Conagher (1969) (13 page)

And then one day Johnny McGivern rod e in.

You didn't tell me what that countr y was like , Johnny said accusingly .
I los t myself two, three times .

Did you find him ?
Conagher asked.

He's comin'. It'll take him a day o r two, with what he had to do .
Johnn y glanced around .
From what I hear, yo u won't need him .

We'll need him .

Riding alone, and riding wide over th e land, Conagher found himself watchin g the tumbleweeds. But a week passe d before he found another note, and then i t was by merest chance. He had come dow n a draw that opened on the plain and foun d an old corral, built for trapping wil d horses. Made of poles and brush, utilizin g what was at hand, the corral had long sinc e been abandoned, and was now breached i n several places; but piled against the nort h wall was a mat of tumbleweeds.

He rode up to them and checked the m from force of habit, and found two of th e notes.

The first one, almost illegible, mus t have been written months ago.

When I was a little girl I dreamed of a handsome knight who would com e on a white charger and carry m e away.

Where, O where are you, Whit e Knight? I have waited so long, s o very long!

The second note was written muc h later, judging by the freshness of the in k and the better condition of the paper.

Last night I walked out to look up a t the stars. I wish I knew the names o f the stars.

Almost without realizing it, Conn ha d begun to build an image of the girl wh o wrote those strange notes. She was young , slender, and blonde, and she was somebod y he could talk to, somebody as lonel y as he was himself.

Don't fool yourself , he said aloud.

She ain't writing the notes for an y leather-skinned cowpuncher like you .

The work went on. Johnny helped wit h the cattle, and they gained ground. The y saw nothing of the Parnell outfit, althoug h Tile Coker had been to the Plaza. A stag e had been held up over in Black Canyon , some distance to the west. None of th e outlaws had been recognized, but ther e had been four of them, with a fifth holdin g the horses.

For a week, then, Conagher staye d around the ranch. He repaired the corra l gate, broke two horses for the roug h string, dehorned a quarrelsome steer, an d cut wood against the coming of colde r weather.

Snow fell at the end of the week, just a light skimming over that was gone wit h the first sun; but during the next wee k more snow fell and the ground wa s covered. The weather settled down to still , cold days and nights, and Johnny an d Conn were busy breaking the ice in wate r holes and checking on the stock.

It was hard, bitterly cold work, an d many a day Conn got down from th e saddle five or six times to walk som e warmth back into his feet.

Chip Huston was in the bunk hous e when Conagher rode back one day. Th e hunter looked up .
Trouble all over ?

It'll come any day now , Conaghe r replied .
Keep yourself armed an d ready .

Little by little Conn had taken over th e ramrodding of the ranch, and nobod y objected. Seaborn Tay stayed quiet , resting a lot, and Conn had a hunch th e boss suffered from a bad heart.

The following morning when Conaghe r saddled up he planned only a short ride.

However, he tied a blanket-roll behind hi s saddle, for a man might get caught ou t somewhere in this weather and he'd bette r be ready for a long night in the cold.

He had not gone more than four mile s from headquarters when he came on th e tracks of a bunch of cattle. They wer e bunched tightly, perhaps twenty head , and were driven by three riders on big , free-striding horses.

Making a little cairn of stones t o indicate the direction taken, Conaghe r started north.

The trail of the cattle led straight in tha t direction, and the riders apparently had n o worry about being discovered.

It might be a trapit probably was.

And as he thought that, a cool finge r touched his cheek, another his forehead.

Conn looked up ... it was snowing. Th e thieves must have expeced it; within a n hour all trail would be wiped out.

Nevertheless, Conagher held to it. H
e had a couple of frozen biscuits with him, a chunk of bacon, some jerky, and coffee. H
e would take his chances.

All through the morning and into th e afternoon he followed the trail, which hel d straight north, but by mid-afternoon th e trail was gone, wiped out by the snow.

He rode over into a patch of scrub oa k mixed with pine, and made camp.

EVIE TEALE tied the scarf over he r head as she looked out the window.

The slowly falling flakes were beautiful , but they brought to her a chill of fear.

The winter would be long, and it woul d take a good deal of fuel to heat the cabin.

The pile of wood behind the cabin ha d grown, but judging by the past few week s since it had grown colder, Evie knew th e pile would never last through the winter.

Laban had been working steadily part o f each day to build up the supply. Ruthi e and Evie herself had gone far into the hills , gathering scattered fallen small branche s into a pile to be dragged back to the ranch.

Charlie McCloud had come by, ridin g over on his own time, to help them. It wa s Charlie, with Laban's help, who built th e stone-boat, a sort of sledge to haul wood.

The place needed plenty of work, and Evi e could see that McCloud was worrie d about them.

Using the stone-boat and one of th e horses, they could haul good-sized logs , although they had snaked a few dow n before this, using simply a clove hitch nea r one end of a log. Over the years a lot o f trees had fallen and limbs had been blow n down, and there had been few campers t o use it.

The stage now stopped at its ow n station, several miles away, so that sourc e of income was finished. Now it was onl y themselves they could depend on, an d what they could obtain from the countr y around. Evie carefully hoarded the fe w dollars saved from feeding the passengers , holding the money against a trip to th e Plaza and a chance to buy warm clothing.

As Evie went outside she saw that th e snow was falling faster, and a cold win d was blowing. Ruthie was gathering chip s around the log where Laban choppe d wood, and Evie took up the shovel an d went back to the work of banking th e cabin.

She was piling dirt around the foundatio n to keep the wind out and to mak e the house warmer. This was somethin g they had done each year when she lived i n the East, though there it was her fathe r who had done it.

When she straightened up to rest he r back, she looked off across the grasslan d toward the south. The far hills were n o longer visible . . . the falling snow wa s drawing a curtain around them.

