“Did you notice something?” she asked suddenly. “Wing Cary seemed very sure that Jim Walker wasn’t coming back, that you weren’t he.”
Gatlin frowned. He had noticed it, and it had him wondering. “He did sound mighty sure. Like he might know Walker wasn’t coming back.”
They were silent in the dark office, yet each knew what the other was thinking. Jim Walker was dead. Pete Chasin had not known it. Neither, obviously, had Bill Trout.
“What happens to you then?” Gatlin asked suddenly. “You lose the ranch?”
She shrugged. “I never had it, and never really thought I would have it, only…well, if Jim had lived…I mean, if Jim got the ranch, we’d have made out. We were very close, like brother and sister. Now I don’t know what I can do.”
“You haven’t any people?”
“None that I know of.” Her head came up suddenly. “Oh, it isn’t myself I’m thinking of, it’s all the old hands, the ranch itself. Uncle Dave hated Cary, and so do his men. Now he’ll get the ranch, and they’ll all be fired, and he’ll ruin the place. That’s what he’s wanted all along.”
Gatlin shifted his feet. “Tough,” he said, “mighty tough.” He opened the door slightly. “Thanks,” he said, “for getting me out of there.”
She didn’t reply, so, after a moment, he stepped out of the door and drew it gently to behind him.
There was no time to lose. He must be out of town by daylight and with miles behind him. There was no sense getting mixed up in somebody else’s fight, for all he’d get out of it would be a bellyful of lead. There was nothing he could do to help. He moved swiftly, and within a matter of minutes was in his hotel room. Apparently searching for Jim Walker, they hadn’t considered his room in the hotel, so Gatlin got his duffel together, stuffed it into his saddlebags, and picked up his rifle. With utmost care, he eased down the back stairs and into the alley.
The streets were once more dark and still. What had become of the Flying C hands he didn’t know, but none was visible. Staying on back streets, he made his way carefully to the livery barn, but there his chance of cover grew less, for he must enter the wide door with a light glowing over it.
After listening, he stepped out and, head down, walked through the door. Turning, he hurried to the stall where his powerful black waited. It was the work of only a few minutes to saddle up. He led the horse out of the stall and caught up the bridle. As his hand grasped the pommel, a voice stopped him.
“Lightin’ out?”
It was Pete Chasin’s voice. Slowly he released his grip on the pommel and turned slightly. The man was hidden in a stall.
“Why not?” Gatlin asked. “I’m not goin’ to be a shootin’ gallery for nobody. This ain’t my range, an’ I’m slopin’ out of here for Texas. I’m no trouble hunter.”
He heard Chasin’s chuckle. “Don’t reckon you are. But it seems a shame not to make the most of your chance. What if I offered you five thousand to stay? Five thousand, in cash?”
“Five thousand?” Gatlin blinked. That was half as much as he had in his belt, and the $10,000 he carried had taken much hard work and bargaining to get. Buying a herd, chancing the long drive.
“What would I have to do?” he demanded.
Chasin came out of the stall. “Be yourself,” he said, “just be yourself…but let folks think you’re Jim Walker. Then you buy a ranch here…I’ll give you the money, an’ then you hit the trail.”
Chasin was trying to double-cross Cary? To get the ranch for himself?
Gatlin hesitated. “That’s a lot of money, but these boys toss a lot of lead. I might not live to spend the dough.”
“I’ll hide you out,” Chasin argued. “I’ve got a cabin in the hills. I’d hide you out with four or five of my boys to stand guard. You’d be safe enough. Then you could come down, put your money on the line, an’ sign the papers.”
“Suppose they want Walker’s signature checked?”
“Jim Walker never signed more’n three, four papers in his life. He left no signatures hereabouts. I’ve took pains to be sure.”
$5,000 because he looked like a man. It was easy money, and he’d be throwing a monkey wrench into Wing Cary’s plans. Cary, a man he’d decided he disliked. “Sounds like a deal,” he said. “Let’s go!”
