To The Last Man

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"Then, goin' back to Jean's tellin' aboot trackin' rustled Cattle,
I've got this to say. I've long suspected thet somebody livin' right
heah in the valley has been drivin' off cattle an' dealin' with
rustlers. An' now I'm shore of it."

This speech did not elicit the amaze from Gaston Isbel that Jean
expected it would.

"You mean Greaves or some of his friends?"

"No. They wasn't none of them in the cattle business, like we are.
Shore we all knowed Greaves was crooked. But what I'm figgerin' is
thet some so-called honest man in our settlement has been makin'
crooked deals.

Blue was a man of deeds rather than words, and so much strong speech
from him, whom everybody knew to be remarkably reliable and keen,
made a profound impression upon most of the Isbel faction. But,
to Jean's surprise, his father did not rave. It was Blaisdell who
supplied the rage and invective. Bill Isbel, also, was strangely
indifferent to this new element in the condition of cattle dealing.
Suddenly Jean caught a vague flash of thought, as if he had intercepted
the thought of another's mind, and he wondered--could his brother Bill
know anything about this crooked work alluded to by Blue? Dismissing
the conjecture, Jean listened earnestly.

"An' if it's true it shore makes this difference--we cain't blame all
the rustlin' on to Jorth," concluded Blue.

"Wal, it's not true," declared Gaston Isbel, roughly. "Jorth an' his
Hash Knife Gang are at the bottom of all the rustlin' in the valley
for years back. An' they've got to be wiped out!"

"Isbel, I reckon we'd all feel better if we talk straight, replied Blue,
coolly. "I'm heah to stand by the Isbels. An' y'u know what thet means.
But I'm not heah to fight Jorth because he may be a rustler. The others
may have their own reasons, but mine is this--you once stood by me in
Texas when I was needin' friends. Wal, I'm standin' by y'u now.
Jorth is your enemy, an' so he is mine."

Gaston Isbel bowed to this ultimatum, scarcely less agitated than when
Esther Isbel had denounced him. His rabid and morbid hate of Jorth had
eaten into his heart to take possession there, like the parasite that
battened upon the life of its victim. Blue's steely voice, his cold,
gray eyes, showed the unbiased truth of the man, as well as his fidelity
to his creed. Here again, but in a different manner, Gaston Isbel
had the fact flung at him that other men must suffer, perhaps die,
for his hate. And the very soul of the old rancher apparently rose
in Passionate revolt against the blind, headlong, elemental strength
of his nature. So it seemed to Jean, who, in love and pity that hourly
grew, saw through his father. Was it too late? Alas! Gaston Isbel
could never be turned back! Yet something was altering his brooding,
fixed mind.

"Wal," said Blaisdell, gruffly, "let's get down to business. . . .
I'm for havin' Blue be foreman of this heah outfit, an' all of us to
do as he says."

Gaston Isbel opposed this selection and indeed resented it.
He intended to lead the Isbel faction.

"All right, then. Give us a hunch what we're goin' to do,"
replied Blaisdell.

"We're goin' to ride off on Jorth's trail--an' one way or another--
kill him--KILL HIM! . . . I reckon that'll end the fight."

What did old Isbel have in his mind? His listeners shook their heads.

"No," asserted Blaisdell. "Killin' Jorth might be the end of your
desires, Isbel, but it 'd never end our fight. We'll have gone too far.
. . . If we take Jorth's trail from heah it means we've got to wipe out
that rustier gang, or stay to the last man."

"Yes, by God!" exclaimed Fredericks.

"Let's drink to thet!" said Blue. Strangely they turned to this Texas
gunman, instinctively recognizing in him the brain and heart, and the
past deeds, that fitted him for the leadership of such a clan. Blue
had all in life to lose, and nothing to gain. Yet his spirit was such
that he could not lean to all the possible gain of the future, and
leave a debt unpaid. Then his voice, his look, his influence were
those of a fighter. They all drank with him, even Jean, who hated
liquor. And this act of drinking seemed the climax of the council.
Preparations were at once begun for their departure on Jorth's trail.

