Rattler's Law, Volume One

by James Reasoner

"I've heard a little," Day said with a shrug. "It's none of my business, though. I've got worries of my own just running this spread."

  Flint watched the rancher intently, looking for any signs of lying or guilt. "What do you know about a man called G. W. Ramsey?"

  Day's eyes narrowed. "I've heard of him. Some sort of hired gun, ain't he?"

  "That's exactly what he is. And he's been known to work for ranchers who want some sodbusters out of the way."

  Day's jaw tightened and a red flush crept over his face. "You accusin' me of hirin' this man Ramsey, Marshal? I didn't even know he was around here."

  Despite what appeared to be genuine anger, the words didn’t ring true to Flint. He said, "Ramsey's around, all right. I saw him myself at Copeland's, the night of the dance. And I've had several reports of a man fitting his description leading raids on the farms the last few nights."

  "But you don't know for sure it's Ramsey, do you?" Day asked shrewdly.

  "I don't have proof," Flint admitted.

  "And even if it is, you sure don't know who hired him, right?" A smug smile played around the rancher's wide mouth.

  Flint suppressed the impulse to smash a fist into that expression. "Like I said, I don't have any proof."

  "Well, it wasn't me, Marshal. I can't speak for anybody else."

  "You'd better be damned sure of that, Day. Because a man was killed last night, and G. W. Ramsey and his men were the ones who did it."

  Breath hissed between Day's gritted teeth. "I was goin' to invite you in for a cup of coffee, Flint, but I don't think I will now. I fight my own battles, mister. I never in my life paid anybody to gun down somebody else."

  The two men glared angrily at each other on the porch, and they both jerked around when the screen door of the house banged open.

  Billy Day strode out. His face was red with fury, and his hand hung close to the butt of his gun. "I heard that, you son of a bitch!" he raged at Flint. "You can't accuse my pa of something like that and get away with it."

  "Billy!" Day lashed out angrily. Moving quickly, he stepped between his son and Flint. "Stop it, you fool! Flint is a lawman." He glanced over his shoulder. “Not just that. You know they used to call him the Rattler.”

  "I don't care! He can't talk to you like that!"

  Day gripped Billy's shoulders and bodily steered him to the door. "Get back in that house! I'll handle this." He yanked the door open, shoved Billy inside, and closed it after him.

  A fine sheen of sweat glistened on Day's forehead when he turned back to Flint. "Boy flies off the handle too easy," he said.

  "Thanks for stepping in. I didn't want him drawing on me."

  Day looked meaningfully at Flint. "I didn't want you drawing on him." He squared his shoulders. "Look, Flint, unless you've got something else to say, I think you'd better get off my land. I've told you I don't have anything to do with G. W. Ramsey or one of those sodbusters getting killed. There's nothing more to say."

  "Okay," Flint said. With a curt nod, he went to his horse, mounted up, and rode away from the ranch house.

  Flint was still not convinced that Houston Day knew nothing about the hired guns coming to Abilene. This visit to Rafter D might still have some results, the marshal hoped as he swung away from the main trail and rode into some trees and brush.

  The clump of growth was on a slight rise, and in its protective cover, he could sit unobserved and see the ranch house. As far as he could tell, no one was paying any attention to him; Day's cowhands had moved to work elsewhere on the huge spread. Flint waited for a half hour, watching to see if either Day left the house.

  If the Days did have some connection with G. W. Ramsey, they would want to warn the man that Flint knew who he was. Sometimes the only way to get the results you wanted was to stir up a hornet's nest, the lawman mused.

  He was about to give up when Billy Day rushed from the house and hurried to the corral. The young man quickly saddled a horse, swung onto the animal, and galloped away from the ranch house, heading south.

  Behind him, at a good distance, rode Lucas Flint.

  11

  About two miles south of the ranch house, Billy Day suddenly turned onto a small track that ran southeast of the main trail. The countryside was brushy and rugged, and Flint realized that they were moving into an area where several small creeks flowed into the Solomon River.

