moment, after finding out how many more lives this Jensen had taken, all in a matter of minutes, before the attack had really gotten started. Now he found himself wondering if Jensen had gotten Little Horse and his four scouts. He could see their assault on the cowboys’ camp was doing little beyond running off Jensen’s herd. “Maybe it wasn’t such a good plan to come at them out in the open like this. We’ll pull back an’ find another way. Ride a wide circle an’ tell the men to head north. It’s gonna take Jensen awhile to round up these cattle, an’ that’ll give us time to come up with a better idea. They’re headed north to Colorado with this herd, so we’ll look for a place north of here to set up an ambush that can’t fail.”
Bill Pickett and Tom Hill galloped up as Billy was leaving to give Jessie’s order to withdraw. Pickett’s face was a mask of hatred.
“Half your damn gunslicks ran off before we rushed ’em,” he said. “Look out yonder. There ain’t but fifteen or twenty of us, an’ we come here with more’n forty. So few of us can’t get close enough to find anything to shoot at. Them cowboys are all layin’ down in the grass where we can’t see ’em, an’ we’re out in the open.”
“Some of ’em didn’t run off,” Jessie said quietly, as most of the gunfire stopped when Billy began motioning men to pull out and follow him northward. “Billy told me Jensen killed twelve men in that ravine where they was waitin’ for my signal, an’ then he got three more, includin’ Raul. He may have killed Little Horse an’ our scouts. Ain’t seen ’em since before the fight started…” As he was speaking to Pickett, he saw a hatless man carrying a rifle running on foot toward the cowboy camp. “That must be Jensen right there. If I had a Sharps buffalo gun…”
Pickett saw the running figure too. He squinted to see him more clearly in the bright morning sunlight. “He’s just one man, Jessie. He may be good, but there’s always somebody who’s a little better. If he done what Billy claimed he did, then he’s pretty damn good. Only, I’m promisin’ you I can kill him if I get to pick the place, an’ the time.”
“I’m gonna give you that opportunity,” Jessie remarked as a final gunshot popped in the distance. “You can pick the spot. I don’t give a damn how you do it I just want Jensen dead. We’ll skirt their camp an’ head north, the direction they’ve got to go to get to Colorado. You can start lookin’ for the right place on the way up.”
The man Jessie believed to be Jensen disappeared into a tall stand of bunch grass near a group of tethered horses still pawing the ground, prancing as a result of loud gunfire coming from all directions.
“I’ll kill him for you,” Pickett promised again. “You just let me do it my way.”
Unconsciously Jessie shook his head in disbelief when he got a count of the men Billy was leading north, scarcely more than a dozen. Was it possible that Jensen could have killed so many men himself? It went against everything Jessie knew about paid shootists. Even the best of them in tough border towns like Laredo could barely claim a dozen kills over a lifetime. Jensen had killed at least that many in a matter of minutes.
Tom Hill spoke his mind. “Whoever Jensen is, he ain’t got any stake in this range war, really. We could let him ride back to Colorado an’ git on with rustlin’ Chisum out of business, so don’t no more of us git killed.”
“Are you turnin’ yellow on me, Tom?” Jessie asked.
“Nope,” Tom replied with conviction. “I’ve done my share of killin’ over the years, but there’s always come a few times when I knowed to toss in my cards an’ git out of the game. You ain’t asked me, but I’ve got this funny feelin’ about tryin’Jensen again. Never was all that superstitious myself, but I’ve seen with my own fwo eyes what this feller Jensen can do. Some men are borned with a knack fer killin’. It comes natural to ’em, same as breathin’ air.”
Pickett’s jaw tightened. “He’ll bleed same as any man”
“Maybe,” Tom said. “First, somebody’s got to git close enough to put a bullet in him. Since he come here, that ain’t been too awful easy.”
Pickett glared at Tom, as though he’d been insuited by the remark. “Ain’t nobody with backbone tried yet. These yellow sons of bitches Jessie hired don’t know the first thing ’bout killin’ a man, seems to me.”
Before Jessie lifted his reins to ride off, he caught a glimpse of an Indian riding out of trees to the west. It was Dreamer, if Jessie remembered right. “Yonder’s one of them Apaches. If he speaks any English, I’ll ask him what come of Little Horse an’ all the others.”
“My money says they cut an’ run,” Pickett growled. “I told you a goddamn Injun ain’t worth the gunpowder it takes to kill ’em when it comes down to cases.”
The Indian came galloping up on a piebald paint pony. He looked at Jessie for a moment as if trying to think of the right words to say.
Jessie grew impatient. “What the hell happened to Little Horse an’ the rest?”
“All dead,” Dreamer answered, making an odd slashing motion with his hand across the top of his scalp. “Chop head, like this. Come see.”
“I don’t need to see it,” Jessie snapped, when his grim prediction proved to be true.
Tom swallowed. “I didn’t know Jensen used a woodcutter’s ax in a fight like this. Most Apaches are mighty damn hard to sneak up on, ’specially fer a white man.”
“Let’s ride,” Jessie said, weary of hearing more bad news. “We’ll catch up with Billy an’ the others an’ then we’ll decide what to do.”
“I’ve already decided,” Pickett said as he turned his horse to follow Jessie. “I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch myself, an’ when I blow his goddamn head all to pieces with ol’ Betsy here, you’ll see Mr. Smoke Jensen wasn’t nothin’ but lucky he didn’t run into me first.”
As they rode around the cowboy camp Jessie wasn’t so sure of Pickett’s judgment when it came to Jensen. There was a ring of truth to what Tom had said, about some men having a natural gift when it came to killing. He recalled a time down in West Texas a few years ago, when he saw Clay Allison in action. Allison could draw and shoot as quickly as Jessie, and for that reason, Jessie left him completely alone until an offer of a job in New Mexico took him out of Sanderson.
He gave Jensen’s camp a last look before he urged his horse into a thin line of trees to the northeast. Jessie couldn’t help remembering what Dreamer had just told him, that Little Horse and his Apaches died from split skulls. Tom was right about one thing, that an Apache was hard to slip up on from behind. It was beginning to seem like Jensen was always finding a way to get behind them.Thirty-six
Smoke crept up to camp and spoke before he showed himself. “It’s me. Is everybody okay?”
