Clabe?”

  Ike drawled, “I’ll take my chances with this one.”

  One of the Texans, a grim fellow named Daggett, said slow, casual, “Tell y’u what, Major. Why don’t you put the saddle on Clabe and let the poor pony ride.” The grim Texan wore flaring weather-worn chaps. He had on a checker-patched pair of pants, a ragged gray shirt, a black vest full of holes where he’d snagged himself on greasewood. “Or better yit, put that newspaper fellow aboard Clabe. Then he kin use Clabe’s back for a table and write us up as we go.”

  There was a short sardonic laugh from the rest of the Texans.

  From behind the group came a well-dressed man. His name was Charles Exon. He rode a big lively sorrel. Exon was a young doctor just in from Philadelphia. His family had money invested in a large ranch near Cheyenne. As a gesture to show that he and his family had their heart in the right place, he’d offered to go along. He thought the raid a wonderful lark so long as their side was in the right. “Here, Major, I’ll trade with him. My horse is twice too lively for me as it is.”

  The trade was made.

  The sun was up an hour by the time the raiders got rolling. Wagons rattling, horses nickering, the party crossed the plank bridge over the Platte a mile above town. Once across, the major placed outriders some three hundred yards to either side with orders to warn off stray horsemen and keep them far enough away so they couldn’t identify anyone in the group.

  Two hours out of Casper, well over the first hogback, one of the wagons bogged down in a wet draw. It took a dozen ropes tied to saddle horns to pull the wagon out of the muck. The delay put the major in a rage. And the major’s high and mighty airs in turn threw the Texans in a deeper pet.

  Four hours out, young Doc Exon, who’d never ridden horseback before, discovered he’d developed a blister on his Philadelphia behind. When he complained about it, the major told him to climb down and get aboard a wagon.

  Six hours out, tough old Bat Wildy developed a bad nosebleed. Clabe sided him, trying to help him stanch it. With Doc Exon offering suggestions from the wagon, they tried everything: sage leaves, gunpowder, cotton plugs. Bat even tried standing in his stirrups with giving springy knees. It didn’t help. The front of Bat’s coat was a mess of blood. To cap it, Bat finally fainted and fell off his horse.

  At that, the major called a halt. After Doc Exon had old Bat comfortable, the major ordered the cooks to make a warm meal for all hands. The rear ends of the wagons were let down, fires were started out of dry clumps of sage, horses were unsaddled and staked out to graze in a nearby draw, and the men were told to stretch out on blankets and get such rest as they could until the cooks had chow. The joshing talk around the fires and the hot coffee soon revived Bat.

  They were riding again, near evening, when the sky clouded over and snow began to drift down.

  “ ’Y godies!” grim Daggett cursed. “Snow. That’s Yankee country for y’u all right.”

  Men pulled down their broad-brim hats, tied silk kerchiefs over ears, edged a shoulder into the white furry wind.

  The raiders climbed a long swell in the land. Horses on the wagons leaned into it, head to one side, tails clapped down.

  Lightning flashed, strangely. It hit near a chuck wagon, knocked loose an empty pail, sent it rattling away through the silver sage-brush.

  A cookie named Perley Cates was driving the wagon. He tipped back his old soggy hat and looked startled up at the snow clouds. Then his bearded face darkened over in outrage. He shook his fist at the sky. “All right, you old bald-headed son-of-a-gun up there, if you’re after me you better raise your sights some!”

  Before anyone could laugh or protest at the blasphemy, lightning strangely struck again. It hit a greasewood bush almost beside Clabe and his horse, not a half-dozen feet away. For a second both he and his sorrel were caught up in a seething ball of pink fire. It stunned him, stiffened him, knocked his tan hat sailing. The sorrel’s yellow mane crackled, burst into racing edges of searing fire. The sorrel’s yellow tail shot straight up, also burst into searing racing edges of fire. Sparks flew out of the pupils of the horse’s eyes, popping them. Slowly, in slow motion, like a stone statue of a man on a horse, both stiffened man and stiffened horse tipped over and fell to the ground. Blackness rushed in where a moment before blue-white lightning and pink illumination danced.

