Clifton Adams - Boomer

The last thing Joe Grant wanted was trouble, and now he could feel trouble gathering around like thunderheads. At first it had seemed so simple—he'd just wanted to get his money from Ortway and settle down somewhere quiet and peaceful. Maybe, he thought, he just wasn't the peaceful kind. Maybe he was the kind that was dogged by trouble wherever he went....

Then Rhea Muller, without the bandages and medicine, came into the tent and Grant felt the sensation of strange excitement go over him when he looked at her. She said everything there was to say with one word. “Farley?”

Her brother nodded.

She looked at Grant. “We don't have to worry about Farley now. Mr. Grant is going to take care of everything.”

CHAPTER FIVE

IT WAS WELL past dark when old Zack Muller got back to his lease that night. Pat Morphy and Lon Calloway, the two drillers, had gone to Sabo; Grant and Bud Muller were getting ready for bed in the bunk tent when the old man came in.

“You stop off at Sabo?” young Muller asked. The old man nodded heavily, warming himself at the oil-barrel stove in the center of the tent. “I heard about our roustabout. But that's only the beginning of the trouble; we can't get our tools and machinery in Kiefer; we'll have to go to Tulsa after them.”

Bud swore harshly. “That'll mean a two-, three-day waste! Didn't Kurt Battle have the equipment?”

“Maybe.” Zack Muller smiled weakly. “But he's not selling anything to the Muller lease.” He turned to Grant. “Ben Farley's a big man in the Territory; he's got maybe a dozen locations and as many wells. If he pulled that much business away from Battle—well, you can see where that would leave an equipment dealer.”

The picture of Ben Farley was growing clearer in Grant's mind, and it was a picture that he didn't like. “I can hire a wagon and go to Tulsa after the equipment. I think I could make it in two days.”

But the old man shook his head. “I'd better do it. I know the dealers, and tools are hard to get. I'll take Bud with me, though, if you'll stay and look after Rhea and the lease.”

Grant nodded, although he wasn't sure just how a man would go about “looking after” Rhea Muller if she didn't want to be looked after.

Within an hour the old man and the boy began walking back toward Sabo, leaving the one Muller saddle horse on the lease. Grant stood outside the bunk tent watching the two figures disappear into the dark brush along the banks of Slush Creek, and he saw Rhea Muller standing in the orange lamplight in front of the dugout. After her father and brother had disappeared she did not look in Grant's direction. He thought of calling to her, but by that time she had gone back into the shack.

Grant had no idea how much work went ahead of building an oil derrick, but the next morning he began to learn. A cellar had to be dug, then came the slush pit and provisions for storage. A line had to be laid to the creek, for oil wells had to have water; a bunkhouse had to be built, and a place for the crew to eat.

Grant and Rhea Muller were standing in front of the dugout watching Calloway and Morphy work on the cellar. “They're drillers,” Rhea said, “and good ones, too. Digging cellars is not their work but they know it's got to be done. Are you beginning to see what we're up against, Joe?”

She used his first name again, deliberately, and he could not forget that moment of excitement when he had held her hard against him. He looked away. “I could give Calloway and Morphy a hand.”

But she shook her head. “We need a dozen hands—carpenters, rig builders, roustabouts.”

“Somewhere in Sabo or Kiefer there must be that many men who aren't afraid of Farley.”

“Maybe. But that isn't the whole problem. Labor is always at a premium in a new field; some of the promoters are even shanghaiing cowhands from the Cherokee country and turning them into tool dressers and carpenters. Even if we could find men willing to work for a Muller, we'd have to pay them a bonus, and we can't afford it. Still...”

She drew the word out, looking up at Grant. “When Bud and my father get back from Tulsa we've got to have everything ready to start building. Somewhere in Sabo or Kiefer there's a man named Turk Valois; he's a 'runner.' Do you know what a runner is?”

Grant nodded. “At end-of-track towns, when the railroad was hard up for labor, a runner acted as go-between for the railroad and the workers.”

“It's the same in an oil field; it's Turk Valois' business to round up labor for the lease owners, collecting a commission for each man that's hired. I want you to find Valois and talk to him. We've got to have workers and he's the only man who can get them for us.”

There was something in her voice that made Grant frown. “Do you know this Valois very well?”

After a moment she nodded.

“Maybe it would be better if you talked to him. I could drive you over to Sabo...”

“No!” Grant was startled at the sudden viciousness. She stood ramrod straight, staring straight ahead. “I don't like Turk Valois, and he doesn't like me. But he's not tied to Farley, either, and he might be willing to help us if you talk to him.”

There were other questions that Grant wanted to ask but he knew that he would get no answers. A coolness veiled her eyes as she turned toward him. “You'd better get started,” she said brittlely. “I'll be all right on the lease with Calloway and Morphy.” She wheeled and disappeared into the dugout.

Puzzled, Grant stood for a moment in front of the dugout. The name of Valois had thrown up a barrier of ice between them. Now, stronger than ever, he felt his instincts warning him of trouble ahead—and at the same time his notion of clearing out was getting weaker. When the idea occurred to him he remembered the day before when Rhea had been soft and willing in his arms. It was a thing he could not forget. At one time or another in every man's life he toys with the thought of love—and Joe Grant guessed that was what he was doing now.

The Muller saddle horse was a claybank stallion that they kept in the dry grass along the banks of Slush Creek. Grant brought the animal up to the bunk tent, dragged his rig from under his cot and cinched it down on the claybank's back. The puzzle of Turk Valois still bothered him as he swung up to the saddle.

It was midmorning when Grant rode into the noise, mud, and confusion of Sabo. More tents and cardboard huts had sprung up overnight and the traffic of heavy freighters was heavier than ever. Grant swung over to the side of the road and called to a teamster. “I'm looking for a man named Valois, a runner. You know him?”

“Mister, everybody knows Turk Valois, but you won't find him in Sabo. You better try the Wheel House in Kiefer.”

Grant lifted a hand in a vague salute and swung to the west on the main road to Kiefer. He rode along the edge of the congested road watching the endless chain of wagons headed for the Glenn ranch, and he began to notice how the men and even the horses looked alike in their urgency and greed. No one looked in his direction; they were too preoccupied to bother with strangers.

He had wanted to run for Texas, but now he knew that right here in the Creek Nation was the safest place he could possibly be. As he entered Kiefer, he observed the crowds working like ants along the stilted sidewalks. This man could be a killer, that one a thief—nobody cared.

He felt relief wash over him and suddenly had the impulse to laugh out loud. Nobody cared!

He rode the length of Kiefer's mile-long Main Street of shanties and shacks, stores and dance halls, illegal saloons and cribs, all wide open and brazen and noisy. They would never find him here!

For the first time in many hours he felt completely free and unhunted. He could let himself be caught up in this new kind of excitement and forget that he had ever known a man named Ortway or had robbed a bank in Joplin.