The Hanging (Herne the Hunter Western Book #17) Read online

  But the omens seemed better. The sun was shining and there was a new freshness to the air that morning. They’d cooked up some fatback with some beans, following it with coffee black and strong enough to float a six-gun. The way they both liked it. Hebe was crooning a song to herself as she drove the pair of oxen along the still muddy trail. A song that she had sung to several of her assorted brood of children, about a young girl who finds a land where the princes are poor and the beggars rich.

  Ezekiel was dozing in the rear of the wagon, his mind carrying him forward to a place where the sun would shine each and every day and they could live high off the hog. His grandfather had come from England, married to a full-blooded gipsy. One of the Petulengro tribe. And Ezekiel had retained something of the traditional wanderlust of his grandmother’s people. Never content to stay for long in one place.

  But now that was over.

  The years had caught up with them. The days were no longer filled with good things and the nights were times of wakefulness. His heart seemed to leap in his scrawny chest if anything startled him. He’d dosed himself, but even that no longer worked properly for him.

  Yes. It was time to go for the sun.

  The gentle movement of the wagon rocked him so that he slipped quietly into sleep.

  ‘Breed says we lost them back a mile. Thinks they took a side trail some place that’ll cut them up high and then back on the main path here.’

  The Reverend Wyndham barely managed to restrain a most un-Christian curse. ‘Then we must go back?’

  ‘Says not. Says we keep goin’ and he figures we’ll cut their tracks again in around six miles.’

  ‘Then we should perhaps split our forces?’

  Blennerhassett interrupted. ‘Why don’t we just do like the breed says? We split up and we could be in a whole lot of trouble. They might hit us first.’

  ‘There’s that, Cyrus. But this never started as a turkey shoot. It might come hard to take five such dangerous men. No, I think we shall go on, with great caution. Lead ahead.’

  Black George Wright. The leader of the bandits. Aged in his middle forties. Spent more than half of his life in various penitentiaries for a variety of crimes running from rustling to rape and back again. He’d finally been released eight months earlier and had sworn that he would never go back to the world of grey stone and iron. He’d planned the bank robberies with great care, cashing in on his superficial resemblance to Jed Herne.

  His gang was carefully chosen.

  The O’Sullivan twins. Sean, with the scar, and his brother Dermot. Sean the oldest by thirty-five minutes. They had come to America from their home in the bogs of Ireland during one of the regular and devastating potato famines. They’d met Wright when he was serving time. They were there for a misunderstanding over some horses. The misunderstanding being that the horses didn’t belong to them. They were twenty-two years old.

  The negro was called Beech. The others didn’t know what his real name was and he never told them. He’d met Wright just after the older man had been released from prison. There’d been a fight in an alley. Wright had seen a drunk and gone after him, but his intended victim sobered up too quickly and George found himself in trouble. Beech opened up the drunk’s face with an open razor, held across the back of his hand.

  It wouldn’t be true to say that Wright and Beech were friends. Nobody was friends with Beech. But he was a good man. Reliable and excellent around horses.

  Last of the five was the smallest and youngest. Barely sixteen years old and built like a strong wind would whip him away like a falling leaf. The rest of them called him Joey. George and Joey had met somewheres round Baton Rouge. Joey had been passing by a gunshop when George and the twins came bursting out after robbing the store. Joey had tripped up a pursuing deputy and then shot the man through the face with his own pistol. Hitching himself up on the back of Wright’s stallion and riding out of town with them. George had taken a shine to the youngster and given him the Meteor for his own use. Joey had never let the blue-eyed leader down, showing himself a killer who was as ruthless as the other four. Maybe more so.

  ‘Riders comin’, Zeke,’ croaked Hebe Haroldson, twitching her fingers nervously on the reins of the team. But her husband was fast in sleep and never stirred. Not even waking when she pulled the oxen to a halt on the side of the trail.

  The old woman watched the riders coming towards her, her eyes veiled with age, shading them with a leathery hand against the bright afternoon sun. It surely was a blessing that the weather had picked up the way it had. Only another few weeks of this wearisome traveling and she’d be able to sit out in that California sun that folks talked so much about.