  “Whoa!” Walrus roared, reining in his prancing horse.

  Everybody stopped, stood enstatued, staring, jaws dropping.

  “My God,” Jesse said softly, “struck down by lightning!”

  “And in the middle of a snowstorm,” Irv whispered, flushed face paling to ashen gray.

  “Holy Moses and the prophets! If it ain’t one thing it’s another,” Walrus raged.

  Doc Exon hopped down off the wagon and ran over with his little black bag. He knelt down, put a hand on Clabe.

  “What a way to go,” Bat said softly.

  “Look at his face turn blue,” Jesse said.

  Clabe was still vaguely conscious. He couldn’t move, couldn’t see, but he heard the commotion around him. He felt the sorrel between his legs slowly hardening over with the stiffness of death. He felt the young doctor’s hand slide warm and brotherly over his face. The smell of burnt air stung fiercely in his nostrils.

  “Couple of you men give me a hand here,” Doc Exon ordered. “Quick.”

  Jesse and Bat and Irv jumped to the ground, heels tomping. The thin film of snow made the gray ground greasy and the men slid around some as they warily approached the fallen giant. Jesse and Bat and Irv lifted up part of the singed sorrel while Doc dragged Clabe free.

  “Water,” Doc called. “Quick.”

  Perley Gates hopped down off his spring seat and, grabbing another bucket, dipped it in a water barrel tied to the side of the chuck wagon. He came hobbling and sloshing toward them. He threw half of the water across Clabe’s blue face.

  Clabe came up gasping. “Hey!”

  “He’s alive!” Bat whispered. Others picked it up. “He’s alive!” “Alive!” The murmuring wonder of it passed through the raiding party.

  The wind rose. Snow whistled over the long swell. Snow on the new sage and the new spring bunch grass shoots took on the color of creamy green.

  Doc Exon chafed Clabe’s face; rubbed his hands.

  Rain began to fall mixed in with snow. The rain froze the moment it hit. Curiously the snow melted.

  Jesse looked up at the sky. He lipped some of the rain. “Sure is a strange spring,” he said, nodding.

  Bat looked at the frozen drops of water gathering on a tip of gray sage. “Silver thaw,” he said.

  Irv said, “A year of extremes. Strong ones.” The color of Irv’s face slowly returned. “A hard winter and now a late spring. We’re liable to have a tough summer.”

  Bat said, “It’ll try to catch up with itself.”

/>   Irv said, “Nature always seems to even things up.”

  Ike edged his horse up to the kneeling group. He looked down, lips curling. “I’ve seen it all now. Lightning in a Yankee snow-storm.”

  Walrus’s horse shied at the dead horse. Walrus spurred him close anyway. “Holy Moses!” Walrus cursed again. “If it ain’t one thing it’s another.”

  Bat stood up, groaning. “For godsakes, Wallace, this man was hit by lightning. What’d you expect, that we’d let him lay out here for the wolves? It’s a miracle he’s alive, man. Be thankful.”

  “Any more delays,” Walrus snapped, “and we might as well give up Bighorn County without a fight.”

  Ike looked down. “Is the horse daid?”

  Bat went over and kicked the horse. The horse’s burnt popped-out eyes moved as if alive. Bat said, “Knocked stiffer’n a peetrified tree.”

  Walrus called, “Here, someone, help these men lift the big fellow onto a wagon.”

  Four men grabbed at a corner of Clabe.

  “Hey,” Clabe said, robin-egg eyes opening wide in astonishment, “hey! I can stand. Let go.” He wrestled free. With a hand on Bat’s shoulder, he righted himself. He staggered around a little, trying to get his balance back.

  The men watched him, staring up at his blue face.

  “Put him on a wagon,” Jesse said, “like Wallace says.”

  Doc looked anxious. “He should rest a while.”

  “We haven’t got time,” Walrus snapped.

  “Besides,” Ike reminded them, drawling, leaning with arms crossed on the pommel of his saddle, “he ain’t got him a hoss anyway.”

