Lake of Fire

by Linda Jacobs

  While she watched, he drew rein and looked toward the dock, where an eddy of pale smoke rose from the still-floating ruined hulk. Hank stood on the bank with Alexandra. Though he still wore his torn, soot-stained white shirt and gray trousers, she had changed into a lavender dress.

  Danny smirked like he had at the stagecoach when he’d discovered her little pistol and pocketed it.

  Laura waited in the trees, impatient to be about her mission. But she dared not move as long as Danny was in the area.

  In a few minutes, Hank and Alexandra turned away from the wreck, went up the slope and into the hotel, no doubt for the breakfast Laura was skipping. Once they disappeared from view, Danny made a clicking sound with his tongue and nudged his palomino into motion.

  As soon as he was out of sight, Laura raced across the meadow to the stable. As quietly as she could, she opened the door and went inside. This early, the interior was dim and cool.

  “Help you, miss?” one of the stablemen called.

  Taking a breath of the manure-scented air, Laura tried not to act rushed as she walked down the aisle. When she reached White Bird, she put out a hand and petted her on the withers. “I’d like to have this one saddled and take her for a morning ride.”

  Hopefully, Feddors hadn’t put out any orders that she was not to have a horse.

  The tackie, dressed in denim and a plaid shirt, hesitated. “White Bird is one of the army mounts.”

  Laura tried to appear relaxed. “Yes, I know. Sergeant Nevers wanted me to try her out.”

  The stableman smiled with teeth white against his chocolate skin. “Sure thing, miss. But if you don’ mind my sayin’ so, you need to wear something a lil’ warmer.”

  “I’ll just walk her over to where I’m staying and change,” Laura lied.

  “Sure thing. Sure thing. Jus’ take a little while.”

  A few minutes later, Laura accepted the reins, along with a heavy canteen.

  “You should take a lunch, too.” He offered a paper sack from a box that must have been sent down from the hotel kitchen.

  “That’s a good idea, but I should be back before long.” Nonetheless, she accepted the bag.

  The first question was which direction Cord would go. North led toward Mammoth and Feddors’s fabled stockade. Southwest along the lakeshore was beside a busy road; busier with the Alexandra no longer in service. If Laura wanted to hide, she’d go east through the passes until she was out of Captain Feddors’s jurisdiction.

  Trying to appear casual, she rode slowly until she was out of sight of the stable. Then she urged White Bird to a quicker pace, following the lakeshore trail until she reached the place where the Yellowstone River flowed north out of the water body. There she drew rein and looked around.

  The path continued to the north along the riverbank. The Grand Loop Road ran close alongside.

  She looked at the ground for tracks, but there was no way to tell which way Cord and Dante might have gone. At this rate, she might as well turn back.

  CHAPTER TWENTYSIX

  JUNE 29

  The posse passed the abandoned cabin and pushed on to the north. Larry Nevers rode on the right flank, closest to the Yellowstone River.

  He felt a little sick. He’d liked Cord Sutton from the moment he came into the soldier station. In his opinion, the best thing Sutton had done was publicly humiliating Feddors. Or the worst.

  Hopefully, they were on the wrong track, but Larry doubted it. If the army were after him, he’d swim his horse across the Yellowstone and go east through the mountains.

  Ahead on the short stretch of the Grand Loop Road they were following, there seemed to be a commotion. A tourist wagon had stopped and the group was out, pointing and staring down toward the river. When the posse drew closer, the driver stepped into the road and waved his arms.

  Without slowing, Feddors ordered, “Nevers. Deal with this.”

  He hated to do it. If they caught up to Sutton, he wanted to be there.

  “Sir, yes sir!” he clipped out, slowing his horse. “Trouble with the wagon?” he called to the gray-bearded driver.

  A nearby woman wearing a ridiculous feathered hat gestured toward the Yellowstone.

  The driver grimaced. “One of the passengers hollered at me to stop. Saw what looks like a body.”

  Larry handed his reins to the driver and went to the edge of the road. Down the slope to the riverbank, he side-footed until he got a look at what appeared to be a man washed up on the opposite shore.

