Link Forster fired.
The man he aimed at seemed to jolt in the saddle, the animal jumped forward and the man fell with his arms around the horse’s neck.
At once a burst of firing started along the edges of the shallow valley. Gunsmoke drifted, dust spurted, the point rider fell sideways from his horse as the herd started to move.
Off to Forster’s right was the remuda. The remudero’s back was to the man, but even so he could see that he was no more than a boy. He swung his rifle and without thought drove a shot into the back. He missed. The horses were on the move like the cattle now, racing north, the boy going with them. Forster fired and missed again, but one of the men above the valley chopped him from the saddle. The slight figure bounced once, lifted its head and then lay still.
Forster was on his feet, running for his horse, yelling orders. He saw men breaking from cover. As he reared into the saddle, he saw one of the cattlemen racing his horse across the valley toward the ambushers, firing as he came. Damned fool, he didn’t stand a chance. Somebody cut him down in short time. Man and horse went down in a heap. The horse got to its feet and ran wildly, stirrup-irons flying, but the man lay still with a leg twisted awkwardly under him.
The cows were racing wildly north now, already almost out of the valley and onto the plain. The riders Forster had detailed went after them, their horses going at a flat run. The others rode down into the valley looking for survivors. A burst of firing came from the north end of the valley and Forster turned his horse toward the sound. He rode through the pall of dust raised by the herd and saw two of his men headed in the same direction. Almost at once Forster saw that there was a cattleman standing by his fallen horse, firing. Forster spurred down on him. Even as he charged on the man, the fellow fired and knocked a Kansas man from the saddle. Forster drove his horse straight down on the man. The fellow raised his rifle again, fired and missed. In the next second, the racing horse hit him with a shoulder and knocked him flying. The man at once tried to get to his feet, but the other Kansas man likewise rode into him and put him down again. This time, he lost his rifle and was slow to rise. Forster turned and stopped his horse, raised his rifle and shot the man through the head. The Texan went down and stayed down.
Shots came from down valley. Forster and his men rode back that way. They found two Kansas men off their horses and hesitating. One of the drovers, they yelled, had holed up in the rocks yonder.
“For Crissake,” Forster shouted. “Get in there and get him out.”
The man snarled: “You do it.”
Without a word, Forster turned his horse toward the rocks and charged. A shot came. It winged through the sleeve of his coat. Forster saw that another rider was closing on the rocks from the east, firing as he rode. Before he could reach the rocks, a man stood up among them and pitched forward into his face.
Forster heaved his horse to a halt, piled from the saddle and strode up to the fallen figure. The terrified gaze of a mere boy met his. He lifted his rifle and fired. The face hit the dust.
Forster looked up and saw Grotten standing there, his face grim.
The other men rode up.
“All accounted for?” Forster asked.
“I reckon,” a man said.
“Ride around and make sure.”
They scattered, spreading out and riding slowly along the valley. Suddenly very tired, Forster walked to his horse and swung into the saddle. He felt drained of strength.
He sat there a moment, while Grotten caught up his own horse and mounted. A shot came from across the valley, showing that his men had found a Texan alive and settled him.
“We’ll forget this when we see the color of gold,” Forster said, but there was the edge of doubt in his voice.
“Maybe,” Grotten said.
“Let’s get after the cows,” Forster said and put spurs to his horse. Together they rode after the herd.
* * *
McAllister stopped.
Above the sound of the canelo’s hoofs he thought he had heard firing. He listened and heard it again. The faint popping of distant firearms fire straight ahead.
He touched the canelo with iron and got moving.
Ahead of him was what seemed to be a break in the surface of the prairie. As he rode forward, he saw a line of brush and rocks; he turned left before he reached these, then swung ahead again. Now above the sound of his horse’s hoofs, he could hear the faint hammer of gunfire and another ominous sound which he knew to be made by the hoofs of a large herd of cattle on a stampede. He knew also that they were going north and away from him.
The pace he was traveling at was the greatest he had hit since leaving Combville and he paid for it in physical pain; the sweat coursed down him and he gritted his teeth together in an effort to bear it. Yet he did not hold the canelo back. Nothing seemed as important as seeing what was going on ahead there.
He burst suddenly into the mouth of a shallow valley and saw before him the dust haze of the disappearing herd. A horse ran crazily across his path as he pulled the canelo back on its haunches. Several horses rode away from him. A man and horse lay still on the ground.
