Fugitive's Trail

by Robert J Conley

  “That’s what they’re a saying, is it?” I said.

  “All of them’s saying that,” the boy told me. I decided to get back to the point.

  “You don’t happen to know where ole Clell went, do you?” I asked him.

  The kid pointed north. My guess had been right.

  “You going to kill him too?” he asked me.

  “Why you ask?” I said. “Is he a friend a yours?”

  “No,” he said. “The son of a bitch kicked my dog.”

  I seen an old hound laying back over against the wall of the building behind the kid, and I nodded at it. “That your dog?” I asked him.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  “Is he all right now?”

  “Yeah,” the kid said. “He’s okay, but that don’t make it all right that Clell kicked him that time.”

  “You’re right about that,” I said. “Ain’t no good reason for a growed man to go kicking no dog. Tell you what. When I find Clell, if he draws on me the way Asa did, I’ll kill him.”

  “You think he’ll draw on you?” the kid asked me.

  “He will,” I said. “I guarantee it.”

  Well, I rode on out a that town with a third reason in my head for killing ole Clell Hook, and that was that he had kicked that kid’s dog. It brung me in mind of ole Pigg, that first man I had kilt, and it brung me in mind of ole Farty and the way I had walked all the way home a bawling and carrying his bloody body. I like to of cried again right then and there just a thinking on it, but I sure did feel good for that kid back there that Clell hadn’t killed his dog or even hurt it too bad. Anyhow, I was dead set on killing Clell then.

  Now I didn’t have no idea where the next town would be, for I was total unfamiliar with that whole damn country, but the road Twats a riding seemed like it was well traveled, so I guessed that there must be one somewhere up north of me, and further, I figgered if I was to keep on a riding, I’d eventual come to it. So I kept on a riding, and for company, I talked to ole horse, and now and then, it seemed like to me that he’d answer me. The trouble was that I couldn’t understand his horse talk. I wondered then if horses was smarter than men, ’cause they can understand our talk, at least some of it, and we can’t understand theirs.

  You know, dogs is thataway too. Why, hell, ole Farty understood might near ever’thing I ever said to him. If ever I called out to him, he’d come a running. He’d fetch a stick or he’d fetch a squirrel after I’ d shot it. If I told him to sit down and keep quiet, why, he’d do that too. I swear he could understand people talk, and sometimes I could understand his dog talk, but not near all the time. So anyhow, I ain’t at all sure who’s the smartest a the critters, horses or dogs or folks. And then there’s ole Zeb’s burro. Bernice seems to know a whole lot a people words too. I tell you what, it’s a downright puzzlement.

  Anyhow, I got me a little antelope and had me a fair meal, but I wished that ole Zeb had a been along to cook it ‘stead a me. I cut up and packed along all the meat that I could, ’cause I never did believe in wasting nothing. Besides, I knowed from personal experience what it was like to be on the trail without nothing, not even water. I rode that whole day without seeing a single solitary human person, and that night I found me a good campsite off the road so that no one would come a riding along in the middle a the night and run right over me by mistake, and I set up my camp there. I built me up a little fire, ole Zeb had learned me not to build them up too big, and I fixed me some coffee and seared me up some more of that antelope meat. I et myself full, and then settled in for the night.

  And then I couldn’t help myself, but I got to wondering about the smarts of a antelope. I wondered if maybe one a them critters could understand people talk too, like dogs and horses and burros. They might, you know. I never knowed of a human person a trying to talk to one a them. I thought that maybe if I was to ever get the chance and I weren’t too hungry, I might just try talking to one and find out, but then I changed my mind, ’cause I sure did like to eat that antelope meat, and if I was to find out that he could understand my lingo, why, that would just spoil it for me. It’d make me feel like a cannibal to go and eat one after that. I decided to leave it alone.

  Next morning I woke up just a shivering. It had got downright cold overnight. I hopped around some and got the fire built back up as quick as I could, and I huddled myself around it for a spell. After a while, I cooked myself up the same kinda meal for breakfast what I’d et for supper the night before, but I didn’t mind that none. It was good, ’special out there in that cold mountain air. When the sun went and got a little higher up in the sky, the air commenced to warming some, and I started in to clean up after myself and pack my stuff up again. I figgered I’d best be on my way.

