THE FIGHT IN THE CACHE
A clear night and a good moon made a long ride possible, and the
Crawling Stone contingent, headed by Stormy Gorman, began coming into
the railroad camp by three o'clock the next morning. With them rode
the two Youngs, who had lost the trail they followed across Goose
River and joined the cowboys on the road to the north.
The party divided under Kennedy and Smith, who rode through the Door
into the Cache just before daybreak.
"I don't know what I am steering you against this morning, Farrell,"
said Whispering Smith. "Certainly I should hate to run you into Du
Sang, but we can't tell where we shall strike him. If we have laid out
the work right I ought to see him as soon as anybody does. Accidents
do happen, but remember he will never be any more dangerous than he is
at the first moment. Get him to talk. He gets nervous if he can't
shoot right away. When you pull, get a bullet into his stomach at the
start, if you possibly can, to spoil his aim. We mustn't make the
mistake of underestimating him. Rebstock is right: he is a fright with
a revolver, and Sinclair and Seagrue are the only men in the mountains
that can handle a rifle with him. Now we split here; and good luck!"
"Don't you want to take Brill Young with you?"
"You take both the Youngs, Farrell. We shall be among rocks, and if he
tries to rush us there is cover."
Stormy Gorman with four Crawling Stone cowboys followed Whispering
Smith. Every rider on the range had a grievance against Williams
Cache, and any of them would have been glad to undertake reprisals
against the rustlers under the wing of Whispering Smith.
Just how in the mountains--without telegraph, newspapers, and all
ordinary means of publicity--news travels so fast may not certainly be
said. The scattered lines of telephone wires help, but news outstrips
the wires. Moreover, there are no telephones in the Mission Mountains.
But on the morning that the round-up party rode into the Cache it was
known in the streets of Medicine Bend that the Tower W men had been
tracked into the north country; that some, if not all, of them were in
Williams Cache; that an ultimatum had been given, and that Whispering
Smith and Kennedy had already ridden in with their men to make it
good.
Whispering Smith, with the cowboys, took the rough country to the
left, and Kennedy and his party took the south prong of the Cache
Creek. The instructions were to make a clean sweep as the line
advanced. Behind the centre rode three men to take stock driven in
from the wings. Word that was brief but reasonable had been sent
everywhere ahead. Every man, it was promised, that could prove
property should have a chance to do so at the Door that day and the
next; but any brands that showed stolen cattle, or that had been
skinned or tampered with in any way, were to be turned over to the
Stock Association for the benefit of owners.
The very first pocket raided started a row and uncovered eighty head
of five-year-old steers bearing a mutilated Duck Bar brand. It was
like poking at rattlesnakes to undertake to clean out the grassy
retreats of the Cache, but the work was pushed on in spite of
protests, threats, and resistance. Every man that rode out openly to
make a protest was referred calmly to Rebstock, and before very long
Rebstock's cabin had more men around it than had been seen together in
the Cache for years. The impression that the whole jig was up, and
that the refugees had been sold out by their own boss, was one that no
railroad man undertook to discourage. The cowboys insisted on the
cattle, with the assurance that Rebstock could explain everything. By
noon the Cache was in an uproar. The cowboys were riding carefully,
and their guards, rifles in hand, were watching the corners. Ahead of
the slowly moving line with the growing bunch of cattle behind it,
flourished as it were rather conspicuously, fugitive riders dashed
back and forth with curses and yells across the narrow valley. If it
had been Whispering Smith's intention to raise a large-sized row it
was apparent that he had been successful. Rebstock, driven to
desperation, held council after council to determine what to do.
Sorties were discussed, ambushes considered, and a pitched battle was
planned. But, while ideas were plentiful, no one aspired to lead an
attack on Whispering Smith.
Moreover, Williams Cache, it was conceded, would in the end be worsted
if the company and the cowmen together seriously undertook with men
and unlimited money to clean it out. Whispering Smith's party had no
explanation to offer for the round-up, but when Rebstock made it known
that the fight was over sending out Du Sang, the rage of the rustlers
turned on Du Sang. Again, however, no man wanted to take up personally
with Du Sang the question of the reasonableness of Whispering Smith's
demand. Instead of doing so, they fell on Rebstock and demanded that
if he were boss he make good and send Du Sang out.
Of all this commotion the railroad men saw only the outward
indications. As the excitement grew on both sides there was perhaps a
little more of display in the way the cattle were run in, especially
when some long-lost bunch was brought to light and welcomed with yells
from the centre. A steer was killed at noon, everybody fed, and the
line moved forward. The wind, which had slept in the sunshine of the
morning, rose in the afternoon, and the dust whirled in little clouds
where men or animals moved. From the centre two men had gone back with
the cattle gathered up to that time, and Bill Dancing, with Smith,
Stormy Gorman, and two of the cowboys, were heading a draw to cross to
the north side of the Cache, when three men rode out into the road
five hundred yards ahead, and halted.
