At about midday, Silas Martin vented an odd-sounding growl. But it was only a vocal reaction to some image that flickered through his mind as he lay wedged on the back of the wagon, resting on the line between sleep and unconsciousness. When the growl was curtailed, the old man resumed his shallow breathing. The recent thinning of his face was clear to see, but the paleness of his complexion was hidden by the trial dust that adhered to the sweat which constantly pumped from his pores—the saline beads like drops of his diminishing strength being squeezed out by die pain.
After snapping his head around in response to the strange sound, Edge avoided looking at Martin again. Only in this way was he able to suppress the guilt he felt
Nearing the hills and then entering them under a sky growing dark with evening, the half-breed was conscious of two nagging concerns. Most urgent of these was that Ralph undoubtedly knew he was being trailed. For if Edge had been able to see him during the first few hours, then he had certainly been aware of the wagon rolling in his wake. On the open prairie there had been nothing he could do about his pursuers. And he had not tried, even by demanding more speed from his mount—the sign on the short grass and dusty bald patches revealed a constant, even pace. But here in the hollows and rises of the hilly area, with night falling fast, there was ample opportunity for the hold-up man to prepare and spring a trap.
Which was why Edge reined the weary team to a halt before the final crimson rays of the setting sun had faded from the western dome of the sky. The silence which closed in around him after hooves had ceased to clop and springs to creak was eerie in its seeming completeness. But it lasted for little more than two seconds, until Silas Martin sucked in some air and Edge allowed the breath to whistle out through his teeth. Then the wagon made small sounds as the horses moved a couple of feet forward to start cropping on grass.
The chosen spot was at the center of a broad, shallow hollow surrounded by grassy slopes, the highest ground no more than forty feet above where the wagon was parked. A man atop any of the hills would have had a clear shot at the half-breed as he sat on the wagon seat, sucking tepid water from a canteen and raking his narrow-eyed gaze in every direction. But it was a chance Edge had to take and he took it And when he survived, he gave brief consideration to the other point which concerned him, as he watered the horses and then released them from the traces.
There had been no sign to mark the border, but he felt sure that he had crossed from Colorado into Kansas some time during the afternoon. A fact which demanded his attention because of that long-ago killing of Elliot Thombs. He had been in the state of Kansas only once before since he killed Thombs—at a time when he had been, perhaps, as close to death as was Silas Martin now. And only narrowly had escaped the posse which had sought to capture him.
But it was not fear of legal retribution which bothered him as he moved away from the stalled wagon and grazing horses. Instead, he considered the possibility of his ruling fate dealing out a more subtle form of justice—by having a fat little hold-up man fire a shot that would spill the life-blood of Edge on the dusty soil of Kansas.
A mile beyond the parked wagon, he came to an abrupt halt, his moonlit features altering from their impassive set to take on the lines of a frown. He was halfway up a long, gentle incline, stepping directly into the hoofprints left by the two horses, his hooded eyes raking constantly from left to right to study the curved crest of the hill silhouetted in solid black against the star-pricked sky.
He saw nothing to warn him of danger and his straining ears picked up no sound. And a half-second later he realized it was his sense of smell which had brought him to an instinctive halt.
There was a fire somewhere close.
He remained erect as he started forward again, until he was in danger of being skylined. Then he went down onto all fours for a few yards, finally flat out on to his belly.
The smell of burning became stronger by the moment and he even heard the crackle of flames attacking wood before he reached the vantage point of the hill crest. And looked down at Ralphs night camp.
It was at the bottom of a narrow, north-to-south valley with grass on the slope falling away from where Edge watched, and low brush cloaking the other side. The fire had never been a large one and was now little more than a heap of softly glowing embers, which stirred flames and crackled only when they were fanned by a slight breeze which eddied along the valley.
