For a moment my heart stilled; then I felt its slow, heavy beat.
A man was standing by the fire, a square-shouldered man with a thick neck, a man no longer young but whose shoulders were shocking in their intimation of quiescent power.
How he had come there, I did not know, but he was standing, as if waiting. Rifle in hand, I walked toward him, walking slowly, very slowly.
CHAPTER 39
He wore dungarees such as were worn by sailors on the China ships, a broad leather belt, and a white cotton shirt stretched tight over unbelievable muscles. So far as I could see, he carried no other weapon.
“Good morning.” I gestured toward the pot. “Will you have some coffee?”
His features had an Oriental cast but he looked unlike any Japanese or Chinese I had seen, although my knowledge of both peoples was limited. He had high cheekbones and a scar on the side of his jaw. When he got that scar, he had also lost an earlobe.
He squatted on his heels and accepted the cup I brought from an arbor we had built to add to the tree’s shade.
“I am Johannes Verne,” I said.
He tasted the coffee. “You grandson to Captain Verne?”
“Yes.”
“Captain my friend.”
“I wish I had known him. All I know is what my father told me. He sailed off the China coast for many years, I believe.”
He watched the horses moving inside the corral. We took some of them out to graze each day, returning them to the corral at night. A few of the horses had already been driven to the corral in town, others to land held by Miss Nesselrode on the old Indian trail to Santa Monica.
“You have many horses.”
“If we can keep them. There are many thieves, too. I am told there are some bandits down near Anza spring.”
“Eleven,” he said.
Surprised, I said, “Eleven?”
“Yes. I count. They wait for somebody who comes from the town.”
“You know them?”
“I see them. I come by, see, go to look. I listen.”
“They did not see you?”
“Did you see me come here? I am Yacub Khan.”
Apparently that was explanation enough, and he was right, for I had not seen him until he stood at the fire. It irritated me that I had been so careless. How could I not have seen him? I was alert. I was a damned fool. He had done it, somehow. If he had, others might.
As if he read my mind, he said, “You watch good. I see it.”
He emptied his cup, then stood up. He watched the horses for a few minutes, then walked to the corral. He put his hands on the bars and then called; he called to the black stallion and it came right up to him. He put his hand out and the stallion did not shy. “He is a good horse,” he said. “Yours?”
“He’s unbroken. Some say he is a bad one.”
“He is good horse. Very strong. He run very far, very fast.”
“You have had experience with horses?”
“In my country everybody rides; from tiny baby, we ride. I am of Turkestan, what the Chinese call Sinkiang. We have the best horses in the world. There are no better horses than those of Karashar or Bar-Kol.”
When I was a small boy my father often showed me maps and pointed out places on them, some of them places he had visited, others places he simply knew about. Turkestan I remembered because Marco Polo had crossed it.
The black stallion had remained close to us, and putting out a hand, I scratched its neck.
“He is a good horse,” Yacub Khan said. “He is the best of them.”
It dawned on me suddenly. “You are from Khotan? You are the fighter?”
“I have fought.” Abruptly he turned and started away. Having no idea what to say or why he had come or why he was going, I simply stood and watched him go.
When he was some fifty yards away, he turned and looked back at me. “You are strong. Become stronger.”
Then he walked away, his shoulders very straight, walking with a curious flat-footed style, toes turned out.
Why had he come? He, whom I had heard was a recluse, seeing no one, wishing to see no one. Captain Laurel had said he was the best, and Liu Ch’ang agreed. Now he said: You are strong. Become stronger.
When I looked again, he was gone. Of course, he could have gone into the trees. No doubt he had.
Eleven outlaws, he said. It was too many. For a few minutes I stood looking about me as if seeing the place for the first time.
Suppose they came now to run off my horses? What would I do? What could I do? The corral, which opened on a small pasture fenced with rails, stood on a level spot among low, rolling hills close to the mountains. One of the several canyons that offered trails to the San Fernando Valley was close by, and Los Angeles was less than ten miles away. In the clear air it was not easy to judge distance.
Between where I now stood and Los Angeles there were numerous clumps of brush and trees and some vast stretches of prickly pear. Against the mountains and around Anza spring, named for the explorer who stopped there on a trip to the north, there were trees.
By this time the outlaws must know I was alone, so if they attacked, how would they do it? Our fire could be seen for miles, and they would judge that I was nearby. A sudden charge might kill me and run off the horses, needing no more than minutes.
My position close to the corral was not a good one, for riders could split, ride around the corral, and take me from both sides. Thinking of that, I recalled a spot I had seen while gathering firewood.
No more than fifty yards from the corral, it was a low knoll covered with rocks and chaparral, backed by a few trees and some fallen logs. From one of these I had taken bark for kindling, and broken some small branches.
Building up the fire and adding fresh fuel, I then retreated to the knoll and found the view I had of the corral and my camp was better than expected. Carefully I looked around, choosing several possible firing positions, for after firing, I must move at once. My movements could be covered by the way the hill fell away as well as by the brush and rocks.
