“We did what you said,” Frank told him. “Blocked that little stream of theirs so it stopped the waterwheel. I don’t see what you’re trying to do, though. Seems like it’d be a lot easier to kill this Blaylock than it would to do a bunch of little things like that.”
“Little things?” Jacob said. “I wouldn’t call ‘em so little. You couldn’t even whip his wife and daughter in a fight. Looks to me like you might have more on your plate than you can chew.”
“You got no call to talk,” Earl said. “I didn’t see you helping us out with that dam.”
“Don’t you worry about Jacob,” Dockett said. “He’ll be with you tonight.”
“Tonight?” Frank said.
“That’s right,” Dockett told him. “Let me explain what I want you to do.”
#
“What’s going on, Sam?” Jenny asked that evening at supper. “Who built that dam?”
The family sat around their rough-hewn table, eating bacon, eggs, and biscuits. The bacon had been bought in town, but the eggs were fresh, gathered that day from the hen house nearby.
The men had spent the rest of the afternoon removing the dam from the stream. Duane could have blasted it out, but since they had Blaylock’s sons, Elijah and Titus, to help, the clearing didn’t take long. Now the millwheel was turning again, and the sawmill would be ready to go the next morning.
“I wish I knew,” Sam said, in answer to his wife’s question. “I’ve been wondering the same thing.”
“Do you think those men in the store had anything to do with the stream?” Miriam asked. “They’re vermin, and sneaking around to do something would be just like them.”
Sam couldn’t answer that question, either. He was a man who liked to be in control of things, and not knowing what was going on bothered him. It bothered him a lot.
The fight in Mr. George’s store had been the first odd thing, but Sam hadn’t thought much about it. Thing like that happened. There were rowdies in towns all over the state. But now, after the incident at the saloon and the damming of the millstream, it was clear that someone was out to harass him. He couldn’t figure out why. It just didn’t make sense. Sam took a bite of bacon and chewed it as he puzzled things over.
“Could it be that Mitchell McCarthy’s work?” Jenny asked. “He’s the one who’s been making accusations and causing trouble for you in Shooter’s Cross.”
That was yet another question he couldn’t answer, Blaylock thought, though he certainly had his suspicions about McCarthy. But why would McCarthy have someone take a shot at him? Why dam up the stream?
“I wish I knew who was involved,” Blaylock said. “Someone’s got it in for us, though. That’s for sure.”
“You’ll find out who it is,” Titus said. “You’ll take care of them just the way you always do.”
Titus was Blaylock’s older son, sixteen, tall and rangy, with a few too many of his father’s qualities, Blaylock thought. He was too impetuous, too eager for action, which sometimes led him to do rash things.
Elijah, who was thirteen, was smaller than his brother, and he always would be. He took after his mother, being more serious and inclined to prefer reading about action in a book to taking part in it. He mopped up what was left of his eggs with a biscuit and said, “It’s obvious to me what’s going on.”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Jenny told him.
Titus grinned at him, and Elijah kicked him under the table.
“He thinks he’s so smart,” Titus said. “I bet he doesn’t know a thing.”
Elijah finished chewing. Then he said, “I do, too.”
“Tell us, then, Mr. Smarty.”
“Yes,” Miriam said. “I want to hear it.”
Sam nodded. Elijah was almost always worth listening to when he had an idea.
“Someone’s trying to goad you,” Elijah said to his father. Then he turned to his brother. “Goad. That means to provoke or annoy.”
“I know what it means,” Titus said, giving Elijah another kick. “You aren’t the only one who’s read a book.”
Sam regarded his son. “I know that. But why would they be trying to goad me?”
“If they can annoy you enough, you might be provoked into doing something impetuous.” He looked at Titus. “That means, . .”
“I know good and well what it means,” his brother said.
“Maybe you do. Anyway, in this case it means that they want our father to do something impetuous that might be a mistake that would be to their advantage.”
Sometimes Elijah was a little annoying himself, but he was also perceptive, clever, and almost as smart as he thought he was.
“I’ll have to think about that,” Sam said.
“Yes,” Jenny said. “You do that. Thinking is the answer. I don’t want any shooting or killing around here.”
“There won’t be any of that,” Sam promised, and he hoped he wasn’t lying.
#
Later that night, after everyone had been asleep for hours, the noises started.
Elijah heard them first. He poked his brother in the ribs and said, “Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?” Titus said, rolling over and pulling a pillow over his heard. “Leave me alone. I’m asleep.”
“No, you’re not. You’re talking to me.” Elijah pulled the pillow away. “Listen.”
Titus took a weak swing at Elijah, but Elijah had already left the bed and was standing at the window. Titus got up and went to join him, rubbing his eyes.
A moon just past the full hung low in the sky filled with stars that added a little to the light from the moon. Nothing moved in the shadowed darkness outside.
“I don’t hear anything,” Titus said. “You must have dreamed it.”
Elijah put a finger to his lips and whispered, “Be quiet. You’ll wake Miriam.”
“Why not?” Titus turned toward the door. “Might as well wake everybody up. I’ll go wake Pa and tell him you’re hearing things.”
“What’s going on?” Miriam said from her bed on the other side of the room.
