Marshal Joseph Longtree watched Wolf Creek burn.
It had started for mysterious reasons in the undertaking parlor. But once started, it had found the chemicals therein and exploded into life.
It turned into a major blaze within minutes.
Whether the fire was unleashed by accident or on purpose, it didn't matter-the town was burning. Longtree had arrived with Lauters moments after the slaughter had occurred. By then, the beast was long gone. But the evidence it left was all-too apparent. The beast had broken through the rear wall of the mortuary.
The fire was spreading fast. Almost effortlessly, cheered on by the winds that screamed out of the north. The buildings and houses in Wolf Creek were all packed together very closely and the flames jumped from roof to roof.
Longtree and Lauters were stalking the beast.
There was no posse to be had. All available men (and women) were busy fighting the blaze and this included Bowes. Even the sixty men Ryan had assembled to exterminate the Blackfeet, were helping out.
The trail of the beast was easy to follow, though somewhat erratic. It was only a matter of following the path of wreckage and death. Wherever it went, people were killed, homes or buildings destroyed. It had charged through the wall of a saloon, murdering six people and maiming a dozen others. Then it kicked down the door of a miner's little home and decapitated his family. Next, the trail led to a dry goods store. The proprietor was crushed like a bundle of old sticks and stuffed into a coal furnace. One valiant, though suicidal, man had attempted to stop the fiend as it left the store. They found his shotgun bent into a V and his body driven headfirst like a fencing post through the snow and into the frozen earth. Only his wrenched legs were visible. Wherever the lawmen went, the tale was the same: atrocity upon atrocity.
"It's taking back its lands," Longtree commented as they slipped through the caved-in wall of a dance hall.
Lauters studied the stomped furniture and shattered fixtures. "Its lands?"
"Yes," Longtree said. "Once there were many like it. They ruled this land, the Blackfeet and other tribes worshipped them. Now it's come back and it's taking back its property."
Lauters looked at him like he was crazy. "It's a monster."
"But not a mindless one.''
"You're giving it a lot of credit, aren't you? Maybe it can reason a bit, but it's still a monster."
There was no arguing with that.
Longtree was wondering if the beast was on the run or merely hiding out in one of these ruined structures, awaiting the man he needed to kill. Or had he forgotten now, in the inebriation of massacre, why he'd been called back? What his reason for being was. Anything was possible with this creature, anything at all.
"I take it," Lauters said, scanning the debris for bodies, "that you've been talking with Crazytail and his bunch."
"I have."
"And you believe those tales they tell?" the sheriff said incredulously.
Longtree sighed, realizing he still disliked this man. And why not? He was a rapist, a murderer, a vigilante, a cattle rustler, would-be assassin (and God knew what else) parading as a lawman. "If you have a better explanation about the origin of this beast, Sheriff, I'm all ears," Longtree said patiently. "It came from somewhere."
Lauters spat. "Hell. That's where it came from."
"Regardless," Longtree sighed, "that's where it's going."
They moved along, Lauters in the lead. There was blood in the beast's tracks now. Fresh blood.
"If it bleeds," Lauters said happily, "it can die."
The trail suddenly ended. The only possible place the beast could have gone was the building leaning before them. The church. Together they circled around it. No tracks led away.
"We've got it." Lauters was jubilant. "We've got the sonofabitch."
"We'll need help."
"Stay here," Lauters ordered. "I'll get some men."
Longtree watched him vault away, moving quickly through the drifts. Longtree studied the church. Why had the beast come here? Was it for the obvious reason that it simply needed shelter, a place to mend its wounds? Or was it something else entirely? Did it know a house of worship when it saw one? Did it think in its unflappable egotism that it belonged here, a god to be kneeled before? Regardless, Claussen had been right-he was its priest now.
Longtree waited. If the beast tried to escape now, he would have to try and stop it…and no doubt perish in the attempt. There was nothing to do but wait for reinforcements. He toyed with the idea of wiring Fort Ellis for Army troops, but getting them when they were needed was like getting a child to open its mouth so you could pull a tooth. Besides, it would take them a day or so to reach Wolf Creek…and the beast surely wouldn't sit still that long.
So the marshal waited, smelling the smoke of the burning town. Like Nero, he fiddled while Rome burned.