Gunsmoke Read online

  "Rustlers, huh? I warned you men that Tennant was talking you into trouble. Help me arrest him like you should have in the first place and I'll see what I can do about clearing the rest of you."

  "Jim, this is the devil," Dongie Taylor said frankly. "The men were sure you were right ... and now look where we are. 'Most dark now ... and we're away out here like a bunch of lost sheep." He was saying mildly what many of the men were thinking.

  "You men know Clarkson!" Jim told them. "You can see this is a trick. When Clarkson heard we got away last night, he figured there might be trouble ... and got ready for it. The Ladrone bunch is out on the range here somewhere."

  "How do we know where they are?" old John Posten demanded heavily. "Clarkson outsmarted you, Tennant, like he's outsmarted everyone else. We've got our ranches and our families to think about. We listened to you and you were wrong. Most likely you'll be wrong on anything else. We tried to help you when we thought you were right. Now we look like a bunch of fools. We don't doubt you meant well, but I don't want to get any deeper, the way this has turned out."

  "I know how you feel," Jim said, "but you and the other men have still got your chance. These Mexicans didn't ride across the border to buy legal cattle. They can buy cheaper where they came from. I know that country. The fact that they're here is all the sign you need on Clarkson. Stay with me tonight and maybe tomorrow and we'll find what they came north to get. It'll be beef that no bill of sale will cover."

  "What's your idea, Jim?" Dongie Taylor said hopefully.

  Lan Hanson 's harsh voice warned them before Jim could answer. "I'm giving you men your chance with the law now. Back me up in serving that warrant on Tennant and I'll see that the rest of this is forgot. If there's any crooked work going on, I'll see about that, too. I'm the sheriff and the law will take care of it."

  At Jim's side, Hondo whispered: "He's gettin' 'em, Jim. Think of somethin' fast or we'll have to fight back to the border."

  "We'll have to hunt Clarkson and they don't want to hunt," Jim said heavily. "Who's that coming?"

  It was too dark now to see far but the drumming hoofs of a galloping horse on the back trail could be clearly heard.

  "I hope it's Clarkson," Hondo gritted, reining around to meet the approaching rider.

  But it was not Clarkson, or any of his riders. It was Lindy Lou, riding a lathered horse. Jim spurred to meet her.

  "Jim! Did you find Clarkson? Is it all right?"

  "No. Clarkson tricked us."

  "I was afraid so!" Lindy Lou cried. "I've been trailing you and trying to catch you. Jim, Buckshot Bledsoe is dead. He rode back to the Ladrone Ranch to look around and was shot. But he stayed on the horse and reached my house. He was dying, Jim. He was out of his head. But he kept mumbling ... 'Tell Jim, Paso Diablo ... tell Jim, Paso Diablo!"'

  "Good girl! Don't tell anyone!" Jim called to the men who were gathering around them: "Clarkson's men killed Buckshot Bledsoe. But Buckshot sent word where to go. We're all right now ... and Clarkson won't be looking for us. That's good enough, isn't it?"

  "Good enough for me!" Dongie Taylor yelled. "If Miss Merriman can bring word clear out here, I can ride on to find Clarkson now."

  Lindy Lou's ride, the sight of her far out here by Ladrone Mountain, shamed more than one man who was wavering. Shouts of agreement backed up Dongie. In short minutes they were riding again, Lindy Lou with them on a fresher horse that one of Hanson 's gun deputies had been riding. Jim had tried to make her go home but her logic had been unanswerable.

  "I can't go back alone, Jim, and none of the men can be spared to go with me. I'll ride with you and ... and shame anyone who wants to hang back."

  "And get hurt ... maybe shot?"

  "If trouble starts, I'll get out of the way, Jim. I'll not make any trouble. But this is my business, too. Father would have been here in my place. And I want to be near you. I ... I want to be sure you'll come back this time."

  And after that there was no more time to talk.

  Paso Diablo-Devil Pass-was past the malpais belt south of the Ladrone range. Lava flows, rocky ridges, and pinnacles were cut by deep-scoured arroyosfifteen miles of malpais ending in Devil's Ridge, a black, frowning barrier to the way south.

