The Trail Ends at Hell

by John Benteen

  His eyes ranged over familiar faces. Jess Ford, the easy-going man Rio had challenged ... Jess would move quietly from place to place, having a few drinks in each. Then he would turn into a savage, a gunman, ready to shoot up the whole town unless somebody took him in hand . . .

  Mule Sloane, short, stocky, twenty-three, and already veteran of four drives ... Mule went for women. He would take his whole roll, spend it in one whore house after another. They laughed at Mule, but the fact remained: he could and would service five or six women in a night. And was aching to, right now.

  “Silent” Ross. He was tall, hatchet-faced, and talked a blue streak. What he wanted was, Kilpatrick knew, to gamble. He would bet on anything: whether a cow would turn right or left, whether Panhandle’s biscuits would rise properly or fall sad. Silent was longing to buck the tiger.

  Gary Buckner... He was a fresh-faced kid, a totally different sort from Rio Fanning. Most men on the trail were old at twenty-five; Buckner was a year past that and still looked as if he’d just been weaned. He was the kind to fall in love with some road-ranch whore and give her all his money and never quite understand how she had come to disappear when he went looking for her afterwards to vow undying love.

  There were others. Cord Lightner, who never talked, who wore his six-gun strapped low, had eyes like a fish, and whom people let alone. As long as they let him alone, he was all right. Nobody had ever known him to drink with a crowd or go after a woman; but he was too fast with a gun for anybody to question his tastes in whiskey or sex.

  Wilkie Murray was any cowboy and all cowboys rolled into one, good-natured, but possessed of a fierce pride. Nobody had better push young Wilkie into a corner. The same was true of his saddle mate, Tep Chance, who was the best bronc rider in the crew. Tep, at twenty-four, could sit anything with hair, and on chilly mornings when other punchers didn’t feel like topping out their broncs, he delighted in riding four or five snuffy ones in a row. Then there was Lem Caldwell, who rarely spoke, rode swing, and had pulled two unhorsed punchers from certain death in the face of stampedes. Lem, ugly and dreary, was, perhaps, the most cold-nerved man in the bunch.

  And Steve Fleming, Charlie Douglas ... Good men all, Boyd thought as he let his eyes range across them. Then he tossed his half-smoked cigarette into the fire.

  “I know,” he said, “that you’re all achin’ to go into Gunsight and raise holy hell. I don’t blame you. If this was Dodge or Abilene, I’d turn a third of you loose tonight. But I ain’t gonna do it. I’m gonna ask all of you to stay with the herd.”

  A kind of sigh of disappointment went up from the punchers. Panhandle, the cook, tilting back his big white hat, stepped into the firelight, favoring his game right leg. “Dammit, boss — We can see the lights. We wanta go in.”

  “I know you do.” Kilpatrick’s voice was hard. “Maybe tomorrow night you can. I’ll know after a man named Jordan comes out, looks at the herd, and makes me an offer.”

  Panhandle squatted before the fire, picking up an ember and using it to light his pipe. His eyes were curious, appraising, as they looked at Boyd through the smoke. “Something’s wrong in there. What is it?”

  Kilpatrick hesitated. Then, carefully, for they were all longtime employees and good friends, he told them everything that had happened in Gunsight, omitting mention only of Stewart Gault. Before he had quite finished, Panhandle got to his feet, staring. “Rio killed their marshal?”

  “Right in front of my eyes,” Boyd said.

  “Go on,” Panhandle said taughtly.

  Boyd did. When he had finished his recital, he took out his own makings, began to roll a smoke. “That’s the size of it. Everything’s up in the air. Maybe I’ve made a bad mistake by bringing the herd to Gunsight. I won’t know until Jordan comes out tomorrow, makes me an offer. Meanwhile, there’s no law in town and — ”

  Panhandle cut him off. “That don’t make no difference. We can carry our own law with us.”

  Kilpatrick smiled when the cook touched the gun on his hip. “Right enough, Panhandle. All the same, until I’m sure I can sell this herd here at the right figure, I can’t pay you off. It might turn out that we have to go to Dodge or — ”

  “No,” Panhandle said. “No, we ain’t going to Dodge. You know that, boss. We’ve come a lot of extra distance to Gunsight. If the people here try to screw you, well — ” He laughed, lips writhing under his beard. “You got twenty gunhands to straighten things out with. Meanwhile, there’s some of us still got cash in our jeans. We’ve been lookin’ at the butt-end of cows for a long time. Those of us that can afford it without you havin’ to lay out money ought to be allowed to hit the burg.”

