The Floating Outfit 35

by J. T. Edson

  ‘And sent the ’breed on ahead to dicker the way by the Kweharehnuh for them?’ asked Laurie.

  ‘Something like that,’ agreed the blond youngster.

  ‘Would Glover’ve made enough money to be able to pay for that many rep—’ the Kid began, then his head swiveled around and he pointed. ‘Hey. Look there!’

  Following the direction indicated by the Kid, Waco and Laurie found that a cavalry patrol was coming towards them. Fanned out in line abreast, ten privates flanked a first lieutenant, sergeant and civilian scout. Unlike the posse, who had returned their rifles to the saddleboots, the soldiers carried their Springfield carbines in their hands.

  ‘Halt!’ yelled the officer, apparently addressing the posse, for his own men kept moving. ‘Halt in the name of the United States Government.’

  ‘Means us, I’d say,’ drawled the Kid.

  ‘Best do it,’ Waco commented, studying the officer’s non-regulation white planter’s hat, shoulder-long brown hair, the buckskin jacket over an official blue shirt and Western-style gunbelt. ‘He reckons he’s ole Yellow Hair Custer.’

  Stopping their horses, Laurie’s party watched the patrol advancing in what looked suspiciously like a skirmishing line. Instead of riding straight up, the lieutenant brought his men to a halt about fifty yards away. The soldiers did not boot their carbines. Rather they shifted the weapons to a position of greater readiness which the Kid, for one, found disconcerting and annoying.

  ‘Who are you men?’ demanded the officer in a harsh, challenging tone.

  ‘The sheriff of Wichita County and his posse,’ Laurie called back, moving slowly around so that his badge of office would be visible. ‘Don’t you remember me, Sergeant Gamba?’

  ‘It’s him all right, sir,’ declared the stocky Italian non-com.

  Not until he had received the assurance did the officer show any sign of relaxing. Ordering his men to sling their carbines, he rode forward. Asking the Kid to accompany him, Laurie went to meet the patrol.

  ‘What brings you out this way, sheriff?’ asked the officer, without the formality of an introduction.

  ‘I was after the Glover gang,’ Laurie replied. ‘They robbed the bank at Wichita Falls.’

  ‘Did you catch them?’

  ‘Nope. The Kweharehnuh turned us back.’

  ‘Kweharehnuh!’ repeated the officer eagerly. ‘Did they attack you?’

  ‘Just told us to turn back,’ corrected the sheriff.

  ‘And, of course, you obeyed,’ the lieutenant said dryly.

  ‘Seeing’s how there was twenty or more of ’em, all toting Winchesters or Spencers,’ the Kid put in, ‘it seemed like a right smart thing to do.’

  ‘There were only twenty of them?’

  ‘Maybe twenty-four, or -six. I didn’t stop to take no careful trail count on them, mister. ’Specially when they could right soon get more to help out should they need ’em.’

  ‘Where do I find them?’ the officer demanded and a light of battle glowed in his eyes.

  ‘Was you loco enough to go looking, they’re maybe four, five miles back,’ the Kid replied. ‘All ’cepting two scouts who’re watching us talking to you.’

  ‘I don’t see any scouts,’ announced the lieutenant, after taking a cursory glance at the surrounding country.

  ‘That figures,’ the Kid sniffed. ‘They’re not fixing to be seen.’

  Although the officer, his name was Raynor, heard the words, he ignored both them and the speaker. An ardent admirer of General George Armstrong Custer and a disciple of his policy towards Indians, Raynor saw the chance of coming to the notice of his superiors. Oblivious of the fact that he commanded a mere ten men, and they barely beyond the recruit stage, he was prepared to take on whatever force the Kweharehnuh might have at hand. If there was honor and distinction to be gained, however, he did not intend to share it with an obscure civilian peace officer.

  ‘Wait here for an hour, sheriff,’ Raynor ordered. ‘Then we’ll accompany you after the outlaws.’

  ‘But—!’ Laurie gasped, realizing what the officer meant to do.

  ‘Handling Indians comes under the jurisdiction of the United States Army,’ Raynor interrupted pompously. ‘And this is far beyond the boundaries of Wichita County.’

