by J. Lee Butts
Boz and Glo nodded.
“Once we’re set, I’ll call ’em out. Maybe the Pickett boys are drunk enough by now to think I’m alone. If they get to figuring the three of them can take me without much effort, be willing to bet they’ll come out onto the porch. Once they’re all outside we’ll have ’em in a crossfire. Right where we want ’em.”
“Then what?” Boz said.
“Well, if I need you boys to move out where they can see you, I’ll call for you to step on out and show yourselves. Should it prove necessary for you to have to make the move, get well situated as quickly as possible. Given where you’re gonna be standing, gotta stay sharp. Sure as the devil don’t want you shooting across the porch with those shoulder cannons of yours and accidentally hitting one another.”
Big Jim Boston danced from foot to foot like a trained bear in a traveling circus. He nervously rubbed both hands up and down on the sides of his leather apron. “Well, none of this sounds good. What ’er you intendin’ to do here, Dodge?”
The rifle made a loud mechanical racking noise when I levered a shell into the Winchester’s receiver and left the hammer back.
The harsh, metallic click of the rifle’s lever slapping against the stock’s grip jerked Clementine Webb’s head up. An eerie unearthliness crept into the girl’s voice when she hissed, “He intends to kill them all. Don’t you, Ranger Dodge?”
I refused to look at the girl. Boz and Glo in tow, I strode past Big Jim and headed through the wide-open barn’s back door and, from there, toward the front entrance. “We’ll see,” I said.
Then, over one shoulder, I called out, “You stay here, Clem. Keep the dog with you. Don’t let him get to wandering around till the shooting’s over. Anyone bothers you, just snap your fingers and tell Bear to go get ’em.”
15
“. . . USE YER PERFORATED HIDE FOR A FLOUR SIFTER . . .”
LINED UP NEAR elbow to elbow, we drew to a halt outside Boston’s front entrance near a decrepit rail fence that surrounded the livery’s horse-poor corral. East of the empty enclosure stood the ramshackle grocery and mercantile business of Eldritch Smoot. Men’s and women’s ready-made clothing, draped over wooden hangers, nearly covered the boardwalk outside Smoot’s street-facing windows.
Beneath the fading shirts and dresses were a number of rickety tables beset with mounds of tarnished pots, pans, galvanized washtubs, and discolored bolts of cloth. The floorboards of the store’s raised veranda were littered, here and there, with piles of ancient, dust covered, army-surplus McClellan saddles. Above the shabby concern’s open door, a weather-scarred sign invited shoppers inside by boasting the availability of guns, boots and shoes, dry goods and clothing, hats and caps.
Boz, me, and Glo cast darting glances toward Smoot’s. We eyeballed each nook and cranny of Carta Blanca’s main thoroughfare, then carefully gave Mendoza’s one more final going-over.
We viewed the rough cantina at something of an angle that made it somewhat problematic for us to see the entire front façade all at one time. Off to our left, the slap-dash, westernmost side of the saloon ran away from us and toward the low hill the joint’s back wall abutted.
The place appeared to have grown up in bits and pieces, like a patch of unwanted ragweed. Half the establishment’s front façade, on the most distant side of the entrance, was constructed of crumbling, adobe bricks. The remainder of the shanty-like affair seemed to have been built from discarded scraps of wind-aged lumber taken from the remains of other long-gone houses, businesses, and saloons.
The most easily viewable exterior side of the structure was nothing more than a jumbled series of weathered, paint-blistered, wooden doors nailed one edge atop the other like shake shingles. A sloped roof covered a rickety front porch constructed of rough-cut, never-planed boards laid directly atop the parched, dusty ground. A number of shaggy, white-faced curs lazed around in the ever-shrinking rectangle of moving shade provided by the veranda’s overhang.
Scattered here and there, empty whiskey barrels of various sizes stood beneath the scruffy porch like a milling group of tipsy loafers seeking a spot of shelter from the sun. The largest of the metal-bound casks sat atop its own separate elevated platform. The container supported one end of a V-shaped, wooden gutter. The wishfully crude setup was for catching whatever sparse rainwater might someday drip from the roof’s front edge and rotting corners.
