The Devil's Roundup Part 8

She looked around at the peeled log walls, the spa.r.s.e furniture. Willie saw this, and there was no apology in his voice. "A man can't start out a success." He turned from her then, stopping in the doorway to add-"Don't be long."-and moved off toward the barn at a long-legged lope.

The remainder of the night pa.s.sed swiftly for them, a quick succession of events that, at dawn, led them toward the desert and Jesse Dulane's ranch. Winegla.s.s was miles behind them, as was the wizened minister who had solemnized the affair. Louise slept in the saddle, her chin bobbing against her chest. Willie dismounted stiffly and lifted her to the ground. They were at the outer fringe of the timber, the desert slightly below and west of them. Dulane's Anchor spread squatted three miles away, now only an indistinct jumble of rough buildings.

Willie kindled a small fire, and boiled a pot of coffee.

"Louise." He touched her, bringing her awake and handed her the tin cup. She drank quickly, then handed it back to him, leaning back against the bole of a stunted tree.

"Please let me go in alone, Willie."

She watched his face, but he gave no sign that he had heard her. Willie drained the cup, kicked the fire until it was smothered with dirt, and then pulled her to her feet.

"You're not too tired?"

She shook her head as he helped her mount. They angled off the slope to hit the road a half hour later.

Dawn had blossomed into a full, sunny morning when they finally crossed the ranch yard. Men made a cursing group around the corral as horses were being cut out. Eyes swung to them, then turned back to the business at hand, as they dismounted a few yards from the porch.

Jesse Dulane came from the house, Strang and Valverde at his heels. He gave his daughter a close inspection, then said: "So you gone and done it? Well, 1 seen it comin', danged if 1 didn't. Headstrong, that's what you are.. .just like your mother, but 1 like a woman that way." He made a motion toward Strang with his head and said curtly: "Get on with the work."

Strang stepped off the porch.

Valverde moved to follow Strang, but Jesse laid a hand on his arm, holding him. "Not you," he said. "You got a grudge, and a man packin' a grudge ain't worth a d.a.m.n to me or himself unless he gets it out of his system. You been wantin' to tangle with Kerry.. .all right, here's Kerry. Tangle with him."

Valverde made no attempt to hide his eagerness. He took a long step toward Kerry, only to be halted by the old man's voice.

"Take that danged gun off! I won't have you iosin' your head and pluggin' my brand new son-in-law just because you got a nasty temper."

Valverde let the gun belt drop, and stepped from the porch only to be knocked into a sprawl by Kerry's driving fist.

Jesse snorted in disgust as Valverde struggled to his feet. "h.e.l.l," Jesse told him, "this ain't no waltz!"

Valverde's temper was a live thing, and he let it out, boring in with the ferocity of a wild animal. Willie withstood the brunt of the attack, then leveled the squat man with a damaging uppercut.

Louise grabbed her father's arm, shouting: "Stop them! Make them stop!"

"What for?" Jesse said. "Man was made to fight over a woman. It's as natural as the sun and the wind. Look at 'em go at it!"

Kerry took a slas.h.i.+ng fist across the mouth to get near Valverde, then closed one of the man's eyes with a meaty hook. Valverde went down on one knee. Kerry stepped back, waiting for him to get up.

Jesse yelled: "Stomp him... stomp him!"

Kerry's breath was ragged, and he pulled for wind. "You ...fight your ...way. I'll fight him... mine."

Valverde made his feet then, picking up a fist-sized rock from the yard. Jesse shouted at him, but he ignored the old man, lifting his hand to strike. A gun blasted behind Kerry, and he jumped as Valverde bent over, clutching a bulletcreased hip. Jesse holstered his .38-40.

"Once," Jesse said, "1 could have shot the danged thing outta his hand, but my eyes are goin' out on me, 1 guess." He gave Valverde a hard glance. "Git to the bunkhouse and have Cookie patch that up." The old man's face was hard, and his mouth, behind his ragged, gray mustache, was pulled into a thin line.

Willie Kerry pawed at his bruised mouth and looked at Jesse.

Louise said: "1'm married now, Father. I've come after my things."

"You're wearin' 'em," Jesse told her.

Louise took a backward step and gasped.

"Don't say 1 didn't tell you. You know how 1 feel about you marryin' some brush-popper. 1 wanted you to be a lady, but you prefer him. All right.. .start out that way, flat broke and standin' in the only clothes you wear."

"That's carrying bein' tough a little too far," Willie said.

"Is it now?" Jesse wanted to know. "I fed this young beauty on milk and honey... maybe she's a little soft. She's on her own now, and she made her bed. Let's see if she's woman enough to lie in it. She either has gumption or she ain't. Time will tell. I give her six months to come crawlin' back, and, when she does, don't ever come after her, `cause she only gets one chance to come back."

