He was within reach of me, and he had that axe ready, but when our eyes met he stopped. His eyes were as mean-looking as I’ve ever seen. Now, I’ve lived a good part of my life in difficulties, and my mind thinks in terms of fighting. The way he was holding that axe told me he was going to cut down and to the left with it. A man swinging an axe from the right-shoulder side can’t cut much to the right. Not with accuracy.
Loomis, if he tried to hit me, would cut down and left, so I was all braced to roll right and come up. His knuckles were white with gripping the axe, and I could see the hate in his face. Of a sudden it came to me that, old as he was, Loomis didn’t only want that gold, he wanted the girl.
A moment there I thought he was stopped, then he suddenly took a deep, rasping breath and swung. The breath warned me, but he swung faster than I’d thought and I just skinned by, the axe missing by inches.
But then I was on my feet, like a cat, and had my Tinker pointed tight against his wishbone. He didn’t have a chance to lift that axe again; my knife was right where I could open him up, and he knew it. I looked right down into his eyes and said, “Loomis, you’re a murdering skunk. I got me a notion to kill you.”
All the same I was in a fix, and I knew it. If he killed me, nobody would question it much. Penelope might, but she would have nobody to argue with, and I was a known outlaw. Flinch would say nothing of it, or think nothing of it. On the other hand, if I killed him, nobody would believe me at all.
So I just looked into his eyes … we stood chest to chest, not eighteen inches between us, and I reached up with my knife and flicked a button from his coat … and then another, and another, until I was right under his chin. Then I touched the point under his chin and just pricked him a mite.
“Mr. Loomis,” I said, “you hadn’t ought to done that. You make a body right mistrustful of folks. Now you just turn your tail around and hike back to camp … And, Mr. Loomis, don’t you ever try that again or I’ll part your brisket with this blade.”
Well, he was sweating like nothing you ever saw, he was that scared. He backed off, and then turned and ran back through the water.
I saddled up and loaded up and, taking my Winchester, walked the dun along the edge of the slough for a ways, then came out and skirted the camp. I wanted to scout the country anyway, but I also wanted to come into camp so’s I could see everybody. It wasn’t in my mind to ride up and have somebody a-laying for me.
When I rode in Penelope gave me an odd look, but nothing was said. I had an idea Flinch knew what was going on, for that breed missed very little. He was the sort that remains on the side lines and then picks up the pieces after the fighting is over.
We took out across the prairie. They would be hunting us by now, and no doubt would be following along streams where there was water. But from now on there were a good many scattered sloughs or pools, and water would not be so hard to come by.
That night we made camp in a depression north of Carrizo Creek, a place unlikely to be seen until a man was within a few yards of it.
Looms was restless and on edge. He avoided me, and I was just as glad. Squatting near the fire, I drank hot black coffee and talked to Penelope. It had been a while since I’d had a chance to talk to any girl.
“You be careful,” I warned her there at the last; “you trust nobody. You’re a mighty pretty girl, and where gold and women are concerned not many can be trusted.”
“How about you, Nolan?” This was the first time she had called me my by given name.
“Me neither. I’m as hungry for gold as the next man.”
“And women?”
“Well, up to a point. My ma raised me to respect womenfolks.”
She was quiet for a minute or two and then she spoke very quietly. “I don’t trust people altogether, Nolan.”
“You must trust Loomis, to come clear out here with him.”
“He’s old enough to be my father. Or my grandfather, almost. Besides, how else could I get out here? Would you tell someone how to find a buried treasure and just let them go, hoping you’d get a share?”
“Nope.”
“Neither would I.”
We moved out from camp before the first light. There were clumps of mesquite about, and more prickly pear than we had been seeing before. I shucked my Winchester and rode with it to hand. We angled northwest across the country, headed for a crossing of Perico Creek almost due south of the Rabbit Ears.
The dun and me, we stayed off to one side, either in front of the buckboard or behind it, always keeping it within sight; but I was careful to offer no target for my back.
Where, I wondered, was Sylvie Karnes and her brothers? And what had become of Steve Hooker?
Topping out on a low rise I saw the Rabbit Ears off to the north, showing just above the horizon and a good ways off. They were two nubbins of mountain, scarcely big enough to be called a mountain in this country. But even from this distance you could see why it got its name of Rabbit Ears.
It was near noontime, and we were a mile or so short of the ford. Down off the rise you couldn’t see the Rabbit Ears, and I said nothing about them to the others.
The thought in my mind was that we were now within a few miles of more gold than most people had ever seen, and unless I missed my guess half a dozen people were ready to kill for it.
A moment there I thought, why not just light out? Why walk into someting that was none of my business? Let the murdering Karnes outfit and the rest of them fight it out … was any amount of gold worth that much risk? I doubted it.
It would be mighty easy to turn my horse and ride away. A few days’ ride to the west was Mora, where I had kinfolk. To the north there were the hell-for-leather mining towns where a man could make do one way or another. A twitch of the bridle and I would be off and free-riding with nothing to worry about but Comanches.
The trouble was, there was a girl back there; and mean though I might be, I couldn’t leave that girl to a pack of wolves. It just wasn’t in me. Every ounce of horse sense I had told me to cut and run, but I swung my horse and rode on toward the ford on the Perico.
And right into a bellyful of trouble.
7
Steve Hooker, Tex Parker, and Charlie Hurst were sitting their horses just across the ford, blocking the trail. They all had rifles, and they were just sitting there, and Hooker was grinning. The thing was, they expected me to stop.
“You boys want something?” I called out.
“You turn around and git out’n here!” Hurst yelled. By that time I was at the water’s edge. That water was no more than eight inches deep and there was good hard bottom, so I let the dun have the spurs and went through the water and up the bank and into them before they realized I wasn’t going to stop and parley.
They sure enough expected me to pull up and talk about it, but when trouble faces me I never was much on the talk. So I rode right into them and then I dropped the reins and slammed right and left with the rifle.
Hurst tried to duck, but the rifle barrel caught him behind the ear and knocked him from the saddle. Parker was reaching for me when I swung the rifle across and drove the barrel into the side of his head.
It struck with a thunk like the butt of an axe against a log, and he went out. Grabbing the reins as my horse turned, I put the muzzle of the gun on Steve Hooker. His own rifle was coming up and I shot him, holding high a-purpose so he’d take it through the shoulder. He jerked, but stayed in the saddle, losing his grip on his rifle.
He started to swear, and I said, “You still got a left hand. You want to try for none?”