The Outlaws of Salty's Notch

by Will Keen

  Paladin and Long were not hitting their targets. Outnumbered and out-gunned, they were firing while slowly retreating through the trees lining the creek. For Long, that was difficult. The Henry was an awkward weapon to fire when standing up, much more so for a lame man walking backwards. The outlaws could not see them, but the hail of lead they were pouring into the timber was deadly. Under snapped orders from Breaker they had spit into groups of two. Beginning on the left and right flanks, each pair was firing spaced shots, working their way inwards. It was a clever move.

  But men crossing open ground under fire, however wild, are bound to suffer casualties. Paladin grunted in satisfaction as he took careful aim and one of the outlaws threw up his hands and went down in a heap. His well-placed shot had an immediate effect. Outlaws following Breaker’s orders and advancing in an orderly fashion scattered like leaves in the wind. They sought cover. Paladin sent them on their way with a volley of shots that emptied his gun.

  ‘Go for the horses, Shorty,’ he said, shouting above the crackle of gunfire, ducking as an incoming bullet sent white splinters flying. ‘I’ll keep plugging away, hold these fellers off as long as I can. When you’ve brought those horses close, give a whistle and I’ll come running.’

  He watched the little hostler grin and slip away through the trees carrying the useless rifle. When he turned back to face the clearing Paladin realized the situation had changed. The gunfire had become spasmodic. Then it ceased altogether. In the sudden deadening silence his ringing ears caught the sound of excited voices. Moving through acrid, drifting gunsmoke, he edged back to the opening in the trees, reloading from his gun-belt.

  At once he was hit by a surge of hope.

  Brad Corrigan had made a break for freedom. Taking advantage of the diversion created by Paladin and Long, he must have first backed slowly away from the Mexican kid until there was plenty of space between them. Now he was running. Clutching the incongruous derby hat in one hand, Corrigan was making for the bridge. He hurdled the body of the outlaw Paladin had downed and kept on running. Though a man slowed by age, his long, raking strides were eating up the ground.

  It was again the alert Mexican kid who had first spotted Corrigan’s move. It was the Mexican who cut short the escape. Moving as if he had all the time in the world, he coolly took aim and fired two shots. Paladin was helpless, caught in the act of reloading. Unable to do anything to save the man, he watched the bullets hit Corrigan as he neared the bridge. The marshal arched his back at the terrible impact, continued running but the strength had leaked from his bony frame. He fought to keep going, but it was momentum driving him and his long legs were buckling. Then his feet became tangled in the coarse wet grass. He pitched head first over the bank alongside the bridge, catching the timber with his shoulder and twisting as he fell. There was a splash. A gout of water glistened in the strengthening moonlight.

  His old hat, dropped from a nerveless hand, wobbled its way across the grass and came to rest against the single wooden step that led on to the bridge.

  A thin whistle from close by dragged Paladin away as the other outlaws came out from cover and gathered around Breaker and the kid. Pouching the six-gun, he threaded his way through the trees and out on to the open grass where Long was waiting with the horses.

  The little hostler was up in the saddle where he was at home, looking questioningly at Paladin. Paladin shook his head. He took the reins from Long, thrust a foot into a stirrup and quickly mounted. His mind was numb. He couldn’t look the other man in the face. Not fifteen minutes ago he had told the hostler that he, Paladin, was living proof that Bushwhack Jack Breaker could be beaten. Yet, when put to the test, he could only watch a cold-blooded killing while fumbling with brass shells and an empty gun.

  Hell, he had been no more than thirty yards from the Mex and he was incapable of firing a single shot to save the man who was his best friend.

  ‘Back to town?’ Long said.

  Paladin took a breath. He glanced back across wet grass to the trees, visualizing the clearing that lay beyond them and had been the scene of brutal killings. As if to taunt him, the stink of cordite lingered in his nostrils; his ears rang to the echoes of gunfire. Above that ringing he heard the rise and fall of distant voices, but not the crackle of timber that would signify pursuit.

  He turned in the saddle to look the other way, towards the moonlit antebellum, thought about the imponderables and the questions that remained unanswered. About the town of La Belle Commune, and where it fitted into Bushwhack Jack Breaker’s plans – and admitted to being stumped.

