Larry and Stretch 7

by Marshall Grover

  The Home of Great Western Fiction!

  A whip-crack was the overture … and gun-thunder was the finale to another wild and hilarious escapade of the hard-punching, fast-shooting hell-raisers from Texas. Larry and Stretch came to Horton County for peace and quiet, but found intrigue, danger and gun-trouble.

  The Governor of Colorado was being blackmailed by the urbane and treacherous Philo Brayner, who planned a bank robbery and a safe getaway. But the thieves reckoned without the West’s toughest trouble-shooters.

  The Texans played it quiet—until the final shooting showdown.

  LARRY AND STRETCH 7: NEVER PROD A TEXAN

  By Marshall Grover

  First Published by The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd

  Copyright © Cleveland Publishing Co. Pty Ltd, New South Wales, Australia

  First Smashwords Edition: June 2017

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Series Editor: Ben Bridges

  Text © Piccadilly Publishing

  Published by Arrangement with The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd.

  Chapter One

  The Hermits of Horton County

  “That’s no lynch party,” Larry Valentine observed.

  “Nope,” grunted Stretch Emerson. “Worse’n a lynch party, if you ask me.”

  “It looks like,” frowned Larry, “they’re about to take a whip to him.”

  “That’s what it looks like,” agreed Stretch. He grimaced in disgust. “Runt—you aim to sit by and watch a whippin’?”

  “Not so you’d notice,” growled Larry.

  Moments before, the nomadic Texans had ambled their mounts out of a cedar copse in a lonely sector of Horton County. They had passed a signpost at dusk of the previous day and, before making their night camp, had decided to visit the county seat. Horton, a passing rider had informed them, was one of the most heavily populated towns of south-west Colorado: a veritable frontier metropolis. They had visited many a small town in the past few months. Now, they hankered for something bigger.

  The cedar copse was located a short distance from the foothills of a mountain range. From here, they could study every detail of the grim scene now being enacted. There were eight men. Seven were garbed as cowpokes. The eighth was afoot, a flabby, vacant-eyed jasper, nondescript, uncommonly shabby. His shirt had been torn from his back. He wasn’t struggling, nor voicing a protest, despite the fact that two of the cowpokes were tying him to a tree-trunk. Another man, thickset and belligerent, was slowly dismounting—and uncoiling a whip. A few yards from where the horses stood, a longhorn placidly chewed grass.

  Larry’s shouted challenge caused eight pairs of eyes to focus on him. He came on at a brisk canter, with Stretch tagging him close. In a flurry of dust, they reined up, and the half-naked hombre tied to the cottonwood trunk showed them a mild grin.

  “Howdy,” he offered.

  His placidity contrasted sharply with his predicament. Larry threw him a puzzled glance, then eyed the thickset waddy.

  “Whatever he’s done,” he prodded, “is it bad enough to rate a whippin’?”

  As well as being thickset, the whip-toter was mean-eyed and red-haired.

  “Is this,” he sourly enquired, “any of your consarned business?”

  “Butt out, saddlebums,” one of the other men curtly advised. “That’s a Box V steer over there—and this lousy buzzard was about to steal it.”

  The Texans subjected the prisoner to a thoughtful scrutiny, which he returned with interest. They judged him to be in his early twenties, now that they could observe him closely. He was sandy-haired and unshaven. His large brown eyes showed no guile, no bitterness, no resentment. He seemed resigned to his fate.

  “Howdy, gents,” he greeted them again. “My name’s Burl Stogie. Reckon you must be strangers hereabouts. Don’t recollect I ever seen you before.”

  Without pausing to consider the possible consequences, Stretch flashed him an encouraging grin, and told him: “Emerson’s my handle—and this here’s my sidekick, Larry Valentine.”

  “I’m Red Kellin,” the redhead arrogantly announced, “Box V foreman. This fat skunk tried to rustle this here beef, and now he’s gonna pay for it.” He added, truculently, “And nobody better get in my way.”

  “Kellin,” said Larry, “I don’t admire rustlers any more than you do. Even so, it ain’t right to take a whip to a man.” He looked at the hapless Burl Stogie again. “He don’t look much—but he is a man.”

