He reached the bottom, glanced each way, then put his horse across the open and into the trees. He was visible for no more than two minutes and, once under cover of the pines, he turned in his saddle and watched John Child across the open. Then they both waited, unmoving, watching all around them for several minutes. Finally, Child said, “I guess we made it.”
Radigan nodded. Reluctantly, he turned his horse and headed down through the trees. It was not right to leave a girl alone like that, alone for days on end, and probably scared. Although Gretchen was less afraid than any woman he had ever known…not one word of complaint through all of this, and never once when she shirked her work. In cold and snow, everywhere, she had held up her end of the work and the riding.
Where the Vache Creek trail met with the easy way to Valle San Antonio, they parted.
John Child looked twice his size in the heavy buffalo coat. He drew up, the steam from his breath making a plume in the still, cold air. “You be careful, Tom,” Child said. “All those boys up there aren’t friendly.”
“All right.”
“You watch especial for Swiss Jack Burns. He’s a gunman from over Kansas way. Fancies himself.”
“Yeah?” Radigan grinned. “With Loren Pike over there he’s probably dead by now.” He gathered his reins. “Loren, he never was much given to let be. Fact is, he’s a right impatient man, sometimes.”
Radigan picked out the broad shoulder of Cerro Jarocito to the north. East of there was a spring and it was only about six miles to that spring. Call it seven to be sure. Then three or four miles over to Coyote Creek and about six or seven miles north to Loma Coyote. It was a good eighteen miles, anyway you looked at it, and cold riding. Five or six hours if he was lucky, and no telling how much if he was not lucky.
He was riding a dapple gray, a good horse that would weigh all of twelve hundred pounds and one who knew how to travel in snow and over icy trails.
The wind was from the north, the sky was slate gray and promising snow, a promise Radigan did not want fulfilled. The trail had not been traveled since the storm, and at places the snow had crusted hard. By noon, when he should have had ten miles behind him he doubted if he had come more than six, for several times he had gone out of his way to skirt drifts of snow, and once had gotten himself tangled in a thick growth of lodgepole, and had to ride more than a mile to get out of it, and two more miles before he found his way back to the trail. He was swearing when he found it and the dapple was agreeing with him, shaking its head with disgust.
He had watered the horse at the spring, and when they reached Coyote Creek the water was frozen over at several places, which made crossing difficult, for the ice was not strong enough to bear the weight. The wind blew cold down the canyon from the north, stiffening Radigan’s face and making his hands numb.
It was late dusk when he came down out of the canyon and rode across the bench and into the town.
The narrow street was as still as the day the earth was born, still and cold in the last light of day, with lights showing in the Ramble House, and across the street at the Utah Saloon. The only other light showed at an eating place, a light that showed from beyond a fly-specked window.
Loma Coyote was not much as towns went, and as towns went, Loma Coyote would someday go. It was a stopping place for drifters, a cooling-off place for men wanted by the law and who had found other places too hot for comfort. There was nothing going on at Loma Coyote that anybody could mention, a couple of miners who worked dismal prospect holes in the nearby mountains but did most of their drilling without a single-jack at the walnut bar of the Utah Saloon.
The population rarely exceeded thirty persons, all but three or four of them male. Once the population had leaped overnight to a surprising fifty-six, but that was during a Ute war when prospectors and trappers fled the hills for the doubtful security of Loma Coyote.
They were silent men, accustomed to loneliness, and the combination of too much company and too much of Loma Coyote’s own brand of whisky had led to results somewhat less than surprising. By daybreak of the second day the population had decreased to fifty-three, and there were three bodies lying in an empty shed awaiting a spring thaw for burial.
By the sixth morning the population was almost back to normal, for one by one the newcomers decided the Utes were less to be feared than the population and whisky of Loma Coyote.
At the far end of the street was a huge, drafty old structure that could only be a barn, and a lantern hung outside over a scarcely legible sign that indicated the premises were a livery stable.
