Blood of the Mountain Man

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

  Club knew that Cosgrove had lost the upper hand in Red Light. The merchants had banded together and told Club they would no longer pay protection money to him. They all went armed now, and his deputies were very nervous. On this very morning, Club had told his men to enforce the law and that was it. They took orders from him, not from Major Cosgrove, Jack Biggers, or Fat Fosburn. The Big Three didn’t much like that, but Club Bowers really didn’t much care.

  Deputy Modoc sat down behind him on the bench. “It’s over, ain’t it, Club?”

  Club nodded his head. “Yeah, it is, Doc. The money men over yonder don’t know it yet, but it’s over. They’ll be a lot more shootin’, and a lot of killin’, but it’s over. It’s like I told you boys this mornin’. From now on we enforce the law. We arrest whoever breaks it.”

  “Even them over yonder in the office?”

  “Even them. I’m ridin’ out to Miss Jenny’s ranch and makin’ peace with them folks and tellin’ them how it’s gonna be from now on. I’ll see you later.”

  “Rider comin’, Mister Smoke!” Jimmy yelled from his lookout position in the barn loft. “I think it’s Club Bowers. He’s alone.”

  Smoke stepped out of the house, buckling his gun-belt around him. He stood in the yard and waited. Club held up a hand. “I’m peaceful, Smoke. Can I step down?”

  “Sure. Come on in the house and have some pie and coffee.”

  With coffee poured and thick wedges of pie cut, Club said, “From this day on, Smoke, me and my deputies enforce the law as it is written. You break the law, I’ll arrest you, or go down try in’. The same thing goes for Cosgrove, Biggers, Fosburn, or any of these no-’counts they’re bringin’ in. My office no longer takes protection money from any merchant. They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Well, I’m an old dog, and I think I can change. At least, I’m going to give it one hell of a try. Excuse my language, Miss Sally, Miss Jenny.”

  Smoke held out a hand and Club shook it. “Welcome to the right side of the fence, Sheriff.”

  Club smiled. “I think I like it over here, Smoke.”

  “How are things in town, Sheriff Bowers?” Jenny asked innocently.

  Club chuckled. “Settlin’ down, Miss Jenny. Been an awful lot of funerals, though. Boot Hill’s rapidly fillin’ up.”

  “How did Cosgrove take your decision?” Sally asked.

  “I think he seen it comin’, Miss Sally. Didn’t none of them kick about it too much. I been uneasy about the situation in town ever since Miss Janey passed on.”

  “Did any of the Big Three have anything to do with my sister’s death?” Smoke asked.

  Club shook his head. “No. She died of the fever … or complications brought on by the fever. I know that. Van Horn held on to the ranch until Miss Jenny could get out here. That old man is randy to the core, let me tell you. You know there’s gold up in the mountains?”

  “I guessed as much,” Smoke said.

  “Worth a fortune, so Cosgrove says. I’ll tell you what I think. I think Biggers wants Fosburn’s spread, Fosburn wants Biggers’ spread, and Cosgrove wants it all. These guns that’s comin’ in … well, I think they’ll follow the orders of the man who offers them the most money, no matter which one of the Big Three they might be workin’ for at the time. That’s what I think.”

  “How about the townspeople?” Sally asked.

  “They want things to settle down. They’re tired of Cosgrove and all the trouble. And they’ve told him so. Still tellin’ him so when I left. Chung Lee told him that if any more trouble happens, he was gonna starch his longhandles so stiff they’d look like a suit of armor standin’ in the corner. Then he called him some things in Chinese that I’m pretty sure wasn’t very complimentary.”

  “What’s his next move, Club?”

  “I wish I knew. All I know is that Kit Silver is wirin’ for more gunhands to come in. And even Kit admits they’ll be the scum of the earth. There is no law, yet, about two men settlin’ their differences in the street. I can’t interfere in that. But I am going to keep the peace in Red Light, Smoke. I mean that.”

  “Good. I won’t push inside the town limits, Club. But I won’t be pushed, either.”

  “That’s fair enough. You know that damn back-shootin’ Hankins has been snoopin’ around here, don’t you?”

  “I suspected it. And some of the boys cut his sign yesterday.”

