When he came out, he said, “I think she'll be all right.”
“I'm sure she will,” Owen said thoughtfully, and they turned to the stairs and went back down to the basement.
Arch Deland had just got the boy back in his cell when Will Cushman came into the office on his way home from church. “Well!” the sheriff said, surprised at seeing Toller in the room. “What brings you to Reunion, Owen?”
“To have you swear me in as a deputy. If you still want me for the job.”
Cushman blinked, frankly pleased. “Good! The people of this county will be forever grateful, Owen.”
“There's one condition,” Owen continued. “That boy you have locked up—I want him sworn in with me.”
The sheriff's face grew suddenly red. “That's impossible, Owen! The boy's an outlaw!”
“And a member of the Brunner gang,” Owen finished, “which is why I want him with me. And the girl you have upstairs—I want her released and sent out to my farm to stay until I get back.”
Will Cushman wanted to protest, but his good sense gained the upper hand. Being county sheriff hadn't been exactly pleasant these past few weeks, with all the county officials demanding action and political enemies demanding his scalp. To break up that gang he was ready to do almost anything—except go after them himself.
Uneasily Cushman took out a clean white handkerchief and wiped his face. “All right, Owen,” he said. “Whatever you say. When do you want to be sworn in?”
“This is as good a time as any, I suppose.”
It was midafternoon when they rode out of Reunion— Owen Toller, whose fame and daring lay behind him, and Dunc Lester, whose anger had brought him to manhood before his time. They had county horses and county rigs; a strong but shaggy roan for Owen and a hammer-headed gray for the boy. A big-footed work horse had been fitted out as a pack animal, loaded with grub packs, cooking utensils, blankets, and ammunition.
Arch Deland saddled with them at the county corral and said, “I'll ride a piece with you, Owen, if you don't mind.”
Owen studied his old friend with grim amusement, noting the booted carbine on the deputy's saddle, the saddlebags bulging with odds and ends of clothing and boxes of rim-fire cartridges. “How far do you figure a piece is?” Owen asked, grinning faintly.
Deland shrugged. “Till I get tired, maybe. I figure Will won't miss my services much.”
The camped that night in a hollow between two hills. They fried bacon and warmed canned beans in the fat and ate together out of the iron skillet.
When darkness came down, Dunc Lester said, “We better put out the fire.” Arch and Owen looked at each other, and the old deputy said, “We're still in the foothills, son, a full day's ride to high ground.”
The boy didn't bother to answer, but scooped up handfuls of dirt and smothered the fire, and for the rest of the night they were a little more alone, and the chill of early spring was in the air.
They did not talk much after the fire had been put out. Before that time Dunc had told them a little of what had happened; about the home place, and old Mort Stringer, but he never mentioned the girl. After the fire was out they did not speak of Ike Brunner and the gang, but each of them would look, from time to time, at those dark hills ahead of them. They knew how news traveled in this country. Before long Ike Brunner would know all about them, these three volunteers who had set out from Reunion to bring in the leader of the gang.
Maybe, Owen Toller thought, the three of us will have a chance. The longer he thought about it, the more certain he was that three was the right number. One more would have been too many, but three men could travel almost as quickly and quietly as one, provided all of them were familiar with the country, as they were.
Resting against his saddle, Owen smiled faintly at the darkness. The bitter humor of the situation occurred to him, and he thought, We are the volunteers. A wild young outlaw, a farmer, an aged deputy. Out of all the people in this county, it finally boiled down to just the three of us.
But soon his mind took another turn and he realized that the word “volunteer” hardly applied to any of them. Be truthful, he warned himself; look at yourself and the others. And now he saw himself and Dunc and Arch in a truer perspective, and he understood that none of them had entered this thing for unselfish reasons. No, he thought quietly, we have our reasons. Our own battles to fight.
Dunc Lester had the girl, he himself had his anger, and Arch Deland had his memories. To the old deputy civilization was a cage with no doors. Statehood had brought the end of an era; it had cut off the purpose in Arch Deland's life, which, in a way, was worse than dying. It had left an old man with nothing to do and, except for his memories, empty.
Now it seemed strange to Owen that he had not detected this lack of purpose and emptiness in his old friend.
Owen himself had felt it at times, but in Elizabeth and the children he had found something else to take the place of the life he had left behind. Something finer and better than anything he had known before.
For the first time in his life, Owen experienced pangs of pity for his friend, for he understood now that Arch had volunteered because he sought to return to the past, where he had been a man of consequence.
And what about myself? Owen asked silently. Certainly I am no hero. The very thought made him uncomfortable. But why did I leave my family to undertake a fool thing like this, anyway?
He was not searching for the past, like Arch Deland, for he held the future in his hands. And he was no wild hill boy bursting with hate and fear and the love of a girl, like Dunc Lester. But he had come.
Owen pondered this slowly. He hated like death to admit that Ben McKeever and all the others had defeated him and brought him to heel, but perhaps that was the answer after all.
Chapter Ten
After a hard climb they reached a crest known as Hogback the next afternoon. Dunc Lester had guided them around the scattered hill-country farms, through heavy timber, along rocky trails that could hardly be seen a few feet away. Owen and Deland were not strangers to this country. As a haven for outlaws, the Cooksons ranked second only to the western wastelands of the Panhandle, and as U.S. deputies they had ridden this high wilderness often. Still, they did not know the land as Dunc Lester did, and Owen was grateful that the boy had come.
Now the three of them paused in a small clearing to blow the horses, and Dunc got down and walked stiffly to the far edge of the ridge, and there was bleakness in his eyes as he stood there, gazing hard at the land below.
Arch brought the pack horse up to graze, and Owen got down and loosened the cinch on his roan. The two men looked at each other, then at the boy.
“What is it?” Owen called.
“Maybe you'd like to see.”
When Owen and Arch reached the place where the boy stood, they saw below them a small blackened clearing and the charred remains of a cabin and a few outbuildings.
“What is it?” Deland asked.
“Nothin' now. It used to be our home place.”