The Seventh Man Read online

  Chapter V. The Fight

  There were three spots of white in the dim saloon, the faces of Stewart,Lorrimer, and old Lew Perkins, and at the feet of Vic grew a spot ofred. Knowing with calm surety that no hand would lift against him evenif he turned his back, he walked out the door without a word and swunginto the saddle. There, for an instant, he calculated chances, for thestreet stretched empty before and behind with not a sound of warningstirring in the saloon. He was greatly tempted to ride to Dug Pym'sfor his blanket roll and a few other traveling necessities, but heremembered that the men of Alder rose to action with astonishing speed;within five minutes a group of hard riders would be clattering up histrail with Pete Glass at their head. An unlucky Providence had sent Peteto Alder on this day of all days. There stood his redoubtable dustyroan at the hitching rack, her head low, one ear back and one floppedforward, her under lip pendulous--in a pasture full of horses one mightpick her last either for stout heart or speed. Even in spite of herhistory Vic would have engaged Grey Molly to beat the roan at equalweights, but since he outbulked the sheriff full forty pounds, heweighed in nice balance the necessity of shooting the roan before heleft Alder. It was, he decided, unpleasant but vital, and his fingershad already slid around the butt of his gun when a horse whinnied faroff and the roan twitched up her head to listen. She was no longer acloddish lump of horseflesh, but an individual, a soul; Gregg's handfell from his gun. Cursing his sentimental weakness, he lifted Mollyinto a canter down the street. Still no signs of awakening behind him orabout; only little Jack Sweeney playing tag with a black-and-tan puppy,the triumphant cackle of a hen somewhere to the left; but as he nearedthe end of the street, where the trail swung into the rocks of theslope, a door banged far off and a voice was screaming: "Pete! PeteGlass!"

  Grey Molly switched her tail nervously at the shout, but Vic was toowise to let her waste strength hurrying up so sharp a declivity; thatdusty roan whose life he had spared would be spending it prodigally toovertake him before long and Molly's power must be husbanded. So he kepther at a quick walk by pressing the calf of one leg into her flank andturned in the saddle to watch the town sink behind him. Sometime in thevague, stupid past Marne had jog-trotted down this slope, but now hewas a new man with an eye which saw all things and a gun which could notfail. Figures, singularly tiny and singularly distinct, swarmed into thestreet from nowhere, men on horses, men swinging into saddles; hereand there the slant light of the afternoon twinkled on gun barrels, andludicrous thin voices came piping up the hill. As he reached the netherlip of Murphy's Pass a small cavalcade detached itself from the mainmass before Captain Lorrimer's saloon and swept down the street, first adusty figure on a dusty horse, hardly visible; then a spot of red whichmust be Harry Fisher on his blood-bay, with a long-striding sorrelbeside him that could carry no one except grim old Sliver Waldron.Behind these rode one with the light glinting on his silver conchos--MatHenshaw, the town Beau Brummel--then the black Guss Reeve, and last ofall "Ronicky" Joe on his pinto; "Ronicky" Joe, handy man at all things,and particularly guns. It showed how fast Pete Glass could work and howwell he knew Alder, for Vic himself could not have selected five coolerfighters among the villagers or five finer mounts. The posse switchedaround the end of the street and darted up the hill like the curlinglash of a whip.

  "Good," said Vic Gregg. "The damn fools will wind their horses beforethey hit the pass."

  He put Grey Molly into an easy trot, for the floor of the pass dippedup and down, littered with sharp-toothed rocks or treacherous, rollingones, as bad a place for speed as a stiff upslope. According to hisnicest calculation the posse could not reach the edge of the gulchbefore he was at the farther side, out of range of everything except along chance shot, so he took note of things as he went and observed aspot of pale silver skirting through the brush on the eastern ridge ofthe gorge. There would be moonlight that night and another chancein favor of Pete Glass. He remembered then, with quiet content, thatjogging in the holster was a power which with six words might stop thosesix pursuers.

  A long halloo came barking down the pass, now drawling out, now cut awayto silence as the angling cliffs sent on the echo, and Vic loosened therein. Grey Molly swung out with a snort of relief to a free-swinginggallop and they swept down a great, gentle slope where new grass paddedthe fall of her hoofs, yet even then he kept the mare checked and heldher in touch with an easily playing wrist. He did not imagine that eventhe sheriff on the dusty roan would dream of trying to swallow up GreyMolly in a short sprint but that assurance nearly cost Vic his life. Theroar of hoofs in the gulch belched out into the comparative silenceof the open space beyond and just as he gave the mare her head a guncoughed and an angry humming darted past his ear.

  Molly lengthened into full speed. He could not tell on account of themuffling grass whether the pursuit was gaining or losing. He trustedblindly to the mare and when he looked back they were already pullingtheir mounts down to a hand gallop. That would teach them to match Mollyin a sprint, roan or no roan!

  He slapped her below the withers, where the long, hard muscles rippledback and forth. She was full of running, her gallop as light as thetoss of a bough in the wind, and now as he pulled her back to a swingingcanter her head went high, with pricking ears. Suddenly his heart wentout to her; she would run like that till she died, he knew.

  "Good girl," he whispered huskily.

  The day was paling towards the end when he headed into the foothills ofthe White Mountains. He drew up Molly for a breath on a level shoulder.Already he was close to the snow line with ragged heads of white rearingabove him. Far below, a pale streak of moonlight was the Asper. Then,out of that blacker night on the slopes beneath, he heard the clinkinghoofs of the posse; the quiet was so perfect, the air so clear, that heeven caught the chorus of straining saddle leather and then voices ofmen. All this time the effects of the whisky had been wearing away byimperceptible degrees and at that sound all his old self rushed back onVic Gregg. Why, they were his friends, his partners, these voices in thenight, and that clear laughter floated up from Harry Fisher who had beenhis bunkie at the Circle V Bar ranch three years ago. He felt an insaneimpulse to lean over the edge of the cliff and shout a greeting.