Marauders' Moon (4 page)

“But the railroad,” Webb said. “Ain't there a railroad in Wintering that runs to Bull Foot?”

“No San Patricio man could reach it with a dozen head. They'd kill him. That's Wake Bannister's way of punishing Buck Tolleston and us. So we sit here bush-whackin' over the county line, refusing to return each other's prisoners and cussing each other out. San Patricio will be broke until we get the railroad here. And now, by the gods, this bank robbery has cleaned out what little we did have. Do you blame Tolleston for being mad?”

Webb asked, “And you can't cross over into Wintering to hunt the bank robbers?”

“Not without havin' to fight the whole county,” Wardecker said grimly.

Webb settled back into silence, pondering what Wardecker had just told him. He didn't see how he would be included in this fight. He had no share in it, nothing at stake here—only the winning of his freedom. And yet there were some things here he didn't understand, and which he wanted to clear up. Was Tolleston recruiting gun fighters, and would he offer Webb his freedom if he would fight for him? Try as he might, Webb could think of no other reason for Wardecker's saying what he had.

“Look here, Wardecker. What started this row?” Webb asked. “What happened back in Texas?”

Before the sheriff could answer, the door opened and Buck Tolleston entered. He only glanced at Wardecker and went over to Webb.

“I was just talking to Iron Hat Petty,” Buck said with deceptive mildness. “He claims you and McWilliams stopped just outside of town for a parley before the bank was held up.”

Webb rose and looked down at him, his patience evaporated in an instant. “That's when I got the handcuffs, you jug-headed little fool!”

Tolleston smiled meagerly. “It couldn't have been, too, that you was a couple of minutes ahead of time, could it? It couldn't have been that you stopped to look at your watch and stall for five minutes or so?”

Wardecker heaved himself to his feet and reached for his crutch.

“Buck, will you get the hell out of here?” he asked sternly. “Iron Hat Petty has been so drunk for the last ten years he couldn't see that far. Now get out!”

Tolleston's face was dark with fury, but even he could see that Wardecker had lost his usual mildness and meant exactly what he said. He swallowed once, and without looking at the sheriff, said to Webb, “Come along,” and stomped out the door.

Webb looked at Wardecker. “It's mighty easy for a sheriff to lose a prisoner. You the kind that don't care, Wardecker?”

“Nothin'll happen. Only don't fight with him.”

“You better gag me, then.”

Wardecker grinned. “Maybe that would be better all around. Now go along, Cousins. And don't make trouble. I'll be seein' you soon.”

Tolleston was waiting outside. Together they walked down to the O. K. corral. Tolleston left orders for the three Broken Arrow hands in the posse to return to the ranch as soon as they could. From Iron Hat Petty he rented a horse. Webb got a look at Iron Hat, and his anger at the man died.

Iron Hat was old, rheumatic, and moved with a broken-arched gait that was little more than a creep. A bulbous, purple-veined nose was ample testimony to his drinking habits, but for all of that, his bleared eyes were shrewd, his comments, made in a thick, whisky-muted voice, dry and sharp. His derby was green with age, and he wore it squarely on his bald head.

Webb looked over the horse Tolleston hired for him. It was a bay, chunky, big of chest, a stayer.

“I'll send it back tomorrow, Iron Hat,” Tolleston said.

“You better trade him,” Iron Hat said lazily, indicating Webb.

“Why?”

“If he ever gets out of gun range with his horse you'll play hell catchin' him on that nag of yours.”

“What's the matter with my horse?” Tolleston demanded belligerently.

“Nothin'. Only the bay is better. You better trade him.”

Tolleston said grimly, “He won't get out of gun range.”

“No, but I reckon he'd feel a lot better if you took the best horse. So would I,” Iron Hat said. He turned to Webb. “I'll pasture your roan.” And he turned and walked away, leaving Tolleston grim-jawed and surly.

