It is a terrible thing to be hunted, Zeke knew that. He could see the faces of dead men now, between the storefront and the street. Les Harmon, the sheriff of Mesa, would shoot on sight and shoot to kill.
What would they think of Zeke Tomlin in Dry Creek then? He was respected. He could mend their saddles and stand up to their poker bluffs. He said “Howdy” to the marshal and voted in the elections. But he had only been there nine months. He was a stranger in town.
He was a stranger in town who had come riding one dusk on a wind-broken horse to fall from his saddle over by the Golden Horn. They’d given him water and they’d found him a job. He had stayed. He had never quite belonged, some of these men had known each other all their lives.
If Les Harmon told them the story, they’d be ashamed they’d known Zeke; they’d believe a lawman. Dry Creek’s marshal, Tom Brennerman, would buy Les a drink and the man from Mesa would ride away. If Zeke yelled now, Harmon would tell what he knew. If he didn’t yell, Harmon would kill him. If he killed Harmon—well, they hanged a man who killed the law, didn’t they?
Zeke’s throat was dry and hot. He looked across to see Les Harmon watering his horse in front of the Golden Horn. Harmon would flash his badge and ask for Zeke Tomlin. Then he’d come across the street—Zeke tried to swallow and found he couldn’t.
There was no sense in running. Dry Creek was the only town in this large cattle basin, beyond that the desert was dry and wide and a horse left tracks. And then there was his leg. He had not done much riding after Les Harmon’s .44 had taken him nine months and more ago.
He was caught. Time had kept the trail open, not closed it. Les Harmon had not given up.
Zeke tried to think of how he could have given his whereabouts away, but all Zeke could think about was the trail which had stayed open.
It had started innocently enough: a fight in a saloon where a bartender had tried to take all Zeke’s money at once with knockout drops.
Zeke had felt young and free then. He hadn’t killed a man. He was just a good-looking, go-to-hell puncher with a summer’s wages to spend, a crooked grin on his face and his blond hair standing straight up with devilment. He hadn’t meant anybody any harm.
The bartender had put too many in the slug and Zeke had tasted it. That had begun the long trail. It stood like yesterday between Zeke and the street, a painful haze of circumstance out of which a few details moved clear.
Mesa was a crooked town. It had sprung up with a railroad and it fought its fights from ambush. It was a cloud of wickedness on the clean range. That was what the preacher had said and he had been right. Gamblers, women, toughs had settled at this final end-of-line which stopped two spans of railroad tracks head-on to span a continent. Few punchers had been there. Zeke had been drifting south from Wyoming. He had not intended to stay beyond the night. But he had tasted the Mickey Finn and he had thrown the glass straight into the bartender’s face.
The fight had been brief. Zeke had gone half over the bar to punish his man, when a loafing tough, anxious for a drink, took sides and a chair from behind. Zeke Tomlin was stretched out in the sawdust.
Les Harmon had come in and his star looked big. He had taken Zeke’s gun and with some help had dragged him to the nearby calabozo where the cell door had clanged.
Zeke lay for some time in the dark. He had had a little to drink and he had swallowed some of the Mickey. He did not immediately become aware of the voices in the sheriff’s office. Then: “All right,” he heard one say. “They’re too sore about their payroll for us to take chances. But it sounds kind of crazy just the same.”
“Take him and do like I said!” said Harmon with a strange eagerness.
A blustering big man, black-booted and frock-coated with a yard of string tie, opened the door. “Hey, sonny,” the big man had said. “If you want to get out of here, you can give us a hand.”
“I’m stayin’,” said Zeke.
One of the hard cases with the big man said, “Shall we persuade him, Big George?”
Big George nodded and they stood Zeke up, three of them, and shoved him out to his horse. Zeke saw Les Harmon’s hard, cold face under the kerosene lamp in the office. Les Harmon was faintly amused.
They put Zeke on a horse and tied his legs to the cinch and led him out of town through the shadows. The yellow squares of light lay behind them in the desert when they halted at last.
