Mojave Crossing s-11 Read online

  West of us lay the Rancho Rodeo de las Aguas [now the Beverly Hills area], but looking along the edge of the mountains I saw a faint smudge of blue smoke, indicating where our destination lay. This was the adobe house of Greek George ... the very same place where Tiburcio Vasquez had been shot and wounded as he scrambled out a window, attempting to escape.

  Roderigo came out of the tavern, looking serious as all get out. "Se@nor, there are five men at the house of the Griego, but the man of your name is not among them."

  Well, I was some relieved. No Sackett had ever shot another, and I wasn't itching to be the first. We'd never had much truck with those Clinch Mountain Sacketts, for they were a rough lot, having to do with moonshining and perambulating up and down the Wilderness Trail or the Natchez Trace for no good purpose. But they were fighters ... they were good fighters.

  "We'll ride over there," I said. "I figure to lay hands on my outfit."

  He looked at me, and I'll give him this.

  He was game. He mounted up and swung his horse alongside of mine, and the only thing he did was to reach back and take the thong off his six-shooter.

  "I would like you to meet my grandfather," he said suddenly. "Old Ben would like you."

  "From all I've heard," I replied honestly, "I'd like to meet him."

  And I'd heard a-plenty. This here was a wise old man, although not too wise to be taken in by a pretty face. But he was not alone in that.

  We trotted our horses along the road that came down behind the adobe, and we swung down.

  The door opened and a man lounged there, a tough, kind of taunting smile on his face. "Well, look who's here! We figured you were lyin' dead out on the Mojave."

  "I take a lot of killing."

  "So you do." The man chuckled. "But we never make the same mistake twice."

  While he was making talk, I was walking toward him. Roderigo, so far as I knew, had not moved from his place by the horses.

  The man in the door straightened up and, grinning at me, suddenly went for his gun. He no doubt fancied himself a fast man, but I didn't even move to draw. I just fetched him a clout with one of my fists, which are big and toughened by a good many years of work with shovel, sledge hammer, and rope ... and he never got his gun clear.

  My fist caught him on the angle of his jaw and drove the side of his head against the door jamb. He slumped over and fell where he was, and at the same time I heard two quick shots from outside. Flattening against the door with my fist full of gun, I glanced over to see Roderigo holding a smoking pistol. There was a man with a Winchester slumped over a sill of the window in the ell of the house. He looked kind of dead to me.

  Inside three men were suddenly reaching for the smoky beams, and a pretty Mexican girl was standing staring at me. She was young, but she was pert ... and I'd say that her path had probably been a twisty one.

  "You look like him!" She was surprised, a body could see that. "You look just like him!"

  "We Sacketts favor," I said, "if it is Nolan you speak of, but I've never seen the man."

  "You'll see him but once," she said contemptuously.

  "Why, now. As to that, I'll speak my piece and he'll go about his business ... elsewhere."

  It was not so much a boast as a wish. I called for no shooting with kinfolk, and was surprised that he had it in mind. Only maybe he didn't.

  To those others I said, "I came for my outfit ... and the gold."

  "You'll find your horses and gear yonder."

  A red-headed man indicated the corral and stable.

  "I don't know anything about any gold."

  "Ma'am," I said to that Spanish girl, "stir up your fire. I reckon we're going to need it. And bring that spit over here." I grinned at those men. "I traipsed about down New Mexico way for quite a time. Those there Apaches, they know a thing or two."

  The red-headed one, he wasn't worried much, but those others, they started shifting their feet and both of them broke out in a sweat.

  The one I'd slugged in the doorway was fetching around, so I backed up and grabbed hold of the back of his neck with one hand and dragged him bodily into the room and skidded him across the floor.

  The Mexican girl hadn't moved. I took up a poker and worried the fire a mite, then she turned and took up her shawl. "Don't you worry," she said to the others. "I'll go for Nolan and Se@nor Dayton."

  She looked boldly at me. "This one will do nothing! He is afraid."

