Five

They rode into a small clearing that paralleled the stream, and dismounted.

“All right, boy,” Brandon said, crooking a finger at Rome. “I’m appointing you the hostler for this outfit. Look after the horses.”

Able Rome, blandly ignoring the lawman’s words, turned, began to loosen his saddle cinch. Back up the slope in the darkening trees an owl hooted.

“You hear me?”

Starbuck faced the marshal. “He’s got a name. Might try using it,” he drawled.

Brandon gave Shawn a contemptuous side glance, spat, bobbed his head. “Why, sure ... Mr. Rome.” he said with exaggerated politeness, “I’ll be obliged to you for looking after the horses.”

Able smiled faintly, began to gather up the trailing reins of the five mounts.

“And you two—Mr. Gilder and Mr. Moody, start dragging in some wood for a fire,” the lawman continued. He swung his sardonic gaze to Shawn. “If you don’t mind, Mr. Starbuck, you’ll do the cooking.” Shawn nodded coolly to the marshal, neither angered nor amused by his broad irony.

“Sack of grub hanging on my saddle. Go light on it. Liable to have to last a few days,” Brandon said and, moving to where Rome was picketing the horses, drew the rifle from his saddle boot.

“Taking me a look up the trail. Back in a few minutes.”

Starbuck watched him stride off and then crossed to get the flour sack of supplies hanging from Brandon’s saddle. As he pulled at the cord securing it, he felt Rome’s eyes upon him and looked up. The man’s features were taut.

“Don’t go out of your way to do me any favors,” he said in a low voice. “I can look after myself.”

“I expect you can,” Shawn replied indifferently. “It wasn’t meant as a favor.”

“I’ve been bucking up against men like the marshal all my life and I’ve got my own way of handling them. I don’t need you or anybody else horning in for me just because I’m colored.”

Rome’s words did bespeak some measure of education, Shawn realized, but his belligerent attitude more than offset the asset.

“That wasn’t the reason for it,” he said and, wheeling, returned to the center of the clearing where Dave Gilder, sweat standing out on his forehead in large beads despite the coolness, was placing stones in the customary horseshoe arrangement.

“I expect the marshal’ll want the fire kept low,” he said. “He won’t want to let them outlaws know we’re on their heels.”

Starbuck agreed, began to dig around in the sack of grub. Brandon had neglected to bring a large spider or a coffee pot of suitable size, forcing him to fall back on his own trail equipment. Again he was conscious of Able Rome’s dark-eyed consideration as he probed his own saddlebags for the necessary items, but the man said nothing and he had no words for him.

A time later Harry Brandon returned. The meal of fried meat, potatoes, warmed-over bread and coffee was under way on the fire. Gilder and Moody, their supply of wood gathered and nearby, had brought in the blanket rolls and placed them about where they would be handy. Able Rome, his charges watered and now grazing on plentiful grass, hunkered in solitary silence at the edge of the glow.

“Ahead of us, just like I knowed they’d be,” the lawman said, propping his rifle against a tree. “That grub about ready?”

“About,” Starbuck answered. We moving after them tonight?”

Brandon glanced about the camp, giving it his appraisal. “No hurry—and no point. They can’t give us the slip now, there being only one trail ... Be a mite risky in the dark, anyway.”

Shawn let it drop. It was up to the lawman and he evidently didn’t feel it was necessary to close in at once. Besides, the long hours he had already put in on the sorrel were beginning to catch up to him.

Thunder growled in the distance. Brandon glanced at the black sky, murmured, “Reckon it’s a-coming,” and walked to where Rome had fitted his saddle over a clump of mountain mahogany. Pulling at the tie strings behind the cantle, he freed his brush jacket and pulled it on.

Settling it about his torso, he reached into an inner pocket and produced a pint bottle of whiskey. Making no effort to conceal his actions, he drew the cork and treated himself to a healthy swallow. Then, smacking his lips and brushing his mustache, he replaced the cork in the container and returned it to his pocket, seemingly oblivious of the watching men.

“Grub’s ready,” Starbuck said, glancing at Dave Gilder.

The shine of sweat was again on his haggard face as he stared into the fire. Raising a hand, he ran his fingers unsteadily through his thinning red hair.

Able Rome, plate in hand, came forward at once, began to help himself from the contents of the two spiders. Brandon, unsmiling, waited until the black man had finished and then took his turn, plainly irritated. Gilder followed and Shawn then looked expectantly at Moody, who had not stirred.

“You’re next.”

The immobile, sallow features of the man altered slightly. He shrugged half-heartedly, took up a plate and portioned out a small amount of the food. Shawn gave him a questioning smile.

“Either you don’t have much of an appetite or my cooking’s not as good as I figured.”

“Foods fine—just not hungry,” Moody said in an apologetic tone. “Coffee’s what I need most.”

Starbuck pushed one of the containers at the man and turned to fill his own plate. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast—and then but little—and hunger was pushing at him.

They ate in silence, all but Walt Moody wolfing down the food, and when it was gone made their way to the creek, where each cleaned his plate and tools. Shawn made more coffee and after storing the remainder of the supplies where mice and other small animals could not get to them, moved back to the fire and settled down on his folded blanket.

The others were there before him, sprawled in the warm glow. Gilder had produced a pipe, was puffing at it nervously. Both Rome and Moody had built cigarettes, and Shawn dug into his shirt pocket for his sack of tobacco and papers.

