by L. P. Holmes
“About a dozen head to start with. And—”
“And you’d slaughter ’em and peddle the meat to those damned sodbusters, eh?” cut in Asbell.
“The general idea. There are some other details.”
“No!” rapped Asbell. “Not a chance. Not a pound of Rocking A beef ever goes to feed them cussed sodbusters.”
“But they are eating some of it, by your own admission,” Martell pointed out. “I saw one job of slow-elking against you. You said there’d been more of the same. You’re not making any money out of your cattle that way. You raise cows to sell, don’t you?”
“Not to sodbusters,” Asbell vowed. “I’ll drive my beef across the Lodestones through Fandango Pass and on down to the railroad at Quartz Junction, same as in the past. That kind of business is good enough for me. To hell with the sodbusters. Let ’em starve, for all I care. As for the slow-elking … I’ll bust that up, if I have to hire me an outfit of fifty men.”
Bruce Martell stood silent for a moment. “That sun out there,” he said musingly, “it rises and it sets. The earth turns. Things change and nothing stands still. The world moves along and a man moves with it, or it rolls him under and crushes him. You know those settlers are in Indio Basin to stay, Mister Asbell. Why beat your head to pieces against the inevitable?”
Asbell clamped dogged teeth into his cheroot. “Sure I know they’re there to stay. I knew the day would come when they’d overrun Indio Basin. That’s why I got my roots set here on this side of the river. They stay south of the river and leave my beef alone, and I won’t bother ’em. Hell, I’m no fool. I know what a man can do and what he can’t. Pushing them sodbusters out of the basin is one of the things I can’t do. But that’s no sign I got to like ’em, is it? Or sell beef to ’em? No, by God. I did all right the old way, and I’ll stay by the old way.”
“You,” said Bruce Martell with slow distinctness, “are a damned, crusty, pigheaded old catamount. For a long time you’ve been the big mogul around here, had this whole big chunk of country for your own back yard to play around in. That’s made you proud. But down across the river now are hundreds of people, plenty of them damned fine people. Should you get ’em worked up to the necessary pitch, they could come across the river and rub you out like you were a lone ant on a hot rock. That’s exactly what will happen one of these days if you try to live alongside ’em with a chip always on your shoulder. But if you make friends with enough of those people, they’ll be good for you, and you’ll be good for them. As the setup now stands, there’s the fattest chunk of business you ever saw, right here in front of you. Can’t you see that?”
“I see what I like to look at, and do as I damned please,” growled Asbell. “I never bowed my neck to any damned man, and I shore don’t intend to start doing it now to a flock of sodbusters. They let me alone, I let them alone. But any time they want trouble, let ’em cut their wolf loose.”
“Nobody is suggesting that you bow your neck to anybody,” said Martell. “I’m just—”
“You’re wasting your time and mine, friend,” cut in Asbell again.
Martell took a final inhale, pinched out his cigarette butt. “When the Lord set out to make the most pigheaded critter in all creation, he made an old-line cattleman. To hell with you.”
He stepped off the porch, went over to the black horse, and gathered up the reins. That was when a hard voice came across at him from the bunkhouse door.
“Keep your hands full of reins … an’ nothin’ else, mister! This Winchester is lookin’ right down your throat!”
Bruce went completely still, except for his head. He turned this and saw the rifle and the man behind it. And he saw Carp Bastion coming past the corner of the bunkhouse, a hard grin on his face. Carp didn’t have a gun, but he was opening and closing his fists with anticipation.
Bruce’s eyes, now cold and smoky, came back to Asbell. “What is this?” he rapped harshly.
“An idea of Carp’s,” answered Asbell, his eyes sardonic. “You’ve roughed Carp up a couple of times when you got the jump by surprise. Carp don’t think you can do it again from an even start. You’ve got nothing worse ahead of you than a going-over with fists. Nobody else will mix in. But the idea is that you take your gun off before the roundelay starts.”
“No need of throwing a Winchester against me if that’s all you want,” gritted Bruce. “Seems this whole damned outfit needs to be convinced of something or other.” He ignored the poised rifle, dropped the rein, unbuckled his gun belt, and hung it to the saddle horn. He turned and moved to meet Bastion.
