by John Shirley
“The boss made them use their knives and their hands to dig a grave for the dead one,” said Ray Jost as the drovers sat around the fire. The men who hadn’t been on the gather with him listened raptly. “They had them cows herded in that southeast canyon, just like Mase figured. He made ’em do all the work. Then he found seventy-four dollars on them, and he took that, all their guns, and Sawney’s horse as a fine and sent ’em on their way. That horse looks just fine in our remuda.”
“I’m kinda surprised he just let them ride out,” Rufus said, shaking his head. “My uncle Chet would’ve hung ’em!”
“Hung ’em from what?” Ray asked, tossing a mesquite twig into the campfire. “A mesquite bush?”
“Furthermore,” said Dollager, eating his own meal now that the others had finished, “best not hasten to bloodshed, young man. It weighs heavily upon the soul. Mr. Durst was indeed more generous than many would have been. Why, my old captain in India would have consigned those scoundrels to a firing squad! But as Aristotle said, ‘At his best, man is the noblest of animals, but if he does not cleave to law and justice, he is the worst.’ Hanging men outside the law is bestial indeed.”
“Wouldn’t have bothered me none,” Ray admitted as he rolled a cigarette. “But maybe this Aristotle knew a thing or two.” He turned to Mase, who was standing up, stretching, preparing to put in a few hours watching the herd. “Mase—what troubles me about letting those owlhoots go is we may meet ’em sometime on the trail. Maybe get ourselves bushwhacked.”
“It’s a chance I took,” Mase admitted. “But I am no executioner, so it was that or drag them along with us till we find a court. From what I hear, the law in Leadton is as crooked as a Virginia fence. So we might’ve had ’em with us all the way to Wichita.”
“You did the sensible thing,” said Pug, nodding.
* * *
* * *
He made a mistake letting us go,” said Rod Kelso. “He’ll pay for taking money from my pocket—and my gun! That was a damned fine gun!”
“He kilt Sawney, too,” Phil pointed out. He waved at the dance hall girl who was ferrying drinks around the Jack of Hearts.
“Hell, I never liked Sawney nohow. But my gun! And fifteen dollars! And then having to herd cattle—I hate that kind of work! Plumb degradin’!”
“As if you know a stitch about work,” growled Fletcher.
He was mad at more than Durst. He was mad at the world. It made him angry just to see another Durst sitting across the room, at the table beside the stage, his shotgun propped on his leg, one hand holding it the way a king held a scepter as he watched the big crowd of drinkers in the saloon. The place was going great guns since Hiram Durst had taken over as guard here. Hiram nodded his head with the fiddle music played by the old one-legged prospector seated on the little stage, just like a king listening to his music in court. Durst. Was he related to Mase Durst? He seemed to see a resemblance in their faces. Seemed likely they were kin.
Hiram Durst was a dangerous man. And a very alert one. Not a good man to challenge face-to-face.
But at some point, there would be a chance, if it worked out as Fletcher hoped, to set things up so that Hiram Durst could watch his own brother die—before dying himself.
That would balance the accounts all right.
CHAPTER TEN
The gun smoke rose from Katie’s pistol, curling blue in the morning sunlight. Holding the gun with her right hand, she aimed—catching the tip of her tongue between her front teeth and closing one eye—and fired once more at the old flour-starter tin on the stump. She missed, but not by far. Katie was out in the nearest pasture to the house, bereft now of stock, thinking she’d better just shoot six more rounds and then get back to her chores. Jim was out riding the fences with Hector, but he’d be back soon.
She had tried firing the Colt Army pistol Mase had given her with two hands, the way Mase had suggested, and with one hand. Two hands felt awkward. She found that she could manage with one despite the kick, and it seemed to aim better. She didn’t know if she was ready to get in a real fight with the likes of Clement Adams, but practicing with the gun gave her a feeling of strength she needed right now.
“Senora!”
She turned to see Curly waving to her from his horse as he walked it up. “You have a letter! They send it from town!”
