Rebel Spurs Part 30

Drew found Rennie's expression one of indifference. Maybe _Don_ Cazar no longer regarded him with the cold dislike Drew had met at the camp, but they were still strangers. What he had once said back in Kentucky at a remote and distant time was very true now. "Maybe Hunt Rennie doesn't know I exist; maybe we won't even like each other if and when we do meet ... I don't know...."

Now Drew thought he did know. Was this insurmountable barrier all his fault? Because he had been so sure he wanted to go it on his own-come to his father as an equal and not a beggar? But could he ever have acted differently? Too independent, too defensive always-Alexander Mattock had made him like that. Now it seemed that his grandfather had won, after all.

Because his grandson was the kind of man he was, there would be no meeting with Hunt Rennie to claim kins.h.i.+p, nothing more than what now existed.

"I'm all right." After too long a pause, Drew replied to his father's question. "Do we just keep on sittin' here?"

"If necessary, Chino, pa.s.s those supplies you brought in. We eat cold, at least for now."

"You look ready to up saddle 'n ride." Anse was waiting behind Drew's rock. His arm rested in a sling with a neat and reasonably clean bandage about his wound.

"How's that hole?" Drew asked with renewed concern.

"Nothin' much more'n a nick. Say, th' Old Man's like a real doc, ain't he?

Carries doc's things in his saddlebags an' patched me up last night so I'm near as good as new. After I drunk th' wrinkles smooth outta my belly an'

had me some shut-eye, why, I'm as right as four aces in any man's hand!

'Course I sure could do with some coffee-'bout strong 'nough to float a hoss shoe gentle like. But we ain't bendin' lip over that this sunup.

Lordy, this jerky sure gives a man's chewers a workout!"

They chewed away at the dark sun-dried _carne_ of the border country.

There was about as much flavor in it as in a piece of wood, but it kept a man's insides busy and about half satisfied. And they did have water.

Drew looked out over the land about them. Rennie had their small force stationed to cover every approach to the water hole, and with the Pimas here too, Drew was sure that they would not be surprised. Would Kitch.e.l.l follow the pattern Rennie expected-try to water here? And then strike for the south? With his men scattered, many killed or taken at the pa.s.s, he had very little choice.

For some reason the quartet of fugitives must have been trailing quite a distance behind the main band, and so had been warned in time by the gunfire. Was one of that four Shannon? And what would it mean to Rennie if Shannon did turn up now with Kitch.e.l.l?

Drew jerked back against the boulder, reacting to a screech from somewhere out in that wild country-a fierce, mad sound which tore at the nerves. He had heard its like before, but never rising so to the pitch of raw intensity. It was the challenge of a fighting stallion, one of the most terrifying sounds ever to break from the throat of an animal.

From the pocket meadow came the answering squeals of their own mounts, the pounding of hoofs as they fought their stake ropes.

"_Don_ Cazar!" It was Teodoro. "The Pinto comes-and would fight!"

Again that shriek of rage and utter defiance. The rocks echoed it eerily, and Drew found it hard to judge either distance or direction. The wind was rising, too, scooping up dust to throw against men and boulders. But that wild stud could not be too far away, and what had stirred him to this point of vocal outburst?

"Teodoro," Rennie called, "get back there and see if you can quiet those horses."

Drew reached for the carbine he had taken from the boot on the saddle of the captured bay. Army issue ... Spencer. He appraised it with the sharp, quick scrutiny of a man who had had to depend on enemy weapons before.

Just how had this fallen into outlaw hands? The arm was well kept, ready for action.

Horses turned mean, turned man-killer at times. And the Pinto was reputed to be a murderer of his own species. Not just content to protect his band from a raiding stallion, he actually went out of his way to seek and force a fight with other males. Could it be that now the wild killer had been drawn from hiding to meet a strange stallion?

And could that stranger be s.h.i.+loh? It would mean the men they sought were circling back to this water hole. s.h.i.+loh and the Pinto! Even when saddled and ridden, the Kentucky stallion might respond to the challenge. And so handicapped he would have no chance! Drew bit hard on his underlip.

The yap-yap of a coyote sounded brazenly from the ridge behind which Drew was almost certain the Pinto had trumpeted.

"Pa.s.s the word," said Rennie. "Riders coming."

Anse hissed it on to Donally, who hid in the brush behind. Drew lay tense, as if his whole body was able to listen and a.s.sess sounds.

