Trail Smoke (Musaicum Vintage Western). Ernest Haycox

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СКАЧАТЬ coffee with a bitter and unpleasant concentration on his dry, drawn features. The kid—Ferd Bowie—was bony and peaked. He still had an adolescent down on his cheeks, but there was a sallow savagery all about his look that told Buck Surratt of wickedness too early learned. Chunk Osbrook lifted a pair of ink-black eyes and seemed to measure Surratt for weight and reach. He was blunt and solid and proud of his strength, and Surratt understood then he would never be satisfied until he had demonstrated it. Buck Surratt suddenly remembered another man in his past who had been like that.

      They ate out their hunger and left the room. More leisurely, Surratt listened to their idle palavering on the porch. When he was through he went out there and packed his pipe and glanced through the soft bright heat of the meadow, not noticing them. The talk had stopped with his appearance and the silence was a morose, alien thing. Torveen stood in the doorway of the main house, indifferent and minutely smiling, as though he were removed from this animosity and impartial to it. But Surratt detected the irony of that man's glance.

      He tried another match on his pipe and clenched it between his teeth. Stepping off the porch he walked over to his pony and unlashed the blanket roll. The stillness behind him was hard and continuing, and he had no need to turn to see how closely they were watching him. He strolled back to the ell and went along it to the end door. Inside, he saw a dozen double-decked bunks surrounding a stove md a table and four home-made chairs. Heat and stale smoke and the horsy smell of men's clothes lay thick through the room. He dropped his roll on an empty bunk and walked back to the porch.

      Nick Perrigo sat on the porch edge, his back bent far forward, his hands on his knees. He glowered at the dust; the nerve-ridden thinness of his face sharpened. He said idly: "Chunk, you left your tobacco in the bunkroom."

      Chunk Osbrook rose with a jerk, as though released from enforced waiting. His spurs dragged along the porch. Not looking that way, Surratt heard him strike the flat of his hand against the building wall and go into the bunkroom.

      There was a quality of expectancy flowing out from this crew that fanned across Surratt's cheeks; it was an intangible thing other men might not have felt But for him, trained in the shadings of trouble, it registered on receptive senses and ticked a coolness along his nerves. In the bunkroom something fell to the floor. He turned then and stared at these men. They were looking away from him, motionless against the sunlight—and waiting. There was, he thought regretfully, nothing new in this pattern; it was the pattern of his life and all the running in the world would not help him. He walked back to the bunkroom door and went in.

      It was his blanket roll on the floor, thrown there by Chunk Osbrook. The man stood backed up against the table, his feet braced apart. A slow, deep breathing lifted and lowered the heavy arch of his chest; and his eyes were round and bright and greedy. He said:

      "Your junk was in my way."

      Surratt walked around the table. The space was narrow and he had to pull his shoulders aside to avoid brushing Osbrook. He went on around. Osbrook made a swift wheel and sudden doubt shaded the glitter of his desire. The table lay between them. Surratt put his hands at the edge of the table, gripping it. His thoughts were dismal then, darkened by the going of a hope. The ways of a man's life always caught up with him. Somewhere was peace but not for him; and this chore had to be done. There wasn't any emotion in his voice.

      "The boys wouldn't want to miss this, Chunk."

      The sweep of his hands carried the table up against Chunk Osbrook's taut frame and destroyed the rush the man was set to make. Osbrook flung the table aside with a lunge of his arm. Rage came out of Buck Surratt in a gust of breathing and turned his face white. He threw himself against Osbrook, the point of his shoulder driving Osbrook across the floor to the doorway. Osbrook struck against the casing and ripped up a jabbing blow that caught Surratt wickedly in the belly. They fought and heaved and wrestled around the doorway, using their knees and their elbows. But Surratt dislodged Osbrook from the casing and drove him to the edge of the porch. Osbrook fell off backwards, landing on a shoulder.

      Surratt jumped down to the dust and leaped aside. Osbrook, on his knees, made a dive for Surratt's legs and missed. He rolled on and lunged up to his feet—and charged, his knees driving him, his shoulders low and crouched. Surratt met him savagely. He broke up that lowering, bull-like rush. He sheered away those flogging arms and reached Osbrook's turning temple with one sledging smash. It exploded through the man's head and he saw Osbrook's eyes mirror the streaked craziness it produced. It took the power out of Osbrook's fists; they sagged and struck without aim, and then Surratt crashed his temple again and sent him down into the dust. Osbrook was blind, he was half knocked out, but the attacking instinct still held him together and he reared back on his knees and made another grab for Surratt's legs. Surratt kicked the man's hands aside and tramped a half circle around Osbrook. He reached down and got Osbrook around the neck, hauling him up that way. There wasn't any pity in him as he battered that broad and dogged face at will. Osbrook's lips began to drip and spread formlessly, and when he fell he rolled a little and his hands reached vainly for Surratt; and then he was through, his legs squirming involuntarily.

      Surratt walked backwards; he turned. The crew hadn't stirred. They didn't stir now, but the color of Ferd Bowie's eyes was deep and hating, and the wildness of his disappointment burned bright spots on his starved, consumptive cheeks. Nick Perrigo stared at his feet, bitter and biding his time. The other man, Ed, rested his body on the building wall and seemed afraid of all this. Sam Torveen remained in the doorway, an obscure smile on his face; he was behind the crew and they didn't see him raise a hand toward Surratt in a half-saluting manner.

      There were three of them here, Surratt understood, who respected nothing but the whip—Perrigo and Bowie and Chunk Osbrook. Pity or generosity they didn't know. He cast a quick look behind him to where Osbrook had risen uncertainly. He looked back to the porch again, the temper in him still pitched to kill.

      He said: "Is that all—or is there some more?"

      They had nothing to say. He hadn't felt Osbrook's blows and hadn't been aware of being struck. But suddenly his body began to hurt where those blows had landed.

      Twilight flowed across the meadow in indigo ripples, and somewhere in the depths of the hills a coyote's howl thickened the land's deep loneliness. A faint wind came off the Gray Bull peaks and rustled through the trees like the echoes of a distant waterfall. Abruptly it was dark, with the lights of the ranch laying rich yellow beams across soft blackness. Ferd Bowie's horse clacked over the creek bridge and Ferd Bowie wheeled into the yard. He said, "All right," and got down.

      The crew made vague shapes on the porch. Somebody ticked a cigarette through the air, and when it fell its burning tip burst into a vivid spray of light. They had been waiting here, the sense of it very strong to Surratt—and now the waiting was done and they were rising along the porch. Sam Torveen's voice was keen and a little whipped-up. "Everybody inside." He turned into the big room, the others at his heels. Following, Surratt heard horses traveling down the road.

      Torveen stood in the center of the room, his red hair ragged on his forehead. He was smiling again, crookedly.

      "Some of them will come in and some will stay in the yard. Ed, you go stand at the corner of the house." He looked at Buck Surratt, that glinting amusement strong in his eyes. "You came up here for reasons of your own, friend Buck. The reasons are about to appear." He moved around the room, closing the wooden shutters against the windows and dropping the bars across them. He returned to the table, caught up the lamp and placed it in a corner of the room where its light would not make a background. Perrigo and Bowie and Chunk Osbrook had posted themselves around this room, making dark and studied shapes. The oncoming men boomed across the plank bridge. They were in the yard presently—and halted. A voice that was familiar to Surratt hailed the house.

      "Torveen. I want to see you."

      Torveen СКАЧАТЬ