The Law of the Trigger

Chapter Three

The tall wooded hills of the old Cherokee Nation stood silent and green in the early morning. The rugged peaks seemed to stretch and expand, growing wilder and more formidable in the brilliant clean light of the new day. Slowly the sound of hoofs faded in and overrode the silence of the hills, and from the south a rider appeared flogging a barrel-chested little bay over an old Indian trace, pounding relentlessly toward the higher ground.

The rider's name was Dunc Lester, and he had come a long way. He had been as far south as the Canadian, had glimpsed the Arkansas border on the east, had spread the word as far north as the Verdigris. A lanky, big-boned boy in his late teens, he wore the clothing of the hill country: big overalls, flannel shirt, and heavy, thick-soled shoes. An ancient Colt's .44, converted to use modern brass-cased ammunition, was strapped around his waist. A twelve-gauge shotgun was slung in a makeshift boot by his left knee.

Indian-like, Dunc rode with blithe disregard for his mount, putting the lathered animal up the hard incline at full gallop. Suddenly, from the great emptiness of the hills, a rifle barked sharply. The slug screamed over Dunc's head and he hauled hard on the reins, bringing the bay to a rearing stop. Quickly he cupped one hand to his mouth and sounded the mournful, sobbing bark of a coyote. Then he kicked the faltering bay and moved on, carefully.

Far above Dunc a man appeared on a limestone outcropping near the crest of the hill. He cradled a repeating Winchester in the crook of his arm and grinned as the rider came toward him.

“Goddamn it, Gabe!” Dunc Lester cried. “What're you tryin' to do, kill me?”

Gabe Tanis, a dish-faced, round-shouldered man in his early forties, shrugged off the boy's anger. “You know what Ike said. Nobody gets through this pass without he gives the signal.”

Dunc appeared disgusted. His family and the Tanises had farmed side by side almost as long as he could remember, and Gabe knew him like a brother. “Damn it, Gabe, have your eyes give out on you? Couldn't you see it was me?”

“Sure,” Tanis said mildly.

“Then why,” Dunc demanded, “did you try to burn the hair off my head with that rifle? You mad at me or somethin'?”

“Nope,” Gabe drawled. “But you know when Ike or Cal says something...”

“All right!” Dunc groaned. A man who rode with the Brunners accepted the brothers' word as absolute law, and Dunc knew that he should have given the signal.

Gabe bit off a piece of twist tobacco and chewed thoughtfully. “You get over toward Talequah?” he asked finally.

Dunc began to cool off. He figured he might as well rest a minute and let the horse blow. “Not all the way,” he said. “But I've been to a hell of a bunch of places. I don't reckon the Brunners've changed their minds about robbin' the freight company, have they?”

“They ain't said nothing about it if they have.”

“Well,” Dunc said, “I guess they know what they're doin'. Spring of the year seems like a bad time to get the gang together, though. Johnson grass will take the crops before the boys can get back to the fields.”

Gabe shrugged. He didn't care much whether Johnson grass got the crops or not. He seemed to ponder something for a moment. “Did you go past the home place?” he asked finally.

“Came past there yesterday,” Dunc said. “Everybody's fine. Your wife was down with the croup last week, but she's up now.”

“Sarah Sue's tough,” Gabe said with faint pride. “Always was. How many of the boys you expect will be in on the freight-company raid?”

“Plenty.” Dunc decided that he was ready to travel again. Ike and Cal would be waiting to hear from him. He nodded to Gabe and kicked the bay back on the trace. As he was pulling out, he called over his shoulder. “And try not to kill anybody, will you? In case somebody forgets the signal!”

There were two more outposts between Gabe's position and Ulster's Cave. Dunc was careful to stop each time and give the signal. Now he was moving into the wildest section of the hills, where there wasn't even an Indian trace to follow. This was a country of tall pine and spruce, of dangerous limestone overhangs and rocky peaks, of old deer trails that twisted crazily through the woods and led nowhere. In these woods a man could get lost before he knew what had happened; in this forest every tree looked like the next one, every hill had an identical twin. Horses became confused, and even Indians lost their way.

But Dunc Lester had lived most of his life in this hill country of eastern Oklahoma and he knew it well. His folks had moved here when it had been Cherokee country, and they hadn't asked the Cherokees about it, either. He had never learned to read, and he couldn't even sign his name, but he knew better than to let a deer trail throw him off in these hills.

