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  Clint said, “Rooney, get back up there, or you’re out of a job on the Circle B!”

  “Then I’m out of a job,” the man responded. “I’ll draw my time and ride right now! Jensen didn’t know whether my head was in that hat when he shot it. I could have a bullet through my brain just as easy.”

  Luke grinned to himself for a second, knowing that he didn’t have to worry about an attack from the rear. None of the men with Clint Norman were going to risk that. He resumed his careful path along the ledge.

  Men were still arguing below when Luke came out on top of the ridge. He could see a couple of hundred yards in both directions. His horse had galloped off to the south, and he wanted to recover the animal, so he headed that way even though it was the opposite direction from his ultimate destination. His shirt was soaked with sweat as the sun beat down on him.

  The ridge was maybe a hundred yards wide, littered with boulders, and cut through with crevices, some of them wide enough that he had to detour around them. The ground was so rough that he couldn’t afford to hurry. If he did, he stood a good chance of spraining or even breaking his ankle.

  “There he is!” shouted a man from behind Luke. One of the men with Clint had found another way to the top.

  Luke ducked and twisted and brought his Winchester up as a shot blasted. He didn’t know where the bullet went, but it didn’t hit him and that was all that mattered. He spotted the man about a hundred yards away and triggered a shot of his own. The man stumbled and dropped his rifle, fell to his knees and caught himself with one hand. He was hit, but the way he bawled curses made Luke think the wound was painful but probably not too bad. Enough to put the varmint out of the fight, though. At least, Luke hoped so.

  As he resumed his hurried passage along the ridge, he wondered how many men Clint had brought with him. During the ambush, he hadn’t been able to tell how many men had been shooting at him—only that it was more than one.

  With one of his allies wounded and another too spooked to continue the fight, the odds might be getting too close to even for Clint’s taste. Knowing that, Luke wasn’t surprised a few minutes later when he heard hoofbeats. He paused, looked back, and saw that the man he had shot was gone. The fellow had been able to make it down off the ridge crest and was probably one of the men riding away.

  Again, Luke couldn’t tell for sure how many horses he heard, but several, no doubt about that. Had all the bushwhackers fled . . . or was that just a ruse to get him to drop his guard?

  He came to a spot where the ridge fell away in a much gentler slope. He had to get back down to the trail somewhere, so it was as good as any, he decided. From up there he could see the tops of some trees about a quarter of a mile farther on and recalled from when he rode past them earlier that some grass grew as well. His horse might have stopped there to graze.

  Luke took a handful of .44-40 cartridges from his pocket and thumbed them into the Winchester to replace the rounds he had fired. Then he held the rifle ready for instant use as he picked his way, sliding in places, down the angled slope to the trail.

  Nobody shot at him while he was descending. When he reached the bottom, the silence continued. His gut told him that Clint Norman and the other bushwhackers had fled, but he was still careful anyway. He walked south along the trail toward the trees he had seen from the ridge crest, pausing every few moments to listen intently. His eyes never stopped moving as he searched for any sign of another attack.

  Peace still reigned over the hills.

  Relief went through Luke when he came in sight of the trees and spotted his horse standing in the shade underneath them, head down. The animal cropped at the grass growing there. Luke spoke softly as he approached. He’d been riding that mount for a while, and the horse was used to him, but horses sometimes spooked for no apparent reason.

  He caught hold of the dangling reins, slid the Winchester back into the boot under the right saddle fender, and checked the horse over to make sure none of the flying lead had struck it earlier. Seeing that the horse appeared to be unharmed, Luke swung up.

  “I’m glad you didn’t run all the way back to the McKinney spread,” he said. “That would have been embarrassing, trudging back on foot.”

  He turned the horse and set out in the same direction he’d been going earlier. Before he had gone fifty yards, something bothered him and he reined in. He hipped around in the saddle and gazed back along the trail. Nothing moved, not even a bird or a lizard. Frowning, Luke faced forward and heeled the horse into motion again.

  He wasn’t convinced that he wasn’t being followed. . . but if he was, whoever was back there probably would try to kill him sooner or later, and he would deal with it then.

