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Title: Boot-Hill PayoffAuthor: Robert E. Howard* A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook *eBook No.: 0608131h.htmlLanguage: EnglishDate first posted: Nov 2006Most recent update: Nov 2018This eBook was produced by Richard Scott and updated by Roy Glashan.Project Gutenberg of Australia eBooks are created from printed editionswhich are in the public domain in Australia, unless a copyright noticeis included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in compliance with a particularpaper edition.Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check thecopyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing thisfile.This eBook is made available at no cost and with almost no restrictionswhatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the termsof the Project Gutenberg of Australia License which may be viewed online athttp://gutenberg.net.au/licence.htmlTo contact Project Gutenberg of Australia go to http://gutenberg.net.au
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Western Aces, October 1935
FIVE men were riding down the winding roadthat led to San Leon, and one was singing, in a tonelessmonotone:
"Early in the mornin' in the month of May,
Brady came down on the mornin' train.
Brady came down on the Shinin' Star.
And he shot Mr. Duncan in behind the bar!"
"Shut up! Shut up!" It was the youngest of the riders whoripped out like that. A lanky, tow-headed kid, with a touch ofpallor under his tan, and a rebellious smolder in his hot eyes.
The biggest man of the five grinned.
"Bucky's nervous," he jeered genially. "You don't want to be noderned bandit, do you, Bucky?"
The youngest glowered at him.
"That welt on yore jaw ought to answer that, Jim," hegrowled.
"You fit like a catamount," agreed Big Jim placidly. "I thoughtwe'd never git you on yore cayuse and started for San Leon, withoutknockin' you in the head. 'Bout the only way you show yo're aLaramie, Bucky, is in the handlin' of yore fists."
"T'ain't no honor to be a Laramie," flared Bucky. "You and Lukeand Tom and Hank has dragged the name through slime. For the lastthree years you been worse'n a pack of starvin'lobos—stealin' cattle and horses; robbin' folks—why,the country's near ruint. And now yo're headin' to San Leon to puton the final touch—robbin' the Cattlemen's Bank, when youknow dern well the help the ranchmen got from that bank's been allthat kept 'em on their feet. Old man Brown's stretched hisself nighto the bustin' p'int to help folks."
He gulped and fought back tears that betrayed his extreme youth.His brothers grinned tolerantly. "It's the last time," he informedthem bitterly. "You won't git me into no raid again!"
"It's the last time for all of us," said Big Jim, biting off acud of tobacco. "We're through after this job. We'll live likehonest men in Mexico."
"Serve you right if a posse caught us and hanged us all," saidBucky viciously.
"Not a chance." Big Jim's placidity was unruffled. "Nobody butus knows the trail that follows the secret waterholes acrost thedesert. No posse'd dare to foller us. Once out of town and headedsouth for the border, the devil hisself couldn't catch us."
"I wonder if anybody'll ever stumble onto our secret hide-out upin the Los Diablos Mountains," mused Hank.
"I doubt it. Too well hid. Like the desert trail, nobody but usknows them mountain trails. It shore served us well. Think of allthe steers and horses we've hid there, and drove through themountains to Mexico! And the times we've laid up there laughin' inour sleeves as the posse chased around a circle."
Bucky muttered something under his breath; he retained no fondmemories of that hidden lair high up in the barren Diablos. Threeyears before, he had reluctantly followed his brothers into it fromthe little ranch in the foothills where Old Man Laramie and hiswife had worn away their lives in futile work. The old life, whentheir parents lived and had held their wild sons in check, had beendrab and hard, but had lacked the bitterness he had known whencooking and tending house for his brothers in that hidden den fromwhich they had ravaged the countryside. Four good men gonebad—mighty bad.
*
San Leon lay as if slumbering in the desert heat as the fivebrothers rode up to the doors of the Cattlemen's Bank. None notedtheir coming; the Red Lode saloon, favorite rendezvous for themasculine element of San Leon, stood at the other end of the town,and out of sight around a slight bend in the street.
No words were passed; each man knew his part beforehand. Thethree elder Laramies slid lithely out of their saddles, throwingtheir reins to Bucky and Luke, the second youngest. They strodeinto the bank with a soft jingle of spurs and creak of leather,closing the door behind them.
Luke's face was impassive as an image's, as he dragged leisurelyon a cigarette, though his eyes gleamed between slitted lids. ButBucky sweated and shivered, twisting nervously in his saddle. Bysome twist of destiny, one son had inherited all the honesty thatwas his parents' to transmit. He had kept his hands clean. Now, inspite of himself, he was scarred with their brand.
He started convulsively as a gun crashed inside the bank; likean echo came another reverberation.
Luke's Colt was in his hand, and he snatched one foot clear ofthe stirrup, then feet pounded toward the street and the door burstopen to emit the three outlaws. They carried bulging canvas sacks,and Hank's sleeve was crimson.
"Ride like hell!" grunted Big Jim, forking his roan. "Old Brownthrowed down on Hank. Old fool! I had to salivate himpermanent."
And like hell it was they rode, straight down the street towardthe desert, yelling and firing as they went. They thundered pasthouses from which startled individuals peered bewilderedly, paststores where leathery faced storekeepers were dragging forthblue-barreled scatter-guns. They swept through the futile rain oflead that poured from the excited and befuddled crowd in front ofthe Red Lode, and whirled on toward the desert that stretched southof San Leon.
But not quite to the desert. For as they rounded the last bendin the twisting street and came abreast of the last house in thevillage, they were confronted by the gray-bearded figure of old"Pop" Anders, sheriff of San Leon County. The old man's gnarledright hand rested on the ancient single-action Colt on his thigh,his left was lifted in a seemingly futile command to halt.
Big Jim cursed and sawed back on the reins, and the big roanslid to a halt.
"Git outa the way, Pop!" roared Big Jim. "We don't want to hurtyou."
The old warrior's eyes blazed with righteous wrath.
"Robbed the bank this time, eh?" he said in cold fury, his eyeson the canvas sacks. "Likely spilt blood, too. Good thing FrankLaramie died before he could know what skunks his boys turned outto be. You ain't content to steal our stock till we're nighbankrupt; you got to rob our bank and take what little money we gotleft for a new start. Why, you damned human sidewinders!" the oldman shrieked, his control snapping suddenly. "Ain't therenothin' that's too low-down for you to do?"
Behind them sounded the pound of running feet and a scatteringbanging of guns. The crowd from the Red Lode was closing in.
"You've wasted our time long enough, old man!" roared Luke,jabbing in the spurs and sending his horse rearing and plungingtoward the indomitable figure. "Git outa the way, or—"
The old single-action jumped free in the gnarled hand. Two shotsroared together, and Luke's sombrero went skyrocketing from hishead. But the old sheriff fell face forward in the dust with abullet through his heart, and the Laramie gang swept on into thedesert, feeding their dust to their hurriedly mounted anddisheartened pursuers.
Only young Buck Laramie looked back, to see the door of the lasthouse fly open, and a pig-tailed girl run out to the still figurein the street. It was the sheriff's daughter, Judy. She and Buckhad gone to the same school in the old days before the Laramies hitthe wolf-trail. Buck had always been her champion. Now she wentdown on her knees in the dust beside her father's body, seekingfrantically for a spark of life where there was none.
A red film blazed before Buck Laramie's eyes as he turned hislivid face toward his brothers.
"Hell," Luke was fretting, "I didn't aim to salivate himpermanent. The old lobo woulda hung everyone of us if he couldof—but just the same I didn't aim to kill him."
Something snapped in Bucky's brain.
"You didn't aim to kill him!" he shrieked. "No, but you did!Yo're all a pack of low-down sidewinders just like he said! Theyain't nothin' too dirty for you!" He brandished his clenched fistsin the extremity of his passion. "You filthy scum!" he sobbed."When I'm growed up I'm comin' back here and make up for ever'dollar you've stole, ever' life you've took. I'll do it if theyhang me for tryin', s'help me!"
His brothers did not reply. They did not look at him. Big Jimhummed flatly and absently:
"Some say he shot him with a thirty-eight,
Some say he shot him with a forty-one;
But I say he shot him with a forty-four.
For I saw him as he lay on the barroom floor."
Bucky subsided, slumped in his saddle and rode dismally on. SanLeon and the old life lay behind them all. Somewhere south of thehazy horizon the desert stretched into Mexico where lay theirfuture destiny. And his destiny was inextricably interwoven withthat of his brothers. He was an outlaw, too, now, and he must staywith the clan to the end of their last ride.
Some guiding angel must have caused Buck Laramie to lean forwardto pat the head of his tired sorrel, for at that instant a bulletripped through his hat-brim, instead of his head.
It came as a startling surprise, but his reaction was instant.He leaped from his horse and dove for the protection of a sandbank, a second bullet spurting dust at his heels. Then he was undercover, peering warily out, Colt in hand.
The tip of a white sombrero showed above a rim of sand, twohundred yards in front of him. Laramie blazed away at it, thoughknowing as he pulled the trigger that the range was too long andthe target too small for six-gun accuracy. Nevertheless, thehat-top vanished.
"Takin' no chances," muttered Laramie. "Now who in hell ishe? Here I am a good hour's ride from San Leon, and folkspottin' at me already. Looks bad for what I'm aimin' to do. Reckonit's somebody that knows me, after all these years?"
He could not believe it possible that anyone would recognize thelanky, half-grown boy of six years ago in the bronzed,range-hardened man who was returning to San Leon to keep the vow hehad made as his clan rode southward with two dead men and a lootedbank behind them.
The sun was burning hot, and the sand felt like an oven beneathLaramie. His canteen was slung to his saddle, and his horse was outof his reach, drooping under a scrubby mesquite. The other fellowwould eventually work around to a point where his rifle wouldout-range Laramie's six-gun—or he might shoot the horse andleave Buck afoot in the desert.
The instant his attacker's next shot sang past his refuge, hewas up and away in a stooping, weaving run to the next sand hill,to the right and slightly forward of his original position. Hewanted to get in close quarters with his unknown enemy.
He wriggled from cover to cover, and sprinted in short dashesover narrow strips of open ground, taking advantage of every rock,cactus-bed and sand-bank, with lead hissing and spitting at him allthe way. The hidden gunman had guessed his purpose, and obviouslyhad no desire for a close-range fight. He was slinging lead everytime Laramie showed an inch of flesh, cloth or leather, and Buckcounted the shots. He was within striking distance of the sand rimwhen he believed the fellow's rifle was empty.
Springing recklessly to his feet he charged straight at hishidden enemy, his six-gun blazing. He had miscalculated about therifle, for a bullet tore through the slack of his shirt. But thenthe Winchester was silent, and Laramie was raking the rim with sucha barrage of lead that the gunman evidently dared not lift himselfhigh enough to line the sights of a six-gun.
But a pistol was something that must be reckoned with, and as hespent his last bullet, Laramie dove behind a rise of sand and begandesperately to jam cartridges into his empty gun. He had failed tocross the sand rim in that rush, but another try would gainit—unless hot lead cut him down on the way. Drum of hoofsreached his ears suddenly and glaring over his shelter he saw apinto pony beyond the sand rim heading in the direction of SanLeon. Its rider wore a white sombrero.
"Damn!" Laramie slammed the cylinder in place and sent a slugwinging after the rapidly receding horseman. But he did not repeatthe shot. The fellow was already out of range.
"Reckon the work was gettin' too close for him," he ruminated ashe trudged back to his horse. "Hell, maybe he didn't want me to geta good look at him. But why? Nobody in these parts would be shyabout shootin' at a Laramie, if they knew him as such. But who'dknow Iwas a Laramie?"
He swung up into the saddle, then absently slapped his saddlebags and the faint clinking that resulted soothed him. Those bagswere loaded with fifty thousand dollars in gold eagles, and everypenny was meant for the people of San Leon.
"It'll help pay the debt the Laramies owe for the money the boysstole," he confided to the uninterested sorrel. "How I'm goin' topay back for the men they killed is more'n I can figure out. ButI'll try."
The money represented all he had accumulated from the sale ofthe Laramie stock and holdings in Mexico—holdings bought withmoney stolen from San Leon. It was his by right of inheritance, forhe was the last of the Laramies. Big Jim, Tom, Hank, Luke, all hadfound trail's end in that lawless country south of the Border. Asthey had lived, so had they died, facing their killers, withsmoking guns in their hands. They had tried to live straight inMexico, but the wild blood was still there. Fate had dealt theirhands, and Buck looked upon it all as a slate wiped clean, a recordclosed—with the exception of Luke's fate.
That memory vaguely troubled him now, as he rode toward San Leonto pay the debts his brothers contracted.
"Folks said Luke drawed first," he muttered. "But it wasn't likehim to pick a barroom fight. Funny the fellow that killed himcleared out so quick, if it was a fair fight."
He dismissed the old problem and reviewed the recent attack uponhimself.
