Clay Nash 1 Read online

  He used the knife blade to poke them out and scatter them. Then, chewing on the cactus pith again, he spat the mouthful of acrid liquid into a pile of ash and charcoal scraped from partly burnt sotol wood. He moved this mess together and spread it around under his eyes and on his cheeks. It would reduce glare and give some protection from sunburn. He made some more and smeared as much as possible over his already sun-reddened shoulders. He felt a whole lot better, glanced at the sun and cringed from its pulsing glare and heat. It was time to move on, but before he went there was one more chore to do. He moved around, carefully overturning rocks near clumps of bushes, looking for small rodents, perhaps a snake, holding a club of sotol bush in one hand, ready to strike. But there was nothing living on this waterless, parched knoll and he would have to travel out into the desert without any food supplies. He stuffed his pockets with cactus pith and carried another large piece in his hands. Then he staggered down the far side of the knoll and moved out into the featureless landscape, knowing it was about time for Matthews and his men to start their pursuit.

  ~*~

  Cash Matthews reined down his blood Arab and stared across the desert from beneath his hat brim, squinting. His lips were cracked and dry and a little bead of blood showed at the deep crack in the center when he pulled them back around bared teeth, cursing. He hipped in the saddle, seeing Vern Dekker riding down the slope towards him.

  “Well?” Matthews snapped as the ramrod came up.

  Dekker shook his head. “No sign, Cash.”

  “Where the hell can he be?” Matthews demanded, his voice cracking with the intensity of his frustration and thirst, too, for the hunters had to ration their water. “Goddamn it! Two days and more and Nash is still free!”

  “Might not be alive,” Dekker pointed out.

  Matthews glared at him. “Then I want to know about it! Find his body and bring it to me!”

  “Can’t do that if we can’t pick up his trail, Cash,” Dekker said easily, his own voice rough-edged from thirst. “Hasn’t been a sign of him since he left that first knoll where he’d lit a fire. And we still dunno why he lit it. Wasn’t no sign that he’d cooked anythin’ and he sure didn’t light it to keep warm.”

  “Forget the jokes, Vern!” Matthews snapped. “I expected Nash to be found long before this. I don’t like being made a fool of. Specially by a man who should be starving and dying of thirst and exposure by now!”

  Dekker shrugged. “You’ve been with us every inch of the way, Cash. You know we’ve done our best. He must be part Injun or gopher or somethin’ ... ”

  “Goddamn you, I told you to quit trying to be funny!” Matthews’ face congested with his anger. He controlled himself with an effort. “All right. Tell the men to keep searching. I’ll double the bonus now. Two hundred dollars for the man who brings in Nash. I’ll ride back to the spread and arrange for more supplies to be sent out to you.”

  Dekker pursed his lips. “Dunno that the men are gonna take too kindly to that, Cash, even for the chance at the two hundred bucks. They’ve about had enough now and they’re ready to turn back.”

  “There’ll be no turning back until I say so!” snapped Matthews. “Tell ’em that! Stay with this search until Nash is found, dead or alive. But found he will be before I call it off. You tell ’em that, Vern!”

  He wheeled the Arab and raced away from Dekker who sighed and nodded to himself, then turned his own mount and rode off towards the line of searchers stretched out across the face of the desert.

  ~*~

  Nash didn’t know how much longer he could keep going. Three days so far and he’d had the luck of the devil with him.

  By the time the sun had been high enough to near-boil his brains in his skull that first day, he’d stumbled over the edge of a hidden arroyo, right under a cutbank. The shade had cooled the ground and he’d lain there, too exhausted to move. When his strength had come back, he’d crawled far back under the bank, hoping it wouldn’t collapse and bury him alive. And, back there in the deep shadow he’d chewed on the cactus pith and, despite himself, dozed. He’d heard the thunder of hoofs and the ground above had vibrated with riders passing back and forth but none of them had come down into the arroyo and the cutbank was not visible from above. They’d merely ridden along the banks and then moved on.

