Honor of the Mountain Man

by William W. Johnstone

  Joey stared at Smoke for a moment. “This wouldn’t be in the way o’ charity, would it?”

  “Hell no. Remember, we’re all part owners of the ranch, in it together. I’m going to expect a good return on my money, and you’ll earn everything you make, believe me.”

  Joey nodded. “I’ll think on it, Smoke, I surely will.” He glanced up at the sky, shining golden in moonlight, snow-covered peaks glistening and sparkling like they were sprinkled with diamond dust. “It is a mighty purty country, one God has smiled on, I think.”

  They were about halfway to the Rocking C, with heavy timber on either side of the trail, when Joey whistled softly to himself. “Smoke, look up yonder, ’bout a hundred yards or so, on top o’ that small hillock. There’s some boulders and such, an’ I just caught a glimpse of somethin’ shiny up there, like moonlight reflectin’ off a gun barrel.”

  Smoke cut his eyes northward but couldn’t see anything amiss. “Tell you what, Joey”—he glanced at scudding clouds in the sky—“those clouds are going to cover the moon in a minute. When it gets dark, turn Red into the timber. I’ll follow, and then we can injun up on whoever is up there waiting on us.”

  “You got it, partner.”

  Five minutes later the moon disappeared behind the clouds and the two men pulled their mounts into the forest on the left side of the trail. They stepped out of their saddles and crouched behind a large stand of pines. Without a word both men knelt in the sandy loam and smeared the dark dirt over their faces and hands to hide their white skin. Then, simultaneously, they pulled their knives from scabbards and took off at a trot through the woods toward a small rise ahead.

  At the foot of the hill Smoke waved Joey to the left and he slipped to the right, neither making a sound on the soft carpet of pine needles underfoot.

  Slowing to a careful walk, Smoke inched up the rising ground, shuffling his feet so as not to break a branch and give their enemies any warning.

  He crouched at the base of a series of boulders and listened. He heard a slight cough and the creaking of leather as someone shifted position above.

  Smoke put his back to the rock and eased around it, to find four men kneeling with rifles aimed at the trail below.

  One of the men whispered to another, “They oughta be outta those trees by now. What the hell are they doin’ takin’ so long?”

  “You think they saw us, Jesse?” the man answered.

  “Naw, they couldn’t see this far at night, even with the moon.”

  “I don’t like this, Dave,” another said, his voice hoarse. “I’m shaggin’ outta here, boys.”

  Smoke saw Joey’s face appear at the other side of the small clearing, and he nodded at him.

  As the man stood and turned to leave, he found himself face-to-face with a huge shape with a blackened face. Smoke growled, “Too late, partner,” and stuck his knife to the hilt in the startled man’s chest just below the rib cage, angling the blade upward to pierce his heart.

  With a short, sobbing gasp, the man looked at the hilt of the blade, then up at Smoke. His eyes clouded and he fell facedown with a soft thump.

  Jesse looked back over his shoulder, “Willie, what’s . . .”

  Smoke stepped toward him, holding his blood-smeared knife in front of him. “Willie’s dead, and you’re next,” he said.

  Jesse yelled, “You!”

  Smoke said, “Yeah, howdy,” and slashed backhanded across Jesse’s throat, nearly severing his head from his body. Jesse croaked and gurgled, strangling on his own blood and fell, clutching his bloody neck in both hands.

  “Son of a bitch,” one of the others yelled, and pointed his rifle at Smoke.

  To Smoke, in the moonlight, the hole in the end of the Winchester’s barrel looked big enough to fall into.

  As the man sighted along the rifle barrel, his eyes suddenly opened wide and he screamed a blood-curdling scream into the night. “Aiyee ...” and pitched forward onto his rifle with Joey’s Arkansas Toothpick protruding from his spine.

  The final man aimed his rifle and pulled repeatedly on the trigger, getting nothing but metallic clicks for his troubles. Joey stepped to him and hit him flush in the mouth with a balled-up fist, flattening his nose and sending blood spraying into the air.

  The assassin’s eyes crossed, and he fell as if he had been poleaxed, unconscious before he hit the ground.

  “Ya gotta cock it first, dummy,” Joey said to the fallen man.

  Smoke dipped his head. “Thanks, Joey.”

  Joey shrugged, “Better late than never, I guess.”

