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Sudden Outlawed ~ Oliver Strange
(Book 04 in the Sudden Westerns series)
Chapter I
“I’m pretty near down to my last chip, son, an’ before I get outa the game there’s somethin’ I wanta say.”
The voice was weak, little more than a whisper, and the breath came with difficulty from the speaker’s labouring lungs. Out of the gaunt, angular face, deeply graven with lines of suffering, hard eyes rested approvingly upon the youth who, with downcast head, stood beside the bed. Tall, slim, and supple, wide-shouldered and narrow-hipped, strength showed in every line of him. In his eyes lay a deep-seated misery.
“I’ve allus had the name for a square shooter, but I ain’t done right by yu, Jim,” the sick man went on. “There won’t be nothin’ for yu—but a debt-to two men.”
“Yu’ve been mighty good to me,” the boy muttered, and despite his iron effort for control there was a quaver in his voice.
The other was silent awhile, fighting for breath, and then, “Peterson stole my li’l gal an’ broke my heart,” he said slowly. “An’ when yu was East, gettin’ some larnin’, that houn’ Webb stripped me.” His voice was harsh, pregnant with passion; hatred gave him a last spasm of strength. “yo’re the fastest fella with a gun I ever see, an’ I’ve knowed some o’ the best; I’m leavin’ them two skunks to yu.”
The younger man’s bronzed face remained impassive as a redskin’s, save that the muscles of the square jaw firmed up and the grey-blue eyes became icy.
“I’ll get ‘em,” he promised, and this time there was no tremor in the low vibrant voice.
A gleam of fierce satisfaction flitted over the pallid features of the dying man and then his head sagged sideways. The boy just caught the whispered words, “S’long—Jim.”
For a moment he stood dazed, hardly realizing that all was over. Death he had seen before, but not in this guise. Now, as he looked down upon the stark form of the man who had been his only friend, a convulsive sob tore at his throat. Gently he drew up the sheet to cover the glazed expressionless eyes, and went out.
Seated on a bench in front of the ranchhouse, he mechanically rolled and lighted a cigarette, his mind delving into the past. He saw himself, a half-starved, lanky lad, parentless, nameless, friendless, practically the property of an old Piute brave, travelling the country with a band of ponies. How he had come to be with them he had never learned, but he knew that he was white—the Indian woman had once told him as much, after a successful sale when her lord and master became drunk before the fire-water was finished, an unusual occurrence of which she promptly took advantage. The nomad life toughened the boy, gave him self-reliance, and the ability to stay on the back of anything that wore hair. He was not unhappy, for the Indian couple were kind enough when sober. And he loved the horses.
With the advent of Bill Evesham had come a complete change, for the kindly-faced, lonely rancher took a fancy to the boy and bought him, together with a string of ponies, from the Indian horse-trader. So Jim—Evesham called him that—had come to the ranch at Crawling Creek.
The ensuing years were happy ones. He acquired some rudiments of knowledge at a school fifteen miles distant, and learned the cattle business. Then Evesham sent him East to complete his education and for nearly two years he paid only flying visits to the ranch. He had returned finally a few months ago to find his benefactor ailing and broken, a glum, dispirited man who remained obstinately silent respecting his troubles.
“Things ain’t gone none too well, Jim, an’ I’ve had to sell stock,” was his grudging explanation when the young man remarked on the depleted herds.
“Yu should ‘a’ fetched me back—I’ve been spendin’ coin yu couldn’t afford,” Jim had protested.
“Shucks! Had to give yu yore chance. We’ll make the grade,” the rancher had replied.
But although Jim had applied himself whole-heartedly to work on the range, matters did not improve, and the cattleman’s failing health proved a heavy handicap. One by one the few remaining riders had drifted until only Limpy, a disabled cowboy who acted as cook, and Jim, were left. And now… . A halting step on the porch aroused him.
“Jim, he’s—gone,” Limpy announced in a shocked voice. The boy nodded miserably. The older man put a hand on his shoulder.
“I’m powerful sorry,” he said. “Bill was a good fella—one o’ the best I ever knowed. ‘S’pose the place’Il be yores now?”
