The Loner: The Devil’s Badland

by J. A. Johnstone

  Or call it fate, destiny, what have you. When you came right down to it, he had to try to save the hostages.

  That was what Rebel would want him to do.

  “Come on,” he said as he steered Pamela toward the ledge. “I’m not going to untie you or take that gag out. Your uncle and your friends can do that for you once you’re back with them.”

  He stopped short of the ledge and let go of Pamela’s arm.

  “Go ahead,” he told her. “But take it slow and easy.”

  She cast one last, hate-filled glance over her shoulder at him and then stepped out onto the ledge. She started down, moving slowly as he had told her.

  The Kid stretched out again in a cluster of several small rocks that gave him some added cover and thrust the Winchester’s barrel over the edge. He couldn’t see Pamela as she descended the ledge, but he’d be able to track her with the rifle as soon as she stepped out onto the lower bench.

  “Miss Tarleton’s on her way down!” he called. “Send the hostages up!”

  “Hang on!” Trace replied.

  The Kid felt a surge of anger. “Damn it, you’d better not be backing out on the deal now!”

  “Take it easy,” Trace said. “Here they come.”

  A moment later, James and Meggie MacTavish appeared on the trail that led through the heavy brush. James had his arm around his sister’s shoulders. Behind them, Dave Whitfield trudged along the path. The rancher looked gray and exhausted. None of them were tied up.

  They moved onto the lower bench. Their steps were stiff. The Kid figured they had to know that several rifles were trained on them at that moment. They walked across the bench toward the spot where the ledge began.

  Pamela reached the bottom of the ledge and moved out so that The Kid could see her again. She walked toward the three hostages, moving a little faster than they were. It took only a minute for her to reach them.

  “Hold it!” The Kid shouted. “Pamela, you stay there!”

  For the first time since this standoff began, Anthony Tarleton spoke up. “Like you said, it’s too late to change the rules, Browning! Let Pamela go, or I’ll have my men kill those prisoners right now!”

  “I’ll put a bullet in her head at the first shot!” The Kid yelled back. “I’m not backing out of the deal! I just want the others up here first!”

  Pamela shook her head and made noises through the gag, as if urging her uncle not to go along with it. But after a tense moment, Tarleton said, “All right. Just wait right there, Pamela. You’ll be back with us shortly.”

  The prisoners moved on past Pamela. As they approached the ledge, The Kid couldn’t see them anymore. He kept the Winchester’s barrel rock-steady as he aimed it at Pamela.

  Would he pull the trigger if Tarleton tried a double-cross? Could he? Killing some of those gunmen without giving them a chance didn’t bother him. They were cold-blooded murderers with plenty of blood on their hands. They had chosen to live by the gun. They knew that the odds were they would die by it as well.

  Pamela was different. She had probably never carried out an act of real, personal, face-to-face violence in her life. But she had plotted Rebel’s kidnapping and murder, as well as everything else that had happened to torment The Kid in the past few months. She had ordered someone’s death, more than once. Was that the same as committing murder herself? Was it actually worse?

  The Kid didn’t know the answers to those questions. He didn’t know if he would pull the trigger, either. He reckoned he wouldn’t know until the time came, if it ever did.

  He heard the scuff of footsteps on the ledge. The prisoners were moving faster now as they approached freedom. Suddenly James MacTavish reached the top of the ledge and came hurrying onto the upper bench, practically dragging Meggie with him. Dave Whitfield puffed along behind them, out of breath from the climb. He wasn’t a young man anymore.

  “Get back there by the cave,” The Kid told them without taking his eyes off Pamela. “They can’t get a shot at you once you’re there.” Then he raised his voice. “All right, Pamela, go on down.”

  She glanced back at him, but she was far enough away that he couldn’t really make out the expression on her face. Especially with the bandanna tied across the lower half of it to keep the gag in. He would have bet a hat, though, that she was seething with anger and hatred.

  She strode toward the brush, moving faster. After a moment, she reached the trail and stepped down onto it. He watched as she disappeared from his view.

