The Fourth Western Novel

by H. H. Knibbs

  Three of the gang he knew by sight, Ed Randall, his right-hand man, Harper, and Sarg, an ex-railroad man. The other four he knew by name only: Lindquist the Pecos cowboy; Stevens, said to hail from the Tonto Valley; Bill Page, and White Eye Johnson the Texan. From Yardlaw’s description Young Pete thought he could recognize them. As there was always the possibility that one or two of the gang might visit the cañon for word with the chief or for supplies, Pete sat watching the stone house. After a half-hour or so a man came out carrying another man. The figures were too far for Pete to catch any detail, but by the way the man hung in the other man’s arms Pete judged him to be either unconscious or dead. In either case, why carry him out of the house? The man carrying the other walked to the rim of the ledge, paused for a second, and then heaved him into the cañon below.

  “That’s one way of buryin’ ’em,” muttered Young Pete.

  Hardened by a life of outlawry, Young Pete tried to ignore the brutality of dumping a body into a cañon like a log. While aware that on the ledges or anywhere along those rocky walls there was no place to make a grave, and that to pack the body up to the timber and bury it would have been a risky job because the Randalls were on the watch for a possible surprise, still no logic could convince him that the act was either necessary or decent.

  Seldom curious as to motives except as they might affect his own welfare, Young Pete was irritated by a growing urge to meet the man who had so callously disposed of his companion. Pete wanted to size him up, note what kind of an eye he had, and how he carried himself. He was almost tempted to make his way into the cañon and wait on one of the ledges above the stone house until the outlaw appeared. Although he might get away with it, however, it would be a foolish and unnecessary risk. At any moment one or more of the gang hiding back in the hills might take a notion to visit the stone house. Moreover, it was not a good idea to leave his horses too long. Someone might happen to discover them, and ambush and kill him. He could, he told himself, lie out on one of the cañon ledges and pick off anyone that came along. Although he knew that any of the Randall gang would skyline him and drop him merely on suspicion, it was not in his books to shoot a man down without giving him a chance.

  The man in the stone house below came out with a saddle on his shoulder. Pete watched him saddle up and lead his horse out of the corral. Would he ride up or down the cañon? The noon sun was hammering hard on ledge and tree and boulder. A haze of heat hung in the air. Far below the man mounted and began to ride up the cañon trail. Pete drew back from the point of rocks where he had been sitting. A few yards north of him the trail crossed the timbered crest.

  Somewhere in the brush a rattler buzzed. Through the still air came the distant click of hoofs. A little later Pete could hear the creak of a saddle. Soon he would be able to see the man who had more than roused his curiosity. Screened by a clump of brush, Pete stared at the trail. The head of a steel-gray horse showed, then its shoulders and front. The polished butt of a carbine glittered in the hot light. Sharp, hard blue eyes looked out from beneath the curled brim of a tattered sombrero. Sallow-faced, his mouth and chin half concealed by a stubbly black beard, the rider of the steel-gray rested his mount.

  Already Young Pete had identified him as Harper, Ed Randall’s right-hand man. Black Joe Harper, he was called. Appreciating the value of surprising a man from the rear, Young Pete made no move until the outlaw had ridden past. “Harper!” he called sharply, stepping out of the brush. He expected the outlaw to whirl and fire.

  To his surprise Harper coolly pulled up his horse and faced him. His hard blue eyes swept Young Pete from head to foot. “Hello, Tonto! What in hell you doing up here?”

  “Lookin’ for a couple of stray horses. Seen any?”

  “No.”

  Pete stood with his hands touching the edges of his open vest. Slouched in the saddle, Harper looked as if he had no suspicion whatever of the Tonto Kid’s mission. Yet he knew there was something wrong. The gang had already had word that it was Pete who had killed Bart Randall. What was Young Pete doing now in the Horse Thief Cañon country?

  “Looking for Ed?” asked the outlaw.

  “Yes.”

  Harper bared his teeth in a grin. “He’s looking for you. Seems you and Bart had a little argument.”

  “Seems we did.”

