Riders of the Dawn

by Louis L'Amour

  “No. I never really believed you’d killed him.”

  “Then …?”

  She said nothing, not meeting my eyes.

  “I want you, Olga. You, more than anything. I want you on the Two Bar. You are the reason I have stayed here, and you are the reason I am going to remain.”

  “Don’t. Don’t talk like that. We can never be anything to each other.”

  “What are you saying? You can’t mean that.”

  “I do mean it. You … you’re violent. You’re a killer. You’ve killed men here, and I think you live for fighting. I watched you in that fight with Morgan. You … you actually enjoyed it.”

  Thinking that over, I had to agree. “In a way, yes. After all, fighting has been a necessity too long in the life of men upon earth. It is not an easy thing to be rid of. Mentally I know that violence is always a bad means to an end. I know that all disputes should be settled without it. Nevertheless, deep inside me, there is something that does like it. It is too old a feeling to die out quickly, and as long as there are men in the world like Morgan Park, the Pinders, and Bodie Miller, there must be men willing and able to fight them.”

  “But why does it have to be you?” She looked up at me quickly. “Don’t fight any more, Matt. Stay on the Two Bar for a while. Don’t come to town. I don’t want you to meet Bodie Miller. You mustn’t. You mustn’t!”

  Shrugging, I drew back a little. “Honey, there are some things a man must do, some things he has to do. If meeting Bodie Miller is one of them, I’ll do it. Meeting a man who challenges you may seem very foolish to a woman’s world, but a man cannot live only among women. He must live with men, and that means he must be judged by their standards, and, if I back down for Miller, then I’m through here.”

  “You can go away. You could go to California. You could go and straighten out some business for me there. Matt, you could …”

  “No. I’m staying here.”

  There were more words and hard words, but when I left her, I had not changed. Not that I underestimated Miller in any way. I had seen such men before. Billy the Kid had been like him. Bodie Miller was full of salt now. He was riding his luck with spurs. Remembering that sallow face with its hard, cruel eyes, I knew I could not live in the country around Hattan’s Point without facing Miller.

  Yet I saw nothing of Bodie Miller in Hattan’s Point, and took the trail for the Two Bar, riding with caution. The chances were he was confident enough now to face me, especially after the smashing I’d taken. Moreover, the Slades were in the country and would be smarting over the beating I had given them.

  The Two Bar looked better than anything I had seen in a long time. It was shadowed now with late evening, but the slow smoke lifted straight above the chimney, and I could see the horses in the corral. As I rode into the yard, a man materialized from the shadows. It was Jonathan Benaras, with his long rifle.

  When I swung down from the saddle, he stared at my face, but said nothing. Knowing he would be curious, I explained simply. “Morgan Park and I had it out. It was quite a fight. He took a licking.”

  “If he looks worse’n you, he must be a sight.”

  “He does, believe me. Anybody been around?”

  “Nary a soul. Jolly was down the wash this afternoon. Them cows are sure fattenin’ up fast. You got you a mighty fine ranch here. Paw was over. He said, if you needed another hand, you could have Zeb for the askin’.”

  “Thanks. Your father’s all man.”

  Jonathan nodded. “I reckon. We aim to be neighbors to folks who’ll neighbor with us. We won’t have no truck with them as walks it high an’ mighty. Paw took to you right off. Said you come an’ faced him like a man an’ laid your cards on the table.”

  Mulvaney grinned when I walked through the door, and then indicated the food on the table. “Set up. You’re just in time.”

  It was good, sitting there in my own home, seeing the light reflecting from the dishes and feeling the warmth and pleasantness of it. But the girl I wanted to share these things with was not here to make it something more than just a house.

  “You are silent tonight,” Mulvaney said shrewdly. “Is it the girl, or is it the fight?”

  I grinned and my face hurt with the grinning. “I was thinking of the girl, not of Park.”

  “I was wondering about the fight,” Mulvaney said. “I wish I’d been there to see it.”

