Kill McAllister (13 page)

“The captain wants those two Texas men found,” he told them. “And this time we stay out till we find 'em.”

Nick sneered.

“We stay out damn long time, I think.”

“Suits me,” Grotten told him. “Let's ride.”

The breed was angry, but he knew better than to cross Grotten. He rode north and started quartering the country, searching for any kind of sign and finding nothing. The weather was turning colder now and the men did not have sufficiently warm clothing with them. They shivered with cold in the saddle and cursed. By nightfall they had found nothing until Nick who had ridden on ahead suddenly wheeled his horse and rode back to the other two. When he reached them, they saw that he was excited.

“There's fires up ahead,” he told them. “An Indian village.”

Grotten said: “You reckon they could be there?”

“It's a chance,” Nick answered. “Or maybe the Indians sighted 'em.”

“It's risky,” Sholto put in. “We're far west now and these could be hostiles.”

Grotten said: “We're three men with repeating rifles. There isn't a bunch of savages in the world could face us down.”

“You ain't been around Indians,” Nick said.

“You scared to go in there?” Grotten demanded.

“I ain't scared of no damned Indian.”

“All right, then,” Grotten told them. “We'll pull back a way and camp. Come dawn, we'll go in and ask questions.”

“There's one thing,” Nick added. “We've been scouted. One of them Injuns snuck up on us and looked us over. I found his sign.”

“Christ,” said Sholto, “I don't like the sound of that. Maybe they're goin' to jump us.”

Dryly, Grotten said: “They can always try.”

He led the way back south a mile or two, then halted in a spot that offered some shelter from the cold wind that was pressing from the north. In vain did Sholto and Nick claim that they would die of cold. Grotten told them to build a fire. Sholto thought the light would be sighted by the Indians. Grotten growled out they weren't likely to have scouts out in this weather. Indians were as human as anybody else and felt the cold. So they scratched around for brushwood and found not much of that. But it was enough to start a fire. Nick heated coffee while the other two went further afield in search of fuel. They spent half the night bringing in brushwood and keeping the fire up, for they had no more than one blanket apiece and by this time the cold was piercing. But certainly there was no threat from the Indians and in the dawn they saddled, mounted and started their horses through the now inches thick snow. It was not long before they were in sight of the lodges of the Indians.

Sholto and the halfbreed pulled in their horses. They didn't like what Grotten was getting them into.

“For God's sake,” Grotten said, “just stick with me and we'll come out of this all right. But mind, I don't want either of you two getting trigger-happy. We're going in there to talk.”

Nick jerked his head.

“Talk to that,” he said.

Grotten turned his head and saw them. For a moment his breath was taken away, the sight was so unexpected. The Indians lined the nearest ridges, mounted. It seemed they had come there by magic. Not a sound came from the riders or their mounts. There was no movement except for the shaking of a horse's head and a flutter of robe or feather in the light wind. They looked like ghosts through the white curtain of snow. But Grotten knew they weren't ghosts; they were very concrete indeed. They could bloody a lance-head with the best and lift a man's hair quick as he could draw breath. He reckoned there were at least twenty of them and the way Indians could ride and fight, even though he and his companions were armed with repeating rifles, they were odds he didn't look upon favorably.

He didn't panic, however. He lifted a hand in the universal peace sign. For a moment there was no movement from the line of riders, then a man in the center of the line walked his horse forward, lifted it to a trot and came up close to them. They saw he was a middle-aged man wearing a skin cap. His clothes were
old and worn, but his face was that of a warrior and a commander. The scalps hanging from his horse's gear showed that he was a fighting man of some renown. When he spoke he didn't beat about the bush in the Indian fashion, but came straight and brutally to the point.

“You will go back,” he said in Cheyenne.

“What's he say?” Grotten asked Nick. But the halfbreed understood no more than a half-dozen words of the language and had to resort to sign language. The Cheyenne replied with strong and emphatic movements. Finally, Nick told Grotten: “They're Cheyenne. He's tellin' us go back. They want no whites here.”

