The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume 1 (29 page)

Jones stared at him thoughtfully. “Talon,” he said carefully, “you ride a mighty fine horse yourself. One with speed and staying quality.”

Talon smiled. “That's right,” he said quietly.

Ruth collected the dishes. “Do you plan to make Carson tonight? You can do it if you push right along.”

“You wouldn't be trying to get rid of us, would you?” Talon smiled at her. “I don't think you women should be here alone with Dan Burnett laid up.”

Ruth almost dropped the dishes. She turned sharply, but Kate spoke from the kitchen. “Dan may be laid up, but I'm not. You ride out of here, both of you!”

Jones put his cup down hard and stared at her, his fat jowls quivering. “Now, looka here—!” he started to protest.

“Get!… Get goin'!”

Talon picked up the coffeepot and refilled his cup. “Like I said, you're going to need help. Especially with a gold shipment on that coach.”

Jones turned to stare at him, astonished. But Kate Breslin walked on into the room, and she had Burnett's Remington in her fist. “You know about that, do you? That means you're what I figured you were. You get goin', mister.”

“What else would keep you scared?” Talon asked mildly. “Only that you were afraid of something happening while Dan's laid up.”

“We'll handle that … 
Ride!
”

Suddenly there was a rush of horses in the yard, and Talon said,

“Now you'll really need me. Those riders are the worst kind of trouble.”

“Don't give me that!” Kate said, but she hesitated, lowering the gun a little.

“There's three men, Kate,” Ruth said.

The door opened and the three men from the Indian fight came into the room. The gunman leading them stopped and his expression hardened when he saw Talon and Jones. “You should have kept going,” he said. “We told you.”

“Tracey, isn't it?” Talon asked the bearded man. “And you,” he said to the gunman, “are Lute Robeck.”

“That's right.” Robeck walked to the bar and picked up a bottle.

“That's two bits a shot,” Kate said.

“Shut up.” Robeck merely glanced at her.

Kate started to speak, then tightened her lips and was still; her eyes went from face to face and she walked back to the door of the bedroom and stood there, waiting. She knew all about Robeck … the man was known to be a gunman, a killer, a rustler, and occasional robber of payrolls at outlying mines. Tracey, too, was a known man. Her eyes went to Talon. Who was he? What was he?

“Well,” Robeck said, “you're here, and the stage is due in a couple of hours, so you'll stay, right here, until we're ready for you.”

“Lute,” Jones said, “you'd better take Talon's gun. I don't know who he is, but he's too smart.”

“Let him have it,” Robeck said. “It may give me an excuse to kill him.”

Talon glanced at Jones. “So you're one of them?”

“Sure.” Jones smiled. “I worked for the mining company until they got a good shipment ready. No use pulling holdups when there's no cash coming; we just wait until we know they've got it. Like now.”

The dark outlaw who had said nothing loitered in a corner of the room almost beyond Talon's view. There were four of them now, four to one. “Watch that Breslin woman,” Jones said. “She's got Burnett's gun.”

“Where's Burnett?” Robeck demanded.

“Back of that door. I figure he's hurt. Leastwise that's what Talon here figured out.”

Robeck grinned at Talon. “I hope you try for that gun,” he said. “I don't like you, much.”

Talon lifted his cup and sipped coffee slowly, watching Robeck over the cup's rim.

The outlaw walked to the door, and when Ruth made as if to stop him, he shoved her roughly aside and opened it. He strode to the bedside and looked down at the suffering man. “You lie quiet, Burnett,” he said, “and maybe you won't be killed.”

“You let me get my hands on a gun,” Burnett said, “and I'll not make you any promises!”

Robeck chuckled. “Flat on his back and still full of fight.” His eyes went to Ruth. “Food, liquor, a gold shipment, and a girl … what more can a man ask?”

“You'd be wise to let her alone.”

Robeck turned his head slowly to look at Talon, who had not moved.

“Don't push your luck,” he said.

Tracey got out a deck of cards and was joined by the dark man, whom he had called Pete. Tracey began to lay out a game of solitaire. Lute Robeck walked to the now open door and leaned against the doorjamb, watching the empty road.

Four to four, Talon thought, only there were two women on his side, and a sick man. And they were all around the room, and even when they did not appear to be, he knew they were watching him. He also knew that he, at least, was to be killed. That was why they had left him his gun.… Robeck fancied himself with a gun. He wanted Talon to try it so he could test himself.

An hour went slowly by. Talon wanted to move, but hesitated to give Robeck the chance he might be wanting. The two women had gone quietly to work, cleaning up his table and, at Robeck's order, preparing food for the others. At least one of them watched the women at all times, without making an issue of it.

