“I’m out being hunted.” He looked to see how I would take that, but when I succeeded in keeping my expression one of polite interest, he continued. “There’s a posse after me, and what I’m afraid of is that I may have led the boys right into that nest of Cheyennes.”
Although I tried to withhold comment, such concern for his pursuers on the part of a fugitive from justice was too much for me. “Well, it would keep them out of mischief, wouldn’t it?”
The gambler frowned. “A man shouldn’t want to save his neck that badly. Besides, the sheriff is a friend of mine.”
He was talking to himself rather than to me. Yet I felt the rebuke, even though I found the reasoning obscure.
“He doesn’t seem to be worrying about it,” I pointed out. “Or at least he’s apparently absent-minded enough to be trying to drag you back to jail.”
“That’s what he’s paid for,” Blackfoot Terry said. He paused to listen again, then amplified that statement. “I had a pistol discussion with somebody whose friends swore to charges against me. What else could he do?”
Before I could think of any comment, McQuinn suddenly slapped his thigh. “Rifle fire!” he cried. “I’ve got to go back.”
Chapter 4
I HADN’T HEARD ANY SHOTS myself, but that wasn’t what worried me. What did give me concern was the feeling that if a wanted outlaw could show interest in the welfare of a pursuing posse, an ex-magistrate could do no less. Finding I could not shrug it away, I unharnessed my off-leader, hustled him over to where my rifle leaned against the wheel, put a foot on the hub and climbed aboard.
McQuinn was out of sight by then, but I saw him when I reached the saddle between the two low hills through which he had first come loping my way. From there the ground dipped and swept up again toward another rocky outcropping. Blackfoot Terry was making for this skyline, having dropped off his horse, which was evidently trained to stand fast unhitched. Not relying on my own mount for such constancy, I used the long team reins to anchor him to a gnarled shrub.
Having heard our approach, the gambler was looking back at me from his post on the ridge, signaling for extreme caution. Belly-crawling, I moved abreast of him and peered through a screen of weeds. In the fashion of the district, the land fell away from the knob we were on into a big hollow framed by other ridges. Most of the flooring was prairie dotted with bushes of one sort or another. Off to our left, though, there was a scrub-oak thicket.
“The boys are holed up in the woods,” my companion murmured.
While I was wondering how he knew, a shot and the rising smoke from black powder showed that somebody was certainly in the cover indicated. “Where are the Indians?” I asked.
“Look down my sights,” he suggested.
When I had twisted my head into the necessary position, I could see a patch of brown behind a low shrub. Even as I squinted, it moved, and I lost sight of it.
Up to that moment the business had not seemed real, but awareness of the silent menace which was enveloping the posse then swooped down to grip me. “I’m afraid I lost your shot for you,” I told McQuinn. At the same time I didn’t like the idea of drawing attention to our presence until we had worked out a plan for getting out of trouble as well as jumping into it. “How many are there, would you say?”
“There’s no sense in shooting now.” There was a pause before he answered my question. “I’ve spotted six — no, seven, and they’ll be sneaking in from all sides. There’s probably twenty or thirty of them.”
I still hadn’t been able to locate any of the attackers unaided. “Do you know how many there are in the posse?”
“There were six, but I wouldn’t want to bet on the count now.” He started to work away from the ridge, and once again I followed him. “Now,” he went on, when we had reached a point where we could stand with safety, “there’s only one way to break this up. These Cheyennes have naturally left their ponies where they’d be safe from gunfire. The game is to stampede the nags and let the redskins know they’d better start horse hunting, if they don’t want to be stuck out here afoot.”
His analysis was clear to me, and so were the hazards. “The ponies will be guarded, naturally.”
“I’ll have to kill the horse wrangler,” he agreed. “Then I’ve got to ride back within shouting range, to let the bucks know they’re up against it.”
“Shouting range is closer then shooting range,” I said.
“Yes, but I’ll be moving fast, and any Indian who squares around for a quick shot at me will have a hard time doing that and hiding from the posse boys, too. Would you like to scrooch up to the ridge again and help out?”