  Kilpatrick looked back at him wordlessly for a moment. Then he shrugged, eyes ranging over the crew. “How many of you have got any money?”

  They looked at one another. Finally six of them stepped forward, including the cook.

  Kilpatrick grinned. “All right,” he said. “Then I can’t hold you. Divvy up, make your own arrangements, and settle it among ourselves. All I say is that I want no less than six men here with the herd for each shift. Panhandle, since you seem to be the horniest, you’re in charge.” He poured himself a cup of Arbuckle, slapped boiled beef and potatoes into a pan, and moved off into the darkness.

  There was a lot of talk among the drovers. Men rode off toward the herd to discuss the matter with their fellows on duty. Boyd ate beef and biscuits and swilled strong coffee and thought of Stewart Gault. It was strange how he could not get her out of his mind: that slim-waisted, big-breasted body, that coppery hair and those emerald eyes. He had never met a woman who had done that to him before: racked him back, filled his mind with her presence. And she could ride and she was tough: the makings, he thought, sopping a biscuit in gravy, of a good wife for a rancher.

  Then Panhandle walked out of the firelight. “We got up a crew, boss. Six men. You’re goin’ back into town, we’ll ride with you. Guarantee that you’ll have enough punchers with the herd.” He looked down at the cross-legged Kilpatrick. “One thing about it; we didn’t want you to go back into the hellhole by yourself no-how. Our main reason for goin’ is so you’ll have guns to side you if you need ’em. We ain’t forgot that Rio might come at you.”

  Kilpatrick laughed softly, getting to his feet. “If Rio comes at me, that’s my affair. But, okay, Panhandle. Tell your men to saddle and ride. We’ll head for Gunsight in a couple of minutes.”

  ~*~

  “Another bucket,” Kilpatrick said.

  The flunky in the barbershop nodded, raised a wooden bucket high, dumped five more gallons of hot water over the trail boss.

  Kilpatrick snorted as the cascade flushed him. Then he arose from the tub, reaching for the towel the flunky handed him. He swabbed his lean frame, appraising it in the long mirror on the wall of the barbershop’s back room.

  Below the level of his shirt, it was pale as death; he had rarely exposed himself to sun. But the muscles on his hairy chest were like metal bonds, the biceps of his arms melon-sized, his buttocks lean and compact, his legs saddle-thin and hard. There were scars: a Yankee bullet had caught him outside of Atlanta; a Comanche arrow had raked his knee ... Two gunfights, one in San Antone, the other in Abilene, had left their puckered mementos, but that did not matter; his adversaries were dead. He grinned. “Gimme my clothes,” he said, as he toweled himself.

  Once he’d reached the end of trail, he always donned the same outfit: dove-gray shirt of soft flannel, neat cord pants, his town hat of gray to match his shirt. He wore the same boots, but fresh socks to replace those that had almost rotted on the trail. Dressed, feeling miraculously clean and reborn after the first hot bath in months, he accepted the gun belt the young half-breed handed him. When he had cinched its brass-gleaming thirty-two inches around his waist, he lifted the Colt in its holster and let it drop. When the cartridge guns had come in, he had been the first to buy one. A lot of people were reluctant to let go of their old cap-and-balls; some still toted them
today. But Boyd Kilpatrick had a feel, an instinct, for weapons, and the moment he had picked up his first Peacemaker, he had known it was his gun. He had felt the same way about the octagonal-barreled Winchester ’73 in his saddle scabbard on the roan outside.

  Rubbing witch hazel into his tanned cheeks, he inspected his freshly barbered face in the mirror. The shave was clean, and most of the wildness had been trimmed out of the gray-flecked jet. He set the pearl sombrero into place, tilted to the proper angle, and tipped the flunky a dollar. Then he went out of the barber shop and mounted the hitched roan.

  A few minutes later, he had found the only painted house in Gunsight. Its paint was its only claim to distinction; otherwise, it was a squat, single-story bungalow like the rest in this end of town. Standing on the porch, twisting the doorbell, he was aware of a strange pounding of anticipation in his chest.

