Last Mountain Man

and said softly, “You’re the Preacher; man who rides with the young gun, Smoke. Don’t talk, just listen. The bounty’s been upped on your friend’s head. That’s the word I get. Someone up in the Idaho Territory is out to get Smoke.”

“Potter, Stratton, and Richards.”

“That’s right. Potter is big … politically. Richards is in mining and cattle. Stratton owns the town of Bury. Those two gunfighters on the porch, Felter and Canning, work for those three men. They got a bunch of hardcases camped just north of town. When you leave, and I hope it’s soon, ride out easy and cover your trail.”

“Thanks.”

“No need for that. I just know what happened in the war, that’s all. Can’t abide a traitor.”

Preacher glanced at him.

“Since that first shooting, back at the mining camp, the story’s spread. I reckon all the way to the Idaho Territory. But there’s more. Your friend has a sister named Jane — right?”

“He don’t speak none of her.”

“Well, she’s up in the territory now.”

“Let me guess: She’s in Bury.”

“Yeah. She’s Richards’s woman. He keeps her.”

“I’ll tell him.”

When Preacher rode out of Del Norte, he did so boldly, not wanting to implicate the shopkeeper, maybe leaving him open to rough treatment from Felter or Canning. Poor fellow had enough woes to contend with from that braying wife. Preacher picked up his jars, secured them well, then rode out to the east.

He didn’t think he was fooling anybody, for Felter knew him; knew he was friends with the young gunfighter. He would be followed.

Preacher rode easy, constantly checking his back trail. He rode across the San Luis Valley, slowly edging north. No one alive knew Colorado like the Preacher, and he was going to give his followers a rough ride.

By noon of the second day, Preacher had spotted his trackers. He grinned nastily, then headed his horses toward the Great Sand Dunes. If any of those behind him had any pilgrim in them, this is where Preacher would cut the sheep from the goats.

He skirted the southernmost part of San Luis Creek, filled up his canteens and watered his horses, and grinning, headed for the dunes. On the east side of the lake, Preacher pulled into a stand of timber, carefully smoothed out his trail with brush and sand droppings, then slipped back and waited.

He watched two men, neither of them Felter or Canning, lose his trail and begin to circle. Leaving his horses ground reined, he worked his way to the edge of the timber until he was close enough to hear them talking.

“Damned ol’ coot!” one of them said. “Where’d he go?”

“Relax,” his partner said. “The boss’s got twenty men workin’ all around. We got him boxed. He can’t get out.”

Old coot! Preacher thought. Your Ma’s garters I can’t get out!

“Relax, hell! I want that five thousand dollars.”

The ante was going up.

“How much is on the ol’ fart’s head?”

Old fart! Preacher silently raged.

“Nothin’,” the meaner-looking of the pair said with a grin. “It’s the gunfighter Richards and them want. That old man ain’t worth a buffalo turd.”

Buffalo turd! Preacher almost turned purple.

“We’ll take the old man alive, make him tell where the kid’s at, then kill him.”

You just dug your own grave, Preacher thought.

The two men sat their horses. They rolled cigarettes. “How come all this interest in this Smoke? I ain’t never got the straight of it.”

“Personal, way I heard it. The kid’s sister is Richards’s private woman up in Bury. I ain’t never been there so I can’t say if she’s a looker. Probably is. Then they’s the gold.

“Seems the kid’s brother was a Reb in the war, on a patrol bringin’ gold in for the South. Richards and them others killed the Rebs and took the gold — ’bout a hundred or so thousand dollars of it. ’bout three-four years back, the kid’s Daddy comes a-bustin’ into Bury — ’fore it was a town proper — and killed some of Richards’s men. Took back some of the gold. ’bout forty thousand of it, so I heard — but some of it was dust that had been recently washed. Richards thinks the kid has it … wants it back and the kid dead.”

Preacher grinned. He had thought all along Emmett buried the gold with him. Smart man.

Preacher jacked back the hammer of his Henry and blew both men out of the saddle. “Call me an old fart and a buffalo turd, will you!”

Preacher rode hard to the north, following the creek, going from first one side to the other, many times riding down the middle of the creek to hide his horses’ tracks. Just south of the small settlement called Crestone, Preacher headed west, across the valley, undercutting another settlement between the San Luis and the Saguache Creeks. He was out of supplies when he reached Saguache. Picketing his pack animals just outside of town, he rode in, just in time for a hanging.