Novel 1955 - Heller With A Gun (v5.0) (6 page)

It was very cold.…

Chapter 7

O
UT IN THE darkness Tom Healy crouched and shuddered with cold. He had to have a fire. Much as he hated to move far from the wagons, he must have a fire.

There was nothing he could do here. And it was improbable that anything further would be done tonight. He had seen Boyle try the door of the women's van, swear, and turn away. The three men huddled close to the fire, talking in low tones.

Healy straightened stiffly and walked over the snow. A half mile away, among some rocks and trees, he found shelter from the wind. Shivering, he got sticks together and started a fire.

He had no gun. He had no weapon of any sort. The night wind blew cold, and his blaze dipped and fluttered, then ate hungrily at the dry sticks.

Doc Guilford was dead. The old man had made his try and failed. Wycoff's wound was too slight to matter.

In the morning they would rifle the wagons. They would find the money belonging to the show, but the other box might not be so easily found. It was sunk in a compartment of the double bottom of the wagon. Maguire himself had suggested the hiding place in his letter. They would also find the shotgun.

The shotgun. If he could get his hands on that shotgun. He considered the possibility as the fire slowly warmed his cold muscles. His chances were slight, yet if he got the shotgun he could handle that crowd. At close range it was hard to miss with a shotgun.

He had no experience on which to draw. His years began to seem woefully wasted, for in this emergency he had nothing on which to base his plans but remembered sequences of old melodramas or the stories of Ned Buntline. Yet if he could creep close enough, if he could get into that wagon…

First he must give them time to fall asleep. He fed fuel to his fire, reflecting that if the fire did not keep him warm, getting fuel for it would. Searching for wood, he found a hefty club. With that he felt better.

An hour passed slowly and he waited it out. His back was cold, his face too hot, yet he felt better. He was no longer shaking, and he had a plan.

When the third hour had passed he left his fire burning and, taking the club, started back to the wagons.

Art Boyle dozed on a blanket near the fire. The others had gone to sleep, as they usually did, in hastily built shelters near the wagons. Healy waited, hoping Boyle would fall asleep, yet after several minutes he knew that he must act at once, before he grew too cold.

The door of the van where he had himself slept was close by. Neither Wycoff nor Barker had moved in.

The hinges were well oiled and they should not squeak. There might be some frozen snow around the bottom of the door.

Mentally he went through every move. It would take four strides to cover the ground to the door. All would be within plain view of the man by the fire.

Once there, he must open the door without noise, step completely inside, and reach under the blanket where the shotgun lay. He must grasp it and turn, one hand on the barrel, the other at the trigger guard.

Once that turn was completed, he would be reasonably secure. He would disarm Boyle and tie him up, and then he would take Wycoff and Barker. One wrong move and he must shoot.

If he failed, he would be killed, and worse, Janice would be left without protection.

Janice and Dodie and Maggie…and it was his fault. He had brought them into this.

His mouth was dry and his heart pounding. He took one quick glance toward the still figure by the fire and stepped out toward the wagon. To him every footstep sounded horribly loud, yet the man lay still.

One…two…three…He was at the step. His hand grasped the latch and pulled. The door did not budge.

The mud and snow on the bottom had frozen.

He took a breath, then pulled hard on the door. It came open suddenly and he went through the door in one quick step. Outside there was no sound, and he moved swiftly to the bed, feeling for the shotgun.

“All right, Healy. Lift your hands—an' they better be empty!”

For an instant he wanted to gamble. He wanted to grasp the gun, swing it clear of the bedding. But he knew he would never make it.

He turned slowly. “Boyle.” He took a breath, one hand still on the bed. Under it he could feel the outline of the shotgun barrel. “Boyle, there's not much here. Suppose you take what there is, give me that gun, and you take a horse and ride. How about it?”

“Not a chance!” Boyle's black frame in the doorway receded a little. “Come out with your hands up.”

To make a move now would be certain death, and a dead man was no good to anybody.

“You won't get away with this. King Mabry's out there.”

Art Boyle's grin showed in the reflected firelight. “If he's alive, he's got his own troubles.”

“What's that mean?”

“Get down on the ground,” Boyle said, and when Healy had descended, Boyle pushed the door shut. “Means the boss sent a man out to get him.”

Healy was an actor and he threw on his talent now. “You sent
one
man after him? Hardly seems enough.”

