The Big Hunt (13 page)

“Hello, Jenkins,” the big hunter greeted.

“We found your hoss straying, Barran,” the scar-faced man answered hurriedly. “Brought it
here and this lot jumped us afore we could say a word.”

“I just bet they did,” drawled Kerry, his eyes running along the line of men until they reached the lean, sallow-faced one. “Looks like there're a lot of old friends here, doesn't it, Shaun?”

With that Kerry took a step in the sallow young man's direction, Shaun bristling dangerously at his side. Fear came to the young man's face and he made a hurried pace to the rear as if to hide behind his companions. Showing real loyalty, the men he tried to use as cover kept out of the path of the advancing hunter.

“No!” screeched the sallow young man. “It wasn't me. I didn't——”

“I know what you did and lying won't help you,” Kerry interrupted. “Now I ought to let you see what the coon got because of you.”

“I didn't send him after you!” the man yelled, terror on his face. “Keep that dog off of me.”

For a moment Kerry stood indecisive. One word from him would send Shaun springing forward to tear the man's throat out; and, the way Kerry saw it, the other deserved that fate. Kerry had sworn to take revenge on the man when next they met, but with the opportunity at hand, he could not force himself to give the order to the waiting dog.

“I'm trying to break Shaun of jumping skunk, so
you're safe,” Kerry finally growled. “Now get the hell far away from me, and do it fast.”

Turning, the young man went at a staggering run to where his horse waited. None of the others needed further urging but followed on his heels. Kerry stood with the Remington gripped in his hands. Shaun sat at his side, neither taking their eyes from the departing bunch until they passed out of sight.

“We'd best double the guard tonight, Dobe,” the hunter declared as he turned to his companions.

“I reckon you could be right,” Killem answered. “You know them from some place, Kerry?”

“I know 'em.”

“Do you think they'll be back?” asked Lord Henry.

“I don't reckon so,” Kerry answered. “But I'd sooner not count on it.”

While the others gathered to help unload and examine the trophies of the day's hunt, Kerry returned to his gray. As he looked the horse over, Beryl walked across and stood by him.

“Where did you know them from, Kerry?” she asked.

“Back on the railroad. Some of them anyway.”

“Did they work for it?”

“You might call it that. Most of the time the big
jasper with the scar and the thin young cuss tried to stir up trouble among the gandy dancers.

“Gandy dancers?”

“Construction hands. Varley, the thin one, was the leader. He's educated, a thinker—though I'd sooner not have his thoughts. Jenkins was the muscle. From the start they were trouble. You know the thing, equality for everybody.”

“Only they mean bringing everybody down to the level of the lowest,” Beryl agreed. “We have some of them in England.”

“You've got them. Hating the guts of anybody who had more than them and looking down on the men they were supposed to help. Just using them to get what they themselves wanted.”

“You didn't like them?”

“They didn't go for me,” Kerry corrected. “I figure if a man's paying me, I owe him a good day's work, which didn't set right with them. Food wasn't too good at first and they'd almost brought work to a stop, stirring up the men with talk about the employers not keeping promises. So when I started hunting and bringing in fresh meat, it didn't set too well with Varley or any of his bunch. I gave Jenkins that scar when he tried to jump me.”

“And the other one, the thin chap?” asked Beryl. “Did he try to do anything against you?”

“Not him,” Kerry growled. “He's the kind who always gets somebody else to do the dirty work.”

“Who did he get?”

“There was a coon Varley had around all the time. Well, Varley got him all liquored up one night and stirred him up against Southerners on the old slavery hates. Then sent him after me. The coon came with a razor and Shaun jumped him, killed him before I could do a thing.”

“What happened then?”

“I went after Varley, but he ran out. The company fired the rest of the bunch next morning and ran them off. I knew there'd be trouble if I stayed on, too. The other coons wouldn't give a thought to why that feller died, that he'd been drinking and sent to kill me, and they'd be after me. Varley had them all boiling with hate against the whites so that they figured one of their own kind couldn't do a thing wrong. The damnable part is that, until Varley started stirring them up, the checkerboard crews got on fine. By the time he'd done, they had to make up white and black gangs and keep them well apart. Nobody had thought of skin color until he got among them, but they did after Shaun killed the coon. The blacks wanted my hide and the whites sided me. Rather than be the cause of bad fuss, I pulled out.”

