Desert Death-Song

by Louis L'Amour

  “Some of them think you were drowned in escaping from jail. I don’t think Van Hardin thinks that, nor Olney. They seem very disturbed. The crowd is in town for Childe’s funeral, and because some of them think you were murdered once Olney got you in jail. Some of our friends.”

  “Betty!” The call came from the street below. It was Van Hardin’s voice.

  “Don’t answer!” Tack Gentry got up. His dark green eyes were hard. “I want him to come up.”

  Betty waited, her eyes wide, listening. Footsteps sounded on the stairway, then the door shoved open. “Bet—” Van Hardin’s voice died out and he stood there, one hand on the door knob, starring at Tack.

  “Howdy, Hardin,” Tack said, “I was hopin’ yuh’d come.”

  Van Hardin said nothing. His powerful shoulders filled the open door, his eyes were set, and the shock was fading from them now.

  “Got a few things to tell yuh, Hardin,” Tack continued gently, “before yuh go out of this feet first I want yuh to know what a sucker yuh’ve been.”

  “A sucker I’ve been?” Hardin laughed. “What chance have yuh got? The street down there is full of my men. Yuh’ve friends there, too, but they lack leadership, they don’t know what to do. My men have their orders. And then, I won’t have any trouble with yuh, Gentry. Yore old friends around here told me all about yuh. Soft, like that uncle of yores.”

  “Ever hear of Black Jack Paris, Hardin?”

  “The gunman? Of course, but what’s he got to do with yuh?”

  “Nothin’, now. He did once, up in Ellsworth, Kansas. They dug a bed for him next mornin’, Hardin. He was too slow. Yuh said I was soft? Well, maybe I was once. Maybe in spots I still am, but yuh see, since the folks around here have seen me I’ve been over the cattle trails, been doin’ some Injun fightin’ and rustler killin’. It makes a sight of change in a man, Hardin.

  “That ain’t what I wanted yuh to know. I wanted yuh to know what a fool yuh were, tryin’ to steal this ranch. Yuh see, the land in our home ranch wasn’t like the rest of this land, Hardin.”

  “What do you mean?” Hardin demanded suspiciously.

  “Why, yuh’re the smart boy,” Tack drawled easily, “yuh should have checked before takin’ so much for granted. Yuh see, the Gentry ranch was a land grant. My grandmother, she was a Basque, see? The land came to us through her family, and the will she left was that it would belong to us as long as any of us lived, that it couldn’t be sold or traded, and in case we all died, it was to go to the State of Texas!”

  Van Hardin stared. “What?” he gasped. “What kind of fool deal is this yuh’re givin’ me?”

  “Fool deal is right,” Tack said quietly. “Yuh see, the State of Texas knows no Gentry would sell or trade, knowin’ we couldn’t, so if somebody else showed up with the land, they were bound to ask a sight of questions. Sooner or later they’d have got around to askin’ yuh how come.”

  Hardin seemed stunned. From the street below there was a sound of horses’ hooves.

  Then a voice said from Tack’s left, “Yuh better get out, Van. There’s talkin’ to be done in the street. I want Tack Gentry!” Tack’s head jerked around. It was Soderman. The short squinty eyed man was staring at him, gun in hand. He heard Hardin turn and bolt out of the room; saw resolution in Soderman’s eyes. Hurling himself toward the wall, Gentry’s hand flashed for his pistol.

  A gun blasted in the room with a roar like a cannon and Gentry felt the angry whip of the bullet, and then he fired twice, low down.

  Soderman fell back against the door jamb, both hands grabbing at his stomach, just below his belt buckle. “Yuh shot me!” he gasped, round eyed. “Yuh shot—me!”

  “Like you did my uncle,” Tack said coolly. “Only yuh had better than an even break, and he had no break at all.”

  Gentry could feel blood from the opened wound trickling down his leg. He glanced at Betty. “I’ve got to get down there,” he said, “he’s a slick talker.”

  Van Hardin was standing down in the street. Beside him was Olney and nearby was Starr. Other men, a half dozen of them, loitered nearby.

  Slowly, Tack Gentry began stumping down the stair. All eyes looked up. Red Furness saw him and spoke out, “Tack, these three men are Rangers come down from Austin to make some inquiries.”

  Hardin pointed at Gentry. “He’s wanted for murdering Anson Childe! Also, for jail breaking, and unless I’m much mistaken he has killed another man up there in Childe’s office!”

