“Get on, Hambone,” he yelled at the horse. “Git, git.” The horse stepped into the water and its front hooves slid sideways on the smooth rocks. But it pushed onto hard sand and began to pick its way across the ford. It lifted each foot high. The water made fountains against its legs, shooting up and falling down with each step the horse took.
Sweeney made it to the opposite bank in about ten minutes. His horse clambered up onto the bank and stamped its feet, then shook itself from mane to tail.
“Y’all can come on over anytime you’re ready,” Sweeney said, a wide grin on his face.
Schneck guided his horse along the same path Sweeney had taken but held his horse in check so that it took him longer, and his horse got skittery out in the middle where the water was deeper and stronger. But he made it to the opposite bank and watched as Wagner and Jackson followed at intervals.
“Now, we need to find a suitable place for an ambush,” Schneck said. “Don’t any of you ride down the road any more than you have to. And when we cross, LouDon, you be sure to get you a spruce limb and wipe out our tracks.”
“Yes, sir,” Jackson said.
The four men crossed the road in single file and stayed to the rock-strewn stretch where flooding had left rocks of every size when the river jumped its banks in previous spring floods. Jackson cut a willow branch and wiped out their tracks on the road.
“I wonder where the hell we are,” Schneck said after a while.
“There ain’t no fresh wagon tracks on that road,” Jackson said. “So, we’re somewhere twixt our valley and LaPorte.”
“You dumb bastard,” Schneck said. “I know where we are, but not exactly.”
“I lost all track of time and distance comin’ through that heavy timber,” Wagner said. “But we’re still high up, I reckon. And they ain’t passed us yet.”
“That’s what I wanted to know,” Schneck said
They rode on, looking for possible places for an ambush as the clouds swirled in the sky and began to float toward the arc of the sun. A breeze sprang up and lifted delicate spray off the river’s whitecaps, and somewhere a mountain quail called a piping strain of melodic notes and then was silent as the breeze stiffened and made the aspen leaves jiggle and twist so that the colors changed, shifted subtly with every cooling gust.
Schneck kept looking over his shoulder at the road, and he fingered the butt of his Colt in its holster. He did not hear anything, but his nostrils seemed to fill up with the cloying scent of blood.
Human blood.
TWENTY-ONE
Brad and Thor stopped to water their horses at a small woodland lake a short distance from the road. They had not yet reached the Poudre, but they were some distance from the valley they had left. Below the lake was a beaver dam. Water spilled over the dam and as they rode on, they passed several smaller dams and heard the warning slap of the beavers’ flat tails as the furry animals dove under their mud-and-stick shelters. Small birds flitted along the tiny stream, and yellow butterflies bounced on the air like autumn leaves. Nymphs skittered just above the water, and some perched on small stones and flexed their dusty, moth-like wings as if they were fanning themselves in the fresh air.
The wide canyon was shadowy with heavy, ash-bottomed clouds hovering just above it, all packed together and floating eastward, propelled by strong winds from miles away.
Brad thought that these were prairie-seeking clouds and would not bring rain to the mountains. He had seen the Rockies produce their own weather many times, forming huge clouds and launching them over the highest peaks like sailing ships, only to see them drift off, turn black, and bring darkness and lightning and heavy rains to the plains and the towns down on the flat.
Today seemed no different. The cloud tops were still fluffy and white and the temperature still mild. These were not yet rain clouds. They were just the mountains’ way to shed moisture for a parched land beyond their majestic dominion.
As their horses slaked their thirst in the lake, a cow elk, drinking on the far side of the lake, lifted her head and bellowed softly at them, giving off a throaty grunt that startled the two horses. The elk finished drinking and turned and strode off into the timber, the tawny fluff of her tail like some sad and snooty good-bye wave.
Trout broke the surface of the slightly ruffled waters and snatched nymphs and dragonflies out of the air in graceful porpoising arcs and left concentric ripples that spread in ever-expanding circles until they lapped at the mosses and grasses that bordered the shoreline.