The short, fleshy Ralph lay under his blankets on one side of the fire. The two horses were hobbled on the other side, close to the dark hump formed by the two saddles and spare bedroll. A coffee pot, a mug and a canteen were on the ground close to where Ralph slept—too early and too soundly for a man who knew he was being followed.
For stretched seconds, the half-breed directed his unblinking gaze at the heap of blankets—seconds that perhaps linked together to form a miniute. Which was longer than a man could hold his breath. Long enough for Edge to be convinced that whatever caused the blankets to be shaped in human form was not breathing, and to decide that the Stetson at one end of the unfurled bedroll was not resting over the sleeping face of a man.
“I don’t know it all, Silas,” the half-breed muttered as he shifted his attention to the brush-covered slope beyond the campsite, “but I ain’t quite the fool that feller thinks I am.”
The brush was low-growing but thick, merging as dark and solid with the ground on that side of the valley as the grass on the opposite slope. Edge guessed that Ralph would be concealed close to the camp, but this hunch was of no use to him. For although he spent a full fifteen minutes peering at the area he was sure concealed the man, he saw no sign of life. Or if he did, any movement made by Ralph was covered by the gentle stirring of the foliage under the tug of the night breeze.
He withdrew from the hill crest then, moving far enough back from the slope so that he could rise to his full height. Then he headed north at a loping run, his faith in his plan increasing as the breeze freshened and dried the sweat of exertion on his lean face.
He did not alter direction until he was some six hundred yards beyond Ralph’s night camp. He slowed down there, and was at his most cautious as he crested the rise and moved into the valley.
The embers of the cooking fire were almost out now, but the moon was as bright as ever. The horses, saddles and bedroll were clearly discernible as dark shapes against darkness. So he kept low and progressed in short spurts with long pauses in between. None of the small sounds he made would carry on the breeze to the camp. But a chance glance by a man with a repeater rifle in his hands would certainly mean the end. So now it was the sweat of fear which oozed from and dried on the half-breed’s flesh.
Then he was across the valley and climbing up the opposite slope through the thorny, clothes-snagging, flesh-tearing brush. Still afraid, but with an easier mind—which allowed him to expose his teeth in a grin of evil relish, as he considered the prospect of killing the man who robbed him.
A grin that became fixed and lacking in even sardonic humor when he reached the top of the rise and looked down into a hollow east of the valley. Saw a second night camp.
Two horses as at the one in the valley. Hobbled and unsaddled. But no fire and no patch of dark ashes to show where one had been. With unopened bedrolls stacked in the same heap with the saddles. There were no men in sight down in the hollow and there was no cover in which they could be concealed.
Moonlight illuminated the second camp as brightly as the first—sufficient for the puzzled half-breed to see that there were no rifles in the saddleboots.
The absence of men and weapons established, Edge turned his attention back to Ralph’s camp and started through the brush toward it. There were a thousand and one possibilities which might explain the horses and gear down in the hollow on the other side of the rise—the strongest of which was that Hitoshi and Zenko were the missing riders.
Beyond this, Edge did not project his thoughts into the unknown. For it was immaterial and therefore futile. The new d
evelopment did not alter his intentions. Simply added to the danger of what he planned to do.
He advanced toward the valley camp on a diagonal line across the slope, his progress necessarily slow as the thorns clawed at his flesh and old, dead, dry twigs threatened to snap and reveal his position. So that it took him more than an hour to reach a point a hundred feet north of the camp and twenty feet up the slope from the valley bottom. In all that time, only the horses and wispy smoke from the dying fire made small movements on the open ground. While on the eastern slope the brush foliage continued to rustle, stirred out of inertia by the breeze from the north.
He reached his chosen position with blood from countless scratches mingling with the sweat beads on his face and hands. So that when he ran the back of a hand across his forehead, cheeks and jaw, the salty moisture soaked through the cut flesh to sting the tissue beneath. But the tension of controlled fear acted to swamp pain as he took from his jacket pockets the dry twigs he had collected at the top of the rise.
