“Hold it, you two!” the foreman called. “Beaumont, you ain’t hardly welcome here. And while I hate to be rude to a lady, you ain’t either, Miz Stratton.”
“There’s no time for that, Ed,” Callie said.
“Where’s Duggan?” Beaumont asked.
MacDonald was about to argue, but at that moment Earl Duggan came around the chuck wagon and saw the newcomers. “What the hell?” the rugged old rancher grunted. “What do you want?”
“A gang of outlaws is about to attack and try to stampede your herds and wipe you out,” Beaumont said.
“Outlaws! You mean sodbusters and nesters and greasy-sack cowpokes, don’t you?” With the rough gallantry of his kind, Duggan glanced at Callie and added gruffly, “No offense, ma’am.”
“The hell there’s not!” she shot back at him. “Yes, my brother and some of his friends are with them, but the men who are really behind it are outlaws like Ranger Beaumont said. They’ve fooled Al and the others.”
Duggan frowned in confusion. “What you’re sayin’ doesn’t make any sense.”
“Listen to me,” Beaumont said urgently. “This whole range war has been planned so that the men behind it can loot the county.”
Some of the other Slash D punchers had come up to listen. Pitch Carey spoke up, saying, “What do you mean, the men behind it?”
“Ace McKelvey, Skeet Harlan, and that gunslinger Coburn. They’re all working together.”
Several of the men began to scoff at that idea, but Duggan cut them off with a curt gesture. The old cattle baron frowned in thought and said, “That at least sounds a mite interestin’. I wouldn’t mind hearin’ more, Ranger.”
Beaumont opened his mouth to explain, but before he could say anything else, the rattle of gunfire suddenly came through the morning air. The cattle became more frantic, surging back and forth in the pens, putting a strain even on the thick rails that enclosed them.
“Too late for that!” Beaumont said. “Here they come now!”
* * *
As Frank and Sheriff Wilmott ran into the jail, Frank called to the lawman, “Tell your men to try not to kill the members of Rawlings’ bunch! They don’t know they’re being used!”
“They know they’re about to try to break some prisoners out of jail!” Wilmott barked back at him. “They’ll have to take their chances.” After a moment, though, he added, “But I’ll tell the boys to concentrate on Coburn and them other outlaws.”
The sheriff snatched a Winchester out of a rack and tossed it to Frank, then followed it with a box of shells. The two deputies and the jailer were also picking up extra ammunition. The jailer, a wiry, silver-haired man named Strickland, said to Wilmott, “I called as many of the fellas as I could get hold of, Sheriff, and told them to get down here as fast as they could.”
“Good,” Wilmott said as he thumbed shells into a shotgun and snapped it closed. “We’re liable to need all the help we can get.”
“I’m going out,” Frank said. “Most of the gang will head for the banks downtown. Hold the jail, and I’ll try to stop the outlaws.”
“By yourself?” Wilmott demanded. “One man ain’t no match for that gang!”
A thought occurred to Frank. “Let me take Chris Kane with me, if he’s strong enough to be up and around and use a gun.”
“Kane’s a prisoner!”
Strickland said, “I’ll go with him and Morgan and keep an eye on him, Sheriff.”
Wilmott grimaced and rubbed at his jaw for a second before he said, “I reckon three men against fifteen or twenty is better than one. Go let Kane out and give him a gun!”
Frank and Strickland hurried along the corridor to the cell block. Kane had heard the commotion and was standing at the door of his cell, grasping the bars. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“Need some help if you’re up to it, Kane,” Frank grunted. “Can you move around some and handle a gun?”
Kane stared in confusion at the jailer. “You’re letting me out?”
“Yeah,” Strickland said with a grin. “You and me and Morgan are gonna go fight a gang of outlaws.”
Kane jerked his head in a nod. “All right. I’ll do what I can. Don’t know how much strength I’ve got after being laid up, but I’ll do my best.”
Strickland unlocked the cell door and pressed a six-gun into Kane’s hand. “Don’t get any ideas about escapin’, son,” he warned. “You’re comin’ back here when it’s all over. If you live through it.”