Checking my field of fire, I settled down to wait, and was scarcely in position before I glimpsed three riders come out of the trees and ride slowly along the dim trail that led from the southwest. They were ambling along as if going nowhere, and in no hurry, yet I was suspicious.
Where were they going?
The route they followed would bring them close to our camp, and the trail led on past and into one of the canyons that offered access to the valley beyond. Yet, at this hour, where were they going? There were ranches in the valley, and a stage stop at Calabasas.
Curiously I watched them draw nearer. As I watched, one of them drew his rifle from the scabbard. My own rifle eased forward. At the corral the black stallion was restless, and glancing that way, I saw he was not watching the three riders, but something off to my right, head up, ears standing.
Turning sharply, I saw five riders, rifles in hand, less than a hundred yards away. While my attention had been riveted on the three riders, as was no doubt intended, the others were approaching under cover and from almost behind me.
Eleven, Yacub Khan had said, and there were but eight in sight. Where were the others? By now they all must know I was not at the fire, and were waiting until I gave away my position.
They did not know how I was armed, but would assume I had a rifle, which, once fired, must then be reloaded. They would also assume that I had a pistol capable of five or six shots, depending on whether all cylinders were loaded. Thinking of that, I drew each pistol, for I had two, and in each I loaded the extra chambers while watching the riders.
The five had drawn up. One man was standing in his stirrups, peering around.
That I was not in sight disturbed them. If they could surprise me, they need not fire a shot. Otherwise they could draw m
y fire and leave me with an empty rifle. That I had two pistols and my father’s shotgun loaded with slugs, they could not guess.
Monte and Jacob had expected to be back before sundown, and any firing would bring them on the run. Yet now I was alone, very alone.
Where were the other riders?
The three riders drew abreast of our fire, but a good hundred yards off, then walked their horses past it. Glancing around swiftly, I saw the five riders were moving forward.
Sweat broke out on my brow. My heart was pounding heavily. What should I do? To shout a warning meant to give away my position, yet it went against the grain to shoot an unwarned man. Yet, they had come here to steal, and so were taking their own chances.
The three riders suddenly turned and started for my fire. The first of the five rode around the near corner of the corral and trotted his horse to the gate. He reached to unfasten it, and I yelled, “Get away from there!”
Instantly I rolled over and three bullets struck into the brush or the log near which I’d been lying. Quickly I took aim at the rider at the gate. Just as he leaned over to pull the pin, I squeezed off my shot, the bullet directed at the small of his back right above the cantle of the saddle.
The moment I fired, I dropped the rifle and, picking up the shotgun, fired one barrel at the rider nearest the fire.
He raised up in his stirrup, looked right at me although I was deep in the brush, and then, as his horse wheeled, he toppled from the saddle and fell at the fire’s edge.
They were gone, vanished! Two men lay on the ground, one near the fire, the other some distance away, where he had fallen from his running horse. Swiftly I reloaded my rifle, then the empty barrel of the shotgun.
All was quiet. A stick fell in the fire, and sparks flew up.
The horse of the man near the fire walked slowly away.
Moving carefully, I shifted my position to have a better view of the corral and the fire. I could see along both sides of the corral for most of the way, but some of the riders were grouped just beyond the end of it farthest from me. As the ground fell away there, I could not see them, although I could detect occasional movement. Nor did I dare fire, for the horses were milling about. Had they been loose in our pasture, the outlaws would have been driving them, a mile away by now.
Slowly the moments passed. I lay quiet, sweating, straining my ears for any sound. Some of them were pinned down at the end of the corral, and to emerge would bring them within sight, but where were the others?
The sun was going down. It would soon be dusk, and then dark. They had only to wait. Uneasily I glanced over my shoulder. It was already growing dark under the trees. I saw nothing, heard nothing.
When I looked back, the man near the fire had moved. So he was not dead then, only wounded.
Again I looked over my shoulder, searching the trees and brush for some movement. There was nothing.
The wounded man at the fire had put out a hand, and digging his fingers into the earth, was trying to pull himself along the ground. His rifle had fallen from his hand when he was shot and lay in plain sight.
Where were Jacob and Monte? How far could our shots be heard? Over a mile, I assumed, but could not be sure. I simply did not know, and so much depended on the terrain, the vegetation, and the general surroundings. I dried my sweaty palms on my shirtfront, and drawing my spare pistol, I placed it on a rock near my hand. The other was in my waistband.
Again I checked all around me….Nothing. The wounded man had crawled several feet. My eyes swept the trees. Our horses had bunched at my end of the corral, away from the outlaws.
How many were down there? Three? Four? Brush crackled behind me, and two men burst out not thirty feet away. Whipping around at the first sound, I fired the shotgun point-blank at the nearest man; then, forgetting the other barrel, I caught up the pistol and shot into the next man.
A bullet burned my ear, another plunked into the earth beside me, and then I felt a sharp impact on my leg. I fired again, and that man went down. He got up, staggered a few steps, and fell again.
