Passin' Through (1985)

by L'amour, Louis

  Mrs. Hollyrood now, she never seemed to go anywhere. Not that Parrott City or Animas City had much to offer, but womenfolks always like to shop around and look things over. She never left the ranch. Of course, bein’ an actress an’ all she’d probably had her fill of travel.

  She was a right handsome woman, her beautiful gray hair always perfectly done, and few wrinkles for a woman her age.

  Matty now, Matty was what some folks, like that English lord I guided, they would call her beauty classical. She was perfectly beautiful and beautifully perfect, if you get what I mean. Only she never seemed to smile. Her only expression was in her eyes.

  Just who was she? There had been nothing wrong with her shooting when she shot that man riding at her with a torch. She’d grown up shooting, of course, but most folks would show more feeling, it seemed to me. She shot that man because she had it to do and that was all there was to it.

  In my pocket I had the will that said Janet Le Caudy was to inherit the ranch, and when I got back, something would have to be done about that. And I was on my way back.

  Yet, when I took a last look around, walking to the cliff edge and listening, it was Janet I was thinking about. “Le Caudy” sounded like Billy Cody’s name, but the way she spelled it was French, I guess. A mighty pretty woman.

  My fire was dying but the coffee was still hot. I drank another cup and then stretched out on my bed and slept like a baby.

  Twice during the night I awakened, listened into the night, and once I walked to the cliff edge. The stars were bright in the sky, and high on the edge of the mesa I seemed almost among them. When morning came I saddled up and checked my supplies. If I’d had more I’d have stayed right there until they tired of hunting me, but at most I’d enough for two days. What I’d best do was get on down to the ranch, say my goodbyes, turn that will over to Janet Le Caudy, and ride on out of what was none of my business anyway.

  Skirting the cliffs, I found a way where Indians had walked, and rode north. The view from there took a man’s breath. I mean, I’d seen some sights but this was one of the finest. Finding a way through the cedars, I skirted the heads of some canyons an’ worked my way over to the east rim of the mesa. There I could look east over the Mancos Valley and in the distance could see Maggie’s Rock and the ranch land.

  There was a narrow switchback trail came down off the rim there, and I took it. Then I headed east, keeping a sharp lookout for travel, but I saw nobody.

  This was wild country. There were cattle running, most of the brands unfamiliar although I saw a few Phillips cows amongst them. The main trail was just north of me but I wasn’t about to leave tracks on it, so I came around the end of Menefee Mountain and worked my way, keeping away from trails, into Thompson Park.

  This was ranching country and there should have been folks working around, but I saw no one and hoped nobody saw me. At the head of Thompson Park I crossed Cherry Creek an’ rode up Deadman Canyon. Now I was in back of the ranch, and I found a horse trail that led up the ridge near Maggie’s Rock.

  When I left Deadman I had to ride through Spring Gulch, a pretty little canyon, both sides covered with trees. This was a place to take my time and I did so. I rode, rifle in hand, ready for anything. So far I’d used my head but also I’d had luck.

  Thing that worried my mind was Pan Beacham. Who was he after? And if he was after me, where was he? The rest of them were troublesome men, but Pan … he was poison, pure poison.

  It was already dark when I rode up the lower end of Spring Gulch. I was dead beat and so were the horses although I’d switched saddles once. It was moonlight, so when I fetched up right below Maggie’s Rock, I pulled the riggin’ off my stock and picketed them. The grass was good, and I was tired. There’d be no coffee tonight.

  Tomorrow I would ride down to the ranch, after scouting for trouble, and I’d say my goodbyes, then cut across to Parrott City to see Janet Le Caudy.

  Not that she’d be waiting to see me.

  She probably had forgotten I so much as existed, but I had to give her that will. It was hers, and half that ranch was hers.

  That worried me, too. Why, when Phillips left the ranch to Mrs. Hollyrood, didn’t he tell her he only owned half of it? That just didn’t make sense.