Jim shook his head. “Reckon not, Limpy,” he replied. “I figure the ranch is pretty well hawg-tied. I expect I’ll be ridin’.”
The following afternoon found Jim again on the porch seat, brooding, restless, his eyes on the blue mountains which rimmed the horizon and hemmed in the broad undulating stretches of sun-scorched grass. Though he had seen Evesham buried that morning, he still found it difficult to believe that the man who had been all the father he had ever known was gone.
Presently a tiny blot appeared on the trail to town, gradually growing in size until it became a rider, jog-trotting leisurely towards the ranch. The visitor proved to be a short, stout man of more than middle age, dressed in rusty black, and obviously ill at ease in the saddle. He got down clumsily, tied his mount to the hitch-rail, and mopped his moist face.
“Damn hosses anyway,” he complained. “Why didn’t the A’mighty give us wings?”
Despite his sadness, a glint of a smile wrinkled the corners of the young man’s mouth as he tried to vision the stumpy form of the speaker flapping its way through the air.
“You’ll get ‘em in the next world, Pyke—mebbe,” he said, sardonically, adding, “There’s liquor inside.”
Pyke shook his head. “On’y makes yu hotter,” he said, and plumped himself down on the bench.
Neither spoke for a while. The visitor filled and lighted a pipe and the other constructed a cigarette. Pyke did not seem in a hurry to open the conversation, and Jim sensed the reason. He had seen him at the little cemetery in the morning and had noticed his constraint.
“Well, ol’-timer, spill the beans,” he said quietly. “Come to tell me to pull my freight, huh?”
Pyke looked still more uncomfortable. “Hell, no, Jim,” he protested. “Stay as long as yu’ve a mind to, but—” He paused awkwardly and then went on with a rush. “Pore of Bill owed a lot o’ coin an’ this yer ranch is all there is to show for it. Won’t cover the debt no how; he didn’t own more’n a section o’ the land, an’ if what I’ve heard is correct, he’s been losin’ cattle, so …”
“There’ll be no pickin’s for me,” the young man helped him out. “I knowed that a’ready.”
“Yu see, Jim, I ain’t alone in this,” Pyke said hastily. “Two —three of us chipped in to tide Bill over. If it was just me I’d be willin’ to let the debt run, but—”
The other smiled sombrely. “yu don’t have to tell me,” he replied. “What’s come o’ Webb?”
“Ain’t a notion,” was the answer. “He faded ‘bout the time yu was due to get back. Never liked the fella m’self but Bill usted him—too much, I reckon.”
Jim nodded a gloomy acquiescence. He had seen the man on the last of his brief visits from the East, and recalled him as big-built, redheaded, and something of a blustering bully.
Evesham had made him foreman, and with increasing ill-health, had left things largely in his hands.
“I didn’t oughta gone away,” he muttered, voicing an ever-present regret.
“He was dead sot on yore goin’,” the elder man consoled. What yu aimin’ to do, Jim?”
“I’ve got a job,” came the instant reply, rasped out through enched teeth.
Pyke’s mild gaze noted the set, out-thrust jaw, the frosty gleam in the grey-b
lue eyes, and shook his head as he guessed the boy’s intention.
“She’s a large country,” he offered. “Now, I was thinkin’ we’ll want someone here to run the ranch….”
Jim stood up. “It’s mighty kind o’ yu, Pyke, but …” He looked at the familiar scene. “No, I couldn’t stand it—without —him,” he said. “I reckon I’ll scratch gravel.”
“Well, chew it over—there’s no hurry,” Pyke told him, as he climbed into his saddle.
The young man’s smile was tight-lipped. “I’ll be away early in the mornin’,” he said.
“Mebbe I’ll be back—some day.” There was a finality in his tone which conveyed that further argument would be futile. Pyke had no more to say; the West held that “a man must skin his own meat,” and advice, unless plainly asked for, was seldom offered. So, with a nod of farewell, he rode away.
Jim watched the visitor dwindle to a mere speck and vanish where the trail dipped into a hollow, but he was not thinking of Pyke; his mind was milling over the last few days. For the first time he had had the bitter experience of standing helplessly by while a dear one passed over the Big Divide, and now—as at the time—the thought of his impotence filled him with a blind, unreasoning rage, the rebellion of youth and strength against the immutable law of Nature. There was nothing he could have done then, but there was something he could do—now.