  The Ranger looked at him curiously, then one of them glanced at Hardin, “Yuh all the hombre what lays claim to the Gentry place?”

  Hardin swallowed quickly, then his eyes shifted. “No, that was Soderman. The man who was upstairs.”

  Hardin looked at Tack Gentry. With the Rangers here he knew his game was played out. He smiled suddenly. “Yuh’ve nothin’ on me at all, gents,” he said coolly. “Soderman killed John Gentry and laid claim to his ranch. I don’t know nothin’ about it.”

  “Yuh engineered it!” Bill London burst out. “Same as yuh did the stealin’ of my ranch!”

  “Yuh’ve no proof,” Hardin sneered. “Not a particle! My name is on no papers, and yuh have no evidence.”

  Coolly, he strode across to his black horse and swung into the saddle. He was smiling gently, but there was sneering triumph behind the smile. “Yuh’ve nothin’ on me, not a thing!”

  “Don’t let him get away!” Bill London shouted. “He’s the wust one of the whole kit and kaboodle of ’em!”

  “But he’s right!” the Ranger protested. “In all the papers we’ve found, there’s not a single item to tie him up. If he’s in it, he’s been almighty smart.”

  “Then arrest him for horse stealin’!” Tack Gentry said. “That’s my black horse he’s on!”

  Hardin’s face went cold, then he smiled. “Why, that’s crazy! That’s foolish,” he said, “this is my horse. I reared him from a colt. Anybody could be mistaken, ’cause one black horse is like another. My brand’s on him, and yuh can all see it’s an old brand.” Tack Gentry stepped out in front of the black horse. “Button!” he said sharply. “Button!”

  At the familiar voice, the black horse’s head jerked up. “Button!” Tack called. “Hut! Hut!”

  As the name and the sharp command rolled out, Button reacted like an explosion of dynamite. He jumped straight up in the air and came down hard, then he sunfished wildly, and Van Hardin hit the dirt in a heap.

  “Button!” Tack commanded. “Go get Blackie!”

  Instantly, the horse wheeled and trotted to the hitching rail where Blackie stood ground hitched as Olney had left him. Button caught the reins in his teeth and led the other black horse back.

  The Rangers grinned. “Reckon, Mister,” he said, “yuh done proved yore case. This man’s a horse thief.”

  Hardin climbed to his feet, his face dark with fury. “Yuh think yuh’ll get away with that?” His hand flashed for his gun.

  Tack Gentry had been watching him, and now his own hand moved down, then up. The two guns barked as one. A chip flew from the stair post beside Tack, but Van Hardin turned slowly and went to his knees in the dust.

  At almost the same instant, a sharp voice rang out. “Olney! Starr!”

  Olney’s face went white and he wheeled, hand flashing for his gun. “Anson Childe!” he gasped.

  Childe stood on the platform in front of his room and fired once, twice, three times. Sheriff Olney went down, coughing and muttering. Starr backed through the swinging doors of the saloon and sat down hard in the sawdust.

  Tack stared at him. “What the—”

  The tall young lawyer came down the steps. “Fooled them, didn’t I? They tried to get me once too often. I got their man with a shotgun in the face. Then I changed clothes with him and then lit out for Austin. I came in with the Rangers, then left them on the edge of town. They told me they’d let us have it our way unless they were needed.”

  “Saves the State of Texas a sight of money,” one of the
Rangers drawled, “anyway, we been checkin’ on this here Hardin. On Olney, too. That’s why they wanted to keep things quiet around here. They knowed we was checkin’ on ’em.”

  The Rangers moved in and with the help of a few of the townspeople rounded up Hardin’s other followers.

  Tack grinned at the lawyer. “Lived up to your name, Pardner,” he said. “Yuh sure did! All yore sheep in the fold, now!”

  “What do you mean! Lived up to my name?” Anson Childe looked around.

  Gentry grinned. “And a little Childe shall lead them!” he said.

  HIS BROTHER’S DEBT

  “You’re yellow, Casady!” Ben Kerr shouted. “Yellow as saffron! You ain’t got the guts of a coyote! Draw, curse you, fill your hand so I can kill you! You ain’t fit to live!” Kerr stepped forward, his big hands spread over his gun butts. “Go ahead, reach!”

