Radigan (1958) (11 page)

"I'm staying. You start trouble and you'll go to jail." "You'll take us?" Barbeau scoffed.

"I'll take you," Flynn replied. "Now you, Barbeau, you want to make a fight of it?"

Barbeau hesitated. He was a fair hand with a gun, but Flynn had not become a deputy sheriff for nothing, and he was not at all sure he wanted to gamble. Moreover, they had orders to stay out of trouble in town.

Flynn walked in on Barbeau. "I've told you, Barbeau. Have a drink if you want it and get out of town, but you'll start nothing here."

Barbeau hesitated and Bitner spoke up. "Let it go, Barb. Our time will come."

Shrugging, Barbeau turned toward the bar and Downey filled his glass. Radigan had been watching Downey with interest. His right hand had remained below the edge of the bar, and it was Radigan's hunch the shotgun was there. Radigan picked up the pot and filled his cup.

He was in a dangerous position. Outside of town he would be fair game. Flynn, despite the fact that he was deputy sheriff of the county, had practically said as much.

He would keep the peace here, but outside of town a man would have to fight his own battles.

Yet the black horse bore no brand they knew, and they might suspect his horse was stabled elsewhere. Radigan had a hunch they would go outside, check both ways out of town, and wait for him, and common sense told him he had no reason to buck the kind of a deck they would stack against him. He pondered the question while he waited.

Downey came around the bar. "More coffee, Tom?" "Please."

They would be expecting him north of town, on the route back toward the ranch, yet they would have a man or men at the trail that ran southwest out of town, too. There was a point of rocks that came down to the trail a bit over a mile out of town, but just this side of that point a dim trail, scarcely visible any more, left the main road and went up through the rocks and cut back, climbing higher and higher toward Pajarito Peak, but well this side of the peak there was a break in the long ridge that divided that trail from the valley where San Ysidro lay.

If he could get out of town-if he could get to that trail-and if they let him leave town, he'd have a chance, because the logical waiting point was at the point of rocks.

He finished his cigarette and drank the remaining coffee, and then the men walked out of the saloon, and he was alone. "Thanks, Jim," he said.

"Don't thank me. I just don't want any trouble." "All right."

Radigan got up and walked to the bar and paid Downey, who dropped the money into the cash drawer without glancing at it. "Watch yourself, Tom. They'll be waiting."

Radigan glanced out the window. Their horses were gone, but there was a man loitering across the street and up a short distance.

Radigan grinned. "God have pity on the poor sailors on such a night as this!"

Downey said, "You'll do, Torn- only those boys want you." "Pack me a bait of grub, will you? I may be in the hills a couple of days."

"That girl didn't get hurt, did she?" Downey asked.

"No. Lot of iron in that girl, Pat. She'll be around when the chips are cashed in."

He shrugged into his coat while Downey put the last of the bundle together. Radigan was thinking of' all the buildings down the street. There were four on the right side of the road, three on the left, and scattered houses back of that, lanes, barnyards, stables. The Hansen house was on the left but back from the road, and the idea came to him suddenly.

"See you." He walked out the door and closed it carefully behind him. He crossed the walk as if going away from the saloon, then turned and stepped quickly into the saddle on the black horse, swung abruptly around the saloon and behind it.

The action was swift and unexpected. The watcher across the street was caught flat-footed, but instantly he dashed across the street. Before he could round the saloon, Radigan rode from behind it and was across the street and behind a building there. He rode down into the wash, came up through the trees, walking the black in soft sand to make no noise. And then he rode directly for the Hansen place.

It was a big, old adobe with an upstairs gallery and it stood among some cottonwoods with corrals and a barn behind it. The sun was high, and Radigan walked the black along the trail, knowing the horse was unfamiliar and gambling nobody was apt to be there who would know him.
He walked the horse past the house and tied in among some brush under the cottonwoods beyond the house.

From inside the house he heard a pleasant soprano voice singing an old love song.

He listened for a moment, then rapped on the door. A breeze stirred the cottonwoods and they chafed their leaves with soft whispering. The singing stopped and he heard footsteps within. He shifted his weight and the floor boards creaked slightly, and the door swung open.

Angelina Foley was quite obviously astonished. He removed his hat. "How do you do, Miss Gelina? Are you receiving callers?"

Momentarily she hesitated, then she stepped back. "Come in. You startled me."

"Some of your men seemed to be in a fighting mood," he commented casually, "and I thought I'd let them cool off a bit." He smiled. "And I thought it might he a good time to get better acquainted."

"You're assuming that I wish to know you better?" "Don't you?"

"I'm not sure." She motioned to a divan. "You have your nerve, coming here."

"Can you think of a better place?" He relaxed on the divan. From where he sat he could see the trail leading up to the ranch. "If one has to wait, why not where a man can talk to a beautiful girl?"

She waited, and he looked around the house. It was a roomy old place, cool, comfortable and quiet, yet much had been done to change it. There were curtains in the windows tonight, and a piano-how long since he had seen a piano outside of a barroom?

"You sing very well. Do you play?" "Of course."

"Will you?"

"Mr. Radigan, if you have any business with me, please state it. I have no intention of playing for you, and I think it impudent of you to suggest it."

"It is all too rare when we hear music out here," he replied, his manner reflecting no reaction to her evident impatience. "Especially old Italian folk songs."

"You know that song?" Her surprise was evident.

"We come from many places," he replied. "You'll find among Western men some who know many things beside cows and range conditions." He paused. "Miss Gelina, I'm curious.