  This was no time to think about that. Tired as I was, my thinkin’ just wouldn’t make sense. Not that my thinkin’ was anything to write home about. When it came to stock, like horses an’ cattle, well, I could hold my own. At mining with a single jack an’ drill I was a good man. Swinging a single jack or double jack can put power in a man’s shoulders, and I guess I had that, but that was about the size of it.

  It surely didn’t look like rain but in these mountains rain could come up almost anytime, so I stowed my gear an’ saddles back under a tree where the branches would give it some shelter from any rain that fell.

  There was no worry about rattlers at this altitude, for I’d never seen one above seven thousand feet, or for that matter, not often about sixty-five hundred, and judgin’ by the plant life I was around seventy-five hundred or better right here.

  There’d been rain earlier. It hadn’t fallen where I was but I’d heard distant thunder and had seen lightning over the La Platas. Dunn’ the last hour I’d been travelin’ over wet grass and seein’ a good many pools left by the heavy showers. Before comin’ up to camp I’d let the horses drink their fill at a couple of those pools.

  There was one right down yonder where water had gathered in a slight hollow atop of a boulder. I’d go there and get my own drink.

  Lots of shadows. Trees in clumps, trees standin’ alone, big rocks here an’ there. This was spooky country at night, but then, most wild country is spooky after dark. I stretched, getting the kinks out of my system.

  Rifle in hand, I walked down to that rock where the water was. My lids felt thick and heavy. I was sure enough tired, I was -

  I bent over to drink and felt a wicked blow in the back and then the roar of a shot, close by. I hit the grass, rolling, stunned and hurt bad. When I started to rise, another bullet struck a tree with an ugly whap, and I rolled again, fighting back panic.

  Through a fog of shock and fear I heard a voice. He spoke in a conversational tone, easylike, with no hurry in him. “Got you, Mr. Passin’. If you’re not dead you can expect me back come daylight. I got no idea of walkin’ into a bullet from a man who’s dyin’.

  “I aimed true and I got you. I seen it hit an’ I seen you fall, an’ I got you with my second shot. I heard it hit.

  “You give me trouble, Mr. Passin’, but I figured you for a cagey one. You’d not go ridin’ back down to that ranch without lookin’ it over.

  “Lookin’ it over from where? Had to be that ridge, an’ comin’ at it from the west? Well, all I had to do was set up there close to Maggie’s Rock an’ wait. Sure enough, there you come. Your hosses was beat so I figured you’d be, too. Had you dead to rights.

  “I wonder who you are, Mr. Passin’? You’re somebody I should know, but I been fittin’ an’ comparin’ an’ tryin’ to make you out. No luck so far. But you’re good. You left them others half-crazy with wonderin’ where you got to. They wasn’t lookin’ for three horses, like I was, so when they cut your trail they thought they had the wrong man.

  “You ain’t goin’ no place. You jus’ lie there an’ die. I’ll come around in the mornin’, just to make sure, an’ maybe I’ll turn your stock loose so they won’t starve when the grass plays out.

  “Good night, Mr. Passin’, an’ goodbye. See you in hell, sometime.”

  He walked away and I could hear him go. Later I heard his horse, that was while I could still hear. It was a fight to hold still an’ stay conscious. I slipped in my mind but I fought it back. If I moved or groaned he would kill me now. He was just hopin’ I’d speak so’s he could finish the job. He was just baiting me, waiting.

  He knew I was somewhere down there in the dark an’ I might be playin’ possum, so he was behind a rock somewheres just awaiti
n’ for me to make a fool of myself, but I didn’t go to school to eat lunch. Hurt as I was an’ ready to pass out, I had sense enough to keep quiet.

  Then I crawled. I had to get away, I had to hide. I had to live. I had to -

  Everything faded. I’d crawled into mud, and I had to stop the bleeding. I rolled over on my back and pressed the back of my head into the mud.

  My eyes closed and I just lay still. If I could not move, I would die. He’d find me there in the morning, and if I was not dead one easy shot would do it. Or he might just pick up a rock and bash in my skull. He’d been known to do that, too.

  I had to move, I had to, I would, I -

  Chapter Fourteen

  A spattering on my face, and my eyes opened upon darkness. My eyes opened to the rain, then closed. My head throbbed with a dull, heavy beat. When I tried to move, pain shot through me. Waiting, I forced myself to think.

