Sam Hazlitt had been trailing rustlers he had found out who they were and where the herds were taken, and he had been shot down from behind. The catch was that the tally book, with his records, was still missing. That tally book might contain evidence as to the rustling done by men who were now pillars of the cornmunity and open them to the vengeance of the Hazlitt outfit.
Often Western men threw a blanket over a situation. If a rustler had killed Sam, then all the rustlers involved would be equally guilty. Anyone who lived on this ranch might stumble on that tally book and throw the range into a b.l.o.o.d.y gun war in which many men now beyond the errors of their youth, with homes, families, and different customs, would die. It could serve no purpose to blow the lid off the trouble now, yet Allen Ring had a hunch.
In their fear of trouble for themselves they might be concealing an even greater crime, aiding a murderer in his escape. There were lines of care in the face of Roily Truman that a settled, established rancher should not have.
"Sorry," Ring said, "I"m stayin". I like this place."
All through the noon hour the tension was building. The air was warm and sultry, and there was a thickening haze over the mountains. There was that hot thickness in the air that presaged a storm.
When he left his coffee to return to work, Ring saw three hors.e.m.e.n coming into the canyon mouth at a running walk. He stopped in the door and touched his lips with his tongue. They reined up at the door, three hard-bitten, hard-eyed men with rifles across their saddle bows. Men with guns in their holsters and men of a kind that would never turn from trouble. These were men with the bark on, lean fanatics with lips thinned with old bitterness.
The older man spoke first. "Ring, I"ve heard about you. I"m Buck Hazlitt. These are my brothers, Joe and Dolph. There"s talk around that you aim to stay on this place. There"s been talk for years that Sam hid his tally book here. We figure the killer got that book and burned it. Maybe he did, and again, maybe not. We want that book. If you want to stay on this place, you stay. But if you find that book, you bring it to us."
Ring looked from one to the other, and he could see the picture clearly. With men like these, hard and unforgiving, it was no wonder Roily Truman and the other ranchers were worried. The years and prosperity had eased Roily and his like in comfort and softness, but not these. The Hazlitts were of feudal blood and background.
"Hazlitt," Ring said, "I know how you feel. You lost a brother, and that means somethin", but if that book is still around, which I doubt, and I find it, I"ll decide what to do with it all by myself. I don"t aim to start a range war. Maybe there"s some things best forgotten. The man who murdered Sam Hazlitt ought to pay."
"We"ll handle that," Dolph put in grimly. "You find that book, you bring it to us. If you don"t," his eyes hardened. "Well, we"d have to cla.s.s you with the crooks."
Ring"s eyes shifted to Dolph. "Cla.s.s if you want," he flared. "I"ll do what seems best to me with that book. But all of you folks are plumb proddy over that tally book. Chances are nine out of ten the killer found it and destroyed it."
"I don"t reckon he did," Buck said coldly, "because we know he"s been back here, a-huntin" it. Him an" his girl."
Ring stiffened. "You mean ?"
"What we mean is our figger, not yours." Buck Hazlitt reined his horse around. "You been told. You bring that book to us. You try to buck the Hazlitts and you won"t stay in this country."
Ring had his back up. Despite himself he felt cold anger mounting within him. "Put this in your pipe, friend," he said harshly. "I came here to stay. No Hazlitt will change that. I ain"t huntin" trouble, but if you bring trouble to me, I"ll handle it. I can bury a Hazlitt as easy as any other man!"
Not one of them condescended to notice the remark. Turning their horses they walked them down the canyon and out of it into the sultry afternoon.
Allen Ring mopped the sweat from his face and listened to the deep rumbling of far-off thunder, growling among the canyons like a grizzly with a toothache. It was going to rain. Sure as shootin", it was going to rain a regular gully washer. There was yet time to finish the job on the spring, so he picked up his shovel and started back for the job. The rock basin was nearly cleaned and he finished removing the few rocks and the moss that had gathered.
Then he opened the escape channel a little more to insure a more rapid emptying and filling process in the basin into which the trickle of water fell. The water emerged from a crack in the rocks and trickled into the basin, and finishing his job.
