Gunsmoke over Texas (6 page)

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FTER THEY FINISHED EATING
, Slade and old Tom sat on the veranda and smoked. Finally Mawson asked a question, “Well, son, are you going to stay on for a while and help me run the dang place?”

“Yes, on a condition,” Slade replied.

“What’s the condition?” Mawson asked curiously.

“That I be allowed to handle things as I see fit with no interference from anybody,” Slade explained.

“Done!” old Tom said. “That’s the kind of talk I like to hear. You’re in charge from now on.”

“Okay,” Slade smiled, rising to his feet, “and now I’m going to take a little ride and look things over.”

Getting the rig on Shadow he rode south by a little east. He quickly decided the spread was a comparatively easy one to work. It was roughly a twenty by fifteen mile rectangle. Chaparral growth was sparse and the only real combing necessary would be in the canyons and gorges slashing the eastern hills that walled the Bradded R, the other holding that ran down to the creek. Being open range, the stock of the outfits would mingle. He observed several small streams that flowed south to join the creek that Curly Nevins said flowed from under a cliff of the western range to cross the valley and enter one of the canyons cutting through the hills to the east. Riding steadily, he finally reached the first of the fenced waterholes. He pulled up and studied the water. It was crystal clear with no scum on the surface. Evidently the hole was fed by a spring.

Slade dismounted and climbed the barbed wire fence. With the greatest care he examined the stones at the water’s edge. Finding nothing of an ominous nature, he dipped a handful of the water and tasted it; it was pure and sweet, no taint, no acidity, and no bitterness. Dipping another handful he drank a little, not much, and climbed out of the enclosure.

“No, you don’t get any,” he told Shadow. “You’d be sure to drink too darn much. If I happen to be wrong, and I don’t think I am, what I swallowed won’t give me any worse than a few belly cramps but I’ll bet you my hat against your next nosebag that I won’t feel a single pain.”

Shadow snorted and refused to take the bet. With a chuckle, Slade forked him and rode south. When he reached the oil scummed creek he again dismounted. The creek at this point flowed in a shallow gorge, down the slightly sloping wall of which it was possible to climb. Slade scrambled down and squatted at the water’s edge. The reek arising from the stream was very strong; no wonder cows refused to drink it. He turned his attention to the jagged stone that formed the bank. It was cracked and seamed and fissured. Slade instantly recognized it as shale and typical of an oil producing region. For some time, he examined the stone, his black brows drawing together. Finally he climbed back to the prairie and stood gazing north. The valley undoubtedly sloped from north to south, which lent credence to Bob Kent’s theory that the oil pool would be found underlying the mesa. Well, in Kent’s case, practice had overshadowed precept: Kent did strike oil. Slade’s eyes followed the contours of the hills from north to south and he shook his head in a puzzled fashion. Next he studied the almost barren wide band of rangeland extending north from the creek, and again he shook his head. To all appearances, oil seepage was killing the grass roots, but he still couldn’t understand how the seepage continued for such a distance. Mounting Shadow he rode west till he reached the Chihuahua Trail. Fording the stream he headed for Weirton.

It was pretty well on in the afternoon and he decided a bite to eat wouldn’t go bad. He entered the Black Gold and saw Bob Kent eating a meal at a table. The oilman waved a greeting.

“Come on and partake of a surrounding,” he invited.

Slade accepted and sat down on the opposite side of the table. Kent beckoned a waiter and Slade gave his order.

“Blaine Richardson has started drilling a well out on the desert,” Kent announced. “He says he’s going to bring in a gusher that will make things up here look picayune. Darn it, maybe he will!”

“How about the well he drilled down on the south end of the mesa, was that a gusher?” Slade asked.

Kent shook his head. “Nope, it’s a pumper like the rest of them,” he replied. “The only gusher brought in here was my first strike, but the pressure eased off fast. One of the funniest manifestations I ever ran up against. Almost overnight the pressure decreased to only a slight flow and we had to start pumping. Most unusual, so far as my experience goes. The same holds good for every other well, practically no pressure at all.”

Slade nodded, his eyes thoughtful.

“Richardson says,” Kent continued, “that the reason is that the real oil pool is somewhere down to the south of here and that what we’re getting is just the back-flow under pressure from the big reservoir beneath the desert. He says I’m wrong about this section and that the only part ever under water was the desert.”

