the Mountain Valley War (1978) (5 page)

"Nita, I have been through this before. Perhaps the odds were less, but the game was the same. No, I must stay."

He paused. "I must talk to Hale. He could stop this if he would. He has to be made to understand."

"There isn't a chance! Not one. He lives in a world all his own. No one even dares address him, and if you approached him he would be offended. You would not have a chance to speak. And don't forget, the man's not over forty and he's a fighter."

"You seem to know him well. Has he made you any trouble?"

"What makes you ask that?"

"I want to know."

She shrugged. "He wants to marry me, Lance." She smiled suddenly. "I will admit that he told me so somewhat in the manner of a king conferring a boon upon some lesser creature, but nonetheless, he did ask."

Trent stared at her. "And you, Nita? What did you say?"

"I am lonely, Lance. I have no life here, only a business. I know no women but those of the dance hall. Oh, they're a pretty good lot, really. And my girls are strictly dancing partners, nothing more. It may be that one or two of them have found friends ... I wouldn't know about that, and it is their own business, but I know no one else, see no one else. I am dreadfully, frighteningly alone.

"King Bill is strong. He knows how to appeal to a woman. He has a lot to offer, and even though he has a son as old as I, he's still a young man. I do not like what he is doing, but he can offer many arguments why he believes he is right.

"No, I will not marry him. Even if you were not here, I would not. I've been tempted, I will admit, but he's a little insane, I think. He got too much money and too much power and it all came too easily. He believes he is better than other men because he has succeeded. But whatever you do, don't underrate him ... or Cub."

"You spoke of him as a fighter. You mean he will have his men fight?"

"No. I mean he will fight. He told me once in such a flat, ordinary voice that he could kill any man with his bare fists."

"I want no trouble with him. Only a few minutes' conversation."

"Shaw, his foreman, tells a story about King Bill killing a man with his fists in El Paso, and another on the ranch. These were men who challenged him personally."

"I must see him today, Nita. He must be convinced his best recourse is to leave us alone. He doesn't need our land, and none of us are thieves. We encroach upon him in no way."

"He won't talk to you, Lance. I know him. He has made a big thing of not being addressed by anyone to whom he does not speak first. He will just leave you to his bullyboys."

"He'll talk to me."

"Don't go over there, Lance. Please don't."

"Has he made trouble for you?"

"No. So far, he has listened to me and we have talked very quietly. None of the others have made trouble, either, largely because they know he is interested in me.

"There was an attempt at a holdup one night, but they may not have been his men. At least, nobody ever claimed them."

"What happened?"

"They didn't know about Jaime. I was counting the receipts for the week, when they came in with guns. Jaime had just stepped out for a minute and then he stepped back in. They were facing each other, both with guns in their hands, and one of them said, 'Looks like we tackled more'n we expected. All right if we back out now?' And Jaime said, 'No.'

"They didn't understand. It was a Mexican stand-off, and it seemed to them the best thing was just to back out. But you know Jaime, he just said 'No' and they stared at him and one said 'No?'. And Jaime shot them both.

"Since then there has been no trouble. But I have no illusions. If King Bill wants this place ... or me, he will stop at nothing. Or the minute he steps out of the picture, Cub will be there."

"Well"--he turned to go--"I must see him. I've got to make at least one attempt to stop this before it gets started. I can't bring Moffit back, but maybe I can save some others."

"And if you fail ... ?"

"I'll buckle on my guns and come to town."

He paused in the outer room to watch Price Dixon dealing cards, but his mind was not on the game. He was thinking of King Bill and how to approach him.

Hale fought to win. In this little corner of the West there was no law but that of the gun and what men chose to impose upon themselves. By and large, western pioneers wanted law and order and were law-abiding people, although there were always those who were lacking in self-discipline or were heedless of the rights of others. Hale would have been the last man to flout the law. In fact, he sincerely believed he was the law.

There were few trails in or out of the country, and Hale had always been careful to see that no potential troublemakers reached the area, or, if they came, did not long remain. Even what news left the valley depended much upon Hale. The echoes of the trouble to come might never reach beyond these hills.

Hale himself lived in a ranch house two miles from Cedar, a place referred to locally as the "Castle," and rode into town once each day for a brief stop at the Mecca and occasionally at the Crystal Palace. Trent decided the logical place to find him was the Mecca, as he did not wish to bring trouble to Nita by meeting him here.

Trent knew what Nita meant when she spoke of being lonely, for there had been few times in his life when he had not known the feeling. He had been born on the frontier in Dakota, but his father had been killed and he had lived with an uncle in New York and then with an aunt in Virginia. They had been kind, always, but he had been left much alone.

Trent walked out on the dark street. He led the buckskin to water, fed him some hay, then led him back to the hitching rail.

There were few people around, but the sounds of music came from both the Mecca and the Crystal Palace. Dan Cooper had left the store and was sitting on the steps outside. He watched Trent, then strolled over to where he was tying the buckskin.

"Ifn I was you, Trent," he said, "I'd fork that horse and light a shuck. You ain't among friends."

"Thanks, Cooper. I take that as a friendly tip, but I've got business. I don't want a war in Cedar, and I want to make one more attempt at stopping it."

"And if you don't?"

"Then I'll have to take steps."

Dan Cooper began to build a cigarette. "You sound all-fired sure of yourself. Who are you? What are you?"

"Like I said, old son, I'm a nester named Trent."

He turned to stroll off down the boardwalk, and as he did so, a small cavalcade of riders rode down the street from the Castle and drew up before the Mecca. Four men, and the big man on the bay would be Hale.

Hale got down and led the way through the bat-whig doors. Cub followed, while Ravitz tied Hale's horse. Dunn stood for a moment looking toward Trent, whom he could not quite make out in the gloom under the awning. Then he walked inside.

