Thunder Wagon (Wind River Book 2)

by James Reasoner

  Then Cole drew a deep, ragged breath and stepped back, although he kept the gun trained on Langdon. Casebolt and Jeremiah pounded up behind him, and the deputy said, "You got him, huh?"

  "Damn right," Cole said. "And now he's going to tell us—he's going to tell the whole town— what he's been up to here in Wind River." He shook his head and grinned humorlessly. "You never should have gotten so greedy, Langdon. If you hadn't cheated Hank Parker out of a shipment of whiskey, I might not have ever tumbled to your real operation."

  Langdon just groaned in pain from his wounds. Somehow, Cole couldn't bring himself to feel too sorry for the man.

  Not when there was a whole troop of cavalry out there somewhere riding into an ambush . . .

  Chapter 19

  Major Thomas Burdette reined in with his left hand and raised his right in the signal to halt. His sergeant bellowed out the order, and the troop of cavalry came to a crisp stop. Burdette saw that as he glanced over his shoulder and felt pride swell his chest. Even out here in the middle of all this desolation, his men were disciplined and well trained. They were living examples of his skills as an officer and a leader of men.

  Those skills would be appreciated even more by his superiors, Burdette thought, if someone would have the good sense to assign him to a more suitable task—such as tracking down and routing the Sioux who were making life miserable for both settlers and the railroad back in the eastern half of Wyoming Territory.

  But that was a task for another day, Burdette told himself. For now, his duty was to find out who was responsible for the attacks in this part of the territory, and he intended to fulfill his mission. Of course, when he did run the culprits to ground, they would probably turn out to be only a ragtag band of Shoshone.

  Any engagement, however, no matter how one-sided, would help advance his career. Thomas Burdette knew how to take his victories where he found them, he thought smugly.

  "We'll stop here to rest the men and the horses, Sergeant," he told the noncom. "Thirty minutes, no more."

  "Yes, sir!"

  The sergeant called the order to dismount and fall out, and the troopers began complying gratefully. Burdette swung down from his own saddle and looked around.

  The troop had stopped for nooning in a grassy swale between two small hills. A tiny stream, barely three inches wide, trickled through the middle of the depression. Following the sergeant's orders, the troopers held their horses back to keep the animals from trampling the creek and ruining it.

  The men took turns filling their hats from the stream and letting their mounts drink from the headgear. Canteens were also refilled. The men broke out their rations— hardtack, jerky, and dried beans—and began eating their meager meal.

  Burdette took off his hat and used his yellow bandanna to mop sweat and dust from his face. Although he was still optimistic, he was also becoming more and more frustrated. The troop was quartering through the same general area where the tracks of Sawyer's stolen stock had been lost a couple of days earlier, and Burdette had hoped they would pick up the trail again before now. Obviously, he was just going to have to be patient.

  Either that, or proceed directly to the Shoshone camp and wipe out the vermin who were no doubt responsible for the continuing atrocities in the area around Wind River. Perhaps there was no real proof of their guilt, but Burdette knew Sawyer would thank him, the Union Pacific would thank him, and his superiors would have no choice but to admire his initiative. He was convinced that the redskins were to blame for the trouble.

  And besides, they were only Indians. It wasn't like they had any rights to be considered, Burdette mused . . .

  He was still trying to talk himself into the idea a moment later when a bullet ripped through his hat and jerked it off his head.

  Burdette heard the crack of the rifle at the same instant as his bullet-torn hat went sailing through the air. With an incoherent cry, he flung himself forward instinctively, landing so hard on the ground that the breath was knocked out of his lungs. As he lay there on the grass gasping for air, more shots blasted the still Wyoming air. Men screamed in pain as bullets ripped through muscle and bone.

  "Up there!" the sergeant shouted. His sidearm was out and began cracking as he returned the fire.

  Burdette twisted his head and looked in the direction the noncom was shooting. Puffs of smoke drifted up from the hill to the south. Ambushers must have crept up on the far side of the slope, Burdette reasoned, then opened fire on his unsuspecting men. A cowardly tactic, but an effective one.

