The Family Jensen Page 7

  Walking Hawk lifted his rifle in his right hand and shook it. “We can fight! Better to die defending our home than to be shot down like dogs from ambush!”

  Matt couldn’t argue with that sentiment, but he knew Longacre intended to take advantage of the way the Paiutes felt. He tried another tack. “If you can convince your warriors to wait, I’ll send word to Preacher and to another man you may have heard of, Smoke Jensen. Smoke and I are like brothers. He and Preacher will come and help me stop Longacre.”

  “Can you promise that no more of our young men will die?” Walking Hawk demanded.

  Matt’s mouth tightened into a grim line. “I can’t do that,” he admitted. “I don’t know how long it’ll take Smoke and Preacher to get here. But I’ll send word to them today. If Longacre’s really trying to provoke an Indian war, there’s no time to waste.”

  “What will you do? Kill Longacre and his men?”

  “We’ll do whatever it takes,” Matt said.

  For a long moment, Walking Hawk regarded Matt intently. Then he jerked his head in an abrupt nod. “We will wait . . . for now. But if you are lying to me about Ghost Killer—”

  “It’s no lie. He’ll come, and he’ll help you.”

  Matt hoped that was true. Even though Preacher had seemed to be in splendid health the last time Matt had seen him, the mountain man was getting on in years. There was no telling what might have happened in the months since. The same was true of Smoke, who had never shied away from danger in his life.

  “Go now,” Walking Hawk commanded. “My warriors will not harm you.”

  Matt nodded. He turned to Maureen and asked, “Can you get back to town from here by yourself?”

  “Of course,” she said. “It’s not that far. What are you going to do?”

  “Remember those telegrams we were talking about earlier? I reckon it’s time to send them.”

  “So you’re headed for the telegraph line?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Be careful, Matt,” she urged him. “Longacre could have men watching the line, just to make sure nobody gets a message out.”

  Matt smiled. “I’ll keep my eyes open, don’t worry about that. I’m sort of in the habit of it.”

  Walking Hawk moved his pony aside and gestured to his men. Matt and Maureen rode past him, away from Big Bear Wash and toward Halltown. The half circle of Paiute warriors broke apart to let them through. Matt felt a stirring of unease as he saw the angry looks on those bronzed faces. He didn’t blame them for hating anybody with white skin, but they had to understand that he was on their side.

  He urged the sorrel into a trot. Maureen kept the mare even with him. The wash and the Paiutes fell behind. A short time later, the buildings of Halltown came into view in the distance.

  Matt lifted a hand and waved Maureen toward the settlement. “I’ll see you later!”

  “Be careful, Matt!” she told him again.

  He smiled and waved as he heeled the sorrel into a gallop.

  Smoke would know where Preacher was and how to get word to the old mountain man. Matt could send one wire to Smoke, in care of Sheriff Monte Carson in Big Rock, the town near Smoke’s Sugar-loaf Ranch. Carson would see to it that Smoke got the message, and Smoke would get in touch with Preacher. Both of them would head for Halltown—or Helltown, a name that would certainly be more fitting if Cyrus Longacre got his way and provoked a bloody Indian war—and they would come a-runnin’.

  All Matt had to do was keep the lid on the boiling pot until then.

  As Maureen sent the mare Daisy loping toward the settlement, she turned her head to watch Matt Jensen galloping away. She knew there had been plenty of violence between the red men and the white settlers as civilization expanded westward across the continent, but she was horrified by what Chief Walking Hawk had told them about two young men from his tribe being murdered. It was one instance where killing could have been avoided and peace maintained.

  It was also about Cyrus Longacre’s greed and, perhaps to an even greater extent, his arrogance. He believed Paiute land was his to use any way he wanted, simply because he was rich and powerful and had hired gunmen working for him. That was uncomfortably reminiscent of some of the things Maureen had seen in Ireland, as the English landholders kept their boots on the throats of the Irish peasants.

