Benedict and Brazos 18

by E. Jefferson Clay

  The Home of Great Western Fiction!

  Duke Benedict and Hank Brazos were finally closing in on the man they’d sworn to kill; the same man whose gang of cutthroats had massacred innocent men by the hundreds throughout the late Civil War. And Bo Rangle knew it. So he figured to dig up the fortune in Confederate gold he’d stolen at the Battle of Pea Ridge and then high-tail it to Mexico. If anyone got in his way … well, that was going to be their hard fortune.

  But still Benedict and Brazos kept coming. They survived ambushes, shootouts, a terrifying white-water ride through the Lizard River and still kept after their quarry.

  And yet there was something in them that almost hoped they wouldn’t catch up to him.

  Because when they did, when Rangle lay stone-cold dead at their feet, there was another battle each man would have to face.

  They were going to have to gunfight each other!

  BENEDICT AND BRAZOS 18: BO RANGLE’S BOOTHILL

  By E. Jefferson Clay

  First published by Cleveland Publishing Co. Pty Ltd, New South Wales, Australia

  © 2021 by Piccadilly Publishing

  First Electronic Edition: March 2021

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by means (electronic, digital, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Series Editor: Ben Bridges

  Text © Piccadilly Publishing

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  Chapter One

  The Night the Killer Came

  Bo Rangle rolled up his right shirt sleeve. A jagged scar ran the length of the muscular forearm from elbow to wrist. He looked at his uncle through cold green eyes.

  “Shiloh,” he said. “A Yankee bayonet done that.”

  Charlie Rangle clamped his hands together to try and conceal their trembling. He was as tough and as hard as any wild-horse wrangler had to be, but the old man had been shaking ever since the tall man with the savage green eyes had arrived with dusk. Bo Rangle, ex-Civil War renegade, killer and outlaw, usually had that effect on people.

  “Look, Bo,” he began, but his visitor chopped him off.

  “Gettysburg,” Bo said, unbuttoning his dusty shirt to reveal another ugly scar at the base of his ribcage. “And I’ve got more if you want to see ’em, Charlie.”

  Charlie Rangle shook his head. All he wanted to see was the dust of this tall, heavy-shouldered man who had blown in from nowhere at his little horse ranch this misty autumn twilight.

  “What do you want from me, Bo?” he asked. “And what makes you reckon I’d be interested in how you’ve got yourself marked up?”

  “I got my reasons, Charlie.” Bo Rangle buttoned his shirt and fingered his hat to the back edge of coarse black hair that grew like a mane and was chopped off square at the shirt collar. He met the older man’s eyes levelly. “I’ve had enough, Charlie,” he said softly. “I’m through runnin’ and hidin’ like a dog. I’m scarred head to toe from the years. I’m an old man at thirty.” His voice fell. “I’m quittin’, Charlie ... turnin’ myself in ...”

  The ruddy, seamed face of the gray-headed old rancher whose only feature in common with the man standing across the lamplit table was his jade-green eyes, softened a little at that. This was his sister’s son, a vicious, murderous son it was true, but kin nonetheless.

  “You really mean that, Bo?” he asked uncertainly.

  “You never did believe in me—but I guess it’s too late to fret any about that now. But I swear to you now on ma’s grave that what I say is so, old man, and I want you to help me. That’s why I’m here.”

  The invocation shattered Charlie Rangle’s fear and resentment. How could you disbelieve a man who took an oath on his mother’s grave?

  “Help you, Bo?” he said softly. “How can I do that?”

  A picture of weary dejection, Bo Rangle moved to the window to look out. Around the ranch house, the shadows of the Misty Mountain foothills were deepening as they stretched down from Monroe’s Hill. It was late Fall and the trees were glowing gold and red in the dusk, their big, bright leaves moving over the bare earth of the yard before a breeze that had a chill in it. The tall man shivered a little, then he spoke without turning, in a voice heavy with fatigue and regret.

