The Two-Gun Kid

by J. R. Roberts

  “Maybe you’re right,” Heston said, “but it don’t really matter. We’ll catch up to them sooner or later.”

  “Just the two of us?” Zack asked. “We can take him?”

  “You take care of the kid, Zack,” Heston said. “I told you to leave Adams to me.”

  Zack knew his cousin was fast with a gun. He’d seen him outdraw and kill two, even three, men at one time. And he was younger than Clint Adams. If anybody could put an end to the legend of the Gunsmith, it was Darby Heston.

  Each night they camped, Clint would talk and Roscoe would listen. Each night Roscoe did more listening, and asked fewer questions.

  That night Clint took the first watch. While Roscoe wrapped himself in his blanket, Clint took a blanket to Hector and made sure he was tightly bound.

  “He asks a lot of questions,” the Mexican said.

  “He’s listening more,” Clint said, “and he’s changing. If his attitude hadn’t undergone a change already, he probably would have killed you, just for the experience of it.”

  “So your lessons saved my life,” Hector said. “Gracias.”

  “He still wants to try his hand, though,” Clint said, looking over to where Roscoe lay. “He still wants to put those guns into play.”

  “He will get his chance,” Hector said.

  Clint looked back at Hector.

  “How many are coming, Hector?”

  “Enough so that you will need him,” Hector said. “His baptism is coming.”

  Clint yanked on the man’s bonds, making him flinch. He stood and dropped the blanket on top of him.

  “I cannot say more,” Hector said, “but I can give you some advice.”

  “I’ll take it.”

  “Make sure you choose the time and place,” the Mexican said.

  “They do want it to be public, don’t they?”

  “Your humiliation of him—Zack—was public,” Hector said. “His retribution must also be public.”

  “He hasn’t got the nerve or the skill to pull this off,” Clint said.

  “He is bringing someone who has.”

  “I figured.”

  TWENTY-NINE

  “We’ve got a choice,” Clint said, standing in his stirrups. “That way is Abilene, and that way is a small town called Eager.”

  “I thought it was pronounced I-ger?” Roscoe said.

  Clint looked at him, then at Hector, who shrugged.

  “Just to avoid confusion,” Clint said, “we’ll go to Abilene.”

  “Good,” Roscoe said.

  “Why good?”

  “Abilene’s a big town, it’s got newspapers,” Roscoe said. “Whatever happens will be written up.”

  The boy’s eyes were shining, and Clint knew he hadn’t spent quite enough time with him—but how much more could he afford?

  Clint had a quick decision to make. Go into town—Abilene, Eager, any town—or wait for his pursuers here? Which one would benefit the boy the most?

  He decided to go into Abilene. Maybe the boy’s final lesson would best be acted out in front of witnesses.

  “Okay,” he said. “Abilene.”

  “What are we gonna do with him?” Roscoe asked, indicating Hector.

  “When we get to town, we’ll turn him over to the sheriff,” Clint said.

  “For what?” Hector asked. “Following you? Is that a crime?”

  “We’ll think of something when we get there,” Clint promised him.

  When they rode into Abilene, Roscoe was wide-eyed. It was the largest, busiest town he had ever been in. He was surprised at the amount of traffic on the main street—horses, wagons, and pedestrians.

  “I’ll bet they have a really big whorehouse here,” he said.

  “More than one,” Hector assured him.

  “Shut up,” Clint said to the Mexican.

  “I’ve already seen three hotels,” Roscoe said. “Which one are we gonna stay in?”

  “Relax,” Clint said. “First we’ll stop at the sheriff’s office and drop Hector off. Then, after we see to the horses, we’ll check into a hotel.”

  Sheriff Aaron Carter placed Hector in a cell, then came back into his office, where Clint and Roscoe were waiting.

  “So you have an idea who his partners are?” Carter asked. “Or when they’ll get here?”

  “No,” Clint said.

  “But you know what they want, right?”

  “I can guess.”

