CHAPTER XVIII
HAWK QUARRELS WITH LARAMIE
On the morning the raiders entered the Falling Wall, Laramie hadstarted with Henry Sawdy for the Reservation to appraise some allottedIndian lands. Laramie rode home that night; Sawdy, promising to stopat the ranch on his way down in the morning, stayed overnight at theFort with Colonel Pearson. Laramie got home late. He was asleep nextmorning when a door was pushed open and a man walked unceremoniously inon him. To what instinct some mountain men owe their composure whendisturbed in their sleep by a friend, as contrasted with the instantdefense they offer in like circumstances to an enemy, it would bedifficult to say--certainly there is a difference.
Laramie half opened his eyes to realize that Abe Hawk had come into hisroom and seated himself on the one chair. The sleepy man was notinclined to wake up. "You're early, Abe," was his only greeting. Hawkmade no answer.
After a further effort the drowsy man roused himself to the attentionthat seemed demanded in the case: "Going somewhere?" he mumbledperfunctorily.
"Yes." Hawk's hard tone might have surprised his host for a moment;but if it did, drowsiness overpowered his senses once more and it wassome time before he realized that his visitor was sitting silent at hisside and that he himself ought to say something. In protest he shiftedhis comfortable position in bed: "Get your breakfast ready, Abe," hesuggested, hospitably, but with his heavy eyes closed.
"I've had breakfast."
"Where you bound for today?"
"On a long trip."
"Which way?"
"Home."
"What do you mean, 'home'?"
"I mean hell, Larrie--the home long waiting for me."
Laramie's eyes batted slowly. Not a half a dozen times in all theirlong acquaintance had Hawk shortened Laramie's name in speaking to him;and then only when he spoke as he rarely did from a depth always hiddenfrom the men among whom his wasted life had been spent. Roused bysomething in the utterance of his guest, Laramie looked up.
If the sight was a shock, the mountain man gave no outward sign of it.The lower right side of Hawk's face had been torn away as if by someexplosion, and blood, darkened by clay and rude styptics, clotted thelong beard that naturally fell in a glossy black. His disorderedgarments, blood-smeared and hanging loose--his coat sleeve and hisshirt torn from his forearm for bandages, his soft hat jammed low overhis eyes--for an instant, Laramie hardly recognized him. But the coldblack eyes that looked out of the wreck of a man before him pierced soclearly the long shadows of the early light that Laramie had no choicebut to realize it was Hawk and even the shock only served to restrainand steady him. He showed but little of his amazement when he sat upand spoke quietly: "What's up, Abe?"
"Night before last I was playing cards with Gorman over at Henry's.After daylight Gorman went out for a bucket of water. We heard a riflecrack. I looked out the window. Stormy was tumbling.
"You know the draw that runs down past his corral? Barb Doubleday,Pettigrew, Van Horn, Stone and a bunch of cowboys and Texas men lay inthat draw. It was hell to pay from daylight till dark. The Dutchmangot laid out cold right at the start. They tried to rush me. Istopped three of 'em and dug myself in. We went at it hammer andtongs. In the afternoon they put a hole through my whiskers. Afterawhile they clipped my shoulder. Then I got a bullet through my arm."He held up his left forearm swathed in a mass of soiled andblood-soaked bandages. And he told of Van Horn's go-devil.
"The raid's on," muttered Laramie.
"Soon as it was dark, I began to dig under the sill," Hawk went on."They began lighting fires. I knew they couldn't keep those going agreat while. About ten o'clock I crawled out under the front sill andgot to the creek; I never was so gone for water in my life. I set acandle so it would fire the shack when it burned down and sneaked ahorse from their bunch and got over to my place." He looked at hisarm. "I tried to keep things bound up. Maybe I left a little redbehind me. If I did, they'll be after me."
His story haltingly told; his utterance through his torn cheek thickand painful but savagely uncompromising; carrying a physical burden ofwounds that would have overwhelmed a lesser man but with a deadly hateshowing in his manner, Hawk, from sheer weakness, paused: "I went to mycabin to look for more cartridges," he added slowly, "and not a one wasthere left on the place." He hesitated again. "I didn't want to comehere----"
Laramie sprang to his feet: "Where the hell else would you go?"
Hawk heard unmoved the rough assurance; perhaps his eyes flashed, forLaramie's voice rang strong and true. He already had his hand onHawk's chair: "Come over here to the light," he said, "till we get someof this dirt off you. You need a bath, Abe. For a clean man you looklike----"
Hawk put up his right hand: "I'll do for all the job that's left aheadof me."
"What job's left ahead of you?"
"You've got a rifle like mine, Jim; the Marlin you don't use."
"Well?"
"I come to see if you'd lend it to me again."
"Why not?"
