CHAPTER 21
GIBBON HAD NEVER swapped lead with more than two men at a time before, and he’d had to do it only once, when a couple of scatterbrained grub-liners got tired of stealing chickens for supper and held up the Landmark National Bank in Canaan.
Neither man had a good working pistol, and Gibbon and his deputy at the time—Lon Donner, who literally lost his head during the Old Trouble—plugged one in the wrist. Gibbon shot the other in the neck though he was aiming for the man’s shoulder.
That had been a mild skirmish—four boys playing cowboys and Indians—compared to how this was likely to pan out. Twelve drunk Double X men and a half-assed posse from Canaan with at least five drunks of its own. Gibbon didn’t know how wasted Thornberg was, but he’d smelled booze on his breath, and even Homer Rinski reeked of the bottle. What the hell was the world coming to, when Bible-slapping Christians turned to guns and alcohol?
Gibbon only hoped that the Double X men were as tight as they normally would be this time of night and that his men would be able to take out a few of Magnusson’s men before the Double X crew filled them all with lead. That would be something, anyway.
Now he and Rinski crept down the trail in the dark as the others fanned out to take their own positions at various points around the roadhouse. Gibbon crouched low and was irritated to see that Rinski was not doing likewise. The old soul-burner was strolling down the trail as though en route to a Saturday-night prayer meeting, the only difference being the double-barrel side-by-side he carried under his arm.
Gibbon approached the corral, where a dozen saddled horses milled, turning their heads to watch the strangers and to sniff the air. The men were spooky but not spooky enough to warrant the commotion of driving them off.
“Easy now, easy,” Gibbon whispered, crawling between the slats.
When he and Rinski had hunkered down behind the corral and a feed trough filled with green-smelling hay, with a good view of the cabin, Rinski rumbled darkly, “What are we waiting for, Sheriff?”
Gibbon frowned. The wrath of the righteous. “I’m waiting for everyone to get settled. Keep your shirt on, Homer.”
Hawk nose aimed at the cabin, from which the sound of table slaps and occasional hoots rose. Rinski said, “I don’t want them to be so drunk they don’t know what’s happening to them, that they don’t know what they’re payin’ for.”
Gibbon observed the man sharply, trying to restrain his anger. “Just remember,” he said, “I’m giving them a chance to give themselves up. Nobody shoots until I’ve done that.”
Rinski’s voice rumbled up out of his chest like distant thunder. “Those who ignore the law do not deserve its protection.”
“I couldn’t agree with you more, Homer, but we’re not out here to draft an amendment to the Constitution.”
“I don’t care about man’s law; I care about God’s law,” Rinski said. He stared at the cabin like a dog fixes on a treed cat. Gibbon laughed ruefully and shook his head.
When he thought the rest of the posse had had enough time to gain their positions, he took a deep breath and released it. “All right, I’m gonna call ’em out.”
“Hold on,” Rinski growled, and nodded at the cabin.
The door squeaked open and two men in sheepskin coats and wool collars stepped onto the porch, descended the steps, and walked into the road, unbuttoning their flies. One was tall and broad-shouldered; the other was of average height, and thin.
The shorter man said, “Just one more jack and I could be pokin’ some real pussy in Milestown.”
“It’s always one more card with you, Chris,” the tall man said. “One more card and you’re sitting on top of the world.”
“Oh, you didn’t see my hand, man. You didn’t see it.”
As the tinny sound of urine hitting the hard ground rose on the still night, the door opened again, and another man stepped out. A big round figure in a buffalo coat, he took a single step, turned to the right, and opened his pants, keeping his head down.
“What you two doin’ way out there—playin’ grabby-pants?” he said when he’d gotten a steady stream going.
The tall man said in a throaty voice, languorous with alcohol, “We’re enjoyin’ the stars.”
“Shit,” said the man by the door.
“You stole my jack, Cobb,” the man called Chris said.
Cobb gave a soft, high-pitched hoot.
“It’s gonna be payback time, ya sorry son of a bitch,” Chris said.
“Not for me,” Cobb replied. “I’m throwin’ in and spendin’ the rest of the night with the whore.”
