“Any of you know these?” Ryan yelled over the top of the workers’ startled conversation. He waited for the buzz of conversation to subside and some suggestions to come. But there was none. “You sure you don’t know them?” he added.
There was a general silence. The companions exchanged glances. They would talk of this later, but from the looks they swapped they were all sure that they agreed on one thing: the workers weren’t hiding anything here. At the very least, they would have expected them to try to blame men from another ville. But there was no such attempt. It was looking more and more likely that J.B.’s theory of an outside sabotage mission was correct.
“Okay, load them up,” Ryan directed when he was sure there was to be no response. Doc, J.B., Mildred and Dean lifted the corpses back onto the horses, and they were ready to roll.
“By the way,” the sec man said, staying Ryan with a hand on his arm, “there’s something back at sec camp that Myall wants you to see.”
“What?” Ryan queried with a furrowing brow.
The sec man grimaced uncomfortably. “I’d rather not say—” he made a motion toward the still stunned workers “—but I think you’ll find it a hell of a lot more interesting than I can let on.”
With this cryptic remark the sec man returned to his duty, and the procession of workers started again for the well and refinery, leaving Ryan and his companions to ponder on what they were about to find.
WHEN THEY REACHED the sec camp, they were greeted by Myall and McVie, who were both looking more solemn than any of the companions had seen in the short time that they had known them. The companions rode and led their horses into the compound and dumped the corpses on the ground.
“Take a look at them,” Ryan said as the sec chief and his second in command approached. “Recognize any of them?”
Both men looked over the corpses.
“None of them look familiar to me,” McVie murmured, “but then again I doubt if their own old ladies’d recognize these two,” he added, indicating the mangled corpses.
“I didn’t think you would,” Ryan said softly. “They’ve been using wags—and good ones—to get to and from the well and the refinery. I don’t reckon they come from the camp—”
“You could be right at that,” Myall interrupted. “Come with me. Leave the chilled there,” he added as he turned and led the companions to one of the sleeping tents dotted near the mess building.
“What’s going on?” J.B. queried.
“Sure as hell what we’d like to know,” McVie replied in a tone that encouraged no answer.
They walked the rest of the way in silence, and when they reached the tent, Myall drew the tent flap to one side. “He’s mebbe starting to smell, so be careful,” he said mysteriously.
The companions followed the sec chief into the tent.
“Dark night,” J.B. whispered. “What happened to him?”
For on the ground, laid out in death, was Crow. The Native American was barely recognizable apart from his giant frame and teaklike skin, for he had been beaten to death. There were no stab wounds or bullet holes on his body, but his flesh was a puffy mass of contusions and welts. His skull was misshapen where it had been fractured, his cheekbones beaten out of shape and his jaw at an unnatural angle where it had been dislocated. His clothes were ripped and torn, covered in blood, and it looked as though he had been dragged behind a wag for some distance, as ragged strips of flesh had been torn from his arms and legs.
“The patrol out on the blacktop found him at first light,” Myall stated simply. “Figure he’s already been dead for some time. Probably happened some time during the night. Another thing—we found a shit load of plas-ex on him, a timing device and a heavy-duty handblaster. A Colt Python like yours, Jak.”
“That’s weird,” Dean said, “I never saw him with a blaster before.”
“Neither did I,” Myall replied, “but that doesn’t mean that he wouldn’t have carried one when… when he was on a mission.” The sec chief spit out the last phrase, as though he couldn’t quite believe it himself.