“He'll take him.” Boyle said it, but to Healy he did not sound positive.

“Look, Boyle.” Healy's voice was low and persuasive. “Why run a chance? There's seven hundred dollars in that wagon. Take it, take a horse, and beat it. Just let me have my chance. Then you'll have the money, and if Mabry comes you'll be out of it.”

Boyle chuckled. “Might take it,” he said, “was there only you. But there's them women. They're the best-lookin' women hit this country since I been here. I ain't goin' to miss that.”

Healy searched his mind for an argument. Somebody was stirring in the shelter where Barker slept. The low murmur of their voices might awaken Barker.

Art Boyle stood six feet away, and Healy gauged the distance and considered it. Yet the sound of a shot would be an end to it.

J
ANICE AWAKENED SUDDENLY. For an instant she lay perfectly still. Then she heard the low sound of voices and she slipped from her narrow bunk and listened.

Tom was out there! He was talking to someone. She strove to hear, then to see out. Finally, standing on tiptoe to look over the frost on the window, she made out Tom. She could not see who talked to him. Yet from his attitude she knew he was again a prisoner. She turned quickly for the gun.

Maggie moved, putting her feet to the floor and dragging her heavy coat around her. She picked up a heavy flatiron and hefted it. Dodie was awake, lying there, eyes wide, watching.

Janice waited for the other man to speak so she could locate his position. She would have to open the door, then shoot. And she had no idea whether she could score a hit or not. Yet it might give Tom a chance to do something.

She dropped a hand to the door latch, testing it gently. As they had been coming and going earlier in the day, the door was not frozen. She swung it open a few inches and heard Tom say:

“Whoever's out after Mabry will get killed. Mabry will find he's being trailed, and when he's through with the trailer he'll come hunting Barker.”

“Might, at that,” Boyle agreed. He seemed to be weighing his chances. “But I'd as soon take a chance with him as with Barker. Mabry's one man, Barker's got friends. Some of the old Plummer outfit.”

“Plummer?”

“Sheriff one time up at Alder. His outfit murdered more'n a hundred people. Then the vigilantes hung twenty-six of the gang. But they didn't get 'em all.”

Janice had the door opened wider now and was edging around to try a shot when Barker spoke. “What's going on?” Then, seeing Healy, he grinned. “Got him, did you?”

He walked over to Healy, lifted a broad hand, and struck him across the face. “I think I'll kill you now, before we have more trouble.”

“Boss?” Boyle said.

“Well, what is it?”

“If we have to move these wagons, we can use him. Might's well get some work out of him first.”

Barker hesitated, then shrugged. “All right. But for now, tie his hands and keep him with you. I want to go through that wagon.”

Janice eased the door shut. She turned back to her bed. Her spirits had never been lower, and Maggie felt the same, obviously. They had done nothing. There had been nothing to do.

“What'll we do?” Dodie whispered.

And the whisper was like a plaintive cry in the lost emptiness of night.

Chapter 8

K
ING MABRY REACHED the Hole-in-the-Wall hours before the wagons arrived and followed a stream that he took to be the Middle Fork of the Powder, hunting a place to hole up for the night.

When he had ridden more than a mile he turned off into a ravine and found a place where the clay shoulder broke the wind. There he dug a shelter out of a snowbank.

The night was cold, but he was asleep before he was fairly settled in place.

At daybreak he thrust an arm from under the robe long enough to toss a couple of sticks on the coals. When they blazed up, he added more. Not until the fire was blazing cheerfully did he come out from under and pull on his heavy socks and moccasins.

When the coffee water was on, he mounted the bank to look around. The snow was unbroken as far as he could see except by the towering wall of red sandstone, and that was streaked with white where snow lay along the ledges and breaks.

He ate jerked beef and drank coffee, then saddled up and cut across the flatland toward the gap.

Nothing had come through. Had they gone up the valley of the Powder?

The sky was gray and lowering. It looked and felt like snow. He turned back toward the Hole, keeping to low ground and riding with caution. Yet he was almost at the opening itself before he heard the sound of an ax.

It was unmistakable. He listened, trying to place the sound exactly while the big horse stamped restlessly, eager to be moving.

He started again, riding directly toward the Wall. There was little cover, but the stream had cut deep here and there, and the banks provided some concealment. There were some willows and here and there a cottonwood.