  ‘You mean you’re fixing to lock horns with them Kweharehnuh, growled the Kid, ‘knowing they’re all toting repeaters?’

  ‘I shall do my duty as I see it, cowboy,’ Raynor replied. ‘If you’ll wait here, sheriff, I’ll send back word when it’s safe for you to join me.’

  Chapter Three – You’re Letting Them Get Killed

  Riding westwards once more at a slow walk, the posse heard the crashing of many shots from where the cavalry patrol had disappeared into a valley. It could not be said that the sound came as any great surprise to Sheriff Laurie and his companions.

  Stubbornly refusing to listen to the Kid’s warning, and overriding the sheriff’s offers of assistance, 1st Lieutenant Raynor had insisted on taking his small body of men in search of the Kweharehnuh. Nothing anybody had said came close to persuading him that he was acting in a foolishly dangerous manner. The two scouts had either concealed themselves exceptionally well, or withdrawn at the sight of the posse meeting the patrol. So, on his own scout failing to locate them, Raynor had made it clear that he doubted if they had ever existed.

  When the Kid had tried to pass his warning to Sergeant Gamba, Raynor had flown into a rage and threatened to arrest him for trying to seduce members of the United States Army from their duty. Laurie’s intervention had saved the officer from paying the penalty for such in: cautious, ill-advised behavior. Unfortunately, the damage had been done. Filled with an over-inflated sense of his own importance, Raynor had taken the Kid’s words as a personal affront and refused to discuss the matter further. Repeating his order for the posse to remain at that spot until his men had cleared a way through the Indians, Raynor had set off to meet his destiny.

  If it had not been for the very real danger of Raynor stirring up an Indian war, Laurie might have left the officer to his fate. As things stood, the civilians knew that they must back up the military. Allowing the patrol to cover about three-quarters of a mile, the sheriff had followed with his men.

  Absorbed in daydreams of the acclaim his victory over the Kweharehnuh would bring, Raynor had remained in ignorance of the flagrant disobedience shown by the civilians. Concentrating on the range ahead, for they had taken the Kid’s warning seriously, Gamba and the scout had evidently decided that they could forget the danger of an attack from the rear. None of the other soldiers had seen sufficient service to take the precaution of maintaining an all round watch in such a situation.

  ‘Come up careful!’ snapped the Kid, making another of his spectacular changes from the borrowed horse—remounted on his return from the interview with Kills Something—to his stallion and sending it leaping forward.

  Before starting to follow the soldiers, the members of the posse had drawn their rifles. Armed and ready for battle, they set off after the Kid. Their horses might still have been walking, the way the big white—unburdened by a saddle and other equipment—drew ahead of them.

  Despite the urgency of the situation, the Kid did not forget his lessons in the art of making war Nemenuh-fashion. He scanned the rim of the valley, searching for any scouts the Kweharehnuh might have placed there. Not that he really expected to find them. Acting as scouts was work for the younger braves, but not at such a moment. No properly raised Nemenuh warrior would be willing to take such a passive role when there was honor to be won, coups available to be counted and loot for the gathering. So the whole bunch he had met earlier would be involved in the ambush.

  Given just a smidgen of good Texas luck, the posse’s arrival might not be detected until it was too late for the Kweharehnuh to deal with them.

  Approaching the rim, the Kid signaled for his horse to stop. Even before its forward momentum had ceased, he quit its back and ran on. Dropping to his st
omach, he wriggled to the edge of the valley and looked over. He had expected to find the patrol in difficulties; but not in that deep.

  Below the Kid, the slope descended at an easy angle and was covered with a coating of rocks and bushes. It formed one side of a narrow, winding valley through which the posse had earlier followed the Glover gang. At the time, it had struck the Kid as a good place for an ambush. Studying what lay before him, he found that his judgment had been very accurate.

  Raynor sprawled motionless on his back halfway across the bottom. Close by lay his scout, his skull a hideous mess where a heavy-caliber Spencer’s bullet had torn through it. One private and four dead horses completed the toll taken by the Kweharehnuh’s opening volley.

