Matt sat his horse for a time, thinking things over. They had passed no water since leaving the funeral site. Their horses would have to have water. And that meant the raiders would be forced to swing back west, toward the Pecos. Matt turned toward the river. If things worked out, he’d have a little ambush of his own.
Josiah faced the two men and they were scared. They didn’t know how the Ranger had gotten ahead of them, and at this juncture, that really wasn’t important. He had, and the outlaws’ guns were in leather.
“Mornin’,” one said, his eyes not meeting Josiah’s gaze, but instead remaining fixed on the muzzle of the Ranger’s .45, the hammer back.
“Man shouldn’t ride no blue steel on a raid,” Josiah said. “Horse like that’s too easy to fix in a person’s mind. Your hat’s got a turkey feather stuck in it. That’s stupid too. Stands out like a pimple on your nose. You’re one that raided the funeral, I’m Josiah Finch, and that makes you dead.”
Josiah shot him, the .45 slug knocking him out of the saddle. The second man grabbed for iron and Josiah blew him to hell. Josiah pulled saddle and bridle off the horses and turned them loose. Josiah took the dead men’s ammo and hung their gunbelts on his saddle horn, after making sure all weapons were loaded up full. He left the raiders where they lay, baking under the hot Texas sun.
“Hope the buzzards don’t get sick,” he said, and rode out. He’d cut some more tracks in a little while. He wondered how the brothers were doing.
“Breed,” the man said, “I don’t know where you come from, but I’m gonna gut-shoot you and leave you out here to die.”
Sam shot him, then shifted the muzzle and drilled the second man in the center of his chest. The first man was hanging onto the saddle horn and trying to quiet his bucking horse and lift his Hog-leg all at the same time. He didn’t have anymore time left him. Sam’s .44 barked again and the raider tumbled from the saddle.
Sam swung down and approached the raiders. Both were dead. He checked the brands on the horses; they were not familiar to him. He stripped saddles and bridles from their horses and turned them loose. Just as Josiah had done, he took their guns, looping the gunbelts on his saddle horn after checking to see they were loaded up full. He left the men where they lay. The carrion birds and wolves and coyotes would feed, and soon the bare bones would bleach under the relentless sun. The leather would rot and the spurs would rust.
Sam mounted up and rode away, wondering how his brother was doing.
Matt sighted in the rider in front and squeezed the trigger. The Winchester rifle boomed and the rider fell from the saddle to land in the cool sands on the east side of the Pecos. Before the large group of raiders could get out of range, Matt had emptied two more saddles. He punched rounds into his rifle as he walked back to his horse. Across the river, he left the saddle and looked at the hired guns. One was still alive, the .44 slug taking the man low in the left side and exiting out high on the right side, just under his arm pit.
“Lawmen ain’t supposed to ambush people,” the dying gunny whispered.
“I’m an unusual lawman,” Matt told him. “You got any family you want me to notify?”
“You’d do that?”
“Yes.”
“Got a sister in Arkansas. Fort Smith. Old maid, last I heard. Probably still is. Ugly as sin. Mabel Tucker. She’d like to know where I’m buried. You are gonna bury me?”
“Nope.”
“You a cold man, Ranger.”
“Not as cold as you’re about to be.”
“That’s a fact.”
“Who hired you?”
“Don’t know his name. Man that contacted us was a go-between, I’m shore. Give us a hundred dollars apiece to hit the Flyin’ V. Said there’d be a bonus if we killed the woman and the boy. Did we git ’em?”
Matt shook his head as waves of disgust washed over him. Even dying, the outlaw was not repentant. He started to ask another question, then saw that the man was dead.
He decided he would not write the old maid sister. She’d be better off forgetting this brother.
As Josiah and Sam had done, he turned the horses loose and took the guns. He was just starting to swing into the saddle when he heard hooves. He turned, pistol in hand.
Josiah was riding up from the south. “That’s Heck Tucker,” he said, looking at the nearest body sprawled on the sands. “He’s a bad one. Reward on him, but you’re gonna have to tote the body in to claim it.”