  A pang of loss went through him. He was back to where he’d started, trying to avenge Rebel’s death. He had had the person responsible for that atrocity in his hands, and he had chosen to let her go.

  It hadn’t really been much of a choice. Whitfield and the MacTavishes didn’t deserve to die because they had gotten caught in Pamela’s vicious plot against him.

  The Kid kept his rifle trained on the opening in the brush. He heard people moving around down there, as well as the faint sound of voices. But he couldn’t make out any of the words. He expected Tarleton’s men to start taking potshots at him, but so far nothing had happened.

  “James,” he called softly, “get the rope off my horse and see if you can throw a loop over that rock that’s sticking out up there.”

  Instead of doing as he was told, James said, “What are you dressed up for, Browning? You look like some sort of dime novel gunslinger.”

  As a matter of fact, Conrad Browning had taken some of the inspiration for his new identity of Kid Morgan from the fanciful dime novels that had been written about his father, Frank Morgan. But that wasn’t the time or place to explain. He snapped, “Just do what I told you.”

  “Are you thinkin’ we can climb up to that ledge?” Whitfield asked. “Hell, there’s a better way to get out of here than that.”

  The rancher’s comment was so unexpected that it prompted The Kid to look around. “What are you talking about?”

  Whitfield used a blunt thumb to point toward the dark hole in the cliff face. “That’s Dead Injun Cave. In the back of it, there’s a little crack—a chimney, I guess you’d call it—that runs all the way to the top of this mountain. It ain’t the easiest climb in the world, but it’s easier than tryin’ to shinny up a rope on a cliff while somebody’s shootin’ at you.”

  “How do you know about that chimney?” The Kid asked.

  “I told you, I’ve hunted in these mountains, and dodged Apaches, too. They chased me into that very cave about fifteen years ago. I figured I was a goner, but then I found that crack and climbed out through it. The ’Paches don’t know it’s there. They won’t come anywhere near the cave because of those old bones in it. Bad medicine, they call it.”

  That made sense. The Kid felt his pulse quicken as he realized that Whitfield might be on to something.

  “All right, Whitfield, lead the way. Get those two youngsters out of here. I’ll stay behind to cover you.”

  “No!” Meggie cried. “You have to come, too, Mr. Browning.”

  “Somebody’s got to stay,” James said. “Otherwise, those killers will just rush up here and shoot us while we’re trying to climb out.”

  “Your brother’s right, Meggie,” The Kid told her. “Go with him. Show them the chimney, Whitfield.”

  The rancher nodded. “Come on, you two.” As he led them toward the cave, with James practically dragging Meggie, Whitfield added, “Don’t pay no never-mind to that ol’ skeleton in there. He’s fifty years or more past bein’ able to hurt anybody.”

  As the three of them disappeared into the cave, The Kid settled down to wait for the inevitable battle. The taut silence had already hung over the mountainside for longer than he expected.

  For that reason, he wasn’t surprised when shots began to ring out.

  What surprised him was the direction they came from.

  Above him.

  Chapter 21

  The Kid rolled over onto his back as a slug whipped past his ear and slammed into the ground beside
him, kicking up dirt and rock chips. Some of the dirt got in his eyes and blurred his sight.

  More bullets whined around him like angry bees. He didn’t have to see perfectly to know the shots were coming from the ledge he had considered using as an escape route. Aiming in that general direction, he cranked off three rounds from the rifle as fast as he could work the lever, then jackknifed up off the ground and ran toward the cliff.

  Slugs kicked up dust at his feet, but he was moving too fast for the riflemen to draw a good bead on him. He knew what had happened. One of his enemies down below had spotted that ledge and realized that anyone who managed to climb onto it would have a good shot down at him. Tarleton had split his forces, sending some of the hired killers to work their way around and get onto the ledge.

  If The Kid had sent Whitfield and the MacTavishes up the rope, as he’d intended, they would have been climbing right into the gunsights of Tarleton’s men.

  The Kid reached the cliff and pressed his back against the rock face. The shots fired by the men on the ledge couldn’t reach him there—but he couldn’t hit them, either. Even worse, he couldn’t keep the rest of Tarleton’s men from getting to the lower bench and coming up that ledge.

