Land Grabbers Page 9

  Besides, I reminded myself, neither of us might even live out this night.

  It began before any of us was prepared for it. We were filing past a field of alfalfa nearly ready for the mowing. A dozen oak trees stood in a clump near the trail. From the dark shadows of the trees gunshots suddenly erupted. Flame flashed from the muzzles of rifles; a man in front of me clutched at his chest and fell from his horse. The rest of the soldiers scattered. Sergeant Hawkins grabbed the bridle to my bay and shouted above the racketing of the rifles, ‘This way!’

  Ahead of us a drainage ditch ran paralleling the field. Hawkins intended that we should take cover there. I ducked low across the withers and heeled my horse that way as other soldiers rushed past us, firing as they rode. I dismounted on the run and sprawled to earth in the muddy ditch. Hawkins never reached it.

  A bullet fired from the oak grove struck him in the throat. Blood fountained from the wound. I saw instantly that it was a killing shot and could only watch helplessly as Hawkins fought to stay in the saddle, to achieve the shelter of the drainage ditch, and fell dead in the roadway, the following riders leaping their horses over his body.

  Captain Cole had regrouped his men a little way ahead and now, with a few hand signals, dispatched his soldiers. These formed two flanking groups and, surrounding the oak grove, they opened fire from horseback. Then, half a dozen men who had been concealed in the trees, broke free of the encirclement, whipping their horses toward safety, the soldiers pursuing them.

  I waited. The descending moon lit Hawkins’s empty eyes. There was not another man to be seen across the fields in any direction. I clawed my way up out of the ditch and walked to Hawkins, leading my bay horse. I slipped his Colt revolver from his holster, collected his Winchester rifle and shoved it into my saddle scabbard. For Hawkins I could do nothing but bid him a silent farewell.

  I found his horse, reins trailing, fifty yards on. Distant gunfire crackled, but I saw no living soul. I gathered up the reins to Hawkins’s horse, figuring I might need it.

  Trish might need it – if I could only find her.

  That was my plan now: to find her and take her far away from the Canoga. No matter what happened between the warring factions. To rescue her and ride far away from here even if I had to take her kicking and screaming to safety. I wanted her well, and I had had enough of all this trouble.

  I did not know where she had gone. I had told her to try to hole up in one of the stronger ranch houses, but I did not know if she had followed my instructions. Nor did I know which house she might have taken shelter in or even where any of the ranches were located.

  And I did not know if I could convince her to ride with me.

  Her loyalty to her dead father, to the ranch they had built together, to her neighbors, was obvious. She loved the Canoga country and was willing to fight for it. What influence could I wield that would overcome those feelings? The answer was discouraging. None. None at all. I rode on with only groundless hope to sustain me.

  I saw the lone rider approaching before he saw me and I was able to guide my horses into the shadows of a lone, wide-spreading oak tree. I waited, rifle at the ready. The moon was lowering and on this increasingly dark night it was difficult to tell friend from foe – assuming I had any friends left on the Canoga. As he neared, I recognized the rider and called out to him.

  ‘Oliver!’

  Looking startled, Ollie Webb reined up the piebald pony he was riding and squinted into the shadows, his rifle at the ready. I rode on to the road to meet him.

  ‘Oh,’ he said, with undisguised contempt, ‘it’s you.’

  ‘How’s everything in the settlement?’ I asked.

  ‘Mostly quiet.’ His words were bitten off sharply. He studied me with angry eyes. ‘You did it, Clanahan, didn’t you?’

  ‘Did it?’

  ‘As soon as you got the rest of us out of the canyon, you rode down and led the raiders up here.’

  ‘I did,’ I was forced to admit. ‘But you have to understand my thinking.’

  ‘I don’t,’ he said sharply before I could go further with my explanation. ‘It seems my father was right about you all along. He was alerted as soon as we rode back to the ranch and told him what had happened. He gathered a few men and rode out to try to head the land grabbers off.’

  So it was Webb and his crowd who had ambushed Cole’s army and not, as I had believed, Jake Shockley’s men.

  ‘Where are you riding now, Oliver?’ I asked.

  ‘To try catching up with my father. They’re greatly outnumbered.’