“I wonder if this lake has any bass in it,” Thor remarked.
“No. Just trout,” Brad said. “There are dozens, maybe hundreds, of these little lakes all through the Rockies. I’ve fished some of them. Never saw anything in them except rainbow trout. But on the streams, I’ve caught speckled trout and cutthroat trout.”
“Taste good?”
“Very good,” Brad replied. “I know dozens of ways to cook them, and so does my wife, Felicity. They taste best when you’ve just taken them out of the water, cleaned them, and put them on a grate atop an open fire, maybe with a sprig or two of sagebrush laid on top of the burning wood. They have very delicate flesh and small bones that come out when you filet them.”
“Never tasted such fish,” Thor said. “Bass and sunfish is mostly what we have up north.”
“Maybe I’ll take you fishing with me when this job is finished,” Brad said.
“I’d like that,” Thor said, and they pulled on their reins and guided their horses back to the road down the steep canyon to the river.
Two young mule deer crept out of the brush-choked creek and bounded off into the surrounding timber. They made little noise as they gamboled away, leaving a cloud of birds flushing from cover.
The two men were silent for a time as they wended their way down the canyon and onto the road slashed into being long ago by lumberjacks and later improved by sheepherders and hunters.
“Why do we talk about fishing and such when we know what lies ahead on this cloudy day?” Thor asked after a time of reflection.
“Fear,” Brad said.
“Fear?” Thor acted surprised and glanced at Brad’s face.
“We talk about ordinary things because we dread what we might find down this road,” Brad said. “The fear is that we might be too late to save those Basque women and their children.”
“Are we also afraid of facing Schneckand three of his men?”
“Maybe,” Brad said. “The unknown is always a fearsome thing. We can’t put a name to it, so we are afraid of it.”
“I never thought about it that way,” Thor said.
“I keep going over this road in my mind. I wonder where the wagons are right this minute. I wonder where Schneck and his men are waiting in ambush. And all this makes my stomach tighten up and sweat break out on my forehead. Behind all that wondering, there is the stalking beast of my imagination. I fear what I can’t see, what I can’t know.”
“I think I know what you mean, Brad. My imagination has been going wild ever since I talked to the Mex, Verdugo. I keep thinking of the hatred Schneck has for those sheepherders.”
“Did you know that when you went to work for him?”
“No, he never mentioned it until he knew the sheepherders were up in that valley. He considered it a personal insult and a threat. He said sheep would ruin the grass forever. He really has a big wad of hate stuck in his craw.”
“Hatred can blind a man to both reason and the truth,” Brad said.
They prodded their horses into a faster gait, each man living with his own private thoughts, both listening for any sound of wagons rumbling down the road ahead of them. They both gazed at the ruts and saw where the wagons had stopped so that the women and children could go into the woods and relieve themselves. They saw the imprints of small shoes and boots coming and going. Neither man commented, but Brad noticed that the edges of the shoe tracks and the horse tracks were beginning to crumble. At one time, he knew, the tracks were
crisp and well-defined. Hours ago. Now, the breeze was turning the top rims of the tracks into dust. The road was drying out.
The road and the river wound down through small, ancient moraines where rocks and boulders had rolled under the powerful rush of flooding waters eons ago. Some of the places were desolate and pools of water still remained near the bank of the river, left there by the first rush of melted snow hurtling down from the muscular slopes of the high mountains.
The river ran fast, whooshing over rocks and splashing through narrow crevices in the streambed, carrying clouds of silt and dirt along with disjointed tree branches, small limbs with tattered leaves still clinging to them, as if it were scouring the earth with its powerful energy. The river widened and narrowed in rapid succession as they rode along its length. Chunks of bank tore loose, and the clods of dirt and grass fell into the maelstrom and were decimated and obliterated within a few yards amid the turbulence. Rocks loosened from the bank and clattered as they fell into the cascading waters before they vanished in silence amid the shadowy shapes of trout grabbing at the grubs and earthworms dislodged from their earthen hiding places.
