The only defense against such a disaster was the brute strength which the men could apply to three poles: concentrating all their efforts on the port side to force the ferry across the thrust of the currents.
The danger common to all negated the enmity of those who had come aboard under duress toward those who had been the captors. So that Edge, Tatum and O’Keefe worked at their pole with as much strength as each was able to muster. Redeker and one of the deputies were on another pole. And the sheriff and two remaining lawmen applied their weight and strength to the third.
Maria Lassiter sat fearfully in the buggy, tightly gripping the padded seat as the restless movements of the gelding rocked and jolted the vehicle. The unafraid Angel North continued to speak placating words to the animal.
The men were grouped at the bow of the craft, thrusting the poles hard into the river bed, not so much concerned with propelling the ferry forward as to keep her headed out toward midstream. And, as had happened with the much smaller, lighter boat last night, this one followed a lengthy but inexorable course diagonally from one bank toward the other.
At first the men cursed—at the poles, the ferry and the river. But soon the only sounds to be forced from between their clenched teeth were grunts and gasps, as the sweat beads of exertion coursed their flesh and they called upon the willpower of their minds to supplement the strength of their bodies.
Behind them, the citizens of Fallon moved along the east bank of the Wind River. Silent now as the widening gap of water emphasized their impotence. Whether they wanted the ferry to flounder and sink or to safely reach the opposite bank, perhaps even they themselves did not know.
Ahead of the lumbering craft and the men struggling to control its direction, three riders steered their horses along the west bank: men and mounts briefly glimpsed because there was no time to devote to anything that was happening outside of the existence of the ferry on the river.
Until one of the horsemen whirled his right hand in the air above his head. And the loop of a lariat curled over the starboard gunwale and slapped against the deck.
Perhaps everyone aboard saw this. But all with the exception of Edge considered the task of the moment too important to abandon it.
The half-breed released his grip on the pole and lunged across the deck. Tatum cursed and O’Keefe howled in dismay as the strength of the most powerful man was abruptly lost. The pole was sunk deep into the riverbed and they could not wrench it free before the ferry swung, and the two remaining men had to let go or be dragged overboard.
The diving form of Edge spooked the gelding into a rear and Angel North was sent stumbling backwards. She and Maria screamed. The lawmen and Redeker struggled to bring the ferry back on to its cross-current course.
Edge was down on his belly, his arms at full stretch to hook his clawed fingers over the lariat loop. As the swinging action of the boat drew the rope taut and he was dragged across the deck, he cursed. His anger was directed inwardly again, triggered by the realization of another uncharacteristic lapse of his ability to anticipate danger. He had taken part in shoving off the boat from one bank without considering the even more difficult task of docking it against the other.
No more rope was played out from the shore and the half-breed was jerked hard into the angle of the bow ramp and side of the ferry. The pain of the impact augmented what he was already suffering from as a result of his dive to the deck. The honda hissed around the loop and trapped both his hands. It felt as if his arms were within a fraction of an inch of being wrenched from their sockets.
Then footfalls thudded on the deck behind him. And the bright blueness of the sky was blotted out as men leaned over him, to fist the rope in their hands. He heard their grunts as they called upon their diminished strength in a renewed fight against the river.
The gelding snorted and scraped hooves against the deck.
‘We’re saved! We’re saved! Praise the Lord!’ The voice was Angel North’s, shrilling to a high soprano pitch.
With the others taking the strain of the rope, there was enough slack behind them for Edge to pull his hands out of the loop and get to his feet. Every muscle in his body seemed to be burning with the flames of pain. But he was no stranger to suffering of any kind and he was able to fight the urge to sit down and indulge the need for comforting rest.
The gelding was still afraid, ears pricked and eyes bulged. Angel North had re-established a hold on the bridle but was otherwise ignoring the animal as she gazed skyward, radiantly smiling her gratitude. Maria Lassiter was staring at the west bank of the Wind River, incredulity superimposed on the frown of fear.