Talon got out the makings and rolled a smoke. He touched the cigarette paper to his lips and then put the cigarette in his mouth. Robeck watched him with bright interest, but there was a matchbox on the table and Talon took out the match and struck it on the table edge in plain sight.

Robeck chuckled. “Cagey, ain't you?” he said. “Where'd I ever see you before?”

“You never did,” Talon said.

Robeck's eyes sharpened. “Maybe.… You wanted by the law?”

“No.” He turned his head. “Ruth, I'd like some more coffee, if you will.”

It was very hot and still. Perspiration stood out on their faces. He had one gun against four, and they were not worried by him.… Robeck was actually anticipating trouble. “If you're going to try for that gun,” he said, “you'd better have at it. When the stage comes we're going to take it away from you.”

“I can wait.”

Robeck chuckled, watching Ruth carry the coffee to the table. He got to his feet and walked to the bar to pour a drink. Ruth gave Talon a look then slanted her eyes quickly away in the direction of Robeck. She looked back and gave him a slight little nod. She wanted him to go ahead, she was ready to take her chances.

Robeck's eyes followed the girl. “Now, there's a woman for you. Fire in her, I'll bet.” He glanced at the clock on the shelf. “And we've got most of an hour yet. Maybe her and me—”

“Leave her alone.”

Robeck turned, his smile gone. Before he could speak, Talon spoke again. “Leave her alone, Robeck. You'll get the gold if you're smart, but leave that girl alone or I'll kill you.”

“What?”
Robeck was on his feet facing Talon. “You'll kill
me
? Get on your feet, tall man, and I'll cut you down! Get up, you hear?
Get up!
”

Talon did not move. He looked at Robeck and smiled. “Don't be in a hurry,” he said. “You have some time left.”

The moment died. Pete walked to the door, then stepped outside and walked toward the barn. Ruth served the others and watched them eat. Kate Breslin had done nothing since the gun was taken from her but to cook and remain silent. It was very hot, and Talon loafed in his chair, waiting.

A fly buzzed on the window. Pete walked out to the road and looked off into the distance, shading his eyes against the glare. Jones got up and walked to the window and then turned back, and as he came back toward the table he was behind Talon. Suddenly his gun was thrust against Talon's spine. “You may want to play games,” he said to Robeck, “I don't. That stage is due any minute.” Jones reached down and took Talon's gun, then stepped back away from him, careful not to get within reach of Talon's hands.

“All right.” Robeck shrugged. “I just figured maybe he'd like to try it with me.” He grinned at Talon. “No guts.”

Talon got slowly to his feet and stretched his long arms. Idly, he walked to the bar where Robeck was seated, and poured a drink. Robeck moved back a little, watching Talon cheerfully. “I'll still kill you if you start anything, Talon,” Robeck warned. Ruth, tense only a moment before, relaxed, accepted her fate … she and Kate were one step further from safety.

 

In the kitchen, Kate Breslin had taken an old .31 Colt from her valise, and she slipped it into Ruth's hand. “Only if the chance is just right,” she whispered. “Then give it to him.”

Pete walked out to the road. “Not much more time, Lute.”

“No.” Lute glanced around the room. “They don't know the women are here, anyway. They can't know, with the only stage since Burnett was hurt going out the other way. We'll hide them … put 'em in Burnett's room.”

Tracey got up. “What about Talon?”

Ruth came into the room and crossed to the table where Talon sat. Lute watched her with bright interest, never missing a move. The butt of the little Colt was visible to Talon from under Ruth's apron, but he carefully ignored it. Ruth fussed with the dishes, waiting, and suddenly Robeck began to laugh.

“He's yellow! Yellow! Ruthie, you picked yourself the wrong man!”

Ruth turned away from the table and instantly Robeck motioned to Tracey, who grabbed the girl and shoved her across to Robeck, who jerked the apron from her, and the gun. “You little fool!” He slapped her wickedly across the mouth. “Who do you think you're fooling?” He shoved her back against the counter and slapped her again. Instantly, she lashed out and slapped him, then kicked him on the shins. There was a momentary struggle, and then he shoved the girl from him and slapped her again, thrusting the pistol into his waistband.

Talon stood flat-footed, watching, but making no move away from the table. His expression had not changed as he watched the brief struggle. When it was over he stepped over and helped the girl to her feet. Angrily, Ruth jerked away from him. “Don't touch me, you coward!” she flared.

Robeck laughed.

Pete ran in from the road. “Here she comes!” he said.