“No way, amigo.”
“Si, si, señor. I paid Gutzman off that pile I just cleared from you boys.” He gave another hoot, louder this time.
“Come on, Cobb. I was close, man. I was really close.”
“Shut up,” the tall man said. He was staring straight out at the corral. “Somethin’s got the horses riled.”
The short man watched and listened for five seconds then said, “Coyotes.”
“Prob’ly,” the tall man said. His voice was flat.
He took a step toward the corral. The short man stayed in the road. Cobb was still urinating off the porch, but his head was turned toward the corral.
Gibbon sighed with a grunt in it, and stood. “Hold it right there.”
The tall man and the short man, Chris, stiffened. Their hands jerked toward the pistols on their hips but stopped before they got there.
The tall man in the road said, “Who the fuck are you?”
Gibbon was about to answer the man’s question when out of the corner of his eye he saw Homer Rinski straighten his long frame and lift his shotgun to his shoulder. “Your executioner!”
Rising and arcing across the yard, like the voice of God, Rinski’s proclamation was followed by the glass-shattering boom of his bird gun.
Thrown high by the blast, the tall man hit the ground on his back and wailed like an animal.
Gibbon yelled, “Goddamnit, Homer!”
The short man palmed his revolver and Rinski gave him the second barrel, driving him into the air and back about six feet. When he hit the ground he turned on his side, gave a shake, and lay still.
“What the hell’s goin’ on!” someone yelled from inside the cabin.
The man on the porch squeezed off three quick pistol rounds, fumbling for the door. Before he could get it open, Gibbon shot him twice in the chest. The door opened and Cobb fell into the cabin.
Hurdling the dead man in the doorway, two other men ran out of the cabin and ducked behind the water trough.
“We’re the law, and you’re all under arrest!” Gibbon shouted, his heart pounding now, his mouth dry and coppery with excitement and fear.
He heard the sporadic bursts of gunfire as the posse began slinging lead. Thornberg’s men, no doubt—the stupid sons of bitches. But he knew they were just following Rinski’s lead.
“The hell you say!” one of the Double X men yelled. “What’s the charge?”
“Rustlin’ and murder,” Gibbon replied. He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled to the posse, “Hold your fire! Hold your fire!”
The shooting thinned, but someone was still slinging a few rounds at the back. Probably Thomberg himself.
Gibbon exploded, “I said hold your fire!”
The words had barely left his mouth when one of the Double X men by the water trough lifted his revolver and raked off two quick rounds, one of which thunked into the corral about six inches from Gibbon. The other plugged a horse in the corral and set it to screaming. All the horses were running circles around the corral now, knocking against the rails, so on top of everything else, Gibbon had to worry about getting trampled.
He ducked. “You’re surrounded, you stupid son of a bitch!”
“Go diddle yourself!”
Rinski blasted the water trough with buckshot. Gibbon was about to yell at him when another man appeared in the doorway. He could tell from the
German accent it was Gutzman.
“Holt your fire, holt your fire!” Gutzman bellowed. “Vot’s dis?”
“This is Jed Gibbon from Canaan, Gutz. We’re here for the Double X men. They come peaceful, no one gets hurt.”
“Ve are all just haffing a goot time here tonight,” Gutzman said sorrowfully, as if defending a passel of good-natured schoolboys.
“Tell ’em to come out, Gutz, with their hands up.”
Gutzman turned his head and said something. He stood there, listening to the reply. Then he turned his face back to Gibbon. “I haf girl,” he said, his voice low and dark. “An innocent girl.”
“Send her out.”
He turned away from the door and returned to it, clutching a girl by an arm. He pulled her in front of him and they stepped onto the porch together. Gibbon could tell that she was barefoot and wrapped in nothing but a blanket. The temperature was falling below zero, and she had to be chilled to the bone, but she gave no indication, no struggle.
“Put some clothes on the girl, Gutz. Then you and her come on out.”
The big German stood behind the girl, his hands on her shoulders—her head came only halfway up his chest—and glanced uneasily into the cabin and at the two men crouched behind the water trough. Apparently, he didn’t like what he saw.
