Ana spurred Dinero into a run coming out of the corral, leaving deep tracks and kicking up dust. When she crossed the Guadalupe River she headed southwest and rode hard for another half a mile, then slowed down to a trot and turned back for home.
As soon as Ana got back to town and took care of her horse, she went straight to Esther Jarnigan’s house. Mrs. Jarnigan, now that she was alone, offered Ana more money than she was making at the saloon to come and live with her. Not only did she need the help, but she also needed the company. Ana accepted graciously and moved her few belongings in that very day.
Before the day was over, Deputy Burch had been elected sheriff to take Sheriff Ed Jarnigan’s place, and had already talked the mayor into offering a two thousand dollar reward for Josh Logan. He formed a posse consisting of only his gang members, plus old Henry Bates, a slow thinker who volunteered to ride with them.
Tom Burch and his men met down at the livery stable, only to find all the horses turned out to pasture. He grabbed Willie Sneed by the front of his shirt.
“What the hell did you turn them horses out for?” he yelled.
“I was low on feed so I let ‘em out to graze,” Willie said.
“I ought to make you go out there by yourself and bring ‘em back in.”
“I can’t do that,” Willie said. “My horse is out there, too.”
“Yeah, well,” Burch said. “That pasture ain’t but a couple hundred acres so you can go on foot.”
“I can’t do that, either,” Willie said. “I’m too stove up to walk that far.”
Burch drew his pistol and cracked Willie on the head, knocked him unconscious, then turned to his men.
“Go get them horses!” he yelled.
They took their bridles and walked across the pasture until they reached the herd. But when they tried to catch some of them, the horses just threw up their heads and high-tailed it back to the pens in a dead run, leaving the posse to walk back.
“Alright, boys,” Burch said, after they’d caught their horses and saddled up. “Every one of you will get a hundred dollars for bein’ in the posse, but whoever shoots Josh Logan will get five hundred.”
“The reward is for two thousand,” Miguel said. “Whoever shoots Logan ought to get more than five hundred.”
“I said five hundred and that’s what it’ll be,” Burch said. “Do you want to go or not?”
“Yeah, I want to go,” Miguel said.
“Alright then, mount up,” Burch said. “Let’s go on and go, if we’re goin’.”
They left town at a gallop and headed straight for Josh’s cabin on the Guadalupe River. Finding Josh gone when they got there, they dismounted and searched the ground for tracks.
Slim Tabor noticed a deep set leading out of the corral. “Over here, Tom,” he said. “Looks like Logan lit out for the river.”
They covered the short distance to the trees that bordered Guadalupe as fast as they could go. Crossing the river, with Burch leading the way, they followed Ana’s tracks southwest for a half a mile before losing them.
“Hell, boys,” Burch said. “He may be headed for Mexico.”
“We can’t cross the border,” Emery Reeves said. “So, what are we gonna do?”
“All we can do is head back to Victoria,” Burch said. “Bud,” he added, “take the boys and go to back up to Logan’s place and look around some more before you come back to town. We might have missed somethin’ in our rush to follow them deep tracks comin’ out of the corral.”
As soon as Ana left his ranch, Josh had mounted up and rode north at a slow pace, hoping he wouldn’t leave any tracks. But when he got into the timber he put the spurs to Macho and headed up river. The big black was fast and held the pace well. After about an hour of going north, he turned northwest, and crossed the San Antonio River.
He rode until it was too dark to see, then got off and led Macho, covering some sixty miles. Late that night he arrived on the banks of the Atascosa River and pitched a dry camp under the cottonwoods.
He unsaddled Macho, picketed him in the green grass near the river bank, and leaned back on his saddle to try and get some rest. As he sat by the fire of his camp that night he thought about Ana, and wondered if they’d ever be able to settle down together.
Daybreak was in the east when the stagecoach bound for San Antonio rounded a curve in the road and was held up by three bandits firing double-barrel shotguns and yelling for driver Nate Wilks to stop.
Josh grabbed his Winchester and slipped through the trees toward the sounds, not more than a hundred yards from his camp.
