Ride the Man Down (24 page)

Will's glance shifted then to a still form at the bottom of this slope. A steer, both legs broken, was futilely trying to struggle to its feet, and each time it fell back on the crushed, broken form of Red Courteen. His red hair seemed oddly colorless against the deeper red around him.

Will turned away just as he picked up the distinct voice of someone shouting, “The horses. Get your horses!”

Will looked across to the flats beyond the arroyo. Many cattle had reached that side and were running, still in panic, toward the mountains. He picked out four men still on their feet dodging among them, and one of these men was Sam Danfelser. Beside him, clinging to him, was the slight form of Lowell Priest.

Will turned and saw Jim Young paused on the lip of the arroyo, staring unbelievingly down at the struggling cattle. Will looked the other way then, and something caught at his throat.

Mel Young's horse had halted, and was standing motionless, the dust settling around him. And slumped over his neck, face buried in the mane of the horse, was Mel Young.

Someone down the arroyo was still shooting, the shots regular as the ticking of a clock. Will pulled his horse around and went back to Mel and dismounted. Jim Young rode up beside him now and dismounted too. Whoever was shooting now saw them, for a spurt of dust kicked up at Will's feet.

Will said sharply, “Let's get him out of here.”

He mounted, took the trailing reins of Mel's horse, and, leading the horse, headed back in the direction from which they had come only a few minutes before.

The bare knoll afforded them some protection. In its lee Will dismounted again. He and Jim both saw Mel's shattered shoulder. His shirt down to his waist was dark with blood. Will said, “Mel, do you hear me?”

Mel nodded but did not speak. Will looked at Jim and said, “If he gets off that horse he won't get on again.”

Jim Young's glance shuttled back to the herd. They were scattered far and wide over the flats. Moving among them, however, was a horseman leading two horses.

Jim said soberly, “Danfelser's there. If he caught Mel he'd shoot him.”

Will nodded. “Want to take the chance?”

Jim Young's face was white, scared, and sober. He asked simply, “What do you think, Will?”

“Let's hit for the nearest timber and then decide.”

Will took the rope off his saddle and swiftly looped it around Mel's ankle. Then he ran it under the horse's belly to the other ankle and, after taking a turn around it, looped it over the saddle horn. It would keep Mel in the saddle.

He looked at Jim now and his eyes were dismal. “This'll be rough, kid.”

“Go ahead,” Jim said.

They mounted now, and Jim, leading Mel's horse, pointed toward the distant island of timber to the east on the flats. They rode steadily, hard, not sparing their horses, and when, an hour later, they pulled into the stand of live oak, Will reined up. He put his horse over to Mel and said quietly, “How are you, Mel?”

Mel tried to straighten up, bracing his good hand against his horse's neck. When he looked up at them his face was gray and lined with pain.

“Just keep goin',” he whispered.

Will glanced at Jim. “If we're lucky we've got a half-hour's start on them, Jim.”

He turned now and scanned the flats they had crossed, but the long stretch of it was empty. He took his bearings now. To the north the pine-black shoulders of Indian Ridge were close, and he knew if he could reach them that he could shake off pursuit. But it was time they needed. No man could endure the agony that fast travel would bring to Mel, and if they didn't travel fast Sam and the remainder of Red's men could corner them out on the flats, and that would be the finish.

Will glanced at Jim Young, who was watching him with a dismal soberness in his eyes. He had never guessed how much these two strayed, broke brothers depended on each other, and he knew Jim hadn't either until now. Will said slowly, “Jim, we split up. You got to go it alone.”

Puzzlement crept into Jim Young's face, and Will went on: “Look at it this way. Who does Danfelser want?”

“You.”

“Then if he sees our tracks split, two going the same way, the third lining out, which would he take?”

Jim answered slowly, “The single. He'd figure you'd decided you couldn't help and were dodgin' again.” Will nodded, and Jim, understanding now, shook his head and said quietly, “You ride out, Will. I can take care of Mel.”

“You pull 'em off me for a few hours, Jim. By that time we'll be holed up at Cavanaugh's and safe.”