In the front of the building was a dark little room in which a stove glowed cherry-red but there was no other light.
Out of the gloom a voice called. “Hay a-plenty, an’ he’p yourself. Corn if you’re a might to, but that’ll be four-bits extry.”
“That’s a lot of money.”
“Take it or leave it, but you stick your lunch-hooks into my corn bin without I say and you’ll catch yourself a death of cold, because I’ll open your belly with a shotgun.”
The old man came out of the “office” carrying a sawed-off shotgun, and he held up a lantern, peering at Radigan. “Man can’t be too careful, that’s what I always say. You’re un-titled to feed your hoss here, but them as wants corn I figure can pay for corn, because most likely they’re running from something.”
“I’m not running, old man. I’m looking for a friend of mine. His name is Loren Pike.”
“Never heard of him. No memory for names. I figger names don’t cut much ice, this here country. Man changes his name ’bout as often as he changes his address, and with most folks hereabout, that’s mighty often.”
“I own a ranch south of here. The name’s Radigan.”
He peered at Radigan again. “Maybe you own a ranch, maybe you don’t, an’ iffen you do, maybe you won’t own it long. Not what I hear folks say.”
“I own it, and a year from now, ten years from now I’ll still own it.” Radigan stripped the saddle from the dapple. “And if I have any trouble from you I’ll ride back up here and burn this flea cage around your dirty ears.”
The old man drew back. “Now what kind of talk is that? Ain’t I puttin’ your hoss up for you? Didn’t I say he’p yourself to corn? Didn’t I?” The old man looked at him shrewdly. “Why, you might be the man John Child works for?”
“Child works for me.”
“All right. I’ll rub your horse down, and I’ll give him a bait of corn. And if you’re lookin’ for any newcomer you might try the Utah or the Ramble. Most folks favor one or the other. On’y my advice to you is to get out of town. Sleep in the haymow if you’re a might to, but stay shut of those places. Swiss Jack is full of trouble tonight.”
Tom Radigan walked to the door, ducked his head against the cold wind and walked down to the eating house. He opened the door and stepped in, accompanied by a few blown flakes. A big, hard-faced woman stood behind the counter and shoved coffee over to him. “You can eat,” she said, “but if you’re lookin’ for anything else, it ain’t to be had. Not tonight, anyway.”
“I want to eat.”
She looked at him. “Yes, I reckon you would. Be an hour for you get any notions, I’d say, get the cold out of you then, and you’ll be looking for something else. Takes a while for the cold to get out of a man’s muscles. I’ve got three girls here, one sixteen and two nineteen, and I can handle more business than the three of them—and better.”
“I’ll settle for a thick steak.”
“You’ll take b’ar meat, an’ like it. We ain’t had any cow meat around here since the storm. Fellers drive it up from the south of here, but the trails are closed.”
Radigan ate in silence while the big woman talked on, apparently neither listening to his occasional comments or caring if he listened to her stream of conversation.
When he had eaten he tossed a dollar on the counter and she handed him three quarters in change. He took a last gulp of scalding coffee and got up, shoving
out into the cold. “Don’t you come the high and mighty on me!” she called after him. “You’ll be back!”
He crossed the street, following a beaten path, to the Utah Saloon.
It was a bar no more than ten feet long and of hand-hewn planks, and the man behind it was nearly as tall as the bar was long. Two men leaned on the bar and several others sat around at tables. They all looked up when he came in, and, seeing he was a stranger, looked again.
“Whisky,” he said, “or whatever you serve by that name.”
The big man leaned over the bar. “You don’t like our drinkin’? Then you can do without.”
“Give it to me. I don’t know whether I like it or not.”
“You’ll decide or you won’t get it.”
“All right! I like it.” Radigan glanced around at the others. They returned his gaze solemnly, and he said, “If these gentlemen like the whisky, I’ll buy.”
The big bartender turned again. “Now see here, stranger. That’s again you’ve throwed a doubt on my liquor. I don’t like it.”