McAllister turned his horse and rode him up onto the side of the valley and getting among the rocks and brush on the rim. The firing was at the northern end of the valley now.
“Rem.”
He started in the saddle. He knew that voice. He swung down from the saddle and looked out over the valley. What he had thought to be a dead body was up on one elbow.
Sam.
“Stand, boy,” McAllister called back to his horse and started down the side of the valley. The rifle-fire continued to the north.
He could tell from Sam’s face that he was badly hit.
“Thank God you come, man,” the Negro said. “They’re killin’ all of us’ns. Drag me up to the brush yonder. An’ hurry.”
McAllister didn’t need any second bidding. Normally, he would have lifted the foreman in his arms and carried him, but now he could do nothing but drag him and that brought the sweat afresh to his face. He made it to the brush, then went on one knee beside Sam and took a look at him. He was shot through the belly. He was deep in shock and his face was an ashen gray. He looked terrible and McAllister thought he couldn’t last long. But that couldn’t make any difference to his actions; he had to get Sam out of there and fast.
“Sam,” he said, “where’s there water from here?”
The Negro frowned, thinking.
“Nearest is north-west.”
McAllister had to decide. North-west would mean going right past the men up ahead, but the only way he could lose sign was to go through water. There was no time to wipe out sign.
“I’m goin’ to get you on my horse and get you across the valley, Sam.”
“They’ll sure get us, boy.”
“They’ll hunt us down if’n we don’t reach water.”
He strained at Sam and got him to his feet. It was then that he had found that the man had also been shot in the back. It was a wonder to McAllister that the man was breathing at all. The canelo stood obediently and finally Sam was in the saddle. McAllister loosened the Negro’s belt and looped it over the saddlehorn. Sam groaned and clung to the apple. McAllister then fought his own way up behind the cantle, got the lines in his hands and got the horse on the move. He went due south a good way, then turned west for a mile before he made his final swing to the right and headed north-west. There was more gunfire back in the valley. McAllister was torn, knowing he had to try and get Sam out of this alive and feeling strongly that he should be back in there cutting down some of the Kansas men who had done this thing to his outfit.
“How far to water?” he asked Sam, but there was no reply. The trail-boss was either unconscious or dead. McAllister felt for the heart beat and found it weak and uncertain. He had never felt more helpless in his life. He went on north-west at a steady walk, praying that he could keep ahead of the Kansans till night came down to cover him, knowing instinctively that they would come hunting him.
* * *
The herd had not run more than three or four miles. It had now slowed to a walk, some of the animals had started to graze.
Forster pulled his horse up alongside Grotten and said: “Dice, take ’em on north. I feel uneasy about the men back there. I’ll take Sholto back with me and make sure.”
Grotten nodded. It was a wise precaution.
Forster rode across the rear of the herd, called to Sholto and the man came on the run. Forster looked him over. The man looked shaken, but that did not disturb the captain. A man had a right to look that way after what Sholto had just been through. Killing a whole outfit wasn’t a thing a man did every day of the week. He told the man what he proposed and they rode back over the wide trail left by the stampeding cattle. When they reached the valley, they rode from fallen man to fallen man, checking to make sure they were all dead. When they reached the south end of the valley, they pulled up their horses and Sholto said: “That’s taken care of.”
Forster sat still in the saddle, thinking.
“Wait a minute. What about the nigger?” he said.
“What nigger?”
“The first man I shot was a nigger.”
“I didn’t see no nigger.”
Forster looked doubtful for a moment.
“I was pretty sure he was black.”
Sholto knew that there were Texas outfits who used Negro hands. It was possible.
“Maybe you was mistook. Was he close?”
“No,” Forster said, “he wasn’t all that close. I could have been mistaken. But I remember where he fell. Over there. Let’s go take a look.”
They turned their horses in the direction he indicated. When they reached the spot where Forster thought he had seen the man fall, he said: “It was here. I’m certain.”
“Well, he ain’t here now that’s for sure,” Sholto offered.
Forster showed impatience.
“Where the hell is he, then? I hit him fair and square. He wouldn’t be walking anywhere.”
He looked around. The ground was churned and marked by hoofs. His eyes fell on twin narrow ruts in the surface of the ground.
“Hold on a minute.”
He swung down from the saddle, walked along the ruts for a few paces and then raised his eyes to the brush and rocks above. Leading his horse, he traced the ruts to the rim of the valley. Sholto rode behind him. In the brush, Forster pointed to the ground.
