Novel 1978 - The Proving Trail (v5.0) Page 13

  For three generations there has persisted in our family a deadly feud which has resulted in seven duels, four of them fatal. There have been other deaths attributed to one cause or another, but some at least were from poison.

  Twice I was myself embroiled in duels, twice I was victorious, and after that efforts were made to use poison or to way-lay me. I had enough. I simply disappeared. Then I met your mother, married, and you were born.

  There was no honor among them. They wasted their inheritance and wanted the rest. At last count there were thirteen of them and but three left of us. Their name is Cabanus although some have used the name of Yant. If something happens to us they will be the closest and can claim any estate, and this, as much as hatred, is behind it.

  Do not take them lightly. They have intelligence of a high order, and they have courage, yet they will stop at nothing, and will kill from ambush or with a knife in the dark, or poison, and it is said the women are skilled and practiced poisoners with poisons brought by them from Surinam, where they frequently go.

  I had hoped to keep you from all this, had hoped to win by gambling enough money to send you to school, to set you up somewhere in a business or profession, and have done with all that. Then word came to me that they were seeking me out.

  The most skillful and deadly of them all is Joseph Vrydag, a cousin of theirs, lately of Surinam. He would now be a man of forty years and spent some years before he was twenty in the goldfields of California and Nevada. I have no idea as to his appearance.

  There was a little more, but there lay the gist of it, and it seemed I should have no recourse but to lay claim to what estate there was, if only to defeat them. When one is very young, death seems remote. I thought of the poisoned tack in my boot. I should have to be wary.

  Joseph Vrydag…no idea as to appearance, but a man of forty years. I must walk with caution, and alone.

  There remained one more document. It was another map, but an ancient map, drawn upon beautifully tanned deerskin. On it were located a river, a small fort or what appeared to be so, and an Indian village. Trees were indicated and a cliff, nearby a deep canyon or ravine, and at a point in the wall of the canyon, a cave was indicated, or what appeared to be a cave, behind a waterfall.

  What it meant I had no idea, but somehow I got the idea that it might be the most important item of all. Why was it enclosed here? Obviously it was very old, obviously a part of my legacy, if such it could be called. There was no indication as to the location of the map, no names were given, nothing beyond the few terrain features. The map was meant to be used by someone who knew the area to which the map applied.

  On a sudden inspiration I opened my bedroll, where I sometimes carried a few extra items of clothing, and got out my old buckskin hunting shirt. It had been patched a time or two but was still useful. On the inside of the back, just above the waistline, I stitched the buckskin map, the face of the map toward the back of the shirt so it was not visible.

  When I had finished the stitching, I stood up and stretched, and as I did so I glanced out of the window. There was a man standing across the street, somewhat in the shadows. As the night was cold, he wore a heavy coat. Moving to the side of the window, I drew the shade, then went to the door, glanced into the empty hall, and in two quick steps was at the door of the room next to mine. It stood open, as the room was empty. Closing the door after me, I went to the window of the dark room and peered out.

  The man in the heavy coat was still there, his shadow obscured so I could not make him out. Another man came up the street and joined him. I saw the white of his face as he looked up. So then, I was being watched for.

  Returning to my room, I put the last of my possessions together, rolled my blanket roll tighter, and lay down on my bed to wait, with the light turned off.

  A hand touched my shoulder. It was Louis. “No light,” he warned, “and come now!”

  Rising, I took up my rifle and blanket roll and followed him down the dark hall. How he expected me to leave the hotel without being seen I had no idea, for the front entrance opened upon the street and the back door upon what I remembered as a wide, vacant area. Yet I had not had time to examine it.

  He led the way to the back door and paused. Outside I heard a confused mumbling and what sounded like a drunken argument, then a rather confused medley of voices singing “Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair.”

  “Step outside,” Louis whispered, “and join them. Say nothing, just go along with them.”

  The door opened a crack and I slipped out and men closed around me. Almost at once the door opened again, but this time the hall was lighted and a shaft of light fell over the group.

