by Short, Luke;
A sick wrath was in Sam then, and without a word he yanked his horse around and rode away from the others. He heard Priest calling to him and did not stop.
Later he was roused by the drops of water on his hand, and he glanced at the sky. It was almost dark, and he looked around him with a kind of surprise. The black, aching rage in him was dulled now, and he had not been aware of the passage of time.
Reining up now, he thought of what to do. He must build this all over again, and this time with more care, more patience. Twice this day Will had slipped through his hands, but Will could make mistakes. Thinking of it now, Sam decided that Will had already made one. If he had a hurt man with him, that meant he’d have to hole up, and in time his hide-out could be found. It would take all his men and Bide’s crew, but they would find him.
Sam put his horse toward Boundary now, patient again as the large, sparse drops of rain thickened and turned into the first full bunting of the storm.
Long after dark Sam rode into Boundary. The slicker which had been on the saddle of the horse he had chosen at the stampede was too tight and, putting it on, he had split it across the shoulders. He was wet and cold and bone-weary, and the sight of Boundary, its streets pooled glassily with the lain, did not cheer him.
He looked at the warm light of the Belle Fourche and rejected it. More than anything else he was hungry and, turning in at the tie rail in front of the Stockman’s House, he tried to remember when he had eaten last and could not.
He stepped down into the mud and tied his horse, oblivious to the fact that he was leaving it out in the rain. He had swung under the tie rail and was mounting the steps of the hotel porch when he heard his name called sharply: “Sam! Sam!” He wheeled ponderously and saw a man bolt down the steps of the Belle Fourche, dodge under the tie rail, lose his footing, fall to one knee in the mud, and come up again, cursing. He recognized the voice of Russ Schultz, and a faint premonition tugged at him.
Russ splashed uncertainly across the street and ducked under the near tie rail and came up to him. His heavy face, turned up now into the rain-streaked light, was harried and anxious, and he said, “You heard?”
“What?”
“Kneen got Bide.”
Sam accepted this, repeating it to himself, but he was thinking, That leaves just me. Oddly this news had no power to move him. Kneen wasn’t bluffing, and Bide thought he was, and that was all there was to it. Sam’s mind was almost placid, barren of regret; he was aware of his hunger and of a vast, gathering impatience.
When he did not speak Schultz gave him the account of the shoot-out. Hearing it, Sam had a fleeting impersonal admiration for both men, and that was all. Schultz had talked himself out, and there was nothing left to say.
Sam said then, “Where’s Kneen?”
“In his room.”
Sam made a move to go, and Schultz said quickly, “Be careful, Sam. Miss Evarts is there.” Then, as if he had just thought of it, he added, “He wants to see you.”
“Sure he does,” Sam said mildly and went in. Schultz followed him as far as the lobby and watched him climb the stairs and he was puzzled.
Kneen had been moved from his old room, and Sam had to come down again and ask where he was. He was directed to the second-floor-front suite.
Sam approached the suite and did not knock. He palmed the knob and stepped in and saw Celia sitting in a chair beside the table in front of the parlor’s middle window.
She was dressed in black riding clothes, and Sam looked at her a moment, feeling nothing except the old, old impatience. Celia rose and said, “He’s in here, Sam. Don’t talk to him long,” and started for the next room, and Sam wordlessly followed her.
He paused just inside the door and looked curiously at Kneen. The old man was flat out in bed, no pillow under his head, and when he turned his head to see who entered Sam saw his pale eyes were sick, pain-filled.
Sam tramped over to the bed and regarded Kneen a moment, his face unrelenting, unpitying. He said softly, “You only did half a job, Joe.” Kneen wet his lips with his tongue and said in a fragile, toneless voice, “Stay off Hatchet, Sam. I’ll warn you like I warned him.”
Sam’s smile was slow, musing. He found he had no business with Kneen after all, and he turned away and went out of the room. Celia had left Kneen’s room and was standing in the middle of the parlor.
Sam paused, looking at her, his heavy face impassive, his eyes watchful. He was aware that his slicker was dripping water; he could hear the drops faintly touch the rug, and he looked at Celia as if she were someone he hardly knew.
