by Lou Cameron
As he felt her mound of Venus cupped in his now trembling hand, he moaned, “Oh, hell, there’s a limit to how much sense the Lord has a right to expect from one poor mortal cuss.”
But he only took off his gun rig and kept his jeans on, from the knees down, as they got to know each other better.
She seemed intent on his knowing her even better, for as he entered her, she wrapped her slim legs around his shirttails and hauled her calico shift up until the moon was shining on her small but lovely naked breasts. She pleaded with him to take everything off. He told her it felt fine just the way they were going about it, and that was no lie. She was young and firm as well as wayward, and she moved just right as she sobbed that she’d almost forgotten how good this felt.
He found it easy to accept how long she said she’d gone without it. Although, from the way she moved those slender hips, it was safe to assume she’d surely done it a lot before her folk had sent her out west.
He naturally climaxed in her fast. Any man would have. When he tried for seconds, she grinned up at him wickedly and said, “Oh, goody. Do you think you can do it three times without stopping?”
He laughed, kissed her, and replied, “That’s not what I’m most worried about, you horny little minx. If we’re going to make a habit of this, we’d better take some elemental precautions.”
She said she knew how to take care of herself, later. He said that wasn’t what he meant. She didn’t catch on until he had her on her hands and knees atop the mattress, so he could stare out the window when he wasn’t staring down at her pale rump in the moonlight.
She laughed like hell, and arched her back for more. “If they come now,” she said, “I’ll just die!”
But she didn’t when, just as they were climaxing together, he gasped, “Oh, yeah, nice. But stay just the way you are, honey. I think I heard something out back.”
She remained in that tempting position but told him to get back there and do it, damn it, some more, as Stringer hauled up his jeans and .38 to take a look-see out the back loophole.
Then he cursed and fired. She screamed and flattened out, asking what was up. “He ain’t up now,” he replied. “He’s down behind the watering trough at this end of the corral. I can’t say if I got him or he ducks good. Get to that other damned window with that rifle, girl.
He didn’t turn his head from the loophole to see if she was good at taking orders. If she wasn’t, they were both dead. He had a target for sure out his side of the cabin.
It got very quiet, although somewhere in the night an owl was hooting or someone more disgusting was moaning low. After a time a cautious voice called out, “Hey, MacKail?”
“MacKail’s my name. What’s your game?”
You got old Siwash. He’s down ahint the water trough and he sounds like he’s gut shot.”
“I sure hope so. What do you want me to do about it? Kiss it and make it well?”
There was another silent interval. Then he heard, “We want to haul our wounded from the field of battle, if that’s not too much to ask.”
“It was your notion to turn it into a battlefield,” Stringer called back. “I would have been content to leave it a corral. How come you boys waited for moonrise, anyway? Do you like to be gut shot?”
“New orders,” the same sad voice replied. “Had it been up to us alone, we’d have waited you out as you suggested. We know your rep, MacKail. How about it? Can we pick up or wounded pard and see what can be done for him?”
“I’m studying on it. Who told you I was all that reputable?”
“Aw, come on. How many gents called MacKail could be wandering about under old Rough Rider hats in these parts? The big boss told us how good you are. That’s why we’re asking, polite, about old Siwash. It won’t hurt you to hold your fire long enough for us to pick him up, will it?”
“It might, if you boys were to rush me from such short range.”
“Look, we’ll come out in view with our guns put away. You can cover us easy from that… window?”
“Never mind just where I might be right now. Come a mite closer if you like, and we shall see what we shall see.”
This time the silence was longer. They probably had to argue about it some. Stringer knew he would, if anyone had asked him step out in the open with the moon so bright in a cloudless sky.
Then he saw two of them moving across the corral, his way, toward the dark bulk of the watering trough. He waited until they were too close to miss, then emptied his wheel into them, dropped the empty pistol, and ran over to the window to grab the rifle and shove Fran out of the way. Sure enough, he got three shots off at the ones rushing the cabin from the slope.