  Then he heard footsteps. The door opened and she was there.

  She had changed clothes again. The sprigged muslin over a white petticoat outlined every round and curve of her body, accentuating them with frills and ruffles. She looked up at him and red lips curved in a smile. “So you did come to supper.”

  “If supper’s ready.”

  “It almost is. Come in, Mr. Kilpatrick.”

  “Boyd,” he said, entering and giving her his hat to hang on the rack.

  “Then you call me Stewart.”

  “Suits me. What about your daddy — ”

  Stewart’s brow furrowed. “He’s out of the picture, I’m afraid. He killed the whole bottle before he came home. He’s in his room, asleep.”

  Boyd looked at her. “Then it’s only you and me?”

  “I’m afraid it is.” She looked back steadily.

  “Do you know something?” Boyd said. “That suits me just fine.”

  Stewart smiled. “I thought it would.”

  She led him back into the kitchen. She had furnished the house with a nice hand, neither too feminine nor too stark. Once in the warm room, where a big wood range glowed, with pans all across its top, she said, “If you’re like most Texans I’ve known, you’ll want a drink. I try to keep it away from Dad, but when he passed out, I put it up in the cabinet. Help yourself.”

  A little surprised, Boyd went to the cupboard, took down the bottle of good bourbon. “You might pour me one, too,” Stewart said. “I take mine with water.”

  Boyd froze, his hand on the bottle. She was a nice girl, or so he had judged her, and nice girls didn’t drink.

  Again she gave a throaty laugh that made her breasts move enticingly. “Don’t look so shocked, Boyd. I’m not entirely made of sugar and spice and everything nice. When you’ve spent twenty-three years bouncing around from track’s end to track’s end, you learn how to appreciate good whiskey. About two ounces, please. With water.”

  “All right,” Boyd said, and he followed her instructions while she was busy with the pans on the stove. When he came to her, held out the glass, and said, “Here,” she turned. He looked down at her, and when her eyes met his, he had to brace himself. He had not expected anything like the total impact of the locking of their gazes. What he saw in those great emerald jewels set in her face shook him profoundly. She was looking back at him with an intensity that was new to Kilpatrick.

  But she yielded first, turned away, taking a long drink from her glass. “I hope you like fried chicken.”

  “I like anything you might fix,” Kilpatrick said.

  “The menu’s not too varied. We’re pretty poor now that Dad’s drunk himself out of his job, his property ...” She turned the chicken in the pan, then took up her glass again and faced Kilpatrick. “And now you’ve got to deal with Tully Jordan. Boyd, what will you do?”

  “Sell my beef,” he said. “At the best price I can get.”

  “Here in Gunsight?”

  “If I like what Jordan quotes me tomorrow.”

  “And if you don’t. If he uses this lock he’s got, quotes you a ridiculous price ... That means another drive, another fifteen days east to Dodge and Dodge already filled up with Texas cattle.”

  “I’ll worry about that when I come to it,” he said. “I ain’t helpless. I’ve got twenty top Texas riders with me. If I feel like I’m being cheated, I can make it as hard on Jordan as he makes it on me. With my twenty men, I can take this town apart so he’d never be able to put it back together again. Maybe, if I have to go to Dodge, I’ll do that. Just as a going away present.”

  Stewart looked at him sharply. She raised her glass, drank. “Maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea.”

  “What are you driving at, Stewart?”

  Suddenly she turned away; almost furiously, she moved the chicken in the pan again. “My dad was on his way up until Jordan hit Gunsight. He wrote you and other people letters and he wrote all of you the truth — as it was then. But Jordan put him back on the bottle, took the town that was his whole creation away from him. Yours is the first herd to hit here. Maybe it would be good for Gunsight, good for Texas, if you people shook this town up.”

  Kilpatrick smiled. “And put Isaac Gault back on top?”

  “You couldn’t find a better man,” she said fiercely. “He’d deal with you fair and square.”

  Kilpatrick emptied his glass, set it aside. “Maybe it’ll come to that, I don’t know. All I know is that, when you’re a trail driver, the herd comes first. If I get a good price, I’ve no complaint. If I get a bad one, then I have to rare and snort. It’s early to talk about that before Jordan looks over my herd and makes me an offer.”