  If anybody could put a stop to Longacre’s plans, it was Matt Jensen, she thought. Matt had the confidence, the courage, and the ability, and if his friends Smoke and Preacher were anything like he was, Longacre would have a real fight on his hands. But that depended on Matt being able to get a message to the other two.

  The trail Maureen followed took her past a low ridge topped with rugged boulders, dipping into a depression where she could no longer see the settlement. Suddenly a couple horsemen spurred out from behind those boulders and headed down the slope. Daisy shied instinctively as she saw the horses coming toward her. Maureen gasped as she recognized the hard-planed, beard-stubbled faces of the men. They worked for Longacre, and from the looks of it, they were trying to cut her off from town.

  She hauled back on the reins as she quickly tried to turn Daisy around.

  The men were too close, and were on her before she could wheel the mare and get away. One of them reached out and grabbed the reins, ripping them out of her hand. “Hold on there, girl. Where are you goin’ in such an all-fired hurry?”

  “Let go of my horse!” Maureen cried. “I have to get back to town.”

  “No, you have to come with us.” The second man said with an ugly grin. “I reckon the boss is gonna be mighty interested in findin’ out why you and that Jensen fella have been gallivantin’ around all over the country today.”

  “You’ve been following us!” Maureen exclaimed.

  “That’s right. And I don’t figure Mr. Longacre’s gonna be too happy when he hears that Jensen’s been talkin’ to those redskins. That’s not a very friendly thing to do after the boss fed him dinner and offered him a job and all.”

  The hardcase holding Maureen’s reins snickered. “From what I hear, that ain’t all the boss offered Jensen. Or rather, it was that Barry gal doin’ the offerin’.”

  Maureen felt her face grow warm. She didn’t know what had happened between Matt and that blond trollop of Longacre’s—probably nothing, she told herself—but she didn’t really care at the moment. She just wanted to get away from those men.

  “You’d better let me go,” she warned. “You’ll be in a lot of trouble if you don’t.”

  “Is that so? Who’s gonna give us trouble? That tame sheriff?”

  “When Matt Jensen finds out about this—”

  Maureen stopped short as harsh laughs came from the men. Obviously, they weren’t afraid of Matt, and Maureen’s eyes widened in fear and shock as she realized why.

  They didn’t expect Matt Jensen to live through the day.

  Chapter 10

  As Matt pushed the sorrel at a hard run toward the spot southeast of the settlement where the telegraph wires were down, his belly reminded him that he hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and it was past midday. That picnic lunch he and Maureen had planned on sharing was still in her saddlebags on Daisy.

  It certainly wasn’t the first time in his life he’d gone hungry, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. A growling stomach in a good cause was nothing to worry about.

  As he rode, he thought about the message he would send to Smoke. If he couldn’t tie in to the telegraph wire where it was down and get a signal through there, it would mean Longacre’s men had sabotaged the wire somewhere else. He would just have to follow the line until he found the last break.

  There was no doubt in his mind that Longacre was part of the reborn Indian Ring. If the railroad baron was willing to have his men attack the Paiutes so blatantly in hopes of starting a war that would ultimately involve the army, he had to have the utmost confidence in his Washington connections. That meant the Indian Ring.

  Matt saw the telegraph poles a
head of him. Halltown was behind him. Even though a sense of urgency hammered in his brain, he pulled the sorrel back to a walk. The horse was a loyal, valiant companion and would run until its heart gave out if Matt asked it to. But he didn’t think it was necessary to ride his horse into the ground. He knew how to put the miles behind him in a hurry by alternating a gallop and a walk, so the sorrel would have a chance to rest a little along the way. Matt swung down from the saddle and walked, too, holding the reins and leading the horse.

  Sunlight winked off metal on a knoll a couple hundred yards ahead of him. That split-second reflection was enough to make Matt jerk to his left. At the same time, a puff of smoke jetted from the rocks on top of the knoll. The sharp crack of a rifle shot whipped through the air, and the reins in Matt’s right hand gave a violent jerk. He stumbled to his left, thrown off balance by the sudden move, and saw that he still gripped a few inches of the bunched reins.