“Peterson and Webe.”
He murmured the names, his face a grim threat; his hands flashed to his hips, the black-handled guns leapt out, a staccato stream of crashes shattered the stillness, and a tall weed, twenty paces distant on the edge of the trail, dissolved into fragments before a hail of lead. From inside the ranchhouse came a scurry of clumsy footsteps and Limpy appeared in the doorway carrying a rifle.
“What th’ blazes, Jim?” he began. His darting eyes took in the lounging figure on the bench, the smoking guns, and the stricken target. “Thought it was Injuns, or some o’ them Mex raiders.”
“Just me, lettin’ off steam,” the other explained. “Wanted to see if I’d got rusty, but I reckon if that’d been a man …” He nodded at the weed.
“He’d shore be hittin’ the high spots for hell,” the cook said, and then, curiously, “Did yu have a particular fella in mind, Jim?”
The answer took the form of a question. “Any idea where that chap Webb went?”
The lame man’s eyes narrowed. “Wish I had, the buzzard,” he growled. “But for him, Bill wouldn’t have …” He paused as the significance of the query dawned upon him. “yu ain’t stayin’ then?”
“I hit the trail in the mornin’,” was the reply.
“Good huntin’,” was all Limpy said, and went in to prepare the evening meal.
Jim reloaded his empty weapons and thrust them back into the holsters. His spate of anger was past, leaving only a cold determination. He had to find two men, only one of whom he had seen, and such is the optimism of youth, the magnitude of the task did not daunt him. Even had he known of the years which were to elapse ere he would fulfil his promise to the dead man, it would have made no difference; his early life had endowed him with much of the redskin’s patience and relentlessness. This strange quest, which set him drifting in a wild, lawless land, flung him headlong into many perilous adventures, with one of which this story deals.
Chapter II
The rider was talking to his horse.
“We gotta have a label, Nig—Evesham won’t do nohow.”
He looked meditatively at the broad rolling prairie which stretched away on each side of the rough trail he was following, a monstrous expanse of sun-baked, brown grass.
“Green is a good name, kind o’ refreshin’, nothin’ fancy nor outstandin’. Jim Green o’
Texas shore listens well, huh?”
The big black, pacing demurely along, tossed its head as though in agreement and his master patted the sleek neck.
“Good,” he said. “Settles me, but yu ain’t got no brand a-tall, an’ that’ll mean trouble with a large T.”
He got down, trailed the reins, and stroked the satiny muzzle thrust inquiringly towards a pocket. He produced a biscuit, which the horse daintily accepted.
“Now be a good fella,” the rider admonished. “This ain’t goin’ to hurt like an iron.”
With a knife-blade held against his thumb he plucked the hair from the skin on the animal’s rump, and, in time, produced a creditable J G brand. Surveying his work, he decided that it would serve, though an expert would not be deceived. He resumed his journey.
“Looks like we might he gettin’ some place,” he remarked presently.
The trail was broadening out, and as they topped a billow in the surface of the plain a huddle of black blotches, from a few of which spirals of smoke twisted into the clear sky, came into view.
“Must be what that joker we met called the ‘pop’lar an’ progressive township o’ Fourways,’ ” the traveller soliloquized. “She don’t appear to have progressed very far.”
The criticism was justified. Two irregular rows of habitations formed some sort of a street, the surface of which was a hoof-scored, wheel-rutted desert of dust. The better of the buildings, the stores and saloons, were constructed of timber or ‘dobe; the dwelling-places, for the most part, were mere shacks with earth-covered roofs. Save for a few citizens lolling beneath the board awning of the largest saloon, the place appeared to be deserted. The newcomer deciphered the weather-scarred sign, and surveyed the lounging group with a fleeting smile.
“The Early Bird,” he murmured. “An’ some o’ the worms waitin’ to be catched.”
Dropping from his saddle he stepped into the saloon. After the fierce glare without, it was comparatively cool and dark inside. As he advanced, a short figure rose from behind the bar, stretched lazily, and rubbed half-open eyes.