“Look. There’s been a horse here. Somebody came here and dragged that nigger to a horse. He’s taken him off.”
Sholto pushed his hat to the back of his head.
“It don’t seem possible,” he opined. “Who’d’a done a thing like that?”
Slight apprehension struck Forster.
“I don’t know who did it,” he said. “But we’ll damned soon find out. Look, they went south. They mounted double and went south.”
Forster stepped into the saddle and they headed south, but that didn’t get them anywhere for after a few hundred yards the tracks of the horse were lost in those of the herd. Forster swore in sudden fury. He was worried now.
“They must have either followed the herd tracks back south or cut off east or west.”
“Then they got away,” Sholto said. “This is a kind of big country. Hell, I ain’t no hand at trackin’. This is a job for the half-breed.”
Forster clapped his thigh.
“Nick! Sure, that’s the answer. Ride hard for the herd, Sholto, and send Nick back to me. Tell him to fog it.”
Sholto said: “Keno,” put spurs to his animal and raced away down the valley.
Forster stayed where he was, thinking.
He was in a fix now and he didn’t like it. If that nigger got away and talked, his having the herd could come to nothing. More than that, he could find himself dangling by the neck. Forster felt a little sick at the thought and real fear briefly touched him. That black must be hunted down and killed. Him and the man who was with him. Could it possibly be McAllister? Perish the thought, he told himself. The man had been too badly beaten to sit a horse for a month. No, somebody else had entered the play. Well, they would both have to be killed and quick before they could reach any kind of settlement.
But what if they weren’t found and killed?
The possibility didn’t bear thinking on, but Forster knew that a wise general planned for all possibilities. He drove his brain furiously. Holst would likely not touch any cattle he took him in view of what had happened in Combville. He had planned to get rid of them with another contact he had further west. But that would be risky if the shot man talked. So what else could he do with the damned cows?
Suddenly, an idea hit him.
Grotten’s brother.
It was like an inspiration. He laughed out loud. There were real possibilities there. The more he thought about it, the more he liked it. Dice and his brother were close; Mike would do anything for Dice. Mike had the range, but not the cows. He was land rich and cow poor. The problem was solved. Forster and Grotten would bring Mike in on the deal and they would both go into the cattle rearing and fattening business. They could sell beef when some of the fuss died down, they could sell further north, they could carry out a massive brand change. It would be tricky but it could be done. It had been done before and it would be done again.
He planned on excitedly to himself, until he saw the mounted figure of the halfbreed racing back toward him. This was Nick Wetherby, a halfbreed Osage. If anybody could pick up the sign of the missing men, it was him.
Nick pulled his horse back onto its haunches. He was a thickset, ugly man. He didn’t like whites much and he hated Indians. He owed loyalty only to himself, but he kept in with the Forster gang because the members treated him more or less as an equal.
“Sholto says you got sign, boss,” he said.
Forster explained to him what he thought had happened and what he wanted. Nick twisted his face into a quick grin and said: “This ain’t goin’ to be easy. Take time. You go ahead. I tell you when I find somep’n.”
Forster turned his horse and rode north, knowing he had left his problem with an expert. Nick turned south riding along the edge of the cow-sign, watching the ground close to the east. He covered five slow miles this way, then reckoned he had gone far enough this turn. He crossed the cow sign to the west and now rode slowly north, watching the ground to the west. It was near nightfall when he found what he wanted about a mile south of the valley – the sign of one horse, carrying double, as he knew, going north-west. The halfbreed chuckled to himself. It had been easier than he thought. Come the following day, he’d find those two men for the boss and then they would be dead. He liked the thought of that. Violence with him on the winning side was one of his few simple pleasures. He rode north along the valley, passed through it and rode on five miles north till he came to the sight of a fire.
He was challenged. He answered and rode in.
Forster looked up eagerly from his meal.
“Well?”
Nick slipped from the saddle.
“I find ’em, boss,” he said with pride. “Goin’ north-west. Dawn, we find ’em. They ain’t goin’ so far. Ridin’ double. One man hurt bad. Find blood a-plenty. Maybe dead now, huh?”
“Start before dawn. Pick up the trail at first light,” Forster said. “Dice and Sholto’ll go with you. Me too maybe. Those two have to be dead.”
Nick grinned.