"She'll never come back to you," Willie prophesied.

"Won't she, now?" Jesse taunted. "How long do you think you'll stay around when things start gettin' tough for you?"

"It finally comes out," Willie said tightly. "All right, confine the fight to me. Don't drag her into it." He took a ragged breath, trying to get control of his temper. "You make a big show of fight in' fair... what can you do to me unless you step outside the law?"

Jesse smiled, and waved them away with his hand. "Go on ... go home with him. Go back to that hole in the wall and the loneliness and the empty bellies."

Louise stared at her father. "I don't think I ever knew you before. 1 think 1 sincerely hate you now."

A look of grief flitted across her father's eyes, then was gone.

Willie took Louise by the arm, leading her to the waiting horses, wondering about it. They mounted and rode from the yard.

II.

The first month pa.s.sed happily, but Willie felt the added pressure. He rode into the hills for three days, returning on the fourth, driving four raw-boned steers before him. He drove them into Hondo and sold them, buying her cloth and things for the house with the twenty-eight dollars. Louise made no complaint, even appeared happy, but he saw the faraway look in her eyes when she thought he wasn't looking. He felt the shouldershaking sobs in the night when she supposed him sound asleep beside her. Willie recognized a mistake when he made one, and he had the solution at his fingertips, but he lacked the will power to take her home, to put her away from him forever.

The supper hour pa.s.sed, as had many others, with her laughter filling the small room, her beauty a tonic after a hard day's work. Willie shoved his plate away from him and fas.h.i.+oned a smoke with great care. Louise watched him, then said: "Tell me about it, Willie. 1 think it would help both of us."

He was surprised but masked it quickly. "1 don't know the words. I'm afraid 1 might use the wrong ones, and then 1'd hurt you."

Her dark eyes glowed, and she said simply: "Just say the words. I'll know what meanings to attach to them."

There was a long silence, a thoughtful drawing on his cigarette, then: "1 been wanting to talk to you about how it will be for us next year, our future here.. .but there won't be any future. Oh, I guess you love me, but love ain't enough, is it?"

She looked at him solemnly and said honestly: "1 don't know, Willie. Most of the time it is, but, then again, 1 get lonely. 1 guess I'm not the kind of a woman who likes to be poor."

Willie sighed deeply and crossed to the door to throw out his cigarette. "I guess that sums it up all right," he said quietly, and went outside for a drink of water. He paused by the well curbing, hearing the night sounds around him. He was half turned to reenter the cabin, when the sheriff's voice said: "'Evenin', Willie."

Kerry whirled, seeing them then in the darkness, the squat, blurred shapes of horses and riders. "Who's with you?" Willie forced his voice to be calm.

"Just Ron Banks, my deputy," Harms said, "and Strang, Pecos, and Valverde."

"What do you want?" Kerry asked.

Louise stepped to the door, standing framed in the lamplight.

"Get back in the house," Kerry told her, and the door closed.

"1 got a writ here," Harms said. "We want to inspect your cattle for rustled stock."

Kerry snorted. "There ain't been no rustiin' around here since Saber cleaned Bodry's bunch out ten years ago. Besides, a man don't need no writ to look at another man's herd. What's behind all this?"

"1'm just doin' my job," Harms maintained. "Dulane thought, seein' how you and him is sorta on the outs, it would be better to have the court order."

"All right," Willie said shortly. "We'll start in the mornin'."

"'Fraid not," Strang said. "The old man's gonna s.h.i.+p day after tomorrow 'n' he wants all he can get."

"What the devil!" Willie's temper threatened to get the better of him. "I've got on to sixty head in this brush. How the devil do you expect me to cut them out in time?"

"Gotta be done," Harms said. "Court order."

"1 get it," Willie said. "He wants to see me work day and night, is that it?"

"Take it any way you want," Strang said. "Go get your horse and kiss your wife good bye for a few days."

Willie glowered at them in the darkness, then went into the house. He emerged ten minutes later, sullen and silent, and crossed to the barn.

He rode in on the morning of the third day, dirty, with a half-inch stubble on his face. Louise met him at the door. He spent ten minutes at the horse trough before slipping into clean clothes and putting his razor away. She had a meal ready for him, and he ate in silence. Louise waited until he lifted his coffee cup, then blurted: "1 hate him...I hate him!"

Willie shook his head. "No, you know that isn't so. It's just that he's alone now, and I guess that can hurt when you get older."

"How many of his cattle did you find?"

"None. I knew there wouldn't be any, but I had to look." Willie scrubbed a hand across his face, and stood up. "I could sure use some sleep, but there's something I have to do in town. Guess I'd better get it done."

