Blood on the Hills Read online

  Jody came and hunkered down beside Froud and said in a low voice: “Froud, was Shawn hidin’ out in that shaft or was he the feller that lit out an’ shot you?”

  The sheriff said: “So you finally got around to thinkin’ about that. Wa-al, the answer ain’t too sure. When that feller rid past shootin’ at me, he was goin’ like a bat outa hell and there was lead a-flyin’. I didn’t see much of anything. If Shawn was him, then there’s a horse without a saddle someplace around here. If there ain’t, then there’s another of these cut-throats on the loose an’ that means we’re in trouble.”

  Leaving Froud to guard the prisoners, Jody rode off on his horse and circled the place looking for the tracks of the horse that might have brought Shawn back to the shaft. But he failed to find any. There was some gear piled near the thorn-bush pen and he caught up a couple of the horses inside and saddled them for the prisoners. There were two more in there and these he set free. That would allow for one spare horse on the trail. He didn’t want himself encumbered with too much loose stock with two wounded men on his hands and one very much alive prisoner. He did a little arithmetic and he reckoned, judging by the number of horses that it looked like there was a seventh outlaw and he was out there on a horse without a saddle. Soon or late, he’d be coming back for his comrades and the gold.

  A hell of a note, he thought. This is sure going to be a fine trip.

  He rode back to the creek with empty canteens rattling on the saddlehorns. They would have to take as much water with them as they could carry. He filled the canteens, slung them on saddles and said: “Nothin’ gained sittin’ around here all day. Let’s move, Froud.”

  The wounded prisoner said: “You don’t expect me to ride, for the luva Gawd.”

  Froud levered himself to his feet with the aid of his rifle—“We don’t aim to leave you here, that’s for sure. You an’ Shawn’s goin’ to swing together.”

  Jody brought a horse alongside Froud and helped him into the saddle. The older man leaned on the saddlehorn his face gray with suffering. As Jody hesitated, doubting his ability to stay in the saddle, the sheriff snarled: “What in Hell’re you gawking there for, boy? Get them buzzards aboard an’ let’s go.”

  The next was the wounded prisoner. It was a hard chore getting him into the saddle and the man complained bitterly, but Jody got him aboard, looped his belt over the saddlehorn and told him to hang on tight.

  He walked back to Shawn, released him from the willow tree and told him to get on his feet. The outlaw rose slowly then kicked Jody in the crotch.

  While Jody lay on the ground holding himself, Froud drew his gun and said: “Try any thin’ more, Shawn, an’ I’ll break a leg.”

  Shawn just stood there looking at them mockingly.

  “That was for jumpin’ me, kid. Nobody ever did that an’ got away with it,” he said.

  Jody climbed slowly to his feet. He hurt like hell and he was terribly tempted to pull his gun and gun-whip the man to his knees. But his upbringing gained the better of him.

  Through his teeth, he said: “Climb through your arms so your hands is behind your back.”

  Shawn looked at him in surprise.

  “Can’t be done,” he said.

  “It’s goin’ to be done,” Jody told him. “Or I’m a-goin’ to kick your teeth in.”

  Shawn saw he meant it. He doubled up and with some difficulty climbed through the circle of his arms until his bound hands were behind his back. His face was red from the effort.

  “Now get on that horse,” Jody said.

  “Who could get on a horse with his hands behind his back?” Shawn demanded.

  “I never seen it done,” Jody admitted. “But, by God, I’m a-goin’ to see it now.”

  Shawn sighed. He made a dozen tries before he succeeded and, by the time he was in the saddle, he was exhausted. The incident seemed to amuse Froud.

  “Just a raw kid,” he said.

  Jody flitted him an appreciative grin and mounted his own horse. He tied the lead line of the spare horse to the rawhide thong around Shawn’s wrists. This last appalled the outlaw.

  “Hope that goddam horse pulls back on me,” he cried, “he could have me outa the saddle.”

  Jody smiled.

  “Sure knock the stuffin’ outa you,” he said.

  They headed on down off the shelf.

