As they rode, Story questioned his new men, learning that Bell and Shaps did the most talking.
“They hit us around midnight,” Shaps said. “Most of us snoring. I remember jumping up, thinking stampede. Heard the gunshots, but there were too many for our two night herders. That’s when I realized we were being attacked.”
“Closer to four in the morn for us,” Bell said. “We were in the Cherokee Strip. They drove the herd right into the Spring River. Left them there. Must have lost ten or twenty, stuck in the mud, about the same number drowned. Couldn’t go after them, because we’d be sitting ducks trying to cross the river.”
“They didn’t steal your herds,” Story said.
“They would’ve,” Shaps said.
“They give you a warning twice,” Bell added. “Maybe. That’s what Ol’ Perkins told us.”
“What happened to your night herders?” Story asked.
Shaps frowned. Bell answered. “You know what a man looks like after he’s been caught in a stampede?”
Story cursed.
“No way of telling,” Shaps said softly, “if they were dead before the hooves flattened them like hotcakes.”
About a furlong later, Story drifted back to the new riders and found Bell. “Which way did they stampede the herd?”
“Hell, mister, I don’t . . . no, no, I reckon. Yeah, north.”
Shaps twisted in the saddle, but it was Drew Finley, to Story’s surprise, who answered first. “North. Last thing I remember seeing before those bastards give me this . . .” He patted his bad leg. “. . . was the North Star.”
* * *
Back at camp, just as the sun began to sink, Story swung off his horse and handed the reins to Cesar Lopez with an order, “Fetch the best night horse in Dalton’s string.” Taking the cup the cook had just filled, Story turned toward the crew. Dalton Combs was already standing, dropping his dishes in the wreck pan and stopping in front of Story. Jameson Hannah moved closer.
“I have a chore for you,” Story told the black cowboy. In the roughly four hundred miles they had traveled, Story had learned that the quietest rider, the best man at night, and one of the toughest men on the trail was the wiry Dalton Combs.
Combs nodded.
“Some grangers followed us out of Baxter Springs,” Story said. “Maybe a dozen. Maybe even more. Only four, five kept in sight. I figure they’ll camp somewhere, on this side of the river, but not that far away. They won’t have a campfire. They will have several guards. If I’m right, they’ll be coming after our herd. If another hunch is right, they’ll be camped south of us.”
Other plates and cups clanged into the tub of dishes the cook and wrangler would be washing on most evenings. A series of soft clicks revealed the rotation of several pistol cylinders, including Dalton Combs’s.
“Who’s on the first watch?” Story turned to Hannah.
“Luis and Ward.”
He nodded, looked at the gathering. “Peña, Melean. Join them.” Those two were veterans, and likely could handle a revolver on a running horse better than any of the remaining drag riders. “Martinez. I want you and Lopez watching the horse herd. Barley, you stay here with José. Make enough racket like you’re a full crew. But not so loud you stampede the cattle.” He dumped his coffee, untouched, onto the ground. “Rest of you, saddle a good horse. You new men, have my wrangler catch you good night horses. Pretend you’re riding herd and the air’s full of lightning strikes and electricity. Shuck your spurs. And anything else that’s likely to jingle or give you away. Watches. Coins. Leave them with José.”
“Mil gracias,” the Mexican said.
Ignoring the joke, unless the cook was being serious, Story swung back to Combs.
“We’ll meet you at the southern tip of the herd.”
With a grim nod, Combs stepped over the wagon tongue, stopping when Boone called out his name. The black man turned.
“One of those men,” Boone said, “rode with Missouri bushwhackers during the war. He’s not likely one to care much for your kind.”
Combs nodded. “That’s all right. I probably won’t like him much, either.” His head bobbed, and he grinned. “I appreciate the warning, Boone. You take care. All y’all, take care.”
The newspaper reporter scribbled notes, and when the men started for the remuda, he stepped in line with them.
“Mr. Cromwell,” Story said, “you should stay in camp.”
“But the story is with you, and I should follow the story.”
Story let his head bob. He liked a man, even a fool, who showed grit.