  “He’s trash,” scowled Kellin. “Him and his loco mother. Trash!” He jerked a thumb. “Now vamoose, Valentine, and take your skinny sidekick with you!”

  “Put the whip away,” advised Larry. “Rope this jasper to his horse and take him to Horton. Deliver him to the law. That’s better, Kellin. That’s a sight cleaner than whippin’ him.”

  “I said vamoose!” breathed the redhead.

  Abandoning all thought of keeping his temper, Larry coldly told him, “Drop the whip—or I’ll make you eat it!”

  He was aware that the odds were heavy. Seven against two. But there had been other occasions—many other occasions—upon which the Lone Star Hellions had challenged more than double their number, with drastic consequences for the opposition. This, he sensed, would be another such occasion. And he was right.

  Kellin indicated his resentment quickly and violently. The lash of his whip snaked out to coil about Larry’s neck. He jerked backward, and Larry had no option but to draw his boots from his stirrups. Simultaneously, a Box V puncher threw the loop of his lariat over Stretch from behind and wheeled his mount. Both Texans were hauled from their saddles and unceremoniously dumped.

  They sat up, traded glances, and retaliation began immediately. Larry got both hands to the whiplash, jerked on it and tore the hilt from Kellin’s grasp, the while Stretch freed himself of the imprisoning noose. His strength was greater than his attacker’s. He rose up, still clinging to the rope, heaving backward with all his might, so that the horse reared and threw its rider.

  Kellin roared an oath and charged at Larry, who was deftly disposing of the whip, hurling it high into the branches of the cottonwood. The other Box V men emptied their saddles, and the hassle got under way with a vengeance. Back to back, the Texans defended themselves with their customary vigor.

  Kellin was the first casualty. Larry’s blow, a wild, swinging uppercut, sent the ramrod reeling seven yards, to collide with a horse. Stretch, after taking a left to the jaw and a right to the side of his head, grasped two neckerchiefs and rammed two heads together with jarring force. His victims sagged. Stepping over their prone bodies, he rammed his bunched right into an unprotected belly.

  Larry, meanwhile, was under heavy attack, being borne down by two burly punchers. On the ground they rolled , and heaved, raising dust in a wild melee of flailing arms and threshing legs. When Larry struggled to his feet, one of his assailants was clinging to his back, but his arms were free. He threw a hard jab at his other attacker and laid him low.

  But Kellin had revived, and the odds were still heavy. Once again, the Texans stood back to back, slugging it out, taking punishment and always retaliating. And then, abruptly, the ruckus was checked. Somewhere up in the hills, a rifle was crackling.

  Larry heard six reports in rapid succession and, de
spite the turmoil of the situation, found time to reflect that the unseen marksman was no mean shot. Immediately in front of him, bullets were chewing up the dust. “Move back!” Kellin gasped. “It’s her—that crazy old witch ...!” He yelped, spun and began dashing towards the horses. A slug had dug a shallow crease atop his left shoulder, and he wasn’t waiting for any more. Another Box V man unleashed a startled yell and clutched at his right arm. Blood trickled through his fingers, as he took off in hot pursuit of the ramrod.

  There were no wild blows to be parried now, no lashing boots to be dodged. Still back to back, the Texans dazedly viewed the retreat.

  “They’re gone,” blinked Stretch. “They ain’t just goin’, runt. They’re gone!”

  “All I can see,” frowned Larry, “is their dust.”

  The shooting had ceased. For that, they were fervently grateful. Panting from their exertions, they retrieved and donned their Stetsons, trudged across to the cottonwood to unrope the chuckling Burl.

  “What’s so funny?” Larry sourly challenged him. “We near took a beatin’ on your account.”

  “And we could of got our heads blowed off,” complained Stretch.

  “Shucks, no.” Burl shook his head vehemently. “Ma’s got keen eyes. Even way up there, she could tell which was Box V and which was strangers. Not that she don’t shoot at strangers, mind.”

  “That comforts me—I don’t think,” muttered Stretch. “Ma shoots at strangers all the time,” Burl cheerfully informed them. “I guess she just ain’t partial to strangers— nor even folks she’s acquainted with. But she could see you gents were tryin’ to help me, I reckon.”