  She slammed down her glass. “Which will be twenty dollars a head less than your beef is worth, you can count on that!”

  Kilpatrick looked at her, looked at that tense and luscious woman-body; and he had been three months on the trail and that dress hugged every line of her figure. “Ah, Stewart,” he said, “I’m tired of talking.”

  She turned away from the stove, spatula in hand, and looked at him as he came toward her. Then her red lips quirked, her green eyes glinted. “You know something, Boyd? So am I.” And, quite easily and naturally, she moved into his arms.

  The spatula clattered to the floor. Then the soft, luscious cushions of her breasts were against his chest. When his mouth came down on hers, Stewart’s lips were parted, hungry. The kiss lasted a long time, and it was, for Boyd Kilpatrick, a momentous thing.

  Then they broke apart. Stewart was trembling. “Boyd,” she whispered. “Oh, Lord, Boyd ... I’ve been the strong one in the family for so long. I’ve waited so long for somebody stronger than me ...” Then the kitchen was full of the smell of something scorching. “Oh, heavens! The chicken!” She turned away, shoving a dislodged wisp of hair back into place.

  Still shaken, Boyd took his drink, watched her at the stove. He went to her again, but this time, when he reached for her, she moved away, smiling. “No,” she whispered. “No, it wouldn’t be wise. I ... sit down, Boyd. Sit down and finish your drink and tell me about yourself. I want to know all about you.”

  It was a hard thing for him to do. All the need so long pent-up on the trail was unleashed in him, now, hammering at him, and all he wanted was to get Stewart back in his arms. But she was right: another kiss like that and things would get out of control. He took a short rein on himself, forced himself to obey. Then, as he began to talk, it was easier. It had been a long time since he had had a woman to talk to. A long time, for that matter, since he’d had anyone to talk to. Being a trail boss was a lonely business: whatever your fears, doubts, worries, you had to mask them. Like a ship’s captain you had to seem to be infallible, the smartest, toughest, hardest man of the crew. Boyd was not ordinarily talkative, but now he found words flowing, as Stewart busied herself with the meal.

  “And so that’s it,” he concluded. “I figured this drive, if I could get a top price for the herd, would put me over the hump. Then I can bring in some blooded stock to breed up the critters on my ranch down on the Pecos. Maybe one more drive after this one and I’d b
e through with the trail, stay home and make a real spread out of my place.”

  “It sounds fine,” said Stewart, turning to look at him. “It sounds wonderful — a real home, not bouncing around from town to town, but having a place.” Then she turned back to the stove. “I wish — ”

  “You wish what?” Boyd asked, curiously tense.

  “Never mind what I wish,” she said. “Right now, supper’s ready. Would you like to help me put it on the table?”

  Chapter Five

  It was nearly eleven o’clock when Boyd left Stewart Gault. Her father, dead to the world with booze, had not awakened. The meal had been magnificent, but even better than that was holding Stewart in his arms again after it was over, kissing her. They had not been able to stay apart. At last, almost in self-defense, she had pulled away. “Boyd, Boyd,” she whispered. “This is leading to something neither of us is ready for yet. You’d better go.”

  He started to protest, then thought better of it. What was building up between himself and Stewart was too good to ruin. At last he nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I reckon you’re right. But I’ll see you tomorrow?”

  “Oh, yes, please, I’d die if you didn’t ...”

  “Don’t do that,” he grinned and reached for his hat. Then he sobered. “Good night, Stewart.”

  She looked at him with eyes that were lambent. “Good night,” she whispered, “darling.” And held her face up for his final kiss.

  Now, mounting the roan, Boyd saw her silhouetted in the lighted doorway. He raised his hand; she waved back. Then he turned the horse and rode toward the railroad tracks. No matter what else happened in Gunsight, he thought, it had been worth the trip.

  Now, though, it was time to think of other things. First of all, Panhandle and the other riders who had come to town with him. By now they’d all be drunk as seven hundred dollars. And, down there below the tracks, Gunsight was just building up steam. Lights blazed; tinny music whanged; there was laughter, shouting; and people thronged the sidewalks. It was not going to be easy to fish a half-dozen tanked-up Texans out of that hell’s broth of vice. Instinctively, Boyd loosened his Colt in its holster.