  Rock Casady, numb with fear, stepped slowly back, his face gray. To right and left were the amazed and incredulous faces of his friends, the men he had ridden with on the O Bar, staring

  Sweat broke out on his face. He felt his stomach retch and twist within him. Turning suddenly, he plunged blindly through the door and fled.

  Behind him, one by one, his shamefaced, unbelieving friends from the O Bar slowly sifted from the crowd. Heads hanging, they headed homeward. Rock Casady was yellow. The man they had worked with, sweated with, laughed with. The last man they would have suspected. Yellow.

  Westward, with the wind in his face and tears burning his eyes, his horse’s hoofs beating out a mad tattoo upon the hard trail, fled Rock Casady, alone in the darkness.

  Nor did he stop. Avoiding towns and holding to the hills, he rode steadily westward. There were days when he starved, and days when he found game, a quail or two, killed with unerring shots from a six-gun that never seemed to miss. Once he shot a deer. He rode wide of towns and deliberately erased his trail, although he knew no one was following him, or cared where he went.

  Four months later, leaner, unshaven and saddle weary, he rode into the yard of the Three Spoke Wheel. Foreman Tom Bell saw him coming and glanced around at his boss, big Frank Stockman.

  “Look what’s comin’. Looks like he’s lived in the hills. On the dodge, maybe.”

  “Huntin’ grub, most likely. He’s a strappin’ big man, though, an’ looks like a hand. Better ask him if he wants a job. With Pete Vorys around, we’ll have to be huntin’ strangers or we’ll be out of help!”

  The mirror on the wall of the bunkhouse was neither cracked nor marred, but Rock Casady could almost wish that it was. Bathed and shaved, he looked into tortured eyes of a dark, attractive young man with wavy hair and a strong jaw.

  People had told him many times that he was a handsome man, but when he looked into his eyes he knew he looked into the eys of a coward.

  He had a yellow streak.

  The first time—well, the first time but one—that he had faced a man with a gun he had backed down cold. He had run like a baby. He had shown the white feather.

  Tall, strongly built, skillful with rope or horse, knowing with stock, he was a top hand in any outfit. An outright genius with guns, men had often said they would hate to face him in a shootout. He had worked hard and played rough, getting the most out of life until that day in the saloon in El Paso when Ben Kerr, gunman and cattle rustler, gambler and bully, had called him, and he had backed down.

  Tom Bell was a knowing and kindly man. Aware that something was riding Casady, he told him his job and left him alone. Stockman watched him top off a bad bronc on the first morning and glanced at Bell.

  “If he does everything like he rides, we’ve got us a hand!” And Casady did everything as well. A week after he had hired out he was doing as much work as any two men. And the jobs they avoided, the lonely jobs, he accepted eagerly.

  “Notice something else?” Stockman asked the ranch owner one morning. “That new hand sure likes jobs that keep him away from the ranch.”

  Stockman nodded. “Away from people. It ain’t natural, Tom. He ain’t been to Three Lakes once since he’s been here.”

  Sue Landon looked up at her uncle. “Maybe he’s broke!” she exclaimed. “No cowhand could have fun in town when he’s broke!” Bell shook head. “It ain’t that, Sue. He had money when he first came in here. I saw it. He had anyway two hundred dollars and for a forty-a-month cowpoke, that’s a lot of money!”

  “Notice something else?” Stockman asked. “He never packs a gun. Only man on the ranch who doesn’t. You’d better warn him about Pete Vorys.”

  “I did,” Bell frowned. “I can’t figure this hombre, boss. I did warn him, and that was the very day he began askin’ for all the bad jobs. Why, he’s the only man on the place who’ll fetch grub to Cat McLeod without bein’ bullied into it!”

  “Over in that Rock Canyon country?” Stockman smiled. “That’s a rough ride for any man. I don’t blame the boys, but you’ve got to hand it to old Cat. He’s killed nine lions and forty-two coyotes in the past ninety days! If he keeps that up we won’t have so much stock lost!”

  “Two bad he ain’t just as good on rustlers. Maybe,” Bell grinned, “we ought to turn him loose on Pete Vorys!”

  Rock Casady kept his palouse gelding moving steadily. The two pack horses ambled placidly behind, seemingly content to be away from the ranch. The old restlessness was coming back to Casady, and he had been on the Three Spoke only a few weeks. He knew they liked him, knew that despite his taciturn manner and desire to be alone, the hands liked him as well as did Stockman or Bell.

