Desert Death-Song

by Louis L'Amour

  A few days later he killed a wolf, skinned it, and then buried the carcass, but of the head he made a cap to fit over the crown of his old felt hat, and wherever he went, he wore it.

  A month later, walking into Fremont behind the switching tails of Jennie and Julie, he met Sally at the gate. She was talking with young Sid Barton.

  “Hi,” Sid said, grinning at him. Then he looked quizzically at the wolfskin cap. “Better not wear that around here! Somebody might take you for a wolf!”

  Old Billy chuckled. “I am!” he said. “Yuh’re durned right, I am! Ask them Apaches!”

  MAN RIDING WEST

  CHAPTER ONE: The Man from Points Yonder

  Three men were hunkered down by the fire when Jim Gary walked his buckskin up to their camp in the lee of the cliff. The big man across the fire had a shotgun lying beside him. It was the shotgun that made Gary uneasy, for cowhands do not carry shotguns, especially when on a trail drive as these men obviously were.

  Early as it was, the cattle were already bedded down for the night in the meadow alongside the stream, and from their looks they had come far and fast. It was still light, but the clouds were low and swollen with rain.

  “How’s for some coffee?” Jim asked as he drew up. “I’m ridin’ through, an’ I’m sure hungry an’ tuckered.”

  Somewhere off in the mountains, thunder rolled and grumbled. The fire crackled, and the leaves on the willows hung still in the lifeless air. There were three saddled horses nearby, and among the gear was an old Mother Hubbard style saddle with a wide skirt.

  “Light an’ set up,” the man who spoke was lean jawed and sandy haired. “Never liked to ride on an empty stomach m’self.”

  More than ever, Gary felt uneasy. Neither of the others spoke. All were tough-looking men, unshaven and dirty, but it was their hard-eyed suspicion that made Jim wonder. However, he swung down and loosened his saddle girth, then slipped the saddle off and laid it well back under the overhang of the cliff. As he did so he glanced again at the old saddle that lay there.

  The overhang of the cliff was deep where the fire was built for shelter from the impending rain. Jim dropped to an ancient log, gray and stripped of bark, and handed his tin plate over to the man who reached for it. The cook slapped two thick slabs of beef on the plate and some frying pan bread liberally touched with the beef fryings. Gary was hungry and he dove in without comment, and the small man filled his cup.

  “Headed west?” The sandy-haired man asked, after a few minutes.

  “Yeah, headed down below the Rim. Pleasant Valley way.” The men all turned their heads toward him but none spoke. Jim could feel their eyes on his tied down guns. There was a sheep and cattle war in the Valley.

  “They call me Red Slagle. These hombres are Tobe Langer and Jeeter Dirksen. We’re drivin’ to Salt Creek.”

  Langer would be the big one. “My name’s Gary,” Jim replied, “Jim Gary. I’m from points yonder. Mostly Dodge an’ Santa Fe.” “Hear they are hirin’ warriors in Pleasant Valley.”

  “Reckon.” Jim refused to be drawn, although he had the feeling they had warmed to him since he mentioned heading for the Valley.

  “Ridin’ thataway ourselves,” Red suggested. “Wan to make a few dollars drivin’ cattle? We’re short handed.”

  “Might,” Gary admitted, “the grub’s good.”

  “Give you forty to drive to Salt Creek. We’ll need he’p. From hereabouts the country is plumb rough an’ she’s fixin’ to storm.”

  “You’ve hired a hand. When do I start?”

  “Catch a couple of hours sleep. Tobe has the first ride. Then you take over. If you need he’p, just you call out.”

  Gary shook out his blankets and crawled into them. In the moment before his eyes closed he remembered the cattle had all worn a Double A brand, and the brands were fresh. That could easily be with a trail herd. But the Double A had been the spread that Mart Ray had mentioned.

  It was raining when he rode out to the herd. “They ain’t fussin’,” Langer advised, “an’ the rain’s quiet enough. It should pass mighty easy. See you.”

  He drifted toward camp, and Gary turned up his slicker collar and studied the herd as well as he could in the darkness. They were lying quiet. He was riding a gray roped from the small remuda, and he let the horse amble placidly toward the far side of the meadow. A hundred yards beyond the meadow the bulk of the sloping hill that formed the opposite side of the valley showed blacker in the gloom. Occasionally there was a flash of heat lightning, but no thunder.

