The Bounty Hunters, page 15
“That’s what I intend to do,” Travis said.
“It’s a pity though,” Colman said, after riding in silence a short time. “We’d make a hell of a team, if you could see things my way.”
“I’d have to be blind to see things your way.”
“I think we better drop the subject,” Colman said.
“Suits me.”
They followed the canyon for several miles, then left it and rode west through a region of sheer-walled buttes and colorful rock formations. Most of the way there was not a blade of grass or a tree except for tough, stunted cedars clinging to slopes too barren to support anything else. But here and there they came upon a surprising streak of green, usually along washes, but sometimes higher up, above bare rock, they saw a crown of trees.
“You think Grayson ever found out why you killed his brother?” Colman asked after another long silence.
“It would be a miracle if he hasn’t,” Travis grunted. “With you writing him letters and Nita Ramsey telling everyone Red raped her.”
“I never mailed that letter,” Colman said, scowling at the memory of the lump Travis had put on his head.
“You never mailed that one,” Travis agreed.
“I didn’t mail any others either,” Colman said. “I didn’t know where to mail them to.”
“Why did you write it then?”
“It was part of my plan.”
“You and your plan,” Travis said, his mouth twisting in an expression of mild contempt.
“Travis, what really happened at the Ramsey ranch that day?” Colman asked. “Do you know for sure?”
“Everyone who knew for sure is dead except Nita Ramsey, and I doubt if she’ll ever admit the truth even to herself.”
“You ain’t got a very high opinion of her, have you?”
“No,” Travis said. “Have you?”
“I’ve got a feeling she ain’t as bad as you seem to think,” Colman said cautiously. “I can’t see that she’s all that much worse than Lorna Mason.”
“Something else we disagree on,” Travis said.
“You tell me the difference,” Colman said. “Oh, I’ll admit Lorna Mason tries to act like a lady. But that don’t mean she is one.”
“What’s a lady?” Travis asked.
“I figured you’d know more about that than me,” Colman said. “I never knew any. If you want my honest opinion there ain’t any. That’s what I was trying to say. Women are all alike. Some just manage not to get caught, or they don’t get a chance to do anything to get caught at.”
“You may be right,” Travis said.
Colman looked at him in surprise, almost smiling. But when he saw how grim and bleak Travis’s face was, the smile vanished. Just when he thought he was beginning to know the blond man, Travis revealed a different side of his personality—and seemed like a stranger again. But Colman had a feeling that this was the real Travis—grim, hard, lonely.
“You’re in a sour mood today,” Colman observed. “I can’t much blame you, after what happened back in that canyon. But it seems like I’m the one who should be mad about it. You never let on like you cared much one way or the other, and you say you never thought my plan would work any of the time, anyhow.”
Travis looked at him out of cold gray-blue eyes, then looked ahead again without saying anything. But after a short time he spoke quietly. “I blame myself more than you. I always regret it when I let someone talk me into doing something I know is stupid. Not that you gave me much choice at first. But that’s not what I’m mad about. I should have gone after Grayson before something like this happened. I could have been looking for him when he had his men out looking for me. That’s what I should have done.”
“Why didn’t you?” Colman asked curiously.
“I don’t think you’ll understand, Colman,” Travis said in a quiet but surprisingly harsh tone, “but there was always some doubt in my mind if I’d done the right thing by killing Red Grayson. It wouldn’t have bothered you. The fact that there was a price on his head would have been reason enough for a man like you. But it wasn’t enough for me. Even the knowledge that he needed killing wasn’t reason enough. I wasn’t sure I had any right to kill him. And later I wasn’t sure I had any right to kill Sam Grayson, even though he had his killers out looking for me. But I’m beginning to think you may be right, and somehow I don’t much care any longer whether you are or not. I wish I’d killed both of them when I went after Red. People like the Graysons need killing.
Colman’s black eyes brightened in agreement. “Now you’re beginning to talk sense.”