  A grimace twisted The Kid’s face. They had backed him into a corner, all right. All he could do now was go down fighting.

  “Browning!”

  The low-voiced call came from the cave mouth. The Kid glanced over, saw Dave Whitfield emerge from the dark hole in the cliff.

  “What are you doing here?” The Kid snapped. “You’re supposed to be helping James and Meggie escape.”

  “I got ’em started up that chimney,” Whitfield said. He was still breathing hard from the climb, and his haggard features held an even more pronounced gray tinge. “It’s about a three hundred yard climb, and it’s steep and tight. It’ll take ’em a while. There ain’t nothin’ else I can do to help them now. But I can still play a hand down here.”

  The Kid shook his head. “No, get on up there while you still can. I’ll hold off Tarleton and his men from inside the cave. They’ll be here any time now.”

  “Damn right they will, but you ain’t gonna hold ’em off.” Whitfield reached out and closed his hand around The Kid’s Winchester. “I am.”

  “This is my fight—”

  “Yeah, it is,” the rancher broke in, “but I sat in on the game. And now I’m cashin’ out, Browning. My ticker’s shot.”

  The Kid frowned. “Your heart?”

  “That’s right.” A look of pain passed over Whitfield’s rugged face. “Something’s busted inside. I felt it when it happened. So I know I ain’t goin’ home. If those two kids have any chance o’ gettin’ out of this alive…it’s you.”

  The Kid’s mind reeled. He knew Whitfield was telling the truth. It was obvious by looking at him that something was very wrong.

  “Damn it…” The Kid began softly.

  Whitfield shook his head. “There ain’t time to go on about anything. Come on. I’ll show you the way out of here.”

  The Kid finally let go of the Winchester. Whitfield nodded toward the cave, and they both hurried into its dark maw.

  They had to step around the ancient skeleton to reach the back of the cave. The sun was high enough now so that its rays slanted into the gloom. Whitfield gestured toward the low-hanging ceiling and said, “Up here.”

  The Kid moved closer and saw the narrow slit in the rock that he hadn’t noticed before. It started from the rear wall, ascended at a steep angle, and was so dark he couldn’t see more than a couple of feet up it. When he leaned closer to it, he heard faint scraping noises that had came from Meggie and James struggling to reach the top.

  “You’re sure it still goes all the way through?” he asked Whitfield.

  The rancher grunted. “Well, if it don’t, then you and them other two are pure-dee in a bad fix. But if you stay here, you know you’ll end up dead.”

  The Kid nodded. Whitfield was right.

  The opening was so narrow that The Kid wasn’t sure if his shoulders would fit through it. But the brawny James MacTavish had made it, so he supposed he could, too. He turned to Whitfield and held out his hand.

  “They call you Devil Dave,” he said, “but I reckon—”

  “Oh, hell, I told you not to start goin’ on,” Whitfield said as he gripped The Kid’s hand. “Chances are, I’m just as bad as the MacTavishes made me out to be.” He sighed. “Damn, I hope ol’ Hamish pulls through, anyway. And one more thing…if you get outta this mess alive, Browning, I’d sure be beholden to you if you’d tell my daughter that I love her. Help her out any way you can, will you?”

  “Sure, Dave,” The Kid answered without hesitation. “You have my word on it.”

  “I reckon that’ll do, then.” Whitfield gestured curtly with the rifle. “Get the hell outta here while you still got a chance. I think I hear ’em comin’ out there.”

  The Kid nodded, reached into the chimney, and pulled himself up until he could get a foothold and push himself higher. The stone walls closed in around him, scraping his shoulders and threatening to take his breath away. His heart pounded heavily in his chest. He crawled upward into the pitch blackness inside the mountain.

  He hadn’t gone very far when he heard a sudden blast of gunfire. The shots echoed up the crack in the rock and were so loud that he winced as they assaulted his ears. After a few seconds, the fusillade died away for a moment. The Kid heard Dave Whitfield yell, “Come on, you mangy polecats! I’ll kill ever’ damn one of you!”

