stopped flowing Will ripped open the Union campaign jacket and carved
“Luke? Hey, Luke, where the hell are you?” a hoarse voice called, followed by the crunching and snapping of twigs and branches and the dislodging of pebbles and clods of dirt.
Will looked around him. There was what appeared to be a fairly deep indentation—a natural furrow—a few feet from the rock. He slithered into it on his back and drew his knife.
“Goddammit, Luke—if yer drunk again on watch, I’m gonna tear yer ass off. Hear me?”
There was more anger in the voice this time. “Dumb sumbitch! You ain’t . . .”
The fellow stepped over Will and the furrow, one boot on either side, beginning to swing his right foot forward to take another stride. Will jammed his knife upward to the hilt, directly between the outlaw’s legs, and then twisted it sharply.
Will completely expected a horrendous screech that would bring the entire camp up to the rock, but instead the man fell to his side, hunched over, both hands gripping his groin. His mouth was wide-open, forming a large O, but the only sound from him was an almost feminine squeak. Will rolled out of the furrow and cut the fellow’s throat. The gurgle of his death was louder than his reaction to the blade in his privates, but even that wasn’t loud. The man was a bare-chested Indian in deerskin pants and moccasins. Will took the moccasins and a Colt .45, carved
Will noticed his knife was still dripping blood. This time he swiped both sides of the blade on his own pants.
The walk back to the camp was a whole lot more comfortable in the moccasins. He crossed a rocky area in what he thought was almost perfect silence. Apparently, he was wrong. The sound of a handful of beans being shaken frantically in an empty tin can stopped Will where he stood. The snake was somewhere off to his left, maybe a yard or so away—maybe more, maybe less—but Will peered until his eyes teared and all he could see was a small cluster of larger rocks and scattering of smaller ones. The moon gave him no help. He’d hoped that the oily glistening of the serpent’s eyes or the pale whiteness of its open mouth would place the rattler for him. The erratic but constant rattling continued. Will’s mind built a fat six-footer with fangs as long as a saddler’s needle, coiled tightly, ready to strike, the glistening, evil eyes focused on his calf, or his arm, or even his face.
He stood motionless for what seemed like forever, frightened sweat dripping into his eyes, almost afraid to blink. He felt a wetness in his pants without realizing he’d pissed himself.
Hot urine drained down his legs and into his moccasins. Still the snake warned him, the young-pea-sized, irregularly shaped stones dancing in the buttons at the end of its tail.
Will tensed his leg muscles, but slowly, hoping he wasn’t moving. His upper body was ready to move—had been since the first sounds reached him. Both his hands were clenched into fists, but he was no more aware of them than he was of wetting himself.
His legs were beginning to tremble from the tension. He was beginning to grow dizzy.
He counted to three in his mind and hurled his body to his right, slamming painfully against the stones, and scrambled to his feet within the smallest part of a second after striking the ground.
Then, he ran.
Austin was leaned back against his saddle, smoking a cigarette but cupping his hand completely around it so that no dull red of the end showed. The bottle was next to him. His rifle was resting across his chest, locked and loaded and ready to fire. The cigarette was in his left hand, his Colt in his right—pointed at Will’s chest. He lowered the weapon as soon as he recognized his friend.
“You find that guard?”
“Yeah.”
“You kill him?”
“That’s what I was out there for. Lemme have that bottle.” He stepped closer to Austin to grab the neck of the booze bottle.
“I did another one, too.” He pulled the cork and took a long swallow.
“They’ll be more wary now, Will. One Dog doesn’t much to take his men bein’ killed ’less he does it.”
“True. That bother you?”
Austin chuckled. “Hell, no, I—What’s that on—? Damn, boy, did you piss your pants?”
“It wasn’t One Dog—it was a goddamn rattler longer’n your leg.”
Austin chuckled again. “Sure,” he said.
“It went like it was supposed to, snake or no snake,” Will said, sounding a bit insulted.
Chapter Four
“Any trouble?” Austin asked, picking up on a slight change in his friend’s standard voice.
“No.”
“You sound strange, Will. Like . . . I dunno. Jus’ strange. Ain’t killin’ them sonsabitches what we’re out here for?”
“It’s not the killing. I’d as soon shoot one of them as a barn rat. Thing is . . . I marked ’em, Austin.”
“Marked? What’d you mean?”
“I carved a
“HW? What’s that?”
“Me an’ my brother were goin’ to call our operation the H&W Cattle Ranch an’ our brand was gonna be a
Austin thought that over for a while. “Seems to me, you done good, Will. You know as well as I do that the whole buncha them are pure crazy, ’specially the Injuns, what with that superstitious stuff of theirs. You gave ’em somethin’ to think about, some-thin’ to wear on ’em while we hunt them down. Hell, boy, seems like a good idea to me.”
“Maybe so. I never did anything like that before. I killed men, but it was always face-to-face an’ I never left no extra mark on ’em. I don’t want to be like that loon who rode with the Earps for a bit—he usta hack the ear off a man he gunned.”
“Not Holliday?”
“No—no. Doc wouldn’t do nothin’ like that. Some saddle tramp they picked up, name of Kid something or other. He’s dead. He tried to draw on Wyatt, an’ Wyatt shot his ass off.”
“You didn’t cut nobody’s ear off. What you done is declare war, my frien’. That’s what you did an’ that’s how One Dog and his men will see it. Like I said, you done good. All the cards is on the table now.”
Both men were silent for several moments.
“They’ll have more lookouts now, but they won’t try to track you in the dark. They’ll be lookin’ for sign at first light, but not before,” Austin said.
Will grinned. “You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?”
“You bet I am,” Austin answered, tugging the ten-inch blade from his boot. “What say we take out a couple more of them—an’ leave the HW on them, too.”
“We gotta split up, though, when we get close,” Will warned. “We do what we can an’ then haul ass back here an’ saddle up an’ light out. Right?”
“Right. An’ no guns—a single shot’d bring the whole crew on us like a swarm a hornets. If the kill cain’t be done quiet, it won’t get done at all. We’ll git him the next time.”
“We got maybe two an’ a half, three hours of good dark. We gotta be quick,” Will said.
“Let’s move then,” Austin said, hauling off a boot. “We’re wastin’ what time we got.”
Will expected at least a few muffled curses from Austin as they set out on the mission, as bootless feet landed on a particularly sharp rock, and was mildly surprised when he not only heard no profanity, but barely heard
