“Look here.” One of the punchers started to rise. “You can’t get away with that! You—!”
“Twenty-four hours, gentlemen. You ride out and tell him that. I am through talking.” His head turned ever so slightly. “As for you, I would suggest you either sit down or draw a gun. The choice is yours.”
He spoke mildly, as one might in a polite conversation, and without stress.
Slowly, carefully, the puncher sat down.
Galloway Sackett tasted his rye again and when the bartender came near he said, “I’m hunting a man who knows the San Juan country.”
The bartender shrugged, then indicated Shadow with a gesture of his head. “He knows it, but I wouldn’t start any talk about it now. He’s got things on his mind.”
“I also want a horse—a good horse and a couple of pack horses or mules.”
“Talk to him.” Then the bartender added, “That’s a good country to stay out of. There’s talk of trouble with the Utes, and the Jicarillas been cutting loose up thataway.”
The four men at the table got up quietly and went out of the door, walking carefully. Galloway Sackett finished his drink, then walked over to the other man’s table.
“Mr. Shadow? I’m Galloway Sackett.”
“It is a name not unknown to me. Sit down, will you? What will you have?”
“I’m going to have some coffee and some grub, but what I really want is information. The bartender told me you knew the San Juan country.”
“I do.”
“About a week ago I ran into a bunch of Jicarillas and they had my brother. They’d started to work on him. I was alone, but figured if I could create a fuss he’d cut loose on his own. I did, and he did.”
“He got away?”
“He surely did. And dropped clean off the world. I hunted for him and they did. Those Jicarillas weren’t about to lose him so they taken in after him. He was stark naked and had his hands tied, but he got away.”
“He’s dead, then.”
“Not Flagan. We Sacketts don’t die easy, and Flagan is a tough man. He’s been up the creek and over the mountain. He’s fit Comanches and Arapahoes on the buffalo plains, and about ever’ kind of man or animal. He’s a tough man.”
“That San Juan country is tough. It’s the most beautiful country in the world, but about two-thirds of it stands on end.”
Shadow paused, waiting while the bartender placed coffee and food on the table. Then he asked, “What do you want me to do?”
“Tell me about it. How the streams run, the best ways to get through the mountains, where I’m liable to run into Indians. I’m going in after him.”
“You’re bucking a stacked deck, my friend. You’ll need an outfit.”
“That’s another thing. The bartender said you had horses. I need a spare for Flagan to ride when I find him, and I’ll need a couple of pack horses for grub and the like.”
Shadow took a thin cigar from his pocket and lighted it. He studied the end of it for a moment, then said, “If I didn’t have some business to attend to, I’d go with you.”
“Twenty-four hours, you gave him. Do you think he’ll move?”
“Yes.”
Galloway glanced at Shadow thoughtfully. “He must know you, this Fasten gent.”
“He knows me. He stole cattle and killed men in the Mimbres country. He wiped out a lot of us, then pulled out and drove the cattle clear out of the country. I took in after him.”
“I lost the trail, then found it again. Meanwhile he’d settled down here, hired a bunch of reasonably honest hands, and then he cooked up that Clover Three brand. Guess he had an idea it couldn’t be blotted, so I did it, just as a challenge. So he sent a hired man after me, but I remembered the man from Texas, and he did not remember me.”
“How’d that happen?”
Shadow shrugged. “I was a teacher at Waco University. Our paths did not cross in a way he would notice.”
“You were a teacher?”
He shrugged. “One does what one can. I needed the job, they needed the teacher. In fact, they wanted me to stay on, but the pay was small and I was restless. I had come to America to hunt for gold.”
He glanced at Galloway again. “Are you related to Orrin Sackett?”
“He’s kin.”
“He defended me in a shooting case. My first one, in fact. It was a little matter of a horse. My horse was stolen. I hunted the man down and he drew a pistol and I shot him. Someone advised me to hire Orrin Sackett and I did … fortunately.”
They finished their coffee, talked idly of various things, and then Shadow stood up. “I have a cabin down the road apiece. If you’d like you may join me. There’s an empty bunk, and you’re welcome.”
The cabin was small but comfortable. There were Navajo rugs on the floors, curtains at the windows, and a couple of dozen books.
“I envy you the books,” Galloway said. “School was a rare time thing for us. Mostly it was Ma teaching us from the Bible, and she read a couple of stories to us written by Walter Scott. Flagan an’ me, we got our learning in the woods with our Winchesters.”
“Your brother is a woodsman? Not just a cowhand?”
“We grew up in the Cumberland country. We learned from the Cherokees. Given a chance Flagan could get along most anywhere.”
“Then he might make it. He might just be alive.”
It was the first time he had slept in a bed in weeks, but Galloway slept well, and awakened with the sun. Shadow was already outside but a minute or two later he came in.
“I just had word. Fasten left the country. I’ve started some men rounding up my cattle, and the others.”
Galloway Sackett dressed. Somewhere in the country far to the north and east his brother was either dead or fighting for his very existence. Somehow he must find him. The night before, Shadow had carefully outlined the lay of the country, how the rivers ran, the Animas, the Florida, and the La Plata, and Galloway, knowing his brother’s mind as he knew his own, was trying to figure out what Flagan would have done when he got away.
He would have headed for the mountains, and the first trail he’d found had pointed north. It was Flagan’s trail, but that of the Apaches following him as well.
Flagan would head into the hills, try and find some place to hole up. He would need some clothes, and he would need shelter and food. In the mountains, with luck, he could find what he needed.
“Sackett?” Shadow called from the door. “Get your gear together. I’ve saddled our horses and we’re packed for the trip.”
“We?”
“I’m going with you.”
Chapter IV
For a week I rested beside the creek, keeping hidden when possible. I treated my feet alternately with the salve I had made and leaves of the Datura, and the soles began to heal.
Twice I snared rabbits, once I knocked down a sage hen. There were yampa roots, Indian potatoes, and I found a rat’s nest containing nearly a bushel of hazelnuts. The fare was scant but I was making out.
By the end of the week I’d completed a bow and some arrows, and had killed a deer. With the piece of elk hide, softened by its burial in the earth, I made moccasins. Marking out the soles by tracing my feet with charcoal, I then cut out an oval as long as my two feet, cut it in half, and in the middle of each squared-off end I cut a slit long enough for my foot to get into, then cut another slit to make a T. I now had the upper for each moccasin and using a thorn for an awl I punched holes to sew the uppers to the soles. Finally I punched holes along each side of the slit to take a drawstring.
One of the first things I’d done was to make a shelter hidden well back in a clump of willows. Crawling back into the middle of the thickest clump I could find, I cut off some brush, enough to make a sleeping space. Then I drew the willows together overhead and tied them, allowing others to stand up to mask what I had done.
This wasn’t a shelter I built all at once. First I had just crawled among the willows to sleep where I’d not be easily found, then I widened it for more room, and the willows I cut I wove in overhead and around the sides to make it snugger and warmer. After a week of work the tunnel was six feet long and masked by tying two growing willows a little closer together once I was inside.