Riding toward me through the shimmering heat waves were three immeasurably tall black figures. They were spread out and riding right for me, walking their horses.
There was no way I could escape. My only choice was to fight. Yet there was a chance…a slim chance.
To reach for my Winchester would invite a bullet. Trusting their picture of me was as indistinct as mine of them, I slipped the six-shooter from my waistband and held it alongside the pommel of the saddle as I rode toward them.
It was them. I’d had no doubt of it, and now there could be no more running, no more evasive action. My heart pounded with slow, heavy beats, and even the roan seemed to sense the tension that was in me, for he began to step with short, quick steps, alert for an instant movement. It was well that he did so.
They came toward me, and the distance narrowed. I made no attempt to get away, just kept my horse moving right at them. One of them spoke to the others under his breath, and they all started to pull up. It was the moment I had been waiting for.
Just as their horses began to pull up, I slapped the spurs to mine. Rarely did I use spurs on a horse, but this time the signal was instantaneous. He gave a great bound, and as he leaped my pistol came up. I saw one of them grab wildly for a gun, and then I was among them, through them.
There was time for one quick, chopping shot as I brought the gun down. The man who was drawing threw up his hands, and as his horse leaped wildly, he toppled from the saddle, and I was off and running.
I heard a shouted curse and then a clatter of hoofs as the horse whose rider I had shot started to run away. Glancing back, I saw one of them going after the horse and the other swinging for a shot at me. Yet before he could get his horse turned and steadied for a shot, I had put at least four horse-lengths between us, and before me was a dip in the trail. I heard the angry whip of a bullet and then the report and turned the roan at right angles down the hollow, my other horse running neck and neck with my mount.
Behind and above me I heard the pound of hoofs of a running horse and knew a rider was cutting across-country to head me off. He was closing in on me, and suddenly the shallow wash along which I had been riding petered out and I was facing a lava field close on my left. Yet the trend of the lava was forcing me toward the east and closer to those in pursuit of me. I was trapped…unless there was a way through the lava.
A gap opened on my left ahead, and gambling it was not a blind passage, I swung my horses into it. Yet my horses had put scarcely their length into the opening before I was struck a wicked blow on the shoulder.
Almost, I lost my grip on the pistol I held, but somehow managed to get it thrust back behind my belt. The opening in the lava took a sharp turn, and I was racing north again, but somehow I had lost my grip on the lead line, and my other horse was running free. The mountains before me danced weirdly, and I felt a strange lightness and giddiness. Losing my grip on the reins, I grabbed wildly for the saddle horn and fastened both hands on it. Yet suddenly my horse swerved, and I felt myself falling.
I fell…hitting hard and bouncing, then lunged to my feet and made the edge of the lava in a plunging run, where I fell once more. A moment I lay there, then I crawled deeper into the lava, keeping my head down and using every bit of skill I knew. Twice I got up and ran for short distances, working deeper and deeper into the ferocious-appearing lava. There were jagged edges everywhere, but I crawled wildly to get some distance behind me, then tumbled into a gap where the lava had been forced to either side by a huge boulder. I lay there, gasping for breath…listening.
My own horses ran off somewhere, and the riders swept by, following them. Within minutes they would realize I had fallen and would come back, searching for me.
Careful to make no sound, I worked my way through a narrow gap in the lava, and keeping to my belly or knees, I wormed my way through it. There were spaces where the flows had parted to go around some obstruction, others where it had piled up, and there were abrupt drop-offs of eight to ten feet. Coming upon a few feet of grass, I lay still for a while, listening.
How far had I come? Less than a hundred yards so far. I heard an angry shout, then swearing. The clatter of a horse’s hoofs, then the horse drew up, not far from where I was. I lay perfectly still, careful to make no sound.
Over me the sky was blue, scattered with a few puffballs of cloud. Almost due south of me loomed the tower of Capulin Mountain. Beyond it was the still greater mass of Sierra Grande, over two thousand feet above the surrounding country.
