The girl had not yet furnished her cabin fully and Cato had to spread his blankets on a mattress on the floor of the spare room. It suited him; he had slept in far worse places. But there was not much give in the fiber mattress itself, laid over bare boards and he figured, after waking several times, that he might have been more comfortable out on the ground where he could have at least dug a hole for his hip. Or maybe the small sofa in the parlor might give him more comfort, even if he had to sleep with his legs curled up all night.
In any case, he stuck it for several hours, tossing and turning, trying to get comfortable but not achieving this state. Finally he reckoned he would move into the parlor and take over the sofa for the night.
He groped around in the darkness—there was little light spilling through the one window—and picked up his blankets and boots: it was an old habit to keep his boots handy with his gunrig wherever he slept. He was a man who sometimes had to be up and running fast with only a split second between sleep and full wakefulness and a pair of boots ready to slip on made all the difference.
He didn’t want to disturb the girl and padded across the room silently in his stockinged feet, blankets bundled under one arm, gunrig and boots in his free hand. Cato groped his way down the short passage, past Marnie’s bedroom, to the beaded curtains that hung across the doorway to the kitchen. Crossing this room—lit by a faint glow from the banked fire in the wood stove—Cato dropped a blanket, muttered a curse and stooped to pick it up. As he straightened, he was looking directly at the rear door and there was a gap between the door edge and the frame. He froze as he saw a flare of flame through the crack.
He let the rest of the blankets fall to the floor and swiftly buckled his gunrig around his waist. Keeping an eye on the crack, seeing the glow of a fire of some sort out there, he pulled on his boots and moved across to the door, gun in hand. The Enforcer put his eye to the crack between the door edge and the frame and sucked down a sharp breath.
Outside in the yard, he could see the silhouettes of two men as they huddled around two pinecone torches, fanning the flames to life. He didn’t hesitate. He fumbled at the door latch and swore as it jammed. He had to strain against the panel to free the latch tongue and it came loose with a rush, clattering. By the time he had wrenched the door open and dropped to one knee, the men had let the torches fall and were running into the darkness across the yard.
Cato fired at a dark shape, knew instantly he had missed when he heard the lead clang off an old iron wagon tire hanging over the fence palings. Two guns spat death at him from the darkness and bullets chewed splinters from the edge of the doorway as he launched himself through and sprawled full length in the dirt of the yard. The Manstopper roared twice in quick succession and he heard a man grunt as lead thumped into him out there in the darkness. Only one gun replied now, but it was a deadly shot and kicked gravel into Cato’s face, stinging his eyes. He rolled to the side as the gun blasted again and lead slammed into the ground where he had been a moment before.
Boots rattled against the palings of the fence and he knew that one of the men was climbing over. He spun around so that he had a ground-level view, hoping to spot the man’s silhouette against the stars. But the man went over low and Cato missed seeing him. The other man, wounded, triggered three wild shots and Cato turned his gun towards the flashes and dropped hammer. He heard the man’s body thud back to the ground and then he was up and running forward, gun cocked and ready to shoot into the man again, but there was no more movement.
Cato reached the fence, stumbling and skidding to hands and knees, as he heard a horse start up and race away on the far side. Cato swore, not able to see a gate. He leapt at the tall palings, hooking an arm over the top, swinging up his leg and hanging there, catching a glimpse of a rider moving away fast, hunched in leather. Hanging there precariously, Cato swung his right hand over and triggered a wild shot, knowing he had little hope of hitting the rider. The horse continued on and, just before turning out of the lane, the rider hipped and blasted his last two shots back in Cato’s direction.
Cato dropped back to the yard and snapped his gun up but relaxed when he saw it was only Marnie Hendry running across the yard in her nightgown. He kicked against the man he had downed and scraped a vesta into flame, kneeling swiftly.
The girl halted and he heard her gasp. He shook out the vesta flame immediately. The dead man wasn’t a pretty sight: one of the bullets had hit him in the face. Cato straightened and looked into the girl’s face, seeing a lantern glowing at the window of the house next door.
“Looks like I guessed right, anyway,” Cato said. “I came to the right place when I came to Concho ... Two hombres on the train tried to nail me, now two more tried to burn your cabin down …”
“Heavens! There’s no law here, John. The sheriff has to come from Timbertop.”
