The horse had still not reached the bend of the arroyo where it would come into view. For a few moments the quiet fall of its hooves stopped, then started again.
Kane was very close now.
Garrett raised his gun, almost to eye level, the hammer back and ready. If he was lucky he would be able to get off one fast shot and it would have to count. If he missed . . . then Kane would bed him down for keeps.
The horse kept coming.
Garrett touched his tongue to his top lip, fear burning like a cold fire in his belly.
His black walked through the curve of the arroyo and into the open.
Garrett raised his gun higher, his finger on the trigger. But he had no target. The horse was riderless.
“Behind you, Garrett. Turn real slow.”
It was Kane’s voice. Garrett paused for just an instant, considering his options.
“Turn or I’ll drop you right there,” Kane said. “Thought maybe you’d like to see it coming.”
The thought had flashed through Garrett’s mind that he could turn fast and fire. But he just as quickly dismissed the notion. Kane would kill him before he even brought his gun to bear.
Garrett turned slowly, holding his Colt in an upraised hand, knowing his time was running out fast.
“Just open your fingers and let the iron drop,” Kane said.
Through the gathering gloom he saw Kane’s white smile. “I don’t know how you survived the last time I gunned you, boy. But this time I mean to make sure.”
The muzzle of Kane’s gun lifted a fraction, ready for the shot. “Now let go of that gun like I told you.”
Deciding to sell his life dearly, Garrett swung down his arm and leveled his Colt, already aware that he was way too slow.
Kane could have gunned him right then but he never got to pull the trigger.
A flash of gray and the big wolf was on top of him, its wide-open mouth clamping over Kane’s face, the fangs digging deep. Kane screamed and fell on his back, Mingan tearing at his face.
Kane lifted his hand, trying to get his gun into a firing position. But the wolf jumped off him and bounded away. His face streaming blood, Kane staggered to his feet and triggered shot after shot at the fleeing wolf. But the animal had been quickly swallowed by the darkness and Kane’s bullets went wild.
“Kane!” Garrett’s voice cut through the ringing silence that followed the staccato racket of the wolfer’s shots.
The man turned, his face a grotesque mask of scarlet blood. White bone showed on his cheekbones where the skin had been ripped to shreds.
“Now it’s your turn to drop the gun,” Garrett said, his voice soft and easy. “Do it now or I’ll kill you.”
For a few moments Kane thought about it, and Garrett could see the man’s mind working. How many shots had he fired?
Garrett gave him the answer. “You shot your gun dry, Kane. Now drop it on account of how I won’t tell you again.”
“Damn your eyes, Garrett,” Kane snarled as he threw his useless Colt on the ground. “You’d better kill me now because I won’t rest until I skin you alive.”
“Big talk coming from a man who was just half et by a wolf,” Garrett said, smiling, feeling the tension of the past hours draining from him. He stepped toward Kane. “Back off.”
The man read something in the grim set of the young rancher’s mouth and took a couple of steps back. Garrett picked up Kane’s gun and shoved it into his waistband. “Come morning we’re headed for the Marias,” he said. “You’re going to tell those boys of yours to let Jenny Canfield and the other women loose.”
Kane’s face was streaked with thin fingers of blood, his eyes blazing with rage. “Do that and you’ll never leave the river alive,” he said.
Garrett nodded. “Neither will you,” he said. “This much is certain, Kane. One way or the other you’ll die with me.”
“Thetas!” Annie Spencer ran to the wolfer’s side. “You’ve been sore hurt,” she said. “Let me help you.”
Kane sat as the woman poured water on her fingers and began to dab the blood off his face, whispering wordless, soothing sounds as a mother would to a sick child.
Garrett shook his head. There was just no accounting for women. She’d been used and abused by Kane and was deathly afraid of him. And she’d said she hated the man. But that had been a lie. She still loved him, an unnatural, perverted kind of love to be sure, but love just the same.
After taking time to reload Kane’s Colt, Garrett stepped to his black and untied the rope from the saddle. He walked back to where Annie was still tending to the big wolfer and said, “Annie, step away from him.”
“Why?” the woman asked, turning her head to Garrett.
