Driftin' (Shad Cain Book 3) Page 7

  As we neared the back of the of the house, I saw Miss Wells standing at the corner with a rifle in hand and then Earl stepped out behind her with a double barreled Greener. They couldn’t see me, but they knew the horse and dog. I reckoned they figured me to be laying hurt or dead back there up against the mountains.

  As soon as Hank had the buckskin stopped, I slid off the back. I landed and tried to stretch myself into a better position. She handed her rifle to Earl and came a hurrying to me.

  “You hurt, Shadrac?”

  “It ain’t nothin’ a new rib wouldn’t fix, Ma’am, but that’s the least of it. We only got a few days or at most a couple of weeks before that Glazer bunch makes their play. This here’s Hank and he’s near starved to death. He can tell you all about it… I gotta get to Max Bell quick, so he can spread the word and start makin’ plans.”

  “You’re not goin’ anyplace till I take a look at that rib. Now pull that shirt up.”

  I knew it wouldn’t do a bit of good to argue, and I’d save time just submitting, so I done it. She probed and pushed around on the one that was hurting and pronounced it a wicked bruise but not broken. That was good news. A bruised rib feels about the same as a busted one but heals a lot quicker.

  “Now let me wrap it… Earl, you help Mister Hank down and take him in the kitchen and find him somethin’ to eat…. I’ll be there soon as I get this mountain man patched up.”

  We both knew that wrapping a rib didn’t help it heal, but it made if feel a lot better. So I went along with her.

  I was in the saddle in just a few minutes, and as I swung my horse around to go she tugged on my pant leg and said, “Shadrac, when you come back, you can call me, Aunt Dee like all my other friends.”

  Chapter 10

  It didn’t take near as long to get to the Bellem as it did the first time I came, but I was in a bit more of a hurry this time. I didn’t ride at a full gallop, but that long legged horse could put miles behind him at almost any gait. Dog kept up, but he was panting when he arrived. There had been a time or two when he would have to come along at his own pace and catch up later… he knew how to do that.

  Wincing as I swung from the saddle, I headed for the porch and met Bell as he was coming out.

  “What happened to you, man, you look like you’ve been through it?”

  “Yeah, and trust me, it feels worse than it looks, but there’s no time for that. You got a big problem and damned little time to fix it.”

  “What’s going on?”

  I went on to tell him about the Chinamen being taken up to the mountains to work a mine. Then I told him about the massacre at the logging camp.

  “Max, they’ve got less than a month to take full control of this stretch of land, so that when the loggers move in, they can legally stop them because they will control all the open range…. Chances are the loggers are gonna fight, but they fight with axe handles and fists not with guns. That camp only had a couple of rifles, and I saw hundreds of spent cartridges where the gunmen were shooting from.”

  “But the problem you… we’ve got is, what happens between now and then.”

  He stood there thinking for a few seconds, and then he smiled and said, “You’ve been working too hard, my friend… what you need is a little fun. I think they opened the game with a busted hand when they tried burnin’ out Adams. They didn’t expect any resistance. Right about now, they’re shufflin’ the cards and gettin’ ready to deal again. What say we go get some more chips and start stackin’ the deck?”

  “Now you’re talkin’ my language.”

  “Let’s take a little ride and visit some of the neighbors. There’s a few good fighting men up the line who figure to stand when needed. I talked to most of them yesterday, but I didn’t have this new information. There’s some gents up the line who may be settled, but they’re far from tame.”

  We rode up the line and stopped at every ranch on the way. Max told them all what was going on and how soon it was going to happen. Most were for getting their guns and going into Glazer’s back yard and start picking the apples off his tree.

  But Bell told them that we needed to set our defenses first. They needed to make sure the women and kids were in a safe place before we kick over the hornet’s nest. There were a total of four women and ten youngens to be stashed somewhere safe. A meeting scheduled for the next day at the Bell ranch to iron out some plans.