  Paso Diablo knifed through the ridge between sheer walls of rock. In spots half a dozen riders could not move abreast. The malpais belt was dry. There was no water for thirty miles south of the pass. And now in the midnight moonlight the water-scoured sand at the entrance to Paso Diablo was white and smooth. Lan Hanson 's accusing anger rasped from a dry throat.

  "No cattle have been through here! Tennant's made fools of you again! Maybe you'll see it this time!"

  Hours back men and horses had watered at a Ladrone windmill tank beyond the malpais. Now they were dry and that far windmill was the nearest water. Horses were dead beat, men tired, tempers on a hair trigger. Jim sensed what was coming in the sullen silence that followed Hanson's words.

  "Clarkson's men couldn't have started to drive this way until late, and it's hard trailing across the malpais," Jim told them. "We cut across from Ladrone Mountain and made fast time. I figured to beat them here. Buckshot Bledsoe knew what he was talking about."

  "Maybe he did ... an' maybe he didn't!" old John Posten snapped. "But I've had enough. Don't know whether I can get my hoss back to water now. You don't know what you're doin', Tennant. I'm quittin' you. There's the pass to the border. Better take it quick before Hanson starts you back to San Angelo jail."

  "That the way the rest of you feel?" Jim asked.

  Lindy Lou, siding her horse close to him, cried out at their silence: "You can't do it! Henry Clarkson will own you body and soul if you quit Jim now! Can't you see this is your last chance? My father would have known Jim was right! He would have done what Jim is doing! He wouldn't have been afraid!"

  "We ain't afraid," John Posten said stubbornly. "We've just had enough truck with Tennant's ideas. He better cut and run before the sheriff takes him in.,,

  "You men are deputies," Lan Hanson reminded. "Give me my guns and help arrest Tennant and his friends, dead or alive. They'll get a fair trial."

  "They're gonna do it, Jim," Hondo warned under his breath.

  "You and Red ride south," Jim said through tight lips. "Stay here with them, Lindy Lou. I've got an idea. Maybe it'll work."

  Before the others knew what he was doing, he rode hard out into the moonlight. Lan Hanson 's shout rang after him: "Stop them! Shoot them! Ride after them!"

  But no guns were fired. Riders followed. Two riders. Hondo and Red Carney, following Jim into the malpais, back toward the Ladrone range.

  "They're makin' a show of coming after us!" Hondo called as he caught up.

  "I figured some of them would!" Jim yelled back. "They've got to head back for water anyway. But they're not shooting. They're not ready for that. Why didn't you two head south? Nobody would have followed you into the pass."

  "We're fools like you," Hondo retorted gruffly. "There ain't much run left in these horses, Jim."

  "I know, but they'll have to do what they can."

  Two miles-three miles-the malpais was stark and torturous under the moon. White sandy arroyo beds were like bleached, sinuous bones over which water roiled during infrequent storms.

  They rounded a turn in one wide arroyo-and saw a dark moving mass ahead that might have been a shoulder-high wall of water coming majestically toward them. But the sound through the night was the uneasy bawl of hurrying cattle.

  "There they are!" Jim called, lifting his rifle. "I thought we'd meet 'em somewhere out here if Buckshot was right! Hell's gonna bust loose in a minute!"

  "Let 'er bust!" Red yelled back. "This is what I've been taggin' along to see!"

  Three riders ahead of the cattle spurred toward them. The leader hailed them. "Who's that?"

  "Come an' see, Jack Black!" Red Carney yelled. "And come shootin!"

  Black's gun flash was visible before the report and the high-pitched sound of the
passing bullet.

  "Get 'em before the swing men ride up!" Jim shouted. "Scatter those steers! Stampede!"

  Red Carney's rifle shot cut off his words. The rider just behind Jack Black pitched to the arroyo sand.

  "Tally one!" Red whooped, spurring forward. "Jack Black's my man!"

  Hondo uttered an Indian yell as he followed Jim toward the blazing guns of Jack Black and the other man.

  The first steers had stopped uneasily. Those behind jammed up in a bawling mass. Then suddenly the mass broke up the steep sides of the arroyo and ahead in the first run of a panic-stricken stampede.

  The two Ladrone men jerked their horses around but they were too late to do anything. Big steers were charging at them in a blind run. They abandoned the gunfight and drove their horses up the arroyo bank out of the way. Red swerved up the same side of the arroyo after them, and Jim and Hondo followed.