  But then a strange feeling come over me. It was kinda eerie like. I couldn’t pin it down to nothing neither, and that was just what made it so weird. I just of a sudden got this feeling that someone was a watching me from my back trail, maybe follering me. I looked all around behind me and never seed nothing though. Then I looked in ever’ direction, real slow and keerful. It appeared like as if I was the only living human critter within yelling distance or a rifle shot or even farther, hell, within human eyesight. I couldn’t get shuck of that feeling though that someone was back there a dogging my trail, and that begun to bother me something fierce.

  I packed my horse up, put out the fire and swung myself up into the saddle. I give another look back over my shoulder. I couldn’t help myself from doing that, and then I rode on, but ever’ now and then, I’d look back. I still couldn’t see nothing back there. I was so dead set on looking back and seeing whatever it was that was a giving me that feeling, that I damn near rid right over the sign that someone had camped along the road not too awful much ahead of me, but I did see it. I couldn’t find no evidence a who it mighta been though, but I figgered that maybe it was ole Clell, and he weren’t too far off. I studied his campsite for a spell, looked back down my trail again, then headed on north.

  I come up on a pretty good rise a little after that, and I kinda moved to the side a the road and snugged up against the rock wall there and set still. Ole horse, he didn’t understand, so I talked low to him and shooshed him and done what I could to keep him calm. I was just a waiting to give whoever it was back behind me time to catch up and let me get a glimpse a whoever it was, but I waited a spell, and I never seed no one. Then I told myself that if there really was someone back there, and he really was a follering me, why then, he was some kinda expert at the tracking and follering business. Fin’ly I moved on. Then in a bit, I come down in a kinda valley, and I done the same thing again. I sidled off to the edge a the road and waited and watched the horizon behind me. This time I waited even longer than the time before. I rolled me a cigareet and smoked it full. No one ever come up on that horizon. Fin’ly I rid on again.

  Well, here I was in some kinda predicament. I knowed for pretty sure that ole Clell Hook was ahead a me ’cause I was tracking him, and now it sure as hell seemed to me that someone was on my trail and being real keerful about not letting me see him—or them. I didn’t know of no Hookses other than the two I had done kilt and ole Clell what was up there ahead a me. Nor I couldn’t think a no one else what might be after my young ass just then neither.

  Then for the first time for real I begun to sort out my real and true situation in this here life. I had kilt me a couple a Piggses, the first one with just only a ax handle, but the next one in a for-real gunfight. I had kilt me two Hookses in face-to-face fights, even though the first one was nekkid at the time, and I had shot the ear off a ole Cutter. Now I didn’t know a no more Piggses or Hookses, but that didn’t mean that there weren’t none out there somewheres just a itching to get at me for what I done to their kin.

  And friends too. So I had me two families, the friends and relatives a each a which was possible all out to get me for what I done to their kin. Why, hell, there might not be no end in sight. There might not never be no end to it. T
he monumentalness of it all sunk into my head of a sudden. You know, when someone makes you fighting mad and you lash out at him without thinking about the consequences beyond just the winning or losing a the fight, why, you just never know what kind of shit you might be a piling up on yourself for years to come, maybe for the rest of your natural life.

  And then on top a all that, there was the reputation that I was a getting from all this stuff that had been a happening to me. I never asked for it nor looked for it, and it wasn’t none to my liking, but that didn’t seem to make no difference. I was a getting it. Hell, I was being called “a regular Billy the Kid” most ever’ time I turned around, even in a new town. I had tried a time or two to put a stop to that kind a talk, but it didn’t do no good. Even ole Zeb had used it, and I had kinda chastised him, you might say, over it. Then I had gone and did it my own self. Just before I shot that Asa Hook, I had said it my own self just to kinda shake him up a bit. I reckon it worked too, ’cause I sure as hell blowed him away there on that staircase. But there was other folks around too that time, and they heared me, what I said. I had went and promoted the saying a that saying what I had been trying to put a stop to it. I had did it myself.