“Oh! Is it from Mase?”
“No, senora. The name on it is Malley.”
“It’s my uncle Forrest!” she said, holstering the gun. She tore open the envelope and read it then and there. It was the merest note.
Dear Katherine,
Your letter has been forwarded to me by Elizabeth. I am most concerned to hear that your homestead is in jeopardy. I shall have to look at the agreement between you and the bank, but it is quite possible they are within their rights. However, the matter can surely be delayed until the loan is repaid. That may not resolve the matter, but it may be our only recourse as yet. I am obliged to complete the representation I have undertaken in the defense of a worthy man, but will make my way to you as soon as possible when that is concluded. I hope it may be within a fortnight.
Affectionately
Yrs,
Forrest Malley, Esq.
* * *
* * *
Thirty-four days into the drive to Wichita. They’d been two of those days eking their way slowly up the canyon, pushing the reluctant cattle into the stone chute of the trail, but not too hard. It would have been easy for the cattle to split their hooves or break their ankles on this uneven, rubbly ground.
Mase and Pug were standing to one side, watching the chuck wagon clatter and rumble as Dollager, leading the oxen on foot, tried to get over a moraine, or ancient glacial rock deposit. The bank of small boulders and gravel was only about five feet high, but it was steep and supported by an uptilt of the stony canyon floor that could not be cleared away. There was no way around; it stretched from one canyon cliff to the other. They’d taken most of the supplies out of the wagon to reduce its weight, but it was still too heavy. Straining and bawling, the oxen had at last gotten themselves over, the tongue of the wagon scraping over the stone behind them, but the wagon seemed stuck now. Dollager roared commands at the oxen, urging them on. The wagon tongue screeched across stone. The front wheels rose, slipped over the impediment—then came a raucous crackling sound, and the right rear wheel of the chuck wagon snapped off its axle. The wheel had caught awkwardly on a big rock atop the blockage.
“Hellfire!” Pug growled.
The chuck wagon’s left rear wheel went over, the broken axle of the right side dragging through rock as it followed. Then the wagon slammed to a halt.
“Hold it, Dollager!” Mase shouted. But there was no need for the order. The wagon wasn’t going to move much from where it was without the fourth wheel.
Dollager joined Mase and Pug to inspect the damage. The wheel was more than broken; its iron rim was warped and half its wooden spokes shattered.
“Well, we’ve got spares,” said Mase. “We’ll set up a lever and put it right. Let’s start taking the rest of the supplies out to lighten ’er up. . . .”
He turned to shout at Karl Dorge and Rufus and Denver, who were working to clear brush. “Yo, boys, come on back! We’ve got us a new job!”
Pug called out to the drovers pushing the herd up. “Hold on now. Keep ’em where they are!”
A few pieces of extra lumber had been brought along for chuck wagon repairs, and Mase pulled two long oak boards out of the wagon bed, as Pug and Dollager detached one of the spare wheels and rolled it over to the axle.
“We shall need a fulcrum,” Dollager said.
Mase looked around, spotted a boulder in the moraine that was about the size of a bushel. “Let’s you and me dig that one out and roll it over. . . .”
Pug called Dorge, Duff, and Jimson over. East
Wind was sent to keep the oxen steady. Using the small boulder as a fulcrum and the two boards, stacked, as a lever, the four drovers tilted up the back corner of the wagon as Mase and Dollager lifted the replacement wheel onto the axle.
The wagon was soon moving on, bumping across the stony ground, and the cattle were following, the sheer press of them pushing those in the front over the barrier.
The trail was clearer now, though occasionally the drovers had to clear rocks that might have proven dangerous to the herd. It was slow going in the narrow passage, the cattle pressed together, steers sometimes angrily jabbing at one another with their horns. The cowboys had to keep chiefly in the drag and in front, for fear of being gored in the tight confines of the herd, or of getting crushed against the stone walls of the beetling red cliffs.
