Suddenly, there was no place to go. There’d been no trail. I’d just been following the lines of least resistance, and now the mountainside broke sharply off and I stood on the brink of a cliff with a deep pool of water lying thirty feet below. I could hear water falling somewhere near, but the surface below was unruffled and clear. There was no hesitation in me.
This far I had come, and there could be no thought of turning back. So I dropped my gear into the water, and feet first, I jumped.
A moment of falling, then my body struck the water and knifed into it. There was intense cold. I went down, down, and then as I was coming up my head bumped something and it was the quiver of arrows I’d made. A few yards away was the bow. Gathering them up, I swam for the only shore there was, a narrow white-sand beach back under the overhang of the cliff from which I’d jumped.
No more than four feet long and three wide, it was still a place where I could crawl up and rest. As I neared it I found my spear and the hide with my few belongings in it floating near. After I’d beached the bow and arrows, I recovered them and returned to the beach.
Stretching out on that beach meant putting my feet in the water, and that was just what I did. That sandy strip was completely invisible from anyone not on the surface of the water, for the pool was rimmed around with smooth rock edges, and none of them seemed to be less than six feet above the water. Even if the Indians circled and got on the rocks opposite they could not see into my hiding place. Their eyes could touch only the water or the rock above me.
Nobody was likely to find me here, but the question was, and it was an almighty big question, how was I going to to get out? I’d no food left and not much strength, but for the moment I was safe. So I curled up on the sand, pulled the remnants of my hides over me and went to sleep.
And in my sleep I dreamed that I heard a sound of horses, the whimper of a dog or wolf, and the sound of falling water.
When I awakened it was a long time later. I was cold, shivering cold, and the water was gray with late evening. There was a waterfall near … not that it mattered. This was one I wasn’t going to get out of.
Galloway, where are you?
Chapter V
“There’s a town,” Shadow said, “or what passes for a town.”
“Flagan don’t know nothing about a town. When he taken out he was stark naked an’ running his heart out, but if I know Flagan he’ll take to the hills. There’s places to hide and a better chance of rustling some grub.”
“Nevertheless, he’s apt to come upon some tracks, and if he follows them he’ll find some prospector’s camp or a ranch.”
“Ranch?”
“They’re coming in. The Dunn outfit have laid claim to a wide stretch of range and they’re bringing in cattle.” Shadow rode around a tree, pulling up to let Galloway ride abreast. “There’s some others, too.”
“There’s room for all.”
“Not if you listen to the Dunns. They’re a tough lot. From Kansas.”
There was the shadow of a trail, long unused. It wound among the rocks and boulders, following the contour of the land. Under the trees it was shadowed and still. Occasionally they drew up to give their horses a breather, for the altitude was high.
“I was talking with an old Ute,” Shadow commented, “and showed him a picture of the castle where I was born. He said there were bigger castles back in the mountains.”
“Castles?”
“Big houses,” he said, “bigger than any dozen houses he had ever seen, bigger than twice that many, he claimed.”
“You’d never guess it. Not in this country. He was probably tellin’ you a tall tale.”
“Maybe.”
Hours later they came down off the mesa into a wide, grassy valley. Almost at once they saw tracks. A dozen riders on shod horses had passed, and not too long before.
Nick Shadow drew up and studied the tracks. Then he looked north in the direction they had gone. “Some of that Dunn outfit,” he said. “Stay away from them, Sackett. They’re trouble.”
“Isn’t likely I’ll run into them.” They mounted a ridge as Galloway spoke and he pointed off to the west. “River over there?”
“The Mancos. Mesa Verde is just beyond. That’s where the old Indian told me the castles could be found. Someday I’m going to ride over and have a look.”
After a moment Shadow added, “You’d best not hope too much. Your brother didn’t have much chance.”
“He’s a tough man. He’s had his tail in a crack before this. If I know him he’s a comin’, and somehow or other he’ll keep himself alive. Up to us to find him, no matter how long. No Sackett ever left another in a bind. Leastways, none from my part of the country.”
They had turned eastward, and high upon the right, but back from where they rode, the mountains lifted, bold peaks, their rugged flanks streamered with snow, forested almogt to the top. They rode cautiously, knowing it was Ute country but also that the Dunns were here.
“I’ve met none of them,” Shadow said, “but they’ve a name for being a quarrelsome lot. Rocker Dunn killed a man over near Pagosa Springs a year back, and they say he’d killed a couple in Kansas before they came west. There’s talk that several of them rode with Quantrill.”
“Where’s that town?”
“South of us. East and south. It lies over close to the La Plata. They’ve called it Shalako after one of the Kachinas.”
Galloway was thinking of Flagan. Back in those mountains somewhere he was fighting to keep alive … if he was alive. Without weapons, in a rugged country where the only humans he found were apt to be enemies, his chances of survival depended upon himself and his own energies.
They had grown up together, fighting each other’s battles, working together, struggling together, and no man could know another so well as Galloway knew Flagan. He knew what Flagan must do to survive because he knew what he would do. And there was no easy way.
Flagan would be struggling for every mouthful of food, thinking, conniving, planning. And he would be working his way north, staying with the kind of country where he could find a living, and slowly moving toward the destination for which they had set out.
Shalako lay on the flat with a backdrop of trees and towering mountains. The flat was green, dotted with clumps of oak brush, and the metropolis itself was composed of three buildings, two short stretches of boardwalk, one log cabin, a dugout, and several outbuildings of obvious intent.
“Now look at that,” Nick Shadow commented. “It shows you how fast this country is growing. This town has increased one-third since I saw it only a few months ago. Somebody built a barn.”
“Livery stable, looks like.”
“Well, what more do you want? A saloon, a general store, and a livery stable. That’s enough for any town.”
“And looks like there’s folks in town,” Sackett commented. “Four, five horses in front of the saloon, and a buckboard yonder by the store. Business is boomin’.”
“They’re ruining the country,” Shadow agreed. “A year or two ago a man could ride a hundred miles through here and not see anybody, or even hear anybody but the Indians who shot at him. Now look at it You can hardly walk without falling over people.
“And by the way,” he added, as he drew up before the saloon, “that’s a Rocking D brand … the Dunn outfit.”
They swung down, whipped the dust from their clothes, two tall men. Nick Shadow, man of the world, educated, refined, and immaculate … not even the long dusty ride had robbed him of that appearance. And Galloway Sackett, in a buckskin coat, a dark blue shirt, shotgun-fringed chaps and boots. On his head a black, flat-crowned hat. He wore his gun tied down, and carried a Bowie knife at his belt. The fact that he had another one, an Arkansas toothpick with a long slender blade, was not obvious. It was suspended between his shoulderblades, the haft within easy grasp below his shirt collar. This was a Tinker-made knife.
Tying their horses they crossed the boardwalk and entered the saloon. Outside it had a false front, behind it a peaked roof, and inside there was no ceiling, just the heavy beams overhead.
There was a long bar, a dozen tables, and chairs. The bartender was a broad-faced man with corn yellow hair, massive forearms resting on the bar. At the end of the bar was a wiry old man with a thin face and high cheekbones, in buckskins.