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“How about it, Jim?” Chuck asked. “You know Nat. Where’d you think he’d be?”
Morton squinted and drew on his cigarette. “Ain’t no figurin’ him. I know him, an’ I’ve hunted along of him. He’s almighty knowin’ when it comes to wild country. Moves like a cat an’ got eyes like a turkey buzzard.” He glanced at Chuck. “What’s he done? I heard some talk down to the Slash Five, but nobody seemed to have it clear.”
“Stage robbed yestiddy. Pete Daley of the Diamond D was ridin’ it, an’ he swore the robber was Nat. When they went to arrest him, Nat shot the sheriff.”
“Kill him?”
“No. But he’s bad off, an’ like to die. Nat only fired once an’ the bullet took Larabee too high.”
“Don’t sound reasonable,” Morton said slowly. “Nat ain’t one to miss somethin’ he aims to kill. You say Pete Daley was there?” “Yeah. He’s the on’y one saw it.”
“How about this robber? Was he masked?”
“Uh huh, an’ packin’ a Winchester .44 an’ two tied-down guns. Big black-headed man, the driver said. He didn’t know Bodine, but Pete identified him.”
Morton eyed Benson. “I shouldn’t wonder,” he said, and Chuck flushed.
Each knew what the other was thinking. Pete Daley had never liked Bodine. Nat married the girl Pete wanted, even though it was generally figured Pete never had a look-in with her, anyway, but Daley had worn his hatred like a badge ever since. Mary Callahan had been a pretty girl, but a quiet one, and Daley had been sure he’d win her.
But Bodine had come down from the hills and changed all that. He was a tall man with broad shoulders, dark hair and a quiet face. He was a good-looking man, even a handsome man, some said. Men liked him, and women too, but the men liked him best because he left their women alone. That was more than could be said for Daley, who lacked Bodine’s good looks but made up for it with money.
Bodine had bought a place near town and drilled a good well. He seemed to have money, and that puzzled people, so hints began to get around that he had been rustling as well as robbing stages. There were those, like Jim Morton, who believed most of the stories stemmed from Daley, but no matter where they originated, they got around.
Hanging Bodine for killing the sheriff—the fact that he was still alive was overlooked, and considered merely a technical question, anyway—was the problem before the posse. It was a self elected posse, inspired to some extent by Daley, and given a semiofficial status by the presence of Burt Stoval, Larrabee’s jailer.
Yet to hang a man he must first be caught and Bodine had lost himself in that broken, rugged country known as Powder Basin. It was a region of some ten square miles backed against an even rougher and uglier patch of waterless desert, but the basin was bad enough itself.
Fractured with gorges and humped with fir-clad hogbacks, it was a maze where the juniper region merged into the fir and spruce, and where the canyons were liberally overgrown with manzanita. There were at least two cliff dwellings in the area, and a ghost mining town of some dozen ramshackle structures, tumbled-in and wind-worried.
“All I can say,” Morton said finally, “is that I don’t envy those who corner him—when they do and if they do.”
Blackie wanted no issue with Morton, yet he was still sore. He looked up. “What do you mean, if we do? We’ll get him!”
Morton took his cigarette from his lips. “Want a suggestion, friend? When he’s cornered, don’t you be the one to go in after him.”
Four hours later, when the sun was moving toward noon, the net had been drawn tighter, and Nat Bodine lay on his stomach in the sparse grass on the crest of a hogback and studied the terrain below.
There were many hiding places, but the last thing he wanted was to be cornered and forced to fight it out. Until the last moment he wanted freedom of movement.
Among the searchers were friends of his, men with whom he rode and hunted, men he had admired and liked. Now, they believed him wrong, they believed him a killer, and they were hunting him down.
They were searching the canyons with care, so he had chosen the last spot they would examine, a bald hill with only the foot high grass for cover. His vantage point was excellent, and he had watched with appreciation the care with which they searched the canyon below him.
Bodine scooped another handful of dust and rubbed it along his rifle barrel. He knew how far a glint of sunlight from a rifle barrel can be seen, and men in that posse were Indian fighters and hunters.
No matter how he considered it, his chances were slim. He was a better woodsman than any of them, unless it was Jim Morton. Yet that was not enough. He was going to need food and water. Sooner or later they would get the bright idea of watching the waterholes, and after that. . . .
It was almost twenty-four hours since he had eaten, and he would soon have to refill his canteen.
Pete Daley was behind this, of course. Trust Pete not to tell the true story of what happened. Pete had accused him of the holdup right to his face when they had met him on the street. The accusation had been sudden, and Nat’s reply had been prompt. He’d called Daley a liar, and Daley moved a hand for his gun. The sheriff sprang to stop them and took Nat’s bullet. The people who rushed to the scene saw only the sheriff on the ground, Daley with no gun drawn, and Nat gripping his six-shooter. Yet it was not that of which he thought now. He thought of Mary.
What would she be thinking now? They had been married so short a time, and had been happy despite the fact that he was still learning how to live in civilization and with a woman. It was a mighty different thing, living with a girl like Mary.
Did she doubt him now? Would she, too, believe he had held up the stage and then killed the sheriff? As he lay in the grass he could find nothing on which to build hope.
Hemmed in on three sides, with the waterless mountains and desert behind him, the end seemed inevitable. Thoughtfully, he shook his canteen. It was nearly empty. Only a little water sloshed weakly in the bottom. Yet he must last the afternoon through, and by night he could try the waterhole at Mesquite Springs, no more than a half mile away.
The sun was hot, and he lay very still, knowing that only the faint breeze should stir the grass where he lay if he were not to be seen.
Below him he heard men’s voices, and from time to time could distinguish a word or even sentence. They were cursing the heat, but their search was not relaxed. Twice men mounted the hill and passed near him. One man stopped for several minutes, not more than a dozen yards away, but Nat held himself still and waited. Finally the man moved on, mopping sweat from his face. When the sun was gone he wormed his way off the crest and into the manzanita. It took him over an hour to get within striking distance of Mesquite Springs. He stopped just in time. His nostrils caught the faint fragrance of tobacco smoke.
Lying in the darkness, he listened, and after a moment heard a stone rattle, then the faint chink of metal on stone.
When he was far enough away he got to his feet and worked his way through the night toward Stone Cup, a spring two miles beyond. He moved more warily now, knowing they were watching the waterholes.
The stars were out, sharp and clear, when he snaked his way through the reeds toward the cup. Deliberately, he chose the route where the overflow from the Stone Cup kept the earth soggy and high-grown with reeds and dank grass. There would be no chance of a watcher waiting there on the wet ground, nor would the wet grass rustle. He moved close, but here, too, men waited.
He lay still in the darkness, listening. Soon he picked out three men, two back in the shadows of the rock shelf, one over under the brush but not more than four feet from the small pool’s edge.