Oliver Strange - Sudden Westerns 09 - Sudden Makes War(1942)

by Oliver Strange

  She did not respond to his elephantine playfulness, and his clumsy attempts to help prepare a meal only reminded her, oddly enough, not of the efficient cavalier she had parted from, but of his friend, Dan Dover. Would he be pleased she had not perished, even though she was a Trenton? She stifled the thought resolutely, and busied herself brewing coffee.

  Chapter XXII

  The bound men in the cave watched the preparations for departure and wondered what was to happen to them. They saw the wounded rancher carried out, and Dan’s protest that he was not fit to be moved was ignored. When their weapons and stock of provisions were also taken it began to look grave. A remembrance of Sudden’s description of the gulf in the tunnel was not comforting. When all was in readiness, Garstone strolled over, and stood, contemplating Dover with malignant contentment.

  “You have lost everything, or nearly,” he said. “Treasure, ranch, and paid gunman; only your life remains. Well, I give you that; violence is not to my liking.”

  The suave, insolent voice made the young man indifferent to consequences. “Yo’re tellin’ me,” he flung back. “Even when you rob a train, you pick the safe job—the men on the engine ain’t never armed.”

  It was a guess, but a good one, and the gibe went home. But Garstone was a winner, and could afford to laugh; he did not.

  “Keep clear of Rainbow, if you’re wise,” he warned. “And if you meet Malachi, tell him my promise will be kept.”

  “He won’t believe me,” Dan replied.

  Garstone shrugged away the insult and looked at Yorky. “And you, get back to your sewer, you rat.”

  “Rats has teeth an’ can bite,” the boy spat out, and waited for the expected kick.

  It did not come and, despite his hardihood, Yorky breathed more easily when the bully had vanished through the exit from the cave. He was silent for a time, wresting with some problem, and then asked, “Does the mails from these yer hick towns ever git lost?”

  “I reckon, now an’ then,” Dan replied. “Why?”

  “Ain’t heard from me uncle in Noo York—”

  “Don’t you pull that stuff on me, son,” the rancher cut in. “Hello, who’s that?”

  A slight figure had slid cautiously into the cave; it was Malachi. “So the buzzards have flown,” he greeted. “And how are my patients?”

  “Yo’re one shy—they took Trenton,” Dan told him. “Damnation! it will probably finish him,” Malachi exploded, and busied himself with their bonds.

  “They’ve also collared our food, weapons, an’ I s’pose, hosses.”

  “No, I set them adrift—thought it was a bright idea at the time, but afterwards I wasn’t so stuck on it,” the doctor said ruefully. “I forgot they’d be lost for us, too.”

  “You did yore best, Phil, an’ there’s a chance some will drift back. Grub is goin’ to be the worry—we’ll have to trap. By the way, Garstone said for me to tell you he would keep his promise. What was it?”

  “Oh, nothing of consequence,” Malachi smiled. “I was to be shot if I made any use of my liberty: Just a bluff.”

  He went away to attend to the hurt men, and the rancher’s eyes followed him with a new expression. “A bluff. Huh? But you had the nerve to call it, Phil,” he said softly.

  After a while the doctor came back. “They’re both going on well, but I can’t understand Hunch,” he reported. “That crack on his skull isn’t serious, but it seems to have destroyed his memory.”

  “What, again?”

  “Odd, isn’t it? But he failed to recognize me, and appears to have no recollection of the Circle Dot, or how he came to be here.”

  “Mebbe the big axe would start his rememberin’ machinery,” Dan suggested.

  “I tried that, but he just stared as though he’d never seen it before. Physically, he’s perfectly sound.”

  “Well, Tiny’ll keep us tied here for a spell,” the rancher said. “Hi, Yorky, rustle some fodder for the fire; I’m goin’ to see if I can knock over a cottontail or two.”

  “We’ll be awright when Jim comes along—he’s got his guns.”

  “He’d shorely be a cure for sore eyes,” Dan replied moodily. He could not share the boy’s confidence.

  “Stranger things have happened,” Malachi said. “The blackest moment is the turning-point, you know.”

  Meanwhile, the man of whom they were speaking was not many miles distant. The gully in which the Wagon-wheel party had surprised him was, he had discovered, considerably east of the one he was making for, but with Old Cloudy in sight again, he had a mark to steer by. He did not fear pursuit; they had the treasure. He wondered where was Trenton. Behind, perhaps, in the charge of Flint. But how were they transporting him? His mind went to his late fellow-traveller.