  The bullet that had slashed through the reins would have gone through his body if he hadn’t moved so fast.

  A second shot blasted out from the knoll. The sorrel whinnied in pain and leaped away, a long, bloody furrow on it’s flank. Momentarily maddened by the pain of the wound, the horse stampeded away from Matt.

  The rifleman on the knoll had been trying to kill the horse with that second shot, so he could finish off his true quarry at leisure. The sorrel wasn’t dead, but the shot had accomplished its purpose anyway. Matt was on foot, armed only with his .44 and Bowie knife, and the closest cover was at least a hundred yards away, a distance he could never cover before the rifleman riddled him with lead.

  Or was the closest cover a hundred yards away? Matt asked himself that question as he broke into a run. Another slug screamed past his head. High-heeled boots were made for riding, not running, but he managed to work up some pretty good speed as he zigzagged back and forth across the open ground. The threat of imminent death gave wings to the man’s feet.

  He had spotted a dark, twisting line on the ground, maybe twenty yards away. The possibility existed that it was a narrow gully. As he drew closer, a fourth bullet kicked up dust at his feet. A fifth whipped past his ear.

  It was a gully, a seam cut in the ground by runoff from one of the region’s rare but fierce thunderstorms. No more than three feet deep and about that wide, it was barely big enough for him. But the way it was angled would make it a lot harder for the bushwhacker’s lead to find him.

  Matt left his feet in a rolling dive. His hat flew off his head, and dust swirled around him. The ground dropped out from under him and he thudded into the gully, coming to a sudden, bone-jarring stop. He stretched out and flattened himself against the hot, sandy dirt.

  Shots sprayed out from the top of the knoll, bullets chewing at the top of the gully, bare inches from his head. Matt could tell from the way the rifleman was cranking off the rounds as fast as a Winchester’s lever could be worked that the man was angry at his quarry for eluding him, even if it was only for the moment. Closing his eyes to protect them from the flying grit, Matt lay there waiting for the fusillade to run its course.

  When the shooting stopped, he fought the impulse to get up and run while the bushwhacker was reloading. The man might have more than one rifle, might just be waiting for Matt to make a break for it.

  He looked around, but he couldn’t see how far his sorrel had bolted before the animal’s panic subsided. If he could get his hands on his own Winchester, it would go a long way toward evening the odds. As far as he could tell from the sound of the shots, there was only one man on the knoll.

  He knew that lifting his head would be a good way to get a .44-40 slug drilled through it, so he twisted his neck to look along the gully. He couldn’t tell how far it ran, but maybe he could inch his way along until he reached better cover. It was worth a try.

  There wasn’t much else he could do. He certainly wasn’t going to lie there and wait for somebody to come along and kill him

  Using his toes to push himself along and staying as low as possible, Matt worked his way along the shallow slash in the earth. After a moment the rifle on the knoll began to crack again. He could tell from the way the dust flew in a wide swath along the gully that the bushwhacker didn’t know where he was anymore. The man was firing blindly. A grim smile tugged at Matt’s mouth.

  The gully began to curve. Matt’s heart leaped as he realized the gully was angling toward the knoll. If it ran far enough in that direction, he might be able to get behind the bushwhacker and turn the tables on the would-be killer.

  The shooting continued, but the bullets were landing well behind him. He risked moving a little faster, working hard to keep himself low so the bushwhacker didn’t catch a glimpse of him. Matt thought it was a chance worth taking since the man seemed to be looking at other parts of the gully.

  Like a snake twisting back and forth, the trench cut its way across the ground. Suddenly, Matt bit back a curse as he saw it was about to peter out. It had curved through an almost ninety-degree angle before it came to an end. The question was whether it had brought him close enough to the knoll to make a dash for it.

  The rifle shots stopped again. Matt risked lifting his head and saw that he was about twenty yards away from some boulders clustered at the base of the slope. He wasn’t the sort of hombre who endlessly pondered a decision. He thought he could make it, so he quickly got his hands and feet under him, levered himself up and out of the dwindling gully, and launched into a run.

