by Paul Lederer
‘We got trouble, Lang,’ Virgil Sly told me as I swung down.
‘Do we?’ I asked and Virgil frowned at my reaction which was only acceptance.
‘Someone’s building out on the Panhandle. Don’t know who it is or what they think they’re doing—’
‘Ask Matti,’ I said coldly. ‘She can enlighten you.’ There was no humor in my eyes and I received not a hint of a smile from Matti. ‘Want some advice, Virgil? Make up your bedroll and pack your saddle-bags. Ride on out of here while you can. It’s just going to get uglier.’
‘Lang!’ Virgil’s expression was one of pained astonishment. ‘How can you say something like that to me?’
‘I said it because I care about you, Virgil.’
‘I care about you too, Lang,’ Virgil replied soberly, ‘you and the Rafter L. Whatever trouble is coming, I’m sticking with you.’
Matti stood there, hands on hips, the breeze flattening her blue skirt against her legs and toying with her hair. She asked sharply, ‘Don’t you have any orders for me, Lang?’
‘You do what you want, lady. But you should know that we might have half the town, drunk and angry, coming onto this property by afternoon. Nothing’s going to stop them.’
Her voice was small, tight, breathless with determination. ‘Oh, isn’t it! I will stop them, Lang. I swear I will.’
She swept into the house. I glanced at Virgil who shrugged with his eyes.
‘I’d better talk to her,’ I said.
‘I guess you had. What do you want me to do now?’
I gave him his instructions. He alternately grimaced, frowned and grinned. He went off toward the toolshed and I scraped off my boots on the porch before entering the little house where I found Matti standing at the south window, her clenched hands held rigidly at her sides.
‘You need anything, Matti?’ I asked and she turned sharply to face me. There was glittering anger in her eyes.
‘A gun! All I have is this foolish little .32 pistol.’ She showed me a small revolver she had kept tucked in the pocket of her skirt.
‘Sit down, Matti,’ I said, in a tone I hoped she would not consider bossy. After a brief hesitation, she complied. ‘You have to get away from the ranch,’ I said, my eyes searching hers. ‘I wasn’t kidding about the danger you run here. Men will be coming up here, a lot of them and they will be angry and out of control.’
‘I’ll not leave. This is my land. No one has the right to push me off it,’ she said in a brittle voice. She was angry, but far from hysterical.
‘I see.’ I paused for a moment. I had undervalued this woman, it seemed, mistaken her nerve and her determination. I had to ask. ‘Matti, everything is coming apart now. Why don’t you tell me how it really came about? What you are really doing here, how it came to pass.’
She took in a sharp breath, shook her head and then lowered her eyes. ‘It doesn’t matter any more now … if I tell you, does it?’
I said I couldn’t see how.
‘You asked me once if I have a shadowy background in San Francisco!’ She laughed mirthlessly. ‘I don’t, Lang. I have nothing there. I had nothing there. The part about me trying to give music lessons was true – there just wasn’t any money in it. Not enough to survive on. Maybe I wasn’t any good at it, I don’t know.
‘My father was a sailing man and he vanished out on the Pacific. Mother, grieving, was in her grave within the year. I was left with nothing and I was ill-prepared to fend for myself. The promise of a new life appeared out of the blue when I was at my lowest point. An item in the newspaper placed there by someone searching for a possible heir to the estate of Webster Ullman also known as ‘Hangdog’ Ullman. A lawyer’s address was given.
‘New Mexico Territory! It seemed a desperate chance, but I was already two weeks behind in my rent and there was no promise of any employment on the horizon. I couldn’t live on the streets. I grasped the opportunity desperately. When I arrived, one of the first people I met was already trying to take my only hope away.’
‘Me.’
‘You,’ she answered. ‘I wanted to like you, I did like you. But then the panic would return to me. What could I possibly do now, where could I go if not here? There was just nowhere left,’ she said, explaining her mercurial moods, her stubbornness.
‘I’m sorry, Matti,’ I said, meaning it. ‘If I had known—’
‘If you had known, what? What could you have possibly done?’
‘Understood a little more, maybe.’
