Killoe (1962) (13 page)

A big man leaped past me on a gray horse---it was the blond man who had been with Webb Holt when he was killed.

A horse struck me with his shoulder and knocked me rolling, a bullet spat dirt into my mouth as it struck in front of me.

Again I started to get up and I saw Pa firing from his knee. There was blood on his face, but he was shooting as calmly as if in a shooting gallery. Ben Cole was down, all sprawled out on the ground, and I saw Jim Poor rise suddenly from the ground and run to a new position, with bullets all around him.

Suddenly I saw Bud Caldwell charge into camp, swing broadside, and throw down on Pa. I flipped a six-shooter and shot him through the chest. The bullet hit him dead center and he was knocked back in the saddle and the horse cut into a run. Turning on my heel I fired again from the hip and Bud Caldell fell on his face in the dirt and turned slowly over.

And as it had started, it ended, suddenly and in stillness.

The wagontop on one of the wagons was in flames, so I grabbed a bucket of water and sloshed it over the flames, and then jumped up and ripped the canvas from the frame and hurled it to the ground. A bullet clipped the wagon near me and I dropped again and lay still on the ground.

Our herd was gone. Freeman Squires was surely dead, and it looked like Ben Cole was, too.

Nothing moved. Lying still in the darkness, I fed shells into my six-shooter and tried to locate the Patterson.

Somewhere out in the darkness I heard a low moan, and then there was silence. The smell of dust was in my nostrils, an ache in my bones; the gun butt felt good against my palm. Behind me I could hear the faint rustle of water among the thin reeds along the bank, but nothing else moved.

They were out there yet, I knew that, and to move was to die.

What had happened to Conchita? To Ma Foley? Where was Pa?

In the distance, thunder rumbled . . . the night was vastly empty, and vastly still.

A cool wind blew a quick, sharp gust through the camp, scattering some of the fire, rolling a cup along the ground.

With infinite care, I got a
and
fiat on the ground and eased myself up and back, away from the firelight. After a moment of waiting I repeated the move.

Thunder rolled . . . there was a jagged streak of lightning, and then the rain came.

It came with a rush, great sheets of rain flung hard against the dusty soil, dampening it, soaking it all in one smashing onslaught.

When the lightning flared again, I saw my father lying with his eyes wide to the sky, and then the lightning was gone, and there was only the rumble of thunder and the rush of rain falling.

Chapter
Five.

In a stumbling run I left the place where I lay and ran to my father's side. He was dead. He had been shot twice through the body and had bled terribly.

Taking the rifle that lay beside him, I leaped up and ran to the nearest wagon and took shelter beneath it. If any of the others lived, I did not know, but my father was dead, our cattle gone, our hopes
destroyed, and
within me, suddenly and for the first time, I knew
hatred
.

Under the wagon, in partial shelter, I tried to think ahead. What would Soto and his men do? All my instincts told me to get away, as far away as possible before the morning came, for unless I was much mistaken, they would come to loot the wagons.

How many others were dead? And did any lie out there now, too grievously wounded to escape? If so, I must find them. Knowing the Comanche, I could leave no man who had worked with us to fall helpless into their hands.

Carefully, I wiped my guns dry. The Patterson still lay out there somewhere, but I had my father's breech-loading Sharps. The shotgun he had also had must still be lying out there.

The storm did not abate. The rain poured down and the Pecos was rising. It was a cloudburst, or something close to it, and the more I considered it the more I began to believe that my enemies might have fled for shelter, if they knew of any. Or perhaps they had gone off after our cattle, for without doubt they would take the herd.

Suddenly, in the wagon above me, there was a faint stir of movement. Then thunder rumbled in the distance, and lightning flashed, and on the edge of the river bank, not twenty yards off, stood two bedraggled figures. I knew them at once. Tim Foley and his wife!

They lived, at least. And who was in the wagon? One of us, I was sure.., yet could I be sure? Perhaps it was some Comanche who had started to loot the wagon.

Carefully, I eased out from under the wagon. The rain struck me like a blow, the force of the driven rain lashing viciously at my face. It would be completely dark within the wagon, and I would be framed against the lightning, but I must know. The Foleys were coming, and they must not walk into a trap.

One foot I put on a horizontal spoke of the wheel, and, holding to the edge of the wagon with my left hand, I swung myself suddenly up and into the wagon. There was a startled gasp. "Conchita?"

"
Dan!
. Oh, Dan! You're alive!"

"More or less. Are you all right?"

"Of course, but this man is hurt. He has been shot." Risking a shot myself, I struck a light. It was Zeno Yearly, and there was a graze along his skull and a crease along the top of his shoulder. Evidently the bullet had struck him when he was lying down in the wagon, and grazing the side of his skull, it had burned his shoulder. He had bled freely, but nothing more.

The rain continued without letup, and through the roar of the rain on the canvas wagon cover we heard the splash of footsteps, and then Ma Foley and Tim climbed into the wagon. Zeno sat up, holding his head and staring a
rou
nd him.

"It's safe, I think, to light a candle," I said
.
"They have gone or they would have shot when I struck the match."

When a candle was lighted I rummaged in the wagon for ammunition.

"Here," Tim Foley said, holding out the Patterson, "
I
found it back there."

Taking the gun, I passed the Sharps over to
him
, and began cleaning the Patterson, wiping the rain and mud
from
it, and removing the charges.

"Are we all that's left?" Ma Foley asked plaintively. "Are they all gone?"

"Pa's dead, and I saw Squires go down, ahead of the stampede. I saw Ben Cole fall."

