Several miles to the northeast, the Captain Russell Fogg and his riders were silently perched up on a brush shrouded ledge in the Glass mountains. They had been watching a large group of horsemen approaching on the plain below. As they watched in the clear moonlight, they saw the group break off, half to the left, and the other to the right of them. They merely sat silently as the two groups passed to either side of them, one group, coming within a quarter mile of their position. Tanner had split his forces, obviously hoping to attack the Fogg ranchhouse from two sides, or hoping that at least, one of the two groups would encounter them somewhere on the disputed range.

After waiting in virtual silence for about a half hour, Fogg signaled for the men to mount up. They then rode quietly down the slope, toward the Tanner rancheria. As they were departing, Nighthawk reined up beside Captain Fogg. "Captain, seems to me that ya'll don't need me too terribly bad tonight, so I'm gonna take off for a while." Nighthawk said.

"Why? Where you headin'?" Fogg asked.

"It's personal, Cap. Don't worry, I'll catch up to you in a day or so."

Fogg wondered at the halfbreed's secretiveness but grudgingly let the matter drop. "Alright Lance, do what you have to, but get back as soon as you can. We're liable ta be playin' cat and mouse pretty soon, and I'm gonna need ya somethin' fierce. Try not ta be gone too long."

"I won't be, not if I can help it, Cap." The huge halfbreed said, then wheeled his mount, and headed off toward the south-west.

Several hours later, the Fogg riders came within sight of the Tanner Rancheria. The could cover was so heavy that the moon was no longer in sight-- so much the better for Fogg's plans. There was no way to storm the ranch, there wasn't enough cover to hide behind for at least two-hundred yards from the twelve foot walls surrounding the house. Nevertheless, Fogg was aware that the ranch was only sparsely guarded. Tanner, had taken the bulk of his men in search of Fogg, which fit into Captain Fogg's plans perfectly. That was the strategic reason for massacring Tanner's south-side crew in the first place. That maneuver had been specifically designed to draw Tanner out into the open, and into a futile chase. Meanwhile, Fogg would destroy Tanner's home base. His own ranchhouse, was unimportant with regard to the larger scheme of things, and Tanner's reputed skill as a tactician as a colonel in the Union Army during the Civil War, was now heavily suspect. Captain Fogg, thinking about it snorted to himself in derision. Tanner, was, in his opinion, a fool. But then, weren't all Yankees?

Nighthawk had scouted the place not long back and had reported that there was a group of enclosed stables near the enclosure where he kept some of his prize breeding horses. Fogg called Dancing Jack Haylock over and gave him instructions. Haylock departed in the direction of the stables with two canteens filled with kerosene. There were only a few reasonably large mesquite bushes some three-hundred yards from the enclosure, and the men tethered their horses to whichever ones they could find, then quietly sprinted to within two-hundred yards of the walls. There, they dropped down on all fours and began making for the gate.

Fortunately for the Fogg's, and just as Captain Fogg had anticipated, the guards were lazy. They had not anticipated any type of an attack whatsoever and thus, neither of the two guarding the wall by the gate noticed as the men crept up and flattened themselves against the outer wall on either side of the gate. Suddenly, a cry went up from inside the enclosure.

"Hurry! Come on boys, the stables are on fire! If Tanner's prize breedin' stallions get cooked, you can bet our asses are gonna get the same!"

Captain Fogg had difficulty suppressing a laugh. Obviously, none of these men had fought in the war. They were acting like idiots. But then, that was what he had hoped for. Surely, at least one or two of them would suspect that the fire was no accident.

Sure enough though, the gate opened and several men came rushing out with buckets-- directly into a hail of bullets. Instantly, the Fogg outfit was inside, searching for targets in the dark. Three shadows made it to the ranch-house, followed closely by Tyler Dain. As the MT men slammed the front door, he quickly dodged to the side and dove head-first through the front window. He came up suddenly as two bullets slammed into the floor where he had just been. Then his own guns were bucking in his hands. His first shot caught the man who had fired at him, in the forehead, flipping him backwards. His next shot killed the other who was attempting to bring his pistol to bear, The third cowboy, was trying to douse the lamp as Dain's final shot ended his earthly existence. The whole scenario was played out in less than three seconds. Dain himself then doused the light, and waited as the sounds of sporadic gunfire continued for two more minutes.

Out of the fifteen men Tanner had left to guard the place, four were left, holed up in the ammunition storage shed, which was built into the wall on the north side. Fogg ordered some of the men to search the ranchhouse for liquor bottles, blankets and coal oil. When the men returned with those items, the liquor was poured out, and coal oil was poured into the bottles. Then, tearing strips of a sheet off and rolling them up, they stuffed each opening on the bottles with the cloth, leaving about two inches hanging out. As several of the men opened up at the front windows of the ammunition storeroom, four men bearing the bottles of coal oil, lit the rags where they protruded from the bottles, rushed up closer, and hurled them through the front windows. Two other bottles were thrown upon the roof which was made up largely of timber. The storehouse roof was soon engulfed in flames. As one of the men inside began shouting that they surrendered, a huge explosion rocked the courtyard as the fire had burned through a wooden keg of black-powder. One of Fogg's men was too close, and was instantly killed by the explosion which leveled the building and left a gaping hole in the adobe wall it had been built into.

Noticing that Haylock had returned from the stables Captain Fogg asked, "Did ya manage ta get the horses out safely?"

"Hell yes, and a good thing too, cap. Them are some a the finest lookin' horses I ever seen!"

"Good, we'll need 'em. You take some of the men and round 'em up. The rest of you go to the tack rooms and get an extra saddle. We're gonna each take an extra mount, courtesy of our Yankee friend, Colonel Tanner. After feedin' and waterin' ours, we'll saddle Tanner's up and ride his horses while leading our own. That way, if we have ta ride hard and fast, our own horses will be good and rested up."

After they had rounded up and saddled the horses, the men spent fifteen minutes systematically looting the place. Afterwards, they gathered up the remains of the defenders and placed their bodies inside the ranch-house. Fogg then had them set the house on fire. They ignited anything that would burn before leaving, then set out southward. It was just breaking dawn. * * *

Meanwhile, the Tanner faction were once again searching for the elusive Foggs. Having arrived at the small stone structure that was the Fogg ranchhouse, they had found no one. Thus, they pulled down the stables and ransacked the place then once again, split up into two groups and resumed their search. Soon afterward, Terrell's group, the Concho River riders, came across a grisly scene. A clump of live-oak in the valley between the Wood's Hollow and Santiago Mountains. However, this little grove contained the bodies of the MT south-section riders, minus the one that had made it back to Olsen's Falls. All of them were stripped naked, and hanging by their necks from the various live-oaks in the valley. The sight was all the more gruesome since the buzzards had already attacked several of the bodies, along with coyotes and various other scavengers.

Terrell signaled to Tanner with three shots from his Henry repeater. Tanner's group arrived within minutes. Furious at the sight even though half expecting it, Tanner nevertheless ordered the search resumed. The bodies could be buried at a later date. For now, Fogg had to pay.

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