The Trail Ends at Hell

by John Benteen

  In the shelter of the animal, he went on, coolly, inexorably, toward Jordan’s cover. Then the shot came.

  The black grunted, fell. Jordan’s aim was good; he was obviously an expert with a pistol, for Boyd identified the weapon from its sound. As the horse hit the ground, Boyd fell behind it, using it for shelter. At the same instant, he pumped off two rounds from the Colt at the exact spot where the gun flash had showed.

  Nothing happened. Behind the black’s carcass, Boyd replaced the spent shells. Now, he thought. Now, there was nothing left but to go into the brush after Jordan. It was like hunting a bear or a cougar. The time came when you bayed it; you had to go after it and take your chances.

  He had sixty yards of moon-silvered ground to cross before he made the shelter of the brush. It was a deadly distance, but he did not think of that. He thought of Panhandle, of Tep Chance, Cord Lightner, the others ... And of the stampeded herd. And, most of all, of Stewart, exposed to death by the rifle fire of Jordan’s men.

  He checked his gun again, crawled around the dead black’s rump, and then, on his feet, bullet-tattered batwing chaps flapping, ran as fast as he could for cover.

  As he crossed the open ground, the gun blazed once, twice. Boyd did not fire back, but he marked the spot. The bullets whizzed by him, close enough, but he was a hard target at full tilt in the tricky light. Then another shot; it burned across his back, like the sear of a branding iron. Jordan had him pinpointed. He fell forward, scrabbled on hands and knees the last twenty feet into the shelter of a clump of willows.

  Then it was the two of them in the brush. Jordan could not be more than a hundred feet away. Boyd lay panting for a moment, the hammer eared back on his Colt, straining for any tatter of sound. Presently, he heard a rustle somewhere up ahead. It could have been the rising wind — but it could have been Jordan, too.

  Boyd wormed forward on his belly, quiet as an Indian. Then his luck broke; a twig snapped beneath him with a fatal sound. Immediately, ten yards away, a gun exploded.

  Boyd screamed, a sound of terrible agony. Then it trailed off into a coughing, gagging sound. He sprawled face down among the willows, motionless.

  There was a rustling, louder now. Boyd’s body, arms and legs outflung, was immobile. Brush clashed and rattled: then Jordan was there. He towered over Kilpatrick’s body, with a gun pointed down at it. “You bastard,” he panted. “You spoilt everything. I had it all figured out until you came along. Why did you have to be the first trail boss? Why didn’t you stay with the herd?”

  Still, Kilpatrick’s body betrayed no sign of life.

  “I’ll make sure you’re finished,” Jordan said, and he lined the gun to put another shot through Kilpatrick’s head. Then Boyd rolled, firing as he did so.

  The first bullet caught Jordan under the chin, went straight up through his head. It tore off the top of his skull. The second punched through his breastbone. The third caught the collapsing body in the belly.

  Then it was over. Boyd got to his feet, trembling.

  He stared down at the corpse. “Goddamn you,” he said fiercely. “I wish it could have been slower.”

  Chapter Ten

  He found Jordan’s horse ground-reined in the brush. It didn’t like the idea of hauling a dead body, but he fought it into submission. With Jordan’s corpse across the saddle before him, he rode into a strangely silent Gunsight.

  The lights still spilled from all the windows. But the streets were deserted, everybody holed up. The horse’s hoofbeats made a lonely sound in the dust.

  Then the steel gleam of railroad tracks. He crossed them, and, ahead, he saw the hospital and the men clustered outside it: his own and the remnants of Jordan’s band. He caught a flash of color, too: Stewart’s dress.

  Near the group, he reined in. Stewart ran forward, then halted at the sight of the body across the saddle. Her hand went to her breasts. “Boyd! You won!”

  “I won,” he said, and he shoved the corpse so that it pitched limply onto the street. Feeling very tired, then, he swung down. Stewart came to him and he held her: amazing how that revived him. Clutching her, he whispered: “All right. If your daddy wants it, it’s his town now.”

  “I don’t care about the town. I only care about you.” Then she pulled away. “Boyd. Rio Fanning ...”

  He let his arms drop. “What about Rio?”

