At a plateau Blue paused to let Hector and the mule blow. They had climbed six or eight hundred feet above the fishing hole, and the view was grand. From up here he could look down on the Wilson river, glinting its way through the secluded valley, and off to the west the snow-shrouded blue peaks of the high country, Grant and Sherman and Terry, which guarded this vast green land and nurtured it with their water. Puffball clouds hung on the highest ones, looking more innocent than they were. A cow elk and her new calf stood quietly, watching him. The sight of all that was enough to make a man forget he was hunting down a killer. But not for long.
Chapter 4
Blue worked quietly upslope, not worried about running into his quarry, who was a day ahead. The prints of a single horse led steadily away from the fishing hole, through timber and meadow, past talus, into rushing freshets, around dense thickets of new-leafed aspen. The killer was not pushing his horse. Every little while he had stopped, rested the animal, let it graze while he did his chores. Blue found some boot prints, round toe, worn heels, medium size, not much different from his own boots but wider. Blue thought maybe he was gaining. The killer didn’t know he was being followed. If he didn’t have a pack horse, he wasn’t far from home, and everything he needed hung from his pommel or was stowed behind his cantle. What sort of man was he? One who was comfortable in nature. Blue found the remains of a small fire, compact and tucked into a corner of rock, safe from the wind, a site that made a natural stove where a man could boil some water or cook a meal. Blue could tell at a glance, and he approved. Blue filed away the knowledge, knowing that it might prove useful. At each place where the man had dismounted, Blue searched the whole area, looking for a cache, a spent brass shell, for evidence of any sort. He found nothing at all.
Blue pushed ahead, keeping a weather eye on the peaks, which generated their own storms, but so far this June day glowed with sunlight. He passed blue spruce and Engelmann pines, lodgepole thickets so dense a man on foot couldn’t penetrate them, a place where fire had scoured the slope. He found bear scratches on one of the pines, and decided it was time to watch out for Old Ephraim. He passed parks bursting with purple larkspur or blue flax, stands of alder and birch. He didn’t need to follow the hoofprints; the rising country was hemming him in, and there was only one way to go. If this weren’t a manhunt, he would be enjoying a glorious day, with zephyrs mixing warm and chill air, the scent of pines heavy, the air so fresh and sweet that he sucked in a lungful just for the sheer pleasure of it. He followed a chattering creek upward, through dark timber that hid the peaks above. He skirted a huge blow-down, where some violent force of nature had flattened thousands of trees, and torn limbs off of others, heaping them all into kindling. The mountains were rarely benign; they sprang at a man darkly, killed and mauled plant and animal alike. Sometimes he found hoofprints, most often he didn’t, but that was not important. He rode alone, a solitary man, content with the world, not a bit lonely, the natural wonders at every hand substituting for conversation.
Maybe Carl Barlow was making progress, maybe the dead man had a name now. Maybe someone had been reported missing, someone from Centerville on the other side of the county or some place where Blue didn’t know many people. Maybe Barlow would catch the suspect and have him in the lockup when Blue returned.
That was all right. He wondered how Olivia was doing. She would have her toot and there would be no stopping her. When the cat was away, he thought, that pretty little mouse would play. Whenever he got back from these lawing trips, there would be a few stories floating around, Olivia taking a nip, Olivia cussing a butcher with hard words that never passed her lips when Blue was in town. It made him uneasy sometimes. What kind of woman was Olivia, the one she kept hidden from Blue? What had she taught the children? But mostly he just laughed. If Olivia wanted a nip, or wanted to cast aside her churchy inhibitions, then he’d just keep quiet. Hell, he’d lived with Olivia thirty years. They used Olivia’s toots against him in the elections, but it hadn’t cost him any votes, except maybe Mrs. Peabody, who ran the temperance society. She had tried to make an issue of it in the paper, but Cyrus Mack wouldn’t print her letter, and told Blue so. He said Blue was running for office, not Olivia.
