Grey Sunset Pass

1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5183-0443-9
Verlag: Charles River Editors
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 374 Seiten

Zane Grey was an American author best known for writing Western fiction.  With books such as Riders of the Purple Sage and Betty Zane, Grey is perhaps the most famous writer of Westerns with many of his books being adapted into movies and TV shows.  This edition of Grey's Sunset Pass includes a table of contents.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Grey, Zane

Leseproben

CHAPTER I
.................. THE DUSTY OVERLAND TRAIN PULLED into Wagontongue about noon of a sultry June day. The dead station appeared slow in coming to life. Mexicans lounging in the shade of the platform did not move. Trueman Rock slowly stepped down from the coach, grip in hand, with an eager and curious expression upon his lean dark face. He wore a plain check suit, rather wrinkled, and a big gray sombrero that had seen service. His step, his lithe shape, proclaimed him to be a rider. A sharp eye might have detected the bulge of a gun worn under his coat, high over his left hip and far back. He had the look of a man who expected to see some one he knew. There was an easy, careless, yet guarded air about him. He walked down the platform, passing stationmen and others now moving about, without meeting anyone who took more than a casual glance at him. Then two young women came out of the waiting-room, and they shyly gazed after him. He returned the compliment. At the end of the flagstone walk Rock hesitated and halted, as if surprised, even startled. Across the wide street stood a block of frame and brick buildings, with high weatherbeaten signs. It was a lazy scene. A group of cowboys occupied the corner; saddled horses were hitched to a rail; buckboards and wagons showed farther down the street; Mexicans in colorful garb sat in front of a saloon with painted windows. “Reckon the old burg’s not changed any,” soliloquized Rock, with satisfaction. “Funny, I expected to find her all built up....Let me see. It’s five—six years since I left. Well, I never ought to have come back, but I just couldn’t help it. Somethin’ roped me in, that’s sure.” Memory stirred to the sight of the familiar corner. He had been in several bad gun fights in this town, and the scene of one of them lay before him. The warmth and intimacy of old pleasant associations suffered a chill. Rock wheeled away and hunted up the baggage-room to inquire about his saddle and bag, which he had checked at Deming. They had arrived with him. Reflecting that he did not know yet where to have them sent, Rock slipped the checks back into his pocket, and went out. A subtle change had begun to affect his pleasure in returning to Wagontongue. He left the station, giving a wide berth to the street corner that had clouded his happy reflections. But he had not walked half a block before he came to another saloon, the familiar look of which and the barely decipherable name—Happy Days—acted like a blow in his face. He quickened his step, then reacting to his characteristic spirit, he deliberately turned back to enter the saloon. The same place, the same bar, stained mirror, and faded paintings, the same pool tables. Except for a barkeeper, the room was deserted. Rock asked for a drink. “Stranger hereabouts, eh?” inquired the bartender, pleasantly, as he served him. “Yes, but I used to know Wagontongue,” replied Rock. “You been here long?” “Goin’ on two years.” “How’s the cattle business?” “Good, off an’ on. Of course it’s slack now, but there’s some trade in beef.” “Beef? You mean on the hoof?” “No. Butcherin’. Gage Preston’s outfit do a big business.” “Well, that’s new,” replied Rock, thoughtfully. “Gage Preston?... Heard his name somewhere.” “Are you a puncher or a cattleman, stranger?” “Well, I was both,” replied Rock, with a laugh. “Reckon that means I always will be.” Several booted men stamped in and lined up before the bar. Rock moved away and casually walked around, looking at the bold pictures on the wall. He remembered some of them. Also he found what he was unostentatiously seeking—some bullet holes in the wall. Then he went out. “Reckon I oughtn’t have looked at that red liquor,” he decided. There were times when it was bad for Trueman Rock to yield to the bottle. This was one of them. The sudden cold