Conagher (1969) (12 page)

Can you do anything for him ?

Why the hell should I? He was comin'
a fter me when he got it. But I will, kid, I will because I'm a damn fool, if I can fin d the time while I'm standin' off you r friends .

Conagher moved back, watching th e windows .
Your friends are waitin' unti l dark when the lot of them can come dow n here and jump me. Well, I've got som e money here, boy, and I'll bet you the stac k that I take at least two more, and likel y three, and you can be one of them .

Scott stood still, his face still pale, ange r fighting with indecision .
You can sta y here if you like , Conagher said , an d mind your friend, if friend he is .

You'd trust me ?

Not a damn bit. If you made a wron g move I'd shoot you dead in your tracks.

But you're better off down here than ou t there. You got a chance, kid. You'd bette r take it .

I ... I can't. I'd be a traitor. I'
d be?

A traitor to them? All right, boy , you've had your say, now get out and ge t on back up the hill, but when you com e down again, you better be using that gun , because I'm going to be aiming for you r guts .

You're a hard man, Conagher .

This here's a hard country. But it's a good country, Scott, and it'll be better a s soon as we hang or shoot a few mor e thieving skunks .

His face white to the lips, Scott wen t out. He hesitated, then started the lon g walk up the hill. Conagher watched hi m go, knowing how long and hard a walk th e boy was taking. He was going back to hi s outlaw companions, when deep dow n inside he knew he shouldn't. He was goin g back out of misplaced loyalty.

Suddenly Conagher shouted , Scott , you tell Smoke Parnell that if he has th e guts of a jack rabbit he'll come down her e and we'll shoot it out, man to man. He'
s supposed to be gun-handy. Me, I'm just a cow puncher .

When Scott got over the crest, Pet e Casuse, Tile Coker, and Smoke Parnel l were waiting for him .
Took you lon g enough , Smoke said .
What happened t o Hi ?

He's been shot in the belly. It's prett y bad, I guess .

Tough, but while Conagher's carin'
f or him he ain't watchin' for us ?

Curly Scott looked at him, the n repeated what Conagher had said.

I heard him
, Parnell said carelessly , an' why should I be a fool? We got hi m right where we want him, and come dar k we'll go in after him .

Curly Scott dropped to the ground. H
e wished he was anywhere but here. He ha d seen that man down there. He wa s unshaven and down at heel, he was no kid , and he was alone, but there was somethin g about him . . .

That's a tough man down there , h e said quietly , and we still don't kno w where Leggett and Tay are .

Hell, they've quit! They've taken ou t durin' the night. That damn fool dow n there is fighting for a brand that's qui t him .

Conn Conagher, with occasional glance s from the window, cleaned up the gunsho t and bandaged the man as well a s he could with what was at hand.

He looked toward the house. There ha d been no sign of life over there. Maybe the y had left him. Maybe they had pulled ou t while he was asleep. Well, no matterh e wasn't quitting. Maybe he was just to o dumb to quit.

Chapter
10

THE wounded man was muttering , and suddenly he asked for water.

Conn brought it to him in the long handle d drinking gourd and held it fo r him while he drank.

Hi Jackson looked up at him .
I'm i n pretty bad shape, ain't I ?

I'd say so
.

You're Conagher ?

Uh-huh.. . . The kid brought you i n Scott .

He's . . . he's a good boy. He ought t o go home .

Then Jackson lay quiet, breathin g heavily. He'd lost a lot of blood, an d Conagher didn't think he had much time.

I got to leave you pretty quick. Whe n it's dark your outfit will be down here afte r me .

You ain't goin' to make it, Conagher.
y ou know that, don't you ?

I know nothing of the kind. But if I don't make it, they will be buryin' four o r five of your boys with me. They didn'
t pick on no pilgrim. I've been through thi s a time or two .

Shadows stretched out from the house , gathered in the lee of the bunk house.

Now . . . soon there would be no mor e time.

He filled a cup with the black coffee an d sipped it while making his rounds of th e windows. Then he stuffed his pockets wit h shells, glanced again at the wounded man , and edged over to the window.

Again he looked toward the ranc h house. Where were Tay and Leggett?

Suddenly he glimpsed a shadow, th e shadow of a running man. There was n o time for a shot, no time for anything.

He went out the window and made it t o the corral corner in a long, swift dive. A m an moved near the far corner, and as h e moved a rifle shattered the stillness an d the running man fell sprawling. Instantl y there were three more shots, all of the m from the house!

Another man was down, and Con n could hear somebody swearing.

Whoever was in the house had wisel y held their fire until the attackers expecte d no danger from that quarter. Two me n were down, and the one in plain sight wa s dead.

Crouched at the corner of the corral , Conn saw a flicker of movemen t something white. He looked again, an d saw that it was a paper tied to a tumbleweed, another message like th e one he had found before.

It was within reach, and he put out a hand and cautiously untied it. It was to o dark to read it, and he thrust it carefull y down into his pocket.

The dusk was deceiving. Straining hi s eyes, he tried to make out some furthe r movement, but there was none.

In another minute he heard a whisper.

Tile? Back out . . . we're pullin' away .

There was a shuffling movement o f someone crawling along the ground. Con n had his gun up and could have scored a sure hit, but what was the use?

If he fired now they would surely retur n his fire and he would likely get hit.

If they were pulling out, let them go.

There was no point in it if they wer e quitting. Smoke Parnell had never ha d more than nine or ten men that Con n knew of, though there could be mor e . . . and he had lost three here today.