“I don’t know whether it’s sense or not,” Travis said. “I just know how I feel.”
Colman’s elation slowly vanished. He grew worried. “You ain’t in love with that woman, are you, Travis?”
Travis gave him a quick glance. “What woman?”
“You know what woman. Lorna Mason.”
Travis looked bleakly ahead. “In love with her?” he said. “About like you’re in love with Nita Ramsey.”
Colman scowled. Then he grew thoughtful. “I think I know what you mean,” he said slowly. “You ain’t in love with her. You just want her. And,” he added, “you don’t want a bastard like Sam Grayson to have her, with or without her consent.”
Travis nodded. “You’re not quite as dumb as I was beginning to think, Colman.”
“I ain’t dumb at all,” Colman said. “And here’s something else that I guess you’ve already thought of. Grayson won’t kill her, will he? She’s worth too much alive.”
“The only way he’d kill her would be to keep me from getting her,” Travis said. “But I don’t know what else he may do.”
“And that’s what worries you?” Colman asked.
Travis did not answer. But his silence was answer enough.
Not long after that they halted on the rim of a wide canyon whose walls were gashed by smaller canyons strewn with eroded rock formations similar to the ones they had been seeing for some time.
“See that second cliff rising beyond the far canyon wall?” Travis asked. “From here it looks like a bench of the canyon, but it’s farther back than it looks.”
“I’m glad I brought you along,” Colman said. “I never would have found it without you.”
Travis nodded. “I wanted to show you where it is in case anything happens to me. We can’t approach it in the daylight without being spotted. Let’s circle back and I’ll show you how to get into the canyon. It’s too steep here.”
They were about to turn their horses when they saw a trace of dust and then made out three tiny men on tiny animals crawling across the canyon floor.
“The same ones we saw this morning?” Colman asked. “You mean it’s took them this long to get where they are?”
“It’s taken us this long to get here, hasn’t it?” Travis asked. But he was studying the riders with a worried look on his face.
“You ain’t sure it’s them, are you?” Colman asked.
“Not as sure as I’d like to be,” Travis admitted.
“If it ain’t them, who else could it be?”
“I wish I knew,” Travis said. “Grayson may have sent for some more help. Let’s head back to town and see if that bartender has seen anyone else.”
Chapter 18
The bartender was worried, and a little angry. His face was pale one moment, red the next. His eyes were bloodshot and he looked as if he had not slept much the night before.
“You boys are putting me in a spot,” he said. “It was different when you was in here yesterday. You let on like you was taking Travis here to Grayson, and I could let on like I believed you. But now it’s plain you boys are in this thing together. What do you think will happen to me if they find out I talked to you?”
“They won’t hear it from us,” Travis said.
“Walls have ears,” the bartender said darkly. “And somebody might come in any minute and hear us talking. Old Abe Settle usually decides to have a drink about this time, right before I close—and he’s the biggest talker in this town. Telling him something is like putting it in the newspaper. Worse, because a lot of people can’t read, but everyone listens to gossip and passes it on.”
Colman watched the bartender with hard eyes—a strong man showing the weak no mercy. “You’ve already talked long enough to tell us what we want to know,” he said.
The bartender sighed and scratched under his right eye, a look of doom on his face. “Three more men rode through last night. Just came in long enough to dampen the dust, like them others.”
“You catch any names?”
The bartender took a deep breath and said, “There was a big fellow they called Vince. Seems like he was in here a few times several years back, but I ain’t seen him lately, till last night.”
Travis and Colman looked at each other and Colman said, “Vince Biggers. Used to ride with the Graysons, then formed a gang of his own. Worth two thousand dead or alive.”
The bartender was holding his trembling chin, his eyes on the door. “Another tall feller in his late thirties, with black whiskers flat against his face—him they called Roop.”
“Aaron Roop,” Colman said. “Worth a thousand either way.”
