Cartridge Creek, page 11
His heart thudded against the ground as he tried to get his raddled wits straight, and he twisted, sizing up his predicament.
It was a rough one; at least two men forted up in the brush more than a hundred yards away. His own cover wasn’t really worth a damn. They were out of accurate six-gun range and could leave the brush and climb to higher ground and pick him off with long guns with no risk to themselves, and that within a few more minutes. One of them could cover the other while he got into position.
Leatherman’s hands went to his hips and he was relieved to find both Colts in place, for whatever good that would do him in this mess. Head clearing, he considered. He only had two choices, neither good. He could lie here and wait for them to take him, or he could run for cover— and the only cover was the brush along the creek, a good hundred yards away. If he could make that, the odds would change abruptly. Then they would have to hunt him down at close quarters, bring themselves within the range at which his Colts were useful. But unless they were blind, palsied, or dead drunk, he did not see how he could cross that hundred yards of open ground.
He thought about it a few seconds longer, and then knew he would try it anyway. Suddenly he was full of rage. No sooner had he made the first step toward a new life than those bastards yonder had tried to blow it away from him. His rage was not only at them, but at Cartridge Creek itself, their den, their roost. All right, if they wanted him, they’d damned well have to fight. Heat flared within him, subsided, turning to clearheaded iciness. He rubbed his face with dirt, crawled on his belly up the slope a little, looked out from behind the cactus, exposing only smudged forehead and half-lidded eyes.
Across the road, a white fog of powder smoke drifting in the brush betrayed their location. They had chosen their position well, commanding the ford, with a clear shot at a range far enough away so that he could not bring his short guns into play.
Now, he realized, if he had any salvation, it would be the fact that he carried a pair of them, was a two-gun man. His hand tightened on his left Colt. If he survived, that extra gun would have to make the difference.
Cautiously turning his head, he surveyed the ground between himself and the creek. For half the distance, there was no cover of any kind. Then what seemed to be a shallow depression, maybe an old buffalo wallow long since filled in and grassed over, barely big enough for his prone body and with not more than a foot of depth.
He could not pause long there, but it was a way station he would have to make if he were to live.
Leatherman slipped rounds into the empty chambers beneath the hammers of the Colts. No use waiting any longer. He sucked in a deep breath, and then he was on his knees behind the cactus and his right-hand gun sprayed lead toward that smudge of powder smoke in the brush, six slugs drum rolling as he held high, moved the muzzle from left to right, and slipped hammer and pulled trigger instantaneously. Before the sound of the last shot died, he was on his feet, bent low, long legs driving as he ran for his life, trading the loaded left gun for the empty one in his right hand and bringing it to thundering life.
Its six rounds, too, plowed into the brush as, twisting, dodging, Leatherman, like a startled jackrabbit, dashed on. Through the roar he thought he heard the whine of lead, the flat slap of rifle shots, but no bullet touched him. Twelve slugs ripping through the brush like that had made them flinch, threw off their aim, forced them to keep down. Then the hammer of the Colt clicked on empty and the little hollow was still ten yards away, and now they could raise up and shoot. He heard the rifles as he launched himself in a great dive, landed sliding, dirt and rocks skinning his chest through his shirt. Dust spurted from a bullet where he had been as a jackknifing somersault brought him into the hollow. More sprayed along its edge as they pumped slugs at the spot where he had, he hoped, disappeared. Panting, fumbling at his cartridge belt, he pressed flat against the earth. Deftly, but with what seemed to him agonizing slowness, he jacked out empty hulls, crammed in fresh rounds from his belt loops. And now the rifle fire tapered off. Either they were reloading or changing position; if it were the latter, maybe now was the time to take the chance.
He gulped in air and this time gave them no signal. He was up, running, shooting as he went, with both hands this time, the beautifully balanced Colts hardly bucking in his palms. Powder smoke made a screen around him, but he had to outrun it, and then he was in the open.