“To hell with that. I’ll handle it myself. You got a horse?”
“No. You’re not going after them?”
“One hombre vamoosed. I aim to track him down. You go back inside. I’ll handle things, Marnie.”
Her fingers dug into his arm. “John ... I’m—I’m scared.”
“You’ll be all right. It’s me they want. And I’ll be right out where they can get at me. I want to draw ’em out into the open.”
The girl started to protest again but Cato didn’t have time to argue and he bundled her back inside hurriedly. By that time, neighbors had arrived to see what all the shooting was about and Cato identified himself, ordered two men to take the dead man down to the undertakers and commandeered a horse from another man. He was riding before dawn, heading out in the direction he had heard the fleeing gunman take.
But he didn’t know this country, only had a general idea of it from maps. As he recalled, behind Concho, the trails ran across the flats and all converged on the rising range known as the Indian Hills. He was sure this was where the man was headed: he reckoned he wouldn’t hang around town. A stranger would be too noticeable in a town like Concho and, anyway, most likely he had only been hired to set fire to the girl’s house and then quit this neck of the woods.
So Cato rode for the hills along the dark trail, dismounted when he came to the foothills and made a cold camp until sunup. Then he examined the trail and his hunch paid off: he had no trouble picking up the tracks left by the fleeing horse, fresh and deep and plain as a pointing arrow.
But, after an hour’s riding, by which time he was deep into the range, surrounded by heavy timber and boulder-shot slopes, the tracks had petered out. Or, not so much petered out as they had been covered. The man had calmed down apparently after his first panicky flight and had taken time to cover his trail. But he hadn’t been good enough. Though his tracks had been obliterated fairly well along the actual trail, he had neglected to do a thorough job where he had left the trail and started into the timber. It was just a faint curve of a horseshoe in the loose earth, scooped up into a small pile by the horse slipping and scrabbling for a foothold. In the slant of the early sun, it was easy for an experienced tracker like Cato to see. It pointed the way the killer had taken and Cato moved ahead on foot, leading his mount, rifle in hand. He knelt occasionally to examine an overturned rock with the dark patch where it had rested in the earth showing plainly, not yet dried by the sun. It didn’t mean that he was all that close behind the killer as the timber was thick and not much sunlight penetrated in that part. Just the same, he wasn’t all that far behind and he wondered about that, for the man had had a good lead.
When he came to long streaks in the earth on the other side of the slope, he knew why. The man hadn’t tried to cover them: to do so would have meant leaving sign that was even easier to discern than the original. But the marks told Cato something he hadn’t suspected until now. The horse had been hit by one of his bullets. There was a couple of faint smears of brownish blood to confirm this. It probably wasn’t a bad wound, but with the rider pushing it hard and into rugged, rising country like this, the wound was beginning to tell on the animal.
Cato hoped the man would keep climbing and not strike out across the face of the slope or even go downhill. That way he might stand a chance of overhauling him.
It occurred to him, too, that the man didn’t seem, to be fleeing wildly any longer. There was a direction to his tracks: he knew where he was going. Maybe there was a pass through the hills that Cato didn’t know about. Maybe he was aiming to rendezvous with a pard ... in which case, Cato had better start keeping an eye out for trouble. But he somehow didn’t think this was it. There was no particular reason, just his hunch, that the killer was on the run, making for someplace to hole up. He might turn and fight like a cornered rat when he reached it, of course, or he might simply go to earth and hope that he had thrown Cato …
He came out onto a cleared grassy slope and he moved up and down, within the line of trees, crouching, squinting, trying to get the sunlight in the right position so he could see where the horse had made passage across. Faint shadows and hollows marked the path taken by the killer and it seemed to lead towards a ledge with a great pile of boulders at one end.
Even as Cato saw this he smelled the faint tang of woodsmoke in the air and froze. He couldn’t believe that the man he was trailing would be loco enough to stop and build a campfire! Crouching, he looked around slowly, trying to discern any hazy updraught of smoke against the pale blue of the sky, but there was nothing. His nostrils distended as he sniffed again. It wasn’t a ‘live’ smell; more like the lingering dankness of smoke from a fire that had been doused with water ... or coffee dregs!
