When the group came to the trail leading up into the forest on the side of the slope, Cletus stopped them across the stream from a rotting one-room log cabin that looked like it hadn’t been used for years.
“Jimmy,” he said, pointing to Jimmy Corbett, “I want you to wait over there by that cabin for Mac Macklin to get here. He’ll probably have some more men from Mr. MacDougal, an’ I want you to bring ‘em on up after us when they get here.”
“Yes, sir,” Jimmy said, jerking his horse’s head to the side and riding toward the shallow, ice-encrusted stream.
“And Jimmy . . . ”
“Yeah, Boss?” the boy said, looking back over his shoulder to see what Cletus wanted.
“You’d better fire a couple of shots when you get close to let us know it’s you coming.” Cletus smiled. “I figure we got more’n a few itchy trigger fingers in this group, and you wouldn’t want to sneak up on none of ‘em.”
Jimmy grinned and touched the brim of his hat as he rode into the stream and over toward the log cabin.
“We gonna sit here all day jawin’ or we gonna go up there and git Jensen?” Jason Biggs called from the front of the group of men, where he sat impatiently in his saddle.
Cletus clenched his teeth and walked his horse over next to Biggs’s without answering.
He leaned over to put his face close to Biggs’s and said in a low voice, “You open your pie-hole like that at me one more time, Jason, an’ we’re gonna see who the best man with a gun is! You hear me boy?” he asked, his face red and his voice harsh. His flat, dangerous eyes let Biggs know he wasn’t kidding in what he said.
“Uh, I didn’t mean nothin’ by what I said, Clete, you know that,” Biggs answered, his eyes looking down and not meeting Cletus’s.
“Remember, Jason, one more time is all it’s gonna take. I won’t remind you again.”
“Yes, sir.”
As Cletus rode off, his back turned, Biggs let his hand fall to the butt of his pistol. No one could talk to him like that and get away with it.
Then he looked around at the men gathered nearby. He knew they’d blow him out of the saddle if he shot Cletus, so he relaxed and kicked his horse into following Cletus’s. There’d be plenty of time later for Clete to have an accident.
TWENTY-SIX
Sheriff Wally Tupper handed the dally rope he had attached to the two pack animals behind him to Jack Dogget, one of the men riding with Angus MacDougal.
“Here’s your dynamite and gunpowder and extra shells, Angus,” he said, trying as hard as he could to keep his anger out of his voice.
Angus MacDougal tipped his head. “Come on with us, Wally,” he said, though this time it was more in the way of an offer instead of an order. “I promise you it’s gonna be fun. After all, hunting a man is much more exciting than hunting elk or bear, and I’m offering a bonus of five hundred dollars to the man who catches that son of a bitch.”
Wally shook his head. “No, thanks, Angus. I think I’ll stay here.”
Angus stared at him, his eyes narrowing. “I get the feeling you don’t think much of what I’m doing, Wally. Am I right?”
Wally nodded. “Yep, you’re right as rain, Angus. I told you, Jensen ain’t done nothing wrong—leastways nothing against the law. Everybody there that day says he fired in self-defense—that Johnny prodded him and drew on him without any provocation.”
“Bullshit!” Angus screamed, making his horse stomp and crow hop a time or two. “He killed my boy, and he’s going to pay for it!” Angus’s face was beet red and his eyes were wide and full of madness. He looked like he was about to have a stroke.
Wally shook his head sadly. “Maybe he did kill him, Angus, but Johnny wasn’t no boy. He was a growed man who shot his mouth off and got himself killed for drawing on the wrong man at the wrong time. It was bound to happen sooner or later, and if it hadn’t have been Jensen, it would’ve been somebody else.”
“You saying my boy deserved to get killed, Wally?” Angus asked, his voice suddenly low and dangerous but the madness still in his eyes.
Wally sat up straighter in the saddle, tired of being a whipping boy for this crazy old man. “Yeah, I guess that’s what I am saying, Angus, and it’s long past time someone told you like it is.”
Angus smiled grimly. “This is a dangerous time to try and grow a backbone, Wally.”
“Maybe, Angus, but I’ll tell you this straight. If you go up in those mountains and kill Jensen, that’s your business ‘cause it’s out of my jurisdiction. But if you bring him back here and do it, then I’ll see that you hang for it.”
“Those are awfully big words, Sheriff,” Angus said, looking around at the twelve men sitting on their horses with him. “I hope you can back them up.”
Wally looked around at the men, his face paling just a bit. “These men all agreed to go out with you to catch a gunman, Angus. I don’t think they agreed to kill an officer of the law.”
Angus snorted through his nose. “Well, we’ll just have to see about that when I get back.”
Wally nodded. “Things are going to be different when you get back, Angus. That’s what you’d better be thinking on while you’re up in those mountains.”
Angus growled and spurred his horse right at Wally, waiting for him to jump out of the way. But Wally stood his ground, and it was Angus who had to pull his horse to the side and ride off toward the mountains in the