  “This about Rio,” a voice said from the door of the hospital.

  Instinctively, Boyd shoved the girl aside. Then he stared at the figure in the doorway.

  Rio carried no rifle, but his twin holsters were full. He stood there, looking at Boyd with his cold, blue eyes. The badge on his shirt caught the light from the hospital, winked a silver gleam, like a distant star.

  “You hit me,” he said.

  “I had to,” Boyd said. “I wanted Jordan. He was my meat. I got him.”

  “No,” said Rio. “He was the law’s meat. What he did was within my jurisdiction. It was up to me to get him, not you.”

  “Kid — ” Boyd said.

  “Don’t call me kid.” Rio’s voice was brittle. “I told you, I am the marshal of this town.”

  Boyd looked at him, then smiled. “And a damned good one. You’ll stay marshal. You’ll be a famous lawman someday, if you learn the technique. How to enforce the law and not worry about your reputation. You’ve got a good start, Rio. The badge. I told you, it makes all the difference in the world.”

  The boy looked back at him. “Yes. It does. That’s why you’re under arrest. Will you come peaceably?”

  “Arrest for what?”

  “Interfering with an officer of the law in the execution of his duty.” Now those cold eyes flared. “I’m taking you in.”

  Boyd stood immobile for a moment. Then he said, “Rio. You don’t want to take me in.”

  “No,” Rio said. “Really, I don’t. What I want to do is kill you.” His face twisted. “Goddamn you, Kilpatrick. If I had been the one to bring in Tully Jordan, I would have made a name for myself. But every time I have tried to build up my rep, you have got in the way. I wish you and me could have it out. But I am the law. If you’ll throw down your guns, I’ll take you in peaceable.”

  Boyd stood there. Then he shook his head.

  “Rio, Rio,” he said. “You still ain’t learned, have you? How many men you kill don’t count for anything. I have killed a mess of them tonight, and I would rather nobody knew about ’em. It ain’t the guns that matter. I ... I don’t know how to explain it to you. But, it doesn’t make any difference if there’s somebody faster than you.”

  “There ain’t anybody,” Rio said fiercely.

  “You keep saying that. But there always is.”

  “I don’t believe it. Kilpatrick, will you come along?”

  Boyd was still full of the juice of combat. But that was not why he shook his head. “No,” he said.

  “You’re resistin’ arrest?”

  “If you want to call it that. Rio, listen to me — ”

  “I’ve heard enough of your talk.” Rio’s red lips curled. “Either you lay down your guns and come under arrest or I kill you.”

  “That’s what you’ve wanted all along.”

  “I’ve seen you. You’re fast. I’m faster. I told you, I’d have to brace you.”

  “Rio, I’m tired, and I’ve done a lot of shooting tonight already. Let me alone. My herd’s stampeded, and I’ve got to see to it.”

  “Later,” Rio said. “For now — ”

  “I told you, no,” Boyd said. “The herd always comes first.”

  “Not with me. The law does.”

  “You’re not concerned about the law. You just want to brace me.”

  “Maybe,” Rio said.

  Then Boyd made up his mind. “You’re gonna have to learn the difference between enforcing the law and working out your private grudge. Kid, you’ve got guts and depth, bottom, like we say when we talk about a good horse. But there are a lot of mixed up notions in your way. You think those two
guns entitle you — ”

  “If I’m fast enough with ’em — ”

  “You ain’t,” Boyd said flatly.

  “Oh, no,” Stewart breathed. “Not another fight, now.”

  “As good a time as any,” Boyd said and he pushed her aside as she reached for him. “All right, Rio. I’m not coming. I won’t be arrested. What you want to do about it?”

  The youth’s eyes gleamed happily. “You want to move out into the street?”

  “I’ve been there before. You saw me take Knowles.”

  “I ain’t Knowles,” Rio said.

  Boyd rubbed his face. It was all clear in his mind, now.

  “No,” he said. “You ain’t. Let’s go.” And he stepped down off the sidewalk.

  Rio did likewise. Now, in the fitful glare of lights from the buildings, they faced one another, ten yards apart. Rio, the genius with guns, stood with legs spraddled, his hands loose near his twin holsters.