“See?” Radigan grinned at the others. “He admits he doesn’t like it himself.”
The big man interrupted angrily. “I said no such thing. I meant—”
“Trying to weasel out of it,” Radigan said. “Well, fill a glass and I’ll see if I like it.”
The big man stared at him for an instant, then went behind the bar and poured a drink. Nobody else moved. “The offer stands,” Radigan invited.
Nobody moved.
“See? Nobody likes it.”
He tasted it. For an instant he thought his throat was on fire, then he backed off and looked at the glass. “A barrel of branch water, two plugs of tobacco, a bar of soap to give it a bead, and a couple of ounces of strychnine, and maybe three gallons of alcohol. Color the whole thing with greasewood, and that’s about the formula. No wonder nobody drinks it.”
He tasted it again. “Started by selling to the Utes, I’ll bet. No wonder they went on the warpath so much.”
“You’re breedin’ trouble,” the big man warned.
“No I’m not, and I don’t want trouble. Now you haul out that jug from under the bar and I’ll have a decent drink.”
The bartender muttered gloomily and reached under the bar. Immediately the others got up and walked over to join Radigan.
When the glasses were set up and the drinks poured, Radigan said, “I’m Radigan of the R-Bar outfit. You should know the brand. You’ve eaten R-Bar beef, time to time.”
A round-faced man with a sour face looked at the whisky in his glass, then tossed off half of it. “You accusin’ us of rustlin’?”
“Stating a fact,” Radigan said. “And I’m not the man to begrudge a beef now and again, although why you waste time on my little herd when there’s nearly three thousand head in the country that don’t belong there.”
“You invitin’ us?”
“Telling you. What you do is your own affair, only they’re no friends of mine. Fact is, I’m right in the middle of a first-class cow war.”
The door opened behind them in a gust of cold wind a slender blond man came in. He was tall, wiry, and his face was narrow with straight brows above long, deepset eyes. He wore a short sheepskin coat that gave his gun hand plenty of room and a round beaver cap that fitted his narrow skull tightly.
At the same moment there was a clatter of horses’ hoofs in the outer street, and Radigan glanced out the window. In the narrow shaft of light he saw Harvey Thorpe, and the men around him were Thorpe’s men.
Radigan tossed off his drink and shrugged into his coat. The newcomer was watching him. “I don’t know you,” he was saying. “I’m Swiss Jack.”
Radigan grinned at him. “My name is Will Haftowate. And that’s what you’ll have to do.”
“What?” Swiss Jack looked inquiringly.
“You’ll have to wait,” Radigan said. “I spoke of a cattle war: that’s it, out front.”
Swiss Jack glanced over his shoulder. The group of riders were dismounting outside. “That’s no cattle war. That’s Bob Harvey, and if he wants to see you, I’m going to keep you for him.”
“Let him alone.” The big bartender had leaned across the bar. “We don’t hold anybody for anybody here.”
“Now, see here—”
The back door closed softly, and Swiss Jack turned sharply around. Radigan was gone.
Chapter 6
*
THE WIND BLEW cold off the mountain as Radigan paused on the icy back step, listening for sounds within. He could hear the murmur of voices but could distinguish no words, and he waited only until he heard the front door open and then he walked swiftly along the well-beaten path to the outhouse and went past it to the barn.
He paused there, his shadow merging with the heavier shadow alongside the barn wall, and he calculated swiftly. There were only a few buildings in town and all would be searched at once, therefore shelter within any of them was out of the question.
The arrival of Thorpe and his riders was a puzzle, for it was impossible they could have known of his coming here. They might be looking for Pike and Cade, but that was doubtful as thus far they had no argument with them. Hence it was logical to assume they had come here for some other reason and their arrival at this time was purely coincidental. But why would they come here?
And Thorpe had at least a dozen riders with him, and perhaps even more.