All three went down, of course. But one struggled to his hands and knees to start crawling back upslope, bawling like a fresh-branded calf. Stringer levered another round in the chamber and ended his bitching with a .30-30 round that raked the wounded owl hoot from rectum to brain, if he’d been aiming right.
He put another round in the chamber and handed the rifle back to the naked blonde, saying, “I don’t think they’ll try that again. But keep an eye peeled anyway.”
Then he was back at his own gun loop, reloading, as a voice called out in an injured tone, “That was dirty, MacKail. You had no call to put them poor boys in the dust with Siwash. Ain’t you got no sense of honor?”
Stringer laughed. “Thanks,” he called back. “I was afraid I might have missed one. As you know, or as you’ll shortly hear, we just dropped three more of you on the far side. Your boss sure must want me bad. Although, as I see you know who I am, entire, that’s starting to make some sense. I didn’t think you boys were all that interested in buffalo hides alone.”
There was no answer. Stringer sensed that whatever their real business might be, they didn’t consider it any of his business.
He took aim at the watering trough and shot it, low. Fran asked why. “Letting the water out,” he said. “I suspect the boys on the ground behind it are down for good. But in case they’re being sneaky, the first one who pops up to throw a shot my way is in for a splintery surprise.”
She sighed. “Oh, what will we ever do now?”
“You might start by putting your dress back on,” he said. “I reckon we’ve convinced ’em they can’t come in. But sooner or later we’ll want to go out. I’ve got to study on that some more.”
“Oh, Lord,” she said, “they have us trapped in here!”
“There must be an echo in here,” he replied. “Everytime I say something, someone says the same thing back at me.”
CHAPTER
NINE
*
Sunrise was a long while coming. It helped to pass the time but did nothing for Stringer’s nerves to be cooped up with a beautiful sex maniac. Some of Fran’s suggestions as to how a man could peer out a loophole and enjoy an orgasm at the same time seemed more alarming than practical. He wasn’t in the mood in any case, for next to a bucket of ice water, there was nothing more cooling to the passions of a man with any sense than another man, or several other men, lurking about outside with guns.
At last it got light enough to see colors, and there didn’t seem much else to see, out back or up the silent grassy slope.
As Fran prepared them a cold breakfast, she opined that this time they were gone for good.
“Aside from the dead pony and pet buffalo,” he said, “I make it three dead men out front and some damn body’s boot sticking out from behind the watering trough to the rear. They wouldn’t ride off and leave their fallen behind. Not because it wouldn’t be decent, but because at least one of those fallen rascals ought to have some identification on him.”
As she opened a tomato can with an ax, she replied, “Pooh, I’m sure you scared them good, for you are about the shootingest man I’ve ever heard tell of out this way. I’ll bet you scared the wits out of those saddle tramps, lover.”
“It’s not their wits I’m worried about,” he said. “Their boss seems to think I’m m
ighty important to him, dead. He doesn’t have to risk my shooting skills. He’s got domesticated killers to take his chances for him. I wish I knew what he’s really up to.”
She asked what he meant, so over breakfast he brought her up to date on his life since Granger, leaving out some of the dirty parts. She agreed it was a poser.
“It seems to me,” she said as she drank some beans, “that if I was out to gun the president, I’d just do it. So why would they be going to all this trouble just to stop you from warning him that they might?”
“Out of the mouths of babes,” he said. “They’ve had the edge on me in transportation as well as numbers from the beginning. Maybe that’s not what they’re afraid I’d tell old T.R. Maybe they’re out to stop me from telling him something else about ’em.”
She asked what that could be.
“That’s where I lose the scent,” he replied. “I just don’t know any state secrets or criminal plans anyone that important would be interested in. When and if I do catch up with the presidential party, I’ll be lucky to get a personal interview with old T.R. I’ll no doubt have to explain it all to some prissy assistant, and the hell of it is, I don’t know what those outlaws don’t want me to explain, if it’s not an assassination plot.”