Walt Slade gazed curiously at the oilman, apparently started to speak and then changed his mind and commented only with a nod. A moment later he asked a question. “Kent,” he said, “I understand you had a year in college, is that right?”

“Yes, that’s right,” Kent replied.

“And didn’t you get any geology and petrology, the science of rocks?”

“I got some geology, but not much,” Kent admitted. “Enough to give me my notion about this valley, but that’s about all.”

Again Slade’s only comment was a nod.

“Everybody’s talking about how you downed those two cow thieves and saved Tom Mawson’s herd,” Kent commented. “Arch Caldwell says if there were more cattlemen like you in the section there wouldn’t be any trouble.”

“Perhaps,” Slade smiled, “but right now I wouldn’t want to bet on it.”

Kent glanced at him questioningly, but the ranger did not see fit to amplify his remark.

With a sigh of contentment, Kent pushed back his empty plate. “Well, got to be getting back on the job,” he observed. “They’re putting the finishing touches on a new storage tank over by my Number Three well.”

Wade Ballard, the owner, smiling pleasantly, came over bringing drinks on the house. “You did a fine chore the other night, Mr. Slade,” he congratulated the ranger. “I’ve a notion the loss of that herd would have hit Tom Mawson pretty hard right now.”

“I suppose the loss of five hundred head of prime stock would hit any cattleman pretty hard,” Slade replied. “At the current prices it would amount to around ten thousand dollars.”

“And that’s a lot of pesos,” Ballard said and went back to the bar.

“Wade’s inclined to think Richardson may have the right idea about drilling down on the desert,” Kent observed. “He told me an experienced oilman, an engineer, who came down from the Spindletop field last month to look things over agreed that Richardson was correct when he said the desert was the only part of this section ever under water, that down there was the inland sea and not up here, as I figured.”

Slade glanced up quickly. “Did you talk with that engineer?”

“Nope, I was up at Proctor that day and didn’t meet him,” Kent answered. “Well, I’ll have to be going; see you soon.”

For some time after the oilman departed, Walt Slade sat smoking. Now and then he glanced toward where Wade Ballard stood at the end of the bar, and his eyes were thoughtful. Finally he pinched out his cigarette, nodded good-bye to Ballard and headed back for the Walking M.

It was late when Slade reached the ranchhouse, the front of which was dark save for a single lamp turned low in the living room, doubtless left for his convenience. After stabling Shadow he sat in the living room for some time, smoking and thinking. After a while he blew out the lamp and groped his way up the dark stairway. Reaching the upper hall he located the doorknob, turned it and stepped into the room, and halted, staring.

The room, with the window shades drawn, was brightly lighted. On the bed sat a girl clad in a revealing silk nightgown. She was a rather small girl with big blue eyes and curly brown hair through which she was, at the moment, running a comb. The comb stopped moving and she stared, looking quite a bit startled, but not at all frightened.

Walt Slade was usually very much at ease in the presence of women, but at the moment he was anything but at ease. He actually stammered. “I — I beg your pardon!” he gulped. “I must have opened the wrong door.” He started to beat a hurried retreat, but the girl stayed him with a gesture of her little hand.

“Wait,” she said in a low, musical voice. “You must be Mr. Walt Slade who saved my brother’s life.”

“Yes, I’m Slade,” he admitted, “and I’m sorry that — ”

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” she interrupted. “It was a perfectly natural mistake. I’ve done it myself a couple of times; the knobs are close together. Shut the door, it’s drafty. There’s no harm been done so far as I can see. I’ll slip on a robe and some slippers and then I want to talk to you,” she said. “Sit down, won’t you?”

A moment later she was snugged in a robe of some clinging stuff that molded itself nicely to the sweet curves of her figure. She thrust her feet into little beaded moccasins and sat down.

“Now, that’s better,” she said.

“I’m not so sure,” Slade disagreed.

She laughed again. “Perhaps not,” she admitted, “but we have to accord some respect to the sacred proprieties, don’t we? But I want to thank you for what you did for my brother. Clate and I have always been very close to one another, especially after our mother died.”

“I didn’t do much,” he deprecated.

