Purgatory

“Not for a bottle, not even for a case of whiskey will I tell. What good is whiskey to a dead man?”

“Schuler, I want you to think about something,” Matt said quietly.

“Think about what?”

“You are afraid of the wrong man. Odom isn’t here.”

“That doesn’t matter. If I tell you how to find him, then he’ll find me.”

“I’ve already found you,” Matt said.

“What?”

“Think about it,” Matt said. “I found Bates, and I killed him. I found Paco, I killed him. When I find Odom, I will kill him.” He paused for a long moment. “And like I said, I found you.”

“I—I’m afraid,” Schuler said, his voice so quiet that he could barely be heard.

“You should be afraid,” Matt said.

“Yeah,” a patron at a nearby table said, laughing. Ever since Schuler had come out of the back room, the patron had been watching and listening to the conversation. “Like the man said, he’s scared of—” the laughter died in his throat when he saw the expression on Matt’s face. It wasn’t one of passion, or even cold fury. He wasn’t sure what he saw—maybe something in Matt’s eyes. But he felt the hackles stand up on the back of his neck as he realized he was looking into the face of death. “My God, Schuler, he means it,” the patron said quietly.

The patron’s words stopped everyone in the room as if there had been a gunshot. A nearby card game came to a halt, the three men at the bar turned around, the bartender stopped polishing glasses, and there was a deadly silence in the room.

The clock ticked loudly.

Schuler’s bottom lip began trembling and a line of spittle ran down his chin.

“Now, I’m going to ask you again, Schuler. And I want you to think about it. And while you’re thinking, I want you to know that I’m here and Odom isn’t. Tell me what you know, or I will kill you where you sit.”

Schuler drew a deep breath and held his hands up. “All right, all right, I was with them, just like you said. But I didn’t know they was goin’ to be a lot of people killed. I wouldn’t of had nothin’ to do with it if I had known there was goin’ to be a lot of innocent people killed.”

“I know. I was there, in the express car, remember? I heard you tell Odom that you didn’t know that he planned to kill anyone. In fact, if I hadn’t heard you talking to Odom, I would’ve already killed you by now.”

“Just so’s you know,” Schuler said.

“Where can I find him?”

“Why you lookin’ for him? Why are you doin this? You ain’t the law, are you?”

“No. This is personal. One of the people killed was a little girl, about four years old. One minute she was riding on the train with her mother and brother, and the next minute the train wrecked and a large stake was driven through her heart.”

“No!” Schuler said. He closed his eyes and began shaking. “I didn’t know about the little girl,” he said. “I didn’t know about any of them.”

“Where is Odom?” Matt asked again.

“You got any money?”

“Why?”

“If I give you any information, I’m going to need enough money to get out of here. My life won’t be worth a plugged nickel if Odom finds out I told you where to find him.”

“How can I find him?”

Schuler poured himself a glass of whiskey before he spoke again. He drank it, then wiped the back of his hand across his mouth.

“It’s goin’ to cost you fifty dollars.”

Matt pulled fifty dollars from his pocket and handed it over. “All right. Here’s you money. Now, start talking.”

“Do you know Odom?” Schuler asked, taking the money and stuffing it down into his pocket. “I mean, do you really know him?”

“No.”

“Well, he’s real crazy,” Schuler said. “I’ve never known anyone before who likes killing, but Odom actually likes it. They say he killed his first man when he was fifteen. They’s been others that’s killed for the first time when they was only fifteen, but the man Odom killed was his own pa.”

“Where will I find him?”

Schuler took another drink of whiskey. The whiskey had a somewhat calming effect, and he put the bottle down, this time without the shakes.

“Did you hear what I said? The first man he killed was his own pa.”

“I heard.”

“You’ll find him in Purgatory,” Schuler said.

“What makes you think he’s gone to Purgatory?”

“The marshal there is a fella by the name of Cummins,” Schuler said. “Him ’n’ Odom is brothers.”

“Brothers?”

“They don’t have the same name ’cause they got different papas, but they got the same mama. And after Odom killed his own pa, he moved in with his mama, Cummins, and Cummins’s papa.”

“Thank you,” Matt said.

“Don’t be thanking me,” he said. “If you are going to Purgatory after Odom, you are going to have to deal with Cummins and all his deputies. And you might find out you’ve bitten off more than you can chew.”

“I’ll take my chances,” Matt said. “I’m going.”

“To face all of them?”

“Yes.”

“That’s bold talk, Matt Jensen,” another voice said.

Jensen? Who knew that he was Matt Jensen?

Turning slowly, Matt saw a big man with gray hair and a sweeping mustache leaning against the wall. The man’s arms were folded across his chest. He, like everyone else in the room, had been listening to the conversation. He let his arms drop by his side, with one hand hovering near his pistol. When he did so, it revealed that he was wearing the star of a U.S. marshal.

Matt moved his own hand into position to draw.

The tension in the room grew palpable, and everyone moved out of the way of what they were sure was an impending gunfight.

“You are Marshal Kyle, aren’t you?” Matt asked. “We met at the train wreck.”

“Yes, we met there,” Kyle said. “But I believe you were telling people your name was Cavanaugh then.”

“My name is Cavanaugh,” Matt said.

Kyle shook his head. “No sense in lying about it now. I know that you are Matt Jensen.”

Matt nodded. “Yes, I am Matt Jensen,” he said. “But Cavanaugh is the name I was born with.”

Kyle chuckled. “Well now, this can be a little confusing,” he said.

“Marshal, I didn’t cause that train wreck, I didn’t kill Deputy Hayes, and I didn’t steal any money,” Matt said.

“Odom killed the deputy,” Schuler said, speaking quickly.

“You say Odom killed the deputy?” Kyle asked.

“Yes.”

Kyle nodded. “I suspected that,” he said. “I appreciate the confirmation.” He looked back at Matt. “You don’t deny killing Deputy Gillis, do you?”

“I killed him,” Matt said, without further clarification.

“Gillis drew first?”

“He tried to,” Matt replied and, inexplicably, Kyle laughed.

“That’s a good way of putting it,” Kyle said. “Now, about your going to Purgatory…” He let the sentence hang.

“I’m going,” Matt said resolutely.

“Oh, I’m sure you are going,” Kyle said. “I’m going with you.”

“Well, Marshal, I appreciate your interest, but I prefer to do this alone.”

“Oh, don’t misunderstand me, Matt Jensen,” Kyle said. “I’m not asking for permission to come with you. On the contrary, I’m giving you permission to go with me.”

“You are giving me permission?”

“Let’s say, I’m asking you to come with me,” Kyle corrected. “As a deputy U.S. marshal.”

“Wait a minute. You are going to make me your deputy?”

“As a temporary thing,” Kyle replied. “Just until we get Purgatory cleaned up.”

“But I don’t understand. What about the other thing?” Matt asked.

“What other thing?” Kyle replied. Then, suddenly, he smiled broadly and reached into his shirt pocket. “Oh, you must be talking about this.” He walked over to hand the paper to Matt.

“What is this?”

“Read it,” Kyle said. “If you have any questions, I’ll explain it. Though, how difficult is it to understand a full governor’s pardon?”

Chapter Twenty-two

“Damn,” Kyle said.

“Yeah,” Matt replied. “I see them.”

The two were looking at vultures, wings outstretched as they rode the thermal waves.

“Coyote?” Kyle suggested.

“No. Too many for a coyote. It’s bigger than that.”

“Deer? Horse?”

“Look how they are staying away,” Matt said. “If it was a deer or a horse, they’d be on it. No, whatever it is, they are afraid of it.”