Once away from Wagon Mound, riding through a rolling country whose rises were stippled with scrub piñon and cedar, Webb observed the country with the practiced eyes of a cowman. The grama grass was thick and deep, and while many of the arroyos they crossed were dry, a good many more ran water, and lots of it. It was typically good range of the Southwest, with the exception that it had a wealth of water along with its shelter and feed. Far to the north and west, thrusting their jagged peaks to the cavalcade of swollen clouds, lay the Frying Pans. Their lower reaches were black in the distance, indicating full timber, but halfway up their slopes it gave way to gaunt and barren rock, as if the desert beyond were waging a war which had already won it the peaks and half the slopes.

Fat, solid cattle spooked away from them, and once, surprising a cow with her calf as they climbed out of an arroyo, their horses were chased a short way. As the cow stopped, regarding herself the victor, Tolleston smiled, and Webb expected him to comment on the shape of the stuff they had seen.

Instead, Tolleston said, “What brung you into that gang over in Wintering, Cousins?”

“Hell with you,” Webb said calmly.

Tolleston ignored this. He said, “Ever work on a cow outfit?”

“Some.”

“Break horses?”

“A few.”

“Any job you can't do around an average spread?”

“Cook for money.”

“Good,” Tolleston said. “I don't reckon you'll have to here.”

They did not speak again until late afternoon, when they had forked off three separate wagon roads, each time the trail becoming fainter. Then, topping a rocky rise, Tolleston pulled up and waved off to the north. “That's the Broken Arrow,” he said, not without pride.

Before them, at one edge of a deep and wide, grassy valley knifed by a willow-bordered creek, lay the ranch buildings of the Broken Arrow. To Webb, who had traveled through a large part of cattle land, the place spoke to him in his own language. The house itself was a two-story stone affair with a gallery running across the front, and adobe wings branching off on either side. Giant cottonwoods cast their lace umbrellas over it, leaving it deep in shade. Off to the north lay the cluster of sheds and corrals, all solid, all well kept. Between the two lay the long adobe bunk house and cook shack adjoining. All of it had been built for an eye to utility, yet it had achieved a kind of rough beauty that was not all age, and it made Webb look again at Tolleston.

Afterward, riding through the valley and crossing the plank bridge that spanned the creek in front of the house, Webb saw that it held as much as it promised. While all of it had the indolent, mellow air of a home ranch, still the firm hand of discipline could be seen. The harness, the wagons, all the gear that goes to clutter up a corral lot, were in good shape, kept that way by work. It was almost dusk when they turned their horses into the horse corral, slung the saddles over the poles, and turned toward the bunk house.

A cluster of men loafed around its door, and it was for this group that Tolleston headed. The hands fell silent as they approached, and Webb felt their quiet, prying gaze as they observed him.

Tolleston stopped before them and spoke to a sober-faced, middle-aged man who stepped out to meet him.

“Mac, this here is Webb Cousins—the man that held up the bank in town today, along with six other rannies. He's the county's prisoner, but the funds was cleaned out in the robbery, and they've give him to me to guard. You'll work him like you do the rest of the men, but he'll carry no gun, and he'll never ride alone unless with my permission.” He turned to Webb. “This is McCaslon, my foreman.”

McCaslon looked at Webb briefly, coldly, and said to Tolleston, “Did you say the bank?”

Tolleston told them. Webb watched the faces of the seven men as they listened to their boss, wondering if they, too, shared this common animosity toward the neighboring county. They did. They were utterly motionless, listening closely as the story unfolded. When Tolleston was finished, they looked at each other, and then at Webb. It was McCaslon who looked the longest, and in his eyes Webb could see a hard and relentless dislike shaping up.

McCaslon said, “And he's in with them five and McWilliams?”—indicating Webb.

“That's what I think.”

“You want us to lock him up?”

Tolleston hesitated a moment, torn between his desire to be on the safe side and the memory of what Wardecker had said.

“No,” he said at last, regarding Webb thoughtfully. “I don't reckon so. When we get proof, there's time enough for that. But I want him kept around the place for the present—or until I tell you.”

“Uh-huh,” McCaslon said softly, a trace of a hidden promise in the look he gave Webb.

The cook's triangle clanged out into the night then, and Tolleston said, “As soon as you've finished eating, bring him up, Mac,” and left.

All the hands turned, waiting for Mac to say something. He did, and said it to Webb. “Go on in.” He indicated the cook shack.