  “Come on, boys,” Louis was saying, “be reasonable! I’ve got some sleepy, tired people inside!”

  “Aw, look!” a drunken voice said. “There’s French Louie! Good ol’ Frenchy! Come on, Louie! Have a drink!”

  “Too much work,” Louis said affably, “but I’ll tell you what I’ll do. You go sing somewhere else and I’ll give you a couple of bottles!”

  “It’s a deal!” the man beside me shouted. “Good ol’ Frenchy! ’Member when we worked the graveyard shift together?”

  “Now, now, boys,” Louis said. “Here, take these bottles, and you boys just drift along. My guests are tired people and need their rest.”

  “We were just serenadin’ ’em,” another miner said. “Come on, Louis! Come along with us!”

  “Some other night,” he said. “You boys get along now!”

  He closed the door, and staggering and singing, waving a bottle or two, they started off across the lot, singing “Tenting Tonight on the Old Camp Ground.”

  The man who had draped his arm around my shoulders now whispered, “Your hosses are under them cottonwoods yonder. When we get to ’em, you just slip off and you’re on your own.”

  “Sure…and thanks.”

  “Forget it. Any friend of Louis’s is a friend of ours.”

  They staggered on singing, and I stood under the trees for several minutes watching the hotel. Nobody followed the “drunken” miners and nobody came toward me, so evidently the ruse had worked. Mounting and staying behind the trees and buildings, I found my way to the edge of town, taking bypaths until well clear of it. Then I rode off along the trail to the south, following Clear Creek.

  From time to time I paused to listen, but there were no sounds of pursuit. Nevertheless, I decided to leave the trail at the first opportunity.

  By moonrise I was on the dim trail that led to Chicago Lakes. There was a good chance they would not guess what I was doing, and I had told no one. Had I been going west, the route was by way of Silver Plume and Bakerville, and east the logical route was that toward Idaho Falls and Denver. Instead I had gone south into some very rough, wild country. By daybreak I was crossing a shoulder of Chief Mountain, and looking back could see no sign of pursuit. After a brief stop to switch gear to my other horse, I rode on down to Cub Creek and followed it to Troublesome.

  Coming out of the mountains with the Hogback in front of me, my belly was fighting hunger and my horses needed a rest if I intended to push them as hard as planned. Ahead of me there was a low house built of flat rocks, a corral with a couple of horses, and some cultivated ground. I rode into the gate and stepped down.

  A man came to the door. “’Light an’ set,” he said. “We’re just at table.”

  “I’d be obliged,” I said, and led my horses to the trough for water. When they’d had their fill, I picketed them on a patch of grass, and dropping my gear in the shade I walked in.

  There was a blond young man and a woman just as blond. Neither of them were much older than me. The house was far cleaner than most.

  “Come far?” he asked.

  “A piece.”

  “Out of the way here,” he commented. “We see mighty few people.”

  “Been workin’ the other side of the Divide,” I said. “Goin’ to see my folks in Kansas.”

  We talked idly a
s we ate, about grass conditions, rainfall, and the price of silver and beef, always top subjects in Colorado at the time. News was scarce and they were hungry for outside talk, so I gave them what I could, as I’d covered a sight of country one time and another. They hungered for me to stay, but the road was calling and the distance great.

  When I topped out on the rise, I looked back. They were still standing in the yard and they seemed to be waving, so I waved as well, although I knew they could not see me. They were tough young folks, the kind who made do, and they would get along all right until there was sickness. It’s then you need folks around you, and a woman needs womenfolks.

  Denver lay off to the north, but I made no show of going there, just taking out across the prairie and putting the Front Range behind me.

  This was Indian country I was riding into, Comanche, Cheyenne, and Arapaho country, with Kiowas further east and Utes all about. Pa had been friends with the Utes, knew both Ouray and Shavano, or Showano—I’d heard him called both. Why they took to pa as they did I’d no idea, but they surely did. Somewhere along the line he’d done them a service or proved himself to them somehow. They were a strong, courageous people, and I hoped I could avoid them, for they did not know me and I wanted to kill none of them, nor to be killed by them.