“So Varley cost you your job?” Beryl said.

“In a way,” Kerry answered. “I'd been thinking of pulling out for some time. I'd grown tired of shooting a buffalo for its tongue and maybe some of the hump, leaving the rest to rot. I pulled out and tried homesteading, but got wiped out. Then I wound up doing something even more distasteful than meat-hunting.”

“That's all behind you now,” Beryl told him.

“I reckon it is. Well, I'd best take the horses to the remuda.”

“I'll come along with you for the walk.”

After helping Kerry and the wrangler to tend to the horses, Beryl did not rush back to the camp. For the first time she and the hunter went beyond the casual friendship of the past days. On returning to the camp, they could hear Lord Henry talking.

“And I finally bagged him on the run at at least three hundred yards.”

“T
HERE'S A CHANGE IN THE PACK'S VOICE NOW,”
Lord Henry commented, as he halted his horse and looked across the ridged hill country.

“They've got that old painter up a tree,” Sassfitz Kane replied, cocking his head to one side and listening to the steady coarse chop of the hounds baying. Mingled with it came the deeper bark of the wolfhound and the old-timer went on, “I see that old Shaun dog's right there with them, Kerry.”

“Sounds that way,” agreed the hunter. “Best get to them.”

“You in a rush to get back and see somebody?” grinned Kane.

A slight flush of red tinged Kerry's tanned face. “You know the gals are off hunting together, and I don't like for them to be on their own after meeting Varley's bunch.”

“Sure,” Kane replied amiably. “We've been falling over their sign every day for the past week.”

During the seven days since the hectic meeting with the ex-railroad trouble-makers, Kerry's party had seen no more sign of the others' presence. Kerry took their trail at dawn the next day and found them to be moving steadily away toward the hills. As a precaution, he led his own party at an angle away from the line taken by Varley's bunch, and after the third night went back to normal instead of subjecting everybody to double guard duty.

Since the night of Varley's visit, relations between Beryl and Kerry had changed. At first it had not been noticeable, but the blonde and the hunter drew closer together and spent as much time as they could in each other's company. Every day after the hunting ended, Kerry either took Beryl riding or went walking with her. Calamity heartily approved of the situation, but could not help wondering how Lord Henry regarded it. Being a forthright young lady, she decided to take up the matter at the first opportunity. So far it had not come and she, forthright or not, realized tact would be
needed if she wanted to avoid doing more harm than good.

Once in the hills, hunting absorbed everybody's attention. Lord Henry took a cock turkey, a good bull elk, and added a black bear to his growing collection of trophies. The Wind River country, as Kerry promised, produced well and the party moved deeper along the river's course, looking for a place to halt for an extended stay.

While hunting ahead, Kerry and Lord Henry had found the freshly killed body of a deer. From the fact that the deer was killed by being bitten below the base of the skull, and other signs, Kerry concluded a cougar brought it down. Deciding to take the chance and add a cougar to the collection, they returned to the main body with the intention of bringing Beryl along to see the hounds work. Beryl and Calamity, the latter declaring she needed a rest from team driving, had already left the others to hunt for camp meat, and so looked like missing the first opportunity to see Kane's hounds in action.

Knowing his sister's keenness at following the hounds, she rode to hunt regularly while in England, Lord Henry could guess at her disappointment when she heard what she had missed, but if they delayed while somebody went out to locate the girls, he might lose the cougar. So he decided to
go out, knowing there would be other chances for his sister to follow the hounds before the trip ended.

Already the chase had lasted for three miles, with plenty of hard riding and excitement. Once the cougar stopped to make a fight, holding off the pack even though Shaun ran with it. That fact led Kerry and Kane to suspect that they hunted a large, powerful tom in the prime of life; one worthy of being called a trophy.

At one point the cougar crossed a valley down which the horses could not go. By the time the hunters found a place where they could ascend and then climbed up to the other side, the chase had drawn far ahead and only the baying of the four hound-dogs guided them.

Following the sound of the hounds baying “treed,” Kerry and the other two men left the valley rim and rode on. Half a mile passed and they saw the dogs at the foot of a huge tree, scrabbling or rearing against its trunk, staring up to where a large tom cougar lay snarling defiance down at them from a limb.

