Almost at once the tracks of the murderers and those of his two companions were wiped out and he was alone in a vast and empty country. The water fell heavily. The skies seemed to open and deluge the thirsty land below with a solid sheet of water. Being without a slicker or any kind of poncho, Blade was at once soaked to the skin. The wind blew from the north, so he had no trouble in moving his horse ahead of it. Before very long, the dun stumbled down a steep ridge, and behind this ridge Blade lay-up with the horse and found some protection from the wind. He stayed there for the remainder of the day and the following night, shaking with cold and tightening his belt against hunger. He had nothing more than a handful of jerky in his pockets and this he did not care to touch in case he should have no other opportunity to find food.
He found himself sleeping at dawn, still holding his horse’s line. The animal woke him with a soft whinny. With little groans of discomfort, Blade rose and worked the stiffness from his limbs, then swung into the saddle and headed on south, riding through a dry and sunny world.
Within a few minutes riding he discovered what had caused the dun’s whinny. Not a quarter mile from him stood a small house on the edge of a barranca which ran full with water after the hard rain. As he drew near to it, he saw that it was little more than a jacal, a small Mexican place with a pen for goats and an adobe corral for larger stock.
He sang out as he approached, but received no reply. This caused him some uneasiness, unarmed as he was, and he dismounted and went up to the entrance with caution.
The door hung from one rawhide hinge. The earthenware cholla in the open doorway was smashed. The place felt empty, but the aura of humans was still about it.
As Blade expected, the interior was poor—a crude table, a couple of three-legged stools, an open and empty cupboard on the wall.
His eye at once went to the table with a piece of white paper on its top weighed down by a small rock. When he picked it up, he read: ‘We buried the man, his wife and the others. They are not too far ahead of us. Gone direct south.’ The note was signed ‘George’.
Blade found the pitiful grave on a low mound to the west of the house; George had tied two sticks together to make a cross. He went back into the house and searched for something that he could use as a weapon. In a corner on the earth floor, he found a crude domestic knife with an old blade about two inches long. This he tucked in his belt. On looking further, he found an old braided three-strand reata. Accepting both as better than nothing, he caught up his horse that was drinking at the barranca and rode on.
Maybe it was hunger, but he felt himself depressed. Maybe it was that there had been too much violent death in the last few days. Certainly, his conscience was troubling him. He had been hired to find a man and it seemed he was doing everything but that. The trail he had been following was now so cold you could freeze water solid on it. Just the same, he told himself, no son-of-a-bitch was going to get away with that grullo horse.
It was noon when it all happened.
About an hour before, the country had started to become broken and a light rain started to fall. Pretty soon, he knew, the country would be sprouting green if this went on. The sound of the dun’s hoofs changed. It became duller as the rain laid the dust.
Hills shouldered their way up toward the grey clouds on either hand. On the higher slopes he could make out the dark smear of green that was timber. He would not sleep cold tonight, any road.
He reined in abruptly when he heard the shot.
It had that damp heavy note to it that a rifle shot has in rain. He did not have much idea from whence it came, except that he knew that it was to the south.
He was given a clearer idea of the direction when there came a flurry of shots. He at once angled his horse to the right and kicked it into motion. The animal scrambled over the nearest ridge and was straightway forced to tackle another. Now, as Blade was only too well aware, hills play hell with shots and sound in general. No sooner did he reach the top of the second ridge than he was on top of a bunch of held horses. At least, that’s what he thought he was looking at, for there was a man standing below him with the lines in his hand. The fellow saw him at once and heaved a gun from the holster on his right hip. Then Blade took in the fact that some of the horses down there were loose and on the edge of them nearest to him was his own mount.
So accustomed was he to wearing a gun that his first instinct was to draw his. His mind went blank with dismay when he found that his right hip was unadorned by the Colt Frontier that usually hung there.
The fellow below had the gun thrust out on a rigid arm, thumb on hammer. He bawled out: ‘Stay right where you’re at.’
