Gunsmoke and Gold

by William W. Johnstone

  The question caught him by surprise. “Me? Hell, no. Why’d you ask?”

  “Oh, just stories I’ve heard about you, is all.”

  Charlie watched Jack Linwood make his afternoon rounds, then enter the Red Dog. “I’ve been a lot of things, son. Drover, trail boss, marshal, I even farmed for two years to try to get away from my reputation. Over in Kansas. Sorriest two years I ever spent in my life. Horse got so he wouldn’t even have nothin’ to do with me. Widder lady got to makin’ eyes at me and I knowed it was time to hit the trail. That woman must have weighed a good three hundred pounds and had a butt on her two ax handles wide. Whole house shook when she walked in. I was skired the damn roof was gonna fall in on me. I left in the dead of night and I ain’t never gone back.”

  Matt and Dewey stopped directly across the street from them and Matt pointed. Charlie followed the direction of the point and grunted.

  “More riders comin’ in. Comin’ from the east, so they’re probably Lightning hands. I wish I could figure what’s goin’ on here.”

  Simmons of the general store and Walters of the saddle and gun shop walked up. “Charlie,” Walters said, “them Circle V and Lightning hands all walk like they’re bad stove up.”

  “I noticed it too,” Simmons said. “What’s goin’ on here, Charlie?”

  “Go get Sam, Jimmy. Move, boy! We got big trouble brewin’.”

  “But they don’t have no guns!” Jimmy said.

  “Yeah, they do, boy. ’Member you commented about how funny them hands was walkin’?”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “They got ’em stuck down in their boots!”

  Eighteen

  Matt noticed that the riders coming in from the east had stopped just shy of the warning sign. Tiny hairs bristled on the back of his neck. He watched Jimmy run across the street and duck into the alley, obviously heading for Juan’s café and cantina. He looked at Charlie. The man lifted one Colt out of leather and then tapped the side of his boot.

  “Damn!” Matt said.

  “What’s wrong?” Dewey asked.

  “Get to the office and get a rifle. Get ready for some action if those Lightning hands come into town. If they come, they’ll come fogging. Move.”

  Matt stepped into the newly-named Cattle Club and jerked both .44’s out of leather. “First man who makes a move, I plug. So just stand easy, boys.”

  “What’s up, Matt?” Jack asked, turning from the bar.

  “They got six-guns in their boots, Jack. And a gang of Lightning hands have stopped just short of the warning sign. They’re up to something.”

  A Lightning hand grabbed for his boot and came up with a six-gun. Matt drilled him dead center in the chest; the room exploded in gunfire and the air was filled with smoke.

  Across the street, Charlie and Sam had the hands in the Red Dog lying belly-down on the floor, while Jimmy collected the bootguns.

  In the Cattle Club, Ned, seeing the battle was going against them, ran out the back door and headed straight for the cantina. It was the worst mistake he ever made, and for the rest of his life—which would not be all that lengthy—he would curse that decision. He ran through the dining area, cussing and hollering and waving his six-gun. He caught motion out of the corner of his eye and slid to a stop, leveling his pistol. A searing pain tore through him, beginning at his wrist. He heard something hit the floor and looked down. He started screaming.

  What had hit the floor was his six-gun, with his hand still wrapped around the butt of the Remington. He lifted horror-filled eyes. Juan was smiling at him, a big, heavy, and bloody Bowie knife in his right hand.

  “Now, señor,” Juan said. “You will pay the ultimate price for violating my daughter.” He swung the knife, the blunt edge hitting Ned on the side of the head and knocking him down.

  “Juan’s a-draggin’ that no-good out the back door, Pa,” Joe said.

  “Yep,” Reed said, turning the page in his Bible and taking a sip of tequila.

  “Cut his hand off, too, Pa,” Jake said.

  “Yep. And something tells me Juan ain’t through cuttin’, neither.”

  “You reckon we ought to go fetch the doc, Pa?”

  “Nope. Tell the blacksmith to git his bellows a-pumpin’. Git a iron white-hot. Move.”

  “Nothing is working,” Dale said to Chrisman. The men sat in Dale’s office at the bank.