Whispering Smith spoke: "There come our men; stop here. This ground in
front of us looks good to me; they may have chosen something over
there that suits them better. Feel your guns and we'll start forward
slowly; don't take your eyes off the bunch, whatever you do. Bill, you
go back and help the men with the cattle; there will be four of us
against three then."
"Not for mine!" said Bill Dancing bluntly. "You may need help from an
old fool yet. I'll see you through this and look after the cattle
afterward."
"Then, Stormy, one or two of you go back," urged Whispering Smith,
speaking to the cowboy foreman without turning his eyes. "There's no
need of five of us in this."
But Stormy swore violently. "You go back yourself," exclaimed Stormy,
when he could control his feelings. "We'll bring them fellows in for
you in ten minutes with their hands in the air."
"I know you would; I know it. But I'm paid for this sort of thing and
you are not, and I advise no man to take unnecessary chances. If you
all want to stay, why, stay; but don't ride ahead of the line, and let
me do all the talking. See that your guns are loose--you'll never have
but one chance to pull, and don't pull till you're ready. The albino
is riding in the middle now, isn't he? And a little back, playing for
a quick drop. Watch him. Who is that on the right? Can it be George
Seagrue? Well, this is a bunch. And I guess Karg is with them."
Holding their horses to a slow walk, the two parties gingerly
approached each other. When the Cache riders halted the railroad
riders halted; and when the three rode the five rode: but the three
rode with absolute alignment and acted as one, while Whispering Smith
had trouble in holding his men back until the two lines were fifty
feet apart.
By this time the youngest of the cowboys had steadied and was thinking
hard. Whispering Smith halted. In perfect order and sitting their
horses as if they were riding parade, the horses ambling at a snail's
pace, the Cache riders advanced in the sunshine like one man. When Du
Sang and his companions reined up, less than twelve feet separated the
two lines.
In his tan shirt, Du Sang, with his yellow hair, his white eyelashes,
and his narrow face, was the least impressive of the three men.
The Norwegian, Seagrue, rode on the right, his florid blood showing
under the tan on his neck and arms. He spoke to the cowboys from the
ranch, and on the left the young fellow Karg, with the broken
nose, black-eyed and alert, looked the men over in front of him and
nodded to Dancing. Du Sang and his companions wore short-armed shirts;
rifles were slung at their pommels, and revolvers stuck in their
hip-scabbards. Whispering Smith, in his dusty suit of khaki, was the
only man in either line who showed no revolver, but a hammerless or
muley Savage rifle hung beside his pommel.
Du Sang, blinking, spoke first: "Which of you fellows is heading this
round-up?"
"I am heading the round-up," said Whispering Smith. "Why? Have we got
some of your cattle?"
The two men spoke as quietly as school-teachers. Whispering Smith's
expression in no way changed, except that as he spoke he lifted his
eyebrows a little more than usual.
Du Sang looked at him closely as he went on: "What kind of a way is
this to treat anybody? To ride into a valley like this and drive a
man's cows away from his door without notice or papers? Is your name
Smith?"
"My name is Smith; yours is Du Sang. Yes, I'll tell you, Du Sang. I
carry an inspector's card from the Mountain Stock Association--do you
want to see it? When we get these cattle to the Door, any man in the
Cache may come forward and prove his property. I shall leave
instructions to that effect when we go, for I want you to go to
Medicine Bend with me, Du Sang, as soon as convenient, and the men
that are with me will finish the round-up."
"What do you want me for? There's no papers out against me, is
there?"
"No, but I'm an officer, Du Sang. I'll see to the papers; I want you
for murder."
"So they tell me. Well, you're after the wrong man. But I'll go with
you; I don't care about that."
"Neither do I, Du Sang; and as you have some friends along, I won't
break up the party. They may come, too."
"What for?"
"For stopping a train at Tower W Saturday night."
The three men looked at one another and laughed.
Du Sang with an oath spoke again: "The men you want are in Canada by
this time. I can't speak for my friends; I don't know whether they
want to go or not. As far as I am concerned, I haven't killed anybody
that I know of. I suppose you'll pay my expenses back?"
"Why, yes, Du Sang, if you were coming back I would pay your expenses;
but you are not coming back. You are riding down Williams Cache for
the last time; you've ridden down it too many times already. This
round-up is especially for you. Don't deceive yourself; when you ride
with me this time out of the Cache, you won't come back."
