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diff --git a/77480-h/77480-h.htm b/77480-h/77480-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..dfd8ada --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/77480-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4771 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <title> + The Saga of Silver Bend | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> + <style> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2,h3 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .51em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .49em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 33.5%; + margin-right: 33.5%; + clear: both; +} + +hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} +hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} +@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } +hr.full {width: 95%; margin-left: 2.5%; margin-right: 2.5%;} +div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} +h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} + +x-ebookmaker-drop {display: none;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.right {text-align: right;} + +.smcap { font-variant:small-caps; } + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + +.caption p +{ + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0; + margin: 0.25em 0; + font-weight: bold; +} + +table { + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; +} + +table.autotable { border-collapse: collapse; } +table.autotable td, +table.autotable th { padding: 4px; } + +.tdl {text-align: left;} +.tdr {text-align: right;} +.tdc {text-align: center;} + +div.titlepage { + text-align: center; + page-break-before: always; + page-break-after: always; +} + +div.titlepage p { + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + font-weight: bold; + line-height: 1.5; + margin-top: 3em; +} + +.ph1 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph1 { font-size: x-large; margin: .83em auto; } + +.ph2 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph2 { font-size: medium; margin: .83em auto; } + +.ph3 { text-align: right; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph3 { font-size: medium; margin: .83em auto; } + +/* Poetry */ +.poetry-container {display: flex; justify-content: center;} +.poetry-container {text-align: center;} +.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} +.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} +.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} +.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} + +.blockquot { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77480 ***</div> + +<div class="figcenter x-ebookmaker-drop"> + <img src="images/illusc.jpg" alt=""> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="titlepage"> + +<h1>The Saga of Silver Bend</h1> + +<p>By J. E. GRINSTEAD<br> +<i>Author of "Signed, 'Scada,'" etc.</i></p> + +<p><i>Randy Ross didn't dare face the sight of<br> +death—but when war broke loose upon the Railroad<br> +Ranch, death was too frequent to dodge.</i></p> + +<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br> +Argosy All-Story Weekly March 16, 23, 30 1929.]</p> + + +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<table> +<tr><td class="tdr">I.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">THE MESS IN THE BOTTLE</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">II.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">RANDY TAKES THE ACID TEST</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">III.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">THE VIGIL AT RAILROAD RANCH</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">IV.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">"ASSASSINATED, SIR, ASSASSINATED!"</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">V.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">AMBUSH.</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">VI.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">RANDY SEEKS INFORMATION</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">VII.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">WHO KILLED ASA ROSS?</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">VIII.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">DANGLING SCARECROWS</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">IX.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">BELL HOLDERNESS ASKS HIS QUESTION</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">X.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">DOLLY TELLS THE TRUTH</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tdr">XI.</td> <td class="tdl"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">THE STORM STRIKES SILVER BEND</a></td></tr> +</table> + + + +<hr class="chap"> + +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</h2> + +<h3>THE MESS IN THE BOTTLE.</h3> + + +<p>Two riders were hazing a little band of cattle northward on a prairie +trail. Half a mile ahead of them the trail dropped over the rimrock +into a broad, hazy valley. That valley was known as Silver Bend.</p> + +<p>One of the riders was a round-faced little chap, whose high heels +helped him to be five feet four. His eyes were the wide, innocent +blue eyes of a baby. He might have been twenty or he might have been +thirty; his age didn't show. His auburn hair was inclined to curl, and +therefore he was called Dolly. He had another name, but nobody in the +cow country knew or cared what it was.</p> + +<p>The other man was long and lank, flat of cheek, with a pair of cold, +keen gray eyes that peered from under bony brows. Eyes that saw things +and were thoughtful.</p> + +<p>Never were two men less alike, physically and characteristically, +than these two. Yet, gaunt, saturnine, thoughtful Old Sankey and the +capricious Dolly were side-partners. As he circled a yearling, and +drifted back to the side of Sank, Dolly broke into the song of Railroad +Ranch:</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"Hobble the left foot, turn loose the right,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That's about as long as we ever stop at night.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Workin' on the Railroad,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Mighty little pay,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Workin' on the Railroad,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Eatin' prairie hay.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"Unroll your blankets and spread 'em on the ground,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Can't get asleep before the boss comes round,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Workin' on the Railroad, up at break of day,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Workin' on the Railroad for mighty little pay."</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + +<p>"Shut up, Dolly," growled Old Sank. "You make my head ache, and, +besides that, this ain't no time for singing fool songs."</p> + +<p>"How come it ain't?"</p> + +<p>"You ask how come? Don't you know we're riding right into the roughest +mess since the soap boiled over?"</p> + +<p>"What mess?"</p> + +<p>"Why, a lot of them killers acrost the river sent word they'd be over +to cut the herd, when the Railroad held its home round-up. They ain't +huntin' cattle, they're hunting trouble, and they're goin' to find +some."</p> + +<p>"Uh-huh! Yes, sir, boss! If they jump Old Railroad Ross, they'll be +smoke."</p> + +<p>The partners drew rein just where the high point of prairie broke over +the rimrock into the valley. To right and left they could see the +river, almost beneath them, where only a narrow ridge kept the stream +from cutting across.</p> + +<p>Silver Bend, so called from the silvery cottonwoods that marked the +course of the river, lay before them like a map. A great loop, six +miles deep and four miles wide at the widest point, with its neck less +than a mile across. In the middle distance lay the Railroad Ranch house +and pens.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Looks like a dang bottle, don't it, Sank?" said Dolly, musingly.</p> + +<p>"It is a bottle, son, and it's got a mess in it that ain't fitten for +humans. It's goin' to get shook, and some of the mess is goin' to be +took, to-day. Any minute."</p> + +<p>"Huh! It ain't happened yet," and Dolly pointed to a cloud of dust +that rose, half a mile west of the ranch, in an open prairie valley. +"They're still cuttin' 'em."</p> + +<p>"It'll happen, all right."</p> + +<p>"Then come on. We don't want to miss the party, if there's goin' to be +one."</p> + +<p>"No, I reckon not, but if you had been to as many parties like that as +I have, you wouldn't be in such a rush."</p> + +<p>"I been to some. What makes you figure on a mess in Silver Bend, +anyway?"</p> + +<p>"Seen it coming. Recollect I been workin' on the Railroad ten year. You +ain't been here but a year, and they's plenty you don't know. Mostly, +you've 'hobbled the left foot and turned loose the right.' Not sleeping +at night, you been asleep in the daytime. This mess has been brewing +for a long time, and now it's about ripe to boil over."</p> + +<p>"Well, let her boil. What of it?"</p> + +<p>"Plenty. If it was just a ruckus between the Railroad and that +Holderness gang across the river it wouldn't be so bad, but if it +starts it drags in the Bend and the whole country adjacent. Old +Railroad Ross and his three boys are apt to be the center of it, but +it'll spread. Railroad will spread it, if it starts."</p> + +<p>"I see. Them's the kind of happy settlement I've busted into. I been +here a year and ain't heard a gun, except some fellow shootin' at a +hawk or a coyote, and now—"</p> + +<p>"And now you're apt to hear two guns—or more. But come on. Let's drift +'em on down there."</p> + +<p>Down the steep hill and into the timber, they followed the band of +cattle. Asa Ross, the eldest of the three Ross boys, and acting +foreman, had sent Sank and Dolly out onto the big prairie early that +morning to get this bunch off the head of Elm Branch. Old Sankey didn't +mention it, but he and Asa Ross had been pretty close, and he suspected +Asa had sent him away to keep him out of trouble. They had found the +cattle without difficulty and were bringing them in at mid afternoon, +instead of at nightfall, as Asa probably expected them to do.</p> + +<p>At the edge of the prairie valley the cattle they were driving scented +the big round-up herd and scampered on toward it. The partners drew +rein at the edge of the prairie. A familiar scene lay before them. The +"cutting" was in progress. No rodeo stuff. Just hard-working, skillful +riders, on highly trained horses, cutting cattle from an immense herd, +while other riders held the herd in place. Everybody who was ever in +the cow country has seen a round-up, but this one in Silver Bend was +loaded.</p> + +<p>On the side of the herd toward them, Sank and Dolly could see a knot of +men sitting quietly on their horses, watching the work. They could make +out Old Railroad Ross, sitting his horse straight as an Indian, despite +his three-score-and-odd years. Suddenly, above the din of bawling +cattle, they heard the flat, echoless report of a gun. They saw Old +Railroad's gun flash in the sun, as he jerked it from the holster. They +saw his horse lunge as the spurs went in, and then they heard a medley +of shots, yells, and tramping hoofs.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""> + <div class="caption"> + <p><i>Old Railroad's gun flashed in the sun as he jerked it from the holster.</i></p> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p>"Come on!" snapped Sankey, fairly lifting his mouth with his spurs, and +darted toward the battle, with Dolly crowding him for the lead.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>They were too late to see the fight. Such battles are not of long +duration. They were not too late to see some of the results of this +one, but it would be a long time before all the results were seen.</p> + +<p>A few neutrals were trying to hold the big herd and keep it from +breaking into a stampede. A small party of men were riding hard for the +timber at the north side of the prairie, firing backward as they rode. +A dozen riders were in pursuit, pouring volley after volley at the +fugitives. Just at the edge of the timber, one of the fugitives threw +up his hands and pitched from the saddle.</p> + +<p>The pursuers stopped. They were fighters, but canny fighters. They +were not going to crowd that gang, when the others were behind trees. +They turned back toward the round-up ground and reached it just as +Sankey and Dolly did. They were led by Old Railroad Ross himself. He +dismounted and stooped over the man who lay on the ground near the +herd. It was Asa Ross.</p> + +<p>The other men stood back in silence, as the old ranchman's jaws set and +quivered with emotion. Asa was dead. A fair-haired, pleasant-faced man +of around thirty stepped out of the group and went to Old Railroad's +side. This was Peyton Ross, next younger than Asa. There were tears on +his cheeks, and he couldn't speak for sobs. The iron had never entered +Pate Ross's soul. He couldn't stand rough stuff. Railroad looked at him +with a glance of almost contempt, then, ignoring this living son, he +turned to the other men and said:</p> + +<p>"Get a wagon around here, fellows. Load Asa in and take him to the +house. I'll ride on and tell mother."</p> + +<p>Ross caught his horse and mounted, then stopped and looked over the +men, as if he were counting them.</p> + +<p>"Where's Randy, Leck?" he inquired of the leathery old puncher, who +stood near.</p> + +<p>"I don't know, sir," replied Leck. "He was with the bunch that went +after them fellows, and he ain't come back."</p> + +<p>"Sank, you and Dolly go find Randy, and bring him home," and Railroad +Ross rode grimly away toward his house. He was bereaved of the son +upon whom he meant to shift the load in his declining years. Now he +was framing what he would say to his good wife, when he reached that +rambling old house in the edge of the timber.</p> + +<p>Sankey called Old Leck aside and said:</p> + +<p>"Leck, you heard what the old man told me to do. The fight was over +when we got here. Tell me how it happened, and where I'm apt to find +Randy."</p> + +<p>"Ain't much to tell about the fight. It come up like most of 'em do, +only this one was planned to make it cold murder. Early this morning +Bell Holderness and his two brothers, Sam and Steve, comes across to +the round-up. With 'em is two fellows I don't know. Some of the gang +that hangs out at the Holderness ranch, I reckon. The other man with +'em was Ben Tarleton, and—"</p> + +<p>"Ben Tarleton! Are you sure of that?"</p> + +<p>"'Course I'm sure. Knowed him all his life. You knew Ben had sorty gone +to the wild bunch, didn't you?"</p> + +<p>"I knew the grand jury was after him for some of his devilment, but +nothin' serious."</p> + +<p>"Huh! That's the way they all start. Anyway, six of 'em had been here +all day. At noon they et at the chuck wagon, and Old Railroad treated +'em just like he did the rest. A little while ago the six of 'em got +together and rode around to the north side of the herd. I thought they +was fixing to leave, and was glad of it. But they stopped in a bunch +and sat watching Charlie Stone cut, on that little brown bronc of hisn. +I reckon everybody was watchin' Charlie except me. I saw Asa Ross go +round a steer and turn it back to the herd. As Asa trotted back toward +the herd he passed close to the Holderness outfit. I was so far away +that I couldn't hear anything that was said, but Asa stopped and the +next second there was a shot. Asa never did draw."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Huh! Cold killin's always start hell in the cow country," commented +Sankey. "But what about Randy Ross? Where am I apt to find him?"</p> + +<p>"You know where he is as well as I do. Where does he always go when +trouble comes up, that he ain't got the nerve to face?"</p> + +<p>"You mean—Why, Leck, he couldn't do that, at a time like this! The +yellow, unprincipled whelp. Old Man Railroad just had one boy. The +other two is women with britches on. Damn Randy's sorry soul, he—"</p> + +<p>"Hush! Don't talk so loud. It won't do no good. Old Railroad lies to +himself about Randy, and you got to lie to him, no matter what you +find, nor where you find it. Better ride now. Better go north until you +get out of sight in the woods."</p> + +<p>Mounting his horse, Sankey rode north, with Dolly by his side. Neither +of them spoke until they reached the edge of the timber, and then they +stopped. On the ground lay a handsome, dark young man, dead. He was +well clad in garments that had known the hand of an expert tailor. A +handsome gold watch chain lay across his vest. His boots were of the +finest make. The face was of patrician mold and told of good lineage.</p> + +<p>"There's some more hell!" growled Sankey.</p> + +<p>"I don't see anything but a dead man," returned Dolly. "I just seen +another one back yonder. Looks like a hoss trade to me."</p> + +<p>"Hoss trade, hell. Asa Ross was the best cowman, or any other sort of +man that ever stretched a stirrup strap. Call it a trade to swap Asa +for that carrion?"</p> + +<p>"Well," drawled Dolly, "the Railroad might have give some boot. Maybe +they throwed Randy Ross in for good measure. Looks like it."</p> + +<p>"Damn Randy Ross! He ain't worth thinkin' about. Don't you know who +this fellow is?"</p> + +<p>"I shore don't. All I know about him is that he's ter'ble dead."</p> + +<p>"No, I reckon you don't. He's been away from here the last year. Over +in the Indian country, sorty on the dodge."</p> + +<p>"I see. He didn't know much about dodgin' or else he didn't know much +about Old Railroad Ross. Who is he? Tells me—he won't mind being +introduced to a cow-puncher now, even if he has got a pearl-handled +gun."</p> + +<p>"That's Ben Tarleton."</p> + +<p>"Huh! Sounds like something to make a summer dress out of, to me."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you dang fool, you don't know anything about Silver Bend and the +folks adjacent. Come on and let's find Randy and take him home, like +the old man said."</p> + +<p>A little way into the timber, Sank turned sharp to his left. They +circled the west side of the open prairie, keeping in the timber until +they were headed south, following a trail that led up the river.</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute, Sank," called Dolly, and when Sankey stopped, "Where +are you heading, anyway? If Randy chased them fellows and they got him, +he'd be somewhere back toward the ford, on the west side of the Bend."</p> + +<p>"Yes, he would, but he didn't. Randy's gone up the river to Willow +Mills to drown his troubles. Every time he stubs a toe or a dance gets +called off on account of the weather, he's got to get drunk, so's he +can stand it."</p> + +<p>"Don't be too hard on Randy. He's just—"</p> + +<p>"Too hard, nothing. How could I be too hard on a chap that would run +away at a time like this? Poor Old Railroad didn't have but one boy. +Pate's a good fellow, but he orto been a woman. Randy's just too +hell-fired, awful dam' sorry to live. That's what he is. He ain't got +as much nerve as—"</p> + +<p>"Don't choke yo'self, Sank," drawled Dolly, while a hard, glinting +light came into his baby-blue eyes. "Let yo' tongue rest a minute. +Yo're talking about me some, and it sorty scratches."</p> + +<p>"About you! Why, dang yo' red-haired, fightin' fool soul, you'd rather +eat smoke than flapjacks and honey. That's why I tied up with you."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"I know, but—you're talkin' about me just the same. A fellow don't +learn to face rough stuff until he has it pushed on him. When I was +a kid I used to run off and hide when the family got ready to go to +a funeral. I was afraid of dead people. I never got over it until my +partner, out at a line-rider's cabin, got busted by a bad bronc. I had +to pack him to the shack. I had to wait on him until he bled to death +inside. I had to watch him die, and then I had to pack him on a bronc +and take him to headquarters. It took that to cure me, and I'd have +dodged it if I could. When I was Randy's age, I was just as bad as he +is."</p> + +<p>"Randy's age? How old are you?"</p> + +<p>"Thirty-five, and I been through hell backward, forward, and sidewise. +Randy Ross is a thoroughbred. He's got a heart in him as big as a +house, and he's got plenty nerve, too. Old Railroad knows it. Charlie +Stone forked a bad bronc the other day and rode it ragged. I was +standing close to Railroad and I heard him mutter: 'Just like Randy. A +thoroughbred ain't worth a damn until it's busted.'"</p> + +<p>"Yeah! That goes when they ain't been spoilt, but Randy's spoilt. Plumb +ruined. He'll never get busted. Railroad has give him money, got him +out'n his scrapes, and laughed at his devilment until nothing can't be +did, now."</p> + +<p>"Maybe not, but the best bronc I ever rode in my life was a busted +outlaw. Men's like horses, they have to be busted. I reckon if you'd +look back aways, you'd see where they was some dust and the ground tore +up when you got rode."</p> + +<p>Old Sankey looked at Dolly with a puzzled expression in his gray eyes. +This mess had shown him a new side of his little partner. He had known +all along that Dolly had courage, but he had never suspected any depth +to him. Dolly had touched a spot in the old puncher that nobody knew +about. He, too, had "been rode." It had been a long time ago, but he +could remember it.</p> + +<p>"All right, Dolly, I'll let my tongue rest; but we got to get on after +Randy. He's gone to Willow Mills. Leck seen him when he started. We'll +find him drunk. We got to take him home, and we got to lie about where +we found him, when we get there. Let's ride."</p> + +<p>They rode on up the river trail through the big cottonwoods. As he led +the way, Sankey was doing some real thinking and wondering if Dolly +could be right. He didn't believe it.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>RANDY TAKES THE ACID TEST.</h3> + + +<p>A mile farther on the partners came to where the high point of prairie +pushed in to form the stopper to the Silver Bend bottle. Here the river +crowded close to the bluff, and the trail ran along the foot of the +bluff and close to the high, red banks of the river for a quarter of +a mile, with the valley on the other side. Beyond that narrow pass, +the bottom broadened again on their side, and formed the considerable +community of plantations that supported the better business of the +town of Willow Mills. Just before entering this narrow defile, Sankey +stopped and said:</p> + +<p>"There's two things I want to mention. One is that some time, when the +river is high, two sticks of dynamite, one mule, and one bull-tongue +plow is all it would take to turn the water across here, cut a new +channel, and leave Silver Bend on the other side."</p> + +<p>"All of which ain't got nothing to do with finding Randy and getting +him back home as quick as possible."</p> + +<p>"Maybe not, but here's something that has. A man in them seedling +cottonwoods, just across the river, could pick us off easy as we go +through that narrow place, and I ain't quite ready to be picked."</p> + +<p>"They ain't had time to get up here and get set, but that'll be a good +thing to remember. Go ahead."</p> + +<p>They rode on through the pass, watching the thicket of young +cottonwoods on the other side of the stream. Sankey breathed a sigh of +relief as they entered the big bottom above the bend. The river turned +back west, and slightly north, here. The trail entered a wide lane that +ran due west, two miles, to Willow Mills.</p> + +<p>To the south of the lane, left of the riders, a number of farmhouses +and broad fields could be seen. On their right, north of the lane, and +about a mile from the town, stood a big, two-story white house, with +green blinds and trimmings. There was no house near it. A few tenant +houses stood well back along the river.</p> + +<p>"I been seeing that house ever since I've been in this country," said +Dolly, pointing ahead. "Who lives there?"</p> + +<p>"Everything to the right of the lane, in this bottom, is the Tarleton +plantation. The Tarletons have been here ever since Texas has been +Texas. Old Judge Tarleton's grandfather settled the place."</p> + +<p>"Judge Tarleton? Anything to that young chap we saw layin' dead in the +bushes back a ways?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, right smart. Ben Tarleton was the youngest son of Judge Tarleton. +That makes this big white house one of the corner posts of the +three-cornered mess that starts in Silver Bend to-day, and won't stop +until God knows when."</p> + +<p>"Just farmers, ain't they?"</p> + +<p>"No. They're planters. There's a difference. The people who live in +the shacks and work the land are farmers. The old judge is a real, by +gad, sir, Southern planter. The kind that reaches for his gun when he's +insulted. He's apt as not to take the killin' of Ben as an insult. The +judge is pretty old, but he's got two more boys, and ary one of 'em +would think it a disgrace to run from the devil if he had a red-hot +pitchfork in his hand."</p> + +<p>"Nice folks. You said this is a three-cornered mess. Where's the other +corner? I might want to run the lines some time—or maybe dodge 'em."</p> + +<p>"The other corner is one of the outposts of hell. It's the Holderness +ranch, owned by Bell Holderness and his brothers. Steve Holderness +married an Indian woman. That gives him a right to hold land in the +Indian country. Bell Holderness, the oldest brother and a bachelor, +furnishes the brains for the outfit, and everybody knows he owns the +ranch in Steve's name. The reason they ain't pirates is because they +ain't got a ship."</p> + +<p>"Some more nice people. But look! Ain't that Randy Ross?"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>The sun was just setting behind the distant forest. At the mouth of a +broad lane that ran back through an avenue of tall poplars to where the +Tarleton home stood in its grove of locust trees, a man and a woman sat +their horses, as if they had merely met at that spot and stopped to +pass the time of day.</p> + +<p>That is exactly what had happened. Neither of them noticed the approach +of the two riders. Suddenly, the man whirled his horse in the road +and went thundering on toward Willow Mills. The woman put her hand to +her brow, to shade her eyes against the glare of the setting sun, and +stared after him.</p> + +<p>Not until the two punchers were fairly abreast of her did she notice +them. With a quick glance at her, as she turned her head, Dolly saw the +same patrician feature that had marked the dead face of Ben Tarleton.