in his very marrow, the blank gray shade stealing over his mind, the presagement of a spell of morbid sinking of spirit—these usually preceded his rather rare drinking bouts. He had not succumbed in a long time now, and he hoped something would happen to prevent it in this instance. For if he fell here in Wagontongue, it would be very bad. It would be folly and the poorest kind of business. He had been industrious and fortunate for some years in a Texas cattle deal, and had sold out for ten thousand dollars, which amount of money he carried in cash upon his person. Rock went to the Range House, a hotel on another corner. It had been redecorated, he noticed. He registered, gave the clerk his baggage checks, and went to the room assigned him, where he further resisted the mood encroaching upon him by shaving and making himself look presentable to his exacting eyes. “Sure would like to run into Amy Wund,” he said, falling into another reminiscence. “Or Polly Ackers. Or Kit Rand.... All married long ago, I’ll bet.” He went downstairs to the lobby, where he encountered a heavy-set, ruddy-faced man, no other than Clark, the proprietor, whom he well remembered. “Howdy, Rock! Glad to see you,” greeted that worthy, cordially, if not heartily, extending a hand. “I seen your name on the book. Couldn’t be sure till I’d had a peep at you.” “Howdy, Bill!” returned Rock, as they gripped hands. “Wal, you haven’t changed any, if I remember. Fact is you look fit, an’ prosperous, I may say. Let’s have a drink for old times’ sake.” They went from the lobby into a saloon that was new and garish to Rock’s eye. “Fine place, Bill. Reckon you’ve been some prosperous yourself. Do you still run the little game up-stairs that used to keep us punchers broke?” “It’s a big game now, Rock,” replied the hotel man as they tipped their glasses. “How long since you left Wagontongue?” “Six years.” “Wal, so long as that? Time shore flies. We’ve growed some, Rock. A good many cattlemen have come in. All the range pretty well stocked now. Then the sheep business is growin’, in spite of opposition. We have two lumber mills, some big stores, a school, an’ a town hall.” “Well, you sure are comin’ on. I’m right glad, Bill. Always liked Wagontongue.” “Did you jest drop in to say hello to old friends, or do you aim to stay?” inquired Clark, his speculative eye lighting. Rock mused over that query, while Clark studied him. After a moment he flipped aside Rock’s coat. “Ahuh! Excuse me, Rock, for bein’ familiar,” he went on, with slight change of manner. “I see you’re packin’ hardware, as usual. But I hope you ain’t lookin’ for some one.” “Reckon not, Bill. But there might be some one lookin’ for me. ... How’s my old friend, Cass Seward?” “Ha!—Wal, you needn’t be curious aboot Cass lookin’ for you. He’s been daid these two years. He was a real sheriff, Rock, an’ a good friend of yours.” “Well, I’m not so sure of that last, but Cass was a good fellow all right. Dead! I’m sure sorry. What ailed him, Bill?” “Nothin’. He cashed with his boots on.” “Who killed him?” “Wal, that was never cleared up for shore. It happened out here at Sandro. Tough place then. But for that matter it still is. Cass got in a row an’ was shot. There was a greaser an’ a cowpuncher shot up the same night, but they didn’t croak. The talk has always been that Ash Preston killed Seward. But nobody, least of all our new sheriff, ever tried to prove it.” “Who’s Ash Preston?” “He’s the oldest son of Gage Preston, a new cattleman to these parts since you rode here. An Ash is as bad a hombre as ever forked a hoss.” “Bad? What you mean, Bill?” “Wal, I leave it to you. I ain’t sayin’ any more, an’ please regard that as confidence.” “Certainly, Bill,” replied Rock, hastily. After another drink and some casual conversation about the range they parted in the hotel lobby. Rock took an instinctive step back toward the saloon door, hesitated, and turned away. He was still stubborn about giving in to the desire for liquor. He declared to himself that he did not really need or want whisky. It was just a need to drive away a mood. He had not calculated that it would hurt to come back to Wagontongue. He told himself that there was no reason why it should. Suppose he had been in love with Amy Wund, and later with Polly and Kit? That had never hurt him, or even prevented him from falling in love with Texas girls. He...