Larry and Stretch 18 Page 3

  Garbed in black, she sat by the parlor window and wistfully studied her cousin. Wilbur Neale stood with his hands thrust into the pockets of his well-tailored pants, his expression grave, his voice soft.

  “We have to be brave, Cousin. I know it’s hard—hard to imagine carrying on without Uncle Eli—but that’s what he’d want. We’ll mourn him, of course, and ...”

  “I only wish I knew the answer,” she murmured.

  “The answer to what?” he asked.

  “Don’t fence with me, Wilbur,” she chided. “You know exactly what I mean. I first noticed it six months ago—the great change in Dad’s attitude toward you. He became so—so terribly grim, and I could never understand why. I asked him about it. He refused to explain. And now I ask you. Please tell me, Wilbur.”

  “It was nothing,” he frowned. “Certainly nothing serious. He always trusted me, Cousin. He never ceased to trust me. The incident you speak of—I fear you’ve exaggerated it in your mind.”

  “Dad was always a fair-minded man,” she pointed out. “I can’t believe that he’d treat you that way—without ample reason.”

  “I made a foolish error while tallying stock,” he smoothly explained. “When your father discovered it, he lost his temper. I’ll admit we had harsh words but, afterward, the incident was forgotten. It just wasn’t important,”

  “Maybe you’re right,” she mused. “Maybe I exaggerated it in my mind. But—for a while—I had the impression that he had ceased to trust you. He seemed to be …” She searched her mind for the right words, “on his guard against you.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” He said it mildly, without heat, and summoned up a reassuring smile. “I was an orphan when your father took me in. He paid for my education, taught me all I know about the operation of this emporium, always treated me with the utmost kindness. Why would he need to fear me? That just doesn’t make sense, Cousin.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” she sighed.

  He came to her, took her hands in his.

  “It’s been like a nightmare for you,” he muttered. “The shock of it all—the grief ...”

  “I’m feeling stronger now,” she told him. “You needn’t hesitate to—to mention the details. About the funeral, I mean.”

  “Ten o’clock tomorrow morning,” said Neale. “Meantime, you must try to rest. Go to your room, Cousin. There’ll be no customers until day after tomorrow, and I can take care of any callers. Yes. I can at least do that much for you—shield you against the inevitable misery-mongers.”

  “You aren’t being very charitable,” she chided. “It’s only to be expected that Dad’s friends should call on me.”

  “I don’t mean to sound unkind,” he frowned. “I’m thinking only of your welfare. You’re badly in need of sleep.”

  “Very well.” She permitted him to assist her to rise. “I’ll go to my room and, perhaps, I’ll forget for a while, and sleep.”

  He escorted her along the corridor to her bedroom, then left her. After closing the door, she moved wearily to the window and lowered the shade, closing out the afternoon sun. The atmosphere was becoming oppressive, so she removed her clothes and donned a light robe, before sinking onto her bed.

  For an hour she lay there, yearning for the oblivion of slumber, praying for it, but in vain. She could hear the familiar street-sounds, but couldn’t blame them for her restlessness. It was something else that plagued her mind and kept her wide awake. A suspicion? A fear? Fear of what? Her cousin had offered a frank and convincing explanation of the enigma that had puzzled her these past six months. Eli Ventaine was inclined to be over-exacting at times. An error in calculation could have irritated him—but to such an extent? To the point of his becoming downright hostile toward his nephew?

  The other sounds reached her then. Closer sounds, Subdued. Furtive. She trembled, as she sat up and swung her bare feet to the floor. On tiptoe, she moved to the bedroom door and opened it. The muffled sounds were repeated. Which room? Wilbur s? No! Her father’s room.

  She glanced along the corridor and, with a thrill of apprehension, noted that the door of the next room was half-open. Try as she might, she couldn’t resist the impulse to investigate. Silently, she crept to that doorway.

  Wilbur’s back was turned to the doorway. He was on his knees beside the old bureau, opening every drawer, checking the contents—old invoices, receipts, documents of every description—and she detected a desperate urgency in his movements. He was cursing, softly, but bitterly. She had never seen him this way before. Somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to call out to him, to demand an explanation.

