by Ray Hogan
Flat on the gray-streaked rock bench, Shawn held his gaze to the upper end of the trail, awaited the initial appearance of Mason Lynch. The sun was out and well on its way across the clean sky by that moment, and already was making its searing presence felt. Jays flitted about in the scrubby pinons and cedars, their crests lifting and falling as they scolded lesser birds, warning them from their asserted territory; high overhead a Mexican eagle soared in ever-extending circles as it hunted from an exalted level.
Insects buzzed noisily in the weedy growth struggling for life from the crevices in the rock, and a gopher, frightened into hiding by the arrival of the sorrel and his rider, satisfied finally that all now was well since he could detect no more sound or movement, reappeared, scurried up onto the lower lip of the shelf, where he rose to a rigid, military stance while he studied the land below with bright, sharp eyes.
Shawn stirred restlessly, loosened the bandanna around his neck. The heat was beginning to drill into him, reach the inner depths of his body. Mason should be close, he thought, but judging distance from an overhead position can be difficult and quite often unreliable. Lynch might have been farther away than he figured.
Impatiently, Starbuck brushed at the sweat accumulating on his face. He’d be glad when this was all over and done with, settled one way or another. Then he could go on about his business—that of looking up a rider named Ivory at Canfield’s Box C and determining whether he was his missing brother, Ben, or not. That was what had brought him down into Arizona Territory in the first place, but it seemed he was always getting sidetracked—involved. . . .
The minutes dragged by. Another quarter-hour—a half. Again Shawn stirred, the direct, blazing shafts of sunlight bearing down mercilessly. The gopher, startled for the third time, darted away, disappeared into the loose rocks. The eagle had drifted on seeking more productive hunting, but the jays were still there—quarrelsome, noisy, and impertinent.
A blur of motion up-trail—Starbuck’s attention focused on the point instantly. It was Lynch. He was rounding a clump of brush, hat in hand, the bay following and not limping to any great extent. Apparently Mason was permitting the horse to take it easy, saving him in the event sudden and hard use should become necessary. A pistol was thrust under Lynch’s waistband, the butt sticking out at a handy angle.
Shawn remained motionless, ignoring the pesky, buzzing flies that circled his head, seeking to light on his sweaty skin. Motion, however small, could catch Mason’s eyes, tip him off and seriously complicate the situation.
Looking close, Starbuck endeavored to judge the frame of mind dominating the man. He was running a great personal risk, he realized, no matter how he made his presence known. At the first sound of a voice or the small move of anything, Mason likely would react violently. His nerves would be at hair-trigger keenness and likely he would shoot blindly and without thought.
It would be wise to act when the man was still in front of him and not after he had passed the ledge, Shawn decided. There was at least a chance that Lynch would recognize him in that split second before he pulled the trigger of his weapon.
Mason drew near, became definite. Sweat lay thick on his forehead and cheeks, glistened in his neck and arms. His shirt was soaked, long, dark streaks running down from his armpits, extending across his shoulders. Weariness lined his face and rode him like a leaden pack that threatened to bring him to his knees. There was no spring in his step, only a mechanical trudging, a placing of one foot ahead of the other. He’d had a hard time of it during the night and there was little strength remaining in his tortured body.
He came to a listless, sliding halt. Ground-reining the bay, he looked ahead to the now hazy tumble of the Mescals, then turned, walked slowly down to the stream. Kneeling, he dashed water over his head, against his burned face, and then dripping, sat for a time hunched on his heels, resting. But it was for only brief minutes. Rising, he glanced to the sky as if searching for relief from the pitiless heat, and finding no hope, moved back to the bay. Catching up the trailing leathers, he resumed his jaded march.
Off behind Starbuck the sorrel, annoyed by the hordes of ravenous insects, shook itself violently. Instantly Mason Lynch stopped, hand going straight to the pistol at his waist.
