Shadow on the Land (15 page)

“Hadn't thought of it that way,” Highpockets admitted. “What are you gonna do with them wagons, run 'em over the cliff?”

“No. They'll string 'em along our west fence.”

The Italians stayed on top that night, wagons hauling food and bedding from the cañon.

* * * * *

It was another cloudless day, the sun beating down upon the open country with pitiless abandon. Lee, keeping his usual position at the gate through half the morning, saw the Twohy party coming. Quinn and the sheriff were in front, twenty mounted men behind them, ten wagons bringing up the rear.

“Wonder how Mike figures on twenty men busting through here,” Lee mused. He nodded at the Italians, who immediately spilled out across the road.

“We're going through this time, Dawes!” Quinn called as he rode up.

“You said something like that yesterday,” Lee murmured.

“If it takes an army to open that damned gate, we've got it.”

Lee laughed. “Is that what you call an army, Mike?”

Quinn swung down, not answering, and motioned to his men. “Pick handles in that front wagon, boys. Help yourself.” He nodded cheerfully at Lee. “These fellows are deputies, Dawes, in case you're interested.”

Lee studied Quinn with puzzled eyes. Mike Quinn had been through too many fights like this to think his twenty men could smash a passage through Lee's Italians. He said slowly: “You're a fool if you slaughter that bunch, Quinn.”

“A fool?” Quinn laughed softly, an arrogant certainty about him. “If you think I'm a fool, take a look behind you.”

Lee wheeled. Surprise ran through him, and then momentary panic. Hundreds of men had come through the lower fence and were striding swiftly toward the party at the gate, grim purpose on their stony faces. Pick handles, crowbars, shovels—all made a ragged fringe across the front of the crowd. The entire Harriman outfit in the cañon had come up the grade to take part in this finish fight.

Lee picked up a length of juniper limb that lay in the grass, and faced Quinn. The panic was gone now, his lips drawn flat and tight against his teeth. He said: “Looks like we'll have some heads cracked, and, boy, I sure aim to get yours.”

Chapter Twelve

M
ike Quinn's rugged face showed amazement, and then anger. “You've always been a fighting fool, Dawes, but I didn't think you were so long on the fool part of your make-up.”

“Come ahead,” Lee invited.

“Don't think we won't.”

“Hold on.” Highpockets raced across the road in his leggy stride. “Don't start no fireworks yet, fellers. Somebody's coming.”

Lifting his gaze past Mike Quinn and the sheriff's party, Lee saw a horseman coming at a fast pace from Grass Valley, and, from the way he rode, there could be no doubt that urgency was in the saddle with him. Then Lee saw that it was Baldy.

“I don't care who's coming!” Quinn shouted belligerently. Open up!”

“I know this man,” the sheriff broke in. “We'll wait.”

Quinn swore angrily, pounding his pick handle on the post at the end of the gate, but he made no hostile move.

Baldy thundered past the wagons and pulled up at the gate, reeling a little in the saddle from the violence of his ride. He ran a sleeve across his dirt-smeared face and, leaning over the gate, said in a low tone: “Johnson Porter saw Quinn leave with the sheriff's party, and him and the rest of 'em decided it wasn't good business to hold the gate any longer, till we get the injunction dissolved.”

For a moment Lee stood staring at Baldy, the sickness of defeat in him as his mind gripped this new order. Slowly he nodded and, drawing the key from his pocket, opened the padlock.

“So they pulled off their dogs,” Quinn sneered.

“Just tied 'em up, Mike.” Lee handed another key to Baldy. “Ride down and open the lower gate.” He swung the wire gate away from the road, and motioned for the wagons to go through.

The Harriman laborers fell back, and, after a moment's consultation with Quinn, retreated into the cañon. Quinn waited at the lower gate until the wagons were through and had dropped on over the rim. Then he rode back to where Lee was standing beside the sheriff's party, his smile a mocking whiplash for Lee.

“They'll pour enough supplies over this road in the next few days to lay twenty miles of steel,” Lee said sourly as he watched them go, “but so will we. Highpockets, you'd better stay here. Just keep an eye on what goes through.”