“There’s only one thing they are afraid of,” Kyle said.

“Yes,” Matt replied. He didn’t have to say it aloud. He knew, and he knew that Kyle knew, that what the buzzards were circling was a man.

It took at least half an hour before they reached the body. It was hanging from the branch of a cottonwood tree, twisting slowly at the end of the rope. Some of the vultures had gotten brave enough to descend to the upper branches of the tree, but none had actually reached the body yet, because it showed no signs of vulture feeding.

“It’s Dempster,” Kyle said.

“He was just a drunk. Who could a drunk make angry enough to do something like this?”

“He had stopped drinking,” Kyle said. “And he is the biggest reason the governor granted you a pardon.”

“I’ll be damn,” Matt said as he sat on his horse and looked at Dempster’s body. “He tried to defend me in the trial. I guess he never gave up.”

“And my guess is, that’s what got him killed,” Kyle said. “He made an enemy of Cummins and his deputies.”

“We can’t leave him just hanging like this,” Matt said.

“Want to bury him?” Kyle asked.

“No. I have a better idea.”

Matt and Kyle arrived in Purgatory at just about supper time, and along with the spicy aromas of Mexican cooking, they could smell coffee, pork chops, fried potatoes, and baking bread.

Matt was pulling a hastily constructed travois. Dempster’s body was in plain sight, tied onto the travois.

“Frederica?” a woman called.

“Sí, señora?” a young Mexican girl answered.

“Take the clothes down from the line, will you?” the woman ordered.

“Sí, señora,” the servant girl replied.

The servant girl, startled by sight of the dead man on the travois, gasped, and took a step backward. Matt touched the brim of his hat in greeting, then urged his horse on.

A game of checkers was being played by two gray-bearded men in front of the feed store, watched over by half-a-dozen spectators. A couple of them looked up at Matt and Kyle rode by, their horses’ hooves clumping hollowly on the hard-packed earth of the street.

“Son of a bitch!” one of them said. “That’s Dempster. That’s Bob Dempster’s body he’s a’pullin.”

Amon Goff came through the front door of his shop and began vigorously sweeping the wooden porch. His broom did little but raise the dust to swirl about, then fall back down again. He brushed a sleeping dog off the porch, but the dog quickly reclaimed his position, curled around comfortably, and within a minute was asleep again.

Goff watched the two men ride by, then, nervously, went back into his shop and started pulling down window shades.

“What are you doing that for, Amon?” he wife asked. “It ain’t time to be a’closin’ yet.”

“Hush, woman, and get into the back,” Goff said.

“What?”

“Do like I say, woman!” Goff said. “There’s about to be some killin’ and we’d best be out of the way.”

Matt and Kyle stopped in front of the city mortuary, and Matt dismounted, then cut the travois loose. A tall, cadaverous-looking man, dressed all in black, stepped out of the building.

“You the undertaker?” Matt asked.

“Yes, sir, Prufrock is the name.”

“Take care of him, Prufrock,” Matt said.

“Well, I—uh, would be glad to,” the undertaker replied. “Is the city going to pay for it?”

Matt handed the undertaker a fifty-dollar bill. “No,” he said. “I’m paying for it. The city will be paying for the others.”

“What others?” the undertaker asked, clearly not understanding what Matt was talking about.

“Marshal Cummins and his deputies,” Matt said flatly.

“Wait,” Kyle said. “Prufrock, my name is Ben Kyle. I’m a United States marshal. I’m going to ask you just one time and if you know what is good for you, you will tell the truth. Have you ever heard of a man named Jerome? Cornelius Jerome?”

Prufrock didn’t answer.

“You have five seconds to answer,” Kyle said. “Or when we have finished with Cummins and his crowd, we will be coming back for you.”

“He’s buried out here in Boot Hill,” Prufrock said quickly. “Under the name Bill Smith.”

“If you knew his name, why did you bury him as Bill Smith?”

“It was what Marshal Cummins ordered,” Prufrock said. “He killed him.”

“Cummins killed Jerome? Why?”

“He didn’t mean to kill him. He was tryin’ to shoot his hat off his head. It was an accident,” Prufrock said.

“An accident?”

“Yes.”

“This is what I want you to do, Prufrock. I want you to write that out for me and sign it,” Kyle said.

“I can’t do that,” Prufrock said. “Cummins would—”

“Don’t worry about Cummins. He’ll be dead,” Kyle said in a flat, matter-of-fact voice.

Leaving the startled undertaker with Dempster’s body, Matt and Kyle rode slowly down to the far end of the street, then tied their horses off at the hitching post in front of the Pair O Dice Saloon. When they dismounted, Kyle drew his pistol, pointed it into the air, and pulled the trigger. The gunshot echoed through the quiet streets for a long time. Then it was silent.

The gunshot attracted several of the townspeople and they looked toward the saloon, at the two men who were standing in front, one with a smoking gun.

A curtain fluttered in one of the false fronts.

A cat yowled somewhere down the street.

A fly buzzed past Matt’s ear, did a few circles, then flew away.

A face appeared over the top of the batwing doors, then looked out at Matt and Kyle.

“Are you one of Cummins’s deputies?” Kyle asked.

The man shook his head no.

“Then get the hell out of the saloon.”

“Why should I do that?”

“Get out or get killed,” Kyle said.

Without another word, without even looking back into the saloon, the man left and walked hurriedly on down the street.

“Hear me!” Kyle shouted.

The two words echoed back down the street. “Hear me—hear me—hear me.”

“Anyone in the saloon who isn’t with Marshal Cummins, come out of there now!” Kyle called.

From inside the saloon, Matt could hear the sounds of chairs and tables being scooted across the floor as people hustled to leave. A few seconds later, almost a dozen men came through the front door, then hastened to get out of the way, though they didn’t go so far as to not be able to see the show they were certain was about to take place.

Kyle looked over at Matt.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

Matt didn’t answer. Instead, he stepped up onto the porch, then pushed through the batwing doors and went inside, backing up against the wall as he did so. At the bar, a glass of beer in front of him, his lips dripping with moisture, stood Cletus Odom. Also at the bar, but separated by the length of the bar from Odom, stood Marshal Cummins.

Matt’s lips twisted into an evil smile. Part of him wanted to kill both men this very instant, while part of him wanted to delay the pleasure. He could imagine the fear Dempster had shown when about to be hanged, and he wanted these two men to know that same terror.

“Cummins,” Kyle said. His words were cold, flat, menacing. “As a United States marshal, and acting upon the authority of Governor Fremont, I am here to inform you that your office of city marshal, and the offices of all deputies under you, have been vacated. You no longer have any legal standing. In addition, I am placing all of you under arrest.”

Cummins didn’t turn around, didn’t even look up at the mirror. Instead, he just stared into his glass of beer.

“Now just what makes you think I’m going to let you do that?” Cummins asked.

“There’s no letting to it, Cummins,” Kyle said. “We’re doing it.”

“You and that murderer with you?”

“This man is a deputy U.S. marshal,” Kyle said.

“A deputy U.S. marshal, is he? And what does that mean?”

“That means I can kill every damn one of you and it’ll be legal,” Matt said in a cold, deadly voice.

“I’m going to ask all of you now to unbuckle your gun belts and let them drop to the floor,” Kyle said.

“No, thank you. I got no plans to go hang.”

“You’re going to die at the end of a rope, or you’re going to die here today,” Kyle said.

