A short sound of surprise tore itself out of Grant's throat. He shoved himself away from the depot and started running as the girl tripped on her long skirts and fell into the gravel and cinders along the tracks. Grant and the two cowhands arrived at her side at the same instant.
One of the men, Grant noticed, was tall, long-faced, and gangly. The other was almost as tall as his partner, but thick and heavy. The heavy one lunged at Grant with both fists swinging.
Grant saw the ham-sized fist looming in his face. The blow to the side of his face numbed him and he went reeling back against one of the cattle cars. His mouth tasted of salt and blood, his knees felt ready to buckle, but he shoved himself aside in time to escape the big man's second rush. He grabbed blindly, caught the man's sleeve, and with savage satisfaction pumped his own hard right fist into the man's stomach.
He glimpsed the thin man and the girl scrambling on the snow-patched ground for possession of the leather satchel, and then the heavy man came in again. Grant went reeling back under another blow to his face.
For an instant he was dazed; the world tilted sharply and he fell back on his side. All fight had been knocked out of him for the moment. He wanted to quit. Then he heard the girl scream and saw the thin man tear the satchel from her grasp, and suddenly Joe Grant remembered how much he owed her.
“Let's go, Bat!” the thin man yelled. “I've got it!”
But Bat was concentrating at the moment on something else. Suddenly Grant's world stopped its spinning, and he looked up and saw the man's big face grinning down at him. He saw the kick coming but could not move away in time to escape it. Instead, he grabbed at the big square-toed boot, pulled and twisted, and the big man came crashing down in the gravel.
The girl was still screaming. From the corner of his eye Grant glimpsed the thin man racing for the shadows at the end of the depot, and he thought: I guess this is no time to insist on fair play! He grabbed his heavy revolver out of his waistband and hit the big cowhand across the back of the head while he was still falling.
The man called Bat was tough. He grunted, cursed, and started to push himself up to his hands and knees. Grant brought the revolver back again, but the girl shouted, “Let him go! The other one has my money!”
Still dazed, Grant staggered to his feet and leaned for a moment against the cattle car.
“Catch him!” the girl shouted again. “You've got to catch him!”
Grant stared at her. He looked up and saw the racing thin man. I owe it to her, he thought. I'll catch him if it kills me!
He began to run. His legs felt wobbly and he couldn't drag enough air into his lungs, but he kept running. The thin man rounded the corner of the depot and disappeared into the darkness, and Grant knew that he would never catch him this way. He lifted his revolver and fired once, twice, three times into the air.
Almost immediately the thin man returned the fire, and Grant felt himself grinning weakly. This was somewhat better. It might get him killed, but at the moment that possibility seemed better than running. He fired again, then ducked behind a baggage cart to reload.
The thin man was out there somewhere, waiting. At least he wasn't running. Suddenly a shot punctuated the darkness and Grant saw the cowhand's hunched figure briefly against the outline of a loading chute. He breathed deeply. All right, he told himself, it's time for more running.
He swung wide around the chute and opened fire again, hoping that the cowhand's revolver was empty and that he hadn't had time to reload.
He knew that he had guessed right when he heard the man climbing the pole cattle pen behind the chute. “Stay where you are!” Grant yelled. The man cursed as something hit the ground with a heavy thud. It was either his revolver or the satchel—either way, the cowhand wasn't stopping to recover it. He dropped on the other side of the loading pen with another curse and ran into the darkness.
It was the satchel. Grant breathed heavily with relief as he picked it up and headed back toward the depot.
The noise of the shooting had emptied the coaches, and now the passengers stood huddled at the end of the depot staring anxiously into the darkness as Grant returned.
“What's goin' on here?” the ticket agent called.
“Two cowhands tried to grab Miss Muller's bag,” Grant said, surprised that he remembered her name so easily.
Rhea Muller came forward quickly, her eyes wide with panic. “Did... did they get away?”
“The thief got away but he left the bag.” He handed it to her and saw the anxiety go out of her face. She took the bag, held it hard in her hands, and looked at him.
