“What word?” Herrara’s tone was belligerent

The Mexican had been drinking wine, as had the others. He was in an ugly mood and I was a stranger who did not seem impressed by him. There had been some other Mexicans down in Sonora and Chihuahua who weren’t impressed, either, and that was why he was up here.

“Milo Talon,” I said, “is a friend of mine, and I want to pass the word along that he’s needed on the Empty, over east of here, and that he’s to come careful.”

“I’ll tell Dart,” the American said.

Herrara never took his eyes off me. He was mean, I knew that, and he’d cut up several men with his knife. He had a way of taking it out and honing it until sharp, then with a yell he’d jump you and start cutting. But the honing act was to get a man scared before he jumped him. It was a good stunt, and usually it worked.

He got out his whetstone, but before he could draw his knife I drew mine. “Say, just what I need.” Before he knew what I was going to do I had reached over and taken the stone. Then I began whetting my own blade.  Well, it was a thing to see. He was astonished, then mad. He sat there empty-handed while I calmly put an edge to my blade, which was already razor sharp. I tried the blade on a hair from my head and it cut nicely, so I passed the stone back to him.

“Gracias,” I said, smiling friendly-like. “A man never knows when he’ll need a good edge.”

My knife was a sort of modified Bowie, but made by the Tinker. No better knives were ever made than those made by the Tinker back in Tennessee. He was a Gypsy pack peddler who drifted down the mountains now and again, but he sold mighty few knives. The secret of those blades had come from India where his people, thousands of years back, had been making the finest steel in the world. The steel for the fine blades of Damascus and Toledo actually came from India, and there’s an iron pillar in India that’s stood for near two thousand years, and not a sign of rust.

I showed them the knife. “That there,” I said, “is a Tinker-made knife. It will cut right through most blades and will cut a man shoulder to belt with one stroke.”

Tucking it back in my belt, I got up. “Thanks for the grub. I’ll be drifting. I don’t figure to be trapped inside if Dutch comes along.” Nobody said a word as I went outside, tightened my cinch, and prepared to mount.  Then the American came out. “That was beautiful,” he said, “Joe is an old friend of mine, but he’s had that coming for a long time. He didn’t know what to think.  He still doesn’t.”

“You’re an educated man,” I said.

“Yes. I studied law.”

“There’s need for lawyers,” I said. “I may need one myself sometime.” He shrugged, then looked away. “I should pull out,” he said. “I just sort of drifted into this, and I’ve stayed on. I guess it doesn’t make much sense.” “If I knew the law,” I said, “I’d hang out my shingle. This is a new country. No telling where a man might go.”

“I guess you’re right. God knows I’ve thought of it, but sometimes a man gets caught in a sort of backwater.”

I stepped into the saddle, listening beyond his voice. Nobody came from the cabin. I heard no sound on the trail.

The American pointed. “Isom Dart has a cabin down that way. He’s a black man, and smart.”

“We’ve met,” I said.

He looked up at me. “They’ll be wondering who you are,” he said. “It isn’t often a man stands up to Mexican Joe.”

“The name is Sackett ... Logan Sackett,” I said and rode off. When I looked back he was still looking after me, but then he turned and walked toward the cabin door.

I trusted the Anglo. I had heard of him before, and he was a man of much education who seemed to care for nothing but sitting in the cabin and drinking or talking with the Mexicans or passersby.

This Brown’s Hole was a secret place, although the Indians had known of it.  Ringed with hills, some of them that could not be passed, it was a good place, too, a good place for men like me. There we’re places like this in Tennessee where I had been born, but they were more green, lovelier and not so large.  My thoughts returned to Emily Talon. She was a Sackett. She was my kin and so deserving of my help. Ours was an old family, with old, old family feelings.  Long ago we had come from England and Wales, but the family feeling within us was older still, old as the ancient Celtic clans I’d heard spoken of. It was something deep in the grain, but something that should belong to all families ... everywhere. I did not envy those who lacked it There’d never been much occasion to think on it. When trouble fetched around the corner we just naturally lit in and helped out. Mostly, we could handle what trouble came our way without help, but there was a time or two, like that time down in the Tonto Basin country when they had Tell backed into a corner.  Riding through wild country leaves a man’s mind free to roam around, and while a body never dare forget what he’s doing, one part of his mind keeps watch while another sort of wanders around. My thoughts kept returning to Em Talon and the Empty.