  ‘Riders, Zeke,’ she called again as they drew closer.

  But Ezekiel slept peacefully on.

  ‘Wagon ahead of us. Came in a mile back from side trail,’ said the breed, swinging quickly down from the saddle, to check the tracks.

  ‘What of the bandits? When are they going to come back on the trail?’

  The breed looked up at the priest with barely concealed contempt. ‘Have been in front for half of an hour. Maybe more.’

  ‘Why in Hades didn’t you tell me?’

  Iron-eye Spann gobbed in the dirt. ‘You did not ask.’

  ‘Then are they ahead of this wagon or behind it?’

  ‘Cannot tell.’

  ‘Got a guess?’

  ‘My mother did not raise me to guess for white men. I tell you what I know. Wagon close ahead. Riders also somewhere close. But side trails now rock. Hard to tell. Hunters use them.’

  The priest shook his head. ‘We are getting closer, my friends,’ he called. ‘Closer to the ungodly who shall soon feel our righteous anger.’

  ‘Lynch ’em,’ shouted Blennerhassett with predictable ferocity.

  ‘We catch up first on that rig. Then we can ask ’em if they’ve seen anything of those robbers.’

  Herne picked his way along after the posse. From what he’d seen so far the breed was no better at tracking than an eight year old Comanche girl child. He’d seen him at least twice break off from the main party, pretending he was following up a side trail. Once he was out of sight of the other vigilantes the breed would pull out a green bottle and take a copious swig from it.

  Already the shootist had spotted something that he was certain the Indian tracker had missed. At some point the riders had given up their horses to one man. It was clear from the spread and the direction of the hoof marks, as well as the depth in the soft earth, that there was just a single man leading all five animals.

  So where had they gone?

  ‘There’s the rig.’

  It was a conventional, high-sided, canvas-shrouded Conestoga wagon, rattling along, pulled by a slow-moving pair of oxen, their flanks steaming slightly as the temperature slipped down towards evening. The drapes at the rear of the rig were laced shut and the posse couldn’t see who rode the box. Wyndham motioned his vigilantes forwards, calling out as he went.

  ‘Ho, there. Ho! Rein in, whoever you are.’

  The rig rattled on as though the driver was asleep, or deaf.

  ‘This is a legal posse and I demand you stop, or we’ll bring you down.’

  ‘Well said, Reverend,’ hissed one of the men at his shoulder.

  But still the wagon rolled.

  The eighteen men of the pursuing group all heeled forwards, closing in. The leaders pulling level with the front of the rig. There was a hunched up figure on the box with the reins held slackly in his hands. Or, her hands? It was hard to tell. The person was so muffled in layers of blankets and woolen scarves that it could have been either man or woman. So little sign of life showed that it could almost even have been a corpse.

  ‘Hey, there!’ shouted Wyndham, using his finest open-air, river crossing meeting voice.

  At last the driver seemed to hear. Jerking into slow life and pulling in on the team, bringing them to a ponderous halt.

  ‘Where you headed, mister?’ as
ked the minister.

  ‘Yonder,’ replied the shrouded figure, jerking a thumb ahead of the wagon.

  ‘Where from?’ called Blennerhassett.

  The driver pointed behind them. ‘Been on the trail six month now. Aimin’ for Oregon. Got kin there.’

  ‘What’s your name, neighbor?’ said Wyndham, trying to make out a face amid the shadowed layers of clothes. The voice was quavering and hoarse, like an old man with a severe case of bronchitis. And the driver was trembling as if an ague possessed him.

  ‘I’m Michael Pryor, sir.’

  ‘I’m the Reverend Henry Wyndham, priest to the good folks of Stanstead Springs.’

  The driver peered at the stocky figure on the fat grey and nodded. ‘Pleased to

  meet you, Reverend. You look like men on earnest business.’

  ‘We ride to a hanging, Mr. Pryor,’ shouted someone from the crowd.

  ‘Whose would that be?’