And they were ready, waiting, and with the creek twenty yards away, Leatherman’s guns were empty and the air came alive with lead all around him. He felt a sharp burn across his back, like a heavy whiplash, but there was no halting, no time to wonder whether the wound was serious. Ten yards to the brush, now, and— He threw himself forward, began to roll. A slug sprayed his eyes with dirt, earth and sky whirled crazily. Then, blessedly, he crashed into limbs and twigs and the limber trunks of saplings. He twisted, disappeared into the shelter of the underbrush, sliding past clawing thorns toward the small, thick cane that lined the creek bank. He crashed into it and brought up short, chest heaving, mouth open and gulping air. He felt blood soak the back of his dust-smeared shirt, but now he was out of their line of fire, at least for a while. He forced his shaking hands into steadiness, getting to his knees in the cane, with drooping willow branches giving additional cover, and emptied and reloaded his guns.
Then the last fat round went home in its socket and Leatherman eased down the hammer. Now, you bastards! he thought savagely. Now, if you still want me, you come to me! There was no more pain from the bullet burn, no more exhaustion, only a wild, feral exultation. By God, now they would have to take him face to face and man to man! Leatherman crawled through the cane and reached the creek bank’s edge.
The stream, like most in this country, was small, five or six feet wide, a couple deep, its banks of sandy clay, perhaps a yard high. Leatherman looked up and downstream, saw the place he wanted, where the channel made a sharp bend. There was good cover on both banks. He dropped into the water, slogged downstream, and took up position in the blind spot behind the bend. Then he waited.
He waited for a long time, but he was not fool enough to think they had given up and ridden off. The bleeding of his back had stopped; he knew the only danger was that the wound might stiffen him a little. He ignored it, settling down with the same patience he had used in bargaining with Ralph Gorman, a characteristic instilled in long years in the Brasada and on the trail, where time was something you took enough of to do the job at hand, do it right, and still keep alive. Crouched behind the shelter of the bank, he breathed softly, holding his breath for long intervals, and attentive to every sound. Wind in cane always made noises like someone coming through; he did not let that spook him, or the scratchings of small birds that had resumed their foraging in the silence that followed all the gunfire.
And then, seemingly, the world exploded. Leatherman dropped to his knees in water as, outside the line of brush, a rifle sprayed its full load with Gatling-gun speed. They were using his own tactics against him, spraying lead. It whined across the creek, clipped leaves, moving in a flat arc like a mowing machine’s blade. Leatherman threw back his head and let out a hideous, gurgling scream, chopped it off short. The gunfire did not cease; when one Winchester was emptied, the second one began.
Leatherman stayed hunkered down. Presently the shooting ended, and in its wake the silence seemed unearthly. It lasted for a long time. He could imagine them consulting. Now came the test of nerve for them. If they wanted him, they would have to come into the brush with six-guns. He could guess at their whispered debate, maybe even at their tactics if they decided to take the chance. If it were he, he thought, he’d send one man wide upstream to wade down quietly, and he’d circle through the brush from downstream in a kind of pincers movement. But he could not count on that, not count on anything. However they came, he thought, let them come.
For five minutes, nothing happened. Leatherman began to wonder if they’d given up, were heading for their horses.
Then the bird flew by.
It was only a sparrow, like the others scratching in the duff. But, coming from upstream, this one flew swiftly and did not stop, and as it passed Leatherman he read the message it carried. He pressed back against the angle of the bend, the cool sand good against the bullet rake. Holding his breath, he listened for the least variation in the quiet, steady gurgle of the water. Then he thought he detected a faint sloshing.
Yes. It came again. One of them was there, around the bend, coming slowly. Leatherman faced the corner of the bend and raised his right-hand gun.
The rest of it was pure reflex. He had a second to spare, and instinctively he used it to check the bank downstream. All at once he was staring straight into the face of a man in a blue shirt who must have been an expert stalker, who’d come through that cane without a sound. His gun was lined at Leatherman, and he was easing back the hammer slowly so as not to spook Leatherman with its click.
For a half second that seemed endless, they looked into one another’s eyes. Then Leatherman felt his left Colt buck in his hand without his own volition, and its roar shattered the silence with obscene abruptness. Somehow Leatherman knew as the hammer came down that the slug went home; that was marksman’s instinct. There was no time to look and see; he twisted, stepping out from around the bend before the sound had fairly died.