Onward they went, as a damp wind picked up, wailing as it came down the canyon. Toward evening, riding out a short distance ahead, Mase heard the cattle making an excited mooing he recognized, and looked back to see their muzzles lifted to sniff at the air. Likely they smelled water.
The canyon jogged to the left, and around the curve, a quarter mile on, they came to a sizable pool of clear water. It was coming from a spring in a clay layer of the cliff walls.
As Dollager moved the chuck wagon into place, Mase once more scanned the tops of the cliffs. He knew the drive was in a bad spot in this canyon if the likes of Joe Fletcher took up a position on those rocks. They could pick off a number of men before the drovers could get under cover. There were game trails up there, maybe from mountain goats, and a man could move around those trails for a better shooting angle.
All they could do was keep a watch on the cliffs. Mase got off his horse, led it to the pool, and let it drink. He waved Ike Vinder and Rufus over to him. “You two set yourselves to watch those cliffs. Keep an eye on the cattle but mostly watch those cliff tops till it gets good and dark and you can’t see anything else.”
“You expecting that Fletcher bunch to come after us from up there?” Vinder asked.
“Expecting—nope. But prudence is a virtue, boys. Now get to it. Post yourself over there, Vinder—Rufus, you go on over there.”
They went to their posts, and looking around, Mase spotted a small dead tree, half crushed by a boulder. Mase went to the tree and started breaking off branches for the campfire, thinking the while that the crushed tree was a reminder that there was some real risk from falling rocks here. He dropped the wood at the ring of stones Dollager had arranged for the campfire, and that wailing wind chose that moment to whip down the canyon again, mischievously flipping Mase’s hat right off his head. He caught the hat by the brim in midair, just as it was about to blow into the pool.
“Mase,” said Pug, riding up, “there’s a yearling with a broken ankle. Stepped in a hole in the rock.”
“Well—I guess we’ll have fresh beef. Go ahead and shoot it, and I’ll send the coosie to cut the meat off.”
Pug rode back to do his bidding. Arranging the wood for the fire, Mase shook his head in disgust. How many cattle had he lost? Eleven at Red River. More to the Chickasaw. He suspected that a few of those the rustlers had driven off were still out on the range somewhere. They needed to do an accurate count.
He shook his head. Each lost beef was a loss in income for Katie and Jim. . . .
“Dollager!” he called, standing up. “I’ll start the fire and the coffee! You’ve got some butchering to do!”
* * *
* * *
Miz Durst,” Tor Oliver said, “I sure appreciate the pie and the home brew, but, ma’am, I’m not sure what any of us can do for you.”
“It’s not for me—not only!” she protested. She was standing at the stove, underscoring her words by tapping a finger on the cold iron. “It’s for your own selves, too!”
There were three neighbors gathered around her kitchen table that evening. None of them seemed convinced they should band together with her against Harning. Not even in court.
Tor Oliver was a widower, white haired and bearded, who kept to himself at his ranch bordering the Durst land to the southeast. Beside him was Marty Smole, a stern, darkly tanned cotton farmer with a deeply lined face, and his wife, Gwendoline, a shy little woman with gray-streaked black hair and big brown eyes.
“Now, how’s it going to help people to get in a fight with Harning?” Oliver said, shaking his head with incredulity. “He’s a powerful man, and he’s mighty friendly with some big men in the state! He’s got half a dozen hired hands who carry guns! I have two men working for me who carry nothing but sheep shears!”
“Standing up to him doesn’t have to need guns,” Katie insisted.
“Hmph!” snorted Smole, raising his bushy eyebrows. “Do you say so, now? Why, ma’am, Harning’s the kind who’ll fight anyone who defies him! He’ll force a fight!”
“That’s right,” Oliver said. “That’s him to a T.”
Katie shrugged. “Mr. Oliver . . . you’ll have to face him one way or another. San Vincente Creek runs through my land and then down to yours. And that’s what he wants—along with all the good grazing on Durst Ranch. He wants to control that water, don’t you see? And if he takes my land from my husband and me, why, he’ll block up the creek so you can’t use it for irrigation!”
