Dark night of the mounta.., p.1
Dark Night of the Mountain Man, page 1
LOOK FOR THESE EXCITING WESTERN SERIES
FROM BESTSELLING AUTHORS
WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE AND J.A. JOHNSTONE
The Mountain Man
Luke Jensen: Bounty Hunter
Brannigan’s Land
The Jensen Brand
Smoke Jensen: The Beginning
Preacher and MacCallister
Fort Misery
The Fighting O’Neils
Perley Gates
MacCoole and Boone
Guns of the Vigilantes
Shotgun Johnny
The Chuckwagon Trail
The Jackals
The Slash and Pecos Westerns
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Stoneface Finnegan Westerns
Ben Savage: Saloon Ranger
The Buck Trammel Westerns
The Death and Texas Westerns
The Hunter Buchanon Westerns
Will Tanner, Deputy U.S. Marshal
Old Cowboys Never Die
Go West, Young Man
Published by Kensington Publishing Corp.
DARK NIGHT OF THE MOUNTAIN MAN
WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE AND J.A. JOHNSTONE
PINNACLE BOOKS
Kensington Publishing Corp.
www.kensingtonbooks.com
Table of Contents
Also by
Title Page
Copyright Page
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
Teaser chapter
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Copyright © 2023 by J.A. Johnstone
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ISBN: 978-0-7860-4356-9
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CHAPTER 1
It was safe to say that Nelse Andersen had been drinking when he encountered the bear. Every time Nelse drove his ranch wagon into Big Rock to pick up supplies, he always stopped at the Brown Dirt Cowboy Saloon to have a snort or two—or three—before heading back to his greasy sack outfit northwest of town.
Smoke Jensen happened to be in the settlement that same day, having come in to send some telegrams related to business concerning his ranch, the Sugarloaf.
A ruggedly handsome man of average height, with unusually broad shoulders and ash blond hair, Smoke stood on the porch of Sheriff Monte Carson’s office, propping one of those shoulders against a post holding up the awning over the porch.
The lawman was sitting in a chair, leaning back with his booted feet resting on the railing along the front of the porch. His fingers were laced together on his stomach, which was starting to thicken a little with age.
At first glance, neither man looked like what he really was.
Smoke was, quite probably, the fastest and deadliest shot of any man who had ever packed iron west of the Mississippi. Or east of there, for that matter.
As a young man, he’d had a reputation as a gunfighter and outlaw, although all the criminal charges ever levied against him were bogus. Scurrilous lies spread by his enemies.
These days, he was happily married and the owner of the largest, most successful ranch in the valley. In fact, the Sugarloaf was one of the finest ranches in all of Colorado. Smoke was more than content to spend his days running the spread and loving Sally, his beautiful wife.
Despite that intention, trouble still had a habit of seeking him out more often than he liked.
At one time, Monte Carson had been a hired gun, a member of a wolf pack of Coltmen brought in by one of Smoke’s mortal enemies to wipe out him and his friends.
It hadn’t taken Monte long to figure out who was really in the right and switch sides. He had been a staunch friend to Smoke ever since, even before Big Rock had been founded and he’d been asked to pin on the sheriff’s star.
Pearlie Fontaine, another member of that gang of gun-wolves, had also changed his ways and was now the foreman of the Sugarloaf. Smoke couldn’t have hoped for two finer, more loyal friends than Monte and Pearlie.
Or a finer day than this, with its blue sky, puffy white clouds, and warm breeze. Evidently, Monte felt the same way, because he said, “Sure is a pretty day. Almost too pretty to work. What do you reckon the chances are that all the troublemakers in these parts will feel the same way, Smoke?”
“They just might,” Smoke began with a smile, but then he straightened from his casual pose and muttered, “or not.”
Monte saw Smoke’s reaction and brought his feet down from the railing. As he sat up, he said, “What is it?”
“Hoofbeats. Sounds like a team coming in a hurry.”
Monte stood up. He heard the horses now, too, although Smoke’s keen ears had picked up the swift rataplan a couple of seconds earlier.
“Somebody moving fast like that nearly always means trouble.”
“Yeah,” Smoke said, pointing, “and here it comes.”
A wagon pulled by four galloping horses careened around a corner up the street. The vehicle turned so sharply as the driver hauled on the team’s reins that the wheels on the left side came off the ground for a second. Smoke thought the wagon was going to tip over.
But then the wheels came back down with a hard bounce and the wagon righted itself. The driver was yelling something as he whipped the horses.
Monte had joined Smoke at the edge of the porch. “What in blazes is he saying?”