  As she retreated from the doorway and furtively returned to her own room, she asked herself the inevitable question. Why hadn’t she challenged her cousin? And the answer was all too obvious. She was afraid. For many years, she had accepted him, had regarded him as she would a brother, even though they had little in common. She was inclined to be an introvert, whereas Wilbur was the direct opposite—a smooth-tongued, easy-going extrovert, popular, congenial and a patron of Ketchtown’s houses of entertainment. Not just the Bogardis Opera House and the Delroy Restaurant, but the gaudier houses. The saloons. The gambling palaces.

  Gingerly, she closed and locked her door, crept to her bed and sank onto the mattress. Sleep? Could she ever hope to sleep again—plagued by these vague suspicions, these unanswered queries?

  Ten minutes later, she rose from her bed and moved wearily to the window to raise the shade and frown down into Main Street. There was noise, loud, compelling noise that seemed unpardonable in her present mood. Her father was laid out at the Maxton Funeral Parlor. Elias Ventaine—friend of so many Ketchtown citizens. There were many to mourn him and, surely, the town should be quiet. But, somewhere along Main Street, somebody was beating a drum. Beating a drum and shouting. Locals were pouring into the street to watch the arrival of a gaudily-painted wagon.

  After rapping at her door, her cousin called to her; “Cousin Lucinda—are you all right? I knew that infernal din would wake you.”

  She went to the door.

  “Yes. The drumbeat woke me. I don’t understand ...”

  “Some rabble-rousing evangelist. I saw the wagon from my window. Disgusting—the way these bull-roaring preachers peddle salvation—like drummers selling their wares.”

  She leaned against the door, sighed heavily and, for a few more moments, forced herself to murmur polite replies to his solicitous enquiries. Was she feeling any easier? Had her appetite returned? Should he sent for a doctor?

  “I’ll be all right, Wilbur,” she called. “If I could just—be alone for a while.”

  He moved away along the corridor. Sick at heart and with her shoulders slumped in weariness, she crossed to the window and seated herself. Curiously, she hadn’t yet begun thinking of the men accused of her father’s murder.

  But, in the very near future, Lucinda Ventaine would become more than interested in one of the Lone Star Hellions.

  Chapter Three –

  Fugitive at Large

  Throughout the remainder of that day, Dan Cox and his minions concentrated on establishing themselves as travelling evangelists. The wagon was stalled in the entrance to a narrow side alley strategically close to the Trust & Security Bank. The team was bedded in a nearby livery stable. From mid-afternoon till sundown, Cox, Waddell and Erskine followed their usual routine—Waddell beating the drum to attract an audience, Erskine playing on the harmonium, Cox booming out his ranting, raging condemnations and exhortations.

  His sermons were well-rehearsed and calculated to appeal to the gullible. The theme was always simple. You repented and were saved, or you continued your sinful ways and suffered eternal hell-fire.

  Mid-morning of the following day, the campaign was resumed, much to the disgust of the occupant of the second story cell at the county jail. Stretch Emerson wasn’t opposed to religion or to preachers in general, but there was something about the bull-voiced fat man that caused him revulsion—
something indefinable. He couldn’t explain it; he simply disliked Cox on sight.

  From his perch in the corridor, old Chris remarked,

  “We ain’t had no drum-beatin’ sin-killers in Ketchtown for quite a spell. Kinda livens up the old town, you know?”

  “Chris,” frowned Stretch, “you can have my share of that fat jasper, and welcome.”

  ‘That’s right friendly,” mused Chris, ‘you callin’ me by name. Only wish I knew your moniker, boy. Ain’t you membered it yet?”

  “Can’t recollect a thing,” lied Stretch.

  “Not even the moniker of your sidekick?” prodded Chris.

  “Nope.” Stretch shook his head. “Can’t even recall if I had a sidekick.”

  “You sure as hell got a sidekick,” grinned Chris, “and he’s still on the loose. Bob and Otis took another posse out this mornin’. I swear I never seen Otis so mean. Kinda hurt his pride, you know? I mean, him a deputy, and all, and this feller puttin’ him to sleep with just one punch, then stealin’ his hardware, his tobacco, his bay stallion.”

