by Ray Hogan
“Leave it up to me,” Starbuck said, his tone almost a command. “I’ll do the right thing when the moment comes.”
Ron nodded. “I know you will, and whatever you decide to is all right with me ... I’ll tell him myself if you think it’s what I should do.”
“No, leave it to me,” Starbuck repeated. “Rhoda, have I got your word on it?”
The girl’s shoulders moved slightly. She had changed again it appeared to Shawn, was now filled with a hard bitterness and displaying a hatred for her brother.
“Whatever you say,” she murmured, and, wheeling, headed for the stairway.
Ron watched her go in thoughtful silence. “Guess Pa means more to her than I figured—and me even less. But that’s my fault. Never once tried to be a brother to her—or even know her. I can understand the way she feels toward me, and I can’t blame her.”
“She surprises me, too,” Starbuck said. “But down deep I think your pa and you—even the ranch—mean plenty to her. A lot of that hell-I-don’t-care manner of hers is just show.”
“Only hope he pulls through. Like to try making it up to both of them—be what I should have been all these years.”
“Not all your fault ... Best way you can start is to get that herd of cattle to Crockett’s without any slip-up. That’ll be proof to both of them.”
“You think I ought to go ahead, start the drive in the morning?”
“Up to you—and maybe depends a lot on what the doc says when he gets here.”
“Can tell you right now how Pa will look at it. He’ll order me to go on. He told Crockett the herd would be there by the first of the month and he believes in keeping his word. I’d have to start tomorrow to make it in time.”
Shawn gave that thought. “He’ll be wanting you to make good on his promise, no doubt of that,” he said after a bit. “But let the doctor do the deciding for you. He may figure it best you stick around close. If you’re a few days late Crockett’ll understand when he learns the reason for it.”
A shout went up at the lower end of the yard. Starbuck wheeled. A half a dozen riders were coming into the cleared ground near the bunk-houses. A man was draped over the saddle of a seventh horse.
“They’ve got him,” he said, stepping out onto the hard pack. He glanced at Ron. “Sorry for what I was thinking.”
“Forget it,” Hagerman said.
The riders, now surrounded by a dozen more men—night crew members routed out of their sleep by the yelling—pulled to a halt near the porch.
“He’s dead,” one of the men said soberly. “We trailed him from the rocks. Was hit all right ... You got him in the leg.”
“He seen us a following,” another added. “Holed up in them buttes south of the creek. We was hoping he’d come peaceable but he had a mind to make a fight of it. Something we sure didn’t figure on him doing.”
“Couldn’t be helped,” Starbuck said. “Any of you get hurt?”
“Amos Whitfield. Caught hisself a slug in the leg.”
“Doc’s on his way here now to look after Pa. He can take care of Amos, too,” Ron said.
“Fine ... How is the mister?”
“Pretty bad shape,” Hagerman replied, and moved to where the blanketed shape lay across its saddle. Taking the edge of the cover he raised it. “Anybody know who he is?”
“Know him?” one of the riders echoed. “Why, it’s Dave Archer! Figured you knowed!”
Ron had turned, was staring at Starbuck. Shawn, as if unable to believe it, stepped up to the horse and had his look. Behind him Hagerman’s dragging voice could be heard.
“Then ... the killer... he’s still on the loose.”
Starbuck turned to face him. “The way it adds up. Archer was a man with a grudge and tried to settle it. But it means that gunslinger’s still hanging around.”
Twenty
Starbuck watched the riders wheel slowly away, move off onto the road leading to Brasada with Dave Archer’s lifeless body. Ira Blackburn would be paying Hash Knife a call before sundown, they could all be sure of that.
“Think maybe you’re wrong,” Ron said, breaking into his consciousness. “Be no need for that killer to wait around now.”
“You’re forgetting something,” he replied. “Odds are good he won’t know anything about Archer shooting your pa. He’s laying out in the brush somewhere, dodging everybody. Word will never get to him. We’ll play it safe, keep on expecting him.”