  “I’d say you were right on time, partner.”

  Smoke bent and effortlessly picked the unconscious man off the ground and slung him over his shoulder. “Let’s find their horses and we’ll take them and this hombre back with us to the ranch,” Smoke said.

  “Okay,” Joey answered as he bent to pull his knife from the back of the dead bushwhacker.

  * * *

  Joey and Smoke passed two sentries at the edge of his property and waved as they rode on by. “Good to see the boys are taking this seriously,” Joey observed.

  Smoke nodded. “Yes. Wouldn’t do for us to be caught napping when Murdock sends his men to call.”

  As they approached the ranch house, Smoke and Joey saw a large campfire built about twenty yards from the house.

  “What the hell?” Joey said.

  Smoke grinned. “That’s probably Puma. He never could abide sleeping indoors unless there was a blizzard howlin’, and then he’d bitch about feeling closed in.”

  Sure enough, Puma was sitting cross-legged in front of the fire, Cal and Pearlie sprawled on the ground in front of him, listening raptly to his tall tales of the good old days.

  Louis Longmont and Monte Carson had carried chairs from inside the house and were sitting there, listening and drinking coffee. When Louis saw Smoke and Joey arrive, he inclined his head toward Puma and rolled his eyes, grinning.

  Puma was telling the boys about the time Smoke had called twenty old mountain men in from the high lonesome to help him deal with Tilden Franklin and his bunch of hired killers.

  “You shoulda seen it, boys, some of those coots were pushin’ eighty and more. They was spoilin’ fer one more fight, didn’t none of ’em wanna die in bed.” He lit a stubby cigar off a burning twig from the fire and stared at the two young boys in front of him. The only fittin’ way fer a mountain man to die is with his guns blazin’ in a hail of lead.“

  He took a sip of his coffee and made a face. “Anyway, there was at least twenty of the wildest, rootin’est, tootin’est old beavers that ever forded a mountain stream all gathered together to give Preacher’s boy a hand. There was Charlie Starr, Luke Nations, Pistol Le Roux, Bill Foley, Dan Greentree, Leo Wood, Cary Webb, Sunset Hatfield, Crooked John Simmons, Bull Flagler, Toot Tooner, Sutter Cordova, Red Shingletown”—he paused—“give me some time and I’ll name some more.”

  Pearlie glanced at Cal. “He’s tellin’ the truth, Cal. I was there fer that fracas.”

  Puma continued. “Old Tilden Franklin and his gunnies was holed up in a town he’d founded named Fontana. Well, there wasn’t no other way so the mountain men headed on into the jaws of hell. . . .”

  * * *

  Hardrock, Moody, and Sunset were sent around to the far end of town, stationed there with rifles to pick off any TF gun hand who might try to slip out, either to run off or try and angle around behind Smoke and his party for a box-in.

  The others split up into groups of twos and threes and rode hunched over, low in the saddle, to present a smaller target for the riflemen they had spotted lying in wait on the rooftops in Fontana. And they rode in a zigzagging fashion, making themselves or their horses even harder to hit. But even with that precaution, two men were hit before they reached the town limits. Beaconfield was knocked from the saddle by rifle fire. The one-time Tilden Franklin supporter wrapped a bandanna around a bloody arm, climbed back in the saddle, and, cursing, continued onward.
Hurt, but a hell of a long way from being out.

  The old gunfighter, Linch, was hit just as he reached the town. A rifle bullet hit him in the stomach and slapped him out of the saddle. The aging gun hand, pistols in his hands, crawled to the edge of a building and began laying down a withering line of fire, directed at the rooftops. He managed to knock out three snipers before a second bullet ended his life.

  Leo Wood, seeing his long-time buddy die, screamed his outrage and stepped into what had once been a dress shop, pulling out both Remington Frontier .44s, and letting ’em bang.

  Leo cleared the dress shop and all TF riders before a single shot from a Peacemaker .45 ended his long and violent life.

  Pearlie settled down by the corner of a building and with his Winchester .44-.40 began picking his shots. At ranges up to two hundred yards, the .44-.40 could punch right through the walls of the deserted buildings of Fontana. Pearlie killed half a dozen TF gun hawks without even seeing his targets.

  A few of Tilden’s hired guns, less hardy than they thought, tried to slip out the rear of the town. They went down under the rifle fire of Moody, Hardrock, and Sunset.