Again Jim shook his head. “No man can keep on the dodge and take care of a hurt man. It ain't your job, Will.”

Will said gently, “That's the only way it can be. When you've pulled 'em off me you can hunt up Celia. Get some medicine and some grub from her and bring it to me. I can't do it myself, can I?”

“It ain't right, Will,” Jim said stubbornly.

Will smiled. “We're wasting time.”

Jim Young sighed. “All right.”

They rode through the live oaks and out into the deep grass of the flats beyond. Here they parted, Will leading Mel Young's horse and turning north toward the safe hills flanking Indian Ridge. Jim Young watched them go and then, after waving once, lined out east. Will knew how thin this was, but he had not watched Sam Danfelser all these years for nothing. The working of Sam's mind was simple and direct, and Sam would follow the single track, reasoning that no hunted man would ever burden himself with a wounded partner. He would think that because he would not, in a similar position, burden himself.

Chapter 23

As Sam became more certain during the gray afternoon that Will was heading for Hatchet he made his plans. There were enough of them—Priest and two of Red's hands—to hold Will here while Bide and his crew were brought in. In the back of Sam's mind the picture of what would happen then was not clear. But the outcome was. If Will was fool enough to try to make Hatchet he was a dead man.

Sam's reverie was interrupted by Priest's weary, querulous voice saying, “Who's this coming?”

Sam looked up and saw a rider quartering toward them out of the bald hills behind Hatchet.

Sam watched the rider and presently answered, “One of Bide's men. We've had 'em watching Hatchet for a week.”

As the man came closer Sam noted curiously that he did not seem in any hurry. Sam looked about him, seeing the grass waving in the ground breeze that had sprung up since the sun went under. Rain was coming, he could tell, and he looked again at the approaching rider, who was still in no hurry. When the rider was close Sam impatiently put his horse ahead of the others.

“Did he go on in?” Sam called as soon as he was within earshot.

The rider came over to him and reined up and said, “Who?”

“Ballard.”

The puncher's face was suddenly alert. “When was this?”

“Just now, you fool!” Sam said angrily. “He rode right past you, unless you were asleep.”

“Not Will Ballard,” the puncher said flatly: “No sir. Not him.”

“Did anybody?” Sam asked slowly.”

“Sure. One of them towheaded brothers rode in a little while ago.”

Sam stared at him, speechless. The first faint rumblings of thunder over in the Indigos came to him above the sound of Priest and the others pulling in beside him. Sam didn't move, but he felt an unspeakable rage uncoiling within him. They had been following the wrong man all afternoon. Will, with the hurt brother, was already over in the Indian Ridge country.

A sick wrath was in Sam then, and without a word he yanked his horse around and rode away from the others. He heard Priest calling to him and did not stop.

Later he was roused by the drops of water on his hand, and he glanced at the sky. It was almost dark, and he looked around him with a kind of surprise. The black, aching rage in him was dulled now, and he had not been aware of the passage of time.

Reining up now, he thought of what to do. He must build this all over again, and this time with more care, more patience. Twice this day Will had slipped through his hands, but Will could make mistakes. Thinking of it now, Sam decided that Will had already made one. If he had a hurt man with him, that meant he'd have to hole up, and in time his hide-out could be found. It would take all his men and Bide's crew, but they would find him.

Sam put his horse toward Boundary now, patient again as the large, sparse drops of rain thickened and turned into the first full bunting of the storm.

Long after dark Sam rode into Boundary. The slicker which had been on the saddle of the horse he had chosen at the stampede was too tight and, putting it on, he had split it across the shoulders. He was wet and cold and bone-weary, and the sight of Boundary, its streets pooled glassily with the lain, did not cheer him.

He looked at the warm light of the Belle Fourche and rejected it. More than anything else he was hungry and, turning in at the tie rail in front of the Stockman's House, he tried to remember when he had eaten last and could not.

He stepped down into the mud and tied his horse, oblivious to the fact that he was leaving it out in the rain. He had swung under the tie rail and was mounting the steps of the hotel porch when he heard his name called sharply: “Sam! Sam!” He wheeled ponderously and saw a man bolt down the steps of the Belle Fourche, dodge under the tie rail, lose his footing, fall to one knee in the mud, and come up again, cursing. He recognized the voice of Russ Schultz, and a faint premonition tugged at him.