Yes, a definite odor of coffee dregs, and he knew damn well his man hadn’t had time to stop, build a fire, brew coffee, drink some, and then use the dregs to extinguish the fire. But a man who was waiting for the two men to return after setting fire to the girl’s house in Concho could have done those things …
He had guessed wrongly. Cato knew that even before the rifle whiplashed from that boulder clump and put a bullet cleanly through the head of his horse. The animal reared and crashed over onto its side, sliding and skidding away, legs kicking in a final convulsion. Cato threw himself sideways and back, rolling, desperately for the cover of a tree. Bullets followed his movement, kicking up dirt and grass and stones, finally ripping a long line of bark off the trunk of the tree just above his head.
It had been a bad guess, all right. Not only was there a man with a rifle up on that ledge, well-protected by the boulders, but there was another man slightly downslope, behind a deadfall, catching him in a crossfire. If they had waited just a little longer, until he had moved away from the line of trees, they would have had him cold. But someone had gotten impatient and opened fire just a mite too soon, while he was still able to use the trees for cover.
And he needed all the cover he could get! The rifles opened up again, pinning him, while bark and splinters and clods of earth rained around him. During the lull—he reckoned it must be time for them to reload—Cato threw his rifle to his shoulder and triggered two swift shots at a movement he saw up on the ledge. His bullets left gray streaks on the rocks, whining away in ricochet. He swore. The man up there had himself fine protection. Cato ducked swiftly as lead from downslope tipped the crown of his hat and ripped the felt, knocking the hat askew. He spun and fired a swift volley, as fast as he could work lever and trigger, seeing bark spray into fine powder along the edge of the deadfall. That man down there didn’t have as good protection as the one up on the ledge but, as long as he didn’t poke his head up too far, he would be able to dodge Cato’s lead and help keep the Enforcer pinned down. Unless Cato changed positions with him. And pronto. He glanced up at the ledge. The man up there must be about reloaded by now; for sure there would be some cartridges in the magazine tube and he would only have to throw the rifle to his shoulder and start shooting as soon as Cato showed himself. But, if there were only five cartridges in, with two or three more to go, then it was a better chance than if he waited until the man was fully reloaded.
Cato leapt up abruptly, lunged for the tree downhill about three yards away, skidded behind it as the deadfall killer triggered, then, barely pausing, dived for the next tree downslope, snatching at the trunk with one arm and spun himself around it fast, keeping the tree between him and the rifle while the man fired. Then Cato went forward across the open ground, legs driving, mouth wide open to gulp down as much air into his lungs as possible, arms pumping, the rifle’s weight throwing him off balance a little but the slope of the ground helping to compensate for it. His sudden charge threw the man behind the deadfall: it was the last thing he had expected, and it seemed it had also caught the man on the ledge off guard, too, for he was halfway to the deadfall before either man started to shoot.
Cato instantly started zigzagging and brought his own rifle up and across his chest. He saw that the man behind the deadfall was on his feet now, trying to lead him, sighting carefully, his rifle barrel trying to follow his wild maneuvering. The rifle roared and Cato didn’t hear the shot. He saw dirt spout in front of him, and then he was leaping onto the deadfall and lunging forward as the startled killer tried to back-pedal and fell over. Cato jumped down and brought up the butt of the rifle in a sweeping arc. It smashed the other man’s gun from his grasp, caught him a glancing blow on the jaw and sent him sprawling back again. But he wasn’t finished. He snatched at Cato’s ankle and prevented the Enforcer from dropping down behind the deadfall for cover. The rifle on the ledge whiplashed three times and Cato felt the mule-kick in his side and was knocked spinning. The man holding his boot tried to grab his knees but Cato instinctively kicked out, sending him sprawling. His breath was hot and ragged in his throat and his side was numbed. Through the blurring red haze in front of his eyes he saw the man snatching at his six-gun and Cato brought the rifle around one-handed and triggered. The muzzle was only inches from the killer and his body was blown back a couple of yards by the impact, a tremendous hole torn out of his back by the bullet’s exit.
Before the man had hit the ground, Cato rolled away down the slope, hearing more bullets from the rifleman on the ledge whining off the deadfall. He clamped his arm tight against his side as he ran down the hillside towards the thicker timber. He felt the air whip of lead past his face and he instinctively moved to the left, then back again to the right, pounding for the timber, breathing hard, feeling the blood pouring from the wound in his side. The trees seemed to be lurching and the ground under his pounding boots was like the rolling sea, heaving up and falling away. He whipped his head aside involuntarily as bark from the closest tree tore loose and sap splattered into his face. Then he was past the first tree, the second, the third, and there were trees all round him. He heard a couple of bullets ricochet and then there was silence again as the gunman paused to reload.