  He shook his head. ‘No,’ he said, thinking hard. ‘I can see it now. They’ve got rid of Corrigan, Paulson and Mackie to make it easier for them to take the town – though God knows why they’d want to do that. But it’s the town they want, and that’s where they’ll go.’

  ‘But first they’ll come after us.’

  ‘Maybe – maybe not.’

  Long swore. ‘OK. But if they were using the antebellum their horses are up there, by the old stables. They’re forced to go to the house, so I say we get away from here, and fast.’

  ‘We could do that, but there’s more to it than saving our hides. It’s a question of where we’re better off, now, and in the days to come. Breaker will take his men into town. If you go back to your stables, me to my rooms over Paulson’s place, we’re vulnerable; they’ll know exactly where we are, we’ll be separated, and they can take us at any time. If we’re still alive when tonight’s over and done with, we need distance between us and them. If they come after us now we’re outnumbered, and against those odds I want an advantage. The only way we can get that is by fighting from cover.’

  ‘A long speech, and I don’t like any of it too much,’ Long said.

  ‘That’s fair enough, and I’m not in a position to give orders. It’s your choice, Shorty – but Bowman-Laing’s old place is our best bet,’ Paladin said. ‘I’m moving into a high room with a big window, taking my rifle and a box of shells. If he wants me, Jack Breaker’s going to need an army and a battery of howitzers.’

  Without waiting for a reaction, Paladin touched his horse with his heels and took it at a fast clip across the lawns towards the big house.

  Paladin, though inclined to be stubborn when he got the bit between his teeth, was also an intelligent man who liked to think he would listen when a man was talking common sense.

  Long caught up with him as he was about to dismount.

  ‘Listen,’ the hostler said breathlessly, ‘I’d go in with you, but what about our horses? We leave them anywhere close and they’re seen, they give the game away.’

  Even as he spoke, the murmur of voices Paladin had heard drew closer. The outlaws had left the clearing, made their way through the fringe of flanking trees and were heading back to the mansion.

  ‘Damn it, you’re right,’ Paladin said, already moving his horse towards the side of the big house. ‘They’re too close already. The best we can do is get behind the stables. If you can keep the horses still and quiet—’

  ‘Can a mother soothe her bawling infant?’

  The irrepressible Long was again grinning as he spurred alongside Paladin. Together they rode up the slope and across the overgrown stable yard. There the outlaws’ horses proved the point Long had made: a couple of them whinnied and pawed the ground as the two men approached, the sound carrying on the still night air.

  Then they were behind the old stables, shrouded in darkness, out of the saddle and leading their horses across dead leaves and pine needles, the rank smell of rotting vegetation in their nostrils. Paladin eased his horse in close to the stables’ back wall, figuring that tucked in close like that they were less likely to be seen if an outlaw took a hasty glance around the corner.

  Then, leaving Long to keep the animals close to the wall and silent, he walked a little way up the slope into the woods, recklessly sweeping aside branches, snapping deadwood underfoot as he moved in deeper. He positioned himself so that,
past the end of the stables and across the yard, he could see the side of the house and a section of the moonlit front lawns.

  Then he waited.

  Voices again. Someone laughed. Another man said what sounded like ‘shut up’. Then one of the horses tethered in front of the stables let out a soft whicker, and Paladin knew it had heard and scented the outlaws.

  A soft whistle drew his attention. He looked across at Long. The hostler had his hand cupped on his horse’s muzzle. With his other he pointed at his own eyes, up at the sky, then at Paladin. It was followed by an urgent pushing motion with the palm of his hand. He was telling Paladin moonlight was filtering through the trees, and he could be seen; to get back.

  He was just in time. As Paladin backed deeper into the trees the Mexican kid came around the corner of the house. His boots swished through the weeds. He crossed the yard to the horses. That put him out of sight.

  Paladin listened to the clatter of boots on steps. The antebellum’s front door banged open. More thumping and banging as men moved quickly up stairs, in and out of rooms. Within minutes they were down the stairs and out again and clattering down the columned portico’s steps. Two of them came around the house into the yard, carrying blanket rolls, chasing moon-cast shadows. The big man, behind him Bushwhack Jack Breaker, Brad Corrigan’s marshal’s badge a tarnished gleam on his vest.