He made a pile of the twigs, delved for a match, struck it on his boot and held the flame in cupped hands beneath the kindling. He waited only long enough to ensure the twigs were burning before he turned and started back up the rise, able to move faster through the brush already flattened by his advance.
Behind him the small fire grew, the flames fanned into increasing ferocity by the chill night breeze. The brush began to crackle under the assault of the fire. Gray smoke was plucked away from the flames and driven down the valley. Sparks rose, glowed brighdy and died.
A man shouted. In a language the retreating halfbreed did not understand. But the tone of alarm was clearly discernible. An answering burst of words was powered by anger.
Edge halted the fast crawl and looked back over his shoulder. He had struck the match less than thirty seconds before, yet the fire already had a firm hold on the brush—the flames broadening out across the valley-side as eagerly as they advanced along it.
Shimmering columns of heat blurred parts of the scene ahead of the fire. Swirling smoke completely veiled other areas. But he glimpsed two brightly garbed figures standing in the path of the hungry flames, swinging to left and right from the waist, rifles raking in the wake of frightened eyes searching for a target. Their mouths opened and closed, venting sounds which did not reach through the crackle of the fire to Edge’s ears.
Then they moved their feet, heading in the direction the half-breed had hoped for—up the slope to escape the flames and gain the advantage of the high ground. Which left the way to Ralph’s camp clear for Edge.
He got to his feet, whirled, and powered into a headlong run-down and across the slope, in the insubstantial cover of the leaping flames and swirling smoke. Twice his feet were snagged by curling, thom-jagged brush branches and he was sent crashing full-length to the ground. Each time, grimacing at the pain of impact and more blood-spurting tears in his flesh, he took the opportunity to glance upward to his left. On the first occasion the flames and the smoke and the sweat and blood which dripped across his eyes blotted out the scene. But the next time he glimpsed the Japanese.
They had the more difficult route to cover, having to force their way upward through the brush. Conscious of the fire roaring at their backs. Aware, too, that the man who had set light to the brush might send killing shots toward them at any moment
Down on the open ground of the valley floor, Edge lengthened his stride, gasping for breath and coughing violently as woodsmoke was sucked into his lungs with the air. Above him to the right, the slope was an expanse of charred vegetation, wisping with smoke here and there, behind the wall of fire that increased its speed with every foot it traveled. Ahead of him the two horses were over on their sides, sent crashing to the ground as the fire and smoke created panic in their brains and the hobbles on their forelegs prevented the rear and bolt they had sought to make. Their hindlegs flailed as their eyes bulged with terror, their necks strained upward, teeth bared.
The sudden appearance of the half-breed triggered a fresh wave of snorting from the helpless animals. He had to move in close to their dangerously kicking hooves to drag one of the saddles off the pile—only then was he able to slide die rifle from the boot
He came to a skidding halt then, pumping the lever action of the Winchester and hearing the satisfying sound of a bullet being jacked into the breech.
Then another bullet thudded into horseflesh, silencing one of the animals which continued to thrash the ground and air in its death pangs.
Edge whirled and crouched, thudding the stock of the rifle to his shoulder and sighting with one narrowed, blue-glinting eye along the barrel.
The report of the shot reached his ears, just as the muzzle and eye ceased to rake the hilltop and he drew a bead on the target.
Both Hitoshi and Zenko had to out-run the voracious flames, now stood on the top of the valley-side, looking down at Edge across the blackened brush as the fire raged away to the south. Both had their rifles to their shoulders, one pumping the action after exploding the shot which missed the half-breed and killed the horse.
Edge aimed for the other Oriental and hurled himself forward as soon as he squeezed the trigger, seeing the puff of white muzzle-smoke as the Japanese got off a shot.
The bullet from above came close enough to punch a hole in the half-breed’s coat and shirt sleeves, searing the skin of his right arm without breaking it.
The Japanese made no defensive move and died for the mistake—taking the bullet in his chest left of center.
