Down the street a man sold whisky from a board lai d across two barrels, dipping the whisky with a tin cup.
And it was good to be there. These were tough. an d bearded men, a rough, roistering, and on the whole friendly crowd. They were men, and I was a man among them.
My face was lean and hard, and my body was lean, too.
Only my shoulders were wide, my chest deep, my arm s strong. Those long months in the mountains had pu t some beef on me, and tempered my strength.
A man came up the street wearing a badge. He ha d a broad brown face with strong cheek and jawbones , the skin of his face stretched tight. His eyes were deepsunk and gray to almost white.
He looked hard at me, then looked again. It was a long, slow look that measured and assayed me, but he continued to walk. Farther down the street he stopped and I s aw him standing alone, watching me.
Finally he moved on, but when he did a slim youn g man walked over and stopped beside me. "Don't kno w you, friend, but watch yourself. Oll ie Burdette's got hi s eye on you."
"Trouble?"
"He's the marshal, and he shoots first and asks questions later. Killed a man last week."
"Thanks."
"My name's Kipp. Got a little spread out east o f town. Come out, if you've a mind to."
He walked on away from me, a quiet young man wit h quick intelligent eyes. But maybe too quick to warn me.
For a while I loafed where I was, thinking about it.
Right now I should ride on, but I'd just come into tow n and had done nothing, nor did I intend to get on th e wrong side of the law, ever. Sometimes the law can mak e mistakes, but usually it's right, and it's needed to regulat e those who haven't yet learned how to live with their fellow men.
Walking across the street, I went into the hotel. Th e dining room was only half full, so I found a table an d sat down.
After I'd ordered, I picked up an old newspaper an d browsed through it. I was just getting to the last pag e when a voice said, "Please? May I have it?"
Looking up from the paper, I saw a slender young girl.
She could have been no more than fourteen, but she ha d beautiful eyes and a nice smile.
I got to my feet quickly, embarrassed. "Yes, ma'am.
Of course. I just finished."
"It was Papa's paper. I put it down on the table an d forgot. He would be just furious if I didn't have it. He loves his newspaper."
"Sorry, ma'am. I didn't know."
Suddenly someone was beside us. Glancing aroun d I looked into those gray-white eyes of Ollie Burdette's'
They were cold and still. "This man botherin' you, youn g lady?"
His voice was harsh, commanding. There was something almost brutal in its tone and assurance. It wa s the voice of a man not only ready for trouble, but pushing it.
"Oh, no!" She smiled quickly. "Of course he isn't! He just gave me my newspaper. I'd have lost it otherwise."
"All right." He turned away almost reluctantly, givin g me a hard look, and I felt the hairs prickle on the bac k of my neck, and my mouth was dry. Yet it angered me , too. Burdette was very ready to find trouble.
"Are you looking for a job?"
My eyes went back to her. She was looking up at me , bright and eager. "Papa needs a man to break horses."
"I'd like that. Where's your place?"
She told me, then added, "I'm Liza Hetrick. You as k for me."
When she was gone and my dinner finished I sat ther e thinking. What Kipp had said might be true. There wer e gunmen who deliberately hunted trouble, some becaus e of an urge to kill, some because they wanted to sto p trouble before it began, some who were building a reputation or whose only claim to recognition was a list of killings. But why pick on me? Because I was only a boy an d wore a man's gun?
Yet I was no longer a boy in Western consideration.
At seventeen and younger, a boy wore a man's boot s and a man's responsibilities. And was the better for it, I t hought.
Yet it would be a good idea to ride out of town.
Avoiding trouble was the best thing. I wasn't trying t o prove anything to anybody. I wasn't so insecure that I i had to make people realize I was a tough man, and n o man in his right mind hunts trouble.
Walking to the door after paying my check, I looke d down the street. Burdette was a block away, standin g in front of the barbershop. Stepping out of the door, I w alked down the street to my horse. As I gathered th e reins I heard his boots on the walk.
"You, there!" His voice was harsh. "Don't I know you?"
