Legion of Fire Read online

  Around the edges of the central room, the rock walls were pocked with half a dozen irregularly shaped, concave natural chambers big enough to be entered into for anyone perhaps seeking a modicum of privacy. The largest of these, the size to accommodate six to eight average-sized people, had also been barricaded by a construction of saplings and branches. In this case, the barricade had been built even sturdier than the corral, with its uprights and cross members secured much closer together.

  As Craddock absorbed the full scene, he helped Millie down out of the saddle and held on to her by one arm, keeping her close to him as he stripped his bedroll from their horse with his other hand. He turned the animal over to a man who’d stepped forward saying he would take it to the corral. While he absently watched the gent lead away a couple other horses, he glanced at the barricaded chamber, thinking it resembled an army post stockade. As someone who’d spent his adult life trying to avoid jails of all kinds, the sight of it gave him an uneasy feeling.

  A moment later, he saw the faces of three women suddenly appear between the wooden bars, gazing out with frightened and forlorn expressions, and he realized more clearly what the barricaded chamber actually was. And that realization was somehow even more unsettling.

  It was a stockade—a holding pen for women the Legion periodically abducted to keep on hand for “entertainment” during extended periods such as the winter months ahead when the gang planned on laying low for a while.

  His final thought—that Millie Burnett was among those destined to be kept in that stockade and made available as part of that entertainment—jolted Craddock. More than he ever would have expected and more than he wanted to admit to himself.

  What was it about the girl that got under his skin the way it did?

  In the beginning it had been about strictly one thing . . . or had it ever been that basic? From the start, his yearning for her and his inability to stop thinking about her had been stronger than the way he usually felt about any woman. And then, when he was able to make his escape from the town jail and she happened to be right there, the decision to take her with him had more or less made itself, even to the point of failing to take hardly anything else into consideration.

  The next indication she was getting to him had come right after being swept into the ranks of the Legion of Fire and he saw Sam Kelson’s reaction to Millie. Why the hell had that bothered him so much? As long as he got what he wanted, why did he care if he had to share with Kelson or anybody else? Especially after Millie and her sassy mouth had made it clear how she felt about Craddock, saying that merely having him look at her made her want to gag.

  But it did bother him. He didn’t like the thought of other men having their way with Millie. Not out of jealousy or what might be mistaken for fondness. It was just that she belonged to him, damn it . . . like a new saddle or a fancy watch, a personal possession he didn’t want others to handle. There likely would come a time when he wouldn’t care about Millie being passed around. But that time wasn’t now, not yet. And he particularly didn’t want her to fall into the hands of the smirking, cold-eyed Kelson.

  No matter how he felt, Craddock didn’t see where he could realistically do much to change the situation. A confrontation with Kelson would be futile, what with a score of other guns backing him. Guns in the hands of men not only loyal to the gang leader but men sure to be thinking about their own chances at Millie. The idea of fleeing and taking Millie with him, especially now that he’d not only been accepted into the Legion but had seen the location of their hideout, amounted to contemplating suicide. He’d be hunted down and killed for certain, and Millie would likely end up being treated harsher than ever.

  No woman—or girl, for that’s all she really was—was worth that. No matter how much she’d gotten under his skin. As far as the things she’d recently begun whispering to him, confiding in him how scared she was of Kelson, telling Craddock how she felt safer in his presence, warning him that Kelson wouldn’t hesitate to remove him if he got in the way . . . what the hell was that all about? She was angling for something, that was plain enough. Did she really think he was a big enough fool to actually believe that somebody who’d threatened to gag merely from the way he looked at her would all at once turn so cuddly and dependent and willing? It was intriguing to think how far he might get with her if he played along, but—

  Craddock’s reverie, the flood of thoughts that had poured over him so suddenly after he’d sighted the stockade for the women captives, was broken more suddenly than it had come upon him. A furious outburst came from Sam Kelson, who stood only a few feet away.