  On the way back, we went to the Wells ranch to collect the young fella from the logger’s camp. We’d take him back to the Bellem, and let the others talk to him, so they’d get a real feel how bad that bunch was.

  Miss Wells was mad enough to spit fire at what Crawford had told her. She volunteered the use of her place as a safe haven for the women and kids.

  “Why, those youngens can throw their pallets in the bunkhouse with Earl, and the ladies can stay in the house with me. Those skunks know better than to mess with an old lady with important friends. I’ve got a letter ready to send to the governor next time someone goes down to Bakersfield.”

  “That’s mighty kind of you, Aunt Dee.” Max told her. “I do believe they will be much safer here than they would anywhere else in the valley…. An attack on any of the ranches can be taken as just part of a range war, but an attack on your place would be out and out murder and they know it.”

  “Nothin’ to do with bein’ kind…. I just get lonesome for some female company… well, any company besides Earl.”

  “Izzy will be here, and she’s as good a rifle shot as any man in the valley. So with you, Izzy, Earl, and young Tim Adams… you’ll have some firepower if you need it.

  Bell told me later that Aunt Dee Wells, loved Earl like a brother and would gladly take a bullet for him, and he felt the same about her…. It was just a game they’d been playing for years.

  I got young Crawford settled in the bunkhouse and rustled him some clothes to wear, while Max told Dori of the plans. He said she was saddened at first, to think that her home might be burned and her things would be lost, but Dori was a practical woman and knew that leaving was for the best. She knew most of the husbands and fathers would feel a little better knowing there was another rifle watching over their families.

  He was coming out the kitchen door as I was leavin’ the bunkhouse, and we met halfway in between them.

  “Now, my friend, are you up for some mischief?” He asked me.

  “You got some of Ben Blue’s blasting powder? That was about as much fun as I could stand.”

  “No, and I sure wished I did… but we got somethin’ almost as good, but just as loud and damn near as destructive…. We’ll need fresh horses, and you’d better put that beast of a dog up before we go… We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

  At supper, when all six of the hands were together, and they were finishing their apple pie, Max stood up and got their attention.

  “Boys, you all know there’s been trouble brewing on the range for some time… well it’s come. You heard about the raid on Adams’ place the other night. But you may not have known about a massacre on a loggin’ camp up in the mountains. Glazer needs to get us off the range in the next few weeks. If we’re gone, he’ll control the range and can stop the loggers from comin’ through… He’s got somethin’ goin up there that he don’t want anybody knowin’ about.”

  “That skinny boy, Hank, there with the logger boots was the only survivor up there… he can fill you in on the details if you’re interested, which I’m sure you will be…. I just want you to know. This is my fight, and if any of you don’t feel right about it you’re free to go with no hard feelins’. I won’t think any less of anyone workin’ for ridin’ wages who wants to draw his time and leave.”

  The men all looked at each other, and then they all looked at the tall lanky rider named Curley. Curley cleared his throat, and looked down at his crumb littered plate, stood up and said, “Boss…Miss Dori, there are a few of us that could get gun wages if we wanted ‘em. And you probly figgered we already
talked this over. We know you got a lot invested in this place, and we ain’t got nothin’ invested but our sweat…. But this is our home, and we aim to fight for our home. If you don’t like that, then that’s just your tough luck.”

  The crew yelled and clapped as Curley made an awkward schoolboy bow. Dori made an elegant curtsey and Bell made an equally awkward schoolboy bow. It was settled and probably had been for weeks or even months. If the other ranchers were as well liked and had men as loyal, then there would be a force to reckon with.

  I had been able to catch a few hours sleep before supper, so I was ready when supper was over and it was time to saddle up and ride. I put Dog in an empty stall and shut the door. He wasn’t happy about it, but I’d left him before, and it was for his own good. I just hoped he’d stay put.

  We rode out and headed straight for the river. Bell figured it would be about a ten mile ride as the crow flies. I’ve heard a couple of fellas say “as the raven flies”, which never made much sense. A crow flies in a straight line, but a raven, being a bigger bird soars like a hawk. A raven can go twice as far as a crow to get to the same place. So we crossed the river and stayed on the same course.

