TRAIL TO PIE TOWN
by Louis L'Amour
(first published in the pulp magazine West Feb. 1949)
In the Barrons, the
close-knit frontier clan of this story, Louis
 |
| Cover West magazine Feb. 1948 |
L'Amour's faithful readers will
recognize an early prototype of the Sacketts.
In the days when the nearest neighbors – or law officers – lay twenty or
eighty miles away, families had to stick together in the face of threats, both
from their fellow men and nature. That
the clan ethos had its dark side (as illustrated in many parts of the world today, or
on Judge Judy for that matter), L'Amour was only too aware – populating
his stories with clans hateful as well as good.
Dusty Barron turned the
steel-dust stallion down the slope toward the wash. He was going to have to find water soon or
the horse and himself would be done for.
If Emmett Fisk and Gus Mattis had shown up in the street at any other
time it would have been all right.
As it was, they appeared just
as he was making a break from the saloon, and they had blocked the road to the
hill country and safety. Both men had
reached for their guns when they saw him, and he had wheeled his horse and hit
the desert road at a dead run. With Dan
Hickman dead in the saloon it was no time to argue or engage in gun
pleasantries while the clan gathered.
It had been a good idea to
ride to Jarilla and make peace talk, only the idea hadn't worked. Dan Hickman had called him yellow and then
gone for a gun. Dan was a mite slow, a
fact that had left him dead on the saloon floor.
There were nine Hickmans in
Jarilla, and there were Mattis and three Fisk boys. Dusty's own tall brothers were back in the
hills southwest of Jarilla, but with his road blocked he had headed the
steel-dust down the trail into the basin.
The stallion had saved his
bacon. No doubt about that. It was only the speed of the big desert-bred
horse, and its endurance, that had got him away from town before the Hickmans
could catch him. The big horse had given
him lead enough until night had closed in, and after that it was easier.
Dusty had turned at right
angles from his original route. They
would never expect that, for the turn took him down the long slope into the
vast, empty expanse of the alkali basin where no man of good sense would
consider going.
For him it was the only
route. At Jarilla they would be watching
for him, expecting him to circle back to the hill country and his own
people. He should have listened to Allie
when she had told him it was useless to try to settle the old blood feud.
He had been riding now, with
only a few breaks, for hours. Several
times he had stopped to rest the stallion, wanting to conserve its splendid
strength against what must lie ahead.
And occasionally he had dismounted and walked ahead of the big horse.
Dusty Barron had only the
vaguest idea of what he was heading into.
It was thirty-eight miles across the basin, and he was heading down the
basin. According to popular rumor there
was no water for over eighty miles in that direction. And he had started with his canteen only half
full.
For the first hour he had
taken his course from a star. Then he
had sighted a peak ahead and to his left, and used that for a marker. Gradually, he had worked his way toward the
western side of the basin.
Somewhere over the western
side was Gallo Gap, a green meadow high in the peaks off a rocky and rarely
used pass. There would be water there if
he could make it, yet he knew of the Gap only from a story told him by a
prospector he had met one day in the hills near his home.
Daybreak found him a solitary
black speck in a vast wilderness of white.
The sun stabbed at him with lances of fire, and then rising higher
bathed the great alkali basin in white radiance and blasting furnace heat. Dusty narrowed his eyes against the
glare. It was at least twelve miles to
the mountains.
He still had four miles to go
through the puffing alkali dust when he saw the tracks. At first he couldn't believe the evidence of
his eyes. A wagon-here!
While he allowed the
steel-dust to take a blow, he dismounted and examined the tracks. It had been a heavy wagon pulled by four
mules or horses. In the fine dust he
could not find an outlined track to tell one from the other.
The tracks had come out of
the white distance to the east and had turned north exactly on the route he was
following. Gallo Gap, from the
prospector's story, lay considerably north of him, and a bit to the west.
Had the driver of the wagon
known of the Gap? Or had he merely
turned on impulse to seek a route through the mountains. Glancing in first one and then the other
direction, Dusty could see no reason why the driver should choose either
direction. Jarilla lay southwest, but
from here there was no indication of it, and no trail.
