Hard Ride to Hell (9780786031191)

by Johnstone, William W.

  Pearlie rubbed his chin. His fingertips rasped on the beard stubble that covered his lean, angular jaw as he frowned in thought.

  “Pretty smart,” he said after a moment. “So then the fella decided to use the tunnel to drive off stolen cows.”

  Smoke nodded and said, “That’s the way it looks to me.”

  The tunnel was big enough for that. It was about thirty feet wide, and the arched ceiling rose about twenty feet. The floor was stone, so there weren’t any tracks to prove that the rustled cattle had come through here, but they had the declaration of a dying man and the fact that there was no other place the cows could have gone.

  The smoothness of the walls, ceiling, and floor was what told Smoke the tunnel had been formed by flowing water instead of being chipped out by tools in the hands of men. No telling how far back in the past that had been, he mused as he stood there looking around in the light of the torch Cal held.

  “Reckon we can pick up the trail again at the other end?” Pearlie asked.

  “That’s what I’m hoping. Go back and get the other men and the horses. One more thing . . . Steve, I want you to ride back to the ranch.”

  Barstow had come into the tunnel with Smoke, Pearlie, and Cal. He said, “I been keepin’ up all right, haven’t I, Mr. Jensen? Why are you sendin’ me back?”

  “You’ve kept up just fine,” Smoke assured the young cowboy. “But there’s no telling how far this chase is going to lead us, and you’ll need some rest if that arm is going to heal properly. Besides, I’ve got a couple of chores for you. I want you to tell Mrs. Jensen what we’ve found. She needs to know it may be a spell before we get back. Also, I want to get word to Monte Carson in Big Rock about this tunnel.”

  Monte Carson, who like Pearlie, had once been a hired gun who found himself on the wrong side from Smoke, had given up that life and become the sheriff in Big Rock, the nearest town to the Sugarloaf ranch. He and Smoke had been good friends for several years now.

  Although Barstow still looked a little reluctant, he nodded and said, “I reckon I can take care of those things for you, Mr. Jensen. What do you expect the sheriff to do about this tunnel?”

  “I don’t think there’s anything he can really do about it,” Smoke said, “but he needs to know it’s here. When we get back, I may do something about it, though. Some dynamite ought to close it up permanent like. I don’t care for the idea of there being a hidden back door to Sugarloaf like this.”

  “Neither do I,” Pearlie agreed. “It’s too temptin’ for thieves of every stripe.”

  “All right,” Barstow agreed. “I’d rather come with you and settle the score with those wideloopers, though.”

  “It’ll get settled, Steve,” Smoke said. The flat, hard tone of his voice left no doubts in the minds of the men who heard it.

  Chapter 12

  Once Steve Barstow had started back to the ranch house with his messages for Sally and Sheriff Monte Carson, Smoke and the rest of the men led their horses into the tunnel.

  They could have ridden—the ceiling was plenty high enough for that—but Smoke wanted to take it slow and easy as they made their way through the ridge. They could only see as far ahead of them as the flickering light from the torches they carried would reach, so there was no telling what they might run into. Smoke was confident that the passage ran fairly straight and true, but he couldn’t be sure of that.

  The darkness closed in behind them just as thick and stifling as it was in front of them, and as they went deeper into the tunnel, Smoke thought about the millions of tons of rock just above their heads. He didn’t believe the tunnel was in any danger of collapsing. It had been here for thousands of years, after all. But that much weight looming over a man made him think, no matter how much he believed the path he followed was safe.

  Smoke wasn’t the only one who was a little nervous. Beside him, Pearlie muttered, “I don’t much cotton to dark holes like this. They give me the fantods.”

  “There’s nothing to worry about,” Cal told him. “You’re as safe as if you were sleepin’ in your own bunk, back in the bunkhouse. Wait a minute. You’ve fallen out of your bunk while you were asleep before, haven’t you?”

  “Dadgummit, I was havin’ a nightmare, and you know it. Don’t go makin’ sport of me about that, Cal.”