Cummins turned away from the bar and looked toward Odom. Odom and Cummins were at opposite ends of the bar. Jackson and Crack were also in the saloon, Jackson near the piano, Crack by the little potbellied stove. The four men were all spread out, which was going to make them more difficult targets than they would have been if they were closer together.

“Could be that you two are the ones that’s goin’ to do the dyin’,” Cummins said. “You might’a noticed that there’s four of us and only two of you.”

“Marshal, you take Cummins,” Matt said flatly. “I’ll kill Odom.”

Saying that he would “kill” rather than that he would “take” Odom was deliberate on Matt’s part, and it had the desired effect. He saw Odom flinch slightly; then he saw Odom’s tongue slide out to lick his dry lips.

Matt’s comment was followed by a long pause, the silence broken only by the ticking of the clock that stood against the back wall.

“Now!” Cummins suddenly shouted, and he, Odom, Crack, and Jackson all started for their guns.

Matt reacted to the sudden move quickly, drawing his own pistol faster than he had ever drawn it before. He had his own gun out in time to take quick but deliberate aim and shoot Odom in the gut. Odom, the barrel of his own pistol just topping the holster, pulled the trigger, shooting lead into the floor. A red stain began to spread just over his belt buckle.

Cummins had his gun out before Kyle and his pistol shot cracked an instant after Matt’s. The bullet from Cummins’s pistol hit Kyle in the left shoulder, even as Kyle was pulling the trigger of his own gun. Kyle’s bullet hit Cummins in the chest and the outlaw marshal went down.

Even as Odom’s gun was clattering to the floor and he was putting his hands over his belly wound, watching the blood spill through his fingers, Matt was turning his attention to Jackson and Crack. But, because they were some distance apart, he had to be very deliberate in selecting his target, so he went after Jackson first, getting what was his second shot off, even before Jackson could fire his first. Matt’s bullet hit Jackson in the forehead, and he pitched back crashing into the piano, raising a cacophonous and discordant clang before bouncing off and landing on the floor.

An acrid, blue smoke from the discharge of the weapons formed a big cloud that was already beginning to drift toward the ceiling.

Knowing that Crack was behind him and had not yet fired, Matt threw himself down just as Crack did fire. Crack’s bullet fried through the air exactly where Matt had been but an instant earlier.

Firing up from the floor, Matt’s bullet hit Crack under the chin, then burst out through the top of his head, emitting a detritus of blood, skull bone fragments, and brain matter.

Getting up from the floor but still holding on to his smoking gun, Matt looked over at Marshal Kyle. Kyle was leaning against the bar, holding his hand over the bleeding wound.

“How bad is it?” Matt asked.

“It hurts like a son of a bitch, but I’ll live,” Kyle replied.

Hearing Odom groan, Matt walked over to look down at him.

“You know why I shot you in the gut instead of the head?” Matt asked.

“Because you couldn’t hit me in the head,” Odom answered. He tried to laugh, but it came out a barking cough. Little flecks of blood sprayed out on his lips and on his shirt.

“Oh, I could have,” Matt said. He stood up and rammed his pistol back in his holster. “But I wanted you to die real slow.”

“Why?” Odom asked. “Why did you take such a personal interest in killing me?”

“Even if I told you, you wouldn’t understand,” Matt said.

From outside, there came the sound of dozens of footfalls on the boardwalk. Both Matt and Kyle whirled toward the batwing doors, their pistols raised and ready.

“No, hold it, hold it! Don’t shoot!” a man shouted, pausing just outside the batwing doors. He had both hands up to show that he wasn’t armed.

“It’s all right, Jensen, I know him,” Kyle said. “Bascomb, what are you doing here?”

“We came to check up on you, Marshal,” Bascomb said.

“Well, you’d better get out of here before the rest of Cummins’s deputies get here.”

Bascomb smiled. “You don’t have to be worryin’ none about them, Marshal.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean Duke, Warren, and Gates are in jail,” Bascomb said. “Soon as the folks comin’ out of the saloon told us what was goin’ on, we figured them boys would probably be goin’ down there to help out Cummins. So we just waited for ’em, and got the drop on them.”

“You got a doctor in this town?” Jensen asked.

“Yeah, we do,” Bascomb answered.

“Well, quit standing here palavering. Go get the doctor for the marshal.”

“Oh,” Bascomb said. “Oh, yes, I didn’t think about that.” Turning, he yelled up the street. “Get Dr. Urban up here! Get Dr. Urban up here to tend to the marshal.”

“To hell with tendin’ to the marshal, let the son of a bitch die!” someone called back.

“I’m talkin’ about U.S. marshal Kyle,” Bascomb replied. “Marshal Cummins is already dead.”

Matt waited until Dr. Urban arrived, then stood by as the doctor examined the wound.

“How bad is it, Doc?” Matt asked.

“Not bad at all,” the doctor said as he began cleaning the wound. “Looks like the bullet just left a little crease. If it doesn’t putrefy, it should heal up quickly.”

“That’s good to know,” Matt said. He took the badge off his shirt and handed it to the marshal.

“You are welcome to keep that deputy’s badge,” Kyle said. “I can always use a good man like you. The law can always use a good man like you.”

“I appreciate it, Marshal,” Matt said. “But I think I’ll just be getting on.”

“Where are you headed?”

Matt paused for a moment, then smiled. “You know—I haven’t really given that any thought.

“What about me?” Odom asked.

“What about you?” Matt replied.

“Ain’t you goin’ to let the doctor look at me?”

“It wouldn’t do any good for the doctor to see you. You’re going to die no matter what he does,” Matt said.

“But you can’t just leave me here to die on the floor,” Odom said.

Matt thought of Suzie Dobbs, and all the others, killed and injured in the train wreck caused by this man.

“You can’t leave me like this!” Odom shouted again.

Matt started for the door. Then, just before he left, he looked back at Odom. “Yeah, I can.”

“You son of a bitch! I’ll see you in hell!” Odom shouted.

“Not likely,” Matt replied. “I’ve done my time in Purgatory.”

TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCITING PREVIEW OF

Sidewinders

An Exciting New Western Series by William W. Johnstone and J. A. Johnstone

In frontier literature, the name “Johnstone” means big, hard-hitting Western adventure told at a breakneck pace. Now, the bestselling authors kick off a rollicking, new series—about a pair of not-quite-over-the-hill drifters.

Meet Scratch Morton and Bo Creel, two amiable drifters and old pals. Veterans of cowboying, cattle drives, drunken brawls, and a couple of shoot-outs, Scratch and Bo are mostly honest and don’t go looking for trouble—it’s usually there when they wake up in the morning.

Now, in remote Arizona Territory, they’re caught up in a battle between two stagecoach lines. The owner of one, a beautiful widow, has gotten both Scratch and Bo hot and bothered—each trying to impress her as they fend off the opposing stage line aiming to destroy her. But nothing is what it seems to be in this fight, and two tough sidewinders are riding straight into a deadly trap.

Sidewinders

by William W. Johnstone with J. A. Johnstone

Coming in September 2008

Wherever Pinnacle Books are sold.

Man that is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble.

—Job 14:1

We’re peaceable men, I tell you.

—Scratch Morton

Chapter One

“All I’m sayin’ is that a man who ain’t prepared to lose hadn’t ought to sit down at the table in the first place,” Scratch Morton argued as he and his trail partner, Bo Creel, rode along a draw in a rugged stretch of Arizona Territory.

“You didn’t have to rub his nose in it like that,” Bo pointed out. “That cowboy probably wouldn’t have gotten mad enough to reach for his gun if you’d just stayed out of it.”