“Because I said so. Now move!”
“Don’t hurt him,” Annie pleaded as she rose to her feet.
Garrett shook out a loop, then tossed it over Kane’s shoulders, cinching it tight when it fell over the man’s upper arms. He stepped closer to the wolfer and wound the rope around him several times, before tying it behind him.
Kane made no protest, but his searching eyes were on Garrett the whole time, his face black with a deep hatred.
“Did you have to do that?” Annie asked, her own eyes blazing. “Truss him up like a chicken that way?”
“Yes, I did,” the young rancher answered, not an ounce of give in him. He looked down at Kane and smiled. “Thetas, best you get some rest. You’ve got a long walk ahead of you come morning.”
“Listen, Garrett. When I kill you, it will be real slow. You’ll die a thousand little deaths before you go screaming into hell. Damn you, boy. I’ll skin your sorry hide piece by piece so it takes you a week to die. You’ll beg me to put a bullet into you, but I won’t because I’ll remember this day and all I’ll do is giggle and cut some more.”
Garrett smiled. “Kane,” he said, “you’ve got a heart as big as a Brazos riverboat, haven’t you?”
The twilight shaded into night. Garrett unsaddled the black, then sat close to Kane, not trusting Annie Spencer. The waxing moon rose and the coyotes began to talk among the hills. A breeze stirred, coming off the Bear Paw Mountains to the west, carrying with it the faint scent of pine and sage.
Kane sat in a scowling silence, Annie close beside him. She had washed most of the blood off the man’s face, but could do little about the raw lacerations made by Mingan’s fangs. The wolf had scarred Kane and he would carry the marks for life. Now man and animal shared a common bond of mutual hate and terrible disfigurement and the bad blood between them would not go away until one or both of them were dead.
Annie moved, getting nearer to the wolfer. “I’d appreciate it if you’d put some space between you and Kane, Annie,” Garrett said. “You’re making me a mite uneasy.”
“I won’t untie him, if that’s what you’re thinking,” the woman said.
Garrett nodded. “That’s what I was thinking. Now move away from him.”
Annie rose to her feet and walked a few steps away from Kane. She sat and rested her thin back against a rock. “This better?” she asked Garrett.
“Sets my mind at rest. For a spell there, you and Kane were getting too all-fired cozy.”
“Thetas was hurt and he needed help,” Annie said. “I guess old habits die hard.”
“Loving a man become a habit with you, Annie?” Garrett asked.
The woman nodded. “A real hard habit to break, seems like.”
Garrett’s eyes slid to Kane’s face, a dour blur in the gloom. “You told me you hated him.”
“I do. How can a woman love and hate a man at the same time? You tell me. I only know that’s how it is.”
“And that’s how come I don’t want you going near him,” Garrett said.
“I won’t set him loose, cowboy,” Annie said. “There’s no going back to how things once were between us.”
Kane’s laugh was a hard, cold cackle coming out of the darkness. “You’re damned right about that, Annie. Oh, maybe in the nig
ht I’d reach out for you, to scratch an itch like. But come first light I’d take one look at you and kick you clear out of bed.”
The big wolfer tilted back his head and roared, his laughter even more cruel than his words.
Garrett waited until Kane had fallen silent and shook his head. “Miz Spencer, that bad habit you say you got, if’n I was you, I’d break it real fast.”
The woman made no answer, but Garrett heard her sob, a small, wrenching sound in the quiet.
Garrett rose to his feet, sat down beside Annie and put his arm around her scrawny waist, pulling her to him. The woman laid her head on his shoulder and they sat like that for a long time, saying nothing, until Annie’s sobs died away.
Later, as he lay on his back and looked up at the stars, Garrett asked himself why he had comforted Annie, a woman who meant nothing to him. He had no answer. Maybe it was just that he couldn’t bear to see a wounded creature hurting. Or was he just getting soft? He had no answer for that either.
Chapter 18
At first light Luke Garrett shook Annie awake, then kicked Kane in the ribs until the man opened his eyes.
“That’s a dozen more cuts, boy,” Kane said, his boiling eyes boring into Garrett’s. “I won’t forget.”