When I turned around it was very slowly. I could fee l a queer stillness in me, something I'd never felt before.
His cold eyes stared into mine.
"Don't believe you do, Mr. Burdette. Pm new here."
"I've seen you somewhere. I know that look."
I sat my horse and looked at him. "You've neve r seen me, Mr. Burdette. I'm only a boy and I've live d most of my life in the hills. But I think the look is on e you've seen before."
With that I touched my spurs and started away. Bu t he was not through. "Wait!"
Drawing up, I looked at him. All along the stree t movement had stopped. We were the center of attention.
That strange, cool, remote feeling was in me. That waiting. . . .
"What d'you mean by that?" He came into the street , but not close. "And where did you get my name?"
"Your name was told me," I said, "and also that yo u killed a man last week." Why I said it I'll never know , but it wasn't in me to be bullied, and Burdette was making me angry. "Don't ride me, Burdette. If you want t o kill a man this week, try somebody else!"
And then I rode out of town.
The trail wound upward into the tall pines. The gras s smelled good, and there were flowers along the way. A t the fifth turning, just four miles from town, I saw a rai l fence and back of it a barn bigger than any I'd ever seen , and a strongly built log house.
A dog ran out, barking. Then a tall, rough-hewn ma n with a shock of white hair came to the door. "Light an d set, stranger! I'm Frank Hetrick."
"My name is Ryan Tyler. I was told to ask for Liza."
He turned. "Liza! Here's your beau!"
She came to the door, poised and pretty, her cheek s pink under the tan. "Papa! You shouldn't say such things.
I told him you'd give him a job."
Hetrick looked at me from keen blue eyes. "Do yo u break horses, Tyler?"
"Yes, sir. If you want them broke gentle."
"Of course." The remark pleased him. "Get down an d come in."
At the door I took off my ragged black hat and ra n my fingers through my hair. There were carpets on th e floor and the furniture was finished off and varnished.
You didn't see much of that in pioneer country.
It was the first time I'd been inside a house in ove r a year, and I'd never been in one as nice as this before.
Not, at least, since Pap and I left home. There was a double row of books on shelves across the room, and whe n Hetrick left the room I walked over to look.
Some of them were books Logan Pollard had talke d about. Tacitus, Thucydides, Plato, and a dozen others tha t were mostly history.
Hetrick returned to the room and noticed my interest. "I see you like books. Do you read a lot?"
"No, sir. But I had a friend who talked about book s to me."
After supper we went out on the porch to sit and Hetrick built a smudge to fight off the mosquitoes. We sa t there talking for a while and watching the blac k shadows capture the mountains. But that smudge was almost as bad as the mosquitoes, so we went in.
Liza sat down beside me and started asking questions, and the first thing I knew I had told them abou t Logan Pollard and Mary, and how Pap died. But I didn't tell them about the Indians I killed, or about the Mexican rustlers, or about McGarry.
It wasn't that I wanted to hide anything, but I wasn't the kind to talk, and that was over and done. The on e thing I did not want was a gun-fighti
ng reputation, an d besides, I liked these people. Somehow, I felt at hom e here. I liked Hetrick, and Liza was a mighty nice girl , even if she did look so big-eyed at me sometimes that I w as embarrassed.
The next day I went to work at forty a month. Ther e was one other hand on the place, a Mexican name d Miguel.
Hetrick came out and watched us that first day. An d from time to time in the days that followed he cam e around and watched, but he had no comment and mad e no suggestions. Only one day he stopped me. "Rye," h e said, "I like your work."
"Thanks, sir."
"You're working well and you're working fast."
"You've good stock," I said, and meant it. "Breedin g in these horses. It shows."
"Yes." He looked at me thoughtfully. "Breeding always shows through." He changed the subject suddenly. a ye, Liza told me you had words with Ollie Burdette."
"It was nothing."
"Be careful. He's a killer, Rye. He's dangerous. You'v e known horses like that, and I've watched Burdette. He's got a drive in him, a drive to kill."
"Yes, sir."