  The Three Rivers saloon was on the north bank of the river just below where the two branches came together and made the river. We passed within a half mile of it, but several hundred feet above it on a ridge…. We didn’t even stop for a beer. About a mile beyond the saloon, Bell saw what he wanted.

  Down below was a small herd of longhorns. There wouldn’t have been more than fifty or sixty head in that bunch. It didn’t seem likely that we come out here to rustle a bunch of longhorns. With the new breeds taking hold, them wiry stringy longhorns ain’t worth a whole lot.

  The sun was going down, and we waited until we were sure there was no one around. Then slow and easy like, we bunched those steers and started moving them back toward the river.

  While we were waiting for the sun to set, Bell unfolded his plan and I agreed that it was a good ‘un.

  “Most folks don’t know it, but that saloon belongs to Glazer. Clancy the former owner stopped on his way out and told me that Glazer threatened to burn him down and build a new one if he didn’t sell… he sold. About the only ones who go there are Glazer’s men. It’s sorta like a company saloon and whorehouse. It gives the men a place to go and let off steam.”

  “What I’m plannin’ is to take this bunch and get ‘em movin’ real slow and then start ‘em goin’ right through the front door and windows… they might take out the whole front wall. That first floor extends out over the river, and it’s propped up on stilts in the back, if we can get enough cattle in there… well the whole place is going into the river.”

  “Now that’s the kind of plan I can get my teeth into and enjoy the chewing… but why on earth did they extend it out over the river?”

  “Clancy used to like to fish through a trap door in the floor…. Clancy had his own ways.”

  We moved the cattle up to about a quarter mile from the front of the saloon. It was dark enough that the lights from the door and windows stood out against the blackness. When those beeves get spooked, they’re going to go right at those lights.

  “Why don’t I go in there and kinda soften them up before we send the cows in? I think it might be good to put a little doubt in their minds.” I said.

  “Go ahead… it wouldn’t hurt none.”

  So I just trotted on up to the hitch rail and tied up with the others there. Then I pulled the slipknots on the other horses. I didn’t want them in the path of them cows. There were about a half dozen men sitting around drinking and playing cards. A sullied queen without a crown was watching the game without much interest. She looked up as I came in but soon returned to watching the cards.

  One fella was standing at the bar, but he didn’t look up or even act like he saw me, so I ignored him right back. I ordered a beer and was sipping at it when one of those boys just sitting asked me if I was passing through or was I new. I told him I was just passing through.

  “Oh,” he said, “We been waiting for a fella named Reese…Bob Reese. S’posed to be top man in his business.”

  “Nope, he ain’t me. I’m on my way out of here. I was trackin’ a bear up there in them big trees, and run across what must a been a shootin’ gallery. Looked like about eight or nine men got slaughtered. And then someone tried to burn the carcasses, but the fire must a gone out, ‘cause they’re still there and stinkin’. I told a rancher down south of here about it and he sent a rider into Bakersfield with a letter to the govner. With that kinda stuff goin’ on, I’m a goin’ on… out of here.”

  His eyes got wide and he had a death grip on the chair arm. He swung his head around quick enough to snap his neck off and said, “He did what?”

  Gulping down the last of my beer, I went to the door. There I stopped and turned back to him and said, “Oh yeah… Reese ain’t comin’… He wasn’t as good as folks thought.”

  I was off the porch and leading my horse out into the dark before that boy ever thought to say, “Huh?” I walked that horse a couple hundred yards before I gave him a nudge. Max was all set when I got back to the cattle.

  He handed me three coal oil soaked rags and said, “We’ll move ‘em up a little farther then we’ll light these rags and throw them into the cattle. We won’t even have to yell or fire a shot. These critters will head straight for the door. They won’t even know their comin’ until it’s too late.”