“Thank you,” she said coolly.
“I'm sure you're welcome, ma'am,” Grant said stiffly. She wouldn't bend, she wouldn't smile. It was clear that she hated his guts, yet she had lied for him and had accepted his help.
The ticket agent shot anxious glances at both of them and said, “Lucky you got the satchel back, lady. But I better call the sheriff anyway.”
“No!” Rhea Muller said quickly. “The thieves got away; there's nothing we can do about it now.” Then her face brightened with a brazenly artificial smile. “Thank you just the same, sir, but Mr. Grant and I must go back to the train.”
Grant made a small sound of surprise as she took his arm. When they were a few paces away from the curious passengers, Grant hissed, “I'm not taking this train; I'm waiting for the Katy!”
The false smile disappeared. “Very well, Mr. Grant, if you want to wait and talk to the sheriff.”
He glanced quickly at the ticket agent who was hurrying into the depot and knew that she was right. He couldn't afford to talk to a sheriff; there were too many questions that he couldn't answer. Still, he didn't like the idea of heading west toward the Oklahoma country—civilization was too strong there, law enforcement too rigid for his liking.
“Well?” she asked when they reached the coach.
Grant looked cautiously into her blue suspicious eyes. “I can't say this was in my plans, but it looks like we'll be taking the same train after all.”
She nodded. “I thought we would.”
Grant handed her up to the coach and moved away from the excited crowd of passengers. “How long before the train pulls out?” he asked the conductor.
“Right away. We're behind schedule now. Say.” He grinned. “That was some scrap! The young lady ought to be real proud of you.”
Grant then went back to the depot to recover his saddle.
The train started moving again as Grant hefted his saddle into the rack overhead. Rhea Muller was watching him now, coolly and speculatively, and as he settled into his seat she said, “May I talk to you, Mr. Grant?”
It seemed that she never ran out of surprises. He frowned, then stood up to let her move in next to the window. “I'd like to talk to you, too, Miss Muller. First of all, I'd like to know why you lied to that deputy marshal today.”
She sat very erect as usual and stared straight ahead. “Perhaps,” she said quietly, “it was my woman's intuition.” She indicated the black satchel with a nod. “It was no surprise when those men tried to take this. I was afraid some such thing would happen and I needed the protection of a... a man like you.”
“A favor for a favor. Is that it?”
“Yes.”
But Grant was not satisfied. “I still don't understand it. It's clear that you don't like me, so why did you pick me to protect you?”
“Sometimes,” she said blandly, “it takes a thief to catch a thief.”
Grant felt the heat of anger rushing to his face. Sure, he had robbed Ortway at the point of a gun but he had never thought of himself as a thief. He had simply taken by force what Ortway was trying to cheat him out of. “How,” he asked stiffly, “can you be so sure I'm a thief?”
I saw your face. I saw the fear in your eyes when you learned the deputy marshal was making an inspection of the train.”
And maybe she was right. Maybe everybody could have seen it if they had bothered to look.
They rode in strained silence for several minutes, and then Grant looked at her. “Would you mind telling me what's so important about that satchel you're carrying?”
For a moment he thought she was not going to answer. Then she said, “Money, Mr. Grant. A great deal of money, and it is very important to me.” Then she looked straight at him, her eyes perfectly sober. “I want to hire you, Mr. Grant, to see that nothing else happens to it.”
Grant started. “I'm a thief. Remember?”
“But we understand each other,” she said evenly. “Do you want the job?”
“No.”
“The pay is not very good,” she continued. “But there is very little law where I am going, which should prove attractive to a man like yourself.”
It suddenly occurred to Grant that Rhea Muller was a very handsome young woman. Stiff and distant, but in her way almost beautiful. “You think you've got me pegged, don't you? Bank robber, gun shark, thief....” He leaned back on the seat and nudged his hat forward on his forehead. “Where is this place that has no law?”
