the Trail to Seven Pines (1972) (21 page)

"Swing around," he advised. "My horse is tied back up in the junipers."

"Get Jacks?" Lock asked suddenly.

"Think so. That quake busted things up. He was hit bad and went down just as Laramie opened on me."

"I got that one-dead center."

"It was Jacks who killed your brother."

"I figured that. He or Pony Harper."

"Harper was involved somehow-Jacks said something about it while I was hidin' out there in the house."

"I got the feeling," Ben Lock replied, "that he was the one spotting the gold shipments, but I'm not sure."

Hopalong found Topper dragging a picket rope and a branch of the manzanita to which he had been tied. Mounted, he turned toward the ranch. The others fell in beside him.

"Never would have found that place if it hadn't been for you," Lock said suddenly.

"I trailed Jacks away from Poker Gap, then lost him. I spotted your tracks, then lost them, but kept the general direction and picked up Jacks's trail again."

Behind them, on the rubble-littered floor of the ruined house, a bloody man groaned, then tried to move. Only the fact that he had partly rolled under the table had saved him from the falling adobe blocks. A bloody furrow lay along his scalp above the ear, and he sat there, blood trickling down his face, staring, shocked and half blind, at the ruin about him, unknowing, uncaring. Lightning showed him the crumpled body of Laramie, and slow curses bubbled at his lips as he remembered the image of that crouched, black-clad man with guns that flamed their death into the room-a man he was going to kill.

Sobbing, Jacks was trying to crawl when Duck Bale felt his way over the ruins. "Take it easy," Bale said. "We Bald Knobbers stick together. I'll get you out of this."

Chapter
11

Vengeful Outlaw
.

It was Tex Milligan who first saw John Gore. He saw him when he was several miles off and kept watch on the lone rider, suspecting at first that it might be Cassidy or Shorty Montana. When he did see who it was, he almost broke a leg getting down the mountain to where Frenchy and Kid Newton were loafing outside the bunkhouse.

Bob Ronson had come from the house at first sign of his descent, and with him were Dr. Marsh and the Ronson sisters.

Before Milligan could burst out with his story, Ronson was alongside him. "Who is it, Tex? What's happened?"

"Gore!" Tex gasped, when he could catch a breath. "John Gore headin' this way. Be here in a couple of minutes. He's ridin' a spent cayuse, and with my glass he looks sore as a boiled owl!"

"He may want peace talk," Ronson said. "If he does, we'll dicker with him." He glanced around the circle of his riders and added quietly, "I'll do the talking."

"Boss," Newton objected, "he may be huntin' trouble. Maybe huntin' me. Let me have him."

"Or me," Ruyters said quietly. "The Kid's had his share of the Gore outfit. I want mine."

"No." Bob Ronson's voice was clear with authority. "I'll handle this, and handle it my way."

The rage of John Gore had now become a cold fire that blazed through every muscle of him. What had happened he had no idea, and strangely, he did not care. Later, when he had calmed down and with time to think, he would have cared, but now he was too filled with a burning lust to vent his fury on someone, something. He had been woefully outgeneraled, and by circumstances, not by men. His trip to Corn Patch had isolated him from the fight when he was most needed; he had been set afoot, trapped in an isolated mountain village with only two dead men for company.

What had happened to his men, he did not know. The deserted ranch, empty of supplies, ammunition, and horses, portended the worst. Certainly, from the look of things, Rocking R men had been on his ranch. Where his men now were, or if any were alive, he did not know. Had he seen them at that moment his fury would have driven him insane, for they were walking, plodding wearily on blistered feet, in boots never made for walking, across the seemingly endless miles of an alkali flat. For all their use to the fight now under way, they might have been on another planet.

John Gore's eyes were red-rimmed from the blazing sun, his face grim under the film of dust, his lips tight with the tenseness of his rage as he rode down the trail and into the yard of the Rocking R.

He had expected to find a deserted ranch and only the horses and perhaps the Ronsons.