  A nice girl, he admitted, but somewhat lacking in savvy.

  “Young women is apt to take a fella at face-value,” he mused, and then came the cynical addition, “Wouldn’t take ‘em a-tall if they didn’t, I s’pose.”

  Sudden was no misogynist, but so far the fair sex had not figured largely in his life. He was to meet his fate, but the time was not yet.

  He trudged on, crossing ridges, threading arroyos, circling thickets of impassable brush, steadily advancing towards the mountain. The sun was still high in the heavens when, in a strip of sandy soil, he noticed hoof-prints. They pointed eastwards, and a careful scrutiny revealed five different sets. The prints of his own horse, Nigger—which he could recognize at a glance—were not among them.

  “Four riders, one of ‘em Garstone,” he deduced, “an’ a pack-hors. Or mebbe they’ve distributed the baggage an’ tied Trenton on the fifth.”

  The the tracks were not those of his friends he was quite sure. Exactly what had happened to Malachi and Hunch he did not know, but he had seen Tiny shot down, and it was most improbable that he would be able to sit a saddle so soon.

  He set himself to follow the trail, and at the end of an hour’s hard work reached what he knew must be the deserted Wagon-wheel camp. Standing in a small grove of trees, and sheltered by a cliff, was a canvas tent; only the presence of a woman could account for such a thing in that place. The ashes of the two fires were cold. Hanging from a branch was most of the carcase of a newly slain deer. He stepped to the opening of the tent and peeped in. A man, swathed in blankets, was lying on the floor. The puncher did not need two guesses—it was Zeb Trenton.

  “The murderin’ swine,” he muttered. “They leave him here, helpless, an’ to cinch it, hang a bait outside that would fetch any mountain cat gettin’ scent of it.” He bent over the rancher.

  “Trenton, its Jim Green.”

  The eyes remained closed and there was no movement. Sudden seized one of the ice-cold hands; a faint flutter of the pulse informed him that the flame of life still flickered. A quantity of stores, flour, bacon, coffee, caught his eye, and the packages seemed familiar. With them, guns and six-shooters, thrown in an untidy pile on the ground. He picked up one of the rifles; it was Yorky’s prized Winchester, and he understood; this was the loot from the cavern. What had become of his friends? Only in one way could he find the answer, and, granite-faced, he set out, carrying his own rifle—which he had found among the rest, and the boy’s. Exhausted and hungry as he was, his magnificent muscles did not fail him. Moving with the effortless swinging stride of an Indian on the trail, he crossed the basin, and entered the gorge. Apprehension grimmed his mouth as he approached the cave.

  “Hello, the house,” he hailed.

  “It’s Jim,” he heard Yorky yell. “Didn’t I tell yer he’d make it?”

  The boy was the first to reach him, closely followed by Dan and Malachi. Judged by the standards of the East, their welcome was little more than casual, but Sudden was a Westerner himself, and he understood.

  “Jim, I’m powerful glad to see you,” was what the rancher said, but the clasp of his hand told a great deal more. And so with the others, but they all wanted to know what had befallen him.

  “We
ll, we got away—” Sudden began.

  “We?” Dan cried. “Then Beth—Miss Trenton—is alive?”

  “Shorely,” the narrator smiled. “Tryin’ to find a way back here, we ran into Garstone—”

  It was the doctor who cut him short this time. “See here, Jim, we like you a lot, but you’ll be as unpopular as a drunk at a temperance meeting if you don’t tell a complete story.”

  “Shucks, I’m doin’ just that,” the puncher protested. “I caught the girl in time—there was a bit of a crack in the floor o’ the tunnel. Flint an’ Rattray started shootin’ an’ I had to get her outa there.”

  “How did you cross that bit of a crack?” Malachi demanded. “I was looking at it a while ago; it nearly froze my blood.”

  “Jumped it, o’ course; think we growed wings on the spot?” Sudden replied, and divining the coming question, added, “Well, she warn’t so heavy.”

  “My sainted aunt,” Malachi breathed. “How many lives have you, Jim?”

  “I started level with a cat, but mebbe I’ve used up a few,” the puncher grinned.

  “All right,” the doctor smiled. “Get on with your—bragging.”

