The Last Gunfighter: Hell Town

by William W. Johnstone

  Hammersmith looked at Jessica, saw the smile she gave him, and said, “Yes, sir, that’d be just fine. The reports are on my desk.”

  “I’ll find them,” Munro said as he started up the steps. Hammersmith reached back inside the door to snag an old slouch hat from a nail driven into the wall. He put it on as he waited for Munro to go into the office. Then he went down the steps to join Mrs. Munro.

  He didn’t offer to take her arm. That would have been too forward, he thought, especially out here in the open like that, with the stagecoach driver and the guard lounging near the coach as they rolled quirlies. Instead, he pointed toward the mouth of the shaft and asked, “Do you mind walking, ma’am?”

  “Not at all,” Jessica replied. “It’s a beautiful day.”

  Not half as beautiful as you.

  He kept that thought to himself as he led her over to the shaft, pointing out the stamp mill, the barracks for the miners, and the storage buildings as he did so.

  “It looks like you have everything you need here,” she commented.

  “Well, we have to bring supplies out from town, of course. But other than that, we’re pretty self-sufficient.”

  She wore a green traveling outfit and hat today, and Hammersmith wondered just how many different outfits she had brought with her to Buckskin. He didn’t think he had seen her in the same one twice.

  When they reached the mine shaft, she hesitated, looking a little nervous as she said, “Are you sure it’s safe to go in there?”

  “There are a couple of dozen men down there right now, working,” he told her. “They wouldn’t be there if they didn’t think it was safe.”

  Actually, that was stretching the truth a mite. The men were down there because they wanted the wages they were being paid—and because they feared the big, iron-hard fists of Gunther Hammersmith. They knew he wouldn’t take it kindly if any of them tried to quit without a good reason. And as far as Hammersmith was concerned, there weren’t any reasons good enough.

  Following the rails that the ore carts used, Hammersmith and Jessica walked down the steps that had been cut into the steeply inclined plane of the entrance shaft. That gave Hammersmith an excuse to take her arm. He had to steady her so she wouldn’t fall. It was just coincidence that his elbow nudged the warm softness of her breast as he linked his arm with hers.

  Their way was lit by oil lanterns hung on the walls of the shaft at regular intervals. Many of the sturdy shoring timbers on the sides and ceiling of the shaft were new. Hammersmith pointed them out to Jessica and said, “See? Nothing to worry about.”

  “Not for you, perhaps, Mr. Hammersmith, but I’ve never been underground before.”

  Hammersmith couldn’t contain his surprise. “What, you’re married to Mr. Munro and you’ve never seen one of his mines before?”

  “I was just never interested in them…until now.” She looked up at him and smiled as she said it.

  Hammersmith felt his heart speed up. “Well, I won’t let anything happen to you, you can count on that. I’d sacrifice my own life to keep you safe, ma’am.”

  “Why, Mr. Hammersmith, how gallant of you.”

  And she squeezed his arm, which meant that his elbow pressed against her breast again.

  They descended several hundred feet to the main drift, the tunnel that followed the vein of silver through the mountain. Hammersmith knew that it stretched for more than a mile under the earth. Several crosscut tunnels intersected it; the crosscuts provided ventilation and access to smaller drifts that paralleled the main tunnel. There were also some vertical shafts leading to lower levels.

  “You mean the mine goes even lower?” Jessica asked when he pointed out the vertical shafts to her.

  “That’s right. Some mines where I’ve worked go down several thousand feet.”

  She looked up at the ceiling, no doubt thinking of the tons of rock and dirt perched there over her head, and Hammersmith felt a shiver go through her. “I can’t imagine such a thing,” she murmured. “We’re already so deep that it’s frightening.”

  “Nothing to be scared of,” he assured her. “As long as you take the right precautions, mines like this are perfectly safe.”

  “But things sometimes go wrong, don’t they? There are cave-ins and things like that?”

  Hammersmith shrugged. “Most problems are caused by carelessness. I don’t allow my men to get careless. They know they’ll be in for trouble if they do.”