Jean took but little time for his own needs. A horse, a blanket,
a knapsack of meat and bread, a canteen, and his weapons, with all
the ammunition he could pack, made up his outfit. He wore his buckskin
suit, leggings, and moccasins. Very soon the cavalcade was ready to
depart. Jean tried not to watch Bill Isbel say good-by to his children,
but it was impossible not to. Whatever Bill was, as a man, he was
father of those children, and he loved them. How strange that the
little ones seemed to realize the meaning of this good-by? They were
grave, somber-eyed, pale up to the last moment, then they broke down
and wept. Did they sense that their father would never come back?
Jean caught that dark, fatalistic presentiment. Bill Isbel's convulsed
face showed that he also caught it. Jean did not see Bill say good-by
to his wife. But he heard her. Old Gaston Isbel forgot to speak to
the children, or else could not. He never looked at them. And his
good-by to Ann was as if he were only riding to the village for a day.
Jean saw woman's love, woman's intuition, woman's grief in her eyes.
He could not escape her. "Oh, Jean! oh, brother!" she whispered as
she enfolded him. "It's awful! It's wrong! Wrong! Wrong! . . .
Good-by! . . . If killing MUST be--see that y'u kill the Jorths!
. . . Good-by!"

Even in Ann, gentle and mild, the Isbel blood spoke at the last.
Jean gave Ann over to the pale-faced Colmor, who took her in his arms.
Then Jean fled out to his horse. This cold-blooded devastation of a
home was almost more than he could bear. There was love here.
What would be left?

Colmor was the last one to come out to the horses. He did not walk
erect, nor as one whose sight was clear. Then, as the silent, tense,
grim men mounted their horses, Bill Isbel's eldest child, the boy,
appeared in the door. His little form seemed instinct with a force
vastly different from grief. His face was the face of an Isbel.

"Daddy--kill 'em all!" he shouted, with a passion all the fiercer
for its incongruity to the treble voice.

So the poison had spread from father to son.

CHAPTER IX

Half a mile from the Isbel ranch the cavalcade passed the log cabin
of Evarts, father of the boy who had tended sheep with Bernardino.

It suited Gaston Isbel to halt here. No need to call! Evarts and
his son appeared so quickly as to convince observers that they had
been watching.

"Howdy, Jake!" said Isbel. "I'm wantin' a word with y'u alone."

"Shore, boss, git down an' come in," replied Evarts.

Isbel led him aside, and said something forcible that Jean divined
from the very gesture which accompanied it. His father was telling
Evarts that he was not to join in the Isbel-Jorth war. Evarts had
worked for the Isbels a long time, and his faithfulness, along with
something stronger and darker, showed in his rugged face as he
stubbornly opposed Isbel. The old man raised his voice: "No, I tell
you. An' that settles it."

They returned to the horses, and, before mounting, Isbel, as if he
remembered something, directed his somber gaze on young Evarts.

"Son, did you bury Bernardino?"

"Dad an' me went over yestiddy," replied the lad. "I shore was glad
the coyotes hadn't been round."

"How aboot the sheep?"

"I left them there. I was goin' to stay, but bein' all alone--I got
skeered. . . . The sheep was doin' fine. Good water an' some grass.
An' this ain't time fer varmints to hang round."

"Jake, keep your eye on that flock," returned Isbel. "An' if I
shouldn't happen to come back y'u can call them sheep yours. . . .
I'd like your boy to ride up to the village. Not with us, so anybody
would see him. But afterward. We'll be at Abel Meeker's."

Again Jean was confronted with an uneasy premonition as to some idea
or plan his father had not shared with his followers. When the
cavalcade started on again Jean rode to his father's side and asked
him why he had wanted the Evarts boy to come to Grass Valley. And the
old man replied that, as the boy could run to and fro in the village
without danger, he might be useful in reporting what was going on at
Greaves's store, where undoubtedly the Jorth gang would hold forth.
This appeared reasonable enough, therefore Jean smothered the objection
he had meant to make.