  The priest answered. ‘A black-hearted villain they call Herne the Hunter. He and his four murdering friends robbed our bank and slew Edgar Abbott the manager. And the good Widow Britton.’

  ‘And old Bart. Bart Winston,’ prompted someone else in the posse.

  ‘Ah, yes. And we ride after them to bring them to justice.’ He paused. ‘To justice.’

  ‘I wish you luck. Five of ’em, you say.’

  ‘Yes. Have you seen anything of such a band?’

  The old man on the box-seat hesitated. ‘Nope. Can’t say I have. Though I thought I heard horses galloping at a pace off along a high trail to the left. Up that way.’

  He pointed towards the mountains, stark against the clear sky.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Couple of hours back, I guess.’

  ‘You saw them?’ asked Cyrus.

  ‘Nope. I don’t see so good these days, mister. Not so damned good.’

  ‘You alone?’

  ‘I am, Father. I am. I lost my poor dear Martha back at Independence. Now I go alone.’

  There was a boy of fifteen with the vigilantes. Jacob Hendrik. And he called out to the driver. ‘You got somethin’ leakin’ from the bed of your rig, mister. Drippin’ in the mud.’

  ‘What?’

  Just for a moment the old man’s voice seemed to change. To lose its croakiness and become stronger. Worried far beyond the boy’s simple comment.

  ‘Drippin’, there.’

  ‘Yeah, there is.’

  The driver laughed. A harsh, grating sound, like a pasture gate too long without oil. ‘Sure. I didn’t take your meanin’, son. It’s molasses. I had a keg turn over when the rig caught on an old stump a few miles back. I got it righted but there’s still some comin’ on through the planks.’

  ‘Sure seems a lot, mister.’

  The old man suddenly lost interest in the dripping molasses. ‘I got to get goin’, gentlemen. I’ll keep my eyes skinned for them rogues you talked of. Herne, did you say?’

  The Reverend Wyndham nodded. ‘That’s it, Mr. Pryor. Herne. Herne the Hunter.’ Another of his studied pauses. ‘The Hunter.’

  ‘Good luck to you all.’

  He waved a gloved hand, the blankets nearly falling off his scrawny shoulders, so that he had to tug them back on. The priest waved in return, leading his posse away ahead of the rig, looking for a way to reach the left trail where Pryor had said he’d heard horses moving fast.

  The sound of the vigilantes faded away into the distance. The driver still sat, silent, not making any attempt to move the oxen on. Finally, several minutes later, he threw off the blankets, vaulting down from the seat and peering where there was a wet pool of stickiness under the rig.

  ‘Fuckin’ blood,’ he said.

  Inside the wagon there was muffled laughter. The twins had been sitting on one side of the bed, leaning back against a pile of blankets. Dermot’s boots were resting on the face of Hebe Haroldson, leaving a smear of dirt on her white cheek. His spur had snagged on the wrinkled skin near the eye, bringing a trickle of slow blood.

  The smallest of the gang, Joey, was sitting comfortably astride the chest of Ezekiel Haroldson, amusing himself with carving delicate patterns on the old man’s face with the needle point of a short-bladed knife.

  It was his weight on the blank-eyed corpse that had squeezed out some of the blood and nearly betrayed them all.

  ‘Beech’ll be back with our horses in an hour or so,’ said George Wright. Then we’ll get on. Free as birds.’ And he laughed.

  Though the Stanstead Springs posse was well off on a fool’s chase, Wright wouldn’t have been, so happy if he’d looked far above and behind them, seeing the solitary figure among the trees, on a black stallion.

  Watching them in silence.

  Chapter Seven

  It was growing colder.

  That evening there were flurries of snow down at the lower levels of the trail. Herne realized that his plans for getting to California were receding further and further from probability, passing beyond the limits of realistic possibility. The passes would be closed any day now.

  But he was progressing. The gang were in his sights, and the vigilantes had gone blundering off on a false track.

