The Warhunter 3, page 12
“It doesn’t matter what you say,” said the reporter. “What matters is what Ella says.”
If Bryce wasn’t right about anything else, he was right about that. Hunter said nothing. Deep in his thoughts, he just walked away.
Ella was waiting for him by their wagon. “What’s going on?” she asked with studied indifference.
“I’m riding out ahead of the train to look at some tracks found by one of the young scouts. The wagons ought to catch up to me before dark.”
“I see,” said Ella.
“I talked to Eric Bryce. He’ll likely travel with you this afternoon, just in case there’s trouble.”
She nodded her head.
“One last thing ... ”
“Yes?”
“Whatever you’re thinking about me and Nadine Ballantine, forget it.”
Ella was startled. Just then, with Hunter about to ride out, and with him all but pushing Bryce and her together, it was the last thing Ella expected Hunter to say. But Ella had lived too long on the second floors of too many saloons to have much faith in the spoken word.
“You expect me to forget what’s plain in front of my eyes, just because you say so?” she challenged.
“What you think is ‘plain in front of your eyes’ is only in your head. I’m expecting you to believe me because I’m telling you the truth. That’s the long and the short of it,” he said gruffly. “I’ll see you tonight. I’ve got to get going.”
Ella didn’t know what to say. She stood in silence as he pulled his saddle out of the back of their wagon and started off in the direction of the remuda.
Finally, she found the words she wanted to say.
“Be careful!” she called to him.
But by then he was too far away to hear.
Chapter Twenty
IT HAD BEEN a long time since he’d ridden anywhere alone. Ella, it seemed, had almost always been with him. How much longer she would be with him was now seriously open to doubt. As much as he hated to admit it, it looked as if maybe Eric Bryce was right. Maybe she was choosing the reporter over him.
Hunter glanced up at the cloudless sky, then let his eyes wander over the landscape before him. What he saw was a flat, arid sweep of rocks and sand, with a sprinkling here and there of scrub brush and hardy desert flowers. In the desert itself, just a few miles away, there wouldn’t even be any plants. It was a lonely, cruel land, and to survive it a man had to be strong—in spirit as well as in muscle.
The wagon train fell farther and farther behind him as Hunter rode west. And the land became drier, more alkaline, as he approached the edge of the Great Salt Lake Desert.
It was one of nature’s mysteries that there should be a fresh-water spring in so desolate a place. Yet there it was, cold and clean. Hunter drank, and then filled his canteen to the top.
In a land as dry as this, where there’s water there’s bound to be an Indian trail. The tracks young Bobby Dielman saw had to be somewhere nearby.
Hunter scouted a little south of the spring, thinking that was a likely area for the wagons to travel, and, therefore, a likely place for Bobby Dielman to have done his earlier tracking. And sure enough the Indian trail was there, complete with the hoofprints of more horses than Hunter cared to count.
Hunter studied the tracks, following the trail for half a mile. The horse droppings he found were old and dried out. On high ground, in wide-open places where the wind seemed to blow up out of nowhere to whip sand in your face, in those places the tracks had blown away.
The only conclusion Hunter could form was that the Indian sign Bobby Dielman found was indeed old, and offered no threat to the oncoming wagon train.
But there was something else ... hard to pick up at first, because of the multitude of tracks. And even then, once he spotted it, there was no sure way to know if it meant anything. Amid all these hoofprints, with the definition of the tracks fading from the effects of wind and the occasional heavy morning dew that passed for rain, there were, to Hunter’s surprise, some tracks still sharp and clear.
Another, much smaller, party of Indians had recently passed through here.
Hunter continued still farther along the trail, searching for signs that would tell him more.
A quarter of a mile, and nothing. Another quarter of a mile ... and nothing. Hunter, on foot, studied every inch of the trail. He had to figure out how many Utes there were, what their mission might have been, and just how long ago it was that they traveled here.