Along the creek bed he followed right on top of the killer’s hoofprints because there was no other passage. He glanced ahead at sun-dappled parks, mostly watching out for bear. He feared black bears more than grizzlies, even if they lacked the ferocity of the bigger bear, but he didn’t know why. He didn’t know why he harbored all sorts of preferences and prejudices. He just did.
As noon approached he burst out of thickets into an upland of thin alpine tundra that stretched toward the saddle. Here the landscape changed abruptly; naked gray rock, stunted bristlecone pines twisted by wind, arctic tundra dotted with tiny blooms not as large as a button. A chill wind sliced into his coat, and he pulled up the collar. June it might be down in Blankenship; up here it was March.
The huge peaks rose to either side, naked gray rock now, splashed with decaying snow banks, harboring little life except the pikas sunning themselves, and an occasional coyote. He saw an eagle hanging in the sky.
When he topped the saddle he rode over a broad hump for a hundred yards, gravel and tundra underfoot. And then, suddenly, the other side of the slopes opened before him, a vast sea of mountain and forest lost in haze a hundred miles distant. He tugged the rein and stared. He had never been up here before, on the roof of the world. Down there somewhere to the south, but not in sight, was Centerville. It too had started as a mining town, mostly silver but some gold and copper too, and when the pockets of ore gave out it turned into a shopping town for the local ranches, a quarter of the size it had been at the peak of its boom. Down that valley to the southwest, beyond what he could see, was Tamara’s place. She and her husband Steve raised fat red shorthorns on a well-watered flat surrounded by verdant hills that stretched higher and higher into the high country. Blue thought maybe he might have a chance to stop in. The killer had been drifting toward Centerville, and that was clue enough. Blue would have a talk with Zeke Dombrowski, the town constable.
He let the horse and mule blow; the last half mile had been steep. The wind cut sharply through his clothing, and he was eager to start down the long grade and into that line of firs below. Maybe he’d have himself a lunch, if he could get out of the wind.
He felt the shot before he heard it. The gelding shuddered, stood rigidly, and then started to cave, even as a sharp snap racketed through the air. He felt his horse weaken and weave, and he pulled his right foot loose of the stirrup even as the animal dropped to the left. He hit the ground violently, banged his head, landed on his revolver and that shot pain through his hip. The horse collapsed on his left leg, pinning him under it. Fiery pain bloomed in his leg, which was pinned under the horse. He heard another shot, and the squeal of the mule, and heard his mule struggle and collapse. Then he heard nothing.
He was helpless. Fear engulfed him. He raged at himself for being so careless. But most of all he wanted to live, and he didn’t know whether he would last one more minute with that killer a hundred yards away.
He tried to move his pinned leg. He tried to pull his shotgun from its scabbard, but it, too, lay under the horse. He felt Hector slump into death, a last sigh, heavier on his leg now. His good horse, sixteen years his friend, dead in a few seconds. In death, it was performing one last service to Blue, shielding him from the muzzle of that gun down below. He half expected a dark form to fill the sky above him, and struggled to reach his revolver. Every time he moved, his bruised hip howled. He felt blood on his temple, where it had struck rock. He crabbed sideways, and found that he could pull his leg, inch by inch, out from under. It felt broken. He ignored the pain, or at least endured it, as he tugged his leg bit by bit. His holster bit at him, and he managed to undo his belt and let the holster twist away. Fear shot through him. Dead animals, maybe a broken leg, and maybe a killer even now stalking up that grade, ready to dispatc
h him. He tugged at the holster and got it free. He worked his revolver loose, and liked the cold hard heft of it in his hand, the pressure of his finger on the double-action trigger. He peered about, craning to see, armed now, five loads to defend himself...if he didn’t faint from the pain.
He could not see the mule, hidden by the dead gelding. He needed to get loose, and began once again to pull his leg free, feeling it scrape against rock, feeling his muscles howl with the slightest motion. He was sweating. His heart raced. He tugged hard, and this time he pulled his leg free. He lay on his back, fearful of the shadow that might suddenly loom above him. But he saw only some puffball clouds and a soaring crow. The wind had coaxed his hat away, just out of reach, and he crabbed toward it, caught it just as it started to slide away again.