  He had covered more than a fourth of the distance to the rocks before the bushwhacker spotted him. Shots roared, coming so close together they sounded almost like a single peal of thunder. Dust and dirt spurted from the ground, and more slugs whipcracked past Matt’s head. A few long heartbeats later, he threw himself behind the rocks and knew he was safe. As if to prove that, a slug ricocheted from one of the boulders with a high-pitched scream.

  Matt drew his Colt and risked a look. The range was still pretty far for a handgun, but when he saw a flicker of movement on top of the knoll, he triggered two swift shots. The bushwhacker returned the fire as Matt ducked behind the rock.

  The rifle fell silent, and the silence stretched into several long minutes. Maybe the bushwhacker was trying to work his way around to a place where he would have a better angle, Matt mused.

  Or maybe he lit a shuck out of there rather than taking on his intended victim in a more even fight, Matt thought when he suddenly heard hoofbeats drumming across the rugged terrain. He waited a minute or so, in case it was a trick, then darted from the slab of rock where he had taken cover to another boulder where he could see the flats on the other side of the knoll.

  A lone rider was galloping east, pushing his mount hard. He was already several hundred yards away. At that distance it was difficult to be sure, but Matt thought the hombre was pretty big.

  Judd Talley. Matt’s eyes narrowed as the name went through his brain. It made sense. Despite his noncommittal stance the night before, Longacre must have figured out there was no way on God’s green earth Matt was going to work for him. Sensing a threat, Longacre must have told Talley to follow him and dispose of him if possible.

  Did that mean Talley had been following him and Maureen earlier in the day? Had Talley been alone, or did he have more of Longacre’s men with him? Men he could have sent after Maureen . . .

  A cold finger of fear for the lovely young woman trailed along Matt’s spine. He wanted to rush back to Halltown and make sure she was all right.

  But now that Longacre had tried to have him killed, the gloves were off, and it was more important than ever that he get word of the brewing trouble to Smoke and Preacher. Matt was enough of a realist to know he might not survive open warfare with Talley and the rest of Longacre’s gun crew. If he wound up dead, Smoke and Preacher would have to take up the fight.

  With his lips a tight, bleak line, Matt punched out the two empties from his .44 and thumbed in fresh cartridges to replace them. Then he holstered the gun and looked around for
his sorrel. He spotted the horse grazing contentedly about two hundred yards away and trudged in that direction, picking up his hat along the way.

  The sorrel had calmed down and didn’t shy away. Matt patted the horse on the shoulder and frowned at the bullet graze in the sleek hide. “We’ll get that tended to as soon as we can. I’m sorry, but right now I’ve got to get that message through.”

  He swung up into the saddle and sent the horse running southeast again along the line of telegraph poles. After what seemed like longer than it probably was, he reached the place where the line was down.

  “Should’ve sent the wire when I was here this morning,” he muttered disgustedly to himself as he dismounted and reached into his saddlebags for his telegraph key. He had gotten the key and learned how to tie in to the singing wires while he was scouting for the army. He stowed the apparatus inside his shirt, took off his hat and boots, and walked over to the pole. He hoped that junction box at the top was live.

  Shinnying up one of these rough wooden poles without climbing gear took a lot of strength and effort and usually left a man with splinters in his hands and feet. Matt ignored the stinging pain and worked his way up. About halfway to the top, the thought occurred to him that he’d make a heck of a target up there. Since he couldn’t do anything about that, he continued up the pole, trying tried not to think about it.

  Sweat coated his face and soaked his shirt by the time he reached the top. Wrapping his legs around the pole and his left arm around the crosspiece he used his right hand to get the key out of his shirt. He twisted the wires from the key around the terminals on the junction box, braced the key against the crosspiece, and tapped out a signal. He paused to wait for a response, experiencing a few agonizing moments before the key began to clatter. Matt translated the code in his head, then asked the sender to identify himself. C-a-r-s-o-n—C-i-t-y came back to him.