“Gag him,” said Big George.
Zeke glared but they gagged him, tight so that it was hard to breathe. Then they passed the bridle off his horse and let Zeke have his hands.
“It’s about ten,” said Big George, looking at the stars. “She won’t be along for another half-hour.”
Zeke saw then they were beside a faint road. The group was looking back at the town, sitting tensely, fussing with their reins.
“Hope nobody starts in from the mine,” said somebody.
“They won’t,” said Big George. “The boss won’t let them off until they get their full week’s work out. They don’t think they’ll get their pay and nobody is liable to quit without it.”
One of the owl-hoots snickered nervously. “They’ll have to wait longer than that.”
“Shut up,” said Big George.
It was cold and the desert wind was sharp through Zeke’s shirt. The stars snapped brilliantly in their countless millions. The horses moved restively back and forth around the boulder which Big George had taken for his station.
“All right,” said Big George, looking for his clock amongst the stars. “You and Eddy climb down and take them from the right side of the trail. Bill, you and Oofty take cover behind this rock. Mike, take the horses and get back out of range.”
They had snapped a lead rope on Zeke’s mount. Big George led it off the trail and stood there, waiting. The desert wind was blowing colder through Zeke’s shirt. He heard the man called Mike taking the horses well off the trail and then hoofclicks over dry, hard stone. There was a riverbed near at hand.
It was terribly dark. The stars in their brilliance made the earth seem blacker. The smell of sage was keen in the cold air.
Something was coming from town now. The far-off rumble grew louder and the ground began to tremble under the pound of hoofs and coach wheels. It was traveling dark and traveling fast.
It came nearer. Suddenly from both sides of the trail flame spat. The two lead horses, shot squarely, were two wrenching screams in the night. A shouting confusion swelled up with the unseen dust. More guns blasted, orange and blinding.
Men swore. One last shot sounded and a groan died out. The man called Bill rode up.
“They won’t tell nobody nothin’ now,” said Bill.
“You sure?” said Big George.
“Sure I’m sure,” said Bill.
“Take this rope,” said Big George and rode toward the wrecked stage. Presently one final shot sounded and Big George came back. “You’d bungle everything if I didn’t wipe your noses for you. You got the pouch, Mike?”
“I got it,” said Oofty.
“Let’s ride,” said Bill nervously.
“Not so fast,” said Big George. “All right, you.”
He took hold of Zeke’s gag and ripped it loose. He hung the bridle on Zeke’s pommel.
Zeke said nothing. He knew it wouldn’t do any good.
“Give me that pouch,” said Big George. He took a sheaf of bills from it, and stuffed several by the edge under the cinch of Zeke’s saddle. Big George tested the lashings which secured Zeke’s legs and then put on two new ones, lower down.
Zeke’s horse began to tremble. Big George was shoving something under the saddle blanket.
“You take my advice,” said Big George, “and ride! The sheriff will be here in about twenty minutes. He’ll have a few friends and they’ll be plenty mad when they see them horses. The sheriff will shoot you on sight. My advice is ride.”
He slashed the mount’s rump with his knife and the horse leaped forward. A quirt popped and the hors
e began to run, blindly, crazily, splitting the cold desert wind.
He slashed the mount’s rump with his knife and the horse leaped forward. A quirt popped and the horse began to run, blindly, crazily, splitting the cold desert wind.
Crazy with the cut and whatever was under the blanket—driven down by each leap—the horse reached across the range, slashing through sage, stumbling and springing up again.
Zeke knew why he was there now. To make a trail while the others took a streambed. He knew why Les Harmon had given up a prisoner. Sometime since, the sheriff would have been “surprised” by the far-off gunfire and would have ridden forth with the mine company’s friends in town. It was coldblooded, it would work. They must have done it before.
The maddened horse raced on. They would count on Zeke’s attempts to free himself. He determined he would not. Let the mine company find him as he was.
