by L. P. Holmes
Shrewd old Ezra could make plenty of this, so, coming back from town, he cut around by the Carling camp. Here, while making small talk, he had studied Tracy Carling covertly. There was a tautness in her, a deep-seated anger. Presently Ezra managed to get her aside.
“Things happened in town a couple of days ago, so I hear,” he said artlessly. “You heard about it, youngster?”
“I heard,” answered Tracy curtly. “And I feel all dirtied up. I never want to see Bruce Martell or … or that man Spelle again. The idea … the two of them beating each other like brute beasts … over me. And in a saloon … too. I’m … I’m disgusted with them and with myself.”
“Well, now,” Ezra said, “I wouldn’t feel that way. Spelle had that whipping coming, and Martell gave it to him. I bet Spelle never tries to bother you again. Ain’t every girl’s got a champion like Bruce Martell.”
Tracy made a violent gesture with a small, clenched fist. “You don’t understand. I tell you I never want to see either of them again.”
“Likely,” said Ezra, old and wise, “you’ll change your mind on that, youngster. You want to remember, this is a new country and still a wild one. Men settle their affairs here different than that quiet farm country back where you come from. And no good woman should ever feel ashamed because a good man throws a solid fist for her. If I know Bruce Martell, he won’t ever mention it to you, and he won’t expect no thanks, nor want any. But don’t you hold it ag’in’ him for what he did. That wouldn’t be fair.”
To which Tracy stamped her foot and turned her back on him.
Later, sitting quietly in his cabin, Ezra chuckled over the memory. A proud youngster, that Tracy girl.
A knock sounded at the door, startling, because Ezra had heard no sound of outside approach. He threw a glance toward his bunk along the far wall, at the old trunk shoved back beneath it. Hanging on a couple of pegs above the bunk was an old Spencer carbine.
The knock came again, with a peculiar insistence about it. Ezra got up quietly, moved over until he had only to reach an arm to lift the old rifle free. Then he boomed, “Come in!”
The door swung back and Ezra grabbed for the Spencer. For the faint glow of the lamplight, reaching beyond the open door, showed a figure masked to the eyes behind a bandanna handkerchief.
Ezra had the Spencer free and half lifted when a harsh curse spat at him from behind that masking handkerchief. A curse and the words: “No you don’t!”
Then gun flame bloomed through the door, feral red and lancing. Ezra Banks never felt the lead smash into him. He never knew what hit him. He just fell sideways, half on his bunk, half off it. That quickly could the bridge between life and death be crossed.
The masked killer came in, followed by two others. “The damned old fool,” snarled the killer. “He would have it.”
“No matter,” said one of the others. “These sodbusters are just a bunch of sheep. The money is around here somewhere. Let’s get about locating it. We got a big night ahead.”
They found the money in the trunk under the bunk. They took it and rode away. They didn’t bother to close the door. And later, when a chill night wind began to drift across the earth’s blackness, the push of it swung the door back and forth in a dismal creaking.
Not long after, across the half-mile run of country where the Carling camp lay, another shot sounded. And after that, the tattoo of racing hooves speeding away and fading into the night.
Up at the Rocking A headquarters, Bruce Martell arose in a gray, chill dawn and dressed to the discomfort of muscles still creaking stiffly to remind him of the fight, now a few days past. In an all-out mix-up like that, he thought grimly, a man never realized how much he’d put out or how much he’d taken until after the muscular reaction came.
He stepped into the bite of the outer air and went over to the cookshack. Water he poured into the tin basin on the bench beside the door, then shoveled with cupped hands across his face, made him gasp with its iciness. But the rough toweling brought an answering glow, and morning hunger leaped up in him.
Back by the corrals, hooves clumped. Bruce turned and stared. It was a heavy workhorse, coming at an unaccustomed, weary jog, and on its broad back a slim figure was hunched. Even in the dawn’s mistiness there could be no mistake. Bruce hurried over at a run.
“Tracy! You? Girl … what’s wrong?”
