minutes.'
We turned and went down the row of rooms and stopped before one that was in the dark. Torres struck a light and lit a lantern. He held the light up to the window and I stepped into the door.
Chico Cruz had been sitting there in the darkness. Torres said, 'We don't need you any longer, Chico, you can go ... now.'
He looked at Torres from his dark, steady eyes and then at me.
'There is trouble here,' I said, 'and you do not make it easier.'
'You are to make me go?' His eyes studied me carefully.
'It will not be necessary. You will go.'
His left hand and arm were on the table, toying with a .44 cartridge. His right hand was in his lap.
'I said one day that we would meet.'
'That's fool talk. Juan has said you are through. There is no job for you here, and the quarters are needed.'
'I like it here.'
'You will like it elsewhere.' Torres spoke sharply. His courage was returning.
'You will go now ... tonight.'
Cruz ignored him. His dark, steady eyes were on me. 'I think I shall kill you, senor.'
'That's fool talk,' I said casually and swung my boot up in a swift, hard kick at the near edge of the table. It flipped up and he sprang back to avoid it and tripped, falling back to the floor. Before he could grasp a gun I kicked his hand away, then grabbed him quickly by the shirt and jerked him up from the floor, taking his gun and dropping him in one swift moment.
He knew I was a man who used a gun and he expected that, but I did not want to shoot him. He clung to his wrist and stared at me, his eyes unblinking like those of a rattler.
'I told you, Cruz.'
Torres walked to the bunk and began stuffing Chico's clothes into his saddlebags, and rolling his bedroll. Chico still clung to his wrist.
'If I go they will attack the hacienda,' Cruz said, 'is that what you want?'
'It is not. But we will risk it. We cannot risk you being here, Chico. There is an evil that comes with you.'
'And not with you?' He stared at me.
'Perhaps ... anyway, I shall not be here.'
We heard the sound of a horse outside, and glanced out to see Pete Romero leading Chico's horse.
Chico walked to the door and he looked at me. 'What of my gun?' he said, and swung into the saddle.
'You may need it,' I said, 'and I would not want you without it.'
So I handed him the gun, nor did I take the shells from it. He opened the loading gate and flipped the cylinder curiously, and then he looked at me and held the gun in his palm, his face expressionless.
For several seconds we remained like that, and I don't know what he was thinking. He had reason to hate me, reason to kill me, but he held the gun in his hand and looked down at me, and my own gun remained in its holster.
He turned his horse. 'I think we will never meet,' he said, 'I like you, senor.'
Juan Torres and I stood there until we could hear the gallop of his horse no longer.
Chapter XIII
Jonathan Pritts had brought with him an instrument more dangerous than any gun.
He brought a printing press.
In a country hungry for news and with a scarcity of reading material, the newspaper was going to be read, and people believe whatever they read must be true--or it would not be in print.
Most folks don't stop to think that the writer of a book or the publisher of a newspaper may have his own axe to grind, or he may be influenced by others, or may not be in possession of all the information on the subject of which he writes.
Don Luis had known about Pritts' printing press before anybody else, and that was one reason he wanted his granddaughter out of the country, for a paper can be used to stir people up. And things were not like they had been.
Don Luis sent for me again, and made a deal to sell me four thousand acres of his range that joined to mine. The idea was his, and he sold it to me on my note.
'It is enough, senor. You are a man of your word, and you can use the range.' He was sitting up that day. He smiled at me. 'Moreover, senor, it will be a piece of land they cannot take from me, and they will not try to take it from you.'
At the same time, I bought, also on my note, three hundred head of young stuff.
In both cases the notes were made payable to Drusilla. The don was worried, and he was also smart. It was plain that he could expect nothing but trouble. Defeat had angered Jonathan Pritts, and he would never quit until he had destroyed the don or been destroyed himself.
His Settlement crowd had shifted their base to Las Vegas although some of them were around Elizabethtown and Cimarron, and causing trouble in both places. But the don was playing it smart ... land and cattle sold to me they would not try to take, and he felt sure I'd make good, and so Drusilla would have that much at least coming to her.
These days I saw mighty little of Orrin. Altogether we had a thousand or so head on the place now, mostly young stuff that would grow into money. The way I figured, I wasn't going to sell anything for another three years, and by that time I would be in a position to make some money.
Orrin, the boys, and me, we talked it over. We had no idea of running the big herds some men were handling, or trying to hold big pieces of land. All the land I used I wanted title to, and I figured it would be best to run only a few cattle, keep from overgrazing the grass, and sell fat cattle. We had already found out we could get premium prices for cattle that were in good shape.
Drusilla was gone.
The don was a little better, but there was more trouble. Squatters had moved into a valley on the east side of his property and there was trouble. Pritts jumped in with his newspaper and made a lot more of the trouble than there had been.
Then Orrin was made sheriff of the county, and he asked Tom to become a deputy.
Now we had a going ranch and everything was in hand. We needed money, and if I ever expected to make anything of myself it was time I had at it. There was nothing to do about the ranch that the boys could not do, but I had notes to Don Luis to pay and it was time I started raising some money.
Cap Rountree rode out to the ranch. He got down from his horse and sat down on the step beside me. 'Cap,' I said, 'you ever been to Montana?'
'Uh-huh. Good country, lots of grass, lots of mountains, lots of Indians, mighty few folks. Except around Virginia City. They've got a gold strike up there.'
'That happened some years back.'
'Still working.' He gave me a shrewd look out of those old eyes. 'You gettin' the itch, too?'
'Need money. We're in debt, Cap, and I never liked being beholden to anybody.
Seems to me we might strike out north and see what we can find. You want to come along?'
'Might's well. I'm gettin' the fidgets here.'
So we rode over to see Tom Sunday. Tom was drinking more than a man should. He had bought a ranch for himself about ten miles from us. He had him some good grass, a fair house, but it was a rawhide outfit, generally speaking, and not at all like Tom was who was a first-rate cattleman.
'I'll stay here,' he told me finally. 'Orrin offered me a job as deputy sheriff, but I'm not taking it. I think I'll run for sheriff myself, next election.'
'Orrin would like to have you,' I said. 'It's hard to get good men.'
'Hell,' Tom said harshly, 'he should be working for me. By rights that should be my job.'
'Maybe. You had a chance at it.'
He sat down at the table and stared moodily out the window.
