Showdown at Yellow Butte (1983) (3 page)

"He went on to say that they had arranged to buy the land, but that a bunch of squatters were on it who refused to leave. He wanted to hire me to lead a force to see the land was cleared, and he said that most of them were rustlers, outlaws or renegades of one sort or another. There would be fighting and force would be necessary."

Dai nodded. "Right he was as to the fighting, but renegades, no. Well," he smiled grimly past his pipe. "I'd not be saying that now, but there's mighty few. There are bad apples in all barrels, one or two," he said. "But most of us be good people, with homes built and crops in.

"An' did he tell you that their oath was given that the land was unoccupied? Well, it
was!
An
d
let me tell you. Ninety-four sections have homes on them, some mighty poor, but homes.

'Shrewd they were with the planning. Six months the notices must be posted, but they posted them in fine print and where few men would read, and three months are by before anything is noticed, and by accident only. So now they come to force us off, to be sure the land is unoccupied and ready. As for swamp, desert now, and always desert. Crops can only be grown where the water is, an' little enough of tha
t
Dai shook his head and knocked out his short-stemmed pipe. 'Money we've none to fight them, no lawyers among us, although one who's as likely to help, a newspaper man, he is. But what good without money to send him to Washington?"

The Welshman's face was gloomy. 'They'll beat us, that we know. They've money to fight us with, and tough men. But some of them will die on the ground, and pay for it with their red blood. And those among us there are who plan to see 'tis not only the hired gunners who die, but the high an' mighty. You, too, lad, if among them you stay." Kedrick was thoughtful. 'Dal, this story is different from the one I've had. I'll have to think about it, and tomorrow we ride out to look the land over and show ourselves."

Reid looked up sharply. "Don't you be one of them, bye! We've plans made to see no man gets off alive if we can help it."

'Look, man!" Kedrick leaned forward. 'You've got to change that! I mean, for now. Tomorrow it's mainly a show of force, a threat. There will be no shooting, I promise you. We'll ride out, look around, then ride back. If there's shooting, your men wil
l
start it. Now you go back to them and stop it. Let them hold off, and let me look around."

Dai Reid got slowly to his feet. "Ah, lad! 'tis good to see you again, but under happier circumstances I wish it were! I'd have you to the house for supper and a game, as in the old days! You'd like the wife I have!"

"You? Married?" Kedrick was incredulous. 'I'd never believe it!"

Dai grinned sheepishly. "Married it is, all right, and happy, Tom." His face darkened. "Happy if I can keep my ground. But one
promise
I make! If your bloody riders take my ground, my body will be there when they ride past, and it will be not alone, but with dead men around!"

Long after the Welshman had gone, Tom Kedrick sat silently and studied the street below the window. Was this what Consuelo Duane had meant? Whose side was she on? First, he must ride over the land, see it for himself, and then he must have another talk with Gunter. Uneasily, he looked again at the faces of the men in his mind. The cold, wolflike face of Keith; the fat, slobby face of Burwick, underlined with harsh, domineering power; and the face of Gunter, friendly, affable, but was it not a little . . . sly?

From outside came the noise of a tinny piano, and a strident
female
voice, singing. Chips rattled, and there was the constant rustle of movement and of booted feet. Somewhere a spur jingled, and Tom Kedrick got to his feet and slipped into a shirt. When he was dressed again, with his guns belted on, he left his room and walked down the hall to the lobby.

From a room beside him, a man stepped and stared after him. It was
Dornie
Shaw.

Chapter
III

ONLY the dweller in the deserts can know such mornings, such silences, drowsy with warmth and the song of the cicadas. Nowhere but in the desert do the far miles stand out so clearly, the mesas, towers and cliffs so boldly outlined. Nowhere will the cloud shadows island themselves upon the desert, offering their brief respite from the sun.

