Berger grabbed the handle of Smoke’s knife, ripped the blade from his body, and flung it at Smoke. The knife fell short, landing at Smoke’s feet. Berger couldn’t control the horse. It bolted, carrying its bullet-riddled rider out of the ranch yard and into the darkness.
Preacher ran up to Smoke, who had his right arm clamped tight against his body now, and said, “Are you all right, son?”
“I will be,” Smoke said. “This is just a scratch. We’d better find Matt.”
“Shouldn’t be hard to do,” Preacher said. “Looks like the fracas is about over.”
There were only scattered shots now as the defenders finished off the last of the raiders. A few of the hired gunmen had thrown down their weapons and surrendered already, and the other survivors were quick to do so.
As Smoke and Preacher hurried toward the ranch house, Matt came out onto the porch and called their names. He leaped down and came to meet them.
“Smoke, how bad are you hit?”
“Not bad,” Smoke assured him. “I’ll be all right. How about you?”
“Not a scratch. Preacher?”
“You know I’m too old and ornery to die,” Preacher replied. “Them dang bullets just go around me.”
“Smoke,” Matt said, and something in the younger man’s voice told Smoke there was bad news. “The baron wasn’t so lucky. He’s gone.”
“Blast it!” Smoke said. “One of those hired guns got him?”
“Well ... not the way you think. That redheaded woman, Greta Schiller, killed him.”
“What!”
“Best I can figure it out,” Matt said, “she was working for the baron’s enemies, too, just like Berger, only she was spying on him and waiting for a good chance to assassinate him.”
“Were you able to grab her?”
“No, but she didn’t get away. Erica killed her.”
The news that von Hoffman was dead had shaken Smoke, but at least the baron’s cousin had been able to avenge his murder. There was something fitting about that.
“Where’s Kane?” Matt went on.
Smoke pointed with his good arm.
“Over yonder. He’s out cold.”
Matt went over to Kane to check on him and came back shaking his head.
“He’s dead, Smoke. Looks like he must have choked on his own blood when he couldn’t get any air through that nose of his after you smashed it.”
Smoke shook his head. He wouldn’t lose any sleep over Kane’s death, but he honestly hadn’t meant to kill the man. He would have left it up to the law to hang him.
But maybe Preacher was right. Maybe he was getting too soft in his old age.
On the other hand, he thought, looking around at the carnage that surrounded the three of them, maybe not.
Epilogue
The small cemetery on the Rafter 9 grew considerably more crowded the next day as a dozen of the ranch’s defenders were laid to rest, including Baron Friedrich von Hoffman.
After the funerals, Smoke, the wound in his side bandaged up now, sat down with Erica to have a talk with her.
“I reckon this is your ranch now,” he told her. “You don’t have to make any decisions yet, but eventually you’ll have to figure out what you want to do with it.”
“I know what to do with it,” she replied without hesitation. “I will make it the very best ranch in this part of the country, just as Friedrich intended. And New Holtzberg will be a fine settlement, as well.” She gave an emphatic nod, despite her pale, tear-streaked face. “Dieter has promised to help me, and I know the others will, too.”
Smoke smiled and patted her hand.
“You know, I think you’ll be just fine,” he told her. “All of you.”
A worried frown creased her forehead.
“But what about Friedrich’s enemies, back in the old country? I am his heir. They may come after me, now that he is gone.”
“I don’t think so,” Smoke said. “I hate to say it, but they got what they wanted.”
Erica’s mouth tightened into a grim line, and her features hardened.
“Someday they will pay for what they have done,” she vowed.
“The settling up comes to everybody sooner or later,” Smoke said, “for the good and the bad alike. Best we can hope for is that the good we’ve done outweighs the rest of it.”
“In your case, Herr Jensen,” Erica said, smiling now, “I think there is no question about that.”
Smoke waited a few days to let the wound in his side heal a little more before he saddled his horse and got ready to ride for home. Preacher was going to join him.
“I think I’ll stick around here for a while, just to make sure Erica and Dieter get the ranch off on the right foot,” Matt said as he stood on the porch. Smoke and Preacher had led their saddled horses up to the house to say their good-byes.
Erica hugged both of them, and Dieter shook their hands.
“Don’t worry about us, Smoke,” Dieter said. “We will be fine.”
Smoke grinned and said, “With a true Western hombre like you around, Dieter, I’m sure of it. I’d like to stay, but I’ve got a ranch of my own to run, you know.”
“Maybe the Sugarloaf and the Rafter Nine can do some business sometime, ja? I mean, you reckon?”
“I reckon we just might,” Smoke told him.
As they rode away, headed south toward Colorado, Preacher said, “It’s a damn shame the baron didn’t make it. I never did like him very much, mind you. He still had too many o’ them high-falutin’ European ideas. But I got a hunch he would’ve come around in time.”
“I think so, too,” Smoke agreed. “He had a dream for this land where he brought his people, and at least that dream is still alive. I don’t think Erica and Dieter will let it die.”
“I don’t reckon they will, either ... but they ought to have a little easier time of it with both Kane and Berger dead.”
Smoke rubbed his jaw and frowned in thought.
“You know, we never did find Berger’s body,” he said quietly.
“Oh, hell, the wolves got it! You know that. I shot him full o’ holes, and you stuck a Bowie in him. You don’t reckon anybody could live through that, do you?”
“I wouldn’t think so,” Smoke admitted. “But I’d feel a mite better about it if I knew he was in the ground where he belongs.”
Preacher snorted and said, “You need to stop worryin’ about things that ain’t gonna happen. You got a pretty wife waitin’ for you at home, remember, and by now I’ll bet she’s missin’ you somethin’ powerful!”
“You know, I believe you’re right,” Smoke said with a grin. “Let’s go home.”
The porter took the man’s bag and helped him up the stairs into the private railroad car in the depot at Cheyenne. It was a warm night, but the fella was all wrapped up in an overcoat anyway, and he moved gingerly, like he was sick or hurt. And when he spoke, his voice rasped like a rusty gate.
“Thank you,” the passenger said. He pressed a coin into the porter’s hand, and the porter couldn’t help but notice how thin and pale the man’s fingers were.
“You’re mighty welcome, sir. You headed east on business?”
“No. I travel ... for my health.”
Well, that was no surprise, the porter thought. The poor varmint looked and sounded like he had one foot in the grave already.
“But when I come west again ... it will be for pleasure,” the passenger went on. “To look up an old friend ... a man named ... Jensen.”
That name was familiar to the porter for some reason, but he couldn’t place it just then. He didn’t worry about it, just tipped his cap to the passenger instead, and said, “You enjoy your trip now, sir.”
He left the car and started back across the platform toward the station. Behind him, with a hiss of steam and a clanking of its drivers, the train pulled out, heading into the night.
The porter paused, looked over his shoulder at it, and shook his head. His shoulders moved as a shu
dder went through him. The night seemed a mite colder all of a sudden.
He didn’t think about it for long. He had work to do. With another little shake of his head, he went back into the station.
PINNACLE BOOKS are published by
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Copyright © 2012 William W. Johnstone
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
Following the death of William W. Johnstone, the Johnstone family is working with a carefully selected writer to organize and complete Mr. Johnstone’s outlines and many unfinished manuscripts to create additional novels in all of his series like The Last Gunfighter, Mountain Man, and Eagles, among others. This novel was inspired by Mr. Johnstone’s superb storytelling.
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
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ISBN: 978-0-7860-3049-1
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