When they reached the trees, they swung down from their saddles again. Chloride held the reins of all three mounts this time while Bo and Scratch searched among the trees and examined the ground.
After a few minutes, Scratch reappeared with something in his hand. He held it out to show Chloride.
“Got a couple of hombres who smoke quirlies, and one who favors cheroots,” the silver-haired Texan said as he displayed the remains of the smokes he had picked up.
Bo came out of the trees and added, “And at least one gent who prefers a pipe. I found where he knocked out the dottle.”
“How about brass?” Scratch asked.
Bo nodded. “I saw quite a few cartridges. They didn’t bother to pick up the empties when they left. Looked like standard forty-four-forty rounds, though.”
“Yeah, same here. How about the horses?”
Bo nodded. “I can show you where they held them. Come on.”
“That’s more like it,” Scratch muttered when he saw the welter of prints left by the horses while their owners were waiting for the Argosy gold wagon to come along. He knelt beside the tracks and studied them for long moments, filing away every detail, every nick and bent nail. Bo leaned over and peered at the hoofprints as well. His skill as a natural-born tracker wasn’t quite as good as Scratch’s, but he knew he would recognize some of those hoofprints if he saw them again.
“You reckon the Devils spend most of their time in Deadwood?” Scratch asked quietly.
“Sure,” Bo said. “They probably have a hideout somewhere in the hills, but what good is a pile of stolen loot if all you do is squat in a cave somewhere all the time? Chloride said they were masked and that he never got a good look at their faces. Until now they’ve killed everybody they held up, so there weren’t any witnesses left behind.” Bo nodded confidently. “They’re hiding in plain sight, I’ll bet, right there in the middle of Deadwood.”
Scratch grunted. “Probably pretendin’ to be respectable citizens.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it a bit,” Bo said. “Think you can follow their back trail from here?”
“Maybe. If we’re right about them comin’ from Deadwood, though, it won’t do us much good. Chances are, they’ve got some rendezvous where they get together for their robberies, and from there the back trails’ll scatter out all over hell and gone.”
“Maybe the place where they rendezvous is the same place they cache their loot,” Bo suggested.
A grin stretched across Scratch’s face. “I didn’t think about that. You might be right, Bo. It’s sure worth checkin’ out, anyway. Let’s get Chloride and have a look.”
“He may want to go back to Deadwood, since he’s already shown us the site of the robbery.”
“We can let him make up his mind about that.”
They walked back through the trees and found the old-timer where they had left him, still holding the two horses and the mule. “Any luck?” Chloride asked.
“We’re going to try to follow their back trail,” Bo explained. “Do you want to come with us, or would you rather go back to town?”
Chloride scratched his beard for a second, then said, “I’d just as soon go on with you fellas, if that’s all right.”
“Sure,” Scratch said with a nod. He reached for the reins of his horse.
The sudden whipcrack of a rifle shot split the chilly morning air, and Chloride’s hat leaped from his head into the air.
CHAPTER 7
Bo heard the slug sizzle between him and Scratch after it ripped through the old-timer’s hat. His hand shot out, grabbed Chloride’s arm, and swung him deeper into the trees.
“Hunt some cover!” Bo ordered.
More shots roared. Bo couldn’t tell exactly where they were coming from, but at the moment that didn’t really matter. The only important thing right now was finding shelter from the lead flying through the air around them.
Scratch snatched his hat off his head and slapped it across his horse’s rump, causing the animal to take off running. Bo’s horse and Chloride’s mule followed. That put their mounts out of the line of fire.
But it also put the Texans’ Winchesters out of reach, because the rifles were still in their saddle boots. They had their handguns and the extra ammunition they carried in their shell belts and pockets, but that was all.
Chloride had scrambled behind one of the tree trunks. Bo and Scratch hurried to find cover of their own as slugs whipped through the branches, chewed hunks of bark from the trees, and sprayed splinters.
Scratch called over to Bo, “You hit?”
“Nope. How about you?”
“No, they didn’t wing me, either. Chloride?”
“I’m fine,” the old-timer said. “But this is the second day in a row I been shot at, and I don’t like it!”
A grim chuckle came from Bo. “Neither do we. What are we going to do about it?”
“Did you see where those bushwhackers are holed up?” Scratch asked.