“Stay out of it, hell! He practically accused you of cheatin’. I couldn’t let him get away with that, old-timer.”

There was a certain irony in Scratch referring to Bo as “old-timer.” The two men were of an age. Their birthdays were less than a month apart. It was true, though, that Bo was a few weeks older. And neither Bo nor Scratch was within shouting distance of youth anymore. Their deeply tanned, weathered faces, Scratch’s thatch of silver hair, and the strands of gray in Bo’s thick, dark brown hair testified to that.

The Arizona sun had prompted both men to remove their jackets as they rode. Scratch normally sported a fringed buckskin jacket that went well with his tan whipcord trousers and creamy Stetson. He liked dressing well.

Bo, on the other hand, usually wore a long black coat that, along with his black trousers and dusty, flat-crowned black hat, made him look like a circuit-riding preacher. He didn’t have a preacher’s hands, though. His long, nimble fingers were made for playing cards—or handling a gun.

He had been engaged in the former at a saloon up in Prescott when the trouble broke out. One of the other players, a gangling cowboy with fiery red hair, had gotten upset at losing his stake to Bo. Scratch, who hadn’t been in the game but had been nursing a beer at the bar instead, hadn’t helped matters by wandering over to the felt-covered table and hoorawing the angry waddy. Accusations flew, and the cowboy had wound up making a grab for the gun on his hip.

“Anyway, it ain’t like you had to kill him or anything like that,” Scratch went on now. “He probably had a headache when he woke up from you bendin’ your gun over his skull like that, but he could’a woke up dead just as easy.”

“And what if that saloon had been full of other fellas who rode for the same brand?” Bo asked. “Then we’d have had a riot on our hands. We might have had to shoot our way out.”

Scratch grinned. “Wouldn’t be the first time, now would it?”

That was true enough. Bo sighed. Trouble had a long-standing habit of following them around, despite their best intentions.

Friends ever since they had met as boys in Texas, during the Runaway Scrape when it looked like ol’ General Santa Anna would wipe the place clean of the Texicans who were rebelling against his dictatorship, Bo and Scratch had been together through times of triumph and tragedy. They had been on the drift for nigh on to forty years, riding from one end of the frontier to the other and back again, always searching for an elusive something.

For Scratch, it was sheer restlessness, a natural urge to see what was on the other side of the next hill, to cross the next river, to kiss the next good-lookin’ woman and have the next adventure. With Bo, it was a more melancholy quest, an attempt to escape the memories of the wife and children taken from him by a killer fever many years earlier. All the fiddle-footed years had dulled that pain, but Bo had come to realize that nothing could ever take it away completely.

After the ruckus with the redheaded cowboy, they had drifted northward from Prescott toward the Verde River, the low but rugged range of the Santa Marias to their left. Some taller, snowcapped mountains were visible in the far, far distance to the northeast. Flagstaff lay in that direction. Maybe they would circle around and go there next.

It didn’t really matter. They had no plans except to keep riding and see where the trails took them.

Changing the subject from the earlier fracas, Scratch went on. “I think we ought to find us some shade and wait out the rest of the afternoon. It’s gettin’ on toward hot-as-hell o’clock.”

Bo laughed and said, “You’re right. Where do you suggest we find that shade?”

He waved a hand at the barren hills surrounding the sandy-bottomed draw where they rode. The only colors in sight were brown and tan and red. Not a bit of green. Not even a cactus.

Scratch rasped a thumbnail along his jawline and shrugged. “Yeah, that might be a little hard to do. Could be a cave or somethin’ up in those hills, though. Even a little overhang would give us some shade.”

Bo nodded and turned his horse to the left. “I guess it would be worth taking a look.”

They had just reached the slope of a nearby hill when both men heard a familiar sound. A series of shots ripped through the hot, still air. The popping of revolvers was interspersed with the dull boom of a shotgun. Bo and Scratch reined in sharply and looked at each other.

“Sounds like trouble,” Scratch said. “We gonna turn around and go the other way?”

“What do you think?” Bo asked, and for a second his sober demeanor was offset by the reckless gleam that appeared in his eyes.

The two drifters from Texas yelled to their horses, dug their boot heels into the animals’ sides, and galloped up the hill. The shots were coming from somewhere on the other side.

Bo was riding a mouse-colored dun with a darker stripe down its back, an ugly horse with more speed and sand than was evident from its appearance. Scratch was mounted on a big, handsome bay that was somewhat dandified like its rider. Both horses were strong and took the slope without much trouble. Within moments, as the shots continued to ring out, Bo and Scratch crested the top of the hill and saw what was on the other side.

The rocky slope led down to a broad flat crossed in the distance to the west by a meandering line of washed-out green that marked the course of a stream. A dusty road ran from the east toward that creek, and along that road, bouncing and careening from its excessive speed, rolled a stagecoach.

The driver had whipped his six-horse hitch to a hard gallop, and for good reason. Thundering along about fifty yards behind the stagecoach were eight or ten men on horseback, throwing lead at the coach. Even in the bright sunlight, Bo and Scratch could see spurts of flame from the gun muzzles. A cloud of powder smoke trailed after the pursuing riders.

As if the circumstances of the chase weren’t enough to convince Bo and Scratch that the men on horseback were up to no good, the fact that they had bandannas tied across the lower halves of their faces to serve as crude masks confirmed that they were outlaws bent on holding up the stage. The two drifters brought their mounts to a halt at the top of the hill as their eyes instantly took in the scene.

Scratch reached for his Winchester, which stuck up from a sheath strapped to his saddle. “We takin’ cards in this game?” he called to Bo.

“I reckon,” Bo replied as he pulled his own rifle from its saddle boot. He levered a round into the Winchester’s firing chamber and smoothly brought the weapon to his shoulder. As he nestled his cheek against the smooth wood of the stock, he added, “Since we don’t know the details, might be better if we tried not to kill anybody.”

“I figured you’d say that,” Scratch grumbled as he lined up his own shot.

The two of them opened fire, cranking off several shots as fast as they could work the levers on the rifles. The bullets slammed into the road in front of the masked riders, kicking up gouts of dust. The men were moving so fast it was hard to keep the shots in front of them, and in fact one of the bullets fired by the Texans burned the shoulder of a man’s mount and made the horse jump.

That got the attention of the outlaws. They reined in briefly as Bo and Scratch stopped shooting. It was their hope that the masked men would turn around and go the other way, but that wasn’t what happened.

Instead, the gang of desperadoes split up. Three of them dismounted, dragging rifles from their horses as they did so, and bellied down behind some rocks. The other seven took off again after the stagecoach.

“Well, hell!” Scratch said. “That didn’t work. We should’a killed a couple of ’em.”

“Come on,” Bo cried as he wheeled his horse. “They’re going to try to pin us down here!”

Sure enough, the three men who had been left behind by the rest of the gang opened fire then. Bullets whined around the heads of the Texans like angry bees, one of them coming close enough so that Bo heard the wind-rip of its passage beside his ear.

They heeled their horses into a run again, following the crest of the hill as it curved to the west. The outlaws continued firing at them, but none of the bullets came close now.

The hill petered out after about three hundred yards. Bo and Scratch started downslope again, angling toward the wide flats and the road that ran through them. They glanced over their shoulders, and saw that the three men who had tried to neutralize the threat from them had mounted up again and were now fogging it after the rest of the gang, which had carried on with its pursuit of the stagecoach.

In fact, the outlaws had cut the gap to about twenty yards, and from the way one of the men on the driver’s box was swaying back and forth and clutching his shoulder, he looked like he was wounded. The other man, who was handling the reins, looked back and appeared to be slowing the team.

