The faint amusement went abruptly from Reece Brabazon’s eyes. His mouth went into a tight razor-thin line, his small body tensed. “I see,” he said quietly. “You are provoking me. You want a gunfight, is that it, Bannerman?”
“If that’s what it takes to stop you getting to Circle D.”
“That’s what it’ll take,” Brabazon said.
Yancey nodded. “So I figured. Might as well get on with it, huh?”
Brabazon regarded Yancey with a deadpan expression for a long moment, summing-up the man, taking in every detail, trying to gauge the man’s mood. There was certainly no fear there; nor an over-abundance of confidence; just a cold implacability that brought the suggestion of a faint frown to Brabazon’s brow.
“All right,” he said finally. “Here?”
“Why not?” Yancey said, seeing the passengers and some townsfolk looking in their direction. The townsfolk had recognized the signs of an impending gunfight.
“You call it,” Brabazon said easily, moving away from the telegraph shack, turning so that his eyes were on Yancey constantly.
Yancey stepped away from the shack, too, moving into the open, seeing men scatter for cover. He stood tall in the cleared space between the shack and the depot platform, legs planted wide, aching body as relaxed as possible, flexing the fingers of his right hand. They were still raw and stiff from his efforts in the mine tunnel and he hoped there would be no fumbling when he drew.
“I said call it, Bannerman!” Brabazon snapped and Yancey gave him a faint crooked smile and didn’t change his attitude, just kept flexing those fingers at regular, monotonous intervals. Brabazon was standing stiffly, coat tails brushed back, pearl grips of his Smith and Wessons exposed. His face was taut, whether from tension or the anticipation of an impending kill, Yancey couldn’t tell. But one thing he did know: Brabazon didn’t like being disobeyed and he was impatient to kill Yancey. So Yancey deliberately refused to call the shots, to yell ‘Draw!’ as Brabazon wanted him to.
Because of Brabazon’s rising excitement his impatience grew rapidly and the more impatient and tense he became, the more Yancey seemed to relax. Infuriated, Brabazon abruptly snarled, “Damn you!” and his hands flashed to his guns.
Yancey had never seen anything so fast in all his life. Brabazon was even faster than he had been on past occasions. The double-action revolvers just seemed to appear in his hands, as if they were sprouting from his palms and they spat fire and smoke with a distinctive crack. Yancey reeled, his own gun not quite clear of leather. His side blazed with pain as he spun and heard the Smith and Wessons crack again. Then he was dropping to one knee, turning his upper body and bringing his Colt up and across, bracing his forearm into his side for greater gun control. The Colt hammered and drowned out the third twin cracks of the other guns. He felt lead fan his cheek. But Reece Brabazon was down, coughing, his guns dangling from his hands, flowered silk vest stained with his blood that spread from a hole right in the center of his chest. He sat there, weaving drunkenly, a look of utter disbelief on his corpse-like face. He stared at Yancey as the big man got slowly to his feet and raised his smoking Colt, sighting carefully along the barrel. Brabazon tried to bring up his revolvers but he only managed to lift them a few inches off the ground. Then Yancey’s big gun roared and Brabazon slammed over backwards under the impact of lead, legs flying up in the air before coming down in the dust with a thud ...
~*~
Coming into Main, Cayuse Dekker reined in sharply at the sound of the gunfire. Cato sat beside him, his hands bound to his saddle horn with rawhide. On the other side of him rode Milt Macrae, one of Dekker’s top guards and the man who had claimed Cato’s Manstopper when it had been taken from the small Enforcer.
They had been riding since sun-up to get here in time to meet the train and Reece Brabazon. The special assassination gun was in Dekker’s saddlebags. He was so pleased with it he couldn’t wait to show it to Brabazon and had brought it with him to town. He aimed to have Kirby Steele throw Cato in a cell where he couldn’t escape and Dekker could then concentrate on other arrangements he needed to take care of.
But now the unexpected gunfire from down near the railroad depot had thrown his plans haywire. He called to a townsman who had come out of a store to look up towards the depot.
“Hanrahan! What the hell’s that? Kirby Steele after someone at the depot?”
The townsman shook his head. “Ain’t Kirby Steele, Mr. Dekker. He’s over at the coroner’s.”
Dekker frowned and glanced towards the coroner’s building. “Well, why in hell ain’t he up at the depot to see what’s doin’?”
“Can’t,” Hanrahan told him curtly. “He’s dead.”
“He’s—what?”
“That feller Yancey Bannerman ... Rode in last night wearin’ Red Kinsey’s clothes and he and Steele had a shoot-out. He nailed the sheriff and then he stayed over last night and went to meet this morning’s train ...”
