Dig Your Own Grave Read online

  “You left that part out,” Ansel said, “that part about Whip shootin’ at him. He wasn’t plannin’ on arrestin’ us. He was just plannin’ on trailin’ us.” He looked at Bo and nodded. “Now he knows that we know he’s onto us, so he’s gonna have to decide what he’s gonna do. And it ain’t likely gonna be to ride into the middle of our camp and say You’re all under arrest, is it? I think we’ve got him where we want him. He might think about sneaking up here while we’re asleep and try to shoot as many of us as he can before we can wake up. I hope he does. He’ll just be shootin’ holes in our blankets. Then, if one of us doesn’t get a shot at him, we’ll chase him till we catch up with him and settle his hash.”

  Chapter 6

  As Ansel Beaudry had surmised, Will knew that the outlaws were onto him, and it was now a question of what they would choose to do about it. Tom Daly was on his way to warn the others that a lawman was tracking them. To chase after Daly was not an option for Will at this moment for several reasons. His horses were tired, too tired to go after Daly at a full gallop, and it was already getting dark, so to follow his trail might be difficult, as well. And if he did find their camp, he was sure to be met with a ready welcoming party. Their camp could not be far up ahead. If he had to, he would guess that it was probably at the Cimarron River. There was also the possibility that they might decide to come back, looking for him. He had to rest his horses, so to play it safe, he decided to ride on down the creek to find a better spot to camp, then wait until morning to pick up the chase.

  He rode about two miles downstream before he found a spot that he thought offered him the best place to camp. Not sure that he might now be the hunted, he considered making a cold camp to make sure a fire didn’t expose his campsite. A rude gnawing sound from his stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten much all day. It was enough to persuade him that there was probably enough cover from the trees to hide the smoke, especially in the dark.

  The night passed peacefully with no visit from the five outlaws, so he stirred up the few remaining sparks of his fire enough to start a flame for a cup of coffee before he saddled his horses. This was a change in his usual routine, but he figured he might need a little boost to get this day off to a good start, not knowing how busy the day might get for him. When he was ready, he climbed aboard Buster and backtracked to the place where he had confronted the two outlaws. “I coulda camped right here,” he told Buster when he found Whip Dawson’s body lying just as he had left it. Good, he thought. They didn’t come after me. Maybe they’ll just keep going. Even as he thought it, he figured there was very little possibility of that. Tom had departed without taking time to think about it, but surely he had seen that Will was alone, and that made it more than likely they would come after him. Until he found out for sure, he had little choice but to keep tracking them.

  It was easy to see where Tom Daly had crashed through the bushes when he made his departure the night before. Will followed his trail across the creek and out to the open prairie beyond. He paused briefly to see if he could find any tracks to tell him the gang had returned to look for him, but there were none. In a mile or so, Daly’s tracks led him back to the common trail and the gang’s general line of travel that had changed very little over the past few days.

  * * *

  Up ahead, on the banks of the Cimarron River, the band of outlaws were saddled up and ready to leave their campsite. Ansel Beaudry and Bo Hagen stood at the edge of the trees, looking back over the way they had come a couple of days before, as if they might see a horseman on the distant horizon. After a moment, Ansel turned and looked back at the campsite they were preparing to leave. He was disappointed that the deputy had not chosen to visit the camp during the night. They had been ready for him with five decoys around the fire and everyone hidden to receive their visitor. He had hoped it would be a simple solution to the problem. When he turned back again, Hagen asked, “We goin’ back after him?”

  “I was thinkin’ about it last night,” Ansel replied, staring out again across the way they had come. “I had an idea he would try to come sneakin’ in here last night and start shootin’ while we were asleep, but he didn’t. Maybe he’s smarter than I gave him credit for. Might be, he’s smart enough to know he’ll most likely get himself shot. Whaddaya think, Luther?” he asked when Luther Curry came to join them. “You think that deputy got some common sense and decided to let us be?”

  “Maybe,” Curry replied. “If he’s got half a brain in his head, he oughta be able to figure out five-to-one odds in our favor ain’t too healthy for him. We goin’ after him?” He repeated Hagen’s question.

