Guns of the Timberlands Page 4

  He was a lean, well set-up young man with blond hair and a thoughtful face. A quiet man, but tough and capable.

  Coffin offered his glasses and Clay studied the rider with interest. The morning air was clear and the sun bright, but along the trail from town there were occasional clumps of smoke trees and desert willow that obscured the rider for minutes at a time. Finally, as she emerged from behind a sandhill, he made her out. It was Colleen Riley.

  There was a steep trail, useful only to a skilled rider on a good mountain horse, that led off Piety on the town side. He handed the glasses back to Coffin. “I’m going down there.”

  He started his horse, then turned in the saddle. “Devitt will probably start moving today.”

  The sun was warm and he tipped his hat lower over his face. He went swiftly down the dangerous switchback trail, sliding the last few feet, then breaking into a canter through the cat-claw and mesquite. He came out on the trail just as Colleen appeared, not twenty yards away.

  “Hello, cowboy!” she called gaily. “Riding somewhere?”

  “To meet you.” He gestured toward Piety. “Saw you coming.”

  She glanced toward the peak, then looked back at him, her eyes sober. He looked fit and handsome this morning, a lean, powerful man who filled out his gray wool shirt as a man should.

  “We’ve been expecting visitors,” he added, “and did not want to seem lacking in hospitality.”

  “Clay”—she used his first name without thinking—“you mustn’t have trouble with Jud. He’s a hard man—too hard sometimes. Why don’t you sell out to him?”

  “He hasn’t asked me. If he did, I wouldn’t sell. This is my home, and I like it here. I’m not going to tuck in my tail and run at the first sign of trouble. And I’ve had trouble before.”

  Her eyes followed the trail toward the buildings in the mouth of the Gap. “You’ve a lovely view.”

  He swung his horse into the trail and they rode along. “It was the view I liked as much as the grass,” he admitted. “I like space out in front of me.”

  Colleen drew up suddenly. “Why! Why, the trail goes right through your gates!”

  Clay Bell dug out the makings and began to build a smoke, offering no comment.

  She turned on him. “Jud will have a lot of trouble getting his machinery through those gates, won’t he?”

  Bell looked up at her, grinning slyly. “Yes, ma’am, I sort of think so.”

  “You won’t let him?”

  “That’s right.”

  “But you don’t own the timberland!”

  “Neither does Jud. But I’ve a prior right of use. I’ve even worked to improve it, and to prevent fires. He wants to destroy all we’ve saved.”

  She turned in the saddle. “But you don’t understand! The ties are for a railroad, and railroads build a country.”

  “So does beef.”

  For the first time she began to see the situation in its true light. She had known Jud Devitt three years and had become accustomed to seeing him ride roughshod over obstacles. Looking suddenly at Clay Bell, she had a sudden realization he presented a different sort of obstacle. One that might not be so easy to ride over.

  “There’ll be trouble,” she said soberly. “Serious trouble.”

  “Colleen”—he gestured at the ranch, then down at the bottom lands—“this wasn’t easy to build. Without the water and grass from the high range, we can’t operate here. I’d be broke. I’d be through.

  “I fought Indians and rustlers when I first came in here. Two of my first bunch of hands are buried here. You think I’m going to give up just because Jud Devitt wants to log off my land?”

  They rode on and Hank Rooney opened the gate for them, glancing briefly at Colleen.

  “Won’t you come in?” Clay said. He turned without waiting for her reply. “Hank, tell that cook to rustle us some coffee. We’ll be on the porch.”

  When they were seated she looked around with excited interest. The ride and the early air had brought color to her cheeks. He watched her with appreciation. There was depth to her, and a quickness of mind that he liked. Young as she was, she was no child. She was a woman with all a woman’s instincts. He felt a vague uneasiness stir within him. She was the first woman who had ever sat on this porch, looked out over this view.

  “It’s strange to actually be out West,” she said suddenly. “My uncle used to tell us stories about Bill Longley and John Wesley Hardin. Were there actually men like that?”

  “Some still around.”

