The Wild Gun Page 10

  “So you’d give them a chance to kill us?”

  “I’d want the edge, Earl. But to shoot a man down from a distance is wrong. It makes me sick that I did that today.”

  “Come to think of it, it makes me a little sick, too.”

  “It won’t happen again.”

  “No. Those men are killers. They murdered your friend.”

  “I know. But a man has to live with himself. I killed that man the same way he, or his friends, killed Jesse Barnes. But was killing that way justified? I don’t think so.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself, Cord.”

  Cord spit out a chunk of fibrous stalk that he couldn’t chew.

  “Well, I won’t make that mistake again,” he said. “That shot makes me no better than the man I killed or the man who hired him.”

  “So what are you going to do next time?”

  Cord looked up at the sky. He breathed a deep breath.

  “We are given life. Maybe for a purpose, Earl. It’s up to us to make it what it is. If we don’t have a code to follow, we are just sheep. We follow. We eat. We die. We leave no footprints.”

  “So?”

  “So, it’s what a man does that makes him human, that makes him a man. I don’t want to go through life as a heartless killer.”

  “But you want justice. You believe in justice. You believe a man must pay for his crimes.”

  “Sure. But who sets me up as judge and jury? Who gives me the right to be God?”

  “Where there is no law . . . ,” Earl said.

  “You’re right, Earl. In a way. Where there is no law, one man, or many men, must become the law. There is such a thing as justice. And I believe in it. But justice is blind, and I wonder if I am supposed to be its eyes.”

  Their talk ended there and they waited for sunset.

  No man tracked them that day.

  They slept, and some hours before dawn, Cord woke up and shook his brother awake.

  “It’s time,” he said. “Time to face the enemy.”

  They rode down to the 2Bar2 Ranch and, on foot, prowled around the bunkhouse. They listened to the snores of men inside and the soft nickers of horses in the corrals.

  They waited for a lamp to be lighted and for the first man to heed the call of nature and leave the bunkhouse.

  They waited, their hands on their pistol grips in the chill before dawn.

  NINETEEN

  Lamplight illuminated the window of the bunkhouse. Cord crouched between that window and the front door. He heard a rustling from inside and the gravelly voice of a man who had suddenly awakened.

  Springs creaked as the men inside stirred. Cord heard footsteps and the clang of a coffeepot. Soft voices announced that they were awake. He tried to count the number of different voices and could only discern four or five.

  Finally, one man emerged from the bunkhouse. It appeared that he was going to head for the nearby outhouse. When he was clear of the steps and on firm ground, the man stiffened as he felt something hard and cold in his side.

  Cord shoved the barrel of his pistol into the soft flesh of the man’s side. He cocked the hammer back. The click was loud in the silence of the predawn.

  “Not a sound,” Cord said.

  The man nodded.

  “This way,” Cord whispered and pointed toward the outhouse. When they were a few feet away from the outhouse, Cord stopped and faced the man.

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “Orson Farrell,” the man said.

  “Do you know who I am?” Cord asked.

  “You’re the one they call the Wild Gun, ain’t you?”

  “Close enough. Do you know how close you are to death, Mr. Farrell?”

  “Pretty close, I reckon.”

  Earl watched from the other side of the bunkhouse door, fascinated.

  “Good guess. I’m going to give you a choice, Mr. Farrell.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You can saddle up and ride away from this ranch and we’ll call it quits. You’ll live. But if you stay here or ever come back, I’ll kill you. What’s your choice?”

  “I’ll saddle up,” Farrell said.

  “Make it quick,” Cord told him. He stepped away and watched as Farrell walked toward the stables. He was unarmed and still in his nightshirt.

  Cord walked back to stand next to the door.

  He looked at Earl.

  Moments later, they heard hoofbeats and saw a shadowy figure on horseback. Farrell rode away at a rapid gallop.

  That’s when another man emerged from the bunkhouse. He yawned and stretched his arms upward as he clumped down the steps.

  He stopped when he felt the cold steel of Cord’s pistol punch him in the layer of fat ringing his side.

  “What the hell?”

  “Not a word if you want to live,” Cord said.

  “Damn you,” the man said without thinking.

  “Step out,” Cord said. “And keep your mouth shut.”

  The man nodded, his hands up in the air.

  A few feet away, Cord moved the pistol and stuck the barrel square in the man’s belly.

  “Do you know who I am?” he asked.

  “You the Wild Gun?”

  “I am, and your time on this ranch is up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you’re not going to work here anymore. You’re not going to shoot down any more innocent men.”

  “I didn’t . . .”

  “Don’t lie. What’s your name?”

  “Colby. Ted Colby.”

  “Well, Ted, you’ve got a choice to make.”

  “Huh? What choice?”

  “The same as I gave your friend Farrell. You can saddle up and head for Cheyenne and then parts farther out, or you can die right where you stand. It just takes a little squeeze of this trigger and your guts will churn to mush.”

  “Jesus,” Colby said.

  “Your choice, Colby. Live or die.”