My one comfort as I managed a nod was that I would have a sure means of retreat. As Blackfoot Terry strode toward his horse, however, he snatched this consolation away from me.
“When the braves have worked all the way around the hollow, one of them may try to find out if he can spot the boys from this knob. If one of them does, he might notice your horse, so watch out for that.”
It was of less concern to me that my horse might be seen by a lurking brave than that I myself might be the object of such discovery. It would not be true to say that I felt lonesome after McQuinn rode out of sight around the base of the hill. My trouble, as I worked my way back to the skyline, was that the area seemed overcrowded with stealthy, invisible men, all bent on lifting my scalp.
The sense of danger sharpened my perceptions. Twice I caught fleeting glimpses of an Indian, as he edged nearer to the beleaguered posse. As alert as I felt myself to be, though, I was slow to react when something finally happened.
Over the ridge on the far side of the prairie bowl a horse came running. My first thought was that it was one of the ponies which McQuinn had stampeded, but going the wrong way. Then a man’s head showed over the withers of the wildly racing horse. I caught only a glimpse of it before it ducked down, but the sight was enough to warn me that the moment of action had arrived.
Yet in spite of the pressure of urgency, I had nothing to do but to try to look everywhere at once. Searching all points of the prairie for Indians who might pop up to risk a shot, I also found it impossible to keep from following the progress of the invisible rider, careering around the rim of the hollow behind the line of attack.
Halfway to me his head showed once more. So did his fist, which shook something formless and dangling. And while making this gesture of defiance Blackfoot Terry shouted words of which I could make nothing, though I understood them. He was telling the Indians of the scattered ponies and of their dead warden.
As McQuinn had foreseen, his advantage was that cover and concealment rarely work well from two directions at once. A safe spot from which to fire down upon the white men in the thicket was not apt to offer hiding for a brave who wished to wheel around for a snap shot uphill at the running horse. Several must have attempted the maneuver, for I heard rifle fire from the direction of the trees, but I myself saw only one Indian. He turned away from his post behind a clump of weeds just as I was swinging my gun to bear toward the spot where he crouched.
As I was lining up my sights, I heard a rifle bark from the other side of the knob’s rocky crest. It was the very thing I had been fearing, but I didn’t have time to worry about the Indian somewhere abreast of me. The one trying to shoot McQuinn was uppermost in my mind.
In my hurry to get off my shot first I missed, but the bullet struck near enough to make him drop down. Shots were being loosed from other points in the hollow, however, and I groaned as the gambler’s horse stumbled in response to one of them. A bullet kicked rock splinters in my own face then, and when I looked again the horse was down with McQuinn trying to jerk him to his feet.
The sight of their man brought to earth was too much for the Cheyennes, who rose, whooped, and fired. Equally forgetful of caution, the posse members broke from the woods to shoot at the Indians, at last making fair targets. Everybody was firing but everybody was in such furious haste that I don’t believe any d
amage was done. I know I emptied my gun at a warrior running toward McQuinn without doing better than clip shrub leaves just behind him.
My shots made him remember where he was, though, and he dropped down in the tall grass out of sight. All the rest, on both sides, regained their senses and took cover also. As for McQuinn’s mount, it was up and running again, spouting blood from two wounds. A moment later it was out of my line of vision, over the rim of the hollow.
Remembering that I was not alone on the ridge, I put speed ahead of caution. My getaway wasn’t as rapid as I wanted to make it, though. It was only when I was dashing toward my big brute of a coach horse that I realized I could not mount it without something to give me a boost. When I had untied the animal, therefore, my only recourse was to leg it, urging my confused and balking steed to follow. A bullet from the warrior on the knob zinged past me before I had gone very far, however, and at the crack of the rifle I lost my position in the lead. Springing forward, the horse started dragging me.
Barely managing to keep my feet, I was lurching forward when I heard McQuinn rushing toward me. There was blood smeared over him as well as his mount, but whether it all came from the latter was something I didn’t take time to find out. Instead I looked back at the Indian on the ridge, who was getting ready to fire again. He missed when I swerved, and sighted once more.
