No Man's Land

by William W. Johnstone

  Some folks believed the toes had just rotted off because the old outlaw was so mean-spirited. Frank couldn’t really argue with that theory because he’d seen Bob in action. They’d always gotten along well enough, though, and from what Frank had seen, Bob’s mean streak only flared up when he was provoked—and never toward innocent women and children. The gunfighter shared that particular tendency himself.

  Bob had spent the last five years in the Nebraska state prison and according to all recent accounts, had decided to go more or less on the up-and-up, minding his own business at the trading post, since his release.

  Low, gunmetal clouds boiled in a broad sky as Frank neared the log-and-canvas trading post. The smell of rain hung heavily in the air, and a cold wind kicked at the tufts of brown, wilted grass. The sky looked like it might open up at any moment, and Frank was glad to get somewhere out of the weather.

  He tied Stormy up to a low pine rail out front of the long, narrow building. Dog hunted him a place under a stack of old crates that looked like it was made just for him.

  Three-Toed’s place smelled like cheap whiskey and mildew. Old Bob himself stood behind the rough plank bar. Behind him was a small array of bottles, sacks of salt and flour, two double-barrel shotguns, and boxes of cartridges. The whole caboodle was stacked precariously on a set of flimsy wooden shelves held together with horseshoe nails, and looked like one good sneeze from the retired outlaw might bring it down around his shoulders.

  “What’ll you have?” Three-Toed said as Frank walked up to the bar. He had long gray hair pulled back in a ponytail and tied with a leather whang.

  “Whiskey,” the gunfighter said. He made no attempt to disguise his voice, but didn’t identify himself either. Bob would be a good test to see if Frank was as unrecognizable as he thought he was.

  “Lucky you made it when you did,” Three-Toed said, getting a half-full bottle and shot glass. “I believe this rain could turn too snow without too much trouble.”

  Frank threw back the whiskey, and shivered despite the relative warmth put off by the potbellied stove at the end of the bar. “Got anything to eat?”

  “Boiled meat and potatoes.”

  “What kind of meat?”

  Three-Toed shrugged. “Like I said, boiled.”

  Frank gave a somber nod. “I reckon I’ll just have another whiskey then.” There wasn’t much danger of getting drunk on the watered-down mixture.

  Three-Toed chuckled. “I’m just joshing you, friend. It’s mule-deer doe. Good too. I got a damned Digger Indian works for me. He has to take a wagon far and wide just to keep me in firewood this time of year. He shot the doe just yesterday.”

  “In that case, I’ll take some. How you been gettin’ along, Bob?”

  Three-Toed leaned over the bar to peer at Frank’s face. He shook his head and combed a hand over his gray hair. “Am I supposed to know you from somewheres?”

  “Well, I sure hope so. We spent a whole winter holed up together in the Absaroka—back when you had all your toes.”

  “Morgan? Is that you?” Three-toed poured himself a glass of the hard stuff he kept hidden behind the bar.

  Frank winked and gave a little nod. “In the flesh.”

  “I heard you’d done crossed over.” Bob rubbed his eyes and blinked to clear them. “I swear, Morgan. You’re all but wasted away. You look near dead now.”

  “I nearly was. Don’t have much fat to spare, so if you could hurry with that meat and potatoes I’d be much obliged.”

  “Comin’ right up.” Three-Toed disappeared behind a quilt partition, and came out with a steaming bowl.

  “Swan’s been tellin’ everyone how he killed Frank Morgan and his wi . . .”

  Frank took a spoonful of the broth and meat. It was not Abby’s mutton stew, but it was hot and savory enough to chase the chill away from his bones. He shook his head and waved off the mention of Dixie. “She’s dead, Bob. Not talkin’ about her don’t make me any less comfortable with the fact. What’s he saying?”

  Three-Toed took up a glass and began to polish it. “He says he jumped you out north of Pueblo somewhere. He don’t make no bones about the fact it was an ambush, but you know how folks are. They was beginning to believe all those books about you—beginning to think you might be bullet-proof.”

  Frank put down the spoon and looked the old outlaw in the eye. “What does he say about my wife?”

  “You don’t want to hear this, Morgan.” Bob began to polish the glass faster. It looked clean, but his hands needed something to do.

