Zane Grey (25 page)

"Howdy, Gass!" he said. "What's the good word?"

"Wal, Abel, it's not good, but bad. An' it's shore started," replied
Isbel. "I'm askin' y'u to let me have your cabin."

"You're welcome. I'll send the folks 'round to Jim's," returned
Meeker. "An' if y'u want me, I'm with y'u, Isbel."

"Thanks, Abel, but I'm not leadin' any more kin an' friends into this
heah deal."

"Wal, jest as y'u say. But I'd like damn bad to jine with y'u.... My
brother Ted was shot last night."

"Ted! Is he daid?" ejaculated Isbel, blankly.

"We can't find out," replied Meeker. "Jim says thet Jeff Campbell said
thet Ted went into Greaves's place last night. Greaves allus was
friendly to Ted, but Greaves wasn't thar—"

"No, he shore wasn't," interrupted Isbel, with a dark smile, "an' he
never will be there again."

Meeker nodded with slow comprehension and a shade crossed his face.

"Wal, Campbell claimed he'd heerd from some one who was thar. Anyway,
the Jorths were drinkin' hard, an' they raised a row with Ted—same old
sheep talk an' somebody shot him. Campbell said Ted was thrown out
back, an' he was shore he wasn't killed."

"Ahuh! Wal, I'm sorry, Abel, your family had to lose in this. Maybe
Ted's not bad hurt. I shore hope so.... An' y'u an' Jim keep out of
the fight, anyway."

"All right, Isbel. But I reckon I'll give y'u a hunch. If this heah
fight lasts long the whole damn Basin will be in it, on one side or
t'other."

"Abe, you're talkin' sense," broke in Blaisdell. "An' that's why we're
up heah for quick action."

"I heerd y'u got Daggs," whispered Meeker, as he peered all around.

"Wal, y'u heerd correct," drawled Blaisdell.

Meeker muttered strong words into his beard. "Say, was Daggs in thet
Jorth outfit?"

"He WAS. But he walked right into Jean's forty-four.... An' I reckon
his carcass would show some more."

"An' whar's Guy Isbel?" demanded Meeker.

"Daid an' buried, Abel," replied Gaston Isbel. "An' now I'd be obliged
if y'u 'll hurry your folks away, an' let us have your cabin an'
corral. Have yu got any hay for the hosses?"

"Shore. The barn's half full," replied Meeker, as he turned away.
"Come on in."

"No. We'll wait till you've gone."

When Meeker had gone, Isbel and his men sat their horses and looked
about them and spoke low. Their advent had been expected, and the
little town awoke to the imminence of the impending battle. Inside
Meeker's house there was the sound of indistinct voices of women and
the bustle incident to a hurried vacating.

Across the wide road people were peering out on all sides, some hiding,
others walking to and fro, from fence to fence, whispering in little
groups. Down the wide road, at the point where it turned, stood
Greaves's fort-like stone house. Low, flat, isolated, with its dark,
eye-like windows, it presented a forbidding and sinister aspect. Jean
distinctly saw the forms of men, some dark, others in shirt sleeves,
come to the wide door and look down the road.

"Wal, I reckon only aboot five hundred good hoss steps are separatin'
us from that outfit," drawled Blaisdell.

No one replied to his jocularity. Gaston Isbel's eyes narrowed to a
slit in his furrowed face and he kept them fastened upon Greaves's
store. Blue, likewise, had a somber cast of countenance, not, perhaps,
any darker nor grimmer than those of his comrades, but more
representative of intense preoccupation of mind. The look of him
thrilled Jean, who could sense its deadliness, yet could not grasp any
more. Altogether, the manner of the villagers and the watchful pacing
to and fro of the Jorth followers and the silent, boding front of Isbel
and his men summed up for Jean the menace of the moment that must very
soon change to a terrible reality.

At a call from Meeker, who stood at the back of the cabin, Gaston Isbel
rode into the yard, followed by the others of his party. "Somebody
look after the hosses," ordered Isbel, as he dismounted and took his
rifle and pack. "Better leave the saddles on, leastways till we see
what's comin' off."

