Under his ready laugh and effervescent smile, Charlie Shaw gave the
impression of entire competence. The downright self-reliance demanded
by the range of all who would pass muster in its service, was quite
apparent to Rock. In a cow camp a man was judged by the way he carried
himself, and what he could do, rather than his years. Charlie had been
giving Nona an account of things on round-up. Apparently he had just
ridden in. He nodded to Rock and went on with his talk. Rock sat down
beside them to roll a cigarette.
“I know within a dozen head how many unbranded calves are scattered
around here,” Nona said finally. “We had an open winter. We should have
at least seventy or eighty more calves than last year. Yet the tally is
less.”
“The range is covered to the last fringe,” Charlie stated. “They’ll
make a few more rides, but they won’t show much. I don’t savvy it
either, Nona, but that’s the count.”
“How did the Cross come out on their calf crop?” she inquired.
“Nobody knows but Buck. I wouldn’t ask him.”
The girl stared at the porch floor for a second, frowning.
“I don’t understand it,” she said. “There ought to be more calves than
that.”
Charlie didn’t comment. After a minute she got up and went inside. Shaw
looked at Rock smoking in silence.
“Say, old-timer,” he remarked abruptly, but in a discreet undertone,
“there’s some whisperin’ about you in the Maltese Cross outfit.”
“Yes?” Rock became alert. “What do they whisper? And who’s whispering?”
“I don’t know who started it,” Charlie said. “I heard it the first day
you rode in with me and Alice Snell and Joe Bishop. I don’t like to
repeat gabble, but seems to me you’d ought know.”
“Shoot!” Rock smiled.
“It’s just a whisper,” Charlie mumbled seriously. “Nobody said a word
to me direct. I just overheard here and there. They say you’re
rustlin’.”
“_Me_--rustling?” Rock perked up in astonishment. For the moment he
forgot his assumed identity. The idea was so utterly ludicrous. He
laughed. Recollection sobered him. This must be more Martin history.
“Ye’ah. Got you hooked up with them Burris boys over behind the
Goosebill,” Charlie murmured. “Talkin’ about rawhide neckties. Some of
them Texicans in Buck’s crew are bad hombres, Doc.”
Rock knitted his brows. He hadn’t heard before of the Burris boys. The
Goosebill he had seen only as an oddshaped hill standing blue on the
southwestern sky line, halfway between the Marias and Fort Benton.
“Well, you reckon I’ve been draggin’ the long rope in my spare time and
should be a candidate for their kind attentions?” he asked.
Shaw snorted.
“I might ’a’ known you’d make a joke of it,” he complained.
“I wonder who wants to get me so bad as that?” Rock said under his
breath.
“Buck Walters, of course,” Charlie returned promptly. “Who else? Just
like his damn left-hand ways. Didn’t you never figure he’d shoot at you
over somebody else’s shoulder? As a matter of fact, I’m satisfied Buck
aims to get you.”
“Why?”
“Say, you know why well enough,” Charlie blurted irritably. “You been
flirtin’ with the undertaker all spring. You ain’t a fool.”
“You mean Alice Snell?” Rock hazarded a guess.
“Sure.” Charlie looked at him out of narrowed eyes, the bright blue of
which held a peculiar gleam, whether of friendship or disapproval Rock
could not tell from the boy’s otherwise impassive face. No; not
disapproval; merely the recollection of something unpleasant, either in
the past or threatening in the future. This capable youngster was by no
means an open book. “I wouldn’t yeep, only to give you a hint to step
soft. Buck’s mean. He’ll make trouble. Nona’s had a hard enough row to
hoe. Long as we draw wages from her, we got to do the best we can for
her. The TL ain’t so popular as it used to be with the Maltese Cross.”
“Account of me?” Rock inquired.
“I don’t know,” Charlie said frankly. “I’ve told you all I know. That
talk about rustlin’ an’ hangin’ parties was _meant_ for me to hear.
Savvy?”
* * * * *
Rock didn’t, but he nodded. His brows wrinkled deeply. The solution
finally came to him. To make a decision with him was to act.
“Do you recollect asking me where I got that riding rig?” he asked.
“Sure. Why?”
“I’ll tell you in a minute. Meantime I want to show you something.” He
rose. “Come on in!”
Charlie followed him into the kitchen.
“Will you open up that room?” Rock asked Nona. “The one where that
stuff is we put away?”
“Why----” She stopped short. Something on the faces of the two men
checked the question on her lips. Silently she took a key out of a
drawer and walked into the hall, the narrow passage that divided the
house. She opened a door--the only locked door in all those log-walled
rooms.
“You better come in,” Rock said.
“Charlie’s got to know. You better tell him.”
A window from the south let sunlight into the room. A bed long unslept
in stood against one wall. On the floor lay a saddle, bridle, a pair of
black, Angora-faced chaps, and a pair of silver-inlaid spurs. Beside
them a pair of worn riding boots, a brown calfskin belt full of .45
cartridges, and in the holster a plain, black-handled Colt. On a nail
above hung a man’s felt hat. A canvas war bag lay across a chair,
stuffed with the dead man’s belongings.
