open air he could feel the tears streaming down his cheeks as the smoke attacked his eyes. He began to breathe deeply, not breaking stride, and tossed the bundle of guns on to the fire as he passed.
The cartridges in the guns began to explode as he reached the edge of the shelving and dropped down, taking the steep slope at a headlong dash, gravity assisting his own momentum. From the shadowed entrance of one of the other mine adits, a pair of large eyes watched Edge's disappearance down the slope. The pupils were dilated against the night and they were of a dark color, emphasizing the gleaming whiteness of the eyes. And beyond the whites there was darkness again—a coal black darkness of pigmentation developed by a limitless ancestry living under the merciless glare of the African sun.
Anatali, a pure blood Zulu warrior, drew back his fleshy lips to show the gleam of opalescent teeth and moved forward to pursue Edge. But suddenly he drew back, as three more men stumbled out of the smoke-filled tunnel, coughing and gagging.
Anatali bided his time.
Chapter Five
DESPITE the maintained force of the north wind, which seemed to be gusted by some avenging spirit with a grudge against the world, Edge was encompassed by a warm feeling as he widened the distance between himself and the worked-out mine. He had money for the first time in a long while and he had come by it in a manner that he considered reputable, by his self imposed code of ethics. And, in the process, he had gotten rid of the two hillbillies who were not worth the trouble for the prices on their heads. He was heading west now, by the crudest of reckoning: simply that the Sierra Nevada was a range of mountains that stretched like a great length of knotted rope in a north-south direction down one side of the country and therefore if he rode up to the top and then down the other side he would eventually come to the ocean. He was aware that mountain country could not be reduced to such simple terms in practice, but any problems that faced him were still in the future as he entered a gulch that seemed to be ill line with what appeared as a pass between two peaks, many miles distant.
The start of the gulch was not wide, and it got narrower, the sides growing steeper with every yard he covered. After the initial burst of speed away from the mine and because of the ever-rising ground on the route west, the horse was reluctant to move at more than a walking pace and Edge demanded no more. He was deeply tired himself and had been searching for a suitable campsite, sheltered from the weather. The gulch offered no respite, its smooth floor and sides—which doubtless became a channel for melting snow in the spring—acting as a funnel down which the wind blew with an eerie howling sound.
They jumped him as he emerged from the upper end of the narrow ravine, Fats approaching from the right, Blue lunging from a narrow ledge of rock. The sound of the Colt was whipped away by the wind and carried up the mountain. Fats stopped dead in his tracks for an instant that seemed to stretch into seconds. His tiny eyes had grown wide to stare at the smoking hole in the end of Edge's holster. His mouth open, too, drooling the foam of saliva. But then a spurt of blood gushed from the wound in the back of his throat and stained his many chins red as he fell to his knees and pitched forward.
"You're always running off at the mouth, Fats," Edge muttered and was knocked from the saddle as Blue crashed into him, a knife held high.
Edge hit the rocky surface with a jarring thud that made Blue's frail body feel like a ton weight on top of him. Blue yelled in pain as his shoulder wound opened up under the impact, but his good arm continued its swing in a deadly arc, hand clutching the knife. Edge saw it coming and put all his strength into a heave that sent Blue's thin body rolling away from him. The knife clanged against rock. Both men leapt to their feet at the same
The cartridges in the guns began to explode as he reached the edge of the shelving and dropped down, taking the steep slope at a headlong dash, gravity assisting his own momentum. From the shadowed entrance of one of the other mine adits, a pair of large eyes watched Edge's disappearance down the slope. The pupils were dilated against the night and they were of a dark color, emphasizing the gleaming whiteness of the eyes. And beyond the whites there was darkness again—a coal black darkness of pigmentation developed by a limitless ancestry living under the merciless glare of the African sun.
Anatali, a pure blood Zulu warrior, drew back his fleshy lips to show the gleam of opalescent teeth and moved forward to pursue Edge. But suddenly he drew back, as three more men stumbled out of the smoke-filled tunnel, coughing and gagging.
Anatali bided his time.
Chapter Five
DESPITE the maintained force of the north wind, which seemed to be gusted by some avenging spirit with a grudge against the world, Edge was encompassed by a warm feeling as he widened the distance between himself and the worked-out mine. He had money for the first time in a long while and he had come by it in a manner that he considered reputable, by his self imposed code of ethics. And, in the process, he had gotten rid of the two hillbillies who were not worth the trouble for the prices on their heads. He was heading west now, by the crudest of reckoning: simply that the Sierra Nevada was a range of mountains that stretched like a great length of knotted rope in a north-south direction down one side of the country and therefore if he rode up to the top and then down the other side he would eventually come to the ocean. He was aware that mountain country could not be reduced to such simple terms in practice, but any problems that faced him were still in the future as he entered a gulch that seemed to be ill line with what appeared as a pass between two peaks, many miles distant.
The start of the gulch was not wide, and it got narrower, the sides growing steeper with every yard he covered. After the initial burst of speed away from the mine and because of the ever-rising ground on the route west, the horse was reluctant to move at more than a walking pace and Edge demanded no more. He was deeply tired himself and had been searching for a suitable campsite, sheltered from the weather. The gulch offered no respite, its smooth floor and sides—which doubtless became a channel for melting snow in the spring—acting as a funnel down which the wind blew with an eerie howling sound.
They jumped him as he emerged from the upper end of the narrow ravine, Fats approaching from the right, Blue lunging from a narrow ledge of rock. The sound of the Colt was whipped away by the wind and carried up the mountain. Fats stopped dead in his tracks for an instant that seemed to stretch into seconds. His tiny eyes had grown wide to stare at the smoking hole in the end of Edge's holster. His mouth open, too, drooling the foam of saliva. But then a spurt of blood gushed from the wound in the back of his throat and stained his many chins red as he fell to his knees and pitched forward.
"You're always running off at the mouth, Fats," Edge muttered and was knocked from the saddle as Blue crashed into him, a knife held high.
Edge hit the rocky surface with a jarring thud that made Blue's frail body feel like a ton weight on top of him. Blue yelled in pain as his shoulder wound opened up under the impact, but his good arm continued its swing in a deadly arc, hand clutching the knife. Edge saw it coming and put all his strength into a heave that sent Blue's thin body rolling away from him. The knife clanged against rock. Both men leapt to their feet at the same
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