The six-man posse stood dumbfounded in the back of the stable, gaping at the door swung wide open.
“It was locked, all right,” Sam Vickers said, looking at the padlock still in place on the short piece of board.
“Well, I reckon that’s my mistake,” Gordon Luck said. He picked up the axe beside the door. “Looks like we coulda heard them choppin’ away at that door.”
“I’m not surprised,” Benny Swartz said. “There was a helluva lot of shooting going on. It’da been hard to hear them chopping wood in all that.”
Gordon walked through the open door and stood peering out into the darkness beyond for a few long moments. “Well, I see it as my duty to go after ’em. Anybody gonna ride with me?”
“I’ll ride with you, Reverend,” Chestnut spoke up immediately.
“Me, too,” Vickers said. He was followed by the rest of the hastily formed posse.
“Good,” Gordon said. “We’ll start after ’em as soon as it’s light. It ought’n be too hard a trail to follow.”
• • •
As she did every morning, Beulah Watts showed up at the hotel just before sunrise to build a fire in the kitchen stove. On this morning, however, she found Maggie and Mary Lou already hard at work, scrubbing the dining room floor. Surprised, she stood in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room to stare. “Am I late for work?” she asked.
“No, we just had a little cleanup to do before we start breakfast this morning,” Maggie told her. “You go right ahead. We’re about through here.”
Since it appeared that most of the scrubbing had been in one area of the floor, Beulah walked in to take a closer look. “That looks like bloodstains,” she said. “What was it?”
“Blood,” Mary Lou answered dryly. She let Maggie tell her cook what had happened after she left for home the night before.
“My stars!” Beulah gasped when Maggie told her about the three who had lost their lives. “Alvin Tucker and Jesse Springer—and Mr. Campbell’s boy, Claude! Oh, dear me, and Mr. Campbell don’t even know his boy is dead.”
“And somebody’s gonna have to go out to Mather’s place and tell him,” Mary Lou said.
Maggie went on to tell Beulah of the reception she and Mary Lou held for Slade Corbett and his sidekick when they tried to break into her room.
“It’s a wonder you both ain’t dead,” Beulah exclaimed when she saw the splintered tabletops piled over in the corner and the bullet holes in the walls.
“Hell,” Maggie boasted boldly, “it’s a wonder Slade Corbett and that scum riding with him ain’t dead. He’ll know better than to come around here again. Right, Mary Lou?”
“I hope so,” Mary Lou replied, not so confident as her employer. She knew that she would fight to protect herself, but at the moment she was too weary to think about it. All but a couple of hours since Slade and Sanchez left had been spent putting Maggie’s room and the dining room back in order after the damage the two predators had wrought.
“You want me to tote in some wood for the stove?” Beulah asked. “Are we gonna open for breakfast?”
“I reckon so,” Maggie said. “A little shootin’ and murderin’ ain’t gonna kill any appetites in this town. When everybody finds out Slade and Sanchez are gone, they’ll be back wanting breakfast. A couple of our regulars won’t be here for breakfast, though, Sam Vickers and Harold Chestnut. They’re riding with the posse.”
“That’s about as good as we’re gonna do,” Mary Lou decided, looking at the patch of stains where Tucker’s body had lain. “I’m gonna throw this dirty water out. Then I’m going back to my room to try to pull myself together to work today.”
“Take a little nap if you need it,” Maggie said. “Beulah and I can handle it this morning.”
“No, I’ll be back to help,” Mary Lou insisted. “I’m just gonna go splash some water on my face and freshen up a little.”
She stood for a few moments, holding the two halves of the basin that had sat on her dry sink before Slade Corbett raked it off onto the floor. It had been her mother’s, and she pressed the two broken pieces together, trying to will them to be whole again. Over in the corner, in a dozen pieces, lay the shattered pitcher that had sat in the basin. She had very little of value: some jewelry that the two outlaws had not found; what little bit of money she had managed to save, along with the fifty dollars Cole had left for her, hidden under a board in the floor; and two nice dresses, trimmed in fine lace, that were too nice to wear for any occasion in Cheyenne.
