Nest of Vipers (9781101613283) (20 page)

FORTY-TWO

When Jordan first got a look at the rider who was following him, he thought it was that new man, Randy McCall, the one they called Jinglebob. When he had a chance to look again a half hour later, he saw that the rider was not Jinglebob. Instead, it was a man he had never seen before.

Who was he?

Jordan wondered. Was he a hired tracker? A detective? A U.S. marshal?

It didn't dawn on him until later that the man he caught a glimpse of whose pursuit was relentless, might be the man who had made him the offer to sell his horses back to him—Brad Storm.

When he spotted the man again, he was sure that it was the one they called the Sidewinder. Brad Storm. The man was a superb tracker. No matter where Jordan led him, the Sidewinder picked up his trail. He waited for an opportunity to draw his rifle and pick off the tracker, but each time he stopped and tried to get a fix on Storm, the man seemed to know he was being watched and did not present a clear target.

The man was uncanny, Jordan thought. Storm seemed to know when Jordan was waiting in ambush, and he would blend into cover and turn invisible. It was maddening to have a man like that on his trail. Even when he did see Storm in the open, he could never see all of him. Storm either hunched low over his saddle, or rode into a copse of thick trees, or just halted his horse and waited a few seconds. At such times, all Jordan could see was the switch of the roan's tail, or a leg or two, perhaps the horse's rump, or the boots of the rider.

After two or three hours, Jordan knew that he would not lose his tracker with any of the tricks he had learned from the Cheyenne and Arapaho. He had tried everything he knew and remembered from when they were being pursued by Kiowa or Utes from whom they had stolen horses.

Storm seemed to possess a sixth sense that warned him of danger. Jordan had no doubt that the Sidewinder could read tracks like some people could read books. He seemed to unravel every deception, every doubling back, every trail through thick brush or over trackless stone.

Jordan and Sugarfoot climbed ever higher. He stopped just below timberline and realized that he dared not go farther. Up on the barren slope he saw a large mule deer standing like a sentinel looking down on him. If he ventured to that open space below the snowcapped peak, he would be an easy target for a rifleman.

He turned his horse and headed back down. He knew now where he had to go if he was to make a stand and shoot the man who tracked him like a dog on the scent or a cougar stalking a wandering deer. He rode straight down into the thick timber that he knew. He still tried to throw Storm off his track, but after a time, he knew that he would never shake him. The man was as good a tracker as any Arapaho or Cheyenne brave. He was relentless, and he was not misled by any of Jordan's backtrackings or tricks.

He rode now with a purpose. He knew where he could go and have a chance to shoot Storm and kill him. He passed a place he knew well, where a large stone guarded the cavity in the hill where there was an ancient stone that the Arapaho had told him contained messages from their ancestors. He knew the stone well, for he had looked at it many times as a boy. And, more than once, his Arapaho companions had gone there to speak of the days before the white men, the days when their people talked with gods and believed that they had been created as special people to inhabit the Earth.

He passed by there, and pangs of memory trickled through his mind like waves in a pool startled by a thrown stone.

The ancient ones left records of themselves on many stones throughout the Rockies, and some of the elders in the Arapaho tribe remembered the stories they had been told, about a frozen world of ice and snow and a terrible deluge that had covered the Earth, except that one man and his kindred had escaped on the back of a giant turtle and repopulated the Earth.

Jordan rode to the place of the caves and spotted the wide ledge where he could ride Sugarfoot and both of them disappear into a very large cave. A cave where he had heard the ancestors of the Arapaho once lived after the rains that nearly drowned the entire world.

He rode up to the edge of the ledge and urged Sugarfoot onto it. He rode toward the cave and saw something he never expected to see.

There, lying flat on his back with his throat cut deep from ear to ear, was one of his men. He recognized Dan Jimson, the baldheaded gunslinger the boys had all called Curly. He had been stripped of his gun belt and had already begun to decompose.