‘It’s not possible,’ she gasped as Edge reclaimed his Winchester from the buggy. ‘Not my baby!’
Edge snapped his head around to see what had caused the change in the pregnant girl. But he saw just the snow covered meadow, for the ferry was now bow-on to the bank and the raised ramp concealed the men on the shore. Then the craft shuddered as the impact of the docking was transmitted down its length. And again those with work to do had no time to waste.
While the other men continued to grip the rope, holding the bow of the ferry hard against the bank, Redeker ran to the ramp release latch on one side. Edge went to the other side.
Angel North continued to commune silently with the heavens.
The ramp swung down and crunched into the snow.
‘Get the buggy off!’ Redeker yelled.
The woman did not hear him. The girl continued to gaze in awe at the shore.
Again the half-breed and the Mexican looking youngster moved simultaneously, Edge to the left of the gelding and Redeker to the right. They grasped the bridle and yanked at it as they ran forward.
Angel North was knocked to the deck with a cry of alarm as the gelding submitted eagerly to the demands of the two men. Edge, Redeker, the horse and the buggy thudded and clattered along the deck, down the ramp and on to the snow draped meadow.
The priest was next to land. Then the other men, Sheriff Karnes half dragging the ex-whore as the ferry, no longer held against the bank, was claimed by the river and dragged out into deep water.
Edge had briefly glimpsed their mounted rescuers, received a fleeting impression of men garbed in strangely bright clothes. For a long moment after this, he watched the sheriff, the deputies, the doctor and Redeker: his reflexes primed to combat any aggressive moves they might make. But exhaustion sank the men to their haunches or caused them to sag against the wheels of the buggy as they panted deep breaths of chill morning air into their punished lungs.
The priest, his woman and Maria Lassiter stared at the horsemen. The girl was still incredulous. O’Keefe and Angel North expressed a brand of depthless joy that for once appeared to have robbed them of the power of speech.
‘Good morning.’
‘We are happy to have been of some small service.’
‘Perhaps you are able to assist us. We seek a man named Silas Martin.’
Edge heard the monotone, strangely accented voices speaking English and recalled a Burmese poet who had died badly at a mission far to the south. Then he looked at the trio of men who had spoken the words and saw the reason for the joy and disbelief with which others were viewing them.
For the horsemen were Orientals. Men of middle years with yellowish skin and oddly shaped eyes. With their hair plaited into single pigtails and thin, drooping, waxed moustaches. They wore hats shaped like shallow cones and long, silken, multi-colored robes belted at the waist. From one side of the belt of each man hung a curved scabbard with the handle of a sword jutting out. To the other side was fastened a conventional holster housing a Colt revolver. They sat astride strong looking stallions, saddled Western style.
The last man to speak was neatly coiling the lariat which had been used to hold the ferry boat against the bank.
‘Ain’t a name I know,’ the half-breed replied. ‘Real glad you were looking for him around here. Obliged for the help.’
The four lawmen, Joe
Redeker and Doctor Tatum had also recognized the distinctive accents of the mounted men. And now they looked at them in the same manner as Maria Lassiter.
‘Hot damn!’ the deputy named Frank gasped. ‘The three from the Orient!’
‘We are from the country of Nippon,’ the man coiling the lariat confirmed, and exchanged puzzled glances with his companions, all three of them suddenly wary of being viewed with awe and disbelief. ‘Please, can any of you tell us whether Silas Martin is among those on the far side of this river?’
He raised an arm and everyone looked toward the throng on the opposite bank. The bulk of the ferryboat no longer intervened, it was being pushed fast downstream at the mercy of the currents. The people there were silent as they returned the attention of those on the west bank with a higher degree of concentration.
‘Ain’t nobody of that name lives in Fallon,’ Sheriff Karnes supplied, trying to shake off the sense of unreality which had gripped him. But there was a huskiness in his voice and as soon as he looked at the trio of horsemen again his gaze was trapped by their alien appearance.
