Devil's Manhunt Read online

  Bonnet did the hunting. Sven did all the work with slavish deference, even bringing in what Bonnet had shot. The game was usually a doe or a fawn. It always had been wounded once and then shot between the eyes. Always wounded. The meat was sometimes rank with the fear taste which comes when an animal, not instantly killed, lies in terror and agony before dying. The wounding holes were always in painful places.

  On one such hunt Bonnet was gone all morning. About eleven o’clock, before the sun fell across the sluice and lighted the gold in the riffles, a series of six shots was heard. Sven started up alarmed. After a long interval there was a seventh. When Bonnet returned, his shoulder was scratched and his coat torn. He was not bored then; he was excited. There was something like honesty in his laugh when he turned Sven back.

  “No, no game,” he said. “It was a bear. A big one. Had an eight-foot scratch mark. I tracked him for two hours before I found him, and he had my wind before I came up. Oho, he was mad. He reared and charged and I barely had time to shoot. Hit him five times and the brute was still alive when he came up to me. Oh, he was mad, let me tell you. I caught him six times all in the throat and chest. He was spitting and roaring like a drunk in a barroom. This blood’s all his; I wrestled him for a minute or more before I could get my gun away. I let him have the last one right in the roof of the mouth. Oh, he was a rough one, he was.

  “Ah,” and Bonnet stretched. “I haven’t enjoyed myself so much since my dear old mother’s funeral.”

  All the remainder of the day Bonnet was in extra good humor; he even told Tim to knock off for a while and rest himself, offered Tim some tobacco. Once in a while Bonnet chuckled in a satisfied way. He would poke Sven playfully and laugh.

  “You should have seen him,” he told Sven late in the afternoon. “An eight-foot scratch mark. I saw them on the trees. Big as you, almost, and all fight.” He paused and looked speculatively at Sven. “Too bad you’re so valuable to me.” He slapped Sven resoundingly on the shoulder, playfully cuffed his ear. “What a game you’d make, my Swedish friend. And what a trophy! I’d mount your head on a silver board up above the fireplace. That I would!”

  Sven turned quickly away and began to stir up the fire; there was a gray look under his beard.

  After the incident of the bear, his own approaching fate seemed all the more terrible to Tim. Night after night he would struggle with his bonds until his wrists and ankles bled, but never once could he slack those ropes.

  Daily, the pile of gravel grew less. Tim saw, with something like a shock one morning, that only a few hours of labor would be left. He took his pick and went savagely into the gravel vein. But there was only red clay there, all the blue was gone. He thought of breaking the sluice but he realized that the three or four hundred dollars remaining to be washed would be of no account to Bonnet. He could do nothing else but dawdle over his work now, buying a few hours of life with a few pounds of muck. It never occurred to him otherwise than that Bonnet would kill him as soon as the work was finished, kill him, cave a bank in on him and take the gold away.

  Tim worked as slowly as he could and was only occasionally prodded on by the watchful young man. At noon Sven roasted a haunch of venison and they ate, Tim seated by the sluice. Two or three times Tim glanced up and surprised Bonnet looking at him. He was amazed to be given an extra slab of meat.

  “Eat hearty,” said Bonnet. “In the name of the ancestral halls of Virginia which raised me, I never permit a guest to go hungry.” He laughed, and his strange eyes flickered at Sven. “You never knew, I suppose, what a hope of the house I was. Yes sir, my old mammy was sure her Stede would be a great man someday, and the governor and the old lady built a mighty high castle of hopes. The world was mine—fast horses and faster women. A hunt before breakfast and a duel before dark. Ah yes, that was the life—all bows, poetry, soft music, tradition, silver and old lace. They thought it was enough to hold me. Their idea of a great man was the overlord of a few dozen slaves. Hah!” He looked fixedly at the slice of dripping meat in his hand.

  Suddenly his face changed. He pitched the meat violently into the dirt. “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! Damn you!” He stabbed the meat with his hunting knife, stabbed again and again until the knife flew from his grasp. His face was livid with rage. Sven cowered.