Tracey grabbed Ruth and shoved her toward the bedroom door. Robeck stood watching Talon and smiling. “No hurry,” he said. “They're bringing it right to us.”

Tracey ordered Kate from the kitchen and into the bedroom. “If they make a wrong move,” Robeck ordered, “use your gun barrel. And I don't care how hard you hit.”

Lute Robeck walked to the door and looked out. The stage was rolling into the yard. “All right.” He gestured to Talon. “Walk out there ahead of us and don't say anything or make a wrong move.”

Whatever happened now would depend on fast thinking and breaks, and the shotgun guard must do some fast thinking, too. He walked outside with Lute beside him; Jones and Pete moved up behind. Talon angled toward the stage, knowing the men behind him would spread out. If the shotgun guard started shooting, which Robeck well knew, Talon would be the first man killed.

The stage whirled into the yard and came to an abrupt stop in a cloud of dust. The shotgun guard was staring from the door to the waiting men, and as Talon slowly turned he saw a rifle barrel glinting from the bedroom window.… Tracey was going to kill the guard.

“Holdup!” Talon yelled, and a Colt Lightning slid from under the arm of his coat.

Robeck swore and swung his gun, blasting fire. His first shot was too quick, Talon's was not. The bullet caught Robeck over the belt buckle and he started back. Talon fired again, then nailed Jones. Pete was already falling and suddenly there was silence broken only by the plunging of the horses and the rattle of harness. They quieted down and Talon got slowly to his feet.

Talon walked over to Robeck and kicked the gun from his hand, but the man was dead.

Tracey was standing in the door, his hands high. “Don't shoot!” he said. “I've quit!”

Ruth came from the door, but the shotgun guard reached Talon first. “Thanks,” he said. “When I didn't see Dan I figured something was wrong.”

“I'm sorry,” Ruth said, “I just thought—”

“I always carry a spare,” he said. “You know, any of us in there could have been killed. Sometimes it's better to reserve judgment … when a man's life is on the line, he naturally wants to wait until the time is right.”

He walked to the stable for his horse. It was still a long way to Carson.

Alkali Basin

The stage rocked and rolled over the desert road, vainly pursued by a thick cloud of fine white dust. It plunged down a declivity into a dry wash, then swept up the other side and around a hairpin curve at the top, to straighten out on the long dash across the valley.

Price Macomber, vice-president of the Overland Stage Company, was heading west on an inspection tour accompanied by his niece and Pete Judson, the district superintendent. Price, a round man with a round pink face and round rimless spectacles, was holding forth on his pet theme—useless expenditures.

“It has been my experience,” he was saying, “that given the slightest excuse each driver and each station operator will come up with a number of items of utterly useless expense, and such items must be eliminated.”

He braced himself against the roll of the stage and stared out the window for an instant as if collecting his thoughts. Then his eyes pinned Judson to his seat as a collector pins a butterfly. Judson squirmed, but there was no escape.

“You understand,” Macomber continued, “I'm not accusing these men of including items for their own advantage. No doubt at the moment they believe the item essential, yet when viewed logically it usually proves such claims were arrived at without due consideration.

“Take, for example, the ridiculous request of this man Wells, at Alkali Basin. Four times now he has written us demanding we send him blasting powder!

“Now think of that! Blasting powder, of all things! What earthly use would a station agent have for blasting powder? In our reply to his first request, we suggested he submit his reason for wanting it, and he replied that he wished to blast some rocks.

“Were the rocks on the road? No, they were not. They were some seventy yards off the road in the desert. The request was, without doubt, the whimsical notion of an uneducated man at a moment when he was not thinking. By now he no doubt realizes the absurdity of his notion.

“It is such items as this that can be eliminated. And I observed,” Macomber added severely, “that you recommended his request be granted. I was surprised, Judson. Needless to say, I was very surprised. We expect better judgment of our district superintendents.”

Judson mopped his brow and said nothing. In the past one-hundred-and-ten miles he had learned it was wiser to listen and endure. Price Macomber's voice droned on into the hot, dusty afternoon with no hint of a letup.

The best arguments Judson had offered had been riddled with logic, devastating and inescapable. He would have liked to say that sometimes logic fell short of truth, but lacked the words, and no argument of his could hope to dam the flow of words that poured over the spillway of Price Macomber's lips.

Molly Macomber stared wearily at the desert. Her uncle, so polished, immaculate, and sure of himself, had failed to materialize into the superman he had seemed in Kansas City and St. Louis.

Against the background of the rolling grasslands, she had noticed that his stiff white collar and neat black suit seemed somehow incongruous. Also, among the ragged, stark ridges of the desert, his mouth seemed too prim and precise, his eyes seemed flat and rather foolish. They were like the eyes of a goldfish staring from a bowl at a world it neither understood nor saw clearly.