“I think I’ll pass on that.”
“Don’t blame you. He’d be ripe as a plum ’fore you got him in. You gonna bury ’em?”
“Did you bury yours?”
Josiah smiled. “Not likely.”
“Let’s see if we can find Sam.” Matt swung into the saddle and they headed out.
Sam found them, joining them about a half-hour after they left the Pecos. “I heard shots.”
“I got two, Matt got three,” Josiah said. “How about you?”
“Two. I didn’t recognize any of them.”
“I did. They’re ol’ boys fresh from the cattle wars up in Kansas. Most of ’em anyways. John Lee’s savin’ his permanent people and hirin’ out ’way far from here. What’d you boys want to do?”
“Trail them,” Sam said.
“Might make good Rangers after all,” Josiah said.
They caught up with them at a trading post on the Seminole Draw after days of hot, dusty tracking. The three were dirty, unshaven, tired, hungry, and about as sociably inclined as irritated porcupines.
“I was beginning to think you were lost,” Sam said to Josiah, as they sighted the small settlement by the river.
“I ain’t never been lost,” the little man said. “Horse has, but I ain’t.”
Horse swung his tired head around and gave Finch a baleful look.
“We’ve been pushing them hard,” Matt said. “And we know they’re out of supplies, living on jackrabbits.” He checked his guns. “Let’s go get this over with.”
“No way we can ride in unseen,” Sam said. “You can bet they’ve got lookouts.”
“I want something to eat I didn’t have to shoot, skin, and cook,” Josiah said. “And I aim to have it before or after we brace that trash over yonder. It don’t make no difference to me. Let’s go.”
They made a half circle and came in behind the long, low building, reining up at the corral. Josiah patted Horse on the neck. “You just hold that saddle up for a few more minutes, ol’ feller. I’ll be out directly to relieve you of it and you can rest for a time.”
The men loosened their guns in leather and walked around the front of the trading post. The windows were so dirty and fly-specked they could not see inside. The outside walls were pocked and pitted with old bullet scars, and parts of several arrows were still imbedded, grim reminders of the battles the post had endured. Bleached white by years in the sun, the skeletal fingers and wrist bone of a human hand hung outside by a piece of wire.
Josiah pointed to it. “Durin’ an attack one Injun got close enough to ram his hand through a window. One of them inside lobbed it off with an axe. That was about ten years ago. Injun attacks sort of petered out for a time after that.” Josiah pushed open the door and stepped inside.
The door they entered opened into the store section of the post, filled with everything that the owner figured somebody might want . . . someday. The bar was at the far end, to the right of the men. They could hear loud talk and rough laughter coming from that end.
“Maybe they didn’t have guards out,” Sam said.
“They figure they’re a day or so ahead of us,” Josiah said. “They ain’t been figurin’ on us ridin’ all night to get here. You boys ready for a drink to cut the dust and some food for the belly?”
“Sounds good to me,” Matt said, and took the lead, winding his way through the counters piled high with merchandise.
The men stepped into the dimly lighted bar area and the laughter and loud talk stopped as abruptly as someone suddenly blo
wing out a lamp. Matt walked to the middle of the bar—several long planks supported by barrels—and leaned up against it.
Josiah took one end and Sam took the other. All three men were conscious of the hard eyes that stared at them from two tables pulled together in a corner of the room.
The barkeep, a huge grossly overweight man who both looked and smelled like he was only days away from his semiannual bath, lumbered out of a back room and pulled up short at the sight of the badges pinned to the shirts of the trio. His gaze cut to the men in the corner.
“Three whiskeys,” Josiah said. “Then we’ll talk about somethin’ to eat.”
“Got stew that’s hot and fresh homebaked bread my old woman just took from the oven.”
“Sounds good,” Sam said. “We’ll drink first.”
The barkeep looked at the identical three-stone necklaces on Matt and Sam. He looked hard at Sam, frowned, and said, “I ain’t never served up no whiskey to Injuns. If you is an Injun.”