Mr. Oliver blinked—and blanched. “You—you don’t know that, ma’am.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” said Mrs. Smole softly.
Her husband looked at her with surprise. “Why, Gwennie!”
She blushed but went on. “I think we should listen to Mrs. Durst. This man will stop at nothing. It’s not right what he does—we’ve all heard the stories. And he treats his poor wife like an old rag. Have you heard how he talks to her?”
“Hmph!” said Smole again. “That’s none of our business.”
“How is it you think we can be of any use without picking up a gun?” Oliver said.
“By testifying to anything you see that you think is wrong,” Katie said. “And if I send a message—then you might choose to come to be a witness to what is happening. You don’t have to mix in a fight.”
“That sounds to me like the right thing to do!” declared Mrs. Smole almost boldly.
“Suppose he’s coming onto my land with armed men, threatening me. . . .” Katie suggested. “He’s done it before! Now I’ve barred him and his men from my ranch. I’ve let it be known. If you see them on my property—if you see him breaking any law—speak up! Talk to the sheriff!”
“The sheriff?” Smole smirked and shook his head. “That man will dance a jig if Harning asks him to.”
“If enough people speak out, the sheriff will have to do something,” Katie insisted.
Oliver picked up his hat and stood up, staring at the floor. Then he shoved the hat on his head and said, “I’ve got to head home. But I’ll think on what you said.”
Smole nodded. He took his wife’s hand and drew her to her feet. “That goes for us. We’ll think on it.”
Gwendoline Smole gave Katie a shy smile. “I’ve always admired you, Katie Durst. I hope you whup that man one way or the other. I surely do.”
Then she took her husband’s arm and they all went to the door, leaving Katie alone in the kitchen.
“Mama?”
She turned to see Jim in his red long johns, standing at the entrance to the hall. “Can I have some pie—and home brew?” he asked.
“You’re supposed to be asleep!”
“All the talking woke me.”
“So you were listening, were you?”
“Yes, ma’am. I think you said it right. Everything that you said.”
She opened her arms, and he came to her hug. “You can have pie,” she said, hugging him. “But no home brew.”
* * *
* * *
Mase was sitting on his bedroll near a lantern with a piece
of paper laid over his knee, trying to work out how much money the ranch had lost in missing cattle. . . .
He heard a crackling from somewhere above, then a rumbling sound, and he looked around—to see a boulder about seven feet in diameter bouncing past him, whooshing through the air and missing him by a few inches. It flew on with meteoric intensity over the campfire, making the flames flutter and sparks fly, and straight at East Wind and Rufus, who were standing together near the chuck wagon. Both of them saw it coming and threw themselves to the right and left. It struck the ground between them, rolling on to shatter against the cliff face with an echoing crack.
Dollager, standing at the Dutch oven nearby, gaped after it and then said breathlessly, “Truly there’s an angel keeping watch!”
Mase jumped to his feet and turned toward the high rocks the danger had come from. He could see faintly a small cloud of dust up there. “Anyone see that thing start down?” he called.
“Not me,” said Rufus, getting up.
“Nor I!” called Dollager.
“What the devil’s going on?” Pug asked, trotting up to them, breathing hard. “Why, I was just pulling up my britches in the shrubs and comes a sound like a cannon!”
“A boulder came down from there,” Mase said, staring up at the cliff. His mouth was dry, his pulse pounding, though nothing more was falling from the canyon wall. His fear was all about what had almost happened. “Came within a hair of busting me flat, Pug! Rufus and East Wind, too!”
“That is a hell of a thing!” Pug said, taking off his hat and slapping it against his thigh. “Could’ve killed you easy!”
Mase looked toward the cattle bedded down about two hundred feet away, too far off to be disturbed by the noise of the boulder.
He reached down to the saddle lying by his bedroll, picked up his gun belt, and strapped it on. Then he caught up the lantern and started toward the cliff the boulder had come from.