Return of the Mountain Man

15

Smoke slipped around the side of the Pink House and into the weed-grown alley in the rear. He carefully picked his way toward the rear of the stable. He felt sure the front of the stable would be watched.

For the first time since he had arrived in Bury, the town was silent. No wagons rattled up and down the streets. No riders moving in and out of town. No foot traffic to be seen in Bury. A tiny dust devil spun madly up the main street, picking up bits of paper as it whirled away.

Smoke slipped from outhouse to outhouse, both hammer thongs off his .44s.

Reese and his deputies apparently believed Smoke would not take to the alleys, but instead stroll right down the center of the main street, spurs jingling, like some tinhorn kid who fancied himself a gunhand. But Smoke had been properly schooled by Preacher, whose philosophy was thus: if you’re outnumbered, circle around ’hind ’em and ambush the hell out of ’em. Ain’t no such thang as a fair fight, boy. Just a winner and a loser.

Smoke didn’t want to open the dance just yet. He was in a very bad position, being on foot and armed with only his short guns.

And he was still about a block and a half from the stable. His eyes picked up the shape of a small boy, frantically and silently waving his arms. Little Ben. Smoke returned the wave. Ben disappeared into the stable and returned seconds later, leading a saddled and ride-ready Drifter. Smoke grinned. Drifter must have taken a liking to Little Ben, for had he not, the stallion would have stomped the boy to death.

“Jensen!” The harshly spoken word came from his right, from the shadows of an alley.

Out of the corner of his eye, Smoke could see the young man had not drawn his pistol. The cowboy was a PSR rider, but Smoke did not know his name.

Smoke slowly turned, facing the young rider. “Back away, cowboy,” Smoke stated softly. “Just walk back up the alley and no one will ever have to know. If you draw on me, I’ll kill you. Turn around and you’ll live. How about it?”

“That thirty thousand dollars looks almighty good to me, Jensen,” the puncher replied, his hands hovering over his low-tied guns. “Start me up a spread with that.”

“You’ll never live to work it,” Smoke warned him.

Ben was slowly leading Drifter up the alley.

“Says you!” the cowboy sneered.

“What’s your name, puncher?”

“Jeff Siddons. Why?”

“So I’ll know what to put on your grave marker.”

Jeff flushed. “You gonna draw or talk?”

“I’d rather not draw at all,” Smoke again tried to ease out of the fight.

“You yellow scum!” Jeff said. “Draw!” His hands dipped downward.

Jeff’s hands had just touched the wooden handles of his guns when he felt a terrible crushing double blow to his chest. The young cowboy staggered backward, falling heavily against the side of the building. Smoke was already turning away from the dying cowboy as light faded in Jeff’s eyes. “Ain’t no human man that fast!” Jeff spoke his last words, sitting in his own dusty blood.

Smoke looked back at the dying cowboy. “Just remember to tell Saint Peter this wasn’t my idea.”

But he was talking to a dead man.

He heard the drum of bootheels on the boardwalk, all running in his direction. He turned just as a voice called out, “Hold it, Jensen!”

Smoke ducked in back of the building just as a shot rang out, the bullet knocking a fist-sized chunk of wood out of the building. Smoke dropped to one knee and fired two fast shots around the side of the building, then he was up and running toward Ben and Drifter, ignoring the howl of pain behind him and in the alley. At least one of his snap shots had struck home.

“That damned little stableboy’s helpin’ Jensen!” a man’s voice yelled. “I’ll take a horsewhip to that little son of a bitch!”

Smoke reached Ben and Drifter. “Run to Miss Flora’s, Ben. Them women won’t let anything happen to you. Run, boy, run!”

Ben took off as if pursued by the devil. Smoke mounted up. His saddlebags were bulging, so Ben must have transferred a lot of his gear from the packs normally borne by the pack animal. He looked back over his shoulder. Sheriff Reese was leading a running gang of men. And they weren’t far behind Smoke.

“Hold up there, Jensen!” Reese yelled, just as Smoke urged Drifter forward and cut into the alley where the dead cowboy lay. Reese lifted a double-barreled coach gun and pulled the trigger. The buckshot tore a huge hole in the corner of the building.