  “From a cave-in, you mean?”

  Hammersmith laughed. “From me. I reckon most of them would rather have to deal with a cave-in than face me when I’m mad at them.”

  “You are a rugged man, Mr. Hammersmith.”

  “You can call me Gunther if you want,” he ventured.

  “All right…Gunther.”

  She didn’t invite him to call her Jessica, and while he noticed that, he didn’t really care. As long as he got to walk along beside her and touch her now and then, it didn’t matter to him what he called her.

  There was quite a bit of noise underground. Picks rang against the walls; steam-powered drills known as widow-makers chattered as they gouged holes in the rock so that dynamite could be planted in them; men shouted back and forth to each other. In some mines, the rock was balanced so precariously that a loud noise could set off a cave-in, meaning that the hard, dangerous work of shoring up had to be completed before the real job of taking the ore out could begin. In the Alhambra, that had already been done. An earthquake or a badly placed blast might bring the place down, but short of those things, it was safe down here, as Hammersmith had explained to Mrs. Munro.

  He didn’t try to take Jessica all through the place. That would have taken too long and exhausted her. He settled for showing her the general layout and letting her watch some of the men at work for a few minutes. At this level, they still wore their grimy, dust-covered shirts. Lower down in the earth, where the temperature rose, the miners often stripped their shirts off and worked bare-chested. Hammersmith recalled doing that himself, when he was a young man and too stupid to do anything except swing a pick all day long. He had learned a great deal since then.

  Even here, it was warmer than on the surface, and Jessica’s face shone in the lantern light as a fine layer of perspiration appeared on her skin. “My goodness,” she said as she fanned herself with a hand, “if you dig down far enough, do you reach Hades itself?”

  Hammersmith laughed and said, “I wouldn’t be surprised. That’s probably how folks got the idea that Hell’s somewhere under the earth. Once you get past the upper level, where it’s cooler, the deeper you go, the hotter it gets. Smells a little like brimstone too.”

  “I think I’m ready to go back out and get some fresh air.”

  “Sure. You’ve seen all there really is to see anyway.”

  They started back up, the light from the mouth of the shaft growing brighter as they climbed. Before they reached it and stepped back out into the sunshine, Jessica stopped and said, “Gunther, thank you for showing me around.”

  “Oh, it was my pleasure,” he said without hesitation, meaning every word of it.

  “You’re just being polite. I’m sure you couldn’t have enjoyed getting stuck with your boss’s wife like this.”

  He shook his head. “You’ve got that all wrong, ma’am. I didn’t mind a bit, truly. Fact is, I, uh, really enjoyed spending the time with you.”

  “Really?” She smiled up at him. “Why, that’s such a nice thing to say, Mr. Hammersmith…I mean, Gunther.”

  He had never liked his name all that much. It sounded coarse and harsh to him. But when she spoke it, in that honeyed voice of hers…well, that was different. He looked down at her, realizing just how close she was standing to him. Nobody was around; all the men were down at the bottom of the shaft. And she had this look on her lovely face, like she expected him to do something….

  What the hell.

  He pulled her into his arms and brought his mouth down on hers in a hard, urgent
kiss.

  Chapter 21

  The same sort of racket came from the Alhambra that had come from the Crown Royal until the explosion a couple of nights earlier. The donkey engines, the compressor that powered the steam drills down in the mine, the shuddering thumps of the stamp mill in action…

  A mine was a noisy place, and one that stunk a mite too, Frank thought as he rode up. The frontier had been a lot more peaceful before all this newfangled machinery came along, starting with the railroad. Frank was old enough to remember what it had been like before. He could only imagine the changes that some of the real old-timers, like Catamount Jack, had seen in their lifetimes.

  Frank brought Stormy to a halt and dismounted in front of the building where the office was located. The place had been cleaned up and repaired a lot since that day he and Garrett Claiborne had stopped by here and almost gotten themselves gunned down for their trouble. At least, Hammersmith wasn’t taking potshots anymore at anybody who happened to come riding along.