“N-nein,” he muttered fearfully. “Ve come now.”
He pushed the girl down the steps and into the wagonyard, steering her with his hands.
Gibbon cursed. “Come on, Gutzman. She’s gonna freeze to death out here.”
Gutzman ignored him. He pushed the girl into the road, jerking his head around and giving a little skip as he hurried toward the corral. The girl moved stiffly before him, half running as Gutzman pushed her along.
Suddenly another figure appeared in the cabin door swaying as though drunk. The man was holding a shotgun or a carbine—Gibbon couldn’t tell which. The sheriff’s throat ached and his heart skipped a beat. Gutzman and the girl were between him and the cabin, in the line of fire.
“Get down!” Gibbon yelled.
He started bringing his Winchester to his shoulder when the man in the doorway said thickly, “This is for interruptin’ our card game, ya sumbitch, Gibbon!”
The gun in the man’s arms—a shotgun—boomed and flashed, and Gibbon jerked with a start. Gutzman grunted and fell headfirst into a pile of horse apples, knocking the girl to her knees.
Turning to see behind her, she gave a clipped scream as the shotgun exploded again. She flew back, arms flung above her head, releasing the blanket, her naked body skidding on the frozen ground and rolling against a corral post.
Feeling several pellets tear his coat and sting his cheek, Gibbon raised his rifle and fired, and the man in the doorway flew backward into the cabin, shotgun leaping from his arms.
The men behind the water trough lifted their heads and raised their pistols. They’d squeezed off only one shot apiece before Gibbon and Rinski brought their weapons to bear, stood the men up and flung them back against the cabin—dead.
That was all the encouragement the rest of the posse needed to resume shooting. The night exploded with the cracking of rifles and six-guns and the regular blasts of Rinski’s shotgun.
Smoke swirled like fog in the moonlight and the air was redolent with gunpowder. The horses screamed as the bullets from their own riders tore into the corral. Finally the saddled mounts bolted through the rails and off behind the barn.
Between the darkness and the fog, Gibbon couldn’t make out the individuals in the cabin; he keyed instead on the orange flames leaping from their guns and on the moonlit puffs of smoke. It seemed to work. Three times he heard a grunt or a curse following the bark of his Winchester.
It was fairly easy pickings. With the Double X men pinned down in the cabin, with no means of escape, it was just a matter of time before the posse did them in. Gibbon knew that if he hadn’t had the element of surprise—and, he had to admit, the trigger-happy Rinski—things could have gone very differently.
Now they were going like he’d wanted them to, but he didn’t feel good about any of it. It wasn’t just Gutzman and the dead whore, either. It was the thunder of the gunfire and the yells and screams from the cabin and the wails of the dying horses in the corral behind him: the whole bloody mess.
He’d wanted to feel redeemed. Instead, he just felt dirty.
The shooting from the cabin petered out about twenty minutes into the fight. Ten minutes later it stopped altogether.
Gibbon knew the Double X men were dead. They hadn’t had a chance in such tight quarters. If they hadn’t been so drunk they might have tried running for it—slipping out the windows and scattering. But the booze had made them clumsy and disoriented and incapable of coming up with any kind of defensive strategy.
So they ran around like rats in a cage as the bullets flying through the windows and through the chinking between the logs turned them into hamburger.
Gibbon put his rifle down, but the rest of the posse kept shooting. No one was returning fire, but they kept shooting just the same, with as much vigor as they’d started with. Gibbon knew they wouldn’t stop until they ran out of bullets.
He shook his head, slumped down behind the feed trough, rolled a cigarette, and smoked it down to a half-inch nub.
The shooting thinned. The posse was running out of bullets. Gibbon took a deep drag from his quirley, burning his fingers, and glanced over his shoulder at the cabin. There was an orange glow in the windows.
Fire, he knew. A spark from one of the bullets had ignited kerosene.
Well, that should do it. He could go home now, wait for Magnusson to make the next move.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw a figure crouch down before the corral. Turning his gaze, he saw Jacy Kincaid approach the Indian girl.
