High Country Horror by Jon Sharpe Read Free Book Online Page A

“He went up to the back gate and let the dog see him so it would bark. Then he snuck around the fence. When Myrtle came out and told the dog to hush, he hopped the fence, slit the dog’s throat, and jumped her before she could cry out.”
    “You got all that from the tracks?”
    “Some. Some of it I’m guessing.”
    “That poor girl.”
    “Either he gagged her or he knocked her out and carried her here and threw her over the horse. Odds are he was long gone before her parents came out to find why she was taking so long.”
    “Clever rascal,” Tibbit said.
    “Clever bastard,” Fargo amended.
    “By now he could be anywhere.”
    “But he made a mistake.”
    “He did?”
    “He brought the horse close so he wouldn’t have to carry Myrtle all that far.” Fargo tapped a finger on one of the tracks. “All we have to do is follow these to his lair.”
    “My word!” Tibbit exclaimed. “That’s right. What are you waiting for? Every moment counts.”
    “On foot it could take days,” Fargo mentioned. “We’ll collect our horses and do it right.”
    “Yes. What was I thinking?” Marshal Tibbit happily rubbed his hands together. “This is marvelous. At last I can put an end to the disappearances. Folks won’t think so poorly of me.”
    “And no more girls will be taken.”
    “Yes, that too.” Tibbit turned. “Let’s hurry. Maybe we can end this before the sun goes down.”
    “Provided he doesn’t see us coming,” Fargo said.

6
    Myrtle Spencer’s abductor was clever. The tracks wound among the trees like the twisting of a snake, not to make it harder to trail him, since the tracks were fresh and plain, but to slow the trackers down. For over a mile the serpent in the saddle hadn’t ridden in a straight line for more than twenty feet. For Fargo it was tedious and slow, constantly having to rein right and left.
    Marshal Tibbit wasn’t accustomed to so much riding. He complained that his backside hurt and a little later complained that his legs hurt and a little later yet complained that he was sweating all over and could dearly use a hot bath.
    “Don’t you mean a cold one?”
    “No, I always take hot baths. I have delicate skin and cold baths are too rough on me.”
    Fargo glanced at him.
    “What?”
    “Nothing.”
    The forest ended at the brink of a high canyon wall. Fargo drew rein and scanned the bottom but saw no tracks. He reined to the east but there were none along the rim in that direction, so he reined to the west only to find there were none in that direction, either. “What the hell?”
    “What’s wrong?”
    “His horse sprouted wings and took to the air.”
    “Your jokes are weak,” Tibbit said.
    Fargo returned to where the tracks came out of the trees. Below was a talus slope. Made up of loose dirt and small stones, it would give way under the weight of a horse and turn the stones and dirt into a deadly avalanche. The talus was undisturbed—not a single pockmark anywhere. “Stranger and stranger.”
    “Are you saying we’ve lost them?”
    “The tracks have disappeared into thin air.”
    “How is that possible?”
    “It’s not.” Fargo racked his brain for an explanation. “Maybe he stopped and wrapped the hooves in hide.” But even then, there should have been impressions where the soil was soft. Horses were heavy.
    “Well, we got this far at least,” Tibbit said. “We’ve learned that it’s one man and he must know the Spencer family really well.”
    “Caught on, did you?”
    “I’m not completely worthless, Mr. Fargo. Whoever this fellow is, he wanted Myrtle and only Myrtle. He had to know the dog was hers, and that if it raised a ruckus she would likely be the one to come out and quiet it.” Tibbit pushed his hat back on his head and mopped his brow. “Which doesn’t really help much since I’d already come to suspect it must be someone in Haven and not an outsider.”
    “How did that come to you?”
    “Am I to believe a stranger has a cabin off in