  Cord wiped sweat from his brow as he rode. He’d boldly followed the Grand Loop Road past the outlet of the Yellowstone, north along the west riverbank, and crossed where it ran placid and shallow above the rushing cataract of LeHardy Rapids. Heading back over marshy ground, he’d caught his first glimpse of the men trailing him in the broad meadow west of Ebro Springs.

  Last night, he’d hidden in the trees along the shore and watched Hank’s boat burn with a fierce satisfaction. And stayed around long enough to know he’d be hunted down as the arsonist.

  Now, on the east side of Pelican Valley, he angled along the southern edge of the trees at the base of Sulphur Hills, surveying the terrain and considering options. The shortest distance out of the park as the crow flew would be to head up Bear Creek on the west slope of Mount Chittenden and make it out through Jones Pass.

  But the Bluecoats came on through knee-deep grass beside the shining waters of Pelican Creek. The stream meandered in tight loops, seeming to echo and reecho itself between the abandoned loops of previous courses.

  His pursuers reached a particularly nasty stretch of bog that held a few feet of water and were forced to slow. But they were close, too close.

  If Cord hadn’t lost his wayakin, would this streak of rotten luck be running?

  He pulled his Colt and looked at the wax seal Sergeant Nevers had attached to it. Yellowstone’s laws against guns did not seem to consider what threats a man might find there. Cracking the sealing wax, he used his knife to cut the tape around the trigger. Then he took some ammunition from his saddlebag and loaded the revolver, one chamber at a time. One more offense wouldn’t change Feddors’s mind about him if he were caught.

  Men pointed in Cord’s direction and veered toward him.

  His only escape now would be the wooded slopes on the northern side of Pelican Creek. He’d never be able to cross the open valley to get up Bear Creek.

  From behind, he heard Feddors shout, “Shoot the sum bitch before he gets away!”

  Cord’s shoulder blades tensed; he waited for the impact of bullet on flesh. After it was done, it would be justified as a guilty man fleeing the scene, a man who attempted to murder Hank by burning his boat.

  A bullet whined past his ear. Another plugged his saddlebag.

  Lying out flat along Dante’s neck, he spurred him on toward the thick forest that ringed the valley. It was just a matter of yards, but it looked like miles as another bullet grazed the side of Dante’s neck, plowing a dark red furrow.

  Laura chafed against returning to the Absaroka Suite, to having a bath and dressing in the feminine clothing her aunt had left in her wardrobe. To lunch in the charming dining room with a view, while she wondered if Cord had been hunted down like an animal.

  Admitting defeat was the last thing she wanted, but she was no tracker.

  As she turned White Bird back toward the hotel, a sharp crack, followed by a rising pitch rang out on the other side of the river. She jerked the reins. “Sorry,

  girl.”

  Soldiers? Shooting at Cord? Who else had guns when the tourists were prohibited a working weapon?

  Of course, there was someone else who defied all rules, cooking squirrel with his rifle propped beside the fire.

  Another volley of shots went off.

  Laura looked over her shoulder toward the infirmary where her father lay. As she’d written in her burned missive, at some level she loved her parent.

  Even so, she turned White Bird to face the Yellowsto
ne.

  Another shot sounded.

  She urged the mare to the edge of the water. The memory of being swept up by the Snake made her breath come fast … thinking of bone-chilling cold and a tangle of deadfall almost made her turn back.

  “Let’s go, girl.” At her direction, White Bird waded in.

  Laura caught her bottom lip in her teeth as the water rose over the mare’s flanks. She couldn’t do this … Water rose, emerald silk floating slimy against her legs.

  Her knees were wet, her thighs. White Bird’s feet left the bottom. The water was around Laura’s waist and trying to float her.

  She gave up sidesaddle and gripped the horse with both legs. Leaning forward, she wrapped her arms around White Bird’s neck.

  This wasn’t working; they were being swept downstream the way Dante had. And above the splashes of White Bird’s swimming, there came a more ominous sound. Somewhere around the blind bend of the river, there were rapids.

