Milo Talon

by Louis L'Amour

  “Nate Albro always worked for control of anything in which he invested. Jefferson Henry was more interested in selling stock than in development. Albro didn’t like Henry and made no secret of it.

  “To understand all that has happened,” she continued, “you have to understand Jefferson Henry. He really is a small-natured man who wants to be considered important. He always envied Albro and tried several times to move in on him without doing more than annoying Nate. He is revengeful, never forgets an injury, even an imagined one.

  “When Nate was killed Henry pulled some political wires to get himself appointed guardian of Nancy, and he almost made it. Newton had married her mother and was officially Nancy’s guardian and he moved them away from the reach of his father.”

  Penny Logan knew about all that any outsider could pick up, partly from newspaper accounts and in part from the gossip of others who came to her for advice or assistance. A good deal came from a shrewd appraisal of the situation. She had done well with her own investments and many of the cattle and sheep men depended on her advice and suggestions.

  On the train, I went over everything step by step and found myself no further ahead. The fact that men looking for Nancy had come to our ranch puzzled me until I considered the fact that they might have a description or partial description. An opening into high mountain meadows and valleys. Our ranch was one such, and another, I realized suddenly, was right behind us.

  A hidden place in the mountains with a higher mountain valley behind and above it.

  A ride into that country might be just what was needed. But first, the notebook.

  CHAPTER 11

  ONCE I GOT back to the hotel I ended up tucking the notebook in my pocket for later reading and saddling my horse. Stopping by the desk on my way out, I picked up answers to some of the letters I’d written, but I tucked them in my pocket along with the notebook.

  Remembering that moving curtain in the window across from Maggie’s, I left the livery barn by the back entrance, rode around the corral, and came up behind Maggie’s where I tied my horse.

  German looked around as I came in the back door. “You’re late. She’s been worried.”

  John Topp was already seated at a table and he glanced up as I came in, looking from me to the kitchen entrance. For a moment I was inclined to mention the moving curtain, but did not. Molly came over with coffee as soon as I sat down. “You’re late,” she said.

  “Had to get my horse,” I replied. “I’m taking a ride. I need to get out of town, get some fresh air.”

  She laughed. “You could walk out of town in not more than a minute,” she said, “starting from anywhere.”

  “It’s a big town to me.” I was joking, but part of it was for John Topp. “Biggest town I ever saw before I was twenty was three teepees and a chosa.”

  “What’s a chosa?”

  “A dugout. They had to drag me into town with a rope. I’d never seen so many people all at one time in my life. Why, there must have been six or seven in sight when we rode in!”

  She filled my cup. “That was the year of the big dry-up. We kids just couldn’t wait until Sunday.”

  “To go to church?”

  “To get a drink of water. Ever’ Sunday, Ma would give us a drink. The rest of the time we sucked on stones. That’s why in my country the ground is covered with small stones; they were bigger once but we kids sucked them dry tryin’ for moisture. You could always tell just where the river was by the dust.”

  “Dust?”

  “The fish swimmin’ up river. They raised quite a lot of it. When the first rains came some of the fish were so unused to water they drowned. You would walk all along the bank and just pick ’em up by the dozen.”

  “Drink your coffee.”

  It was in my mind that one day I’d have to tangle with John Topp. I wasn’t hunting trouble, but he just made me uneasy and I figured maybe that was why Jefferson Henry had him around, to handle any trouble that developed. If this case went the way it looked we were going to have plenty of trouble. Nonetheless, I didn’t want him to get killed before we had a chance.

  The trouble was that for the first time in my life I wasn’t sure. Off and on I’d had it out with quite a few, and figured that at rough-and-tumble, root-hog-or-die sort of fighting I was as good as the best. But there was something awesome about Topp. He had those big hands and shoulders that bulged with muscle, and big as he was, he moved like a cat.

  So I didn’t want anybody shooting him until I’d put a bunch of five against his chin.

  Baggott might be laying for me, but maybe for him. Worst of all, he might be trying for a shot at Molly, who knew more than she was telling and maybe knew too much for the comfort of some. So it was in my mind to tip him off.

  “Molly? Has Mr. Baggott been in?”

  Out of the tail of my eye I saw Topp’s head come up and his fork pause halfway to his mouth.

  “He has been back once or twice. Most of the time I think he buys what he wants down at the store. I see him down the street with a sack in his hands once in a while.”

  “I was wondering,” I continued, “if that was him had a room on the second floor across the street. Somebody is living up there and Baggott doesn’t stay at the hotel.”

  She brought my breakfast and I did no more talking. Now he knew, and so did anybody else who was in the room, and by now there were a half dozen others. When breakfast was finished I slipped out the back way, took a quick look around, and stepped into the saddle.

  First, I rode west to the water-tower. There was nothing there but the tower itself, a cool, shady place with water dripping and a sidetrack where the private car had stood. I scouted around but saw nothing but a few old horse and cow tracks.

  The railroad crossed the river at this point, so I turned my back to railroad and river and headed for the Hooker Hills and the trail along Huerfano River toward the mountains. It was a long ride to where I planned to go but I had an idea I might stop at Pablo’s horse camp for the night, or at least for a meal.