She pulled to a halt. Her face was ghostly pale, twisted with grief and terror, her eyes wide and stunned. She stared at Bruce as though from a great distance and spoke tonelessly through stiff lips.
“Uncle Brink … they shot him. They smashed our wagons, robbed us. Ezra Banks … Ezra … he’s dead.”
She spoke droningly, mechanically, as though all emotion and feeling were frozen in her. Only her hands moved, fingers twisting and untwisting in the ragged mane of the stolid old workhorse.
“Girl,” cried Bruce softly. “What are you talking about? You can’t mean …?”
She began to sway, and suddenly she was toppling off her mount. Bruce caught her in his arms, and she lay in them, still and white.
Bruce carried her over to Hack Asbell’s cabin, kicked open the door, his voice lashing ahead of him. “Hack! Up and out, Hack. Here’s trouble—plenty!”
The old cattleman had just awakened. He came up in his blankets, blinking stupidly. He began to swear.
“What the hell—?”
“It’s Tracy Carling,” cut in Bruce savagely. “She brings word of dead men and robbery down in the basin. Hurry up—get into your clothes!”
As soon as Asbell was out of his bunk, Bruce lowered the girl onto it, smoothing the blankets under her. Asbell dressed, bent over the girl, touching one of her hands.
“Here …,” he rasped, “get a blanket over her. She’s half frozen. Where’s that whiskey bottle?”
He got the bottle and Bruce edged a little of the liquor through the girl’s lips. She choked a little, moaned, opened her eyes. Asbell pushed Bruce aside.
“Here, let me handle this, son.”
The girl stared around, that stunned, stricken look in her eyes. Hack Asbell sat on the edge of the bunk, holding one of her chilled hands between both his gnarled palms.
“It’s me, lass,” he said gently. “Old Hack Asbell. Now what’s this you’ve come to tell us?”
She struggled to a sitting position. Suddenly with a little gasping cry she caught at him and began to sob wildly. Old Hack wrapped both arms about her and she clung to him, crying in a way that tore and wrenched at Bruce Martell’s heart, in a savage agony. Hack Asbell held her gently, crooning soft words.
“There … there, youngster. It’s all right. Have your cry and then tell old Hack all about it.”
Her period of wild grief was as short as it was violent. Presently she began to quiet and Hack eased her back onto the pillow. “Now, youngster … tell us about it.”
She did, haltingly at first, then with the words breaking from her almost in a torrent. Bruce stood, tall and dark and still, his face a taut mask, missing no word.
In the Carling camp, it seemed, they had just turned in for the night. Then there was the sound of hooves, coming toward their camp. Brink Carling got up, to greet whoever it was riding in. Riders barged in suddenly, masked riders. One of them tried to club Brink Carling down with a swinging gun. Carling struggled with the fellow, who pulled away and shot him. Then the raiders began ransacking the camp. There was quite a bit of money hidden in the big wagon. The raiders tore everything to pieces before they found it. Then, with the camp ax, one of them deliberately wrecked the big wagon and the spring wagon, smashing spokes from the wheels. Then they raced away into the night again.
Both Tracy and Aunt Lucy thought at first that Brink Carling was dead. He wasn’t, but he was badly wounded. Aunt Lucy was caring for him as best she could. Tracy caught up one of the heavy workhorses and rode over t
o Ezra Banks’ camp for help. And she found Ezra Banks lying dead in his cabin. Her next thought for help was the Rocking A. She knew she could find the headquarters if she just took the trail and stayed on it. She didn’t know why she had come here instead of going to town for help. It was just something inside her, something instinctive that told her to come to the Rocking A.
“You did right, youngster,” said Hack Asbell, harshness coming into his tone. “Now you just rest a little and we’ll take care of everything.” He looked up at Bruce. “You and the boys will ride, of course, son. Every man with a rifle under his leg and guns at his belt. Lord knows I’m no savior of other people … but a thing like this! Bruce … get those damn murdering raiders … get ’em any way you can. I’ll take care of the youngster here. I’ll hook up a rig and get right down to the Carling camp and take over there. But you ride. I don’t care how far or how long, but bring me the ears of those dirty whelps!”