  He did his work and more and he was a hand. He avoided poker games that might lead to trouble and stayed away from town. He was anxiously figuring some way to be absent from the ranch on the following Saturday, for he knew the whole crowd was going to a dance and shindig in Three Lakes.

  While he talked little, he heard much. He was aware of impending trouble between the Three Spoke Wheel outfit and the gang of Pete Vorys. The latter, who seemed to ride the country as he pleased, owned a small ranch north of Three Lakes, near town. He had a dozen tough hands and usually spent money freely. All his hands had money, and while no one dared say it, all knew he was rustling.

  Yet he was not the ringleader. Behind him there was someone else, someone who had only recently become involved, for recently there had been a change. Larger bunches of cattle were being stolen, and more care was taken to leave no trail. The carelessness of Vorys had given way to more shrewd operation, and Casady overheard enough talk to know that Stockman believed a new brain was directing operations.

  He heard much of Pete Vorys. He was a big man, bigger than Rock. He was a killer with at least seven notches on his gun. He was pugnacious and quarrelsome, itching for a fight with gun or fists. He had, only a few weeks ago, whipped Sandy Kane, a Three Spoke hand, within an inch of his life. He was bold, domineering, and tough.

  The hands on the Three Spoke were good men. They were hard workers, willing to fight, but not one of them was good enough to tackle Vorys with either fists or gun.

  Cat McLeod was scraping a hide when Rock rode into his camp in Blue Spring Valley. He got up, wiping his hands on his jeans and grinning.

  “Howdy, son! You sure are a sight for sore eyes! It ain’t no use quibblin’, I sure get my grub on time when you’re on that ranch! Hope you stay!”

  Rock swung down. He liked the valley and liked Cat. “Maybe I’ll pull out, Cat.” He looked around. “I might even come up here to stay. I like it.”

  McLeod glanced at him out of the corners of his eyes. “Glad to have you, son. This sure ain’t no country for a young feller, though. It’s a huntin’ an’ fishin’ country, but no women here, an’ no likker. Nothin’ much to do, all said an’ done.”

  Casady unsaddled in silence. It was better, though, than a run-in with Vorys, he thought. At least nobody here knew he was yellow. They liked him and he was one of them, but he was careful.

  “Ain’t more trouble down below, is there? That Vorys cuttin�
� up much?” The old man noted the gun Rock was wearing for the trip. “Some. I hear the boys talkin’ about him.”

  “Never seen him yourself?” Cat asked quizzically. “I been thinkin’ ever since you come up here, son. Might be a good thing for this country if you did have trouble with Vorys. You’re nigh as big as him, an’ you move like a catamount. An’ me, I know ’em! Never seen a man lighter on his feet than you.”

  “Not me,” Rock spoke stiffly. “I’m a peace-lovin’ man, Cat. I want no trouble with anybody.”

  McLeod studied the matter as he worked over his hide. For a long time now he had known something was bothering Rock Casady. Perhaps this last remark, that he wanted no trouble with anybody, was the answer?

  Cat McLeod was a student of mankind as well as the animals upon whom he practiced his trade. In a lifetime of living along the frontier and in the world’s far places, he had learned a lot about men who liked to live alone, and about men who sought the wilderness. If it was true that Rock wanted no trouble, it certainly was not from lack of ability to handle it.

  There had been that time when Cat had fallen, stumbling to hands and knees. Right before him, not three feet from his face and much nearer his outstretched hands lay one of the biggest rattlers Cat had ever seen. The snake’s head jerked back above its coil, and then, with a gun’s roar blasting in his ears, that head was gone and the snake was a writhing mass of coils, showing only a bloody stump where the head had been!

  Cat had gotten to his feet gray faced and turned. Rock Casady was thumbing a shell into his gun. The young man grinned.

  “That was a close one!” he had said cheerfully.

  McLeod had dusted off his hands, staring at Casady. “I’ve heard of men drawin’ faster’n a snake could strike, but that’s the first time I ever seen it!”

  Since then he had seen that .44 shoot the heads off quail and he had seen a quick hip shot with the rifle break a deer’s neck.

  Now his mind reverted to their former topic. “If that Vorys is tied in with some smart hombre, there’ll be hell to pay! Pete was never no great shakes for brains, but he’s tough, tough as all get out! With somebody to think for him, he’ll make this country unfit to live in!”