  Slagle had taken him on because he needed hands, but none of them accepted him. He decided to sit tight in his saddle and see what developed. It could be plenty, for unless he was mistaken, this was a stolen herd, and Slagle was a thief, as were the others.

  If this herd had come far and fast, he had come farther and faster, and with just as great a need. Now there was nothing behind him but trouble, and nothing before him but bleak years of drifting ahead of a reputation.

  Up ahead was Mart Ray, and Ray was as much of a friend as he had. Gunfighters are admired by many, respected by some, feared by all and welcomed by none. His father had warned him of what to expect, warned him long ago before he himself had died in a gun battle. “You’re right handy, Son,” he had warned, “one of the fastest I ever seen, so don’t let it be known. Don’t never draw a gun on a man in anger, an’ you’ll live happy. Once you get the name of a gunfighter, you’re on a lonesome trail, an’ there’s only one ending.”

  So he had listened, and he had avoided trouble. Mart Ray knew that. Ray was himself a gunman. He had killed six men of whom Jim Gary knew, and no doubt there had been others. He and Mart had been riding together in Texas, and then in a couple of trail drives, one all the way to Montana. He never really got close to Mart, but they had been partners, after a fashion.

  Ray had always been amused at his eagerness to avoid trouble, although he had no idea of the cause of it. “Well,” he had said, “they sure cain’t say like father, like son. From all I hear your pappy was an uncurried wolf, an’ you fight shy of trouble. You run from it. If I didn’t know you so well, I’d say you was yaller.”

  But Mart Ray had known him well, for it had been Jim who rode his horse down in front of a stampede to pick Ray off the ground, saving his life. They got free, but no more, and a thousand head of mad cattle stampeded over the ground where Ray had stood.

  Then, a month before, down in the Big Bend country, trouble had come, and it was trouble he could not avoid. It braced him in a little Mexican cantina just over the river, and in the person of a dark, catlike Mexican with small feet and dainty hands, but his guns were big enough and there was an unleashed devil in his eyes.

  Jim Gary had been dancing with a Mexican girl and the Mexican had jerked her from his arms and struck her across the face. Jim knocked him down, and the Mexican got up, his eyes fiendish. Without a word, the Mexican went for his gun, and for a frozen, awful instant, Jim saw his future facing him, and then his own hand went down and he palmed his gun in a flashing, lightning draw that rapped out two shots. The Mexican, who had reached first, barely got his gun clear before he was dead. He died on his feet, then fell.

  In a haze of powder smoke and anguish, Jim Gary had wheeled and strode from the door, and behind him lay dead and awful silence. It was not until two days later that he knew who and what he had killed.

  The lithe-bodied Mexican had been Miguel Sonoma, and he had been a legend along the Border. A tough, dangerous man with a reputation as a killer.

  Two nights later, a band of outlaws from over the Border rode down upon Gary’s little spread to avenge their former leader, and two of them died in the first blast of gun fire, a matter of hand guns at point-blank range.

  From the shelter of his cabin, Gary fought them off for three days before the smoke from his burning barn attracted help. When the help arrived, Jim Gary was a man with a name. Five dead men lay on the ground around the ranch yard and in the desert nearby. The wo
unded had been carried away. And the following morning, Jim turned his ranch over to the bank to sell, and lit a shuck—away from Texas.

  Of this Mart Ray knew nothing. Half of Texas and all of New Mexico, or most of it, would lie behind him when he reached the banks of Salt Creek. Mart Ray was ramrodding the Double A, and he would have a job for him.

  CHAPTER TWO: Ghost with the Night Herd

  Jim Gary turned the horse and rode slowly back along the side of the herd. The cattle had taken their midnight stretch and after standing around a bit, were lying down once more. The rain was falling, but softly, and Gary let the gray take his own time in skirting the herd.

  The night was pitch dark. Only the horns of the cattle glistened with rain, and their bodies were a darker blob in the blackness of the night. Once, drawing up near the willows along the stream, Jim thought he detected a vague sound. He waited a moment, listening. On such a night nobody would be abroad who could help it, and it was unlikely that a mountain lion would be on the prowl, although possible.

