by Shorty Gunn
‘Dad always told us to stick together. You know the old saying, blood’s thicker than water?’
‘Yes I do. Now I have a family of my own to think about and that’s blood too. It’s not like the old days when we were riding and running wild with no one to worry about but ourselves. Some day you’ll know what I mean.’
‘Maybe, but right now I’m not ready to rock the cradle just yet. What do you say we get to those fresh horses instead of standing here jawing about it.’
‘Put your horses in the barn out of sight. I’ll help you. While we’re waiting for Red, they can get a good feed. So can you three in the house. Angelina will be surprised to see you again.’
The marshal and his young Crow sidekick followed tracks through hill country with increasing ease. As they rode, Whitman’s mind worked trying to puzzle out where he thought the gang might be going. That’s when he remembered an offhand conversation he’d had some months back with a friend who said that Keller had a cousin living somewhere near Janesville, in the general direction the tracks led. That simple disclosure suddenly became the key to unlocking Cort Keller’s escape plans. Whitman pulled to a stop motioning for Little Hawk to do the same.
‘If these tracks lead where I think they might, we may be facing even more guns than just Cort Keller and his gang. He could be heading for family. There’s no telling how much more help he could get there. When we get close enough to know for sure, we’ll lay up until dark before trying to smoke them out. That way they won’t know how many guns they’re facing.’
Little Hawk stared back before commenting. ‘We not know either.’
‘That’s true, but I still believe that gives us the edge. Keep your eyes open up ahead for any sign of smoke or buildings. That’s where we’ll find this bunch. We don’t want them to think we’re within twenty miles until we make our move. This is one time Keller isn’t going to ride away scot free like he has in the past. We’ll bring him back to New Hope in cuffs or feet first. I don’t much care which way either.’
Chapter Two
Long shadows of evening crept over Coy Brandon’s ranch, its silent fingers reaching out across the meadow into a dark band of timber on the other side. Inside the edge of those tall pines Whitman and Little Hawk silently watched the glow of kerosene lamps flicker on behind curtained windows inside the log-walled ranch house. No horses were tied out front at the hitching rail. A first curl of blue smoke twisted up from the stone chimney, as Angelina began cooking supper.
‘They’ll be eating soon,’ the marshal whispered. ‘We’ll give them another ten minutes to get at the table, before moving in. You keep that six-shooter of yours real handy. If I know this bunch like I think I do, there’ll be gunplay for sure. They’re not going to just throw up their hands and quit.’
Little Hawk’s hand moved down caressing the pistol grip on his wheel gun. His always stoic face lit with just the briefest flash of a smile. He loved the feeling of the big weapon. It excited him like nothing else could. The ancient Crow blood pulsing through his veins made his heart beat faster. His dark eyes never left the log house across the meadow. He was eager for a shootout. Whitman’s hand grabbed his shoulder silently urging him to his feet. Both men stood for several minutes before starting across the meadow in slow motion, guns tight in their hands.
Inside the house Angelina brought a tray of smoking hot venison and potatoes to the table. Her dark brown eyes briefly met her husband’s. That look said she was not happy to be feeding or hiding Cort and his men, but she would not say so out loud. To do so would bring on Coy’s quick temper. She knew about the long, bloody history of fighting and robbery he’d once shared with his cousin before they met. It scared her when he first told her about his and his family’s bitter days back in Tennessee, raiding and fighting against Union soldiers. It scared her even more now to have these dangerous men sitting in her house, at her table, with her children next to them.
‘This dinner looks mighty fine, Angelina,’ Cort’s compliment broke the uneasy silence around the table.
‘It sure does,’ Red added, glancing at Wic and Fan. ‘Sort of reminds me when we were back home in Tennessee and Mom’s cooking.’
‘Tennessee . . .’ Coy’s voice trailed off thinking about those wonderful teenage days before the ravages of war spread a dark cloud of misery over the South. ‘I wonder what it’s like back there now? We left a lot of friends when we moved west. Are they still there stuggling, or did they pull up and leave too?’
