Monument Rock (Ss) (1998) (33 page)

Rusty had his gun out. "Who is it?" he demanded.

Dunning turned, saw Gates, and saw the gun. "It's Flynn," he said. "He tried to ge
t
into Lena's window and got shot."

"Shot? Lona shot Flynn?" Gates could not believe that.

He bent over the cowhand. "Dead?"

"No, he ain't, but he's bad hurt. Let's get him inside."

Poke was cursing his luck, for when he fired he was
sure that it was Mailer he had under his gun. But why was''

Flynn here? Had Lona planned to escape?.

When they put the boy down on Lena's bed, Gates'
w
orked over him, and Dunning watched. "Where do you stand in this, Gates?" Poke aske
d
suddenly.

Rusty looked up. He had wondered if he would be asked. "Now, that's a good point
,
Dunning. I don't know where I stand. I don't know what the fuss is all about. However,"
h
e added, "this is a deal where I'd look to see where the money was."

"I've got it. You work for me an' you can make yourself a fast stake."

"That sounds good to me. What do I do?"

"Saddle a horse an' see that girl at the Fandango. Tell her Poke Dunning wants t
o
see Kilkenny tomorrow at three. Then you get back here and stand ready to side m
e
... against anybody."

"What does it get me?" Rusty knew the question was expected.

"Two-fifty for five days. Double if you have to fight."

Rusty saddled up and rode out of the ranch but he did not ride more than a half mil
e
before he swung off the road and headed for Monument Rock. He would ride directl
y
to Kilkenny. Whatever this meant he did not know, but Kilkenny could make his ow
n
decision after he apprised him of the facts.

Kilkenny heard him out in silence. The return of three men to Blue Hill when fiv
e
had gone out, the shooting of Gordon Flynn. "No," Gates said, when asked, "he's no
t
dead. But he's got a bad wound and lost a lot of blood. When I left, Dave was takin'
c
are of him, and old Betts is a good hand with a gunshot."

Kilkenny got to his feet and paced nervously beside the fire. It was daylight now
,
but the morning was still cool. They wanted him there at three o'clock, and betwee
n
now and three many things could happen, and Gates was here. "You get back to th
e
ranch," he said. "You watch your chance, and if there is one, get that girl out o
f
there. If there isn't, watch her close. Maybe it's just best to do that."

"Are you comin' at three?"

"I think so."

"It may be a trap."

"Could be. Anyway, tell him I'll be there."

He watched Rusty go with misgiving. Dunning, Mailer, Starr, and Socorro would b
e
there to meet him, yet there seemed to be no suspicion of Rusty, and it would b
e
only a matter of hours until he would go himself.

Over his coffee, he considered the whole setup at Blue Hill, remembering every detai
l
of the ranch and its layout.

This was to be a showdown, he knew that. Whether or not Poke Dunning wanted to tal
k
business, Kilkenn
y
knew very well that if he did not agree to whatever Dunning demanded, he would hav
e
to fight his way out. Knowing this, he made plans to stay in. Dunning was going t
o
deal the cards, but he would play his own hand the way that suited him best.

The killing of Geslin interested him. Frank Mailer was fast, for Geslin had bee
n
very fast and an excellent shot. And Mailer had killed him.

From what Gates said, they had been in some sort of a gun battle, for Ethridge, too
,
was dead. They had brought back sacks stuffed with money, and that might mean a holdu
p
at any one of a dozen places.

Shortly before noon Kilkenny mounted the buckskin and left his hideout, but he di
d
not ride out into the flat--
n
lands toward Blue Hill; instead he crossed Salt Creek Wash''
a
nd rode up the canyon that opened opposite Monument Rock and ran due north. Emergin
g
from the canyon at
a
p
lace just west of Popping Rock, he struck an old trail across the highlands bac
k
of the cliffs that formed the northern boundary of the Blue Hill range. It was
a
trail he had used before, and one he well knew. Within an hour of easy riding, h
e
was on the point of rocks opposite Blue Hill, and here, after concealing his hors
e
among the pinons, he found a place on the crest of the cliffs and began to make
a
systematic study of the ranch through his glasses.

His point of observation could scarcely have been better, for he was at an altitud
e
of some six thousand feet, while the ranch itself was all of five hundred feet lowe
r
and scarcely a mile away. From his vantage point in the clear mountain air, he coul
d
easily see the figures and, knowing them, could distinguish one from the other, eve
n
though features would not be discernible. Yet after fifteen minutes of careful study
,
he saw no one.

Becoming increasingly anxious, Kilkenny moved dow
n
a little lower and somewhat closer to the edge of the cliff, and studied the terrai
n
still more carefully. A few of the buildings were concealed by the bulk of the neare
r
peak, but the house and the
bunkhouse
he could plainly see, and there was stil
l
no movement.

He got up at last and rode west. He had a ride of at least two miles before ther
e
was a way down from the rim, and when he made it, he was on the Old Mormon Trail.

