the Man from the Broken Hills (1975) (27 page)

Chapter
25

My horse could walk as fast as many horses could trot, and he moved right out, heading south away from the ranch. Yet I had no idea of overtaking the posse. I'd never been one to travel in a crowd, and I had noticed that too often the wrong men wind up as the leaders of groups or mobs.

It was a rough thirty-five miles and a bit more from the ranch to the cabin on the Concho, and I made a beeline for it. Shortly before night fell, I stepped down near the head of Kiowa Creek and, without unsaddling, built myself a fire and made coffee and bacon. When I'd eaten, I loaded up frying pan and coffeepot, drinking the last of the coffee from the pot itself, and I took off toward a hollow in the prairie maybe a half mile from the creek. I'd spotted this place before, and there was a seep that didn't quite make it to the surface but did green up the grass. There I staked my horse, rolled up in my blankets and, with my horse for lookout, slept like a baby until the last stars lingered in the sky.

Moving out, I held to low ground well west of Kiowa country, and I came out of the timber on Tepee Draw on the south side of the cabin. There was no smoke, no sign of life.

For several minutes I sat the buckskin, watching the house. It had every appearance of being deserted, and there was a plain enough trail heading off toward the southeast. Chancing it, I rode up.

The cabin was empty. Most of the food had been cleared out. Only a few shabby clothes remained, and a few cast-off utensils. There was some coffee on the fire that was still warm. Stirring up the coals, I heated it again and drank from a broken-handled cup while pacing from window to window.

I went outside. After watering my horse, I went back to the house. Everything that was worth anything had been cleaned out. Mounting up, I followed the trail southeast past the mountain, and after a few miles I reached Spring Creek.

One rider was ahead of me, riding easy. The trail was several hours hold. It was that long-striding horse again.

Twin Baker!

Southeast of here lay the San Saba and the Llano River country, and I knew almost nothing about it except from bunkhouse or saloon talk.

The next day, shortly after sunup, I rode down into Poor Hollow. There was a crude brush and pole corral there, big enough to hold a few head for a short stay. And from the droppings, cattle had been kept there recently as well as several times in the past.

At one side, under some trees, I found a small circle of stones where repeated fires had built quite a bed of ash. The ashes were cold, but the tracks looked no more than two to three days old.

Squatting under a big old pecan tree, I studied the corral, yet my mind was ranging back over the country. Twin Baker had evidently stolen the cattle in relatively small bunches, then drifted them by various routes to this or other holding corrals where he left them, while going back for more. There was water from the creek and enough grass to keep a small bunch. When he returned with another lot, he'd probably drive them further south and east.

Moving out of Poor Hollow toward a prong of the San Saba, I made camp under some trees. I fixed a small bait of grub where the smoke would rise through the leaves and dissipate itself among them, leaving no rising column to be seen. It was on fairly high ground with a good view all around. My back to a tree, I studied the layout.

I saw a huge old buffalo bull with two young cows, a scattering of antelope, and a few random buzzards. Otherwise, nothing but distance and dancing heat waves. Nevertheless, I had an eerie, unpleasant feeling at odds with the beauty of the land. I had the feeling that I was heading right into a trap.

Someplace, Baker had to have a base, a place with water, and good grazing, where cattle might be held for some time. After a rest I drifted on, taking my time. This country was more rugged, and there was a good bit of cedar.

Twice I camped. Twice I came up to holding grounds where cattle had been corraled for a time, mostly young stuff, judging by the tracks and the droppings.

It was lonely country. Several times I saw Indian sign, but it was old. There were several sets of tracks, mostly made by that long-stepping horse, but now I began to come on other tracks, lone riders or sometimes two or three in a bunch. All of them headed east.

Come daybreak, I was up on the hurricane deck of my bronc again, and looking down the trail ... And it was a trail. Yet this was what I liked, riding far in a wide, lovely country with distance all around. At every break in the hill, there was a new vista, yet the apparent emptiness of the country could fool you. And wherever a man looked, there were hidden folds of the hills that could hide an army ... or an Indian war party looking for scalps and glory.

