One Man, One Gun

by Matt Chisholm

  Issuing new and classic fiction from Yesterday and Today!

  He rode hard and he rode tall, slamming his way along a wild Colorado trail, beset by Indians and tricked by a treacherous friend. He fought with his fists and with his gun. He loved and lost and lived to love another day. He was a Storm down to the bottom of his boots, he challenged the world, thumbed his nose at danger and took on odds that would make a hero pale.

  ONE MAN, ONE GUN

  STORM 5

  By Matt Chisholm

  First published by Mayflower Books in 1972

  Copyright © 1972, 2014 by Matt Chisholm

  Published by Piccadilly Publishing at Smashwords: January 2014

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Estate.

  Chapter One

  It was spring and the world was young.

  So was Jody Storm. He was twenty-four years old and all winter he had been raring to go. Now he was going. He rode a good horse, he had money in his pocket and his father had trusted him on a man-size errand.

  All winter he had fretted, all winter he had bitterly surveyed his present position — the youngest man in the family, the green kid, the butt of all the jokes. And they could be pretty rough around a cow-camp. But now he was free of all that, he was riding high and he had left the prison of familiar existence behind him. Sure, his family was great. Pa was great, Ma was great, they were all great, his two brothers, his sisters, his sister-in-law, Uncle Mart, he wouldn’t change them for the world. He just wanted to get away from them all. Clay’s wife, Sarah, who boarded him at the eastern end of Three Springs Valley, she was the best cook in the world next to Ma, but a man didn’t live for food alone.

  He couldn’t make out why they all treated him as irresponsible and young. Hell, he was twenty-four, he’d fought through the last years of the War Between the States, why he’d even been wounded, but that didn’t seem to weigh in his favor. He worked as well or better than the next man, he’d toted a gun in defense of the valley against all comers, he could ride anything on four legs, but still they treated him like a green kid.

  He’d complained about it to Pa when they were out on the range together.

  Pa nodded. Always calm, Pa. Always listen to what a fellow had to say. Jody had to give him that. But it was Pa’s infernal calm that riled him up. If the old man would get mad once in a while and clear the air it would have been better. But, no, when Will Storm heard Jody’s complaint, he just nodded and said: “Son, the only trouble you have is youth.”

  “Youth?” shouted Jody in disgust. “How old does a feller have to get before he ain’t a youth? I ain’t no youth, Pa. I’m all of twenty-four. When you was my age you was married to Ma.”

  Pa smiled, gently. The sight sickened Jody to rage.

  Pa said: “Then you ain’t me, Jode.”

  Jody wanted to say: “An’ thank God for that,” but Pa might be quiet and calm, but you didn’t get sassy with him just the same. You trod carefully with Pa. He had a way of taking it out on a man.

  “Pa, I jest gotta git outa here. Now I said it. I know you an’ the rest think the world starts and finishes in this here valley. But I’m jest about filled up with Three Springs right up to the eyeballs.”

  “Which is as it should be,” said Will.

  Christ, thought Jody, ain’t he never goin’ to disagree with me. If only the old man would give him a fight ...

  “That’s real nice,” said Jody, employing as much irony as he knew how, but knowing he was wasting his time with Pa, “you agreein’ with me. But it don’t do me no good. Do it, now?”

  Will Storm looked at him, his youngest son, and his eyes crinkled. Jody was the wild one, all right. Full of ginger and get-up-and-go, like his Uncle Mart. Maybe too like his Uncle Mart for his parents’ ease of mind. Long ago Mart had taken the wrong fork in the trail and only recently had he come back into the fold of decent men. The same streak was in both of them. Anger too near the surface, impulse ruling them. Both too enthusiastic about skill with guns. Sure, in this country a man had to learn to look after himself. But a man shouldn’t worship violence. That road took you to hell, either a living hell here on earth or to a hotter hell below.