Mounting again, he rode on,
and when he came to the edge of the low hills fronting the mountains, he
detected the wagon trail running along through the scattered rocks, parched
bunch grass and greasewood. It was still
heading north. Yet when he studied the
terrain before him he could see nothing but dancing heat waves and an
occasional dust devil.
The problem of the wagon
occupied his mind to forgetfulness of his own troubles. It had come across the alkali basin from the
east. That argued it must have come from
the direction of Manzano unless the wagon had turned into the trail somewhere
further north on the road to Conejos.
Nothing about it made
sense. This was Apache country and no
place for wagon travel. A man on a fast
horse, yes, but even then it was foolhardy to travel alone. Yet the driver of the wagon had the courage
of recklessness to come across the dead white expanse of the basin, a trip that
to say the least was miserable.
Darkness was coming again,
but he rode on. The wagon interested
him, and with no other goal in mind now that he had escaped the Hickmans, he
was curious to see who the driver was and to learn what he had in mind. Obviously the man was a stranger to this
country.
It was then, in the fading
light, that he saw the mule. The
steel-dust snorted and shied sharply, but Dusty kneed it closer for a better
look. It had been a big mule and a fine
animal, but it was dead now. It bore
evidence of that brutal crossing of the basin, and here, on the far side, the
animal had finally dropped dead of heat and exhaustion.
Only then did he see the
trunk. It was sitting between two rocks,
partly concealed. He walked over to it
and looked it over. Cumbersome and
heavy; it had evidently been dumped from the wagon to lighten the load. He tried to open it, but could not. It was locked tight. Beside it were a couple of chairs and a bed.
"Sheddin' his
load," Dusty muttered thoughtfully.
"He'd better find some water for those other mules or they'll die,
too."
Then he noticed the name on
the trunk. D. C. LOWE, ST. LOUIS, MO.
"You're a long way from
home," Dusty remarked. He swung a
leg over the saddle and rode on. He had
gone almost five miles before he saw the fire.
At first, it might have been
a star, but as he drew nearer he could see it was too low down, although higher
than he was. The trail had been turning
gradually deeper into the hills and had begun to climb a little. He rode on, using the light for a beacon.
When he was still some
distance off he dismounted and tied the stallion to a clump of greasewood and
walked forward on foot.
The three mules were hitched
to the back of the wagon, all tied loosely, and lying down. A girl was bending over a fire, and a small
boy, probably no more than nine years old, was gathering sticks of dried
mesquite for fuel. There was no one else
in sight.
Marveling, he returned to his
horse and started back. When he was
still a little distance away he began to sing.
His throat was dry and it was a poor job, but he didn't want to frighten
them. When he walked his horse into the
firelight the boy was staring up at him, wide eyed, and the girl had an old
Frontier Model Colt.
"It's all right,
ma'am," he said, swinging down, "I'm just a passin' stranger an'
don't mean any harm."
"Who are you?" she
demanded.
"Name of Dusty Barron,
ma'am. I've been followin' your
trail."
"Why?" Her voice was sharp and a little
frightened. She could have been no more
than seventeen or eighteen.
"Mostly because I was
headed this-away an' was wonderin' what anybody was doin' down here with a
wagon, or where you might be headed."
"Doesn't this lead us
anywhere?" she asked.
"Ma'am," Dusty
replied, "if you're lookin' for a settlement there ain't none thisaway in
lesson a hundred miles. There's a sort
of town then, place they call Pie Town."
"But where did you come
from?" Her eyes were wide and
dark. If she was fixed up, he reflected,
she would be right pretty.
"Place they call
Jarilla," he said, "but I reckon this was a better way if you're
travelin' alone. Jarilla's a Hickman
town, an' they sure are a no-account lot."
"My father died,"
she told him, putting the gun in a holster hung to the wagon bed, "back
there. Billy an' I buried him."
"You come across the
basin alone?" He was incredulous.
"Yes. Father died in the mountains on the other
side. That was three days ago."
Dusty removed his hat and
began to strip the saddle and bridle from the stallion while the girl bent over
her cooking. He found a hunk of bacon in
his saddle pockets. "Got plenty of
bacon?" he asked. "I most
generally pack a mite along."
She looked up, brushing a
strand of hair away from her face. She
was flushed from the fire. "We
haven't had any bacon for a week."