  Pan Beacham had shot me. Only my bending to drink had saved me from instant death. Remembering the feeling and realizing how I felt now, I suspected the bullet had skimmed the top of my right buttock, then had cut a furrow in my back above the right shoulder blade and then hit my skull.

  As I was alive, the bullet had probably only grazed my head. Deliberately, I forced myself to think, to reason. I was not going to die. Not here, not now. But if I were to survive I needed to move, to be gone from here before Beacham returned. I could not see enough stars to judge the time. The brief shower was over but there might be another. The clouds were over me but in the west beyond Mesa Verde’s bulk the sky was clear.

  Now I must move, but first a plan. My duffle. My packs. There were things there I would need. Yet suppose he had not gone? Suppose he was sitting back under a tree out of the rain and watching my packs? It would be a logical thing for him to do.

  For a moment I mentally braced myself for the effort, then I rolled over. Pain stabbed through me like a sword, making me gasp from sheer agony, yet now I was on my chest, my hands under me. One hand reached out, groping for my rifle. The shine of moisture on the barrel guided my hand. My other hand grasped a tuft of grass and I tugged, slowly, inch by painful inch, groping my way forward.

  High ground. I needed to get to high ground. A rough guess suggested it was some two hundred yards through the brush to the top of the ridge. The ranch house was no more than a mile away and probably less. They would help me, and I would need help, but how was I to get there? And crawling as I was would leave a trail any child could follow. Long before I could reach help Pan Beacham or some other enemy would find me.

  There was another thought. There were mountain lions ranging the ridge. I had seen their tracks and their droppings. Bears, also, and in the daytime, buzzards.

  Slowly, painfully, I crawled. My eyes were accustomed to the dark, and sometimes I could see. There were open spaces among the trees and I crawled through them, dragging the rifle. My head felt heavy and I had to stop. Resting my head on the wet grass, I think I passed out. Maybe I just slept. Then I was crawling again, inching through brush. At a tree with low branches I tugged myself up to my knees, waited for a slow minute, and then managed to get to my feet. Leaning against a tree I felt for my gun. It was still in its holster, the loop over the hammer holding it secure.

  What I wanted was to lie down. I wanted to pass out, I wanted just to rest, but to sleep was to die. How much time remained? I did not know. The sky had clouded over and no stars remained. It was going to rain again. Now I could move faster but not much faster. I could reach from tree to tree, from bush to bush, inching my way up the ridge. Several times I fell, and each time it was harder to rise.

  There was gray light on the eastern horizon before I topped out on the ridge, and I needed a place to hide. No doubt there were caves or hollows in the sides of Maggie’s Rock but I had no time to look nor any wish to dispute their possession with a mountain lion.

  Lowering myself carefully to a seat on a flat rock, I got out my bandanna neckerchief and wiped my rifle free of mud and leaves. Then checked the action. It worked.

  One thing I knew. If I was to hide, it had to be close. I could go no further. The ranch was almost within sight, and would have been but for the trees, but I hadn’t the strength to go on without rest, and the ridge on which I sat offered nothing. To the south it dropped off steeply, in some places sheer for thirty or forty feet, in others just trees and brush through which I’d climbed. On the other side of the ridge it was even steeper and more thickly clad with ponderosa. There was a vague trail along the crest of the ridge and -

  Stones, a small square of stones at ground level. Hobbling, I crossed to it, and looked into a hole about five feet deep and roughly two feet square, perhaps a little larger.

  I knew what it was. Such holes were used by Indians to trap eagles when they wanted their feathers. An Indian would crouch down in the hole and it would be covered with a lid of woven branches. Atop this he would have a live rabbit tied. Its struggles to escape would attract an eagle, and when it swooped to take the rabbit the Indian would seize its legs.

