Matagorda (1967) (19 page)

Cowering on her bench, Jessica could only clutch herself and wait.

Tappan Duvarney and his men were scattered widely when the wind came. Duvarney himself had found some thirty head of cattle on a slope and started moving them inland. Soon he had come upon a dozen more, all steers in this lot, bedded down on a long ridge.

He had driven them no more than a mile when Lawton Bean appeared, driving thirty-odd head of mixed stuff. Some distance off they could see a long ridge running roughly north and south, and they started for it, picking up a few head from the country between.

Welt Spicer came up driving a small herd, and they bunched them on the ridge, somewhat in the lee of the rocky crest that was tufted with stunted trees and low brush. There, under a deep hollowed-out space in the rock, they found where men had occasionally taken shelter. A crude wall of piled-up stone had been built to offer even more shelter, and when the wind came they brought their horses under the overhang.

Thunder was now an almost continuous sound, and lightning flared again and again, lighting up the deep shadows under the overhang. The darkness was like late twilight.

The rain roared down, slashing at the skin like cutting knives whenever one got within its range.

Spicer sat in the farthest corner of the cavelike space and stared out at the storm.

All the men, for fear of lightning, had placed their guns some distance away from them. Suddenly Bean looked around at Tap. "I thought I heard a yell!" he shouted.

"Listen!"

Duvarney went close to the mouth of the cave and waited, but for several minutes he heard nothing; then faint and far off, he heard what sounded like a shout.

"Somebody is out there needing help," he said. "You sit tight, and I'll have a look."

"Don't be loco," Spicer objected. "A feller often hears such sounds in a storm."

Drawing the string under his chin a little tighter, and turning up his collar again, Duvarney hesitated only briefly, then plunged into the wall of water outside. His heels skidded on the muddy surface, and he almost fell, then he turned and started to clamber up the slope toward the crest of the ridge, clinging to the brush to help him climb.

He could see that on the top of the ridge the trees were bent at an impossible angle, their roots still holding but the trunks almost parallel with the ground beneath.

He clung to some brush, half crouching, and looked at the top of the ridge.

No man could stand erect there. The wind would blow him right off. He turned and looked all around. He could see nothing but the driving rain. Below the ridge all was a swirling mass of water from the swollen creeks. The cattle were huddled just under the crest of the long ridge, taking what shelter they could from the onslaught of the storm.

A feeble shout made him turn his head again, and he saw them. Past the point of the ridge where the slope fell away to the creek bottom a man was struggling with a mired horse, a horse that carried a dark, humped bundle on its back.

Duvarney fought his way along the ridge through the brush. One look and he could see that the man was staggering with weariness. Once he fell to his knees and could barely struggle up. Duvarney yelled and ran to him, stumbling and falling himself, skidding on his knees. He got up, reaching the man just as he was about to fall into the water.

It was Tom Kittery.

Tap led him back to the slope, where he made him sit down, and then he caught up the reins on the horse. "Come on, boy!" he called. "Let's get you out of here!"

The horse needed little help, only a little more than Tom Kittery was able to give in his exhausted condition. He struggled, forefeet clambering at the bank, but with Duvarney's help he struggled free. It was only then that Duvarney looked to see who was on his back. Two men ... or bodies . . . wrapped in their slickers so as to shelter their heads, and tied to the horse's back.

Grabbing Tom by the arm, Duvarney pulled him erect. Just then he saw Lawton Bean and Spicer coming toward him in a tumbling run.

"Wondered what was keepin' you!" Spicer yelled.

With Bean supporting Kittery, and Spicer walking alongside, they got back to the shelter of the overhang. Once they were out of the immediate roar and rush of the storm, it was like a reprieve from some ghastly hell, or from a wind-tortured world where one gasped for every breath, struggled to make every step.

Duvarney untied the men on the horse, and saw that they were the Cajun and Lubec.

Both were wounded. The Cajun was stretched out on his slicker, and Lubec helped himself to a corner and leaned back, breathing hoarsely. One of Lubec's arms was clumsily bandaged and in a crude splint.

"What happened to that?" Spicer asked.

"Horse fell on me," Lubec grumbled. "Slipped on a bank." He indicated the Cajun.

"That one's been shot. Caught two slugs."

A long time later, with the wounded men cared for and Tom in an exhausted sleep, Tap Duvarney slept, too.

Outside the storm still raged, thunder crashed and reverberated against the hills, but he slept.

Chapter
Fifteen.

When the morning came, the storm was gone. A few scattered clouds, ragged with a memory of yesterday's winds, still remained in the sky. Only a small wind blew, and there was no rain.

Tappan Duvarney stood at the opening of the overhang and looked out across the rain-soaked landscape. Everywhere were evidences of the hurricane's passing. Trees were down, streams still rushed bank-full, and great pools of water were everywhere over the land.

He went outside and looked along the ridge. The cattle were up, beginning to move around, seeking out the sparse grass. Half a mile away he could see another slope, also dark with cattle.

Welt Spicer came out, hitching his gun belt into place. "What's up, Major?"

"We're going to move cattle," Duvarney said grimly. "When we get some chow we're going to check out that bunch yonder. If there's any Rafter K stuff there, we'll drift it north along with what we have."

"What about them?" Spicer motioned behind them.

"The Cajun's got to have treatment. If we can find that buckboard-"

"I know where it is. Come across it t'other day. Do you want I should ride up there and get it?"

Duvarney checked his watch. It was not yet five o'clock in the morning. There were several hundred head of cattle on this ridge, and nearly as many on the other. He went to his saddlebags for his field glasses and climbed to the top of the ridge.

