Ransom by Frank Roderus Page B

to himself thinking how he had put the fear in them. They were pretty thoroughly cowed, all right. And they should be. He meant a good bit of the crap he had told them.
    It was just a damned shame he had not brought a bottle along. Or several. After all, it was going to be a couple weeks before he went back down to collect his money. He really should have brought a bottle. Not that he had money to pay for one, and barkeeps tended to watch too close to swipe one. Now, if it was just as easy to steal a bottle as it was to take a horse, well, he would have something to warm his gut in the evenings. On the other hand . . .
    He looked across the fire to the woman and the girl, huddled over there about as far away from him as they could get and still receive some warmth from the fire.
    Damn woman was starting to look better and better and that was the truth of the matter. She was a bitch but she was a fancy one. He had never had a woman that fancy, nor one that uppity. He wouldn’t expect her to be as good as, say, a Mexican trollop or an Injun squaw. But it might be interesting to find out.
    Thinking about what the blond bitch would be like twisted his smile into a leer.
    He hadn’t thought she was paying attention to him, but she was. She saw his expression and read it correctly.
    Her face flushed bright red and she quickly dropped her eyes.
    â€œI have to . . . I have to go to . . . to the bathroom,” she said.
    â€œRight over there, missy, but you stay in the light, y’ hear me? Don’t be going past that clump o’ brush. Don’t go behind it. I got to see.”
    He would not have thought it possible, but she flushed even darker.
    She did not get up or go anywhere.
    Apparently, he thought, she did not have to go all that bad.

Chapter 10
    Taylor got off the brown and knelt, examining the ground closely for a moment. Then he stood and scuffed at the gravel, stepped back, and looked at the faint mark his boot had made. Finally he turned and looked up at Hahn, who was waiting, still mounted on the paint horse. “I think we may have something here.”
    â€œIt’s them?” Hahn said, his expression brightening and his posture straightening as well. Taylor shook his head. “I don’t know as it’s them, but I can tell you that it’s some-damn-body. Somebody’s been through this way.”
    â€œCan you tell how long ago?”
    â€œNo, I can’t. All’s I can say for sure is that horses have passed this way not too awful long ago. Could be a day, two days, I really ain’t sure.” He removed his hat and ran the back of his wrist across his forehead.
    â€œBut it’s them,” Hahn persisted.
    â€œLikely,” Taylor conceded. “Nobody would be moving cows up here this time o’ year. Everybody running cattle up here already has ’em here and it’s too early for them to be brought back down. Shouldn’t be anybody up in these hills again for another couple months.”
    â€œCould there be a prospector? Someone like that?”
    Taylor considered that for a moment, then said, “Could be. I won’t guarantee against it, but most prospectin’ fellas I’ve come across don’t have more’n one horse. Most often they only go out with a mule or a burro an’ no horse at all. From what I see here, there’s more than the oneanimal. An’ if you look right here”—he pointed—“you can see that piece of a curve pressed into the soil there where there’s a little less gravel. That’s for sure a horse hoof. So, no, I don’t reckon it’s a prospector wandering around up here and it for sure ain’t no elk nor deer nor anything like that. Wouldn’t be no point to a prospector bein’ here since everything has pretty much been looked over anyway. That leaves . . . well, we’ll see.”
    â€œGod, I hope it’s them,” Hahn said. He pulled his shotgun out