It was one of those moments when a man either turns tail and runs or does something ridiculous. He does the first thing that comes into his head. That was all Blade could do and pray that it was not too ridiculous.
Inside his head a small voice said: That’s my horse down there and, by God, I mean to have it.
‘Are you Charlie?’ he demanded. There had to be a Charlie in every bunch of men.
This fellow was a tall gangling man with a month’s beard on his sunken cheeks and trail-worn rags covering his thin body.
The question seemed to stop him in his mental tracks.
‘Charlie?’ he said. ‘Aw, I ain’t Charlie. He’s over yonder. Who the hell’re you?’
‘They call me Harry Graham,’ said Blade, giving the first name that came into his head and moving the dun down the side of the ridge in the direction of the horses.
‘Now, hold hard a minute,’ the man said, undecided.
‘I have to get word to Charlie real urgent,’ said Blade.
The man’s gun was down. Blade was within twenty feet of him.
‘There’s one hell of a fight goin’ on over there,’ said the man.
‘Trust Charlie,’ said Blade. ‘Things ain’t never quiet, not with Charlie around.’
As he came near the man, he seemed to fall out of the saddle. Both his hands gripped the wrist of the hand that held the gun and he came out of the saddle. Unfortunately, as he did so, the gun went off. As luck would have it, the shot did not strike either man or horse, but it spooked the horses there. Those he held at once jerked themselves free of him. Those that were free already kicked up their heels and ran.
To give credit where credit was due and in spite of the fact that the stranger landed under Blade, he put up a savage fight from the moment he hit dust. He gave all the signs of being a human dynamo. He threw Blade off him for a start. Ignoring the fact that one of the horses seemed to be doing its best to trample him to death as it panicked and pitched, the fellow struck Blade a stunning blow on the side of his head with his gun.
Blade, in the act of rising, was knocked back against the forelegs of the dun, which at once reared with a frightened whinny and whirled away in a pitching frenzy. His feet being the nearest thing to the enemy, Blade drove a heel with all his strength into the fellow’s knee. It was just as well he did for the gun was aimed in the region of his belly. The man howled with pain and concentrated for one fatal moment on that pain—fatal because Blade occupied it in hurling himself forward. His shoulder drove into the man’s legs and smashed him from his feet. His head struck a rock with a sickening sound, he made a frantic effort to rise, his eyes rolled. Again he fought to raise the gun, but his strength failed him and he lay full length and still on the ground.
Through a mist of uncertainty from the blow on the head, Blade was now all action, moving mechanically through the motions that had to be performed. His eyes fought to focus and dimly made out the old Colt gun lying on the ground. He bent to pick it up and nearly fell on his face. When he had it tucked in the waistband of his pants, he went after one of the horses, not because he wanted it, but because there was a rifle on the saddle.
The animal was backing up away from him, but when it saw him coming it swung away sideways, lifting its head to avoid stepping on the dragging lines. Almost at once it stumbled on one an
d that was enough for Blade to jump and catch it by the bridle. He spoke to it in his gruff horseman’s voice to soothe it, searched hastily in a saddle pocket for ammunition and found it. He filled his pockets, ripped the rifle from the scabbard and released the horse.
The rifle was an old single-shot Remington with a slide-breech. A good old gun and Blade liked it. Many years before, he had learned to shoot with one.
He turned and found he was seeing not too badly. The dun was now calmed somewhat and stood waiting for him. He loaded the rifle and stood it against a rock. Then he looked at the saddlepad he’d been riding and thought, hell, why should he sit that damned thing even once more. If he was going to shoot from the back of a horse, he best make certain he could stay there. He caught the other horse again and stripped the saddle from it. In a matter of minutes, the dun was saddled and tightly girthed. Blade forked it with a glad feeling and rode toward the gunshots which were sounding again.