  I chuckled at that, and it made her mad. Her black eyes flashed and she started to say something back, but I just said, "Ma'am, you sure are a pretty little baggage, but you just go get Nolan Sackett, and when you come upon him you tell him it is William Tell Sackett who is here, and to come along if he's a mind to. As for Dayton, he knew I was coming here. I saw him earlier today ... with a man named Oliphant."

  That surprised them, but she went scooting out like she was afraid I'd stop her, which I'd no mind to do. It was in me to settle things, and if they all came around so much the better.

  "I have friends, se@nor," Roderigo said to me;

  "perhaps I should go for them." He paused. "There are the vaqueros from our ranch, and I believe it is a thing they would like, to find these ... who are known to be thieves."

  Now even Red was looking out of sorts, so I told Roderigo, "You go ahead. Tell 'em to bring extra rope. We may need some neckties for these boys."

  Back in those days the pueblo, as everybody called Los Angeles, was a place noted for being mighty free with their hangings, legal or otherwise. Over a span of a few years there had been forty legal hangings and thirty-seven spur-of-the-moment affairs. Shootings were a daily occurrence, but, casual as the authorities were, the townspeople were notoriously short-tempered on occasion, and it required little effort to organize a lynching party.

  They might not figure me for much, but they had the consciousness of their own guilt to worry them.

  There was a close-up storeroom at the back of the house and, herding them all back there, I put them in and barred the door.

  Outside, I located my horses, all five of them, and my saddle gear. Saddling up the horses, I found my pack, which had been gone through, but most of it nobody wanted and so it was intact. My Winchester I found in the house along with somebody else's outfit. The Winchester I took, checked the loads, and made ready for whatever might happen.

  But what I wanted most was the gold, not all of it being mine. And believe me, I wanted what belonged to me. For the better part of an hour I went over that house, going through everything, hunting the gold, but I didn't find it at all.

  And then I heard horses a-coming and knew I was in for shooting trouble.

  From the window I watched them approach, then slipped outside and waited among the willows beside the spring. The Mexican girl was with them, and I counted six men, all heavily armed.

  They came up at a fast trot, accompanied by a little dust cloud, and as they slowed their pace and spread out to surround the house the dust sort of thinned and settled down. When they actually moved up around the house the horses were walking.

  Crouched among the willows, I just waited and let them come. I wasn't seeking any shooting war unless forced to it. Most particularly, I was hunting Nolan Sackett, but he wasn't among them.

  All this time I was studying about where my gold might be. Oliphant had said it was here, on this place, but I had my doubts.

  When those riders dismounted and went into the house I went over to my horses, mounted up on the stallion, and walked them away from there. From inside I heard argument and talk, but I walked steadily away from there, putting the bulk of the barn behind me as soon as I could, and heading for the mouth of a canyon that opened not far off.

  Roderigo would be back, and until then I wasn't going to do any shooting I could avoid.

  I might kill the wrong man. I might kill the man who knew where my gold was.

  After a minute or two they came bursting out of the door and began to hunt all around.

&nbs
p; Sitting my saddle in a clump of tall cactus, I watched them, holding my Winchester across the saddle in front of me. Off down the valley from the direction of the Rancho Rodeo de las Aguas I could see a dust cloud that meant riders moving fast.

  The men at the house started scouting around for my tracks, but there were too many horses around the place, and too many people had come and gone. They weren't going to get anywhere with that, and I wasn't much worried.

  I was only worried about getting my gold back, for there were folks back in Arizona depending on me. My hunch was that wherever that gold went, Dorinda would know. Unless I was judging her all wrong, she was a girl who could keep her eye on a thing like that.

  That distant cloud was coming nearer, and I guess they sighted it, too, for all of a sudden they scrambled for their saddles and rode off, scattering out.

  Two of them rode past me, heading up the canyon [Laurel Canyon] where there were other hangouts for outlaws.

  When they had gone I walked my horses from the clump of cactus and rode back down to the ranch. Only the girl remained to greet me, and her eyes flared when she saw me.

