Rawhide Justice

by Ralph Hayes

‘Do you know where that cabin is?’

  The older man had come over behind the boy, and he now answered for him.

  ‘He don’t. But I do.’

  O’Brien looked him over. ‘All right.’

  ‘I seen them there. There in that prospector’s cabin south of town about a mile. On the old post road. You can’t miss it. And we ain’t seen that prospector in town since they moved in out there.’

  O’Brien looked at his plate. ‘That figures. The old man is dead and buried, if I know McComb.’

  ‘Damn!’ the old fellow swore. ‘Well, the law here don’t do nothing about nothing. I hope you get out there, young fellow. We’ve seen what you can do.’ He leaned down. ‘But listen. He’s got that Iron Kid Purvis with him. That boy has won medals for shooting. Before he went bad. Together, they would be almost impossible to kill.’

  O’Brien picked up the rifle and sent a little thrill of excitement skittering through the boy.

  ‘You been real helpful,’ he said to them. ‘Nice talking to you.’

  Then he rose and left with them staring after him.

  For the next forty-eight hours O’Brien did nothing, figuring that the left arm would be at a definite disadvantage during that time. By the end of the second day the arm felt better and he could use it without substantial restriction. It would have been safer to sleep out on the trail, but he had taken a chance and taken a room at the smaller hotel in town, warning management again about keeping his presence private. It worked.

  Meanwhile McComb and Purvis had stayed put for most of the time at the cabin, waiting for O’Brien to appear and discussing ways to ambush him and take his deadly rifle out of play.

  In mid-afternoon of that second day after O’Brien’s learning where they were, McComb was becoming impatient with the waiting, and angry.

  ‘Damn him!’ he spat out to Purvis as they sat together in the cabin. ‘Why doesn’t he come?’

  ‘Maybe he gave it up and rode out,’ Purvis suggested. ‘When he found out there’s still two fast guns waiting for him out here.’

  ‘He wouldn’t do that,’ McComb told him.

  ‘Maybe he hasn’t figured out where we are yet,’ Purvis went on. ‘Who knows we’re out here?’

  McComb rose from the table. ‘I’d like to know if he’s still in town. Maybe I’ll check at Langley’s again. I think that clerk had something to hide. I might just ride in there.’

  ‘You could run into him alone.’

  ‘Not likely. If I do, I’ll kill him.’ Bitterly he added, ‘I’ll be back here in less than an hour. If he shows up you can hold him off till I get back.’

  ‘He’ll be dead before you get here,’ Purvis said easily.

  McComb left within five minutes. Within another halfhour O’Brien rode up over a rise of ground and had the cabin in view.

  He reined in and studied the cabin. He saw that there was only one horse tied up outside, and it wasn’t McComb’s mount. If O’Brien went on in, McComb could be waiting in ambush somewhere. Or he could arrive back at the most inopportune time.

  He decided to go on in.

  He dismounted fifty yards from the cabin, and hitched the appaloosa secluded in a small stand of cottonwoods. Then he walked down to the cabin with the Winchester at the ready.

  Inside, Purvis was so relaxed about the way things were going that he was making himself a hot cup of coffee at a fireplace. When they took over the cabin there had been a long spit-rod over the fire, but there were no hooks to hang a pot on, so Purvis had thrown the rod out into the yard. O’Brien walked over it as he quietly approached the open cabin door, having removed his spurs before he left the appaloosa. He arrived at the doorway without Purvis hearing him.

  He levelled the rifle at Purvis, whose back was to him.

  ‘Hold it right there.’

  Purvis whirled around, both hands going for his guns.

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ O’Brien said casually. He didn’t want to kill him. He wanted to know where McComb was, and if he was coming back. Purvis dropped his hands to his sides.

  ‘So you’re O’Brien.’

  ‘So you’re the Iron Kid.’

  ‘That’s what some folks call me.’

  ‘You look like a walking armory,’ O’Brien said. ‘Why don’t you get rid of them Wells Fargos?’

  Purvis began to understand the seriousness of his situation.

  ‘Look, we can talk about this, can’t we?’

  ‘If they ain’t on the floor in thirty seconds you’ll take their place there.’

  Purvis looked down the barrel of the rifle. Then, very reluctantly, he unbuckled his gunbelt and dropped it to the floor.

  ‘Now the shoulder gun,’ O’Brien ordered him.

  Purvis hesitated, then removed the Joslyn .44 from its holster and carefully laid it on the nearby table.

  ‘What else is there?’ O’Brien said.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Turn around.’

  Purvis swore under his breath and turned. O’Brien stepped forward and removed the Harrington pocket pistol from his waist. He shook his head. And he threw it onto the table, too.

  ‘Now step away from the table,’ O’Brien told him. ‘And let’s talk about McComb.’

  But when Purvis turned back there was desperation in his eyes. O’Brien saw it too late. With the Winchester now hanging loosely under O’Brien’s arm, Purvis suddenly hurled himself maniacally at the hunter. He was almost as tall as O’Brien, and his weight as he hit O’Brien drove him back through the doorway the door jamb tore the gun from his grasp. It clattered to the floor.

  Both men hit the ground hard outside the cabin. Pain rocketed up O’Brien’s left arm. He had been as careless as Purvis for a moment. He still had the skinning knife in a boot, but couldn’t get at it. Purvis was pummelling his face with his fists; O’Brien tried to catch them and hold them. The men rolled over and over on the ground, partially rising then falling again, as O’Brien tried to get this suddenly wild man under control. The tethered mounts were rearing and plunging. Eventually O’Brien got his feet under him. Savagely he hauled Purvis up and threw a rock-hammer punch into his face, breaking his nose in two places. O’Brien’s left arm was screaming at him.