  ‘Where’s Charlie?’

  ‘My brother still doesn’t see the truth of what you’ve done. For some reason he still trusts you. As if you could trust someone who has let the enemy in your back door. What did they promise you, Clanahan? Money? Land?’

  ‘Nobody promised me anything,’ I said coldly. I was sorry that Oliver saw things the way he did, but I understood. In his place maybe I would have felt the same way. ‘Where’s Trish?’ I asked. ‘Have you seen her?’

  ‘At the Staley place,’ Oliver told me. ‘She was there trying to talk to some of the men when we got word that you had let the outlaw army ride the canyon trail.’

  ‘Some day, Ollie, when there’s time, I’ll explain it all to you.’

  His eyes told me that he had no desire to hear anything more from me. I still was not sure that he wouldn’t start shooting. I don’t think he had decided either. Risking it, I nodded, and started the horses forward, showing him my back.

  I wasn’t sure where the Staley ranch was, but I knew the direction the others had taken when riding to the spread from Trish’s house. I thought I could find the place even in the darkness.

  After that? Well, I just didn’t know. What I wanted and what Trish was determined to do were at wide variance. My idea was to ride away, see that she was safe and then maybe, when things played out, to return to the Canoga with her. She intended to stay and fight for her land, I knew. I did not want to present myself to her as a coward; neither did I wish to die fighting a battle that seemed desperately doomed. The only hope was of Cole defeating Jake Shockley’s outlaw band and giving up the land grab as a bad bargain now that he and his men had been exposed as counterfeit soldiers.

  It seemed a vague hope. I did not doubt that Cole could defeat Jake, but what of his own men? They had been promised land and homes, would they all be willing to put down their arms and simply ride away with nothing to show for their efforts?

  These thoughts drifted through my mind as I rode the dark trail toward the Staley ranch. Full darkness was settling as the moon died in the west and the night seemed much colder, more dangerous still.

  I saw the white two-story house beyond the surrounding trees, its lights blazing, and I started that way. I nearly bumped into the armed man emerging from the shadows.

  ‘Charlie!’ I said with relief. He smiled weakly at me and eased his pony up beside mine. ‘If you’re looking for Oliver, he’s about three miles down the road.’

  ‘I’m not,’ Charlie said quietly, nervously. ‘I’m standing picket. Lucky I recognized you. I was about to sound the alarm.’

  ‘How many men do you have in the house?’ I asked and I thought that Charlie paused uncertainly before answering. Perhaps he was still not sure of me and thought I had devious reasons for asking.

  At last he told me, ‘A dozen or so.’

  ‘And Trish?’ I asked, trying to keep my anxiousness from showing. Charlie Webb shook his head.

  ‘She’s gone, Clanahan.’

  ‘Gone!’ I said in disbelief. She had found a relatively safe place to ride out the storm and then had decided to ride off. Why?

  ‘She wasn’t comfortable here. Said she wanted to be back at her place. Said she could fight as well there as from here, better maybe.’

  ‘She’s crazy!’ I said in disbelief. Charlie grinned.

  ‘She does seem to tilt that way,’ he agreed, adding: ‘She was figuring – after hearing th
e shooting on the western trail, that the battle had begun and that Shockley – is that his name? – must have abandoned her house and gone on the attack.’

  ‘It wasn’t Jake Shockley who was doing the shooting.’ I told him, ‘it was your father and whoever’s riding with him.’

  ‘Oh,’ Charlie said, pursing his lips. ‘Yeah, that figures, doesn’t it?’

  It did because Barney Webb would do anything to curry favor with Jake Shockley. The return of his sons from the canyon must have given him warning that Cole might have attempted the ride up to the Canoga.

  ‘Is she alone, Charlie?’ I asked.

  ‘Ned went with her,’ he replied.

  ‘Ned!’

  ‘Yeah, he’s a little puppy dog where Trish is concerned. He wouldn’t let her go alone. No one else offered.’

  ‘I’ve got to get over there,’ I said. My despair must have been obvious. I couldn’t help it. Trish, alone except for a kid barely out of short trousers, riding into Jake Shockley’s camp!

