Range Of Golden Hoofs Read online

  The ruse worked. On the hill the dry gulcher pulled his trigger. Dan did not hear the solid thump of lead into his horse’s belly. He drowned that sound with the roar of the Sharps. From above two small rocks, just at the top of the ridge, smoke drifted away and Dan Shea sent the slugs from the Sharps searching about the stones. He fired three times and paused, not sure of the effects of his shooting, waiting and listening, trying to detect his results, if any.

  Again silence hung over the draw, the dead horse, the man and the cattle. Dan, with the Sharps ready, searched the ridge with his eyes. Then there was a scurrying movement, and the Sharps kicked back sharply against his shoulder.

  The crash of the rifle rang in Dan’s ears as he reloaded. He squirmed for better position, saw a mounted man atop the hill, leveled the Sharps again and, miraculously, stayed his finger on the trigger. The mounted man was coming along the ridge at a run, arm thrust out as he leaned forward on his horse. The rider was shooting at something in front of him. Dan stood up.

  On top of the ridge the rider disappeared. Two reports, the first one loud, the second fainter, drifted back to Dan. With the rifle dangling in his hand Shea started up the ridge.

  He was on top, surveying the country to the west, when he saw a horseman coming toward him. The rider came deliberately, as though in no hurry. Dan sat down to wait. Either this approaching rider was the man who had driven off Dan’s attacker or he might possibly be the dry gulcher himself. In either event Dan was prepared. Sitting there on the ridge top, he waited.

  The rider came on, his horse climbing. When he was close enough Dan identified the man. Jesse Louder was coming toward him. Louder’s horse was sweating, and Louder himself showed some excitement. He stopped beside Dan, dismounted and stood looking down. “You hurt?” Louder asked.

  “No,” Dan answered. “My horse is dead.”

  “He was up here in the rocks,” Louder announced. “I heard the shootin’ an’ I came across the creek to see what it was. I saw him an’ I saw his horse. He heard me comin’, I guess. Anyhow, he lit a shuck for his horse an’ pulled out. I couldn’t catch him.” There was regret in the cowman’s voice.

  Deliberately Dan lowered the hammer of the Sharps, rested it across his knees and reached into the pocket of his vest for tobacco and papers. “I thought it might be some of you folks,” he drawled, looking searchingly at Louder. “I found a bunch of your cattle on my grass and I was moving them.”

  Louder advanced a step and looked down the slope of the ridge. Dan’s dead horse lay in the bottom of the draw. The cattle grazed along the slopes. Anger glinted in Louder’s eyes.

  “Where did you figure to take them cows?” he demanded.

  “Back into the hills,” Dan answered calmly. “I’d made you a fair proposition, Louder. It looked to me like you’d called my hand.”

  Louder frowned. “Come on,” he ordered abruptly. “I want to look at this.”

  Dan got up. Louder mounted. With the cowman riding and Dan walking beside him, they went back down the hill.

  Louder did not bother with the cattle. He turned toward Rito Osos. Dan said nothing but walked along beside the horse. When they reached the creek Dan stopped. Louder rode over to the stream, worked along the bank, east and west, stopped, apparently to examine something, and then came slowly back to the man on foot.

  “They were shoved across,” Louder said slowly. “I found horse tracks.”

  Dan nodded, watching Louder’s angry eyes.

  “I gave orders,” Louder said, staring at Dan, “for the stuff up here to be drifted west. I’d decided to take your proposition, Shea.”

  Still Dan waited, making no comment. Louder was frowning. He shifted his eyes from Dan’s.

  “I’ll push those cattle back,” he announced suddenly. “You want me to side you back home? Do you want to take your saddle in?”

  “No,” Dan replied and then, warmth in his voice: “I’m obliged to you, Louder. That fellow had me treed.”

  Jesse Louder grinned. The smile drove all the coldness from his face and warmed it. “I expect I’d of done the same thing you did,” he said. “It would have been tough for me to find them cows back in the hills though.”

  “I wanted to make it tough.” Dan answered Louder’s smile with one of his own. “I thought you’d decided to run a blazer on me. I was going to take you up on it.”