Shawn, flattened upon the ledge as much as possible, felt rather than saw the man’s sharp eyes digging at the rocks, the slope beyond him. If the sorrel moved again the moment of resolution was at hand; if not, likely Mason, seeing nothing and hearing no more, would assume it had been some animal frightened by his approach, and move on.
The charged, blistering moments crawled by filled with the dry clacking of insects, the drone of flies hovering above his sweaty skin. He dared not raise his head to see if Mason had dismissed the alarm and was continuing his passage, feared to stir at all since Lynch could still be scanning the rock ledges and slopes for the source of the noise.
A full, interminable minute . . . two . . . three. Shawn heard the click of metal against stone, swallowed hard. Mason was again on his way—almost directly below him if he could judge by the nearness of the sound. With great care he lifted his head a few inches. Lynch was a dozen steps away.
Starbuck reached for his pistol, drew it slowly, carefully, making certain it did not scrape against the rock. Second thoughts entered his mind. He decided against the procedure, slid the weapon back into its holster. Best to face Mason with both hands clearly visible—and empty.
Drawing his legs up beneath him, balancing himself with palms flat against the blistering granite, he waited until Lynch was coming straight toward him. Then, taking a deep breath, he rose to his full height
“Mason—”
Lynch jolted as if struck bodily by the solitary word. He threw himself back against his horse, fingers clawing for the gun in the waistband of his pants.
“It’s me—Starbuck!”
At the mention of the name Lynch froze. His hand drifted away from his weapon as he saw none in Shawn’s grasp. Slowly he straightened, brushing at the sweat clothing his eyes with a forearm.
“You stood a damn good chance of getting your head blowed off.”
“I know that. A risk I had to take,” Starbuck said, keeping his arms away from his sides.
Mason considered him suspiciously. “You come after me?”
Shawn moved nearer to the edge of the shelf. “Not exactly—not after you.”
Lynch shook his head. “Wasted your time. How’d you know to come this way?”
“Remembered what you said about the Mescals—that you’d once started to build yourself a ranch there. Sort of guessed that was where you’d make for.”
The tautness still held Mason Lynch in a viselike grip. “I can forget that, I reckon,” he said in a low, disconsolate voice. “They’d never leave me be. Was aiming to rest my horse till morning, then hit for the border. Ain’t too far from here.”
“One night won’t do him much good for that kind of a trip. Must be a hundred miles across there. You sure that’s what you want to do?”
Mason shrugged indifferently. “Nothing else left.”
“Could be. You shoot Kit Canfield?”
Lynch laughed, a harsh, grating sound. “There anybody thinks I didn’t?”
Far back up the slope above Starbuck a rock clattered hollowly, set up a thumping sound as it started downgrade.
Instantly Mason’s mouth snapped shut. His hand reached again for the pistol in his waistband. Starbuck spun, threw his glance to the outcropping on the crest where he had earlier stopped and shortly thereafter spotted Mason.
A dozen riders were outlined against the sky. One man, on foot, was crouched at the extreme edge of the rocky shoulder, staring down the long slope into the valley. That would be the Indian, Yaqui Joe—the tracker. He hadn’t succeeded in throwing the posse off for long, Shawn realized.
He came back around, met Mason Lynch’s hard, accusing eyes, saw the leveled pistol pointing at him.
“Something I never figured from y
ou—leading them to where I’d be.”
‘That’s not the way of it,” Shawn said quietly. “They’re following me—not you. Thought I’d shaken them, but they’ve got themselves a tracker—Yaqui Joe they called him. He must’ve figured what I was doing first off. Hoped I’d have a couple hours’ start on them at least.”
Mason Lynch only stared, his red-lidded eyes sunk deep in his pinched face.
“It’s the truth. If I was leading them I would’ve stuck with them. Makes more sense. Fact is, I was supposed to do just that but I ducked out, came on alone.”
“So’s you could escort me across the border, that it?”
Shawn ignored the thick sarcasm. “Nope, to get you out of the way before that posse could catch up. Huckaby’s at the head of it but they’re mostly Canfield lovers, and I don’t figure the marshal will be able to hold them back if they ever get their hands on you. There’s only one thing on their minds—string you up.”
