Big Jim 3

by Marshall Grover

  The Home of Great Western Fiction!

  BIG JIM 3

  GUN TRAPPED

  About GUN TRAPPED

  One - The Brothers Gillery

  Two - More Gillerys!

  Three – Ride With The Outcasts

  Four – The Nonchalant Bride-to-Be

  Five - Calamity Sam

  Six – Return to Double L

  Seven – Late Night Alert

  Eight – Marauders at Sun-Up

  Nine – Dig and Run

  Ten – No Bride for the Big Man

  The Series

  Copyright

  About Piccadilly Publishing

  ALONG A STRANGE TRAIL … THEY FACED NEW DANGERS!

  Big Jim Rand didn’t plan on becoming the guest of honor at a shotgun wedding, but this was what the roughneck Gillery brothers had in mind when they kidnapped the tall avenger and his sidekick — that philosophical Mexican, little Benito.

  To add to Big Jim’s troubles, outlaw Pete Holbrook and his cutthroat crew were closing in on the Gillery ranch, preparing to kidnap or murder the high-spirited Lucy Rose, sister of the hard-boiled Gillerys.

  Here are Big Jim and Benito, caught in the middle of another dangerous intrigue, another crisis that could only end in a gunsmoke showdown.

  One – The Brothers Gillery

  Within ten minutes of his arrival at Hingle Wells, the tall stranger was in trouble. He wasn’t looking for it, and Hingle Wells certainly didn’t appear lively; it was, in fact, barely large enough to be called a town. And yet, quiet though it appeared to be, Big Jim Rand was very soon up to his ears in a crisis.

  He left his horse, a large and strong charcoal stallion, tethered to the rack outside the Hingle Emporium and went inside to confer with the proprietor. Orin Hingle, elderly, pudgy and placid, greeted him affably and, in a few drawled sentences, told him all there was to know of this lonely outpost of civilization.

  “Yeah, sure, we named the place after me. Tossed a coin we did—Leroy and me. That’s his place directly opposite. The forge. Leroy Polke’s his name. He’s a blacksmith and a horse-doctor and a barber. And me, well, this old emporium sells more than just provisions. If you’re hungry, my wife’ll rustle up some chow for you and, if you’re thirsty, I serve the best rye in the whole doggone Arizona Territory.”

  Except for its small but reliable water supply, Hingle Wells had no excuse for its existence. Here dwelled a storekeeper doubling as bartender and restaurateur, and a blacksmith who could also cut your hair and tend your sick horse. These men, their wives and children, made up the entire population. Jim had a vague recollection of seeing a couple of horsemen moving in from the opposite direction while he was dismounting at the hitch rack, but he assumed they weren’t members of the Wells’ small population.

  “You travellin’ alone?” asked Hingle.

  “Just about,” said Jim.

  It was an ambiguous answer—not exactly a lie, not exactly the truth. For quite some time, a scruffy, runty Mexican name of Benito Espina had been riding in his shadow, and Benito wasn’t a saddlepard to brag about. Larcenous, indolent and unwashed, he was apt to give an unfavorable impression. Why did a husky, clean-cut Americano of Jim’s caliber permit such an unsavory hombre to ride with him? The answer was simple. Benito had once saved his life. He hadn’t the heart to part company with the little Mex. On the other hand, he hadn’t deemed it advisable to bring Benito to Hingle Wells. He was seeking credit and therefore needed to make a good impression on the storekeeper. Had Hingle caught even a fleeting glimpse of Benito, he would be justified in thinking that a big hombre like Jim must be some kind of outlaw if he rode with a shifty-eyed little skunk like Benito.

  “I’ll be stone-cold honest with you, Mr. Hingle,” he frowned. “I’m near broke right now—got less than three dollars in my pockets and scarce any provisions in my saddlebags.”

  “Well,” observed Hingle, “you don’t look like just another saddle bum.”

  And this was an understatement. James Carey Rand was no footloose drifter. Even in his travel-stained riding clothes, he was an impressive specimen of hefty masculinity, all of six feet five inches tall and of powerful physique. His hair and eyes were dark-brown, his sun-tanned countenance clean-shaven and ruggedly handsome.

  “I thank you for the compliment, Mr. Hingle,” he acknowledged. “And now could we talk a deal? I’m short on cash, but maybe you’d agree to a trade.”

