A pang of disappointment went through Frank as he recognized one of the hands from the Montero ranch. He had been hoping that someone other than Dolores’s crew was responsible for this attack on the drilling rigs, but clearly that wasn’t the case.
When Frank was within arm’s reach and the gunman still hadn’t noticed him, he reversed the Colt, lifted it, and brought the butt of the heavy revolver crashing down on the man’s head. The cowboy’s Stetson absorbed some of the force of the blow, so that his skull didn’t crack under the impact, but it was still enough to send him slumping senseless to the ground.
Frank pulled the man’s belt off, pulled his arms behind his back, and used the belt to lash his wrists together. He took the man’s bandanna off and crammed it into the cowboy’s mouth. It would take the hombre a minute or two anyway to spit out the makeshift gag when he regained consciousness. Then Frank tossed the man’s rifle and six-gun into the brush where they wouldn’t be easy to find.
From the sound of the shots, he estimated that there were at least a dozen men up there on the ridge, firing down at the drillers. It was too much to hope for that he could sneak up on all of them and knock them out, Frank knew, but he intended to whittle down the odds as much as he could.
Luck was against him, though, because he suddenly came to a clearing where a couple of cowboys were holding the horses of the other men. The horses reacted to Dog’s presence, rearing and neighing, and as the cowboys struggled to control them, one of the men spotted Frank.
“Morgan!” he howled. “Over here! It’s Morgan!”
Frank recognized the man doing the yelling, too. It was the young cowboy called Jeff, who had carried a grudge against him since Frank’s first day in Los Angeles. Jeff let go of the reins he was holding and clawed at the butt of the revolver on his hip instead.
That was a mistake, because the spooked horses he had just released bolted, and the shoulder of one of them slammed into Jeff as it went past, sending the young cowboy flying off his feet. The horses stampeded off, and it was all the other man could do to hang on to the ones he still had hold of.
Frank leveled the Colt at the man and ordered, “Let ’em go.”
The puncher’s eyes widened. “Mister, I can’t! Then we’d all be afoot.”
“That’s the idea,” Frank said. “Now let go of those reins, if you know what’s good for you.”
This was one of those times when having a reputation as a cold-blooded killer came in handy. The man’s face paled under its tan, and his fingers spread out as he released the reins in both hands.
The horses took off. Some of them came between Frank and the second cowboy, though, and the man took advantage of the opportunity to snatch his gun out of its holster.
Before he could raise it and fire, though, Frank sprang across the clearing and slashed at the man’s head with his Colt. The front sight raked across the cowboy’s forehead, opening up a bloody gash.
The man stumbled back a step under the impact of the blow. Frank’s left hand closed around the wrist of his gun hand and twisted hard. The puncher cried out in pain as he let go of his gun and it thudded to the ground.
Frank released the man’s wrist and brought his left fist up in a short, hard blow to the jaw. That put the cowboy on the ground. He was stunned, and a quick kick to the head knocked him out cold.
Better to wake up with a headache than not wake up at all, Frank thought as he turned away from the man he had just knocked unconscious.
A gun roared behind him as he turned. He felt the heat of the bullet as it passed by his cheek.
Jeff had recovered from being knocked down by the horse and was on his knees, the gun in his hand thrust out in front of him. He froze that way, eyes widening, as he found himself staring down the barrel of Frank’s Colt.
Frank almost fired. Only the tiniest fraction more pressure was needed to trip the big six-gun’s trigger.
But he held off and said, “Drop it, Jeff. I don’t want to kill you.”
“You . . . you said that to Lonnie . . . and he’s dead!”
Jeff was terrified—Frank could see that in the young man’s eyes—but he wasn’t willing to back down and lower his gun. He was too proud to do that.
Or too stupid, depending on how you looked at it.
But as Jeff hesitated with his own finger on the trigger, Frank heard running footsteps crashing through the brush toward him. Jeff’s shouts and the eruption of handgun fire had drawn the attention of the other men on the ridge. Frank knew that if the rest of the Salida del Sol crew came up and saw him pointing his Colt at Jeff, they would open fire to save their young compadre.
So he did the only thing he could. He lowered his own weapon and said in a calm voice, “All right, son. You’ve got the drop on me.”
Jeff’s eyes widened even more, although that didn’t seem possible, and for a second Frank thought the youngster was going to go ahead and shoot him. That was the calculated risk Frank was running.
But then Jeff’s finger eased on the trigger. He wasn’t a murderer, and that’s what he would have been if he had gunned Frank down like this.
Slowly, Frank pouched his iron. He was standing there with his hands at his sides when several more men burst into the clearing and leveled rifles and six-guns at him. He was surrounded.
“Hold your fire!” a voice yelled behind him. Frank recognized it as belonging to Pete Linderman. Dolores Montero’s foreman circled around Frank, covering him with a Winchester. Blood dripped from a bullet burn on Linderman’s leathery cheek.
With a bitter note in his voice, Linderman went on. “Morgan. I didn’t want to believe it was you. After fightin’ side by side with you last night, I didn’t figure you’d go over to the enemy this quick.”
“How do you know I’m working for Magnusson?” Frank asked.
