They were still about five yards away. To make it clear I wasn’t looking for trouble I swung a little to my left. They followed the move, intent on cutting me off. I thought, well, we are going to have trouble.
Then we were face to face. They stopped and so did I. The older man said, “Listen, son’bitch, this here walk is fer men. You want by you step out in the street.”
I said, “You step out in the street. Unless you’re just looking for trouble.”
His right arm moved. I couldn’t say for sure that he was reaching for his revolver, but I wasn’t about to wait and find out. I drew and, with a slashing motion, cracked him across the temple and the side of the head with the barrel of my revolver. He dropped like he’d been hit with a wagon tongue. I never even paused, just kept the gun coming on around. I jammed it in the belly of the younger man. I said, “You move and I’ll put a hole in you a goat can walk through.”
His eyes got big. He carefully lifted his hands away from his side. “Lis’sen, he never meant no harm. We ’us jest foolin’ around. Harry’s had a good many drinks.”
I said, “I ain’t the man enjoys a joke just right now.”
I was aware that people had stopped and were staring at us. All of a sudden a loud voice from my left said, “Hold it!”
I chanced a quick glance. A pudgy little man was standing in the middle of the dusty street. However, there was nothing little or pudgy about the double-barreled shotgun he was holding on me. He pointed a finger. “You! Put that pistol back in the holster an’ keep yore damn hands well clear of it. I’m the depity sheriff here an’ you is under arrest.”
I said, “Just a damn minute. I didn’t start this foo—”
“I don’t want to hear a word. An’ I ain’t seen you puttin’ that revolver away. Do it careful.” He raised the shotgun to his shoulder.
With delicate care I replaced my revolver. At my feet the man I’d hit was starting to stir around and moan.
The deputy said, “Now you, you walk straight toward me. They is a hair trigger on this shotgun and it is loaded with double-ought buckshot.”
I started toward him, stepping off the boardwalk. The deputy called past me, “Raymond, help Harry up and get him over to the barbershop. Looks like he’s got a cut on his haid. Then you and him either sober up or get back to the ranch.”
So it was hometown boys against the stranger. Well, at least I knew that the two hadn’t been my would-be killers, just a couple of ranch hands with too big a load of liquor. They hadn’t looked like ranch hands, not with the way their gun rigs had been set up. But likely, in the kind of town Hondo was and with the kind of company they constantly got, a ranch hand had to be part gun hand also.
When I got to the end of the barrel of the deputy’s shotgun I stopped. He jerked his head. “Down that way. You’ll see the sign that says sheriff.”
It was about half a block. I walked along with the deputy behind me. Surprisingly, very few people even took much notice of us. I had the feeling that it was a very common occurrence.
We came to the office and I went in. The deputy followed me. He went around behind a little desk that was set against a side wall and sat down. There were two other desks just like it and a big one in the middle of the room. It appeared that the sheriff had a pretty good force of deputies.
The deputy had me stand across the desk from him. He laid the shotgun down but kept it close to hand. He took off his worn hat and wiped his brow. “Disturbin’ the peace. Twenny dollars. If you ain’t got it we’ll sell what you got to raise it. Ain’t got room in the jail.”
“Just a damn minute. Don’t you want to hear what happened?” He said tiredly, “I seen it. Besides, I ain’t got time to listen to the details of every little scuffle happens out thar on them streets. If we did, that’s all we’d get done around here. Twenny dollars.”
“I want to see the sheriff.”
“Cain’t. He’s home doin’ chores. He’d say the same as I did. Or one of the other two depities.”
“I didn’t start it.”
He looked up at me as if I was an idiot. “I know that. But you’re a stranger. Them boys ain’t got twenny dollars between ’em, an’ if I was to fine or jail these ranch hands from around here ever’time they started trouble, wouldn’t no work git done.” He leaned to his side and spit into a cuspidor. “You gonna pay or you want me to auction off that good-lookin’ roan colt and that packhorse?”
“Why don’t you just take that shotgun and go out on the road and stick people up.”
He wiped his forehead again and sighed. “I know it’s raw, mister, but I don’t make the rules here, I jest take orders. Besides, you don’t know what it’s like keeping the peace in this here town. You are more than likely a fine, upstanding gent, but we jest ain’t got the time to find that out. Besides, you’ll be gone an’ Raymond an’ Harry will still be here.”
I looked at him for a second and then dug a twenty-dollar bill out of my pocket. I put it on the desk. “Am I free to go now?”
“Shore,” he said. “Make yourself at home. Jest remember that the next offense is forty dollars, an’ if you shoot anyone we will make room for you in the jail.”
I said sarcastically, “Is it within the law to get a bite to eat?”
He half smiled. “Long as you pay your reckoning. Best place in town is the Elite. Just down the street.”
“Much obliged,” I said.
“Glad to do business with you.”
I went outside and walked toward the livery stable. The Elite Cafe was just a block away. I turned in, half expecting to see Raymond or Harry, but the place was quiet and orderly with tablecloths and elderly women waiting tables.
