Moonshine Massacre

Chapter 34

Matt was shaken by the news he’d just heard. He stared at Thurman Harlow for a second, then said, “You mean they carried her off?”

Harlow’s head bobbed up and down. “Yeah. She was down at the creek and got caught out in the open when Kane’s bunch showed up. She tried to make it back to the cabin, but they cut her off. I yelled for her to get in the cornfield and hide. She didn’t have time, though. Cimarron Kane hisself grabbed her and hauled her up on his horse.”

Anger raged through Matt like a prairie fire, mixed with fear for Frankie’s safety. “Did he hurt her?”

“Not right then,” Harlow replied with a shake of his head. “Not that I could see, anyway. Lord knows what he plans on doin’ to her, though.”

Matt forced himself to put aside the emotions he was feeling and think coolly and calmly. “This was just a few minutes ago. They haven’t gone far yet. I came in from the main trail and didn’t run into them. Which way were they headed when they rode out?”

Harlow frowned. “Now, that’s odd. They lit a shuck outta here goin’ east. That ain’t the way back to their place.”

“No, it’s not,” Matt agreed. “But Cottonwood’s northeast of here. Maybe they were headed for town.”

“Why would they do that?”

Matt shook his head. “I don’t know, but I aim to find out where they’re goin’, because I’m gonna pick up their trail and follow the sons of bitches. How big a bunch was it?”

“Looked like ever’ nephew and shirttail cousin Kane could scare up. Close to thirty men, I’d say.”

Those were heavy odds, Matt thought, but he wasn’t going to let them stop him.

Besides, if Kane was headed for the settlement for some reason, Sam was there, and the two blood brothers made a formidable team.

“You say you’re goin’ after ’em, Mr. Bodine?” Harlow asked.

“That’s right.”

“The boys and me was about to get mounted up and do the same thing, if you want to wait—”

Matt swung up into the saddle and lifted the reins. He wasn’t waiting for anybody or anything, not with Frankie’s life probably in danger. “A bunch of riders that big will leave a trail that’s easy to follow,” he said. “You can catch up to me.”

Before Harlow could argue with him, he turned his horse around and sent the stallion leaping into a run. He rode past the ruined still, where only a little smoke was rising from the entrance now, and on past the ridges. The ground was a jumble of hoofprints from all the horses that had galloped along here. The trail was so plain a blind man could have followed it, Matt thought.

He drove his horse hard, and after a few minutes he began to see dust hanging in the air ahead of him. It hadn’t had time to settle yet after Kane and the others passed, and there was no wind to blow it away. The heat was as bad as ever, maybe even worse, but Matt barely noticed it now. All his thoughts were of Frankie.

Again, he forced his brain to function rationally, pushing the fear aside so that he could figure out what he needed to do now. No matter how you stacked it up, thirty-to-one odds were almost insurmountable. If he rode right up and attacked the men he was following, he wouldn’t accomplish anything except to get himself killed. And that wouldn’t help Frankie one damned bit, he told himself.

As soon as that was clear in his head, he pulled back on the reins and slowed the stallion. The horse couldn’t keep galloping at that pace, anyway, without running itself into the ground. At a fast trot now, Matt continued following the men who had abducted Frankie Harlow. He wasn’t likely to lose sight of them, not with all that dust their horses were kicking up.

And sure enough, the trail had angled a little north of due east. They were heading for Cottonwood. Matt was sure of it.

The question remained, though…what were they going to do when they got there?

Sam stood looking at the dust for a moment and frowning because he couldn’t figure out why a group of that size would be riding toward Cottonwood. He didn’t know that the riders represented trouble…

But he didn’t know that they were peaceful, either. He decided that he needed to tell Marshal Coleman about this.

Turning, he moved at a fast walk up the street toward the marshal’s office. That made him stand out, because everybody else who was moving around today was going about it pretty slowly because of the heat. Ike Loomis was standing in the open double doorway of his livery barn, and he called, “Where you goin’ in such an all-fired hurry, Sam?”

“I need to find Marshal Coleman,” Sam replied as he stopped. “Have you seen him?”

“Nope. I just got back from visitin’ with Mike. He’s awake now and seems to be doin’ pretty good.”

Sam nodded. “I’m glad to hear that,” he said honestly. “He may well have saved my life.”

“If I see Marsh, I’ll tell him you’re lookin’ for him.”

“I’d appreciate that,” Sam said. He hurried on toward the marshal’s office.

When he got there, he saw that the door was still standing open. Coleman had opened both the front and back doors earlier, to let whatever breeze there might be blow through the building. So far it hadn’t done anything to dissipate the heat, Sam discovered as he stepped inside. It was sweltering in there, just as it had been when he left.

He frowned as he saw that Coleman wasn’t in the office. The cell block was quiet. It was too hot even for the prisoners to bitch. Sam felt a pang of worry and dropped his hand to the butt of his Colt as he stepped over to peer through the window in the cell block door. He thought for a second that the prisoners might have escaped somehow, but he could see that the cells were all closed securely and the prisoners were still locked up inside.