Du Sang laughed, but his blinking eyes were as steady as a cat's. It
did not escape Whispering Smith's notice that the mettlesome horses
ridden by the outlaws were continually working around to the right of
his party. He spoke amiably to Karg: "If you can't manage that horse,
Karg, I can. Play fair. It looks to me as if you and Du Sang were
getting ready to run for it, and leave George Seagrue to shoot his way
through alone."
Du Sang, with some annoyance, intervened: "That's all right; I'll go
with you. I'd rather see your papers, but if you're Whispering Smith
it's all right. I'm due to shoot out a little game sometime with you
at Medicine Bend, anyway."
"Any time, Du Sang; only don't let your hand wabble next time. It's
too close to your gun now to pull right."
"Well, I told you I was going to come, didn't I? And I'm coming--now!"
With the last word he whipped out his gun. There was a crash of
bullets. Questioned once by McCloud and reproached for taking chances,
Whispering Smith answered simply. "I have to take chances," he said.
"All I ask is an even break."
But Kennedy had said there was no such thing as an even break with
Whispering Smith. A few men in a generation amuse, baffle, and mystify
other men with an art based on the principle that the action of the
hand is quicker than the action of the eye. With Whispering Smith the
drawing of a revolver and the art of throwing his shots instantly from
wherever his hand rested was pure sleight-of-hand. To a dexterity so
fatal he added a judgment that had not failed when confronted with
deceit. From the moment that Du Sang first spoke, Smith, convinced
that he meant to shoot his way through the line, waited only for the
moment to come. When Du Sang's hand moved like a flash of light,
Whispering Smith, who was holding his coat lapels in his hands, struck
his pistol from the scabbard over his heart and threw a bullet at him
before he could fire, as a conjurer throws a vanishing coin into the
air. Spurring his horse fearfully as he did so, he dashed at Du Sang
and Karg, leaped his horse through their line and, wheeling at arm's
length, shot again. Bill Dancing jumped in his saddle, swayed, and
toppled to the ground. Stormy Gorman gave a single whoop at the
spectacle and, with his two cowboys at his heels, fled for life.
[Illustration: Wheeling at arm's length, shot again.]
More serious than all, Smith found himself among three fast revolvers,
working from an unmanageable horse. The beast tried to follow the
fleeing cowboys, and when faced sharply about showed temper. The
trained horses of the outlaws stood like statues, but Smith had to
fight with his horse bucking at every shot. He threw his bullets as
best he could first over one shoulder and then over the other, and
used the last cartridge in his revolver with Du Sang, Seagrue, and
Karg shooting at him every time they could fire without hitting one
another.
It was not the first time the Williams Cache gang had sworn to get him
and had worked together to do it, but for the first time it looked as
if they might do it. A single chance was left to Whispering Smith for
his life, and with his coat slashed with bullets, he took it. For an
instant his life hung on the success of a trick so appallingly awkward
that a cleverer man might have failed in turning it. If his rifle
should play free in the scabbard as he reached for it, he could fall
to the ground, releasing it as he plunged from the saddle, and make a
fight on his feet. If the rifle failed to release he was a dead man.
To so narrow an issue are the cleverest combinations sometimes brought
by chance. He dropped his empty revolver, ducked like a mud-hen on his
horse's neck, threw back his leg, and, with all the precision he could
summon, caught the grip of his muley in both hands. He made his fall
heavily to the ground, landing on his shoulder. But as he keeled from
the saddle the last thing that rolled over the saddle, like the flash
of a porpoise fin, was the barrel of the rifle, secure in his hands.
Karg, on horseback, was already bending over him, revolver in hand,
but the shot was never fired. A thirty-thirty bullet from the ground
knocked the gun into the air and tore every knuckle from Karg's hand.
Du Sang spurred in from the right. A rifle-slug like an axe at the
root caught him through the middle. His fingers stiffened. His
six-shooter fell to the ground and he clutched his side. Seagrue,
ducking low, put spurs to his horse, and Whispering Smith, covered
with dust, rose on the battle-field alone.
Hats, revolvers, and coats lay about him. Face downward, the huge bulk
of Bill Dancing was stretched motionless in the road. Karg, crouching
beside his fallen horse, held up the bloody stump of his gun hand, and
Du Sang, fifty yards away, reeling like a drunken man in his saddle,
spurred his horse in an aimless circle. Whispering Smith, running
softly to the side of his own trembling animal, threw himself into the
saddle, and, adjusting his rifle sights as the beast plunged down the
draw, gave chase to Seagrue.