The Strong Land Read online

  The marshal walked on along the street of false-fronted, weather-beaten buildings. Squalid and dismal as they looked, crouching here where desert and mountains met, the town was changing. It was growing with the hopes of the people, with their changing needs. This spring, for the first time, flowers had been planted in the yard of the house beyond the church, and in front of another house a tree had been trimmed.

  From being a haphazard collection of buildings, catering to the transient needs of a transient people, the town of Sentinel was becoming vital, acquiring a consciousness of the future, a sense of belonging. A strong land growing, a land that would give birth to strong sons who could build and plant and harvest.

  Fitz Moore turned into the empty alley between the Emporium and the abandoned barn, which was a relic of over-ambition during a boom. And thoughts persisted. With the marshal dead, and the town helpless …

  But how had the outlaw gang planned to kill him? For that it had been planned was to him a certainty. And it must be done and done quickly when the time came.

  The loft of the barn commanded a view of the street. The outlaws would come into town riding toward the barn, and somewhere along that street, easily covered by a rifleman concealed in the barn, the marshal of Sentinel would be walking.

  He climbed the stairs to the loft. The dust on the steps had been disturbed. At the top a board creaked under his feet, and a rat scurried away. The loft was wide and empty. Only dust and wisps of hay.

  From that wide door the raid might be stopped, but this was not the place for him. His place was down there in that hot, dusty street, where his presence might count. There was much to do. And now there was only a little time.

  Returning to his quarters, Fitz Moore thrust an extra gun into his pocket and belted on a third. Then he put two shotguns into his wood sack. Nobody would be surprised to see him with the sack, for he always carried firewood in it that he got from the pile in back of Gard’s.

  He saw Jack Thomas, sitting in a chair before the livery stable. Barney Gard came from the saloon, glanced at the marshal, and then went back inside. Fitz Moore paused, relighting his dead cigar.

  The topic of what would happen here if the Henry gang attempted a raid was not a new one. He had heard much speculation. Some men, like Thomas, had brought it up before, trying to feel him out, to discover what he thought, what he would do.

  Jack Thomas turned his big head on his thick neck and glanced toward the marshal. He was a good-natured man, but too inquisitive, too dirty.

  Johnny Haven, sitting on the steps of the saloon porch, looked at the marshal and grinned. He was a powerful, aggressive young man.

  “How’s the town clown?” he asked.

  Moore paused, drawing deep on his cigar, permitting himself a glance toward the loft door, almost sixty yards away and across the street. Deliberately he had placed himself in line with the best shooting position.

  “Johnny,” he said, “if anything happens to me, I want you to have this job. If nothing does happen to me, I want you for my deputy.”

  Young Haven could not have been more astonished, but he also was deeply moved. He looked up as if he believed the marshal had been suddenly touched by the heat. Aside from the words, the very fact that Marshal Moore had ventured a personal remark was astonishing.

  “You’re twenty-six, Johnny, and it’s time you grew up. You’ve played at being a bad man long enough. I’ve looked the town over, and you’re the man I want.”

  Johnny—Tom. He avoided thinking of them together, yet there was a connection. Tom once had been a good man, too, but now he was a good man gone. Johnny was a good man, much like Tom, although walking the hairline of the law.

  Johnny Haven was profoundly impressed. To say that he admired and respected this tall, composed man was no more than the truth. After his first forcible arrest by Fitz Moore, Johnny had been furious enough to beat him up or kill him, but each time he had come to town he had found himself neatly boxed and helpless.

  Nor had Fitz Moore ever taken unfair advantage, never striking one blow more than essential and never keeping the young cowhand in jail one hour longer than necessary. And Johnny Haven was honest enough to realize that he never could have handled the situation as well.

  Anger had resolved into reluctant admiration. Only his native stubbornness and the pride of youth had prevented him from giving up the struggle. “Why pick on me?” He spoke roughly to cover his emotion. “You won’t be quitting.”

  There was a faint suggestion of movement from the loft. The marshal glanced at his watch. 10:02.

