Twelve Dead Men

by William W. Johnstone

  “That I can do as well, señor, when I have to.” José added in a prayerful tone, “At least I hope so, if El Señor Dios wills it.”

  Miguel thought for a moment, then said, “Give it a try. But if you think he’s catching on too soon, just keep going and we’ll try something else, comprende?”

  “Sí.” José unscrewed the cap from the flask and began splashing the potent liquor over the front of his shirt.

  Miguel figured José hadn’t brought the tequila with him tonight specifically for the ploy, but it was good thinking anyway. The tequila was strong enough that the guard would be able to smell it as José approached.

  When he was ready, José took a deep breath and then started toward the back of the saloon in a stumbling walk, weaving back and forth a little for added effect. Between the unsteady gait and the reek of tequila, he definitely seemed to be drunk.

  Miguel saw the guard straighten from his casual pose as José approached. The man leveled the rifle in his hands and snapped, “Hold it right there, mister.”

  “Wha . . .” José staggered to a halt. “Is . . . is someone there?”

  “Good Lord,” the outlaw said. “José, is that you?”

  Miguel frowned. He hadn’t considered the possibility that the sentry had been with McLaren’s gang for so long he would remember José.

  Something else occurred to Miguel then, a thought that sent ice down his spine. What if José decided to try to save himself from McLaren’s vengeance by betraying the group of townspeople hidden in the dark alley next to the saloon? All he had to do was point them out, and the guard could open fire. That would bring the rest of the gang and ruin everything.

  Instead José mumbled, “Do . . . do I know you, señor?”

  “It’s me, you fat ol’ fool. Ned Byers.”

  “Ned! Mi amigo Ned! What are you doing here?”

  “You ain’t heard what’s goin’ on?” Byers asked with suspicion edging into his voice.

  “I have heard nothing. I have been”—José hiccupped very realistically—“in my cantina all day.”

  “Yeah, you smell like it, all right,” Byers said with a note of disgust. “You didn’t know Otis was back in town with all the boys?”

  “Otis? My old compadre Otis? I must see him and say hello.”

  “Yeah, he wants to see you, too. He’s got some other business to take care of first, but he’ll get around to you. Why don’t you go on in?”

  “Into the saloon? This is where Otis is?”

  “Yeah. Hang on a minute.” Byers stepped to the door and rapped quietly on it.

  In the shadows, Miguel held his breath. They might not have to bust the back door down after all. That could be a big stroke of luck for them . . . but if something went wrong, it could spell disaster.

  The door opened, and Byers told one of the outlaws inside, “Look who’s here. It’s ol’ José his ownself. Otis is gonna be mighty happy to see him.”

  “I would not be sure of that, Ned.” José swung his good arm around, taking Byers by surprise. Having slid the cap and ball pistol out from where it was tucked behind the sash around his waist, José smashed it against Byers’s skull with enough force to stretch him out on the ground.

  “What the hell!” exclaimed the outlaw just inside the door.

  “Not another sound, amigo,” José said as he pointed the revolver at the man’s face and eared back the hammer. “This old hogleg, she will blow your head clean off your shoulders if I pull the trigger. Get your hands up and come with me.” He backed away from the door.

  The outlaw went with him, arms half-lifted. A few feet out the door, he suddenly muttered, “The hell with this,” and dropped his arms. His hand clawed at the gun on his hip.

  José pulled the trigger, but the hammer snapped harmlessly as the old revolver misfired. The outlaw’s gun came up and flame spouted from its muzzle as the roar of the shot filled the alley behind the saloon.

  * * *

  Fontana put her hands against Otis McLaren’s chest and cried, “No! You can’t hang them!”

  “You’ve got that wrong, girl. I can do any damn thing I want.” McLaren laughed and hefted the pearl-handled revolver. “This gun says I can, and so do the guns of these fellas with me.”

  She continued to clutch at him. “But if you spare them, I . . . I’ll do anything you want.”

  McLaren laughed harshly. “I reckon you’ll do that anyway, whether I hang those little bastards or not. Anyway, I sort of promised you to Gyp.” He laughed again. “Although he ain’t in much shape to handle anything else right now, even a sweet little morsel like you.”