Rock pointed to the saddle. On the yellow leather a stain lay black
like dried paint.
“Do you know that rig?” he asked. “Do you see that smear? That’s
blood.”
“Well?” The boy looked at the dead man’s outfit in puzzled wonder. He
looked at Nona Parke and back again at Rock. “Well?” he repeated. “I
see it. What’s it all about?”
“Am I Doc Martin or not?” Rock asked softly.
“Are you crazy?” Charlie demanded. “What are you getting at? Who do you
think you are? Have you gone loco?”
“Tell him,” Rock commanded the girl.
“Doc is dead,” she whispered. “He was shot from ambush a week ago
yesterday.”
Nona Parke’s cowpuncher looked at her unbelievingly. She gave him
details, chapter and verse, describing that tragic afternoon, Rock’s
coming, and the burial at sunrise.
“That’s all,” she said wearily. “You can see his grave beside dad and
mamma.”
“Poor old Doc,” Shaw muttered. He looked at Rock with new interest. “I
wouldn’t ’a’ believed it if _she_ hadn’t told me. You’re the dead spit
of him. You talk like him. Only, you seemed a little different, some
way, from what Doc used to be.”
“Come on into the bunk room,” Rock invited. “Let’s try to get down to
cases.”
“Has anything happened?” Nona asked sharply.
“Gosh, no,” Rock equivocated. “Nothing at all. I wanted this kid to
know how things stand, though. I couldn’t go on and not tip my hand,
for fear he’d think there was something queer about me.”
“Probably it’s best,” Nona agreed. “Supper will be ready in a few
minutes. Charlie has to ride back to the round-up. I’ll call you.”
“All right.”
* * * * *
They turned out of the hall into the huge room where Rock slept. Side
by side, they sat on a bed that seemed lost in that empty space, where
forgotten riders had clanked their spurs and joked and told stories
through long winter nights, while the fireplace roared.
“Now you see where I stand,” Rock said. “I’m having a dead man’s
troubles wished on me. Tell me just how Doc Martin stood with Alice
Snell, and why Buck Walters had his knife out for Doc.”
“That’s simple,” the boy answered. “This blond _dulce_ was soft on
Doc--crazy about him. I don’t blame you. Darn it, I keep thinkin’ of
you as Doc Martin. I can’t get it that he’s cashed in.”
“You can see how hard it is for me to make any one believe I’m _not_
Doc,” Rock observed.
“Hell, yes. They’d have to have it _proved_. They’d laugh and think you
were trying to put it over ’em.”
“Were you and Doc friends?” Rock asked. He wanted to know where this
boy stood.
“I liked Doc,” the boy said simply. “He showed me lots of things. He
was kinda high-handed with anybody he didn’t like. But he was darned
good to me. Doc was a white man.”
“No chance of him being mixed up in anything underhanded?”
Charlie Shaw snorted disdainfully, which was explicit enough answer for
Rock.
“Go on, tell me about Alice Snell and Doc--and Buck Walters,” he
prompted.
“Buck’s the fly in the ointment.” Charlie frowned. “As I said, I don’t
blame Doc for playin’ up to Alice. She’s a mighty sweet-lookin’ girl.
Only----”
“I gathered somehow,” Rock filled in the pause, “that the late Doc was
pretty sweet on Nona Parke. So much so, that he was jealous of any man
that paid her much attention, and that he got himself in wrong with
Elmer Duffy over that.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But Nona don’t want nothin’ of a man except that he
be a good stock hand around her outfit. Sure, Doc thought a heap of
her. So do I. But not the way he did. Even if he got to consolin’
hisself with Alice, I expect he still felt like protectin’ Nona from
fellers like Duffy. Elmer ain’t such a much. I’d be inclined to horn
off fellers like Duffy, myself. An’ _I’m_ not stuck on Nona. Me ’n’ Doc
worked for her two years, off ’n’ on. She’s been like a sister to me.
She’s game as they make ’em. Darned few girls would have the nerve to
run this one-horse show the way she’s done. I’d rather have her for a
boss than anybody I know.”
There was a sincerity in this stumbling, embarrassed declaration that
Rock admired. But he was still on the trail of the unknown, and he
quizzed Shaw further.
“This Snell girl’s of age. She’s rich. I guess she’s been spoiled.
Always had her own way about anythin’. She come up here last summer,
first time. Come back again this spring. Took a dickens of a shine to
Doc and didn’t hide it much. Everybody in the country knows it, except
Nona. She ain’t got eyes nor ears for anything but her ranch and her
cattle. An’ Buck Walters is crazy about this Snell girl, himself,
though she has no use for him. She told Doc once that she’d can Buck
off the Maltese Cross if her dad hadn’t made him an administrator of
his will. I don’t know if there was anythin’ definite between Doc an’
Alice. I do know Buck has turned to hatin’ you--Doc I mean--like
poison, lately. His eyes burn whenever your name comes up. That’s why I
said he aims to get you--get Doc. Darn it, I keep gettin’ you all mixed
up.”
