the Strong Shall Live (Ss) (1980) (8 page)

"You actually saw water and grass?" Hill asked. "He's done nothing you all couldn't have done, and he's done it all in four years! Certainly, I saw it!"

"You takin' up for him now?" Dulin asked. "No! I am just telling you he's proved his case. He was right, and you all were wrong."

Stangle leaned forward, intent. "Where'd you say that water was? In Cottonwood Draw?"

"He's dammed both Cottonwood and Spring Valley. He's planted seedling trees around them to hold the banks and help conserve moisture."

"Well!" Stangle slapped his thigh. "That's it, men! That settles our problem!"

"What do you mean?" Drake looked up hopefully.

"He's got water. Why don't we just take down The Fence and drive our cattle in there? That sneakin' Mexican's got no right to all that water when our cattle are dyin'!"

Casady let his chair legs down hard. "You mean to say you'd have the gall to ask him for water after the way we've treated him?"

"Ask nothin'!" Stangle said. "Just tear down The Fence and let our cattle in. They'd find the water and grass soon enough."

"We couldn't do that," Drake protested, "it wouldn't be right."

"Right?" Stangle's voice was hoarse with bitterness. "Are you so anxious to go broke? You want to watch your cattle die?" -

"You'd do a thing like that?" Casady demanded, his eyes going from one to the other.

"I would," Rock Dulin said. "Are you too nice to save your cows?"

Candy stared at Dulin, appalled. "No, Rock," Casady said quietly, "I'm not too nice. I hope, however, that I know something of fair play. We've bucked that kid and made his lifepure hell. We tried to drive him out and he stuck. We fenced him out of our country and still he stayed. He tried to tell us, and we were too damned hardheaded to listen. Now, you would ruin what he has done. How long will that little grass last if we turn our herds in there? We've got seven or eight thousand head between us."

"I don't know, and I don't give a damn!" Stangle said. "He's got no place here in the first place. I've got my cattle to save, and I'll save them."

"He won't stand for it," Hill replied. "He'll fight."

"I hope he does!" Stangle said. "Him and his highfalutin ways! Handin' gold right over the counter! Throwin' it right in our faces!"

"What if he does fight?" Drake asked.

"You fought injuns to get there, didn't you?" Dulin said. "You killed some of Scovey's boys?"

Candy Drake stared in shocked disbelief. "You could do a thing like that? Joe Stangle, what kind of a man are you? To wreck all he's done! To destroy everything!"

"It would save our stock, Miss Candy," Benson protested. "We've families to think about. Your pa's in the same fix I am, and I'm head over heels in debt."

"What would you do if he wasn't there? What if I'd not been so foolish as to tell you?"

"But he is there," Dulin replied, "and thanks to you, we know what he's got. There may be water enough to keep our stock alive for a month, and by then the rains might come. I'm for it."

"So am I!" Stangle declared.

"It isn't right," Drake protested. "If he has water it's due to his own hard work, and the water's his."

"Well, Tom, if you want to go broke, the choice is yours," Stangle said. "I'll be damned if I let my cattle die. If you had a water hole you'd let me use it, wouldn't you? Why should he be the only one who's fenced in?"

Casady's dislike was obvious as he stared at Stangle. "And just who built The Fence? Seems to me you had a hand in it, Stangle."

"That cuts no ice." Stangle waved a hand. "We'll tear it down. We'll run our cattle in there, and then we'll see what happens. I'm not going to let my cattle die because he keeps his water fenced up."

"I reckon that speaks for me." Hardy Benson spoke reluctantly. "I'm in debt. I'll lose all I have."

"That says it for me," Vinnie Lake added.

Cab got to his feet. "How about you, Tom?"

Drake hesitated, before his eyes the vision of his dying cattle, the size of the bill he owed Mayer.

"I'll string with the boys," he said.

For a moment Casady looked around at their faces. "I'd rather my cattle died," he said. "Good night, gentlemen!"