Buford Perry, a tall, rangy outlaw stood in the middle of the road with his shotgun aimed at Wilks, while Hector Medina, a wild looking Mexican, ordered shotgun rider Hoot Mouser to toss down the strong box.
Another bandit, Rowdy Watts, a short, heavy-set man with long black hair hanging down around his shoulders jerked the coach door open and forced the passengers out at gun point and began stripping them of their money and jewelry.
Josh stepped out into the clearing, catching the bandits by surprise.
“Throw ‘em up, boys,” he yelled.
Rowdy Watts wheeled around and fired and the bullet whizzed past Josh’s ear. Josh fired a shot of his own, knocking Watts down. He fired another round, striking Hector Medina in the chest. Buford Perry joined in on the gun fight and tried to duck behind the coach, but a bullet from Josh’s rifle sent him sprawling across the grass.
Hoot Mouser jumped down from his seat and picked his shotgun up out of the dust and wiped it off with the tail of his shirt. Looking around and seeing all three bandits lying dead, he looked at Josh and nodded.
“Damn, you shot the whole bunch,” he said. “I didn’t even get a shot.”
Josh walked over and picked up the passenger’s money and jewelry and handed it to them, and helped them get back in the coach.
“Where’d you come from?” Wilks said as he climbed down.
“It don’t matter,” Josh said. “I just wish I could a got here sooner.”
“Who are you, anyway?” Mouser asked.
“I’m Josh Logan.”
“Well, you happened along at the right time,” Wilks said. “This is the same damn bunch that robbed us two other times.”
“Glad to help,” Josh said. “Now, how about helpin’ me get ‘em tied across their saddles so I can take ‘em on into Cestohowa.”
“There’s a big reward for these outlaws,” Wilks said. “Sheriff Luke Benson up there at Cestohowa will tell you all about it.”
A few minutes later the driver popped his reins and the team lunged against their collars and started on up the road, while Josh rode along behind, leading the outlaw’s horses.
The stagecoach rolled right on past Sheriff Benson’s office when they arrived in Cestohowa, a small town started by Polish immigrants. They pulled up at the relay station to change horses. Josh stopped and tied Macho and the outlaw’s horses to the hitch rack.
“Sheriff Benson,” he said, as he stepped in his office. “There’s three dead men tied to their saddles out front. What do you want to do with ‘em?”
“Who are they and where’d you get ‘em?” Benson said.
“I don’t know who they are,” Josh said. “I caught ‘em holdin’ up the stagecoach, and when I tried to capture ‘em they threw down on me, so I shot ‘em.”
About that time driver Nate Wilks walked in the sheriff’s office with a wide grin on his face. “Sheriff Benson,” he said, as he pointed at Josh. “That man shot the same three outlaws that robbed the stagecoach last month, and tried to rob us again today.”
“Yeah, he done told me,” Benson said. “Let’s go take a look and see if we can identify any of ‘em.”
Benson took hold of the tall man’s hair and lifted his head, then pulled a wanted poster out of his shirt pocket and looked at the photo.
“Why, hell, that’s Buford Perry,” he said. “He’s wanted in New Mexico for bank robbery. There’s a four t
housand dollar reward for him and his gang, dead or alive.”
He looked at Josh and nodded. “Looks like you’ll be gettin’ the reward, so what do you want to do about it? Wait for it to get here, or what?”
“I’m just passin’ through,” Josh said. “I’d appreciate it if you’d deposit it here in the Cestohowa bank for me. I’ll come for it later.”
“Alright,” Sheriff Benson said. “It’ll be in there when you’re ready for it. What’s your name, anyway?”
“I’m Josh Logan.”
Josh led Macho down to the livery stable and had caretaker Ned Clinger put him in a stall with feed and water, then went to the diner and ordered. It’d been a while since he’d had a hot meal.
Sometime after darkness fell, he rode out of Cestohowa and headed back toward Victoria. He wanted to see Ana and find out if she’d heard anything about Burch and his men.
The next day Sheriff Benson received a wanted poster in the mail from newly elected Sheriff Tom Burch at Victoria that said Josh Logan was wanted for the murder of Sheriff Ed Jarnigan. Benson crammed the poster in his shirt pocket and headed to the livery stable.
