Nevada (1995) (4 page)

"Don't worry, Mother Wood. Reckon Cash an' I won't clash. Becaus
e
I'm not lookin' for trouble."

"You never did, my boy, I'll swear to that. But you never run fro
m
it. An' you know Cash Burridge. He's bad medicine sober, an' hel
l
when he's drunk."

"Ahuh, I reckon, now you remind me. Has Cash been up to his ol
d
tricks lately?"

"I haven't heard much, Jim," she returned, thoughtfully. "Mostl
y
just Lineville gossip. No truth in it, likely."

Nevada knew it would do no good to press her further in thi
s
direction, which reticence was proof that Cash Burridge had bee
n
adding to his reputation one way or another. Nevada had a curiou
s
reaction--a scorn for his own strange, vague eagerness to know.

Old submerged or forgotten feelings were regurgitating in him. A
s
low heat ran along his veins.

"Lineville shore looks daid," he said, tentatively.

"It IS dead, Jim. But you know it's comin' on winter. An' thi
s
Lineville outfit is like a lot of groundhogs. They hole up when th
e
snow flies. There's more travel along the road than ever before.

Three stages a week now, an' lots of people stop here for a night.

I get a good many; been busy all summer an' fall."

"Travel on the road? Wal, that's a new one for Lineville.

Prospectors always came along. But travel. What you mean, Mothe
r
Wood?"

"Jim, where have you been for so long?" she asked, curiously.

"Sure you must have been buried somewhere. There's a new minin'
t
own--Salisbar. An' travel from north has been comin' throug
h
here, in spite of the awful road."

"Salisbar? Never heard aboot it. An' stagecoaches--goin' throug
h
Lineville. By golly!"

"Jim, there's been only couple of hold-ups. None of this outfit
,
though. We hear the stage line will stop runnin' soon, til
l
spring."

"You mentioned aboot a cattleman named Holder buyin' heah sinc
e
I've been away. Shore he's not the only one?"

"No. But cattle deals have been low this summer. Last bunch o
f
cattle come over in June."

"Wal, you don't say! Lineville is daid, shore enough."

"Jim, that sort of thing has got to stop sometime, even if it i
s
only a lot of two-bit rustlin'."

"Two-bit? Ha! Ha!"

"Jim, I've seen thousands of longhorns rustled in my day."

"Ahuh! Reckon you have, I'm sorry to say," responded Nevada
,
looking up at her ruddy face again. "Shore you never took me for
a
rustler, did you, Mother?"

"Goodness, no! You was only a gun-packin' kid, run off the ranges.

But, Jim, you'll fall into it some day, sure as shootin'. You'l
l
be in bad company at the wrong time. Now I'm from Texas an' I
a
lways loved a good clean hard-shootin' gunman, like Jack was.

There wasn't nothin' crooked about Jack for years an' years. Bu
t
he fell into it. An' so will you, Jim. I want you to go so fa
r
away from Lineville that you can't never come back."

"I'll go in the spring. Shore I'm not hankerin' for the grablin
e
ride these next few months."

"Fine. That's a promise, my boy. I'll not let you forget it. An'
m
eanwhile it'll be just as well for you to be snug an' hid righ
t
here. Till spring, huh?"

"Mother Wood, you said you wasn't inquisitive," laughed Nevada
,
parrying her question. Then he grew serious. "When was Hall hea
h
last?"

"In June, with the last cattle that come over the divide. An'
,
Jim, the right queer fact is he's never been back."

"Wal, I reckon that's not so queer to me. Maybe he has shook th
e
dust of Lineville. He rode in heah sudden, so I was told. An' wh
y
not ride off that way? To new pastures, Mother Wood?"

"No reason a-tall," she said, reflectively. "Only I jest don'
t
feel that way about Hall."

"An' that high-flyin' Less Setter from the Snake River country.

Did he ever come again?"

"No. That time you clashed with Setter was the only time he eve
r
hit Lineville. No wonder! They said you'd kill him if he did. I
r
emember, Jim, how that night after the row you talked a lot. I
t
was the drink. You'd had trouble with Setter before you come t
o
these parts. I never told it, but I remember."

"Wal, Mother, I came from the Snake River country, too," replie
d
Nevada, with slow dark smile.

"It was said here that Less Setter was too big a man to fiddl
e
around Lineville," returned the woman, passing by Nevada's crypti
c
remark, though it was not lost upon her. "Hall said Setter ha
d
many brandin' irons in the fire. His game, though, was to wheedl
e
rich cattlemen an' ranchers into speculations. He was a cunnin'
s
windler, low-down enough for any deal. An' he had a weakness fo
r
women. If nothin' else ever was his downfall, that sure would be.

He tried to take Lize Teller away with him."

