The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume Five Page 9

  The sudden stillness after the sound of guns was like death. Con, unhurt, glanced across at José Morales. The Mexican was leaning against the doorjamb of the stable.

  “One small scratch!” he said. “It is good shooting, no?”

  “Quill?” Fargo turned.

  “All right,” Bernie said. “Threw splinters in my face a couple of times. Those boys weren’t smart. They should have hit the snow sooner.”

  Con walked over to Butch Mogelo. The big outlaw was dead. Three shots had gone through his body, one through the muscles where his neck joined his shoulder, and the last one between the eyes.

  Cabaniss had been hit three times. At least two of the wounds, one inflicted by Morales and one by Quill, would have been fatal.

  Mace Looby was still alive, sitting in the snow.

  He looked up at Fargo.

  “My luck run out,” he said, and died.

  Morales walked toward the house, wiping blood from his cheekbone.

  “You inherit much trouble, sí?”

  Con Fargo turned and looked up at the pines clothing the long razor-backed ridge.

  “Yeah,” he said. “A lot of trouble, but a wonderful country—a man’s country!”

  “No room for a woman?” Audrey said from the door.

  He looked at her, smiling slowly. “A western woman,” he said.

  Audrey said quickly, “My mother rocked me to sleep in a prairie schooner with a rifle across her knees.”

  “That’s western!” Fargo said, and slipping an arm around her waist they walked through the door together.

  Hattan’s Castle

  Hattan’s Castle, a towering pinnacle of rock that points an arresting finger at the sky, looks down on a solitary frame building with a sagging roof, a ruined adobe, and several weed-covered foundations, all that is left of a town that once aspired to be a city.

  On a low mound a quarter of a mile away are three marked graves and seventy-two unmarked, although before their wooden crosses rotted away a dozen others had carried the names and dates of pioneers.

  East of the ruined adobe lies a long and wide stone foundation. Around it there is a litter of broken bottles and a scattered few that the sun has turned into collector’s items. Twenty feet behind the foundation, lying among the concealing debris of a pack-rat’s nest, is a whitened skull. In the exact center of that skull are two round holes less than a half inch apart.

  Several years ago the scattered bones of the skeleton could still be seen, but time, rain, and coyotes being what they are, only the skull remains.

  Among the scattered foundations are occasional charred timbers, half-burned planks, and other evidences of an ancient fire. Of the once booming town of Hattan’s Castle nothing more remains.

  In 1874, a prospector known as Shorty Becker drank a stolen bottle of whiskey on the spot. Drunk, he staggered to the edge of the nearby wash and fell over. Grabbing for a handhold he pulled loose a clump of manzanita and the town of Hattan’s Castle was born.

  Under the roots and clinging to the roots were flecks and bits of gold, and Shorty Becker, suddenly sober, filed on one of the richest claims in the state’s history.

  Nineteen other lucky gentlemen followed, and then a number who were only fairly lucky. Hattan’s Castle went from nothing to a population of four thousand people in seven days, and three thousand of the four came to lie, cheat, steal, and kill each other and the remaining one thousand-odd citizens, if such they might be called.

  Spawned from an explosive sink of sin and evil, the town lived in anarchy before the coming of John Daniel. When he arrived the town had found its master. With him were the hulking Bernie Lee and a vicious little murderer who called himself Russ Chito.

  Marshal Dave Allen went out in a burst of gunfire when he had words with John Daniel. Daniel faced him but fired only one shot, the others were fired by Russ Chito and Bernie Lee, in ambush on opposite sides of the street and taking the marshal in a deadly cross fire.

  Shorty Becker was found dead two days later, a gun in his hand and a bullet in his brain. John Daniel, a self-appointed coroner, pronounced it suicide. Becker was found to be carrying a will naming Daniel as his only friend and heir.

  Daniel turned the working of the mine over to others, and opened the Palace Saloon & Gambling Hall. From the Barbary Coast he imported some women and a pair of bartenders skilled in the application of mickeys, knockout drops, or whatever most suited the occasion.