  So I had me this reputation all of a sudden, and what that meant that I had never before give no thought to, was it meant that there would be bastards a gunning for me just for the hell of it. Why, if I was “a regular Billy the Kid,” then what might the feller that gunned me down get to start in calling hisself? Maybe he’d be “a regular Wild Bill Hickok” or something, and there would be a plenty of them out there just itching to make that kind a reputation for theirselfs, and it wouldn’t bother them none at all if they was to have to make it by blowing my young ass away.

  So I thought again about who it might be what was back there behind me on the trail, and even though I still hadn’t really seed no one back there, I just knowed that it was someone a follering me. Like I said before, I could just feel it. Anyhow, I thought again about who it might be, and then I said to myself, hell, it could be just anyone, anyone at all. It could be a friend or a relative of a Pigg or of a Hook or it could be just some young shit just a wanting to kill hisself “a regular Billy the Kid.”

  Then I had me another thought. I didn’t think that it could be so, but what if it was the law? What if, because of one or another a them scrapes I had got myself into, what if some kinda charges had been filed on me and I didn’t even know nothing about it, and there was a lawman, or a posse even, a coming up on my trail? What about that? Well now, to my mind, that was the worst thought a them all. That one final thought a coming into my head made the hairs on the back a my neck stand up and wave around and tickle me, I can tell you. I really didn’t want no law dogs on my trail, and I hated to think about being caught and throwed in jail and then getting my ass hung up by my neck.

  Someone once told me that whenever they hang a man, he shits in his pants. And, you know, there’s always a big crowd around a hanging. Folks thinks it’s good entertainment, you know, and there’s some that thinks it’s a good lesson for the kids to see. They watch a hanging, then they won’t go out and get theirselfs into no trouble. At least that’s what some folks thinks. But I sure can’t think a nothing more embarrassing than to get hung out in front of a big crowd a folks and then to shit in my pants right there with all of them a looking on. So I was worrying about that lawman back there behind me. And I was thinking how if I’d a knowed what would be in store for me later, would I have bashed ole Pigg in the back a the head with that ax handle? I don’t know, but I think that likely I would of. I never really had no time that time to think on it anyhow.

  You see that’s what’s wrong with that there theory about hanging, I mean the one where they thinks the kids’ll learn from it and then keep outa trouble. When a feller goes to kill someone, he don’t stop and think about hanging. He don’t think about getting hisself caught. He don’t think about is it right or wrong what I’m fixing to do, or is it against the law, ’cause he ain’t really thinking none at all. He’s just blind mad, ’cause someone done him something, and he means to do it back and worse. The thinking all comes later.

  The thinking comes like when you’re alone riding a trail a follering after someone you want to kill who also wants to kill you, and then you sense that someone’s coming up on your own back trail. That’s when the thinking comes, and that’s just what I was a thinking. Fin’ly I told myself to lay off that deep thinking. It wasn’t going to do me no good, and it was a keeping me from thinking about what I had ought to be thinking about, which was to find out for once and sure just who it was coming at my back.

  If I was for real right in between two different parties, both of which had a sincere desire to make me into a youthful corpus, I had best get to scheming on the most likely way to survive the situation. Well, I said to myself, it didn’t make no sense to go racing ahead after ole Clell for a number a reasons, the first and most obvious a which was that I’d wear out ole horse. So I decided that I’d oughter first concentrate on the probable danger to my rear. I had already tried watching the trail from high and from low, and I hadn’t seed nothing either time. I was going to have to try some other trick to smoke that smart feller out.

  Just then I seed a real narrow trail turn sharp to my left off a the main road, and it run through a narrow gap, really just a kinda slit in the rocks. I didn’t stop to think about it. I just turned ole horse real sharp into that there narrow passageway and let him pick his way along and up the mountainside. There weren’t no need for guiding him along neither. There was only one way he could go. The onliest thing I could do was to just stop him whenever I decided it was time to stop. Hell, if I’d a changed my mind and wanted to go back, there wouldn’t a been no way, just ’cept to back him out all the way back down. So I was what you might call committed, but that was all right too.