  “I remember it now,” Cal said with a smile. “You were hollerin’ ‘Don’t let it get me, boys, don’t let it get me!’ What was chasin’ you, Pearlie? It must’ve been something pretty bad to have you running in your sleep like that. A bear, maybe? Or a mountain lion?”

  “None of your doggoned business, youngster,” Pearlie snapped. “My dreams is private.”

  “Yeah, and that’s probably a good thing, too.”

  Their voices echoed against the rock ceiling. Smoke wanted to tell them to be quiet, but he realized Cal was nervous, as well, and was keeping himself calm by poking fun at Pearlie.

  Anyway, anybody who might be waiting for them in the tunnel would hear the horses coming, so telling Pearlie and Cal to be quiet really wouldn’t do any good. As long as they were inside this shaft, they wouldn’t be sneaking up on anybody.

  Chances were, the rustlers were long gone, along with the stolen stock. But they might have left someone behind to guard the far end of the tunnel, just as they had left bushwhackers to watch the end that opened from Gunsight Ridge.

  “Stay alert,” Smoke told his men. “We could be walking right into trouble.”

  “If we do, we’ll give the varmints more hell than they figured on,” Pearlie said.

  Smoke had heard about tunnels like this one having bottomless pits in them. He didn’t think that would be the case here. The rustlers wouldn’t have been able to drive cattle through the tunnel if such a pitfall had been waiting for them. That would have resulted in a lot of cows plummeting to a bad end.

  Even so, Smoke kept a wary eye out ahead of them as he led the group.

  The half mile or so seemed much longer, and what felt like an hour passed before the men from Sugarloaf reached the other end. Smoke felt relief go through him as he spotted an irregular circle of grayish light ahead of them. That was starlight coming through the opening of the tunnel, he knew.

  “Put out those torches,” he told the men carrying the burning brands. “We’ll wait a minute to let our eyes adjust before we step out of the tunnel.”

  The cowboys dropped the torches on the rock floor and stomped them out. What seemed like impenetrable darkness closed in around them like a shroud.

  It didn’t last long, though. Smoke’s vision compensated for the lack of torchlight, and he was able to see the mouth of the tunnel even better now. He could even make out the tunnel’s curving walls.

  Murmuring a command to follow him, he started forward, still leading the ’Palouse. As he neared the entrance, he dropped his right hand to the butt of the Colt on his hip, but he didn’t draw the weapon. He could do that quickly enough if he needed to.

  When he reached the tunnel’s mouth, he signaled a halt.

  “I’ll go out there and take a look around,” he said.

  “I’m comin’ with you,” Pearlie declared.

  “No, you’re not,” Smoke replied. “You’re staying here in case you need to take charge.”

  “You mean in case some of the skunks are waitin’ out there and they kill you? That ain’t never gonna happen.”

  Smoke chuckled and said, “I appreciate the vote of confidence, but I’m not bulletproof, Pearlie, and I’ve got the scars to prove it. Just stay here while I do a little scouting.”

  “Still say you ought to send somebody who ain’t important,” Pearlie muttered. “Like the kid here.”

  He nodded toward Cal as he added that last comment.

  “Save the squabbling for later,” Smoke said before Cal could respond to the gibe. He handed his horse’s reins to Slewfoot. “I’ll be back.”

  With that, he drew his revolver and glided out into the darkness.

  Only it
wasn’t as dark now as it had been, Smoke noted as he left the tunnel. He glanced up at the sky, which was turning gray back beyond the ridge. The sun would be coming up in another hour or so.

  The tunnel opened onto a long, brush-dotted slope that led down to a broad valley running north and south. Smoke had been over here on this side of Gunsight Ridge before, of course—he had been all over this part of Colorado—but to get here he had gone the long way around. The tunnel cut ten miles, maybe more, off the journey.

  About fifteen miles north of here, the mountains that formed the valley petered out, dropping down to some broad flats with a small river flowing through them. A settlement known as Bitter Springs was located there.

