“She was there, all right.”
Refilling my cup, I thought that over. She was not entirely against me then.
“You’d better get over to Doc West’s. That face needs some attention.”
Out in the air I felt better. With food and some black coffee inside me I felt like a new man. The mountain air was fresh and good to the taste, and even the sun felt good.
I walked along the street .Out of the grab bag of the world I had picked this town. Here in this place I had elected to remain, to put down my roots, to build a ranch. Old man Ball had given me a ranch, and I had given my word. Here I could cease being a trouble-hunting, rambunctious young rider and settle down to a citizen’s life. It was time for that, but I wanted one more thing. I wanted Moira.
Doc West lived in a small white cottage surrounded by rose bushes. Tall poplars stood in the woodyard and there was a patch of lawn inside the white picket fence. It was the only painted fence in town.
A tall, austere man with a shock of graying hair answered the door. He smiled at me.
“No doubt about who you are, Brennan. I just came from treating the other man.”
“How is he?”
“Three broken ribs and a broken jaw. The ribs were broken last night, I’d say.”
“There was no quit in him.”
“He’s a dangerous man, Brennan. He’s still dangerous.”
After he had checked me over and patched up my face, I got back on my feet and buckled on my guns. My fingers were stiff. I kept working them, trying to loosen up the muscles. What if I met Jim Finder now? Or that weasel, Bodie Miller?
Picking up my sombrero, I remembered something. “Have Tharp check Morgan Park’s boots with those tracks Canaval found. I’m betting they’ll fit.”
“You think he killed Maclaren?”
“Yes.”
On the porch I stopped, gingerly trying to fit my hat over the lumps on my skull. It wasn’t easy. Scissors snipped among the rose bushes. Turning I looked into the eyes of Moira Maclaren.
Her dark hair was piled on her head, the first time I had seen it that way. And I decided right then it was much the best way.
“How’s Canaval?” I asked.
“Better. Fox is running the ranch.”
“He’s a good man.”
My hat was back in my hands. I turned it around. Neither of us seemed to want to say what we were thinking. I was thinking that I loved her, but I was afraid to say it.
“You’re staying on at the Two-Bar?”
“The house is finished.” When I said that, I looked at her. “It’s finished … but it’s empty.”
Her voice faltered a little, and she snipped at a rose, cutting the stem much too short.
“You … you aren’t living in it?”
“Yes, I’m there, but you aren’t.”
So there it was, out in the open again. I turned my hat again and looked down at my boots. They were scuffed and lost to color.
“You shouldn’t say that. We can’t mean anything to each other. You … you’re a killer. I watched you fight. You actually like it.”
Thinking it over, I had to agree.
“Why not? I’m a man … and fighting has been man’s work for a long time on this earth.”
“It’s bad … it will always be bad.”
I turned my hat, then put it on. “Maybe … but as long as there are men like Morgan Park, Jim Finder, and Bodie Miller, there must be men to stand against them.”
She looked up quickly. “But why does it have to be you? Matt, don’t fight any more! Please don’t!”
I drew back a little, though I wanted to go to her and take her in my arms.
“There’s Bodie Miller. Unless someone kills him first, I’ll have to face him.”
“But you don’t have to!” Her eyes flashed angrily. “All that’s so silly! Why should you?”
“Because I’m a man. I can’t live in a woman’s world. I must live with men, and be judged by men. If I back down from Miller, I’ll be through here. And Miller will go on to kill other men.”
“You can go away! You can go to California to straighten out some business for me! Matt, you could—”
“No, I’m staying here.”
There were more words, and they were hard words, and then we parted, no better off.
But she had started me thinking about Bodie Miller. He was riding his luck with spurs, and he would be hunting me. Remembering that sallow-faced killer, I knew we couldn’t live in the same country without meeting. And my hands were bruised, my fingers stiff.
Bodie Miller was full of salt now. I’d have to ride the country always ready. One moment off guard and I would have no other moments, ever.
How could I live and not kill?
Yet when I rode up to the ranch I was thinking of a dark-haired girl tall among the roses.
TWENTY
Jonathan Benaras stared at my face, then looked away, not wanting to embarrass me with questions.
“It was quite a fight … he took a licking.” Benaras grinned in his slow way, and a sly humor flickered in his gray eyes. “If he looks worse’n you do, he must be a sight.” While I stripped the saddle from the buckskin I told them what had happened, as briefly as possible. They listened, and I could see they were pleased. Jolly hunkered down near the barn and watched me.
“It’ll please Pa … he never set much store by Morgan Park.”
“Wish I’d been there to see it,” Mulvaney mused. “It must have been a sweet fight.”
We went inside where supper was laid, and we sat at a table and ate as men should—for the first time, not around a campfire. But I was thinking of the girl I wanted at this table, and the life I wanted to build with her, and how she would have none of me.
Nobody talked. The fire crackled on the hearth, and there was a subdued rattle of dishes. When we had eaten. Jolly Benaras went out into the dark with his rifle. Walking to the veranda, I looked down the dark valley.
The first thing was to find out what Booker and Morgan had been up to, and the only possible clue I had was the silver assay.
The place to look was where the Two-Bar and the Boxed M joined, I decided. The next day I would ride that way, and see for myself. If it was not there, then I must swing ride and need tracks, for tracks there must be.
Mulvaney rode with me at daybreak. The Irishman had a facile mind, and a shrewd one. He was a good man to have on such a search, and also, he had mined and knew a little about ore.
The morning fell behind us with the trail we made across the Dark Canyon Plateau, and we lost it at Fable Canyon’s rim. Off on our right, but far away, lay the Sweet Alice Hills.
Heat waves danced. … I mopped my face and neck. We saw no tracks but those of deer, and once those of a lobo wolf. We rode right and left, searching. More deer … the spoor of a mountain sheep, the drying hide of an antelope, with a few scattered bones, gnawed by wolf teeth. And then I saw something else.
Fresh tracks of a shod horse.
Turning in my saddle, I lifted my hat and waved. It was a minute before Mulvaney saw me, and then he turned his mule and rode toward me at a shambling trot. When he came closer I showed him the tracks.
“Maybe a couple of hours old,” he said.
“One of the Slade gang?” I suggested, but I did not believe it.
We fell into the trail and followed along, not talking. At one place a hoof had slipped and the torn earth had not yet dried out. Obviously then, the horse had passed after the sun had left the trail, possibly within the past hour. The earth had dried some, but not entirely.
We rode rapidly, but with increasing care. Within an hour we knew we were gaining. When the canyon branched we found where the rider had filled his canteen and prepared his meal.
We looked at his fire and we knew more about him. The man was not a Slade, for the Slades were good men on a trail, and their gang were men on the dodge who had ridden the wild country. The maker of the fire had used some wood that burned badly, and his fire, was in a place where the slightest breeze would swirl smoke in his face.
The boot tracks were small. Near by there was the butt of a cigar, chewed some, and only half smoked through.