I saw the puff of smoke, but I was in the air before the sound of the explosion reached me. “Short,” the gambler said, as he bore me along by an arm hooked under my shoulders. “Put your foot on mine.”
We were abreast of my horse by the time I had managed to do that. I wasn’t at all sure of my ability to climb on the taller animal, but it was either that or be trampled underfoot after Blackfoot Terry let go. For a moment I sprawled on the broad back, unable to catch hold of anything and jolting painfully. Then my straining left hand got a grip on the horse collar, and I hoisted myself out of chaos.
Sitting up, I saw McQuinn ahead of me, albeit on a steed which was beginning to slow down. Nevertheless, the gambler spurred him past my camp at the water hole, over the so-called road and into the grass beyond. It appeared that I would be losing the man’s company as abruptly as I had gained it until I saw him throw himself off. Next I heard the shot, and a few minutes later he joined me, carrying his rifle.
“I’d like to look at that bottle you were talking about,” he said.
I needed that drink and the two that finished the quart. “Do you do things like that often?” I asked, when I had located my few remaining cigars.
“There are some advantages in having lived with the Indians.” He blew a smoke ring and watched it drift upward. “Otherwise I’d never have known the Blackfoot for son of a bitch.”
It took me a moment to phrase my next remark so that I wouldn’t sound critical. “I didn’t know you were going to scalp the fellow.”
“I just remembered that in time,” he told me. “Those Cheyennes might not have known what I was saying — though probably most of them know enough Blackfoot for cussing purposes — but they could guess what happened when they saw me waving Indian hair.”
After nodding assent, I remembered the other thing which had puzzled me. “Why did you bother to ride your horse beyond the trace?”
“It won’t do much good,” he replied, “but it may take them a little while to decide just where I’m heading.”
“But I thought we’d shaken the Indians.”
“I’m not worrying about the Cheyennes; that is if we scat out of here as soon as your off-leader has rested a little. I’m thinking of the posse.”
“What!” I looked to see if he was serious. He was. “They couldn’t possibly bother you after what you did.”
“Nobody asked me to horn in,” McQuinn said, “and it’s a cinch that nothing I did here in No Man’s Land will reverse my outlaw standing in Borro County, New Mexico.” His eyes narrowed just a trifle. “Maybe I should have asked earlier, but does this stage carry passengers?”
Although I didn’t take to the idea of a posse crawling up my back, we were in alliance. “Your horse carried double for a ways,” I said, “so I reckon the coach can manage it. Is straight ahead the best direction?”
“It’ll take us to Texas, which is where I was heading for in the first place. As a matter of fact, I’d be there now if I hadn’t had to leave Centipede in such a hurry that I was forced to hunt my food along the way.” Climbing up to the driver’s seat, the gambler pointed at the horse I’d lately ridden. “Now if this line likes to oblige its passengers, you’ll harness him up, and we’ll move along. The Indians will have squirmed out of gun range pretty soon, leaving the way clear for the bloodhounds of the law.”
Sundown was close at hand, but we pushed ahead until it had given away to twilight, and dusk in turn to full night. Around nine o’clock we camped where a trickle of water crossed the trace, but we were rolling again at white dawn.
McQuinn rode with me at first, but after a while he retired to the coach, to make up some of the sleep he had recently done without. I was therefore alone when I caught sight of a small, square wooden building. As we neared this edifice, I could see nothing but a little, glassless window. When I had driven beyond it, though, I perceived that the box had a larger hole. The doorway itself was low, narrow and crudely framed. More noteworthy was the sign above it.
RUSTLERS ROOST, the letters stated. WHY DON’T YOU?
“Hey, Terry,” I called down to the coach, as I reined in. “We’re somewhere or other.”
Waiting for McQuinn to wake up and get his bearings, I discovered another sleeping man. This one was stretched out under a shelter open to all four winds. In addition to him it covered primitive kitchen arrangements and a squaw busy plaiting leather strands into a lariat. She looked at me as if I didn’t exist, but after a moment she paused in her work to shake the sleeper.