* * *
In an arroyo due south of the cattle’s bedding grounds, Story opened his saddlebags and pulled out strips of white cotton that he had cut from two shirts. “I want you boys to tie one of these around your necks,” he whispered, “over your bandannas, and another over your left arm.”
“Even if those clouds stick, as bright as that moon is, that’ll give us away,” Andrew Shaps said.
“That’s right. And maybe that way Stubbings or I won’t accidentally put a bullet through your breast. Tie them tight, boys. That’s how we sometimes did things on the vigilance committee up north.”
As the men came over to pluck out cotton cloth, Story heard the soft hoofbeats. Sam Ireland reached for his holstered revolver, but Story shook his head. He waited, and suddenly realized he felt chilled. Son of a bitch, he had started sweating. A coyote pup barked, but Story let out a breath. “It’s Combs,” he said, handed the saddlebags to Boone to continue passing out the markers, and nudged his horse up the banks of the arroyo.
The black rider eased his mount with such skill, Story didn’t see him until Combs and his blood bay gelding stood maybe twenty feet away.
“Boss,” he whispered.
“It’s me, Combs,” Story said.
A revolver’s hammer softly lowered, and rider and horse covered the distance. “They’re camped on a knoll. Mile and a quarter south of here.”
“How many?”
“Couldn’t get close enough to count, not with them on the high ground. Maybe a dozen. Maybe six more. Just no sure way of telling.”
Jameson Hannah brought his horse up the arroyo and toward Story.
“Two riders left, though,” Combs said.
“When?”
“Ten minutes.” He moved his arm toward the west. “My guess is that they’ll be making sure the cattle and boys are all comfortable.”
“You couldn’t kill them?” Hannah said.
“I could’ve killed one. But that would have ruined our surprise.”
“Can you kill them now?” Story asked.
“It’d be better if I had a partner.” He lifted his head toward the clouds. “Stubbings.”
“Get him,” Story said. “And go. Quiet, if possible.”
“If possible.” Combs’s gelding had already started down into the arroyo.
Story looked at Hannah. “Get the rest of the men up here. You’ll take half and hit the camp from the east. I’ll take the others and hit them from the west.”
“Good chance we will be outnumbered,” Hannah said.
“But they won’t be expecting us,” Story said.
That’s when the full moon began to move beyond the dark rain cloud, and Story whispered a curse that would have left Ellen fuming for a week.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Jameson Hannah took his men, including Story’s new hires, on a wide berth to the east. That left Boone with Story, Petty, Allen, and the newspaper reporter from Baxter Springs, who wouldn’t be any help. Maybe that’s why Story had let him tag along, especially now that the moon bathed enough light on the Indian Nations so that anybody could see the white strips of cotton around their necks and arms. They could see their faces, hats, chaps, and the nighthawks zipping across the cool skies.
In a muddy buffalo wallow, Story swung off his horse. “On foot,” he ordered, and saddles creaked as nervous men dismounted. Boone’s new boots sank into a miserabl
e soup.
“Cromwell,” Story said. “You stay here. Keep our horses, and keep them quiet.”
The newspaper reporter wet his lips. “How do I . . . do . . . that?”
Story swore, inhaled and exhaled, and whispered, “Try not to let them bolt when the shooting starts.”
Minutes later, Story climbed out of the wallow, motioned Petty and Allen to his left and Boone to his right, and they moved toward what folks in these parts might call a hill. One that, even if it had to be pushing ten o’clock in the evening, Boone could see as plainly as if he were looking through one of Oliver Wendell Holmes’s American stereoscopes.
Crouched, with revolvers drawn, already cocked, they moved through sweet grass and cactus. Heart slamming against his ribs, Boone tried to recall the last time he had felt this mixture of fear and exhilaration. He thought he saw the brief reddish glow from a cigarette or cigar. Seemed absolutely sure he saw a shooting star dash across the sky, only to realize that as bright as the damned moon was, he probably hadn’t seen a damned thing. He heard someone snort, or fart. In the back of his mind, he revisited the predawn discussions of his friends in the Confederate cavalry.
