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Murder at the Rocking R

by Catt Ford

Dreamspinner Press

www.dreamspinnerpress.com

First published in 2012, 2012

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Murder at the Rocking R

by Catt Ford

Tell Hadley had stopped smoking some years ago. There

were rumors about that it made folks sick, could even kill

them. It had almost killed him.

One time he'd just about stumbled in on a hornet's nest of

killers because the habit had dulled his sense of smell. He had

the scars to prove it.

When a man rode the range alone, he needed all his

senses sharp to take in his surroundings. Sometimes it was

more sight, sometimes smell. Taste could keep a man from

drinking tainted water or eating poisonous fruit. So he'd

learned his lesson the hard way and quit smoking while he

was healing up from that encounter.

Right now he needed his sense of smell the most.

Darkness had fallen while he was still riding up the steep,

winding trail, robbing him of sight, so he had to rely on the

instincts of his buckskin. She was a half-wild mustang with

plenty of speed and bottom that nobody could ride but him.

Tough, trail-savvy, and a fighter, she'd carried him over a lot

of territory. She knew how to pick her way along a dim trail

even in the dark, and a horse could follow a scent trail as well

as a dog.

He could hear nothing but the hum of insects and the soft

thud of her hooves in the dirt. He could see nothing but the

black shapes of jagged rocks and the stars white in the sky

above. But he could smell something on the air.

"Softly now, Malena," Tell whispered to the horse.

She twitched an ear at him and kept moving forward. She

could smell it too.

Murder at the Rocking R

by Catt Ford

Burning wood. A fire meant coffee, food, and water. Maybe

grass for the horse.

A fire could also mean sudden death.

He had to admire whoever was up there. From no vantage

point had he been able to spot the telltale orange gleam of

the fire. Before the sun went down there had been no trail of

smoke written in the sky. The rider had been right smart in

choosing his way. If not for Malena and the occasional fresh

chip on a rock, he would have lost the trail hours ago.

The rider was pretty determined not to be followed. That

could mean a lot of things. Tell had no false modesty. He

knew he was a good tracker, one of the best. A Navajo scout

had once told him anyone could read sign on the ground

provided they kept their eyes open. A good tracker learned to

follow the trail of the mind. Once a man learned how his

quarry thought, he could follow where there was no trail.

That was what Tell had done. The visible trail had given

out five miles back. The rider he was chasing had taken to the

water, doubling back in a small stream instead of coming out

the other side. It had cost him two hours of patient searching

through thick brush beside the overgrown stream, but he had

finally found where the rider and horse had emerged.

An impatient man would have given up. A less observant

man would not have noticed white dust where an iron shoe

had chipped a water-rounded stone.

The hunted had walked his horse over a dry streambed full

of pebbles and stones to make his trail harder to follow.

Murder at the Rocking R

by Catt Ford

The hunter had expected that level of trail-savvy and

searched for it. What he had not expected to find was the

drop of dried blood.

There had been plenty of blood where he first picked up

the trail, but there had also been a number of dead bodies

strewn about to account for it. He had not suspected that his

prey had also been wounded.

That gave Tell something to think about while he let

Malena mosey her way up the trail. A cornered wolf will fight.

A wounded wolf when cornered will fight to the death. He

would have to take care.

* * * *

The pocketful of fire he'd made was so small that very little

heat reflected off the rocks to warm him. Noel had moved the

coffeepot to the side so the coffee wouldn't boil. He made a

face as he sipped the black brew. He preferred it with sugar

and milk, but when he'd set out earlier today he had only

expected to be away from town for a few hours.

Of course he carried a small supply of coffee and beef

jerky with him out of habit. Not much, but it would keep him

alive until he returned.

If he returned.

Noel figured he had about an hour before the hunter

behind him caught up. The man was good. His horse was

better. Earlier in the day, much earlier, he'd caught a flicker

of movement in the bushes and stopped to figure out what it

was. Hoping it was just a deer or some other wild animal, he

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