The Outlaws of Salty's Notch

by Will Keen

  After she called to him she drew rein close to one of the trees, her gloved hand absently stroking the chestnut mare’s wet neck. She knew Rodriguez had heard her, though he rode on for several hundred yards. As she waited patiently for his return, she sat relaxed in the saddle and let her thoughts wander.

  She had always stayed well behind Paladin and Breaker on the ride from Louisiana. When she rode into a Bay City lit only by lamplight she had heard the fierce bursts of gunfire. Intuition had told her that Breaker must be involved. Quickly pin-pointing the sounds she had ridden her mare around the back of the hotel. Another horse was tethered there. When she dismounted and went into the building through the back door, the first thing that drew her gaze in the dim light was the body of a man lying on the floor by the counter. Her heart began thumping. Her mouth went dry.

  Then Rodriguez came bounding down the stairs. He had a smoking six-gun in one hand. In the other he was carrying a heavy leather bag. In his excitement he was almost dancing across the passage, stepping lightly on the balls of his feet. He saw Bowman-Laing, recognized her at once and lifted his six-gun. She saw the killing light glinting in his black eyes, his white teeth bared in a ferocious grin, and quickly thrust out a hand as if to ward off the bullet.

  ‘Goodness me, don’t do that, Rodriguez,’ she’d said, ‘you need me with you.’ And, as quickly as an old woman could, she turned and ran for the back door.

  She had spoken in haste, the words tumbling out in a desperate attempt to save her life. It was likely that when he considered himself reasonably safe from immediate pursuit he would realize his mistake in allowing her to ride with him. When that moment came, she was finished. On the frantic flight from town she had been riding with the ease of one who had learned to ride as a child, all the while racking her brain for some way of convincing the outlaw that he did need her and should let the old lady live.

  She had been able to come up with just the one reason, and it was a possibility only, founded on her belief in man’s goodness: she was an old lady far from home, and needed his help. But this man was an outlaw, a wicked man. If that failed – as she knew damn well it would – she needed another reason that would appeal to his darker side. Her only hope was that if she could keep him talking something would emerge.

  And now Rodriguez had slowed his horse, turned, and was coming back to her. She watched his approach, put a good deal of feigned weariness into her smile.

  ‘I’m exhausted. They won’t come after you tonight. They might not come after you at all.’

  ‘It was a deputy marshal I shot,’ Guillermo Rodriguez said. He had dismounted, and was taking the opportunity to take the banknotes from the leather bag and stuff them into his saddle-bags. ‘They will hunt me down relentlessly and hang me from the nearest tree. You have blankets. I will leave you here.’ He grinned. ‘It would not be wise to stay with you and perhaps fall asleep. I do not fully understand why you are with me in the first place, but think perhaps you intend to kill me.’

  Oh yes, Bowman-Laing thought, oh yes, Señor Rodriguez, that’s exactly what I intend to do. Perhaps not here, and not by my own hand, but there is another who can do it much better than I.

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘Really? You think I’m after all that money?’

  He shrugged, sent the empty leather case crashing into the scrub and buckled the saddle-bags. ‘That would naturally be yours once I am dead. But I think you mostly wish to avenge the deaths of those men in La Belle Commune.’

  ‘If you think that, why did you agree to let me ride with you?’

  ‘In the hotel there was much danger and I was careful of my life so in too much of a hurry to protest.’

  ‘I want you to take me home,’ Bowman-Laing said. ‘You owe me that much.’

  ‘I owe you nothing.’

  ‘Wasn’t it you put a flaming torch to my house and burned it to the ground?’

  ‘Is unimportant. The house was old, of no use.’

  ‘It was where I was born.’ She looked at him, thought of his background, how village Mexicans would have strong family ties, and presented him with her first attempt to convince him.

  ‘You can pretend I’m your mother,’ she said.

  ‘My mother was many years ago shot dead.’

  ‘That’s awful. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Again, is unimportant.’ His smile was cruel. ‘The man who was responsible is now also dead. In Bay City there was at last some recompense.’

  Bowman-Laing was frowning. ‘Bay City? Then you must mean Jack Breaker.’

