The Savage Trail Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  A Mad Dash for Safety

  The horse rocketed beneath him and leaped into a full gallop,his head stretched out, ears flat, lips peeled back to brace the wind. John hugged the horse’s neck, his head resting gently on its shoulder.

  He drew his pistol, cocked it, held it tight against his leg. Below him, the ground blurred past. Beneath the pounding hoofbeats he could hear the thunder of his own heart, feel his throbbing pulse in his ears.

  Next, he heard a loud crack, like a bullwhip snapping the air.

  Over his head, John heard the hiss of a bullet as it passed a foot above him.

  Then there was another rifle shot and a bullet thudded into the earth below him, between Gent’s legs, plowing a foot-long furrow . . .

  Berkley titles by Jory Sherman

  THE VIGILANTE

  THE VIGILANTE: SIX-GUN LAW

  THE VIGILANTE: SANTA FE SHOWDOWN

  THE DARK LAND

  SUNSET RIDER

  TEXAS DUST

  BLOOD RIVER

  THE SAVAGE GUN

  THE SUNDOWN MAN

  THE SAVAGE TRAIL

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

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  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  THE SAVAGE TRAIL

  A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley edition / May 2008

  Copyright © 2008 by Jory Sherman.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form

  without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in

  violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-0-425-22116-7

  BERKLEY®

  Berkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  The “B” design is a trademark belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For Diane and David Flack

  1

  JOHN SAVAGE COULDN’T SHAKE IT OFF. THE STENCH OF DEATH was still in his nostrils, as strong and cloying as the day his parents,along with so many friends, were killed. Death cloaked him like an old, moth-eaten overcoat, heavy and musty. But these were men he had killed and the revulsion he felt now was no less than on that fateful day when Ollie Hobart and his men had come to the mining camp bent on robbery and slaughter.

  “Too bad that damned Hobart got away,” Ben Russell said, a slight quaver in his voice. “Was he one of them lyin’ there dead, you could hang up that gun your pa left you.”

  “He’s not the only one who got away. I don’t see Army Mandrake here.”

  “That Dick Tanner ain’t among the dead here, neither.”

  “Nope. He should be, the bastard.”

  John had just finished reloading the pistol and it was back in its holster. Yes, Ollie Hobart had gotten away, along with that woman, Rosa. But John knew where they were headed. It was plain that Ben wanted him to quit chasing the man responsible for all those murders. He’d had his fill of bloodletting. So had he, for that matter, but he couldn’t let Hobart get away with murder.

  There were the smells of Rosa’s Cantina in the room, too, the faint scents of whiskey, mezcal, tequila, beer, the stomach-wrenchingstale odor of cigar and cigarette smoke that lingeredin the air and in every nook and cranny, like egg-laden cobwebs.

  John and Ben walked through the deserted cantina one last time. The body of Red Dillard, not much older than John, lay on its back staring sightlessly into eternity.

  “Ollie killed him,” Ben said. “His own man.”

  “Right between the eyes.”

  “What do you make of a man like Hobart, John?” Ben asked. He cut off a chunk of tobacco with his knife, stuffed it in his cheek.

  “You can’t figure a man like that. Born killer, I guess.”

  “Born, or made?”

  “There you go again, Ben, making judgments.”

  Ben held up both hands in mock surrender.

  “I warn’t judgin’, John. Just is I wonder when the killin’s goin’ to stop, that’s all.”

  “When Hobart is six feet under.”

  “You kill him, you got to kill Rosa, his woman. They’re paired up like two spoons.”

  “I know, Ben. It don’t bother me none.”

  "Christ, John, you’re gettin’a heart hard as a damned rock.”

  “No harder than the one still beatin’ in Hobart’s chest.”

  “But to kill a woman, John,” Ben said. “I don’t know.”

  “My father told me once about his trip out West. He and my mother were in a wagon train, and most of the folks had dogs they brought with them from home. At night, they’d hear the coyotes howl and sometimes they got real close. He said the coyoteswould send a bitch close to the wagons. The female was in heat. The male dogs put up a ruckus, and if one of ’em got loose and chased that bitch in heat, the other coyotes would pounce on him and tear him to pieces.”

  “Yeah? And so?”

  “Every time a female coyote came near, they shot it and their dogs didn’t chase after that bitch and get killed.”

  “Not the same thing,” Ben said, a stubbor
n jut to his jaw.

  “Something to keep in mind when you’re talking about women, Ben. Women who run with a pack of wild dogs.”