“He’s a breed,” Josiah said. “Pour the rotgut.”
“No offense meant,” the fat man said, filling the shot glass in front of Sam, which Sam had carefully wiped out with a handkerchief.
“None taken,” Sam said with a smile, then suddenly whipped out a long-bladed knife. His eyes hardened. The barkeep backed up as far as he could go. “But don’t serve me over three whiskeys. It stirs up my Indian blood and I get vicious and might take a notion to start scalping.”
“Two’ll be your limit!”
Sam laughed, sheathed his knife, and picked up his drink. The three of them moved to a table, arranging the chairs so they could all look over into the corner.
“I don’t recognize the brands on them horses out in the corral,” Josiah said. “You reckon they might be stolen?”
“I wouldn’t doubt it,” Matt replied.
“We ain’t ridin’ no stolen horses,” the voice came from a man in the corner. “Them horses was bought by us.”
“They mighty tired animals,” Josiah said. “You boys been pushin’ hard since you left the Pecos. I think you ought to give them a rest.”
“We ain’t been close to the Pecos, and I don’t recall askin’ for your opinion on nothin’,” another man at the corner table said. “So why don’t you shet your trap?”
“Them’s Texas Rangers, boys,” the barkeep said.
“That don’t spell crap to me,” yet another man said. “And it damn sure don’t give ’em the right to call us horse thieves.”
“I think we hurt their feelin’s,” Josiah said.
“Maybe so.” Sam picked it up. “But how do you hurt the feelings of a liar?”
“Good point,” Matt said.
“You callin’ us liars?” one of the raiders asked.
“I’m callin’ you all liars,” Josiah said. “You’re liars, backshooters, ambushers, and hired killers. You’re scum, punks, and trash. We’ve trailed you all for days. And we’ve left a string of dead bodies from the Pecos to here, and the list includes Tom Johnson, Hale Rivers, Barry Jackson, and Heck Tucker. Now what do you have to say about that, you ugly bastard?”
The outlaws came up dragging iron. But the Rangers had anticipated that. They jerked first and the trading post thundered with gunfire. Matt, Sam, and Josiah had a six-shooter in each hand, two more tucked behind each gunbelt and they let the lead fly. The barkeep hit the floor and stayed down, the building trembling when his weight impacted the boards.
It was over in only a few heartbeats. Gunsmoke hung heavy in the low-ceiling post. The reverberating gunshots had caused old bird’s nests, dirt, and droppings to fall from the ceiling. One raider crawled to his knees, blood on his face, hate in his eyes, and his hands filled with .45’s. Six pistols roared as one and the slugs lifted the gunhand to his boots and flung him back against a wall, dead before he hit the wall.
“Holy Jesus Christ!” the barkeep bellered.
The trio of Rangers walked over to the blood-slick corner. Raiders were stacked up on top of each other, sprawled in death and near death. One of them looked up through the gunsmoke and cussed the trio.
“I’d hate to go meet my maker with them words on my lips,” Josiah told him.
The outlaw added a few more.
“Where’s the rest of your bunch of trash?” Josiah asked him.
“You go straight to hell!” the outlaw told him.
“It don’t make no difference,” Josiah said. “We’ll find ’em if we have to track ’em clear to Canada. Who paid you to attack the ranch?”
The raider told the Ranger where to put his question. Sideways.
The Rangers loaded up while the raider cussed them. The barkeep was on his hands and knees, peeping around a barrel behind the bar. “I’ll bury ’em for five dollars apiece,” he said.
“I ain’t dead yet, you fat pig!” the only surviving raider gasped.
“You will be in a little while,” the barkeep replied. “And I can wait.”
“First thing you do it git up and fetch us somethin’ to eat,” Josiah told him. “Then start draggin’ this trash out the back. You take what they owe you and five dollars more per hole. And dig the holes deep or the coyotes’ll eat ’em. Bring ever’thing else back in here. You hear me?”
“Yes, sir!”