  “At least we got Robert and Denise out of the picture,” Chrisman said with a sigh. He cursed. “And we were so close. So close.”

  “We’re still close. Just stay calm. The gold and silver is still out there, and only we know where it is.”

  The shooting had stopped. A horrible scream ripped through the town.

  “What in God’s name was that?” Chrisman said, getting up and looking out the window.

  But Dale wasn’t terribly interested. “Perhaps I spoke too hastily. Actually, all this trouble is working for us, not against us. Sooner or later, Ramer and Blake will catch a bullet and that will be that. In the meantime, have Red and his boys start rustling their cattle. Drive them north and run them off cliffs. They’ve got notes coming due pretty soon. The sheriff up there can be bought. I’ll see to that. What are you looking at?”

  “Bodies bein’ dragged out of my place.”

  “Either of you boys hurt?” Charlie asked, walking over to the Cattle Club.

  “No,” Matt told him. “What was that scream just a moment ago?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Ned came staggering out of an alley, lurching as he walked, his face white against the pain. “He gelded me!” Ned squalled. “He cut me like a horse!” He fell down in the dirt and passed out.

  Doctor Lemmon took his time getting to the man. “Maybe there is justice in the world after all,” the doctor was heard to mutter.

  * * *

  “You don’t demand a damn thing!” Sheriff Linwood got all up in Hugo Raner’s face. “And you sure don’t tell me how to run this office.”

  “I want Juan Garcia arrested, by God.”

  Jack smiled and sat back down in his chair. Matt and Sam and Charlie sat in the office and smiled along with him. Dewey and Jimmy were checking the town.

  It was the morning after the aborted attack on the town by Lightning and Circle V hands.

  “On what charge, Hugo?” Jack asked.

  “He castrated Ned!”

  Jack shook his head. “We don’t have any proof of that—only his word. Can’t find the big knife Ned said he used. No sign of blood in the alley by his place. And you know what else, Raner? Must be eighty, ninety citizens of this town that’s been in my office, yesterday and today, who will get up in a court of law and swear they were in his café bein’ waited on—by Juan—when the incident took place.” He smiled again. “It’s like the Bible says, you reap what you sow.”

  “What the hell do you mean by that?”

  “You alibied for Ned after Victoria was raped. And everybody in this town knew you were nothin’ but a low-down liar when you said it. That’s what I mean.”

  Raner opened his mouth. Jack closed it.

  “Don’t make threats. Not agin me, not agin this town, not agin the people in it. Do it, and I’ll put you in jail.”

  Raner struggled to keep his temper in check. “I want to pay my hands’ fines.”

  “Fine. Thousand dollars ought to cover it.”

  “A thousand dollars!” Raner squalled. “Are you out of your mind?”

  “It just went up to fifteen hundred,” Jack said calmly.

  “Damn you!” Raner screamed, and leaned over the desk, grabbing Jack by the shirt and hauling him out of the chair.

  Charlie stepped over and laid a cosh on the back of Raner’s head. The big man sank to the floor with a sigh. Put a terrible dent in Raner’s expensive hat.

  “Put him in a cell,” Jack said. He picked up a pen and wrote in the jail register: Hugo Raner, jailed for assaulting a peace officer. Fine, One hundred dollars.

  Pete
Harris stepped into the office just as Hugo was being dragged into a cell. He chuckled at the sight. “Man, you are gonna have one irritated feller on your hands when he wakes up. What’d he do?”

  He listened and shook his head. “I always thought Hugo had better sense than that. But I’ve been proved wrong so many times here lately, nothin’ surprises me no more.” He poured a cup of coffee and sat down. “How’s Ned?”

  “He’ll live, Doc Lemmon says,” Matt told him. “If you call that living.”

  Pete shuddered at the thought. “Juan ain’t near-abouts through, boys. You all know that, don’t you?”

  “Do you blame him?” Jack asked.

  “I wouldn’t have waited this long,” Pete replied. When Hugo Raner woke up, he was killing mad. But he had enough sense to outwardly calm himself and pay his fine. Jack lowered the fines of his hands and cut them loose. Blake came in just before dusk and got his men out of jail.

