by Cole Shelton
“Are you the nurse, ma’am?” Shane Preston called to her. Already, the woman was peering over the side of the buckboard at the motionless, bloodied figure of Jonah, and she drew in her breath sharply.
“What happened?” the man with the rifle growled suspiciously, his dark eyes fixed on Shane.
The gunfighter ignored the question. “Ma’am,” he said, “my pard’s got a bullet in him. Can you help me get it out?”
“I’m not a doctor,” she protested.
“You’re a nurse, ma’am,” Shane said, climbing down from the buckboard seat. “And that makes you the most qualified person between here and Broken Bow. I’d be mighty obliged if you’d take a look at him. He’s in no condition to travel all the way to the doc.”
“You heard what my sister said,” the lanky man beside her snapped. “She’s just a nurse! She’s never handled anything like this!”
The girl’s eyes roved over the old gun hawk. A fly was buzzing over the sticky wetness of his blood, and she heard him groan. She swallowed, and then looked at her brother.
“Luke,” she said briskly, “help this gentleman bring him inside.”
“You know who he is, don’t you?” Luke Wainwright said. Kathleen stood at the window, watching the tall man rubbing down his palomino stallion. By now, the grayness of dusk was settling on the ridge tops. Day was nearly done.
“He said his name was Shane Preston,” she recalled.
“Ever since he rode in, I’ve been tryin’ to remember what I’d heard about him,” Luke said. He drew on his cigarette, and the glow illuminated a pallid, freckled face with heavy-lidded eyes and a sharp nose. “He’s a gunfighter, Kathleen.”
The nurse kept her eyes on Shane. She shivered suddenly.
“It was old Lomas who told me about him,” Luke Wainwright said. “You remember old Lomas, Kathleen?”
“The prospector I tended for snakebite when Doc Lonegan was—er—indisposed?”
“Drunk,” her brother corrected her bluntly. “Anyway, back to old Lomas. I rode into town with him after you fixed him up, and he happened to tell me about Shane Preston and Jonah Jones.”
“What did Lomas say about Preston?” the girl asked. She saw Shane leave his horse to graze on a long line then start to rub down the cantankerous old mare.
“Told me a damn interestin’ story,” Luke Wainwright muttered, flicking the ash from his cigarette.
“Oh?”
“Seems Preston wasn’t always a gunfighter. Just a few years ago he was a rancher owning a small spread, and married to a nice young wife.”
Kathleen fingered the bullet she’d just extracted from the older man’s body.
“One day, so Lomas said, Preston came home to find his wife murdered and his place robbed. He trailed the two hard cases to a border saloon and plugged one of them.”
“Just one?” she queried.
“The second hombre put a slug in Preston’s belly and then escaped. Lomas reckoned that Jones tended Shane, and ever since, they’ve ridden together.”
“And Preston found the other killer?” Kathleen asked, her interest aroused.
“Nope.” Luke shook his head. “He’s still lookin’. Lomas said that Shane Preston was a man full of hate, just livin’ for the day he’d catch up with that killer.”
“A man full of hate!” she mused, still watching.
Kathleen’s eyes roved over the stranger. She wouldn’t exactly call him handsome. His face was strong but rugged. His hair was dark, worn long. The nurse’s eyes went to the man’s powerful shoulders and his lean, muscular frame. He mightn’t be handsome, but he was the kind of man a woman would look at twice.
“But why did he become a gunfighter?” she asked finally.
Luke Wainwright shrugged. “Probably to give him a stake so he could keep on huntin’ down his wife’s killer.”
She said thoughtfully, “I think it’s about time I let him know about his friend.”
“Kathleen!”
“What is it?” She paused at the door.
“Just remember—he’s a gunfighter!”
“So?” she murmured.
“So I’ve noticed the way you’ve been lookin’ at him,” Luke Wainwright muttered.
With a toss of her blonde head, Kathleen walked outside into the dying day. She moved away from the porch to where Shane was rubbing Tessie’s flanks.