  That night I camped on Willow Creek, made me a spot of coffee and finished the cold meat and bread Louis Dupuy had given me to travel on, then turned in, dead beat.

  My eyes opened on a damp, foggy morning. Everything was dripping and wet, and much as I was wishful for a hot meal and coffee, I decided against it. Bringing in the horses, I saddled up and taken out.

  It was spooky, riding in that fog. A body couldn’t see beyond his horse’s ears, and although I was riding a dim trail, I’d no idea where it went or what lay ahead of me.

  Suddenly it seemed to me I heard other sounds than my own. I pulled up sharply, listening.

  Sure enough, there was somebody…or something…out there in the fog.

  Chapter 14

  *

  SOMEBODY—AND MORE than one rider—was moving out there in the fog, and not far away. I whispered to my horses, trusting to my own, worried about the other. Their ears were pricked but they seemed as nervous as I, and neither made a sound.

  Hoofs coming nearer. It would be close work for a rifle, so I drew my pistol and waited. Closer and closer, and then they were passing by, not more than fifty or sixty feet away. There was only a sound of hoofs, one irritable curse, and they had passed me by, pointing toward Denver. For several minutes I waited, then holstered my pistol and started off, at a walk first, then a canter.

  Whoever had passed me might have no interest in me, but they were dangerous times, with Indians riding the war trails and any number of men willing to take advantage of any unwary traveler. The old-timers never shot until they could see what they were shooting at, but the greenhorns might blaze away at anything that moved.

  As the fog lifted, I slowed my pace to look around. It was wide-open country, a distant butte showing here or there and not two hundred yards off a herd of antelope, heads up to see what manner of a creature I might be. Uneasily they moved away, not running, just fading into the landscape.

  At noon I made a stop on Box Elder Creek. The creek was not running but there were pools of water here and there. After stripping the gear from my horses, I gave them a chance to roll, watered them, and then saddled the other horse and got a fire started for coffee. The place I’d chosen was under the edge of the creek bank with brush growing along the edge, so my smoke—what little there was from dry wood—dissipated in going through the branches.

  By simply standing up I could survey the country without showing myself, so I looked it over carefully now and again, ate, drank several cups of coffee, and dozed a little in the sun. By the time an hour was past, I was moving out over the prairie again, holding to low ground and changing my angle of travel from time to time so anybody watching me could lay no ambush.

  The afternoon was hot and still. In the distance heat waves danced and shimmered, and in a far-off basin lay a vast blue lake that was not there at all. A lone buffalo bull, looming black and ominous against the sky, seemed to have legs enormously long, and he seemed but a short distance away, but I knew he was well over a mile away. This was a land where mirage was usual, and I had seen them before this.

  Eastward I rode as the day was waning, eastward while the shadows gathered, and nowhere did I see any rider or any moving thing but occasional buffalo, antelope, and a few stray cattle, yet I was haunted by uneasiness. By now my enemies would be moving to prevent me from reaching Carolina. They would know Delphine’s attempt at poison had failed, and they would be coming east to find me.

  Some of their clan remained in the East and they could be reached by telegraph. The wires had been in for several years now and were frequently used by cattlemen and other businessmen. I knew about them, and their existence made me uneasy, for by now word could have reached others of the clan, who might even now be moving west toward me. I had no reason to doubt that the others had remained in the East to await word from Delphine or Felix.

  Now I rode into a rough and broken land, sand hills and washes, sparse growth of any kind, yet riding up a wash I came on an undercut bank where the remains of old campfires were. Charred ends of sticks and brush lay about some of the fires.

  Dismounting, I put together a small fire from the ends of charred sticks and whatever was around, needing only enough to make coffee. It was very still. No sound but my own movements, the slight jingle of spurs, the occasional scuffing of my boots, and the crackle of the fire taking hold, and my eyes kept straying to my horses, trusting to their natural alertness.