It was getting late. Long shadows made Hunter’s work more difficult. Weary, Hunter leaned against a boulder and glanced down into the deep shade beside the rock, trying to rest his eyes from the harsh glare of the sun.
A familiar scent caught Hunter’s attention.
He peered a little closer into the shadow, then dropped down on one knee to get a better smell.
Hunter touched the cool, damp ground. He reached out and put his fingers down about two feet away. In this place it was cool, but it wasn’t damp. Hunter touched the wet spot again, then lifted his fingers to his nose.
Hunter wasn’t anxious to consider himself a master of the subject, but as far as he could tell, it was horse piss he was smelling. From the angle of the sun, and the length of time it was in the shade, it seemed a good guess that a rider, or riders, passed this way no later than midmorning. Maybe even as recently as noon.
Hunter moved still farther up the trail. At last, near dusk, he found a patch of ground where the wind had blown away most of the old tracks but hadn’t as yet come up strong enough during the day to blow away the new ones.
There were four sets of tracks. The length of their stride was long, which indicated that these riders were in a hurry. In addition, all four horses were mounted. A lack of pack horses meant this couldn’t be a hunting party. There was only one choice left—they were scouts.
There was no way to know how far these scouts had ranged. They could have come down from the north, or circled around from the east. They could have even come in off the desert. Whether or not they knew of the existence of the wagon train was open to conjecture. Only one thing was certain: They must have seen something. Why else would they be on the gallop?
The sun was going down. Hunter had learned all that the signs could tell him. He figured he had better hurry back up the trail and meet the wagon train near the spring at the edge of the desert. They were probably wondering where he was.
Or so he thought.
As it turned out, when he reached the spring it was Hunter who was left to wonder what had become of the wagon train. Seven miles was an easy distance to cover between a nooning break and dusk, particularly when traveling over the kind of level ground they were on.
It occurred to Hunter that the wagon train might have come under attack, but that sort of reasoning just didn’t hold up. Not with scouts racing south only late this morning. Besides, in this thin, dry, desert air, the sound of rifle fire would carry a long way. If the wagon train had been in a fight, he’d have heard it.
There were a lot of possible reasons for a wagon train to be delayed. Trouble herding the livestock, or a wagon with a broken axle could slow them down, only Hunter had a feeling it was simple fear that kept the wagon train from covering its usual afternoon distance. All it would take would be one slow wagon at the front of the train and they’d move at a crawl, all bunched up, feeling safe, but losing valuable time.
Hunter could have ridden back that night, but he decided not to. He figured everyone was probably a little edgy with this Indian scare, and if he came riding up in the black of night, some trigger-happy fool would likely shoot him. Besides, he had told Strunk and the others he would meet them here, so here he would stay.
Hunter unrolled his bedroll and stretched out near the spring, behind some rocks. He wondered if Ella was worried about him. It was nice to think she was. It wasn’t so nice, however, to think of her with Eric Bryce. But there was nothing Hunter could do to drive that thought out of his mind except close his eyes and go to sleep.
In the morning, as the sun reached higher and higher into the sky, Hunter became increasingly impatient. Where were they? he asked himself.
Time and again, he put his ear to the ground and heard the rumble of the wagons, but the hours passed, and still they did not arrive.
They finally came into sight almost four hours after sun-up. Hunter mounted his horse and led the lead wagon as close to the spring as possible, and then indicated to that wagon, and those following, that they should circle.
Hunter’s wagon was near the end of the train. As he guided the wagons in their circling procedure, he kept an eye out for Ella. But before she came into view, Jack Strunk and some others on horseback rode up and badgered him with questions.
“What’d ya find?” asked the wagon master.
“The tracks Bobby Dielman saw are old.”
Strunk and the others looked relieved.
“But there’s a problem,” Hunter continued.
“What’s that?” Strunk questioned, nervously.
“I found signs of a small scouting party that rode through here early yesterday. From what I could tell, they saw something—possibly us—and it’s a fair guess they’re on their way to report what they’ve seen.”