  “Johnny”—the sudden change of tone brought Johnny’s head up sharply—“when the shooting starts, there are two shotguns in this sack. Get behind the end of the water trough and use one of them. Shoot from under the trough. It’s safer.”

  Two riders walked their mounts into the upper end of the street, almost a half block away. Two men on powerful horses, better horses than would be found on any cow ranch.

  Three more riders came from a space between the buildings, from the direction of Peterson’s Corral. One of them was riding a gray horse. They were within twenty yards when Barney Gard came from the saloon, carrying two canvas bags. He was headed for the bank when one of the horsemen swung his mount to a route that would cut across Barney’s path.

  “Shotgun in the sack, Gard.” The marshal’s voice was conversational.

  Then, as sunlight glinted on a rifle barrel in the loft door, Fitz Moore took one step forward, drawing as he moved, and the thunder of the rifle merged with the bark of his own gun. Then the rifle clattered, falling, and an arm lay loosely in the loft door.

  The marshal had turned instantly. “All right, Henry!” His voice rang like a trumpet call in the narrow street. “You’re asking for it! Take it!”

  There was no request for surrender. The rope awaited these men, and death rode their guns and hands.

  As one man they drew, and the marshal sprang into the street, landing flat-footed and firing. The instant of surprise had been his. And his first shot, only a dancing second after the bullet that had killed the man in the loft, struck Fred Henry over the belt buckle.

  Behind and to the marshal’s right a shotgun’s deep roar blasted the sunlit morning. The man on the gray horse died falling, his gun throwing a useless shot into the hot, still air.

  Horses reared, and a cloud of dust and gunpowder arose, stabbed through with crimson flame and the hoarse bark of guns.

  A rider leaped his horse at the marshal, but Fitz Moore stood his ground and fired. The rider’s face seemed to disintegrate under the impact of the bullet.

  And then there was silence. The roaring was gone and only the faint smells lingered—the acrid tang of gunpowder, of blood in the dust, of the brighter crimson scent of blood on a saddle.

  Johnny Haven got up slowly from behind the horse trough. Barney Gard stared around as if he had just awakened, his hands gripping a shotgun.

  There was a babble of sound then, of people running into the street. And a girl with gray eyes was watching. Those eyes seemed to reach across the street and into the heart of the marshal.

  “Only one shot!” Barney Gard exclaimed. “I got off only one shot and missed that one!”

  “The Henry gang wiped out!” yelled an excited citizen. “Wait’ll Thomas hears of this!”

  “He won’t be listenin,” somebody else said. “They got him.”

  Fitz Moore turned like a duelist. “I got him,” he said flatly. “He was their man. Tried all morning to find out what I’d do if they showed up …”

  * * * * *

  An hour later Johnny Haven followed the marshal into the street. Four men were dead and two were in jail. “How did you know, Marshal?”

  “You learn, Johnny. You learn or you die. That’s your lesson for today. Learn to be in the right place at the right time and keep your own coun
sel. You’ll be getting my job.” His cigar was gone. He bit the end from a fresh one and went on. “Jack Thomas was the only man the rider of the gray horse I told you I saw could have reached without crossing the street. He wouldn’t have left the horse he’d need for a quick getaway on the wrong side of the street. Besides, I’d been doubtful of Thomas. He was prying too much.”

  When he entered the Eating House, Julia Heath was at the table again. She was white and shaken. He spoke to her.

  “I’m sorry, Julia, but now you see how little time there is for a man when guns are drawn. These men would have taken the money honest men worked to get, and they would have killed as they have killed before. Such men know only the law of the gun.” He placed his hands on the table. “I should have known you at once, but I never thought … after what happened … that you would come, even to settle the estate. He was proud of you, Julia, and he was my best friend.”

  “But you killed him.”

  Marshal Moore gestured toward the street. “It was like that. Guns exploding, a man dying under my gun, and then running feet behind me in a town where I had no friends. I thought Tom was on his ranch in Colorado. I killed the man who was firing at me, turned, and fired toward the running feet. And killed my friend, your brother.”