  “Tryin’ to help you?” scowled Larry. “Doggone you, boy. If we hadn’t happened along, those jaspers would’ve flayed the hide offa your fat carcass!”

  “Yep.” Burl nodded placidly. “Reckon they would of.”

  Freed of the ropes, he bent to retrieve his tattered shirt. They traded wry grins. Much as they detested rustlers, they found it hard to maintain any feeling of animosity for this shambling, inept no-account.

  A steady plodding of hoofs heralded the approach of the sharpshooter. Their eyes widened and their jaws sagged. Larry had forgotten Kellin’s shocked reference to a ‘crazy old witch’. Had she been straddling a broomstick instead of a mule, this aged woman would have fitted that uncharitable description.

  She looked to be all of sixty years old. Her gray hair hung straggly about her thin shoulders. Her sharp-featured face was deeply lined, and her ugliest characteristic was the expression in her bright blue eyes—truculent, cold, forbidding. She hefted a Henry repeater. Her garb was as shabby as her son’s. Patched jeans tucked into scuffed boots. A checked cotton shift. A man’s jacket, torn in several places. A battered Stetson, flat-crowned, with a floppy brim.

  Some short distance from the tree, she reined up. Only then did the Texans remember to doff their hats. She eyed them intently, committing them to memory. Larry, she observed, was a husky, dark-haired hombre, ruggedly handsome, square-jawed, aggressive-looking, his quizzical eyes reflecting a keen intellect. He stood close to six foot three. His garb was the garb of the cattleman, complete to the batwing chaps and sweat-stained bandanna. The butt of a Colt .45 jutted from the holster slung to his right hip.

  “All right ...” she rasped, and her voice was as unfriendly as her expression. “I saw it all. You were helpin’ my boy, and I’m beholden, but I fazed them bully-boys offa your backs and I reckon that makes us even.” She scowled at her grinning offspring. “Got yourself in another fix, huh?”

  “Wasn’t doin’ no harm, Ma,” Burl assured her. “There was just this one little maverick, you know? And—uh— you and me ain’t had no fresh beef in quite a spell. I didn’t figure Mr. Vickery would miss just one little old maverick, so I ...”

  “So you tried to hustle a Box V critter into the hills,” she accused. “And, next thing you knew, there was Kellin and his hardcase pards jumpin’ outa the timber.” She grimaced in exasperation. “I try to raise you right, but it just ain’t no use. How many times have I gotta tell you? Never steal nothin’—less you’re dead sure you’ll get away with it.”

  Stretch couldn’t suppress a chuckle. The old woman froze him with a steely glare.

  “I said somethin’ funny?”

  “No, ma’am,” frowned Stretch.

  “He’s Mr. Emerson, Ma,” offered Burl. “Other gent is Mr. Valentine.”

  His mother nodded curtly and gave her name.

  “I’m Annie Stogie.”

  “Our pleasure, ma’am,” said Larry.

  “Don’t give me no sweet talk,” she sniffed. “Only reason you talk polite is you’re afeared of this.” She patted the stock of her rifle. “Well, don’t you never forget it. They call me Eagle-Eye Annie, and I reckon you know why.”

  “That was real fancy shootin’, ma’am,” declared Stretch.

  “I can burn a squirrel’s whisker at fifty paces,” she grimly assured them. “I ain’t got much, but what’s mine I hold—savvy? You aim to stay healthy, you better stay clear of these here mountains. Here’s where us Stogies ’bide— and we ain’t partial to company. I’m thankin’ you for helpin’ this fool boy of mine, but I’m warnin’ you to ride clear of us.”

  “Ma’am,” grunted Larry, “we ain’t about to make war on a lady.”

  “There’s plenty that would, in Horton County,” she shrugged, “so I don’t trust nothin’ in pants.” She added, as an afterthought: “Nor in skirts.”

  She crooked a finger at Burl. Obediently, he hustled across to his swaybacked mare and swung astride. The Texans stood watching, as mother and son retreated into the foothills. In a matter of minutes, they were out of sight, and Lafry was soberly remarking:

  “Somethin’ sad about her. I don’t savvy what, but it’s there. I had a notion she wanted to be friendly, but didn’t know how.”