He smiled at her, but she shook her head, saying: "I'll wait here."

He went out to his horse then, wondering if she was ashamed to face her friends with only a homemade dress to show for her married life. Willie rode slowly from the yard.

He paused on the bluff overlooking Hondo. It was a sight he never tired of seeing, but, somehow, today it failed to raise his spirits. He nudged the horse with his heels, and an hour later came onto the main street. Buggies and buckboards were thick along the hitch racks, and it was only then that he realized it was Sat.u.r.day. He pa.s.sed the loading pens, noticing that they were empty. He felt an idea brush him and moved over to the agent's window to ask: "Jesse Dulane s.h.i.+p yesterday?"

The agent looked surprised. "Why, no, Willie. Beef prices dropped another quarter. He wouldn't s.h.i.+p now."

Willie nodded his thanks, and trotted the length of the street. Edith Saber called to him, and he swung his horse to dismount before her.

"Willie," she said, "John told me to ask you if you could spare some time. He wanted to put on another crew and needs a good boss. There's the extra house that goes in with the deal."

Willie read nothing in her voice, but he felt something there. He lowered his head as though deep in thought, thinking: It sure must show plain enough. He looked up at her and murmured-"I'll think it over."-and tipped his hat, walking on down the street.

Loyal Surrency's bank door stood open. Willie walked in, nodded to the cas.h.i.+er, and swung the low mahogany gate aside to enter the inner office. Surrency sat behind his desk like an overgrown bullfrog. He glanced at Willie, and his eyes clouded, as though he had been reminded of something unpleasant.

Willie pulled a chair back and sat down.

Surrency said briefly: "What is it this time?"

Willie flushed. "This time? I only been in here once before and that was to get the loan in the first place."

"A little dry this year," Surrency said. "Heard you'd been having trouble."

Willie had no wish to discuss it and made a vague motion with his hand. "It comes and goes," he told the banker.

"Seen your friend, Rudy?"

"Why, no," Willie said, something in the man's voice turning him cautious.

"When are you going to be able to start paying again? You're three months behind now."

"I know that," Willie admitted. "I been waitin' for the beef market to climb just like everyone else. 1 mean to pay, but that isn't what 1 came in to talk about. 1 need a little ready cash... maybe fifty, seventy-five dollars. 1'd kinda like to buy my wife a few things."

Surrency smiled then, and Kerry stiffened, knowing it to be a strange thing. Surrency put his beefy hands together and said, as if each word gave him great pleasure: "I've put a good deal of thought into your note, Kerry, and I've come to the conclusion that the best procedure would be foreclosure."

Kerry slapped the arms of his chair. "That's a little sudden, ain't it? You gave me a six months' extension on that note."

"I've changed my mind," Loyal Surrency said flatly.

"Mighty convenient, ain't it?"

"Just what do you mean?"

"I don't exactly know," Kerry admitted. "I'd like to know what the h.e.l.l you mean."

"I had trouble with a man," Loyal said. "I feel that you're responsible." Kerry's face was puzzled, and Surrency supplied: "George Rudy. He took a fancy to my daughter. Naturally 1 objected, and 1 believe everything would have been all right if you hadn't seen fit to encourage him. You were talking to him the night of the dance, then you ran away with Dulane's daughter. The combination was sufficient to cause Rudy's unforgivable words to me."

"Wasn't there some kind of fight?" Willie asked pointedly.

Surrency's face was livid as he snapped: "Yes, dammit. The pup had the effrontery to demand satisfaction."

"I take it you got stomped?"

Surrency scowled, and Willie laughed. He felt he could afford to at this point.

Surrency said coldly: "Get your things together and move off that property, or I'll have the sheriff move you off."

"So Rudy licked you," Willie murmured. "You weren't the cut-proud bully boy you thought you were after all. What about Marilee? Did she cradle your fat head and tell you she'd never see the brute again, or was she woman enough to go with him?"

Surrency surged to his feet, pawing at Kerry. Willie's temper filled him. He stretched Loyal Surrency flat on his back with one punch.

There was a great thras.h.i.+ng sound from the other room as the teller crowded through the door to pick up the banker. Surrency's mouth was bleeding, and he shook his fist at Kerry. "I'll have the sheriff after you for this!"

"Go to h.e.l.l," Willie told him. He stalked out to stand on the boardwalk. He stood there letting his anger die and saw John Saber go into Keno Charlie's. Willie felt a whim nudge him and crossed the street.

III.

Saber stood belly flat against the bar, and Kerry sided him. Saber shot him a quick glance and commented: "Hot today, isn't it?"