Ring glanced thoughtfully to see if anything remained undone. There was still some moss on the rocks from which the water flowed, and kneeling down, he leaned over to sc.r.a.pe it away, and pulling away the last shreds, he noticed a s.p.a.ce from which a rock had recently fallen. Pulling more moss away, he dislodged another rock, and there, pushed into a niche, was a small black book!
Sam Hazlitt, dying, had evidently managed to shove it back in this crack in the rocks, hoping it would be found by someone not the killer. Sitting back on his haunches, Ring opened the faded, canvas-bound book. A flap crossed over the page ends, and the book had been closed by a small tongue that slid into a loop of the canvas cover. Opening the book, he saw the pages were stained, but still legible.
The next instant he was struck by lightning. At least, that was what seemed to happen. Thunder crashed, and something struck him on the skull and he tried to rise and something struck again. He felt a drop of rain on his face and his eyes opened wide and then another blow caught him and he faded out into darkness, his fingers clawing at the gra.s.s to keep from slipping down into that velvety, smothering blackness.
He was wet. He turned a little, lying there, thinking he must have left a window open and the rain was his eyes opened and he felt rain pounding on his face and he stared, not at a boot with a California spur, but at dead brown gra.s.s, soaked with rain now, and the glistening smoothness of waterworn stones. He was soaked to the hide.
Struggling to his knees, he looked around, his head heavy, his lips and tongue thick. He blinked at a gray, rain-slanted world and at low gray clouds and a distant rumble of thunder following a streak of lightning along the mountaintops. Lurching to his feet, he stumbled toward the cabin and pitched over the doorsill to the floor. Struggling again to his feet, he got the door closed, and in a vague, misty half world of consciousness he struggled out of his clothes and got his hands on a rough towel and fumblingly dried himself.
He did not think. He was acting purely from vague instinctive realization of what he must do. He dressed again, in dry clothes, and dropped at the table. After a while he sat up and it was dark, and he knew he had blacked out again. He lighted a light and nearly dropped it to the floor. Then he stumbled to the washbasin and splashed his face with cold water. Then he bathed his scalp, feeling tenderly of the lacerations there.
A boot with a California spur. That was all he had seen. The tally book was gone, and a man wearing a new boot with a California-type spur, a large rowel, had taken it. He got coffee on, and while he waited for it he took his guns out and dried them painstakingly, wiping off each sh.e.l.l, and then replacing them in his belt with other sh.e.l.ls from a box on a shelf. He reloaded the guns, and then slipping into his slicker he went outside for his rifle.
Between sips of coffee, he worked over his rifle until he was satisfied. Then he threw a small pack together and stuffed his slicker pockets with shotgun sh.e.l.ls. The shotgun was an express gun and short barreled. He slung it from a loop under the slicker. Then he took a lantern and went to the stable and saddled the claybank. Leading the horse outside into the driving rain, he swung into the saddle and turned along the road toward Basin.
There was no letup in the rain. It fell steadily and heavily, yet the claybank slogged along, alternating between a shambling trot and a fast walk. Allen Ring, his chin sunk in the upturned collar of his slicker, watched the drops fall from the brim of his Stetson and felt the b.u.mp of the shotgun under his coat. He had seen little of the tally book, but sufficient to know that it would blow the lid off the very range war they were fearing.
Knowing the Hazlitts, he knew they would bring fire and gunplay to every home even remotely connected with the death of their brother.
The horse slid down a steep bank and sham- bled across the wide wash. Suddenly, the distant roar that had been in his ears for some time sprang into consciousness and he jerked his head up. His horse snorted in alarm, and Ring stared, openmouthed, at the wall of water, towering all of ten feet high, that was rolling down the wash toward him.
With a shrill rebel yell he slapped the spurs to the claybank, and the startled horse turned loose with an astounded leap and hit the ground in a dead run. There was no time to slow for the bank of the wash, and the horse went up, slipped at the very brink, and started to fall back. Ring hit the ground with both boots and scrambled over the brink, and even as the flood roared down upon them, he heaved on the bridle and the horse cleared the edge and stood trembling.
Swearing softly, Ring kicked the mud from his boots and mounted again. Leaving the raging torrent behind him, he rode on. Thick blackness of night and heavy clouds lay upon the town when he sloped down the main street and headed the horse toward the barn. He swung down and handed the bridle to the handyman.