  He started on again, yet now his senses were alert, and his hand slid under his slicker and touched the butt of a .44. He was almost at the far end of the small herd when a sudden flash of lightning revealed the hillside across the narrow valley.

  Stark and clear, glistening with rain, sat a horseman! He was standing in his stirrups, and seemed amazingly tall, and in the glare of the flash, his face was stark white, like the face of a fleshless skull!

  Startled, Gary grunted and slid his gun into his hand, but all was darkness again. And listen as he could, he heard no further sound. When the lightning flashed again, the hillside was empty and still. Uneasily, he caught himself staring back over his shoulder into the darkness, and he watched his horse. The gray was standing, head up and ears erect, staring off toward the darkness near the hill. Riding warily, Gary started in that direction, but when he got there, he found nothing.

  It was almost daylight when he rode up to the fire which he had kept up throughout the night, and swinging down, he awakened Dirksen. The man sat up, startled. “Hey!” he exclaimed. “You forgot to call me?”

  Jim grinned at him. “Just figured I was already up an’ a good cook needed his sleep.”

  Jeeter stared at him. “You mean you rode for me? Say, you’re all right!”

  “Forget it!” Gary stretched. “I had a quiet night, mostly.” Red Slagle was sitting up, awakened by their talk. “What do you mean—mostly?”

  Jim hesitated, feeling puzzled. “Why, to tell you the truth, I’m not sure whether I saw anything or not, but I sure thought I did. Anyway, it had me scared.”

  “What was it?” Slagle was pulling on his pants, but his eyes were serious. “A lion?”

  “No, it was a man on a horse. A tall man with a dead white face, like a skull.” Gary shrugged sheepishly. “Makes me sound like a fool, but I figured for a moment that I’d seen a ghost!”

  Red Slagle was staring at him, and Jeeter’s face was dead white and his eyes were bulging. “A ghost?” he asked, faintly. “Did you say, a ghost?”

  “Shucks,” Gary shrugged, “there ain’t no such thing. Just some hombre on a big black horse, passin’ through in the night, that was all! But believe me, seein’ him in the lightnin’ up on that hill like I did, it sure was scary!”

  Tobe Langer was getting up, and he too, looked bothered. Slagle came over to the fire and sat down, boots in hand. Reaching down he pulled his sock around to get a hole away from his big toe, then he put his foot into the wet boot and began to struggle with it.

  “That horse now,” Langer asked carefully, “did it have a white star between the eyes?”

  Gary was surprised. “Why, yes! Matter of fact, it did! You know him?”

  Slagle let go of the boot and stomped his foot to settle it in the boot. “Yeah, feller we seen down the road a ways. Big black horse.”

  Slagle and Langer walked away from camp a ways and stood talking together. Jeeter was worried. Jim could see that without half trying, and he studied the man thoughtfully. Jeeter Dirksen was a small man, quiet, but inclined to be nervous. He had neither the strength nor the toughness of Slagle and Langer. If Gary learned anything about the cattle it would be through his own investigation or from Jeeter. And he was growing more and more curious.

  Yet, if these were Double A cattle, and had been stolen, why were they being driven toward the AA ranch, rather than away from it? He realized suddenly that he knew nothing at all about Red Slagle nor his outfit, and it was time he made some inquiries.

  “This Double A,” he asked suddenly, “you been ridin’ for them long?”

  Dirksen glanced at him sharply, and bent over his fire. “Not long,” he said. “It’s a Salt Creek outfit. Slagle’s segundo.”

  “Believe I know your foreman,” Gary suggested, “I think this was the outfit he said. Hombre name of Mart Ray. Ever hear of him?”

  Jeeter turned sharply, slopping coffee over the rim of the cup. It hissed in the fire, and both men looked around at the camp. Jeeter handed the cup to Gary and studied him, searching his face. Then he admitted cautiously, “Yeah, Ray’s the foreman. Ranch belongs to a syndicate out on the coast. You say you know him?”

  “Uh huh. Used to ride with him.” Langer and Slagle had walked back to the fire, and Dirksen poured coffee for them. “Who was that you rode with?” Slagle asked.

  “Your boss, Mart Ray.”