Dulin started to his feet, his hand reaching for his gun. "I'll kill that--"

"Better not try," Hill said dryly. "You never saw the day you could match Cab with a gun."

He looked around at their faces. "I don't know that I like this, myself."

"It's settled," Stangle declared. "Dulin, Lake, Benson, Drake, and Hill. How about you, McKesson?"

"Sure, I'll ride along, trail my stock with yours. I never liked that Mex, no way."

Tom Drake glanced at him thoughtfully. Curt McKesson was a new man in the valley, a big, somber man with a brooding, sullen face. Drake had seen him angry but once, but that had revealed him to have a vicious, murderous temper. He had beaten a horse to death before anyone could interfere. He disliked the man, and it disturbed him to see how McKesson's eyes followed Candy every move she made. The light in them was not good to see.

Joe Stangle got up, satisfaction showing in his eyes and voice. "We can meet at Willow SpringsMonday morning. Once The Fence is down and the cattle started for water there will be no stop-pin' them."

Candy watched, feeling sick and empty. She wanted to protest but knew they would not listen. Their own desperation coupled with Stangle's hatred and Dulin's sullen brutality had led them into something most of them would live to regret. Now they were only thinking about delaying their bad times. One by one they filed out and when they had gone she turned on her father.

"Dad, you've got to stop them I You can't let them destroy all that poor boy's work!"

"Poor boy, is it? He's got no right to all that water when our cattle are dying!"

"Who dammed those draws? What have you done to try to save your cattle? All you've done is sit here with the rest of them and sneer at what he thought and what he did!"

"Be quiet!" Drake's voice boomed, his guilt making him even more angry. "I won't have you takin' up for that Mexican. Nor is it your place to question my actions."

"Dad"--Candy's tone was cold--"You'd better understand this. Barry Merrano will fight. If he fights, somebody will get killed. If I were you I'd do a lot of thinking before you start anything. It isn't like it was when you drove out those rustlers. The country has changed."

Despite himself, he knew what she said was the truth. He shook his head irritably. "Nonsense! He's yellow! He won't fight."

He hesitated, thinking. Then he said, "He won't fight. Joe Stangle made a fool of him and he did nothing, nothing at all!"

"Then you'd better go out to the bunkhouse and take a look at Price Taylor. Price thought he wouldn't fight, too."

"What? What do you mean?"

"Barry rode home with me tonight and was leaving me at the gate. He had been a gentleman, no more. Price jumped him, and Barry gave him a beating."

"He whupped Price? Girl, you're crazy!" "Go look at him. Ask Price if he's yellow. Also, I seem to remember you tried to frighten him away before, and he didn't run. He had only an idea to fight for then. Now he's got a place worth having!"

She paused. "Remember this, Dad. He'll fight, and somebody will get killed."

"Bah!" Drake said, but he was disturbed. She knew her father well enough to know that he bad not liked the action taken tonight, yet these were the men he knew, men he had worked beside, men with whom he had shared trouble. He had gone along because it offered a way out of bankruptcy and failure, and because there seemed no alternative.

Tom Drake had fought Indians, outlaws, and rustlers, and now he would fight to hold the place, but he knew in his heart that if he were Merrano, he would fight. He did not approve of killing and he believed Merrano would run, yet now, listening to his daughter, he was no longer so sure.

"Dad?" Candy spoke quietly. "I want you to understand. If you go through with this I'll go and fight beside Barry Merrano. I will take a rifle and stand beside him and what happens to him will happen to me."

"What!"He stared at his daughter, consternation in his eyes. In that instant he looked not only into his daughter's eyes but into those of his wife, and something more, he saw a reflection of himself, thirty years before.

Without another word, Candy turned and left the room. The big old man behind her stared after her, hurt, confusion, and doubt struggling in his mind. He sat down suddenly in the big hide chair. Suddenly he felt old and tired, staring into the fire, trying to think things out and seeing only his dying cattle and the failure of all he had done.