By now, guns had begun to pop somewhere close by. A rifle cracked from up front in the jail. Frank hoped Wilmott had ordered his men to aim high as much as possible.
He and Strickland and Kane went out the back door of the jail and trotted toward the downtown area a couple of blocks away. As they did, several riders with bandannas masking the lower halves of their faces swept past the jail and pounded on toward them. Frank called out a warning. He and his two companions pivoted. He brought the Winchester to his shoulder. Beside him Strickland crouched and aimed a rifle, while Kane went to one knee and leveled his revolver. All three of them fired at the same time, smoke jetting from the barrels of the weapons.
Three of the onrushing outlaws went out of their saddles, drilled cleanly. Frank and Strickland fired again, and two more men tumbled off their horses. That broke the back of the charge.
But only for the moment. “Hunt some cover!” Frank ordered.
The three men spread out, Frank on one side of the street while Kane and Strickland went to the other side. Kane was moving fast but carrying himself somewhat gingerly. If his partially healed wounds broke open, he might bleed to death. There were more immediate threats, though, like outlaw lead. Here they came again, determined to reach the banks and the other businesses. Frank and his two allies were equally determined to stop them.
For a long moment guns blazed fiercely as Frank and Strickland fired their rifles as fast as they could work the levers and Kane emptied his six-gun. Bullets whined and sang around the defenders as the outlaws on horseback returned the fire.
That much racket drew plenty of attention. The saloons weren’t very busy on a Sunday morning, but each of them held a few men. They rushed out to see what was going on. The churches were emptying, too, and although most men no longer carried guns to church, they had rifles and shotguns in the buggies and wagons that had brought them to services. As Frank reloaded the Winchester while he knelt behind a rain barrel, he turned and shouted to the men rushing along the street, “Take cover! Outlaws attacking the town!”
It took only a moment for the citizens of Brownwood to figure out what was going on. Even though “civilization” had come to this part of Texas, the frontier was still in the blood of these men. Even the ones who had not lived through the wilder days had grown up hearing tales of the Alamo and San Jacinto, Cibolo Creek and Palmito Ranch, Adobe Walls and Palo Duro Canyon. They were ready to fight to defend what was theirs.
The outlaws never had a chance.
The forces of lawlessness swept into Brownwood thinking that these Texans were soft and would be easily distracted and overcome. Instead, the raiders ran right into a storm of lead that scythed through them and sent them flying from their saddles. Wounded men hit the ground, struggled upright, and were riddled as they tried to lift their guns. Frank, Kane, and Strickland led the battle, but within minutes they had a formidable force at their backs.
Down at the jail, Sheriff Wilmott and his handful of deputies were putting up a fierce resistance as well, and the ranchers who had come to free their friends soon realized that their so-called allies, the men Flint Coburn had sent to help them, had deserted them instead. Pulling back, dragging their wounded with them, they regrouped and stared at the big sandstone building with its barred windows. Suddenly, the idea of taking it over didn’t seem quite so appealing . . . or even possible.
Nothing was going like it was supposed to go. The carefully laid plans were being shot to hell.
* * *
Inside the little tow
n jail, Skeet Harlan had regained consciousness. He listened to the sounds of battle and tried to see out the tiny barred window, ignoring the scared prattling of Marshal Keever. Harlan seethed inside as he sensed that everything was going wrong. He needed to be out there, so he could try to salvage something from this mess. Instead, he was stuck here in this cell with that idiot of a marshal.
The door of the office slammed open and one of the townsmen ran inside. “Marshal! Marshal Keever!” he cried. “Come quick! There’s trouble!”
Then he stopped short and gaped at the sight of Keever and Harlan locked up in their own cell. Harlan flung himself across the cell and grabbed the bars, rattling the door. “The keys!” he shouted at the townie. “Get the keys and let us out of here, man!”
The startled, confused townsman looked around wildly for a moment before his gaze fell on the ring of keys lying on the desk. He snatched them up and ran over to the cells. “Outlaws in town!” he said as he fumbled with the keys and the lock. “They’re attackin’ the jail and tryin’ to get to the banks! You gotta help stop ’em!”
