Calloway's Crossing

by I. J. Parnham

  “I was wondering. . . .” She took a deep breath. “Ryan didn’t exactly scare you and. . . .”

  Baxter flashed a brief smile. “And you want to know how you can stop Ryan protecting you?”

  “I do.”

  Baxter shrugged. “Get a gun.”

  “We’ve got guns.”

  “Then learn how to use them.”

  Baxter pulled his hat down and lifted a leg to mount his horse, but Grace raised a hand. He lowered his leg and his eyes narrowed with a warning that he really did want to leave now, but Grace provided a large and sweet smile and moved closer to him.

  “I have about all the skill with a gun I’ll ever get, and Trip reckons he has enough to take on Ryan, but I don’t want him to do that without having an advantage, and I have an idea.” Grace placed her hands on her hips. “You might like the sound of it.”

  Chapter Seven

  “YOU DID WHAT?” CHESTER said. He checked that only Isaac was close, but when he spoke again, he still lowered his voice. “You’ve hired a gunslinger to kill Ryan?”

  “Not exactly,” Grace said. “What I reckon—”

  “What we reckon. . . .” Trip said, interrupting her as Chester’s eyes were blazing showing he’d never accept an idea if it came from her. He coughed. “What I reckon is we have to do something while we’ve still got a settlement left.”

  Chester turned to Trip. “You’re just like Milton Calloway, never listening to sense. Not only did you bring bridge workers here to shoot up the place, you then attracted outlaws who demanded money. Now you want to hire a gunslinger to shoot up the outlaws. Where will this end?”

  Grace and Trip shook their heads, but to Trip’s surprise, Isaac spoke up.

  “Pa, Trip hasn’t committed us to hiring this man,” he said.

  Chester snorted his breath through his nostrils.

  “He hasn’t, son,” he said and then stamped his boot for emphasis. “That doesn’t mean I have to listen to this nonsense.”

  Isaac shrugged. “You say I’m old enough to make my own decisions, and if that’s true, I’d like to hear his plan.”

  “You are old enough, but age won’t bring wisdom if you listen to damn fool ideas like Trip’s,” Chester said, waving his hands above his head.

  “I’ll listen, but it doesn’t mean I have to agree with him. We’ve always dealt with trouble, but we knew the railroad would bring more people, and people are trouble. If we don’t want Ryan to burn Calloway’s Crossing to the ground, we need help, and if that means hiring Baxter, then. . . .”

  “You’d better not be about to say you support Trip, boy.”

  Isaac stood before his father, and Trip guessed that when he’d first offered support for Grace’s idea, it’d been guarded, but Chester’s belligerent attitude was forcing his son to make a stand. As that stand probably meant he’d support the idea, Trip kept quiet.

  “I do,” Isaac said.

  “But . . . But he wants two hundred dollars, and that’s a whole heap of money we just haven’t got.”

  Isaac frowned. “I see you’ve stopped complaining about whether this is the right thing to do, it’s just that we can’t afford it.”

  Chester stabbed a firm finger at Isaac’s chest. “That isn’t what I said and you know it.”

  “It is what you mean. You want Ryan to leave, but you’ve got no idea as to how we make him go other than arguing against this idea. So admit it, you like the idea but you’re worried about the money.”

  A slow sigh slipped from Chester’s lips. “I do not like the idea, but I guess I hate the idea of parting with two hundred dollars more.”

  “How much trade will we lose with Ryan around?”

  Chester closed his eyes and when he spoke, the anger had gone from his voice and his tone was low and defeated.

  “I guess the time when I handed over decisions to you would come one day. Perhaps that day is here already.” He smiled and Trip was surprised to detect pride in his eyes after his son had stood up to him. “How do you propose we raise two hundred dollars, son?”

  Isaac breathed deeply as his father acquiesced, and then shrugged.

  “I don’t—”

  “I reckon we worry about one thing at a time,” Trip said before Isaac could worry himself into backing down. “First, we get rid of Ryan. Then, we work out how we pay off Baxter.”

  “That’s madness,” Chester said.

  “Maybe it is, but I reckon paying off one man once has to be less of a problem than paying off five men every day, surely?”

