She looked down at him. “What are you going to d o Now?”
He shrugged, and tried to smile. “Drift, I guess. Wha t else is there to do?”
“You could go back into the Army. Or you could be a n engineer. Frank Paddock told Uncle Cart that you wer e one of the best in your class at the Point.”
“I won’t do it lying here.” He started to get up and fel t a sharp twinge of pain.
Betty put her hands on her shoulders and pressed hi m back. *Tou stay there! You are in no condition—’*
He was smiling. She flushed and quickly took he r hands from his shoulders. “Uncle Cart said you were t o stay in bed,” she said primly.
“Ever been to California?” he asked.
“Californiar?”
“It’s a nice place for a honeymoon,” he said.
Dave Sproul tiptoed across his saloon and peere d through a crack in the shuttered window. The street wa s still … no horses, nothing.
He went back to his quarters, where he knelt an d lifted a board in the floor; he could look down into a n opening between two of the foundation blocks. He too k two sacks of gold from the hole and stuffed them into hi s saddlebags.
After a last look around, he went to the door an d looked across the yard toward the barn. Nothing stirre d there.
They were all gone. Everybody was gone. He ha d been whipped and they had all turned tail and left him.
But he knew it was not only that he had been beaten , but that they all knew an order had been issued for hi s arrest on the testimony of Mary Tall Singer. Selling gun s to the Indians … They had other evidence, he supposed , and undoubtedly Kilrone would testify.
They could send him to prison. Dave Sproul faced th e fact; he had never dodged reality, and reality in thi s case meant the law. Well, the West was a big country , and there was always a new name, a new place, an d a new beginning.
He went out the back door, closed it softly, and wen t to the barn. His horse was already saddled, the pac k horse loaded. He would ride east, avoid towns, and reac h the railroad in Wyoming.
He was stiff and sore, his head throbbing with th e heavy ache left from the fight, his face battered almos t beyond recognition. He chuckled … anyone who sa w him now would not recognize him.
The horses were ones he had never used before.
There was every chance he would get away; and he ha d money banked with WeDs Fargo, as well as that h e carried with him.
He went along the East Fork trail, camped the firs t night on Raven Creek, and at daybreak was well awa y on the route he had chosen, riding southeast. By nightfal l he was hunting a camping spot along Wolf Creek.
He was safely away. By the time he got to the railroa d he would have grown a beard, and within a month h e would be back in business. To hell with them! The y couldn’t stop him. As for Kilrone … the son-of-a-gu n could hit, damn him … One day Kilrone would b e riding or sitting down to eat and he would get a bulle t right between the eyes.
That Indian girl, too. No wonder she was alway s around, watching, listening, saying nothing much. He’d figured she’d been gone on him, and all the while sh e was gathering evidence. He’d have a bullet for her too.
Sproul was not a frontier man, or a wilderness man , and he did not have the instincts and had not develope d the senses as a man accustomed to living in those far-ou t places does. He found his camping place now, built a fire, and put water on to boil for coffee.
Far up on the slope he caught a flash of sunlight o n something—probably it was mica or some other minera l formation. He picketed his horses, and was walking bac k to the campfire when the bullet hit him.
It took him right between the shoulder blades an d turned him halfway around. He fell heavily, but got hi s hands under himself and, blindly, like a stricken animal , dragged himself toward the fire.
Medicine Dog wanted horses. Horses were importan t to an Indian: they made him a big man among his people.
And the lone man he had seen had two fine animals.
The Dog came down off the slope, approached th e camp warily, and saw the man lying there, sprawle d out. It was not until he turned him over that he saw wh o it was he had shot.
The Dog gave a grim chuckle. It was an odd thin g that this should be the man he had killed. He wa s tugging the watch chain from Sproul’s vest when Sprou l opened his eyes. “Dog!” he said. “I—”
Medicine Dog ignored him, and ripped the nugge t chain and the watch from the vest. Sproul was wearin g a gunbelt, so the Dog pulled that off too. Sproul tried t o sit up, and the Dog calmly smashed him on the skul l with the butt of his rifle and continued his looting.
When he had gathered all he wanted, the Do g dumped some coffee into the boiling water and after a while he drank some. He glanced toward the whit e man—he felt nothing toward him at all.
After some time he mounted one of the horses and , leading the other, was about to leave. But he pause d beside the body of Dave Sproul. Holding his Wincheste r in one hand, he pointed the muzzle at the fallen ma n and shot him again. Then he rode away, returning to th e horses he had left in the hills.
The remains of the coffee boiled away, the coffe e grounds burned, and the fire died out. Once, when onl y a few coals were left, the man moved slightly, then la y still.
Kilrone (1966) Page 16