  “I reckon I’ll ride out. Hell, that ain’t no choice.”

  “It’s the only one I’m giving you,” Cord said.

  “I’m gone, then,” Colby said.

  Cord shoved him toward the stables and watched the man stumble to where his horse was boarded for the night.

  “Cord, look out,” Earl called from the doorway as Colby reached in his back pocket and pulled out a small pistol.

  Cord crouched as Colby whirled around and cocked the .32 revolver.

  Colby pointed his pistol straight at Cord.

  Cord leveled his pistol and squeezed the trigger. The explosion was loud in the predawn quiet. Flame and smoke spurted from the muzzle of his pistol.

  His bullet slammed into Colby’s chest just as Colby squeezed the trigger of his pistol. His bullet plowed a furrow in front of Cord and died in the dirt before it reached his boots.

  Colby tumbled forward as blood spurted from the hole in his chest. He gurgled as more blood rose in his throat. He gasped and kicked after he hit the ground. His hand relaxed as the .32 Smith & Wesson slid from his lifeless grasp.

  He gave a last scratchy sigh and died.

  Cord spun around as yells erupted from inside the bunkhouse.

  “What in hell was that?” someone shouted from inside.

  “Earl, get to your horse,” Cord yelled and started running toward Windmill.

  The two reached their horses and climbed into their saddles as the bunkhouse door flew open and men with pistols and rifles in their hands jammed the doorway. They turned their heads right and left as Cord and Earl rode off into the darkness.

  A lamp came on in Horace’s house in the upstairs bedroom.

  Three men poured through the doorway of the bunkhouse and swung their weapons, each looking for a target.<
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  “Who the hell shot?” Jessup asked. He swung his pistol in a wide arc.

  “Look, over there,” called another.

  The men rushed to where Colby lay.

  “It’s Ted Colby,” Jessup said. “Dead.”

  “Shit,” said another man as he crouched and looked all around him.

  “It’s that Wild feller,” Nestor Jones growled.

  “Where’s Farrell?” one man asked. “He come out here?”

  “Orson,” called out another, cupping a hand to his mouth.

  No answer.

  “I heard a horse ride away a while ago,” Jones said. “Or at least I thought I heard one at a gallop.”

  “Orson must have lit a shuck before Colby come out.”

  “This is a hell of a note,” Jessup said.

  “Nobody’s safe here,” Nestor said. “I’m gettin’ the hell out.”

  “He’ll hunt you down. They don’t call him ‘the Wild Gun’ for nothin’.”

  “You don’t know nothin’,” Nestor said to Pete Gander. “You ain’t never seen that jasper.”

  “No, I ain’t, but I seen what he done,” Pete said.

  The men had started to walk back to the bunkhouse when Horace emerged out of the darkness.

  “What’s goin’ on here?” he asked.

  “I told Ted that peashooter he carries would get him in trouble,” Pete said.

  “What in hell are you talkin’ about?” Horace demanded.

  “Colby’s dead,” Jessup said. “And Farrell is missing.”

  “What?” Horace exclaimed.

  “Over yonder,” Pat said as he pointed to Colby’s body.

  Horace walked over and looked at the dead man.

  “He’s dead, all right. Anybody see anything? Who shot him?”

  The men shrugged and shook their heads.

  “You lily-livered baboons. Wild came here right under your damned noses and shot Ted. No tellin’ what he did to Farrell.”

  “We heard galloping hoofbeats a while ago,” Pete said. “Farrell must have lit out.”

  “Damn,” Horace said.

  He looked at the remainder of his men and wagged a finger at them.

  “You’re a worthless bunch,” he said. “A man walks up here and does what he wants to do while you bunch of blind bastards let him do it. Well, if you don’t watch out, you’ll be next. That Wild Gun is one loco bastard, but he’s a dead shot.”

  The men’s heads drooped as Horace raged at them, cursing them, calling them every name that came to his tongue.

  Horace walked back to his house. He was still angry. Wild threatened to ruin everything, all his plans, his dreams, his hopes.

  Where in hell was his tracker, Danny? He wondered. Had Wild killed him, too? There was no one else he could trust to track down and kill Wild. And somehow, Wild had eluded Danny.

  But maybe, he thought, Danny was still alive and would come through for Horace.

  And if not, well, Wild would eventually come for him.

  The thought made Horace even angrier. But his hands turned clammy and sweat soaked his forehead as he sat down in his chair and aimed his pistol at the front door.

  Just in case.

  TWENTY

  Danny had tracked Cord and Earl until it got too dark for him to see.

  But he knew the direction they had headed after entering the mountains. He would wait until morning and then pick up their trail in daylight.

  He began to track his quarry at first light. There were plenty of signs, with hoofprints in the vacant spots between layers of pine needles. He looked for disturbed or broken branches on saplings and brush. He also looked for scrapes in the pine needles where one or both horses dragged their hooves.

  It was not the easiest trail to follow, but Danny had learned to track wild game at an early age. He was fascinated by the tracks of quail and squirrel, wild turkey, rabbits, and bobcats in the Ozark wilderness of Missouri.