‘Why talk about it now in front of the children?’ Angelina spoke up irritated and worried the men would spend the entire evening reminiscing about the violence and killing, while Colin, Sallie Ann and Donetta listened.
Coy saw the nervousness and frustration in her eyes. He knew he had to change the conversation fast. ‘Colin, the pitcher is nearly empty. Would you go out to the well and fill it up. Your dinner will stay hot if you move fast.’
‘Sure Dad. I’ll take care of it.’ He came to his feet grabbing the large vessel.
‘Better take the lantern and rifle too just in case,’ Coy cautioned. ‘That grizzly bear has been prowling around here the last few days near the horse corral.’
‘I’ll go with him to help out.’ Wic quickly got to his feet. ‘He’ll have his hands full. I’ll take the rifle, Colin.’
‘All right.’ Coy nodded, glad Wic offered, hoping Angelina would appreciate the gesture although she said nothing, continuing to serve each plate.
‘Sounds like you’re going to have to kill that bear,’ Cort said. ‘Once they get the smell of horse flesh up their nose it won’t stop there. You know how those grizzlies are.’
‘You’re right. With everything else going on around here I haven’t had the chance to get away and track him down. I know I’m going to have to. If you stay around a few days maybe we can both go after him.’
Outside in the dark, Whitman and Little Hawk approached the ranch house until only yards away. Suddenly the front door swung open and two figures stepped outside, backlit by lamp light, one carrying a long gun.
Whitman reacted quickly with a shouted order. ‘Drop that rifle and put your hands up, or I’ll cut you two down where you stand!’
Wic reacted instantly, shoving Colin out of the way. ‘Get down, kid!’ He brought the rifle up firing blindly at the voice the same instant the marshal and Little Hawk fired back. The .44 bucked in the young Crow’s hands, shattering the lantern spewing a bright ball of flame over the ground illuminating the star man and his partner. Wic swung on Whitman diving for the ground, firing as fast as he could work the lever action. Little Hawk doubled-handed his pistol firing back at Wic, spinning him to the ground wounded. Colin lay a few feet away, belly crawling back for the door yelling for his father.
Cort, Red and Fan bolted from the table running to the door, pistols drawn, shouting for Wic. Coy grabbed his shotgun off pegs on the wall, slamming a window open and firing both barrels in the direction of two figures crouching in meadow grass. Angelina screamed, wrapping both arms around Donetta and Sallie Ann, pulling them down to the floor, covering their bodies with hers, petrified by the deafening gunfire.
‘Get back. There’s too many guns!’ Nate grabbed the Crow by the shoulder pulling him to his feet, both men running into the night back toward dark timber, while bullets whined around them.
‘Wic, are you hit?’ Cort ducked outside as the shooting came to a sudden end, Red, Fan and Coy right on his heels.
Colin struggled to his feet. Coy ran up holding him at arm’s length. ‘Are you all right, son? Tell me you are!’
‘My hands and face got a little burned when the lantern was shot out. Who fired on us? We haven’t done anything wrong to anyone, have we Dad?’
‘Don’t worry about that right now. Get in the house and have your mother put something on those burns. She needs your help and needs to see you’re not wounded.’
Cort kneeled next to Wic doubled up on the ground, trying to lift him into a sitting
position. His hand felt the warm sticky blood of a bullet wound soaking through his shirt.
‘Where are you hit?’
‘In . . . my side. Feels like I’m . . . torn apart.’
‘Red, Fan, help me get him inside where we’ve got some light,’ Cort ordered.
At the table Cort swept dishes, knives and forks off with one sweep of his arm. Angelina stood against the wall with her arms around the children aghast at the scene, still trembling in fear from the sudden vicious attack.
Lifting Wic on the table, Cort carefully unbuttoned his shirt, opening it to see the ugly, bleeding bullet hole in his side just above his gun belt. He glanced up at his brother and Fan as Coy came to the table after escorting Angelina and the children into the bedroom.
‘Wic needs a doctor, and fast or he’ll bleed to death,’ Cort said. ‘There must be one in Janesville, isn’t there?’ He turned to Coy.
