An Occurrence in Crazy Bear Valley Read online

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  ISBN: 1-62105-048-3

  An Occurrence In Crazy Bear Valley copyright 2010, 2012 by Brian Keene

  Lost Canyon of the Damned copyright 2010, 2012 by Brian Keene

  Cover art copyright © 2012 Glenn Chapman

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written consent of the publisher, except where permitted by law.

  Printed in the USA.

  Acknowledgements

  For this Deadite Press edition, my sincere thanks and appreciation go to everyone at Deadite Press; Richard Chizmar; Brian Freeman; Tim Lebbon; Steve Vernon; Tim Curran; William Schafer; Joe R. Lansdale; John Joseph Adams; Tod Clark and Mark Sylva; and my sons.

  For Bryan Smith,

  my fellow Prostitute...

  AN OCCURRENCE IN CRAZY BEAR VALLEY

  ONE

  The following story is based on true events…

  Morgan and his group heard the lumberjacks long before they spotted them. The noise echoed through the thick, shadowed forest—the heavy, monotonous thud of large axes striking wood, the honeybee-buzz of sawing, the crude, grumbled curses, snatches of conversation, grunts of exertion and loud gasps of breath. Morgan and the others simply followed the sounds, riding single-file around the bend in the swift-flowing river, until the woodsmen were in sight. The lumberjacks continued with their work, oblivious to the group’s presence. Morgan wasn’t surprised. With all the noise, the workers wouldn’t have heard their approach.

  For the last twenty miles, Morgan and the others had ridden through the shallows and along the riverbank, rather than trying to lead the horses through the dense, choking undergrowth. The horses didn’t like the forest. It spooked them. In truth, it spooked Morgan, too, though he didn’t dare admit it to the others—he didn’t have that luxury. Display even the slightest amount of indecision or fear, and they’d be jockeying to take his place as leader of the gang. He kept his misgivings regarding the forest to himself. Ever since entering this vast stretch of cool, murky wilderness, he’d had the uncanny sensation that the trees were watching them. Before coming across the lumberjacks, he’d been unsettled by the lack of sound—there were no birdsongs, no squirrels barking, none of the usual things one heard in the woods. It was as if Mother Nature had decided to hold her tongue.

  He squinted, surveying the locale. For the last several miles, the river had wound through a long but narrow valley. The lumberjacks had cleared a wide swath along the riverbank. The clearing stretched deep into the woods, ending atop a faraway hill covered with tall grass, broad ferns, and a colorful rainbow of wildflowers. Morgan smiled at the simple beauty, studying the various hues of red, yellow, blue, white and purple. In contrast, an ugly, crude bunkhouse sat on top of the hill. It had been fashioned from uneven pine slabs, sod, and rocks. It looked sturdy but drafty. Morgan guessed that the structure was probably cold as a witches titty in the wintertime. Smoke curled lazily from a chimney in the cabin’s roof.

  Morgan halted his mount. One by one, the rest of the group fanned their horses out beside him and stopped as well. He nodded at each of the riders in turn—Tom Parker, tall and dour and pale, with an S-shaped scar just above one thin eyebrow and an ability to cheat at poker like none other; Henrik Gunderson, the mountain man whose perpetual scowl and tobacco-stained teeth both remained hidden beneath his thick, unkempt, salt and pepper-colored beard; Vernon Stephens, fat, bow-legged, and oily, his bulbous nose infested with blackheads and blue veins, gasping for breath as he sagged in his saddle; Eli Johnson, flashing missing teeth and bleeding gums as he smiled humorlessly, his pink and gnarled left hand, burned in a fire at a livery in Kansas City many years ago, clutching the saddle of his horse; and finally Clara, a refugee from a whorehouse in Wisconsin, riding behind Johnson, her long, wavy red hair spilling out from beneath her hat, her small, thin hands wrapped around Johnson’s waist. None of them spoke. They simply watched the workmen.