“I told you you’d wake her,” Elijah said.
“Elijah thinks he hears ghosts,” Titus said.
Elijah hit him on the arm. “I never said that.”
Miriam got out of bed and walked over to the window. “I thought I heard something, too, but I went back to sleep. Let’s be quiet and listen.”
“I don’t see why we should,” Titus began, but before he could finish his sentence there came a distinct howling from the trees not far from the house.
“That’s not a coyote,” Elijah said.
“Or a bobcat,” Miriam said. “It’s not like anything we’ve heard since we came here.”
“It’s an owl,” Titus said. “That’s what it is.”
The noise came again, but it was different this time, and it certainly wasn’t an owl. Or a bobcat or a coyote. It was followed immediately by another noise that was different though just as eerie.
“I’m waking Pa,” Elijah said, but he didn’t have to. Sam Blaylock had appeared in the doorway.
#
“You three get back in your beds,” he said. He was fully dressed and his Smith & Wesson was in its holster at his hip.
“Did you hear those sounds?” Miriam asked, and before he could answer, she said, “What are they?”
“I don’t know,” Sam said, “but I’m going to find out.”
“Do you think they’re haints?”
“Where did you hear about any haints?” Sam asked, though he had a pretty good idea of the answer.
“Gabby told us about the Indians. He says – ”
“Never mind what he says. There’s no such thing as ghosts. You three get back in your beds, and I’ll go see who’s making those noises.”
“I’ll go with you,” Titus said.
“Me, too,” Miriam said.
“Oh, no, you won’t,” Jenny said from behind Sam. “And I’ll be staying here in the room with you j
ust to make sure you don’t get into any trouble.”
Titus said something under his breath.
“What was that?” Sam asked.
“Nothing,” Titus said. “You never want us to have any fun.”
“You have too much fun as it is,” Sam said. “Now get in your beds.”
The children did as he said. Jenny gave Sam a quick kiss and said, “Be careful” before going into the room and sitting in a high-backed rocker near Miriam’s bed.
Sam got a rifle from his bedroom and propped it against the wall.
“Use this if anybody but me tries to get in,” he said.
Jenny assured him that she would, and he left them there. Outside, the night air smelled of pine trees and the river. He started toward the mill. Randy, Duane, and Tucker met him on the path. No one had a lantern. They were wary of making targets of themselves.
All of them were armed. Randy and Duane each had a Smith & Wesson to match Blaylock’s, while Tucker wore a pair of Trantor revolvers. Blaylock knew that he carried a third located at the small of his back. Of the four of them, Tucker was by far the deadliest in a gunfight in spite of his mild appearance. They stood close and spoke in whispers.
“You been hearin’ those haints?” Gabby asked Blaylock.
“I heard something. I don’t know what it was, but I don’t believe in ghosts.”
Gabby scratched his beard. “Don’t matter if you believe in ‘em or not. They’re out there waitin’ for you, just like I told you.”
“I have a feeling those ‘ghosts’ are who dammed our stream,” Duane said.
“You got that right,” Gabby said, not catching the inflection in Duane’s voice. “They dammed it up and disappeared.”
“They left sign,” Tucker said. “Do haints leave sign?”
“If they want to, they do. They wanted us to know they’d been around, and then they was just gone. Flew away like a bird.”
“They didn’t fly anywhere,” Blaylock said. “Somebody brought them in a boat and then picked them up when they were finished.”
“You can think that if you want to,” Gabby said with a shrug. “I didn’t see any boat today, and I know what I know.”
The noises came again, louder, different, and more frequent.
“That’s not any animal,” Randy said. “Not from around here, anyway.”
“I didn’t say it was an animal,” Gabby told him. “I said it was a haint. Injun ghosts moanin’ in the night. Ain’t you been listenin’ to me?”
“Why don’t we go see what it is,” Duane said. “That way we could settle it.”
“Can’t see a haint, not unless it wants you to see it.” Gabby held up the Greener in his right hand. “This here shotgun’s no use against ‘em, either.”
“Why’d you bring it, then?” Duane said.
“’Cause you never know what else might be out here, that’s why. A man’s gotta be ready for anything.”
“Good idea,” Sam said. “Now come on, and let’s see what’s out there.
“Haints is what’s out there,” Gabby said. “Haints. You just mark my words.”
“We’ll find out,” Blaylock said.
Blaylock had good night vision, but he wished the moon gave more light. Still it gave some, and he and the others had walked the woods often enough to know them better than anyone who might be intruding. Better than any ghosts, too.
The men walked along the bank of the stream, and before long Blaylock heard the sound of the waterfall that poured out of the peak. They had tapped the hot springs there and allowed the water to flow over the diatomaceous earth to eliminate the noxious sulphur odor that, along with the springs, gave Rancho Diablo its name.
For a few seconds, Blaylock heard nothing but the falls and the water of the stream. A screech owl called far off down in the river bottom, the thin cry hardly audible over the other sounds.
Blaylock stopped. It was darker back in the trees than it had been in the cleared area near the mill. He thought about what Elijah had said at supper and wondered if he’d allowed himself to be provoked into a rash action. The others gathered around him.