Then, somewhere in the brightness of darkness, a gun roared, and suddenly Boone was footing it toward the enemy, and the blood-curdling rebel yell escaped from his voice.
“Give them tyrants hell, boys!” someone screamed.
Forty yards later, Boone realized that it was he who had shouted.
A man charged down the hill, right toward him, probably didn’t even see him, and Boone felt the .44 buck in his hand, saw crimson spray out of the back of the man’s head, then damned near tripped over him, would have if his shoulder had not slammed into another running man. Boone spun, somehow kept his feet, and within seconds found himself charging into the camp of rustlers.
The first blasts from revolvers boomed like cannon. Now Boone heard merely faint pops. If anyone else cut loose with a battle cry, Boone could not hear. A horse reared, a muzzle flashed, a man with hands held above his head, slammed back onto the hill, to be met with the hooves of the horse’s forefeet. Orange flashes. Rising smoke bathed by moonbeams. A rider pursued a running man off to Boone’s right.
His legs felt light, but for a man who had spent the past year or more trekking up and down the mountains of western Montana Territory, he ran through the air.
A man stumbled before him, righted himself, tried to bring a massive Dragoon up, but the barrel of Boone’s Army Colt split the side of the man’s skull, and he toppled to Boone’s left. Someone behind him roared. The piercing scream of a man consumed by panic died quickly.
Two men dashed down the top of the rise, and Boone spun, thumbed back the hammer, squeezed the trigger. By this point, he felt no heat, no jerking in his hand, heard nothing but a peeling in his ears. Thumb eared back hammer, finger touched trigger, hammer fell. Boone glanced at the nipples on the cylinder, but saw only blurs. Yet he had felt nothing, so he knew his gun was empty. He slammed the barrel into a man’s side, saw him tumble, and Boone’s brain told him to stop. He shoved the Colt into his holster, reached down, jerked a double-action revolver from the man’s waist.
He could see horses now, even sabers slashing—but figured the latter to be his imagination, his insanity. A man stumbled in the distance. Boone stopped, spun, dropped, just as a bullet whistled past his ear. He raised the gun that felt different in his hand than a heavy Army Colt. Realized from the feel of the trigger that he did not have to pull back the hammer with his thumb. He squeezed. The big revolver spoke. He saw flame, smelled smoke, watched the man twist, stagger, and bring up his revolver. Boone’s next shot blew a hole in the gunman’s arm, glimpsed the rustler’s pistol spinning, sailing, flying from his right hand to his left. Boone stepped toward the man, fired again. The man dropped to his knees, and Boone squeezed the trigger, felt the buck in his hand, saw the man spinning to his right. By then Boone had lost count of how many rounds he had fired.
It did not matter. The man lay on the ground, his head propped up against the stump of an ancient, long-removed tree. Boone stared at the revolver and tried to remember where he had gotten this strange gun. He could remember Sergeant Thomas handing him the Army Colt, saying it was appropriate that a Yankee gun be used to take Yankee lives—just before Boone had started walking west.
A hand touched his shoulder. Boone turned, tried to shove the double-action pistol into his well-worn holster. The first two tries missed. The third left the gun in the mud. He just blinked and looked at the man.
The face seemed familiar. The voice sounded like Tom Allen’s.
“Son of a bitch, Mason. We done it. We’re still alive.”
* * *
He looked at the man he had shot to pieces. The face was drawn; the body bloodied. Boone counted four holsters on the man’s torso, all empty now, and the man’s head had been propped up against a corpse’s thigh. Blood seeped from both corners of his mouth. He appeared to grin.
“Done what I set out to do.” The man whispered, coughed, spit out phlegm. “Died game.”
“You ain’t dead yet,” one of Nelson Story’s conglomerates, that Andrew Shaps fellow, said.
Boone moved over toward Story, who stood over that white-bearded son of a bitch, Ben Fariss, who sported no more than a bloody bandage wrapped over his left hand. Story, on the other hand, was looking down the ridge, cursing.
“That inkslinging bastard. I told him to keep the horses. And they’re running seven ways from sundown.”
“Shut the hell up.” Boone turned toward the shout, found Jameson Hannah pointing to the north. “I don’t hear hooves. Maybe the herd’s not scattering.”
