"They might have killed you."
"Might have. But I might have done some shooting, too. Anyway, Heseltine would think twice before taking a shot at me. If he did that he wouldn't be safe anywhere in Colorado."
He paused and refilled his cup; then he asked, "What are your plans?"
"To get well, and get on their trail. I'm going to track them down no matter how long it takes." I hadn't really thought of it that way, but suddenly I knew that what I said was true.
They had robbed a boy and a wounded man. The wounded man was dead, but somewhere along the line something had happened to that boy. They had tried to kill me, and I had put one of them down with lead, but they had almost gotten me this time. Next time I would be shooting first.
Something else had happened, too. The cold eyes of Bob Heseltine no longer worried me. I'd been pushed around and shot at, but I was no longer afraid. Wary, yes, but not afraid, as I admitted to myself I had been.
"A man does what he has to do," Lander said quietly.
"You lived with Indians too long, Lander," Con said.
"I'd like Tucker to drop the whole thing. I've some contracts and I need a good young man to help me." He looked over at me. "You could make a good bit more than working for wages. I need a man to help me ramrod a track-laying job."
"All right," I said. "I'll help, and when the job is finished, I'll go after them. It might be a good thing to let them relax a little."
"It will be thirty days before we can get started," Con said. "Lander will be working with me, too."
Thirty days? I'd be well long before then, and could do a little scouting.
The days passed slowly, but pleasantly enough. Day-times I'd talk with Vashti, and I'd help her get fuel in for the fire, breaking branches for kindling, as I couldn't take a chance on swinging an axe, for fear it would open my wound.
It wasn't until I began moving around that I found where that other bullet had struck.
My gun belt was a kind of fancy one, with loops for cartridges and silver plaques separating one set of twelve from another. One of those bullets had hit one of those silver plates, glanced off, and gone about its business, but the wallop it gave me left a big bruise on my back and side. The second bullet must have hit me as I was turning from the first shot.
When I could get outside to sit in the sun I saw what a grand place they'd picked for that cabin.
It was on a small knoll. Down in the trees there was a corral with several horses, and a long slope covered with aspens. The cabin stood in a grove of their slim pale trunks, and I loved the whispering of their leaves.
There were squirrels around, and birds, and it was almighty pleasant just sitting in the sun and watching things. Sometimes I'd walk out from the house and sit down on a stump left from the time they cut logs for the cabin. The squirrels would pay me no mind, just chasing one another through the trees and along the ground.
There's a good deal of life goes on in an aspen grove.
Elk and beaver love the bitter inner bark, squirrels and chipmunks come looking for the berries and seeds among the brush that often grows along the ground;
Rocky Mountain nuthatches, blue jays, and woodpeckers are always there, as well as a dozen other kinds of birds and animals. Harebells, bluebells, cowslips, and pink roses often cover the ground.
When I was looking and listening in the stillness like that it seemed I could almost feel the mountains changing, for no matter how changeless and timeless they may seem, they are never twice the same.
Lander Owen came up from where he'd been chopping wood. He squatted on his heels alongside the porch and nodded toward the mountains. "A man can always learn from them," he said. "The Indians know a lot no white man will ever know, and they don't tell what they know. They expect you to know it, too, and they don't feel they have to tell what they know, the way a white man does.
"Maybe if they'd had a written language it would have been different, for the Indian has a great feeling for words, and the sounds of words. Surely there would have been poets among them, as there were artists."
"I never knew much about them except that they like to fight."
`They are a warlike people, generally speaking. Now and again some chief would see the wisdom of avoiding trouble, and his people would usually profit by it.
"Vashti's grandfather, Ma-ga-ska, The Swan, was a great warrior, but he was a shrewd ruler and a man of great natural ability. Denig used to say that his people were the most trustworthy of any Indians he knew, but they had been at war with the Crows as far back as anybody could remember. But as long as The Swan was alive they had no trouble with the white man."
Lander Owen was silent then for a while, but presently he said, "Son, you should have seen this country when I first came into it. There were mighty few white men, and not so many Indians as you'd think, and a man could ride for days and see nobody at all. He could drink from any stream and find food in most places, and there were millions of wild horses running free on the Plains.
Now men are coming into the country and soon you'll see cities growing up."
"Cities? Out here?"
"Boy, a beaver builds dams because it's his nature, and a man builds cities for the same reason, I suppose.
It's likely men can't help themselves any more than a beaver can ... or the ant that builds an ant hill, or the bees a hive.
"There are men who seem to have a compulsion to build to build buildings, railroads, or bridges; to sink mines, to build fortunes. It's man's nature. Some make it through luck, but the ones who last are those who put one foot ahead of the other, one stone on another. If you build to last, you've got to build with work and with patience."
What was I going to build, I wondered. Anything at all? Or was I just going to find those two men and make them give up what was left of our money. I didn't like to think of what I wasn't doing, so I shook it off. I'd heard old men talk before, like pa.
But when I thought of him I remembered how right he had been about Reese and Sites, and how wrong I'd been. Well, that was one time. Now I knew better, and I was going to find those men. And I had several weeks before Con Judy got started with his kind of building.