“He made us let go of the horses!” Jeff shouted as he struggled to his feet. He still seemed to be shaken up from having been knocked down by the horses.
He wasn’t telling the story exactly as it had happened either. He had let go of the horses he was holding because he’d been surprised to see Frank again, not because he had been ordered at gunpoint to release them like the other cowboy.
Frank didn’t think that any good would be served by pointing out that discrepancy, though, so he let it go.
“We’re set afoot, Pete!” Jeff went on. “And those damn drillers are liable to come after us again!”
“We’ve got the high ground now,” Linderman said curtly. “They won’t get away with bushwhacking us again.”
Frank found that comment mighty interesting, but having almost a dozen guns pointing at him wasn’t a very good atmosphere for figuring things out. He said, “I didn’t have anything to do with ambushing you, Linderman, and neither did those drillers down there.”
“Bullshit!” Linderman shot back at him. “I saw you and Magnusson ridin’ up with my own eyes, Morgan. The señora wouldn’t hire you, so you went and sold your gun to that bastard.”
“It’s true that I’m working for Magnusson,” Frank admitted, “but what I’m really trying to do is find out who’s causing trouble for both sides in the valley.”
“I can tell you who’s causin’ the trouble, mister,” one of the other punchers said around a chaw of tobacco that bulged out his cheek. “It’s them greasy oil varmints.”
Several of the other men nodded in grim agreement. All of them looked like they would welcome an excuse to fill Frank with lead.
He was careful not to give them one. “Tell me what happened,” he suggested.
“The hell with that,” Linderman snapped. “You probably know as well as we do. You and Magnusson probably planned the whole thing and then rode out here to see how it turned out. Well, it backfired on you, Morgan.”
He used the barrel of his rifle to gesture to several of the others. “Somebody get his gun, and then tie him up. We’re takin’ him back to the hacienda.”
“Hold on,” Frank said quickl
y. He wasn’t going to let them take his gun without a fight. He just wasn’t made that way.
But in the end, the struggle probably wouldn’t get him anything except a wallop over the head with a rifle barrel, and maybe a few kicks to the ribs for good measure. He went on. “If you don’t want to explain it to me, then let me tell you what happened.”
“Of course you’d know.” Linderman shook his head. “Like I said, you and Magnusson must’ve planned the ambush.”
“You and your men were riding the range not far from here.” Frank pointed in the direction of the ranch headquarters and forged ahead as if Linderman had not spoken. “Somebody opened fire on you from the top of this ridge. Probably wounded a couple of you.”
“Ed Matthews is more than wounded,” Linderman said grimly. “He took a bullet right through the brisket. He’s dead.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Frank said, and meant it. “For what it’s worth, a couple of the drillers down there are wounded and maybe dead.”
“They had it comin’, the bushwhackin’ sons o’ bitches!” one of the cowboys shouted.
Frank shook his head. “The drillers aren’t the ones who shot at you.”
“What the hell are you talkin’ about?” Linderman demanded. “Of course they are. We charged up here and ran ’em back down there to those rigs.”
“Did you see any of them shooting at you?”
“Damn right we did! They’re hidin’ behind their sheds and those derricks—”
“No, I mean when the shooting first started,” Frank cut in. “Did you see them up here on the ridge? Did you see them running back down to the wells?”
Linderman glared at him and didn’t say anything for a moment, and the foreman’s silence gave Frank the answer he expected. Frank had put together in his mind everything he had seen and heard earlier and had a pretty good idea how things had played out.
“That don’t mean anything,” Linderman finally said. “It had to be them who shot at us. Who else could it have been?”
“That’s the question we all need to answer,” Frank said. “Here’s the way I see it. The bushwhackers were up here on this ridge. They’d probably been following you to see which direction you were going, then circled around to set up their trap.”
“On horseback, you mean?” Linderman asked with a frown.
“That’s right. I saw the dust their horses raised a while ago. Some of them got on this side of the ridge, some on the other, and they opened fire on you fellas at the same time as they started shooting at those drillers on the other side of the ridge. All it would take was one volley each way. Then they lit a shuck out of here.”
The foreman’s frown deepened. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”
“You charged right up here, didn’t you?” Frank asked. “And by that time, the drillers had gotten behind some cover and were shooting at the top of the ridge, because that’s where they’d been ambushed from a minute earlier. You thought they’d taken those first shots at your bunch and then run down the hill, so you returned their fire.” Frank shrugged. “It makes perfect sense.”
One of the cowboys warned, “Don’t listen to him, Pete! He’s in with Magnusson. We saw it for ourselves!”
Linderman rubbed his jaw. “Hold on a minute. You’re sayin’ that somebody tricked us and those drillers into shootin’ at each other by bushwhackin’ both sides?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Frank replied with a nod. “There’s already a wedge between the two bunches. Now that men have been badly wounded or killed on both sides, it’ll just be driven in deeper . . . unless you and your men listen to reason, Linderman.”
“What about them? What about Magnusson’s bunch? They were shootin’ at us, no doubt about that.”
“Only because they believe you shot at them first.”