The man in midstream halted, raising his Winchester, staring in surprise. Leatherman fired both guns at once. One slug caught the man in the belly, set him down hard in the water; the other missed. Leatherman fired again, with the right-hand gun. The man fell back, body wholly submerged, not moving, and the current borne toward Leatherman was suddenly pink.
He whirled, dripping, guns up, turning back to the bank. There was no sign of Blue Shirt. Leatherman moved cautiously. Then he saw it, a patch of blue visible through a gap in the cane. It lay on the ground.
Leatherman scrambled carefully up the bank, smashed through the cane. The man in the blue shirt lay on his back, staring wide-eyed at a sky he would never see again. The single bullet had caught him in the heart. Looking down at him, Leatherman made a sound in his throat. The man’s jaw was fringed with yellow beard. The sightless eyes were slanted like a lynx’s.
“Hollister,” Leatherman said aloud, voice like the chime of iron on iron. “Fate Canady …”
His mouth twisted, and he spat. Mixed with the reaction that welled up in him was a hatred that made him tremble. So Canady could not even wait for his own deadline to run out. He’d sent these bastards to trail Will Leatherman, take him from ambush, copper all his bets, wind up all loose ends at once. Leatherman’s hands steadied as he carefully dried and reloaded both his guns. He found Hollister’s Winchester, reloaded it; he would not be caught without a rifle again. Then, with the hatred, the rage, like a hot dry flame within him, he followed the creek upstream. Across the ford, close-tethered in the brush, he found two horses. Unbridling and unsaddling one, he mounted the other. Turning from the road, he traveled cross-country, keeping to cover all the way. He swayed a little in the saddle, but his mind was crystal clear, now, and he knew exactly what he must do. Presently, he heard the whistle of a train; the late afternoon highball freight passing through Cartridge Creek, not even slowing for the little scab the town made on the prairie. Leatherman forced himself to pull up and wait. Not until darkness fell did he move on. When the lights of the town gleamed ahead, he followed the railroad tracks toward the station office. He tied the horse in the darkness of the pens along the siding, went carefully ahead on foot. No one was on the station platform; save for Sully, visible through a lighted window, the depot was deserted. Leatherman went on quickly, mounted the steps as silently as a cat. When he jerked open the door, Sully swung around, half rising from his chair, hand reaching for his gun. Recognizing Leatherman, he dropped back and stared. “Judas Priest! What happened to you?”
“Never mind,” rasped Leatherman, drunk with fatigue and a kind of elation. “Gimme a pencil. I want to send a telegram.” He ripped a sheet off a block of flimsies, and with Sully’s pencil began to write.
Presently he straightened up, thrust the sheet at Sullivan. “Send that now,” he said harshly. “Then, as soon as it’s on the wire, you and me need to talk.”
“About what—?”
“Dammit, send that telegram!”
Sullivan looked into Leatherman’s eyes, then nodded, turned toward his key. Leatherman, panting slightly, leaned against the wall, hands on guns, well out of lamplight and away from windows while the message clicked out to Jerry O’Brien in San Antonio, DEAL FINE STOP HANDLE GORMAN PURCHASE SELF STOP BUY EVERYTHING ELSE AND LEAVE THE REST TO ME STOP LEATHERMAN.
Chapter Eight
It was what he did best: handling cattle. There was, after all, a range count to make, and that helped to pass the week that followed, though there was plenty else to do as well. In that interval, Will Leatherman learned every foot of G-Bar-G range, his range now, and the knowledge deepened in him that he had been right: this was the place where, if there was a rest of his life, he would spend it, a place worth fighting for.
He knew, too, that Bettina Grady was the only woman he would bring here. The seven days that passed cut off from her was a kind of torture. While he was busy, it was not so bad; at nights, she haunted him. Thank God Sully was there to look after her in Cartridge Creek. The thought of anything happening to her filled him with terror; the knowledge that if something did, Fate Canady would be responsible, reinforced his determination.