And then the horse nearly plunged off a cliff and went careening over a slide. Zeke began to contort himself to get at the lashings on his legs and feet.
The horse had obviously not come from town. He had no destination. He was running with pain and whatever was under the saddle blanket. Zeke got the lashings off one leg. And then fate at once hurt and helped him.
The horse went into a hole and the snap of its breaking leg was loud. It fell on its neck and toward the side Zeke had freed. Stunned, Zeke rose in a little while from the dead mount and unwound the lashings from his other leg.
He was unsteady and sick, badly shaken and scared. He thought he could hear hoofbeats off somewhere. He would have no defense. Les Harmon was riding up to kill him and solve a robbery.
Zeke felt under the cinch. The implanted bills were gone, strewn back to make a trail. How far he had come and just where the holdup lay, Zeke did not know. He knew he had to have a gun. There were guns back there with the dead men.
He skirted his dead horse and climbed over hard rock to a ridge. He stood and looked and found the lights of Mesa. He was not sure of his landmarks but he had some vague recollection of where north had been at the holdup and where the town had lain.
He wondered if he dared approach the town. He could try to tell them about Harmon and Big George. But it came to him suddenly that he was a stranger in town. Who would know him or believe him? He was just a puncher on the loose with his summer’s pay. A stranger in town.
Zeke walked the ridge, listening over his heartbeats to the sigh of the desert wind. Pursuit would come to him sooner or later.
Then he recalled that there might be a horse at the holdup and he walked faster.
About an hour later he crossed the trail. He looked intently at the lights of the town and tried to judge whether they were further or nearer than the holdup. They seemed smaller but distance was deceptive in this clear air and he had gone almost a mile before he knew that he had guessed wrong. He was well off the trail, staying on rocks where he could. He went back. He was getting nervous. By this time several people would be around the wreck. He was certain of this. If they’d left a gun—
He had guessed right about the people. There were lanterns bobbing and even at a distance one could see the bodies under the blankets, beside the broken wheels of the coach. There were lots of legs around the lanterns, throwing long, thick shadows outward from the scene.
Zeke kept to the sage and watched. Once he heard somebody shout to an approaching rider, “You get him, Harmon?”
“This ain’t Harmon. I come back with my horse lame. They got his trail.”
“Funny, just one man.”
“There mighta been more. Harmon says it was probably just one. They’ll have him before mornin’! Harmon says it mighta been that waddy that tried to bust up Sloppy Joe. He heered about the coach load and got hisself out of jail. Sawed the bars.”
“Young, tow-headed kid in a red shirt?”
“That’s him. Harmon says to kill him on sight. He’s wanted in ten states and five territories.”
“Seems funny, just one man. Ground looks like it’s been dragged around here.”
“You ain’t got no Apache in you, Blucher. Shut up.”
“Still, seems funny.”
“Harmon says to shoot him on sight.”
“I think he had friends.”
“He ain’t got no friends. He’s just some owl-hoot stranger.”
“Let’s get back to town. I’m dry. Harmon’s got five men with him.”
“I’m sticking around to see what happens.”
They continued to remain around the coach. Somebody built a fire. The night wind stiffened.
Zeke gave it up. He was shivering with nervousness and cold, and he knew it would be daylight before long. Suddenly he felt himself getting mad.
Zeke got up and walked to the dry riverbed. He cast up and down it for some time, feeling rocks, not daring to strike a light. Suddenly he became interested. His questing fingers had found a rough place on a stone where the riverbed narrowed, upstream from the holdup. He walked rapidly then, sure of the distance of Big George from the scene of the murders. He got madder as he walked. He had no slightest notion of what he would do. He kept on walking.
Somewhere ahead would be Big George.
It was dawn and Zeke was still walking. It was easier now to catch these occasional chips from the stone and the very rare prints in the sand patches, but it was terribly dangerous now that Big George might look back.
Zeke kept on walking. At noon he found a muddied pool and drank heavily from it, sure now that Big George could not be far ahead of him. He was getting even madder.