Cato dearly wanted to stop and rest but knew now was the time to get as much timber between him and that ledge as he could. But he did slow down and ripped the kerchief from round his neck and stuffed it inside his shirt over the wound. He couldn’t tell if the bullet had gone in or merely burned a deep furrow in the flesh, but there was certainly a lot of bleeding and all this running wasn’t helping. But it would help a sight less if he stopped. He didn’t know who this shooting might bring. If one man was camped, waiting for the men to return from Concho, there could be others and they might well be drawn by the sounds of gunfire.
He was using the trees now to help him, cannoning into them, clawing at them one-handed, easing himself around the trunks, and stumbling, gasping, for the next. He worked his way downhill this way. There was no shooting now and he reckoned the man would be coming after him. The ground suddenly fell away from under him and he yelled a little as he plunged down several feet, struck a mound of earth with a jar that threw him forward, both hands going out instinctively to help break the fall. He struck hard, the jar riding up both arms into his shoulders and neck and then his face plowed into the soft earth and he thought his neck would break as he twisted in a wild, flailing somersault. He landed flat on his back and his legs were dangling over a low bank into swiftly flowing water.
Dazed, still clinging desperately to his rifle, Cato shook his head and sat up, blinking. He was on the edge of a wide creek, deep, fast, with cutbanks either side. His hat rolled off, splashed into the water and was carried away swiftly. It caught on a snag in midstream and stayed there, the water rippling around it. As the roaring in his ears diminished he turned his head and looked back up the slope. He could hear a horse up there, working its way down through the timber. It seemed the man from the ledge didn’t aim to let him get away.
Cato couldn’t move far in his present condition and he knew he stood no chance of trying to wade or swim the creek. There was only one place to go and that was under the cutbank.
There was already a nest of water rats there and he slammed at them with his rifle butt as they snapped and squealed. He killed one and the body floated out to catch on his hat. The others scattered, squealing wildly. Cato, near exhausted, rolled under the shallow cutbank, water lapping his chest, the rifle gripped hard in cramped hands. He lay there and slowly his breathing settled down to near-normal and his vision cleared.
And the first thing he saw was a horse’s legs only a few feet in front of the cutbank as the killer put the animal down the edge of the stream out of the main current. The horse paused right in front of him and Cato cursed silently as he saw the body of the water rat and the fresh blood trailing away from it near his hat. The man would soon know that the rat had come from its nest under the bank very recently ...
Cato didn’t even stop to think it out: all he knew was he didn’t aim to lie there and be trapped, shot like a fish in a barrel. He lunged forward and out, coming up through the curtain of grass roots and thin brush that overhung the cutbank, even through the edge of the soft rich earth itself. He burst up as if coming out of the ground and he threw himself forward with a mighty effort, swinging the rifle by the barrel.
The startled rider, a red-haired man with a deep, livid scar on one side of his cheek from an old wound, hipped in the saddle and started to lift an arm defensively. The rifle smashed the arm aside brutally and Cato heard the bone crack. It broke the force of the swing to some extent but the brass plate on the rifle butt took the man on the side of the jaw and he lifted out of the stirrups, hitting the water with a wild splash, and was carried away swiftly by the mainstream current. Staggering forward, Cato grabbed the frightened horse and clambered awkwardly into the saddle even as the animal moved away. He fumbled a boot into the stirrup and clawed his way over the saddle, falling into the seat and almost dropping his rifle as he lay along the horse’s neck. He jammed his heels home and the animal whickered and lunged forward.
Cato turned it towards the bank and held on tightly as it lunged out of the water and onto solid ground. The man he had hit was floundering around in the water, struggling to get to the shallows, dazed, his jaw hanging open and slanted at an odd angle. He was no longer interested in Cato and the Enforcer had no time for him.
As the horse struggled out, he slid the rifle into the dripping scabbard beneath his right leg, bunched the reins and dropped forward as he yelled into the mount’s ear and urged it on at a fast clip. He clamped an arm against his side and wondered if he was going to make it out of these hills alive.