Novel 1966 - The Broken Gun (v5.0) (9 page)

The rider emerged from a narrow branch canyon just ahead of me, a canyon that until that moment I had not realized was there. He drew up and looked around.

He was still muttering to his horse, which evidently had slipped on the rock. After that one glance around, he dug into his shirt pocket for the makings and began to build a cigarette. He was half turned away from me, but I knew the danger of being seen from the corner of the eye, almost greater than being seen when directly in front, and waited.

He was not over twenty yards off, but too far for me to throw a rock with accuracy even if I had been sure of my aim, which I wasn’t. It had been years since I’d thrown any kind of a ball, and at baseball I’d been no great shakes. But I dearly wanted that horse; and if not the horse, at least a gun.

Thoughtfully, trying not to look directly at him for fear something in my concentration would attract him, I studied the terrain between us. It was ground that would be easier to cross quietly than some I had crossed in Korea under equally bad conditions—but I was several years away from Korea.

If he turned in any direction he was almost sure to see me. With infinite care I moved a foot to my right, then moved my body and my other foot. Now I was directly behind him. I stood up, as intent on the horse as on the man, for the horse’s range of vision was greater, and of the two I feared he would be most alert.

Judging the sand, I took a long step toward them, and then another. The wind was away from the horse and toward me, so I tried one more step, and still another. Now a large rounded boulder was in the way. Crouching, I went around it to the right, and stepped down to a flat rock.

Two more steps I managed, and then the horse sidestepped quickly and snorted. Instantly, I ran toward them. The rider saw me then, and dropped his hand for his gun.

The days of the fast draw were past, and his was no better than average. His horse was moving nervously, and I was coming at him, but as his fingers closed about the gun butt I let fly with my rock, throwing it with a bowling motion, and off my fingertips. I was hoping for nothing more than to make him duck and so give me time to close in, but even though he jerked his head back, the rock caught him on the point of the chin.

His gun was coming free of the holster, but it went off as his finger tightened convulsively. The sudden shot burned a streak along the flank of the horse and the animal leaped. That, coupled with my thrown rock, knocked him from the saddle. Rushing in, I swung a long right as he hit the ground and caught him flush on the jaw. Something crunched under my fist, and he screamed in agony. His jaw had been broken by the rock, and the blow from my fist had shattered it.

His half-drawn gun had dropped back into the holster, and I jerked it from him. While he held his jaw and moaned, I stripped off his gun belt.

Then, ignoring him, I looked around for the horse. The frightened animal had run off a hundred yards or so, stepped on the trailing reins, and stopped. I wanted the horse, but I wanted the rifle in the scabbard on the saddle even more.

Leaving the cowhand clutching his jaw and making moaning sounds, I walked toward the horse. He let me come close, then trotted off a few steps. I walked after him, talking softly, and finally he let me come close enough to take the reins. A moment later and I was in the saddle.

That shot would bring trouble pretty soon, and I had no idea of being there when it arrived. The difficulty was that there were few possible routes of travel at the bottom of the canyons.

Avoiding the New River trail, I went over a saddle in the hills to a trail that skirted Grapevine Canyon. Then cutting back to Gray’s Gulch, I skirted the towering mass of New River Mesa, and saw tracks in the trail ahead of me.

A walking horse. I recognized the tracks even before I heard her speak.

“Was that you who shot?”

It was Belle. She was sitting the saddle in the deep shadow beside a dense mass of juniper.

“I was shot at. Or rather, he was drawing for a shot when I got to him.”

“You
killed
him?”

“No…but he’s dismounted now, and he has a broken jaw. He’s out of it—you can be sure of that.”

“Where were you going?” she asked.

I shrugged. “Robbers’ Roost, or some place around there. What we’d better do is get clear out of this part of the country.”

“And leave my ranch?”

“You’ve left it before. Go back with a deputy U.S. marshal. That’s what I’d do.”