The cabin on the north slope of Bartlett Peak was well hidden, and there was plenty of grub. Pete Chasin left him there with two men to guard him and two more standing by on the trail toward town. All through the following day, Jim Gatlin loafed, smoking cigarettes and talking idly with the two men. Hab Johnson was a big, unshaven hombre with a sullen face and a surly manner. He talked little, and then only to growl. Pink Stabineau was a wide-chested, flat-faced jasper with an agreeable grin.
Gatlin had a clear idea of his own situation. He could use $5,000, but he knew Chasin never intended him to leave the country with it and doubted if he would last an hour after the ranch was transferred to Chasin himself. Yet Gatlin had been around the rough country, and he knew a trick or two of his own. Several times he thought of Lisa Cochrane, but avoided that angle as much as he could.
After all, she had no chance to get the ranch, and Walker was probably dead. That left it between Cary and Chasin. The unknown Horwick, of whom he had heard mention, was around, too, but he seemed to stand with Cary in everything.
Yet Gatlin was restless and irritable, and he kept remembering the girl beside him in the darkness and her regrets at breaking up the old outfit. Jim Gatlin had been a hand who rode for the brand; he knew what it meant to have a ranch sold out from under a bunch of old hands. The home that had been theirs gone, the friends drifting apart never to meet again, everything changed.
He finished breakfast on the morning of the second day, then walked out of the cabin with his saddle. Hab Johnson looked up sharply. “Where you goin’?” he demanded.
“Ridin’,” Gatlin said briefly, “an’ don’t worry. I’ll be back.”
Johnson chewed a stem of grass, his hard eyes on Jim’s. “You ain’t goin’ nowheres. The boss said to watch you an’ keep you here. Here you stay.”
Gatlin dropped his saddle. “You aren’t keepin’ me nowhere, Hab,” he said flatly. “I’ve had enough sittin’ around. I aim to see a little of this country.”
“I reckon not.” Hab got to his feet. “You may be a fast hand with a gun, but you ain’t gittin’ both of us, and you ain’t so foolish as to try.” He waved a big hand. “Now you go back an’ set down.”
“I started for a ride,” Jim said quietly, “and a ride I’m takin’.” He stooped to pick up the saddle and saw Hab’s boots as the big man started for him. Jim had lifted the saddle clear of the ground, and now he hurled it, suddenly, in Hab’s path. The big man stumbled and hit the ground on his hands and knees, then started up.
As he came up halfway, Jim slugged him. Hab tottered, fighting for balance, and Gatlin moved in, striking swiftly with a volley of lefts and rights to the head. Hab went down and hit hard, then came up with a lunge, but Gatlin dropped him again. Blood dripped from smashed lips and a cut on his cheekbone.
Gatlin stepped back, working his fingers. His hard eyes flicked to Pink Stabineau, who was smoking quietly, resting on one elbow, looking faintly amused. “You stoppin’ me?” Gatlin demanded.
Pink grinned. “Me? Now where did you get an idea like that? Take your ride. Hab’s just too persnickety about things. Anyway, he’s always wan-tin’ to slug somebody. Now maybe he’ll be quiet for a spell.”
There was a dim trail running northwest from the cabin and Gatlin took it, letting his horse choose his own gait. The black was a powerful animal, not only good on a trail but an excellent roping horse, and he moved out eagerly, liking the new country. When Gatlin had gone scarcely more than two miles, he skirted the edge of a high meadow with plenty of grass, then left the trail and turned off along a bench of the mountain, riding due north.
Suddenly the mountain fell away before him, and below, in a long finger of grass, he saw
the silver line of a creek, and nestled against a shoulder of the mountain he discerned roofs among the trees. Pausing, Jim rolled a smoke and studied the lay of the land. Northward, for all of ten miles, there was good range. Dry, but not so bad as over the mountain, and in the spring and early summer it would be good grazing land. He had looked at too much range not to detect from the colors of the valley before him some of the varieties of grass and brush. Northwest, the range stretched away through a wide gap in the mountains, and he seemed to distinguish a deeper green in the distance.
Old Dave Butler had chosen well, and his XY had been well handled, Gatlin could see as he rode nearer. Tanks had been built to catch some of the overflow from the mountains and to prevent the washing away of valuable range. The old man, and evidently Jim Walker, had worked hard to build this ranch into something. Even while wanting money for his relatives in the East, Butler had tried to ensure that the work would be continued after his death. Walker would continue it, and so would Lisa Cochrane.