Garrett ignored the wolfer and stepped to his saddle. His saddlebags were still in place and he reached inside and found a rope piggin string. He walked over to Kane. “On your feet.”
The man rose and Garrett quickly bound his wrists together with the string. He loosed his rope, then dabbed the loop around the wolfer’s neck, pulling the rawhide hondo tight so it settled just under Kane’s chin.
Garrett smiled. “Try to make a run for it, Thetas, and I’ll break your damned neck.”
Kane looked terrible. His beard and long hair were crusted with blood and the cuts on his face were open to the bone, his wild eyes shot through with threads of scarlet. Without his guns he seemed smaller, but the man had lost none of his arrogance and he cursed Garrett viciously, his face a snarling mask of anger.
Last night had convinced Garrett that he could trust Annie not to make an attempt to free Kane. He passed her the wolfer’s gun. “If he tries any fancy moves, kill him.”
The woman nodded. She held the Colt in both hands, her thumb on the hammer. Kane’s bloodshot gaze went to Annie, curious and calculating, but he said nothing.
Garrett saddled the black, picked up the end of Kane’s rope and swung into the leather. He kicked a stirrup free and told Annie to climb up behind him. The woman gave Garrett back the Colt, stepped into the stirrup and mounted, hitching up her skirt to straddle the horse, showing a deal of still shapely leg.
“All ready?” Garrett asked her, turning his head.
She nodded and the young rancher kneed the black into motion, tugging on the rope, forcing Kane to stumble after him.
After clearing the arroyo, Garrett rounded the hill, then headed east toward the Marias. A scarlet sun hung low in the sky and the morning was still not unbearably hot. Ahead of him the heat waves had yet to begin to shimmer and the land stood out in stark detail. He could see low-lying brush flats that stretched all the way to the horizon until they touched the blue arch of the sky.
For an hour they rode in silence, the only sound the creak of saddle leather, the soft fall on the horse’s hooves on the sand and Kane’s shuffling steps. Vultures quartered the sky, gliding in elegant circles, and once a gazing antelope lifted its head to watch them as they rode past.
As the sun climbed higher the temperature rose. Garrett passed the canteen to Annie. The woman drank and so did he. Stepping out of the saddle, Garrett lifted the canteen to Kane’s lips and the man took a swallow.
“How far to the river, Kane?” he asked.
“An hour,” the wolfer answered. “Maybe less.” His eyes met Garrett’s. “You don’t really think you can ride into my camp and get out alive, do you?”
“You’re my ace in the hole, Kane,” the young rancher said. “Anybody even looks like drawing a gun and I’ll scatter your brains.”
Kane studied Garrett, reading him. “You mean that, don’t you?”
Garrett nodded. “Uh-huh. You can bet the ranch and all the cattle on it.”
Thirty minutes later Garrett struck an old buffalo trail that angled slightly to the northwest. He followed the trail, the black’s hooves kicking up plumes of dust, and behind him Kane coughed and cursed as he stumbled forward, breathing a dry, noxious mix of powdered dirt and manure.
Annie Spencer, looking over Garrett’s shoulder, saw the cottonwoods along the river bottom first. She pointed them out to Garrett and the young rancher’s eyes followed her leveled finger. Now he too caught sight of the cottonwoods, rising like puffs of smoke in the distance.
He rode up on the wolfers’ camp just as the sun climbed directly overhead.
Garrett reined up the black and jerked the rope, yanking Kane alongside his left stirrup. “I’m going to ride in slow and peaceful,” he told the wolfer.
“But if I see any snake eyes, remember what I said—I’ll gun you.”
“Big talk, boy,” Kane said. “We’ll find out if you’re still talking so big a few minutes from now.”
Garrett nodded. “It won’t make no never mind to you, Thetas. On account of how you’ll already be coyote bait.”
A few men were gathering at the edge of the camp, rifles slanted across their chests. They watched Garrett intently as he quickly scanned the lay of the land.
