Pursuit Of The Mountain Man

18

Someone among them smelled the ambush. Smoke knew it was going sour when the group split up into three’s and four’s and began skirting the meadow on two sides, staying well out of rifle range of the timber on the hill.

Smoke watched them for a moment, and then wormed his way back into the timber to his horse. “Not our day, fellow,” he said, swinging into the saddle. “I’m not going to push you, boy. I know you’re tired. So let’s just lope for about a mile and see what we can come up with.”

Von Hausen’s group was right on his tail and the horse seemed to know it. If he was tired, he sure didn’t act it when they hit the flats. That big Appaloosa stretched out and was flying like a young colt, his powerful legs eating up the distance.

Smoke grinned, even through the race was deadly. He loved to sit a saddle when the horse loved to run and was doing so. Enjoyed feeling the power of a horse that was doing what he loved to do. Smoke hung on as the ’paloosa scrambled up a ridge and leaped into the timber. Smoke cut left and weaved through the timber, smiling when he spotted the ravine that the north boundaries of the meadow ran into. Far in the distance, he could see riders entering the wide mouth of the ravine.

He heard a shout, but it was too faint for him to make out the words. If those coming up the ravine heard it, they did not seem to pay any attention to it.

Smoke grabbed his rifle and found adequate cover on the rim. He eased the hammer back and waited.

Paul Melham didn’t like the looks of this ravine and told those behind him so, in blunt words. He ended with, “I’m tellin’ y’all I heard a runnin’ horse.”

“Then how come none of the rest of us heard it, Paul?” Cat Brown challenged. “I’ll tell you why: ’cause there wasn’t no runnin’ horse, that’s why. If Jensen was in that timber back yonder, he wouldn’t have come this way. That ambushin’ bastard would have flanked us and picked us off. Relax, Paul. He’s miles ahead of us.”

“If you’re so damn sure of that, then you come up here and take the point.”

“Oh, hell, Paul!” Cat said. “If you’re that skittish I might as well. You got fear sweat runnin’ into your eyes. You wouldn’t be able to see a grizzly if he reared up in front of you.”

Smoke pulled the trigger and Paul was nearly knocked out of the saddle. He managed to hold on with his good right arm. His left arm dangled useless.

Smoke knew he’d shot off the mark. A fly had landed on the end of his nose just as he’d pulled the trigger. Probably shot the man-hunter in the shoulder by the way he acted.

But the ravine was void of man-hunters now, except for their horses, and Smoke wasn’t about to shoot a horse. All in the group had left their saddles and found what protection they could in the rocks. Smoke smiled and started putting rounds close to the horses’ hooves. That set the already panicked animals off and running. The last he saw of them they were running hot and hard out of the ravine.

Smoke ran back to his horse, swung into the saddle, and was gone.

Paul crawled back to Cat and Utah, pulling himself along with his good arm. He was cussing to beat sixty.

“Fall back!” Cat yelled. “Stay close to the sides and get back out of range. Somebody holler for von Hausen to get the medicine bag.” He looked at Paul’s shoulder. “You’re lucky, Paul. Bullet punched right through. I don’t think nothin’s broken.”

“When we catch up with that damn Jensen,” Paul panted, his face shiny with pain. “I swear I’ll skin him slow.”

If any of us are left alive to catch up with him, Utah thought. That sudden thought startled him, for he’d never even considered quitting this bunch. He shook it out of his head. After killin’ them soldiers, he couldn’t quit. This was a race to the end—for all of them. Them who was runnin‘, and them who was chasin’.

“It’s a painful wound, I’m sure,” Gunter said, after cleaning out Paul’s bullet-punctured shoulder. “But nothing appears to be broken and there is only the expected bleeding. Can you ride?”

“I can ride,” Paul said grimly. “I want a shot at that damn Jensen.”

No one among them, it seemed, could speak of Smoke in any other manner except ‘that damn Jensen.’

“Let’s find us a way around this ravine,” von Hausen said. “He’s probably still up there, waiting.”

“He’ll just move when we do,” Hans pointed out. “He’s got the high ground.” That damn Jensen seemed to always have the high ground.

