They rode away, and Al had another drink and watched them go. He still had not been taken to the hideout, which meant they did not trust him. Well … he’d show them!
The sun was still high and hot. He took another drink, and pocketed the bottle. Then he swung into the saddle and started for the flat. He was not used to whiskey and he had taken on quite a lot, but he was not thinking of that. He was thinking of Fallon. If he could kill Fallon, he could be the boss … the marshal, maybe. He would stand on the corner in a black coat, and he would get a pair of pearl-handled pistols like those Tandy Herren wore.
And he’d show that uppity snip of a Ginia Blane!
Suddenly, he came upon a vague sort of trail. It was narrow, no more than six to eight inches wide and very old. Made by Indians, no doubt, or by mountain sheep. He stared at it, let his eyes follow it. Some fifty yards farther along and out in the open on a barren shoulder, it simply vanished, erased by time. But still farther on, away up the slope, it seemed to appear again.
Drunkenly, he stared at the almost invisible trail. Why, this must be the trail he’d heard Fallon wondering about. Fallon had said there were no sheep tracks up the canyon, so they must have another way over the mountains. This could be it.
Turning his mount, he followed the trail for half a mile, picking out bits of it here and there. It was only occasionally visible, and when he finally gave up he had passed the flat, and no thought of cattle was in his mind. Vaguely, he heard a rumble back in the mountains … sounded like thunder.
He was very drunk and very sleepy. He drank the last of the whiskey and turned his horse toward town. The sun had disappeared, but he gave it no thought. He dropped the empty bottle beside the ancient trail. It was not easy to find a way down off the mountain, and it was the horse that found it, and not Al Damon.
That night it rained in the mountains.
Macon Fallon was tired and had gone to bed early. He awoke to the flash of lightning and the sound of thunder. There was a patter of rain on the roof.
Then he sat up abruptly. It was going to rain … it was sprinkling even now. The brief patter stilled, and Fallon sat up in bed staring at the window and trying to figure out why he had awakened so suddenly.
The dam!
He tried to think of something that remained undone; but if the water came, he was as ready as he would ever be.
He swung his feet to the floor and went to the window. He looked toward the mountains and could make out the great thunderheads that loomed above them. Lightning lit up a cloud like a huge incandescent globe. As he watched, speculating on what the rain would mean to the town and the crops that had been planted, he saw a rider coming up the street. From the way the man sat his saddle, he was either drunk or hurt.
Sure that the man was injured, Fallon started to turn from the window when lightning flashed again.
It was Al Damon.
“Al Damon?” he said aloud, unbelievingly.
He glanced at his watch. It was past one in the morning and Al should have been in bed hours ago, and the stock in the corrals. Turning swiftly, he went to the back window, which looked toward the corrals. At the flash of lightning he strained his eyes toward them. The corrals were empty!
If the stock was not in its corrals, then the herd must have taken shelter from the approaching storm in its usual place, the undercut bank above the dam. But it was one of the duties of the herdsman to keep the stock from returning to that shelter.
For a quarter of a mile above the dam there was no way of escape from the wash by anything larger than a man on foot or a mountain lion. A flash flood in the mountains, which would surely follow any heavy rainfall there, would drown every head of stock at Red Horse, except for the riding horses kept in the town itself.
Those cattle and horses represented every chance of escape these people had if anything went wrong at Red Horse. To some of them, their stock represented their very existence here, and without it they could not survive.
There was no hesitation in Macon Fallon. He glimpsed the empty corral and, turning swiftly, he grabbed his pants off the chair and stepped into them. In a sudden panic, he stamped into his boots and caught up his gun belt. As he strapped it on, he caught up his hat and slicker and ran for the door.
Brennan, sitting up in bed and reading from Montaigne by a coal-oil lamp, heard the door close, heard the rush of Fallon’s feet on the steps. He got out of bed and went to the window. The street below was empty.
He stood there for a minute or two, worrying about what was happening, but reflecting that had Fallon needed him he would have rapped on his door.
