Clattering Hoofs Read online

  The German’s heavy jaw dropped, but his gaze clung to Sloan and his rifle still covered the young man. “He’s a cow thief just the same.”

  Ranger strode swiftly after his daughter. “You hard of hearing, Hans?” he snapped. His hand closed on the barrel of the rifle and pushed it down.

  Sloan swung out of the saddle hull heavily. The fingers of one hand held tightly to the horn to steady himself. His head felt strangely light, and the earth tilted up to meet the moonlit sky. For the first time in his life he felt as if he were going to faint.

  But white teeth flashed in a smile defiant and derisive. “Thought I’d better drop in at the rendezvous,” he said. “McNulty and the Dutchman can’t have their hanging without a hangee.”

  6. A Chip on His Shoulder

  RANGER TOOK FIRST THINGS FIRST. “LET’S GET INTO THE house and look at your wound,” he said. “Can you walk?”

  “Learned twenty-six years ago come Christmas,” Sloan replied, a thin grin on his sardonic face.

  He gave up the support of the saddle horn and moved forward jauntily. But his step faltered.

  Sandra slipped an arm around his waist. “Lean on me,” she told him.

  Her father took the other side. “Don’t walk. We’ll carry you.”

  He would not have it that way. “Just a li’l’ knife rip in the shoulder. Nothing to make a fuss about.”

  But he let them steady and help him to the steps, up them, and to the lounge in the parlor, where he promptly fainted from the loss of blood. Life in this rough brush country developed many accidents. John Ranger had doctored broken limbs, gunshot wounds, and knife gashes. Now he gave competent first aid to Sloan.

  “Will he be all right?” Sandra asked him while he was washing his hands in the tin basin outside the house.

  “Ought to be good as new in a few days,” her father said. “A fine clean muscular specimen like he is builds blood fast.” He dried his hands on a none too clean towel. “Now I’ll listen to your story, honey.”

  Nelson had joined them. The two saw that the tale lost nothing in the telling. The stark fact stood out that Sloan had charged four desperadoes, killed one, slammed another unconscious, and driven the other two away.

  “He’s got sand in his craw,” the cattleman admitted. “All the time Pete and Hans were wanting to hang him he was as cool as if they were talking about another fellow.”

  “Hang him!” Sandra cried aghast. “What for?”

  “We trapped him up a cañon where we had driven Scarface. He claims he isn’t one of the gang. I’m beginning to believe it. I hope he is telling the truth.”

  “Of course he is,” his daughter cried in hot indignation. “He’s wonderful, Father. He came down the hill like a tornado. It was all over in ten seconds. I was terribly frightened, but I needn’t have been.”

  “He just banged one of ’em over the head and shot another through the belly quicker ’n scat. The others lit out like the heel flies were after them.” The eyes of the boy were big with reminiscent excitement. “Gee! He could of licked a regiment.”

  “You aren’t going to let anybody harm him, are you?” Sandra asked. “After what he did for us.”

  “No.” John Ranger spoke with crisp decision. “I’ll have a talk with the boys. There won’t be any trouble.”

  “He isn’t a thief,” Sandra announced loyally. “And if he was I wouldn’t care.”

  The cattleman wished he was as sure Sloan was innocent. But innocent or guilty it was not going to make any difference with him.

  Blunt and his party reached the ranch. Bill Hays was put to bed and his wound dressed. One of Ranger’s riders started on the fifty-mile ride to bring a doctor. After supper John gathered the men around him at the corral.

  He told the story of how this man Sloan had saved his children from the raiders. There was a long silence after he had finished.

  Blunt spoke first. “He has guts. That’s sure.”

  “But he’s a cow thief just the same,” McNulty added.

  Ranger looked at him with contempt in his steady eyes. “I don’t think it. We’ll know in a couple of days whether his story is true. But right now I’m serving notice that whether it is or isn’t nobody is going to harm this man.”

  Uhlmann protested sourly. “Now look here, John. We can’t turn a cow thief loose because he’s game. He would be a menace to the community. Take Scarface. They don’t make them any gamer than he is, but by jiminy, if I get my gun sights on him he’s going to die.”

  Ranger said, spacing his words deliberately: “We’re not talking about Scarface, but about a man who has just saved my children at great risk to himself, a man who had got away scot free and came back because he had to make sure that they would get home safe. I’m talking about the man lying wounded in that room.