“Them wanting to do that is nothing new.”
Starbuck looked up slope again. “Well, it’s what you can figure on if we keep standing here. They’ll find where I came off the rim, follow my tracks—and the next thing you know they’ll be right in our laps.”
Mason did not lower his weapon, simply continued to stand rigidly in the blazing sun. “Could all be a double-cross ... a trick. Maybe there’s more of them circling around us. For all I know you’re working right with Huckaby and Canfield.”
Starbuck swore in disgust. “I’m working for nobody but myself—and, I guess, sort of for you. And why I’m doing that even I’m not sure! It’s your trouble, not mine—your neck they’re wanting to stretch. Hell, if I had a lick of sense I’d climb on my horse and ride out, let you handle your own problems.”
“You’re not about to—not with me holding this gun on you!”
“I don’t think you’d shoot me, Mason—and if you did pull that trigger you’d have Huckaby and his bunch down on you before you could get a half-mile. Use your head. I’m trying to help you—trying to be your friend!”
Mason continued to stare at Shawn for another long, silent minute, and then his arm began to lower. Shifting wearily, he thrust the weapon into his waistband.
“All right,” he said in a resigned voice. “I’m leaving it up to you. What’ll I do now?”
Fifteen
Relief flooded through Starbuck, broke the iron-hard tension that gripped him. He wiped at the sweat on his forehead, cast another glance to the rim above them. Huckaby’s riders were still there but he could no longer see Yaqui Joe. That could only mean the canny old Indian was back somewhere on the plateau, nosing about for prints that would tell him where the sorrel started down. He would locate them with little difficulty, and soon the posse would come racing down the grade.
“Got to pull out of here quick,” he said, wheeling toward the thicket where the sorrel waited. “Be smart, I think, to double back upstream.”
Mason made no reply, held off until Starbuck had led his horse off the bench and down to the level of the trail.
“The way I just come?” he said. “Why not keep going for the border?”
“Be what they’ll figure you’d do. We cut north, stay in the stream so’s there’ll be no tracks, and it ought to throw them off us in a hurry. Even that Indian can’t pick up hoof-prints there. Got to be careful, however. Couple of places where the water’s out in the open. See us easy, if they’re looking.”
“They’re starting down now,” Mason said.
That would mean that Yaqui Joe had found the point where he’d begun the descent from the plateau. He’d hoped to have time in which to brush out the tracks both he and Lynch had made in the immediate area, but it was too late now.
Leading the way, he waded into the shin-deep stream at a fast walk with the sorrel slogging in behind him, sending up sprays of water from his hoofs at each step. He could hear Mason Lynch and the bay keeping pace.
For a good quarter-mile he maintained a steady gait, working up a sweat despite the cool surroundings. Finally, with breath coming hard from the sheer labor of not only bucking the current but from the continually lifting grade as well, he halted in a wide bend of the creek. There a thick covering of cottonwood branches completely sheltered them from any possibility of being seen.
Climbing out onto the bank, water dripping from his soaked pant legs where the sorrel had splashed him, he tied the horse to a clump of birch and sat down upon a rotting log. Pulling off his boots, he poured the collected water from them, then, stripping off his socks, he wrung them dry and hung them on a nearby bush. A short distance away, Mason Lynch, close-mouthed and morose, was following the same procedure.
When those necessary creature-comfort chores were completed and both had settled back to regain spent breath and ease their aching muscles, Lynch finally turned to Starbuck. The dark void of bitterness, of utter hopelessness in the man’s eyes Shawn had noticed at their first meeting, had returned, and there was a conspicuous drag to his voice.
“Now what? Got them between me and the border—and I’d be a fool to keep riding north. Thinking on it, seems I’ve been herded around to where I’m between a high fence and a tall place.”
Angered, Starbuck shook his head. “If you figure me for some kind of a Judas-goat, then climb on my horse and head out. He’ll get you away from here fast—”
“I’m not saying—”
“Then quit thinking it. Just be damned glad you’re hid. That’s a lynch mob back there.”