  ‘When it happened I was very young, but I have always a good memory.’ He nodded. ‘Breaker, yes, he was there and he is dead so now it is finished.’

  ‘Then take me home, Guillermo,’ she said softly, and using her knuckles to press her lips against her teeth and cause pain she looked at him with eyes in which bright tears welled. But behind that façade, her thoughts were racing.

  Guillermo Rodriguez had presented her with the key.

  ‘Es ridiculoso,’ he said, ‘and you are a most stupid woman. I leave you now, before it is too late and I am caught.’

  ‘You were wrong about Breaker.’

  He frowned. ‘I remember well. Breaker, and the other men from Texas, their horses still wet from crossing the Bravo.’

  ‘Oh, Jack Breaker was there all right, and I’m sure he was using his six-gun. But the bullet that killed your mother was not fired by Breaker.’

  ‘Who then? You know?’

  ‘In La Belle Commune, quite recently, there was a very sick man,’ Bowman-Laing said. ‘The town’s doctor can’t be trusted, so I took this sick man back to my lodge in the woods close to my old house where I nursed him back to life.’ She smiled sadly. ‘He was delirious. In his rambling he talked about you, how he had recognized you when you rode through the town. He is the man who shot your mother, Rodriguez, and he’s well known in La Belle Commune. His name is Brad Corrigan.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  Paladin and Grey set off after Guillermo Rodriguez as the first rays of the sun were brightening the eastern horizon and touching the high false fronts of Bay City’s buildings. Better that way, Grey had insisted. A couple of hours start was nothing, so why follow an outlaw in the dark when he could leave the trail and kill them both from ambush.

  So in the heavy silence that settled over the town after the shooting they had snatched what rest they could, and Paladin had revised his thinking. As they prepared to leave he suggested to Grey that rather than killing Rodriguez – which, if Emma had played on the image of an old woman then taken him by surprise, could have been done without leaving the hotel – she intended slowing him down by whatever means she could cook up.

  Grey was unimpressed and deliberately refused to speculate. The whole idea of an old woman riding all the way from Louisiana then hanging on to an outlaw’s coat tails was too difficult to swallow.

  They collected their horses from Curly Johnson’s barn, thrust Winchester repeating rifles into leather saddle boots, then moved off up the street. There was only one way Rodriguez could have left town from his starting point, Grey said. He led Paladin down the alleyway alongside the side of the hotel, checked the ground and saw the unmistakable signs of the outlaw’s hurried departure, then struck out across the barren outskirts of Bay City before turning to head north.

  Once clear of the town they rode hard and fast for thirty minutes. There was a trail but it was now little used, the deep ruts overgrown with grass and weeds. In a swift aside, not taking his eyes off the way ahead, Grey told Paladin the trail’s condition helped in tracking Rodriguez. Paladin agreed. Even he could see the fresh imprints of horses’ hoofs, the torn or flattened grass, the occasional droppings.

  When they had covered ten miles, Grey abruptly sat straight in the saddle and slowed the pace to a walk. Paladin pulled alongside. Grey nodded to the right. His face was grim, his voice harsh.

  ‘You see what I see?’

  The landscape was little
changed: gently undulating, covered in rough scrub for as far as the eye could see. It was a ragged stand of grey-green, withered cottonwoods that Grey was indicating. The rising sun was casting long shadows, but no shadow could hide the shocking sight that met their eyes.

  ‘That’s Emma Bowman-Laing,’ Paladin said hoarsely, and he spurred his horse off the trail.

  Rodriguez had tied the old lady to the gnarled trunk of one of the cottonwood trees and left her to die.

  Paladin got to her first. He kicked his feet free of the stirrups and hit the ground running. He rushed to the tree, rested one hand high on the trunk’s rough bark as he leaned close. Bowman-Laing’s thin body was sagging, supported painfully by the binding ropes. Rodriguez had made damn sure she couldn’t move. A rope bound her ankles to the tree, another encircled her slender waist, a third was high up under her armpits. Her head had fallen forward so that her chin was on her chest. Her thick grey hair was hiding her face.