“Only saved his life,” she answered. “And I understand you saved Dad’s herd from being stolen and saved an oil well from burning up and perhaps destroying a town. Mr. Slade, do you always go about doing good?”

Walt Slade’s eyes were suddenly very serious. “Thank you,” he said. “I think that is about the nicest compliment I ever received. I only hope I’ll be worthy of it.”

“I think you are and always will be,” she said gravely. “And I hear you’ve gone to work for Dad. I’m glad; he needs somebody to help him, with Clate flat on his back and Curly Nevins often barely able to walk because of his rheumatism. But it’s late and I won’t keep you from your rest; you must have had a hard day. I’ll see you again in the morning. I suppose I’m a little late in introducing myself, but I’m Mary Mawson, as doubtless you’ve already guessed.”

In the privacy of his own room, Walt Slade thought, Gosh! she’s a regular little doll. Slade was tired, but just the same it took him quite a while to get to sleep.

H
E SAW HER AGAIN
the next morning at the breakfast table. Old Tom performed the introductions which Slade acknowledged gravely, Mary with something very like a grin tugging at her red lips.

“The poor dear would be shocked if he knew about last night,” she whispered as they left the dining room. “I’ll have to leave you now and give the cook a hand. Here come the Bradded R boys already; there’ll be a big crowd here today for the funeral. Poor old Jess!” she added, her wide eyes suddenly misting. “He was with us when I was a little girl.”

• • •

They buried Jess Rader that afternoon under the whispering pines on the hill, where slept Tom Mawson’s wife and others of his relations and workers. Most of the cattlemen of the valley were present and many a curious and interested glance rested on the tall man with the black hair and level gray eyes who stood beside Mary Mawson at the open grave.

Slade was surprised to see Wade Ballard, the Black Gold saloon owner, among those present, but he recalled Curly Nevins saying that Tom Mawson had met him in Proctor and thought pretty well of him. So he thought nothing of it when after the funeral Mawson and Ballard walked away together, conversing earnestly. Ballard appeared to be urging something about which old Tom was dubious.

For a while the Walking M cowboys went about their chores in a subdued manner, but death sudden and sharp is too common an occurrence on the rangeland to leave any lasting impression. Before long things had about gotten back to normal.

The following morning Slade rounded up half a dozen of the hands and told them to get ready to ride and to bring wire nippers with them. He led the way to the first of the fenced waterholes on the south range.

“All right,” he told the hands, “cut the wire and get those fences down.”

The cowboys stared at him. “But, boss,” one protested, “we lost nearly fifty cows around this hole.”

“You won’t lose any more if you keep an eye on the holes,” Slade replied. “Get busy!”

After a look at him the punchers decided it best not to argue. With some grumbling, under their breath, they went to work on the fence. Soon the hole was open to the cattle grazing some distance off. Slade led the way to the next hole. The hands obeyed orders and within an hour all the fences were down.

Slade rolled a cigarette and regarded his men in silence for a moment, then he said, “It’s nonsense to think that oil in the water would poison cattle. A heavy flow of uncontrolled gas, yes, but oil, never. In the first place if there was a heavy scum on the water as there is on the creek to the south, the cows wouldn’t drink it, and even if they did, it wouldn’t hurt them. You haven’t found any dead stock around the creek, have you?”

The hands were forced to admit they never had.

“And you never will,” Slade said. “These holes were deliberately poisoned with arsenic or strychnine, arsenic most likely. I examined the rocks and there was no frosting of arsenic crystals on them, but I suppose you’ve had some heavy rains since the holes were fenced? I thought so. Which would cause the water to rise enough to wash away any arsenic riming that might have been left. But no matter how much poison was dumped in the holes the water would purify itself in a few days. There is a constant flow from springs into the holes which would take care of that. Unless the holes are poisoned again, which I consider unlikely, nothing more will happen. But we’ll keep a watch on them just in case. Incidentally, I drank some of the water yesterday and didn’t get any belly cramps.”

The cowboys cursed and glared southward. “Want us to keep this quiet, boss?” a wizened old puncher asked.

Slade considered for a moment. “No,” he decided. “If the word is spread around that we’ve caught on to what was done it may tend to alleviate the danger of further poisoning. Nobody would be likely to come snooping around knowing he’d be taking a chance on eating lead.”

“What about that spoiled grass down toward the creek?” another puncher asked.

