“Ange,” I said, “you’ll find some cold flour in my pack. Take it and some of that meat and cook them up together. When it gets dark, we’re going to get out.”
“Can we?”
“We can try.”
Worried as I was about what Tuthill and the rest of them might do, I was more worried about the cold.
Somehow we had to escape. We had to try. We had to try while we had our strength.
Ange was in no condition to attempt a winter in the mountains. We lacked the food for it, lacked the proper clothing and equipment. Yet bad off as we were, those others must be suffering more by now. For his own sake, I hoped the man I shot was dead.
Frightened by the firing, the horses had drawn away from the cave mouth. Now they started back, but before they could reach us, two quick shots put them down. The pack horse first, then the appaloosa.
For the first time in months I swore. Pa was never strong on cussing, and Ma was dead set against it, so we boys kind of grew up without doing much of that, but I said some words this time. They were good horses, and they had done no harm to anyone. But I knew why they were killed. Those men over there, they were realizing how much they needed grub . . . and horse meat was still meat, and not bad eating at that.
Night came. Stars appeared, wind came flowing like icy water over the rim of the mountain. The moon was not visible to us yet, but shone white upon the mountain tops. Twice I dusted the woods with gunfire; and then Ange and me, we ate what we could. What was left of the jerked meat I stowed away in a pack, and made another pack of our blankets and the ammunition.
With a long pole I’d used a couple of times for fishing, I reached out and snagged Tom Bigelow’s gun belt, then the pistol. I shucked the shells from the gun belt, and used them to fill empty loops in my own belt. Emptying the shells into my hand from the cylinder, I took my axe and smashed the firing pin.
Then I made a loop on my pack from which to hang the axe, and covered over the shovel and pick with rock waste from the floor of the tunnel. They would probably find them, but I had no intention of making anything easy.
Occasionally a shot hit the back wall or struck into the woodpile. Only at long intervals I returned their fire … I wanted them to become accustomed to long waiting.
There was every chance they would try an attack under cover of darkness, although their dark figures would be visible on the snow for a time. However if they managed to cross far down the valley and worked toward us along the wall…
“Be ready to move,” I whispered to Ange. “I think they will try something now, and after that we’re pulling out.”
Getting up from behind the stacked wood, I moved outside and eased along the rock wall until I could look both ways. Nothing at first . . . then a faint whisper of coarse cloth brushing on branches. Waiting until I detected a movement, I lifted the rifle, located the movement again, and fired.
There was a grunt, a heavy fall, and a bullet struck rock near my face. I ducked and half fell back into the tunnel. Outside there was cursing, and several shots. Catching up the packs, I slung one on my back. Ange already had the small one. An instant we paused. I levered a shot at a stab of flame from the trees, and then we slipped out.
The area around the tunnel lay in heavy darkness. We went swiftly along the wall and, when well away from the tunnel, turned up through the trees.
We had to go down the trail up which they had come, and go down it in darkness. Then we had to go up the opposite side, climb that steep talus slope to the bare, icy ridge that overlooked the Vallecitos. Whether Ange could make this, I did not know.
Once into the trees and moving, working away from the valley of the mine, we slowed down, holding to a steady pace. The snow had frozen, and we moved now across a good surface where there was no need for snowshoes.
The crude pair had been abandoned, as they were in bad shape anyway after the rough usage they had. As long as the cold held the snow would remain solid, but when it began to get warmer the ice beneath the snow, left from the sleet storm, would melt. Once that happened, travel would become impossible. At the lightest step, snow might slide, bringing down all the snow upon an entire mountainside in one gigantic avalanche. The cold was a blessing, severe as it was.
We traveled steadily. Nobody would be too anxious to investigate the mine, even when they began to believe we had escaped. And when they did investigate, they would start at once to seek for gold. Most of that in sight had been taken by me, and they were going to have to do some digging to get at the rest.
And before long they would have other things on their minds.
Time to time I stopped to give Ange a chance to catch her breath and ease her muscles. She didn’t complain, and seemed to be holding up.
The moon was bright on the canyon wall when we came to the path down. Ange caught my sleeve. “Tell? Do we have to?”
“We have to.”
I tried a foot on the trail. The frozen snow might make it a lot easier going down than loose snow over that sleet. Moving carefully, like a man walking on eggs, I started down.
Wind bit at exposed flesh, stiffening our muscles. The canyon below was a great open mouth of darkness. Above us the ridges and peaks towered pure, white, and glittering with wild beauty in the moonlight. It’s rare in a man’s Me to see such a sight, and I stopped for a minute, just taking it in. Ange was standing close behind, her hands on my back.
“I wish Ma could see that,” I said. “She favors lovely things.”
The wind gnawed at our faces with icy teeth, as we moved along. Snow crunched as we put our feet down, each step a lifetime of risk and doubt.
The path was scarce three feet wide, widening to four at the most but looking broader in spots because of the cornices of snow that hung over the lip. It was a steep path where every step had to be separate, the foot put carefully down, the weight rested gradually, and then the other foot lifted.
The sky above was amazingly bright; the moon made the hills and peaks like day. High above, on a frosty ridge where I hoped to be by daylight, the snow blew, throwing a brief veil across the sky. The snow hanging on the slopes above the trail made me mighty uneasy. Snow like that can start to slide on the slightest provocation, and with daylight it would become worse.
When we were halfway down, we stopped again, and Ange came up beside me. “You ready for it?” I asked her. They’ll be coming soon, Ange.”
“How long has it been?”
“Couple of hours …”
We hit bottom with our knees shaking, and headed for the cave. By daylight they would realize we were gone. With the fire out, they would soon guess that we’d lit a shuck, and they would come a-helling after us.
We were almost to the cave before we smelled smoke. Catching a whiff of it, I pulled up short. Somebody was in the cave.
Stepping into the opening, gun up and ready, I found myself looking into the muzzle of a .44 gun. That gun muzzle looked as great as the cave mouth, as black as death itself.
“Mister,” I said, “you put down that .44 gun. If you don’t, I’m sure going to kill you.”
And all the while he had the drop on me.
XIV
Newton was holding that pistol—that white headed kid I’d talked out of trouble back down the line.
He was lying on his back, looking sick, and the gun in his hand was shaky. A blanket was pulled over him, and I could see from the fire that he had been feeding sticks into it without getting up.
“What’s the matter, Kid? You in trouble?”
He kept the gun on me. Could I swing that Winchester up in time to nail him? I was hoping I wouldn’t have to try.
“Busted my leg.”
“And they left you? That ain’t hardly decent, Kid.” Using up all the nerve I had in store, I put my rifle down. “Kid, put that gun away and let me look at your leg.”