Sudden: The Range Robbers

by Oliver Strange

  “Lo, Green; yu want me?’ asked Petter.

  “Got some news for yu,’ said the puncher, with a half-glance towards the room which served the ranch-owner as an office. But the Old Man did not take the hint.

  “Well, let’s hear it—our friends won’t mind me ‘tendin’ to business for a minute,’ he said, and added with a twinkle of amusement, “You met Mr. Tarman before, I think.’

  Green turned his gaze upon the visitor lounging easily in his chair, and with a perfectly grave expression on his face, said quietly, “Shore, I lent him my hoss.’

  For a brief instant Tarman’s eyes flashed murder, and then he joined in the laugh which, started by Noreen, spread to the others.

  “Yu gotta admit I didn’t keep him long,’ the big man said, and his laugh boomed out again. It was well done, but to the girl it did not ring true. She had caught that fleeting look and knew that the man’s vanity had been rubbed on a sore spot, and that he would have cheerfully slain the offender.

  “Well, well, what yu got to tell us, Green?’ asked Simon.

  The cowboy gave a bald account of the day’s discoveries, and watched the faces of the visitors as he did so, but could see nothing more than a polite interest on either of them. His employer was plainly pleased.

  “Yu didn’t recognise them two fellers?’

  “No, but they looked like Greasers, an’ they could shoot.’

  “Well, if yu set ‘em afoot they won’t get them cows shifted without help. ‘Course, mebbe they got other hosses, or there’s more than just the pair of ‘em.’

  “If there’d been more they’d ‘a’ come pilin’ at the first shot,’ Green pointed out.

  “That’s so,’ agreed the cattleman. “Reckon yo’re tired?’

  “Not so as yu’d notice it,’ smiled the cowboy.

  “Good for yu,’ said the Old Man. “Blaynes is out on the range somewheres. Get another hoss, pick up any o’ the boys yu can find an’ hump it to the Frying Pan. It’s Job’s business this time, but it’s ourn too an’ we got to help him. Yu didn’t see any o’ our cows, I s’pose?’

  Green shook his head. “Hadn’t time to look over the herd, but I fancy they were all Frying Pan.’

  As he swung into the saddle, Seth Laban rose from his chair. ‘I reckon I must be goin’ too,’ he said.

  “Why, Seth, what’s yore hurry?’ asked Tarman.

  “Yu know I got a date with Rayne,’ replied Laban. “I told yu comin’ up I couldn’t stay.’

  “So yu did, Seth; I done forgot it,’ agreed his friend.

  When Laban had taken his leave the big man turned to his host and remarked casually, “That chap Green ‘pears to be a pretty capable proposition. Handy with his weapons too, judging by the way he got that boy o’ yores away from the marshal.’

  “Never seen him fire a shot but I should say he ain’t no novice,’ Simon replied.

  “Was it a fair fight, Mr. Tarman?’ inquired Noreen.

  “Well, it was an even break, an’ I told the marshal so, but it was forced on the dead man; the Y Z boys meant to get him, an’ came there a-purpose. I should say Green framed it up, an’ he certainly got away with it. Funny, as I was sayin’ to Seth, I believe I’ve seen him somewhere an’ can’t just fix him, but I’ll bet a stack he’s more gunman than cowboy.’

  “He knows his work,’ offered the cattleman.

  “Mebbe so, but if I’m right yu gotta ask yoreself what’s a gunman doin’ around here?’ rejoined Tarman, and having planted this seed of doubt in the minds of his hearers, he went on to talk of something else.

  When Green reached the bunkhouse he found Larry lounging on the bench outside. The young man promptly greeted him, “How’s the cow-thief business?’

  “Not so brisk as when yu were in it,’ retorted his friend, with a grin. “Yu go get that four-legged table yu got into the habit o’ callin’ a hoss, an’ drape yoreself across it; if yu can find any more o’ the boys, fetch ‘em along.’

  “Huh ! yu got that job as foreman a’ready?’ snorted the other. “If I had I’d be handin’ yu yore time,’ smiled Green. “The Old Man’s orders; get agoin’.’

  But Larry delayed another minute. “Say, do yu know that the Pretty Lady has been ridin’ with the Handsome Stranger this afternoon?’ he asked. Green looked at him and saw that the boy was not joshing. “What are yu goin’ to do about it?’ he inquired.

