IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY
Buddy knew that Hatfield would be compelled to return southward by the
same route he had gone. But here the boy was confronted with the problem
of the route Orlick had led his pursuer, when the two had reached the
square. It was gravely essential that he decide quickly upon some
action, for the boy realized fully that his life was in jeopardy every
moment he lingered here in the midst of the enemy.
While he hoped vainly to catch sight of some of his own people, and
appealed to his judgment to point out to him the direction Hatfield had
taken, he suddenly discerned two men trotting down the middle of the
road, running close together with rifles at ready position. Buddy fell
down flat on the ground and watched through the spokes of the wagon
wheels.
The men halted at Eversole's store, and looked up at the windows
overhead. Then they whistled softly. Then they went around to the front
of the store, and Buddy heard them knock several times on the closed
door. Evidently getting no response, they turned about, and the next
instant Buddy heard a loud, profane exclamation and saw them pulling
something out of the horse-trough. At this distance, in the
semi-darkness, Buddy could not distinguish what the object was they
labored over, and did not then know it was the dead body of old
Eversole.
As the boy was straining his eyes, now for the moment half forgetful of
his perilous whereabouts, he was suddenly electrified by voices behind
him. He shrank close to the ground, and casting a look in the rear,
observed the forms of three men approaching along the South road. Now
acutely alive to his danger, Buddy's eyes swept the shadows to the left,
the only avenue open for retreat. His searching eyes lit upon a rockaway
carriage, with the tongue propped up, standing at the roadside some two
hundred feet distant. He crawfished cautiously toward this lone vehicle,
dragging his rifle after him through the dust of the road. When the
three men had advanced and were on a direct line ahead, bringing the
wagon in between, and thereby screening him, the boy darted safely to
the shadow of the carriage and peered out at the men, who now quickened
their pace toward the two at the horse-trough.
Thinking that the carriage would afford a reasonably safe hiding place
for the moment, Buddy decided to climb inside, where he could peep out
at the five men in front of Eversole's store, and at the same time watch
the highway for Johnse Hatfield. The boy knew that, if he could remain
unseen long enough, it was only a question of time ere some of his own
faction would come upon the scene, affording him protection and
assistance in seeking Hatfield.
Now bent upon secreting himself inside the carriage until the way was
clear, and, in the meantime, determine what was the most likely route
Orlick had taken to escape Hatfield's vengeance, Buddy opened the
carriage door, but fell back, amazed and startled, as the limp body of a
dead man tumbled out upon him. Recovering quickly from this surprise,
Buddy took a look at the face. The body lolled half out of the vehicle,
one arm and the head hanging down between the wheels. Although the face
was outward, it was at the same time downward past the step of the
vehicle, and in this inverted position the boy could not have recognized
his best friend in the wan moonlight.
He shot a swift look around him and across toward Eversole's store--then
laying his rifle on the ground, he lifted the dead man's head up and
scrutinized it closely. As Buddy had never known Steve Barlow, the face
was strange to him, and he was in the act of easing his gruesome burden
down, when soft sounds like muffled footsteps startled him. They were
close to him, seemingly coming from the opposite side of the carriage.
Without waiting an instant or even looking a second time, Buddy jerked
his hands free, grabbed his gun, and made a headlong dive across the
plank-walk and sprawled against the picket fence, at bay, but with gun
pointed toward the carriage and ready to die fighting and take a toll
for his own life.
His little heart beat wildly for the next few seconds. Affrighted, he
had dropped his burden so suddenly that its weight had jerked the other
arm outside, and now the inverted dead face swung to and fro, and
gesticulated between the wheels in the moonlight. Then under and behind
this grim pantomime, the boy could discern the vague outlines of legs in
the dense shadow cast by the carriage.
Buddy did not court shots from the front, but he had always dreaded a
shot in the back, and he knew that the McGills would show no quarter,
not even to a boy, much less a Lutts boy. In reality, it was less than
fifteen seconds that Buddy lay with finger in the trigger-guard, staring
at that veiled, menacing shadow stirring near at hand, but it seemed
very much longer to the boy. He could not endure the suspense, and just
as he began to crawfish stealthily along the fence, a riderless, unshod
horse stepped leisurely from the gloom and walked noiselessly through
the thick dust.