Meanwhile, he got to know the Gorman riders, and they were all the old rancher had claimed: men mostly not young but tough as rawhide, with every bit of softness burnt out of them by years of handling wild cattle and half-broken horses and contending with Indians and rustlers and border jumpers. Their roots ran almost as deep in this range as Gorman’s; their loyalty to it and to their brand was solid. As he took their measure, they took Leatherman’s, and before the week was over, he had passed whatever tests they’d applied. They would fight for him—or fight for the ranch under his leadership. On the fourth day, a Mexican from Cartridge Creek brought out an envelope addressed in Sullivan’s copperplate handwriting. Leatherman opened it, read first the telegram.
BASED ON YOUR WIRE OFFERED SELLER IMMEDIATE ACCEPTANCE DEAL AND RECEIVED WIRED CONFIRMATION PROMPTLY STOP PAPERS MUST BE SIGNED BUT PROPERTY NOW OURS YOU HAVE FREE HAND WITH SAME STOP HEAR STRANGE RUMORS DEEPLY CONCERN ME BUT TRUST YOUR JUDGMENT STOP REMEMBER EITHER DEAL PAYS OR WE GO UNDER STOP WRITE FULL DETAILS PLEASE AND BEST OF LUCK STOP OBRIEN.
Leatherman’s hand had sweated slightly as he folded the wire and put it in his pocket. Well, the chips were in the pot, all of them, including his own life. The magnitude of what he was undertaking and all that rode on it hit him like a hammer blow for a moment. Then, quickly, he opened the next piece of paper in the envelope, also in Sully’s handwriting. When he had digested its message, he let out a long breath of relief. That part of the gamble, anyhow, had paid off. He would have to get the wagons rolling at once, but first— There was still a sheet of paper in the envelope; and it was written in a different hand. Almost at once, he knew whose it was. His heartbeat quickened as he read it.
Dear Will,
You don’t know how relieved I was to get Sully’s message. Thank God you are out of Cartridge Creek and safe at the G-Bar-G. Neither Sully nor I will let the least word of where you are slip except to tell Tom when he comes back. Fate Canady is like a madman; they say two of his men have disappeared and he has been asking about you everywhere. Of course, no one knows anything to tell him except Mr. Murdock at the livery, whose horse came in with a bullet cut. (My heart stopped when I heard that.)
I’ll see that Tom gets your message as soon as he returns from Los Angeles. Meanwhile, please, be very, very careful.
Sincerely yours,
Bettina Grady
It was better, Leatherman thought, not to dwell on that message too much or try to analyze it. There was plenty else to do. He went to give the orders about the wagons. Things were shaping up, now; if only Tom Brand would hurry back.
And three days later, Brand came, lashing a lathered horse with rein ends as it galloped up the ranch road; and Leatherman, stepping forward to meet him as he jerked it to a sliding halt in the dooryard of the ranch thought at once: He knows.
Brand swung down, dropped the blown animal’s reins, strode forward. His face was dark, his eyes lambent, and Leatherman, crossing the yard to meet him, tensed. Brand had looked like this when he had killed Les Wallen, the gunman in Cartridge Creek, and— Leatherman saw that Brand wore the pair of Smith & Wessons.
Six feet away, Brand halted. His big body seemed swollen with the rage it contained. “Damn you,” he whispered, staring at Will Leatherman. “God damn you. You bought my town.”
“Yes,” said Leatherman.
Brand’s voice rose. “And played me for a fool, a sucker, didn’t you? ‘Rangeland’!” he mocked. “And all the time you knew—”
“Tom, ease off.”
“Ease off? There I was in Los Angeles, begging ’em for help, and they laughed in my face. It’s not our responsibility any longer,’ they said, and they showed me a telegram. ‘We’ve sold it—to an outfit called San Antonio Development!’ My town, Cartridge Creek, sold out from under me and—” He almost strangled on the words. “And now I’m nothing in it, nothing! They took away my job as commission agent, even took away my railroad pass! The new owner will have to recommend an agent, they said.” He shook his head violently. “And after all the blood I’ve sweated, all the risks I’ve taken, for their damned property. And now I’ve got to crawl to you, a stranger, even to stay on in town. By God, Leatherman—”
Will stood motionless. One wrong move now could cause a tragedy. Quietly he said, “All right, Tom, say it, call me anything you want. But get this straight now, I won’t fight you.”
“You’ll fight me if I—”