Lander Owen went off now about his business and I still sat there in the sun, riding my mind down the possible trails those two might have gone. I wasn't going to let up on them until I had them by the short hair.
It would have been easier, in some ways, if I'd never met Con Judy. He was my friend, maybe the first real friend I ever had, but he had opened doors for me that maybe he'd better left closed. He had introduced me to men who were doing something in the world, men who had the respect of their communities. All of them were building things to last; and me, I was just hunting two men who had taken our money and tried to kill me.
Five days later, on a horse I bought from Lander Owen, I took the trail.
I didn't aim to ride into Leadville, because I didn't want Con Judy to talk me out of it, or anybody else. I was giving myself three weeks to find them, and if by that time I hadn't, I would double back, take Con's job, and stay on it until I earned some money.
Vashti was there to say good-bye, although she didn't hold with my going. She said it, and then turned her back on me and walked away. I was looking after her, thinking I should say something I hadn't said, when Lander stepped up close.
"Boy, Con is probably right, and Vash, too. Me, I lived with redskins too long. I figure you got it to do, so I'll tell you this: When they pulled out they were headed for the Frying Pan country, and they'd teamed up with two more outlaws, Burns King and Pit Burnett."
Burnett I'd seen a couple of times in Leadville. He had been a hanger-on around State Street, and had been pointed out as a gunman, a mine guard, and a trouble-hunter. King I knew nothing about, and said so.
"Well," Lander Owen said drily, "when he was hangin' around Prescott there were a lot of holdups in Black Canyon. He drifted up Nevada way and there were a couple up there. I don't know anything,
but it seems to me It seemed to me, too. Heseltine was not teaming up with any other outlaws because he wanted company, but because he had something in mind.
And what about the money? Was that all gone? I felt my stomach kind of turn over at the thought.
Now I knew what I was going to do. I was going to ride up Frying Pan way, and then I was going to cross over and find out the nearest stage route. And I was going to get me a job riding shotgun. If they wanted to hold up a stage, I would be there waiting for them.
I'd ride shotgun for free, if it had to be. When they came hunting I'd be sitting right up on top, ready for them.
Chapter 10
The man at the stage station was named Rollins. He looked up at me from under a green eyeshade, then sat back in his swivel chair. He was a man of forty-odd, already a little gray around the temples, but he had a capable way about him.
His eyes were blue and steady, and he studied me a moment before he answered me. "You want to ride shotgun? What makes you think we need a shotgun guard?"
"Bob Heseltine and Kid Reese are headed this way.
They've got Pit Burnett and Burns King with them."
"Oh? Heseltine, is it? You wouldn't be Shell Tucker, would you?"
"I would." I was surprised. "How did you know that?"
"There's been talk." He leaned forward in his chair and shuffled the papers in front of him. He seemed to be considering my application for the job. "You realize, of course, that the shotgun guard will be the one they're looking for first? They'd blast you off the top before you could lift a finger."
"I've thought about that. I had an idea I'd ride inside.
You say you haven't had a guard, so it's likely they won't be expecting one."
Rollins settled back again. "All right. What do you want to do?"
"Have the job, stay out of sight, and make one run over the route to sort of get the lay of the land. I'd like to talk to your drivers, too."
Rollins shook his head. "No, that's too risky. One of them might say something. I'll tell you what I'll do.
We have a bed in the back of the station here. We can fix you up there, you can eat and sleep there, and you can talk to Tobin Dixie. He's our smartest driver, and very likely he's the one you'll have. He knows every inch of the route, knows it the way you know the shape of your face."
That night, sitting on the edge of a cot in the back room at the stage station, I listened to Dixie. He was a small, wiry man with sandy hair, lean jaws constantly busy with Navy plug, and shrewd, careful eyes. Right off, I liked him. There was something about him that told you he'd stand with you.
"It ain't so easy, Tucker. The first ten mile is open country, right out in the sagebrush. There's no cover, none a-tall, and no place to hide a horse ... not even room to hide your hat.
"Then the road goes uphill for three, four mile. Winding road, lots of cover. There's one big gray boulder that's been used by half a dozen holdup men. Sticks right out into the road.
"After that it's all downhill, right to the next station.
There's lots of brush and boulders, but the stage is moving too fast to stop it easy. Only one holdup man tried that stretch, and the stage just ran off and left him standing there."
We talked quite a spell, and when Tobin Dixie had gone I stretched out on the bed, put my hands behind my head and began to study on what I'd heard.
A logical place would be on the slow upgrade, but that didn't seem what Heseltine would do. Maybe on top? I thought about that, but didn't like it either.
The thing was, I was going to have to guess right. If I didn't, I could get myself shot ... and probably would anyway.
On the downhill side the stage would be rolling too fast ... but suppose, for some reason, it wasn't? Suppose for some reason it had to go slow?
The more I studied on it the more likely it seemed, if it could be worked. But how could a man slow down a stage without being on it? If one of them did ride the stage they would see me, and I would see them before they ever left town. It didn't seem a very sure possibility.