  It was difficult. To be caught by the posse would be the worst of news. With the lynching fever coursing through their veins there wouldn’t be a lot of chance of convincing them he wasn’t Herne the Hunter. Especially as he was. From hanging parties he’d seen the shootist figured that there was an average of less than an hour between being caught and being hung. Posses were notoriously disinterested in listening to protestations of innocence.

  So killing the five robbers wouldn’t be enough. He’d need proof. The head of the leader would be sufficient. In that kind of cold it would remain recognizable long enough for him to get it identified and himself cleared.

  He decided that his best bet was to come in close to the bandits’ camp that night and find out what he could about them.

  Around ten there was a longer period of steady snow, thick enough to coat the trail and lie crisp along the branches of the trees. The clouds were low and covered up the moon, making tracking in on the robbers easy.

  The negro had returned to join them, bringing the horses with him. And all five now sat around a small fire. Safe enough as there was no chance of seeing smoke at night and the prevailing wind was carrying the scent away south, in the opposite direction to the posse. And the forest was dense enough to mask it from a casual passer-by. Not that you got many casual travelers that late into the Colorado fall.

  Herne had left his rifle with his stallion, tied safely out of trouble a quarter mile along a side trail to the left. A long gun wouldn’t be of much use to him in a night raid at close quarters. All he really wanted to do was get close enough to hear their plans and maybe find out more about them. Who they were. Whether they were after any more banks. What kind of opposition they were likely to provide for him.

  The chill bit through his clothes as he walked carefully among the silent, sky-scraping trees. His boots crunched into the snow but he didn’t bother to take any great caution. Time for that when he got closer to the camp. There was enough light for him to see his own breath pluming out ahead of him in the darkness.

  He heard the robbers before he saw them. Raucous laughter from one of them. Then high-pitched giggling that he guessed was the black.

  It had been the black who’d stabbed the old lady on the wagon. Leaning from his saddle and swinging with a casual athletic ease up on the seat. Driving in a short, broad-bladed knife, piercing the old-timer’s back. The negro had then disappeared inside the rig and Herne had been close enough to hear the single, muffled cry as the husband went quickly to join his wife.

  There was the fire.

  Glittering like a nest of rubies among the black trunks of the pines. When he crept closer, setting each foot down with infinite slowness, he could see the silhouettes of the five men, sitting hunched around the flames, backs towards him. They were talking animatedly. The shoot
ist was surprised to see that they hadn’t bothered to put out a sentry at all, feeling themselves safe.

  When he was within ten paces Herne stopped and slithered down into a crouch, behind a tree, where he could still see the gang, and hear their conversation.

  Despite the falling temperatures and the flurries of hail and snow, the shootist didn’t move a muscle for the next hour. Enduring discomfort that would have reduced most white men to the brink of tears. But he’d lived and fought long enough with and against the Indian tribes to know what true suffering was. Once he’d taken part in an Apache raid and laid for a day and two nights under six inches of baking earth. Not moving for anything. Relieving himself where he lay. Enduring the heat and the cold and the muscle pain.

  The wait in the snow was nothing to Herne.

  He learned all their names. Wright was clearly the leader, dominating the conversations, roaring with laughter at his own jokes. He was delighted with the way their murder of the old couple had sent the posse off on a wild hog chase. Herne was surprised at the closeness of the friendship between Wright and the slight figure of the man called Joey. George frequently touched the other man on the shoulder and the shootist began to wonder whether they were a couple of brownholers. Plenty of that kind of thing went on in most prisons and it wouldn’t have surprised him at all.

  And it was a classic coupling. The tall, tough, masculine Wright and the slender Joey.

  It didn’t affect Jed at all. It didn’t interest him or disgust him. He just accepted that some men preferred other men.

  Herne didn’t.

  ‘Know what he said?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Want to hear?’

  Dermot O’Sullivan laughed. ‘Come on, George. Tell us.’

  ‘Sure. He said that he’d never seen one with teeth before!’

  He leaned over and banged the other twin on the shoulder, nearly knocking him sideways, bellowing his own merriment. The rest of the men joining in. Joey’s giggling rising and circling above the deeper voices of the others.