“The answer to that I don’t know as yet,” Slade frankly admitted. “The grass roots are undoubtedly being killed by oil seepage, but how it comes the seepage extends so far beyond the field is a question that right now I’m not prepared to answer. I never heard of anything like it before and I don’t understand it.”

As he spoke he automatically raised his gaze to the hill crests on the west. Abruptly his eyes narrowed a little. From this particular angle he observed something he had not noticed before; the slope of the rimrock was reversed. The slope of the valley was indubitably from north to south, but the slope of the rimrock was just as definitely from south to north. Slade had a feeling that there was an important significance to the phenomenon, just what he couldn’t at the moment determine; it would require some thinking out. He dismissed the problem for the time being and turned his attention to more immediate matters.

“We’ll ride east and have a look at the canyons and draws over there,” he told his men. “I’ve a notion those gulches will require considerable combing. The old man figures to run his shipping herd north to the railroad next week and seeing as we have the time he wants to add as many beefs as he can to it. The Bradded R and the Turkey Track up to the north have decided to join with us and have a round-up so they can roll herds, too. The old man wants to get the round-up started tomorrow if possible and it won’t hurt for us to look over the ground a bit today while we have the chance. It’s logical to believe those gulches will comb to advantage; cows hole up this time of the year.”

A careful going-over of the broken ground proved Slade’s surmise was correct; there were plenty of fat beefs seeking the coolness and good grass of the canyons.

“We’ll have our work cut out for us in these cracks, but it’ll pay off,” he said. “Well, I guess we’d better be heading for home.”

Old Tom’s reaction to Slade’s account of the poisoned waterholes was explosively profane.

“That was just an act of pure danged cussedness, nothing less,” he concluded. “Just somebody trying to start trouble.”

“Yes,” Slade agreed thoughtfully, “it sure looks like somebody had just that in mind, to start trouble.”

“The blasted sidewinders!” growled Mawson. “The devil with them! Let’s start figuring that round-up. I’m going to see to it that you are made round-up and trail boss; I want somebody handling the chore I can depend on.”

• • •

The round-up got under way the following morning. When the other owners appeared on the scene old Tom insisted that Slade be appointed boss of the round-up. The Bradded R and Turkey Track owners, who had met Slade at the funeral of Jess Rader and had already sized him up, offered no objections.

Slade had all the responsibility and was absolutely in control of the round-up, for it is an unwritten law of the rangeland that not even an owner can dispute or question the round-up boss’ orders.

His first act was to select his assistants from the cowboys gathered for the work. Each was put in command of a group of riders who would thoroughly scour the range in search of vagrant cattle as well as large bunches.

“I don’t want any mavericks when this chore is over,” Slade told them. “Mavericks left after a round-up are a sign of careless combing. I want everything out of the canyons and brakes, and I want cows, not excuses.”

The hands resolved there would be neither mavericks nor excuses. They didn’t hanker to do any explaining to this particular round-up boss.

Slade sent the riders out in troops. Each troop would spread out over the range, dividing into smaller parties which presently scattered until the men were separated by distances that varied according to the topography of the country. Each man had to hunt out all the cattle on the section over which he rode. On the broken ground near the hills and in the canyons careful searching for small clumps or cannily holed-up old mossybacks was necessary.

The cows were gathered up in groups as large as the rider or riders could handle and driven to a designated holding spot where they were held in close herd. After the round-up boss decided a sufficient number had been assembled, the riders mounted fresh horses and the business of cutting out the various brands began. Into the milling, bawling and thoroughly bad-tempered mass went the riders, and it was a difficult and dangerous task. The cows dodged, the horsemen swore and finally the critter in question, mad as a hornet, was shoved to where the cut was being formed. Next the beefs were driven before the tally man who carefully checked off the brands. According to brand, the animals were distributed to the subsidiary holding spots of the various ranches.

Day after day the cowboys toiled in the dust and heat. Group after group of cattle streamed in. The various herds steadily grew larger. Only choice animals were held on this particular beef round-up, the others would be allowed to drift back onto the range.

Slade set his night guards with care. He didn’t think anybody would attempt a widelooping while the herds were at the holding spots, but a foolhardy raid might easily set off a stampede that would scatter the cows, mad with fright, all over the range, which would necessitate doing the work all over.