  “I been considering son,” Will said. “Two things. One, maybe I ain’t trusted you enough. It’s natural. Your ma an’ me’ve been anxious about you. You’re our youngest son. Folks are like that. Two, that fancy horse of yourn has been eatin’ its fool head off all winter and it could do with a mite of exercise.”

  Jody frowned, wondering what was coming next. Suddenly excitement fluttered in him.

  Will went on: “So I’m goin’ to solve both them problems at one go. First, I’m goin’ to trust you with somethin’ I’d prefer to do myself. Second, you’re goin’ to give that fancy horse some travel.”

  “What d’you mean, Pa?” Jody demanded.

  “Charlie Rolf lives two hundred miles from here,” Will said. “He has a hundred thousand dollars, so I heard tell, and durn nearly as many cows. He has the finest bulls this side of Missouri and a pretty daughter. That should give a young feller like you some incentive. I want you to go to Charlie and bring me back the finest bull money can buy. I’ll give you a month’s wages and pay you a dollar a day. You come back with that bull harmed in any way or without him an’ I’ll sure have your hide.”

  “Pa,” Jody said. It was all he could say, for a moment.

  He couldn’t wait to start. He said so and Will said he didn’t know what was holding him.

  He turned his horse around and raced as fast as he could go back to Clay’s house on the eastern side of the valley. At the sound of his horse pounding into the yard with Jody letting out a couple of Comanche yells, Sarah Storm, Clay’s wife, came to the door. He piled out of the saddle, reached her in a half-dozen bounds, kissed her and whirled her around a couple of times. She glared at him, red-faced and breathless. She wasn’t used to such treatment from Jody.

  “What in heaven’s name has gotten into you, Jody?” she demanded.

  He told her. It came out in a rush. He was so excited he couldn’t keep still. He was going off alone into the wilderness. At last he had gotten away from the family.

  She smiled. The Storms seemed to specialize in beautiful women and Clay wasn’t any exception. Sarah was enough to make a man’s mouth water and think ambitious thoughts that would get him nowhere because Clay wouldn’t let him and Sarah wasn’t that kind of a woman. She didn’t see any man as a man except Clay.

  “Jody,” she said, “calm down. Now, you take it easy. This is no picnic. It’s dangerous country between here and the Rolf place.”

  “Now don’t you start, woman,” he cried. “I’m a man growed an’ I can look out for myself.”

  “You’re a great big overgrown schoolboy,” she said, “and you know it.”

  He became a little mad. It was bad enough having the rest of the family saying things like that. He had a soft spot for Sarah and he would have liked to rate high with her.

  “I’ll show you,” he told her. “I’ll just show you. I can look out for myself better’n the next feller. Heck, I came through the war without no family seein’ if I washed behind the ears. You’ll see. This is goin’ to be the best durned trip a man ever had. I got a feelin’, Sarah. This is my chance. Why, old man Rolf could offer me a
job as a foreman, maybe make me manager of one of his outfits. I might save his daughter’s life from savage Indians or maybe fight off a passle of rustlers. I got this feelin’.”

  “You had that feeling before,” she told him. “And it’s gotten you into a lot of trouble. Listen, Jody, just go carefully. Show them you’re steady and reliable. That’s why Will’s doing this. Don’t you see?”

  “The old man thinks I’m goin’ to fall down on this,” he said. “But I’ll jest show him. I’ll show all of you.”

  “You’ll need supplies,” she said, bringing him back to earth. “When do you start?”

  “Now,” he said. “Right this minute.”

  “There’s only half a day’s daylight left. Ride at dawn.”

  “Not on your sweet life. I’m off now.”

  She tried to persuade him otherwise, but he wouldn’t have it. He was already on his way to the corral to rope his favorite horse. This was Blue, a Spanish horse, not the most beautiful animal ever, but a stayer and a good swimmer. The Storms weren’t fooled by a horse’s looks. They wanted animals that could give a man a day’s work and live on short rations and little water if necessary. The gelding was five years old and smart and, like most of the Storms’ private horses, he was gentle. No Storm took pride in the fact that his mount gave battle every time a rider put a leg across him. Will Storm had firm ideas about the relationship between a rider and his mount and he saw to it that his sons shared them. When Jody climbed the corral fence, Blue came toward him nickering with pleasure.