“Clinger,” he yelled, as he came in through the door. “Is that black horse of Josh Logan’s still in here?”
“No, he ain’t,” Clinger said. “He saddled him up and pulled out sometimes last night after I’d done gone home. Why?”
“He’s wanted for murder, that’s why,” Benson said.
“Who’d he kill, anyway?” Clinger said.
“Rumor has it he killed the sheriff down at Victoria,” Benson said. “And now that these wanted posters have been sent out, it looks like its true. Did Logan say anything about where he might be headed?”
“No,” Clinger said, doubting the rumor. “The only thing he said to me was could he sleep here at the livery stable ‘cause he didn’t want to go up to the hotel.”
Sheriff Benson telegraphed Sheriff Burch down at Victoria, letting him know that Josh Logan had spent the night in Cestohowa, and that he had formed a posse to scour the hills for him.
Sheriff Burch thought Josh had left the country and gone to Mexico, so when he got the message that he’d been in Cestohowa, he got the posse together and told them to scatter out and head in that direction.
“Don’t forget,” he yelled. “It’s five hundred to the man that shoots Josh Logan.”
As Burch mounted up, Crazy Chester pointed his long-barrel, wooden pistol at him and yelled, “Bang! Bang!” Everyone in the posse laughed out loud, but Burch just sulked, and rode on.
Tom Burch and his men spread out and headed north and east. Slim Tabor and Miguel Nunez decided to stick together, figuring they’d have a better chance at finding Logan than riding alone. They rode west to the tree-lined San Antonio River and turned north, keeping about two hundred yards between them.
When Josh noticed Macho limping, he got off and checked, only to see one shoe was loose and about to come off. He rode on into the tiny town of Panna Maria and pulled up in front of the blacksmith shop.
After he unsaddled Macho and tied him to the rack, it didn’t take Juan Ramos, the old fellow who ran the place more than a few minutes to reset the shoe. Josh handed him a twenty dollar bill.
“I only charge a dollar to trim and reset a shoe,” Ramos said.
“Yeah, but you checked all four of ‘em so it’s worth twenty to me,” Josh said.
He left Panna Maria and rode for several miles before stopping on the banks of the San Antonio River to pitch camp and let his horse rest. He woke up many times during the night. He figured he’d be safer going north instead of back south toward Victoria since Sheriff Burch had his men scattered all up and down the river.
Miguel Nunez was sitting on a rise about a hundred yards away and saw Josh coming. In his haste to collect the five hundred dollars Burch had promised to whoever shot Josh, he jerked out his rifle and fired.
The bullet whizzed over Josh’s head and slammed into the trunk of a tree. Josh wheeled Macho around and spurred him into a run, back the way he’d come.
Slim Tabor heard the shot and started toward the sound of the noise. When he saw Josh coming through the brush, he hid behind a clump of cedars and fired almost point blank as Josh raced by, knocking him out of the saddle.
It was only a grazing wound to his left arm, but it stunned him when he hit the ground and Tabor was standing over him before could clear his head.
“I got him!” Tabor yelled. “I got Josh Logan!”
Miguel Nunez rode through the trees as fast as he could get his horse to go. He slid him to a stop and jumped off with his revolver pointed at Josh’s head.
“That was a good shot, Tabor,” he said. “Now we will split the five hundred.”
“No, we ain’t splittin’ no five hundred,” Tabor said. “I’m keepin’ it all because I’m the one that got him.”
“Yeah, but I saw him first and shot at him,” Nunez said. “And besides that, I was chasin’ him when you hit him so we will take him in and split the five hundred like I said.”
“No, we won’t,” Tabor said, as he turned toward Josh and aimed his pistol. “And we ain’t takin’ him in live, either. Sheriff Burch said to shoot him so I’m gonna go ahead and kill him and be done with it.”
Josh drew his pistol and fired, striking Tabor in the chest. Before he could fire again, Nunez ducked into the trees and ran for his horse. Josh tried to stand up, but toppled over on his side, allowing Nunez time to make his escape.