She went back to the work. She rarel y thought of Jacob now, her life was to o filled with planning, and doing. Sometime s she talked with the children abou t him, but his image had grown faint wit h the passing of time. He had been a stiff , unbending man who had loved hi s children, but he had never known how t o show it to them, and Evie doubted if h e ever felt the need to show them that h e cared.

Their small herd had grown by two.

Her cow had calved, and they ha d acquired another, a stray that wandered u p to the water hole one day for a drink, an d had just stayed with them. It wore n o brand.

Suddenly she heard a long halloo an d the pistol-like crack of a whip, and the n she saw the racing stage team and th e stage. It came plunging around the ben d and down the little slope. Ben Logan wa s driving today, and he shouted at her.

Somebody riding beside him waved, too , and then the stage was gone, disappearin g in the falling snow.

She went back inside for a moment t o add to the fire, putting on a few heav y sticks to keep the room warm while the y were outside.

Just when she was growing worrie d about Laban, she saw the horse comin g through the snow, and then the stoneboat , piled high with fire wood, and Laba n walking beside it. When he came up to th e cabin he tied the horse and came right ove r to her.

Ma, we better watch out , he said .
I heard something back there. It sounde d like a lot of riders or a lot of cattle .

Did they see you ?

I don't think so. I was down behind a tree digging a chunk out of the snow an d frozen dirt, and the outfit was a few yard s back of me in a grove where there wa s shelter from the wind.

I didn't see but one rider, and I couldn't tell whether he was an Indian or a white man, but it looked as if he was ridin g a saddle. I just saw him shadow-lik e through the snow, and it sounded as i f there might be a lot of them ... or mayb e not so many riders, but a lot of cattle. So I came on home .

I'm glad you did .
She turned.

Ruthie? Come on in. After Laban put s the horse up we will have a story and som e doughnuts .

Who could the riders have been? It wa s not like Indians to ride in cold weathe r unless they were driven to it. Wisely, the y preferred their lodges.

Outlaws? It seemed probable, for th e route they were taking led to nothing bu t wilderness. Unless . . .

Two months ago, before the first sno w had fallen, she had ridden back into th e mountains, making a kind of sweep in a half-circle back of their place to see wha t fuel lay on the ground.

Drawn on by the silence as well as b y the beauty of the hills, she had ridden si x or seven miles into the mountains and ha d come upon a small park in the hills. It wa s a deep, grassy basin with forest around th e edges and a few trees scattered across it.

There was a stream there, and she notice d a dugout cabin in the side of the hil l across the park. No smoke came fro m the chimney, and she saw no signs o f occupation.

She went no nearer, but she did make a sweep around the end of the park an d came on a dim trail. There were no fres h tracks, but there were old droppings o f horses as well as of cattle, and some ol d tracks.

Whoever was driving these cattle tha t Laban had heard might know of tha t place.

She sat with the children around th e fire, eating doughnuts, and Evie told the m a story about her girlhood in Ohio an d western Pennsylvania. When she looke d out again she could barely make out th e corrals. All was white and still, and cold.

When the story was finished and th e children were working at the lessons sh e had laid out for them, she sat by the fir e trying to plan for the coming weeks. Ther e must be a path kept open to the shed an d the corrals, the fuel must be use d sparingly, and above all there must b e enough work and amusement to keep th e children busy.

Both of them would help in clearing th e snow from the path, and both would hel p in bringing in the fuel. Laban would fee d the stock. The worst of it was they did no t have sufficient hay for a long hard winter.

Part of the winter the animals must graz e outside, pawing their way through th e snow. This the horses could do, but th e calves must be fed.

For three days the snow continued t o fall, steadily and without letup. Ever y morning Laban went out at daybreak an d shoveled snow to keep a path open to th e shed.

The stock was in good shape. The sno w banked the flimsy building and covere d the roof with snow, so that inside it wa s warm and snug. Evie milked and carrie d the milk to the house, while Laban cleane d out from under the animals and put hay i n their mangers.

The snow was more than two feet dee p on the level, and was piled high on bot h sides of the path. The skies were now gra y and overcast. The temperature was te n above zero on the thermometer beside th e door.

Ma
!
Ruthie at the door tugged a t Evie'sarm .
Look !

It was a wolf, a large gray wolf, almos t white, on the side of the hill behind th e cabin, watching them. He was not ove r fifty yards away, and was seemingl y unafraid. Evie shouted at him, but he di d not move. She turned back into the cabin.

When she came out with the rifle the wol f was gone.

She thought about the men driving th e cattle that Laban had seen or hear d back there when the snow had started.

They could not be honest men, drivin g where there was no trail, and in a directio n where there was no town or ranch.

It worried her that they should be s o near.

Far to the south, Conn Conagher's hors e floundered and fell. Stiff as he was , Conagher kicked loose from the stirrup s and landed on his feet, then fell to hi s knees. He got up slowly, in time to hel p the gelding to its feet. Holding the reins , Conagher brushed the snow from hi s clothing.

The wind was on his cheek. It had bee n blowing right out of the north into hi s face. He turned the reluctant horse to fac e it, and then, holding the reins, he led off , struggling against the wind and deepenin g snow.

He didn't need anyone to tell him h e was in trouble. So far as he knew, ther e was nothing ahead of him until he reache d the stage road, which would be invisible i n all this snow. Beyond it there was nothin g but plains, mountains, and wilderness.

There was a cabin, though . . . shelter i f he could reach it. That woman . . . wha t was her name? She ran a stage station tha t should lie almost due north of him. Bu t Conagher recalled that somebody had sai d the stage had moved their station furthe r west; in that case the woman was probabl y gone and the buildings abandoned.