Sugarfoot shied away from the dead man, and Jordan reined him in so hard the horse's head bowed. He looked down over the edge of the ledge and saw a dark lump lying in a pile of brush and boulders. Curly's horse. It must have leaped off the ledge and fallen to its death, Jordan thought.

The shadows below the ledge began to deepen when he rode inside the cave and dismounted.

He led Sugarfoot deeper into the cave and patted his neck. He pulled his rifle from its scabbard and walked back toward the entrance. He leaned the rifle against the cave wall next to the entrance and then dropped to his knees.

He drew his pistol and checked that all the cylinders were full. Then he laid the pistol in front of him on the cave floor as he knelt and waited, listening for any sign that Storm was closing in on him.

Jordan knew that this was his last stand. He had to either kill Storm or Storm would kill him.

He knelt there and listened until he heard the soft sound of a horse moving toward the pile of rocks that were below the bluff and the ledge.

The horse moved close to the rock pile and then Jordan heard the footfalls retreat. It was quiet for a time. Then he thought he heard the sounds of a man on foot. And the man was climbing up the slope beyond the edge of the ledge off to his left.

Storm would reach the ledge in a few minutes, Jordan knew. If he had been the one to kill Curly, then he would know that he and his horse were in the cave.

He heard the scrape of a boot on stone.

Jordan began to chant the Arapaho death song in a low voice that gradually grew louder. He knew the words, and he knew what they meant.

“It is a good day to die,” he sang in the Arapaho language. “I do not fear death. Death is my friend who comes for me. It is a good day to die.”

He sang and waited, his rifle close at hand, his pistol lying ready just in front of him.

The footsteps grew louder and louder.

Storm was approaching.

Soon, Jordan knew, he would be in a fight to the death.

It was a good day to die for either one of them.

FORTY-THREE

Shadows crawled up the cliff face and burrowed into the hollows beneath the ledge. They shrouded the face of the bluff and slid into the cave where Jordan Killdeer knelt and chanted his death song.

He stopped and listened for the scrape of a boot or the crunch of stone underfoot. Instead, he heard what sounded like a faint whisper, a swishing sound as if someone had stroked an eagle feather with a pair of fingers.

Brad Storm hugged the cliff face and heard the same sound, as if someone had breathed out a lungful of air, or brushed the seat of a chair with a feather duster.

Swish, swish.

Then, a silence for a few seconds.

A soft scraping sound.

It sounded like coiling scales.

The brittle rattle from the edge of the cave broke the silence.

Brad heard another series of sounds and a soft grunt.

“I know your tricks, Storm,” Jordan yelled from inside the cave. “You don't fool me.”

“That's not my rattle,” Brad said.

The rattling grew louder.

Brad heard the sound of boots striking the cave floor.

“It's a snake,” shrieked Jordan.

Brad moved then, through the shadows and into the dark of the cave. He slid around the lip of the entrance and saw a dim figure stomping the ground. He heard the rattles become more frantic and looked down. There was a three-foot rattler coiled up and moving its head. Its forked tongue twitched as its eyes followed Jordan's movements.

Jordan had a pistol in his hand and was backing toward the wall.

Brad ducked his head and charged straight at the man. He jumped over the coiled rattler and slammed into Jordan's midsection with the force of a pile driver.

Jordan grunted in pain and tried to club Brad with the butt of his pistol.

Brad swung his gun hand in a wide arc and cracked into Jordan's arm. The pistol flew from Jordan's hand and clattered on the cave floor.

The rattler uncoiled and slithered from the cave, its rattles clattering together like hollow dice.

“Bastard,” Jordan growled and stooped to pick up his pistol.

Brad rammed his gun barrel into Jordan's gut and knocked the air out of his lungs.

Sugarfoot neighed his fear and displeasure from the back of the cave.

Jordan grappled with Brad. He lashed out with both arms, and his hands grabbed Brad's arms as the half-breed tried to edge away toward the cave entrance.

Brad shoved his pistol back in its holster and spread his arm to break Jordan's grip. Jordan's hands flew off Brad's arms as Brad drove him backward and slammed his body into the hard rock wall.