* * * * *

Returning to Grass Valley with Baldy, Lee reported to Johnson Porter what had happened, and rode north to Moro. He sought out the county judge, and asked: “How long will it take Twohy Brothers to get a road condemned through the Girt place?”

“Hard to say,” the judge answered. “Perhaps six months.”

Lee took a room in the Moro Hotel, and remained there through the week, the scene of battle shifting to the courtroom. Judge Butler had come by train from Condon to hear cause why the injunction should not stand. The next morning, H. S. Wilson, Porter Brothers' lawyer, moved that the temporary injunction secured by the Harriman lawyers be dissolved. Wilson asked for a quick trial, calling attention to the fact that Porter Brothers had come into court immediately.

Bowerman, one of the lawyers for Twohy Brothers, argued that Monday would be the first day they could get their witnesses together. Later, he agreed that, if Wilson would put the farm owners on the stand, Friday would be all right for the hearing. Wilson answered that he did not know the farm owners personally, but it would be agreeable to him for Bowerman to get them and ask any questions he wished. Judge Butler set Friday for the case to be heard.

“We'll get it dissolved all right,” Wilson told Lee confidently that noon.

The lawyer was proved to be a good prophet when Judge Butler did dissolve the injunction, holding that the evidence did not prove that the Twohys had secured any right to cross these ranches. The Harriman attorneys started proceedings to condemn a road, a fact that did not particularly worry Lee, but he rode back to the Girt place without the feeling of triumph the legal victory should have given him.

“What's been going on?” Lee asked as he reined up at the gate.

“Never saw so much freighting in my life,” Highpockets answered. “Been some Porter stuff through here, too, but you ought to see what the Twohys have been doing. I don't reckon they've had a wagon that's stood still since Quinn brought that first bunch through.”

“They'll stand still now,” Lee said grimly, and locked the gate. “I don't reckon Mike will give us any more trouble trying to get through here.”

When Lee saw that the Twohys had accepted the court decision, he returned to Grass Valley with Highpockets, leaving Baldy at the gate.

“You did a good job,” Johnson Porter told Lee. “It was a delaying action, and it worked. What's more, we've got a road to use.” He laughed. “I'll have to get out there someday, and watch them take hay down on mule back.”

“What about our side of the thing?”

“No complaints. Stuff is coming into The Dalles in fine shape.
The Bailey Gatzert
got in with fifteen tons of equipment . . . sledges, anvils, coal, axes, shovels, and what-not. We're sending most of it to Dufur on the Great Southern, or part way to Boyd, and from there it isn't so bad to freight it into the cañon. We're sending some on to Sherars Bridge, and we're shipping an outfit of heavy equipment we had stored at Vancouver . . . dump cars, steam shovels, rails, locomotives.”

“How do we stack up with the Twohys on manpower?”

“They're a little ahead of us,” Porter admitted. “They've got about twelve hundred men at work. That's more than we have, but we're pulling them in fast, and we'll be working all along the cañon.”

“Horses?”

“We've got about fifteen hundred, and we're buying more.”

“I was asking because I'd like to pull off another delaying action somewhere along the line,” Lee said thoughtfully. “If we could corner all the horse feed in the country, we'd worry them some more.”

“It's worth a try,” Porter agreed. “Go ahead. For the moment we can let the Girt place stand. I want to send you south again, anyway. Take Magoon with you.” He turned to a map on the wall. “Notice where Willow Creek comes into the Deschutes. Right there is three tenths of an acre next to the river that could block us. We've got to have it.”

“I'll get it,” Lee promised.

Porter brought his finger down the black line that was the river. “We cross to the east side here. Between this point and the mouth of Trout Creek our surveys are in conflict. We've protested to the General Land Office, basing our argument on our priority of right at that point.”

“Stacks up like trouble.”

Porter nodded. “It is trouble. Right now we're fighting in Portland in the courts. The Harriman legal forces claim we've filed old maps that have been bought, illegal surveys, and all that with the Interior Department.” He gestured angrily. “They won't make it stick, but it's one of those things that makes railroad building tough.”

