Carlan's
Gold (cont.)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
He kept the horse between
himself and the men . . .
When the stranger got down from his saddle, Mary Logan was shocked.
He wore Indian leggings, fringed and dark with wear, and like many
Indians, his buttocks were bare. Hastily she averted her eyes. It
was bad enough for an Indian to wear such clothing, for a white
man it was indecent.
After the first glance at the boy and herself he had ignored them,
but she noticed that when he dismounted from his horse he kept the
horse between himself and the men, nor did he turn his back on them
at any time. Was it accident? Natural caution? Or did he realize
something was wrong here?
 "Going
far?" Kavanaugh asked the question. He was a big man, tall as the
stranger, but heavier. He wore gray striped trousers, boots to his
knees, and a buckskin vest. His gun was heavy and worn easy to his
hand. Mary Logan was afraid of Kavanaugh.
"Fort Bridger."
He was more than thirty, this stranger was, but there was an agelessness
about him that made him seem forever young and forever old. Did
he realize these men had killed and were prepared to kill again?
How could he realize? And what could he see? What was there to
see but the small fire, the blackened coffee pot, the four men,
the girl and the boy? And the six horses.
Her mind reached out to him, trying to grasp his attention without
actually looking at him or speaking, trying at once to plead for
help and to warn him of his danger.
Six horses...had he noticed that?
The camp was in a hollow on a hillside, cloaked with aspen. The
smoke was dissipated to some extent by the leaves and branches,
but this man had seen it. Perhaps when it was first lighted...there
might have been a puff of smoke then.
The stranger's shirt was red, faded by sun and rain, and there
was a short jacket of buffalo hide thrown over the blanket roll
behind his saddle.
Squatting beside the fire he filled a blackened cup from the blackened
pot. He tasted the coffee, and his teeth flashed whitely in a smile,
and for just an instant he seemed to be looking at her...did he
smile?
"Coffee tastes good," he commented. He gulped scalding coffee and
added, "My name is Carlan." He jerked his head back in the direction
from which he had come. "Rough country back there."
"What's there?" Walsh asked.
"Game...water if you know where to find it...and gold."
The word hung in the still air. Mary Logan smelled the wood smoke,
smelled the coffee, felt the warm sun...and felt the impact of the
word.
Missett blinked slowly. "Did you say...gold?" The last word
was almost a whisper.
The stranger glanced at his coffee. "Take an outfit to get it out.
I mean...it's there, all right, but it would take a few men. A body
can't work a gold claim and watch for Blackfeet at the same time."
Kavanaugh watched Carlan intently, his mind prying at the words
as if to find some secret in them, turning each one to see what
lay behind it. Walsh and Missett were thieves, murderers, but Kavanaugh
was evil, evil beyond the grasp of their smallness.
"If you found gold," Walsh suggested slyly, "you must have some.
Where's yours?"
 Carlan
chuckled, a small mischievous chuckle. "Now you wouldn't think me
fool enough to come away without a sample, would you? Same time,
a man would be a fool to bring out enough so a man would want to
kill him for it.
"Gold is a mighty obvious thing, heavy to handle, hard to hide,
and not easy to get rid of without causing talk."
He tucked a finger in his pocket and drew out a chunk of gold about
the size of a thimble. "There might be fifty dollars there...might
be less, but that there's gold."
Kavanaugh took, it weighing it in his palm, studying the problem
it presented. And as all eyes centered upon it, Carlan glanced at
Mary Logan and winked, then gave a brief, meaning glance around
the camp."There's more of this?" Kavanaugh asked.
"A man would have to go into Indian country to bring it out, but
there's enough to make a dozen men rich. Moreover, a man would have
to know exactly where it was...and it isn't easy to
find."
Carlan took the nugget from Kavanaugh's fingers which yielded it
reluctantly.
"How'd you come to find it?"
"Hunting a deer...saw him through some trees, and hit him first
shot. It was a neck shot and the deer jumped, then fell over and
slid down the side of the hill. Down there he started to get up,
but he was facing up the hills and he pawed some before he died.
He uncovered this gold."
Mary watched, listening. She knew they wanted to believe him, and
that the story was plausible, but suddenly she was sure he was lying...but
to accomplish what?
"You find much of it there?"
"Filled my hat with nuggets like that." He took out a short-stemmed
pipe and filled it with tobacco. "I hid the rest of it."
"You said it would take several men," Walsh said, "and there's
four of us."
He gave it to them then, and Mary Logan knew that he knew. She
did not know who he was or how he knew, but somehow he did.
"You've no outfit," he replied quietly, "you don't have two days
grub. You have no pack horses. You don't have ammunition enough."
They had no words with which to argue, for what he said was true
and each man of them knew it. To get out any amount of gold would
take time, and even if they could get part of their living from
the land, there was much they would need, and they had nothing here.
Walsh and Missett were thinking of the gold, Kavanaugh, Mary was
sure, was thinking of Carlan, for Kavanaugh did not accept his story
as true.
"You have no outfit yourself," Kavanaugh's suspicions clung to
his words.
"It's six months since I left the Green," Carlan explained, "and
the last two months I've been living with Shoshones. All my grub
was gone months ago and my gear worn out. When I saw your smoke
I was headed in for supplies and help."
It was their problem, this lack of supplies. It had held them here,
prisoners of their prisoners, and they had no words with which to
argue and each man of them knew it well. To get out any amount of
gold would take time, and time meant provisions even if part of
their living could come from hunting. Yet they had been unable to
go to Ford Bridger because of Mary Logan and her son Jim.
The Logans would be known at Fort Bridger, and none of the group
sufficiently trusted the others to leave her alone with those who
remained behind.
Kavanaugh turned it over in his mind and Mary Logan sat very still,
watching with steady eyes. She was sure she had guessed rightly,
and that somehow Carlan understood her predicament and intended
to help. At least, he had them thinking of something now, where
as when Carlan rode in their one question was when to kill him.
Now, suddenly, they were trying to please him, to reach an agreement
and to be taken in.
"We've got to get grub," Carlan continued, "and we need tools.
A man needs a pick and shovel. He could even use some powder. And
he needs grub...no way you can figure on wild game...a man starts
hunting and the game is liable to drift clean out of the country."
They knew the truth of what he said. Mary Logan could see that
Kavanaugh was chewing it over, but she noticed something else...Walsh
and Taylor were looking to Carlan for the answer, for leadership.
It was fairly up to Kavanaugh now
EDITOR'S NOTE: This
is all we have of Carlan's Gold. From these few pages we can only
guess at the plight of the Logan family. Where is Mr. Logan? And
as for Carlan, Is there really gold? In Louis' signature style,
within a short time he has set up the potential for at least 3
or 4 different conflicts.
<<
Previous page
1,
2
Return
to the Preview Table of Contents
|
