9
Everybody was in the saddle and moving as the sounds of the single shot filtered faintly to them. John T.’s horse triggered the deadfall and the logs came crashing down, blocking the trail behind him and putting several horses into a panic. They bucked and snorted and tossed Gunter to the ground, knocking the wind from the man. Briscoe’s horse reared up and the gunfighter fought to regain control. His horse’s hooves slammed against the flank of the horse Marlene was riding. Her horse jumped in fear and Marlene’s butt hit the ground. She squalled in shock and sprawled quite unladylike in the hoof-churned mud. She said a lot of very ugly words, in several languages.
John. T. left the saddle in a flying dive when he spotted the body of the man from Nevada. A slug whined wickedly just as he left the saddle. If he had waited another second, his brains would have been splattered against a tree.
So much for Jensen losing his nerve, John T. thought, as he hugged the ground.
Smoke’s second shot tore the saddle horn off and the horse bolted in fear. Leo Grant came riding up and Smoke sighted him in and fired just as Leo turned in the saddle, the .44-.40 slug taking him high in his left arm. Leo screamed in pain but managed to stay in the saddle and jump his horse into the timber.
Smoke had lost the element of surprise and knew it. He grabbed up his pack and ran into the timber behind the jumbled mass of boulders.
“Stay back!” John T. yelled down the trail. “Stay back and get down. Get off those horses and get into the timber.”
“Oh, damn!” Leo moaned. “I think my wing’s busted. Jesus, it hurts.”
“Quit complainin’,” John T. told him. “You’ll live.”
“Is Matt dead?” Utah called, crawling through the brush.
“Near as I can tell, he is,” John T. returned the call. “Leastwise he ain’t movin’ and they’s an awful lot of blood on the ground.”
“Damn!” Utah said. “Guess we was both wrong about Jensen.”
“Yeah. Von Hausen had the same idea, I’m thinkin’. We all misjudged Jensen.”
Smoke had moved back into the timber for a ways, then cut south, making his way through the timber silently and coming up in back of the group.
Larry Kelly turned to glance nervously at his back trail and his eyes widened in shock and fear. Smoke Jensen was standing in the center of the trail.
“Oh, no,” he said, just as Smoke lifted his rifle and pulled the trigger.
The slug took Larry dead center in his stomach with the same effects as a blow with a sledgehammer. The force of it doubled him over and dropped him to the trail, screaming as the pain surged through him, white-hot fingers that seemed to touch every nerve in the man.
Smoke jumped to the other side of the trail and vanished. But he didn’t vanish for long.
A stick of dynamite, tied to a short length of broken off limb came sputtering through the air.
“Goddamn!” Valdes yelled. “That’s dynamite!” Then he hit the ground and said a prayer. It was said very quickly.
The dynamite exploded and horses went running in blind panic in all directions. The pack animals ran into the timber, losing their packs and sending supplies scattering everywhere. Another stick of dynamite came hissing through the air and landed near Maria. When it blew the concussion lifted her off the ground and sent her tumbling down the hill. She landed in a creek, banged her head on a rock, and came up sputtering and yelling.
Nat Reed tried to cross the trail to get a shot at Smoke and a bullet burned his face, taking a chunk of meat out of his cheek. Thinking he was more seriously wounded, Nat bellied down on the ground and started hollering that he was dying.
The wilderness became silent; no more dynamite was thrown, no more shots. But the people of the von Hausen party did not move from their cover for several minutes. With the exception of Maria. She had crawled from the icy waters of the creek to lay huddling, trembling, and sobbing behind a large rock.
“He’s gone,” John T. announced, his voice reaching those sprawled on the ground, crouched behind trees, and hiding in the bushes. John T. stood up and walked over to Larry Kelly who lay on the ground, his legs drawn up and both hands holding onto his .44-.40 punctured belly.
“Help me!” the gun-for-hire said.
“You know there ain’t nothin’ nobody can do,” John T. told him. “We’ll build a fire and make you comfortable, Larry. That’s about it.”
Larry started weeping.
Even von Hausen was shaken by the suddenness and the viciousness of the attack. He sat on a rock and willed himself to be calm.
Gunter slipped and slid and stumbled down the bank toward Maria. Halfway there he lost his footing and rolled the rest of the way, landing on his ass in the cold waters of the creek.
Gunter said a few very vulgar words.
“Assemble,” von Hausen said. “Let’s see how much damage was done.”
“One dead, one dyin’, and two wounded,” John T. told him.
“I don’t wanna die!” Kelly screamed.
“You shoulda thought of that ’fore you signed on,” Utah told him. “That’s the problem with you young squirts. You don’t consider that a bullet might have your name on it.”
“Go to hell!” Kelly yelled at him.
“I’ll be right behind you, boy,” the older gun-for-hire told him.
The cook, Walt, was walking around gathering up what supplies he could find and muttering to himself. An old gunfighter who had given it up years back, Walt no longer carried a gun on him.
“What the hell are you mumbling about?” Hans asked the man.
“You told me this was a huntin’ trip,” Walt snapped at him. “You didn’t tell me ’til we was five hundred miles gone that it was a man-huntin’ trip.”
“You find that repugnant?” von Hausen asked from his seat on the rock.
“I don’t know what that means,” Walt replied, a sack of flour in his hands. “But I think you’re all about half nuts—or better—chasin’ after Smoke Jensen. Ifn you’d asked me from the start I woulda told you Jensen is pure poison. You’d be better off stickin’ your arm in a sackful of rattlers.”
“Keep your opinions to yourself,” Gunter panted the words, as he shoved Maria over the top of the bank. “Just cook.”
“I’ll do that,” Walt said. He tossed the sack of flour to Gil Webb.
“What the hell do you want me to do with this?” Gil asked.
Walt suggested a couple of things.
Smoke left the trail and headed west, between Jenny Lake and Leigh Lake. Miles behind him, Larry Kelly and the man from Nevada were buried in shallow graves, the mounds covered with rocks to keep the scavengers from digging up and eating the bodies.
“Suggestions?” von Hausen said to John T.
“We ain’t got nothin’ to use as leverage to make him come to us,” John T. said. “If you wanna go on, all we can do is keep chasin’ him.”
“I shall press on to the last man,” von Hausen told him. “Will the men stay?”
“There ain’t nobody talkin’ about quittin’.”
“Mount the men.”
Marlene fell back to ride beside old Walt-when the trail permitted that. “Did you know this Preacher person who raised Smoke Jensen?”
“I knew of him.” The cook didn’t like the women any better than he liked Von Hausen, Gunter, or Hans. If anything, he liked them less. Women didn’t have no business out here in the wilderness, shootin’ and chasin’ a human bein’ like he was some kind of animal.
“What was he like—that you know of.”
How could I tell you somethin’ about him that I didn’t know, you ninny? Walt thought. “Tough as rawhide and wild as the wind. He taught Smoke well. Give this hunt up, missy. You’re headin’ for grief if you don’t. Smoke’s done showed you how he fights. And if you think he’ll spare you ’cause you’re a woman, you’re flat wrong. You start shootin’ at him, he’ll put lead in you just as fast as he would a man.”