  ‘I’d go with you, Clanahan,’ Charlie said, ‘but you see how it is.’

  ‘I know. Thanks for wanting to help. The army was pursuing your father and his crowd to the south. If anyone wishes to attack the house, they’ll likely not be riding up the western road.’

  ‘Thanks, Clanahan. And good luck to you.’

  Luck. I needed a lot of luck, and it seemed I must have already used up my fair share in the last few days. What had impelled Trish to ride back to her house, knowing that it was an outlaw fortress? I knew, of course. How many times had she told me that she was going to fight for her land? She meant it and I could only admire her for the vow she had made, but her concept of how to go about things was seriously flawed.

  I rode on through the darkness, wondering if my own thinking was not just as flawed. A lone knight rushing to the rescue of a maiden who seemed not to want rescuing.

  I rode southward, still hearing occasional gunfire crackling toward the east as the forces of evil fought the forces of evil. Viewed in that light there seemed to be a sort of madness to it. Jake Shockley could not win, outnumbered as he was, Cole could not win now that his plan had fallen apart. Barney Webb had already lost. The day he had thrown in with Jake had been the end of him. Once the community learned of his and Wes King’s treachery, they would no longer be welcome neighbors on the Canoga.

  The moon was only a memory beyond the eastern hills, but by starlight I pressed the bay horse on toward Trish’s tiny house, wondering what rash course she might have followed. I guessed that she had believed her house by now would be empty of raiders, they having gone to join the battle. On her own, and now with the help of young Ned Webb, she would drop the shutters and bar the door, ready and willing to hold off any interlopers with her Winchester.

  Perhaps she was right. I saw no reason why Shockley would take the time and trouble to assault her. He had much bigger problems to deal with. Still, you never knew what some men might do. Especially a man obsessed like Jake Shockley.

  Maybe his gang, seeing that the game was up, had decided to pull out while they could. More unlikely, but chillingly possible – maybe Jake and Cole had managed to reach a truce and had formulated a new course of action. Maybe anything!

  I only knew that I had to find Trish and be at her side when trouble did come. I felt that way about her now; I had felt that way since I found her alone and wandering on the desert. It was a fine feeling, caring for her that way, but I couldn’t convince myself that she felt the same about me, no matter that I was a ‘fine looking specimen’.

  I could smell woodsmoke long before I spotted the little house concealed among the oaks. I swung down from my horse and led it forward through the star-shadows, rifle in my hand. Approaching from the rear, I could not see how many horses might be hitched in the front of the house, and circling that way, putting myself in the line of fire, seemed ill-advised. I dropped the reins to the bay horse and eased forward, finally sliding along the unpainted wall of the ranch house to the rear window. Cautiously I lifted my head and peered in.

  Whatever I had expected to see, the group gathered within was not it.

  In one corner sat Jake Shockley. Vallejo was beside him, seated on the floor. Across the room, sitting on the yellow sofa was Beth Cole! Facing them all, pistol in her hand, was Trish.

  TEN

  I slipped around the corner of the house, moving quickly – and silently, I hoped – toward the front door. I saw no men posted outside and there was no sign of Ned Webb. Just four horses, all of which I recognized.

  How in the world had Trish gotten the drop on the badmen, and where had Beth Cole come from? What would she be doing here alone unless Cole had been cut down in the gun battle? I made my way to the plank door and knocked cautiously, keeping my body to one side of the door frame. I heard Trish’s voice.

  ‘Who is it?’ She did not sound anxious.

  ‘Giles. Let me in.’

  ‘Who is it?’ someone else – Vallejo, I thought – muttered.

  ‘Clanahan.’

  The response to this was a disparaging grunt. The door opened a bare inch and then was swung wide – by Beth Cole, smiling brightly as if I were a welcome sight. Trish stood leaning against the wall, one hand still holding the big Colt revolver, the other tucked under her arm. Her eyes flickered toward me.

  ‘Took you long enough,’ she said.

  ‘No one invited me.’ I glanced around at Shockley and the slumped Vallejo. Their faces showed only resignation. ‘Where’s Ned?’ I asked Trish.