  Somehow, Stretch managed to suppress a chuckle. His face was impassive, when he commented,

  “Yeah—you couldn’t expect a deputy to cotton to that.”

  He closed to ears to the haranguing of Deacon Cox and squatted on the bunk. Breakfast hadn’t been as substantial as he was accustomed to. To take his mind off his hunger, he fished out his makings and built a smoke.

  Old Chris talked on, his voice droning incessantly, and Stretch wasn’t listening. He was thinking of Larry and feeling a stirring of optimism. Wasn’t that just like old Larry? He hadn’t merely escaped. He had lit out on a deputy’s horse, with a deputy’s gun belt girding his loins, and leaving that deputy slumbering with a sore jaw.

  His optimism would have increased, had he been able to see Larry at this moment. At sun-up, Larry had broken camp. Now, he was riding the high country, moving deeper into the hills. The dressing and bandage so carefully applied by Doc Everingham had been discarded. He wasn’t troubled by the slight aching, the stinging sensation at his scalp. What troubled him was the seemingly impossible task he had set himself. Where to begin?

  He was jerked from his reverie, while putting the bay to yet another grassy, windswept slope, A shrill sound had reached him, high-pitched and strident, the scream of a woman in panic. He stared ahead, filled his right hand with Colt. The two men and the woman were some considerable distance up the slope, but his eyes were keen; he could make out every detail of this tense tableau. One of the men was mounted, sitting a pinto and laughing, calling encouragement to his crony. That one, a dark-haired, swarthy jasper, was grappling with the woman. She was bare-headed and garbed in a white blouse, gaily-patterned skirt and sandals. The blouse, Larry perceived, was ripped clear to the waist. She was screaming protests in Spanish, a language in which he was fluent.

  The bay had toted him up more than one steep slope this morning and was panting heavily. He couldn’t hope to force the animal to speed under these conditions, so he swung down and continued up the grade with long strides. His shouted challenge alerted the girl’s assailant’s, just as he intended it to. As soon as the swarthy one moved clear of the girl, Larry dropped to one knee, steadied the Colt’s barrel in his cupped left hand, sighted and squeezed the trigger. Simultaneous with the loud report, Comanche Trask’s Stetson was whisked from his head, perforated. Russ Porter twisted in his saddle, swinging his six-shooter toward the climbing Texan. Larry paused again, sighted again, cocked and fired twice. His first bullet tore Porter’s right shirtsleeve. His second whined so close to Porter’s face that it actually seared his flesh. For the marauding hard cases, this was enough—more than enough. If this proddy stranger could place his bullets so accurately, at such long range, they weren’t about to test his aim at close quarters. Trask swung astride his sorrel and dug in his spurs. With Porter tagging him close, he rode on up the slope to disappear beyond a cluster of rocks.

  Larry took the bay’s rein in his left hand and came on warily. Reaching the sobbing, wide-eyed girl, he addressed her in her native tongue, but kept his eyes on the rocks.

  “You wait, young one. Mind my horse until I return.”

  She nodded nervously. As he began his climb to the rocks, she moved close to the bay, fondling its mane and staring after him. It took him all of ten minutes to reach the lava deposits, because he climbed slowly and with caution. No sign of the two hard cases, those skirt-chasing sidewinders who so strongly resembled—who? Who did they resemble? The likeness was unmistakable. He rolled and lit a cigarette, grinned mirthlessly and decided that his luck was changing—for the better.

  They rode a sorrel and a pinto. One was dark-haired and brawny, the other blond and scrawny. Small wonder they seemed familiar!

  Would they expect him to follow them? Obviously not, because they weren’t attempting to erase their back-trail; their horse-tracks showed clear beyond the rocks, leading across open ground toward a timbered ridge. He turned and descended to where the girl awaited. Elis grin was reassuring. She was young, probably no more than seventeen, but well-developed, obviously a peon girl. He offered his Stetson to her.

  “I apologize for my fellow-Americanos, young one. Do not judge us all by the actions of these bandidos.”

  She smiled shyly and with gratitude. Somehow, she had managed to effect temporary repairs to her torn blouse. She seemed at ease with him. On the ground beside her lay an overturned basket from which had spilled wild berries. He guessed she’d been picking them when the riders came upon her.

