The Man From Nowhere

Chapter 14

The sky was on fire as Eddie Oates tightened the cinch on the paint’s saddle and the morning air held an edge. Drinking coffee that steamed in the cup, Yearly stood watching him.

“Wish I could go with you, son,” he said, “but I’d only slow you down.”

“I’ll be back soon enough, Jacob. I promise.”

The old man nodded. “You’ve set a task for yourself, Eddie. Mash Halleck and his boys are no bargain.”

“I know that going in,” Oates said. “But I got it to do.”

“Are three whores and a simple boy worth dying for?” Yearly made an apologetic motion with his cup. “Just askin’, like.”

Oates turned to face him. “I betrayed all of them, Jacob. I reckon that answers your question.”

“Like I said, just askin’.” A silence, then Yearly said, “You look mighty fine this morning.”

Oates was wearing the high-button suit and derby hat. Pete’s stiff new boots were on his feet and fit him well. He wore the store-bought shirt but had forgone the celluloid collar and tie, settling for a faded blue bandanna tied loosely around his neck. The Winchester was in the saddle scabbard and Pete’s gun belt was strapped around his lean hips.

“You look the part,” Yearly said, as though he’d decided that more praise was needed.

Oates opened his mouth to speak, but the words died on his lips. Following the younger man’s gaze, Yearly turned and saw what Oates was seeing.

Three riders were heading toward the cabin at a trot, a purposeful gait that suggested men who knew where they were going and why.

Yearly laid his cup on a corral post and slid the Winchester out of the scabbard on the paint’s saddle. His glance at Oates was brief, as were his words. “I sense that mischief’s afoot,” he said.

He stepped out of the corral to the front of the cabin and Oates followed.

The three riders drew rein and even a less perceptive man than Oates would have realized they added up to trouble. They were young, lean from a lifetime in the saddle, and the faces of all three wore a taunting, arrogant expression, the look of men who knew well how to use the Colts they wore on their hips and were accustomed to lesser men walking wide of them.

They were dressed like punchers, but no cowboy could have afforded the blooded horses they rode or the quality of their firearms.

“Howdy, boys,” Yearly said, his eyes wary. “I got hot coffee in the pot.”

The oldest of the three men spoke. “You own this cabin, old-timer?”

Yearly allowed that he did.

“Good. Then you got until noon to gather your stuff together and get out.”

The old man’s smile was not a pleasant thing to see. “To tell you the truth, boys, I ain’t much inclined to leave.”

That statement hung in the air like smoke on a windless day. The direct gazes of the three men were suddenly cold, hard and calculating, weighing odds. But finally a towheaded youngster with reckless eyes grinned and said, “Mister, you wouldn’t want to make our lady boss sleep out in the cold another night, would you? See, she needs a roof over her head and yours is the only cabin around for miles.” His smile widened and he lifted his shoulders and spread his hands. “So you see how it is with us.”

Oates spoke, drawing the attention of all three men. “Tell your lady boss she’s welcome to spend the night here. I’m sure we can make a place for her.”

“Ah, but you see, she’s coy, modest you might say,” the towhead said. “She won’t go for that arrangement.” He grinned insolently. “Nice hat, by the way.”

The rider who’d first spoken, a little older and a lot meaner than the others, leaned forward in his saddle and said, “Maybe you don’t hear so good, old man. I said be out of the cabin by noon.”

Yearly shrugged. “I hear just fine, but my talking is done. There’s nothing we can do for you boys, so ride on afore I forget my manners and start shootin’.”

Then the old man made a mistake, the last he’d ever make.

He levered a round into the Winchester. A challenge. A war sound.

All three riders drew, very fast. The three shots sounded as one and Yearly took two of them, one high in his left shoulder, the other, more serious, square in the belly.

The old man slammed back against the cabin wall, trying to bring his rifle to bear.

For an instant Oates had stood rooted to the spot, stunned by the suddenness of unexpected violence. Then he moved.

“You sons of bitches!” he screamed.

He couldn’t remember drawing his gun, but all at once it was there, bucking in his hand. The older man shrieked as Oates’ bullet smashed away most of his lower jaw. The man went sideways out of the saddle, upsetting the aim of the man on his right who was trying to draw a bead on Oates.

The towhead swung his gun on Oates, fired, missed. Then he was blown out of the saddle as Yearly’s Winchester roared.

The third man was fighting his bucking horse, his Colt held high above his head, when Oates shot him. Reeling in the saddle as a bullet slammed into his chest, the man fired at Yearly, thinking he was the danger. Oates’ second shot blasted into the man’s head. The rider’s hat flew off in a scarlet fan of blood and brain and he crashed to the ground. His horse galloped away, the reins trailing, its eyes rolling white.

When Oates kneeled beside Jacob Yearly, the old man was already dead. There was no repose in his features. His face was frozen into a mask of anger, outrage and wonder at the manner and time of his dying.

His heart heavy, Oates rose to his feet. He walked over to the fallen men. Only the oldest man whose lower jaw had been shot away was still alive. He knew the extent and nature of his wound and his eyes were full of terror. Oates shot him, shot him again, then holstered his gun. It was not an act of mercy; it was revenge.

He buried Yearly near the creek, his blackened old pipe in his hands and a volume of Dickens on his chest. Oates had no words, but his whispered, “Thank you, Jacob, for everything,” summed up better than prayers how he felt.

After letting the Morgan and the buckskin loose, Oates stuffed supplies into a burlap sack, then set the cabin on fire.

He mounted the paint and rode east. He knew that no matter what happened, he would never come back.

The desire for revenge was a raw emotion new to Eddie Oates, one he had only recently experienced. His first encounter with it had come when he’d thought of returning to Alma and putting a bullet into Cornelius Baxter.

Now a thirst for vengeance fermented in him again.

Three men had died for Jacob Yearly’s death and Oates considered that the blood price had been paid. But the person who had sent the gunman here to throw the old man out of his cabin was still alive.

The lady boss who could not sleep another night out in the open and was willing to kill to prevent that happening, was walking the earth.

Oates rode with a face of stone. A fine old man was dead and the woman, whoever she was, continued to cast her vile shadow on the ground.

That could not stand.

For now, his hunt for Sammy Tatum and the three women was pushed to the back of Oates’ mind. Jacob Yearly was lying cold in his grave and his soul cried out for vengeance. He would give it to him.

Unbidden, a thought came to Oates, one that suddenly unsettled him.

The Tin Cup Kid had recognized something in him. Oates had thought the Kid was a gunfighter who had met a kindred spirit, a man who shaped up to be good with the iron.

But what if he’d been mistaken and it was something else entirely?

What if the Kid had looked at Oates and saw not a gunfighter, but a fellow killer?

All at once the bright morning seemed darker. And Eddie Oates felt a chill.