  Knowing he was reasonably safe for the moment, he slept and when he awoke it was dark. He was ravenous but chewed on more of the cactus pith to alleviate his thirst, trying to forget the griping pains in his guts. Nash left the cutbank and arroyo cautiously, and, when satisfied that all was clear, took time to search for the Pole star and get the direction he wanted.

  It was easier travelling at night, even though he stumbled over broken ground and obstacles he couldn’t see, and likely walked past sources of food. He figured he must have made several miles before moonset and then there was only the faint desert starlight for him to see by. He shivered in the night wind and the drop in temperature was unbelievable, but he kept moving, knowing he could make greater distance at this time than during the day.

  Come morning, he’d been within a mile of the rugged line of hills he would have to cross or find a passage through. Although nearly dead on his feet, legs aching, heels blistered, he staggered on until he reached the hills and clambered over the warming rock until he found a cave just large enough to take his body. There was a rattlesnake back there, too, and he tried to kill it with his club but he was too weak, and the snake was only interested in escape. The fact that the snake had been holed-up here was encouraging. Water must be nearby and also food, or the snake wouldn’t have been here. He found a flat rock that filled the cave entrance tolerably well and flopped back on the cool rock, cradling his head on one arm, too exhausted to worry about his hurts ...

  It was still daylight when he awoke, but the light had the look of afternoon about it. Something had dragged him up from his exhausted sleep, but what? Another snake worming its way into the cave? He snatched at his club instinctively, but there was enough reflected light to see that this was not the danger. Then he heard it: horses’ hoofs outside. He crawled to the entrance, and looked out between the rock and the cave mouth, a small slit. He saw two riders, both M-Bar-M hard cases, and they were drinking from their canteens.

  “Waste of goddamn time,” one man complained. “He wouldn’t be loco enough to try to cross these hills. Nothin’ beyond but a couple of stage way-stations. He’d never make it.”

  “Well, we ain’t found sign of him in any other direction,” answered the second man. “That’s why the boss said to try here ... And ease off on that water, pard. It’s all we’ve got till we join up with the others.”

  “Well, that I aim to do right now.”

  “Wait up! We ain’t searched these hills proper yet!”

  “You search if you want,” the first man said, corking his canteen and starting his mount forward. “I ain’t wastin’ time or strain. He just wouldn’t come this way. He’d make for the ranches and the towns. Adios.”

  He rode slowly away and the second man hesitated a spell then muttered a curse and rode off after his companion. Nash released a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding.

  There were bluffs in the hills and at their bases he found limestone caves with water inside. It was stagnant and he only drank a couple of mouthfuls, holding back with difficulty. Outside, he searched along the base of the cliffs until he found ferns growing in a shaded spot. He dug down maybe eighteen inches before fresh water began to well up through the ground. He plunged his face into it and drank his fill, before sluicing it over his tortured body.

  He killed a snake in the rocks, cooked it over a small fire he built far back in the limestone caves, the smoke dissipating in the big cave itself. That night, he travelled on with flame-seared snake meat stuffed into his pockets, his body now smeared all over with charcoal mixed with some of the fat from the snake meat, and he’d also used its body juices and blood to make an evil-smelling charcoal paste. But he figu
red it was better than being blistered. He plaited the ferns into a crude hat and let some of the fronds hang down over his neck. It was amazing what a difference this made when he travelled by day.

  He had nothing to carry water in but had seen birds circling high up in the crags and knew there must be more water about somewhere. Nash began the climb over the range, the rocks slashing through the thin leather remaining on the soles of his boots.

  ~*~

  The place was called Iron Ridge and it was a way-station for the Garth Stagecoach Line, which ran through that part of Texas in a long loop from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to El Paso and continued in a wide sweep up through Texas to Independence, Missouri, and dog-legged back to Denver, Colorado, before completing the circle down to Santa Fe.