  Carter frowned. He was in his fifties, had obviously been a lawman for many years in Abilene and in other towns. He’d been through this kind of thing before.

  “So there’s gonna be blood on my streets,” he said.

  “There’s been blood on the streets of Abilene before, Sheriff,” Clint said, “but there won’t be this time if I can help it.”

  “I know how this works, Adams,” the sheriff said. “They won’t give you a choice.”

  “You never know, Sheriff,” Clint said. “You never know.”

  Carter walked them to the door of his office.

  “If you happen to spot them before they spot you, let me know, will ya?”

  “Sure, Sheriff.”

  Outside the office, Roscoe said, “A hotel now?”

  “I told you,” Clint said, “the livery stable, then a hotel. Come on, we can walk them.”

  They grabbed the horses’ reins and started walking. Clint had been to Abilene before and knew where the closest livery was.

  “Why did you tell the sheriff there’d be no blood if you could help it?”

  “Because there won’t be.”

  “You won’t fight them when they get here?”

  “Not if I can avoid it.”

  “You mean . . . you’d run away?”

  “I’d like to run away, Bookbinder,” Clint said, “but I can’t. If I did that, I’d be even more of a target for every two-bit gunny than I am now. No, I can’t run, but I can try to avoid killing.”

  “But . . . why? You’re fast. You can kill them easy.” The boy was truly puzzled.

  “What if there’s five of them?” Clint asked. “Or eight? Or ten? Should I stand in the street and face that many? That’d be stupid.”

  “But . . . what if there’s only two, or three? You can kill that many, can’t you?”

  “Bookbinder, the day will come when one man with a gun will kill me.”

  “How?”

  “He’ll be faster. It could even turn out to be you.”

  “You think I could be faster than you?” Roscoe asked. “Really?”

  Clint looked at the boy, then said, “You’re not even listening,” and walked on faster.

  THIRTY

  “Abilene,” Darby Heston said.

  “They’re playin’ right into our hands,” Zack said. “You can kill Adams right in the street and it’ll make newspapers around the country.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Whataya mean, maybe?”

  Heston sat back in his saddle and regarded his cousin while rolling a cigarette.

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why is Adams goin’ to Abilene?” Heston asked.

  “It’s a big town,” Zack said. “Hotels, saloons, food, girls . . . why else would someone go there?”

  “But by now he knows we’re after him,” Heston said. “Correction, he knows somebody’s after him. He don’t know it’s me. He might know about you, but not me.”

  “Unless Hector told him.”

  Heston drew on his cigarette and squinted at Zack through the smoke.

  “You told me the Mex wouldn’t talk.”

  “Well, he wouldn’t . . . normally.”

  “What’s changed?”

  Zack shrugged.

  “He’s in the hands of the Gunsmith,” he said. “Maybe that’ll impress him.”

  “It better not,” Heston said, tossing the cigarette away.

  “We goin’ in?” Zack asked.

  “We’re goin’ in.”

  The
y gigged their horses and rode to Abilene.

  Clint and Roscoe got the horses into a livery and then they checked into a nearby hotel. It wasn’t the biggest hotel in town, but to Roscoe it was the lap of luxury.

  Clint knocked on Roscoe’s door. He’d taken two rooms so the boy could have his own.

  “Let’s get something to eat,” he said. “We’ve got time before they get here.”

  “This place is great!” Roscoe said as they walked down the hall.

  “There’s a restaurant across the street,” Clint said. “Let’s try that.”

  “I could use a steak this thick,” Roscoe said, holding his thumb and forefinger a couple of inches apart.

  “Then that’s what you’ll get.”

  “Really?”

  “Why not?”

  “This is great,” Roscoe said. “I never had a steak that size.”

  They left the hotel, went across the street, and got a table in the moderately busy restaurant.

  “Two steak dinners,” Clint told the waiter. “All the trimmings.”

  “Comin’ up. And to drink?”

  “A pitcher of beer.”

  “Right.”

  As the waiter left, Roscoe leaned forward and said, “They bring a pitcher of beer to the table?”