  As he trailed Billy, Flint passed a few small herds of grazing cattle, and he supposed they were still on the Rafter D range. He had given Billy a good quarter-mile head start, and the young man was in a big hurry, so the marshal knew he wouldn’t be spotted. Billy forded one stream, but at the next he turned and followed the creek to the east. Flint closed the gap between himself and the young man, wanting to hear Billy's conversation with Ramsey when he finally reached his destination.

  A few moments later Billy rode into a stand of trees and thick brush. Flint could smell the rich aroma of coffee heating over a campfire and reined in before he reached the thicket. He dismounted quickly, walking his horse away from the trail and into the scrubby vegetation.

  After tying his horse to a small bush, Flint silently picked his way among the trees and brush. A man like Ramsey would post sentries, and Flint wanted to avoid them at all costs. Slithering behind every bit of available cover, he approached close enough to part the brush a little and peer into the encampment.

  Flint studied the large camp, which had been set up in a wide clearing. A few tents were pitched close to the creek, and several bedrolls were spread around a crackling fire. Grazing in a makeshift corral, formed by ropes strung between trees, were two dozen horses. Ten men dozed in the cool shade of the trees, while another six or seven were busy cleaning weapons and repairing saddles. One man held the reins of Billy Day's horse. Billy had dismounted and now stood in front of the largest tent, talking animatedly with a heavyset man who sported a bushy black beard.

  As he listened to Billy, the man paced impatiently and turned to face Flint's hiding place. The same glittering blue eyes Flint had seen a few nights earlier at the settlers' dance flashed across the clearing.

  G. W. Ramsey, Flint thought. It has to be.

  Flint wasn’t close enough to hear most of what Billy was saying, but he did catch an occasional word or phrase—"lawman," "knows who . . . are," and "damn Flint!" He grinned humorlessly. I was right, he thought. Houston Day sent his son to warn Ramsey that I know who he is.

  Ramsey's booming laughter reached Flint, and then the bearded outlaw shook his head and clapped the worried-looking younger man on the shoulder.

  Billy twisted from Ramsey's grasp, said something angrily, then turned and stalked to his horse. He yanked the reins away from the man holding them, mounted, and galloped out of the camp.

  As he fled, the enraged young man passed less than thirty yards from the marshal's hiding place. Well concealed, Flint nevertheless crouched deeper in the brush, although Billy was far too angry to notice anything.

  Flint took a deep breath. Ramsey had laughed off Billy's warning and obviously was not afraid of some local lawman. Flint knew from the circular he had read that the burly, bearded man was used to riding where he wanted and doing as he pleased.

  When the hoofbeats of Billy's horse had faded away, Flint slipped out of his hiding place and went to his horse. He swung into the saddle.

  Now that he knew where Ramsey and his men were camped, he could go back to Abilene for help before he paid a formal visit to the bearded man. But what would that accomplish? Flint asked himself. Despite his certainty that the man was responsible for the atrocities of the last few days, he had no proof. Nor was Ramsey wanted anywhere else. Flint had no grounds on which to arrest him.

  The marshal turned his horse toward the camp. Maybe some straight talk would do some good.

  As he rode through the trees, he heard a low whistle, undoubtedly a guard's signal, and grimaced knowingly. He had been lucky that they hadn’t spotted him before.

  Slowly walking his horse
into the camp, Flint scanned the group of rough-looking men. All of them stood grimly tensed with their weapons held ready. They didn’t drop their guard when they saw that he was alone.

  G. W. Ramsey, still standing in front of his tent, arrogantly assessed him with icy, piercing eyes. His hand rested on the butt of the Remington revolver holstered at his waist. Flint rode directly up to him, reined in, and looked down at him. "G. W. Ramsey?" he asked.

  "What if I am?" the bearded man responded.

  Flint felt the hostile eyes of the men boring into him. The badge pinned on his vest was like a red flag to hardcases like these.

  "I'm Lucas Flint, the marshal of Abilene. We saw each other a few nights ago but weren’t introduced. I thought it might be a good idea if we had a talk."

  Ramsey didn’t confirm or deny that he and Flint had seen each other before. A grin curved his lips under the beard. “I’ve heard of you, Flint. A real town-tamer and curly wolf, they say. Or rather . . . what is it some folks call you? The Rattler? On account of you’re so fast and deadly?”