‘No, sir. Silas Martin would be visiting. Passing through. He has come from Portland in this country. With a large box.’
Karnes shook his head. ‘Ain’t been no strangers in town for at least two months. Until these people came.’
He began to nod, indicating individuals in the group around the buggy. But then saw that he had lost the interest of the Orientals.
‘We thank you, sir. And again we say we are happy to have helped you. Now we must go. To look for Silas Martin.’
‘But you can’t!’ O’Keefe exclaimed, his joy suddenly gone. ‘You must come with us to the stable!’
The Orientals exchanged more puzzled, wary glances. ‘Sir?’
‘Jesus Christ is to be born again!’ the priest explained quickly. ‘We have Mary and Joseph. We have the shepherds. We have the Angel. You are the three Kings from the Orient. You must come with us!’
‘No!’
‘This means nothing to us, sir!’
‘We must continue our search for Silas Martin.’
The three were no longer wary. And had abandoned their curiosity. Now they were simply impatient to re-start their interrupted mission. And they gathered in their reins and tugged on them to turn the horses away from the buggy.
‘Edge!’ O’Keefe shrieked. And swung both hands up to grip the brim of his hat.
The half-breed arced the Winchester downward and clenched his right hand around the barrel. Then powered into a half turn to aim the rifle at the fat little priest.
‘Hold it, feller,’ he said softly.
‘But...’
‘We owe them,’ Edge said into the tense silence as the priest was lost for words. ‘Least we can do is let them do what they want.’
The Orientals were angry, then puzzled. Finally impatient again.
‘We understand none of this,’ the apparent leader of the trio said. ‘Just that there is trouble here. We, also, are troubled and will be so until we find Silas Martin. Good day.’
He heeled his mount forward and the other two were quick to follow: cantering their horses south through the snow. The tracks they had left earlier showed their route had brought them from the north.
‘You fool!’ O’Keefe accused the half-breed, tears rising to the corners of his eyes as he watched the departing riders. ‘They were another sign.’
As he suffered dismay, Angel North generated a harsh hatred which she stared at Edge.
‘They want something as bad as you do, feller,’ the tall, lean man with the leveled rifle drawled. ‘And they had three guns against our two.’
‘So it wasn’t anything to do with owing them anything?’ Maria Lassiter asked dully, seemingly drained of the capacity to feel deep emotion
‘Way it was, both purposes were served,’ Edge replied evenly as he shouldered the Winchester and glanced out across the river.
Since the Orientals had ridden away, the crowd on the opposite bank had begun to disperse. A few people still stood silently on the bank. But many more were heading back up the hill toward Fallon. Some slowly. A number moving as fast as the steep and slippery slope would allow.
‘Please can we go now?’ Maria Lassiter asked. ‘My father...’
She appeared now to be caught on the borderline between two emotions. Anxiety for the dying man in the stable of the ghost town and embarrassment that she had allowed herself to be affected by the appearance of the three Orientals.
‘What’s the hurry of some of those people over there?’ Edge asked Karnes.
The lawman with the jug handle ears was reluctant to reply for a moment. But then he shrugged. ‘Some Fallon folks have got boats,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ O’Keefe responded to the pregnant girl, suddenly rising above the setback. ‘We must leave. Come, Daughter. To see the three wise men was sufficient. They were a sign.’
‘We ain’t gotta walk all the way to that broken down old town have we, Deke?’ a deputy asked miserably.
‘You don’t have to come if you don’t want to,’ Angel North snarled, sharing her anger for Edge among the four lawmen. ‘We don’t need none of you no more.’ She glared at Tatum. ‘Nor you, neither. There wasn’t no doctor around the first time.’
‘But if you wish to see Christ reborn, you will not have to walk,’ the priest added with a triumphant grin. ‘At the house of the ferryman there are horses for all. The Almighty has provided.’