“All right, Carp. This is the third time. It’s going to be the roughest on you.”
Carp’s grin didn’t fade. He had a lot of confidence in his burly power and he’d seen more than one man go down under the lash of his knotted fists. He went into this with a headlong rush, fists flailing.
The world seemed to explode. And something hit him heavily across the flat of his shoulders. This was the earth.
Carp rolled over, got up, trying to get his eyes in focus again. It was as though a mule had kicked him on the side of the jaw. He hadn’t seen that punch coming; he hadn’t even seen it start. But he knew it had landed. He floundered a little, blinking, and located Martell again, standing poised and waiting.
“Better call it off, Carp,” said Martell. “I’ve had a lot more experience at this sort of thing than you. I don’t want to mess you up.”
Carp did the only thing he knew how to do. He came in again, fists windmilling. Bruce sidestepped, cuffed him on the ear, grabbed him, swung him around, and belted him on the jaw again. Carp’s knees wobbled, but he managed to stay up. He launched a wild swing that landed squarely on the bandaged wound on Bruce’s left arm.
A gust of pain ran all through Bruce, and he knew that the wound had broken open again. In fact, almost instantly there was a sogginess under the bandage and then a moist, warm seeping down his arm.
Bruce gave back, and Carp came on in, leaping at his momentary advantage. Bruce crouched under two whistling punches and then uppercut wickedly. Carp’s head snapped back and he was wide open, arms waving. Bruce set himself and duplicated his first punch.
That finished it. Carp was on the ground again and, though he floundered blindly, he couldn’t get up.
Bruce turned back to his horse, his glance raked Hack Asbell. “Everybody satisfied?” he rapped curtly.
Asbell was looking at Bruce’s left hand, streaked with seeping crimson. “You didn’t use the left hand once,” said the cattleman. “But it’s bleeding. How come?”
Bruce touched his arm. “A wound here, not healed. It broke open.”
A queer look came over Asbell’s face. “Why in hell didn’t you say you had a wounded arm?” he burst out.
“Why should I?” retorted Bruce. “You wanted a fracas, didn’t you?”
He buckled on his gun, stepped into the saddle, and rode away, a big man in the saddle, a very big man at that moment.
Carp crawled to the edge of the porch, pulling himself up on it, sat there with his dazed head in his hands. Hack Asbell’s voice dripped sarcasm.
“Well, did you find out?”
“I found out,” mumbled Carp. “My God! Can that guy hit! He’s a man, that feller is, Hack.”
“His left arm was wounded,” lashed Asbell. “You broke it open. He was bleeding when he left.”
“I didn’t know that,” groaned Carp. “Now I feel like a damned dog. A damned dog!” He got to his feet and lurched over to the bunkhouse. “He fought me fair and he licked me quick. He coulda’ cut me to ribbons, but he didn’t. And him with a wounded arm.” Carp’s shame was abysmal.
Hack Asbell watched Bruce Martell out of sight, then threw his cheroot butt aside.
“Butte … Speck!” he yelled. “One of you saddle up a bronc’ for me. I’m going to town.”
H
e went back into the cabin, found his worn old Peacemaker Colt gun, and buckled it on. Then he went over to the corrals, where Butte was catching up a good-looking sorrel.
“Think you ought to, boss?” asked Butte, lanky and towheaded.
“Ought to … what?” snapped Asbell.
“Ride into town. Plenty of feelin’ against us down there right now. Better let some of us boys go in with you. Three or four of us together, the sodbusters leave alone. But one man—!”
“Hell with the sodbusters!” growled Asbell. “For twenty years I been riding into Starlight whenever I felt like it—to have a couple of drinks with Sam Beardon, across his bar, and deal a few hands of cards with him. Why should I change now, just because of a few sodbusters?”
“Not a few, boss,” murmured Butte. “A lot. A hell of a lot.”
Asbell’s answer was just a snort. He waited until Butte had the sorrel ready, then went into the saddle. “You boys patrol the lower range again today,” he ordered. “No telling when them cussed slow-elkers will try their luck again.”