  There were four lumberjacks. Two of them worked a massive handsaw, pushing and pulling it back and forth as the blade bit deep into a gnarled old oak tree. Both men were covered in sawdust and sweat, despite the cool breeze. Two more workers hefted heavy, cumbersome axes, chopping up the oak tree’s already-downed companion. They remained unaware of the riders. Stephens twisted in his saddle and farted. Gunderson noisily spat a wad of brown tobacco juice onto the ground. His horse whinnied. Finally, the woodsmen looked up, clearly startled by the unexpected newcomers.

  Smiling with reassurance, Morgan raised his right hand in greeting. “Howdy.”

  One of the men nodded, holding his axe cautiously in front of him.

  “Howdy,” the lumberjack returned the greeting. “Where’d you all come from?”

  “Back yonder.” Morgan nodded with his head. “My apologies. Didn’t mean to spook you or nothing. We were just passing through.”

  “Well, you did spook us and then some, I guess. But it don’t matter.”

  “Looks like hot work,” Morgan said. “Hard work, too. Damn hard.”

  One of the men on the tree-saw nodded. “I reckon you could say that.”

  Morgan let his hand slowly drop to his side, so as not to spook them any further. His smile remained.

  “Well,” he said. “I’d imagine you boys could use a break. Am I right?”

  The lumberjacks chuckled at this, visibly relaxing.

  “Yeah,” a man with an axe said, “I reckon we could, at that.”

  “We was just fixing to take one,” his partner agreed.

  “Good,” Morgan said. “Please, allow me to help.”

  “What’s tha—”

  Still smiling, Morgan pulled his pistol and shot the man in the face. The worker’s nose, chin and teeth vanished in a wet, red spray. The man spun around and toppled over, still clutching his axe. Before the other three lumberjacks could even move, Gunderson, Parker, and Johnson had pulled their weapons and gunned them down. Giggling, Clara put her hands over her ears to block the noise. Stephens simply watched, blinking atop his overburdened horse like a squat toad. None of their mounts reacted to the gunfire. Like their riders, the horses had grown accustomed to it by now. The shots echoed through the valley and surrounding forest like slow-rolling thunder. Their ears rang from the noise. Acrid smoke hung in the air.

  When the last lumberjack fell, Morgan’s smile grew broader. He raised his head, cupped a hand around his mouth, and shouted, “Timber!”

  Laughing at the joke, the group dismounted and stepped into the clearing, examining the bodies of the lumberjacks. They rummaged through the men’s pockets, but found nothing useful.

  “Shit,” Parker muttered. “They weren’t worth the price of the bullets we put into them, Morgan.”

  “Reckon there’s any more of them up in that cabin?” Johnson asked, warily eyeing the ramshackle structure.

  “I doubt it,” Morgan said. “If there were, they’d have started shooting by now, or at least come outside to see what all the commotion was about.”

  Stephens, who’d been kneeling over one of the corpses, stood up quickly. His disfigured nose wrinkled in disgust. “Aw, goddamn it!”

  “What’s wrong?” Clara asked.

  “This one shit his pants when he died,” Stephens said. “I got it on my fucking fingers.”

  Clara and Parker laughed.

  Ignoring Stephens’ pli
ght, Morgan pointed at the shack on top of the hill. “I reckon we might find something useful up yonder. At the very least, we can camp there for the night. Be nice to have a roof over our heads again.”

  Johnson nodded. “If it don’t leak.”

  Gunderson frowned. “You sure that’s a good idea, boss? Making camp here?”

  “We need to rest,” Morgan said. “So do the horses. We keep pushing them the way we have, and they’re going to drop right out from under us. I don’t know about y’all, but I don’t cotton to the idea of outrunning the posse on foot.”

  “I reckon,” Gunderson replied. “But what if the posse comes across us here?”

  “I don’t think we have to worry about that,” Morgan said. “In truth, I don’t think they’re after us anymore.”

  “How can you be sure?” Eli asked.