  Chapter Five

  Jody hoped he would never have to live through another ride like that one.

  Froud led the way, looking more dead than alive, and there were times when Jody, bringing up the rear, thought the sheriff either slept in the saddle or had sunk into unconsciousness. Jody rode with his rifle across his thighs. He was tired to the bone and he fought to keep alert. He felt sure that there was another bank-raider loose and that before they reached town they would hear from him, if not through his loyalty to his fellow-robbers, at least because of his desire for the money.

  The wounded prisoner, whose name turned out to be Bert Cummings, was suffering considerably and he let them know it every few minutes. His complaints became a monotonous part of the general sounds of the journey, the thud-thud of hoofs and the creak of saddle-leather and the jingle of bridle-chains. Jody grew to hate that man, for he could feel too much of the man’s pain for his own liking. He’d planted the lead in the fellow and Jody wasn’t enamored of causing pain to living creatures.

  He faced, too, his own personal situation, and there wasn’t much of it to his liking. He had set out to see the world, seek his fortune or find his proper place. And now he was anchored down by a situation that seemed almost entirely out of his control. He was bound by some invisible and unbreakable thread to this man Froud. A man he didn’t even like too well. He was tied to getting these three men back alive to a town he had never seen in the service of folks he had never heard of. It was a real Jody situation and he didn’t doubt that he would come out in the red at the end of it, showing a lot of loss and no profit. If ever there was a born sucker, he was it.

  As they climbed down slowly out of the mountains, he found himself nodding off to sleep and brought himself back to wakefulness with a jerk. But within minutes, his chin hit his chest again. Every now and then Shawn would look back at him and the outlaw knew just how tired he was. The fellow was looking for his chance.

  At noon, they rested, but they didn’t allow their prisoners down off their horses. Froud said it was too risky and if they kept taking Cummings off his horse and putting him back on again, the bastard would die on them and he didn’t want to risk that.

  While Jody and Froud rested under a tree, Jody told the sheriff how hard he was finding it to keep awake.

  Froud said: “You know what men do when they’re ridin’ herd and they can’t keep their eyes open?”

  “Sure, they rub tobacco juice in them.”

  “Do it.”

  “Not me. It hurts like hell.”

  “Do it. You can’t afford to sleep, boy,” Froud said grimly. “There’s another one of these fellers around. I can feel it in my water.”

  The sheriff gave him a plug of tobacco and he rubbed some juice around the rims of his eyes. The effect was pure agony. His eyes seemed to be on fire. He knew nobody could sleep with eyes this way.

  A half-hour later, they were in the saddle again, Jody’s eyes smarting and him feeling a fool. That Froud and his ideas, he thought.

  Get into the open country as fast as they could make it, Froud had said. While they were in these hills they were sitting targets for a man with a rifle. Jody knew the man didn’t have a rifle. He’d ridden out on a horse without a saddle and all he had been shooting at Froud with was a six-shooter. Maybe he was short on bullets now. Maybe he didn’t have any ammunition left at all. But Jody Storm didn’t have that kind of luck.

  They came across a large sweeping shoulder of a hill and went down into a pleasant narrow valley. Cummings gave every sign from the rear of being unconscious. He hung back on his belt around the saddlehorn, his head lolling helples
sly. He could have been asleep.

  Maybe he’s dead, thought Jody.

  He urged his horse forward to check, a small chill running through him because he may have ridden for an hour or more with a dead man. Cummings” eyes were closed and his mouth was open wide. Spittle ran down his chin.

  He’s dead, Jody thought and touched the man’s face. It was cold.

  “Froud,” he called.

  The sheriff halted his horse and turned it to look back.

  “What is it?”

  “I think Cummings is dead.”

  Froud started back.

  In that second, a hand seized Jody by the front of his shirt and almost hauled him from the saddle. He tried to lift the rifle, but he felt his Colt being snatched from leather and then it was rammed into his side.

  Cummings shouted to Froud: “Stay back or the kid gets it.”

  Froud halted.