A pair of six-over-six glass-paned windows, located on either side of the front entrance, provided the only possibility for occupants to see outside. Above the chaotic porch’s pitched roof, a near-indecipherable sign informed the prospective imbiber that he was about to enter MENDOZA’S CANTINA DE CARTA BLANCA.
A wispy dust devil swept along the street all the way up from the river. The miniature cyclone paused between Boston’s livery and the saloon, then blew itself out as it twisted east and disappeared over the low hills that placed the dying west Texas village in a bowl-like earthen cavity.
I nodded, and my partners heeled it for their assigned spots at either end of Mendoza’s rude porch. “Careful, boys,” I softly hissed at their backs, “Don’t let your attention stray. Wait for my call. Try not to shoot me or each other.”
I stood in the swirling dust and waited until both my friends were properly stationed and had signaled their readiness. Then I strolled to a spot twenty or thirty feet distant from the liquor locker’s front entrance.
Mendoza’s only obvious method of egress and exit stood wide-open. It sported but one half of a weather-beaten batwing door that dangled from a single, bent, springloaded brass hinge.
After a quick glance at each of my partners, I held the Winchester’s stock against one hip, touched the trigger with my thumb, and fired off a single shot. The weapon’s thunderous report echoed off the surrounding hills. It ricocheted around a bit, then escaped west, back across the river, like a frightened animal fleeing from larger predators.
One-handed, I levered a fresh round in, then laid the gun across my left arm. Cupped my right hand to my mouth and yelled out, “This is Texas Ranger Lucius Dodge. You Pickett boys best come on out right now. We’ve got things to talk about.”
Didn’t take long to get the easily predictable results. No more than ten seconds had passed when inquisitive faces oozed up out of the interior darkness of the blasted entryway, then bobbled around behind the busted batwing like carnival balloons tethered to a string.
The decrepit café door squawked open, pushed to one side by a disembodied arm.
I recognized the first of the murderous Pickett bunch to slither out onto the porch as Priest. Tall, lank, and gaunt, the scowling killer dressed himself in the garb typical of most working cowboys—sombrero, faded cotton shirt, brightly colored neck scarf, high-waisted pants, shotgun chaps, riding boots, and massive, silver-plated Mexican spurs. His elaborate pair of horse rakers sported rowels the size of a grown man’s palm. He drunkenly crabbed-walked to one side of the porch.
Behind him came Roscoe, then Cullen. Although separated by one to three years, the men could have easily been mistaken for a set of stubble-chinned, grim-faced, rheumy-eyed triplets. As the dodgy, dangerous trio spread from one end of the veranda to the other, all the skinny dogs, hairless tails tucked between their legs, cautiously rose and slunk out of harm’s reach.
Priest edged his way to my left. He reached the farthest porch pillar and leaned a bony shoulder against it. The gunny had picked a spot not five feet from where Glo hid with his back pressed against one of the wooden doors that made up the cantina’s strangest wall.
The squint-eyed thug propped a booted foot atop one of the empty barrels. He hoisted an open, half-filled bottle to twisted, snarling lips. A goodly amount of the nose paint missed its target and ran from the corners of his mouth and down his neck.
He wiped his ragged chin across the sleeve of a bib-front shirt that appeared to have once been bright yellow. The lethal skunk cast a nervous, tight glance at his elder brother Roscoe, who had stepped of
f the watering hole’s rough porch and now stood in the street less than twenty feet from me.
Hat pulled low over mean, beady eyes, a smoldering hand-rolled ciga-reet dangling from the corner of a cruel mouth, Cullen Pickett leaned against the most distant prop on the opposite end of the porch from brother Priest. The man was totally unaware that Boz Tatum stood behind him, a buckshot-charged coach gun leveled at his murderous guts.
Roscoe, oldest and widely proclaimed by those who knew the family as the most dangerous of the slavering pack of human animals, rocked in the stifling afternoon breezes. He pushed the leading edge of his broad-brimmed, palm-leaf sombrero away from sun-tortured eyes.
“Just be goddamned. Truly is you, ain’t it, Dodge,” he said. “Heard you’d been outta circulation for a spell now. Hell, at first, we all thought you ’uz dead. Fact is, figure as how damned near everyone in this part of Texas thought you ’uz dead. Know we all hoped so leastways.”
