Chapter IX.

A tall man in a buckskin jacket? Could he have been one of the two men who were watching the cart?

Georgetown was little more than a cl.u.s.ter of shacks and log houses close to the river. Orrin Sackett wanted no trouble, but if trouble was to come, he preferred it here, now.

He walked the street, alert for a sight of the man in the buckskin jacket, but he saw him nowhere. The stores, he noticed, were well stocked, and it struck him that instead of waiting until he reached Pembina or Fort Garry, he might stock up here. There was a good chance that Riel or someone buying for the Canadian army would have bought out the stores.

For that matter, why not try to buy the Red River cart from Baptiste? Or to hire him to drive? Usually, he had learned, in the long caravans of carts, one driver took care of three carts, and he planned to have but two.

Transporting horses or carts on the International was no new thing, so arrangements were quickly made. In the store, he bought the staples he would need. Flour, bacon, beans, dried apples, coffee, tea, and several cases of hardtack, similar to the Bent's Hard-Water Crackers he had enjoyed as a boy.

He purchased powder, shot and cartridges as well, and four extra rifles.

"Better cache them good," the storekeeper advised. "Louis Riel needs all the guns he can get."

"Do you think there will be a shooting war?" Orrin asked.

The storekeeper shrugged. "Not if Riel can help it. I've done business with him, with his pa, too. They was always reasonable folks, but from what the newcomers are saying, they've got an idea back East that he's leading a rebellion, and they want to hang him."

Outside on the street, Orrin took a quick look around for the buckskin-shirted man but also for anyone else who might seem too interested or too disinterested.

He was worried, and not about what might happen here but what could happen to the north. Tell and Tyrel were depending on him not only for food and ammunition but for additional help, and the last thing he wanted was to get into the midst of a shooting fight in which he had no stake.

The way to stay out of trouble was to avoid the places where trouble was.

When a difficulty develops, unless one can help, it was far better to get away from the area and leave it to those whose business it was to handle such things.

Despite the wisdom of staying out of trouble, his route led right through the middle of it. The best thing he could do would be to get in and out as rapidly as possible.

He looked around the store, buying blankets, a couple of spare ground sheets, odds and ends that would be found useful on the way west where one could buy little or nothing. That was all right. All the Sacketts were used to "making do." It had been their way of life.

"Old Barnabas would enjoy this," he thought suddenly, and said it aloud, not thinking.

"Hey? What's that?"

Orrin smiled. "Just thinking about an ancestor of mine. Came over from England many a year ago, but he was always going west."

"Mine, too," the storekeeper said. "My grandpa left a mighty good farm and a comfortable business. Just sold out and pulled out. Pioneering was in the blood. I guess."

Orrin agreed. "I've got it, too," he admitted. "I'm a lawyer, and I've no business even being here."

"Well, luck to you." The storekeeper looked up. "You goin' west? To the gold fields, maybe?"

"That's right."

The storekeeper shook his head. "I'll talk to Jen about it. That there western country a" well, I'd like to see it. I surely would. Wild country, they say, with mountains covered with snow, deep canyons a" "

"I'll send my cart around for this," Orrin said.

"Better get you another cart. You got a load here. You got enough for two carts. I've got one I'll let you have reasonable, and a good, steady horse with it."

"The way you talk," Orrin said, "you may need it yourself."

"Up to Jen. I'll talk to her. But maybe a" Jenny's got the feelin', too. I seen her lookin' off to the horizon now and again. After all, we was westerin' when we come here." He waved a hand. "Don't worry about the cart. I got a good man can build me one. I'll sell you cart, horse, and harness reasonable. When I come west a" well, we may meet up sometime."

"Thanks." Orrin held out his hand. "That's decent of you. If you don't see me, and you hear the name of Sackett, you just go to them and tell him you were friendly to Orrin Sackett. You won't need more than that."

He returned to the street and walked back to the hotel. Baptiste was loaded and standing by his horse.

"You ever been to British Columbia, Baptiste?"

"I dream of it. But it is for young men. I am no longer young."

"It is for men, Baptiste, and you are a man. I have another cart. Will you get it for me?"

"I will. But British Columbia? He iss far off, I t'ink."

"We will cross the wide plains, Baptiste, and follow strange rivers until they are no more. Then we shall climb mountains. It will be cold, hard, and dangerous. You know what the western lands are like, and it is never easy."

Devnet Molrone came out on the street with Mary McCann. "Do we start so soon?"

"It is twenty miles, they say. We will have to hurry."

He glanced up the street. There was a tall man standing there, a tall man in a buckskin coat. Across the street, seated on a bench, was a man in a black coat. He smiled; it was so obvious.

"What is it?" Devnet asked.

"What?" He glanced at her. "Oh? Nothing, I was just a" "

"You looked so stern there for a moment, and then almost amused. Somehow a" "

"It is nothing," he replied. "It is just that some patterns are so familiar. The men who use them do not seem to realize the same methods have been used for centuries. Each seems to think he invented it."

"I don't believe I understand."

He leaned on the wagon. "Miss Molrone? Do you see those two men up the street? For some reason, they wish me harm. They have followed us here. When I go up the street, as they know I must, the man in the buckskin jacket will start trouble, somehow. Then, when he makes a move to draw a gun, the man across the street in the black coat will try to kill me."

"You're mad!" She stared at him. "That's utterly preposterous! People don't do such things."