This took him over a low ridge that gave him a view of the flat terrain beyond. It was scattered with giant boulders and dry brush. At first glance he could see no sign of life, but there came a shot half to his right and he saw a wisp of drifting rifle-smoke. It came from a clump of brush and rocks and the shot no sooner sounded than there was a splutter of gun-fire from a rough circle around it.
Blade gave a shrill rebel yell followed by George’s name.
The firing stopped.
Then there floated back to Blade a yell of the same kind.
A man stood up not thirty yards from Blade and stared in his direction. Blade jammed the butt of the Remington into his shoulder and fired. He did not know how to miss at that range. The man fell backward into some brush and at once there was a stutter of rifle-fire and lead enlivened the air where Blade had been. He had kicked the dun in the slats and had it running. He knew that the only way to be of any help to George was to keep moving.
He did not head for McMaster’s position. If he merely joined the man and the girl, all three of them would be pinned down. The only gain could be to keep his forces divided.
There was a man almost ahead of him. He dropped the rifle and pulled the old Colt from his belt. At the same time, he swung the dun to the left.
The man rose up from cover, rifle raised.
Blade whirled the dun to the right. The man fired, the shot missed Blade by a foot. It was as if the dun knew exactly what Blade wanted. It got the bit between its teeth and headed straight for the fellow. There was a crashing of brush and then the heavy shoulder of the horse drove into the man.
Blade had a glimpse of the wide frightened eyes, the mouth opened in a yell, then he was past.
There was a man ahead, running. Blade headed after him.
He never heard the shot above the thud of the dun’s hoofs, but the man tripped and went down, bouncing slightly. From the boneless way he fell, Blade knew that he was dead.
He pulled the dun in and looked around. His eyes found McMasters. The hunter was shouting and pointing. Blade saw the loose horses running. Now he put the dun into motion again, running it across the flat and almost at once he saw his grullo. He kept the dun going, yelling to it. He could see the grullo did not have its heart in the running and when he gave the shrill familiar whistle, the animal swung away from the fleeing bunch of horses. Another whistle and the trained animal stopped. Blade dashed on past it, taking the rope from the saddle-horn and building a noose. He had sighted his mule.
The big Missouri stopped at once when the noose dropped over its neck. Blade headed back.
The first thing McMasters said to him was: ‘I reckon those animals you caught were your own, Blade. Christ, I don’t know how a man can be so selfish.’
The Indian girl walked out of the brush. She smiled at Blade. He thought that showed some improvement.
Then another girl walked out from cover behind her and Blade stared in disbelief.
‘Hell, George,’ he said, ‘do you collect females?’
McMasters looked a little surprised at the question and said offhandedly: ‘Oh, her. Well, we kind of found her wandering around someplace.’
With one eye wary for the enemy, Blade inspected the newcomer to their group. It may have been that he had traveled through the lonely places and the deserts of the West for too long, but the young woman looked remarkably handsome to him. She was now tired and not a little scared, but that could not rob her of her beauty of face and form. She looked Mexican, but there was a touch of the golden Spaniard about her. Somewhere back in her family tree there had been a blonde Goth. The flesh was more gold than brown. The eyes, though darkly browed and darkly fringed, were of a startling green. The mouth . . . however, there was no time then to dwell on the delights of a lovely girl. The men they had hunted were still in the vicinity.
McMasters was saying: ‘They are going to finish up with our horses, do you know that?’
Blade took his gaze with some reluctance from the girl.
‘I’ll guard the ladies and the horses here,’ he said. ‘Feel free to chase your animals if that’s what you have in mind.’
The half-breed gave him a look of utter disgust.
‘If the women aim to stay with us,’ he said, ‘they stay with us. They go where we go. Girls, you get up on that mule and let’s ride.’
Sure enough, when a few minutes later Blade and McMasters headed across the plain in the wake of McMaster’s disappearing remuda, the two girls, mounted on the mule, went with them.