Twice during the following month, Kipp came over.
He liked to talk and he liked Mrs. Hetrick's pies. So did I. He was over for my birthday, too, the day I wa s eighteen.
He looked at my old Shawk & McLanahan. "Yo u should have a Colt," he said. "They're a mighty fine gun."
"Heard of them," I admitted. "I'd like one."
The next morning when we went out, nine of Hetrick's best homes were gone. Stolen.
The story was all there, in the tracks around the corral where we held the freshly broken stock. Movin g around, careful to spoil no tracks, I worked it out.
"There's two, at least," I said. "Probably one or tw o more."
Kipp had stayed the night, and when I went to th e barn for my saddle, he followed along. "I'll go with you," h e said. "Three is better than two."
Reading their sign was no problem. I'd been livin g too long like an Indian. The three of us rode fast, knowing as we did that they were going clear out of th e country. We could tell that from the direction they took.
There was nothing that way, nothing at all for miles.
Hetrick had a fine new rifle, and Kipp was well armed..
As for me, I still had the old Joslyn .50, although it wa s pretty nigh worn out now. But I knew that old carbin e and could make it talk.
The thieves took the horses into a stream and followe d it for miles, but that isn't the trick some folks think it is , and it didn't wipe out their trail the way they expected.
A horse makes a deep track in wet sand and sometimes th e tracks don't wash out very soon.
So water or not, we held to their trail until they lef t the stream and took out across a sandy flat. From tha t they reached some prairie, but the dew was wet on th e grass and the horses had knocked the grass down an d you could follow it at a rtrot.
On the fourth day of trailing the thieves had slowe d down. We were coming up fast until we smelled a woo d fire, and then we started walking our horses. We wer e going down a long slope covered with pines when w e saw the branding fire.
We bunched a little as we neared the fire and the y were busy and didn't see us until a horse whinnied. On e man dropped his branding iron and a thin trail of smok e lifted from the grass where the iron fell.
There were four of them, four to our three. They stoo d waiting for us as we walked our horses nearer, four toug h looking men from the rough country. One of them was a lean, hatchet-faced man with hair that curled over hi s shirt collar. He had gray-striped trousers tucked into hi s boot tops.
"Reckon you got the wrong horses," I said.
The big man with the black beard looked nervously a t the one with the hatchet face. I was watching him, too. He had a bronco look about him that spelled trouble, an d I could see it plain. He wore his gun tied down and hi s right hand was ready. And they were four to our three.
"You think so?" Hatchet Face was doing the talking.
One of the others was an Indian or a breed, a square.- j awed man with a wide face and a beaded vest.
"The horses belong to Hetrick, here. I broke them all.
We're taking them back."
"Are you, now?" Hatchet Face smiled and showed som e teeth missing. "You're a long ways from home, boys, an d we've got the number on you. That means we keep th e horses."
Kipp and Hetrick were forgotten. I could feel tha t lonely feeling again, the feeling of trouble coming, and o f being poised and ready for it. It was the something tha t happened to me when something was coming up.
"No," I said, choosing my words careful-like. "Yo u are four to three, but with us it's just one to one."
Hetrick had a wife and daughter, and I knew he wa s no fighting man, although he would be right with m e when the chips were down. I wanted to keep this shor t and quick, and I had an idea that I might do it b y keeping the fight between the two of us. The other s didn't look ambitious about a shoot-out. Black Bear d would back up quick if he had the chance. The man I'd called was number one and if there was to be a fight, h e would make it.
His face thinned down, seemed to sharpen. He had no t expected that. There was a quick calculation in his eyes.
Old Blue walked forward two steps, then stopped. I w as looking right down the muzzle of his courage.
"Yes," I said it low and straight at him. "You have thi s wrong, Bronco. I'm the man you think you are."
He measured me, not liking it. "What's that mean?"
"It means we take our horses. It means if you reach fo r a gun, I'll kill you."
Never before had I talked like that to any man. No r did I know where the confidence came from, but it wa s there, as it had been when Logan Pollard stopped McGarry that day when he would have quirted me.
