Читать книгу Gunsight Showdown: A Walt Slade Western - Bradford Scott - Страница 5

THE SUN VANISHED behind the Chinatis in a splendor of scarlet and gold. The lovely blue dusk began sifting down from the hilltops and the heat diminished appreciably. Slade rode on, gazing expectantly to the south.

Low down appeared “echoes” of the stars blossoming in the darkening sky—the lights of the construction camp. Slade quickened Shadow’s gait a little. The black horse sniffing oats in the offing, made no objection. Slade relaxed comfortably in the saddle. “Another twenty minutes or so and we’ll make it,” he said.

Abruptly he straightened up, staring. The whole southern sky was ablaze with yellowish light. Moments later a rumbling boom reached the Ranger’s ears.

“What in blazes!” he wondered. “If that was a dynamite explosion, it sure wasn’t set properly, making all that light. Get going, horse, I’ve a notion something isn’t as it ought to be down there.”

Shadow lengthened his stride still more. Slade peered ahead. A little later his hand tightened on the bridle.

In the gloom ahead had materialized shapes, grotesque, unreal. They quickly resolved to five speeding horsemen. Slade’s eyes narrowed a trifle.

“I don’t know what this is all about, but I figure it’s a good notion to give those hurrying gents the right of way,” he muttered.

Not far from the trail was a big ocotillo brandishing its snaky arms. Slade swerved his mount and halted him in its shadow, which did not provide much concealment.

On came the riders. Now they were opposite where the Ranger sat his horse. He saw the white blur of faces turned in his direction, saw a sudden gleam of shifting metal. He was already sideways out of the saddle as a gun blaze and a slug yelled through the space his body had occupied an instant before.

Walt Slade didn’t take kindly to being shot at for no apparent good reason. He signified his dissent in no uncertain terms. Prone on the ground and in the deeper shadow, he whipped both guns from their sheaths and sent a stream of lead hissing in reply.

A yell of pain echoed the reports, and another. He saw one of the riders slump forward and grab the saddle horn to keep from falling. A second lurched sideways, recovered, sagging in the hull.

The bunch did not pause to try conclusions with him, hidden in the shadow as he was. They tore on up the trail, two of them reeling and swaying but keeping their seats.

Slade leaped to his feet, slid his heavy Winchester from the saddle boot, then changed his mind and resheathed the long gun. After all, the bunch might be but a band of trigger-nervous cowhands who had been startled by the apparition of the horseman lurking in the shadow of the big candlewood. This was a wild land, and such a one might well be suspect. He muttered wrathfully and glared after the vanishing riders.

Later he was to regret that he changed his mind and replaced the rifle without using it.

“Let’s go, horse,” he said as he forked Shadow. “This is beginning to turn out to be something of a night. Bet you we find more trouble at the camp—I’ve got a feeling.”

Twenty minutes later they reached the outskirts of the big construction camp, which was in an uproar, men shouting and cursing and bawling orders. A locomotive lay on its side, spouting steam from broken pipes. A big crane also lay slanted sideways, half in and half out of a hole hollowed in the ground near the tracks of a siding. A boxcar was roofless, another had been turned at right angles to the tracks. Still another was a mass of tangled wreckage strewn over the ground. Around this last was a swirl of activity. Just beyond it, spike mauls were thudding frantically as a crew laid a line of rails parrallel to the wreckage. On these rails stood another and heavier crane, with a hissing locomotive shoving it along as fast as the track layers could place the iron.

From where he sat his horse Slade could see over the heads of the crowd to where workmen were swarming like distrubed ants over the wreckage.

In the forefront, directing operations, was a broad-shouldered, stocky but powerfully built individual with craggy features, keen blue eyes and a glorious crinkly white mane sweeping back from his big, dome-like forehead. It was James G. “Jaggers” Dunn, the famous General Manager of the great C. & P. Railroad system. His voice boomed orders liberally spiced with profanity.

Slade dismounted, shouldered his way through the crowd and touched Dunn on the arm. The G.M. whirled around with an exasperated exclamation. Then his eyes widened and he stared.

“Slade!” he exploded. “Where the devil did you come from?”

“Tell you later,” Slade replied. “What’s going on here?”

“Some blankety-blank-blanks set off a charge of dynamite and blew up half the camp,” Dunn answered. “Tell you about that, later. Right now I’ve got trouble on my hands. There’s a poor devil of a workman pinned under that mess. A heavy beam, a side sill, is resting across his chest and holding him. The beam is slowly pressing down on him as the ends of the sill, resting on other timbers and weighted with wreckage, sinks as the wreckage beneath it settles into the soft earth. We’re trying to get the big hook over there into position where it can lift the wreckage off the beam, and the boys are laying track as fast as they can to accommodate it, but I’m afraid we won’t make it in time. The poor hellion will be crushed to death before we can raise the stuff. That crack in the wreckage is so narrow only one man can crawl in there and he can’t do anything but try and comfort him.”

Slade squatted down and peered down the narrow aperture between the splintered timbers.

“Get that fellow out of there,” he told Dunn. “Hurry!”

The General Manager bawled an order. The workman came shuffling back out of the crack. Slade moved forward and peered. By the light of the flares blazing on all sides he could make out the form of the pinned man. He could also see that on one side of his body the beam was lifted a couple of feet from the earth. He turned to Dunn.