“What about Combs and Stubbings?” Sam Ireland asked.
“I think that’s them.” Boone didn’t know who answered, but after a minute, or ten minutes, two riders eased their mounts up the slope.
Yes, he realized, it was Combs. And Stubbings. Grim-faced black warriors. They rode up easily, and Combs swung out of the saddle and approached Story.
“Did you see that inkslinging son of a bitch?” Story demanded. “I told him to keep the . . .”
He saw the notebook Dalton Combs shoved toward him. He could see the bloodstains on the paper.
Story frowned, hung his head briefly, then raised his eyes and asked, “Dead?” Though everyone knew the answer.
“Yes, sir,” Combs said. “Reckon one of the grangers run up to him, shot him. He tried to get a horse, but me and Jordan rode up. It was Jordan who killed him. Killed the man who killed that newspaperman.”
Story took the bloodstained notebook and tossed it to the ground.
That’s when the ringing left Boone’s ears, and he could hear clearly, could even think like a sane man, and he turned to look at the dying bushwhacker, Will Ethridge, head propped up against a stump, being offered a cigarette by Tom Petty, and then the laughing old killer Ben Fariss.
“You boys dropped the ball,” Fariss said. “All I gots to do is tell the judge that here we sat, minding our own business, and you Texans jumped us. Us camped all peaceable, planning to see what kinds of fish was biting in the Neosho.”
Another voice, more wheezing than speaking, came out. “Die game . . . That’s . . . that’s what . . . I told Todd I’d do . . . for him.”
Story stepped over another corpse and made a beeline for Will Ethridge.
“You figure you died game,” Story said.
The mortally wounded bushwhacker looked up.
“You didn’t.” The Navy bucked in Story’s hand. Ethridge’s head slammed back, blood pouring out of the hole where his left eye had been. Story shouted, “Get my horse.” He closed the distance and stood over Ben Fariss.
“You hold on, Montana,” Fariss stammered. “I got rights. I got . . .”
Story aimed the Navy and pulled the trigger.
Fariss’s “Jesus Christ” overshadowed the loud click Story’s Navy made, the hammer striking an empty chamber.
“Listen to me,” Fariss shrieked, as Story tossed his empty revolver to Jameson Hannah and spotted a saddle near a bedroll. He moved as though possessed, lifted the lariat from the horn.
“Now, you just wait a damned minute . . .” Fariss started to rise, but Sam Ireland’s boot caught him under the chin and drove him into the soggy earth. When Fariss pushed himself up, Story slipped the lariat over Fariss’s neck, cutting short the granger’s prayer or curse.
Tom Allen had brought Story’s gelding, and carrying the rope, Story moved to the horse, made a few dallies around the horn, and stepped into the saddle.
“Wait.” Ben Fariss had scrambled to his knees. He tried to push himself to his feet, then realized how much time that might waste. His fingers clasped over the lariat’s loop around his neck. His face turned whiter than the full moon. He started to scream just as Story kicked the gelding’s sides.
Boone watched as horse and rider dragged the leader of the Granger’s Association down the slope and toward the Neosho River.
CHAPTER FORTY
When the cell door opened again, Molly McDonald rolled over, squeezed her eyelids tighter, and groaned from the light.
“You two get up,” the deputy called. “And get out of town.”
Molly coughed, started to curl up into a fetal position, but the man’s words slowly registered. Her eyes opened. Lowering her voice, she said, “You ain’t got no wood that needs cuttin’ at the sawmill? No limestone to be put down at that new schoolhouse? No shit you want us . . .”
“I want you two out of Marysville. Your sentence has been served. Both of you up. Now. And get out of my sight.”
Molly rolled up and sat on the floor. Marysville’s wasn’t the worst jail she’d ever struck, but after six months a change of scenery would be nice. She punched Constance Beckett’s shoulder.
“Get up, Cory,” she growled.
Sweet, pure Constance Beckett answered with a vulgarity that caused the deputy to say, “I can add another week to your sentence for language like that.”
A Thousand Texas Longhorns Page 21
