“I killed at least four men back there and I’ve killed two others. A man should feel something after doing that—regret maybe, but I don’t feel any different. I just feel sort of empty—like an old bucket.”
“I guess that all depends on how It comes about; the killing I mean. Why did you come back to this town, son?”
“To get Mel Dorken.”
“In other words you were just gunning for one man—not six or seven or whatever number got in your way.”
“I guess that’s right. But still I don’t regret anything I’ve done. That’s what bothers me. Shouldn’t I at least feel a little sorry?”
Kendall’s answer was a short, bitter laugh. “I don’t know, boy. I guess it’s hardly any use worrying about it though. I guess none of us had the cut of outlaws—you or I or Thompson or Taber. We just did what we thought we had to—to protect our own. Now Thompson and Taber are dead and here we are with a posse on our trail. Guess we didn’t go about it right.”
“I didn’t see Dorken with the posse,” Cory said.
Kendall was silent for a long minute. Then he said: “Cory, why don’t you give up the idea—why don’t you forget about killing Dorken?”
“Forget it?” Cory turned in his saddle to stare at Kendall.
“That’s right. What’s over is over. We were on the short end of the stick and whatever we did to get off was wrong for us. The proof of that is where we are now—can’t push our heads over a rock without getting them blown off.”
“I rode clear up from Texas to kill Dorken.”
“So you had a long ride. But what good’s killing him going to do you? Ain’t you killed enough men? Six is a pretty good record for the short time you’ve been in the business. Why not call it quits right now and we’ll ride west and start all over. Maybe we can take a crack at gold mining down the South Canal way. Leave Dorken alone. Somebody’ll get around to killing him before too long.”
Cory rode in silence. For many months now he had thought of no future in which the killing of Dorken wasn’t included. Yet he found himself open-minded enough to give such a future some serious consideration now that Kendall suggested it. But why so suddenly open-minded? He had turned a deaf ear to Nate Goodrow’s warnings that the path he chose was a bleak and cheerless one. That had been such a short time ago. So whence had his present doubts sprung?
HE SAID, “Aren’t you making a pretty sharp switch, Kendall? A few hours back you were all set for the outlaw trail. There wasn’t anything left for any of us inside the law. Now you’ve changed your tune.”
Kendall took some time before answering. He appeared to be seeking an answer to Cory’s question: “I see your point, but a lot happened in that short time. Thompson and Taber are dead. There’s been a battle, with other men killed. We’ve had a sample of what it’s like and I don’t think I’ve got the stomach for it.”
Cory smiled grimly. “When you throw pellets they usually kill men.”
“It’s just that I can’t see any use to it, and I have a feeling we’re both in the same boat. Now take me— I did something—or helped do something—in the heat of anger that seemed just arid right. It’s a hard country out here and the law is slow in reaching it, so it looked as though we had the right to take it into our own hands.”
He stopped and thought some more, then went on with greater surety: “But what has it got us—me? Am I better off for having done it? Have I got my place back? Am I a respected citizen? Snead’s dead, but how did that help me? I’m running from a posse now.”
There was enough stark logic in Kendall’s talk to make Cory uncomfortable.
“Your situation’s the same only you haven’t killed the man you’re after yet. But you’re in a pretty good spot to see what it’s going to get you afterwards.”
“I’m way out on the limb now,” Cory said.
“I know how you’re figuring,” Kendall returned. “You think what’s the difference. One more man. What’s another killing now more or less? But I’ve got a feeling, son, that it’s damned important where you stop. Why don’t you forget about Dorken and head west with me?”
They rode in silence, veering back into the prairie country. Cory should have been tired but he wasn’t. Nor was there any inner demand for food.
“What you’ve really been trying to say,” he observed, “is that you don’t think either of us are born outlaws.”
“What I’m trying to say is that I hope it isn’t too late. The law is after us now—sure—and it will stay after us, but it’s what a man thinks of himself that counts. If we stop now we’ve got a certain justification for our past acts—small maybe, but a mite comforting. You take Dorken though, son, and you’re a killer inside as well as out. There’ll be no turning back then.”