  Four years passed and Hattan’s Castle boomed in lust, sin, and murder. The mines continued to prosper, but the miners and owners remained to spend, to drink, and to die. The few who hoarded their gold and attempted to leave were usually found dead along the trails. Buzzards marked their going and if a body was found it was buried with the usual sanctimonious comments and some hurry, depending on the condition of the remains. John Daniel, aloof, cold, and supercilious, ruled the town with a rod of iron.

  Chito and Lee were at his right hand but there were fifty others ready to do his bidding. Immaculate always, coldly handsome and deadly as a rattler, John Daniel had an air of authority which was questioned by none. Of the seventy-five graves on Boot Hill at least twenty had been put there by him or his henchmen. That number is conservative, and of those found along the trail at least half could be credited to John Daniel’s cohorts. Then Bon Caddo came to town.

  He was Welsh by ancestry, but what more he was or where he had come from nobody ever knew. He arrived on a Sunday, a huge man with broad, thick shoulders and big hands. His jaw was wide and hard as iron, his eyes a chill gray and calm, his head topped with a wiry mass of rust-colored hair. The claim he staked four miles from the Castle was gold from the grass roots down.

  Within two hours after the strike Russ Chito dropped in at the Palace. John Daniel stood at the end of the bar with a glass of sherry.

  “Boss,” Chito said, “that new feller in town struck it rich up Lonetree.”

  “How rich?”

  “They say twenty thousand to the ton. The richest ever!”

  John Daniel mentally discounted it by half, possibly even less. Even so it made it extremely rich. He felt his pulses jump with the realization that this could be what he was waiting for, to have enough to be free of all this, to buy a home on Nob Hill and live the life of a gentleman, with no more Russ Chitos to deal with.

  “Invite him in. Tell him I want to see him.”

  “I did tell him, and he told me where I could go.” Russ Chito’s eyes flickered with anger. “I’d like to kill the dirty son!”

  “Wait. I want to talk to him.”

  Bon Caddo did not come to Hattan’s Castle and his gold did not leave the country. Every stage, every wagon, and every rider was checked with care. Nothing left the country but Bon Caddo continued to work steadily and hard, minding his own affairs, uninterested in the fleshpots of the Castle. He was cold to all offers from John Daniel, and merely attended to business. Efforts to approach him were equally unsuccessful, and riders always found themselves warned away by an unseen voice and a rifle that offered no alternative.

  At the beginning of the third month, John Daniel called Cherry Creslin to his office. She came at once, slim, beautifully curved and seductive in her strictly professional way.

  “You like to ride,” Daniel said, “so put on that gray habit and ride my black. How you do it is your own affair, but get acquainted with Bon Caddo. Make him like you.”

  She protested. “Sorry, John. Get one of the other girls. I want no part of these drunken, dirty miners.”

  “You’ll do as I tell you, Cherry, and you’ll do it now. This man is neither drunken nor dirty. He is big, and tough, and, I think, dangerous. Also, he cares nothing for gambling or whiskey.”

  She got up. “All right, I’ll go. But you’ll wish you’d never sent me. I’m sick of these jobs, John! Why don’t we cash in our chips and pull out? Let’s go to New York, or San Francisco.”

  “Get started. I’ll tell you when to go, and where.”


  The canyon of the Lonetree was warm in the spring sunshine. The cottonwoods whispered secrets to each other above the stream that chuckled humorously to the stones. There was no other sound but the trilling of birds, and on the bank above the stream the sound of Caddo working.

  He wore a six-shooter, and a rifle stood nearby, and just out of sight in the tunnel mouth was a shotgun, a revolving weapon made by Colt.

  Standing with his feet wide apart in their heavy miner’s boots, he made a colossal figure. He was freshly shaved, and his shock of rusty hair was combed. His red flannel shirt was open at the neck, and his huge forearms, bulging with raw power, showed below his rolled-up sleeves. Cherry Creslin, impressed by few things, was awed.

  At the sound of hoofs splashing in the water, he looked around. Then he saw the rider was a woman, and a beautiful woman, at that. He smiled.