  Thinking about strategy helped Burdette force into the back of his mind the panic he felt welling up inside him.

  More of his men were fighting back now, going down on one knee and forming a rough skirmish line. The Springfields they carried began to crash as they returned the fire. Burdette saw four men lying on the ground, three of them still moving, the other motionless in the limp sprawl of death. Sickness clogged the majors throat as he saw the bloody mess where half of the dead troopers face had been shot away.

  This was not the first time Burdette had been under fire. He had seen some limited action four years earlier, during the waning days of the Civil War. That had been entirely different from this, however. Then everything had been out in the open, two opposing forces moving straight toward each other across a field.

  For some reason, this ambush was even more frightening. Burdette supposed that was because he couldn't see the enemy this time; the only evidence of the men trying to kill him was the haze of powder smoke hanging over the ridge to the south.

  Burdette twisted around on the ground, staying low, and reached for the flap of his holster. He fumbled it open and grasped the butt of his revolver. As he drew out the weapon he realized that none of the shots from the ambushers had come close to him since that first one, the one that had knocked his hat off. Maybe they thought that shot had killed him. Maybe if he joined the fight, they would realize their mistake and concentrate their fire on him until he was nothing but a pile of bloody ribbons. It might be better if he simply lay there and was as still as possible.

  He couldn't do that, and he knew it. His hand trembling only a little, he lifted the pistol, pulled back the hammer, and fired toward the top of the hill. It was impossible to tell if he had hit anything or not, but he didn't let that deter him. He cocked the gun and squeezed off another shot, then another. The blood was surging through his veins now as he found himself caught up in the battle.

  "Hold your fire!" the sergeant shouted a moment later. Burdette growled a curse as the gunshots died away. He would have to have a talk with the noncom. He was the one who should have issued the order to cease firing. After all, he was in command of this troop.

  Then he realized what had prompted the sergeant's order. When the soldiers stopped shooting, silence fell over the valley. The ambushers had given up the attack. Either that, or they were trying to lure the troopers into doing something foolhardy.

  A moment later Burdette heard hoofbeats, a lot of hoofbeats. Quite a few men, a dozen or more, were riding away in a hurry. Galloping, in fact, like they were being pursued by demons out of hell. "They've fallen back!" he called excitedly. "We've got them on the run!"

  Burdette sprang to his feet, too late remembering that this could be a trap. Nothing happened, though, as he turned to his men and shouted, "Mount up! We're going after them!"

  No one argued with the order. Members of the troop had been wounded, and at least one had been killed. There had to be retribution.

  The soldiers leaped to their mounts and pulled themselves up into the saddles. Burdette left his hat where it had fallen and raced to his own horse. This was why he had joined the cavalry, he realized as he practically leaped onto the back of the animal. He was about to lead a charge that would utterly destroy the enemy, and he had forgotten all about the fear that had plagued him only moments earlier.

  This was war, even though on a small scale, and Burdette gloried in it.

  He led his men out o
f the swale and around the hill to the south. They were howling for blood as they rode, and Burdette had never been more proud of them. Those damned Shoshone would rue the day they had attacked the United States Cavalry, he vowed.

  There was the dust cloud of the fleeing attackers up ahead. Through the haze, Burdette could see only that they were dressed in buckskins and brandishing rifles. He was confident, though, that the ambushers had been Shoshone. And he intended to catch them if he had to chase them to the ends of the earth.

  * * *

  Cole leaned forward over the neck of the golden sorrel Ulysses. The horse was stretching its legs in a ground-eating gallop, trailed by Billy Casebolt's pinto. Both lawmen were urging all the speed possible out of their mounts as they rode straight toward the location of the Shoshone village. Cole hoped Two Ponies and his people hadn't moved their camp since Casebolt's visit there a few days earlier.

