by Short, Luke;
When Jen returned with the dripping wet rifle, she said, “It’s clean and re-loaded.” She bent down and kissed him lightly on the cheek. “I’ll get our horse, Reese.”
He nodded and in the interval between then and when Jen returned sleep overwhelmed him. She had brought her blanket roll and food with her, but when she saw him sleeping she put it aside, gently extricated his rifle from under his body and then took up his vigil.
During the hour he slept Jen saw no movement on the canyon bench, and while she watched she speculated on the future. First, she would have to get Reese to a doctor. With his torn leg would he be able to ride? Or should she hunt down the nearest ranch for a wagon? She knew Moffitt had a doctor but would Reese allow himself to be taken there? She doubted it. While she herself could carry the news of Orv’s ambush to Jim Daley, Reese would insist on seeing him too, and while the ambush had taken place outside Sutton County, Reese would want Orv’s trial held in Bale. Farmer, Orv’s attorney—no, she was thinking too far ahead. The immediate problem was to get Reese in the safe hands of a doctor.
A movement she caught in the corner of her eye swivelled her head a little; she saw a moving object far out on the flats, so far that she could identify it only as a horse and mounted rider headed west. Could it be Orv? He had probably bidden his horse somewhere back from the canyon’s rim rock. Reaching it after the ambush and careful not to be identified, he could have traveled the cliff north until he found a break in it, descended and headed west to warn the Hoads who were driving the stolen cattle. This was only a guess, and she made herself be patient until Reese wakened and could give his judgement of the far rider.
When Reese did awaken, Jen helped him to a sitting position, where he was supported by a thick alder branch at his back. His face was flushed now, and Jen guessed that the fever had started. She told him of the distant rider, and he listened with a curious indifference, his eyes shining with fever.
When she was finished Reese said, “He knows he didn’t kill us, and he knows you’ll get word to Sheriff Braden. He’s probably on his way to pull off his boys and scatter the herd.”
“Then shall we try to make Moffitt?” Jen asked. “Shall I get a wagon?”
“No,” Reese said flatly. “We’ll ride double and make camp at dark. We’ll make the Moffitt road by the middle of the morning and flag down the Bale stage when it passes.” He paused. “Now, why did you follow me from the stage station, Jen?”
“You’re no good in court without a corroborating witness, Reese. They’ll be tried in a different district under a different judge, and Callie will be tried with them. What good would it be to find them and give the information to Braden if he can’t get somebody besides you to testify against Callie?”
“But how did you find me?”
Jen told him of the stable-boy’s directions, of her decision to ride the rim rock instead of the more difficult canyon and of hearing the exchange of shots which attracted her. As she talked Jen saw beads of perspiration form on Reese’s forehead and upper lip and she knew that his leg was torturing him.
Food was needed, she thought, and she unwrapped her blanket roll and served up her meagre fare of bread and leather-tough jerky. Reese had scarcely taken two bites when he laid his bread on the leaves and tucked his jerky in his shirt pocket. “Jen, I’m caving in,” Reese said thinly. “I want to try and make that saddle while I still can.”
Wordlessly, Jen handed over the rifle, then rose and moved up beside him. Together they managed to get him on to his feet, and again Reese leaned on her. This time Jen could help him by grabbing his belt to lift and steady him. When they halted beside the horse Reese reached out and stroked the gelding’s nose. “He’ll hold still for a wrong-side mount, Jen.” His speech was oddly slurred and it seemed to surprise even himself. He looked down at Jen and smiled. “You’d better make it the first time, Jen. Turn the stirrup so I can get my left foot in it, then get under me and boost me. Once, I’m belly down across the saddle, swing my left leg astride over the horse. When I’m up there, don’t try to put my right foot in the stirrup. Let it dangle.”