  For a pack-animal, Jody chose Sox, sturdy bay gelding with four white sox, a sober disposition and a will to work. Sox would keep up, wouldn’t wander and would keep on coming. He tied his horses in front of the house and went inside. Sarah had his supplies laid out all ready. There was everything there that he would need. The thought passed through his head that he could do a lot worse than one day find a wife like Sarah. But that day was a long way off. He hoped.

  He toted the supplies outside, made two packs of equal size and hitched them to the pack-saddle on Sox. Sarah came out to watch. He had sobered down a little by now, but the excitement still burned inside him. He’d made up his mind to show the girl what a steady fellow he was.

  He stepped into the saddle and said: “Tell Clay goodbye for me. Tell him I’ll bring back a bull that’ll make his eyes pop.”

  Sarah twinkled and said: “You mean gentleman cow,” referring to the convention of the period.

  He blushed and said: “Beg pardon. An’, Sarie, I — uh — wa-al, I — wa-al, see here, Sarie, I’m mighty beholden for all you done. I sure am.”

  “Mercy,” Sarah told him, “there’s no call for that. You’re not going to China, Jody.”

  That was it, he thought, suddenly without warning he did feel he was going to China or some such place. He lifted his hand and said: “See you,” and turned Blue and rode out. He didn’t turn and look back till he reached the motte of trees in the bend of the creek. He waved and Sarah returned the wave with her apron.

  He set his horses to a lope and ran them across the valley, not seeing any of the family or the crew until he came in sight of the big house standing on the rise near the two creeks that watered this side of the valley. At the sound of his horses, Kate and Melissa came out and ran toward him.

  Lordy, he thought, now the women start.

  As he stepped down from the saddle, his mother came out of the house, wiping her hands on her apron. Looking at Martha Storm you could see at once where the nineteen-year-old Kate and fifteen-year-old Melissa inherited their looks. They all possessed the same fine bone structure of the face.

  Kate said: “Aren’t you the lucky one. Why wasn’t I born a boy?”

  Will Storm came out onto the stoop and watched them. Martha gave no sign that she wanted to say anything. You never knew with her, sometimes she laid down the law, sometimes she stayed still. Jody knew that she liked to keep the family together. She had enough of partings during the war. Just him going this two hundred miles was hurting her, but she wouldn’t let on.

  Melissa was dancing around, talking, talking, talking. She always talked a lot and he didn’t pay her much heed. Pa came forward and said: “All set?”

  Will handed him some money and he stowed most of it under his shirt in his money-belt. The rest he stuffed into his pockets. Now Will handed him a letter.

  “That’s for Rolf,” he said.

  “Sure,” said Jody. He looked around, seeing the different feelings in their faces — envy on the girls’, apprehension on his mother’s. His mother’s concern angered him.

  “Quit lookin’ like that, Ma”, he said. “I ain’t a-goin’ to my funeral.”

  “See that you don’t,” she said and then looked as if she could bite off her tongue.

  “Shall you stop at the springs for the night?” Will asked.

  “No,” Jody told him. “There’s nothin’ at the Springs for me.” Which was a lie. There were drink and women at the Springs and Jody was excited by the thought of both. “I’ll push on as far as I can before dark.”

  “Good. Off with you, then.”

  Jody stepped aboard and looked down at them.

  Ma smiled and said: “Have a good time, son.”

  “Bring me back something nice, Jode,” Melissa told him.

  “Watch out for yourself,” said Kate.

  Pa said: “See you bring back that bull, son.”

  Jody grinned.

  “Pa,” he promised, “ifn I don’t have that bull, I don’t be comin’ back.”