  WITHIN FIVE MINUTES of agreeing to the plan, Chester packed the rest of his family off to Wagon Creek to stay out of whatever trouble was about to erupt. Isaac refused to leave and when Trip tentatively suggested that Grace should also leave, she refused his request and instead suggested a refinement to their plan.

  Baxter accepted that plan with the briefest of nods and slipped away. Trip didn’t know where he went, but he assumed he was taking up a good position to pull off their plan. While Chester prepared the barn, the others headed to the saloon. Inside, Trip strode straight to Ryan’s table and provided what he hoped would be an honest and resigned smile.

  “When do you want your money?” he asked.

  “Now would be fine,” Ryan said, as Pike grunted with disappointment. He smiled and leaned back in his chair. “Then we can leave.”

  As Trip nodded, Grace joined them and set a hand on her hip.

  “Oh, do you need to go now?” she said, lowering her voice to a sultry drawl.

  Ryan shrugged. “There’s no need to stay once we’ve been paid.”

  “I thought you might enjoy discussing our arrangements some more.”

  “There’s nothing to discuss, as it’s perfectly simple. You pay me fifty dollars every day or Pike burns Calloway’s Crossing to the ground.”

  “Is that all you want?” she asked.

  “All?” Ryan frowned. “What are you saying?”

  Grace sashayed to Ryan’s side. She placed a finger on his shirt and, just like she’d done when she’d first met Trip, looped it around the cloth and dragged him forward and then up from his chair.

  “I’m saying we could talk in private – while your men enjoy our beer,” she breathed.

  Ryan met her eye. “I have nothing to say that I can’t say in front of my men.”

  As everyone grunted their approval, Grace fluffed her hair and lowered her voice to the huskiest of whispers.

  “Who said anything about talking?”

  “You. . . .” A slow grin appeared. “Where were you thinking of doing this talking?”

  “We can go to the barn.”

  Ryan stood back and gave a low whistle. As she sidled by him, he barked commands to his men to stay in the saloon, and then followed her outside and to the barn, rubbing his hands. His men shouted lewd suggestions and joshed Pike about his previous painful encounter with her until they disappeared from view.

  Then they demanded more beer. While Isaac served them, Trip mooched around the saloon, feigning indifference, and then slipped outside. He closed the door behind him as Ryan and Grace headed into the barn.

  Chester was loitering outside the stable where he was out of view from the barn door. Trip gave him a brief nod and hurried to the barn. While Trip had been in the saloon, Chester had pulled his wagon up at the front.

  Trip jumped on to it and levered himself up the barn wall to climb in through the open hay loft door. On the upper level, he collected the gunbelt Chester had placed there. Grace and Ryan were standing ten feet in from the door and slightly to the side.

  Grace had positioned Ryan to face away from the door so Trip could sneak inside unseen. So far, she hadn’t persuaded him to go to the side so he’d be below Trip.

  “All right, quit the coy saloon-girl act and tell me what you want,” Ryan was saying.

  “That was no act,” Grace said. “I wanted to get you alone so we could enjoy ourselves a while.”

  “We could, but
I’m no fool. I saw what you did to Pike and I know this is just an act.”

  Ryan snorted and moved to brush by her, but Grace raised a hand, halting him.

  “All right, I’ll tell you. I want a partnership.”

  “Why would that interest me?”

  Up in the upper level of the barn, Trip winced, silently urging Grace to win this debate quickly and get Ryan to the side of the barn. They had planned for Trip to get a drop on him and then, with the lead man subdued, to pick off the others one by one using the same tactic of Grace inviting a man to go out into the barn.

  The plan would go awry when the remaining men noticed that Ryan hadn’t returned, and that was when Baxter would step in. They had several cues, including Grace screaming, for him to appear and join Trip in persuading the remaining men to leave, but Trip still hoped they could divide Ryan’s forces before they needed Baxter’s help.

  “It’ll interest you because the railroad’s a-coming,” she said. “You have enough sense to muscle in on it, but you’re always moving on, and moving on might not be wise. This area will boom and those with brains and muscle can make plenty. I’ve got the first. You’ve got the second, and I can get us in on schemes you’d never dream of on your own.”