“Suppose you’re right,” Hagerman said, and turned to re-enter the house. He halted, seeing Rhoda standing in the doorway, her gaze on the departing riders.
“Ought to satisfy you,” he said with no particular heat. “There’s your proof it wasn’t me that put a bullet in Pa.”
“I heard,” she said, and faced him. There was a glitter of tears in her eyes. “I’m glad I was wrong.”
“Like to believe that—”
The dry slicing noise of iron tires cutting into sand reached Shawn. He swung his attention from the Hagermans to the road leading up to the yard. A light buggy drawn by a lathered horse was rounding the windbreak.
“This the doctor?” he asked, breaking the hush that had fallen between Ron and Rhoda.
Hagerman nodded. “That’s him. Old Henry Dice. He’s not much but he’s all we’ve got around here.”
The physician hauled up at the edge of the porch, flung the reins at Shawn and climbed down. He was an elderly man, as well along in years as Price Hagerman, but there was a sharpness in his glance and a steadiness in his manner that denied time.
“Where is he?” he demanded briskly, grabbing a satchel from under the seat.
“Upstairs—”
“Upstairs,” Dice repeated, brushing by Starbuck. He touched the girl with a look. “Rhoda, I’ll be needing you. Mrs. Salazar still around? Good. She’ll have to help, too.”
Shawn waited until the medical man, trailed by Rhoda, had entered the house, and then, wrapping the leathers around the whip stock, led the still heaving horse into the shade of nearby trees. Making use of the iron tether ball lying on the floor of the buggy, he retraced his steps to the porch. Ron had not stirred, was staring vacantly into the house.
Starbuck touched him on the arm, pointed at the chairs on the gallery. “Might as well sit ... Nothing we can do except wait.”
It was a good two hours later when Henry Dice thumped tiredly down the steps and moved toward the porch. Ron, rising quickly, met him as he pushed open the screen.
“How is he?”
The doctor pursed his lips, shrugged. “Bad. No point in not telling you. I got the bullet out, but he lost a hell of a lot of blood—and he’s not a young buck anymore.”
Shawn, stepping in behind Hagerman, said, “That mean he’s liable not to make it?”
“Hard to tell. Price is tough as a boot, but like I said, he’s old and there’s plenty against him.”
“He’ll come through it,” Ron stated, nodding his head. “Nothing’ll get Pa down.”
Dice gave the younger Hagerman a speculative look. “Could be—but I wouldn’t do too much planning on it. What he needs now is rest and quiet. Expect you to see that he gets it. I’ve done all I can for the time being. Be back tomorrow unless you send for me sooner.”
The physician stepped off the gallery and walked heavily to where Shawn had parked his buggy. The minutes he had spent wrestling for Price Hagerman’s life had taken much out of him, showed him now for what he was—a tired, worn-out old man.
“Pa’s asking for you—both of you,” Rhoda said from the doorway.
Both men wheeled at once, followed her up the stairway. Half-way up Ron slowed his step.
“You figure it’s all right? From the way Dice talked he—”
“The doctor gave him something to ease the pain and make him sleep. He’s awfully weak, but he kept saying he had to see you.”
Starbuck hung back when they reached the rancher’s room. Hagerman opened his eyes as Ron entered. He was pale, looked
sunken and the appearance of bigness was gone from him.
“Boy,” he said in a low, husky voice, “want you to take that herd to Crockett.”
Ron nodded. “Aim to start in the morning.”
“See that you do ... Was figuring to tell you at supper time. Had made up my mind ... Getting shot didn’t have nothing to do with it.”
“I know, Pa. Starbuck told me ... Don’t worry, I can handle it fine—same as I can handle the place when I get back.”
“You want Starbuck to go with you?”
“If you say so. Won’t need him, however. I think it’s best he stay here, sort of look after things for me until I return.”
“Suit yourself,” Price Hagerman said drowsily, and, drawing his hand from beneath the light coverlet, extended it to Ron. “Luck ... son.”
The younger man looked down hastily. He moved forward, took the limp fingers into his own, pressed them. “Thanks, Pa,” he mumbled and turned away.