"If he knowed I was a Laramie, it might have been anybody. Buthow could he know? Joel Waters wouldn't talk."
No, Joel Waters wouldn't talk; and, Joel Waters, old time friendof Laramie's father, long ago, and owner of the Boxed W ranch, wasthe only man who knew Buck Laramie was returning to San Leon.
"San Leon at last, cayuse," he murmured as he topped the lastdesert sand hill that sloped down to the town. "Last time I seen itwas under circumstances most—what the devil!"
He started and stiffened as a rattle of gunfire burst on hisears. Battle in San Leon? He urged his weary steed down the hill.Two minutes later history was repeating itself.
AS Buck Laramie galloped into San Leon, asight met his eyes which jerked him back to a day six years gone.For tearing down the street came six wild riders, yelling andshooting. In the lead rode one, who, with his huge frame andcareless ease, might have been Big Jim Laramie come back to lifeagain. Behind them the crowd at the Red Lode, roused to befuddledlife, was shooting just as wildly and ineffectively as on thatother day when hot lead raked San Leon. There was but one man tobar the bandits' path—one man who stood, legs braced wide,guns drawn, in the roadway before the last house in San Leon. Soold Pop Anders had stood, that other day, and there was somethingabout this man to remind Laramie of the old sheriff, though he wasmuch younger. In a flash of recognition Laramie knew him—BobAnders, son of Luke's victim. He, too, wore a silver star.
This time Laramie did not stand helplessly by to see a sheriffslaughtered. With the swiftness born of six hard years below theborder, he made his decision and acted. Gravel spurted as thesorrel threw back his head against the sawing bit and came to asliding stop, and all in one motion Laramie was out of the saddleand on his feet beside the sheriff—half crouching and hissix-gun cocked and pointed. This time two would meet the charge,not one.
Laramie saw that masks hid the faces of the riders as they sweptdown, and contempt stabbed through him. No Laramie ever wore amask. His Colt vibrated as he thumbed the hammer. Beside him theyoung sheriff's guns were spitting smoke and lead.
The clumped group split apart at that blast. One man, who wore aMexican sash instead of a belt, slumped in his saddle clawing forthe horn. Another with his right arm flopping broken at his sidewas fighting his pain-maddened beast which had stopped a slugintended for its rider.
The big man who had led the charge grabbed the fellow with thesash as he started to slide limply from his saddle, and dragged himacross his own bow. He bolted across the roadside and plunged intoa dry wash. The others followed him. The man with the broken armabandoned his own crazed mount and grabbed the reins of theriderless horse. Beasts and men, they slid over the rim and out ofsight in a cloud of dust.
Anders yelled and started across the road on the run, butLaramie jerked him back.
"They're covered," he grunted, sending his sorrel galloping to asafe place with a slap on the rump. "We got to get out of sight,pronto!"
The sheriff's good judgment overcame his excitement then, and hewheeled and darted for the house, yelping: "Follow me,stranger!"
Bullets whined after them from the gulch as the outlaws begantheir stand. The door opened inward before Anders' outstretchedhand touched it, and he plunged through without checking hisstride. Lead smacked the jambs and splinters flew as Laramie duckedafter Anders. He collided with something soft and yielding thatgasped and tumbled to the floor under the impact. Glaring wildlydown Laramie found himself face to face with a vision of feminineloveliness that took his breath away, even in that instant. With ahorrified gasp he plunged to his feet and lifted the girl afterhim. His all-embracing gaze took her in from tousled blond hair towhipcord breeches and high-heeled riding boots. She seemed toobewildered to speak.
"Sorry, miss," he stuttered. "I hope y'ain't hurt. I was—Iwas—" The smash of a window pane and the whine of a bulletcut short his floundering apologies. He snatched the girl out ofline of the window and in an instant was crouching beside ithimself, throwing lead across the road toward the smoke wisps.
Anders had barred the door and grabbed a Winchester from a rackon the wall.
"Duck into a back room, Judy," he ordered, kneeling at thewindow on the other side of the door. "Partner, I don't knowyou—" he punctuated his remarks with rapid shots, "—butI'm plenty grateful."
"Hilton's the name," mumbled Laramie, squinting along, hissix-gun barrel. "Friends call me Buck—damn!"
His bullet had harmlessly knocked dust on the gulch rim, and hispistol was empty. As he groped for cartridges he felt a Winchesterpushed into his hand, and, startled, turned his head to stare fullinto the disturbingly beautiful face of Judy Anders. She had notobeyed her brother's order, but had taken a loaded rifle from therack and brought it to Laramie, crossing the room on hands andknees to keep below the line of fire. Laramie almost forgot the menacross the road as he stared into her deep clear eyes, now glowingwith excitement. In dizzy fascination he admired the peach-bloom ofher cheeks, her red, parted lips.
"Th-thank you, miss!" he stammered. "I needed that smoke-wagonright smart. And excuse my language. I didn't know you was still inthe room—"
He ducked convulsively as a bullet ripped across the sill,throwing splinters like a buzz-saw. Shoving the Winchester out ofthe window he set to work. But his mind was still addled. And hewas remembering a pitifully still figure sprawled in the dust ofthat very road, and a pig-tailed child on her knees beside it. Thechild was no longer a child, but a beautiful woman; and he—hewas still a Laramie, and the brother of the man who killed herfather.
"Judy!" There was passion in Bob Anders' voice. "Will youget out of here? There! Somebody's callin' at the back door. Go let'em in. And stay back there, will you?"
This time she obeyed, and a few seconds later half a dozen pairsof boots clomped into the room, as some men from the Red Lode whohad slipped around through a back route to the besieged cabin,entered.
"They was after the bank, of course," announced one of them."They didn't git nothin' though, dern 'em. Ely Harrison startedslingin' lead the minute he seen them masks comin' in the door. Hedidn't hit nobody, and by good luck the lead they throwed at himdidn't connect, but they pulled out in a hurry. Harrison shores'prised me. I never thought much of him before now, but he showedhe was ready to fight for his money, and our'n."
"Same outfit, of course," grunted the sheriff, peering warilythrough the jagged shards of the splintered window-pane.
"Sure. The damn' Laramies again. Big Jim leadin', as usual."
Buck Laramie jumped convulsively, doubting the evidence of hisears. He twisted his head to stare at the men.
"You think it's the Laramies out there?" Buck's brain felt a bitnumb. These mental jolts were coming too fast for him.
"Sure," grunted Anders. "Couldn't be nobody else. They was gonefor six year—where, nobody knowed. But a few weeks back theyshowed up again and started their old deviltry, worse thanever."
"Killed his old man right out there in front of his house,"grunted one of the men, selecting a rifle from the rack. The otherswere firing carefully through the windows, and the men in the gulchwere replying in kind. The room was full of drifting smoke.
"But I've heard of 'em," Laramie protested. "They was all killeddown in Old Mexico."
"Couldn't be," declared the sheriff, lining his sights. "Theseare the old gang all right. They've put up warnin's signed with theLaramie name. Even been heard singin' that old song they used toalways sing about King Brady. Got a hide-out up in the Los Diablos,too, just like they did before. Same one, of course. I ain'tmanaged to find it yet, but—" His voice was drowned in theroar of his .45-70.
"Well, I'll be a hammer-headed jackass," muttered Laramie underhis breath. "Of all the—"
His profane meditations were broken into suddenly as one of themen bawled: "Shootin's slowed down over there! What you reckon itmeans?"
"Means they're aimin' to sneak out of that wash at the other endand high-tail it into the desert," snapped Anders. "I ought to havethought about that before, but things has been happenin' so fast.Youhombres stay here and keep smokin' the wash so theycan't bolt out on this side. I'm goin' to circle around and block'em from the desert."
"I'm with you," growled Laramie. "I want to see what's behindthem masks."
They ducked out the back way and began to cut a wide circlewhich should bring them to the outer edge of the wash. It wasdifficult going and frequently they had to crawl on their hands andknees to take advantage of every clump of cactus andgreasewood.
"Gettin' purty close," muttered Laramie, lifting his head. "WhatI'm wonderin' is, why ain't they already bolted for the desert?Nothin' to stop 'em."
"I figger they wanted to get me if they could, before they litout," answered Anders. "I believe I been snoopin' around in theDiablos too close to suit 'em. Look out! They've seen us!"
Both men ducked as a steady line of flame spurts rimmed the edgeof the wash. They flattened down behind their scanty cover andbullets cut up puffs of sand within inches of them.
"This is a pickle!" gritted Anders, vainly trying to locate ahuman head to shoot at. "If we back up, we back into sight, and ifwe go forward we'll get perforated."
"And if we stay here the result's the same," returned Laramie."Greasewood don't stop lead. We got to summon reinforcements." Andlifting his voice in a stentorian yell that carried far, hewhooped: "Come on, boys! Rush 'em from that side! They can't shoottwo ways at once!"
They could not see the cabin from where they lay, but a burst ofshouts and shots told them his yell had been heard. Guns began tobang up the wash and Laramie and Anders recklessly leaped to theirfeet and rushed down the slight slope that led to the edge of thegulch, shooting as they went.
They might have been riddled before they had gone a dozen steps,but the outlaws had recognized the truth of Laramie's statement.They couldn't shoot two ways at once, and they feared to be trappedin the gulch with attackers on each side. A few hurried shotsbuzzed about the ears of the charging men, and then outlaws burstinto view at the end of the wash farthest from town, mounted andspurring hard, the big leader still carrying a limp figure acrosshis saddle.
Cursing fervently, the sheriff ran after them, blazing away withboth six-shooters, and Laramie followed him. The fleeing men wereshooting backward as they rode, and the roar of six-guns andWinchesters was deafening. One of the men reeled in his saddle andcaught at his shoulder, dyed suddenly red.
Laramie's longer legs carried him past the sheriff, but he didnot run far. As the outlaws pulled out of range, toward the desertand the Diablos, he slowed to a walk and began reloading hisgun.
"Let's round up the men, Bob," he called. "We'll follow 'em. Iknow the water-holes—"
He stopped short with a gasp. Ten yards behind him Bob Anders, acrimson stream dyeing the side of his head, was sinking to thedesert floor.
Laramie started back on a run just as the men from the cabinburst into view. In their lead rode a man on a pinto—and BuckLaramie knew that pinto.
"Git him!" howled the white-hatted rider. "He shot BobAnders in the back! I seen him!He's a Laramie!"
Laramie stopped dead in his tracks. The accusation was like abomb-shell exploding in his face. That was the man who had tried todrygulch him an hour or so before—same pinto, same whitesombrero—but he was a total stranger to Laramie. How in thedevil didhe know of Buck's identity, and what was thereason for his enmity?
Laramie had no time to try to figure it out now. For the excitedtownsmen, too crazy with excitement to stop and think, seeing onlytheir young sheriff stretched in his blood, and hearing the franticaccusation of one of their fellows, set up a roar and startedblazing away at the man they believed was a murderer.
Out of the frying pan into the fire—the naked desert wasbehind him, and his horse was still standing behind the Anders'cabin—with that mob between him and that cabin.
But any attempt at explanation would be fatal. Nobody wouldlisten. Laramie saw a break for him in the fact that only hisaccuser was mounted, and probably didn't know he had a horse behindthe cabin, and would try to reach it. The others were too excitedto think anything. They were simply slinging lead, so befuddledwith the mob impulse they were not even aiming—which is allthat saved Laramie in the few seconds in which he stood bewilderedand uncertain.
He ducked for the dry wash, running almost at a right angle withhis attackers. The only man capable of intercepting him wasWhite-Hat, who was bearing down on him, shooting from the saddlewith a Winchester.
Laramie wheeled, and as he wheeled a bullet ripped through hisStetson and stirred his hair in passing. White-Hat was determinedto have his life, he thought, as his own six-gun spat flame.White-Hat flinched sidewise and dropped his rifle. Laramie took thelast few yards in his stride and dived out of sight in thewash.
He saw White-Hat spurring out of range too energetically to bebadly wounded, and he believed his bullet had merely knocked thegun out of the fellow's hands. The others had spread out and werecoming down the slope at a run, burning powder as they came.
Laramie did not want to kill any of those men. They werelaw-abiding citizens acting under a misapprehension. So he emptiedhis gun over their heads and was gratified to see themprecipitately take to cover. Then without pausing to reload, heducked low and ran for the opposite end of the wash, which ran onan angle that would bring him near the cabin.
The men who had halted their charge broke cover and came onagain, unaware of his flight, and hoping to get him while his gunwas empty. They supposed he intended making a stand at their end ofthe wash.
By the time they had discovered their mistake and were pumpinglead down the gully, Laramie was out at the other end and racingacross the road toward the cabin. He ducked around the corner withlead nipping at his ears and vaulted into the saddle of thesorrel—and cursed his luck as Judy Anders ran out the reardoor, her eyes wide with fright.
"What's happened?" she cried. "Where's Bob?"