“Why do you say that? How do you know?” demanded Strunk.
“I don’t know it for sure, but Indians don’t run their horses unless they have a damn good reason, and those four braves whose tracks I picked up were running awful damn fast.”
Neither Strunk nor the others spoke. They were thinking, worrying.
Hunter looked up and saw that his wagon had already rolled by. He swore at himself, knowing Ella had undoubtedly seen him, and that she probably thought he was ignoring her.
“What did you say?” asked Strunk.
Hunter realized he had cursed loud enough to be heard. “Nothing,” he said irritably.
“Well,” said Strunk, casting about for the right thing to do, “I guess we ought to spread the word for everyone to be on their guard. In the meantime, we might as well get our water barrels filled and then let the animals drink at the spring.”
“Jack?” asked one of the men.
“Yeah?”
“Don’t ya think we ought to maybe stay here till mornin’? I mean, why start out into the desert in the middle of the day? At least here we got all the water we need.”
“That makes sense,” replied Strunk. “We’ll start out a little earlier in the morning tomorrow, maybe about an hour before dawn. Spread the word,” he announced.
“Wait a minute,” Hunter cut in sharply. “You’ve already wasted half a day getting here. The desert is rough, sure, and it would be better to start out fresh in the cool of the morning, but we only have a few weeks, maybe a month, to reach the Sierras before we run the risk of snow. The Utes may or may not be a threat, but if those scouts I told you about are bringing a war party, the faster we get across the desert, the better.”
Strunk had already made his decision. To reverse himself now, in front of these other men, was too humiliating an act for the wagon master to consider.
“What you’re sayin’ has merit,” Strunk told Hunter, “but with all the work that needs to be done before we move out onto the desert, we’d probably get so late a start anyway that we’d only be losin’ a few miles. I don’t think a delay of two or three miles is gonna make all that much difference. And like I said, we’ll be startin’ out extra early tomorrow mornin’ anyway.”
Jack Strunk had won his point—not by virtue of superior logic, but simply because as wagon master the final word was his.
Chapter Twenty-One
A BUCKET BRIGADE was formed. Buckets were passed from hand to hand, starting at the spring and stretching out till they reached every wagon in the circle. The water barrels were filled in this way without the barrels having to be unfastened from their secure positions on the side of each wagon.
Ella and Eric Bryce were a part of that bucket brigade, and so when Hunter returned to his wagon, he found it deserted.
Hunter shook his head disapprovingly. The mules were still in harness. It’s just like someone from the city, he thought, to think of himself first, and his animals second. Bryce had business to see that the mules were unhitched and scrubbed down before worrying about water for himself. That spring wasn’t going anywhere. But improperly handled animals have a way of dying on you just when you need them the most.
Hunter took care of the mules, then sat down in some shade and opened his worn copy of Redburn. With the Great Salt Lake Desert looming ahead, reading about endless vistas of bright blue water seemed somehow to make his mouth less dry.
He might have gone on reading all day if he hadn’t been distracted by a commotion down by the spring.
Curious, he put the book away and casually sauntered over to where a crowd had gathered.
It wasn’t until he got real close that he could see what it was all about. Cal Taggert had Eric Bryce’s arms pinned behind his back, and Zack Taggert was whaling away at the reporter’s stomach.
Ella was screaming, pleading for help, trying to claw Cal Taggert off Eric’s back, but Wally Taggert grabbed her and pulled her away.
Hunter bulled through the crowd, wondering why everyone was watching and no one was helping. When he emerged on the other side of the mob, he found out why.
Hal Murdock was holding a shotgun, standing guard over his cousins, while Zack Taggert continued to pummel away at Bryce.
A shotgun can only blow a man’s head off if he’s in front of the muzzle. Hunter was lucky enough to have emerged out of the crowd right next to Murdock. With one quick step, he was inside the angle of Murdock’s barrel.