Mamacita Salazar, standing impatiently by, a disapproving frown clouding her dark features, bobbed her head briskly.
“It is good,” she said. “Now you will all go. The patron must sleep. The doctor say so ... I will stay. Go.”
Rhoda came about slowly, followed her brother from the room. Seeing Starbuck just outside the door, she moved to him, caught his arm.
“He’s going to die, Shawn ... I ... I know,” she cried softly.
The tall rider slipped his arm about her shoulders, continued on for the stairs. Ron, eyes fixed straight ahead, was already halfway down.
“Don’t give up on him yet,” Starbuck said. “His kind never quits easy.”
There was a small room on the ground floor that had been used as quarters for the cook in the days when the Hagermans had both a housekeeper and a woman to take care of the kitchen chores.
Starbuck transferred his belongings that same night. The belief that danger from the killer was far from past still occupied his mind, and, thus convinced, he felt the need to be in a position where he would have a command of not only the entrance to the house but of the yard as well.
There had been no further sign of the intruder, nor had there been any reports from the crew of strangers in the area, but to Shawn this was no assurance. The reputation of a hired killer in the circle wherein he moved depended upon the thoroughness with which he accomplished the task he contracted to do. Therefore, Shawn was certain the man would not back off until he either completed his chore or had proof that Price Hagerman was dead.
But as the tension-filled days dragged slowly by, during which the rancher fought a stubborn battle toward recovery, Starbuck did have the satisfaction of seeing to his own mission. He talked with each member of the crew as they came in off the range—and learned nothing of value.
All had been riding for Hash Knife a relatively short time, no more than half a year in most cases, and none could recall any man fitting Ben’s description or that had answered to the name of Damon Friend.
It was the cook, Charley Hubbs, who came up finally with a lone possibility. Hubbs had worked for Price Hagerman for a bit more than a year. There had been a man, he recalled, who had quit shortly after he signed on for the kitchen job—one who had ridden for Hagerman almost three years and was somewhat of a celebrity because of it.
His name, Hubbs recalled after considerable pondering, had been Jim Winfield. (According to the dates Shawn had mentioned, he would have been working for Hash Knife at the same time); thus he would probably be the only person likely to know if there had ever been a Damon Friend on the spread.
It wasn’t much to go on, but the leads Shawn dug up usually weren’t, and he was now more or less inured to disappointment. Thus, when he turned to Rhoda that evening at the supper table for additional information, he wasn’t too hopeful.
“A Jim Winfield,” he said, after hearing from her that Price seemed much improved—had even sat up for a time during the day. “He worked for you quite awhile. Quit about a year ago. You remember him?”
Rhoda gave it thought. She had matured much in the past few days, was far different from the girl he had encountered upon arrival.
“Name doesn’t sound familiar. Why?”
“He would have been around at about the same time as my brother—if Ben was ever here.”
“I see. But if he’s gone now—”
“I’ll try to locate him. Chance he could tell me where Ben headed after leaving Hash Knife.”
“If, as you say, your brother was here.”
“Something I won’t know unless I find this Winfield and talk to him.”
Rhoda smiled wanly. “Which makes it two men that you have to track down. Seems a bit hopeless to me.”
“Way it goes sometimes ... You sure you don’t remember him?”
“I’m sure. Never have paid much attention to the help. Even if I did, I’d have no idea what happened to him. Riders just come and go—show up from nowhere, disappear into nowhere. Maybe Ron can tell you something about him ... Or you could ask around town.”
“Be what I’ll do if Ron doesn’t remember. Glad your pa’s coming along.”
“He’s better, but he’s still weak. That’s what worries me—Mamacita, too. He can’t get his strength back.”
“Takes time. Little surprised he’s doing as well as he is. What does the doc say?”
“That he’s making progress—nothing more than that. Doesn’t mean a thing far as I’m concerned. It’s just something to use as an answer ... He asks about you every once in awhile.”
“Like to go up and talk to him soon as you think it’s all right. Did look in through the door a couple of times. Was asleep.”