Coleman could have gone to his house for a few minutes. That was the most likely explanation since Sam hadn’t spotted him on the street. He turned and walked out of the office, heading for the lawman’s home.

He heard Lobo barking before he reached the house. The little dog sounded upset about something, but that didn’t really mean anything. Sam had been around dogs all his life and knew that they often carried on like that for no good reason.

But the possibility that Lobo did have a reason for being upset made Sam walk a little faster as he approached the house. He saw Lobo standing on the front porch, barking at the closed door.

“Lobo, what’s wrong?” Sam called as he opened the gate. He started up the walk toward the house.

Lobo turned and started barking at him then. The little bundle of gray and brown fur was definitely angry or scared or both, Sam thought. He bounded onto the porch and rapped his knuckles sharply against the doorjamb. Lobo kept barking.

Marshal Coleman opened the door a few seconds later and looked out at Sam through the screen. Sam felt relief go through him as he saw that the lawman seemed to be unhurt. Coleman didn’t look happy, though. He frowned as he glanced down at the dog and said sharply, “Hush, Lobo!”

Lobo gave a little whine, but he stopped barking.

Coleman looked at Sam and asked, “What is it?”

“There’s a lot of dust outside of town, Marshal,” Sam reported. “Appears to be a big bunch of riders coming.”

“Why are you tellin’ me about it?”

It was Sam’s turn to frown. “Well…I thought you’d like to know.”

“People come and go all the time,” Coleman said stiffly. “I don’t reckon it’s anything to worry about. Just go on back to the office, Sam.”

“It could be Cimarron Kane and his family coming back to cause more trouble,” Sam pointed out.

Coleman waved a hand in dismissal. “On a hot day like this? I don’t reckon even Kane’s that crazy. No, Sam, just go on back to the office and don’t worry so much.”

Why was Coleman so insistent that he go back to the office? Sam wondered. He had just been there a few minutes earlier, and everything seemed fine.

Unless Coleman didn’t really care where he went. The marshal just wanted him to get away from here, Sam realized. That meant if there was something wrong, it was probably going on right here, and Sam knew that Coleman would want to protect Hannah above all else…

But who or what could be threatening her?

Lobo had stopped barking, but he continued to make angry little growling noises deep in his throat. He stood stiffly next to Sam’s boots, and suddenly, as Coleman pushed open the screen door and snapped at Sam, “Well, go on,” Lobo shot forward through the narrow gap. He darted past Coleman’s feet, prompting a startled exclamation from the marshal, and raced across the room, snarling.

Coleman jerked around, lines of terror suddenly appearing on his weathered face. “No!” he cried.

Sam jerked the screen door open and rushed inside even as the wicked crack of a gunshot sounded. Somewhere inside the room, which was dimly lit because all the curtains were pulled, Hannah screamed. Sam shouldered Coleman aside and drew his gun at the same time. He caught a glimpse of Hannah struggling with a man, holding on to his arm and trying to keep him from shooting again. Down around the man’s feet, Lobo nipped furiously at his ankles.

“Drop the gun!” Sam ordered as he raised his Colt, but the man ignored the command. Instead, he slashed a brutal backhanded blow across Hannah’s face, knocking her away from him. At the same time, the small-caliber pistol in his hand jerked up and gouted flame and lead again.

Sam was in the line of fire and might have been hit if someone hadn’t knocked him aside. He heard Coleman grunt in pain, and realized that the marshal had shoved him out of the way and taken the bullet meant for him. There was no time to see how badly Coleman was hurt, though, because there was still the threat of the intruder to deal with. Sam snapped a shot at him, but the man twisted aside just in time to avoid the bullet. Sam couldn’t pull the trigger again because Hannah cried out, “Dad!” and lunged toward her wounded father, putting herself in the line of fire.

The intruder didn’t worry about endangering her. His pistol cracked again, and what felt like a giant fist slammed into the side of Sam’s head just above his left ear. The impact made him stumble back a step. The room spun crazily around him. He felt his legs folding up beneath him, but couldn’t seem to stop them. As he fell, he tried to raise his gun for another shot, but everything was such a blur he couldn’t find his target.

He heard Lobo’s pained yelp, though, and Hannah’s sobs. He realized he was lying on his back. A figure loomed over him. His vision cleared enough for him to recognize Linus Grady glaring down at him over the barrel of the gun. The gambler didn’t look so affable now. In fact, he looked like the Devil himself.

“You should have done what the marshal told you and gone back to the office, Sam,” Grady said. “Of course, you’d have died anyway, but you could have postponed it for a while.” Grady drew back the pistol’s hammer. “This way I can go ahead and dispose of you now.”

He pulled the trigger, and the red flame spurting from the muzzle was the last thing Sam saw before oblivion claimed him.