Wind River

by L. J. Washburn

  "Why did they want to stop the train?"

  "Carrying . . . payroll . . ."

  Icy fingers touched the back of Cole's neck. He had heard of trains being held up and robbed back east, but not this far out on the frontier. Still, the outlaws couldn't have picked a better target. The payroll for the work crews added up to a hefty sum.

  Cole forced his mind off that and gently eased the wounded man's arm aside. He winced at the sight of the injury. The engineer had been shot in the stomach, just as Cole had thought, maybe more than once. It was a hell of a way to die, and death was a long time coming. Cole was surprised the engineer had managed to hang on this long without passing out from the pain.

  He heard an angry voice demanding, "Let me through, you bloody fools!" Dr. Judson Kent stepped up into the locomotive's cab a moment later, took a look around, and said, "Oh, my Lord."

  "This fella's still alive," Cole said, "although I don't reckon there's much you can do for him. If you'll tend to him, I need to check the rest of the train."

  Kent went to one knee beside the wounded engineer. "Of course. I'll take over here, Marshal."

  Cole left Kent bending over the injured man and leaped down from the cab, again motioning the curious bystanders back from the edge of the platform. He drew his gun again and started past the coal tender. The train was a short one, only one boxcar and the caboose behind the locomotive and tender. Cole stopped beside the boxcar and reached up to slide open the door.

  The car was loaded with railroad ties and sections of track bound for the area several miles to the west where new tracks were being laid. Cole glanced around inside, satisfied himself that no one was hiding there, then hurried on to the caboose. He noticed as he reached it that Michael Hatfield was trailing him closely.

  "Better stay back," he warned the editor. "I don't think there's going to be any trouble back here, but I can't be sure."

  "I heard what the engineer said to you," Michael replied. "This was the payroll train, and someone stopped it and held it up, didn't they?"

  Cole glanced sharply at the young man, intending to warn him to keep quiet about that for the time being, but the damage was already done. Shouts of alarm went up from those citizens standing closest, and soon the news had spread all over the platform. Men began running down the street, carrying the word even farther. Soon the whole town would know that the Union Pacific payroll had been stolen.

  There was nothing that could be done about that now, Cole realized. He went up the steps leading to the platform on the rear of the caboose and stepped carefully inside.

  The first thing that caught his eye was the sprawled body of the conductor, lying facedown in a pool of his own blood. Two more men were inside the car, also dead, lying on their backs where the}' had been gunned down by the robbers. Cole recognized both of them and knew they had served a dual role as guards and paymasters for the Union Pacific. They would have given out the wages to the work crews if the train had arrived here safely.

  Too late for that now, Cole thought. The money was long gone, hauled off in the canvas pouches in which it was usually carried. A quick look around the caboose told Cole the pouches were gone.

  He stepped out wearily, holstering his gun, and questions from the crowd bombarded him. He held up his hands for silence, and when it came after a few moments, he said, "The men inside are dead, and it looks like the payroll's gone, all right."

  Howls of dismay rose. A few of the railroad workers were here in town for one reason or another, primarily for putting the finishing touches on the nearby roundhouse, but most of them were west of town laying track. They would be coming back to Wind River tonight on the work train, however, and when they found out their pay had been stolen . . . Well, there was no way of knowing what would happen, Cole thought.

  But one thing was certain. It wouldn't be good.

  Cole recognized one of the men in the crowd as the supervisor of the roundhouse construction. He motioned for the man to join him, then said, "You'd better take a handcar and go on up the line to find your boss. Let him know what's happened."

  "I don't know if that's a good idea, Marshal," the railroad man said dubiously. "If those section gangs find out their pay's been stolen, they're liable to cause trouble."

  "Maybe not if you tell them a posse has already gone after the outlaws and intends to get the money back."

  "A posse?"

  Cole nodded. His worries about Billy Casebolt would just have to wait. This holdup could affect the whole town. If the track layers rioted, they might burn Wind River to the ground.