He pulled it to him. It was a fine old pearly hat, sweat-stained and comfortable. But now it would serve another purpose. He lacked a stick to lift it, so he gingerly clasped the brim and raised it above the torso of his brown horse, expecting it to be blown from his fingers. But nothing happened. He lifted the hat higher. Nothing happened. The killer was too smart to shoot at a hat, or maybe too close to bother.
Blue lay on the cold rock, fearful, not knowing what to do. Darkness would cloak him eventually, but darkness would come very late this June night. He needed to know if he could walk. He felt along his leg, looking for knots, for broken bones, for torn ligaments. Plenty of pain, more than he had ever known, but he could find no fracture. He might be able to walk. He wouldn’t know until he tried. He crawled toward the head of the horse and peered around it. He could see nothing and he was too low to see who or what was down that slope. Whoever had shot his horse and mule had been an expert. A single bullet to the heart had killed the gelding. Two shots, two dead animals.
It occurred to Blue that the killer could just as easily have killed him, but didn’t. The killer was toying with him, wanting him to suffer, wanting to put fear into him. And succeeding. Blue knew that he was entirely at the mercy of the man. The killer wasn’t a day’s ride ahead as Blue had supposed, he was maybe a hundred yards ahead, and probably enjoying Blue’s terror.
If that was so, then there was only one thing to do. Blue stuffed the revolver into his holster, rolled over, lifted himself on his good leg, and stood up.
Chapter 5
Blue stood, the cold wind whipping him. His right leg hurt but he could stand on it all right. He cradled the shotgun in the crook of his arm and waited. If anyone was coming for him, it would happen soon. But no one came. He limped toward that line of wind-twisted pine where the killer had waited for him, clambered down a steep rocky slope, and was feeling every step.
The stunted trees, a hundred yards below, might tell a story. He plunged into them and soon found the place. Some scuffed dirt and two ejected brass cartridges told him all he needed to know. Forty-four caliber Winchester. He pocketed them. He had the feeling these would not be the first he would be pocketing. He stared upward toward the pass, aware of how perfectly he and his horse and mule had been skylined, and what a fool he had been to suppose the killer was twenty miles away.
The trail disappeared into woods below, but he didn’t follow it. Instead, he worked back to the pass, wincing as his leg rebelled. He figured he had better get used to it, because he had a long walk ahead of him.
On top, he tried to pull his riding saddle off his big old horse, but couldn’t. He couldn’t do much with the pack saddle and panniers on the mule, either. The perpetual wind sailing through that pass chilled him. In the mountains, cold was the enemy. He was six or seven miles from the fishing hole, and over three hours on foot, assuming he could walk. He would need to cross several rills and runnels, and one good-sized creek, too. He untied his slicker from its nest behind the cantle, and stuffed some shotgun shells into his pockets. He would leave the revolver and cartridge belt here, in one of the panniers. A revolver wasn’t worth carrying in this country; it was a good enough city weapon, though. He found an old undershirt and tied it tight around his leg above and below the knee. The binding felt good.
He remembered at the last to undo Hector’s bridle and reins and bring them with him, along with a halter and lead rope. He stared at the lifeless horse, feeling bad, and removed his hat. He would never hear Hector nicker again. Damned good horse, at least most of the time. They had seen a lot of living together. He screwed his hat onto his head. It was one more reason to catch that son of a gun and string him up.
Satisfied that he had what he needed, he started back, down rocky grade, past bristlecone pines, his leg howling at him. But he ignored it. At least it wasn’t broken. That would have been his death sentence.
He wore the slicker so he wouldn’t have to carry it, and let the shotgun ride his shoulder. But the walking tired him, and he hadn’t gone two hundred yards before he needed to catch his breath. He was high up; maybe ten thousand feet, but it was the leg pain that wearied him.