The cracked mud in the dried-up water holes, the leafless trees, all his years, all his struggle, all his work and his plans gone.

That was Friday night. Early Saturday morning a buckboard left Mirror Valley and bounced over the stones and through the thick gray dust toward Willow Springs and the turnoff to Merrano's tunnel. Clyde Mayer had made a decision, and he was following through. He knew nothing of the action taken by the ranchers at the TD ranch. He was threatened by foreclosure by the wholesalers, and in this emergency he was turning to the one man in the valley who seemed to have money.

The tunnel was unguarded, and he turned in hesitantly. When he emerged into the bright sunlight Barry Merrano was standing in the door of his house. The sound of hoofs in the tunnel was plainly audible within the house at any time.

Mayer pulled up in the ranch yard and tied the lines to the whipstock. He got down carefully, for he was not as agile as he had once been.

"Howdy, son!" He peered at Barry over his glasses. "Reckon this visit's a surprise."

"Come in," Barry invited. "I'm just back from patching a hole in a dam. A badger dug into it, and the water started to drain out."

"My, my!" Mayer looked around slowly. "Your mother would be right proud, young man! Right proud! She was a fine woman, your mother was!"

"Thanks. That's always good to hear from somebody else. She was a good mother to me."

When they were seated over coffee, Mayer said, "Son, I've come to you for help. The wholesalers have shut off my credit, and they are demanding money. I am low on stock, and the ranchers will be coming in for supplies."

"How much do you need?"

"An awful lot, son. I'd need five thousand dollars. I'd sell you a half interest in my business for it. I know I've been foolish to extend credit, but these are good men, son, and basically they meanwell. Every one of them will pay off if it is the last thing they do, but that won't help me now ... nor them."

"If you don't get the money, you go broke?"

"That's right."

"Then what happens to the ranchers?"

"They'd starve or get out. The drouth's hit this country so bad there isn't a head of cattle fit to sell. It will take two really good years to get them out of the hole they're in. They'd never be able to stick it out. They have no food, no feed, no water."

Merrano stared into his cup, his brown, wind-tanned face thoughtful. After a moment he said, "All right. I'll buy a half interest in your store on one condition. I don't want anybody to know about it."

Mayer hesitated. "What about credit for fee ranchers? They are my friends, and I'd hate to turn them down."

"Don't. Give them what they need. Somebody has to have faith in this country. Maybe after this they will learn their lesson and handle their stock sensibly."

Mayer stood up, his relief obvious. "I don't mind telling you, son, I was scared. I hadn't anywhere to turn."

He started for his buckboard and paused before getting into it. "Son, you be careful. That Joe Stangle is a mighty mean man, and so is Dulin,"

"Thanks. I'll keep my eyes open."

After Mayer had gone Barry returned to the house and got his Winchester. Then he slipped on his gunbelt. It was time to begin moving the cattle off the Long Valley range and back into the basin. No use to let them feed there too long. In a few weeks he would take thirty head over to Aragon for sale. It would save on feed and water and give him a little more working cash.

He had saddled up and was about to mountwhen he heard a rattle of horse's hooves. It was Candy Drake.

At her expression he caught her hand. "Candy? What's happened?"

Swiftly, the words tumbling into one another, she told him of the meeting and its result. "Please, Barry! Don't think too hard of Father! All he can see now is his cattle dying!"

"I know," he agreed. "The trouble is that the little water I have wouldn't help much. With that mass of cattle coming in, my smaller pools would be trampled into mud within hours and the bigger pools behind the dams would last no time at all. It would simply add my ruin to the rest of them. Believe me, Candy, I'd like to help.

"There is a way, if they will work. There's water in the White Horse Hills. It would take a lot of work, but they could get at it."

"They wouldn't listen, Barry. Not now."

"There's only one thing I can do now, Candy. They broke my mother's heart on this ground, and they turned Father from a laughter-loving young vaquero into a morose and lonely man.