Why did you come here?"

"Because of the land I own," she replied coldly. "What other reason could there be?"

He shrugged, turning his hat in his hand. "I was wondering. Usually folks who have a good working ranch and a herd the size of yours don't leave the place where they are. I'm wonder
ing
why you left, and why you work a bunch of hands who handle guns better than they do cows."

Angelina Foley glanced toward the door. She was alone here, with only the Mexican woman cook for company, but she was thinking rapidly, trying to discover some method of attract
ing
some of her hands back to this ranch. Radigan had guessed shrewdly that this would be the last place they would think of looking, and moreover, every remark he made gave greater reason for worry. This was no ordinary cowhand or cattleman.

"I wrote to the governor," he said.

She stiffened. "You what?"

"I wrote to the governor," he repeated. "They know me in Santa Fe, and I wanted them to know what was happening here."

She was frightened, but she knew at once that they were in real trouble. This was the last thing they had expected. When they prepared to drive west out of Texas, Harvey had assured her there would be no trouble as they not only had claim to the land to which they were going but the man squatted on it would be eliminated before they arrived. She had suspected for some time that Harvey had some further idea in the back of his head, some idea for going to the New Mexico ranch. She had not inquired too much about that.

The move was essential. Her father had managed the ranch poorly, had spent too much money, and had become involved in hopeless quarrels.
It was due to her own quick action and positive thinking as much as to Harvey that they had abandoned the hopeless fight and moved to New Mexico.
The trail they had left behind them was not a pretty one, but due to Ross Wall they had brought the herd safely across the long, dry drive and had left behind all pursuers-left them dead.

Now, if an inquiry began there would be immediate repercussions from Texas.

Instantly she knew he must not guess her panic, and she saw that somehow she must win him over or he must be killed. Or better yet, made to disappear. If he merely disappeared there would be a period of waiting to see if he reappeared, and by that time they would be settled on the ranch with friends of their own.

"It's too bad there is trouble between us." She got up and walked to the window, and as she spoke her thoughts raced swiftly ahead, searching out a way through all the nooks and crannies of possible solutions. "You're a strong man, Tom." "Just a cattleman."

"No, far more than that. I wish we could have met under other circumstances. A girl in my position, who has to run a ranch like a man, doesn't meet many men who are of interest to her."

She was not, she reflected, just talking. Every word was the truth. She turned suddenly and looked at him, seeing for the first time through the implication of her own words, and realiz
ing
it was true: this was the man she should have met before this.

He was a handsome man. And without doubt a courageous one. There was nothing of Harvey in him, Harvey who had an ulterior motive for everything, and who was always searching for some way to make money without work.

She crossed the room to him. Over her shoulder he saw that the road was still empty.

"Tom, what do you want out of life? I mean, what are you working for?"

"I want to make that ranch pay. You have no idea what a job that is. I mean, you've come here from a Plains state where the problems are tough enough, but you know the answers to them, as I did. Up here one has to learn new answers, new ways. I'm cautious, so I came with few cattle, and I worked particularly hard to keep them alive. By the time I found the answers I'd managed to wet-nurse a small herd through two winters, and by then I could branch out a little."

"Is it that hard?"

"Worse! You're welcome to come and see for yourself if you like." He gestured with a quick dismissing wave of his hand. "Your folks probably think they've won, but we left the ranch because we didn't want to be pinned down, and we aren't worried because we know what will happen this winter. You'll lose that herd, lose everything you've got. Your hands will quit because you have easy money hands, except for Wall, and maybe a few others. Of course," he added, "you might be lucky. We might have a good winter."

His words had the ring of truth and she was worried. The herd was all she had, and if they lost it they would have nothing.

Sensing her doubt, he said, "Have you looked at that valley lately? You've had the cattle on it for several days, and the grass is about gone. You've too many cows for the range you can get."

He was the one they must be rid of, for once he was gone there would be no trouble from John Child or that girl.
The girl they could destroy by implication, and Child would probably go down with her, or he could be tracked down and killed.

How to get Radigan? His appeal to the authorities frightened her, for it was the one thing they had never expected and the one thing that could destroy them. Yet if he disappeared, seemed to ride away on his own, then it would be a simple thing.

The whole affair would die down and their seizure of the ranch would be an accomplished fact which a visit to Santa Fe by Harvey and herself would cement into finality.

Harvey could be polished andingratiating, and she knew what a beautiful woman could do to most men.
With Radigan out of the way.

"Do we have to fight?" she protested. "I mean, do we have to be enemies?"

She came close to him. "Tom, I am sorry, I really am. Can't we end all this? You must understand how I feel? After all, my father left the land to me, and it is all I have of his."

"I'm sorry."

She looked up at him, making her eyes wide, her lips parted a little. "Tom, please!

We mustn't be enemies!"

He looked down at her and suddenly she felt he was laugh
ing
at her. He made no move to take her into his arms, although the invitation was there, nor did he move away.

He just looked down into her eyes and said quietly, "We need not be enemies. I wish it wasn't that way, so why don't you give up this notion and move away?"

She was furious. Her anger flashed wickedly for an instant, and then she drew back, and smiled quickly, almost sharply at him. "No! I couldn't do that. It-it would be almost a betrayal. Of my father, I mean."

She turned away from him and walked to the window. Glanc
ing
past her he saw the road was still empty. Suddenly he was aware that she, too, was watching that road, which meant she was either expecting or hoping for someone.