The bounty hunter wheeled around, his eyes wide with panic, the rifle in his hands coming up. But Smoke’s forward charge knocked the man sprawling, loosening his grip on the Winchester. The man opened his mouth to yell a warning. With one hard swing of the long-bladed knife, Smoke ended the life of the hunter.
He took the man’s rifle, pistol, and ammo, and then dragged the body into the pile of brush. Smoke made his way back to Dagger, using a different route, stashed the weapons, patted the big stallion on the neck, and once more headed out into the woods.
This time out, he was going to show Jud Vale what he thought of a man who would declare war on women and young boys.
And he would write the message in blood.
Smoke stayed near the top of a ridge, working his way along, keeping to the brush and timber, not skylining himself. At the highest point of the ridge, Smoke bellied down and made his way to the crest.
A Bar V hand chose that lime to stick his head up and look Smoke right in the eyes. Smoke recovered from his shock before the puncher and clobbered the cowboy right between the eyes with the butt of his Winchester, sending the man sprawling backward, his forehead bleeding.
Smoke was over the crest and on top of the hand before the man could recover. Smoke busted the man on the side of the jaw with the butt of the rifle and the hand’s eyes rolled back in his head. He was out for a long time, with a broken jaw.
Smoke tossed the man’s pistol into the brush and smashed the man’s rifle useless against a tree trunk. He moved down the ridge, mad and on the warpath. A Bar V gunny spotted him and raised his rifle to fire. Smoke leveled his Winchester and shot the man in the belly, doubling him over and bringing a scream of pain.
Now the fire had reached the hot grease and the war was on.
The landscape seemed to erupt with ugly and very hostile gun hands as Smoke dived for cover just as unfriendly fire began zinging and popping and ricocheting all around him.
Jumping behind a fallen log, Smoke wriggled his way to the other end and rolled into a small depression in the earth. Below him, the Bar V gunnies were shouting and cussing.
Smoke leveled his Winchester and put an abrupt and permanent halt to one gunfighter’s swearing. The .44 slug caught the man in the chest. The hand’s rifle went flying as blood stained the front of his shirt.
Smoke lunged out of the depression and made the timber before the others could get him in gun sights; shooting uphill was just as tricky as shooting downhill.
On the crest of the ridge, in deep timber, Smoke settled in for the siege. He dusted one Bar V gunny’s position, sending the man hugging the earth and losing his hat. Just for spite, knowing what value Western men put on their hats, Smoke lifted his rifle and knocked the hat spinning, ventilating the Stetson.
The gunny cussed Smoke, loud and long.
Smoke ducked down as the lead began whining wickedly all around him, bringing the thought to his mind that now would be just a dandy time to haul his ashes out of that particular location.
During a break in the firing, Smoke eased back, clearing the crest of the ridge, and began making his way west, working in a slow, careful semicircle until coming to a better, if temporary, area in which to work.
He lifted his Winchester, sighted in a foot sticking out from behind a large rock, and squeezed the trigger. The yowl of pain that followed told him he had taken another gunny out of the fight. The man was screaming in pain from his bullet-shattered ankle.
Another gunny, with more guts than sense, left his safe position to move to what he felt was a better one.
Smoke shot him, the bullet going in his left side and tearing out the right side, spinning the man like an out-of- balance top and dropping him to the hard, rocky ground. He did not move.
Smoke punched more .44’s into his Winchester and made life miserable for a gunhand who was crouched behind a tree. The man decided to seek better cover and made a run for it. Smoke knocked a leg out from under him and the man rolled down the hill, hollering and cussing. He finally managed to break his downhill rolling by grabbing onto a small tree and painfully work his way behind it. Smoke let him be, and concentrated on the others.
But the fight was gone from this bunch. Smoke watched without firing as they began working their way down the hill, staying in cover, carrying and helping the wounded back out of range of Smoke’s deadly rifle fire.
He left his position and worked his way back into deep timber, paralleling the gunnies’ retreat, sensing from their urgency and the direction of their travel that they were heading for their horses. He was waiting for them when they reached the picket line.
Smoke shot one badman in the belly and dusted another gunhand before they all left in a confusing and disorderly retreat, some of them losing their weapons as they stumbled and ran away.
Smoke ran into the camp, grabbed up the fallen weapons, and stuck them in empty saddle boots. He grasped as many reins as he could, swung into a saddle, and led the horses back to where he had left Dagger. There, he tied and grouped the horses and headed back for Box T range.
All in all, it had been quite a profitable day.
It was late night before Smoke reached the ranch house. He put the horses into the corral, told the boys to strip the gear from them and clean and store the weapons. He switched horses and then filled a sack with dynamite and caps and fuses, and was back in the saddle, heading once more for Bar V range.
He made a cold camp, slept for a few hours, and was up about three in the morning. He checked his guns and then saddled up. With a grim smile on his lips, Smoke went headhunting under the stars.
About two miles from the main house, and not running into a single Bar V hand, Smoke moved several hundred head of cattle toward the direction of Jud’s mansion and then tossed two sputtering sticks of dynamite near the bunched-up herd of Bar V cattle. The explosions sent them into a snorting, wild-eyed stampede heading straight for the mansion.
Smoke tagged along to see what other mischief he could get into this fine night.