Drifter leaped ahead and charged through the alley, coming out on the main street. Smoke turned his nose north for a block and then whipped into another alley, coming out behind Reese and his men. Smoke had reloaded his Colts and now, with the reins in his teeth, a Colt in each hand, he charged the knot of gunslicks headed by Sheriff Reese.

“I want that thirty thousand!” a man yelled. Smoke recognized the man as Jerry, from back at the trading post.

“Hell with you!” Reese said. “I want that—” He turned at the sound of drumming hooves. “Jesus Christ!” he hollered, looking at the mean-eyed stallion bearing down on him.

The charging stallion struck one gunhand, knocking the man down, the man falling under Drifter’s steel-shod hooves. The gunnie screamed, the cry cut off as Drifter’s hooves pounded the man’s face into pulp.

Reese had jumped out of the way of the huge midnight black horse with the killer-cold yellowish eyes, losing his shotgun as he leaped. One of Drifter’s hooves struck the sheriff’s thigh, bringing a howl of pain and a hat-sized bruise on the man’s leg. Reese rolled on the ground, yelling in pain.

“You squatter-lovin’ son!” Jerry screamed at Smoke, bringing up a .45.

Smoke leveled his left-hand .44 and shot the man between the eyes.

As blood splattered, the foot-posse broke up, fear taking over. Men ran in all directions.

Smoke urged Drifter on, galloping up the alley and once more entering the main street. He looped the reins loosely around the saddlehorn and screamed like an angry cougar, the throaty scream, almost identical to a real cougar’s warcry, chilling the shopowners who were huddling behind closed doors. Stratton, Potter, and Richards had promised them a safe town and lots of easy money; they hadn’t said anything about a wild man riding a horse that looked like it came straight out of the pits of Hell.

Preacher sat straight up on his blankets. He slapped one knee and cackled as the gunshots drifted out of Bury. The shots were followed by the very faint sounds of a big mountain lion screaming.

“Hot damn, boys!” Preacher hollered. “Somebody finally grabbed holt of Smoke’s tail and gave ’er a jerk. Bet by Gawd they’ll wish they hadn’t a done it.”

“He a-havin’ all the fun!” Beartooth gummed the words.

“They’s plenty to go around,” Lobo growled. “When he needs us, he’ll holler.”

“Ummm,” said Nighthawk.

“How eloquently informative,” said Audie.

Leaning close to Drifter’s neck, presenting a low profile, Smoke charged up the main street. He was not going to shoot up the town, for he did not want to harm any woman or child. He had made up his mind that he was going to give the shopkeepers and the storeowners and their families a chance to pull out. But he was doing that for the sake of the kids only. To hell with the adults; man or woman, they knew who they worked for. One was as bad as the other.

Ten minutes later, Smoke had reined up and dismounted in the camp of the mountain men.

“Howdy, son!” Preacher said. “You been havin’ yourself a high old time down there, huh?”

“That’s one way of putting it,” Smoke said, putting one heavily muscled arm around the old man’s wang-leather-tough shoulders.

“You grinnin’ like a chicken-eatin’ dog, boy,” Preacher said. “What you got a-rattlin’ ’round in ’at head of yourn?”

Smoke looked at Powder Pete. “You got any dynamite with you?”

“Only time I been without any was when them durned Lakotas caught me up near the Canadian border and wanted to skin me. Since I was somewhat fond of my hide, I were naturally disinclined to part with it.”

Smoke laughed aloud, and the laughter felt good. He felt as though he was back home, which, in a sense, he was. “What happened?”

“The chief had a daughter nobody wanted to bed down with,” Powder Pete said, disgust in his voice. “Homeliest woman I ever seen. ’At squaw could cause a whirlwind to change directions. The chief agreed to let me live if’n I’d share Coyote Run’s blankets. How come she got that name was when she was born the chief had a pet coyote. Coyote took one look at her and run off. Never did come back. ’At’s homely, boy. I spent one winter with Coyote Run, up in the MacDonald Range, on the Flathead. Come spring, I told ’at chief he might as well git his skinnin’ knife out, ’cause I couldn’t stand no more of Coyote Run. Chief said he didn’t know how I’d stood it this long. Told me to take off. I been carryin’ dynamite ever since. Promised myself if’n I ever got in another bind lak ’at ’air, I’d blow myself up. Whut you got in mind, Smoke?”