  Hunched behind a rock at the foot of the slope, his right arm dangling limp and bloody from where a .44 Winchester ball had struck it, Sergeant Gamba held a long-barreled Peacemaker in his left hand and yelled encouragement to his remaining men. They had lost all their horses, the Kid observed, and apparently most of their ammunition. Crouching in whatever cover they could find, they still returned the hail of lead which came hurling their way from various points on the other slope. So far, the Kweharehnuh remained concealed except for brief appearances to rise and throw shots at the soldiers.

  Nearer rumbled the hooves of the posse’s horses. The sound slammed the Kid back to reality. There was only one way in which his party could hope to save the remnants of the patrol. Done properly, it would inflict such a defeat on the Kweharehnuh as to chill their desire for further riding of the war trail.

  Swiftly the Kid backed away from the rim and rose. Turning, he sprinted towards his companions, waving for them to halt. While uncertain of what he wanted, the sheriff was willing to back him up. Reining in his own horse, Laurie yelled for the others to stop. All but Narrow obeyed. Every bit as hotheaded and reckless as the late Lieutenant Raynor, the deputy was too excited by the prospect of a fight to take notice of what went on around him.

  The Kid spat out a curse. All too well he knew the way of the Comanche braves in that kind of a fight. Only by acting as he wanted could the posse hope to be effective in their rescue bid. So he did not mean to let the deputy spoil the plan he had in mind.

  Flinging himself forward, the Kid shot out his left hand to grab the reins of Narrow’s horse close to the bridle’s curb chain. With a jerk, he caused the animal to turn so abruptly that it nearly fell and almost unseated its rider. By dropping his rifle and clutching the horn in both hands, Narrow saved himself from being dislodged. Rage flared in his eyes as he glared down at the Kid’s unsmiling, Comanche-savage face. At that moment, the Indian-dark cowhand looked anything but young and innocent.

  ‘What the hell—?’ the deputy snarled.

  ‘Get down, pronto!’ answered the Kid, still holding the reins. ‘If you don’t, I’ll gut this critter and you for making me do it!’ Then he swung his gaze to the other men. ‘Get off them hosses and head for the rim. Be careful. Don’t let the Injuns see you and don’t start shooting until I give the word.’

  ‘Do it!’ Waco advised, leaping to the ground. The fact that the Kid had said ‘Injuns’ instead of ‘Kweharehnuh’ gave the youngster some notion of how urgently and seriously he regarded the situation.

  ‘Come on, boys!’ Laurie went on and set the townsmen an example by dismounting to dart after Waco on foot.

  Leaving their horses ground-hitched by the trailing reins, the four men headed towards the rim. Retaining his grip on Narrow’s reins, the Kid watched them. He nodded in satisfaction when he saw that his orders were being carried out to the letter. Then he turned his eyes to meet the deputy’s.

  ‘On your feet, or not at all, hombre,’ the Kid warned. ‘And make up your mind fast.’

  ‘All right,’ Narrow answered and swung from his saddle.

  While the deputy checked his rifle, the Kid joined their companions on the rim. Still the steady rain of bullets flew from the opposite slope, being answered by an ever-decreasing response from the soldiers. So far, fortunately, the Kweharehnuh did not appear to have realized that a new factor had entered the game.

  ‘No shooting!’ the Kid gritted, hearing Hobart’s low- spoken exclamation of anger and seeing him lining his rifle.

  ‘You’re letting them get killed!’ Narrow raged, having arrived and flattened himself alongside Waco. ‘And I’m damned if I’ll stand by—’

  ‘You shoot and so do I,’ the blond threatened, twisting to thrust the muzzle of his rifle into the deputy’s side. ‘Lon knows what he’s doing.’

  ‘Get set!’ ordered the Kid, moving his rifle into position and watching the way in which the Kweharehnuh braves exposed themselves for longer periods when rising to shoot at the soldiers. ‘They’ll be charging—Now!’

  Suddenly, bringing the final word of the Kid’s warning in a sharp, loud crack, stocky warriors seemed to spout from their places of concealment.

  ‘Brave up, brothers!’ roared a young tehnap who wore as his war-medicine a head-dress with a pair of pronghorn antelope horns large enough to turn a white trophy hunter wild with envy. ‘This is a good day to die!’

  With their repeaters cracking as fast as the levers could be worked—and, in the case of the Spencers, the hammers cocked manually—the warriors hurled themselves eagerly towards the soldiers.