  “Depends on what you got to trade with,” said Hingle.

  “A few days back,” Jim told him, “I won a six-shooter off a whisky drummer in a Lewisburg saloon. There were only the two of us left in the game. I was sitting behind a pat hand and I’d rather have taken cash from this drummer, but he claimed he was broke—and still wanted to see me.”

  “So he put up the six-shooter,” guessed Hingle, “and you won the pot.”

  “That’s how it went,” nodded Jim. He patted the ivory butt of the Colt .45 holstered at his right hip. “Now, as you can see, I already own a handgun. I have no use for the spare, so ...”

  “You’re offerin’ a six-gun in trade for provisions?” frowned Hingle.

  “Not just an ordinary Colt,” Jim assured him. “Silver-plated and engraved, with pearl grips. As handsome a weapon as you ever saw.”

  “Well, I dunno,” grunted Hingle. “I think first I oughta take a look at it.”

  “Fair enough,” said Jim. “I’ll go fetch it.”

  He noticed, when he emerged from the store, that the two burly riders had dismounted and were taking him out of winding, but not especially concerned. As for Benito, he assumed that itchy-fingered little Mex had obeyed his instructions and was staying out of sight in the mesquite just west of the wells. He descended from the store porch and stood beside the big stallion, to unfasten the flap of his saddlebag and reach inside for the spare Colt. His back was now turned to the two burly hombres, and this proved to be a bad mistake—in more ways than one. From where they stood, they could see the .45 holstered at his right hip, but had no way of knowing that he held a second six-shooter in his left hand. He tensed, as one of them called a challenge.

  “Hold it right there, big man!”

  The muscular blacksmith promptly appeared in the doorway of his forge, glowered at the two burly men and called a reproach.

  “Dewey and Rick Gillery—jest what in tarnation are you up to now?”

  “Polke,” growled the elder of the two men, “we’ll thank you to mind your own consarned business.” And then he spoke to Jim again. “You can peek over your shoulder, stranger, just so you’ll know we ain’t foolin’. But you keep your hand far clear of your holster—savvy?”

  “I hear you,” scowled Jim.

  Benito Espina, also, had heard the challenge. This unwashed little Mex—Jim’s shadow almost since the day of his honorable discharge from the 11th Cavalry—carried no gun, but was willing to lend help to the big man. Distraction, for instance, might give Amigo Jim some chance of turning the tables. With this thought in mind, Benito left his burro concealed in the mesquite and, as silently as a marauding Apache, worked his way around back of the forge and crouched behind a rain-barrel. From this vantage point, he commanded a clear view of Big Jim’s challengers. One of them hefted a rifle, the other a cocked .45.

  Jim glanced over his shoulder, moving only his head. His muscular torso shielded his left hand in which the spare Colt was gripped. He kept his right hand well clear of his holster. What he saw in that brief glance caused him no pleasure—two of the most belligerent-looking galoots he had ever laid eyes on, one brandishing a rifle, one covering him with a Colt.

  “All right,” said the man with the rifle. “Now you’ve seen us and you know we ain’t foolin’—go ahead and unstrap the hardware.”
/>   “Damnitall, Dewey ...!” began the blacksmith.

  “Told you before, Polke ...” began the man hefting the Colt.

  “Mister Polke to you!” countered the blacksmith. “And I wasn’t talkin’ to you, Rick Gillery. I was talkin’ to your brother, thinkin’ he might have more sense, him bein’ the oldest.”

  “We don’t need no advice from you, Mr. Polke,” muttered the man with the rifle. “We know what’s gotta be done, and we aim to do it.”

  “You’ve never seen me before,” frowned Jim. “What do you want from me? If this is robbery, the joke’s on you. I’m near broke.”

  “We don’t want your money, big man,” drawled Rick Gillery. “What we want is you!”

  “Yup,” grunted Dewey Gillery. “I reckon you’ll do fine.”

  “For what, damnitall?” demanded Jim.

  “You’ll find out,” Dewey grimly promised. “Go on now, unstrap that Colt—slow and easy.”

  This was the moment. A diversionary tactic was called for, a distraction sorely needed—and Benito supplied it. From behind the water-barrel, he yelled harshly at Jim’s challengers.

  “Drop the guns, gringos!”