  Bonnet stood suddenly and grasped his rifle. For a minute Tim was certain that he was going to be shot. Mr. Bonnet strode off and was soon vanished from sight.

  Sven huddled beside the fire, shivering. Tim sat where he was, looking wonderingly at the piece of meat in the dust. As time progressed, Sven became more and more nervous.

  He looked now and then accusingly at Tim as though Tim had done something to offend his master. At last Sven rose, undecided, but determined to do something about it. He picked up the revolver and fired it three times into the air. There was no answer from Bonnet.

  The trees and the grass of Desperation Peak whispered in the afternoon wind. Sven’s agitation increased, he would raise his nose to the wind and, with a sudden surge of hope, sniff worriedly. Finally he beckoned Tim to come up to the camp spot. Tim went. He found himself seized and trussed to a log, and he carefully did not resist. Sven hastily picked up a rifle then and disappeared.

  A strange exultation shook Tim. All the time that Sven had been lashing him he had carefully tensed his muscles and held his arms out a small distance from his body. By relaxing now, his bonds were loosed; the exultation was mingled with terror lest Bonnet should return before he could get entirely free.

  Chapter Two

  IN less than five seconds after Sven had vanished in the trees, Tim had one hand out, in another fifteen seconds he had both hands loose. The remaining coils of rope, enlarged, fell about his ankles and he feverishly tore at the knots which were all that remained between him and liberty. He sprang at the pile of effects which lay near Bonnet’s rough bed, hunting for a weapon. All he found was a short sheath knife. He turned to grab a canteen but at that moment a rustling in the pine needles on the slope started him up like a frightened rabbit. He raced across the creek and up the far bank to dive out of sight in a clump of alder.

  He flung himself headlong through the brush. The thickets tore at his hands and clothes. Roots tripped him and he slid over slippery pine needles, more than once losing his balance, bringing up with a bruising crash against a tree. He passed half a dozen gullies before he stayed the haste of his flight.

  A quarter of a mile lay between him and camp. He turned at right angles and went scurrying up a wash where, from boulder to boulder, he could find cover. He came at last to a prominence from which he could look back over his trail. The forests and meadows over which he had come remained innocent of pursuit so far as he could see. There was a beating in his throat.

  Temporarily satisfied that he was not immediately pursued, Tim turned to gaze out across the sinks. He saw them shattering the sunlight, parched and deathly, between himself and freedom. It came to him then that he was in a second kind of trap. Not for months would rain come and only rain would make it possible to cross those wastes without a canteen.

  His heart began to race. He looked up above him to the towering heights of Desperation Peak. Then a kind of calmness came to him, for he realized that this was wilderness; in its tumbled, folded terrain were thousands upon thousands of hiding places from which one could reach water.

  Then he stared back along his trail and saw something moving on a meadow. It was Sven.

  The big Swede came along at a trot, his eyes fixed on the earth, his course a zigzag which picked up all the signs of Tim’s spoor. Behind him at a considerable distance walked Bonnet. The young man’s gun was carelessly cradled over his arm; his hands were in his pockets, his gait was a saunter, as though he took the utmost joy in the song of the birds about him.

  Tim drew back. He scurried down from the prominence, took one final glance at the far-off meadow and scuttled on up the ravine. He ran for a mile, keeping on rocks where he could. Now and then he slipp
ed off into the wet sand. When he found a stone ledge he cut from one ravine to the next. He kept on rising, attempting to keep as high as he could so that he could always command his back trail.

  At last he reached an eminence and looked back. Sven appeared on a ridge and studied the mass of boulders ahead. Now and then Sven would turn and glance back, as though waiting. After a little, Bonnet wandered up, gun in the crook of his arm, and spoke for a while with Sven; then Bonnet took something out of his pocket, something which flashed in the afternoon sun. It was a pocket spyglass. Tim ducked, shivering.

  When he looked up again Bonnet had put away the pocket telescope. He sat now doing something which Tim could not make out. Sven came back into view carrying a stick which he fixed in the ground. A moment later a tiny speck of white was fluttering from the top of it. Ostentatiously then, Bonnet and Sven walked down the ridge, returning toward camp, which lay some distance straight down. Tim had doubled his tracks and cut back higher but even with the camp.