  They’d barely had time for their full group to file into the cave and get dismounted. Craddock had helped Millie down out of the saddle and was holding on to her by one arm, keeping her close to him as he’d stripped his bedroll from their horse with his other hand. He’d turned the animal over to a man who’d stepped forward saying he would take it to the corral. While he’d absently watched the gent lead a couple of other horses, Craddock had taken a few moments to scan their surroundings and in the process allow his mind to wander some.

  “What the hell do you mean we lost another man?,” Kelson ranted. “And Pride got seriously hurt in the bargain? How could the two of you let a simple diversionary maneuver go so badly wrong? What happened?”

  The man he was addressing, right in the middle of everything for everyone to see and hear, was Henry Wymer, one of his chief lieutenants. The latter stood ramrod straight, chin up, almost as if at military attention, with Kelson’s face shoved within inches of his.

  “It was a dispute between two of the men—Eames and Browne,” Wymer responded calmly, flatly. “Neither Pride nor I knew anything was building until it came to a head yesterday morning when we were breaking camp. It was over one of the women. They began fighting about who she was going to ride with. Eames pulled a knife. Pride tried to separate them, made the mistake of stepping in between, and got slashed pretty badly. That’s when I shot Eames dead.”

  “Where was this?” Kelson said.

  “Little over a day’s ride to the south and west. When I saw how bad Pride was hurt, I shortened the wider loop we were making and came here in the most direct way possible.”

  Some of the heat left Kelson’s face. “Where is Pride?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  Wymer inclined his head toward one of the side chambers. “Over yonder. He’s hanging on, but he lost a lot of blood on the trail. Crowley’s been tending him the best he can ever since we got here.”

  Crowley, Craddock had learned, was a game-legged old man who stayed behind and guarded the lair while the rest of the Legion was out doing their raiding.

  “In case you’re wondering,” Wymer added, “I’ve ordered Browne stripped of his guns and kept tied up. I figured you’d want to deal with him yourself. No Nation Smith is keeping a close eye on him until then.”

  Kelson gave a sharp nod. “Good. I’ll get to him in time. But first, I want to see Pride.” He turned toward the side chamber Wymer had indicated. Men parted out of the way ahead of him.

  He’d only taken a couple of steps when, after his gaze happened to pass over Millie, he paused. Raising his voice again, addressing no one in particular yet raking his eyes over everybody, he said, “Before anything else, I want the rest of these damn women put in the stockade. And hear this, every one of you randy curs—there will be no putting your paws on ’em until I give the word.

  “We’ve already lost at least one man because somebody got too overheated and eager. That’s the trouble with having women around. I allowed half a dozen of them to be gathered up and brought here so we’d have some company for the upcoming winter. That breaks down to only six for twenty.” Kelson’s eyes narrowed as they continued to sweep the faces before him. “So that means none of you fools have the luxury of thinking you’ve fallen in love and that any one of these women is special to just you. That’s how jealousies and trouble starts in an outfit like ours. And I will be damned if
I let that set in! You all know we lost nearly a third of our force in that raid a few days ago. We can’t afford to lose any more. Certainly not due to squabbling among ourselves over a bunch of throwaway women. You’d better pray each and every one of you believes and understands what I’m saying . . . because before I allow that kind of rot to set in, I will take a shotgun into the stockade and get rid of the problem by getting rid of the women!” His words hung heavy in the air for a long count.

  Hearing them, Craddock thought The crazy bastard would do it, too. He’d do it and never blink an eye.

  He felt Millie tremble in his grasp, signaling her fear and sense of desperation. Craddock had enough feeling for her to wish he could say something to soothe her, but before he had any chance, two burly raiders, acting on a signal from Wymer, stepped forward to take Millie and the other two women who’d arrived with their group over to the stockade where the rest were already penned up. Watching her being led away, Craddock couldn’t help thinking what a loss it would be if anything happened to her. More than ever, he didn’t see where he had much chance to do anything about it. Above all else, he had to think of his own neck.