  “I’m tempted to,” Ansel answered. He had been thinking the situation over during the night just past. If one deputy marshal was trying to follow them, it was for the purpose of telling a posse where to find them. Ansel was in a hurry to get to the hideout before they could assemble that posse, then they could lie low until the law gave up looking for them. And that would depend a lot on whether this hideout on Grassy Creek was as difficult to find as Tom Daly claimed. He had cooled off considerably since he found out the lawman had killed Whip. Ansel hated to lose Whip, but he had no burning desire to avenge his death. Now, in the light of day, he deemed the most important thing for him and his men was to get to this hideout that he had been told was unknown to the law. “I think not,” he finally answered Luther. “I think this lawman, this Will Tanner; is that what Tom called him? I think he’s most likely on his way back for help. Let’s get mounted and get goin’. Maybe we’ll drop one of us back after a while, just to make sure, but he’s gonna have to stay a helluva ways back to keep us from seein’ him.”

  “This time we’d best make sure it’s one of us, so’s we don’t make a mess of it like Tom and Whip did,” Bo said.

  * * *

  More than five miles behind them, Will was faced with a situation that favored the men he was chasing. The farther west he rode, the more open the prairie became. With no mountains or mesas, and a scarcity of trees, except along the banks of rivers and creeks, he could not risk closing the gap between himself and the outlaws. He kept his eyes on the distant horizon, lest he’d suddenly see them and fear that they had spotted him as well. Over the rolling grassland, he could have easily followed their trail at night, but the next morning when the sun came up, he would have to stay hidden until they lengthened the distance again. His only objective was to stay on their trail until they finally got to where they were going to stay put. Those were the orders Dan Stone had given him and he was happy to obey them. As one day led to the next, with nothing to change the routine, he began to hope they would keep going until they passed into Texas. Then he could turn around and head for home, and as soon as he reached a telegraph line, wire Dan that the outlaws were now a problem for the Texas Rangers.

  When the outlaws left the Cimarron, they continued in the same southwest direction for about twenty-five miles before they struck the winding river once again. Will reached the spot where they had rested their horses and decided to use the same place to rest his. With that in mind, he made a very careful approach to the tree-lined banks to avoid a surprise like the one he had endured back on Stillwater Creek. It was then that a cloudy sky that had been threatening all morning decided to release its burden. He spread his rain slicker over some low bushes to make a rain shelter for himself and sat there drinking his coffee while he watched his horses down near the water’s edge. The rain held steady for quite a while, long enough to cause Will some concern about the trail he had been following. It might cause that trail to become less obvious, as the tall grass began to come back from being trampled by the gang’s horses.

  In the saddle again, he found that the sudden rainstorm, now reduced to a light drizzle, had not been enough to restore the grass completely, but had caused him to be a little more careful when the trail led over patches of bare ground and sand. Riding across one such patch, which also had a gravel area, he found no sign of tracks on the other side. He reined B
uster back and guided him in a circle around the perimeter of the barren plot until he came to a place where the outlaws had left it. “Now, why the hell did they decide to quit on the general line they’ve been riding for days?” he asked the buckskin gelding as he peered out to the southwest in the direction the tracks were leading. After all this time, were they just now thinking about losing him?

  Half a day’s ride found him at a shallow crossing of the North Canadian River, and he could plainly see tracks where the outlaws had started across. Planning to stop there for the night, he crossed to the other side, but found no sign of the outlaws leaving the river. He realized that the men he pursued were in the same state of uncertainty as he was. The difference was he knew he was following them. They weren’t sure if he was or wasn’t, so they had evidently decided to start covering their trail just in case. He would have to wait until morning to find out if they were successful, since it was rapidly becoming darker, so he proceeded to make his camp.