McMasters seemed to be making a case in favor of something or other to Blade as they rode.
‘These ain’t my horses, Joe,’ he said. ‘They’re the girl’s. They’re all she has in the world, in a manner of speaking. We owe it to her to catch them.’
‘By the looks of things,’ said Blade a mite coldly, ‘it ain’t all you owe to her. During my absence, it looks to me as if you didn’t let much grass grow under your feet, George. It looks to me as if you and that Indian wench have a fair understanding going between you.’ McMasters smirked a little.
‘She’s a woman and I’m a man,’ he said. ‘She needed a little comforting. You wouldn’t argue with that, not after what she went through. Can I help it if I’m attractive to women?’
Blade said: ‘Some of those fellows have caught up a horse or two. They’re heading along west of us and if we don’t raise a little dust, they’re going to reach the horses before we do.’
McMasters spoke to the Indian girl in Cheyenne, ‘Keep after the horses, girl. Me and Blade are going to cut those men off.’
Blade objected.
‘I said nothing about cutting the men off,’ he said. McMaster’s reply was to quirt his horse into a dead run and swing it to the west. The little mare got her head down and ran. The dun was fast, but she left it standing.
Blade kicked at the dun and shouted to it. It responded, but he could see that the other men were well mounted and their animals were traveling well, overtaking the loose horses. They must have been desperate for the horses, for they were casting their nooses even though McMasters was riding down on them, firing as he went.
He was bold enough for anybody, but he was not fool enough to sacrifice his life for a bunch of Indian ponies. Failing to hit anybody, he swerved the mare away from them and circled. One of them, halting his horse, slipped from the saddle and started shooting back at him with a rifle. Blade rode in fairly close, let go a couple of shots from the back of his racing horse, failed to make a hit and withdrew. Both of them together managed to get behind some half-dozen ponies and drive them clear of the three men. Tacitly, they agreed enough was enough. They were alive and they had horses. As the two girls came along, the two men joined them and rode on south.
They did not draw rein for two or three miles. When they did and looked back, they could see nothing of the men they had been following.
‘Well,’ McMasters said, ‘what do you think? This looks a good time to break off the fight. We could get ourselves killed out here. We don’t have one damn
bit of advantage. If the rain stays off, I say we pick up their trail in the morning.’
Blade said: ‘Carried unanimously.’
Three
Ike Mannion was not so much brave as indifferent to danger. The evil of his nature showed on his face. The years of violence showed in every line. Men said that he had gone bad at his mother’s breast. They also said that, if she was as mean as him, that was not surprising, for her milk would have been sour.
Saddle-sore and as sour as his mother’s milk, he sat eating his bacon and hard tack and thinking about the men who were following them. He looked across the fire at Duke Dukar. Duke was a different breed. He had turned bad in the face of an undefeatable world. It had refused to give him what he wanted so he had gotten into the habit of taking it. Duke, they said did not have a nerve in his body. But that was a judgment that came from the scum he ran with. They also considered that he was a deadly gunman and men were kept at a distance by his terrible reputation. Whether he was actually fast with a gun was another matter. All his fellow killers had witnessed were point-blank killings of helpless men. And women.
Duke was smiling and Ike hated that smile. It put him down. Ike hated two things about Duke. One, he was a gentleman. Two, he was educated.
‘For crissake,’ Ike said, ‘what in hell’re you grinnin’ at?’
‘You’re getting kind of edgy, Ike,’ Duke said. ‘Those fellows have been on our back-trail too long.’
‘They ain’t nothin’ to me,’ said Ike stoutly. ‘Once we’re in the hills, they won’t amount to a heap of beans.’ Duke’s grin faded.
‘They found the dead Indians is my guess,’ he said.
Lon Southey, who had just come in from the horses, heard this.
‘They found the Mexicans, too,’ he said. ‘There was two women there an’ one of ’em was a Mex.’
Ike gave a snort of disgust.
Blade 1 Page 2