“He’s gonna stop and give up!” Scratch shouted over the pounding of hooves. “Those owlhoots got their blood up! They’re liable to kill everybody on that coach!”

“They might at that!” Bo called in agreement. He had rammed his Winchester back in the saddle boot. Now he unleathered the walnut-butted Colt on his hip and said, “We won’t hold back this time!”

Scratch whooped. “Now you’re talkin’!” He drew one of the long-barreled, ivory-handled, .36 caliber Remington revolvers that he carried.

Both men opened fire as they veered toward the road. The hurricane deck of a galloping horse wasn’t the best platform for accurate marksmanship, but Bo and Scratch had had plenty of experience in running gun battles like this. Their flank attack was effective. A couple of the outlaws were jolted by the impact of the drifters’ slugs and had to grab for the horns to keep from tumbling out of their saddles.

Despite having a heavy advantage in numbers, the masked outlaws began to peel sharply away from the road. They threw a few shots at Bo and Scratch, but didn’t put much effort into it. The Texans slowed their horses as the would-be robbers abandoned the chase, picked up the three stragglers, and galloped off to the east.

“We goin’ after ’em?” Scratch asked.

Bo’s forehead was creased in a frown. “Have you gone loco? With five-to-one odds against us, I plan on thanking my lucky stars that they decided it wasn’t worth it to rob that stagecoach after all!”

“We winged at least a couple of ’em. I saw the varmints jump.”

Bo nodded. “Yeah, I did, too.” He inclined his head toward the coach, which had rocked to a halt by now, with thinning swirls of road dust rising around it. “Let’s go see how bad that fella on the stage is hurt.”

The wounded man was still conscious. They could tell that from the furious cussing they heard as they approached. The driver had climbed down and was helping the other man to the ground. As the hoofbeats of the Texans’ horses rattled up, the driver turned and pulled a gun.

“Hold on there, son!” Bo called as he reined in. “We’re friends.”

Scratch brought his bay to a halt alongside Bo’s dun. “Yeah,” he said. “In case you didn’t notice, we’re the hombres who got those owlhoots off your tail.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder in the direction that the gang had fled.

The driver nodded and holstered his gun. “Yeah, I know that,” he said. “Sorry. I’m just a little proddy right now.”

“You’ve got reason to be,” Bo said as he swung down from his saddle. “How bad is your friend hurt?”

The driver was a young man, probably in his mid-twenties. He wore a brown hat and a long, tan duster over denim trousers and a blue, bib-front shirt. A red bandanna was tied around his neck. His wounded companion was considerably older and sported a brush of bristly gray whiskers. He had lost his hat somewhere during the chase, revealing a mostly bald head.

He answered Bo’s question by saying, “How bad does it look like I’m hurt, damn it? Them no-good buzzard-spawn busted my shoulder!”

The right shoulder of his flannel shirt was bloody, all right, and the stain had leaked down onto his cowhide vest. Crimson still oozed through the fingers of the left hand he used to clutch the injured shoulder.

“Take it easy, Ponderosa,” the younger man told him. “Sit down here beside the wheel, and we’ll take a look at it. It might not be as bad as you think it is.”

“Oh, it’s bad, all right,” the old-timer said. “I been shot before. Reckon I’ll bleed to death in another few minutes.”

“I don’t think it’s quite that serious,” Bo said with a faint smile as he tied his dun’s reins to the back of the coach. Scratch had dismounted, too, and tied his horse likewise. Bo went on. “My partner and I have had some experience with gunshot wounds. We’d be glad to help.”

“Much obliged,” the young man said. “If you’ll give me a hand with him…”

Bo helped the driver lower the old man called Ponderosa to the ground. Ponderosa leaned back against the front wheel while Bo pulled his vest and shirt to the side to expose the wound. Under Ponderosa’s tan, the bearded, leathery face was pale from shock and loss of blood.

While Bo was tending to the injured man, Scratch glanced inside the coach and said to the driver, “No passengers, eh?”

“Not on this run,” the young man said with a shake of his head. “And not much in the mail pouch either. If those outlaws had caught up to us, they would have been mighty disappointed.” He held out his hand. “My name’s Gil Sutherland, by the way.”

“Scratch Morton.” As Scratch shook Gil Sutherland’s hand, he nodded toward Bo and added, “My pard there is Bo Creel.”

“And I’m Ponderosa Pine,” the old-timer said, introducing himself through gritted teeth as Bo probed the wound. “Given name’s Clarence, but nobody calls me that ’less’n they want’a tangle with a wildcat.”

“We wouldn’t want that,” Bo said with a dry chuckle. “Good news, Ponderosa. That bullet didn’t break your shoulder. I think it missed the bone and just knocked out a chunk of meat on its way through.”

“You sure? It hurts like blazes, and I can’t lift my arm.”

“That’s just from the shock of being wounded. We’ll plug the holes to stop the bleeding, and I think you’ll be all right.” Bo looked up at Gil Sutherland. “How far is the nearest town?”

“Red Butte’s about five miles west of here,” Gil replied. “That’s where we were headed when they jumped us. This is the regular run between Red Butte and Chino Valley.”

“Let’s get Ponderosa here on into town then. He needs to have a real doctor look at that wound, just to be on the safe side.”

“That’s assumin’ there’s a sawbones in this Red Butte place,” Scratch added.

Gil nodded. “Yes, there’s a doctor. Don’t worry, Ponderosa. We’ll take care of you.”

“Ain’t worried,” Ponderosa muttered. “Just mad. Mad as hell. I’d like to see Judson and all o’ his bunch strung up.”

“Who’s Judson?” Bo asked as he used a folding knife he took from his pocket to cut several strips of cloth from the bottom of Ponderosa’s shirt. He wadded up some of the flannel into thick pads and used the other strips to bind them tightly into place over the entrance and exit wounds.

“Rance Judson is the leader of the gang that was chasing us,” Gil explained.

“Him and those varmints who ride with him been raisin’ hell in these parts for six months now,” Ponderosa added.

Scratch asked, “If folks know who he is and that he’s responsible for such deviltry, why don’t the law come in and arrest him?”

Gil Sutherland shook his head. “We’re a long way from any real law out here, Mr. Morton. There’s a marshal in Red Butte who does a pretty good job of keeping the peace there, but he’s not going to go chasing off into the badlands after Judson’s gang. That would be suicide, and he knows it. We all do.”

Bo finished tying the makeshift bandages into place. He straightened from his crouch, grunting a little as he did so. “Old bones are stiffer than they used to be.”

“Tell me about it,” Ponderosa grumbled. “And I’m quite a bit older’n you, mister.”

“Let’s get you in the coach,” Gil suggested. “It won’t be all that comfortable, but it should be better than riding up on the box.”

“Wait just a doggone minute! I signed on to be the shotgun guard, not a danged passenger!”

“I’ll ride shotgun the rest of the way,” Bo said. “Where’s your Greener?”

“On the floorboard where I dropped it when them polecats ventilated me, I reckon.”

Gil said, “I don’t think Judson and his men will make another try for us. You don’t have to come with us into town.”

“We don’t mind,” Bo said.

“Truth to tell, all this dust has got me thirsty,” Scratch added with a grin. “You got at least one saloon there, don’t you?”

“Several,” Gil admitted.

“Then what are we waitin’ for? Let’s go to Red Butte!”