She belched delicately. “You say you think President Roosevelt could be somewhere here in the park. If you think that, those gun slicks surely must think that, right?”
He started to ask if there was any point to such an obvious remark. Then he said, “Jesus H. Christ, you’re right. They did stop me from getting through. They have me boxed tight, and even as we sit here in the box, old T.R. is riding about out there like a big-ass bird and an easy target!” He got to his feet and moved to the one door.
“Do you think they’re really gone?” she asked. “I thought you said—”
“I know what I said,” he replied, drawing his .38. “They can’t be after old T.R. and me at the same time. So let’s see who they’re after.”
He took a deep breath and opened the door. Nothing happened until he stepped halfway out in the cold gray light of dawn. Then a rifle squibbed from the tree line up the slope, thudding its ball into the door jamb instead of Stringer, and he was back inside, muttering, “They’re after me.”
Fran moaned. “Oh, how are we ever to get out of here?”
“With considerable ingenuity,” he said, “as soon as I can come up with something that smart. But it’s not as if we had any pressing morning chores to do. The ponies locked up with the furs may get hungry and thirsty, but they’re not going anywheres right now. I wonder if it could be those furs they’re… Never mind. Dumb notion. They couldn’t have been trying to stop me from getting here with a warning. I didn’t know I was coming.”
She licked her lips. “Speaking of coming, we have them pinned down a discreet distance away, don’t we, honey?”
He chuckled fondly. “Hold the thought, for now. I agree they’d be foolish as hell to rush us by broad day. On the other hand, it was dumb of them to move in last night after the moon came up. I don’t think the ones here planned to. They must be getting messages by relay riders from the nearest telegraph office. Where do you reckon that might be, Fran?”
“There are no Western Union offices, or even wires, in this corner of the park. I reckon you could send or get a telegram at Yellowstone Station. I don’t know of any place nearer.”
He frowned. “Neither do I, and to deliver wired instructions to that gang up the slope, a rider would have to not only ride fast, but circle clear of the presidential party! They have to be somewhere between us and the railroad depot. But that just makes no sense, if they’re plotting what I thought they could be plotting.”
“Maybe they’re just afraid of meeting up with our president,” she suggested. “They say he’s mighty tough, and he’d be traveling with a big party, wouldn’t he?”
Stringer thought about that. “Yeah. He can’t go out in his garden to pick roses without a whole army of secret servicemen and politicos tagging along. In any case, they don’t seem to be after T.R. after all. I’ve come all this way on a fool’s errand.”
“But I’m sure glad you came,” she said. “I came, too, a lot. I wish we could go somewhere else so we could come some more.”
He laughed. “I’d settle for just getting out of here. But we seem to be stuck until those rascals either leave or give me a better crack at ’em. You’d best keep an eye up that slope. I’ll make sure nobody tries to come in the back way.”
He moved over to his loophole. The boot protruding from behind the water trough was still there. So was a cloud of flies. The hover flies shone golden in the morning sunlight. The blue bottles were already down behind the trough, feeding.
The flies got thicker as the sun crept higher. Stringer was feeling the effects of a tense, sleepless night. But he knew he could stay awake seventy-two hours, given something interesting to think about. He kept telling himself they could be attacked again at any moment, but it still felt dull as hell. So he was more half asleep than he knew when Fran suddenly yelled, “Oh, for heaven’s sake!”
He ran over to join her at the window, asking what was up, and saw at least fifty riders splashing across the creek downstream. Most were men, but some rode sidesaddle. Stringer recognized at least two mounted figures near the head of the column, ran to the door, flung it open, and shouted, “For God’s sake, Mr. President, duck!”
And then, even as the stocky gent wearing glasses and a walrus moustache under a pith helmet glanced his way, a rifle squibbed and a gout of dirt and shredded grass mushroomed up a few yard’s in front of the presidential pony.