  Kelson wasn’t done. He made a final statement. “Until I announce an orderly procedure for consorting with those women, the stockade will remain off limits except for those assigned to guard it. In the meantime, I’d advise everyone to put your minds on other things and go about getting settled in.”

  Craddock’s eyes went back to Millie as she was being shoved behind the barricade of the stockade. It tugged at him some to see her treated in such a way. At the same time, he felt a sense of relief for her being spared, at least temporarily, from whatever was in store for her and the other women.

  Hopefully, if Kelson could keep his temper, it wouldn’t involve a shotgun.

  * * *

  Kelson’s next display of anger came within minutes of concluding his visit with Elmer Pride. The gang leader emerged from the chamber clearly troubled by the wounded man’s condition. He appeared saddened and somewhat subdued, but it didn’t take long for a new rage to build in him. He ordered Wymer to have Browne brought before him.

  As all the men gathered round, the half-breed No Nation Smith trotted out Browne. The latter was a heavyset individual with thinning hair and contrastingly shaggy brows above dark eyes that darted anxiously from side to side as he was shoved roughly in front of Kelson. With his wrists bound at the small of his back, Browne staggered slightly from the shove, then caught his balance and drew himself up straight. His eyes quit darting around and settled into an unflinching gaze that met Kelson’s glare.

  “I don’t deserve this treatment,” Browne protested. “Eames was the one with the knife. All I did was defend myself. I never—”

  “Shut up!” Kelson cut him off. “You were a participant in a fight over a lousy damn woman. A fight that ended up getting one man killed and left another, a man worth ten of you on the best day you ever had, with his gut sliced open. What do you think you deserve for that? Praise?”

  “It was that damn Eames, I tell you,” Browne insisted. “He kept needling me about a gal he stole away from me down in Arizona a few years back. Saying how I didn’t know how to satisfy a woman. Asking if I wanted to watch so he could show me—”

  “I don’t give a damn about that kind of foolishness!” Kelson cut him off again. “It may be that Eames got what he had coming. And if it wasn’t that we’ve recently lost so many men, I likely would see to it you got the same. If Elmer Pride dies, I’ll still see to that, and will handle it personally.”

  “But I never laid a finger on Pride!”

  “No matter! It was the fight you were involved in that led to him getting stabbed.” Kelson sneered in disdain. “You and Eames, two grown men taunting each other and fighting over a girl like a couple of schoolboys. Well, you know what they do with schoolboys to punish them and set them straight, don’t you? They get a whipping!”

  Browne’s mouth dropped open, half in disbelief. “No! No, you’re not going to whip me!”

  Kelson’s own mouth went from a sneer to a cruel smile. “You’re right. I’m not going to whip you. But you’re damn sure going to get one.” He made a gesture. “Smith and a couple of you other men, drag him over to the women’s stockade. Strip off his shirt and tie him to the barricade. I want those damn women to see what their flaunting ways cause, and I want Browne to have a good look at what he’s getting his fool hide shredded over!”

  Had his hands not been tied behind his back, the husky Browne might have made a good fight of it. Even as it was, before he was subdued he got in a couple of solid kicks and a teeth-rattling shoulder slam to the jaw of one of the men who converged to grab hold of him. No Nation Smith finally took the starch out of him with a kick of his own to the big man’s solar plexus. After that it was easy enough for the half-breed and his two accomplices to drag Browne over to the barricade where they stripped off his shirt and then retied his wrists high and wide to the rugged latticework.

  All the other men, including Craddock, had formed a loose semicircle and stood looking on. No one spoke.

  Old Man Crowley, the caretaker, came limping over from the corral area with a coiled bullwhip in one gnarled hand. He silently handed it to Kelson.

  The gang leader held the whip in front of him for a long moment, glaring down at it. Then he looked up and swept his glare across the faces of the onlookers.

