“We'll make it,” Owen rasped.
They lay quiet, soothed by the sound of running water. Finally they staggered to the bank of a narrow stream and drank their fill of cold, iron-tasting water. Owen filled his hat and took it back to the stretcher, where he dribbled a few drops between the deputy's cracked lips and bathed his hot face.
Dunc Lester watched dispassionately. He had liked Arch Deland, but the old man was as good as dead. It seemed a criminal waste of time and effort to use yourself up on a dead man.
But Owen closed his eyes and senses to the things that Dunc Lester saw and knew. The skin of Deland's face had gone yellow, as dry as parchment. The eyes were glazed, the breathing shallow, the heart fluttery.
Owen would not see these things. Arch, he told himself,had escaped death a thousand times, and he would escape it this time. He would not consider the enormous odds against them; he had to believe that Deland would pull through once they got him to a place where he could be cared for. And that was what he believed.
Owen took hold of his end of the stretcher. “You ready, son?”
Dunc shook his head, not in a negative response, but in bewilderment at the marshal's unreasoning singleness of purpose. And yet it was that very thing about the marshal that made Dunc believe that there was a bare chance that they might come out of this alive. He abandoned the hope of bringing in Ike Brunner. All he wanted now was escape, and he knew that he must depend on Owen Toller's strength for that. Slowly he bent down, took the bloody stretcher poles in his raw hands, and lifted.
It was midafternoon when they finally sighted the Cooper cabin. They eased the stretcher to the ground and Dunc said, “Maybe I'd better go on ahead and see how things stand.”
Owen nodded, then sat beside the stretcher and fanned the flies and insects away from Deland's masklike face. He thought, It's almost over, Arch. Soon we'll have you fixed up with a bed and some food and maybe even some white hill whisky. He deliberately ignored any possibility that Ike Brunner might disrupt his plans.
He watched Dunc Lester walk unsteadily down the long green slope. The cabin, a sturdy boxlike structure of logs and mud, was set in a lush draw between two hills. Behind the cabin there was an outhouse, a stockade shed, and perhaps five acres of broken land. Tender shoots of corn and green tobacco grew out of the reddish earth, but Owen noticed that the young crop had grown up in weeds and that the shed was empty. There was no sign of livestock of any kind, and the only show of life was a ribbon of wood smoke curling up from the mud chimney.
Dunc disappeared around the back of the cabin and several minutes passed. Then two men appeared in the yard and began the climb up the long slope. One man was thick and heavy, his work-rounded shoulders hunched powerfully as he plodded forward. The other was loose-jointed and gangly, and he walked with the spring of youth, on the balls of his feet. Both men carried long-barreled shotguns in the crooks of their arms. They walked directly to the stretcher, and there was caution and distrust in their eyes as they looked first at Owen and then at the unconscious deputy. The younger man rested the stock of his shotgun on the ground and shook his head. “He sure looks like a goner to me.”
The older man had his thoughtful eyes fixed on Owen. “Young Lester claims you're a marshal from Reunion.” It was more an accusation than a statement.
“Just a deputy,” Owen said heavily. “My friend here has been hurt. Could we put him up at your cabin for a while?”
“You got Ike Brunner's bunch after you?”
Owen saw that lying would not help. He nodded. “Yes, I guess we have.”
“Then we can't help you,” the man said shortly. “Nobody can.” He looked tired; there were deep lines of weariness around his eyes and around his mouth. “You can't fight Ike Brunner. I know.”
“I'll fight him,” Owen said flatly, rising to his feet, “When the time comes.”
Surprisingly, the man laughed. “It looks like you haven't had much luck so far.” Suddenly the laughter went out of him and grimness took its place. “My name's Harve Cooper, and this here's my boy, Morris. We haven't got much use for outsiders, Marshal... but then, we're not exactly friends of Ike Brunner's, either. So I guess you can use the cabin if you want to. Me and my boy won't be here much longer, anyway.”
With a physical effort Owen pulled himself out of his exhaustion and studied the faces before him. In their eyes he saw suspicion and anger and fear. “Do you mean,” Owen asked slowly, “that Ike is forcing you out of the hills?”
“Mister,” Morris Cooper said, “when Ike Brunner tells you to do somethin', you do it.”
What surprised Owen was the tone of pride in the young man's voice. Although he hated Ike Brunner, he received satisfaction in the knowledge that the gang leader could not be taken by an outsider.
“That's enough talk,” Harve Cooper said sharply to his son. “Give me a hand with the stretcher.”
The two Coopers placed their shotguns across Arch Deland's chest, took up the stretcher, and began a slow, steady march toward the cabin. Owen did not offer to help; he felt that the last of his strength had slipped away from him, and he followed behind, stumbling like a drunken man.
When they reached the cabin yard, Owen became aware of the rank, sourish odor of a whisky still off in the trees somewhere, and then he saw how the place had been stripped of everything that could be moved. All the rugged, hand-hewn furniture had been moved out of the cabin, along with clothing and bedding, cooking pots, and a conglomeration of plows and tintype pictures and hand-loomed rugs, all the things that a family gathers over a period of years. Everything was stacked outside now and the cabin was bare.
The two Coopers took Deland into the cabin and put him down in front of the fireplace, where Dunc Lester was waiting. “I reckon the rest is up to you, Marshal,” Harve Cooper said, and he and his son walked out to the yard. “He doesn't look much better,” Dunc Lester said, kneeling beside the stretcher.
“At least he can rest,” Owen said heavily. But he knew that would not be enough. At last reality began closing in around him and he felt his own helplessness. “If we only had a horse, maybe I could get Doc Linnwood in Reunion.”
“If we had a horse, and if Ike Brunner would let you through, and if Deland wasn't goin' to die before sundown anyway, maybe we'd have a chance,” Dunc said, facing the cruel wall of facts.
“How can you be so sure he'll die?” Owen demanded angrily.
“I've seen the look before. There's nothin' we can do.” Then Harve Cooper came through the doorway carrying a red chunk of venison haunch and an iron pot half filled with water. “I had this meat ripenin' in the woods,” he said, “but I guess I won't be needin' it now.”
“Thanks,” Owen said. “A strong broth is what Arch needs; that will snap him out of it.”
Cooper hung the pot on a hook in the fireplace. He glanced briefly at Deland, shrugged, and walked out again. “I've been thinkin',” Dunc said quietly. “I had a little talk with Morris Cooper and he told me how things were here. Remember Manley Cooper's place, the one that was burned out? Well, it seems like Ike tried to bring Manley in with the gang, seein' as he lived so close to their hide-out. But Manley wouldn't listen.”