Bounty on a Baron

Chapter Twenty-four

Decker walked to the telegraph office to see if he’d received any replies to his wires. Fairly sure now that the Baron was in Broadus, he didn’t really think the wires were important any longer, but if he had received any co-operation from the lawmen in the other towns, he wanted to be able to acknowledge them.

As it turned out, he received no offers of cooperation. Apparently the lawmen in all three towns had no liking for bounty hunters, for none of them offered him the slightest bit of help.

It was just as well.

He tore up the messages and discarded them, then stepped outside.

Over breakfast Josephine asked Brand, “What are we going to do?”

“About what?”

“About what?” she asked. “About that man Decker.”

Brand looked at her across the table. She had come home in a highly agitated state the night before and had not been able to sleep very well. She looked drawn and haggard.

“Don’t worry about it,” Brand said.

“How can I not worry about it?”

“Go to work.”

She looked at him as if he were crazy.

“I can’t go to work!” she said.

“Sure you can.”

“Lucy can run the shop,” she told him, referring to the woman who worked for her.

“I want you to go to work, Josephine,” Brand said softly. “I don’t want to have to worry about you. Worrying about you could get me killed.”

“I don’t—” Josephine said, and then she stopped. She had been about to say that she didn’t understand that, but suddenly she did.

“All right,” she said. “I’ll go to work.”

“Good girl.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I think,” Brand said, “I’ll have a talk with our new friend, Decker.”

“You’re going to talk to the man who wants to kill you?” she asked incredulously.

“Maybe he can be reasoned with.”

“If everything you’ve said about him is true, I don’t see how you can hope to—”

“Sometimes,” he said, “I can be very persuasive.”

Kyle Roman was standing across the street from Josephine Hale’s house, waiting for her to go to work. For a while it looked as if she wasn’t going to leave, but finally the front door opened and she stepped out. He waited until she was out of sight before he crossed the street and knocked on the front door.

After a few moments the man known in Broadus as Brand, now known to Roman as the Baron, answered the door.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“We have to talk.”

“About what?”

“About a man called Decker,” Roman said, looking as if he expected the name to mean something to Brand.

“I know all about Decker.”

That deflated Roman for the moment.

“You do?”

“Yes.”

“Well…what are we going to do about him?”

“What are we going to do?” Brand asked.

“That’s right.” “Have you had breakfast yet, Sheriff?”

“No,” Roman said, looking confused.

“Well, come in and have a cup of coffee.”

At the poker game the night before Decker had not only found out where Josephine Hale lived, but also where she worked. He was standing across the street from her shop when she opened the front door with a key and entered. Only then did he step out of the doorway and start toward the southern end of town. Roman had two cups of coffee and listened to what Brand had to say.

“You want me to stay out of it?” he asked when Brand was fi nished.

“That’s right,” Brand said. “Decker is my prob lem, not yours.”

“But—”

“But what?”

“I—I—”

“Wait a minute,” Brand said. “I heard something about a shooting last night. That wasn’t you, was it?”

Roman stared helplessly at Brand.

“Did you try to shoot him in the back?” Brand asked.

“What are you getting so upset about?” Roman demanded. “If I’d killed him, you wouldn’t have to worry about him.”

“You son of a bitch!” Brand said. He reached across the table and pulled Roman to him by the shirt front. “I’ve never shot a man in the back in my life. Are you that much of a spineless coward?”

“I—I—”

Brand released Roman and pushed him back into his chair, where the man sat and stared at him, bewildered.

Brand stood up and began to walk around the table.

“What else have you pulled?” Brand asked. “Tell me.”

“Well—”

“Come on!” Brand shouted, poking Roman in the arm, jarring him. “Tell me.”

“I…I tried to frame him for murder.”

“Well, that was smart. How did that work?”

“It didn’t.”

“Tell me about it. Come on, if we’re going to be partners in this, you have to tell me everything.”

Reluctantly, Roman told Brand what he had done to Martha after Decker had left her. Brand listened, continuing to circle the table.

“So, you killed an innocent woman for nothing.”

“Well, you—you killed an innocent boy, didn’t you? Isn’t that why Decker’s after you?”

“That was an accident,” Brand said, “an unfortunate accident. You, my friend, cold—bloodedly killed a woman who had nothing whatsoever to do with all of this.”

“It was the only thing I could think of.”

“And this,” Brand said, stopping behind Sheriff Kyle Roman, “is all I can think of.”

Too swiftly for the sheriff to realize what was happening, Brand slid his left forearm around Roman’s neck, put his right hand beneath the man’s chin, and twisted viciously. Roman’s body stiffened, shivered, and then went limp.

“That’s one problem solved,” Brand said, straightening up.

Decker stood across the street from Josephine’s house, trying to decide what to do. Finally he crossed the street and moved alongside the house, stealthily peering into windows as he went. When he finally got to the kitchen window he stopped and watched as a man stood behind the sheriff and quickly and efficiently broke his neck. There was no question about it. Only a man like the Baron would be capable of such an act. The bounty hunter had found his quarry at last.

Decker couldn’t really feel sorry for the sheriff. He had obviously gotten in way over his head due to greed.

Decker watched a moment longer, assessing his foe. The Baron lifted Roman up and tossed him over his shoulder. The man was obviously very strong, evidenced by both the move he’d used to break the man’s neck and the ease with which he was carrying the now-dead weight.

Rather than stay and watch the Baron dispose of the body, Decker decided to go somewhere to think and decide how best to confront this formidable opponent.