Chapter Two

Once they had loaded the still-complaining Ponderosa Pine into the stagecoach, Bo climbed onto the driver’s box next to Gil Sutherland, leaving his horse tied at the back of the coach. Scratch mounted up and rode alongside as Gil got the vehicle moving.

“Used to be a Butterfield coach, didn’t it?” Bo asked as he swayed slightly on the seat from the rocking motion. He had Ponderosa’s double-barreled scattergun across his knees.

“How did you know?” Gil said.

“You can still see some of the red and yellow paint on it in places.”

Gil grunted. “We didn’t strip the paint off on purpose. The sun and the dust and the wind in this godforsaken country took care of that for us.”

“We?” Bo repeated.

“My father was the one who started the stage line. It runs from Cottonwood to Chino Valley and on over to Red Butte, where the headquarters are. There’s another line that runs from Flagstaff down to Cottonwood and then on south, but there was no transportation from Cottonwood west to the Santa Marias until my father came along. Chino Valley and Red Butte were growing fast because of all the ranching and mining in the area, so he thought it would be a good gamble that they’d need a stage line. He figured some other settlements might spring up along the way, too.”

“Sounds like a worthwhile gamble,” Bo said with a nod. “How’s it working out?”

Gil scowled and shook his head. “Not so good.”

“Because of those outlaws? Folks are too scared of being held up to ride the stage?”

“Well, it didn’t help when Judson and his bunch started raising hell, but that’s not all of it. Those other settlements never sprang up. There’s just Chino Valley and Red Butte. And the mines played out, for the most part. There’s only one still operating at a good level.”

“So there’s not as much business as your pa thought there would be.”

“That’s right. It’s been a struggle to make ends meet.” Gil’s voice caught a little. “It didn’t help matters when my father got sick and died.”

Bo looked over at the young man with a frown. “You’re running the stage line now?”

Gil shook his head again. “My mother’s in charge. I do what I can to help, just like when my father was still alive. I’ve got a younger brother, too, but he—” Gil stopped and drew in a breath. “Let’s just say that he’s not much for hard work and leave it at that.”

Bo didn’t say anything in response to that. Clearly, there were some hard feelings between Gil Sutherland and his little brother, and they might well be justified. But Bo knew it usually didn’t pay for a fella to stick his nose into family squabbles.

Gil drove on in silence for a few minutes, then said, “Thanks for pitching in back there. Judson’s bunch would have caught us in another minute or two, and there’s no telling what they might have done, especially when they found out they weren’t going to get much in the way of loot.”

“It looked like you were about to stop and let them catch up,” Bo said.

“That’s right, I was. I knew we couldn’t outrun them, and the way Ponderosa was only half-conscious and bouncing around on the seat, I was afraid he might get pitched off and break his neck. I was hoping they’d just take the mail pouch and let us go.”

“Is Judson in the habit of doing things like that?”

Gil shrugged. “They’ve killed a few men during their holdups, but only when somebody tried to fight back. Like when they hit the bank over in Chino Valley last month.”

“They’re not just stagecoach robbers then.”

“No, they’ve rustled cattle and run them south across the border into Mexico, they robbed the bank like I said, and they raided the Pitchfork Mine and stole an ore shipment that was about to go out. They’ve stopped the stage half-a-dozen times, I guess, even though they’ve never made a very big haul at it. Killed a driver and a guard, though, so nobody wants to work for us anymore. Ponderosa and I have been taking all the runs ourselves lately. Now he’s going to be laid up for a while, more than likely.” Gil sighed. “I don’t know what we’ll do. Shut down, I guess.”

Bo didn’t say anything to that either. He had some thoughts on the matter, but he kept them to himself for the time being.

The creek that Bo and Scratch had seen from the top of the hill turned out to be a narrow, shallow stream, not much more than a twisting thread of water in a gravelly bed. As Gil drove across it at a ford, he said, “This is Hell Creek. Not much to look at, but it’s the only water this side of the Santa Marias and it never dries up, no matter how hot the weather gets.”

“Spring-fed, I reckon,” Bo said.

Gil nodded. “That’s right. North of here, in the ranching country, it’s bigger.”

Bo sniffed the air. “Sulfur springs, too, unless I miss my guess.”

“That’s how it got its name,” Gil said. “From the smell of brimstone. Not very pleasant, but the water doesn’t taste too bad. You get used to it after a while, I suppose.”

The terrain began to rise a little once they were on the other side of Hell Creek. The slope was very gradual at first, but became more pronounced. More tufts of grass appeared, and even some small bushes. Bo saw trees up ahead, where the foothills of the Santa Maria Mountains began.

A little over an hour after they left the site of the attempted holdup, the stagecoach arrived at Red Butte. Bo and Scratch saw why the settlement had gotten its name. A copper-colored sandstone mesa jutted up from the ground about half a mile north of the town, which had a main street, half-a-dozen cross streets, and a couple of streets paralleling the main drag. The buildings were a mixture of adobe, lumber from the trees growing in the foothills, and brick that must have been freighted in from Flagstaff or some other big town.

“Not a bad-lookin’ place,” Scratch commented. “Wouldn’t exactly say that it’s boomin’, but it don’t look like it’s about to dry up and blow away either.”

“There are enough ranches along the Santa Marias, both north and south of town, to support quite a few businesses,” Gil said. “Throw in the Pitchfork, too, and folks do all right. They just don’t have much need of a stage line except to deliver the mail.” His mouth twisted. “And we probably won’t have that contract much longer.”

“What do you mean by that, son?” Bo asked, but Gil didn’t answer. The young man was busy bringing the stagecoach to a halt at the edge of the settlement, in front of a neatly kept adobe building with a wooden barn and some corrals behind it. Someone had planted cactus roses on either side of the three steps that led up to the shaded porch attached to the front of the adobe building. The bright yellow roses were blooming, providing a welcome splash of color in an otherwise drab setting.

The front door of the building opened while the coach was still rocking back and forth on the broad leather thoroughbraces that supported it, after coming to a stop. A dark-haired woman wearing a long, blue dress with tiny yellow flowers on it came onto the porch. She pushed back her hair from her face, and relief showed in her eyes as she looked at Gil.

That relief was fleeting, lasting only a second before it was replaced by worry. She looked at Bo, a sober, almost grim stranger riding with Gil, and at Scratch, another stranger who had reined his horse to a halt alongside the team. Then she asked anxiously, “Where’s Ponderosa?”

The old-timer swung the door of the coach open before Gil could answer, saying, “I’m right here, Miz Abigail—what’s left of me anyway!”

The woman cried out in surprise and lifted a hand to her mouth. Then she hurried forward. “For God’s sake, Ponderosa!” she exclaimed. “What happened to you?”

“Judson’s men again, Mother,” Gil said from the box. “They hit us about a mile the other side of Hell Creek.”

The woman, who was obviously Abigail Sutherland, turned her head to look up at her son as she was helping the wounded man from the coach. “Did they get the mail pouch?” she asked, and the slight quaver in her voice was evidence of just how important that question was to her.

Gil shook his head. “Not this time. These two strangers came along and lit into Judson’s bunch. They wounded a couple of the outlaws and ran them off.”

“Not in time to keep me from gettin’ plugged, though,” Ponderosa grumbled.

Scratch had dismounted. He came around the back of the coach, leading his bay with the reins in one hand. He used the other hand to sweep the cream-colored Stetson off his head and gave Abigail Sutherland a big, toothy smile.

“Scratch Morton, at your service, ma’am,” he said, introducing himself.

Abigail turned to him. “Thank you for your help, Mr. Morton,” she said. “And your friend is…?”