"Rub him down," he said. "I"ll be back."
He started for the doors and then stopped, staring at the three horses in neighboring stalls. The liveryman noticed his glance and looked at him. "The Hazlitts. They come in about an hour ago, ugly as sin."
Allen Ring stood wide legged, staring grimly out the door. There was a coolness inside him now that he recognized. He dried his hands carefully. "Bilton in town?" he asked.
"Sure is. Playin" cards over to the Mazatzal Saloon."
"He wear Mex spurs? Big rowels?"
The man rubbed his jaw. "I don"t remember. I don"t know at all. You watch out," he warned. "Folks are on the prod."
Ring stepped out into the street and slogged through the mud to the edge of the boardwalk before the darkened general store. He kicked the mud from his boots and dried his hands again, after carefully unb.u.t.toning his slicker. n.o.body would have a second chance after this. He knew well enough that his walking into the Mazatzal would precipitate an explosion. Only, he wanted to light the fuse himself, in his own way.
He stood there in the darkness alone, thinking it over. They would all be there. It would be like tossing a match into a lot of fused dynamite. He wished then that he was a better man with a gun than he was or that he had someone to side him in this, but he had always acted alone and would scarcely know how to act with anyone else.
He walked along the boardwalk with long strides, his boots making hard sounds under the steady roar of the rain. He couldn"t place that spur, that boot. Yet he had to. He had to get his hands on that book.
Four horses stood, heads down in the rain, saddles covered with slickers. He looked at them and saw they were of three different brands. The window of the Mazatzal was rain wet, yet standing at one side he glanced within. The long room was crowded and smoky. Men lined the bar, feet on the bra.s.s rail. A dozen tables were crowded with cardplayers. Everyone seemed to have taken refuge here from the rain.
Picking out the Hazlitt boys, Allen saw them gathered together at the back end of the room. Then he got Ross Bilton pegged. He was at a table playing cards, facing the door. Stan Brule was at this end of the bar, and Hagen was at a table against the wall, the three of them making three points of a flat triangle whose base was the door. It was no accident.
Bilton, then, expected trouble, and he was not looking toward the Hazlitts. Yet, on reflection, Ring could see the triangle could center fire from three directions on the Hazlitts as well. There was a man with his back to the door who sat in the game with Bilton. And not far from Hagen, Roily Truman was at the bar. Truman was toying with his drink, just killing time. Everybody seemed to be waiting for something. Could it be he they waited upon? No, that was scarcely to be considered. They could not know he had found the book, although it was certain at least one man in the room knew, and possibly others.
Maybe it was just the tension, the building up of feeling over his taking over of the place at Red Rock. Allen Ring carefully turned down the collar of his slicker and wiped his hands dry again. He felt jumpy and could feel that dryness in his mouth that always came on him at times like this. He touched his gun b.u.t.ts and then stepped over and opened the door.
Everyone looked up or around at once. Ross Bilton held a card aloft, and his hand froze at the act of dealing, holding still for a full ten seconds while Ring closed the door. He surveyed the room again and saw Ross play the card and say something in an undertone to the man opposite him. The man turned his head slightly and it was Ben Taylor!
The gambler looked around, his face coldly curious, and for an instant their eyes met across the room, and then Allen Ring started toward him. There was no other sound in the room, although they could all hear the unceasing roar of the rain of the roof. Ring saw something leap up in Taylor"s eyes, and his own took on a sardonic glint.
"That was a good hand you dealt me down Texas way," Ring said. "A good hand!"
"You"d better draw more cards," Taylor said. "You"re holdin" a small pair!"
Ring"s eyes shifted as the man turned slightly. It was the jingle of his spurs that drew his eyes, and there they were, the large rowelled California style spurs, not common here. He stopped beside Taylor so the man had to tilt his head back to look up.
Ring was acutely conscious that he was now centered between the fire of Brule and Hagen. The Hazlitts looked on curiously, uncertain as to what was happening. "Give it to me, Taylor," Ring said quietly. "Give it to me now."
There was ice in his voice, and Taylor, aware of the awkwardness of his position, got to his feet, inches away from Ring. "I don"t know what you"re talking about," he flared.
