Chapter 13
Sid had missed. He’d had a chance to end this all at one time and blame it on the savages, but he’d missed.
He’d done his share of bow hunting, so he was good, but he hadn’t counted on that horse being so close to her when it went crazy.
Then that half-wild woman turned the animal so it blocked his next shots.
Furious at wasting the opportunity and putting Wade on guard, Sid jumped down from the rocks where they’d hidden the bow and the arrows they’d made to look like the Flatheads’.
Ready for a chance to finish this and lay the blame on the Indians, Sid ran for Paddy, who waited just around the bend with his horse.
They were far enough behind the cowhands that no one paid attention when they caught up to them in the mountain valley, lush with thick grass.
“We can’t stick together.” Sid glared at the incompetent cowhands he’d hired.
He hadn’t wanted trail-savvy men on the payroll, but now, hiring this pack of fools and running off so many of the experienced drovers would likely cost Sid his job.
And he needed to be here, on the spot, to take the reins when the old man died… which was going to be soon.
“Let’s split those two up.” Paddy nodded toward a pair of half-grown boys, brothers who looked to be running away from nursery school. The pair didn’t know the kicking end of a horse from the biting end.
“They must have come West on the train. They don’t have a lick of horse sense.
” Paddy snickered as he watched one of them fighting his well-trained pony when the pony was smarter than the kid.
The sandy-brown longhorns that dotted the flowing grassland ripped grass from the ground and chewed while the cowboys tried to get them moving.
“And try ’n’ teach ’em something, Pad.” Paddy knew cattle—Sid would give him that.
“Wade isn’t man enough to run me off, but there are enough of the old hands left that, if Chester tells ’em to back that young whelp, I won’t be able to hold on to this place.
” Sid grunted when one of the boys nearly fell off his cutting horse.
“Maybe if we bring a few of these men along, we can put off that fight. I want Boog and Harv here for me when that happens.”
Paddy nodded and spurred his horse toward the pair.
Wade rode through the narrow canyon mouth.
Sid scanned the lay of the land, figured where he’d perch to take a shot.
He needed to finish this soon with the boy, then take out Mort.
He should have shot him where he lay that night.
Instead, he’d left him for dead, preferring to make it look like an accident.
He could have crushed his head with a rock, though.
Or run his horse over the still form until there was nothing left of him.
He’d outsmarted himself that time. Not again.
Silas dismounted and crouched by the half-gone hoofprint.
“The cattle passed this way for sure.” Red stayed on Buck and rode forward, patting his loyal old horse to encourage him. “They had to, but it looks like a solid wall of rock ahead.”
Silas swung back up. “Let’s go over that area really closely. These cattle were headed somewhere.”
They were surrounded by rugged scrub pines and tightly bunched groves of quaking aspen.
Some still small, others much taller. They were just leafing out for the spring, and they grew like an impenetrable wall in front of the rock wall that seemed to have erupted straight out of the heart of the earth.
The ground was pebbles and stone, and if cattle had come this way, the trail had been concealed by a master.
The occasional rare bit of a hoof would have been lost if Red was alone, but Silas knew the trail and had an eagle eye.
They urged their horses forward as the slippery rocks underfoot gave way to the scratching branches of the scrub pines.
“How did anyone get cattle to come through here?”
“Yeah”—Silas eased his sorrel forward—“through here to nowhere.” He pointed.
“I see it. Another print.” Red marveled at the skill of the man. He was good on a trail, but Silas humbled him.
Reaching down, Silas snagged a tiny tuft from one of the sharp branches that tried to claw them to a stop. He held it up. “Fur. A couple of my cattle are red. Herefords. Weirdest thing. We found Herefords in among our herd.”
Silas held the fur so it gleamed orange against the brownish red of his sorrel gelding.
“Those probably are descendants of the cattle Cassie’s first husband owned.” Red studied the fur. “He had some dumb idea about red cattle being the future of the West.”
Silas snorted. “Maybe if the land was lush everywhere and water plentiful. There are places those animals could thrive, but not out here.”
