The outlaw stepped closer, Smoke recognizing him as a wanted murderer. “No, it ain’t all right with me. You jist git your butt on out of here.”
Smoke could smell the odor of rotting human flesh from those unfortunates hanging from the meat hooks at the edge of town. Those few still alive were moaning and crying out in pain.
Smoke looked around him. They were alone. He smiled at the outlaw. “Playtime is all over, you bastard.”
“What’d you say to me, fancy-pants?” The man stepped closer, almost within swinging distance. Just a few feet more and Smoke would turn out the man’s lights. Forever.
“I said you stink like sheep-shit and look like the ass end of a donkey.”
Cursing, growling deep in his throat, the outlaw charged Smoke. Smoke jerked up the two-by-four and laid the lumber up against the man’s head. The outlaw stopped, as if he had run into a stone wall. His skull popped under the impact. He dropped to the earth, dying, blood leaking from his ears and nose and mouth.
Smoke dropped the two-by-four and quickly dragged the man behind the privy, stretching him out full length behind the two-holer. He could only be seen from the timber.
Smoke took the man’s two .44s and punched out the shells from the loops of his belt. He grabbed up his own guns and walked back into the timber, heading for his campsite.
He was smiling, humming softly.
They had said their good-byes to their wives and kids and girlfriends and swung into the saddle, pointing the noses of their horses north, toward the outlaw town.
One deputy from an adjoining county had been caught trying to make it alone to Dead River. He had been brought back to face Jim Wilde. It turned out his brother was one of the outlaws living in Dead River. The deputy was now locked down hard in his own jail, under heavy guard.
The members of the posse were, to a man, hard-faced and grim. All knew that some of them would not live through the night that lay before them. And while none of them wanted to die, they knew that what lay ahead of them was something that had to be done, should have been done a long time back. The outlaw town had been a blight on society for years, and the time had come to destroy it and all who chose to reside within its confines.
The riders each carried at least two pistols belted around their waists. Most had two more six-guns, either tucked behind their belts or carried in holsters, tied to their saddles. All carried a rifle in the boot; some had added a shotgun, the express guns loaded with buckshot. The men had stuffed their pockets full of .44s, .45s, and shotgun shells.
The posse rode at a steady, distance-covering gait; already they had changed horses and were now approaching Red Davis’s place. While the hands switched saddles, the men of the posse grabbed and wolfed down a sandwich and coffee, then refilled canteens. All checked their guns, wiping them free of dust and checking the action.
“Wish I was goin’ with you,” Davis said. “I’d give a thousand dollars to see that damn town burned slap to the ground.”
Wilde nodded his head. “Red, there’ll be doctors and the like comin’ out here and settin’ up shop ’bout dark. Some of us are gonna be hard-hit and the slaves in that town are gonna be in bad shape. You got your wagon ready to meet us at the mouth of the pass?”
“All hitched up.” He spat on the ground. “And me and my boys will take care of any stragglers that happen to wander out when the shootin’ starts.”
Jim Wilde smiled grimly. Between the Utes and Red Davis’s hard-bitten hands, any outlaws who happened to escape were going to be in for a very rough time of it. Red’s ranch had been the first in the area, and the old man was as tough as leather—and so were his hands.
Red clasped Jim on the shoulder. “Luck to you, boy. And I wanna meet this Smoke Jensen. That there is my kind of man.”
Jim nodded and turned, facing the sixty-odd men of the posse. The U.S. Marshal wore twin .44s, tied down. He carried another .44 in his shoulder holster and a rifle and a shotgun in the boots, on his horse. “All right, boys. This is the last jumpin’-off place. From here on in, they’s no turnin’ back. You gotta go to the outhouse, get it done now. When we get back into the saddle, we ain’t stoppin’ until we’re inside Dead River.” He glanced at the sinking sun. “Smoke’s gonna open up the dance in about an hour—if he’s still alive,” he added grimly. “And knowin’ him he is. Anybody wanna back out of this?”
No one did.
“Let’s ride!”
The guards along the pass road had just changed, the new guards settling in for a long and boring watch. Nothing ever happened; a lot of the time many of them dozed off. They would all sleep this dusky evening. Forever.
One guard listened for a few seconds. Was that a noise behind him? He thought it was. He turned, brought his rifle up, and came face to face with a war-painted Indian. He froze, opening his mouth to yell a warning. The shout was forever locked in his throat as an axe split his skull. The Ute caught the bloody body before it could fall to the ground and lowered it to the earth. The body would never be found; time and wind and rain and the elements and animals would dispose of the flesh and scatter the bones. A hundred years later, small boys playing would discover the gold coins the outlaw had had in his pockets and would wonder how the money came to be in this lonely spot.
His job done, for the moment, the brave slipped back into the timber and waited.
Up and down the heavily guarded narrow road, the guards were meeting an end just as violent as the life they had chosen to live. And they had chosen it; no one had forced them into it. One outlaw guard, who enjoyed torturing Indians, especially children, and raping squaws, was taken deep into the timber, gagged, stripped, and staked out. Then he was skinned—alive.
Their first job done, the Indians quietly slipped back and took their positions around the outlaw town of Dead River. With the patience bred into them, they waited and watched, expressionless.
York looked up and blinked, at first not recognizing the tall muscular man who was walking toward him, out of the timber. Then he recognized him.
“Damn, DeBeers. I didn’t know you at first. How come you shaved off your beard?”