Waiting, as always, fretted the nerves. Imagination gave birth to sounds, made the quiver of a bush unnatural, planted in a man a growing sense of eyes boring down on his body, nakedly visible to the enemy. Drew's muscles ached. He forced tight rein on his imagination and began the hard task of consciously schooling himself past the danger of a freeze when and if attack did come.

Wind moaning about the rocks, sand blown in eyes and face. Twice Drew half put out his hand to the canteen which lay between him and Anse. Both times he did not complete the reach. His tongue felt swollen, the saliva in his mouth sticky, sickly tasting.

No sun-this was going to be a cloudy, overcast day.

He half arose. That scream came again, this time closer, more rage-filled.

Drew turned his head.

"Cover me!" He did not give Anse a chance to protest.

That slope ... he had been studying it carefully for long moments of the wait, gauging the distances between bits of cover, the tricky open s.p.a.ces he would have to cross. But the riders they had been alerted to expect were not in sight, and if what he truly believed was about to happen did, the outlaws might never reach the water hole at all.

He was running, dodging, working his way up to the crown of the ridge. But he was still too low to see what was going on at the far side when that scream of challenge was answered. The answer was deeper in tone, but it carried with it the same rising note of anger and fighting promise.

Although Drew had never seen s.h.i.+loh prepare to give battle, he was sure he had just heard him voice such readiness.

The Kentuckian flung himself flat before he reached the skyline, wriggling on in a desperate crawl. Then he lay panting in a small earth dip, only a ragged fringe of gra.s.s between him and the down slope.

Even in the swirl of wind-blown dust there was no mistaking s.h.i.+loh-rearing and fighting to dislodge his rider, wheeling about in a circle. Three other horses and their riders had edged well beyond the circ.u.mference of that circle, the horses neighing and snorting.

The squeal of the Pinto was ear-wrenching, though as yet the killer stud had not appeared in plain sight. The cry triggered s.h.i.+loh into a fantastic effort. He reared, striking out with front hoofs, perhaps in an effort to keep his balance. Drew fully expected to see him crash over and back.

Apparently his rider feared the same fall. In the dusty murk the man separated from the horse. s.h.i.+loh whirled and pounded back, away from his rider, and as he went he voiced once more his answer to the Pinto.

Drew sighted a dark spot moving in to intercept the gray. Then the spot turned broadside and he appreciated what had made the Pinto so elusive to hunters. The mottled red-and-white patches of the wild stud's coat melted into the landscape in an uncanny fas.h.i.+on, making the horse seem to appear and disappear as he trotted back and forth.

The Kentuckian tried to bring the Spencer in line with that weaving, distorted barrel of spotted body. What was the range? Too far, he was afraid, for a shot to count. But he knew that he could not lie there and watch the Pinto cut down s.h.i.+loh in one of those vicious, deadly, equine duels. The Kentucky horse had no fighting experience, and his greater bulk and height would mean little against the wily cunning of the murderer who had already tasted blood too many times. To allow s.h.i.+loh to be ripped to pieces was utterly unthinkable.

The men down there no longer mattered. Drew rose to one knee, steadied the carbine, and fired.

Did the Pinto really flinch from a bullet striking home? Or had the dangerous sound of gunfire caused his old caution to win out for an instant over his blood l.u.s.t? The red head with the dangling white forelock tossed, and then the wild horse whirled and ran. s.h.i.+loh, teeth bared, ready and willing to come to battle, followed....

Drew was on his feet. Then he was pulled backward by a jerk out of nowhere, and he fell under a brown, mostly bare body which pinned him firmly to the ground.

17

Drew struggled wildly but he could not break the grip which held him down.

He was looking up into the face of Greyfeather, and none of his writhing made any impression on the Pima's hold. There was a sprinkle of shots; then a whirl of the wind brought sand up over them, blinding eyes, filling mouth and nose. Even the Indian flinched from that and Drew managed to tear loose. He rolled down the grade, bringing up against a small tree with a jolt which drove most of the air from his laboring lungs.

He pulled his arm up across his face, trying to s.h.i.+eld his eyes from the blast which thickened steadily, gasping for air to breathe. And the wind voiced a howl which arose as alarmingly as the stallions' screaming.

Stallions! Drew clawed his way up to his knees. But there was no seeing through that murk to where s.h.i.+loh had been. Then he was on his feet, stumbling along ... the big gray must be hidden somewhere....

"Drew!" A figure blundered into him from behind, almost sending him to the ground again. "Get down, you fool!" Hands clutched at his body, trying to pull him earthward.