Devil's Manhunt (Stories from the Golden Age) (8 page)

“Well?” shouted Bart. “Where is it?”

“I sold it!” said Lem. “That freighter wanted two kegs and all the rest is in the back end of the warehouse.”

Bart whirled and bumped into Dutch. “Saddle up and ride after that freighter!” he ordered. “Bring back a keg of Giant powder, and don’t fail!”

Dutch ran out and Tolliver limped up, hand to his punctured ribs. “I think they’re drunk in there, boss. I heard the dangedest yowls comin’ out of there. Thought somebody was mortal hurt until I heerd the words to the
‘Streets of Laredo.’
They’re drinkin’ up the entire stock!”

“That,” said Bart, “would take a powerful lot of drinkin’. They ain’t got long for it noways. Dutch—”

Dutch was coming back, white-faced and racing. “Boss! The stableman is over there all tied up and there ain’t a single condemned hoss in the hull danged town!”

They hurried to confirm it and found the Star Barn entirely empty except for the stableman who, gagged all night, wanted to cuss somebody good and proper and didn’t care just who.

Bart finally cut through the fanfare. “Who did it?”

“I didn’t see good. A big man in greasy buckskin and a beard. He come in and said he wanted to wash down his own hoss and then
by jimminies
, the skunk whopped me. I come to in an empty stable and not a one of you
rannies
come near me the hull danged night! I—”

Bart stared at the end of the sod warehouse he could see from here. The morning sun was bright, the meadowlarks were singing and the prairie was steaming dry. But there was no loveliness in the view to him. He suddenly threw down his hat and jumped on it.

. . .
cowpuncher
lay dyin’
Cowpuncher lay dyin’
As cold as the clay . . .

It came faintly but even at this distance there were hiccoughs in it.

A
s the days followed, freighters came and riders came. The food swiftly diminished in Thorpeville and after the fifth day not even a jackrabbit could be shot a decent walk from the place. As long as the river to the south remained swollen, no beef would come in and very soon the two hundred population of the community were notching up their belts tighter and taking speculative looks at one another.

The effort to send a wire for help met with failure; there was too much water to the east and no wagon could cross here for a while. Repairs were being made on the bridge but this was also slow and difficult due to the floods.

Then it began to rain again and made matters much worse. Half a dozen at a time began to walk out of Thorpeville, down along the tracks, knowing they could raft or swim the break in the rails and maybe catch a handcar ride to Sioux, a hundred miles down the tracks. A telegram Henry got said that a train was there making repairs and would transport from there. It was only sixty miles. Why wait? The population began to walk.

The constant guard of the sod house occasionally sought to surprise the alertness of its inmates. Various expedients were tried, such as shooting with rifles through the slots from long range, pushing burning boxes up against the doors, promises of money in return for a
parley
, two outright charges and three sneak attacks at night.

All efforts failed. No matter how many songs came out of that warehouse to badger and irritate the guards, a foray was met with shots. George Bart was getting exactly noplace. It had been going on for two and a half weeks when George, one morning, found he had a population of exactly fifteen. Nine of these were too old to walk, four of them were his gunmen, one was his bartender (who was thought to have a secret store, he stayed so fat) and the remaining one was Bart himself. There was a little food left. Somebody had shot a locoed horse out on the prairie and they could live if they didn’t object to horse meat.

The prairie was drying again. The river to the south was reported down by an oldster who had gone out and shot himself a private deer. George Bart felt that if he could just hold on until a train could come through he would bring up troops.

Henry, the telegraph operator, had long since taken his own handcar down to the bridge and left it there as thoroughly as he had left his resignation of office on his desk. George Bart could not read the clicks and clacks of the instrument; he could only stand on the platform, listen at the window, and hope that the occasional sputters meant relief had already started.

It was in this condition that Greg Matson and four Texicans found Thorpeville. They had forded with their cattle and they held them now on the prairie about a mile from the loading pens, the first herd through of the season.

They were promptly approached, as they started to ride in, leaving two of their number to ride guard, by George Bart. “I want to buy cattle!” said Bart.

Greg Matson had a beard now and its stiff bristles hid him from recognition. “We got cattle. Thirty dollars a head, two thousand head. Prime beef, all fed up to weigh south of the cro—”

“I don’t want a herd!” cried Bart. “I want a dozen steers!”

Greg sat his horse thoughtfully. “Now, ain’t that unfortunate, I only sell in two-thousand-head lots today.”

Bart kept his temper. He was hungry. He usually ate a lot. “All right. I’ll buy the herd. Come on up to my office and I’ll give you the fair price.”

This looked like an easy victory. Greg and two men rode forward watchfully, keeping pace with the men on foot and finally came to the New York House. The Texicans followed inside, very alert.

George opened his safe and got out a stack of bills. He kept a lot of money on hand to buy up cattle buyers who had lost too much and he brought out a thick sheaf of bills.

Under the bills lay a
Derringer
; ranged round the Texicans were four men.

His office window was very grimy and broken in one place but he had eyes only for the Texicans before him. He started to swing, Derringer cocked. “Look out!” yelled Sudden Johnny at the window.

Bart tried to swing back and shoot. Dutch, diving for cover, upset him and the Derringer whammed into the safe door, both barrels.

A chair and then Johnny came through the window. A knife flashed and Spanish Mike finished Dutch, square in the doorway, blocking all exit.

The noise in the room was loud and painful and long, and then from the din of smoke and swearing came Sudden Johnny—dragging George Bart by the collar. They reached the street and George pitched into the mud.

Johnny let him get up and knocked him squarely down again. George rose a second time and went down a second time. He tottered to his feet a third and went suddenly backwards into a water trough where, except for the mercy of his opponent, he most certainly would have drowned.