“Ask him if the two Texans have been here.”

“I just did and he says they're at war with the whites.”

“You mean these Indians killed 'em?”

“I dunno. Maybe.”

Sholto said: “I reckon this is a Mexican standoff. They're too strong for us to fight. They're scared of our guns.”

Grotten said: “You could be right. Nick, tell him we are looking for two bad men, one white and one black. If they do not give them to us, many pony soldiers will come and there will be killing.”

Nick told this with signs and the Cheyenne made a snorting noise. He made a sign to the line of warriors and they walked their ponies forward.

Grotten said urgently: “Tell him to get them away from us or some bucks will die.”

Nick did that, but the Cheyenne merely kicked his pony into action and raced away through the snow. Slowly, the others advanced.

“Let's get out of here,” Grotten said.

“Me first,” said Sholto and wheeled his mount. The others followed suit and they spurred away. The Indians started yelling and when the three Kansans looked back they saw the whole line of them coming after them at a gallop. Sholto heaved his repeater from the saddle-boot and Grotten yelled: “Put that fool thing away, man. Hit one of them and we're all dead. Just keep on going.”

The Cheyenne warriors chased them for a couple of miles, never coming within pistol shot, but showing their enjoyment of the whitemen's fear by their delighted yells.

* * *

If it had not been for Nick Wetherby, the three of them would never have found the herd again in the snow and even the halfbreed did not find it easily. Even though the cows were traveling slowly, and now in some misery in the unaccustomed snow, the three men did not come upon them until the late afternoon. They found that the Kansas men were having their trials for the Texas cattle were showing an inclination to drift south back home ahead of the wind and the snow it carried. Forster had hastened the pace as much as he was able for the animals were finding it impossible to graze, small bunches here and there were continually trying to break away from the main bunch. It was Forster's fear that they were starting to lose their cohesion as a herd and he was getting rattled, knowing his own inexperience at handling these wild southern cows. He was so occupied with this new problem that he paid Grotten little attention when his lieutenant told him of the failure of his mission.

“Forget it,” Forster told him, “we have our hands full of these damned cows. They're not feeding, they're not staying together. These fools we brought along don't appear to have any cattle sense at all.”

“What do you expect?” Grotten said. “They only know farm cows. The only experience they've had of these longhorns is the small bunches they've stolen. My advice is drive 'em hard. We have to get 'em to Mike before this gets worse. So we run the fat off 'em. They'll pick it up in the spring.”

“We're going to lose half this bunch in the cold before we're done,” Forster complained.

“So we lose half. We still show a profit.”

Both men broke off as a muley cow broke to the right, dodged a rider and showed the way for a dozen others. Grotten reached her first, flapped his slicker in her face and turned her.

And so it went on through the day till dark when most of the crew gathered around the captured wagon and ate an indifferent meal. They were all miserable with extreme cold and there was no fuel but the little that was on the wagon. Men slept little that night and only half the outfit could lie down at a time if they were lucky. On several occasions, cursing, the whole crew was in the saddle to stop the unsettled herd from drifting. An exhausted and red-eyed gang got the animals on the move in the morning. This day Forster drove the herd hard, losing some of the drags in the hard drive, but tiring the rest so that by nightfall they were pleased to halt and rest. This night the majority of them settled,
but the snow was unnerving them and still there were some breaks for freedom during the night and at one time Forster feared a general stampede. But when the next dawn came he still had a sizable herd ahead of him. The men were in a bad way now, none of them equipped for such weather. Everyone of them was wearing everything he had in his roll and most of them had on their full complement of longjohns and two shirts. Their hat brims they had tied about their faces with their bandannas, none of them had shaved since they left Combville and they looked a wild and unkempt bunch. Even Forster who was normally a neat dresser looked wretched. And he was hating it. Only his seething ambition and his longing for gain kept him going. The only man who seemed unperturbed was Dice Grotten; he rode stolidly, wearing out horse after horse, but never himself. There was no doubt in his mind that they would reach Colorado and come spring they would have a fine fat herd.