  This strange voice, coming so unexpectedly, had the desired effect. Both brothers half-turned and darted glances towards the rain-barrel and Jim had his chance. He did a fast ‘border-shift’, transferring the spare Colt from his left hand to his right, then whirling, cocking and firing. To the bug-eyed Leroy Polke in the doorway of the forge, it seemed the big stranger didn’t take aim at all; he wasn’t to know that Jim Rand had been the champion pistolero of his regiment.

  His first target was the right hand of Dewey—the Gillery with the rifle. Both Dewey and Rick were staring at the rain-barrel in that tense instant; Rick was swinging his six-gun toward it. Jim triggered and, simultaneous with the roar of the report, Dewey jumped convulsively, unleashed a startled yell and dropped the rifle. That fast-triggered bullet hadn’t broken the skin of his right hand, but had come so close as to burn it. As the rifle clattered to the ground, Rick Gillery’s Colt boomed, but not at Jim. His bullet bored a hole in the rain-barrel behind which Benito still crouched and Jim had an even clearer target. The sun glinted off the barrel of Rick’s .45. Jim drew a fast bead and fired again, and Rick’s hand was suddenly gunless and numbed; the gun was spinning to the ground. On Rick’s broad and unshaven visage was stamped an expression of acute astonishment, matching the look on the face of big brother Dewey.

  “Holy—jumpin’—Julius . .!” breathed Polke.

  Baring his buckteeth in a leering, triumphant grin, Benito rose from behind the water-barrel, waved to the big stranger and called:

  “Saludos, Amigo Jim!”

  “Saludos yourself,” grunted Jim, “and you got here just in time. I don’t know what in blazes these jaspers aimed to do to me ...” His expression hardened, “… but I sure aim to find out.”

  “That weren’t fair, Dewey,” complained Rick Gillery, as plaintively as a small boy deprived of a piece of candy. “He done shot my Colt clear outa my hand.”

  “You should complain!” scowled Dewey. “Look at my left paw! Doggone him—he burned it with a bullet!”

  “Neither of you should complain,” Jim sternly asserted. “You were threatening me. I’d have been justified in killing you …”

  “He’s right,” Polke warmly assured the brothers. “Listen to him, boys. He makes sense.”

  “Those dratted Gillerys again—up to their old tricks!” Hingle remarked.

  Deftly, Jim slid the silver-plated .45 into the waistband of his pants and unholstered his own long-barreled Cavalry model. The fancy Colt with the shorter barrel had worked fine for him just now, but he was more accustomed to his own weapon. He didn’t cock it, but he lined it on the Gillerys and arranged his features in an expression of truculence.

  “Now,” he growled, “I reckon you two heroes owe me an explanation. Just what the heck were you after?”

  “Well, doggone it,” mumbled Dewey, “we didn’t mean no real harm.”

  “You should pardon me if I seem skeptical,” countered Jim. “When a couple of hardcases point guns at me and make threats, I take it for granted they don’t mean to be sociable.”

  “Talks real educated, don’t he?” remarked Rick.

  “Sure do,” agreed Dewey. “Could be he’s from back East—got himself educated at one of them fancy colleges.”

  “Got himself educated,” corrected Jim, “out of books. Any man can learn, if he’s willing to read. Let’s not change the subject, boys. What did you want from me?”

  They didn’t answer immediately. First, they subjected him to a searching appraisal, after which they traded pensive stares.

  “He’d do,” Rick opined.

  “Durn right,” agreed Dewey. “He’d do fine.”

  “I’d do fine for what?” demanded Jim, who was fast running out of patience.

  “Well, it’s thisaway,” said the elder brother. “We’re lookin’ for a husband for Lucy Rose. That’s our sister ...”

  “Right purty little thing, she is,” Rick assured him. “You could do a heap worse,” asserted Dewey. “Well? It ain’t too much to ask, is it? You ain’t already wed, are you?”

  “He don’t look like a regular married feller,” observed Rick. “Looks like a sure-enough bachelor-man.”

  By now, Jim Rand was finding it difficult to credit the evidence of his ears. Had the events of the past several months imposed too great a strain on his mind? Was he becoming mentally unhinged? His Colt sagged in his hand. He blinked at the brothers Gillery in disbelief. Behind him, Benito had risen to his feet and was frowning incredulously. Only the inhabitants of this water-stop seemed unaffected by the Gillery’s statement. Jim threw a quick glance over his shoulder at Hingle. Hingle shrugged helplessly. Jim then frowned across at Polke. Polke shrugged helplessly.