“Keep the expense down,” Macomber was saying, “and the profits will take care of themselves.”

Judson stared at the desert and shifted his feet. He felt sorry for Molly, who evidently expected glamour and beauty on this westward trek. He also felt sorry for himself. He took a drink with his stage drivers, and played poker with them. Somehow he had always got results.

He had visited Alkali Basin just once before, and heartily wished he would never have to again. If Wells, keeper of the station there, wanted blasting powder, Judson was for letting him have it. Or anything else, for that matter, including a necklace of silver bells, a Cardinal's hat, or even a steamboat—anything to keep him contented.

In the three months before Wells took over the station at Alkai Basin, no fewer than six station agents had attempted the job.

The first man stuck it ten days. It was a lonely post where he had only to change horses for two stages each day, one going east, and one west. After ten days that agent had come to town on the stage and shook his head decisively. “No!” he said violently. “Not for any price! Not even Price Macomber!”

Four days after the next agent took over, the stage rolled into Alkali Basin and found no horses awaiting it. The horses were gone from the corral, and the agent lay across his adobe doorstep shot three times through the body, mutilated and scalped.

Two more men had tried it, one after the other. The Apaches got the first one of these on his second day, and the other man fought them off for a couple of hours, then went to Mexico with two teams of six horses each, and had not been heard from since.

Blasting powder might be somewhat extreme, but in Judson's private, and oft expressed opinion—to everyone but Macomber—any man who would stick it out for as much as ten days in the white dust and furnace heat of Alkali Basin, was entitled to anything he wanted.

The man called Wells had been on the job for two solid months, and so far, except for the powder, his only request had been for large quantities of ammunition. He sent in a request for more by every stage.

Macomber leaned with the sway of the stage as it swung around a corner of red rock. The movement awakened Molly who had dozed, made sleepy by the motion of the stage and the heat. A thin film of dust had settled on her face, her neck, and her hair. Perspiration, extremely unladylike perspiration, had left streaks on her face.

Her eyes strayed out over the white, dancing heat waves of the basin's awful expanse. The hot sun reflected from it and the earth seemed to shimmer, unreal and somehow ghastly. In the far distance, a column of dust arose and skipped along over the white desolation like some weird and evil spirit. It was the only movement.

The stage reached bottom and paused briefly in the partial shade while the horses gathered breath for the long, bitter run across the desert bottom, inches deep in alkali.

The pursuing dust cloud caught up with and settled over the stage and the clothing of the occupants. Even Price Macomber's dauntless volubility seemed to hesitate and lose itself in space. He was silent, staring out the window as though totaling a column of figures. Money saved, no doubt.

As the stage stumbled into movement once more, he glanced at Judson. “How much farther to our stop?”

“Forty miles to a decent place. It's no more than ten miles to Alkali Basin. We change horses there, but we'd better get food and water at Green's Creek.”

The horses, as though aware of the coming rest, lunged into the harness and charged at the heat waves.

 

Six hours earlier, morning had come to Alkali Basin. The sun, as though worn from its efforts of the previous day, pushed itself wearily over the jagged ridge in the distance and stabbed with white hot lances at the lonely stone building and the corrals.

Wells, his stubble of beard whitened with alkali, stared through one of the small windows with red-rimmed, sleepless eyes. The Apaches were still there. He couldn't see them, but he knew without seeing. They had been there, devilish in their patience, for eighteen hours now. They were out there in front of him, behind that low parapet of rocks.

He was a big, rawboned man, hairy chested, and hard-bitten. His reddish hair was a rumpled, uncombed mass, his shirt was dirty and sweat-stained.

A rough board table occupied the center of the room, and on it was a candle in a bowl, and a lantern. The coals in the fireplace were dead long since and his bunk was a tumbled pile of odorous blankets. Close beside him as he knelt by the window was a wooden bucket. The wood was ingrained with white, and there was a milky film in the bottom. The water looked like skim milk. It was heavy with alkali. It was all he had.

Beside him on the floor, two boxes of shells were broken open. The floor around him was littered with empty shells, and the skin of his right hand was broken by a furrow, raw and bleeding, where a bullet had cut across the back of it.

He squinted his eyes at the desert sun and rolled his quid of chewing in his jaws. Then he spat. No head showed, no hand. Then a shot hit the stone wall near the window and whined away into the dancing heat.

