Frank heard the gunshots from somewhere behind him and reined Stormy to a halt. He hipped around in the saddle to peer through the trees, but of course, he couldn’t see more than about fifty yards in any direction because of all the thick redwood trunks.
Frantic shouts accompanied the gunfire. Those sounds were all too familiar to Frank.
They were the sounds of the Terror going about its bloody business.
Dog had turned around, too, and pricked his ears forward. The hair on the back of his neck was ruffled up, and a low growl came from him.
“Yeah, Dog, that sounds like what we’re looking for,” Frank said. “Go get it!”
Dog took off like a shot. Frank rode after him, leading Goldy and trusting Stormy to find the fastest route through the woods. The shots and the yelling grew louder. It sounded like the men were coming toward Frank at the same time he was headed toward them.
Up ahead somewhere in the brush, Dog suddenly snapped and snarled and then yelped wildly. “Dog!” Frank bellowed. He jerked the Winchester from its saddle sheath and worked the rifle’s lever.
At that same instant, something came crashing through the undergrowth and burst out right in front of Frank. One second it wasn’t there, the next second it was. He didn’t have time to even try to bring Stormy to a halt. The big gray collided with whatever the thing was. Frank caught only a glimpse of it before Stormy went down and he was sent sailing through the air. In that brief second, though, he was aware of its massive size, its shaggy pelt, and its blinding speed as it ran upright with something slung over one shoulder.
Frank thought that something was a man.
Then he crashed into a tree trunk, bounced off, and went rolling across the ground. The impact stunned him, and although a part of his brain cried out for him to get up and find the Winchester he had just dropped, his muscles refused to respond. All he could do was lie there with the world spinning crazily around him.
He was at the mercy of the Terror.
There was no doubt in Frank’s mind that was what he had just seen. The huge, hairy beast was what had been killing men all through these woods for months. This encounter contained something new, though. The Terror had had a prisoner. Maybe that was keeping it occupied. Maybe that was why it hadn’t fallen on Frank already and ripped him limb from limb.
Frank suddenly felt coarse hair against his face. He jerked away from it, some deep, atavistic instinct finally forcing his muscles to work again.
Then relief washed through him as he saw Dog’s face only inches away from his own. The big cur peered intently at him with a mixture of curiosity and concern.
Frank’s muscles were starting to work again after the shock of slamming into the tree like that. He reached up, looped an arm over Dog’s sturdy back, and braced himself that way as he pulled himself into a sitting position. Dog licked his face happily. Frank recalled the animal’s yelp a few minutes earlier, and looked him over for any sign of an injury. He didn’t see any blood. Maybe Dog had just been scared. Such a thing was mighty rare, but not impossible.
Frank had felt some fear of his own during that instant when he’d gotten a close-up look at the Terror.
Unfortunately, everything had happened so fast that he still didn’t know if it was man or beast. The shaggy pelt said animal, but he had never seen an animal move that fast on two legs.
Whatever it was, it was gone now. He didn’t see it anywhere.
He was about to have other company, though. Horses pounded and crashed through the woods somewhere nearby, and a man shouted, “Sutherland! Damn it, Sutherland, can you hear me?”
Sutherland—if that was the name of the man the Terror had been carrying—couldn’t hear him. Sutherland was either dead or a long way off by now, the way the Terror had been moving.
Another man called, “Erickson, did you
Erickson, Frank thought. The men coming toward him wanted him dead. Might be a good idea not to be just sitting here in the forest when they came along.
He glanced around for Stormy and Goldy, but didn’t see either of the horses. They would be somewhere close by, he knew, and would come if he whistled for them. It might be better to just let them stay wherever they were, though, at least for the moment.
He spotted his Winchester and his hat lying nearby and reached for them, wincing as pain shot through him when he leaned over. He might have cracked a rib or two, he thought. Getting hold of the rifle’s barrel, he drew the weapon toward him and then planted the butt against the ground. He used it as a makeshift crutch to lever himself to his feet, being careful not to let the barrel point at him as he did so.
When he was standing again, he hobbled toward the closest redwood. The sounds of horses and men were very close now. Erickson and his cronies would be coming in sight at any moment. Frank hurried as much as he could, motioning for Dog to follow him.
They went around the tree, which was about twelve feet wide at the base, and then Frank stopped and leaned back against the trunk. He stood there with the Winchester slanted across his chest, ready to fight if he had to. Dog sat at his feet, still and silent except for an occasional tiny whine that showed how much he wanted to tear into the hombres searching through the woods.
Frank would shoot it out with Erickson’s bunch if he had to, but shaken up and on foot as he was, it would be better if they didn’t find him right now. To increase the chances of that, he stayed absolutely still, barely even breathing, as the searchers moved closer and closer. The wind sighed through the treetops high overhead. Frank felt a few drops of drizzle on his face as the moisture filtered down through the thick canopy of branches.
Then a couple of riders passed by not more than twenty feet away from him. All they would have had to do to see him was turn their heads, but they never looked in his direction. He recognized the big, red-bearded Erickson and one of the other men whose name he hadn’t heard. The other man was saying, “Sutherland’s gone. We’re never gonna see him again, Erickson.”