  No sooner had I recognized what it was than I began weaving a lid from pine boughs. Hobbling to the nearest tree, I cut several and wove them into a rough square large enough to cover the hole. Into the crude matt I wove some dead boughs also, and covered it with scattered leaves, then placed it close beside the hole. If need be, that was my refuge. Then I made a dragging track further along the dim trail and to the edge of the cliff on the side where the ranch lay. By the time I got back to my refuge, the sun was in the sky and I was completely exhausted.

  From the rim I peered through the trees at the place where I had originally fallen. Some two hundred yards back toward the opening of Spring Gulch was a bay horse, a saddled horse tied to a tree.

  Finding its rider required several minutes, and when my eyes discovered him he was squatting in the rocks looking at the place where I had fallen into the mud near a puddle of rainwater. He was a cautious killer, and now he was wondering what had become of me and how far I had managed to get.

  My horses and outfit were there, evidence enough that I was out of action. From where he squatted he would be able to see where I had been crawling. Now his eyes were following my route.

  For a moment I was tempted to try a shot, but shooting sharply down-or uphill could be tricky. One is apt to over-or undershoot, and my shot must be a kill or he would have me. My position would have been given away, also that I was close by, and he would have all the advantage of being able to maneuver, and I would not. My one chance was the hole. Stepping carefully on rocks, I went to the hole and eased myself into it, gasping with pain. Crouching low, I eased the crude cover in place. Surrounded by small brush, I hoped his eyes would pass quickly over it. And if he came to look, I had my rifle.

  Slowly, my tired muscles relaxed. Rifle in hand, I waited. Slowly, I closed my eyes, but not to sleep, merely to rest, for to sleep now might be to snore or even breathe heavily, and that could give me away.

  It was a long wait. My back stung and my head throbbed with that same dull, heavy ache. It felt like something pressing on the back of my skull, and when I moved my head it must be with infinite care or I would almost black out. Minutes passed, then ever so softly, and almost above me, a boot brushed the earth. To step on my lid Beacham must step over brush, and it was unlikely for the direction led elsewhere.

  Another step, and I could hear him breathing. I dared make no slightest move. My rifle muzzle was within inches of the lid over my hole and my finger was on the trigger.

  He would not be looking for or suspecting any such hiding place. No one would. Such holes were uncommon, and always on high places where eagles flew. He might not even know of the trick the Indians used. Not many did. It would be the last thing he would suspect.

  He would be looking around rocks, among trees. If he suspected, all he had to do was shoot into the lid, for there would be no escaping. I quite filled the hole. The only way to move was out.

  All was quie
t. Boots scuffed earth, moving away. My eyes closed again but my ears strained for sound. Thank God he did not have a dog! Boots grated again, and again he was standing close by. He was puzzled.

  He knew I was shot. He was sure I was badly hurt. A good marksman knows where his bullets go, and but for the fact that I had bent to drink I would be dead.

  I had crawled. He had seen that in the track I left. Later, had managed to get on my feet but had fallen again and again. He would have seen that, too. So how could I get away? I simply had to be close by. He was obviously disturbed but wary, also. A man who can move is a man who can shoot. He might not suspect me of having a rifle unless he checked both saddles, for the other rifle was in its scabbard and he might have seen that. It would be unlikely he would suspect me of having two rifles, which was the case due to the outfit inherited with the blue roan.

  He struck a match on his jeans. I heard the scrape and the flare. He was lighting a cigarette. He flipped the burned-out match and it fell on the lid above me. From time to time his boots moved.

  My legs were cramped and the strain was becoming unbearable. He walked off a few steps, then came back.

  An awful thought came. He knew I was there! He was amusing himself, deliberately torturing me. Supposing he decided to build a fire atop my hole? That was ridiculous because it was among small but highly inflammable brush. If only I could straighten out, stretch my cramped legs!

  My thoughts concentrated on his horse. If I thought of him he might somehow sense my thoughts. I did not believe that but had heard of such things, so to keep my thoughts from him I thought of his horse. Somebody was going to steal his horse. Somebody was going to set him afoot. Somebody -

  He moved away but not far away. Finally he swore softly, bitterly, then his footsteps retreated off down the trail. I waited. I counted a slow one hundred, and there was no sound. Again I counted, slower still, something to measure the passing of time. Still I waited.