“Then there was a younger man,” the bartender said. “Not as big as the others. He was always smiling like he’d just heard a joke. I think one of the others called him Ralph.”
“Raff,” Colman said. “Spelled with two f’s. Raff Petty. I saw it on a poster a while back. He’s only good for five hundred.”
Travis glanced at the bounty hunter in silence, then said to the bartender, “Anything else?”
The bartender shivered. It was cold in the saloon. But the bartender was scared. Scared of the Grayson gang. Scared of the Biggers gang. Scared of Travis and Colman. Scared of dying, whether it was tonight or twenty years from now. “They was expecting two more men on the train tomorrow. That big fellow—Vince—said for me to tell them to stay in town till someone came in to show the way, if someone didn’t meet them at the train. I guess them two ain’t been out there before.”
“He happen to mention their names?”
The bartender shook his head. “He said I’d know them when I saw them. Oh, and he said to tell them not to worry about horses, because whoever came to meet them would bring some.”
Travis thoughtfully reached in his pocket and laid some money on the bar for the drinks. Colman added a small gold piece and said to the bartender, “Get something for your nerves.”
Travis saw the bartender’s face turn red and he said quietly, “Thanks for the information.”
The bartender only nodded and Travis and Colman went out into the windy street, turning up their coat collars. There was a light still burning in a hotel down the street. The rest of the town was dark. They stopped on the boardwalk and Colman said, “That fellow’s in the wrong business. A bartender should have more guts.”
“I’ve known bounty hunters who trembled when the Grayson gang was mentioned,” Travis said.
“Then they were in the wrong business too,” Colman said. “What do we do now? We ain’t just up against the Grayson gang any longer. Now we’ve got to take on the Biggers gang as well. You know anyone we can send for, Travis?”
“No,” Travis said. He was looking toward the hotel. “Let’s get a room. I’d like to be here when the train comes tomorrow.”
Colman looked at him curiously. “Maybe whittle down the odds a little?”
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Travis said.
The next day Raff Petty rode into Dry Wells alone, but with two extra saddle horses on a lead rope. He stopped briefly at the saloon, then rode on down the street to the hotel. At the hotel door he stopped and stood looking at Ben Travis, who sat in a chair near the desk. Travis had turned the chair so that it faced the door at a slight angle. The desk clerk had found some excuse to be elsewhere. Colman was upstairs.
“You Travis?” Raff Petty asked.
Travis silently nodded, watching Petty through cold eyes.
Petty seemed to be enjoying himself. He had a green bundle under one arm. “I was going to leave this at the saloon for you,” he said, “but the bartender said you were here.” He threw the green bundle to the floor in such a way that it came unwound. It was Lorna Mason’s green dress and had been torn open all the way down the front, as if it had been ripped off her.
Travis glanced at the dress, his face as expressionless as stone—and almost as hard. “What’s that got to do with me?” he asked.
Petty’s smile grew into a chuckle. He was a rather small man trying to look like a bigger man, and the high-heeled boots and bulky coat helped. But he did not look good smiling. There did not seem to be room enough on his small tight face for a smile. When his lips pulled back from his teeth it looked as if his whole grinning skull might pop out.
“Grayson thought you might like to have it,” he said.
Travis shook his head. “It doesn’t mean anything to me.”
“That was the only dress she had,” Petty said, watching him closely. “The rest of her clothes went on to Carson City in her suitcase. Grayson’s got her shut up in his room naked, to keep her from trying to run off or anything. But if you ask me that ain’t the only reason. It gets cold up on that mesa at night, and firewood is mighty scarce. How you reckon they keep warm, Travis?”
Travis shrugged. “Anything else you wanted to tell me?”
“Grayson wanted me to give you a message if I saw you, and to leave it with the bartender at the saloon if I didn’t. He said to tell you he knows now why you killed Red. It was because of that Ramsey woman. He said if you plan to kill him because of the Mason woman, he’ll be waiting.”
