The High Rocks by Loren D. Estleman Page A

was even bigger than I remembered. Crouched though he was, one leg thrust out for balance, its mate drawn up beneath him, a massive hand clutching the jagged rock to which the thong had been tied while he maintained his grip on me with the other, he was nearly seven feet of solid muscle without an ounce of suet anywhere. He was made to look even more ponderous by the bearskin he wore poncho-style over a buckskin shirt and pants tucked into the tops of fur boots the size of snowshoes. The eyes beneath the rim of his fur hood were the clear blue of his Scandinavian ancestors’, and his features, despite the leathery grain of his complexion, were even and handsome enough to turn the head of a mining camp’s most hardened prostitute. His full beard, like his shoulder-length hair, was reddish and streaked with yellow. The only flaw was a jagged patch near the corner of his jaw on the left side where
the whiskers grew sparsely over scar tissue—the remnant, I judged, of an old tomahawk wound. But for that, he hadn’t changed in fifteen years.
    The mystery of where he had come from so quickly was explained by the snow clinging to his shoulders and the front of his bearskin. Lord knew how many hours he had lain there after setting his trap, covered with snow from head to foot, waiting for his pursuers to come along and blunder into it. He had the patience and ruthless cunning of a tracked cougar. He didn’t appear to recognize me, but I don’t suppose it would have mattered if he had. I was an intruder in his territory and worse, I had been riding with one of his mortal enemies on his own trail. The grin he wore disturbed me. I had a feeling it was the last thing a lot of Indians had seen this side of the happy hunting ground.
    I decided to bluff it out. “Long way down,” I said, acknowledging his assistance with a nod.
    â€œGoes all the way to the bottom.”
    A cracker-barrel answer, flat and noncommittal as a storekeeper agreeing that rain was wet. His voice was gentle and curiously high-pitched for a man his size, but held a harsh edge as if he wasn’t used to using it. He watched me through unblinking blue eyes.
    â€œI reckon I would have too, if you hadn’t happened along,” I ventured.
    â€œReckon.”

    The conversation was becoming one-sided. I tried to pull myself farther up the slope, but failed to purchase a grip with my gloves on the smooth wet surface of the rock and gave up. My chest and stomach grew numb where I was lying in the snow. I was painfully aware that the scalp-hunter’s fist on my collar was the only thing that stood between me and oblivion, and from the look on his face I gathered that he was debating with himself whether it might be a good idea to let me go. At length he sighed resignedly and pulled me up onto a better footing.
    â€œThanks,” I said, and started to get up.
    He didn’t reply. Instead he swept a loglike arm around behind me, crushed me to his chest, and with his free hand thrust against my chin began pushing my head backward until my spine quivered like a drawn bow. One of Ezra Wilson’s stitches on the back of my head popped audibly.
    â€œWhat’s your name, injun lover?” Anderson demanded, through his teeth. “What you doing in my mountains?”
    I couldn’t answer. He was holding me so tightly I couldn’t breathe and the pressure on my jaw made it impossible for me to form words. Blood pounded in my head.
    â€œAnswer me, injun lover!” He increased the pressure.
    My lungs screamed for air. I was like a swimmer going down for the last time within sight of a shore
full of people; help was only a cry away, but I was unable to ask for it. My spine creaked where he was bending me backward. I fought to retain consciousness. My eyesight shrank to pinpoints of light in a black shroud. Bear Anderson’s contorted features faded into insignificance and I felt myself floating away from my body.