Some men just can’t understand there isn’t any free ride. Everything has its price.” “I can’t stand it, Borden. I just can’t! I’m not cut out for this. Borden, I want to go comhome. I want to go back east! I want to get away from all thisl” “I know, Bess, but what would I do back there?” “I don’t care. Anything is better than thisl” “Well”-he turned away-“I’ll give it some thought, honey. Now I’ve got to go finish my job.” He walked to the cafe and stopped outside. Already the bodies were gone, dust thrown over the blood, the loose horses tied up.
What could he do back east? What would he do?
Sackett stood in the door of the Bon Ton.
“Come on in, Bord Hyatt Johnson’s here, and George. We’ll have some coffee.” He turned toward the door, looking back once more. This was his town, and it was safe once more.
Firelight flickered on the canyon walls, somewhere in the distance a coyote howled. Wind stirred through the pines and fluttered the flame of the fire.
“You set up an’ eat. You an’ me, we’re goin’ to have a long time together. How long you live depends on how I get treated, understand? You give me any back talk or any trouble an’ I’ll kill you. “Wouldn’t be the first woman I killed, although the others were squaws. I never had nothin’ like you.” “You will hang for this.” He chuckled harshly. “Yeah? Who is goin’ to know it ever happened? You sure ain’t goin’ to be in no shape to tell anybody, an’ who could find this place? Nobody’s been in here for fifty yearl Maybe more’n that.” Out in the darkness a horse stamped and blew. Ducrow straightened up from the fire, listening.
“Monson an’ them,” he said, thinking aloud, “I’ll bet they went to do that bank jobl Well, that will- be an easy onel Then if they are smart they’ll head for Mexico.” He glanced around at Juliana. “Your pa thought he was king bee!” He paused, then shook his head.
“And for a while there, he was. He could plan “em, I’ll give him that.” He glanced at Juliana.
“Your pa’s dead, you know. Perrin an” them, they’ll have killed him by now. I mean whoever Perrin left to do it. There was nobody but him, all alone in that stone house of his.” Juliana sat up straighter. “Don’t be too sure,” she said, “and when he has time he’ll hunt you down. Don’t you suppose he knows this place? Who knows this country better than he does?” Ducrow stared at her. “What makes you think he knows this place?” “Peach Meadow Canyon?” Juliana was frightened, but desperation was making her think. “I’ve heard him speak of it,” she lied.
Ducrow was uneasy now, and she sensed the doubt.
He had believed himself secure, but her comment had injected an element of uncertainty. If she had a chance it lay in that doubt. He had believed himself secure, but if she could make him wary, make him hesitate- “Aw, he don’t know nothin’ about this place! Nobody does! Anyway, those boys back at Toadstool have taken care of him. All that damn’ discipline! Do this, don’t do that! Makes a man sick! This here’s been cumin’ for monthsi” “The man you call Perrin,” Juliana said, “was killed! I looked back. He was down, and Mike Bastian was standing over him.” Ducrow squatted by the fire. Rig Molina would be killed attempting to rob the treasure train, Monson and Clatt were gone, and if Perrin was dead, then what would stop him from moving in and taking over? Juliana had been afraid but was so no longer. She was like a trapped animal fighting for its life. Dru would have known what to do . . . but what would she do? There had to be something, some way to outwit him, some way to trick him …. How?
The fire-if she could only get him into the fire!
If she could trip him, push himl if she could get hold of a gun! She could shoot, even if not so well as Dru.
Or a knife, something she could hide until the proper moment. Even a sharp blade of stone.
Indians used them, and some of the scrapers she had seen seemed hardly to have been shaped at all. Her eyes searched the ground for a sharp-edged stone.
She would slash him across the face . . . no, not the face. It must be the throat. She must try to kill him or hurt him badly, she must “Here!
