J. Edson - Ranch War

“I still reckon you want that ranch ’cause you know you can’t make a go of this timber game,” Calamity stated.

“Like hell I do!” Florence answered angrily. “It’s just that the Loup and a few other streams run through your range.”

“So?”

“So I need that water. I have to throw a dam across the bottom end of the gorge there to make the water back up and raise the level of the creeks and streams that run into it, so that we can float the timber here. And I can’t do that unless I own the Rafter C.”

“Why not?” Calamity inquired. “With all them guns you’ve got hired, you ought to be able to handle a four-man ranch crew.”

Watching Florence’s face, Calamity could see worry lines on it. If the blonde was not grieving, she felt deeply concerned by Olaf’s death. Whatever caused the emotion went deeper than the demise of the bald giant. Florence’s cheeks reddened at the girl’s increasingly mocking tone. Sucking in a deep breath, the blonde allowed it to come out again in an annoyed hiss.

“It was the law, not the ranch crew that stopped me damming the river.”

“Day Leckenby?”

“No. This’s ranching country and one of the State Legislature’s laws is that you cannot deprive a ranch of its water supply.”

“Which you’d’ve done if you threw that dam across the Loup.”

“Exactly,” Florence agreed. “It wouldn’t affect the ranchers further down the Loup; they have side streams that would give them enough for their needs.”

“So that’s what’s behind it,” Calamity growled. “You’re willing to run the Trinians off their land just so that you can cut the timber up here.”

“It didn’t start out that way,” Florence answered bitterly. “When I took the contract, nobody mentioned ab——”

“About the water rights of the ranchers,” Calamity finished for her. “In other words, Flo, you got too——”

Stepping forward, Florence swung her right hand in a slap that rocked the girl’s head and almost tumbled her from the bench. Vandor glided forward, catching hold of Calamity’s shoulder and forcing her to remain seated as she tried to rise and retaliate. Hotheaded as Calamity might be, she knew the value of caution. Trying to repay the blow right then would get her nowhere. So she held her temper under control and waited for Florence to continue.

“Nobody took me!” the blonde gritted, her whole attitude showing that she secretly agreed with Calamity. “I offered to buy the Trinians out honestly enough. But they wouldn’t sell.”

“Couldn’t sell,” Calamity corrected.

“Wouldn’t, couldn’t, it all meant the same to me; that I wasn’t able to fulfill my contract. Then I learned they were trying to locate you to buy the ranch.”

“And you fixed it through The Outfit so your hired guns got to me afore I saw Lawyer Talbot and learned about the ranch. Why not have me killed in Topeka?”

“The Outfit didn’t want trouble there, or the chance of you being connected to one of their men,” Florence admitted and Vandor let out a worried growl.

“Then you was real lucky that I had to be sent on to Counselor Talbot in Mulrooney,” Calamity remarked, guessing that Vandor did not approve of his employer discussing The Outfit’s affairs.

“Like hell it was luck!” Florence protested. “I wrote to Pinkerton’s in Endicott’s name and told them to have their man take you to Lawyer Grosvenor instead of to Talbot. That was planning, not luck.”

“Either way,” Calamity grinned, “it sure went sour on you.”

“How’d you get hold of Ruiz’s sabino and Hogue’s bay?” Vandor demanded.

“Me ’n’ the Kid killed ’em,” Calamity answered without thinking.

“You and who ?” Vandor spat out.

His attitude gave Calamity a warning and she decided against making known the true identity of her companion. If Vandor learned that the black-dressed Texan was the Ysabel Kid, he would figure that the story of the desertion was a lie.

“What’s the idea of fetching me up here, Flo?” Calamity asked, ignoring the man. “Did you figure I’d be scared enough to sell out to you if you got hold of me?”

“Would you be?”

“Would you believe me was I to say ‘yes’?”

“No,” Florence replied. “You might agree to sell, but I doubt if you’d keep to doing it. So there’s only one thing left.”

“What’d that be?” asked Calamity.

“You’re going to meet with an accident,” Florence explained. “A very bad accident. It’ll be fatal.”

“Who’d you say helped you to down Hogue and Ruiz?” Vandor growled, moving closer to the girl.

Ducking her head, Calamity butted Vandor in the body with sufficient force to stagger him backward. Then the girl straightened up, meaning to use her feet or any other method to remove Florence from her path. Even as she came erect, Calamity felt a hand catch hold of her shoulder. Pulled around, she saw that Florence had not been taken as unawares as had the gunslinger. Having turned Calamity, the blonde threw a punch with her other fist. Putting her whole weight behind it, Florence drove up her hand. The knuckles impacted under Calamity’s jaw. Lifted on to her toes, Calamity pitched on to her back unconscious.

“Get up!” Florence snapped at Vandor as Logger ran toward her. “She was right about one thing. We both had lousy luck in picking our male help.”

Lurching erect, Vandor rubbed his chest and moved toward where Calamity sprawled motionless on the ground.

“I’ll kill her!” the gunslinger spat out.

“My way,” Florence interrupted. “Get hold of one of those crowbars, Logger. Lift that log on the carriage high enough for Mr. Vandor to slip a length of rope under it. Then put the girl on the log, fasten her there.”

Picking up one of the big, wide-ended iron crowbars which were used for altering the positions of the logs on the carriage, Logger obeyed. Vandor paused for a moment, looking at the blonde.

“You mean you’re going to——?”

“I’m going to arrange for an ‘accident’ to happen to Miss Martha Jane Canary,” Florence answered coldly. “She has to die, or The Outfit will want to know why not.”

“Yeah,” Vandor agreed.

Already the girl knew enough to make trouble for a member of The Outfit and that organization was not noted for restricting its reprisals to the direct cause. If Martha Jane Canary lived, The Outfit were going to ask why and Vandor would be one of the people required to give an answer.

“And, in case anything goes wrong,” Florence continued. “I want to be able to show anybody who can demand an answer that it was an accident. Way her body’ll look after it’s been through the saw, I doubt if there’ll be too close an examination of how she died.”

Collecting a length of rope that hung on the wall, Vandor went to do his part in the execution. Florence took hold of Calamity’s ankles and dragged her toward the men. Leaving them to raise her, the blonde collected a small hammer and some nails from the stores area of the mill.

Opening her eyes, Calamity groaned. First she tried to move a hand to her jaw, then to sit up. Through the swirls of dizziness, she realized that she was held down on a hard, rough surface. An attempt to move her legs warned that her trousers were fastened against the sides—of a log.

Understanding of her position sank in like an icy cold knife. Turning her head from side to side, Calamity knew that her supposition had been correct. Managing to raise her shoulders, she looked down her body to where the shining serrated blade of the circular saw glinted at the other end of the carriage. Only by exerting all her willpower could she hold down a shudder as she swung her eyes back to Florence and the two men.