That hit Cannan like a fist to the belly. “What’s a killer like Pauleen doing here?” he said.
“Him, and Dave Randall. And Shotgun Hugh Gray. And a half-a-dozen other Texas draw fighters. But Mickey is the worst of them, or the best of them, depending on your point of view. The day after he arrived he shot the town marshal.”
“And where do you come in, Dupoix?” Cannan said.
“I’m here for the same reason Mickey and them are here. For gun wages. Two hundred dollars a day until the job is done.”
“What job? And who’s paying you?”
Dupoix, elegant in a black frockcoat, boiled white shirt, and string tie, stepped to the window, then turned and said, “You’ve never forgiven me for that time in . . . what the hell was the name of the place?”
“Horse Neck,” Cannan said.
“Yeah, Horse Neck. A benighted burg at the end of a railroad spur, as I recall.”
“It was a hell-on-wheels tent town and I was sent there to keep the peace, Dupoix,” Cannan said. “You ruined it for me and nearly got me kicked out of the Rangers.”
“Cannan, those three gentlemen playing poker with a marked deck were asking for trouble. They took me for a rube.”
“That’s why you shot them, Dupoix, because your pride was hurt.”
“They were notified.”
“You left three dead men in the saloon, then lit a shuck on a stolen horse.”
“The buckskin I left at the livery was a superior animal in every way to the one I . . . borrowed. Its owner got the best of that bargain.”
Cannan held up his cigar, showing an inch of gray ash at the tip.
Dupoix picked up an ashtray from the table and laid it on the bed.
“You did take a pot at me, you know,” he said. “My right ear felt the wind of your bullet. Now why did you do that?”
“I was aiming for the hoss,” Cannan said. “My shooting was off that day.”
“Ah, yes, as I recall you’re no great shakes with a revolver.”
“I wish I’d brought my rifle along. Then I would have hung you for sure.”
“Suppose I tell you that those three Irish gents drew down on me first?”
“Wouldn’t have made any difference, Dupoix. You took me for a rube and my pride was hurt.”
The gambler smiled. “Touché, Ranger Cannan.”
Dupoix refilled Cannan’s glass then his own. He stepped to the window again and lit a cigar.
“You never answered my questions, Dupoix,” Cannan said. “Why—”
“Am I here and who’s paying my wages?” Dupoix said.
“Well?” Cannan said.
The gambler pulled back the lace curtain. “Look out there,” he said. “A fair town with a schoolhouse and a church with a bell in its tower. It’s got a city hall where the flag flies every single day of the year and the people dress in their best of a Sunday and go to worship.”
Dupoix turned his head to Cannan and spoke over his shoulder.
“Last Chance was started by tin pans,” he said. “They came here looking for gold, found none, and most of them left. But a few decided to stay and set down roots. In the early years they went through hell, but in the end they built something worthwhile.”
“You still haven’t answered my questions,” Cannan said.
“Patience, Ranger, I’m answering them. Unless you’re planning on going somewhere?”
“Funny, Dupoix. Go ahead.”
“All right. Now, where was I?”
“You were talking about folks trying to build a town in a wilderness where there shouldn’t be any town,” Cannan said.
He suddenly felt irritable, from the whiskey or the pain of his still-healing wounds, he didn’t know.
“The people of Last Chance worked together to irrigate the fertile bottomland with canals that carry water from the river. Despite droughts and floods and all the other things that plague farmers, they grew wheat, corn, oats, and now there’s talk of planting cotton.”
“They built their prosperity on farming?” Cannan said.
“Not entirely. They act as middlemen for Mexican trappers who supply them with fox, beaver, wolf, and bobcat fur. Last Chance also trades hogs, turkeys, and bees with Mexico for hard cash, and a few raise cattle on the floodplain farther along the river.” Dupoix smiled. “You could say the hardy folks out there have turned this part of the desert into a Garden of Eden.”
“Then why are you and the other gun hands here, Dupoix?” Cannan said.
“Because, Ranger Cannan, we’re going to take it all away from them,” Dupoix said.
PINNACLE BOOKS are published by
Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2014 J. A. Johnstone
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
Following the death of William W. Johnstone, the Johnstone family is working with a carefully selected writer to organize and complete Mr. Johnstone’s outlines and many unfinished manuscripts to create additional novels in all of his series like The Last Gunfighter, Mountain Man, and Eagles, among others. This novel was inspired by Mr. Johnstone’s superb storytelling.
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
PINNACLE BOOKS and the Pinnacle logo are Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off. The WWJ steer head logo is a trademark of Kensington Publishing Corp.
ISBN: 978-0-7860-3352-2
First electronic edition: July 2014
ISBN-13: 978-0-7860-3353-9
ISBN-10: 0-7860-3353-3
Bloody Sunday Page 24
