that’s where they’re headin’.”
“So?” June demanded, her hands on her hips. “So what? Prove that them riders come from the TF. And then even if you do that, see what the law will do about it.”
“Now, June,” Peyton said.
The woman turned around and walked off, her dress dirty and soot-covered.
“What are you gonna do?” Smoke asked Peyton.
“Pull out. What else is there to do?”
“We’ll help you rebuild, just like we’re doing with Wilbur Mason.”
“And then what?” Peyton demanded. “What happens after that? I’ll tell you,” he blurted out. “The same thing all over again. No. I’ll find me some horses, fix that busted wheel, and take off. This land ain’t worth dyin’ over, Smoke. It just ain’t.”
“That’s not what you told me a few weeks back.”
“I changed my mind,” the man replied sullenly. “I don’t feel like jawin’ about it no more. My mind is made up. We’re taking what we can salvage and pullin’ out. Headin’ up north of here. See you men.” He turned and walked off, catching up with his wife.
“Let him go,” Charlie said to Smoke. “He’s not goin’ to last anywhere out here. First time a drought hits him, he’ll pack up and pull out. The locust come, he’ll head out agin, always lookin’ for an easy life. But he’ll never find it. You know yourself it takes a hard man to make it out here. Peyton’s weak, so’s his woman. And them kids are whiners. He’ll leave the land pretty soon, I’m figurin’. He’ll get him a job in some little store, sellin’ shoes and ribbons, and pretty soon he’ll find something wrong with
Smoke hated to say it, but he felt Charlie was right in his assessment of Peyton. Tilden had burned Wilbur Mason out; that had just made Wilbur and his family all the more determined to stay and fight.
“Good luck, Peyton!” Smoke called.
The man did not even turn around. Just waved his hand and kept on walking.
Somehow that gesture, or lack of it, made Smoke mad as hell. He wondered if he’d ever see Peyton or his family again. He thought, if he didn’t, he wouldn’t lose any sleep over the loss.
The few other small rancher-farmers in the high country met that afternoon on a plateau just about halfway between Smoke’s Sugarloaf and the beginning of the TF range. And it was, for the most part, a quiet, subdued gathering of men.
Mike Garrett and his two hands; Wilbur Mason and Bob Colby; Ray Johnson and his hired hand; Nolan Edwards and his two oldest boys; Steve Matlock, Smoke and his gunhands.
And Reverend Ralph Morrow, wearing a pair of jeans and checkered shirt.
“Ralph is gonna buy some land from me,” Smoke explained. “Farm some and ranch a little. Preach part time. The minister come up with a pretty good idea, I’m thinking. But we’ll get to his idea in a minute. Anybody got any objections to Ralph joinin’ our group?”
“I ain’t got no objections,” Ray said. “I’m just wonderin’ if, him bein a preacher and all, will he fight?”
Ralph stepped forward. “Some of you might know me. For five years, I went by another name. I fought under the name of the Cincinnati Kid.”
Matlock snapped his fingers. “I read about you in the Gazette. You kilt a man…ah…”
He trailed off into an uncomfortable silence.
“Yes,” Ralph said. “I killed a man with my fists. I didn’t mean to, but I did. As to whether I’ll fight. Yes. For my family, my land, my friends. I’ll fight.”
And everyone there believed him. Still, one had to say, “But, Reverend Morrow, you’re a minister; you can’t go around shootin’ folks!”
Ralph smiled…rather grimly. “Smoke and Charlie and some of the boys are going to help me build my cabin, first thing in the morning. You let some sucker come around and start trouble, you’ll see how fast I’ll shoot him.”
The laughter helped to relieve the tension.
And Reverend Ralph Morrow suddenly became just “one of the boys.”
“How about that other idea, Smoke?” Wilbur asked.
Smoke walked to the edge of the flats. He pointed down at the road. “That road, right there, connects Danner and Signal Hill. Seven, eight miles further down, you got to cut south to get to Fontana. Right?”
All agreed that was true. So?
“Pearlie is ridin’ hard to the county seat right now. The Reverend and his wife, Bountiful, come up with this idea at noonin’. Right here, boys, right here on this plateau, but back yonder a ways, there’s gonna be a town. We don’t need Fontana. The land the town will be built on is gonna be filed on by Pearlie; he’s carrying the money to buy some of it outright. When that surveyor was through here last year, he left a bunch of his markings and such at the house. Never did come back for them. Sally remembered ’em this morning. Everything is gonna he legal and right. My wife is puttin’ up the money to build a large general store. I figure that once I explain it all to Louis Longmont, he’ll see the humor in it and drop some of his money in. I’m hopin’ he will. Pretty sure. Pearlie is carryin’ a letter to the bank at the county seat; me and my wife have some money there.” He grinned. “She has a heap more than I do. Wilbur Mason and his wife is gonna run the store for us. Wilbur owned a store back east of here at one time. So they both know what to do.
“Day after tomorrow, there’s gonna be wagons rolling in here. Lumber, and a lot of it. We’re gonna have several buildings here, including a sheriff’s office and a jail.”