Bruce looked down at the girl’s haunted eyes and quivering lips. He said, “Glad you made it an order, Hack. Because I’d have gone, anyhow.”
He whirled and went out. His harsh yell emptied the bunkhouse, brought the crew into the cook shack. While they gulped hot coffee, he told them the story. He saw gray anger break in every one of them.
“God knows,” exploded Carp Bastion, “I’ve never loved any sodbuster. But murder is murder. This is our chore, Bruce.”
Butte Allen said, “There’ll be some ready to believe Rocking A responsible. We can prove different by dragging in those responsible, dead or alive. What’re we waiting for?”
“Not a thing,” rapped Bruce. “Saddle and ride!” He turned to the cook. “Take a mug of this coffee over to Hack’s cabin, Muley. That girl needs it.”
Five minutes later, in a thunder of hooves, Rocking A started its ride of retribution.
At Hack Asbell’s urging, Tracy Carling drank the coffee that Muley brought. Asbell drew the cook aside.
“Go hook a team to my buckboard, Muley. While I’m gone, you give this cabin a mucking out and bring in a couple more bunks. There’s a badly wounded man I’m going to bring here, along with his wife and this girl. They’ll be staying for a while. And put a big bundle of blankets in the back of the buckboard. And Muley, keep that old buffalo, Sharps rifle of yours handy. Should any riding bunch outside our own boys start coming into headquarters, you start shooting … for keeps.”
Muley, a gruff, bearded old fellow who limped on a crooked leg, nodded. “I heard what Bruce told the gang. I’ll shoot, and I won’t miss, Hack.”
Bruce Martell led his men straight to the Carling camp. Six riders besides himself. There was Carp Bastion and Butte Allen. Jim Lark and Speck Morrison. Card Wilcox and Rowdy Turner. Good men all, when headed right. And tough in a fight.
The Carling camp looked much the same, except that both the heavy and the spring wagons sagged drunkenly because of smashed wheels. There was a fire going and Brink Carling lay beside it, blanketed. His wife crouched beside him.
Bruce took off his hat as he rode up. Every man with him did the same. The look on Aunt Lucy’s face cut Bruce like a knife. Her fine, brave eyes held the same wide, stricken look as had been in Tracy’s. Bruce spoke gently.
“Brink … he’s still alive, Missus Carling?” He held his breath for her answer. He marveled at the low steadiness of it.
“Yes. Still alive. With help … I’ve hopes.”
“Hack Asbell is on his way, bringing Tracy with him. Hack will take care of everything. Now I wonder … was there any chance of recognizing any of those devils who did this thing? Any voice … anything at all that you remember?”
She seemed to consider. Then her white head shook. “It was dark, and Brink was down … There were so many of them.”
“At a rough guess … how many, Missus Carling?”
“I … don’t know. Ezra Banks … Tracy told you about Ezra?”
“Yes, she told us. We’ll make this all up to you, Missus Carling. And remember, Hack will be here shortly. Is there anything we can do … right now?”
“Nothing. I’ve done all that can be done for … for Brink. The bleeding has stopped. There’s more color in his face.” She leaned over and ran a gentle hand across the blanketed figure beside her.
At the gesture, Carp Bastion groaned. “And to think I once tried to get rough in this camp! Butte, when this chore is over, if I’m still alive, back me up against the corral fence and work me over with a pick handle. As a personal favor, Butte.”
“That goes for both of us, Carp,” answered Butte. “I was here, too, wasn’t I? Right now I see myself as knee-high to a grasshopper.”
The other riders were stirring restlessly when Bruce Martell swung his horse back to join them. “This way!” he ordered, and spurred off toward Ezra Banks’ cabin.
The lamp had burned itself out. Ezra Banks lay, a gaunt and shrunken figure. Bruce stood for a moment in the doorway, then went back to his saddle.
“Had to make sure old Ezra was past help,” he told the crew bleakly. “Now … town.”
Carp Bastion swung his head. “You figure to find those raiders in town, Bruce?”
“No. But their trail, maybe. Come on!”