  Both men looked up sharply, then Slagle’s face cleared and he smiled. “Say! That’s why the name was familiar! You’re that Jim Gary! Son of Old Steve Gary. Yeah, Mart told us about you.” Langer chuckled suddenly. “You’re the scary one, huh? The one who likes to keep out of trouble. Yeah, we heard about you!” The contempt in his tone stiffened Jim’s back, and for an instant he was on the verge of a harsh retort, then the memory of what lay behind him welled up within, and bitterly he kept his mouth shut. If he got on the prod and killed a man here, he would only have to drift farther. There was only one solution, and that was to avoid trouble. Yet irritating as it was to be considered lacking in courage, Langer’s remark let him know that the story of his fights had not preceded him.

  “There’s no call,” he said, after a minute, “to go around the country killin’ folks. If people would just get the idea they can get along without all that. Me, I don’t believe in fightin’.”

  Langer chuckled, but Slagle said nothing, and Dirksen glanced at him sympathetically.

  All day the herd moved steadily west, but now Gary noticed a change, for the others were growing more watchful as the day progressed, and their eyes continued to search the surrounding hills, and they rode more warily approaching any bit of cover.

  Once, when Jeeter rode near him, the little man glanced across the herd at the other riders, then said quietly, “That was no ghost you saw. Red rode up there on the hill, an’ there was tracks, tracks of a mighty big black horse.”

  “Wonder why he didn’t ride down to camp?” Jim speculated. “He sure enough saw the fire!”

  Dirksen grunted. “If that hombre was the one Red thinks it is, he sure didn’t have no aim to ride down there!”

  Before Gary could question him further, Jeeter rode off after a stray and cutting him back into the herd, rode on further ahead. Jim dropped back to the drag, puzzled over this new angle. Who could the strange rider be? What did he want? Was he afraid of Slagle?

  A big brindle steer was cutting wide of the herd and Jim swung out to get him, but dashing toward the stream, the steer floundered into the water and into quicksand. Almost at once, it was down, struggling madly, its eyes rolling.

  Jim swung a loop and dropped it over the steers horns. If he could give the steer a little help now there was a chance he could get it out before it bogged in too deep.

  He started the buckskin back toward more solid ground and with the pull on the rope and the struggling of the steer, he soon had it out on the bank of the stream. The weary animal stumbled and went down, and shaking his loop loose, Gary swung
his horse around to get the animal up. Something he saw on the flank made him swing down beside the steer. Curiously, he bent over the brand.

  It had been worked over! The Double A had been burned on over a Slash Four!

  “Somethin’ wrong?”

  The voice was cold and level, and Jim Gary started guiltily, turning. Then his eyes widened. “Mart! Well, for cryin’ out in the night time! Am I glad to see you!”

  Ray stared. “For the luvva Pete, if it ain’t Gary! Say, how did you get here? Don’t tell me you’re drivin’ that herd up ahead?”

  “That’s right! Your outfit, ain’t it? I hired on back down the line. This steer just got hisself bogged down an’ I had a heck of a time gettin’ him out. You seen Red an’ the boys?”

  “Not yet. I swung wide. Get that steer on his feet an’ we’ll join ’em.”

  Yet as they rode back, despite Ray’s affability, Gary was disturbed. Something here was very wrong. This was a Slash Four steer with the brand worked over to a Double A, the brand for which Ray was foreman. If these cattle were rustled, then Mart Ray was party to it, and so were Slagle, Langer and Dirksen! And, if caught with these men and cattle, so was he!

  He replied to Ray’s questions as well as he could, and briefly, aware that his friend was preoccupied and thinking of something else. Yet at the same time he was pleased that Ray asked him no questions about his reasons for leaving home.

  Mart Ray rode up ahead and joined Slagle and he could see the two men riding on together, deep in conversation. When they bedded down for the night there had been no further chance to talk to him, and Gary was just as well satisfied, for there was much about this that he did not like. Nor was anything said about the midnight rider. When day broke, Mart Ray was gone. “Rode on to Salt Creek,” Red said, “we’ll see him there.” He glanced at Jim, his eyes amused. “He said to keep you on, that you was a top-hand.”

  Despite the compliment, Jim was nettled. What else had Ray told Slagle? His eyes narrowed. Whatever it was, he was not staying on. He was going to get shut of this outfit just as fast as he could. All he wanted was his time. Yet by midday he had not brought himself to ask for it.