Clay Nash 4

by Brett Waring

  Luke Bray coughed as the lead slammed into his chest and drove him back. He fell against a chair and splintered it. He lay there, coughing blood, staring up with glazing eyes.

  Brad Burns’ Colt blurred out of his holster an instant after Lem Forrester fired and his hammer dropped a split-second before Zack Forrester commenced his own draw. Lem staggered as Burns’ lead smashed into his body and he snarled, brought around his own Colt and got off a shot as Burns hurled himself to one side. Zack fired, crouching, and his lead tore a white scar in the counter front as Burns lit on his shoulders, somersaulted, spun on his knees and came around with gun blazing in a spectacular move. Lem Forrester lifted to his toes as a bullet took him under his tilted jaw and he went over and down, jerking and twitching his last few seconds of life away.

  Burns got off another shot as Zack fired again and the yellow-haired trail-driver felt the burn of lead past his cheek. Zack staggered as Burns’ bullet struck him somewhere in the upper body and he spun along the bar, an outstretched arm sweeping bottles and glasses to the floor. He reached the end of the bar and went down, but he rolled and when he lunged upright, Burns had to hastily tilt his gun barrel and fire into the ceiling, for Zack Forrester had grabbed the cowering barkeep, an arm around the man’s neck, his smoking gun-muzzle under his ear.

  “Back!” Forrester yelled. “Back, or I’ll blow his head off!’’

  Burns froze and the others in the room made not a sound as Zack Forrester, breathing hard, backed up towards the rear door of the saloon, dragging the sweating, terrified barkeep with him. Just before he dodged through the doorway, he brought his gun down from the man’s ear and fired at Burns. The yellow-haired man staggered as lead clipped the point of his left shoulder and he spun completely around, going down to the floor and squirming around on his belly, gun blasting as Forrester flung the barkeep from him and dived out the door. The barkeep screamed but he was safe, only stung by flying wood-splinters as Burns’ lead clipped the doorframe.

  Brad Burns leapt to his feet, lunged towards the batwings, but was hampered by the crowd. By the time he had slammed and cursed his way out into the street, he could hear the rapidly fading hoofbeats of a fast-moving horse quitting town and he knew Zack Forrester had made good his escape.

  He holstered his gun and, holding his bleeding left shoulder, went back into the saloon. There was a crowd gathered at the far end of the bar but they fell back as he approached and he saw a man kneeling beside Luke Bray. No one bothered to check Lem Forrester for signs of life. There was a hole in his head as big as an apple.

  “Bray gonna pull through?” Burns asked.

  The doctor glanced up and shook his head. “He's dead. It got him through the lungs.”

  “God help us,” said Brad. “Ellen Bray was worried about him facin’ up to the Forresters and I said I’d keep an eye on him. But I got here too late.” He swore briefly. ‘‘Already had to tell her her brother was killed in a stampede out on the Pecos, now I got to give her more bad news.”

  ‘‘Hell, mister, don’t go blamin’ yourself,” a man said, “you done more’n enough. I ain’t seen anyone get a gun out so fast since Hickok passed through here.”

  There were murmurs of agreement from the others. ‘‘Well, that's fine, gents, and I thank you for the compliment,” Burns said, ‘‘but the fact remains I still got to tell Ellen Bray her uncle’s dead and I didn’t get here soon enough to stop them.”

  ‘‘No one could’ve stopped ’em tonight,” the shaking barkeep said, holding the whisky bottle he had been drinking from. ‘‘The Forresters were in a proddy mood, just spoilin’ for trouble. Luke came in at the wrong time, is all.” He nodded at Burns. ‘‘Mind you, if you’d been the sheriff, I reckon both them Forresters would be lyin’ dead on the floor!”

  ‘‘That’s likely true, mister,” the doctor said, looking Burns up and down. ‘‘You staying on in our town a spell?”

  ‘‘Well ... yeah, a spell. I’m writing a book about a cattle drive. I came in with Longhorn Tommy Loveless’ herd.”

  ‘‘Well, now, that’s mighty interesting,” the doctor said, hand cupped around his chin as he studied Burns closely. “You’re a fine figure of a man and mighty fast on the draw … and this town no longer has a lawman.”

  Burns stiffened as he got the drift of the doctor’s words and the rest of the room understood what the sawbones was getting at, too, and there were cries from all around the barroom.

