He heard the sound of horses’ hooves. The sound gradually faded.
Rifle fire slammed the air. A man cursed painfully. “Dammit, Dalton, you done me in.”
A rifle clattered onto wood and fell to the earth with a dull thud. The outlaw mistakenly shot by one of his own men fell heavily to the earth. He died cursing Dalton.
Still Smoke did not move.
“Smoke? Smoke Jensen? It’s me, Jonas. I’m gone, man. Pullin’ out. Just let me get to my hoss and you’ll never see me agin.”
“Jonas, you yeller rabbit!” Lanny yelled. “Git back here.”
But the fight had gone out of Jonas. He found his tired horse and mounted up. He was gone, thinking that Smoke Jensen was a devil, worser than any damn Apache that ever lived.
Smoke sensed more than heard movement behind him. But he knew that he could not be spotted under the pile of tangled logs, and he had carefully entered, not disturbing the brush that grew around and over the narrow entrance.
For a long minute the man, Danny, Smoke felt sure, did not move. Then to Smoke’s surprise, boots appeared just inches from his eyes. Danny had moved, and done so with the stealth of a ghost.
He was good, Smoke conceded. Very good. Maybe too good for his own good.
Very carefully, Smoke lifted the muzzle of his rifle, lining it up about three feet above the boots. The muzzle followed the boots as they moved silently around the pile of logs, then stopped.
Smoke caught a glimpse of a belt buckle, lifted the muzzle an inch above it, and pulled the trigger.
Danny Rouge screamed as the bullet tore into his innards. Smoke fired again, for insurance, and Danny was down, kicking and squalling and crying.
“I’m the bes’,” he hollered in his high, thin voice. “I’m the bes’ they is.”
Wild shooting drowned out whatever else Danny was saying. But none of the bullets came anywhere near to Smoke’s location. None of the outlaws even dreamed that Smoke had shot the back-shooter from almost point-blank range.
Danny turned his head and his eyes met those of Smoke, just a couple of yards away, under the pile of logs.
“Damn you!” Danny whispered, his lips wet with blood. “Damn you to hell!” He closed his eyes and shivered as death took him.
Smoke waited until the back-shooter had died, then took a thick pole and shoved the body downhill. It must have landed near, or perhaps on, an outlaw, for the man yelped in fright.
“Lanny, let’s get out of here,” a man called. “He ain’t gonna get Jensen. The man’s a devil.”
“He’s one man, dammit!” Lanny yelled. “Just one man, that’s all.”
“Then you take him, Lanny.” The outlaw’s voice had a note of finality in it. “’Cause I’m gone.”
Lanrry cursed the man.
“Jensen, I’m hauling my freight,” Hayes called. “I hope I don’t never seen you no more. Not that I’ve seen you this day,” he added wearily.
Another horse’s hooves were added to those already riding down the trail, away from this devil some called the last mountain man.
Smoke remained in his position as Lanny, Woody, and a few more wasted a lot of ammunition, knocking holes in trees and burning the air.
Smoke calmly chewed on a piece of jerky and waited.
Thirty-Three
Smoke had carefully noted the positions of those left. Five of them. He had heard their names called out. Woody, Dalton, Lodi, Sutton, and Lanny Ball.
The outlaws had tried to bait Smoke, cursing him, voicing what they were going to do to his wife and kids. Filthy things, inhuman things. Smoke lay under the jumble of logs and kept his thoughts to himself. If he had even whispered them, the white-hot fury might have set the logs blazing.
After more than two hours, Sutton called, “I think he’s gone, Lanny. I think he suckered us and pulled out and set up a new position.”
“I think he’s right, Lanny,” Woody yelled. “You know his temper; all them things we been sayin’ about his wife would have brought him out like a bear.”
Sutton abruptly stood up for a few seconds, then dropped to the ground. Lodi did the same, followed by the rest of them, and cautiously, tentatively, the outlaws stood up and began walking toward each other. Lanny was the last one to stand up.
He began cursing the rotten luck, the country, the gods of fate, and most of all, he cussed Smoke Hensen.
Smoke emptied his rifle into Lodi, Sutton, Dalton, and Woody, knocking them spinning and screaming to the littered earth.
Lanny hit the ground.
Smoke had dragged Danny’s fancy rifle to him with a stick. Dropping his empty Winchester, Smoke ended any life that might have been left in the quartet of scum, then backed out of his hiding place and stretched his cramped muscles, protected by the huge pile of logs.
Smoke carefully checked his Colts, wiping them free of dirt with a bandana. “All right, Lanny!” he called. “You made your brags back in Gibson. Let’s end this madness right here and now. Let’s see if you’ve got the guts to face a man. You sure have been real brave telling me what you planned to do with my wife.”
“You know I wouldn’t do that to no good woman, Jensen. That was just to make you mad.”
“You succeeded, Lanny.”
“Let’s call it off, Smoke. I’ll ride away and you won’t see me no more.”
“All right, Lanny. You just do that little thing.”
“You mean it?”
“I’m tired of this killing, Lanny. Mount up and get gone.”
“You’ll back-shoot me, Jensen! ” There was real fear in the outlaw’s voice.
“No, Lanny. I’ll leave that to punks like you.”
Lanny cursed him.
“I’m steppin’ out, Lanny.” This was to be no fast draw encounter. Smoke knew Lanny was going to try to kill him any way he could. Smoke’s hands were full of Colts, the hammers eared back.
At the edge of the piled-up logs, Smoke started running. Lanny fired, missed, and fired again, the bullet burning Smoke’s side. He turned and began pulling and cocking, a thunderous roar in the savage blow-down.
Lanny took half a dozen rounds in his upper torso, the force of the striking slugs driving him back against a huge old stump. He tried to lift his guns. He could not. His strength was gone. Smoke walked over to him, reloading as he walked.
“You ain’t human,” Lanny coughed up the words. “You a devil.”
“You got any kin you want me to write?”
“You go to hell!”
Smoke turned his back to the man and walked away.
“You ain’t gonna leave me to die alone, is you?” Lanny called feebly.
Smoke stopped. With a sigh, he turned around and walked back to the outlaw’s side. Lanny looked up as the light in his eyes began to dim. Smoke rolled a cigarette, lit it, and stuck it between Lanny’s lips.
“Thanks.”
Smoke waited. The cigarette fell out of Lanny’s lips. Smoke picked it up and ground it out under the heel of his boot.
“Least I can go out knowin’ it wasn’t no two-bit tinhorn who done me in,” were Lanny’s last words.
Smoke returned to the natural corral and saddled up. He wanted no more of this blown-down place of death. And from Dagger’s actions, the big horse didn’t either. Smoke rode out of the Medicine Bow Range and took the easy way south. He crossed the Laramie River and made camp on the shores of Lake Hattie.
He crossed over into Colorado the next morning and felt he was in home territory, even though he had many, many hard miles yet to go.
He followed the Laramie down into the Medicine Bow Mountains, riding easy, but still with the smell of sudden and violent death seeming to cling to him. He wanted no more of it. As he rode he toyed with the idea of selling out and pulling out.
He rejected that almost as quickly as the thought sprang into his brain.
The Sugarloaf belonged to Smoke and Sally Jensen. Fast gun he might be, but he wasn’t going to let his unwanted reputation drive him away. If there were punks and crud in the world who felt they just had to try him ... well, that was their problem. He had never sought the name of Gunfighter; but damned if he was going to back down, either.