“Better go on thinkin’ of me as Doc Martin,” Rock suggested, “until
something breaks. I’m interested in this. Listen, now, Charlie: Do you
remember where the Maltese Cross was a week ago yesterday--the day Doc
was shot? Were they in easy reach of the Marias? Do you recollect if
Buck Walters was missing that afternoon?”
“I know where we were,” Charlie said. “Couldn’t say for sure whether
Buck was early or late off circle that afternoon. Anyhow, I’m here to
tell you that he wouldn’t be likely to do his own bushwhackin’. Too
foxy for that. He’s got at least half a dozen riders in his outfit
that’d kill a man for two bits--especially if Buck told ’em to.”
“Got something on ’em, I suppose,” Rock suggested.
“Maybe; I don’t know. I know he’s got some hard citizens in his crew.
None of ’em has made a crooked move since they come to Montana, but
they got ‘Killer’ written all over ’em. There’s two fellers that never
ride with the round-up. They hang around the home ranch all the time,
foolin’ with horses. They got a name down South. A rider in Benton told
me their history last fall.”
“I see. Buck Walters has a lot of hard pills on his pay roll.” Rock
nodded. “Not because they’re such good range hands, eh? Most
cowpunchers aren’t killers--not by choice or for money. Now, why do you
reckon he keeps men like that around, Charlie?”
But all Shaw could answer was a shake of his head and a muttered,
“Search _me_.”
“It would sort of seem as if Buck kept a crowd around that would burn
powder free and easy, if the play came up,” Rock mused. “Consequently,
he must expect something to break. What would it likely be? A cow
outfit don’t have to fight for nothin’ in this country.”
And again Charlie Shaw shook his blond, youthful head.
“He wouldn’t surround himself with bad men from Bitter Creek, waiting
for their night to howl, just to deal with Doc Martin for shining up to
a girl he has his mind on.”
“No; because he brought most of his crowd up from the South with him,”
Charlie answered. “But he’ll put your light out, just the same, if he
gets a good chance.”
“Doc Martin has already had his light put out,” Rock said.
“I keep forgettin’,” the boy muttered. “If I was you I’d advertise that
fact pronto. It ain’t healthy to be in Doc Martin’s shoes around here.”
“I have a notion to fill ’em for a while, just to see what comes of
it,” Rock said slowly. “You’re sure Buck Walters had it in for Doc over
this girl--and nothing else?”
“Nothing else that _I_ know of,” Shaw said.
Something in the boy’s tone made that denial unconvincing and warned
Rock that there was more in Charlie Shaw’s mind than he would utter.
“Do you suppose there was something that Doc Martin knew or had found
out or suspected, that would make Buck want him out of the way?”
Shaw stared at Rock for a minute, as if trying to fathom his
purpose--as if he were suspicious of subtleties beyond his
understanding.
“I can’t answer for what Doc might have known. All I know is that I’m a
Parke rider, and I don’t aim to horn into nothin’ that don’t concern me
nor the outfit I ride for--nor my friends.”
“I’m a TL rider, too,” Rock said pointedly. “I aim to be as good a
hand, if not better, to the outfit I work for as any rider that ever
forked a cayuse. Even if you don’t know anything positive, Charlie, you
could tell me what you _think_ about Buck Walters.”
“I might tell you when I know you better,” the boy said bluntly. “A man
that wags his tongue too free is a fool. I’ve told you what I know. It
ain’t important what I _think_.”
Rock gave him credit for a wisdom beyond his years and did not press
the matter. He had taken a liking to this slender, smiling youth.
Charlie was good stuff--that curious mixture of which all good range
men were made--loyalty, courage and a rude dignity. And he was damnably
efficient. The boy had an eye like an eagle and a discerning, practical
mind. He knew or suspected far more than he would ever admit to any one
he didn’t know inside out and could trust implicitly. He would have
told things to Doc Martin that he would only reveal to Rock Holloway
when Rock had demonstrated that he was all wool and a yard wide.
Nona called them presently to supper. They ate, then smoked a cigarette
on the porch. Charlie Shaw strolled off to the stable, mounted and rode
away to rejoin the Maltese Cross. While Rock sat on the edge of the
porch, pondering on what he had learned, Nona joined him. She leaned
against a log pillar, looking absently out across the river flats. Rock
watched her. She was so young, so utterly free from self-consciousness,
so intent upon her own purposes. Something about her warmed his heart.
It wasn’t beauty, as Alice Snell was beautiful. It was an air, an
atmosphere, something indefinable, subtle, but very powerful, like the
invisible force in a bit of bent steel that draws other bits of steel
to itself.
“I want you to take a wagon and go to Fort Benton to-morrow,” she said
abruptly, “and see if you can hire a couple of men for haying. We’ve
got to get up a couple of hundred tons of hay for next winter.”
Rock smiled. He had been brooding over life and death, treachery and
broken faith, loyalty in unexpected phases, the mystery of passion that
bred hatred and bloody clashes. Nona had been thinking of hay for her
stock.
Each to his own thoughts. He envied her a little and admired her for
that simplicity, the directness of her faith and works. His own mental
groping and convolutions would have distressed her, no doubt.