  “Do you know Stag Harvey and Jack Kilburn? Are they really dangerous men?”

  He looked around at her. “Where did you see them?”

  “Oh, they were talking to Bob last night. Mr. Tripp, you know. He’s foreman of the lumberjacks for Jud. That clerk at the hotel told me who they were.”

  The cook came in with the coffee, prepared to be surly about it. Then he saw Colleen and swallowed a little. Carefully, he dried an already dry table before her, and then put down the coffee with a little flourish.

  Tripp talking to Harvey and Kilburn? Hiring them? No, he told himself, it was too soon for that. Devitt did not yet know what sort of a fight he was facing. Yet the fact was one to be remembered. Both men were strictly cash-on-the-line warriors. Tough and dangerous, but fighters for money—and worth all they were paid.

  He glanced up from his coffee at the girl across the table. It was not only the first time any woman had ever sat on this veranda, but the first time in many months that one had sat across the table from him. Somehow she fitted into the background, she belonged here. She was looking across the valley now, her features relaxed, an expression of quiet peace in her eyes and around her mouth.

  She looked around, suddenly aware of his attention. For the first time they looked directly at each other, and everything inside him seemed to come suddenly to rest. A slight flush mounted in her cheeks.

  “You belong here.” He said it suddenly. “This should be your home.”

  She studied him curiously, then looked around the ranch yard, at the sunlit, hard-packed earth, the soft shadows along the walls, the coolness of the place after the heat of the valley. Yet even the valley, with its pastel greens and browns, contributed to the peace of the place. She liked the distance, liked the emptiness. She had never been a girl who depended upon others for pleasure, excitement, or entertainment.

  His words echoed in her mind, and she felt a little shiver of something almost like fear, yet there was such a ring of sincerity and truth in his voice that it caught every bit of her attention and almost forced her acceptance.

  Was this her country? Did she belong here, under the shoulder of Emigrant Gap? There was a faint perfume from the sage that mixed with the aroma of the coffee, the smell of old leather, the clean, bright warmth of the sun.

  No sooner had the thought come to mind than she rebelled. What could she be thinking of? She was to marry Jud Devitt!

  “You’re mistaken,” she told him seriously. “I’m a city girl. This is just an interlude for me, a sort of vacation.”

  His eyes were slightly mocking. “Is it?”

  “Jud Devitt is a man a girl could be proud of,” she said. “He does things, big things. Men respect him for his ability.”

  “These big things—aren’t they all done for Jud Devitt? And you want to remember that you’ve only see him win. You never know a man until you see him lose.”

  She looked at him again and something in his eyes made her heart falter. “And you? Have you ever lost?”

  “More than once.”

  He glanced out from under the edge of the veranda roof. A thin trail of smoke lay against the sky. As he looked there was a puff.

  “Jud Devitt’s coming now.” Bell got to his feet. “I wish he would bring all his men at once. The sooner they know what they are facing, the better.”

  He held the door for her and they walked outside. The cook rattled pans in the kitchen but there was no one else about.

&
nbsp; “Are you so anxious for trouble?”

  “No … but if it has to come, why wait?”

  “His men like to fight. They are used to winning, too.”

  He could see them coming, four men riding toward the Gap. He glanced toward Piety Mountain and saw two more puffs of smoke.

  Coolly, he considered his position. It was unlikely that Devitt would try to force a way through at this time. He would try to bully his way through, then resort to trickery or some legal or semi-legal means. But a man with a rifle could hold his place for a long time.

  He walked to his saddle and took the rifle from the scabbard.

  “You’re not going to use that?”

  “Not unless I’m forced to.” There was a whimsical light in his eye. “Not unless your man tries to come through.”

  He stood waiting, watching the riders. Jud Devitt was in the lead, and the man rode well. A little behind on his right was Bob Tripp, and the two other men followed close behind. Clay waited. Sweat trickled down his cheek and he drew deep on his cigarette, then dropped it to the earth.

  They were coming on, and he was ready. He stepped outside the gate and stood waiting, a tall, lonely figure, the stone walls of the buildings rising to right and left.

