Chapter 9: The Ring on His Hand

Jude reached the North Pass at first light, on foot, after four hours of hitching and running.

The pass was a stone throat between two ridges, barely wide enough for two trucks.

The Compact kept a watch hut at its mouth.

A thin trail of smoke rose from it, and four riders stood outside with rifles, looking up the road.

"Ardmore!" one of them shouted.

"Sir, we thought you were..."

"How many up the road?" Jude said.

"We heard engines an hour ago."

"Thirty, maybe more."

"We sent word to the hall."

Jude looked at the narrows.

The roadway sloped up and to the right, and big boulders lay along the left wall.

A dozen men could hold it, if they were good.

Four men would hold it for a quarter hour.

"Take cover behind the boulders," he said.

"Two on the high wall, two with me."

"Sir, you're not on the roster."

"I know," Jude said.

"Do it anyway."

They moved without another word.

The first truck came around the bend at a crawl.

Then a second, and a third, with men standing in the beds and black cloth whipping from their arms.

Jude waited until the lead truck was thirty yards out.

"Now," he said.

The four rifles opened at once.

The first truck's windshield spidered, and the driver slumped.

The truck rolled forward and slewed sideways against the rock, blocking the road.

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