  It was true that Gyp wasn’t in very good shape. He had to have help standing up, and blood dripped from his nose and mouth as his head drooped forward.

  At McLaren’s words, though, he lifted his head and snarled. “I’ll be in . . . a lot better shape . . . when those two Jensens are danglin’ there next to Muller!”

  “Let’s get at it, then.” McLaren nodded to his men, several of whom closed in around Ace and Chance.

  * * *

  In the alley behind the Melodian, José reeled back as the gunman fired. Miguel lunged toward them from the corner. He didn’t want to use his gun unless he had to. One shot might go overlooked inside the saloon, depending on what was happening in there. A whole flurry of them was bound to be noticed.

  Miguel left his feet in a diving tackle that sent him crashing into the man who had just shot José. They fell to the trash-littered ground in the alley and Miguel made a desperate grab for the gun with his left hand. His fingers closed around the cylinder and clamped down tight on it, which meant it couldn’t turn and the outlaw couldn’t fire.

  A second later, Miguel’s right fist slammed into the man’s face. He went limp, and Miguel was able to wrench the gun out of his hand.

  Miguel stood up and looked around to see Lee Emory supporting José. Colonel Howden and the other men were there, too, ready to charge into the saloon through the rear entrance.

  “A couple of you tie this man up and gag him.” Miguel gave the low-voiced order. “José, how bad are you hurt?”

  “It is nothing, Marshal,” the fat man replied, although his voice was thin from pain. “The bullet, she hit me in the same shoulder as before, so I will not even need another sling!”

  Miguel nodded. “You’re going to stay out here and cover our backs. Somebody give him a gun that actually works.”

  “This old pistola, it has never let me down before,” José said in mournful tones. “I can still help you—”

  “I told you, you’re going to watch our back. Anyway, you’ve done plenty. You got us in there where we need to be, and from the looks of it, they didn’t notice that shot.” Miguel drew the pistol he had jammed back into its holster before he tackled the outlaw. “Let’s go. Quiet and careful.”

  * * *

  Ace had hoped the fight took enough time to give Miguel and the others a chance to get in position and launch their attack. That didn’t seem to be the case, so all he and Chance could do was put up a fight against overwhelming odds.

  Fontana suddenly screamed and threw herself at McLaren. She clawed at his face, raking her fingernails down his weathered cheeks. With that going on, everybody in the room paused to look at the two of them, and Orrie chose that moment to lurch up from his place against the bar, even though he was obviously in great pain from being kicked by McLaren earlier. Lunging at the outlaw nearest to him, he grabbed the man’s gun arm, shoved it toward the ceiling, and rammed into the man as hard as he could.

  Unfortunately, Orrie wasn’t very big and didn’t weigh much, so he wasn’t able to knock the outlaw off his feet. The man caught himself, wrenched his arm free, and fired at point-blank range. Orrie doubled over as the slug punched into his middle.

  McLaren cursed as he tried to fend off Fontana’s attack. He brought his left arm around in a backhand that slammed into her head. Her rich brown hair came loose from its pins and fell around her fa
ce in disarray as she toppled to the floor.

  “By God, that’s enough!” he bellowed. Looking around, he saw Orrie lying crumpled on the floor in a spreading pool of blood, and then pointed his gun at Fontana.

  Chance lunged toward him, and so did Ace, but some of McLaren’s men grabbed them and held them back.

  The bloody scratches Fontana had given him stood out against McLaren’s cheeks. His finger whitened on the trigger just for a second, but he held off. Instead of shooting Fontana, he grated, “I reckon the music’s over.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  With Emory, the colonel, and the other men at his back, Miguel stepped through the doorway. They hurried to the door on the other side of the room then crept through a short hallway with Hank Muller’s office to the left. Stopping at the closed door at the end of the hall, Miguel wrapped his left hand around the doorknob, turned it carefully, and opened the door slightly.

  Some sort of commotion was going on inside the saloon, and he hated to think what it might be. On the other hand, the Jensen brothers were supposed to create a distraction. From the sound of it, they most likely had succeeded.