Grasping the horn with his left hand Reese waited until Jen turned the stirrup toward him, holding onto his belt with her free hand. Putting his weight on his stiff-armed right arm and rifle and grasping the saddle horn, Reese swung up his left leg, and Jen guided the stirrup toward his boot. Then swiftly, as Reese pulled on the horn, she pushed from behind, and Reese fell across the saddle, belly down. As he had directed, Jen swung his left leg over the horse’s back, and Reese was astride. Now, with his left leg levering, he edged himself over the cantle and into the saddle. His right leg dangled straight down, and Jen knew that the raw exit wound would be pressed against the saddle skirt. The motion of the horse would make it bleed again and it would, Jen knew grimly, be a sustained agony. She said nothing, however, and went back into the thicket for her blanket roll and Reese’s hat. When the blanket roll was tied ahead of the pommel, Jen picked up Reese’s rifle, moved to the stream, cleaned it as she had done before, then slipped it into the empty saddle scabbard.
“Finished,” she said. “Now let me lead my horse over to yours, Reese. We’ll need your food and blankets.”
Reese only nodded and now Jen gathered up the reins and, leading her horse, sought a break in the alder brush. Once through it she glanced back and saw that Reese’s face was set in a grimness that almost frightened her.
At the downed horse, Jen worked Reese’s blanket roll free and tied it behind the cantle. He was silent all through it, his head sunk as if in reverie. Jen had to remind him to free his boot from the stirrup so she could use it to mount. Once she was settled behind him, Reese lifted the horse into motion, heading north across the tree-stippled flats which cast late afternoon shadows.
Reese, it turned out, could not keep awake, or was it, Jen wondered, that he could not keep conscious? His head would loll and his body from the waist up would sag until Jen had to put her arms around his waist to keep him in the saddle. Finally she slipped the reins from his hand to correct the almost aimless wandering of the puzzled horse. At full dusk they came to a cluster of big pinyons that bordered a small seep, and Jen knew that here they must make camp, for Reese for the dozenth time had slid off again into unconsciousness.
Jen took Reese’s hat off his head, dismounted, went to the seep, filled his hat with water, then came back and pitched the contents into Reese’s face. The shock of it roused him and Jen said, “We’ve got to get you down, Reese. It should be on the right side again, shouldn’t it?”
Reese only nodded. First Jen untied both blanket rolls and spread out the blankets on the flat under a big pinyon. Afterwards she went back to the horse and said to Reese, “Lean as far over as you can, Reese, and I’ll get your leg over. Get belly down like you did before. Here’s your rifle.”
Reese did as he was instructed and Jen worked his leg over the cantle, then circled the horse, got behind Reese and slowly eased him down. His left leg buckled and for a moment she had the full weight of him before he caught himself. Afterwards she led him to the blankets, slacked him onto them and covered him with one. As she stood above him looking at his flushed face, the lids closed over his unseeing eyes.
That was done, but what would tomorrow bring, Jen wondered with quiet despair.
6
Around midnight Orv, who had finally circled back to the creek, was picked up by a watcher who called, “Sing out, Mister.”
He recognized Buddy’s voice and said, “It’s me, Orv.”
Buddy was mounted and therefore ready for fight or flight, and Orv approved. He approached now and reined in.
“Figured it was you, Uncle Orv, but wasn’t taking a chance.”
“Get me to some whisky,” Orv said, then added, “How are things?”
“Fine as silk.”
“Not any more,” Orv said grimly. “Who’s night herder?” Buddy told him Big John was and Orv said, “Get him in. Where’s camp?”
“Hi, boys,” Orv greeted them, and they both answered, “Hi, Pa.”
“Get me a drink,” Orv said, even before he dismounted.
June went over to the rickety spring wagon out of the circle of firelight and returned with a jug. Orv, out of the saddle now, accepted it gratefully, removed the cob cork and drank deeply under the pleased scrutiny of his two sons.
When he had caught his breath, Orv said, “Got anything to eat?”
Emmett promptly headed for the grub box, moving with a bear-like, pigeon-toed walk that was almost muscle bound.