She looked away quickly, and her chin quivered a little, then became
stubborn. "Nor much of anything
else, but you're welcome to join us."
He seated himself on the
ground and leaned back on his saddle while she dished up the food. It wasn't much. A few dry beans and some corn bread. "You got some relatives out here
somewheres?"
"No," she handed
him a plate, but he was too thirsty to eat more than a few mouthfuls. "Father had a place out here. His lungs were bad and they told him the dry
air would be good for him. My mother
died when Billy was born, so there was nothing to keep us back in Missouri. We just headed west."
"You say your father had
a place? Where is it?"
"I'm not sure. Father loaned some man some money, or rather,
he provided him with money with which to buy stock. The man was to come west and settle on a
place, stock it, and then send for dad."
Dusty ate slowly, thinking
that over. "Got anything to show
for it?"
"Yes, father had an
agreement that was drawn up and notarized.
It's in a leather wallet. He gave
the man five thousand dollars. It was
all we had."
When they had eaten, the girl
and boy went to sleep in the wagon box while Dusty stretched out on the ground
nearby. "What a mess!" he told
himself. "Those kids comin' away
out here all by themselves an' the chances are that money was blowed in over a
faro layout long ago!"
In the morning Dusty hitched
up the mules for them. "You foller
me," he advised, and turned the stallion up the trail to the north.
It was almost noon before he
saw the thumb-like butte that marked the entrance to Gallo Gap. He turned toward it, riding ahead to scout
the best trail, and at times dismounting to roll rocks aside so the wagon could
get through.
Surmounting the crest of a
low hill, he looked suddenly into Gallo Gap.
His red-rimmed eyes stared greedily at the green grass and trees. The stallion smelled water and wanted to keep
going, so waving the wagon on, he rode down into the Gap.
Probably there were no more
than two hundred acres here, but it was waist deep in rich green grass, and the
towering yellow pines were tall and very old.
It was like riding from desolation into a beautiful park. He found the spring by the sound of running
water, crystal clear and beautiful, the water rippling over the rocks to fall
into a clear pond at least an acre in extent.
Nearby space had been cleared for a cabin, then abandoned.
Dusty turned in the saddle as
his horse stood knee deep in the water.
The wagon pulled up. "This
is a little bit of heaven!" he said, grinning at the girl. "Say, what's your name, anyway?"
"Ruth Grant," she
said, shyly.
All the weariness seemed to
have fled from her face at the sight of the water and trees. She smiled gaily, and a few minutes later as
he walked toward the trees with a rifle in the crook of his elbow he heard
laughter, and then her voice, singing.
He stopped suddenly, watching some deer, feeding a short distance off,
and listening to her voice. It made a
lump of loneliness rise in his throat.
That night after they had
eaten steaks from a fat buck he'd killed, their first good meal in days, he
looked across the fire at her.
"Ruth," he said, "I think I'll locate me a home right
here. I've been lookin' for a place of
my own.
"I reckon what we better
do is for you all to stay here with me until you get rested up. I'll build a cabin, and those mules of yours
can get some meat on their bones again.
Then I'll ride on down to Pie Town and locate this hombre your father
had dealin's with, an' see how things look."
That was the way they left
it, but in the days that followed Dusty Barron had never been happier. He felled trees on the mountain side and
built a cabin, and in working around he found ways of doing things he had never
tried before. Ruth was full of
suggestions about the house, sensible, knowing things that helped a lot. He worked the mules a little, using only one
at a time and taking them turn about.
He hunted a good deal for food. Nearby he found a salt lick and shot an
occasional antelope, and several times, using a shot-gun from the wagon, he
killed blue grouse. In a grove of trees
he, found some ripe black cherries similar to those growing wild in the
Guadalupe Mountains of West Texas. There
was also some Mexican plum.
When the cabin was up and
there was plenty of meat on hand he got his gear in shape. Then he carefully oiled and cleaned his guns.
Ruth noticed them, and her
face paled a little. "You believe
there will be trouble?" she asked quickly.
"I don't want you to–"
"Forget it," he
interrupted. "I've got troubles of
my own." He explained about the
killing of Dan Hickman and the long standing feud between the families.