  As Miguel eased the door open a little farther, a harsh voice shouted, “Hang ’em!”

  The time for stealth was over. He threw the door open and charged into the saloon with flame spurting from the gun in his hand.

  The brutal command echoed in the air as gun-thunder crashed. The man holding Ace’s left arm cried out and let go, falling away with crimson flowers blooming on his shirt where bullets had torn into him.

  Ace knew there was only one logical explanation for the sudden turn of events, and sure enough, he saw Miguel Soriano had burst into the room, gun blazing.

  Even though he was battered, bruised, and weary from the fight, Ace knew it was the only chance he and his brother had. With one arm free, he twisted away from the other outlaw holding him and brought his left fist whistling around in a powerful punch that landed solidly on the man’s jaw. That broke his grip, and Ace was loose.

  Chance took advantage of the same opportunity Ace had and turned on the men holding him. He managed to drive an elbow in the belly of one man and hooked a foot behind the knee of the other, then jerked and made the outlaw topple.

  At the same time, Lee Emory, Colonel Howden, and the other members of the group from Lone Pine poured into the saloon and opened fire on McLaren’s gang. The fact that all the hostages had been forced to sit down against the bar came in handy. Although mostly out of the line of fire to start with, most hunkered lower, stretching out on the floor.

  Not Fontana, though. She surged up and leaped at Otis McLaren to wrestle with him for his gun. She was no match for the brutal outlaw leader. He slammed a fist in her face and she staggered backwards.

  A few yards away, Chance glanced over his shoulder at Fontana as she reeled away from McLaren. He dived at her and knocked her to the floor an instant before bullets sizzled through the space where she had been. “I thought I told you to get down and stay down!” he yelled over the crash of guns.

  “They killed Orrie!”

  “They’ll pay for it,” Chance promised. He got a hand on the floor, pushed himself up a little, then grabbed one of the outlaws around the legs and upended him. The back of the man’s head smacked against the floor when he landed, and he didn’t move again.

  Chance ripped the gun out of the man’s hand, rolled over, and came up triggering. Another member of McLaren’s gang went over backwards as the shots ripped through him.

  The chaos of flaming death filled the saloon. Men on both sides were falling as slugs whipped back and forth. Ace scooped two fallen revolvers from the floor and came up on a knee as the guns roared and bucked in his hands. From the corner of his eye he saw Sinton drawing a bead on him and twisted in that direction, firing just as the burly outlaw squeezed off a shot. Ace felt the warm breath of the bullet as it went past his cheek. Sinton doubled over as both of Ace’s bullets buried themselves in his ample gut.

  A few yards away, Chance had another target and was about to fire again when something crashed against his back and knocked him forward.

  An arm looped around his neck and closed on his throat like a vise. “Now I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch!” Gyp rasped in Chance’s ear as he tried to crush the young man’s windpipe.

  Gyp had caught him without much air in his lungs. Explosions were already going off behind Chance’s eyes, and a red haze descended over his sight. He stumbled forward with Gyp hanging on to him, then thrust a foot back and tangled it with the outlaw’s feet. Chance planted his other leg and drove forward. He twisted as they both fell so Gyp wouldn’t land on top of him.

  The impact loosened Gyp’s hold but didn’t break it. Chance was able to gulp down enough air to keep himself from passing out. He twisted far enough to reach back and get his hand on Gyp’s face. His fingers dug for the outlaw’s eyes. Gyp jerked his head back, but he couldn’t get away from Chance. He bellowed in pain and let go. He had to, or else Chance would have dragged his eyes right out of their sockets.

  Chance writhed around and slashed the edge of his hand across Gyp’s throat, making it his turn to gasp for breath. Chance hit him again . . . using the gun in his other hand. The blow landed with a crunching sound as bone shattered. Gyp spasmed once, then straightened out and lay still. His eyes rolled up and began to glaze over.

  He wouldn’t molest Fontana or any other woman ever again.

  The battle had given Crackerjack Sawyer the chance to stop pretending to be unconscious. He had scrambled to his feet when the fighting started and leaped onto the bar, rolling over it to land on the other side. Grabbing a full bottle of whiskey by the neck, he leaned over the hardwood and smashed the bottle over the head of an outlaw who came within reach. The blow took the hardcase by surprise, and he folded up, out cold.