For Bob Ronson he had only contempt, and for the women only irritation and the hope they would keep out of his way. What he found instead was a small circle of men waiting for him. Frenchy, Tex, Kid Newton-and in the door of the bunkhouse now, Joe Hartley.

A few feet away stood another group, the two girls and Doc Marsh. Straight before him was Bob Ronson, who now took a step forward.

"How are you, John?" Ronson spoke clearly. "Get down. I suppose you've come to talk peace."

The word was a red rag to a bull. "Peace!" The fury within him turned his voice hoarse.

"I'll peace you, you idiot!"

Ronson was unmoved. He stood quietly, his face white but composed. Frenchy, the oldest hand here, touched his tongue to his lips. Bob Ronson had never faced a situation like this before. Secretly, Frenchy had always been afraid that he would not measure up. More than anything in the world he wanted now to step forward and take this fight off the hands of his boss, but he knew the fierce pride of the young man, knew how much he would resent it. Knowing the others had a like feeling, he whispered, "Stay back. It's his fight."

Ronson said calmly, "Gore, don't be a fool. As we've said before, there is range enough for both of us here. All you have to do is stay on your side of the Blues and not figure because Dad is dead that you can ride roughshod over this range.

"You have no alternative to peace. Your men are out in the desert afoot and pretty badly off from hunger and thirst by now. You have no horses at your ranch nor at any of your stations. Cassidy has seen to that. Harris, with whom you apparently tried to do business, is dead. Within a matter of hours we'll burn Corn Patch to the ground.

"This is an ultimatum. You can make peace now and sign an agreement to remain on your side of the mountains, or we'll ride on the 3 G and burn it to the ground. Then we'll herd your riders, still afoot, out of the country, and you with them!"

Frenchy could scarcely restrain his elation. Cattle Bob in his palmiest days could not have laid it on the line so simply and directly. Frenchy was grinning despite himself, and despite the tightness of the situation.

Gore slid from his horse, so hurried that he staggered when he reached the ground, and then he turned. "I'll see you in hell first!" he roared.

"Sorry, John." Ronson was still cool. "If that's the way you want it."

John Gore was beyond reason. He had never known defeat, and there was nothing in his makeup that would accept it. He knew now only one thing, a red rage and lust to kill. He growled and his hand whipped down for his gun.

To Frenchy that scene moved with the slow pace of a death march. He saw John Gore's flashing draw, not a fast draw as such things go, but much faster than that of Bob Ronson. He saw the rancher's gun come up, heard the hard sharpness of the report, and incredibly Bob Ronson still stood there!

Ronson was lifting his pistol and taking aim at shoulder height, standing sideways as though on a target range. Gore shot again and again. And then Bob Ronson fired.

John Gore's knees buckled and slowly he sank to the ground. From his knees he went over on his face, stretching out on the ground, and there was not a man there but knew he was dead. Slowly, white as death itself, Ronson lowered his pistol.

"Frenchy," he said quietly, "you and the boys put his body in the barn for now. If he is not claimed by some of his own crowd by nightfall, we'll bury him in the morning." He turned then. "Doc, you'd better get your kit. I think I've been shot."

It was pouring rain when Hopalong Cassidy and Shorty Montana rode into the street of Seven Pines. Both men were hungry and badly whipped by the hours of riding. Leaving their horses in the livery stable, they pushed on up the street, their heads buried in their slicker collars, hat brims pulled low. Be hind them rode Ben Lock. He had fallen slightly behind the others, and his face was grim.(

"This durned country!" Montana said bitterly. "If she ain't burnin' up with heat, she's drownin' in rain!"

"Let it rain!" Hopalong said. "I'm for a bunk and some blankets. Another few miles and that horse's backbone would have wore clean through to my shirt pockets!"

"What do we do about Harper?" Shorty asked, Hopalong having informed him as to the contents of Thacker's wallet.

"That will wait. We get the Rockin' R trouble off our hands first."

They shook off their dusters and hats on the hotel porch. Inside the dimly lit lobby they paused a moment. A sleepy clerk stuck his head out of his door and glared at them. "Number ten. Pick up the key in the pigeonhole and don't bother me!"

