A Breed of Men Read online

  George watched the animal kick out its life and then there was born in him the firm resolution to kill the man who had done this thing. To this purpose, he started to work his way through the rocks, determined to outflank the man above him. He was no slouch at this kind of work, for Joe Widbee had trained him and there wasn’t any better teacher than Joe. As he crawled, as silently as he knew how, he reckoned that the other man was also likely on the move, or he would be if he knew his business.

  He worked his way some thirty feet above the flat and then played possum, obeying the golden rule that as often as not the still man caught the moving man if the moving man was looking for the still one.

  George may have been killing mad, but that didn’t mean that he was ready to lose patience. He had learned the value of patience on the hunt. He could have stayed there till nightfall if need be. He shut off every other thought than that was needed to catch the other man in his sights. All his senses were acutely keyed to faint movement and faint sound.

  When the loose stone rattled lightly, his sharp ears caught the sound. When the man moved quickly from boulder to brush, George did not miss the movement. He stayed still until he could get clear sight of his target. He aimed at one final shot.

  Time passed. George did not stir. The man’s sounds gradually became clearer as he moved along the side of the hill. Slowly, slowly, he moved until he was almost directly above George.

  Then there was silence as the man waited, searching for movement from below. After a while a loose stone started down the steep gradient, hit rock and bounced so close to George that he could have reached out a hand and caught it.

  Now the man was starting down.

  George controlled his breathing so that he could hear more clearly, letting it go gently.

  Finally, the man either lost his patience or his nerve.

  “I can see you,” he said. “Come on out with your hands up or I blast you.”

  George felt an enormous satisfaction surge through him. He had the man almost exactly located.

  He filled his lungs with air and rose quickly to one knee, pulling the brass-bound butt of the Spencer into his right shoulder. His eyes located the man above him and slightly to his left. The man saw him and it seemed that for one brief moment their eyes met.

  George moved the muzzle of the carbine slightly left as the man heaved up his own weapon.

  He never triggered a shot.

  George shot him through the body.

  The fellow jerked as the heavy slug thudded into him. The expression on his face froze and died even before his body did. But even so he planted his feet squarely on the rock on which he stood and he made a last supreme effort to lift his rifle. It wavered in his dying hands. Automatically, George levered and fired again, this time with a particular aim. The bullet took the man in the head. Now, suddenly, he was limp, his body seemed to collapse loosely. He turned on tiptoe in a fantastic pirouette of death and slowly pitched forward. His rifle clattered on stone. The body hurtled down, struck near George, hit a smooth slope and rolled.

  George turned, transfixed by the sight.

  The body came to rest, loose rocks shifted in his wake, rained down on the still form.

  George climbed down and stood looking at him, knowingly feeling nothing. The man’s mouth and eyes were open, sweat still glistened on his brutish face among the stubble of his jowls. Thirty years old, George thought. His eyes took in the details of the ragged jacket, worn corduroy pants, scuffed boots. Silver spurs, silver on the conchas on his belt.

  The shaking started then, the killing sickness. He wanted to retch. Maybe he would have given way a little then, but the need for self-preservation overtook him. Others may have heard the shots. He had to get away, fast. The man must have had a horse and it couldn’t be too far off. On trembling legs George started searching for the animal. He walked past his own dead animal and picked up the tracks of the man further on. These led him up the hillside among the rocks. Here he lost the tracks, but picked them up on soft grassy ground higher up. There was timber here and he found the animal grazing peacefully among the trees.

  He was surprised at the animal’s fine lines. The man may not have looked much himself, but he certainly mounted himself well. It was a red roan and its saddlery was good, of Mexican make, the leather tooled extensively. George untied and mounted. The animal obeyed him without demur and George sent it forward at brisk trot through the trees, aiming to stay on high ground for safety’s sake.

  He covered some twenty paces, then the rope took him.

  He heard the whir of it, but there was no time to duck. The roper was behind him and the forward movement of the roan saw to it that George was torn out of the saddle.

  He hit dirt on his back and most of the wind was knocked out of him. He lay there for a moment, unable to move and he heard the laugh, the laugh that was to haunt him for days to come, the laugh that was to instill in him a hatred that bordered on insanity. It was high-pitched, almost falsetto.

  He heard boot falls, the clinking of spurs. Turning his head, he saw a man walking toward him. He held no rope, so that meant there were two of them.

  There was no sense to it, but George made a try for his gun.

  Two things happened. The rope around the upper parts of his arms was jerked violently by the man who held it out of George’s sight. The other man jumped forward and stamped down on his wrist. The pain of it flew through George like a searing flame. He twisted hard to sweep the man off his feet with his legs and the fellow hit him in the face with something hard. It knocked him silly.

  When he finally managed to focus his eyes, he saw that he had been hit with the loaded butt of a quirt. He saw also that the man who held the rope was now in the saddle and was dallying the end around the saddle horn. The high-pitched laugh came again.

  He walked his horse toward George, coiling the rope. He had a long lean face, shaped something like a hatchet. A shade or two darker and would have made a good drugstore Indian. The mouth was a lipless slit. The eyes were narrow and close together as if the structure of the face was too thin to allow them to be anything more.