  His eyes came to rest on Craddock. “You,” he said flatly. “You haven’t done hardly anything to earn your way into our ranks yet. But you’re a friend of Elmer Pride. It was thanks to him speaking up for you that you got invited in to begin with. So I think it only fitting that you start earning your keep and at the same time do a little something to repay Elmer.” Kelson extended his arm, holding the whip out to Craddock. “Twenty lashes. Make ’em pop, and make ’em bite in good and deep.”

  Chapter 37

  Luke and the others made it within the boundaries of the badlands by the time night fell. Despite a clear sky and a wash of bright starlight, Turkey Grimes claimed conditions were too murky for him to negotiate an accurate course through the twisting arroyos and increasingly erratic pattern of rock formations so they stopped to make camp in a narrow, sandy-bottomed gap between two high, flat rock faces.

  Luke suspected their captive probably could have gone farther if pushed, but he had no way of being certain. He also had to consider that the darkness might lend itself to some attempt at trickery by Grimes, so he agreed to stop.

  They kept the camp cold. No fire for warmth or coffee or a hot meal. Without knowing how close they actually were to the Legion’s hideout, the risk of exposing themselves via a campfire could not be afforded. Recognizing the necessity for making this sacrifice, however, did not make it a welcome decision. Although all traces of snow had disappeared during the course of the day, the air had remained chilled. With the sun down, it rapidly grew more so.

  “Christ Almighty,” Grimes grumbled. “If I knew you were gonna freeze me and starve me anyway, I might as well had you leave me back there where you killed my cousin and Grogan.”

  “You’ve got a blanket to cover up with and some jerky to eat, don’t you?” Burnett responded. “If you really want to see how it would have been if we’d left you back there, I can show you real quick by taking those things away. So shut up with your complaining.”

  Turkey pulled his blanket tighter around him, muttering and mumbling a few more indecipherable things, then was quiet.

  Draped in his own blanket where he sat with Luke and Russell a short distance removed from Turkey, Burnett did some muttering of his own. “Much as I hate to agree with that miserable skunk about anything, I have to go along that this is kind of lousy. Freezing and gnawing on another damn meal of jerky and hardtack, especially considering all that food and other supplies we had at our disposal only a short time ago.”

  Before entering the barren badlands, they’d decided to leave behind the pack animals
and spare horses they had acquired after their ambush. Luke had pointed out that keeping the pack train with them and leading it into the twisting sprawl of rocks would make their passage noisier and much more awkward should they find themselves in a situation where they’d need to fight or flee. The practicality of it couldn’t be argued, so they’d left the animals picketed in a decent-sized patch of graze, one of the last to be found before rocks and bare ground dominated the landscape.

  If they returned relatively soon, the animals would still be there; if things worked out where they were gone too long, maybe permanently, the restraints weren’t so strong that the horses wouldn’t be able to break them when prodded by thirst and the need to find additional graze.

  Responding to Burnett’s reference to the abandoned supplies, Luke said, “Without a fire to cook them over, not much of what we left behind would increase our comfort significantly. Maybe a can of peaches or some such. Hard to argue something like that wouldn’t go pretty good right about now.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Burnett allowed. “A pot of coffee, which we do have the makings for, would go a long way toward fixing most everything, if we could risk a fire.”

  “Talking about what we don’t have only makes it worse,” Russell said. “Think about what Millie and the other women are probably going without, the sacrifices they’re having to make. That’s what we have to stay focused on, what needs to keep driving us no matter how uncomfortable we are.”

  “Goes without saying, kid,” Luke told him.

  “That’s right. No need preaching to the choir,” Burnett added. “None of us has to be reminded about our purpose for being here.”

  “No, of course not,” Russell said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to sound like I was . . . preaching. It’s just that I can’t help thinking about what those women might be going through.”

  “None of us can. But you’ve got to put it out of your mind,” Luke advised. “Like you said a minute ago as far as too much talk about what we don’t have. Same thing when it comes to thinking. Thinking and making careful plans is good—too much thinking about what you can’t control can bog you down, make you start second-guessing yourself. Not good to let that happen.”