He shook the sorrel’s reins and was gone.
Chapter Seven
It was in the warm hours of midafternoon when Bruce Martell rode into the town of Starlight again. He hadn’t intended seeing this town of violent memories so soon again, but a circumstance had come up that made it necessary. At the urging of his brother Kip and Jeff Clebourne, Bruce had staked out a piece of land just upriver from their holdings. It was virtually an island, with an ancient overgrown channel cutting around to the south side of it. There was just about a quarter section in the chunk, and when Bruce finally consented to look it over with Kip, he found it a strangely attractive place.
It was walled off from the rest of the world by the river channels and borders of tall, cool alders and was of deep, rich soil. Bruce could conceive of little chance that he’d ever have use for it himself, not permanently, anyhow. But a man did not have to be sharp as a weasel to see how things definitely were between Kip and Cadence Clebourne. These two kids had stardust in their eyes. And later on, if all went well, an extra chunk of good land turned over to them wouldn’t hurt their future any. And so Bruce had set his stakes and was now in town to record it at the Land Office.
Starlight did not seem so jammed-up as it had been before. Most of the wagons on the street were ponderous freighters, bringing in supplies to pour into the clamoring maw of this surging new country. Bruce kept off the street with the black, going around behind the store to leave the horse at the corral there. Then, wanting to pay his way out at the Clebourne camp, he went into the store, and when he finally got a turn at the counter, ordered up a couple of sides of bacon and a few luxury items that he thought might please Cadence Clebourne. He put this all in a sack that he carried around and tied behind the saddle of the black. Then he went over to the Land Office.
Here, also, the crush had thinned out, and presently he was able to claim the attention of Cashel Edmunds, the agent—a tall, dark man with a hungry nose. Edmunds had a quick, soft way of moving about, and his eyes were sharp and questioning and none too friendly as he listened to Bruce supply the necessary description and data on his claim.
“What’s Rocking A trying to do?” demanded Edmunds. “Edge back across the river, maybe?”
“What’s Rocking A got to do with it?” asked Bruce. “I’m not riding for Asbell. Even if I was, it’s none of your affair. I’m twenty-one and a citizen of reasonable good standing. I got as much right to settle on a piece of free land as the next man. Suppose we get the filing done and let the talk go.”
Their eyes locked, and it was Edmunds who looked away. He made the necessary recordings and handed over the preliminary title claim.
“You’ve got to prove up the same as everybody else,” snapped Edmunds. “You’ve got to—”
“I know all about that,” cut in Bruce. “It’ll be done.”
He was turning to the door when he heard the first swelling growl of voices, down at the lower end of town, a growl that grew and harshened swiftly. He stepped to the door with Edmunds at his shoulder.
A buckboard was coming up the street, its team of broncos at a walk. All about it surged a thickening crowd. Driving the wagon was a big man in corduroy coat and trousers. It was Jason Spelle, who Bruce had met that night at the Carling camp. Spelle was bareheaded, his hair tawny in the slanting sunlight. Some kind of word was shuttling through the crowd, and men jostled and pushed and struggled, trying to get close enough to the buckboard to see what was lying across the narrow back of it. And all the time the fierce, gathering rumble of a savage anger lifted and grew.
At the outer edge of the crowd a man lifted a yell that cut through the clamor of the rest.
“Tell us about it, Jason … Tell us about it!”
Almost directly in front of the Land Office, Jason Spelle drew his team to a halt. He stood up and looked around. He made a dominant, compelling figure, and when he held up his hand, the crowd quieted. His voice rolled, big and strong and bitter.
“I want every settler in Indio Basin to know about this. Jake Hendee lies dead in the back of this buckboard. Some of you may have known Jake, but, for those who didn’t, I’m telling you that he was a good, law-abiding, honest man. Purely by chance I drove by his camp today. And what did I find? Why I found the pole of his wagon propped up and poor Jake Hendee, with a rope around his neck, hanging to it! There was a sign pinned to his shirt—this sign. I’ll read it to you!”