  The moonlight was bright enough to see clearly the man who had plunged to the arroyo sand, who was suddenly lying there alone as his horse bolted, who struggled weakly on hands and knees-and then went down under the stampeding steers.

  Jim swallowed and felt a little sick. And there was no time to think more of it. The earth seemed to be shaking, even to men in the saddle, as the big steers erupted wildly out of the arroyo and scattered into the badlands night.

  Swing and drag riders of the herd were visible, too, in the moonlight, riding wildly for safety, helpless for the moment to do anything but scatter out.

  "Red!" Jim shouted.

  But Red Carney was recklessly following Jack Black and another. The two Ladrone men vanished in a depression. Red followed them, his six-gun blasting shots.

  A few moments later Jim's horse plunged down the steep rocky slope and Red's horse was kicking in a heap at the bottom. The stocky man's body was crumpled at one side among the rocks.

  The Ladrone riders had stopped on the opposite slope and were shooting back as running steers plunged by over to Jim's left.

  Jim's six-gun was empty. His rifle magazine was full. He dismounted beyond Red and had the rifle up almost as soon as he hit the ground.

  Ricocheting lead screamed off a rock by Jim's leg and the Ladrone men wheeled to ride over the crest of the slope out of sight. Jack Black's bearded face had been clear enough in the moonlight-and the bulk of the other man could be no one but Henry Clarkson.

  Black was a dark mass in the rifle sights as Jim squeezed the trigger. The snapping report knocked the Ladrone man out of the saddle as if he had been axed. A second later Hondo's horse came tearing down the slope to a rearing stop.

  "Jim, them Ladrone men are bunching up and heading this way! They can see now we're alone!"

  "That's Henry Clarkson riding back toward them," Jim said. "Jack Black won't be helping any more. That was him I knocked out of the saddle. Wait'll I look at Red."

  The stocky gunman was dead. His face sober, Jim climbed back in the saddle.

  "He was good enough in his way," he said quietly. "And he'd feel better because I got Jack Black."

  "What about them Ladrone men?"

  "We can't handle the bunch alone. Make a ride for it."

  The mad stampede was scattering far over the badlands. By daybreak most of the cattle would be back toward water and grass, back on Henry Clarkson's land with all the damning evidence of their brands.

  Jim led the way out of the depression and with the moonlight lighting them they were sighted. A yell of discovery rang out. Snapping gun reports marked ten or a dozen riders converging after them.

  "These hosses can't run far!" yelled Hondo.

  "They won't have to!" Jim called back.

  Even fresh horses would not have lasted long through that broken, torturous country. But the Ladrone men gained fast, shooting as they rode. Bullets screamed, whined uncomfortably close. The end was only a matter of time for the pursuit to draw closer.

  Hondo called: "They'll get us, Jim! These horses won't last!"

  "Keep going!" Jim retorted-and his words met a burst of yells off to the right as a line of riders burst over a low ridge. "A gunfight was all those ranchers needed!" he yelled to Hondo, wheeling back.

  The Ladrone men had bunched to a stop. A bullet from Jim's rifle drove one horse down, floundering. Blasting rancher guns sent a second wounded horse bolting with its rider. The Ladrone men fired a few scattered shots and broke back to the north. The dismounted rider staggered to his feet and limped after them, waving, calling frantically.

  Hondo rode toward the man while Jim swerved to meet the ranchers.

  "Stay together, men!" he shouted. "Let 'em go! They're licked!"

  But it was half a mile farther on before the last of the strung-out ranchers turned back. Jim led them to the spot where Red Carney sprawled among the rocks. On the opposite slope Jack Black lay alive and sullen where Jim had shot him out of the saddle.

  "So Clarkson wasn't smart enough to keep outta trouble after all," Black gasped when Jim stood by him. "I knew we'd better get you an' that Red Carney before we bothered with the cattle. I got Red anyway, damn him."

  "And it'll be the last gun work you do," one of the ranchers told him. "From now on there'll be law in these parts that works. Here, Hanson? Put him under arrest!"

  Black pushed himself up to a sitting position. His sullen voice grated. "Is that Lan Hanson with you men?"

  Lan Hanson had changed. He was gruff and positive.

  "It ain't no one else. You'll go back under arrest, Black. We'll get to the bottom of this."

  "You double-crossiri skunk. You must've led 'em to us." Jack Black had his gun out and roaring before anyone could stop him.