Once his pa had taken him to Talequah, but Dunc couldn't say that he cared much for town life. He remembered vaguely that Talequah had been the capital of the old Cherokee Nation, and he had heard that over to the west somewhere there was a place called Tulsa, and south of that another place called Oklahoma City. He neither wanted nor expected ever to see those places. He had heard that a town called Reunion was the county seat for this part of the country, but about all he knew about Reunion was the bunch of county law dogs they'd chased out of the hills three weeks ago.

Thinking of that episode, Dunc grinned widely. Townspeople were soft. He guessed he'd never forget the way that bunch of deputies had stuck their tails between their legs and lit out for the bottomland. He guessed they wouldn't be bothered any more with the law dogs.

After giving the third and last signal, Dunc was almost within sight of Ulster's Cave. You had to get pretty close before you could see it at all, for it was more of a wide overhanging shelf than a cave. Sort of like one big room that you could drive a dozen or more wagons into, with a roof of stone and three walls of red clay dirt. The way it was grown up in brush and scrub spruce, it was just about impossible to see it at all.

The last sentry, a short, potbellied little man named Dove Wakeley, waved to him. “You have a good trip, Dunc?”

“Good enough, I guess,” Dunc called. “Passed your home place yesterday. The folks are doin' fine.”

Dove nodded and grinned, and Dunc rode on out of sight along the narrow hill trail. Now he could see the cave, and the big iron wash kettle simmering with venison stew near the entrance, and the half-dozen horses grazing along the steep slope. Four men drifted out of the cave's dark interior, exchanged greetings with Dunc, and received news of their families.

The few men at the cave were Brunner regulars. Most of them had got in trouble with lowland law—mostly over property rights with the Indians—and the cave was a handy place to hide out in. A good many of these men had lost the land they had settled when the Nation had been cut up into personal allotments. These were the bitter men, and it was no good explaining to them that the land had never been theirs legally; all they knew was that they had been robbed of land that they had cleared and worked and claimed as their own.

As Dunc swung down from the saddle, Ike Brunner and his younger brother, Cal, came out of the cave.

“How was it down south?” Ike asked.

“All right,” Dunc said. “Abel Westrum cut his foot with an ax last week and can't ride. Bus Finnley is down with the slow fever. All the others'll be here this time tomorrow.”

“Wes Longstreet got in yesterday, from the north,” Cal Brunner said. He looked at his brother. “Maybe we better make out a list of the ones we can count on.”

Dunc and the two brothers hunkered down by the cave's entrance. Ike took up a stick, smoothed a place on the ground, and scratched the names down as Dunc called them out.

Ike, the older of the two Brunners, was a tall, long-faced man in his late thirties. If he had ever smiled, Dunc Lester had not seen it. Dunc guessed that Ike Brunner was the smartest man he'd ever seen, and without Ike the gang would be nothing. Still, not many of the boys liked him. He was unfeeling, cold, and deadly.

Cal Brunner was several years younger than his brother. Where Ike was feared, Cal was liked. A brash, good-looking kid, Cal Brunner was as quick to laugh as he was to fight; he loved corn liquor and country dances and girls. But he took orders from his brother like everybody else.

To some, Dunc guessed, this would seem like a pretty strange situation: thirty to fifty fiercely independent hill boys taking orders from a man they didn't like. That was because outsiders could not understand what debts these people owed Ike Brunner. Dunc thought of Dove Wakeley. When Dove's woman was down with scarlet fever and seemed sure to die, Ike Brunner hauled a doctor all the way from Talequah, kicking and yelling blue murder. And Ike put his pistol to the doctor's head and told him by God if he let the woman die he'd blow his brains right through the roof.

Dove's woman got well. Some people said it was an act of God, but Wakeley figured Ike Brunner had had a hand in it too, and he had been one of the regulars ever since. And there was Gabe Tanis. Gabe's cabin and sheds had burned to the ground one night. Everything he owned went up in fire and smoke. Of course the neighbors pitched in and helped rebuild, but only Ike Brunner would have thought of bringing him a new team of work mules. Where the mules had come from Gabe didn't know, and he cared less; he just knew that he had the best team in the hills, thanks to Ike Brunner.

Dunc himself was deeply in debt to Ike. During the big dry-up two years ago, the home place hadn't grown enough to half feed the big Lester family. Ike had brought shelled corn and flour to see them through the winter and early spring. When Dunc heard later that the Brunners were in trouble with the lowland law, he was among the first to help out.