The valley road was deserted. When, a mile farther on, the riders
passed a group of cabins, just on the outskirts of the village,
Jean's quick eye caught sight of curious and evidently frightened
people trying to see while they avoided being seen. No doubt the
whole settlement was in a state of suspense and terror. Not unlikely
this dark, closely grouped band of horsemen appeared to them as Jorth's
gang had looked to Jean. It was an orderly, trotting march that
manifested neither hurry nor excitement. But any Western eye could
have caught the singular aspect of such a group, as if the intent of
the riders was a visible thing.

Soon they reached the outskirts of the village. Here their approach
bad been watched for or had been already reported. Jean saw men, women,
children peeping from behind cabins and from half-opened doors. Farther
on Jean espied the dark figures of men, slipping out the back way
through orchards and gardens and running north, toward the center of
the village. Could these be friends of the Jorth crowd, on the way
with warnings of the approach of the Isbels? Jean felt convinced of it.
He was learning that his father had not been absolutely correct in his
estimation of the way Jorth and his followers were regarded by their
neighbors. Not improbably there were really many villagers who, being
more interested in sheep raising than in cattle, had an honest leaning
toward the Jorths. Some, too, no doubt, had leanings that were
dishonest in deed if not in sincerity.

Gaston Isbel led his clan straight down the middle of the wide road
of Grass Valley until he reached a point opposite Abel Meeker's cabin.
Jean espied the same curiosity from behind Meeker's door and windows
as had been shown all along the road. But presently, at Isbel's call,
the door opened and a short, swarthy man appeared. He carried a rifle.

"Howdy, Gass!" he said. "What's the good word?"

"Wal, Abel, it's not good, but bad. An' it's shore started," replied
Isbel. "I'm askin' y'u to let me have your cabin."

"You're welcome. I'll send the folks 'round to Jim's," returned Meeker.
"An' if y'u want me, I'm with y'u, Isbel."

"Thanks, Abel, but I'm not leadin' any more kin an' friends into this
heah deal."

"Wal, jest as y'u say. But I'd like damn bad to jine with y'u. . . .
My brother Ted was shot last night."

"Ted! Is he daid?" ejaculated Isbel, blankly.

"We can't find out," replied Meeker. "Jim says thet Jeff Campbell said
thet Ted went into Greaves's place last night. Greaves allus was
friendly to Ted, but Greaves wasn't thar--"

"No, he shore wasn't," interrupted Isbel, with a dark smile,
"an' he never will be there again."

Meeker nodded with slow comprehension and a shade crossed his face.

"Wal, Campbell claimed he'd heerd from some one who was thar. Anyway,
the Jorths were drinkin' hard, an' they raised a row with Ted--same old
sheep talkan' somebody shot him. Campbell said Ted was thrown out back,
an' he was shore he wasn't killed."

"Ahuh! Wal, I'm sorry, Abel, your family had to lose in this. Maybe
Ted's not bad hurt. I shore hope so. . . . An' y'u an' Jim keep out
of the fight, anyway."

"All right, Isbel. But I reckon I'll give y'u a hunch. If this heah
fight lasts long the whole damn Basin will be in it, on one side or
t'other."

"Abe, you're talkin' sense," broke in Blaisdell. "An' that's why
we're up heah for quick action."

"I heerd y'u got Daggs," whispered Meeker, as he peered all around.

"Wal, y'u heerd correct," drawled Blaisdell.

Meeker muttered strong words into his beard. "Say, was Daggs in
thet Jorth outfit? "

"He WAS. But he walked right into Jean's forty-four. . . .
An' I reckon his carcass would show some more."

"An' whar's Guy Isbel?" demanded Meeker.