  Bill Foley, throwing caution to the wind, like most of his friends having absolutely no desire to spend his twilight years in any old folks home, stepped into an alley where he knew half a dozen TF gunnies were waiting and opened fire. Laughing, the old gunfighter took his time and picked his shots while his body was soaking up lead from the badly shaken TF men. Foley’s old body had soaked up a lot of lead in its time, and he knew he could take three or four shots and still stay upright in his boots. Foley, who had helped tame more towns than most people had ever been in, died with his boots on, his back to a wall, and his guns spitting out death. He killed all six of the TF gunslicks.

  Toot Tooner, his hands full of Colts, calmly walked into what was left of the Blue Dog Saloon, through the back door, and said, “I declare this here game of poker open. Call or fold, boys.”

  Then he opened fire.

  His first shots ended the brief but bloody careers of two cattle rustlers from New Mexico who had signed on with the TF spread in search of what Tilden had promised would be easy money. They died without having the opportunity to fire a shot.

  Toot took a .45 slug in the side and it spun him around. Lifting his pistol, he shot the man who had shot him between the eyes just as he felt a hammer blow in his back, left side. The gunshot knocked him to his knees and he tasted blood in his mouth.

  Toot dropped his empty Colts and pulled out two Remington. 44s from behind his gun belt. Hard hit, dying, Toot laughed at death and began cocking and firing as the light before his eyes began to fade.

  “Somebody kill the old son of a bitch!” a TF gunhand shouted.

  Toot laughed at the dim figure and swung his guns. A slug took him in the gut and set him back on his butt. But Toot’s last shots cleared the Blue Dog of hired guns. He died with a very faint smile on his face.

  Louis Longmont met several TF gun hands in an alley. The gambler never stopped walking as his Colts spat and sang a death song. Reloading, he stepped over the sprawled bloody bodies and walked on up the alley. A bullet tugged at the sleeve of his coat and the gambler dropped to one knee, raised both guns, and shot the rifleman off the roof of the bank building. A bullet knocked Louis to one side and his left arm grew numb. Hooking the thumb of his left hand behind his gun belt, the gambler rose and triggered off a round, sending another one of Tilden Franklin’s gun slicks to hell.

  Louis then removed a white linen handkerchief from an inside breast pocket of his tailored jacket. He plugged the hole in his shoulder and continued on his hunt.

  The Reverend Ralph Morrow stepped into what had been the saloon of Big Mama and the bidding place of her soiled doves and began working the lever on his Henry. 44. The boxer-turned-preacher-turned-farmer-turned-gunfighter muttered a short prayer for God to forgive him and began blasting hell out of any TF gun hawks he could find.

  His Henry empty, Ralph jerked out a pair of .45s and began smoking. A lousy pistol shot, and that is being kind, Ralph succeeded in filling the beery air with a lot of hot lead. He didn’t hit a damn thing with the pistols, but he did manage to scare the hell out of those gun hands left standing after his good shooting with the rifle. They ran out the front of the saloon and directly into the guns of Pistol Le Roux and Dan Greentree.

  Ralph reloaded his rifle and stepped to the front of the building. “Exhilarating!” he exclaimed. Then he hit the floor as a hard burst of gunfire from a rooftop across the street tore through the canvas and wood of the deserted whorehouse.

  “Shithead!” Ralph muttered, lifting his rifle and sighting the gunman in. Ralph pulled the trigger and knocked the TF gunman off the roof.

  Steve Matlock, Ray Johnson, Nolan, Mike Garrett, and Beaconfield were keeping a dozen or more TF gun slicks pinned down in Beeker’s general store.

  Charlie Starr had cleared a small saloon of half a dozen hired guns and now sat at a table, having a bottle of sweetened soda water. He would have much preferred a glass of beer, but the sweet water beat nothing. Seeing a flash of movement across the street, Charlie put down the bottle and picked up a cocked .45 from the table. He sighted the TF gun hand in and pulled the trigger. The slug struck the man in the shoulder and spun him around. Charlie shot him again in the belly, and that ended it.

  “Now leave me alone and let me finish my sodie water,” Charlie muttered.

  The Silver Dollar Kid came face-to-face with Silver Jim. The old gunfighter grinned at the punk. Both men had their guns in leather.