Swiss Jack had called him Bob Harvey. Was that a mistake? Or another name Thorpe had used? Radigan recalled his own first impression, that Thorpe was a tough man, one who had been known somewhere before this. But Bob Harvey? He turned the name over in his mind, but it meant nothing to him.
No use standing where he was. He went around the corner of the barn his feet crunching on the frozen snow under the eaves. Back of the barn, and perhaps thirty yards off was the creek bed. He started for it, moving swiftly, not wanting to be caught outlined against the snow, and when he reached the blackness he stopped to catch his breath and to listen.
The back door had slammed. Was the search starting? If there was a search he was sure it would be Swiss Jack who started it: the others, whatever else they might be were men who kept their own counsel.
He moved back into the brush along the creek, then went down along the icy rocks. His Winchester was with his saddle and gear back in the livery stable, but to go for it now was fatal.
He saw men fanning out from the barn, going from building to building. Obviously, the idea that he might have remained outside on such a cold night had not occurred to them, but it would soon come to mind. Yet only a few minutes had passed when he heard a call. It was Thorpe’s voice. “All right! No time for that! Come on in! We’ll take care of him on the way back!”
The way back from where?
He saw them straggle back and mount up, and then they rode out of town in a tight cavalcade as if bunching against the cold.
If men traveled on such a night there, haste was imperative and they must have far to go.
Nobody commented when he came back into the saloon and this time the bartender reached under the bar for the good jug and poured a drink. “On the house,” he said.
“Cold out there,” Radigan commented.
“Especially,” it was Swiss Jack, “if you have cold feet to begin.”
Radigan took his drink and his time. Then he turned slowly around and looked at Swiss Jack. He looked at him for a full minute while the room was silent. The fire crackled and inside the pot-bellied stove a stick fell. A man shifted his feet and poured a glass full and the trickling of the whisky could be heard plainly in the room.
“Yes,” Radigan said quietly, “I had cold feet from a long ride, and cold hands, and there were a few more outside than I was in any mood to tackle. There must have been a dozen of them.”
“So?” Swiss Jack was sitting back in his chair, smiling.
“There’s only one of you.”
Swiss Jack was surprised. He had expected everyt
hing but that and for an instant it caught him unawares, and also, he instantly realized, he was in no position to draw a gun and any slightest move on his part could be construed as a move to draw. If the big man at the bar was any hand at all with a gun, then Swiss Jack himself was as good as dead. And he was not ready to die.
For a long moment he sat very still, wondering if he dared move from his slouched position without feeling the tear of hot lead in his guts.
Radigan knew exactly how Swiss Jack was feeling and he was in no hurry to let him off the hook. “I said just any time,” he said, “but if you reach for a gun, I’ll kill you.”
Swiss Jack’s mouth was dry and he could feel his pulse throbbing heavily. He dearly wanted to move, his position had become cramped, but he was quite sure now that the big man was not fooling.
Radigan watched him, his eyes cold but his lips smiling slightly. He did not want to kill this man, yet he knew that if it became necessary he was not going to lose any time doing it or any sleep afterwards. He did not want to brag but he knew that sometimes even a dangerous man will hesitate before tackling an equally dangerous one.
“You called that man Bob Harvey. I don’t know the name.”
“Your hard luck.”
“Not mine. He’s yellow enough to hire his killing.”
Swiss Jack laughed. “Bob Harvey? You’ve the wrong man. Bob can kill his own cats.”
“He hired Vin Cable to kill me.”
He saw the sudden awareness in Swiss Jack’s eyes and knew now that whatever else Swiss Jack might do he was not going to begin a fight under any misapprehensions.
“You’re Radigan?” There was a slight note of incredulity.
“I’m Radigan.”
By now he knew the story of the killing of Vin Cable would be known wherever Western men gathered, for such stories were quickly passed on from campfire to card table across the country. And especially were such stories the gossip of such places as this, where they were meat and drink to the lonely men who lived by the gun.
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