II
All morning he rode, and well into the afternoon, studying the range but avoiding the buildings. Once, glancing back, he saw a group of horsemen riding swiftly out of the mountains from which he had come and heading for the XY. Reining in, he watched from a vantage point among some huge boulders. Men wouldn’t ride that fast without adequate reason.
Morosely he turned and started back along the way he had come, thinking more and more of Lisa. $5,000 was a lot of money, but what he was doing was not dishonest, and so far he had played the game straight. Still, why think of that? In a few days, he’d have the money in his pocket and be headed for Texas. He turned on the brow of the hill and glanced back, carried away despite himself by the beauty of the wide sweep of range.
Pushing on, he skirted around and came toward the cabin where he had been staying, off from the town trail. He was riding with his mind far away when the black snorted violently and shied. Jim drew up, staring at the man who lay sprawled in the trail. It was the cowhand Pete Chasin had left on guard there. He’d been shot through the stomach, and a horse had been ridden over him.
Swinging down, a quick check showed that the man was dead. Jim grabbed up the reins and sprang into the saddle. Sliding a six-gun from its holster, he pushed forward, riding cautiously. The tracks told him that a party of twelve horsemen had come this way.
He heard the wind in the trees, the distant cry of an eagle, but nothing more. He rode out into the clearing before the cabin, and drew up. Another man had died here. It wasn’t Stabineau or Hab Johnson, but the other guard, who must have retreated to this point for aid.
Gun in hand, Gatlin pushed the door open and looked into the cabin. Everything was smashed, yet when he swung down and went in, he found his own gear intact, under the overturned bed. He threw his bedroll on his horse and loaded up his saddlebags. He jacked a shell into the chamber of the Winchester and was about to mount up when he heard a muffled cry.
Turning, he stared around, then detected a faint stir among the leaves of a mountain mahogany. Warily he walked over and stepped around the bush.
Pink Stabineau, his face pale and his shirt dark with blood, lay sprawled on the ground. Curiously there was still a faint touch of humor in his eyes when he looked up at Gatlin. “Got me,” he said finally. “It was that damned Hab. He sold us out …to Wing Cary. The damn’ dirty…!”
Jim dropped to his knees and gently unbuttoned the man’s shirt. The wound was low down on the left side, and, although he seemed to have lost much blood, there was a chance. Working swiftly, he built a fire, heated water, bathed, and then dressed the wound. From time to time, Pink talked, telling him much of what he suspected, that Cary would hunt Chasin down now and kill him.
“If they fight,” Jim asked, “who’ll win?”
Stabineau grinned wryly. “Cary…he’s tough, an’ cold as ice. Pete’s too jumpy. He’s fast, but, mark my words, if they face each other, he’ll shoot too fast and miss his first shot. Wing won’t miss. But it won’t come to that. Wing’s a cinch player. He’ll chase him down an’ the bunch will gun him to death. Wing’s bloodthirsty.”
Leaving food and a canteen of water beside the wounded man and giving him two blankets, Jim Gatlin mounted. His deal was off then. The thought left him with a distinct feeling of relief. He had never liked any part of it, and he found himself without sympathy for Pete Chasin. The man had attempted a double-cross and failed.
Well, the road was open again now, and there was nothing between him and Texas but the miles. Yet he hesitated, and then turned his horse toward the XY. He rode swiftly, and at sundown was at the ranch. He watched it for a time, and saw several hands working around, yet there seemed little activity. No doubt they were waiting to see what was to happen.
Suddenly a sorrel horse started out from the ranch and swung into the trail toward town. Jim Gatlin squinted his eyes against the fading glare of the sun and saw the rider was a woman. That would be Lisa Cochrane.
Suddenly he swung the black and, touching spurs to the horse, raced down the mountain to intercept her.
Until that moment, he had been uncertain as to the proper course, but now he knew. Yet for all his speed, his eyes were alert and watchful, for he realized the risk he ran. Wing Cary would be quick to discover that as long as he was around and alive, there was danger, and even now the rancher might have his men out, scouring the country for him. Certainly there were plausible reasons enough, for it could be claimed that he had joined with Chasin in a plot to get the ranch by pretending to be Jim Walker.
