the Tall Stranger (1982) (12 page)

"You might fool some young sprout with that he-hasn't-asked-me business, but not me. I seen many a young buck Indian give twenty head of ponies for some squaw when he could have had better ones for ten. Just because she wanted him like, and caused him to figure the price was cheap. No, sir! I'd rather try to get away from a bear trap on each foot and each hand, than a woman with her head set on marriage."

Flushed with embarrassment, she ignored what he had said. "Then--then, you'll let us have peace, sir? You won't be fighting us if we draw off from Harper?"

"Of course not, ma'am! I reckon it'd be a right nice thing to have a few folks around once in a while!" His eyes flashed. "But no more, you understand. Only this bunch of yours. No more!"

"And we can have our land, then?" she persisted.

"Sure, you can have it. You can have what them other fellows got, too, when they get out. Sure, you can have it. I can't set my hand to paper on it, though, because I never did learn to write. That's true, ma'am! Never learned to write, nor to read. But I can put my name on the side of a house with a six-shooter. I can do that. But them pens! They always figured to be a sight too small for my hands. No, I can't read printin', but I can read sign. I trailed a Blackfoot that stole a horse from me clean to Montany one time. Trailed him six hundred miles, believe me or not. Yes, ma'am, I come back with the horse and an Indian scalp. Took it right in his own village."

A startled yell rang out and Springer burst through the door. "Boss! Boss! Here they come! Oh, quick, man! Here they--"

His voice died in the report of a gun, and Hardy Bishop lunged from his chair to see men charging the porch.

Turner had started from the bunkhouse, but the rush of the horses rode him down and they heard his wild, agonized screams as he went down under the pounding hoofs. Sharon never saw the old man reach for his guns, but suddenly they were spouting flame and she saw a man stagger back from the door, clutching at his breast, blood pouring over his hand.

Then a wild figure wearing one boot appeared from the other room, swinging gunbelts about his hips. Then Rock Bannon, too, was firing.

A sound came at the rear window, and Rock turned and fired from the hip and the dark form looming there vanished. The attack broke, and Rock Bannon rushed to the rifle rack and jerked down a Henry rifle. Then he grabbed another and ran back, thrusting one at Bishop.

The old man dropped to his knees beside a window. "Come up on us fast!" he said. "I was talkin' to this gal."

Rock's eyes swung to her, and then amazement faded to sudden grimness. With horror, she saw suspicion mount in his eyes.

A wild chorus of yells sounded from outside, and then a volley of shots smashed through the windows. The lamp scattered in a thousand pieces, and from the kitchen they heard cursing, then the crash of a buffalo gun.

"How many did you see?" Rock demanded.

"Most like a dozen," Bishop said. "We got two or three that first rush!"

"A dozen?" He wheeled to the girl. "Did the settlers come? Did they? Are they fighting us now?"

"Can't be that," Bishop said, staring out at the ranch yard, his eyes probing the corral. "No chance of that. This girl come with peace talk."

"And while she was talking, they rode in on us!" Rock raged.

Sharon came up, her eyes wide. "Oh, you can't believe that. You can't! I--"

The thud of bullets into the logs of the house drowned her voice, and the crashing of guns. Rock Bannon was slipping from window to window, moving on his feet like an Indian. He had yanked off his other boot now. A shot smashed the water olla that hung near the door. Bannon fired, and a man toppled from behind the corner of the corral and sprawled on the hard-packed ground near the body of Turner.

"They're goin' to rush us," Bannon said suddenly. He began loading his Colts. "Get set, Hardy. They're goin' to rush."

"Let 'em come! The sneak-thievin', pelt-robbin', trap-lootin' scum! Let 'em come! More'll come than'll go back!"

As the outlaws rushed suddenly, charging in a scattered line, the old man burst through the door, his Colt smoking. A man screamed and grabbed his middle, took three staggering steps, and then sprawled his full length on the ground. Another man went down, and then a gun bellowed and the old man winced, took another step and then toppled back into the room.