  It didn’t amount to much—a general store, a couple of saloons, a blacksmith and a livery stable, and a few more businesses—but it was common knowledge that men on the dodge could stop there without having to worry about the law. The sheriff’s office at the county seat was a long way off, and deputies hardly ever got up that way.

  Buyers who didn’t care too much about where merchandise came from could pick up some pretty good deals in Bitter Springs, too, Smoke knew. Cattle, horses, guns, wagons, mining equipment, anything with a value on it was traded there, and nobody asked any questions. It was a perfect place for the rustlers to dispose of the stock they had driven through the tunnel from the Sugarloaf.

  As the light of approaching dawn grew stronger, Smoke ventured down the slope and studied the rocky ground. He saw tracks here and there, enough of them to confirm that the stolen herd had been driven down into the valley. Satisfied that they were on the right trail, he returned to the tunnel.

  “No bushwhackers out there?” Pearlie asked as Smoke walked up to the entrance.

  Smoke shook his head and said, “I didn’t see any, and nobody took a shot at me. My hunch is that whoever is ramrodding those rustlers thinks that nobody else has any idea this tunnel is here.”

  “And I reckon he was right about that . . . until tonight.”

  “Yeah,” Smoke agreed. “I found enough tracks to know that they drove our stock down into that valley below us. I don’t know which way they went, but we ought to be able to follow them. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were bound for Bitter Springs.”

  “That little wide place in the trail up north of here?” Pearlie thought it over and nodded. “Yeah, that makes sense. Plenty of hombres up there who’d be willin’ to buy some stolen cattle and try to make some fast dinero on ’em.”

  The men mounted up. Smoke led the way down the slope toward the valley. They hadn’t brought along any supplies, so they weren’t equipped for a long chase. However, if the trail led farther than Bitter Springs, they could pick up some provisions there.

  Smoke’s instincts told him that wouldn’t be necessary. He was convinced they would find the men they were looking for at the settlement.

  When the cattle reached the base of the trail leading down from the tunnel, they had turned north, just as Smoke expected. The eastern sky continued to lighten, and eventually the sun peeked over Gunsight Ridge, flooding the valley with golden and rosy-hued light. The glow made the valley, which was rocky and choked with brush in many places, look more attractive than it really was.

  This was mediocre rangeland, in contrast to the much better graze only a couple of miles away on the other side of the ridge. But people were always hungry for land, so several small outfits had been established here. Smoke and his companions passed some scrawny cows cropping at bunch grass, but didn’t see any cowboys tending to them. Those animals would be allowed to run mostly wild in the brush until it came roundup time again.

  A couple of hours after the sun came up, Pearlie pointed up a little draw to the left and said, “Looks like there’s a house up yonder. Want to stop and talk to the folks, Smoke?”

  “That’s probably not a bad idea,” Smoke said. “We might find out a little more about what we’ll be facing when we get to Bitter Springs.”

  They turned their horses and rode along the twisting draw. After a hundred yards, a crude log cabin came into view. Smoke rose from the stone chimney at one end of the structure. That was what Pearlie had spotted. There was no barn, but Smoke saw a small shed and a pole corral off to one side of the cabin.

  “Pearlie, Cal, you come with me,” Smoke said. “The rest of you fellas wait here. It might spook whoever lives in that cabin if they see a whole gang of men riding up.”

  “We don’t want nobody gettin’ an itchy trigger finger,” Pearlie agreed.

  The three of them trotted their horses toward the cabin, slowing the mounts to a walk when they came within a hundred yards. Smoke’s keen eyes searched the place. He hadn’t seen any sign of movement so far. No dogs had come bounding out to meet them, barking and wagging their tails, as often happened when strangers rode up to a ranch.

  Quietly, Pearlie said, “I ain’t much likin’ the looks of this, Smoke. Reminds me of a couple of times down in Texas when I come up on places where the Comanch’ had been, but got spooked off for some reason ’fore they had a chance to burn the houses down. Everybody there was dead, though. Men, women, kids . . . they even killed the livestock.”

  “I don’t see any bodies,” Smoke said, “and it looks to me like there’s a milk cow in the shed that’s still alive.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right. But if the folks this place belongs to ain’t dead, where are they?”