  The dismounted man bent and took George’s gun from him.

  George looked into his face. It was pale and fleshy, but the flesh hung loosely. He looked like a man who had not been in the sun and wind for a long time. His breathing was bad and he hadn’t shaved in a week. His hair was very short.

  The mounted man said: “You done me a favor. You done all of us a favor. You know that?” George shook his head to clear it.

  The fleshy man said: “You killed Charlie Sturt for us. It was comin’ to him an’ you done it.”

  “So,” the man with the rope said, “we’re goin’ to show our appreciation, ain’t we, Link.”

  The other man looked grave.

  “Sure,” he said, “we’re goin’ to show it. You ain’t never goin’ to forget it, not as long as you live, boy.”

  Cold clay settled heavily in George’s belly.

  “On your feet,” said the man with the rope.

  Link kicked George in the ribs and said: “You heard the man, sonny.”

  George rose slowly to his feet. He faced the fact that most likely he wouldn’t get out of this alive. Such a thought is bracing to say the least of it. Suddenly, in spite of the fall and the blow on his head, his brains were working. Suddenly, his reactions and powers of attention were heightened.

  He looked around. He was in scattered timber. Further up the slope, the trees were thicker.

  The man edged his horse forward, loosened the noose and flicked it free of his prisoner. George picked up his hat and crammed it down tight on his head. Link had his head down as he watched George from under his thick gingerish brows.

  “Goin’ to give you a chance,” said the man with the rope.

  Link jerked his head up, surprised.

  “What you aim to do, Win?”

  “Have me a little fun.” The laugh came again, playing on George’
s nerves like the shrill notes of a discordant fiddle. “Think you can reach them trees, boy?”

  George looked at the trees again. Did the man Win mean to come after him with a rope or a gun? The rope might give him a chance. Not much of one, but a chance just the same.

  “Rope?” he asked.

  The man nodded, laughing, delighted.

  “Best lil ole roper in the cow-stealin’ trade,” he said.

  George looked at Link. The man had his hand on the butt of his belt-gun. So, if the rope failed, the gun took over.

  “I’m on,” George said.

  Win built the noose he wanted.

  “Jest when you are good an’ ready,” he said politely. The little eyes were bright with excitement.

  Link said: “You could git yourself all tied up in them trees with a hoss.”

  “He ain’t goin’ to reach the trees,” Win said.

  George launched himself.

  He feinted for the trees, changed direction and charged the man on the horse. The animal reared, squealing in alarm. George knew that in that second his back was squarely to Link. The man could kill him. He ducked under the horse’s head as the animal came down onto its forefeet and came around the other side.

  For a brief moment, rope in one hand, the lines in the other, Win was helpless. George clutched desperately at his jacket and heaved backward. The man yelled and lashed across his body with the rope. The braided rawhide ripped across George’s face, but his weight was telling. The man came out of the saddle. George swung him as he came, hurling him to the ground. He hit hard and rolled. The horse was between George and Link. For a fraction of a second he was torn between making a try for the horse and heading for the trees.

  He glanced across the back of the scared horse and saw Link with his gun in his hand. That decided him. He turned and darted for the trees.

  Behind him, he heard Win yelling words that were incomprehensible. The trees seemed an eternity away. He started zigzagging to dodge the shots that must come. Every pace he took he expected a bullet in his back.

  Ten, twenty yards and no shot came.

  He was nearing the trees when he heard the horse running. Looking back he saw Win mounted and coming after him, mouth wide in a wild yell. He tried to quicken his pace, going straight for the trees now. He could hear the whoosh of the whirling rope.

  He reached the first of the closely growing trees and plunged into the half-light beneath them. The thunder of hoofs came closer. He could hear the pant of .the horse, the creak of leather as the rider guided him between the trunks.

  Then he heard the rope coming and dove for the nearest tree.

  As he hit dirt, the horse pounded past.

  He scrambled to his feet, thinking to run at an angle. He hadn’t covered a couple of yards when his right leg was whisked from under him.

  He hit the ground hard on his chest and face. Stunned, he felt himself being torn over the surface of the earth. Terror engulfed him. He tried to protect his face with his arms. He felt as if his guts and his chest were being smashed and ripped from his body.

  His head and shoulders crashed into something and he knew that he had struck a tree. This was death on the end of a rope. The end for a coyote. The agony and the horror went on and on.

  When it finally stopped, he was almost incapable of knowing that it had stopped. He felt as if the greater part of him were already dead. Just somewhere there was a small uncertain flicker of life.

  Then that too seemed to be blown out.

  He was nothing.

  Chapter Three

  When consciousness started reluctantly to come back to him, he was mainly aware of being a mass of pain. His mind was confused and for a while he had no idea of what was happening to him.

  Slowly, very slowly, he realized that he was lying sideways across the saddle of a trotting horse with his feet and hands on either side, tied beneath the belly of the animal.

  This agonizing condition seemed to go on for a long time. He fought hard to keep a grip on his wits and his sanity. When he had begun to admit defeat, nature took over and mercifully took his senses from him again.