A boulder or a log in the road? No, the driver would know right away something was wrong, and would either turn around, if there was room, or go around the obstacle, or get shaped up to fight.
Bob Heseltine was no fool, and he wouldn't choose a place where they were likely to be ready for him. All the way up that slow, winding hill they would be set for trouble, and when they slowed at the top to take a breather, they would be sitting with their guns ready.
On the long ride downhill they would be relaxed, feeling the danger was over. The question was, how could the stage be slowed down without its being a warning.
Tobin Dixie had gone over the road for me thoroughly, but there's nothing like seeing a trail for yourself. So I had that to do, if I could do it without being seen.
At the same time, holed up as I was, I had a chance to study the situation. I did not want to kill anybody, and particularly I didn't want to kill either Reese or Heseltine. I wanted my money back, and I was sure they hadn't spent all the money as yet ... they hadn't had time.
It seemed likely they had some idea in mind that called for more money than they had. Instead of just whooping it up in saloons, they must have an idea of going somewhere else and starting something else that required more money; or maybe they wanted to go to the elegant hotels back east or on the coast and really live it up. I decided Ruby Shaw might be wanting just that, and from all I'd heard Ruby was a girl who got what she wanted ... up to a point.
There was no other reason that I could see for them to start on the outlaw trail again so soon. Not with money in their pockets that the law couldn't touch them for.
One of them would come to town to scout around, and no doubt they also had somebody in town already who knew when the stage would be carrying money.
Did that somebody know about me? I had to chance it that he didn't, and make sure he didn't learn anything about me. Which meant I had to stay holed up.
There was a peekhole in the wall where a man could see what went on in the office, and there was a window that looked out on the street. The building next door cut off the view, but sitting by that window a man could watch folks pass for a few yards on this side of the street, and several times that distance across the way.
About noon on the second day a man walked up the street and leaned against the awning pole and began to build a cigarette. He was a lean, swarthy man I had not seen before. He looked like any cowpoke, except that his boots were polished, he wore fancy Mexican spurs, and his outfit looked a mite better than most cowhands could afford.
When he cupped his hands to light his smoke, his eyes came over to the stage station, held there for a moment, then drifted along. He stalled around there until he had smoked three cigarettes, then he walked off down the street, but later he came back and stood against the front of a building just within range of my view.
There was a bench there, and after a while he sat down on it and spent a good part of the afternoon right there. And while he studied the station and watched what went on, I studied him.
He carried a six-shooter in a holster on his right hip, but he also wore a coat, whereas most riders simply wore a vest, because it gave them shoulder room and had pockets for tobacco, matches, and such-like.
As I watched, he put a hand into the left side of his coat several times a movement I was sure he wasn't aware of. What was there that occupied his mind? Money? Could be. A weapon? More likely. There was no bulge that I could see at this distance, but why not a derringer insurance against those little occurrences that sometimes happen?
It would be a thing to remember.
The next day the man with the polished boots was no longer around, but there was another one, and this one I had no trouble recognizing, for it was Reese.
He was less patient than the first man, who I surmised was Pit Burnett. Reese would sit for a short while, then move off and stroll along the street, and presently return. Everybody on the stre
et was too busy to pay them much mind, for western towns had few men just idling time away. Every man had a job to do and he was busy doing it.
The next day I was supposed to take my trip on the stage to study the route, and I was restless to be going.
But as I waited there in the back room, all of a sudden a buckboard came rolling up the street with two men on the driver's seat, one of them carrying a Winchester.
Riding behind was another man, also armed. Reese was half asleep on the bench across the way, but when that buckboard showed up he got up as quick as if he'd been bee-stung. On the side of it was painted the words, GOLD HILL MINING CO.
When I looked at the bench again Reese was gone.
This then was it. I wasn't going to get a chance to take that first ride over the road. This shipment would be going out on tomorrow's stage, and I'd be riding with it.
After a few minutes the buckboard rolled away and I got up. One of the men who had come with it had evidently remained behind.
Rollins opened the door and stuck his head into the room. "Come in here, Shell. I want you to meet somebody."
He was a short man, square and heavy around the middle, but the eyes that measured me as I went into the room were sharp and steady.
"Shell, meet Do Silva. He'll be riding with you."
"We can use him," I said, but I was not happy over it, and he noticed it.
He looked at me thoughtfully. "You do not like me, amigo?"
"I've got nothing against you," I told him. "You look like quite a man. Only I was on this deal alone and was planning to handle it alone."
He shrugged. "I can listen."
I hesitated. "Well. I don't know how I can handle it, only I don't want to kill Kid Reese or Bob Heseltine unless I have to."
He just looked at me, so I explained. "All right, unless we have to. Who are the others?"
When I told him about Burns King and Pit Burnett, he shrugged again. "They are bad men, amigo. Burnett will shoot. So will King if he is pushed. I do not know the others."
"You saw Reese. He was the puncher who got up off the bench as your buckboard rolled by. I saw you look at him."
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