"Daid an' buried, Abel," repled Gaston Isbel. "An' now I'd be obliged
if y'u 'll hurry your folks away, an' let us have your cabin an' corral.
Have yu got any hay for the hosses?"

"Shore. The barn's half full," replied Meeker, as he turned away.
"Come on in."

"No. We'll wait till you've gone."

When Meeker had gone, Isbel and his men sat their horses and looked
about them and spoke low. Their advent had been expected, and the
little town awoke to the imminence of the impending battle. Inside
Meeker's house there was the sound of indistinct voices of women and
the bustle incident to a hurried vacating.

Across the wide road people were peering out on all sides, some hiding,
others walking to and fro, from fence to fence, whispering in little
groups. Down the wide road, at the point where it turned, stood
Greaves's fort-like stone house. Low, flat, isolated, with its dark,
eye-like windows, it presented a forbidding and sinister aspect.
Jean distinctly saw the forms of men, some dark, others in shirt
sleeves, come to the wide door and look down the road.

"Wal, I reckon only aboot five hundred good hoss steps are separatin'
us from that outfit," drawled Blaisdell.

No one replied to his jocularity. Gaston Isbel's eyes narrowed to a
slit in his furrowed face and he kept them fastened upon Greaves's store.
Blue, likewise, had a somber cast of countenance, not, perhaps, any
darker nor grimmer than those of his comrades, but more representative
of intense preoccupation of mind. The look of him thrilled Jean, who
could sense its deadliness, yet could not grasp any more. Altogether,
the manner of the villagers and the watchful pacing to and fro of the
Jorth followers and the silent, boding front of Isbel and his men summed
up for Jean the menace of the moment that must very soon change to a
terrible reality.

At a call from Meeker, who stood at the back of the cabin, Gaston Isbel
rode into the yard, followed by the others of his party. "Somebody look
after the hosses," ordered Isbel, as he dismounted and took his rifle
and pack. "Better leave the saddles on, leastways till we see what's
comin' off."

Jean and Bill Isbel led the horses back to the corral. While watering
and feeding them, Jean somehow received the impression that Bill was
trying to speak, to confide in him, to unburden himself of some load.
This peculiarity of Bill's had become marked when he was perfectly sober.
Yet he had never spoken or even begun anything unusual. Upon the
present occasion, however, Jean believed that his brother might have
gotten rid of his emotion, or whatever it was, had they not been
interrupted by Colmor.

"Boys, the old man's orders are for us to sneak round on three sides
of Greaves's store, keepin' out of gunshot till we find good cover,
an' then crawl closer an' to pick off any of Jorth's gang who shows
himself."

Bill Isbel strode off without a reply to Colmor.

"Well, I don't think so much of that," said Jean, ponderingly.
"Jorth has lots of friends here. Somebody might pick us off."

"I kicked, but the old man shut me up. He's not to be bucked ag'in'
now. Struck me as powerful queer. But no wonder."

"Maybe he knows best. Did he say anythin' about what he an' the rest
of them are goin' to do?"

"Nope. Blue taxed him with that an' got the same as me. I reckon
we'd better try it out, for a while, anyway."

"Looks like he wants us to keep out of the fight, replied Jean,
thoughtfully. "Maybe, though . . . Dad's no fool. Colmor, you wait
here till I get out of sight. I'll go round an' come up as close as
advisable behind Greaves's store. You take the right side.
An' keep hid."

