Marauders' Moon (9 page)

A light was on in the office, and Britt entered without knocking. Hugo Meeker was talking to Wake, and he made the polite gesture of getting up to leave when Wake waved him back. It was all right with Britt, too. Ever since he could remember, there had been no secrets from Hugo, and sometimes in the past Hugo had gentled Bannister's harsh discipline to his son. Britt liked him.

“Stick around, Hugo,” Britt said and sat down.

“Who's the company?” Bannister asked dryly, coming abruptly to the point. It had been a long time since Britt had tried to lie to his father. He didn't now, knowing it was useless.

“Some saddle bum Buck Tolleston wants to hold for that Wagon Mound bank hold-up.”

Bannister frowned a little. “You mean you took him away from Buck?”

“Not exactly. He was listenin' in on a conversation I didn't want repeated.”

“With whom?” Wake asked gently.

“Martha Tolleston.”

Hugo Meeker almost smiled. He liked young Britt because he had a lot of his old man's characteristics, and he was the only person—with the single exception of Hugo himself who was not afraid to stand up to the old man. He watched Wake now.

“I heard about that,” Wake said. “I wondered if you'd tell me.”

“Why shouldn't I?”

Wake said idly, “You don't take this feud between Buck and me very serious, do you, son?”

“Not a heap,” Britt admitted, smiling a little. “Besides, it's your fight, not mine.”

Wake looked over at Hugo. “I'm close to sixty,” he said. “Your uncle Ted is a pretty sick man and he's fifty-five. All your kin around here are rattle-brained. When I die, you'll inherit this feud.”

“No, thanks.”

“It's not a question of wantin' to,” Wake insisted. “If you don't fight, you'll go down.”

“When Buck's gone, the feud'll die, anyway,” Britt said.

“The—uh—little lady wants it that way, too?” Wake asked mildly.

“That's about it.”

Wake said sharply, “You want to marry her, Britt?”

“Yes.”

Wake nodded, looking over at Hugo, whose face was expressionless behind his cigarette.

Wake pulled out a cigar case and lighted a smoke and then leaned back in his chair. At first he paid no attention to Britt, and Britt waited, knowing there was something to come.

Finally Wake said, “Ever hear why Tolleston and I hate each other the way we do, Britt?”

“I never heard you say it.”

“You've likely heard we were just two men that one country couldn't hold, is all. Both bull-headed, both ambitious, both want to be leaders, both like power. That's about what you've heard, isn't it?”

“About.”

Wake nodded. “There's some truth in that. If we didn't have any other reason, we might use that one. It's logical.” His gaze rested now on Britt. “But it's something more than that, son. Maybe it's time you heard it.”

Hugo cleared his throat. “It is, Wake.”

“I'll begin with Buck Tolleston and me settlin' down in the Big Bend country after the war, because that's where I first knew him. Cattle business wasn't much then—and it was hard. A man needed a wife. I got one—your mother, Britt. You've seen pictures of her. Sweetest face I ever saw. Buck Tolleston wanted her, too, but I won. That was all right, or at least it would have been to a decent man. But not to Buck Tolleston. I was strugglin' to get a foothold in that country then, and I was growin'. But Tolleston was bigger and besides that, he had a bunch of his kinfolks settled around him. The night before I married your mother, she and I talked it over. It was pretty plain that Buck Tolleston and me could never be friends, and if we couldn't be friends, we was bound to be enemies. I asked Amy what she thought we ought to do—stick there and fight the Tollestons or move on to new range. She said stick. Well, we did.

“We stuck until I got hold of a good spread. I went over my head to get it, way over. I hadn't even got a crop of calves from my herd when it happened.” Wake continued more quietly: “I was framed for a murder of a nester.”

“By Buck,” Hugo put in.

“Your mother was carryin' you then, Britt, but that didn't seem to make no difference. I went to prison—for six years.”

“And served every day of it,” Hugo said harshly, watching Britt.

Wake went on. “The spread was lost, of course. Three weeks before you was born, your mother was turned out—by one of the Tollestons. Folks down there were pretty scarce then, Britt, and none of them was our friends. I'll just skip what happened after that—five and a half years of it—and tell you what your mother did. She cooked down in a Mexican's place on the border until I come out of jail. When I went to jail, she was a woman in all her beauty. When I come out, she was an old woman-ugly, work-worn, consumptive, and wretched. Down there is where Hugo found her.”