  “Do me a favor,” begged Stretch. “Don’t get no notions about nothin’.” He enlarged on that plea, as they nudged their mounts away from the foothills and back towards the regular trail. “Made ourselves a promise, didn’t we? Said as how we’d take it easy in this Horton burg—a big town where a couple drifters like you and me can lose ourselves, and stay outa trouble. All right, runt, let’s keep it that way.”

  “That’s how I want it,” Larry assured him. “I never yet hunted trouble. You know that.”

  “You and me both,” growled Stretch. “But it makes no never mind. Trouble is what we get, every place we go, and I’m plumb weary of it.”

  To many an irate lawman, these drifters had virtuously asserted that they never looked for trouble. Nevertheless, trouble was their destiny, violence their constant shadow. They had never ridden the owlhoot trail, had, in fact, been responsible for the apprehension—and sometimes the bloody end—of many a wanted outlaw. In Arizona, Nevada, Wyoming and New Mexico, there were badge-toters who remembered them as a blessing, but a very mixed blessing. For, next to eating and drinking, fighting was the thing they did best.

  “It’ll be different this time,” Larry Valentine assured his lean sidekick. “I’m curious about old Annie—but I ain’t about to buy into a fight on her account. In Horton, we’re gonna rest up and live quiet for maybe two-three weeks. Soft beds. Prime chow. Good liquor.”

  “That’s what I crave,” said Stretch.

  “That’s what I crave,” declared Larry, “and that’s the way it’s gonna be.”

  ~*~

  At this same time, ten o’clock of a fine morning in early summer, the manager of the First National Bank of Horton was conducting a distinguished visitor on a tour of the premises. From the street entrance, through the front office, in and out of his own office and out to the rear door opening into the back alley, Felix Baldwin courteously conducted the urbane, expensively-garbed Philo Brayner. To wait on such a-highly-respected guest was, he declared, a pleasure and a privilege.

  “Horton is honored, Mr. Brayner. We’re a progressive-minded community
, as you’re well aware. Naturally, we’re delighted that the Hartigan Combine has chosen our town as the site for a new Hartigan hotel.”

  “Well,” smiled Brayner, “our organization has established a better class of hotel in every important city west of the Mississippi—and Horton will be no exception, provided I can acquire a suitable property.”

  “Surely,” suggested Baldwin, “our building would be too small for your purpose?”

  “It would be, I’m afraid,” agreed Brayner. “But it’s difficult to tell from the outside. That’s why I had to check the interior.”

  “In any case,” said Baldwin, “I doubt if my headquarters would consider selling.”

  Brayner caressed the ivory knob of his handsome cane, cast a critical eye over the bank’s rear wall. He was a tall man, and impressive. The dark, well-barbered hair was slightly gray at the temples. The features were regular, the eyes probing and genial, matching his ready smile. His linen was immaculate, his cravat colorful, but in perfect taste. Perfection, in fact, was the keynote of Mr. Philo Brayner’s imposing exterior.

  Small wonder that Brayner and his associates had made such an impact on the local scene. They were staying at the Republican Hotel and, as Horton folk well knew, only the wealthiest transients could afford accommodation at that exclusive establishment. Their manners were faultless. They exhibited fat bankrolls, as befitted members of the board of the largest hotel chain in the country. Moreover, they had made no secret of their purpose in visiting the big town. Within the year, and provided Brayner could acquire a suitable site, Horton would be boasting of a new Hartigan Hotel, further evidence of the new prosperity, a proud indication of Horton’s transition from humble cattle town to bustling frontier metropolis.

  Horton was according these visitors all due courtesy, plus a mite extra. A few hours after their arrival, some five days ago, Mayor Willoughby Flake had organized an official welcome to them. They were feted, wined and dined; the town council promised full cooperation. A new hotel, built to the standards of luxury typical of the Hartigan chain, would attract thousands of tourists. Thousands of tourists, to the merchants and businessmen of Horton, meant thousands of dollars in revenue. Profits for the storekeepers. Profits for the owners of the saloons, honky tonks and other houses of entertainment lining the main street. New money—with every man hustling for his share. Horton was a profit-minded community. Hence the popularity of Philo Brayner and his well-groomed colleagues.