"No time to pow-wow," panted Laramie. "Bob's been hurt. Don'tknow how bad. I got to ride, because—"
He was interrupted by shouts from the other side of thecabin.
"Look out, Judy!" one man yelled. "Stay under cover! He shot Bobin the back!"
Reacting to the shout without conscious thought, Judy sprang toseize his reins.
Laramie jerked the sorrel aside and evaded her grasp. "It's alie!" he yelled with heat. "I ain't got time to explain. Hope Bobain't hurt bad."
Then he was away, crouching low in his saddle with bulletspinging past him; it seemed he'd been hearing lead whistle all day;he was getting sick of that particular noise. He looked back once.Behind the cabin Judy Anders was bending over a limp form that themen had carried in from the desert. Now she was down on her kneesin the dust beside that limp body, searching for a spark oflife.
Laramie cursed sickly. History was indeed repeating itself thatday in San Leon.
For a time Laramie rode eastward, skirting the desert, and gladof a breathing spell. The sorrel had profited by its rest behindthe Anders' cabin, and was fairly fresh. Laramie had a good lead onthe pursuers he knew would be hot on his trail as soon as theycould get to their horses, but he headed east instead of north, thedirection in which lay his real goal—the Boxed W ranch. Hedid not expect to be able to throw them off his scent entirely, buthe did hope to confuse them and gain a little time.
It was imperative that he see his one friend in San LeonCounty— Joel Waters. Maybe Joel Waters could unriddle some ofthe tangle. Who were the men masquerading as Laramies?
He had been forging eastward for perhaps an hour when, lookingbackward from a steep rise, he saw a column of riders approachingsome two miles away through a cloud of dust that meant haste. Thatwould be the posse following his trail—and that meant thatthe sheriff was dead or still senseless.
Laramie wheeled down the slope on the other side and headednorth, hunting hard ground that would not betray a pony'shoof-print.
DUSK was fast settling when he rode intothe yard of the Boxed W. He was glad of the darkness, for he hadfeared that some of Waters' punchers might have been in San Leonthat day, and seen him. But he rode up to the porch without havingencountered anyone, and saw the man he was hunting sitting there,pulling at a corn-cob pipe.
Waters rose and came forward with his hand outstretched asLaramie swung from the saddle.
"You've growed," said the old man. "I'd never knowed you if Ihadn't been expectin' you. You don't favor yore brothers none. Looka lot like yore dad did at yore age, though. You've pushed yorecayuse hard," he added, with a piercing glance at thesweat-plastered flanks of the sorrel.
"Yeah." There was bitter humor in Laramie's reply. "I just gotthrough shootin' me a sheriff."
Waters jerked the pipe from his mouth. He looked stunned.
"What?"
"All you got to do is ask the upright citizens of San Leonthat's trailin' me like a lobo wolf," returned Laramie with amirthless grin. And tersely and concisely he told the old rancherwhat had happened in San Leon and on the desert.
Waters listened in silence, puffing smoke slowly.
"It's bad," he muttered, when Laramie had finished. "Damnedbad— well, about all I can do right now is to feed you. Putyore cayuse in the corral."
"Rather hide him near the house, if I could," said Laramie."That posse is liable to hit my sign and trail me here any time. Iwant to be ready to ride."
"Blacksmith shop behind the house," grunted Waters. "Comeon."
Laramie followed the old man to the shop, leading the sorrel.While he was removing the bridle and loosening the cinch, Watersbrought hay and filled an old log-trough. When Laramie followed himback to the house, the younger man carried the saddle bags over hisarm. Their gentle clink no longer soothed him; too many obstaclesto distributing them were rising in his path.
"I just finished eatin' before you come," grunted Waters."Plenty left."
"Hop Sing still cookin' for you?"
"Yeah."
"Ain't you ever goin' to get married?" chaffed Laramie.
"Shore," grunted the old man, chewing his pipe stem. "I just gotto have time to decide what type of woman'd make me the bestwife."
Laramie grinned. Waters was well past sixty, and had been givingthat reply to chaffing about his matrimonial prospects as far backas Buck could remember.
Hop Sing remembered Laramie and greeted him warmly. The oldChinaman had cooked for Waters for many years. Laramie could trusthim as far as he could trust Waters himself.
The old man sat gripping his cold pipe between his teeth asLaramie disposed of a steak, eggs, beans and potatoes and tamped itdown with a man-sized chunk of apple pie.
"Yo're follerin' blind trails," he said slowly. "Mebbe I canhelp you."
"Maybe. Do you have any idea who the gent on the showy pintomight be?"
"Not many such paints in these parts. What'd the man looklike?"
"Well, I didn't get a close range look at him, of course. Fromwhat I saw he looked to be short, thick-set, and he wore a shortbeard and a mustache so big it plumb ambushed his pan."
"Why, hell!" snorted Waters. "That's bound to be Mart Rawley! Herides a flashy pinto, and he's got the biggest set of whiskers inSan Leon."
"Who's he?"
"Owns the Red Lode. Come here about six months ago and bought itoff of old Charlie Ross."
"Well, that don't help none," growled Laramie, finishing hiscoffee and reaching for the makings. He paused suddenly, lightedmatch lifted. "Say, did this hombre ride up from Mexico?"
"He come in from the east. Of course, he could have come fromMexico, at that; he'd have circled the desert. Nobody but youLaramies ever hit straight across it. He ain't said he come fromMexico original; and he ain't said he ain't."
Laramie meditated in silence, and then asked: "What about thisnew gang that calls theirselves Laramies?"
"Plain coyotes," snarled the old man. "Us San Leon folks wasjust gittin' on our feet again after the wreck yore brothers madeout of us, when this outfit hit the country. They've robbed andstole and looted till most of us are right back where we was sixyears ago. They've done more damage in a few weeks than yorebrothers did in three years.
"I ain't been so bad hit as some, because I've got the toughest,straightest-shootin' crew of punchers in the county; but most ofthe cowmen around San Leon are mortgaged to the hilt, and stand tolose their outfits if they git looted any more. ElyHarrison—he's president of the bank now, since yore brotherskilled old man Brown—Ely's been good about takin' mortgagesand handin' out money, but he cain't go on doin' it forever."
"Does everybody figure they're the Laramies?"
"Why not? They send letters to the cowmen sayin' they'll wipeout their whole outfit if they don't deliver 'em so many hundredhead of beef stock, and they sign them letters with the Laramiename. They're hidin' out in the Diablos like you all did; they'salways the same number in the gang; and they can make a get-awaythrough the desert, which nobody but the Laramies ever did.
"Of course, they wear masks, which the Laramies never did, butthat's a minor item; customs change, so to speak. I'd have believedthey was the genuine Laramies myself, only for a couple ofreasons—one bein' you'd wrote me in your letter that you wasthe only Laramie left. You didn't give no details." The old man'svoice was questioning.
"Man's reputation always follows him," grunted Buck. "A barroomgladiator got Jim. Hank got that gunfighter the next week, but wasshot up so hisself he died. Tom joined the revolutionaries and therurales cornered him in a dry wash. Took 'em ten hours andthree dead men to get him. Luke—" He hesitated and scowledslightly.
"Luke was killed in a barroom brawl in Sante Maria, by atwo-gunfighter called Killer Rawlins. They said Luke reached first,but Rawlins beat him to it. I don't know. Rawlins skipped thatnight. I've always believed that Luke got a dirty deal, some way.He was the best one of the boys. If I ever meet Rawlins—"Involuntarily his hand moved toward the worn butt of his Colt. Thenhe shrugged his shoulders, and said: "You said there was tworeasons why you knowed these coyotes wasn't Laramies; what'st'other'n?"
"They work different," growled the old man. "Yore brothers wasbad, but white men, just the same. They killed prompt, but theykilled clean. These rats ain't content with just stealin' ourstock. They burn down ranch houses and pizen water holes like atribe of cussed Apaches. Jim Bannerman of the Lazy B didn't leave'em two hundred of steers in a draw like they demanded in one ofthem letters. A couple of days later we found nothin' but smokin'ruins at the Lazy B, with Jim's body burned up inside and all hispunchers dead or shot up."
Buck's face was gray beneath its tan. His fist knotted on thegunbutt.
"The devil!" he choked, in a voice little above a whisper. "Andthe Laramies are gettin' the blame! I thought my brothers draggedthe name low—but these devils are haulin' it right down intohell. Joel Waters, listen to me! I come back here to pay back moneymy brothers stole from San Leon; I'm stayin' to pay a bigger debt.The desert's big, but it ain't big enough for a Laramie and therats that wears his name. If I don't wipe that gang of rattlers offthe earth they can have my name, because I won't need it nomore."
"The Laramies owe a debt to San Leon," agreed old Joel, fillinghis pipe. "Cleanin' out that snake-den is the best way I know ofpayin' it."
Some time later Laramie rose at last and ground his cigarettebutt under his heel.
"We've about talked out our wampum. From all I can see,everything points to this Mart Rawley bein' connected with thegang, somehow. He must have been the one that shot Bob Anders. Hewas ahead of the other fellows; they couldn't see him for a rise inthe ground. They wouldn't have seen him shoot Anders. He might havebeen aimin' at me; or he might have just wanted Anders out of theway.
"Anyway, I'm headin' for the Diablos tonight. I know yo'rewillin' to hide me here, but you can help me more if nobodysuspects yo're helpin' me, yet.
"I'm leavin' these saddle-bags with you. If I don't come backout of the Diablos, you'll know what to do with the money. Solong."
They shook hands, and old Joel said: "So long, Buck. I'll takecare of the money. If they git crowdin' you too close, duck backhere. And if you need help in the hills, try to git word back tome. I can still draw a bead with a Winchester, and I've got a gangof hard-ridin' waddies to back my play."
"I ain't forgettin', Joel."
Laramie turned toward the door. Absorbed in his thoughts, heforgot for an instant that he was a hunted man, and relaxed hisvigilance. As he stepped out onto the veranda he did not stop tothink that he was thrown into bold relief by the light behindhim.
As his boot-heel hit the porch yellow flame lanced the darknessand he heard the whine of a bullet that fanned him as it passed. Heleapt back, slamming the door, wheeled, and halted in dismay to seeJoel Waters sinking to the floor. The old man, standing directlybehind Laramie, had stopped the slug meant for his guest.
With his heart in his mouth Laramie dropped beside his friend."Where'd it get you, Joel?" he choked.
"Low down, through the leg," grunted Waters, already sitting upand whipping his bandanna around his leg for a tourniquet. "Nothin'to worry about. You better git goin'."
Laramie took the bandanna and began knotting it tightly,ignoring a hail from without.
"Come out with yore hands up, Laramie!" a rough voice shouted."You can't fight a whole posse. We got you cornered!"
"Beat it, Buck!" snapped Waters, pulling away his friend'shands. "They must have left their horses and sneaked up on foot.Sneak out the back way before they surround the house, fork yorecayuse and burn the breeze. That's Mart Rawley talkin', and Ireckon it was him that shot. He aims to git you before you havetime to ask questions or answer any. Even if you went out therewith yore hands up, he'd kill you. Git goin', dern you!"
"All right!" Laramie jumped up as Hop Sing came out of thekitchen, almond eyes wide and a cleaver in his hand. "Tell 'em Iheld a gun on you and made you feed me. T'ain't time for 'em toknow we're friends, not yet."
The next instant he was gliding into the back part of the houseand slipping through a window into the outer darkness. He heardsomebody swearing at Rawley for firing before the rest had taken uptheir positions, and he heard other voices and noises thatindicated the posse was scattering out to surround the house.
He ran for the blacksmith shop, and, groping in the dark,tightened the cinch on the sorrel and slipped on the bridle. Heworked fast, but before Laramie could lead the horse outside heheard a jingle of spurs and the sound of footsteps.
Laramie swung into the saddle, ducked his head low to avoid thelintel of the door, and struck in the spurs. The sorrel hurtledthrough the door like a thunderbolt. A startled yell rang out, aman jumped frantically out of the way, tripped over his spurs andfell flat on his back, discharging his Winchester in the generaldirection of the Big Dipper. The sorrel and its rider went past himlike a thundering shadow to be swallowed in the darkness. Wildyells answered the passionate blasphemy of the fallen man, and gunsspurted red as their owners fired blindly after the recedinghoof-beats. But before the possemen could untangle themselves fromtheir bewilderment and find their mounts, the echoes of flyinghoofs had died away and night hid the fugitive's trail. BuckLaramie was far away, riding to the Diablos.
MIDNIGHT found Laramie deep in theDiabios. He halted, tethered the sorrel, and spread his blankets atthe foot of a low cliff. Night was not the time to venture furtheralong the rock-strewn paths and treacherous precipices of theDiablos. He slept fitfully, his slumber disturbed by dreams of agirl kneeling beside a wounded man.