"No?" Ring was standing with his feet apart a little, and his hands were breast high, one of them clutching the edge of his raincoat. He hooked with his left from that position, and the blow was too short, too sudden, and too fast for Ben Taylor. The crack of it on the angle of his jaw was audible, and then Ring"s right came up in the gambler"s solar plexus and the man"s knees sagged.
Spinning him around, Ring ripped open his coat with a jerk that scattered b.u.t.tons across the room. Then from an inside pocket he jerked the tally book. He saw the Hazlitts start at the same instant that Bilton sprang back from the chair, upsetting it.
"Get him," Bilton roared. "Get him!"
Ring shoved Taylor hard into the table, upsetting it and causing Bilton to spring back to keep his balance, and at the same instant, Ring dropped to a half crouch and turning left he drew with a flash of speed and saw Brule"s gun come up at almost the same instant, and then he fired!
Stan Brule was caught with his gun just level, and the bullet smashed him on the jaw. The tall man staggered, his face a mask of hatred and astonishment mingled, and then Ring fired again, doing a quick spring around with his knees bent, turning completely around in one leap, and firing as his feet hit the floor.
He felt Hagen"s bullet smash into him, and he tottered. Then he fired coolly, and swinging as he fired, he caught Bilton right over the belt buckle. It was fast action, snapping, quick, yet deliberate. The four fired shots had taken less than three seconds. Stepping back, he scooped the tally book from the floor where it had dropped and then pocketed it. Bilton was on the floor, coughing blood. Hagen had a broken right arm and was swearing in a thick, stunned voice. Stan Brule had drawn his last gun. He had been dead before he hit the floor.
The Hazlitts started forward with a lunge, and Allen Ring took another step backward, dropping his pistol and swinging the shotgun, still hanging from his shoulder, into firing position. "Get back!" he said thickly. "Get back or I"ll kill the three of you! Back, back to where you stood!"
Their faces wolfish, the three stood lean and dangerous, yet the shotgun brooked no refusal, and slowly, bitterly and reluctantly, the three moved back, step by step. Ring motioned with the shotgun. "All of you along the wall!" The men rose and moved back, their eyes on him, uncertain, wary, some of them frightened.
Allen Ring watched them go, feeling curiously light-headed and uncertain. He tried to frown away the pain from his throbbing skull, yet there was a pervading weakness from somewhere else.
"My gosh," Roily Truman said. "The man"s been shot! He"s bleeding!"
"Get back!" Ring said thickly. His eyes shifted to the glowing potbellied stove, and he moved forward, the shotgun waist high, his eyes on the men who stared at him, awed. The sling held the gun level, his hand partly supporting it, a finger on the trigger. With his left hand he opened the stove and then fumbled in his pocket.
Buck Hazlitt"s eyes bulged. "No!" he roared. "No, you don"t!"
He lunged forward, and Ring tipped the shotgun and fired a blast into the floor, inches ahead of Hazlitt"s feet. The rancher stopped so suddenly he almost fell, and the shotgun tipped to cover him.
"Back!" Ring said. He swayed on his feet. "Back!"He fished out the tally book and threw it into the flames.
Something like a sigh went through the crowd. They stared, awed as the flames seized hungrily at the opened book, curling around the leaves with hot fingers, turning them brown and then black and to ashes. Half hypnotized the crowd watched. Then Ring"s eyes swung to Hazlitt.
"It was Ben Taylor killed him," he muttered. "Taylor, an" Bilton was with him. He, he seen it."
"We take your word for it?" Buck Hazlitt demanded furiously.
Allen Ring"s eyes widened and he seemed to gather himself. "You want to question it? You want to call me a liar?"
Hazlitt looked at him, touching his tongue to his lips. "No," he said. "I figured it was them."
"I told you true," Ring said, and then his legs seemed to fold up under him and he went to the floor.
The crowd surged forward and Roily Truman stared at Buck as Hazlitt neared the stove. The big man stared into the flames for a minute. Then he closed the door.
"Good," he said. "Good thing! It"s been a torment, that book, like a cloud hangin" over us all!"
The sun was shining through the window when Gail Truman came to see him. He was sitting up in bed and feeling better. It would be good to be back on the place again, for there was much to do.
She came in, slapping her boots with her quirt and smiling. "Feel better?" she asked brightly. "You certainly look better. You"ve shaved."