‘Ralph Doniphan just has the one saddle horse,’ Karnes said with a puzzled frown. ‘So how come...?’
‘The Lord has provided!’ O’Keefe interrupted. ‘For those who have faith.’
‘With a little help from Sam Colt,’ Edge said flatly, which set light to a glimmer of comprehension in the sheriff’s eyes. ‘You already seen it ain’t just religion the priest has on the brain.’
Chapter Eleven
‘I’LL see you all hang for this!’ Sheriff Deke Karnes snarled after he had raked his shocked gaze over the carnage at the Doniphan house.
The downstream drift of the ferry had meant they had to trudge more than three hundred yards back along the riverbank. This and the exertion of making the crossing had left them all breathless, the air expelled by their lungs wisping white in the air. The shock of seeing the corpses of the three Bar-M hands slumped in the snow and the blood-spattered bodies of the Doniphan family inside the house acted to deflate even more everyone except Edge, the priest and the ex-whore.
That’s if the Fallon folk don’t take the law into their own hands,’ Tatum added hoarsely. The Doniphan family was well respected hereabouts.’
‘It was necessary,’ O’Keefe said, off-handedly. They would not loan us their boat. We lost three of our own.’
Edge heard the talk from the side of the house, where he had gone to reclaim his gelding and the other horses. Perhaps there were other exchanges between the divided group in front of the house, but the half-breed heard nothing more while he was in the stable at the rear, saddling the black gelding of the dead Ralph Doniphan.
When he led all the horses out to where the people waited aboard and close to the buggy, a heavy, morbid silence was clamped over the group. Even O’Keefe and Angel North were contributing to the solemn aura. But their mood had nothing to do with the six bullet-shattered corpses close by. For their attention was directed across the river, at the town and the slope below it, where people were hurrying to drag skiffs and rowboats down to the bank.
‘Ah!’ the priest said gratefully as he turned to the sound of approaching hooves in the snow. ‘Now we can make haste. They will not be able to ferry horses across the river?’ His tone added the query and his small eyes pleaded anxiously for the reassurance of confirmation. But nobody answered him. Neither did anyone object to his suggestion that they should leave immediately.
Because the group was a mount short, the doctor elected to ride with Maria Lassiter and Redeker in the buggy. Karnes rode Doniphan’s horse a
nd his deputies swung into the saddles of the animals with Bar-M brands. The half-breed’s Winchester and Remington were not drawn and O’Keefe’s Colt remained inside his hat. Thus, the four lawmen moved out to start the last leg of the trip back to the ghost town of their own free will.
The verbal silence continued, the thought processes of some of the travelers written into the lines of the frowns they showed.
The pregnant girl, Redeker and Tatum were anxious for various reasons. The sheriff and his deputies were angry at the commission of murder, their knowledge of the culprits and their present inability to do anything about it. Angel North nurtured her hatred toward Edge. O’Keefe was eagerly excited. Edge displayed nothing on his face to hint at what was going on in his mind. Apart from the one time Virginia City whore, it was impossible to tell whether any member of the group was still affected by the incident with the trio of Orientals.
The sun stayed bright as it inched up the cloudless dome of the sky. The mountain air was crisply cold. The direction the slow-moving group took was pre-determined by the tracks which six riders had left in the snow the previous night.
Once over the southern ridge of the east to west valley there was little point to backward glances for the humps and hollows of the Wind River range would have concealed anyone who was following. But all knew that at least some of the Fallon townspeople would be moving along over the easy-to-see sign in the snow. With, among them, as many motives for reaching the ghost town as were shared by the group they were following.
Smoke smudged the sky at the head of the valley above the ghost town so that those in the buggy and riding escort knew, long before they came to a halt on the street in front of the saloon, that the livery stable out back was still occupied.
EDGE: Eve of Evil (Edge series Book 28) Page 13
