The Hair-Trigger Kid by Max Brand (smart ebook reader .TXT) 📖
- Author: Max Brand
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despair.
Said Mrs. Milman: “Georgia!”
“Yes, mother.”
“Take a horse and ride to the Chet Wagner house. Tell Chet what has
happened. Ask him if he’ll come over here and help us fight. Remind him,
if you have to, how we helped him through that bad winter, two years
ago.”
“I hate to go begging to Chet,” said the girl. “He—”
“Are you going to let your pride stand between you and bankruptcy?” asked
her mother coldly. “Chet is a good lad. He’ll never say no to you.”
Georgia looked desperately at her father for help.
“No, no, Georgia,” said he. “I won’t allow you to use your influence when
you—”
“Georgia might fetch in the Wagners,” admitted Spot, thoughtfully. “And I
might be able to raise the Birch outfit. Tom Birch always was a pretty
good friend of mine I dunno about the Peters. They’re a pretty hard lot.
We can try ‘em, though. But I tell you what, we ain’t got the kind of men
ridin, this range that can stand up to such a bunch as Dixon’s crew.
However, it’s better to make a try and slip than not to try at all. It’s
the ghost of the law that he has behind him that’s gonna hold back
everybody. It’s just robbery, I know. But you’d have to pay him two
hundred thousand dollars for a quit claim!”
There was a faint cry from Milman.
Then he exclaimed: “Well, if the worst has come to the worst, two hundred
thousand will have to be paid—and then we’ll fight him in the courts and
get the money back!”
“Get back water from the desert!” said Mrs. Milman, her voice much
gentler than her words. “Are you going to quit and surrender, my dear?”
“Look the thing in the face!” exclaimed her husband. “What else can I do?
The cows—”
“I’d rather,” said Elinore Milman, “see every cow and horse on the ranch
dead of thirst than to allow crooks to beat you in this manner. Get the
money back from them in the courts? Why, ten minutes after you paid the
cash down, they’d have scattered to the four winds. Get the money back,
indeed!”
This grave speech had such weight that Milman suddenly threw his hands
above his head.
“I’ll get our boys together and lead ‘em down!” he cried. “Spot, send out
a call to—”
“No,” said the foreman with unexpected firmness,
“Are you going to quit on me, too, Spot?” asked Milman sadly.
“I’ll do my share of range ridin’,” said Spot, “and I’ll keep care of the
herd, and I’ll do my share of fightin’, too. But I’ll never go against
the mob that I saw down there by the river until we’ve got the odds on
our side. I’ve only got the ordinary share of sand. I ain’t got enough to
want to throw myself away. Why, Milman, there’s single men down there
that would eat any three men we’ve got, and eat ‘em before breakfast.”
“You see, Elinore?” said the rancher to his wife, in despair.
“Well,” she said in her usual gentle calm, “go ahead and see what
neighbors we can get to join us. If they haven’t turned up by five or six
this evening, I’ll take a gun and see what I myself can do with the
desperadoes.”
They looked at her in amazement.
Her cheek had not reddened, her voice had not altered or her eye
brightened. She was as gently calm as ever, but suddenly they knew that
she was steel. All three stood like children before her.
She explained to her husband: “I’ve put a good deal of my life into this
ranch and its affairs, my dear. If I have to die for the sake of it, I’ll
die without a whimper. But in the meantime, let’s find out what our
friends will do. Georgia, ride to see Chet Wagner. You try the Birch
family. I’ll go to the Peters myself.”
“You’ll do nothing of the kind,” broke in Milman. “You ride about
begging? I’ll go myself. And you stay here!”
She nodded at once.
“Of course, I’ll do what you wish, my dear,” said she.
But when the other three left the room, they all realized something they
had never guessed before—that little Elinore Milman was the real
controlling force in that ranch. Her own husband had not dreamed how true
it was, but looking dizzily back through the years, he could now realize
that a hundred times her voice, like a hand upon his shoulder, like a
hand at his back, had pushed him along the way she chose, and given him
courage for great attempts.
There was something mysterious—this utter manliness of resolution in a
woman—and to the mystery they trusted a good deal. If her body were
small, her soul was so great that it seemed to all three of them an
overwhelming thing.
They took horses at once and cut across country in varying directions.
There were a few squatters here and there who might have been picked up
more quickly, but Milman’s outfit, for many good reasons, was not on
speaking terms with the squatters. The nearest big ranches were the only
ones likely to be able to send forth men in sufficient numbers. Chet
Wagner, in particular, was as brave as a lion, though Georgia blushed
when she thought of appealing to him for help.