Brad felt a tug at his heart as he watched the trout flash beneath the greenish waters, snatching easy morsels from the clumps of dirt and grass. They sometimes exploded from the water and gulped down the flying nymphs flapping close to the surface. He thought of how complex life was, with its delicate balance between life and death, each creature depending on others for food and survival.
Sheep versus cattle, he thought. Man depended on both species for food and clothing. Brad was wearing the skins of deer he had killed, and the world depended not only on wool but also on beef and cowhides. Both had a place in the universe, yet neither shepherd nor cowman could meet on common ground and work out a solution to the grazing problem. It seemed senseless to Brad, but he knew that it was the way of the world. If enemies could not be found, enemies would be created, and it was always survival of the fittest. All creatures have to obtain sustenance, and in that delicate balancing act of nature, some must die so that others can live.
There were no winners in the long run, Brad thought. A man might hunt elk and live off the meat for a month, and in the next, he might encounter a bull in the rut and wind up gored and dead. The elk would not eat the man, but it was pushing down on the scales and death was the great leveler in the complex scheme of life.
On the road ahead, they saw a rag doll that must have fallen from one of the wagons. The sight of it wrenched at the two men because, at first glance, it looked like a small child dressed in blue overalls with red hair. Brad’s stomach turned until he got close enough to see that it was only a doll.
The two men looked at each other and rode on, kicking their horses into a trot.
Ten minutes later, they heard the crack of a rifle. Then, more shots sounded far down the road and the screams of women and children floated up to them as if from some unknown cave or dungeon.
Brad put Ginger into a gallop, a grim cast to his face. Sorenson spurred his horse, too, and the two men raced down the road filled with a dread larger than the dark clouds floating over their heads.
The rifle shots grew louder and the screams more piercing.
Both men drew their pistols against an enemy they could not see. But the act gave them some comfort. They were armed and ready to shoot.
The wind was cold against their faces, and the rims of their ears reddened with the chill.
They rounded a bend and saw the two wagons askew on the road, each cocked at a crazy angle with dead horses collapsed in their traces and the outriders sprawled on the road like fallen scarecrows, the crimson pools of their blood turning as black as ebony.
Small children stood in one wagon, clutching each other, screaming and whimpering.
And, still, there were the screams of terrified women and the whipcrack snap of rifle shots in quick succession. Puffs of white smoke burst from behind trees and blew to ghostly tatters in the brusque wash of wind that coursed the canyon and whipped the waves of the river into a frothy frenzy.
Brad’s heart seemed to stop, and he felt an iron hand squeeze it.
The tears came when he saw a small boy blown out of the wagon, his head in a cloud of blood as if he’d been smitten by an iron-studded mace wielded by some medieval warrior.
Time stopped at that moment, and everything Brad saw seemed to be some grotesque tapestry pinned to a stone wall where there was only blood and the screams of women fleeing for their very lives.
TWENTY-TWO
When Schneck saw the wide moraine next to the road, the bordering timber, he knew that it was the perfect place for an ambush. He found Jackson a place to set up in a choked stand of aspen that seemed a perfect hiding spot. He ordered them all to stake out their horses deep in the woods while Jackson sat there in the concealing aspens to watch the road. They took his horse and led it to a place a quarter mile from the road and hobbled the horses in a small wooded glade behind a huge outcropping of gray rocks mottled with moss and mold.
Sweeney, Wagner, and Schneck hiked back to the road.
“Halbert,” Schneck said, “you set yourself up next to the river in that cluster of alder bushes. Sit real still and keep your eyes and ears open. Jackson’s off to your left, and you’ll see the wagons before he does. Wait until the wagons are real close and then you shoot the horses. Shoot them dead, every one, so that those wagons can’t move. Got that?”
