Ralph Compton - Blood on the Gallows

Clare did not look at him, nor did she speak. Her eyes were fixed on the flat where Harlan and the others still sat their horses, staring up at the ridge. Away from the mist of the valley, the sky was an upturned bowl of pale blue and to the east the climbing sun looked like a gold coin.

Fighting his pain, McBride tried again. ‘‘I surely thought I was done for.’’

‘‘Where’s your rifle?’’ Clare asked. She did not turn her head.

‘‘Lost it. Down there. My horse nearly fell and I dropped it.’’

The girl had been born and raised in a land of horseman, and now her beautiful hazel eyes slanted to McBride in surprise. She did not say a word, but the indictment was there.

For his part, McBride felt he had apologized enough in the past for his lack of riding skills. He asked, ‘‘Why did you help me? Getting Harlan off my back, I mean?’’

‘‘You tried to help me at the hotel. I owed you one.’’

‘‘I guess Lance Josephine really means to marry you,’’ McBride said. He managed a smile. ‘‘Like I’m telling you something you don’t already know.’’

‘‘I know. But he doesn’t want me, he really wants my pa’s ranch.’’ She shook her head; then her eyes went back to the sights of her rifle. ‘‘We have a one-loop spread held together with baling wire and twine and we raise more cactus than cows. There’s land aplenty around here for the taking, so why does Lance and his father want ours?’’

‘‘I don’t know.’’ McBride searched his brain but found nothing to add. Finally he said, ‘‘How did you find me?’’

‘‘It was easy. I was in town to tell Lance I never wanted to see him again. But Dora Ryan told me he’d ridden out that morning with Thad Harlan and a few other hard cases. She told me you’d broken out of jail and that Lance was vowing to hang you for what you’d done to his face.’’ She looked at McBride. ‘‘I’ve been tracking game since I was old enough to handle a rifle, so you weren’t hard to find.’’

‘‘Lucky I came this way.’’

‘‘I knew you would. You couldn’t climb out of the valley and there’s too much open country to the east.’’ She looked pensive. ‘‘I wonder what Thad Harlan is planning. Lance will leave it up to him.’’

‘‘They’ll talk it over for a while. Harlan isn’t a man to make a bullheaded charge into our fire. And he knows the only one I’ll be shooting at is him.’’ McBride reached into his slicker. ‘‘This is Sammy,’’ he said. ‘‘He’s a kitten.’’

‘‘I can see that,’’ Clare said. She laid her rifle aside, reached out and took the little animal, smiling as she held it against her and stroked its soft fur. Sammy purred.

‘‘Clare, I don’t even know your last name,’’ McBride said, smiling. Any woman who loved cats was tip-top in his book.

‘‘It’s O’Neil. Pa says I’m descended from Irish kings, but I don’t know about that.’’

‘‘My pa told me I had an ancestor called St. Brigid who was a famous Irish holy woman. I don’t know about that either. She didn’t rub off on me, that’s for certain,’’ said McBride.

He winced and put his hand to his side. When he took the hand away again, it looked as if he were wearing a scarlet glove.

Clare was shocked. McBride could see her breasts rising and falling under her threadbare white shirt. ‘‘You’ve been hit,’’ she said.

‘‘Yeah, but I don’t know how bad.’’

‘‘Judging by the blood, I’d say pretty bad.’’ The girl bit her lip and looked down the slope. ‘‘They haven’t moved. I can’t take a look at your wound until they leave.’’

‘‘If they leave,’’ McBride said. He wiped his bloody hand on a clump of grass and drew the Colt from his waistband. The morning was growing hot and sweat stung his eyes. Suddenly he wanted something to happen, an end to this standoff.

McBride rose above the boulder and yelled, ‘‘Come and get me, Harlan! I didn’t mean to scare you that bad.’’

‘‘McBride, is that you?’’ Harlan called.

‘‘You know it’s me, damn you.’’

‘‘I know you’re hit, McBride. You got my bullet in you. Best thing for you is to come down from that ridge. I’ll take you back to town and let the doc look you over. Maybe you can stay at the hotel for a few days until you can ride on.’’

Despite his pain and growing weakness, McBride laughed. ‘‘Harlan?’’

‘‘Yeah.’’

‘‘You go to hell.’’

There’s was a moment’s pause; then the lawman yelled, ‘‘Who’s up there with you, McBride? He shot one of my deputies.’’

‘‘Five United States Marshals, Harlan. All well armed and determined men.’’

‘‘Tell me another, McBride.’’

Harlan wasn’t going to attack. Josephine was close to him, yelling in his ear, his arms waving, but the marshal ignored him. He rode over to the wounded man, who was coughing blood, the front of his slicker black with it. The man raised his head, and even from where he watched, McBride saw sudden hope in his eyes.

But it was the man’s misfortune that he was astride a beautiful Appaloosa stud.

Harlan rode closer, took his foot from the stirrup, then kicked out from the hip. His boot hit the wounded man high on the left side of his chest and he screamed and tumbled from the saddle. He lay on his back, his legs twitching, but he made no further sound.

Harlan gathered up the reins of the Appaloosa and led it back to the ridge. He drew rein and yelled, ‘‘Hey, McBride!’’

Stunned by what he’d just witnessed, McBride made no answer. Beside him Clare’s face was white.

‘‘McBride, if I see you in Rest and Be Thankful again, I’ll kill you!’’

Harlan kicked his horse into motion, leading the stud. After glaring at the ridge for a few moments, Lance Josephine and the other rider fell in behind him. They disappeared into distance and sunlight, the hills closing around them.

‘‘I could have killed him,’’ Clare said. Her eyes were fixed on McBride, clouding, a cold anger wrinkling her forehead. ‘‘I could have knocked Harlan off his horse at this range but I didn’t.’’

‘‘And now you don’t have to live with it,’’ McBride said.

‘‘There’s already a man dead on the ground, we didn’t need another.’’

Quick tears started in the woman’s eyes. ‘‘I tried to wing him. I shot to wound him . . . I tried . . .’’

‘‘You did wound him, Clare, and maybe with some attention he would have lived. It was Harlan who killed him. He wanted the fancy horse.’’ McBride’s voice was veneered by wonder when he said, ‘‘I could have killed Harlan yesterday. He was lying unconscious at my feet and I let him go.’’

‘‘Lance says Thad Harlan can’t be killed, that he sold his soul to the devil.’’

McBride’s smile was a grimace as pain stabbed at him. ‘‘To a devil by the name of Jared Josephine, maybe.’’

Clare took a step toward him, holding Sammy to her breast. ‘‘Your wound needs more attention than I can give it here. I’m taking you home with me.’’

McBride nodded, then said, ‘‘Do you know who the dead man is down there?’’

‘‘He’s an outlaw, goes by the name of Jake Streeter. Have you heard of him?’’

‘‘Yeah, I’ve heard of him. He’s a kitten killer,’’ McBride said.

Chapter 12

Clare O’Neil told McBride that her ranch lay to the north of Deadman Canyon, where the foothills of the Capitan Mountains finally faded into lower, rolling country. To the west, the thousand-foot, volcanic cinder cone of Sunset Peak cast a cooling shadow over the ranch buildings, and the ponderosa pine on its higher slopes provided a ready supply of timber.