My mount lifted his head, water dripping from his muzzle. “Come on, boy,” I said quietly, “we’ve got a long day ahead of us.” He turned his head toward me and pushed at me with his nose and I rubbed him between the ears. They were fine animals and I would regret releasing them, which we must do. Already she might have brought charges of horse stealing against us.
Molly watched me saddle up. “Milo? Will we get away?”
“We will,” I said and wished I was as confident as I tried to sound. There were too many of them, and they knew the country better.
Leading off at a good pace, I rode until we were abreast of Gobbler’s Knob, although some distance away, before I veered slightly to the west to round the shoulder of the mountain that lay ahead.
There was no wind and no sound but the soft hooffalls of our horses. Suddenly I switched our route—no use making it too easy for them—and rode into Junkins Creek and held to it as much as possible for a good two miles. Coming up out of the streambed. I led the way over a saddle into the basin of the Hardscrabble. With Bear Mountain looming over us we stopped for a nooning, a bit shy of the hour. There was water and grass, so we ate a little food ourselves and let the horses rest.
We’d passed scarcely a word since riding out. She was scared, and so was I. Scared for her more than me, but I knew when they came up to us, as they would, there’d be some shooting, and I was one man against only God knew how many.
The coolness was gone when we mounted up. Now I began to be careful, leaving them as few tracks as possible and careful to have those heading north and a mite east. I was hoping they’d figure I was heading for Oak Creek and the trail to Canon City.
At the mouth of the canyon I left some tracks for them, not too obvious, but indications we’d gone down the Oak Creek Trail. We rode a half mile up the creek then came back by a different route, riding in the creek or wiping out what tracks we made and sifting dust and leaves over the ground.
We skirted the base of Curley Peak, followed Grape Creek a ways, and then turned up another creek that came down from the west. We were dead tired and so were our horses. So far we had seen nobody, although twice we had startled deer.
Suddenly my mount’s ears went up and a moment later I heard it.
Right ahead of us, not fifty feet away, a man and a woman, talking!
CHAPTER 21
AS WE SAW them, they turned their heads and saw us. There was no help for it, so we rode on up to them.
Their eyes went from one to the other, then to our horses. They were western people and nobody was needed to draw them a picture.
“Sir,” I taken off my hat, “an’ ma’am? We’re in trouble, mighty serious trouble. We need some grub and we need fresh horses.
“These,” I added, “are not ours. We’ve got to turn them loose to find their way home.”
For a moment they hesitated, then the man said, “The house is yonder. You ride over and we’ll be right behind you.”
As we drew up in the yard of the ranch house, Molly said, “Milo? What will we do?”
“Be ourselves. Tell them the truth. Nothing was ever gained by lying but the risk of more lies.”
We stepped down, me helping her from the saddle. For a moment she clung to me. “Milo, I’m beat. I can’t do it.”
“We’ve no choice. We get out of here if we have to walk. Stay here and we’ll have these folks pulled into trouble.”
Stripping the gear from the horses, I turned them into the corral. “Better let them drink and eat a mite,” I said.
“Might as well go inside,” the man said. “Bess will fix you some grub.”
“I’ll need a couple of horses,” I said, “and I can buy them.”
He gave me a straight, hard look then said, “We’ll talk after we’ve et.” He ducked his head at our horses. “Where’d you get those?”
“They belong to Maggie. Woman runs a restaurant off down the way. Owned by she, German Schafer, and the young lady, yonder.”
“She’s not your wife?”
“No, sir. She’s a friend, I’d say. A young lady in trouble.” I taken off my hat and wiped my brow, then the hatband. “Only fair to tell you, it’s shooting trouble.” At his expression I shook my head quickly. “Not woman trouble. It’s money trouble. If they catch her, they’ll kill her.”
“And you?”
“Sure. They’ve got my number up, too. I’m used to it, and she ain’t. I been shot at a few times, here and there.”
He looked at my six-shooter. “Can you use that?”
“I reckon.”