“‘Lo, Jud. Back again?” Then, as the stranger neared him, he added, “Sorry. Took yu for another fella.”
“I shorely hope he’s good-lookin’,” the customer grinned, and spun a coin on the counter.
“Well, that’s as maybe, but no woman ain’t grabbed him yet,” the saloon-keeper laughed.
He pushed forward a bottle and glass, accepted an invitation to help himself, and deftly tossed a three-finger dose of spirit down his capacious throat.
“Town seems quiet,” the visitor offered.
“Too blamed hot,” the other explained. “Come back in a coupla hours, if yo’re aimin’ to stay, an’ yu’ll see some action.”
The remark was as much of a question as politeness permitted; the stranger answered it in part only.
“I’m huntin’ a meal an’ a bed,” he said.
“Yu’ll find both at the ho-tel a piece along,” he was told.
The customer nodded his thanks. “Reckon I’ll go chase that chuck right now,” he smiled.
“My belly an’ my backbone is shore gettin’ acquainted. See yu later—I expect.”
The saloon-keeper’s gaze followed him speculatively, noting the long, easy stride and the swing of the wide shoulders.
“Two guns an’ wears ‘em low,” he commented. “I’d say they ain’t just ornaments neither.”
Jim found the “ho-tel”—a shrivelled log and shake edifice which had the distinction of possessing the only second storey in the town. Having put his mount in the corral, he carried his saddle into the building. A slatternly woman showed him to one of the bedrooms and went to prepare food.
Two hours later, having fed and “slicked himself up,” he was again in the Early Bird. As its proprietor had predicted, the scene was very different. The harsh light of large kerosene lamps shone down upon about a score of men, some lined up at the bar, others gambling at the tables which occupied part of the space in front of it. Every few moments the door swung back to admit additions to the company. The rattle of poker chips and dice, strange oaths, and occasional raucous laughter punctuated the incessant hum of voices.
Squinting through the blue haze of tobacc
o smoke the man from Crawling Creek studied the company. Apart from casual glances, no one took any notice of him—strangers were hardly a novelty in Fourways, and curiosity a dangerous commodity, liable to be resented. One man only looked him over keenly and turned away, apparently satisfied. This was a dumpy, bulbous-faced fellow with a big paunch and a strut suggestive of an overfed turkey. From the somewhat ironic deference accorded him and the fact that he paid for no liquor, Jim deduced that he held a post of importance, and this was soon confirmed.
“Where’s Jud?” the fat man asked.
“Ain’t a notion, sheriff,” the saloon-keeper replied. “Should ‘a’ bin back hours ago. He warn’t”
He stopped, mouth and eyes opening as the swing-door jerked wide and a man staggered in, flung his arms out, and pitched forward on the sanded floor. Mallick, the sheriff, hurried to the prone figure.
“By God, it’s Jud hisself!” he cried. “What the hell …?”
Others sprang to help and the senseless man was lifted to a chair. One of them looked at his hand in surprise; it was smeared with blood. He snatched aside the open vest, disclosing an ominous patch of red on the coarse woollen shirt front.
“He’s bin drilled!” he cried.
Astonishment, expressed in lurid language, greeted the statement, and the excited onlookers, eager to get a sight of the wounded man, crowded in and threatened to engulf him.
The sheriff, feeling for a fluttering pulse, looked up and cursed them savagely.
“Satan burn yu,” he snapped. “Stand back an’ give him a chance, he ain’t cashed yet. Gimme some liquor.”
The circle widened and the saloon-keeper brought a glass of whisky. Mallick tilted back the hurt man’s head and administered a stiff dose. The fiery spirit took effect. Jim, who had helped with the lifting, saw the pale lips move and caught the whispered words:
“Bushwhacked me—one man—waitin’ in th’ chaparral.” He paused, and then, “On’y ‘nother—mile—bronc. Guess—we can -make it.”
His mind was wandering, living over again those terrible hours during which, hurt to death, he had clung to the back of his horse and paced the long, long miles which lay between him and help. Then out of the pain-drawn face, sickly grey under the tan, a gleam of recognition flashed from the heavy-lidded eyes as they met those of Jim.
Sudden: Outlawed Page 1