  CHAPTER 11

  A short time later, Luke passed the spot where Clint Norman and the men with him had sprung their ambush earlier. Nothing happened. Maybe Clint would give up the grudge he held. Luke didn’t really believe that would happen, but it was something to hope for, anyway.

  He rode deeper into the hills, climbing steadily. The higher elevation helped some with the heat, but the sun was still brassy in the sky overhead. Luke gnawed on a piece of jerky, washing it down gratefully with swigs of water from one of his canteens.

  Late in the afternoon he spotted buzzards circling lazily ahead of him, riding currents of heated air. His eyes narrowed as one of the carrion birds dipped down low to the ground, then swooped up again. Two more buzzards repeated the maneuver and came to the same conclusion as the first. Whatever they were keeping their beady, avaricious little eyes on was still alive.

  Probably an animal, Luke thought, but on the off chance that it wasn’t, he nudged the horse into a slightly faster gait and came in sight of a huge pile of slab-sided boulders. A flash of bright color at the base of the rocks caught his eye. He pulled the Winchester from its scabbard, cranked a round into the chamber, and rode forward carefully. As he came closer he made out a human shape sprawled on the ground. It appeared to be a man lying on his back with a yellow bandanna draped over his face.

  Luke thought the man was dead, but then he moved a little. That was enough to spook the buzzards again. The big, ugly birds had been circling gradually lower, but they soared up at that sign of life.

  The man lifted a trembling, gnarled hand and tugged the bandanna off his face, revealing a brush of gray whiskers that jutted up from his jaw. He tried to push himself into a sitting position but slumped back down with an audible groan. Luke figured the man had heard hoofbeats approaching, and that had roused him from his stupor.

  The man wore brown canvas trousers tucked into high boots and a fringed vest over a red-checked shirt open at the throat to reveal long red underwear. An old, battered brown hat lay nearby. A gunbelt was strapped around the old-timer’s scrawny waist, but the attached holster was empty.

  Luke reined in when he was still twenty feet away and kept the Winchester’s muzzle pointed in the man’s general direction. He didn’t believe the man was setting a trap, but until certain of that, Luke was going to be careful.

  “You look like you could use some help, friend,” he called.

  “I need . . . water,” the old-timer rasped in a tortured voice. “I don’t want to die . . . with such . . . a dry throat.” His vest had fallen open to reveal an irregular dark brown stain low on the shirt’s right side.

  That was dried blood, Luke realized. “You’re not going to die,” he said, although he couldn’t be sure of that until he checked the man’s wound. “I have plenty of water. Before we go any further, though . . . is anybody else around here?”

  “Not that I . . . know of. I give them ’Paches . . . the slip . . . a ways back.”

  Luke tensed and repeated, “Apaches?”

  “Yeah. Band of . . . about a dozen of ’em . . . jumped me this mornin’. Must’ve run off . . . from the reservation. One of the . . . damn bucks . . . shot me with an old Spencer . . . he probably took off . . . a dead army trooper. But I led ’em . . . a merry chase . . . let
me tell you. Never expected to . . . get away from ’em . . . but I was gonna make . . . the red-skinned bastards . . . pay for killin’ me.”

  The old man’s story had the ring of truth to it, but Luke remained alert as he swung down from the saddle and took one of the canteens loose. He carried it by its strap as he warily approached the man on the ground. He held the rifle ready in his other hand. “Can you sit up and handle this canteen by yourself?”

  “I dunno . . . Lost a heap o’ blood . . . from that bullet hole.”

  Luke knelt beside the old-timer. He placed the Winchester on the ground, got an arm around the man’s shoulders, and lifted him. With his other hand, he worked the cork loose from the canteen and tilted it to the old man’s lips. The man sucked greedily at the water. Luke let him guzzle for a few seconds, then took the canteen away. The old-timer moaned.

  “Not too much at once,” Luke said. “You know that. It’ll just come back up and be wasted.”

  The man’s husk of a tongue scraped over his lips. “You wouldn’t happen to have . . . a bottle o’ somethin’. . . a mite stronger . . . would you? That might cut the dust . . . even better.”