  I could kill him now, Paladin thought. One shot. Make up for failing old Brad. The Mex’ kid did the shooting, but plugging Breaker, the honcho, would likely put an end to this whole damned mess. . . .

  He eased his six-gun from its holster and lifted it high, rested the barrel on his left forearm and took a bead on Breaker. And again he was too slow, because one half of his brain was telling him to pull the trigger while the other was warning him that this was not what had been arranged with Long; that killing Breaker wouldn’t tell him what five outlaws were doing moving in, executing three fine citizens, taking over the town of La Belle Commune.

  Then Breaker and the big man, too, were out of sight. That put three of the outlaws with the horses – but what were the other two doing?

  There was a rattle of hoofs. Wasting no time, Breaker and the big man came into view. They spurred across the yard. The sound of hoofs was muffled as the two men crossed the lawns and headed towards the bridge across the creek and so to the trail into town.

  Something was wrong – but what? Paladin shifted uneasily. He pouched his six-gun. A movement attracted his attention. Long was signalling. When Paladin looked at him, this time the hostler pointed to his own nostrils, then spread both hands.

  And suddenly Paladin was aware of a muted crackling, the acrid smell of smoke.

  The Mexican appeared around the edge of the stables. He was in the saddle, leading two horses. As he crossed the yard the last two men came running from the house. There was a brief exchange of words. It included, Paladin guessed, a couple of coarse comments, for the Mexican tilted his head and laughed, then flicked the reins and released their horses. The two men mounted quickly and lit out in pursuit of Breaker and the big outlaw.

  The Mexican hung back. His horse turned, backed, danced a little with long tail flicking, and the kid grinned and held the reins high, his white teeth flashing. He looked straight at where Paladin was hiding, raised a forefinger, pointed it like a pistol.

  ‘If it is your intention to hide in the woods, my friend, you should maybe blacken your big shiny six-gun,’ he called. ‘One idea is to hold it over a fire for the coating of soot, you understand?’ He flicked a thumb over his shoulder. ‘Me and Breaker, we think that, so we give you some help. You want a fire, you have a big one any minute now. It is a pity about the house, but we have finished with it anyway, and the old woman, she will soon be dead. Possibly.’

  He shrugged his shoulders, spread his hands eloquently, and with another grin he had spun his horse and was away across the lawns.

  ‘Why didn’t you plug him?’ Long said bitterly, coming away from the stable wall with the horses. ‘He was on his own and talking fit to bust. If you’d winged him we could’ve got the story out of him, found out what these fellers are up to.’

  ‘Too late for regrets,’ Paladin said. ‘But what about the house?’

  Even as he spoke, as smoke whipped across his face and brought tears to his eyes, he knew it was a question with only one answer.

  Emma Bowman-Laing’s antebellum mansion was doomed. The encircling trees shielded it from strong seasonal winds, but created a sun trap. Over the years the timber construction had dried out in the blistering heat of long summers. The fire started by the outlaws was ripping through it with frightening speed.

  ‘Done for,’ Long said, answering the question as they mounted and moved away from the yard to watch in disbelief from the moonlit cool of the lawns. ‘To put that out’d take a chain of men with buckets bringing water from the creek – and they’d be wasting their time.’

  ‘Which is what we’re doing watching it die,’ Paladin said. ‘Three men have been shot. Mac and Rik are in the woods. Brad went in the creek, so Christ knows where he is now. It’s incumbent upon us to go find him, and give all three a decent burial.’

  ‘More than that,’ Long said, turning away from the searing heat that was hitting them all the way across the lawn as brilliant tongues of flame erupted from windows and the broken roof and began licking at the trees. ‘I’ve got a hunch Brad could be alive. Lying somewhere downstream, soaking wet, bleeding to death—’

  ‘Rider coming,’ Paladin warned, and he turned his horse to face the Bowman-Laing bridge.

