I managed to pull myself to the window, but I could see nothing, only the blackness and the windowpane running with water.
Somehow I got back onto the bed, and could only stare up at the ceiling.
Later, I once more got up and added fuel to the fire.
The supply of wood was getting low. Soon it would be gone.
Again! slept, and again there was nightmare.
Only this time I was on a great slippery rock with waves breaking over it, cold waves that rushed over me as I clung to the rock.
I dug my fingers into a crack, and with each wave that came I was stiff with fear. My fingers became numb. How long could I hold on?
..
And then I was a-wake and it was day. The rain had stopped and the wind was gone. The cabin still stood. I was too weak to move. My wound had bled some more, but that had stopped. My mouth was dry, but I had no wish to stir. My fingers did move, to feel for the gun it was still there.
For a long time I dozed. But at last I was awake, really awake.
Light from the windows was the dull light of a cloudy day, or maybe the light of evening.
Turning my head, I could see the fireplace.
Some coals still remained, and a thin thread of steam rose from the pot. Only two sticks were left.
When I tried to rise my head swam, but I made it.
Without fire, I doubted if I could survive another night.
I got up slowly, added the two sticks to the fire, and poured another cup of tea.
Huddling there, I drank it. Then with an effort I got to the bed, took up the gun, thrust it into my waistband, and stumbled to the door.
For a moment I leaned against the door jamb, watching outside.
Not thirty feet from the door there was a woodpile. Holding my hand against my side, I made it to the pile and gathered three or four sticks together, about all I figured I could carry. I was just stooping to pick them up when I heard hoof-beats on the trail … more than one horse.
Clumsily, because of my side, I dropped to one knee.
The woodpile was about five feet high, and thick through. Wood had been taken from the place where I crouched, leaving a notch in the pile, and in this I waited, gun in hand. Four-foot lengths of wood almost surrounded me.
Heseltine’s voice was the first I heard.
“Aw, he’s dead, Kid!
We’re wastin’time.” “I’ll believe it when I see it. We figured to have him twice before.” “There’s no way out of that canyon, and even if there was, how could he crawl all the way over that mountain? Anyway, the canyon heads up off south of here.” “Just the same, I’m looking around.” A saddle creaked, and footsteps sloshed over the wet earth. I heard a step on the porch; momentary silence, then the door creaked open.
“Nobody in there,” Reese said doubtfully.
“The fire’s almost out.” “If you two will stop being such fools,” a girl’s voice said, “we can be on our way before somebody comes back and wants to know what we’re doin’ here.” “So?” “What are you going to tell them, Kid?” Ruby Shaw’s tone was contemptuous. ‘Everybody in Leadville knows we’ve had trouble, so if Tucker shows up dead, they’ll know we were hunting him.” ‘She’s right, Kid.” Reese still hesitated, but finally, grumbling, he went to his horse.
Stirrup leather creaked again, and for a F moment I had a wild urge to step out just as they rode away. I was sure to get one of them .
maybe both.
Good sense warned me. In my condition I couldn’t even be sure of putting a bullet close to them … even be sure of holding a gun at arm’s length.
Dry-mouthed, gun in hand, I listened to them ride away. Slowly I holstered my gun and picked up the armful of wood. I’d taken two staggering steps toward the house when a voice said, behind me, “Thought there for a minute I was going” to see a shooting.” I stood very still.
Walk on, I told myself, walk right up to the steps. If he was going to shoot he would have done it already.
Walk right inside and put the wood down. Get your hands empty.
Don’t look around, Don’t turn, just act as if you didn’t even hear.
I started toward the cabin. At the steps I paused automatically to scrape the mud from my boots on the scraper there, but I did not look around. I went on inside and carefully dropped the wood into the woodbox.
Behind me, in the doorway, a dry voice said, “Mister, I’m friendly, so when you turn around your hands better be empty.” Slowly, I turned.
A wiry man was standing in the doorway. He held a rifle in his hands and it covered me. Had I planned to draw, I would never have gotten halfway around before he’d nailed me.
Then I saw something else. From a window which had been soundlessly pushed open another rifle was pointed at me.
“I never drew against a full house,” I said.
“Come in and make yourselves to home.” The man stepped inside. He was all of fifty, maybe older, and he had a lean old face that looked hard enough to have worn out two or three bodies.
‘Come in, Vash. This is him I was telling you of.” A girl appeared behind him, carrying a rifle.
She was young, slender, and large-eyed.
With her free hand she brushed a strand of hair back from her eyes and came on into the room, seeming to take very short steps. Without tbinldng, my eyes dropped to her feet. She wore men’s shoes.
When I looked up, she was walking by me, her face flushed.
The man pushed the door shut behind her, then glanced around the room.
‘allyou et?” ‘ationo, sir.” He looked at me and said, ‘allyou’d better set down, son.
You look as if you’re all in.” “I’ve been shot,” I said, and dropped weakly onto the bed. “They got lead into me. I done the best I could with it.” “We’ll eat,” the old man replied, ‘then Vasb will see to it.
She’s good with gunshot wounds. Started learnin” on me when she was ten year old.” She had taken off her man’s coat. She had a figure, all right, and maybe wasn’t as young as she looked there to start. She might be all of sixteen.
She picked up the teapot, looked into it.
“WelLike you had sense enough for that, anyway.” She went about fixing something to eat whilst the old man barred the door and put up the shutters. “Seen you down to towd,” he commented. comally’ve stirred up some talk.” He hung up his hat and coat, added wood to the fire, then sat down and took a pipe from his pocket. He held it up. “Learned it from the Injuns, as a boy. Been at it ever since.” He gestured toward the girl. ‘Her ma was an Ogalalla.” ‘I hear they were the best of the Sioux,” I said, “and had the handsomest women.” ‘Well, depends where a body stands, I reckon. Ifn they had good chiefs they reckoned to be right pleasant folk, often enough.
Them Hunkpappas now, I had trouble with them a time or two, and with the Arickaras.
‘I come west in “33. Trapped fur up north, lived with the Sioux for nigh onto twenty year.” He struck a match. He jerked his head in the direction the riders had gone. “Them the ones you’re after?” I nodded.
“You had you a chance.” “I decided against it.
Didn’t know whether I was strong enough to draw a bead on them. I might have taken one, but the other one would have killed me, weak as I am. I let ’em ride off. There’ll be another day.” ‘Well,” the old man said dryly, “you ain’t a total damn fool.” He paused for a minute. “When you tangle with them, boy, don’t let that woman go without judg’m” her careful.
She’s worsen either of them, I’m thinking.” “Her?, “Yes, her.
She’s poison mean, and quick with a gun, too.
She killed a man up to Weaverville, a year or so back.” As I sat on the bed the warmth of the fire after the cold outside was making me sleepy. I tried to hold commy eyes open, and for a while there I could manage it.
Then somewhere along the line I just faded out.
When my eyes opened again the room was dark except for the firelight.
I stayed still, wondering what had happened.
My boots had been taken off, and my pants.
For a time I just stared up at the ceiling. Then I swung my feet to the floor, and that girl was sitting by the fire, looking into the coals.