  “Give me an example.”

  Trip mopped his brow. Grace had reckoned she’d get Ryan to do anything she wanted within seconds of leading him into the barn and neither of them had planned for her sweet-talking to take this long. In confirmation of the time this was taking, a shadow edged out before the barn door and the ever-skeptical Chester shuffled into view.

  Trip hoped that Chester would work out that their plans hadn’t gone awry yet, but Chester shuffled another pace. Grace arched her back, possibly masking a wince as Chester’s shadow appeared around the barn door, and then pointed to the side of the barn.

  “I was standing up all last night and I’m not used to that. Perhaps we could sit down over there and discuss my ideas – and without the coy saloon-girl act.”

  Ryan nodded and took a pace to the side. Grace heaved a sigh of relief, but with Ryan moving even farther away from Chester’s line of sight, Chester edged another short pace closer to the barn door.

  On the upper level, Trip stood up as Ryan disappeared from his view and then slipped to the edge, ready to get a drop on him, but Chester darted his head forward and put a hand to his brow.

  “What the—?” Ryan said, striding back into Trip’s view and heading toward Chester.

  Trip darted back, but his sudden movement dragged a creak from the wood beneath his feet making Ryan do a double-take and raise his head. Trip rocked from foot to foot, but then accepted he had no choice but to act.

  He took a long pace forward and leaped from the upper level, aiming to bundle Ryan to the ground. With Ryan already alerted, his target stepped aside and Trip hit the ground heavily on his feet, and then tumbled to his knees before sprawling on to his chest, winded.

  On the ground, Trip shook himself, pain numbing his knees and feet, and then rolled on to his back, but it was look up into the barrel of Ryan’s drawn gun. He had a firm hand clamped on Grace’s arm and Chester was loitering by the barn door with his hands thrust high.

  With a short twitch of his gun, Ryan signified that he should leave and, while clutching his chest, Trip stood up, exaggerating his hurt as he swayed on the spot. Ryan signified that Trip should walk ahead of him and with Ryan at the back, the group left the barn.

  In the doorway, Trip stopped for long enough to snarl at Chester, but Ryan kicked him forward and then aimed his gun at Chester. As Ryan fired, Chester cringed away, but the shot only winged his hat to the ground.

  “Any more tricks and somebody will pay in blood,” Ryan said.

  Chester retrieved his hat as the gunfire enticed Ryan’s men to come outside. They sported the grins and good-natured airs of people who had enjoyed too much beer that afternoon, but that attitude died quickly.

  They ripped out their guns. Heath walked sideways to the barn, while the other men spread out and the hobbling Pike dragged Isaac out of the saloon.

  “There’s no need to do nothing,” Trip said. “We’ll pay. I have your fifty dollars.”

  Ryan snorted. “Fifty is what I wanted before you tried that trick. Now I want one hundred, every day.”

  “We can’t pay that much.”

  Ryan took a long pace toward Trip, his eyes blazing, but Grace screeched. Ryan released his grip of her arm and swung up his left hand, clipping her around the back of the head and knocking her to the ground.

  When she hit the ground, she rolled to her knees and then threw back her head and screamed, the sound echoing back and forth between the buildings in Calloway’s Crossing. Ryan gestured at her to stop, but her screaming continued unabated as if her lungs would never give out.

  “Have you finished?” he asked when she’d delivered her last warbling screech.

  “You’re not going to . . . kill him, are you?” she babbled, her eyes wide and scared. Then she thrust a knuckle to her mouth and bit it.

  Ryan furrowed his brow. Trip had used the distraction to back away several paces and Chester was mopping his brow.

  “What’s happening here?”

  “Nothing,” Trip said.

  “That isn’t right. You’re all acting strange.”

  Trip’s throat went dry, but he avoided the urge to gulp.

  “We’re just scared.”

  “You are scared, but I’ve seen plenty of scared people, and you aren’t acting like them. You’re expecting something to happen.” Ryan narrowed his eyes. “What is it?”