That old woman was alone except for a slip of a girl, and you could bet Jake Planner was studying ways to get her away from the ranch. Chances were he thought I was still around, but if he did know I was gone he’d figure I was gone for good. Well, if I could find Milo Talon, I would be. Right now I wanted Milo more’n anybody, but I hadn’t any fancy ideas about being safe in Brown’s Hole.  So far most of the folks in the Hole, if they weren’t outlaws themselves at least tolerated them. The Hoys, however, tolerated them least of all, as they’d lost some stock from time to time.

From time to time I rode off the trail and waited in the cedars to study my back trail, and I kept my eyes on the tracks. I wanted to see Dart, but there were others around I’d no desire to see at all.

Suddenly I heard hoofs a-coming and I pulled off the trail. It was Dart, and he was riding a sorrel gelding. They called Isom Dart a black man and he’d been a slave, but he surely wasn’t very black.

He seen me as quick as I did him. “H’lo, Logan. What you all a-doin’ up thisaways?”

“Huntin’ you. I want to pass word to Milo Talon. He’s needed on the Empty. His ma’s still alive and she’s in trouble. He’s to come in careful ... and anybody in town is likely an enemy.”

Dart nodded. “You know how ‘tis, Logan. He’s a fast-ridin’ man, and he may be a thousand mile from here. I’ll get word to him.” I gathered my reins. “You’d better hole up for a while your ownself. Brannenburg is huntin’ rustlers.”

“I never been in his neck o’ the woods.”

“Don’t make no difrence. Dutch thinks he’s godawmighty these days. If you ain’t a banker or a big cattleman you’re a cow thief.” No man in his right mind rides the same trail going back, not if he has enemies or it’s Injun country. After leaving Dart I taken to the water, swam the Green and edged along through the brush, weaving a fancy trail for anybody wishful of hunting me. I backtracked several times, rode over my own trail, swam the Green again, and stayed in the water close to the bank for a ways.  When I did come out of the water I was in a thick stand of cedar and I worked my way east toward the Limestone Ridge. Turning, I walked my horse toward the gap that led to Irish Canyon, then turned east again and crossed Vermilion Creek and proceeded on east to West Boone Draw.

Most of the time I was riding in cedar or brush or following draws so that I could keep out of sight. I saw nobody, heard nothing, yet I had a spooky feeling.

There are times riding in the hills when you know you are alone and yet you are sure you are watched. Sometimes I think the ghosts of the old ones, the ones who came before the Indians, sometimes I think they still follow the old trails, sit under the ancient trees, or listen to the wind in the high places, for surely not even paradise could be more lonely, more beautiful, more grand than the high peaks of the San Juans or the Tetons or this land through which I rode.  There’s more of me in the granite shoulders of the mountain or in the trunks of the gnarled cedars than there is in other men. Ma always said I was made to be a loner, and Nolan like me. We were twins, him and me, but once we moved we rode our separate ways and never seemed to come together again, nor want to. There’d been no bad feeling between us, it was as if we sensed that one of us was enough at one time in one place.

Riding out of the brush I looked across the country toward East Boone Draw. I just sat there for a while, feeling the country and not liking what I felt.  There was something spooky about Brown’s Hole. Maybe it was that I couldn’t get Brannenburg out of my mind. The Dutchman was hard ... he was stone. His brain was eroded granite where the few ideas he had carved deep their ruts of opinion.  There was no way for another idea to seep in, no place for imagination, no place for dreams, none for compassion or mercy or even fear.  He knew no shadings of emotion, he knew no half-rights or half-wrongs or pity or excuse, nor had he any sense of pardon. The more I thought of him the more I knew he was not evil in himself, and he would have been shocked that anybody thought of him as evil. Shocked for a moment only, then he’d have shut the idea from his mind as nonsense. For the deepest groove worn into that granite brain was the one of his own rightness.

And that scared me.

A man like that can be dangerous, and it made me uneasy to be riding in the same country with him. Maybe it was that I’d a sense of guilt around him and he smelled it.

Here and there I’d run off a few cattle from the big outfits. They branded anything they found running free without a brand, but let a nester or cowhand do the same and he was a rustler.

I’d never blotted any brands. I’d never used a cinch ring or a coiled wire or anything to rewrite a brand. Here and there I’d slapped my brand on mavericks I’d come across on the plains. By now there must be several thousand head of stock running loose on the plains that I’d branded.  Suddenly I’d had enough of Brown’s Hole. I was going to get out and get out fast.

And that was when I realized somebody was coming down my back trail, somebody hunting me.