  Flint ignored the gibing tone of Ramsey’s words and regarded him coldly.

  Ramsey looked shrewdly at him. "I'm not wanted for anything, and neither are any of my men."

  Flint doubted the last part of that statement, but he wasn’t going to press the point. "I'm here to talk, not to arrest anybody," he responded.

  A flicker of a smile played at Ramsey's lips. "Light and set, then, Marshal Rattler. You already know I'm G. W. Ramsey."

  The marshal dismounted slowly, not wanting to spook any of the gunmen. A chill ran through Flint, and he realized he had been a fool to ride in here alone. But turning to face Ramsey, he concealed his apprehension and said evenly, "I want law and order in my town, mister. I won't stand for anybody making trouble."

  "Now, have we done anything in Abilene, Marshal? My boys and I haven't even been into town."

  "I know that," Flint said with a nod. "But you're raising a ruckus in the area, and that's going to affect Abilene. We've had enough trouble between the farmers and the ranch hands in town. I want this situation to cool down, not get hotter. I want it to stop."

  Ramsey shook his head. "You're talking to the wrong man, Marshal. I don't even know what you're talking about. My friends and I are just resting our horses for a few days."

  "On Houston Day's range? Does he know about that, Ramsey?"

  "Are we on the Rafter D?" Ramsey asked casually. "I heard of Day but didn't know this was his land."

  "His son was just here," Flint said coldly.

  For an instant, anger flickered in Ramsey's blue eyes, anger at Billy Day for allowing himself to be followed, Flint reasoned. The bearded man said, "You talking about that pup who rode in a few minutes ago? I don't know anything about him, Marshal. Never saw him before today."

  "And I suppose you didn't have anything to do with a farmer being killed last night," Flint snapped. He heard several guns being cocked, an unmistakable sound that would make any man's spine go cold, no matter how brave—or crazy—he was.

  Ramsey grinned. "We're peace-loving men, Marshal. You'd have to have mighty strong proof to show that we've bothered anybody since we've been here."

  "You disrupted that dance at Copeland's place," Flint pointed out. "I was there. I saw you."

  "Did you see the face of any man here?" Ramsey shot back.

  "You know I didn't. All of you wore masks, just like you did when you killed Guy Yarbrough." Flint laughed contemptuously. "Wearing masks because you were afraid to show your faces."

  Madness glittered in Ramsey's eyes, and the marshal tensed. If Ramsey goes for his gun, I'll kill him, he thought. I'll never leave alive, but then neither will Ramsey.

  The fire in the gang leader's eyes suddenly died. He threw back his head and laughed, in the same way he had laughed at Billy Day. "You don't know a damned thing, Marshal," he declared. "You're just spouting words to see where they land. Now why don't you ride back to Abilene and stop harassing law-abiding citizens?"

  Flint looked at him for a long moment. "When I get the evidence I need, I'll be back to see you, Ramsey."

  The bearded man laughed again. "Always glad to see a representative of law and order, Marshal."

  As he mounted up, Flint saw that the other men had formed a tight ring around him. He turned his horse and rode toward them, his face stony. With a slight nod from Ramsey, the grim-faced hardcases stepped back and allowed Flint through. He kept the horse at a steady walk until he was on the open trail, then heeled it into a trot.

  When he was half a mile away from the camp, he raised a shaking hand to wipe the cold sweat off his forehead. He had come close to dying back there, and he knew it.

  He doubted he had done any good by his visit; at best he had put Ramsey and his men on notice. They knew that he was aware of their identities and would look for proof of their crimes, but he didn’t believe that they would pack up and leave.

  As he rode toward Abilene, pondering his next move, some instinct alerted him. With a frown, he reined in, his keen eyes scanning the rolling, brushy countryside around him.

  The glint of sunlight on metal flashed in a clump of trees fifty yards ahead to his left. Acting reflexively, he kicked his feet free of the stirrups and dove from the saddle. A bullet whistled over his head, followed a second later by the flat crack of a rifle.

  Landing hard on the ground, the marshal rolled and came up with his hand darting to his holstered Colt. His horse, spooked by the shot, danced around nervously between him and the thicket where he had spotted the reflection.