At that moment there was a burst of firing from out in front, then a second pounding of gunfire, and silence.
The fire smoldered, almost out. Slow smoke arose from the coals. The wounded man was gone.
A dark spot in the dust near the fire showed where he had bled, and there were drops of blood further along. When I was attacked from behind, he had chosen the moment to stagger away. His tracks were visible from where I lay.
The man hit with the shotgun slugs was dead; the other one was alive and conscious, his eyes wide open. “You goin’ to kill me?” he asked, his voice almost casual.
“You were trying to kill me,” I said, reloading the shotgun.
“You had us in a bind. We didn’t know where you was.”
“When a man sets out to be a thief, he sets himself up in a shooting gallery. He’s any man’s target.
“I never saw so many damn fools,” I added. “Men risking their lives for so little. If you stole all those horses, with today’s market there wouldn’t be enough left for one good night in a saloon. Any man who would risk his life or prison for so little has got to be soft in the head. At least two men are dead, two who will never see another sunrise, eat another meal, or know another woman, and for what?”
“I don’t have to stand for no preachin’.”
“Like hell you don’t! You have to stand for whatever you get! You’ve got no more choice than a rabbit.”
A call came from the fire. “Johannes?”
“Up here,” I said. “I’ve got me a pigeon. He’s lookin’ toward his rifle now, wondering if he should chance it. I may let him try.”
They came up the hill then, and through the brush. Only it was not just Monte and Jacob. Kelso was there, and two other men, two strangers.
“Looks like you had you a time,” Monte said. “Your pa couldn’t have done better.”
CHAPTER 40
During our early years in Los Angeles, with a population not exceeding three thousand persons, there was an average of fifty to sixty killings per year; yet when we moved our horses to Miss Nesselrode’s rancho, there was no trouble. Even the black stallion behaved himself, shying only slightly when, riding beside him, I reached over and put a hand on his back.
The ranch was a quiet place with an old adobe house standing under the shade of huge old sycamores, and with a good view back toward Los Angeles.
On the morning after the delivery of the horses, Miss Nesselrode was busy with other things, so it was I who opened the shop and laid out the newspapers just in from Wilmington on the morning stage.
The streets were virtually empty, as I had come early to the shop. Down along Commercial Street, only one man was visible, a tall man, wearing an apron, who was sweeping the boardwalk. I had just taken a book from the shelf and was settling down to read when the door darkened and I glanced up to see the man whom we had seen watching the shop from across the street.
He was a man of what we then called middle age, a neatly dressed man in a gray suit and a narrow-brimmed hat. Nodding a greeting, he asked if we had a Boston newspaper he might see.
“It is ten days old, which is very up-to-the-minute news for us.”
“For me, also.” He smiled, but his gray eyes were sharp, penetrating. “You have a nice shop. Are you the owner?”
He was leading up to something, and I was wary, yet something else disturbed me also. There was a faint suggestion of an accent in his voice, something vaguely familiar.
“Mind if I sit down? This is a reading room, is it not?”
“Of course.” Opening a box of books, I began taking from it several volumes by Bulwer-Lytton and a collection of tales by Poe. I glanced at it again, as he had been a friend of my father’s and a man whom I had known slightly.
He saw the name. “Is
that Edgar Allan Poe? He has become very popular in Europe, suddenly.”
“These are the first of his books we’ve had. My father knew him, and I have met him.”
“He died, I think. A few years ago.”
“I had not heard.” For a moment I straightened up. Another thread to the past, gone, lost forever. “He was a soldier once, so my father said. For as much as two years, I believe, and a sergeant.”
He glanced at me. “Surely you did not know him here?”
“We lived in the East then. My father said that as a boy Poe was a noted swimmer, and thought of swimming the English Channel.”
“Well for him he did not try. Nobody could swim the channel! That’s preposterous!”
He changed the subject. “You have a nice shop. Is it yours?” It was the question I had avoided.
“It belongs to Miss Nesselrode.”
“Nesselrode? An interesting name. Have you known her long?”
“Long enough. She’s a fine woman.”
“I do not doubt it, but I am curious. The name is not common, you know. I have seen her, I think. A tall, attractive young woman?”
“Yes.”
“Most women of her age are married,” he commented.
The comment deserved no reply. He was seeming to read his paper, making idle conversation the while. Yet he was prying, he was seeking for something, and it seemed to be about her. It occurred to me suddenly that she was no longer such a young woman, yet she seemed ageless. I had never thought of the passing years affecting her in any way at all.
“I wonder”—he spoke casually—“how she came by the name?”
“As most of us do, I presume.” I spoke rather brusquely. “As you, no doubt, got yours.” Straightening up from my work, I said, “When it comes to that, I do not believe we have met. I am Johannes Verne.”
“I am Alexis Murchison.”
An interesting name. The Murchison would be English, no doubt, and the Alexis? It could be Russian.
The Lonesome Gods (Louis L'Amour's Lost Treasures) Page 28