Suddenly, there opened ahead of me a lovely green valley and some buildings. From a hill, I'd seen some adobe ruins off to the north and east of where I was ... mostly east. That was the San Saba Presidio, an attempt by the Spanish in early times to settle and administer this country. Comanches did them in, wiping out the last few priests who didn't get away ahead of time.

The buildings I now saw must be south of the old Presidio. There were only four or five, a town, if you wanted to call it that-a store, a saloon, a few cabins. Some empty, some occupied. There were some corrals.

The saloon was a long low adobe building. There was a bar in it, and a lean, savage-looking man with an almost bald head. Suspenders were holding up his pants. He wore a slightly soiled undershirt, and his brows were a straight bar across his head above his eyes.

"What are ya having?" He stared at me with glassy blue eyes.

"Beer, if you've got it."

"We got it an' it's cold, right out of the springhouse." He reached for the bottle, put it on the bar. "Driftin'?"

"Sort of. I've got a liking for new country."

"Me, too. This ain't my place. I just agreed to set in for the boss. He had to go down to San Antone for a spell. Stomach botherin' him, he said, and it could be."

"Can you feed a man here?"

"If you like Mexican food. We got a gal here who can really put on the beans. We got beans, rice and beef. In the early morning we'll have eggs ... The woman's got chickens.

He laughed. "Second batch she's had. Weasel got the whole bunch here a while back. Some folks say that man is the only one who just kills to be killing ... Those folks never saw a hen house after a weasel has been in it. He'll kill one or two, drink their blood, and then just kill all the rest. Seems to go kind of wild, crazy-like."

I agreed. "Mountain lion will do the same thing. Kill two three deer, sometimes, eat a little off one of them and bury it in brush, then go off."

I tasted the beer. It was good, much better than I'd expected. I gestured toward the north. "Isn't that the old Presidio up yonder?"

"Sure is. Ain't much account except for holdin' cattle. Buildings and the walls make a fine corral ... hold a mighty big herd, comes to that." He looked at me again. "You headin' for San Antone?"

"Sort of. But I'd latch onto a cow outfit if there was one needin' a hand. I'd rather drive cattle, if it comes to that. I'd rather just sit up there on my bronc an' let the world slide by. I got a good cuttin' horse yonder, and he knows more about cows than I do, so I just set up there and let him do the work."

"Not many outfits this far west. Away over on the North Concho I hear there's some. Never been that far west, myself," he said.

"You said they sometimes held herds in the Presidio? Any cattle up there now?"

He shook his head. "Been some a few days back ... Just a small bunch, though. Maybe a hundred and fifty head. Two men drivin' them."

He chuckled, suddenly.

When I looked a question, he smiled and shook his head. "Beats a man how some folks get together. They come in here for a beer, just like you. One of them a real quiet man. Still face ... good-lookin' feller, but mighty quiet. Never missed anything, though. Other feller, he was younger ... Kind of a flashy sort, swaggers it around, and you can just see he's proud of that big gun on his hip. Never saw such two different fellers together before."

"Didn't the quiet one have a gun?" I asked.

"Surely did. But you know something? You had to look two or three times to see it. I mean it was right out there in plain sight, but he wore it like he'd been born with it and it was hardly so's you'd notice it."

He paused. "That younger feller, he wore two guns, one stuck behind his belt on the left side with his vest hangin' over it a mite ... But the way he wore those two guns you'd a thought he had six. Just seemed to stick out with guns all over."

"High forehead? High wave of hair thrown back? Striped pants, maybe?" I asked.

"That's him. You know him?"

"Seen him around. Name's Tory Benton. Hires his gun sometimes."

The bartender shook his head. "He never hired it to that other man. Never in this world. That other feller, he don't need any gun hands. I seen his kind before."

