Troublesome Range Part 16

A haughtiness edged into Ruth's look now. "Clark, I asked you about Joe. Please tell me."

"He was seen north of here this afternoon," he told her, willing now to pretend as she was pretending. "They're looking for him." "I hope he gets away," she said directly. Then: "You won't mind waiting for a few days, will you?"

"No. It's probably better that way." He turned and went back down the steps and picked up his reins.

"Will you have supper here at the house?" she asked.

"I'd better eat with the men. We're expectin' word from Yace Bonnyman any minute."

Ruth let him go without further urging, a little frightened at not wanting him to be with her tonight and at showing it. Two hours ago one of the men coming down from the herd camp had brought her word of the renewed hunt for Joe. Since then her dismal world had brightened; it had also become complicated, chiefly by her promise to Clark. Now she was excited and wary, not knowing what to do but wait.

Until just a moment ago she hadn't consciously tried to picture her wants. But they stood out clearly now and Joe Bonnyman formed the core of them. She had come to the abrupt realization that Joe was the only man who mattered to her. She wanted terribly to see him; her hope that he would live through this seething trouble was a constant and heavy pressure on all her thoughts.

She watched Clark walk off into the shadows and turned back into the house, avoiding the main living room where her father's body lay in its simple pine coffin before the huge center fireplace.

The six men down from the herd camp had already eaten and were loafing along the front of the bunkhouse, enjoying their after-supper smokes, their talk running icily and low against their expectation of what the coming night might hold. At the side kitchen door, Clark called in to the cook-"One more plate, Jim."-and, having rolled up his sleeves, ladled out a basinful of water from the cedar bucket on the bench.

The cool lathering Clark gave his face and hands seemed to cleanse him of more than the dust and grime of this afternoon's ride. By the time he had toweled his face dry, he could look with some amus.e.m.e.nt on Ruth's poor show of affection. He was fully aware of her reason in asking that the wedding be delayed. Joe was much in her thoughts, he realized. Well, he wouldn't be there long. Tonight, tomorrow at the latest, and Joe Bonnyman would no longer be a threat.

He was halfway through his meal in the kitchen when he heard a horse running in along the road. He stepped to the door and saw a rider swing across the yard and come straight on for the bunkhouse.

It was an Anchor man, Ed Dennis. He came directly to the kitchen entrance, seeing Clark there, with a casual-"Hi, yuh, boys."-to the men outside the bunkhouse door.

Dennis's message was brief and he began it as soon as Clark had closed the door. The mesa men had lost Joe just below the pa.s.s at dusk. They were on the way back to Yoke now. They would take time out to eat there and start for Diamond around 9:00. Workman would take half the men and circle to come in on Diamond from the east. Bonnyman, with the others, would follow the basin trail in from the west.

"You've got the tough job," Dennis concluded. "The boss wants Harper tolled out into the open, if it can be worked, sharp on ten o'clock. That's where you come in. You're to ride straight in the road from the south. You'll likely get within range of the layout before you're stopped. Throw a lot of lead at it, and then hightail. The boss thinks Harper'll follow you. If he does, once he's clear of the trees, we'll have him on two sides."

Clark frowned, seeing the simplicity and workability of Yace's plan. It didn't seem to have a hole in it. Harper would naturally take the initiative once he saw he wasn't outnumbered, especially in view of what Clark had told him this afternoon. Clark's six men would look like easy odds to him. He wouldn't be expecting a trap because he was relying on Clark to arrange matters.

Misunderstanding Clark's frown, Dennis said: "If you're careful, none of you will even get scratched. The boss said not to get too close but to raise plenty of h.e.l.l with your powder, then run."

There was nothing for Clark to do but agree. He did.

Dennis seemed relieved. He explained further: "The only reason you're drawin' on this job is because you ain't wore out like the rest of us. We ran the legs off a lot o' horseflesh chasin' Joe this afternoon. I'll sure be glad to turn in this jughead I got for that little paint horse."

