CHAPTER XV
THE RAID OF THE FALLING WALL
Against the alert, the effective blow is a sudden blow. Secrecy, and asurprise, were the only hope of success in what the cattlemen were nowattempting in the Falling Wall. Of the men on whom they could count toorganize and carry through such a raid, they had just one capable ofenergizing every detail--Harry Van Horn. Laramie, the man Doubledayand Pettigrew would have chosen, they had failed to enlist, and whatwas more serious--though this, perhaps, Doubleday did not realize--theyhad likewise failed to rid themselves of; Tom Stone had bungled.
But Doubleday in especial was not a man to lose time over a failure.He knew that Van Horn had "go" enough in him to clean out a wholecounty if he were given the men and backing, and that he stood high inthe councils of the range. When Van Horn spoke, men listened. His eyeflashed with his words and his long, straight hair shook defiance atopposition. He swore with a staccato that really meant things and cutlike a knife. When once started, mercy was not in him.
In the Falling Wall park there lived a mere handful of men, and thesewidely scattered; but Van Horn was the last man to underestimate thehandful he was after. He knew them every one, and knew that no bettermen ever rode the range than Stormy Gorman, Dutch Henry, YankeeRobinson and Abe Hawk, and their associates--if, indeed, for a man thatnever mixed with other men, Hawk could be said to have associates.
But the four named were the men to whom the lesser rustlers of the parklooked; the men whose exploits they imitated, and these were the men onwhose heads a price had, in effect, been set.
Van Horn assembled his men, earlier than Lefever had been informed. Anold trail from Doubleday's ranch to the Falling Wall crosses the roadto the Fort some distance north of Sleepy Cat. The party from theranch--Tom Stone with some of the most reckless cowboys andDoubleday--waited there for the Texans whom Van Horn was bringing fromPettigrew's. Both parties were at the rendezvous that night by twelveo'clock, and within thirty minutes were headed north by way of theCrazy Woman for Falling Wall park.
The night for the raid had been chosen. The sky was overcast, and whenthe party left the crossing between twelve and one o'clock their exactdestination was still a secret to the greater number. Small ranchersalong the creek might have wakened at the smart clatter of so manyhorses, but men to and from the Fort traveled late at times and madeeven more noise. This night there were riders abroad; but there was nosinging.
Dawn was whitening the eastern sky when the raiding party halted near aclump of trees on the south fork of the Turkey. The valley into whichthey had ridden during the night was very broken, but offered goodgrazing. Along the tortuous water course, Stormy Gorman, the oldprize-fighter, and Dutch Henry, the ex-soldier, had preempted two ofthe very few pieces of land that did not stand directly on edge andbuilt for themselves cabins. Gorman's cabin lay a mile above the forkwhere the raiders had halted; Henry's lay a few miles farther up thecreek.
During the long night ride it had been decided to strike at Gorman'sranch first; thence to follow the creek trail up to Dutch Henry's,despatch him in turn, to cross rapidly a narrow rough divide beyondwhich they could reach Hawk's cabin on the east fork of the Turkey andthence sweep into the northwest to clean out the smaller fry--the"chicken feed" rustlers--as Van Horn called them. But toward morning,following much ill-natured dispute between Stone and Van Horn, thetactics were changed. It was decided to go after Dutch Henry first--asthe more alert and slippery of the two--and as quietly as possible thesilent invaders rode slowly along the creek past Gorman's place up toHenry's.
Day was breaking as the riders, dismounting and leaving their horses onthe creek bottom, crept noiselessly, under Stone's guidance, up a washto the bench on which Henry's cabin stood. Hiding just below a shallowbank at the head of a draw, they lay awaiting developments. WhereStone had posted them they commanded the cabin perfectly. He had livedpart of one year with Henry when they two preyed jointly on the rangeand he knew the ground well.