He looked up sharply as she approached.
“How is he?” the gunfighter demanded.
“I dug this out of his shoulder,” she told him, holding the bullet between thumb and forefinger. “It wasn’t far from his heart, Mr. Preston.”
“Thank you, ma’am.” He looked at her, his face suddenly softer.
“He’s sleeping peacefully. I gave him some laudanum,” Kathleen said. “He’s lost a lot of blood, but he has a fair chance.”
Shane took the bullet from her and examined it with his deep, impenetrable eyes.
“Mr. Preston,” she said softly, “I’d like to keep watch over him for a while—just in case. This is the first time I’ve ever taken a bullet out of a man on my own, although I helped Doc Lonegan several times. It’s a little different to delivering babies!”
“You say you’d like to check on him for a while,” Shane drawled. “How long’s that? I’ll never forget what you’ve done for old Jonah ... If all goes well, how long d’you think you’ll have to nurse him?”
“A week, maybe.” She looked at him intently. “Why do you ask, Mr. Preston? You have to be somewhere at a certain date?”
He shook his head. “Nothing on hand, ma’am. I’ll stick around, if I may. I can make myself useful while Jonah’s recovering. Looks like you’ve started a fence over there which needs finishing.”
“Luke started it,” she said. “But he’s a slow worker. Spends a lot of his time trapping game in the hills. He sells the pelts in town—helps buy the supplies we need.” She smiled. “A nurse doesn’t get much work about here.”
“This time she’ll be paid well,” Shane promised her. He fumbled in his hip pocket and found a ten dollar bill. “Maybe this will do for a start?”
She gaped as he placed it in her hand. “But this is too much!”
Shane grinned at her. “I know that old goat. Once he begins to get well, he’ll eat your cupboard bare!”
“Thank you,” she said, folding the money gratefully and dropping it in the pocket of her dress.
“You needn’t worry about me,” he informed her. “I’ll live off the food in my saddlebag and bed down in the barn.”
“Of course you won’t!” Kathleen exclaimed. “I wouldn’t hear of it! You can join us for meals and—and—there’s a spare room out back you can use.”
“Well ...”
“It’s settled,” she said firmly.
“I’ll start on that fence tomorrow,” Shane promised her.
“Maybe you’d like to see Jonah,” she said. “I can see he means a lot to you.”
“He saved my life once,” Shane told her. “My bullet wasn’t in as deep as the one you cut out of him just now, but there wasn’t a medic or a nurse for miles around.”
“I heard that he tended you once,” Kathleen Wainwright ventured, her eyes gazing into his. “It was after you were shot up in that border saloon.”
Shane forced a grin. “Who told you that?”
“My brother heard the story,” she replied. “And now you’re hunting for your wife’s killer.”
“Scarface,” he said, a dark expression clouding his face.
She frowned. “Scarface?”
“I saw him as I went down,” Shane Preston recalled bleakly. “He was a man with a scar. I never found out his name, but I’ll know him again when I see him.”
“When?”
“All trails cross, ma’am,” Shane said.
Kathleen lowered her eyes. “You—you must have loved her very much, Mr. Preston.”
“Grace was a fine woman,” Shane murmured. “She was my life—and t
hose filthy killers took her from me!”
Kathleen looked up at him, and this time she saw a different expression on his face. The fading light showed her the bleak emptiness in his eyes.
And, for a moment, Kathleen was afraid.
“Who’d your brother hear the story from, ma’am?” Shane asked casually.
“An old prospector called Lomas,” she replied.
“Ezra Lomas?”
“I tended him for snakebite.”
“Ezra was a homesteader before he turned prospector,” Shane Preston said, slapping the mare on the rump. “Used to own the next spread to mine. He helped me bury my wife.”
There was a long silence.
Then the gunfighter said quietly, “Let’s take a look-see at Jonah. After you, Miss Kathleen.”