  Little by little Pete drew back the edge of his vest. Catching the glint of the deputy’s star, the outlaw’s expression changed. “So that’s it?” he snarled. With the first word the outlaw went for his gun. At the second word he fired. The third was not much more than a mumble. Whirling his horse he spurred over the crest. Save that he knew he was hit, and hit hard, Harper was hardly aware that the Tonto Kid had fired at all.

  Crashing down the hillside, the outlaw’s horse lunged and leaped, its rider rocking in the saddle. Young Pete didn’t want to drop the horse. Yet it wouldn’t do for Harper to get to his fellows and warn them. Halfway down the mountainside as the horse swerved to avoid a boulder, the outlaw fell, and lay crumpled up in the low brush.

  For several minutes Young Pete stood watching the country below before he finally climbed down to where the dead outlaw lay. The shot had taken Harper in the pit of the stomach, paralyzed him. Had he been hit anywhere else except in the head or the heart, he would have kept on firing until either he or the Tonto Kid was down.

  Gouging a hollow in the hillside. Young Pete covered the body with rocks. Far down the foothills Harper’s horse was making for the spot where Pete’s horses were staked. Fearing the gray would stampede them, Pete lost no time in getting down to the valley. The steel-gray broke for the brush-lined slope on the western hillside. Before Pete could saddle up and take after him, the horse had disappeared. Sooner or later some of the gang would run onto the gray, and look for Harper. “Had a hunch I ought to dropped that horse,” muttered Pete as he prepared to move camp.

  The Hamills of Thunder Mountain claimed the land bordering the south side of Horse Thief Cañon. A stranger trespassing on the property had to explain himself. As Pete knew, the Hamills would not bother a man hiding out from the law, but a peace officer was about as welcome in their territory as a cloudburst. The one occasion on which Young Pete had had to ride the Hamill range he had barely escaped with his life. Yet the south rim afforded the only lookout now that Harper had been killed.

  Young Pete camped in the timber back from the south rim of Horse Thief Cañon, his horses now grazing on Hamill pasturage. In spite of the chance that Brent or Judson Hamill might discover him, the location had its advantages. From the cañon trail, far to the north, it would be difficult for the outlaws to identify him without a field-glass, should any of the gang happen to see him on the rimrock. In any event he was reasonably safe from an attack from the rear. Only because the gang respected the Hamill range were they tolerated in the neighborhood.

  That evening Pete sat near the edge of the rim watching the stone house in the cañon below. The horse Harper had left in the corral moved about nervously, apparently suffering for water. As darkness settled, Young Pete turned in. He had been asleep several hours when he was awakened by moonlight on his face. Through the still, starlit air came the occasional distant click of a shod hoof. Walking to the rim, Young Pete peered down into the wide, dusky hollow. Directly across the cañon, and some two hundred feet below, a patch of moonlight lay like a silver pool on the trail. Above and below the moonlit spot the great hollow was deep in shadow.

  Faint and muffled came the sound of horses moving along the trail. His gaze fixed on the pool of moonlight, Young Pete waited and listened. A horse stumbled. The sound of cursing came clearly through the still air. Finally the head of a horse poked into the pool of moonlight, its rider’s figure tiny but distinct. Pete counted four horsemen. Some distance behind the other came a fifth; leading a horse with an empty saddle. A few minutes later a light showed dimly in the doorway of the stone house. The door closed. The gang had
now assembled at headquarters. They must have found and captured Harper’s mount. Pete went back to his blankets. For a long time he lay awake trying to shape some kind of plan. He decided, finally, that all planning was out of his hands. He would simply have to stay in the Horse Thief Cañon country and take it as it came.

  Next day, as he squatted near a tiny breakfast fire, Pete’s gaze roved up and down the rimrock which ran like a clean-swept road in front of him. Just within the edge of the timber lay his blankets and saddle. A few yards farther back his horses grazed the circle of their stake-ropes. The morning sun struck like slanting flame on the red bark of the big trees. In overalls, shirt, and vest, his hat off, Young Pete might have been some stray cowboy who had bushed out for the night.

