Tyree looked around and found a tin cup that had escaped the flames. He walked to the creek, rinsed out the cup, then filled it with water. When he got back he held the old man’s head and put the water to his lips.
Boyd drank a few sips, then nodded. “That was good, Chance. Real good.” He swallowed hard. “They burned my fiddle, boy. Burned the old cabin where Lorena grew up and my fiddle with it. Now why would they do a thing like that to a man? Tell me why, Chance?”
Tyree shook his head. “I don’t know, Luke. I only know evil exists and it’s continually at war with all of God’s creation. Maybe someday a preacher will tell me the why of it.”
Tyree gently laid Boyd’s head back on the ground. “The man with two guns. Was his name Luther Darcy?”
“I seem to recollect that’s what they called him. Of course, I’d heard the name before. He’s a bad one, Chance. As bad as they come.”
“Recognize any of the others?”
Boyd shook his head. “No. It all happened so fast, I didn’t get a good look at any of them.”
“Think, Luke,” Tyree said. “Was Quirt Laytham with them?”
“Didn’t see him, Chance. I don’t think Quirt had a hand in this.”
Tyree let that go. “Luke, I’ve got to get you to a doctor.”
“Too late for that, boy,” the old man said. His fevered eyes sought Tyree’s in the gloom. “Listen, Chance, I’ve been lying here thinking and it’s good you came along when you did. When I’m gone, I want you to have this place. I’m giving it to you. I once thought Lorena would live on here, but that ain’t likely now she’s getting hitched to Quirt Laytham.” Boyd reached up a smoke-blackened hand and clutched the front of Tyree’s shirt. “Ranch this place and make a go of it, son,” he said. “I think them who burned me out want to have it for themselves, but don’t let them. Hang on to it, Chance, fight for it if you must, and don’t let anybody take it from you.”
Tyree smiled and shook his head. “Luke, this will be Lorena’s ranch. She’s your daughter and it’s hers by right.”
“No, Chance. Lorena will have all of Quirt’s lands and cattle. She doesn’t need this place, but you do.” The old rancher took a couple of tortured, shuddering breaths as waves of pain swept over him. “In the cabin. Look for it now. A steel box. The flames won’t have touched it.” Boyd saw Tyree’s hesitation and said, “Go, boy, get it now.”
Tyree walked into the smoking cabin and after a few minutes searching found a large metal box. The steel was scorched and blackened, but the box itself was intact. He carried it out to Boyd and the old man said, “Open it.”
Tyree opened the box and took out the items one by one, a deed to Boyd’s ranch, a couple of double eagles and a gold medal on a colored ribbon.
The rancher smiled. “I was given that by old General Winfield Scott after the battle of Contreras in the Mexican war. I’d been with him since Vera Cruz and stood at his side when he took the Mexican surrender at Mexico City on September fourteenth, eighteen and forty-seven.” Boyd looked up at Tyree, shaking his head. “Hell, it seems like just yesterday, but it was sure a long time ago.”
Boyd’s hand reached to his shirt pocket and took out a stub of pencil. “Bring that deed close to me, Chance. I’m signing this ranch over to you.”
“Luke, I don’t think—”
“Don’t argue, boy. I was thinking of doing this for a spell and not just tonight. In fact right after you met that pretty Sally gal. You two will make this a proper ranch, and you’ll have children to bring life to the place.” Boyd scribbled on the deed, and handed it back to Tyree. “There, it’s done. I’ve signed the ranch over to you and it’s yours.”
Again Tyree opened his mouth to object, but Boyd waved a hand and hushed him into silence. “Now, boy, there’s something you can do for me,” he said. “Chance,” he whispered, his voice hoarse with pain, “I’m burned away from the waist down. Nothing left of my legs but ash. I’m in so much pain I can hardly stand it and it’s getting worse by the minute. There’s no hope for me, but I don’t want to linger like this. I wouldn’t allow an animal to suffer like I’m suffering right now.”
Boyd again clutched Tyree’s shirt. “Make it a clean shot, son.” His pleading eyes sought those of Tyree’s in the darkness. “Do this much for me, boy. Help an old man.”
Tyree eased a fallen timber off Boyd’s legs and he was shocked by what he saw. Luke was right—both his limbs were incinerated, burned to a mass of blackened, melted flesh, spikes of white bone showing here and there. Luke Boyd must have been in agony, and so far only the old rancher’s stubborn courage had prevented him from screaming.
The terrible sight of Boyd’s legs made Tyree’s decision for him. He turned the old man’s head in the direction of the western sky where a million stars shimmered. “Watch the stars, Luke,” he said. “Watch the stars and remember your life. Remember how it was, every single moment of it.”
The old man nodded and the night sky was reflected in his eyes. His face settled into repose, smiling, a man at peace with himself and his death.
Tyree thumbed back the hammer of his Colt. “Remember how it was, Luke,” he whispered. “Remember how it was, my friend.” The sound of a gunshot echoed loud through the canyons, then faded away like the beat of a distant drum.
Tyree laid Luke Boyd to rest at the base of the mesa. He dug the grave deep, and when the old man was covered with earth, he piled the spot high with talus rocks so that it would be seen and be safe from animals. Then he fashioned a cross from a couple of the burned timbers from the cabin and set it up among the rocks.
Hat in hand, Tyree stood at the graveside for long hours as the moon dropped in the sky and a deeper darkness fell around him. The coyotes sang Luke’s lonely funeral dirge while the breeze sighed and whispered a eulogy to the listening night.
When the dawn came, Chance Tyree finally turned away from the grave and allowed his grief to be replaced with a savage anger.
He looked up at the brightening sky, his face a mask of pain and hate, and made a vow . . . to visit a hundred different kinds of hell on the canyon country.
Chapter 20
Tyree searched among the ruins of the cabin and found several cans of food. The labels were burned away and he had no idea what the cans contained. But he was lucky. There were beans in the first can he opened, peaches in the second, the contents of both scorched but edible.
He ate hastily, then swung into the saddle. His first task was to rescue Sally. No matter the odds, he was determined to free the girl and bring her back here—home to his ranch.
Tyree rode through the remainder of the night, chasing the dawn, and the morning sun was just beginning its climb into the sky when he rode into Crooked Creek and reined up outside the Regal Hotel. A few people were walking briskly along the boardwalks and several cow ponies stood three-legged at the hitching rail of the restaurant, but at this early hour the town was quiet.
Tyree stepped out of the saddle, yanked his Winchester from the scabbard and levered a round into the chamber. He jumped onto the boardwalk and slammed through the hotel door. The clerk at the desk—a small, round man wearing an eyeshade, muttonchop whiskers bookending a cherubic face—looked up from the ledger he’d been studying, his eyes alarmed.
Giving the man no chance to talk, Tyree snapped, “Sally Brennan’s room?”
“Top floor, number twenty-six,” the clerk answered. “But, hey, you’ve got no right to—”
Tyree didn’t wait to hear the rest. He was already taking the stairs two at a time.
At the end of the hallway, a couple of men with deputy’s stars pinned to their shirts, shotguns in their laps, were sitting on chairs outside the door. One was Len Dawson, the other a tall, sour looking man Tyree didn’t know. The two immediately sprang to their feet, and Dawson shouted, “Tyree! What the hell are you doing here?”