He left at daybreak. In his pocket he carried the leather wallet
containing the agreement Roger Grant had made with Dick Lowe. It was a good day's ride from Gallo Gap to
Aimless Creek where Dusty camped the first night. The following day he rode on into Pie
Town. From his talks with Ruth he knew something
of Lowe, and enough of the probable location of the ranch, if there was one.
A cowhand with sandy hair and
crossed eyes was seated on the top rail of the corral. Dusty reined in and leaned his forearm on the
saddlehorn and dug for the makings. After
he had rolled a smoke he passed them on to the cross-eyed rider.
"Know anything about an'
hombre name of Dick Lowe?" he asked.
"Reckon so." They shared a match, and looking at each
other through the smoke decided they were men of a kind. "He's up there in the Spur Saloon
now."
Dusty made no move. After a few drags on the cigarette, he
glanced at the fire end. "What kind
of hombre is he?"
"Salty." The cowhand puffed for a moment on his
cigarette. "Salty, an' mean. Plumb poison with a shootin' iron, an' when
you ride for him, he pays you what he wants to when you quit. If you don't think you got a square deal you
can always tell him so, but when you do you better reach."
"Like that, huh?"
"Like that." He smoked quietly for a few minutes. "Four hombres haven't liked what he paid
'em. He buried all four of 'em in his
own personal boot hill, off to the north of the ranchhouse."
"Sounds bad. Do all his own work or does he have
help?"
"He's got help. Cat McQuill an' Bugle Nose Bender. Only nobody calls him Bugle Nose to his
face."
"What about the
ranch? Nice place?"
"Best around here. He come in here with money, had near five
thousand dollar. He bought plenty of
cattle an' stocked his range well."
The cross-eyed cowhand looked
at him squinting through the smoke.
"My name's Blue Riddle. I
rode for him once."
"I take it you didn't
argue none," Barron said, grinning.
"My maw never raised no
foolish children!" Riddle replied wryly.
"They had me in a cross fire.
Been Lowe alone, I'd maybe of took a chance, but as it was, they would
have cut me down quick. So I come away,
but I'm stickin' around, just waiting. I
told him I aimed to have my money, an' he just laughed."
Dusty dropped his hand back
and loosened his left-hand gun. Then he
swung his leg back over the saddle and thrust his toe in the stirrup. "Well," he said, "I got papers
here that say I speak for a gal that owns half his layout. I'm goin' up an' lay claim to it for
her."
Riddle looked up
cynically. "Why not shoot yourself
and save the trouble? They'll gun you
down."
Then he sized Barron up
again. "What did you say your name
was?"
Dusty grinned. "I didn't say, but it's Dusty
Barron."
Blue Riddle slid off the
corral rail. "One of the Barron's
from Castle Rock?" He grinned
again. "This I gotta see!"
Dusty was looking for a big
man, but Dick Lowe, whom he spotted at once on entering the saloon, was only a
bit larger than himself, and he was the only small man among the Barrons.
Lowe turned to look at him as
he entered. The man's features were
sharp, and his quick eyes glanced from Dusty Barron to Riddle, then back
again. Dusty walked to the bar, and
Riddle loitered near the door.
The man standing beside Lowe
at the bar must be Cat McQuill. The
reason for the nickname was obvious for there was something feline about the
man's facial appearance.
"Lowe?" Dusty
inquired.
"That's right,"
Lowe turned toward him slowly, "something you want?"
"Yeah," Dusty
leaned nonchalantly on the bar and ordered a drink. "I'm representin' your partner."
Dick Lowe's face blanched,
then turned hard as stone. His eyes
glinted. However, he managed a smile
with his thin lips. "Partner? I have no partner."
Dusty leaned on the bar
watching his drink poured. He took his
time.
Lowe watched him, slowly growing
more and more angry. "Well,"
he said sharply, "if you've got something to say, say it!"
Dusty looked around,
simulating surprise. "Why, I was
just givin' you time to remember, Lowe!
You can't tell me you can draw up an agreement with a man, have it
properly notarized, and then take five thousand dollars of his money to stock a
ranch and not remember it!"
Dusty was pointedly speaking
loudly and the fact angered Lowe.
"You have such an agreement?" Lowe demanded.
"Sure I got it."
"Where's the party this
supposed agreement belongs to? Why
doesn't he speak for himself?"
