LITMIR.BIZ

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Spooked by the shot, Reed’s horse bucked and threw him off. He crashed down on the ground and lay in a limp sprawl, not moving.

      “Damn it!” one of Reed’s companions yelled. “He’s done kilt Jingo!”

      The man swung the barrel of his rifle toward Frank.

      With more time now, Frank didn’t have to shoot to kill again. He broke the man’s shoulder with a bullet instead. The man dropped his rifle, swayed in the saddle, clutched at his wounded shoulder, and bawled in pain.

      Frank shifted his aim toward the third hardcase, who quickly held up both hands in plain sight. “Don’t shoot, Morgan,” he said. “I don’t want any part of this.”

      “That’s a smart move,” Frank told him. “You boys should have gone after the Terror while you had the chance. Now you’ve got to tend to your friend and take Jingo to the undertaker.”

      “All right to put my hands down?”

      Frank nodded. “Just keep ’em away from your guns.”

      As the man dismounted and began helping his wounded companion climb out of the saddle, one of the loggers let out a whistle and said to Frank, “I never saw a draw that slick in all my life. Is it true, mister? Are you really Frank Morgan?”

      Frank nodded. “That’s my name.”

      “No offense, Mr. Morgan, but I figured you were dead by now. I’ve been hearin’ stories about you since I was a kid. I’ve even read some of the dime novels about you.”

      Frank smiled. “Stories get exaggerated, and you’ve got to remember, dime novels are written by fellas who don’t really know what they’re talking about even when they’re sober, which they usually aren’t.”

      “Yeah, but you’re still The Drifter.”

      Frank shrugged. “Reckon a couple of you boys could put Jingo on his horse?”

      Two of the loggers picked up the gunman’s corpse and draped it over the saddle. Reed’s horse didn’t care for having a dead body on its back, so another logger held the reins while the first two lashed the corpse into place. By now, the uninjured man had used his bandanna to tie up the wounded shoulder of his friend, who still whimpered in pain. The loggers had to help get him back on his horse.

      The third hardcase mounted up again and said, “No hard feelings, Morgan. It sure as hell wasn’t my idea for Jingo to slap leather like that. He’s always wanted to make a big name for himself as a gunman, and I reckon he figured killin’ you was the best way.”

      “No hard feelings,” Frank agreed, “as long as you really let it go and don’t try to bushwhack me later. I wouldn’t take kindly to that.”

      “Don’t worry.” The man gave a harsh laugh. “I’m not that stupid. Anyway, I still want that ten-grand reward for the Terror, so I’m gonna be kind of busy hunting that monster. I don’t have time to get myself killed throwing down on The Drifter.”

      Leading the other two horses, the man turned his mount and hitched it into motion. He rode off into the trees, and was soon out of sight among the thick, towering trunks.

      The leader of the loggers stuck out his hand to Frank. “My name’s Karl Wilcox. It’s an honor to meet you, Mr. Morgan.” He glanced around at the gory remains of his fellow loggers. “I just wish it was under better circumstances.”

      “So do I,” Frank agreed.

      Wilcox waved a hand at the other men. “This is Dave Neville, Asa Peterson, and Gus Trotter.”

      Frank nodded at them. “I imagine you fellas would like to gather up your friends’ bodies. I’ll give you a hand.”

      “Yeah, we’ve got a wagon back yonder in the woods. Gus, go get it.” Wilcox grimaced. “The rest of us will start rolling up the bodies in blankets.”

      That was a particularly grim, grisly chore, since some of the bodies were in pieces. The loggers were able to tell which pieces went together, or least they claimed they could. Frank certainly wasn’t going to argue with them. He hadn’t known any of the dead men.

      Gus Trotter came back with the wagon. Two mules were hitched to the vehicle, and numerous logging tools were heaped in the back of it. The loggers shoved those tools aside to make room for the corpses.

      “What’s the nearest town?” Frank asked.

      “That’d be Eureka,” Wilcox said. “That’s where we’ll take these poor fellas.”

      “I reckon that’s where I’ll find Rutherford Chamberlain, too?”

      Frank wasn’t sure why he wanted to talk to the timber baron. Maybe in the back of his mind, he was considering asking Chamberlain to call off the bounty hunting.

      Wilcox shook his head. “Nope, Mr. Chamberlain doesn’t go into town much. He conducts all his business from his house.”

      “Where’s that?”

      “About five miles north of here. You can’t miss it. Biggest damn house I ever saw, and nearly all of it is made out of redwood.”

      “He lives in the forest?” Frank asked in surprise.

      “That’s right. He always says that since the woods made him his fortune, that’s where he’s gonna live. You plan to go see him, Mr. Morgan?”

      “I might,” Frank said.

      “Be careful when you ride up. He’s always got men on guard, and with everything that’s going on in these parts, they’re probably pretty nervous. They might get trigger-happy.”

      Frank nodded. “Much obliged for the warning. I’ll keep it in mind.”

      The loggers made ready to leave for Eureka with their gruesome cargo, but they paused as Karl Wilcox said, “You know, Mr. Morgan, when we first got here, I thought for a second you had done that to our friends. Or rather, that dog of yours. I figured it was a wolf when I first saw it.”

      The other men nodded in agreement.

      “I’m glad you stopped to find out what was really going on before jumping to conclusions,” Frank said.

      Wilcox nodded. “So are we. If we’d gone after you or the dog, I reckon you would’ve shot all four of us.”

      That wasn’t likely, Frank thought, but he couldn’t rule it out entirely. Anybody who came at him with an ax was asking for trouble, no doubt about that.

      “Are you gonna look for the Terror?” Wilcox asked.

      “I’m not in the business of hunting monsters,” Frank said. Especially when he didn’t really believe in them in the first place, he added to himself.

      Of course, just because he didn’t believe a monster had killed those men, that didn’t mean he knew what had ripped them apart like that. That uncertainty was enough to make a trip through these shadow-haunted woods plenty nerve-racking, especially for a man traveling alone. It was a good thing the dangerous life he’d led had given him such icy nerves, he thought with a wry, inward grin.

      The wagon rolled off toward Eureka, loaded down with six corpses and four live, scared men. Dave Neville handled the reins. Wilcox, Peterson, and Trotter gripped their axes tightly and swiveled their heads from side to side, constantly on the lookout for danger.

      Before mounting up, Frank walked all the way around the clearing, studying the ground. A thick carpet of redwood needles covered it, built up from centuries of shedding by the huge trees. There were also a lot of brittle cones lying around. Frank had hoped that whatever killed those loggers might have left some tracks, but that wasn’t the case. He didn’t see any prints among the needles.

      That left Dog’s nose. “How about it, fella?” Frank asked the big cur. “You smell anything unusual?”

      Dog trotted around the clearing.

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