Taggart (1959) (2 page)

When the bucket was filled she carried it back to the house. Consuelo was preparin
g
supper.

"You see him?"

"No ... he's probably on his way back."

"You think what we do if he does not come back? Suppose somebody kill him? What w
e
do then?"

"We would saddle up and ride to Tucson."

"I think 'Paches come here," Consuelo said gloomily. "I feel it. We are fool to stay."

"You wanted to go to San Francisco and buy a lot of fancy clothes ... that was al
l
you talked about in Tucson, so what did you expect him to do? He loves you."

"He is fool."

"Any man is a fool who will waste time on a woman who does not love him, and yo
u
don't love Adam. He ought to take you back to Tucson and leave you there."

"He is weak. He is frighten. Once ... once I think I love him, but I like a stron
g
man. Adam is not strong."

"Adam has a sort of strength you'll never understand, Connie, and he has gentleness
,
too. I hope the day comes when you realize the sort of man you married. He's wort
h
a dozen of that trash you seem to think are strong ... like Tom Sanifer."

Consuelo's eyes flashed. "You know why Adam bring me here? Because he was 'frai
d
I run off with Tom Sanifer, that's why ... and he was right. If Tom had come bac
k
I would have gone where he asked me. Tom told Adam when he came back he'd take m
e
away."

"In front of you?"

"Yes ... he told him. Adam, he just stand there and say, `I think you won't do that.'

Adam is a coward. If he is not a coward he would shoot Tom Sanifer then. He woul
d
shoot hi
m
dead, and then I love Adam. But he does nothing, he just looks at Tom and he say
,
`I think you not do that.'

"What happened when Tom came back?"

"He did not come back before you came, and then Adam bring us here. He bring us her
e
because he is afraid that I will go with Tom."

"You don't know your husband, Connie. Adam was not afraid. That is his way, and i
f
you two are to be happy you must understand that ... you are Latin, and your peopl
e
are demonstrative. Adam is not."

Consuelo turned sharply around. "I do not care! You think I want to live all my lif
e
in the desert? I am woman! I want to have happiness! I want music, good food to eat
,
place to go! I want to dance, to sing, to be glad! There are men who will give m
e
what I want."

"And after?"

"Who thinks of after? He has gold now ... why don', we go? Why does he wait unti
l
we are all dead?"

Miriam was folding the clothes she had washed. "In some ways," she said quietly
,
"I think Adam is a fool. If he had used good sense he would have let you go wit
h
that man, and be glad that you were gone."

"Oh?" Consuelo turned on her angrily. "What do you know about man? I think you neve
r
have a man. I think you don't know what to do with one if you have him."

"Maybe I wouldn't," Miriam agreed, "but I could give it a try."

"You afraid of man. You afraid of what man do to you. I like a strong man, who want
s
a strong woman. I think Tom Sanifer was like that."

"From what they told me in Tucson, Tom Sanifer was a cheap bully in a loud shirt."

"You hear lie. He was a strong man ... a big man." Miriam wiped off the table to
p
and began placing dishes for the evening meal. She had never known much about th
e
relationship between Connie and her brother. Adam was not inclined to discuss hi
s
personal affairs, but she had guessed h
e
was not happy. However, she was equally aware that he loved the girl he had married
,
and if Adam loved her that was enough for Miriam.

"I think you don't like me," Consuelo said suddenly. "I think you hate me."

Miriam considered it, and then shook her head. "I don't hate you. I might even lik
e
you if you weren't married to Adam, but he deserves better than you're giving him."

"Does he complain? Does he think I am not enough woman?" "There's more to being
a
woman than what happens with a man in bed, believe me. You should learn that. Wha
t
you can give a man in bed he can get from any street woman, what he wants from
a
wife is that, but much more. He wants tenderness, understanding, the feeling of workin
g
together for something. You're stealing from him, Connie."

"I? Steal?"

"You're robbing him of that. If you don't give him more than you're giving him now
,
you're not a wife, you're a whore." "So? You know nothing."

"He should have let Tom Sanifer have you. You'd have been better for him ... he'
d
probably want nothing more from you. "

"Some day," Connie straightened and her eyes flashed, "some day I think I kill you."

"You won't kill me. You won't even try, Connie, because if you did I'd kill you.

You might kill Adam because he loves you, but you won't kill me, and you won't eve
n
try."

"You think."

Boots scraped on the gravel outside and Adam Stark came in the door, smiling. "I
t
was a good day," he said, "the best yet." "Supper's ready."

He stood for a moment in the door looking around the room. It was unbelievable t
o
him that so bare a place could have been made to look so much like a home, and wit
h
so little to do with. And it was home. Sometimes he was afraid he would never kno
w
any home but something such as this, and he wanted the good things of life for Conni
e
and for himself.