"No luck with Joe?"

Dennis shook his head. "He played us for a bunch of suckers. Yace can't decide why. Well, I'll get on back. Oh, another thing. Lyans ain't due back in town until late tonight. They decided not to wait on him."

After the Anchor man had ridden off into the night with a peremptory-"Enjoy your rest while you can, gents."-to the idle Brush crewmen outside, Clark sat for several minutes deeply in thought. He was remembering something Dennis had said, a small but potent item of information, wondering how he could use it. Only when he felt the presence of the men gathered close to the door to the bunkhouse beyond, anxiously waiting to learn what news Dennis had brought, did he resume his eating. He intentionally delayed telling the men of the plans for the night in order to settle on one of his own.

What he was thinking made him glance toward the closed door of the kitchen. He decided finally, over his second cup of coffee, that it had been impossible for any of the crew to have overheard Dennis. Sure of that, yet not sure of one other thing, he left the kitchen and sauntered out through the bunkhouse to the door. There, he stood and took his watch from the pocket of his waist overalls and looked at it.

"Time to ride," he told them. "We're due to move in on Diamond at ten." He went on to explain how they were to decoy Harper away from the layout.

The willingness and speed with which the men got their guns, saddled, and were ready to travel was grim proof of the seriousness with which they were tackling this job. Shorty, the Anchor man who had been killed at Diamond this morning, had boasted many friends; several of these Brush men were among them. As one of them put it before they left the lower corral: "Dunne, I've notched every slug on my belt. If one of 'em hits a man, it'll tear a hole in him big enough to shove a boot through."

Clark had an impulse to go to the house to speak to Ruth. But the memory of her interest in Joe still rankled and he rode straight out of the yard without once looking toward the house.

They traveled at a steady trot, neither hurrying nor wasting time. Long past the time they should have raised the lights of Diamond, Clark signaled a halt, telling them: "They're expectin' us. No lights. We'll go along careful." He took out his watch, held it close so that he could see it in the faint starlight. "Twenty minutes. Plenty of time."

"We goin' right on in?" one of the men asked.

"Right on in. But slow."

When they went on, Clark was tense under the foreboding that there was nothing he could do to stop this. Earlier, when he saw Harper, he'd been optimistic over the possibilities of heavy casualties among the mesa crews. But because he hadn't been in on Yace's plan, his own was unworkable. The last twenty-four hours had put much power in his hands. Now he wanted more, and his whole thought was centered on tonight so weakening Anchor and Yoke and the other big outfits that, when this was over, he would come out stronger than they. It was possible, he told himself, if only he could find a way of getting word in to Harper.

They rode the high gra.s.s with their horses at a walk, the shoes of the ponies making but a faint slurring sound against the night's utter stillness. Ahead, the shadow line of trees that hid the Diamond buildings held a threat much greater than the presence of lights would have indicated; wakeful, watchful men were on the alert there, Clark knew. He was riding into a trap of his own planning.

Finally he could stand it no longer and said sharply: "Hold on! Something's wrong up there." His glance came around to the nearest man. "Alec, you and I will go on ahead and have a look."

"Careful, Dunne," said one of the others, as Clark and the man he had spoken to reined on ahead toward the margin of the locust grove, now less than 300 yards ahead of them.

Clark drew his Winchester from the scabbard and laid it across the horn of his saddle. Alec, close alongside, did likewise. Clark could feel the other man's tense excitement.

They reached the trees without being challenged. The channel of Clark's spine was cool with nervous perspiration. This, he told himself, was the hardest part. His pulse hammered as he saw he might make good his one slim chance.

Reining close in to Alec, he whispered: "You go right, off toward the house. Don't go in on it but take a look and get back here. I'll take the bunkhouse."

Once he had lost Alec in the darkness, he came quickly out of the saddle, looped reins over a low branch, and hurried back through the trees until he was even with the bunkhouse. There he halted and whistled softly, the same call he had used in summoning Harper two nights ago.

