He was carrying his preferred weapon of choice, the M-16 carbine: short-barrelled, light and utterly dependable. His right thumb slipped the catch silently to ‘automatic’ mode and then he fired. Half a magazine tore into the bush; the tawny blur vanished, then reappeared on the ground where it had fallen. Only then did Max break cover.
The Cheyenne never used stone war clubs. They preferred hatchets, with which they could slash sideways and downwards from a horse’s back, or throw with accuracy and speed.
The flying axe hit the major in the right bicep, shearing through the muscle and shattering the bone. The carbine fell from a nerveless hand. He stared down, white-faced, and pulled the axe from his own limb and when the bright red blood gushed, clamped his left hand over the gash to staunch the flow. Then he turned and ran down the path whence he had come.
The scout let drop from his left hand the fifty-foot thong with which he had tweaked the branch, recovered his axe and his hat and ran on to find his horse.
Braddock, his son and remaining three men found the major leaning up against a tree, breathing deeply, when they caught up.
Sheriff Lewis and his party had heard the fusillade of carbine fire, the second that day, but quite different from the fugitive’s single-shot rifle, and rode in fast. The senior ranger looked at the shattered arm, said, ‘Tourniquet,’ and broke open his first-aid pack.
While he dressed the mangled flesh and bone Sheriff Lewis listened as Braddock told him what had happened. He stared at the rancher with contempt.
‘I ought to arrest the lot of you,’ he snapped. ‘And if it wasn’t for the fact we are one hell of a long way from civilization, I would. As of now, you butt right out of this, Mr Braddock, and stay out.’
‘I’m seeing this thing through,’ shouted Braddock. ‘That savage stole my son’s girl and has seriously injured three of my men—’
‘Who should not even have been here. Now, I’m going to bring this boy in to face charges, but I am not looking for any fatalities. So I want your weaponry, I want it all and I want it now.’
Several rifles swung in the direction of Braddock and his party. Other deputies collected the rifles and handguns. The sheriff turned to the ranger who had done his best for the major’s arm.
‘What do you reckon?’
‘Evacuation, quickly,’ said the ranger. ‘He could ride back with an escort to Red Lodge, but it’s twenty hard miles, with West Fork in the middle. A tough ride, he might not make it.
‘Up ahead is the Silver Run Plateau. The radios should work there. We could call up a helo.’
‘Which do you advise?’
‘Helo,’ said the ranger. ‘That arm needs surgery without delay or he’ll lose it.’
They rode on. In the clearing they found the discarded carbine and the cartridge. The ranger studied it.
‘Flint arrows, a flying hatchet, a buffalo gun. Who the hell is this guy, Sheriff?’
‘I thought I knew,’ said Lewis. ‘Now I don’t think I do.’
‘Well,’ said the ranger, ‘he sure ain’t an out-of-work actor.’
Ben Craig stood at the edge of the forest and stared ahead at the shimmering flat plain of rock. Five miles to the last, hidden creek; two more across the Hellroaring Plateau and a last mile up the face of the mountain. He stroked Rosebud’s head and her velvet-soft muzzle.
‘Just one more before the sun goes down,’ he told her. ‘One more ride and we will be free.’
He mounted up and urged the horse into a canter over the rock. Ten minutes later the pursuers reached the plateau. He was a speck on the rock face a mile away.
Clear of the trees the radios functioned again. Sheriff Lewis made contact with Jerry and learned the fate of the little Sikorsky. Jerry was back at Billings Field and had borrowed a larger Bell Jetranger.
‘Get down here, Jerry. Don’t worry about the sniper. He’s over a mile away, out of range. We have an emergency evacuation. And that civilian volunteer with the Piper Cub? Tell him I need him and right now. I want him over the Silver Run Plateau, no lower than five thousand feet. Tell him he’s looking for a lone horseman heading for the mountains.’
It was past three and the sun was moving west towards the peaks. When it slipped behind Spirit Mountain and Beartooth Mountain the darkness would come fast.
Jerry and the Bell got there first, clattering out of the blue sky to land on the flat rock. The major was helped aboard and one deputy went with him. The police pilot took off, radioing ahead to Billings Memorial to ask for a landing in the parking lot and
major surgery and trauma teams to be on standby.
The remaining riders set off across the plateau.
‘There’s a hidden creek he probably doesn’t know about,’ said the senior ranger, moving up beside the sheriff. ‘It’s called Lake Fork. Deep, narrow, steep-sided. There’s only one way down and up the other side that could be passable for a horse. Take him ages to find it. We could close up and take him there.’