  He got his answer almost immediately, when one of the shutters over the lone window creaked open. Somebody thrust out a rifle barrel and fired, sending a bullet whistling menacingly over the heads of the three riders.

  Chapter 13

  “Damn it!” Pearlie exclaimed as he bent lower in his saddle. His hand reached toward his gun.

  “Hold it,” Smoke said sharply. He stretched out a hand toward Pearlie and gestured for him not to draw the weapon. The foreman stopped his draw with obvious reluctance.

  All three of them had pulled their horses to a stop in response to the shot. A voice yelled from the cabin, “Don’t come any closer, or the next one won’t miss!”

  “That fella needs to have a lesson taught to him,” Pearlie said. “Somebody who owns a little greasy-sack outfit like this has got no right—”

  “He’s got every right,” Smoke said. “The same rights we do. More, in this case, because this is his land, not ours.”

  “Well, yeah,” Pearlie agreed grudgingly. “I reckon that’s true. But I don’t like bein’ shot at! And I sure don’t like bein’ shot at and not shootin’ back!”

  “Just take it easy,” Smoke told him. “You two stay here.”

  “You better not go any closer, Smoke,” Cal warned. “That hombre’s liable to drill you next time, like he threatened. He sounded loco enough to do it.”

  Smoke shook his head and said, “I don’t think so. Just because he’s a little spooked doesn’t mean he really wants to kill anybody.”

  “It doesn’t mean he won’t.”

  That was true, too, Smoke thought, but he wanted to talk to the rancher and he didn’t feel like shouting his business all over the country. Again he told Pearlie and Cal to stay where they were, and then heeled the ’Palouse into a walk that carried him slowly and deliberately toward the cabin.

  The rifle cracked again. This time the bullet kicked up dirt ten yards in front of Smoke’s horse.

  “We don’t mean any harm, mister,” Smoke called when the shot’s echoes had faded away. “We just want to talk to you, that’s all.”

  “I got nothin’ to say to you dirty coyotes!” came the reply from the cabin. “We had a deal, and you busted it!”

  “We don’t have any deal,” Smoke insisted. “We’ve never even met before.”

  He had kept the ’Palouse moving while he talked, and now he was within fifty feet of the cabin. He could see a narrow slice of face through the gap between the shutters. That didn’t allow him to make out many details, but he thought he saw fear in the eye that peered over the
rifle’s barrel.

  “Listen,” Smoke went on, “I promise you we’re not who you think we are, and we don’t mean you any harm.”

  “You think I’m gonna believe that lie, after what happened to my Sara Beth?”

  Smoke reined in and shook his head.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, mister. It’s been more than a year since I’ve been in this valley. I didn’t even know there was a spread here.”

  The man in the cabin didn’t respond right away. After a long moment of silence, he said, “You ain’t part of that no-good bunch who’s been drivin’ cattle up the valley to Bitter Springs?”

  “They’re the varmints I’m looking for,” Smoke replied, letting a hard edge come into his voice. “If you have a grudge against them, then we should be friends, because so do I.” He paused. “Those were my cattle they stole.”

  “Then you’re—” The man stopped short for a second, then went on. “You just stay right there. Don’t move.”

  “Fine,” Smoke said, although he was getting slightly impatient with this.

  The rancher withdrew the rifle, but he didn’t close the shutter. Instead, he disappeared, but a moment later a different face peered out through the gap. Smoke couldn’t be sure, but he thought this one belonged to a woman.

  Sensing that she was studying him, he remained still in the saddle and let her take a good look. A minute or so went by, and then she withdrew from the window.

  After another minute, the cabin door swung open and a tall, rawboned man stepped outside. He still had the rifle in his hands, but it was pointing toward the ground.

  “My daughter says you ain’t one of the polecats who chased her,” the man said. “She couldn’t see your friends back yonder quite as well, but she don’t think they were part of the bunch, neither.”

  “They weren’t,” Smoke said. “I can promise you that. When did it happen?”