  ‘Gone to try again,’ she said. ‘Maybe he will reach Camp Grant this time.’

  ‘You still think we will need soldiers?’ I asked. She answered tightly:

  ‘I’m not going to hang all these thugs and killers.’

  ‘No, I guess not,’ I said, easing past Beth toward Trish. ‘How did this happen?’ I gestured toward the two prisoners. ‘And Beth … how do you happen to be here?’

  ‘This was easy,’ Trish told me. Her dark blue eyes were sparkling as she spoke. ‘The three raiders must have decided to pull out. One of them was seeing to the horses while these two ransacked the house.’ Looking around I could see that cupboards had been gone through, that the mattress on the bed in the other room had been flung aside.

  ‘You said there were three men,’ I commented.

  ‘There were. The other one’s in the barn. Ned got him.’

  ‘It appears that I missed all of the action.’ I said. There seemed to be a hint of derision in Trish’s smile.

  ‘So it seems.’

  ‘And Beth?’ I turned to her questioningly.

  ‘Oh, Clanahan,’ she said with weary exasperation. ‘I found out where my father was from one of the men we captured. I had the idea that I could ride over here and talk to him before both he and Cole managed to get themselves killed.’

  Her eyes grew misty. ‘All I accomplished was distracting Father while this woman and her little man slipped in and got the drop on them.’

  Jake Shockley, uncharacteristically, had said nothing to this point. Now he mumbled, ‘Damn sloppy of me, wasn’t it?’

  Sloppy, yes. But fortuitous. If Jake hadn’t had his attention diverted by the unexpected arrival of his daughter, things might have turned out much worse for Trish and Ned.

  Jake said, ‘Looks like instead of me hanging you, you’ve got the chance to kill me again, doesn’t it, Clanahan?’ Neither woman knew what Shockley meant, but it brought a thin smile to Vallejo’s lips.

  ‘I wouldn’t think of doing that, Jake. I mean to take you back with me to Mesa Grande. There’s still the small matter of that murder that I’d like to clear up.’

  ‘That!’ Jake Shockley said in surprise. ‘They’ve already forgotten about that. There’s no way anyone is going to keep trying to track you down for that killing.’

  ‘I’m not willing to take that risk,’ I answered.

  Vallejo had been stretching his arms and legs. I turned my eyes on him, wondering wh
at he was up to. But I had been watching the wrong man. Jake Shockley suddenly reached for his boot and came up with a small, chrome-plated pistol. He fired before I could move, and he had taken the obvious shot – at the person holding the gun on him. In horror I saw his bullet tag Trish, saw crimson blood stain the sleeve and bodice of her white blouse. I was on Jake before he could fire again. Wrenching the pistol from his hand I slugged him as hard as I could on the jaw and he sagged back. Vallejo had been too surprised to make a move. Now I backed away from the prisoners, hearing Trish moaning softly on the floor behind me. I tossed the pistol to Beth.

  ‘Keep an eye on them,’ I told her, and I went to Trish. Lifting her head, I propped it with a cushion from the couch and then cut away the sleeve on her dress. The bullet had tagged her just below the shoulder joint, a difficult place to apply a tourniquet, but I did the best I could, using the strip of sleeve I had cut off. Dark blue eyes opened to look at me, to study me as I bound her wound. She smiled distantly and mouthed three words.

  I had done all I could for the moment, and so I stroked her frizzy blond hair and stood to take care of the business at hand. First I meant to bind Shockley and Vallejo tightly so there would be no repetition or attempt at escape. With that in mind I went into the ravaged kitchen searching for twine or whatever I could find.

  Returning, I found Shockley sitting up, rubbing his jaw. I felt like hitting him again. Glancing at Trish, bloody and unconscious, I felt like pummeling him half to death. Tying him up would have to do for now. I started that way but was halted mid-stride.

  ‘That’s far enough, Clanahan,’ Beth Cole said calmly. ‘You’ve done enough damage.’ She had the little chrome pistol trained on me, and there was not a glimmer of a smile on her full lips. ‘All right, Father, take his gun,’ she said and, grinning wildly, Jake Shockley rose and stepped to me, yanking my Colt from its holster.