“A shovel, quick!” he said.

The G.M., who knew Slade well and had experience with his handling of what appeared a hopeless situation, obeyed the order without question. Trailing the shovel after him, Slade wormed his way into the opening and began scooping out the earth in the shallow hollow under the beam.

The pinned man was moaning softly, but was still conscious.

“Take it easy,” Slade told him. “Don’t try to breathe too hard. Relax your muscles and don’t try to fight that thing. We’ll get you out.”

The calm, steady voice had the desired effect. The fellow calmed, the wild look left his eyes and was replaced by one of confidence.

“Guess if you say it’s so, it is,” he panted. Slade scooped frantically at the earth under the beam.

“That ought to do it,” he muttered, pushing the shovel aside. He crawled into the deepened hollow, braced himself on hands and knees and raised his back until it came in contact with the sinking beam.

At first the weight was nothing, but slowly and steadily it increased, until the strain on his arms and legs was terrific. He could feel the wood grinding into his flesh and he began to breathe heavily. An iron band seemed to be tightening and tightening around his chest. His eyes bulged, his temples throbbed. The terrible pressure was almost more than he could bear, but—

The beam had stopped sinking!

A face appeared in the opening, the face of General Manager Dunn.

“How you doing?” he asked hoarsely.

“Okay so far,” Slade panted. “Don’t know how long I can hold out.”

“The hook’s almost in position,” Dunn said. “A little more and we’ll be ripping that stuff off. Once we get the trucks that are on top of the wood off the weight will ease. Just a few minutes more.”

Outside a voice suddenly bawled, “Mr. Dunn! Mr. Dunn! that blankety-blanked stuff’s on fire!”

Bellowing profanity, Jaggers Dunn went shuffling back out of the hole. Another moment and his voice was roaring orders.

Now smoke was filtering through the chinks in the wreckage. Slade gasped and coughed. Bands of light were flickering past his eyes, then coils of blackness. Already the heat was intense, and above he could hear the crackling of the flames eating into the oil soaked wood. The pinned man began gibbering with fright.

“Easy!” Slade panted. “Save your strength. They’ll make it.”

The poor devil quieted. Slade wondered if they would make it. His muscles, bulging on arms and shoulders, were turning to water. A little more and he would collapse, which would very likely mean the finish for both of them. The ringing spike mauls were like the measured tolling of a passing bell.

Suddenly they ceased. He heard the boom of the locomotive’s exhaust, the grinding of steel on steel. The exhaust ceased. There was a creaking and jangling. Voices hummed and murmured overhead. The creaking grew louder, culminated in a ripping crash. Again, and yet again. Slade braced himself and summoned his last reserve of strength for a final effort.

Abruptly the crushing weight on his back lessened. He heard the crash of tossed-aside iron and timber, as the crane’s beam swung around and dropped its load, and swung back for more. The jangling of chains, a scratching and scraping as of a horde of giant rats. The chatter of the engine and the intolerable pressure on his back almost ceased. One more rending crash. One more back swing of the crane arm. Another creak and crash and the relief was so great he almost fainted.

“We’ve got the beam!” Jaggers Dunn roared. “Easy, now, easy. Hold it! Crawl out, Slade, we’ve got it!”

Slowly, carefully, fearful that there still might be some mistake, El Halcón eased down. Above him the beam hung motionless. He wormed his way to the near unconscious worker, gripped his shoulders and hauled him free. Another moment and he was shuffling backward through choking smoke and blistering heat, dragging the rescued man after him.

Light blazing against his eyes! A gulping draught of sweet, fresh air. Then hands gripping him, hauling him and his burden away from the burning wreckage. Old Jim Dunn peering with anxious eyes.

“You all right?” he choked.

“Fine as frog hair,” Slade replied, smiling wanly. “Was touch and go, though. If you fellows hadn’t rattled your hocks out there I’m afraid we would have both been goners. Give me a hand, will you?”

Dunn’s huge paw lifted him erect and supported him until he was steady on his feet. Others were ministering to the rescued workman who was sore and cut and bruised but apparently had suffered no serious injury. He held up a hand to Slade.

“Much obliged, feller, I won’t forget it,” he croaked. Slade patted him on the shoulder.

A hose line had been hooked up to the locomotive and the fire was being quenched.

“Was afraid to risk it until we got you out, for fear we’d scald you,” Dunn observed to Slade. “Don’t know how the devil it caught. Must have been a spark from the explosion smoldering in there somewhere. Wind fanned it and that grease-smeared mess flared up like a grass fire. Began to look like you’d be cooked as well as squashed. Okay, come on over to the car. I’ve a notion some hot coffee and a bite to eat ought to set well with you about now.”

“First my horse,” Slade said. “Then it’ll go fine.”

Dunn let out a bellow and a man came running, who was properly introduced to Shadow, after which the big black allowed himself to be led to a leanto where other critters were accommodated. First Slade secured his rifle and saddle pouches. Then he and the G.M. made their way to a long, green and gold splendor with WINONA stencilled on the sides, that sat on a nearby siding; General Manager Dunn’s palatial private car.

“You remember Sam, don’t you?” said Dunn as they clambered aboard. “He’s still with me.”

“Quite well,” Slade replied and shook hands with the smiling colored man who met them at the door.

“Fine to have you back with us, Mistuh Walt,” said Sam, and hurried off to prepare a meal.