Hugo cleared his throat. “She used to tie you under the big table there in the kitchen and give you a red chili to play with. She did that because it wasn't safe for a gringo kid to play in the plaza then. Those Mexicans would ride 'em down.”

“Hugo was with her when I found her,” Wake went on, his voice emotionless, almost flat. “She died right after that—thanks to Buck Tolleston.”

Britt's face was grave, a little pale, and he was leaning forward in his chair.

“After that, I turned outlaw,” Wake said. “Not many people here know that. I wrote to my brother Will in Tennessee to come down and bring all the Bannister kin that would come. He did. He brought five boys with him. In a year, we'd killed half a dozen Tolleston hands or kin, fired Buck Tolleston's spread three times, stole a good half his herds, and we was doin' well for ourselves. Buck Tolleston knew who was doin' it, and he couldn't fight us. So he picked up and moved to here. I followed him. And I reckon you know the rest of it.”

“Or can guess it,” Hugo put in quietly. “Buck ain't dead yet. He will be.”

Wake Bannister said no more. He lighted his cigar, which had gone out, and then waited for Britt to say something. Britt looked at the Stetson held between his knees. Finally he stood up and looked down at his father.

“I—I never knew this, dad. I—why didn't you tell me?” he asked huskily.

“A young man has to get a lot of things out of his system, Britt, before he's worth much. I was givin' you time to do just that. But I reckon the time's up.”

“I reckon it is,” Britt said gently.

“I knew you were seein' this Tolleston girl. I thought it was some of your hellery, or just plain contrariness, because you thought I wouldn't like it. Now, I reckon you're ready to know the kind of blood that runs in the Tolleston veins.”

“Or don't run,” Hugo said.

Britt said earnestly, “Dad, I swear I've never told her anything about us over here that would—”

“I know that,” Wake said. “It's never even entered my mind you had, son. What's past is past. And now, either you bear your share of squarin' things up, or you don't. Which'll it be?”

“I'm with you; I would have been for ten years back if I'd known this.”

“There's been time enough,” Hugo said. “There ain't now. The time's here.”

Britt looked swiftly at his father, his face strained. “You mean you're goin' to kill Tolleston?”

Buck smiled faintly. “Nothin' of that kind, Britt. If I'd wanted to kill him, I could have done it years ago. No, I'm goin' to ruin him first, clean him out of everything he owns, and the rest of his bunch with him. Wardecker and his Forked Lightning, Lou Hasker and his Chain Link, Wurdemann and his Running W, Miles Kindry and his Rocking K, Wes Anders and his Seven A, Blindloss, Sweetser, Winterhoven, and Frank Pillsbury—all of them will go down with him. And when I have them licked, when Buck Tolleston looks around him and sees he's got nothin'—not even a horse to ride out of the country with—then I'll be satisfied. I may kill him then, but if I do, it will only be a kindness to him.”

Britt said quietly, “How?”

“Sit down, son. We don't start tonight.”

Face grim, Britt sat down. Some of his youth and his arrogant coltishness had fallen away from him in these few minutes, and it was as if he had finally and irrevocably passed into man's estate. He sat down and rolled a smoke with unsteady fingers.

“I don't think you knew it,” Bannister began, “but I've had one of Buck Tolleston's hands in my pay. He brings me word that Buck suspects we hired these five Montana hardcases to rob his bank—along with McWilliams and this prisoner he was bringin' back. Well, Buck was right.”

“You mean those men out in the old bunk house are the robbers?” Britt asked slowly.

“That's it. I paid them.”

Britt appeared to reserve his decision, for he said nothing.

Bannister went on: “Buck will receive word that his hunch was right. We were behind the hold-up. All right, he aims to use this knowledge to band all the San Patricio ranchers together for a raid on Bull Foot. He will, too, because that bank robbery touched them where it hurts the most—in their pocketbooks. They'll meet some night soon and ride out of San Patricio down here.”

“Then what?” Britt asked curiously.

