Chapter 9

Ethel and Adam repacked their camping stuff and headed for Wilsonville as fast as they could travel. They had no idea why Charley Wilson would head for Wilsonville. As far as they knew, he had no ties to the town, so why would he go there? The most logical reason was because he knew who Ethel and Adam were, but how could he know that? The other possibility was that he intended to rob the bank, but a lot of towns had banks, so, why would he pick Wislonville?

They might never know the answer to that question, but it didn't matter. Their primary task was to stop Charley Wilson, no matter what he had in mind. They pushed their animals as fast as they could. The animal taking the worst beating was the pack mule, since he had no companion to swap off with. The mule was on his last legs, so they stripped what they had to have from the pack, pulled the pack frame off the mule, and turned it loose. Hopefully, it would survive, but they didn't have any more time to spend worrying about it.

They arrived at the ranch and found everything to be in good shape. Adam stopped off at the ranch, but Ethel pushed on to town. She headed directly for the bank and got there just after the robbery that she had feared. She checked and found that Jonas had been out of the building on business during the robbery, so he had not been in danger. However, the robbers had made off with $27,000 in gold, the entire reserve of the bank.

This was heavy enough, just a shade over 77 pounds, that it was going to be a burden to carry. Neither one of the robbers were small men, so the horses would notice the extra load. It was fortunate that the robbers had ridden out of town in the general direction of the Rocking S ranch, so she would be able to change her horse and pick up some help when she passed the place.

Ethel rode into the yard and fired her pistol into the air three times, the universal call for help. Everybody in the house and three hands from the barn came running. "I need a fresh horse right now! Adam, the bank was robbed, and I need your ability as a tracker. We are only minutes behind the robbers. Jonas is completely fine. He was out of the bank at the time of the robbery. Nobody was injured. We may need the rest of you as a posse. Please saddle up and follow us as soon as you can."

Ethel reloaded her pistol while she was waiting for her fresh horse. She jumped aboard as soon as it was ready, and she and Adam rode hell for leather after the robbers. Anna changed clothes in record time, and she and the three hands were only minutes behind Ethel and Adam.

Ethel led them to her last known site of the robbers' trail, and the chase was on again. A few times they had to slow down for Adam to be certain of the trail, but he was sure that they were gaining on the robbers. After all, they had fresh horses and the robbers did not.

Two hours into the chase and they saw a dust cloud ahead. By this time Anna and the ranch hands had caught up, so all six of them stopped worrying about following the trail and just started riding after the dust cloud. This meant that they could move faster, and they were sure to catch up before dark, which was crucial.

The robbers probably had seen the dust cloud of their pursuers, so now it was a race, one that the robbers had to lose for many reasons. The bank would be immediately out of business if it permanently lost that $27,000. There was no way that they could recover from that blow.

If the robbers got away with that much money, there would be no way to catch them. They could buy their way anywhere, and they would be impossible to find.

If Charley Wilson and Hank Smith got away this time, they would probably forever be out of Ethel's reach, and she could not live with that. Sure, she wanted to marry Adam Strong, but she had so much emotion invested in catching the murderers that she always had that as her number one priority.

Suddenly, one of the horses pulled up lame. It was ridden by a ranch hand. He was abandoned and would be recovered later. It could be a minor thing and he could make his way back to the ranch, albeit, somewhat slowly. The rest of the Rocking S crew continued on, thundering after the robbers.

Oh, thank God! There they were! The robbers were now in sight! Baring some miracle of bad luck, there was no way that they could escape, and they must have known it. Yes, they did! They were heading for a grove of trees. They must have planned to make a stand there.

The robbers reached the trees just seconds before the pursuers were within rifle range. They chased off their horses to divide their attackers. Somebody had to chase the horses to make sure that they were not still carrying the gold. Adam dispatched the two hands to chase down the horses while the rest of them engaged the robbers. This made it three to two in favor of the good guys, but that could change with one lucky hit.

Adam had ordered the ranch hands simply to catch the horses and bring them back to hitch them with the rest of the horses. They would worry about searching the horses later. There was about 90 minutes until sundown, so they needed to get with the program as soon as possible. The three would harass the robbers until the two hands returned to help.

The grove of trees was small enough that the three could, with their rifles, make sure that the robbers did not escape as long as there was light enough to see. Actually, the robbers would probably not try to run off on foot, but would try to get their horses back, since they would not leave without the gold, and it was too heavy to carry on foot with all of the other stuff they would have to carry.

All of the good guys were using .44-40 Winchesters, so there would be plenty of ammunition to go around. They did not have to worry about saving rifle cartridges, as long as they didn't waste them. Everybody loaded every available pocket with extra ammunition, Anna to the point that she could hardly walk!

At this stage, Adam directed the two women to move out so there was 120 degrees of separation between two adjacent shooters. That way, there was no easy escape route for the robbers. Their main task at the moment was to keep the robbers bottled up until the hands got back with the horses.

The two women moved out, and all three fired off a few shots into the trees just to annoy the robbers and to tell them that they were surrounded. It was only about 15 minutes later that the two hands returned with the horses, so they were available to join the fight. Now they could get serious.

Adam placed the two hands to each side with about a 30 foot spacing. They then started to creep in on the robbers. The robbers held their fire until the three men got to within about 75 yards. At that point, they started to shoot. This was exactly what Adam wanted. The robbers were giving away their positions with the muzzle flashes and powder smoke. Meanwhile, the women had also moved in close enough to make a difference in the fire.