  “Me? What’s it gotta do with me?’ asked Larry.

  “Well, I was wonderin’ that myself,’ replied Green slowly, and left the other to work it out.

  “Hell’s bells, can yu beat it?’ muttered the young man, when he realised that he had been very neatly admonished. “If he ain’t the cussedest…! He gave it up and went in search of Dirty and Simple, who were somewhere about. When he returned with them, Green had turned the roan into the corral, transferring the saddle to his other pony. He explained the situation to them while they were getting their mounts, and after snatching a hasty meal, they started for the Frying Pan ranch.

  “Might’ve took me in yore shootin’ party,’ reproached Larry, who, paired with Green, was leading the way.

  “No place for boys,’ came the drawling reply.

  “Awright, grand-pop; yu old moss-heads want to hog all the fun. D’yu reckon the marshal will start anythin’?’

  “I would, in his place,’ Green replied grimly. “I’d start a journey, an’ I’d make it a long one.’

  For the greater part of the trip, however, Green was silent. Though he had not shown it, the knowledge that Noreen had been for a ride with Tarman annoyed him. He knew that this feeling was quite unwarranted, the girl had a right to dispose of her own company, and what was more reasonable than that she should show the visitor over the ranch? Nevertheless, the thought of it made him profane. Another thing that occupied his mind was the departure of Seth at the same moment as himself; it might have been just a coincidence but he felt instinctively that it was not.

  He was still puzzling over this incident when they reached their destination. In spite of the darkness they had made good time, though as Dirty ruefully remarked, “Supper must be damn near forgotten by now.’ They rode past the bunkhouse, from which came the tinkle of a banjo and a powerful if unmelodious chorus.

  “Huh! Tryin’ to scare off rustlers, I guess,’ commented Simple. “Job must be away or stone deaf.’

  The ranch-owner was neither, for he came to the door in answer to Green’s knock. He carried a lamp in his left hand, the right being hooked in his belt in useful proximity to his gun.

  “Lo, boys,’ he greeted, recognising them. “What’s up?’

  Green explained the reason for their visit and the effect on Leeming was ludicrous—as Dirty put it— “It fair set him alight.’

  “Hell’s bells!’ he cried. “That’s the way things allus happen on this blamed ranch. Here’s Dirk an’ six o’ the boys away with the trail herd an’ me with half a staff. But we’ll get ‘em, yu bet yu; we’ll have them cows back here an’ hang every damn thief we find with ‘em. Yu boys will want to hit the way, I reckon?’

  “We’re aimin’ to come with yu—we can get there by sun-up an’ have a cat-nap on the way,’ Green replied, adding slyly, “That is if yu want for us to come.’

  “What the…’ the rancher started tempestuously, and then he caught the twinkle in the speaker’s eyes and grinned himself. “Yu nearly had me goin’ again, blast yu,’ he said. “Course I’ll be pleased to death to have yore help. Come along to the bunkhouse an’ stoke up while I get the boys together.’

  Scrambling into a coat and snatching up a Winchester, Job led the way. At his entrance the concert ceased abruptly, and Charlie, who was sufficiently recovered to sit up in his bunk and manipulate his banjo, laid the instrument aside.

  “Hump yoreselves, boys,’ Leeming cried. “Green here has located our cattle an’ we’re agoin’ after ‘em. Lucky, yu better stay with Charlie; the other five, with the Y Z boys, will be enough to turn the n
rick.’

  “Oh hell, boss, I’m fit all right,’ protested Lucky. “An’ I shore owe them fellers a crack for the one they gave me.’

  “Yore turn’ll come—we ain’t expectin’ to corral the whole bunch,’ said the boss. “Somebody’s gotta stay. Where in blazes is that grub I told that blasted cook to put up?’

  He bustled about, pouring out torrents of abuse indiscriminately directed at his own men and the cattle-thieves, and Green was amazed at the manner in which it was received.

  “Ain’t he the son of a gun?’ privily remarked Zeb Woods, who as acting foreman in Dirk’s absence got more than his share. “But durn it, he don’t mean anythin’. He’d ride from hell an’-all to give any one of us a helpin’ hand, an’ we shore knows it. How’s Ginger makin’ it?’