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, Miss Zella," said Sankey, sweeping his hat from his head.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Sankey, I'm so glad it is you," returned Zella Tarleton. +"Maybe you can do something with Randy. I—I don't know this gentleman +with you, but—"</p> + +<p>"You can say anything you like in his presence, ma'am. He'd forget to +eat if a lady asked him to forget."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure of that, or he wouldn't be with you. I know you haven't any +patience with Randy, but he's good. He's just—he's just spoiled and +irresponsible, generally, but now he seems to be demented."</p> + +<p>"What seems to be the matter with him now?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. I met him here, and he didn't want to stop and talk to +me. Something terrible has happened. He said he was going to kill Bell +Holderness, and after that, he didn't care what happened. He said that +half a dozen times. I begged him to go to the house, and tell me what +was wrong, but he was almost insulting, and broke away while I was +talking to him."</p> + +<p>"That does sound like he was crazy," drawled Sank. "If he wouldn't +listen to you he ain't apt to listen to me."</p> + +<p>"I know, Mr. Sankey, but you must do something! Get to him before +he—You know how he gets when he's in trouble. Get him to go home. +Make him go home. He wouldn't have a chance with Bell Holderness."</p> + +<p>"Then I reckon we better ride," said Sank, shaking his bridle reins. +"I'll do my best, Miss Zella."</p> + +<p>"Now who dealt that lady a hand in the game?" asked Dolly when they +were out of earshot.</p> + +<p>"She deals 'em herself and deals 'em square," snapped Sank. "It's a +damn shame for a woman like that to be crazy over a sorry cub like +Randy Ross."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I see. That brings on more talk. Why don't she marry him and +reform him?"</p> + +<p>"She's got too much sense to try a fool stunt like that. She's told +him plenty of times that she'd marry him whenever he showed her that +he could keep straight, and be a man. Every time she tells him that he +goes and gets drunk to drown his sorrow."</p> + +<p>"I see. Let's go to Willow Mills," and Dolly shot down the road like a +flash, with Sank spurring hard to keep up with him.</p> + +<p>Willow Mills was but a border village, with half a dozen stores, +blacksmith shop, hotel, two saloons, and a dance hall. It was a +combination farm center and cow-town, and like all border towns, +especially those on the line between Texas and Indian Territory, it was +rough. As the partners rode into town they saw Randy dismount in front +of the Cottonwood Saloon, and drop his bridle on the ground. They saw +him pull his gun from the holster, spin the cylinder, put it back, and +then disappear into the saloon.</p> + +<p>"If he meets Bell Holderness in that shape, old Railroad Ross loses +another boy," snapped Sank. "Come on, let's get him before he gets to +drinking."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>They stepped to the door and looked in. There was no one in the place +but Randy and the bartender. Randy Ross was standing in the full light +of the big hanging lamp. He was a picture of physical beauty for a +man. Full six feet, broad of shoulder, and tapering to the waist. His +head was finely modeled, and his features good. He was as well clad as +Ben Tarleton had been, and after much the same fashion. His physical +strength was such that he showed no more than his twenty-five years, in +spite of his dissipation.</p> + +<p>"Ain't it a damn shame for a man like that to be yellow?" muttered +Sankey.</p> + +<p>"He ain't yellow, or he wouldn't be here," replied Dolly. "Come on. +Let's get him out of there."</p> + +<p>"You get him out. He's taken one drink, and the devil couldn't stop +him."</p> + +<p>Randy had taken one drink, set his glass on the bar, and was reaching +for the bottle, when Dolly said, at his elbow:</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute, Randy, I want to see you outside."</p> + +<p>"Why, hello, Dolly! What are you doing here? Just in time to help me +take a drink. Give us another glass, and—"</p> + +<p>"No. Sometimes I drink and sometimes I don't."</p> + +<p>"This is when I do," returned Randy, and filled his glass to the brim.</p> + +<p>Dolly caught his arm, and he looked into those blue eyes, which had +gone cold and dark.</p> + +<p>"Set that glass down, Randy. If you take another drink right now, +you'll curse yourself for it as long as you live. People are saying +you are yellow. Let that alone. Come with me, and show 'em you ain't +yellow."</p> + +<p>Randy set the glass down and turned slowly away from the bar. His face +had gone hard and set.</p> + +<p>"Show me somebody that says I'm yel—" he began, and then stopped. +"Dolly, I am yellow. Yellow as paint. I wish to God I wasn't!"</p> + +<p>"No, you're not yellow. Come on outside. I want to talk to you."</p> + +<p>For half an hour the two of them squatted in the deep shadow by the +blacksmith shop. Old Sankey kept them located by the red glow of +their cigarettes, while he watched for the possible coming of Bell +Holderness. Dolly talked as he had never talked in his life. At last he +said:</p> + +<p>"You can't whip anything by running from it. I know; I've tried it. +Come on. Let's go back to the ranch. I'll stay with you and help you +face it."</p> + +<p>The three of them mounted and rode out of town. Preposterous as it +might seem, Randy had never touched or looked upon a dead person. For +several years there had been no occasion to see such things. Prior to +that time he had simply run away from them, and to-day he had done the +same thing.</p> + +<p>Probably no other man in the Railroad outfit understood Randy's feeling +in the matter, except little Dolly. Up to the time he saw Zella +Tarleton, Dolly hadn't cared much what happened, but something in the +girl's pleading tone had determined him to save Randy from himself. +There was going to be trouble, and plenty of it, in Silver Bend, but +Randy Ross had to face it like a man, for that girl. At the lane +leading to the Tarleton place, Randy stopped.</p> + +<p>"Let me go in here a minute, fellows," said Randy. "I'll come on and +catch up with you."</p> + +<p>He wasn't fooling Dolly. The little puncher knew what would happen. +Randy would go back to town and try to drown his troubles. He cudgeled +his brain, and finally:</p> + +<p>"They might not want you in there, Randy. They might heard about Ben by +this time, and—"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Ben! What about Ben?"</p> + +<p>"Didn't you know he was killed in that mess at the Railroad to-day?"</p> + +<p>"Killed! My God, no!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, he was killed. I saw him."</p> + +<p>"Then I don't want to go in there. Let me go back to town."</p> + +<p>"No," said Dolly, firmly. "We're going back to the Railroad. That's +the best place for all of us right now."</p> + +<p>They rode on through the lane and struck the trail that ran through the +narrows. Sank led the way, then came Randy, and Dolly brought up the +rear. He was back there because he didn't mean to let Randy Ross turn +and get away from him.</p> + +<p>He knew that terrible thing that was gripping Randy's heart with icy +fingers. It wasn't fear. It was a tangible thing, worse than fear. He +himself had lain awake at night, gripped by it. It couldn't be tamed. +It had to be killed, and only one thing could kill it. That was contact +with the dead.</p> + +<p>Just as they reached the narrows, two shots rang on the night, and a +minute later two riderless horses came bounding along the trail toward +them. They stopped the horses, and old Sank felt over the saddles in +the darkness.</p> + +<p>"One of 'em's Leck's and the other Pate's," he said.</p> + +<p>"Well, let's get down the trail," said Dolly. "Whoever done it has run +away, and maybe the boys are just shot up a little."</p> + +<p>He knew better, but they pushed on, the two riderless horses trotting +ahead of them, with bridles over the saddle horns. At the narrowest +place, the lead horse snorted, shied, and the two of them whirled and +came back to the riders.</p> + +<p>"I'll—I'll hold the horses while you look," said Randy.</p> + +<p>"No, come on," insisted Dolly. "The horses will stand."</p> + +<p>Randy dismounted and staggered along the trail. Fifty yards farther on, +they found Leck, stone dead. Twenty feet beyond him lay Peyton Ross.</p> + +<p>"I'll—I'll get the horses," faltered Randy.</p> + +<p>"No. Let Sank bring them."</p> + +<p>They stood together, within a few feet of Leck's body, until the horses +came. Dolly knew, only too well, what Randy was suffering. He recalled +that night in a line-rider's cabin, with his dead partner. This was +the baptism of death for Randy. He'd either come out of it a brave man +or a hopeless coward, according to the stuff that was in him.</p> + +<p>"Hold the horse, Sank," commanded the little puncher. "You take his +shoulders, Randy. You're stronger than me."</p> + +<p>How Randolph Ross went through that ordeal he never knew. When Leck was +lashed to his horse, they went on to Peyton Ross. As they lifted the +body to its saddle, sobs were shaking Randy, but they were no longer +sobs of fear and dread. He loved this gentle, kindly brother, as if he +were a sister. He had always stood in awe of Asa, who was ten years his +senior, and paid little attention to him.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Randy laid his hand on his brother as he lay bound to the +saddle, and in a husky tone that seemed the very tearing of his +heartstrings, he said:</p> + +<p>"Good-by, Pate. You'll go to God, if ever man did. I won't forget you, +and I won't forget the men that done this." He was cold now, and when +he spoke a moment later, his voice was hard and even. "Each one of you +boys lead one of the horses. You won't have to watch me now, Dolly. +I'll lead the way, so if those fellows are still in the brush, you'll +get a warning."</p> + +<p>"God! What a dose for a man to take," whispered Dolly to the silent old +Sankey, as Randy mounted, and rode on down the trail. "He took it like +a man, too. Don't tell me he's yellow!"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>A light was burning in the house at the Railroad Ranch, while some of +the men sat up with the dead, as was the custom of the country. A light +also showed in the long bunk house.</p> + +<p>There would be little sleeping that night. The men talked among +themselves in low tones. Asa Ross, as foreman of the ranch, had been a +hard driver, but fair, and the men liked him. They wondered who would +handle the men now.</p> + +<p>For all of old Railroad's dash that day in the gun fight, they +knew he was too old for the job. Peyton couldn't do it. He was too +tender-hearted. He'd either give the ranch away, or somebody would take +it away from him. There was no use to consider Randy. He was too young, +and besides that, he was yellow, and a drinker. All these things the +men talked over among themselves.</p> + +<p>The evening was chilly, and old Railroad Ross sat by a little fire +in the open fireplace. Asa's body was in another room. Railroad was +alone with his grief. The grief of such men is not normal. They feel +as deeply, perhaps, as other people, but their grief seems to benumb +and harden them. Often such men are charged with looking upon death as +merely a physical loss.</p> + +<p>Ross had been disappointed in the matter of sons. He wanted a houseful +of them; ten had been born to him. As one man put it, owing to +rattlesnakes, round-up fights, and rough stuff, only three reached full +manhood. Asa was now gone. Peyton was also gone, but the old fellow +didn't know it as he sat staring, hard-eyed, at the fire, and trying to +get his bearings in this storm that had overtaken him as he neared the +last port on the seas of life.</p> + +<p>Silver Bend, all of it, twelve thousand acres in extent, had been +acquired by Ross in his early manhood. His real name was Randolph Ross. +His brand was plain RR. He said he knew the brand could be run, but +that a thief would take your stuff anyway, if you didn't watch it.</p> + +<p>Waggish cowboys dubbed the place Railroad Ranch. From that it was but +a step to calling the ranchman Railroad Ross. As the years passed he +became so known all over the far-flung ranges. Even the banks thought +that the initial in his signature, "R. Ross," stood for Railroad.</p> + +<p>Railroad cattle and horses in thousands roamed the unfenced prairies to +the southward, but Silver Bend was Railroad's home, and he loved it in +the peculiar way that such men love their homes.</p> + +<p>He was wondering now who would carry on, and keep it together, when +he was gone. Of all his boys, Randy, the baby, named for his father +and more like his sire in some ways than any of the others, had been +the bitter disappointment. What would the spoiled, irresponsible Randy +do with Silver Bend and the Railroad if it fell to him? The old man's +musings were interrupted by low voices and shuffling steps at the side +gate of the yard, heard through the open door.</p> + +<p>He stepped out into the yard and called:</p> + +<p>"What is it, boys?"</p> + +<p>"Come out here, please, Mr. Ross," replied Sank, and then when he +reached them the old puncher went on in low tones:</p> + +<p>"It's Pate and Leck. We found 'em up at the narrows."</p> + +<p>"Found 'em? What do you mean? Dead?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. I reckon somebody got the water light on 'em from across the +river and just potted 'em."</p> + +<p>"Potted Pate. Murdered him. He never done a thing to anybody in his +life. Him and Leck was goin' to town to get a coffin for Asa and have +a grave dug. Pate didn't even have a gun on him. And they just bushed +him, cold."</p> + +<p>The old man's voice was hard and hummed like a taut wire. He stopped +and seemed to be trying to control himself before those strained wires +broke. Presently he went on in a flat, lifeless tone:</p> + +<p>"Take Pate in the room where Asa is and lay him out. Better take Leck +to the bunk house, I reckon. He'd feel more at home there."</p> + +<p>He turned away and took a few steps, and then turned back. "I sent you +after Randy, Sank. Did you find him?"</p> + +<p>"Here I am, dad," said Randy, stepping forward from the group by the +gate.</p> + +<p>"Come on in the house. The other boys can attend to things out here."</p> + +<p>He and his one remaining son went into the house together. What +terrible thoughts of havoc and disaster were in the mind of old +Railroad Ross at that moment none would ever know.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>THE VIGIL AT RAILROAD RANCH.</h3> + + +<p>Railroad and Randy sat down by the fire. The old man threw on a fresh +stick of wood, filled his pipe, lit it, and smoked in silence. The +clock ticked mournfully on the mantel. There was no sound about the +house except an occasional low-spoken word, or a light step on tiptoes. +The whole place seemed to be in silent mourning. It was so still in +that room that a bit of falling ember in the fire could be heard.</p> + +<p>At last Railroad spoke:</p> + +<p>"Randy, it looks like the old Railroad is square up ag'in' its last +fight, and mighty shorthanded for such a bad mess. Asa's gone, and I'm +too old to carry on. I been wondering about you. I ain't never pulled +the hackamore on you like I ought to, I reckon. I didn't have much fun +when I was a boy. By the time you grew up I had right smart money, and +I just turned you loose. You ain't never been rode none, Randy, and +you've sorty gone bronc on me, but, Randy—Boy, I—I need a man right +now."</p> + +<p>Old Railroad choked and stopped. For the first time since he had stood +over Asa as he lay on the ground, the old fellow broke and a tear +glistened on his flat, hard cheek.</p> + +<p>Followed minutes of silence. The clock ticked on. The two men, +startlingly alike except in age, sat staring into the fire, the red +light on their bronze faces.</p> + +<p>Finally Randy stirred in his chair, cleared his throat, and said:</p> + +<p>"Dad, I'm—I'm going to try to be a man."</p> + +<p>Railroad turned his head and stared at Randy, as if one of his dead +sons had spoken to him, but said no word, and Randy went on:</p> + +<p>"I've been a worthless, drunken pup, dad, and, worst of all, I've been +yellow as paint."</p> + +<p>"No! Not yellow!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, dad, yellow. I'm coming clean. Sank and Dolly would lie to you +about me, just as everybody else has done, but I'm going to tell you +the truth. When I saw Asa dead I didn't have the nerve to face it. I +ran away. I went to Willow Mills to get drunk and forget it, like the +yellow pup I was. That's where they found me. Don't let them tell you +anything else."</p> + +<p>"Go on," commanded Railroad. "It's hard as hell to take, but give me +the whole dose."</p> + +<p>"The rest won't be so hard to take, dad. Little Dolly got me out of the +Cottonwood some way. I think he must have done it with his eyes. Then +he talked to me. He made me come home. He watched me, and when I tried +to turn back and run away from it he wouldn't let me."</p> + +<p>"God made a man when he made Dolly. If He'd made him any bigger, he'd +be the biggest man in the world. It's bitter, but I can take it. Go on."</p> + +<p>"When we found Leck and Pate I tried to run away again. Dolly made me +help him put them on the horses. Dad, it wasn't live men I was afraid +of. It was dead men and death itself. I never told you before, because +I was ashamed of it. I'm telling you now because I'm cured of it."</p> + +<p>"What!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, cured. When I put my hand on Pate all the yellow went out of me. +He never was afraid; he just didn't want to hurt anybody. From that +moment on I wasn't afraid of anything, and I never will be again. All +I want now is a chance to prove it, and square things for the cold +killing of Asa and Pate."</p> + +<p>"Thank God!" said Railroad in a husky voice as he gripped the hand of +his one remaining son. "You're giving me help when I need it. I didn't +see how I was going to get by this, but I can now."</p> + +<p>Randy rose and left the room. Railroad didn't know where he was going. +Perhaps out to the bucket that hung on a hook on the long black +gallery, to get a drink.</p> + +<p>Randy went into the room where his two murdered brothers lay. He turned +back the sheets and looked at them. No one in the room spoke a word. +They stared at Randy and wondered. They noticed something that Randy +himself had not noticed. His long Colt .45 was still in the holster at +his belt.</p> + +<p>Some of the grim old punchers took it as an omen, others looked upon +it as they would have looked upon wearing a hat in the presence of the +dead.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Randy replaced the sheets gently, turned, and left the room. He had +faced the dead without a quiver. He could face anything now. Returning, +he sat down in the chair by his father.</p> + +<p>"Dad, I don't know where nor how to begin, but I'm ready to try to be a +man. Tell me what to do, and I'll do my best. I don't understand why we +are in this trouble. I don't understand why the Holderness boys—"</p> + +<p>"Just a minute, Randy. You would not understand it. It's old, old +trouble that began when you was a baby. Twenty-four year ago this +round-up time. Sam Holderness, the daddy of these Holderness boys, +ranched in above Willow Mills. Sam was a blustering sort of fellow and +didn't amount to much, but right self-important. At the round-up that +spring Sam and me had an argument over some brands.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what anybody else said to Sam, or whether they egged him +on. All I know is that along late in the afternoon Sam came at me, +makin' smoke. I was right handy with a gun in them days; had to be. I +shot Sam.</p> + +<p>"The bullet went through his right lung and stopped him, but didn't +kill him. He got up all right, but come winter he took pneumonia and +died. I don't know whether that bullet hole in his lung had anything +to do with it or not. Some of the doctors said it did, and others said +it didn't; but no matter. There was plenty of busybodies to say that I +killed Sam Holderness.</p> + +<p>"I felt bad about it, of course. Sam didn't have anything much, and he +had left a widow and three little boys. Bell was about ten year old +then. A quiet, say-nothing boy. The youngest one wasn't more than a +baby. I went to the administrator of Sam's estate and put ten thousand +dollars where he could draw on it for the widow and children, without +anybody knowing where it come from."</p> + +<p>"They made out all right. The boys grew up. Sam's widow married and +went away from this country; but the boys stayed. They worked with +cattle. I knew 'em all, and they seemed to treat me same as anybody +else.</p> + +<p>"Then two, three year ago Steve Holderness married into the Chickasaw +tribe, across the river. Bell had got some money together, trading here +and yonder, and they started the Holderness ranch. I thought the old +trouble was all forgot, but one day Steve got drunk at Willow Mills and +give it out that I was goin' to pay for killin' his daddy.</p> + +<p>"There was right smart talk about it here and yonder, but it died down. +Then this thing broke to-day, right out of a clear sky. Ain't no doubt +but what Bell Holderness has kept this in his gizzard all these years. +If they'd killed me, it wouldn't look so bad, but seems like they aim +to get my boys one at a time and leave me to suffer out my old age. I +thought the country had got civilized some, and we had got away from +them old wars, but I was wrong."</p> + +<p>"I never heard of that before, dad. I could understand the Holderness +boys wanting to meet you and shoot it out, if they thought you killed +their father. But this cold killing and bushwhacking of innocent men +don't go."</p> + +<p>"No, it oughtn't to go; but it looks like they're makin' it go. I +understand the Holderness boys are rough. I've never been to their +ranch, but I understand it's a sort of hangout for a hard gang of +fellows that's dodging the law. That reminds me of Ben Tarleton. What +in the kingdom ever made a boy, raised like Ben was, take up with +fellows like them?"</p> + +<p>"That's the bitterest part of it all, Ben getting killed at our +round-up the way he did."</p> + +<p>"Well, he was with them fellows. They killed Asa, and one of them got +killed. It just happened to be Ben."</p> + +<p>"I know, dad, but—you know about Zella and me. She's the only thing +that has kept me from going plumb to the devil and being as bad as Ben +was."</p> + +<p>"Huh! Maybe so, but I got an idea it's partly what's inside of you. I +knew you and Zella were sweethearts, and I supposed you'd marry as soon +as you got yo' crop of wild oats harvested, but now—"</p> + +<p>"Now!" Randy almost gasped. "You wouldn't object to me marrying Zella, +because of this?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no. I ain't got a thing ag'in' Zella. She's one of the finest +young women in Texas. Trouble is, old Judge Tarleton and them other two +boys of hisn, Lav and Cliff, are pretty apt to object some. You look at +it from yo' relation to Zella, and it looks bad enough. Look at it from +the viewpoint of having the Tarletons join the Holderness gang ag'in' +us, and it looks a lot worse."</p> + +<p>"I hadn't thought of that."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"You better think of it if you're goin' to try to work out of this +mess alive. It'll be plain enough that Ben was shot in the back. You +couldn't convince the old judge and his boys that ary Tarleton that +ever lived would turn his back to an enemy. That leaves it just plain +assassination in their minds. Besides that, Ben had not fired a shot. +Every chamber of that pearl-handled gun was full."</p> + +<p>"Do they know all that?"</p> + +<p>"I reckon they do, by this time. Dave Simms was here with the D Bar +outfit. They put Ben in their chuck wagon and took him over the prairie +road and around that way. Judge Tarleton and the boys may see sense, +knowing as they do how Ben's run wild lately. The chances are, though, +that they'll go clean crazy. They're good folks, but they can't believe +a Tarleton is ever wrong."</p> + +<p>"They're the kind that can be awful hard, when they are hard," said +Randy, musingly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and they're apt to be hard now. They's one thing. Whatever they +do will be done in the open. They won't pot nobody from the bushes. Old +Judge Tarleton is likely to just straddle a horse and come storming +right over here."</p> + +<p>"Dad, it's going to be hard for me," sighed Randy. "If I'd been a man +all along, I'd know how to act, but now—"</p> + +<p>"Them's things a fellow has to learn by himself. 'Bout all I can tell +you is to keep yo' head cool. It don't take a very brave man to kill +somebody. It takes a lot braver one to not kill when he's crowded +and has a chance to kill. We can handle the Holderness gang if the +Tarletons stay out of it. If they don't? Well, let's not cross any +bridges before they're built." Lighting his pipe, old Railroad smoked +in silence, while Randy pondered his situation.</p> + +<p>The following day was a day of funerals at Willow Mills. Members of two +of the most prominent families on that part of the border were buried +in the same cemetery. The people of the community were in attendance, +but the wise ones were tight-lipped. The trouble between Railroad Ross +and Sam Holderness was recalled by old men, and they wagged their heads +over it.</p> + +<p>Few knew any of the facts about the killing of Asa Ross and Ben +Tarleton at the Railroad round-up. Randy Ross, Dolly and Sank, and old +Railroad knew of the bushwhacking of Pate and Leck, but they had told +nothing.</p> + +<p>The cortege that came in from the Railroad ranch was ominous. A wagon +brought three caskets. Ahead of the wagon rode ten armed men, with +Randy Ross in the leading pair, and Dolly by his side. Behind the wagon +came the family carriage and a few other vehicles, followed by ten more +armed men.</p> + +<p>There was pretty likely to be peace until the funeral was over, or +a lot more graves would be needed. The procession filed through the +wide gate and stopped. At the grave the armed punchers stood about in +groups, bare-headed but vigilant.</p> + +<p>The Tarleton funeral had entered the gate a few minutes ahead of them. +The graves were less than a hundred feet apart. With bowed gray heads, +Railroad Ross and the venerable Judge Tarleton stood with their backs +to each other, listening to the last rites of their sons.