Lisa’s eyes widened when she saw him. “I thought you’d be gone by now. There’s a posse after you.”
“You mean some of Cary’s men?” he corrected.
“I mean a posse. Wing has men on your trail, too, but they lost you somehow. He claims that you were tied up in a plan with Pete Chasin to get the ranch, and that you killed Jim Walker.”
His eyes searched her face. “You mean he actually claims that?”
She nodded, watching him. “He says that story about your being here was all nonsense, that you actually came on purpose, that you and Chasin rigged it that way. You’ll have to admit it looks funny, you arriving right at this time and looking just like Jim.”
“What if it does?” he demanded impatiently. “I never heard of Jim Walker until you mentioned him to me, and I never heard of the town of Tucker until a few hours before I met you.”
“You’d best go, then,” she warned. “They’re all over the country. Sheriff Eaton would take you in, but Wing wouldn’t, nor any of his boys. They’ll kill you on sight.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “I can see that.” Nevertheless, he didn’t stir, but continued to roll a cigarette. She sat still, watching him curiously. Finally he looked up. “I’m in a fight,” he admitted, “and not one I asked for. Cary is making this a mighty personal thing, ma’am, an’ I reckon I ain’t even figurin’ on leavin’.” He struck a match. “You got any chance of gettin’ the ranch?”
“How could I? I have no money!”
“Supposin’,” he suggested, squinting an eye against the smoke, “you had a pardner…with ten thousand dollars?”
Lisa shook her head. “Things like that don’t happen,” she said. “They just don’t.”
“I’ve got ten thousand dollars on me,” Gatlin volunteered, “an’ I’ve been pushed into this whether I like it or not. I say we ride into Tucker now an’ we see this boss of yours, the lawyer. I figure he could get the deal all set up for us tomorrow. Are you game?”
“You…you really have that much?” She looked doubtfully at his shabby range clothes. “It’s honest money?”
“I drove cattle to Montana,” he said. “That was my piece of it. Let’s go.”
“Not so fast!” The words rapped out sharply.
“I’ll take that money, an’ take it now! Woody, get that girl!”
For reply Jim slapped the spurs to the black and, at the same instant, slapped the sorrel a ringing blow. The h
orses sprang off together in a dead run. Behind them, a rifle shot rang out, and Jim felt the bullet clip past his skull. “Keep goin’!” he yelled. “Ride!”
At a dead run, they swung down the trail, and then Jim saw a side trail he had noticed on his left. He jerked his head at the girl and grabbed at her bridle. It was too dark to see the gesture, but she felt the tug and turned the sorrel after him, mounting swiftly up the steep side hill under the trees. There the soft needles made it impossible for their horses’ hoofs to be heard, and Jim led the way, pushing on under the pines.
That it would be only a minute or so before Cary discovered his error was certain, but each minute counted. A wall lifted on their right, and they rode on, keeping in the intense darkness close under it, but then another wall appeared on their left, and they were boxed in. Behind them they heard a yell, distant now, but indication enough their trail had been found. Boulders and slabs of rock loomed before them, but the black horse turned down a slight incline and worked his way around the rocks. From time to time, they spoke to each other to keep together, but he kept moving, knowing that Wing Cary would be close behind.
The cañon walls seemed to be drawing closer, and the boulders grew larger and larger. Somewhere Jim heard water running, and the night air was cool and slightly damp on his face. He could smell pine, so he knew that there were trees about and they had not ridden completely out of them. Yet Jim was becoming worried, for the cañon walls towered above them, and obviously there was no break. If this turned out to be a box cañon, they were bottled up. One man could hold this cañon corked with no trouble at all.
The black began to climb and in a few minutes walked out on a flat of grassy land. The moon was rising, but as yet there was no light in this deep cañon.
Lisa rode up beside him. “Jim”—it was the first time she had ever called him by name—“I’m afraid we’re in for it now. Unless I’m mistaken, this is a box cañon. I’ve never been up here, but I’ve heard of it, and there’s no way out.”
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