UNSEEN ATTACKERS
Just before he got to the trees, Fielding felt a tug on the rope and heard the blast of a rifle. The roan horse went down and jerked the bay sideways, and a second shot crashed.
Fielding jerked the dally loose and threw the rope aside, then kicked the bay into a pounding run until he made it to the trees. He pulled the horse to a quick halt and yanked his rifle from the scabbard. He placed the second shot as coming from across the opening, where pine trees grew in a slope of jumbled rocks.
He searched the hillside, which lay in shade, and when he saw movement he got the object in his sights and fired. It moved again, a man crouched and running uphill. He picked up the target, got a bead on it again, and squeezed the trigger.
The gunshot split the evening, and then the wallop of a bullet hitting a body came echoing back. A man’s cry lifted in the air.
Fielding waited. He thought he heard a second voice, the rattle of rocks, a scuffling sound . . .
Other
NOT A RUSTLER
STRANGER IN THUNDER BASIN
TROUBLE AT THE REDSTONE
DEATH AT DARK WATER
RAVEN SPRINGS
LONESOME RANGE
RANCHO ALEGRE
WEST OF ROCK RIVER
RED WIND CROSSING
BLACK HAT BUTTE
FOR THE NORDEN BOYS
MAN FROM WOLF RIVER
NORTH OF CHEYENNE
COYOTE TRAIL
WILD ROSE OF RUBY CANYON
BLACK DIAMOND RENDEZVOUS
ONE-EYED COWBOY WILD
John D.
Nesbitt
GATHER MY
HORSES
Copyright © 2011 by John D. Nesbitt
Chapter One
As he came around a curve in the trail, swaying with the motion of his horse, Tom Fielding caught a view of the valley below the rim. Up here on top, the earth was ocher-colored, dotted with sparse vegetation and small rocks. Past the edge, the valley stretched out in dark hues of waving green. Across the sea of grass, the hills to the west rose in lighter tones, still green, while beyond them in the distance, the Laramie Mountains stood in shades of bluish gray and light purple, with patches of darkest green. Another turn in the trail closed off most of the view as the edge of the rim slanted upward. A minute later, the trail turned to the left again and began its descent, a gentle slope that led into an opening in the wall. Thirty yards ahead, the trail fell away in sharper decline, down through a gash in the bluffs. Fielding drew his horse to a stop and paused on the verge before going down.
He turned in the saddle and looked back as the first four packhorses came to a stop. The kid Mahoney had come to a halt as well, and the three pack animals he was leading bunched up behind him. Fielding motioned with his head toward the trail through the gap, and Mahoney nodded.
After a moment’s breather, Fielding nudged his saddle horse and started forward. The trail itself was wide enough for wagon travel, but late spring rains had washed trenches in the road, and the horses had to pick their feet up and set them down with care as they shifted and sidestepped. By habit, Fielding held the lead rope at his hip.
Though the ruts called for careful navigation, Fielding didn’t mind them. Until someone could get a team and a scraper up here, the only way to get by was on horseback, so a bit of business had come his way, packing supplies to a couple of ranches and farms up on the flats. It had been an easy trip, with not a single tree or rock for
