When he cupped his hands to light his smoke, his eyes came over to the stage station, held there for a moment, then drifted along. He stalled around there until he had smoked three cigarettes, then he walked off down the street, but later he came back and stood against the front of a building just within range of my view.
There was a bench there, and after a while he sat down on it and spent a good part of the afternoon right there. And while he studied the station and watched what went on, I studied him.
The carried a six-shooter in a holster on his right hip, but he also wore a coat, whereas most riders simply wore a vest, because it gave them shoulder room and had pockets for tobacco, matches, and such-like.
As I watched, he put a hand into the left side of his coat several times-a movement I was sure he wasn’t aware of. What was there that occupied his mind?
Money? Could be. A weapon? More likely. There was no bulge that I could see at this distance, but why not a derringer-insurance against those little occurrences that sometimes happen?
It would be a thing to remember.
The next day the man with the polished boots was no longer around, but there was another one, and this one I had no trouble recognizing, for it was Reese.
He was less patient than the first man, who I surmised was Pit Burnett.
Reese would sit for a short while, then move off and stroll along the street, and presently return. Everybody on the street was too busy to pay them much mind, for western towns had few men just idling time away. Every man had a job to do and he was busy doing it.
The next day I was supposed to take my trip on the stage to study the route, and I was restless to be going.
But as I waited there in the back room, all of a sudden a buckboard came rolling up the street with two men on the driver’s seat, one of them carrying a Winchester.
Riding behind was another man, also armed. Reese was half is-leer) on the bench across the way, but when that buckboard- showed up he got up as quick as if he’d been bee-stung. On the side of it was painted the words, GOLD HILL MINING CO.
When I looked at the bench again Reese was gone.
This then was it. I wasn’t going to get a chance to take that first ride over the road. This shipment would being out on tomorrow’s stage, and I’d be riding with it.
After a few minutes the buckboard rolled away and I got up. One of the men who had come with it had evidently remained behind.
Rollins opened the door and stuck his head into the ROOM- “Come in here, Shell. I want you to meet somebody.” He was a short man, square and heavy around the middle, but the eyes that measured me as I went into the room were sharp and steady.
“Shell, meet Do Silva. He’ll be riding with you.”…We can use him,” I said, but I was not happy over it, and he noticed it.
He looked at me thoughtfully. “You do not like me, amigo?”” “I’ve got nothing against yeaat I told him. “You look ke quite a man.
Only I was on this deal alone and was planning to handle it alone.” He shrugged. “I can listen.” I hesitated. “Well, I don’t know how I can handle it, only I don’t want to kill Kid Reese or Bob Heseltine unless I have to.he just looked at me, so I explained.
“All right, unless we have to. Who are the others?” When I told him about Burns King and Pit Burnett, he shrugged again.
“They are bad men, amigo. Burnett will shoot. So will King if he is pushed. I do not know the others.” “You saw Reese. He was the puncher who got up off the bench as your buckboard rolled by. I saw you look at him.” ‘That was Reese? He was watching?” ‘llh-huh. And before him Burnett was here. At least, I think it was Burnett.” I described him, and the Mesican nodded.
“I think so. I think it is him.” The more I talked to Silva, the better I liked him. He was thirty-five or so, not over five feet five, but he must have weighed close to two hundred pounds. Only a little of it was fat. He moved quickly and easily, and I figured he would handle himself well in a battle.
We sat and talked, drank coffee and ate frijoleg, tortillas, and beef, and speculated on tomorrow. I explained to him my thinking about the country-the slow climb, the hilltop, and then the fast downhill trip.
He listened but offered no comment, and I had no idea whether he agreed or not.
When morning came it was cloudy and cool, with a feel of rain in the air. Nobody was around when we put the solidly built chest that held the gold into the boot under the driver’s feet. Tobin Dixie was driving, Do-it was short for Fernando, I learned-would ride on the box.
I would ride inside. There were no passengers.
‘Are there any stops?” I asked. ‘I mean where we might pick up passengers?” ‘Two,” Tobin anskered, ‘b we don’t often pick up anybody until along toward the end of the week. Friday, maybe.” There were few people on the street when we rolled out. Tobin IX-DE was on the box, and he started at a good clip. Seated in the stage, I leaned back and got set to get a little rest while we crossed the flats, before we came to the hills.
When the stage started the long climb, I sat up and kept my eyes open.
There was no sign of movement anywhere except a bunch of antelope that took off as we approached, and a couple of jack rabbits.
With a pair Of field glasses belonging to Rod, I checked out the country. Once I thought I saw dust, but it vanished and there was nothing more.
We made the climb and drew up for a breather.
Silva kot down from the box and walked back.
“How are they going to stop us?” he asked. ‘Do you think they’d shoot the horses”…”…I doubt it.” I was puzzled. All the signs bRd pointed to a holdup. We had the gold aboard and the bandits knew it.
They also knew Silva was riding shotgun, and that he was a dangerous man, but an express messenger is wide open to being killed from ambush.
Almost nobody ever shot a stage driver … that was almost as bad as killing a woman or a child. In the minds of most western men-a stage driver was something special, and outlaws had long made it a practice to leave them alone — not that there hadn’t been accidents.
We had stopped on the crest, a bank of earth and rock about six feet high on our right, the slope falling steeply away on our left.
The slope was dotted with stunted pines. A few rocks had fallen off the bank and lay across the road. A camp-robber lay came dow and perched on one of the rocks-near the top of the bank.
“Tobin,” I asked suddenly, “are there any banks down there along the road? Any- cuts the road goes through?” “Sure. There’s a dozen, anyway. This here road was cut comand blasted out of the mountainside have any rockfalls along the road”…”…Evee time there’s a storm.” He glanced at me, his expression suddenly thoughtful. Why?” “What do you do when you see a rock fall?” “Why, slow up, of course. Some of those rocks are big enough to upset a stage, and a man has to be careful of his horses.silva had turned around and was looking at me. “You’re right. That could be it.” Tobin turned around. ‘Let’s go see,” he said.
“The second or third fall, probably. I doubt if it would be the first one.” As I spoke, he nodded, then swung up to the box.
Opening the shotgun, I checked it. Two cartridges.
There was a box on the seat beside me and I dropped half a dozen from it into my pocket, then took the thong off the hammer of my six-shooter.
The stage started to move before Silva was quite seated.
Tobin jumped the horses into a run and started down the grade. He put the horses around bends as if no such things were there, making time while he could.
We had run for nearly a mile before I suddenly heard a yell from Tobin and the stage began to slow down.
From the side window I could see a spill of rocks and small boulders across the road.
We slowed up and drove around them, and just as Tobin was about to let the horses go again there was a yell from the bank above the stage.