“It sounds like . . . bear,” Smoke said. “Is that Nelse Andersen?”
The wagon flashed past them. Monte said, “Yeah, I saw him drive by a little while ago, not long before you showed up. Looked like he was on his way back to his ranch.”
They watched as the wagon swerved down the street and then came to a sliding, jarring stop in front of the Brown Dirt Cowboy Saloon. Nelse Andersen practically dived off the seat and ran inside, leaving the slapped-aside batwings swinging to and fro behind him.
“Well, I have to find out what this is about,” Monte said. “He can’t be driving so fast and reckless in town. He’s lucky he didn’t run over anybody.”
“I’ll come with you. I’m a mite curious myself.”
By the time they reached the saloon and pushed through the batwings, Andersen was standing at the bar with a group of men gathered around him. A rangy, fair-haired man, he had a drink in his hand, which was shaking so badly that a little of the whiskey sloshed out as he lifted the glass to his mouth.
The liquor seemed to steady him. He thumped the empty glass on the bar and said, “It was ten feet tall, I tell you! Maybe even taller!”
One of the bystanders said, “I never saw a grizzly bear that tall. Close to it, maybe, but not that big.”
“This wasn’t a regular bear,” Andersen insisted. “It was a monster! I never saw anything like it. It had to weigh twelve hundred pounds if it was an ounce!”
He shoved the empty glass across the hardwood toward the bartender and raised expectant eyebrows. The bartender looked at Emmett Brown, the owner of the place, who stood nearby with his thumbs hooked in his vest pockets. Brown frowned.
A man tossed a coin on the bar and said, “Shoot, I’ll buy him another drink. I want to hear the rest of this story.”
Brown nodded, and the bartender poured more whiskey in the glass, filling it almost to the top. Andersen picked it up and took a healthy swallow.
“Start from the first,” the man who had bought the drink urged.<
“Well, I was on my way back to my ranch,” Andersen said. “I was out there goin’ past Hogback Hill, where the brush grows up close to the road, and all of a sudden this . . . this thing rears up outta the bushes and waves its paws in the air and roars so loud it was like thunder crashin’ all around me! Scared the bejabbers out of my horses.”
“I think it scared you, too,” a man said.
Andersen ignored that and went on, “I thought the team was gonna bolt. It was all I could do to hold ’em in. The bear kept bellerin’ at me and actin’ like it was gonna charge. I knew I needed to get outta there, so I turned the team around and lit a shuck for town.”
Emmett Brown had come closer along the bar. “You had a gun, didn’t you? Why didn’t you shoot it?”
Andersen tossed back the rest of the drink and once again set the empty firmly on the bar.
“I didn’t figure that rifle of mine has enough stopping power to put him down. I could’a emptied the blamed thing in him and it might’ve killed him eventually, but not in time to keep him from gettin’ those paws on me and tearin’ me apart.” Andersen shuddered. “I wouldn’t’a been nothin’ but a snack for a beast that big!”
“I still say you’re exaggeratin’,” claimed the man who had said he’d never seen a grizzly bear ten feet tall. “You just got scared and panicked. Maybe it seemed that big to you, but it really wasn’t. It couldn’t have been.”
Andersen glared at him and said, “Then why don’t you go out there to Hogback Hill and see for yourself? I hope that grizzly gets you and knocks your head off with one swipe o’ his paw!”
“I don’t cotton to bein’ talked to like that—” the man began as he clenched his fists.
“That’s enough,” Monte Carson said, his voice sharp and commanding. “You’re not going to bust up this saloon because of some brawl over how big a bear is.”
Enthralled by Andersen’s story, the men hadn’t realized that Smoke and Monte were standing at the back of the crowd, listening.
Now they split apart so that the sheriff and Smoke could step forward. Nelse Andersen turned from the bar to greet them.
“Sheriff, you better put together a posse and ride out there as fast as you can.”
“Why would I do that?” Monte asked. “I can’t arrest a bear. Assuming there really is one and that he’s still there.”
“You don’t believe me, Sheriff?” Andersen pressed a hand to his chest and looked mortally offended.
“Those do sound like some pretty wild claims you’re making.”
Smoke said, “I’ve seen some pretty big grizzlies, but never one that was more than ten feet tall and weighed twelve hunderd pounds. I think you’d have to go up to Alaska or Canada to find bears that big.”
“Well, Smoke, no offense to you or the sheriff, but I’ll tell you the same thing I told Hodges there. Why don’t you ride out there and have a look for yourself? A critter as big as the one I saw is bound to have left some tracks!”