From there, studying the terrain, he saw that, as he had suspected, there were cattle and occasionally horses on every rise within sight. Some of those must be from the scattered herds or ungathered cattle wearing the Rafter K brand.

Spicer had coffee boiling when he came back. The Cajun was lying on his back, half reclining against the wall.

"A man would think you'd been hurt," Tap said, grinning. "You mean it only took two slugs to put you down?"

"Maybe I'm gettin' weak in my old age." The Cajun's eyes searched his. "You find many cow, yes?"

"Plenty. Can you sit it out here while we round them up? Then we'll get the buckboard and you can ride in that when we drive them."

"I be all right. You go along."

Tom Kittery was on his feet. "I'm ready to ride if you are, Tap," he said quietly.

"I'm beginning to think you're right. We should be in the cattle business."|

"How about you?" Duvarney looked over at Lubec.

Johnny Lubec had changed none at all. "I'll handle as many cows as any of you, busted arm and all, but I'd rather stay and fight."

"Welt, you ride south with Johnny. Start all the Rafter K stock north and west. If you see trouble coming, come on back this way and we'll meet it together. But if you see Jackson Huddy, come running for me, fast."

They looked at him.

"I've staked him out," Tap said quietly. "When he killed Lon he killed a man of mine; and besides, he's the one who's out to stop us. When we get this drive started I'm going to cut out and go after him."

"Who's huntin' trouble now?" Lubec said.

"It's a safety precaution. If there was any other way I'd leave him until later.

But I'm going to hunt the hunter."

"He'll kill you," Lubec said.

"Well," Tom said, "Huddy ain't never got me, and Tap here took me alive . . . although," he added, grinning, "I don't believe he could do it again."

Bean worked east, and Tom Kittery with Duvarney himself rode north. By noon they had brought the cattle down off the high ground, and had then waded them and swum them until they could get them to still higher ground west and north of Horseshoe Lake.

Lawton Bean was the last man to come along. None of the cattle was in a mood to cause trouble. After the fury of the storm, they seemed to welcome the presence of men and drifted ahead of them as if they realized they were driving them to safety.

It was almost sundown before Bean came in. He was riding with his rifle across his saddle.

"Picked up some sign back yonder," he said to Tap. "I think we're goin' to have comp'ny."

"How many?"

"One man . . . it's Huddy, all right, and he's ridin' his killin' horse."

When Duvarney looked his question, Bean added, "Folks down here tell me when Jackson Huddy goes huntin' he rides a blaze-face roan. Good, steady horse . . . hard one to see . . . lots of bottom, and quiet."

"That's a good horse," Kittery agreed. "I know him."

"I picked up some hairs off a tree where he'd been scratching himself." Bean looked at Duvarney. "Since the rain stopped."

"You didn't see him?"

When Bean shook his head, Kittery said, "I'll lay five to one he saw you. And that means he trailed you back here."

"Tom," Duvarney said, "I've got Belden and some of the boys holding a herd on the Guadalupe just west of Victoria. Most of them are cattle I sold to Bob Brunswick, just before the storm." He touched his shirt pocket. "I've got the check right here."

"You moved fast."

"We had to, with the storm coming, and then I moved the cattle for Brunswick. What I'm suggesting now is that you push this herd on to join those cattle."

"What about you?"

"I'm heading for Indianola. My girl's there. Also," he went on, "I want Jackson Huddy to follow me."

He had been thinking as he talked. Riding with a herd would not only make him a sitting duck, but would endanger the others. What he must do was lead Huddy down the trail, and it was a trail that Duvarney now knew pretty well himself . . . and somewhere along that trail there might be a showdown.

He already had part of his route planned. He would ride right out in plain sight, but where there was no cover for Huddy, and then when he got to where there was cover, he would ride right into it.

"You're buckin' a stacked deck," Tom said. "I think we'd best stick together."

"No, I want him to come for me."

"Don't worry," Lubec said, "he will!"

Duvarney left the herd on a bare hill with no cover for several hundred yards in either direction. He decided that he could take it for granted that Huddy was a good shot with a rifle, but he would also remember that Huddy, now at least, was not a gambler. Huddy would study his victim, stay with him until he got within easy range, then shoot him down. From all he had heard, Huddy was a one-shot killer ... it was even a matter of pride with him.

That meant Duvarney must not give him that one shot until he was ready to do so.

He rode north, scouting the land and the possible routes that Huddy might take, and then he began a bit of mental warfare. Huddy would be looking for a pattern, and for a time he must not find one. Duvarney felt that first he
must
shake Huddy's overweening confidence in himself. He must worry him into acting as he had not planned.

For two miles he kept to open country that offered no concealment. Dropping behind a screening ridge, he wheeled his horse and raced back a quarter of a mile in the direction from which he had come, then rode down into a sandy wash. He followed it for half a mile and, climbing out of it, went to a thicket of mesquite, prickly pear, and oak. Doubling back, he scouted his earlier trail with care, finally emerging upon it.

Sure enough, another horse had been along here. He rode on across his trail without a stop, went over a low saddle, and headed back in the original direction, paralleling his old trail. Finding a long, shallow pool of muddy water, he rode into it and followed it along for a few hundred yards, then deliberately he cut across it.

A pursued man will usually emerge from a stream on the same side on which he entered; knowing this, he did the opposite. Mounting a low hill, he crossed over it and left his horse tied to a small shrub while he crept back to the crest of a ridge where there were a few scattered stones and some low brush. Lying there, he settled down to wait.

He had his back to the sun, and so could use his glasses without fear of being seen.

He was lying there watching when he saw, far off, a rider approach the place where the trails crossed. He smiled, but he continued to watch, knowing he must understand this man and his thinking if he expected to remain alive.