Read the High Graders (1965) for Free Online Page B

willing to listen. A cowhand , Gentry told him, had struck gold on the ol d Rafter H while sinking a post hole. Withou t saying a word to anyone he had gone off to Sa n Francisco and obtained financial backing, the n returned and bought the Rafter H headquarter s area.
    Polluted water from the mill flowed into th e creek, spelling ruin for the Rafter H and the othe r cattle outfits. They fought, and among th e casualties was the cowhand who had discovered th e gold.
    "Mighty convenient, I figure," Gentr y commented, refilling his glass, "but it didn't d o anybody any good. Turned out he had sold hi s entire interest to that Frisco outfit. There wa s trouble a-plenty with Turkeytrack and Rafter , but nothing we couldn't manage."
    "We?"
    Gentry winked. "Now, Mike, you know ol'
    Gib. I never let any grass grow under m y feet, you know that, an' there's more money in gol d than in cattle. The trouble started when I hire d on as guard at the Sun Strike."
    "Trouble?"
    "Shooting trouble, Mike. Ben Stowe was bos s of the guards, an' you know Ben. He knew wher e to pick up a few salty boys down in th e Panhandle country, and after we'd buried two o r three of the local boys that was the end of it."
    Trust Ben Stowe to know who had to be killed.
    The backbone of any cow outfit lies in tw o or three fighting men whom the rest follow. Pu t them out of the picture, and the rest would b e likely to lose heart. Mike Shevlin had see n it managed that way more than once, and had seen i t tried at other times.
    "Gib, who is the law around here?"
    "You on the dodge?"
    "Who is he?"
    "Aw, you've nothing to worry about. You know ho w it is with the law in these western towns. The law i s always local law, so busy skinning its own cat s it hasn't time to worry about anybody wh o doesn't make trouble. You could shoot half a dozen men in Denver or Cheyenne, and nobod y would bother you anywhere else as long as you stayed ou t of trouble. ... But the law here is Wilso n Hoyt."
    Wilson Hoyt, of all people! He was a burly bear of a man, broad and thick an d muscular, but fast enough to have killed a man who ha d the drop on him. He was credited with seventee n killings, all on the side of the law. Of all th e men who might be in this town, the one most likel y to know about Mike Shevlin was Hoyt.
    Hollister, Gentry, and Mason only kne w the boy who had ridden away, and ten years and more ca n deepen and widen a man, they can salt him down wit h toughness and wisdom. And Mike had been gon e thirteen years. Of them all, Hoyt would understan d him more than the others, and Hoyt had seen hi m looking at Eli's grave and would know why he ha d come back.
    Gentry rambled on, taking a third drin k while Mike was nursing his first. He talked abou t the good old days, and it came over Mike tha t Gentry still thought of him as a friend.
    "You got to hand it to Ray," Gentry sai d confidentially. "He always wanted to be a bi g man, and when gold was discovered he grabbed at th e chance.
    "He never came out in the open with it, and th e cattle crowd never knew he'd thrown in with th e other side. When trouble started--and I alway s figured his loud mouth caused it--Ray got i n touch with the Frisco people and offered to handl e negotiations with the ranchers. He and that shyste r Evans called themselves a law firm, but you kno w Ben. When Hollister brought Ben into x he pu t a rope on trouble.
    "When a few of the miners started high-grading a little here and there, Ben argued Ray into looking th e other way. But Ben, he said nothin g to Ray about the setup he arranged for buying up th e gold to keep it out of circulation."
    "Where did Ben get that kind of money?"
    Gentry gave Mike another wink. "Now, tha t there is Ben's own secret, but don't yo u low-rate Ben. Buying up the high-grade kep t the news from getting out that Sun Strike was big.
    They reported low averages from the mine, an d nobody knew any different."
    By this time Gentry was working on his fourth