  Raising his voice to be heard over the uproar on the platform, Cole shouted, "I want volunteers for a posse! We're going after those thieves!"

  "I'll ride with you, Marshal," Michael Hatfield said immediately, "but doesn't your authority end at the edge of town?"

  "Maybe so, but I know the country around here and I can read sign," snapped Cole. "Besides, recovering that payroll money is the only way I know of to make sure there's no trouble here in Wind River. I reckon that gives me the right to head up a posse."

  "Nobody's going to argue with you about that, Brother Tyler!" called Jeremiah Newton. The massive blacksmith stood on the platform wearing his apron and carrying a sledgehammer. "The Lord said, 'Thou shalt not kill,' so I reckon it's our Christian duty to go after those murdering heathens."

  "Thanks, Jeremiah," Cole said. He had two volunteers now, Michael and Jeremiah, and most of the other men didn't waste any time in speaking up. They were all eager to start tracking the desperadoes responsible for this outrage.

  Dr. Kent stepped down from the cab as the platform was emptying. The volunteers were hurrying back to their houses or businesses to fetch their rifles and horses. With a weary shake of his head, Kent told Cole, "The engineer is dead. He bled to death, both internally and externally, as victims of that sort of wound usually do."

  "I figured he was a goner as soon as I saw him," Cole said. "At least he lived long enough to bring the train in and tell us what happened."

  "Did I hear you say that you're going after the highwaymen who committed this atrocity?"

  "That's right. A posse is, anyway, and I'm leading it."

  "I wish you the best of luck. Would you like for me to accompany you?"

  Cole considered the offer for a moment, then shook his head. "I'm a pretty fair hand at patching up bullet wounds when I have to be," he said, "and that's likely all we might run into. I'd rather have you here in town to sort of look after the place."

  "I appreciate the faith you have in me, Cole, but I'm not a lawman. Far from it, in fact."

  "I know that, but you've got enough common sense to keep people from flying off the handle. And if there's any trouble from the railroad workers, your medical skills will be needed for sure."

  Kent sighed. "I fear that you are correct, my friend. Very well, I shall do what I can to keep the town from being overrun by barbarians. I suggest, though, that you bring back that payroll money as soon as possible."

  "That's just what I intend to do," Cole said firmly.

  Less than thirty minutes later a posse of twenty men rode out of Wind River, following the railroad tracks to the east so that they could pick up the trail of the robbers where the holdup had taken place. Cole rode at their head, surprised that the group also included Hank Parker. He supposed the saloonkeeper had a stake in this matter; if the railroad crews were all broke, they couldn't spend their money on Parker's watered-down rotgut and brightly painted women.

  Try as he might, Cole couldn't completely forget about Billy Casebolt's disappearance, just as he hadn't stopped worrying about Andrew McKay's death and the possibility that William Durand might have killed his partner. But he hadn't been able to unearth any new facts concerning the case for over a week, and circumstances now prevented him from looking for Casebolt, who had been headed in the other direction when he vanished. Cole grimaced as he urged the golden sorrel on at a brisk trot.

  This business o
f carrying a badge was damned frustrating.

  * * *

  Cole found out just how frustrating over the next day and a half.

  He found the spot where the holdup had taken place; it was easy enough to locate because the remains of the flaming barrier the locomotive had smashed through before coming to a stop were still scattered along and on top of the tracks. And the tracks of the robbers were equally easy to find. The hoof prints of eight horses led almost due north, toward the mountains. Cole hoped they could catch up to the outlaws before they reached those distant peaks. Once they were in the mountains, it would be easier for the thieves to cover their trail and slip away from the posse.

  But the outlaws had a lead of several hours, and it was always slower following someone. Losing the trail meant backtracking until the sign could be cut again. That happened a couple of times and threw the posse even farther behind. The delays grated on Cole, but there was nothing he could do about them.

  Nightfall found the men from Wind River miles north of the railroad, but the mountains didn't seem much closer in the fading light. Distances were deceptive out here, Cole knew, and he hoped the mountains were still far enough away so that he and his companions would have time to catch up to the thieves.