  “What a helluva way to conduct a war,” Walrus growled, twitching atop his horse. He still had trouble keeping his mount near the fallen sorrel.

  “War, eh?” Ike said. “Well, Major, maybe it’s a good thing we ain’t wearin’ uniforms.”

  “How so?” Walrus’s mustache moved quick, once. His dark eyes looked black at Ike.

  “Half of us would be in gray.”

  Walrus humphed.

  Snowflakes fell thicker. It blurred the outlines of horse and man.

  “Besides,” Bat put in, looking up at Walrus, “who knows, maybe the lightning was meant as a sign.”

  “Paugh!”

  Bat said, “Don’t it strike you funny it struck twice in the middle of a snowstorm? And in the same place?”

  “Not at all. I’ve heard of it many times.”

  “In the same place? You know what they say: Lightning never strikes twice in the same place.”

  “Wife talk.”

  Ike drawled, “Maybe it does in Yankee country.”

  Walrus wried his stiff neck around at Ike again. “How would you know? You come from Texas.”

  Ike’s face fell into a set glare. He backed his horse, gently, spurs and bit gingling, until he was once again grouped with the rest of his Texans. They looked on, silent, sullen, leaning with arms across the pommels of their saddles.

  Clabe staggered around, his stunned brain gradually opening up. Slowly too the blue pallor washed out of his face. His right cheek began to show a spot of pink.

  Clabe saw his hat lying to one side in the snow-tufted sage. He went over and picked it up. He stared at it. Snow fell on his matted blond hair.

  “Hey!” he called. “Looky here.” He stuck a finger through a black singed opening in the dented crown and held it up. “It burnt a fresh hole right through the top of it.” With his other hand he felt of his hair. A sharp smell of burnt ozone rose from the hat. He thought he could smell it in his hair too.

  The men came over to look. They examined the little black hole in wonder.

  A meadowlark whistled cheerfully out of the snowy distance. Its swift clear warble seemed to say, “Wheu! Wheu! See you in the morning.”

  “I don’t like it atall,” Bat said.

  Doc stepped in front of Clabe. Reaching high, he lifted the lid of each of Clabe’s eyes. “How do you feel, Clabe?”

  “Well,” Clabe said, turning his burnt hat round and round on his big finger, “well, I don’t know yet. I’ll have to wait till I find out.”

  A smile broke along the young doc’s grim lips. “Good.”

  “I don’t like it nohow,” Bat said. “Maybe it is wrong to dry-gulch men like Cain. It’s a sign all right.”

  Hunt came riding in through the snow. He’d been an outrider the last while. He overheard Bat’s remark. His white teeth gleamed in the snowy dusk. “You weaseling out on us, Bat?”

  Walrus was still having trouble with his horse. When he touched him with spurs, the horse reared, held rampant a second with front hooves pawing, then came down with a thud. “It’s a sign, all right,” Walrus barked. “A sign to move on. Get aboard that wagon, Clabe. Or we’ll throw you aboard.”

  “I can make it alone,” Clabe said. He walked heavily, still staggering some, and climbed in the nearest wagon. Doc Exon got in beside him.

  “Somebody take that saddle off Clabe’s horse,” Walrus ordered. “The rest of you move on.”

  “Cookie shouldn’t’ve said that,” Clabe murmured. “Perley knows the Big Boss up there don’t stand for sass.”

  They rode on. The snow thickened. Men got out their yellow slickers one by one. They rode slowly, steadily, through a blind smother of white. Horses began to slide on the gummy gray ground. The spans of four on the wagons had trouble getting traction. Men cursed.

  “It’s like riding on the knob of the North Pole itself,” grim Daggett said, casual, slow. “I swear.”

  “Fust thing we know we’ll bump into an iceberg,” Ike drawled. “This country!”

  A meadowlark flitted from bush to bush. It whistled cheerful, clear, pure. “Wheu! Wheu! See you in the morning, boys!” It flew up some twenty feet high; sang once again. “Wheu! Wheu! In the morning!” Then, with a turn of wing, was gone.