They had ridden for four days. The horses were thinning down from lack of bait, but the men were in pretty good shape. McAllister's great fear was that Sam would catch pneumonia, but the Negro trail-boss seemed to be bearing up under the rigors of the rough travel. He stayed snug and warm in his buffalo robes and seemed to be picking up fast. In fact, as he told McAllister, “This air sure is bracin', Rem boy.” For McAllister traveling horse-back it was a little too bracing and he rode most of the time like Coyote huddled in the saddle in a buffalo robe.

In all the four days, they did not meet a living soul except for a handful of Kiowa bucks who were out hunting game. So they said. McAllister was convinced that they were hunting white scalps. They seemed to gaze longingly at McAllister's, but did not think much of Sam's woolly locks for prestige purposes. Coyote spoke with them lengthily and with some heat and after a long pow-wow they rode reluctantly on their way. Sam and McAllister, both ‘o' whom had prepared themselves to shoot their way out of the situation, sighed with relief.

On the fifth day they entered broken country and reached the cabin.

It stood in a sheltered rincon with water and timber handy. At a glance, McAllister saw that it was an ideal place to winter. On inspection, it looked as tight as a fort, though it had not been lived in for some years and looked it. It was composed of stout logs, squared off roughly to fit tight and where they didn't fit, the gaps were chinked with mud. The door hung drunkenly on one rawhide hinge – something that would have to be put right at once. There was an ingenious stove made of stone and mud, and a fine stone chimney made by a man who knew how to make chimneys. There were two bunks, one on either side of the single room. Rat-chewed blankets were on them, trash lay about the floor and on a shelf near the stove McAllister found some tins of food. McAllister cleaned one of the bunks out and he and Coyote carried Sam inside and put him in it still wrapped in the buffalo robes.

There was a wood pile right near the stove with kindling ready.
McAllister built a fire right off and the warm glow of the thing at once made the place more cheerful. Sam grinned over the side of the bunk.

“Man, I never saw a finer sight,” he said happily.

Coyote hobbled the horses and let them go, knowing that they would rustle for themselves either by pawing away the snow to the grass or by chewing on the twigs and bark of trees. They'd be gaunted down comespring, but they'd be alive if they were worth their salt. The young Indian brought their gear and supplies inside and dumped them on the hard-packed earth floor. McAllister found some pots and pans in a corner, cleaned them in the snow and prepared a meal of pemmican. There was a rough table in the place, but no chairs, so he and the Indian squatted on the floor and ate. After that, they all felt better. Sam rolled a smoke, McAllister fired his pipe and gave Coyote a puff at it. Then McAllister fixed the door with an end of his rawhide lariat and it looked like the cabin was tight against the world.

“Boy,” Sam said, “we'm in paradise, sure ‘nough.”

They slept snug and warm that night, McAllister and Sam in the bunks and Coyote stretched out in front of the stove. McAllister lay awake for some time, his hands behind his head, thinking. He thought a little about Millie, Nellie Stein's attractive maid and regretted the opportunity lost. He thought about Boss back there on the trail dead, he thought about Forster and the herd and about Colonel Struthers down there in Texas waiting for news of the sale. Sam and he had been trusted. They were still trusted and he knew that both of them would live up to the trust. Ideally, they must take the price of the herd back home. If they couldn't do that, they would take the price out of the hide of the man who had taken it from them. That might take some doing, because Forster and his men would take some finding. This was a big country. But as sure as God made little apples McAllister and Sam would find them.

* * *

Coyote departed the following morning, taking with him his bow and arrows, a pouchful of food and his paint pony. He shook hands solemnly with Sam and McAllister. All they could find to give him was a mirror that had been left in the cabin, but with this he was highly delighted. He rode away and before he went from sight into the timber he turned and lifted a hand in farewell.

It had stopped snowing for the moment, but a look at the sky told McAllister there was plenty more to come. He turned back
into the cabin and started to prepare for the winter. If Sam and he were to survive, he must get busy.