  Link said: “I sure reckon you killed him. I ain’t never seen a man live after bein’ drug thataway. No, sir. Remember that Mex you drug down near El Paso. You let him git up an’ then you took his feet from under him agen. Laugh? Christ, I ain’t never laughed so much since my ole woman up an’ died on me.”

  Win said: “Naw, he ain’t dead. I reckon I’m kinda expert. I use my head. I know what a man kin take. This feller now—he’s all rawhide. Maybe he don’t look much, but he has a lotta sand.”

  “Sand don’t help a man live after a draggin’.”

  They argued the niceties of the matter this way and that until they came to a steep and narrow trail that mounted the wall of the valley. They halted and surveyed it, casting speculative glances at the burden the third horse carried.

  Link gave a short hacking laugh.

  “You’re goin’ to lose him goin’ up there.”

  Win thought that very funny and laughed.

  “You could be so right,” he said and started up, leading the horse carrying the half-dead prisoner. They climbed with the greatest of caution because Win did not want to lose a good horse and he reckoned the horse would belong to him in future. He might have a little trouble with Link over that, but Link was a man who knew his position in the hierarchy.

  When they reached the top, they stopped to breathe the horses. They tilted their hats back and wiped their sweating brows.

  The place they were in was a pleasant watered height, a long green bench. They could hear the distant bawling of cattle. Beyond the green reared the titanic heights of the Rockies, dwarfing them. But they were indifferent to the beauties of the place that appealed to the eye. To them the place meant safety. The law would need an army to take them here and if an army started in after them, they’d be gone a week before the soldiers reached here.

  They now walked their horses across the bench, heading north and pretty soon they came to a jagged line of gigantic boulders sitting gray and forbidding among the green. They entered a narrow passage between two of these and entered a narrow and rock-walled trail. This they travelled for about five minutes and then came out into the soft light of timber. The hoofs of their horses were silent on pine needles.

  A short while after, they came out above a natural basin in the hills and started their horses down into it. Below them they could see several columns of smoke rising and drifting on the clear mountain air. Through the trees below them, they could see the bright glitter of water and within ten minutes they were riding beside a lake that was as smooth as a lady’s mirror.

  A mile further on, between the head of the lake and a piled up rocky mass that looked like a misshapen castle, they came in sight of the cabins. There were no more than a half-dozen of them and they were mostly small and carelessly thrown together, for none of the men here were enamored of physical labor that did not result in material profit.

  From a lean-to at the side of one came the clink of a blacksmith’s hammer. This seemed to designate it a peaceful scene. It rang its clear music to the peaks above. A man came out of the lean-to with a hammer in his hand. He was thickset and bearded, he wore a leathern apron and he shone with sweat. He stared at them for a moment and disappeared from sight.

  There were a few men and one or two women in sight. They gazed at the two riders and the burden on the third horse and showed little interest. Win led the way to a cabin nearest the wall of rock. Near it was a small corral with a few horses in it.

  A man came to the door of the cabin and stood watching them.

  Link dismounted at the corral fence and tied his horse. Win followed suit.

  The man in the doorway of the house walked toward them and looked curiously at George’s still form.

  “Who was hit?” he asked.

  Win giggled.

  “He ain’t one of ourn,” he said. “Jest a feller nos
in’ around. Followed right along our tracks. Hy git back?”

  The man jerked his head in the direction of the cabin.

  “Brought the cows on in an’ he’s sleepin’. Said you had a mite of trouble. Where’s Charlie?”

  Win said: “Thet feller killed him dead. Neatest damn thing you ever saw in your life. Saved me a chore.”

  The other nodded.

  “You drag him?”

  “Sure did.”

  The man drew a knife, stepped to George and cut the rawhide holding him across the horse. He pulled hard on the seat of George’s pants and George came off the horse. He lay on his back, face dust and blood-flecked. The man inspected his face and said: “Know who he is?”

  “Never saw him before.”

  “Why’d you bring him in?”

  Win looked surprised and thoughtful, as if he hadn’t gotten around to asking himself that question yet.

  “Don’t rightly know,” he said. He laughed. “Maybe ‘cause I never owned a Negra, thought I might git me a white.”

  The other looked thoughtful.

  “If he was trailin’ you,” he said, “maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea at that.”

  Win looked surprised again, this time because he had done something clever. He had always wanted to do something clever.

  The man turned and walked into the cabin. Dusk was starting to come down softly and swiftly over the land. He lit a lamp that stood on the table.

  The interior of the place contained four bunks in pairs one above the other. A dingy bachelor home, more a camp and an untidy one at that. Unwashed pots, pans and plates stood on the table. In one of the bunks lay a fully clothed man, snoring. Hy Folly, a man who aspired to prominence in the world of crime. He’d never make it. Not alone.

  But, the man thought, he could make it with me. He hasn’t many brains, but he follows and he isn’t afraid of anything on earth.

  The door was kicked open as Win and Link brought in their unconscious prisoner. They dumped him unceremoniously on the floor and stood back to survey him. Win looked pleased and proud.