Lujan looked first at the aging men on the porch, and then looked at Smoke, When he spoke, there was disapproval in his voice. “It is not nice to laugh at the old, my friend.”
“Lujan, I’m not laughing at them. These men are friends of mine. As well known as we are, we’re pikers compared to those old gunslingers. Lujan, you’re looking at Silver Jim, Pistol Le Roux, Hardrock, and Charlie Starr.”
“Dios mio!” the Mexican breathed. “Those men invented the fast draw.”
“And don’t sell them short even today, Lujan. They can still get into action mighty quick.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it for a minute,” Lujan said, dismounting.
“If I’d known you old coots were going to show up, I’d have called the old folks’ home and had them send over some wheelchairs,” Smoke called out.
“Would you just listen to the pup flap his mouth,” Hardrock said. “I ought to get up and spank him.”
“Way your knees pop and crack he’d probably think you was shootin’ at him,” Pistol laughed.
The men shook hands and Smoke introduced them to Lujan.
Charlie Starr sized the Mexican up. “Yeah, I seen you down along the border some years back. When them Sabler brothers called you out. Too bad you didn’t kill all five of them.”
“Wasn’t two down enough?” Lujan asked softly, clearly in awe of these old gunslingers.
“Nope,” Silver Jim said. “We stopped off down in Wyoming for supplies. Store clerk said the Sabler boys had come through the day before, heading up thisaway. Ben, Carl, and Delmar.”
Lujan sighed. “Many, many times I have wished I had never drawn my pistol in anger that first time down in Cuauhtemoc.” He smiled. “Of course, the shooting was over a lovely lady. And of course, she would have nothing to do with me after that.”
“What was her name?” Hatfield asked.
Lujan laughed. “I do not even remember.”
* * *
The old gunfighters were all well up in years—Charlie Starr being the youngest—but they were all leather-tough and could still work many men half their age into the ground.
And the news that the Box T had hired the famed gunslingers was soon all over the area. Some of Cord McCorkle’s hired guns thought it was funny, and it would be even funnier to tree one of the old gunnies and see just what he’d do. The gunfighter they happened to pick that morning was the Louisiana Creole, Pistol Le Roux.
Ol’ Pistol and Bobby were working some strays back toward the east side of the Smith when the three gunhawks spotted Pistol and headed his way. Just to be on the safe side, Pistol wheeled his horse to face the men and slipped the hammer thong off his right-hand Colt and waited.
That one of the men held a coiled rope in his right hand did not escape the old gunfighter. He had him a hunch that these pups were gonna try to rope and drag him. A hard smile touched his face. That had been tried before. Several times. Ain’t been done yet.
“Well, well,” the hired gun said, riding up. “What you reckon we done come across here, boys?”
“Damned if I know,” another said with a nasty grin. “But it shore looks to me like it needs buryin’.”
“Yeah,” the third gunny said, sniffing the air. “It’s done died and gone to stinkin’.”
“That’s probably your dirty drawers you smellin’, punk,” Pistol told him. “Since your mammy ain’t around to change them for you.”
The man flushed, deep anger touching his face. Tell the truth, he hadn’t changed his union suit in a while.
“I think we’ll just check the brands on them beeves,” they told Pistol.
“You’ll visit the outhouse if you eat regular, too,” Pistol popped back. “And you probably should, and soon, ’cause you sure full of it.”
“Why, you godda—” He grabbed for his pistol. The last part of the obscenity was cut off as Pistol’s Colt roared, the slug taking the would-be gunslick in the lower part of his face and driving through the base of his throat.
Pistol had drawn and fired so fast the other two had not had time to clear leather. Now they found themselves looking down the long barrel of Pistol’s Peacemaker. The dying gunny moaned and tried to talk; the words were unintelligible, due in no small measure to the lower part of his jaw being missing.
“Shuck out of them gun belts,” Pistol told them, just as Bobby came galloping up to see what the shooting was all about. “Usin’ your left hands,” Pistol added.
Gun belts hit the ground.
“Dismount,” Pistol told them. “Bobby, git that rope.”
“Hey!” one of the gunnies said. “We was just a-funnin’ with you, that’s all.”
