Blood on Mcallister Read Online Free PDF Page B

wild Texas cattle and, being a good deal tamer, merely stood and watched McAllister bovinely as he passed. To camp, he found a sheltered spot, for a cool wind had blown up that would freshen as the night progressed. There was no timber in evidence nor water so he made a dry camp. There were buffalo chips in plenty, but he didn’t bother to build a fire, but ate the contents of a tin of tomatoes which rode easily on the stomach that had been punished a little with the drink he had taken on board at Abbotsville. He rolled in his blankets with the canelo munching the good grass, thought a little of the welcome he would get from his friend Jim Rigby and his little girl Pat and fell asleep well content.
    He awoke with the dawn, forewent breakfast, except for a sip of water from his canteen, smoked a pipe of tobacco as he rode and headed on north-west. Toward noon, he came in sight of a house. It wasn’t much of a place as houses go but then nobody had been in the ranching business in this part of the country long enough to build well yet. Timber had been used to construct two corrals near the place and there was a bunkhouse. McAllister saw it as the headquarters of a ranch with a good hands riding for it. It had not been there when he had come this way the previous spring. Jim Rigby would tell him about the owner. He toyed with the idea of goingdown and cadging a meal, for his belly was starting to rumble ominously, but he never got around to making up his mind. Three riders headed toward him from the building and they came at a pace that showed they were men in an almighty hurry. He reined in on the ridgetop and awaited them.
    Being the horseman he was, the first thing he noticed was that their horses were bigger than the animals to which he was accustomed down in Texas. That would be the good northern feed; there was something in the minerals in the soil and the grass that put height and weight on a horse. The animals had plenty of run in them; they bounded with the energy and eagerness of good hounds. The men on their backs were the usual run of cowhands, mostly unshaven and garbed in rough range-clothes. They all wore guns at their hips and in their hands were carbines. This was enough to make him pay them notice. These boys constituted a war-party. He was a man who could take a hint—he wasn’t too welcome here.
    They brought their mounts to a running halt in a style that showed they were proud of their careless horsemanship.
    McAllister grinned easily. ‘Howdy,’ he said.
    The man in the center who seemed to have a cast in his right eye, said: ‘What you want here?’
    â€˜Me?’ said McAllister who knew when he was out-numbered and out-gunned and decided to act accordingly. ‘Why, I don’t want a thing, mister.’
    â€˜Then move on.’
    â€˜That’s what I aim to do when you’re through talkin’.’
    â€˜Where you headed?’
    â€˜Clanton.’
    â€˜What’s your business there?’
    â€˜I don’t have none.’
    â€˜Why you goin’ there?’
    The answer to that was that it was McAllister’s business, but those three carbines meant business and McAllister wasn’t aiming to argue with them.
    â€˜I heard it was a nice place, I reckon. I’m a drifter an’ I’m driftin’. Is there a new law against it?’
    â€˜Don’t get fresh, boy, or we’re liable to quieten you downa mite,’ the man told him. ‘You sure you ain’t hirin’ out to nobody around Clanton?’
    â€˜Certain sure.’
    The three men looked at each other, undecided. Finally, the man in the center said: ‘What’s your name?’
    â€˜McAllister.’
    A certain look came into the man’s face.
    â€˜You any kin to old Chad McAllister?’
    â€˜Son.’
    â€˜I heard of you. Some kind of gun-hand, ain’t you?’
    â€˜No kind of gun-hand.’
    â€˜Maybe Mr. Brenell should ought