Mason shrugged. “I expected it to be. You say Huckaby’s running it?”
“Supposed to be, but the way Barney Canfield’s got the men all fired up—offering a hundred dollars gold for you, dead or alive—I don’t think the marshal can stop them if they ever get a hold of you, start in.”
“Doubt if he’ll even try.”
Shawn nodded slowly. “Got to admit that I’m not so sure of him either. Thought all along he was trying to do a job, now I’m wondering about it. You’ve never got around to answering my question.”
“What was that?”
“Kit Canfield—you shoot him? Tell the truth, Mason. A lie will only make it harder to help.”
Lynch’s eyes locked with those of Starbuck, held. “It wasn’t me,” he said soberly. “That’s the God’s truth. I was there—I’m admitting that—but I didn’t have anything to do with the shooting.”
Starbuck leaned forward. “You saw it?”
“I was about as far from Kit as we are from that big rock—fifteen, maybe twenty strides.”
“Then you recognized the man who did it?”
“Seen a man—that’s about all. Never got a clear look at him.”
Shawn settled back despondently. “Not much there that’ll help.”
“What I told myself when it was all over and I was standing there in the dark. Who’d believe a yarn like that from me? Everybody knows how things stood between me and the Canfields—and a lot of them are dead sure I came back to square up with the other two. You saw that.”
Starbuck’s eyes were thoughtful. “How was it that you just happened to be right there?”
Mason’s eyes spread slightly and then his head came forward as his shoulders sagged. “You’re proving my point. You don’t believe a goddam word I’m saying. It’s a cinch Huckaby and everybody else’ll look at it the same way.”
“Not saying I don’t. Let’s hear the rest of it.”
Mason lifted his hands, allowed them to drop to his sides in a gesture of hopelessness. “What for? Won’t do no good. Either you believe me—or you don’t.”
“Wrong!” Shawn snapped. “You’ve got to convince folks and the best way to do that is start with me—a friend. Then we can work together at making somebody like Huckaby listen—maybe even Barney Canfield, if we can get close enough to him.”
“Not sure there’s any use trying to talk to any of them.”
“We’ll go to Tucson, then, lay it out for him. But the thing now is let
me hear all of it—everything that went on. Just give up, keep feeling sorry for yourself and how you’re going to have to spend the rest of your life dodging the law—and there’ll be nothing for me to do but move on, tend to my own business.”
Mason’s gaunt face had tipped down. His eyes were set, staring, reflected his hopelessness. “Probably be best anyway, Shawn. All I can do is cause you grief—maybe even get you shot.”
“Something for me to decide.”
“You standing by me, being a friend—that’s the best thing that’s happened to me in a lot of years. Thinking you’d changed, brought that posse down on me, sort of jolted something inside me—and then if you don’t believe—”
“The rest of it,” Starbuck broke in gently. “Let me hear it.”
Mason shifted, brushed at his lips. He sighed deeply, picked up a twig lying at his feet, began to snap it into small lengths.
“Went down to the graveyard after I left you last night,” he began. “Had a look at the folks’ graves, done some weed pulling and straightening up, then I got to thinking about Marie—she’s the one I told you about.”
Shawn nodded. “The one you’d figured to marry.”
“I was remembering what you said,” Lynch went on in a wooden voice as if not hearing, “and decided I would like to see her, maybe talk to her. Thought she might have some feeling for me—that maybe there was still a chance we could sort of get together, team up.
“Her being what the marshal said she was and all that don’t make no difference to me. When I studied on it I could see it was my fault she ended up that way. Besides, I ain’t got much to offer either—a busted-down convict with nothing more’n a piece of land.
“Well, I went down to the Frisco House and was standing there looking through the window at her and a couple others, trying to get up enough guts to go in, when Kit Canfield came along. I watched him go inside, like he owned the place, and got right after Marie. He took her upstairs—and I know I’ve got no right, but it riled me plenty.”