  Lan Hanson fell, the third bullet smashing into his body before Jim could plunge in and wrench the gun away from Black.

  "Should've knowed he'd do us dirt sometime. But he won't double-cross no one else," Black gasped as he collapsed on the stony ground.

  "He holed Hanson smack in the face. Kilt him clean," announced the rancher who was first to the sheriff's side.

  A shout several hundred yards away drew attention. It was Hondo calling: "Any more trouble?"

  And it was Hondo who came riding slowly and driving a heavy-set, limping figure ahead of him.

  "Got the old bull skunk hisself," Hondo announced. "Wasn't no trouble to make him talk. He's guilty as all get out. Here he is."

  A rancher shouted: "Git him to a tree and string him up!" Other men vociferously approved the suggestion.

  "You can't do that, men," Jim told them. "You wanted honest law. You rode out today to get honest law. You got what you wanted. Now let honest law handle Clarkson."

  "Tennant's right," old John Posten lifted his voice. "If we needed the law when we were down, we'll need it worse when we're on top. I got an idea." Posten was still gruff as he turned to Jim. "I guess most of us are ready to eat crow. We thought you'd made fools outta us, Jim, and we acted like fools. We needed you and we'll keep needing you. Hanson swore you in as a deputy, so there ain't nothing to stop you from taking Clarkson back to jail. We'll back you up. And we'll see you voted in as sheriff. That's what we want. How about it?"

  Lindy Lou had ridden up in the background. Now, coming forward, she was unabashed, although the eyes of all the men were on her.

  "Jim's been away a long time," she said. "He came back to settle down. He wanted to keep away from trouble. Isn't that what you told me, Jim? Don't you want to stay at home from now on?"

  Jim stepped over and took her hand. It was icy and trembling from the strain of the past hour. If the men who were looking at them, the friends, the old neighbors and the strangers there, were reading their two minds, it did not matter. They could all see Jim's grin in the moonlight.

  "I've got a ranch," Jim told them, "and I'll be getting married. I'm home to stay ... and I aim to stay at home."

  The year 1937 began with a major work, "Murder Caravan," a six-part serial that was sold to Detective Fiction Weekly. This was followed by three short novels, two of th
em Westerns. The fourth short novel that year was also a Western, titled "Lodeville Calls a Gun Doctor," completed in May. It was published in Star Western under this title in the issue dated August 1937. For its first appearance in book form the title has been abbreviated.

  Pop Marcy owned the Gunsight Mine outside Lodeville, and the Gunsight Bar in Lodeville. And tonight Pop Marcy was curtly positive in telling the tall, sullen young man fronting the Gunsight Bar that he'd had enough "You'll get no more booze here tonight, Halliday," Pop said.

  Five men lined the bar. A four-handed stud game filled one of the tables. Men hugged the roaring stove at the back. A moment after Pop Marcy spoke, two men dived through the front door, stamping snow off their feet, brushing it from their coats, and swearing at the blizzard

  The norther had struck hard at dusk. Sleet had turned to fine hard snow that swirled and drifted on the icy ground, blotting out the lights of the mines beyond town.

  In the Gunsight Bar, Halliday pushed a flatbrimmed hat back off his moist forehead. His sheepskin jacket covered a gaudy woolen shirt; his stained corduroy trousers were tucked inside highlaced boots caked with drying mud. He spoke truculently: "Trying to start another argument ... by making out I'm drunk, eh?"

  Pop Marcy's white eyebrows, mustache, and white hair had an alert, bristling look. His gray eyes were cold as he swabbed a damp rag over the bar top.

  "You've had enough, I said, Halliday."

  "I'm sober enough to make you another offer for your tinned mine!"

  "You'll never be sober enough to buy it. An' there's a heap more room for you over at the Thirty-Deep Bar. We're crowded in here."

  A thick-chested man beside Halliday laughed. "That oughta hold you, Nelse. Ike, gimme the bottle again. That wind hangs icicles on my liver."

  Ike, the lanky night bartender, put the bar bottle out. Nelse Halliday leaned over and caught it. "I'll take mine now, Jerry. Your drink's on me."

  Pop Marcy snatched up a bung starter and smashed the bottle. Swearing, Nelse Halliday jumped back from the cascading whiskey.