They had hardly disposed of themselves in this manner and werebeginning, in the gray dusk, to distinguish objects with somecertainty, when the door of the distant cabin opened and a mongrelcollie bounded out followed by a man who left the door ajar. The man,carrying a water pail, set it down, yawned, stretched himself andtucked his shirt slowly inside his trousers. Wild with joy the dogdanced, leaped and barked about his master--only to be rewarded by akick that sent him yelping to a little distance, where turning,crouching with extended paws, whining and frantically wagging his tail,the poor beast tried to beg forgiveness for its half-starved happiness.The man, giving this demonstration no heed, picked up the pail andstarted for the creek.
His path took him in a direction roughly parallel to the line alongwhich his hidden enemy lay.
"Don't fire at that man," exclaimed Van Horn to his companions undercover of the draw. "That's not Dutch Henry," he whispered the nextmoment. "Don't fire. I'll take care of him."
The rustler, quite unconscious of his deadly danger, tramped unevenlyon. His dog, no longer repulsed, dashed joyously back and forth,scenting the trails of the night and barking wildly at his master byturns. The man was walking hardly three hundred yards from whereStone, rifle in hand, lay, and had reached the footpath leading fromthe bench to the creek bottom when Stone, half rising, covered himslowly with point-blank sights. In the path ahead, the dog had strucka fresh gopher hole and, still yelping, was pawing madly into it, whena rifle cracked. The man with the pail, swung violently half around bythe shock of a spreading bullet, jerked convulsively and the pail flewclattering from his hand. He struggled an instant to keep his footing,then collapsing, fell prone across the path and lay quite still.
Stone, followed by a man nearest him, scrambling down the draw, hurriedalong the creek bottom, and ran up to reach the path where the murderedman lay. The dog, barking and dashing wildly around his prostratemaster, spied the foreman and sprang furiously down the trail at him.Stone, rifle in one hand and revolver in the other, was ready, and,firing from the hip, broke the collie's back. With a howl the strickenbrute turned, and, dragging his helpless hindquarters along the groundwith incredible swiftness, pawed himself back to the dying man's headand yelping, licked frantically at the hand of his master. Coming upinto plain sight, Stone got a good look at the man he had killed:"Stormy Gorman!" he exclaimed, with an oath of surprise. "Who'd 'a'thought," he continued, "that big bum would be up at Dutch Henry's thismorning!"
The old prize-fighter was struggling in his last round. Hisheavy-lidded eyes, swollen with drink and sleep, were closed, and fromhis mouth, as his head hung to one side, a dark stream ran to a littlepool in the dust. Only a stertorous breathing reflected his effort tolive and even this was fast failing. Van Horn hurried up the path fromthe bottom, whither he had followed Stone; anger was all over his face:"Kill that damned dog," he exclaimed, out of breath, to those abouthim. Two of the three men drew revolvers and shot the collie throughthe head.
"Damnation!" cried Van Horn in a fury. "Stop your shooting. Couldn'tyou knock him in the head? Do you want to start up the whole country?"he demanded, as he saw the man who lay at his feet and had taken thebrief count for eternity was Gorman. He turned on Stone with rage inhis eyes and his voice: "Now," he cried, punctuating his abuse with thefiercest gestures, "you've done it, haven't you!" Anger almost chokedhim. "You've got Gorman with a brass band and left Dutch Henry in thecabin waiting for us, haven't you? Why," he roared, "didn't you obeyorders, let this tank get down to the bottom and knock him on the headinto the creek?" A violent recrimination between Stone and Van Hornfollowed. But the milk was spilt as well as the blood of the stubbornrustler, and there was nothing for it but new dispositions.
Gorman's presence indicated that Henry was at home. If he were athome, he was, no doubt, within the cabin; but just how, after Stone'sblunder, to get at him, was a vexing question.
Van Horn started down the foot trail back to the bottom and around tothe first hiding place.
Lingering with a companion to look at Gormanin his blood, Stone turned for approval: "See where I hit him?" hegrinned. "Poor light, too."