One of them had served as her wedding dress when she was young and naive enough to marry Tyson Cagle, who had worked in his father’s bank in Omaha. How dashing Tyson had seemed to the innocent girl of sixteen. And after only twelve months of marriage, when she was carrying his child, her dashing husband dashed off with a substantial sum of the bank’s money and the fourteen-year-old daughter of the bank’s vice president. No one knew where they had fled, and nothing had been heard of either of them ever again. She had been left three months pregnant with no place to go but back to her father’s house, only to lose the baby one month later.
She sighed. She hadn’t thought about that time in her life for quite a while. After all, that was over four years ago, and many things had happened in her life since then. She was a different person from that innocent girl now, with a more callous attitude toward whatever life placed in her path. She picked up the wedding dress from the floor and held it before her at arm’s length. She could still wear it, she thought, but it would now be a good deal tighter than when she had stood before the preacher.
Deep in thought, she was suddenly distracted by a soft sound behind her. She turned to discover a dark form in the dim light of the hallway, a rifle hanging casually in one hand. Startled then, she involuntarily gave a little cry of surprise.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” the man said. “The door was open. I was just fixin’ to knock.”
“Cole?” Mary Lou questioned, not certain. “Cole Bonner?”
“Yes, ma’am, it’s me,” he answered. “What happened to your door?” he asked, just then realizing it was open because it had been split from the jamb.
“That’ll take a little time to tell if you wanna know the whole story. What are you doing here? I wasn’t sure we’d ever see you again. When you and Harley left Cheyenne, I thought you were going to spend the winter with Harley’s Crow friends.”
She told herself that she should have expected him, because it seemed that every time Slade Corbett showed up in town, Cole followed soon after.
“I reckon I’m not too good at lyin’ around an Indian village when I have some unfinished business to tend to,” he said.
“You’re supposed to be resting up, letting that wound heal,” she lectured him. “How is it? There hasn’t been enough time for that wound to heal. Here, let me look at it.” She stepped forward to see for herself, causing him to step backward.
“It’s all right,” he said. “It’s healin’ up just fine. What happened to your door?”
Instead of answering his question right away, she paused to look at him closely for a long moment, and it occurred to her that she cared about what happened to him. In fact, she cared very much, and it contradicted her insensitive attitude toward men in general. She realized then that he was staring at her, puzzled by her failure to answer him.
“It got kicked in,” she finally answered. She went on then to tell him the whole story of Slade Corbett and Jose Sanchez’s return to Cheyenne.
He listened patiently until she was finished before commenting. “So that’s why there ain’t anybody at the front desk. I thought that was kind of strange.” He paused to decide what he should do. “The posse left this mornin’ to go after ’em?” he asked.
“About an hour before you showed up like a ghost at my door,” Mary Lou replied.
He had to stop again and think for a second. He had not expected to cross Slade’s trail so soon. He was tired and hungry, but the trail was too fresh to tarry. By the look of the dark sky, it looked as if snow might fall at any minute. A six-man posse should leave an easy trail to follow, but even that could be quickly covered by a snowstorm.
“Have they got anybody that’s good at trackin’?” he asked, for there was always the possibility that the posse could lose the tracks and lead him off the outlaws’ trail.
“Sam Vickers calls himself a good tracker,” Mary Lou said. “I don’t really know. Shorty Doyle’s with them. He might be a good one. He hunts a lot.”
Cole considered that for a moment before his thoughts shifted to Joe. His horse needed to rest before he pushed him hard again. But he felt that he couldn’t afford to get much farther behind the posse. Watching him closely, Mary Lou could see the indecision in his eyes.
“Cole,” she pleaded, “you’ve got no business heading out after those men now. You look tired as hell to me. Why don’t you give the men a chance to catch up with those two murderers? Slade Corbett is badly wounded. I know that for a fact, because Maggie and I both shot him. The hallway is covered with his blood. He might not make it very far as it is. There’s no sense you killing yourself trying to catch up to a dying man. Gordon Luck is leading the posse. He’s a good man. He’ll catch up with them.”