  The two walked, keeping in sight. They were soon far away in this distance-deceptive air; Bonnet then seated himself and Sven stretched out.

  For a long time Tim remained where he was. At length he crawled out and started toward the stick.

  Now and then he stopped, looking intently down the mountain at Bonnet and Sven. Halfway to his goal he halted, apprehensive of a sudden sprint by Bonnet or Sven to catch him.

  He reached the stick and took the note.

  I don’t know why you ran away. I meant nothing but good by you, but now that you are gone I see no chance of persuading you to come back. You do me the disservice of distrusting me. You cannot live long without food. And eventually we shall catch you.

  If you do want to come back, walk down the ridge toward us. I don’t suppose that you will. By the way, you lay a very good track. Even Sven, who has a nose like a fox, had difficulty following it. I didn’t expect you’d be so clever. Good sport, what?

  Mr. Bonnet

  Tim looked down the slope at the two motionless figures. He began to tremble as he recalled what Bonnet had said about mounting Sven’s head.

  He ripped the note across, and turned to look up into the heights of the mountain.

  A bullet nearly got him. He ducked from its spiteful snap, before the report reached him he had flung himself into the gravel. By hard running, Bonnet had come within five hundred yards of him, was starting up now to come nearer.

  Tim sprang up and the rifle puffed smoke. Racing over the flats, bounding over logs, ducking through trees, Tim wildly attempted to place distance between himself and his pursuer. He plunged through a creek and hauled himself to a bench. Somewhere ahead he heard another stream roaring. He darted toward it, pausing only once upon the bank to look back. There came Bonnet about six hundred yards behind him, traveling in a straight line, his run effortless.

  Racing over the flats, bounding over logs, ducking through trees, Tim wildly attempted to place distance between himself and his pursuer.

  Tim started to plunge into the stream, then saw above him that, amongst its cascades, a pinnacle of rock raised itself. A moment later he was resting on top of that pinnacle, was out of sight from the stream. He breathed heavily and hoarsely, waiting for Bonnet.

  The young man came to the edge of the water and looked up and down it. He was hardly winded. He looked to the load in his rifle and then started upstream, walking through the swift water of the cascade, coming closer and closer. In a moment now he would be directly under the pinnacle.

  Tim took a ten-pound rock and held it securely; he waited, gauged his distance, then, looking down on the corduroy shoulders only a few feet distant, drove the boulder hard against them.

  The movement of the water baffled his aim, and the blow was only a glancing one; before he could take up a second missile, Bonnet, falling sideways and rolling, had found cover under the overhanging branches of an alder. The rifle lay in the swift water. Tim was on the verge of leaping down after it when the spiteful crack of a pistol sent rock chips flying near his head. He ducked back.

  “Aha,” said Mr. Bonnet. “Why, there’s more life and fight in you than I had thought. This is sport. But here, it isn’t fair; you haven’t any weapons. Look, down on the bank where you entered the stream I will lay a sheath knife. It is long and sharp and will come in handy. Yes, and I will even put a packet of dried meat there, since there is no fun in hunting starving game. It’s a free gift.” There was a rustle in the bushes.

  Tim lay still. He was afraid to wait long, afraid of being encircled. He came up cautiously. A second shot knifed splinters from the rock.

  But Tim, having risked it, flung himself backwards and down. He lit on the far bank. A third shot plowed mud at his feet. He ducked into the trees. Behind him he heard Bonnet yelling.

  “Fair enough. Fair enough! No hard feelings! Come back for the meat! I’m going back to find Sven!”

  Tim cut at right angles and came into position where he could see the stream clearly. Bonnet was retrieving his rifle and beating the water out of his hat. As good as his word, he went back to the bank, placed the knife and the food there. He sauntered off across the meadow, disappearing a few minutes later amongst the trees, eight hundred yards away.

  Tim took a deep breath; he dived out of his cover, splashed through the stream and scooped up the packages.

  Instantly he sensed motion and leaped aside. One of Sven’s hands barely touched him, and Tim was away again, through the water and up the bank. He glanced back once. Sven was shaking his head groggily, trying to swing around and start his bulk in immediate pursuit.