“I don’t consider bein’ dragged no fun. And that’s what you was gonna do, right?”
“Aw, no!”
Pistol’s Colt barked and the bootheel was torn loose from the gunny’s left boot. “Wasn’t it, boy?” Pistol yelled.
On the ground, holding his numbed foot, the gunny nodded his head. “Yeah. We all make mistakes.”
“Git out of them clothes,” Pistol ordered. “Bare-butted nekkid. Do it!”
Red-faced, the men stood before Pistol, Bobby, and God in their birthday suits.
“Tie ’em together, Bobby. But give them room to walk. They got a long way to hoof it.”
The gunny on the ground jerked and died.
The bare-butted men tied, their hands behind their backs, Pistol looped the rope around his saddle horn and gave the orders. “Move out. Head for your bunkhouse, boys. Git goin’.”
“What about Pete?” one hollered.
“He’ll keep without gettin’ too gamy. Now move!”
It was a good hour’s walk back to the Circle Double C ranch house, and the gunnies hoofed it all the way. They complained and moaned and hollered and finally begged for relief from their hurting, bleeding feet. They shut up when Pistol threatened to drag them.
“Pitiful,” Pistol told him. “Twice the Indians caught me and made me run for it, bare-butt nekkid. Miles and miles and miles. With them just a-whoopin’ and a-hollerin’ right behind me. You two are a disgrace.”
Cord stood by the front gate and had to smile at the sight as the painful parade came to a halt. He had ordered his wife and daughter not to look outside. But of course they both did.
The naked men collapsed to the ground.
“Mister McCorkle, my name is Le Roux. They call me Pistol. Now, sir, I was minding my own business, herdin’ cattle like I’m paid to do, when three of your hands come up and was gonna put a loop around me and drag me. One of them went for his gun. He was a tad slow. You’ll find him dead by that big stand of cottonwoods on the Smith. He ain’t real purty to look at. Course, he wasn’t all that beautiful when he was livin’. I brung these wayward children back home. You want to spank them, that’s your business. Good day, sir.”
Pistol and Bobby swung their horses and headed back to Box T range.
Cord looked at the naked men and their bloody feet and briar-scratched ankles and legs. “Get their feet taken care of, pay them off, and get them out of here,” he instructed his foreman. He looked at the gunslicks on his payroll. “Pete was one of your own. Go get him and bury him. And stay the hell away from Box T riders.” He pointed to the naked and weary and footsore men on the ground. “One man did that. One . . . old . . . man. But that man, and those other old gunfighters over at the Box T came out here in the thirties and forties as mountain men. Tough? You bet your life they’re tough. When they do go down for the last time, they’ll go out of this world like cornered wolves, snarling and ripping at anything or anyone that confronts them. Leave them alone, boys. If you feel you can’t obey my orders, ride out of here.”
The gunfighters stared at Cord. All stayed. As Cord turned his back to them and walked toward his house, he had a very bad feeling about the outcome of this matter, and he could not shake it.
* * *
“It’s stupid!” Sandi McCorkle said to her friend. “They don’t even kno
w why they hate each other.”
Rita Hanks nodded her head in agreement. “I’m going to tell you something, Sandi. And it’s just between you and me. I don’t trust my father, or my brothers.”
Sandi waited for her friend to continue.
“I think Daddy’s gone crazy.” She grimaced. “I think my brothers have always been crazy. They’ve never been . . . well, just right; as far as I’m concerned. They’re cruel and vicious.”
“What do you think your dad is going to do?”
“I don’t know. But he’s up to something. He sent a hand out last week to Helena. Then yesterday this ratty-faced-looking guy shows up at the ranch. Danny Rouge. Has a real fancy rifle. Carries it in a special-made case. I think he’s a backshooter, Sandi.”
The two young women, both in their late teens, had been forbidden by their fathers to see each other, years back. Of course, neither of them paid absolutely any attention to those orders. But their meetings had become a bit more secretive.
“Do you want me to tell Daddy about this, Rita?”
“No. He’d know it came from me and then you’d get in trouble. I think we’d better tell Smoke Jensen.”
Sandi giggled. “I’d like to tell him a thing or two—in private. He’s about the best-looking man I’ve ever seen.”
