2-Gun Western, November 1955 — page 20: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

AS FAST AS THEY CAME a moment or two before Long Sam’s report was verified. The boat shoved from its covert and headed into the fast water. It came swiftly, handled by two rowers, one an Indian in the stern, stripped to his waist and noth- ing else but a loin cloth; the other in the bow, wearing buckskin and hick- ory. He also wore a hat. At this dis- tance he seemed more like a white than a redman. “Whut’s that they got in the boat?” “Looks like a mess of willer branches.” And so it did—long limber willow limbs with the leaves still fresh, cover- ing a mysterious cargo. “She’s a bullboat, all right, shore as sour apples,’ Pappy admitted. _ A bullboat was a type of canoe not too often used by Indians. It was -made by bending a very tough kind of wood, hickory, yew if it could be obtained, or splint oak, for ribs; and then by running a light tough keel along the bottom, and the same kind of wood around the tops of the ribs as a gunwale. Over this serviceable skeleton buffalo hides would be stretched. When the hides cured over the cedar resin calking, the bullboat was light, water-tight and swift. By this time the canoe had come within hail. “Cody,” drifted over the water. “Cody hell!” Pappy said. “Cody friend.” “That’s that half-breed,” Long Sam said. “His pappy was a Mormon mis- slonary, or something.” “Wouldn’t trust the likes of him with the life of a dead mule,” Pappy said. “You ones come down off the load.” i eee, SAM helped Betty down, and took his time, liking the chore. The old woman got so flustered her foot slipped and her fat leg got hung up in the sow’s crate. She began to yell like something possessed. “It’s chawing off my leg!” Then she realized the word was indelicate and changed it. “Limb.” Pappy was calling back to the half- breed. “Come no nigher, Cody, What’s your business?” “Cody trade.” “Cody trade what?” 21 “Cody trade buffalo meat.” He ges- tured toward the cargo concealed un- der the willow boughs. “Don’t you trust him, Pappy,’ Long willer branches.” “Whar you get buffalo meat?” Hadn’t been a buffalo sighted in weeks. Cody made a gesture toward the headwaters. “Tell your mammy to stop her squalling, a body can’t hear himself cuss,’ Long Sam said to Betty. Mean- while he was busy. The Yankee had laid out his rifle, his pistols, and the scythe blades. “Now hand down that thar front of the bedstead,” Long Sam said. The Yank put that off the load. The woman kept yelling. The tread mule understood the racket as a signal to pause. The boat now was drifting down the current. Cody and his cargo were coming nigher. Pappy kept up a parley. “Lay down on your belly,” Long Sam told Betty. “Know what to do with a shootin’ arn?” “You shoot it.” “Take one yur pappy’s pistols. But don’t waste no lead till we know for sure.’ He had got the bedstead between the wagon and the side of the ferry- boat. It made a good barricade. The horseflies and the old woman’s squalls had the hitched mules nervous, and the lead team was tugging at their halters. ~Long Sam took Pappy’s rifle and bellied alongside Betty until he could sight upon Cody and the bullboat un- der the bedstead. It wasn’t much of an ambush, but it was better than none. “Don’t shoot till I give the word,” Pappy said, low. “We don’t want to start nothin’.” After all, the half- breed might be friendly. It was just this element of doubt that always made it so dangerous. Long Sam could have killed either the Indian or Cody, but if those willows covered a half dozen warriors and their guns, that would only start the battle. His eyes lifted and he searched the Shoreline from whence had come the bullbpat. This time there was no doul#. It was a typical Indian canoe, oO Comicoooks Sam said. “They’s Injuns under them CO