Chet Lindeen walked to Blair with a frown. “Judas, you would pick the only dead-end in town,” he growled.
“Had no damn’ choice. Some hombre with a rifle blew my bronc out from under me. Never mind that now. Someone else might come along. Can you get me out, Chet?”
“Yeah. I’ll fix it. Hang back here. Some folk saw me run in after you. I'll have to tell ’em you dodged into a building or somethin’.”
“Okay. Don’t be long.”
“Just fade back into the shadows there—See? That corner.”
Blair automatically turned his head and Lindeen brought up his gun and shot him three times.
The outlaw’s body crashed against the wall of the storage shed and he made a gurgling sound as he slid down in a limp heap. Lindeen kicked the gun away from his nerveless fingers and shot him again.
He whirled at the sound of running feet and saw Lang Huckabee and a couple of townsmen hurrying up. They stared at the dark shape of Blair.
“Thought you had him covered, Sheriff,” Huckabee panted.
Lindeen looked at him coldly.
“I did. Got the drop on him. Then, just as I was bringing him out he tried for his gun. Had to drop him.”
“You sure did a job on him,” said Huckabee.
Lindeen’s hard eyes narrowed.
“I didn’t aim to give him more than the one chance.”
“Looks to me like you didn’t even give him that.”
The sheriff stiffened.
“You tryin’ to tell me somethin’, Huckabee?”
The Winchester man sighed and shook his head. “Guess not. Just seems like a waste of lead, is all, four slugs in one man.”
“You can’t talk about wastin’ lead! What in hell kinda gun’s that you were usin’?” demanded Lindeen.
“Special refinement,” Huckabee said curtly, showing the rifle with the over-sized lever. “But while we’re wasting time jawing, the outlaws are getting clean away—and they have something of mine that I absolutely must have back.” Lindeen felt himself stiffen but didn’t think the others had noticed in the dark.
“Yeah? And what’s that?”
“A special presentation rifle bound for the Governor.”
“How d’you know they’ve got it?”
“Because I went to the bank to check. The vault’s cleaned out. They’ve taken everything.”
Lindeen frowned: “Everything? You mean—money, books ... ?”
“Yes, damn it,” Huckabee said impatiently. “Everything. Including my rifle.”
“’Cept the books,” said one of the townsmen. “This feller that Huckabee blew out of the saddle was carryin’ them and when his mount crashed, they scattered all over Main.”
Lindeen felt the blood drain from his face. Once again he was glad of the darkness that kept the others from seeing.
The main reason for the robbery had been to get the bank’s books away: to destroy them and their incriminating evidence.
His mouth was grim and his hands shook as he slowly reloaded his six-gun.
“We better get a posse together, Chet,” one of the townsmen said.
“Yeah,” Lindeen agreed heavily. “We better.”
Lang Huckabee frowned: he wondered why the sheriff sounded so unenthusiastic.
Three – The Governor’s Men
Yancey Bannerman crouched a little lower and kept his fists cocked, watching as the three men moved closer.
He had nowhere to go, they had worked him around the bar until he had had to back into a corner where there were no exit doors or windows. The only way out was past the three men. And they didn’t aim to let him through. Their faces were bruised and streaked with blood and there was skin missing in some places. Their knuckles were split but they were willing to split them again, right to the bone, as long as they could turn Yancey’s face into pulp and stomp on his ribs until they cracked.
They were a mean trio and once more Yancey cursed his sidekick, Johnny Cato, for stirring up the trouble in the first place. As always with Cato, it had started over a girl. He had had an encounter earlier in the evening that had left him in a sour mood. Yancey, good-natured and easy-going, hadn’t wanted to see his pard brooding into his drinks alone and had accompanied him around Austin’s saloons trying to brighten him up.
He had succeeded too well. They had put away a lot of booze and both had been in high spirits near the end of the evening in one particularly noisy saloon.
Cato had spotted a Chinese girl in a red silk gown. He liked Oriental women but hadn’t even bothered to look at the company she was in before he had moved to her table. Yancey had been too late to stop him and by that time, Cato had been holding the girl’s arm, while he argued with her companion, a big hombre sporting a black leather eye-patch.
