Range Rebel (Prologue Western) Read online

  RANGE REBEL

  By Gordon Shirreffs

  a division of F+W Media, Inc.

  contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Also Available

  Copyright

  one

  THE DAWN RAIN HAD CEASED its steady drum tapping on the taut canvas fly. For a time the wind thrashed the wet branches of the tall pines and then it died away. Dave Yeamans listened to the quiet drip of the rain and the last soughing of the wind as it whispered through the leaves. His fire had gone out during the night. Dave closed his eyes, fighting against sleep. A subtle warning seemed to come to him. He raised his head. It was too darned quiet to suit him. He threw back his tarp and blankets and scratched his armpits, yawning widely. “Damn but it’s cold,” he said sourly. Winter was on its way to the Mogollons.

  Dave knelt by the fireplace and began to shave splinters. Suddenly his head snapped up. He threw himself backward and scrabbled for his Spencer. He levered home a round and poked his head out from beneath the fly, cursing as icy water dribbled down his back. The woods were quiet again, as they always were after a rain, but something had moved in the wet brush.

  A gun flatted off from behind a tree. The slug ripped through the taut canvas of the fly. “Drop that carbeen!” called a man. “There’s four of us out here, hombre! Calf rope! Grab those fuzzy ears!”

  Dave’s finger tightened on the trigger. There was a lot of movement in the brush. They could make his tarp look like a sieve and the slugs would richochett from the rock formation against which he had situated his camp. He lowered the repeater to his blankets and slowly raised his hands.

  “Go get his shooting irons, Mort!” the same voice called out. “I got a bead on his belly!”

  The brush rustled and a lean man trotted toward the shelter holding a Henry rifle at hip level. He brushed past Dave and snatched up the Spencer and Dave’s gunbelt, heavy with a converted cap-and-ball Colt and a bowie. “All right, Dan!” he yelled. “He’s dehorned!”

  Three men came out of the brush. The rain glistened on their ponchos. One of them was broad enough to make two of Dave. He had tied a gaudy scarf about his battered black hat and knotted it below his blocky chin. His face seemed hewed from the very rock of the mountains about them. “Get a fire going, Shorty,” he said. He looked at Dave. “Where’s the coffee?”

  Dave jerked a thumb toward his fiber morral in which he carried his food. “Can I put my pants on?” he asked.

  “Ain’t polite to stand there without ’em,” said Shorty with a grin as he pawed into the morral.

  Dave limped to his clothing and pulled on his trousers. “What’s the idea?” he asked over his shoulder.

  “Listen to him!” said Shorty as he prepared the coffee. “Innocent as all hell, ain’t he?”

  The big man looked at the fourth man. “Mick,” he said quietly, “look for a running iron.”

  Dave had a scaly feeling as he watched the man look through his gear. He was some kind of a breed. His flat face was deeply pitted by smallpox scars. His eyes were a startling light blue in contrast to the mahogany color of his face.

  The man named Dan squatted by the fireplace and watched Shorty light the splinters. “Name?” he asked over a broad shoulder.

  “Yeamans. Dave Yeamans.”

  “Business?”

  “Hunter.”

  The big man sucked at a tooth. “Sho? I’m Dan Edrick. Run the Lazy E spread down in the valley. Ain’t heard of no hunters up here other than local boys.”

  “You have now.”

  “Yeh.” Edrick scratched in his short beard. “Texas man?”

  “Brazos country.”

  “How long you been around here?”

  “A month or so.”

  “How long in Arizona Territory?”

  “Couple of years.” Dave limped to his bed and got his pipe and tobacco pouch.

  “Rebel, eh?”

  Dave slowly turned. “I was a Confederate soldier, if that’s what you mean.”

  Edrick shrugged. He glanced at Dave’s legs. “Wounded?”

  Dave nodded.

  “What regiment?”

  “Fifth Texas. Hood’s Division.”

  “No running iron,” said Mick in a flat voice.

  “Don’t mean nothing,” said Edrick, “A smart sticky looper would have cached it.” He watched Dave light his pipe. “Maybe you were wounded at Chancellorsville?”