</p> + +<p>Randy, outwardly cold but inwardly torn with emotion, stood by his +mother's chair. He quivered as his ear caught a few words of what the +minister was saying at Ben Tarleton's grave. Among them were, "stricken +down in the bloom of youth by an assassin's bullet." That told him how +the Tarletons had taken Ben's death, and what he might expect from +them in his hour of trouble.</p> + +<p>He glanced toward that other funeral, and saw Zella sobbing in the arms +of a neighboring woman, and his heart almost broke, because he could +not even offer a word of comfort to this woman, who he had loved from +his boyhood and who needed him now as he needed her.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>There was no disturbance at the cemetery. Randy had expected none; but +on the return to the ranch every bend of the road, every thicket by the +way, was a potential ambush.</p> + +<p>He was head of the Railroad outfit now. Old Railroad Ross and his +wife got into their carriage when the funeral was over, and waited +deferentially for the Tarleton carriage to pass out ahead of them. In +it were the judge and his wife, Zella and her two brothers.</p> + +<p>There was little show of emotion. Railroad and his wife were silent +because they had seen so much sorrow and knew the futility of violent +grief. The Tarletons were silent, because violent emotion was +unbecoming their patrician blood and lineage. No one in the Tarleton +carriage looked toward the Ross equipage.</p> + +<p>Passing out the gate, the Tarletons went on toward the white house in +the locust grove, followed by no one. Outside the gate, the Railroad +outfit formed again, as it had come, and followed at a respectful +distance. Two old men stood at the cemetery gate talking, as the crowd +broke up and left.</p> + +<p>"I never noticed Randy Ross lookin' so much like his daddy before," +said one.</p> + +<p>"Looks just like Railroad did twenty or thirty year ago," replied the +other, "but he won't never be the man his daddy is, if he lives—and he +won't."</p> + +<p>"Say he won't? Why?"</p> + +<p>"I picked up a smatterin' of how this mess comes up. The real quarrel +is with the Holderness boys, over the killin' of old Sam years ago. +Worst thing Randy's up ag'in', though, is the Tarleton boys. They ain't +afraid and they mean business."</p> + +<p>"Well, it ain't my quarrel. The less outsiders say about a mess like +this, the less they're likely to have to swallow."</p> + +<p>"That's right. I wouldn't mention it, except to a fellow like you. It's +their quarrel. Hands off and let 'em settle it, I say."</p> + +<p>In those few words the sentiment of the better element of the community +was expressed, and they would studiously refrain from talking; but +there were plenty of irresponsible people who would take sides and let +their tongues wag.</p> + +<p>Nothing befell the Railroad outfit on the return trip to the ranch. +Things were set as nearly to rights as they could be after such a +catastrophe. The men went about the late evening ranch work, getting +ready for the next day's handling of stock, branding, and the like. Old +Railroad and Randy kept to the house. Sank and Dolly went out to round +up the remuda.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Dolly," said Sankey, "I got an idea that you've elected yo'self to a +right dangerous place."</p> + +<p>"Anybody that sticks to the old Railroad now is in a dangerous place, +and anybody that quits it is a yeller-bellied hound."</p> + +<p>"That may be true, and I reckon it is; but I don't aim to quit, so +you ain't hurt my feelings none. Point is, Randy Ross aims to ride, +and ride hell-bent for trouble. The Railroad riders will have to go +in pairs or better, and somebody's got to ride with Randy. After what +happened last night, he's apt to take you."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'd hate to leave you, but if he calls me, I'll have to ante."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know you will. Trouble is, whoever rides with Randy is due for +about what Leck got for riding with Pate. That Holderness gang aims to +clean up on the Railroad and do it quick."</p> + +<p>"Looks like it, but unless I miss my measure of Randy, he'll be at the +cleaning."</p> + +<p>"With the Holderness gang, yes. With the Tarletons, he can't turn a +hand."</p> + +<p>"Why can't he?"</p> + +<p>"Account of Zella."</p> + +<p>"Huh! You may see it that way, but I don't. I can see how a man could +love that girl to death, but I can't see why he should stand still and +let her folks shoot him to shoestrings on account of it, and I don't +believe Randy can. Anyway, I ain't in love with her, and if I happen to +be between them and Randy, or can get between 'em—"</p> + +<p>"Steady! Wait till it happens, to talk about it, and then don't talk. +Whatever way things jump, you and me will work together, and we'll find +plenty to do before this thing is over. I'm just a pore old puncher, +and Randy Ross is the only heir to the Railroad and about a million +bronchos and cattle, and has got a fighting chance for the finest girl +in Texas, but I wouldn't trade places with him for a whole lot to boot."</p> + +<p>The Railroad was quiet enough that night. The men were catching up +with their sleep. No one was likely to attack the place, when thirty +hard riders and straight shooters were known to be there. But Randy's +troubles were not far off.</p> + +<p>Came morning, and true to Sankey's prediction, Randy called Dolly to +ride with him, but he arranged for Sankey and another trusted old +puncher, Con Bates, to be always on the same part of the range with +them. They had just saddled up and were ready to ride.</p> + +<p>Old Railroad Ross was giving Randy some instructions about the work, +when they heard a lone horseman coming up the trail. They turned and +saw that the gaunt, stiff man astride the powerful horse was Judge +Tarleton!</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>"ASSASSINATED, SIR, ASSASSINATED!"</h3> + + +<p>A tableau of stoicism was presented as Judge Tarleton rode up and +stopped. The old planter had a gun on his hip. Railroad Ross stood like +a block of granite, looking square at the visitor. Randy stood by his +father's side. Both were armed, but no hostile gesture was made.</p> + +<p>The young man's lips were drawn in a hard line. He knew that the +Tarleton family had merely tolerated him as Zella's suitor, because +she was the only daughter of the house, and usually had her way. His +standing there, his hope of winning Zella had long hung by a slender +thread.</p> + +<p>What was Judge Tarleton's purpose? Would what the old planter had +to say sever that thread? Worse still, would it sever the friendly +relations between the two old families? He was not left long in doubt.</p> + +<p>"Good morning, judge," greeted Railroad. "Won't you get down and come +in?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir, I won't get down," returned the judge, ignoring the greeting. +"I won't go into your house now, and I don't know that I ever shall. I +came over here to get some information about the murder of my son."</p> + +<p>As he sat there on his horse, Judge Tarleton was the personification of +family pride and resentment against a world in which any untoward thing +could happen to a Tarleton. Railroad stood calmly looking his neighbor +over, from his gray head crowned by a broad black hat, to his fine +morocco-topped boots.</p> + +<p>Tarleton's cheeks glistened from a fresh shave. He shaved from his +temples to a line running from the mustache back to the hinge of the +jaw, and he shaved it every day. Below that line was a neatly trimmed +beard that had once been black.</p> + +<p>The high-bridged nose and other outstanding features that marked Zella +and Ben were there. His very air and bearing bespoke the patrician. +It said plainly that he didn't know and he didn't care a hang whether +he was going to meet with hostility at the Railroad or not. When Ross +didn't speak, he rapped out:</p> + +<p>"Well, what have you got to say?" much as if the old ranchman had been +a slave.</p> + +<p>Railroad's face was as fixed as granite, and one expected it to break +if he opened his mouth.</p> + +<p>"I have to say that murder is a pretty hard word to use about that +killing."</p> + +<p>"That's what it was. Assassinated, sir, assassinated! I know my people. +No Tarleton ever turned his back in a fight. Ben was murdered. Shot in +the back by a cowardly assassin."</p> + +<p>"That's pretty hard talk, judge. I don't think Ben was assassinated, +because there ain't any assassins in my outfit. I wish you could see +yo' way to change that word to something else."</p> + +<p>"I'll change nothing! The boy was shot in the back. He wasn't fighting. +His gun was still in the holster and hadn't been fired. I don't charge +you with murder. I've known you a long time. You're rough, but I've +found you square. All I want is for you to tell me who killed Ben. My +sons and I will attend to the rest."</p> + +<p>The tableau turned now. Railroad's lips were a grim line. Finally, he +spoke:</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"I'm sorry, judge, but I don't know. You haven't asked me how this mess +came up, but I'm going to tell you. Bell Holderness and his gang comes +here to make trouble and they made it. They killed one of my boys cold. +Naturally, I and my men opened on 'em, and they run. I ain't charging +nothing against Ben. He was with the Holderness boys and when they ran, +he did, and he was killed. Who killed him, I can't say. Several of us +were shooting. They were a good distance from us, their horses were +running, and ours were running. Whoever killed him was shooting at the +crowd and happened to hit Ben."</p> + +<p>"So, as near as you can come to it, your outfit murdered Ben?" and +Tarleton's lips curled in a silent snarl.</p> + +<p>"No, I don't put it that way. Ben was a wild boy. He got in bad +company, and somebody in my outfit shot him. I'm sorry, for I don't +think Ben had anything against me or the Railroad outfit."</p> + +<p>"You admit the killing then! To me and my boys it was murder, and we +have our own way of settling with murderers, whether it is one or a +hundred. Lav and Cliff wanted to come with me, but I told them no. If +you was friendly, and could explain and help us get the murderer, I +could do more alone. If you wasn't friendly, I was enough to be shot in +the back."</p> + +<p>"That's more hard talk, judge," pleaded Railroad. "I, nor ary man in my +outfit, ain't got a thing ag'in' you and your boys. Not one of us had +anything ag'in' Ben. I've got trouble enough with the Holderness boys +'thout quarrelling with a family that's been friendly and my neighbors +for years."</p> + +<p>"Never mind that," snapped Tarleton. "I don't feel any blame for being +friendly to you. Sometimes it takes a good many years to find people +out." Then the judge shifted his glance to Randy's set face. "You have +been treated as a friend and an equal at my house, young man. That's +past. If you come there again, you come as one of the assassins of my +son, and will be treated accordingly."</p> + +<p>Randy winced, but didn't speak. He couldn't trust himself. Anyway, +Railroad didn't give him a chance.</p> + +<p>"Judge Tarleton," he said, as his brows knit, "you've made yourself +pretty plain, and I don't know that talking more could do any good. If +any trouble comes up between your family and my outfit, you'll have to +start it."</p> + +<p>"It's already up, sir!" and Tarleton whirled his horse and rode away.</p> + +<p>"Too bad!" said Railroad to his son.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it is too bad," admitted Randy, "but if nothing else will do +them—"</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute, Randy. I want to say a word to all of you. Judge +Tarleton and his boys are good men—among the best in the country. I +want every one of you to keep out of trouble with them if you possibly +can without running from them. Mount and ride now, but keep your eyes +open."</p> + +<p>Without a word, Randy mounted and rode away, with Dolly by his side, +and Sank and Con following at a little distance. They were heading +toward the round-up grounds. Randy wasn't going to wait for a further +demonstration from the Holderness gang. He was going to see what he +could find along the river, where Leck and Pate had been killed.</p> + +<p>When they reached the round-up ground, they saw Judge Tarleton look +back, as he entered the timber on the trail that led up the river. He +wasn't a half mile ahead of them, and was riding slowly, apparently to +show that he wasn't afraid.</p> + +<p>They rode on, entered the timber, and followed on up the trail. When a +quarter of a mile from the narrows, they heard a single shot.</p> + +<p>"Good God! They've shot the judge!" gasped Randy, and galloped on up +the trail, with Dolly at his heels.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Coming out on the river bank, where they could see far ahead, they +saw a horseman, sagging in his saddle and clinging desperately to the +saddle horn. They knew it was Judge Tarleton, but as Randy quickened +his speed to go to the old planter's assistance, a gun cracked across +the river. Randy's horse reared and crashed to the earth. He rolled +free and came up behind a big cottonwood tree.</p> + +<p>Dolly spurred his horse behind a thicket, dismounted and crept to the +river bank. Something moved in the thicket on the other side of the +stream. Dolly's carbine cracked, and a terrible yell came from the +thicket. After that, silence.</p> + +<p>"I don't know whether you ought to have done that or not, Dolly," said +Randy. "You didn't see the man that shot at me, and you might shoot the +wrong man."</p> + +<p>Dolly looked at him with an odd glint in his blue eyes.</p> + +<p>"See here now, Randy. Let's you and me get this straight before we go +any further. Do we let that Holderness gang pot us, or don't we? If +we're going to fight back, I'll stay with you. If we're going to be +potted, why, I ain't ready to be potted, that's all."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I mean to fight back and fight hard. I just want it to be in the +open."</p> + +<p>"Well, it won't be. That gang aims to bushwhack us. Do you know what +that fellow's done for you?"</p> + +<p>"Why, no, except that he missed me, hit my horse, and left me afoot."</p> + +<p>"He's done a heap more than that. He's shot old Judge Tarleton, and +the Tarleton boys will lay it on the Railroad outfit. The judge saw us +following him, and if he gets home alive, which he probably will, he'll +tell 'em it was us."</p> + +<p>"Then let me have your horse, and I'll go on and catch up with the +judge and tell him better."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and he'd believe you, just like you'd believe the biggest +liar you ever saw in your life. Now you listen to me. You got to do +something more than just not be afraid. You got to use your head in +this mess. I been thinking. The Holderness gang ain't just trying to +square a mess that happened a hundred years ago. I don't know what +they're after, but it's something else. Had you thought of what a hell +of a long shot for a six-shooter it was from the Railroad outfit to +where that gang went into the woods and Ben Tarleton fell?"</p> + +<p>"Why, no. What of it?"</p> + +<p>"Well, when Sank and me was out after the remuda yesterday evening, we +met Con. He showed us where Mr. Ross and the boys turned back and it's +full two hundred yards from there to where Ben fell!"</p> + +<p>"I don't see—"</p> + +<p>"I don't either, but I'm guessing. I don't believe anybody hit Ben that +far with a six-shooter. I believe Bell Holderness shot Ben in the back, +as they ran away."</p> + +<p>"Bell did! Why would Bell kill one of his own gang?"</p> + +<p>"Ben didn't exactly belong. He wasn't that sort. Couldn't be. He +probably didn't know what the Holderness boys were up to when they +went to the round-up. Maybe he said something about the killing of +Asa. It might be, and likely was, that Bell simply figured that if Ben +was killed at your round-up, it would put the Tarletons against you, +instead of against them, as they would have been if Ben hadn't been +killed."</p> + +<p>"Dolly, do you suppose—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I suppose a whole lot of things; and among 'em, I suppose we +better get your saddle off'n that dead broncho and get away from here."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Sank and Con had heard the shots, but misjudged the direction. They +came up just as Randy was ready to mount behind Dolly for the return to +the ranch. They all returned to the edge of the prairie. Dolly brought +a fresh mount for Randy, and then they went into a general discussion +of the situation.</p> + +<p>Con Bates had been with the Railroad as far back as Randy could +remember. He was a typical leather face, and talked so little that +people often wondered if he was dumb. He sat on his heels, listening, +as the others talked. He heard Dolly's suggestion as to Bell Holderness +having shot Ben. He listened to everything and said nothing. Finally, +Randy turned to him.</p> + +<p>"Con, you've been in many a mess like this. What do you think is the +best way to handle it?"</p> + +<p>"I been in plenty of messes," growled the wrinkled old puncher, "but +none like this. They ain't no two alike. Besides that, I've never been +in one when Bell Holderness was ramrodding the other side of the fight."</p> + +<p>"A fight's a fight, ain't it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Sometimes it's a dozen. This is apt to be that kind before it's +over. I've known Bell Holderness all his life. He never made a horse +trade in his life that he didn't plan every move in it before he said a +word. When he brought his gang over here and killed Asa, he had all his +plans made. He knows now that Asa and Pate are out of the way. He knows +Railroad is too old to push the fight, and he thinks right now that he +knows what you'll do."</p> + +<p>"I guess he's mistaken about that," said Randy, with a wintry smile, +"for I don't know myself."</p> + +<p>"Maybe not, but you ain't done what he thought you would, and I don't +believe you will."</p> + +<p>"What was that?"</p> + +<p>"He thought you'd go to Willow Mills and get drunk, and he'd pick a +quarrel with you and kill you. Likely he still thinks so."</p> + +<p>Randy shot a glance at Dolly, and then:</p> + +<p>"He'll miss his guess, if he does. I may go to Willow Mills, but if +Bell, or anybody else kills me, he'll kill me sober, and I'll be at the +killing."</p> + +<p>They rode south, up the hill, and out onto the prairie. The four +of them were not together all the time. When noon came, Randy and +Dolly stopped under a lone hackberry tree, where they could see a +considerable distance in every direction. They took the lunch from +their saddle pockets and ate it. Randy was silent and thoughtful. At +last he spoke:</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Dolly, you look like a boy, but I know you're a lot older than I am. +Anyway, you've been a man longer, for I never was a man until you +pulled me out of the Cottonwood and made a man of me. I need help +badly. We can't just sit still until they push us over."</p> + +<p>"No, I reckon not," grinned Dolly, "but I got a picture of the one that +pushes you over while you're still alive. You're so damn fightin' mad +right now, Randy, that yore boots are scorching, and you don't know +what's the matter with you. Way I look at it is this. Holderness is +ahead of the game. He's got three of the Railroad outfit. He's got Ben +Tarleton dead and the old judge shot, and got it all laid on us."</p> + +<p>"I've proved to myself that I'm not afraid, Dolly, and now I'm ready +for anything. If I could just see a place where we could strike, and +strike hard, I'm rearing to break Bell's luck. You're right about me +being mad."</p> + +<p>They rode on back toward the ranch late in the afternoon. They were +within half a mile of where Sank and Dolly hazed the band of cattle +over the rimrock the day of the round-up, when they saw two riders, +each leading a horse, coming in from the west.</p> + +<p>"Why, that's Cub and Shorty. I wonder—" and Randy stopped.</p> + +<p>"Them two and Keech and Brazos Jim went to town after the mail. I heard +Mr. Ross tell 'em to go and for four of 'em to go together."</p> + +<p>"Another mistake," said Randy, musingly. "Looked like a dare."</p> + +<p>"Looks to me like somebody taken it up. Let's see what they got to say. +What's happened, Shorty?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing much," drawled the tallest puncher in the outfit, who had been +dubbed Shorty. "We rides into town a little after noon. Cub and me goes +to the post office, and Keech and Brazos went over to the Cottonwood +to wait for us. When we got to the Cottonwood, Keech was layin' on the +floor dead, and Brazos, he was down and bleedin'.</p> + +<p>"As we stepped in to the place two guns went into our faces, and we was +kindly invited to reach for the sky. We reached. Behind one of them +guns was Lav Tarleton, and behind the other was Bell Holderness."</p> + +<p>"No!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and a right smart of it. Then we got some news. We found out that +the whole Railroad outfit confessed to murder. We found out just what +we were. We found out that you, Randy, shot old Judge Tarleton in the +back. Then we got turned loose, without our guns, to bring the glad +tidings that unless Railroad—I mean Mr. Ross—would give up Randy and +the man that kilt Ben, they was goin' to be war."</p> + +<p>"'Bout thirty days late with that news," said Dolly. "Everybody that +ain't blind or crazy, knew it all."</p> + +<p>"What did they kill Keech and Brazos for?" asked Randy.</p> + +<p>"Not a thing in the world. Keech killed one of Bell's gang, and Brazos +two. That was all. We heard the shooting, and thought it was just in +fun—but it wasn't."</p> + +<p>"Where did Bell and Lav go?" asked Randy.</p> + +<p>"They shooed us down the lane as far as the big house. Then they turned +us loose to drift, and they went in the house."</p> + +<p>"In the house! Bell Holderness went in Tarleton's house?"</p> + +<p>It was what Holderness had been trying to get the right to do, ever +since Zella became grown. Randy's world was falling about his ears.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>AMBUSH.</h3> + + +<p>Somebody had been watching Randy and Dolly from a safe place, as they +rode across the prairie, but he hadn't watched long enough. The spy +didn't see Cub and Shorty, and he didn't see Sank and Con, who were +riding down another draw, and coming into Silver Bend a quarter of a +mile east of where the trail went down the hill.</p> + +<p>Randy led down the trail. His mind was in turmoil. The Railroad and its +troubles were of course, the main problem; but what was making those +troubles? Was it possible that Bell Holderness had started all this +death and destruction in order to get him out of the way? Not likely. +If Bell wanted him killed, it would be easy enough to have had some of +the Holderness gang pot him from the brush long ago. Zella might be one +of the pawns in the game, but certainly not the only one, perhaps not +the main one. What was it all about? The only answer he got was the +crack of a gun and a whistling bullet that narrowly missed him.</p> + +<p>They were well down into the open timber of the bend by this time. The +shot had come from his left. Randy didn't look to see where the others +of his party were, though he knew that Dolly was a little way behind +him.</p> + +<p>He whirled his horse into the woods as he drew his gun. He had gone +berserk. The blood of a hundred pioneer ancestors was burning in his +veins, and all thought of fear or caution was forgotten. His only +thought was to mix smoke with the man who had shot at him.</p> + +<p>He glimpsed two riders in the woods and opened on them. They returned +his fire for a moment. Bullets whistled and leaves and twigs fell +around Randy, but he pushed on. Into the mêlée came Dolly, and close +behind him Cub and Shorty. Still the attackers stood their ground. +There must be quite a party of them. It was growing dusky in the woods. +Apparently, no hits were scored on either side. Con and Sank heard the +shots and came hurrying on. It sounded like a major battle going on as +they came up.</p> + +<p>"Come on, fellers!" called Randy. "Let's take 'em," and he spurred +straight for the group of trees behind which the enemy had taken +shelter. Dolly went with him. Con and Sank sought the flank on one +side, while Cub and Shorty took the other.</p> + +<p>This was something more than members of the Holderness gang cared to +face. They had thought they were going to surprise Randy and the little +puncher. Instead, they had jumped six men, none of whom was frightened +about being surprised.</p> + +<p>The Holderness outfit still had an even break, for there were six of +them, but they were not seeking an even break. They gave back for a +better position, and made a mistake. Bullets flew among them in spite +of the gathering dusk, as they crossed an open glade, going toward +the river on the west side of the bend. One pitched from his horse. +Panic-stricken, the others fled.</p> + +<p>"Crowd 'em, fellers!" yelled Randy. "Get 'em as they cross the river at +the old ford."</p> + +<p>On through the timber they tore, running into thickets of mustang grape +and bamboo, halting to get the sound of hoofs, then on again. Finally, +they came out on the river bank, just as five horsemen rode out on the +bar on the other side.</p> + +<p>Two carbines cracked. One was Dolly's and the other was in the hands of +Shorty, whose big mouth spread in a wide grin. He had jerked the gun +from Sank's saddle. They saw one man fall, and another grip his saddle +horn and lean over, as he plunged into the brush on the other side. +Dolly had got a man, so that made three down and one crippled, out of +six—and not one of the Railroad men had a scratch, except from briers.</p> + +<p>"What the hell did you grab my carbine for?" growled Sank, as silence +followed the fusillade of shots.</p> + +<p>"Why, Cub and me didn't have any guns."</p> + +<p>"No guns! What did you come along for?"</p> + +<p>"Just company, I reckon," grinned Shorty. "Anyway, I got one and +crippled another so the dogs can ketch him."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Shorty was the most uncompromising fighter in the Railroad outfit. He +always grinned, whichever way the fight was going. He had grinned when +Bell Holderness and Lav Tarleton took his gun—grinned because he knew +they were making a mistake by not killing him. He meant to kill Bell +Holderness and grin at him as he died.</p> + +<p>"Well, we'd better stay on this side," said Randy. "The woods are +likely to be full of 'em on the other side of the river."