*
With the first gray of dawn he was riding familiar trails thatwould lead him to the cabin in the hidden canyon that he knew sowell, the old hideout of his gang, where he believed he would findthe new band which was terrorizing the country. The hide-out hadbut one entrance—a rock-walled tunnel. How the fake gangcould have learned of the place Laramie could not know.
The hideout was in a great bowl, on all sides of which rosewalls of jumbled rock, impassable to a horseman. It was possible toclimb the cliffs near the entrance of the tunnel, which, if thefake gang were following the customs of the real Laramies, would beguarded.
Half an hour after sunrise found him making his way on foottoward the canyon entrance. His horse he had left concealed amongthe rocks at a safe distance, and lariat in hand he crept alongbehind rocks and scrub growth toward the old river bed that formedthe canyon. Presently, gazing through the underbrush that maskedhis approach, he saw, half hidden by a rock, a man in a tatteredbrown shirt who sat at the mouth of the canyon entrance, his hatpulled low over his eyes, and a Winchester across his knees.
Evidently a belief in the security of the hide-out made thesentry careless. Laramie had the drop on him; but to use hisadvantage incurred the possibility of a shot that would warn thoseinside the canyon and spoil his plans. So he retreated to a pointwhere he would not be directly in the line of the guard's vision,if the man roused, and began working his way to a spot a fewhundred yards to the left, where, as he knew of old, he could climbto the rim of the canyon.
In a few moments he had clambered up to a point from which hecould glimpse the booted feet of the guard sticking from behind therock. Laramie's flesh crawled at the thought of being picked offwith a rifle bullet like a fly off a wall, if the guard looked hisway.
But the boots did not move, he dislodged no stones large enoughto make an alarming noise, and presently, panting and sweating, heheaved himself over the crest of the rim and lay on his bellygazing down into the canyon below him.
As he looked down into the bowl which had once been like aprison to him, bitterness of memory was mingled with a brief, sicklonging for his dead brothers; after all, they were his brothers,and had been kind to him in their rough way.
The cabin below him had in no wise changed in the passing of theyears. Smoke was pouring out of the chimney, and in the corral atthe back, horses were milling about in an attempt to escape theropes of two men who were seeking saddle mounts for the day.
Shaking out his lariat, Laramie crept along the canyon rim untilhe reached a spot where a stunted tree clung to the very edge. Tothis tree he made fast the rope, knotted it at intervals forhandholds, and threw the other end over the cliff. It hung fifteenfeet short of the bottom, but that was near enough.
As he went down it, with a knee hooked about the thin strand totake some of the strain off his hands, he grinned thinly as heremembered how he had used this descent long ago when he wanted tododge Big Jim who was waiting at the entrance to give him alicking. His face hardened.
"Wish he was here with me now. We'd mop up these rats byourselves."
Dangling at the end of the rope at arm's length he dropped,narrowly missing a heap of jagged rocks, and lit in the sand on hisfeet, going to his all-fours from the impact.
Bending low, sometimes on hands and knees, he headedcircuitously for the cabin, keeping it between himself and the menin the corral. To his own wonderment he reached the cabin withouthearing any alarm sounded. Maybe the occupants, if there were anyin the canyon beside the men he had seen, had gone out the back wayto the corral. He hoped so.
Cautiously he raised his head over a window sill and peeredinside. He could see no one in the big room that constituted thefront part of the cabin. Behind this room, he knew, were a bunkroom and kitchen, and the back door was in the kitchen. There mightbe men in those backrooms; but he was willing to take the chance.He wanted to get in there and find a place where he could hide andspy.
The door was not locked; he pushed it open gently and steppedinside with a cat-like tread, Colt poked ahead of him.
"Stick 'em up!" Before he could complete the convulsivemovement prompted by these unexpected words, he felt the barrel ofa six-gun jammed hard against his backbone. He froze—openedhis fingers and let his gun crash to the floor. There was nothingelse for it.
The door to the bunk room swung open and two men came out withdrawn guns and triumphant leers on their unshaven faces. A thirdemerged from the kitchen. All were strangers to Laramie. Heventured to twist his head to look at his captor, and saw abig-boned, powerful man with a scarred face, grinningexultantly.
"That was easy," rumbled one of the others, a tall, heavilybuilt ruffian whose figure looked somehow familiar. Laramie eyedhim closely.
"So yo're 'Big Jim'," he said.
The big man scowled, but Scarface laughed.
"Yeah! With a mask on nobody can tell the difference. You ain'tso slick, for a Laramie. I seen you sneakin' through the bresh tenminutes ago, and we been watchin' you ever since. I seen you aimedto come and make yoreself to home, so I app'inted myself a welcomecommittee of one—behind the door. You couldn't see me fromthe winder. Hey, you Joe!" he raised his voice pompously. "Gimme apiece of rope. Mister Laramie's goin' to stay with us for aspell."
Scarface shoved the bound Laramie into an old Morris chair thatstood near the kitchen door. Laramie remembered that chair well;the brothers had brought it with them when they left their ranchhome in the foothills.
He was trying to catch a nebulous memory that had something todo with that chair, when steps sounded in the bunk room and "Jim"entered, accompanied by two others. One was an ordinary sort ofcriminal, slouchy, brutal faced and unshaven. The other was of anentirely different type. He was elderly and pale-faced, but thatface was bleak and flinty. He did not seem range-bred like theothers. Save for his high-heeled riding boots, he was dressed intown clothes, though the well-worn butt of a .45 jutted from aholster at his thigh.
Scarface hooked thumbs in belt and rocked back on his heels withan air of huge satisfaction. His big voice boomed in the cabin.
"Mister Harrison, I takes pleasure in makin' you acquainted withMister Buck Laramie, the last of a family of honest horse-thieves,what's rode all the way from Mexico just to horn in on our play.And Mister Laramie, since you ain't long for this weary world, I'mlikewise honored to interjuice you to Mister Ely Harrison, high manof our outfit and president of the Cattlemen's Bank of SanLeon!"
Scarface had an eye for dramatics in his crude way. He bowedgrotesquely, sweeping the floor with his Stetson and grinninggleefully at the astounded glare with which his prisoner greetedhis introduction.
Harrison was less pleased.
"That tongue of yours wags too loose, Braxton," he snarled.
Scarface lapsed into injured silence, and Laramie found histongue.
"Ely Harrison!" he said slowly. "Head of the gang—thepieces of this puzzle's beginnin' to fit. So you generously helpsout the ranchers yore coyotes ruins—not forgettin' to grab ahealthy mortgage while doin' it. And you was a hero and shot it outwith the terrible bandits when they come for yore bank; only nobodygets hurt on either side."
Unconsciously he leaned further back in the Morrischair—and a lightning jolt of memory hit him just behind theear. He stifled an involuntary grunt, and his fingers, hidden byhis body from the eyes of his captors, began fumbling between thecushions of the chair.
He had remembered his jackknife, a beautiful implement, and thepride of his boyhood, stolen from him and hidden by his brotherTom, for a joke, a few days before they started for Mexico. Tom hadforgotten all about it, and Buck had been too proud to beg him forit. But Tom had remembered, months later, in Mexico; had boughtBuck a duplicate of the first knife, and told him that he hadhidden the original between the cushions of the old Morrischair.
Laramie's heart almost choked him. It seemed too good to betrue, this ace in the hole. Yet there was no reason to supposeanybody had found and removed the knife. His doubts were set atrest as his fingers encountered a smooth, hard object. It was notuntil that moment that he realized that Ely Harrison was speakingto him. He gathered his wits and concentrated on the man's raspingvoice, while his hidden fingers fumbled with the knife, trying toopen it.
"—damned unhealthy for a man to try to blockmygame," Harrison was saying harshly. "Why didn't you mind your ownbusiness?"
"How do you know I come here just to spoil yore game?" murmuredLaramie absently.
"Then whydid you come here?" Harrison's gaze was cloudedwith a sort of ferocious uncertainty. "Just how much did you knowabout our outfit before today? Did you know I was the leader of thegang?"
"Guess," suggested Laramie. The knife was open at last. Hejammed the handle deep between the cushions and the chair-back,wedging it securely. The tendons along his wrists ached. It hadbeen hard work, manipulating the knife with his cramped fingers,able to move just so far. His steady voice did not change in toneas he worked. "I was kind of ashamed of my name till I seen howmuch lower a man could go than my brothers ever went. They was hardmen, but they was white, at least. Usin' my name to torture andmurder behind my back plumb upsets me. Maybe I didn't come to SanLeon just to spoil yore game; but maybe I decided to spoil it afterI seen some of the hands you dealt."
"You'll spoil our game!" Harrison sneered. "Fat chance you'vegot of spoiling anybody's game. But you've got only yourself toblame. In another month I'd have owned every ranch within thirtymiles of San Leon."
"So that's the idea, huh?" murmured Laramie, leaning forward toexpectorate, and dragging his wrists hard across the knife-edge. Hefelt one strand part, and as he leaned back and repeated themovement, another gave way and the edge bit into his flesh. If hecould sever one more strand, he would make his break.
"Just how much did you know about our outfit before you camehere?" demanded Harrison again, his persistence betraying hisapprehension on that point. "How much did you tell JoelWaters?"
"None of yore derned business," Laramie snapped. His nervesgetting on edge with the approach of the crisis.
"You'd better talk," snarled Harrison. "I've got men here who'dthink nothing of shoving your feet in the fire to roast. Not thatit matters. We're all set anyway. Got ready when we heard you'dridden in. It just means we move tonight instead of a month later.But if you can prove to me that you haven't told anybody that I'mthe real leader of the gang—well, we can carry out ouroriginal plans, and you'll save your life. We might even let youjoin the outfit."
"Join the—do you see any snake-scales on me?" flaredLaramie, fiercely expanding his arm muscles. Another strand partedand the cords fell away from his wrists.
"Why you—" Murderous passion burst all bounds as Harrisonlurched forward, his fist lifted. And Laramie shot from the chairlike a steel spring released, catching them all flat-footed,paralyzed by the unexpectedness of the move.
One hand ripped Harrison's Colt from its scabbard. The otherknotted into a fist that smashed hard in the banker's face andknocked him headlong into the midst of the men who stood behindhim.
"Reach for the ceilin', you yellow-bellied polecats!" snarledLaramie, livid with fury and savage purpose; his cocked .45 menacedthem all. "Reach! I'm dealin' this hand!"
FOR an instant the scene held—thenScarface made a convulsive movement to duck behind the chair.
"Back up!" yelped Laramie, swinging his gun directly on him, andbacking toward the door. But the tall outlaw who had impersonatedBig Jim had recovered from the daze of his surprise. Even asLaramie's pistol muzzle moved in its short arc toward Braxton, thetall one's hand flashed like the stroke of a snake's head to hisgun. It cleared leather just as Laramie's .45 banged.
Laramie felt hot wind fan his cheek, but the tall outlaw wassagging back and down, dying on his feet and grimly pulling triggeras he went. A hot welt burned across Laramie's left thigh, anotherslug ripped up splinters near his feet. Harrison had dived behindthe Morris chair and Laramie's vengeful bullet smashed into thewall behind him.
It all happened so quickly that the others had barelyunleathered their irons as he reached the threshold. He fired atBraxton, saw the scar-faced one drop his gun with a howl, saw "BigJim" sprawl on the floor, done with impersonation and outlawryforever, and then he was slamming the door from the outside,wincing involuntarily as bullets smashed through the panels andwhined about him.
His long legs flung him across the kitchen and he catapultedthrough the outer door. He collided head-on with the two men he hadseen in the corral. All three went into the dust in a heap. One,even in falling, jammed his six-gun into Buck's belly and pulledtrigger without stopping to see who it was. The hammer clicked onan empty chamber. Laramie, flesh crawling with the narrowness ofhis escape, crashed his gun barrel down on the other's head andsprang up, kicking free of the second man whom he recognized asMart Rawley, he of the white sombrero and flashy pinto.
Rawley's gun had been knocked out of his hand in the collision.With a yelp the drygulcher scuttled around the corner of the cabinon hands and knees. Laramie did not stop for him. He had seen theone thing that might save him—a horse, saddled and bridled,tied to the corral fence.
He heard the furious stamp of boots behind him. Harrison's voicescreamed commands as his enemies streamed out of the house andstarted pouring lead after him. Then a dozen long leaps carried himspraddle-legged to the startled mustang. With one movement he hadripped loose the tether and swung aboard. Over his shoulder he sawthe men spreading out to head him off in the dash they expected himto make toward the head of the canyon. Then he wrenched the cayusearound and spurred through the corral gate which the outlaws hadleft half open.
In an instant Laramie was the center of a milling whirlpool ofmaddened horses as he yelled, fired in the air, and lashed themwith the quirt hanging from the horn.
"Close the gate!" shrieked Harrison. One of the men ran to obeythe command, but as he did, the snorting beasts came thunderingthrough. Only a frantic leap backward saved him from being trampledto death under the maddened horses.