He said mildly, “Are you happy now?”
Celia said, “Give up, Sam. It’s over.”
Sam’s smile was slow, again musing, and he said, “No. No, I don’t think so.” He paused. “There’s Will,” he suggested gently. There was no expression in Celia’s face except a kind of pity, which Sam did not see.
“Yes sir,” he murmured, as if to himself, “there’s Will,” And he left her, closing the door behind him.
Downstairs in the lobby Schultz came up to him, and Sam went out the door and halted on the porch. Schultz followed him out, and Sam stood there, looking out at the rain blurring the reflected lights in the hundred small puddles of the street, feeling his impatience.
Schultz said, “What happened to Priest? He pulled in at the store and fell off his horse.”
Sam didn’t answer him, and they were quiet.
Schultz said presently then in a bitter, unguarded voice, “I wish he’d gone after Ballard like he had the chance.”
Sam turned slowly and said, “Who?”
“Bide. She told him. She tried to send him out, but he was worried about Kneen. He could of missed him.”
Sam said, “Who?”
“Bide. He—”
“Who told him?” Sam asked.
“Lottie Priest. She come and told him about Will last night, and he wouldn’t go. He—”
“Shut up,” Sam said gently. He was looking at Schultz, not really looking at him either. His slow, methodical mind considered this, first with a tentative, faintly skeptical speculation, and then with curiosity, and then, much later, with a rising conviction.
He said, “Why, yes,” as if in answer to some question Schultz had asked him, and he went down the steps and turned upstreet, hurrying now.
Schultz watched him go, and he was puzzled and faintly uneasy. Sometimes he didn’t understand Danfelser, and this was one of the times. Schultz went back into the empty lobby and, after a turn through it, sank into a chair. He did not know what to do with himself. There was a man lying dead on a table in the back room of Johnson’s Hardware Store, and because of this Schultz didn’t know what to do with himself. His was a bought loyalty, and it was on the market again, with no immediate taker. Sam had surprised him by not wanting it, and Schultz, a simple man, was at a loss. He heard the lobby door open and looked over and saw Jim Young, his slicker dripping rain, tramp through the lobby and mount the stairs, and Schultz speculated idly and with complete neutrality on his business.
He was still speculating on it when Jim Young and Celia Evarts came downstairs. Celia had on a man’s slicker and Stetson, and she was in a hurry. They both went out, and Schultz stared idly at the doors. He yawned and then, curiosity stirring, he rose and went out onto the porch. Looking upstreet and then down, he could not see them and he forgot them.
It came to him then, watching the steady slanting rain, that he was through here. Across the street at the Belle Fourche there were men waiting for their orders, and he did not know what to tell them because nobody had told him.
A feeling of bafflement, almost resentment welled up in him at the thought Danfelser couldn’t use him, and Bide was dead, and he was through.
He wandered back into the hotel and slacked into a chair and presently slept. He was awakened by someone shaking him roughly. Opening his eyes, he looked into Sam Danfelser’s face. Something had happened, Schultz knew; he could tell it by
the faint, brash glee in Sam’s eyes as he stood looking down at him.
Sam said, “I know where Will is.” Schultz came out of his chair. He had a purpose now; he had orders.
“Everybody’s over at the Belle Fourche. Give me a minute,” he said.
“No,” Sam said. There was a half-smile on his lips. “I just want you along.” He started for the door now, Schultz at his elbow, and said mildly, “Why didn’t I think of her before?”
Chapter 24
Celia stood in the archway of the livery barn while Jim Young saddled her horse and brought him to her.
She saw the fear and the worry in his face as he came up beside her and handed her the reins, and she said, “Will’s with him, Jim. We’ll do everything we can.”
“I know,” Jim said quietly. He gave her a lift into the saddle and handed her the saddlebag filled with medicine that the doctor had given them, and she took the reins. “You don’t blame the doctor, do you, Jim? Kneen had first call on him.”
“I don’t blame him,” Jim said tonelessly.
Celia said quietly, somberly, “When you bring him out, Jim, be careful. Be awful careful nobody’s following.”
