William Johnstone - Bounty Hunter

The four men didn’t follow the path back toward the road. They struck out across country, soon vanishing in the thick woods.

“Deserters,” Edgar said in disgust. “Lousy deserters.”

“Maybe worse than that,” Remy said. “You don’t trust them, do you, Luke?”

“Not one bit. We’ll keep our eyes open in case they double back and make a try for the gold.”

“So now we have to worry about the Yankees and those four,” Dale said. “Things don’t get any easier, do they?”

Luke shook his head. “Hardly ever.”

They buried Colonel Lancaster’s body in the woods and stayed hidden in the little clearing all night. Several times Luke heard a lot of hoofbeats in the distance and thought it was likely the Yankees were hunting for them. None of the searchers came close to the wagons, though. Luke wondered if that was because they really hadn’t gone very far from the site of the battle with the cavalrymen. The Yankees might have expected them to head on south as quickly as possible.

Nor was there any sign of Potter, Richards, Stratton, and Casey. Luke hoped the four men really had lit a shuck for the frontier. It would certainly make things easier.

By morning, Dale had developed a fever and lay stretched out under one of the wagons.

Luke looked at him, then at the others. “If we move him, we take a chance on him getting worse.”

“We could stay here another day,” Remy suggested. “Give the Yankees that much more time to get tired of lookin’ for us.”

That sounded like a pretty good idea to Luke. They continued lying low and took turns wiping Dale’s face with a wet cloth to keep him cool as he tossed and muttered. It was all they could do for him.

The fever broke the next night. Dale was still weak, but a lot more coherent the morning after that. As he sipped a little broth Edgar had made from the salt pork, he said, “We gotta get movin’ again. That gold needs to get to the new capital.”

Luke had his doubts whether that new capital even existed, but on the chance that it did, they had to continue their mission. He nodded. “We’ll hitch up the teams.”

Dale was able to sit up and ride on the seat of the lead wagon next to Luke. Edgar handled the other wagon while Remy rode ahead to scout their route. He came back to report that the trail was clear.

“Lots of tracks, though, and they’re pretty recent,” Remy said. “There are still plenty of Yankees in these parts. Might be better if we started travelin’ at night again.”

“That won’t be easy since we don’t know exactly how to get where we’re going,” Luke said. “We’ve got the colonel’s map, though. Maybe we can figure it out.”

Late that afternoon, they had to leave the road hurriedly to avoid a cavalry patrol. Luke and Edgar managed to pull the wagons behind a hill before the blue-clad troopers rode past, but it was close.

“You’re right,” Luke told Remy. “We’ll travel at night the rest of the way, starting tonight. We’ll stay here and let the horses rest for a few hours, then try to put a few more miles behind us.”

They made a cold supper from rations that had dwindled to almost nothing. For days, they had gotten by on about half the food they really needed. Luke’s belly felt empty all the time. The trek wouldn’t last much longer, he told himself, and then things would be better.

Remy did a little more scouting while it was still light and returned to tell the others, “There’s a river about a mile from here. It’s shallow, and there’s a good ford. We shouldn’t have any trouble gettin’ across.”

“And we can fill up our water barrels and canteens while we’re at it,” Edgar said.

That sounded like a good plan to Luke. When they had rested for a while and it was good and dark, they started the wagons rolling south again.

The moon hadn’t risen yet when they reached the river, but Luke saw stars reflected in its placid surface. Remy rode out in front of the wagons so the others could see how deep the water was. Luke figured it was only about a foot.

“The bottom’s good and solid,” Remy said. “The only problem is that the bank on the other side is a little steep. It’ll be a hard haul for the teams gettin’ all that weight up to the top. But I reckon they can do it.”

“All right, let’s go.” Luke slapped the reins against the backs of his team. The big draft horses leaned into their harness. Water splashed around the wheels as the wagon began fording the river.

Luke made the crossing without any problem and started up the grade on the far side as Edgar’s wagon rolled out of the water behind him. Remy sat his horse to one side.

Suddenly, what felt like a sledgehammer slammed into Luke, low down on his back. He cried out in agony as the impact drove him forward. Dropping the reins, he slumped over and almost pitched off the seat to land under the hooves of the team. At the last moment he twisted his body and fell to the side, landing with stunning force beside the front wheel.

He had never felt such pain in his life. It swelled and burst into a fiery explosion that seemed as big and hot as the sun. As Luke lay there gasping for breath, he heard shots, heard men cry out. Remy cursed and gasped. Edgar roared in defiance, a bellow that was cut short by a flurry of gunfire.

They had been ambushed. The question was whether the bushwhackers were Yankees . . . or those damned deserting curs, Potter, Stratton, Richards, and Casey.

He got his answer a moment later when hoofbeats sounded close beside his head. Instinctively, he tried to jerk away from them, but his body wouldn’t work anymore. All he could do was lie there and twitch.

“I don’t hear you giving any orders now, Jensen,” a man’s harsh voice said.

Wiley Potter. Luke recognized the voice, even though he couldn’t respond to it.

He thought his gun was still tucked in his waistband and tried to edge his hand toward it. A gun roared, and mud from the riverbank splattered in his face as the bullet tore into the ground beside his head.

“You’re beat, Jensen,” Potter said. “You might as well admit it. The other three are dead, and you soon will be. And that gold’s goin’ with us, just like it was supposed to all along. You stupid idiot, did you really think we were just gonna ride away and leave it?”

Luke was hurting too much to force his thoughts into any coherent order. He shifted a little, and an even more terrible wave of agony made him scream.

“Your back’s busted,” Potter went on. “That was a hell of a shot I made, if I do say so myself. You’re gonna be a long time dyin’, Jensen, and I’m going to sit right here on my horse and enjoy every minute of it. So you go ahead and scream. It’s music to my ears.”

“Wiley, we can’t stay here too long.” That was Stratton. “We need to take these wagons and get movin’. Why don’t you just put a bullet in his head and be done with it?”

Casey laughed. “What fun would that be? I’m with you, Wiley. I want to listen to Jensen scream while he’s dyin’.”

Luke’s mind cleared abruptly. He understood what they’d been saying and forced himself to cut short the agonized cries coming from his tortured throat. He wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction.

But his resolve was short-lived, as the pain made him cry out again. Several of the deserters laughed, obviously enjoying Luke’s torment.

They weren’t going to have much longer to indulge their sadistic glee. A darkness that had nothing to do with night was closing in around Luke, washing over his mind like a black tide. This is what dying feels like, he thought in a final moment of clarity.

“He’s dead,” he heard Wiley Potter say.