  Hamish Munro’s private stagecoach was parked in front of the building. His guard and driver sat on the edge of the porch, smoking. The guard had his rifle across his lap, and his eyes followed Frank closely.

  “What do you want, Marshal?” he asked.

  “I’m looking for your boss,” Frank replied. “Is he inside?”

  Before the guard could answer, the door of the office opened and Hamish Munro stepped out. “What do you want, Marshal?” the mining magnate demanded.

  “Hammersmith around?”

  “I thought I heard you say you were looking for me.”

  Frank nodded. “Oh, I was. I just thought I’d talk to both of you together, save a little time that way.”

  “Hammersmith is tending to some chores I assigned to him,” Munro said. “Anything you have to say, you can say it to me. If I deem it worthwhile of his time, I’ll pass it along to him.”

  “All right then, if that’s the way you want it.” Frank hooked his thumbs in his belt and asked, “Have you had any trouble out here at the mine?”

  “What sort of trouble?”

  “I reckon you heard about what happened at the Crown Royal a couple of nights ago.”

  Munro pursed his lips. “Yes, of course. A terrible accident. Sorry for the loss of life. But nothing like that has happened here.”

  Frank didn’t think Munro sounded the least bit sorry. He said, “I want you to know, I’m going to find out who was responsible for that blast and bring them to justice.”

  “I thought you killed the four men who set that dynamite,” Munro said with a frown.

  “I shot three of them when they threw down on me. I reckon the fourth one was killed by whoever hired them, so that he couldn’t answer any questions about who was really to blame for what happened.”

  Munro shook his head and scowled. “I wouldn’t know anything about that.”

  “Didn’t say you would,” Frank pointed out. “All I’m saying is that I’m going to continue to investigate until I get to the bottom of that business, and when I do, whoever came up with the idea of blowing up the Crown Royal’s stamp mill is going to be mighty sorry.”

  In a harsh, angry voice, Munro asked, “Why are you telling me this?”

  Frank shrugged. “So you’ll know that if anything suspicious happens around your mine, I’ll look into it the same way. If you have any trouble, just let me know and I’ll see what I can do.”

  Munro’s bushy, reddish-gray eyebrows lowered even more, as Frank’s reply appeared to confuse him. “All right,” he said. “Is that all?”

  “You’re sure nothing’s happened out here that you want to report?”

  “I’m certain,” Munro snapped.

  Frank reached for Stormy’s reins. “I reckon I’ll be getting back to town then.” He swung up into the saddle. “Come on, Dog.”

  He turned the Appaloosa and rode away. Without looking over his shoulder, he felt Munro’s eyes on him anyway, gazing after him with what had to be a mixture of hatred, anger, and puzzlement. Munro had been ready to take offense when he thought that Frank was about to accuse him of being involved with the explosion at the Crown Royal, but Frank’s sudden change of tactic had confused him.

  That was the idea. It was always better to keep an enemy off balance—and Frank was still convinced that Munro was the enemy. He had put the man on notice that he was going to continue investigating that dynamite blast until he found the true culprits. Maybe that would spook Munro into doing something rash, like trying to have him killed.

  Frank hoped that Munro would send a bushwhacker after him. He would take his chances, willing to run the risk because he was confident that if he could get his hands on a prisoner, he could get a confession implicating Munro or Hammersmith—or both of them.

  Then, as he had promised Munro, he would see to it that they got what was coming to them.

  * * * *

  Hammersmith fully expected Jessica to pull away from him, to slap him across the face, to run screaming for her husband. He figured it would be worth losing his job to taste the sweetness of her mouth and feel the warmth of her body in his arms.

  She did none of those things.

  Instead, she returned the kiss with the same passionate intensity that Hammersmith put into it.

  When she finally took her lips away from his after a long, delicious moment, she said in a half whisper, “My goodness, Gunther, I was beginning to think you were never going to get around to that.”

  He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You…you wanted me to kiss you?”