Somebody spoke, and in the clear air I could hear their voices. “Got to be near.” Another voice said, “I hit him. Hit him hard.”
As if on cue, my shoulder began to hurt. I remembered that savage blow on the shoulder. I had been shot then. Moving slightly, I felt a dampness on my side, below the shoulder.
Blood…I had been hit.
I must get away. If they began to climb over the lava, they would find me. Desperately, I tried to recall how wide this flow had been. Not much over a mile, I thought. Avid as they were to kill me, I doubted if they would cut their boots to pieces hunting me. They would look, probably not for long. They knew I was wounded but they also knew I was armed.
Rolling over on my knees, I started to crawl. A voice stopped me.
“How’s Corley?”
“Bad. We’ve got to get him to a doctor. He was hit hard and dragged. Elias is with him.”
“Wait until I get my hands on that McRaven!”
“Hell, he’s dyin’ now. I got him. I know I did.”
“We thought we had him two or three times. He’s harder to kill than a ’possum. Every time you think you’ve got him, he crawls off. I d’clare, next time we get him, alive or dead, I’m a-goin’ to
bury
him. Bury him deep an’ pile the grave with rocks.”
“He’s afoot, and he’s bad hurt. Leave Elias to take care of Corley. You an’ me, we’ll scout both sides of this lava bed. Sooner or later he’s got to come out, if he lives. Then we’ll get him.”
I sat up and felt up under my shirt. I found the hole. Could see it by craning my neck. The bullet had gone through my shoulder, leaving an ugly blue hole where it went in, and it had come out at the back. Tearing my handkerchief, I plugged both holes, barely reaching the one back of my shoulder. The shoulder moved, so I didn’t figure I’d broken any bones, yet I had lost blood. I crawled a little further, following the way that seemed easiest, then stopped. My shoulder was really hurting now, and my throat and mouth were dry. My head felt heavy and my eyes did not seem to focus properly. Shock, maybe, as much as the bullet. What I needed was a hole. Someplace to crawl into, someplace where they couldn’t find me.
A shadow crossed my face. I glanced around, then up. A buzzard!
They would not have to look for me now. The buzzards would point the way.
Chapter 21
H
OT WAS THE sun above me, slow the circles of the waiting buzzards, silent the rocks about me. I lay flat on my back, and I closed my eyes. Only to lie still, only not to move, only to wait!
Wait for what? For death? I was a fool. Many a man had recovered from worse wounds than I had. A bullet through the shoulder, what was that? Yet I did not move.
The wound was probably not too serious. The loss of blood was, and the lack of water. My horses were gone. I had my pistols and what ammunition remained in my cartridge belt. Around me was a bed of broken, jagged lava, which would cut my boots to ribbons in no time. There were pitfalls and cracks, and nowhere a man could run except in those occasional places where the lava had run around an area because of some obstruction or chance. Here and there were long aisles between flows. In some of them grass grew, in some there was only sand. Water, if it was to be found at all, would be caught in some natural tank or hollow in the basalt.
A boot scraped upon stone, and the sound shocked me into awareness. Pushing myself up, I broke into a stumbling run down the little avenue between flows.
My wounded shoulder hurt abominably when I ran, and I could feel the dampness of blood. I ran clumsily, staggering, stumbling, bumping into rocks. My feet seemed to come down in erratic patterns. I swore bitterly and plunged on until I fell.
For a long moment I lay still, heart pounding. Then I got up and ran on until suddenly my way was blocked by a jagged wall of basalt. Finding a break that gave access to the top, I climbed up. Instantly a bullet smashed the rock beside my head and the report of a heavy rifle boomed in my ears. I tried to run over the broken lava, risking a broken leg at every step. A jackrabbit burst from the ground at my feet and went leaping along over the rocks and down another crack. Turning sharply, I followed it just as another bullet whapped against a rock and then went whining off across the lava.