  “Like I said, we got clear an’ bumped into the other crowd. Garstone told Miss Trenton that he had her uncle safe an’ she decided to stay with ‘em. He tried to persuade me, but I warn’t willin’. Then Flint objected to my goin’ an’ I had to argue with him; his arm was hurt.”

  “Bruised, no doubt,” Malachi commented ironically. “Mebbe,” the puncher agreed. “He jumped aside when I charged, an’ Bundy shot him in the head.”

  “Why’n hell—” Dover began.

  “He’d claim to be aimin’ at me, though I was six feet from Flint; it was either mighty good, or mighty bad, shootin’. Now I’m comin’ to the important part; I wanted to tell you right off, but Doc would have his dime novel.” He grinned at Malachi. “I’m headin’ for here, as near as I can guess, when I stumble on tracks. I back-trail an’ they lead me to the Wagon-wheel camp. There, inside a tent, is Zeb Trenton.”

  “Alive?” This from the doctor.

  “On’y just, I’d say.”

  “They left him alone. Why, it’s plain murder.”

  “Yu said it—‘specially the way things was fixed,” Sudden agreed, and told of the deer-meat.

  Dover’s face grew dark. “We can trump that trick, anyway, by fetchin’ him here,” he said.

  “You were goin’ to suggest that, Jim?”

  “Yeah, the more so as they seem to ‘a’ got our stores an’ weapons there. I didn’t see no hosses.”

  “They never got ‘em,” Dan said, and explained.

  “Well, yu can’t have everythin’ in this world o’ sin an’ sorrow; we’ll have to hoof it.” He looked at the big cowboy, who, squatting near, was energetically cursing his crippled limb. “If I leave yu my rifle, Tiny, can yu deal with any visitors?”

  “Betcha life, an’ I hope it’s that dawg’s-dinner of a Wagon-wheel foreman.”

  “Don’t let yore prejudice blind yu to the merits o’ Garstone an’ Lake,” was Sudden’s sardonic advice. “What is it, Yorky?”

  “Is my gun among them at th’ camp, Jim?”

  The puncher shook his head, but th’ boy’s crestfallen expression was too much for him, and he pointed to the weapon, lying with his own, where he had laid them when he came in

  “Guessed yu’d be losin’ sleep over it,” he smiled.

  Yorky secured the gun, examined it anxiously, and then appealed to the others. “Ain’t he th’ ring-tailed wonder o’ th’ world?”

  “Yu wanta hang a weight on that tongue—it moves too easy,” Sudden said, and closed him up like a clam.

  On their way across the basin, the rancher—by what he regarded as artful questions—dragged a few more details from his companion.

  “So she ain’t believin’ Zeb was got by one o’ his own gang?”

  “Well, she didn’t exactly call me a liar, but it amounted to that,” the puncher admitted.

  “A Trenton never listens to reason,” Dan said, but the accent of bitterness was less marked. “It musta been a tough experience for one with her raisin’.”

  “She’s got plenty pluck—an’ didn’t complain, not once, but she don’t like rattlers.”

  “You shore do surprise me,” Dan grinned.

  They dropped into a silence. Behind them they could hear Yorky chattering excitedly, and the doctor’s amused and sometimes caustic replies.

  “That boy’s havin’ the best time of his life,” the rancher remarked presently. “I’m havin’ my worst. I’m right sorry I dragged you into this, Jim.”

  “Forget it. Did yu promise me a picnic?”

  “No, but I’m finished; this was my ace in the hole. The Circle Dot—”

  “Ain’t changed han’s yet. I don’t know what Garstone’s game is, but he’s clearly reckonin’ Trenton out of it. If we can take him back alive, it’ll put a kink in his plans that’ll need straightenin’.”

  “By the Lord, yo’re right,” Dan cried, and with a grim smile, “I never dreamed a day’d come when I’d wanta keep Zeb outa hell, but it shore has. Hope we ain’t too late.”

  To Sudden the camp appeared just as he had left it, except that he could not remember having olosed the flap of the tent. He went across, raised it, and looked inside, only to start back in astonishment. The rancher was still there, rolled in his blankets, but a few feet away, lying with arms flung wide and sightless eyes staring, was the bearded man, Lake. A revolver lay near Trenton’s right hand, which was slung across his body.