  “But if he’s a rustler—” began Blunt unhappily.

  “If he is a rustler we’ll drive him out of the district. But that will be all.” Ranger did not lift his voice, but there was an icy threat in his words. “Anybody who lifts a hand against him will have to settle with me.”

  Blunt shifted ground. “John is right, boys. I’d feel the same as he does if it had been my Elvira. Guilty or not guilty, we’ll have to take a chance on this young fellow.”

  Uhlmann grumbled that he had cattle in the bunch taken by the rustlers. They were on their way to Mexico now. If he lost them, he’d be damned if he was going to let anybody be generous at his expense.

  “When you know how many you have lost, make a bill and send it to me,” Ranger told him scornfully. “I’ll pay it unless it is shown that Sloan was not one of Scarface’s men.”

  “Don’t think I won’t send it to you.” Uhlmann retorted. “Get soft with cow thieves if you like. I won’t.”

  Within twenty-four hours the truth of Sloan’s story was confirmed. He had spent the night of the raid at a roadhouse in Redrock. The following morning, while the raiders must have been chousing the stolen stock across the flats to the hills, he had eaten breakfast at a Chinese restaurant in Tucson, just off the old plaza. He had sat opposite the deputy sheriff Mosely while they ate their flapjacks and steak and had discussed the depredations of the Apache Kid a dozen years earlier.

  Some days later Sloan was sitting on the porch of the Blunt house in the warm sunshine waiting for a wagon that was to take him to the Circle J R. Two men rode up the lane to the house and swung from their saddles. They were McNulty and Uhlmann. Blunt was shoeing a horse and they stopped for a minute to talk with him. While they were still talking, a wagon driven by Ranger rolled into the yard.

  The owner of the Circle J R pulled up in front of the porch. The bed of the wagon was filled with hay to make the riding easier.

  “Ready to go?” Ranger asked Sloan.

  “Yes, sir. But there’s no need of my bothering you. I’m doing all right here. In a couple of days I’ll move on.”

  “You won’t bother us. We all want you to make a long visit at the ranch. The children won’t let me rest until I get you.”

  McNulty and Uhlmann clumped forward from the outdoor blacksmith shop with the awkward gait of men who wear tight high-heeled cowboy boots. Pete went up the porch steps to Sloan, an ingratiating smile on his face. He held out a hand.

  “Put her there, pardner,” he said. “Looks like the joke is on we’uns. You can’t hardly blame us, of course. The story you pulled was the thinnest darned one I ever did hear. But, as the old sayin’ is, all’s well that ends well.”

  Sloan did not seem to see the hand. He looked coldly at McNulty. When he spoke his voice was icy, without a trace of passion. “What I said about you the other day still goes. I wouldn’t want to live in the same township with a mean-hearted scoundrel willing to hang a man without giving him a chance to prove his innocence.”

  An angry flush swept McNulty’s face. Blunt had come from the forge and was standing beside Ranger, a pleased smile in his eyes. He did not object to hearing the little scamp told off. But Pet
e resented public castigation.

  “If that’s the way you want it, suits me.” he blustered. “Since you’re askin’ for it, I’ll say I’m not satisfied yet. By my way of it, you’re still a cow thief.”

  “For that, next time we meet I’ll flog you within an inch of yore life,” Sloan promised, a silken threat in his low voice.

  “You can talk tough now, because you claim you’re a sick man,” Uhlmann said sourly. “But when you’re well don’t try to ride me, unless you want to come with your gun a-smokin’.”

  “Enough of that, boys,” Ranger interrupted hurriedly. “Mr. Sloan has a right to be annoyed. If you two had got your way, we would have hanged an innocent man. You ought to be mighty pleased he’s living. It’s a lesson to all of us not to go off half-cocked. If you’re ready, we’ll go now, Sloan.”

  Cape Sloan rose, a wiry brown man with a dynamic force in him that was arresting. His gaze traveled with leisurely contempt over McNulty and rested on the pachydermous face of Uhlmann. He stood apparently at careless ease, a thumb hooked in his sagging belt.