  "You know where that gold is?" I asked mildly. "You could save me trouble if you told me."

  "I care nothing for your trouble!" She tossed her head. "When Se@nor Sackett comes he will make a fool of you."

  "He'd better hurry. My friends are coming."

  She said nothing to that, for now we could hear the drum of the horses' hoofs.

  "If you change your mind," I said, "you come to me. Seems a shame, a pretty girl like you, mixed up with this crowd."

  She started to reply, then tightened her lips.

  There were twenty wiry, tough-looking vaqueros with Roderigo, and they looked disappointed when it proved there would be no fight.

  "You had better come away with us," Roderigo said, "Old Ben wishes to see you."

  "Ben Mandrin?"

  "Si." He smiled. "And the Se@norita Robiseau."

  Chapter Six.

  The house was a long adobe with several doors opening on a veranda. The place was old and mellow. There were some huge old oaks about, and a few sycamores. The shade was a welcome thing after the long ride's heat, and I pulled up there and sat my saddle a minute or two, just looking around.

  If they didn't take it away from Old Ben, this place might become Roderigo's, and I didn't blame him for wanting it. There was a feeling of lazy good will about it, from the smell of the barnyard and the jasmine around the house to the shade of the huge old trees.

  The house was L-shaped and rambling, and opened on a view that showed the sea away off to the west-- just a hint of it beyond the round shoulder of a hill. In between was grassland, brown now and parched from the drouth, with here and there a cultivated patch of corn or beans, or some other row crop.

  A door opened and, looking past my horse's head, I saw Dorinda standing there, wearing a lovely dress and looking more beautiful than she'd a right to.

  "Won't you get down and come in? Mr.

  Mandrin would like to see you."

  She turned. "Juan, will you take care of the gentleman's horse?"

  Stepping down from the saddle, I whipped dust from my clothes with my hat and walked across the yard.

  The feeling up my spine warned me that somebody was watching--not Dorinda, and not Juan.

  She held out her hand to me, smiling with her lips. It was a wide, pretty smile showing beautiful teeth, but her eyes did not smile.

  They were cautious, somewhat worried eyes.

  "Thank you, Mr. Sackett. Thank you very much for all you did. When they came to get me we thought you were dead."

  "Handy," I said.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Otherwise they might have made sure."

  She let her eyes rest on my face a moment longer, as if trying to judge how smart I was, or how dangerous. ...

  "It was all a mistake."

  "There's men dead out there on the Mojave would be surprised to hear it," I said bluntly.

  When she started to answer me I cut her short. "Ma'am, I didn't come to call on you. I came to see Ben Mandrin."

  His voice came deep and booming. "And so you shall! Come in, Mr. Sackett! Please come in!"

  He was sitting in a great old rocker, and whatever I had expected a pirate to look like, it was not this. He had never been tall--not like me, anyway--but he was broad-shouldered, and my guess was that he had once been a mighty powerful man. It showed in the size of his bones. His wrists were as large as mine, which are ten inches around, and he had strong, well-made hands, flat across the knuckles ... a fighter's hands.

  He had a broad, heavily boned face and deep-set eyes; his heavy shock of black hair was mixed with gray. He had to be upwards of seventy years old, but he didn't look it.

  Only you could see at a glance that something was wrong with his legs. He had them covered by a blanket, but I could tell they were thin, almost like there was nothing there at all.

  There was an old scar over one eye and another on his cheekbone, but he did not look sinister, as they say of such men. He looked like a strong old man who had lived a life.

  He was old, all right, a body could see that, but I could see a whole sight more. Old as he was, and with those crippled legs, there was a lot of iron in him yet.

  "So you're Sackett?" he said. "Dorry told me of you. You sound like a fighting man."

  The scar over his eye held my attention, and he noticed it. "Saber," he said. "That was a long time ago, a lifetime away."

  "Off Hatteras," I said, "and they thought it killed you."