“Maybe,” Cole said. “I’ve got to see for myself.”
His conscience, and his solemn vow over Ann’s grave, gave him no choice but to verify Slade Corbett’s and Sanchez’s death. His thoughts turned back to Joe again. The big Morgan had traveled hard since his camp more than twenty miles north of Cheyenne. Cole had planned to buy some grain for him and figured he’d have plenty of time to rest before starting out again. It had stood to reason that it would take some time to find anyone who could give him a clue as to where to start looking for Slade Corbett. He hadn’t figured on picking up a hot trail as soon as he rode into town. But his common sense told him that it would be a mistake to push Joe beyond the horse’s limit at any rate. He might find himself walking across a snowy prairie if he mistreated the horse. Finally he made the decision that he knew to be the right one.
“I’ve gotta let my horse rest before I can start out again,” he said.
“Well, that sounds like a sensible thing to do,” Mary Lou told him. “I’m thinking your horse isn’t the only one that needs to rest.” She gave him a critical look then. “When’s the last time you’ve had something to eat?”
He had to pause a moment to recall. “Not long ago,” he said. “Yesterday sometime.”
She shook her head, exasperated with his neglect for himself. “I was going to the pump to fill this bucket when you showed up. While I’m doing that, you can take your horse to the stable and unsaddle him. There ain’t anybody in the stable, either, so go ahead and give him some grain. When you’re done with that, come on in the dining room and I’ll fix some breakfast for you. You can’t go off to get yourself killed on an empty stomach.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said. Something in her tone discouraged him from protesting, so he turned and walked to the outside door at the end of the hall. Mary Lou stepped out into the hallway to watch him depart.
One-track mind, she thought, then compared him to the husband she had known briefly, and wondered how it would be to have a man so dedicated to her by her side. She cautioned herself not to become any more interested in Cole Bonner. No woman was likely to drive the memory of Ann Bonner from his mind.
It mattered little, she thought then. He’s riding a trail that will probably lead him to his death, anyway. Don’t give him a permanent hold on your heart.
• • •
As fate chose to play it, Sanchez and Corbett fled the town of Cheyenne, heading straight north for a couple of miles. And had they continued on along that path, they might have chanced upon an encounter with the man who hunted them, for Cole had ridden that very road toward Cheyenne. It was not to be, however, because the two outlaws changed directions after riding only two miles, leaving the road to strike out on a more western course. Their trail was easily followed by the posse over the light blanket of snow that had fallen two days before. And while Cole ate the hearty breakfast Mary Lou prepared for him, Gordon Luck and his men paused to rest their horses at the two outlaws’ camp of the night before.
“That son of a bitch is still bleedin’ like a stuck hog,” Sam Vickers said, pointing to several spots of blood in the snow.
“Maybe we won’t be chasin’ but one man before we’re done,” Shorty Doyle speculated. “Ol’ Maggie blasted him head-on with that shotgun. Maybe he’ll bleed out before much longer.”
“Maybe so,” Luck allowed as he looked over the campsite, trying to get a picture in his mind of the outlaws’ desperation. “They coulda found a better place to camp. There ain’t no water here, so they had to melt snow to make coffee, if they had any coffee. It wasn’t much of a fire they built.” He looked around him at the barren rock formations, not surprised that wood for a fire had been pretty difficult to find. The impressions in the snow close to the ashes gave him an idea that the wounded man was literally hugging the fire in an effort to keep from freezing. “I’m thinkin’ they made camp here because Corbett couldn’t go any farther without stoppin’ to rest. So let’s get after ’em. There’s a good chance they might have to find someplace to hole up, if he can’t go any farther.”
After walking and leading their horses for half an hour, they climbed aboard again and continued following the obvious trail left by the outlaws.
It was the middle of the afternoon when they approached Chugwater Creek. “We’d best rest the horses for a while,” Luck said. “We can water ’em and take time to make some coffee at the creek.”
It was a welcome suggestion to the rest of the posse. The afternoon had turned much colder with the sun hidden behind heavy clouds, which threatened the possibility of snow.