With that Jean strode off, going around the barn, straight out the
orchard lane to the open flat, and then climbing a fence to the north
of the village. Presently he reached a line of sheds and corrals, to
which he held until he arrived at the road. This point was about a
quarter of a mile from Greaves's store, and around the bend. Jean
sighted no one. The road, the fields, the yards, the backs of the
cabins all looked deserted. A blight had settled down upon the peaceful
activities of Grass Valley. Crossing the road, Jean began to circle
until he came close to several cabins, around which he made a wide
detour. This took him to the edge of the slope, where brush and
thickets afforded him a safe passage to a line directly back of
Greaves's store. Then he turned toward it. Soon he was again
approaching a cabin of that side, and some of its inmates descried him,
Their actions attested to their alarm. Jean half expected a shot from
this quarter, such were his growing doubts, but he was mistaken. A man,
unknown to Jean, closely watched his guarded movements and then waved a
hand, as if to signify to Jean that he had nothing to fear. After this
act he disappeared. Jean believed that he had been recognized by some
one not antagonistic to the Isbels. Therefore he passed the cabin and,
coming to a thick scrub-oak tree that offered shelter, he hid there to
watch. From this spot he could see the back of Greaves's store, at a
distance probably too far for a rifle bullet to reach. Before him,
as far as the store, and on each side, extended the village common.
In front of the store ran the road. Jean's position was such that he
could not command sight of this road down toward Meeker's house, a fact
that disturbed him. Not satisfied with this stand, he studied his
surroundings in the hope of espying a better. And he discovered what
he thought would be a more favorable position, although he could not
see much farther down the road. Jean went back around the cabin and,
coming out into the open to the right, he got the corner of Greaves's
barn between him and the window of the store. Then he boldly hurried
into the open, and soon reached an old wagon, from behind which he
proposed to watch. He could not see either window or door of the store,
but if any of the Jorth contingent came out the back way they would be
within reach of his rifle. Jean took the risk of being shot at from
either side.

So sharp and roving was his sight that he soon espied Colmor slipping
along behind the trees some hundred yards to the left. All his efforts
to catch a glimpse of Bill, however, were fruitless. And this appeared
strange to Jean, for there were several good places on the right from
which Bill could have commanded the front of Greaves's store and the
whole west side.

Colmor disappeared among some shrubbery, and Jean seemed left alone to
watch a deserted, silent village. Watching and listening, he felt that
the time dragged. Yet the shadows cast by the sun showed him that,
no matter how tense he felt and how the moments seemed hours, they were
really flying.

Suddenly Jean's ears rang with the vibrant shock of a rifle report.
He jerked up, strung and thrilling. It came from in front of the store.
It was followed by revolver shots, heavy, booming. Three he counted,
and the rest were too close together to enumerate. A single hoarse
yell pealed out, somehow trenchant and triumphant. Other yells,
not so wild and strange, muffled the first one. Then silence clapped
down on the store and the, open square.

Jean was deadly certain that some of the Jorth clan would show
themselves. He strained to still the trembling those sudden shots
and that significant yell had caused him. No man appeared. No more
sounds caught Jean's ears. The suspense, then, grew unbearable.
It was not that he could not wait for an enemy to appear, but that he
could not wait to learn what had happened. Every moment that he stayed
there, with hands like steel on his rifle, with eyes of a falcon, but
added to a dreadful, dark certainty of disaster. A rifle shot swiftly
followed by revolver shots! What could, they mean? Revolver shots of
different caliber, surely fired by different men! What could they mean?
It was not these shots that accounted for Jean's dread, but the yell
which had followed. All his intelligence and all his nerve were not
sufficient to fight down the feeling of calamity. And at last, yielding
to it, he left his post, and ran like a deer across the open, through
the cabin yard, and around the edge of the slope to the road. Here his
caution brought him to a halt. Not a living thing crossed his vision.
Breaking into a run, he soon reached the back of Meeker's place and
entered, to hurry forward to the cabin.

Colmor was there in the yard, breathing hard, his face working, and in
front of him crouched several of the men with rifles ready. The road,
to Jean's flashing glance, was apparently deserted. Blue sat on the
doorstep, lighting a cigarette. Then on the moment Blaisdell strode
to the door of the cabin. Jean had never seen him look like that.

"Jean--look--down the road," he said, brokenly, and with big hand
shaking he pointed down toward Greaves's store.

