Deane did not comment. He turned his glass on the bar, studying the wet rings left by the bottom of it.
“We’d have heard his name.”
“Maybe we have,” Matt suggested, “maybe we have … an’ it might be a different one than the handle he uses now.”
“Who?”
“You’re as good at guessing as I am.” Matt shrugged. “But a man could figure it out, maybe. Clay Allison has a club foot, an’ Wyatt Earp has a different color of hair an’ eyes. Also, he’s an honest man. He’s too big for Billy, an’ I know Dave Rudabaugh, but he’s one of them. I know he is!”
Matt was waiting on the street by the hitching rail when Murphy came up with Ban. Both men had stopped by after the show to get their horses, and now they were saddled up and ready to go. It was a good long ride they had ahead of them.
Bardoul glanced up and saw Brian Coyle going into the IXL, and saw Massey leave them at the door. All would be moving out soon, so if he was to speak, it must be now. Clive Massey was heading down the street, so without a word, Matt stepped up on the boardwalk and followed the Coyles into the hotel. Barney had joined them and the three were going upstairs.
They opened the door of Brian Coyle’s room, and he lighted a light. When he lifted it, he saw Matt Bardoul standing in the door. They all three looked at him, waiting, trying to find some reason for his being there.
“I’d like to speak to you, sir,” he said carefully.
“Very well.” Brian was puzzled. “Come in and close the door.”
“Sir,” he said, “tonight when I was saddling my horse a man spoke out of a dark stall … I didn’t get a glimpse of him … and warned me not to go on this trip. He warned me that nobody was to come back alive.”
“Nonsense, my boy! Utter nonsense! Why, the Sioux wouldn’t think of attacking a train as large as ours!”
“He wasn’t thinking of the Sioux. I believe he was thinking of the same thing I was, that there are too many outlaws on this wagon train.”
Brian Coyle’s face had hardened. “Just what is your motive for this advice, Bardoul? I’ll admit I was aware there was some bad blood between you and Massey, but I ascribed that to nothing more than Clive’s short temper and your own abruptness.”
“Are you aware of the character of the men around him? Of Bat Hammer, or Abel Bain?”
“Bain? I don’t believe I know him.”
“You wouldn’t. He’s hiding in Hammer’s wagon. He’s known in all the camps as a thief and a murderer.”
Coyle’s face was stiff now, and his manner had grown chill. “Really, Bardoul, I think you’ve gone far enough. If you had such suspicions you should have voiced them at the meeting and not come to me here alone and by night. I’m afraid, sir, you’re guilty of some very ungentlemanly conduct!”
Matt’s face paled a little. His eyes shifted to Jacquine’s but she glanced away coldly. “I was thinking of your daughter, sir. If there is trouble it would not be a good place for her.”
“We, my son and I, are quite capable of caring for Jacquine’s interests. You forget, Young Man, that I am one of the leaders of this wagon train, that I helped organize it, that I might say, I did organize it!
“Every man on this train is known to me, personally. Each one has been vouched for by one of my trusted friends. If there is any Such person as Abel Bain, I have seen nothing of him.
“As to your tale bearing, and I’m sorry Bardoul, but there is no other name for it, I can only say that I have known some things about you and your past conduct for some days. I do not refer to the fact that you are an acknowledged gunfighter and a killer. I refer to other stories, known to the military, and they do not reflect well upon you, sir.
“Until now I had not mentioned those stories, nor did my son or daughter know of them, but under the circumstances, you leave me no other alternative than to mention them.
“Now, sir, let me give you a warning: you are going with us. I, myself, spoke for you against the wishes of Colonel Pearson and Clive Massey. But I know from what the Colonel has told me that you are a rebel and a troublemaker. We will have no trouble caused by you on this trip! Understand that! If there is, no one man on the train will be called upon to face you! We have organized our own force to keep the peace on this wagon train, and in the town until it is settled and an election can be held. At the first sign of trouble from you, you will be summarily dealt with!”
“Thank you, sir.” Matt Bardoul’s face was deathly white.
He turned abruptly and started for the door, then with his hand on the knob, he turned his head. “I know nothing of the personnel of your police force, or who its leader may be, but I’ll make a little bet that Clive Massey is the commander, and that he chose the men to enforce the law!”
That time the remark got over. He saw Coyle’s eyes narrow slightly with realization, and Matt knew he had been correct. He turned and walked outside, pulling the door shut after him.
Buffalo asked him no questions, and they mounted up and started out of town, yet when he turned off the trail to Split Rock and went by a different route, they made no comment. Buffalo was riding with his rifle across his saddle bows.
When he rolled out of his blankets at daybreak, the camp was already stirring. Fires were glowing over the bottomland where the wagons had gathered, and as he pulled on his boots he saw that Bill Shedd had a fire going.
The big man grinned when he walked up. “Little coffee goes good on a chilly mornin’,” he said. “But she’ll be plenty hot after that sun gets up!” Bardoul nodded. “That’s right. Did you refill those water barrels?”
“Yep, sho’ did. We got plenty of water. More’n enough, most ways, to last us three days.”
“We’re liable to need it.”
Hardy and Buffalo came up and joined them, but there was little talk. He had said nothing about his warning to Coyle, but he knew they were quite aware of what he had done, and approved it. From his actions they probably deduced the result.
Last gear was loaded into the wagons, and Murphy had already mounted the seat when Matt looked around to see a tall young man, very slender, approaching him. The fellow had blond hair that needed cutting, and a shy face. “Mr. Bardoul?” he asked. “Could you use another driver? I know you have one, and you probably want to drive your other wagon yourself, but I thought, maybe you … besides,” he added suddenly, “I’d drive it for nothing! I … just want to be along. I want to go with the train.”
“Did you talk to Brian Coyle?”
“No, I didn’t. I talked with the other man … the tall one. The Army man.”
“What did he say?”
“He said I couldn’t come unless I had a wagon.” That decided Matt. “Can you handle an ox team?”
The boy’s eyes brightened. “Yes, sir. I certainly can! Oxen or mules, it doesn’t make any difference! I can keep your wagon in good shape, too!”
“All right! Mount up!”
He walked back to his horse and climbed into the saddle. From far ahead came the long, familiar call, “Ro-l-l-l-l ’em over!”
Whips cracked, and his wagon started. From the back of the zebra dun, he watched the wagons roll out and form up in four parallel columns, each almost a half mile long.
Gray dawn was lifting behind them, and he watched the oxen move out, a step, and then another step, in a slow, swaying, rhythmical movement, the covered wagons rumbling behind. Long grass waved in the light breeze, and far ahead, skylined on a hill top, Colonel Orvis Pearson lifted his hand theatrically, and motioned them on.
For better or worse, they had started. Now it only remained to wait and see what was to happen.
CHAPTER IV
Westward, the land lay empty. Behind them the rising sun threw their long shadows before them across the wind rippled grass. They were shadows not soon to fade from these virgin lands, but they were to lie long upon the plain and the mountain, darkening the retreat of the Indian.
The buffalo, of course, were gone. Here and there a lonely old bull, or a cow with a calf, wandered dismally and alone where once they trailed with their millions. The buffalo had roamed the prairies for countless years, and then the white man had come, and the buffalo were gone like a sprinkling of powder in a strong wind.