  ‘Emma?’ Paladin said softly, and he reached out with great tenderness and lifted her chin.

  ‘She’s alive,’ Grey said.

  Paladin cupped her chin and held the weight of her head in the palm of his hand. Deeply sunken blue eyes looked at him through lids narrowed to slits. Unbelievably, thin lips puckered by lines of pain and old age twitched in an attempt at a smile.

  ‘Knew you’d come, Paladin,’ she mumbled – and then she fainted.

  The fire sent a thin plume of white smoke into brilliant blue skies. Severed ropes lay like dead snakes around the base of the cottonwood tree. Close enough to the fire to warm her old, abused bones, Emma Bowman-Laing lay with her head on Jim Grey’s saddle. One of his blankets covered her from her shoulders to her toes.

  Suspended from a curved branch poked into the ground, a coffee pot bubbled over the flames, tended to by Jim Grey. Paladin had just asked Bowman-Laing what had happened. She answered with a despairing shake of the head followed by a rush of words.

  ‘I told that Mexican that Brad was one of a bunch of wild Texans led by Jack Breaker,’ she said, ‘and that it was Brad who killed his mother. It was a crazy, wicked lie, but I knew it would be enough to send him hot-foot back to La Belle Commune. I was banking on him taking me with him; I’d already asked him to take me home. Of course, I was going by the response I would expect from a good man, but this man is wicked. He spoke not another word. Tied me to the tree. Took my horse, headed east for the border at a fair old lick.’

  Jim Grey poured coffee into tin cups. Bowman-Laing lifted herself on to one elbow. Paladin handed her a drink, steadying her hand with his as she lifted the cup shakily to her lips.

  ‘Putting two and two together,’ Paladin said, ‘I suppose Rodriguez killed Breaker for the same reason that’s taken him after Brad.’

  ‘Of course. He thought it was Breaker who had shot his mother. And now, thanks to my stupidity, he’s going to kill poor old Brad, unless you can get to him first – and that’s going to be tough because he’s got two horses and a couple of hours’ start on you.’

  ‘Leave now,’ Jim Grey said, and he winked at Paladin. ‘As soon as this brave young lady’s strong enough, I’ll throw her across my saddle and take her back to Bay City.’

  ‘Foolhardy, not brave,’ Bowman-Laing said bitterly. ‘And I deserve being thrown somewhere. What in the world was I thinking of, horning in on men’s work?’

  Paladin stroked her hand before rising to his feet and walking away. ‘Your heart was in the right place,’ he said, pausing for a moment, ‘and, strange though it may seem, it’s worked out for the best. For one thing, you’ve saved me from a manhunt clear across Texas to the Rio Grande. And though Brad’s unlikely to be expecting trouble back there in La Belle Commune, he’s a tough old bird with sharp eyes and doesn’t miss much.’

  ‘Tough, but getting old, Paladin,’ she called to his back.

  ‘Yeah, well, I don’t know about you,’ Paladin said as he reached his horse and swung into the saddle, ‘but I can’t imagine a better lookout post for an old man than that rocking chair of his creaking out there in the afternoon sun.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  It had taken Paladin and Breaker a week to reach Bay City after crossing the Sabine River. By riding night and day, cat-napping when he could, Paladin retraced his steps to the banks of the big river in three days. It was a cool dawn, the wide waters glinting in the early sunlight. He and Breaker had crossed further upstream where they had found a stony ford. Here he would be forced to swim his horse across. The water was calm, with little current, but one look at the exhausted animal flecked with white foam told Paladin swimming wasn’t possible for either of them without a few hours’ sleep.

  He cursed softly, then shook his head at his foolish impatience and took the horse down the grassy bank to a patch of wet gravel. He allowed it to lap up just enough of the cold water to slake its thirst, then pulled it away. He looked around. There was a stand of trees fifty yards downstream. They would find shade there as the sun climbed higher in the skies and the temperature soared. By afternoon they’d both be rested. La Belle Commune was another two days’ ride, but Paladin knew he must be closing in on Rodriguez. The Mexican might have a strong spare mount, but even using two horses a man can ride only so fast.