  “This is wild country. There’s nothing out here but Indians, critters, and folks like these ones we just shot—lumberjacks and prospectors. Most of the men in that posse are city-born. Townspeople. They like their three meals a day served with silverware and cooked on a stove instead of around a fire. They like their books and music and sitting around of an evening, deciding who to vote for and discussing the problems of the world as if they could do something to change them. My point is, they’ve gotten soft. More and more since the end of the war. They’ve got big old bellies to go along with their big old wallets. They’ve been out here long enough that they’ll miss their warm beds and their women. They can’t go without their comforts. I don’t reckon they’ll want to stay out here too long before turning around and heading back, no matter how high the bounty on our heads is. But just in case, we’ll stay here in this valley just long enough to rest up, and then I reckon we’ll ride on.”

  “And go where?” Stephens blasted another fart as he bent over on the riverbank and washed the dead man’s feces from his fingers.

  Morgan shrugged. “Somewhere away from your sorry ass, I imagine. Damn, but you stink. Reminds me of the whores in that place we took Clara from. Their snatches smelled like your ass, Stephens.”

  Laughing, the group started up the hill. Morgan turned back to Stephens, and nodded at the four corpses.

  “Toss them bodies in the water, far out enough that the current will take them away. Make sure of that. We don’t need them attracting bears and what-not.”

  “Actually,” Parker said, “maybe we ought not to. I mean, not to second-guess you, boss, but I dare say that my stomach could do with some fresh game. I’m a might tired of eating scraps on the run. These dry rations don’t make a proper meal. I bet the rest of you could do with some fresh meat, too. Am I right?”

  The others nodded cautiously, glancing between Parker and Morgan.

  “So,” Parker continued, “if we was to leave these bodies lying out, and a bear or wolves come sniffing around, looking to eat, we could bag one.”

  Morgan paused, considering the suggestion. “I’m sure those lumberjacks have food up yonder in the cabin.”

  “Yeah,” Parker said, making one more effort. “I reckon you’re right. But it’s probably all salted or dried. Same shit we’ve been eating for the past week. Wouldn’t you rather have something fresh between your teeth, boss?”

  “I guess we could all do with some of that. Good idea, Parker.” Morgan turned back to Stephens. “String them corpses up, and ring the dinner bell. But not too close to the cabin, mind you. Just close enough that we have a good shot when something comes along to eat them.”

  They walked up the hill towards the shack, leaving Stephens to grumble and moan to himself about always getting the shit jobs. Their pace was arrogant and leisurely. They moved without care—and without fear. They trod on the wildflowers as they walked, crushing the fragile petals beneath their dirty boot heels. Gunderson spat tobacco juice on green ferns. Johnson and Parker swatted at bees.

  Now that the gunshots had finally faded, the ringing in their ears subsided and silence once more returned to the clearing. Morgan still didn’t like it. He preferred the wide open plains and deserts to these dank, shadowy woodlands. Here, the trees grew too closely together, and you never felt the sun on your face. You couldn’t see if someone was coming for you, and there was always the sensation of being watched.

  They pulled their weapons again as they neared the cabin. None of them expected trouble. They were all in agreement with their boss that the shack was deserted. But each of them had survived this long by playing it cautious, and their actions now were part of a learned response, as natural to them as sneezing, chewing, spitting, or shitting.

  Morgan nodded silently at Gunderson and Johnson, both of whom spread out and approached the porch. While Morgan, Parker, and Clara fanned out in front of the cabin, Gunderson and Johnson positioned themselves on either side of the door. Then, Gunderson opened it and peeked inside. When he wasn’t greeted with gunshots or screams, he stepped inside. Johnson followed him, clutching his weapon with his good hand while clenching his burned hand into a gnarled fist. They disappeared from sight. No sound came from inside the shack.

  “All clear?” Morgan called out after a moment, mildly annoyed that they hadn’t yet reported back.

  There was no answer.

  “Goddamn it,” he muttered. “I swear, Johnson ain’t been right in the head since that mule kicked him back in Cheyenne.”

  Clara grinned. “He might not be right in the head, but the rest of him still works fine.”

  Scowling, Morgan cupped one hand over his mouth. “Johnson? Gunderson? You all clear or what?”

  “We’re all clear,” Johnson shouted back, “but it ain’t deserted, boss.”

  “What?”

  “I said it ain’t deserted. Best come see for yourself.”

  Morgan frowned at the others. “What the hell’s he talking about?”