  The relay station consisted of one large adobe building that served as a resting place for travelers and also the living quarters for the station agents, Jed Summers, and his daughter, Mary. There were stables and corrals for the teams; a long clapboard shed where travelers who wished could sleep overnight in ranch-style bunks; a blacksmith’s forge and workshop for repairs to the stagecoaches; and a windmill and clay banked water tank that was only half full of muddy-looking water right now. Jed Summers ran a few beeves and a couple of milking goats for his and Mary’s use. Occasionally, he butchered a steer for the travelers but they paid extra for such luxury meals. Mary had a corn patch and small truck garden for vegetables at the rear of the adobe building that required constant attention and watering, but she successfully grew some greens and potatoes.

  Right now, she was carefully watering the potato patch, figuring on how she could rig a canvas awning to give the garden area some sort of shade. She tipped the last dregs of muddy liquid out of the wooden pail and then walked down to the clay banked tank, tying a rope to the pail before tossing it into the water.

  She hauled in on the rope, pulling the pail free of the murky water, listening to the ringing beat of her father’s hammer in the forge as he worked at fixing an iron tire to a repaired coach wheel. He was slowing down, she thought. Age was creeping up on him and she didn’t know how much longer he could stand the pressure of work out here in this terrible heat. The coaches were more frequent now and some timetables had the stages arriving in the middle of the night or the early hours of the morning. All required complete changes of teams, some needed repairs on the spot, and, of course, the weary travelers wanted coffee and short-order food whatever the hour. She found it grueling enough, but old Jed, with all the heavy work to do, too, must have found it well-nigh intolerable. The pressure would likely be even greater once the Garth Stage Line was running on the new right-of-way Walt Garth was negotiating for. It would cut thirty miles off the old route and would be across flat pastureland, making it a far more comfortable trip. But there seemed to be some sort of hold-up, for which she was grateful at the moment, but sooner or later the traffic would increase. And there was even a rumor that Wells Fargo wanted to buy out Garth. If that happened ...

  Mary Summers had the pail in her hand now and suddenly she gasped, dropped the pail so that it clattered and rolled back down the slippery slope into the water. Her eyes widened as, across the tank, she watched, fascinated, as a human hand clawed feebly at the earthworks, was joined by another. She started to back off as she heard a groan and a man’s head slowly appeared as he pulled himself up.

  The hair was filthy and matted beneath a crude sort of fern hat and at first she thought he was an Indian or a negro, but she noticed that there were patches of blistered white skin showing through the black smears.

  “Dad!” she called loudly, without taking her eyes off the apparition that crawled slowly over the earthworks, straining and grunting with the effort. “Dad, here quick!”

  Jed Summers came running out of the smithy, swinging his heavy blacksmith’s hammer like a weapon, leather apron flapping as he hurried towards his daughter by the tank.

  “What is it, girl?” he yelled, panting up the slope of the tank. “Injuns?” She pointed as he stopped beside her and he looked across the tank, breathing, “Judas!”

  Clay Nash made one final effort to heave himself onto the top of the earthworks, his eyes swollen, vision blurred. He could hear voices and saw indistinct shapes coming around the lip of the tank towards him. His voice rattled gutturally but no words came.

  Unable to stop himself, he slid forward down the slippery clay slope and splashed into the muddy water of the tank.

  “Quick, Dad! Before he drowns!”

  Jed Summers dropped the hammer and slid and slithered down the bank, going up to his thighs in water as he reached out, got his fingers in Nash’s matted hair and dragged him out of the water. He lay back against the slope, looking at the sun-blistered man, panting.

  “He’s in bad shape, daughter. Looks like he’s walked clear across the desert. Look at his boots! And his feet are cut to ribbons. By the looks of his levis’ knees, I’d say he crawled a goodly part of the way, too.”

  “We’d better get him into the house, Dad.” Mary, unmindful of the mess her clothes were getting into, slid down the clay bank to give her father a hand.