</p> + +<p>"Apt to be plenty more on this side," said Sankey. "We better—"</p> + +<p>"There goes one! Gimme back that gun!" yelled Shorty, as a horseman +sprang out of a thicket and headed back up the river trail toward the +narrows.</p> + +<p>"Don't shoot!" called Randy. "Let's take him alive and make him talk. +Come on, Dolly."</p> + +<p>Up the trail they thundered in pursuit. It was half a mile to the spot +where Randy's horse had been shot from under him earlier in the day. It +was a dangerous spot, but they paid no attention to that.</p> + +<p>The fleeing horseman didn't have a chance. He was poorly mounted and a +poor rider. He didn't try to shoot, but seemed to have his whole soul +centered on going away from where he was to somewhere else. As they +caught up to him, Randy went on one side and Dolly on the other. Randy +reached out, caught the back of his collar, and fairly lifted him from +his saddle.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Lawd, he done got me now!" moaned the prisoner, as Randy dropped +him on the ground and dismounted.</p> + +<p>"Pompey, what the devil are you doing in here, this time of day?" +demanded Randy. "Don't you know this bend is full of killers?"</p> + +<p>"Y-y-y-yassir, yassir, I know it now, Mistuh Randy, but—oh, Lawd, +help me! Please, Mistuh Randy, don't you 'member that night I help you +on yo' horse out at the mouth of the avenoo, when you—when yo' horse +wouldn't stand still? Oh, Lawdy, save me now!"</p> + +<p>"Shut up, fool!" snapped Randy, shaking the frightened negro boy as if +he were a bundle of rags, which in fact he was. "Catch his pony, Dolly, +and let's get away from this place."</p> + +<p>They put Pompey on his pony, and all rode back into the bend. Out in +the round-up prairie, where no one could slip up on them, they stopped. +It was growing dark, but Pompey's eyes and teeth showed white in his +shiny black face. That face was mostly eyes and teeth anyway.</p> + +<p>He was a skinny little fellow, and perhaps the most skillful and +adroit liar on the Tarleton plantation, but he never lied when he was +scared, and he was frightened within one inch of his life now. He had +been caught fairly in the middle of the battle, as it swept on toward +the river, and had run into a thicket like a rabbit. Then, as things +quieted down, he had tried to run out of trouble, and here he was.</p> + +<p>"Which way did you come in here?" asked Randy.</p> + +<p>"I—I come down the river trail, Mistuh Randy."</p> + +<p>"Didn't you know it was dangerous on that trail?"</p> + +<p>"Nossir, I didn't, but I does now. Oh, Lawdy! Miss Zella, she didn't +say nothin' about dat to me. O-o-o, Lawd, save a poor nigger—"</p> + +<p>"Shut up! What did Miss Zella have to do with it?"</p> + +<p>"Why—she have everything they is to do with it," returned Pompey, +quieting down a bit, but still shaking with fright. "She sont me—sont +me—to—to bring this here to you," and suddenly remembering his +errand, he pulled a note from somewhere among his rags and handed it to +Randy.</p> + +<p>"Hum! It's too dark to see to read it, and we can't make a light here. +Too good a target. Keep him here until I get back, boys. If he tries +to get away, shoot his liver out," and smiling at Pompey's fright, +Randy mounted, and rode on toward the ranch house alone.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>As he galloped that half mile, with the note in his hand, Randy thought +of many things. Life seemed dark and forbidding before him, but one ray +of light shone out of the darkness. Zella was still true to him. She +still cared enough for him to send him a note, dangerous as it was to +send it, and despite the trouble it might make for her if her father +and brothers learned by any chance that she was communicating with him.</p> + +<p>He wondered now why he hadn't been man enough to cut out his wild +behavior and claim Zella as his own, long ago. That couldn't be +helped now, but she should never have cause to think he was wild and +irresponsible again. When this mess was over—</p> + +<p>He dismounted and hurried to his room, the big room that had been +occupied together by the three brothers, from their childhood. The +grim, silent, thoughtful Asa, of whom he had always been a little +afraid, was not in his familiar seat in the chimney corner. The gentle, +kindly Peyton was not by the table with his book.</p> + +<p>There was no light in the room. Randy struck a match and lit the lamp +on the table. Pate's book still lay there. He glanced at the mantel +and saw Asa's pipe and tobacco box. Loneliness gripped him like an icy +hand. He tore open the note, and with changing countenance, read:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> + +<p><span class="smcap">Dear Randy</span>:</p> + +<p>I call you that from long habit. I can't remember when I didn't +call you that, but now, all is done. I am writing this saddest note +of my life, for the sake of that past. I tried hard to believe you +were not guilty of the thing my brothers charged you with. There +was doubt about you having anything to do with Ben's death, and I +clung to that doubt, oh, how I clung to it!</p> + +<p>But when my father came home, shot in the back and dangerously +hurt, from ambush; when he told me he saw you and knew that you +and some of your men followed him and shot him, there could be no +longer any doubt. My love for you has caused me much sorrow. I have +often told you that some day you would commit a crime in one of +your wild escapades, but I never thought it would be such a direct +stab at my heart as this has been.</p> + +<p>I'm writing this because I feel that your death and the death of +your father could not bring back my dead brother and heal the wound +of my father. My brothers and the Holderness brothers have sworn to +kill you and your father.</p> + +<p>I don't want to see you killed. There are many other places in the +world where you could live out your life. Go while you can and hide +yourself from the certain death that awaits you here. There have +been many sad moments in the years that I have loved you, but the +saddest is now, when I say—good-by.</p> + +<p class="ph3"><span class="smcap">Zella.</span></p> +</div> + +<p>Randy sprang to his feet, and crushed the note in his hand. That ray of +light that he thought he saw was further gloom. He paced the old oak +floor in rage.</p> + +<p>"The death of me and my father won't bring back her brother, and heal +her father's wound," he grated. "No, and what about my two brothers +and three loyal, trusted men who were willing to fight my battles? +What will bring them back? Go while the going is good, will I? If she +thinks I could shoot an innocent man in the back, she never knew me. If +she thinks I'm yellow enough to run away from this fight, she knows me +still less!"</p> + +<p>He sat down to the table and wrote:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"> + +<p><span class="smcap">Miss Tarleton</span>:</p> + +<p>I have your note, and thank you for any good intentions it may have +contained, but they are wasted. I have never shot a man in the +back, and never shall, unless he commits an assault on me, and then +runs, as has happened more than once since this trouble. I can't +understand the purpose of your note. If it was to get information +as to my purpose, you shall have it. Silver Bend and the Railroad +Ranch is my home, and I mean to stay here.</p> + +<p>Until now, I have shrunk from the thought of a clash with your +brothers. Now, since you tell me that they have allied themselves +with my enemies, I shall welcome the day when we meet. You say my +death will not bring back your brother. You didn't mention anything +that would bring back my two brothers. They were both murdered, if +not by your brothers, at least by their allies, and, I take it, +with their sanction. I mean that some one shall atone for the death +of my brothers. If anything in this note will bring comfort to my +enemies, they are welcome so to construe it.</p> + +<p class="ph3"><span class="smcap">Randolph Ross.</span></p> +</div> + +<p>Randy folded the note, put it in an envelope, and placed it in his +pocket. He struck a match, set fire to Zella's note, and dropped it in +the back of the old fireplace. He watched it burn. Thus ended his hope +of happiness with the only woman he'd ever love.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>He stole out, mounted his horse, and rode back to where he had left his +men with Pompey. He didn't want his father to know about these notes; +this was his personal affair. When he got back to the men, he said:</p> + +<p>"Boys, I don't want it known that I got that note. Go on to the house +and eat. Take the mail in, Shorty, but don't say anything about what +happened up at town to-day, unless dad questions you. There may be a +lot more to tell when I get back, and—"</p> + +<p>"When you get back! Where are you going?" asked Dolly.</p> + +<p>"Just now, I'm going to take Pompey up to the top of the hill and send +him home by the prairie road. He'd get killed before he got halfway +through the narrows. You boys go on and eat. Anything I'd eat would +poison me the way I feel now."</p> + +<p>"I'm not hungry, either," declared Dolly. "I'll go with you. One lone +man ain't got much business prowling the bend right now."</p> + +<p>Randy said nothing, but he felt much. This little blue-eyed puncher was +beginning to mean a great deal to him. Pompey got on his pony and was +given the note. Escorted by Randy and Dolly, he took the trail that led +out to the prairie. Out on the prairie they stopped.</p> + +<p>"Here, Pompey," said Randy, and gave the boy a silver dollar.</p> + +<p>"Thanky, suh, Mist' Randy. You're the onliest one that ever did give me +a whole, borned dollar at one time, 'ceptin' Mist' Ben, and he won't +never give me no more."</p> + +<p>"No, and that's likely to be the last one I'll ever give you. Now, +listen to me. Keep your eyes open. If you see anybody on the prairie, +don't let 'em come to you. When you hit the bottom, ride that pony."</p> + +<p>"Yas, suh, boss! When I hits dat dark ole bottom, I'm gwine make this +old pestletail bronc think the ha'nts is ridin' him!"</p> + +<p>"Well, go on."</p> + +<p>"But, er, Mist' Randy—"</p> + +<p>"What is it?"</p> + +<p>"If you ever needs me, you knows whar I is. You 'bout the onliest white +man I got left since Mist' Ben is gone."</p> + +<p>"All right. If I ever need you I'll call for you. If you deliver that +note to anybody but Miss Zella, I'm likely to call for you pretty soon +and bring a rope."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Lawdy, Mist' Randy! Don't talk that way, and me got to go thoo +that ole dark bottom. I ain't heavy enough to break my own neck, if you +did hang me. Come on here, pony, we's got to travel."</p> + +<p>Pompey rode away into the night. Randy and the little puncher sat +silently listening until the hoof beats died out.</p> + +<p>Randy made no move to turn back toward the ranch. Dolly sat his horse +in silence. Great stories are told of ancient knights and their loyal +squires. Never was there a greater knight than Randy Ross was at that +moment, nor was there ever a more loyal squire than Dolly.</p> + +<p>He had been watching Randy all the year he had been at the Railroad. +He had envied that stalwart height, the broad shoulders, and perfect +form. He had envied Randy's education. Perhaps he had envied most of +all the ease with which Randy could jerk his gun on a running horse and +kill a leaping jack rabbit.</p> + +<p>He had envied him all this, watching the devil-may-care Randy in the +days before he got "busted," as Dolly called it. Since that night, when +Randy had reacted so wonderfully to the acid test, and had come out of +it so much a man, Dolly's envy had turned to a sort of worship. He was +ready to follow Randy anywhere, no matter how wild the adventure, or +how slim the chances of coming out of it alive.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Dolly," said Randy at last, "I don't suppose my private affairs would +interest you. Maybe you didn't even know that I had expected to marry +Zella Tarleton."</p> + +<p>"Sankey told me something about it that evening we found you at the +Cottonwood saloon. We saw her, and—It was sorty for her that I talked +to you like I did."</p> + +<p>"Then I have to thank her for a service, if she caused you to make a +man of the sorry thing I was then."</p> + +<p>"I didn't make a man of you," disclaimed Dolly. "I knew you was a +thoroughbred all the time. I—I just sorty rode you and quieted you +some, and then you done the rest yourself."</p> + +<p>"All right, I'll thank you for the riding, but let that all go. I won't +forget it. What I'm going to tell you is that everything between Zella +and me is over. She told me in that note that she believed I shot her +father in the back. When a woman can believe a thing like that of a +man, it's time for things to be over. I'm just telling you that, so +you'll understand something else I'm going to tell you."</p> + +<p>"But maybe she ain't had a square deal, Randy. Maybe somebody has +stacked the deck on her. She don't look to me like a girl that would +deal from the bottom of the deck on a fellow."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, she does understand. She advised me to run. To get out of +this mess while the going was good. To play the part of the yellow pup +that I used to be."</p> + +<p>"No!"</p> + +<p>"Yes. But, Dolly, I won't do it. If she had thrown me cold a week ago I +might have gone to the devil. I may go anyhow, but not the way I would +have gone then. She was all there was in the world to keep me half +straight then. There's something else to keep me straight now."</p> + +<p>Randy stopped, raised a gauntleted hand to the starry heaven, and went +on: "If God lets me live, I'll avenge my two brothers and the loyal men +who fell fighting for the Railroad, regardless of whom it may hurt. I +held back from tangling with the Tarleton boys. I kept my temper when +the old judge talked to dad like he was a dog; all on account of Zella. +She has freed me from any obligations. From here on the Tarletons and +Holdernesses look alike to me. Let's go."</p> + +<p>They turned back down the steep trail that led into Silver Bend and the +Railroad ranch. Dolly said nothing, but he was puzzled. Well, he knew +Randy hadn't shot the old judge, and was pretty sure he didn't kill +Ben. Randy was getting a dirty deal, and he was for him, no matter what +he might do from here on.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>RANDY SEEKS INFORMATION.</h3> + + +<p>They had reached the bottom before either of them spoke again. Randy +stopped and Dolly came up to him.</p> + +<p>"Dolly, I've got to find out something. I don't know anything about the +H Bar ranch. Never was there in my life. Dad has peculiar ideas. He +never would let his cattle drift across onto the Indian lands, even +when grass was short on this side and going to waste over there. He +always said he never had taken anything that didn't belong to him, and +that grass didn't belong to him."</p> + +<p>"Well, I reckon he was right about it."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'm sure he was. He said it would keep him out of trouble with +fellows on that side, but it hasn't done it. I don't want any of their +grass, but I do want to know something about what I'm fighting. I've +got to have some information."</p> + +<p>"Huh! How are you goin' to get it?"</p> + +<p>"Go after it."</p> + +<p>"Go to the H Bar, you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, if necessary."</p> + +<p>"Why, Randy, that Holderness gang would shoot us so full of holes we'd +make a picket fence look like a solid wall."</p> + +<p>"Maybe not. We've got to get our hands on one of that gang and make him +talk."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thataway. Sure, come on; let's go."</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute. We might find one of them in the cottonwoods, across +the river, watching the narrows."</p> + +<p>"I think you will find one there," said Dolly grimly, "if somebody +ain't packed him off, and you'll find two more layin' on the sandbar on +the other side of the river, but you won't get much information from +them."</p> + +<p>"No, I suppose not. You know that boat the boys built last summer. Know +where it is?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. It's at the upper end of the slough, but we can't go to the H Bar +in a boat. It's four or five mile from the river, up at the edge of the +prairie," Dolly pointed out.</p> + +<p>"I know, but maybe we won't have to go to the H Bar. We may find what +we want closer than that," Randy said with cold menace.</p> + +<p>"Meaning what?"</p> + +<p>"That somebody stays in that thicket of cottonwoods all the time. They +shoot at everybody that goes from the Bend toward Willow Mills, and +at nobody that comes this way. We can row up the river on this side, +close in to the bank, and they'll never see us. Just above the thicket, +we can drift across, tie up our boat, and take a look. I've got to +investigate that thicket, and they've shown us that we can't do it in +the daytime."</p> + +<p>"They shore have. That sounds all right. Let's go," said Dolly.</p> + +<p>"Easy, then. They're likely to be anywhere. We'll leave our horses in +the big grape thicket this side of the slough."</p> + +<p>Their horses hidden, they pushed the boat through the upper end of the +slough into the river. Dolly was no seaman.</p> + +<p>"All I can do is sit still and look scared," he said in a low tone.</p> + +<p>"Just keep quiet and keep your eyes open. I'll work the boat." With +noiseless strokes of the short oar, Randy sent the boat upstream.</p> + +<p>In the marshes, around that thicket of cottonwoods, frogs were keeping +up an incessant din that would cover any noise the boat might make. +Well above the thicket they crossed to the other side, got out and tied +the boat to a sapling and went ashore.</p> + +<p>"We've got to be careful now," whispered Randy. "It's two or three +hundred yards down this little point to where their sharpshooters take +their stand."</p> + +<p>They stole softly on through the dense thicket and had gone a hundred +yards when Randy put his hand behind him and touched Dolly.</p> + +<p>"Listen!" he whispered.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>There was the sound of two men walking. They were coming along a trail +from opposite directions, and, crouching in the thicket close to the +ground, Randy and his little puncher heard them meet.</p> + +<p>"Hello, Steve! That you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," replied a growling voice.</p> + +<p>"Well, sit down here on this log. I got a mouthful to tell you."</p> + +<p>"Go ahead and tell it."</p> + +<p>"Well, I come in here awhile ago to relieve Red. I went down to the +stand, and Red was layin' there dead."</p> + +<p>"Hell he was!"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Some of that Railroad outfit potted him. Are you and Bell sure +you can handle this mess the way you set out to do? Because, if you +ain't, I aim to slide out while the sliding is good."</p> + +<p>"Of course we're sure," Steve said angrily. "We've already got Asa and +Pate. That just leaves Old Railroad to lead the fight, and he won't +last long."</p> + +<p>"What about Randy?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing. He don't amount to anything if he's alive, and I don't reckon +he is. The Tarleton boys are rearin' to get him, and Bell aimed to run +'em together to-day."</p> + +<p>"Huh! Bell is a pretty smooth schemer, but I don't understand him +starting this mess the way he did."</p> + +<p>"Bell didn't start it. I started it, and he gave me hell for it. Bell's +too cautious. We been ready to clean up on the Railroad outfit for a +month, and Bell kept putting me off. We could 'a' got 'em one at a +time, and nobody known it. Bell's idea was to go over there to the +round-up and look things over. Then the next day we'd begin to work on +'em."</p> + +<p>"Well, why didn't you work it that way?"</p> + +<p>"We would, but trouble is, Bell was after one thing and I was after +something else. All I wanted was to clean up the whole Ross outfit, +because old Railroad killed my daddy. Began to look to me like Bell +never would do anything, so when I got a good chance I let Asa have it. +He was the only one I was afraid of."</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you get all of 'em?"</p> + +<p>"Get, nothing! The whole outfit came foggin' after us like a bat out +of hell, and we run! Then as we went into the timber, Bell shot Ben +Tarleton."</p> + +<p>"What for?"</p> + +<p>"I asked Bell that. He said it had to be done. Said in a pinch we could +say Ben shot Asa. Besides that, Ben being shot that way, old Judge +Tarleton and the other two boys would think the Railroad outfit done +it."</p> + +<p>"Bell's smooth, ain't he?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, he's smooth, but he's too slow. We'd orto cleared up on Railroad +and his boys, and gone on back home. Everybody knows Railroad killed +pap, and nobody would blame us, but Bell wants too much."</p> + +<p>"What is it he wants?"</p> + +<p>"He wants Silver Bend. Says it's the best tract of land on either side +of the river from head to mouth. Thinks when they ain't nobody left but +the old woman he can get it at his own price, and he can. Another thing +he wants is Zella Tarleton, and when Randy Ross is out of the way he'll +get her. Oh, he'll get what he wants. He always does." Steve's tone +showed his confidence in his brother's shrewdness.</p> + +<p>"Why don't a gang just ride over to the Railroad, call Railroad and +Randy out, and—"</p> + +<p>"Two good reasons. One is, these messes have got to look like gun +fights, in case there should be any hereafter about it. The other is +that Bell and me wants to stay here awhile yet. Calling Railroad and +Randy out and shooting them up wouldn't be no healthy job."</p> + +<p>"I thought you said Randy don't amount to anything."</p> + +<p>"He don't, Bill. He's yellow all the way through. But still and all, +if he was cornered thataway—he's the fastest and best shot in this +country."</p> + +<p>"Well, what's the program?" asked the other. The listeners had +identified him by now as Bill Hayden of the Holderness gang.</p> + +<p>"Just to watch for Railroad and Randy and get 'em. Your job is to +watch that trail, and you better get on it. Old Railroad ain't afraid +of the devil. He'll be riding up to Willow Mills, and give you a +chance. Bell will make the Tarleton boys get Randy, and then we'll be +in the clear of everything."</p> + +<p>"Maybe so. I don't like the idea of goin' down there and keepin' watch +on that trail, with Red layin' there dead," Bill admitted.</p> + +<p>"He can't hurt you. I'll send some of the boys to get him as soon as +I get back to the ranch. Keep your eyes open. Remember that every +Railroad puncher you get will make the rest quit that much quicker when +Railroad's gone, and—</p> + +<p>"What's that!"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>In his pent-up rage, Randy had moved and broken a twig beneath him. +Steve Holderness and his hired killer sprang up from the log and stood +for a moment listening. There was no chance to take the two killers in +the darkness, so Randy had to lie still.</p> + +<p>"Varmint in the bushes," said Hayden at last.</p> + +<p>"Reckon so," replied Steve. "Get on the job, and if anybody comes along +do as good shooting as you did when you got Pate Ross and that old +puncher."</p> + +<p>They parted, and their steps died away in the distance. Presently, +Randy heard the thudding of a horse's hoofs, as Steve mounted and rode +for the H Bar.</p> + +<p>"What are we going to do now?" whispered Dolly.</p> + +<p>"We're going to get Hayden," replied Randy, in a tense whisper. "He +killed Pate, and I'm not going to wait for any law. We'll give 'em some +of their own medicine. From here on, I fight the devil with fire."</p> + +<p>Silently they waited for half an hour, then found the trail and walked +on down toward the river, letting their footsteps be plainly heard. As +they approached the river, a low voice said:</p> + +<p>"You boys come for Red? Got here mighty quick."</p> + +<p>"Met Steve on the trail, and he sent us on," replied Randy in a low +tone.</p> + +<p>"Well, come and get him. I'll be glad when he's gone," and Hayden +turned his back to lead the way to where the body lay.</p> + +<p>The next moment Hayden lay on the ground, knocked out by a blow on the +head from Randy's gun.</p> + +<p>"We've got to get away from here!" said Randy. "Come on, those fellows +may get here any time," and, picking up the unconscious Hayden, he led +the way to the boat.</p> + +<p>When Hayden came back to the world, he was lying on the ground under +a big tree that overhung the river at the narrows, and near the spot +where Pate and old Leck had fallen. His hands and feet were tied, and +he felt something at his neck.</p> + +<p>"Whu—what are you fellows doing?" asked Hayden, groggily.</p> + +<p>"Just waiting for you to wake up," said Dolly. "We're in a sorty hurry. +Got anything to say before you go?"</p> + +<p>"Go where?"</p> + +<p>"I'd hate to say," and Dolly pulled the rope slightly.</p> + +<p>"You fellows ain't going to hang me!"</p> + +<p>He would have ended in a yell, but the rope jerked taut, and he rose +endwise from the ground, kicked a few times, and was still. They made +the rope fast and left him there. Without a word, Randy turned and led +the way to their horses. Just before they mounted he said:</p> + +<p>"Dolly, I know all I want to know now. We've got the man that killed +Pate. I mean to hang Steve Holderness for killing Asa. The Tarletons +can settle their own scores for the killing of Ben. I don't know any +better punishment for them than for Zella to marry Bell Holderness and +then find out about that."</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""> + <div class="caption"> + <p><i>Without a word Randy turned and led the way to their horses.</i></p> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p>"You're too hard, Randy," said Dolly. "She don't know all that. The +Tarletons believe you killed Ben, and the old judge told her you shot +him."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I'm hard. Hard as hell itself. I've had plenty to make me hard. +I'll make Silver Bend safe before I'm through, if you'll stay with me. +Even if I have to hang a man to every tree in it."</p> + +<p>"I'll stay with you, when it comes to cleaning up the Holderness gang, +but I wish you wouldn't be so hard on Miss Zella. She—"</p> + +<p>"Never mind. Don't mention her name to me again, and you and I will get +along finely," and, mounting his horse, Randy led the way on to the +ranch.