By the time he had finished his second drink, Emmett had retrieved a greasy skillet half-full of fried meat and put it on the fire to warm up. He shoved the coffee pot onto the bordering coals, then went back to the grub box to get a handful of tin cups. Courteously both boys waited till their father had sampled the jug again and lifted out a piece of steak from the pan to chase his drink. By that time Big John and Buddy had ridden in and dismounted. Buddy took his uncle’s horse and tied it and his own back in the timber. Big John, after greeting his father, filled a cup with coffee from the black pot. It was only after he tasted the coffee and found it tepid that he poured all the coffee back into the pot and placed it again on the new fire.
Buddy returned now, picked up the jug, took a drink and passed it to Emmett. While the three brothers were having their drinks, Buddy said, “Sump’n gone wrong, Uncle Orv?”
Orv’s three sons exchanged glances and then looked at their father. Orv had seated himself cross-legged before the fire, and now his three boys and Buddy stationed themselves across the fire from him so they could watch his face. Big John sat down but the others stood.
Orv’s opening remark was, “Boys, I run out of whisky and that lost me my shootin’ eye.” They all smiled at that, and then Orv began his story. He started it with the seeming irrelevance of his whipping of Wash Plunket, but that led on to Wash’s information that Reese and the lawyer woman had ridden out of Bale three mornings ago, presumably in search of the R-Cross cattle. He told of meeting Callie and afterwards stationing himself above Copper Canyon on the hunch that Reese and the woman were headed for it. They came, saw the sign, and Orv said he saw them bed down at Armistead’s last night. Reckoning that Reese would return and pick up the sign this side of the mountain, Orv said, he stationed himself at the canyon mouth, figuring Reese would come down it. However, Reese had crossed him up. Instead of traveling the canyon, Reese had dropped down the Moffitt road till it descended from the bench and then had followed the base of the bench to the canyon mouth.
“That put him a far piece away from me because I figured him for the canyon. Still, I had to take a chance.” Orv wiped his greasy hands on his pants and said, “How’s that coffee, boys?”
Emmett moved to pick up the pot and Orv resumed, “Know how it is, shooting downhill? You’re likely to overshoot so you’re mighty careful not to. Well, I got him in the leg and killed his horse. He fell clear and then forted up behind his downed horse. We swapped shots for maybe twenty minutes but at that range, danged if I could draw down fine enough on him.”
He accepted his coffee from Emmett who then gave the others their coffee, lifted his own cup and again faced his father across the fire. Country-fashion none of the boys spoke, nor would they speak until Orv had finished his rambling account of the failed bushwhack of a kinsman.
“Who do you reckon come along then? I’ll tell you. It was that lawyer woman, riding hell for leather out of the canyon. I tried to scare her off but she wouldn’t scare. She seen Reese, but before she come up to him, she hid her horse in the creek brush. She come out afoot then, and I tried to scare her off again, but she never paid any attention to me. She fiddled around with Reese’s leg and then, by God, you won’t believe what she dare next! She stood on that dead horse with her skirts out hiding Reese from me. Then she put herself between him and me and damned if she didn’t help him back into the brush. I tried to get Reese without hurting her, but I couldn’t do it at that range. They made the brush. I pulled out then while they was busy hiding so they never got a look at me. That was about the middle of the afternoon.”
The boys looked at each other, and it was Buddy who spoke first. “Uncle Orv, what’s Callie going to say about this?”
“Hell, she won’t care. I made sure of that when I talked to her at their new line shack.”
It was June, the youngest and rashest, who said predictably, “Pa, why don’t we get going now? He’s hurt and they’re riding double. We could finish the job easy.”
Orv looked at him almost pityingly. He reached for the jug, took a drink from it and set it down by Big John before he answered.
“Well now, June, if that was the thing to do, I could have done it myself, couldn’t I?”
June said brashly, “Then why didn’t you?”
Orv looked at the other boys and said, “One of you tell him.”
Big John looked at June. “You dang little fool. Reese never saw Pa and that woman lawyer never either. They don’t know who shot Reese. If we tracked them down and killed him, that woman lawyer sure as hell will.”
