Long ago, an old gunfighter had told me, ‘Make the first shot count. You may never get another.’ I wasn’t going to need another. Laredo fell against the side of the house and his gun went off into the dust at his feet. His shoulder against the wall, his knees buckled and he slid down to the hardpacked earth. For a moment, I stood very still, just waiting. It was warm, and there was the acrid smell of gun smoke. Somewhere up the street, if you could call it that, a door slammed. A woman stood in the street, shading her eyes toward us. Slowly I crossed to my horse, thumbing cartridges into my gun. When I holstered it, I stepped into the saddle.
The bartender was in the door, looking at me. “What’ll I do?” he pleaded. “I mean, what—“ “Bury them,” I said. “There’ll be money in their pockets, and it will buy you an easy winter … Take it. Keep their outfits. Bury them, and put some markers on their graves.”
I pointed at each in turn. “His name was Laredo Larkin, and his was Sonora Davis.”
“Where they from?”
“I don’t know,” I said, “but they got where they were going. They’ve been riding down the road to this place for a long, long time.” Then I rode out of there.
Laredo and Davis. Was I riding the same road as them?
26
The trail of the stolen cattle turned south toward the Llano River country. The worst of it was, I’d ridden out of town without getting anything to eat, and my belly was beginning to think my throat was cut. So when I saw an adobe house up ahead, I rode up to it and swung down.
A slender young woman came to the door, shading her eyes at me. I also saw a man come to the door of the barn to watch me.
“I’d like to buy something to eat,” I said. “Or grub I can take with me.”
“ ‘Light an’ set,” she said. “I’ll put something on.”
The man walked up from the barn, a thin young man with a quick, shy smile.
“Howdy! Passin’ through?”
“That’s my name,” I said, grinning. “Seems to me that’s about all I do. Pass through. Been here long?”
“Nobody’s been here long. I come in when the war was over. Found this place, fixed up the old ‘dobe and the corrals. Got a few head of cattle on the range, and then I went back to West Virginia for Essie, there.” “Well, you’ve got water, grass an’ time. Seems like you won’t need much else.” He glanced at me again. “Surprised you didn’t eat in town. That Mexican woman’s a good cook.”
“There was a shooting up there, so I lit out. No tellin’ when there might be more.”
“A shootin’? What happened?” he asked.
“Looked to me like a couple of gunhands had been waitin’ for a man. He rode into town and they had at him and came up short.”
“He got them? Both of them?”
‘”Looked that way. I just straddled my bronc and lit out,” I said. We walked to the trough, where I let the horse drink, then tied him on some grass while I went inside. We sat down, and the man removed his hat, wiping his brow and then the sweatband of his hat.
“Hot,” he said. “I’ve been down in the bottom putting up some hay.”
Essie came in and put plates on the table. She shot me a quick, curious glance. News was scarce in this country, and visitors were few. I knew what was expected of me. They wanted to know what was happening … anywhere at all. So I told them all about the box supper at Rock Springs Schoolhouse, about the cattle thefts up in the Concho country, and repeated what I’d said about the recent shooting.
Essie put a pot of coffee on the table, then beans, beef and some fried potatoes—the first I’d had in some time. “He grows them,” she said, proudly, indicating her husband. “He’s a good farmer.”
“Seen some cattle been driven through here. Some of yours?” I asked casually. He shook his head quickly. “No. No, they aren’t. They come through here from time to time … Never stop.” He glanced at his wife. “That is, they never done so until this last time … There was a stranger along then, flashy looking man. I didn’t take to him much.”
Essie’s face was flushed, but I avoided looking at her. The man continued. “He stopped off, started talking to Essie. I guess he took her for a lone woman, so I came up, and he kind of edged around her, and I seen him take the loop off his gun.”
“A man with a high forehead?” I asked.
“Yes, sir. He did have. Kind of wavy hair. Anyway, I was afraid of trouble, but that other man came back and spoke real sharp to him, and this first man, he rode off. When he looked back he said, ‘You wait, honey. I’ll be ridin’ this way again.’ I heard that other man say ‘Like hell you will! I done too much to keep this trail smooth. I don’t figure to have it messed up by—‘ Then his voice kind of trailed off, but I heard the other man speak. Believe me, they were none too friendly when they left.”
“The one who talked to you,” I said to Essie, “is a gunman named Tory Benton.”
“A gunman?” Her face paled. “Then if—“
“Yes,” I said bluntly. “He might have killed your husband. He wouldn’t hesitate to do just that. He shot a friend of mine up north of here.” They exchanged glances.
“Those cattle,” I asked casually, while refilling my cup, “does he take them to his ranch?”
“Wouldn’t call it a ranch, exactly. He’s got him a place down on the Llano … Runs maybe a thousand head … or more. All young stuff.” He hesitated. “Mister, I don’t know you, and maybe I shouldn’t be tellin’ you all this, but that there outfit doesn’t size up right to me.”
“How so?” I asked.
“Time an’ again they drift cattle through here. They never bothered me, nor me them, until that last feller come along who bothered Essie. Hadn’t been for him, I might have kept my mouth shut. I got no call to suspicion them except that it don’t seem likely a man would have so many calves without cows, always driftin’ along the same route.”
“How many men does he have?”
The young man shrugged. “Can’t say. Most often he’s driftin’ only a few, an’ he’s alone. Sometimes it’s after dark, and I can’t make them out. Time or two, when I was scoutin’ for game down south of here, I cut their trail. One time I looked across the Llano and saw the cattle. Seemed to me there were two or three men down there, but I was afraid they’d see me and I wanted no trouble, so I lit out.”
“South of here, you say?” I asked.
“Almost due south. The Llano takes kind of a bend this way. There’s quite a canyon there, and he’s running his cattle in south of there. Good grass, plenty of water, and lots of oak, elm, mesquite and some pecans. It’s a right nice locality.”
When I’d finished eating, I went out and brought up my horse, tightened the cinch and stepped into the saddle. “Friend,” I suggested, “you could make yourself a couple of dollars if you want to take a ride.” “A ride to where?”
Now I knew that cash money was a hard thing to come by in these places, and any two-bit rancher like this was sure to be hard up. “Up north of here along the Middle Concho … Likely they’re south of there by now, and you could meet them half way. There’s a party of riders … a Major Kimberly and a man named Balch will be leading, I think. Tell them Talon sent you, and that the cattle are on the Llano.”
“Those are stolen cattle?” he asked.
“They are. But you just ride, and don’t tell anybody why or wherefore. The man you had trouble with was Tory Benton, and the man bossing the move is Twin Baker … and he’s five or six times tougher and meaner than Benton. Don’t cross them. “They’ll see my tracks if I miss them and they come back this way. So don’t lie. Tell them I was here, that I ate here and just pulled out. I didn’t talk or ask questions. I just ate. You understand?”
He agreed.
My trail was southeast, through rough, broken country with a scattering of cedar and oak. Nor was it the kind of country a man likes to travel if he’s worried about being drygulched; the country was perfectly laid out for it. Like I said before, my mother raised no foolish children that I knew of, so I switched trails every few minutes. That horse must have thought I’d gone pure loco. Suddenly, I turned him and started due east toward the head of Five Mile Creek. Then south, then west.