We walked our horses down the draw. The mesa cast a shadow over most of the trail, allowing it to emerge into the light only at rare intervals. Suddenly, I realized that I was hungry.

There were saddlebags on the horse, but there was nothing to eat in them. There was tobacco, but I was not a smoker. Other than that, I found only matches, some odds and ends of rawhide, a handful of cartridges for the .303 rifle, and two more cartridges for the pistol.

“If we get out alive,” Belle said.

I looked at her. I’d been thinking the same thing, but did not know how much she realized the situation. Of course they knew where we were, within a few miles. By now they might have found the man I’d hurt; or they would find him before dark. I hoped for his sake they would find him, for he was out of it as far as I was concerned, and badly injured.

Cities and highways and people were not many miles away from us, no distance at all as such things are figured in these days, but between ourselves and whatever refuge they offered, those miles were all desert and mountains. And men close by were searching for us by horse and jeep.

“What is worrying me right now,” I said, my eyes searching the hills, “is Pio Alvarez.”

“Pio?”

So, as we rode deeper and deeper into the canyon, I told her what I knew about Pio. I told her about Korea and that cold and bitter retreat, and how Pio and I had fought side by side, had cowered together among the rocks and brush, had crept for miles across country. There was a lot I did not tell, for those who have not experienced such things cannot understand. To sheltered and peaceful people who live in warm homes and sit in comfortable chairs and sleep safely at night, there can be no realization of the desperation of men running and fighting for their lives against enormous odds.

We had killed, Pio and I, killed with skill and ruthlessness and with shocking effect. Those who came between us and freedom had little chance against us; they were killed and left there on the ground.

I knew Pio, or I thought I did; and Pio’s brothers had been killed. He would know why, and by whom. “They haven’t any idea what they’ve started,” I told Belle. “Pio is one of the greatest guerilla fighters I have ever seen…and there isn’t an ounce of mercy in him.”

We found the stone-walled cave where Lost River ran—cold, clear water rising from the depths of the earth, running a few yards on the surface, and then disappearing into the rock again. We found the river in a niche in the rocks where few would think to look. There was a hollow there with trees and brush, and only one opening that anyone was likely to find.

But there was another opening, and the journal of John Toomey had told me where to look for it.

“We haven’t any food,” Belle said. “All they have to do is hold us here and wait for us to starve.”

“Maybe,” I responded.

Rock walls rose on either side of us, and entry to the cave where the river emerged was through a narrow cleft in the rock. At times in the bygone ages the river must have swelled to flood dimensions, for the walls of the niche into which we had come were water-worn. They were undercut, offering some shelter.

It was very still here. There was only the sound of the water rustling by, running swiftly over polished rocks, with only a few pebbles at the bottom. It ran along until almost outside the cave, then suddenly dipped into the rock and vanished with a hollow sound, falling into an unknown vastness. Inside the niche the space measured only a few square yards.

“You knew about this place?” Belle asked.

Listening, I did not answer at once. Then I said, “Did you ever hear of John or Clyde Toomey?”

“Toomey? No, I don’t think so.” But she hesitated, her eyes searching mine. “Why do you ask?”

“Because I’ve a fool idea that they were behind all this. I say a fool idea, because both men have been dead for ninety years.”

I changed the subject. “How did your family happen to settle here?”

“Just as every pioneer family did, I suppose. They came west, found a likely spot, and built a home.”

“They built it?”

“Not really. I did hear once that it was built by another man, somebody who worked for my grandfather or great-grandfather. They never told me much about the place, but they were adamant that it should never be sold. That’s why when the will was made, the place was left in such a way that the property would remain in the family, no matter what.”

“What was your great-grandfather’s name?”

“Dawson, I suppose. I was never very interested in such things, and nobody ever talked about him. In fact, Dad and Mother always insisted that the matter never be mentioned. But I overheard some talk between them and asked questions.”

“That man who worked for your great-grandfather? Do you remember his name?”

“Oh, yes. It was Bal Moore. He filed on this land, and he deeded it to his boss. They did that back in cattle days.”