  From his voice, there was no way to tell that Whitfield was already dying. The Kid had seen it in the rancher’s eyes. Whitfield was sacrificing what little was left of his life to give him and the MacTavishes a chance to escape.

  The Kid kept climbing. He had to press his feet against the sides of the shaft to keep from sliding back down and pull himself higher with his arms and shoulders. It was grinding, exhausting work. The darkness surrounded him like a black shroud, and from time to time, he had trouble catching his breath. If he could see just a flicker of light above him, he thought, so that he would know he was climbing toward freedom, it might make the ordeal easier.

  Only moments after that thought went through his head, he saw a faint glimmer in front of his eyes. He thought at first he was imagining it, but then he realized it was really there. From somewhere high above him, a tiny ray of light had penetrated into the mountain. It shone on a bit of metallic rock wedged into the side of the chimney. A fleck of gold or silver, maybe. A grim smile tugged at The Kid’s mouth. He might be climbing right through a bonanza and not even know it—although it was more likely the rock was mere quartz or something like that.

  The shots came in bunches below. The Kid couldn’t hear Whitfield shouting anymore, but he knew the rancher was still alive. If he wasn’t, the shooting would be over.

  The Kid tilted his head back and peered upward. He could see an actual opening now, with a bit of blue sky in it, but it was no bigger than his thumbnail. The sight encouraged him. The fact that he could see it told him that James and Meggie had made it to the top and gotten out of the chimney. If they could make it, he told himself, so could he.

  Below him, the gunfire had stopped, although it was a moment or two before The Kid realized it wasn’t starting up again. He paused, just for a second, and closed his eyes. Vaya con Dios, he thought.

  He resumed climbing, forcing himself up the shaft as quickly as he could. Once Tarleton and his hired killers realized that The Kid, James, and Meggie were gone, they would start looking around. It wouldn’t take them long to find the chimney leading up from the cave. Unlike the Apaches, they wouldn’t be afraid to venture into the final resting place of that old Indian.

  The little opening above him grew larger, though it still seemed maddeningly far away. The Kid gritted his teeth as he heard voices below him. The killers were in the cave. If they found the escape route, all they’d have to do was stick a couple of revolvers up the chimney a
nd empty them. There was no place in there for him to hide.

  He couldn’t control what they did down there. All he could do was keep climbing. The opening was fifty feet above him, he estimated. Then forty, then thirty, then twenty…The shaft narrowed even more, so that he could barely force himself through it. One of his feet slipped, and he drove his elbows against the sides to keep himself from sliding back down. Even through the buckskin, the rough rock scraped his skin raw.

  After catching himself, The Kid started climbing again. Ten feet to go. He reached up, caught hold of a small projection, pulled up and shoved with his feet at the same time. Five feet. A few more seconds and he’d be able to reach up and grab the edge of the opening. Then it would be a simple matter to pull himself out.

  “…must’ve gone up there!”

  The shouted words rose up the shaft. One of Tarleton’s men must have stuck his head right into the chimney before he yelled the news of his discovery.

  “Shoot up there, you fools! Shoot!”

  That was Tarleton. The Kid grimaced and tried to scramble the few remaining feet.

  That was when something suddenly blocked out the light from above. The Kid looked up and saw James MacTavish looming in the opening, stretching an arm down toward him.

  “Grab my hand!” James urged.

  The Kid lunged upward and caught hold of James’s wrist. The brawny young man hauled him upward. The Kid’s booted feet pushed against the sides of the chimney at the same time. His head came out into the open air. Then his shoulders caught and wouldn’t budge. James grunted with effort as he wrapped both arms around The Kid’s right arm and heaved. The Kid felt like that arm was about to pop out of its socket.

  But instead, his shoulders popped free of the shaft’s narrow opening. Still hanging on to The Kid’s arm, James toppled backward. The rest of The Kid’s body emerged from the chimney. He rolled away from the opening just as guns began to roar at the other end. Bullets ricocheted madly back and forth against the chimney’s walls. Some of them made it all the way to the top and whined off into the air.