  Shawn was laughing. He jumped his horse forward and rammed it into Froud’s. The animal reared high and the sheriff went back helplessly over the cantle of his saddle. Shawn threw one leg over the neck of his horse and jumped to the ground, dragging the horse tied to him forward.

  Froud was in agony, but he tried to draw his gun. Shawn stamped down on him with the high heel of his cow-boot. Froud yelled.

  Cummings cocked the Colt.

  He’s going to kill me, Jody thought, and threw himself over the far side of his horse. He felt the bullet cut through his hat as he went.

  Shawn was yelling for Cummings to cut him loose.

  Jody’s horse, frightened, started to skitter sideways toward Jody on all fours on the ground. Jody swiped at it and it shied back toward Cummings. The man fired over the horse as Jody flung himself flat on the ground.

  Shawn was screaming: “For crissake cut me free, you goddam fool.”

  Cummings didn’t seem to know what to do, then he jumped his horse forward toward Shawn. Cummings’ face was screwed up with exquisite pain. He took his belt from over the saddle-horn and just about fell out of the saddle.

  “I don’t have no knife,” he mumbled.

  Shawn yelled: “Shoot me free.”

  Jody dove under his horse and got his hands on the rifle he had dropped. He heard the sound of a shot and he saw Shawn with his hands free, running.

  Froud was on his hands and knees, apparently searching for something.

  Shawn stopped, picked something from the ground, ran another couple of paces and scooped up something else. The loose horse came between him and Jody.

  Cummings was shouting feebly: “Wait for me. Don’t leave me.”

  Jody jacked a round into the breech of his rifle and bellowed: “Hold it, the pair of you.”

  Cummings turned, holding the Colt in two shaking hands and fired. The bullet went wide. Jody’s view of Shawn was now blocked by Froud’s horse. All the animals kept shifting around.

  Cummings was slowly going down into a kneeling position. When his knees touched ground, he fell over sideways.

  Jody became aware that Shawn was in the saddle. Jody elevated the rifle, fired and missed. He could see the sack of money in Shawn’s left hand. The man was driving the spurs home and the animal was jumping forward. Jody hauled himself to his feet, fired and fired again. The rider was dodging this way and that through the rocks and the brush. Then he was gone from sight.

  On trembling legs, he walked forward and looked down at Cummings. The man’s eyes were open.

  “You see that?” he whispered. “A man couldn’t believe it. Could a man believe a partner would do a thing like this to him?”

  Jody didn’t speak. There wasn’t anything to say.

  Cummings died with his eyes open. Jody leaned over and closed them.

  Then he walked to Froud.

  The sheriff was sitting up with a dead look on his face. His eyes were bitter and defeated.

  “You all right?” Jody asked.

  “Aw, sure,” Froud said. “I fall off a horse, I get stomped, I’m all shot to Hell. Sure, I’m fine. You goddam green kid. Suckered. Plumb suckered like a goddam pilgrim. Christ, it makes a man puke. Shawn gone. The money gone. Every damn thing wasted.”

  Jody squatted.

  “There ain’t much to do,” he said, “is there? Except head on back to town. You need a doctor. I’ve had my fill of men dyin’ an’ that’s straight.”

  Froud looked at him long and hard.

  “So there ain’t much to do, huh?” he said. “That’s fine an’ dandy. I tell you what you do, sonny. You get up on that there horse of yourn an’ you go after that sonovabitch an’ don’t let me see your face till you come back with the money. An’ the man—if you can manage that without your gun bein’ took away from you or fallin’ offn your fool horse or some sech.”

  “Now, wait a minute,” Jody said.

  “I ain’t waitin’ no minute. Nor’s you, bucko. Get movin’.”

  “I resign,” said Jody.

  “Resign all you damn well want, but you do like I say.”

  Jody stood up and walked around a bit. Finally, he said: “I don’t have to pay you no heed. You ain’t nothin’ to me. I done your chores for you. I killed a man for you. I reckon that about does it. I had my bellyful.”