The pony spooked. Its rider steadied it with surprising skill, shook a pudgy fist at the unseen sniper among the distant trees, and shouted “Charge!” at the top of his lungs.
“No! London!” Stringer shouted. “Stop that crazy bastard!” But if Jack London heard him, nobody else seemed to, for all fifty of them, whether riding astride or sidesaddle, tore up the hill after Teddy Roosevelt, yelling like a Sioux war party!
“Oh, shit!” Stringer sobbed, grabbed the rifle from Fran and tore after them on foot.
The tall newspaperman could run pretty good, even tired, but the mounted band of obvious lunatics were out of sight among the trees before he’d made it much beyond the dead buffalo. He stopped, winded, and hunkered down behind the bloated carcass to see what would happen next.
What happened was that the same wild riders came out of the tree line, a staggered line abreast, as Teddy Roosevelt in the lead spotted Stringer and rode toward him.
Stringer rose to his feet, and another member of the party—who had to be either a Secret Service agent or a politician with a mighty big pistol in his hand—yelled, “Drop that rifle, now, mister!”
Stringer dropped it just as Jack London caught up with them. “He’s all right. I know him,” London said.
The president reined in to regard Stringer sternly. “What’s this all about, young man?” he demanded.
“I wish I knew, Mr. President,” Stringer replied. “I thought the gang that had me pinned down here was after you.”
“Rubbish,” T.R. said. “Didn’t you see how they refused to stand their ground and fight like men?”
Stringer tried not to laugh, but he had to as he replied, “I fear you may have startled them, sir. I know you just startled us.”
“Us? Us? You mean there were two of you, and you were afraid to charge the rascals?”
“One of us is a young girl, sir,” Stringer said. “And with all due respect, this was a serious fight until you showed up. If you’ll look yonder, down past that dead pony, you’ll see I put three on the ground for good. I had to shoot two or three more on the far side of the cabin.”
T.R. screwed his glasses tighter to his nose as he regarded the scene below for as long as he could stay silent. Then he said, “Ah-hah. I get the picture. Those saddle tramps were out to rob one of the facilities of this park, eh?”
“I’m not sure what that cabin constitutes as part of this park, sir. They killed the man who built it before I got here. His niece and I have been pinned down inside ever since. She’s just a sort of tourist, by the way. I don’t think she knows much about park policy.”
“Bully,” said the president as Fran appeared warily in the doorway in the distance.
A man in Army blue with a gal in a riding habit at his side joined them. “That cabin down there has no business being down there,” he declared. “I suspect we’ve come upon squatters, Mr. President.”
“This is no time to worry about people on our side, Major,” T.R. said. “What’s the story on those others who were pegging shots at us just now?”
The fancy-dressed but determined-looking woman at the officer’s side said, “We lost them, Mr. President. I, for one, rode through their camp among the trees. My sweet horse took a pile of supplies like the born jumper he is, but those ruffians ran like rabbits.”
“Bully,” the president said, “that’s the way I like my outlaws to run.” Then he turned back to Stringer. “If that young lady will be good enough to brew some refreshing coffee for us all, we’ll take time out to plan our next against those chaps.”
Stringer didn’t argue. But as he walked down the slope beside the presidential pony, he couldn’t help saying, “We’re talking about desperate men, sir.”
“They should feel desperate,” T.R. said. “I’ll not suffer outlaws in my national park and—Zounds, who shot that poor buffalo!”
“They did, sir,” Stringer replied. “The old man camped in this sort of unpoliced corner of the park tried to stop them. That’s when they shot him.”
“Nobody has any right to nest on park land, dash it,” the Army major grumbled.
But T.R. snapped, “There you go picking nits again, Major. Didn’t you just hear this young man say the poor patriot died defending federal property? There can’t be more than eight hundred buffalo left in this park, or anywhere, come to think of it. But those villains will have more to answer for now than poaching. Murder is serious anywhere. I simply won’t have it in a national park!”
