The Humbug Man Read Online Free PDF

frustrated that the snow made it such an ordeal to get to Blake.
    With her heart hammering in her throat, blind fear choking her, she held on to the reins and felt her heartbeat shaking her as she heard Blake’s shrill voice.
    Ahead of her, Hollister made his way quickly through another thick stand of aspens, through the thick underbrush, and Maggie, right on the heels of his mount, caught a horrifying glimpse of a small dark head far below, near the ribbon of stream that cut through the snow. Blake! And only a few yards away, stalking, a big silver wolf.
    Maggie felt her heart stop. Her son. Her boy! She saw Hollister swing out of the saddle, heard his voice.
    “Don’t move!” he yelled at Blake and sighted down the rifle barrel with an economy of motion that was as menacing as the wolf itself.
    There was a sudden report, and then another and another, the crack of rifle fire echoing with horrible violence down the ridge and up the next slope, at odds with the pastoral beauty and peace it disturbed.
    “Blake!” Maggie screamed, tears sliding down her cheeks as she swung out of the saddle. There was smoke from the rifle in Hollister’s hands, but even before it cleared, he was down that slope, his big frame absorbing the shock of his steps with grace and ease. Maggie was right behind him.
    “Mr. Hollister! Mom!” Blake cried, his voice excited and high-pitched with pain.
    Through her tears, Maggie could see the unnatural angle that Blake’s left leg was lying at. Broken for sure, she thought sickly, and thanked God for Tate Hollister.
    The man knelt quickly beside the boy, the rifle cast aside as he felt the lower leg, and Blake winced. Maggie got on Blake’s other side, hugging him, shaking with reaction.
    “Broken,” Hollister murmured. “A simple fracture, thank God, not a compound one. What happened?”
    “Lost my footing.” Blake tried to grin. “I came out…to check the river. Gosh, Mr. Hollister, that wolf sure was a beaut. I guess that’s why you didn’t kill him, huh?”
    “Timber wolves are damned near extinct,” Hollister said as he got up and broke two limbs off a tree. “If he hadn’t turned tail, I wouldn’t have had a choice, but I flushed him. I hate killing when I don’t have to. Maggie, I need some cloth to make a splint,” he said as he pulled a folded blanket from its position just behind the saddle on his horse. He wrapped the limbs to make a cradle and then very carefully drew the cradle under Blake’s leg.
    It was the first time he’d ever called her by name, and Maggie couldn’t understand why her heart ran wild. She let go of Blake long enough to hand him the wool scarf around her neck.
    “Will this do?” she asked in a quivering tone, handing the scarf to him while Blake gripped her hand tightly and tried to reassure her that he was all right.
    “Hi, guy,” she said and spoiled her stiff upper lip by bursting into tears.
    “Aw, cut it out, Mom,” Blake muttered. “It’s just a broken leg.”
    “Excuse me,” she said, trying to laugh. “You know how mothers are.”
    Hollister glanced at her, but he didn’t say anything. He whipped out his pocketknife and made a neat slit right down Blake’s boot so that the whole thing was laid bare and easily removed. Then he positioned the sticks he’d broken on either side of Blake’s leg and put his wool bandanna next to Maggie’s. “OK,” he told Blake quietly. “This is going to be rough. I have to straighten that leg and splint it, and it’s going to hurt like hell. Want something to bite on?”
    “Oh, but you can’t—” Maggie was already protesting.
    “Shut up,” he told her, his eyes black and steady and challenging.
    She did, instantly, without an argument, because that hard glare was like a dash of cold water.
    “I’ll be OK,” Blake said through his teeth, nodding. He clenched his hands at his sides and propped himself on them. “Go ahead.”
    Maggie felt tears spurt from her eyes as Hollister