There had been fists thrown and when Cato looked like spreading the big man all over the room, his companions had stepped out of the crowd—five of them—big, range-tough men who figured to have some fun with the Enforcer. Yancey had sighed and bought into it.
But he was sorry he had: three apiece at that time of night was just a little more than he could handle, he reckoned, and threw a swift glance across to see how Cato was doing. He saw Cato scoop up a chair, fling it through a window and follow it in a headlong dive.
Great, thought Yancey. That left him with three to handle on his own.
If the only way out was past them, then that was the way he had to go. And the sooner the better. He let out a sudden, almighty yell then charged.
His massive, six-feet-two-inch body scattered them like skittles, but one man managed to grab Yancey’s shirt as he charged through. The man happened to be looking up as Yancey’s meaty hand clubbed down smashing his nose to a bloody pulp. He let go with a scream, but the other two men were closing in.
Yancey ducked a swing, but took a boot in the ribs and went crashing back against the corner again. The men came in, fists hammering, stepping all over their downed pard but ignoring his cries. Yancey ducked and weaved and grunted as the big fists drove into him and rocked his senses. He blocked one blow with an upraised forearm and grabbed the man’s hand, twisting savagely and getting his arm up the other’s back. The man lifted to his toes with a wild yell and Yancey gave one more violent wrench as he literally threw the man into his companion.
The arm snapped and the man fell in a dead faint as his pard dodged back and crouched low, stalking Yancey. The Enforcer stepped forward, feinted with his right and snapped his boot up into the man’s startled face. He dropped. Out cold. Yancey stepped on the back of his head as he got out of the corner shaking his aching hands and spitting a little blood.
The men standing around the walls said nothing as he stumbled to the bar, fumbling out a kerchief and wiping blood from his mouth and nostrils. The barman set up a large shot of whisky and Yancey took the glass and gulped at the liquid. He nodded his thanks then looked towards the broken window.
There was no sign of Cato or the men who had followed him. Yancey turned to the barman.
“Put it all on Mr. Cato’s bill,” he muttered and walked unsteadily towards the batwings.
Outside, the one-eyed man and his companion were waiting.
They stood at the edge of the walk, feet spread, hands on hips, faces battered and ugly. Yancey propped just outside the batwings, groaning inwardly; he thought he had finished fighting for the night.
“Your pard run out and left you, mister,” the one-eyed hombre said. “Gave us the slip. But we still got you.”
Yancey was about out on his feet and his hands were stiff and sore and slippery with blood from cuts on his knuckles. If this got down to guns, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to hold his Colt. But if he made a move to wipe his palms down his trousers, they might construe it as a movement towards his gun and then—
“You got me, too, you bastards.”
Yancey snapped his head up as the two startled rannies spun at the sound of Cato’s voice. The Enforcer was standing in a patch of
dull, yellow lamplight, his right arm crooked above the butt of the massive gun he called Manstopper.
The two men flicked their eyes from Yancey to Cato and back again. The one with two good eyes ran a tongue across his lips and nudged his companion. Yancey knew it was over. They didn’t want to finish it with guns, not when the breaks were even.
The one-eyed man scowled and, muttering, stomped down the saloon steps and hurried away into the night, followed swiftly by his companion. Yancey and Cato watched them go and then Cato stepped onto the verandah.
“Sorry I had to leave you with ’em, Yance, but discretion really did seem to be the better part of valor right about then.”
Yancey waved airily: “Forget it—I told the ’keep to send you the bill.”
Cato stopped dead as they walked along the verandah.
“You what?”
“Well, hell, you started it.”
“Judas, an’ I never even got close enough to that Chinese girl to figure out what perfume she was wearin’. But I gotta pay for all the damages.”
“Luck of the game.”
“Ain’t much luck in that,” Cato said then suddenly squinted at Yancey. “Did you notice if that gal was still around in there?”
“Yeah, sure, she was watchin’ from the stairs—Hey, hold up, Johnny. You’re not going back are you?”
Cato grinned over his shoulder as he headed towards the batwings.
“If I gotta pay, I’m gonna get my money’s worth.”