Sharon stared at him in horror, and then ran to him. He looked shocked.

"Hit me! They hit me! Give me my gun, ma'am. I'll kill the scum like the wolverines they are!"

"Ssh, be still," she whispered. She began tearing the shirt away from the massive chest to search for the bullet wound.

Steadily, using now one gun, then the other, Rock Bannon fired. He could sense uncertainty among the attackers. They had shot the old man, but four of their own number were down, and probably others wounded. They were beginning to lose all desire for battle.

Watching closely, Rock saw a flicker of movement behind a corral trough. He watched, lifted his rifle, took careful aim, and when the movement came again, he fired, just under the trough.

A yell rang out and he saw a man lift up to his full height, then topple over.

"All right!" Bannon shouted. "Come on and get me! You wanted me! But you'd better come before the boys get in from the north camp or they'll spoil my fun."

They wouldn't believe him, but it might make them doubtful. He heard voices raised in argument. Then there was silence. He reloaded all the guns, his own, Bishop's Henry, and the old man's six-guns. It was mid-afternoon, and the sun was hot. If they waited until night, he was going to have a bad time of it.

There was a chance, however, that they would believe his story, or fear that someone from the line cabin might ride far enough this way to hear the shots. If both groups came, they would be caught between two fires and wiped out.

An hour passed, and there was no sound.

"Rock!" Sharon was standing behind him. "We'd better get him on a bed."

He avoided her eyes, but got up and put his rifle down. It was a struggle, but they lifted Bishop off the floor and put him on his homemade four-poster. While Sharon bent over him, bathing the wound and treating it as best she could, Rock walked back to the windows.

Like a caged panther, he prowled from window to window. Outside all was still. Only the bodies of the dead lay on the hard-packed ground of the ranch yard. A dust devil started somewhere on the plain and twisted in the grass of the meadow, then skipped across the ranch yard, stirring around the body of Turner, and blowing in his hair.

Turner was dead. The old man had been with them almost as long as Rock himself. He had been like one of the family. And Bob Springer was gone, blasted from life suddenly, taking away all the young man's enthusiastic plans for a ranch of his own. Well, they would pay. They would pay to the last man.

The steel-dust stallion had come back from the end of the corral near the creek. He seemed curious and approached the body lying near the trough with delicate feet, ready to shy. He snuffed at the body, caught the scent of blood and jerked away, eyes distended and nostrils wide.

There was no one in sight; apparently the attackers had drawn off. They had anticipated no such defense as this. They had no idea that Rock Bannon was home, nor did they realize what a fighter the old man could be. They had to learn what the Crows had learned, long since.

Rock waited another hour, continuing his slow prowl. Within the house he was comparatively safe, and he knew that to go out before he was sure was to tempt fate. From time to time he went into the bedroom where Bishop lay on the four-poster. He was unconscious or asleep, Sharon sitting beside him.

He avoided her eyes, yet the thought kept returning, filling him with bitterness, that she had ridden here with peace talk, and under cover of her talk Harper's men had made their approach. Knowing Bishop, he knew that unless his attention had been diverted, no rider or group of riders could have reached the ranch without being seen.

Had she planned that with Mort Harper? Everything he knew about the girl compelled him to believe she would do nothing of the kind, yet the thought persisted, and it was almost too much of a coincidence.

After all, what reason had he to believe otherwise? Hadn't she admired Harper? Hadn't Pete Zapata been waiting in her cabin for him? Perhaps she had tried to warn him by throwing sticks on the fire, or it could have been an accident. The fact remained that in visiting her he had been almost killed in a trap laid by Zapata, and while she was making peace talk with Bishop, the raiding party had struck. It was not her fault they were not dead, both of them. He knew she came to the door from time to time, and once she started to speak, then turned away as he avoided her eyes.

Rock was crouching by a window when the sound of horse's hoofs brought him to his feet. It was Bat Chavez, astride a slim, fast buckskin. The horse shied violently at Turner's body, and Bat had a hard time getting him to the door.

