Novel 1954 - Utah Blaine (As Jim Mayo) (v5.0) by Louis L’Amour Read Free Book Online

womanly curiosity turned upon this tall young man with the grave face and the slow smile. She had noted the two tied-down guns. She was far too knowing not to realize what they meant. Immediately she connected them with his name. She also knew better than most what an impact his presence must be making on the valley ranchers and their riders. Long before Joe Neal had any warning of what was coming, she had tried to warm him. She had watched the cattle of the 46 fattening on the rich graze and plentiful water, and she had seen the men from other ranches lingering hungrily around the edges. Their range was not bad, but it is not in many men to be satisfied with less than the best—when the best seems available.
    Angie told Blaine this, of how stubborn Joe Neal was. He had wrested his range out of Apache country. Nobody would chase him from it.
    “He told me he came here in ’60,” Blaine marveled. “How did he get along with the Indians? Surely there were a lot of them?”
    “He talked peace when he could, fought when he had to. Twice all his men deserted but one, but he stayed on and fought it out.”
    “One stayed?”
    “Yes.” Angie Kinyon turned and indicated a stone slab at the head of a mound of earth under the sycamores some thirty yards away. There were flowers on the grave. “He lies there. He was my father.”
    “Oh.” Utah looked at her curiously, this tall, lonely girl with the leaf shadows on her face. “You were here? Through all that?”
    “My mother died in Texas before we came West with Joe. I grew up here, through it all. Never a week went by that first year without a raid of some kind. The second year there were only three. Then there were years of peace, then more fighting as the Apache began to fear the soldiers and wanted to kill all white people.”
    “You never left?”
    She looked at him quickly. “Then they haven’t told you about me?”
    “No. They told me nothing. Forbes told me you lived here.”
    “You’ve seen him?” The quick smile on her lips brought Utah a sharp twinge of jealousy that surprised him. Was that it, then? Was she in love with Forbes? “He’s fine. One of the finest people I’ve known.”
    She was silent for a few minutes and he began thinking of his meeting at Goat Camp. “I’d better go.”
    She followed him. “Be careful.” She put her hand on his sleeve suddenly. “Utah—do be careful! They’ll all be after you, every one of them. There’s not one you can trust.”
    “Maybe we can work something out. Mary Blake has two good men, and Coker is going to stand with me.”
    “Mary…then you’ve met her.” Her eyes searched his face. “You’re going to meet her now.”
    “Yes. To work out a plan of battle.”
    “She’s selfish.” She said it quickly and it surprised him. He had not expected her to speak ill of another woman. “She’s been spoiled.”
    “I wouldn’t know.” Despite himself his voice was cool. “She only seems to want to protect her ranch.”
    Angie nodded seriously. “You didn’t like what I said, did you? Perhaps I should only have said something nice. It would have been wiser for me, but of no use to you.” When he did not respond, she added, “Mary is lovely, and she is like her father. Nothing existed in this world but the B-Bar for Gid. Mary is the same way. She is strong, too. They are underrating her, all of them. To keep that ranch intact she will lie, steal and kill.”
    “You really think that, don’t you?” He put a foot in the stirrup and swung up. “Sometimes one has to kill.”
    She acknowledged that. “There are ways of killing. But remember what I have said. If she thought she could save the B-Bar by selling you out she would do it without hesitation.”
    He turned the dun stallion. “Well, thanks,” he said, “but I think you judge her too severely.”
    “Perhaps.” Her eyes were large and dark. She stood there in her buckskin skirt and calico blouse, looking lonely, beautiful, and sad.