  They had left Abner Langdon back in Wind River, being tended to by Dr. Kent while Jeremiah stood guard. The crooked saloon owner had spilled the whole story, unable in his pain even to think about lying.

  Cole's guess about the Central Pacific being behind all the trouble Langdon and Sweeney had caused was correct, although Langdon insisted that the Big Four knew nothing of the lengths to which he and his cohort had gone to delay construction of the Union Pacific. Cole wasn't convinced that the financiers wouldn't have condoned murder if they had known about it, but that didn't really matter either way.

  What was important was reaching the Shoshone camp in time to prevent the final step in the plan from being realized.

  By the end of this day an Indian war would have been averted—or it would be in full, bloody sway, sweeping over the Territory.

  Cole's hat hung by its chin strap, bouncing against his back as he rode. The wind of his passage caught his thick brown hair and blew it out behind him. His own gun was back in its holster on his hip, having been retrieved from Langdon's shack. The sun was high overhead, and he glanced at it now.

  A little after noon. Probably too late to stop the ambush on Major Burdette's patrol. But the plan called for the bushwhackers to withdraw after inflicting a little damage and then lead the cavalry back to the Shoshone camp before slipping away. Caught up in the heat of pursuit, Burdette and his men would sweep down on the peaceful village and massacre its inhabitants. But word of the atrocity would spread, and all the other tribes in the territory would rise in anger to avenge their fallen brothers.

  If, by some chance, the Shoshones were able to fight off the attack, and destroyed the cavalry troop instead, the army would immediately move to send more soldiers and would launch a massive campaign of reprisal. Either way, work on the Union Pacific would be effectively delayed for months.

  It was a cunning scheme. Cole just prayed there was still time to put a stop to it.

  His eyes scanned the horizon as he rode, and after a while he spotted some dust rising to the northwest. Reining in, he pulled Ulysses to a stop and lifted an arm to point toward the dust as Casebolt rode up alongside him.

  "What do you think?" Cole asked.

  The deputy squinted into the distance, adding even more wrinkles to his leathery face. "Could be them, I reckon," he said after a moment. "Looks like there's two bunches."

  "That's what I thought," Cole agreed. "Sweeney and the rest of those hard cases pretending to be Shoshones are in front, and Burdette and his men are chasing 'em."

  "We're still about three miles from Two Ponies' camp," Casebolt said worriedly. "Goin' to be close, Marshal."

  "Then we'd better not waste any more time." Cole heeled the sorrel into a run again.

  Even that brief respite had allowed the horses some rest, and they seemed stronger as they launched into a gallop once more. Still, the distance dragged by with agonizing slowness. Finally, several minutes later, Cole and Casebolt rounded a rugged-looking shoulder of rock and saw the Shoshone tepees along the cottonwood-lined banks of a small creek. Everything appeared to be peaceful.

  But those columns of dust were closer now, and as Cole reined in again he could faintly hear the popping of gunfire in the distance.

  "That's them," he snapped. "No doubt about it now."

  "What are we goin' to do?" Casebolt asked.

  Cole's lips pulled back in a savage expression that was half grin, half grimace. "Give Sweeney one hell of a surprise," he said. With that, he rode down toward the Shoshone village, Casebolt following closely behind him.

  The Indians heard them coming, and so did the dogs. Several curs came bounding out from the scattering of tepees, snarling and barking. Men emerged from the conical shelters, all of them armed with rifles, lances, or bows and arrows. They shooed the women and children inside the tepees in case an enemy was attacking.

  It quickly became obvious that the two white men riding hurriedly into the camp were friends, though. Cole had a palm lifted in the universal gesture of peace, and Casebolt was well known to these people.

  A tall, well-built warrior with graying dark hair stepped forward and greeted the two lawmen as they drew their winded horses to a halt. "Billy Casebolt!" said Two Ponies. "We did not expect to see you again so soon, but you and your friend are welcome."