Jordan cursed and brought his arms up. His made fists and lashed out at Brad with his right hand.

The blow landed on Brad's jaw and staggered him. He doubled up a fist and drove it straight into Jordan's belly. Jordan cried out in pain and doubled over for a second or two. He came out of his crouch swinging. He punched with a right and a left, trying to drive Brad backward.

Brad fended off the blows with his arms and elbows, but stepped backward, out of range of Jordan's fists.

“I'll get you, you sonofabitch,” Jordan snarled, and he waded toward Brad, both fists cocked to deliver blows once he had his attacker in range.

Brad sidestepped Jordan's charge and landed a glancing blow on his face with a roundhouse right. Jordan cried out in pain and fell toward the back of the cave.

Brad went after him. Both men panted hard as they grappled again, each trying to land fists on the other's body and face.

Jordan was strong. Brad could feel the corded muscles in his arms, the power of his legs as Jordan pushed against him and tried to encircle him with his arms.

Brad stepped a half pace backward and escaped the lethal grip of Jordan's hands. He lashed out with a left hook and caught Jordan on his right ear with a stinging blow.

“Owwww,” Jordan erupted and staggered sideways. Then he recovered and swung a right at Brad's head.

Brad threw his head back and felt the air rush past his chin. He reached up and grabbed Jordan's wrist. He dug in his nails and squeezed the wrist hard.

With an extra effort, Jordan broke the hold and tried to knee Brad in the crotch. He came close.

Brad brought a fist down and cracked the knuckles into Jordan's upper leg. He was so close he could see the pain etched on Jordan's face.

But Jordan danced away, limping slightly from the pain in his leg.

Brad pressed his advantage and strode close. He hammered Jordan with a quick left and then a right, landing both blows on either side of Jordan's jaw. Jordan winced and retaliated with a flurry of fists that drove Brad backward toward the cave entrance.

Both men could hear each other's labored breaths.

Jordan pursued Brad with flailing fists. He was fast. Brad stepped slightly to one side and Jordan threw himself off balance for a split second. Brad rammed a fist into his side. Jordan staggered and grunted in pain.

But Jordan was still standing. He whirled to attack Brad again from a better angle.

Brad was ready for him.

As Jordan charged him with his fists doubled up, Brad stood his ground. He jutted his elbows out, and Jordan's blows stung both of them with tremendous force.

Brad saw his opportunity. Both of Jordan's fists were low and he had not yet drawn them back toward him to strike out again.

Jordan cursed him in Arapaho.

Brad drove an uppercut between Jordan's arms and bashed him on the point of his chin.

Jordan's head snapped backward. His arms went slack. His eyes rolled in their sockets and he had to widen his stance to keep his balance.

Brad followed up with a savage left hook that slammed into Jordan's jaw with hammering force. Jordan spun around, dazed, and struggled to keep from falling.

“Give it up, Jordan,” Brad panted.

“Not until you're dead,” Jordan said. His voiced sounded as if he had a mouthful of mush. Blood leaked over his lips and when his mouth opened his teeth were covered with blood.

Brad's fist had cracked one side of Jordan's lips, drawing blood, splitting the tender skin.

Jordan tried to recover. His dark eyes seemed to have a light of their own as he charged Brad with swinging fists.

Brad tucked in his belly, and one of Jordan's fists missed its mark. The other one caught Brad high in the chest. It was a skin-tightening blow that filled his lungs with a sudden heat.

Brad grabbed one of Jordan's arms and twisted it. Jordan cried out in pain and swiveled around until he dropped to one knee.

“Damn you, Storm,” Jordan yelled, and there was pain in his voice.

Brad continued to twist until he heard something snap in Jordan's elbow.

Jordan screamed and dropped to his knees.

Brad released his grip on Jordan's arm and saw the forearm dangle uselessly, swinging back and forth in a slow motion, like a broken pendulum.

Jordan tried to rise to his feet.

