TWENTY-ONE
Clint finished his business in El Paso del Norte fast enough to simply mount up and continue on. He left town and continued to ride south. He’d gone only a few miles when he realized he was being followed. The terrain was rocky, sandy, not much in the way of vegetation, but there were hills and valleys. It was easy to tail someone if you rode in the valleys while your prey rode in the hills, and vice versa.
It wasn’t so easy when your prey already knew you were following him and waited in one of the valleys for you.
Clint dismounted and waited. He had an idea who was tracking him, so he didn’t have his gun in his hand when the rider came over the rise and started down. The rider saw Clint, reined his horse in for a moment, then continued on with a resigned slump to his shoulders.
“Did you really think you could follow me without being spotted?” Clint asked.
“I was hopin’,” Ben Weaver said.
“I notice you’re not wearing your badge.”
“I turned it in.”
“If I tell you to go back, you won’t, right?” Clint asked.
“Right.”
“You’ll just keep following me.”
“Right.”
“I could kill you and leave your body here for the buzzards.”
“But . . . you wouldn’t do that,” Weaver said a bit hopefully.
“No,” Clint said. “I wouldn’t.”
“So . . . can I ride with you?”
Clint pointed a finger at Weaver.
“If we run into trouble, you’d better pull your weight, Weaver.”
“I will.”
“I’m not getting killed trying to protect you, understand?”
“I understand.”
“And if you get me killed . . .”
“What?”
Clint didn’t have anything to add, so he said, “I’ll come back and haunt you.”
“Okay.”
Clint mounted up.
“Okay, come on.”
They rode a few miles in silence before Weaver tired to start a conversation.
“So where are we goin’?”
Clint thought about remaining quiet, but what the hell. Talking would pass the time.
“I don’t know.”
“But I thought we were lookin’ for—”
“We are looking for someone,” Clint said, “but I don’t really know where to look.”
“So . . . where are we goin’?”
“Right now,” Clint said, his eyes on the ground, “we’re just riding, Ben. As soon as I spot something helpful, I’ll let you know.”
“Somethin’ helpful?” Weaver asked. “Like what?”
“Have you ever tracked?”
“Well, I—”
“No, wait,” Clint said, “you told me. You’ve never been out of El Paso.”
“Well, I been on posses.”
“So then you’ve tracked.”
“Well . . .”
“Okay, you were with someone who tracked.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I’m looking for a familiar sign,” Clint said, “a hoofprint that I’ve seen before.”
“How do you recognize a horse’s print?”
“Usually, by the shoe,” Clint said. “Something about the shoe.”
“What about this one?”
“I’ll show you when we find it.”
“There.”
It was an hour later. Clint pointed, then turned and looked up at Weaver.
“You have to dismount to see it.”
Weaver dismounted, looked around nervously.
“We’re not being watched, Ben,” Clint said. “Nobody knows we’re coming.”
Weaver walked over to where Clint was crouched, looked at the track Clint was pointing at.
“There.”
“What is that?”
“It’s a triangle,” Clint said. “See it? On the shoe.”
“Who would put a triangle on a horseshoe?” Weaver asked, peering intently.
“We’ll probably never know that,” Clint told him, “but at least now we know we’re going in the right direction.”