  White Bird struggled to keep her nose above water.

  Though every instinct told Laura to cling to the animal, she slung her leg back across and lowered herself into the water on the down-current side. With a death grip on the saddle horn, she made sure the reins were around her arm and took her weight off White

  Bird.

  Would Cord be proud if he could see her? Was he alive to care?

  White Bird’s hooves took purchase on the bottom; then she was swept on a little farther.

  Finally, she struggled and found footing. With Laura hanging on, a drag on the saddle, she staggered out of the river.

  Laura let go and landed on her feet. With no time to waste, she remounted and rode in the direction of the shots.

  Dripping wet, she should be freezing. She should be thinking about what she’d do if whoever had a gun decided to take a bead on her.

  She pressed on.

  Ahead, suddenly, there was light. A valley, covered in lush grass opened up between the lake and the forest, stretching to the east. A stream meandered across its floor.

  And a cavalryman on foot led a horse with a man’s body slung across its back.

  Laura recognized the soldier. “Sergeant Nevers! That is, Larry.”

  Was that Cord?

  “Miss Fielding.” He doffed his cap. “… Laura. What are you doing out here?” He looked with disbelief at her soaking clothes; even her hair was wet.

  “I …” She could say she was taking a ride, but who would ford the Yellowstone for sport? “I … heard shots.”

  Her heart raced while she waited to know.

  Larry gave her a steady look. “You were afraid the posse had shot Sutton.” His tone said he knew about her and Cord.

  “He’s not … ?” She stared at the man’s motionless legs, not long enough to be Cord’s, she saw that now, ashamed to be so relieved. “Who is he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Laura brought White Bird closer and took in the brown suit, matted brown hair, and pale forehead. “That’s Edgar Young, Cord’s banker.”

  “Looks like there was a knife fight and someone dumped him in the river.” Something in Larry’s face changed.

  “Will he be all right?”

  “He’s breathing.”

  She looked at the motionless form. A person in this condition often never woke, or if they did, they were changed in some monstrous way. If that were true of Edgar, he might not ever be able to tell what happened.

  “I saw you this morning,” she told Larry. “Riding out with Feddors.”

  “The rest of them have gone on. I stopped to take care of … Edgar.”

  Laura focused on Larry’s eyes, enormous behind his spectacles. “Cord is a good man. He couldn’t have burned Hank’s boat, and he would never have fought Edgar.”

  “I’d like to think that’s true.”

  As soon as Larry headed toward the infirmary with Edgar, Laura surveyed the valley and the mountains. She saw no one.

  Now that the rush of fording the river had passed, she began to shiver. But there was no time to build a fire and dry her clothes as she and Cord had done after their dunking in the Snake. Had there been, she had no matches. Her sack lunch had gone down the Yellowstone; all she had left was a full canteen.

  This was crazy. She had to turn back.

  But there, on the other side of the valley, barely visible above a rocky cliff, she believed she spied the head of a black horse.

  Laura stood up in the stirrups and waved both arms.

  The figure of a man appeared on the bluff. He wore the blue of Cord’s denims and cotton shirt. For a moment, he stood without moving.

  Then he ducked out of sight.

  This was the sheerest folly, waiting for Laura when he was hunted by a man who wanted nothing more than to kill him outright.

  After evading the posse in the forest, Cord had reined Dante in on a promontory, where he would have sworn his Nez Perce uncle, Bitter Waters, had rested his tired horse back in 1877. Pelican Valley lay behind in the flats, rocky slopes ahead. Here, the tribe had surveyed the valley, looking back for signs that the Bluecoats were still in pursuit.

  Thankfully, the posse had made a turn to the southeast and headed up Bear Creek, clearly understanding Cord would have gone that way to get out of the park as soon as possible.

  If Laura got here soon, they might thread the needle through Mist Creek Pass and come out into the Lamar Valley ahead of Feddors and his men. He would follow the route he remembered traversing when Cappy Parsons had taken him to find women and dairy cows.

