Manifest Destiny

Dutch made his way afoot across the sharp rocks, making little leaps from one to another; the important thing was not to touch any soft ground where he might leave a footprint.

Moving in that ma

The water ran several feet deep along the curve, birling against an exposed root system where it had undercut the clay bank.

It was going to be cold but it looked good enough; anyway it would have to do. Dutch slipped into the stream, sucked in his breath at the sudden frigid cold and lowered himself all the way into the water, clutching a root overhead, propping the rifle above him with his free hand; he slipped under the tangle of roots and came up beneath the cutbank.

He had to turn the rifle and swap hands to pull it lengthwise through the overhanging roots. There was no way to keep the rifle completely dry but he did his best—pressed it against the roots above his head and suspended it there with one hand until the arm got tired; then he traded hands and waited and shivered while the eddying water lapped around his throat.

He was inside a cave; his view of the world was restricted by a great many gnarled roots and he couldn’t hear a damn thing over the rush of the river but he was alive and, he hoped, invisible.

Nothing to do but figure on waiting it out here until they rode off—if he could stand the cold that long.

It was no good predicting. Either he would be lucky or he wouldn’t

It wasn’t long before he glimpsed movement on the opposite bank and moved his head forward to get a better view between roots. By shifting his face from side to side he could command a fair view of the area, a bit at a time, and it wasn’t so far away; he had a clear enough perception of what transpired then—clearer than he’d have preferred.

A dozen horsemen were gathered, all of them hooded. Several dismounted now. One dragged a man forward at the end of a lasso and Dutch saw it was Pierce Bolan. Pierce was yelling at his captors but they weren’t paying any attention. Dutch couldn’t hear what anybody said over there; all he caught was the raging high timbre of Pierce’s voice.

Dutch had to clench his teeth to keep them from chattering. It was mostly the icy cold of the water but he knew what was going to happen and he watched, because there was no point in not watching.

They tied Pierce Bolan’s hands behind him and it took four of them to boost him up on one of the saddle horses. Pierce struggled and yelled all the way but it had no effect.

Several horsemen entered the creek from this side, upstream not far from Dutch; one of them was leading Dutch’s saddle horse. So they’d found it. Presumably half a dozen others were still up on the rim chasing the pack horse.

Across the river the new bunch, leading Dutch’s horse, joined the rest. They were all wearing hoods, various colors and patterns of cloth—banda

A thin man tossed a line over a tree-limb and knotted the noose around Pierce’s neck. A short man stood at the head of the horse, holding it, and a burly man, who seemed to be the leader, stood like a hunchback, hands buried in the pockets of the long coat that flapped against his ankles; that one made an indicative show of sincere regret—Dutch had to fight down the impulse to shoot the swine and to hell with consequences—and then the swine threw his head back and said something to Pierce Bolan.

Pierce shouted back at the swine, raging at him.

Dutch changed hands on the rifle, shivered in the chill water and specified to himself with dismal clear logic why there would be no good served by his interfering. They would still lynch Pierce Bolan, and they would kill Dutch himself in the bargain. It was better to live and fight again another day, Gott damn it.

The hooded swine turned away and made a sharp gesture with a swinging arm; they slapped the horse out from under Pierce Bolan and he fell slantwise and was brought up hard before he could hit the ground—brought up by a snap that whipped his head hard to one side as if it had been hit by a buffalo-gun bullet.

Dutch thought it was a wonder it didn’t rip his head clear off.

Pack broke off his labors in the office of The Bad Lands Cow Boy to go outdoors and clear his head. The words were not coming properly—he wasn’t sure what to say about the events he was reporting.

The morning sun was bright but the breeze was cool enough to make him turn his coat collar up. He saw Sewall and Dow in front of Joe’s store lashing their purchases down across their pack animals. Joe stood on the porch chewing the cud with them. Pack waved them all a hesitant good morning and was thinking about joining them when the noise of a disruption drew his attention toward the embankment.

Several men were ru

Pack caught Joe Ferris’s eye. It took no more than that; in a flash the two were off, racing through the side street on a course designed to intercept those men. After a moment Pack heard the drum of hoofbeats behind him and assumed it was Sewall and Dow, coming along out of curiosity.

Another foot chase; it reminded him, as he puffed along, of the pursuit of the Lunatic. The poor bewildered soul was in the asylum now.

At the edge of the river the fugitive tried to run under the bridge but two of his pursuers were there first. The man backed out into the sun; the two pursuers came forward with revolvers in their hands and Pack recognized them as clerks who worked for Jerry Paddock in the De Morès Hotel. The rest of the crowd caught up—some of Paddock’s hangers-on: two bartenders, a stable hostler, several workers from the abattoir crews.

One of the hotel clerks said, “All right, Calamity. I guess that’s it.”

Pack had heard the name “Calamity” once or twice. He associated it with a reputed hardscrabble horse-rustler and petty thief but he’d never seen the man.

The former fugitive stood surrounded by Paddock’s well-armed men. He looked a bit of a calamity sure enough—lanky and filthy, dark-ski

Calamity stood with his feet splayed wide in weariness. He puffed. He shifted his bleak glance from one face to another and the crowd slowly pushed forward, closing the circle around him.

One man shifted his rifle into his left hand and reached out to grip Calamity’s arm. “You all finished here, boy.”

Water fretted against the pilings of the railroad bridge. Pack glanced at Joe Ferris beside him. Joe’s face was glum. His hand lay on the butt of the Remington revolver in his holster but he did not draw it out. He was looking off downriver.

Pack looked that way and saw, of all people, Redhead Fi

They seemed to have picked a rather spectacular time to have emerged from their seclusion.

More horses came up from behind. Pack looked around and, as he expected, saw Sewall and Dow; but then came Jerry Paddock, who rode straight past them without a glance and walked his horse straight into the crowd. His men parted to make way.