"Jim Poor got down under the bank. I think he was unhurt then, if the river didn't get him."

Huddled together, we waited for the morning, and the rain continued to fall. At least,
there
would be water. We must find and kill a steer, if we could
find
a stray. And somehow we must get to the Rio Grande, or to the Copper Mines.

For we had been left without food. What had not been destroyed in the brief fire in the other wagon was undoubtedly damaged by the rain, although I hoped the damage would be slight. And there had been little enough, in any event.

Our remuda was gone, the horses stolen or scattered, and the chance of catching any of them was slight indeed. The trek that now lay before us would in many ways be one of the worst that anyone could imagine, and we had women along.

The responsibility was mine. These were our people, men who worked for us, and my father was dead. In such a case, even with the herd gone, I could not, dared not surrender leadership. Now, more than ever, we needed a strong hand to guide us out of this desert and to some place where we might get
food
and horses to ride.

Fear sat deep within me, for I had encountered nothing like this before, and I feared failure, and failure now
meant
death . . at least, for the weakest among us.

All the night long, the rain fell. The Pecos was running bank-full, and so would be the arroyos leading to it. Our way west was barred now by one more obstacle, but, once the sun came out, the arroyos would not run for long, and their sandy basins, long dry, would drink up the water left behind. Only in the tinajas, the natural rock cisterns, would there be water.

The sun rose behind a blanket of lowering gray cloud, and the rain settled down to a steady downpour, with little lightning, and thunder whimpering among the canyons of the far-off Guadalupes.

Stiffly, I got to my feet and slid to the ground. Donning my slicker, I looked carefully around.

The earth was dark with rain, the ground where the camp stood was churned into mud, and wherever I looked the sky was heavy with rain clouds that lay low above the gray hills. The Pecos rushed by--dark, swirling waters that seemed to have lost their reddish tinge. Crossing the camp, I picked up Pa's body and carried it to shelter under the wagon, then began to look around.

On the edge of camp I found Bud Caldwell... he was dead. Another man, unknown to me, but obviously a Comanchero, lay dead near the river bank.

Ignoring their bodies, I gathered the body of Ben Cole in my
arms
and carried him to where Pa lay.

We desperately needed horses, but there were none in sight. There was a dead horse and a saddle lying not too away and, walking to them, I took the saddle from the horse, tugging the girth from beneath it. The horse lay upon soft mud, and the girth came out without too much trouble. Then I removed the bridle and carried them to the wagon.

Tim Foley got down from the wagon. "Tim," I said, "you and Mrs. Foley can help. Go through both wagons and sort out all the food you can find that's still good. Also, collect all the canteens, bedding,
and
whatever there is in the way of ammunition and weapons."

He nodded, looking around grimly. "They ruined us, Dan. They ruined us."

"Don't you believe it. We're going to make it through to the Copper Mines, and then we'll see. If you find Pa's papers, account books and the like, you put them aside for me."

Zeno Yearly got down from the wagon also. He looked wan and sick, but he glanced at me with a droll smile. "We got us a long walk, Dan. You much on walking?"

Together we hunted around. There was no sign of Jim Poor, I but he might have been drowned or swept away by the river. The one thing none of us was talking about was the kids. Tim's two boys and Stark's children. Nobody had seen a sign of them since the attack, yet I had seen them bedded down and asleep when I was awakened o go out for my night guard.

Zeno and me walked slow up along the bank of the river. Whatever tracks there had been were washed out. It was unbelievable that they could all have survived, but the fact that we saw no bodies gave us hope.

Zeno and I spread out, and suddenly he gave a call. He was standing looking down at or into something. When I got over there, I saw that he was standing on the edge of some limestone sinks.

The earth had caved in or sunk in several places that were thirty feet or more in diameter. Looking across the hole where Zeno stood, we could see the dark opening of a cave.

Zeno called out and, surprisingly, there was an answering call. Out of a cave under the very edge where we stood came Milo Dodge.

"Heard you talkin'," he said. "You all right?"

"You seen the youngsters?"

"They're here with me, all dry a
nd safe. Emma Stark is here, too
."

Slowly, they climbed out of the cave and showed themselves. Milo climbed up to where we were.

"Frank Kelsey's dead. He lived through the night, died about daybreak. He caught two damned bad ones, low down and mean . . . right through the belly."

"Pa's dead," I said, "and Ben Cole."

"Emma Stark got the youngsters out when the first attack hit, and I'd seen this place, so I hustled them over here. I got in a couple of good shots, and missed one that I wished had hit."

"What do you mean?" He had a look in his eyes that puzzled me.

"Ira Tilton," Dodge said. "He was with them. When they came riding in he was alongside Bud Caldwell. I took a shot at him."

"Remember the fight Tap had with Webb Holt? If Ira was with them, that explains how those other men showed up so unexpectedly. He must have warned them."

"I'll make it my business," Milo said coldly. "I want that man."

"You'll have to get to him before I do," Zeno said. "I never liked him."

Slowly we gathered together, and it was a pitiful bunch we made.

Tim Foley, Milo Dodge, Zeno Yearly, and me ... three women, five children. Foley's boys were fourteen and ten . . .

Emma Stark's youngsters were a girl thirteen, and two boys, one nine, one a baby.

"First off," I said, "we'd better move into that cave, Milo. The women and youngsters can hide there while we hunt horses. I can't believe they were all driven off, and I think we should have a look around. Some of those horses may come back to camp."

We stripped the wagons of what was left that we could use, and took only the simplest of gear. We moved our beds and cooking utensils down there, and what little food was left, and we moved our ammunition too.