  I told them about it, and, as I talked, I began to wonder what Park would do now, for he would not rest easy in jail, and there was no telling what trick Jake Booker might be up to. And what was it they wanted? Until I knew that, I knew nothing,

  The place to look was where the Bar M and the Two Bar joined. And tomorrow I would do my looking, and would do it carefully.

  On this ride, Mulvaney joined me, and I welcomed the company as well as the Irishman’s shrewd brain. We rode east, toward the vast wilderness that lay there, east toward the country where I had followed Morgan Park toward his rendezvous with Jack Slade. East, toward the maze of cañons, desert, and lonely lands beyond the river.

  “See any tracks up that way before?” Mulvaney asked suddenly.

  “Some,” I admitted, “but I was following the fresh trail. We’ll have a look around.”

  “Think it will be that silver you found out about in Booker’s office?”

  “Could be. We’ll head for Dark Cañon Plateau and work north from there. I think that’s the country.”

  “I’d feel better,” Mulvaney admitted after a pause, “if we knew what had become of that Slade outfit. They’ll be feelin’ none too kindly after the whippin’ you gave ’em.”

  I agreed. Studying the narrowing point, I knew we would soon strike a trail that led back to the northwest, a trail that would take us into the depths of Fable Cañon. Nearing that trail, I suddenly saw something that looked like a horse track. A bit later we found the trail of a single horse, freshly shod and heading northeast—a trail no more than a few hours old.

  “Could be one o’ the Slade outfit,” Mulvaney speculated dubiously. “Park’s in jail, an’ nobody else would come over here.”

  We fell in behind, and I could see these tracks must have been made during the night. At one place a hoof had slipped and the earth had not yet dried out. Obviously, then, the horse had passed after the sun went down.

  We rode with increasing care, and we were gaining. When the cañon branched, we found a water hole where the rider had filled his canteen and prepared a meal. “He’s no woodsman, Mulvaney. Much of the wood he used was not good burning wood and some of it green. Also, his fire was in a place where the slightest breeze would swirl smoke in his face.”

  “He didn’t unsaddle,” Mulvaney said, “which means he was in a hurry.”

  This was not one of Slade’s outlaws, for always on the dodge nobody knew better than they how to live in the wilds. Furthermore, they knew these cañons. This might be a stranger drifting into the country, looking for a hideout. But it was somewhere in this maze that we would find what it was that drew the interest of Morgan Park.

  Scouting around, I suddenly looked up. “Mulvaney! He’s whipped us! There’s no trail out!”

  “Sure ’n’ he didn’t take wings to get out of here,” Mulvaney growled. “We’ve gone blind, that’s what we’ve done.”

  Returning to the spring, we let the horses drink while I did some serious thinking. The rock walls offered no route of escape. The trail had been plain to this point, and then vanished. No tracks. He had watered his horse, prepared a meal—and afterward left no tracks. “It’s uncanny,” I said. “It looks like we’ve a ghost on our hands.”

  Mulvaney rubbed his grizzled jaw and chuckled. “Who would be better to cope with a ghost than a couple of Irishmen?”

  “Make some coffee, you bogtrotter,” I told him. “Maybe then we’ll think better.”

  “It’s a cinch he didn’t fly,” I said later, over coffee, “and not even a snake could get up these cliffs. So he rode in, and, if he left,
he rode out.”

  “But he left no tracks, Matt. He could have brushed them out, but we saw no signs of brushing. Where does that leave us?”

  “Maybe,” the idea came suddenly, “he tied something on his feet?”

  “Let’s look up the cañons. He’d be most careful right here, but if he is wearin’ somethin’ on his feet, the farther he goes, the more tired he’ll be … or his horse will be.”

  “You take one cañon, and I’ll take the other. We’ll meet back here in an hour.”

  Walking, leading my buckskin, I scanned the ground. At no place was the sand hard-packed, and there were tracks of deer, lion, and an occasional bighorn. Then I found a place where wild horses had fed, and there something attracted me. Those horses had been frightened.

  From quiet feeding they had taken off suddenly, and no bear or lion would frighten them so. They would leave, but not so swiftly. Only one thing could make wild horses fly so quickly—man.

