CHAPTER XXIV
NIGHT AND A HEADER
For John Lefever the rainy night promised to be a busy one; darknessand the storm would, he felt, give Laramie a chance to get Hawk safelyinto town; but to do this successfully would call for precaution.
The rain had hardly begun to fall that afternoon--to the discomfitureof Kate and her undoing with Belle--before Lefever began to cheer up inspeculating on what might be done. He found Laramie at the hotel andset out to round up Sawdy. The rendezvous was set at Kitchen's barnand half an hour later the three men were shut up in the old harnessroom back of the office to talk the venture over.
Laramie made no effort to discourage John concerning the project; ithad become a pet one with the big fellow; but he did not give the ideastrong endorsement. "You're too blamed pessimistic, Jim," growledLefever.
"No, John," protested Laramie evenly, "I'm only trying to see things asthey stand. Don't figure we are going to pull this thing withouttrouble. Harry Van Horn's got a good guess that Dave is pretty wellshot up; and that he's hiding out. He knows a man can't hide outwithout friends."
"I grant you that," interrupted John. "But if you can get him acrossthe Crazy Woman, Jim, it's a cinch to run him into town."
"Don't figure that every mile of that road isn't watched, for it is. Iride it oftener than you and I see plenty of sign. And Harry knowswhat a rainy night means just as well as we do. He'll be on the jobwith his men--that's all I'm saying. Now, go ahead. You want Abebrought in--that's your business. I'm here to bring him in--that's mybusiness. Shoot."
Laramie and Lefever arranged things. Number Seventy-eight, the throughfast freight, would be due to leave Sleepy Cat for Medicine Bend at4:32 in the morning. The crew were friendly. Could Laramie make itwith Abe, starting by midnight? He could. It was impossible to meetLaramie outside town because no one could tell which trail he mighthave to choose to come in on. But Sawdy and Lefever could look for himout on the plateau at the head of Fort Street. Henry Sawdy, his heavymustaches sweeping his thick lips, and his bloodshot eyes moving fromone to the other of the two faces before him only stared and listened.
"Why don't you say something, Henry?" demanded Lefever, exasperated.
Sawdy turned a reproachful look on his lively partner: "When you'retalking, John, there ain't no chance to say anything. When Jim'stalking, I don't want to say anything."
Laramie ordered his horse, got into oilskins, and riding out the backway of the stable started for the Falling Wall. The day was spent andthe rain had turned soft and misty. He rode fast and with a littlewatchfulness, exercised before reaching the Crazy Woman, satisfiedhimself that he had not been followed out of town.
What had actually happened was that he rode north not long after Kateherself started for home. But Laramie followed old trails out oftown--even at the price of rounding fences and at times dodging throughwire gates for short cuts. Night was upon him when he reached thebluffs of the creek. Between showers the sky had lightened, but thenorth was overcast, and Laramie knew what to look forward to. When hehad got up the long hill, and reached the northern bluffs, it wasraining steadily again, and night had spread over mountain and valley.
Abating something of his usual precaution in riding to reach Hawk'shiding place, Laramie went slowly into the bad lands by a route lessdangerous than that he usually followed. As the night deepened, thewind rising brought a heavier rain. The trail became increasinglydifficult to follow; rough at best, it was now almost impassable.Sheets of water trickled over stretches of rock causing the horse toslip and flounder. In other places rivulets shooting out of crevicescut the loose earth from under the horse's feet. Leg-tired, the horsefinally resented being headed into the driving rain and went forwardslipping, hesitating and groping like a man on hands and knees.
When Laramie got him to the old bridge, the pony was all in. Laramiefound shelter for him under a ledge and rifle in hand clambered alongthe side of the canyon toward the abutment. Close to the entrance heset his rifle against the rock, listened carefully, as always, feltdown at his feet for the few chips of rock he had so placed that theywould be disturbed if trodden by an enemy, listened again carefully,and with his revolver cocked in his right hand, and the muzzle lyingacross his left forearm, Laramie slowly zigzagged his way to theinside. Once there, he stood perfectly still in the darkness andcalled a greeting to Hawk. He failed to receive the usual gruffanswer. This never before had happened, and without trying for alight, Laramie moved slowly and with much caution over to the recesswithin which Hawk lay. There he could hear the cowboy's labored, butregular breathing as he slept. The storm, waking the water crevices ofthe mountains into a noisy chorus, had lulled the hunted man into anuntroubled sleep.
Laramie shook his oilskins in a heap on the floor, cautiously lighted acandle and set it on the board that served as a table. In spite of hisslickers he was wet through. He hung his hat on the end of a brokentimber and laid his revolver beside the candle. Bethinking himself,however, of his rifle, he picked up the six-shooter again, steppedoutside the entrance, brought in his rifle, wiped it, stood it in aconvenient corner and turned toward Hawk.
The candle, burning at moments steadily and at moments flickering,threw its uncertain rays into the recess where the wounded rustler lay.They lighted the sallow pallor of the sleeping man's face, fell acrosshis sunken eyes and drew the black of his long beard out of the gloombelow it. Laramie seated himself on a projecting ledge and lookedthoughtfully at his charge. He was failing; of that there could be nodoubt. Steel-willed and hard-sinewed though he was, the wounds thatwould long ago have put an ordinary man out of action, were undermininghis great vitality and Laramie, in a study, felt it.
Yet such was the younger man's natural stubbornness that left to hisown devices he would have fought out the battle against death rightwhere the failing man lay; only the judgment of Lefever and Carpyswayed him in the circumstances.