  “I don’t think,” Louder said, “that you’ll find any more YH cows on your grass, Shea. If you do they’ll be strays, an’ I’ll be obliged if you’ll just push ’em back.”

  “Why sure,” Dan agreed. “If they’re west of the house it won’t make any difference anyhow. I’m not going to use that grass there till later. After it rains.”

  For a moment neither man spoke, then Louder shifted his weight in his saddle and his horse moved. “If you don’t want me to take your saddle in I’ll pick up the cows an’ go on,” he drawled. “I’ve got a little business to tend to back at the ranch.”

  “I’ll send out for the saddle,” Dan replied. “I’m much obliged to you, Louder.”

  “That’s all right,” Louder answered. The horse turned. Louder rode up the draw toward the grazing cattle. Dan Shea watched him for a moment and then, lifting the heavy Sharps until it rested across his arm, started down the creek toward Rancho Norte.

  In the next three days Dan Shea, riding his retrieved saddle on a fresh horse, saw movement across the creek. At the end of the three days when he rode east from Rancho Norte and looked to the north he saw no cattle. The country east of Rancho Norte and north of the creek had been cleaned of cows. West of the ranch, however, there were plenty of cattle. Dan grinned as he came home.

  On the fourth day following the trouble Dan, coming in from his herds, found that he had a visitor at the ranch. Fitzpatrick, tall and sandy and smiling, met Dan as he dismounted.

  When the men had shaken hands Fitzpatrick drawled: “I thought I’d come out an’ see how you were makin’ it.”

  “I’m mighty glad you came,” Dan replied. “Come on. We’ll clean up and see what Domisinda’s got to eat.”

  After supper, sitting in front of Dan Shea’s new rock house, Fitzpatrick talked. His cigar smoldering, peacefully stretched out with his shoulders against the new rock wall, he came to the purpose of his visit.

  “There’s quite some talk in town,” Fitzpatrick said. “Seems like you had some trouble out here.”

  “How did you hear about it?” Dan asked.

  A smile lined Fitzpatrick’s face. “Buster Flint is in town,” he drawled. “He’s been drinkin’ quite a little. Seems like Buster is pretty sore about Louder firing him because of a sheepman.”

  “So?” Dan said. So it had been Buster that pushed the YH cattle across the creek! And Louder had fired Buster because of the incident.

  “Buster’s cussin’ Jesse Louder,” Fitzpatrick continued. “He’s pretty sore. He says it’s too bad you wasn’t killed instead of your horse.”

  “You heard about that too?”

  “Buster’s got quite a tale. Mebbe it ain’t all so. What happened, Dan?”

  Dan puffed the cigar that Fitzpatrick had given him. “I’ll tell you what happened,” he agreed.

  When he had completed his story there was a pause; then into the quiet Fitzpatrick dropped soft words.

  “It might be that was some my fault,” he said. “You see, I told Youtsey about you seein’ one of them fello’s that killed Maples there in town.”

  “Yes?” Dan prompted.

  “Yeah. I told him about that an’ about how the fello’ was talkin’ to George Delaney. It might just be, Dan…”

  “It might be what?”

  “It might be that Youtsey asked Delaney about who he’d been talkin’ to. An’ it might be that Delaney saw the same man again. An’ then, you bein’ able to recognize him an’ all, it might be that that fello’ thought you were a little dangerous. I’m kind of watchin’ out for things myself. I keep my eyes open. It would pay you to
do the same thing, I think.”

  There was a long silence. Then: “It’s an idea, anyhow,” Dan Shea said.

  Fitzpatrick, having delivered his message and warning, turned to other subjects. “Youtsey,” he commented, drawing smoke from his cigar, “has been doin’ himself some good. He found out who that fello’ was that was killed at San Felice.”

  “So?”

  “Uh-huh. We knew his name was Maples, but Youtsey’s been writin’ to the capital. Maples run a little abstract office up there. Kind of a jackleg. Made abstracts, sold some real estate, done a lot of things.”

  “And so?” Dan prompted.

  “An’ so Youtsey’s got his mystery solved. He knows just who was murdered.”

  “But not who did the murdering.”

  “No.” Fitzpatrick contemplated his cigar again. “He ain’t got that far with it yet. Youtsey is easy satisfied.”

