Starlight Riders Boxed-Set 50 Western Classics in One Edition. Ernest Haycox
in Powder, ready to talk turkey."
"Make it in Powder, then, a week from this night. I'll be waiting."
"Check."
By the time they had finished their meal, securely put away all the provisions and packed Bill's kit bag, it was dusk. Lin saddled his horse, feeling considerable sympathy for the patient animal.
"When all this tramping around is over," he promised, "you're going to get a good, long rest, old fellow."
Leading the way up the gully, he guided Bill across the mesa in a southerly direction, and gave him a landmark to steer by until the misleading high country was well behind. They shook hands and parted.
Lin swung back, northward, and traveled as rapidly as the rough ground would permit. Within twenty minutes he was at the six pines and riding down into the small bowl occupied by the Chattos. A small fire gleamed like a yellow gem in the very pit of the depression, but when he came to it he found the place deserted. Not even a stray can nor so much as an extra piece of firewood gave evidence of its recent tenants.
Still in the saddle, Lin whistled softly and after quite some wait he heard stones rattling down the slope. A heavy body passed through the outer darkness and stopped at a safe distance.
"Come on up, boys," Lin said. "You know who I am."
"We damn near traveled without you," grumbled a voice which Lin immediately recognized as that of Beauty Chatto. "What took you so all-fired long?" He moved into the circle of light, a somber, black-visaged creature. At times there was a measure of humanity in the man, a certain self-knowledge of his utter unscrupulousness. And usually he had a certain amount of humor about him. Tonight all this was lacking. He stared grimly at Ballou, as if weighing and judging him in the suspicious, uneven balance of his mind. "If a man's going to travel with me, he's got to be on the dot. Won't have you round the country, leaving me and Nig waiting. Where you been?"
Lin said evenly, "None of your business, Beauty. This is your proposition, not mine. If you figured last week I was safe enough to ride with, you better keep the same notion in your head tonight. Don't razz me. I don't take it well. You said to meet you after dark. This is the time and this is the place. But why advertise our location with the bonfire?"
"So you'd know we was waiting," Beauty said. He tramped the fire beneath his boots, leaving only a smoking mass that now and then emitted a fitful spark. "Come on. We've got a whole slough of work cut out for us. It's a long way to—" He checked himself as he led the way up the farther slope, found his horse and got into the saddle.
"To where, Beauty?"
"That's something you'll discover later."
"Still holding out on me, eh? Beauty, you'll have to come across with the whole works if I ride with you boys."
"You'll know it all by the time we're through with the present deal," Beauty said, not quite so gruff. "No time to parley now. Nig's up ahead waiting for us. Put the spurs into that donkey of yours."
The ugly man was in a hurry and, unusually for him, he seemed apprehensive. From time to time, as they forged over the rugged ground, Lin saw Beauty turn in the saddle and look behind him.
"Ain't nobody within ten miles," he said in a subdued rumble, "but I always like to watch the ridges, nevertheless. Don't do no harm. For God's sake, push that horse!"
"What's the program?" Lin asked.
"Nig's been doing a little cutting out. Started before dark. We won't have to do no milling around. Pick 'em up and haze 'em along fast as we can go. Run the fat right off the critters."
"Uh-huh," Lin said. His senses, sharpened by the nature of the work he was engaged in, suddenly took warning, and he drew up the horse. Beauty went on a few feet before stopping. Ahead at no great distance was the uneasy, shuffling sound of cattle. Out of the darkness floated a challenge.
"Beauty?"
"Yeah. Me and Lin. Set?"
"All tied up in a knot. Ready to step on her?"
"Yeah," Beauty said. His aim scraped against the saddle. There was a sudden burst of match light. A blazing arc went upward to his face and touched a cigarette, then fell to the ground in a streak of vivid flame. Lin, roused, spurred his horse beside the outlaw and struck the cigarette from the man's mouth.
"Of all the bonehead tricks! Haven't you got a lick of sense? I thought you were an old hand at this. My great aunt! I'm not traveling with any brass bands tonight. Cut it out!"
"Doggone it," said Beauty in a crestfallen tone, "that's sure one on me. Bonehead is right. Just wasn't thinking, Lin. Been so long since I had a smoke that it sorta come to me naturally, without thinking. Never mind. Ain't nobody near."
"That's what the bobcat thought when he stepped into the trap," Lin said, still angry.
"Let's go," Nig said. Being several feet away, Lin could see nothing of Beauty's brother, but he could hear the man's heavy breathing and the creak of his saddle leather. "Beauty and me had better ride flank. You haze 'em along from behind. Let's get outa here. If anything should go wrong, I'll let a yelp out of me, which is a sign for you to make a run for it."
The brothers moved away and presently were lost to Ballou. He rode down the slanting ground and came up behind the slowly moving cattle. From somewhere in the van he heard Beauty's softly spoken signal. "Let's go." At that he shoved his horse against the bunch and as gently as possible, pressed them on. They got in motion after some confused moving about. Lin was kept extremely busy for a few moments heading off bolters, but finally they settled to a steady pace. The run was on.
After they had gone some hundred yards Lin knew where he was. At this point the mesa curved into a kind of chute that led, with some amount of winding and twisting, out of the high ground and down into the East Flats. It was an admirable natural road to take stock over in the dark, for the banks of it acted as a check against the cattle breaking off on the flanks. In addition, this particular gully was the least obstructed of all the entrances or exits of the mesa. Therefore, it was possible to put the herd to a stiff run. They had not gone far before the whole group was a- trot. Lin sat losely in the saddle with little work to do and free to puzzle over the point they were bound for.
Beauty Chatto had said they shipped the rustled stock through another man—obviously some cattleman of the valley. That meant, of course, that eventually they would reach one of the three or four loading pens along the railroad. Lin had lived long enough in the country to know just how this worked, but it did not seem possible they would try to drive that whole distance in a night's time. For they still had the job of changing brands before them, and this had to be done in daylight, in some isolated section where chance travelers would be least apt to stray.
And what brand would they use? What cattleman acted as agent for the Chattos? Lin, running through the list in his mind, could not fix upon any particular man who would put himself in any such position. Obviously it was some extremely bold and restless character who paraded the streets of Powder and acted the part of honesty. Well, within a few hours he should know that man's name. And in all probability it would be one well known to him.
Folks rise and fall in this world, he mused, and that gent, whoever he may be, is leading straight for destruction. This tampering with right and wrong is a risky thing, always.
He sat up, all attention. Something in the headlong pace of the herd made him uneasy. He scanned the black skyline, trying to discern the still blacker figures of the Chattos who should be riding thereon. But he saw nothing. Once he thought he felt the presence of someone not far from him, and in order to quell the disquietude of his mind he turned his horse up one bank and rode along it for a hundred yards or more. Nothing came of it, except a dangerous stumble on the part of the pony. Still unsatisfied, he dropped back into the gully.
Then, without reason and without tangible evidence of danger, the hair rose at the back of his neck. He slackened his pace and reached for his gun while the horse, a wise, veteran animal, shied away. At almost the same time there came a flash of light and the crack of a gun. The galloping herd vanished in the night