  “In some restaurants in large towns, yes,” Clint said.

  Roscoe sat back and said, “This is amazing.”

  “Settle down, Bookbinder,” Clint said. “It’s just a restaurant.”

  “Shouldn’t we sit by the window so we can see the street?” Roscoe asked.

  “No,” Clint said, “I never sit by the window, because I don’t want to be seen. Too easy to take a shot at me.”

  “Ah,” Roscoe said.

  “You won’t have that problem, though—” Clint said, but Roscoe cut him off.

  “I will when I get my reputation,” he said.

  “Bookbinder . . . ,” Clint said, shaking his head. “Have you been listening at all the last few days?”

  “Sure I have,” Roscoe said. “I’ve been hearing you. It sounds to me like you wish you’d never picked up a gun, Clint. Like you wish you weren’t the Gunsmith. Well, do you know what I wish? I wish I wasn’t Roscoe Bookbinder. What the hell kind of name is that?”

  “Roscoe—”

  “So when I finally get my reputation, I’m gonna have a whole different name,” he said. “I haven’t picked it out yet, but you know how people make fun of me and call me the Two-Gun Kid? Even that name would be better.”

  The waiter came with two steaming steak plates, set them down, and then added the pitcher of beer and two glasses.

  “Anything else?” he asked.

  “No,” Clint said, “no, I think we’ve got enough. Thanks.”

  Roscoe picked up his knife and fork and cut into his thick steak. Clint decided to suspend the lessons for a little while and just eat.

  THIRTY-ONE

  “We don’t know where they are,” Zack said, “or where they’re stayin’.”

  “I’ll find out,” Heston said. “Don’t worry.”

  “We can both find out.”

  They were at a rooming house on the edge of town. Heston had assumed they’d find at least one such place there. Most towns had them, he said to Zack. When Zack asked why they didn’t just stay in a hotel, Heston said he didn’t want to run into Clint Adams until they were ready.

  “But he don’t know you,” Zack said.

  “He knows you,” Heston said. “At least, he saw you once.”

  “He might not remember.”

  “We’re not takin’ that chance.”

  So they found a rooming house being run by a widow named Mrs. Ivers, and they got two rooms. Now they were on the porch.

  “I want you to stay here,” Heston said.

  “Where are you goin’?”

  “Into town.”

  “I’m hungry, Darb.

  “Mrs. Ivers will give you somethin’ to eat,” Heston told him.

  “And you’re gonna go to a restaurant, right? A café? And have somethin’? Maybe a steak?”

  “I’m gonna see if I can locate Adams and the kid,” Heston said.

  “And maybe visit a whorehouse? Have a whore or two?” Zack asked.

  “Yeah, maybe,” Heston said. “What’s the difference? I’m tellin’ you to stay here. You understand?”

  “Yeah,” Zack said. “I understand.”

  Heston left Zack on the porch and walked toward the center of town.

  “Look,” Roscoe said over dessert, “I know you’re tryin’ to help me.”

  “I thought you asked me to help you,” Clint reminded him.

  “Well, yeah, I did, but I didn’t think you were gonna try to change me,” he said. “I just thought you’d help me learn to shoot, you know, better.”

  “Faster?”

  “Yeah.”

  “More accurate, is more like it,” Clint said.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Roscoe said, “I know, you been tellin’ me, it’s better to shoot straight than fast.”

  “So then you have been listening,” Clint said, “at least part of the time.”

  “That’s all we been doin’, Clint, is talkin’,” Roscoe said. “We ain’t done much shootin’.”

  “That’s because I wanted to work on your head first.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ wrong with my head.”

  “It wasn’t screwed on tight enough, Roscoe.”

  “Huh?”

  “You have to think more before you shoot.”

  “I’m worried about when there’s no time to think,” the kid said. “That’s when I want to shoot fast and straight.”

  “Those times wouldn’t come up if you weren’t so intent on being a gunman, Bookbinder.”