  She knew then how it must have been for this man, and she was silent.

  “And now?” she murmured.

  “My job will go to Johnny Haven, but I’m going to stay here and help this town grow, help it become a community of homes, use some of the things I know that have nothing to do with guns. This”—he gestured toward the street—“should end it for a while. In the breathing space we can mature, settle down, change the houses into homes, and bring some beauty into this makeshift.”

  She was silent again, looking down at the table. At last she spoke, her voice barely audible. “It … it’s worth doing.”

  “It will be.” He looked at his unlighted cigar. “You’ll be going to settle Tom’s property. When you come back, if you want to, you might stop off again. If you do, I’ll be waiting to see you.”

  She looked at him, seeing beyond the coldness, seeing the man her brother must have known. “I think I shall. I think I’ll stop … when I come back.”

  Out in the street a man was raking dust over the blood. Back of the old barn a hen cackled, and somewhere a pump started to complain rustily, drawing clear water from a deep, cold well.

  Lit a Shuck

  for Texas

  The Sandy Kid slid the roan down the steep bank into the draw and fast-walked it over to where Jasper Wald sat his big iron-gray stallion. The Kid, who was nineteen and new to this range, pulled up a short distance from his boss. That gray stallion was mighty near as mean as Wald himself.

  “Howdy, boss! Look what I found back over in that rough country east of here.”

  Wald scowled at the rock the rider held out. “I ain’t payin’ you to hunt rocks,” he declared. “You get back there in the breaks roundin’ up strays like I’m payin’ you for.”

  “I figgered you’d be interested. I reckon this here’s gold.”

  “Gold?” Wald’s laugh was sardonic, and he threw a contemptuous glance at the cowhand. “In this country? You’re a fool!”

  The Sandy Kid shoved the rock back in his chaps pocket and swung his horse back toward the brush, considerably deflated. Maybe it was silly to think of finding gold here, but that rock sure enough looked it, and it was heavy. He reckoned he’d heard somewhere that gold was a mighty heavy metal.

  When he was almost at the edge of the badlands, he saw a steer heading toward the thick brush, so he gave the roan a taste of the diggers and spiked his horse’s tail after the steer. That old ladino could run like a deer, and it headed out for those high rocks like a tramp after a chuck wagon, but when it neared the rocks, the mossyhorn ducked and, head down, cut off at right angles, racing for the willows.

  Beyond the willows was a thicket of brush, rock, and cactus that made riding precarious and roping almost suicidal, and once that steer got into the tangle beyond, he was gone. The Kid shook out a loop and hightailed it after the steer, but it was a shade far for good roping when he made his cast. Even at that, he’d have made it, but just as his rope snagged the steer, the roan’s hoof went into a gopher hole, and the Sandy Kid sailed right off over the roan’s ears.

  As he hit the ground all in a lump, he caught a glimpse of the ladino. Wheeling around, head down with about four or five feet of horn, it started for him.

  With a yelp, the Kid grabbed for his gun, but it was gone, so he made a frantic leap for a cleft in the ground. Even as he rolled into it, he felt the hot breath of the steer, or thought he did.

  The steer went over the cleft, scuffling dust down on the cowboy. When the Kid looked around, he saw he was lying in a crack that was about three feet wide and at least thirty feet deep. He had landed on a ledge that all but closed off the crack for several feet.

  Warily he eased his head over the edge and then jerked back with a gasp, for the steer was standing, red-eyed and mean, not over ten feet away and staring right at him.

  Digging out the makings, the Kid rolled a cigarette. After all, why get cut up about it? The steer would go away after a while, and then it would be safe to come out. In the meantime it was mighty cool here and pleasant enough, what with the sound of falling water and all.

  The thought of water reminded the Kid that he was thirsty. He studied the situation and decided that with care he could climb to the bottom without any danger. Once down where the water was, he could get a drink. He was not worried, for, when he had looked about, he had seen his horse, bridle reins trailing, standing not far away. The roan would stand forever that way.