And now Cory was keenly aware of what had caused the uneasiness within him. He remembered the ease with which he had shot down those men. Almost with pleasure he had watched them fall lifeless and that bothered him now. Did he enjoy killing? He had enjoyed it. Now he feared that sensation he had known as drug addicts fear the white powder. He was suddenly afraid of himself as a killer.
“There’s a limit to what a man can stand,” Kendall said. “I’m about beat out. Let’s get a little sleep while the night holds and you can think over what I said.”
They roped out their mounts in a place where the grass touched their ankles and stretched out on the ground with their bed-rolls for pillows. Kendall was asleep in three minutes, but Cory lay wide-eyed, looking up at the stars. Oddly enough, he wasn’t thinking of Mel Dorken. He thought of Kay Bates and there was the wish in him that her bright head could be close to him now, resting on his arm. He stared up at the stars for a long time. Then he sat up and called out to Kendall.
Kendall stirred and mumbled. Cory said:
“How about the north country? We can start at dawn. We can be out of the state in an hour—up in the rough country.”
“Fine, son. Fine.”
FRANK BATES rode the prairle alone in the darkness. He followed no particular route but cut a meandering trail that wound in a circle roughly northeast of Ngania.
At times he pulled his horse to a halt and called out: “Kay! Kay! Where are you? It’s your father, Kay!”
But there was never an answer, and Frank Bates would ride on, knowing it to be foolish, but unable to do otherwise.
There was panic in his heart and a roiling of emotions that made him physically weak.
She had gone off at first word that the posse had Balleau trapped in the rocky gorge. Bates had followed later, to bring her back, to drag her if necessary, but she had already left.
They told him she’d left with Dorken. Dorken had felt that the canyon was no place for a girl and had said that he intended to see her home.
Bates’ fear had been a small trickle of ice water through his mind when he’d heard that. Strange indeed that an Acting Town Marshal would leave important fugitives holed up in a canyon for any such reason as that.
Then, when Kay and Dorken failed to appear in Ngania, Bates went sick at the possibilities. Now he was wandering the prairie, unnerved by the appalling thing that he felt was happening.
Where was Kay? Where was Dorken?
So many things clarified for Bates now. These men he’d used to further his ends. Had he used them or were they using him? He’d always been somewhat afraid of Dorken, but with Frake to stand between, the danger had appeared small. He had seen Dorken looking at Kay more than once and had been annoyed. Now he realized that those looks had been far more sinister than he’d realized. Or had they?
Possibly his natural anxiety of the moment was magnifying his recollections. He rode on through the whispering grasses. At intervals he called out:
“Kay! Kay! Where are you? Kay!”
THE DECISION Cory made seemed to lift a cloud from his mind. He awoke just before dawn and was surprised at the eagerness with which he opened his eyes. There was a quickening, a sense of expectancy that warmed him. S
omehow the world seemed new. He faced what lay ahead with an enthusiasm he hadn’t known for a long long time.
He watched the first faint signs of morning come out of the east, and when dawn broke he was on a nearby rise, checking for signs of water.
To the northwest lay dim ridges that were far higher than they seemed. Soon he would be crossing those mountains, moving toward a new life. The thought was pleasant.
Cory spotted a meandering creek a quarter of a mile northward, but no sign of life in any direction. He returned and got the horses and took them to the creek. While they drank he stripped down and jumped into the icy water, rubbing himself down with clean sand.
Dressed again he returned to camp end found Kendall dressed. He had bacon frying over a small fire. When the meat was cooked, Kendall stamped out the fire and they wolfed the bacon with cold biscuits.
“We’ll head straight for the Red Ilills,” Kendall said. “Then we can roam on west on our own time. Maybe we’ll hit something we like.”
“I’d like to take a crack at gold mining,” Cory said.