* * * * *

Lee and Highpockets took the train to Shaniko, and Highpockets, securing the same team of bays that had taken Lee on his first trip into the interior, drove again across Shaniko Flat, down Cow Cañon, and into Madras.

“I know this fellow on Willow Creek,” Highpockets said. “He's been as balmy as the rest about the people's railroad, but I've got a hunch he'll deal.” He hesitated, pulling thoughtfully at a huge ear. “I'm thinking a lot of folks are going to change their minds when they see what's happening in the cañon.”

“Hanna maybe?”

“Well now, I wouldn't be sure about her. She ain't a filly you can hold back once she takes the bit into her teeth.”

Highpockets was right about the Willow Creek property. The farmer said frankly that a Harriman agent named Quinn had offered him $3,000 for the vital piece of land, but he hadn't sold.

“I just don't like the idea of playing dog-in-the-manger, mister. We've been looking for a railroad into this country for a long time. Now that we're gonna have two, I ain't a man to try to stop one of 'em. If you want that piece of land and a right of way across my ranch, you can have 'em both for three thousand.”

“It's a deal,” Lee said quickly, drawing checkbook and pen from his pocket.

Lee and Highpockets returned to Madras that night, and spent several days in the northern part of Crook County determining the practicality of cornering the hay and grain supplies. The last day they swung south to Crooked River, and stopped at Hanna's place on their way back to Madras.

“I suppose you stopped here because Highpockets got hungry,” Hanna said.

“He's got hold of the lines.” Lee grinned as he stepped down and patted Willie. “Come to think of it, I've got a hole in my stomach, too.”

“Come in. We'll see what we can do about filling it. I've got some newspapers to show you. Or have you kept up on the developments?”

“No. I've been traveling too much. Seems like the reporters know more about my railroad than I do.”

“Don't you get her to talking and hold up supper,” Highpockets warned as he unhitched and led the horses to the water trough.

Lee followed Hanna into the kitchen, and grinned when she said: “At last the big secret is out. The
Bend Bulletin
reports that Jim Hill is backing the Oregon Trunk.”

“It was time to tell it. I hear that a Bend newspaperman was chasing up and down the cañon trying to find out who was backing the Trunk, and just when he did find out and thought he had a scoop, Stevens gave out his statement.”

Hanna laughed. “Well, it just goes to prove that there is a strange element called luck that plays a big part in our lives.” She picked up a newspaper from the table. “This
Madras Pioneer
just came today. It quotes from
The Dalles Chronicle
to the effect that central Oregon's sympathies are with Hill, because Harriman has a record of broken promises.”

Lee reached for the paper, eyes scanning the editorial. He muttered: “The Columbia Southern would have been extended south if Harriman hadn't bought it. The Corvallis and Eastern would have come in, but Harriman got that. The passes from the south are controlled by Harriman. Central Oregon is bottled up. All but the Deschutes route.” He tossed the paper back on the table. “More Harriman Fence which we're going to break down. Hanna, I could talk a week, and I couldn't give you any stronger reasons why you should sell us a right of way.”

She gestured wearily. “Some of my neighbors are going to see it that way.”

“She's weakening, son!” Highpockets called from the doorway.

Lee, watching her, was not sure. There was a firmness of moral fiber, a strength of character in her, that would not let her change a decision this easily. “I hope you are weakening,” Lee said gravely. “A lot depends on you.”

“I know.” She turned into the pantry, calling back briskly as if putting the railroad question out of her mind: “I'm out of wood! No wood, no eat. A couple of tramps like you ought to work for your meal, anyhow.”

“Sure,” Lee said. “Where's the woodpile?”

* * * * *

They returned to Shaniko the next day, Lee riding most of the way in silence, thinking of the possibilities that control of the local supply of hay and grain would give the Oregon Trunk, and seeing the difficulties involved in securing such a monopoly.

That evening, as Lee and Highpockets crossed the lobby of the Columbia Southern Hotel and entered the dining room, they met Cyrus Jepson.

“'Evening, Dawes,” Jepson said pleasantly.

“Howdy. What's going on in Jepson City?”

“Development, Dawes. Nothing can hold that country back. We'll have the biggest irrigation project in Oregon around Jepson City.”