Considering it, he realized that somehow he never worried about Miriam, and tha
t
was wrong. He did not worry about her because she seemed so self-sufficient, so strong.

She was like their mother had been, only more so, much more so. But he felt it wa
s
wrong to think of a girl that way ... it was wrong for any man to consider a gir
l
self-sufficient, for men wanted to do something for a woman and when there was nothin
g
they could do, there was no place for love.

Love was, he suspected, much a matter of service. One loved and was loved, as on
e
needed and was needed. Or so it seemed to him.

Shadows were filling the canyon, and only the sky was bright. The canyon in whic
h
they lived was from thirty to sixty feet wide through much of its length. Only wher
e
the buildings stood was it a bit wider, but even there it seemed no wider, for th
e
buildings were partly protected from above by the overhang of the cliffs.

Except from that one point at the top of Rockinstraw, there was no way of seein
g
into the canyon, and the edges of the canyon were concealed by a scattered growt
h
of prickly pear, ocotillo, and juniper, with here and there some scattered pin oaks.

"Stay home tomorrow," Consuelo suggested suddenly. "No." Adam Stark drew back a home-mad
e
chair. "There's work to do. Every day I don't dig makes it a day more we have t
o
stay ... so I'd rather work."

"Aren't you thinner?" Miriam asked. There were hollows in Adam's cheeks she had neve
r
seen before.

He smiled. "A man with two women . . . they fuss too much. Sure, I may be thinner.

This is a hot country, and swinging a pick isn't the way to put on beef."

"Did you see anything from the mountain?"

Adam finished the mouthful of food he had taken and filled his cup before replying.

"I'm not sure," he said. "I thought once I saw a flash over north of here ... lik
e
sunlight on a rifle barrel, but nobody would be up in that country."

"You've been there?"

"Hunting . . . there's nothing over there." "Did you see it again? That flash, I
m
ean?" "No. "

"But you think it was somebody? You think someone was over there?"

"Maybe ... it was sudden, then gone. Might have been the sunlight on a sliding rock
,
or something."

"You don't believe that?"

"No," he replied honestly, "I don't."

"I am not afraid," Consuelo said, and seated herself at the table. "I can shoot."

Chapter
Two.

Swante Taggart was still alive. Under a copper sky he rode his horse through
a
rust and copper land. Through tim
e
corroded hills flecked with the green of juniper or the dusty gray of sage he walke
d
the gaunt steeldust, knowing the ache of hunger and the heaviness of nights withou
t
sleep.

At thirty-two, Swante was thankful for the years behind and hopeful for those ye
t
to come, but now he lived, not from day to day, or even from hour to hour, but fro
m
minute to minute.

That he rode through such a land at such a time was a matter of selection but no
t
of choice. The choice had been made for him by the sudden arrival of Pete Shoye
r
at Crown King.

The selection of route was Swante's own, for he knew it well enough to doubt anyon
e
would follow him ... but Shoyer was doing it.

Eleven of the posse had turned back when Swante Taggart had ridden into Apache country
,
but Shoyer was behind him, and there were still men with him, although but few.

Taggart was out of water, out of food. Somewhere south of him was Globe, but he di
d
not want to go to Globe. And he was at least three hard days' ride from the minin
g
town of Morenci. Three days or even more at the rate of travel he must use, for Geronimo'
s
dust-brown warriors were riding a grudge against the white man, and under cover o
f
Geronimo's activities a dozen small bands had come out to raid and kill.

No ridge could be crossed without a careful study of the country around, and he mus
t
take time to hide his own trail when that was at all possible. A dozen times alread
y
he ha
d
doubled the changed direction, but so far he had been less than lucky, for Pete Shoye
r
was still behind him.

Pete Shoyer was a man-hunter by choice and profession. He had been a scout for th
e
Army, as had Taggart himself, and they had known each other slightly, but withou
t
liking. Shoyer had also ridden as a paid gunhand for the big cattle outfits, an
d
lately he had been a Wells Fargo agent and a deputy United States marshal. Taggar
t
dd not mean to be taken, and Shoyer was notorious for bringing in dead men, but unti
l
now Swante Taggart had never fired a shot at a man wearing a badge, and he did no
t
want to begin ... even with Pete Shoyer.

The Verde River and twenty miles of blistering land lay behind him, but by the rout
e
Taggart had taken he had covered more than thirty miles. Leaving the Verde he ha
d
taken what he believed was Canyon Creek trail, but it had proved a cul-de-sac nort
h
of Lion Mountain. When he found a way out of there and reached the bed of Alder Creek
,
the sand was dry and there was no hint of water, anywhere.

When he got down now from the horse he staggered, and for a moment he leaned agains
t
the horse before straightening to look around. He had drawn up in the partial shad
e
of a thick clump of juniper, and squinting his eyes against the glare, he searche
d
the country before him.