  Frank nodded. “You’re right. I don’t want to, but I need to know for certain what happened. Tell it. Tell it all.”

  Old Bob slumped like a chicken-killing dog that knew it was about to get a beating. “He cut her finger off. Tells everyone she was alive when he cut it off. Keeps it in a little corked bottle full of alcohol. He wears her weddin’ ring on little leather string around his neck.” Bob trailed off, but cast his eyes down at the ground. Frank could tell there was more.

  “I need it all.”

  “He said he liked to listen to her scream.” Three-Toed looked up suddenly. “If I’d a known you were still alive, I’d killed him for you last time he was in here.”

  Frank pushed the bowl away. His appetite had vanished with the news of Dixie’s suffering. “No, I’m glad you left it to me, Bob. This is something I need to take care of personally.”

  Though there was no one else in the room, Three-Toed Bob leaned over the bar and spoke in a hushed tone. “Swan and his men have taken over a little burg out east of here about seventy-five miles away. They done run off or killed all the decent folks. I ain’t never been there, but I hear it’s mighty flat, just like here. Be awful hard to sneak up and take potshots.”

  “I don’t intend to. This is something I need to do face-to-face.”

  Bob rubbed the top of his head again. “I can give you rough directions from what I’ve heard people say, but I’m not exactly sure where it is.”

  “I’ll find it.” Frank pushed away from the bar. “In the meantime, I need to get my horse out of the rain. I’ll pester you for a cup of coffee, then if you got a place I can bed down for the night, I’d be much obliged.”

  “I got a barn and a shed. Take your pick.”

  “Barn sounds fine.”

  “You know, Morgan.” Three-Toed leaned over the bar and was talking in his conspiratorial voice again. “Gettin’ in—I don’t reckon that will be much of a problem. I just can’t say you’ll be able to get yourself out of there.”

  Frank let his fist bounce up and down on top of the bar. He sighed. “Well, Bob, I don’t much give a damn whether I do or not.”

  Chapter 30

  Frank settled Stormy and his packhorse in the barn and threw two flakes of hay in a feed bunk. The stout Appy pinned his ears and chased the short-coupled bay packhorse to the other side of the rough wooden bin. Once the eating hierarchy was established, both horses calmed down and began to munch their hay. It was still chilly in the drafty barn, and steam rose from the backs of the wet horses.

  It was raining in earnest now. Frank wove his way through a maze of drips from the leaking roof, and found a surprisingly dry spot by the stack of grass hay. He threw his saddle and kit there and rolled out his bedroll.

  Once he was certain nothing would get wet, he left Dog to guard everything and went back inside for a cup of coffee.

  He stomped his feet to get the mud and grass off as he came in from the storm.

  “Shut the damn door,” a potbellied rowdy said from the bar. A taller, redheaded man about Frank’s age stood beside him. They were drenched to the skin and drinking coffee as fast as Bob would bring it. “You’re lettin’ all the wind in.”

  “My apologies.” Frank closed the door. He was surprised by the presence of the two men. They must have tied their horses around the building.

  “You got a room to let?” Red asked.

  “Got a shed that don’t leak much,” Three-Toe
d said, pouring a cup of coffee for Frank. “It’s a damn sight better than a tent on the plains.”

  “I don’t aim to sleep in no tent on the plains,” the fat cowboy whined. “And I don’t fancy sleepin’ in no leaky shed either. What’s the matter with your barn?”

  “Occupied,” Three-Toed said.

  “By who?” Red shot a glance at Frank. “The scarecrow? Why, he’s so skinny I doubt he’d get wet if he stood out in the rain. Ain’t that right, scarecrow?”

  “Like the man told you”—Frank took his cup of coffee and calmly drank a sip—“the barn’s occupied.”

  “The whole damn barn?” Chubby whined again.

  “Yep,” Frank grunted over the lip of his cup.

  “We’re sleepin’ in the barn.” Red waved Frank off and turned back toward the bar.

  “Listen, boys.” Frank put his coffee on the table next to him. “I don’t want any trouble, but I do want to be left alone.”

  “I don’t know who you think you are.” Red spun around. “I ought to wring your scrawny neck, but it’d be too easy. I seen bed bugs bigger’n you down in Fort Worth.”