  When morning came, he saddled his horses and followed the river north. He figured Beaudry would not likely follow the river’s course south toward its confluence with the Canadian, since that would take him in a direction opposite the one he had followed for days. Will continued along the North Canadian for almost two miles before he reached a shady bend with a grassy apron spreading down to the water. The best place, so far, he thought, and paid particular attention to the thin strip of sand between the water’s edge and the grass. Figured, he said to himself when he spotted the hoofprints left by the horses leaving the water. They set out on a line that would take them toward the Canadian, a distance of twelve or fifteen miles from the north fork.

  When he reached the Canadian, he was faced with the same puzzle to solve as he had been on the north fork. He followed the tracks into the river, only to find none on the other side. This time, however, he was not so fortunate. He spent the rest of the day searching the banks of the river, but found no sign of horses leaving it. By the time he was forced to stop to rest his horses, his frustration was nearing a peak. How, he wondered, could a herd of horses leave the river without leaving a clue? He was almost ready to believe they swam up the river to Texas. It would be hard to convince Dan Stone of that one, he thought. Thinking realistically then, he had to assume that they must have headed in the opposite direction, possibly leaving the water on the same side they had entered it. It was hard to convince himself that they had reversed their line of travel, however. He was still inclined to keep following the river north, even though he had to admit that he had lost them. “I reckon I ain’t the tracker I thought I was,” he confessed to Buster. “We might as well make our camp right here. I’m about to starve and I s’pose you and the other horses are ready to rest. Maybe tomorrow will bring us some better luck.” It was most likely that the outlaws had come out of the river at some point behind him, and he had simply missed it. Still, he was reluctant to turn back, fearing the possibility that he might be just short of the sign he searched for. “I’ll ride a little farther up the river in the mornin’,” he declared. “If I don’t see sign pretty soon, I’ll turn around and go back.” With that decision, he went about the business of making camp.

  * * *

  At first light, he continued up the river for almost two miles before being stopped by the sound of a rifle shot. Moments later, he was startled by a couple of deer that would have collided headlong into Buster, had they not split to flee on either side of him. With no time to think, he pulled his rifle from his saddle sling and wheeled Buster toward a group of cottonwoods, the closest cover he could see. Out of the saddle then, he scanned the riverbank upstream. It figured he had run up on a hunter, but was the hunter with the gang he was searching for? They must feel pretty confident that they have lost me, he thought, else they would hardly risk shooting at a deer. His concern now was the likelihood the hunter, in trying to follow the deer, might spot him and his horses in the trees and think them deer. With that a possibility, he decided to try to head the hunter off before he got that far, so he left the horses there and proceeded upstream on foot, still hoping he wasn’t mistaken for a deer.

  He had not advanced far when he had to duck behind another tree to keep from being seen by a lone hunter bending over the carcass of a deer, his knife in hand. He wore a buckskin shirt and his hair was long, braided Indian style in two braids. With only the descriptions of Ansel Beaudry and his men, given to him by Ned Carter and Wilbur Paul, he could not be certain if he was looking at one of the gang or not. He didn’t remember anyone describing one of them with long braided hair and a buckskin shirt, however. Since the hunter’s back was turned toward him, he cautiously moved closer to a couple of cottonwoods no more than ten yards from the man. Suddenly, he was struck with a feeling of familiarity. “Moon?” he called out, not really questioning as much as reacting in astonishment.

  “Jesus!” Oscar Moon blurted, and stumbled over the carcass in his panic to defend himself. Landing on his behind, he frantically fumbled to find his rifle before he was able to recognize his surprise visitor. “Will,” he gasped, “you scared the hell outta me!”

  “Sorry,” Will replied, “you kinda surprised me, too.” He walked over and extended his hand to help Moon up from the sitting position he had landed in. “I didn’t expect to run into you up here.”

  “Well, I don’t know why not,” Moon said as he got to his feet. “I told you last time I saw you I was movin’ my camp up here on the Canadian. What are you doin’ up this way?”

  “I was trailin’ a gang of five outlaws up until I struck this river,” Will said, “but I lost ’em somewhere downstream from here. I don’t suppose you saw ’em come up this way, did you?”

  “Nope, I ain’t seen a soul but you in the last few days. Who is it you’re chasin’?” Will told him about the joint efforts of the three territorial Marshals Services to run the vicious gang to ground. “Where were they headin’?” Moon asked.

