Collection 2005 - Riding For The Brand (v5.0) Read online

  Contents

  _________________

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Foreword

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Riding for the Brand

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Four-Card Draw

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  His Brother’s Debt

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  A Strong Land Growing

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  The Turkeyfeather Riders

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Lit a Shuck for Texas

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  The Nester and the Piute

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Barney Takes a Hand

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Man Riding West

  AUTHOR’S NOTES

  Fork Your Own Broncs

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Home in the Valley

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  West is Where the Heart Is

  About Louis L’Amour

  Bantam Books by Louis L’Amour

  Copyright

  To my loyal fans

  with gratitude for

  riding for the brand.

  _____________________

  Foreword

  ________________

  BEGINNING A WRITING career is never easy, and the stories in this collection were often written when the going was rough. Nobody wanted to buy a story from somebody named Louis L’Amour so, for a time, I used the name of one of my characters named Jim Mayo.

  The material from the stories came from sitting on a bale of hay eating a lunch in a shady spot by an irrigation ditch or out on a mountainside with an old-timer with whom I’d become friends. They did not tell me these stories, which are my own creation, but they did talk of old-time fights, rustling cattle, round-ups, camp cooks, and drifting cowhands who might have come from anywhere.

  Long ago I’d learned to listen more than talk and the stories came easily to those old men, not talking to me but to each other. I was just an innocent by-sitter storing memories.

  They talked of whiskey and women, of mossy-horn steer and wild mustangs, of cutting horses and ropers, of nights in town and long rides home, of gold discoveries, lost mines, buried treasures, and outlaws.

  They had lived in the west when it was wild and the memories did not fade. Some of them as boys had seen the last of the mountain men come down with their furs, and they had seen buffalo hunted and Indian war parties.

  They had eaten the dust of the trail herds, smelled the branding fires and coffee boiling in cowboy camps. To listen to them was to hear the saga of the west at first-hand, and to remember many a night rolled up in my own blankets, still thinking of the stories, and seeing again how it must have been when those fine old men were young.

  _______

  MY TITLE STORY, Riding for the Brand, begins with the main character taking the name of a man he never knew and laying claim to his property. It is fitting that his actions should have a passing similarity to the circumstances surrounding this book’s publication.

  My publisher, Bantam Books, and I have rushed into print with this volume, and a second frontier collection, Dutchman’s Flat, because a publisher I’m in no way associated with is issuing early magazine versions of some of my stories in a book that bears both my name and the same title as this edition. They’re doing this without my authorization or permission, and without even having the courtesy of telling me what they plan to publish.

  In 1983, this same publisher issued unauthorized editions of some of my frontier and detective stories in two collections, Law of the Desert Born and The Hills of Homicide. To offer my readers the chance to have the proper presentation of these stories, Bantam Books quickly published them in expanded editions, and I am pleased to note the demand for the authorized Bantam titles was so great that the unauthorized paperbacks quickly faded from the marketplace.

  Now, two and a half years later, this publisher is back, again trying to profit from my hard work.

  Their publication of an unauthorized version of Riding for the Brand is outrageous and unfair. Unfortunately the old copyright law fails to protect the stories they’ve taken for their volumes. As I said once before, while this publisher may be legally cleared to bring out these totally unauthorized versions, each of us must make his or her decision about the ethics of that kind of publishing.

  My anger toward them has quickly been channeled into a renewed sense of determination to publish my short stories the way I see fit to best serve my readers.

  I put aside the new novel I’m writing and worked into the night to select and edit the stories in this volume and to prepare the introductory historical notes that precede them. Many of the Bantam staff as well worked around the clock to bring this book to you as quickly as possible.

  The unauthorized editions shortchange the reader by offering fewer stories than I’ve selected for my edition, and they do not have any of my newly written commentary.

  Bantam Books is my official publisher and has been so for more than thirty years. They are the only publisher authorized to issue my short stories in book form. Only accept short story collections with my name on them that are published by Bantam.

  I know my loyal fans—who certainly know how to read a brand—will want to own only the enhanced, enlarged Bantam edition of this book. It will come as no surprise to them that I will never autograph one copy of the unauthorized edition of Riding for the Brand. As far as I’m concerned, it simply doesn’t exist.

  I hope you enjoy reading this new collection as much as I appreciate you “riding for the brand” with me.

  Louis L’Amour

  Los Angeles, California

  February, 1986

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  __________

  RIDING FOR THE BRAND

  THE TERM “riding for the brand” was an expression of loyalty to a man’s employer or the particular outfit he rode for. It was considered a compliment of the highest order in an almost feudal society. If a man did not like a ranch or the way they conducted their affairs he was free to quit, and many did, but if he stayed on he gave loyalty and expected it.

  A man was rarely judged by his past, only by his actions. Many a man who came west left things behind him he would rather forget, so it was not the custom to ask questions. Much was forgiven if a man had courage and integrity and if he did his job. If a man gave less than his best, somebody always had to take up the slack, and he was not admired.