  Crackerjack snatched another bottle from the back bar and waited for a second victim to come within reach. His eyes widened, though, as he spotted one of the outlaws aiming a gun at Howden’s back. Crackerjack drew back his arm and let fly. The whiskey bottle smacked against the outlaw’s head and laid him out.

  “You’re welcome, you damn Yankee!” Crackerjack yelled at the colonel.

  Howden looked over his shoulder in surprise, then in a blur of motion brought his rifle to his shoulder and fired. Crackerjack jerked back, then realized Howden hadn’t been aiming at him. He looked to his left along the bar and saw one of the outlaws wilting with a hand pressed to his chest where blood welled out of a bullet hole.

  “Same to you, Johnny Reb!” Howden called. “That varmint was about to ventilate you!”

  The two old-timers looked at each other for a second, then both nodded. It was all the gesture either of them needed.

  Miguel’s left arm hung limp at his side, blood dripping down it from the wound where a slug had knocked out a chunk of meat from the upper arm. His right arm was still fine, though, and the gun in that hand blasted at the outlaws until the hammer fell on an empty chamber. Reloading one-handed would be difficult, so he waded into the fray with the gun rising and falling as he struck out with it. A couple more of McLaren’s men went down. Miguel didn’t know if he had knocked them out or cracked their skulls and killed them, and he didn’t care. All that mattered was that they were out of the fight.

  The gunfire had begun to die out. A few more shots blasted, then an echoing silence fell over the saloon. Ace looked around, saw to his great relief that Chance was still on his feet and apparently unharmed except for some scrapes and bruises, and then took stock of the situation.

  All of McLaren’s gang huddled in bloody heaps on the floor except for a couple who had thrown their guns down and surrendered. Several of the townsmen from Lone Pine had been killed or badly wounded in the frantic battle, but Miguel, Lee Emory, Colonel Howden, and Crackerjack Sawyer were still standing. Miguel was wounded, and so was Emory, who had to lean on his rifle to hold him up. The right leg of his trousers was stained with bl
ood where he’d been winged.

  Chance helped Fontana to her feet.

  She threw her arms around his neck and hung on tightly to him, burying her face against his chest. “Is it over?” she asked in a voice hoarse from the clouds of powder smoke that hung in the air. “Is it really over?”

  “Looks like it is,” Chance told her.

  Ace wasn’t so sure. His eyes quickly searched the bodies scattered on the floor for one wearing a long black duster, but he didn’t find any. He opened his mouth to ask if anyone had seen what happened to Otis McLaren . . .

  But before he could get the words out, a terrified scream ripped through the night outside, and Ace figured he had his answer.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  “My God!” Lee Emory cried in a voice wracked by pain and fear. “That sounded like Meredith!”

  Ace thought so, too, and was already dashing toward the batwings. He slapped through them onto the boardwalk, only to be greeted by the roar of a shot and the flat whap! of a bullet passing close by his ear.

  He dived to the planks and rolled off them as another slug struck the boardwalk and threw splinters into the air. He landed on his belly and looked up to see Otis McLaren backing away. The outlaw’s left arm was around Meredith Emory’s neck as he dragged her along with him like a human shield.

  Ace had no idea how Meredith had gotten herself captured by McLaren, but that wasn’t important at the moment. Since McLaren was still shooting at him, he scrambled along the muddy street and threw himself behind a water trough. He looked back at the saloon. Chance and Emory were pushing through the batwings.

  The newspaperman yelled, “Meredith!”

  “Stay back!” Ace shouted. “Hold your fire!” He didn’t want anyone blazing away at McLaren and hitting Meredith instead.

  McLaren didn’t have to worry about that. He slammed a pair of shots at the Melodian’s entrance, and Chance and Emory ducked back barely in time to avoid them.

  A harsh laugh floated along the street. “Damn. Looks like all the sheep livin’ here have got more guts than I expected. I never figured they’d even put up a fight, let alone get the best of my boys.”