Rawhide

Incident of the Sterling Fox

Chapter 9

Amy Jackson had just let Carl Gleason and the Holt brothers in from the rain, when they all heard a commotion near the barn. She hurried to the parlor window to look outside. She squinted, trying to see through the heavy rain that now poured down from the rumbling sky. "I can't see a thing out there!" She turned to Gleason.

"It'd better not be a posse 'cause if it is-" Bryan Holt said threateningly. He patted his holster and gave Gleason, and a very frightened, Amy, a menacing glare.

The house seemed to shake from the thunder outside. The area near the barn lit up for a moment but the rain pounding against the window proved it impossible to detect what might be lurking outside. A terrified neigh and a man yelling urgently, caused all heads to turn towards the sound.

"I'll go check it out. Stay here, Amy" Gleason grabbed his hat and opened the front door.

"Be careful, Carl!" Amy called, her voice tight with anxiety.

The door shut with a resounding thud and she hurried to open it again. She peered through the inky blackness and tried to see Gleason. Lightning cracked and the yard flooded with light for a moment. She glimpsed Gleason bending over something or someone.

"Hey, Amy!" He shouted.

"Yeah?"

"Tell one of them Holt's to come out here and give me a hand!"

Amy turned to the Holt brothers who were standing behind her in the doorway. She opened her mouth to relay the message but the oldest brother silenced her with a raised hand, signaling for her to not say anything. "I heard 'im." He said curtly.

"Ya think it's a trick, Bryan?" the whiny voiced Seth asked.

"Maybe there's a posse out there. Maybe we're surrounded! Maybe this Gleason's a traitor! Maybe-" Cameron was interrupted by Bryan.

"Shut up, little brother." He snapped.

Just then, Gleason's voice called out from the yard again. "Hurry! Got a sick man out here!"

Outside, Carl Gleason kneeled over the young man. "It's alright. You're gonna be alright. What's your name? What happened out here?"

"Name's Rowdy Yates. My…my horse…she bolted." The young man managed to whisper, his teeth chattering from the chills. Gleason looked around. There was no sign of the horse he spoke of.

"I don't see your horse nowhere around. Must've run off." He held the young man's head off the muddy ground. Then he noticed the bandage. Shock bolted through him and he placed his hand on the stranger's left shoulder. Underneath the soaked and muddy shirt he felt a lumpy bandage. Realization hit him as he recognized the young man's face and he realized that this was the drover who had been at the post office when the bank had been robbed. I sure hope those Holt's don't recognize him. Gleason thought anxiously. He knew if they did, the drover wouldn't stand a chance.

Seth Holt trotted out into the rain, bundled tightly in a slicker, toward Gleason and the man lying on the ground. Together they carried, a shaking, feverish Rowdy into the parlor and laid him on the sofa.

Once they had the drover settled on the sofa in front of the fireplace, Amy hovered to and fro gathering a few blankets from the bedroom. She laid them on the sick stranger and went to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee.

By now all three Holt brothers and Carl Gleason were standing before the fire around the sofa and their visitor, who had passed out. Cameron was the first to speak, "Who do ya think it is? Ya think maybe he's runnin' from the law? Look at his head all bandaged up like that. Wonder what he was doin' out here." He said it all in one breath.

Bryan scrutinized the drover, suspiciously. "I don't rightly know, little brother, but I don't like it. Don't like it at all. He might be with a posse lookin' for us, for all we know."

"He said his name is Rowdy Yates." Gleason spoke up. When the brothers looked at him with surprised expressions, he added, "He told me before he passed out." He shrugged.

"We need to find out just who he is and what he's doin' here."

Bryan bent close to Rowdy's face and began patting his cheek lightly. "Come on, boy. Hey, you! Wake up."

Rowdy groaned and slowly opened his eyes. It took him a moment before he remembered what had happened. He studied the men before him. The man who had woke him, was gruff-looking and had a scowl on a face that was badly in need of a shave. Rowdy coughed hoarsely, and a girl appeared beside the sofa with a steaming cup of coffee. "Here, drink this, you'll feel better." She coaxed him to take it in her soft southern accent.

"Thank you, ma'am. I'm much obliged." His hands shook as he reached for the mug and took a swallow of the warm liquid. He sighed with relief as it warmed his cold, aching body. "My horse spooked at a rabbit then the lighting started up and she just bolted right out from under me. I'm sorry to inconvenience you like this." Rowdy looked up apologetically at her.