"Got any shells for it?" snapped Hawk.
"I guess so."
"I left the horse at the cabin to stand 'em off awhile. They'll lose alittle time there. They'll come down the creek--can't come any otherway. I'm going to wait for 'em in the timber."
"What for?"
"I'll finish with Doubleday and Van Horn, anyhow. Maybe I can withStone."
"And they'll finish with you."
"After I get them three the rest are welcome to what's left of me.I've got to be moving."
"Hold on a minute, Abe." Laramie sat down on the side of his cot, hisknees spread apart, his elbows resting on them, and his hands claspedas he leaned forward, head down, to think.
"Them fellows are riding every minute," Hawk reminded him grimly.
"Let's talk this thing over," persisted Laramie.
"I'll pay you for your rifle right now," mumbled Hawk, feeling with hisright hand in his trousers pocket for some gold pieces.
"Don't talk monkey stuff, Abe."
"Then don't make a monkey out of _me_," snapped Hawk. "Give me yourrifle and let me go!"
"After we've talked it over."
Hawk pulled himself up out of the chair. "You blamed fool," he saidbrokenly. "Don't you know that bunch will track me to your door andsmash us with lead or burn us up in this shack if they get here first?Give me the rifle," he thundered, "or I'll go into the timber with thissix-shooter. What do you mean? Are you going to turn yellow on mebecause I'm a thief?"
Laramie moved neither hand nor foot: "You're an older man than I am,Abe," he replied, without even looking up. "I can take words from you,I'd hate to take from anybody else--you know that; and you know why.You won't talk; all right. Now I'll tell you where you get off; you'renot going down to the timber--not a blamed step," he addeddeliberately. "Finger your six-shooter as much as you like." Laramiewaved his hand with his words. "Use it on me if you like. But, by----, Abe----" As his voice changed, he jumped to his feet, addinglike lightning, "you're not going to use it on yourself!"
He sprang for Hawk, reaching with his left hand for the gun. Intigerish ferocity the two men came together. Sleepy Cat worthies hadsometimes speculated on what might happen if the two men most known andmost feared in the Falling Wall country, Hawk and Laramie, should everquarrel. They met now; but in a quarrel the wildest gossip had notfancied. Reeling, feet slipping, knees and hands locking, eyesstaring, no word spoken and breathing hard, the two struggled in themiddle of the cooped-up room--Hawk striving to free and kill himself;Laramie determined to wrest the gun from his grasp.
It was an unequal contest. Weakened by loss of blood, Hawk was notlong a match for the only man on the range who under other conditionscould have stood up before him. Gradually, with the gun in his righthand, Hawk was bent backward, with Laramie's left hand slipping alongthe barrel closer and closer to the grip. Prolonged by the fear offurther injuring the wounded man, the tempestuous effort for masteryend
ed when Hawk was forced to the bed and Laramie's iron fingers,closing on the gun, wrenched it from him.
Hawk was done out and Laramie without more resistance straightened himout on the bed.
"You're worse hit than you think," panted the conqueror. "I've got ascheme better than yours, if there's time to put it through. Wait tillI get a couple of horses."
The clatter of a horse outside cut into his last words. Laramieinstantly slipped Hawk's revolver back into his hand, picked up his owngun and holster, strapping it to his waist as he ran, crossed the room,tore up a board in the floor, snatched a pair of rifles from theircache and hastening back to Hawk, his eyes glued all the while to thedoor, pushed one rifle into Hawk's hand and swung the other to his hip.
Not a word had been spoken. But preparations for a reception had beenmade complete and eventualities thoroughly considered. Heavy footfallsoutside announced the approach of a man. The next moment the door wasflung open and the intruder heard Laramie's voice in savage emphasis:
"Pitch up!"
The intruder did not, however, pitch up. It was John Lefever. Hestood amazed. "For the love of God," he exclaimed, "what's brokeloose?"
"Come in, John," cried Laramie, seizing his arm. "I want your horse aminute. Stay here till I get back--come, Abe, lively!"
"Where you going?" demanded Lefever, staring as he tried to collect hiswits.
Laramie hurried Hawk past him: "That'll depend on the shooting, John,"was all Laramie hastily said. "Doubleday and Van Horn have got a bunchof Texas men raiding the Falling Wall."
Lefever, gazing stunned at Hawk, talked as if he saw nothing. "I knowall about that," he cried. "Man alive, that's what I'm here for. Holdon, can't you?"
"Not now. Stick around till I get back."
Lefever caught his breath in time to fire one more question:
"What about Abe?"
"He's not coming back. Scout around down along the creek, John, so youcan see those fellows when they ride in. Hold 'em as long as you canand for God's sake keep 'em out of this cabin--there's blood oneverything."