  ‘‘Hey, yeah! How about this hombre for sheriff?”

  ‘‘Pin a star on him!”

  ‘‘Man can draw fast as that better be on the side of the law!”

  ‘‘We could sure use him for a lawman!”

  And other things of a similar nature. Burns was stunned and couldn’t make a reply right off.

  ‘‘Could be you’ll sell more books if you can put ‘sheriff’ in front of your name on the cover,” prodded the doctor. “That appeal to you?”

  It did appeal to Burns and he nodded slowly.

  “I guess I might take it on ... for a spell,” he said quietly and there was a cheer from the crowd.

  The doctor held up his hands for silence then took the tin star that the barkeep had unhooked from Luke Bray’s shirt. He pinned it onto Brad Burns’ vest and shook the young man’s hand, smiling.

  “I reckon you’re hereby elected sheriff of Ojo Medina, young feller!’’

  Chapter Three

  The Meeting

  Zack Forrester moaned and cursed and slammed his fists down against the bunk. The man holding his shoulders put more weight on them and the one sitting on his legs shifted uncomfortably. Sweat streamed from Forrester’s face as Chuka Cox, tongue between his teeth, probed none too gently for the bullet in the outlaw’s chest.

  “Gimme that bottle!’’ gasped Forrester desperately, writhing in agony, almost out of his mind with pain.

  Link Magee, the man holding his shoulders, glanced at Cox and the man nodded, taking another track with the knife-blade and opening up more flesh.

  “God rot you, Chuka!’’ roared Forrester, then drank deeply from the whisky bottle that Magee held against his lips. He let out one more yell and sagged back on the bunk, panting, as Cox held up the misshapen lead slug in bloody fingers. “Stop the bleedin’, damn you! Don’t admire that goddamn thing!’’ gasped the outlaw leader and Cox grabbed rags hurriedly and began mopping up his handiwork. Magee released Forrester’s shoulders and the man snatched the whisky from him and gulped down the remainder of the liquid in the bottle while Cox worked.

  “Hell, I hope I never get shot again with only you around, Chuka!’’ Zack told the man. “I’ve seen rheumaticky butchers do a better job!”

  "You’re alive, ain’t you?’’ Cox growled, tying the padded rags in place over the wound.

  Zack nodded slowly. “Yeah. Which is more’n Lem is.”

  Ashen-faced now, after his ordeal and the crude surgery, Zack sat up groggily on the bunk and leaned back against the wall of the adobe shack that served as the gang’s hideout. “Goddamn that yeller-haired son of a bitch! Half-brother to a bolt of lightnin’!”

  “What started the ruckus in the first place?” Cox asked.

  Forrester’s mouth curled. “Bray wantin’ more dinero. Reckoned the Wells Fargo report claimed we got over a hundred-thousand out of that Alamogordo express car and he wanted ten thousand in a lump sum.”

  “Great day! We didn’t get anywheres near that, did we?” Clem Lester asked.

  “Closer to sixty grand,” growled Forrester. “He still wanted a bigger cut, anyway. Reckoned he was tired of livin’ on his niece’s charity. Seems it’s her house and so on. He had somethin’ wrong with his lungs, too. Been coughin’ blood for a spell and the sawbones told him he didn’t have a lot of time left. So he aimed to do some travellin’ and high-livin’.”

  “At our expense!” Link Magee put in.

  “Yeah. He laid it on the line: pay up or he’d take us in and notify the Rangers. So’s he would
n’t be involved, I guess he aimed to shoot us down while ‘tryin’ to escape’ ...”

  “He always was a tough hombre in his early days, Luke Bray,” opined Chuka Cox. “Helluva hard man. Guess there was still a spark in him.”

  “Not any more. Goddamn yeller-haired polecat hornin’ in!”

  “Who is he?” Magee asked.

  “Dunno. Never seen him before and didn’t hear his name. But he’s fast. Damn near finished me as well as Lem.”

  “Think he could be a Ranger, mebbe?” suggested Cox, and his words brought a thoughtful frown to Forrester’s pain-lined face.