  “All right, Kid,” Silver Jim said. “You been lookin’ for a rep. Here’s your chance.”

  The Silver Dollar Kid grabbed for his guns.

  He never cleared leather. Silver Jim’s guns roared and bucked in his callused hands. The Kid felt twin hammer blows in his stomach. He sat down in the alley and began hollering for his mother.

  Silver Jim stepped around the punk and continued his prowling. The Kid’s hollering faded as life ebbed from him.

  Smoke met Luis Chamba behind the stable. The Mexican gunfighter grinned at him. “Now, Smoke, we see just how good you really are.”

  Smoke lifted his sawed-off shotgun and almost blew the gunfighter in two. “I already know how good I am,” Smoke said. “I don’t give a damn how good you . . . were.”

  Smoke reloaded the ten-gauge sawed-off and stepped into a stable. He heard a rustling above him and lifted the twin muzzles. Pulling the triggers, blowing a hole the size of a bucket in the boards, Smoke watched as a man, or what was left of a man, hurled out the loft door to come splatting onto the shit-littered ground.

  Smoke let the shotgun fall to the straw as the gunfighter Valentine faced him.

  “I’m better,” Valentine said, his hands over the butts of his guns.

  “I doubt it,” Smoke said, then shot the famed gunfighter twice in the belly and chest.

  With blood streaking his mouth, Valentine looked up from the floor at Smoke. “I . . . didn’t even clear leather.”

  “You sure didn’t,” the young man said.“We all got to meet him, Valentine, and you just did.”

  “I reckon.” Then he died.

  Listening, Smoke cocked his head. Something was very wrong. Then it came to him. No gunfire. It was over.8

  * * *

  “Jiminy,” Cal whispered as Puma finished his story. Then Cal punched Pearlie in the shoulder, giving him a hard look. ”Why didn’t you tell me about that, you skunk?“

  Pearlie blushed. “Shucks, Cal. I didn’t do much, Smoke and the mountain men did most of the fightin’.”

  Louis Longmont stood and stretched. “Puma, you oughta write penny dreadfuls, the way you embellish a story so.”

  Puma looked up through slitted eyes. “I don’t know what that word means, but I hope fer yore sake it don’t mean what I think it do!”

  Monte laughed. “No, Puma, he just means you tell a hell of a fine tale.”

  Smoke step
ped out of his saddle and pulled on his dally rope, bringing the horse with the unconscious ambusher forward. They had slung him over the saddle and tied his hands to his feet under the bronc’s belly.

  When Joey cut him down and rolled him over onto his back in the dirt, Pearlie said, “Jesus, what happened to his face? A mule kick him?”

  Smoke grinned. “No, it was just Joey’s fist.”

  Louis called out to the ranch house, “André, some coffee for Smoke and Joey, please.” He looked at the blood-splattered shirts and dirt-covered faces of his two friends. “You two look like you’ve had an eventful ride back from town.”

  Smoke nodded. “Monte, would you see if you can wake that galoot up while Joey and I wash up? Then we’ll see if he can give us any useful information about the size of Murdock’s new gang.”

  Chapter 17

  Smoke’s friends were arranged around the campfire when he and Joey finished washing the outlaws’ blood off their faces and hands and changed clothes.

  Smoke walked outside to stand over the man whose face Joey had smashed. He was conscious, tied hand and foot, and squirming on the ground, looking around at the unfriendly faces surrounding him.

  “What’s your name, cowboy?” Smoke asked, his tone neutral, neither friendly nor angry.

  “Moses, Moses Jackson,” the gunny answered, blood still trickling from his bent, shattered nose.

  “Want to tell me why you and your friends were out there waiting to bushwhack Joey and me?”

  “We weren’t gonna kill you, we was just gonna—” He stopped, evidently in too much pain to think up a good lie.

  “Uh-huh,” Joey growled, “you was jest sittin’ there, guns cocked and aimed, waitin’ to blow us to hell.”

  Moses lowered his eyes, moaning softly when movement caused his pain to flare.

  “Did Murdock send you out to do us in?”

  “I ain’t sayin’ anything else. Go on and get the sheriff and have him take me to jail.”

  “So that bastard Sam Murdock can let you escape? I don’t think we’ll send for him just yet,” Smoke said, his tone becoming harder.