The Goose Moon by Caleb Rand

Author:Caleb Rand [Caleb Rand]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780719805493
Publisher: Robert Hale
Published: 2012-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

Some time after Will had made the jump, Lester Madge and a man called Goober York halted their horses. They’d cut the tracks of Will’s mule as it left the trail along the canyon floor.

‘We’ll wait here for the others,’ Madge said.

Two hours later, it was Larris Jule who arrived with Tom Moss, a hired gunman. York told them of the loss of two riders.

‘Stryker must think he’s on a goddamn buffler shoot,’ Jule snarled, rubbed at the pain high in his shoulder. When he’d simmered down, it was four men again who pushed uptrail. They followed Will’s clear prints until darkness caught them on the switchback.

York suggested they retreat to better ground for night camp. ‘We’ll over-ride the place, smudge up his tracks with ours, won’t see where he turns off,’ he reasoned.

Jule got down from his horse and led it forward up the switchback. ‘Where’s he supposed to turn off?’ he sneered and continued on towards the top of the ridge.

‘We’re tired, an’ so are the horses. Why don’t we make camp, have ourselves some grub,’ York complained.

Jule kneeled and lit a match a few inches off the ground. He took a close look, walked forward and stared into the darkness, then came back. ‘Stryker’s goin’ on. He’s pushin’ for the high ground,’ he told them.

‘Goober may be right. The feller could break trail anytime,’ Madge said.

‘Well if he does manage it, he’ll ride west for a time. He was serious about takin’ us one by one. So if he don’t, he’ll be wantin’ to get back to Polson. He could head for the ranch even, to finish it there. I would, if I were him.’

Jule led them forward, and every hundred yards or so he dismounted and flared up another match. It was late when they neared the rim of the canyon, where he eventually found Will’s prints. He dropped the match, stamped on it quickly.

‘Down there. He’s below us now. Let’s move,’ he directed his men excitedly.

‘I reckon not,’ York objected. ‘That’s a one-time Bole Mines track. They had burros to take ’em up an’ down to the cabins. We go now, get stuck halfway down, how’d we get back? That’s if we don’t fall to our deaths before.’

‘Stryker made it down, goddammit,’ Jule snapped.

‘That was by daylight, Larris. An’ besides, he’s got us on his tail,’ Madge put in.

The whites of Jule’s eyes smouldered eerily in the darkness and his voice got shrill. ‘I can almost sniff him. He ain’t more’n two hours ahead. We go.’

‘I know this land, you don’t,’ York continued his grumble. ‘There’s breaks in the trails, I’m tellin’ you. We’re still a spit out o’ Bole, so I ain’t for playin’ up like a bighorn.’

‘If Stryker’s still alive, he’ll still be there in the mornin’, Madge said coolly.

Jule stood thinking for a moment. Like most inherently fearful men he sensed some relief in holding over. ‘I already sent a man into Bole. But someone goes back downgrade to watch the creek. Stryker could make a trail through there, get back around us.

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