  Long before he had come to Hattan’s Castle he had heard of John Daniel, and knew his every trick. Moreover, he knew this woman by name and knew she was reputed to be John Daniel’s own woman. He could see, as she drew nearer, that she was genuinely beautiful and despite the hard lines that showed through her lovely skin, there was warmth there, but a restrained, carefully controlled warmth.

  “Good morning, Bon Caddo.” Her voice was low and lovely, and deep within him something stirred, and he tried to bring up defenses against it. She was all woman, this one, no matter what else she might be.

  “Hello, Cherry.”

  “You know me? I don’t remember you.” She looked at him again. “I don’t think I could forget.”

  “You’ve never seen me, Cherry, and I’ve never seen you, but I’ve been expecting you.”

  He gestured to a seat under a tree. “Won’t you get down and stay for a while? It’s quite pleasant here.”

  “You—you’ve been expecting me?” She was irritated. She was accustomed to handling men, to controlling situations. This man, she realized, was different. Not only was he a physical giant but he was intelligent, and…she admitted it reluctantly…he was exciting.

  “Of course.” He smiled pleasantly. He had, she thought, a truly beautiful smile. “John Daniel has tried everything else, hasn’t he? Everything but you…and murder.”

  Her features stiffened and her eyes went hard, but she did not pretend to misunderstand. “So you think he sent me? You think I am the kind of woman a man can send on some dirty business?”

  He leaned on his shovel. “Yes,” he said, and she struck him across the face with her quirt.

  He did not move nor change expression although the red line of the blow lay vividly across his cheek and lips. “Yes,” he repeated, “but you shouldn’t be. You’ve got heart and you have courage. You’ve just been riding with the tide.”

  “You’re very clever, aren’t you?”

  “No. But this situation isn’t very hard to understand. Nor are you, Cherry Creslin. It’s a pity,” he continued, “that you’re tied up with such a murdering lot. There’s a lot of woman in you, and you’d make some man a woman worth keeping.”

  She stared at him. The situation was out of hand. It would be difficult now to get him back in the right vein. Or was this the right one?

  “You may be right,” she said, “maybe I’ve been waiting for you.”

  He laughed and stuck his shovel down hard into the pile of muck. Then he walked over to her, and the black horse nuzzled his arm. “Not that way, Cherry. Be honest. I’m not so easy, you know. Actually the only way is to be honest.”

  She measured him, searching herself. “Honest? I don’t know whether I could be. It’s been so long.”

  “Ah, now you are being honest! I like that, Cherry.” He leaned his big shoulder against the horse’s shoulder. “In fact, Cherry, I like you.”

  “Like me?” A strange emotion was rising within her, and she tried to fight it down. “And you know what I am?”

  “What are you? A woman. Perhaps no worse and no better than any other. One cannot always measure by what a person seems to be or even has been. Anyway, it is always the future that counts.”

  “You believe that? But what of a woman’s past?”

  Bon Caddo shrugged. “If a woman loved me I’d start counting the days of her life from the time she told me she loved me. I would judge by what happened after that, although I’d be a hard judge for the after years.”

  She was irritated with herself. This was not what she had come for. “How did we start talking like this? I did not intend to get into anything like this.”

  “Of course. You came to get me to fall in love with you or at least to lure me down to that sinkhole at Hattan’s Castle. You might manage the first, but not the last.”

  “If you were in love with me and I asked you to come, would you?”

  “Certainly not. Doing what a woman asks is not proof of love. If a man isn’t his own man he isn’t worthy of love. No, I’d use my own judgment, and my judgment tells me to stay away from Hattan’s Castle and the Palace.”

  His eyes seemed to darken with seriousness. “We of Welsh or Irish blood, Cherry, sometimes have a power of prophecy or intuition, call it what you will, and mine tells me that when I come to Hattan’s Castle it will mean blazing hell and death. For me, the town, or both of us.”

  Something cold and frightening touched her and suddenly she put her hand on his. “Then, then don’t come, Bon Caddo. Don’t come at all. Stay here, or better still, take your gold and go.”

  “You advise me that way? What would John Daniel say?”