Believing sleep was the best preparative for the ordeal of the ride totown, Laramie hesitated about waking Hawk--yet the hours were precious,for the trip would be long and slow. Fortunately he had not long towait before Hawk woke.
Laramie was sitting a few feet away and silently looking at him whenHawk opened his eyes. They wandered from one object to another in thedim candle gloom, until they rested on Laramie's face; there theystopped.
Laramie's features relaxed into as near a smile as he permitted himselfon duty: "How you coming, Abe?"
Hawk eyed him steadily: "What are you doing here tonight?"
Laramie answered with a question: "How about trying the gauntlet?"
"That what you want?"
"It's what Lefever and Carpy want."
"They running things?"
"They think you'd get well full as quick at a hospital."
"What do you think?"
"I guess you would."
"Tired taking care of me?"
"Not yet, Abe."
"Raining?"
"Hell bent."
"What's the other noise?"
"Thunder; and the river's up."
The roar of the waters was not new to the ears of the two men wholistened, however much it might have disturbed others unused to theirtearing fury.
Hawk listened thoughtfully: "Why didn't you pick a wet night?" he asked.
"We had to pick a dark one, Abe."
"Where's the horses?"
"Over at my place--what's that?"
The last words broke from Laramie's lips like the crack of a pistol.He sprang to his feet. Hawk's hand shot out for his gun. Onlypractised ears could have detected under the steady downpour of rain,the deep roar of the canyon and the reverberation of the thunder, thehoof beats of a stumbling horse. The next instant, they heard thehorse directly over their heads. Laramie, whipping out his revolver,looked up. As he did so, a deafening crash blotted out the roar of thestorm--the roof overhead gave way and amid an avalanche of rock andtimbers, a horse plunged headlong into the re
fuge.
In the narrow quarters so amazingly invaded, darkness added to aninstant of frantic confusion. Laramie was knocked flat. In the midstof the fallen timbers, the horse, mad with terror, struggled to get tohis feet. A suppressed groan betrayed the rider under him.
Laramie, where he lay, gun in hand, and Hawk, had but one thought:their retreat had been discovered and attacked. It was no part oftheir defense to reveal their presence by wild shooting. The enemy whohad plunged in on top of them was at their mercy, even though unseen.He was caught under the horse, and to clap a revolver to his head andblow the top off was simple; it could be done at any moment. Of muchgreater import it was, carefully to await his companions when they rodeup, above, and pick them off as chance offered. Escape, if the raidingparty were properly organized, both men knew was for themimpossible--and they knew that Harry Van Horn organized well. Thealternative was to sell their lives as dearly as possible.
This was by no means a terrifying conclusion to men inured to affray.And for the moment, at feast, the situation was in their hands, not inthe enemies'.
A deluge of wind and rain swept through the broken roof. Laramie,stretching one arm through the debris, felt the shoulder of the rider,flung in the violence of the fall close to him.
The prostrate horse renewed his struggles to get to his feet.
Laramie, exposed to the pouring rain, covered with mud, bruised bybroken rock still rolling down the open crater, and caught among rottentimbers, struggled to right himself before his enemy should do so. Heraised himself by a violent effort to his elbow, freed his pistol armand reaching over, pushed his cocked revolver into the side of thefallen horseman.
A bolt of lightning shot across the crater, leaving behind it an inkyblackness of rain and wind. The sudden onslaught from overhead mightwell have confused his senses; but he had seen the lightning sweepacross a white, drawn face turned toward the angry sky--and in theflash he had caught the features of Kate Doubleday.
Stunned though he was by the revelation, he knew his senses had nottricked him. There was in his memory but one such riding cap as thatwhich shaded her closed eyes; for him, but one such coil of woman'shair as that falling now in disarray on her neck. Completely unnerved,he carefully drew away his revolver, averted the muzzle and spokeangrily through the dark: "Who's here with you?"
There was no answer. He asked the question sternly again, listeningkeenly the while for sounds of other riders above. Had she discoveredthe retreat and led to it his enemies? Could it be possible that eventhey would allow her with them on such an errand and on such a night?
He called her name. The roar of the canyon answered above the storm;there was no sound else. Once more he stretched out his arm. His handrested on her breast and he was doubly sure his senses had not trickedhim. But she might be dying or dead. The fear struck home that shewas dead. Then her bosom rose in a hardly perceptible respiration.
A storm of emotion swept Laramie. He squirmed under the debris thatpinned him and got nearer to her. He listened still for sounds of anenemy, of those who must be with her--where could they be? Thedelicate breathing under his heavy hand came more regularly. Then amoan of pain checked and, again, released it.
Feeling slowly in the stormy dark for obstructions that might havecaught her, Laramie freed one of her feet caught in the stirrup and bypushing and lifting at the shoulder of the horse succeeded after muchexertion in freeing her other foot, caught under it. He felt his wayback to Kate's head and getting on his feet placed his hands under hershoulders to draw her toward him.
As he did so, a sharp question of fear and confusion was flung at him:"Where am I? Who are you?"
"Who are you?" echoed Laramie, pulling her away from the horse whichhad begun to struggle again. "Who's here with you?" he demanded.There was no answer.
"Who's here with you?" he repeated sternly. "Tell me the truth."
"I've lost my way. Where am I? Who are you?"
The truth in her manner was plain. Incredible as it seemed that shecould have strayed so far, all apprehension of an attack vanished withher questions.
"You're a long way from home," he said, shortly.
She made no reply.
"Your horse took a header. You fainted. I suppose"--he hardlyhesitated in his words--"you know who is talking to you?"
In her silence he heard his answer.