Worried, he studied the trail, but there was no evidence of any recent travel. Turnin
g
off the trail, he chose a way that would keep him close against the cliffs, wher
e
he would have the partial cover of desert brush, pinon, and fallen boulders unti
l
he could reach a point that would put the bulk of the peak between himself and th
e
ranch buildings.

From time to time he halted and studied the ranch anew through his glasses, and ther
e
was still no movement. The place might have been deserted for years; it lay silen
t
and crystal clear in the bright noonday sun.

Far away across the desert the heat waves danced weirdly, and the towering shoulder
s
of Monument Rock were purple against the sky, while between rolled the salmon, pink
,
and shadowed magenta of the desert, flecked with islands of cloud shadow. The ai
r
was so still that one felt as if a loud voice might shatter it to fragments, or dissolv
e
the whole scene like something reflected in the rounded surface of a soap bubble.

Uneasily, Kilkenny pushed back his hat "and mopped the perspiration from his bro
w
and face. It was very hot. No breath of wind stirred the air. He dried his palm
s
on his handkerchief and stared thoughtfully at the silent ranch, then let the buckski
n
pick his way forward another hundred yards. He hesitated again, every sense aler
t
for danger, and he loosened the guns in their holsters and squinted his green eye
s
hard against the glare.

He studied the ranch again, near enough now to discern the slightest movement, bu
t
there was none. Removing the glasses from his eyes, he wiped them off, then studie
d
the ranch again. If he went much farther, he would have to ride out in the open
,
and a marksman atop the peak would have him in easy shooting distance. For a lon
g
time he studied the rim of the nearer peak, then the buildings and corrals of Blu
e
Hill, yet he saw nothing.

Something was radically wrong. Something had happened, and it must have happene
d
since Rusty left the ranch ... or after Rusty returned, for there was no sign o
f
him, either.

If it were indeed a trap, it had been set much too soon, for he was not due for almos
t
an hour. Furthermore, they would have left somebody in sight; they would have ha
d
some natural, familiar movement to lull his suspicions. Yet there was nothing; fo
r
all the movement, the scene might have been painted on glass.

Far away over the range a lonely steer moved, heading for water, miles away. Above
,
the heat-dancing air, where a buzzard swung on lazy, waiting wings. Kilkenny shove
d
his glasses back in the saddlebag and rode forward, clinging still to the cliff shado
w
and its slight obscurity. Now he slid his Winchester from the scabbard and, turnin
g
the buckskin away from the cliff, rode directly across to the shadow of the pea
k
opposite.

When he could ride no closer without presenting too large a target, he swung dow
n
from the buckskin, and speaking to it softly, he moved forward. Always light on hi
s
feet, he moved now like a wraith, then halted, scarcely forty yards away from th
e
ranch house, to look and listen. He waited there while a man might have counted
a
slow fifty. There was no sound, no movement. A flat, uneasy stillness hung over th
e
place.

What had happened?

Kilkenny arose swiftly from behind the shrub and moved with swift, silent stride
s
to the wall of the building and along the wall to Lona's window, from which he ha
d
seen the girl's shadow on that first day before she emerged to wave to him. The windo
w
was open, and the lace curtain hung limp and lifeless in the dead, still air.

Inside the room a mirror hung on the wall, and from the side he could see it, an
d
it gave him a view of most of the inside of the room. There was nothing. He had lef
t
his Winchester with the horse, but now he slid a Colt into his hand and stepped quickl
y
past the window to get the view from the opposite side. The room was empty. He steppe
d
over the sill and stood inside.

There was some blood on the sill where Flynn had been shot the previous night. Th
e
door was open on the silent, sunlit patio. Kilkenny returned his gun to his holste
r
and crossed to the door, studying the patio.

Under the eaves of the porch hung an olla
,
its sides dark with the contents of clear, cold water. Several strings of pepper
s
hung from the eaves across the way and a spring bubbled from the ground into a tin
y
pool in the center of the patio, then trickled off through a stone pipe to empt
y
into the water trough away at the corral.

Listening, he heard nothing. Yet within any one of the half-dozen windows or tw
o
doors, a gun might wait. Back inside the window where he would be invisible, eithe
r
Dunning or Mailer might stand, gun in hand. A gourd dipper hung near th
e
oll
a
and another at the spring. Kilkenny's mouth was dry and he longed for a drink. Hi
s
ears straining with the effort to hear some sound, he waited a moment longer, the
n
stepped out into the patio, and crossed it, to the door opposite. As he walked h
e
glanced sharpl
y
right toward the open side from which he could see the corrals and the stable. Al
l
was bright and still.

The kitchen was empty. He placed a hand on the coffeepot, and it seemed to be vaguel
y
warm. Lifting the lid of the stove, he saw a dull red glow among the few coals ato
p
the gray of ashes and the grate. He stepped past the stove and walked into the dinin
g
room, and then he stopped.