“Ought to have a better fire than that,” Brandon said cheerfully. Gathering up an armload of dry limbs, he dropped them onto the low flames. “We running short on wood or something?”

Gilder glanced up at the lawman. “I figured you wouldn’t want them outlaws to spot us.”

The lawman dismissed the thought with a motion of his hand. “Makes no difference. They know—and there ain’t nothing they can do about it.”

“Except move on,” Starbuck said, finishing his smoke and hanging it in a corner of his mouth.

“Not them—not while it’s night. They’ve got two pack mules they won’t chance losing. Be daylight before they’ll pull out ... That there fancy belt you’re wearing, does it mean you’re a champion fighter or something?”

“No,” Shawn replied, looking down at the silver buckle with its superimposed ivory figure of a boxer. “It belonged to my Pa. It was given him by some folks back where I came from. He was good at boxing, but he wasn’t a champion. Could have been, I expect, if he wanted.”

“You know how to do that kind of fighting?” Gilder asked.

“Pa taught my brother and me—both.”

Able Rome flipped his spent cigarette into the surging flames. “I once saw a boxing match,” he said, speaking for the first time since words had passed between him and Shawn at their arrival. “It was quite a show.”

Starbuck turned to the man. “Was that somewhere around here?”

“No, it was during the war. At the camp where I was stationed.”

Shawn settled back. “I thought maybe one of the boxers might’ve been my brother. He puts on exhibition matches now and then ... About the only way I ever turn up a line on him.”

“Is he lost or something?” Gilder asked.

“Not lost,” Brandon explained. “Starbuck just can’t locate him. Been hunting him all over the country for years. He thinks maybe one of them outlaws could be him.”

“It was your idea, not mine,” Shawn said drily. “But I’m not saying you couldn’t be right. It’s been a long time since I last saw Ben. He could’ve changed. I doubt he’d turn to killing as a way of making a living, though.”

There was silence after that, broken only by the noisy clacking of innumerable rain crickets filling the night with their prophecies. Able Rome began to roll a fresh cigarette.

“What’s he look like? Could be I’ve run into him somewheres.”

Shawn went into details, such as they were, of Ben, noting that he could be living under the name of Damon Friend. When he had finished the men all shook their heads. None could recall ever encountering anyone of either name or who fit the meager description he could supply.

“What’s got you figuring he might be one of them killers?” Dave Gilder asked.

Shawn ducked his head at the lawman. “The marshal said one of them is named Ben and that he sort of fills the bill.”

Brandon nodded. “If it’s the Ben Snow I’m thinking of,” he said, tossing more wood into the fire, “he does. You got to remember, howsomever, I ain’t seen none of them killers. I only know what the guard told me.”

Able Rome studied Starbuck with narrowed eyes. “You volunteer for this posse on the strength of that?”

“Partly. Sometimes I have to go on what I can get—even if it is a slim lead. Otherwise it could turn out someday that I spent a lot of time looking without really looking at all.”

“I know what you mean,” Dave Gilder murmured, staring into the flames. “A man can keep promising himself tomorrows—that he’s going to do something, I mean, and then one day he wakes up and finds out all he’s got is a lot of empty yesterdays laying behind him, and he ain’t done nothing.”

“Just the way it can turn out,” Brandon said. Picking up a small clod of dirt, he tossed it at Walt Moody.

“Ain’t that what you say, greenhorn?”

Moody, in brooding silence through it all, roused himself. Hunched forward, shoulders slumped, he locked his hands together and stared off into the night.

“I don’t think I’m an authority on much of anything,” he said. “I figure that what’s going to happen to a man is going to happen. God’s will, I guess you’d call it—”

“God,” Gilder broke in, stirring restlessly, “I don’t know whether there’s such a thing as God or not, but there sure is a hell! I’ve been in it from the day I was born, and I don’t figure I’ll be out of it until I’m dead—if then.”

Walt Moody shifted his sick eyes to Dave. “I agree with that. The drawback is that a man gets born whether he wants to be or not. Has no say in it—just has to start living and making the best of what comes his way and whatever happens to him. Some make a go of it, others fail—even though they try.”

Thunder rolled menacingly again, now somewhat louder and nearer. Brandon grinned across the flickering flames at Able.

“Ain’t you got nothing to say about this, Mr. Rome? I figured you’d be a genuine humdinger of expert when it comes to this here moaning and groaning about living.”

“I expect I am, marshal,” Rome replied coolly, and glanced at Starbuck. “That name of yours—Shawn. Are you part Indian?”

“No. My mother once taught some Shawnee kids. I guess she liked the sound of the word, made it into a name for me.”

The answer seemed to disappoint Able Rome. It was as if he had been hoping for a kindred soul in variance. He shrugged, and once again drew out his cigarette makings.

Brandon looked up into the blackness that was the sky, as a deep rumbling was again heard. “Aim to start early in the morning. Reckon we’d best be turning in. Boy—uh, Mr. Rome, you sure them horses can’t get loose?”

“They’ll be there when we want them,” Able said.

“Well, they sure better be or—”

Brandon’s words were checked as the fire exploded suddenly into a shower of sparks and ashes and burning brands. A split second later, the hollow crack of a gunshot echoed through the night. For a long breath no one moved, and then Starbuck threw himself to one side, clear of the flames’ pale glow.

“Get out of the light!” he yelled.

The outlaws had spotted them.