He brought up short, giving me a ten-fflc jolt. I went to my knees, slammed into the tree, and he swung to ride around to get a loop around the tree, so as to bind me there. My hand grabbed at my blankets and came up with my Colt.
Too late he saw the gun, and grabbed at his chest. I fired, holding the gun in my left hand, and scored a clean miss on him, but burned his horse across the shoulder.
The crow-bait gave a startled leap, throwing his aim off target, and I got off a second shot and missed again.
The rope had slacked briefly and I threw it off, flattening myself behind the cottonwood. I heard his gun roar and heard the bullet thud into the tree, but my pistol was in my right hand now and I jumped into the clear.
He had a big Colt in his hand. “Got you!” he yelled, and threw the gun up to chop down, as some men will do.
I shot, not looking at the gun, but only at him. My bullet caught him in the side above the hip, but he managed to fire. It was too close a miss for comfort, and I jumped back past the cottonwood. As my feet hit ground on the other side of the tree, I shot again. He reeled in the saddle, gave me a glaring look, and slapping spurs to the crow-bait, was away at a dead run.
For a moment I could only stand and stare after him.
He was hit twice, one of them a good one, at least, but that was a tough old man. I wanted to see no more of him, ever.
The dun seemed undisturbed, by which I gathered he had been around gunfire before. Saddling up, I gathered my gear and rode out of there on the far side of the place of ambush.
my knees were badly tore gravel and into the tree, my began to sting as sweat got into it. I also was developing a stiff neck, and a rope burn on it as well.
that was a mean old man,- I said, speaking to the dun, who flicked an ear at me.
talking to a horse was not a comnew thing for me, or for any man who rides miles over lonely country. But then, I always figured horses were as good as people, or better, and I took them into my confidence from time to time. That line-back dun was a good listener, and had to be, for I’d had the scare of my life and was talking it out of my system.
Of course, that old man figured he just had a weteared kid, but I’d gotten some lead into his system that was going to take some digesting.
Nevertheless, I scouted the country carefully as I rode, and kept on riding the day through.
When I finally got to Walker”…ness Pass, two men were camped there with some sheep.
In answer to my question one of them said, Three days ago-Bob Heseltine and two others and a woman.
They went through the pass and I figure they’re headed north from there.” “You know Heseltine?” I asked. They asked me to eat with them, and I joined them.
‘Seen him kill a man in a saloon down Texas way.
That was seven, eight years ago. He shot that man down with no reason at all but that he didn’t like him. at He looked at me. “Are you Shell Tucker?” comallyes.” ‘Heard you was hunting’him. Good luck.” ‘There may be a man hunting me,” I told them, finishing my coffee. Then, as they were hungry for news, or for any sort of diversion, I told them about my encounter with the old man.
They listened, exchanging looks. comn old man, nowhe about five-seven or comeight? Weigh about a hundred and forty? With a kind of white scar near his mouth?” “You know him?” “Boy, you tackled an al” he-coon. That there was Pony Zole. He’s a claim-jumper, a boss thief, and more than once a murderer, but nobody ain’t never proved it on him.
“Down Ruidoso way he come up with some Mexicans driven’ sheep, and offered to help. Of a sudden, a couple of days later, he cut loose with his Winchester and killed two of them. The third man came runnin’ back to camp, and he shot him .
on’y that man didn’t die. He lived to tell of it.
“A posse set out, but he’d sold the sheep and left the country.
He’s a bad one.” “Well, I got lead into him,” I said, “but he was still in the saddle when he left out of there, and he didn’t look too happy about the way things turned out.” One of the men chuckled. “If he shows up, you went south.” The coffee had been good, the beans better, and I hated to ride on, but time was against me and Bob Heseltine was riding away.
Down the trail a piece, I looked back.
The mil was empty, hilt I had an uneasy feeling that the hunter had become the hunted.
There’s nothing like time alone to give a man a chance to check up on h se , and I expect it was high iin If time that I stopped to look at my hole card.
A lot of miles had been left in the dust behind me, and I’d been in a few shootups, and here I was no nearer to what I’d set out to do.
And all the while, back there in Colorado was Vashti. And the more I thought of comVashti, the more I thought what a fool I was to go traipsing off across the country. By now she might even be married.
Ma at dPeople That pulled me up short, and the dun, too. just the thought of it gave me a twinge, but why not? I’a staked no claim on that girl.
There was no reason at all why she should wait, but the thought of her marrying some no-account .
Of course, that was a cause for ming, too, because a man has to be honest with himself. What did I mean . no-account? Might folks say that of me?
I had nothing. No claim, no shack, just a two-bit layout down Texas way that by now was probably occupied by somebody else. I had no means to make a riving beyond Punching cows or doing day labor, and that surely wasn’t enough for Vashti even if she might think it was.
Somewhere along there I lost all track of Bob Heseltine and them.
From time to time there’d been tracks of a sort, and I’d been sure in my mind I was on the trail.
That old dun was nobody’s fool, and he knew I was trailing somebody. I think that dun even put me back on the trail a couple of times.
Where could they go but straight ahead? If I knew Ruby Shaw, she wouldn’t cotton to any bide-out camp in the Sierras, which reared up on my left, nor would she take to Death VaHey, which lay yonder beyond the Panamints. She would want to head for Virginia City, where they were taking silver out of the Comstock.
Come to think of it, these men must be catching billy-hell right now, Heseltine and the others.
Almost ever since they got that money, months ago now, they’d been riding. She hadn’t had much chance to pleasure herself with having molaey, and she wasn’t the kind to let it lay. She would be nagging at those boys to do something about me.
Moreover, this was a pretty good place in which to do whatever they had a mind to. The mountains and the desert left few trails open for travel and even after Death Valley was past there was still a lot of wide-open dry country to the east.
Suddenly, I found their tracks again.. Four riders, ana not very far ahead of me, by the look of them.
A man doesn’t travel as far as I had without learning something, and I’d been trailing tough, dangerous men.
I’d had mirier showdowns with both Sites and Reese, but so far I’d never actually locked horns with Heseltine. But now they were together again .
or so it appeared.
Yet I wondered about Doc. His share of the money had probably been mentally divided among them, but now he had returned, and would be making claims.
Well, the element that makes a man a thief makes him untrustworthy, but those who associate with him often forget that. Doc Sites was neither needed or wanted, least of all by Ruby Shaw.
I’d not done much but just hang on, nagginp at their heels, watching for my chance. Everywhere I went the story was there ahead of me, like at the sheep camp, where those men had known who I was.