Part 8

With those cattle came ruination and defeat. The absence of Kipp, Tad and Shorty was now accounted for. Somehow, they had gotten into the Pocket, killed or captured Black Jack and his men and were bringing out the stolen herd. The swift vision of a prison cell made him wince. He shut his eyes against it and his chin dropped to his chest. When he looked up a moment later, the color had come back into his lips. He turned to his two followers.

“You’ll find fresh horses at the corral in town. It’s a forty-hour ride to the Canadian line. You’d better lose no time.”

The two men gazed at him for a moment, then whirled their horses and were gone in a cloud of dust, without a word of parting. Fox now turned to Hank Basset and his wife who acted like people who moved in a dream, stupefied. With steady hand, Fox brought forth Hank Basset’s note and slowly tore it to bits. The scraps of paper fluttered to the ground.

“It would be better if you rode back towards your ranch, madam. I bid you good day.”

Ma Basset hesitated, her eyes moving from Fox to her husband. Something in Fox’s bearing silenced her usually ready tongue.

“Better drift, Ma,” mumbled Hank.

She turned her horse and rode away. The old horse, headed on the homeward trail, voluntarily quickened his pace and she gave him rein.

Hank licked his dry lips and stared at Fox who had taken the .45 from its holster and was spinning the cylinder, his eyes on a solitary horseman who had quit the herd and was riding toward the lone tree.

“That will be Joe Kipp,” said Fox, his voice flatly emotionless. “For a man who has spent his life in the saddle, he sits a horse badly.”

The white-handled gun went back in its holster. Then Fox rode to the cottonwood and with an abrupt movement, jerked Hank Basset’s sign from its place on the tree trunk.

“You’ll have no further need of it, Basset, and the thing was an eyesore. The spelling was miserable. Should Kipp shoot better than he rides, bury me on the LF side of the tree.”

Midway between the tree and the herd, Joe Kipp came on, his horse at a running walk. Fox, riding to meet him, halted for a moment to call over his shoulder to Hank.

“A man may be a scoundrel, Basset, but still not be a coward.”

Then he rode on.

Those that watched saw the two men ride toward each other. Saw the gap between them lessen. Two puffs of white smoke appeared at precisely the same instant. Both men swayed drunkenly in the saddle. The horses, startled, leaped forward. The riders slipped to the ground to lie quietly, but ten feet apart.

Tad was the first to reach the spot. He swung from his saddle to bend over Kipp. Fox, a red smear oozing from the hole between his eyes, lay face upward, his gun still clutched in his lifeless hand.

“Is Kipp dead?” panted Shorty, riding up.

Tad looked up, shaking his head. “Creased. He’ll come to directly. Fox’s bullet done parted his hair. The sun must’a’ somehow sp’iled the buzzard’s aim.”

Hank rode up, panting as if from a hard run.

“Toss me Kipp’s badge, Hank,” called Tad. “He’s done earned the right tuh wear it.”

* * * * *

From Ma Basset’s kitchen came the savory odor of roast turkey, baking pies and coffee.

In the front room, cotton covers had been removed from plush seated chairs and the place buzzed with conversation, generously punctuated by laughter. Holiday spirit prevailed.

Shorty Carroway, scrubbed, shaved, resplendent in a suit of store clothes, was gradually becoming more red of cheek due to the confines of a shining celluloid collar.

“That red tie uh yourn has slipped up under yore off ear, runt,” confided Tad, also in holiday garb, in a voice that carried the length of the room.

Shorty rescued the truant tie and grinned wickedly.

“Is it the style tuh wear one sock draggin’ low thataway when yuh got low water shoes on, Ox? Swap yuh this here Los Cruces letter uh Joe Kipp’s fer Pete Basset’s pardon paper. Dang me if I ever knowed so many big words could be herded together on one hunk uh paper. This judge gent in Los Cruces shore tells it scary. And them two reward checks fer Fox and Black Jack, man, they runs into real money. Joe ’lows the Black Jack reward goes tuh you.”

“Fer gosh sake, dry up,” muttered Tad. “Don’t go sp’ilin’ Joe’s dinner, talkin’ about the breed. Where’n —— yore manners? And mind yuh, act purty when Miz Basset sets yuh alongside thet school-marm at the table.”

Shorty squirmed, his glance darting to an angular maiden lady across the room. Tad chuckled softly.

Joe Kipp, exonerated from the Los Cruces killing and recently returned from the border town, was in a corner with Pete Basset who had that morning made his triumphant return from Deer Lodge.

Ma Basset and the school teacher were fluttering about the room collecting vacant chairs and setting the table. The school teacher, taking advantage of a lull in the operations, headed like a homing pigeon for the vacant place on the setee alongside Shorty. The little puncher grinned in a sickly fashion and swallowed hard.

“We’ll have a chance to finish that thrilling tale of yours now, Mister Carroway,” she cooed.

Shorty, catching Hank’s eye, sent a look of desperate appeal that might have brought results had not Tad interfered.

“If there’s anything Mister Carroway loves, it’s relatin’ them hair-brained escapes uh hisn. Git him tuh tell yuh about the time he stumbled over Lafe Tucker’s tame polecat in the dark, ma’am.”

Ma Basset, sensing Shorty’s agonized frame of mind, came to the rescue.

“Hattie, if yuh don’t mind, will yuh put on the red napkins. I’m gettin’ that hefty that my feet kills me when I’m on ’em long.”

She dropped into a chair and fanned herself with her apron.

Hattie reluctantly obeyed and Ma winked at Shorty. The little puncher grinned his thanks.

Hank Basset, who had been hovering in the vicinity of the cupboard where Ma’s bottle of snake-bite cure was concealed, caught Joe Kipp’s eye and a meaning glance was exchanged.

“Ma,” said Hank, sniffing audibly, “ain’t them biscuits burnin’?”

THE END