  As a matter of fact, Luke did have a flask of whiskey in one of his saddlebags, but that wasn’t what the old man needed. He chuckled and said, “Let’s just concentrate on getting some water in you and keeping it down.”

  The old-timer nodded weakly. He was mostly bald, with only a few strands of lank gray hair plastered over his liver-spotted scalp. Luke let him have another drink, waited, then gave him more water as a bit of color creeped back into the man’s leathery face.

  “I figured I was dead for sure.” His voice was slightly stronger. “I didn’t want to die with the sun in my eyes . . . and I sure as hell didn’t want to watch the buzzards comin’ for me. That’s why I put my bandanna over my face. I was just waitin’ . . . for the end . . .”

  “What’s your name?” Luke asked.

  “O . . . O’Donnell. Folks call me . . . Badger.”

  “I’m Luke.” He left it at that, didn’t give his last name. He didn’t know who Badger O’Donnell was or what the old-timer was doing in those rugged hills, but he also didn’t see any point in announcing that he was Luke Jensen. Too many people might recognize that name and know he was a bounty hunter.

  “I’m mighty pleased to meet you, son. Now, about that whiskey . . .”

  “Later,” Luke said. “Right now, it might be a good idea to try to get you out of the sun. What happened to your horse?”

  “Didn’t have no horse. Was ridin’ . . . a mule. And after I passed out and fell off . . . I got no idea what might’ve happened to him.”

  “What about your gun?”

  “Reckon it must’ve dropped outta the holster . . . when I took that tumble. I never noticed it was gone until I’d crawled a ways . . . and I wasn’t gonna go back and look for it.” A rusty laugh came from the old-timer’s throat. “A little later, I wished I had. If I’d had my gun . . . you never woulda found me alive, Luke. I’d have ended it . . . as soon as I saw them buzzards circlin’ around up there.”

  “Losing it was a stroke of good luck, then. Come on.”

  Luke corked the canteen, slung it around his neck, and then helped Badger O’Donnell to his feet. The old man was pretty shaky, but he was able to walk with Luke’s arm around his waist to support him.

  They made it to Luke’s horse. He put Badger’s left foot in the stirrup on that side, then boosted the old-timer into the saddle. Badger grabbed the saddle horn and swayed back and forth, and Luke steadied him.

  When Badger seemed fairly stable, Luke said, “Hang on. I’ll take it slow.”

  “I’m sure obliged to you, boy.”

  Luke grinned. “It’s been a long time since anyone called me a boy. I’ll take it as a compliment.”

  “Hell, I’m so old Methuselah’s a boy compared to me,” Badger said.

  Luke didn’t think Badger was quite that old—in his sixties, more than likely—but it was obvious by looking at him that he had spent most of his life outdoors and had lived a rugged existence. There wasn’t much to him except rawhide and bone. He hung on to the horn and rocked back and forth in the saddle as Luke led the horse along the trail.

  After a while they came to some scrubby cottonwoods and Luke helped Badger dismount and sit in the welcome shade with his back propped against a tree trunk.

  “All right, I’d better take a look at that wound now,” Luke suggested.

  Badger made a face. “I had a feelin’ you was gonna say that. Reckon that shirt’s stuck to it ’cause of the dried blood. Gonna hurt like hell when you pull it loose.” He licked his lips. “This’d be a good time for somethin’ stronger to drink than water, not that I ain’t obliged to you for sharin’ your canteen.”

  “All right,” Luke said with a chuckle. “Wait there.”

  “I ain’t likely to go scamperin’ off.”

  Luke returned to the horse, which had started grazing. He dug out the flask and took it over to the tree where Badger sat. He would have gulped down all the whiskey if Luke had let him.

  After one gulp of the fiery stuff, he pried the flask out of Badger’s stubborn grip. “More later,” he promised.

  “I’ll hold you to that.” Badger closed his eyes, leaned his head back against the tree trunk, and gritted his teeth. “Do your worst, son.”

  Luke pulled the vest aside, unbuttoned the shirt, and eased it back. As Badger had predicted, the dried blood caused the fabric of the shirt and the long underwear beneath it to stick to the wound. Badger grunted in pain as Luke probed at it.