Molly had gone inside and I followed. Molly was nowhere to be seen but the woman was fixing something at the stove.
She turned and looked at me out of very beautiful eyes. She had graying hair but she was still a handsome woman, and kindly, by the look of her.
“Are you in love with her?”
Me, I was startled. “Well, now, ma’am, we been on the run. There’s been no time to take stock, even to talk much.”
“She’s very lovely. It’s the kind of beauty that grows on one.”
“Yes, ma’am, she’s right pretty. Only I’m a drifting man. I’m loose-footed, don’t belong nowhere. You show me a trail and I got to follow it wherever it goes. That’s no life for a woman.”
“My husband was that way. And he’s made a good husband.”
Now all this here talk was making me uneasy. If Molly hadn’t been in such a sight of trouble I’d have taken out, right then, right fast.
“You’ve got a nice place here,” I said.
“We made it nice. The two of us, together.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I looked around. “You got a basin where I could wash up?”
“By the back door. There’s a towel there, and there’s soap.”
When I went outside to wash up for supper, the man was leading two horses up from the stable. Our gear was already on them. He tied them at the hitch rail. “You might have to leave fast,” he said.
“How much do I owe you?” I said.
He shrugged. “Sixty dollars a head if you want to buy them. If you want to use them, just turn them loose. They’ll come home.”
“I’ll buy.” I let him lead the way back inside, trusting no man behind me at such a time. His wife was putting some food on the table and Molly was pouring coffee.
Taking money from my pocket, I counted out one hundred and twenty dollars in gold coins. He stared at them, and then at me. “Not often we see gold hereabouts,” he said.
“It’s honest money,” I said, “and mighty little of it left.”
Now that wasn’t true but I didn’t figure to let anybody have an idea I was carrying. Even some folks you’d expect to be honest can become greedy at such a time. I like people, but I count my change and I always cut the deck.
Yet resting awhile was a pleasant thing. Theirs was a comfortable place, with window curtains and rag rugs on the floor and all the dishes washed clean and shining. The floors looked like a body could eat from them, although I’ve no idea why anybody would want to.
Molly was talking to them and I was considering. We’d come a far piece and we’d held to it pretty well, but I’d no doubt those chasing us were far behind. It was likely that some of them had ridden right up the road to Canon City, which was the town nearest and the one we’d be likely to ride for if we wanted help from the law. They’d try to intercept us there. Only I had no such idea.
Molly was an easy talking girl and in her world there were no strangers. I kept thinking how she and Ma would get along and what company she’d be for Ma, but I shied away from the thought. Ideas like that are a trap. They can get a man into trouble. There were a lot of horizons I wanted to cross before I got into double harness.
“If you wanted to double back,” the old gent was saying, “you could head north for Lookout Mountain, then follow Copper Gulch. Headin’ north you are apt to get yourself cornered.”
“How’s that?”
“Royal Gorge. It
’s a thousand feet deep and right across your trail. Canon City’s right at the mouth.”
Now I just sat there, cussing myself for a damn fool. Shows a man how forgetful he can become. I’d known about that gorge for years and then had clean forgotten it. How could a man forget anything as big and deep as that gorge?
“These men know this country?”
“Seems likely.”
“Then they’ll be waiting for you at Grape Creek and Copper Gulch. Least, that’s the way to figure.”
He was right, of course. I finished eating, trying to think our way out of it.
“If you go north to Lookout,” the old man said, “you can take Road Gulch east to Texas Creek. That’s your best bet.”
Getting up, coffee in hand, I walked to the door. Turning there I said, “You’d better forget you ever saw us. They’ll find our tracks, so just tell them you and the wife weren’t at home, that we took a couple of horses and left.”
“I don’t like to lie.”
“Mister, some of these men would stop at nothing, torture and murder included. The best way is for you to know nothing except that you missed some horses and grub.”
“Well, all right. I’ll give it thought.”
Molly’s eyes met mine and she got up. She was tired but so was I, and we’d only started running. Now we had fresh horses and I had a new idea. A damned fool idea, but maybe a good one.
