Calder Brand - Janet Dailey Page 0,44

snorting. Most of the hands had ridden out to the herd. Joe could hear them singing to calm the restless animals. Anything—a lightning bolt, an unexpected sound, or a movement in the dark—could trigger the stampede.

Despite the cold storm, Joe was sweating under his clothes. Rain streamed off his slicker and ran down the horse’s flanks. Ahead, through the murk, he could see the camp. Set on a low rise, it was marked by glowing lanterns that hung from the chuckwagon. The horses would be nearby. On most nights, they would have been turned loose to graze. Tonight, they were bunched inside a rope corral to keep them where they might be needed in case of a stampede.

The corral, which could be put up anywhere, was nothing more than a long rope strung in a circle, supported by a few stakes hammered into the ground. Pulling it down with the horse would be easy. The only challenge would be not getting caught.

Slipping out of the saddle and dropping the reins, he looped one end of his lariat around the nearest stake and wrapped the other around the saddle horn. He was so close to the camp that he could recognize Rusty’s square-built shadow cast by the lanterns against the cover of the chuckwagon.

Joe was about to mount his horse again when, from the rainy darkness beyond the herd, his ears caught a popping sound. For an instant he hoped it might be thunder. But he knew better. It was pistol fire.

One shot, then a second. A pause, then two more, then silence. Not a gunfight. An execution.

Even before he’d thought it out, the nauseous weight in his gut told him the truth. Clem and Slinger were dead. All he could do now was try to get away and save himself.

Chain lightning zigzagged across the sky, striking close. As the thunder boomed, Joe leaped into the saddle. The horse surged forward, jerking out the stake that anchored the rope fence and pulling down one side of the corral. Snorting and whinnying, the horses in the remuda poured through the opening and plunged downhill toward the herd. Spooked by the gunfire and the lightning, the cattle were already stampeding. As they spread over the prairie in a dark wave of thundering hooves and bobbing horns, the men raced to catch the leaders and turn them aside.

Left in the open, Joe was still dragging the stakes and the rope from the corral. He paused to free his lariat from where he’d twisted it around the saddle horn. The water-swollen rope refused to come loose.

Pausing the horse for an instant, he used both hands to attack the tangle. That was when something seemed to explode inside his head. The horse reared and bucked. He felt a burning sensation above his ear and then another, like the stab of a red-hot knife, going through his shoulder from the back. For an instant he fought the blackness that was swirling around him. Then, as another burning jab struck his side, he tumbled through space and into the dark.

* * *

Joe hovered on the edge of unconsciousness, his slow awareness coming and going like the open spaces in a cloudy sky. There was pain—deep and throbbing—in his head and through his body. And he felt cold, as if he were lying on wet ground. He could no longer hear the sound of the rain or feel it on his face. Maybe the storm was over.

He could not summon the will or the strength to open his eyes, but he sensed a bright light, like a lantern, shining down on him. And he could hear men’s voices, fading in and out, but strangely familiar.

“Looks like we got a live one here, Jesse.” Joe recognized the voice of Rusty, the cook.

“Well, we can turn him over to the sheriff with the two dead ones tomorrow, if he lives that long. Looks like he’s shot up pretty bad. Were you the one who hit him?”

“Hell, Jesse, you know I can’t shoot for sour apples. It was Mike, come up to change horses, that plugged him. Good thing you told the men to keep their guns handy tonight.”

“Well, there’s been a lot of rustling in these parts. Maybe now there won’t be so damned much. And we got the stampede stopped, too. All in all, the night could’ve been worse. Hell, there might even be a reward for these three buzzards—that would make a nice bonus to split among the men.”

The