William Johnstone - Winter Kill

Carefully, they moved closer until they could peer through some brush toward the foot of the ridge. That was where the fire was located, in a large open area where the trees had been cleared away and all the vegetation had been burned off. The big pile of wood blazed fiercely, with flames jumping up at least ten feet in the air. At the base of the ridge itself stood several log cabins, and off to one side was a corral made of peeled pine poles where the horses were kept.

Most of the outlaws congregated around the fire and passed bottles of whiskey back and forth as they laughed and talked about their good fortune, but a couple of hardcases armed with rifles stood just outside one of the cabins. Frank pointed that out to Conway and Meg and whispered, “I’ll bet a hat that’s where the prisoners are being held.”

“You’ll have to make it to Skagway and buy a hat before you have one to bet,” Meg whispered back to him, causing Frank to grin. The girl had spunk, and he, for one, admired that.

“How do we get them out of there?” Conway asked.

Frank studied the face of the ridge. It was fairly steep and dotted with trees, but he saw a few boulders here and there, too. Not enough to cause an avalanche if he started one of them rolling, though. Anyway, a rock slide might crush the cabin where the prisoners were.

An idea began to form in his head. Meg still had her revolver, and Frank had given Conway his Winchester, leaving him armed with one of the .32s he had kept for himself. He was used to a heavier gun, but a .32 slug was enough to kill a man if it hit him in the right place—and nobody was better than Frank Morgan at hitting the places he wanted to hit.

What they needed was a distraction, something to shake the outlaws up so bad they wouldn’t know what was going on until Frank, Conway, and Meg had had a chance to cut down some of them and even up the odds a little. Frank thought he saw a way to do that.

But first he had to be sure of his allies. He looked at them in the faint light that reached into the brush from the bonfire and asked, “Meg, can you kill a man?”

“I can kill more than one if I get the chance,” she answered without hesitation.

“How good a shot are you? Have you ever used a pistol? I was going to give all of you ladies some tips on gun-handling while we were on the Montclair, but the weather was too bad and you were all too sick most of the time.”

“I can shoot a pistol,” she said. “I used to plink at foxes and other varmints back on the farm.”

Frank nodded. “All right. How about you, Pete?”

“I’m a good shot,” the young man said.

“Ever kill a man?”

“Well…no. But I’ve been thinking about everything those poor gals have gone through already and how terrified they must be right now.” Conway swallowed. “I can pull the trigger when I need to, Frank. Don’t worry about that.”

“All right, then. Here’s what I’m going to do…”

Quickly, he explained his plan to them, and when he was sure they understood their part in it, he left them there and started circling wide around the outlaw stronghold, taking Dog with him. Once he was sure they were out of reach of the light from the fire, Frank darted to the base of the ridge and started climbing it. It was steep enough to be tough going, and he was a little out of breath before he got as high as he needed to be.

He began working his way back along the ridge until he was above the fire and the cabins. Once he reached the right spot, he studied the terrain again, just to make sure he had figured things correctly and his plan had a chance of working. After a moment, he nodded to himself, satisfied that what he was about to do was the only chance they had of freeing the prisoners and dealing with the outlaws. He went to the boulder that was the key to everything and turned around so that he could put his back against it. Then he planted his feet against the slope and started to push.

He didn’t have to worry about giving a signal to Conway and Meg. If this worked, they would know when to go into action.

Frank groaned with effort as he strained hard against the big rock. At first it didn’t want to budge. Then it rocked a little, no more than an inch or two. Frank redoubled his efforts. Cords of muscle stood out in his neck as he strained. The boulder shifted again, and this time he didn’t let it rock back. He was able to keep it moving instead. He heard a scraping sound, and then suddenly the boulder fell away from him as it overbalanced and began to roll down the ridge.

Frank dropped to the ground as the boulder’s resistance vanished. He sprang up in time to see the outlaws around the bonfire looking up. They must have heard the rumble of the massive rock coming toward them. Someone down below shouted.

Then, just as it began to build up some speed, the boulder reached the little hummock of ground Frank had spotted earlier. Like it was launched from a ramp, the big rock shot up into the air, arching out away from the face of the ridge. It seemed to hang there for a second, suspended, before its weight sent it plummeting down…

To crash right in the middle of the bonfire and send burning brands flying everywhere like a bundle of dynamite had just gone off.

Chapter 17

Some of the outlaws screamed as the red-hot ashes and burning branches pelted them. A couple of the fur coats worn by the men blazed up as they caught on fire. Others ran around waving guns, looking for something to shoot even though it must have seemed to them like the boulder had dropped magically out of the sky into the fire.

Frank lined the sights of the .32 and began to fire, targeting the guards by the cabin. They hadn’t been injured when the fire scattered, since they were farther away from it, so they represented the greatest threats. The range was long for a handgun, but The Drifter was a superb marksman. He tried for headshots, and both of the outlaws went down as Frank’s bullets bored through their brains.

At the same time, Conway and Meg opened fire from the brush where they were hidden. Two more of the hardcases stumbled and fell because of that volley. That left five of the outlaws on their feet. Of that five, two were on fire, staggering around and screaming as they slapped at the flames engulfing their clothes, and another man shrieked as he pawed at his eyes, which had evidently been blinded by the spray of hot ashes. The final two fired back at Conway and Meg in the brush. They must not have spotted Frank on the slope behind them. He drew a bead and shot one of the men in the back, the slug driving the outlaw forward onto his face as it ripped through him. That made the other one whirl toward the ridge and fire his rifle wildly. Lead whipped through the trees near Frank.

Then two more shots roared out from the brush. Both of them found their target, knocking the outlaw off his feet.

Less than thirty seconds had passed since the boulder slammed into the fire. Six of the nine outlaws were down. As Frank reloaded swiftly and efficiently, the two men in the burning coats finally succeeded in ripping the garments off themselves. Before they could do anything else, though, Frank snapped the cylinder of his revolver closed, lifted the gun, and fired two more shots— one, two! Both men staggered and collapsed.

That left only the blinded man. As the echoes of the shots died away, he fell onto his knees and screamed, “Don’t kill me! Please, don’t kill me!”

Frank was sure the man wouldn’t have shown any mercy if the circumstances had been reversed. But that didn’t really matter. He wasn’t a cold-blooded killer and never had been. He stood up and called to Conway and Meg, “Hold your fire!”

He kept his gun trained on the remaining outlaw as he made his way down the steep slope. Conway and Meg emerged from the brush. “Cover the others!” Frank told them. “They might not all be dead!”