  CHAPTER 5

  DEVITT HAD NOT failed, as he approached, to note the way in which the ranch buildings commanded the passage through the Gap. This was something he should have been told. Why had Wheeler failed to tell him?

  The slits in the rock walls were ports for shooting, and he could see at a glance that if it came to that sort of fighting, two men could hold the Gap against fifty. His jaw muscles tensed as he saw the figure of Clay Bell standing carelessly outside the gate, waiting.

  Then he saw Colleen Riley, and he swore under his breath. What possessed the girl to come out here at a time like this?

  Devitt drew up some twenty yards from Bell. “We’re scouting a route into the Deep Creek timber,” he said. “Can we get our sawmill through here?”

  “This way is closed.”

  “So?” Devitt placed his hands on the pommel. “You undertake to block a public road? A stage route?”

  Clay Bell took his time, rolling a fresh smoke before he spoke. He wanted to take time enough for more of his riders to appear. Also, he could see that Devitt was impatient.

  “The stage stopped using this route fifteen years ago, and the road goes through Tinkersville now. Nobody has been allowed through here since I took over, without express permission.”

  Devitt was coldly angry. It irritated him that Colleen must be standing there to see him frustrated. “You take a lot on yourself, Bell. You’re just a squatter here. You ranchers try to control the entire range without the slightest legal right.”

  Clay smiled and put the cigarette between his lips. Deliberately, he stalled. “You’re a smart man, Devitt. You should have looked into my land titles before you started this move. I’ve filed on this claim and proved up on it. I own all the land in Emigrant Gap, lock, stock, and barrel.

  “Also,” he added, “I own over a hundred acres at the foot of the Pass. You’ll not cross over my land with any logging equipment whatever, now or later.”

  Jud Devitt sat very still in his saddle. For the moment he was beaten, and he tried to think of some way to save face until he could circumvent this move. Noble Wheeler should have told him of this. At the same time, he appreciated a good blow. Clay Bell was shrewd, and Devitt could see no mere show of force would bluff the man.

  “You deny me right-of-way? You can’t do it, Bell. A man has a right of access to his property. Legally, you haven’t a leg to stand on.”

  Clay drew deep on his cigarette. The wagons hauling Devitt’s machinery were drawing nearer. “Possession has its legal points, Devitt. And I’m in possession. Also, I’m grazing cattle on Deep Creek range. Sorry, Devitt, you’ve tried to stack the cards on the wrong man.”

  Jud Devitt’s patience was wearing thin. “What,” he asked harshly, “if we force a way?”

  Bob Tripp glanced quickly at Devitt, his lips forming a protest. Devitt was bull-headed sometimes and might not realize what he was facing.

  “You won’t,” Bell replied shortly. “You try to force a way in and you’ll have to come shooting.”

  “There’s four of us—one of you.”

  “Yes.”

  Jud Devitt studied the man before him. His impatience drove him, and he was angered to have a man standing between himself and the job he meant to do. His every urge was to drive through, to ride the man down and press on. He had three tough men with him, and all were armed. Behind, others came. Yet something held him back.

  It was the man himself.

  It was Clay Bell, and something in his manner. Bell was neither alarmed nor excited. He gave no indication of any emotion. He just waited for Devitt to move.

  Jud Devitt had the feeling suddenly that to Clay Bell this was old, not new. That he played a game in which all the moves were clear-cut and definite, while Devitt himself was uncertain.

  “All right,” he said finally, “you’ve stopped me. But I’ll log off Deep Creek if it has to be over your dead body!”

  He turned his horse but Bell’s voice arrested his movement. “Devitt?”

  “What?”

  “What about your dead body?”

  Devitt stared at Bell and suddenly within him there was that cold realization, something that had never really occurred to him before—he might be killed himself! It was preposterous, and yet …

  “Colleen? Are you riding with us?”

  She swung into her saddle and rode to the gate which Bell held open. “Be careful,” she whispered. “I know him. He’ll stop at nothing!”