Smoke exchanged a glance with Monte and then said, “You know, I think I just might do that. Especially if you come along and show me where you saw him, Nelse.”
Andersen swallowed hard, opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, then he nodded and said, “I’ll do it. I got to go home sometime, and I’ll admit, I’ll feel a mite better about travelin’ on that stretch of road if you’re with me.”
“I’m ready to go if you are.” Smoke looked at Monte again. “Are you coming?”
“No, I’d better stay here in town,” the sheriff said, adding dryly, “since I don’t really have any jurisdiction over bears. But you’ll tell me what you find, won’t you, Smoke?”
“Sure,” Smoke replied with a chuckle.
One of the bystanders said, “How about the rest of us comin’ along, too?”
“Might be better not to,” Smoke said. “A big bunch might spook that bear and make him attack, if he’s still out there.”
The real reason Smoke didn’t want them coming along was because he knew how easy it was for a group of men to work themselves up into a nervous state where they might start shooting at anything that moved. That could lead to trouble.
A few men muttered at the decision, but Smoke was so well respected in Big Rock that no one wanted to argue with him. He and Andersen left the Brown Dirt Cowboy, but not until Andersen cast one more longing glance at the empty glass on the bar and sighed in resignation.
Smoke’s horse was tied at the hitch rail in front of the sheriff’s office. He swung into the saddle and fell in alongside the wagon as Andersen drove out of Big Rock. The Sugarloaf was located off the main trail that ran due west out of the settlement, but Andersen followed a smaller trail that angled off northwest toward the small spreads located in the foothills on that side of the valley.
As they moved along the trail, Smoke chatted amiably with the rancher, who was a bachelor, well-liked but not particularly close to anybody in these parts. Andersen asked after Sally, as well as Pearlie and Cal Woods, another of Smoke’s ranch hands. He didn’t seem to be affected much by the whiskey he had consumed. Smoke had heard that Andersen had a hollow leg when it came to booze, and now he was seeing evidence of that.
They covered several miles before Andersen pointed to a rugged ridge up ahead on the right and said, “That’s Hogback Hill.”
“I know,” Smoke said. “Good name for it. It looks like a hog’s back, sort of rough and spiny.”
Andersen was starting to look apprehensive now. “That brush on the right is where I saw the bear. He must’ve been down on all fours in it. When I came along, he just reared up bigger’n life. I really thought he was gonna eat me.”
Smoke’s sharp eyes scanned the thick vegetation they were approaching. “I don’t see anything moving around in there,” he said. “Or hear any rustling in the brush, either.”
“I didn’t see or hear anything out of the ordinary until suddenly he was right there, no more than twenty feet from me. He’s a sneaky one, that bear is. He was layin’ up, waitin’ to ambush me.”
Smoke tried not to grin as Andersen said that with a straight face. The rancher appeared to believe it. Smoke supposed he ought to give the man the benefit of the doubt. As far as he could recall, Andersen didn’t have a reputation for going around spreading big windies.
“We’ll be ready, just in case,” Smoke said as he pulled his Winchester from its saddle scabbard under his right leg. He laid the rifle across the saddle in front of him.
A moment later, Andersen pulled back on the reins and brought his team to a stop. “This is it,” he said. “This is the place.” He pointed into the brush. “Right there. I’ll never forget it.”
Smoke studied the bushes and listened intently. There was no sign of a bear or any other wildlife, other than a few birds singing in some trees about fifty yards away.
“I’m going to take a closer look,” he said.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“I don’t think there’s anything in there.” Smoke swung a leg over the saddle and dropped to the ground, holding the Winchester ready in case he needed it. He had spotted something that interested him, and as he moved into the brush, using the rifle barrel to push branches aside, he got a better look at what he had noticed.
Quite a few of the branches were snapped around the spot where Andersen said the bear had been, as if they’d been broken when something large and heavy pushed through the brush. A frown creased Smoke’s forehead as he spotted something else. He reached forward and plucked a tuft of grayish brown hair from a branch’s sharply broken end.
That sure looked like it could have come from a bear’s coat.
Smoke moved closer, pushed more of the brush aside, and looked down at the ground. Some rain had fallen about a week earlier, so the soil was still fairly soft, not dried out yet.
After a long moment, he turned his head and called, “Come here, Nelse.”
“I ain’t sure I want to,” the man replied. “What did you find?”
“Better you come take a look for yourself. There’s nothing around here that’s going to hurt you.”
With obvious reluctance, Andersen set the brake on the wagon, wrapped the reins around it, and climbed down from the seat. He edged into the brush and followed the path Smoke had made.