  “I’ve run my rope out, Charlie. I’ve had every law dog, soldier boy, bounty-hunter and back shooter in the West houndin’ me day and night ever since Appomattox. They’ve chased me across ten States and they’ve given me more wounds, scars and pain in six months than I got in four years of war. I’ve lived hungry and I ain’t slept eight hours at a stretch for longer than I can remember. I’m an animal, Charlie, a mad dog that’s got to be tracked down and killed.”

  Charlie Rangle could have pointed out that such a fate might be fitting for a man whose notorious band of marauders had preyed mercilessly on both North and South alike during the War Between the States. But he didn’t, for Charlie Rangle was a compassionate man. He could even feel compassion for the man who had made the name, Rangle, a stench in the nose of every decent man in the country.

  “I’m sorry, Bo,” he said. “I’m sorry it all turned out the way it has for you.”

  “Don’t waste your pity on me, on account of I’m not worth it.” The outlaw turned, haggard now, slump-shouldered. “They’re goin’ to kill me, Charlie. I’m a dead man the minute I turn myself in, but I ain’t gonna bellyache this late in the game. They’ll kill me and I’m ready for it. But I want to go clean, maybe with a little dignity, Charlie. I don’t want some mob tearin’ me to pieces. I want the chance of gettin’ taken in, standin’ trial, then sent off right. You reckon that’s too much to ask, Charlie?”

  “Hell, no, boy. You got a right. But—”

  “But where do you come in?” Bo Rangle came back to the table and rested his big hands on the rough surface. “I’ll tell you, Unc. You can tell me where to find Benedict and Brazos.”

  Charlie’s eyes widened. “What?”

  “Now don’t go actin’ coy on me, Charlie. I know them two have been combin’ the Misties for a week, figurin’ I’m on my way through to pick up my cache in the wild country. And I also know they’ve been here, sniffin’ around to see if you might have heard anythin’ of me. But don’t go lookin’ so nervous, Charlie. It don’t matter a damn to me one way or another ... not now it don’t.”

  The lamp flickered as a sudden gust of wind came through the doorway. Charlie Rangle swallowed, then said uncertainly, “Well ... well, it’s true that those fellers have been here a couple of times, Bo. But I don’t understand what you want with them. I mean, the way I heard it, you and them jokers are mortal enemies.”

  “I hate their guts, Charlie. They’ve given me more trouble between ’em than the rest put together.” Rangle’s expression grew intense as he leaned across the table. “And that’s the point. I know those bastards and I respect ’em. I know if I give myself up to them, they’ll play the game by the rules. They’ll give me the chance to die like a man. You catchin’ on now? I want to give myself up to Benedict and Brazos, so I want you to tell me where I can find ’em.”

  “That’s why you came here?”

  “That’s why.”

  Silence fell as Charlie Rangle stood stroking his w
hiskers and studying his nephew pensively. Bo Rangle met that long, probing stare frankly. The quiet dragged on for a full, tense minute until the older man finally shook his head.

  “Well, I don’t rightly know if I—”

  “Charlie, don’t let me down,” Bo broke in emotionally. “This is the last thing I’ll ever ask from you ... the chance to die the way I want. You know you’d do it if ma was here, Charlie ...”

  Another handful of seconds, then Charlie Rangle drew in a deep breath. “All right, Bo. Like you say, if Essie was here, I’d do what you ask. But I’ve got your oath that you mean what you say? That you’ll give yourself up?”

  “On ma’s dyin’ breath.”

  “You’ll find ’em at Whetstone. They was through here yesterday lookin’ for you and said they’d be stayin’ at Whetstone tomorrow night to rest up.”

  Bo Rangle straightened. His expression didn’t change, but in his temple a vein began to pulse.

  “Thanks, Charlie. You’re real kin after all.”

  Smiling for the first time since he’d glanced up to see the long silhouette standing framed in his doorway, the rancher said, “Well, if it helps any, Bo, I might as well tell you that I never believed you were as bad as folks said. Now why don’t you set down, boy? I’ll pour you a stiff drink. You sure enough look like you could use one.”

  “Real kin,” Bo Rangle said. “Thanks, Unc.”

  Charlie Rangle turned away and went to the old kitchen dresser for the whisky. He splashed a generous helping into two glasses, turned back to the table and froze.