“That’s what he does most of the time. I think what he needs is something to perk him up, stir his interest. I’m beginning to think he doesn’t really care whether he gets well or not.”
Starbuck pushed back from the table. “Doesn’t sound like him. It be all right if I pay a call in the morning? Maybe I can help a little.”
“I wish you would ... and don’t pay any attention to Mamacita if she fusses at you. Your coming can’t do him any harm. Do you still think that killer will show up?”
“Pretty sure he will.”
“Pa asked about him several times, too. He still wonders who it was that hired him.”
Shawn glanced sharply at her. “You didn’t tell him?”
Rhoda shook her head. “No ... I gave you my word I wouldn’t. I’ll keep it. But don’t you think he may have given up and ridden on?”
“Not the way he’d do. And when he finally comes I’ve got to be expecting him ... You don’t get two chances with his kind.”
Twenty-One
Late that next day, with the breathless heat gripping the land relentlessly, a rider pounded into the yard.
Starbuck, hunched in the shade of a cotton-wood a few strides from the front of the house, recognized the man as Wes Lovett, one of the pair he had met that first morning when Price Hagerman was shot and who later had gone with Ron on the drive.
Brushing away the sweat on his face, and immediately worried, Shawn rose and crossed to the rack where the puncher had halted.
“Something wrong?”
Lovett grinned at him. “Nope—the other way around. I got to see Mr. Hagerman.”
Starbuck glanced to the doorway. Rhoda, attracted by the hoof beats, was standing there looking questioningly toward them.
“Ron sent you, that it?” Starbuck said.
Lovett bobbed his head. “Said I was to see the old man—I mean, Mr. Hagerman.”
Again Shawn looked to Rhoda. “It’s all right,” she said. “I think he’s awake.”
Starbuck led the rider into the house, and, accompanied by Rhoda, conducted him to the rancher’s bedroom. Earlier he had paid his call on Price, had found him indifferent and listless, as the girl had said.
“Got a visitor for you,” he announced, pushing the young puncher up to the foot of the bed. “Says Ron sent him.”
The rancher stirred, frowned. “Lovett? You one of the crew?”
“Yes, sir. Been with Ron on the drive. He wanted you to know everything went real good. We never lost a single cow—no, sir—not one!”
“That so?” Hagerman said, pulling himself up slightly. Rhoda stepped forward at once, braced his back with a pillow.
“Not a head lost,” the rancher repeated. “That sure is mighty fine.”
“Ron figures to be home tomorrow, had me come on ahead so’s you’d know how he made out.”
Price Hagerman was nodding, showing his pleasure. A tinge of color was filtering into his sallow cheeks and the brightness in his eyes had increased.
“I appreciate your hurrying back to tell me, Wes Lovett. Was a kind thing to do.”
“Was Ron’s idea. Said he was anxious for you to hear about it ... Well, I’d best be going.”
“Obliged to you again,” Hagerman murmured, smiling as the rider hurried from the room and clomped down the stairs.
“Best medicine I could’ve got,” he said then, shifting his eyes to Shawn and Rhoda. “Makes me plumb proud, knowing what the boy done. Reckon there ain’t no doubt now about him.”
Rhoda leaned over, wiped the beads of sweat from his brow. “You were right to give him his chance, Pa. I’m glad you did.”
The rancher looked closely at her. “You mean that? You saying it from your heart?”
She nodded. “I am, Pa. Guess we’ve all learned a few things in the past days.”
“Ain’t no doubt of that, either,” Hagerman said.
Strength seemed to be flowing into the man from some unsuspected source. He pulled himself to a sitting position, placed his gaze on Starbuck.
“Asking a favor of you. I’m plenty damned sick of this bed. Like to have you tote me downstairs, let me set out on the porch. Reckon you can do that?”
“Pa—” Rhoda began, protestingly.
“Now, don’t go fighting me over it. Can rest as cozy there as I can here—better maybe. Won’t be so goddam hot, and I’ve took a notion I’d like to see how things are looking.”