A brief council was held in the draw. Watched for more than an hour,not the slightest sign of life about the lonely cabin could bedetected. Various expedients, none of them very novel, were tried todraw Henry's fire should he be within. But these were of no avail. Adozen theories were advanced as to where Henry might or might not be.To every appearance there was not, so far as the enemy could judge, aliving man within miles of the spot. The older heads, Pettigrew,Doubleday, Van Horn, even Stone, talked less than the others; but theywere by no means convinced that the house was empty.
One of the least patient of the cowboys at length deliberately exposedhimself to fire from the sphinx-like cabin. He stood up and walked upand down the edge of the draw. Nothing happened. Emboldened, hestarted out into the open and toward the cabin. No shot greeted him.A companion, jumping up, hurried after him; a third, a Texas boy,sprang up to join them. For those watching from hiding it was aticklish moment. Toward the draw there was a considerable growth ofmountain blue-stem, none of it very high and gradually shorteningnearer the house. The three men were hastening through the grass,separated by intervals of perhaps fifty feet. The foremost got withina hundred yards of the cabin door, which still stood open as Gorman hadleft it, before Van Horn's fear of an ambush vanished. He himself, notto be too far behind his followers, then rose to join the processionthrough the blue stem and the crack of a rifle was heard. Van Horn,with a shout of warning, dropped unhurt into the draw. But the lastman of the three in the field stumbled as if struck by an ax. Of thetwo men ahead of him, the hindermost dropped into the grass and crawledsnakelike back; the man in front dropped his rifle and started at topspeed for safety; from the edge of the draw his companions sent afusillade of rifle fire at the cabin.
Apparently the diversion had no effect on the marksman within. Hefired again; this time at the Texan crawling in the blue stem, and thehalf-hidden man, almost lifted from the ground by the blow of thebullet, dropped limp. Meantime the first cowboy in his dash for safetywas making a record still unequaled in mountain story. He jumped likea broncho and zig-zagged like a darting bird, but faster than either.The efforts of his companions to divert attention from him wereconstant. Some of them poured bullets at the cabin. Others jumped totheir feet, and, yelling, sprang from point to point to exposethemselves momentarily and draw the fire of the enemy. This was of noavail. The hidden rifle with deliberate instancy cracked once more.The fleeing cowboy, slammed as if by a club, dashed on, but his rightarm hung limp. No snipe ever made half the race for life that he putup in those fleeting seconds; and by his agility he earned then andthere the nickname of the bird itself, for before the deadly sightscould cover his flight again he threw himself into a slight depressionthat effectually hid him from the range of the enemy.
A swarm of hornets, roused, could not have been more furious than thecompany under the lee of the draw. Shooting, shouting, cursing deepand loud, they made continual effort to keep the deadly fire off theirfallen companions. They saw the half-open door of the cabin swing nowslowly shut and they riddled it with bullets. They splintered the logsabout it and, scattering in as wide an arc as they dare, continued topour a fire into the silent cabin. At intervals they paused to waitfor a return. There was no return. All ruses they had ever heard ofthey tried over again to draw a fire and exhaust the besieged man'sammunition. Nothing moved the lone enemy--if he were, indeed, alone.The day wore into afternoon. By shouting, the assailants learned thattwo of their three hapless companions lying in the blue stem were stillalive--the Snipe very much alive, as his stentorian answers indicated.He called vigorously for water but got none. His refuge was tooexposed.
How to get rid of Dutch Henry taxed the wits of the invaders. Thewhole morning and the early afternoon went to pot-luck firing from thetrench along the draw, but although it was often asserted that Henrymust long since be dead--having returned none of the shooting that wasmeant to call his fire--no one manifested the curiosity necessary toprove the assertion by closing in on the cabin. Stone was stillsulking over Van Horn's sharp talk of the morning when Van Horn cameover to where the foreman had posted himself to cover the cabin door:"We've got to get that guy before dark, Tom, or he'll slip us."
"All right," replied Stone, "get him."