Chapter
5

Trent pushed open the doors and stepped into the now crowded saloon. Most of those present seemed to be Hale cowhands, but there were a few prospectors and miners coming from or going to the gold camps to the north. At the bar, King Bill was standing, his broad back turned to the room.

He was big. Perhaps an inch shorter than Trent's six feet and one inch, he was much the heavier of the two. He was broad and powerful, with a massive chest, his head a block set upon a muscular neck, his jaw broad and strong. He was a bull, and Trent, looking at him now, could well believe the stories of his killing men with his fists.

Beside him, in beautifully tanned and dressed white buckskin, was Cub Hale, and on the far side of Hale were Dunn and Ravitz.

Trent walked to the bar and ordered a drink. Dunn, hearing his voice, turned his head. As their eyes met, the glass slipped from Dunn's fingers and crashed on the edge of title bar.

"You seem nervous, Dunn," Trent suggested. "Let me buy you a drink."

"I'll be damned if I will!" Dunn said. "What d' you want here?"

Trent smiled. All the room was listening, attracted by the fall of the glass and Dunn's explosive question.

Of those present, some would be townspeople who might not have chosen sides."

"Why, I just thought I'd ride down and have a talk with King Bill." He spoke calmly but clearly, so that all might hear. "It seems there has been a lot of war talk, and somebody killed a harmless family man on his own doorstep the other day, killed him when he was unarmed and totally defenseless. It struck me that King Bill would want to know about it."

"Get out!" Dunn ordered, his hand hovering near his gun. "Get out or be carried out!"

"No use to reaching for that gun," Trent replied calmly. "As everybody can see, I am not heeled. And I am here to make peace talk with King Bill."

"I said get out!" Dunn replied.

Trent was still smiling when Dunn's hand suddenly dropped for his gun. Instantly Trent moved. His left hand dropped to block the gun hand, the right whipped up in a short, wicked arc and exploded on Dunn's chin.

The punch was short but perfectly timed, and it caught Dunn on the point of the chin. He started to drop, and Trent let go of the gun wrist and let him fall, but as he did so he slipped the gun from Dunn's holster and placed it on the bar.

Trent turned to Hale. "Sir, some of your men invaded our area and murdered Dick Moffit, then burned him out. They ran his young children into the woods, homeless and hungry, then hunted them to try killing them as well. Those same men warned me to move out. Now, I've heard you are a fair man, so I have come to you."

King Bill did not move or give any indication that he heard. He looked at the whiskey in his glass, tasted it, and put it carefully back on the bar.

Cub Hale had moved away from him, poised and eager. "Hale," Trent said, "this is between you and me. Call off your dogs. I am talking to you and nobody else, and what is said here tonight will be repeated up and down the country. We want peace, but if we have to fight to keep our land, we will fight. If we fight, we will win. You are bucking the United States government now, Hale, as all our land has been properly filed on and we are proving up."

Cub was waiting. At a word from his father or even a gesture, he would draw. Trent was unarmed. He felt cold and tight, and knew that never had he been so close to death.

"What's the matter, Hale? Are you going to make a murderer of your son because you're too yellow to talk?"

Hale turned slowly. "Cub, stay out of this. I'll handle it."

Cub hesitated, alive with eagerness and disappointment.

"I said," Hale's tone was harsh, "get back and stay out of this."

He looked at Trent for the first time, his eyes cold and ugly. "As for you, you've squatted on my range. Now you're getting off, all of you. If you don't leave, you'll take what you've got coming, and-that's final."

"No, Hale, it is not final. We are filed legally, and we intend to stay. You made no claim on any of that land until we moved on it and started developments. If we don't get justice, we will have a United States marshal in here to find out why."

"Justice! You grangers will get all the justice you need from me! I've given you time to leave. Now, get!"

Trent stood his ground, yet his own anger was welling up within him. The unreasonableness of the man irked him. Ruthless as he might be, he might also be basically a square shooter.

"Hale," he said, "I've heard you're a fighting man. I'm calling you now. We fight, man to man, no holds barred, and if I win, you leave us alone, if you do, we leave."

King Bill turned, his fury swelling the veins in his neck. "You! You challenge me? You dare? You, a dirty-necked nester, a farmer? No! I bargain with no man. Move out or suffer the consequences."

"What's the matter, Bill! Are you afraid?"

For a long moment there was silence in the room, and then Hale unbuckled his gun belt. "All right, nester, you asked for it."

He swung suddenly, a vicious backhand. Expecting something of the kind, Trent sidestepped easily, and Hale nearly went off balance with his blow.

"What's the matter, Bill? I'm right here."

Hale moved in fast, swinging both fists. Trent met his rush with a left jab that split both his lips and showered him with blood. For an instant the larger man was stopped still by the shock of seeing his own blood. Then in a fury he closed in. Trent evaded the first blow, but a powerful right swing caught him alongside the head, and he staggered back on his heels. His blood staining his gray shirt, Hale closed in fast. He hit Trent again. Trent evaded another punch, more by good luck than skill, and closed with him, smashing away at Bale's body with both fists.

Throwing him off, Hale knocked him to the floor with a left. Trent rolled over and climbed to his feet, but was knocked down a second time, his head roaring with sound. As he rolled over to get up, somebody kicked him viciously in the ribs, and he caught a glimpse of Cub's malicious grin.

Hale rushed, swinging with both fists, but Trent went inside of a left and smashed a right to the heart. Hale grabbed him and threw him against the bar, then charged, swinging hard with both fists, knocking his head from side to side. Desperately Trent lunged to get away from the bar, but Hale pushed him back, measured him with a left, and started the right that was to finish it.