Molly came out, saying good-bye, and I gave her a hand to the saddle. I didn’t envy her, riding sidesaddle over all that rough country, but she’d handled it mighty well.
We took off, heading toward Lookout Mountain, and when we glanced back, they waved.
DICKIE?” THE WOMAN with the lovely blue eyes was thoughtful. “Did you see how thick in the waist that young man was? Seems odd, somehow, a young man like him, so neat and trim except for that thick waist.”
“A money belt, more than likely, Bess. He paid us in gold, offhand like. I mean, not like giving up his last cent. More like a man who knew what he had and wasn’t worried about money.”
“Of course, there’s that little ol’ trail by way of Gem Mountain. You didn’t think to mention that to him.”
“Man on a good horse, like the sorrel, he could get to the Road Gulch near Texas Creek maybe a half hour before them.”
“You could have your lunch there, Dickie. I’ll just fix it for you while you’re saddling up.”
She paused. “You’d better take your heavy coat, Dickie. It’s apt to be chilly, waiting up there.”
She hesitated again. “Such a nice young couple. I did enjoy talking to her.”
When he returned with the saddled horse she was at the door with a lunch rolled in a thin towel. She put it in a burlap bag. “I was thinking, Dickie. I did so enjoy talking to that young woman, and she seemed real handy around the house.”
“Now, Bess, don’t you be thinking that way. She might be suspicious of us.”
“Even for a little while? After all, there’s been no trouble about the others.”
“We’re kindly people, Bess, that’s the reason. But a sharp young lady around, and especially if she saw his horse or guns or even the gold. Now don’t you be thinking of it. I know how you’d like company but it’s taking too big a chance.”
“Only for a couple of weeks? One week, even?”
“Now, Bess, I’ve got to be going. If I’m to be there first it’s a hard ride.”
“You do as you think best, Dickie, but do wear the coat while you’re waiting. Those old rocks are chilly and you could catch your death.”
WE TOPPED OUT on a shoulder of Elkhorn Mountain and I glanced back. It lay all green and still under the morning sun. Turning away, my eye caught something—I looked back.
Dust? It was too far off to see. Might be smoke. Or maybe just a change in the type of vegetation. I felt myself frowning. It did look like dust.
The old man had been right. There was every chance Rolon Taylor or Pride Hovey would have somebody watching at both Grape Creek and Copper Gulch as they were the only routes east over the mountains. Turning west was the right idea.
Texas Creek? I considered that. If we crossed the Arkansas near Texas Creek we could head into the hills and to Denver. There, with a good lawyer, we could probably get things settled. Yet the idea bothered me.
Jefferson Henry knew a lot more about the courts and law than I did and, for that matter, so did Pride Hovey. Nor did I want to get tied up in any long legal argument. I wanted to be over the hills to yonder.
There were shadows in the canyon when we reached it, but only here and there, for the hour was not yet late.
“I’ve been thinking, Molly. Maybe it would be better to go back to town, back to German Schafer and the railroad. They wouldn’t be expecting it, certainly, and the answers all seem to be there.”
“Are you sure? Weren’t we trying to get away from there?”
“Yes, but they’ve all followed us. Or most of them have. I don’t know, maybe it’s a foolish idea.”
Yet the more I thought of it the better I liked it. We had pulled them away from the town, and they would scarcely expect us to return. Back there I could be in touch with Portis, and through him with the United States Marshal’s office.
There were scattered trees and some clumps of rock where we emerged from the gorge. We were walking our horses when I glanced off to the south in time to catch a wink of light. I spurred my horse and startled, he leaped, bumping Molly’s horse. Something rapped me hard on the skull and I felt myself falling. My horse sprang from under me and I fell among some rocks, rolling over and dropping into a dark space between them. I clawed at the rocks, trying to catch myself, then I hit bottom and all was blackness. Through the closing darkness in my skull I heard, I thought I heard, another shot.
