Nicole was dead. The acts of the men had grown perverted and in their haste, her throat had been crushed.
Felter sat by the lean-to and watched the valley in front of him. He wondered where Smoke had hidden the gold.
Inside, Canning drew his skinning knife and scalped Nicole, tying her bloody hair to his belt. He then skinned a part of her, thinking he would tan the hide and make himself a nice tobacco pouch.
Kid Austin got sick at his stomach watching Canning’s callousness, and went out the back door to puke on the ground. That moment of sickness saved his life — for the time being.
Grissom walked out the front door of the cabin. Smoke’s tracks had indicated he had ridden off south, so he would probably return from that direction. But Grissom felt something was wrong. He sensed something; his years on the hoot-owl back trails surfacing.
“Felter?” he called.
“Yeah?” He stepped from the lean-to.
“Something’s wrong.”
“I feel it. But what?”
“I don’t know.” Grissom spun as he sensed movement behind him. His right hand dipped for his pistol. Felter had stepped back into the lean-to. Grissom’s palm touched the smooth wooden butt of his pistol as his eyes touched the tall young man standing by the corner of the cabin, a Colt .36 in each hand. Lead from the .36s hit him in the center of the chest with numbing force. Just before his heart exploded, the outlaw said, “Smoke!” Then he fell to the ground.
Smoke jerked the gun belt and pistols from the dead man. Remington Army .44s.
A bounty hunter ran from the cabin, firing at the corner of the cabin. But Smoke was gone.
“Behind the house!” Felter yelled, running from the lean-to, his fists full of Colts. He slid to a halt and raced back to the water trough, diving behind its protection.
A bounty hunter who had been dumping his bowels in the outhouse struggled to pull up his pants, at the same time pushing open the door with his shoulder. Smoke shot him twice in the belly and left him to scream on the outhouse floor.
Kid Austin, caught in the open behind the cabin, ran for the banks of the creek, panic driving his legs. He leaped for the protection of the sandy embankment, twisting in the air, just as Smoke took aim and fired. The ball hit Austin’s right buttock and traveled through the left cheek of his butt, tearing out a sizable hunk of flesh. Kid Austin, the dreaming gun-hand, screamed and fainted from the pain in his ass.
Smoke ran for the protection of the woodpile and crouched there, recharging his Colts and checking the .44s. He listened to the sounds of men in panic, firing in all directions, hitting nothing.
Moments ticked past, the sound of silence finally overpowering gunfire. Smoke flicked away sweat from his face. He waited.
Something came sailing out the back door to bounce on the grass. Smoke felt hot bile build in his stomach. Someone had thrown his son outside. The boy had been dead for some time. Smoke fought back sickness.
“You wanna see what’s left of your woman?” a taunting voice called from near the back door. “I got her hair on my belt and a piece of her hide to tan. We all took a turn or two with her. I think she liked it.”
Smoke felt rage charge through him, but he remained still, crouched behind the thick pile of wood until his rage cooled to controlled venomous-filled fury. He unslung the big Sharps buffalo rifle that Preacher had carried for years. The rifle could drop a two-thousand-pound buffalo at six hundred yards. It could also punch a hole through a small log.
The voice from the cabin continued to mock and taunt Smoke. But Preacher’s training kept him cautious. To his rear lay a meadow, void of cover. To his left was a shed, but he knew that was empty for it was still barred from the outside. The man he’d plugged in the butt was to his right, but several fallen logs would protect him from that direction. The man in the outhouse was either dead or passed out; his screaming had ceased.
Through a chink in the logs, Smoke shoved the muzzle of the Sharps and lined up where he thought he had seen a man move, just to the left of the rear window, to where Smoke had framed it out with rough pine planking. He gently squeezed the trigger, taking up slack. The weapon boomed, the planking shattered, and a man began screaming in pain.
Canning ran out the front of the cabin, to the lean-to, sliding down hard beside Felter behind the water trough. “This ain’t workin’ out,” he panted. “Grissom, Austin, Poker, and now Evans is either dead or dying. The slug from that buffalo gun blowed his arm off. Let’s get the hell outta here!”
Felter had been thinking the same thing. “What about Clark and Sam?”
“They growed men. They can join us or they can go to hell.”
“Let’s ride. They’s always another day. We’ll hide up in them mountains, see which way he rides out, then bushwhack him. Let’s go.” They raced for their horses, hidden in a bend of the creek, behind the bank. They kept the cabin between themselves and Smoke as much as possible, then bellied down in the meadow the rest of the way.
In the creek, the water red from the wounds in his butt. Kid Austin crawled upstream, crying in pain and humiliation. His Colts were forgotten — useless anyway; the powder was wet — all he wanted was to get away.
The bounty hunters left in the house, Clark and Sam, looked at each other. “I’m gettin’ out!” Sam said. “That ain’t no pilgrim out there.”
“The hell with that,” Clark said. “I humped his woman, I’ll kill him and take the eight thousand.”
“Your option.” Sam slipped out the front and caught up with the others.
Kid Austin reached his horse first. Yelping as he hit the saddle, he galloped off toward the timber in the