After a few minutes he saw the smoke. The darker gray of the morning clouds had disguised it well. When he was approximately four hundred yards away he drew up and left his horse in a space between the willows and a clay bank.

The sound of the ax continued.

It was late. If they were cutting wood, it meant they did not plan to move that day. Yet Barker must know what the sky implied. He would know it meant snow, and farther west the timber was fairly heavy along the streams, offering plenty of fuel. Here there were only willows and what driftwood they could find along the stream.

Carrying his rifle, he went downstream, covering the ground in long, easy strides. Pausing once, he cleared the rifle's mechanism to be sure that dampness had not frozen it tight.

When he worked his way to the top of the bank again he could see the vans. The stove in one of the wagons was going, and there was a fire beyond it.

As he watched, Healy came out of the willow carrying an armful of wood. Wycoff, one arm in a sling and his rifle in the other hand, walked a little to his left. Healy dumped the wood and started back toward the willows.

Edging around for a better view, Mabry saw Barker. But Art Boyle was nowhere in sight.

The small camp was concealed partly by the V of the two vans, forming a wall against the wind. A clay bank was to the west, and a hedge of willows protected the other two sides. Barker was sitting on a log drinking coffee. None of the women was in sight, and there was no sign of Doc Guilford.

Obviously, Barker had made his move. Wycoff's injured arm could be a result. What Barker now intended was not apparent, except that he planned to spend the night, yet in this weather that could easily mean being snowed in for a week. And his present position was far from good. Why wasn't he moving?

It was growing colder. Tying his scarf across his mouth to conceal his breath, he worked his way nearer.

He could do nothing without knowing where Boyle was. To make a move without knowing the whereabouts of all three men would be reckless in the extreme, and a man did not live long by being reckless. Only fools took chances.

It began to snow. Large flakes began to sift down from the gray sky, fast and thick. His coat began to whiten. He wiped off the rifle.

Healy was swinging an ax awkwardly, chopping a log. Wycoff was standing nearby, carrying the rifle in the hollow of his good arm.

Neither man was talking and Healy was obviously all in. The unfamiliar work and the cold were exhausting him. Wycoff chewed tobacco and watched, his features expressionless.

Healy stopped suddenly. “Got to take a breather,” Mabry heard him say. “I never used an ax before.”

“I can see that.” Wycoff was contemptuous.

“What's Barker figure to do?” Healy asked.

Wycoff shrugged, saying nothing. Obviously he believed it was no concern of Healy's.

“He might get away with killing us, but if he touches the girls, he's in trouble.”

“Our business,” Wycoff said. “You get busy.”

Healy picked up the ax and started a swing. Mabry eased back carefully, making no sound. Not a word about either Doc Guilford or Boyle.

He began to scout the vicinity. He was no longer worried about tracks, for in this snow they would soon be gone. He had circled well to the east, between the wagons and the Hole, when suddenly he stopped.

The body of a man lay sprawled across the wash ahead of him. A man that was no longer alive.

Moving to the body, Mabry looked down into the features of Doc Guilford. The old actor stared up at the sky, his sightless eyes staring at the falling snow. A flake touched an eyeball and remained there. The creases in his clothes and the tired lines of his face had become a web of white lines from the snow.

If Barker had killed this man, he dared not let the others live. So why was he waiting? And why here, of all places?

Mabry thought of the man who had been following him. He had led the fellow into the broken country to the south and then switched back north, traveling on rock to leave few tracks. Eventually the tracker would work out his trail and come up with him, and he might have a rendezvous with Barker at this point.

Suddenly he heard voices. One of them he instantly recognized as Boyle's. The teamster was alive, then, and still present.

Mabry saw Healy come in with an armful of wood, and they let him rest. Wycoff swore as he bumped his arm.

“What the hell?” Boyle was impatient. “Why not bust the wagon open and take them out?”

“Let them starve for a while,” Barker said. “They'll listen better if they do.”

“To the devil with that!” Boyle kicked angrily at a stick. “We'd better burn those wagons and get out of here. I don't like the feel of this place.”

Barker said nothing, but after thinking it over he got up and walked to the wagon door. “All right!” he spoke impatiently. “Open up or we'll break the door in!”

Straining his ears, Mabry heard somebody within the wagon reply, but could distinguish no words. Then Barker turned to the others. “She says she's got a gun.”