  Laura and White Bird reached the upper end of the grassy valley. The day had heated up; flies buzzed around the bloody marks on Laura’s skin where a few bold mosquitoes had braved midday for a feast.

  Though it would be only a little way up through the forest to where she’d seen Cord, Laura had to rest the mare before the climb. The stout girl was a work-horse, but the treacherous footing in the wetlands had winded her. Thankfully, there’d been abundant fresh water and the horse had drunk her fill.

  She loosed the reins and let the mare crop sweet grass, for once they got into the pine forest there would be nothing for her.

  A look around the valley floor confirmed no sign of Feddors and his men. If this were a case of vigilante justice, and she prayed it was unfounded …

  Yet, Cord had left her bed, either before the fire broke out or afterward. There had been doubt in Larry Nevers’s eyes when he spoke of someone dumping Edgar in the river.

  A flash of the night she and Cord had spent together in the stable came back. “I hate that I’m in the middle, neither white nor red … I loathe that supercilious captain who marked me the moment he saw me and won’t let it drop. And I hate myself.”

  How far would a man go if he hated himself and so many others?

  Pushing aside her doubts, she urged White Bird forward. Would Cord have waited or had his ducking out of sight meant he was long on his way?

  To her relief, he came to her on foot. His eyes were bloodshot, his hat and clothing dusty from fast riding. “Are you all right?”

  She nodded.

  He reached to help her down, his hands at her waist. “What are you doing out here?” He took in her ruined silk. Though dry, it bore the shriveled look of having been through a clothes wringer without ironing.

  “Looking for you. Feddors has made up a posse …”

  “I’ve already been shot at, thanks.” He gestured bitterly toward Dante.

  Laura sucked in her breath at the raw red scar across the side of the stallion’s neck. Though no blood ran, the furrow was at least a half-inch deep and crawling with flies Dante kept tossing his head to avoid.

  “I heard the shots.” She tried to sound matter-of-fact. “That’s when I had White Bird swim the river.”

  “You might have been coming to view my body.”

  Laura took a steadying breath. “Dead or alive, I was going to find you.”

  For a moment, they looked at each other, last night and th
e night before swimming to the surface of consciousness. They had to get through to his ranch, and she was ready for whatever it took.

  Somewhere along the way, she’d lost the mind-numbing terror that had marked her first encounter with a raging river, the screaming rush when the grizzly had attacked at the brink of Lewis Canyon. There were more important enemies.

  “I saw Danny this morning, riding around the hotel on his palomino, bold as brass since the soldiers were out after you.”

  “This gets better and better. I suppose you believe I burned Hank’s boat.”

  She hadn’t been certain, but faced with Cord’s injured expression, she did know. If she hadn’t believed in him, she wouldn’t have swum the Yellowstone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  JUNE 29

  Larry Nevers stood guard outside the Lake Infirmary. With one shooting victim inside, and Edgar Young another victim of foul play, he took up his post as naturally as breathing.

  Not long after Edgar was brought in, Manfred Resnick showed up, his hands and clothing sooty from examining the wreck of the Alexandra. “Definitely arson,” he reported. “Somebody went on deck and splashed around a load of kerosene, then must have overturned a lantern.”

  “Somebody?”

  Without answering, Resnick went into the infirmary. Though Larry had no backup watch outside, he went in, also. From the start, he’d felt something about blaming Cord Sutton wasn’t right. Talking with Laura had cemented it.

  Dr. Upshur stood guard in his own way, putting up a hand to stay anyone who would enter the room he had Edgar in. “He’s in grave condition and I won’t have him …”

  He was talking to Resnick’s back, for the Pinkerton man pushed past and went to Edgar’s bedside. “A man in grave condition needs to unburden himself of who harmed him,” Resnick said over his shoulder.

  Larry thought the words “before it’s too late,” hung on the air.

  Resnick peered with his one good eye at the unconscious man. Wasting no time, he dug his thumbnail deeply into the nail bed of Edgar’s index finger.