It was getting along in the afternoon so I ordered a steak and some potatoes and green beans and ate in a good deal of a hurry. Everything was good, just as the deputy had said. I drank a couple of cold beers and then ate a wedge of apple pie.
I left the place carrying a pretty good load. They hadn’t had any extra bread to sell me. The waitress said that the lady who did the baking was down with the sciatica and they were nearly out themselves.
The mercantile was my next stop. I bought the usual run of canned goods, with the exception that I added half a dozen cans of pork and beans. The beans the Mexican ladies had sent off with me had played out, and though I didn’t much care for pork and beans, they say a man that is hungry enough ain’t so choosy. I got some more cheese and some saltines and a jar of peach jam. My sweet tooth had been acting up and I figured the jam would taste good on the crackers.
I also bought three varmint traps I happened to spot, the kind you trap cougars or wolves with, the kind with steel jaws that snap shut when they’re triggered. I hadn’t the slightest idea what I was going to do with them, but I thought I might set them out around wherever I was camped and might snag me a skulker.
I carried my provender down to the livery stable and repacked the chestnut’s load. Both horses looked rested and ready to go. The roan was looking harder and more filled out every day.
When I was ready I swung aboard and rode out of the stable barn, nodding at the boy as I went. I figured my pursuers would expect me to pop out of the north or west side of town. Instead I turned back toward the way I’d come and left the town as if I were heading east, heading back home.
I rode east for a half a mile and then slowly, making a big circle, turned back to the north and then gradually to the northwest in the direction of Rocksprings. I figured that the game was going to begin in earnest in the very near future. That is, if those following me did as I hoped.
I looked at my watch. It was going on for four o’clock. I urged the roan into a canter. He took it up willingly, being rested and being young and strong. I wanted to find a good camping place before dark, preferably atop a butte with a lot of rocks around for cover. It was rough country ahead and the horses were going to get a hard workout. But after ten days, they were both trail-hardened and able to take a good deal of abuse. I
pushed on as rapidly as the terrain would allow.
But as I rode, I half smiled at the heavy-handed justice of the law in Hondo. They didn’t care who was right or wrong, they just wanted their money if you were a stranger. In a way I reckoned I couldn’t blame them. With the kind of traffic they got through their town I figured they just didn’t have the time, as the deputy had said, to look into the details of every matter.
Thinking about it, I realized it could have been worse. The two cowhands could just as easily have been my hunters. If that had been so I’d of had to kill them, if I could have, and that would have ended me up in jail with a lot of time and trouble and money to spend before the mess got straightened out. Hondo, such as it was, definitely was not a town to have trouble in. And Rocksprings, way ahead to the northwest, was the same kind of town. Hopefully, the business would be settled before then.
CHAPTER 6
There was a road, of sorts, to Rocksprings. For the balance of that first day I followed it because the country hadn’t turned as rugged as it was going to and I was able to still have a fair look around me. But the grass was already thinning, and dimly ahead I could see the buttes and the cliffs and the big boulders of the hard-rock country. In less than twenty-four hours my horses would be hard-pressed to forage for a bellyful of grass, and after that, there’d just be mesquite and greasewood brambles and cactus and scrub grass. And the road would begin to wind through sheer cliffs and down draws and deep cuts in the brown earth. When that happened I would leave it and ride the high ground as my best chance of not being crept up on or surprised. I did not look forward to the next sixty-odd miles. It was going to be hard on me and hard on the horses. Occasionally we’d run across some little creeks in the valleys, and here and there a few acres of greenery where some farmer was trying to make a go of it. But I knew better than to expect much help from the breed of farmers such rough country raised. They were suspicious, unfriendly, greedy, and as near as not to greet you with a shotgun or a pitchfork. I knew this because Lew Vara and I had once chased five outlaws through the same country, outlaws who had attempted to rob our bank and who had fled toward Del Rio. Lew and I had caught them because we’d both taken an extra horse, switching off when one tired. The five had finally ridden their mounts to their knees and had surrendered to us without a shot being fired. To get them back we’d had to buy horses from the farmers in the area, and you would have never believed that old broken-down plow horses could fetch such a dear price. But it had been take it or leave it. The bank had footed half the bill for the animals and the county the other half.
Thinking back on that, I frowned and wondered if one or some or all of those five could be involved in my present danger. But it had only been some two years back and the five had drawn twenty years in the state penitentiary in Huntsville. They sure as hell hadn’t been released, and I found it damn hard to believe they’d escaped. Something like that would have been in the papers and I certainly hadn’t seen a word about it, and anyway, Lew would have known.
I camped that night on a knoll among the last of the grass. There was a little creek at the bottom, and I gave the horses a good watering and then brought them back up on top of the hump. The campsite I’d chosen was a quarter of a mile off the road, and I’d ridden in the dark for a good half an hour before sliding to my left and mounting the knoll I’d had my eye on well before it got dark. The moon was about to start waxing. Now that I was the hunter I was glad. In two more nights it would be making plenty of light and I might just do a little scouting, especially if I saw a camp fire anywhere near.