The hands made a lane for Webb, and he walked through it into the building, his face faintly amused. The cook shack was not a lot different from most, a long, bare room containing a heavy table almost as long as the room itself, which was flanked by rough benches.

Mac looked around at the men seating themselves. “Where's Stoop?” he asked.

“Out,” someone said carelessly.

“Take this place, then,” Mac told Webb, indicating the place to his right. Webb obeyed, wondering, and when he was seated he counted the men. Six. There had been seven outside. Webb knew what was coming, for he knew cow-punchers well enough to understand their reasoning. What Tolleston had told them about him called for a court and judgment of their own, and since Tolleston had not expressly forbid them to indulge in their own brand of discipline, they had silently assumed that he did not care.

The food was passed around in silence. Webb helped himself, saying nothing, not even looking up from his plate. He heard a man enter, looked up briefly to observe a gaunt and slouching puncher in the doorway, then turned his attention to his plate.

“Company, Stoop,” one of them said, waving a fork at Webb. Webb looked up. He wanted to remember the man who spoke for he was the one who had started it. He saw a solid, chunky man with a rather full face that suggested a kind of cross-grained innocence. The man was grinning pleasantly enough, but there was a smoldering impudence in his eyes. He had a mischievous look about him, but maybe that was because of what was happening. Webb looked from him up to the man who had just entered. Webb had seen this man outside, but the stranger said, “Why, howdy.”

Webb nodded and resumed his eating.

“Buck brought him home,” the innocent-looking puncher continued. “He's a guest of the county.”

“A what?”

“Well, prisoner, I reckon. He stuck up the bank at Wagon Mound this mornin'. Buck brought him home to stuff.”

“Well, well,” Stoop said, elaborately interested. “Ain't no one told him about the private dinin' room?”

“Huh-uh. He was too hungry.”

“Reckon I'd better?” Stoop continued, walking around the table.

“I wouldn't know,” his partner retorted.

Stoop stopped behind Webb. “All the county guests is fed in the private dinin' room, mister. That there”—he indicated an upended cartridge case in the corner beside a rickety chair—“is it. You'll notice that window beside it is barred. That's because we like to make the county's guests plumb at home.”

“A little drafty,” Webb drawled, and returned to his food. All the hands, including McCaslon, had stopped eating and were watching Webb.

“He's delicate,” the man said. “That's why they wouldn't lock him up in town.”

“Well, now,” Stoop said mildly. “So am I. That's why they ain't locked me up. That's why I don't aim to eat in the private dinin' room.” He paused. “Fella, you're in the wrong pew. Move out!”

“I like it here,” Webb said mildly.

Stoop reached out, seized Webb's collar, and yanked back. Webb came out flying, twisted in mid-air, and as soon as his foot was planted behind the bench, arched a tight hook into Stoop's belly. The result was automatic. Stoop folded up like a jackknife, sat down, put both hands across his stomach, and retched audibly for air.

Webb looked around the table and murmured, “The flies are bad in here,” and sat down and resumed his eating. No one said a word.

When Stoop stopped his gagging and dragged himself to his feet, Webb turned to him. “Do you like it that way, or with a little salt on it, friend?”

Stoop glared at him a long moment, then said softly, “We ain't finished with each other, fella.” He walked to the foot of the table, turned up a plate, and demanded food in a surly tone. Webb looked over at the chunky puncher, who was observing him with curious good humor.

“Pass Stoop the blood,” Webb drawled to him. “Take a bucket of it for yourself as it goes by.”

The impudent puncher grinned, and it was with friendliness this time. “I'll do that,” he said, “and I'll take mine without salt, too.”

The meal was finished in silence, and Webb knew that for the present he would be let alone. When he had rolled and lighted a cigarette, McCaslon, who had observed all that went on with the same poker face and eyes which had grown increasingly thoughtful, said, “Come along,” and rose.

Webb followed him out into the night.

McCaslon paused out of earshot of the bunkhouse. “That's a good way to get shot in the back.”

“I thought of that, too,” Webb answered.

“A man with more sense would have taken it a mite slower.”