“She's lying!”

Boyle picked up the ax and walked to the door. He balanced the ax, drew it back, and swung hard. As the ax struck there was a heavy concussion within and Boyle sprang back, tripping over the ax and falling. There was a bullet hole in the door on a level with his head.

Mabry hesitated. He could walk in now, but if he were killed in the shoot-out, Healy would be helpless to get the girls back to civilization. He might kill all three, but the odds were against it, and having killed Guilford, they would not submit tamely to capture.

There was no simple solution. At present they were stopped cold, yet there could be little food in the wagon and the women's fuel must be about gone. There were blankets, however, and plenty of clothes. And they could huddle together for warmth.

Carefully he eased back into the trees. At night, that would be the time.

Snow fell, hissing softly. The tracks he left behind were gone. When Mabry got back to the black, the big horse was covered with snow. Mabry went up to him, speaking softly. Suddenly the horse jerked his head up and his ears twitched.

That and the sudden smash of sound were the last things Mabry remembered.

I
T WAS THE nudging of the horse that brought him out of it. That and the awful cold.

He felt the horse nudging at his shoulder and whimpering, and then he felt the cold. In all his life he had never known such cold, for there is no cold such as that when the inner heat of the body dissipates itself and the cold penetrates to even the deepest tissues. His body was a thing of ice.

He rolled over and tried to bring his arms under him, but the muscles refused to work. Then he rolled once more and back again. His legs would not function, or his arms, but he could roll, and the rolling made his body prickle with a million tiny needles.

He rolled and rolled, back and forth, and his head began to throb, and somewhere down inside him there was a birth of pain.

He worked his fingers, and finally, after several attempts, he got to his knees. Feebly he grabbed for the dangling stirrup, but missed. He fell face down on the trampled snow under the horse.

The will to live was too strong. He began to fight, struggling against the cold as against a visible antagonist, knowing death was very, very near.

He had been shot. That much was clear. He had been wounded. He had lost blood. That was against him, for a wounded man has small chance for survival in the cold. And the cold was frightful. It had cut deep, it was within him, robbing his body of its last heat. But he would not let himself die. He got his hands under him again, and he rolled over again, and he got to his knees again.

How long it took him he had no idea. It seemed an endless, bitter struggle. But he got to his knees again and he reached out and drew the stirrup close. He could not grasp it, for his hands were like clubs, useless except for fumbling movements.

He thrust his arm into the stirrup, and using that leverage, he got half way up, then lunged to his full height and fell against the horse.

Leaning there, he thrust his icy hand under the saddle girth, up under the blanket and against the warm belly. He held it there while the patient black waited and snow fell steadily.

He worked his fingers and the blood began to flow again. His hands were still numb, but the fingers moved. He withdrew his hand and grasped the pommel, pulling himself into the saddle and knocking most of the snow away.

The horse was tied. In his cold, numbed brain he remembered that. It was tied to a bush.

He spoke to the horse and it backed slowly. The horse stopped when the reins drew taut, but the branches were brittle with cold and would snap. He backed the horse again and this time the branches snapped off, and he drew the horse's head around and got the reins in his hands.

Then he started the horse, looping the reins around the saddle horn. Where he was to go he had no idea, or what he was to do. He was hurt, and badly. His leg felt stiff and there was pain in him. The cold was a help in some ways. It would keep down the pain and keep him from bleeding too much. Feebly he struck his hands together, then beat his arms in a teamster's warming, swinging them again and again.

Warmth returned a little, and the horse kept moving. The black was going somewhere and Mabry had no choice but to trust him. All around was a tight white world of snow, shutting out all sound and sight.

The wagons would not move. In the place where they had stopped, much snow would have to be moved before they could start even after the storm passed. By driving into the hollow out of the wind, Barker had trapped himself.

Yet Mabry's own plight was desperate. The warmth stirred by movement was the last warmth in his body. His toes might be frozen, and his face might be. It felt like a mask.

He must get to shelter. He must find warmth. He must…

A long time later consciousness returned and he was still on the horse and the horse was still walking. Yet he had never actually lost consciousness, only sunk into a half-world where he was neither dead nor alive.

And the snow fell.…It fell softly into a cushiony silence, into a world where all was cloaked in white death and where there was no moving thing but the walking horse and the sifting flakes.