  Well, ole horse poked his way through that there channel till we come onto a kinda peak. That is, we come out the other end on a wide flat rock up high over the main trail what was now down below. I stopped him then and patted his neck and told him he done good and clumb down off a his back. Then I went on over to the edge and looked over it down onto the road down there, and I could see it all right. I kinda laid low though, ’cause I didn’t want no one looking up and seeing me up there. I looked back the way I had come from, and I still didn’t see no one. So I decided to just settle in for a spell and really wait him out this time. I made up my mind I weren’t going nowhere till I knowed for sure and certain if there was someone back there, and if there was, then who it was, exact.

  I went back over to ole horse and unsaddled him. There weren’t much for him up there, but I did find him a little patch a grass, and so I led him on over there, and then, by God, I spotted me a little round pool of fresh water up there too. So ole horse, he was in luck. I left him there, and, taking my rifle and my blanket roll along with me, I went back over to a spot near the edge. I built me a comfy little place there where I could lay down and get snug and still watch the road. I figgered this would be my camp for a spell, but I didn’t build no fire. I wanted to find the other feller, not him find me. I settled down and I watched.

  I checked my rifle and I checked my Colt. They was both clean and loaded and ready for action. I knowed they would be, but it was something to do while I waited there. I got kinda hungry after a spell, so I unpacked me a tin a beans and opened them up and et them cold. I washed them down with water out a my canteen. Then I guess I musta dozed off for a spell, ’cause all of a sudden I kinda jerked my head awake, and I could see that the sun was real low in the western sky. I kinda flew into a little bit of a panic then. I jerked up my Winchester and looked all around, but I didn’t see no one, not up on top with me and not down on the road below. Then I asked myself, what if I had gone and let him slip by me down there on the road while I was a snoozing? I called myself nine kinds of a fool then.

  Well, then I thought on it some more, and I guessed that it
wouldn’t be too bad after all if I had let him slip by. ‘Cause then I’d be behind him ’stead a the other way around, but then, how would I know if that was what had really happened? I couldn’t figger that one out. Fin’ly I sorta calmed myself down. I settled back to watch the road. The sun had gone clear down by then, and the sky was a getting black. I decided that I could risk having myself a smoke, so I rolled me a cigareet and lit it. I was just laying back and enjoying my smoke when I seen a flicker down below, and I seen more smoke. But this here smoke was a coming from a campfire down on the road.

  Chapter Eleven

  Well, it was dark a night, and I sure didn’t want to go creeping back down that narrow craveese like that. But I also weren’t at all sure that I wanted that feller down there, whoever he might be, to get between me and ole Clell. I did crave to know just who it was though and whether he was for real on my trail. But there didn’t seem to be nothing for it but just for me to wait out the night. So I tried to settle down and get me some sleep, but it didn’t work too good. I dozed, off a little ever’ now and then, but mostly I just tossed around all through the night. I sure did have me a lot a things on my mind, and I never had been too good at thinking.

  I had Clell ahead a me and someone unknown behind me. I had ole Zeb laid up hurt on down the road south and ole Red a looking over him for me, or at least I thought so. I had give away most all a my money, so I needed to get this business with Clell tuck keer of and start in to worry about my own pockets again. I had me what had begun to seem like a endless supply a Hookses and Piggses a trying to even up family scores with me, and I had my unwanted reputation as “a regular Billy the Kid” and ever’thing what that brung along with it.

  Well, I weren’t too fresh in the morning, I can tell you, and I didn’t want no more cold beans, so I just packed up without no breakfast and got myself and ole horse ready to move on out, but first I decided I’d take me another last look over the edge and see what I might could see down there. What I seed was smoke a coming up from his campfire again. He was a cooking his own breakfast, I reckoned. Well, that kinda pissed me off, ’cause here I was doing without on account a him. I decided though that I’d take advantage a his cooking and eating time, and I’d get a start on him. I headed back down to the main road.