  Chubby took up the cause, and interrupted his whining to pick on Frank. “You got a gun there on your hip, scarecrow. You know how to use it, or you carry it around to keep yourself from blowin’ away?”

  Frank looked at Three-Toed, who stifled a laugh. “I do all right. I think it would be best if we let this drop.” Frank was not a man to back down, but he didn’t want to waste any bullets on this pair of would-be desperados. Neither had the hardened look of a gunfighter.

  “How about if I just drop you?” Red leaned back against the bar. He seemed convinced his bravado would be enough to make Frank flinch.

  “Here now!” Bob growled from behind the bar. “I believe I’ve heard about enough of this.”

  “You shut up.” Red turned and glared at him. “Mind your own damned business.”

  Bob set his jaw. “This is my place. What goes on in here is all my business. You can calm down or clear out.”

  Frank shook his head. “Just let them be, Bob. It’s their funeral.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Chubby stared over pink cheeks.

  “Should I tell ’em who’s gettin’ ready to kill ’em?” Three-Toed hobbled to the potbellied stove to get a fresh pot of coffee.

  “I guess it won’t hurt. They seem bound and determined to get killed. They wouldn’t be able to tell anyone my little secret.”

  “Well, I don’t give a damn who you are, mister.” Red stood away from the bar. “I’m fixin’ to put a hole in you.”

  “Boy, that’ll be a feat if you pull it off,” Three-Toed said. “A passel of truly fast guns have tried to kill Frank Morgan before.”

  “Frank Morgan?” The whine had crept back into Chubby’s voice. His face went pale and he looked ready to sleep anywhere but the barn.

  Red scoffed. “So? So what if you are? You look like you got one foot in the grave already. All you need is a little nudge.” He turned to his partner. “Don’t worry about him. He’s a has-been. Probably all broke up and boo-hooin’ over his dead wife.”

  “I think we ought to let this alone.” Chubby had a tiny lick of sense after all.

  “I ain’t backin’ down from nobody.” Red stood his ground. An evil sneer crossed his face. “You know what, Morgan? I wish I woulda been there when Swan went after you.” He shook his red head back and forth. “I hear tell that wife of yours was a hell of a fighter.”

  “You’re steppin’ over the line, Jake,” Chubby whispered.

  Red put out his hand to silence his partner. He kept his eyes on Frank. “She screamed and whimpered like a baby, they say. If I’d have been there, I woulda showed her what a real man was like. I coulda made her yowl like a—

  The bullet from Frank’s Colt slammed into Red’s belly before he knew Frank had even drawn. Chubby frowned and fumbled for his own pistol until a bullet pierced his chest. Both men slumped, then slid to the floor.

  Three-Toed gimped around the bar and pulled both men’s guns out of their holsters so they didn’t get any ideas before they died.

  Red tried to get up, but his boots slid out from under him. Chubby moaned and clutched his chest with a bloody hand.

  Three-Toed gazed out the greasy window. “Well, hell. I ain’t diggin’ no damn holes in this rain.”

  “I ain’t dead,” Chubby whined.

  Three-Toed poured himself a cup of coffee and offered to top off Frank’s. “You will be shortly. And so will your foul-mouthed friend.” Bob limped over to stand above the redheaded gunman. “You’ll likely be the one to go first, though. Bullet done tore up your gizzard. Your innards is leakin’ out all inside you. Seen it before. You won’t last long.”

  “You can go to hell, you crippled old fool,” Red spit through gritted teeth.

  Bob nodded and looked out the window again. “Just for that, I think I’m gonna dump you in with the hogs out back. I got a boar out there as big as a damn buffalo. He’ll finish you off in no time, bones and all. That way, I won’t have to dig no holes at all—rain or shine.”

  “I need a doctor,” Chubby groaned.

  “What you need is a miracle, boy.” Bob shook his head. “You’re hit as hard as your fool partner.”

  The heavyset man began to weep. “Don’t throw me to no hogs. Please.”

  “Why not?” Bob sipped his coffee. “Hogs gotta eat too.”