Harlan had no intention of helping to stop the raid. He could tell from all the shooting that it wasn’t going as planned. But maybe he could still get something out of it. He shoved the clumsy townie aside, reached through the bars, and unlocked the cell door.
Darting out, he went to the desk and grabbed a spare six-shooter from one of the drawers. He was reaching for a rifle from the wall rack when Keever followed him out of the cell and caught hold of his arm. “What are we going to do?” the marshal yelled, totally spooked.
“I’m gonna get my hands on some money while I still can,” Harlan said. He shook off Keever’s grip.
The marshal grabbed him again, causing red rage to shoot through Harlan. With a snarl, the deputy palmed out the Colt, pressed the muzzle against Keever’s chest, and said, “And you’re gonna die.” He pulled the trigger.
The gun roared, knocking Keever backward. Keever’s coat smoldered from the burning powder that had blasted into it. He made a hideous gurgling sound, and then his boot heels drummed against the floor as he died.
Harlan turned the gun on the gaping townie and fired again, putting a neat black hole in the middle of the man’s forehead and a much larger, messier one in the back of his head where the bullet blew out his skull. The luckless man collapsed, already forgotten by the ruthless killer who had just murdered him.
Harlan thumbed fresh shells into the chambers he had expended, stuck the box of ammunition in his pocket, and ran out of the office.
He turned toward the Palace Saloon.
37
Ace McKelvey hurried into his office, his heart pounding with fear and his face coated with beads of sweat. He had just looked down the street and seen Frank Morgan leading the fight against Coburn’s men. Morgan! That damned gunslinger was supposed to be dead. Harlan had left here with Morgan the night before, on his way to kill the unconscious Drifter and dispose of his body.
Obviously Harlan had fouled up somehow, because Morgan was not only still alive, but from the looks of things he was about to ruin all of McKelvey’s carefully orchestrated plans.
There was only one thing to do. He had quite a bit of money stashed in the safe in his office. He would grab it and get out of here while he still had the chance. Harlan and Coburn wouldn’t get their shares, but that was just too damned bad. He had always intended to double-cross them anyway. He would just be doing it a little sooner than he had planned.
Morgan knew that he, McKelvey, was behind the whole thing. And there was no telling who else Morgan might have told by now. McKelvey knew he couldn’t stay in Brownwood as he had intended. He had to get away while he still could, but at least he would have enough money to make a fresh start somewhere else. He went to a knee in front of the squat, heavy safe and began twirling the knob on the combination lock.
He had just opened the door and reached inside for the canvas bag stuffed full of greenbacks when the rear door of the office was kicked open. Skeet Harlan stepped in and leveled a Colt at McKelvey.
The saloon keeper froze. His hand hovered above not only the sack of money but also the pistol that lay beside it.
A grin twisted Harlan’s ugly face. “Goin’ after the loot you’ve got stashed there, McKelvey? I’m much obliged to you. You’ve saved me the trouble of making you open the safe.”
McKelvey swallowed hard. “I . . . I was just going to come find you, Skeet. It looks like things are going bad out there. We’ll take what’s in here and get the hell out while we still can.”
“What about Coburn?”
“The hell with him!” McKelvey said.
“So you’d double-cross a partner just like that, eh?” Harlan said. “Somehow I figure you were gonna say the hell with me, too, Ace.”
McKelvey shook his head emphatically. “No, of course not! You and I have been in on this together from the first. Coburn came into it later. It’s you and me, Skeet. We’ll go somewhere else and come up with a new plan—”
“I don’t think so. That money’s going with me. I don’t care what you do, McKelvey. The way your fancy plan is falling apart, I don’t think I want to be your partner no more.”
“All right,” McKelvey said desperately. “I’ll split the money with you—”
Harlan just shook his head. His finger tightened on the trigger of his gun.
The door of the saloon burst open at that instant, the noise making Harlan’s hand jerk just enough as he squeezed the trigger. The bullet ripped into McKelvey’s left side and knocked him against the safe as another gunshot roared. McKelvey fought off the pain and grabbed the pistol, twisting around as he slumped against the open door of the safe. He saw the blond whore, Annie, standing there looking down at the bloodstain spreading across the midsection of the housedress she wore. Harlan, spooked by her unexpected entrance, had fired again out of instinct, drilling her.