Ike was a tough one to figure, Dunc decided. A lot of hill families would have gone without food during that dry-up if it hadn't been for the Brunner wagon-train raids. A lot of the womenfolks would still be wearing feed-sack dresses if it weren't for the bolt goods that Ike and Cal took off the mule skinners. And without Brunner money gifts, many of the hill farms would have been lost.

It was a funny thing. How could a man be so open-handed and big-hearted one day and turn killer the next?

Ponderously, Dunc moved the thought around in his mind. Not that it bothered him particularly. The raid on the freight company would bring in all kinds of things that the hill families needed: food, clothing, maybe even some shoes. Once there had been a wagon load of illegal whisky, and again a shipment of farm implements. Through some curious mental process Dunc had stopped thinking of these raids as stealing. Ike claimed that they were doing the fair thing, taking from the rich and giving to the poor. And Ike was always right.

Now Ike Brunner was staring thoughtfully at the ground, studying the list that he had scratched down in the dirt.

“Fifteen from the south,” he said. “Ten at least from the north. That ought to give us thirty men to hit the freight depot with.”

“Hell, we could take Reunion with that many men!” Cal Brunner said.

Ike fixed his cool gray eyes on his brother. “Reunion might be easier to take than that depot. Don't think they haven't heard of us down there, and don't think they won't have the place guarded.”

Then Ike turned his expressionless gaze on Dunc. “You better fill up on grub and get some rest,” he said. “Tomorrow you won't get much of either.”

The two brothers watched Dunc strip the bay and put the animal out to graze. Then they stood up and walked casually away from the cave. Cal shook his head, grinning. “I've got to hand it to you, Ike. The Doolins would still be operating if they had a gang like ours.”

“The Doolins were stupid,” Ike said flatly. “They tried to hold their gang together by dividing equally. These farmers wouldn't know an equal division if they got one; it would just make them hungry for more.”

Cal laughed. “So you don't give them anything!”

“Sure I give them something,” Ike said, looking hurt. “A bolt of cloth, some pots and pans, a plow. Maybe a bottle of whisky now and then. More important, I nurse their babies, get doctors for their wives, steal work mules for their farms. Those are the things that make them loyal to me, not money.”

Well away from the cave, they passed under a tall pine, and Cal's face was suddenly serious. “The trick, is tokeep them loyal, Ike. I get closer to the men than you do, I get to know what they're thinkin'. They don't like the way you've been usin' your pistol.”

Ike's long face grew hard. “Who said it?” he asked.

“I don't know. Maybe nobody; but they're thinkin' it.”

“You're gettin' to be an old woman, Cal. Just let me do the thinkin'.”

Cal shrugged. “Don't say I didn't warn you.”

He started to walk back toward the cave, but Ike called to him. “Just a minute, Cal. Where did you go last night?”

“Why, nowhere, Ike. I was right there at the cave.”

“That's a lie,” Ike said coldly. “I saw you get up and sneak out, and I heard your horse beat tracks to the south. Couldn't be you was sniffin' around Mort Stringer's girl again, could it?”

Cal was visibly shaken by his brother's anger. He started backing off as Ike came toward him, then Ike's hand shot out and grabbed his young brother's arm in a grip of iron. “I warned you to stay away from that girl,” Ike said between his teeth. “You know how Mort Stringer feels about his daughter.”

They stood there for one long moment, Cal's face pale, his brother's face red with anger. Gradually Ike released his hold on his brother's arm. “I've made too many plans, Cal,” he said tightly, “to have them kicked over by the likes of you. These hill people may not like me, but they respect me. And that's the way I'm goin' to keep it. So you fool around with somebody else's girl, but not Mort Stringer's. Understand?”

“Sure, Ike!” Cal nodded eagerly. “I understand!”

“You'd better. And just in case you ever forget this talk... don't say I didn't warn you.”

After the younger brother had beaten a quick retreat back to the cave, Ike Brunner hunkered down beneath the pine, scowling. He didn't like jumping on Cal, but the young hothead stood to ruin every plan he had made. Mort Stringer was a powerful man in these hills, a preacher of sorts who officiated at weddings and funerals. Ike had wisely stayed away from the man, had made every effort not to antagonize him, for he knew what power these backwoods preachers held over the people.