Two – A Killing in Moose Valley
Just after sunup, Luke Wainwright rode his sorrel down from the ridge with a pack-horse in tow. This latter animal was laden down with the pelts of animals Luke had trapped. The load would fetch enough money to bring back a month’s supplies and a few bottles of whisky. Kathleen was always chiding him for drinking so much, but he paid her little attention.
He passed the little wooden cross where his father, Joe Wainwright was buried. For the past ten years, Luke and his sister had lived alone in the valley, scratching out a living.
Now he urged the sorrel into a lope, heading towards the pass. Normally, on his way to Destiny Creek, he would be contemplating the delights of the saloon, the rye, and the card games he’d enjoy; he’d also be looking forward to a time with that percentage girl with the dark hair, knowing that Lucy would let him stay the whole afternoon for five dollars.
Right now, however, his thoughts were on Shane Preston, the tall gunfighter who’d already stayed with them for two nights. He didn’t exactly dislike the man, but he was concerned about his sister. Despite his warnings about getting involved with a wandering gunslinger, Luke could see that Kathleen was attracted to him. He saw it in her eyes, the way she leaned close to him when she served him meals. He told himself that it was about time his twenty-seven year old sister found herself a man—but it had to be the right one! And in Luke Wainwright’s book, a man who lived by the gun wasn’t good enough for his sister.
There was, however, he assured himself, one consolation. The old-timer, Jonah Jones, was proving to be as strong as an ox, and already he was clamoring to get out of bed. Within a short time, the gunfighters would be able to ride on out, leaving his sister enough money to buy the supplies for next month. He mightn’t even need to go trapping.
The sun was warm on his back. He passed a stand of pines, and the next moment heard the sharp report of a gun, a whip crack explosion which sliced the silence. Luke froze in the saddle as the distant echoes bounced back from the valley walls. Two more shots rang out, and Luke Wainwright’s right hand dropped to his gun butt as he urged his sorrel to the crest of the slope. The echoes were dying by the time he reined in half-way down the steep trail, and sitting saddle, he let his eyes rove the length of the basin which stretched out below him. The deep hush mocked him, and when he’d just about convinced himself that the shots had been fired by some distant hunter after game, his eyes fell upon the horse.
It was a flashy chestnut, a big horse standing just off the valley trail—and it was riderless. Luke Wainwright’s gaze dropped to the shapeless heap right behind the mount.
Instinctively, Luke drew out his six-gun, and rode cautiously down-trail towards the horse. The basin was wreathed in stillness as he moved closer. The chestnut was obviously edgy and pulled away. But Luke wasn’t concerned about the horse; his eyes were fixed on the bloodied body sprawled in the coarse yellow grass. He slowed his horse to a walk, then pulled it to a standstill. His lean frame slid from the saddle, and still clutching his gun, he ran over to the crumpled body. The man was face-down in the grass and there was a dark, sticky stain on the back of his shirt.
Trembling, Luke Wainwright turned the body and drew in his breath sharply as he saw the rotund, bearded face of a man he knew very well. Jacob King. Luke felt for his pulse. There was no heartbeat. King, owner of the territory’s largest spread, was dead! There were three rips in his shirt—two close together near the base of his spine, and one clean between the shoulder blades.
Ashen-faced, Luke stood up, and moments later, a shadow fell over him.
“Reach!” The command was a snarl right behind him.
Luke Wainwright whipped around and stared into three cold faces.
“Git your paws high, Wainwright, or we’ll save the hangman a chore here and now!” said Brent Gowrie, thumbing back the hammer of his Peacemaker.
“And just drop that gun you’re holdin’,” the short rider next to Gowrie croaked. “You’ve done enough damage with it already!”
“Hell!” Luke exploded as he realized what they were thinking. “Now listen here—”
“No, you listen, Wainwright,” Gowrie interrupted him caustically. “We hear shooting and we ride here to see you standing over King’s body—and holdin’ a gun in your hand!”
“Drop it!” the short man rasped.
Luke Wainwright let his six-gun slide from his hand and drop to the ground.