"Wal, you don't say!" ejaculated Nevada, trying to affect interes
t
and surprise that were impossible for him to feel. Again h
e
casually averted his face to hide his eyes. For that cold
,
sickening something had shuddered through his soul. Less Sette
r
would never have a weakness for women again. He would never weav
e
his evil machinations around Ben and Hettie Ide, or anyone else
,
for he and two of his arch conspirators had lain dead there in th
e
courtyard before Hart Blaine's cabins on the shores of Wild Goos
e
Lake Ranch. Dead by Nevada's hand! That was the deed that ha
d
saved Ben Ide, and Hettie, too. It seemed long past, yet how vivi
d
the memory! The crowd that had melted before his charging horse!

The terror of the stricken Setter! Revenge and retribution an
d
death! Those villains lay prone under the drafting gunsmoke
,
before the onlookers. Nevada saw himself leap back to the saddl
e
and spur his horse away. One look back! "So long, pard!" On
e
look at Ben's white, convulsed face, which would abide with hi
m
forever.

"Lineville has had its day," the woman was saying, as if wit
h
satisfaction at the fact. "Setter saw that, if he ever had an
y
idea of operatin' here. Hall saw it, too, for he's never com
e
back. Cash Burridge knows it. He has been away to the south--

Arizona somewhere--lookin' up a place where outside travel hasn'
t
struck. He'll leave when the snow melts next spring, an' he'll no
t
go alone. Then decent people won't be afraid to walk down to th
e
store."

"Good luck for Lineville, but bad for Arizona somewhere," returne
d
Nevada, dryly. "Shore, I feel sorry for the ranchers over there."

"Humph! I don't know. There are wilder outfits in Arizona tha
n
this country ever saw," rejoined the woman, contemptuously. "Tak
e
that Texas gang in Pleasant Valley, an' the Hash Knife outfit o
n
the Tonto Rim, not to speak of the Mexican border. Cash Burridg
e
isn't the caliber to last long in Arizona. Waters an' Blink Mille
r
are tough nuts to crack, I'll admit. I suppose Hardy Rue wil
l
trail after Burridge, an' of course that loud-mouthed Lin
k
Cawthorne. But there's only one of the whole Lineville outfit tha
t
could ever last in Arizona. An' you know who he is, Jim Lacy."

"Wal, now, Mother, I shore haven't the least idee," drawled Nevada.

"Go long with you," she replied, almost with affection. "But, Jim
,
I'd rather think of you gettin' away from this life than lastin'
o
ut the whole crew. I've heard my husband say that gunmen get
a
mind disease. The gunman is obsessed to kill. An' if anothe
r
great killer looms on the horizon the disease forces him to go ou
t
to meet this one. Jest to see if he can kill him! Isn't tha
t
terrible? But it was so in Texas in the old frontier days there."

"It shore is terrible," responded Nevada, gloomily. "I ca
n
understand a man learnin' to throw a gun quick for self-defense.

Shore that was my own excuse. But for the sake of killin'! Recko
n
I don't know what to call that."

During the hour Mrs. Wood, who had a gift for learning an
d
dispensing information of all sort, acquainted Nevada with all tha
t
had happened in Lineville since his departure. She did not confin
e
herself to the affairs of the outlaw element who made of Linevill
e
a rendezvous. The few children Nevada had known and played with
,
the new babies that had arrived in the interim, the addition o
f
several more families to the community, the talk of having
a
school, and the possibilities of a post office eventually--thes
e
things she discussed in detail, with a pleasure and satisfactio
n
that had been absent in her gossip about Lineville's har
d
characters.

But it was that gossip which lingered in Nevada's mind. Late
r
when he went into his little room he performed an act almos
t
unconsciously. It was an act he had repeated a thousand times i
n
such privacy as was his on the moment, but not of late. The act o
f
drawing his gun! There it was, as if by magic, level, low down i
n
his clutching hand. Sight of it so gave Nevada a grim surprise.

How thoughtlessly and naturally the fact had come to pass! An
d
Nevada pondered over the singular action. Why had he done that?

What was it significant of? He sheathed the long blue gun.

"Reckon Mrs. Wood's talk about Cawthorne an' the rest of tha
t
outfit accounts for me throwin' my gun," he muttered to himself.

"Funny. . . . No--not so damn funny, after all."

He had returned to an environment where proficiency with a gun wa
s
the law. Self-preservation was the only law among those lawles
s
men with whom misfortune had thrown him. He could not avoid the
m
without incurring their hatred and distrust. He must mingle wit
h
them as in the past, though it seemed his whole nature had changed.

And mingling with these outlaws was never free from risk. Th
e
unexpected always happened. There were always newcomers, alway
s
drunken ruffians, always some would-be killer like Cawthorne, wh
o
yearned for fame among his evil kind. There must now always be th
e
chance of some friend or ally of Setter, who would draw on him a
t
sight. Lastly, owing to the reputation he had attained and hated
,
there was always the possibility of meeting such a gunman as Mrs.

Wood had spoken of--that strange product of frontier life, th
e
victim of his own blood lust, who would want to kill him solel
y
because of his reputation.