  There was a lot of grumbling in camp that night. Cole had insisted that everyone bring enough provisions for a chase that might last several days, but he figured the townspeople had been hoping to find the robbers, recover the money, and be back in Wind River by dark. He knew how unrealistic that expectation was, but most of the settlers had spent relatively little time on the frontier. They still had a lot to learn about the hardships out here.

  Including a cold camp. Cole ordered that no one light a fire. "If those outlaws see a campfire, they'll know we're back here on their trail and they'll push on that much faster," he explained when several men complained. "We want 'em overconfident and thinking nobody's after them."

  The night passed uncomfortably for most of the men as they tried to sleep in bedrolls on the hard, rocky ground. A chilly wind sprang up toward morning, making them even more miserable. As for Cole, he had slept in much worse conditions. He kept that thought to himself, though, knowing it wouldn't make the others feel any better.

  As they were mounting up after a breakfast as cold and unsatisfying as supper the night before, Michael Hatfield groaned. "Every muscle and bone in my body aches," he said as he tried futilely to stretch into a more comfortable position. He was riding a borrowed horse and carrying a rifle from the general store that had been provided by Durand. The businessman had armed several members of the posse, loaning them the weapons free of charge. It was in his best interests, too, if the railroad payroll was recovered quickly.

  "I reckon you're pretty sore, all right," Cole said, offering what little sympathy he could muster. "Wish I could say it was going to get better before it gets worse."

  "Thanks." Michael laughed humorlessly. "I'm not surprised. The way my life has been going, I ought to expect one problem after another."

  Whatever the youngster was talking about, Cole didn't want to hear it. He had more on his mind than Michael's troubles, whatever they might be. He twisted around in the saddle, saw that the other men were mounted, and called, "Let's ride."

  The trail still led north, but during the day it began to curve toward the west. That lifted Cole's spirits even more, and he began pushing the posse harder. They had left the dusty, rolling prairie behind and were riding now over grassy meadows flanked by wooded hills.

  At midmoming, they passed the remains of a small campfire, and Cole figured that was where the gang had spent the night before. The outlaws were only a couple of hours ahead of them.

  Noon came and went, and the posse took only ten minutes for lunch, more to rest the horses than anything else. Cole ignored the complaints as he ordered the men back into their saddles. The next time he needed a posse, he thought wryly, most of these men wouldn't be so quick to volunteer.

  He stopped a couple of times during the afternoon to check the tracks they were following. The edges of the hoof prints were sharper now, not as crumbled. That meant the marks were fresher. The posse was closing the gap, drawing nearer and nearer their quarry.

  The trail led down a canyon toward a bluff of red stone that rose at the far end. From a distance Cole couldn't tell if there was a path to the top or not, but as they drew nearer he thought he could pick out a narrow ledge angling back and forth across the face of the bluff. The ledge probably wasn't wide enough for more than one horse, so they would have to climb it single file.

  A feeling of unease prickled along his backbone. That narrow path would make a good place for an ambush, he realized. Once the posse was strung out along the ledge, gunmen at the top of the bluff would be able to fire down and pick off the pursuers almost at will. But an ambush would assume that the outlaws knew they were being followed, and Cole had taken pains to avoid that.

  Still, it was damned hard to conceal a group of riders this big from someone who really knew how to look, and he was certain the outlaws were the type to watch their backtrail. As the posse approached the base of the bluff, Cole held up his hand to signal a halt.

  The tracks of the outlaws led up the ledge, just as he had expected. Cole studied them for a few seconds, then said to the other men, "You fellas wait here. I want to ride up there and scout around a little before the rest of you come up."

  Jeremiah Newton reined his horse up alongside Cole's. "If you're afraid those sinners might be waiting up there for us, Marshal, you shouldn't be riding into the lions' den alone. I'll go with you."

  "So will I," Hank Parker said, surprising Cole. The saloonkeeper moved forward to join Cole and Jeremiah.