He grinned and rubbed his jaw. "I needed it. Almost two weeks in this bed. I must have been hit bad."
"You lost a lot of blood. It"s lucky you"ve a strong heart."
"It ain"t, isn"t so strong any more," he said, "I think it"s grown mighty shaky here lately."
Gail blushed. "Oh? It has? Your nurse, I suppose?"
"She is pretty, isn"t she?"
Gail looked up, alarmed. "You mean, you..."
"No, honey," he said, "you!"
"Oh." She looked at him and then looked down. "Well, I guess!"
"All right?" She smiled then, suddenly and warmly. "All right."
"I had to ask you," he said. "We had to marry."
"Had to? Why?"
"People would talk, a young, lovely girl like you over at my place all the time would they think you were looking at the view?"
"If they did," she replied quickly, "they"d be wrong!"
"You"re telling me?" he asked.
"Yes!"
ONE LAST GUN NOTCH.
Morgan Clyde studied his face in the mirror. It was an even-featured, pleasant face. Neither the nose nor jaw was too blunt or too long. Now, after his morning shave, his jaw was still faintly blue through the deep tan, and the bronze curls above his face made him look several years younger than his thirty-five.
Carefully, he knotted the black string tie on the soft gray shirt and then slipped on his coat. When he donned the black, flat-crowned hat, he was ready. His appearance was perfect, with just a shade of studied carelessness. For ten years now, Morgan Clyde"s morning shave and dressing had been a ritual from which he never deviated.
He slid the two guns from their holsters and checked them carefully. First the right, then the left. On the b.u.t.t of the right-hand gun there were nine filed notches. On the left, three. He glanced at them thoughtfully, remembering. That first notch had been for Red Bridges. That was the year they had run his cattle off. Bridges had come out to the claim when Clyde was away, cut his fence down, run his cattle off, and shot his wife down in cold blood.
Thoughtfully, Morgan Clyde looked back into the mirror. He had changed. In his mind"s eye he could see that tall, loose-limbed young man with the bronze hair and boyish face. He had been quiet, peace loving, content with his wife, his homestead, and his few cattle. He had a gift for gun handling, but never thought of it. That is, not until that visit by Bridges.
Returning home with a haunch of antelope across his saddle, he had found his wife and the smoking ruins of his home. He did not have to be told. Bridges had warned him to move, or else. Within him something had burst, and for an instant his eyes were blind with blood. When the moment had pa.s.sed, he had changed. He had known, then, what to do. He should have gone to the governor with his story, or to the U.S. Marshal.
And he could have gone. But there was something red and ugly inside him that had not been there before. He had swung aboard a little paint pony and headed for Peavey"s Mill. The town"s one street had been quiet, dusty. The townspeople knew what had happened, because it had been happening to all homesteaders. Never for a moment did they expect any reaction. Red Bridges was too well known. He had killed too many times.
Then Morgan Clyde rode down the street on his paint pony, saw Bridges, and slid to the ground. Somebody yelled, and Bridges turned. He looked at Morgan Clyde"s young, awkward length and laughed. But his hand dropped swiftly for his gun. But something happened. Morgan Clyde"s gun swung up first, spouting fire, and his two shots centered over Bridges"s heart. The big man"s fingers loosened, and the gun slid into the dust. Little whorls rose slowly from to where it landed. Then, his face puzzled, his left hand fumbling at his breast, Red Bridges wilted. He could have stopped there.
Now, Morgan Clyde knew that. He could have stopped there, and should have stopped. He could have ridden from town and been left alone. But he knew Bridges was a tool, and the man who used the tool was Erik Pendleton, in the bank. Bridges had been a gunman; Pendleton was not. The banker looked up from his desk and saw death. It was no mistake. Clyde had walked up the steps, around the teller"s cage, and opened the door of Pendleton"s office. The banker opened his mouth to talk, and Morgan Clyde shot him. He had deserved it.
The posse lost him west of the Brazos, and he rode on west into a cattle war. He was wanted then and no longer cared. The banker hadn"t rated a notch, but the three men he killed in the streets of Fort Sumner he counted, and the man he shot west of Gallup. There had been trouble in St. George, and then in Virginia City. After that, he had a reputation.