Gibbon bent his weary body between the corral slats with a grunt. Flames from the cabin spread quickly. They were licking through the windows, spreading a burnt-orange glow on the ground around the roadhouse.
The gunfire had ceased and men were whooping and hollering, probably passing the flask again. Gibbon could see their silhouettes as they moved in to admire their handiwork.
Gibbon turned to Jacy. She was kneeling over the Indian girl, rifle across her knees. She stared at the girl but kept her hands on her rifle. Her hat was tipped, covering her face.
Finally she lifted her eyes to Gibbon. Neither of them said anything. Finally Jacy stood and walked up the road toward the horses. Gibbon watched her go.
“God has been served here tonight.”
Gibbon turned. Homer Rinski stood behind him, looking at the cabin, the orange flames reflected in the hard plains of his face.
“Say what?”
“God has been served here tonight,” Rinski repeated.
Gibbon turned to watch the cabin burn, sighed fatefully. “Well, let’s see what the devil has to say about that.”
Then he turned and followed Jacy up the trail.
CHAPTER 22
IN THE MAGNUSSON mansion, Charles Franklin Wingate III grinned in his sleep. King Magnusson’s primary eastern investor was dreaming of Suzanne. The lovely girl was asking him to remain at the ranch for another week.
She was clad in only a sheer chemise that clearly outlined her breasts. Her hair hung loose about her shoulders and her eyes were smoky with lust.
“Oh, please stay, Charles,” she begged. “I know you don’t want to be disloyal to Abigail, but I feel we’re just starting to get to know each other.”
She smelled of lilac-scented orris soap, and he didn’t know which aroused him more—her face, which fairly glowed with unadulterated beauty, or the swollen orbs of her breasts, which poked at him wantonly, prodding him from his characteristic reserve.
“Really, Suzanne, I must go.”
“Oh, please, Charles. There are so few men like you in Dakota … sensitive yet virulent.”
She ran her hands over the thick head of hair he’d lost fifteen year
s ago, pressed her warm lips to his. As she ground her hips against him, wrapping a bare leg around his waist, he engulfed her in his arms and fairly moaned with desire.
Someone pounded on the door. “Chuck!” It was King Magnusson.
Wingate’s heart did a somersault. He pushed the girl away as the door opened and Magnusson’s big, ruddy face appeared beneath his cherry-blond mane. The blue eyes flashed.
“King!” Wingate cried.
“In the flesh, old chap. Up and at ’em—let’s pound some grub and get ready to ride!” Magnusson studied the easterner. “Remember? We’re going hunting this morning. I’ll send Minnie up with your bath.”
He turned away and turned back. “Oh, uh … sorry to interrupt.”
“Huh?”
“Sounded like you were having quite the dream. Anyone I know?”
Wingate must have looked as stricken as he felt, because King said in a hurry, “Don’t worry, I enjoy a hot fancy now and then myself.”
Leaning forward he added conspiratorially, “Tides me over between business trips.” He winked and pulled his head back. The door closed, and his boots pounded away down the hall.
Sitting up in the bed, the tail of his nightcap wrapped around his neck, Wingate stared at the door and tried to quell the pounding of his heart. He ran a hand absently over his red muttonchops.
“Oh,” he said weakly, swallowing. “Oh, my goodness … it was just a dream.”
As he looked around the room, getting his bearings, his relief was replaced by bitter disappointment. The girl had not visited his room with her lovely breasts; she hadn’t wrapped her legs around his waist and pressed her warm lips to his.
He lifted a hand to his head. His hair hadn’t grown back, either.
“Goodness me,” he grumbled, and swung his old legs to the floor. Among Magnusson’s associates, King was infamous for throwing his eastern visitors into potentially humiliating “western” situations. It was a sort of game, Wingate knew, and he supposed it was his turn to shrink from a charging grizzly or miss a preposterously easy shot at an elk or some other four-legged beast.
Slouched there on the edge of the bed, waiting for his bath and staring out the frosty gray window—not a tree in sight—Wingate wished he were home. In New York he was not tormented by bored western ranchers and their buxom daughters.
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