  Dave shook his head. “Longstreet’s First Corps was at Suffolk at that time.”

  “Where were you wounded?”

  “Chickamauga.”

  Shorty spat. “Damned liar,” he said, “That was Braxton Bragg’s battle. If he lies about the war hell lie about anything, Dan.”

  Edrick ignored the short man. “So you were a Hood man and was wounded in a battle fought by Bragg?”

  Shorty fed the fire. “We got rope, Dan. Let’s string him up. Only man around here who can’t give a good account of hisself.”

  Edrick grunted. “What the hell you know about the war, Shorty? You sat on your dead rump in Arkansas stealing chickens and playing soldier. The man is right.”

  “Chickamauga!” snorted Shorty.

  Erdick nodded. “Old Pete Longstreet was detached from the Army of Northern Virginia in September of 1863 to join Bragg. Hood was in Longstreet’s First Corps. The Fifth Texas was at Chickamauga.”

  “Sho?” asked Shorty. He glanced at Dave. “I’m sorry, Limpy.”

  Dave flushed. He puffed at his pipe. Mort was squatting at the back of the shelter. His rifle covered Dave. Mick Ochoa was cleaning his long fingernails with a slim Mexican cuchillo. His eyes constantly studied Dave from beneath his eyebrows.

  Dave tamped his pipe. “Why did you jump me, Edrick?”

  Edrick smiled. “We’ve lost over three hundred head in the last month. We can track them into the canyon country south of this place and then they vanish. All the local ranchers are looking for strangers. God help ’em if they can’t account for themselves.”

  “Like me, eh?” asked Dave.

  “Yeh,” said Shorty, “Like you.” He left the shelter and returned carrying tin cups.

  Dave rubbed his bristly jaw. “I’m only a hunter,” he said quietly. “I sell game to the ranchers and to the soldiers patrolling south of here.”

  “Not much in it, is there?” asked Mort.

  “No,” admitted Dave, “but it pays for salt and bacon, cartridges and tobacco. Besides, I like it up here.”

  Edrick eyed Dave. “Like a lone wolf. Like a steer that won’t lie with the herd. An outlier.”

  “Is it a crime for a man to like to live alone and hunt?” asked Dave.

  “No, unless he’s hunting other people’s stock.”

  Dave waved a hand. “You find any here?”

  “We didn’t expect to find any … here.”

  Shorty filled the cups. “What’ll we do with him, Dan?”

  “Don’t be in a rush. Maybe he’s seen something.”

  Dave accepted a cup from Shorty. “I did hear some cattle a week or so ago, along the crick five miles south of here.”

  “We were probably trailing them. We don’t get much farther than the crick.”

  Dave sipped the strong brew. “That’s all I know.”

  Edrick rolled a smoke and passed the makings
to Ochoa. “How well do you know this country?”

  “Better than most men. I hunted up here two years ago. Wintered up here. Damn near froze to death.”

  “Yeh,” said Edrick, “you musta.” He drained his coffee cup. “Let’s vamoose, boys.”

  The three men glanced at Dave and then at Edrick. “What about him?” asked Shorty with a grin.

  “We’ll let him hunt.”

  “A rope is better,” said Shorty.

  “Si! Si!” said Ochoa.

  Edrick gripped Dave’s hand in a powerful grip and thrust his cigarette tip into the pipe bowl. His gray eyes looked up into Dave’s. “Blood thirsty bastards, ain’t they?”

  “Man ain’t done nothing we can prove,” said Mort.

  Edrick released Dave’s hand. It was a little numb from the crushing grip. “Shorty always was a fast man with a rope. Around a cow or a man. Mick Ochoa is near as bad. I’ll tell you about him, Davie. Irish mother. Father was half Mex and half Yaqui. Best tracker in the country. Now, Yeamans: you can stay up here, but don’t try to leave! Mick can trail a ghost. I ain’t sure you’re in on this sticky looping, but if you are …” Edrick spat. “Mick will know. Next time we won’t be so damned formal. Adios, Rebel!”

  Dave watched them file out of the clearing. “Still think we oughta string him up,” said Shorty. “Teach a lesson to these damn rustlers.”