Von Hausen looked at Hans. The spirit seemed to have gone out of the man. He cut his eyes to Andrea. She was staring at Hans with a decidedly disgusted look in her eyes. “Round up the horses. We’re riding until dusk.”

Walt pushed his group as hard as he figured they could stand it. But by dusk, when he broke it off to make camp, he had a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach that they were not going to make the park headquarters.

“They are worn out,” Angel whispered to him, out of earshot of the others.

“I know. We’re not going to make it, Angel.”

“I could ride for the headquarters.”

“And do what? Bring back six soldier boys who are engineers first and soldiers last. I ain’t puttin’ them down—they got a job to do like everybody else—but they ain’t cavalry. We’ll push on tomorrow and get as close to the park entrance as we can before we have to stand and fight.”

“And then?”

“We’ll just pick us the best spot we can find and show von Hausen and his boys and girls that we ain’t gonna go down without one hell of a fight.”

Gilbert walked up. “The ladies are exhausted, gentlemen,” he said. He looked very tired. “And for that matter, so are the men in my party. The young surveyors seem to be holding up well.”

“Yeah,” Walt said. “We was just talkin’ about that. The horses are tired, too. We’ll push on at first light. When we find us a good spot to fort up—with water and graze and shelter—we’ll make a stand of it.”

“Might I make a suggestion?”

“Shore.”

“We ride only a brief time tomorrow. There is a spot not too far from here that I know of—I’ve been in this park several times. It’s almost a natural fort. We spend the rest of the day digging in. And I mean that literally.”

Walt nodded his head. “That’s fine with me, Gilbert. Angel?”

“Suits me. With us in front of them and Smoke coming up behind them, we could put them in a bad spot.”

“Yes,” Gilbert said, obviously pleased that the two gunfighters approved of his plan. “That was my thinking.”

“Let’s have some coffee and get some rest,” Walt said. “We’ll see what the others have to say about this.”

Walt and his group were about four miles north of Smoke. Smoke was camped only about five miles ahead of von Hausen’s party. Neither had any way of knowing what the other was planning.

Smoke boiled his coffee in a small and beat-up coffee pot and chewed on jerky and hardtack for his supper. He was just about out of coffee. He’d have enough for in the morning, and then that was it. And when Smoke couldn’t have his coffee, he turned short-tempered.

Smoke drank his coffee and then carefully cleaned and wiped down his guns in the dying light of the small fire. He tried not to think about Walt and his group and their desperate race for the park headquarters and the tiny garrison of army engineers stationed there. He tried not to think about Sergeant Major Murphy and his patrol, lying stiffened and ravaged by animals and carrion birds in the timber by the creek, shot down in the coldest of blood by von Hausen and those who followed him.

“You’re scum, von Hausen,” Smoke muttered. “Nothing but scum.”

“I hate that damn Jensen,” von Hausen said to Marlene. “The man has ruined a perfectly good hunt.”

“He’s a savage,” Marlene said. “No class or breeding.”

John T. was walking by the tent and heard that. He shook his head and walked on, wondering how in the hell he ever let himself get tied up with such a pack of fools. He walked over to the cook tent and poured a cup of coffee, carrying it over to his bedroll, close to the fire. He sat down, his back against his saddle, and looked at Montana Jess, sitting drinking coffee next to him. The man had a strange expression on his face.

“Time’s runnin’ out for us, John T.,” Montana spoke the words softly.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, them champagne-suckin’, hoity-toity folks over yonder is takin’ us to our deaths. That’s what I mean. And you know it, John T.”

“Spit it all out, Montana.”

“We ain’t got no choice left in the matter, John T. We can’t come out of this unless’n we kill everybody in this park. Everybody.”

“We’ve talked about that, Montana. What’s left to talk about?”

“That ain’t what I mean.” He paused as others moved closer in. “We’re not gonna get Jensen. You know it, I know it, and so do the rest of the boys. It’s only them fools over yonder eatin’ high off the hog that thinks we will. And if we do manage to kill them folks we’re followin’, and we don’t kill Jensen—which we ain’t gonna do—he’ll spend the rest of his life trackin’ us down. We’ll have to change our names and get the hell gone to Ver-mont or Massesschewits or some damn other foreign place, and hope to God he don’t find us.”