Well, he thought hopefully, maybe I've knocked some sense into Cal's head before it's too late.

Early the next morning the Brunner followers began gathering at Ulster's Cave. They were grim men, many of them, old with work and hopeless in this dawn of a new age that they could not understand. They came heavy with guns: shotguns and rifles and pistols, and here and there a muzzle-loading musket. They came with outraged stories of government men breaking up their stills, and of the court actions being taken against them by the Indians. They were angry men when they arrived at Ulster's Cave, and Ike Brunner was pleased.

Cal Brunner moved among them and came back to his brother, grinning. “They sure look loaded for bear!”

“That's the way I want them,” Ike said. Then he walked out and addressed the men in front of the cave.

“Men,” he said, “I know what kind of a raw deal you've been gettin'. Us hillfolks was peace-lovin' people before outsiders began comin' in and started to ruin things. Now the Indians are gettin' uppity, thinkin' they're as good as white people. And do you know who's to blame for all your trouble? I'll tell you who's to blame. It's these outsiders from the East that claim we've got no right to our land. They say they're goin' to sell our land and give the money to the Indians. But that ain't what they've got in mind. What they want to do is turn this land over to the big-money boys back East, so's they can cut down all our timber. Then they'll want to build roads—maybe even railroads—here in the hills, so's they can take our timber out. I tell you, men, what the government's tryin' to do is give us a good skinnin' just so the rich bastards back East can get richer than they already are!”

The men looked at each other and nodded. Ike was right.

“The good Lord knows I've tried to help you,” Ike went on. “But it's come to the point where we all have to pitch in and fight together. If there's anybody here that don't want to fight, I want to hear from him now.”

For a moment there was silence. Then Wes Longstreet, a gangly hothead from Arkansas, spoke for all of them. “We're with you, Ike. We know you're right.”

“All right,” Ike said. “I just wanted to be sure. Now I've got in mind the biggest operation we ever tried. I've got it all planned and, there won't be any slip-ups. How many of you know where Fort Bellefront is?”

Bellefront had once been a fort and later a Cherokee mission. Now it was a freight depot on the stage road linking the Katy railroad, in the east, to the Santa Fe, in the central part of the state. Bellefront was the place where rail freight was brought in on heavy Studebaker wagons to be transferred for shipment to other parts of the state not yet serviced by the steel tracks. All the hill people knew where Bellefront was and what it was. Every man raised his hand to Ike's question.

“Well,” Ike continued, “Bellefront's our target. By hittin' that depot we'll be hittin' the Easterners where it hurts, in their profits. This will be the biggest haul we've ever made; there'll be bolt goods and canned goods and farm tools. Whisky and guns and ammunition. All the things you and your families need are there at the depot waitin' for us to haul it off.”

The men grinned slowly, thoughtfully. “But I want to warn you,” Ike said again. “There'll be a fight.” When no one spoke up, Ike turned to his brother. “All right. We might as well get started.”

Ike and Cal Brunner, plus thirty-one followers, rode away from Ulster's Gave shortly before noon. They headed north.

Thirty-three men in all, Ike was thinking. Plenty of manpower for the job ahead. There'd be nothing left but ashes when they got through with that depot. Then Ike turned his thoughts to something else, and for an instant his stonelike face was touched with an expression that few men had ever seen. He was smiling.

He was not thinking of all that freight and material, or the loose money that might be lying about at the depot. He was thinking of the freight-company safe, and of the riches that were there for the taking. He thought of the four sticks of dynamite that he had wrapped separately and carefully in the shock-absorbing bulk of four blankets; the roll now lashed securely behind his saddle. By sunup I'll be a rich man! Ike Brunner thought to himself. Maybe I'll be the richest man in Oklahoma!

The Brunner gang rode most of the night through that wild, heavily wooded hill country, and as the first gray streaks of dawn were appearing in the east Cal rode back from his point position to report to his brother.

“Looks like we're here,” the younger Brunner said, grinning wearily.

“How does it look?” Ike asked.

“Like a graveyard. They'll never know what hit them.”