“He’s also married with children,” Rita reminded her friend. “But he sure is cute. He’s even better looking than the covers of those books make him out to be. Have you seen the Moab Kid?”
“Yes! He’s darling!”
The two young women talked about men and marriage for a few minutes. It was time for them to be married; pretty soon they’d be pegged as old maids. They both had plenty of suitors, but none lasted very long. The young women were both waiting for that “perfect man” to come riding into their lives.
“How in the world are we going to tell Smoke Jensen about this back-shooter?”
“I don’t know. But I think it’s our bounden duty to tell him. People listen to him.”
“That Bobby’s been gettin’ all red-eared everytime he gets around me,” Sandi said. “I think maybe he could get a message to Smoke and he’d meet us.”
“Worth a try. We’ll take us a ride tomorrow over to the Smith and have a picnic and wait. Maybe he’ll show up.”
“Let’s do it. I’ll see you at the pool about noon.”
The young women walked to their buggies. Both buggies were equipped with rifle boots and the boots were full. A pistol lay on the seat of each buggy. Both Sandi and Rita could, would, and had used the weapons. With few exceptions, ranch-born-and-raised western women were no shrinking violets. They lived in a violent time and had to be prepared to fight. Although most western men would not bother a woman, there were always a few who would, even though they knew the punishment was usually a rope.
Very little Indian trouble now occurred in this part of Montana; but there was always the chance of a few bucks breaking from the reservations to steal a few horses or take a few scalps.
With a wave, the young women went their way, Sandi back to the Circle Double C, Rita back to D-H. Neither noticed the two men sitting their horses in the timber. The men wore masks and long dusters.
“You ready?” one asked, his voice muffled by the bandanna tied round his face.
“I been ready for some of that Rita. Let’s go.”
EIGHT
Silver Jim found the overturned buggy while out hunting strays. The horse was nowhere in sight. He noticed that the Winchester .44 carbine was a good twenty feet from the overturned buggy. He surmised that whoever had been in this rig had pulled the carbine from its boot and was makin’ ready to use it. Then he found the pistol. He squatted down and sniffed at the barrel. Recently fired.
He stood up and emptied his Colt into the air; six widely spaced shots. It took only a few minutes for Smoke and Lujan to reach him.
“That is Señorita Hanks’s buggy,” Lujan said. “I have seen her in it several times.”
“Stay with it, boys,” Smoke said. “Look around. I’ll ride to the D-H.”
He did not spare his horse getting to the ranch, reining up to the main house in a cloud of dust and jumping off. “Switch my saddle,” he told a startled hand. He ran up the steps to face a hard-eyed Dooley Hanks. “Silver Jim found Miss Hanks’s buggy just north of our range. By that creek. Overturned. No sign of Miss Hanks. But Silver Jim said her pistol had been fired. I left them looking for her and trying to cut some trail.”
The color went out of Dooley’s face. Like most men, his daughter was the apple of his eye. “I’m obliged. Let’s ride, boys!” he yelled.
Already, one of his regular hands was noosing a rope.
Within five minutes, twenty-five strong, Dooley led his hands and his hired guns out at a gallop. The wrangler had switched Smoke’s saddle to a mean-eyed mustang and was running for his own horse.
Smoke showed the mustang who was boss and then cut across country, taking the timber and making his own trail, going where no large group of riders could. He reached the overturned buggy just a couple of minutes before Dooley and his men.
“Silver Jim cut some sign,” Bobby told him. “Him and Lujan took off thataway. Told me to stay here.”
Dooley and his party reined up and Dooley jumped off his horse. Smoke pointed to the pistol, still where Silver Jim had found it.
“That’s hers,” the father said, a horrified look in his eyes. “I give it to her and taught her how to use it.”
“Look!” Bobby pointed.
Heads turned. Silver Jim was holding a girl in his arms, Lujan leading the horse, some of its harness dragging the ground.
The cook from the D-H came rattling up in a wagon, Mrs. Hanks on the seat beside him. “I filled it with hay, Boss,” he told Dooley. “Just in case.”
Dooley nodded.