  Jack told him the same thing he’d told Hugo. “Blake, this has got to stop. Men died this day—and there wasn’t no call for them to die. This ain’t got nothin’ to do with sheep no more. This is a personal thing that you and Hugo got goin’. You ain’t got no support in this town. Maybe half a dozen people out of the entire population. The rest is hard agin you.”

  Blake, just as Hugo had done, stood facing the sheriff, his face hard and uncompromising.

  Matt said, “Blake, you and Hugo are playing right into the hands of Dale and Chrisman; you’re both doing exactly what they want you to do. Sam summed it up with divide and conquer . . .”

  “I’m not interested in the opinions of a gunfighter and a damned half-breed,” Blake said.

  “Get out of this office,” Jack said, shaking his head. “You’re just like Hugo: stupid.”

  * * *

  Dusk began settling over the town. The evening was warm and the men sat outside the office for a breath of air.

  “Did Pete say anything about his son?” Sam asked.

  “Said the boy was still in bed,” Matt replied. “Said Robert hurt so bad it was hard for him to move. Doc Lemmon said the boy had about six busted ribs. Pete really stomped him.”

  “Should have killed him,” Charlie said. “The boy won’t forget this. You can bet that right now he’s abed just plannin’ and schemin’ on how to get back at his pa. Has anybody heard anything about that Raner gal?”

  No one had.

  “Vicious,” Jack said. “She was the brains behind their plans. Robert’s not smart enough to figure out anything like that. We ain’t heard the last from them two.”

  No one would argue that.

  They looked up as a dozen men came riding slowly into town, most of the riders bearded and hard-looking and heavily armed. They reined up in front of the Red Dog and dismounted. The lawmen noticed that they slipped the hammer-thongs from their guns the instant their boots touched the ground.

  Matt got up from the bench and walked to the end of the boardwalk to get a better look at the men in the rapidly fading light. He watched them enter the saloon, all of them glancing his way and giving him some dirty looks.

  “The man in front is Del Monroe,” Jack called from the bench. “Gunfighter from down Texas way. The big, fat, ugly one is Don Edison. The one behind him is Walker. I believe another one is called Bolinger. I don’t know the others.” He stood up. “Let’s go collect some guns, boys.”

  Jimmy and Dewey stepped back into the office for a moment while the others walked up the street and pushed open the batwings of the Red Dog. The dozen men were lined up along the bar, being served beer and whiskey. They turned as one to stare at the lawmen.

  “Jack,” Del said. “Ain’t seen you in a coon’s age. You all re-formed now, totin’ that star?”

  “Don’t insult me by sayin’ I was ever as low as you, Monroe,” Jack told him. “You boys saw the sign comin’ in. Shuck them gunbelts.”

  “And if we don’t?” a burly gunhand asked, dropping his right hand to his side.

  “We’ll take them,” he was told.

  “Old man,” the gunhand said with a laugh, “I don’t think you got the strength to pull that iron out of leather. You got a name, pops?”

  “Charlie Starr.”

  The gunhand tensed, then slowly lifted his hand and placed it on the bar.

  Jack cut his eyes first to the right. “That’s Matt Bodine.” To the left. “That’s Sam Two Wolves. Anybody got anything else they’d like to say before them gunbelts is handed over?”

  Jimmy and Dewey pushed through the batwings, each carrying a sawed-off shotgun.

  Del chuckled, then downed his whiskey. “If you’ll be so kind as to direct us to the Lightning range, we’ll be movin’ on, Jack. No need to get testy, now, is there?”

  “Head north to the crossroads. Take the right fork. You can’t miss it.”

  The men downed their drinks and walked out. Many a fight had been avoided by the sight of sawed-off shotguns. Del was the last one to leave the bar. Jack Linwood stopped him.

  “You’d be smart to keep on ridin’, Del. Louis Longmont is here, too.”

  “Longmont!” the gun-for-hire said. “Nobody told us nothin’ about this gang of gunhawks bein’ here and totin’ badges. What the hell is goin’ on, Jack?”

  “That’s a good question, Del. If I ever find out exactly, I’ll tell you. Ride on out, Del. This ain’t worth dyin’ over.”

  “We agreed to ride for the brand, Del. That’s the way it’s gonna be.”

  “Then you’re all gonna be buried here,” Jack told him.