There was a moment in which the night's utter stillness remained unbroken. Then Clark heard the hinges of the bunk-house door squeak faintly. A man stepped out of the door.

Clark came out of the trees, speaking softly: "Heads up, Harper."

"Oh, it's you." The voice wasn't Harper's but Tillson's. He came across to Clark. "Neal ain't back yet. We can't figure what's slowin' him. We doused the lights a couple hours ago, just in case."

Clark had his moment's worry over Harper's delay in returning from Saygar's camp, then he forgot it in the face of this other, more urgent, matter.

"What about Vanover?" he asked.

"Gentry's got him and the girl at the house. We had to hog-tie Vanover. He tried twice to make a break for it."

"Get this and get it fast, Tillson," Clark said, knowing now where his only chance lay. "Round up every man and hit for the trees close above. Take the Vanovers, only keep them back a ways. You and the rest stay close enough so you can spot anyone movin' around down here. I want this place empty in ten minutes. Give me five of those ten to get clear. I've got a man with me."

Tillson's suspicious glance searched Clark's face in the obscurity. "What's this addin' up to?"

"I'm not sure yet. Maybe, just maybe, it's goin' to be the finish. Twenty or thirty minutes from now you may see men movin' around down here. Wait until the guns cut loose down here before you open up on 'em. But when you do open up, get every man in sight. Harper's goin' to make it worth your while to do the job right."

Tillson's drawl lacked its edge of suspicion as he said: "It's about time we collected on something around here."

"You will tonight." Clark turned and faded back into the trees. He rode out the way he had come, cautiously, soundlessly. He came up to Alec so quietly that he startled the man.

"Not a soul stirrin' in the house," Alec breathed, watching the shadows. "What in tarnation can this mean?"

"They're out somewhere," Clark said, "maybe keepin' a watch on our crews. The bunkhouse is empty as a drum. Say!" He spoke the last word explosively. "This may be our chance!"

"How come?"

"We could go in there, fort up, and catch 'em when they come in."

Alec was silent a moment. Then he breathed: "By Satan, you're right. Let's go back for the others."

It was Alec who did the talking when they reached the others. His enthusiasm needed no prodding from Clark. The only question, voiced by one of the others, was: "What'll Bonnyman and Workman be doin' all this time?"

Clark shrugged. "They were to wait until we tangled with Harper, then pitch in and finish it off. If you ask me, they'll stay set. This is a surer way than the other, especially since the other won't work."

"How about roundin' up the others?"

It was Alec who said sharply: "And spend half the night findin' 'em, maybe even get shot because they think we're Harper's bunch? Uhn-uh. If we do this, we do it on our own. And right sudden. Maybe Harper's crew has drifted in while we been sittin' here talkin'."

That decided them. Clark's breath left his lungs in a sharp sigh of relief as another man said-"Come on."-and led them away back toward the trees. Later, if questions were asked, Clark would be able to say that he wasn't the one who had made the decision.

At the trees, they halted, listening a brief interval for any sounds that would betray the presence of men having come in during their short absence.

"We'd better take the bunkhouse, all but one man," Clark said finally. "They'll head for there or the lot behind when they come in. Alec, you take the house."

Alec left, and the others rode back through the thick-foliaged locusts until they were close to the bunkhouse. In a voice barely above a whisper, Clark told the nearest man: "Stay with the horses." Rifle in hand, he swung out of the saddle, setting an example for the others.

He was first in through the bunkhouse door, pushing it back, flattening to the wall a moment before he stepped on in. When the others had entered, he struck a match, glancing around the room in its brief flare, then whipped it out. Quickly, curtly he stationed his four men at windows and door. He climbed to the top tier of bunks and took the high, slitted window facing the barn lot behind, lifting out the sash and then giving them his last word: "This may be a long wait or a short one. Whatever you do, wait'll I give you the word before you open up. We want to be sure of this."