“We'll let them burn Bull Foot—or rather we'll warn the merchants and let them fight. But we—all the Bannisters and all the Bannister kin and all the hands they employ-will be over in San Patricio. With luck, we ought to burn Wagon Mound out, and every big ranch that stands over in that country.”

“Then what?” Britt repeated.

Wake Bannister smiled. It seemed that his son had a head on him, after all.

“That,” Bannister said, “will remain a secret, Britt. Not because I don't trust you, not even because I wouldn't ask your advice—because I'm going to, soon—but because I'm not sure, myself. You'll know when I do, just as Hugo will.”

Britt stared into his hat a full moment, taking in all that he had heard. It was a large dose for one night, and he wanted to get away by himself.

He said, “Is that all, dad?”

When Bannister said, “Yes,” Britt got up and walked to the door. Midway, he paused. “About this man I brought home. What about him?”

“Yes, what about him?”

“I—he overheard Martha Tolleston and me talkin'. Buck sent him. Rather than let him go back and tell Buck about it, I brought him over.”

“Who is he?”

“McWilliams's prisoner. You remember. He's wanted for that Mimbres canyon robbery last year.” He hesitated. “You see, dad, I told Martha I wouldn't turn him over to the law here.”

Bannister said, “You gave her your word; keep it. Besides, the boy's not guilty. That's one of Sheriff Monk-house's tricks to cover up his blunders, just as most of his actions are.”

“What'll I do with him?”

“Turn him loose.”

Britt colored a little. “I can't do that. I reckon he'd ride back to Buck and tell him.”

“And if he did?”

“I promised her,” Britt said simply. “I reckon I can keep my word.”

“Yes. Keep him, then.”

Britt went out. Outside, under the stars, the world seemed to have changed a little. He did not know how, exactly, but he knew why. The stars were less bright, the air less keen, and he felt a new kind of weariness, one that was not physical, but which seemed to crawl through him like a fever.

CHAPTER NINE

Mitch Budrow got in close to daylight. He remembered what Buck had told him about bringing back the word to him immediately, so after he had stripped the saddle from his horse and turned him into the corral, he passed the bunk house and headed for the house.

At Buck's office door he knocked loudly. It was a full minute before a light appeared and Buck opened the door. His hair was rumpled and he was in his underwear and Levis.

“You,” he said, surprise in his voice. “Come in.”

Putting the lamp on the desk, he indicated a chair. “Sit down.”

“Maybe I shouldn't have woke you—”

“What'd you find?” Buck demanded.

“I drifted in yesterday and hung around the hotel most of the mornin' hittin' ranchers for jobs. I only picked the ones I heard was full-handed. When they got used to me bein' there, I drifted over to the saloon—the Melodian. Hugo Meeker was there, and—”

“How'd you know him?” Buck cut in.

“Asked the bartender. Besides, he was ridin' a horse with a Dollar brand. That's what made me ask.”

“Go on.”

“He's foreman for Bannister, the barkeep said. Well, he was buckin' the tiger—”

“It don't sound like him.”

“That's what the barkeep said. That's how I found out it was Meeker. When this gent come in and started for the faro table, the barkeep's jaw fell open, and that is—”

“Go on,” Buck said impatiently.

Mitch, sweating, drew a deep breath and continued. “I'd been sort of mouthy up till then. After that, I shut up and watched. It wasn't long before one of these Montana hardcases drifted in. I saw Meeker look up at him and then slide his look away. Dead face, never a sign he knowed him. This rider drifts into a back room. I watched the door. Pretty soon, another one of these Montana boys drifted in from the dance hall. He went in the same room. Hugo quit playin' faro and watched a poker game a while. Then he drifted back and went in the same room.”

“The one the Montana men went in?”

“That's right.”

“Then what?”

“I hung around for another two hours. They called for drinks three times.”

“That don't sound like Hugo.”

“I know it. That's what—”

“—the bartender said,” Buck finished impatiently. “Get on.”

“About sundown, this Meeker come out, got his horse, and rode off. Ten minutes later, the two hardcases drifted out. They must have killed the bottle because they looked like a cat that'd just ate the fish. One of them took the faro table and cleaned up five hundred and lost it on one card. He turned away and laughed and said, ‘Hell, I'll bust that before I quit.' Then they sat down to a table of poker, and that's where I left 'em.”