  He plodded up the stairs, followed by Parker and then Clara. Morgan paused as he stepped through the door, letting his eyes adjust to the gloom. The first thing he noticed was the stench—sour sweat, wood smoke, feces, urine, unwashed blankets, and meals cooked atop the woodstove had congealed over time to form a permanent and cloying miasma. The smell made Morgan’s eyes water. He struggled with his gorge.

  “Christ,” he gasped. “Let’s get some windows open in here. Damn place smells like Stephens’s ass.”

  Morgan glanced around the shanty while Clara and Parker crowded in behind him. The shack wasn’t much. Describing it as ‘rustic’ would have applied too much charm to the interior. ‘Shit hole’ was much more apt, in Morgan’s opinion. The cabin consisted of a single centralized room that appeared to function as kitchen, living quarters, bunkhouse, and outhouse all in one. The floors and walls were built out of rough, uneven, un-sanded planks, and the cracks between them had been sealed with dried mud and grass to keep the cold out. A cast-iron cook stove occupied one corner. It was dirty and covered with soot, and the stovepipe leading up to the roof was dented and dinged. The lumberjacks had left the fire burning inside, and wisps of smoke snaked from the dents in the pipe. A few rusty pots and pans sat atop the stove. Spider webs hung in the corners and from the ceiling. A scattering of tiny wasp’s nests dangled from the rafters. Mouse and rat droppings dotted the floor.

  The lumberjacks didn’t have much in the way of personal belongings. There were several crude cots with straw-tick mattresses, heaps of soiled blankets and bedrolls, and not much else. A dog-eared copy of the Holy Bible was lying atop a wooden chair. A kerosene lantern hung from a nail in a post. The kitchen table—nothing more than the sawed trunk of a massive oak tree—held a few tin cups, some bowls, and wooden utensils. Some meager food stores—sacks of grain, flour, and beans—occupied some rough-hewn pine shelving. A wooden potato bin sat next to it. Most of the potatoes inside of it were already sprouting thin, greenish-white tubers. A rusty, dented tin pail occupied one corner. Judging by the stench wafting from it, the lumber-jacks had been using the bucket to piss and shit in. There were very few weapons—just
a shotgun, a long rifle, and some ammunition for both, along with a few knives of varying size and length. The only other items in the shack were the lumberjacks’ clothing, footlockers and some spare tools leaning against the walls.

  Like a hundred other such places they’d encountered from El Paso all the way to Cheyenne, and Philadelphia to Kansas City, the cabin was wholly unremarkable. What was remarkable was the woman tied to a post in the center of the room.

  Johnson and Gunderson moved aside, allowing Morgan to fully enter the cabin. Clara and Parker followed him inside.

  “Jesus,” Parker gasped. “Would you look at her.”

  Johnson grinned. “Like we said—it ain’t exactly deserted. Them lumberjacks was nice enough to leave us a present. She’s a real beauty, ain’t she?”

  Clara frowned at this, but said nothing. Parker and Gunderson held their tongues, waiting for Morgan to speak. He didn’t. Instead, he simply stood there, expressionless, quietly appraising the captive. They’d all seen this look before. Morgan wore it when he was playing cards, sizing up an opponent, or getting ready to kill someone. Quite often, those things were one and the same.

  The captive woman was young, maybe nineteen or twenty, and she would have been beautiful under better conditions. It was obvious to Morgan that her current situation had been less than optimum. She was nude except for a coarse, moldering burlap bag. Mold grew in sprawling patches on the fabric. Holes had been cut in it for her arms, head and neck. It stretched from her shoulders to just above her belly button. Her arms were tied above her head with bailing twine, and bound around a rusty nail sticking out of the post. Another length of bailing twine encircled her ankles. Her pale skin was covered with yellow-purple bruises and various scratches, cuts and scabs. Her long blonde hair was dirty and matted, the curls more like barbed wire than anything remotely feminine. The girl’s lower lip was split in the center. The wound looked fresh. Tiny traces of dried blood and snot crusted her upper lip and nostrils. She stared at Morgan and the others, her eyes wide and panicked.