“That all?” Travis asked.
Petty laughed silently. “He figgered that would be enough. Oh, he said to tell you that you and that bounty hunter never had him fooled any of the time. He said you wasn’t smart enough between the two of you to fool him. And the man you shot wasn’t one of his regular men. Just poor old Slim Perkins, who won’t be using his right arm for a while. That old boy said he hadn’t had nothing but bad luck since he first saw you.”
“You might learn something from him,” Travis said quietly.
Petty shrugged, still smiling. “I figger I could take you, Travis. But Grayson said just deliver the message.”
“You can take him one for me,” Travis said. “Tell him if he had any guts he wouldn’t keep sending his men after me. He’d come after me himself. And he wouldn’t hide behind a woman.”
“I’ll tell him,” Petty said. “Anything else?”
“One more thing,” Travis said. He drew his gun and shot Raff Petty through the right shoulder before Petty could move. Then, as Petty stared down at his useless right arm with horrified eyes, Travis added, “Tell him starting now I’ll shoot any of his men on sight. If they try to fight I’ll kill them. If they ain’t got the guts to fight I’ll cripple them. That goes for the Biggers gang as well. You boys will soon find out that this isn’t going to be any fun.”
Colman had heard the shot and was coming down the stairs, a gun in his hand. Travis got to his feet and crossed the lobby toward Raff Petty. Petty backed through the doorway, stumbling and almost falling. Travis followed him out to his horse and helped him roughly into the saddle. He untied the horses and handed the reins and the lead rope to Petty.
“You might as well take the horses on back,” he said. “Those boys won’t need them. But don’t worry, we’ll meet the train and tell them why you couldn’t be there.”
Raff Petty was no longer smiling and he did not have anything else to say. He looked at Travis through pain-hazed eyes and got his horse and the other two headed out of town, holding the reins and the lead rope in his left hand.
Link Colman was looking on from the hotel doorway, a white-toothed smile lighting up his dark face. “Travis,” he said, “you’re behaving more like me all the time. I guess that’s why I’m beginning to like you.”
“Like you, hell,” Travis said. “You would have salted him down for the bounty.”
“I guess I would have, at that,” Colman admitted.
Travis and Colman sat on the hotel veranda, waiting for the train. Their faces were hard and expressionless, showing the small town nothing. The street was deserted, no one was in sight, but with little doubt the townspeople were keeping an eye on them from behind drawn curtains, through cracks and peepholes. The usual crowd had not gathered to await the train’s arrival. Somehow the news had got around that two members of the Biggers gang were coming in on the train and that Travis and Colman intended to meet them at the train and force a showdown.
Travis had shaved and was wearing his dark suit, which had just been pressed at the Chinese laundry down the street. Not to be outdone, Colman had bought himself an expensive corduroy coat that was almost white. It set off his dark trousers and flat-crowned black hat, which he wore low over his hard black eyes.
Colman had left one of the coat buttons unbuttoned so if necessary he could get at the gun in his waistband. He had exchanged the battered Coon Hooks revolver for the blue-steel, maple-handled Colt that had belonged to Rube Ankers and he was wondering how well the gun would shoot. Wondering if he was still any good with a single-action gun. At the moment he could not remember whether he had ever fired the Coon Hooks gun or not. He did not think so. He figured the double-action Colt in his holster would be all he would need today. But it did not hurt to be prepared for more trouble than was expected. And he noticed the slight bulge under Travis’s coat where the Russian model was thrust in his waistband—that in addition to the open-top Colt in the holster.
Colman lit a cigar and glanced at Travis’s poker face. The blond man seemed both relaxed and alert. He had not moved anything except his eyes for quite a while. He had no nervous mannerisms. He did not seem to have many of the usual human weaknesses. Colman found that reassuring.
“Wasn’t Vince Biggers still with Grayson when you killed Red?” Colman asked.