And while automatically attending to his numerous chores, he was constantly studying the bleak hills that soared up on three sides, for he was confident that somewhere in their granite breasts was locked the explanation of the recent weird happenings in the once peaceful valley. One day, near the close of the round-up, he hit on an old trail, little more than a game track, that wound up the fairly gentle side slope of a canyon. To all appearances it led to the rimrock far above. Acting on a sudden impulse he sent Shadow up the narrow track. An hour later he came out on the rim.

From where he sat his great black horse on the dizzy eminence the view was splendid; the valley and its surrounding hills were spread before his eyes like a map. He studied the green floor so far below him. Yes, the valley slope was definitely from north to south, but the hills were different. To the south they were much higher than to the north. A definite reversal of contours. He envisioned the terrain as it must have been a million, perhaps ten million years before. The whole great basin was a sheet of tossing water. Yellow sand banks extended far into the wide inland sea. Its verge was a mass of tall reeds and stupendous vegetation in which huge monsters, scaled and tailed, wallowed and fought. Farther back was the bold shore line that now formed the hills which encircled the bowl. Even the surface of the shore line was doubtless naked stone, while near the water the monstrous vegetation grew with incredible rapidity, died as swiftly and fell, layer on layer, into the turgid water, sinking to the primal ooze, washed over by silt and sand, sinking deeper and deeper under the accumulated weight, while in the dark depths the slow and subtle chemistry of nature wrought unexplainable change.

Followed a long period of upheaval, when the mountains spouted fire and the waters shook to terrestrial thunderings. Slowly the shore line rose higher, and the bed of the wide sea sank. A mighty convulsion, when the earth writhed in agony, caused the great fault that culminated in the subsidence of a wide area to the south to form what was now the desert. The slope of the sea floor reversed under the volcanic hammerings. The water, deprived of surface flow by the heightening of the hills, shrank to shallow pools and marshy lagoons and vanished altogether. Next came a slow process of weathering down, then more volcanic action. The encircling wall that had been the shore line was rent and shattered. Fissures like the canyon beneath came into being. Streams again flowed into the basin, now much shallower, and cut channels across its surface, made their way down the slope from the cap rock and lost themselves in the sands of the desert or by way of subterranean channels reached the Rio Grande and the sea. And that was how the rangeland that was now Weirton Valley came into being.

Walt Slade pondered all this while he studied the hills. He wondered just how deep the reversal that tilted the valley floor from north to south continued. For upon the possible depth of the reversal depended a nebulous theory that was building up in his mind and might lead to the explanation he sought. Heavy with thought, he rode back down the trail to supervise the final round-up chores.

That evening the various herds were driven to their home pastures where they would be held for a few days until the drive north to the railroad and the shipping pens got under way.

“Best handled round-up I ever had anything to do with,” declared old Tom Mawson. The other owners nodded sober agreement.

The following afternoon Slade rode to Weirton, feeling that he should keep an eye on the activities of the oil town. He did not follow the Chihuahua but rode directly south to the creek before turning west, desiring to study its environs a bit more. Upon reaching the ford he splashed his horse through the water and entered the town. He found Bob Kent busy around his workings. The oilman paused in his activities to greet Slade and have a talk.

“That darn Blaine Richardson has got me bothered,” he confessed. “Yesterday he rode down to the desert with two of his best drillers and a pack mule. He came back toward evening but he didn’t bring the drillers or the mule with him. Looks like he’s establishing a permanent camp down there. I wonder if he has got the right notion and that down there was the real inland sea and the best deposit. I’m half of the notion to buy a hunk of that land from the state on the chance that he might be right.”

Slade shot the oilman an exasperated glance. “Kent,” he said, “even a limited knowledge of geology should tell you that the desert was never part of the inland sea.”

“But that engineer from the Spindletop field said it was,” Kent protested.

“If he did, he lied,” Slade replied shortly. “No certificated engineer would make such a mistake. The desert was at one time but a continuation of the hills to the east and west, part of the shoreline of the sea that covered what is now Weirton Valley. The desert came into being in the course of the subsidence that created the Balcones Fault. It was never under water, at least at no period that is covered by geological and petrological survey, and the period of scientific survey covers the formation of oil pools.”