She smiled. "It's no inconvenience at all. I don't get visitors out here often. What's your name?"

The coffee cup warmed Rowdy's hands as he answered. "Rowdy Yates. I'm the ramrod of a cattle drive about 9 miles or so southwest of here." He motioned the direction with a wave of his arm. He winced. He'd forgotten about not using his injured arm. The girl seemed not to notice.

"I'm Amy Jackson and these are my, uh-" She stammered.

The man, with the kinder face, standing next to her finished her sentence. "Brothers. I'm Carl, and this is Bryan, Seth, and Cameron." He pointed at the three other men while saying their names. The one with the scowl on his face was Bryan. Seth had blonde curly hair whereas Cameron had brown curly hair. Both of their eyes were hazel. Cameron was short, and had a sardonic expression on his round face. Seth had a thin, wiry frame and reminded Rowdy of a scared rabbit. Something about the four men seemed vaguely familiar.

After a round of greetings, Bryan stepped forward. "What were you doin' out in that storm? And so far from your herd?"

"Well, my horse was stolen from me yesterday and I went lookin' for him." Rowdy glanced down at his cup of coffee for a moment. He decided to leave out the part about him sneaking off without the trail boss's permission. "I didn't know the storm was comin'."

Bryan seemed satisfied for the moment and settled down on the other end of the sofa. There was something strange about the way the three of the men studied Rowdy that made him uneasy.

Cameron pulled a wooden chair closer to Rowdy and sat down. "What's this horse o' yours look like?"

Rowdy took another gulp of coffee. "Well, his name is Fox. He's a sort of a fox color, and he's got a white blaze and three white socks. I was mailing some letters when he was stolen in town. When the bank was robbed." Then for no apparent reason, Cameron's eyes bugged, Amy's hand flew to her mouth, Seth who had been leaning against the hearth almost fell over, and Bryan's head popped up with a very upset expression on his face. Rowdy looked at them confusedly. Gleason seemed to be the only one who wasn't shocked; The man just calmly surveyed the scene with Rowdy.

Gleason then looked back to Rowdy. "Is that right? Well, I hope you find him. I lost a horse once. Good horse, too. She was my pard for bout a year and a half. She went missin' from the livery one night without a trace bout a year ago, I guess it was. Beautiful palomino, she was. I called her Sunbeam. Sunny for short."

"I'm sorry."

Gleason sighed and scuffed one of his boots against the dark hardwood floor. "No need for that. Can't change the past and I've learned to live without her." But the almost imperceptible tremor in his voice said otherwise. An uncomfortable silence settled on the ranch house.

Rowdy shifted uneasily on the sofa. His chills were gone; having been warmed by the blankets, which now lay folded beside him, and the hot coffee. But there was a strange tension that seemed to hang in the air. Trying to lighten the mood, Rowdy smiled at Amy and tried to make conversation; but the girl seemed distressed and spoke stiffly. Suddenly, upon studying their faces more closely, Rowdy realized where he had seen the four men. He sucked in his breath sharply. "You're the guys who robbed the bank!" Rowdy blurted out. Amy stood stock-still her eyes widening in fear.

He regretted his realization the instant Bryan, sitting beside him, pulled out his gun. The gun's hammer clicked back and Rowdy gulped. "Now wait just a minute here." It was Carl Gleason who had spoken.

Bryan turned on Gleason. "Whaddya mean 'wait'? Yates here knows who we are. And we can't let him go runnin' to the law." Bryan sneered and grinned wickedly at Rowdy. Then he made the mistake of briefly turning his attention back to Gleason.

Rowdy made a grab for the gun causing both he and Bryan to fall onto the floor. Rowdy squeezed Bryan's wrist, trying his best to make the outlaw drop the gun. A shot rang out from the gun and Amy screamed. Bryan's knee came up and the air whooshed out of the ramrod's lungs. Suddenly, Yates found himself on his back but not for long. Again, the two rolled. Rowdy almost had the gun now. "Seth! Cameron! Gleason, someone give me a hand!" Bryan yelled angrily at his two brothers and the man near Amy. Just as the gun was about to leave the outlaw's viselike grip, Rowdy felt himself being jerked roughly to his feet and off of Bryan. Panting and with a wicked gleam in his eyes, Bryan grit his teeth and glared at Rowdy; he pulled out his gun and aimed. "I'll teach you to mess with me, you little-" Rowdy felt one of the brother's grip loosen slightly on his arm. In a flash, his fist swung out and made contact with Bryan's jaw. Then everything went black.