  Without dismounting, Casebolt said, "We may not be once you hear what me and Cole got to tell you, Two Ponies. By the way, this here's my boss, Marshal Tyler from Wind River."

  "Howdy, Two Ponies," Cole said. "I'm afraid there's trouble on the way." He knew he was dispensing with the formality that the Indians loved so well, but there was just no time for it today.

  Two Ponies must have sensed the seriousness of the situation, because he frowned and asked, "What is this trouble?"

  Cole hipped around in the saddle and pointed. "See that dust? A bunch of white renegades attacked a cavalry patrol a little while ago, and now they're leading those soldiers right toward your village here. They'll duck off out of sight at the last minute so that the soldiers will think your people are to blame for the ambush."

  Two Ponies stiffened. "There will be much fighting," he declared. "Many of my people and many of the white soldiers will die."

  "That's just what those skunks want," Cole said. "We've got to stop 'em."

  "The Shoshone will do anything they can to help prevent this."

  Casebolt added, "You got any ideas, Marshal?"

  "Maybe one," Cole said slowly. "There's only one way to convince Burdette that the Shoshones are innocent, and that's to show him who the real killers are. He'll have to see it all at once to believe it." He looked intently at Two Ponies. "Have your men get their horses ready. We have to meet that charge before it ever gets here."

  Two Ponies nodded curtly, understanding what Cole had in mind. He began shouting orders to his assembled warriors in his native tongue, and within a matter of minutes the Shoshones were swinging up onto the backs of their ponies. Cole glanced at the dust in the air. It was even closer now, right on the other side of a gap in the hills to the north. Cole guessed that Sweeney and his men would lead the cavalry through that gap, then swing off to the west, down a narrow canyon and out of sight.

  Cole, Casebolt, and the Shoshones had to plug that gap before Sweeney and the others could get there.

  With Cole and Two Ponies in the lead, the riders swarmed out of the village, leaving behind the old men and boys to protect the women and children. They wouldn't be able to put up much of a defense, but with any luck, they wouldn't need to.

  The slope leading up to the gap in the hills was a gradual one. Cole and the others swept up it, and even over the hoofbeats of their own mounts, the marshal could hear horses approaching at a gallop on the far side of the opening. He reached it first, followed closely by Two Ponies, Casebolt, and the other Shoshone warriors. As Cole hauled Ulysses to a halt he saw the scene spreading out in front of him just as he had thought it would.

  Close to the gap, only about a hundred yards away, rode some two dozen men in buckskins similar to those the Indians wore. Clothes didn't
make a man a Shoshone, though, and as the riders turned startled faces toward the group waiting for them in the pass, Cole could tell they were all white.

  A quarter of a mile behind the renegades came the cavalry, the soldiers yelling and throwing an occasional futile shot toward their quarry. A shallow valley led up to the gap in the hills on this side, funneling both groups toward the opening.

  The opening that was blocked by Cole and his friends.

  He slid his Winchester '66 from the saddle boot and lifted it to his shoulder, working the lever and jacking a shell into the chamber as he did so. When he pressed the trigger, the rifle boomed and bucked against his shoulder, and the slug plowed up dirt and threw grit in the air some ten yards in front of Sweeney's bunch.

  The men in the lead reined up desperately as Cole levered the rifle and fired again. Beside him, Casebolt was doing the same thing, peppering the ground in front of the renegades with rifle slugs. Two Ponies and the warriors with him who were armed with rifles added to the fire, although many of the Shoshones' weapons were single-shot carbines. Still, they were able to lay down a barrage effectively enough to make Sweeney and the other hard cases come to a sliding, skidding stop.

  "I'll drop the next man who moves!" Cole shouted down at them, and his voice was cold and hard enough to convince them that he meant every word of it. The riders milled around in confusion as the cavalry swept up behind them. Suddenly one man broke away from the pack and raced his mount up the slope toward the ridge that turned into the shoulder of rock protecting the Shoshone village from the north winds. Cole sent a shot after him, but the slug just kicked up dust at the horse's feet.