  Club ate the last of his pie, drained his coffee cup, and walked to the door. Just before he plopped his hat on his head and stepped outside, he smiled and said, “But on the other hand, it would be a real shame if somebody called that damn Hankins out into the street, now, wouldn’t it?”

  The fire in his belly had been so strong that Barrie had taken his blankets outside the bunkhouse and slept under the stars so the other men would not hear the occasional muffled moan of pain that passed his lips. He finished a bottle of laudanum and the pain eased, then went away. Breathing easier for the first time in hours, the town-tamer looked up and stared long at the stars in God’s heavens and suddenly thought: this is my last time to see them. It has to be. I’m not goin’ out layin’ in some damn bed screamin’ in pain, unable to control myself. That ain’t no way for a man to go out. A man ought to have the right to pick and choose his time and place of dyin’. And I’m gonna do just that.

  It had been a week since that fine time in town with Smoke and Bad Dog and Wolf and the girl. What a little gal Jenny was. Barrie smiled under the canopy of stars. He liked to think that his daughter would have been just like her. Couldn’t ask for no finer.

  And Barrie knew that Smoke had gotten word from Clemmie Feathers that the town was overflowing with two-bit gunhands on the payroll of the Big Three.

  Barrie made up his mind. At four that morning, he was bathing in the creek and shaving as carefully as possible in what light there was. He’d had his black suit done up nice by Chung Lee and his handmade boots, which he seldom wore, polished to a high sheen. He put on a sparkling-clean white shirt and black string tie. He saddled up silently and strapped on his matched .45s, sticking two more .45s behind his gunbelt. He had made out his will during the first week he was at Jenny’s spread and given it to Van Horn.

  Van Horn, meanwhile, was sitting in his private quarters at the south end of the bunkhouse, drinking coffee and watching his old friend get ready to ride into Red Light and die. He longed to go with him, but knew that Barrie would resent it. Knew that the town-tamer wanted it this way. But there was something he could do. He smiled thinking about it.

  Barrie had no sooner left the yard than Van Horn slipped out of the bunkhouse, saddled up, and took a shortcut to town. He could make damn sure that Club Bowers and his deputies didn’t interfere.

  Smoke lay beside Sally and heard both men leave. He knew what Barrie was going to do, and had a strong suspicion what Van Horn was going to do.

  “Good-bye, Barrie,” he whispered. “You’re a good man.”

  “Did you say something, honey?” Sally whispered.

  “No, dear. You must have been dreaming. Go back to sleep.”

  “Whahsiit?” the old man at the livery stable mumbled, still half asleep.

  “I’ve rid hard to get here, old-timer,” Van Horn said, gruffing up his voice. “Here’s a dollar. Get over to the sheriff’s office and tell him they’s been a stage holdup at Red Creek Crossing. It’s real bad. Dead folks all over the place. The outlaws took off up Devil’s Pass. Move, man!”

  Van Horn slipped back into the darkness, pretending to be seeing to his horse. The rummy-eyed old hostler beat it over to Club’s place and within fifteen minutes, Club and his deputies were riding out for Red Creek. It would be a good five to six hours before they returned. By that time, Van Horn thought with a smile, it’ll all be over.

  All but the buryin’.

  Van Horn walked over to Clemmie’s and sat on the porch with Moses, who had just gotten up to stoke up the fire. The men sipped coffee as the sky grew silver in the east.

&n
bsp; Barrie had a fine breakfast of biscuits and gravy and good strong hot black coffee. And then he bought a genuine five-cent cigar from the counterman. On the boards, he lit up and puffed contentedly. Man can’t ask for much more, he thought. The fire in his belly was gone, and Barrie knew it would never return. He brushed his coat back, exposing the butts of his .45s, then went for a little walk. He stopped for a time to pet a stray dog. The dog licked his hand and Barrie was pleased. He’d always liked animals. He never trusted a man who disliked dogs … serious character flaw there.

  Then he saw a knot of gunhands come walking out of the South End Hotel, on their way to breakfast. One of the men was Luther Cone, and with him was his sidekick, equally no-’count Jim Parish. Barrie had run both of them out of at least two towns that he could recall. After two suspicious killings.

  “Might as well start here and now,” he muttered. He stepped out into the street. “Cone!” he called. “Parish!”

  The men stopped and turned to face Barrie. “Well, well” Cone said. “Would you look at this, Parish. It’s old Barrie hisself. You ridin’ the grub line, Barrie?”