  We moved them another hundred yards give or take and lit up the night. When you toss a hand full of oil soaked, freshly lit rags they go up like shooting stars, but they unfold and just float and flutter on the way down… now a steer ain’t got no accounting for such behavior, so he just wants to get away as fast as he can. And if his neighbor happens to have one of those rags hung on his horn… well… that’s all the more reason to git.

  Sitting there watching that wild knot of black being chased by flaming, fluttering demons, gave a fella pause to wonder about hell. Because there was gonna be some real hell inside that saloon in about ten seconds.

  When they hit the front porch, I knew the saloon was a goner. I saw steer go through the big window on the left just as two others tried to get through the door at the same time. The force of those behind them took out the door frame and half front wall. The other half gave way a few seconds behind the first. The building shook, and then started sliding back toward the river.

  The saloon seemed to teeter there for a long second like it was on a string. Then the rear started down, and the front followed. The current caught it and skewed it around and grounded it before it could be swept away. It just sat there with the front end under about five foot of water. For just a few seconds, it was deathly quiet, but men started cussing and cattle were bawling. The burning rags had all gone out, and the cattle couldn’t seem to remember what it was that had gotten them so scared.

  As we rode a way through the milling cattle, I could hear more swearing and a woman’s voice was doing some bodacious cussing. I guess Queeny was all right. When we cleared the cattle, I looked down at the wreckage, and saw a single lantern burning somewhere in the back.

  Chapter 11

  We realized on our way back to the Bellem, there wasn’t any reason for them to think the ranchers had anything to do with sinking the saloon. We hadn’t fired off any shots or yelled, and the rags were nothing but ash. It was just one of those things that happen for no reason. So retaliation shouldn’t be on their minds. If anything, they’d blame it on some grumpy old mountain man. They were planning to deal with the ranchers soon enough. That might buy us a little precious time.

  It was nigh on to midnight when we got in, and one of the boys was up and greeted us with a Winchester. He breathed a sigh of relief and put the horses away. Someone in that crew was savvy enough to post a guard. I let Dog out. He was a bit miffed about being left behind, but we made up with some ear scratches. Then he took his place on the bunkhouse porch, and the guard se
emed thankful to have his help… I went to bed.

  Early the next morning, Max sent a rider out to tell the ranchers that Miss Wells had offered her ranch as a safe haven for the women and children. They all knew it was the safest place this side of Bakersfield.

  The wagons and outriders started coming in at mid morning Malcolm Peters was the first to arrive with his wife and two youngsters. He told Bell that his two hands would stick. The Collins brothers came next, neither man had ever married, but they had three loyal riders. Dave and Charles Collins were out of Kentucky and both carried a rifle like they knew what to do with it.

  Porter Dumas rode in with his wife and little girl right behind him in a buckboard. Dumas could claim two men riding for his brand. Frank Murchison, his wife and three little ones were next. Murchison said his two riders drew their wages and rode out. Floyd Adams and Clay Smith came in together. Floyd’s family was in a buckboard with his oldest boy handling the ribbons. Smith had lost his wife about a year ago. They were both riding with no wagon. Smith had no riders.

  That gave us twenty one men counting Bell and his men… I would make it twenty two. I had no doubt that those with rifles at Aunt Dee’s place would hold their own. Two of the women had stood with their men and fought off Cheyenne while crossing the plains. There weren’t many weak sisters in this army.

  The problem we faced was not only at least ten more rifles on the other side, but every rifle was held by a seasoned warrior, who didn’t care one whit about taking a life. The problem the other side faced was a handful of men and women fighting for their home and families…I hoped it was enough to make up the difference.

  Dori and the other ladies climbed into their wagons and rode off to have a tea party with Aunt Dee Wells. Before they left I checked The Henry rifle I’d given to the Adams boy. I found it in good shape, and it had been converted to a center fire, so I gave him a sack of cartridges and wished him luck. The men, even the Collins boys, stood and watched them drive off. I knew, each man was wondering if he’d ever see those he loved more than himself again. I don’t know if I’ve ever had that kind of feeling, but you could see it in their faces, and I respected it.