“Damn it, this is makin’ my head hurt.” Linderman blew out a breath in disgust. “But I reckon things could’ve happened the way you’re sayin’ they did, Morgan. Wouldn’t we have seen or heard the fellas ridin’ off, though, if they did like you said?”
“What did you do when the first shots rang out?” Frank asked.
“Well, we were out in the open, so we picked up Ed and hustled into the cover of some trees. Once we figured out where the shots were coming from, we charged up here to flush the bastards out.”
“So if they left a couple of men behind to keep you occupied for a few minutes and make you think there were more hombres up here than there really were, the others could’ve ridden along the ridge and dropped down off of it somewhere else.”
“Maybe . . . but wouldn’t those oil drillers have seen them if they did that?”
“Not if they stayed just on this side of the crest,” Frank explained. “There are enough trees up there to screen them from view.”
“You make a good case for it, Morgan, but where’s the proof?”
Frank jerked a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the oil rigs. “One of the drillers told me they were working down there when someone opened fire on them from the ridge. They just naturally assumed it was you fellas from Salida del Sol . . . and a couple of minutes later, it was.”
“Yeah, that’s fine,” one of the other men said with a snort of contempt, “if you want to believe a bunch o’ lyin’ oilmen! As far as I’m concerned, they stink o’ brimstone ’cause they come straight out o’ Hell!”
“If you want proof,” Frank suggested, “why don’t you check for hoofprints and droppings somewhere along the ridge? Your horses were left on this side. If you find evidence of another group of riders being up here, you’ll know that I’m right about what happened.”
“That’s not exactly proof,” Linderman said with a shrug, “but I reckon we could take a look around.”
He had lowered his rifle now and seemed to be giving serious consideration to Frank’s theory, even though the rest of the cowboys were clearly reluctant to believe it.
“Why don’t you let your men do that?” Frank said. “You and I will go talk to Magnusson and get the drillers’ side of the story.”
“Talk to Magnusson!” Linderman burst out. “I don’t have anything to say to that skunk! Not unless it’s over the barrel of a gun! I don’t care what started it, they still shot at us.”
“In what seemed to them like self-defense,” Frank pointed out. “But I reckon if you’re afraid that you’ll find out I’m right . . .”
Linderman reacted just like Frank thought he would. The ramrod glared at him and snapped, “I’m not afraid of Magnusson or any other damn driller.” He turned to his men. “Take a look for tracks and horse apples along the ridge. Morgan and I are gonna go talk to Magnusson.”
With that, he stalked off. Frank walked beside him, hiding the grin he felt coming on at the way Linderman had played right into his hands.
Chapter 23
The drillers’ guns had fallen silent several minutes earlier, when the members of the Montero crew had stopped firing down at them from the ridge in order to surround Frank.
Now there was always the chance that they would open fire again when Frank and Linderman stepped out of the trees and into view. If that happened, they would be dead men.
But instead, Frank heard Victor Magnusson yell, “Hold your fire! Nobody shoot unless they start it!”
Beside Frank, Linderman grunted. “Sounds like Magnusson don’t fully trust you either, Morgan.”
“I’m sort of getting used to nobody around here trusting me,” Frank said dryly. “I still don’t like it.”
“Reckon you’d be used to it, you bein’ a hired gun and all.”
Frank didn’t waste any breath pointing out the obvious, that he wasn’t the sort of gunfighter everyone around here seemed to take him for.
After the time he had spent being liked and respected in Buckskin, the suspicion that folks in southern California seemed to feel toward him wasn’t very pleasant. It had been his choice to ride away from that Nevada settlement,
though, so he had no one to blame but himself.
Magnusson and the drillers didn’t emerge from cover. They stayed behind the sheds and derricks with the barrels of their rifles poking out, ready to open fire again.
When Frank and Linderman reached the road, Magnusson called, “That’s far enough! What are you doing with that cowboy, Morgan? Switching sides already?”
Frank felt a surge of anger. He wasn’t sure he had ever encountered such a level of distrust as the one that seemed to infect everybody in these parts. They were all mighty quick to jump to conclusions, especially where he was concerned.
“I’m calling a truce, Magnusson!” he replied. “Come on out here so you and Linderman can hash this out.”
“There’s nothing to hash out! They’re a bunch of murdering, bushwhacking bastards! Both of my men who were wounded have died!”
Frank had been afraid of that. So there were casualties on both sides now. That would make them dig in their heels even deeper. The hatred they felt toward each other wouldn’t go away, and neither would the violence.
Unless Frank could somehow talk sense into their heads.
“Señora Montero’s men didn’t attack you, Magnusson,” Frank insisted.
“You’re crazy!” the oilman shouted back. “That’s her foreman Pete Linderman with you right there!”
“Come on out here and talk it over. I’ll prove to you that you’re wrong.”
Magnusson couldn’t resist that challenge. He stalked out from behind the shed where he had been crouched with Rattigan. His spade beard jutted forward as his jaw thrust out belligerently. He came toward Frank and Linderman with his rifle held slanted across his broad chest.
He came to a stop with the road still between him and the other two men. “All right,” he snapped. “If you’ve got something to say, Morgan, go ahead and say it.”
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