“It wasn’t the only dumb thing the man did.”
Silas smiled and continued urging his unhappy sorrel gelding forward.
When Silas’s eyes sharpened, Red followed his gaze.
“A game trail. Right here, going…” Silas lifted his eyes.
The rock wall was almost sheer. Red studied it as they drew nearer. Their horses were single file with Silas in the lead, but they moved calmly forward now, no urging necessary. The stone was streaked with shades of brown.
Suddenly, only a horse length ahead of him, Silas vanished.
Gasping, Red leaned forward and saw it. The wall wasn’t solid.
The game trail veered into a crevice, disguised by the streaks in the stone and the overlapping of one side of the split in the rock.
Red found himself in what would have been a tunnel if it wasn’t open on top, nearly fifty feet overhead and less than four feet wide.
It twisted and turned like a sleeping rattler.
Red’s throat closed in the tight passageway.
There wasn’t room to turn around. If this was a dead end, Red would have to back his horse the whole way out.
The scratch of hooves ahead said Silas was still making progress. Buck walked forward without hesitation.
“Silas?”
The response was only a whisper. “Quiet.”
Falling silent, Red began to study the ground and saw clearly that many animals had passed this way. A quick hairpin turn in the canyon brought Red to Silas.
The trail widened for a few feet, and Silas waited silently. “The cattle are in here somewhere sure as you’re born. All these cattle prints go in. None come out. The horses, though, go both ways.”
“Must be some kind of dead-end canyon in there with enough grass to feed at least a few head of cows.”
Silas nodded. “The trail coming up to this gap couldn’t be that well covered if it was a big bunch.”
“And there could be a back trail out too.”
Silas’s eyes narrowed as he considered that. “Then why do the horses come and go this way so often?”
“We’ll soon find out.” Twenty feet ahead, the gap twisted and went out of sight again. “What are we going to face when we catch up to these rustlers? A band of armed men?”
Silas shook his head. “They’ve quit covering their trail since we got inside the canyon.
Tracks from four different horses. I’m thinking only two of them are in there right now.
” Silas pointed to a distinct print. “Those two horses walked over top of the rest. And one set is even fresher than the other. I think they’ve settled in for a few days, letting the cattle heal from rebranding maybe before they drive them off and make a sale somewhere. ”
Red’s eyes met Silas’s. “Do we take ’em?”
Silas was dead serious for a few seconds. Then a slow smile crept across his face. “I kinda wish Belle was here. She’s a mighty fine help in a fight.”
Red shuddered to think of Cassie showing up. “I guess that’s a yes, then.”
“A definite yes.”
“But let’s go slow.” Red swung down off Buck and led the way to the next twist in the gap.
The trail narrowed and they went single file.
The first glimpse of sky ahead indicated they’d gotten to some kind of canyon. Then a chill cut through Red so hard, he jerked his horse backward.
Silas had to step lively to keep from getting trampled. “What’s wrong?” His voice carried, but just barely.
Red kept backing his horse, and Silas had no choice but to do the same. When they reached the wider spot, Buck backed until he was even with Silas’s sorrel, then Red pulled him to a halt.
“What happened?”
Red opened his mouth. Nothing came out. Finally, feeling foolish, he said, “I just, well, honest, Silas, I felt like God jabbed me in the belly with an icicle. Something told me loud and clear not to go into that canyon.”
Silas stared at Red before he turned to look at the passageway. At last, he nodded. “If someone’s on watch, we might walk right into blazing guns. All right, then. What do we do?”
Red almost heaved a sigh of relief that his gut instinct didn’t bring him ridicule. He knew, though he’d be hard pressed to explain it, that God Himself had just sent him a message. A life-saving message. Emerging from that gap was walking straight into the teeth of a gun.
Silas was a man of the West, used to the odd ways of a trail. He was also a man of faith. Red had talked to him enough to know that. But not all men of faith did a good job of walking in that faith. Not all believers managed to live up to trusting God with their lives. Apparently, Silas did.
And finally, just as sure as the cold poke in Red’s belly came to him, so did something else. “I have an idea.”