He kept his gun out as he made his way back down the bluff, watching Thorp and Emmaline as he did so. Neither of them moved at all. When Longarm reached their side a few moments later, he wasn’t surprised to find that Emmaline was dead. He had heard several of Thorp’s bullets strike her. The midsection of her tattered dress was sodden with blood.
Thorp was dead too, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle. In falling down the steep slope, he must have hit his head and broken his neck. At least that was what Longarm sort of wanted to think.
Emmaline’s fingers were still locked around her husband’s throat in a death grip, and Longarm couldn’t help but wonder if she had broken Thorp’s neck with a burst of unholy strength.
Either way, Longarm thought as he slid his pistol back into its holster, they were both gone. This tragedy had played itself out to its inevitable conclusion.
But all the trouble wasn’t over yet, and the sudden crackle of gunfire from upriver that made Longarm’s head jerk up reminded him of that.
Chapter 18
The Appaloosa and Thorp’s horse were both tied up nearby. Longarm ran to the Appaloosa, jerked the reins free from the little tree, and swung up quickly into the saddle. He wheeled the horse around and urged it into a run across the river. He didn’t much like leaving the bodies of Thorp and Emmaline lying there by the river, but there wasn’t much choice. He had to find out what the shooting was about. He was afraid he had a pretty good idea already.
Being careful to watch out for patches of quicksand, Longarm got as much speed out of the Appaloosa as he could. He veered north before reaching the opposite bank. He could make better time by staying in the streambed, rather than trying to force his way through the thick brush along the bank. More shots rang out, and a few distant yells drifted to Longarm’s ears. Sounded like the others had caught up to the Brazos Devil at last, he thought.
The shooting stopped just as Longarm sent the Appaloosa around one of the bends in the river. He saw movement up ahead on the eastern bank and reined in sharply. He wanted to see what was going on before he charged in there. Edging his mount toward the shore, he leaned forward in the saddle and squinted as he peered along the river.
He saw the two servants standing near the edge of the bank; it was easy to identify them by their turbans. Not far away, in a clearing in front of what appeared to be another cave at the base of the bluff, stood Lord Beechmuir. He was facing Mitch Rainey, who stood near the mouth of the cave with a pistol in one hand and his other arm around the neck of Helene Booth. Rainey kept what appeared to be a tight, painful grip on her while he covered her husband with the gun in his other hand.
Rainey again, Longarm thought bitterly. He wished he had killed the outlaw a long time ago, when he had the chance.
Moving quietly, Longarm slipped down from the saddle and climbed onto the riverbank. He tied the Appaloosa’s reins to a bush. As far as he could tell, Rainey hadn’t noticed him yet, and Longarm wanted to keep it that way. If he could work his way through the brush along the bank, maybe he could take the fugitive by surprise and get Helene away from him before he hurt her.
Rainey’s voice was loud enough for Longarm to make out most of the words as he began easing his way slowly through the thick growth. “… little lady tells me you’re rich,” Rainey was saying. “I want plenty of money and … head start … get her back safe and sound.”
Longarm frowned as he continued moving closer. From the sound of it, Rainey had kidnapped Lady Beechmuir in order to hold her for ransom. But they had found the distinctive tracks of the Brazos Devil at the campsite after Helene disappeared, Longarm recalled. They had all assumed the monster had carried her off. But maybe the Brazos Devil had come along after Helene had been abducted.
Longarm gave a little shake of his head. They could sort it all out after Helene was safe and Mitch Rainey was dead, he decided.
“I don’t have any cash with me,” Booth was saying in reply to Rainey’s demands. “At least not in the amounts you suggest. I’m sorry, old man, but I can’t help you.”
“Well, then, I may just have to take this pretty little gal with me,” Rainey shot back, clearly annoyed. “At least that way none of you bastards’ll come after me. Speakin’ of bastards, where’s that marshal?”
“Marshal Long will be back shortly, and so will the rest of our party. You won’t be able to get away, Mr. Rainey, so you might as well release my wife and make things easier on yourself when you’re brought to justice.”
Longarm heard Rainey laugh harshly. “Hell, nobody’s goin’ to catch me,” he boasted. “Not as long as I got that new partner of mine.”
New partner? Longarm thought. What in blazes was Rainey talking about?
A second later, Longarm’s blood seemed to freeze as he heard Helene start screaming. He hurried forward, confident that her shrieks would now muffle any slight noise he might make moving through the brush. Just before he would have broken into the open, he dropped into a crouch behind the last screening bushes and parted the growth to peer through it.
Longarm’s breath caught in his throat. Lurching out of the cave behind Rainey was something the likes of which Longarm had never seen before. The creature was stooped over, but if it had been standing upright, he judged it would have been close to seven feet tall. A thick coat of matted brown fur covered its body. Huge clawed feet left deep impressions on the ground as it walked. A low growl rumbled from the creature’s throat as burning yellow eyes peered out of a forest of hair.
Was it a bear? Longarm asked himself. No, the bone structure was wrong, he decided. Some things about the monster looked almost human. Was it … could it be … a man? Longarm couldn’t tell, but he understood now why Rainey had been so scared that other time and why Helene was screaming now. Just looking at the thing made cold chills prickle along Longarm’s spine.
“My God!” exclaimed Booth. His face was pale and helooked like he wanted to run, but he controlled his fear with a visible effort. “You’re … you’re in league with the Brazos Devil!”
“Yep, you could say that,” Rainey replied as his grip on Helene’s neck tightened and he choked off her screams. “Him and me got together yesterday. I figured he was goin’ to kill me like he did those other folks, but he ain’t so bad if you don’t rile him. Him and me get along now, and he does just about anything I tell him to do, like grabbin’ this gal of yours for me. He just don’t like it when somebody tries to hurt him, or when they make a lot of noise. I reckon when those rancher’s boys who got killed a while back happened on him, they tried to lasso him or shoot him or something like that.”
“What about Marshal Long’s horse?” asked Booth.
Rainey shrugged. “All critters got to eat. Out here in the woods, you take what you can get.”
Helene was sobbing quietly now and shuddering in Rainey’s brutal grasp. Longarm wondered if he could put a bullet in the outlaw’s head from here, taking Rainey down with a quick kill. But even if he was able to do that, the Brazos Devil would still be right there to grab Helene. Longarm didn’t think he could drop the creature with a handgun.
Where the hell were Catamount Jack and Lucy? A couple of Big Fifties would come in mighty handy right about now.
For that matter, Singh had his master’s elephant gun slung on his back, but it would take time to bring the Markham & Halliday into firing position, time that none of them would have if trouble broke out. As far as Longarm could see, it was a standoff.
Then a slight motion caught his eye and he lifted his gaze to the bluff behind Rainey. Lucy Vermilion was up there, Longarm saw as his pulse quickened. She was working her way along the rugged face of the limestone, just as they had figured the Brazos Devil had done when it carried off Helene. Longarm didn’t see any sign of Catamount Jack, but he figured the mountain man was around somewhere close by. Lucy must have come to investigate the shooting the same as Longarm had, and now she was trying to get behind Rainey without the outlaw seeing her. So far she seemed to have been successful. Rainey never even glanced in her direction.