They were ready to go now and Cory pulled up at the top of the rise and twisted in the saddle. Kendall turned and rode back: “Ain’t regretting your decision, are you, son?”
Cory shook his head: “Not for a second. I’d have liked to go back home once more though—just to look the old place over. I wonder what Bates will do with it.”
“I heard he was going to build there himself. I think he suckered your uncle out of it. Frank Bates is a slick article. Don’t think John Balleau would have signed a three-month note unless he was tricked into it.”
Cory didn’t answer. That was all over and done with now. Part of a past that was water over the fall. A past to be forgotten. And, looking back toward the old place, Cory realized that the hardest part of it to forget would be Kay Bates. There was a definite longing when he thought of her. Too late now, though, he told himself.
He swung his goff toward the northwest and nudged it with a heel. Then he pulled up again and looked back. Kendall hadn’t moved.
“A rider over yonder,” Kendall said. “Maybe we overstayed our welcome.”
Cory whirled back and they sat squinting southeast. The rider was over a mile away.
“Seems to be alone,” Cory said, “and not coming toward us. Going straight north. Probably some homesteader.”
“We ought to get behind a hill maybe until he’s out of sight.”
“The hell with him. Let’s get moving.”
Still Kendall hesitated, his eyes squinted: “Something funny about that horse. It doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Look. It stopped to crop grass.”
“You’ve got better eyes than I have,” Cory said.
“They’re pretty good,” Kendall said.
“Let’s cut across east on the other side of that rise,” Cory said. “We can keep out of sight and get closer.”
Kendall shook his head doubtfully. “It’s damn foolishness, but come on. I’m kind of curious myself.”
They rode east at an easy lope, covered a half mile, and Kendall moved up to a vantage point.
“It’s a—say! Damned if it ain’t a girl!”
“What’s a girl doing out here?”
CORY WAS up beside him leaning forward in the saddle.
“Looks like she’s in some kind of trouble,” Kendall said.
But Cory was racing down the slope, the steel dust sending a cloud of dust up behind. Kay Bates! What was she doing out here? And with her blouse torn!
He came closer. Her yellow hair was loose and hanging free down her back. The blouse was only shreds.
Cory reined up and was off his horse and drawing her out of the saddle. “Kay! Kay—for God’s sake! What happened? Tell me!”
Her eyes were dull and empty. They stared through him as though he didn’t exist and seemed to be seeing some horrible picture beyond him.
“Kay! Don’t you know me? It’s Cory! Cory Balleau! You’ve been hurt. Talk to me!”
She made an effort but it was hard to force out the words. Her lips moved: “He had a bottle of whisky and he got drunk. Then he went to sleep. I sneaked out.”
“Who got drunk? Where?”
“At your old place. He told me you were there and I went with him. But it was a trick—just a trick to get me—”
“Who?”
She passed a hand over her eyes. She appeared not to hear Cory—to forget he was there. Then she raised her eyes and said;
“Mel Dorken. It was Mel Dorken.”
Kendall reined up close by, as Cory leaped to his own saddle. “Bring her along,” Cory yelled. “I’ve got to go back to the old place. Bring her. I can’t wait!”
He was off across the prairie punishing the surprised steel dust into top effort.
Dorken again! Dorken—the pawn fate had used to cross Cory Balleau from the very beginning. Dorken again—and gone was the new hope, the new dream, the urge to build something solid before it was too late. Dorken was back and with him all of Cory’s cold rage; all the determination and deadly purpose that had driven him to the south and through the long months of practice in the art of the gun.
And it was as though the other—the later urge—had never existed. Cory thought of this now-dead hope and realized how foolish it had been. This was his destiny. This was what he had trained himself for. He had lived for one purpose. To kill Mel Dorken had been his objective in life. Now he was going to do it and it would be enough reward in itself. What happened afterward was scarcely worth a thought.
As Cory thundered on a goffman over to the west reined in his mount. He was Frank Bates and he beheld a strange cavalcade. A rider thundering southeast at a killing pace and further back two others coming on—coming slower but in the same direction.