  “If I knew that, I’da just rode on up there and waited for ’em,” Will replied.

  “If these five jaspers are as bad as you say they are,” Moon asked, ignoring the sarcasm, “how come they sent you up here by yourself? Sounds to me like your boss is tryin’ to get rid of you.”

  “I expect he might at that, especially if he finds out I lost the trail of five men leadin’ three packhorses across a prairie without a place a rabbit could hide in,” Will said. “They went in the river downstream from here, maybe five or six miles back. If they didn’t come by you this far upstream, then they came out somewhere between here and there, and I missed it.”

  “You figure they’re just passin’ through?” Moon asked, and Will said it was his guess that they were looking to hole up somewhere until the law got tired of searching for them. “So you figure they’re headin’ someplace that the law don’t know nothin’ about?”

  “I expect so,” Will answered. “At least that’s what I think makes the most sense. They’ve already got marshals stirred up in Missouri, Kansas, and now the Nations. I would think they’re lookin’ to lay low for a while.” He paused to take another look at his friend. Moon had changed somehow since he had last seen him. For one thing, he was wearing a buckskin shirt that looked almost new, with fancy needlework and tasseled sleeves. It was a sharp contrast to the plain old shirt he’d worn that was stained with dirt and smoke. And while he still wore a beard, it looked as if it had been trimmed. Will couldn’t resist commenting. “What’s got into you? You look like you’re dressed up to go to a weddin’ or a funeral. Did you come into some money?”

  The question obviously made Moon nervous. His face flushed a little and he sputtered in his reply. “Nah,” he answered, hesitating, knowing that Will was well aware that he crossed back and forth across the line of the law with regularity. “I ain’t come into no money. My old shirt wore out, that’s all.” Quickly changing the subject then, he said, “I reckon I know where those fellers you’re lookin’ for mighta gone.”

  “Is that so
?” Will responded. He was not surprised, because Oscar Moon knew Kansas and Oklahoma better than any man he had ever met, and he seemed to know the comings and goings of every outlaw in the territory. He had helped Will on a number of occasions. He was the man who led him to Sartain’s on Muskrat Creek, a favorite hideout for outlaws on the run. For that reason, he didn’t press him on the matter of his apparent recent prosperity. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know, anyway, because it was bound to be from an illegal source.

  “The place I’d look is Grassy Creek,” Moon continued. “West of here about two days’ ride, near the Washita River. That’s where they’re headin’. I guarantee it.”

  “Grassy Creek?” Will replied. “I never heard of it.” He was somewhat familiar with the area of Oklahoma where the Washita flowed, but he had never crossed a creek with that name. He had to allow for the fact that he had not spent a great deal of time in this area where General Custer had fought Black Kettle’s Cheyenne. There were no white settlers in this part of the grasslands since it was a Cheyenne and Arapaho reservation now. “I never heard of Grassy Creek,” he repeated.

  “That’s why them fellers are headed there,” Moon said. “Ain’t nobody else heard of it, neither.”

  “How do you know about it?” Will asked, and wondered why he bothered to ask as soon as the words left his lips. Moon knew about everything in the Nations and the prairie west of them.

  “Used to be Sartain’s was the place where all the outlaws ran to hide,” Moon answered, “but too many folks got to knowin’ about Sartain’s—even lawmen.” He paused to grin. “And Elmira’s business sorta petered out, so when Tyler Brinker offered to go partners with her if she’d move closer to his business, she decided to take him up on it.”

  “Who’s Tyler Brinker?” Will asked.

  “Feller runs a tradin’ post on the Canadian River, across the line over in Texas,” Moon replied. “I reckon he’d heard about the money Elmira was makin’ hidin’ outlaws and figured he’d get in on it, too. So Elmira decided to pull up stakes and move her business to Grassy Creek. Darlene went with her, and of course, Elmira’s son, Eddie. I helped her move her stuff over there and stayed long enough to help her and Tom Daly build a right sizable cabin. Tom’s the one who knew where Grassy Creek was.”