  “They came back then,” Dover said.

  This explanation did not satisfy Sudden. The doctor, after one glance at the dead man, turned his attention to the rancher.

  “He’s alive, and certainly no worse; in fact, his pulse is stronger,” he pronounced. “He must have the constitution of a horse.”

  Sudden’s eyes were busy. “Lake wasn’t shot here; see the marks of his spurs as he was dragged in and put in position to make it appear Trenton killed him? Raw work, but whoever did it reckoned on some wild beast comin’ to muss things up. I’d say Bundy an’ this hombre came back—mebbe the girl insisted—an’ she’s waitin’ with Garstone.”

  With a scowling brow Dover allowed this to be a possible solution of the mystery. “If that bloody-minded foreman is around, the sooner we get Zeb to our camp the better,” he said. “Do we have to bury this carrion?”

  The puncher lifted his shoulders. “I’m allowin’ it’s rough on the buzzards, but there’s a spade handy.”

  So Lake got his grave. Stout saplings, with cross pieces, and a blanket provided a litter for the sick man. Sudden and Dover acted as bearers, the other two following with weapons and provisions, including a haunch of the deer-meat. They left the tent standing, an object to spur the imagination of some future visitors.

  They reached the cave without incident, and having announced their arrival loudly—Tiny had an impulsive and suspicious nature—marched in. The crippled one welcomed them with an eagerness not entirely free from personal regard.

  “Food!” he yelped. “You Yorky, git busy with a skillet an’ some o’ that hunk o’ meat; my belly’s that flat you could slide me under a door.”

  “Doc sez yo’re feverish an’ gotta go light on grub,” the boy chaffed. “Mus’ take care, ol’-timer; breakin’ th’ sad noos to yer widder—”

  “I ain’t married none.”

  “Good as—the school-marm would feel like one,” Yorky grinned, and, nimbly avoiding the rock heaved at him, went to his culinary duties.

  Trenton having been made as comfortable as circumstances permitted, the party sat down to a meal they all needed. Tiny, after pushing about half a pound of broiled venison into his mouth, spluttered a compliment:

  “You cook pretty good, yorky. If you live to be a hundred, an’ practice reg’lar, you’ll come mighty close to Paddy at slingin’ hash.” He choked and had to be thumped on the back
.

  “Serves you right for talking with your mouth full,” Malachi told him.

  “Not full, Doc, or there’d be none fer us,” Yorky chipped in.

  The conversation took a more serious turn when Dan raised the question of what they were to do. “With hurt men an’ no hosses, we ‘pear to be hawg-tied,” he said.

  “How long would it take one of us to reach the Circle Dot?” the doctor asked.

  “Best part of a week, if he knowed the country,” Dan stated. “It’s fierce travellin’ afoot.”

  They discussed the project for a while, but the rancher did not favour it. “Where’s the use?” he argued. “I guess we’ve lost the Circle Dot anyways. Best stay here an’ give our invalids a chance.”

  Soon afterwards they turned in, leaving Yorky—who was to take the first watch—sitting at the entrance to the cave, his rifle across his knees. With the potential presence of an assassin in the neighbourhood, no risk could be run.

  In the morning, when the doctor visited his principal charge, he received a pleasant surprise: Trenton was conscious, and could speak.

  “You, Malachi?” he greeted. “Where am I?”

  “In our camp. But you mustn’t talk.”

  “I must—I’ve a lot—to say,” the sick man replied, with a touch of his old fire. “What happened—after Bundy—shot me?”

  “You knew that?” Malachi cried.

  “I saw his hand—grippin’ the pistol—behind me. That was my—last memory. I— His voice trailed off weakly.

  “Let it wait, Trenton,” the doctor urged. “You’ll get well, but are pretty bad still, and must rest.”

  “I can’t—unless I know. It won’t harm me—to listen.”

  Stonily silent, the wounded man heard a brief recital of what had taken place. Only when Malachi concluded somewhat bitterly, “So your friend Garstone is safely on the way back to Rainbow with your niece and the plunder,” did his expression change; fire flamed from the cavernous eyes in the emaciated face as he said hoarsely:

  “My—friend—Garstone. Doc, you must patch me up—strong enough to get to Rainbow—an’ settle with that doublecrossin’ hound an’ his murderin’ tool, Bundy. I’ll obey any orders, meet any bill—”