</p> + +<p>In a little more than forty-eight hours Randolph Ross had changed +from a wild, irresponsible boy to a strong, purposeful man. And in +the last few hours, since reading Zella's note and hearing Steve and +Hayden talk, he had turned to a hard man, with but one purpose in +life—bitter, bitter vengeance.</p> + +<p>He wanted to kill the men who had robbed him of his brothers. He wanted +to humble the woman whom he had loved with all his soul because she had +doubted him when he was in trouble. He was far on the road to becoming +a very bad and dangerous man, and, as the canker ate farther into his +heart, he would become worse.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Wise little Dolly knew this. He could see that what he thought he had +made into a wonderful man was likely to become a hideous monster.</p> + +<p>Randy Ross was desperate now. He would go to any length to put a rope +on Steve's neck. Dolly was willing to follow him in that enterprise, +but when that was done he wanted to see Randy and Zella happy. As he +rode silently along with Randy, he made a resolution to save this +naturally fine young man from himself.</p> + +<p>When they reached the ranch, Dolly went on to the bunk shack. Randy +would have asked him to share that big, lonesome room, for company, +but there was such a storm in his soul that Ross wanted solitude, and +a chance to think things out. He slipped into the house, but didn't +escape the ears of old Railroad. His father was in bed, but hadn't been +asleep, though it was some time after midnight. Randy made a light. He +had eaten nothing since noon, but he wasn't hungry and felt that he +could never sleep again.</p> + +<p>Barely had he sat down to his task of thinking when the door opened and +old Railroad entered. His hair was tousled, and he was in nightshirt +and trousers, with one suspender down.</p> + +<p>"Randy, I'm mighty glad you come in. I couldn't go to sleep. I went +out and asked the boys about you. They said you and Dolly went off +somewheres, but they didn't know where."</p> + +<p>"Some of 'em knew. They were lying to you for me, like always. That's +got to be stopped. I'm not going to do anything more that I'm ashamed +for you to know, or that you'll be ashamed to know. I'll tell you where +I went. You ought to know it."</p> + +<p>Randy recapitulated the day's events. He told of the killing of Brazos +and Keech by Bell Holderness and Lav Tarleton. He told of the running +fight in the woods and of capturing Pompey. Railroad's lips twisted in +a wintry smile at thought of Pompey's fright. Then Randy told of the +note from Zella and what he had written to her.</p> + +<p>"I'm mighty sorry about that, Randy. Zella is as fine a young woman as +there is in the world. She just don't understand."</p> + +<p>"Don't, dad! When you excuse her, I feel like you're accusing me. She +didn't have any right to think that I'd do the things they accuse me of +doing. She ought to know I couldn't do it. I hope she marries Bell, and +then finds out that he shot Ben in the back."</p> + +<p>"Stop, Randy! Don't be so bitter!"</p> + +<p>"Why shouldn't I be bitter?"</p> + +<p>"But you don't know that Bell shot Ben. That was just a guess of ours."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I do know it," and Randy went on to tell of the trip to the +thicket and the hanging of Hayden.</p> + +<p>"Thank God that it wasn't my bullet that killed Ben," said Railroad, +fervently. "Judge Tarleton and I have been friends and neighbors +always. He's hot-headed and jumps to conclusions, but he's a good man."</p> + +<p>"Good man or not, the Tarletons have tied in with the Holdernesses, and +they all look alike to me. I'm not going to hunt the Tarleton boys, but +they're hunting me and they can find me."</p> + +<p>"Randy, I'd hate—"</p> + +<p>"Let's don't talk about that, dad. If we meet, we meet, and that's all +there is to it. We found out that Hayden killed Pate, and we hanged +him. We heard Steve say he shot Asa, and I'll hang him if I live."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"That's all right for them, Randy, but it ought to stop there."</p> + +<p>"What about Bell? He's the prime mover in the whole mess," and Randy +went over the two reasons Steve had given for Bell's part in the mess.</p> + +<p>"Bell ought to hang, too, then. He'll never get Silver Bend."</p> + +<p>"Not while I live," Randy vowed.</p> + +<p>"Not while anybody lives. Mother and I will make a will that, in the +event of your death, we'll leave it to your uncle for his lifetime, and +then to his heirs. He won't want it, but he can't sell it."</p> + +<p>"That's going a long way around. I know a better way than that to keep +Bell from getting it. I don't want to kill him now. I want him to marry +Zella.</p> + +<p>"Then, after they are married, I want to show her proof that he shot +Ben in the back and had her father shot. After that, I'm ready to +shoot Bell, or hang him, whichever comes handiest."</p> + +<p>Railroad was appalled at his son's bitterness. Deep in his heart, he +wanted Randy to marry Zella, had always wanted it. That very day he had +thought of it much. The farmer and his plow were encroaching on the cow +country. A few more years and that would be a farming country.</p> + +<p>A little work—and Railroad had plenty of money to have it done—and +Silver Bend would be a great plantation, five or six times larger than +the Tarleton plantation, and better, because the alluvial soil was +new and fresh. Randy was the only heir now. It would all be his. With +a wife like Zella, a woman of fine breeding and culture, and plenty +of money, Randy could go a long way in life. But Randy had dashed all +those hopes. Railroad sat with bowed head as Randy went on:</p> + +<p>"We can't take the men and go into this fight, as you did in old times, +and shoot it out in the open. They won't come out in the open. If we +went to the H Bar we might find half a dozen men, and maybe none. +They're going to bushwhack and get Railroad riders when and where they +can. More than two men together will simply make a better target for +them. I'm going to take Dolly in the morning, and hunt where I think +the hunting is good. The other men had better work the cattle out onto +the prairie and keep them there until this is over, one way or another."</p> + +<p>"Maybe you're right," said Railroad, wearily, "but don't take too many +chances, son. You're all I got left now. I wish I could ride with you, +but I can't. I'm still good for a minute, but I don't last out. My +heart beats too fast. I reckon I driv it too much when I was younger. +Go to bed and get some sleep. When we get up in the morning, things +never look to us like they did the day before," and Railroad tottered +off to bed, his mind also full of plans for saving this last son from +a life of misery and bitterness.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>WHO KILLED ASA ROSS?</h3> + + +<p>Lights burned late in two rooms of the Tarleton house that night. One +of these was the great bedroom on the ground floor, where the judge +lay, painfully, but not seriously wounded. The bullet had passed +through the top of the left hip, grazing it, but not breaking it. The +doctor had said it would get well, with proper care, and the patient +was now sleeping under the influence of an opiate.</p> + +<p>The other light was in Zella's room. A little while after nightfall +she had slipped out to the cabin back of the house, where the family +servants lived. She asked for Pompey, and was told that he had not come +in. On her way to the house she was upbraiding herself for having sent +the faithful negro into trouble, when a low voice called her:</p> + +<p>"Miss Zella! Miss Zella, here I is," and Pompey stole toward her in the +darkness.</p> + +<p>"What kept you so long?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"Miss Zella, I been skeered outen my nacherl bawn witses," and Pompey +proceeded to tell a highly colored story of his adventures in a hurried +whisper.</p> + +<p>"Did you give Mr. Randy the note?"</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, I sholy did, and he gimme a note for you, an'—now where at is +that old note," and Pompey fumbled among his rags. "Here she is, an' +I's glad to get rid of her. Mist' Randy, say if I give it to anybody +else he gwine hang me good."</p> + +<p>"All right, Pompey. Run along now. I'll give you something in the +morning."</p> + +<p>Zella put the note in the front of her dress and went back into the +house.</p> + +<p>"Huh! Look lak I gwine to come out of this alive yit. Gwine gimme +something in the mawnin'. Hope it ain't no more job like that'n. That +ol' dark bottom, hoo-oo!" and he went on to the cabin where supper and +an expert job of lying about where he had been, were in prospect.</p> + +<p>Zella stole up the stair to her room, entered, and locked the door. No +one in that house, except herself and the faithful Pompey, would ever +know of this note. A hundred times she had received notes in the same +manner from Randy, when he had been on one of his escapades. They had +always been so penitent and so full of love that she could but yield +and give him a chance to make amends.</p> + +<p>But this time she couldn't yield. Almost by rote she knew what was in +that note, she thought. In spite of her protestations to herself and +her written message to Randy, that her love for him was a thing of the +dead past, she knew in her heart, as she pressed the note to her bosom, +that it was not and never could be.</p> + +<p>She opened the note, and, with staring eyes, read the salutation, "Miss +Tarleton." Tears sprang to her eyes. She brushed them away and read on +to the end, then read it again. She looked about the room, as if for +some one to question, then fell across the bed and wept bitterly.</p> + +<p>After all her effort, Randy would not save himself. Never had he failed +to do anything she asked him to do, when he was in a penitent mood. +But he was not even penitent now. What was wrong? Randy, guilty, never +would have written that. It was not the old Randy. Had he been falsely +accused? At that thought, she sobbed afresh.</p> + +<p>For an hour that day, just after noon, she had listened to Bell +Holderness and her brothers discuss the killing of Ben and the shooting +of her father, as they sat in the room with the judge. She had gone +from that room and had written and dispatched her note to Randy, +convinced, she thought, of his guilt.</p> + +<p>Now she ceased her sobbing, and lay staring at the ceiling, trying +to reason the thing out, not knowing that it is impossible to reason +with love; that love is a finished, selfish quality that bears on +all things, but suffers none to interfere with it. Strangest of all, +delicate plant though it may be, it thrives on adversity.</p> + +<p>As she lay puzzling over her problem, she recalled the story Bell had +told of the trouble at the Railroad round-up. It had sounded all right +then, but going over it now, in her mind, it didn't ring true. Bell +never had said definitely who killed Asa Ross. That tormenting question +sprang into her mind. "Who killed Asa Ross?" It would not down. Far +toward morning, she fell asleep, with that question still revolving in +her thoughts.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Her first thought on waking was that she wanted to see Randy, had to +see him. This, she knew was impossible. There was danger everywhere in +Silver Bend. Then her mind veered to Bell Holderness. She wanted to see +him and talk to him. She knew he had spent the night in the house. In +Ben's room, in fact. She dressed hurriedly and went down to the yard.</p> + +<p>It was a fine, balmy spring morning, and a few roses were in bloom. +Zella knew a good many things. Bell Holderness was a handsome fellow, +blond, with deep blue eyes, and a pleasing appearance. Bell had said +nice things to her many a time. In view of the grief in the home, he +had said nothing of that sort to her the day before, but his eyes +had been sufficiently eloquent. She knew her attraction for him, and +purposely lingered among the roses.</p> + +<p>"Wonderful morning, Miss Zella," he said as he came up.</p> + +<p>"Yes. It is such a pity one can't be happy on a morning like this. I've +been wishing you'd come out here."</p> + +<p>"I'd be a strange man if that didn't make me happy."</p> + +<p>"I want to ask you something."</p> + +<p>"I've wanted to ask you something a long, long time, but never had the +courage. Ask your question first, and I'll answer it if I can."</p> + +<p>"Who killed Asa Ross?" she shot the question like a bolt, and Bell +fairly staggered.</p> + +<p>"Why, I—I can't tell you."</p> + +<p>"You can't tell me! You saw it, did you not?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but—Sometimes it is best not to know too much about such things."</p> + +<p>Zella stood looking at him in silence. He averted his eyes and tried to +talk of something else, but failed. The breakfast bell rang, and they +went in. Not another word passed between them.</p> + +<p>Soon after breakfast, Bell saddled his horse and rode to town. He was +thinking of Zella more intently than he had in some time, but the +thoughts were not pleasant ones. He knew she had trapped him, caught +him off his guard with her question, and that he had come out of it +badly. But Bell was the kind of man who can plan and wait.</p> + +<p>Another day ought to see Randy Ross and old Railroad disposed of. Randy +couldn't stay away from drink much longer. Bell didn't mean to kill +Randy—nothing so coarse as that. Either of the Tarleton boys would +kill Randy on sight; they had promised to follow him on to town in a +little while and lay in wait for Randy. Lav and Cliff had only one +purpose in mind now, and that was to meet Randy Ross and shoot it out +with him.</p> + +<p>Bell was barely out of sight when Zella sought her father. The judge +was awake and feeling fairly well. Lav and Cliff were in the room when +she entered.</p> + +<p>"Do it fair and open like men," Judge Tarleton was saying. "I meant to +do it myself the first time I caught either of them away from home. I +don't want a boy of mine ever to turn his back to an enemy, and I'd be +disgraced if I knew one of you took an unfair advantage."</p> + +<p>"What are you talking about?" asked Zella.</p> + +<p>"Talking about shooting Randy Ross," said Judge Tarleton calmly. "Of +course, he's got to be shot after what has happened. I might let him go +for shooting me from the brush, since I guess it won't kill me, but we +can't overlook the killing of Ben."</p> + +<p>"Let me ask you all a question. I asked Bell Holderness, but he +wouldn't answer it."</p> + +<p>"What is the question?" said Lav, impatiently.</p> + +<p>"Who killed Asa Ross?"</p> + +<p>"Why, I hadn't thought of that. He was killed in a gun fight at the +Railroad round-up."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know, but who killed him?"</p> + +<p>"What do you mean? Trying to leave the impression that Ben killed him?"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"No," said Zella, slowly, "but I'm pretty sure that if anybody ever +presses Bell Holderness for an answer to that question, he'll leave +that impression."</p> + +<p>"Now, Zella, you stay out of this," Lav insisted. "It's a man's job, +and we'll attend to it. We are not interested in who killed Asa Ross. +We know who killed Ben and we know who shot father, and that's all that +concerns us."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but are you sure you know who killed Ben, and are you sure it +makes no difference who killed Asa?" persisted Zella.</p> + +<p>"Now, Zella," ordered Lav, "I've told you to keep out of this. We'll +attend to it."</p> + +<p>But Zella had done the thing she meant to do, namely, to plant a doubt +in the minds of her father and brothers. When she was gone, they sat in +silence for moments.</p> + +<p>"Now what do you suppose Zella knows?" asked the old judge at last.</p> + +<p>"Nothing!" snapped Lav, who started when his father spoke, because he +had unpleasant thoughts. He had fired one shot in the mess the day +before when two Railroad punchers had been killed. He was sure he +had not hit either of them, but in a way he had been a party to the +killing, and it wasn't a pleasant thought.</p> + +<p>"She's just like any other woman that goes crazy over a worthless man. +She's got the habit of making excuses for Randy Ross, and she can't +break herself of it."</p> + +<p>"Why, she didn't mention Randy," said Cliff.</p> + +<p>"I wish I knew who did kill Asa Ross," the old judge interrupted. "It +might make considerable difference. Maybe you boys better stay out of +this until we know more. I don't mean hide, but not hunt for him. He +won't run away. He's too much like old Railroad. As Zella says, we +don't know these things. We been pretty hot in the collar about Ben +being killed, and about me being shot up. I didn't see who shot me. +All I know is that Randy and some more fellows were behind me when I +entered the timber. I never did see anybody when the shot was fired."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm going on to town," declared Lav. "I don't mean to hole up. I +can't promise what'll happen if I meet Randy."</p> + +<p>"I'll stay here with father," said Cliff. "I think he's right. We've +always found the Ross outfit on the square. If I'd met Randy yesterday +I'd have opened on him, but now I don't know. Since Zella asked those +questions, things look different."</p> + +<p>But Zella had asked her questions too late, as far as Randy was +concerned. The Tarleton boys had sent him word by Cub and Shorty, or +at least Lav had, that they meant to kill him on sight, and Zella had +written him to leave the country while he could.</p> + +<p>He had said the Tarletons and Holdernesses all looked alike to him, and +he meant it. He knew a square deal when he saw it, and he hadn't been +given one.</p> + +<p>Bell Holderness had ridden on to Willow Mills. The place was quiet as a +churchyard. The men who had been killed the day before had been buried +at nightfall. Willow Mills was but a mile from Red River. Such fights +were common, and the town had its Boot Hill, where men who died in +their boots were buried and forgotten.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Bell went to the Cottonwood Saloon. It was not generally known, but he +owned the place, and the men who worked there were his spies.</p> + +<p>"Seen anything of Randy Ross, or any of the rest of the Railroad outfit +since I was here?" he asked the bartender.</p> + +<p>"No, sir. Had less business last night than we had for a long time. +When nobody comes in from the Railroad or the H Bar, business is always +dull."</p> + +<p>"Hang business," snapped Bell. "I'm interested in locating Randy Ross +just now. Where do you suppose he's getting his whisky if he don't come +to town or send a hand?"</p> + +<p>"Search me."</p> + +<p>"I don't want to search you, but I want you fellows to get your +grapevine telegraph to work and locate Randy Ross."</p> + +<p>"That's it tickin' now, I reckon," drawled the bartender as a lone +horseman came storming in from the north, and skidded to a stop in +front of the Cottonwood.</p> + +<p>It was Steve Holderness. He nodded to the barkeep, poured a drink, +and gulped it. Then he nodded toward the door and went out, with Bell +following him.</p> + +<p>"What the hell are you doing on this side?" snapped Bell, when they +were out in the open. "Didn't I tell you to stay on the other side and +ramrod things over there? I'll handle this side."</p> + +<p>"Yes, you did, but you didn't tie me over there. You're so strong for +schemes and plans. I come over here to tell you that yore damn plans +have busted, and if you don't get from under they'll fall on you."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"I mean for one thing that Railroad Ross ain't as near dead old as you +think he is. You can recollect, as well as I can, when old Railroad +Ross used to be head of the Vigilantes. He hung everybody he caught +with an unidentified horse, and a few more on suspicion, just for +associating with horse rustlers."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I recollect it. What of it?"</p> + +<p>"Plenty. He ain't forgot how to handle a rope, and my neck hurts."</p> + +<p>"Damn it, quit beating about the bush, and tell what's on your mind."</p> + +<p>"Well, last night Hayden went down to the thicket to relieve Red and +found him dead. Somebody had shot him. I went there awhile after dark, +and Hayden told me about it, so I sent a couple of men to get Red. +They got him all right, but Hayden was gone. Meantime Sam come in to +the ranch with one leg shot half off. Him and five more of our fellows +flushed a covey of Railroad punchers over in Silver Bend just at +sunset, and they wouldn't fly. They got one of Sam's men on that side +and two more as they crossed the river just below the thicket. Sam's +shot right smart and the doc's gone out there."</p> + +<p>"Well, what's that got to do with old Railroad and his tight-rope +performance?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing, maybe. This morning I taken some of the boys and went down to +get the two dead ones and look for Hayden."</p> + +<p>"Did you find Hayden? Tell it!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, we found him," and Steve looked over his shoulder as if he feared +the devil were behind him.</p> + +<p>"Where?"</p> + +<p>"Hanging in that big oak tree at the narrows, swinging round and round, +round and round, in the wind, as the rope turned and twisted. Gosh, it +was awful!"</p> + +<p>"Did you go over and get him?"</p> + +<p>"I did not, and I ain't goin' to. I taken a chance coming over here +to tell you about it. That's all the business I got on this side. I'm +goin' back, and stay back. If you want Hayden, you can have him."</p> + +<p>"Yeah!" sneered Bell. "You was in such a hell of a hurry to start this +mess before I was ready. Now it's beginning to pinch, your nerve is +slipping, and you want to leave me the bag to hold. Go on back and +hide if you want to. Randy and old Railroad won't bother anybody much +longer. Some real men are going after them."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Steve mounted his horse and rode out of town. Bell stood rolling a +cigar in his mouth, and watching his brother. Bell Holderness was as +cool-headed a villain as that border ever knew. He made his plans and +worked to them. If something went awry, he never lost his head.</p> + +<p>He had sat in on this game to win Silver Bend and Zella Tarleton; the +stakes were high. Steve had gummed the game when he killed Asa Ross +ahead of schedule, and Bell had saved the day by killing Ben Tarleton, +who was supposed to belong to his gang. Now it appeared that Sam had +gummed it again by going into Silver Bend against orders.</p> + +<p>Bell had told them to stay out after Asa and Pate were killed, and he'd +get Railroad and Randy. He meant to make the Tarleton boys do that job +and leave him with clean hands; he still meant to do that. He turned +and looked up the long lane. A lone horseman was coming toward him. +The morning sun was in Bell's eyes, and he couldn't see who it was. He +slipped into the saloon, spoke a few words to the bartender, and went +on into a back room.</p> + +<p>Waiting there in that little room, Bell Holderness looked like an arch +fiend. His handsome face, which was a cold mask in the company of other +men, gave way to a snarling distortion of rage. Another of his plans +had gone wrong. The Tarleton brothers said they would follow him on to +town. They hadn't done it. Now, he felt sure, Randy Ross was riding +into town. He had to be killed. The Tarleton boys ought to kill him, +would kill him if they met, but Randy had to be disposed of, and that +quickly. He heard a step in the saloon, and a few low-spoken words at +the bar. Drawing his gun, he turned the cylinder lightly, raised and +lowered the hammer, and pushed the gun back loosely in the holster for +a quick draw. It had come to a showdown. If the Tarleton boys didn't +come pretty soon he'd go out there and have it over. He knew how Randy +drank. He would pour it down greedily until he was drunk, and then—</p> + +<p>Bell stood in the little room listening. Only a few low words were +spoken, and he could catch none of them. At last he pulled himself +together and pushed the door open softly. Not Randy, but Lav Tarleton, +sat smoking.</p> + +<p>"I've been waiting for you," said Lav.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know you had come. Where's Cliff?"</p> + +<p>"He decided not to come."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to take Randy Ross on by yourself?" Bell inquired.</p> + +<p>"Yes, if I meet him, but—"</p> + +<p>"But what?"</p> + +<p>"Who killed Asa Ross?"</p> + +<p>Again that question smote Bell in the face. This time it turned his +face to flaming rage, but before Lav could read it, it changed to the +cold, smooth, lying mask.</p> + +<p>"Why, I—I don't know who killed him. He was killed in a gun fight."</p> + +<p>"Were Pate Ross and old Leck killed in a gun fight, too?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. What difference does it make to you how those fellows were +killed? They're dead and it's luck for us that they are. You know who +killed your brother Ben. It was the Ross outfit. Two of them are still +living, and you and Cliff would be strange brothers if you didn't get +them as quick as you can, before they bushwhack you, like they did your +father."</p> + +<p>"We thought that yesterday. We've changed our minds. We're not going to +hunt them. If we meet Randy or his father, we'll let things take their +course."</p> + +<p>Bell went white with the stress of his situation. Nothing but quick +action could save Silver Bend and Zella for him. True to his nature, he +became cooler than ever in the face of disaster. All was not lost yet. +He had other tricks in his bag. Lighting a cigar, he invited Lav to +take a drink.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>DANGLING SCARECROWS.</h3> + + +<p>The Railroad ranch stirred early that morning, despite the fact that +neither Randy nor his father had slept much. Things may or may not have +looked different to Railroad. To Randy there had been no change, for he +had not slept enough to make a curtain between the two days.</p> + +<p>He had some plans himself and he was going to work on them. Bell +Holderness and Lav Tarleton had got two of his men the day before. +On the other hand, he and his men with him had scored a few times +themselves. Dolly had got the man Red, in the thicket. Then they had +got three more and crippled one in the running fight at sunset. Then +crowning the day's work, he and Dolly had hanged Bill Hayden. Five in +all.