“Good luck,” Manning said. He added dryly, “You’re liable to need it.”
Bo left the sheriff ’s office and walked to the Bella Union. He found Scratch and Chloride at the bar in the large, ornate saloon. The fire that had raged through the eastern end of Deadwood the year before had almost reached this far, but it had stopped just short of the Bella Union, sparing the saloon.
“Get your errand done?” Chloride asked.
Bo nodded. “I did. Did you get your thirst taken care of?”
“I’m workin’ on it.” Chloride lifted the half-full mug of beer in front of him and drained the rest of the amber liquid in one long swallow. As he thumped the empty onto the hardwood, he wiped the back of his other hand across his whiskery mouth and then let out a loud belch. “There. I reckon that’ll do the job.”
Scratch finished off his own beer. “You ready to go?” he asked Bo.
“Yeah.”
They had left their horses temporarily at the livery stable. Bo mounted up, then gave Chloride a hand climbing on behind him. The three of them rode up the gulch to the old-timer’s cabin. An icy wind whistled along the creek.
“Got a hunch winter’s comin’ early this year,” Chloride commented. “We’re liable to see snow before Thanksgivin’.”
“I hope not,” Scratch said. “I got to find a wild turkey for Sue Beth to cook up for the feast.”
“We’ll keep our eyes open,” Bo told him. “There are bound to be a few gobblers left around here.”
The old cabin was dark and quiet when they reached their destination. Bo and Scratch kept their hands near their guns until Chloride had the candle lit, just in case anybody was lurking around who shouldn’t be. The old-timer poked up the ashes in the stove and got a fire burning again to take some of the chill out of the air.
On a cold night like this, the best thing to do was curl up in some blankets and sleep. The Texans spread their bedrolls and turned in pretty quickly, followed shortly by Chloride. They would be up before dawn to get ready for the trip back up the gulch to the mine.
Long years of experience had gotten both Bo and Scratch in the habit of sleeping lightly. It didn’t take much to wake them. The slightest unusual sound or any other warning of potential danger would do it.
In this case it was a smell. Bo didn’t know how long he had been asleep when his eyes suddenly opened. Instantly he was fully awake. His life had depended on just such a swift reaction too many times for it to be otherwise. He lifted his head and sniffed the air.
The sharp tang he smelled was familiar, and as he recognized it, he threw the blankets off and reached for his boots. “Scratch!” he said in an urgent whisper.
“I smell it,” the silver-haired Texan replied in the same tone. “Coal oil!”
“Yeah. Wake Chloride, but try to keep him quiet. We don’t want the varmints to know we’re awake just yet.”
There was only one explanation for the smell of coal oil being so strong inside the cabin. Somebody was splashing the stuff around outside, soaking the walls with it, getting ready to burn the cabin to the ground . . . with Bo, Scratch, and Chloride inside it. The citizens of Deadwood would probably think the candle or an overturned lantern had started the blaze, but in reality, it would be pure murder.
If the men outside got away with it. Bo didn’t intend to let that happen.
Moving quietly, he pulled on his boots, buckled on his gunbelt, shrugged into his coat, and picked up his hat and Winchester. As he moved toward the door, he heard the soft whisper as Scratch tried to wake Chloride as quietly as possible, so they could take the would-be arsonists by surprise.
That didn’t work. Chloride came up off his bunk sputtering and yelling. “What is it? Who’s there? Injuns! Don’t let ’em scalp you—”
Just as Bo reached the door, he heard a man’s harsh voice outside, ordering, “Light it up!” Bo grabbed the door and jerked it open.
A sheet of fire roared up in his face.
CHAPTER 13
In the sudden burst of flame, Bo caught glimpses of several men in long coats, bandana masks, and pulled-down hats. The Devils of Deadwood Gulch had come to call, seeking revenge for having their plans ruined the past two days. Bo heard a gun roar, saw the muzzle flash, and felt the wind-rip of the bullet going past his ear.
“Keep your heads down!” he shouted to Scratch and Chloride. More shots blasted as he ducked back and kicked the door closed. Bo realized that the outlaws were giving him and his companions a choice: stay in here and burn, or flee through the door and be riddled with lead.
But there was a third option, Bo thought, and he liked their chances better with it.
He whirled toward Scratch and Chloride, who were grabbing up as much of their gear as they could carry. Flames were already licking up the front wall and one of the side walls, casting a garish light on the interior of the old cabin.
“Come on,” Bo said. “Out the back!”
“But there ain’t no back door!” Chloride protested.
“There’s about to be!”
Bo lowered his shoulder, got as much of a running start as the close confines of the cabin would allow him, and rammed into the rear wall as hard as he could. The rotten old lumber, the tarpaper, and the flimsy tin was no match for his hurtling weight. With a splintering crash, he burst through the wall, lost his balance, and sprawled on the ground.
Scratch was there beside him a heartbeat later to reach down, grab Bo’s arm, and hoist his friend back to his feet. Somewhere nearby, Chloride’s old cap-and-ball pistol boomed.
Bo still had his Colt in his hand. In the nightmarish glare cast by the burning building, he snapped a shot at a masked figure he spotted near the cabin. The man bellowed, “They’re back here! They got out!”
“Head for the trees!” Bo ordered. Pines grew thickly on the wall of the gulch, all the way down to the base of the slope. The Texans and Chloride retreated toward them, backing away and sending bullets spraying around the cabin from Bo’s Colt, Scratch’s twin Remingtons, and Chloride’s old horse pistol. The burning cabin itself gave them some cover because the Devils had to come around it to get a shot at them, and every time one of them stepped into sight, Bo or Scratch or Chloride sent a bullet his way.
They made it unscathed to the trees and got behind some of the thick trunks to continue the battle. Bo didn’t expect the fight to last very long, and sure enough it didn’t. The cabin was fully ablaze by now, but even over the crackling roar he heard the thud of hoofbeats as the outlaws took off into the night.
The cabin was close enough to Deadwood that somebody in the town was likely to spot the orange glow in the sky and know that something was burning. Nothing scared people on the frontier like fire. Deadwood had several volunteer fire companies already. Some of the citizens were sure to come hurrying up the gulch to see what was going on.
“Hold your fire, Chloride,” Bo called to the old-timer. “They’re not shooting at us anymore.”
“Yeah, they’re gone,” Scratch agreed. “Took off for the tall and uncut when they saw we weren’t gonna cooperate with them killin’ us.”
“The hydrophobia skunks!” Chloride raged. “They burned down my cabin! The dang no-good weasels!”
Bo thumbed fresh rounds into his Colt. “We got our guns and most of our gear out of there,” he said. “Lost our bedrolls, but we can replace them. I see that a couple of poles on the fence around the shed and the horse pen are down, so I reckon our horses spooked and busted out when the fire started. They’re probably still around somewhere.”
“Bound to have lost our saddles, though,” Scratch said. “We’ll have to ride bareback into town.”
Bo grunted as he holstered his gun. “Won’t be the first time, will it?”
Scratch chuckled and said, “Not hardly. When I was a kid, I reckon I must’ve rode a thousand miles before I ever knew what a saddle was.”