  Apparently unconcerned as to his surroundings, nevertheless his eye was constantly alert. Although his movements as he made breakfast seemed natural to the task, they were deliberately planned. Now he was facing the rimrock and the wide void of the cañon. Again as he shoved a bit of dry branch into the fire, he was facing the timberlands. His hat was off because its brim cut down his vision as he stooped above the fire. He hummed a tune, “Cowboy, What You Doin’ Here?”

  That he had met and exterminated two of the Randall gang in the past few days did not bother him in the least. Even had the shooting resulted from a private quarrel he would not have felt other than as he did. The fact that he was a peace officer was secondary. In each instance his opponent had opened the fight. It was just as much his job to take care of himself as it was to take care of his enemies.

  Glancing over the rim of his tin cup of coffee, he saw a horseman coming through the timber. Pete ceased humming, “Cowboy, What You Doin’ Here?” Now he might have to answer the question himself. Black-bearded Judson Hamill, a Winchester across the saddle, was riding down the meadow where Pete’s horses grazed. Young Pete’s hand moved up under his vest. Unpinning the deputy’s star, he shoved it into his pocket.

  As the mountain man rode up. Young Pete noted that he had changed greatly. His black hair was streaked with gray, and though still as straight as a pine there was a look of weariness about him. Swiftly memory flashed across Pete’s inner vision—the circumstances of their last meeting. Although the deaths of Ira and Finn were none of Pete’s choosing, and although Judson Hamill had not lifted a finger to detain him, Pete felt that Judson had every right in the world to feel bitter toward him—to consider him an enemy. Now Pete was camped on the Hamill range, grazing his horses in their meadows.

  Squatting by the fire, his coffee-cup in his hand, Pete nodded as Hamill rode up. The tall, gaunt mountain man showed no surprise at finding the Tonto Kid camped on his land. Yet his deep-set black eyes asked a question. Again Young Pete nodded. “Campin’ for a couple of days to catch my breath.”

  “Lost much breath lately?”

  “Some.” He gestured toward the cañon. “Them fellas over there got it.”

  “I heard about that.” Judson Hamill waved his hand toward Young Pete’s horses. “Seems you had time to catch up a pack-horse before you left.”

  “Sure! I don’t mind runnin’ from a bunch when it’s necessary. But damned if I feel like starvin’ to death.”

  “I heard it was a deputy sheriff got Bart Randall.”

  “That’s what they say. But I don’t believe everything telephoned on the wind.”

  Hamill gestured toward his own domain. “The Randalls don’t ride this country much.”

  “That’s why I’m here.”

  “But if the Randall outfit should happen to be tracking down a peace officer, none of the Hamills will stop them.”

  “Fair enough,” said Pete. “If any peace officers show up, you can bet I won’t be anywhere in sight.”

  Judson Hamill stared hard at the youth squatting beside the fire. “Same if the Randalls were to show up?”

  “That would be different. I reckon they’re out to get me. That will be my own private party.”

  Saying nothing as to whether Young Pete could continue camping on his land or would have to move on, Judson Hamill reined round and rode back into the timber. Pete poured himself a second cup of coffee. Hamill, he was sure, would not inform the Randalls of his whereabouts. Whether or not the mountain man suspected him of being a peace officer, Young Pete was not so sure, Hamill was shrewd, and probably knew more about present circumstances than he seemed to know. Young Pete decided to stay where he was until some move of the outlaws forced him to another location.

  Pete spent most of the day watching the stone house in the Hollow. Just before sundown two men came out of the stone house. One of them gestured across the cañon toward Young Pete’s camp. The other raised his hands to his eyes. Pete caught the glint of field-glass lenses. He could easily have lain back on the rimrock, out of sight. But as he had already planned the second big move in his campaign, he sat still.