  I did not like being hunted. It kept me on edge, irritable and restless, yet these very qualities were needed now, for to relax too much might mean the end of me. Well I knew the caliber of the men who sought me. They were ruthless, relentless, without scruple. I was something in the way of what they wanted and so to be erased, rubbed out, dismissed with a gunshot or a knife blade. Yet there was hatred for me and what I had come from, so there would be a measure of satisfaction in destroying me.

  They were several…how many I had no idea. I was a man alone.

  My water bubbled and boiled. I dropped in the coffee, then after a bit a few drops of cold water to settle the grounds, although I did not much care.

  Several times I stood up, letting my eyes sweep the country around, yet my horses cropped at the sparse grass contentedly. I was filling my cup when I saw the roan’s head come up, ears pricked.

  Well, it taken me a minute, no more. I scooped sand over that fire and gulped coffee whilst standing up to have a look-see.

  Nothing.

  The roan was looking off to the southwest, nostrils dilated. “Watch ’em, boy,” I said.

  Taking up my rifle, I walked a bit higher up the draw, my cup still in my left hand. I was going to get me a bait of that coffee come hell or high water, and it looked to be all of that. One thing I was sure of. When trouble came, it wasn’t going to be something picayunish.

  Nothing in sight, so I went back, filled my cup again, emptied out the coffeepot, rubbed sand over it to take off the worst of the soot, then fitted it into my gear. Shoving the rifle back in the boot, I straddled my horse and led out of there.

  My mother never raised any foolish children, so I rode down that wash for a half mile before I decided to come up out of it. Taking a draw that ran off the wash to the northeast, I followed it until it shallowed out and I rode up on the plain.

  Several times before I topped out, I pulled rein to give myself a look around, but I could see nothing. It was twilight on the plains, or as much twilight as a man ever sees in a land where darkness comes quickly.

  A star hung in the sky like a lonely lamp in a widow’s window. The air was cooler now, and fresh with a wind off the western mountains. The horses stirred restlessly, eager to be off, so seeing nothing, I turned my face eastward
and rode away toward the coming night.

  Behind me the sky was weirdly lit, a magnificent sunset with clouds tinted rose and red, with golden arrows shot upward by the archer of the sun. Sometimes I looked back, but not only to see if I was followed. In part I looked toward the setting sun because terror may ride with beauty, and a man needs to milk his hours of the precious things.

  To ride fast, to travel far, these were empty things unless a man took the time to savor, to taste, to love, to simply be. That much I had from pa, and some from Louis Dupuy, who for all his cynicism was a sentimentalist under the skin.

  Into the coolness of the night I rode alone. Onward, eastward.

  There was a railroad at Dodge City. Maybe it was further west, for they’d done a sight of building. The steam cars would carry me fast to where I needed to go.

  For an hour after darkness fell, I pushed on before I began watching for a place to camp.

  When the moon was rising, I rode into a tree-bordered hollow in the prairie where there was a good spring and a pool of water. My horses gave no sign of anything, so I rode in, gun in hand for trouble, but hoping the way was clear.

  First off I saw a pole corral, then a lean-to barn, and beyond it a dugout faced with rock slabs built into a good wall. The horses wanted water and I let them have it, ears pricked for sound, my nose for any smell.

  No wood smoke, no fresh manure, no fresh-cut wood. Walking over to the dugout, I rapped on the door. When no response came, I lifted the latch and, keeping well to one side, opened the door.

  All quiet. The place smelled empty, so I struck a match. A bunk bed, a fireplace, a table, cooking utensils, and on the wall a piece of paper nailed up.

  Lighting a candle I held it up to the paper.

  NOTISS

  This here place belongs to me, you are welcome. Just leave it like you fond it. My wife’s buried yonder under the trees, an our baby beside her. I am a lonely man. Can’t take it alone. I hev gone back for another woman.