Meanwhile the killer was riding away, having succeeded in driving off his pursuer. The whole business puzzled Blue. It was almost as if the killer knew him, knew his habits, knew where he liked to fish, knew when Blue would arrive at the fishing hole and find a warm body, knew what Blue would do, knew where to wait for him. And then shoot his horse and mule rather than shoot the sheriff. Damned if he could figure it out.
Blue knew his knee was swelling; it chafed within his britches and against his binding. But there was nothing he could do. He limped down the long trail, past the blow down, over a rill, into lodgepole forest. At the roaring creek he hunted for the best way across, found a log to sit on, pulled off his boots and stockings, undid his the binding and then his pants, and stepped gingerly into the ice water.
“Damn!” he bellowed, shocked by the numbing cold. He slipped and slid his way across, hurt himself anew clambering up the far bank, and then dressed himself. He was lucky he didn’t break his neck. It made a man appreciate a saddle horse.
Late that afternoon he stumbled into the fishing hole meadow, and there was the coppery bay, watching him. He set down his shotgun, took off the slicker, and started across the lush grass to catch the bay, but it shied from him every time he approached. His bum leg was hurting all the worse, so he gave up for the moment, headed to his favorite perch overlooking the quiet pool below the rills, and sat down. The water was still. Those big cutthroat wouldn’t be biting, not then. Not until dusk. But they were there, lurking in the shadows, dark under the cutbanks, waiting for whatever trout wait for, an occasional flip of the tail keeping them where they liked to live out their watery life. The warmth made him sleepy. This was a sheltered valley, unlike the raw rock nakedness of that high pass at the shoulder of Grant Peak. He had a killer to catch, not to mention a horse. He was no further now toward resolving the mystery than he was when he started. He did his best thinking right there, at the fishing hole, and maybe he would come up with something. But this time he had no line to cast, no lures, no bamboo rod. The bay returned to its grazing, but it was grazing closer, curious about the man at the water’s edge. Blue watched and waited. The bay wasn’t unfriendly, just uncertain. One thing was plain. The killer was someone who knew him, or at least had studied his ways. But was the killer someone he knew? Blue thought of all the hardcases he had collared, including a dozen who had been sentenced to long terms in the Territorial penitentiary. Maybe he was facing one of them. Half swore they would get even some day, and some had tried, only to bounce back behind bars.
But that made little sense now. No one was after him as far as he knew. This whole thing made no sense. He was after a killer, a killer who chose not to kill him when he had the chance, a killer who was warning him off rather than killing him.
Well, he’d get that killer. They all had a way of underestimating old Blue, maybe because Blue didn’t put on airs.
There was nothing flashy about old Blue, he thought. Plain words, plain revolver, plain man in office. Stubborn too. They all told him that, whenever he got his back up and w
anted to do things his own way.
He rose, feeling the protest of his twisted knee, and walked slowly toward the bay, which stopped grazing and waited alertly. “Whoa, boy,” Blue said.
The bay let him approach and slide a rein over his black mane. In a moment, Blue had him. He pushed the bit into the bay’s mouth and buckled the bridle. It was too tight so he loosened it. He took a rein and walked the horse across the meadow to that wooded place where the stranger had been shot, and where Blue had left the bay’s saddle. A few minutes later he had the bay blanketed and saddled. The stranger had been taller than Blue, so Blue shortened the stirrup leathers an inch. He collected his shotgun and slicker and stepped on board, barely able to stand the pain he put on his left leg as he heaved himself over. The bay accepted the weight. With luck, Blue thought, he could make the pass in daylight, collect what he needed from the dead animals, and make camp on the other side.
The bay moved smoothly, but Blue wondered how the flatland horse would do in the mountains. Fine, it turned out. The bay moved gracefully up the trail, a calm horse enjoying himself. Blue made it to the pass at dusk, but there was plenty of light in the west to help him. He switched saddles, putting his own on the bay, and dug into the panniers for the few things he could carry on one animal: blanket, slicker, a little parched corn, some lucifers in a cigar tin, the coffee, and a small skillet.
Cutthroat Gulch Page 3