  He used water from the canteen to soak the cloth and loosen it. He hated to do that when he didn’t know where the next waterhole was, but he wanted to keep the wound from bleeding heavily. Badger might not be able to afford to lose much more of the precious fluid.

  Working slowly and carefully, Luke cut away part of the long underwear and gradually uncovered the deep gash in Badger’s side. Finally, he revealed the injury and the red, swollen flesh around it. Looking at the wound, he frowned. “The Apaches jumped you this morning, you said?”

  “Yeah, that’s right.”

  Luke shook his head. “I think you must be mixed up, Badger. This wound looks older than just a few hours. I’d say it happened yesterday morning, at the latest.”

  “Yesterday . . . Well, I don’t know. Maybe. To tell you the truth, I was outta my head a lot of the time since it happened, on account of losin’ so much blood, I reckon. I suppose I coulda laid up somewhere, out cold, for a long spell.”

  “I think that’s what must have happened.”

  “How bad does it look? Am I shot to pieces? You think I’m gonna pull through?”

  “It appears that the bullet just plowed a furrow in your side. I’m sure it hurt like hell, and you bled a lot, but by itself, I don’t think it’s a life-threatening wound.”

  Badger peered intently at Luke. “For somebody who’s deliverin’ good news, you don’t hardly look too pleased. Tell me the rest of it.”

  “The wound is inflamed. Infection is trying to set in. If we don’t stop it, that could kill you.”

  “What do you need to do?”

  “Open the wound up more and clean it good.”

  “Oh, Lord,” Badger groaned. “That’ll take the rest o’ the whiskey, won’t it?”

  “Probably.”

  Pale and shaken-looking, Badger managed to nod. “Do what you got to do. It’s gonna hurt like blazes, ain’t it?”

  “I’ll see if I can find a piece of wood for you to bite on.”

  “I’ll be obliged.”

  Luke found a piece of broken branch about the right size and cleaned the bark off it. He gathered more wood and built a small fire. If renegade Apaches really were loose somewhere in those hills, the smoke from a fire could lead them right to them, but Luke didn’t see any other option. He kept the blaze as small as possible, just big enough for him to hold his knife in the flames and
make sure the blade was clean.

  He let it cool for a couple of minutes, then eased the old man down on his side and went to work on the wound, enlarging it. Fresh blood flowed, along with foul-smelling corruption that told Luke he had reached the source of infection. Badger moaned as his teeth clamped down hard on the piece of wood in his mouth.

  Luke poured whiskey directly into the wound, and that made Badger whimper. He used a rag to clean the blood off the blade, then heated it in the fire again.

  “Bite down,” he warned Badger just before he pressed the knife against the gash. Badger arched his back in pain as juices sizzled and the smell of cooking flesh rose in the air. A second later, Badger slumped loosely, having passed out. That was a blessing for the old-timer, Luke thought.

  He wished he had some moss with which to pack the wound, but none seemed to grow in the mostly arid landscape. He settled for making a pad of clean cloth and tying it in place. Badger breathed noisily but didn’t wake up. Luke sat back and thumbed his hat to the back of his head, drained by the effort to save the old-timer’s life.

  All they could do was wait to see whether that effort had been successful.

  CHAPTER 12

  By evening, Badger still hadn’t regained consciousness. Luke had allowed the fire to burn down, so he stirred it to life again, added more twigs, and put coffee on to boil. He shaved some strips of bacon from the chunk he had wrapped up, and fried them. The combined smells of coffee and food must have had some medicinal effect, because Badger raised his head a little and said, “Uhhh?”

  “I’m glad to see you’ve returned to the land of the living,” Luke said from where he hunkered beside the fire. “Do you think you’re up to trying some coffee and bacon?”

  “Just . . . lemme . . . at it,” Badger said as he slowly sat up. He winced. “Damn, son. It feels like . . . you carved half my side off.” He added hopefully, “Is there . . . any o’ that whiskey left?”

  “I may have saved a drop or two for you,” Luke said dryly. “When I was finished saving your life, that is.”