</p> + +<p>Decidedly, they had won a trick in the game of war. The chief winning +had been gaining positive knowledge of what the mess was all about. +He was going to hang Steve Holderness if he could lay hands on him, +for the murder of Asa, but he was bitterer against Bell than Steve. +It might be that Steve had thought he was avenging his father, but +with Bell, who was engineering the war, it was just a matter of greed, +avarice and lust.</p> + +<p>Randy quivered at the thought. Like all jealous people, he wanted to +hurt both the persons who caused his jealousy. He wanted to kill Bell +Holderness, meant to kill him. He also wanted to humiliate Zella. Not +that she could ever be anything to him again, he thought, but he wanted +her to suffer for her lack of faith in him.</p> + +<p>At that moment he thought he no longer loved Zella, and wondered that +he had ever loved her. It was in this bitter frame of mind that he +gave the other men orders to work the cattle on the prairie, riding in +pairs, and keeping a close watch. Then turning to Dolly, he said:</p> + +<p>"Better get plenty of bread and meat in our saddle pockets. I don't +know when we'll be back."</p> + +<p>Dolly had obeyed, thoughtfully. No song had passed the lips of the +usually happy little puncher since Sankey had stopped him that first +day. He, too, had slept little. Randy's bitterness against Zella had +set him thinking. He felt sure that if Zella knew Randy was innocent, +she would fly to his arms. She might easily be convinced of Randy's +innocence, but Randy had gone wild. Would he ever forgive the girl? +With such thoughts in his mind, Dolly mounted and rode away with Randy.</p> + +<p>Railroad Ross was old, but he was far from dead. He had one boy left. +He felt that there might be one more little burst of speed in him. +Since burying his two sons, he had sat around the house, unwilling to +leave his good wife alone with her grief. His old heart had been driven +too hard and was in bad shape, but his head was still all right and +he had spent the night in thought. It was not enough to save Randy's +life, if he could not save the boy from the bitterness that gripped his +soul.</p> + +<p>He watched Randy and Dolly ride away toward where they had left Bill +Hayden hanging in the tree. A man had to be pretty bitter to want to +go back and look at a thing like that. The men were mounting, when +Railroad called old Con Bates and Sankey aside, and let the others go +on.</p> + +<p>"Con," he said, "you and Sankey have been with me a long time. The old +Railroad is about on the rocks. You've been in messes with me before, +but never one like this. The Holderness boys have picked up a new breed +of killers that has drifted into that Indian country from the four +corners of the earth. They don't fight like cow-people, but we got to +fight 'em. I just got one boy left. If he comes out of this alive, +he'll be ruined, unless—"</p> + +<p>Railroad stopped. He never liked to tell his men too much. Presently, +he went on.</p> + +<p>"I've been in this bend more than thirty years. I've never trespassed +on the other side of the river, but I may have to do it now. You saw +the two fellows that were with the Holderness boys when they killed +Asa, Con?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir," growled Con.</p> + +<p>"One of 'em was a hatchet-faced, rat-mouthed, gimlet-eyed fellow they +called Bud, and the other was a handsome, gray-eyed devil they called +Turk. Would you know 'em if you saw 'em?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> + +<p>"Well, I want them two fellows and I want 'em alive and well. If they +can be got, you two can get 'em. It may take an hour, or it may take a +month. Get 'em and bring 'em here as quick as you can."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>The two wrinkled old riders mounted and rode away, not saying what they +meant to do. Railroad had not definitely ordered them to go into the +Indian country; but they understood him.</p> + +<p>Railroad watched them ride north, toward the bottom of the Silver Bend +bottle. He knew they were going into danger, but danger meant little +to such men. If it were not for leaving his wife alone, he'd mount and +ride with them. His heart might play out on him, but it would be in a +good cause.</p> + +<p>Knowing Railroad's long-standing policy of keeping to his own side of +Red River, Bell had felt that his gang were safe as long as they stayed +on their own side. Some one had got Hayden and hanged him, but Hayden +must have disobeyed orders and suffered for it the same as Sam had.</p> + +<p>Bell sat in the cottonwood, gnawing at his mustache, and trying to +evolve a new plan, concoct a new lie, that would drive the Tarleton +boys on to hunt Randy and kill him. If he had guessed just how much +Randy Ross knew, and just how different he was from the old Randy, +Bell would not have been so cool. Unmindful of everything, he went on, +planning his next move in this perilous game.</p> + +<p>Randy and Dolly rode west from the Railroad and entered the timber. +They had seen no one, when they reached the river at the ford where the +battle had taken place the evening before. This ford was just below +the cottonwood thicket where so much mischief had been done. Directly +across from the lower end of the thicket, Bill Hayden still swung in +the wind, in plain view from the other side of the river. As they sat +their horses behind a screen of brush, Dolly said:</p> + +<p>"Shore quiet in the Bend this morning. Ain't heard a sound. Seems like +hangin' that gent up has worked like it does on crows. My daddy used to +kill crows and hang 'em up around his melon patch. A crow wouldn't come +in a mile of it, as long as they hung there."</p> + +<p>"Easy on the talking!" warned Randy. "Yonder they come."</p> + +<p>Three men rode down to the ford on the opposite side of the river. Two +of them were leading pack-horses. The other rider was Steve Holderness. +Steve sat on his horse, while the other two men picked the bodies up +from the ground and lashed them to the pack saddles. They had finished +the job and were ready to go, when one of them glanced up and across +the river.</p> + +<p>"Good God! Look yonder!" he cried. "It's Bill Hayden, hanging by the +neck!"</p> + +<p>On the Railroad side of the river, Dolly fingered his gun. "I can get +Steve now," he said.</p> + +<p>"No!" Randy growled. "Let him alone. I don't want him shot. I'm going +to hang him."</p> + +<p>Steve Holderness caught an eyeful of the tight-rope performance, and +hastily wheeled his horse into the brush, calling to the others to come +on. Randy and Dolly sat watching until they all disappeared into the +dense bottom.</p> + +<p>"They won't be so thick around this neighborhood now," said Randy, +grimly. "Come on. Let's go across and see what we can find."</p> + +<p>Crossing the river, they followed the trail of the five horses over the +soft, bottom soil. Twice they glimpsed the Holderness men through the +trees, and stopped behind convenient trunks until the others went on. +Climbing out of the bottom onto a stretch of open woods they came to +the road that led from Willow Mills to the H Bar. Here the two H Bar +men turned north with their gruesome pack-horses, and Steve galloped +south toward town. It was then that Steve carried the news to Bell.</p> + +<p>"We've let 'em get plumb away!" said Dolly, in a tone of disappointment.</p> + +<p>"No, we haven't. It's Steve that we are after. He's gone somewhere to +tell the news. He'll be back."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>They turned across to where the road dipped into the bottom again, rode +into a dense thicket and stopped.</p> + +<p>"Here's where we do some bushwhacking on our own account," muttered +Randy. "Damn that Holderness and Tarleton gang. I'll teach them some +tricks at their own game."</p> + +<p>Dolly shuddered at the venom in Randy's tone. It had reached the point +that the little cowboy shuddered every time Randy mentioned the name of +Tarleton.</p> + +<p>An hour passed in silent listening, after that. Then they heard the +thud of galloping hoofs, coming along the road from the Willow Mills +crossing on the river.</p> + +<p>"Get set!" ordered Randy.</p> + +<p>The horseman came storming on. He was fairly abreast of the thicket +when Randy's gun crashed. The horse faltered, stopped and fell. Steve +Holderness rolled clear and sprang to his feet, but he was looking into +two guns.</p> + +<p>"Get your hands up!" snapped Randy. "Take his gun, Dolly. Get a +horn-string and tie his hands behind him."</p> + +<p>"What's the idea, Randy?" whimpered Steve, as he stood bound.</p> + +<p>For reply, Randy threw a rope over a big limb that projected across the +road.</p> + +<p>"You—you ain't goin' to hang me, Randy?"</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"I—I got a family, and—"</p> + +<p>"Asa had some brothers and a father and a mother," said Randy.</p> + +<p>"I—I didn't kill Asa. It was Bell. Let me go, and I'll tell you all +about it. Bell is back of this mess. I'll tell you what he wants, and +tell you what he aims to do—before he does it!"</p> + +<p>"I know what he aims to do. Let him do it, if he can. Rope him, Dolly."</p> + +<p>There was one wild, gurgling scream, and Steve Holderness swung above +the road, in his death struggle.</p> + +<p>"That'll do for to-day," Randy said, thoughtfully, as they crossed the +river into Silver Bend. "I haven't slept much the last few nights, +and I'm about all in. That'll give the Holderness and Tarleton gang +something to think about, as soon as they find it out. They'll find +it out, too, for somebody will be going from the H Bar to keep Bell +advised about what is going on over here."</p> + +<p>There were but two safe places that they could rest. One of these was +the ranch house. Randy didn't want to go there. He wanted to be alone +with his bitterness and his hate.</p> + +<p>To be with Dolly was as near being alone as it was possible to be in +human company, for he rarely spoke now unless he was spoken to.</p> + +<p>The only other safe place was out on the prairie, where no one could +ride up on them unseen. Already, Randy was becoming a wild man in some +ways. He had been advised that Bell Holderness and the Tarleton boys +were hunting him, and he had become watchful.</p> + +<p>It was well after noon when they stopped at a clump of trees on a high +point, far out on the prairie. They ate a little lunch, then rolled +smokes. Suddenly, Dolly stretched out on the ground, and in an instant, +fell asleep.</p> + +<p>Randy looked at the little puncher in surprise. He himself was not in +the least sleepy, though he had slept very little for three nights. He +had heard that insane people didn't sleep, and wondered if his own mind +was unbalanced. No, he told himself, he was not crazy—yet.</p> + +<p>Randy supposed that Dolly had simply been overcome by need of sleep, +and couldn't stay awake. The fact was that it was some time before +Dolly really went to sleep. He had feigned sleep deliberately, for he +knew Randy would have to sleep some time, and Dolly wanted to be awake, +and very much awake, when that young man finally succumbed to the +demands of nature.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Randy had plenty of time to think, undisturbed. He watched Dolly as +he lay sleeping, as peacefully as if nothing had happened to excite +his mind. This little man had done much for him. Had it not been for +Dolly, he would have gone on a debauch the night his brothers were +killed. Had it not been for Dolly, he would never have been man enough +to face this situation.</p> + +<p>And so his thoughts ran on, taking all the incidents for the last three +days. It was far toward night when Dolly opened his baby-blue eyes, +looked about him, and glanced at the sun.</p> + +<p>"Reckon I must have slept a nap."</p> + +<p>"About four hours," said Randy. "We'd better ride from here if we want +to get home before night."</p> + +<p>They rode back into Silver Bend, seeing no one as they went. When they +came out on the little prairie, they saw four riders just approaching +the ranch. Two of them they recognized as Con and Sankey. The other +two, they didn't know. When they reached the ranch, old Railroad was +talking to the two strangers, whom Randy recognized as the man called +Bud and the one called Turk, who had been at the round-up with the +Holderness boys.</p> + +<p>"What do you want with us?" demanded Turk.</p> + +<p>"I don't know yet," drawled old Railroad. "I don't aim to hang you for +awhile. If you tell the truth, I may not hang you at all."</p> + +<p>"That sounds fair," smiled the handsome Turk, while Bud scowled and +darted a vicious look from his gimlet eyes. "What's this truth you want +told about?"</p> + +<p>"Who killed Asa, who killed Ben Tarleton, and who shot the judge?"</p> + +<p>"Don't you know?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, we know, but we want to see if you fellows would rather tell the +truth about it than be hanged."</p> + +<p>"Don't squeal, Turk!" snarled Bud. "They don't know nothin'."</p> + +<p>"Maybe not," laughed Turk, "but I'd rather be a live welcher than a +dead stayer. Shoot your questions, Mr. Ross, one at a time."</p> + +<p>"All right. Who killed Asa?"</p> + +<p>"Steve."</p> + +<p>"Who killed Ben?"</p> + +<p>"Bell Holderness."</p> + +<p>"Who shot Judge Tarleton?"</p> + +<p>"Red Mangus."</p> + +<p>"You know all that, do you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. I saw Steve and Bell do the killing, and I was in ten feet +of Red, when he shot the judge, and got shot for his trouble. I didn't +even tell anybody Red was dead. I don't believe in laying in the brush +and potting people."</p> + +<p>"Is he telling the truth, Bud?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, hell! Yes, that's right."</p> + +<p>"All right. There's a new log smokehouse with a door that you can't +break. I'm going to put you in there, give you grub and blankets, and +lock the door. When I call on you again, if you tell the same story, I +may turn you loose. If you don't—"</p> + +<p>Randy listened to all this without a word. When the men were locked in +and he and his father went to the house, he asked:</p> + +<p>"What was the idea of all that? We know we didn't shoot Judge Tarleton. +What difference does it make, anyway? We'll have to shoot the judge +and the boys, all three, whenever we meet them. Better hang these two, +while you can."</p> + +<p>"I give 'em my word, Randy, and my word's generally pretty good. +They've got some law on this side of the river, and we're apt to need +witnesses before this mess is over."</p> + +<p>Randy didn't believe his father was likely to pay much attention to law +in a mess like this, but he didn't argue the matter. Instead, he said:</p> + +<p>"All right. We'll talk about that in the morning. I didn't know I was +sleepy until right now. I want to eat something and go to bed."</p> + +<p>Railroad didn't insist on knowing what had happened that day. In half +an hour Randy was asleep in bed. He couldn't have kept awake even if he +had known what would happen while he slept—and he didn't know.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>BELL HOLDERNESS ASKS HIS QUESTION.</h3> + + +<p>Adroitly getting as many drinks into Lav as he would take, Bell +Holderness kept building up his lie and practising it on Lav. By +the time they went back to the Tarleton house at noon, he had about +convinced Lav that it was his own and Cliff's duty, since Randy had +shot their father, and old Railroad practically admitted killing Ben, +to hunt the two up and kill them forthwith.</p> + +<p>When they reached the house, they went in to see the judge. Cliff was +in the room. Bell went over his plausible lie in detail. He knew he +could find a man at the H Bar by which he could prove every statement +he made, so he turned himself loose.</p> + +<p>Judge Tarleton listened with knitted brows, and at times his face +flushed with anger against the Ross family. He had been friendly with +them, and had treated them as his equals, in spite of the fact that +they were just rough cow-people.</p> + +<p>He could understand the animosity of the Holderness boys against the +Rosses. It was common belief that Railroad had killed their father. He +hadn't understood why they had waited so long before retaliating, but +Bell explained that. Ross was rich, while they had always been poor. A +thing like that was likely to get them into court, and without money, +they'd be helpless. They had money, now. They had bided their time.</p> + +<p>That last sentence undid all that Bell had done toward getting +immediate action by the Tarletons.</p> + +<p>"Well," said the judge, "if you boys could bide your time for twenty +years, we can bide ours until I'm up and about again. We'll just stick +to what we decided on this morning. If the boys meet up with Railroad +or Randy, things will have to take their course, but we won't press the +matter, now, by hunting for them."</p> + +<p>That was final. Bell bit his lip in chagrin, but he could go no farther +in that direction without seeming over-anxious. After all, he could +dispose of Railroad and Randy. He had wanted the Tarletons to kill +them, so he would have a hold on the family. Cursing the fate that kept +the Tarleton boys from meeting Randy the day before, when they were in +the killing mood, he turned his attention to another matter.</p> + +<p>Bell knew of the attachment that had been between Zella and Randy. He +knew that was broken, because her brothers had told him. Naturally, it +would be, since she believed Randy was an assassin.</p> + +<p>Bell was wise enough to know that a woman is more susceptible in grief +than at any other time, and he determined to put his case to the test. +Married to Zella, or even engaged to her, he would have far more +strength with the Tarletons.</p> + +<p>It was after noon, when he found Zella alone in the yard.</p> + +<p>"Miss Zella," he said, "I told you this morning I had wanted for a long +time to ask you a question. I'm going to ask it now. You don't have to +be told that I love you, have loved you since you were a little girl. +I know this is an unhappy time for you. It is that very thing that +makes me want more than ever the right to protect you from as much +unhappiness as possible. There is no telling where this trouble will +end. More sorrow may come to you any day. You may even be left without +a brother to protect you. They must inevitably meet Randy, and he is a +swift and accurate shot. Won't you marry me, and give me the right to +protect you?"</p> + +<p>Zella was looking down, digging in the soft mold of the yard with the +toe of her boot. She didn't look up, nor did she speak.</p> + +<p>"Won't you answer my question?" pleaded Bell, in the tone that he knew +so well how to use, so often had used.</p> + +<p>She looked up at him, and there were tears in her eyes. They were tears +for Randy Ross, but he mistook the cause of them.</p> + +<p>"Not now," she said. "Some other time, perhaps."</p> + +<p>"When?"</p> + +<p>"When you have answered the question I asked you this morning."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>The sides of Bell's horse were bleeding when he reached Willow Mills. +He understood Zella's tears now. Those tears were for Randy. Very well; +if she wanted to weep for Randy, she would have cause. Randy Ross, +sober, was a dangerous man. Let the Tarleton boys meet him when he was +sober, and see what happened.</p> + +<p>There would come a day when Bell would own Silver Bend. Randy and old +Railroad would be dead. He'd be rich, and Zella would have cried away +all the tears she had. He could wait. Just now, he had other things to +attend to.</p> + +<p>He didn't care if one or both of the Tarleton boys were killed. It +would leave Zella that much more property when the judge was gone. The +trouble was that their feet had got cold, and the immediate passing of +Railroad and Randy was urgent. As long as they were alive, there was a +chance that too much would be found out about the killing of Ben.</p> + +<p>Bell entered the Cottonwood, and took a stiff drink. He needed a +bracer. Too many of his plans had gone wrong that day. Bell Holderness +had one friend who would stick by him to the end.</p> + +<p>That was a hawk-nosed killer by the name of French Clauson. Bell had +enough on Clauson to send him to the gallows a hundred times over.</p> + +<p>Clauson was his ace in the hole. He never used him when he could +avoid it, except as a spy on his own brothers, Steve and Sam, and on +every one else about the H Bar. Now, he knew he could rely on French +to dispose of Railroad and Randy. He could make him do it. He wished +Clauson was there, but he had given strict orders for him to stay at +the ranch and watch things.</p> + +<p>Bell didn't want to go across the river, himself. He wanted to stay +clear of that mess for two reasons. One was that he wanted to be able +to say that he was pulled into the first quarrel by Steve, and had +got out as soon as he could and stayed out. The other was that it was +dangerous all around that neighborhood, and he wanted to live and enjoy +the rewards of his scheming.</p> + +<p>While these thoughts were in his mind, a rider dismounted at the door, +dropped his reins, and came in. Bell could have hugged him. It was +French Clauson himself!</p> + +<p>Bell was glad to see his henchman. Glad for once that some one had +disobeyed orders, though he knew that something serious had happened, +or French Clauson wouldn't be there. They took a drink together and +walked outside.</p> + +<p>"Get your horse and ride back to the river with me," said Clauson. "I +ain't got much business on this side, and I can't talk to you here."</p> + +<p>They mounted and rode out of town. Bell knew Clauson had something +to tell and he was seething with curiosity, but not a word did his +henchman say until they were out on the wind-swept sand bar, where +there was no possibility of being overheard, and where he could dash +into the river and win the other side, if an officer sought him. And +then:</p> + +<p>"Hell's broke loose in Georgia," he declared, solemnly.</p> + +<p>"What's happened? Out with it, dammit! You're as bad as Steve."</p> + +<p>"Not quite that bad—yet," drawled French, with an odd expression in +his eyes. "About noon to-day, Curly White and three of the other boys +jumped a coupla tigers."</p> + +<p>"Tigers? What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Tigers. Curly come into the ranch alone. He said they run onto old Con +Bates and Sankey on our side of the river. They had caught Turk and +Bud some way, God knows how, and had their hands tied to their saddle +horns, takin' 'em for a ride."</p> + +<p>"No! I don't believe it!"</p> + +<p>"I'm just tellin' you what Curly said. He said when the smoke cleared +away he was the only one of his bunch left, and he done it a running."</p> + +<p>"What did they do with Turk and Bud?"</p> + +<p>"Took 'em on for the ride, I reckon." French was sardonic.</p> + +<p>"Hell! They were with us that day at the round-up! If old Railroad gets +a rope on their necks, those two may talk!"</p> + +<p>"I know it, and that ain't all. Sam went across to Silver Bend with a +gang, and got shot up."</p> + +<p>"Steve told me about that."</p> + +<p>"He didn't tell you Sam died at noon, did he?"</p> + +<p>"No!"</p> + +<p>"I thought not. Somebody hung Bill Hayden, and—"</p> + +<p>"Steve told me about that."</p> + +<p>"Oh, he did? Well, as I came into the bottom, on the other side of the +river, I found Steve himself hanging to a limb, right over the road. +Steve didn't tell you that, did he?"</p> + +<p>"No! Damn your impudent, insolent soul, he didn't, but I'll tell you +something!" Bell almost choked. He was incapable of feeling any human +emotion except selfishness, greed, and lust, and the rage which now +swept him like a storm. "You've accused me of sending you into hell +on my business. I'm going to lead you into it now. Come on, damn you! +It'll take nerve to go where I'm going," and driving in his spurs, +Bell led the way into the ford.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>A little after nightfall that same evening, after Railroad had locked +in his prisoners for the night, and Randy was long ago asleep, a voice +from outside called softly through a crack in the log smokehouse:</p> + +<p>"Walter!"</p> + +<p>Turk sprang up from his blankets and rushed to the wall.</p> + +<p>"Don't! For God's sake, Joe, don't call me by that name. You know +what'll happen to me if officers find out I'm on this side of the +river. You know all about that mess down in Bosque County!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but I ain't as much interested in it as I am in this one that's +going on here."</p> + +<p>"You won't give me away, Joe?"</p> + +<p>"That depends. I heard the tale you told Mr. Ross. Is it straight?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's straight."</p> + +<p>"You're going to tell the same tale if he calls on you again, no matter +what happens, nor where you are when you tell it, or—"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell it straight, Joe. You know I will."</p> + +<p>"You bet I know you will. What are you doing tied up with the H Bar +outfit, anyway?"</p> + +<p>"Well, after I got into that trouble down in Bosque County, I dodged +across the river. There's not much doing over there, and I had to eat. +Bell Holderness told me he needed men. I didn't know what sort of job +it was till the racket started at the round-up."</p> + +<p>"Do you know what sort of job it is now?"</p> + +<p>"I sure do. It's a straight-out murder job. They aim to kill all the +Rosses, and kill 'em from the brush if they can. I refused to do any +of the bushwhacking, and this morning Bud and me was fixing to make a +sneak, when them two old fellows jumped us. They're a pair of cats I'll +tell the world."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and there's a few more kittens in the Railroad outfit. If he +don't win like he thinks he will, what is Bell Holderness going to do?"</p> + +<p>"Go crazy and bring a gang of killers over here. Burn the house and +kill you fellows as you run out."</p> + +<p>"Fine! When will he do that?"</p> + +<p>"Any time he thinks he can't win any other way, and the way he has lost +yesterday and to-day, that won't be long."</p> + +<p>"Good! If you know anything else that might help the Railroad outfit, +you better tell me. It might make it easier for you when the showdown +comes."</p> + +<p>"That's all I know, Joe. Since I refused to bushwhack, they wouldn't +tell me anything."</p> + +<p>"All right. Sweet dreams. If you happen to want me, you better call me +Dolly. They'll hear you better," and Dolly headed for the corral.</p> + +<p>A few minutes later he was on his horse, and headed for the prairie +trail. Once again he was taking Randy's affairs into his own hands. +Not altogether Randy's either. That pleading look in Zella's eyes had +haunted him since the evening she had begged Sankey to save Randy.