A look of sheepishness came over June’s thin face, and he smiled foolishly. It was Emmett, however, who asked the question that puzzled them all.
“Pa, why was that woman riding down the canyon while Reese come around under the bench?”
“I’ve been studying on that all night,” Orv answered. “Maybe them two figured that the herd might still be in the canyon and that we wouldn’t hurt her.”
Now Big John spoke for the first time. “If it was me, I’d have got them both.”
“But it was me, not you,” Orv said quietly. “That woman gets hurt and who do they look for first? Why, Orville Hoad, the man she damn near got hung.”
The boys were silent now, each in his own way reviewing Orv’s moves and seeing the necessity for each one. Their father and uncle had to post himself there at the canyon mouth in order to remain hidden. If he’d waited down on the flats, chances were that Reese would have spotted him and in the shoot-out, Reese would have won.
It was Big John who finally broke the silence. “What’s our move now, Pa?”
Orville finished his coffee and before answering took out his plug of tobacco, cut off a chew and spooned it to his mouth atop the knife blade. He settled the chew in his cheek, then said, “Well, if I was Reese and had me a sore leg, I’d get word to the sheriff in Moffitt that there’s some rustled beef in his county. Quickest way would be to tell the stage driver. So the thing to do now is head the herd south and out of the county. Two of you can do that, Emmett and June. Big John and Buddy, you come back with me, just in case.”
“You expecting trouble, Uncle Orv?”
“Can’t tell yet. Reese will likely tell Jim Daley what he was looking for, if he ain’t already told him. Daley will suspicion us Hoads but he can’t prove anything. Buddy, you and Big John and me can beat Reese home easy. When Daley comes to see us, we ain’t even been away. June and Emmett are up somewhere south in the Wheelers getting some young bear meat. They’ll come back when they get it. That’s our story with Callie and Minnie and Ty backing it up.”
Now he shoved himself to his feet. “Let’s get some sleep, boys.”
For Jen the night had been nearly sleepless. Early in the evening a delirium came to Reese, and there was little Jen could do to help him except keep him covered and bathe his face with water from the seep. In the small hours of the morning, when the wood Jen was husbanding for the fire was almost gone, Reese’s fever broke. When Jen was sure he was lucid, she stripped off his sleeveless shirt and helped him squirm into the extra shirt he had carried in his blanket roll. Kneeling beside him, she buttoned it and then settled back on her heels.
“Reese, I’ve got to get you to a doctor
. You can’t ride today, can you?”
“I don’t think I could make the horse, Jen. No.”
“And I won’t leave you for Orville to shoot. He may be out there in the night now.”
“He isn’t here or I’d be dead long ago.”
“What do I do, Reese?” Jen asked helplessly.
Reese closed his eyes and said, “Let me think, Jen.” She watched his gaunted face which held a beard stubble that made it seem even thinner.
Presently he opened his eyes and said, “Riding is out and a ‘travois’ is out, so here’s what you do. Take off at daylight and head north for the Moffitt road. It’s about eight miles, I’d guess.” He lifted his sweat-soaked shirt that he had just shed. “Tear this into strips, Jen. Use them for markers. Tie them to a tree branch where they’ll show up to you coming back. Every time you put one up, take a look back at the country you’ve just travelled so you’ll see how it should look coming back.”
Jen frowned. “Do I go back to Armistead’s and bring a wagon?”
“No, Jen. Joe Early will be driving the stage. Flag him down and bring him here.”
“From the stage?”
“With the stage,” Reese corrected her. “This country is flat enough. It’s only got a few gullies, and Joe can handle them.”
“But cross-country, Reese, with no road?”
“The Fortyniners didn’t have a road, did they?”
Jen smiled faintly. “Of course not. I’m a little thickheaded at this hour of the morning, I guess.” Then she added, “I don’t know, Reese. What if you go out of your head again?”
“What if I do? I can’t go anywhere, and if I thrash around, that leg will pull my senses back.”
“All right.” She reached behind her for a tin cup of water and gave it to Reese, saying, “Drink this and then try to sleep, Reese.”