  Another weapon blasted, this time from the other side of the trail. Flint was completely exposed to that assailant, and as a slug kicked up dust a few feet away from him, he burst into a run. To his left were a few trees, and though they would provide scant protection, Flint took two steps toward them. Then suddenly he stopped and whirled around.

  The guns of both ambushers roared, the bullets whining through the sparse thicket where the men thought Flint would take cover. His feint had worked. Taking advantage of the few seconds the trick had bought him, he raced toward his horse.

  The image of Pony Express riders vaulting onto their mounts flashed in his mind, and he decided to try that maneuver. Instead of a few moments being shaved off an express run, however, his life hung in the balance.

  The horse had started to trot anxiously down the trail toward home, and Flint had to sprint, gun in hand, to catch up to the animal. He jammed the Colt into its holster. Timing his leap and setting his hands on the horse's rump, he launched himself forward into the saddle.

  Immediately, he hunched against the horse's neck and dug his spurs into its sides. Flint didn’t believe in treating his animals roughly, but he needed all the speed the horse could give. The animal lunged, racing between the two ambushers.

  Glimpsing one man trying to aim his rifle, Flint palmed out the Colt and fired before the man had time to get off a shot. The slug slammed into the man's middle, knocking him backward and doubling him over, the rifle spinning from his hands as he collapsed.

  Despite the lucky shot, Flint was still in danger. Even as he twisted in the saddle to locate the second man, a Winchester cracked. An unseen hand plucked the hat from Flint's head.

  He triggered off two quick shots as he passed the stand of brush where the man was hidden. Then he hauled on the reins and wheeled his horse around. In the sudden silence that fell, he heard a shouted curse, followed by the sound of hoofbeats.

  Flickering movement caught his eye. A third man? Or the second one fleeing?

  Flint held his fire, edged cautiously toward the thick brush, and searched the growth through narrowed eyes. The second ambusher was gone. On the ground, he noticed a splash of red.

  One of his shots had found its target, Flint thought grimly as he looked down at the fresh blood. He had wounded the man and scared him off.

  Flint rode back to the trail and retrieved his hat, grimacing at the ragged bullet hole in its
crown. He walked to the first man, who lay motionless on the dusty ground. The gunman was on his side, eyes open and staring sightlessly. The widening pool of blood beneath him seeped from the wound high in his belly.

  The marshal looked thoughtfully toward G. W. Ramsey's camp. By riding hard and circling around, his attackers could have left there and gotten in front of him. Flint didn’t recognize the man he had killed, but that didn’t mean anything. With his wolfish, beard-stubbled face and dusty range clothes, the dead man easily could have been one of the many hardcases at the camp.

  If Ramsey had sent this man after him, Flint abruptly decided, then Ramsey should get him back.

  A few minutes spent scouting through the brush turned up the slain ambusher's horse, which Flint brought back to the body and tied to a bush. The horse snorted and tried to dance away when it smelled the corpse, and its eyes were wide and fearful when the marshal draped the body over the saddle.

  Leading the horse bearing the dead man, Flint rode toward Ramsey's camp. Unless the second ambusher, the one who had escaped, had already returned, Ramsey was in for a surprise. The marshal, his anger overriding any sense of caution, rode boldly up to the stand of trees that encircled the camp and started through them.

  "Hold it, mister!" demanded a strident voice. Flint reined in as a sentry, menacingly pointing a rifle, stepped from behind a tree.

  "I brought something back for Ramsey," Flint said coldly. He nodded toward the grisly burden on the second horse.

  The guard motioned with his rifle. "Go ahead," he said. "But I'll be right behind you, so don't try anything."

  Spurring his horse to a walk, Flint laughed harshly. He wasn’t likely to do anything foolish in Ramsey's stronghold. On the other hand, coming back here with a dead man wasn’t the smartest thing he had ever done. But he couldn’t allow Ramsey to get away with such tactics, and he wanted the gang leader to know it.

  As he rode in, an excited hubbub ran through the camp. Ramsey's men came out of their tents and sprang from their sleeping bags. All of them pointed weapons at him. No one betrayed any knowledge of the dead man, but that came as no surprise. Ramsey would have trained them not to reveal any secrets.