Wind-dried lips curled off my teeth in a tight grin. “Sure do hate to disappoint a man like you, Roscoe. But you’ve gone and thrown your saddle on the wrong horse. I’m still very much alive, as you can readily see.”
The leader of the Pickett bunch let out a honking, derisive grunt, glanced at each of his lesser brothers, chuckled, then said, “Truth is I’m gladder’n hell you’re still with us, Dodge. Cause that’s gonna give me a chance to polish up my reputation by killin’ the hell out of you myself.”
Then, the stupid bastard made quite a production of rolling up his right shirtsleeve. He cut a quick glance down at the bone-gripped pistol pressed against his left hip and said, “See this here silver-plated, scroll-engraved, Colt layin’ ’cross my belly, Ranger Lucius ‘By God’ Dodge? Well, I’m gonna snatch ’er out shortly and blast the hell outta you, you irritatin’, badge-totin’ son of a bitch. Gonna use yer perforated hide for a flour sifter when I’m done.”
I snorted back at him, then said, “That a fact?”
“Damned right. Natural fact. Been hearin’ all kinda stories and tall tales ’bout you and that Winchester of yours for several years now. How fast and deadly you were with it and all. Never believed any a them silly-assed fables myself. Ain’t no man alive can crank one a them long guns fast as I can draw and fire. Jus’ been bidin’ my time, waitin’ for a chance like this to come my way.”
“Looking to put more notches on your gun, Roscoe?” I offered.
“Never pass up a chance to rub out law bringers like you, Dodge. And, bless my britches, if you don’t stroll right up here askin’ fer me to come on out here and give me the pleasure of killin’ yuh.”
I let his more-than-stupid comment pass without replying.
Several seconds of silence flew by, then he said, “You know, when me and the brothers looked out the door just now, Dodge, swear I couldn’t believe my good fortune. Thought to myself, well, son of a bitch, this must be your lucky day, Roscoe. Truth is, you can’t even begin to imagine how much I’m gonna enjoy puttin’ four or five smokin’ holes in your law-bringin’ ass.”
Squiggly shadows had got unnaturally long when I swung the Winchester around with one hand. Leveled the muzzle up on the man’s chest as I steadied the weapon by grasping the forearm. “Best throw all your pistols in the dirt right now, boys. Give yourselves up, so I can take you to Del Rio for trial and suitable hanging. Any of you go and do anything stupid and all three of you’ll end up under ground just like those poor folks you murdered out on Devils River earlier this morning.”
Priest Pickett’s foot slipped off the barrel top. The heavily booted appendage hit the plank porch with a resounding thump and the amber-colored liquor bottle slid from the man’s already questionable grip. The container bounced on the crude pile of wobbly boards beneath his feet, sprayed alcohol from the jug’s open top and peppered one leg all the way from the mule-ear pulls of the gunman’s stove-pipe boot to his waist. A wild-eyed look swept over the gunny’s acne-ravaged, pockmarked face.
“Hellfire and damnation, Roscoe. Did you hear what that son of a bitch just said?” Priest yelped.
Brother Roscoe’s arrogant demeanor changed in less than half the time it would take to blow out a kerosene lamp. His head cocked to one side, hand hovering over his cross-draw weapon, the leader of the Pickett boys glared at me from one bloodshot eye. “Shut your drunken, stupid mouth, Priest,” he snapped. Then to me, he growled, “What the hell ’er you talkin’ ’bout, Dodge? We don’t know nuthin’ ’bout no killings over on Devils River.”
I shot him another slight grin. “You’re a lying stack of walking horse dung, Roscoe. We tracked you boys all the way from the scene of the killings right to the spots where you’re standing this very instant. Now, I’m a reasonable man. Be more’n happy to entertain the possibility of taking you to Fort Worth for suitable trial and hanging, long as you give up your weapons, right by-God now, then let us slap you in shackles and chains.” Under my breath, I whispered to no one in particular, “You’ll never do it, though, will you, you son of a bitch? Now, jerk that smoke wagon and give me a reason to send you straight to Satan.”