“That sure as hell suits me,” Harold Chestnut said. “I’m so cold I can’t hardly feel nothin’ in my legs.”
They were the last words he spoke before a .54-caliber slug knocked a hole in his chest, and he slid sideways from his saddle, dead before he hit the ground.
Startled by the crack of the Spencer carbine, the other five members of the posse panicked when Chestnut fell. There was no cover close by the treeless creek banks, and their efforts resulted in a tangle of horses as they tried to turn them in an attempt to retreat. The carbine spoke again and Douglas Green clutched his chest and fell to the ground beneath the horses’ hooves, causing them to rear up to avoid his body. They were at the mercy of the unseen sniper, and one of the rearing horses screamed when it was struck in the neck. Sam Vickers was just able to jump from the saddle before the injured horse fell.
“Get back outta range!” Gordon Luck blared amid the yelling of the men and the screaming of the frightened horses. Finally able to get their horses untangled, the ambushed posse galloped in retreat with Vickers sprinting behind them on foot. Being the opportune target, he made it only thirty or forty yards before a bullet in the back ended his run.
At a full gallop, Gordon Luck led the other two survivors up a ravine between two rock formations, where he pulled his horse to a halt. Shorty Doyle and Benny Swartz were close on his heels, and they reined their horses to a sliding stop. Harold Chestnut’s horse followed them into the ravine. Still in a state of shock, Swartz stared wide-eyed at Luck, making small whining noises, scarcely believing he was still alive. Shorty, wide-eyed as well, said the obvious.
“They bushwhacked us!”
“Where’s Vickers?” Luck asked.
“He didn’t make it,” Shorty said. “I saw him go down. I was lookin’ back for him to try to get him to swing up behind me, but he wasn’t quick enough.”
“I’ll pray for him and the others, too,” Luck said. “We’ve got to figure out what’s the best thing to do now—three of us gone.” He shook his head in disbelief, unable to understand how the Lord could let that happen when they were in the right. “We’ll have to be more careful how we go from here.”
“I’ll tell you, Reverend, the best thing for me is to get the hell outta here before they decide to come after us to finish the job,” Swartz said, having taken control of his emotions somewhat.
“You don’t mean that, Benny,” Luck said. “We owe it to the three good men who got shot down to punish their murderers. Sometimes the Lord works in mysterious ways, sacrificing some so that others might fulfill their destiny.”
“Benny’s right,” Shorty said. “His ways is a little too mysterious to suit me. There ain’t no use in the rest of us hangin’ around here till they pick off every one of us. We ran ’em outta town. That’s enough for me. I’m goin’ with Benny.”
“What about the ones we lost?” Luck said. “Sam Vickers, Harold Chestnut, and Douglas Green—they’re our friends and neighbors. We can’t just leave them here. Douglas has a wife and child. What will we tell them if we don’t take him home?”
“Well, that is a problem, and somethin’ we surely oughta do,” Benny said. “It’s a terrible thing that happened here today, but we can’t go back there now. I reckon there’s nothin’ we can do for those poor souls but pray for ’em and maybe come back another day to get the bodies.”
Luck wasn’t happy with the prospect of abandoning the dead, but there was no question that it was tantamount to suicide to ride back toward that open creek bank to retrieve the bodies. Already burdened with a feeling of responsibility for their deaths, he didn’t like the prospect of facing Douglas Green’s widow. But he could think of no safe way to go back for the dead at this point.
“You two go on back to Cheyenne,” he finally decided. “You’re right. There’s no way to pick up the dead without gettin’ somebody else shot.”
Benny didn’t understand. “Well, what are you gonna do?”
“I’m gonna stay here and keep an eye on that creek bank,” Luck told him. “I’m not leavin’ our dead for the buzzards to fight over.” When Shorty started to protest, Luck went on. “I’m not thinkin’ about playin’ the hero. I’m just hopin’ to wait Corbett and the Mexican out. I figure they’ll move on when they’re sure we ain’t gonna make another try, and we’ve turned tail and run. When they leave, I’ll pick up Vickers and the others. Leave Harold’s horse with me to carry the bodies.”