Jim nodded and said gratefully, “Thanks, Miss Evarts,” and saw her ride out into the night and vanish.
Celia watched the road behind her, and she was certain she was not followed. She tightened the slicker strap around her throat and settled down to the long ride, trying to summon the patience to make this bearable. She would never forget the look on Jim Young’s face as he stepped into the parlor back in the hotel. She saw that tight, somber look on his young face and thought instantly, They got Will, and the relief she felt when she learned it was Mel who was hurt made her feel a kind of shame now.
But not much shame, for how else should she feel? Bide’s death this morning had been ugly enough, but it had resolved the bitter fight, freeing Will and Hatchet with him. All day long she had sat beside Joe Kneen, blessing his courage, trying in the only way she could to thank him for herself and Will. But all during the day, too, she had wondered with a kind of dread what Sam would do with Bide dead. Tonight she had her answer. Not in words, perhaps, but in Sam’s stubborn, taciturn face, in his insane, implacable hatred for Will.
Jim Young’s news had brought a wild relief, but it was short-lived when she remembered Sam. For she remembered another thing, too, a few words that were graven in memory. Will had spoken them. I promise you one thing, he had said. Sam won’t get a chance to kill me until Hatchet is on its feet again. And now Hatchet was free, and Will was left to carry out what was implied in his promise. He wouldn’t dodge Sam now; he would hunt him out.
So if she was honest with herself, she would admit that the medicine for Mel Young was only an excuse, for her riding out in this rain to Cavanaugh’s. She had come to see Will, not only to tell him, to warn him of Sam, but because she needed him, had to see him. And being honest, she admitted it to herself and, having done so, felt better.
The rain seemed to slacken when she reached the timber above the foothills, but she knew that was because of the trees. She knew these trails intimately and she rode with a reckless haste that she could not explain. The dripping timber around her smelled of cold pitch and rotting needles, and as she climbed higher and deeper into Indian Ridge she could hear water runneling along the center of the trail. Long hours after midnight she put her horse down the trail into Ray Cavanaugh’s tight little valley and presently came onto the valley floor and past the corral.
The shack was dark, and as Celia approached it, passing the well, she called softly, “Will! Will!” wondering if he had not reached here yet.
The answer was immediate. “Celia.”
She dismounted, forgetting her horse, and ran for the porch, and Will stepped out in the rain to meet her. Celia had herself in hand now, and she said, “How is he, Will?”
“Sleeping,” Will said. “Come and look.”
Inside the shack Will struck a match and touched it to a stub candle.
Celia covertly, almost hungrily, watched him as the flame crept fully alight. His face looked tired and drawn, and his eyes were sunken deep in their sockets. He glanced at her, surprising her watching him, and his face was less grave and he smiled.
Together, then, they tiptoed over to the bunk. It was still on the floor, and Mel Young was covered by its dirty blankets. He lay on his back, breathing the deep, slow breaths of exhaustion. His face was flushed, but he was quiet. His shoulder was hidden by bandages of torn shirt, and Celia noted with relief that they were not stained with blood.
She glanced at Will, and he was eyeing her quizzically.
“Shouldn’t we let him sleep?” Celia said.
Will nodded, and Celia turned away. Will followed her out onto the porch and closed the door behind him. They sat down, side by side, backs against the log wall.
I can say it now, she thought and said, “Bide is dead, Will. Joe killed him.” She told him of the fight at the station and she watched his face, unable to see it in the darkness. His presence was close, and what she told him seemed somehow less dreadful because of it. She told him of Kneen, that the doctor had thought him out of danger if he got through the night, which he seemed to be doing, and all the while Will said nothing. Even when she finished telling him he did not speak.
Presently she said, “What are you thinking, Will?”
“Of Kneen,” he answered slowly, and then, much later, he added, “Of Sam, too, I reckon.”
“He came into Kneen’s room,” Celia said quietly. “He was like a man walking in his sleep with his eyes open.” She reached out and touched him and said miserably, “Will, all he wants is to get you, to kill you.”
“He can try.”
“He will try.”