Jean and Bill Isbel led the horses back to the corral. While watering
and feeding them, Jean somehow received the impression that Bill was
trying to speak, to confide in him, to unburden himself of some load.
This peculiarity of Bill's had become marked when he was perfectly
sober. Yet he had never spoken or even begun anything unusual. Upon
the present occasion, however, Jean believed that his brother might
have gotten rid of his emotion, or whatever it was, had they not been
interrupted by Colmor.

"Boys, the old man's orders are for us to sneak round on three sides of
Greaves's store, keepin' out of gunshot till we find good cover, an'
then crawl closer an' to pick off any of Jorth's gang who shows
himself."

Bill Isbel strode off without a reply to Colmor.

"Well, I don't think so much of that," said Jean, ponderingly. "Jorth
has lots of friends here. Somebody might pick us off."

"I kicked, but the old man shut me up. He's not to be bucked ag'in'
now. Struck me as powerful queer. But no wonder."

"Maybe he knows best. Did he say anythin' about what he an' the rest
of them are goin' to do?"

"Nope. Blue taxed him with that an' got the same as me. I reckon we'd
better try it out, for a while, anyway."

"Looks like he wants us to keep out of the fight," replied Jean,
thoughtfully. "Maybe, though ... Dad's no fool. Colmor, you wait here
till I get out of sight. I'll go round an' come up as close as
advisable behind Greaves's store. You take the right side. An' keep
hid."

With that Jean strode off, going around the barn, straight out the
orchard lane to the open flat, and then climbing a fence to the north
of the village. Presently he reached a line of sheds and corrals, to
which he held until he arrived at the road. This point was about a
quarter of a mile from Greaves's store, and around the bend. Jean
sighted no one. The road, the fields, the yards, the backs of the
cabins all looked deserted. A blight had settled down upon the
peaceful activities of Grass Valley. Crossing the road, Jean began to
circle until he came close to several cabins, around which he made a
wide detour. This took him to the edge of the slope, where brush and
thickets afforded him a safe passage to a line directly back of
Greaves's store. Then he turned toward it. Soon he was again
approaching a cabin of that side, and some of its inmates descried him,
Their actions attested to their alarm. Jean half expected a shot from
this quarter, such were his growing doubts, but he was mistaken. A
man, unknown to Jean, closely watched his guarded movements and then
waved a hand, as if to signify to Jean that he had nothing to fear.
After this act he disappeared. Jean believed that he had been
recognized by some one not antagonistic to the Isbels. Therefore he
passed the cabin and, coming to a thick scrub-oak tree that offered
shelter, he hid there to watch. From this spot he could see the back
of Greaves's store, at a distance probably too far for a rifle bullet
to reach. Before him, as far as the store, and on each side, extended
the village common. In front of the store ran the road. Jean's
position was such that he could not command sight of this road down
toward Meeker's house, a fact that disturbed him. Not satisfied with
this stand, he studied his surroundings in the hope of espying a
better. And he discovered what he thought would be a more favorable
position, although he could not see much farther down the road. Jean
went back around the cabin and, coming out into the open to the right,
he got the corner of Greaves's barn between him and the window of the
store. Then he boldly hurried into the open, and soon reached an old
wagon, from behind which he proposed to watch. He could not see either
window or door of the store, but if any of the Jorth contingent came
out the back way they would be within reach of his rifle. Jean took
the risk of being shot at from either side.

So sharp and roving was his sight that he soon espied Colmor slipping
along behind the trees some hundred yards to the left. All his efforts
to catch a glimpse of Bill, however, were fruitless. And this appeared
strange to Jean, for there were several good places on the right from
which Bill could have commanded the front of Greaves's store and the
whole west side.

Colmor disappeared among some shrubbery, and Jean seemed left alone to
watch a deserted, silent village. Watching and listening, he felt that
the time dragged. Yet the shadows cast by the sun showed him that, no
matter how tense he felt and how the moments seemed hours, they were
really flying.

Suddenly Jean's ears rang with the vibrant shock of a rifle report. He
jerked up, strung and thrilling. It came from in front of the store.
It was followed by revolver shots, heavy, booming. Three he counted,
and the rest were too close together to enumerate. A single hoarse
yell pealed out, somehow trenchant and triumphant. Other yells, not so
wild and strange, muffled the first one. Then silence clapped down on
the store and the open square.