  “In a moment, Mr. Ranger.” His steady narrowed eyes were still on Uhlmann. “It was my left shoulder the greaser cut,” he mentioned, slurring the words gently. “My right arm is good as ever, if anybody wants to find out.”

  Ranger stepped swiftly between the German and Sloan. “Cut out that kind of talk, both of you,” he ordered sternly. “You’re grown men, not kids. You fellows let each other alone. The difficulty is settled now.”

  Sloan’s smile was grim. “You in particular stay away from me, McNulty,” he said. “My promise still stands. You can’t call me a rustler and get off scot-free. If we meet again I’ll wear a quirt on you.”

  He turned his back on Pete and climbed into the wagon.

  7. Jim Budd and Sloan Agree to Bury the Past

  THE CIRCLE J R RANCHHOUSE WAS A LONG LOW RAMBLING building that had been constructed bit by bit, new wings being added as the owner grew more prosperous. Deep porches ran around the front and sides, with vines climbing trellises to give protection from the broiling heat of midday. The house was furnished comfortably and with taste. There was a piano in the sitting room, and along the walls were well-filled bookcases. The tawdry bric-a-brac one usually found in parlors was notably absent. In the bedroom to which Nelson took the guest cheerful chintz curtains had been hung. The armchair beside the window was deep and built to give the body rest.

  As soon as Sloan had washed away the dust of the journey he was called to supper. He was starting to sit down when a huge black man in an apron came in from the kitchen carrying a platter of fried chicken. The Negro’s staring eyes goggled at him. It was a bad moment for Cape Sloan. His stomach muscles tightened. For a second or two he missed what Ranger was saying, but he picked up the sequence and answered before the cattleman noticed. During the rest of the meal he gave his surface mind to the conversation at the table. His deeper thoughts were concerned with Jim Budd and the consequences of this unfortunate meeting.

  Since he was a convalescent, Sandra insisted that he retire early. He protested only formally, for he was tired from the jolting journey in the wagon. While he was undressing a knock came on the door of his room. It was Jim Budd who tiptoed in after his invitation to enter. He had expected Jim would make him a visit.

  Sloan looked up at him from the bed where he was sitting. He wondered what winds of mischance had blown the Negro here.

  “And to think I had to bump into you,” he said, with obvious distaste.

  “Yassuh,” Jim agreed. “We sure done come a long way to meet up.”

  “Do they know who you are?”

  “They don’ know where I wuz.”

  “How do you happen to be working at the Circle J R?”

  “Why, when they turn me loose I kinda jes’ started driftin’ east, as you might say. Mister Ranger was lookin’ for a cook. Me, I was workin’ in a restaurant at Benson where he come in, an’ we fix up for me to do the cookin’ here.”

  “If they knew you had been in the pen they wouldn’t keep you a day.”

  “I reckon that’s c’rect. But I wouldn’t know. Mister Ranger sure a fine man, an’ the little missis sho the finest lady in de land. Mebbe they might keep me.” His face took on a look of humble pleading. “You wouldn’t go for to tell them, Mister Webb.”

  “The name is Sloan.” He frowned at the honest dish face of the cook. “I don’t know. I’ll have to think about that.”

  “I ain’t any bad man. I never wuz. That fellow Candish I gouge was a mighty bad killer. He jump me, jes’ because I was a colored man.”

  Sloan knew that was true. Budd had been railroaded to prison. He had wounded Candish in self-defense. The chances were that he would live peaceably the rest of his life. No doubt he was devoted to the family for whom he was now working. The ranch guest felt a wry sense of sardonic amusement at the way he had inverted their rôles. He was the one who would be in danger if the truth were known. For he had escaped before his sentence was finished and if discovered would be dragged back, flogged, and lose his time for good conduct.

  “Mister Webb ——”

  “Sloan,” interrupted the ranch guest.

  “All right, Sloan then. You wuz Webb when you wuz in the pen at Yuma with me, but if you say Sloan that all right with me. What I wanna say is that I done served my time in prison for wounding Candish. I hadn’t ought to of been in there a day. When they turned me loose I came ’way out here to make a fresh start. I’m doing fine. I’m with good folks I would do a heap for. I never done you any harm. Whyfor do you want to stir things up and get me flung out on my ear?”

  “I don’t want to throw you out of a good job where you are giving satisfaction, Jim. But I want to play fair with the Rangers too.”