"He's dead. He was a lunger an' died on his way
west."
Lowe's relief was
evident. "I'm afraid," he
said, "that this is all too obvious an attempt to get some money out of
me. It won't work."
"It's nothing of the
kind. Grant's dead, but he left a
daughter and a son. I aim to see they
get what belongs to 'em, Mr. Lowe. I hope
we can do it right peaceable."
Lowe's face tightened, but he
forced a smile. He was aware he had
enemies in Pie Town, and did not relish their overhearing this
conversation. He was also aware that it
was pretty generally known that he had come into Pie Town with five thousand in
cash and brought cattle when everyone on the range was impoverished.
"I reckon this'll be
easy settled," he said. "You
bring the agreement to the ranch, an' if it's all legal I reckon we can make a
deal."
"Sure!" Dusty
agreed. "See you tomorrow!"
On the plank steps of the
hotel, he waited until Riddle caught up with him. "You ain't actually goin' out there, are
you?" Blue demanded. "That's
just askin' for trouble!"
"I'm goin' out,"
Dusty agreed. "I want a look at the
ranch myself. If I can ride out there I
can get an idea what kind of stock he's got and what shape the ranch is
in. I've got a hunch if we make a cash
settlement Lowe isn't goin' to give us much more chance to look around if he
can help it.
"Besides, I've talked in
front o' the folks here in town, and rough as some of them may be they ain't
goin' to see no orphans get gypped. No
Western crowd would stand for that unless it's some outlaws like Lowe and his
two pals.
Riddle walked slowly away
shaking his head with doubt. Dusty
watched him go and then went on inside.
He was throwing a saddle on
the steel-dust next morning when he heard a low groan. Gun in hand he walked around the corner of
the corral. Beyond a pile of poles he
saw Blue Riddle pulling himself off the ground.
"What happened?" Dusty demanded.
"Bender an'
McQuill. They gave me my walkin'
papers. Said I'd been in town too long,
which didn't bother Lowe none till I took up with you. They gave me till daybreak to pull my
freight."
He staggered erect, holding a
hand to his head. "Then Bender bent
a gun over my noggin."
Barron's eyes narrowed. "Play rough, don't they?" He looked at Riddle. "What are you goin' to do?"
"You don't see me out
here runnin' down the road, do you?" Riddle said. "I'm sittin' tight!"
"Wash your face off,
then," Dusty suggested, "an' we'll eat!"
"You go ahead,"
Riddle replied. "I'll be
along."
Dusty glanced back over his
shoulder as he left and saw Blue Riddle hiking toward the Indian huts that
clustered outside of Pie Town.
When he rode out of town an
hour later Dusty Barron was not feeling overly optimistic. Riddle had stayed behind only at Dusty's
insistence, but now that Dusty was headed toward Lowe's ranch he no longer felt
so confident. Dick Lowe was not a man to
give up easily, nor to yield his ranch or any part of it without a fight. The pistol whipping of Riddle had been ample
evidence of the lengths to which he was prepared to go.
The range through which Dusty
rode was good. This was what he had
wanted to see. How they might have
bargained in town he was not sure. He
doubted if anyone there would interfere if a deal was made by him. It was his own problem to see that Ruth and
Billy Grant got a fair deal, and that could not be done unless he knew
something, at least, of the ranch and the stock.
Dusty was quite sure now that
Lowe had never expected the consumptive Roger Grant to come west and claim his
piece of the ranch. Nor had he planned
to give it to him if he had. He knew
very well that he, himself, was riding into the lion's mouth, but felt he could
depend on his own abilities and that Lowe would not go too far after his talk
before the bystanders who had been in the saloon. By now Lowe would know that the story would
be known to all his enemies in Pie Town.
Cat McQuill was loafing on
the steps when Dusty rode up, and the gunman's eyes gleamed with triumph at
seeing him. "Howdy!" he said
affably. "Come on in! The boss is waitin' for you!"
Bugle Nose Bender was leaning
against the fireplace and Lowe was seated at his desk. "Here he is, Boss!" McQuill said as
they entered.
Lowe glanced up sharply. "Where's the agreement?" he asked,
holding out his hand.
Barron handed it to him, and
the rancher opened it, took a quick look, then glanced up. "This is it, Cat!"