</p> + +<p>Dolly was a Railroad puncher, and the neighborhood of the Tarleton +plantation was unhealthy for such, but he was going to communicate with +Zella, some way. He didn't believe the Tarletons, with the facts before +them, would take sides against the Railroad. He had the facts, and he +meant to deliver them where, if he was not mistaken, they would do most +good.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>With Zella Tarleton, to feel deeply was to act promptly. Soon after +Bell Holderness left, she was in her room, writing another note to +Randy. She knew she couldn't send it until about night, but she got it +ready, and the tone of it was very different from the last one she had +sent. The pity of it was that Randy would never see it, but she didn't +know that.</p> + +<p>Half a mile out on the prairie, Dolly met a horseman—or almost met +him. The rider whirled out of the trail and set off across the open +prairie. Dolly recognized him and gave chase. The race was short, and +catching the other's bridle, Dolly jerked him to a stop.</p> + +<p>"O-o-o-h! Lawdy! I's done kotch now!"</p> + +<p>"Stop that noise!" commanded Dolly. "Where you heading for?"</p> + +<p>"That ole Railroad, in the dark bottom! O-o-o-h!"</p> + +<p>"Have you got a note for Mr. Randy?"</p> + +<p>"Yassir, nossir. I—I mean I ain't."</p> + +<p>"You can't lie to me."</p> + +<p>"I didn' know that. If'n I can't lie to you, I mean I is got one."</p> + +<p>"Now, you listen to me. If you go fooling around Mr. Randy with that +note, he's going to hang you."</p> + +<p>"But Miss Zella, she say, Pompey, she say, my life and Mr. Randy's life +just plumb 'pend on him gettin' this note, immejit."</p> + +<p>"Well, you can't take it to him."</p> + +<p>"Says which? Whuffo' I can't?"</p> + +<p>"Because I'll hang you if you try."</p> + +<p>"Hoo! Po' nigger! Hangin' whichever way I jumps, and Miss Zella 'll +sho' kill me if I don't jump. Deep water!"</p> + +<p>"I'll stand between you and Miss Zella."</p> + +<p>"Huh-uh! Man, you goin' be ruined if you do. Miss Zella is de sweetest +and bes' woman in the worl', but when she do get riled—hunt cover!"</p> + +<p>"Can you take me to Miss Zella without any one else knowing it?"</p> + +<p>"Yassir, but you gwine know it, and me, too, when we gets there."</p> + +<p>"I'll chance that. Come on."</p> + +<p>"Bress God, I don't have to go thoo that ole dark bottom by my +lonesome, anyway," Pompey consoled himself as he turned back into the +trail and headed for the Tarleton place.</p> + +<p>They entered the Tarleton plantation at the east side, and rode within +a quarter of a mile of the house.</p> + +<p>"Here's whar I turn this ole pony loose in the woods," declared Pompey. +"Old judge and them boys ketches me hossbackin' around in de night, I +sho' sees trouble. I ain't been nowhar but possum huntin' ef'n anybody +asks me. Best you leave yo' bronc here, too."</p> + +<p>Dolly tethered his horse where he could make a quick get-away and +followed Pompey silently. They entered a copse, a hundred yards from +the house, and stopped. At the same moment an exceedingly large and +exceedingly hoarse owl hooted, just once, right by Dolly's side.</p> + +<p>"Dat ole owel better not have to hoot but once," chuckled Pompey, +"less'n Mist' Lav come out here wid his shotgun."</p> + +<p>The owl didn't have to hoot again. A few minutes later a light step +approached the edge of the copse, and Pompey's name was called.</p> + +<p>"Here I is, yit, Miss Zella."</p> + +<p>"How did you get back so soon?"</p> + +<p>"Miss Zella, I rode, and I had help."</p> + +<p>"Did you bring a note from Randy?"</p> + +<p>"No, ma'am, Miss Zella, I didn't. I got kotched."</p> + +<p>"Caught? Who caught you?"</p> + +<p>"A man."</p> + +<p>"What man?"</p> + +<p>"Miss Zella, I don't know what man, but he punches cows fo' de +Railroad, he packs a gun, and he sho' knows how to talk rough to a +nigger. Hoo-ooh! He say he wanted speech with you. He say Mist' Randy +gwine hang me ef'n I tuk him dat note. He say he knows plenty he want +to tell you."</p> + +<p>"Was it Sankey?"</p> + +<p>"No, ma'am, it warn't Mist' Sankey. I got the gemman right here in this +ole plumb thicket, and—"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Miss Tarleton," said Dolly, who was standing only a few feet away, "I +guess I've taken right smart chances, coming here like this, but—"</p> + +<p>"Who are you?"</p> + +<p>"You wouldn't know me by name, but I was with Sankey that evening when +you talked to him at the mouth of the lane."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I see. Pompey, go halfway to the house and wait for me." And, when +Pompey had gone: "Tell me, quick—did Randy send you to me?"</p> + +<p>"No, ma'am, he didn't. I come on my own account. I've been riding with +Randy since this mess come up, and I know a whole lot of things."</p> + +<p>"Has he been hurt?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, ma'am, he's hurt right bad."</p> + +<p>"I knew he would be! Who—who hurt him?"</p> + +<p>"You did!"</p> + +<p>"I! How—"</p> + +<p>"That note you sent him the other night. I don't know what was in it, +but I know it changed him to the coldest, bitterest man I ever saw. +He's bitter against the whole world, and bitterest against you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, don't—don't tell me that!"</p> + +<p>"I'm telling the truth. I'm trying to help, and I'm taking a chance on +getting shot to do it. If your men folks catch me here, they'll shoot +me. If Randy finds out I came, he'll shoot me like I was a dog."</p> + +<p>"Why did you come, then?"</p> + +<p>"To tell you that neither Randy, nor no other Ross, shot your father +or your brother Ben. The man who shot your father is dead. The man who +shot Ben is not dead, but I've got proof of it."</p> + +<p>"Won't you tell this to my brothers and father?"</p> + +<p>"I'd like to, but they'd shoot me on sight."</p> + +<p>"No, no, no. They've been thinking things over. They'll listen. I'll +make them listen. I'll go back to the house and talk to them. You get +your horse, go out to the lane, and come up the front way. If there is +a light in the southeast window, come on to the house. If there is not, +don't come."</p> + +<p>Dolly, loyal squire that he was, was getting into deeper water than +he intended, but since he was in he would see the thing through. A few +minutes later he stopped at the end of the short lane that led to the +Tarleton house. He was looking through the avenue at the dark front of +the old house, when a light flashed in the southeast window, wavered, +then burned steadily.</p> + +<p>"Dolly," he muttered under his breath, "here's where you take the +longest chance of yo' young life. If you can't tell the truth, natural, +and make it stick, you won't come back. Let's go."</p> + +<p>He was met at the door by Zella, who took him into that southeast room. +It was a big, old-fashioned parlor, stiff and conventional in its every +aspect.</p> + +<p>"They'll see you," she whispered. "I don't know what the outcome will +be, but they'll hear what you have to say. Come on, you'll have to go +into father's room. They're in there," she went on, with her hand on +the knob of a door at the north side of the parlor.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>DOLLY TELLS THE TRUTH.</h3> + + +<p>Judge Tarleton lay on his bed. Cliff sat beside him, facing the door, +as Dolly entered. Lav, his dark brows drawn in a scowl, stood just back +of Cliff's chair. This man was a Railroad rider. Old Railroad Ross had +admitted some man of his outfit had killed Ben. It was well known that +the men of the Railroad outfit stuck together as one man. This little +red-haired, blue-eyed manikin was one of them, for all his boyish looks.</p> + +<p>He might be the very man who had fired the fatal shot.</p> + +<p>Zella started to introduce him, realized that she didn't know his name, +and halted.</p> + +<p>"Never mind the introduction," said the judge. "We know he belongs to +the Railroad outfit, and that's enough. What have you got to say for +yourself, young man?"</p> + +<p>Dolly saw that he was starting into this interview with a handicap. +It was the handicap of being a Railroad puncher, but he kept his wits +about him.</p> + +<p>"You fellows think Randy shot the judge. I'm here to tell you that he +didn't. The man who shot you, judge, was an H Bar man called Red. He's +dead."</p> + +<p>"How do you know he's dead?"</p> + +<p>"I killed him about five minutes after he shot you."</p> + +<p>"You killed him? You talk mighty cool about killing men."</p> + +<p>"I am right cool about killing a man that lays in the brush and shoots +innocent men like they were sheep-killing dogs."</p> + +<p>"Huh! Well, I'm not hurt very bad. What my boys and me have against the +Railroad outfit is the killing of my son Ben at the round-up."</p> + +<p>"They didn't kill him."</p> + +<p>"Didn't kill him! Why, Railroad Ross himself told me they did, and +whatever else he is, Railroad is not a liar. We don't know a great deal +about that fight that day, but we've got some friends, and they told us +part of it. Enough to satisfy us that—"</p> + +<p>"Beg pardon, sir, but did they tell you who killed Asa Ross, and what +for?"</p> + +<p>There was that question again.</p> + +<p>"No!" thundered the judge. "We are not interested in that. If you came +here to insinuate that Ben killed—"</p> + +<p>"I didn't. I came here to get word to you that the Railroad outfit +didn't kill Ben, and that Randy didn't shoot you. Instead of hunting +Randy to kill him, you ought to be helping him against his enemies."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Randy's begging for help, is he?" put in Lav.</p> + +<p>Dolly turned his blue eyes on Lav, and for once the stalwart Tarleton, +patrician though he was, quailed before a glance from a pair of +baby-blue eyes.</p> + +<p>Dolly was dangerously near an explosion, but he checked himself.</p> + +<p>"No. Randy isn't asking for any more help than he's got. He don't need +any more. He don't know I came here. I took a chance on getting killed +to help you."</p> + +<p>"Keep quiet, Lav," said the judge, as Lav opened his mouth to speak. +"Now, young man, this farce has gone far enough. I gave my word to my +daughter that you wouldn't be harmed if you came here. There is just +one question that we want answered. Who killed Ben?"</p> + +<p>The crisis had come. Dolly pulled himself together. He was pitted +against the champion liar and coldest schemer in the world, but he came +up to the scratch.</p> + +<p>"Bell Holderness."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"No!" cried the three men together, while Zella, standing in the door, +clenched her hands until the nails cut the flesh.</p> + +<p>"You can't get away with that!" cried Lav. "Bell has been our friend +all through this trouble, and still is. You can't stand here in this +house and try to blacken the name of our friend."</p> + +<p>White-faced, Lav took a step forward, with fists clenched. Dolly stood +his ground, a narrow white line showing along the edge of his lips.</p> + +<p>"Lav!" called the old judge. "My word is out that this boy won't be +mistreated in my house. And after all, he's just a hired man, doing +what he is told to do."</p> + +<p>"A minute, judge," and Dolly's voice hummed with the tenseness of it. +"I told you that nobody sent me here. I am just a hired man, but my +word is as good as yours. Friend or no friend, Bell Holderness killed +your son."</p> + +<p>"Would you like to face Bell Holderness with that statement?" snapped +Lav.</p> + +<p>"Yes! I'd like to face him, but not alone, when he's got a gang of +killers with him, like he had when he murdered Keech and Brazos."</p> + +<p>The shot went home. To be classed as one of the H Bar gang was too much +for Lav. He went white to his lips and recoiled a step. Dolly saw what +was in his eyes. Lav was insulted, and to insult a Tarleton was to seek +deadly danger. Dolly knew some sort of showdown was imminent.</p> + +<p>He had taken a positive stand. He might not get shot there in the +house, but Lav would meet him as soon as he got away from the premises. +A tense moment followed Dolly's statement. A Tarleton had been charged +by innuendo of being a member of a gang of cold killers.</p> + +<p>Finally Lav spoke. "I guess you know what you've done, and there is +only one way out of it. I'm not asking you to do that; I'm telling you +that you have got to do it." Then turning to his brother: "Get your hat +and gun, Cliff, and tell Pompey to bring our horses. We're going to +take this fellow to Willow Mills and let him face Bell Holderness with +this wild tale of his."</p> + +<p>Cliff left the room, and Lav spoke again to Dolly: "You may sit down."</p> + +<p>"No, thank you," said Dolly. "I shoot better standing!"</p> + +<p>"Shoot better! What do you mean by that?"</p> + +<p>"I mean that when folks don't trust me, I don't trust them. You been +wanting to kill Randy Ross. You've got the killing idea in your head, +and you'll sure kill somebody if you don't look out."</p> + +<p>"Father! Lav!" cried Zella, speaking for the first time. "Can't you see +this young man is telling you the truth!"</p> + +<p>"I can see that he has insulted me, and tried to blacken the name of +the best friend we have," snapped Lav, "and I'm going to give him a +chance to square it."</p> + +<p>"You're going to crowd Bell Holderness, and get killed yourself," Zella +almost choked.</p> + +<p>"No, I'm not," Lav snapped. "I won't get killed at all right now, for +I'm not going to turn my back to this friend of yours and Randy's. I +told you to stay out of this mess. Whenever a woman breaks into a thing +of this kind, she only makes more trouble for everybody. You were told +to give Randy Ross up and forget him."</p> + +<p>Zella made no reply. And neither did Dolly. Anywhere else on earth +but where they were Lav would have answered to Dolly at once for his +insinuation that the little puncher would shoot him in the back if he +had a chance. By the time the horses were ready Dolly had cooled a bit. +They went out to mount, where Dolly had left his own horse.</p> + +<p>"Now get this," said Lav. "We're going to Willow Mills, and you are +going to face Bell Holderness. There is but one of you and two of us. +If you start anything, you may get one of us, but the other will get +you. If you want to take a chance on a trade like that, it's up to you."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Dolly was in real danger now, and, as usual in such cases, he began to +banter them. His mission had failed. He wanted to kill Lav Tarleton for +his insults, but he mustn't do it. As far as the two to one odds were +concerned, that troubled him not at all. He was sure he could outshoot +the two of them, but he was there to help Randy and Zella.</p> + +<p>If he shot one or both of the Tarleton boys, it would be believed that +Randy had sent him to do it. Besides that, he had no ill will toward +Cliff. That young man had spoken but a few words to him, and they had +been courteous ones. Cliff and Zella were alike, and evidently favored +their mother. Lav was like the judge, but lacked the discretion of the +judge's years.</p> + +<p>"Maybe you fellows better take my gun," jeered Dolly. "You'll be +safer, and I won't be afraid."</p> + +<p>"We're safe enough," retorted Lav, "and you're safe enough with us, as +long as you don't try to get too funny. You'll need your gun when you +face Bell Holderness."</p> + +<p>Dolly knew that was true. Unless he missed his guess, Bell knew enough +by this time to make him desperate. Bell's only hope for safety lay in +killing a few people, himself among others. These thoughts were in his +mind as they stopped in front of the Cottonwood, dismounted, and went +in. Two men, in chaps, spurs, and other garments of the range rider, +were standing at the bar, drinking.</p> + +<p>"Where's Bell?" Lav asked the bartender.</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Him and French Clauson rode away from here together +about night. I reckon they went to the H Bar."</p> + +<p>"The H Bar! What business would Bell have there? He told me he had sold +out all his interest over there and was not going back any more. Said +he intended to build a home here at Willow Mills."</p> + +<p>The bartender shrugged, and said nothing. He was trying to digest a +message that had come to him over the grapevine a few minutes before. +The man who had brought it stepped in the back door and slipped out +again. Things were not going so well at the H Bar.</p> + +<p>"'Scuse me, pardner," said one of the strangers. "If you mean Bell +Holderness, I know where he is—or where he was about sundown. He was +riding hell-for-leather for the H Bar, him and another fellow. Come +take a drink, all you fellows," and the man threw a dollar on the bar. +"Speakin' of the H Bar, they been having a party of some kind over +there. We come from in on the Washita, and aimed to stay all night +there, but it didn't look happy."</p> + +<p>"What was the matter?" asked Lav.</p> + +<p>"I don't know. There was about forty men there, some packin' one gun +and some two, but nobody was talking. Some of 'em was diggin' holes in +the ground, and four or five dead men lay in a wagon. It didn't look +appetizing, nobody wanted to talk, we wasn't invited to stay, so we +rode on."</p> + +<p>"Was Bell there?"</p> + +<p>"No, sir, he wasn't, but he was goin' there. We met him and the other +fellow a mile this side of the H Bar, then about a mile the other side +of the river we met Steve Holderness. He wasn't hurrying so much," and +the man slowly poured another drink and swallowed it.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Did you talk to Steve?" asked the barkeep, apparently to get away from +talking about Bell.</p> + +<p>"Why, no, we didn't," the stranger said grimly. "Steve wasn't talking, +either. He was right in the middle of the road, but couldn't get his +feet on the ground. Looked like somebody had hung him out to dry. +Everybody on yan side of the river has been expecting the H Bar to be +took to a cleaning, but we didn't hear of it until we got there."</p> + +<p>"You don't speak very respectfully of the dead," said Lav.</p> + +<p>"Respectfully, hell, pardner! Don't nobody speak very respectfully +of the Holderness gang over on the other side, whether they're dead +or alive. The decent ranches, farther out in the Indian country, are +getting ready to go in together and clean 'em up. Looks like if you was +a cowman you'd know that."</p> + +<p>"I'm not a cowman," returned Lav with dignity. "And I don't live on the +other side."</p> + +<p>"Oh, thataway. Well, I ain't talkin' secrets. They's cowmen on this +side of the river, and they know that the H Bar is nothing but a +hangout for thieves and killers. It's a reg'lar vest-pocket hell, +and it's got to be cleaned. Somebody, I don't know who, has trimmed +it some. They told us at the H Bar that Sam was dead. We saw Steve +Holderness hanging up like a side of meat. That leaves only Bell to +ramrod the outfit. I guess he was going home to lead his gang of +killers against whoever it is that's riding them."</p> + +<p>Dolly was very much awake now. What he had heard corroborated what the +prisoner had told him at the crack in the smokehouse. The clans had +gathered at the H Bar. Bell had seen the end of his plans unless he +struck quickly. There was only one thing for him to do now, since so +many of his plans had gone awry. That was to raid Silver Bend, kill +Railroad and Randy, and as many more as he could, then let his killers +scatter. With Steve dead there was no longer any one to hold lands in +the Indian country. He had to act, and act with all possible speed.</p> + +<p>Dolly had put all these things together in his mind as the stranger +talked. He knew men, and he knew this stranger was telling the truth. +He knew, too, that the man was not just an ordinary cow-puncher, for +all he was clad like one.</p> + +<p>"Say there's about forty at the H Bar?" he asked, as the man stopped +talking and rolled a smoke.</p> + +<p>"Yes, there was about that many in sight. Probably more scattered +around. I knew some of 'em. Fellows there from several gangs. Some +from Yellow Hills, some from the Arbuckle Mountains, and several other +hangouts. Looked like a rustler's camp-meeting. Are you a cow hand?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir. Name's Joe Runnels. Work for the Railroad outfit."</p> + +<p>"Old Railroad Ross! You're working for a mighty square man. Thomas +is my name, Alec Thomas. I run the T Stripe brand, in on the prairie +between Red River and the Washita. I'm about an eighth Chickasaw, but +nobody notices that, with these blue eyes of mine. Is it the Railroad +that's working on the H Bar?"</p> + +<p>"They been working on us some," replied Dolly cautiously.</p> + +<p>"I see. Looks like you fellows been swapping work with 'em some. Take +another drink, gents. We got to find a place to sleep."</p> + +<p>As the men started out Thomas motioned Dolly to one side and whispered:</p> + +<p>"I don't know who your friends are, but you better shake 'em and get +back to the Railroad. Bell Holderness has got his gang bunched for +something."</p> + +<p>"That fellow's windy," sneered the bartender, as the two men went out +and crossed to the little hotel.</p> + +<p>"I know part of what he said is true," defended Dolly; and, turning to +Lav: "Well, we ain't apt to see Bell to-night. What do you want to do?"</p> + +<p>"I don't see anything we can do, except go back home."</p> + +<p>"All right, let's ride."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>When they had almost reached the Tarleton house Dolly stopped them:</p> + +<p>"Now see here, fellows. You talked pretty rough to me, but we'll +forget that. You thought the Railroad outfit killed your brother. I've +told you better, but you still don't believe it. You wouldn't believe +Railroad, and you wouldn't believe Randy if he told you; but he'll +never tell you anything. We can't see Bell Holderness, and he'd lie if +we did see him. Anyway, I'd have killed him before he said anything, if +we had met him. I can prove what I told you by witnesses that saw Bell +shoot Ben in the back."</p> + +<p>"Where are they?"</p> + +<p>"Under lock and key, at the Railroad."</p> + +<p>"We can't go there without—" and Lav stopped.</p> + +<p>"Getting killed," Dolly finished for him. "Yes, you can. It takes some +cold nerve, because the bottom is likely to be full of H Bar killers, +but one of you can go there. There's just one man there that would hurt +you, and he's asleep. That's Randy."</p> + +<p>"Randy! Why would he hurt us?"</p> + +<p>"Why wouldn't he? You've accused him of cold murder when he wasn't +guilty. You've played in with the gang that murdered his brothers. You +sent him word what would happen when you met him, and it'll happen—to +you! But Randy ain't slept none for three nights, and he's dead to the +world. It's up to you now. Either come with me and get proof from those +men, or else put up your guns and stay out of this mess. Make up your +mind, for I can't wait. I got business to attend to."</p> + +<p>"I'll go with you," said Cliff calmly.</p> + +<p>"Let's ride, then."</p> + +<p>"Wait a minute," Lav protested. "What'll I tell father?"</p> + +<p>"You ought to have more than you can tell him before morning, after +what Thomas told you. You can tell him what Bell Holderness is, and +ask why he hadn't found it out before now. You can tell him that what +I told him was the truth, and Cliff will be back before morning, with +proof of it. Dammit, tell anything. Tell him about the weather. Let's +go, Cliff." And Dolly set spurs to his horse.</p> + +<p>Perfect peace and quiet was over the Silver Bend, as they rode down +from the prairie and took the trail to the Railroad. Dolly was +wondering how long it would remain that way. They stopped at the +corral. Dolly unsaddled his horse and turned it loose, then they stole +through the darkness to the back of the log house where the prisoners +were. A low call of his name brought Turk, or rather Walter, as Dolly +knew him, to the wall.</p> + +<p>"Now, tell this gentleman the story you told me about the killing of +Ben Tarleton," said Dolly in a low tone.</p> + +<p>Turk not only told it, but elaborated on it, and told it convincingly, +averring again that he and his partner were making a sneak from the H +Bar, because it was too tough, when they were caught.</p> + +<p>"Satisfied now?" asked Dolly when they were back at the corral where +Cliff had left his horse.</p> + +<p>"Yes, more than satisfied. Zella told me some things that satisfied me +that Bell was crooked and trying to play us for suckers, but I couldn't +tell Lav and father. They won't reason in a case like this. They have +to be shown. I came with you because I wanted to be able to show them."</p> + +<p>"Good! Now, when you convince Lav and the judge, they are going to +fly right around, like the arrow on the lightning rod when the wind +changes. They'll want you and Lav to come romping down here to help +Randy hang Bell Holderness. Don't do it. Some more water has got to run +under the bridge before Randy is fit for you and Lav to meet. He may +need help, but you can't help him now."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Cliff, wringing Dolly's hand. "I won't come into +Silver Bend unless I'm sure I can do some good." And he rode away into +the night.</p> + +<p>It was well after midnight, and Dolly was ready to call it a pretty +full day. There was no sign of an attack on the ranch, and he needed +sleep. He would have told Randy what he knew, or at least a part of +it, but Randy needed sleep to put him in shape for what was likely to +come on the morrow. A storm of disaster was brewing over Silver Bend +that would have driven thoughts of sleep from Dolly's mind had he even +dreamed of its terror.</p> + + +<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> + +<div class="chapter"> +<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</h2> +</div> + +<h3>THE STORM STRIKES SILVER BEND.</h3> + + +<p>Morning showed as peaceful a scene at Silver Bend as could have been +found in all the long and winding reaches of that tawny river. The +sun came up and gilded the silver of the young cottonwood trees. The +dogwood was in bloom along with many other shrubs and wild flowers. A +hundred mingled scents of sweetness were in the warm, damp air.</p> + +<p>A great peace was over the world, but it was the calm before such a +storm as Silver Bend had never known in all the more than thirty years +that old Railroad Ross had struggled there. The elements that were to +battle in that bottle and concoct a mess "unfit for human consumption," +as Sankey had said at the outset, were rapidly fermenting for the +mixture.