‘There is, but he isn’t going come all the way out here at this hour.’
‘Then we’ll take Wic to him. We can’t do much out here on our own. You have a buckboard, don’t you?’ Coy nodded. ‘Get the horses hooked up fast. You’ll have to come with us to show me where he lives.’
‘Don’t go, Coy.’ Angelina had exited the bedroom standing in shadows beyond lamp light. ‘Give them the buckboard if we have to, but don’t go. The law will think you’re part of them. I can’t live with that. I won’t even try. Do you understand me?”
‘Angelina, he’s my cousin. I can’t just walk away like that. You know better. You’re just upset. It will pass. I’ll be back soon as I can, you’ll see.’
‘I’m your wife, remember? And you have a family. You make a choice right now. Who is most important to you? Me and the children, or Cort. I’m not going to live like this and try to raise a decent family if you’re going to be any part of this. I won’t have the law coming out here threatening us for information or maybe even putting you in jail. I won’t do it. I’ll take the children and leave. I swear to God, I will. Our own son could have been killed out there tonight!’ She buried her face in both hands crying.
‘Wait a minute,’ Cort put up both hands. ‘I’ll take care of all this right now. We’ll take the buckboard into town. You stay here with your wife, Coy. You can ride in tomorrow with Colin and bring it back out. Just help Red and Fan with the harness so we can get going. Does that suit you, Angelina?’
She stared back without comment, slowly nodding before turning for the bedroom, closing the door behind her. Coy turned to Cort, shrugging slightly embarrassed but thankful the confrontation had been avoided.
‘I’m sorry. I guess she’s right. I have to make a choice. Old habits die hard, you know that. We always did things together, sharing the good and bad, whatever came. I guess I can’t have it both ways, anymore.’
‘Don’t worry about it, cousin. We’ll always be blood. We’ll get out of here fast. It’ll make everything better for you.’
‘Where are you headed?’
‘I don’t know yet. With Whitman on me I’ll have to do some riding to shake him off. First I’ve got to get Wic to that doctor. It’s likely I won’t see you again for quite a while. Take care of yourself and your family too. Tell Angelina I’m sorry for the trouble I’ve caused. I never meant for any of it to happen here. You have to know that.’
‘I do.’ The two men shook hands before Cort pulled him closer, pounding his back and turning away without another word. Both men knew one of them might end up dead before that ever happened again but neither one said so out loud.
Whitman and Little Hawk ran across the meadow through darkened pines until reaching their horses. ‘Where we go now?’ his sidekick questioned.
‘We’re riding for Janesville so I can get some shooters who won’t turn back the minute things get tough. New Hope is too far away and takes too much time for that. I want to get up a posse before Keller can run again. He’ll go even further now that he knows I’m trailing him. One thing I know for sure. We won’t catch him flat like we just did at his cousin’s ranch. Next time it will be a gun battle to the end, and I mean to end it once and for all.’
‘This man can’t ride anyplace with a wound like that,’ Doctor William Whylie said in a steady professional tone, carefully wiping blood away from Wic’s wound as he lay on his side on the examination table. ‘I’ll need to clean this out, see how deep the wound is, and stitch him up, if I can. It will take several days to see if the swelling and bleeding can be stopped.’
‘We don’t have any time for that,’ Keller shook his head under the glow of lamp light hanging over the table. ‘You’ll have to do the best you can right here and now.’
‘There’s nothing fast about a bullet wound like this unless you want your friend to die in the saddle, if he isn’t properly treated. You’ve gotten me up in the middle of the night at gunpoint demanding my help. I haven’t even asked you how he was wounded, but I’d guess it wasn’t cleaning his pistol. Now you don’t want to take my advice on how to save him. If you insist on taking him with you he’ll die a slow miserable death. That’s the one thing I can promise you. Are you going to let me treat him or not? The choice is up to you and you don’t need that six-gun to make it.’
Cort glanced at Red and Fan, their faces dark shadows under wide hats from the kerosene lamp burning brightly above. Neither spoke. Cort leaned down studying Wic’s face, twisted in pain. ‘What about it, Wic? We’ve got to clear out of here fast and ride. Are you up to it? If not just say so.’