Fallon threw the saddle on the black and led him to the door of the stable. Thunder rumbled in the mountains as he stepped into the stirrup. He had always told himself he was a selfish man, and he believed it. So far he had not paused to consider what he was about to do in reference to that belief.
The black was an excellent stock horse, and automatically Fallon felt for the rope at the pommel as he turned die horse into the street. A dark figure moved in front of the harness shop, working with a shovel. Somebody was ditching in expectation of rain.
“Teel?”
“Is that you, Fallon?”
“Going to check the stock. I could use a hand.”
“Got to get my slicker.”
Teel wasted no time. Fallon could see him saddling up by the light of a lantern. There was a smell of fresh hay and manure, and Teel moving swiftly in the vague light seemed like a figure in some witchery.
Rain was pouring down upon the mountains when they reached the flat. The Missourian knew as well as Fallon where the cattle sheltered. The town’s oxen, some of its horses, and all of the mules and cows were there.
At the cut in the bank Fallon caught Teel’s arm. “You stay here to guide them. I’ll go down and start them back.”
“Two can do it better,” Teel said, and started his horse down the cut.
“When the water comes,” Fallon shouted above the thunder, “she’ll come a-rolling with logs, boulders��� everything! You leave it to me!”
Teel ignored him, and went down the bank, with Fallon following. On the bottom they spurred their horses, charging at a dead run along the floor of the wash toward the cattle. At any moment Fallon expected to hear the roar of the flood rushing down from behind them. The hair prickled along the back of his neck.
Several of the oxen and mules were already on their feet, looking nervously toward the mountains. Teel rode into them, slapping with his coiled rope, “Fff-yuh! Fff-yuh! Git with it now! Git!”
Sluggishly, the rest got to their feet. Desperately, yelling and slapping with their ropes, the men got them started. Fallon slid his .44 into his hand and put a bullet into the air. The cattle started to move, but the leaders held back.
“Hike ‘em!” Fallon shouted. “The leaders can smell it! Once they hear that water comin’, nothing will make them go toward it!”
Firing their guns, yelling, and whipping with their ropes, they started the reluctant herd up the wash. Fallon felt a coolness on his face, and terror swept through him. He knew that feeling … he had felt it before. A wall of water was pushing the air before it.
They fired again and again, and the black, stock horse that he was, nipped at the nearest hindquarters. They were moving now, really moving. Lightning flashed and the leaders stopped and started to mill. Fallon drove at them, lashing them into a run.
Rain began to fall. A few scattered drops, large drops hard driven by the wind, and then a roaring rush of rain … a regular cloudburst. Lightning struck somewhere ahead, and again the leaders stopped and started to turn. Fallon, leaving the drag to Teel, drove through the herd, whipping the leaders on.
Suddenly, above the crash of thunder and the rushing roar of the rain, they heard another sound. The herd was running good now and Fallon fell back.
“Drive ‘em!” he yelled. “It’s in the canyon!”
With rope and pistol they harried the cattle up t
he canyon before them, their horses racing back and forth, nipping with their teeth at the frightened creatures. Suddenly Fallon saw, looming ahead, the boulder that marked the cut up which they must drive the cattle.
At the same instant they rounded into a straight stretch of wash that was all of a quarter of a mile long, and even as they turned into the stretch, with the boulder only a few yards ahead, a lightning flash revealed the rolling wall of water. Twelve feet high; tossing logs on its crest, it came rushing toward them at the speed of an express train. For an instant, Fallon was appalled.
They couldn’t make it. There simply wasn’t time. This time he’d bought it, and for Josh Teel, too. Then urgency broke through his fear and he screamed.
“Teel!” He tried to make his voice heard above the roar of the storm. “Let’s go-o-o!”