  "I'm going, too," Michael spoke up. "If something's going to happen, I have to be able to write about it for the paper."

  Cole's features hardened in exasperation. Riding into an outlaw trap might get them all killed, and then Michael wouldn't be able to write about anything. He wasn't sure Michael would understand that line of reasoning, though. Besides, the other three were grown men and had the right to make up their own minds.

  "All right," he said curtly. "Let's go. But keep your eyes open and follow my lead in case of trouble."

  He sent Ulysses onto the path. Jeremiah came next, followed by Parker and then Michael bringing up the rear. The other members of the posse waited at the bottom of the bluff, rifles held ready.

  Cole felt sweat popping out on his forehead as he led the way along the ledge. He had experienced moments like this before, during the War Between the States and since. Moments that seemed to stretch out into hours as a man waited for the crash of guns, waited to see whether he was going to live or die. Despite the coolness of the morning, the air was hot and dry now, and there was no sound except the ringing of horseshoes on the stony path.

  Cole saw the pebble come bouncing down in front of him, rebounding off the ledge and flying off into the air. Before the little rock could fall the rest of the way to the ground, Cole's .44 was in his hand and he was calling to his companions, "Watch out!"

  He twisted his head to look up at the top of the bluff as gunfire rolled down from above like thunder. Powder smoke puffed out from the rimrock. Cole triggered a couple of shots, hoping to drive the bushwhackers back as he jabbed his spurs into Ulysses's flanks and sent the golden sorrel lunging up the path. There was no time to look behind him and see if the others were following.

  Cries from below made him aware that at least some of the ambushers were concentrating their fire on the posse members who had stayed at the foot of the bluff. "Get back!" Cole shouted at them, hoping they would have enough sense to move along the face of the bluff and put themselves at a bad angle as targets. Of course, that would also mean they were in an awkward position to return the fire. The four men climbing the winding path were on their own.

  That was why Cole was attacking. There was no place to hide, no place to run. Charging into the face of the ambush and m
aybe taking the bushwhackers by surprise was really their only chance.

  Bullets kicked up dust and slivers of rock as they impacted on the path around him. Cole caught a glimpse of a man's shoulder and part of his head as he fired from behind a boulder at the top of the bluff. Instantly, he fired twice and was rewarded with the sight of the bushwhacker spinning back away from the rimrock. A shotgun boomed somewhere behind Cole on the path, and he knew Jeremiah Newton was getting into the fight. The big blacksmith had brought a greener with him.

  As Ulysses reached a bend in the trail Cole hauled on the reins and guided the horse around the steep hairpin turn. He and the others were taking the path too fast for safety, but there was no safety in sitting there and letting the ambushers cut them down, either.

  Once around the turn, Cole could look back the way he had come and see that Jeremiah, Michael, and Parker were all still mounted. Parker was firing his rifle toward the top to the bluff as he rode, but Michael had his hands full just controlling his mount.

  Cole jammed his revolver back in its holster and pulled the Winchester '66 from the saddle boot. There was only one shot left in the Colt, and Cole wanted to save it in case he needed it badly later. In the meantime the fifteen-shot magazine of the rifle known by the Indians as the Yellow Boy was full. Cole worked the lever, jacking a shell into the chamber.

  Guiding Ulysses with the pressure of his knees, Cole brought the rifle to his shoulder and began firing, throwing lead toward the rimrock as fast as he could work the lever and press the trigger. Fewer slugs were whipping around him now, and he hoped the bushwhackers were pulling back.

  He stopped firing long enough to take the sorrel around another bend in the trail, and then he was galloping along the final section before it reached the top of the bluff. Cole lifted the rifle again, his eyes scanning the rimrock for targets.

  Obviously, the ambush had been less successful than the gunmen had intended, because as he reached the top of the path Cole spotted several of them racing toward horses tied nearby. He dropped the reins and brought the Winchester to his shoulder again, slamming shots toward the running men.