  “Hell, it’s possible! Bray could’ve set us up, but we made our move just a mite faster than he expected and the other feller didn’t come in till it was near too late. Might be that way. Bray reckoned that feller he killed a couple weeks back looked like an undercover Ranger to him, which is why he prodded him. If they’re nosin’ around this area, they’re gettin’ a mite too close and we ain’t gonna be able to get rid of the gold like we’ve been doin’.”

  “Aw, Rangers and Wells Fargo’ve been checkin’ all along the border for weeks, Zack,” Cox pointed out.

  ‘‘Sure, but if the hombre Bray downed was an undercover Ranger and this yeller-haired hombre is one, as well, that makes two they’ve sent out in a few weeks. Means they must figure they’re onto somethin’ in this neck of the woods, don’t it?”

  The others had to agree it looked that way.

  Forrester rubbed gently at his bandages, frowning worriedly. ‘‘We’ve gotta get that gold across to Valdez. With Bray gone, likely the Rangers’ll put one of their own men on the checkpoint and we’ll never get it past him.”

  ‘‘We’re only guessin’,” Cox said. ‘‘That hombre who shot you mightn’t be a Ranger at all.”

  ‘‘Well, we better make sure what’s goin’ on in town, anyways. You ride in and take a look-see, Chuka.”

  Cox stiffened. ‘‘Not me!”

  There was sudden silence in the room and Forrester’s eyes narrowed.

  “Why not you?” he asked quietly.

  ‘‘Judas, you know I don’t like towns!” protested Cox. ‘‘Too many Wanted dodgers out on me! Wells Fargo’ve been after me for close on two years and they keep puttin’ up the bounty. They suspect I’m in on these express car robberies because they know my work with dynamite!”

  Forrester stared coldly at him. ‘‘It’s gotta be you, Chuka. I’m hit, Link and Clem are meltin’ down the gold and pourin’ it into nuggets. That’s their specialty, same as the explosives are yours.”

  ‘‘What about Adams or Taggart?” Cox asked.

  Forrester shook his head again. ‘‘No good. They rode with us on a flat fee, which we paid.”

  ‘‘Yeah, but they was only goin’ back to their ranch at Sierra Blanca ...”

  ‘‘They ain’t got any ranch at Sierra Blanca. That was to throw anyone off the trail. They’ve gone back to New Mexico, around Socorro, so we can forget ’em. Looks like it has to be you, Chuka.”

  Cox stood up, breathing fast, licking his lips. ‘‘I ain’t doin’ it, Zack! Too risky!”

  Suddenly he was staring down the muzzle of Forrester’s six-gun: the man’s wound hadn’t impaired his gun-speed any. The hammer clicked back to full notch.

  “You're elected, Chuka. You go or I blow you apart right now. And you come back with the right information or I’ll hunt you down. Savvy?”

  Cox swallowed: he knew Zack never forgave an injury and would never give up searching for him if he let him down.

  “I savvy, Zack,” he breathed.

  Forrester lowered the gun hammer slowly but his eyes were still deadly. “And find out if they gave Lem a decent burial. And how I can get at that yeller-haired bastard and square things with him!”

  ~*~

  Most of the town attended the funeral of Luke Bray and those who couldn’t get out to Boot Hill or to the church, sent their representatives. He had been a good lawman, the folk of Ojo Medina said, and he had kept the peace well in their little border town.

  Sure, there had been the odd ruckus and shoot-up, but that was to be expected along the Rio, and Bray had never hesitated to go out with his gun and square-up to the miscreants. He had had a way with words, too, could often talk a liquored-up cowpoke into handing in his gun before someone got killed. Sometimes he gun-whipped the law-breaker into submission and, on a few memorable occasions, he had shot it out and walked away from the gunsmoke. Most folk knew he had some kind of chest trouble, but only the doctor knew how serious it had been. And no one at all knew that Luke Bray had been taking bribes from the Forresters, though there had been gossip from time to time.

  After the burial, Burns walked Ellen back in the blazing sunshine to the house on the hill and helped her receive the streams of townsfolk who came to offer sympathy. He brewed coffee in the kitchen and served it and when he saw Ellen was near breaking point, he hustled everyone out, thanked them for coming, and asked them to tell the rest of the townsfolk that Ellen was not receiving any more visitors this day. A couple of vinegar-faced women in stovepipe bonnets began to protest but took one look at Burns’ rocky face and folded arms as he stood squarely in the doorway and the protests died away.