He knew what they were waiting for. Eventually, he would have to sleep, but it was not that. They were waiting for the stage. By only a few minutes they had missed the last of yesterday's stages, and they had no intention of missing the one coming today. Wells believed there were only eight or ten Apaches out there now, but that was plenty. There wouldn't be more than three or four men on the stage, and they would be caught in the open.

From his window he could cover the front approaches to the stone barn beyond the corrals. The horses were in the barn, hence they were reasonably secure. The Indians had rushed him just as he had put them away, and if they had dashed for the house instead of for him, he would have been headed off, killed, scalped and dying by now.

Shooting with his pistol, he had made a break for the house. One bullet made a flesh wound in his side, and he had dropped two Indians. One of them was only wounded, but Wells had finished him off as he crawled for shelter in the rocks.

It was hot and stuffy in the closed-up stage station. Sweat trickled down his face and down his body under the sagging shirt. There was no time after daybreak that Alkali Basin could be described as cool.

Wells was nearing forty and looked all of fifty when unshaven. None of his years had been easy or comfortable. He had punched cows, driven a stage, placer mined. Nobody had ever called him a pleasant man, and when he smiled, which was rare, his parted lips revealed yellowed and broken teeth. His eyes were black and hard, implacable as the eyes of the Apaches he faced across that seventy yards of alkali and sand.

No one had ever known his real name. When asked, he merely said he came from Wells, so they called him that, and it served its purpose. The Apaches hated, feared, and respected him. They were not concerned about his name.

In the two months of his stay at Alkali Basin, they had attacked him five times. Nine Apaches died in those five attacks. To an Apache, who is supple as a rattler and hard to hit as a hell diver, that meant the stage tender was a warrior of the first order. Several more had been wounded, and two of their ponies killed. It now was a matter of honor that he die.

Wells put a finger in the water bucket and passed it over his cracked lips. He thought he glimpsed a toe against the white of the Alkali behind the end of the wall. Taking careful aim, he squeezed off a shot. A startled yell rewarded him, then a hail of bullets. The storm died as soon as it began.

He crawled to the table and picked up a chunk of dried beef and cut off a piece. Putting it in his jaws, he went back to the window.

His battered hat lay on the floor. A pair of boots, whitened with alkali, stood in a corner under a stringy yellow slicker. On an extra chair was a cracked enamel washbasin containing some bloody water, a day old.

An hour passed slowly. He stared at the rocks in front of the house. They offered the only shelter available to more than one man at a time within a quarter of a mile. From the sides and back, there was no covered approach as the open alkali plain stretched off as far as the eye could reach in all directions. From the station, a slow rise of ground concealed the hills, miles away.

Almost a mile in front of the stage station lay a series of rocky ridges—foothills of the higher mountains beyond. A tongue of scattered rocks offered occasional concealment to a point some distance in front of the station. From there, to get within killing range, the Apaches had to dodge from rock to rock to get behind the low, natural wall in front of the station. Once there nothing could prevent them from lying entrenched for days and maintaining a sporadic fire on the station.

Water was no problem for them. Among the ridges, less than a mile off, was a good spring of only slightly brackish water. It was much better than that offered by the dug well at the station. Wells had killed one Indian going for water, but they offered only a fleeting, flickering target, visible for no more than a moment.

 

Time was running out. He knew that when he looked at the water in the bucket—yet he knew there would still be water left when his time was up. That would be when the stage reached the station. If it pulled up between the Indians and himself, they could use the stage as cover from his fire to get closer, while firing on the stage.

They knew as well as he that they had not much longer to wait. That made them careful. A little while longer and then the stage would come rolling up to them. He could, of course, fire a few shots to warn the stage, but it would be in the open and fairly close up before they could hear, unless the wind was right.

Warned, they might get away, but with spent horses, and in that heat, he doubted it. Whether they did or not, he was a gone gosling.

Suddenly, his bloodshot eyes squinted, and then slowly widened with expectant triumph. Several feet behind the rock wall was a lone, flat-faced boulder. Lifting his rifle, Wells took aim at the face of that rock, and fired.

He was rewarded by a startled yell, and he fired three times, as rapidly as he could squeeze off the shots. One Indian, struck by a ricocheting bullet, lunged to full height, emitting a shrill scream, and Wells triggered his rifle again, to make sure of that one.

The Indian toppled forward over the wall, then hastily was dragged from view.

Wells, chuckling, reloaded his rifle and fired again. An Indian lunged to his feet and raced for the shelter of the rocks toward the ridge, and Wells let him go, content to be rid of him. Then a second Indian left. Wells tried two more shots at the flat rock, then lay quiet, staring with his smarting, red-rimmed eyes at the long, white emptiness of the desert.