J. Johnstone - The Loner - Inferno #12

“Let’s go,” Dunlap said curtly.

The shots had come from due west. The four men rode in that direction. They didn’t push their horses. If they encountered trouble, they might need to make a run for it, so they wanted their animals to be as fresh as possible.

Anyway, the shooting was over. There was no real hurry.

Suddenly, Dunlap leaned forward in the saddle and uttered a curse. “Is that smoke I see up yonder?”

It was. The Kid had spotted the dark, thin ribbon of smoke curling into the air at the same time as the wagonmaster.

“What the hell’s burnin’?” Farnum wondered.

“I don’t know, but I intend to find out,” Dunlap said. “Come on.”

“Horace, wait a minute,” Harwood said. “There’s not much smoke. The fire can’t be very big. It won’t do anybody any good for us to go charging in there and get ourselves killed. We still need to be careful.”

“I reckon you’re right,” Dunlap said reluctantly. “But I sure don’t like it.”

Neither did any of the other men. All four wore grim expressions as they rode toward the rising smoke, which thickened slightly as the flames consumed more fuel.

The smoke gave them something to steer by, and it wasn’t long before they came in sight of what was burning. The fire was beginning to die down, leaving behind the charred husk of what appeared to be a huge wagon.

“That’s a freight wagon,” Dunlap said as they closed in. “One of them Conestogas.”

The Kid knew enough about the freight business to be aware that Conestoga wagons were longer, taller, and heavier than the light wagons used by immigrants. They were behemoths that were used only for hauling freight.

The wagon hadn’t gotten out there by itself. It had been pulled by a team of eight draft horses, all of which lay slaughtered in their traces. Bloody, gaping wounds in the bodies of the unfortunate animals showed where large hunks of meat had been carved out and carried away.

“Apaches,” Harwood said, with no doubt in his voice. “They love horse meat.”

“There must’ve been several teamsters with a wagon this size,” Farnum said. “Where are they?”

“You know the answer to that as well as I do, Milo,” Harwood said. “They must not have been killed in the fighting. The Apaches have taken them prisoner ... the poor, doomed bastards.”

Chapter 8

An air of depressed foreboding hung over the wagon train camp that night. Nobody talked about it, but most of the adults knew that somewhere out there in the darkness, the freighters who had been with that Conestoga were probably screaming their lives away as they were tortured to death by their Apache captors.

The children were more subdued than usual, too. They had heard enough whispered comments from their parents to know what was going on.

The leadership of the wagon train held a subdued meeting next to Jessica’s wagon while they were eating supper. Dunlap had asked The Kid to join in, too.

“I just showed up yesterday,” he said, “and I’m only along for the ride. You don’t need me to help you make any decisions.”

“Ain’t any decisions to make,” Dunlap said. “We’re pushin’ on to Raincrow Valley, just like we always planned. But you’ve been around the frontier for a while, Kid. In spite of your age, you’re one of the most experienced men we’ve got. If you got any advice for us, I’m more than willin’ to listen.”

Dunlap obviously believed that inflated reputation The Kid had tried to develop about himself while he was searching for his wife’s killers. On the other hand, the past couple years in his life had been eventful, to say the least. He really had crammed a lot of experience into them.

The Kid and Farnum sat on a couple of kegs that had been taken from the wagon, while Jessica and Harwood sat together on the wagon tongue. Dunlap paced back and forth in front of them.

“Who ships goods by freight wagon anymore?” he asked. “Everybody uses the railroad now.”

“Not everybody,” Harwood said. “There are still a few freight outfits hanging on. Their rates are lower than the railroad’s, and if you’re shipping something that doesn’t have to be anywhere in a particular hurry, like hammers and nails ...”

They all knew what he meant. The four men had poked around enough in the ruins of the burned Conestoga to find lumps of partially melted hammerheads and nails. The handles of the hammers had been consumed in the blaze, but the metal heads remained, as did the nails they were intended to drive.

“I’ll bet the cavalry patrol caught up with that wagon, just like they did with us,” Dunlap said. “And that blasted Lieutenant Nicholson probably rode right on past it without even slowin’ down.”

Farnum nodded as he clamped his teeth strongly on the stem of his old briar. “Wouldn’t surprise me a bit. And now those poor fellas ...”

He didn’t have to finish that statement. They all knew what he meant.

“We have proof now that the Apaches are out here, over and above what Nicholson told us,” Harwood said quietly. “I’ve seen plenty of their depredations over in Arizona.”

The Kid said, “A gang of white outlaws could have burned that wagon.”

Harwood turned to look at him and nodded. “They could have, but why would outlaws bother with a freight wagon? It wouldn’t be carrying money or anything else they’d want. Besides, they would have just killed the teamsters and left the bodies there.” He shook his head. “No, this is Apache work. Setting the wagon on fire like that, carrying off prisoners ... I’ve seen it all before.”

“Scott’s right,” Dunlap said. “Question is, what do we do about it?”

“There were tracks around what was left of that Conestoga,” Farnum said. “I reckon I could follow ’em.”

“And do what?” Harwood asked.

“Might be able to help those prisoners.”

A bitter laugh came from Harwood. “They’re already dead, or if they’re not, they’re wishing they were. There’s nothing we can do for them, Milo. Our responsibility is here with this wagon train and these people.” He looked at Dunlap. “We’d better double the guards, Horace.”

“I agree,” The Kid chimed in. “I’ll be glad to stand a shift on watch.”

“I reckon we all will,” Dunlap said with a nod. “I’ll go around and talk to folks, get volunteers first and then figure out how many more men we need.”

Jessica spoke up. “Women can stand guard, too, Horace.”

“Oh, I don’t reckon that’d be a good idea,” the wagonmaster replied in a blustering tone.

“Why not?” Jessica asked. “Not just any of the women, of course, but I can handle a rifle and so can some of the others. And my eyesight and hearing are just fine, thank you. I don’t know what else you’d need to stand guard.”

“Shootin’ at targets ain’t the same thing as shootin’ at somebody.”

“I know that. I promise you, if I have one of those bloodthirsty Apaches in my sights, I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger.”

That was easy for her to say, The Kid mused, but he had his doubts, too. He knew how difficult it was for most people to take a human life. He had been the same way at one time.

But he had gotten over it. Putting the barrel of a Winchester to the head of one of the men who’d killed Rebel and pulling the trigger had taken care of that.

Anybody who had lived on the frontier for very long and who was honest with themselves knew there were some people who just didn’t deserve to go on breathing perfectly good air. The Kid had met more than his share of them.

The meeting broke up as Dunlap went to arrange the guard duties. The Kid had volunteered to take one of the first shifts, so he didn’t bother spreading his bedroll under one of the wagons just yet. He could do that later.