Kill McAllister (15 page)

Forster went white, frowning, not knowing what to say. Then he demanded through his teeth: “How many cows?”

“We'll say two hundred for me and you throw Dice's share in with mine. He'll leave 'em with me.”

“You bastard, Grotten. You think you have me over a barrel.”

The grin dropped from Mike's face. Looking at him, Dice knew the word ‘bastard' had done it. If Mike had been wearing a gun he would have shot Forster then.

“Take it easy, Mike,” he said. “The captain didn't mean anything. It's been a shock. I said he'd take it hard.”

Mike threw the line to the halfbreed, stared first at his brother and then at Forster before stamping off into the cabin.

“You shouldn't have said that, captain,” Dice said.

“To hell with the pair of you,” Forster snapped. He turned to the corral, caught himself a horse, saddled and rode off through the snow down the valley. Dice was troubled. He had hoped to get through the winter without a show-down between his brother and the captain. He saw that the men who had been gathered outside the lower cabin were now making their way through the snow toward the upper. In their lead was Sholto. Dice didn't move.

When Sholto was near, Dice said conversationally, “Well, Sholto, it looks like the thaw's on us.” It seemed that all the men started to talk at once. From out of the gabble that went on, Dice made out that they wanted to know what was going to happen now.

He gave them a good looking over. They looked terrible. It seemed the only things they had kept clean during the winter were their weapons. He knew their guns would be well-oiled and their knives sharp. But, for the rest of them, they were an unshaven, dirty bunch of layabouts. Grotten hated the idea of sharing the dwindling profit from the cows with them.

He looked Sholto squarely in the eye and said: “Things don't
look so rosy, Sholto. Mike and I looked over what's left. It's been a hard winter. There's been losses.”

“Losses?” Sholto growled. “What the hell do you mean-losses?”

“For God's sake, man, you don't think Texas longhorns can survive in this northern climate, do you?”

Cowdrey pushed up alongside Sholto.

“All we know is, we put a lot of work and riding' in on this an' we want somethin' back for it.”

“You'll get something back,” Grotten promised him. “But it won't be as much as we hoped. It'll be the same for all of us.”

Sholto said: “I bet it won't be so bad for you an' the captain.”

“You're free to think what you like,” Grotten said. “But my advice is: wait till the snow clears and we can see what we've got.”

“How long will that take?”

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

There was some more talk and then the men went grumbling back to their cabin. Grotten didn't like it. He felt sure there was going to be trouble. Mike came out of the cabin and stared after them.

“I don't like the way things're going, Dice,” he said. “I don't like your damn captain and I don't like that crew of hardcases. The sooner they're off my land, the better.” He shot a hard glance at his brother from under his heavy brows. “Where do you stand if there's trouble between me and the captain?”

Dice knew that question would come and had dreaded it.

“I don't know, Mike,” Dice said. “I thought we'd come to this sooner or later. I've been with the captain a long time. You're my brother. I'll do all I can to prevent a clash.”

Mike looked fierce.

“All you have to do is get us our share and clear that bunch out of here.” He walked back into the cabin again. He sat on his bunk, building a smoke, wondering how much use his three men would be if it came to a showdown with the Kansans. Not much, he thought – they were outnumbered badly and they were cowmen not fighting men. It was the old story. If you want anything done properly, you had to do it yourself.

* * *

McAllister let the thaw do its work before he suggested that Sam try sitting a horse. The creek was full and free-flowing, full to the top of its banks, snow was falling from the laden trees,
slowly color was coming back into the scene from their cabin. Black patches appeared on the ground; the black slowly turned to green; the first shoots appeared and the horses started to pick up as they ate their fill. They heard birds again, they heard the bark of deer in the timber. Sam didn't need any second bidding when McAllister saddled one of the Indian ponies for him and gave the animal a preliminary ride. The little mustang kicked and sun-fished the kinks out of its back, then he was ready for Sam to ride. McAllister slapped the hull on the canelo and they rode out of their little rincon out into the big country beyond.