  It was an awe-inspiring sight and made more so by the ear-splitting war-whoops which burst from each brave’s lips as he charged. No bunch of unblooded soldiers, especially after having been so badly mauled, could be expected to remain unaffected in the face of such an assault. Their heads having been filled with old soldiers’ stories of the consequences of defeat when Indian-fighting, the remnants of the patrol showed signs of panic. Desperately Sergeant Gamba tried to rally them.

  Everything seemed to be going exactly as the Kweharehnuh wanted.

  All but for one small, yet very significant detail.

  In their excitement, the Antelopes had either overlooked or discounted the posse. Even worse for them, they had forgotten the presence of the black-dressed ride-plenty who had been educated as a Comanche and won himself the man-name Cuchilo.

  The Kid had known that, no matter how advantageous it might be, the younger braves would not content themselves with a long-distance fight against an all but beaten enemy. Coups counted by personal contact rated too highly for that. So he had been determined to keep his party’s presence unsuspected until the moment when their intervention would carry the greatest weight.

  ‘Fire!’ snapped the sheriff, at last understanding why the Kid had insisted upon waiting.

  Seven rifles crashed in a ragged volley, followed by the eighth as Waco swung his Winchester away from Narrow. Down went the young tehnap, hit by three bullets. His antelope horn medicine had proved ineffective. Death took two more of the braves at almost the same moment. A fourth screamed and crumpled forward as red-hot lead drilled through his thigh, and a fifth’s ‘yellow boy’ was sent spinning from his grasp.

  ‘Pour it into them!’ Laurie roared, his sights swinging away from the tehnap who had led the charge.

  Even as he worked the lever of his Winchester, the Kid knew that he had not been the only one to send a bullet into the tehnap. Waco would have selected another warrior, knowing how the Kid’s mind worked. Probably the sheriff and that loud-mouthed deputy had gone for the buck as the most profitable—or in Narrow’s case, the most impressive—target. Not that the Kid devoted much attention to the matter, being more concerned with saving what was left of the patrol.

  Caught in the withering blast of fire, the braves’ assault wavered. Another two warriors tumbled to the ground and the rest came to an uncertain halt.

  ‘Get at them!’ bellowed the Kid, leaping to his feet.

  Giving the ringing war-yell of the Pehnane, the dark cowhand bounded down the incline with the agility of a bighorn ram in a hurry. He knew that the posse must press home its advantage and avoid permitting the braves to recover. There was no sign of Ki
lls Something, or the three oldest tehnaps. That figured. Warriors of their standing had earned sufficient honors and would be more respected if they stayed in the background and increased the chances of the younger brave-hearts to count coup. Seeing the attack brought to a halt, they would either rush up to give their support, or remain concealed ready to cover the other braves’ retreat. In either event, they would be a force to be reckoned with. So, as he ran and cut loose with his rifle, the Kid kept a careful watch for the quartet of experienced fighters.

  Waco was the first to follow the Kid’s lead, beating Laurie to it by a fraction of a second. Not that the four townsmen lagged behind. Thrusting themselves to their feet, they rushed after the sheriff and cowhands. Only Narrow remained on the rim. Already his Winchester had accounted for the buck with the pronghorn head-dress and, he felt sure, cut down another Kweharehnuh. He wanted to increase his tally and, shooting on the run being notoriously inaccurate, he doubted if he could do it by leaving his present position.

  Twisting around ready to run away, a soldier saw the approaching figures. For a moment he seemed to be on the verge of raising the revolver which dangled in his right hand. Then, recognizing that help was on hand, he turned to use the weapon against the Comanches. By his actions, he spurred his companions into continuing their resistance. They resumed their firing, adding to the Kweharehnuhs’ confusion.

  An uneasy sensation of having missed something began to eat at the Kid as he passed the soldiers. Another two strides brought him almost to the foot of the slope and produced a realization of what he had missed. While Kills Something and the older tehnaps would have allowed their less experienced companions to carry out the ambush, they ought to be taking a hand now things had gone wrong.

  So where in hell might they be?

  The outcome of the affair could easily hang upon the answer to that vitally important question.