Russ splashed uncertainly across the street and ducked under the near tie rail and came up to him. His heavy face, turned up now into the rain-streaked light, was harried and anxious, and he said, “You heard?”

“What?”

“Kneen got Bide.”

Sam accepted this, repeating it to himself, but he was thinking,
That leaves just me
. Oddly this news had no power to move him. Kneen wasn't bluffing, and Bide thought he was, and that was all there was to it. Sam's mind was almost placid, barren of regret; he was aware of his hunger and of a vast, gathering impatience.

When he did not speak Schultz gave him the account of the shoot-out. Hearing it, Sam had a fleeting impersonal admiration for both men, and that was all. Schultz had talked himself out, and there was nothing left to say.

Sam said then, “Where's Kneen?”

“In his room.”

Sam made a move to go, and Schultz said quickly, “Be careful, Sam. Miss Evarts is there.” Then, as if he had just thought of it, he added, “He wants to see you.”

“Sure he does,” Sam said mildly and went in. Schultz followed him as far as the lobby and watched him climb the stairs and he was puzzled.

Kneen had been moved from his old room, and Sam had to come down again and ask where he was. He was directed to the second-floor-front suite.

Sam approached the suite and did not knock. He palmed the knob and stepped in and saw Celia sitting in a chair beside the table in front of the parlor's middle window.

She was dressed in black riding clothes, and Sam looked at her a moment, feeling nothing except the old, old impatience. Celia rose and said, “He's in here, Sam. Don't talk to him long,” and started for the next room, and Sam wordlessly followed her.

He paused just inside the door and looked curiously at Kneen. The old man was flat out in bed, no pillow under his head, and when he turned his head to see who entered Sam saw his pale eyes were sick, pain-filled.

Sam tramped over to the bed and regarded Kneen a moment, his face unrelenting, unpitying. He said softly, “You only did half a job, Joe.” Kneen wet his lips with his tongue and said in a fragile, toneless voice, “Stay off Hatchet, Sam. I'll warn you like I warned him.”

Sam's smile was slow, musing. He found he had no business with Kneen after all, and he turned away and went out of the room. Celia had left Kneen's room and was standing in the middle of the parlor.

Sam paused, looking at her, his heavy face impassive, his eyes watchful. He was aware that his slicker was dripping water; he could hear the drops faintly touch the rug, and he looked at Celia as if she were someone he hardly knew.

He said mildly, “Are you happy now?”

Celia said, “Give up, Sam. It's over.”

Sam's smile was slow, again musing, and he said, “No. No, I don't think so.” He paused. “There's Will,” he suggested gently. There was no expression in Celia's face except a kind of pity, which Sam did not see.

“Yes sir,” he murmured, as if to himself, “there's Will,” And he left her, closing the door behind him.

Downstairs in the lobby Schultz came up to him, and Sam went out the door and halted on the porch. Schultz followed him out, and Sam stood there, looking out at the rain blurring the reflected lights in the hundred small puddles of the street, feeling his impatience.

Schultz said, “What happened to Priest? He pulled in at the store and fell off his horse.”

Sam didn't answer him, and they were quiet.

Schultz said presently then in a bitter, unguarded voice, “I wish he'd gone after Ballard like he had the chance.”

Sam turned slowly and said, “Who?”

“Bide. She told him. She tried to send him out, but he was worried about Kneen. He could of missed him.”

Sam said, “Who?”

“Bide. He—”

“Who told him?” Sam asked.

“Lottie Priest. She come and told him about Will last night, and he wouldn't go. He—”

“Shut up,” Sam said gently. He was looking at Schultz, not really looking at him either. His slow, methodical mind considered this, first with a tentative, faintly skeptical speculation, and then with curiosity, and then, much later, with a rising conviction.

He said, “Why, yes,” as if in answer to some question Schultz had asked him, and he went down the steps and turned upstreet, hurrying now.