Scratch waved the hand holding the Stetson in Bo’s general direction. “That’s Bo Creel. Don’t let that look on his face fool you, ma’am. He ain’t as sour in disposition as he appears. Not quite.”

Bo grunted and said from the driver’s box, “I’m pleased to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Sutherland. Just wish it was under better circumstances.”

“So do I,” said Ponderosa. “In case anybody’s forgotten, I got a dang bullet hole in my carcass!”

“Yes, and I’ll take you down to Dr. Chambers’ house right now,” Abigail told him. “Can you walk all right?”

Ponderosa sniffed. “I reckon. Got hit in the shoulder, not the leg. I was a mite dizzy earlier, but I’m feelin’ better now.”

Abigail got an arm around his waist to help support him, and they started along the street toward the rest of the settlement. She glanced up at her son as they passed the front of the coach, and asked, “Can you take care of the team, Gil?”

“Sure. But where’s Dave?”

“I don’t know,” Abigail said, and that worried look was back on her face, as well as the concern in her voice.

“We’ll give you a hand with those horses, son,” Scratch said as he put his hat back on. “Won’t we, Bo?”

“Yeah.” Bo placed the shotgun on the floorboard where he had found it.

Gil got the team moving again, and drove the stagecoach around the adobe office to the barn in the rear. He took the coach all the way into the barn before stopping. Scratch followed, leading his horse.

Bo and Gil climbed down from the box. Along with Scratch, they went to work unhitching the horses. Watching the sure, practiced actions of the older men, Gil commented, “You fellas have worked around stagecoaches before, haven’t you?”

“We ran a way station in Kansas for a while,” Bo replied.

“And we hired on as jehus and shotgun guards in other places,” Scratch added. “Fact is, you won’t find many jobs on the frontier that we ain’t done at one time or another. Ain’t that right, Bo?”

“Except for donning aprons and clerking in a store,” Bo said. “I don’t think we’ve ever done that.”

A shudder went through Scratch. “And we ain’t gonna,” he declared.

When the team had been unhitched and the horses turned out into the corral, Gil reached into the compartment under the driver’s seat on the coach and pulled out a canvas pouch. “I’ll take the mail down to the post office,” he said. “If you’re going to be staying around Red Butte for a while, feel free to unsaddle your horses, give them some grain, and put them in the corral with the others if you want to.”

Scratch looked at Bo and asked, “What do you think? We gonna be stayin’ in these parts for a while?”

“We don’t have anywhere else we have to be,” Bo replied. “And Red Butte looks like a pretty nice little town.”

Scratch grinned. “That’s what I was thinkin’.” To Gil, he added, “Much obliged for the hospitality, son.”

Gil lifted a hand in farewell and left the barn while Bo was untying his dun from the back of the stagecoach. Bo commented, “I notice you started calling that boy ‘son’ as soon as you got a look at his mother. Thinking about settling down with the Widow Sutherland, are you?”

“Me?” Scratch held his hand over his heart for a moment, then grinned. “You got to admit, Bo, she’s a fine figure of a woman.”

“It was a pretty picture,” Bo mused, “her standing there on that porch with the wind in her hair and those cactus roses blooming at her feet. But we don’t know a blasted thing about her, other than the fact that she’s got a couple of sons and a stage line started by her late husband. We don’t even know how long he’s been gone. She may still be in mourning.”

“Wasn’t wearin’ black,” Scratch pointed out.

“No, she wasn’t, that’s true,” Bo admitted as he undid one of his saddle cinches.

“And she’s got a whole heap o’ problems on her plate, from the sound of it. Might be we could give her a hand with ’em.”

“Nobody’s asked us for our help.”

“Give it time. Anyway, ain’t you curious about what’s goin’ on around here? You always did like to get to the bottom of any trouble we ran into.”

“That’s true,” Bo said with a shrug. “I guess we could hang around for a while and see what happens. Like I said, it seems like a pretty nice little town.”

Scratch grinned. “And a pretty nice little woman, too.”

Bo just rolled his eyes and shook his head.

Chapter Three

There were a couple of rocking chairs on the porch of the adobe office. Bo and Scratch walked around the building after tending to their horses, and sat down in those chairs to wait. They weren’t sure what they were waiting for, but that was a pretty common situation. Years of drifting had taught them to be patient.

They didn’t have to wait long for something to happen. Three men came down the street, stopped in front of the headquarters of the Sutherland Stage Line, and dismounted. One of them was young, twenty or twenty-one more than likely, and his brown hair and the cast of his features resembled those of Gil Sutherland. Bo figured he and Scratch were looking at the heretofore-missing Dave Sutherland, Gil’s younger brother.

The other two men were older, but still in their twenties. One was tall and scrawny, with a shock of straw-colored hair under a battered, pushed-back hat. The other was short and broad, built like a bull with an animal-like dullness in his eyes and on his face. He wore a derby over dark hair that grew down low on his forehead.

“You hombres looking for somebody?” asked the young man Bo and Scratch took to be Dave Sutherland. He swayed back and forth, and his speech was slurred enough to indicate that he’d been drinking.

The afternoon was well advanced, so it wasn’t like he was drunk first thing in the morning or anything like that. Still, he was a mite young to be putting away enough liquor to get him in such a condition. His companions might have been drinking, too, but they didn’t appear to be as drunk as young Dave.

“We’re waiting for Mrs. Sutherland to get back,” Bo said.

“If you wanna buy tickets on the st-stage, you might as well wait until morning. There’s one due in this afternoon any time now, and there won’t be another one leaving until tomorrow.”

Dave was making a visible effort to stand up straight, and he was being more careful and precise when he talked now, two more signs that he’d guzzled too much rotgut.

“Today’s stage is already in,” Scratch said. “We came in with it.”

“Then why are you hanging around here? Go on about your business!”

Bo frowned. “What did you say, mister?”

“You heard me! You look like saddle tramps to me. Probably want a handout or something. Well, you won’t get it here!”

“You’re makin’ a mistake, son,” Scratch said.

“You’re the one who made the mistake, old-timer. I’m Dave Sutherland. My ma owns this stage line, and I’m telling you to rattle your hocks!”

Dave had confirmed what Bo and Scratch already suspected, that he was Abigail’s younger son, but his belligerence took them by surprise. Some people got proddy like that when they’d had too much to drink, though, and evidently Dave was one of them.

The tall, straw-haired man stepped forward. “You heard Dave. Vamoose, you two old pelicans!”

Scratch frowned, too, and looked over at Bo. “You hear what he called us?”

“Yeah,” Bo said. “Looks like this town isn’t as friendly as we thought it was.”

“Hey! We’re talkin’ to you!” the straw-haired man said.

Scratch nodded. “Oh, we heard you. Either that or there’s a donkey brayin’ somewhere close by.”

The man’s hands closed into bony fists. “Why, you—”

“We’ll just wait here for Mrs. Sutherland,” Bo cut in. “We’re not looking for trouble.”

“You got it whether you’re lookin’ for it or not. Now drift or—”

“Or what?” Scratch said.

“Or Culley and me will make you wish you had!”

Scratch nodded toward the short, broad man and said to Bo, “You figure the baby bull there’s Culley?”

“I reckon,” Bo said.

“He looks strong enough to bend a railroad tie.”

The straw-haired man sneered. “He is, and you’re about to find out for yourself, old man.”

“But dumb as dirt,” Scratch went on as if the other man hadn’t spoken.

Bo heaved a sigh. If a fight hadn’t been inevitable to start with, it sure as blazes was now. Culley’s face darkened with slow anger, and he started toward the porch steps. He was so muscular that his walk had a peculiar rolling gait to it.