“Sure do, Boss,” Sweeney said. He walked to the bank and lay prone in a shallow depression. He laid his rifle out and cocked a shell into the Winchester’s chamber. He sighted down the barrel to a point midway between the bend in the road and its imaginary center.
Satisfied, Schneck and Wagner walked back to the line of large aspens on the other side of the road.
“We can shoot from here,” Schneck said.
“Standin’ up?”
“Yes, Jim. That way, we can move around, pick our targets. Some of them might try to run away.”
“You mean the women?” Wagner said.
“Women, kids, the wagon drivers. We need to be flexible so that none of them gets away from us.”
“No witnesses, right?”
“No witnesses,” Schneck repeated.
The two men stood behind two thick-trunked aspens. They weren’t concealed entirely, but they did not present silhouettes to anyone coming down the road. With the big clouds floating overhead, they were in shadow. Both levered fresh cartridges into their rifles.
Schneck also loosened his pistol in its holster, sliding it up and down to make sure he could jerk it free when he needed it.
Wagner was a few yards in front of him. From Schneck’s position he could see all three men, which was the way he wanted it. He was the general, the commander in the field, and he saw himself that way. He licked his lips in anticipation of the slaughter to come, and he thought upon the effect the killings would have on Garaboxosa and the other sheepherders.
Maybe that sheepherding bastard will get the idea that I mean business, he thought. I gave him fair warning and he didn’t listen. Now, maybe he’ll pack up and drive his damned sheep back to Wyoming. I’d like to kill every one of his damned sheep. They have no business eating my good grass. Let all those Basque bastards go back to Spain or wherever they come from. This is America, by God, and here in the West, we raise cattle, not sheep. We don’t need their damned wool, either. We grow our own cotton in the South and we got other ways to stay warm.
Schneck worked himself up into a silent frenzy with his thoughts. He held the barrel of his rifle against the tree and flexed his trigger finger just outside the guard. He sighted down the barrel, lining up the blade front sight directly in the center of the rear buckhorn, and squeezed thin air to simulate firing that first shot. He wanted to kill a woman right off. He wanted to see her body turn to stone with the shock of the bullet. He wanted to hear her scream as blood filled her lungs and throat and gushed out of her mouth.
; His thoughts began to arouse him sexually. Blood and pain did that to him. He once had a fat mistress that he beat up frequently just so he could be aroused and heighten his satisfaction when he bedded her, plumbing her bruised and swollen depths while she sobbed and moaned beneath him.
He had known many women, and none of them had lasted long when he lived with them. They all left with broken arms, cracked jaws, black eyes, and bruised bodies. Those bruises were the brands he put on them, and he had once notched the ear of a German fräulein just so she would always remember him. He had used the same tool on her that he used to notch the ears of his newborn calves before they were branded.
He thought of those times and the weeping, screaming women as he waited for the wagons to round the bend and come within range of four rifles.
An hour went by, then another. Then he heard the far-off rumble, thump, and clunk of wagon wheels. He felt his heart pump faster, felt his temples throb. His mouth went dry, and he wiped a sweaty palm on his trousers, then grabbed the stock and nestled it against his cheek and sighted down the barrel.
The sounds became louder, and he heard the laughter and banter of the children, the low voices of the women trying to control their exuberance while hanging on to the sides of a rocking wagon.
Then the supply wagon hove into view, slogging along at a slow pace ahead of the passenger wagon. They seemed to be in no great hurry. Some of the children were pointing at the river and counting the small rainbows they saw dancing in the fine mist. All of them were gawking at the river, marveling at its force, its powerful surges over the rocks and boulders, the green rush of its waters as they flattened out before they crashed against rows of rocks jutting from the shallows.
Two riders flanked the passenger wagon. Two swarthy, squat men who wore pistols on their old and worn gun belts. But their rifles and shotguns were lodged firmly in their scabbards. The wagoners had no weapons showing.
Closer and closer they came, the wagons and the gabbling women, the babbling, gleeful children.
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