Edge hit the ground in the scant cover offered by the blanket-draped form of the unmoving Ralph. As the Japanese fell, as stiffly as a tree, going from sight on the other side of the hill crest.
The empty shellcase ejected from the half-breed’s Winchester was still spinning through the air as the surviving Oriental took aim—his target almost totally exposed from the higher vantage-point
But it was a third rifle that cracked through the night—exploding a bullet that hit the Japanese in the left thigh. The impact half turned the man before he started to topple. His finger tugged at the trigger and the shot tore uselessly through the wall of fire.
Edge took aim at the falling form and squeezed his trigger a second time. The wounded Japanese went down faster than he anticipated and the bullet entered his head, to exit through the top of the skull trailed by a splash of blood, tissue and bone fragments. The dead man dropped his rifle and went from sight, sliding down the slope in the wake of his partner.
“Edge-son,” a voice called shrilly. “Are they finished?”
“They’re sure over the hill,” the half-breed growled, and rolled on to his back, narrowed eyes under the hooded lids searching for the source of the shouted words. Right hand pumping the lever action of the Winchester to ready another bullet should it be needed.
But the man who had probably saved his life was not about to try to take it. He stood on the seat of the flatbed wagon which was parked on the western ridge of the valley. A short, slimly built man with his rifle held in both hands, but slung low across the middle of his thighs. A man dressed westem-style but who spoke American with a similar accent to the Japanese.
Edge used his rifle simply to beckon the man to come down into the valley. Then sat up and turned to look at Ralph. As he had rolled over to search for the newcomer, he was aware that the barrel of the Winchester knocked off Ralph’s hat Now he saw it was not just the hat which was displaced. The hold-up man’s head had rolled, too, revealing the ghasdy wound where one of the Oriental’s curved swords had sliced powerfully through the neck. The blood had
not quite congealed, was still tacky as it began to change color from sheened red to matt black.
“Them or me, feller,” Edge muttered as he drew the blankets off the headless torso of Ralph. “Ever since Olsen Creek you were bound to come to a sticky end.”
Chapter Ten
RALPH had no money in his pockets so, as the fire began to bum out from lack of fuel in the south an
d the stranger brought the wagon carefully down the grassy slope, Edge went in search of the dead Japanese. He found their crumpled, blood-spattered bodies just a few yards below the hill crest. Both had died with their eyes open and their sightless stares rebuked him as he delved through the brightly colored robes. Nothing.
He continued on down into the hollow and found what he was looking for in a saddlebag—the money and Silas Martins gold watch wrapped and tied in a brown paper package. In the same saddlebag was a pair of powerful field glasses. But he took only what belonged to him and the old man, then untied the hobbles on the horses and back-tracked over the rise to Ralph’s camp.
The wagon was down in the valley by then, the stranger still sitting hunched on the seat, staring fixedly at the severed head of Ralph lying on its side three feet from the gruesome patch of gore between the shoulders.
“Obliged to you, kid,” Edge said, his greeting startling the Oriental youngster out of his private world of horror.
“It was less than nothing, Edge-son. I aimed to kill the man and failed.”
Then he gave a strangled cry, leapt down off the wagon and fell onto all fours. A torrent of dull-colored vomit gushed from his open mouth to form a pool between his hands.
Edge used a booted foot to drag the displaced head close to the torso, then draped a blanket over the remains of Ralph before he went to the rear of the flatbed to check on Silas Martin. A . saddled horse hitched to the wagon’s tailgate looked dolefully at the half-breed.
“He breathes still, but he is very weak I think,” the stranger said as he rose unsteadily to his feet, using the back of a hand to wipe the stains of nausea off his chin.
Edge thought that the dusty, bristled face of Martin showed no change from the last time he had looked at it
“You want to tell me about you, kid?” he asked as he moved to crouch down beside the gelding which had lost its rider at the Olsen Creek Union Pacific halt.
The Living, the Dying, and the Dead Page 10