  RIDING FOR THE BRAND

  _______________

  HE HAD BEEN watching the covered wagon for more than an hour. There had been no movement, no sound. The bodies of the two animals that had drawn the wagon lay in the grass, plainly visible. Farther away, almost a mile away, stood a lone buffalo bull, black against the gray distance.

  Nothing moved near the wagon, but Jed Asbury had lived too long in Indian country to risk his scalp on appearances, and he knew an Indian could lie ghost-still for hours on end. He had no intention of taking such a chance, stark naked and without weapons.

  Two days before he had been stripped to the hide by Indians and forced to run the gauntlet, but he had run better than they had expected and had escaped with only a few minor wounds.

  Now, miles away, he had reached the limit of his endurance. Despite little water and less food he was still in traveling condition except for his feet. They were lacerated and swollen, caked with dried blood.

  Warily, he started forward, taking advantage of every bit of cover and moving steadily toward the wagon. When he was within fifty feet he settled down in the grass to study the situation.

  This was the scene of an attack. Eviden
tly the wagon had been alone, and the bodies of two men and a woman lay stretched on the grass.

  Clothing, papers, and cooking utensils were scattered, evidence of a hasty looting. Whatever had been the dreams of these people they were ended now, another sacrifice to the westward march of empire. And the dead would not begrudge him what he needed.

  Rising from the grass he went cautiously to the wagon, a tall, powerfully muscled young man, unshaven and untrimmed.

  He avoided the bodies. Oddly, they were not mutilated, which was unusual, and the men still wore their boots. As a last resort he would take a pair for himself. First, he must examine the wagon.

  If Indians had looted the wagon they had done so hurriedly, for the interior of the wagon was in the wildest state of confusion. In the bottom of a trunk he found a fine black broadcloth suit as well as a new pair of hand-tooled leather boots, a woolen shirt, and several white shirts.

  “Somebody’s Sunday-go-to-meetin’ outfit,” he muttered. “Hadn’t better try the boots on the way my feet are swollen.”

  He found clean underwear and dressed, putting on some rougher clothes that he found in the same chest. When he was dressed enough to protect him from the sun he took water from a half-empty barrel on the side of the wagon and bathed his feet; then he bandaged them with strips of white cloth torn from a dress.

  His feet felt much better, and as the boots were a size larger than he usually wore, he tried them. There was some discomfort, but he could wear them.

  With a shovel tied to the wagon’s side he dug a grave and buried the three side by side, covered them with quilts from the wagon, filled in the earth, and piled stones over the grave. Then, hat in hand, he recited the Twenty-Third Psalm.

  The savages or whoever had killed them had made only a hasty search, so now he went to the wagon to find whatever might be useful to him or might inform him as to the identity of the dead.

  There were some legal papers, a will, and a handful of letters. Putting these to one side with a poncho he found, he spotted a sewing basket. Remembering his grand-mother’s habits he emptied out the needles and thread, and under the padded bottom of the basket he found a large sealed envelope.

  Ripping it open he grunted with satisfaction. Wrapped in carefully folded tissue paper were twenty twenty-dollar gold pieces. Pocketing them, he delved deeper into the trunk. He found more carefully folded clothes. Several times he broke off his searching of the wagon to survey the country about, but saw nothing. The wagon was in a concealed situation where a rider might have passed within a few yards and not seen it. He seemed to have approached from the only angle from which it was visible.

  In the very bottom of the trunk he struck paydirt. He found a steel box. With a pick he forced it open. Inside, on folded velvet, lay a magnificent set of pistols, silver plated and beautifully engraved, with pearl handles. Wrapped in a towel nearby he found a pair of black leather cartridge belts and twin holsters. With them was a sack of .44 cartridges. Promptly, he loaded the guns and then stuffed the loops of both cartridge belts. After that he tried the balance of the guns. The rest of the cartridges he dropped into his pockets.

  In another fold of the cloth he found a pearl-handled knife of beautifully tempered steel, a Spanish fighting knife and a beautiful piece of work. He slung the scabbard around his neck with the haft just below his collar.

  Getting his new possessions together he made a pack of the clothing inside the poncho and used string to make a backpack of it. In the inside pocket of the coat he stowed the legal papers and the letters. In his hip pocket he stuffed a small leather-bound book he found among the scattered contents of the wagon. He read little, but knew the value of a good book.

  He had had three years of intermittent schooling, learning to read, write, and cipher a little.

  There was a canteen and he filled it. Rummaging in the wagon he found the grub box almost empty, a little coffee, some moldy bread, and nothing else useful. He took the coffee, a small pot, and a tin cup. Then he glanced at the sun and started away.

  Jed Asbury was accustomed to fending for himself. That there could be anything wrong in appropriating what he had found never entered his head, nor would it have entered the head of any other man at the time. Life was hard, and one lived as best one might. If the dead had any heirs, there would be a clue in the letters or the will. He would pay them when he could. No man would begrudge him taking what was needed to survive, but to repay the debt incurred was a foregone conclusion.