  Chubby’s cries grew softer, then stopped altogether. “He’s done expired,” Bob said, looking at Frank. “Damn, I sure thought the other one would go first.”

  “It’s tricky guessing at that sort of thing.” Frank shook his head as he looked at the bleeding man. After what the outlaw had said about Dixie, Frank felt no pity for him.

  “I’m hurt bad.” Red blinked his eyes. He seemed to have forgotten what kind of behavior had gotten him where he was. “I’m awful thirsty. Could one of you boys get me some water?” He was suddenly wracked with pain and doubled over. “Oh, Lord, I hurt.”

  Frank sat down and poured himself a glass of the good whiskey Bob had forgotten to hide again. He hated to listen to this, and thought he might have to put the man out of his misery.

  “I see angels.” Red’s voice had gone soft now, the hard edge leaking away with the blood that pooled on the ground around him. “They’re comin’ for me now, singin’ a beautiful song.”

  “Them ain’t angels,” Bob said. “Them’s Hell’s buggers comin’ to drag you off to your eternal reward.”

  Red’s eyes were still open—looking for angels—but he was past hearing.

  Frank stood up. “Come on,” he said quietly. “I’ll help you drag the bodies outside. I guess they’ll be sleepin’ in the shed after all.”

  Three-Toed raised a bushy eyebrow. He’d always been a quick one when it came to figuring out ways around work.

  “I killed ’em,” Frank said. “But I don’t fancy feedin’ anyone to the hogs.”

  Bob shook his head. “I got a better idea. There’s an old dry well out behind the shed. We can dump the carcasses down there. It’s deep enough they won’t smell.”

  “All right,” Frank said. “Let’s get the mean one first. I’m tired of looking at him.” He grabbed a boot and Three-Toed did the same. The dead outlaw’s arms trailed behind him as the two men dragged him toward the door.

  “You got a Bible around here, Bob?”

  “I did.” Three-Toed looked around the room. “Oh, yeah, the leg broke off the stove and I been usin’ it to prop the blasted thing up. I can’t read a lick. At least now it’s doin’ me some good.” The dead man’s head thumped when they dragged it across the timber threshold. “Why, you plan on sayin’ some words over these scoundrels?”

  Frank nodded, hunching his shoulders against the rain as they sloshed with their load through the mud. “I might. Thought I could read them a little bit out of the Book of Judges. I don’t know what good it’ll do Red here, but it’d make
me feel some better.”

  Chapter 31

  “You do a good business here,” Frank said later over coffee and cake Bob got out of a tin. He said he’d been saving it for a special occasion. It tasted like wood pulp, brandy, and raisins, but Frank choked it down anyway.

  Three-Toed seemed to like it well enough, and dabbed at his saucer to get at every last crumb. “I reckon. It’s awful lonely out here, but it beats ridin’ the hoot-owl trail. That’s a miserable life. Prison was bad, but it was a damn sight better than that.”

  Frank put up his hand when the other man offered him more of the sawdust cake. “No, thanks, I’ve had enough. Didn’t you have a woman with you up at that post you had up on the Platte?”

  Bob hung his head. “Yup. Crow half-breed named Willow. Now that woman could cook a deer haunch. She weren’t too much to look at, but she kept me warm in the winter, that’s for certain.”

  Frank didn’t pry, but Bob pushed ahead like he needed to talk about it. “I reckon I know how you feel, Frank.” The ex-outlaw gazed out the window again. “I came home one day and found my place burnt to the ground with my wife inside it.” He wiped a tear from his eye. “Damn. Poor little Willow, she was ugly as a stump, but I ain’t that much to look at either. I did love that gal.”

  “You find out who did it?” Frank said, understanding the other man’s pain.

  Bob nodded. His eyes blazed with the memory of his own fury. “I found out all right. Three whiskey peddlers wanted to put me out of business. They just killed Willow for meanness. I caught up to ’em about Medicine Bow. Took ’em in the middle of the night. Kilt every mother’s son of ’em.” Bob brightened. “Cut the leader’s cajones off. Made me a little medicine bag out of it. Wanta see it?” He started to get up, but Frank shook his head.

  “I’ll take your word for it,” he said.

  “This revenge stuff is ticklish business, Morgan. It can eat you up—take my word for it.”