  “Shut up!” said Edrick. “You talk too damn much for a little man!”

  Dave heard them plow through the wet brush. Moments later he heard the dull thud of hoofs on the soft earth. Even after they were gone he seemed to see the Cheshire Cat grin of Shorty and the flat eyes of Mick Ochoa. Time for Dave Yeamans to vamoos. He struck his camp swiftly. There wasn’t much gear. Four years of war had taught him to travel with a minimum of gear. Winter was coming on and he had a hankering to hit the trail south into Sonora. He made up cantle and pommel packs and got his rangy claybank from the sheltered meadow near the stream. The sun was hardly over the mountains when he kneed the horse onto the trail. “Time to cut, Brazos,” he said, “we ain’t welcome here.”

  The sun was well up when Dave reached the bottom of the rough trail. Time and time again he turned in his saddle to study the silent woods behind him. There was no sign of life other than a hunting hawk floating on outstretched pinions high overhead. Damn them! It had been a good camp. It was always so. Every time he settled in a good place something like this happened. The five years since the war had filled Arizona with drifters, war veterans, men on the run, settlers and rustlers. Everyone regarded strangers with suspicion. Many a man had danced a reel on thin air because he couldn’t explain why he was in a certain part of the country at a certain time.

  Dave caught the pungent odor of wood smoke as he crossed a shallow valley. There was a low log building backed against a slope. Beneath an overhanging rock formation were other outbuildings. A horse whinnied from a peeled-pole corral as Dave neared the house. A door banged open and a woman came out beneath the ramada, shading her eyes to study Dave. She went inside the house.

  Dave was dismounting by the gate when the woman reappeared. A heavy Sharps rifle was in her slim brown hands. “Stand where you are!” she called out clearly. “Who are you? What do you want?”

  Dave swore under his breath. “Women too,” he said to Brazos. He placed his hands atop his battered hat. “Wayfarer!” he called out. “Passing through! I need coffee and salt!”

  “Come closer then!”

  Dave walked toward the house. He raised his eyebrows when he caught a good look at her. Not more than twenty or so. Honey-colored hair, braided smoothly, with the sunbeams seemingly tangled in it. Gray eyes. A mouth too wide for beauty, but pretty enough to a man who spent most of his time in the company of a claybank. “The name is Dave Yeamans,” he said.

  “Where are you from?”

  “Texas, ma’am.” Dave smiled.

  She shook her head impatiently. “I mean just now!”

  Dave jerked his head. “North of here. In the woods near that bald butte. I’m heading south now. Sonora way.”

  She eyed him closely. “Did you see anyone up there?”

  “Four men.”

  “Who?”

  “Man by the name of Dan Edrick. Three others; Mort, Shorty and Mick Ochoa.”

  She raised her head. “The Lazy E corrida.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re sure you saw no one else?”

  Dave shook his head.

  She looked up at the moutains. “My father is up there somewhere. John Waite. I’m Leslie Waite.”

  Dave waggled his finger. “Can I take my hands down now?”

  She nodded but the Sharps was centered on his belly. “What’s your business here?”

  “Here it comes again,” said Dave with a sigh.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing, ma’am, nothing at all. I’m a hunter. Stay in the mountains most of the time. An outlier I’ve been called.”

  She looked up and down his shabby clothing. “Saddle tramp would be more like it, wouldn’t it?”

  Dave flushed. “I pay my own way.”

  “You’re sure you didn’t see my father? About as tall as you. Gray hair and eyes. Riding a bayo coyote mare.”

  “No, ma’am.”

  She bit her lip and looked uncertainly past Dave. Despite the heavy weapon in her hands she suddenly seemed like a lost child looking for her parents. “Two of the boys went after him at dawn. He was due back last night. I haven’t seen the boys.”

  Dave rubbed his jaw. “Seems as though there’s a lot of rustling going on hereabouts. Maybe he’s found something.”

  She grounded her rifle. “Maybe I can trust you,” she said. “If you’ll go and look for him I’ll fill a sack with supplies for you.”