“We could be talking into a trap,” he whispered.
“Haints don’t trap you,” Gabby said. “They just let you blunder around and hurt yourself.”
“I’d call that a trap,” Tucker said.
“Dadblame it! You don’t know nothin’ about haints, so don’t try to tell me . . . .”
“Quiet!” Blaylock said. “You’ll scare off every haint and human within a mile.”
“He started it,” Gabby said, glaring at Tucker, who was grinning back at him.
“Never mind who started it,” Blaylock said. “ You three stay here. I’ll go on ahead and have a look around. If I need help, I’ll give a call and, you can come a-running.”
“Not so sure it’s a good idea for you to go off on your own,” Tucker said, his fingers fondling the butts of the Trantors. “Why don’t we spread out a little and go together. Cover a bigger area that way, and we won’t be as much of a target as if we were all bunched up.”
Blaylock thought it over. “You’re right. We’ll spread out. I’ll go on over to the right about forty yards. You come along behind, and Duane can follow you. Randy, you follow Duane. Stay about twenty-five yards apart. Gabby can stick close to the stream.”
Blaylock moved away from the others without waiting for any comments. He knew they’d do as he said. As he worked his way up the peak, the sounds of water from the stream and the waterfall grew louder. Blaylock couldn’t hear the others. He couldn’t hear anything that sounded like the noises they’d been hearing earlier, either.
He kept moving forward slowly and carefully, willing his eyes to pierce the darkness that gathered in the trees. He wondered why the noises had stopped, and that was when he heard the gunshots.
They came from the direction of the house, and in that instant Blaylock realized he’d been tricked.
He turned ran blindly down the side of York’s peak, and all he could think of was that Elijah had been right. He’d been goaded into doing something stupid.
He’d lied to Jenny, too. The shooting had started, and the killing would follow.
9
The firing from the house continued, but Blaylock forced himself to slow down. He’d do no one any good if he fell and broke an arm or leg, or if he ran into a tree and knocked himself unconscious.
He descended the peak at a sort of shuffling job, one arm held in front of him to ward off low-hanging branches. Just before he arrived at the cleared area surrounding the house he slowed to a stop and waited.
A shot came from his left, and he saw the bright muzzle flash. Another came from close by. Almost at once they were answered by shots from the house.
For a few seconds gunfire hammered the night air. Then it was quiet again. As Blaylock debated what to do, a branch cracked behind him. He whirled, pistol in hand.
“Don’t shoot,” Tucker said. “It’s just me.”
“And me,” Duane said from somewhere in back of him.
“What about Gabby?” Blaylock said.
“Haven’t seen him,” Tucker said. “Maybe he stayed up on the peak.”
“If he stuck to the stream, he’s a ways off from us,” Duane said. “What’s going on here?”
“Someone was up on the peak,” Blaylock said. “They slipped past us in the dark and came down here. They weren’t after me and you boys. They were after my family.”
“Looks like they got a little more than they bargained for,” Tucker said, and Blaylock had to grin. If the men had thought they were going to have easy pickings when he left the house, they were sure wrong. Blaylock wondered if Titus was having fun now.
“What’s happening here?” Randy said, coming up and joining them.
Blaylock laid it out again, and Randy said, “What do we do about it?”
“They must know we’re here by now,” Blaylock said, “but they don’t know where we are.”
“So we’ll sneak up behind them?” Randy said.
“They’ll be expecting that,” Duane pointed out.
“Won’t matter,” Tucker said. “It’s dark, we’re quiet, and they don’t really know where we’ll be coming from.”
“They’re all bunched up, too,” Randy said. “Makes it easier for us.”
Firing broke out from the trees again, but this time Blaylock saw something besides muzzle flashes. A dark figure broke off from the trees and dashed toward the chicken coop that was off to one side and behind the main building. It was too chancy to risk a shot at a moving target in the bad light.
“You see him?” he asked Tucker.
“Just barely.”
“I’m going after him. You three get the others. I don’t care what you do to them. Just don’t shoot Gabby by mistake.”
“More likely that he’ll shoot us. Might think we’re haints.”
“Don’t let that happen, either.”
Tucker nodded, and Blaylock didn’t stay around to discuss it any further. He figured Tucker and the others could handle things without him. He moved through the trees until he was well away from the shooting. He could see only darkness behind the house, so he watched for a minute to see if anything moved.
Nothing did, and Blaylock made his own run from cover. He hoped he didn’t get shot by the men in the trees. For that matter, he hoped he didn’t get shot by his own family.
Reaching the side of the house without drawing any fire, he stood with his back to the wall and looked around. He heard the chickens rustling and clucking in their coop. Something had disturbed them, and it wasn’t a fox. Blaylock stood where he was, waiting.
He didn’t have to wait long. The shadowed figure of a man emerged from the darkness behind the chicken coop and made for the back door of the house.
Blaylock stepped out from behind the wall and said, “Stop right there.”
The man didn’t stop. He turned and jumped backward.
Blaylock’s Smith & Wesson spit fire. The man landed on the ground, but he hadn’t been hit. He rolled behind the chicken coop as the chickens began to raise a ruckus.
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