McKelvey fired, catching Harlan somewhere in the body with the slug. He wasn’t sure exactly where he hit the deputy because his eyesight was blurring. He tried to squeeze off another shot, but before he could Harlan’s gun blasted twice more, the reports deafening in the close confines of the office. The bullets struck McKelvey in the chest like twin hammer blows, pinning him against the safe door for a moment before he pitched forward on the floor. He saw all his hopes and plans and dreams, all the money and power he would have had, sliding down into a deep, dark, bottomless well.
Then he slid into the darkness after them and saw nothing but death.
* * *
Frank, Kane, and Strickland had been forced to fall back a little during the last determined charge by the remaining outlaws, but along with the other defenders who had fired from behind wagons and water troughs, they had mowed down the last of the raiders. As wounded horses kicked in the street and dying outlaws moaned, Frank hurried over to Kane and the jailer and asked, “Are you two all right?”
Kane’s shirt was bloody, so that Frank thought his wounds had opened up again. Kane just grinned, though, and said, “Don’t worry, Morgan, it’s a fresh crease. I’m okay.”
“And I’m not hit at all,” Strickland said. “I can thank my lucky stars for that.”
“You sure enough can,” Frank agreed with a smile. He worked the lever of his Winchester and kicked out the last empty shell.
His head jerked around when a woman screamed. A block away was the Palace Saloon, and Frank thought the cry had come from there. He broke into a run toward the place, tossing aside the empty rifle. Kane and Strickland followed him.
As Frank burst into the Palace, he saw the bartender, Rusty, cradling the limp form of Annie. The whore called Midge followed them, her hands pressed to her mouth in horror. As Rusty placed Annie on one of the tables, he shouted to Frank, “Out the back! It’s Skeet Harlan! He killed the boss and shot Annie!”
Frank ran into the office and saw the rear door standing open. He glanced at McKelvey, who was sprawled facedown in a pool of blo
od, but didn’t slow down. Frank could tell that McKelvey was dead, and he couldn’t think of anybody who deserved it more.
Unless it was Skeet Harlan. Frank lunged out the door and saw Harlan limping away, a gun in one hand and a heavy canvas bag in the other. “Harlan!” Frank shouted.
The deputy stopped in his tracks and then turned slowly to face Frank. The canvas bag slipped from his fingers and thudded at his feet. “Morgan,” he croaked.
Frank saw the blood soaking Harlan’s shirt and knew the man was hit. “Drop the gun, Harlan,” he said. “It’s all over.”
Harlan shook his head slowly and grinned a hideous grin. “How about we test our speed like you suggested, Morgan? I’ll leather my iron, you leather yours, and we’ll settle it man to man.”
“It wouldn’t be a fair fight,” Frank said. “You’re hit. It wouldn’t settle anything. Maybe another day.”
“Yeah,” Harlan said hollowly. “Another day . . .”
He jerked his gun up.
Frank fired, his slug driving deep into Harlan’s chest. The deputy went over backward, his Colt booming as his finger involuntarily jerked the trigger. The bullet screamed off harmlessly into the sky. Harlan landed flat on his back, arms and legs flung out to the side. Frank walked up to him, keeping the Peacemaker trained on him just in case.
A grotesque sound came from Harlan’s throat. It took Frank a second to realize that the deputy was laughing. “Still say . . . I’m faster . . . I’ll see you . . . in Hell, Morgan . . .”
His eyes glazed over and his head fell to the side as life departed from him.
Frank holstered his gun and picked up the canvas bag. He assumed it was full of money but didn’t take the time to check. He hurried back into the Palace instead.
When he got there, he found Chris Kane hovering anxiously beside the table where Annie lay. Doc Yantis had arrived while Frank was dealing with Harlan and was examining the young woman’s wound. He glanced up at Kane and said, “Don’t work yourself up into a state, young fella. It’s not as bad as it looks. The bullet went through clean, and I think it missed her vitals. Soon as I get the bleeding stopped, we’ll take her over to my office and get her patched up.”
Violent Sunday Page 28