Buddy heaved a long breath and leaned back against the fence. The horse
was a light dun, with black mane and tail. He wore a saddle and the
reins dragged. The animal stopped and pricked up his ears in Buddy's
direction, then strolled over in the Courthouse yard, champing his bit
noisily, a preface which Buddy thought the horse had previously omitted
with mischievous intent.
In an instant Buddy was all action. He slipped across to a tree and
peered toward the store. The five men appeared to be carrying something,
as nearly as Buddy could make out, into Eversole's side gate. Now was
his time to leave this spot. Here he committed a very boyish and
extremely indiscreet act. The dun horse stood idly by, waiting for some
one to ride him. The empty saddle invited Buddy to mount, with an
insistence that the boy could not resist, in the stress of the moment,
and his earnest desire to get away quickly. The animal being unshod and
the dust being dense, his chances of escape looked favorable, while the
men were in Eversole's yard.
Without another moment's deliberation, Buddy succumbed to this sudden
impulse. Wherefore, he pulled his gun strap over his head and thrust his
arms through, making the weapon fit snugly at his back, and in a jiffy
he was in the saddle.
He reached up to an overhanging bough and possessed himself of a keen
switch and, wheeling the dun horse, was ready for a dash down the road.
As a precaution, he urged the horse up close into the shadow of the
Courthouse to make sure the men had disappeared. The horse, eager to be
away, was prancing now and rattling his bit noisily. As Buddy leaned out
from the saddle, with his eyes fixed intently on the store, a shot
echoed up from the distant river, and oddly enough, Buddy determined in
that instant to take toward the river, instead of the north road. But in
that same instant a disastrous thing happened which sent Buddy afoot
down that river road faster than he had intended to go, and sorely
worsted.
When he turned his head, a man was standing at the horse's head with a
firm hold on the bridle. Without a word, the man led the horse out of
the shadows into the moonlight. This man was hatless, and his head was
swathed about with bandages, and his right arm was trussed up in a
sling. When he lifted his face and scowled up at Buddy, a shiver
traversed the boy's spine and made the perspiration start in his hair.
Buddy could not mistake. It was the evil, murderous visage of Sap
McGill. The boy was in the hands of the enemy at last. The hand that
held the rein also clutched a pistol. Dropping the rein, McGill pulled
Buddy off the horse.
"So besides bein' a Lutts--yore a hoss thief t' boot, air
ye?--well--by-damn!"
Sap cursed Buddy eloquently and long. Buddy said not a word. He felt
that his time had come. He only gazed fixedly at the ugly face over him,
convulsed and working with passion. McGill jerked the boy around and
called out loudly toward the store:
"Hey--Stump--yo', Stump--cum out!"
After calling several times, two men appeared in response, at the side
gate, back of the store.
"Cum on over, Stump--I keetched this fuzzy little Lutts runt a stealin'
my hoss--hain't thet th' all-firedest beatenst nerve ye ever heerd tell
on--cum git thes hoss while I ring thes little cuss's neck."
Sap's left hand clutching Buddy's shoulder, also retained the pistol
which encumbered his grip, and as the two men advanced, Buddy threw all
his strength into a sudden twist, breaking loose, and fled down the road
toward the river with all the might that was in his skinny legs.
In his flight he stooped, and straightened, and ran azigzag; performing
every trick known to him calculated to dodge a bullet. Buddy did
artfully dodge two balls which Sap sent after him, but the third bullet
tripped between his arm and his body, burning a furrow on both sides,
and the fourth pinched a piece out of his shoulder. But these sensations
only lent wings to Buddy's feet, and handicapped as he was, with his
rifle double hitched over his shoulders, he fairly sailed.
When he reached the black shadows of the line of trees that reached out
toward the river, he ventured a look over his shoulder. Sap had stopped,
but the other two men were in hot pursuit. Buddy could not possibly
travel any faster than he was going then, but his pace soon distanced
his pursuers. When the boy observed that they were losing ground, he
darted across a vacant plot between the shacks and continued on,
stumbling now along the darkened, unfamiliar paths back of the houses,
leading toward the river. Finally he paused and stood panting and
listening. Amid these shades it was too dark for him to see more than
fifty feet distant. He could hear nothing but the barking of hounds and
the beating of his own heart. The men who had started out after him had
evidently given up the chase. But wishing to place a safe distance
between himself and these prowling enemies, the boy ran onward, and did
not stop until he was a quarter of a mile past the last house.