Roscoe Pickett’s feral eyes flicked from side to side as though trying to look through me. A twitching hand still hovered over his pistol’s bone grip. He took a half step back toward the cantina’s porch. The entire trio sucked away from me and moved ever so slightly in the direction of the tavern’s entrance like a small, nervous, human wave.
“You jus’ said ‘we’ and ‘us.’ Where’s them others, Dodge?” Roscoe snarled. “Got some more men with you? Where are they?”
“It’s enough you know that my posse’s here and can come if I need them. Now pitch all your pistols, knives, hideout guns, and such out here in the street. Then step away from Arturo’s front door and get your faces down in the dirt where they belong.”
Roscoe’s lips twisted into an angry, tense sneer. “Damned if we will. Ain’t givin’ up my gun to no man. Gonna have to use that long-barreled shooter a yern, Dodge.”
“Me, neither,” Priest growled. “Keepin’ my pistol fer damned sure.”
I could easily see the belligerence of the coming fight grow in their intoxicated eyes before any of them had even made the slightest move toward their weapons. Then, from nowhere, the mute Cullen Pickett’s hand suddenly dropped to the ivory grips of the Smith & Wesson Russian model shooter snugged high and crosswise against his left hip.
A horror-stricken Roscoe tried to wave his unthinking brother off, but before either man could clear leather, the Winchester thundered, bucked, and slapped a massive blue whistler into the bony, centermost part of the elder Pickett’s chest. Sixty grains of spent black powder delivered a 395-grain chunk of pure lead into Roscoe’s breastbone, and from thence out his back and into the wall behind him. A fist-sized wad of the man’s blood and splintered bits of rib bone followed the bullet. The club-like blow knocked the stunned killer backward onto the porch amidst a cloud of swirling wood fragments.
The barrel of Cullen’s cocked weapon had almost topped his gun leather’s front lip when the second ear-splitting blast from my rifle punched a hole in the man’s forehead just above his left eye. The red-hot bullet plowed a furrow through half his addled brain, ricocheted around inside the man’s skull. The massive slug knocked his palm-leaf hat off when it exited through the top of his head, then carved a blood-spattered hole in the roof above. In spite of being dead where he stood, Cullen’s handgun went off. The blast ripped the entire face out of his holster. The wayward shot kicked up a flying cloud of dirt a few paces into the windblown street. Woman-killing scum went down like all the bones had been jerked out of his body at the same time.
The only man on the porch who’d not uttered a single word during the entire confrontation went to the ground like a load of brick dropped from the roof of a San Antone whorehouse. I knew without bothering to check that Cullen Pickett was deader than Wild Bill was when his head hit the poker table in Deadwood’s NO. 10 Saloon.
In his whiskey-sodden haste
to get outside and pick a fight with a man who appeared to be alone, Priest Pickett had completely forgotten to flip the hammer thong away from his weapon. The sound of my two shots still hung in the air as he panicked and jerked on the uncooperative shooter once, twice, three times.
On the third try, the crazy-eyed varmint’s sweaty fingers slipped from the oiled walnut grips with such force he came nigh on to slapping himself right in the face. Terrified, flusterated, and unnerved, he grabbed at the weapon again and fired a burning shot down his own right leg that chewed a massive hole in the plank porch at his feet. Then, the confused child murderer screeched like a wounded animal, turned on his heel, and went to running like he’d lost his mind. Darted past Glorious Johnson’s hiding spot around the corner.
Standing amidst a roiling cloud of spent black-powder smoke, I levered a third shell into the rifle’s receiver and called out, “He’s yours, Glo.”
With the stock of the Greener pressed to his shoulder, Glo stepped away from his hiding place like a man on a leisurely stroll to Sunday school and yelled, “You can go on and stop runnin’ now, Mr. Pickett.”
Guess Priest made two more steps before a cannon-like wad of tightly grouped buckshot blasted him between the shoulder blades. A gob of lead lifted the fleeing killer out of his boots like a rag doll and dumped him onto his face. A handful of witnesses, who had viewed the action from inside the paltry group of functioning business in Carta Blanca, would later tell anyone who’d listen that it was as if someone had run up beside ole Priest and hit him in the back with a long-handled shovel. The murderous wretch landed in the dirt deader than a brass doorknob on an outhouse. Didn’t even flop.