  Four – Stageline Man

  CASH MATTHEWS stormed out of his office in the big ranch house, wrenched open the front door and stomped onto the porch. His face was grim, eyes cold, as he watched Vern Dekker wearily dismount from a trail-dusted horse in the yard. Dekker walked slowly towards the house, slapping alkali dust from his clothing with his sweat-stained hat. He paused with one boot on the bottom porch step and looked up at Matthews, his own face grim and lined with weariness.

  “No sign,” he said, voice grating and harsh. “Been clear across the desert to Pinion Falls, even rode up to Medicine Bow and across to Fort Macrae. Ain’t no one seen hide nor hair of him. And I checked with the stage drivers, too. He’s just gone into thin air, Cash.”

  “Like hell he has!” Matthews snarled. “He’s got across somehow or he’s dead out there. No one can last ten days in that desert! I want his body brought in!”

  Dekker sighed heavily. “You’re wastin’ your time,” he said bluntly. “And mine, too. I could be better employed roustin’ up them other sodbusters instead of chasin’ Nash’s ghost all over the southwest ... ”

  “You’ll do as you’re told!” Matthews snapped.

  Dekker’s trail-reddened eyes narrowed. “Only as long as I feel like doin’ it, Cash. You don’t own me, mister, and I don’t jump to your orders like these rannies you got on forty-and-found. I’m my own man and I’ve had about a gutful of searchin’ for Nash. I reckon he’s dead and I’m all through lookin’. You don’t like it, gimme my time.”

  Matthews’ jaw hardened and his eyes showed the anger that was boiling within him as he glared at Dekker, controlling his breathing with difficulty. After a spell he nodded curtly. “All right, Vern. You’re likely right. It’s a waste of time after ten days.” He frowned thoughtfully. “Only thing, I’ve had something nagging at me the last couple of days. We dismissed the idea that he could’ve headed northwest, out into open desert. We concentrated on the eastern side where the towns and ranches are ...”

  “Makes sense. Ain’t nothin’ out the other way but a couple of stage way-stations. Too risky tryin’ to find one of them when you got three towns and maybe half a dozen ranches the other direction.”

  Matthews nodded. “Right. It’s how anyone would think. It’s also how Nash would figure it. So it’s just possible he did the opposite because we’d reckon it’d be loco. More I think about it, Vern, more I feel we ought to try those way-stations. Only two, aren’t there? Iron Ridge and another one—”

  “Bowie’s Bluff. But hell almighty, Cash, he’d have to face forty miles of open desert without so much as a bluetail fly or a drop of water. He couldn’t make it!”

  “Nash used to work for me. He’s one tough hombre. Lived with Injuns and buffalo runners. He knows about survival. One reason I figured we’d have ourselves some sport with him ... reckoned he’
d give us a run for our money, but not this much.”

  Dekker sighed. “Well, I checked with stage drivers in Medicine Bow, like I said ... ”

  “Drivers aren’t the same as stage station agents,” Matthews said shortly. “Get yourself some rest and cleaned-up. Tomorrow, you take the stage from El Paso through the relay stations and ask around. You can turn back when you get to the railhead, ride a train down to Glory Peak and I’ll have someone meet you there.” He looked at Dekker soberly. “If you find Nash, you’re to kill him. You’ll get the two hundred dollar bonus.”

  “Suits me,” Dekker said, in a better frame of mind now that money was being mentioned. “I’ll rest up today, ride down to El Paso come mornin’. That okay?”

  Matthews nodded. “And come back with something definite this time,” he said curtly, and swung back into the house.

  Dekker gave a mock salute and stepped down, shoving his hat onto the back of his head as he walked slowly towards the bunkhouse.

  ~*~

  From the bed, well back in the shadows of the room, Clay Nash could see through the faded curtains to the yard where the stagecoaches changed teams of horses. He was propped up on pillows, face and torso smeared with an evil-smelling but soothing salve made up by one of Jed Summers’ Indian helpers and applied by Mary.