Like lightning Jean's glance shot down--down--down--until it stopped
to fix upon the prostrate form of a man, lying in the middle of the road.
A man of lengthy build, shirt-sleeved arms flung wide, white head in the
dust--dead! Jean's recognition was as swift as his sight. His father!
They had killed him! The Jorths! It was done. His father's premonition
of death had not been false. And then, after these flashing thoughts,
came a sense of blankness, momentarily almost oblivion, that gave place
to a rending of the heart. That pain Jean had known only at the death
of his mother. It passed, this agonizing pang, and its icy pressure
yielded to a rushing gust of blood, fiery as hell.

"Who--did it?" whispered Jean.

"Jorth!" replied Blaisdell, huskily. "Son, we couldn't hold your dad back.
. . . We couldn't. He was like a lion. . . . An' he throwed his life away!
Oh, if it hadn't been for that it 'd not be so awful. Shore, we come
heah to shoot an' be shot. But not like that. . . . By God, it was
murder--murder!"

Jean's mute lips framed a query easily read.

"Tell him, Blue. I cain't," continued Blaisdell, and he tramped
back into the cabin.

"Set down, Jean, an' take things easy," said Blue, calmly. "You know
we all reckoned we'd git plugged one way or another in this deal.
An' shore it doesn't matter much how a fellar gits it. All thet
ought to bother us is to make shore the other outfit bites the dust
--same as your dad had to."

Under this man's tranquil presence, all the more quieting because it
seemed to be so deadly sure and cool, Jean felt the uplift of his dark
spirit, the acceptance of fatality, the mounting control of faculties
that must wait. The little gunman seemed to have about his inert
presence something that suggested a rattlesnake's inherent knowledge
of its destructiveness. Jean sat down and wiped his clammy face.

"Jean, your dad reckoned to square accounts with Jorth, an' save us all,"
began Blue, puffing out a cloud of smoke. "But he reckoned too late.
Mebbe years; ago--or even not long ago--if he'd called Jorth out man
to man there'd never been any Jorth-Isbel war. Gaston Isbel's
conscience woke too late. That's how I figger it."

"Hurry! Tell me--how it--happen," panted Jean.

"Wal, a little while after y'u left I seen your dad writin' on a leaf
he tore out of a book--Meeker's Bible, as yu can see. I thought thet
was funny. An' Blaisdell gave me a hunch. Pretty soon along comes
young Evarts. The old man calls him out of our hearin' an' talks to him.
Then I seen him give the boy somethin', which I afterward figgered was
what he wrote on the leaf out of the Bible. Me an' Blaisdell both tried
to git out of him what thet meant. But not a word. I kept watchin' an'
after a while I seen young Evarts slip out the back way. Mebbe half an
hour I seen a bare-legged kid cross, the road an' go into Greaves's
store. . . . Then shore I tumbled to your dad. He'd sent a note to
Jorth to come out an' meet him face to face, man to man! . . .
Shore it was like readin' what your dad had wrote. But I didn't say
nothin' to Blaisdell. I jest watched."

Blue drawled these last words, as if he enjoyed remembrance of his keen
reasoning. A smile wreathed his thin lips. He drew twice on the
cigarette and emitted another cloud of smoke. Quite suddenly then
he changed. He made a rapid gesture--the whip of a hand, significant
and passionate. And swift words followed:

"Colonel Lee Jorth stalked out of the store--out into the road--mebbe
a hundred steps. Then he halted. He wore his long black coat an' his
wide black hat, an' he stood like a stone.

"'What the hell!' burst out Blaisdell, comin' out of his trance.

"The rest of us jest looked. I'd forgot your dad, for the minnit.
So had all of us. But we remembered soon enough when we seen him
stalk out. Everybody had a hunch then. I called him. Blaisdell
begged him to come back. All the fellars; had a say. No use!
Then I shore cussed him an' told him it was plain as day thet Jorth
didn't hit me like an honest man. I can sense such things. I knew
Jorth had trick up his sleeve. I've not been a gun fighter fer nothin'.

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