Teel caught the wave of his arm in the almost continually flashing lightning, and together they broke for the gap. Almost at the same moment, a lead steer saw the gap, too, and recognized the way home. Bawling frightfully, the huge ox started for the gap, and in an instant, all were following. Caught up in the rush, Fallon was swept along, and suddenly, through the bawling of cattle and the roar of the rushing water, he heard a lost, despairing cry. Even as he was swept upward to safety, he glanced back and saw that Josh Teel was down, his leg pinned under his fallen horse.
He did not think, he did not pause to estimate the risks involved. He might kill the horse, he might hit Teel, but there was only one chance for them. The horse was lying still. He wanted to burn the animal with a bullet, to make it get up or give Teel a chance to free his leg.
Fallon drew his pistol and chopped down, firing as the gun came level. The horse screamed and lunged and, scrambling to its feet, it went for the gap, and made it.
The roaring of the water drowned all other sound, but Teel, free of the horse, threw his body around and grabbed for the rocky wall of the wash. And then the flood rushed upon him and he was submerged, vanishing under the dark, glistening water.
Dropping from his horse, Fallon took the rope from the pommel and rushed to the bank. As he ran, he shook out a loop. Never better than a fair roper, and long out of practice, he knew it was Teel’s one wild chance now … if the Missourian was not already dead, already swept away.
The wash was filled with the racing water, running ten feet deep, tossing logs and debris. How long would it last? An hour? Two hours? Three? Teel’s body would be carried far in that time, carried down the canyon and out upon the desert.
Fallon worked his way toward the edge, watching out for cracks that might tumble him into the wash. Even as he neared the edge, a huge chunk, a dozen feet long and half as wide, was torn from the opposite bank and fell into the stream.
He drew closer to the spot where Teel had vanished. Here, clinging to his loop���the other end was tied fast to the pommel of the saddle���he lay down in the mud and peered over the edge.
Below him was a ghostly white hand, slipping on the wet rock. And below that was Teel’s face, barely out of the water; his other hand clinging to the rock with a precarious grip.
All that saved him from the violent current was a shoulder of rock that, projecting scarcely a foot into the stream, broke the current just enough so he had not been torn free. Yet even as Fallon saw him, Teel’s fingers began to slip. Reaching over, Fallon dug his knees into the damp earth to give him purchase, and grasped Teel’s wrist.
Slippery … too slippery.
With his free hand, depending on the slight grip with his knees to keep him from falling over into the water, Fallon shook out a loop and dropped it. The loop missed, but Teel was no fool. He was a tough man who had fought for life before, and he did not weaken now. Deliberately, he bobbed his head into the noose, then with a quick, desperate look at FalIon, he let go with his other hand and thrust it through the loop.
Instantly his whole weight was on Fallon’s slippery wrist-grip, and the movement jerked Fallon’s knees loose. His knees skidded in the mud, and with a gasp of panic, Fallon felt himself going over.
Wildly, he grabbed out and caught the rope. It tore through his hand, but his grip held. Then his body struck Teel’s with a thud, and the two men clung together. Fighting for his life against the tug of the current, Fallon got his arm through the same loop with Teel.
Rain beat at their faces with angry fingers, and the rushing water tore at their bodies. Once a heavy chunk of wood struck Fallon in the side and he cried out in pain, but the rope remained taut. Carefully, Fallon began to feel against the bank for a foothold. If he could just get a little slack in the rope…
Teel, who knew as much about a roping horse as Fallon, caught on at once, and dug for a toehold. If they could just get some slack.
They got it, and the black instantly backed up to keep the rope taut, and they had gained a few inches. Again they tried, and Teel got a foothold, although Fallon could get none, but Teel got an arm under Fallon’s shoulders and heaved him up enough to get the slack they needed. Promptly the black horse backed up, tightening the rope again.
But that was the end of it.
Only inches above them was the edge, and water swirled about their hips. They could find no foothold. The only consolation was that Fallon knew the black would hold. He would keep that rope tight until he fell from exhaustion.
That black horse had roped too many bad steers, mean longhorns, and bulls that were fighters. It was his job to keep that rope tight, and it was thus he had been trained. He would keep the rope tight until doomsday, and after.