  Well, both of them were surprised. Dorinda turned sharply to look at me, and the old man caught the arms of his chair and pulled himself out of his slump. "Now how could you know that?" he said.

  "There were few enough who knew."

  "You raided the Carolina coast too often,"

  I said. "The man who gave you that cut over the eye was my grandfather."

  He glared at me for a minute, then he chuckled. "He was a fighter," he said. "Best hand with a blade I ever saw--butar one."

  He took a good look at me. "There's another Sackett here. Is he kin of yours?"

  "I reckon. He's a Clinch Mountain Sackett, and we don't hold with them ... but we aren't pirates."

  There was a mighty hard look in those eyes of his ... gave a man something to think about. Had he been a younger or even a healthier man, you'd think twice before giving sass to him. But I thought he liked this talk, and it came over me that it had probably been a time since anybody gave him back man-talk. Because of his wealth and his being crippled and all, they'd more than likely soft-talk him.

  "That was a long time ago," Ben Mandrin said.

  "I've become a rancher and a stable citizen."

  His eyes glinted with a kind of tough humor. "Or hadn't you heard?"

  "I heard, and I believe it ... up to a point."

  He chuckled again and, glancing over at Dorinda, he said, "I like this man."

  Then he turned his eyes back to me. "How'd you like to work for me?"

  "I'm not hunting work. I'm hunting thirty pounds of gold that was taken from me, and when I find it I'm riding back to Arizona. And furthermore"--I looked right at Dorinda--

  "I've got an idea who to ask about it."

  Oh, he got it all right! Old Ben missed mighty little. He glanced at her, then back at me. "You're wrong, my friend--she has been with me."

  He gestured toward a chair. "Sit down, and we'll talk a bit of ships and sabers and the Carolina coast fifty years ago ... or how much did your grandfather tell you?"

  He turned to her. "Dorinda, bring us a bottle of wine--a very good bottle, that will bring memories around us."

  We sat silent then, listening to her retreating footsteps. From the sound of them, the wine must have been somewhere at the far end of the house, and it was a great way off, it seemed.

  "You helped her in the desert, Sackett, and for that I thank you."

  Surprise
d, I was, for I'd been thinking he knew nothing of her leaving the pueblo. "I went for water, and when I started back, they had her. I stumbled as one of them shot at me, and he thought me dead."

  "And you lay still? She does not know that I know."

  He lighted a long black cheroot, then gave me a sharp glance. "Did she get your gold?"

  "As to that, I couldn't say, but I would believe her a woman to know where gold was. I think"-I tried to put it so he would take no offense--

  "she has a nose for gold, if you'll not mind my saying so."

  She came back then, walking along the veranda toward us, and we sat silent, waiting. The bottle she brought was Madeira, of a kind they call Rainwater, although no storm that I have seen brought such water from the sky.

  "I would have preferred Jamaica," he said, "but it is hard to come by in California."

  We tasted the wine, and it was good. I thought him a fine old man, but I trusted the wine more than I did Old Ben Mandrin; and I trusted him a bit more than I did that black-eyed witch woman. Surely, I thought, this was a strange way for a tall and homely cowhand and miner to be treated, and it gave me an uncomfortable feeling to think that it was likely he would lose all this.

  Roderigo had told me a little more during our ride from the pueblo to Greek George's ranch. Turner, the man from the bank, had relied on Dorinda to persuade Old Ben to sign the notes; and Turner would get cash from Dayton and his friends, while they would take over the note and get the ranch. Even without the note, they would have Old Ben lashed to the mast, for he was broke and down to his last bit of money.

  The drought had ruined the crops and his range, and there was nothing left for him but to yield up the rancho ... but what would he do then, a crippled old man?

  There was none of that in his talk now, for once the wine warmed his blood he talked of the old days off the Carolina coast, and of the fight with my grandfather. They had fought on a bloody deck--my grandfather being one of a make-up crew that had gone off to intercept him when there was no warship about equipped to handle the job. They had fought a desperate fight, with both men wounded and bleeding before the cut that felled Old Ben.