  At the foot of the grade Jud Devitt stopped beside the wagons. “Hold the wagons,” he told Williams. “We’ll go up to the plateau later.”

  “Better send us a chuckwagon. We’ve only a little grub.”

  “You won’t camp here!” Clay Bell sat the saddle of the appalousa. “This is still my land, Devitt. I’ll allow no camping. I’ll give you no legal ground at all. Now get rolling! Get back of that white boulder. That’s my property line.”

  Devitt’s face was white. “I’ll be damned if I—!”

  “Move back.” There was no comfort in Bell’s expression. “Start now or I’ll shoot every head of stock on my land. Get started!”

  Devitt waved a hand at his men. His face was stiff with fury. “Roll ’em back! Let him have his fun!” He turned on Bell. “You’re piling up trouble for yourself!” he said. “I’ll see—”

  “Move!” Bell repeated. He pushed his horse forward, shouldering his appalousa against Devitt’s horse.

  Devitt hesitated, his face ugly and mottled; then, never taking his eyes from those of Bell, he backed up until across the line marked by the white boulder.

  Promptly, and without a backward glance, Clay Bell swung his horse and cantered up the trail to the ranch house. Jud Devitt stared after him, swore bitterly, then turned his horse toward town. He did not speak to Colleen as they rode along.

  He had come off the loser in his first meeting with Bell, but there would be another time … another time …

  “Jud?”

  “Oh … sorry, Colleen, I’m afraid I wasn’t thinking. This mess irritates me.”

  “Why don’t you leave it, Jud? Get the timber another place.”

  He smiled at her to cover his irritation. “You leave that to me, Colleen. It’s my problem.”

  She rode beside him in silence. She could see he was determined. He was too stubbom to leave now.

  “Jud—he’ll fight.”

  “Of course.”

  “Men will be killed. Doesn’t that matter to you?”

  “It matters, of course it matters. But one man can’t stand in the way of progress. That railroad must go through!”

  “You could get the ties elsewhere.”

  “At greater expense. At greater loss of time. They are here, I mean to have
them.”

  He was scarcely aware of her protests. Already his mind was leaping ahead, trying to find some way to get around this trouble. There might be another route to the Deep Creek range, to both the valley and the plateau. He must talk to Wheeler.

  Colleen maintained her silence. The air was cooler now, as they neared town. Dipping down to where the trail ran along the creek, she felt the breeze off the stream, and from the desert willows. She slowed her pace, remembering Clay.

  His features were clear-cut, brown from sun and wind. There was something, too, in the way he walked … and she had noticed what had impressed Jud Devitt. Clay Bell had not been worried at the thought of trouble. He had wasted no words, indulged in no violent talk. Yet he had won—he had forced Jud Devitt to back up.

  And Jud Devitt would never forgive him.

  CHAPTER 6

  JUD DEVITT FOUND Noble Wheeler in the dining room of the Tinker House. He drew back a chair and dropped into it, coldly furious. “Noble, why didn’t you tell me that Clay Bell owned Emigrant Gap?”

  Noble Wheeler gripped his fork tightly in one hand, his knife in the other, both big fists resting on the table-top, his big jaws chomping his food like a restless horse over a cold bit. There was no denying the astonishment in his eyes. “What? Did you say owned?”

  He put a chunk of beef in his mouth, staring blankly at his plate. Bell owned Emigrant Gap! But that …

  “He claims he has title to it. Refuses me right-of-way.”

  “Never guessed he’d be that smart.” Wheeler was thinking now. This could change everything, ruin his carefully laid plans. “Changes a lot of things.”

  “Is there another way up?”

  “Through The Notch. T’other side of the plateau.”

  “Does he own that?” Devitt was sarcastic.

  “Maybe. We’ll find out.”

  Devitt pushed back his chair and waved the waitress away. “I’m wiring Chase. If we get our grant on that timber we can force him to give us right-of-way.”

  “And if you don’t?”

  Devitt’s lips thinned and his eyes looked their dislike at Wheeler. “I’ll go in, anyway. No damned cowhand will stop me!”