“A place called Kiefer, in the Creek Nation. Until a few days ago it was a Pacific flag stop. Then a wildcat on the Glenn ranch blew in a gusher and...” She saw the puzzled look on Grant's face and allowed herself a small, tight smile. “Oil, Mr. Grant.”
He shoved his hat back and came erect. “What would a girl like you know about oil?”
She appeared to give the question serious thought before answering. At last she turned to the window and seemed to speak to the night. “I was not born on a derrick floor, as my father is apt to tell you, but I did grow up in the oil fields of Pennsylvania—and Ohio—Tarport, Petrolia, Grease City. My father is a wildcatter, Mr. Grant; that's how I know about oil.”
Grant had already noticed the strangeness of her speech and dress, and now he realized that Rhea Muller came from German stock, or Pennsylvania Dutch. Well, she's a long way from home, he thought. But Rhea Muller had that look of determined self-sufficiency about her; her own independence threw up a barrier against sympathy. Something in the back of his mind warned Grant to keep his distance. Here was a girl with ambition, and too much ambition always meant the same thing—trouble.
Still, Rhea Muller had the power and the looks to attract men, and Joe Grant was not immune to the attraction of pretty young women. He said at last, “You still haven't told me about the satchel, except that it has money in it.”
“That's all you need to know.”
“Not if I'm going to protect it,” Grant said. “How do I know the money isn't stolen?”
Her face colored but her words were controlled when she spoke. “Perhaps you have the right to know. The money is borrowed—five thousand dollars. Everything my father owns went up for collateral: his leases, a small producing well near Bartlesville. But we had to have the money to buy tools and a rig; we were in no position to bargain.”
Grant whistled softly. “It sounds like a big gamble.”
“Wildcatting is always a gamble. But Glenn Pool is going to be the biggest oil strike in history; it's the once-in-a-lifetime chance that all oilmen look for.”
Grant frowned, but the talk of oil interested him, if only because he knew nothing about it. “Well, maybe it isn't such a gamble. If your father's going to drill where he's sure there's oil, that seems like a pretty safe proposition.”
The girl turned and fixed her cool blue eyes on Grant's face. “It isn't as safe as it seems. Our lease expires in thirty days unless we get a well spudded in within that time. That's plenty of time now that we have the money, provided we're able to get rig timbers, machinery, tools...” She paused for a moment, and Grant thought he saw worry in the faint lines about her eyes. Suddenly she looked away. “Mr. Grant,” she said, “do you know what a 'top lease' is?”
“I never heard of it.”
“It's used by land speculators, especially around new oil fields. Sometimes a man has a good lease but can't promote the money to drill. If it looks like he won't be able to get his well started in time to fulfill the contract, a speculator will buy a lease on top of his. Do you understand?”
“I think so; it sounds the same as betting against the shooter in a crap game. If the first man doesn't get his well started in time, the speculator takes over the lease.” Then he thought of something else and suddenly understood why Rhea Muller was worried. “Does somebody have a 'top lease' on your father's land?”
She nodded, still looking the other way. “A man by the name of Ben Farley.”
“Do you think this Farley had anything to do with what happened in Vinita?”
She did not have to answer. A drilling lease in a new oil field was at stake—a fortune for the speculator if he could stop the Muller well. Derricks and machinery cost money-even Joe Grant knew that much about the oil business. If the speculator could somehow get his hands on the money that the Mullers had borrowed...
Grant breathed deeply, frowning hard. He didn't like it; it smelled of trouble. And he was in enough trouble as it was.
CHAPTER FOUR
SUCH TOWNS AS Dodge, Wichita, and Abilene had not prepared Joe Grant for Kiefer. The depot was a shunted boxcar. The week-old town was a churning sea of black mud, working with animals and humanity. Mule skinners turned the air blue with profanity as heavy freighters dragged through the axle-deep mud. The main street was already a mile-long double file of tents, clapboard and tin shacks. Horses and oxen bogged almost belly deep in the mud, wagons and hacks were stalled; only the long spans of mules were capable of pulling through this river of black slush.