Cato let out a wild Rebel yell. Yancey alive! By hell, he felt like he could rip the world apart, the news was so good to hear! His yell startled both Dekker and Macrae, and Cato rammed his spurs into his mount’s flanks, sending the horse jumping into Macrae’s animal and forcing it down onto its haunches. Macrae swore and fought the reins. Cato swerved his horse into Dekker’s as the rancher, reached for his rifle. The horses whinnied as they collided and Cato rammed home the spurs again. His mount reared, sent Dekker’s horse down thrashing, throwing the rancher. In fact his whole saddle rig busted loose as the horse lunged up, cannoned into Macrae’s mount and sent the guard grabbing wildly at the reins again.
Cato spurred his mount down Main and towards the depot, hunching over, yelling wildly, scattering people. Macrae staggered upright, dragging the unaccustomed weight of the Manstopper from his holster. He held it in both hands and fired, but his shot was wild. Dekker, savage, covered in dust, leapt up and grabbed at his rifle from his spilled saddle rig. Then he saw the cloth in which he had wrapped the special gun protruding from one saddlebag and a snarling grin crossed his features as he knelt and pulled it out. He didn’t bother with the rifle stock, just the revolver itself. Macrae looked at him in surprise.
“Fitting, don’t you think?” Dekker growled. “That Cato should be killed by the gun he built?” He laughed. “Let’s go get him. Bannerman too, if Brabazon hasn’t killed him.”
On foot, both men ran down towards the depot ...
Yancey, side bleeding from Brabazon’s bullet, turned back towards the town at the sound of gunfire down there. Cato’s Manstopper! He would have recognized the sound of that singular gun anywhere ...
Then he saw his friend coming up on his horse and Yancey saw that his hands were tied to the saddle horn. He looked beyond Cato’s racing mount and saw the two men on foot pursuing him. Yancey snapped a shot at them and then leapt for Cato’s horse’s head, grabbing the reins and yanking the animal into a vacant lot. Even as he greeted Cato, he started fumbling at the rawhide bonds. Cato relaxed his hands as much as possible then said, “Jack knife in my saddlebags, if they ain’t taken it!”
Yancey found it, snapped open the blade and instinctively ducked as Macrae fired with the Manstopper. He slashed at Cato’s bonds and was surprised when the small man jumped the animal away and rode back out of the vacant lot.
“Johnny! You blamed fool!” Yancey yelled.
Cato galloped back towards town, towards Macrae and Dekker. Yancey couldn’t believe his eyes and snapped a shot as Macrae brought up the Manstopper. He saw the man fumbling at the hammer and knew he was looking for the toggle that would enable him to fire the shot barrel. Dekker was lifting the gleaming, white-metal gun in both hands and sighting carefully on Cato’s racing form.
Swearing, Yancey gripped his own gun in both hands and fired. Macrae staggered and started to fall. Yancey shot him again but he knew he was too late even as he swung his smoking gun-barrel onto Dekker. The rancher’s teeth were bared as he followed the hard-riding Cato with the telescopic sight and
Yancey swore frantically. He wasn’t going to be able to draw bead before Dekker dropped hammer ...
Then there was a great ear-cracking explosion and the white metal special assassin’s gun exploded in a burst of flame and smoke and Dekker was blown completely off his feet, his face torn off by flying, jagged metal. His boots drummed convulsively and his body jerked, but by the time the startled Yancey had run over to him, he was dead. Yancey looked at the twisted mass of metal that had once been the assassin’s gun. He glanced up as Cato reined in and dismounted.
“Couldn’t do anythin’ to the gun because he kept checkin’ and re-checkin’ me all the way,” Cato explained, a foolish grin on his face. “Only other thing that was left to do was overload the cartridges in weakened cases. For good measure, I overloaded one of the jacketed bullets too, so it’d jam in the barrel ... Pity though. That was a damn fine weapon. Never be another like it.”
Yancey holstered his Colt and shook his head slowly as he clapped an arm about the shoulders of his friend.
“Well, I sure as hell hope not!” he said fervently, and they walked past the staring crowd, heading for the nearest saloon and a long, cool drink.
For the Enforcers, a new day was just beginning.
The Bannerman Series by Kirk Hamilton
The Enforcer
Ride the Lawless Land
Guns of Texas
A Gun for the Governor
… And more to Come!
BANNERMAN 4: A GUN FOR THE GOVERNOR
By Kirk Hamilton
First Published by The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd
Copyright © Cleveland Publishing Co. Pty Ltd, New South Wales, Australia
First Smashwords Edition: March 2017
Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.
This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
Series Editor: Ben Bridges
Text © Piccadilly Publishing
Published by Arrangement with The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd.
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