Conn stayed right where he was , and after a while he heard the drummin g of hoofs, growing fainter in the distance.

By now it was completely dark, and h e went back to the bunk house and stirre d up the fire in the stove. Through the ligh t from the open door he saw that Hi Jackso n was dead.

He struck a match and lighted one of th e lamps, keeping away from the windows i n case one of the outlaws had lingere d behind, though he did not expect it o f them. After all, they had nothing at stake.

They could ride off?and attack again a t another time, if they had the stomach fo r it.

He stood for a moment, reluctant at las t to leave the bunk house. When he did, i t was just as Tay and Leggett emerged fro m the ranch house.

Conagher
?
It was Tay speaking.

You made a fight .

I tried
.

Most of the time we weren't situated t o get in even one shot, and then we got ou r chance .

You broke their backs. You took th e heart out of them/' Conagher said. H
e pushed his hat back .
I'm hungry an d tired, Tay, and there's a dead man in th e bunk house. The one Scott brought in .

Who was it
?

Hi Jackson
.

Too bad
, Tay said .
He rode for m e for a while. He was a good hand, but h e took to riding with bad company .

Leave him to me , Leggett said .
Yo u done your share, Conn .

Conagher walked back to the house wit h Tay and sat at the table while the bos s filled a cup with coffee for him, and set ou t bread, some cold meat, and a quarter of a n apple pie.

You must be starved , Tay said.

Conn ate without talking, and Tay stoo d at the window watching Leggett carry th e dead man out to the hill.

A man isn't long for this world, but h e should come to something better tha n that. Ever think of the here-after, Conn ?

Not much. I figure it's like the Plain s Indians saya happy hunting ground.

Leastways, that's how I'd like it to be. A p lace with mountains, springs, runnin g streams, and some green, grassy bank s where a man can lie with his hat over hi s eyes and let the bees buzz .

Somehow that made him think of th e note in his pocket and he took it out an d fumbled it open. He was so tired he wa s ready to sleep right there, half through hi s meal. He looked at the written words.

There was just one line.

/ have never been in love.

He stared at it for a long moment, the n put it back in his pocket. That was a har d thing for a woman to tell herself, unles s she was a youngster. What kind of a woman would write something like tha t and send it rolling off before the wind?

A lonely one, he told himself, a might y lonely one.

He knew how she felt. Sometimes a body just had to have somebody to talk to.

You saw something and you wanted t o turn and say, Isn't that beautiful? An d there was nobody there.

Well, there were a lot of lonely folks ou t here in the West. Men and wome n working alone, or feeling alone, thei r homes far from each other, their mind s and hearts reaching out across th e distance, plucking at the strings of the ai r to find some answering call.

Lonely people, who looked at horizon s and wondered what, or who, was beyon d them, people hemmed in by distance , people locked in space, in the emptines s .. . prisoners, they were.

In his own way Conagher was a prisoner. He'd never had the education t o escape it, if that was an escape. He'd gon e to work as soon as he was big enough t o wrap his hands around a tool, and he'
d been at it ever since. About all he'd eve r had out of life was a seat in a saddle and a lot of open country to look at.

He had stifled in the dust of the drag o f many a trail drive, stifled in the heat risin g from two thousand hot, moving bodies.

He'd had his guts churned on the seat of a stage coach bouncing over the prairie, an d by many a bronc, breaking horses for th e rough string.

He wished it was spring so the win d could blow back the other way. He woul d like to send a message back to the one wh o had written these notes, to say that she wa s not alone, that somebody had read he r words. But the wind didn't blow that way , and the chances were she'd not find it , anyway.

Tay interrupted his thoughts.

What will they do now ?
he asked.

What do you think, Conagher ?

They won't leave us alone. Next tim e they'll choose a different way . . . they ma y just try to drive the cattle off, or take u s one by one .

Have you ever been shot, Conagher ?

A couple of times, and it is not a rewarding experience .

He finished the pie, drank another cu p of coffee, and pushed back from the table.

I'm going to sleep , he said .
Don'
t wake me unless there's trouble, rea l trouble .

He was staggering with weariness as h e walked back to the bunk house. He pulle d off his boots and gunbelt, simply rolle d over on the bed and went to sleep. In hi s sleep he dreamed of whole battalions o f tumbleweeds, each with its message, al l blowing toward him. He grasped at eac h one, struggling to get its message befor e the wind took it out of reach.

For a week after that, there was quiet.

Conagher rode to the Plaza and reporte d the shootings. The sheriff listened, parin g his fingernails with a jackknife, and at th e end of Conn's recital he got up and hel d out his hand.

I know Seaborn Tay , he said .
He's a good man. A solid man. And I kno w Leggett. I don't know you, but I've hear d about you, and I want to shake your hand.

You've helped rid the country of some ba d men .

He went on
, You mentioned Curl y Scott. Was he hurt, do you know ?

I doubt it
.

Conagher pushed his hat back .
Sheriff , there's a boy who'd cut loose from tha t crowd, given the right chance. He's stuc k by them through some fool sense of loyalt y . . . and they don't deserve it .

Maybe we have what it will take , th e sheriff said .
His sister is in town. If yo u see him, tell him that. She's come from th e East to see him .

And then he added , She has no ide a he's an outlaw .

When he returned from the Plaza , Conagher resumed, with the occasiona l help of Leggett, the slow job of moving th e cattle back to more easily guarded areas.