  Pa grinned and Jody urged Blue forward. He turned along the corral fence out into the valley and waved back to them. All of them waved and then he was trotting up the valley toward Broken Spur country. The valley was lush and rich in the spring, a cattleman’s paradise with good water and grass. The phalanx of the mountains marched away beyond the sight of man to the north, south and west. It was a man’s country and at last Jody Storm was a man in it. What more could a man ask for than to be twenty-four-years-old on a spring day, money in his pocket, a loaded gun on his hip and a good horse under him? Jody felt fit to take on the whole world.

  He could have cut around to the west and avoided the Broken Spur range, for the Brack riders were still smarting from the beating they had taken the year before. Jody laughed to himself. The Storms sure had cut the Bracks down to size. With all their money and all their men they had been no match for the Three Creeks country men. So he rode up into the pass and went down into Broken Spur directly from the south to cock a snoop at Brack’s hired men should they happen to be around. He half-hoped he might meet one riding solo and threaten to shoot the ass off him if he got in his way. If there were two of them he would have to behave a little more circumspectly. Jody may have been a mite wild, but he was no fool and knew that one man wasn’t as good as two men.

  But Broken Spur was conspicuous by its absence. He rode clear along the western line of the range without seeing a living soul. There were cows a-plenty, but no men. And so he reached the Spring Creek road and once he was on it he faced the fact that he had lied to Pa and he had no intention of passing Andy Grebb’s place to camp alone in the hills. He was going to have a last fling before he hit the trail.

  When he sighted Grebb’s, dusk was starting to settle in. The lamps had been lit in the place and there were horses racked outside. There were always horses tied up outside Grebb’s. It was called a ranch, but it was no more a ranch than Jody was a fairy. It was a long untidy string of buildings with a corral at the southern end. In it was some of the fancy horses of which Grebb was so proud. He was always challenging men who owned good horses to race. He never rode himself, but Charlie Stott, his strong-arm, would ride for him. Stott did everything that Grebb didn’t want to do or couldn’t do for himself. Which covered a long list of things, a number of which the law might have frowned upon. Some said it included killing a man or two. For Grebb was a man who didn’t fancy opposition.

  Part of the buil
dings were used as a saloon, another as a house and a third as a store. If you wanted to buy store goods in this neck of the woods there wasn’t anywhere to go but Grebb’s. So Andy grew rich. And fat. He sold anything that men wanted. Which included women and drink.

  The roar of talk and laughter, the sound of a tuneless piano and the shrieking laugh of a woman came from the saloon as Jody dismounted, tied up and went inside.

  The atmosphere hit him hard after the clean mountain air. It was composed mostly of liquor fumes, tobacco smoke and the smell of unwashed human bodies. If cleanliness was next to Godliness then the cow-country males were certainly a Godless crowd. If that fact worried them, they didn’t show it as Jody walked in on them and surveyed the scene they composed. Grebb had improved the place since Jody had been there last. He had actually built a bar in place of the planks laid across barrelheads. It was made of green lumber, but no matter, it was a bar. He had also rashly invested some hard cash in two tables at which now sat engrossed card-players. There were two or three women there, mostly over-thin or over-fat biddies from the city who could only have appealed to men who were half out of their senses for the sight and touch of a white woman. One look at them convinced Jody that strong drink was the first item on the agenda if ever he was to get around to performing acts of sexual prowess this night.

  With this in mind, he approached the bar that was festooned with cowhands, bull-whackers, mule-skinners and a half-dozen men whose occupations were not readily apparent. They all had three things in common — they smelled of drink, they were mostly unwashed and they hadn’t put razor to face for some considerable time. A more bewhiskied and bewhiskered crowd Jody had not seen for some time.

  He bellied up to the bar and called. Grebb himself greeted him. He looked like a cross between a prizefighter which he wasn’t and a stage comedian which he wasn’t either. There was too much fat on him and his eyes were too close together. He didn’t look intelligent and he wasn’t. He was cunning, hard and an opportunist. Which was getting him by admirably.