Ike halted the main body and went forward with Cal and Wes Longstreet to see for himself. Cal was right. The sprawling warehouse, flanked on three sides by loading platforms, showed no signs of life. The freight office, a squat log building, was set apart from the warehouse; Ike noted it briefly and was satisfied. The stables were on the other side of the freight office, and in the faint light Ike could see a few horses and the vague shapes of two old Concords and a mud wagon. Several big Studebakers were lined up beside the main stable, but those were ignored. Not even an eight-team hitch could pull those heavy freighters through that roadless hill country to which they had to return. Most of the horses, Ike noted, were in a pole corral by the wagons.

Ike went back to the main body and called the men around him. “It looks even easier than I figured,” he said confidently. “The guards will be in the warehouse. They may be asleep, but they'll wake up soon enough when they hear us coming. But you've got to forget the warehouse at first and take care of the horses. Dunc,” he said to Dunc Lester, “you take about ten men and get those horses away from the trouble; the rest of us will stand off the warehouse until you're through. It shouldn't take long. But those horses are important; they have to be used as pack animals if we're to haul anything back to the cave. Are you ready?”

Heads nodded silently. Ike and Cal reined about, and this time the gang followed.

The freight-company guards never knew what hit them— not until it was too late. The band of horsemen rode out of the dark hills yelling and hollering like crazy men, firing their rifles and shotguns wildly in the direction of the warehouse. Ike and Cal directed the fire on that big shed while Dunc Lester and his men rounded up the heavy draft horses and herded them out of the way.

“All right!” Ike yelled. “Go to it!”

The guards began giving ground as the gang rushed the warehouse. Cal started to go with them, but his brother grabbed him roughly. “Come with me. We've got some important things to do.”

Quickly he untied the clumsy bundle and took it down from behind his saddle. Cal stood puzzled, oblivious of the rattle of gunfire. “What are you doin', Ike?”

“Stop askin' questions and follow me!”

He knew the men would have their attention focused on that warehouse for several minutes. The sound of shooting was becoming sporadic now; probably the guards had seen that they didn't stand a chance and were making a run for it. At a dead run, Ike headed for the log freight office, his younger brother right behind him. “Ike, where the hell are you goin'?” Ike didn't bother to answer. He reached the front porch of the office and stopped for a moment to get his breath. Very gently he placed the bundle of dynamite beside the door and drew his pistol. Cal reached the porch about three jumps behind his brother.

“Goddamn it, Ike, I don't see—”

“You will! Just stay here at the door and keep me covered. Don't let anybody come near this place. Not even one of the gang: If they do, kill them!”

Cal drew his pistol, ready to shoot the first person to come near the office. Ike's word was law.

Ike had already kicked the office door open and was inside. In the grayish light of dawn he saw that the room was much smaller than he had first guessed, and this puzzled him for a moment. Almost too late he realized that this front part of the cabin was the freight office, and the rear part was the living quarters for the company manager.

Quickly Ike opened a second door and saw that it led into a small parlor. On the far side of the room there was another door, and beneath the door a thin slice of orange lamplight gleamed. Ike Brunner snarled with the sound of an animal and kicked this third door open.

A man in long red underwear was just pulling on his pants when the door burst open. A woman in a white nightgown screamed as the man lunged for his pistol, which was hanging by its cartridge belt on the bedpost. Ike shot him immediately and the man slammed back against the wall. The woman tried to scream again, but she must have glimpsed the deadly thin smile that played along the corners of Ike Brunner's mouth, and no sound escaped her.

Cal Brunner burst excitedly into the small office as the second shot jarred the cabin. “Ike, where are you?”

He saw the open door and rushed in, pistol ready. Then he saw Ike coming out of the other room, and he also saw the white motionless shape of a woman lying on the floor, and the man staring glassily from the corner of the room.

“Ike, my God!”

“Forget it!” his brother said harshly. He ran from the room and out to the porch, Cal right behind him.

“Ike, what have you done?”

Ike gave his brother such a blinding look that Cal cringed back against the wall. “I said forget it. Watch this front door. I'll be through in a minute.”

Unhurriedly Ike unwrapped the dynamite. Cal waited nervously outside as his brother attached the explosives to the hinges of the freight-company safe. They waited outside in a gully while the fuses burned down, and suddenly the windows of the cabin glowed like fire, part of the wall fell in, and the roof lifted crazily.

The shock of the explosion still rang in Cal's ears as Ike hurried back inside the cabin. He thought of that woman lying so still on the floor. That was more than he had bargained for.

Perhaps two minutes passed. Ike came out of the cabin again, this time carrying an opened steel chest. “Look at this, Cal! We're rich!”