As they came on, I managed to put thirty feet or so behind me, and was desperately hoping to find some place to hide. The night was still. The lower pasture they were coming toward was much like the upper. As they reached the fence where I had taken my spill, I came to the fence along the side toward the creek. My hand touched a bark-covered rail, felt for the space beneath it, and then I slipped through. The stream must be close now.
It was growing lighter now the moon would be rising. Remembering how the stream had looked from the crest of the hill above, I recalled that the stream bed was all of fifty yards wide, but the stream itself not over five or six. That meant I would be fully exposed, a black figure moving across white sand; and without doubt a rifleman would be watching such an easy target.
If a body had been taking odds, my chances were about fifty to one to wind up a corpse. There were a lot of men out there with the idea of salting me down, and they had the guns to do it with. Otis Tom Chancy’s time looked to be about up. Nevertheless, I figured to make them pay for their fun. I had me a good bit of ammunition and I could shoot maybe not as well as some, but well enough. As a last resort, I had a bowie knife with a blade sharp enough to slice bone as if it was cheese.
Suddenly a voice spoke, not twenty feet off. “Bud? I figure he got away. Plumb and total.”
“You just hold that. You stow that gab. He didn’t get away. There’s no place he could go.”
Looking past the two who spoke, I could see the dim figures of two or three men out in the pasture. Suddenly I had an idea. With those two there close by, I wasn’t going to get away, but if—
Straightening up, I took careful aim at the little knot of figures out there, and fired.
Instantly, I dropped to my belly in the grass. It was as I’d figured. Those men out there in the pasture didn’t stop to ask questions—somebody had shot at them and they shot back, all of them, and they kept on shooting. I got up and legged it out of there, running eight or ten steps before I slid down a bank and ran up a slight cut toward the cabin and the corrals.
Somebody back there was yelling. “Don’t shoot, damn it! You’ve got Pike!”
Thumbing a shell into my gun, I came up out of the little draw, crossed behind the cabin, and started for the hills. It looked as if I was going to make it.
But all of a sudden a bunch of riders, unheard by me because of the shooting and yelling behind me, came down the trail to the cabin, right toward me.
There was no place to go. I was caught dead to rights, fair in the middle of the trail, with the moon just showing over the ridge. And my gun was in my holster…
The riders drew up when they saw me from a distance. “Pike, what the hell’s going on out there?”
It was Caxton Kelsey.
Chapter 10
Kelsey had mistaken me for the man called Pike, and this gave me the break I needed. My holster was set for a crossdraw, and my right hand was at my belt. Moving it over, I shucked my gun, the darkness of my body masking the movement.
“Kelsey,” I said, “I’ve got a gun lined on your belly. I’ve heard you’re a fast man, but I don’t think you are fast enough to beat a bullet.”
He never moved. He was no fool, and he was not one to gamble against a sure thing. Nor were the others. They sat very still, every one. But you know who worried me the most? It was that red-headed woman, Queenie. A man you can figure on; a woman you can’t. They’re likely either to faint, or to grab for a gun regardless of consequences.
“It’s you they’re after, then.” Kelsey drew on his cigarette and made it glow red in the night. “We’ll get you this time. You’re afoot.”
“Not any more, Kelsey. I’m riding out of here right now. I’m riding your black. I’m not inclined to shoot unless called upon, but at this range I should get two or three of you, including the girl there.”
Now, you hear about men arguing in the face of a gun, or taking wild chances, but it is a rare thing that you find a gun fighter gambling like that—he knows too much about guns. By now I was within fifteen feet of them, and just out of line of their horses.
“You could start shooting, or I could,” I said, “and I’d dearly love to put lead into you, Kelsey; but the way I figure it, whoever starts shooting gets killed, and somebody else as well, maybe all of us. I don’t like the odds, but I don’t have a choice. You boys do.”
“What do you want us to do?”
“Let go your gunbelts. Just unloose the buckles and let them fall. And when you’ve done that, shuck your rifles and drop them.”
“Cax, you ain’t going to let him get away with this, are you?” It was Queenie, and she was mighty angry—ready to spit and snarl and scratch, given chance.
“Queenie,” Kelsey said, cool and quiet, “you make one wrong move and I’ll kill you myself. This man means business, and he’s got nothing to lose.” He chuckled a little. “Besides, I like his nerve. It will be real fun next time we meet when I gut-shoot him.”
They unloosed their belts and let them fall, then dropped their rifles.
“Now back up the length of your horses,” I said, “and get down from your saddles one at a time, Kelsey first.”
Nobody wanted to be a dead hero, and they did just as I said. When they were all down, I told Kelsey to lead his horse up to me. “Now, Kelsey, you be kinda careful,” I said. “I wouldn’t want you to try to get that horse between us, and if anything goes wrong I’m going to kill you first … and you were the one who suggested gut-shooting.”
When I had the black, I rode over, starting their own horses moving ahead of me toward the high range.
When Kelsey and his lot started down the trail, I took time to swing down and gather up a rifle and a cartridge belt. I slung the extra belt over my shoulders and gathered up the others. Then swinging back into the saddle, I started up the trail, shucking shells from the belts as I rode, and stuffing them into my pockets.
Kelsey and the others were yelling, trying to draw some attention from the outfit at the ranch. The black was a good horse and stepped right out, although he had come a far piece that day. Up on the high ground I glanced back; only the light from the ranch house showed. I kept to the west, testing the night for the smell of dust, which would mark the way taken by the stampeding herd.
Dawn was reaching red fingers at the sky when the smell of dust became strong, and I began coming up with scattered cattle. We started bunching them, the black and I, and he proved himself a good cow horse, with a liking for his job. Ranging back and forth in the growing light, we gathered strays and pushed them on to join the herd.
Cotton was out there, bringing up the drag. He swore with relief when he saw me. “Man, I thought you’d caught one! And my pony’s durned near wore out with pushing this bunch.”
“Keep right on pushing,” I said. “We’re heading for Cheyenne.”
There was an idea buzzing in my head. They’d figure we would start for Fort Laramie, and might cut corners trying to head us off—when and if they got horses. If they followed our trail, it was a cinch they’d find us, but I had an idea Kelsey would be impatient to come up with us before we reached Fort Laramie.
We drove on into the dawning, and when day was full upon us, stopped for water.
Five of the Gates horses, stolen by the Kelsey outfit, were found among the cattle. They must have joined the herd in the night, knowing the cattle, and had trailed along. We roped them out, and felt better about the hard work ahead, but neither of us was of any mind to talk. Handy Corbin was still missing, and we had not found Tarlton.
There is something about a morning in the sagebrush country, something about the smell of leather and cows and horses, something about the smoke of a fire on the prairie, of coffee boiling and bacon frying tired as I was—and believe me, every muscle and bone in my body ached—I loved it.