The minutes ran on interminably for Clark. His palms were damp with a nervous perspiration. The silence became oppressive, close to intolerable. Maybe he'd been right in telling his men that the mesa crews would stay set, not moving in unless they heard sounds of a fight. Maybe this was all wasted effort on his part. Tonight might bring no action at all.

He was thinking this, staring out across the wide lot toward the shadowy high shape of the big barn when he saw a dark shape move soundlessly in out of the gloom. Shortly he made that shape out as a man's crouched figure. Slowly the man circled out from the hill slope at the back of the lot, seemingly heading for the bunkhouse.

The Brush man at the side window whispered hoa.r.s.ely- "Here they come."-and at that exact moment Clark heard the soft footfall of slow-walking horses come faintly from the end of the lot out of his line of vision.

Fire at Yoke.

For a moment after hearing that low-voiced announcement by the Brush man-"Here they come."-Clark Dunne stood irresolute. In the past few days he had gone from robbery and the involuntary killing of a man to bushwhacking, to cold-blooded murder, but even now he could not contemplate the wanton blasting down of his own people without asking himself if there were any other way out. In a flash he knew the answer and his indecision pa.s.sed. Dropping quickly off the top bunk, he went to the side window, peering out over the shoulder of the man who knelt there, his rifle half lifted. Four riders were in sight, halted now. One of the horses was a paint.

"That's them," Clark breathed softly. "There's that pinto horse of Harper's. The rest of you get over here."

His urgent whisper brought the others across the room at once. When they stood beside him, he said: "Each of you pick a man, left to right as you stand. Forget it's a man you're shootin' at. Be sure to bring him down. There's another farther out back I've spotted. I'll climb up to my window again and get a line on him. When I shoot, the rest of you cut loose." He wheeled away from them and climbed back to his window.

Clark's hand was shaking as he laid the sights of the carbine on the chest of the man he had first seen, now walking across and nearly out of sight to join the others. Moving his gun to follow the target, the barrel of his Winchester came against the sash he had removed from the window. Irritated at the obstruction, Clark shoved it aside. It tipped over and fell sideward, down in behind the inner edge of the bunk's mattress.

He made a frantic stab of the hand, trying to catch it, then knew his action was wrong. In the last moment he tried to throw his sights on the man in the barn lot again. The crash of the splintering gla.s.s spoiled his aim, but he pulled the trigger anyway.

The man who had been his target-Sherman, Anchor's straw boss, he discovered later-lifted a strident shout that rang across the yard. The guns below Clark at the side window exploded in a ragged, deafening concussion. Out there, somewhere, a man screamed. A riderless horse plunged into Clark's line of vision.

Close on the heels of the rifles in the bunkhouse, others exploded from the timber on the hill close above, laying an uneven but insistent fire down on the men trapped in the barnyard.

Clark called harshly: "Stop! Don't shoot again! Its our own men!" He cursed long and loudly as he dropped down off the bunk, making good this final pretense of his having been innocent of anything but honorable intent in setting this trap.

The bunkhouse was silent a long moment under the realization of these men who were wordless with the stunning realization that they had fired on their own men. Finally one of them spoke, his tone awed and ragged: "Great Jupiter, I know I put a slug in his chest." It was the man who, back at Brush, had mentioned slotting the points of his bullets so that they would mushroom on striking a target.

"Alec, you had a long look at that pinto," Clark said savagely. "Whose was it?"

"Must've been Dennis's," Alec answered in a tired, lost voice. "And I saw him drop."

Never mind that," rasped Clark as the rifles on the hill were answered by a few shots out of the barnyard. Out there men were shouting, cursing, and at least two horses pounded away. "Someone's shooting down from the hill. It must be Harper's crew. They laid this trap and we walked straight into it! Get to the other window and see if you can pick off a man or two."

