job, or on a place of my own.
It meant hard work, and lots of it. Living a life is much like climbing mountains -- the summits are always further off than you think, but when a man has a goal, he always feels he's working toward something.
The next morning, when I'd been working an hour by sun, I hit the pocket.
It was a crumbling ledge of decomposed quartz, seemingly unrelated to what was on either side, and the piece that I found was no bigger than an upright piano, but it seemed to be only the top of a larger ledge. Anyway, in the next three hours I broke up enough of that quartz to get out maybe two thousand dollars' worth of gold.
Pete Kitchen was going to be almighty pleased. I dumped one of my other sacks back in the hole and filled the sack with the rich stuff. I was just loading the last of it and was too busy to be rightly paying mind to anything else when I hear a voice saying, 'Looks like this trip is going to pay off mighty handsome.'
Laura Sackett was there, and three men were with her -- Arch Hadden, Johnny Wheeler, sometime gunman for a smuggling outfit, and one of the gents who had been with Hadden in the fight at Dead Man's Tank. They had come down here for only one reason, and that was to kill me, and they wanted to tell me about it.
There was no call for conversation, not having to stall like before, so I just peeled back my forty-five and wasted no time.
I turned and saw and drew and fired, all kind of in one breath. My first shot took Johnny Wheeler, whose hand was lingering around the butt of his six-gun as if he was minded to use it.
That shot hit right where the ribs spread apart. My second shot was for Arch Hadden, but it missed. Arch had suddenly whipped his horse around and was running like all get-out.
Laura's horse reared up and she toppled from the saddle, and of a sudden the other gunman was shooting past me. I turned to see the Apaches coming down and recognized one of them as Kahtenny.
Me, I dove into that hole I'd been digging and had sense enough to grab the picket ropes of my horses, which I'd had up, loading for the homeward trip.
The Apaches swept by and I saw that third gunman go down. I heard the bark of Apache guns and saw the dust jump from his vest. He came up shooting, only another bullet nailed him.
They caught Arch Hadden.
I saw them catch him. It was Kahtenny and two others, and I saw him turn to fight as they rode up, but a rope sailed out, and then another, and the Apaches had themselves a prisoner.
Well, I'd told him. He had stolen Kahtenny's squaw, and he had been warned. With Apaches, nothing much was doubtful from here on -- only how long Hadden had the guts to stick it out.
This was a hard land, and the rules were written plain in the way we lived. If you overstepped the rules you had bought yourself trouble, and from now on it was going to be settled between Hadden and Kahtenny.
Me, I got up and went to my horses. I fed shells into my six-shooters again, and then I walked over to the man I'd shot to see if he was alive. He wasn't. Johnny Wheeler was buzzard meat.
I taken his guns off, and what he had on him for identification. Might be somebody, somewhere, who'd be wishful to know what happened.
And then Laura Sackett got up off the ground and we just looked at each other. I never did see such hatred in anybody's eyes.
'Downright mis'rable, ain't we?' I said calmly. 'You'd think one of us Sacketts would be considerate enough to die so's you could get some of that bile out of your system.'
'I suppose you're going to kill me?' she said.
'No, I ain't. It would be a kindness to the world, but I never shot a woman yet, and don't figure to now. No, I'm just goin' to leave you. I'm just goin' to mount up and ride right out of here.'
'You'd leave me here?' She was incredulous. 'There's a horse yonder. You get on that horse and ride.'
Putting my foot in the stirrup, I swung into the saddle, and you can just bet that before I swung a-straddle of that horse I swung the animal around so I could keep an eye on her whilst I was doing it.
I taken a turn around the saddlehorn with the lead rope of the pack horse, and she said, 'What if those Indians come back?'
'It's their tough luck, ma'am,' I said, 'but I hope not, for their sakes.
Apaches aren't bad folks. They have trouble enough without wishin' you on them.
Only it might work out for the best. A session with some of those Apache squaws might teach you some manners.' I touched my hat, 'I hope I won't be seein' you, ma'am. Good-bye!'
That black of mine went down into the arroyo as if he knew what was behind him, and when he topped out on the rise beyond we were out of rifle shot. I pulled up then and looked back.
She had caught one of the horses and was trying to mount. The horse was worried by her skirt, and was sidling around.
That was the last I saw of her, of Laura, who had been Orrin's wife.
I rode east, with the sun going down behind me, the feel of a good saddle under me, and a horse between my legs. The trail dipped into a wide hollow, shadowy with evening, and somewhere a quail called. Across yonder hills, miles away, was Pete Kitchen's. I'd make camp before I got there, because nobody in his right mind rode up to Pete's in the nighttime.
He was paying me twenty dollars for the job, and might cut me in for some of the profits. Anyway, it was a road stake, and maybe before lining out for somewhere across the country I'd just ride around and call on Dorset.
I liked that little girl. She was pert and she was pretty, and she had nerve.
A star came out, the desert night was soft, and a coolness came over it.
It came on me to sing, but my horse was carrying me along nicely, and I was not wishful for trouble.