In midafternoon he walked with less spring. It was getting heavier, this stone going, and the riverbed was rising sharply into the hills. If it had been alive, he would have died where he was from a bullet.
A shirt was barely showing in a crevice. They had stoned a man out of sight. Zeke pulled away the gray boulders and found the body of a hard-faced young man. The wound was old and it had bled a lot. Then Big George’s people had not entirely escaped in the holdup. He didn’t know if this was Mike or Oofty or who. He could not recall their names. But they had buried him where he had died. Ten minutes’ more work and Zeke sat down in disappointment. They had buried this man but they had taken his guns.
Zeke put the stones in place and went on up the riverbed. Here, in the wet season, cascades had fallen. The going got harder and the climb more steep and it was nightfall before the stream began to branch and dwindle.
Hungry and thirsty to the point of torment, Zeke threw himself down on the bank of the dry stream and rested. He did not know this country. His horse and his gear were gone. He had no weapons and he was hunted.
He walked now by the faint light of the quarter moon which would soon be gone and his way was slow because he had to locate tracks each time the dry bed forked.
It was midnight when he found water and he drank it in great gulps, trying to stop himself but unable to repress the tremendous greed of his thirst. He was sick for a short time and then began to feel better. Some courage came back into him.
Suddenly he sat up and asked himself what he was doing here. It was a queer sensation. Like a man waking from a nightmare and finding it was real. What was he doing here?
He tried to piece back over his logic without effect. So shocked had he been after the fall that he could not even remember what had happened when he left the holdup. Vaguely he remembered feeling angry and smart. The last place Harmon would permit anybody to look was on the track of Big George. That thought must have been with him. It was all animal cunning, hardly rational at all, the cleverness of the hunted, the fox doubling his tracks to elude the pack. But he had no gun to front Big George and Big George had guns and men.
Even if he went back and tried to tell them that Big George had done the robbery, they would shoot him down. Those men had been furious with the killing of the coach horses and the men they knew. And Zeke was just a stranger in town.
But he had no other way to go and he could not retrace what
he had so arduously won in distance. The moon was gone sometime since but he had stopped looking for Big George’s tracks. All he wanted to do was get out of the country.
After some interminable time—an hour—he heard the running of water and came at length to the edge of a stream which was encased by cliffs. He had passed the divide of the hills. The old streambed he had traveled had once carried some of the burden of this present river. He sensed himself in a tumbled, dangerous country and the roar of the water in the deep gorge was frightening, deep and savage.
For an hour or more he felt his way along the canyon rim, trying to find a way down. It was dangerous work in the darkness. He finally stopped and rested. It was then he saw the pinpoint of light through trees.
Hope came up to him. He had money. He could perhaps buy a horse and a gun and a canteen and food. Perhaps he had a chance now. He went eagerly toward the light.
It was a hut, closed about by rocks and pines, situated on a tiny creek. Zeke moved more rapidly toward it. He came to the door and raised his fist to knock.
An instant before his knuckles struck he heard, “To hell with Harmon, I say. It’s an easy ride to New Mexico!” It was the voice of Big George and Big George was drunk.
“I don’t like to chance it,” said Oofty. “He’s half bloodhound. You see him the night he killed Sammy Walker? By God, his eyes! He’s death-hungry, I tell you. He’d rather hunt down a man for the kill than eat. I swear he would. I ain’t runnin’ out without makin’ sure he gets at least some of his share.”
“You’re a fool!” roared Big George.
“Hell, that ain’t no secret,” said Mike. “I ain’t afraid of Harmon. Pass me the bottle. He’s a hog, wantin’ half. Who’s afraid of Harmon?”
“I am,” said Bill. “He’s kill-crazy. You think it’s just the good idea of it that made him figure out a man to hunt. He loves it. The idea is loony. I said many a time if the hoss stumbled, there’d be a man tied up and pinned down. Harmon likes to hunt. I’m fer splittin’ like he wants and gettin’ more.”