Chapter 37
The Ride

Pa ran to the barn.

“Blue Flame’s gone!” he yelled.

He ran back. “Nick, Alkali,” he said, “you round up whoever you can, like Rafferty said. I’m gonna ride after the sheriff and see if I can catch him and tell him to be back sooner’n an hour if he can. Otherwise, I’ll try to cut Zack off across the ridge if those two ride that direction and through Miracle on their way to wherever they’re going. I think I know where!”

Pa was already mounted and on his way as he was yelling out his instructions. “Fool kids!” he said to himself as he galloped after the sheriff. “Liable to get themselves killed, along with all the rest of us!”

Within two minutes everyone was gone, and it was just Katie and me and the two younger ones. Suddenly I realized we were alone, and I remembered the sheriff’s words about wondering if they had someone watching us. Buck Krebbs was sure familiar enough with our place!

I went inside to show Katie where Pa kept his rifle and I asked her if she knew how to use one. She said she did. Knowing Katie, I wasn’t surprised.

Mr. Jones got back first. He had Patrick Shaw and his eighteen-year-old son Caleb with him. Uncle Nick was next with two other nearby miners. All the men had rifles.

Pa and the sheriff came about twenty minutes later. Altogether they brought another six or seven men. Zack wasn’t with them.

I begged Pa to let me go. I promised to stay behind and out of the way.

“Not even if you had fifty thousand dollars, Corrie! I got two kids out there already, and that’s two too many.”

“About the money, Pa,” I said. “I think Mrs. Parrish might have done something awful to get it.”

He looked down at me from where he sat on his horse, wanting to ask me what I meant but knowing there was no time. Sheriff Rafferty was already explaining the plan to the men.

“Don’t worry, Corrie. I aim to do my best to get it back.”

He reined his horse around, joined the others, and after a few last-minute words, Pa took the saddlebags with the money and sped off over the hill to join the trail running east. The sheriff and the men waited about five minutes, then followed.

The rest of us went inside.

Everything was still and quiet for three hours. We heard nothing more until we heard a horse outside. It was Little Wolf, alone. The first thing I noticed was the blood on his arm.

Frantically I ran to him, shouting out questions. And between Little Wolf’s story and the information we got later that night, I found out all that had happened.

Pa rode east, then south across Washington Ridge, by Fowler Spring and Sailor Flat, over Buckeye Ridge, across Chalk Bluff Ridge and down into Deadman’s Flat. The whole time he was watching out, but never saw a soul. That was about an eight- or nine-mile ride.

He got there all right, found the Negro Jack sign, and tossed the saddlebags in the hollow stump. He said he didn’t think Krebbs had anybody there yet; they probably didn’t figure Pa’d be so quick getting the money. So Pa sat off to the side and waited, but he didn’t think anybody’d been watching or trailing him either. In ten minutes Sheriff Rafferty came with Uncle Nick and the rest of the men.

They split up. Pa took Mr. Shaw, Miss Stansberry’s brother Hermon, and Marcus Weber with him. Everyone else hid in the woods nearby waiting to see if Krebbs or anybody’d come for the saddlebags. Pa and his three men took off west, up on top of Chalk Bluff Ridge, then followed the ridge trail southwest so as to come around and down on the far side of Squires Canyon where the cave was.

Before they were even halfway along the ridge, right by Red Hill spring, they saw a rider coming toward them. Quickly they got off their horses and led them off the trail, drew their guns, and got ready for a fight. But when the rider got closer they put their guns away. It was Zack.

In the meantime, when we’d all been back at home, the minute Zack heard what Pa and the sheriff planned to do—and he had a big grin when he was telling about it!—he sneaked around the back of the cabin, gave Katie his message, and got Blue Flame out of the barn as quietly as he could. He said he knew Pa would say no if he asked, so he just didn’t ask. Little Wolf knew the woods better than any five men in Miracle put together, and he figured the two of them would have the best chance of rescuing Becky if she was in the cave. He saw Pa heading for town looking for him, but by that time he was way up on the side of Buck Mountain.

By the time Pa and the sheriff and the rest of the men were gathering at our place, he and Little Wolf were already crossing Scotts Flat halfway to Gold Run. When they got to Gold Run, they skirted the edge of town, rode up toward Dutch Flat, and turned off the road before they got to Blue Devil Diggings, so as not to be seen by anyone riding south out of Dutch Flat. They tied their horses, then walked slowly up to where Zack and I and Pa’d been before. Zack remembered the area pretty well and he knew from there they’d be able to get a good look down into the canyon and at the cave.

Sure enough, there were two men standing outside the mouth of it.

They slipped up closer, quietly, until they were within earshot.

The two men were Hatch and Krebbs.

“I’ll be back this evening,” Krebbs was saying. “If they ain’t brung the loot yet, I’ll bring ya some grub.”

Hatch said something, but Zack didn’t hear what it was.

“That ain’t none o’ yer concern, ya old buzzard!” Krebbs said. “You jist do what I says, an’ you’ll get yer cut. You stay put right where you are, and if anybody ’ceptin’ me comes around here, you blow their heads off. Ya got me, Hatch?”