Bo made one final attempt to stave off a ruckus. He stood up, held out a hand, and said, “You boys don’t want to do this.” He looked at Dave. “I’m betting your mother won’t like it if there’s a brawl on her front porch.”

“My mother doesn’t tell me what to do,” Dave shot back. “And you shouldn’t have mouthed off to Angus and Culley.”

“Hey!” Scratch said indignantly as he got to his feet. “I’m the one who mouthed off, and don’t you forget it!”

Culley spoke for the first time, rumbling, “Gonna rip you apart, old man!” He charged up the steps, followed closely by the straw-haired man, whose name was Angus, evidently.

Scratch lifted his right leg, planted his boot heel in Culley’s chest, and shoved. Culley went backward into Angus, knocking him over like a ball in a game of ninepins. Both men sprawled in the dirt in front of the porch, looking surprised. Scratch hadn’t seemed like he was moving very fast. His movements had appeared almost casual.

Dave gaped. “You gonna let that old varmint do that?” he demanded, the slur slipping back into his voice.

“Not hardly,” Angus vowed as he scrambled to his feet. He had to help Culley up, because the muscle-bound man was flailing his arms and legs like a turtle that’s been flipped over onto its back.

Once they were both up, Angus said to his companion, “All right, we’re gonna go at this different. I’ll take the preacher, you handle the fancy Dan in the buckskin jacket.”

Culley nodded. He didn’t have much of a neck, just a thick column of muscle. “Yeah. Gonna bust him to pieces.”

Scratch grinned and said, “Come on, baby bull. You try it.”

Angus and Culley advanced up the steps side by side this time, moving more slowly and more carefully. The Texans split up, Bo going down the porch to the right, Scratch to the left.

“Try not to bust up those rockers,” Bo called to his trail partner. “They’re pretty comfortable. Be a shame if they got broken.”

“Yeah,” Scratch agreed. “Might upset Mrs. Sutherland, too.”

Dave yelled, “You leave my mother out of this, saddle tramp!”

Angus charged, swinging a malletlike fist at Bo’s head. At the same time, Culley barreled toward Scratch.

Bo blocked Angus’s punch with the same sort of effortless ease that Scratch had demonstrated in kicking the two ruffians down the porch steps a few minutes earlier. In a continuation of the same movement, Bo’s right fist shot forward in a short, sharp blow that landed flush on Angus’s nose. Blood spurted under the impact. Angus staggered back with a howl of pain.

He retreated only a couple of steps, though, before he caught himself and attacked again, this time wind-milling punches at the black-clad stranger. Bo blocked the first few blows, but then one of Angus’s knobby fists clipped him on the jaw. Angus might be scrawny, but his punches packed plenty of power. Bo was knocked against the railing that ran along the front of the porch. With a shout of triumph, Angus crowded in on him, trying to seize and hold the advantage.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the porch, Scratch had his hands full with Culley. The pocket-sized titan was slow, but even though Scratch was able to land several sizzling punches, Culley just shrugged them off. He appeared to be able to absorb as much punishment as Scratch wanted to deal out.

At the same time, he swung his tree-trunklike arms in lumbering roundhouse blows that Scratch was able to avoid without much trouble. If one of those big fists ever landed, though, it would be like being hit with a piledriver. Scratch would go down hard.

He didn’t intend to let that happen. He darted in and out, peppering Culley’s face with punches in hopes that sooner or later the fella’s brain would realize how badly he was being pummeled.

To his horror, Scratch suddenly felt Culley’s arms snap closed around his torso like bands of steel, and he knew that he had made the mistake of getting too close. Scratch’s arms were still loose, but Culley just ignored the blows and squeezed. As those brawny arms tightened more and more, Scratch grunted and felt his ribs begin to creak.

While Scratch was trying to deal with that bone-crushing threat, Bo thrust a foot between Angus’s ankles as the straw-haired man tried to crowd him into the railing. Angus lost his balance long enough for Bo to hook a left to his jaw and stagger him. Bo reached out, grabbed the front of Angus’s shirt, and heaved him around in a turn that sent Angus hard into the railing.

The wooden rail was sturdy enough so that it didn’t break under the impact of Angus’s body. Instead, Angus’s momentum caused him to flip over the railing. With a startled cry at this unexpected turn of events, he fell to the ground in front of the porch.

And landed right in those cactus roses.

Bo winced at the sudden screeches of agony that came from Angus as his flesh was pierced by hundreds of the razor-sharp cactus needles. Angus tried to jump up, slipped and fell again, and just made his situation that much worse as he landed in the cactus again. He finally rolled clear of the spiny plants, but continued shrieking in pain.

Some of the roses had been crushed. Bo shook his head in regret at that. The blooms had been mighty pretty.

He turned to see how Scratch was doing, and was alarmed to see that Culley had Scratch trapped in a bear hug. Bo could see Scratch’s face over Culley’s shoulder. It was almost purple from the lack of air, and Scratch’s eyes were open wide in pain and desperation.

Bo palmed out his Colt as his long legs carried him quickly to the other end of the porch. He raised the gun, reversing it as he did so, and brought the butt crashing down on Culley’s skull. Bo didn’t hold back, figuring that Culley was one hardheaded son of a gun. The blow landed with a heavy thunk!

Culley just shook his head and kept squeezing.

Bo hit him again, and this time Culley’s grip relaxed a little. It took a third wallop, though, before the baby bull finally let go. Scratch slipped out of the bone-crushing, suffocating embrace and slumped against the adobe wall of the building, his chest rising and falling violently as he tried to drag air back into lungs that were starved for it.

Culley swung around ponderously toward Bo. His little piglike eyes still glittered with fury, but they glazed over as he took a step forward. The damage he had taken finally soaked all the way into his brain, and he pitched forward to land at Bo’s feet, out cold.

Bo stepped over to Scratch and put a steadying hand on his friend’s arm. “You all right?” he asked.

Scratch managed a shaky nod. “I…I will be…once I…catch my breath.”

“Hey!” That was Dave Sutherland again. “You can’t do that!”

Bo turned toward the young man and saw that Dave seemed more sober now. Seeing his two friends being defeated like that must have gotten to him. Culley was unconscious, and Angus was curled up in a ball on the ground. He had stopped screaming, but was still whimpering pathetically.

Furious, Dave reached for the gun holstered on his hip. Before he could even touch it, Bo’s Colt had flipped around again so that his hand was curled around the walnut grips and he had a finger on the trigger. The barrel was centered on the young man’s chest.

“Don’t do it, Dave,” Bo said in a quiet, solemn tone. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I won’t stand here and let you shoot me or Scratch either.”

Dave stared at him, taken by surprise yet again. Clearly he hadn’t expected Bo to react so swiftly. His hand hovered over the butt of his gun as he visibly struggled with the decision of what to do next.

He was saved from having to make it by the sharp, angry voice that cut through the air. “Mr. Creel! What are you doing threatening my son?”

PINNACLE BOOKS are published by

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Copyright © 2008 William W. Johnstone

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE

Following the death of William W. Johnstone, the Johnstone family is working with a carefully selected writer to organize and complete Mr. Johnstone’s outlines and many unfinished manuscripts to create additional novels in all of his series like The Last Gunfighter, Mountain Man, and Eagles, among others. This novel was inspired by Mr. Johnstone’s superb storytelling.

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ISBN: 0-7860-2072-5

^*The Last Mountain Man—MATT JENSEN NUMBER 1