  “Any time,” he said.

  “Cut loose your wolf when you’re ready,” Boyd replied. This was all a dream; he was caught up in a nightmare of violence, but he still knew what he was going to do — if he lived.

  “I’m ready,” Rio said, and both hands flashed down.

  Boyd drew his single gun, in a quick, easy motion. Rio’s twin Colts were already up. Boyd fired just before Rio could trigger a shot. The right hand gun went spinning out of Rio’s hand, its cylinder smashed by a bullet. Boyd fired again, and Rio’s left hand seemed to dissolve in a red spray. He screamed.

  Then, gunless, he stood there before Boyd Kilpatrick. His eyes, mingling defiance and fear, blared. He clasped the shattered left hand to his chest. “All right,” he rasped. “Now, go ahead, git it over.”

  Boyd said, “Maybe I’ll do that.” He lined the gun on Rio, moved forward. “I’ve got three rounds left in the cylinder. It ought not to take but one. Are you ready, Rio?”

  The boy looked back, terrified and defiant.

  Boyd was within five feet of him now. He lined his cocked Colt on the spot between Rio’s eyes. “You ain’t all that big a gun fighter,” he said, mouth twisting sardonically. His finger tightened on the trigger. “You’re fast, and you brag a lot, but, it’s like I said. There never was a horse that couldn’t be rode, never a rider that couldn’t be throwed. Or a gunman that couldn’t be beat.”

  “Go ahead,” Rio croaked. “Shoot.”

  “No,” Boyd said, and, deftly, he eased down the trigger, holstered the revolver.

  “The left hand’s ruined,” he said. “The right hand and the badge ought to be enough. If you’re a man, they will be. I’m not going to kill you, Fanning. I’m going to do even something worse. I’m going to condemn you to grow up.”

  “No!” Rio yelled. “Shoot!”

  Boyd shook his head. “Uh-uh. After you’ve had time to think, you’ll make a good marshal of this town. Go off and think about it. You’ve still got your badge and your gunhand. Go off and think.” Then he turned away, coldly, and went to Stewart, and pulled her to him.

  ~*~

  It was two weeks later that the last steer of the Two Rail herd, except for Big Ugly, was loaded into the final cattle car.

  Mounted on Stewart’s pinto pony beside Boyd Kilpatrick, Ike Gault shook his head. “I wouldn’t have believed it. That a man could go down so far and come up so fast. Boyd, how can I ever pay you?”

  “You already have. Your price beats the one I’d have got at Dodge all hollow.”

  “It took some talking to make the arrangements,” Ike Gault said. He still looked ravaged from the effects of all that drinking and of drying out so quickly. “Stewart’s letters helped pave the way.”

  “You know,” Boyd said, “that I’m taking Stewart from you.”

  “No, you ain’t,” Ike Gault said.

  Boyd tightened his hands on the reins of the roan. “What do you mean?”

  Gault’s blasted face was serious. “You fooled Jordan. He never counted on a Texas trail boss leaving his herd. He thought that if he could stampede it, he could draw you off. But — ”

  “I know all that,” Boyd said impatiently. “I expected it. But those cattle were fat and lazy. They weren’t going to run far. Especially after I side-lined Big Ugly.” He looked at the lead steer, the only animal left in the shipping corral.

  “They followed him for a thousand miles,” he said. “They got to know his beller and his scent. I roped his right front leg and his left hind one together so he couldn’t run far. When the herd outdistanced him, he set off an awful wailing. That was what I counted on. When they left him behind, he bellered and bellered. They didn’t want to run far; their guts were too full of prime grass. They heard him and came back to him when their scare was over.”

  “Cow savvy,” Gault said. “You Texans have it. Jordan lacked it. He didn’t know that a good lead steer was equal to a dozen cowboys.”

  “Longhorns are funny critters,” Boyd said. “Maybe the Herefords I’ll stock my range with will be different.”

  “Not your range,” Gault said. “Ours.”

  Boyd looked at him.

  “You got top price for your beef. I made ten thousand bucks profit out of the sale myself, the first money I’ve made in I don’t know how long.”

  “Ain’t you gonna put it back in Gunsight?”