  There was a faint gleam of grinning irony in Jim’s reply. “I reckon then you’ll want to tell them all about yo’self too, Mister We — Sloan.”

  “No, Jim, I don’t want to do that. I’m here just for a short visit. I don’t want them or anybody else to know about my stay in the pen at Yuma.” Sloan came back to Jim’s case. “We all knew there that you aren’t a bad man, Jim. You ought never to have been convicted. I don’t see how it can hurt the Rangers for you to stay here. You really like them?”

  “I ain’t got any folks of my own—never did have. My wife run away with a yaller nigger, and that busted up what li’l’ home I had. Here’s where I wan’ to stay the rest of my life. They good to me. Never was any people I like as well. I feel like they’re mine, kind of, if you understand me.”

  “That is fine, Jim. We’ll call bygones bygones. What about me? Can you keep that big grinning mouth shut and not let anybody know you’ve ever seen me before?”

  “Sure I can. Listen, Mister Webb-Sloan.”

  “Sloan,” corrected the other. “Be sure to get that right.”

  “Yessir. Well, I think a powerful lot of Miss Sandra. When you rode in hell-for-leather and saved her from a whole passel of bandits you ce’tainly made me feel a powerful lot of respect, Mr. Sloan. My big mouth is done already padlocked.”

  8. Sandra Speaks Out

  AT THE CIRCLE J R THE GUEST TOOK LIFE EASIER THAN HE had done for many a day. Sandra did not let him get up with the family, but saw that Jim prepared a breakfast for him long after the others had eaten. He lounged about the place and let the sunny hours slip away in pleasant indolence. Sometimes he strolled down to the bunkhouse and chatted with a rider who had broken an ankle when his horse stepped into a gopher hole; or he sat on the corral fence and watched the cowboys top young horses they were breaking to the saddle. Occasionally he sat in a rocking chair on the porch of the big house and read a book called The Three Musketeers, dealing with the remarkable and improbable adventures of an amazing chap called D’Artagnan.

  Nelson hovered around him a good deal. The boy was passing through an attack of hero-worship and was drawn to Sloan as a moth to the lamp. The young man had what it takes to win a boy—a touc
h of recklessness, cool courage, an easy indifferent grace, and back of him a life lived dangerously. Moreover, he knew exactly how to treat a boy. He never talked down to him, and he had a flair for “joshing” the youngster without making him conscious of the inferiority of the teens.

  Of the Golden Girl he caught only glimpses during the day as she went to and fro about her work. Having been since her mother’s death sole mistress of the ranch, she had charge of buying supplies not only for the main house but for the boys at the bunkhouse as well. Sloan was surprised at the efficiency with which she did her job. He did not at all wonder at the deep liking and respect, amounting almost to reverence, she won from the tough, tanned young men working for her father. In the case of Jim Budd the devotion he showed was almost pathetic. If it would have helped her he would have chopped the fingers from his hand.

  After supper Sandra always joined her father and Sloan on the porch. During the past hour cool shadows from the hills had blanketed stretches of the valley and lifted the heat from its dusty floor. The stark bare mountains glowed with jewels, their brilliancy softening to violet and purple lakes in the crotches between the peaks, filling them with mysterious dark pools. After the sun had set, magic began to fill the desert night.

  Cape Sloan was very much aware of the girl sitting near him, though she spoke seldom. The young man was inclined to let Ranger carry the conversation, but the cattleman drew him out and forced him to take a share. Sandra observed that their guest was no ignorant cowboy. He could talk well, on many subjects. He had traveled a good deal, not only in the West but as far as Rio de Janeiro and the cattle country of Brazil. But she noticed that his wary and reticent remarks covered a good many elisions about his life. His youth he told about when questioned, and he did not avoid the wanderings of the past two months. But before that there was a gap of five or six years concerning which he said nothing.

  Also, there was some secret understanding between him and Jim Budd. She had seen Jim’s startled astonishment at their first meeting and the momentary discomposure of Sloan. When she had talked with Jim about it he denied ever having met their guest before—and she did not believe him. There had been something in the past that both of them wanted to conceal, some dark and unhappy memory rising to plague them now. An evil ghost from Cape Sloan’s wild and turbulent youth had come to life again.