Sudden Johnny brought him back to the walk and dumped him down much like a man dumps a sack of spuds. His four Texicans came out, bringing what was left of Bart’s crew.

It was a very quiet town. A very quiet, deserted town.

I
t is rumored that George Bart paid back fifteen thousand that day as well as a poke of brass filings found in his possession. It is also rumored that George Bart sold his town, some say for ten thousand, others for eight.

The truth of the matter is, as Spanish Mike afterward told while deeply drunk, George presented the whole place to Sudden Johnny when he saw the state of that warehouse; presented it, and took the first train out for points unknown.

The state of the warehouse, gloated Spanish Mike, was at once a wonderful and dreadful thing to see.

Stranger in Town

Stranger in Town

T
HE
stranger came riding through the hot white dust, and Zeke Tomlin stared.

It was a broiling afternoon in Dry Creek and few were abroad. Even the dogs failed to move out of the stranger’s path, but lay sluggish in their hollows of sand and suffered their fleas to bite. A drunken Indian was weaving an erratic course between the ’dobe houses of the single street, stopping now and then to shake a bottle at an imaginary foe. The stranger came abreast of the Indian and the redman straightened, looked up and sobered a little.

Hunger was on the stranger’s face and guns, like a stamp. Man-hunger, with kill in his eyes.

Zeke Tomlin had been wiping the packing grease from a buffalo rifle. He looked at it and put it down. It was cool in the hardware store but there were no visitors. Zeke, the clerk, was alone behind the counter. A rack of guns backed him, each newly taken from its case. Zeke looked up at the stranger and felt sick and hot.

It was a long time back to Mesa. Nine months. It was a long time back to the hunted trail he had followed away from there. He had thought it was all done and forgotten. And here was Les Harmon, riding through the hot white dust, come to kill him.

It is a terrible thing to be hunted, Zeke knew that. He could see the faces of dead men now, between the storefront and the street. Les Harmon, the sheriff of Mesa, would shoot on sight and shoot to kill.

What would they think of Zeke Tomlin in Dry Creek then? He was respected. He could mend their saddles and stand up to their poker bluffs. He said “Howdy” to the marshal and voted in the elections. But he had only been there nine months. He was a stranger in town.

He was a stranger in town who had come riding one dusk on a wind-broken horse to fall from his saddle over by the Golden Horn. They’d given him water and they’d found him a job. He had stayed. He had never quite belonged, some of these men had known each other all their lives.

If Les Harmon told them the story, they’d be ashamed they’d known Zeke; they’d believe a lawman. Dry Creek’s marshal, Tom Brennerman, would buy Les a drink and the man from Mesa would ride away. If Zeke yelled now, Harmon would tell what he knew. If he didn’t yell, Harmon would kill him. If he killed Harmon—well, they hanged a man who killed the law, didn’t they?

Zeke’s throat was dry and hot. He looked across to see Les Harmon watering his horse in front of the Golden Horn. Harmon would flash his badge and ask for Zeke Tomlin. Then he’d come across the street—Zeke tried to swallow and found he couldn’t.

There was no sense in running. Dry Creek was the only town in this large cattle basin, beyond that the desert was dry and wide and a horse left tracks. And then there was his leg. He had not done much riding after Les Harmon’s .44 had taken him nine months and more ago.

He was caught. Time had kept the trail open, not closed it. Les Harmon had not given up.

Zeke tried to think of how he could have given his whereabouts away, but all Zeke could think about was the trail which had stayed open.

I
t had started innocently enough: a fight in a saloon where a bartender had tried to take all Zeke’s money at once with knockout drops.

Zeke had felt young and free then. He hadn’t killed a man. He was just a good-looking, go-to-hell puncher with a summer’s wages to spend, a crooked grin on his face and his blond hair standing straight up with devilment. He hadn’t meant anybody any harm.

The bartender had put too many in the slug and Zeke had tasted it. That had begun the long trail. It stood like yesterday between Zeke and the street, a painful haze of circumstance out of which a few details moved clear.

Mesa was a crooked town. It had sprung up with a railroad and it fought its fights from ambush. It was a cloud of wickedness on the clean range. That was what the preacher had said and he had been right. Gamblers, women, toughs had settled at this final end-of-line which stopped two spans of railroad tracks head-on to span a continent. Few punchers had been there. Zeke had been drifting south from Wyoming. He had not intended to stay beyond the night. But he had tasted the
Mickey Finn
and he had thrown the glass straight into the bartender’s face.

The fight had been brief. Zeke had gone half over the bar to punish his man, when a loafing tough, anxious for a drink, took sides and a chair from behind. Zeke Tomlin was stretched out in the sawdust.

Les Harmon had come in and his star looked big. He had taken Zeke’s gun and with some help had dragged him to the nearby
calabozo
where the cell door had clanged.

Zeke lay for some time in the dark. He had had a little to drink and he had swallowed some of the Mickey. He did not immediately become aware of the voices in the sheriff’s office. Then: “All right,” he heard one say. “They’re too sore about their payroll for us to take chances. But it sounds kind of crazy just the same.”

“Take him and do like I said!” said Harmon with a strange eagerness.

A blustering big man, black-booted and frock-coated with a yard of string tie, opened the door. “Hey, sonny,” the big man had said. “If you want to get out of here, you can give us a hand.”

“I’m stayin’,” said Zeke.

One of the hard cases with the big man said, “Shall we persuade him, Big George?”

Big George nodded and they stood Zeke up, three of them, and shoved him out to his horse. Zeke saw Les Harmon’s hard, cold face under the kerosene lamp in the office. Les Harmon was faintly amused.