  “He wouldn’t like it,” she replied simply. “He would not like it at all. But it is my best advice to you.”

  “I shall stay until my claim is worked out. I’ll not be driven off.”

  “May I come back again?”

  “Come soon. Come often.”

  Caddo watched her go and then returned to his work. There would be trouble, of course. He doubted that Cherry would tell John Daniel of her failure. Not yet, at least. She would come back, and perhaps again. If she continued to fail, John Daniel would try something else.

  Three times she came in the days that followed and each time they talked longer. Inevitably the day came when she returned to Hattan’s Castle to find John Daniel awaiting her. When their eyes met she knew she was in trouble.

  “Well?” His question was a challenge. “When is he coming in?”

  “He is not coming at all.” There was no use evading the issue. She had probably been spied upon. “He is not coming, but I am leaving. We’re to be married.”

  “What?” Of all things, this was the least expected. “Do you think you can trick me that way? Marry him and get it all for yourself?”

  “You’d not understand, John, but I love him. He’s a real man and a fine man, so don’t try to stop me.”

  “Try? I’ll not just try, I’ll do it!” His eyes were ugly. “Hereafter you will stay in town. I shall find other means of handling it.”

  “Sorry.” She got to her feet. “I am going back to him.”

  He struck her across the mouth with the back of his hand and she fell to the floor, a trickle of blood running from her mashed lip. She looked up at him. “You shouldn’t have done that, John. I am sorry for you, or I would be if there was a decent bone in your body.”

  Furious, he strode from the room and returned to the Palace. The first person he saw was Chito. “All right. You want to kill Caddo. Go do it.”

  Without another word, Russ Chito left the room. From her window Cherry saw him go and divined his purpose. Filled with terror she rushed to the door but hulking Bernie Lee stood there. “You ain’t goin’ no place. Get back inside.”

  She stepped back. There would be no chance to warn Caddo. Chito would be halfway there by now, and he would kill without warning, and from ambush.

  At the Palace John Daniel stared from the window, thinking. The boom was over here, anyway. He would sell out and go away. Within the past few months the population had fallen by a third. It was time to move. With the
gold from Caddo’s claim he could leave all this behind. He would go to San Francisco as they had planned, and he would take Cherry with him. Once away from all this the foolish notions would leave her head. She would be his woman again.

  During the months they had been associated he had never won her love, and it galled him to think that Bon Caddo had, or so it seemed.

  John Daniel hated all that resisted him, anything he did not or could not possess and control.

  The afternoon wore on, and he paced the floor. Chito had not returned. Of course, he was a careful man. He was taking his time. Still—

  In her own cabin, Cherry packed her belongings and waited. She feared, she doubted, yet inside there was a kind of stillness. Terror there was, and fear for the man she now loved, but through it all there was something else, a kind of confidence, a belief that somehow, some way, Bon Caddo would triumph.

  At the Palace Saloon John Daniel was no longer patient. He lit a black cigar and muttered under his breath. He walked to the door and looked down the street. There was no sign of Chito.

  Darkness came and he went to his office. The saloon business began but in a desultory fashion. The whole town seemed to be waiting, watching, wondering. Seven o’clock passed, then eight. John Daniel walked into the saloon and looked quickly around. Many of the familiar faces were missing. Nine came and went and suddenly there was a crash of glass. Men sprang to their feet, staring.

  Where the alley window had been was a gaping hole, and sprawled on the floor inside was Russ Chito. He had taken a shotgun blast through the chest.

  Men rushed to him, and only John Daniel remained where he was, white-faced, his cigar clamped in his teeth.

  Then the swinging doors parted and Bernie Lee tottered into the room and fell sprawling on the floor. He was alive, but brutally beaten.

  John Daniel reached behind the bar and took up a spare pistol. Methodically, he checked it, then tucked it behind his belt. His own gun in his hand, he strode down the street.

  Cherry was gone.

  Her house was lighted, the door stood open, but Cherry was gone.

  John Daniel swore, shifted the cigar in his teeth. “Pete! Dave! Ed! Cherry’s gone and I want her back, and I want Bon Caddo dead!”