  Tim stretched out a lead of a hundred and fifty yards and carefully maintained it. He eased every time that Sven eased, until they both were traveling at a dogtrot. The country here was steeper and sharper, with fewer trees and more rocky knife-backs.

  Tim went straight ahead for some distance. He crossed each successive rise and continued on in a straight line. Then, on the final rise, he turned sharply downhill, leaped from boulder to boulder and dived out of sight in some brush.

  He lay still, waiting.

  Sven stopped at the top and stared. He looked up the gully and then down it, sniffed like a bloodhound, lifting his head and opening his mouth to flavor the wind. He grunted and went cautiously up the slope.

  He worked his way some distance up the gully and then turned back. Warily he eyed the thickets before him, took out his revolver and checked the load. He got down on his hands and knees to peer under the bushes.

  Tim’s hand was sweaty on the knife. He released it for a minute and wiped his palm on his pants, grasping the weapon anew.

  Sven ducked back and forth. He sniffed and grunted with the effort of kneeling. At length he crept back and looked at the clump of bushes. His small animal eyes traced out the telltale pattern of snapped twigs. Suddenly he stood up.

  “Aye vas see you,” he said. “You coom out.”

  He waited then.

  Tim, not breathing, watched the swinging muzzle of the revolver.

  “Aye vas cooming in,” said Sven, but he did not move; the revolver continued to swing in a slow arc back and forth across the brush.

  For nearly an hour Sven stood there, waiting, sniffing, listening.

  Tim carefully began to strip the twigs from a slender sapling which rose beside him. Once he made a noise.

  Sven was instantly on the alert. “You coom out,” he bellowed. “Aye vas tired vaiting.”

  Tim carefully inserted the knife through the center of the wood, driving it with short jabs until four inches of it protruded from the far side. It was Bonnet’s knife, sharp, pointed, thin, deadly. Tim checked his ground again. The course of twigs lay along the only obvious opening into the thicket. The knife was pointed in that direction.

  Gently Tim brought the sapling back. With the slender top of the sapling, he took himself some distance from where he had been.

  “Mr. Bonnet,” yelled Sven. “Coom up, Mr. Bonnet. Oooh, Mr. Bonnet,
coom up.”

  Tim took a creeper and wrapped it carefully around the bottom of the bush near the knife, then backed off again.

  “Coom up, Mr. Bonnet,” cried Sven.

  Tim backed up, holding on to the creeper with one hand, bending the sapling into a steep bow with the other. He burrowed into the earth. With a slow pull he caused the bush to bend some distance from him. The instant reply was a shot. A patter of torn twigs and ripped leaves filtered down into the underbrush. Tim gave the bush a violent jerk. Two more shots followed. He pulled the springy growth toward him and then let go. Three shots tore through the brush and the last severed the creeper which Tim had used for his decoy position.

  Sven came blundering ahead, tearing up shrubs and breaking small saplings as he followed the previously broken twigs into the tangle. He was grunting and snuffling, fending the bushes away from his face.

  “Aye vas got you now, you bet,” grunted Sven.

  Tim’s grip on the top of the sapling tightened. The knife glittered wickedly. Pressed close to the earth, he gauged his distance carefully. He waited until Sven was nearly at the sapling’s base and then let go.

  The knife flashed in a short arc. The thin, wicked point thunked into Sven’s flesh. Sven, with a howl of pain, lurched to tear himself free from the small trunk. His finger convulsed on the trigger and the hammer struck an empty cartridge.

  Tim, the second knife held tight, leaped forward. He gripped the blade as a rigid extension of his arm, drove so hard that his hand sank into the soft flesh of Sven’s abdomen. The Colt slapped down and caught Tim across the forehead. The world was curtained from him by a swift cascade of blood. He stumbled backward, feeling the air moving under the powerful drives of Sven’s avenging arms. Tim tripped.

  He rolled backward through the thicket, torn by twigs, clawing at his eyes to get them free of the hot slippery flow of his own blood. The wild animal smell of Sven beat against him in waves. Something struck against his foot and moved, then there was silence.