  He was halfway to the trees when the bullet ripped across his left shoulder, sending a lightning bolt of agony clear to his fingertips. The blow was powerful enough to throw him sideways against the startled horse. In the same instant he heard the flat crack of the rifle from across the water. His numbed left hand slipped from the reins. Knowing instinctively where Rodriguez would plant his next shot he punched the horse’s rump with a clenched fist, sucked in a breath and screamed a wild rebel yell. The horse whinnied shrilly in protest, settled back on its haunches then bolted.

  Paladin went down. He hit the dry ground hard with his wounded shoulder. Pain was liquid fire coursing through muscle and bone. For an instant he blacked out.

  Consciousness returned to the crack of the distant rifle and the sound of a bullet thudding into the earth close to his head. His shirt was already soaked with blood, his head singing. Clenching his teeth, knowing what he must do because there was no other way to save himself, he waited tensely for the next bullet. When it buried itself in the ground within inches of his hip Paladin let go a scream of agony and flung up an arm. Then he rolled on to his back and lay still.

  In the sudden silence he could hear his pulse hammering, the gentle lapping of the river on the gravel beneath the bank; the hiss of his breath through clenched teeth as he tried to blank out the pain and steel himself for death.

  Then, from across the water, the sound of hoofs. Two horses, unhurried, but moving steadily away into the distance.

  Paladin turned over, pressed his face against the cool grass, closed his eyes and slowed his breathing. When he opened his eyes again the sun was high in the sky, its hot rays burning his back. He groaned and moved, but much too jerkily. He reached out to push himself up on to his knees. The movement tore his shirt from the drying blood on his shoulder with a dry ripping sound.

  The pain was excruciating.

  Once again Paladin blacked out.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Two days later Brad Corrigan was lazily soaking up the late afternoon sun. His eyes were closed. He and Shorty Long were taking it easy, nursing healing wounds and muscles stiff from digging graves for the bodies of dead outlaws. The rocking-chair in front of La Belle Commune’s jail creaked soporifically to the easy pushing of Corrigan’s right foot. He was dozing, half listening to the rhythmic creaking, the distant sounds of the sea lapping the shore beyond Salty’s Notch, an off-key honky-tonk piano.

  The marshal smiled without opening his eyes. Shorty Long had taken over the running of Paulson’s saloon, and he was tinkling the yellowing ivories. But he was still the town’s hostler. There was a jangling cacophony. The music stopped, a lid banged down and minutes later Corrigan heard the uneven stamp of boots on the galler
y across the street as Long left the saloon.

  Off to his stables, Corrigan thought, and he yawned and opened his eyes. As he did so he became aware of the muffled thud of a horse’s hoofs in the dust. At the same time, Shorty Long, halfway across the street, pulled up. He was squinting into the western sun.

  ‘Brad,’ he called warningly.

  ‘I hear,’ Corrigan said, cocking his head. ‘Trotting, but not too easy. Who is it?’

  Long walked down the middle of the street. Corrigan was up on his feet. He tipped his Derby hat over his eyes, looked into the setting sun.

  ‘Dammit,’ he said softly as Long moved to intercept the horse, ‘that’s Bowman-Laing’s chestnut mare.’

  The mare saw Long in front of her, lifted her head and began to turn away. But she was flecked with foam, her eyes showing the whites as she kept her head lifted and turned to one side so that the trailing reins were clear of her forelegs. Long stepped close, grabbed the reins close to the bit. Uttering soothing words, he leaned his weight back to pull her to a halt and ran his hand up and down her wet neck. The horse stopped. Her legs were trembling, nostrils flared as she fought for breath.

  Long was looking at the saddle. Then he bent, lightly touched the open, bloody gashes on her body, and he uttered a soft curse.

  ‘Some sonofabitch,’ he said, ‘has been riding this mare hard, raking her with spurs. She’s bleeding, plumb wore out, been ridden to a standstill.’

  He turned angrily, began to lead the horse away.

  ‘Why’d you look at the saddle?’

  ‘If the rider was shot, there might have been blood,’ Long said. ‘I didn’t see any.’