  Night came on. Mist and snow continued to mizzle down. Eyes became bloodshot from facing the wind. Icicles grew on the tips of walrus mustaches. Snow blew blindingly up under the hats.

  Soon the gumbo became very greasy. Horses began to flounder badly and the wheels clogged all the way to the axle. The drivers had to climb down again and again to pry off the fat sticky clods. The pulling horses became white with frozen foam and sweat and sleet. Some fell in their traces and had to be prodded up. And again and again the wagons had to be helped through gulches by the boys on horseback.

  Ike rode up alongside Walrus. “This is turrible.”

  “We all know that,” Walrus snapped.

  “When do we camp for the night?”

  “We don’t.”

  “What’s that?”

  Irv heard the question. Irv tried to smile in the dim sleet-lighted dark. “We’re riding until we hit my ranch.”

  “How fer is that?”

  “Oh, some twelve miles, I judge. We would have been there long ago if this sleet hadn’t slowed us up.”

  “At this rate,” Ike said, slow, “we won’t get there until morning.”

  “I guess not.” Irv looked across at Walrus. “Maybe we better lay over a day after we get to my place. So the men and horses’ll be fresh when we make our final run for Antelope.”

  “And let them get set for us? Not on your tintype.”

  “How can they? Jesse’s men have cut the wire. We ain’t met anybody yet who might snitch on us. And Mitch is riding this way to make sure nobody passes him going north. So they can’t know about us. One day more won’t hurt.”

  Walrus swelled red on his horse. He wasn’t used to being contradicted.

  Ike said, “Then you think it’ll be morning afore we get there?” “I’m afraid so,” Irv said.

  “My boys won’t like it,” Ike said.

  “Nobody likes it,” Walrus snapped.

  Clabe heard them vaguely. He let his stunned body roll with the jolting crashing wagon. He lay drifting in mind. Perley Gates, the dummed fool, shouldn’t’ve called down God’s wrath. One bolt of lightning
in a snowstorm was a God’s plenty.

  Clabe wondered where Liza was. Probably cuddled up in bed and waiting for him to cozy up against her. He could see himself with his nose into her soap-sweet curly hair, great chest pressing against her cunning back, crooked knees under her knees. And warm together. Murmuring. Slowly drifting off to sleep. And later, half-waking, having her suddenly turn in his arms, passionately seeking his embrace and all his hot potence.

  “Liza, Liza, what you got me into makin’ me a marshal.”

  Snow lightning was sign all right. The raid was doomed. Something terrible was going to happen.

  It was wrong for the raiders to take the law in their own hands; wrong to plot the death of men who happened to see the cattle business another way. It was one thing to go to war in defense of one’s country; it was another to fight for a “set of corporation cormorants” as the Tribune put it. Cain and his settler friends had as much right to public grasslands as did the big cattle kings. It was wrong to seize Cain’s cattle at the stockyards and then require him to prove they were his. God couldn’t help but be against the raiders for rising superior to the laws of the land.

  “Liza, Liza, what you got me into makin’ me a marshal. I’d give my eyeteeth, right now, to be riding the range with the boys again.”

  Clabe wondered what Cain, right then, was doing. Probably asleep in his bunk along the Shaken Grass. All unknowing that in a few hours he’d be shot full of holes.

  What strange throws came out of the dice box. Goodhearted Clabe here in the wagon hated his life as an officer of the law, while out there riding in the dark, mean-eyed Hunt liked it.

  “Perley shouldn’t’ve sassed the Big Boss, calling His hand like that.”

  It was dawn, Thursday, when they pushed through a series of bump gates and arrived at Irv Hornsby’s ranch in a narrow valley. The horses were immediately put in the barn, and curried and fed. All the hands were given a big ranch-style breakfast of pancakes and ham and coffee. Then all spread out their bedrolls, some in the barn, some in the bunkhouse.

  Later, Irv made the rounds with a lantern. “Sleep tight, boys, we’ll take a couple days’ rest. After that bitch-bear of a night in mud, we’ve got to let the horses get back in shape.”