Jean was deadly certain that some of the Jorth clan would show
themselves. He strained to still the trembling those sudden shots and
that significant yell had caused him. No man appeared. No more sounds
caught Jean's ears. The suspense, then, grew unbearable. It was not
that he could not wait for an enemy to appear, but that he could not
wait to learn what had happened. Every moment that he stayed there,
with hands like steel on his rifle, with eyes of a falcon, but added to
a dreadful, dark certainty of disaster. A rifle shot swiftly followed
by revolver shots! What could, they mean? Revolver shots of different
caliber, surely fired by different men! What could they mean? It was
not these shots that accounted for Jean's dread, but the yell which had
followed. All his intelligence and all his nerve were not sufficient
to fight down the feeling of calamity. And at last, yielding to it, he
left his post, and ran like a deer across the open, through the cabin
yard, and around the edge of the slope to the road. Here his caution
brought him to a halt. Not a living thing crossed his vision. Breaking
into a run, he soon reached the back of Meeker's place and entered, to
hurry forward to the cabin.

Colmor was there in the yard, breathing hard, his face working, and in
front of him crouched several of the men with rifles ready. The road,
to Jean's flashing glance, was apparently deserted. Blue sat on the
doorstep, lighting a cigarette. Then on the moment Blaisdell strode to
the door of the cabin. Jean had never seen him look like that.

"Jean—look—down the road," he said, brokenly, and with big hand
shaking he pointed down toward Greaves's store.

Like lightning Jean's glance shot down—down—down—until it stopped to
fix upon the prostrate form of a man, lying in the middle of the road.
A man of lengthy build, shirt-sleeved arms flung wide, white head in
the dust—dead! Jean's recognition was as swift as his sight. His
father! They had killed him! The Jorths! It was done. His father's
premonition of death had not been false. And then, after these
flashing thoughts, came a sense of blankness, momentarily almost
oblivion, that gave place to a rending of the heart. That pain Jean
had known only at the death of his mother. It passed, this agonizing
pang, and its icy pressure yielded to a rushing gust of blood, fiery as
hell.

"Who—did it?" whispered Jean.

"Jorth!" replied Blaisdell, huskily. "Son, we couldn't hold your dad
back.... We couldn't. He was like a lion.... An' he throwed his life
away! Oh, if it hadn't been for that it 'd not be so awful. Shore, we
come heah to shoot an' be shot. But not like that.... By God, it was
murder—murder!"

Jean's mute lips framed a query easily read.

"Tell him, Blue. I cain't," continued Blaisdell, and he tramped back
into the cabin.

"Set down, Jean, an' take things easy," said Blue, calmly. "You know
we all reckoned we'd git plugged one way or another in this deal. An'
shore it doesn't matter much how a fellar gits it. All thet ought to
bother us is to make shore the other outfit bites the dust—same as
your dad had to."

Under this man's tranquil presence, all the more quieting because it
seemed to be so deadly sure and cool, Jean felt the uplift of his dark
spirit, the acceptance of fatality, the mounting control of faculties
that must wait. The little gunman seemed to have about his inert
presence something that suggested a rattlesnake's inherent knowledge of
its destructiveness. Jean sat down and wiped his clammy face.

"Jean, your dad reckoned to square accounts with Jorth, an' save us
all," began Blue, puffing out a cloud of smoke. "But he reckoned too
late. Mebbe years; ago—or even not long ago—if he'd called Jorth out
man to man there'd never been any Jorth-Isbel war. Gaston Isbel's
conscience woke too late. That's how I figger it."

"Hurry! Tell me—how it—happen," panted Jean.

"Wal, a little while after y'u left I seen your dad writin' on a leaf
he tore out of a book—Meeker's Bible, as yu can see. I thought thet
was funny. An' Blaisdell gave me a hunch. Pretty soon along comes
young Evarts. The old man calls him out of our hearin' an' talks to
him. Then I seen him give the boy somethin', which I afterward figgered
was what he wrote on the leaf out of the Bible. Me an' Blaisdell both
tried to git out of him what thet meant. But not a word. I kept
watchin' an' after a while I seen young Evarts slip out the back way.
Mebbe half an hour I seen a bare-legged kid cross, the road an' go into
Greaves's store.... Then shore I tumbled to your dad. He'd sent a note
to Jorth to come out an' meet him face to face, man to man! ... Shore
it was like readin' what your dad had wrote. But I didn't say nothin'
to Blaisdell. I jest watched."