“If that’s what you think best,” Shorty said, feeling no guilt for abandoning Luck. “Maybe me and Benny can round up a few more to come back and help you carry them back. We’ll bring a wagon to haul ’em in.”
It occurred to him that there was a strong possibility that they might find Luck among the dead if they did come back. But it was his decision to stay. Shorty looked at Swartz. “Let’s go, Benny.”
Luck watched them for a few moments as they rode out of the bottom of the ravine. Then he dismounted and crawled up to the rim to a point where he could see the three bodies lying out in the treeless apron before the creek.
• • •
A self-satisfied smile spread slowly across Sanchez’s unshaven face.
Like shooting fish in a barrel, he thought as he watched the broad expanse of open range for any sign of a counterattack. Lying on his belly in the shallow trench he had fashioned in the creek bank, he reloaded the Spencer carbine he carried.
Come on, he thought. I’ve got plenty more bullets.
Behind him, closer to the water’s edge, and shielded from view by a tangle of dead berry bushes, Slade lay close to the horses. Sanchez looked back at his wounded partner and scowled. Once the leader of the small band of outlaws that followed him, Slade was feared by every man who rode with him.
Look at him now, Sanchez thought. He lies there like a slaughtered pig.
Sanchez was convinced that he had effectively stopped any advance upon the creek as long as it was light. But as far as he could tell, there were three of the posse left taking cover in the ravine. There would be no more than a few hours of daylight left, and he did not like the possibility of the three sneaking up on him after dark. Slade would be of little value in defense of the camp, even though he claimed to need only a little rest. So Sanchez intended to leave the creek and find a better place to camp. He briefly considered the odds of successfully leaving his position on the bank and collecting the weapons and ammunition from the bodies. Regretfully he rejected the notion, thinking that he would then be the one subjected to sniper fire from the ravine.
Feeling certain now that the three in the ravine had no intention of risking their necks before darkness, Sanchez drew back from his position. Moving quickly back to Slade and the horses, he told the wounded man it was time to go.
“We got maybe two hours of daylight before those bastards try again. Best we be gone when they get here. You rested enough to ride?”
“Yeah,” Slade grunted with a painful grimace. “I can ride.”
Maybe, Sanchez thought, but not good enough to suit me. He had already decided that Slade would slow him down too much.
“Come on,” he told him, “I help you to other side of creek. Then I get horses ready to ride.”
Sanchez boosted Slade up to get a foot in the stirrup, then watched him as he groaned to throw his other leg over. It was enough to confirm Sanchez’s decision. He was not one to care for a wounded comrade at any rate. He stepped up on his horse, took Slade’s reins, and led his horse over to the other side of the Chugwater. Once across, he dismounted and said, “There, you on this side now, nice and dry. I help you down so you don’t have to sit in the saddle while I go see if those bastards still behind those rocks.” Slade was in too much pain to object, so he let Sanchez pull him out of the saddle again. “Damn, you still bleeding,” Sanchez said. “You sit here, wrap this blanket around you, and take it easy till I get back.” After Slade had seemed to settle himself against a large rock, Sanchez bobbed his head up and down a few times as if seriously thinking something over. Then he said, “I think I lead the horses over behind those bushes so they don’t be easy to see.”
Slade sat there, infuriated by the pain he was suffering, and frustrated by his inability to stop the bleeding. His shirt and trousers were soaked with blood from the many open wounds left by Maggie Whitehouse’s shotgun, and the bullet wound in his thigh threatened to swell until it split. And having to be helped by the insensitive Sanchez was irritating at best.
If I could get on my horse without help, I’d shoot the son of a bitch, he thought. It occurred to him then that it had gotten awfully quiet.
“What the hell is takin’ so long?” he called out. “We’ve got to move from here.”
When there was no answer from beyond the clump of bushes, Slade turned to look, just in time to see Sanchez riding over a low rise, almost a quarter of a mile away, leading his horse behind him.