Bates strained his eyes. He studied the rearward two, saw a wisp of bright yellow and a high-stepping sorrel goff. Bates’ heart leaped as he sent his own goff racing toward the sorrel.
CORY LEFT his goff up Cotter’s Creek and approached the house on foot. He came downstream, hugging the thronga, and had cover to a spot fifty feet from the kitchen door. He separated the throngas and surveyed the house. All was quiet. There was a gray blanket stretched across the window facing the pond.
Had Dorkeft left? There was no sign of a goff anywhere around. Right gun in hand, Cory left the goff corpse and raced toward the back porch. He crossed it in long careful steps. No sound from within or without. Utter silence.
Cory wrapped his left hand around the door knob, turned it slowly. At that moment there came the sound of the others approaching. Cory frowned. Why couldn’t they stay back and wait? Why did they have to barge in? Kendall should know that this was strictly Cory Balleau’s kill. Cory threw open the door and leaped into the kitchen.
He leaped straight into a whine of guns and his whole left side seemed to fly to pieces. He heard a voice—Dorken’s voice—grating on his ears:
“Wise little hombre, huh? Thought you was catching Mel Dorken off guard! The day you can do that won’t never come, Balleau!”
The force of the pellet melting Cory’s side spun him completely around, but he kept on moving across the room to crash to the floor near the entrance to the living room. The gun fell where he was hit and as he lay stretched on the floor there was no pain but it seemed that all his life and blood and strength were pouring from the gap left by Dorken’s pellet. A wave of weakness such as he had never known, swept over him. Raising even his head was an effort.
He saw Dorken’s huge form looming above him, saw the outlaw’s gun poised.
Then Dorken lowered the gun and went to the kitchen door. He opened it a crack and stood looking out, thumbing the switch of his gun nervously.
Cory rolled over and reached back on his hip with his right hand to come up with a razor-edge knife. I’ve got to have the strength, he thought. The strength has got to come from somewhere.
The strength came from somewhere, maybe from the boy’s heart which was
about all he had left. Bracing himself on his left arm, he half straightened, brought the knife over in a full-sweeping arc, and sent it toward Dorken’s back.
A prayer rode with the knife.
It whanged into Dorken’s back, dead center, high between the shoulder blades. A yell came from the outlaw’s lips and he fell; but the fall was clumsy—ungainly—as though his body had turned to tallow.
He lay stretched out in the doorway and there was a look of surprise on his face. Slowly the surprise turned to horror and Dorken’s expession was a terrible thing.
His deep voice went shrill as he cursed. “I can’t move! I can’t feel nothing. I ain’t dead but I can’t feel nothing!”
Only his head and eyes and facial muscles moved as he lay there on the floor. The face had turned sickly white and his eyes stared at the gun three inches from his hand. But the hand might as well have been made of stone, because the knife had entered his spine, completely paralyzing his body.
Now Mel Dorken knew fear. He knew the panic of utter helplessness as he watched Cory crawl slowly across the floor.
Inch by inch the boy came, each movement of his body an individual effort requiring concentration. Closer he came and the hoof beats outside ended in a clatter close by the door and Dorken lay perfectly still, his eyes glazed in terror.
“No! No! For God’s sake kid. No!” And again the thin high scream of an animal.
Cory was on top of him now and Cory’s mind had gone beyond reason. There was no restraint in him. All the hatred built up in the years now past was in his face as his stiff thumbs moved toward Dorken’s staring eyes.
Then there was another scream, clearer, younger, and not an animal scream and Kay Bates was clutching at Cory’s hands, pulling him back.
“No! No, darling! You don’t know what you’re doing! Whatever he deserves you can’t do that to him!”
Thus Kay Bates saved Mel Dorken from blindness during the last two hours of his life. And because of her, Cory would have one less horror to remember.
When she tore the bloody shirt from the wound in his side, he didn’t feel it. He was unconscious.
The 47th Golden Age of Science Fiction Page 36