‘And after that? No, Lang, I began to have doubts about the true ownership of the ranch from the very first. Everything seemed suddenly suspicious. But I had to cling to my claim of ownership, don’t you see!’
‘I do now.’
‘Funny, isn’t it?’ She rose and went to the window, leaving the little pistol behind on the sofa cushion to gaze out at the stark form of Arapaho Peak. ‘In the brief time I’ve been here, I’ve come to care about this land. I can’t explain it. I know it’s raw and dry and primitive. I couldn’t explain it to anyone – it’s like caring for a person no one else in the world likes at all. You just can’t explain it. It makes no sense.’
‘It does to me, Matti,’ I said, walking up beside her to stand looking out across the long land of broken hills, desert flats, stunted mesquite trees and drought-deprived sage. ‘This was my first home, too, the only place I’ve ever had to belong.’
She turned slowly to face me, looking up at me with determination. She clutched my sleeve with one small hand, clutched it very tightly and said, ‘Then we will fight for our land, you and I, Lang. No one can run us off.’
‘Just a minute,’ I said. ‘What I will do and what you must do are two different things. I have described what it will be like up here when the town arrives. Use your imagination and double whatever I’ve said. It will get ugly.’ Her hand fell away at my rejection. The determination remained, however.
‘I will fight, Lang,’ she said with solidly spaced words. ‘Where am I to go if I leave? If I let them drive me away? To Montero? And wouldn’t that be a wonderful life? I am safer with you than alone anyway. No,’ she shook her head definitely. ‘I am here. I will fight for my land – and fight you for it later, if necessary.’
I went out onto the porch to leave Matti to change out of her dress. There was no use in arguing with the lady, and besides she did have a point. Where else was she to go? Virgil Sly was waiting nervously when I emerged from the cabin. I saw the canvas sacks he had tied on behind his blue roan’s saddle.
‘Anything else, Lang?’ he asked.
‘Saddle her buckskin,’ I told him. He goggled at me for a second, then nodded and walked away toward the corral. In a minute Matti appeared wearing her black jeans and checked shirt. I was carrying two Winchesters, my own and another belonging to the marshal’s department. I handed her one of the long guns wordlessly.
The sun was already fading by the time we reached that flat inhospitable section of the ranch we called the Panhandle. Nothing worth fighting over. Only a stony ledge of land skirting the lower reaches of the hills bordering the dry Whipsaw. It was nothing worth fighting for, nothing worth dying over. I had to remind myself that men had already died because of it, and that alone lent the Panhandle value. And to remember that there were men perfectly willing to kill me for ownership of this stony, barren patch of land.
From atop the low ridge we looked down across the Whipsaw at the Hatchet Ranch beyond. Above us loomed the craggy Arapaho Peak, its shadow at this hour nearly reaching us where we sat our ponies. A slight breeze shifted the manes and tails of our horses. I surveyed the surrounding land and then let my gaze settle on the buildings below. We had heard the hammer blows, sharp and solid as gunshots and the rasp of saws long before we had emerged from the screen of brush to find the railroad crew hard at work on the skeleton of the railhead.
Sixteen men I made them at a rough count. Two heavy lumber Wagons were centrally placed between twin buildings where the framers situated
their beams. A dozen horses were ground-hitched near one of Whipsaw Creek’s many cattail-encircled ponds.
‘They may not fight,’ I told the others hopefully. ‘They have no stake in this except for their daily wages.’
‘Men always protect what they have,’ Virgil commented. ‘It’s built into us.’
‘I don’t see anyone wearing a handgun,’ Matti put in. ‘There must be a few rifles around somewhere, but no one has one near at hand that I can see.’
‘They’re not expecting trouble,’ I said, which was what I was counting on. And they were not fighting men, but hard-working laborers, focused on the job at hand.
It didn’t matter. They were trespassers and if their bosses hadn’t seen fit to inform them of that fact, I would.
‘Hand me those bags, Virgil,’ I said, and he untied the canvas sacks and handed them over to me.
‘I’m going down with you,’ Matti said, and for the first time I was so firm with her that she didn’t whimper an objection.