  In the moment it took for O’Brien to get a breath into him Purvis scrambled to his feet drunkenly, blood running down his face. He ran, staggering, back to the cabin, and fell heavily against the wall there, just beside the doorway. A twisted grin came over his bloody face.

  ‘You lose, hunter!’ he said breathlessly. ‘All the guns are inside, and I’m between you and them. Too bad! You’re dead!’

  But O’Brien had picked up the long spit-bar, which was at his feet, while Purvis was running to the cabin. One end of it was unfinished and rather jagged. As Purvis was finishing his tirade, standing at the cabin door, O’Brien hurled the makeshift spear at him violently.

  The rod hurtled through the air like a striking rattlesnake and plunged into Purvis’s mid-chest. His eyes widened as it penetrated completely through him, nailing him to the cabin wall behind him.

  He looked down at the rod incredulously, then grabbed it with both hands. He cast one more look at O’Brien, then he hung there, lifeless.

  O’Brien walked tiredly over to him. He touched the rod; there was no vibration on it. O’Brien grunted.

  ‘What good did all them guns do you, Kid?’

  He leaned against the wall beside the corpse. He was hurting worse than maybe he ever had. He was so tired he felt like lying down on the soft bed back at the hotel and just forgetting McComb for a day or two. But he couldn’t do that now. It was McComb he had come after, and he didn’t know what McComb would do if he found Purvis.

  He had no choice. He had to ride into town and look for him.

  O’Brien stopped at the Langley boarding house first. There was nobody at the registration area, but when O’Brien called out the clerk whom he and McComb had dealt with before came out from a back room.

  ‘Oh. You.
’

  ‘Yes, me.’

  ‘I could have been killed because of you, mister. That McComb threatened me.’

  ‘Has he been back?’

  ‘He was here not long before you. Asking about you again.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And I kept my mouth shut. I didn’t want to be the cause of your early demise. That boy looks pretty dangerous, and my guess is he wants to kill you.’

  ‘You might say it’s mutual,’ O’Brien muttered. ‘How long ago did he leave?’

  ‘Maybe half-hour.’

  ‘Did he say where he was headed?’

  ‘No. But I saw him ride off toward the Occidental. He mumbled something as he left. About not waiting anymore.’

  O’Brien nodded to himself. ‘Well. Appreciate the help.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I’m going to kill him,’ O’Brien said simply. Then he turned and left.

  O’Brien rode on down to the Occidental saloon. As he approached, he saw a crowd of men standing outside the place, near the doorway. He frowned slightly and dismounted, wrapping the appaloosa’s reins over a long hitching post. He slid the retrieved Winchester from its saddle scabbard, levered a cartridge into its chamber and mounted the steps to the doors.

  ‘You going in with that?’ a young cowpoke accosted him.

  ‘So what?’ O’Brien growled.

  The cowboy shrugged. ‘They might not let you stay. After what happened.’

  O’Brien frowned slightly. He took a firm grip on the rifle and pushed through the swing doors.

  Just inside, he stopped frozen in place by what he saw.

  There were two bodies lying in awkward positions on the floor, not far away. One of the dead men was a lawman with a badge still stuck to a blood stained shirt.

  The other was Cyrus McComb.

  O’Brien stared hard, not moving. A rancher was kneeling over the lawman, shaking his head.

  ‘No need for a doc. They’re both dead.’

  O’Brien’s head was spinning. After this long journey to arrive at this point, reality was unacceptable. He walked to where McComb lay and stood over him.

  ‘Are you sure about this one?’ he said to the kneeling man. The fellow rose, and nodded.

  ‘Got one right through the spine. It was a wild shoot-out.’

  O’Brien shook his head, still trying to absorb this unbelievable information.

  ‘Who’s the lawman?’

  ‘Oh, he’s a federal marshal who was after McComb for that bank hold-up east of here. Seems somebody recognized McComb’s voice from when he used to live here. The marshal tried to arrest him and McComb went crazy. They both just started shooting. A bystander got hit; he’s down at the doctor.’

  ‘Good God!’ O’Brien mumbled.

  ‘He came in looking for you,’ the barkeep called out. The rancher looked at the rifle under O’Brien’s arm.

  ‘That makes sense,’ he said to himself. O’Brien glanced over at him.

  ‘As he was taking his last breaths, he mumbled, “Too bad, hunter.”’ The rancher caught O’Brien’s eye. ‘Was there something between you two?’

  O’Brien grunted. ‘A little something.’

  ‘He killed two of McComb’s no-good partners,’ the bartender called out again.

  The rancher’s gaze fixed on O’Brien, and every eye in the saloon focused on him.

  ‘You came here to kill him,’ said the rancher. ‘And the law beat you to it.’

  O’Brien met his look, but said nothing. With one last look at McComb’s lifeless body he turned and left the saloon.

  Outside the crowd was dispersing. O’Brien walked down to the appaloosa and leaned on its flank. He felt as if he had been punched in the midriff. He turned to the horse.

  ‘It’s over,’ he said quietly.

  He felt different. He wasn’t tired any more. His left arm didn’t hurt, either. It was as if McComb’s death had released some healing force in him, and he felt, at least for now, that he might never again feel as bad as he had out at the cabin.

  He slid the Winchester back into its scabbard and patted the appaloosa’s rump. He was ready to leave Billings for good.

  He took the reins off the hitch rail and mounted the horse. All around him was the bustle and noise of the town. It grated on his ears.

  ‘I hear there’s a big herd down south of here a couple days’ ride,’ he said softly to the animal. ‘A wide dark carpet on the prairie just waiting to be culled. Where the grass is shoulder high and the air is sweet as honey.’ He gazed off into the distance.

  ‘Let’s go have us a look.’

  Then he rode off into his newly created world.