The crack where the rabbit had gone led to another of those breaks in the lava field, and I went down it, hearing another shot as I did. This time fragments of rock stung my cheeks and one good-sized piece rapped me on the skull.
For a moment I thought I was hit again, but the flying rock had merely broken my scalp. At the bottom I turned sharply down the space between the flows and came to a drop-off of some six feet. Down I went, half-falling, bringing up at the bottom in a cloud of dust.
For a moment I stood still, my lungs gasping for air, my head spinning dizzily.
No further, I told myself. I’d make a stand here. I simply could go no further.
Yet I did go on. Only now I walked, peering this way and that for some hiding place, some spot fit for defense.
Let them find me. I’d rather fight than run. I told myself that, but all the while another part of my brain sat in judgment on my actions, telling me that I did want to live, and not only to live but to defeat them. They must not profit by killing. My father was gone, and probably others, but I would not—
I fell.
Even as I fell, I knew that I was falling and there was nothing I could do about it. I did not feel myself hit the ground, but when I got my eyes open and my brain clear for an instant, I was on the ground.
Getting my hands under me, I pushed myself up. There was blood where my head had been. There was blood where my shirt pressed against the sand. On my hands and knees I knelt, staring at the bloody sand. Slowly the idea percolated through the fog in my brain. I had to get up. I had to move. I had only my pistols and they had rifles, and they would not be likely to miss again.
Shelter…a hideout…someplace, just anyplace. Lava fields are of many kinds, and lava flows proceed to cover everything. Sometimes the outer skin of a flow would cool and solidify while the lava kept flowing within, as water through a pipe. But I could find no such place.
Then, when I had given up, suddenly the narrow aisle along which I had been walking opened on the bank of a small stream. Kneeling, I scooped up water, splashed it over my face. Then I drank a little, and then a little more. I crossed the stream, which was very small, and kneeling to face the direction from which I’d come, I drank some more. Then taking off my hat, I threw a double handful of water on my head. It stung a little where it touched the cut on my scalp.
Finally rising, I walked up the slope and into the trees.
It was late afternoon now. The sun would be gone soon. I sat down close among some junipers and waited for somebody to come after me.
Surprisingly, I felt better. It might have been the water. It might have been the moment of rest. From where I sat I could see the edge of the lava and the opening from which I’d come. Gun in hand, I waited.
A rattlesnake crawled from some rocks into the grass near the stream, just at the place where I had crossed. “Let them come now,” I told myself. “I have an ally.” But they did not come.
Suddenly I awakened. It was cold. The stars were coming out, and the lava field lay flushed and sullen in the last reflections from the vanished sun. I put my gun back in my holster. I had dozed, slept, and not for a little while but at least an hour. Or so I thought.
For a few minutes I looked all around. Directly to the south of me was the vast bulk of Sierra Grande. To my right front the lesser tower of Capulin, and off my left shoulder a peak bulked large.
My shoulder was stiff and sore, and I was afraid to move for fear or starting the bleeding again, yet if ever I was to escape it must be now, under cover of darkness.
If only I could find my horses! The roan would not go far and would try to find me. I knew this because he had done it before. Often he followed me like a dog, and sometimes I would deliberately hide, but he always found me. A horse, particularly one that has run wild, has a nose almost as good as a hound.
The other horse would undoubtedly stay with the roan. They would also want to feed and they would want water. The creek where I had drunk and which lay before me, just down the slope, probably was a feeder for the Cimarron River.
Grasping a branch with my right hand, I pulled myself erect. For a moment I stood still, bracing myself. I had lost blood and was weak but under the circumstances was not in bad shape. Less bad than after the beating I had taken in the cabin. It seemed a long time ago.
Keeping to the slope, slight as it was, I started to work my way downstream. Suddenly I saw a light. It was far off, perhaps two or three miles, and it was on the slope of that other big peak. At the base of that peak, rather. And it was not a campfire.