  A few days ago the hills had been brown and yellow, but the rains had turned them to green. Close up the sparse grass did not show so clearly, but from a distance the low hills were beautiful. Here and there was an outcropping of sandstone or sometimes of shale. I let my mount pick his way westward, keeping an eye on the country and constantly checking my back-trail.

  My job was to find Nancy Henry, or Albro, as she might now be calling herself. What would happen then must depend on her, what she was like, what she wanted to do. It was obvious that she was hiding, at least she was not anxious to be found.

  The thought came to me then that Anne might know her. Or was I telling myself that as an excuse for visiting her again? When a man secretly wants to do something he can come up with all sorts of good arguments as to why it is necessary and important.

  I’d met Anne only a few years ago when her people camped at our place to rest their stock. They were heading south, looking for a place to homestead. There were four of them in the party, an older man and woman, a small boy, and Anne. They had a good team of six mules and the man was right handy with them.

  Anne was quiet, minded her own affairs, and I saw little of her. Too damned little, if you asked me. She was mighty pretty and I was young, as I still was. We sat out some and talked. She liked to read and seemed to have all sorts of talents, but the main thing that impressed me was her love for wild country.

  The two or three days they were going to stop became a week, then ten days. They drove on south and I moped around the house for a few days, and then Ma suggested if I was going to do nothing around the house I might as well catch up a good horse and ride down to see her. She added dryly, “Don’t forget to come back!”

  Would you believe it? I missed them. Me, as good a tracker as you’d find in any neck of the woods and I lost them. Turned off somewhere, I guess.

  Later, I heard they found a valley where some Mexican bandits once hid out. There was a good spri
ng there and they stopped. Some drifter who’d seen them at our place told me that, but by then it was months later and I’d no idea if they were still there.

  That was a part of the country I had to scout, anyway, and they might just know something. If they were still there. Ma pegged them as “movers,” which was a name given to folks who didn’t settle, who were never really satisfied anywhere. It was also a name given to no-accounts. Usually movers were a rawhide outfit, poor folks with scrawny stock and an outfit tied together with rawhide. Anne’s folks seemed better off, but they were movers anyway. Ma had showed them a nice bit of land with a spring and all, but they shrugged it off and kept going.

  Riding along, thinking of her, I was right up to Pablo’s horse-camp without realizing. Only there was no horse-camp. It was gone.

  Rather, the horses were gone, and Pablo was gone. The wagon was there, turned on its side and half-burned.

  My heart began to pound. Pablo was a friend of mine and if he was dead now it was because of me. Slowly, I scouted around.

  A bunch of riders had come in from the northeast, walking their horses until within a hundred yards. It must have been at night, with darkness to cover them, and then they had charged. There were several bullet-holes in the overturned wagon, the earth was churned by hoofs, and the fire scattered.

  The Dutch oven was overturned, the coffeepot lay on its side, the lid knocked off and the pot badly dented, probably by a hoof. Then somebody had shot into it.

  On one wagon wheel there was a dark stain still red that had to be blood.

  There were no bodies, and search as I would, I could find no tracks left by Pablo.

  How many had there been? Seven or eight at least and they had gotten close without his realizing … or they would never have gotten so close at night.

  Scouting the ground with care, I found another place where someone had fallen. There was blood on the ground and a place where a man in pain had dug his fingers into the earth. One thing puzzled me. The riders, in leaving, had scattered out, leaving not one trail but many.

  Well, the Apaches used to do that, but these were not Indians but white men: all rode shod horses and I’d seen several boot-heel prints where men had dismounted and looked around, searching for loot at the wagon, no doubt.

  My plan to spend the night with Pablo was gone. It was growing late and I’d have to find another place and make a cold camp. What was done here was done. It was too late to do anything now.

  Getting back into the saddle, I took one last look around and started on westward. Unless I was much mistaken I was not more than five miles from the Spring Branch of the St. Charles River. Once, long ago, I’d camped there.

  My horse was tired and I was tired and the way we would go would take us a good hour, but more like an hour and a half. The sun was setting beyond the Wet Mountains and beyond the Sangre de Cristos and it was time I got on with it.

  Where I camped the Spring Branch had a good flow of water, which wasn’t always the case. Back about fifty yards from the branch I found a flat place among some cedar and pine. I was eager for a cup of coffee, but, since I was depending on Pablo, I’d not brought the fixin’s. The grove was thick and the trees branched close to the ground so I had some cover.

  Picketing the horse close by where there was a patch of no-account grass, I settled down for the night. From where I lay I figured that, come daylight, I’d have a view of anybody along the trail that followed along the St. Charles River then curved around below Hogback and pointed toward Turtle Buttes. The valley I was hunting lay in behind Turtle Buttes.

  By this time Anne and her folks might have pulled out, but if they were there I’d get a good meal and a chance to lay up for a bit and consider.

  The trouble was Pablo. I had no idea whether he was dead or alive, and he might be lying somewhere badly wounded. No, much as I wanted to see Anne, I’d have to go back. Hungry as I was, I slept well and awakened to a cool gray morning.