Six riders, their saddles creaking, six hard men, each lost in the twisted arroyos of his own thoughts, were emerging upon the broad desert. They were men who rode with guns, men who had used their guns to kill and would use them so again. Some of them were already doomed by the relentless and ruthless tide of events; and to the others their time, too, would come.

Each of them was alone, as men who live by the gun are always alone. To them, each man was a potential enemy, each shadow a danger. They rode jealously, their gestures marked by restraint, their eyes by watchfulness.

A horse blew through his nostrils, a hoof clicke
d
on a stone, someone shifted in his saddle and sighed. These were the only sounds. Tom Kedrick rode an appaloosa gelding, fifteen hands even, with iron-gray forequarters and starkly white hindquarters splashed with tear-shaped spots of black a clean-limbed horse, strong and fast, with quick, intelligent eyes and interested ears.

When they bunched to start their ride, Laredo Shad stopped to stare at the horse, walking around it admiringly. 'You're lucky, friend. That's a horse! Where'd you find him?"

"Navajo remuda. He's a Nez Perce war horse, a long ways off his reservation."

Kedrick noticed the men as they gathered and how they all sized him up carefully, noting his Western garb, and especially, the low-hung, tied-down guns. Yesterday, they had seen him in the store clothes he had worn from New Orleans, but now they could size him up better, judge him with their own kind.

He was tall and straight, and of his yesterday's clothing only the black, flat-crowned hat remained, the hat, and the high-heeled rider's boots. He wore a gray wool shirt now and a black silk kerchief around his neck. His jeans were black, and the two guns rode easily in position, ready for the swing of his hand.

Kedrick saw them bunch, and when they all were there, he said simply, "All right, let's
go.
They mounted up. Kedrick noted slender wiry Dornie Shaw; the great bulk of Si Fessenden; lean, bitter Poinsett and the square blond Lee Goff; sour-faced Clauson, the oldest of the lot and the lean Texan, Laredo Shad. Moving out, he glanced at them. Whatever else they might be, they wer
e
fighting men. Several times Shaw glanced at his guns.

"You ain't wearin' Colts?"

"No, .44 Russians. They are a good gun, one of the most accurate ever built." He indicated the trail ahead with a nod. "You've been out this way before?"

"Yeah, we got quite a ride. We'll noon at a spring I know just over the North Fork. There's some deep canyons to cross, then a big peak. The Indians an' Spanish called it The Orphan. All wild country. Right beyond there we'll begin strildn' a few of 'em." He grinned a little, showing his white even teeth. "They are scattered all over hell's half acre."

"Dornie," Goff asked suddenly, "you figure on ridin' over to the malpais this trip?"

Clauson chuckled. "Sure, he will! He should've give up long ago, but he's sure hard to whip! That girl has set her sights higher'n any West country gun Slinger."

"She's shapely, at that!" Goff was openly admiring. "Right shapely, but playin' no fav'rites."

"Maybe they're playin' each other for what they can git," Poinsett said, wryly. "Maybe that's where he gets all the news he's tellin' Keith. He sure seems to know a sight o' what's goin' around."

Dornie Shaw turned in his saddle, and his thin features had sharpened. "Shut up!" he said coldly. The older man tightened and his eyes blazed back with genuine hate, yet he
held his peace. It was educational to see how quickly he quieted down; for Poinsett, a hard, vicious man with no love for anybody or anything, obviously wanted no part of what Shaw could give him.

As the day drew on, Kedrick studied the men
,
and noticed they all avoided giving offense to Shaw, even the burly Fessenden who bad killed twenty men, and was the only one of the group Kedrick had ever seen before. He wondered if Fessenden remembered him and decided he would known before the day was out.

Around the noon camp there was less friendly banter than would occur in a cow camp. These men were surly and touchy. Only Shad seemed able to relax, and everything came easily for him. Clauson seemed to take over the cooking job by tacit consent, and the reason was soon obvious: he was an excellent cook.

