A buzzing thing snarled past his ear and from the vacant lot came the coughing spang of a high-powered rifle.
Gun still in hand, Culver whirled around. The rifle coughed again and he felt the searing burn of the bullet as it spun across his ribs.
Out in the vacant lot Calvin Hamilton was running in great leaps toward a saddled horse by the hotel corner. Culver sprang forward, six-gun talking as he ran. Hamilton stumbled once, but regained his feet, ran on. With a yell, he vaulted into the saddle and the horse hammered out of sight behind the building.
Breath gasping in his throat, Culver rounded the hotel corner. From somewhere ahead a rifle hammered and he heard the whine of a heavy bullet passing overhead.
In the space between the hotel and barber shop swift hoofs pounded and a startled horse leaped out into the open.
“Whoa, boy!” Culver yelled.
Moving swiftly forward as the animal wheeled to run, Culver leaped desperately, caught the flying mane in a steel-trap grasp. His toes dragged for a moment as the horse sidled, then he sprang and the horse rose on its hind legs, fighting. Culver clung desperately, digging in his heels.
Then the horse was down again and running … running in the right direction. In the direction that Hamilton had taken.
CHAPTER SIX
Trail’s End
No saddle, no bridle, just a horse. One of the horses that had been turned out of the livery barn when it had been feared that it might catch fire.
No bridle, but the horse was going in the right direction, angling from behind the buildings to come into the street, striking the trail that led out of town, running with driving legs spurred by surprise and fear.
Far up the trail, Culver could see Hamilton and his mount, hazy figures in the gray dawn light. Culver bent low along the horse’s neck, spoke soothing words aimed at the laid-back ears. If the horse only would keep going, perhaps he could handle him even without a bridle. Cuff his head to turn him in the right direction, kick him in the ribs in lieu of spurs.
He rode bent forward, the whistle of the wind a roaring in his ears punctuated by the pounding hoofbeats of the working legs beneath him.
Hamilton had disappeared in a dip in the trail, but he reappeared again. Culver strained his eyes. The man seemed closer than he had before. Hope rose in him.
“Maybe we can overhaul him, hoss,” he said. “Maybe you and I can do it.”
He reached for the waistband of his trousers, hauled out the six-gun. And even as he did it, a sudden thought struck him with paralyzing force. Perkins had fired the gun twice. Nancy had used it once. That had left three cartridges. Culver’s heart sank at the thought that came. How many times had he, himself, pulled the trigger when he ran across the vacant lot in pursuit of Hamilton?
With fumbling fingers, he spun the cylinder, gulped in relief. There was one live shell. He’d only used two shots back there in the vacant lot. But one shell! One bullet! One bullet against the bullets that Hamilton must carry in the heavy rifle!
The trial was rising into higher land, was becoming ever more twisted and tortuous than it had been before. To the left the land sloped up in jagged cliffs and rocky talus slides, with scrawny pines struggling for footholds, while to the right the ground plunged down in frozen anguish.
He was gaining on Hamilton. Culver knew. Each time the man reappeared after being hidden by an angle in the trail, he had lost ground. Once he swiveled in his saddle and raised the gun to his shoulder, but brought it down again without pulling the trigger.
Culver leaned downward, patted the horse’s neck. “Keep going,” he told him. “Keep on going.”
Up ahead a rifle roared and even as it did, Culver heard the spat of the heavy bullet hitting flesh. Beneath him the horse broke its gait and stumbled, front knees folding in mid-stride. The outstretched head pitched forward and Culver felt himself spin into the air.
On hands and knees, Culver dived for the side of the trail, forced his way into a sprawling clump of cedars that clambered over two tilted boulders. The rifle spanged again and the bullet pinged against one of the boulders, went howling into space.
Hugging the ground, Culver glanced toward the trail. The horse lay crumpled in the road, with a pool of blood darkening the wheel ruts. Hamilton, he knew, had deliberately shot the animal. Had gambled rifle against sixgun in a shoot-out on this rocky mountainside.
Culver grimaced. The odds were heavier than Hamilton could guess. With only one cartridge left in the six-shooter, he had virtually no chance at all. Up on the slope the rifle churned three quick shots and the bullets chunked wickedly into the cedar brake.
He’s trying to smoke me out, Culver told himself. Only thing to do would be to work up the hill to the left of Hamilton’s position, taking advantage of screening boulders and scrawny thickets of evergreen. Get above Hamilton so that he would have to come out. Culver surged to his feet and ran, bent low, zig-zagging, fighting his way up the debris-strewn slope.
Something slapped Culver in the shoulder and he was going over, plunging in a dizzy spin toward the jumbled rocks that lay under-foot. As if they did not belong to him, as if they were separate entities, he knew that his feet were fighting to hold him upright. But there was nothing they could do.
He reached out a hand and the hand fell limp. The fingers curled around a head-sized rock, curled and gripped and then slid off and sprawled upon the ground.
Hamilton got me, he thought. Got me just like he got Farson and Crip. Only this time he did it with his own hands instead of someone else’s. He’ll be coming out, figuring I am dead. Only he’ll probably come over to make sure and when he finds I’m not he’ll put another bullet into me.
Culver lay face down upon the rocks and felt their coolness through his clothing. Pretty soon, he thought, that shoulder will begin to hurt like hell. Only probably, by that time I will be dead. If I move now, I’m dead, for Hamilton must be walking up and he’ll have the rifle ready. To the right he heard the scrape of leather on rock and knew the man was coming. Why not use that cartridge? Why not take a chance? It wouldn’t be the first time. Back on the river they said that Grant Culver would take a chance on anything. On the flip of a card, on the trickle of two raindrops running down a window, on impossible chances with a gun … on almost anything.
“A mean man to tangle with,” they said, ”because he doesn’t give a damn.”
And why should he now? He was as good as dead. When Hamilton saw he still had life in him, he would blast it out with a bullet from the rifle.
Culver lay and listened to the crunch of feet, to the rattle of the stones that loosened and rattled down the hillside. Thirty feet away, thought Culver. Ten paces. I’ll let him come a little closer. He counted the steps. One, two, three, four … five paces now!
He tensed himself, wedged one toe against a rock, and then heaved upward, like a wounded bear rising on hind legs. His hand was moving for the gun sticking in his waistband, moving with the old precision, with the same detached efficiency which it always used.
Before him Hamilton had stopped, mouth open in astonishment, feet spread apart as if he’d frozen in mid-stride when Culver moved. But the rifle was coming up, the barrel a shining sweep of metal that pointed from the hip. Culver felt the six-gun come free and tilt upward in his fist. The rifle muzzle spit flame and smoke and a savage hand clutched at Culver’s shirt and twitched it viciously.
Triumph surged in Culver’s brain and his hand was sure. The six-gun bucked against his palm and the sound of its ugly bark echoed in his ears.