Free Blood on the Divide by William W. Johnstone Page B

arrows and trying to fold Jack’s arms across his chest. They were locked in place. He gave up. “But I’ll wager that in two, three years, there won’t be no more rendezvous, nowhere. Anybody want to take me up on that bet?”
    â€œYou don’t mean that!” Rimrock said, aghast at just the thought of it.
    â€œIt’s over, Rim,” Caleb told the man. ’Furrin’s done. We all got to find something else to do. Me and Preacher, we’re travelin’ light. No traps.“
    â€œWe don’t have none either,” Windy said quietly. “It ain’t worth the bother no more.”
    â€œGimme Jack’s blanket over yonder,” Preacher said, pointing. “Rim, help me wrap him up. He’s done stiffened up tight as a drumhead.”
    They placed the mountain man on his back in the hole and buried his weapons with him.
    â€œPut his blade in there with him,” Rimrock said. “He might meet up with a big-assed griz on his way. Windy, strip the saddle offen his horse and turn the poor animal a-loose. He was wild when Jack caught him, so he’ll cut wild again.”
    The men buried Jack Larrabee deep and covered him up and then layered the mound with heavy rocks to prevent the animals from digging up the body. Then the mountain men stood in silence around the mound for several minutes.
    â€œJack was a good man.” Windy finally broke the silence.
    â€œHe didn’t have no back-up in him,” Rimrock said.
    â€œHe went out a-clawin’ and a-scratchin’ and a-bitin’,” Caleb added.
    Preacher put his battered old hat back on his head and said, “See you, Jack.” Then he turned and walked toward Hammer.
    The others fell in line with him.
    â€œAin’t gonna be no one left ’fore long,” Rimrock muttered, after tossing Windy into the saddle.
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    The men had settled in for the night, some miles from where Jack Larrabee lay cold in his grave. A hat-sized fire kept their coffee hot while they lay in their robes and blankets and drank coffee and jawed of men they had known and places they had been and sights they had seen.
    â€œI heared you saved some pilgrim and then took them folks and their wagons all the way to the blue waters last year, Preacher,” Rimrock said.
    â€œI did. Me and Nighthawk and Jim and Dupre and Beartooth. I can’t say as I ever want to do nothin’ like that again.”
    â€œI’d left ’em along the trail,” Windy said. “Damn pilgrims.”
    Preacher smiled. Windy would have done no such of a thing and everybody around the fire knew it. He just liked for people to think him sour and jaded and coldhearted. Preacher said, “If you’d a seen them fine-lookin’ females I took over the mountains and rivers to the blue waters, you’d a still been out there with ’em, Windy.”
    â€œWomen!” Windy snorted. “I ain’t got no use for women. Always wantin’ to tie a man down.”
    â€œWhat about that little Crow gal up on the Yellowstone?” Caleb asked with a smile.
    Windy glared at him from across the fire and everybody hoo-hawed at him. Windy had come back to the lodge after too long a stay runnin’ his traps and she had throwed all his possessions out on the ground, moved the tipi, and took up with another man.
    Windy had been sorta testy about women ever since.
    A fallen branch snapped out in the darkness and the four mountain men were out of their robes and blankets in a heartbeat, grabbing up rifles and flattening out behind cover, well away from the small fire.
    A moan reached their ears. The mountain men did not move. They waited, rifles cocked. Something stirred in the brush, then another moan.
    â€œI’m hurt, boys.” The words came weak and in no more than a whisper. “I’m Shields. Tom Shields.”
    â€œI know him,” Windy whispered. “He’s all right. Can you make it to the