probably fall fifty or sixty feet, to boot. It looks like this is going to be a one-man job.”
“Blast it, Bo—” Scratch said.
“The second man can get in the fight from up here,” Bo cut in. “And that’ll be you, Scratch.”
“How come?”
“I’m a little lighter than you are.”
“Not so’s you’d notice,” Scratch insisted. “I’ll bet there ain’t ten pounds’ difference between us. Never has been.”
“Ten pounds can be a lot when you’re lowering a fella on the end of a rope,” Bo said. “Don’t worry, you’ll still get to shoot some of those road agents. In fact, you’ll have an even better shot at them from up here.”
“Well . . . you got that right, anyway.” Scratch sighed. “All right. Me and Chloride’ll lower you down there. When are you goin’?”
Bo thought it over and said, “Probably be better to go ahead and do it now. If we wait for morning, they’ll be more likely to spot me. I see some rocks down there where I can hide until I’m ready to make my move. That won’t be until the rest of the posse gets here. Everything has to seem normal until then.”
“All right,” Chloride said. “Let’s find some place to dally that lasso.”
Bo couldn’t see the grin on Scratch’s face, but he could hear it in his friend’s voice as Scratch said, “I always knew at least one of us would wind up at the end of a rope, Bo, but I always figured it’d be me!”
CHAPTER 26
Bo took off his hat and coat and set them aside on the ledge. He would be cold down there without his coat, but he wanted the rope to have a nice secure fit around his chest and under his arms while Scratch and Chloride were lowering him.
Chloride had found a little pinnacle of rock at the back of the ledge that would work as a place to secure the rope. He passed one end around it, gripped both parts of the rope, and leaned hard on it to make sure it would stand the strain of Bo’s weight. The rock didn’t budge.
Meanwhile, Scratch fashioned the loop in the other end of the rope and lowered it over Bo’s upraised arms. He snugged it tight under Bo’s arms and said, “All right, you’re ready to go.”
Bo went over to the brink and sat down. Scratch and Chloride took up their positions, back a few feet from the rock spire. They gripped the rope tightly as Bo turned around and wriggled backward, letting his legs go off the ledge first. Carefully, Scratch and Chloride let the rope slide a little around the rock. Supported by the lasso, Bo slipped completely off the ledge and dangled there just under the rim. He nodded to Scratch and Chloride to let them know he was all right, although he wasn’t sure they could see the gesture in the thick darkness. He gave the rope a sharp tug, the signal for them to let it down some more.
It was a very uncomfortable feeling, having nothing but fifty or sixty feet of empty air under your boots. Without really thinking about it, Bo held his breath during the slow descent. He managed to turn around so he could look down and see what was going on in the camp below him. Several of the outlaws had turned in for the night, brushing snow off the ground so they would have clear spots for their bedrolls. Three men hunkered beside the little fire, drawing what warmth they could from the flames. Over by the trees, the prisoners appeared to be asleep now, too, huddled at the base of those pines.
Bo had let himself over the edge above a small cluster of rocks. They weren’t quite big enough to be called boulders, but he thought they would do to keep him hidden unless one of the outlaws decided to walk over there to relieve himself or something like that. If Bo was discovered, he and Scratch and Chloride would have to give as good an account of themselves as they could. With the other two covering him, Bo thought he at least stood a chance of making it to the trees and getting Sue Beth and Martha behind the pines.
With luck, though, the remaining Devils wouldn’t stumble over him and he wouldn’t have to make his move until morning, when the rest of the posse would be close by to pitch in.
Bo made the descent at a slow but steady pace. A feeling of relief went through him when his feet finally touched the ground. Quickly, he loosened the loop around his chest and took it off over his head. Scratch and Chloride would have felt his weight leave the rope. He gave the lasso a couple of quick tugs to let them know he was all right and that they should pull the rope back up. It made a faint slithering sound, a little like a snake, as it went up a lot faster than it had come down.
That left Bo crouched behind the rocks about fifty yards from the fire. The women were slightly to his left, also about fifty yards away but at a different angle.
Bo’s impulse was to try to reach them now, to let them know they were going to be all right, but he couldn’t risk being spotted so soon. He would have a lot better chance to get to the prisoners when all the remaining Devils were getting ready to ambush the posse. The outlaws’ attention would be focused then on the trail up to the pass.
Using a gloved hand, Bo brushed a clear spot behind one of the rocks and sat down. The cold from the rock seeped into him and made the chill even worse, although he wouldn’t have thought that was possible. He clenched his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering. It didn’t seem likely they would make enough racket for the outlaws to hear them, but he didn’t want to take that chance.
A few flakes of snow still drifted down from time to time. Bo felt them hit lightly on his face. Luckily the wind had died down, so it wasn’t blowing to add to his misery.
Mexico, he thought. Next fall he and Scratch would head south a lot earlier, for sure. Some sleepy little town across the border with a hotel and some cantinas . . .
Bo didn’t even realize he had fallen asleep until his head jerked up an unknowable time later. That had been a mighty stupid thing to do, he chided himself. As uncomfortable as the weather was, he didn’t think it was cold enough for a man to freeze to death, but going to sleep was a step in that direction. Not to mention the fact that he couldn’t keep up with what the outlaws were doing while he was asleep. He was lucky none of them had stumbled over him.
He looked at the sky and saw a slowly widening band of gray light on the horizon. Dawn wasn’t far off. According to the plan hatched the day before, Sheriff Manning and the rest of the posse would be riding past Wolf