Cottonwoods and some willows lined both banks of the Marias. A low hill rose just to the right of the camp, on its slope several standing stones that may have had a ceremonial Indian origin. The wolfers’ horses and the oxen grazed close to the river in the shade of the cottonwoods and only one fire burned, a blackened pot on a wooden tripod hanging over the coals.
The wagon was standing close to the fire, the women gathered around it, Jenny Canfield’s bright hair catching the sunlight.
Garrett had seen all he wanted to see. Keeping Kane close, he drew his gun and kneed the horse forward. When he was still thirty yards away he stood in the stirrups and yelled, “Hello the camp!”
A big towhead Garrett recognized as the man who had put a loop around his neck after the fight with Weasel beckoned him forward.
When Garrett rode closer, the towhead’s wary eyes slid from the Colt in the rancher’s hand to Kane. “How do you want us to play this, Thetas?” he asked.
“Do nothing right now, you idiot,” Kane snapped. “Can’t you see he’s got a gun pointed right at my head?”
Ten men now stood in a loose line, facing Garrett. Deke Pickett had his powder horn to his ear and the deaf gunman looked confused as he tried to figure out what was happening. His puzzled eyes darted back and forth from Garrett to Kane and his mouth was working.
At that moment Pickett was the most dangerous of all. If he failed to understand the situation he could go to the gun, figuring he would get all the explanations he needed after the smoke cleared.
The other thing that bothered Garrett was the reckless look in the towhead’s eyes. The man was holding himself tense, thinking it over. How fast was he on the draw and shoot? Probably lightning fast, Garrett decided, and his worries grew.
He shoved the muzzle of his gun harder against Kane’s head. “Thetas, tell your boys to hitch the oxen to the wagon,” he said. “The women are leaving.”
Kane stiffened as though he’d been struck, but his voice was steady as he said, “Do as he says, boys. Hitch up the wagon.” Then, after a moment’s hesitation: “It will be all right, he’s not going anywhere.”
A couple of men left to round up the oxen, both of them looking back at Garrett.
The young rancher watched them go. Jenny’s eyes were on him, and he told himself so far, so good.
But a heartbeat later it took only one questioning word, strangely distorted from the mouth of the poised and ready Deke Pickett, to open the ball. “Thetas?”
Perhaps spurred by Pi
ckett’s confused query, the towhead decided to end it right there. Confident of his speed from the holster, he drew. But the man’s gun still hadn’t cleared leather when a bullet crashed into his chest.
The towhead’s eyes widened in surprise. He looked up at Garrett, trying to determine if it was he who’d killed him, then he fell on his back, blood staining his mouth. A flurry of bullets kicked up exclamation points of warning around the feet of Kane’s men, and when the roar of the shooting died away, a man’s voice called out from the hillside, “Stay right where you are! I’ll kill the first man who makes a move for a gun.”
Garrett’s eyes slanted to the hillside. A rider on a long-legged buckskin emerged from out of the standing stones and made his way down the slope. He held his rifle upright, the butt resting on his right thigh, and even at a distance Garrett saw the white gleam of teeth as the man grinned.
It was Kane who first recognized the rifleman. “It’s Temple Yates, damn his eyes.”
Deke Pickett had moved up beside Kane, his thumbs tucked in his gun belts. He never took his eyes off Yates.
“Temple Yates,” Pickett said. He looked at Kane for confirmation, his attentive stare on the big wolfer’s mouth.
“I know,” Kane said, exaggerating the movement of his lips.
Pickett nodded, satisfied. He took a step back, but now his hands were close to the butts of his Smith & Wesson Russians.
Temple Yates rode near to Garrett and reined up, his searching gray eyes missing nothing, lingering for a moment on the Colt pointed at Kane’s head.
Yates was a tall, slender man, riding relaxed and easy in the saddle. He was clean-shaven but for a sweeping dragoon mustache. His dusty range clothes were drab and nondescript, only the band on his hat adding a splash of color. It was silver and obviously decorated by the same gunsmith who had engraved his twin Colts.
The gunman nodded at Kane. “Thetas.” His eyes shifted to Pickett, narrowing slightly. “See you still got deef Deke with you. Is he hearing any better?”
The Tenderfoot Trail Page 12