Yancey shook his head as his pard disappeared into the saloon, then turned and weaved his way towards his hotel.
~*~
He awoke feeling as if a stampede had passed over him. The sun blazed into his eyes and there was a savage pounding on the door that had him swinging his legs over the side of the bed before he consciously thought about it.
Old habits made him reach for his six-gun as he walked stiffly across the room towards the double doors, his head throbbing and one eye swollen. His hands were aching and there were bruises on his ribs and the side of his neck. He made a vow he would put a bullet through Cato if he were on the other side of that door.
“Goddamn it, leave off that pounding,” Yancey yelled and immediately regretted it. Savagely fumbling, he got the bolt back and lifted the latch, flinging the door open and bringing up the gun. “I ought to blow your loco head off. Why didn’t you simply kick the damn’ door down ... ” He stopped in mid-sentence. It wasn’t Cato standing in the passage. Cato would have been bad news enough. But this was much worse as far as Yancey was concerned.
It was Lang Huckabee, the Winchester man.
He looked edgy and slightly soiled, which was a most unusual condition for Huckabee. He stared at Yancey and doffed his brown Derby, absently rubbing some dust and cinders off the crown—which told Yancey even in his befuddled state that the man had just come in on the early morning train. Which, again, meant he came from somewhere up north.
Yancey groaned as he let the gun drop to his side. “Hell almighty, Huckabee, what in blazes d’you want here?”
He didn’t wait for an answer, but swung back into his room and made for a sideboard, hearing the Winchester man come inside and close the door behind him. Yancey slopped some whisky into a glass and tossed it down. He shuddered as it hit his sour belly and he looked blearily at Huckabee.
“Want one?” he asked hoarsely.
“At seven in the a.m.? No thank you.” Huckabee was
most emphatic. “You look terrible, Bannerman.”
“I feel terrible. But I would’ve felt a damn’ sight better if I’d been able to sleep for a few more hours instead of being woke up by some idiot pounding on my door.”
“Sorry, but it was necessary.” Huckabee didn’t sound or look in the least contrite. “May I sit down?”
“Please yourself, but I sure am,” Yancey said, dropping gingerly into an overstuffed chair. The other man sat on the edge of the small sofa. Yancey squinted at him. “What the hell are you doing here so damn’ early?”
“Believe me, I wouldn’t’ve disturbed you if it hadn’t been necessary.”
Yancey waved his hand impatiently. “You said that before. So what makes it necessary?”
“I was working my usual route for north-east Texas,” Huckabee said without further preamble, “and arrived in Waco. This time I was carrying a rather special rifle—a gold-plated, silver-filigree-inlaid presentation model, a gift for the Governor from the Winchester Company. Handmade. Every part. Worth five thousand.”
Huckabee had Yancey’s full attention and he knew it. The Enforcer started to reach for tobacco and papers but decided that he wasn’t quite ready for that yet.
“I stored it in the vault of my brother’s bank in Waco, thinking that was the logical place to put it for safekeeping while I was in town. You agree?”
Yancey nodded slightly, moving his head gently.
“Well, it wasn’t. Some outlaws blasted their way into the vault and took the damn’ thing.”
Yancey frowned: “Just the gun?”
“Oh, no,” Huckabee said, holding up a stiffened forefinger. “Far from it. They took everything—the gun, the money and all the account books.”
He paused and looked sharply at Yancey who was showing more and more interest. “The books?”
“Strange, isn’t it? Especially when you consider that my brother was most reluctant to allow me to leave the gun there.”
Yancey sat up straighter and looked steadily at the other man, but didn’t say anything.
“I couldn’t understand why. Until the robbery. They got away—well nearly. By chance, I brought down the man who’d been carrying the books—They’re now safe in Waco. But I fear it didn’t make my brother—happy. Nor Sheriff Lindeen.”
“Lindeen?” echoed Yancey. “Now there’s a hardcase. What’s his tie-up in this?”
“I—hesitate to speculate. But, I fear that he and my brother—arranged—that robbery so that the books would be taken with whatever else was in the vault.”
“Bit far-fetched, Huckabee.”