He drew back inside his door but did not return to bed. Instead, he stood thinking for a minute, and then quickly drew on his pants and hurried down the hall to Pony Harper's room.

Harper had been in bed for an hour and was still not asleep. Too many things were happening and there was too little news. He heard the gentle tap on his door and reared up in bed. He reached first for the pistol under his pillow and then listened.

The tap came again. "Who is it?" He spoke in a low tone to be heard only just beyond the door.

"Me-Jerry! Got news for you!"

Harper rolled from bed in his flannel nightshirt and opened the door. Jerry came in and closed it quickly behind him. "Figured you'd want to know. Hopalong Cassidy's in town! He and Shorty Montana! Blew in about five minutes ago, and I put 'em in number ten."

"Cassidy? He say anythin? Any news?"

"Not a word. Both of 'em looked plumb beat, but they sure aren't hurt."

"All right, go to bed. Circulate around in the morning and let me know if you can find out what's been happening."

By morning news had drifted in, as news will. John Gore was dead, killed by, of all people, Bob Ronson! The Gore riders had been trapped, their horses driven off, and they were wandering afoot somewhere in the alkali basin between Willow Springs and the 3 G Ranch. And then, almost an hour later, two men rode into town.

Hankins and Drennan had broken away from the crowd and gone off on their own and had had instant luck. They found some of the horses left by the 3 G grazing in a side canyon. As they had parted under the worst possible terms with the others, neither man felt any necessity of riding back with horses. They mounted bareback and started for Seven Pines.

Their faces were blistered and their feet in terrible shape. Both men were caked with alkali and rifled with only one urgent desire: to get out and stay out.

Hopalong Cassidy was sitting over his second cup of coffee when the two cowhands staggered into Katie's. He looked across the table at them, his blue eyes measuring and cool.

"Coffee's good, boys. What's it to be? Breakfast or trouble?"

Hankins stared sullenly, and it was Drennan who spoke. "Breakfast and a bath. Then a chance to ride on. How about it, Hopalong?"

Shorty Montana's hands were inches from his gun butts, waiting.

"That go with you too, Hankins?" Hopalong asked.

The outlaw nodded sullenly. Then his lips parted in an ironic grin. "You fellers raised hob," he said. "You sure raised hob! If that outfit got to the 3 G without a killin', I'd be surprised. Con was fit to be tied, and that Troy!" He shook his head. "Ah, what a rat! The man's meaner than a crippled coyote, believe me!"

Katie put out coffee for them and then breakfast. While they ate, Shorty Montana sat with his shoulders back against the wall and told them all that had happened.

Harris and Dusark dead, John Gore recently killed by Bob Ronson, who was shot but living, and then the biggest news, told for the first time: the killing of Laramie by Ben Lock, and Clarry Jacks by Hopalong Cassidy.

Later that day Hankins and Drennan drifted out of town. Before the end of the week the range had quieted, Corn Patch had been burned out, John Gore had been buried alongside his brother at Seven Pines, and Bob Ronson was slowly recovering from his wound.

Restlessly, Hopalong worked with his outfit, shaping a herd for a drive to market, cleaning water holes, putting in a couple of dams and a drift fence. It was time to leave, and Gibson of the STL would still be watching for him. Yet he stayed on, held by he knew not what. The range war that had blossomed so quickly had died almost as quickly. Nothing was seen of Con Gore, and word came that he had moved his cattle east of the Blues and was running them there.

Rawhide was back in town and was rarely seen away from Pony Harper's side. Sheriff Hadley, moving belatedly to stop the fighting, had repeated the ultimatum laid down by Bob Ronson and had ridden to the 3 G with it. Con Gore had listened in silence and then turned his back and walked into the house. Boucher was still with him, and Troy had hired on as a hand. Of Dud Leeman there was but one report: He had been seen at Unionville but had left town with Duck Bale, no one knew where, not even an idea of where they were going.