“I didn’t kill him!” Luke protested frantically. “I just heard gunfire—like you did—and I came riding here when I saw a riderless horse!”
“With a gun in your hand?” Gowrie demanded cynically.
“Listen—all of you!” Luke Wainwright pleaded desperately. “I’ve got no reason to kill Mr. King!”
“King was a mighty rich man, Wainwright,” Gowrie remarked. “I reckon the owner of the Rolling Wheel Ranch could have a lot of money on him. Check him over, Redd.”
Redd Yuldara jumped down from his pinto and knelt down beside the dead man. Nimble fingers felt inside his shirt pocket and pulled out a leather billfold. He opened it.
“Reckon there’s over a hundred dollars here.” Yuldara looked up at Gowrie.
“So that’s what you were searching for?” Brent Gowrie snapped coldly.
“What—what do you mean?” Wainwright whimpered, glancing around at their faces.
“We saw you fumblin’ around his body,” said Redd Yuldara.
“I was checking on whether he was breathing or not,” Luke said hoarsely.
“Know something, Wainwright?” Brent Gowrie’s stubbled face was twisted into a mirthless smile. “We oughta shoot you here and now! You’re a low-down back-shootin’ killer! It’s a pity me and the boys hadn’t arrived here a coupla minutes earlier—we might’ve been able to save King’s life.”
Luke stared at them incredulously, the icy hand of fear gripping his heart. He glimpsed their bleak eyes and the disbelief mirrored on their faces. Suddenly he lowered one hand and pointed to his fallen gun. “Look!” he cried. “I—I can prove I didn’t shoot Mr. King! Pick up my gun! Please—pick it up! You’ll find it’s cold. Stone cold!”
“Clegg,” said Gowrie, motioning to the other man.
Lindsay Clegg was a lanky spider of a man, and after he’d eased his ungainly frame to the trail, he took three steps and picked up the gun at Luke’s feet.
“See,” Luke Wainwright croaked. “It’s cold! Tell Gowrie how cold it is!”
“Feels sorta warm to me,” Clegg shrugged.
“What!” Wainwright’s face was drained of color as he surveyed the rangy rider. He felt sick in the pit of his belly as Gowrie’s gun seemed to loom closer. “Look—maybe—maybe it’s warm because it’s in the sun—”
“Put King’s body over his horse,” Brent Gowrie directed Yuldara. “And Clegg, you tie this bastard up!”
“Open the loading chamber,” Luke Wainwright cried. “You’ll find it’s still fully loaded. Not one bullet’s been fired!”
“I reckon that’s for the sheriff to prove,” Brent Gowrie informed him, as Clegg handed him the gun in question.
“Sheriff?”
“We’re taking you in to Harper, Wain
wright,” Brent Gowrie said. “And I’ll be very surprised if you ain’t dancin’ rope in a real short time.”
“You’re wrong! I didn’t kill him!” Luke’s passionate pleas fell on deaf ears as Lindsay Clegg grabbed his wrists and began to rope them together. “You must listen to me—”
“Button up, or we’ll kill you now,” Gowrie warned harshly. He started to build a cigarette while Clegg knotted the rawhide. “I’m the ramrod of the Diamond C spread, the ranch right next to the Rolling Wheel, and I got to know King real well. There was never any trouble between our spreads. We were right neighborly, one to the other, and losing King’s like losing my own boss—so just you hush your mouth or I might lose my temper and let daylight into you!”
“What about Mrs. King?” Yuldara asked.
“Can you be real tactful, Redd?” the Diamond C ramrod demanded dubiously.
Yuldara looked as pious as possible. “Well ...”
“Ride to the Rolling Wheel Ranch now,” Brent Gowrie commanded him. “Tell Mrs. King what happened, but also tell her we got her husband’s killer—that low-down, stinking pelt-toter, Luke Wainwright! Then I reckon you best ride to the Diamond C and let Coventry know—our boss will want to help Mrs. King with the funeral arrangements.”