  The tracks were comparatively fresh, and instinct told me this was the right way. The wild horses had continued to run. Where their tracks covered the bottom of the cañon, and where the unknown rider must follow them, I should find a clue. And I did, almost at once. Something foreign to the rock and manzanita caught my eye. Picking it free of a manzanita branch, I straightened up. It was sheep’s wool.

  Swearing softly, I swung into the saddle and turned back. The rider had brought sheepskins with him, tied pieces over his horse’s hoofs and some over his own boots, and so left no defined tracks.

  Mulvaney was waiting for me. “Find anything?”

  He listened with interest, and then nodded. “It was a good idea he had. Well, we’ll get him now.”

  The trail led northeast and finally to a high, windswept plateau unbroken by anything but a few towering rocks or low-growing sagebrush. We sat our horses, squinting against the distance, looking over the plateau and then out over the vast maze of cañons, a red, corrugated distance of land almost untrod by men.

  “If he’s out there,” Mulvaney said, “we may never find him. You could lose an army in that.”

  “We’ll find him. My hunch is that it won’t be far.” I nodded at the distance. “He had no pack horse, only a canteen to carry water, and, even if he’s uncommonly shrewd, he’s not experienced in the wilds.”

  Mulvaney had been studying the country. “I prospected through here, boy.” He indicated a line of low hills to the east. “Those are the Sweet Alice Hills. There are ruins ahead of us, and away yonder is Beef Basin.”

  “We’ll go slow. My guess is we’re not far behind him.”

  As if in acknowledgment of my comment, a rifle shot rang out sharply in the clear air! We heard no bullet, but only the shot, and then another, closer, sharper!

  “He’s not shootin’ at us,” Mulvaney said, staring with shielded eyes. “Where is he?”

  “Let’s move!” I called. “I don’t like this spot!”

  Recklessly we plunged down the steep trail into the cañon. Down, down, down. Racing around elbow turns of the switchback trail, eager only to get off the skyline and into shelter. If the unknown rider had not fired at us, who had he fired at? Who was the rider? Why was he shooting?

  XI

  Tired as my buckskin was, he seemed to grasp the need for getting under cover, and he rounded curves in that trail that made my hair stand on end. At the bottom we drew up in a thick cluster of trees and brush, listening. Even our horses felt the tension, for their ears were up, their eyes alert.

  All was still. Some distance away a stone rattled. Sweat trickled behind my ear, and I smelled the hot aroma of dust and baked leaves. My palms grew sweaty and I dried them, but there was no sound. Careful to let my saddle creak as little as possible, I swung down, Winchester in hand. With a motion to wait, I moved away.

  From the edge of the trees I could see no more than thirty yards in one direction, and no more than twenty in the other. Rock walls towered above and the cañon lay, hot and still, under the midday sun. From somewhere came the sound of trickling water, but there was no other sound or movement. My neck felt hot and sticky, my shirt clung to my shoulders. Shifting the rifle in my hands, I studied the rock walls with misgiving. Drying my hands on my jeans, I took a chance and moved out of my cover, moving to a narrow, six-inch band of shade against the far wall. Easing myself to the bend of the rock, I peered around.

  Sixty yards away stood a saddled horse, head hanging. My eyes searched and saw nothing, and then, just visible beyond a white, water-worn boulder, I saw a boot and part of a leg. Cautiously I advanced, wary for any trick, ready to shoot instantly. There was no sound but an occasional chuckle of water over rocks. Then suddenly I could see the dead man.

  His skull was bloody, and he had been shot with a rifle and at fairly close range. He had probably never known what hit him. There was vague familiarity to him and his skull bore a swelling. This had been one of Slade’s men who I had slugged on the trail to Hattan’s Point.

  The bullet had struck over the eye and ranged downward, which meant he had been shot from ambush, from a hiding place high on the cañon wall. Lining up the position, I located a tuft of green that might be a ledge.

  Mulvaney was approaching me. “He wasn’t the man we followed,” he advised. “This one was comin’ from the other way.”

  “He’s one of the Slade crowd. Dry-gulched.”

  “Whoever he is,” Mulvaney assured me, “we can’t take chances. The fellow who killed this man shot for keeps.”