John T. realized then that Montana, and the rest of the men, too, he supposed, were not talking about quitting and pulling out, but just letting off steam, with Montana being the spokesman.

That thought was dashed when Mike Hunt said, “Why don’t we kill them princes and barons and what not over yonder, have some fun with them cold-actin’ women, take their money and jewels and just get gone from this place?”

“That thought entered my mind too,” Gil Webb said. “But that’d just make it worser.”

Mike looked at him. “I don’t see how.”

“The German government would get involved in it then, and there’d really be an investigation.”

Mike nodded his head. “I hadn’t thought about that. You’re right.”

John T. did not enter into the conversation. Only when and if he was asked. Best to let the men hash it out among themselves, he concluded.

Paul Melham moaned in pain in his sleep.

“We best stick with what we planned,” Nick spoke up. “With the money bein’ paid us, we can disappear for a good long time if we’re careful with it. This’ll blow over after awhile. It always does, don’t it?”

“Not no killin’ like we done and like we’re plannin‘, it don’t,” Utah Red said. “But I agree with Montana that we ain’t got no hell of a lot of options left us. We just got to go on and do it, that’s all.”

Valdes tossed another stick on the fire. “I am more fortunate than most of you. I can head back into Mexico and vanish. And that is exactly what I plan on doing. With my money, I can buy a cantina and quit this business.”

“You mighty quiet, John T.,” Ray Harvey said.

“Just listenin’ to you boys talk, that’s all.”

“Ain’t you got no opinion a-tall?” Tony Addison asked.

“I reckon not, Tony. I’m goin’ on, so there ain’t much point in talkin’ about what’s behind us. We just do the deed we all agreed to do.”

“Oh, I’m in, John T.,” Tony was quick to say. “Don’t worry ’bout that.”

“I was wonderin’, after listenin’ to all this talk,” John T. said, pulling out the makings and rolling a tight cigarette. “Just had me a little curious, that’s all.”

The men were all quick to speak up that John T. could count on them. Yes, sir. All the way.

“Good, boys, good.” He smoked his cigarette down and tossed the butt into the fire. “I’m gonna turn in. I got a funny feelin’ in my guts that tomorrow is gonna be a damn busy day.”

“Why do you say that, John T.?” Valdes asked.

“Just got a hunch is all.” He rolled his gunbelt and took off his boots. “I pay attention to my hunches, boys. They’ve saved my bacon more’n once.”

“Good idea, John T.,” Gil said. He got up and wandered off toward the bushes.

John T. Matthey went to sleep counting all the men they’d buried on their back trail. Thanks to that damn Jensen.

Smoke was up and drank the last of his coffee before dawn ever thought about opening its eyes. As he had done before rolling up in the blankets the night before, he climbed up on a ridge and looked to the south. Fires, and a lot of them. Von Hausen and his pack of hungry, rabid skunks were very close. He turned and looked to the north. Several small fires; that had to be Walt and his bunch.

He walked to his camp, made sure his fire was out, and then packed up, saddled up and pulled out. He had to find a place to make a stand this day. If he didn’t, Walt’s group wouldn’t have any more days left to them.

Dawn was just breaking when Smoke rode out. He flirted with the idea of just picking a spot and make a stand to the death. But he didn’t flirt with it for very long. The will to live was too strong in him. And just as strong was his will to win against seemingly insurmountable odds.

He’d have to admit he’d done a pretty fair job of doing just that so far.

No, Smoke would not make any stand-or-die move. No, what he would do is catch up with Walt and the others and then fight a rear guard action after seeing what kind of shape they were in.

They were going to win this fight, by God.

His horse sensed its rider’s excitement and the big ’paloosa quickened its step. “That’s right, boy,” Smoke said. “You feel the same way, don’t you?”

The Appaloosa snorted and swung his head. Smoke laughed.

Above him, an eagle soared.