Brad stepped closed to him and drove a straight right hand into Jordan's temple. He heard a sound like a cracking pane of glass. Jordan slumped over and collapsed in a heap. He was out cold.

Gasping for breath, Brad stood over the fallen man and gulped in air to drench the fire in his lungs. After a few moments, Brad walked back to where Jordan's horse was stomping its feet and pawing the stone floor of the cave. He loosened the leather ties on one of the lariats attached to the saddle. He patted the horse's neck and spoke a few soothing words to it.

“It's all over, boy,” he said to the horse as he walked back toward Jordan.

Brad knelt down next to the unconscious man and drew his knife. He stretched out a length of rope and cut it, then used that piece to measure three others and cut them all to the same size, quickly, deftly. He sheathed his knife and let the remainder of uncut rope lie where it had fallen.

He pushed Jordan onto his stomach and drew his arms backward until both hands were behind him. Then he lashed Jordan's hands together and tightened the rope before tying knots. He pulled on the rope to test its hold.

Satisfied, Brad stood up. He pulled Jordan to his feet. Jordan was slowly regaining consciousness. He tried to pull one arm free of the rope bond, but gave up while Brad watched. The other arm was useless and Jordan could not move it or his hand.

“You won this one, Storm. But it ain't over yet.” Jordan, obviously in pain, slurred the words out and appeared to be in a daze.

“No, it's not over yet, Killdeer,” Brad said. “There's one more rope I don't have on me at the moment.”

“Huh? You got ropes in your hand.”

“Not the one I really want,” Brad said.

“You talk like a crazy man. What rope?”

“The rope they're going to put around your neck up on the gallows. The rope that's going to break your damned thieving neck.”

Brad shoved Jordan back toward his horse. He dropped the extra lengths of rope and grabbed Jordan. He forced him onto the saddle, pushed him until he lay on it, belly down. His legs dangled on one side.

Brad wrapped rope around Jordan's ankles, then walked to the other side. He attached the other end of the rope to a D-ring and secured it firmly. Then he tied another rope to another ring and walked to the other side where he wrapped the rope around Jordan's knees and tied it tight. With the last strand of rope, he ran it under Jordan's belt and wrapped the other end around the saddle horn and tied it.

Then he unbuckled Jordan's gun belt and rolled the rig into a ball, which he put into one of the saddlebags.

“I can't breathe,” Jordan said.

“You can breathe,” Brad said.

He picked up the dangling reins and led the horse toward the cave entrance and into the dark.

“Where you takin' me, Storm?” Jordan asked as the night air washed across his face.

“Why, back to Wild Horse Valley where you can take one last look at all the pretty horses,” Brad said.

“You are one mean and devilish sonofabitch,” Jordan snarled.

“It takes one to know one,” Brad said as he led the horse along the ledge.

The dwindling moon peeked over the rim of the mountains and cast a glimmer of light on the two of them as they cleared the ledge and headed down the slope to where Jinglebob's horse was tied.

The horse whickered as they approached.

Jordan's horse replied with a rippling nicker.

“I ain't real comfortable hogtied like this,” Jordan said as Brad pulled himself into the saddle and pulled on the reins of Jordan's horse.

“You'll get used to it, Killdeer,” Brad said. “Just think about all those horses you're going to see one last time.”

“I ain't through with you, Storm. I got friends.”

“If you do have friends, you'll have some company when you go to the gallows.”

“I don't buy it,” Jordan said.

“It's free, Killdeer. You don't have to buy it.”

Brad touched spurs to Jinglebob's horse, and they rode out of the small clearing and headed down into the timber. Moonlight painted streaks of silvery light through the needles and branches of the pines. The beams looked like misty lances of fairy lights as they wound their way over and past deadfalls.

Brad knew the way back to Wild Horse Valley. And so did Jordan.

Brad could hear him wheezing as they descended through the shadows of night along unseen pathways where ancient men had hunted and left strange markings on stone to mark their brief days in a time most men had forgotten, when the West was young and unmarked and un-owned by anyone.