“There's your cougar, Henry,” Kerry drawled. “Get down and take him.”

Unshipping his Express rifle, Lord Henry swung from his saddle. “I'd rather get in closer so there's no chance of wounding him.”

“You'd best not wound him,” warned Kane soberly. “Happen he lands among the hounds alive, he'll cut some of them to ribbons.”

“I'll make sure of him, or not shoot,” promised the peer.

“If he runs again, there's a cliff wall about a quarter of a mile on,” Kerry said. “He can get up it, but neither hoss nor hound can. This's your chance of taking him, maybe the only one you'll get.”

“Leave it to me,” smiled Lord Henry.

Walking forward, the peer saw the cougar turn its head in his direction and its devil's mask face twisted in a snarl which showed long canine fangs. As if sensing the man offered a greater menace than did the dogs, the cougar crouched. Sleek muscles rippled under its tawny coat and it launched itself from the branch in one of the long, fluid leaps for which the mountain lion had long been famous. Clear over the heads of the hounds sailed the cougar, making for the thick bushes beyond where it had been forced to climb into the tree.

Lord Henry threw up the Express, its butt nestling into his shoulder and his right eye aligning the sights. Smoothly he swung, like following a rising pheasant with a shotgun, then touched off his shot. A scream burst from the cougar's lips and its body arched under the impact of the bullet. From
a smoothly curving bound, its flight became a plummet to the ground. Even as the cougar crashed down on its side, the pack charged forward.

“Git back, blast ye!” bellowed Kane, advancing hurriedly. “Call that overgrowed critter of your'n away so's I can deal with mine, Kerry.”

“He's dead, old chap, so he can't harm them,” objected Lord Henry.

“Naw. But they'll make a hell of a mess of his hide happen we don't stop 'em,” Kane replied.

Running forward, Kerry grabbed Shaun by the scruff of the neck and hauled the big dog away from the cougar's body. Once that danger had been removed, Kane drove off his hounds, preventing them from mauling and ruining the hide. Lord Henry stood back, a grin on his face as he listened to some of the choicer expressions Kane used to bring his dogs to order.

“You've quite a command of English,” he commented.

“I've never yet seen a hound-dog who hadn't,” Kerry remarked. “Reckon you can find your own way back to the wagons, Sassfitz?”

“If I can't, I deserve to get lost,” replied the old man. “You still worrying about that lil gal?”

“Well, Kerry,” said Lord Henry as they rode
away from where Kane started to skin the cougar. “Are you still worrying about Beryl?”

“You might say that,” admitted Kerry.

“You're seeing rather a lot of her, aren't you?”

“It'd be hard not to, living like we do,” Kerry answered, realizing that the expected subject had come up and wondering what the result would be.

“I mean rather more than just in the course of your professional duties.”

“Yeah. I reckon I am.”

“And your intentions?”

“Strictly honorable,” Kerry spat out.

“My dear chap,” Lord Henry drawled. “If I'd doubted
that
for a moment, I'd have cancelled the trip at the first hint.”

“What would you say if I told you I aim to ask her to marry me?”

“I'd say the best of luck to you.”

“You wouldn't try to stop her?” asked Kerry.

“Why should I try to influence her one way or the other?” Lord Henry said. “She's over twenty-one, and ought to be intelligent enough to know love from infatuation. In fact, I know she is.”

“I can't offer anything like she's been used to,” Kerry warned.

“Does Beryl know that?”

“It was the first thing I told her.”

“And she said it didn't worry her in the least.”

“How'd you know that?” asked Kerry, for Lord Henry made a statement instead of using the words as a question.

“She
is
my sister,” Lord Henry reminded him. “I know how she thinks. Have you popped the question yet?”

“Not in so many words. I figured it was for me to ask you if I could first.”

“Ask her, old son, by all means.”

“I've no title——”

“It's surprising how few people have in the United States,” replied Lord Henry. “You'll be making me think you're looking for a way out of it soon.”

“I'm just telling——”

“I know what you're doing, and why, old chap,” Lord Henry interrupted with a warm smile. “And I admire you for it. Don't let the title stand in your way. It's Beryl's happiness that counts. I'd rather see her marry you and be happy than force her into it with somebody the family might regard as more socially acceptable and spoil her—and his—life.”