  Dan Shea grunted. “We gave him descriptions of the men who did the killing,” he commented. “It looks like he might have gone along with that end first.”

  “Them men are alive,” Fitzpatrick said succinctly. “They might still do some shootin’. Now Maples is dead an’ buried. He’s safe to investigate.”

  Again Dan grunted and Fitzpatrick puffed on his cigar. Their unspoken opinion of the sheriff of Seco County hung heavy between them. It was not a good opinion.

  CHAPTER SEVEN:

  THERE GOLD IS FOUND

  In the first week of June the shearers came to Rancho Norte. They camped along the creek, and there their cooking fire was built. Daily Dan’s herders brought in sheep, and daily, in the long shed set in the center of the corrals, the shearers worked. They were men apart from all others, skilled workmen, under the orders of a capitán with whom Dan had made his bargain. The shearers, the llaneros who packed the wool into sacks, even the colero—the boy who carried the bucket of thin tar to daub on wounds made by slipping shears—did not consort with the men of El Puerto del Sol. They formed a clan of their own. But even clansmen fight among themselves, and on the third day of shearing at Rancho Norte there was trouble in the shearers’ camp.

  Dan Shea had moved into his new rock house. It was not entirely finished but was better than the tent. Lounging in a rawhide-bottomed homemade chair, resting from the day’s work, he heard the trouble start. Angry voices came through the dusk. For a moment Dan listened, and then as one voice changed from harsh anger to shrill terror he sprang up and ran in the direction of the sound.

  When he reached the camp he found the shearers crowded around the fire. Fire and twilight made them bulk black, and Dan, thrusting through the men, entered a cleared space. On one side of the clearing the boy—the colero—was crouched, frightened, evidently, but in his fright ready to fight. Across from him was a shearer, a pock-marked, burly man whom Dan had noted as the most careless and the slowest of the shearers. The pockmarked man was scowling. He did not note Dan’s arrival but, cautious as some stalking cat, advanced on the boy, a knife in his upthrust hand and maledictions coming in a muttered stream from between his snarling lips.

  Dan Shea did not hesitate. He did not know the right or wrong of the situation but he did know that the boy was small and the man burly. “¡Párelo, hombre!” Dan snapped.

  The pock-marked man threw a glance over his shoulder, snarled a curse and took another step toward the boy. Dan Shea, nothing loath, closed in. He struck twice, sure and certain, dodging the knife before he struck the second blow. The knife, released, flew high and glittered in the firelight as it fell, and Dan Shea, body a straight line from heel to right fist, placed his third blow on the pock-marked jaw, just on angle. Lightning could have been no more thorough. The pock-marked man went down. The boy scurried out, dropping on hands and knees to scuttle between the legs of the men. Dan Shea stood, feet widespread, and addressed the shearing crew. When he finished the pock-marked man was sitting up, and there was no doubt in the mind of any of his hearers that Señor Dan Shea would not stand for foolishness on Rancho Norte.

  In the morning the pock-marked man was gone from the shearing shed. The men worked with more vigor when Dan Shea appeared, and Vicente Lebya, the colero, followed him around during all his visit, frank and almost embarrassing adoration in his eyes.

  Stopping briefly beside the capitán, Dan spoke concerning the absence of the pock-marked man. The capitán shrugged his shoulders eloquently. “Hee’s gone,” the capitán said, and then, eying Dan narrowly: “He is a bad man, señor. Arturo de la Luz. He hass killed a man. You better be careful.”

  Dan grinned and nodded. “I’ll watch out,” he said, and then: “This bunch is shearing a little lighter than those we had yesterday.”

  The shearers stayed a week at Rancho Norte. At the end of that time all of Dan Shea’s sheep were sheared, and some of the wool had been hauled away in the creaking wagons that Don Martin had sent from El Puerto del Sol. Don Martin had bought wool from Dan in addition to taking his own part of the shear. With the money the patrón paid him, Dan had paid his shearers. Some small amount yet remained, as well as the greater part of his wool. For the first time since his arrival at Bendición Dan began to feel like a capitalist.