His companions yelped and ran for the protection of the cabin,firing blindly into the dust cloud that rose as the herd poundedpast. Then Laramie was dashing through the scattering horde anddrawing out of six-gun range, while his enemies howled like wolvesbehind him.
"Git along, cayuse!" yelled Laramie, drunk with the exhilarationof the hazard. "We done better'n I hoped. They got to round uptheir broncs before they hit my trail, and that's goin' to taketime!"
Thought of the guard waiting at the canyon entrance did notsober him.
"Only way out is through the tunnel. Maybe he thinks theshootin' was just a family affair, and won't drill a gent ridin'frominside the canyon. Anyway, cayuse, we takes it on therun."
A Winchester banged from the mouth of the tunnel and the bulletcut the air past his ear.
"Pull up!" yelled a voice, but there was hesitancy in the tone.Doubtless the first shot had been a warning, and the sentry waspuzzled. Laramie gave no heed; he ducked low and jammed in thespurs. He could see the rifle now, the blue muzzle resting on aboulder, and the ragged crown of a hat behind it. Even as he sawit, flame spurted from the blue ring. Laramie's horse stumbled inits headlong stride as lead ploughed through the fleshy part of itsshoulder. That stumble saved Laramie's life for it lurched him outof the path of the next slug. His own six-gun roared.
The bullet smashed on the rock beside the rifle muzzle. Dazedand half-blinded by splinters of stone, the outlaw reeled back intothe open, and fired without aim. The Winchester flamed almost inLaramie's face. Then his answering slug knocked the guard down asif he had been hit with a hammer. The Winchester flew out of hishands as he rolled on the ground. Laramie jerked the half-franticmustang back on its haunches and dived out of the saddle to grabfor the rifle.
"Damn!" It had struck the sharp edge of a rock as it fell. Thelock was bent and the weapon useless. He cast it aside disgustedly,wheeled toward his horse, and then halted to stare down at the manhe had shot. The fellow had hauled himself to a half-sittingposition. His face was pallid, and blood oozed from a round hole inhis shirt bosom. He was dying. Sudden revulsion shook Laramie as hesaw his victim was hardly more than a boy. His berserk excitementfaded.
"Laramie!" gasped the youth. "You must be Buck Laramie!"
"Yeah," admitted Laramie. "Anything—anything I cando?"
The boy grinned in spite of his pain.
"Thought so. Nobody but a Laramie could ride so reckless andshoot so straight. Seems funny—bein' plugged by a Laramieafter worshippin' 'em most of my life."
"What?" ejaculated Laramie.
"I always wanted to be like 'em," gasped the youth. "Nobodycould ride and shoot and fight like them. That's why I j'ined upwith these polecats. They said they was startin' up a gang that wasto be just like the Laramies. But they ain't; they're a passel ofdirty coyotes. Once I started in with 'em, though, I had tostick."
Laramie said nothing. It was appalling to think that a younglife had been so warped, and at last destroyed, by the evil exampleof his brothers.
"You better go and raise a posse if yo're aimin' to git themrats," the boy said. "They's goin' to be hell to pay tonight."
"How's that?" questioned Laramie, remembering Harrison's remarksabout something planned for the night.
"You got 'em scared," murmured the boy. "Harrison's scared youmight have told Joel Waters he was boss-man of the gang. That's whyhe come here last night. They'd aimed to keep stealin' for anothermonth. Old Harrison woulda had most all the ranches around here bythen, foreclosin' mortgages.
"When Mart Rawley failed to git you, old Harrison sent out wordfor the boys to git together here today. They figgered on huntin'you down, if the posse from San Leon hadn't already got you. Ifthey found out you didn't know nothin' and hadn't told nobodynothin', they just aimed to kill you and go on like they'd plannedfrom the first. But if they didn't git you, or found you'd talked,they aimed to make their big cleanup tonight, and then ride."
"What's that?" asked Laramie.
"They're goin' down tonight and burn Joel Waters' ranchbuildings, and the sheriff's, and some of the other big ones.They'll drive all the cattle off to Mexico over the old Laramietrail. Then old Harrison'll divide the loot and the gang willscatter. If he finds you ain't spilled the works about him bein'the top man, he'll stay on in San Leon. That was his idee from thestart—ruin the ranchers, buy up their outfits cheap and beking of San Leon."
"How many men's he got?"
"'Tween twenty-five and thirty," panted the youth. He was goingfast. He choked, and a trickle of blood began at the corner of hismouth. "I ought not to be squealin', maybe; t'ain't the Laramieway. But I wouldn't to nobody but a Laramie. You didn't see nearall of 'em. Two died on the way back from San Leon, yesterday. Theyleft 'em out in the desert. The rest ain't got back from drivin'cattle to Mexico, but they'll be on hand by noon today."
Laramie was silent, reckoning on the force he could put in thefield. Waters' punchers were all he could be sure of—six orseven men at the most, not counting the wounded Waters. The oddswere stacking up.
"Got a smoke?" the youth asked weakly. Laramie rolled acigarette, placed it between the blue lips and held a match.Looking back down the canyon, Laramie saw men saddling mounts.Precious time was passing, but he was loath to leave the dyinglad.
"Get goin'," muttered the boy uneasily. "You got a tough jobahead of you—honest men and thieves both agen you—butI'm bettin' on the Laramies—the real ones—" He seemedwandering in his mind. He began to sing in a ghastly whisper thesong that Laramie could never hear without a shudder.
"When Brady died they planted him deep,
Put a bottle of whisky at his head and feet.
Folded his arms across his breast.
And said: 'King Brady's gone to his rest!'"
The crimson trickle became a sudden spurt; the youth's voicetrailed into silence. The cigarette slipped from his lips. He wentlimp and lay still, through forever with the wolf-trail.
Laramie rose heavily and groped for his horse, trembling in theshade of the rock. He tore the blanket rolled behind the saddle andcovered the still figure. Another debt to be marked up against theLaramies.
He swung aboard and galloped through the tunnel to where his ownhorse was waiting—a faster mount than the cayuse he wasriding. As he shifted mounts he heard shouts behind him, knew thathis pursuers had halted at the body, knew the halt would bebrief.
Without looking back, he hit the straightest trail he knew thatled toward the ranch of Joel Waters.
IT was nearly noon when Laramie pulled uphis sweating bronc at the porch of the Boxed W ranch house. Therewere no punchers in sight. Hop Sing opened the door.
"Where's Waters?" rapped out Laramie.
"Solly!" Hop Sing beamed on the younger man. "He gone to town tosee doctluh and get leg fixed. Slim Jones dlive him in inbuckbload. He be back tonight."
"Damn!" groaned Laramie. He saw his plan being knocked into acocked hat. That plan had been to lead a band of men straight tothe outlaws' hide-out and bottle them up in their stronghold beforethey could scatter out over the range in their planned raid. TheBoxed W punchers would not follow a stranger without their boss'sorders, and only Waters could convince the bellicose citizens ofSan Leon that Laramie was on the level. Time was flying, and everyminute counted.
There was only one risky course left open. He swung on histiring horse and reined away on the road for San Leon.
He met no one on the road, for which he was thankful. When hedrew up on the outskirts of the town his horse was drawing laboringbreaths. He knew the animal would be useless in case he had to dustout of town with a posse on his heels.
Laramie knew of a back alley that led to the doctor's office,and by which he hoped to make it unseen. He dismounted and headeddown the alley, leading the gelding by the reins.
He sighted the little adobe shack where the town's one physicianlived and worked, when a jingle of spurs behind him caused him tojerk his head in time to see a man passing the end of the alley. Itwas Mart Rawley, and Laramie ducked behind his horse, cursing hisluck. Rawley must have been prowling around the town, expectinghim, and watching for him. His yell instantly split the lazysilence.
"Laramie!" howled Rawley. "Laramie's back! Hey, Bill! Lon! Joe!Everybody! Laramie's in town again! This way!"
Laramie forked his mustang and spurred it into a lumbering runfor the main street. Lead was singing down the alley as Laramieburst into Main Street, and saw Joel Waters sitting in a chair onthe porch of the doctor's shack.
"Get all the men you can rustle and head for the Diablos!" heyelled at the astonished ranchman. "I'll leave a trail for you tofollow. I found the gang at the old hide-out—and they'recomin' out tonight for a big cleanup!"
Then he was off again, his clattering hoofs drowning Waters'voice as he shouted after the rider. Men were yelling and .45sbanging. Ahorse and afoot they came at him, shooting as they ran.The dull, terrifying mob-roar rose, pierced with yells of: "Stringhim up!" "He shot Bob Anders in the back!"
His way to open country was blocked, and his horse wasexhausted. With a snarl Laramie wheeled and rode to the right for anarrow alley that did not seem to be blocked. It led between twobuildings to a side-street, and was not wide enough for a horse topass through. Maybe that was the reason it had been left unguarded.Laramie reached it, threw himself from his saddle and dived intothe narrow mouth.
For an instant his mount, standing with drooping head in theopening, masked his master from bullets, though Laramie had notintended sacrificing his horse for his own hide. Laramie had runhalf the length of the alley before someone reached out gingerly,grasped the reins and jerked the horse away. Laramie half turned,without pausing in his run, and fired high and harmlessly back downthe alley. The whistle of lead kept the alley clear until he boltedout the other end.
There, blocking his way in the side street, stood a figurebeside a black racing horse. Laramie's gun came up—then hestopped short, mouth open in amazement. It was Judy Anders whostood beside the black horse.
Before he could speak she sprang forward and thrust the reins inhis hand.
"Take him and go! He's fast!"
"Why—what?" Laramie sputtered, his thinking processes in amuddle. The mere sight of Judy Anders had that effect upon him.Hope flamed in him. Did her helping him mean—then reasonreturned and he took the gift the gods had given him withoutstopping for questions. As he grabbed the horn and swung up hemanaged: "I sure thank you kindly, miss—"
"Don't thank me," Judy Anders retorted curtly; her color washigh, but her red lips were sulky. "You're a Laramie and ought tobe hung, but you fought beside Bob yesterday when he needed help.The Anderses pay their debts. Will you go?"
A nervous stamp of her little foot emphasized the request. Theadvice was good. Three of the townsmen appeared with lifted gunsaround a corner of a nearby building. They hesitated as they sawthe girl near him, but began maneuvering for a clear shot at himwithout endangering her.
"See Joel Waters, at the doctor's office!" he yelled to her, andwas off for the open country, riding like an Apache, and not at allsure that she understood him. Men howled and guns crashed behindhim, and maddened citizens ran cursing for their mounts, toocrazy-mad to notice the girl who shrieked vainly at them, unheedingher waving arms.
"Stop! Stop! Wait! Listen to me!" Deaf to her cries theystreamed past her, ahorse and afoot, and burst out into the open.The mounted men spurred their horses savagely after the figure thatwas swiftly dwindling in the distance.
Judy dashed aside an angry tear and declaimed her opinion of menin general, and the citizens of San Leon in particular, in termsmore expressive than lady-like.
"What's the matter?" It was Joel Waters, limping out of thealley, supported by the doctor. The old man seemed stunned by therapidity of events. "What in the devil's all this mean? Where'sBuck?"
She pointed. "There he goes, with all the idiots in San Leonafter him."
"Not all the idiots," Waters corrected. "I'm still here.Dern it, the boy must be crazy, comin' here. I yelled myself deefat them fools, but they wouldn't listen—"
"They wouldn't listen to me, either!" cried Judy despairingly."But they won't catch him—ever, on that black of mine. Andmaybe when they come limping back, they'll be cooled down enough tohear the truth. If they won't listen to me, they will to Bob!"
"To Bob?" exclaimed the doctor. "Has he come out of his daze? Iwas just getting ready to come over and see him again, when Joelcame in for his leg to be dressed."
"Bob came out of it just a little while ago. He told me itwasn't Laramie who shot him. He's still groggy and uncertain as tojust what happened. He doesn't know who it was who shot him, but heknows it wasn't Buck Laramie. The last thing he remembers wasLaramie running some little distance ahead of him. The bullet camefrom behind. He thinks a stray slug from the men behind them hithim."
"I don't believe it was a stray," grunted Waters, his eyesbeginning to glitter. "I got a dern good idee who shot Bob. I'mgoin' to talk—"
"Better not bother Bob too much right now," interrupted thedoctor "I'll go over there—"
"Better go in a hurry if you want to catch Bob at home," thegirl said grimly. "He was pulling on his boots and yelling for ourcook to bring him his gun-belt when I left!"
"What? Why, he musn't get up yet!" The doctor transferredWaters' arm from his shoulder to that of the girl, and hurried awaytoward the house where Bob Anders was supposed to beconvalescing.
"Why did Buck come back here?" Judy wailed to Waters.