I fed the horses their oats, got them tethered, and then fed myself and made my bed. As always I sat for a time smoking and drinking whiskey. We were at a much higher elevation than when I’d started from Blessing, maybe three thousand feet, and the night air was good and cool. That night I didn’t see any camp fires, but there were plenty of draws and canyons around where they could have built a bonfire and I wouldn’t have been able to see it.
By the second day I was well into the caprock country. It was so called because buttes and hills rose up some fifty to a hundred feet, some going up almost vertical, immense mounds of sandstone and limestone capped by a hard-rock top of granite that had withstood the winds and rains and ravages of time and erosion and had protected the softer rock below. Now the country was barren and brown except for the brambles and cactus and rocks and sand. Cattle could not occupy such lands, neither could sheep or men or horses. Only a few hardy Spanish goats and some mighty lean deer managed to make a living. Of course there were insects enough, and snakes and coyotes and armadillos and other varmints. But it was hard country and no mistake.
I was riding the high country, picking my way from ridge to ridge and avoiding the canyons and draws. The road was well below me, winding through a long valley and a series of cuts and ravines. It was hard going on the horses, but it couldn’t be helped, not if I was to be able to keep an eye out.
Toward the afternoon of the second day out of Hondo I saw them. They were about a half a mile or a little better off to my right, riding along in single file. Right then I was on a long flat stretch of caprock that was pretty sandy and so not too hard on my horses’ feet. I pulled up at sight of them. They pulled up as soon as they saw me stop and turned their horses in my direction. We just sat there, staring at each other. It was clear they wanted me to know they were there and that they meant me no good. I could not see them clearly, but there was no doubt in my mind that it was the three remaining out of the original four.
All the rest of that day they trailed along opposite me at about the same distance. If my path took me in their direction they veered away. If I bore to my left they also came to their left to keep the distance about the same. We were now on top of the caprock, and the terrain was flat and fairly even except for the cliffs and buttes that reared up here and there and the abundance of large rocks. I was not too troubled by the idea of the three charging me because their way was blocked by any number of long canyons and draws and ravines.
Finally, as night came on, I began worrying about a place to camp. I kept riding even after the sun was down and it was good dark. It was dangerous for my horses because the footing was so uneven and chancy, but I didn’t feel that I could let them have a clear look at where I camped.
About an hour after dark I saw a low mound covered with boulders. I dismounted at its base and led my horses up the rather sharp grade. There was a little depression in the middle and that, plus the rocks that were scattered all about, more or less put us out of sight, especially in the dark night. I unsaddled and unloaded the animals, more to give their backs a rest than anything else because we were not going to tarry long. They had not watered that day, but I took one of the big canteens, turned my hat over and filled it up, and let them get a little water that way. After that I grained them good and then got myself a cold supper.
I took a drink of whiskey and drank a lot of water, but I didn’t dare strike a match to light a cigarillo. They were too close.
I tethered the horses close, tying both of them to the saddle horn. I wanted them close in case I had to make a hasty departure, but it didn’t really matter; there wasn’t any grazing anyway.
My plan was pretty simple. I planned to rest and doze until about three in the morning and then leave out quietly and move as rapidly as I could until I was sure I was ahead of the three. Then I was going to cross the caprock to intersect their trail and set my own ambush. I figured I could take down all three if I were lucky, and at least two for certain. After that I doubted the one man remaining would want to continue the chase. I lay there with my eyes closed listening to the night sounds.
I came awake with the sun starting up in the sky. I might not have wakened then if the horses hadn’t gotten restless and gone to jerking around on their tether ropes. The instant I realized how late it was I grabbed my rifle, sprang over to one of the rocks, and looked toward the east, the last place I’d seen the three riders. There wa
sn’t a sign of anything moving. Still, I lay there for a long ten minutes, studying the terrain, trying to see if they might be slowly working their way toward me on foot.
Finally I gave it up and got to my feet, cursing myself. How could a grown man, a man in serious danger, go to sleep? Hell, they could have come up and cut my throat.
Still angry, I spread a little grain around for the horses, gave them another small drink for the road, and got them packed and saddled. I’d held out some bread and cheese, and I chewed on that and drank water while the horses finished the grain.
I was angry with myself. It was an opportunity wasted and I didn’t know when another like it would come along. All I could suppose was that I’d been much tireder than I’d thought.
I got us back on the road and took up the same route I’d been traveling. I kept looking to my right, but there was no sign of the three riders. And they weren’t in sight on my left or behind me or ahead. They had disappeared and that was an ominous sign. I wanted to know where they were.
We pushed on. Now the terrain began to descend, though it was every bit as broken and rough as before. Now I had to wind my way through and around buttes, cliffs, rocky hillsides, canyons, and rock slides. It was the kind of country there’d been absolutely no point in creating. All it did was make me homesick for the coastal plains with their gentle terrain and lush grass and plentiful water.
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