"Not so often here as further south, nor so often where we are going. Nevertheless, it does happen. Trial by combat, Miss Molrone, has been a way of life since the beginning of time. A savage way, I'll admit, and dying out. But it is still with us."

"But that's ridiculous! Those two men a" why, I saw one of them talking to Mr. Gavin just this morning!"

She turned to look at him. "You do not seem the type, somehow. You're so much the southern gentleman. I just a" "

He smiled again. "Southern gentleman? It's just the hat and maybe the fact that I trim my moustache. I grew up in the mountains, ma'am, a-fightin' an' a-feudin', and I cut my western teeth roundin' up wild cows. I've been up the hill and over the mountain, as we Sacketts say."

"But you're a lawyerl"

"Yes, ma'am, and respectful of the law, only if one is to settle difficulties in court, it must be agreeable to both parties. I suspect those gentlemen up the street have already selected their twelve jurymen, and they are in the chambers of their pistols.

"Now," he said, "I must let them present their case, and I am wondering if they have become familiar with a new tactic the boys invented down Texas way?

"We will have to hope they have not heard of it." He unb.u.t.toned his coat. "Miss Molrone, ma'am, would you mind going inside?"

"I will not! Besides, if what you say is true, it's not fair! There are two of them!"

"Please. Do go inside. I know where my bullets are going, but I don't know about theirs."

"Here a" what is this?" It was Gavin. "What's going on?"

"It's those men up there. Mr. Sackett believes they will try to kill him."

"Two men? I see but one."

"The man in the black coat. Mr. Sackett believes when trouble develops with the one, the other will kill him."

Kyle Gavin's features showed nothing. "Oh? I scarcely think a" "

"Gavin? Will you take Miss Molrone inside? I wish to ask that man why he has been following us. If there is anything he wants, I am sure he can have it. There's no need to go skulking about in the brush."

"Following us? I wasn't aware a" "

"Perhaps not. I was aware."

"But two men? Surely, if you know there are two, or believe there are, I cannot see why you would walk into the trap."

Orrin shrugged a shoulder. "If one knows, it ceases to be a trap. And to an extent the situation is reversed. But that's the lawyer in me. I talk too much."

He turned to Devnet again. "And, Miss Molrone, do let Mr. Gavin take you inside. And please? Stay close to him, for my sake?"

Gavin glanced around. "Now what's that mean?"

"We want her to be safe, do we not?" Orrin's expression was bland.

"If there's a shooting here," Gavin warned, "you will be arrested. The Canadian a" "

"We are still in Dakota Territory," Orrin reminded him. "Now will you take Miss Molrone inside?"

"He's right, miss," Mary McCann said. "When lead starts to flyin', anybody can get shot."

The tall man in the buckskin jacket leaned lazily against an awning post. The man opposite in the black coat was reading a newspaper.

Orrin Sackett did not walk toward the man in the buckskin coat, and he did not walk up the middle of the street. He started as if to do one or the other, then switched to the boardwalk that would bring him up behind the man in the black coat.

The tall man straightened suddenly, uncertain as to his move, and in that moment Orrin was behind the man with the newspaper, who had started to turn.

"Sit still now," Orrin warned, "and hang on to that paper. You drop it, and I'll kill you."

The man clutched the paper with both hands. "See here, I don't know what a" "

"All rightl" Orrin's voice rang clearly in the narrow street. "Unbuckle your gun and let it fall." He was speaking to the man across the street. "Easy now! I don't want to have to kill you."

"Hey? What's this all about?" The man in the buckskin coat rested one hand on his buckle. "What's going on?"

"Nothing, if you unbuckle that belt, nice and easy, and then let it fall."

The man across the street could not even see if Sackett had drawn his gun since he was standing directly behind the man with the newspaper.

The man with the newspaper said, "Better do what he says, Cougar. There's always another day."

Slowly, carefully, Cougar unbuckled his belt and let the gun slip to the ground along with belt and holster.

"Now walk away four steps to your left and stop." Orrin reached down and slipped the seated man's gun from its holster, then a derringer from a vest pocket. He gave the man a quick, expert frisk.

"Fold your paper and put it in your coat pocket," he suggested, "then walk over and join your friend."

As the man walked, Orrin moved across the street behind him and gathered up the gun belt and slung it over his shoulder. "Sit down, boys. Right on the edge of the boardwalk. We might as well be comfortable."

"What's going on?" Cougar demanded. "I don't even know this gent."

Orrin smiled. "You seemed to know each other pretty well when I saw you out in the brush today. I had you under my rifle several times out there, and I was tempted, gentlemen, tempted."

"We was just wonderin' where you was goin'," Cougar said.

"You could have asked us," Orrin said mildly. "No use to skulk in the brush and maybe get mistaken for a Sioux."

"We was just curious" a" Cougar's eyes were bright with malice a" "especially since you got no reason to go west no more."

Orrin's expression did not change, but within him something went cold and empty. "What's that mean?"

"Them others, with the cows. They're gone. Wiped out. Herd's gone, all of them ma.s.sacred by the Sioux."

"That's right," the man in the black suit said. "We rode over the ground. The Sioux stampeded buffalo into them an' then follered the buffalo. We seen where a couple of bodies was trampled into prairie, an' gear all over everywhere. They're dead a" killed a" wiped out."

Chapter X.

Orrin's expression did not change. Their faces were sullenly malicious. Cougar hooked his thumbs in his belt. "You lost 'em all," he said, "your family and the cows. The Sioux wiped 'em out. You got nothin' left."