Don Pendleton - Run to Ground

Rivera could survive without the answers, but he could not go home without the stranger's head. Defeat would inevitably lead to other challenges, eventual defeat by someone stronger, quicker, and more cunning than himself. There was no point in leaving Santa Rosa if the stranger was alive, and so Rivera made his mind up that he would not leave, his gunners would not leave, until their job was done. No matter if the county sheriff came, the state police or the National Guard. Better for them all to die in combat than to tuck their tails and run like yellow dogs. Far better for them to find the gringo soon, mop up the witnesses and head for home.

His coffee had gone cold, and he called for more, eyes fastened on the waitress as she moved to serve him. The border crossing might yet have its rewards, he thought, and smiled.

Keeping to the alleys, crossing two blocks down from where his father and the Grundys stretched out side-by-side on Main Street, Rick spent thirteen minutes on his trek to reach the hardware store. Granted he had stopped to vomit twice along the way, but now the rolling of his empty stomach had subsided into steady, throbbing pain, and he was confident that he would not be forced to stop again. The image of his father hung before him like a grim mirage.

From the hardware store, he would be forced to cross the street again, but it would be all right, if he did not delay too long. The bastard with the microphone had promised them an hour, of which twenty-seven minutes remained. The gunners, standing watch beside the caravan, had not molested anyone so far, but Rick had felt compelled to reach the hardware store by a circuitous, deceptive route. He would not draw attention to the Schultzes, would not let himself be seen with them, not with the actions that he had in mind for later. If he failed — an almost certain bet, considering the odds and arms against him — Rick would not bring further wrath upon their heads. If he was not seen entering the store, or leaving it, the bastards might not take it out on Amy, on her parents.

Even as the thought took shape, Rick knew that he was being childishly naive. His father and the Grundys had been murdered in cold blood by men who did not take the time to hide their faces. Clearly they were not expecting any witnesses to walk away and spread the word of what had happened here today. The stage was being set for wholesale slaughter, but the leader of the wolf pack had delayed his final stroke while waiting for some stranger to be found in Santa Rosa. Once he was discovered and in the bag, there would be nothing to restrain the gunners, nothing to protect his neighbors, Amy, any of them.

But he still had time. While the invaders waited for their break, he had an opportunity to move against them, strike a blow for those they had already murdered. It was foolish to believe that he could kill them all before they cut him down, but if he took out a couple, if he did any good at all, it might encourage others to defend themselves. By his example, he might move the others to respond in kind, and if they pulled together, there was still a chance that they might win. A chance, at least, that some of them would walk away.

Rick Stancell did not think in terms of martyrdom or sacrifice. He had not come to terms with the idea that he was, suddenly, an orphan. There was no place in his mind for an examination of some hypothetical tomorrow: where he might wind up; who might be left among the dwindling stock of relatives to take him in; what would become of his ambitions, college, all the rest of it that added up to some uncertain concept called "the future." There could be no future now. If he disgraced himself and tried to run away, the animals would hunt him down and kill him. If he tried to move against them, they would surely drop him in his tracks, but he could salvage something of his pride, his self-respect, along the way.

No point in thinking of his father. His deep, abiding rage was there to keep him warm, and it would never go away, but Rick was focused on Amy. Her softness and her warmth, one final touch, perhaps a kiss goodbye before he set about his final business with the jackals on the street. Just like the movies. "We, who are about to die, salute you," and the credits roll across an image of a fallen warrior as the world goes up in flames.

He was surprised to find the back door of the hardware store half-open, silence warning him away and simultaneously urging him to enter, have a look inside. The open door was nothing, really. In the present circumstances, it was less than nothing, trivia beneath consideration by the conscious mind. But Amy's parents never left the back door open. Never.

Pushing through as quietly as possible, he closed the door behind him, heard the latch engage. The storeroom was as silent as a church when all the members of the congregation have departed for their homes, a hush that somehow was not reassuring in the least. He listened briefly at the open doorway to the store itself, stepped through... and froze.

He spotted Amy's mother first, a crumpled rag-doll figure to his right, her face averted, wispy hair in back all clotted with blood and something that resembled suet. Stancell felt his stomach lurch again, but fought it down, eyes traveling around the store until they came to rest on Amy's father, sprawled behind the register. The whole top of his head was gone, and there was no need for a check on vital signs.

A moaning, whisper-soft, distracted Rick and brought his heart into his throat. It came from the direction of the rifle rack, which Amy's father kept well-stocked, empty now, together with the shelves that usually supported ammunition boxes. In a flash, it registered that someone had cleaned out the weapons, obviously trying to disarm the town, and then his thoughts were back with Amy, focused on that feeble moan.

He stepped around the counter and the first glance told him everything. Naked, she huddled against the wall, her knees drawn up and encircled by her arms. Her face was hidden, muffling the hollow sound of weeping, but she flinched and screamed out loud as Rick knelt down beside her and rested one hand on her shoulder. It took several moments for the girl to recognize him — one eye was swollen nearly shut from the explosive impact of a fist or boot heel. Blood had dried in abstract patterns on her face, but Rick ignored it, busy helping her to stand, supporting her while she tested her legs to see if she could walk with his assistance. Holding her against him, standing between Amy and the lifeless bodies of her parents, he eventually steered her toward the storage room and found a long smock hanging behind the door. He helped her into it, but Amy folded as he fumbled with the topmost button. He caught her halfway to the floor.

He held her in his arms, and she was feather-light, as if the substance of her soul had already flown. He checked her pulse with trembling fingers, pressed his ear against her lips and held his breath until he felt hers, faint and tickling on his skin. She moaned when he lifted her again, and Rick was thankful for the smallest sign that she was still alive.

The Santa Rosa Clinic was a hundred yards from where he stood, but Rick knew he would make it, as he had succeeded with his father earlier that morning. This time, with a little luck, his trek might not end up in death for someone he loved. This time there might still be a chance.

He carried Amy, and the rage within him had a different thrust, a different focus now. He knew precisely what had happened in the hardware store, what she had suffered — granting that a man can understand the pain, the stark humiliation. He hurt for Amy, for his father and the Grundys, and his burning anger made itself apparent in the tears that streaked his face, the wordless curses that emerged in primal snarls as Rick pushed through the doorway, out into the alley and the noonday heat.