The new town came in two parts, the railroad being the dividing fine. To the west there were a few tents and tar-paper shacks which was Kiefer's meager residential district. On the other side stretched the boggy road leading eastward to the Glenn ranch and the new oil field. Shanties and shacks and sheet-iron buildings lined the road on either side. Here were stores of cardboard, banks of canvas, clapboard cribs and livery stables, dance halls and gambling rooms, blind pigs and restaurants.
Kiefer was a boom town, born full grown, vicious and profane.
Saddle on his hip, Grant dropped down from the day-coach into the sucking mud that seemed to cover everything. He had never seen anything like it. No trail town that he had ever seen could compare with it.
Rhea Muller stood on the coach steps, gazing out at the crowds milling around. Suddenly she smiled and lifted her hand, and Grant saw a huge, square-built man and a blond boy coming toward them. He glanced up, and Rhea said, “My father and my brother. They'll take us out to the lease.”
Old Midler's face lighted up when he saw the black satchel in his daughter's arms. “Rhea, you got the money!”
“Yes, but on the banker's terms.”
“Who cares about terms!” the old man shouted. “Now we can get the well started!”
The old man and the boy made a pack saddle by clasping their hands. “Here, well carry you over to the wagon, Rhea. We'll stop by Kurt Battle's and tell him to load up our drilling tools.”
Joe Grant grinned faintly as the old man and the boy swung Rhea down from the coach and plowed through the mud toward a rickety buckboard, all of them talking excitedly at once. A bond of affection seemed to pull them together; happiness showed in their faces. Grant was surprised to hear Rhea Muller's laughter roll free and unrestrained. It was a pleasant sound.
Only after they had reached the buckboard did she remember Grant and motion for him to come over. “My father,” Rhea said. “Pa, this is Joe Grant.”
Joe took old Muller's hand. The big Dutchman grinned, but there was worry behind his pale eyes. “Rhea says you pitched in on a little trouble up at Vinita. I want to thank you. It was a big favor; bigger than you know, maybe.”
Grant looked pleased. There didn't seem to be anything to say. Then he shook hands with Bud Muller, a sober young giant with a good deal of his father in him.
“I didn't think it would start so fast,” the old man said thoughtfully, almost to himsel
f. “Me and Bud was over in Tulsa trying to raise the money. We should have gone with Rhea.”
Rhea smiled at her father, a very different expression from the smiles that Grant had seen before. “It's all over now. We'll get the well going and let's not hear any more about Ben Farley.” She looked at Grant. “You can throw your saddle in the back.”
He hadn't meant to go any farther. He had meant to say good-by and start moving south again, but when he looked at her he knew that it would not be that easy. She was a strange girl, headstrong and ambitious. She was trouble, and he knew it. Yet, he heard himself saying “Thank you.” And he threw the saddle in and climbed up himself.
Rhea and her father rode up front; Grant and Bud Muller braced themselves in the back of the buckboard as it lurched and swayed in the mud.
“You aiming to work for us, Mr. Grant?” Bud Muller asked.
The suddenness of the question threw Grant off guard. “Why do you ask?”
“Rhea said you might.”
Grant tugged his hat down on his forehead to hide the uneasiness in his eyes. “What else did your sister say?”
“That's all. It won't be an easy job, and it might be dangerous. I guess you wouldn't want it for what we could afford to pay.”
Grant wasn't thinking about the pay, or the danger that might be involved in fighting a land speculator called Ben Farley. He was remembering how fast the marshal's office had gone into action, and thinking how much safer he would be in Texas.
He glanced at Bud and said, “I wasn't exactly looking for a job.”
He should have said no. He should have said it at the station and stuck to it. But Rhea Muller had a way about her; she was a hard girl to say no to. Well, he thought, I guess it won't hurt to go out and see what an oil lease looks like. Tomorrow I'll come back and catch a freighter for Tulsa.
A little way from the boxcar depot old Muller stopped the buckboard and climbed down in front of a sheet-iron oil-well supply building. Rhea handed him the leather satchel.
Boomer Page 3