  Chapter Six

  Grey smoke from the burning building was being flattened by an unusual down draught and driven in a south-westerly direction across the lawns. Inexplicably, that down draught was beating back the flames. It seemed to Paladin that though much of the building would be destroyed, a shell would remain. There would be stairs leading to blackened floors, rafters where once there had been a roof. . . .

  Then those thoughts were pushed out of Paladin’s head by the more pressing problem of the approaching rider. Choking, eyes streaming, he and Long rode back towards the trees on the eastern side of the land. There they turned. Long cocked the Henry rifle, rested it across his thighs.

  What had alerted Paladin had been a horse’s soft snorting and the jingle of harness. Now, burning eyes squinting, he saw it. Very softly, he said, ‘Jesus Christ, Shorty.’

  Alongside him, Long said, ‘And Amen to that,’ and he let the hammer down on the cartridge and slipped the rifle into its boot.

  Emma Bowman-Laing on her chestnut mare had emerged from the drifting smoke like a mythical knight riding out of Arthurian mists. A man was seated behind her. His arms were around her waist and he was clinging on with fingers like claws. His long legs were dangling, and from his boots fell glittering drops of water. The flickering yellow flames turned them into droplets of shimmering liquid gold, but from his arms other drops were falling, and they were bright red.

  With another soft curse, Paladin rode to meet the widow and her burden as she drew rein. He swung his horse around and rode in until he was stirrup to stirrup with the chestnut; was vaguely aware of Long doing the same on the other side.

  ‘Brad?’ Paladin put a hand on the marshal’s arm, shook it gently. The shirt was cold, and soaking wet. Blood was seeping down through the wet clothing from a wound high on his shoulder, dripping from his bent elbow.

  ‘He’s out,’ Bowman-Laing said. ‘I imagine his fingers have locked and that’s all that’s stopping him from falling.’

  ‘Where did you find him?’

  ‘I saw him go in the creek with a splash. I’d already moved a little way upstream from the bridge because when bullets are flying there’s always the chance of a wild one, or a ricochet. Brad had grabbed hold of a trailing branch and clung on. He looked up, saw me peering down at him. The bullet had hit him hard, but the shock of the ice cold water kept him from passing out. He raised a hand, waggled in the w
ay that says wait, wait. . . So I did, and, when it was safe to do so, I crossed over the bridge and he was lying in the grass. He’d managed to crawl out of the creek.’

  ‘They carried another man into the trees. He was the second, so I’d say the two of them are there, Mackie and Paulson.’

  She nodded, her mouth a thin line. ‘Like Brad, they were shot in the back.’

  While talking, Paladin was running his hands over Brad Corrigan’s body, searching for more wounds. There was just the one. Just one of Rodriguez’s bullets had caught him in the shoulder as he ran for the creek. So far nothing had been done to stem the bleeding. Paladin reached up, slipped loose his bandanna, began folding it into a thick pad.

  ‘Mackie and Rik Paulson both dead,’ he said softly. He was pushing the wadded bandanna inside Brad’s wet shirt, over the ugly bullet wound. He sensed Bowman-Laing watching him and said, ‘You did well getting Brad here, Emma. How’d you manage his dead weight?’

  ‘He was still conscious – just. I helped him up on to the bridge, made him stand there, then rode my horse into the water so he could come down on to the horse rather than climb up – which he couldn’t have managed.’

  ‘That was quick thinking,’ Long said, ‘but now he needs a doctor – and fast. Forbes—’

  ‘Yes, and presently you can go and drag that cantankerous old sawbones out of bed,’ Bowman-Laing said, ‘but first we get Brad settled; out of those clothes, dry, somewhere warm, and I need both of you for that.’

  ‘You’ve got us,’ Paladin said, ‘but once you saw your old house going up in flames you’d have been better off heading back to town. Now there’s all that way to go back, and with Brad bleeding like a stuck pig, well. . . .’

  They were talking above the hiss and crackle of the fire that was now noticeably dying. Bowman-Laing seemed indifferent to what was happening to her old home. She twisted her neck, tried to look over her shoulder at Brad. He was flat against her back, his cheek turned against her shoulder like a man comfortably asleep, but his closed eyes seemed deeply sunken in a face like old wet snow and his nostrils were flaring at every ragged intake of breath.