Every spring showed itself and men and horses felt good. The sky was clear and a weak sun showed itself. They rode slowly over a shoulder of hill and came to a deep wide valley.

They halted their horses and drank in the scene.

“Good country, Rem,” Sam said. “A man could raise cows here.”

McAllister pointed.

“Somebody did.”

Sam's eyes followed the pointing finger. The Negro squinted to focus on a distant moving object. He made out the distant cattle, all longhorns, feeding slowly along in the valley below.

“They's considerably gaunted down,” he said.

“So'd you be,” McAllister reminded him, “hoofing your feed from under the snow.”

“Look yonder,” Sam said idly. “An overslope.”

McAllister saw a small straggle of cattle come out from a thicket almost immediately below them. Perhaps a half-dozen animals, all busy filling their empty bellies after the hard winter. He saw that their ears bore the overslope mark, the same as that used by Colonel Struthers. Not a surprising coincidence; there were only so many earmarks. But he said, for some reason he didn't understand, “Let's ride down and take a look.”

They rode slowly down the slope and neared the cows. Suddenly, as one animal turned its left flank on broadside to them, Sam halted his horse and gave an exclamation of pure astonishment. McAllister saw it at the same time and also halted. The two men looked at each other.

Sam said: “Who would of believed it? That's the colonel's brand, all right.” The Flying S stood out bold and firm.

“There could be two brands the same,” McAllister said. “This is a long way from home. Different branding organisation.”

Sam thought. “They're all marked the same.”

“Cow there's gettin' around to droppin' a calf.”

“There's some northern critturs here,” McAllister said. “See yonder. Bearin' another brand, too.”

Some more cattle were drifting out of the brush. They bore an undercut earmark and a brand that looked like a Lazy G.

“What do you reckon, Rem?” Sam asked.

“I reckon these're our cows.”

“Me, too. See that big brindle steer? I know him like I know myself. Did ever two fellers have luck like it? We winter in the hills and spent all the time thinking up ways of finding them cows and there they is not five miles off. It's a Goddamn miracle.”

“Let's get out of here,” McAllister said, “before we're spotted.'

Sam reined his animal around and said: “Let's go.” They rode back up the slope, found cover and surveyed the scene once again. They had a problem on their hands and they knew it. They'd found the cows, as Sam said, by a miracle. Now they had to get them back. Who had possession of them? Was it the men who had stolen them? How strong were they? McAllister and Sam were in a weak position. There were only two of them, they were low on ammunition. It could be that they were faced by an impossible task.

“So what do we do now?” Sam wanted to know. “Get the law?”

“Do you know if there's any in this neck of the woods?”

“No, I reckon I don't. But I have ole Boss's papers on me. I can prove the cows is the colonel's.”

“Well, that's somethin'.”

They discussed their problem a little, then rode north along the rim of the valley, keeping to the best cover they could find, watching the valley, finding more and more cattle as they went. McAllister wished he had glasses with him so that he could see their brands. An hour later they came in sight of smoke and a little later spotted a cabin nestling down in the timber. A short way off was another structure also with smoke coming from it.

“We don't know that the cows belong to the houses,” McAllister said, “but the chances are they do.”

They tied their animals and went down a little to have a closer view. In the next hour, they learned that there were at least a dozen men down there. That seemed to make their minds up. No outfit this size would carry so many men normally. It seemed conclusive that here were the men who had stolen the herd. This was the secret hangout of the Jayhawkers.

“Wa-al,” McAllister opined, “I reckon we found 'em, Sam.”

They went back to their horses and rode home. When they ate their meal that evening, Sam said: “I don't know what the hell we do now, but I reckon we just don't go in there an' brace them jaspers.'

“No,” said McAllister. “But it don't mean we can't whittle 'em down some.”

Sam gave him a look.