  “My horse must rest,”’ he told the girl, while helping to retrieve the spilled berries. “In a little while, I will take you home.”

  “Yes.” She nodded eagerly. “You must come to our home, that my parents may offer thanks. I am so grateful, Señor...?”

  “I am called Valentine.”

  “I am Conchita Martinez.”

  “You live in this high country, Conchita?”

  “At the farm of my father, Señor Valentine. A quiet place.”

  “Not far from here?”

  “Less than two miles, Señor.”

  “You walked a long way to pick berries, young one.”

  “We are strong, we Martinez people. Not afraid to walk far.”

  The girl continued to talk of the good life, the quiet, unhurried existence of her family, while they rode away at a right angle, following her directions. She straddled the bay with her bare arms wrapped about his chest, and perhaps she was appreciating the contrast. Close contact with this tough but amiable gringo caused her comfort, more security than disquiet. With those evil ones, it had been so different, a frightening experience.

  During that two-mile ride, Larry learned all there was to know about the Martinez family—all twelve of them. Rafael Martinez, his devoted spouse Rose and ten niños, of whom Conchita was the eldest, had established their farm on a verdant plateau beyond the next saw-tooth rise, some five years ago. They spoke no English and, in the predominantly gringo townships of South Wyoming, had lived as aliens, never knowing true contentment.

  They topped the rise and, for the first time since the beginning of this violent adventure, Larry knew a feeling of tranquility. The plateau had a relaxing effect, seen for the first time, its green fields bathed in the morning sun, the neat alqueria in the background, the chattering clear creek, the grazing livestock and scampering niños.

  Papa Martinez abandoned his plough and waddled toward the house, hustling to reach it ahead of the approaching horseman. His equally obese spouse appeared on the shaded porch, surrounded by several of her brood.

  In the front yard, amid the chickens, the goats and the smaller children, Larry halted the bay and let the girl slip to the ground. Mama Martinez took note of the damaged blouse and almost swooned on the spot. The fat little Mex wrung his hands in anguish. Hastily, Conchita babbled out her story.

  “Gently, Rose,” Rafael chided his wife. “She is unharmed. Give thanks to the good Lord
that this Americano has rescued her from the evil ones.” He doffed his floppy straw sombrero, and fervently assured Larry, “My home is yours, Señor. Everything I possess—all yours ...”

  “Much thanks,” faltered Rosa. “Much—much thanks.”

  “You will rest your horse,” begged Rafael. “You will stay with us, eat with us …”

  “You have thanked me, friend,” said Larry, “and this is enough.” He wasn’t finding it difficult to converse in their dialect. Fortunately, his knowledge of the language had been gleaned from the peons, as well as the pure Castillians. “I have not the time to visit.”

  “How then do I pay this great debt?” demanded Rafael. “To save my daughter from—from what these bandidos might have done—is as much as to save her life. I am yours to command, Señor.”

  Larry hooked a leg over his saddlehorn, cast a glance about the yard and did some deep thinking. Rafael Martinez certainly was beholden to him. As a rule, he was reluctant to acceptant payment, gifts of any kind, as acknowledgement of his chivalry. But maybe he should make an exception on this occasion. He needed help of a very special kind. Rafael Martinez might be just the man to fill that need.

  “There is something you could do,” frowned Larry. “We will talk of it—just you and me.” He swung to the ground, handed the bay’s rein to the eldest Martinez boy and crooked a finger at the sodbuster. “Some place quiet, friend.”

  They moved around back of the house. In the cooling shade of a cottonwood, Larry hunkered on his heels and built a cigarette.

  “You will ask anything of me,” offered Rafael. “Anything at all, my good friend.”

  “First,” said Larry, “I ask your caution. I confide a secret which you must keep.”

  “The lips of Rafael Martinez,” Rafael solemnly assured him, “will be forever sealed.”

  Sooner or later, Larry reflected, he would have to take somebody into his confidence. Could he extricate himself from his present predicament without assistance, without the help of at least one stranger? It didn’t seem likely. So, to Rafael Martinez, he told all, and the telling of it enabled him to get every detail into focus. He told it quietly, dispassionately, with Rafael hanging on his every word.