If that was Dutch, he knew of this place. Were they coming here, or riding on toward Obaro?
“We’ll saddle up,” he whispered to Lennie. He threw a saddle on the sorrel’s back and reached under the belly for the girth. He felt the sorrel swell his belly and tried to stop him. The sorrel whinnied—caught some vague smell of horse, no doubt, a smell carried on the wind. And the harm was done. He grabbed his rifle and crouched, waiting. It was quiet, too quiet. This was no job for one man, and Lennie, as if hearing his thought, slid her rifle from its scabbard and moved to the edge of the pocket.
Considine stood among the rocks on one of the back trails that led to the pocket and watched the girl take her position. With her first move he had recognized her as a woman. Now, with the sky lightening with the coming day, he could see her more clearly. He stepped out into the open and she turned sharply with the rifle on him.
“It’s all right, I’m friendly,” he said.
“Not if I can help it!” she said. Nevertheless, he could see her eyes were bright with interest or excitement.
Behind him he heard Dutch speak. “ ‘Lo, Dave. Figured you had cashed in a long time ago.”
Dutch turned his head. “Come on in, boys. I know this old rawhider.” Considine looked at the girl. She was a beauty, really a beauty. “Did you hear that?” he said. “We’re friends. Dutch knows your Pa.” “My Pa,” she replied shortly, “knows a lot of folks I wouldn’t mess with, so you walk in ahead of me and don’t cut up any or your friend will have a friend to bury.”
Considine was tall, lean, and raw-boned. His dark features were blunt but warm, and when he smiled his face lighted up. He smiled now. “We’ll walk in together. How’ll that be?”
CHAPTER III
“He’s all right,” Dutch said, looking past the girl’s head at Considine. “I rode with Spanyer.”
Dutch gestured toward Considine. “Dave, meet Considine.” “Heard of him.” The wary old eyes glanced at Considine and then away. Then Spanyer indicated his daughter. “This here’s Lennie. She’s my daughter. We’re headin’ for Californy.”
Dave Spanyer was a slope-shouldered man who looked older than his years, but he was weather-beaten and trail-wise, and obviously not a man to take lightly. Considine knew the type. Most of them had come west early, as mountain men or prospectors, and they had lived hard, lonely lives, relying on their own abilities to survive.
“Going to marry her to some farmer?” Dutch asked. “She ain’t going to marry no outlaw, if that’s what you mean.” Spanyer glanced at Considine, who was out of hearing. “If you’re riding with him you’d better fight shy of Obaro.”
“You don’t know him.”
“I know Pete Runyon.” Spanyer looked toward his daughter, who had walked over to their horses. It was growing light now, and a good time to move on. “Don’t say you weren’t warned.”
Dave Spanyer watched them ride on, walking to the edge of the trail to watch them go. Lennie came up beside him.
“Stay away from men like that, Lennie. They’re no good. There’s not many of these new outfits that are worth riding with, but these men … Well, I don’t say they ain’t good men in their way. That Dutch, I knew him a long time back, and Considine, everybody knows him.”
Spanyer turned away. They could have it. They could have the long, cold rides, the lonely camps, the scarce rations. All he wanted was a place in California in the sunshine where he could raise horses and some of that fruit he had heard tell of.
“He’s handsome, Pa. The tall one, I mean.”
“None of that! Don’t you be gettin’ any ideas, now. He ain’t your kind.” Considine was a fool to go back to Obaro, or any place close to it. Nobody had ever tapped that bank and nobody was likely to, not with Runyon the sheriff. And he had a town full of tough men.
Spanyer turned his mind to California. He knew where he was going out there, knew the place well because he had got off a stage there once. It was a little place called Agua Caliente, tucked in a corner of the San Jacintos, and he had laid up there several weeks when he wanted to stay out of sight. Riding the outlaw trail was all right for the young sprouts, but a man was a fool to stay with it. He would buy a little place from the Indians, irrigate a patch, and raise some fruit. It wasn’t likely that anybody would show up around there who was likely to know him, and after a while he would move on out to the coast if things looked good. By that time they would have forgotten him. “Those men were outlaws, weren’t they?”
“It doesn’t matter. Don’t you pay them no mind.” They mounted up, and when he was in the saddle he said, “Never pays to know too much. You didn’t see anybody, you don’t know anything about anybody.” Dave Spanyer turned his thoughts from Considine and his men and thought of the trail ahead. It was Indian country, and he was foolish to try to get through alone. Still, no Indian knew more about the trails than he did, and if necessary he knew how to live off the country.
He was taking a chance, especially with Lennie along, but they had nothing back where they came from, and folks had found out about him. The daughter of an outlaw would have no chance to grow up and live a decent life; but out there in California … well, most of his kind stayed in Arizona. In fact, unless they were sent to Yuma pen they never went as far west as the Colorado. He rode a few yards ahead of Lennie, his Winchester in his hand. He knew the desert too well to be fooled by its seeming innocence. If all went well they would noon at Pozo Redondo. There was a store there, and he could buy what supplies they needed before going on into the desert. With Considine and his outfit in the vicinity, it would be a good idea to stay away from Obaro. Somebody might remember his connection with Dutch and he would be involved.
The sun came up over the ridge and it grew hot. Nothing moved out on the wide sagebrush fiats. Suddenly he saw the tracks … four unshod ponies had crossed the trail … hours before.
Dave Spanyer stared off in the direction they had gone, but there was nothing out there that he could see, nothing at all.
At the foot of Wildhorse Mesa is a spring, and around it some ancient cottonwoods offer their shade. Once deer had come here to drink, but they came no longer, for in the shade of the trees there was now a combination store, stage stop, and saloon owned by “Honey” Chavez. When he first came to the country Chavez had made a business of robbing the desert bees and selling their honey in the settlements, hence the nickname.
The store building was eighty feet long and twenty feet wide. It was built of adobe, and facing it across what was humorously called the “plaza” was another building almost identical in size which was a bunkhouse carrying a faded sign:
BEDS— Two Bits.
Honey Chavez was fat, sloppy, and nondescript, but there was little going on which he did not know about, for he was a man who listened well and found means to profit by the information he gathered. Despite his appearance, he was a man who had many times proved his courage against the Apaches, although usually he was on friendly terms with them. Lacking most of the virtues, Honey Chavez had one very necessary one—he knew when not to talk. From the porch in front of the store there was a good view both up and down the trail, while behind the place was a towering mountain that closed off all approach. In front of the place and across the trail the desert stretched away into almost endless distance before reaching some haunting blue hills, far, far away.
Considine led the small cavalcade into the plaza, where they dismounted and tied their horses. Chavez was standing in his doorway, scratching his fat stomach and watching them. “Getting close to Obaro, ain’t you?” Considine ignored him. Everybody knew about his relationship with Pete Runyon, and what could be expected if he returned to Obaro. He glanced up the trail. There was no sign of Dave Spanyer and his daughter. He stared that way, almost hopefully. She had been quite a girl. And that old man of hers—he was a tough old man, a very tough old man, but they should not be riding through Apache country alone.