</p> + +<p>When Cliff returned home he found his father, Lav and Zella waiting +together in the judge's bedroom.</p> + +<p>"Well, what did you find out?" asked Lav.</p> + +<p>"Just what I expected to find; that the young fellow who was here told +the truth. There is no doubt that Bell Holderness shot Ben in the back, +in order to make us think the Railroad outfit did it, and draw us into +the quarrel on the side of the H Bar."</p> + +<p>"Did you see Randy?" asked Zella.</p> + +<p>"No; I was afraid to see him."</p> + +<p>"Afraid!" rumbled the judge. "No Tarleton ever was afraid of any man."</p> + +<p>"It wasn't the man I was afraid of. It was the result of what we had +done. Lav sent Randy word that we would kill him on sight. I know what +I'd do, and you know what you'd do, if a man sent you such a message. I +don't want to kill Randy Ross, and I don't want him to kill me. One or +the other will happen if he meets any of us before he is satisfied that +we have learned the truth and changed our attitude toward him."</p> + +<p>"Why, nonsense!" growled the judge. "If this trouble between the +Railroad and the H Bar goes on, Randy ought to be glad to have you two +boys on his side of the fight."</p> + +<p>"That's true enough, but we can't go to him now. Dolly says he's as +bitter against us as he is against the H Bar. That we all look alike to +him."</p> + +<p>"Why, I don't understand that attitude," said the judge.</p> + +<p>"I do," declared Zella. "I'm to blame for part of it. You can't go to +Randy, but I can. I'll crawl on hands and knees to him and beg him to +forget what has happened."</p> + +<p>"You'll do nothing of the kind," snapped Lav imperiously. "I've told +you to keep out of this. No Tarleton is going to beg anybody to do +anything. Go to bed. We'll decide what to do."</p> + +<p>Zella went to her room, but not to bed. Gray dawn found her sitting at +the window, looking down the river toward Silver Bend, as if she hoped +to see Randy and what was happening to him. If she had seen him at that +moment, she would have seen him still asleep. At sunrise she did see +her two brothers mount and ride away toward Willow Mills.</p> + +<p>"Where are the boys going?" she asked her father.</p> + +<p>"To hunt Bell Holderness. He is a double traitor. He not only murdered +my son, but accepted my hospitality and claimed to be my friend +afterward. It would be a disgrace if my sons didn't hunt him down, +since I am crippled and can't go myself."</p> + +<p>If Lav and Cliff were to shoot it out with Bell that day, they'd have +to go much farther than Willow Mills. Indeed, they meant to go farther +than that, if they didn't find Bell in his usual haunts.</p> + +<p>Quite unintentionally they were putting themselves where they could not +help Randy.</p> + +<p>Failing to find Bell in the little town, they took the road north +toward the H Bar. The river was low, and they took the shallow ford and +crossed to the other side, hoping to meet Bell as he came to town.</p> + +<p>No man should say they were afraid. They didn't know it, but there was +nothing to be afraid of in that neighborhood, unless it were the grim +fruit that still hung from a limb over the road.</p> + +<p>At daylight, even as Zella sat looking toward Silver Bend, Bell +Holderness had left the H Bar with his men. Where they were going, the +men didn't know, except that they were not going toward Willow Mills.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Randy and his father finished breakfast and stepped out of the house to +start the men on their day's work, when they met Dolly. "Mr. Ross, I +got to talk to you and Randy some," Dolly remarked.</p> + +<p>"What about?"</p> + +<p>"Why, I went to Willow Mills last night, and—"</p> + +<p>"Went to Willow Mills!" exclaimed Randy. "Didn't you know it was +dangerous for any of our outfit to go there just now?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it was sorty shaky, but I found out something. Bell Holderness +has gone back to the H Bar. He's got forty killers there with him. He +knows Sam and Steve are dead, and he'll play his last card at once."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean by his last card?" demanded Railroad.</p> + +<p>"Why, he's got himself where he ain't safe as long as you and Randy are +alive. He's desperate, at the last ditch, and he'll come here with his +gang and kill you."</p> + +<p>"How do you know all this?"</p> + +<p>Dolly told him what Alec Thomas had said.</p> + +<p>"I know Thomas," said Railroad. "He's a good, square man, and he +knows the signs about such outfits as the H Bar. I never thought the +Holderness boys would pull a thing like this, though. I knew it was +a rough outfit, and I've heard some talk about 'em, but this is too +rough."</p> + +<p>"They're not the only rough ones," snapped Randy. "If they jump us in +front, the Tarleton wing of their dirty outfit will stab us in the +back."</p> + +<p>"I don't think so," said Dolly.</p> + +<p>Randy shot him a sharp glance, but said nothing.</p> + +<p>"We'll keep the men all here at the ranch to-day, anyway," said +Railroad. "I don't think they'll come across the river in the daytime, +but our boys will need to be rested whenever they do come."</p> + +<p>"I guess that's right," said Randy, thoughtfully. "No use in them +riding the bend. They'll only get shot from the brush. Come on, Dolly. +If they come into Silver Bend, they'll cross at the ford below the +narrows. We'll go over there and watch."</p> + +<p>Old Railroad stood watching them as they rode off. There went his last +boy, riding into danger. It was the brave and manly thing to do, but +he wished he could have gone himself, instead. Never had he seen such +a change in any man as there had been in Randy, but he was too bitter, +too venturesome. If the H Bar outfit did come that way, they'd get the +boy sure.</p> + +<p>"No work to-day, boys," Railroad told them. "Have the boys saddle and +have their guns ready and loaded, but don't ride. Dolly says Bell +Holderness is apt to come across, and jump us. He's got about forty +killers. There's only twenty-two of us, without Dolly and Randy. +They've gone to watch the ford. Don't any of the rest of you ride into +the bottom. If they're in there, you'll just get shot from the brush, +without having a chance. If they jump us here at the ranch, we'll have +the advantage. Just get ready for anything that happens, but keep +quiet."</p> + +<p>Poor old Railroad. He had thought that battles of this sort were long +past for him. He felt that this would be the last one if it came. He +hoped it wouldn't come, but gamely oiled and loaded his guns. His old +heart would beat rapidly for a moment, skip a beat, then slow down for +a minute, keeping up an endless cycle of change in its working.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Meantime, Randy and Dolly had ridden on to the river and ensconced +themselves in a thicket, where they could watch the ford without being +seen. Randy had not spoken since they left the ranch. Now he turned to +Dolly and said:</p> + +<p>"Where'd you go last night and what for?"</p> + +<p>Dolly had been expecting that question, and dreading it. He was going +to have to lie, or at least not tell all the truth, and he didn't like +that sort of thing. He pulled himself together and plunged into the +task.</p> + +<p>"Why, I went to Willow Mills, like I told you."</p> + +<p>"I know, but why? You didn't take a chance like that just for fun."</p> + +<p>"No, I took it for you," and the earnestness of the little puncher's +voice rang true. "I talked to that fellow Turk last night, and he told +me what Bell would do in a showdown. I knew what we had done to the +H Bar. I knew there was nobody but Bell left to ramrod the outfit. I +wanted to know if Bell had gone to the H Bar, so I went to the Mills, +and found out what I told you."</p> + +<p>"All right. I never have caught you in a lie. I'll be sorry if Bell +gets killed. I wanted him to marry Zella first."</p> + +<p>"Randy, you oughtn't to be so bitter."</p> + +<p>"Hell I oughtn't! Didn't she throw me cold? Hasn't Bell been there with +her through all this mess? Ain't her brothers hunting me to kill me?"</p> + +<p>Dolly wanted to tell him the Tarleton boys were no longer hunting him. +He wanted to tell him that Zella was still true to him and suffering +intensely for her part in the matter, but he didn't dare. Instead, he +said:</p> + +<p>"Randy, you're too hard on Miss Zella. I tell you she didn't +understand—"</p> + +<p>"And I want to tell you that she, or anybody else, will have one hell +of a job making me understand that she didn't understand. I'm not a +sucker any longer. Thanks to you, I'm a man now. I had to be mighty +near killed to make me see sense. I had to lose about everything on +earth that I loved, but thank God, the price shan't be paid in vain. +I've still got my old daddy and mother, and I still have Silver Bend. +It don't make much difference whether I come out of this mess alive or +not, but if I do—"</p> + +<p>Randy stopped. The thought was too bitter to express. It had to do +with what he believed to be the unfaithfulness of Zella, and with his +jealousy of Bell Holderness, which he refused to admit. At that moment, +he thought there was no feeling in his heart for Zella, except to see +her suffer in return for the pain she had given him.</p> + +<p>Dolly offered no word. He was thinking again that he had tried to make +a man, and made a monster. He had changed Randy from a shrinking boy to +a fearless, even a desperate man. A man who could watch the quivering +death throes of his enemies without a quiver. A man who could be a +terrible enemy, even to a woman.</p> + +<p>Looking down the river, as they watched the ford, Dolly was picturing +in his mind the great bottle formed by Silver Bend. At the bottom +of the bottle, and three miles north of the ranch house, the ground +sloped up from the stream to a considerable height and formed a sort of +plateau of a hundred yards in extent. There was no timber on it. The +soil was loose sand.</p> + +<p>In the middle of the plateau was a mound, on which grew an immense +mustang grapevine. The vine was old and gnarled, supported by its own +twisted stems, and a few stunted trees, it covered as much ground as +a large house, and at a distance looked as much like a hay rick as +anything else.</p> + +<p>Dolly had eaten grapes at that vine many a time, squeezing the pulp +from the grape into his mouth, without letting the skin, with its +burning acid, touch his lips. He had no thought of any part that +grapevine might play in the day's events. It was merely a vagary of his +mind that it halted there a moment, in a mental journey from the bottom +of the bottle to the ranch house.</p> + +<p>The plateau, with its lone grapevine, was the sediment in the bottom of +the bottle. To the south of the plateau, the ground sloped down sharply +into a strip a quarter of a mile wide, filled with switch-cane and +grass, with occasional trees in it. The strip was little higher than +the river banks. Railroad Ross called it his winter horse pasture.</p> + +<p>There was always green stuff there in the winter. It had not been +burned over for several years, and was a mass of dead canes and grass, +which protected the greenery under it in the winter. The swale ran +across the bend from the river on the west to the river on the east. +Beyond that, the ground rose sharply into thick timber that was on high +ground and extended on to the prairie valley in which the ranch house +stood.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Dolly was trying to picture in his mind what might happen, and where it +would most likely happen. He started when Randy said:</p> + +<p>"Dolly, you've done a lot for me, but there's one more favor I want to +ask. If the Holderness and Tarleton gang does come into Silver Bend, +let me have Bell Holderness."</p> + +<p>"All right," replied Dolly, absently. "They can come in most anywhere +now. I never saw the river any lower. Listen! What's that?"</p> + +<p>"Wind," replied Randy. "It's a spring norther. I noticed when it struck +awhile ago."</p> + +<p>They listened and the roaring increased.</p> + +<p>"That ain't wind," said Dolly. "Look at the river!"</p> + +<p>A wall of water ten feet high came rolling down the stream and +thundered on by them.</p> + +<p>"Huh! That closes the gate against the H Bar for awhile anyway," said +Randy. "Most too early for a big head-rise, but that's big enough to +stop them from crossing," and shaking his bridle reins, he led the way +back toward the ranch.</p> + +<p>They had almost reached the edge of the prairie at the round-up +grounds, when Dolly said:</p> + +<p>"I smell smoke! Looky how hazy it is," and then as they came out in the +open: "Yonder it is! Somebody's fired the winter horse pasture. It'll +burn the ranch!"</p> + +<p>Randy's jaws set with a click, as his spurs went in and he thundered +away toward the ranch house, with Dolly at his side. The men were +mounting as they rode up.</p> + +<p>"Come on, fellows!" shouted Randy. "We've got 'em in the open now. +They'll have to fight. They can't get back across the river."</p> + +<p>"Hold the deal!" roared Railroad, who had mounted his horse and had +forgotten he had a heart. "They've set a trap for you if you go in +there. Plenty of time to fire against that and save the house, if we +have to. Wait till they make a move."</p> + +<p>There was no long wait. Bell Holderness had come across with his forty +killers. He didn't know yet that his retreat had been cut off by the +high water. In his desperation he had but one thought. He was going to +get Randy and old Railroad Ross.</p> + +<p>When no one came from the ranch to fight the fire, he pushed on at +the head of thirty of his men, intent on cleaning up the Railroad and +burning the house. All he wanted was the land. The burned house would +cover his crime. As they came out on the prairie, Randy whirled his +horse and Dolly whirled with him.</p> + +<p>"Come on, boys!" called Railroad. "They're ridin' straight into hell!" +and dashed for the fray.</p> + +<p>The battle was fought in the open this time. The hired killers had +to fight or run. The Railroad riders had scores to settle and needed +no urging. Four of them went from their saddle at the first crash of +battle, but they were being terribly avenged. A dozen riderless horses +of the invaders dashed across the prairie.</p> + +<p>Bell's forces broke and scattered. He, with French Clauson, had been in +the lead. Bullets had fairly rained around them, but they escaped. At +last, seeing the battle lost, they turned and started for the bottom +of the bottle, with their pursuers almost on them, for Randy and Dolly +were riding with bloody spurs to overtake them.</p> + +<p>The horse pasture was no longer burning. Instead, Bell and Clauson +splashed through water almost to their saddle girths. They knew what +had happened, and that retreat was cut off, but they didn't dare try to +go back the other way now.</p> + +<p>Bell knew some of his gang had gone the other way. He didn't know how +many, but he cursed himself for not following them. His only hope was +that his pursuers would founder in that quarter-mile morass that he had +just passed.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>They didn't founder, but came doggedly on, though the water all but +swam their horses the last few paces, and a strong current was setting +across the bend.</p> + +<p>"Now," said Randy, as they gained the plateau and their horses shook +the water from their coats, "we'll have it out. Remember, you promised +to let me have Bell. Let's go!"</p> + +<p>Began then a battle to the death on that narrow plateau, which was now +an island and gradually growing smaller.</p> + +<p>Old Railroad and half a dozen of his men who had not been hurt in the +battle came thundering down to the edge of the water, and stopped. +They could see by the trees which they knew that they'd have to swim +to reach the island. Across that strip of muddy water they could see +the four men on the island. They watched, spellbound, as if they were +looking at a play.</p> + +<p>They heard the roar of shots, saw the island grow smaller and smaller, +as the water rose around. They saw Randy's horse go down. Saw Randy +rise on his elbow and fire at Bell, who was charging down on him. Saw +Bell's horse fall, and saw him retreat to the other side of the little +island, as Randy regained his feet and limped after him. A few yards +away Dolly and Clauson met and shot it out. Both horses and both men +went down.</p> + +<p>Clauson lay still. Dolly struggled up, took a few steps toward Randy, +and fell.</p> + +<p>The final moment had come. With his back to the swirling water that had +entrapped him, Bell made his last stand. He couldn't afford to miss +this time. It was his last cartridge. He fired, but fired a second too +late. Randy's bullet had found his heart, and Bell Holderness slipped +into the swirling flood.</p> + +<p>As if enraged at the pollution, the water, with a mighty surge, swept +over the island, washing onto Dolly, who lay on the ground. Randy +splashed to where the little puncher lay, and caught him up.</p> + +<p>"Hit bad, Dolly?" he panted.</p> + +<p>"No. Just in the leg, but we're going to get wet. I can't make it, but +you got a chance. Swim for the tree."</p> + +<p>"I won't leave you," declared Randy, splashing waist-deep toward the +old grapevine.</p> + +<p>Watching from the other side, Railroad and his men saw him gain the +vine and push Dolly to safety, then, with the water already at his +shoulders, pull himself up, and help Dolly to the highest point.</p> + +<p>"Good God! Can't we do anything?" cried Railroad. "It'll go over 'em in +a few minutes!"</p> + +<p>"These little broncs couldn't swim it," said old Con, and the others +knew it was true.</p> + +<p>"I'd give everything I got for one big horse," declared Railroad, in a +frenzy of anxiety.</p> + +<p>"There's a chance for a trade," growled Con, as a powerful yellow +horse came storming through the bottom toward them. It was old Judge +Tarleton's big claybank saddle horse, and Zella was bestride him. It +was a vicious brute of Arabian strain, deep-chested, and powerful of +limb.</p> + +<p>"Where's Randy?" she cried, as the horse skidded to a stop.</p> + +<p>For answer they pointed to the grapevine and the two men clinging to +the top of it.</p> + +<p>"Let one of the boys have your horse," pleaded Railroad.</p> + +<p>If she heard him, she didn't heed. In went her spurs. Open-mouthed, the +great beast reared, lunged, and went out of sight in the water until +only Zella's head and shoulders could be seen. He rose and headed out +into that swirling sea.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/illus3.jpg" alt=""> + <div class="caption"> + <p><i>The stallion rose and headed out into that swirling sea.</i></p> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p>Railroad Ross watched with his heart in his mouth, and choked, as he +cried: "What a woman!"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>They cheered as the great horse drifted against the up river side of +the grapevine and stopped, but they couldn't hear what was being said, +out there on that hopeless, swaying island, that was likely at any +moment to uproot itself and float away.</p> + +<p>"Take Dolly to a tree if you can," said Randy, grimly. "It won't make +any difference about me."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Randy!" cried Zella. "Please, please come on. There's a chance +yet."</p> + +<p>"No! We can't both go, and I won't leave Dolly."</p> + +<p>"Go on, Randy, you damn fool!" stormed Dolly. "I don't count. Nobody'll +miss me."</p> + +<p>"No! I tell you I won't leave you!"</p> + +<p>The big horse could just keep its head out of water and stand on the +ground. Soon it would be swimming where it stood.</p> + +<p>"Come on then, Dolly!" called the girl. "I'll take you to a tree and +come back for Randy. Jump!"</p> + +<p>Pushed by Randy, Dolly scrambled behind the saddle. At the same +instant, Zella sprang out of it and landed on the grapevine.</p> + +<p>"Go on, Dolly," she cried, "and God help you to win through."</p> + +<p>"Zella!" Randy cried. "Don't make it any harder for me. Get back in +that saddle."</p> + +<p>"Not without you!"</p> + +<p>"Then go on. I'll try—"</p> + +<p>"You first. Catch a stirrup."</p> + +<p>"No. I'll hold to the horse's tail."</p> + +<p>"Go ahead."</p> + +<p>He dropped into the flood, and ran his fingers into the mass of hair +that floated on the water, just as Zella dropped to the saddle, and set +the horse swimming toward shore. They had won about fifty feet when +the watchers on the shore saw the old grapevine loose its moorings and +float away.</p> + +<p>They saw the logs and trash that swept over the spot, as a boom of +drift gave way somewhere above it, but in tense silence, they watched +the yellow head of that matchless horse, as he battled on with his +double load. They saw the two heads above the water, as the horse +submerged, all but his head, from time to time. Randy, they couldn't +see, but never in all his life had Randy Ross wanted so much to live.</p> + +<p>"God! I can't stand this!" said Sankey, as he threw off his boots, +chaps, and hat. "Tie your ropes to me! I'm going in there."</p> + +<p>Half a minute later, old Sankey pushed his mount into the water. No one +there knew that it was not to save Zella and Randy that he breasted the +flood on a small horse. It was to save that little blue-eyed puncher +that he loved like a brother.</p> + +<p>The watchers saw him win slowly on into the current, as they paid out +the rope. Almost he had reached the trio, when the yellow horse went +down. It came up, and went down again, came up, and fought feebly on.</p> + +<p>"Don't let 'em tangle in the rope!" roared Railroad.</p> + +<p>Sankey quit his spent pony, and with the rope in his teeth, battled for +the bobbing yellow head. He gained it, and both he and the head went +under, it seemed like for ages. Then Sankey floated clear and raised a +hand. Railroad had hold of the rope, the yellow head was barely above +the water. He felt a tug at the rope, as the gallant horse, spent to +the last ounce of its strength, floated with the current.</p> + +<p>"He made the rope fast to the bridle!" yelled Railroad. "Pull! Oh, damn +you, pull!"</p> + +<p>"Gimme the end of it," said old Con, and taking a half hitch on his +saddle horn, set his horse to pulling.</p> + +<p>A few minutes later, up to their armpits in the red water, Railroad +and his men bore the rescued three to dry land. The great yellow horse +scrambled out, stood for a moment quivering, and fell in his tracks, +just as old Sankey gained the shore a hundred yards below them.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>It was late in the afternoon of the same day. The big yellow horse had +revived, and had been taken to the Railroad pens, where he stood, gaunt +and drawn, eating a light feed.</p> + +<p>"He'll pull through now," opined Con, whose knowledge of horses was +unquestioned.</p> + +<p>"I hope he does," said Railroad. "He's worth about a million."</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>On the gallery of the old ranch house, where they had been together +since they had reached the house and changed to dry clothing, sat Randy +and Zella. Neither of them had spoken for a long time.</p> + +<p>"How did you ever happen to be in the bend, and riding that horse?" +asked Randy.</p> + +<p>"Why, I—Some people don't believe it, but when a woman loves a man +as I have loved you, she knows when he is in danger. Lav and Cliff +went away this morning, to hunt for Bell, they said. Pompey went off +somewhere, and there was no one about the place. I got the feeling that +you were in danger. It grew into a fear that Bell would talk Lav and +Cliff into coming here to kill you. I decided to come and warn you. +When I got to the barn there was no horse except father's big saddle +horse, that no one but himself ever tried to handle. I don't know how I +managed to put saddle and bridle on it, for it bit at me, and snorted +terribly. I fought it, and mounted it, then I came like the wind over +the prairie road.</p> + +<p>"As I came into the bottom, I met two men who seemed to be flying for +their lives. They checked, and one of them called: 'Don't go in there, +lady. Hell's raging down there,' and they went storming on. If it was +hell, and you were there, it was where I wanted to be, so I came on, +and—you know the rest."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know the rest, Zella, up to now; and I'll do my best to make +the rest more happy for you from now on. I'll never give you up again," +and he took her in his arms.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Out at the bunkshack, little Dolly was lying on a bunk, the doctor +having dressed his wounds, along with those of several punchers who had +been hurt in that first mad charge.</p> + +<p>"What became of Turk and Bud?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"Old man turned 'em loose," replied Sankey, who sat beside him. "Said +Zella had proved what he wanted to prove by them, and that was that +Zella and Randy would marry."</p> + +<p>"Fine! Bully! I told you Randy was a thoroughbred, and all he needed +was a little bustin'!"</p> + +<p>"Yes," drawled Sankey, "but it took a woman to bust him. Lay down there +and behave yourself. Randy has got him a side-partner now, and I'll +need you as soon as you're able to ride."</p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"Workin' on the Railroad, workin' life away,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Workin' on the Railroad, for mighty little pay!"</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + +<p>"Shut up, Dolly, you make my head ache, and besides that you'll burst +something, and start bleeding again."</p> + + +<p class="ph2">THE END.</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77480 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/77480-h/images/cover.jpg b/77480-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a98e0e --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/77480-h/images/illus1.jpg b/77480-h/images/illus1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..8758fde --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/images/illus1.jpg diff --git a/77480-h/images/illus2.jpg b/77480-h/images/illus2.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e655cd0 --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/images/illus2.jpg diff --git a/77480-h/images/illus3.jpg b/77480-h/images/illus3.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..591ddbe --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/images/illus3.jpg diff --git a/77480-h/images/illusc.jpg b/77480-h/images/illusc.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ae04593 --- /dev/null +++ b/77480-h/images/illusc.jpg |