“All right,” Will said calmly. “I’m through dodging him, though.”
“I know. I didn’t mean that. Only when you ride into Boundary, Will, he’ll—”
Celia felt Will’s hand laid gently across her mouth, and then it fell away, and cold, stark fear was in her. She heard the whisper of cloth as he rose, and she rose, too, beside him. She held her breath, straining every nerve to hear as they both listened. It came to her then—the soft squishing of a horse approaching from behind the house.
She heard something else, too, now. It was the whisper of Will’s gun sight raking the worn leather of his holster as he lifted his gun out.
She felt his arm laid across her, brushing her against the door, and she whispered wildly, “Take my horse, Will, and get out!”
“Go inside,” Will said gently, and he moved away from her toward the end of the porch.
Celia knew a dismal fear then. The rider approaching couldn’t be Jim Young or he would have sung out. It was Sam, for only Sam would hunt him now. And Will was cornered in the dark. She thought, Any way but this, and she heard her horse whicker nervously.
Celia knew what she would do then. She stepped softly off the porch into the rain, moved quietly toward her horse. Will would be watching the corner of the house, and he wouldn’t know until too late.
When she reached her horse she vaulted into the saddle and savagely roweled him around toward the corrals. The splash he made in turning was loud in the night, and above it Celia heard the sound of a galloping horse.
She heard, too, Will’s wild cry, “Celia!”
Will yelled it into the night and lunged off the porch into the rain, and a rider passed him, galloping headlong.
Will shot blindly, running, and the horse vanished into the darkness, and he hauled up in the rain, a wild despair in him. She had drawn Sam off, and he would kill her, not even knowing whom he was shooting.
And then he heard a movement, faint but unmistakable, behind him, and he wheeled in the slanting rain, alert.
“You’re there, Will. Answer me.”
It was Sam Danfelser’s voice, and it came from the corner of the house. A cold and wicked joy curled somewhere inside Will and he said, “I’m her
e, Sam,” and started for him, running. He heard Sam running, too, and knew it would be toward him and that Sam would shoot as soon as he could see him, just as he himself would shoot.
He ran toward the sound of Sam’s heavy splashing feet and then suddenly, only feet in front of him, the night exploded in a bright, blazing flash Will lunged for that flash, his gun in front of him, and he felt it prod into something and he shot. The shot was muffled, and then Sam’s body smashed into him, a long, bubbling groan rising into the night, and Will lost his footing and fell in the mud.
He came up and heard slow, strangling burble and he lunged again for it and tripped over something on the ground and slipped and sprawled across Sam’s body. It lay face down in the mud, arms above the head, and as Will crawled back to it he heard the wet, rattling sound of a man’s last choking breath.
Will rose and stepped over him and ran blindly toward the corrals. He heard a horse slipping down the trail and then someone called, “Sam?”
Will shot. A bawl rode into the night. “Will! Will! It’s me! She’s all right. She’s all right, I tell you!”
Will, still running toward him, heard Celia call from somewhere ahead of him up the trail: “Will! Will!” and he halted, panting, lifting his face toward the sound of that voice. He could tell, he knew she was all right, and there was an unspeakable gladness in him.
Schultz’s horse moved past him, skirting him widely in the darkness, and Schultz called out then, “I quit, Will. I’ve quit. You hear me?” Will didn’t answer, and Schultz, not waiting for an answer, fled. Will was running blindly toward the trail, a nameless urgency in him, a haste to see her and feel her and speak to her. He saw her horse then and he hauled up, and he saw her step down and come to him. He held her, wordless, in the steady rain.
About the Author
Luke Short is the pen name of Frederick Dilley Glidden (1908–1975), the bestselling, award-winning author of over fifty classic western novels and hundreds of short stories. Renowned for their action-packed story lines, multidimensional characters, and vibrant dialogue, Glidden’s novels sold over thirty million copies. Ten of his novels, including Blood on the Moon, Coroner Creek, and Ramrod, were adapted for the screen. Glidden was the winner of a special Western Heritage Trustees Award and the Levi Strauss Golden Saddleman Award from the Western Writers of America.