  Ryan was right. By now, Baxter should have emerged from wherever he was hiding and be making Ryan pay with hot lead. Trip spread his hands.

  “I just don’t know,” he said with all honesty.

  Chapter Eight

  “WHERE IS HE?” TRIP said.

  “I have no idea, but his horse’s gone,” Grace said from the corner of her mouth. “We have to hope Ryan doesn’t realize what we tried to do or none of us will get out of here alive.”

  The last ten minutes had been fraught. Ryan had searched everyone, confiscating every gun, and then herded them into the saloon. He’d positioned them in the center of the room while he conferred with his men by the door. Their low tones suggested they’d decided that something was wrong, but they didn’t know what it was.

  “Then we have to come up with another plan,” Trip said.

  “I know, but I can’t—”

  “Be quiet,” Ryan said, striding across the saloon to confront them. “I’ve had enough of your scheming.”

  “We were discussing how we’d pay you,” Trip said, presenting Ryan with a wide smile. “I’ll fetch your money now, if you want.”

  Ryan sneered. “I’m no fool. You’re not leaving to try another scheme. I want one hundred dollars. Give it to me now or someone dies.” Ryan roved his gun in a sweeping arc, taking in Chester, Isaac, Trip and stopping at Grace. “That someone will be you.”

  As Grace produced an audible gulp and Pike gibbered with barely suppressed glee, Trip sighed as he thought about how much money he’d made last night and, although he’d earmarked most of it for buying new stock and repairing the broken furniture, he accepted he’d have to give it to Ryan.

  “All right, I can cover the one hundred dollars,” he said. “It doesn’t leave me anything to—”

  “That isn’t my problem,” Ryan said. “Give me the money, now.”

  Trip pointed. “It’s behind the bar.”

  Ryan ordered Pike to collect it and Pike shuffled away, his eyes downcast and disappointed. He bent over the bar, but at that moment, metal glinted and then a gun emerged from behind the bar.

  The barrel slammed under Pike’s chin. A hand and arm appeared and Trip just had time to realize that Baxter had been hiding there all along. Then the gun roared, knocking Pike’s head back so that he stood straight before he tumbled away with his arms splayed.

  Even b
efore he’d hit the floor, Baxter rose up from behind the bar – a gun-toting avenger with twin guns brandished and spewing lead. Ryan and his men turned to him, scrambling for their guns, but before they could fire a single shot, Baxter’s guns belched fire in four crisp and neat shots.

  The first two bullets scythed through two of Ryan’s men, taking them with high shots to the sides of the head that spun them away. The third tore through the next man’s neck, wheeling him over.

  Only the shot that sliced a furrow across Ryan’s cheek was non-fatal, but any hint that that was a mistake fled when Baxter fired again, winging Ryan’s gun from his hand. The force swung Ryan around, but he rocked back, wringing his hand, to face a man who had fixed him with his cold eyes and firm guns. Baxter walked out from behind the bar, showing no sign of his apparent lethargy as he walked sideways with his guns never straying from Ryan.

  “Are you ready to beg for your life?” Nothing in Baxter’s hollow tone suggested his request was open to negotiation.

  Ryan gulped. “Maybe we can—”

  Baxter’s guns blasted lead, both shots slamming straight between Ryan’s eyes, rocking his head back to stand him straight before he tumbled backward like a felled tree. Baxter twirled one gun back into his holster.

  The other gun disappeared with a shrug, perhaps up his sleeve, as he took several long paces to walk over Ryan’s body. Nobody made a sound as he headed to the door, but he stopped in the doorway.

  “I’ll dispose of the horses,” he said. “You clean up the mess.”

  With that, he left them.

  TEN MINUTES AFTER BAXTER’S sudden appearance, everyone had calmed sufficiently to act on his instructions. First, Chester and Isaac danced a celebratory jig. Unlike the previous time, Trip clapped his hands as they whirled and when Grace held out an arm, he even did a few reels with her.

  Then they set about cleaning up the saloon. With Chester having sent the rest of his family away, they had to do all the work themselves, but it didn’t take them long to drag the bodies outside to Chester’s wagon.