  Del pushed him aside and stepped out into the night. The men waited until the sounds of their horses had faded away.

  “I recognized a couple of them,” Charlie said. “The one with the scar on his face is called Gant. The skinny one is called Woody.”

  Matt said, “Reno’s the one with the fancy spurs, and the one wearing the black vest was Dean. I think the stocky one with the bullethole in his hat is known as Porter.”

  “Stakes just went up in this game,” Sam said. “Porter is supposed to be a bad one.”

  Matt cut his eyes to his blood brother. “You seen any of his graveyards, brother?”

  “Can’t say that I have.”

  Charlie slipped the loop back on the hammer of his right-hand Colt. “All them boys that just left is scum. Bounty hunters and back-shooters. And there’s something else you can all bet on.” The others waited. “They’ll be more just like ’em comin’ in.”

  * * *

  There was no trouble of any kind for several days. No night-riding was reported, and no hands from the Lightning or Circle V came into town. Both Hugo and Blake came into town to send telegrams, but they caused no trouble and their guns were hung on the saddlehorn. They left as soon as they had concluded their business at the telegraph office.

  Robert was brought into town in the bed of a wagon and got a room at the hotel. A Box H hand drove another wagon in with all of Robert’s possessions. Pete had kicked him out of the house and told him never to return.

  When the young man did leave the hotel, he walked with the aid of two canes and moved very slowly. Mostly he stayed in his room and remained in a laudanum-induced stupor.

  Toward the end of the first peaceful week the town of Dale had seen in months, Denise Raner was brought into town, accompanied by her brother, Carl, and two Lightning hands. A wagon followed the riders and the buggy. Denise’s belongings were piled in the bed.

  Carl hung his guns on his saddlehorn, but those watching him knew he didn’t like it. He escorted his sister into the hotel lobby, checked her in, and left without saying a word to anybody, including his sister.

  Matt and Sam strolled over to the hotel. For the second time since their arrival, the brothers had been banned from dining or staying at the hotel by Dale, who was not speaking to them because of the terrible and according to Dale untrue and libelous accusations brought against him by the brothers. But he couldn’t prevent lawmen from asking questions. And t
he desk clerk was scared to death of the famed gunfighters.

  “Their father is footin’ the bills,” the desk clerk said. “Accordin’ to what I was told, as soon as Robert is able to get around on his own, he’s to leave this country and not come back. Same with Miss Raner. I don’t know nothin’ else, boys.”

  They walked to Juan’s café. Victoria was up and working again, but the sparkle was gone from her eyes and she seldom smiled. Not even at Sam.

  “Her madre and I are sending her down to Arizona to stay with relatives there,” Juan said. “We think it’s the best for her.”

  “I agree,” Sam said. “When’s she leaving?”

  “This afternoon.”

  Sam got up to say his goodbyes to the young woman.

  Juan sat down at the table with Matt and poured them both a tequila. “I hear that Señor Vernon has brought in gunfighters.”

  “Yeah. I’m afraid so.”

  “Then no one has learned anything from all this tragedy and bloodshed?”

  Matt shook his head. “I guess not, Juan.” He watched the man drink his tequila and stand up. “Where are you going?”

  “To sharpen my knife.”

  Nineteen

  The fragile peace in the area was broken that night by another raid on a small farmer and his family. The man and teenage son were killed, the mother and ten-year-old-girl managed to run into the woods and hide before their men were cut down by a hail of bullets. The house and barn was burned to the ground, all the livestock was killed, and the family dog was trampled to death under the steel-shod hooves of the raiders’ horses.

  The little girl was still holding the little dog, wrapped up in a piece of sacking, when Reed and his sons found her and her mother.

  “All right, boys,” Reed told his sons. “This is all I’m a-fixin’ to take. They want war, they’ll get war. Anybody ridin’ a Circle V or Lightning-branded horse, blow ’em out of the saddle.”

  The lanky mountain-bred man and three of his sons found shovels and started digging graves, while Joe Reed rode into town for the sheriff, and for some blankets to wrap the bullet-riddled bodies of the father and son in. The remaining family members had lost everything. They had nothing but the night clothing they were wearing when the raiders struck.