Josiah turned to the brothers. “I figure we got ten back at the ranch. We’ve left ten more on the trail. They’s six here. That means we ain’t got but about twenty more to go. We ought to have this wrapped up in a week or so.”
“I want a doctor!” the surviving gunslick said. “I’m bad hurt.”
“You best hurry up and expire,” Josiah told him. “I don’t see how you’re livin’ now. You got more holes in you than a prairie-dog colony.”
“I hope the Injuns git you all and stake you out over an anthill!” the raider gasped.
“What an unkind thing to say,” Sam told him. “After all we’ve done for you.”
“All you’ve done for me! You ain’t done nothin’ for me except kill me.” The raider shuddered and closed his eyes.
Sam started to reply, then looked down at the man. He was dead.
“I’m hungry,” Josiah said. “Let’s eat.”
Chapter 15
The Rangers caught up with five more at a tiny hamlet on the Blackwater Draw. The townspeople stood in silence and watched the lawmen slowly ride in, stable their horses, and slip their guns in and out of leather a time or two. One minute the few stores on the short street were window-lined with people. The next minute they were deserted.
“They’ll be in that hole-in-the-wall saloon over there,” Matt said.
“Probably,” Josiah replied. “And they know we’re here.”
The batwings opened and five men crowded out, stepping into the street. One called, “We’re tarred of you pushin’ us. Damn tarred of it. We’ll settle it here.”
“Suits me,” Matt called. He jerked iron and put a slug in the man’s belly. The man went down to his knees and the others grabbed for guns.
Sam’s first shot hit a man’s gunbelt and exploded the cartridges in the belt. One slug struck the raider in the foot, another hit him in the groin, and several others exploded and tore a hole in his stomach. Sam’s second shot ended his painful screaming.
Josiah had a Peacemaker in each hand and took two out, the Colts thundering. Matt took careful aim and drilled the last man standing, knocking him up against a hitchrail. The raider’s .45 went off and he shot himself in the knee. He pitched forward into a horsetrough and bubbled and gurgled for a few seconds.
“They come in with about ten more, Ranger!” a citizen said, running up. “Them others pulled out this morning. They headed west toward New Mexico Territory.”
“Thank you,” Josiah said, reloading. “Git someone to bury that trash and bring me what’s in their pockets. We’ll be over yonder in the saloon.”
Over beer and stew, the men inspected what the raiders had in their pockets. Sam read a letter aloud. “ ‘Dearest Ro
b, I hate to be the bearer of sad tidings, but I feel it is best to tell you that Father has stricken your name from the family Bible and forbade your name to be mentioned in this house. He (and I) cannot understand why you left a loving family and chose a life of desperate company and painted women. We are all heartbroken. Your sister, Meg.’ ”
“Where’s it from?” Matt asked.
“It doesn’t say.”
“Another unmarked grave,” Josiah said. “Another family who’ll wait to hear from a son gone bad. The West is full of them kind of stories.”
Matt picked up a tintype and looked at it. “Very pretty lady. Young. Must be his sweetheart.”
“She’s better off without him,” Josiah said. “What’s that on the back?”
Matt turned the tintype over and looked at the scratchings. “ ‘Ruth Sessions. Kansas City. Age fifteen.’ ” He slowly placed the picture on the table.
Sam opened a folded sheet of paper and read, “ ‘In the event of my death, I wish to tell the whole damn world to go right straight to hell.’ It’s signed ‘Billy Jackson.’ ”
“Heard of him,” Josiah said. “Horse thief and murderer from over Louisiana way. We had warrants on that one.” He clicked open a pocket watch and read the inscription. “To Jay from Mother. Love. 1871.” He shook his head and sighed. “Another mother to sit by the door and wait for a son that’ll never return. They never think about their mothers. I don’t know what the hell they think about.”
A citizen nervously approached the table where the men were sitting. “The man who’ll be prayin’ over the deceased, ah, wants to know if there is anything that should be said. I mean, you know what I mean.”
Josiah looked up at him. “Might say they shoulda stayed in closer touch with their mamas.”
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