Relief flooded through Kerry at the words. One of the things he feared when thinking of Beryl had been how Lord Henry might take the news. Now he saw that he need have no worries on that score.

“Then I can go ahead and ask her?” he said.

“Don't let me stop you,” smiled Lord Henry. “What're you planning to do if, or rather when, she accepts?”

“I've got some money saved. Not much, but enough for us to get started with a little horse ranch. We're going to stock it with wild stuff and try to improve the strain.”

“That's a good idea. You both know horses. Beryl can handle her share of it. There'll be her marriage settlement, too. Dowry, you know.”

“I'm not marrying her for that,” Kerry snorted.

“I know you're not, old son. But it's part of the family tradition, and I'm insisting that you accept.”

The discussion ended abruptly as Kerry pointed ahead of them to where smoke rose into the air. Not a single column such as a camp fire might make, or a dense cloud which might herald burning wagons, but a series of puffs that rose at regular intervals.

“That's for us!” he said. “Let's go.”

Among other details arranged during the journey had been a signal to recall the hunters should their presence be urgently required at the camp. Kerry and Lord Henry exchanged glances, knowing what the smoke puffs meant, although not able to guess the nature of the emergency which de
manded their recall. Without a word, they started their horses moving at a fast pace in the direction of the smoke puffs. Showing no signs of exhaustion after his long-chase, Shaun loped along by his master's side.

No hint of what might be wrong showed at the camp. A party of blue-clad U.S. Cavalry soldiers gathered by the fire, being fed by the cook, but they would not be sufficient reason for Killem to send up a smoke signal; unless they brought important news. Seeing the two riders, Dobe Killem walked from the fire. A tall, slim, young lieutenant followed on the big freighter's heels, his uniform well cut but travel-stained. Kerry and Lord Henry were less interested in the soldier than in the expression on the big freighter's normally emotionless face.

“We've got trouble,” Killem told the men as they dismounted. “Lieutenant Dalby here brought Beryl's horse in.”

“We found it straying, the reins fastened to its saddle,” Dalby continued. “So my scout backtracked it. Found where it had been turned loose and were just about to investigate when your wagons came into sight. We came straight over to ask if the horse belonged here.”

A riderless horse always caused concern in the West, where being mounted meant the difference
between life and death, so the soldiers' actions did not surprise Kerry. In fact, he barely gave a thought to that aspect, being more concerned with how the horse came to be riderless in the first place. The horn-tied reins told him that all had not been well when the horse lost its rider. Like most people on the Great Plains, Beryl had her reins in two separate strands instead of being joined together. This was a precaution against being left afoot, for if something caused the rider to drop the reins, their trailing ends caught under the animal's feet and tended to prevent it running. Beryl knew better than to fasten the reins to the saddle-horn unless she did it deliberately to allow it free movement.

“What happened?” he growled.

“We followed the horse to where the ladies had shot a deer,” Dalby explained. “They'd been standing by it when a bunch of men jumped them——”

“Indians?” asked Lord Henry.

“Not according to the scout,” Dalby replied. “According to him, the men rode shod horses and wore boots. The way he read it, there'd been a scuffle either just before, or after, the horse got free. Then the ladies mounted on one horse and the whole bunch rode off.”

“Let's get going, Henry,” Kerry said quietly.

“Let's learn everything we can first,” the peer answered. “We'll want fresh horses, Dobe, and——”

“I've got them waiting,” Killem said. “Food's ready and waiting.”

“Damn it, there's not time for food, with Beryl in danger!” Kerry roared.

“Calamity's in danger, too,” Lord Henry pointed out. “But rushing off with empty bellies and on leg-weary horses won't get us to them any quicker.”

Kerry's protests died away unsaid, for he knew Lord Henry spoke the truth. There was no way of knowing how long they might be on the trail, or what lay at the end of it. Fresh horses, a meal, spare food would prepare them the better for what lay ahead.

“I'll get the horses saddled,” Killem told the hunters. “What rifles do you want along?”

“I'll take the Remington and the Winchester,” answered Lord Henry. “How about you, Kerry?”

“Get my Sharps and the bullet box from the wagon, Dobe,” Kerry said. “I've got the carbine, too. That should do me.”

“All the crew reckon they're coming,” Killem commented, before going to obey his orders.