  Ike Gault shifted in the saddle, looked toward the town.

  “No,” he said. “I’ve learned this, anyhow. There’s no such thing as a decent trail town. Now that I’ve got my senses back, I’ll be able to redeem my interests in this place, maybe make some more profit on them. But it ain’t going to work. My dream is dead, Boyd. Texans are Texans and when they hit town, there’ll be hell to pay, and everybody will be waiting to take their money. But it don’t matter. The trail towns are dead, anyhow. I talked to the President of the Katie. They are gonna run rails down South, so the drives won’t have to be made.”

  “And they’ll all wither up? Dodge, Abilene, Gunsight?”

  “All,” Ike Gault said firmly. “Except as commercial centers for farmers. That don’t make no difference to me.” He turned in the saddle, looked at Boyd with muddy eyes. “Because I’m a drunk. You see? I will be a drunk until the day I die. If I lay off it, never take the first drink, I’m okay. But, as mayor and cattle buyer in a town like Gunsight, there ain’t no chance of that. It will always be here, under my nose. I’ve heard you talk about that place down on the Pecos, where you’re going to take Stewart. It’s a lonesome place, but I’d have somebody to watch me there and no town to booze it up in. This ten thousand I’ve made off your herd — I’d admire to add my capital to yours, see how fat a bunch of Herefords can get on that Pecos grama.”

  Boyd looked at him. “And what cut you want?”

  “Food, a bed, and to be near my daughter when she marries you.”

  “You don’t want to rule Gunsight?”

  “After all that’s happened here, the word will get around. Gunsight’s finished after this season. A hundred years from now, nobody will ever have heard of it.” Gault’s eyes were pleading. “Boyd, take me in with you.”

  Boyd grinned. “Ike, you know I will. With your knowledge of buying and selling, I’ll have the most profitable ranch in southwest Texas. Except that I’ll clout you if I see you taking a drink.”

  “That’s what I’m hoping you’ll do.” The locomotive had got up steam, now; the cattle train, loaded with four thousand Two Rail animals, was pulling out. “It’ll be a pleasure to work with a cowman like you. The sort of man that would realize that even if his cattle were stampeded, in two weeks he could graze all the flesh they ran off back onto them.”

  “I took that into consideration, too, along with how lazy they were and how upset Big Ugly would be when they outdistanced him. Anyhow, we didn’t lose but two or three.” Boyd watched the retreating train.

  Then he pulled the roan around.

  “Ike,” he said, “let’s go back to town.”

  “Yes,”
Gault said, and he spurred the pinto.

  They rode away from the loading pens, with what was left of the trail crew behind them. They entered the subdued District. Once there, Boyd pulled up. He swung his roan, faced his riders.

  “Have your fun,” he said, his face like flint. “But you’re on your own. If you get out of line, don’t forget, you’ll have the marshal to deal with. I don’t think any of you are faster than Rio Fanning.”

  Then he whirled the roan, turned and left them. He and Gault galloped down Railroad Street. On the way, Boyd saw a familiar figure, pulled up. “Rio!”

  Fanning, the marshal’s badge gleaming on his chest, turned. His eyes were opaque. “Kilpatrick.”

  “My boys will be having their fun. They’ve just been paid off.”

  Fanning, his left hand swathed in bandages, nodded. “It’s all right, so long as they stay within the law.”

  “I think you’re old enough to figure out whether they are or not.”

  Fanning touched the badge. “So do I.”

  Boyd sent the roan ahead. “Rio’s going to be a good lawman,” he said. “That badge was all he ever needed. Now he knows he’s somebody.”

  “Since you shot the hell out of him and tamed him down.” Then Gault reined in. “Here’s the house,” he said.

  Boyd swung down. “Yes.” He hitched the roan, as Gault latched the reins of the pinto around the rack’s rail. Then the two of them went up the steps together.

  As the sound of their boots was heavy on the porch, Stewart opened the door.

  Her eyes went from her father to Boyd. “Come in,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for you. Supper’s ready.”

  “Good,” Boyd said. “It’s our last meal in this place. Tomorrow, we go back to Texas.”

  “That suits me fine,” Stewart whispered, and then, as her father watched, she came into his arms.