Timber Creek by Cameron Judd

Author:Cameron Judd
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

CHAPTER 18

There had been a cabin here once, but it was now, for the most part, a relic. The roof had collapsed and its wood had been used for fires, and two runs of upper logs had been cannibalized in the same manner. Now only canvas covered the top, but the cabin obviously was occupied, just as Avery had said.

“Good spot for rustlers,” he said to Hunt as they watched the gaping door of the building. “Hidden away, and nobody even knows it’s being lived in.”

“Which are these?” Hunt asked.

“Leroy Bain and his boys. Small-time stuff before, but now they’re tied in with bigger operators. They’ve led upwards of twenty rustled herds across the border into Canada.”

Across the clearing from the cabin was a small stable and a corral. The remnants of a haystack were scattered up against the cabin wall.

At Avery’s direction, the men divided into two groups and crept down separately, drawing closer to the cabin. McCan, Hunt, Bill, and Tackett comprised one group; Avery and the rest the other. They moved quickly but quietly, then crouched and watched the cabin from both sides.

A man came out. He wore filthy long underwear with a missing backflap. His hair was matted from sleep. He was rolling a cigarette in one hand and using the other to open the fly of his underwear and relieve himself just outside the door.

“Now there’s a trick for you,” Tackett whispered.

Avery shouted, “Leroy!”

Cigarette makings and spray went everywhere. Hunt smiled; Avery had obviously timed his yell for just that effect. But the man in the long underwear didn’t remain flustered for long; he vanished into the dark cabin, and a moment later a rifle muzzle slid out the front window.

“Who are you?” he shouted.

“Get out of the cabin—there’s thirty of us out here!” Avery yelled back. “Six of us are deputy marshals, ten are soldiers, and the rest kill for fun.”

“I recognize your voice, Jephthah Avery!” Leroy Bain shouted. McCan glanced at Hunt; the ranch boss’s eyes narrowed at the realization of Avery’s familiarity with Bain. “I never figured you’d have the guts to come ’round here no more!” Bain continued.

“Why does he know him?” McCan asked, but Hunt waved off the question.

“Bring out your boys and drop your guns, or we’ll roast you alive in there,” Avery said.

Bain fired, the shot ripping the cottonwoods and sending the raiders ducking. But it was a symbolic shot; Bain obviously could not see his targets.

Suddenly another shot jolted out, this one fired by Jeff Avery. The slug shattered part of the frame of the window from which Bain had fired.

Hunt swore and said. “Why’d he do that?” Then he shouted, “Give it up, Bain, and there’ll be no more shooting.” Hunt glared across the distance at Avery.

Suddenly the canvas roof was in motion; it bulged upward, then down again. Somebody had slipped over the back wall, hidden between the top run of logs and the edge of the canvas sheet. McCan saw a man dart into the rocks and brush behind the cabin.

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