He staggered to his feet and led Tabor’s horse closer, but it was almost sundown by the time he got him lifted up and tied across the saddle. He mounted Macho and followed the trail along the banks of the San Antonio River all the way back to Cestohowa, arriving there about an hour ahead of sunup.
Tying Tabor’s horse to the hitching rack, he pinned a note to his body, telling Clinger to telegraph the governor that Josh Logan had brought in Slim Tabor. He also told him to not mention it to Sheriff Benson until after he’d sent the message.
At last morning arrived and Josh was already several miles south of Cestohowa. The country was mostly open, with gullies and washes and only a few scattered trees. He stayed close to the San Antonio River where tall cottonwoods reached out a hundred yards from both banks.
After Clinger sent the message to the governor, he ambled over to the sheriff’s office and broke the news to him about Slim Tabor being brought in dead, but did not mention telegraphing the governor.
Ned Clinger was an old-time law man. He knew an honest man when he saw one, and he saw it in Josh Logan. He didn’t believe Josh killed Sheriff Jarnigan despite what the wanted poster said. He’d heard a lot of bad things about Tom Burch through the years and had never liked him, so he figured the less said the better.
At dawn’s first light, Cestohowa Sheriff Benson had already gotten a posse together. He ordered them to ride out in all different directions to see if they could pick up Josh’s trail when Sheriff Burch and a few of his men rode into town.
The blunt truth was, Benson liked Josh, but he was also anxious to try for the reward.
“I ain’t sayin’ it’s true, but according to this wanted poster, Josh Logan is a cold-blooded killer,” Benson said, as he handed each man a copy. “But someone killed Sheriff Ed Jarnigan in Victoria and Deputy Tom Burch, here, was elected to take his place. Burch formed a posse to go after Logan, but last night someone shot one of his posse members and left his body at the livery stable. He might have been on Logan’s trail and they got into it.”
“If we find Logan, do you want us to capture him or just shoot him?” Henry Bates said.
“How many times do I have to tell you men to shoot him?” Burch said. “Don’t take any chances. All you got to go on is the fact that he’s a young man ridin’ a big black horse.”
The posse mounted up and fanned out in all directions, with slow thinking Henry Bates heading south along the San Antonio River. Henry had noticed old Ned Clinger down at the livery stab
le glancing over his shoulder a couple of times when Sheriff Benson asked him if he knew anything about Josh Logan. It was just a feeling he had, but the river was as good a place to start as any.
Night was coming on as he rode slowly along the river banks. Suddenly he saw a red glow from the embers of a campfire. He tied his horse to a bush and slipped forward. Not more than fifty yards ahead, a man sat near a small fire with a cup of coffee in his hand, stirring the coals with a short stick. He couldn’t tell if it was Josh Logan or someone else, so he stayed where he was and watched.
Several minutes passed before the man stood up and emptied his cup. When he walked over behind a clump of cedars and led out a big black horse, Bates guessed it was Logan. Just as Josh picked up his saddle, Henry Bates stepped out of the bushes with his rifle aimed at him.
“Hold it right there,” he yelled. “Put your saddle down and turn around. Are you Josh Logan?”
“Who wants to know?”
“I do or I wouldn’t be askin’ you,” Bates said. “I’m after Josh Logan,” he added, “and nobody else. So, are you him or not?”
“What if I was?”
“Well, if you was him,” Bates said, “I’d arrest you.”
“On what charge?” Josh asked.
“On the charge of murder,” Bates said. “I’m after a man who rides a big black horse and you got one. Toss that shootin’ iron off to the side and come back over here by the fire so I can see you.”
Josh dropped his pistol in the grass and walked back to the edge of the fire. “Just who are you accusin’ me of murderin’ anyway?” he asked.
“I ain’t the one accusin’ you of murderin’ nobody,” Bates said. “This here wanted poster is doin’ it. So, are you Josh Logan or ain’t you?”
“I might be and I might not be,” Josh said, hoping to get Bates off guard. “Who are you?”
“I’m Henry Bates and I’m in a posse tryin’ to find Josh Logan. From what it says on this here wanted poster I think you’re him.”
“Well, you thought right,” Josh said. “But I ain’t done nothin’ wrong. I can prove it in court ‘cause I got a witness and a good alibi.”
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