  Before dark he made a fairly big fire on the rim, cooked supper, and packing hastily, struck west through the timberland, his fire on the rimrock still bright in the night shadows. Reaching the crest of the range he dropped down the western slope, staked his pack-horse, and rode round the head of the cañon to the north side. Some twenty or thirty yards back in the brush, he dismounted and sat down, the reins in his hand. In the thin, chill air he had no difficulty in keeping awake. Reasoning that the outlaws would investigate his camp, Young Pete wore down the tedious hours waiting.

  About midnight he heard the unmistakable sound of hoofs. Dim in the moonlight, two riders passed on the trail below him, rounded the upper end of the cañon, and disappeared in the timber. When they reappeared on the rimrock near his camp, he tied his horse in the brush. Taking off his boots, Pete made his way down the trail. He had just reached the corral above the stone house when the door swung open and someone stepped out. Pete dropped in the shadow of the water-trough. The horses snorted and circled. Pete held his breath. Cursing the horses, the man turned and walked back to the house. Rising, Pete let down the corral bars and waved his hat. With a rush and roar the horses stampeded down the trail.

  Young Pete turned and ran. Behind him rose the sound of men running about, of voices sharp with surprise. The pool of moonlight through which the outlaws had passed on the preceding night at an earlier hour had widened. As Young Pete sped through it a rifle barked. A slug whistled past his head and spattered on an angle of the cañon wall. Again the rifle barked, but Young Pete had rounded the bend in the trail. He slowed down to a steady trot. Leaving the trail, he climbed through the brush to his horse, and crossing the crest rode down into San Dimas Valley. Two of the outlaws were now afoot. Six of their eight horses were loose, probably making for the desert below. It would take some time to catch them up. Pete’s pack-horse was staked on the San Dimas side of the range. Arriving there, Young Pete moved both horses to another location and managed to get an hour’s sleep before daybreak.

  That morning, while he was watering his horses at the valley stream, a curl of smoke broke above the timber of the range. Finally the smoke grew dense and black, bulging over the distant tree-tops, and moving slowly west in the light breeze. Young Pete was curious as to what might have caused the fire. Like most mountain men, the Hamills were careful about fire. Yet the smoke came from somewhere in the neighborhood of their homestead.

  As Pete watched, a band of horses broke across the distant crest of the range and rocketed down into the valley. Too far away to read the brand, he surmised they were Hamill stock. The smoke seemed to grow less dense, finally subsiding to a thin yellow haze. Aware that in the valley he might be spotted from some crag or ridge, he had already decided to take to the high trails, circle the Hamill homestead, and make his way back to the south rim of the cañon opposite the stone house. Only by constantly moving camp could he hope to keep from being ambushed. It was a case of keeping out of the way, and in the way, until he either wore the gang down or they got him.

 
Young Pete went at his job with the calculating mind of a chess-player. He knew the game from both sides, and knew the odds against him. One mistake would probably end the game.

  His next move was apparently irrelevant, yet he had his reason for it. Riding down the valley to where the stampeded horses had crossed, he back-tracked them up the eastern slope. The smell of smoke came to him as he topped the crest. Films of ash drifted down through the trees. Alert for a surprise, he rode slowly through the timberland. When he came within sight of the Hamill homestead, set in a wide, grassy clearing, he pulled up and sat his horse. The big log cabin, the sheds, and the outbuildings were burned to the ground. Tiny flames still played about the fallen timbers. Flecks of ash floated in the air. When the yellow haze cleared, he saw that the bars of the big corral, which had escaped the flames, were down.

  A man lay near the charred logs that had been the cabin. Still fearing some kind of trap, Young Pete sat his horse watching. The man’s hand moved as if signaling for help. Slowly Pete pulled his carbine from the scabbard. Slowly he rode forward, watching the timber edging the clearing. Within a few feet of the prostrate figure he reined up. The man on the ground was Judson Hamill. He raised on his elbow, tried to speak. His black beard twitched and his head fell back.

  The mountain man’s Winchester lay near him. Scattered roundabout were eight or ten empty shells. Tracks of plunging hoofs showed in the earth in front of the charred cabin. More empty shells glittered in the sunlight. Near the log stable Pete found the bullet-riddled body of Judson Hamill’s brother, Brent. Both the Hamills had died fighting.