  “Of course. What girl wouldn’t want to be kissed by a big, strong, handsome man like you?”

  A tiny voice in the back of his head warned him that she had to be flattering him like that for a reason. Big and strong he was, sure enough, but handsome? No one had ever accused him of that.

  Logic was one thing, though, and the incredible feeling he had inside him at this moment was something else entirely. Maybe she had some unknown motive for playing up to him. He didn’t care. All he knew was that she hadn’t objected when he kissed her, so he clutched her to him and did it again.

  This kiss was just as potent as the first one, but when it ended she put both hands against his broad, muscular chest and said, “That’s enough now. You don’t want to muss me up too much, or Mr. Munro is liable to notice. I don’t want him to know that I’ve been up to any mischief.”

  “Neither do I,” Hammersmith agreed. “I don’t want to cause any trouble for you.”

  “Then we’ll just pretend this little incident never happened….”

  His heart sank.

  “Until we get a chance to do it again,” she went on as she reached up to rest a gloved hand against his cheek. “And maybe more.”

  Hammersmith’s excitement rose again. “You mean it?”

  “Gunther, honey, I never say anything I don’t mean.”

  With that statement to give him hope, Hammersmith said, “I guess we’d better get back to the office.”

  “Lead the way,” Jessica said with her sweet smile.

  Hammersmith took her the rest of the way out of the shaft, letting go of her arm as they emerged into the sunlight. As they started toward the office, he spotted a man riding away. He couldn’t be sure, but he thought the man on horseback was Frank Morgan.

  “What the hell?” he muttered.

  “Is there a problem?” Jessica asked.

  “Nothing I can’t handle,” he answered. He didn’t want her to see how much the idea of Morgan poking around the Alhambra bothered him. He had been able to put aside in his mind that killing from a couple of nights earlier, but he didn’t want Morgan stirring things up again.

  When they reached the office, Hamish Munro was waiting on the porch. He looked distracted by something, but he put a smile on his face and asked Jessica, “Did you enjoy your look around the mine, my dear?”

  “Very much,” she replied. “Mr. Hammersmith was quite informative about what was goi
ng on down there, and he watched out for my safety every step of the way.”

  Munro grunted. “That’s good.” He turned his attention to the superintendent. “Hammersmith, I have to talk to you—”

  “I’m really a little tired, Hamish,” Jessica broke in. “I’d like to go inside the office to sit down and rest for a while before we start back to town, if that’s all right.”

  “Of course,” Munro said. He came down the steps to take her arm and help her up. “You go right on inside. The chair behind the desk isn’t all that comfortable—”

  “I’m sure it’ll be fine, dear.”

  Munro pointed a finger at Hammersmith and ordered, “Wait right there.”

  Hammersmith did so, and then after a moment, when Munro came back out of the office, the owner of the Alhambra said, “Let’s walk over toward the shaft.”

  The guard asked, “You want me and Billy to come with you, Mr. Munro?”

  “No, you can stay here. I’m in no danger here at the mine.”

  Munro stalked off toward the shaft. Hammersmith went with him, and as soon as they were out of earshot of the men at the office, he asked in a low voice, “Was that Morgan I saw riding off?”

  “It certainly was.”

  “What did that bastard want?”

  “He believes that you and I are responsible for that explosion at the Crown Royal two nights ago.”

  “Damn it!” Hammersmith burst out. “How could he know about—”

  Munro lifted a hand and made a curt gesture to stop him. “I don’t know anything about how that explosion happened, Hammersmith, and I want to keep it that way. You’d do well to remember that.”

  “Yes, sir,” Hammersmith said. Munro was touchy about things like that and always had been. He would hint around about what he wanted accomplished, but he never wanted to know any of the details of how the dirty work got done. Hammersmith supposed that was Munro’s way of protecting his own ass. Munro wanted to be able to swear in court, if it ever came down to it, that he had no guilty knowledge of anything.

  That seemed a little cowardly to Hammersmith, but Munro was the one with the money and power. He was the one who made the rules.