“Perhaps—but you weren’t there. You don’t know my brother as I do. I knew there was something behind his reluctance. Lindeen could’ve killed me when he found out I’d shot the man carrying the books.”
“Dead?”
“He was—shot again—later. Trying to escape. Lindeen cornered him and put four bullets into his head. The man didn’t get a chance to use his gun.”
Yancey pursed his lips.
“Begins to stink a mite, right enough. How about a posse?”
Huckabee shrugged: “They been out for two days. Nothing. To be expected, of course. Lindeen’s preparing for another try, with a better posse. But I know that’ll be a waste of time, too.”
“You seen your brother about this?”
Lang Huckabee nodded slowly.
“I tried to be tactful, to give him a chance to tell me all about it; even offered to help out if I could. He threw me out of his office. The whole bank heard it; saw us fighting.” He shook his head. “Most undignified. I’m afraid I—rather let my temper get away from me, too. I threatened him that if he didn’t do something about getting that rifle back—” He shrugged and let it hang.
Yancey Bannerman looked thoughtfully at the gun salesman. He had first met Lang Huckabee about two years earlier. There had been some bad trouble; both he and Cato had been cornered by a bunch of outlaws and they had had only four bullets left between them. Huckabee had come upon the scene, and swiftly summed it up. Having samples of his wares with him, and being an inventive hombre, he had set up guns all around the draw where the outlaws were holed-up and fixed strings to the triggers and hammers in such a way that he could fire ragged volleys simply by working the lever on his own rifle.
It seemed as though there were ten men shooting into the draw and the outlaws had fled, but not before Huckabee had brought down four of them. Yancey and Cato had managed to nail the others, but they knew they owed their live
s to Lang Huckabee. In gratitude, they had told him that if ever he were in trouble, of any kind—serious or not—all he had to do was call on them and they would come a’running.
Lang Huckabee had called on them maybe half a dozen times since then—and had been nothing but a pain in the neck each time. Not content to allow Cato and Yancey to fix whatever trouble it was that he was in, he had tagged along, getting in the way, making suggestions, and spoiling plans in his eagerness to lend a hand. Both Enforcers regarded Lang Huckabee as bad news and they did their best to avoid any territory where he was working.
And Huckabee always managed to be too kind and too generous in his thanks. He always insisted on buying drinks, paying for their accommodation, and presenting them with new rifles or the latest development in ammunition. He meant well, but it was embarrassing for the Enforcers, being, as they were, personal trouble-shooters for the Governor of Texas. It didn’t look good that the representative of a well-known firearms company was sending gifts of his wares to men who were in a position to influence the Governor about arms’ contracts, though Huckabee, to give him his due, had never asked them to do this.
But he was a pest of a man, turning up in the most unexpected places and buying-in without invitation, sometimes undoing months of undercover work in less than an hour. What was more, he hadn’t yet given Yancey and Cato a real opportunity to repay him for having saved their lives. Everything they did for him was of a minor nature and both men felt that they were still in his debt. They suspected that that was how Huckabee wanted it, but suddenly Yancey finally saw a chance to square things away.
“And what is it that brings you here, Huckabee?” Yancey asked, knowing the answer—or pretty sure that he knew—but wanting the other to put it into words.
Lang Huckabee looked steadily at the Enforcer, seeing the scars of old bullet wounds and the weals of a bullwhip on his torso and back. He had known for years that Yancey Bannerman was probably the toughest man in Texas, and certainly one of the toughest men alive, and he was just the sort of hombre to pit against someone as hard as Lindeen.
“I want you to get that rifle back for me, Bannerman,” Huckabee said quietly. “My job’s at stake. If word gets back to the Company that I’ve let it be stolen, my position won’t be worth a plugged nickel. Even if I recovered it, they’d never employ me again. I’ve been entrusted to make delivery on my past record. My whole career hangs in the balance. I—er—remembered that you and Cato—owed me something and I grabbed the first train down from Waco, hoping I’d find you still in Austin and not on assignment somewhere.” He forced a quick, on-off grin. “I guess I was lucky.”
Bannerman the Enforcer 9 Page 3