  “No,” Barrie called. “I’m ridin’ the killin’ line.”

  “Huh? What you mean, the killin’ line?”

  “You workin’ for Biggers, Fosburn, or Cosgrove?”

  “All three, if it’s any of your damn business.”

  “You come to make war against a fine little teenage girl, huh?”

  “If you’re talkin’ about Janey’s daughter, she’s just like her momma, a slutty little two-bit whoor!”

  “You’ll not talk like that about her, Cone. Fill your hand, you scummy bastard!”

  Cone and Parish drew — or tried to. Barrie’s right hand flashed and his .45 roared. Cone and Parish went down in the dirt, both of them gut-shot. Barrie stepped two paces to one side and plugged a third man, a no-’count who fancied himself a gunhand and called himself the Arizona Kid. The Kid should have stayed on the farm, milking cows. Barrie shot him through the heart and then stepped back across the narrow street and into the alleyway as a hail of bullets came at him. One tugged at his sleeve, another clipped the brim of his hat, and another kicked dirt on his polished boots. Barrie knocked a leg out from under the man who dusted up his boots.

  “Gettin’ real interestin’ up yonder,” Van Horn said to Moses. “I think I’ll just mosey up that way.”

  ‘I’ll get my hat and join you,” Moses said. “And my rifle.”

  Very few of the older, more experienced gunhands in the employ of the Big Three took any part in the shootout with Barrie. Word had spread throughout the camps of the gunhands, and when those with rooms in the town’s several hotels heard about the town-tamer coming in all dressed to the nines and with polished boots and totin’ at least four pistols, they figured what was coming.

  The gunfighters put all that together and reached the conclusion that Barrie had come to town to die … but only after making sure a whole bunch of others got sent down that same dark road.

  And a man like that would be hard to stop.

  Barrie ran around the rear of a saddle and leather shop and slipped back up to the street, walking between it and a gaming house. He saw Dev White, a Utah gunslick peeping around the corner of a hastily vacated cafe. Barrie sighted him in and the bullet knocked the man sprawling and hollering. A rifle roared and splinters tore into Barrie’s right cheek. He ignored the bleeding and dropped to one knee, leveling his .45. A New Mexico punk was sent howling to the ground, his belly punctured by town-tamer lead.

  Jody Thomas, a North Dakota kid who was wanted for murder, came running out of the Eagles Nest Hotel, his hands filled with .44s. Moses and Van Horn fired as one and Jody was knocked off his boots and went crashing through a window, back into the lobby.

  “You’re bleedin’ all over the carpet!” the desk clerk hollered at the dying gunman.

  Jody had no rebuttal to that. He simply closed his eyes and died.

  “Stay out of this, you old goat!” Barrie hollered up the street at his longtime friend.

  “We’ll try to keep it fair,” Van Horn yelled.

  “Fair, hell!” Barrie said, reloading. “I got ’em outnumbered.”

  “Get that crazy fool!” Cosgrove yelled from the upstairs window of his new apartment over his mining office.

  The street filled with guns-for-hire.

  Barrie stepped to the other side of the alley, both hands filled with .45s, and yelled, “Here I am, boys. I’m half puma, half wolf, and Gloryland bound. So step up here and I’ll punch your ticket to Hell!”

  Then he opened fire.

  Twenty

  Larry Brown, Johnny Newman, and two gunslicks from Texas stepped off the boards and onto the street and Barrie put them on the hellbound train, punching their tickets with .45 slugs.

  A bullet clipped Barrie’s ear and another one burned his shoulder. He didn’t feel a thing. “Here’s another for Miss Jenny and Smoke Jensen!” he yelled, jamming his empty guns into leather and jerking out two old long-barreled Peacemakers from behind his belt. He cocked and fired so fast the sound was one continuous roll of deadly thunder.

  When Barrie ducked back into the early morning shadows of the alley, the street in front of the hotel was littered with wounded and dead.

  He ran around the gaming joint and a man opened the rear door and stuck out a sawed-off ten-gauge and a small sack of shells. “You don’t remember me, Barrie. But I was bartender in a little mining town in Colorado you cleaned up. Give them no-goods hell, ol’ hoss.”

  Before Barrie could thank the man, the door closed.