  He was staring down the muzzle of a six-gun.

  One of the glasses fell and smashed. Charlie held onto the other but he might as well have dropped it, too, for his sudden, violent shaking had already emptied the contents.

  “Bo,” he breathed after ten terrible seconds. “What’s the gun for? Is this some kind of a joke?”

  “No joke ... Uncle Judas!”

  “Judas? Bo, what do you mean?”

  “I knew you’d know where those bastards were, Charlie, because word has it that you and them has got to be pards ...” The hammer of the Colt clicked back, and Bo Rangle didn’t look weary or repentant any more. With his ferocious green eyes flaring and murderous cruelty etching every feature, he was the most frightening sight tough old Charlie had ever seen.

  “No, Bo!” he gasped in horror. “You ... you swore by your mother’s grave that you wouldn’t ...”

  His voice trailed away. Bo Rangle was smiling at him pityingly; “That don’t count, Charlie,” the killer said softly. “You see, I put that psalm-singin’ old bitch in her grave.” Bo Rangle waited until the full import of his words hit the old man.

  Then he fired.

  The last echoes of the single shot were still muttering deep in the rocky fastnesses of the Misty Mountains as Bo Rangle strode across the darkened yard. He turned the corner of the towering barn where fifteen silent horsemen sat their saddles outlined against the crimson wash of the dying sun.

  “Whetstone,” he grunted, and swinging astride his long-legged bay horse, he led them out.

  Tara Killane was beautiful. She had golden hair with red glints in it, and her skin was golden. Her oval face had high cheekbones and wide-set blue eyes, set on a slender neck. She had long dancer’s legs, and her feet, as she twirled to the sound of the music drifting up from the barroom below, scarcely seemed to touch the floor. When she smiled, which was often, her face flushed with gold—and Duke Benedict was having a hell of a time keeping his mind on business as he watched her from the table.

  “Another drink, lovely lady?” he smiled.

  “Of course.” She executed a graceful pirouette, then glided across to him, fingering an errant strand of hair away from her glowing face. She sat down and smiled across the table at him, her blue eyes looking smoky now in the soft blue light. “Another drink and we’ll both dance, Duke?”

  Duke Benedict sighed as he splashed whisky into two glasses. There was nothing he would have liked better than to dance the whole night away with this girl, but business had to come first. Now, how to tell her that he had invited her upstairs only to ask her questions about a man she’d probably never heard of? He only hoped his overgrown trail partner downstairs in the barroom knew what he was prepared to go through in the name of duty.

  They clinked glasses and sipped the whisky, then he became serious.

  “Tara ...”

  “What’s troubling you, Duke?” she broke in, then she smiled at his look of surprise. “Of course I realize there is something on your mind. I’ve sensed it ever since we met downstairs.”

  Benedict shook his dark head. He’d been surprised to encounter a girl so beautiful in one-horse Whetstone, but it astonished him to find her intelligent as well. He reached across the table and touched her fingers.

  “Perceptive, lovely lady, perceptive.”

  “Are you looking for somebody?”

  His eyes widened. “How the devil did you guess that?”

  She shrugged. “Men like you never come to the mountains.” The full red mouth curled with contempt. “The only ones who come here are thieves, losers, failures. But you and your big friend have a different look ... the look of hunters. You’re lawmen perhaps?”

  Benedict laughed, showing perfect white teeth. “You’re a long way off the mark there, Tara. But it’s true that we’re looking for somebody.”

  “Who?”

  “An old friend of mine ... a friend from the war, actually.” His gray eyes probed the girl’s face. “Perhaps you can help me, Tara. This gentleman’s name is Rangle. Bo Rangle.”

  The girl’s brows creased, then she shrugged.

  “I’m sorry, I’ve never heard of him. He’s a friend of yours, you say?”

  Again Benedict felt the sharp bite of disappointment. He and Hank Brazos had been patrolling the Misty Mountains for two grueling weeks, ever since hearing a rumor that Bo Rangle was returning from the south to Arapahoe Valley where the renegade had cached two hundred thousand dollars’ worth of gold. The two weeks had produced nothing, and just that day they had covered thirty rugged miles before riding into tiny Whetstone in the hope that they might pick up a lead here. It hadn’t taken long to realize that Whetstone was yet another dry well. He hadn’t really held out much hope that this lovely, unexpected late arrival at the saloon might know something, but she’d been the last prospect. Now he stirred as she touched his hand.