“You aim to do somethin' crazy?” he said softly.

“Yes,” McAllister told him, “that's what I aim to do. Surprisin' how often bein' crazy pays off. Thing is the other feller always expects you to act sensible.”

Sam said a little dubiously: “Feller could git hisself killed dead bein' overly crazy.”

McAllister nodded.

“It could turn out that way, but all he has to do is not get in the way of no bullets.”

Sam didn't look convinced.

Night was two hours off and McAllister was preparing. Sam reckoned he ought to be going along too, but McAllister wouldn't hear of it. Sam would be necessary when it came to fighting. Right now was the time for a bit of scouting and McAllister was the one for that.

“I'll pussyfoot around a mite,” he said. “See how the land lies, then we can think up a trick or two.”

“You be careful, boy,” Sam said. “There ain't a man down there ain't a killer.”

“I guarantee they won't see hide nor hair of me,” McAllister said.

McAllister's preparations consisted of exchanging his boots for a pair of Cheyenne moccasins, cleaning his Remington forty-four with great care and sharpening his belt-knife. He had discarded his shotgun chaps and wore only his levis for freedom of movement. He reckoned on coming and going as silently as an Indian. Sam watched with some interest.

“You git in trouble, boy,” he said, grinning, “you use that knife. We're kinda low on shells.”

McAllister grinned back.

“I'll remember that.”

He saddled the canelo, shook once with Sam and was wished luck.

“I got luck, Sam,” he said. “I can feel it in my water. Besides, them fellers has had it all till now and it's time it changed.”

He rode north, following the line of the hills, but keeping carefully away from the skyline. He didn't hurry, because there was a timepiece in his head pacing off the miles and he wanted to get to a certain point at the right time. And he did that. He swung around into the main valley from the north just as dusk was falling, kept to the brush and breaks in the ground as much as possible, then, finding a good hiding place for his horse, he tied the canelo and went ahead on foot. Full dark had now fallen and he had to rely on his memory of the ground as he had seen it
from the valley wall the day before. The actual ground he was treading he had never stepped on before, so it was no easy task to bring himself up with the house. He feared that he would go past it in the dark, but either his judgment was good or his instinct aided him, for suddenly he spotted a light off to his left and he knew that he had nearly missed the first building by no more than thirty yards.

He looked south along the valley and saw the lights of the second building. He knew then that he was nearer the smaller of the two. He turned toward this and approached it silently from the rear. As soon as he was near the wall of the building, he heard the rumble of men's voices. There was one window at the rear and this he approached. In place of glass, he saw, there was the oiled paper so common on the frontier. And this, the found, was torn in one place. This offered him an excellent hearing hole, gave him the opportunity of seeing inside. He put an eye to it and looked in.

He could not see the whole of the single room of which the interior was made, but he had a fair enough view. In his sight were four men. Two he recognised at once. One was the man who had fetched him at gunpoint from the hotel. The other was Forster, the man he wanted. He couldn't believe his luck. The third man looked like a halfbreed Indian; the other bore a resemblance to the man who had taken him from the hotel. Could be his brother, McAllister guessed.

Forster was doing the talking.

* * *

Bob Dunn, the younger of Mike Grotten's hands, had ridden in from the east. He carried with him momentous news, but he wasn't aware of the fact. He turned his horse loose in the corral, strolled into the shack and said carelessly: “There's somebody in that old cabin beyond the breaks, boss. Musta wintered there.”

Mike was alert at once. The halfbreed Ute had told him not a few hours earlier that he had seen strangers in the valley the day before. He hadn't been able to impart the news earlier because he had slept the night at the far end of the valley.

Mike asked: “Did you take a look at them, Bob?”

“I only saw one.”

“What was he like?”

“He was a nigger.”

Forster was on his feet in a second.

“My God, Dice,” he cried, “you hear that? It could be him.”

Dice was a little startled, but he didn't let the news throw him.