As he ate, Tom Kedrick studied his situation with care. He had taken this job in New Orleans, and at the time had needed money badly. Gunter had put up the cash to get him out here. If he did back out, he would have to find a way to repay him. Yet the more he looked over this group, the more he believed that he was in something that he wanted out of but fast.

He had fought as a soldier of fortune in several wars. War had been his profession, and he had been a skilled fighting man almost from the beginning. His father, a one-time soldier, had a love for tactics, and Tom had grown up with an interest in things military. His education had mostly come from his father and from a newspaper man who lived with them for a winter and helped to teach the boy what he could.

Kedrick had grown up with his interest in tactics, and had entered the army and fought through the War Between the States. The subsequent fighting had given him a practical background to accompany his study and theory. But with all his fightin
g
and killing it had entailed, he had not become callow.

To run a bunch of renegades off the land seemed simple enough and it promised action and excitement. It was a job he could do. Now he was no longer sure it was a job for him. His talk with Dai Reid as well as the attitude of so many of the people in Mustang convinced him that all was not as simple as it had first appeared. Now, before taking a final step, he wanted to survey the situation and see just whom he would be fighting, and where. At the same time, he knew the men who rode with him were going to ask few questions. They would do their killing, collect their money, and ride on. Of them all, only Shad might think as he did, and Kedrick made a mental note to talk with the Texan before the day was over, find out where he stood and what he knew. He was inclined to agree with Shaw's original judgment, that Shad was one of the best of the lot with a gun. The man's easy way was not only natural to him, he was simply confident. He had that hard confidence that comes only from having measured his own ability and knowing what he could do when the chips were down.

After he finished his coffee he got to his feet and strolled over to the spring, had a drink, then arose and walked to his horse, tightening the cinch he had loosened when they stopped. The air was clear. Despite their lowered voices, he could catch most of what was said.

The first question he missed, but Fessenden's reply he heard. "Don't you fret about him. He's a scrapper from way back, Dornie. I found that out. This here ain't our first meetin'."

Even at this distance and with his home betwee
n
him and the circle of men, Kedrick could sense their attention.

"Tried to finagle him out of that Patterson herd up in Injun Territory. He didn't finagle worth a durn."

`What happened?" Goff demanded. 'Any shoot-in'?"

"Some. I was ridin' partners with Chuck Gibbons, the Llano gunman, an' Chuck was always on the prod, sort of. One, two times I figured I might have to shoot it out with him my own self, but wasn't exactly honin' for trouble. We had too good' a thing there to bust it up quarrelin'. But Chuck, he was plumb salty, an' when Kedrick faced him an' wouldn't back down or deliver the cattle, Chuck called him."

Fessenden sipped his coffee, while the men waited impatiently. When they could stand the suspense no longer, Goff demanded, "Well, what happened?" The big man shrugged. "Kedrick's here, ain't he?" "I mean what was the story?"

`Gibbons never cleared leather. None of us even seen Kedrick draw, but you could have put a half dollar over the two holes in Chuck's left shirt pocket."

Nobody spoke after that, and Tom Kedrick took his time over the cinch. Then leaving his horse, he walked away further and circled, scouting the terrain thoughtfully.

He was too experienced a man to fail to appreciate the importance of a knowledge of terrain. All this country from Mustang to the Territory line would become a battleground in the near future, and a man's life might depend on what he knew.

He wasted no opportunity to study the country or ask questions.

He had handled tough groups before and he was not disturbed over the problem this one presented. However, in this case he knew the situation was much more serious. In a group the men would be easier to handle than they would separately. These men were all individualists, and were with out any group loyalty. In the last analysis, they had faith in only two things: six-gun skill and money. By these they lived and by these they would die. That Fessenden had talked was pleasing, for it would, at least settle the doubts of some of the others. Knowing bins for a gunhand, they would more willingly accept orders from him, not because of fear, but rather because they knew him for one of their own, and not some stranger brought in to command.