"Me either," Frank said. "Thanks for the warning, Doc. I aim to bring 'em down ... every last one."
Holliday didn't answer, his nostrils flaring gently with opium slumber.
Frank let himself out, and walked back up the hall to fetch his pistol. He saw the nurse seated behind her desk, and came over for his gun.
"Thank you, ma'am," he said, holstering his Colt. "I'm much obliged."
"Is Doc asleep?" she asked. "I just gave him his laudanum before you arrived."
"Yes, ma'am, he's asleep."
Frank went outside and untied his bay, mounting after a look down the empty road back to town. He reined away from the sanitarium and heeled his horse to a jog trot.
Remembering the directions Doc gave him, he knew he would have to pass through Glenwood Springs to reach the right wagon road, a ride that would attract attention should any of the gang be watching for him.
"Suits the hell outta me," he mumbled. It would be just as easy to kill a few more of them here, rather than wait for an ambush somewhere in the mountains looming above the sleepy little village.
He rode through Glenwood Springs at the same slow trot, with an eye out for anyone who seemed to be watching him. He passed the sheriff's office, and noticed that Tom Brewer came out on the boardwalk to stare at him with unfriendly eyes.
"He's on the take," Frank told himself quietly. He'd seen that same look in men's eyes before.
Riding past a blacksmith's shop, he noticed a new pine coffin on a pair of sawhorses. "One less back-shooting bastard to worry about," he said aloud, urging his horse to a short lope as he rode away from Glenwood Springs into a dense ponderosa forest.
Less than a quarter mile from town he found the two-rut wagon road Doc Holliday had described. Frank reined his horse to a halt and looked behind him. No one was following him now, but it was too soon to tell.
He swung onto the wagon ruts and started up a steep hill. The pines grew so close to the road they were like walls on either side. Deep shadows lay before him. It was the perfect place for an ambush.
"Out front, Dog!" Frank bellowed.
Dog understood his job. He trotted out in front of Frank and the bay until he was more than a hundred yards ahead.
"A little insurance," he said, pulling his Winchester from its saddle boot to jack a shell into the firing chamber. He lowered the hammer gently and rested the rifle across the pommel of his saddle.
He slowed the bay to a walk and kept his eyes glued to the ruts and shadows. If Pine or Vanbergen meant to jump him on his way to the valley, they'd have their hands full.
Dog continued up the steep ascent without making a sound or giving a warning. The old dog's senses were as keen as ever and he was rarely taken by surprise.
"Let the bastards come, if they want," Frank said grimly. "I got a little surprise for 'em...."
--------
*Seven*
Frank rode slowly between the pines, stopping every so often to check his back trail, and to listen for the sounds of another horse. Dog sat in the middle of the road panting, watching the man and the horse behind him, when Frank reined his animal to yet another stop.
"It's quiet," he whispered. "Maybe too damn quiet." But there was no evidence that anyone was following him, and Dog had sensed nothing ahead.
"Getting jumpy in my old age," Frank told himself, although he had the eerie feeling that he was being watched.
He heeled his horse forward, continuing up the steady climb toward snowcapped peaks. The creak of saddle leather and the soft drum of the bay's hooves filled the silence around him for a time.
Then Dog halted suddenly, hair rigid along his backbone as he looked to the east.
Frank drew rein on his horse at once, scanning the dark forest. A marksman worth his salt could kill him easily from those pines. Perhaps it was time to proceed with more care until he cleared this part of the road.
He swung out of the saddle, using his bay for a shield to continue moving northwest, walking beside the horse's shoulder. And still, Dog didn't move, watching the trees with a low growl coming from his throat.
"That's good enough for me," Frank muttered, moving off the road to enter black forest shadows where he would make a more difficult target. Balancing his Winchester in the palm of his hand, he crept along at a snail's pace.
"What is it, Dog?" he whispered when he came to the spot in the road where his dog remained frozen between the ruts.
Dog wouldn't look at him, staring at the same spot on a wooded ridge, still growling.
Now Frank was sure something, or someone, was out there. It would be a fool's move to continue along the road until he found out what it was.
He ground-hitched the bay and started walking softly among the pine trunks, using them for cover wherever he could. Dog trotted up beside him, his attention still fixed on the ridge.
_I wonder if it's that Indian again,_ Frank thought.
Dog had never given him a false signal despite the cur's advancing age.
With no warning, the sharp crack of a rifle's report sounded from the ridge. Frank threw himself on the ground behind a ponderosa trunk, listening to the bullet sizzle high above his head.
"Damn, that was close," Frank said, gritting his teeth in anger. He knew now that he should have been more cautious, coming around behind the ridge instead of approaching it head-on.
"I missed you, Morgan!" a distant voice shouted. "But I ain't done yet!"
Dog was crouched beside him ... it wasn't the first bullet the animal ever heard.
_One of Pine's or Vanbergen's men,_ Frank thought. _There may be more than one._
"Stay, Dog," he whispered, crawling backward away from the tree, keeping it between him and the shooter.
Frank took off in a crouch, dodging and darting from one pine to the next, his chest welling with rage.
Moving as quickly as he could, he began a wide circle that would take him around to the back of the ridge.
* * * *
He sighted a prone form using underbrush for cover at the top of the switchback, partially hidden in the shade to keep sunlight from gleaming off his rifle barrel.
"Gotcha, you bastard," Frank whispered, drawing a bead on the man's back. Frank wouldn't shoot a man in the back without giving him a fair warning.
"Hey, asshole! I'm back here!" he cried.
The rifleman flipped over on his side, bringing his gun around as quickly as he could. It was just what Frank had been waiting for.
He triggered a .44-caliber slug into the man's belly. The explosion near his ear almost deafened him.
"Shit!" the rifleman bellowed, jerking when the bullet found its mark. A crimson stain exploded on his shirtfront. He dropped his rifle to grab his belly with both hands.
Frank came to his feet, still covering the bushwhacker as he started toward him. Taking careful steps, he started up the back of the ridge.
"Jesus! I'm shot!" the gunman moaned, blood pouring between his fingers.
"That's a real good calculation of your situation," Frank told him. "You're gonna die for Ned Pine and Victor Vanbergen. Ask yourself if it was worth whatever they were paying you to ambush me."
"You ain't gonna just leave me here, Morgan."
"That's exactly what I'm gonna do. I hope you die slow, so you can think about what you just tried to do. Hurts a bit, don't it?"
"You bastard."