  “Doin’ fine, barrin’ the swellin’,’ Green replied.

  “Swellin’? Why, where he swole?’ asked the puzzled Woods. “In the head,’ said Green, smiling. “Yu see, Miss Norry is nursin’ him.’

  A roar of laughter greeted the explanation and Woods joined in. “I’m it,’ he admitted, “and the drinks are shore on me next time I meet yu in town. Say, he’ll be havin’ a heart attack too, eh?’

  “Shucks! He done had that years ago, an’ got over it, same as the rest of us,’ volunteered Dirty.

  A loud inquiry from the boss as to whether he’d got to wait all night for them put a period to the conversation, and no more time was lost in starting. Having a fixed objective, they headed straight across the Y Z range, in a direction which would leave the Parlour well to their left. For a time they were able to travel at a fast lope which ate up the miles, but when they left the range-land and plunged into the wilderness beyond, the pace had to be moderated.

  Nevertheless, midnight found them little more than an hour’s ride from their destination, and Leeming decided to rest both men and beasts. A fire was lighted, for the night air was very keen, the horses were picketed, and the men rolled up in their blankets and slept the sleep of the healthily-tired. Around them was the black silence, broken only by the sharp crackle of the burning logs, and the occasional cry of some wild denizen of the forest abroad on a predatory quest.

  They were astir again at the first pale gleam of light behind the distant mountains. Swiftly this deepened and became a roseate glow from the midst of which the flaming rim of the sun climbed majestically above the peaks, tingeing them with gold. The daily miracle which turned a world of cold and darkness into one of warmth and light had taken place. But in the gulches, canyons, and wooded tracts gloom still resisted the invading daylight.

  A gulp of hot coffee, a cigarette, and the party resumed its way, and by the time the conquest of the darkness was completed the blind canyon was reached. This was soon negotiated, and one by one they led their mounts through the tunnel, Green going first, with the boss of the Frying Pan following him.

  “Damnation!’ said the puncher disgustedly. “They’ve razzledazzled us.’

  The valley was empty. Some hundreds of yards from where they stood were two black mounds, and as the horsemen approached, these disintegrated into winged portions which took flight; the scavengers of the desert had discovered the dead horses. No other living thing was to be seen, and Job Leeming, in his disappointment, rose to heights which astonished even his own men.

  “Ain’t he a ring-tailed wonder?’ whispered one of them to Dirty. “I reckon he oughtta be President o’ the U-nited States.’

  “He shore can express himself awful easy,’ admitted the other “I guess I’d sooner shoot than talk a thing out with him.’

  “Don’t yu go makin’ any mistakes about his shootin’ either,’ said the Frying Pan man. “He’s a dead game sport.’

  By this time Leeming had let off steam, and with one of his astonishing changes was prepared to accept defeat more or less philosophically.

  “Well, boys, we seem to have had our trouble for nothin’ they’ve been too clever for us,’ he said. “I reckon they must have had some hosses yu didn’t see, Green, or else some more o’ the damn thieves happened along to shift the herd.’

  The Y Z man nodded agreement, though in reality neither of the solutions satisfied him. Laban’s sudden departure recurred to his mind but he could find nothing to connect an apparent stranger with the rustlers. Even if it had been done as a matter of spine against himself, it seemed inconceivable that Laban would know where to send the warning.

  “Guess we’d better have a look round, now we’re here,’ he said. “Sorry we missed the cows, Leeming.’

  “Ain’t nobody’s fault—just bad luck,’ returned the Frying Pan boss. “Mebbe we’ll pick up the trail.’

  Spreading out, they combed the sides of the valley thoroughly, and found one steer only in the thick underbrush, where it had evidently been overlooked by the rustlers when the herd was gathered for a getaway. Job studied the altered brand with interest.

  “Never heard of it,’ he commented. “They made a good job of in. Wonder where they’re sellin”em?’

  At the far end there was a break in the saucer-like rim which shut the valley in, and this seemed to promise another outlet, but when nhey reached it they found that it was closed by a perpendicular ledge of rock eight feet above the grass level of the valley. From the ledge a strip of sand led through a narrow opening in the cliff to the country beyond. The stream entered at a deep gully not a yard wide, a passage impracticable even for a horse. There appeared to be no way of reaching the ledge save by climbing and the sand above it showed no tracks.