  Ben shook his head and gave up.

  John ignored him and walked on through the room for one last check of dead bodies.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here, Ben,” John said, finally.

  “Yeah. I seen enough dead here to last me the rest of my life.”

  John said nothing, but he was already thinking about Hobart,about making him pay for the murder of his parents and all those innocent miners.

  “We’ll pick up Hobart’s trail directly,” John said as the two men mounted their horses. I figure he’s heading for Cheyenne. That tally with what you think?”

  “Onliest way he can go,” Ben said. “North, and Cheyenne would suit him about now. Rosa, too, I reckon.”

  “Yeah, he can’t head back south. All of his men are dead, the ones who rode with him. Cheyenne it is.”

  “Ought to be easy to track. You already can read his sign.”

  That was true. John was a good tracker, taught by his father,who could tell if a frog had sat on a lily pad or where a snake had crawled across dry rock.

  He knew the tracks of Hobart’s horse, had memorized the marks the shoes left, the nicks in the iron, where each was worn down on edges and heels.

  John clucked to his horse, Gent, the Missouri-bred trotter, and gently nudged his flanks with the tips of his blunt rowels. He looked back, but Ben was still sitting his horse, not moving.

  “Come on, Ben. What’s holding you up?”

  “Maybe we ought to sleep on this, Johnny,” Ben said.

  "No. We don’t want to let Hobart get too far ahead of us. Come on.”

  “I don’t know.”

  John reined up his horse and turned it around. He rode up to Ben.

  “I’m going after Hobart, Ben. You want to stay in Denver, go on.”

  “You got to get over this, Johnny. You want revenge for what Hobart did to your folks, I know.”

  “My folks and everybody else up there. If we hadn’t been in that cave, we’d be buzzard bait right alongside them.”

  “So you’re bent on revenge, I reckon.”

  “I am.”

  “You know what they say about that, don’t you?”

  “About revenge?”

  “Yeah. Revenge.” Ben spat the word out as if he had bitten a caterpillar in half.

  “No, I don’t. And I don’t care.”

  “Well, you better listen. If you take up the trail to get revenge,they say, you better dig two graves.”

  John said nothing. A sound startled him as he turned his horse.

  “You hold it right there, sonny,” boomed a loud voice from out of the shadows, “or I’ll blow you plumb off that horse.”

  “What the hell?” Ben said.

  “You, too, you old galoot. Step down from them horses, the both of you. And keep your hands high.”

  John felt a cold chill as three men stepped out of the shadows,the snouts of their rifles glistening in the moonlight, black and deadly.

  Ben swallowed hard and felt the hackles on the back of his neck stiffen and bristle as if spiders were crawling up his spine.

  The sound of the rifles all cocking at once made both men sweat as they lifted their hands. The metallic snicks lingered on the air like faint crackles of lightning.

  2

  Oliver hobart would have ridden his dun horse into the ground if Rosa Delgado hadn’t stopped him. She let out a shrill cry, followed by a stream of invective in Spanish that was like a scalding liquid poured into his ears.

  “Para, cabrón, tu hijo de mala leche, tu diablo de chingadero,salvaje pendejo sin juevos, tu hijo de fea puta.”

  Ollie hauled in hard on the reins. The dun skidded to a stop, fighting the bit. Ollie turned the horse’s head and glared at Rosa Delgado’s shadowed eyes. He had understood every filthy word and his anger boiled up in him until his neck swelled like a bull in the rut.

  “What the hell, Rosa, you gone plumb loco?”

  “You are killing the horses, Ollie, and me. My side hurts.”

  “Hell, we got to make tracks, lady.”

  “There is nobody following us. Look back. The lights of Denver are dim and far away.”

  Hobart looked up and saw the orange lights in the distance, tiny jack-o’-lanterns winking through the evening haze. He heaved a sigh.

  “We’re not far enough away, Rosa, even so. That Savage is like a dead cat. He keeps coming back with more lives.”

  “Are you afraid of him, Ollie?”

  “Not him. That gun of his. Look what he’s done to my men.”

  “He’s just a man. His gun is not so special.”

  The horses were heaving, blowing the snot from their rubberynoses, their ribs expanding and contracting under their hides. They had not started to lather, but Hobart knew they needed rest after that long gallop.

  “It’s special the way that bastard uses it,” he said. “I’d like to own such a gun. And maybe, by damn, I will, one of these days.”

  “We could wait and hide along the road,” she said, “shoot them as they come by. It’s just Savage and that old man.”