“One road leading into and out of Bury.”

Powder Pete and the other mountain men grinned. They knew then what was rattlin’ around in Smoke’s head.

“If you men will, find the best spots to block the road to coach and carriage travel. Set your charges. I’m going to give those who want to leave twenty-four hours to do so. I want the kids out of that town. I’d prefer the women to leave as well, but from what I’ve been able to see and hear, most of the women are just as low-down as their men.”

“Simmons’s old woman is,” Dupre said. “I knowed her afore. Plumb trash.”

“I still want to give them a chance to leave,” Smoke said. “And I especially want Sally and the women in the Pink House out, along with MacGregor and Little Ben. The rest of the townspeople can go to hell.”

Deadlead and Greybull picked up their rifles. Deadlead said, “Us’n and Matt and Tenneysee will block the horse trails out of town. Rest of ya’ll git busy.”

“Preacher,” Powder Pete said, “you take the fur end of town. I’ll scout this end. I’ll hook up with you in a couple hours and plant the charges.”

“Done.” Preacher moved out.

“I shall make the announcement to the good citizens of Bury,” Audie said. “My articulation is superb and my voice carries quite well.”

“Yeah,” Phew said. “Like a damned ol’ puma with his tail hung up in a b’ar trap. Grates on my nerves when you git to hollerin’.”

Audie ignored him. “Considering the mentality of those who inhabit that miserable village, I must keep this as simple as possible. Therefore, the Socratean maieutic method of close and logical reasoning must be immediately discarded.”

“Umm,” Nighthawk said.

“Whut the hell did you say?” Lobo growled. “Sounded like a drunk Pawnee. Gawdamnit, you dwarf, cain’t you speak plain jist once in a while?”

“Rest your gray cells, you hulking oaf,” Audie responded. “I’m thinking.”

“Wal, thank to yoursalf, you magpie!”

“Silence, you cretin!”

Smoke let them hurl taunts and insults back and forth; they had been doing it for fifty-odd years and were not about to quit at this stage of the game. He turned to face the direction of Bury.

He would give them more of a chance than they had given his brother or father. Ever so much more of a chance than they had given his baby son and his wife, Nicole. Ever so much more.

He let hate consume him as he recalled that awful day….

He had made a wide circle of the cabin, staying in the timber back of the creek, and slipped up to the cabin. Inside the cabin, although Smoke did not as yet know it, the outlaw Canning had taken a blanket and smothered Baby Arthur to death. Nicole had been brutally raped, and then her throat had been crushed. Canning scalped the woman, tying her bloody hair to his belt. He then skinned a breast, thinking he would tan the hide and make himself a nice tobacco pouch.

Kid Austin had gotten sick watching Canning’s callousness. He walked outside to vomit.

Another outlaw, Grissom, walked out the front of the cabin. Grissom felt something was wrong. He sensed movement behind him and reached for his gun. Smoke shot him dead.

“Behind the house!” Felter yelled.

Another of the PSR riders had been dumping his bowels in the outhouse. He struggled to pull up his pants and push open the door at the same time. Smoke shot him twice in the belly and left him to die on the craphouse floor.

Kid Austin, caught in the open, ran for the banks of the creek. Just as he jumped, Smoke fired, the lead taking the Kid in the buttocks, entering the right cheek and tearing out the left.

Smoke waited behind a woodpile, the big Sharps buffalo rifle Preacher had given him in his hands. He watched as something came sailing out the open back door. His dead baby son bounced on the earth.

The outlaws inside the cabin taunted Smoke, telling in great detail of raping Nicole. Smoke lined up the Sharps and pulled the trigger. A PSR rider began screaming in pain.

Canning and Felter ran out of the front of the cabin, high-tailing it for the safety of the timber. In the creek, Kid Austin crawled upstream, crying in pain and humiliation.

Another of the PSR riders exited the cabin, leaving one inside. He got careless and Smoke took him alive.

When he came to his senses, Smoke had stripped him, staked him out over an anthill, and poured honey all over him.

It took him a long time to die.

Smoke buried his wife and son amid a colorful profusion of wild flowers, stopping often to wipe away the tears.