"From what he hollered at me as he lighted past, I reckon he'sfound somethin' up in the Diablos. He come for help. Probably wentto my ranch first, and findin' me not there, risked his neck comin'on here. Said send men after him, to foller signs he'd leave. Irelayed that there information on to Slim Jones, my foreman. Doclent Slim a horse, and Slim's high-tailin' it for the Boxed W rightnow to round up my waddies and hit the trail. As soon as these SanLeon snake-hunters has ruint their cayuses chasin' that blackstreak of light you give Buck, they'll be pullin' back into town.This time, I bet they'll listen."
"I'm glad he didn't shoot Bob," she murmured. "But why—whydid he come back here in the first place?"
"He come to pay a debt he figgered he owed on behalf of hisno-account brothers. His saddle bags is full of gold he aims togive back to the citizens of this here ongrateful town. What's thematter?"
For his fair companion had uttered a startled exclamation.
"N-nothing, only—only I didn't know it was that way! ThenBuck never robbed or stole, like his brothers?"
"Course he didn't!" snapped the old man irascibly. "Think I'dkept on bein' his friend all his life, if he had? Buck ain't toblame for what his brothers did. He's straight and he's always beenstraight."
"But he was with them, when—when—"
"I know." Waters' voice was gentler. "But he didn't shoot yoredad. That was Luke. And Buck was with 'em only because they madehim. He wasn't nothin' but a kid."
She did not reply and old Waters, noting the soft, new lightglowing in her eyes, the faint, wistful smile that curved her lips,wisely said nothing.
*
In the meantime the subject of their discussion was proving theworth of the sleek piece of horseflesh under him. He grinned as hesaw the distance between him and his pursuers widen, thrilled tothe marvel of the horse between his knees as any good horsemanwould. In half an hour he could no longer see the men who huntedhim.
He pulled the black to an easier, swinging gait that would eatup the miles for long hours on end, and headed for the Diablos. Butthe desperate move he was making was not dominating his thoughts.He was mulling over a new puzzle; the problem of why Judy Andershad come to his aid. Considering her parting words, she didn't havemuch use for him. If Bob had survived his wound, and assertedLaramie's innocence, why were the citizens so hot for his blood? Ifnot—would Judy Anders willingly aid a man she thought shother brother? He thrilled at the memory of her, standing there withthe horse that saved his life. If only he weren't aLaramie—How beautiful she was.
A good three hours before sundown Laramiewas in the foothills of the Diablos. In another hour, by dint ofreckless riding over trails that were inches in width, which evenhe ordinarily would have shunned, he came in sight of the entranceto the hide-out. He had left signs farther down the trail toindicate, not the way he had come, but the best way for Waters'punchers to follow him.
Once more he dismounted some distance from the tunnel and stolecautiously forward. There would be a new sentry at the entrance,and Laramie's first job must be to dispose of him silently.
He was halfway to the tunnel when he glimpsed the guard, sittingseveral yards from the mouth, near a clump of bushes. It was thescar-faced fellow Harrison had called Braxton, and he seemedwide-awake.
Falling back on Indian tactics, acquired from the Yaquis inMexico, Laramie began a stealthy, and necessarily slow, advance onthe guard, swinging in a circle that would bring him behind theman. He crept up to within a dozen feet.
Braxton was getting restless. He shifted his position, craninghis neck as he stared suspiciously about him. Laramie believed hehad heard, but not yet located, faint sounds made in Laramie'sprogress. In another instant he would turn his head and stare fullat the bushes which afforded the attacker scanty cover.
Gathering a handful of pebbles, Laramie rose stealthily to hisknees and threw them over the guard's head. They hit with a loudclatter some yards beyond the man. Braxton started to his feet withan oath. He glared in the direction of the sound with hisWinchester half lifted, neck craned. At the same instant Laramieleaped for him with his six-gun raised like a club.
Scarface wheeled, and his eyes flared in amazement. He jerkedthe rifle around, but Laramie struck it aside with his left hand,and brought down his pistol barrel crushingly on the man's head.Braxton went to his knees like a felled ox; slumped full-length andlay still.
Laramie ripped off belts and neckerchief from the senselessfigure; bound and gagged his captive securely. He appropriated hispistol, rifle and spare cartridges, then dragged him away from thetunnel mouth and shoved him in among a cluster of rocks and bushes,effectually concealing him from the casual glance.
"Won the first trick, by thunder!" grunted Laramie. "And now forthe next deal."
The success of that deal depended on whether or not all theoutlaws of Harrison's band were in the hide-out. Mart Rawley wasprobably outside, yet; maybe still back in San Leon. But Laramieknew he must take the chance that all the other outlawswereinside.
He glanced up to a ledge overhanging the tunnel mouth, wherestood precariously balanced the huge boulder which had given himhis idea for bottling up the canyon.
"Cork for my bottle!" muttered Laramie. "All I need now's alever."
A broken tree limb sufficed for that, and a few moments later hehad climbed to the ledge and was at work on the boulder. A moment'spanic assailed him as he feared its base was too deeply imbeddedfor him to move it. But under his fierce efforts he felt the greatmass give at last. A few minutes more of back-breaking effort,another heave that made the veins bulge on his temples—andthe boulder started toppling, crashed over the ledge and thundereddown into the tunnel entrance. It jammed there, almost filling thespace.
He swarmed down the wall and began wedging smaller rocks andbrush in the apertures between the boulder and the tunnel sides.The only way his enemies could get out now was by climbing thecanyon walls, a feat he considered practically impossible, or bylaboriously picking out the stones he had jammed in place, andsqueezing a way through a hole between the boulder and the tunnelwall. And neither method would be a cinch, with a resolutecowpuncher slinging lead at everything that moved.
Laramie estimated that his whole task had taken about half anhour. Slinging Braxton's rifle over his shoulder he clambered upthe cliffs. At the spot on the canyon rim where he had spied uponthe hide-out that morning, he forted himself by the simpleprocedure of crouching behind a fair-sized rock, with theWinchester and pistols handy at his elbows. He had scarcely takenhis position when he saw a mob of riders breaking away from thecorral behind the cabin. As he had figured, the gang was gettingaway to an early start for its activities of the night.
He counted twenty-five of them; and the very sun that glinted onpolished gun hammers and silver conchas seemed to reflect violenceand evil deeds.
"Four hundred yards," muttered Laramie, squinting along the bluerifle barrel. "Three fifty—three hundred—now I opensthe ball!"
At the ping of the shot dust spurted in front of the horses'hoofs, and the riders scattered like quail, with startledyells.
"Drop them shootin' irons and hi'st yore hands!" roared Laramie."Tunnel's corked up and you can't get out!"
His answer came in a vengeful hail of bullets, spattering alongthe canyon rim for yards in either direction. He had not expectedany other reply. His shout had been more for rhetorical effect thananything else. But there was nothing theatrical about his secondshot, which knocked a man out of his saddle. The fellow never movedafter he hit the ground.
The outlaws converged toward the tunnel entrance, firing as theyrode, aiming at Laramie's aerie, which they had finally located.Laramie replied in kind. A mustang smitten by a slug meant for hisrider rolled to the ground and broke his rider's leg under him. Asquat raider howled profanely as a slug ploughed through his breastmuscles.
The half a dozen men in the lead jammed into the tunnel andfound that Laramie had informed them truthfully. Their yellsreached a crescendo of fury. The others slid from their horses andtook cover behind the rocks that littered the edges of the canyon,dragging the wounded men with them.
From a rush and a dash the fight settled to a slow, deadlygrind, with nobody taking any rash chances. Having located his tinyfort, they concentrated their fire on the spot of the rim heoccupied. A storm of bullets drove him to cover behind thebreastworks, and became exceedingly irksome.
He had not seen either Rawley or Harrison. Rawley, he hoped, wasstill in San Leon, but the absence of Harrison worried him. Had he,too, gone to San Leon? If so, there was every chance that he mightget clean away, even if his band was wiped out. There was anotherchance, that he or Rawley, or both of them, might return to thehide-out and attack him from the rear. He cursed himself for nothaving divulged the true identity of the gang's leader to JudyAnders; but he always seemed addled when talking to her.
The ammunition supply of the outlaws seemed inexhaustible. Heknew at least six men were in the tunnel, and he heard them cursingand shouting, their voices muffled. He found himself confronted bya quandary that seemed to admit of no solution. If he did notdiscourage them, they would be breaking through the blocked tunneland potting him from the rear. But to affect this discouragementmeant leaving his point of vantage, and giving the men below achance to climb the canyon wall. He did not believe this could bedone, but he did not know what additions to the fortress had beenmade by the new occupants. They might have chiseled out handholdsat some point on the wall. Well, he'd have to look at thetunnel.
"Six-guns against rifles, if this keeps up much longer," hemuttered, working his way over the ledges. "Cartridges most gone.Why the devil don't Joel's men show up? I can't keep these hombreshemmed up forever—damn!"
His arm thrust his six-gun out as he yelped. Stones and brushhad been worked out at one place in the tunnel-mouth, and the headand shoulders of a man appeared. At the crash of Laramie's Colt thefellow howled and vanished. Laramie crouched, glaring; they wouldtry it again, soon. If he was not there to give them lead-argument,the whole gang would be squeezing out of the tunnel in no time.
He could not get back to the rim, and leave the tunnelunguarded; yet there was always the possibility of somebodyclimbing the canyon wall.
Had he but known it, his fears were justified. For while hecrouched on the ledge, glaring down at the tunnel-mouth, down inthe canyon a man was wriggling toward a certain point of the cliff,where his keen eyes had discerned something dangling. He haddiscovered Laramie's rope, hanging from the stunted tree on therim. Cautiously he lifted himself out of the tall grass, ready toduck back in an instant, then as no shot came from the canyon rim,he scuttled like a rabbit toward the wall.
Kicking off his boots and slinging his rifle on his back, hebegan swarming, ape-like, up the almost sheer wall. Hisoutstretched arm grasped the lower end of the rope, just as theothers in the canyon saw what he was doing, and opened a furiousfire on the rim to cover his activities. The outlaw on the ropeswore luridly, and went up with amazing agility, his flesh crawlingwith the momentary expectation of a bullet in his back.
The renewed firing had just the effect on Laramie that theclimber had feared it would have—it drew him back to hisbreastwork. It was not until he was crouching behind his breastworkthat it occurred to him that the volleys might have been intendedto draw him away from the tunnel. So he spared only a limitedglance over the rocks, for the bullets were winging so close thathe dared not lift his head high. He did not see the man on the ropecover the last few feet in a scrambling rush, and haul himself overthe rim, unslinging his rifle as he did so.
Laramie turned and headed back for the ledge whence he could seethe opening. And as he did so, he brought himself into full view ofthe outlaw who was standing upright on the rim, by the stuntedtree.
The whip-like crack of his Winchester reached Laramie an instantafter he felt a numbing impact in his left shoulder. The shock ofthe blow knocked him off his feet, and his head hit hard against arock. Even as he fell he heard the crashing of brush down thetrail, and his last, hopeless thought was that Rawley and Harrisonwere returning. Then the impact of his head against the rockknocked all thought into a stunned blank.
AN outlaw came scrambling out of thetunnel with desperate haste, followed by another and another. Onecrouched, rifle in hand, glaring up at the wall, while the otherstore away the smaller stones, and aided by those inside, rolled theboulder out of the entrance. Three men ran out of the tunnel andjoined them.
Their firing roused Buck Laramie. He blinked and glared, thenoriented himself. He saw five riders sweeping toward the tunnel,and six outlaws who had rushed out while he was unconscious,falling back into it for shelter; and he recognized the leader ofthe newcomers as Slim Jones, Joel Waters' foreman. The old man hadnot failed him.
"Take cover, you fools!" Laramie yelled wildly, unheard in thedin.
But the reckless punchers came straight on and ran into a blastof lead poured from the tunnel mouth into which the outlaws haddisappeared. One of the waddies saved his life by a leap from thesaddle as his horse fell with a bullet through its brain, andanother man threw wide his arms and pitched on his head, deadbefore he hit the pebbles.
Then only did Slim and his wild crew swerve their horses out ofline and fall back to cover. Laramie remembered the slug that hadfelled him, and turned to scan the canyon rim. He saw the man bythe stunted tree then; the fellow was helping one of his companionsup the same route he had taken, and evidently thought that his shothad settled Laramie, as he was making no effort at concealment.Laramie lifted his rifle and pulled the trigger—and thehammer fell with an empty click. He had no more rifle cartridges.Below him the punchers were futilely firing at the tunnel entrance,and the outlaws within were wisely holding their fire until theycould see something to shoot at.
Laramie crawled along a few feet to put himself out of range ofthe rifleman on the rim, then shouted: "Slim! Swing wide of thattrail and come up here with yore men!"
He was understood, for presently Slim and the three survivingpunchers came crawling over the tangle of rocks, having necessarilyabandoned their horses.
"'Bout time you was gettin' here," grunted Laramie. "Gimme some.30-30s."