They went into Starlight in a compact group. The town was boiling with feeling. Settlers along the street glowered and cursed, but offered nothing worse against this grim, heavily armed little band of riding men. Bruce went into the store alone. Donovan was there, talking to Pete Martin and Sam Otten. They were grave and bleak of face. They became more so when Bruce told about Ezra Banks and Brink Carling. Donovan shook his head dolefully.
“That makes six camps raided that I know of, Bruce. Maybe word of more will come in later. This is the worst I ever heard of. I’m no fighting man, but right now I could be dangerous if I knew which way to look.”
“We’re thinking of calling a mass meeting,” said Sam Otten. “Something has got to be done.”
“Something will be done, Sam,” Bruce declared. “Rocking A is riding, as soon as we know which way to ride. Those murdering whelps must have left a trail somewhere. And there’s another angle.”
“What’s that?” demanded Pete Martin.
Bruce built a smoke. He spoke slowly, with frowning concentration. “It’s just an idea of mine I’ve been mulling over. See what you think of it. I came into this basin owing allegiance to no one but myself. I was neither a settler nor part of the Rocking A. My mind was open. What did I find? I found a blind hatred on the part of virtually all the settlers against saddle men … any saddle man. I couldn’t figure it. Most of these settlers were solid men, not of the drifting, haywire, shiftless squatter type who instinctively hate cattle interests and riding men, blaming them for all past and present misfortunes. It didn’t add up in my mind that a single cattle outfit, Rocking A, could have antagonized all these settlers in the short space of a few weeks. So what did I find? I found that one man, Jason Spelle, was responsible for most of that ill feeling. He had settled on no land himself, so it wasn’t possible that Rocking A had ever done anything to him, personally, to arouse his hate. But Spelle was riding everywhere across the basin, preaching that hate to the settlers. So I wondered about that.”
He paused, inhaling deeply. “Two settler camps were raided, two men killed and robbed. Hendee and Dopkins. Evidence was left at each camp, pointing to the Rocking A as being responsible. I believe I proved to you men and others that Rocking A was not responsible. But somebody was. Now then … we know both men were robbed. Who could have known both had large sums of money? Only someone who had visited these men, talked with them, gained their confidence, and got them to talk of their future plans.”
Sam Otten caught his breath. “Spelle, maybe?”
Bruce jerked his head. “Spelle. No other. Well?”
Pete Martin took a short turn up and down, his deep eyes beginning to burn. “Logica
l thinking,” he admitted growlingly. “Go on.”
“Spelle refused to admit the evidence of Rocking A’s innocence in the Hendee and Dopkins affairs—refused flatly, even though it was conclusive. He still went on with his damned lying, preaching against us. I called him on it and he backed down. Right after that the Thorpes made their try to get me. Which could have been their own idea, though somehow I don’t think so. Anyway, after that try went sour, Jason Spelle dropped from sight for some little time. He comes back with all his old smooth gloss missing. There’s something loose in him that he’d kept controlled and hidden before. There was ugliness in him. There was cause for me to muss him up some. He disappears once more. And then … there was last night. So, I’m plenty interested in finding out just where Mister Jason Spelle is now.”
“And if you found him, you figger you might learn some of the answers about last night?” asked Pete Martin.
“That’s right.”
“Where do you intend to start looking?” asked Sam Otten.
“Spelle and Cashel Edmunds were always pretty thick,” Bruce answered. “I’m going to have a talk with Edmunds. Want to come along?”
“Why not?” growled Pete Martin, heading for the door, “Now that you mention it, Bruce … you may have something there.”
To his men, as he and Martin and Otten and Pat Donovan went along the store porch, Bruce said, “Stay put. I’ll be right back.”
The Land Office was empty, but there were sounds of movement in the back room. Without ceremony, Bruce shoved open the door to that room and led the way in. Cashel Edmunds was there, alone. On the bunk stood an open gripsack. Edmunds was shoving odds and ends of clothes into it. He came around fast and startled at the interruption, and at sight of the grim group facing him, his eyes flickered and went shifty. He tried to cover up with bluster.