Eat up, damn youl I haven’t time to be stallin’ around! Eat! “Come daylight we’re movie’ further up the canyonl There’s a place-was “This is the place, Ducrow. Right herel” He couldn’t believe it. Ducrow put the frying pan down and slowly he straightened. Was the thong off his gun or not? “Of Roundy was right.” Ducrow was stalling for the moment he wanted. “He said you could track a snake across a flat rock. “Well, now that you’re here, what are you goin’ to do about it?” “Whatever you like, Ducrow, but I’d suggest you just carefully unfasten your belt and let your guns drop. If you don’t want to do that you can always shoot it out.” “You’re too soft, Bastianl You’ll never make a gang leader like of Ben was! Ben would never have said aye, yes, or no, he’d just have come in blasting! You got a sight to learn, youngster.
You’re too soft! Too bad you ain’t goin’ to live long enough to learn it.
“Perrin always thought he was good with a gun. Never a day in his life I couldn’t have beat him!” He lifted his right hand and wiped it across his tobaccostained beard. The right made a careless gesture but at the same time his left hand dropped to his gun. It came up, spouting flame! Mike Bastian simply palmed his gun and fired. It was smooth, it was fast, but most important it was accurate.
He fired and then stepped to Ducrow’s left and fired again. Ducrow stood staring at him and then his gun dropped from loose fingers. His knees sagged and he fell forward, facedown in the sand. One hand fell into the fire and his sleeve began to smolder.
Bastian stepped forward and pushed the hand away from the fire with his toe. Then he loaded his gun and holstered it.
Dru came running, rifle in hand. “Oh, Mike! I thought you’d been killed!” She dropped on her knees beside her sister, and Mike walked back to the horses.
For a long moment he stood leaning on the saddle. After a while he heard the girls coming and he said, “There’s the ruins of a stone house over yonder. Go there. I’ll come along in a minute and build a fire. We’ll go home in the morning.” He went to where Ducrow lay, and dragged him over against a low ridge of sand and gravel. Then he caved sand over him. “That’s good enough for now, Ducrow.
When we come back, I’ll bury you right and proper.” The coffee was already made, so he brought it to the new fire he built. Later, as the coals burned down, Dru asked, “Mike? What will you do now?” “Go back to Toadstool,” he said. He sipped his coffee and stared into the cup, then at her.
“I’ve got to go back to Ben. I’ve got to make sure he’s all right.” “And then?” “Go someplace and start over.” “Not as an outlaw?”’ I never was one, never really wanted to be one.” He looked up at her. “Dru, folks have to live together, and it can only be done if they work together to keep things right. There’s no room for outlaws in a decent world, not even the kind of world they would try to create.
“Ben was wrong. Wrong from the start, and even as a small boy, I knew it.” “So?” “He was all I had. I’d no place else to go, and he was kind. I’ll say that for him. He was always kind.” Sunlight lay white upon the empty street at Toadstool Canyon when Mike Bastian rode into the lower end of town, his rifle across his saddle.
Beside him was Dru Ragan .
Juliana had stayed behind at the Ragan ranch, but Dru refused. Ben Curry was her father and she was going to him, regardless, outlaw camp or not. Besides, she would be returning with Mike beside her. If Dave Lenaker had arrived, Mike thought, the town was quiet enough for it. No horses stood at the hitching rails, and the door of the saloon gaped wide.
Something fluttered in the light wind, and Mike’s eyes flickered. Torn cloth on a dead man’s shirt, a-man he did not know. He walked his horse up the silent street, and the hoof falls were loud in the stillness. A man’s hand and wrist lay across a windowsill. A pistol lay on the ground beneath it. There was blood on the stoop of another house. “There’s been a fight,” Mike said softly, “and a bad one. Better get yourself set for the worst.” At the mess hall a man lay sprawled in the doorway. They drew up at the foot of the stone steps and Mike helped her down. “Stay a little behind me, if you must come.” Up the steps, across the wide veranda, and into the huge living room. Shocked, they stopped in their comtracks.