  “What have I stumbled into?” Jim heatedly enquired. “Is this a community of lunatics?”

  “Mister,” pleaded the blacksmith, “don’t think unkindly of us Polkes and Hingles. We ain’t loco.”

  “But,” sighed Hingle, “I dunno as we can say the same for these Gillerys.”

  “You can stand there in the bright light of day ...” Jim glowered at the brothers, “… and admit that you—you go out hunting a husband for your sister?”

  “Gotta find a man to wed Lucy Rose,” nodded Dewey.

  “Gotta find him fast,” declared Rick. “Time’s runnin’ out.”

  “Few more days,” sighed Dewey, “and it’ll be too late.”

  Out of deference to the wives and children of Messrs. Hingle and Polke, Jim wasn’t about to demand a detailed explanation of Dewey Gillery’s last remark; he could form his own conclusions anyway. Behind him, he heard Benito sniggering. He cursed under his breath, then grimly informed the Gillerys:

  “I’m not the marrying kind—and I certainly wouldn’t get married to a woman whose brothers have to go hunt her a husband. Is that clear?”

  “You’re missin’ a chance to get yourself a right purty little wife,” frowned Dewey.

  “Cooks good grub,” offered Rick.

  Jim gritted his teeth, gestured impatiently with his Colt. “Mount up,” he breathed. “Leave your guns where they fell—and ride out!”

  “Ain’t no call for you to ...” began Dewey.

  “Out!” roared ex-Sergeant Rand, and he used the volume, the formidable vocal power that had subdued many a rebellious trooper.

  The brothers took one pace backward. Dewey frowned down at his fallen rifle and announced,

  “That there shooter was handed down to me by my sainted pappy—’fore he got took.”

  “Leave it where it is,” scowled Jim. “You can come back for it later—after I’m long gone and far away from here.” He stared hard at the other brother. “As for your six-gun, I wouldn’t try to use it again if I were you. At least not until you’ve had it checked over by a gunsmith. When a gun-barrel gets hit by a
forty-five slug, there’s bound to be damage. You try using it—and it’s apt to misfire, or blow up in your hand.”

  “He talks like he savvies guns,” Rick remarked to his brother.

  “I gave you galoots an order!” barked Jim. “Mount up and ride!”

  The Gillerys trudged to their waiting horses, swung astride and rode away from Hingle Wells in an easterly direction. Then to Jim’s surprise, Polke returned to his chores as though nothing had happened, and so did Hingle. Their wives and children resumed their normal routine.

  He holstered his Colt and stared blankly at Benito. Benito shrugged and grinned.

  “I do not believe these Hingles and Polkes are loco,” he offered. “But these other ones—these Gillerys?” Another expressive shrug. “Quien sabe?”

  “You stay here,” ordered Jim. “I want to work out a deal with the storekeeper.”

  He climbed the steps and re-entered the store. Hingle had returned to his position behind the counter and was eyeing him shrewdly.

  “I guess,” he mused, “you’re wonderin’ about those Gillerys—huh, Mr. ...?”

  “Rand, Jim Rand.” Jim helped himself to an apple from the barrel beside the counter, bit into it and nodded emphatically. “Yes, I do wonder about ’em, but I’m damn near afraid to ask.”

  “They weren’t foolin’,” grinned Hingle. “They really do aim to find a husband for Lucy Rose—and fast.”

  “The lady ...” Jim chose his words with care, “has been—uh—compromised—maybe?”

  “Shucks, no,” frowned Hingle. “Lucy Rose is plumb respectable—for a Gillery. Purty gal, too.”

  “Why then ...?” began Jim.

  “Dunno the whole story,” drawled Hingle. “It’s tied up with old Brigg Fullerton’s will. He owned a ranch hereabouts. Seems he left a passel of greenbacks to little Lucy Rose, only she can’t collect unless she gets wed before her next birthday—or somethin’ like that. Anyways, those brothers of hers been tryin’ awful hard.”

  “I’m going to ask you a fair question,” said Jim. “It seems mighty reasonable under the circumstances.”