  One of the shearing crew did not leave the rancho. Vincent Lebya, the colero, stayed on, nor could Dan Shea’s amused assurance that there was no work, or the positive hostility of Hilario and his family, drive the boy away. Perforce Dan fed him, and Vicente, finding a place to sleep in one of the sheds, bared the knife he had retrieved on the night of the fight and drove Hilario away when Hilario came to remonstrate.

  There was something odd about the boy, something that was not true to the native type as Dan had come to know it, and when Hilario, wrathful and breathing threats and desires of vengeance, came to Dan demanding that Vicente be ordered to leave Dan did not accede. Instead he went to the shed, called Vicente and brought the boy out into the light.

  Under questioning Vicente gave reluctant information. He had no family. He was an orphan. He had no home. He had no relatives. Hilario, standing by, grunted scornfully and spoke his mind: “¡Es indio!”

  The boy’s black eyes flashed vengefully at the speaker, and Dan knew that Hilario had been right. Vicente was an Indian.

  “Apache?” Dan demanded sharply.

  Vicente did not answer for a moment, and then reluctantly he nodded. Dan turned to Hilario. “Let him stay,” he directed. “And feed him.”

  Light filled Vicente’s eyes, and Hilario, muttering to himself, stamped away. From that time on about Rancho Norte Dan Shea had a second shadow, a boy who moved wraithlike at his heels, watching him with black, adoring eyes.

  Following the shearing there was a respite in the work at Rancho Norte. There came a change in the weather too. Clouds gathered about the tops of the Alforjas, bunched and grew black. Rain fell, making of Rito Osos a torrent, filling the water holes, giving new life to the burned grass. Rain brings relief to the range country, rejuvenates it and lifts the hearts of men. There was a week of rain, and at the end of the week Dan Shea stood and watched lambs playing, and he laughed aloud with no one to hear him. It was good to be alive, good to be relieved of restraint, good to be young and strong and working, building for a future.

  All across the range country, all through the pastures of the YH, through El Puerto del Sol, that feeling spread so that when Dan, on impulse, saddled a horse and rode south to visit Don Martin he found the spirit of fiesta imbuing the little settlement below the hacienda.

  At the house itself Don Martin greeted him jovially and Marillita came smiling to bid him welcome. There was a feast that night: young mutton, vegetables from the gardens, fine bread and biscochos and wine, and when the meal was done Don Martin sat awhile with the two young people and then, pleading his need for rest, betook himself to his room, leaving Dan and Marillita alone in the patio.

  They sat upon the bench while the moon came up to look down into the patio and while the mocking-bird that had built a nest in the cottonwood sang in the m
oonlight. Marillita did not whistle to the bird, and Dan sat silent, listening to the song, and presently he felt the soft fingers of the girl’s hand slipped into his own hard palm.

  The following morning Dan Shea went out with Martin O’Connor, returning again at night. Two days he stayed at El Puerto del Sol, returning to Rancho Norte on the third day. When he was gone Marillita moped about the house, her spirits fallen, and Don Martin O’Connor, smiling slyly, spoke at length concerning his partidario on Rancho Norte, doubting Dan’s ability to be successful in the partnership and hurrying away so that he might laugh when Marillita rose hotly to Dan’s defense.

  Who knows the way of a man with a woman? Who can fathom the season when life, refreshed by rain, stirs all across the range country and a man’s blood runs hot? Dan Shea, at Rancho Norte, was preoccupied and dissatisfied. Marillita, at El Puerto del Sol, was given to long silences wherein she did not hear her father’s words.

  There was a distance between Rancho Norte and El Puerto del Sol, a weary travel. To Dan Shea the distance south grew great and the journey north a plague. At first it was once a week that he made the trip, dropping down from Rancho Norte to spend the Sunday with Martin O’Connor. Then the visits grew more frequent and the intervals between them less until all El Puerto del Sol grinned and, with affection, spoke of Danielito and his courtship.

  So July came to an end.

  In August, with the heat oppressive during the day, with the rains breaking the heat, with the grass growing green all across the range land, Dan Shea stood at the house of El Puerto del Sol and watched a band of sheep coming into the corrals below the house. Martin O’Connor, coming up from the pens, stood beside Dan and also watched the sheep. O’Connor was dusty, and streaks of sweat beaded his forehead when he pushed back his hat.