Bronco was bothered, but he was still confident. So I gave him time. I wanted his sand to run out. Mayb e it would. And there was an even better chance it woul d not, for whoever Bronco was, he had used his gun; I c ould sense it, feel it.
That feeling sharpened all my senses, set me up an d ready for what would come. Yet there was no hangin g back. The horses were ours, and no man would dare wal k away from such a situation and still call himself a man.
Not in the West, not in our day. And we weren't abou t to walk away. Hetrick and Kipp would have got themselves killed, but this time they had the difference, and I w as the difference.
"Mr. Hetrick," I said, "you and Kipp gather up th e horses."
"Like hell!" Bronco flared.
Shorty nervously shifted his feet, and that did it. Mayb e Bronco thought Shorty was starting something. Anyway , his hand swept back and I shot him.
The bullet cut the Bull Durham tag hanging from hi s shirt pocket. The second bullet struck an inch lower an d right.
His gun was half drawn, but he seemed to shove it dow n in his holster and he started to take a step, and then h e was dead.
A crow cawed out in the trees on the slope. A hors e stamped. The other men stood flat-footed, caught tha t way, unmoving, not wanting to move.
And there was no more fight. Even if they had wante d one, it was too late. My gun was out and they were under it, and few men have the stomach to buck that deal.
"I'll get the horses," Kipp said, and he started fo r them.
Hetrick got down from his saddle. "Rye," he said, "we'd better collect their guns."
"Sure," I said.
Shorty stared at me. "Rye," he said thoughtfully. "I n ever heard that name. Know who you killed?"
"A horse thief," I said.
"You killed Rice Wheeler," he said, "the Panhandl e gunman."
"He should have stayed in the Panhandle," I said.
Chapter 6
RETURNING was only a two-day trip. We had no trai l to find, and we could cut across country, which we did.
Nobody had very much to say that first day out.
Late on the second day, when we were walking ou r horses up a long canyon, Kipp said, "That Wh
eeler, h e killed six or seven men." Nobody said anything to that , and he went on. "Wait until I tell this in town! It'l l make Ollie Burdette turn' green."
"Don't tell him!" Hetrick said angrily. "Don't say a word about it. I got back my horses and let's let it lay."
"But why not? It isn't every day a man kills a Ric e Wheeler!"
"You don't know gunmen," Hetrick said testily. "I t will start Burdette hunting the boy all the more."
Reluctantly Kipp agreed, but only after I said, "I d on't want that kind of talk about me, I'm not makin g any reputation."
All the way home I was thinking it out. I had kille d another 'man. This was two. That Mexican . . . My sho t might have killed him, but it was Pollard's shot that di d kill him. No doubt about that. And I didn't want to clai m any more than I had to.
Liza ran out to meet us as we came up. "You got th e horses!" She was excited. "Did you catch the thieves?
Where are they?"
Later, I guess she was told, or she heard about it, because for several days she was very big-eyed around me.
But she didn't say anything to me about it, or to anyon e else. And it wasn't even mentioned for a long time.
Sometimes at night we would sit over the table an d talk, and I'd tell them stories about living in the mountains alone, and of some of the places I'd seen. And onc e when we were talking I went to my saddlebags and go t out Ma's picture and showed it to them.
She was a pretty woman. Only twenty when the pictur e was taken.
Mrs. Hetrick looked at it for a long time, then at me.
"Do you know anything about her family?"
"No, ma'am. Pap told me that when they were marrie d her family sort of got shut of her. I mean . . . well th e way I heard it, they didn't think Pap had money enough.
But Pap and Ma, they were happy."
Mrs. Hetrick put the picture down thoughtfully. "Tha t dress she had on . . . that was expensive."
I knew nothing about women's clothes. It looked jus t like any dress to me. Women, I guess they know abou t things like that. One time, a few days later, I heard he r telling Hetrick, "Real lace. I never saw a prettier collar.
to Tame a Land (1955) Page 4