Three men went to the room's north window, one of them knocking out the lower sash with the barrel of his rifle. That man knelt, took deliberate aim, and fired, cursing saltily as he levered a fresh sh.e.l.l into his weapon. Clark, coming up behind him, also laid his sight on the flash of a rifle up in the trees and pumped two shots at his target before he moved quickly aside.

A bullet chipped a splinter from the window's sill, close to the Brush man kneeling there, and whunked into the wall across the room.

"Get back," Clark said flatly. "We'll have to make a run for it. It's every man for himself. We meet a mile south."

The rifles on the hill dropped one Brush man as they made the dash across to the locust grove where they had left the horses. Clark had a moment's panic when a bullet creased the front of his thigh. But once in the trees, out of breath and momentarily safe, he was grateful for that scratch. It would be proof that he had guessed wrong, like the others, fought with them, and come close to being cut down.

As he climbed awkwardly into the saddle, favoring his hurt leg, he heard a confused welter of sounds echoing out of the barn lot. Once he thought he caught Yace Bonnyman's voice booming over the others'. A thin smile came to his face as rifles once more threw back sharp echoes from the hill face.

He rode a quarter mile out on the flats, then turned west, putting his pony to a stiff lope, thinking to come up on Bonnyman's and Workman's men. But after ten minutes' riding, he stopped and listened. The night's stillness seemed complete until, in the direction of Diamond, a renewed burst of firing suddenly sounded. The mesa outfits had evidently stayed on to fight it out, probably because Bonnyman or some other bull-headed fool was unwilling to take his licking and leave.

"h.e.l.l with 'em," Clark breathed, and rode on toward Yoke, wanting to get a bandage on his leg as soon as he could; he could feel the cool wetness of blood down as far as his knee.

There was no light, no sign of life at Yoke when he rode into the yard. Even the big corral was empty, its pole gate standing wide. He went over to the house, got down out of the saddle, and tried the door. It was locked.

"Anyone home?" he called, listening for an answer.

No one came. The layout was completely deserted.

He had a thought that slowed the beat of his pulse until his chest ached. A dryness came to his mouth; he swallowed to clear it. Deliberately he stepped away from the door and down the porch to the nearest window. He lifted a boot and kicked in the lower sash. As the tinkling clatter of falling gla.s.s died out, he stood rigidly, listening again, this time for the sound of riders on their way in. But the night's utter stillness was complete except for the eerie chant of a hunting coyote far out on the mesa.

He stepped in through the window, groping in the darkness until he found the center table of the main room. His hand touched the big bra.s.s lamp there. He picked up the lamp, hurled it to the floor. The reeking stench of coal oil permeated the air.

He was shaking now in a trembling of excitement and rising fear. He went back to the window, listened once more. Still no sound to destroy the complete emptiness of the ranch. Turning back into the room, he quickly lit a match and dropped it on the dark, wet stain that ran across the worn rug. Flames leaped high from the match.

The barn was easier. A thick strand of loose dry hay hung down from the filled loft. All he had to do was light that and watch a leaping tongue of flame lick up along it to the ma.s.s of fire-hungry hay above.

Going back toward Diamond, Clark made a wide swing south, abreast the Middle Arizona layout, before he turned in toward it. The sound of rifles had died out. Diamond was seemingly as deserted as Yoke had been when Clark angled past the trees and lifted his horse to a quick run back toward Yoke. And now a rosy red glow cut the blackness of the night off toward Yoke.

Clark came up on three of the stragglers, Sherman of Anchor and two of his Brush riders, calling stridently when he saw Sherman swing a rifle around at him: "It's all right, Sherman."

As Clark came alongside, one of the Brush men said: "We been huntin' around for you back there. Thought they'd dropped you."

"I was fool enough to climb into the timber and have a try at 'em," Clark lied. "They heard me comin' and took me. I finally got away." He nodded off toward the strengthening glow of the fire in the distance. "What's that off there?"

"They fired Yoke," Sherman told him, his tone bitter and lifeless. "The rest have gone on ahead. We're too plumb wore out to hurry."

From then on no one said much.