Spelle took a crumpled paper from his coat pocket, smoothed it out. The crowd became almost breathlessly still, every man leaning forward, not wanting to miss a single word.
“Here’s what it says,” boomed Spelle. “‘Warning! This is what will happen to every sodbuster found eating Rocking A beef!’”
Spelle swung his glance across the crowd and waved the paper. “That’s what it says. Those are the exact words of it. They took Jake Hendee and lynched him to his own wagon pole. Murder! That’s what it was … cowardly, ruthless murder. And we can thank Hack Asbell and the Rocking A for it.”
The crowd, wild-eyed and seething, broke into a renewed roaring.
“Ah!” exclaimed Cashel Edmunds, at Bruce Martell’s shoulder. “Now that damned high-handed, swaggering Rocking A outfit has done it! And if somebody in that crowd happens to remember that Hack Asbell rode into town today and is up at the hotel right now … this could turn into a very interesting afternoon.”
At that moment someone in the crowd did remember, and the word spread swiftly. The roar of voices deepened, took on an increasingly ugly note, and swept along the street toward the gaunt, two-story building at the upper end of town. A building that had stood in Starlight long before the first settler ever heard of Indio Basin—the Longhorn Hotel. Keeping pace with the crowd went Jason Spelle and his buckboard and the blanket-covered figure it carried. Cashel Edmunds said, a thin exultation in his voice, “I’ve got to see this. I’m locking up the office.”
Bruce Martell did not follow Cashel Edmunds. Instead, he cut around in back of the Land Office, stayed well off the street, and circled at a run up to the rear of the hotel where, on a back porch, a rather blowzy-looking woman was scrubbing clothes in a battered galvanized tub.
She whipped stringy hair out of her eyes with a suds-covered hand, stared at Bruce, and asked, “What’s all the racket about?”
“A fool and his talk,” Bruce rapped. “Hack Asbell inside?”
“I reckon,” the woman nodded. “What of it?”
Bruce didn’t bother to answer. He went in, found himself in a kitchen, went out of it into a dining room with an oilcloth-covered table, cut through a side door into the hotel bar. Hack Asbell sat at a poker table, and across from him was a fat, bald-headed man with a blocky face, made round with rolls of loose flesh. The fat man had laid down his hand of cards and was staring toward the front of the hotel. If Hack Asbell heard the r
umble of the crowd, he paid it no concern.
Bruce caught the cattleman by the shoulder. Asbell looked up, eyes widening.
“You again,” he snorted. “What—?”
“One question, Asbell,” cut in Bruce. “Your crew … did they lynch a settler last night?”
“If they did, he was a slow-elker and had it coming. But they didn’t, or I’d have known about it. What the devil are you driving at?”
“Never mind. Get out of here. Where’s your horse?”
“Down at Joe Leggett’s livery barn, taking on a feed of oats. Get out of here, you say? Are you crazy?”
“No. But you are if you don’t get that stiffness out of your neck and listen to reason. My black horse is tied out back of the general store. If you sneak out of here the back way and circle wide, you can get to my bronc’ without being seen. Then cut and run for it. Hurry up! You ain’t got much time.”
Hack Asbell pushed away from the table, stood up. His face was grim. “Now let’s have it straight. What’s the matter?”
“Matter enough. Hear that yelling outside?”
“I’m not deaf,” Asbell snapped testily. “’Course I hear it. Damned crazy sodbusters. Always bellering and yapping over something. Let ’em howl. Nothing to me. Now what’s this talk about my boys lynching—?”
“The settlers got the body of one of their own kind out there. He was found hanging by the neck to a pole of his own wagon. There was a sign pinned on him, which said that any other settler found eating Rocking A beef would get the same treatment. That’s a mob shaping up out there, Asbell. It’s your hide they’re yelling for. They want you, and they know you’re in here. Will you get out of here and take my horse?”
Now that he fully understood, the grizzled cattleman went completely cool. He looked at Bruce gravely. “Son, you’re going out of your way to help me. Why?”
Bruce shrugged desperately. “I don’t know. Maybe because you’re my kind of man. Maybe because I don’t think you’d lie to me. And there’s still another reason … my own.”