Again Hatch said something.

“I know there ain’t nobody gonna come. There ain’t no way they gonna find where we got the kid if they had a year. But I want somebody here anyway, an’ that’s what I’m payin’ you fer.”

With that, Krebbs turned and rode off up the far end of the canyon.

Nick and Little Wolf spied out the area a bit more. They figured the horses were best where they were, not far from where we’d tied them when we rescued Uncle Nick. Then they set about a plan to lure Grizzly Hatch away from the cave.

For Little Wolf, that wasn’t so difficult, though it took them twenty or thirty minutes to get into place—Zack behind a boulder above the cave, Little Wolf down in the canyon, about fifty feet in front of it. When Zack signaled that he was ready, Little Wolf began making sounds to get Hatch confused—throwing his voice, making animal sounds, then a call like a wolf.

But Hatch wasn’t as easy to fool as Buck Krebbs had been. His beady eyes spotted Little Wolf almost as soon as the first bird-call was out of his mouth.

The first sign that he’d been seen was the explosion of Hatch’s shotgun. If Little Wolf hadn’t been mostly behind a tree, it might have been worse. As it was, some pieces of buckshot found his leg and wrist.

“I see ya, ya redskin varmint!” cried Hatch. “Let that learn ya not to come around here!”

Little Wolf started down the canyon, then looked back. When he saw Hatch wasn’t going to follow him, he knew he had to try something else. He pulled an arrow out of his quiver and let one sail toward Hatch, thunking into a pine tree about five feet away, exactly where he’d aimed.

That made Hatch mad, which was just what Little Wolf wanted.

“Why, you no good animal!” screamed Hatch in a rage. “You won’t take a warning! We’ll see if a belly full o’ buckshot is more to your liking!”

He tore down the hill after Little Wolf.

Little Wolf started to run, and for the first time he felt the pain in his leg. He tripped and fell just as Hatch released the load from the second barrel. It flew over Little Wolf’s head, ripping a six-inch piece of bark off a Ponderosa pine.

If he hadn’t fallen just then, Little Wolf would have been dead.

He jumped to his feet and flew down the canyon limping, hearing Hatch cursing behind him and fumbling to reload his gun. Within seconds Hatch was after him once more.

In the meantime, Zack scrambled down the hillside, went inside the cave, and found Becky. She was dirty, hungry, and afraid, but her spirit wasn’t broken. Zack said her first words to him were, “Hi, Zack. I was just getting ready to escape.”

He signaled her to be quiet, untied the ropes around her hands and feet, then picked her up in his arms. Cautiously they left the cave. Zack looked all about, heard Hatch yelling a hundred yards away, then made a dash with Becky down the hill into the canyon, then up the other side just like I’d done with Uncle Nick. Halfway up the opposite side, he heard the sharp report from Hatch’s gun again. He jumped in terror, nearly throwing Becky to the ground, knowing the danger his friend was in. But he continued on up the hill, finally put Becky down, and hand in hand they ran the rest of the way to the horses, where they fell onto the ground in exhaustion.

Twice more Zack heard Hatch fire. Every time he wondered if he’d ever see Little Wolf again.

Then came a long silence lasting five minutes or more. From far down the canyon came another shot. Almost the same instant, there was a rustle in the brush behind him. Zack turned. There stood Little Wolf, his face pale, sweat and dirt on his forehead, but smiling broadly.

“I finally managed to get the old goat chasing his own tail,” he said out of breath, “but he was not so easy a prey. He is a man of cunning, despite his look of a crazy old fool.”

“You’re hurt!” said Zack.

“Yes, I am hurt, but not badly. He is not so bad a shot either,” Little Wolf added with a tired smile, “for a man on the run. But, little one,” he said, kneeling down beside Becky, “you are safe and well?”

“Yes, Little Wolf,” said Becky. “Thank you for saving me.”

“Your brother is the one with courage. He came to me and told me we must save you.”

“We have to get out of here,” said Zack. “Come on, Becky. You and Little Wolf have to get home.”

“Where are you going, Zack?” asked Becky.

“I gotta get to Pa.”

“Let me ride the Chalk Bluff Ridge,” said Little Wolf. “I know it like my own hand.”

“No,” insisted Zack. “You must get home and out of danger. Your father must tend your wounds. But first, take Becky to Mrs. Parrish in Miracle. She will know what to do. Might be nobody’s at our place. Then you go to your father.”

Little Wolf looked into Zack’s face, so much younger than his own. “I will do as you say,” he said. “I am too weary to argue, and perhaps you are right.”

Little Wolf mounted his pony, and Zack handed Becky up in front of him. “Be careful until you are past Gold Run,” warned Zack.

Little Wolf rode off. Then Zack mounted Blue Flame, worked his way north, past Blue Devil Diggings, back across the Bear, and up Chalk Bluff until he regained the trail on the ridge. Then he swung Blue Flame northeast and made for Deadman’s Flat.