A handful of cartridges were shoved into his eager fingers.
"We come as soon as we could," said Slim. "Had to ride to theranch to round up these snake-hunters."
"Where's Waters?"
"I left him in San Leon, cussin' a blue streak because hecouldn't get nobody to listen to him. Folks got no more sense'ncattle; just as easy to stampede and as hard to git millin' oncethey bust loose."
"What about Bob Anders?"
"Doctor said he was just creased; was just fixin' to go overthere when me and Joel come into town and he had to wait and dressJoel's leg. Hadn't come to hisself, last time the doc wasthere."
Laramie breathed a sigh of relief. At least Bob Anders was goingto live, even if he hadn't been able to name the man who shot him.Soon Judy would know the truth. Laramie snapped into action.
"Unless Waters sends us more men, we're licked. Tunnel's clearedand men climbin' the cliff."
"You're shot!" Jones pointed to Laramie's shirt shoulder, soakedwith blood.
"Forget it!" snapped Laramie. "Well, gimme that bandanna—"and while he knotted it into a crude bandage, he talked rapidly."Three of youhombres stay here and watch that tunnel. Don'tlet nobody out, d'you hear? Me and Slim are goin' to circle aroundand argy with the gents climbin' the cliffs. Come on, Slim."
It was rough climbing, and Laramie's shoulder burned like fire,with a dull throbbing that told him the lead was pressing near abone. But he set his teeth and crawled over the rough rocks,keeping out of sight of the men in the canyon below, until they hadreached a point beyond his tiny fort on the rim, and that muchcloser to the stunted tree.
They had kept below the crest and had not been sighted by theoutlaws on the rim, who had been engrossed in knotting a secondrope, brought up by the second man, to the end of the lariat tiedto the tree. This had been dropped down the wall again, and nowanother outlaw was hanging to the rope and being drawn straight upthe cliff like a water bucket by his two friends above.
Slim and Laramie fired almost simultaneously. Slim's bulletburned the fingers of the man clinging to the lariat. He howled andlet go the rope and fell fifteen feet to the canyon floor. Laramiewinged one of the men on the cliff, but it did not affect his speedas he raced after his companion in a flight for cover. Bulletswhizzed up from the canyon as the men below spotted Laramie and hiscompanion. They ducked back, but relentlessly piled lead after themen fleeing along the rim of the cliff.
These worthies made no attempt to make a stand. They knew thelone defender had received reinforcements and they were notstopping to learn in what force. Laramie and Slim caught fleetingglimpses of the fugitives as they headed out through the hills.
"Let 'em go," grunted Laramie. "Be no more trouble from thatquarter, and I bet them rannies won't try to climb that rope nomore. Come on; I hear guns talkin' back at the tunnel."
Laramie and his companion reached the punchers on the ledge intime to see three horsemen streaking it down the trail, with leadhumming after them. Three more figures lay sprawled about the mouthof the tunnel.
"They busted out on horseback," grunted one of the men, kneelingand aiming after the fleeing men. "Come so fast we couldn't stop'em all— uh."
His shot punctuated his remarks, and one of the fleeing horsemenswayed in his saddle. One of the others seemed to be wounded, asthe three ducked into the trees and out of sight.
"Three more hit the trail," grunted Slim.
"Not them," predicted Laramie. "They was bound to seeus—know they ain't but five of us. They won't go far; they'llbe sneakin' back to pot us in the back when their pards startbustin' out again."
"No racket in the tunnel now."
"They're layin' low for a spell. Too damn risky now. They didn'thave but six horses in the tunnel. They got to catch more and bring'em to the tunnel before they can make the rush.
"They'll wait till dark, and then we can't stop 'em from gettin'their cayuses into the tunnel. We can't stop 'em from tearin' outat this end, neither, unless we got more men. Slim, climb back upon the rim and lay down behind them rocks I stacked up. Watch thatrope so nobody climbs it; we got to cut that, soon's it gets dark.And don't let no horses be brought into the tunnel, if you can helpit."
Slim crawled away, and a few moments later his rifle beganbanging, and he yelled wrathfully: "They're already at it!"
"Listen!" ejaculated Laramie suddenly.
Down the trail, out of sight among the trees sounded athundering of hoofs, yells and shots.
The shots ceased, then after a pause, the hoofs swept on, and acrowd of men burst into view.
"Yippee!" whooped one of the punchers bounding into the air andswinging his hat. "Reinforcements, b'golly! It's a regulararmy!"
"Looks like all San Leon was there!" bellowed another. "Hey,boys, don't git in line with that tunnel mouth! Spread out alongthe trail—who's them three fellers they got tied to theirsaddles?"
"The three snakes that broke loose from the tunnel!" yelped thethird cowboy. "They scooped 'em in as they come! Looks likeeverybody's there. There's Charlie Ross, and Jim Watkins, themayor, and Lon Evans, Mart Rawley's bartender—reckon hedidn't know his boss was a crook—and by golly, look who'sleadin' 'em!"
"Bob Anders!" ejaculated Laramie, staring at thepale-faced, but erect figure who, with bandaged head, rode ahead ofthe thirty or forty men who came clattering up the trail and swungwide through the brush to avoid the grim tunnel mouth. Anders sawhim and waved his hand, and a deep yell of approbation rose fromthe men behind the sheriff. Laramie sighed deeply. A few hours agothese same men wanted to hang him.
Rifles were spitting from the tunnel, and the riders swung fromtheir horses and began to take up positions on each side of thetrail, as Anders took in the situation at a glance and snapped hisorders. Rifles began to speak in answer to the shots of theoutlaws. Laramie came clambering down the cliff to grasp Anders'outstretched hand.
"I came to just about the time you hit town today, Laramie," hesaid. "Was just tellin' Judy it couldn't been you that shot me,when all that hell busted loose and Judy run to help you out if shecould. Time I could get my clothes on, and out-argy the doctor, andget on the streets, you was gone with these addle-heads chasin'you. We had to wait till they give up the chase and come back, andthen me and Judy and Joel Waters lit into 'em. Time we got throughtalkin' they was plumb whipped down and achin' to take a hand inyore game."
"I owe you all a lot, especially your sister. Where's Rawley?"Laramie asked.
"We thought he was with us when we lit out after you," thesheriff answered. "But when we started back we missed him."
"Look out!" yelled Slim on the rim above them, pumping leadfrantically. "They're rushin' for the tunnel on horses! Blame it,why ain't somebody up here with me? I can't stop 'emall—"
Evidently the gang inside the canyon had been whipped todesperation by the arrival of the reinforcements, for they camethundering through the tunnel laying down a barrage of lead as theycame. It was sheer madness. They ran full into a blast of lead thatpiled screaming horses and writhing men in a red shambles. Thesurvivors staggered back into the tunnel.
Struck by a sudden thought, Laramie groped among the bushes andhauled out the guard, Braxton, still bound and gagged. The fellowwas conscious and glared balefully at his captor. Laramie tore thegag off, and demanded: "Where's Harrison and Rawley?"
"Rawley rode for San Leon after you got away from us thismornin'," growled Braxton sullenly. "Harrison's gone, got scaredand pulled out. I dunno where he went."
"Yo're lyin'," accused Laramie.
"What'd you ast me for, if you know so much?" sneered Braxton,and lapsed in stubborn, hill-country silence, which Laramie knewnothing would break, so long as the man chose to hold histongue.
"You mean Harrison's in on this, Buck?" the sheriff exclaimed."Joel told me about Rawley."
"In on it?" Laramie laughed grimly. "Harrison is the kingpin,and Rawley is his chief sidewinder, I ain't seen neither Harrisonnor Rawley since I got here. Be just like them rats to double-crosstheir own men, and run off with the loot they've already got.
"But we still got this nest to clean out, and here's my idea.Them that's still alive in the canyon are denned up in or near thetunnel. Nobody nigh the cabin. If four or five of us can hole up inthere, we'll have 'em from both sides. We'll tie some lariatstogether, and some of us will go down the walls and get in thecabin. We'll scatter men along the rim to see none of 'em climbout, and we'll leave plenty men here to hold the tunnel if they trythat again—which they will, as soon as it begins to get dark,if we don't scuttle 'em first."
"You oughta been a general, cowboy. Me and Slim and a couple ofmy Bar X boys'll go for the cabin. You better stay here; yoreshoulder ain't fit for tight-rope work and such."
"She's my hand," growled Laramie. "I started dealin' her and Iaim to set in till the last pot's raked in."
"Yo're the dealer," acquiesced Anders. "Let's go."
*
Ten minutes later found the party of five clustered on thecanyon rim. The sun had not yet set beyond the peaks, but thecanyon below was in shadow. The spot Laramie had chosen for descentwas some distance beyond the stunted tree. The rim there washigher, the wall even more precipitous. It had the advantage,however, of an outjut of rock that would partially serve to maskthe descent of a man on a lariat from the view of the men lurkingabout the head of the canyon.
If anyone saw the descent of the five invaders, there was nosign to show they had been discovered. Man after man they slid downthe dangling rope and crouched at the foot, Winchesters ready.Laramie came last, clinging with one hand and gritting his teethagainst the pain of his wounded shoulder. Then began the advance onthe cabin.
That slow, tortuous crawl across the canyon floor seemedendless. Laramie counted the seconds, fearful that they would beseen, fearful that night would shut down before they were forted.The western rim of the canyon seemed crested with golden fire,contrasting with the blue shadows floating beneath it. He sighedgustily as they reached their goal, with still enough light fortheir purpose.
The cabin doors were shut, the windows closely shuttered.
"Let's go!" Anders had one hand on the door, drawn Colt in theother.
"Wait," grunted Laramie. "I stuck my head into a loop here oncealready today. You all stay here while I take apaseararound to the back and look things over from that side. Don't go intill you hear me holler."
Then Laramie was sneaking around the cabin, Indian-fashion, gunin hand. He was little more than half the distance to the back whenhe was paralyzed to hear a voice inside the cabin call out: "Allclear!"
Before he could move or shout a warning, he heard Anders answer:"Comin', Buck!" Then the front door slammed, and there was thesound of a sliding bolt, a yell of dismay from the Bar X men. Withsick fury Laramie realized that somebody lurking inside the cabinhad heard him giving his instructions and imitated his voice totrick the sheriff into entering. Confirmation came instantly, in afamiliar voice—the voice of Ely Harrison!
"Now we can make terms, gentlemen!" shouted the banker, hisvoice rasping with ferocious exultation. "We've got your sheriff ina wolf-trap with hot lead teeth! You can give us road-belts toMexico, or he'll be deader than hell in three minutes!"
LARAMIE was charging for the rear of thehouse before the triumphant shout ended. Anders would never agreeto buying freedom for that gang to save his own life; and Laramieknew that whatever truce might be agreed upon, Harrison would neverlet the sheriff live.
The same thought motivated the savage attack of Slim Jones andthe Bar X men on the front door; but that door happened to be ofunusual strength. Nothing short of a log battering ram could smashit. The rear door was of ordinary thin paneling.
Bracing his good right shoulder to the shock, Laramie rammed hisfull charging weight against the rear door. It crashed inward andhe catapulted into the room gun-first.
He had a fleeting glimpse of a swarthy Mexican wheeling from thedoorway that led into the main room, and then he ducked and jerkedthe trigger as a knife sang past his head. The roar of the .45shook the narrow room and the knife thrower hit the planks and laytwitching.
With a lunging stride Laramie was through the door, into themain room. He caught a glimpse of men standing momentarily frozen,glaring up from their work of tying Bob Anders to a chair—ElyHarrison, another Mexican, and Mart Rawley.
For an infinitesimal tick of time the scene held—thenblurred with gun-smoke as the .45s roared death across the narrowconfines. Hot lead was a coal of hell burning its way through theflesh of Laramie's already wounded shoulder. Bob Anders lurched outof the chair, rolling clumsily toward the wall. The room was a madwelter of sound and smoke in the last light of gathering dusk.
Laramie half rolled behind the partial cover of a cast ironstove, drawing his second gun. The Mexican fled to the bunk room,howling, his broken left arm flopping. Mart Rawley backed after himat a stumbling run, shooting as he went; crouched inside the doorhe glared, awaiting his chance. But Harrison, already badlywounded, had gone berserk. Disdaining cover, or touched withmadness, he came storming across the room, shooting as he came,spattering blood at every step. His eyes flamed through thedrifting fog of smoke like those of a rabid wolf.
Laramie raised himself to his full height and faced him. Searinglead whined past his ear, jerked at his shirt, stung his thigh; buthis own gun was burning red and Harrison was swaying in his stridelike a bull which feels the matador's steel. His last shot flamedalmost in Laramie's face, and then at close range a bullet splitthe cold heart of the devil of San Leon, and the greed andambitions of Ely Harrison were over.
Laramie, with one loaded cartridge left in his last gun, leanedback against the wall, out of range of the bunk room.