Smoke took the girl from Silver Jim and carried her to the wagon and to her mother. She had been badly beaten and her clothing ripped from her. One of her eyes was closed and discolored and blood leaked from a corner of her mouth. Silver Jim had wrapped her in a blanket.
“How did you . . . I mean,” Dooley shook his head. “Had she been . . . ?”
“I reckon,” Silver Jim said solemnly. “Her clothes and . . . underthings was strewn over about a half a mile. Looks like they was rippin’ and tearin’ as they rode. Two men took her, a third joined them over yonder on that first ridge.” He pointed. “He’d been waitin’ for some time. Half a dozen cigarette butts on the ground.”
“She say who done this?” Dooley’s voice was harsh and terrible sounding.
“No, señor,” Lujan said. “She was unconscious when we found her.”
“Shorty!” Dooley barked. “Go fetch that old rummy we call a doctor. If he ain’t sober, dunk him in a horse trough until he is. Ride, man!”
Smoke had walked to the wagon bed and was looking at the young woman, her head cradled in her mother’s lap. He noticed a crimson area on the side of her head. “Bobby, bring me my canteen, hurry!”
He wet a cloth and asked Mrs. Hanks to clean up the bloody spot.
“Awful bump on her head,” the mother said, her voice calm but the words tight.
“For sure she’s got a concussion,” Smoke said. “Maybe a fractured skull. Cushion her head and drive real slow, Cookie. She can’t take many bumps and jars.”
Smoke and his people stood and watched the procession start out for the ranch. Dooley had sent several of his men to follow the trail left by the rapists. “Bring them back alive,” he told them. “I want to stake them out.” He turned his mean and slightly maddened eyes toward Smoke. “Ain’t that what you done years back, Jensen?”
“That’s what I did.”
The man’s gone over the edge, Smoke thought. This was all it took to push him into that shadowy, eerie world of madness.
“They’re going to find out what we didn’t tell them, Smoke,” Lujan said. “The trail leads straight to Circle Double C range.”
&nb
sp; “And one of them horses has a chip out of a shoe. It’ll be easy to identify.” Silver Jim said.
Smoke thought about that. “Almost too easy, wouldn’t you think?”
“That thought did cross my mind,” the old gunfighter acknowledged, rolling a cigarette.
“I better get over there.” Smoke swung into the saddle and turned the mustang’s head.
He looped the reins around the hitchrail and walked up to the porch, conscious of a lot of hard eyes on him as he knocked on the door.
A very lovely young woman opened the door and smiled at him. “Why, Mister Jensen. How nice. Please come in.”
Smoke removed his hat and stepped inside the nicely furnished home just as Cord stepped into the foyer. “Trouble, Cord. Bad trouble.” He looked at Sandi.
“Go sit with your mother, girl,” the father said.
Sandi smiled sweetly and leaned up against the wall, folding her arms under her breasts.
Cord lifted and spread his big hands in a helpless gesture. “Boys are bad enough, Smoke, but girls are impossible.”
Smoke told them both, leaving very little out. He did not mention anything about the chipped shoe; not in front of Sandi. Nor did he say anything about the trail leading straight to Circle C range.
“I’ve got to get over there,” Sandi said, turning to fetch her shawl.
“No.” Smoke’s hard-spoken word stopped her, turning her around. “There is nothing you can do over there. Rita is unconscious and will probably remain so for many hours. Dooley is killing mad and likely to go further off the deep end. And those who . . . abused Rita are still out there. Your going over there would accomplish nothing and only put you in danger.”
She locked rebellious eyes with Smoke. Then she slowly nodded her head. “You’re right, of course. Thank you for pointing those things out. I’ll go tell Mother.”
Smoke motioned Cord out onto the porch where they could talk freely, in private. He leveled with Cord.
“Damn!” the man cursed, balling his fists. “If the men who done it are here, we’ll find them and hold them for the law . . . or hang them,” he added the hard words. “No matter what I feel about Hanks himself, Rita and my Sandi have been friends for years. Rita and her momma is the two reasons I haven’t gone over there and burned the damn place down. I’ve known for years that Dooley was crazy; and his boys is twice as bad. They’re cruel mean.”
Live by the West, Die by the West Page 6