  “There ain’t nothin’ else for me to be, Clint,” Roscoe said. “I ain’t gonna be no store clerk.”

  “There are other things you could be.”

  “No,” Roscoe said, “there ain’t.”

  Clint sat back, pushing away his empty dessert plate and beer mug.

  “Okay,” Clint said. “We’ve got another problem.”

  “Whoever’s followin’ us.”

  “Right.”

  “They’re after you, right?”

  “Looks like.”

  “But probably because you helped me back in Evolution when you did,” Roscoe went on. “So I’m gonna stand with you.”

  “You may not have to,” Clint said.

  “Why not?”

  “If there’s one or two, I may not need you to,” Clint said, “but if there’s five or six . . .”

  “I understand.”

  “So while we’re waiting for them to get here,” Clint said, “maybe we should do some more shooting and make sure you’re ready for it.”

  “That’s okay with me.”

  “You done here?”

  Roscoe sat back and patted his belly. “I’m stuffed.”

  “Let’s go find an empty lot somewhere,” Clint said, getting up and digging for his money.

  Darby Heston stopped short when he saw Clint Adams and the kid come out of a restaurant across the street. He recognized the Gunsmith because he’d seen him once before, a few years back. Also, Zack had described both him and the kid, Bookbinder.

  Heston stepped back into a doorway. There was no way Clint Adams would know him on sight, but there was an off chance that Hector had described him. So he stayed back and watched Adams and Bookbinder walk down the street. When Heston realized he was standing in the doorway of a hotel, went inside and checked with the desk clerk. A dollar bought him the information that Clint Adams and Roscoe Bookbinder had registered, and each had his own room.

  Since he now knew what hotel they were staying in, he walked across the street and entered the restaurant the two men had come out of. Both men had had their hands on their bellies. To Heston, that was the international sign that they had enjoyed their meal.

  His cousin Zack had been right. Darby He
ston wanted two things—a steak and, later, a whore.

  THIRTY-TWO

  Clint found an empty lot that was off Abilene’s main street. It looked like a lot where a building had recently burned down, along with adjacent buildings, so there was no danger of errant lead going through somebody’s window—unless it traveled blocks.

  “Targets again?” Roscoe asked.

  “Yes, but close up this time,” Clint said. “I’m going to let you use your speed.”

  There was no fence, but there was a section of wall still standing. They walked to that wall. Clint looked around, found some boards, and propped them against the wall.

  “The board is a man’s torso,” Clint said. “Hit it dead center.”

  “Not in the heart?” Roscoe said. He touched the board. “Right there?”

  “No,” Clint insisted, “dead center, Bookbinder. Send your bullet into the largest part of a man. You start to try to aim for parts—an arm, a leg, or the heart—you’re going to get yourself—and me—into trouble.”

  “Okay.”

  “Just draw and fire when you’re ready.”

  Roscoe spread his legs, drew his right pistol, and fired. He hit the board dead center.

  “Other hand.”

  He holstered the right gun and prepared to draw the left.

  “Reload first!” Clint snapped. “Don’t ever return your gun to your holster with a dead chamber.”

  “Okay.”

  Roscoe drew the gun again, ejected the empty shell, replaced it with a fresh one, and then holstered the gun again.

  “Okay, go,” Clint said.

  Once again Roscoe spread his legs and readied himself, then he drew with his left hand and fired. Off center.

  “Again.”

  “Reload?”

  “Later. Do it again.”

  Roscoe holstered the gun, drew, and fired. Not dead center, but better.

  “Again,” Clint said.

  And again.

  And again . . .

  Darby Heston came out of the restaurant, rubbing his belly the way Clint Adams had been doing. The steak had been thick and tasty.

  Heston decided to take a walk around town, maybe locate Adams and the kid again. He wanted to watch Clint Adams for a while before he faced him. The reason Heston was still alive was that he always knew his enemy before he faced him. The other thing was he never let his stupid cousin get him killed. That was why he’d left Zack back at the rooming house.