  “You’re disappointed,” she said softly. “Is this man very important to you?”

  “That would be putting it mildly.”

  “They say a problem always looks simpler after a good night’s sleep.”

  “I doubt if I’ll be sleeping much tonight,” he murmured absently.

  “I’m sure you could if you’d just relax.”

  “Easier said than done sometimes, Tara.”

  “Is it?” She rose then and stood gazing down at him. There was a different look in her eye that sent a strange tingling sensation along his spine. She reached out and traced a line down the side of his face with her fingernails ... and there could be no mistaking what that look meant now ...

  For just a moment, caution held Duke Benedict back. Wise in the ways of women, something told him that Tara Killane’s sudden desire didn’t ring true.

  But caution faded as he looked into her eyes. To hell with suspicion and be damned to tomorrow’s early start, he decided as he moved to take her into his arms.

  Chapter Two

  The Flames of Hate

  Hank Brazos drained his beer glass, snapped his fingers at his ugly dog and pushed through the batwings into Whetstone’s blowing night. Outside, his craggy, sun-bronzed young face assumed a frown as he looked up at the narrow facade of the Big Horn Saloon. Light showed behind drawn curtains in one of the rooms. Some shape that high-stepper was going to be in tomorrow, he reflected broodingly, then he started slowly across the street in the direction of the hotel.

  Whetstone was n
o paradise. The town, built on the side of a steep slope, had the narrow, high-fronted saloon, a rickety hotel, a blacksmith’s, a small general store, three tumbledown houses, and that was it. Brazos had had every reason to believe that this was one place where Benedict would keep his mind on business, but the moment he’d seen the long-legged girl in the green shirt, the scent of trouble was in the air. Duke Benedict was a good man with a gun or a deck of cards, but show him a nicely-turned ankle or a pair of roving eyes, and the next thing you knew you were on your own.

  Tumbleweed rolled down Whetstone’s one street as Hank Brazos reflected on the series of events that had seen him become the trail partner of Duke Benedict. It was surely one of the most improbable partnerships in the West ...

  It had all begun in the dying days of the Civil War at a place called Pea Ridge, Georgia. There, a Union detachment led by Captain Duke Benedict had clashed with Confederate Sergeant Hank Brazos’ outfit, which was escorting a $200,000 gold shipment to Mexico, where General Nathan Forrest planned to rebuild the battered Confederate Army. The two forces had fought to a bloody standstill, only to have the gold snatched away by the infamous Rangle’s Raiders. Rebel Sergeant Hank Brazos and Union Captain Duke Benedict were the only survivors among two hundred and fifty men.

  The war over, chance had brought the two together and they’d formed a partnership to retrieve the gold and avenge the deaths of their brave comrades. Bound by a common cause, Brazos needed Benedict’s gun skill and icy intelligence as much as Benedict relied on the Texan’s trailsmanship and iron fists. It was an uneasy alliance, but it worked, despite the Yank’s almost habitual unreliability whenever a good-looking woman was involved.

  Two weeks back, Brazos had heard, from a dying badman in Wyoming, that Rangle was on his way back to Arapahoe Valley to retrieve the cached gold. Since then they had patrolled the Misties—the only access to the valley from the south. They had run themselves ragged over the two weeks, stopping off at dozens of mining and hunting camps and asking countless questions. Only once had they thought they were getting warm; that had been when they’d discovered that Rangle’s uncle ran a horse ranch on the far side of the Misty Mountains. But the tip had proved a failure. Charlie Rangle, as fine a type as Brazos had ever met, had quickly revealed that he despised his notorious nephew almost as much as they did. They’d visited Charlie several times in the hope that if Bo Rangle did hit the region, he might decide to look up the old man. The last time they’d seen Charlie, two days back, it was obvious that the old man believed they were on a wild goose chase.