be enough for several days.
Taking a canteen and his rifle, Smoke walked several hundred yards from where he left his gear, reconnoitering the area.
Then he heard a horse snort, another one doing the same. Faint voices come to him.
“Lost his damn trail back yonder.”
Smoke knew the voice: Lanny Ball.
“We’ll find it,” Lodi said. “Then we’ll torture him ‘fore we kill him. I done had some of that money spent back yonder till he come along and queered it for us.’
Smoke edged closer, until he could see the men as they passed close by. Cat Jennings’s gang were in the group.
“Hell, I’m tarred,” a man complained. “And our horses are all done in. We gonna kill them if we keep on. And we got a lot of rough country ahead of us.”
“Let’s take a rest,” Lodi said. “We can loaf the rest of the day and pick up the trail tomorrow.”
“Damn good idee,” an outlaw named Sutton said. ”I could do with me some food and coffee.”
“All right,” Lanny agreed. “I’m beat myself.”
Smoke kept his position, thinking about this new pickle he’d gotten himself into.
It was only a matter of time—maybe minutes or even seconds—before Dagger caught the scent of other horses and let his presence be known. Then whatever element of surprise Smoke had working for him would be gone.
There were few options left for him. He could backtrack and saddle up, hoping Dagger didn’t give his position away, and try to ride out. But he knew in his heart that was grabbing at straws.
His other option was to fight.
But he was body and soul sick of fighting. If he could ride out peacefully and go home and hang up his guns and never strap them on again he would be content. God, but that would be wonderful.
The next statement from the mouth of a outlaw drifted to him, and Smoke knew this fight had to be ended right here and now.
“They tell me that Jensen’s wife is a real looker. When we kill him, let’s ride on down to Colorado. I’d like to have me a taste of Sally Jensen. I like it when they fight.” Then he said some other things he’d like to do to Sally. The filth rolled in a steady stream from his mouth, burning deep into Smoke’s brain. Finally he stood up , the verbal disgust fouling the pure clean mountain air.
Smoke lifted his Winchester and shot the man in the belly.
Smoke shifted position immediately, darting swiftly away. He was dressed in earth colors, and had left his hat back at the corral. He knew he would be nearly impossible to spot. And after hearing the agreeing and ugly laughter of the outlaws at the gut-shot man’s filthy, disgustingly perverted suggestions, Smoke was white-hot angry and on the warpath.
He knelt behind a thick fallen log, all grown around with brush, and waited, his Winchester at the ready, hammer eared back.
Movement to his right caught his eyes. He fired and a wild shriek of pain cut the air. “My elbow s ruint!” a man wailed.
Smoke fired again into the same spot. The man with the ruined elbow stood up in shock and pain as the second bullet slammed into him. He fell forward onto his face.
As the lead started flying around him, thudding into the fallen logs and still-standing trees, Smoke crawled away, working his way around the outlaw’s position, steadily climbing uphill.
He swung wide around them, moving through the wilderness just as Ol’ Preacher had taught him, silently flitting from cover to cover, seething mad clear through; but his brain was clear and cold and thinking dark primal thoughts that would have made a grizzly back up and give him room.
In the West, a man just didn’t bother a good woman—or even a bad woman for that matter. Or even say aloud the things the now-dead outlaw had mouthed. Molest a woman, and most western men would track that man for days and either shoot him or hang him on the spot.
Smoke caught a glimpse of color that did not fit into this terrain. He paused, oak-tree still, and waited. The man’s impatience got the better of whatever judgment he possessed, and he started to shift positions.
Smoke lifted his rifle and drilled the outlaw, the bullet entering his right side and blowing out the left side.
Smoke thought the man’s name was Sweeney; one of Cat Jennings’s crud.
Lead splattered bark from a tree and Smoke felt the sting of it. He dropped to one knee and fired just under the puff of gunsmoke drifting up from the outlaw’s position, working the lever just as fast as he could, filling the cool air with lead.
A crashing body followed the spray of bullets.
“He ain’t but one man!” a harsh voice shouted. “Come on, let’s rush him.”
“You rush him, Woody” was the reply. “If you so all-fired anxious to get kilt.”
“I’m gonna kill you, Jensen!” Woody hollered. “Then drag your stinkin’ carcass till they ain’t nothing left for even the varmits to eat.”
Smoke remained still, listeneing to the braggard make his claims.
“I’ll take him,” a high thin voice was added to the brags.
Danny Rouge.
The only thing that moved was Smoke’s eyes. He knew he couldn’t let Danny live, couldn’t let Danny get him in