Wic stared up with desperation in his eyes, pain written on his face, struggling to decide what to do. His hand gripped Keller’s as he tried lifting himself slightly but fell back because of excruciating pain, his breath coming in short gasps.
‘Don’t . . . leave me here . . . alone. I’ll try . . . to ride.’
‘You heard him, Doc. Do the best you can and make it fast. You’ve got twenty minutes. Then we’re leaving.’
‘You just signed your friend’s death warrant. I hope you understand that. I can’t do much for him in twenty minutes. I might have to put him out just to clean this wound before I even start stitching him up.’
‘You’re wasting valuable time, Doc, get to it. You’re the one on the clock.’
Keller’s natural born slippery luck was still holding good.
At that same moment on the far end of town Nate Whitman was going from bar to gambling house trying to convince enough men to join him forming a posse. His luck was running the wrong way. Nighttime gamblers and drinkers didn’t have any stomach or interest in leaving their preferred pastimes to go riding off into the night after someone most of them had never heard of, much less to get shot at. Whitman’s frustration boiled over when he reached the Mountain House saloon. He climbed up on a small entertainment stage to berate the men who turned to watch him with his loud demanding voice.
‘What’s the matter with you men? Don’t you care a whit about maintaining law and order? Do you want men like Keller and his gang running wild all over the country robbing and murdering innocent people? Where’s your backbone!’
‘Yeah, we might,’ one man shouted back. ‘We spend our time with friends, have a few drinks and don’t bother anyone. We don’t know this Keller you’re so hot about. Long as he don’t bother us, we got no reason to bother him!’
A roar of laughter and approval rose up from the crowd as the marshal stood, hands on his hips, staring back in disbelief.
The lawman wasn’t done trying yet. ‘If he and his gang come riding in here and start shooting up the town, you whiskey breaths will wish you helped out when you had the chance. This town has to have a sheriff. Where is he at? I’ll get some real help while all of you sots stand around propping up the bar!’
Sheriff Mathew Buel heard incessant pounding on his front door, trying to ignore it until his wife, Lynette, demanded he get up answering it. Buel, fifty-one years old, was already considering retiring from the job. Staggering to his feet still in long underwear he heade
d for the door. Opening it, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes he found a pair of shady figures standing there. ‘Mr, you better tell me Janesville is burning down to come here at this hour getting me up,’ he threatened, irritated.
‘I’m US Deputy Marshal Nate Whitman, from New Hope. I’ve got something just as important to tell you. Let me in.’
‘Like what?’ Buel still blocked the door unconvinced.
‘Cort Keller and his gang are less than an hour’s ride away from here. Me and my deputy, Little Hawk, just had a gun battle with the whole bunch at what I think is his cousin’s ranch. I need you to get up a posse fast while Keller’s still close. We might have wounded one of them. If we did, they could still be out there.’
‘Well, Marshal Whitman, I don’t care if you’re chasing Flying Fox. I can’t get a posse up in the middle of the night. Don’t you know that? Maybe in the morning that might be possible, but not now. Everyone’s still asleep except you two night owls.’
‘By sunup Keller and his men can be twenty miles away from here. I need men right now!’
‘There aren’t any men, I said. How many times do I have to explain that to you?’ Buel’s voice rose as his patience faded.
Whitman stood dumbfounded and exasperated. He was used to having his demands met quickly. He expected the same from another lawman. Instead all he got was excuses. His already frayed temper finally ran out.
‘Do you have a deputy working for you?’
‘I do.’
‘I’ll take him and you. Along with me and Little Hawk, that makes four of us. That’s the best I can do right now. Go get him up and tell him to be ready to ride fast. I’m a US Marshal. My authority means I can demand help from local sheriffs. That means you. I’m ordering you to help me. If you refuse, I’ll have you hauled into court for insubordination. Get dressed and let’s get to it. I’m wasting time standing here arguing with you. Time is one thing I cannot waste!’