It had been a means to holding more land, which ranchers had used in all parts of the range country. Their hands would file on claims, usually on sites where there was water, and then either sell out to their boss, or arrange some deal by which the land would fall to the boss, giving him control over the water. Hence, control over the range.

“What happened to Bal?”

“He was killed. I believe it was by Apaches.”

The pieces were beginning to fall into place. Bal Moore’s name was familiar. He had been
segundo
on the drive west, and was mentioned twice in the journal’s pages that I had. He had been tough, and reliable, and he knew cattle. Above all, he had worked for the Toomeys since before the war.

We were not safe here. That was the thought in the back of my mind as we talked, and one part of my consciousness was drifting, searching for a way out. The mountains, of course, are filled with odd corners where a man can hide; the trouble was that such a man as Reese would know them all. Colin, too, would probably be familiar with them. The Roost, I knew, was not far away—just across the mesa, in fact—but the chances were they knew of that, too.

By now they would have moved to guard every route out of the ranch area; once we got outside and could talk, they knew there would be trouble. But though we dared not remain where we were, I had no idea of where to go.

At the moment it was comfortable to wait, for no man can run without considering where he is going. We needed this respite, and despite the fact that we seemed to be in a trap here, there was a way out if John Toomey was right. For he had tried a way out from here, where he had seemed to be caught. It was in this place that he scratched the last words of his journal, on the margins of the pages torn from the book.

Believing the journal might be destroyed, John Toomey had tried to leave a record of truth behind him, hoping the broken and discarded pistol would not be examined…and it was not.

Restlessly, I got to my feet. I knew we had little time. With the rifle I could stand them off for a while, but no doubt they would know about how much ammunition I had, and when it was gone they could move in for the kill—or they would simply let us remain here and starve. I had escaped from one trap only to get into another…unless the escape route mentioned by John Toomey would work for me.

He had written of the route he intended to take, but John Toomey had never escaped alive from the same trap in which we found ourselves.

“Dan,” Belle said, “are we going to get out? Or are they going to kill us here?”

“I don’t know, Belle,” I had to answer. “I really don’t know.”

Chapter 8

T
HE HOLLOW IN which we now stood had been created by falling water. From somewhere above, long ago, a stream had tumbled over the cliff’s edge, gradually hollowing out this basin, then spilling out through the crack by which we had entered, and so into the valley below.

This much was obvious from the appearance of the rock and the basin itself, and this much John Toomey, wounded and trapped, had figured out for himself. But he had gone further, deducing that the hollowing action had been accomplished by Lost River itself. The stream that once had fallen over the edge above had found another way, creeping into some crack and widening it until the entire flow could plunge into the cave and emerge below.

John Toomey’s last words, scratched on the margins of the pages of his journal before he concealed them in the barrel of the Bisley Colt, had said as much. He added that he was now going into the cave from which the water emerged, and try to climb out.

Had he succeeded in that climb? Probably not, but if he had, he must have been found and killed shortly after, for he had never returned to pick up the broken pistol.

He had tried. Wounded and desperate, he had tried. He had dared to crawl into that black opening filled with the roar of rushing water.

Somehow, just the thought of that wounded man, hounded to this place by men who planned his murder, having the courage to crawl into that black hole gave me confidence.

I spoke again. “We’ll get out, Belle,” I said. “We’ll make it.”

The guns gave me confidence, for I had qualified as Expert with six weapons during the training before Korea, and I’d had more than my share of fighting in Korea and Vietnam. If they wanted my scalp they were going to have to buy it the hard way.

How long until dark? I looked longingly at the sky. We had a chance of riding out under cover of darkness, and might even make it through. If we could make it to the village of Cave Creek or to the highway, we’d have a chance. But I knew they would have all the trails covered by men ready and willing to shoot.

We might go over the mountains. If we could get across to the Agua Fria, the country around Mayer and Dewey was familiar to me. And if we could get to a telephone I could call Tom Riley.