By the time he had sat up and turned his curly brown head our way, McQuinn was afoot. “Are we in Texas here?” he called.
The fellow arose, scratching a bulging belly where his shirt was conveniently open. “Your front pair is, but you’re over the border.” He examined the stage with interest, but he didn’t ask any questions. “You see, most of my customers don’t want to be in Texas, but they don’t like to wait very long for a drink after they leave it.”
“The man said ‘drink,’ Baltimore.” I had climbed down from the driver’s seat by then, and we both inspected the inside of the shack. In the foreground were a knocked-to-gether table and three boxes for stools. To the left there was a plank bar with a shelf holding glasses behind it. “What do you have?” my companion asked, stepping aside to let the proprietor in.
“It depends on how well you done before you got here,” we were informed. “Soso horse thieves can likely only afford sod corn barefooted. For good average rustlers there’s some more or less real bottled whiskey. But for sure enough aces, slick enough to make off with a stage coach, I got a few quarts of geniune Kentucky.”
When I asked him if he had any Maryland rye, he obliged me by pouring it out of the bottle containing the dyed-in-the-wool bourbon. Still it wasn’t bad stuff, ranking a couple of notches above the liquor I’d bought in Chuckwalla.
It seemed a pity that we couldn’t afford to linger in such an oasis. “This would be a nice place to stay,” I remarked, “if it were only on the other side of the state line.”
“Why didn’t I think of that?” Blackfoot Terry wondered. After glancing all around the saloon, he turned to the landlord. “How about it? Is there anything to show that the Texas boundary runs past here?”
“There has to be, or I wouldn’t get no business from gents moving north.” Our host tested the quality of my silver dollar by bouncing it on the bar before he pocketed it and gave us a refill. “I can’t see as it would make any difference to you boys, but there’s a boundary blaze on that tree south of my ramada.”
Beginning to get McQuinn’s drift, I watched him as he once more eyed the dirt floor
, the plank walls spotted with knotholes and the base beams which formed the building’s only foundation. “We can move the table and the bar separately,” he mused. “Look here, Mr. — er — ?”
“I ain’t found out what my name is today myself,” the landlord replied to this prompting. Drawing a cigar box from under the bar, he took out one of the paper slips it contained and read the penciled scrawl upon it. “I’m Alexander Hamilton,” he said, holding out the box to me. “Here, take one, so we can get acquainted.”
I drew Patrick Henry, while McQuinn turned out to be Benjamin Franklin. “I used to use Civil War generals,” Hamilton informed us, “but one day a customer from Georgia found out he was William Tecumseh Sherman, and he shot himself; so to keep from losing trade I went back to the Revolution. It’s nice to have you distinguished patriots drinking my redeye.”
“We’ll drink a little more of it,” McQuinn said, “if you’ll let our horses drag this place into the Lone Star State for a little while.” He peeled two hundred-dollar bills from a roll which didn’t seem to miss them. “And we’ll move you back before we leave.”
“That ain’t bad pay,” Alexander Hamilton admitted, “but I may lose some ex-Texas trade, and it’ll be hard on the shebang. I think I ought to have another one of them things, Ben.”
The chief difficulty was seeing that the front didn’t get hauled away, leaving the remainder of the saloon behind. The solution was the industry of the squaw. Catering to the exclusive trade of Rustlers Roost, she had a couple of lariats aside from the one she had been working on when we arrived. Purchasing them, we ran them in back of the shanty and tied the ends to the reins of my six harnessed horses. When we had scooped away the sand from the front of the building, it slid forward at the cost of no particular equine effort.
“Alex,” I said, as the landlord was filling our glasses at the new location, “there’s one thing you might do for us. Does — ” Unable to guess the legal status of the squaw, I was at a loss as to just how to describe her. Finally I nodded in the direction of the shelter where she plied her craft. “Would she cook us some fresh meat, if you happen to have any?”