"Come on out, Rawley," he called. "Harrison's dead. Yore game'splayed out."
The hidden gunman spat like an infuriated cat.
"No, my game ain't played out!" he yelled in a voice edged withblood-madness. "Not till I've wiped you out, you mangy stray. Butbefore I kill you, I want you to know that you ain't the firstLaramie I've sent to hell! I'd of thought you'd knowed me, in spiteof these whiskers. I'm Rawlins, you fool! Killer Rawlins, thatplugged yore horse-thief brother Luke in Santa Maria!"
"Rawlins!" snarled Laramie, suddenly white. "No wonder youknowed me!"
"Yes, Rawlins!" howled the gunman. "I'm the one that madefriends with Luke Laramie and got him drunk till he told me allabout this hide-out and the trails across the desert. Then I pickeda fight with Luke when he was too drunk to stand, and killed him tokeep his mouth shut! And what you goin' to do about it?"
"I'm going to kill you, you hell-buzzard!" gritted Laramie,lurching away from the wall as Rawlins came frothing through thedoor, with both guns blazing. Laramie fired once from the hip. Hislast bullet ripped through Killer Rawlins' warped brain. Laramielooked down on him as he died, with his spurred heels drumming adeath-march on the floor.
Frantic feet behind him brought him around to see a livid,swarthy face convulsed with fear and hate, a brown arm lifting arazor-edged knife. He had forgotten the Mexican. He threw up hisempty pistol to guard the downward sweep of the sharp blade, thenonce more the blast of a six-gun shook the room. Jose Martinez ofChihuahua lifted one scream of invocation and blasphemy at someforgotten Aztec god, as his soul went speeding its way to hell.
Laramie turned and stared stupidly through the smoke-blurreddusk at a tall, slim figure holding a smoking gun. Others werepouring in through the kitchen. So brief had been the desperatefight that the men who had raced around the house at the firstbellow of the guns, had just reached the scene. Laramie shook hishead dazedly.
"Slim!" he muttered. "See if Bob's hurt!"
"Not me!" The sheriff answered for himself, struggling up to asitting posture by the wall. "I fell outa the chair and rolled outaline when the lead started singin'. Cut me loose, somebody."
"Cut him loose, Slim," mumbled Laramie. "I'm kinda dizzy."
Stark silence followed the roar of the six-guns, silence thathurt Buck Laramie's ear-drums. Like a man in a daze he staggered toa chair and sank down heavily upon it. Scarcely knowing what he didhe found himself muttering the words of a song he hated:
"When the folks heard that Brady was dead,
They all turned out, all dressed in red;
Marched down the street a-singin' a song:
'Brady's gone to hell with his Stetson on!'"
He was hardly aware when Bob Anders came and cut hisblood-soaked shirt away and washed his wounds, dressing them asbest he could with strips torn from his own shirt, and whisky froma jug found on the table. The bite of the alcohol roused Laramiefrom the daze that enveloped him, and a deep swig of the samemedicine cleared his dizzy head.
Laramie rose stiffly; he glanced about at the dead men staringglassily in the lamplight, shuddered, and retched suddenly at thereek of the blood that blackened the planks.
"Let's get out in the open!"
As they emerged into the cool dusk, they were aware that theshooting had ceased. A voice was bawling loudly at the head of thecanyon, though the distance made the words unintelligible.
Slim came running back through the dusk.
"They're makin' a parley, Bob!" he reported. "They want to knowif they'll be give a fair trial if they surrender."
"I'll talk to 'em. Rest of you keep under cover."
The sheriff worked toward the head of the canyon until he waswithin earshot of the men in and about the tunnel, and shouted:"Are youhombres ready to give in?"
"What's yore terms?" bawled back the spokesman, recognizing thesheriff's voice.
"I ain't makin' terms. You'll all get a fair trial in an honestcourt. You better make up yore minds. I know they ain't a lot ofyou left. Harrison's dead and so is Rawley. I got forty men outsidethis canyon and enough inside, behind you, to wipe you out. Throwyore guns out here where I can see 'em, and come out with yorehands high. I'll give you till I count ten."
And as he began to count, rifles and pistols began clattering onthe bare earth, and haggard, blood-stained, powder-blackened menrose from behind rocks with their hands in the air, and came out ofthe tunnel in the same manner.
"We quits," announced the spokesman. "Four of the boys arelaying back amongst the rocks too shot up to move under their ownpower. One's got a broke laig where his horse fell on him. Some ofthe rest of us need to have wounds dressed."
Laramie and Slim and the punchers came out of cover, with gunstrained on the weary outlaws, and at a shout from Anders, the menoutside came streaming through the tunnel, whooping vengefully.
"No mob-stuff," warned Anders, as the men grabbed the prisonersand bound their hands, none too gently. "Get those four wounded menout of the rocks, and we'll see what we can do for them."
Presently, a curious parade came filing through the tunnel intothe outer valley where twilight still lingered. And as Laramieemerged from that dark tunnel, he felt as if his dark and sinisterpast had fallen from him like a worn-out coat.
One of the four wounded men who had been brought through thetunnel on crude stretchers rigged out of rifles and coats was in atalkative mood. Fear and the pain of his wound had broken his nerveentirely and he was overflowing with information.
"I'll tell you anything you want to know! Put in a good word forme at my trial, and I'll spill the works!" he declaimed, ignoringthe sullen glares of his hardier companions.
"How did Harrison get mixed up in this deal?" demanded thesheriff.
"Mixed, hell! He planned the whole thing. He was cashier in thebank when the Laramies robbed it; the real ones, I mean. If ithadn't been for that robbery, old Brown would soon found out thatHarrison was stealin' from him. But the Laramies killed Brown andgive Harrison a chance to cover his tracks. They got blamed for thedough he'd stole, as well as the money they'd actually taken.
"That give Harrison an idee how to be king of San Leon. TheLaramies had acted as scapegoats for him once, and he aimed to use'em again. But he had to wait till he could get to be president ofthe bank, and had taken time to round up a gang."
"So he'd ruin the ranchers, give mortgages and finally get theiroutfits, and then send his coyotes outa the country and be king ofSan Leon," broke in Laramie. "We know that part of it. Where'dRawlins come in?"
"Harrison knowed him years ago, on the Rio Grande. When Harrisonaimed to raise his gang, he went to Mexico and found Rawlins.Harrison knowed the real Laramies had a secret hide-out, so Rawlinsmade friends with Luke Laramie, and—"
"We know all about that," interrupted Anders with a quick glanceat Buck.
"Yeah? Well, everything wasbueno till word come fromMexico that Buck Laramie was ridin' up from there. Harrison gotskittish. He thought Laramie was comin' to take toll for hisbrother. So he sent Rawlins to waylay Laramie. Rawlins missed, butlater went on to San Leon to try again. He shot you instead,Anders. Word was out to get you, anyway. You'd been prowlin' tooclose to our hide-out to suit Harrison.
"Harrison seemed to kinda go locoed when first he heard Laramiewas headin' this way. He made us pull that fool stunt of a fakebank hold-up to pull wool over folks's eyes more'n ever. Hell,nobody suspected him anyway. Then he risked comin' out here. But hewas panicky and wanted us to git ready to make a clean sweeptonight and pull out. When Laramie got away from us this mornin',Harrison decided he'd ride to Mexico with us.
"Well, when the fightin' had started, Harrison and Rawley stayedouta sight. Nothin' they could do, and they hoped we'd be able tobreak out of the canyon. They didn't want to be seen andrecognized. If it should turn out Laramie hadn't told anybody hewas head of the gang, Harrison would be able to stay on, then."
*
Preparations were being made to start back to San Leon with theprisoners, when a sheepish looking delegation headed by Mayor JimWatkins approached Laramie. Watkins hummed and hawed withembarrassment, and finally blurted out, with typical Westernbluntness:
"Look here, Laramie, we owe you somethin' now, and we're just ashot too pay our debts as you are to pay yours. Harrison had a smallranch out a ways from town, which he ain't needin' no more, and heain't got no heirs, so we can get it easy enough. We thought if youwas aimin', maybe, to stay around San Leon, we'd like powerful wellto make you a present of that ranch, and kinda help you get a startin the cow business. And we don't want the fifty thousand Waterssaid you aimed to give us. You've wiped out that debt."
A curious moroseness had settled over Laramie, a futile feelingof anti-climax, and a bitter yearning he did not understand. Hefelt old and weary, a desire to be alone, and an urge to ride awayover the rim of the world and forget—he did not even realizewhat it was he wanted to forget.
"Thanks." he muttered. "I'm paying that fifty thousand back tothe men it belonged to. And I'll be movin' on tomorrow."
"Where to?"
He made a helpless, uncertain gesture.
"You think it over," urged Watkins, turning away. Men werealready mounting, moving down the trail. Anders touched Laramie'ssleeve.
"Let's go. Buck. You need some attention on them wounds."
"Go ahead. Bob. I'll be along. I wanta kind set here andrest."
Anders glanced sharply at him and then made a hidden gesture toSlim Jones, and turned away. The cavalcade moved down the trail inthe growing darkness, armed men riding toward a new era of peaceand prosperity; gaunt, haggard bound men riding toward thepenitentiary and the gallows.
Laramie sat motionless, his empty hands hanging limp on hisknees. A vital chapter in his life had closed, leaving him withouta goal. He had kept his vow. Now he had no plan or purpose to takeits place.
Slim Jones, standing nearby, not understanding Laramie's mood,but not intruding on it, started to speak. Then both men liftedtheir heads at the unexpected rumble of wheels.
"A buckboard!" ejaculated Slim.
"No buckboard ever come up that trail," snorted Laramie.
"One's comin' now; and who d'you think? Old Joel, by golly. Andlook who's drivin'!"
Laramie's heart gave a convulsive leap and then started poundingas he saw the slim supple figure beside the old rancher. She pulledup near them and handed the lines to Slim, who sprang to help herdown.
"Biggest fight ever fit in San Leon County!" roared Waters, "andI didn't git to fire a shot. Cuss a busted laig, anyway!"
"You done a man's part, anyway, Joel," assured Laramie; and thenhe forgot Joel Waters entirely, in the miracle of seeing JudyAnders standing before him, smiling gently, her hand outstretchedand the rising moon melting her soft hair to golden witch-fire.
"I'm sorry for the way I spoke to you today," she said softly."I've been bitter about things that were none of your fault."
"D-don't apologize, please," he stuttered, inwardly cursinghimself because of his confusion. The touch of her slim, firm handsent shivers through his frame and he knew all at once what thatempty, gnawing yearning was; the more poignant now, because sounattainable.
"You saved my neck. Nobody that does that needs to apologize.You was probably right, anyhow. Er—uh—Bob went down thetrail with the others. You must have missed him."
"I saw him and talked to him," she said softly. "He said youwere behind them. I came on, expecting to meet you."
He was momentarily startled. "You came on to meetme? Oh,of course. Joel would want to see how bad shot up I was." Heachieved a ghastly excuse for a laugh.
"Mr. Waters wanted to see you, of course. But I—Buck, Iwanted to see you, too."
She was leaning close to him, looking up at him, and he wasdizzy with the fragrance and beauty of her; and in his dizzinesssaid the most inane and idiotic thing he could possibly havesaid.
"To see me?" he gurgled wildly. "What—what you want to seeme for?"
She seemed to draw away from him and her voice was a bit tooprecise.
"I wanted to apologize for my rudeness this morning," she said,a little distantly.
"I said don't apologize to me," he gasped. "You saved mylife—and I—I—Judy, dang it, I love you!"
It was out—the amazing statement, blurted outinvoluntarily. He was frozen by his own audacity, stunned andparalyzed. But she did not seem to mind. Somehow he found she wasin his arms, and numbly he heard her saying: "I love you too, Buck.I've loved you ever since I was a little girl, and we went toschool together. Only I've tried to force myself not to think ofyou for the past six years. But I've loved the memory ofyou—that's why it hurt me so to think that you'd gonebad—as I thought you had. That horse I brought you—itwasn't altogether because you'd helped Bob that I brought it toyou. It—it was partly because of my own feeling. Oh, Buck, tolearn you're straight and honorable is like having a black shadowlifted from between us. You'll never leave me, Buck?"
"Leave you?" Laramie gasped. "Just long enough to find Watkinsand tell him I'm takin' him up on a proposition he made me, andthen I'm aimin' on spendin' the rest of my life makin' you happy."The rest was lost in a perfectly natural sound.
"Kissin'!" beamed Joel Waters, sitting in his buckboard andgently manipulating his wounded leg. "Reckon they'll be a marryin'in these parts purty soon, Slim."
"Don't tell me yo're figgerin' on gittin' hitched?" inquiredSlim, pretending to misunderstand, but grinning behind hishand.
"You go light on that sarcastic tone. I'm liable to git marriedany day now. It's just a matter of time till I decide what type ofwoman would make me the best wife."
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