  Inside the parlor, Brad found Ellen dabbing at her eyes with a cambric handkerchief and she looked up and gave him a wan smile.

  “Thank you for all you’ve done, Brad,” she said huskily.

  He shifted his feet uneasily. “Still wish I’d gotten down to that bar just a mite earlier …”

  She stood up, a small woman, the top of her head reaching only to his chest and she tilted her face up to look at him. Her hand touched him lightly.

  “Brad, you mustn’t blame yourself. People have told me that there were at least three earlier occasions when it looked like blowing-up into a shooting match but Uncle Luke was able to head it off. By the law of averages he couldn’t hope to do that all the time. And it just happened that when you arrived, all the talking and arguing had been done and there was nothing left but guns, for men like the Forresters.’’

  Burns nodded slowly. He would like to believe that. “Too bad the other brother got away, but I’ll get out Wanted dodgers on him, ask the town to post a reward. The way folk thought so highly of your uncle, I reckon there won’t be any trouble gettin’ ’em to do that.’’

  She nodded, still standing close against him and he stirred uneasily as he caught a whiff of her delicate perfume. He knew it to be English lavender water, for he had seen the fancy, cut-glass bottle on her dressing table when he had gone into her room with two townswomen to take her to the funeral. He had also glimpsed some of her underwear draped around the room on chairs or on the bed: petticoats with lace trim and little colored flowers embroidered on them; lacy, long-legged bloomers; silk stockings.

  The perfume conjured up a vision of her room and her intimate things and he began to sweat. She was surely a beautiful woman, Ellen Bray, and he was all too aware that they would be sleeping under the same roof.

  And then it hit him: why he had been getting so many disapproving looks from the vinegary old maids and some other townswomen.

  “Listen, Ellen,” he said abruptly, taking her small shoulders in his big hands. “When you—ah—asked me if I’d like to stay here ... well—uh—your uncle was alive then and still livin’ in this house. Now there’ll only be the two of us ...”

  His voice trailed off as he groped for words. She frowned slightly, looking up into his face. “Yes, Brad?”

  He made a helpless gesture and moved his neck uncomfortably in his collar that was drawn tight with a black-string tie. He loosened it hurriedly.

  “Well, maybe folk’ll talk,” he said somewhat lamely.

  “About what?”

  “Us ... livin’ here under the same roof. Just … you and me ...”

  She searched his face carefully. “Will it bother you, Brad?”

  “Huh? Me? Hell, no! I mean ... well, I was thinkin’ abou
t you. You’ve got to teach the kids of this town and if their parents get it into their heads that you’re ... you’re—”

  She smiled. “For a writer, you’re not very good at finding words, are you?”

  He flushed angrily. “Damn it, don’t make fun of me! I know what these small towns are like!”

  She touched his arm again, said earnestly, “I’m sorry, Brad. I shouldn’t have made fun of you. But what other people think doesn’t bother me unduly. We’ll know they’re wrong, won’t we?”

  “Well ... sure. Sure!”

  “Then that’s all that matters. Don’t give it another thought.”

  He frowned. “You’re sure, Ellen? I mean it’s your town. You’ll have to go on livin’ here long after I move on ...”

  Her eyes searched his face carefully and she gave a small sigh before nodding slowly. “Yes, I’m sure, Brad. And I—hope it’s quite—some time before you do—move on ...”

  She said the last huskily, turned swiftly and hurried out to the kitchen where he heard her starting to wash up the coffee cups and plates. He frowned. He hadn’t really thought about how long he would stay in Ojo Medina, only had some vague notion about getting the book sorted out and maybe the first rough draft penned.

  But now he found himself thinking that maybe, if this lawman’s job worked out, he could stay on here long enough to finish the book and get it away to the publisher in Philadelphia.

  The prospect of a longer stay than he had originally planned suddenly appealed to him. As he walked across the room towards the stairs leading to his room above, he caught another whiff of Ellen’s perfume.

  He started to whistle softly as he climbed the stairs.

  ~*~

  The youth in the stables at Sierra Blanca had been right about the big bay gelding being fast, Clay Nash reckoned as he rode along the trail to Ojo Medina. It had taken him out of the town and into the hills without any trouble and had been eating the distance at a steady lope ever since without showing any signs of tiredness.