Sagging in the loop, which cut into their bodies, they waited. Fallon’s arms ached. His hand, burned on the rope, was raw and bloody, and the pain was frightful.
The great roaring of the water had ceased, but it still rushed around them, still tugged at their bodies; but the awful, tearing violence of it was gone. It was still dangerous, but the black horse was holding them.
“She’s fallin’!” Teel shouted in Fallon’s ear. “Below my hip pockets now!”
After a few more minutes the fall was obvious. And now, on his right, Fallon saw an outthrust of rock. Reaching out, he got a foot on it and pushed up; the black horse instantly took up the slack. Fallon swung a hand up and got hold of the edge. Teel’s boots fought for a toehold and dug in, and suddenly they both had arms over the edge and the black took up the slack so suddenly that they found themselves over the edge and sprawled in a muddy tangle.
Teel struggled to his feet and stood swaying. “You surely picked a lousy night for a ride!” he said wryly.
Fallon got up and spoke to the black horse, which walked toward them. “I could do with some coffee,” he said.
“Hell!” Teel said. “I could do with a drink, although I’ve sworn off the stuff.”
Riding double, they rode back into town.
It was breaking day when they came into the street, covered with mud, and exhausted but hilarious. Damon was out, sweeping off his walk, and he looked at them in astonishment.
“What happened to you two?” he asked.
Teel was not a man given to saving face or mincing words. Briefly, he told what had happened. “We could have lost the herd,” he said at the end, “and you’ve eight or nine head there yourself.”
“I can’t understand it,” Damon said. “Al wouldn’t���”
“He was drunk,” Pete Shoyer interrupted. Shoyer was a late-comer and owed no loyalty to Damon. “I got up to close a window and saw him ridin’ up the street. Chances are he’s back there in the stable, sleepin’ it off.”
Al Damon awakened slowly. The first thing he smelled was the fresh hay beneath him; and opening his eyes, he found himself staring up at the low rafters in the shed behind the store, which served them as a stable.
He rolled over and pushed himself up, sitting back and looking around. His head throbbed heavily and his mouth tasted awful. His pistol had fallen from its holster, and he picked it up and slipped it back in place.
The sun was high
in the sky. The morning noises were around him, but they were late noises. No roosters were crowing, but a hen that had laid an egg was cackling. He got up, then staggered against a doorpost, holding his head. His horse was gone … the saddle was gone. He looked outside and cringed as the sunlight struck his eyes. He’d better find that horse and get the stock out on the grass. Pa would���
The horse was nowhere in the stable, nor was it outside, as he half expected it to be. Hitching up his belt he put on his hat and went striding angrily into the store.
“Where’s my horse?” he demanded. “Somebody rode off on my horse.”
His father looked up. “The horse you call yours,” he said coldly, “belongs to Blane, and Jim Blane is riding it now. He also has your job of riding herd on the stock.”
Al Damon was feeling mad, but his father intervened before his son could give vent to his anger. “You were drunk,” the older man said bitterly; “filthy, dirty drunk and sprawled in the hay. If it hadn’t been for Teel and Fallon we’d have lost everything last night, and no fault of yours that we didn’t.”
“What happened?”
Joshua Teel had told the story, and he had told it in concise and often profane terms. Joshua Teel was no storyteller, but starkly told, the happenings of the night were clear to everyone.
“What I want to know,” Damon asked, “is where you got the whiskey. Brennan didn’t sell it to you.”
“None o’ your damn business!”
Damon’s face went white. “Don’t you speak to me like that!” He came from behind the counter. “You’ve been behaving like a young tough long enough. You will take that pistol off and you will leave it here in the store. And you will get up in the morning���every morning���and help me here.”
“I ain’t a-gonna do it!” Al shouted. “I ain’t no kid! I’ll do what I damn well please!”
He walked out of the store and stopped on the walk. He could hear the ring of Blane’s hammer on the anvil over at the blacksmith shop, and he started in that direction. Then he stopped. Blane was worse than his pa. No use trying to talk to him.
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