  Barrie checked both barrels for blockage and loaded the Greener up. He began walking toward the corner of the building. Cosgrove was still shouting from the window, joined by Fosburn, standing in the door of his mayor’s office.

  The left side of Barrie’s suit coat was drenched with blood from his mangled ear, and he had taken lead in his right leg. He limped on, ignoring the pain. He’d endured a hell of a lot worse from the pain in his belly.

  Dave Stockton and John Robinson came racing around the corner of the keno joint. Barrie smiled at them and gave the pair both barrels from the sawed-off express gun. The worthless pair was flung back, nearly cut in two from the heavy charge.

  Barrie stepped into the narrow passageway between buildings and saw Cosgrove, standing in his window, yelling and screaming and shouting orders. The range was far too great to do much damage with the shotgun, but Barrie gave the man both barrels to keep him honest. The shot had lost most of its punch when it reached Cosgrove, but it bloodied his neck and face and sent him hollering to the floor, certain he’d been mortally wounded.

  At the ranch, Jenny sat down at the table with Smoke and Sally and the hands and asked, “Where are Mister Barrie and Mister Van Horn?”

  “Barrie went into town to even the odds a little bit, Honey,” Wolf told her. “I ’spect Van Horn went in to watch the show.”

  “You mean …”

  “Barrie is dying, Jenny,” Smoke told her. “This is the way he wanted to go out. After breakfast, Cooper, hitch up a team. Some of us will go in to bring the body back. Pasco, you and Ladd get shovels and ride up to the east slope, by that lightning-blazed tree above the spring. Dig a deep hole.”

  “Right, Boss,” Pasco said.

  “And be careful, that damn Hankins is probably prowling around. He’ll shoot anybody he sees on this range. If you see him, drop him.”

  “With pleasure,” Ladd said, pouring syrup over his huge stack of flapjacks.

  “I shore would like to be in town for this mornin’s show,” Wolf said. “When Barrie gets goin,’ he’s plumb hell with a short gun.”

  “I’ll take that damned οl’ has-been,” a young man who called himself Rusty said, hitching at his fancy rig. He pulled both guns and stepped out of the saloon, where he’d spent the night, drinking and gambling and whoring. With both hands wrapped around the butts of .45s, Rusty marched right down the cente
r of the narrow street.

  “He’ll last one minute,” Kit Silver said, pouring a mug of coffee.

  “Thirty seconds” Ned Harden shortened it.

  “Hey, turd-face!” Van Horn called to Rusty.

  “Ten seconds,” Dan Segers said. “Van Horn just bought into it.”

  “Rusty’s dead, then,” Les Spivey said.

  Rusty whirled around and took a shot at Van Horn, standing in the gloom under an awning. Rusty’s shot went wide. Van Horn’s aim was deadly. Rusty sat down hard in the street and commenced to bellering, his guns in the dirt and both hands holding his stomach.

  “You should have stayed to home, boy,” Van Horn said, punching out the empty and filling the slot.

  Ray Houston stood up in the hotel lobby and started toward the stairs.

  “Where you goin’?” Kit Silver asked.

  “I’m through,” Ray said. “This deal’s done gone sour. They got a range war shapin’ up down in New Mexico. I’m headin’ for there.”

  “Hold up,” Nevada Jones said. “I’ll ride with you.”

  Ron Patrick picked up his rifle and said, “That makes three of us. This war ain’t for the likes of me.”

  Barrie’s wounded leg was about to buckle on him and some lucky gunhand he’d not even seen had shot him in the side. “Time to end it,” he muttered. He called out, “In the street, boys! Me agin you all. Holster your guns and meet me eyeball to eyeball. Who’s got the sand to do it?”

  Moses lifted his rifle and Van Horn put a gnarled hand on the barrel. “We’re out of it unless they pull something sneaky, Moses. This is Barrie’s show from now on.”

  Perry Sheridan, a tough from Oregon, stepped out onto the boards. “I’ll meet you, Barrie.”

  “Well, come on, then,” Barrie shouted, standing tall and bloody in the street. “I ain’t got all the time in the world, you know.”

  Andre McMahon joined Perry, as did four others. The older, wiser gunnies stayed put.

  “Fools” Kit said. “Can’t they see that Barrie ain’t got nothin’ to lose?”