  We started on, but no longer were the tracks disguised. The man we followed was going more slowly now. Suddenly I spotted a boot print. “Mulvaney,” I whispered hoarsely. “That’s the track of the man who killed Rud Maclaren.”

  “But Morgan Park is in the hoosegow,” Mulvaney protested.

  “Unless he’s broken out. But I’d swear that was the track found near Maclaren’s body. The one Canaval found.”

  My buckskin’s head came up and his nostrils dilated. Grabbing his nose, I stifled the neigh, then stared up the cañon. Less than a hundred yards away a dun horse was picketed near a patch of bunchgrass. Hiding our horses in a box cañon, we scaled the wall for a look around. From the top of the badly fractured mesa we could see all the surrounding country. Under the southern edge of the mesa was a cluster of ancient ruins, beyond them some deep cañons. With my glasses shielded from sun reflection by my hat, I watched a man emerge from a crack in the earth, carrying a heavy sack. Placing it on the ground, he removed his coat and with a pick and bar began working at a slab of rock.

  “What’s he doin’?” Mulvaney demanded, squinting his eyes.

  “Prying a slab of rock,” I told him, and, even as I spoke, the rock slid, rumbled with other debris, then settled in front of the crack. After a careful inspection, the man concealed his tools, picked up his sack and rifle, and started back. Studying him, I could see he wore black jeans, very dusty now, and a small hat. His face was not visible. He bore no resemblance to anyone I had seen before. He disappeared near the base of the mountain and for a long time we heard nothing.

  “He’s gone,” I said.

  “We’d best be mighty careful,” Mulvaney warned uneasily. “That’s no man to be foolin’ with, I’m thinkin’.”

  A shot shattered the clear, white radiance of the afternoon. One shot, and then another.

  We stared at each other, amazed and puzzled. There was no other sound, no further shots. Then uneasily we began our descent of the mesa, sitting ducks if he was waiting for us. To the south and west the land shimmered with heat, looking like a vast and unbelievable city, long fallen to ruin. We slid into the cañon where we’d left the horses, and then the shots were explained.

  Both horses were on the ground, sprawled in pools of their own blood. Our canteens had been emptied and smashed with stones. We were thirty miles from the nearest ranch, and the way lay through some of the most rugged country on earth.

  “There’s water in the cañons,” Mulvaney said at last, �
�but no way to carry it. You think he knew who we were?”

  “If he lives in this country, he knows that buckskin of mine,” I said bitterly. “He was the best horse I ever owned.”

  To have hunted for us and found us, the unknown man would have had to take a chance on being killed himself, but by this means he left us small hope of getting out alive.

  “We’ll have a look where he worked,” I said. “No use leaving without knowing about that.”

  It took us all of an hour to get there, and night was near before we had dug enough behind the slab of rock to get at the secret. Mulvaney cut into the bank with his pick. Ripping out a chunk and grabbing it, he thrust it under my eyes, his own glowing with enthusiasm.

  “Silver,” he said hoarsely. “Look at it! If the vein is like that for any distance, this is the biggest strike I ever saw! Richer than Silver Reef!”

  The ore glittered in his hand. There was what had killed Rud Maclaren and all the others. “It’s rich,” I said, “but I’d settle for the Two Bar.”

  Mulvaney agreed. “But still,” he said, “the silver is a handsome sight.”

  “Pocket it, then,” I said dryly, “for it’s a long walk we have.”

  “But a walk we can do!” He grinned at me. “Shall we start now?”

  “Tonight,” I said, “when the walking will be cool.”

  We let the shadows grow long around us while we walked and watched the thick blackness choke the cañons and deepen in the shadows of trees. We walked on steadily, with little talk, up Ruin Cañon and over a saddle of the Sweet Alice Hills, and down to the spring on the far side of the hills.

  There we rested, and we drank several times. From the stars I could see that it had taken us better than two hours of walking to make less than five miles. But now the trail would be easier along Dark Cañon Plateau—and then I remembered Slade’s camp. What if they were back there again? Holed up in the same place?