  He came to the bare ground where Cord and Earl had swept away their tracks. He could see that the ground had been disturbed, but as he crossed that place, he had to look long and hard for any signs that they had entered the timber.

  But there were signs.

  There were scuffed patches in the pine needles, a crushed branch on a juniper bush. Slowly, he made his way through the timber and realized that the tracks led in a more or less straight line. And he found the cut spruce branches that the pair of men had discarded.

  Then he came to the place where Cord and Earl had spent most of the night. There were depressions where they had sat and others where they had lain out flat.

  He made a circle to find the tracks leading from that spot. He found signs that they had descended from the mountain and entered into the foothills.

  Now he knew where they were headed.

  He was still in the timber, heading downslope toward the foothills, when Danny drew up short.

  A sound.

  His heartbeat quickened.

  There was something out there. Heading his way.

  He backed his horse farther into the timber and walked him sideways until his body was behind a pine tree and a spruce.

  Somebody was surely riding up and they were in a hurry.

  Heavy footfalls. Crashing through brush.

  The breathy wheeze of a horse.

  The creak of leather. Men in the saddles. At least two horses, he figured.

  Danny waited, listening intently. He separated sounds, judged the terrain, heard a rock dislodge and roll downhill a short distance.

  All these things put pictures in Danny’s mind. Years of tracking had made his senses acute. He knew what was coming up into the timber.

  And he had a pretty good idea who it was.

  He peered from behind the tree as the sounds grew closer. He leaned from the saddle so that just his head cleared the pine tree. Closer and closer came the sounds of two horses. They were climbing, clawing with their hooves for a foothold in grass and rocks, brushing against second-growth saplings.

  At first, he saw nothing but trees and brush. Then, some distance away, he caught a glimpse of a shirt, a man’s arm. Then these disappeared and he saw the shoulders of a smaller man. Just for a second or two.

  His pulse sped up as the thrill of discovery coursed in his veins, his sinews.

  Then the sounds stopped.

  Danny drew his head back behind the tree. He listened.

  The riders had stopped.

  Why?

  He had made no sound. His horse was quiet. The animal stood still, its ears pricked. He listened to the sound of his own breathing. Slow and steady. He listened to his horse’s breath through its nostrils. He listened for sounds where he had last seen parts of two men.

  Dead silence. Cord reined up, put a finger to his lips as he turned around to look at Earl.

  Earl reined up and his brow wrinkled as he wondered why his brother had stopped.

  The horses were not too winded. He felt his horse’s ribs as they flexed.

  Cord had heard something. Or something was not right.

  Earl sat his saddle in silence. He studied his brother.

  Cord’s head twisted and he cupped a hand to one ear. Then he sat very still and raised an arm.

  Cord pointed to his right, toward an outcropping of limestone just inside the timber.

  Earl nodded. He knew his brother wanted him to follow him to a safer place, away from the direction they had been heading.

  Then Cord touched spurs gently to Windmill’s flanks. He tugged on the reins so that the horse only took a single step to its right. He slowly walked Windmill over to the rocky outcropping, then dismounted. He climbed atop the rock bluff and beckoned to Earl to dismount and climb up there with him.

  “What’s the matter, Cord?”
Earl whispered once he sat down next to his brother.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did you hear something? See something?”

  “I felt something,” Cord whispered.

  “What?”

  “A feeling that someone was watching us. You know how it is. You feel eyes on the back of your neck and you turn around and someone is staring at you.”

  Earl nodded. He knew the feeling.

  Still, they seemed alone, surrounded only by trees. Even the elk were not moving, nor the mule deer. It was quiet.

  Cord picked up a small stone.

  He threw it off the rock and into the timber. The rock made a sound and rolled a foot or two.

  Cord put two fingers to his lips in a demand for Earl to keep quiet.

  • • •

  Danny heard the sound of the rock and wondered what it was. He strained his ears to listen for any other sound. All he knew was that the two horsemen had disappeared. He hadn’t heard them, so he knew they had sneaked out of earshot.

  Where were they?

  He slowly dismounted. The stirrup took his weight and creaked. He stood there for a long moment. He listened for any sound.

  But there was no sound.

  He took slow steps to where he had seen the horsemen. He examined the ground and saw the hoofmarks, the disturbed earth and pine needles. He looked into the timber and saw the bare outline of the limestone bluff, a large outcropping of solid rock.

  And that was the direction the tracks were leading.

  He sucked in a breath and gripped the butt of his pistol. Then he started following the horse tracks.

  • • •

  Up on the bluff, Cord saw a bush move. He heard the soft sound of a foot crushing the ground. Then he saw a denimed leg take another step.

  He drew his pistol. There was the slithering sound of metal brushing against leather.

  The approaching man stopped.

  “That’s far enough,” Cord called out.

  He saw the leg stiffen and then saw a man’s shirt, and a second later, his face came into view.

  Cord recognized the man. He knew only that he worked for Jesse Barnes as a horse wrangler.