‘You are not! Virgil, you find a good position and get ready if I need any covering fire.’
He glanced around, said, ‘This looks like as good a place as any,’ and swung down from his horse. Matti hesitated. I don’t know if it was out of fear or stubbornness, but she eventually slipped from the saddle and got down on one knee beside Virgil Sly, rifle at the ready. I had come too far to back down now and so with a loose grin pasted to my lips, I started down to confront the army of railroad workers.
I hated hellfire, but the time for it had come.
EIGHT
I saw the heads of the carpenters lift as I walked the bay horse down the sandy bank toward the rock pan where they were working throwing up a depot and what I took to be a storage barn. The word passed from one man to the other, and then-tools fell silent as I approached. A big man with the sleeves of his shirt rolled up came forward to meet me as I halted the horse, my rifle across my saddlebow.
‘Help you, mister?’ the crew boss asked heavily. He was uncertain what attitude he should adopt. His men were watching him closely. I saw that one of the carpenters had picked up a Winchester from beside a stack of lumber.
‘You’re on my land,’ I said. ‘I’ll have to ask you to leave.’
‘Who the hell are you!’ the foreman demanded.
‘I just told you. I’m the man who owns the land you’re standing on. I don’t recall ordering any new construction.’
You’re crazy,’ the big man said, looking around him for solidarity. Two or three of the men looked angry, others who had removed their caps to mop their brows just seemed relieved of the chance to take a break. One of them shook his head in amusement.
‘I’m not kidding, boys,’ I told them. ‘I’ve got riflemen up on the ridge, just waiting for my signal.’ They looked that way, seeing Virgil and Matti. At that distance they could not tell that Matti was a woman, but that made no difference anyway.
‘Mr Meredith will have something to say about this,’ the crew boss said angrily.
‘Yes, I suppose he will. But the railroad’s plain in the wrong. They’ve got the wrong building site, and I’m closing it down. You men have your job to do, but I doubt any of you wants to die for it.’
‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’ the foreman said, his eyes narrowing.
‘Dead serious. Don’t lift that!’ I shouted at the man with the Winchester. I shifted my own sights toward him and told him, ‘One shot and the guns on the ridge will open up. There’ll be a lot of men who don’t go home today if that happens.’
‘Damn all!’ the foreman said unhappily. He tipped back his head, rubbed his eyes and then shrugged. ‘I guess you’ve got the upper hand, mister. Until Meredith hears about this.’
‘I guess I have.’ I told them, ‘You’ve got ten minutes to pull out. If you can hitch those lumber wagons up in that time, so much the better. You won’t be needing them anymore.’
‘We’ll be back,’ a second worker threatened.
‘Maybe,’ I agreed. But I wasn’t planning on leaving them much to come back to. I didn’t tell them that, but only watched as they loaded their tools, hitched the horses to the freight wagons and started off, leaving behind a dozen surly glances and a few muttered curses. Breathing out a slow breath of relief, I watched until they had crossed the dry river and then swung down to get to work.
I opened up the canvas sacks to retrieve the two cans Virgil had packed and walked among the framed buildings, splashing coal oil on the new lumber. I kept my eyes moving as I worked, watching for any sign of the men returning. But they were underarmed and under-inclined and I had my watchers on the ridge and I was untroubled at my chore.
Finished, I repacked the two tin cans – we could not afford to replace such things – and dragged a match across my bootheel. It flared and I got to one knee to touch fire to a stream of coal oil. It caught immediately, and in seconds as the flames streaked along the rivulets of spilled fuel, the timbers new and bone dry from the kiln caught fire and the sky billowed with dark, wind-tangled clouds of smoke. Saucer-sized flakes of ash twisted upward, driven by the intense heat
The flames rose head-high and then caught the roof joists. The fire writhed against the pale sky, crackling and popping. The bay horse was spooked and I rushed to it, grabbing its reins, swinging aboard to back it from the threatening conflagration. Nothing could have stopped it now. Within minutes the uprights resembled burnt matches and sections of the roofs were collapsing, sending golden sparks up to merge with the crimson flame.
The black, acrid smoke was clouding the sky above me as I guided the bay horse back up the sandy bluff to join Virgil and Matti.