  With a wish for a breakfast I rolled my gear and strapped it behind my saddle. The gelding seemed as ready to move as I was, and we turned back the way we had come, but keeping to the higher land and under shelter of the trees. If anybody was watching I didn’t want to make it too easy.

  When I got within about a mile of Pablo’s horse-camp I shucked my Winchester. My horse had ridden into too much trouble not to know what that meant, and he began stepping light and easy just as if he was reading my mind. He knew when that Winchester slid out of the scabbard that we might see some action, and he was an old warhorse who loved the smell of battle.

  Pulling up under cover of some trees, I looked out between the branches of two of them and studied the campsite. It was still some distance off, but with my higher altitude I could see it clearly enough.

  Nothing in sight, simply nothing at all. Nonetheless, I didn’t go barreling out there, but just sat still, watching the slope and considering.

  Somebody else might be watching that slope besides me and I had to figure where they would be.

  If there was somebody else watching they had to be on a level with me or above me. What bothered me now was Pablo.

  What had become of him? His horses had been scattered or stolen but I saw none running loose now. In his place, if suddenly surprised, what would I have done? On the other hand, if I expected an attack what would I have planned to do? Pablo was no tenderfoot, and he must have been expecting more trouble and he would have made some plans. He would have had a hideout somewhere near, some place he could get to under cover, and where they’d not be apt to find him.

  Why was Pablo attacked? Because they believed he knew too much? Or because he was a friend of mine?

  Studying the land below, I thought I saw a way, a shallow fold between two low knolls, a place sufficient to hide a creeping man that ended in a dry creek-bed. Following the creek-bed back … I would try it.

  The sky was wide and blue. The clouds had drifted away and left the day clear and bright. Riding along the mountain slope, I studied the ground for sign and found none. Then I reached the place where the dry creek-bed left the mountains. Twice within a matter of minutes I found blood on the rocks and blood where a body had been dragged or had dragged itself through the sand.

  Turning, I began working my way back up the dry creek-bed in the direction Pablo, if it was he, had gone. Moving in soft sand, we had made no sound, then suddenly my horse’s ears went up and I felt its muscles stiffen. Ahead lay some old logs and brush, half-blocking the creek-bed which now lay between two low walls of broken sandstone.

  The gelding did not want to go any farther but I urged him on; suddenly I pulled up. On a sandstone ledge, scarcely discernible because of the likeness in color, lay a mountain lion, and he was a big one.

  CHAPTER 12

  IT GAVE ME no more than a quick, irritated glance then returned its attention to its prey, and I had a good idea what that was. Pablo had been bleeding and the lion had smelled blood.

  My hand on his shoulder and a few quiet words calmed the gelding somewhat. We had hunted together before this, and although my horse did not like the smell of cat, he was prepared to stand his ground.

  From where I sat Pablo, if it was he, was invisible. The sandstone ledge on which the big cat lay was a little higher than I was but I could see his head, part of a paw, a portion of his shoulder, and about a foot of his tail. Between us was some thin brush and grass.

  Close as he was, it was a far from easy shot. My bullet was going to have to clear the edge of the sandstone ledge and take him in the skull on his ear or just forward of it. The target I had was about the size of the palm of a child’s hand. Under most circumstances I would ask for no more, but my bullet might be deflected ever so little by the grass or a branch of the brush.

  If not killed instantly the lion would leap right at what he was looking at, and that meant Pablo, wounded and perhaps helpless. Nobody needed to warn me there is nothing more dangerous than a wounded mountain lion.

  Was Pablo co
nscious? Was he armed? I spoke in a tone just loud enough to carry. “Pablo? Do you have a gun?”

  There was no response. The big cat’s tail moved, often preliminary to a leap. Sometimes before attacking, a cat would stand up, then crouch and leap. If that happened here I’d have a better shot, and there would be time for but one. I waited a little longer, then spoke again. “Pablo?”

  He might be nowhere near, but if he was there he lay on a rock around the corner from a rocky projection that cut off my view. I rested my hand on the gelding’s neck. “It’s all right, boy,” I said gently. “It’s all right.”

  Annoyed, the cat turned its head to look at me again, baring its teeth in a snarl. Ordinarily he might have fled, but the smell of blood and the proximity of its prey made that unlikely. To the lion this was his prey, found by him, and I had no right to interfere.

  He was a magnificent beast. There was time for that to register when he suddenly came to a half-crouch and leaped.

  My finger was on the trigger and I had taken up a little slack when the lion jumped. There was no time to think. I fired.

  The lion’s body twitched sharply in mid-leap and I touched spurs to the gelding who sprang forward, rounding the rocky corner just as the big cat struck the rock just short of his prey. It clawed wildly at the sandstone to keep from falling and I saw blood on its side from my bullet. On the shelf of rock toward which the cat was leaping when hit by my bullet lay Pablo, his shirt stained with blood.

  One quick glance registered the scene, for as the lion hit the ground he leaped, and this time he sprang at me. My rifle was up and ready and the cat was in the air, a beautiful, tawny engine of destruction, not more than ten feet away when I fired. The lion fell, hit the rocks, and rolled or slipped off into the sand below. It made one involuntary twitch and died.