  His six-gun, which had been thrown from his holster when he fell, also lay up there on the grass. It was not over twenty feet from the rim of the crevice, and, once it was in his hand, it would be a simple thing to knock off that steer. Getting the pistol was quite another thing. With that steer on the prod, it would be suicide to try.

  When he reached the bottom of the crevice, he peered around in the vague light. At noon, or close to that, it would be bright down here, but at any other time it would be thick with shadows. Kneeling by the thin trickle of water, the Kid drank his fill. Lifting his face from the water, he looked downstream and almost jumped out of his skin when he saw a grinning skull.

  The Sandy Kid was no pilgrim. He had fought Apaches and Comanches, and twice he had been over the trail to Dodge. But seeing a skull grinning at him from a distance of only a few feet did nothing to make him feel comfortable and at ease.

  “By grab, looks like I ain’t the first to tumble into this place,” he said. “That hombre must have broken a leg and starved to death.”

  Yet when he walked over and examined the skeleton, he could see he was wrong. The man had been shot through the head.

  Gingerly the Kid moved the skull. There was a hole on the other side, too, and a bullet flattened against the rock. He was astonished.

  “Well, now, somebody shot this hombre while he laid here,” the Kid decided.

  Squatting on his haunches, the Sandy Kid puffed his cigarette and studied the situation. Long experience in reading sign had made it easy for his eyes to see what should be seen. A few things he noticed now. This man, already wounded, had fallen or been pushed into the crack, and then a man with a gun had leaned over the edge above and shot him through the head.

  There was a notch in his belt that must have been cut by a bullet, and one knee had been broken by a bullet, for the slug was still there, embedded in the joint. The Kid was guessing about the notch, but from the look of things and the way the man was doubled up, it looked like he had been hurt pretty bad aside from the knee. The shirt was gone except for a few shreds, and among the rocky débris there were a few buttons, an old pocket knife, and some coins. The boots, dried and stiff, were not a horsema
n’s boots, but the high-topped, flat-heeled type that miners wear. A rusted six-shooter lay a bit farther downstream, and the Kid retrieved it. After a few minutes he determined that the gun was still fully loaded.

  “Probably never got a shot at the skunk,” the Sandy Kid said thoughtfully. “Well, now, ain’t this a pretty mess?”

  When he studied the skeleton further, he noticed something under the ribs that he had passed over, thinking it a rock. Now he saw it was a small leather sack that the dead man had evidently carried inside his shirt. The leather was dry and stiff, and it ripped when he tried to open it. Within were several fragments of the same ore the Kid had himself found.

  Tucking the samples and the remnants of the sack under a rocky ledge, the Kid stuck the rusty six-shooter in his belt and climbed back to the ledge, where a cautious look showed that the ladino was gone.

  The roan pricked up its ears and whinnied, not at all astonished that this peculiar master of his should come crawling out of the ground. The Kid had lost his rope, which was probably still trailing from the steer’s horns, but he was not thinking of that. He was thinking of the murdered man.

  * * * * *

  When he awakened the next morning, he rolled over on his side and stared around the bunkhouse. Everyone was still asleep, and then he realized that it was Sunday.

  Wald was nowhere around when the Kid headed for the cook shack. Smoke was rising slowly, for Cholly Cooper, the best cook on that range, was conscientious. When you wanted breakfast, you got it, early or late. The Sandy Kid was glad that Wald was not around, for he had no love for his morose, quick-to-anger boss.

  It was not a pleasant outfit to ride for, Cooper being the only friendly one in the bunch. Jasper Wald never spoke, except to give an order or to criticize in a dry, sarcastic voice. He was about forty, tough and hard-bitten. Rumor had it that he had killed more than one man. His two permanent hands were Jack Swarr, a burly Kansas man, always unshaven, and Dutch Schweitzer, a lean German who drank heavily.