During the night I had done a good deal of thinking. Our previous day’s journey had been but twelve miles, very short for travel on horseback, but we had taken time in backtrailing the dead man and otherwise.
Now squatting in the shadow of the sandstone ridge, I drew a circle in the sand that was in my mind twelve miles in diameter. At the previous camp, food had been stolen from us by a lad, and a few miles into the circle a man had been killed, on that same night. Near one edge of that circle we had found their camp, and near the western edge was our own camp of the night. Somewhere in that circle or very close to it would be a woman and a boy, perhaps together again, perhaps waiting or searching. And somewhere here also were five desperate men, who also looked for them.
Seated where I was, I considered the terrain before me. The wounded man, I felt sure, had been attempting to draw the pursuers away from their quarry.
If the two were wise, they would remain where they were, wherever that was, because to find tracks someone must leave tracks, and if they remained still, their pursuers must eventually decide they had moved out of the area. Yet I doubted if two escaping people would have the patience.
Tightening the girth on my saddle, I mounted and rode down off the ridge, returning toward where the dead man’s body had been left.
I was well armed. Aside from the Ferguson rifle, I carried two pistols in scabbards on my saddle, and my fighting knife, an admirable weapon in which I was thoroughly schooled.
CHAPTER 9
The air was clear and cool. The thin grass of the country about was broken at intervals with outcroppings of limestone or sandstone, and there were occasional pines and cedars. Now, suddenly, the land about me looked strange.
Passing through a country is vastly different than searching it, and a land that had seemed simple indeed to me as a passerby was now complex, and filled with possible hiding places. I became increasingly both amazed and irritated with myself that I could have been so stupid as to believe the land unrelieved.
Now I realized that a thousand Indians might have been hidden where I would not have dreamed a dozen could find concealment. Secret folds of the land revealed themselves, and where there had been a long grass hill, suddenly I found that the crest of one hill merged at a distance with the crest of the hill beyond and in between lay a valley where a fair-sized town could have been hidden.
At first I found no tracks except the occasional ones of antelope and buffalo. Then twice I came upon the tracks of the grizzly, easily recognized from those of other bears by the long claws on the forepaws. The five riders had been scouting here also, and twice I crossed their trail.
The morning drew on, and methodically I searched every draw, every hollow, every clump of trees, and found nothing. Nor did I see any tracks that might have been left by Indian ponies.
If the lad had acted as I supposed, he had returned to some previously appointed meeting place with the woman. By now they had eaten, and probably were aware they were searched for by the five mysterious riders. Whatever hiding they had chosen must have been done on the spur of the moment.
From various vantage points I studied all the land about. One place seemed too obvious, another offered too little, yet more and more my attention returned to an outcropping of rocks on the southwest facing slope of a long hill.
From that point, our camp on the night we were robbed would have been visible. The lad would not have gone out on the mere chance of finding something at night in this remote region. He must have seen our camp and made his plans before dark. The route of the wounded man who had died near our trail trended away from that spot.
Allowing my horse to graze for a few minutes concealed by a clump of cedar, I studied the outcropping. It might be larger than it appeared from here; it also might offer a place of concealment.
A trail of greener brush and grass led down from the rocks into a widening fold in the hill.
Apparently there was a spring or something of the kind there that subirrigated the fold and flowed down to what appeared to be a small, willow-bordered stream below.
The boy, at least, was canny. It had been no small feat to slip into t camp of wary frontiersmen and escape with loot. Small the boy might be, but he must also be something of a woodsman to achieve what he had without being seen or heard.
Determined to examine the place, I now gave attention to all the surrounding area. Where were the five mysterious pursuers?
The coolness of the dawn held on, and the wind stirred the sage, moaning among the cedars with a hint of storm. The sky was clouding over, and I was glad there was a slicker behind my saddle. Did the woman and boy have anything of the kind?
Warily, I looked around, my rifle easy in my hands, for this was a land of trouble and I was new upon this grass. These brown-turning hills did not know me yet, nor I them, and there was a menace in their silence, their emptiness.
At the touch of my heel, my horse walked down the long slope, angling across it toward the east. If watchers there were where the rocks crouched upon their hillside, they must see me now.
Suddenly, I felt good. I could trust myself, and I had something meaningful to do. My horse began to gallop and I found myself singing “The Campbells Are Coming!” Down the long hillside to the thin trail below, down over the grass to the waiting ascent. I should climb the slope to– They came out of a notch of the hills riding toward me, five hard-faced men with rifles in their hands, who drew up as they saw me coming. I did likewise, my heart thumping but my Ferguson balanced easily in my right hand, my fingers closed around the action.
Two wore Mexican sombreros although they were not Mexicans, one wore a coonskin cap, the others nondescript felts. Four wore dirty buckskins, one a frock coat. They drew up facing me.
“Good morning, gentlemen!” My voice was cheerful. “A fine morning for a ride, isn’t it?” “Who might you be?” The speaker wore the frock coat. He was a broad-faced man with a black beard and a disagreeable air to him, a burly man who looked likely to have his own way in most cases. I decided I did not like him.
I smiled. “I might be almost anybody,” I said flippantly, “but as a matter of fact, I’m Ronan Chantry, professor of law and literature, student of history, lecturer whenever he’s invited. And who might you be?” They stared at me. I knew that if I disliked them, the feeling was mutual. I also realized they possessed an advantage: they would have no hesitation at shooting me if so inclined.
It was an advantage they had for the moment only, for as soon as I reached that conclusion, I decided I would have no compunctions at shooting them either, one or all.
Wild country and wilder circumstances can thus render all theoretical ethics a little less than a topic for conversation.
“It don’t make no dif’rence who we are,” the man replied roughly. “I want to know just what you’re doin’ here.” My reply was as rough as his. “It makes just as much difference who you are as who I am, and what I’m doing here is obvious. I’m riding. I’m also, if you wish, minding my own damned business!” The man was shocked. He had been so sure he held the strongest position that my reply shook him. He stared at me, unable to make me out, and then I saw his eyes go beyond me, looking for my supporters.
“Look here!” he said roughly. “I want to know–to ” I cut him short. “Whatever you want to know, you’ve a damned impertinent way of asking. Now I have no business with you. If you have any with me, state it and be damned quick. I want to get on with my riding.” One of the men started forward angrily and my rifle twitched only an instant. “Hold it right there!” I said. “I have no idea who you are or what you want, and to be perfectly frank, I don’t give a damn. Now if you want trouble, start the music and I’ll sing you a tune.
If you don’t, get the hell out of the way. I’m coming through!” They did not believe it. That one man alone would talk so to them. Obviously they fancied themselves of some importance and they could not accept it.