  “We might do that. Ever try to shoot something in the dark? Your eyes play tricks on you. You shoot either high or low. If we missed Savage, he’d be on us like ugly on a bear.”

  “We could use the scatterguns,” she said.

  “Maybe. Still a big risk.”

  “I want to go back to my cantina.”

  “Your brother can take care of that, Rosa. But I’ll tell you what. You can go on back there now, if you want. I got businessin Fort Laramie and I’m ridin’ on to Cheyenne.”

  “What business in Fort Laramie?”

  “My business.”

  “You bastard. You never tell me anything.”

  “Maybe you don’t want to know. I’m going to meet up with Army Mandrake there.”

  “That man. It’s too bad he wasn’t at the cantina. Maybe you’d be rid of him.”

  “Army is one of my best men.”

  “You mean he don’t have no conscience.”

  Ollie laughed.

  “Maybe. He’s not afraid of nobody and he handles a knife better’n anyone I know. Army is a good man. A damned good man.”

  “He’s a killer, sin verguenza.”

  “Ain’t we all, though?” Ollie said with a wry laugh.

  The horses were still breathing hard, blowing jets of steam from their nostrils that shone in the moonlight like miniature clouds floating across the face of the moon. There was no traffic on the Cheyenne road at that hour and it was quiet.

  “If I go with you, Ollie, I want to know.”

  “Not yet. I got to keep some things to myself.”

  “Bastard,” she said again.

  He could almost feel her anger, but he didn’t care if Rosa went with him or not. She had been someone to use back in Denver, but unless she could be of help to him now, she was just so much unnecessary baggage, just like those no-accounts who had gotten themselves killed back at the cantina. The West was full of dumb men like them. They had no trade, rode the owlhoot trail, and just drifted from one sorry place to anotherlooking for an easy poke.

  “Make up your mind, Rosa,” Ollie said, reaching into his shirt pocket for a ready-made. He kept listening for hoofbeats, a sign that Savage and his partner were coming after him, but the quiet remained. He worked a cigarette out of the pack, put it between his lips. He was surprised when Rosa leaned over with a box of matches, struck one, and lit his cigarette. She did that sort of thing. She could be a warm woman on a cold night, but she had a jealous streak a yard wide and had her a temper. She was away from her home now and he didn’t know how far he could trust her. Probably about as far as he could throw her horse, he thought.

  “I don’t have no pretty clothes, no paint for my lips, no underwear.I don’t got nothing.”

  “I can buy you those things in
Cheyenne.”

  “You got a lot of money, Ollie?”

  “Enough.”

  “You said you had a lot of gold.”

  “I have money, I said. Just quit your damned bellyachin’, Rosa. Or get the hell back to Denver. I don’t need no whinin’ woman with me.”

  “I thought you loved me, querido. You told me you loved me, eh?”

  “Aw, stop that, Rosa. I love you, darlin’. I just got other things on my mind now.”

  He wanted to smack her across the mouth. But he realized that he needed her, too. She was a good shot, could ride as well as any man, and if it came to a showdown with Savage, he could use her, maybe, another way. Savage might think twice before shooting a woman, and if she was between him and Savage, that would give him a slight edge.

  “Well, I don’t want to just run like the rabbit and not have nothing.”

  “I’ll take care of you, Rosa. And once Savage is six feet under, you can go back to your cantina. I’ll go with you. We can have a good life, you and me.”

  “Promise?” she said.

  “I promise,” he lied. “We’ll lay over at Fort Collins for a time, buy some fresh horses.”

  “And buy me some new clothes there?”

  “In Cheyenne, maybe. I don’t want to linger.”

  “My clothes will fall off by the time we get to Cheyenne. I am already smelling.”

  “You smell just fine to me, Rosa. It won’t hurt you none to wait until we get to Cheyenne.”

  “Yes, it will,” she said.

  “Daylight is my enemy right now. We’ll rest up in Fort Collins, ride out before daybreak.”

  “You are a bastard, Ollie. You are without shame.”

  He didn’t argue with her. He was, in fact, a bastard. He carriedthe name Hobart, but had no idea who his real father was. What’s more, Ollie didn’t care. He had always told his mother that if he ever ran into his father, he’d kill him.

  After the horses were rested, and Rosa’s side stopped hurting,they rode on toward Cheyenne over the road dappled in moonlight, the Rockies looming dark to the west of them, the Platte a shining ribbon of silver marking their way.

  3

  Ben dismounted first, holding one arm up, then the other, as he stepped from the stirrup.