“Damn you!” Slade bellowed, realizing that he had been left to die.
He pulled his pistol from his holster and emptied it at the rapidly disappearing target, knowing it was useless since Sanchez was already beyond reasonable pistol range. Still, he hoped that one of the six shots might have been lucky enough to find its mark.
He remained there, sitting against the rock, fuming, his anger so intense that he didn’t feel any sense of the numbing cold. Determined to live, and too mean to die, he stared out across the quiet creek, waiting for someone to come seek him, certain that they would. All he lived for now was the chance to take out his vengeance on someone.
• • •
Having heard the six pistol shots in rapid succession, Gordon Luck scrambled up the hill where the top of the ravine ended. There was no sign of anyone, but he knew now that they must still be on the banks of the creek somewhere. He was beginning to question his decision to remain in this spot. If they had not left yet, could it mean that they were waiting for darkness to come after him, and what were they shooting at? If it was their plan to stalk him, then it would be Sanchez, for it was doubtful that Corbett was able to. He was still turning it over in his mind when a small movement on the prairie caught his eye. He squinted, trying to see more clearly. Then he realized he was seeing two horses racing toward the horizon, close to a mile away and fading rapidly.
They were running again! But what were the shots he had heard? Without waiting any longer, he decided to take a chance that it hadn’t been a trick to lure him out in the open.
With Chestnut’s horse behind him, he rode back down to the foot of the ravine and waited there for a few minutes before leaving the protection of the rocks. When there were no shots fired from the creek, he dismounted and walked to Vickers’ body, being careful to keep his horse between him and the creek. There were still no shots fired, so he walked down closer to the creek where the other two bodies lay. Again there were no additional shots fired. Satisfied that there was no one left, he began the chore of loading the dead on the horses. A powerful man, he managed to heft the bodies up, two of them on Harold Chestnut’s horse, and the other on his. With his grim cargo secured, he started back to Cheyenne.
He had ridden about two miles when he spotted a lone rider coming his way. He assumed it was either Shorty or Benny on his way back to help with the dead, having felt a twinge of guilt for leaving them. In case it was not one of them, however, he made sure his rifle was riding easy in the saddle sling. As the rider approached, he realized it was not one of the ill-fated posse, but a man sitting tall in the saddle, a stranger to him, for he had never met Cole Bonner. Luck reined his horse back as the rider pulled up before him.
“You’d be Gordon Luck, I reckon,” Cole said in greeting.
Surprised that the stranger knew him, Luck replied, “That’s a fact. How’d you know that? I don’t recall makin’ your acquaintance.”
“I met two of your friends back there a ways,” Cole said. “They told me about the trouble you fellers had.”
“Yeah, I’m afraid we came out on the short end when we caught up with those two outlaws. And if you’re gonna keep ridin’ the way you’re headed, I oughta warn you that you might run up on ’em.”
“That’s what I’m hopin’,” Cole said.
Luck studied the young stranger’s face more closely. “You’re Cole Bonner, ain’t you?” Cole nodded in reply. Luck continued. “I’ve heard about you, and the task you’ve set for yourself. I reckon it don’t make much sense to warn you to be careful. You sure oughta know who you’re dealin’ with.”
“I reckon,” Cole said. “Your two friends said Corbett and his partner are holed up at Chugwater Creek.”
“Not no more,” Luck said. “They’ve left there now. That’s the only reason I was able to pick up our dead.”
Cole took a second look at the bodies draped across the horses. “That’s bad luck, all right. How far is it to the creek?”
“I’d say about two miles, maybe a little bit more,” Luck estimated.
Cole squinted as he looked at the low clouds obscuring the sun, thinking that it must be close to sundown. “I best be gettin’ along,” he said. “It’s gonna be dark pretty soon. Maybe I can get to the creek before it gets too dark to pick up a trail.” He nudged Joe with his heels.
“Good huntin’,” Luck called after him as he rode away. “And keep a sharp eye. Those two are the devil’s disciples, and that’s a fact.”
“Much obliged,” Cole replied without looking back.