J. Johnstone - The Loner - Inferno #12

He checked on the dun, then took his Winchester and moved out a short distance from the circle of wagons. He hunkered down in a clump of greasewood where he wouldn’t be visible and attuned his senses to the night around him.

If there was anything out of place—a sound, a flicker of movement, even a smell that shouldn’t have been there—The Kid would know it.

The three hours he spent standing watch passed in slow, tedious boredom. Of course, that was good, The Kid reminded himself. Excitement would have meant danger not only for him but for the members of the wagon train.

After his shift, he slept fitfully under one of the wagons for a few hours and was up again at dawn with the others, sipping coffee and getting ready to move out. Two more days would bring them to Raincrow Valley, according to Dunlap. From there, The Kid didn’t know where he would go, but he would deal with that when the time came.

He and Harwood and Farnum rode out again in front of the wagons. The landscape was empty, and except for the dust cloud from the wagons behind him, The Kid might have been the only living thing within a thousand miles.

Around midmorning, he saw buzzards circling ahead of him. For such ungainly birds on the ground, they wheeled through the air with a beauty and grace in striking contrast to their grim mission.

They began to descend.

A few minutes later, The Kid spotted them surrounding a dark shape lying on the ground several hundred yards away. Knowing there was no hope, he heeled his horse into a run anyway.

The buzzards took off again as the dun came pounding up. They squawked in protest as they spiraled into the air. He reined in and looked down at the man staked to the ground.

The Apaches had worked him over good with their knives, hacking and mutilating and peeling away much of his skin. His eyelids had been cut off so his lifeless eyes could only stare up into the blazing sun.

The Kid wondered if the man had still been alive when the Apaches left him there. It was a question that would never be answered. He was dead as hell now.

The Kid didn’t have a shovel, so he waited for the wagons to get closer. The buzzards had been at the corpse already, and he didn’t want them desecrating it anymore. When the wagons were within earshot, The Kid drew his Colt and squeezed off three rounds into the air. That brought Horace Dunlap at the gallop.

The wagonmaster grimaced and shook his head as he saw the body on the ground. “One of them teamsters, I expect.”

“Must be,” The Kid agreed, “but there’s not enough of him left to prove anything except that he went through hell dying. The women and the youngsters with the wagons don’t need to see this. If you’ll bring me a shovel, I’ll put him in the ground.”

Dunlap nodded. “I’ll help you. Wait here.”

An hour later, they had scraped a big enough hole out of the hard, rocky ground and lowered the dead man into it, wrapped in a blanket Dunlap had brought back from the wagon train along with the shovel. When the grave was covered up, Dunlap stood at the foot of it and took his hat off.

“Lord, I don’t know this poor sinner’s name,” he said, “but if any fella deserved a nice, comfortable spot in Your bunkhouse, I reckon it’s him. Have mercy on him, and on the fellas who were with him that we may never find, and bring ’em all home to be with You. Amen.”

When The Kid didn’t repeat that benediction, Dunlap glanced over at him. “You ain’t a religious man?”

“Didn’t say that. But I’ve done some things in my life ... Well, let’s just say I’m not sure the Lord wants anything to do with me anymore.”

“I’d bet this ol’ hat of mine you’re wrong about that.” Dunlap put the hat on and continued. “I’ll take the wagons around this spot. Won’t have to go much out of our way.”

“Probably a good idea,” The Kid said.

They didn’t find the bodies of the other teamsters, and by nightfall there had been no other signs of the Apaches. The Kid wondered if they had staked out the corpse as a warning to the wagon train to turn back.

If that had been the intention, it had failed. Dunlap was determined to push on, and The Kid didn’t blame him. According to the wagonmaster, by the time the sun went down again they would be in Raincrow Valley.

The night passed without incident, and so did the next morning. At the midday stop, Dunlap gathered everyone around and pointed to the hills north of them.

“We’re on the last leg of this trip now, folks. See that gap in the hills up yonder? On the other side of it is Raincrow Valley. The Injuns used to call it that because whenever it rains, the crows would flock to the valley. There are basins that hold the water and let it trickle out through some streams, and that lets the grass grow. It’s a mighty pretty place, and it’ll make a fine home for all of us.”

Not for me, The Kid thought, but for the rest of these folks, sure. He was a long way from wanting to settle down. In fact, given the life he had chosen to lead, it was more likely he would die on some lonely trail with a bullet or a knife in him.

When the wagons rolled again, they headed north. All during the long afternoon, the hills seemed to recede in front of them, so the destination seemed as far away as it had been when they started.

Gradually, though, The Kid could tell they were getting closer. The grass wasn’t quite as sparse, and the ground had some slope to it as they climbed toward the pass. The oxen had to strain a little harder in their traces.

As they started up the approach to the pass, The Kid, Harwood, and Farnum rode together. Harwood pulled his Winchester from its saddle boot and worked the rifle’s lever, throwing a round into the chamber. “If there’s going to be an ambush, right on the other side of the pass is the best place for it,” he warned.

The Kid and Farnum followed his example. Gripping their rifles tightly, they rode through the wide pass until the landscape before them dropped down into a broad, surprisingly green valley that was every bit as beautiful as Dunlap had promised.

And there were no Apaches in sight. No shots rang out. Nothing threatened.

“Welcome to Raincrow Valley,” Harwood said.

Chapter 9

The three scouts spread out to search the area on the other side of the pass. According to the prearranged plan, Dunlap had stopped the wagons before they entered the pass, and the vehicles wouldn’t proceed until he got the all clear from Harwood, Farnum, and The Kid.

As he rode along the bank of a small creek, The Kid scared up a small herd of deer, but that was the only life he saw other than a few birds in the scrub pines. He rendezvoused with Harwood and Farnum at the mouth of the pass and reported the lack of any threat that he found.

“Same here,” Farnum said.

Harwood nodded. “The valley appears to be empty. I’ll let Horace know. If you two want to stay over here and look around a little more, that’s fine.”

Harwood headed back through the pass. The Kid and Farnum stayed together as they rode deeper into the valley.

“I’m surprised nobody has settled this place before now,” The Kid commented.

“Well, it’s a long way from anywhere,” Farnum said, “and you got to travel through some pretty rugged country to get to it. You saw that for yourself the past few days. There’s no railroad in here and ain’t likely to ever be one. The soil’s good enough for farmin’, and there’s enough graze for a small herd of cattle, but nobody’s gonna get rich by settlin’ here. But if you’re lookin’ for a nice place to live, where a fella who’s willin’ to work hard can get by, Raincrow Valley fits the bill.” The scout gave The Kid a shrewd look. “How about you, Morgan? You lookin’ to settle down?”