  Dave was about to refuse when he saw the look in her eyes. She was worried sick. “All right, Miss Waite,” he said. “Which way do I look?”

  “Ride back the way you came. There’s a fork in the trail a mile back. Take it to the right. Toward Shadow Valley. He might be somewhere about there.”

  Dave walked back to his horse. “You can forget about the supplies, ma’am,” he said over his shoulder, “but I’d admire to have a real home-cooked meal when I get back with him.”

  “You bring him back and you’ll get the meal and the supplies.”

  Dave followed the trail to the fork and turned off. He reached a narrow valley, dark and damp, shielded from the sun by a knife-edged ridge. He turned up the collar of his sheepskin coat against the chill. “Into the valley of death,” he said wryly.

  Brazos gave the first sign. He whinnied sharply. A moment later he shied and blowed, dancing nervously to one side. Dave freed his Spencer and rested it across his thighs. He studied the wet brush. Something scraped against a tree to his right. He peered into the shadows. A darker shadow moved. Dave’s eyes grew accustomed to the dimness. Cold sweat trickled down his sides. A man was hanging from a tree limb, swaying gently in the cool wind that crept down the valley. Dave dismounted and pushed his way through the brush.

  He gripped an ankle and turned the body. The staring eyes were gray. The bare head was covered with gray hair, shot with white. Despite the contorted face Dave knew the man must be John Waite, for the girl was a picture of him. “For God’s sake,” Dave said softly. He stepped back and stumbled over something lying in the wet grass. It was a running iron. The brand was an odd one. “Three diamonds?” said Dave. “No. Maybe Double W.”

  Dave whistled for Brazos. The claybank was nervous. Dave stood up on his saddle and cut the dead man down. He hoisted John Waite across Brazos’ withers and tied the ankles and wrists together beneath the horse. He thrust the running iron through the straps of his pommel pack and led the claybank back to the trail. “It was the valley of death,” he said. “How in hellsfire will I break this news to that girl?”

  Hoofs thudded on the trail as Dave neared the fork. Before Dave could lead Brazos into the brush
two riders appeared. One of them threw down on Dave, but Dave’s Spencer covered the man’s belly. “Put up that cutter,” he said quietly, “I’ve been choused enough for today.”

  The man slid his Colt into its sheath. “For God’s sake, Kelly,” he said over his shoulder, “it’s old man Waite!”

  Kelly kneed his horse forward. He eyed Dave. “What happened?”

  “I found him strung up in Shadow Valley.”

  Kelly circled his horse on the forehand. “That’s it, Carl,” he said nervously. “I been expecting trouble. Let’s pull leather.”

  Dave cocked the Spencer. “Wait,” he said, “are you men from the Waite ranch?”

  “Yeh,” said Carl. “Why?”

  “Miss Waite said you were looking for her father.”

  “We’ve found him, stranger,” said Kelly. “Let’s go, Carl! We’re dusting outa here before we get one of them hemp neckties!” He set the steel to his bay and was off down the trail before Dave could speak again. Carl followed his partner. In a few minutes even the steady drumming of the hoofs was gone. Dave shrugged. He led the claybank on and halted him in a motte of scrub trees near the ranch.

  The girl had been watching for him, for she hurried from the house and met Dave near the fence. “Is it him?” she asked.

  Dave took off his hat and nodded.

  “How did they do it?” she asked.

  Dave looked down at the ground.

  “How did they do it?” she almost screamed.

  She ran to the horse and looked into her father’s face. “Oh God,” she breathed. “Not by the rope.”

  Dave wanted to leave. She turned. “Who did it?”

  “I don’t know. I found him in Shadow Valley. That running iron was in the grass at his feet. I met Carl and Kelly. They pulled out.”

  “Yes,” she said scornfully. “It would be like them to do just that. Just as the others did.”

  “Why would they do it?” he asked. “Hang him, I mean.”

  She shrugged. “You’re a stranger here. For months there has been a plague of rustling. Every man eyes his neighbor with suspicion. We bought this place months ago. Dan Edrick accused Dad of rustling. Mick Ochoa had found three Lazy E steers with our stock in Cup Valley. Edrick made a lot of talk about it.”