  “Sure,” said Froud, “you don’t have no pay me no heed. Nobody has to pay another man heed. But he pays himself heed. You get on that horse an’ you ride off home to your mammy an’ your daddy an’ you live with yourself. Go home beat. That’s your kind. They don’t breed the other kind no more. There ain’t no more sand in you than a wet fish. Get the hell outa my sight. You make me sick to the stomach.”

  Jody said: “You put it real elegant, Froud. One day I’m a-goin’ to give myself a real treat an’ I’m a-goin’ to kick the shit outa you.”

  “That’ll be the day,” said Froud.

  Jody walked back and picked up his gun, cleaned it and reloaded it. He carefully built a cairn of rocks over the dead man. Gave Froud a boost into the saddle and, holding the line of the loose horse, he mounted his own.

  “Go back to your town,” he said. “Get yourself patched up. Tell that nice banker he can expect the money.”

  Froud nodded somberly.

  “I’ll do that,” he said. “Just remember—when we get it, we count it.”

  “Why, you …”

  “An’ another thing—just remember one thousand of them dollars belongs to yours truly.”

  Jody looked at him with venom.

  “Someday,” he said longingly. “Aw, boy, someday ...” There was vicious promise in his voice. He touched his horse with his quirt and sent it forward at a trot. The spare horse pulled back on the lead line for a few paces and then decided to follow.

  Chapter Six

  Shawn left a trail. At least at first he did. He was traveling fast and he was pretty sure he had good reason to. That kid Storm back there had the nerve to jump him while he had a gun in his hand. Him, Grandus Shawn. If that fool Cummings didn’t kill the kid, that boy would be after him and he knew the fellow owned a horse that could not only run, but had bottom as well.

  So Shawn took the first five miles at a pretty good pace, turning into the hills and following his nose. He gained high ground and took a good look around. He didn’t see any sign of pursuit, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a rider hidden behind some ridge or other.

  He had a good horse under him and that horse wasn’t worn down. He had forty thousand dollars in United States currency notes. He had a gun. But just the same, he was a man alone in the hills without food and with no more than a dozen rounds of ammunition. Other men might envy him, but right at that moment he didn’t envy himself. Not that he lost his nerve or anything like that. Grandus Shawn had never been known to lose his nerve. But he was wary and a little worried.

  The worry was not unmixed with another emotion, for it was not unexpected that he experienced a considerable surprise at being free. He himself had seen no chance at breaking away from Froud and his deputy. The last thing
in the world he had expected was that a damn fool like Bert Cummings would bring it about. It surely did make a man wonder. You thought you’d seen everything and then a thing like this happened. So there was a sort of joy in him that he was still alive and with a fair chance of staying that way. With forty thousand dollars.

  That was enough to make a fellow laugh. There you were one day with a sweet set-up. A good bunch of hardcases, except for that dumb Bert Cummings who was only good for holding the horses, and a good plan. Then you found yourself with a small share of forty thousand dollars. A while later you’re a prisoner and like to be hanged. Then you found yourself free and the whole forty thousand dollars was yours.

  Enough to make a horse laugh.

  He had no sooner thought that thought than he heard a sound which was very much like the laugh of a horse. It was in fact a horse’s whicker.

  He reined in and listened.

  His own horse had its head up and its ears forward. He drew the gun he had taken from Froud and took a good and careful look around.

  “Take it easy, Grandus,” said a voice.

  He looked up and relief washed through him.

  Johnny Shultz.

  He rested his arms on the saddlehorn and grinned—“The last man on earth I expected to see.”

  Johnny slid down from the boulder he stood on, landed near Shawn and said: “My God, hombre, you made it. All in one piece and the money beside. The age of miracles is not past.”

  Shawn stepped down from the saddle and eased himself, stiff from so many hours in the saddle.

  “You shoot the sheriff?” he asked.

  The other, a compact shortish man in his late twenties, hair stiff as wire and black, nodded.

  “Did I kill him?”

  “No. That damn kid deputy of Froud’s took me an’ Cummings,” Shawn told him. “But there ain’t no lawman on earth could hold me too long. You know that.”