Too late Dusty heard the
slide of gun on leather, and whirled to face McQuill, but the pistol barrel
crashed down over the side of his head and he hit the floor. Even as he fell he realized what a fool he
had been, yet he had been so sure they would talk a little, at least, try to
run a blazer or to buy him off cheap.
Bender lunged toward him and
kicked him in the ribs, then Lowe reached over and jerking him to his knees,
struck him three times in the face. The
pistol barrel descended again and drove him down into a sea of blackness.
How long they had pounded him
he had no idea. When he opened his eyes,
he struggled, fighting his way to realization of where he was. It took him several minutes to understand
that he was almost standing on his head in the road, one foot caught in the
stallion's stirrup!
The steel-dust, true to his
training, was standing rigid in the road, his head turned to look at his
master. "Easy boy!" Dusty
groaned. "Easy does it!" Twisting his foot in the stirrup, he tried to
free it, but to no avail.
He realized what they had
planned. After beating him they had
brought him out here, wedged his foot in the stirrup, struck the horse and when
he started to move, had ridden hastily away before they could be seen. Most horses, frightened by the unfamiliar
burden in the stirrup, would have raced away over the desert and dragged him to
death. In fact, it had happened to more
than one unwary cowhand.
They had reckoned without the
steel-dust. The stallion had been reared
by Dusty Barron from a tiny colt, and the two had never been long apart. The big horse knew instantly that something
was radically wrong, and had gone only a little way, then stopped. His long training told him to stand, and he
stood stock still.
Dusty twisted his foot again
but couldn't get loose. Nor could he
pull himself up and get hold of the stirrup and so into the saddle. He was still trying this when hoof-beats
sounded on the road.
He looked around wildly,
fearful of Lowe's return. Then a wave of
relief went over him. It was Blue
Riddle!
"Hey!" Blue
exclaimed. "What the heck
happened?" He swung down from his
horse and hastily extricated Dusty from his predicament.
Barron explained. "They wanted me killed so it would look
like I was dragged to death! Lucky they
got away from here in a hurry, afraid they might be seen!"
"But they got the
agreement!" Riddle protested.
"Uh uh." Barron grinned, then gasped as his bruised
face twinged with pain. "That was a
copy. I put the agreement down an'
traced over it. He took a quick look and
thought it was the real thing. Now we
got to get to town before he realizes what happened."
Despite his battered and
bruised body and the throbbing of his face, Dusty crawled into the saddle and
they raced up the road to Pie Town.
Two men were standing on the
hotel porch as they rode up. One of them
glanced at Dusty Barron.
"Howdy. Young woman inside
wants to see you."
Dusty rushed into the lobby
and stopped in surprised. Facing him was
Ruth Grant, holding Billy by the hand, but her smile fled when she saw his
face. "Oh!" she cried. "What's happened to you?"
Briefly, he explained. Then demanded, "How'd you get
here?"
"After you left,"
Ruth told him, "I was worried.
After father's death and the trouble we had before you came there was no
time to think of anything, and I had to always be thinking of where we would go
and what we would do. Then I remembered
a comment father made once.
"You see, Mr. Lowe left
a trunk with us to bring west or send to him later. It wasn't quite full, so father opened it to
pack some other things in it. He found
something there that worried him a great deal, and he told me several times
that he was afraid he might have trouble when we got out here.
"From all he said I had
an idea what he found, so after you were gone we searched through the trunk and
found some letters and a hand bill offering a five thousand dollar reward for
Lowe. Why he kept them I can't imagine,
but the sheriff says some criminals are very vain, and often keep such things
about themselves."
"And then you rode on
here?"
She nodded. "We met two men who were trailing you,
and as they had extra horses with them so they could travel fast, we joined
them."
Dusty's face tightened. "Men looking for me?"
Riddle interrupted. "Dick Lowe's ridin' into town now!"
Dusty Barron turned,
loosening his guns. He started for the
door.
"I'm in on this,
too!" Riddle said, trailing him.
They walked out on the porch
and stepped down into the street, spreading apart. Dick Lowe and his two henchmen had dismounted
and were starting into the saloon when something made them glance up the
street.
"Lowe!" Dusty
yelled. "You tried to kill me, an
I'm comin' for you!"
