Sundance Read Online Free PDF Page B

favorite gun in his hand, a gun so polite that no one wanted to blame him.
    His sleep went deep then, his dreams lost to him, and he rested.
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    H E RODE WEST for another two days and turned south near the Green River, heading for the Colorado/Utah border and the Outlaw Trail. He saw no one after him in that time and felt safe riding into Browns Park. He was on his way to an old hideout where he hoped to find certain things that he had hidden.
    The way into the canyon was tricky and well disguised. Longbaugh maneuvered it effortlessly and saw no indication of recent visitors. The sun overhead pressed dense, compact shadows from every rock, tree, and bush, as well as one that traveled under his horse. The canyon was eerily empty, not that he wanted company, but he hadn’t remembered the air being quite so dead between the canyon walls. Perhaps because he had so often ridden in with loquacious Parker. In the pressing heat, he felt a cold trickle between his shoulder blades. He had remembereda breeze. Only the air above him moved, bending limbs that were out of reach. He rode with his head on a swivel, ears stretching out, overreacting to the sounds of nature. The noise of his horse’s hooves seemed to come from behind him, the creak of the leather saddle following a second too late. The horse sensed his tension and thought to rebel, but Longbaugh urged him on. Longbaugh thought that even the horse believed they were riding into a trap.
    The passage opened and the inner canyon lay before him. He rode directly to the post office tree, where members of the gang left messages. He found a rolled-up scrap of paper, brittle now and brown-yellow, with a faded message in pencil that had endured any number of downpours to reach this state of illegibility. If it contained a warning, the danger was many years old. He had an ominous sense that he was being watched. He looked up the face of the canyon and was not reassured. He dismounted under the shade of the tree and pondered the surroundings. His eyes ran up the ridge to where the cabin sat. He could not see it, but he knew it was there.
    Not a thing felt right to him. The sun was high, the sky a special shade of blue, the smell of sagebrush strong, and all of that made the sensation odder. What could be off on such a fine, clear day?
    He remounted the horse and rode slowly for the trail that would eventually lead him up the canyon wall and carry him to the hideout.
    He spent more than an hour when the ride would normally take half that, rounded the bend and came in sight of the structure. It appeared unchanged. The immediate area had not been cleared that season or possibly even the year before. That brought him hope. The cabin had been built with a unique floor plan, four rooms, each with its own entrance, and none of the rooms connected inside. He approached the door to the front room and stepped into quiet. Human life had not moved here for months, maybe years. His boots made tracks in the dust on the planks. Stove, kettle, pans hanging on the wall, a couple of chairs, a cot, cobwebs, little else. He took the lantern and a box of matches, and returned to the outside, chased by a shiver.
    He left the horse and walked the slim trail that took him up to thecaves. He passed a series of cave mouths until he came to one in particular. He lit the lantern while standing in the sun, and was unsure in the brightness whether the wick burned. He held his palm over the chimney and felt the sharp heat. He climbed the boulder that partly blocked the cave entrance and took hold of the base of a small scrub oak bush that was thicker now and grew in a place that worked as a handle so he could lower his weight inside. Once in the dark, he held the lantern up as his eyes adjusted. When he was satisfied he was alone, he stooped and moved deeper.
    He remembered the way, and after twenty yards was able to stand, taking a left, a left, and a right, until he