"A hundred and fifty head, you say? If they're trail-broke, two men could handle them, so they wouldn't need me," I said.

"They're trail-broke, all right. He had one old cow, splashes of red an' white. She was the leader and the rest of them just trailed along behind ... young stuff ... three, four years old. Some yearlin's."

Taking my beer, I walked to a table near the window. The bartender brought his bottle along and sat down opposite me. "I'm holed up here until spring," he said. "Got me a dugout yonder. There's beef around, and a good many turkeys. Come spring I'll head for San Antone. I'm a teamster," he added.

We saw a man come out from a house across the way. The bartender indicated him with a nod of his head. "Now there's somethin' odd. That feller ... He's been around here two, three days, just a-settin'. Never comes over here. Never talks to nobody but his partner. I got a feelin' they're waitin' for somebody."

He was a tall, lean, easy-moving man, with a stub of cigar in his teeth and a beat-up black hat on his head. He wore a tied-down gun and a Bowie knife and he was looking at my horse. When he turned his head and said something over his shoulder, another man came out of the house. This second man was fat and short, with unshaved jowls and a shirt open at the neck, with a dirty neckerchief tied there.

Both men looked carefully around.

"Amigo," I said to the bartender, "if I were you I'd get back of my bar and lie on the floor."

He stared at me. "Look here ..." He hesitated. Then he asked, "They comin' for you?"

I smiled at him. "Well now, I wouldn't rightly know. But that tall gent is called Laredo, and folks do say he's right handy with a six-gun. The fat one could be Sonora Davis. Either one of them would shoot you for fun ... Except they usually only have fun when they get paid for it."

"They lookin' for you?"

I smiled again. "They haven't said, have they? Maybe I'd better go see."

Getting up, I slipped the thong from my six-shooter. "I never did like to keep folks waiting. If they respect you enough to make an appointment, the least you can do is not keep them sitting around. You keep that beer for me, will you?"

There was no door, just the open space for one. I stepped into the doorway and walked outside. Stopping in the shade of the awning, I looked at them in the sunlight near their door.

It was very still, and the sun was hot. A black bee buzzed lazily about, and a small lizard paused on a rock near the awning post, his little sides moving as he gasped for air.

"Hello, Laredo," I said, loud enough for him to hear. "It's a long way from the Hole."

He squinted his eyes under his hat brim, staring at me.

"Last time I saw you," I said, "you were holding four nines against my full house."

"Talon? Milo Talon? Is that you?" Laredo asked.

"Who'd you expect? Santa Claus?"

We were sixty feet apart, at least. His partner started to shift off to the right. "Sonora," I said, "I wouldn't do that. Might give me some idea you boys were waitin' for me. I wouldn't like to think that."

Laredo shifted his cigar stub in his teeth. "We had no idea it would be you. We were just waitin' for a rider on a Stirrup-Iron Horse."

I jerked my head to indicate my horse. "There he is. I'm the rider."

Laredo was good with a gun, and so was Davis, but Laredo was the better of the two. Yet I could sense uncertainty in him. He didn't like surprises, and he had been expecting some random cowhand, not somebody he knew.

"I hope he paid you enough, Laredo," I said quietly.

"Well, we didn't figure on you. He just said a snoopy cowhand was followin' along behind him. Hell, if he'd known it was you, he'd have done it himself."

"He knew. I'm sure he knew," I said. There were two of them, and I wanted an edge. I didn't know whether I needed it or not, but I wanted it. They had taken money to kill, and they would not welsh on the job.

"We taken this money," Laredo said, "an' we got to do it."

"You could always give it back."

"We done spent most of it, Milo. We just ain't got it no more," said Laredo.

"Well, I could let you have a few bucks," I said quietly. "I could let you have ... Let's see what I've got." I moved my right hand as if toward my pocket and when they went for their guns I was a split second ahead of them.