Dick Lowe's hard face twisted
with fury as he wheeled, stepping down into the dust.
He stopped in the street, and
Cat McQuill and Bender moved out to either side.
Dusty Barron walked steadily
down the street, his eyes on Dick Lowe.
All three men were dangerous, but Lowe was the man he wanted, and Lowe
was the man he intended to get first.
"This man's an
outlaw!" he said, speaking to Bender and McQuill. "He's wanted for murder in St. Louis!
If you want out, get out now!"
"You're lying!"
Bender snarled.
Dusty Barron walked on. The sun was bright in the street and little
puffs of dust arose at every step. There
were five horses tied to the hitch-rail behind the three men. He found himself hoping none of them would be
hit by a stray shot. To his right was
Blue Riddle, walking even with him, his big hands hovering over his guns.
His eyes clung to Dick Lowe,
riveted there as though he alone lived in the world. He could see the man drop into a half-crouch,
noticed the bulge of the tobacco sack in his breast pocket, the buttons down
the two sides of his shirt. Under the
brim of the hat he could see the straight bar of the man's eyebrows, and the
hard gleam of the eyes beneath, and then suddenly the whole tableau dissolved
into flaming, shattering action.
Lowe's hand flashed for his
gun and Dusty's beat him by a hair's breadth, but Dusty held his fire, lifting
the gun slowly. Lowe's quick shot flamed
by his ear, and he winced inwardly at the proximity of death. Then the gunman fired again and the bullet
tugged impatiently at his vest. He drew
a long breath and squeezed off a shot, then another.
Lowe rose on tip-toes, opened
his mouth wide as if to gasp for breath, and seemed to hold himself there for a
long moment, then pitched over into the street.
Dusty's gun swung with his
eyes and he saw Bender was down on his knees and so he opened up on
McQuill. The Cat man jerked
convulsively, then began to back away, his mouth working and his gun hammering. The man's gun stopped firing, and he stared
at it, pulled the trigger again, and then reached for a cartridge from his
belt.
Barron stood straddle legged
in the street and saw Cat's hand fumble at his belt. The fingers came out with a cartridge and
moved toward the gun, and then his eyes glazed and he dropped his iron. Turning, as though the whole affair had
slipped his mind, he started for the saloon.
He made three steps, then lifted his foot, seemed to feel for the saloon
step, then fell like a log across the rough board porch.
Blue Riddle was on his knees,
blood staining a trouser leg. Bender was
sprawled out in the dust, a darkening pool forming beneath him.
Suddenly the street was
filled with people. Ruth ran up to Dusty
and he slid his arm around her. With a
shock, he remembered. "You said two
men were looking for me. Who?"
"Only us.
He turned, staring. Two big men were facing him, grinning. "Buck and Ben! How in tarnation did you two find me?"
Buck Barron grinned. "We was wonderin' what happened to
you. We come to town and had a mite of a
ruckus with the Hickmans. What was left
of them headed for El Paso in a mighty hurry – both of 'em.
"Then an Injun kid come
ridin' up on a beat-up hoss and said you all was in a sight of trouble so we
figgered we'd come along and see how you made out.
"An Injun?" Dusty was puzzled.
"Yeah," Riddle told
him, "that was my doin'. I figgered
you was headed for trouble, so I sent an Injun kid off after your
brothers. Heck, if I'd knowed what you was
like with a six-gun I'd never have sent for 'em!"
Ben Barron grinned and rubbed
at the stubble of whiskers. "An' if
we'd knowed there was on'y three, we'd never have come!" He looked from Dusty to Ruth. "Don't look like you'd be comin' home
right soon with that place at Gallo Gap an' what you've got your arm
around. But what'll we tell Allie?"
"Allie?" Ruth drew away from him, eyes wide. "Who's Allie? You didn't tell me you had a girl!"
Dusty winked at his
brothers. "Allie? She's war chief of the Barron tribe! Allie's my ma!"
He turned to Riddle. "Blue, how's about you sort of keepin'
an eye on that Gap place for me for a week or so? I reckon I'd better take Ruth home for a
spell. Allie, she sure sets a sight of
store by weddin's!"
Ruth's answering pressure on
his arm was all the answer he needed.
END
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