However, she set her teeth and went grimly on her way. She had a good
fast half-bred gelding under her, and the horse worked well this morning.
Her spirits rose. The keen morning wind of that gallop cut into her face
and blew away her doubts and sense of shame. After all, what was shameful
in asking the help of a man who once had asked her to marry him?
She thought back to her mother, rather bewildered by that quiet
exhibition of strength, and yet she could tell herself that many a time
before she had found the steel under that silken glove.
Her heart rose higher. Every rock was flashing with dew, and the grass
sparkled. Midsummer would have been thrice as trying, but at this season
the dew alone would enable those hardy range cattle to last quite a time.
In the meanwhile, they could find some way. If the neighbors could not or
would not help with guns, they might help with wise counsel. The familiar
face of the big blue mountains was a comfort to her, also. They had
looked down on her through so many happy days that it seemed impossible
that they now should see her in despair.
All would come out well, she told herself. There was too great a crop of
chivalry and manhood in the West for the Milmans to be abandoned in their
time of need.
Then, as the horse trotted to the top of a low hill which looked down
upon a wide, pleasant hollow, she reined it in suddenly with a leap of
the heart. For over the opposite knoll swept a big mule deer with its
long ears laid back with the speed of its running It floated down the
hillside with the peculiar, bounding gait of its species, and the girl,
watching and wondering, listened for the cry of dogs behind it, or the
howl of the wolf running on the trail.
There was no such outcry, but an instant later over the same hilltop
darted a rider on a black horse which had a strange vest of shining white
over the breast and the lower part of the throat.
Instantly she recognized the markings which had given the Duck Hawk its
name. And she saw the rider skillfully jockeying the fleet mare down the
slope.
It lost ground. Nothing that lives and runs on four feet can keep up with
a mule deer over sharp ups and downs. As though it had wings, the deer
smote the ground and rose, and settled, and floated forward again with
apparent lack of effort.
But in the flat of the hollow it was a different matter. The Hawk,
stretched out in a straight line, came like the wind, and the frightened
deer, with the shadow of a swinging rope whipping across it, vainly
strove to dodge.
That instant the rope started out and the deer, snagged around both
forefeet, tumbled head over heels.
It was fast to rise, but not fast enough.
Out of the saddle whipped the rider, and the hunting knife flashed across
the tender throat of the deer as it threw up its head to rise. Then,
stepping in, the Kid gave the poor beast the coup de gr�ce.
It was over in an instant.
But Georgia Milman found herself laughing with excitement. Here was a man
who ran down his venison on horseback! And suddenly she thought of the
wild Indians of the old days. Such feats must have been accomplished by
their most famous riders, now and then, a thing for the hunter to boast
of to the end of his days!
But there would be no boasting from the Kid.
Before she started her horse down the slope, she saw his knife expertly
at work in cutting up the quarry—speed and business were combined with a
rare efficiency.
And it seemed to the girl that it was as though she had seen a hawk drop
out of the sky. Now it tore the prey which it had struck down, and
presently it would be winging away across the hills.
She jogged the gelding down the hill, but had not gone far before the
Hawk jerked up her head and whinnied softly. The Kid, at this, stood up
from his butchering and watched the newcomer. He raised his hat and waved
it to her while she was still at a little distance.
“There’ll be venison steaks around here in another half hour, Miss
Milman,” said he. “Hop off and wangle the fire, while I get the cuts
off.”
She shook her head, still smiling down at the red-handed killer and his
kill.
“Do you do that often?” she asked him. “Do you run down your meat like
that very often?”
“It keeps the Hawk on edge,” said he. “Nothing like a good brush through
rough country to tune up a horse.”
“And nothing like a run after a mule deer to get you a broken neck,” she
observed.
He nodded, but there was no seriousness in his face.
“Well, rifles make a lot of noise,” said he, “and ammunition costs a lot
and weighs a lot. This is the Hawk’s fourteenth deer, if you’ll believe
it.”
The girl looked critically at the mare. She was breathing hard, but her
head was up, her eye was bright, and it was patent that she was still
full of running.
“I’d believe almost anything about her.”
Her face darkened suddenly.
“Are you with those people back at Hurry Creek?” she asked him. “Are you
out here hunting for that crew?”
“What crew?” said the Kid. “Who’s at Hurry Creek? I thought that ran out
on your land?”
“You’re not one of them,” she nodded, with a sigh of relief. “No, if you
were with them, of course, you’d be the top man, and not Champ Dixon.”
“Oh Dixon’s there, is he? ‘What’s his game?”
“Jumping my father’s water rights.”
The Kid squinted at the skyline, as if he hunted for a thought.
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