  Jed had been born on an Ohio farm, his parents dying when he was ten years old. He had been sent to a crabbed uncle living in a Maine fishing village. For three years his uncle worked him like a slave, sending him out on the Banks with a fishing boat. Finally, Jed had abandoned the boat, deep-sea fishing, and his uncle.

  He walked to Boston and by devious methods reached Philadelphia. He had run errands, worked in a mill, and then gotten a job as a printer’s devil. He had grown to like a man who came often to the shop, a quiet man with dark hair and large gray eyes, his head curiously wide across the temples. The man wrote stories and literary criticism and occasionally loaned Jed books to read. His name was Edgar Poe and he was reported to be the foster son of John Allan, said to be the richest man in Virginia.

  When Jed left the print shop it was to ship on a windjammer for a voyage around the Horn. From San Francisco he had gone to Australia for a year in the goldfields, and then to South Africa and back to New York. He was twenty then and a big, well-made young man hardened by the life he had lived. He had gone west on a riverboat and then down the Mississippi to Natchez and New Orleans.

  In New Orleans Jem Mace had taught him to box. Until then all he had known about fighting had been acquired by applying it that way. From New Orleans he had gone to Havana, to Brazil, and then back to the States. In Natchez he had caught a cardsharp cheating. Jed Asbury had proved a bit quicker, and the gambler died, a victim of six-shooter justice. Jed left town just ahead of several of the gambler’s irate companions.

  On a Missouri River steamboat he had gone up to Fort Benton and then overland to Bannock. He had traveled with wagon freighters to Laramie and then to Dodge.

  In Tascosa he had encountered a brother of the dead Natchez gambler accompanied by two of the irate companions. He had killed two of his enemies and wounded the other, coming out of the fracas with a bullet in his leg. He traveled on to Santa Fe.

  At twenty-four he was footloose and looking for a destination. Working as a bullwhacker he made a round-trip to Council Bluffs and then joined a wagon train for Cheyenne. The Comanches, raiding north, had interfered, and he had been the sole survivor.

  He knew about where he was now, somewhere south and west of Dodge, but probably closer to Santa Fe than to the trail town. He should not be far from the cattle trail leading past Tascosa, so he headed that way. Along the river bottoms there should be strays lost from previous herds, so he could eat until a trail herd came along.

  Walking a dusty trail in the heat, he shifted his small pack constantly and kept turning to scan the country over which he had come. He was in the heart of Indian country.

  On the morning of the third day he sighted a trail herd, headed for Kansas. As he walked toward the herd, two of the three horsemen riding point turned toward him.

  One was a lean, red-faced man with a yellowed-mustache and a gleam of quizzical humor around his eyes. The other was a stocky, friendly rider on a paint horse.

  “Howdy!” The older man’s voice was amused. “Out for a mornin’ stroll?”

  “By courtesy of a bunch of Comanches. I was bull-whackin’ with a wagon train out of Santa Fe for Cheyenne an’ we had a little Winchester arbitration. They held the high cards.” Briefly, he explained.

  “You’ll want a hoss. Ever work cattle?”

  “Here and there. D’you need a hand?”

  “Forty a month and all you can eat.”

  “The coffee’s a fright,” the other rider said. “That dough wrangler never learned t
o make coffee that didn’t taste like strong lye!”

  That night in camp Jed Asbury got out the papers he had found in the wagon. He read the first letter he opened.

  Dear Michael,

  When you get this you will know George is dead. He was thrown from a horse near Willow Springs, dying the following day. The home ranch comprises 60,000 acres and the other ranches twice that. This is to be yours or your heirs if you have married since we last heard from you, if you or the heirs reach the place within one year of George’s death. If you do not claim your estate within that time the property will be inherited by next of kin. You may remember what Walt is like, from the letters.

  Naturally, we hope you will come at once for we all know what it would be like if Walt took over. You should be around twenty-six now and able to handle Walt, but be careful. He is dangerous and has killed several men.

  Things are in good shape now but trouble is impending with Besovi, a neighbor of ours. If Walt takes over that will certainly happen. Also, those of us who have worked and lived here so long will be thrown out.

  Tony Costa

  The letter had been addressed to Michael Latch, St. Louis, Missouri. Thoughtfully, Jed folded the letter and then glanced through the others. He learned much, yet not enough.

  Michael Latch had been the nephew of George Baca, a half-American, half-Spanish rancher who owned a huge hacienda in California. Neither Baca nor Tony Costa had ever seen Michael. Nor had the man named Walt, who apparently was the son of George’s half-brother.

  The will was that of Michael’s father, Thomas Latch, and conveyed to Michael the deed to a small California ranch.

  From other papers and an unmailed letter, Jed discovered that the younger of the two men he had buried had been Michael Latch. The other dead man and the woman had been Randy and May Kenner. There was mention in a letter of a girl named Arden who had accompanied them.