‘Well,’ Virgil commented laconically, ‘that’ll get their attention.’
Matti had been watching the destructive growing flames, hands on hips. Now her mouth tightened a little and her eyes met mine. ‘If they come after us they’ll hit the home ranch first. We’d better get back there. Now.’
The lady was right. I waited for them to mount their horses and then started the bay back toward the Rafter L house, the skies tumultuous and dark behind us.
We rode hard to get there, but approaching the ranch, I already saw four men riding fast toward the house. Bitter with myself for dragging Matti into what looked to be shaping up as a shooting match, I readied my Winchester.
‘Hold it, Lang!’ Virgil Sly shouted, placing a hand on my wrist. ‘Don’t that man in front look familiar?’
It took a minute for me to see what Virgil had already observed. The man in front was Bill Forsch, coatless, hatless. I thought at first that the other three were pursuing him, but as they neared the ranch house, I saw that they were riding in a bunch alongside Bill, though I recognized none of them.
‘Don’t shoot, Lang. One of them is wearing a shield.’
I had already decided to hold my fire, and I sat the shuddering bay waiting for the lawyer and the three strangers to reach the yard, I glanced at Matti from the corner of my eye. She looked perplexed, determined … and beautiful with the flush of the ride on her cheeks.
‘It’s me, Lang!’ Bill Forsch yelled as they reached the ranch yard. He approached on a weary roan horse and we shook hands still on horseback. ‘Let me get off this beast,’ the lawyer said and he slid from the saddle.
‘How in hell did you make it back from Santa Fe so quickly?’ I asked, as we stood together, shaking hands once more.
‘Nothing to it,’ Bill said, still breathing hard. ‘I haven’t been asleep since the last time you saw me. We broke into the courthouse around midnight, did our snooping and rode back, switching ponies twice on the way. And, Lang, I’ve got no feeling in my lower half. Have you got a chair – the softer the better?’
‘We have. But who are these…?’
‘We can talk inside,’ Bill said, and he took my arm for support. ‘If I can make it that far.’
‘Virgil, stand guard,’ I said, and helping Bill up onto the porch, we made our way into the house, Matti and
the three strangers on our heels.
There were plenty of places to sit down in the over-furnished cabin, but we were practically knee to knee. Both of the men who sat together on one of the yellow settees wore badges, I now saw. United States Marshal’s badges. One of the lawmen was tall, narrow with a hawk nose, the other was a small dainty man. Beside Bill Forsch on the other settee sat a round man with the jovial face of an elf. His eyes sparkled with amusement as he studied the house and its quantity of furnishings. I left it to Bill Forsch to take charge. I had no idea what was going on.
‘May I introduce Judge Orson Crandall,’ Bill said, nodding at the pleasant round man. ‘It was only with his assistance that I was able to get into the territorial records office in the middle of the night.’ Bill looked at me as he shifted uncomfortably on the cushion. ‘Orson, this is Julius Lang himself.’
I thought that was an odd way to introduce me, but I nodded to the judge. Bill went on, ‘These are federal marshals, Lang. Coyle and Gere by name. The judge invited them along, thinking they might be needed after I explained matters to him and we had proceeded to research all of the records pertaining to the Rafter L.’ I wondered why the territorial judge had been so accommodating. Bill must have dragged him out of bed for this task.
Bill explained, ‘Orson and I are old friends.’ He glanced at the judge. ‘He was once almost my father-in-law.’ The lawyer saw my curious glance and said, ‘There’s a reason I banished myself to Montero. I’ll tell you all about it one day.’
Matti couldn’t contain herself any longer. ‘What did you find out!’ she blurted. Her question was directed at Bill, but Judge Crandall answered.
‘Just as Mr Lang surmised,’ the judge said, ‘the key to the confusion was the missing two hundred acres which he owned and which you, Miss Ullman, on an apparently prior claim, did not. A little digging cleared that up. That two hundred acres, comprising the area known as the Panhandle was transferred to the ownership of Mr Reg Kent after the date of Lang’s purchase of the land but before you came into possession of the property through the will of your uncle.’