MOLLY’S HORSE SPRANG away, following Milo Talon’s horse. She tried to rein in but, remembering that other shot, she rode on into the shelter of a clump of rocks. Drawing up, she turned in the saddle.
Something stirred in the rocks and her heart leaped. Then—it was the old man! The man from whom they bought the horses!
Relieved, she said, “Oh? It’s you! Thank God!” She looked back toward where Milo had fallen. Nothing stirred. A pleasant stretch of green grass, some trees and brush, here and there clumps of rocks. The shadows were growing longer.
“We’d better ride back to the ranch,” the old man said gently. “He’s been shot, I think, and killed. I’ll come back in the morning for the body.”
“But maybe he’s only hurt! He may be lying there—!”
“He’s dead. Gone. It was a perfect shot. Besides, didn’t you hear that other shot? They are still around. We wouldn’t dare look. Not now. You come along with me. You’ll be with us.”
“Well,” she was reluctant, “maybe. Until they are gone.” Then she said passionately, “He just can’t be dead! He can’t!”
The old man smiled, taking her bridle rein. “You will feel better after you’ve had something to eat, and Bess is waiting for you. She’ll be surprised, but she’ll be pleased. She’s a lovely woman and I like doing little things to please her.”
“But Milo?”
He smiled. “Tomorrow’s another day. He’ll keep until tomorrow.”
CHAPTER 22
COLD … IT WAS cold, very cold. Starting to turn over, I banged my head hard, then put out a hand. A cold wall, something cold and hard above me.
I was dead. No, not dead. I could feel cold. I could feel pain.
I was buried alive. I was in my coffin. They believed I was dead and they had buried me.
There was a moment of sheer panic, then I fought myself to calmness. Tentatively, I put out a hand. Stone. It was a stone wall, a rock wall. My hand went down. I was lying upon sand.
I could lift my hand; it moved but a few inches until it came in contact with stone. Now my eyes were wide open. It seemed a little more gray on my left side so I put out my hand.
Emptiness. No rock wall there
. Starting to ease myself over, I stopped suddenly. Something had moved, something above me. A slight trickle of sand, a small pebble that bounced off the rock wall, then again, and again.
Something was up there, something that moved with incredible softness. I was afraid. My hand went to my hip. My pistol was still there, held in place by its thong, so was my bowie. I slid the knife from its scabbard and held it ready. Something was crawling about up there. It was a man. Rough cloth rubbed against rock.
He was above me. How high? Maybe fifteen feet. Slowly, my memory was fitting circumstances to recollection.
I had been shot. I started to lift my hand and pain shot through me like a knife. My arm was hurt. With my other hand I felt of my skull. There was blood, caked, matted blood in my hair and on my face. Gingerly, my fingers touched my scalp. A cut, raw and tender. A bullet must have hit me, cut my scalp, given me a concussion.
Lying still, I listened. A rock fell near me. Then a voice, a familiar voice. “Talon?” It was the old man from the ranch.
Starting to speak, I suddenly closed my mouth. Why was he here? How could he know where to look for me? I lay quiet, wanting to speak, yet every sense warning me not to.
“Talon? If you’re alive, speak to me. I want to help you. Molly is with us. She’s at the ranch with Bess. We’ve got her now. We’ll keep her, for a while.”
Lying very still, I tried not even to blink. Why had he come out in the dark to find me? And how had he come upon this place? Tracks? Did he follow tracks? But we had left few tracks, very hard to find. I would wait. I would think.
Why was he here? Why had he spoken so strangely of Molly? “We’ve got her now. We’ll keep her,—for a while.” What had he meant by that?
Slowly, it was coming back. The old man had told us how to go, by Road Gulch to Texas Creek. Nobody else knew where we were, yet I had been shot? By whom? Could Rolon Taylor’s boys have found me so quickly? Or Pride Hovey’s men? It was scarcely possible.
I had been shot. I remembered that, just a sharp rap on the skull at the time, then falling, hitting rocks, rolling over, falling again.
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