With the element of surprise working for him, Hunter rammed his fist into Murdock’s soft belly, and then wrested the shotgun out of his hands.
Unlike his cousins, Hal Murdock was not a man used to roughhousing. He was the kind of man who fought best only when he had a weapon in his hands. So rather than try to knock Hunter down by diving for his legs—which would have been the smartest thing to do—Murdock instead made a futile grab for the stock of the shotgun.
Hunter easily pulled the gun away and swung it around, smashing the barrel into the side of Murdock’s head.
Hunter fired both barrels into the air.
The Taggerts, startled, turned to face him. As they did, Hunter drew his Colt and pointed it at Zack Taggert’s head.
“Stand away,” he ordered. “Let that man go. And you,” he said, suddenly swinging the muzzle toward Wally Taggert, “let her go, too.”
The Taggerts did as they were told.
Eric Bryce slumped to the ground. Ella immediately rushed to his side.
Jack Strunk came running when he heard the shotgun blast. Muscling his way through the crowd, he came up next to Hunter and demanded to know what was going on.
“I was wondering the same thing myself,” said Hunter.
“He started it!” claimed Zack Taggert, wiping a hand across his bewhiskered face and then pointing it at the fallen figure of Eric Bryce. “It wasn’t any of us! He shoved me out of his way, like I was dirt, so I decked him. It looked like he was goin’ for his gun, so my brother Cal grabbed ’im. That’s the whole story, Mr. Strunk.”
Murdock, his hand up against the side of his badly bruised face, struggled to his feet.
“Is that the way it happened?” the wagon master asked Murdock.
Hal Murdock looked Strunk straight in the eye. “That’s the way it happened,” he replied.
“All right, then,” the wagon master said, “the fight’s over. Let’s just forget about it and put it all behind us.”
“Hold it, Strunk!” Hunter exclaimed. “What kind of an inquiry was that? You didn’t ask Bryce his side of the story!”
“Look,” retorted Strunk, remembering the bargain he had struck with Hal Murdock, “it was just a fight. Nobody got killed. No sense makin’ a big deal outta this.”
“To my way of thinking,” said Hunter evenly, holding back his temper, “it’s pretty damn serious when a handful of fellers can beat a man into the ground and get away with it.”
Strunk didn’t know how far he could go in defense of the Taggerts, particularly with Hunter, so respected a man, being the one who was leveling the charges.
“Well,” said Strunk, looking for a way out of this predicament, “I’ll conduct a personal inquiry into it later, after everyone’s had a chance to calm down.”
“Why wait?” challenged Hunter. “Everyone’s here right now.”
Hal Murdock and Jack Strunk glanced at each other, each one wondering what the other was thinking. Strunk, for one, was sorry he had ever made his under-the-table arrangement with Murdock. He was being pushed to the point where he might have to renege.
“Look, Hunter,” blustered Strunk, “I’m in charge here, not you. I said I’ll look into it later!”
“I know this man,” said Hunter, indicating Bryce, who had not yet come to, “and he’s not the kind of man to go around picking fights. Taggert’s story doesn’t ring true to me, and I don’t like the idea of your letting it slide.” There was a rumble of approval among those in the crowd. They were siding with Hunter.
Perspiration started forming on Jack Strunk’s face faster than the dry desert air could absorb it. He was ready to fold, and Murdock and the Taggerts knew it.
“If you feel that strongly,” sputtered the wagon master, “I suppose—”
“May I say something?” came a question from the crowd.
It was Charles Ballantine, stepping forward, a pleasant smile on his face masking his deeper emotions.
“What is it, Mr. Ballantine?” asked Strunk, with the polite deference that many poor men offer people of breeding without giving it a second thought.
“I believe I can settle this difference of opinion very quickly.”
Murdock eyed the well-dressed, smooth-talking Ballantine with suspicion. Ballantine met his gaze and held it for a long moment, showing, to Murdock’s surprise, friendly reassurance, not fear.