  “Must have took ‘em out at the other end again,’ said Job. “An’ that leaves us just where we was before. No good losin’ time here, ooys; we’d better head for home.’

  Chapter XIII

  ON the following morning the foreman of the Y Z appeared at breakfast with a grin on his face, which broadened considerably when his eyes rested on Green.

  “I hear yu didn’t catch many rustlers,’ he began.

  “Yu heard correct,’ the puncher said quietly.

  “Yu was lookin’ for ‘em in the wrong place,’ went on the foreman. “While you an’ Job was pirootin’ round that blind canyon, they was busy at the Frying Pan, liftin’ another hundred head. S’pose that’s news to yu?’

  Green looked at the maliciously triumphant speaker in blank amazement; it certainly was news and of the very worst kind. What he liked still less was the meaning sneer conveyed in the question.

  “Yu suggestin’ it might not be news to me?’ he asked.

  The foreman hesitated. He had, only a little while before, plainly stated to his employer his belief that this man was working with the rustlers, and than the trip to the blind canyon was merely a ruse to leave the Frying Pan open for another raid. “A damn good exchange too, a hundred cows for a couple o’ cayuses,’ he had sneered. “If he was playin’ straight, why didn’t he drop the men ‘stead o’ the hosses? Accordin’ to his story, they was shootin’ at him.’ Now, he would have given all he possessed to shout “Yes’ and go for his gun, but he could not do it; the narrowed, grim eyes of the cowpuncher seemed to hypnotise him. The other men watched in silence.

  Then Green spoke: “Take off yore belt, Blaynes,’ he said, and at the same moment he unbuckled his own and laid it on the table. The foreman made no move.

  “Take it off, yu white-livered skunk,’ rasped the other.

  The epithet cun like a lash, and with an oath, the foreman’s right hand went to his belt, not to take it off, but to snatch the gun from its holster. In an instant Green divined his purpose and covered the space between them in one leap; his hands shot out and gripped the foreman’s wrists just as the pistol cleared the scabbard. Madly Blaynes strove to loosen the clutch and aim the weapon, but he was powerless; he felt that he was held by steel vices which were being slowly tightened and were crushing the bones of his wrists. The pain was atrocious and the sweat showed in beads upon his forehead.

  “Drop that gun, yu cur!’

  The harsh
order was hardly necessary, for already the weapon was falling from the numbed, lifeless fingers. As soon as he heard it thud upon the floor, Green released his grip and step

  ping back, swung his right first, and sent in a crashing blow which caught Blaynes on the point of the jaw, dashing him, stunned and senseless, into a corner of the room. Then he picked up his belt, buckled it on, and without a word left the bunkhouse.

  “Gosh!’ said Durran, as he helped to lift the stricken man inno his bunk and tried to revive him. “I’d sooner be kicked by an army mule.’

  “Served him right for tryin’ to pull a gun on an unarmed man,’ snorted Dirty.

  “Well, mebbe it warn’t the right play,’ Durran had to admit; “but a foreman can’t allow his outfit to rough-ride him.’

  “An’ he can’t rough-ride them neither, which is one o’ the things Rattler’s gotta learn,’ retorted Dirty.

  On leaving the bunkhouse, Green went in search of Simon. He found him in his office, and the worried look on his face did not lighten when he saw the visitor. Green stated his business bluntly: “There’s somenhin’ yu have to know. Yore foreman accused me of runnin’ with the gang that’s rustlin’ yore cows, tried to pull a gun on me, an’ I knocked him cold. Reckon yu better give me my time.’

  Old Simon studied the puncher for a moment. He had had dealings with many men during an eventful life and could usually size one up to his own satisfaction at least, but this one puzzled him. He did not believe that Green was crooked, and that odd feeling of attraction which he had experienced before again assailed him. He became surprisedly aware that he was loth to let the puncher go.

  “What yu aimin’ to do?’ he asked.

  “Stay around,’ replied the other. “I ain’t double-crossin’ yu an’ I’m agoin’ to prove it in time, but this ranch ain’t big enough for me an’ Blaynes. The next play he makes will be the finish—for him.’