Bannon rushed out. "Everything all right at the line cabin?"

"Shucks, man!" Bat exploded. "That's what I was goin' to ask you. What happened here?"

"They hit us. Dave opened up from the kitchen, Hardy and I shot it out up here. Bishop's down, hit pretty bad. They got Springer and Turner, as you can see."

"Saw them cuttin' across the valley for Poplar a few minutes ago. The boys are gettin' restless, Rock. They want to ride over and wind this up."

"No more than I do," Bannon said shortly. "Yes, we're goin'. We'll ride over and wipe that place out."

"Oh, no! You mustn't!" Sharon had come to the door behind Rock. "Please, Rock! You mustn't. The settlers don't want to fight any more. It's just Harper's crowd."

"Maybe that's true," Bannon said, "but I've seen no sign of them quittin' yet. There were at least twelve men in this bunch. Did Harper have twelve men of his own? Not that I saw, he didn't. And Zapata's dead. So's Miller. Where would he get twelve men?"

He turned back to Chavez. "Get some food into you, Bat, then ride back. I'll be down before long, and when I do, we'll cross that valley. If the settlers get in the way, they'll get what the rest of them got--what they gave Turner and Springer here! We've dallied long enough." Rock Bannon turned and walked back into the house.

Sharon stared at him, her face white. "Then you won't believe me?" she protested. "You'll go over there and kill innocent people?"

"Who killed Springer and Turner?" Rock demanded sharply. "In what way had they offended? I don't know that your settlers are innocent. I tried to tell them what they were going into and they wouldn't believe me. Well, they came, and if they get their tails in a crack they've only themselves to blame.

"I argued with them. I argued with Bishop to give them a break, and now this happens. There were twelve men in that attack on us. At least twelve! Well, some of them died out here, but you and I both know that Harper didn't have twelve men. Perhaps eight, at best. They came in here and killed two of our boys and wounded Bishop. That old man in there has been a father to me. He's been more than most fathers. He's been a guide and a teacher, and all I know I learned from him. He may die. If he does the fault was mine for ever letting this bunch of squatters in here."

The girl clasped her hands in distress. "Please, Rock," she protested, "you can't do this. Most of your men don't know one from the other. The settlers would be killed whether they fought or not. Their homes will be burned."

"If they don't fight they won't be hurt," he insisted stubbornly. "Next time that Harper attacks, he might get us all. Anyway, it looks to me as if they were plenty willing to ride in on Harper's coattails and get all they could while the getting was easy."

"That's not true," she protested hotly. "They wanted to do the right thing. They thought they were doing the right thing. They believed Harper was honest."

Rock slid into his buckskin coat and picked up his hat. His face was grim and hard. He could not look at Sharon, and knew if their eyes met it would tear the heart out of him. Yet he knew he had waited too long now, that if he had resorted to guns long ago so many things might not have happened. Springer might be living, and Turner, and Collins, the settler.

He started for the door, picking up his rifle from where he had left it. "Rock," Sharon said, "if you go back, I will, too. The first one of your men who puts a hand on a settler's home, I'll kill with my own rifle."

For the first time he looked at her, and her eyes were flashing with pain and anger. "Go then!" he said brutally. "But if you're half as smart as I think you are, you'll take your friends and head for the hills. Go! I'll give you a start. Warn Harper, too, if you want. Let him know we're coming. But if you want to save that precious pack of settlers, get them out of Poplar. Take to the hills until this is over--but be out of town before my boys ride in!"

He walked to the door and went out. She saw him stop by the corral and pick up a rope, then go to the corral for the steel-dust. Running from the house, she threw herself into the saddle of her own black mare, tied at the corner of the house, and spurring to top speed, sprang out on the long ride across the valley.

Rock Bannon did not look up, nor turn his head, but in his heart and mind the hard hoofs pounded like the pulse in his veins, pounded harder and harder, then vanished with the dying sound of the running horse.