At that remark, Vanderhoot suddenly looked very startled. His hands gripped the edge of the table until his knuckles turned white.
Odd, Frank thought, taking in the man’s reaction. Now what brought that on?
Vanderhoot suddenly stood up, took his wife’s hand, and together they left the cafe.
“Must not have liked the way his eggs were cooked,” Doc Raven said, smiling.
“I guess so,” Frank replied, sitting down. He whispered, “What the hell is going on, Doc?”
“I really don’t know for sure,” Raven whispered in return. “But I have some strong suspicions.”
“Want to share them with me?”
“Not yet, Frank. Give me a little while.”
“All right.”
They watched as the Easterners left the cafe en masse, their food uneaten. The waitress set their own food on the table before them. It smelled delicious.
“It’s coming together in my mind,” Doc Raven said. “I’m going to have a chat with Horace after I eat. I think the man set a very dangerous game into motion. And if I’m correct, the man is a damned fool.”
“I could have told you that on the first day you told me about the hunt,” Frank said, buttering a biscuit and taking a bite.
Doc Raven nodded his head and glanced outside. It was raining again.
* * *
When Frank walked into the saloon later that day, one could have heard a pin drop, even though the place was filled with gunslicks. Horace Vanderhoot and his Eastern cohorts were nowhere to be seen. Not a word was spoken as Frank made his way to the far end of the bar and told Phil to bring him a cup of coffee.
“Coming right up, Marshal,” Phil said with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes. Obviously, the word had spread very quickly throughout the town.
“I never knowed you was a federal marshal, Morgan,” a gunny called from across the room.
“Now you do,” Frank replied.
“And that’s supposed to make a difference to us?” another asked.
“Only if you’re smart.”
“Well, it don’t make a damn to me,” Fargo said from the other end of the bar where he was nursing a mug of beer.
“That’s your option, Fargo,” Frank told him. “This town’s still got a nice big jail, right, Phil?”
“Sure does. Got four big cells in it.”
“You ain’t puttin’ me in no damn jail!” Fargo said.
“Keep runnin’ that mouth and I just might.”
“By God, I’ll stand up to this tin badge if none of the rest of you ain’t got the guts!” a man said, pushing back his chair and standing up.
“Who are you?” Frank asked.
“I’m called Utah Slim.”
“Never heard of you,” Frank said, and using his left hand, lifted his cup and took a sip of coffee.
“Folks is gonna hear about me plenty after I put lead in you, Morgan.”
“You ain’t gonna get no money, Slim,” a gun-handler reminded him.
“Hell with the money! I want the reputation. The man who kills Frank Morgan can write his own ticket anywheres in the West.”
“That there is a natural fact,” a man Frank knew as Nils Finley said. “Slim’s shore enough got a point.”
“You kill a federal marshal and they ain’t never gonna stop lookin’ for you,” another gunny said.
“The West is a big place,” Slim replied. “ ’Sides, my mind is made up. Step out here and face me, Morgan.”
“You mind if I finish my coffee first?” Frank asked. “I’m a coffee-drinking man and this is fresh brewed.”
“Step out here, badge-toter!” Slim yelled. “I ain’t in no damn mood for a mess of jawin’—”
“In a minute,” Frank said softly.
“Now!” Slim yelled.
“Are you in that big a hurry to die, Slim?” Frank asked.
“Hell with you, Morgan. I think you’ve gone yeller on me. I think I’ll just shoot you right now and listen to you beg.”
Frank stepped away from the bar just as Doc Raven and Bob walked into the saloon. They saw what was happening and immediately stepped to one side, out of the way of any stray bullets.
“I don’t beg for anything to any man, Slim,” Frank said, ice in his tone. “Never have, never will. So either make your play or shut your damn mouth and get out of here . . . while you’re still able to walk.”
Utah Slim grabbed for his six-gun. Just as his hand closed around the butt, he heard the boom of Frank’s Peacemaker and felt a hammerlike blow slam into his belly. He doubled over and grabbed for the bar. He held on and tried to clear leather, finally managing to fumble his Colt from leather. He eared back the hammer and raised the pistol.
“Now die, Morgan,” he gasped.
Frank’s second shot hit the Utah gunfighter in the chest and knocked him away from the bar. Slim dropped his pistol and fell against a table. “I got kin who’ll git you, Morgan,” he said. “They’ll track you down and kill you.”
“Not if they’re no better than you were,” Frank said. “And I stress were.”
“Damn, Morgan,” a gunhawk said, being careful to keep his hands away from his guns. “You’re a cold-hearted man.”
“You want to find out how really cold I am?”
“Nope.”
“Wise of you.”
Utah Slim lost his grip on the table and fell hard to the saloon floor.
“You want to look at him, Doc?” a bounty hunter asked.
“Not really,” Raven said. “But I suppose I should.”
“Gimme something for the pain,” Slim said.
“You probably won’t be hurting much longer,” Raven said, pushing through the crowd. He called to Bob. “Get my bag for me, will you, Bob?”
“Comin’ right up, Doc,” the liveryman said, heading for the door.
Doc Raven knelt down beside the fallen gunman and opened the man’s shirt. He looked at the wounds and grunted softly. Already, pink froth was forming on Utah Slim’s lips. A sure sign that the man had been lung-shot.
“How’s it look, Doc?” Slim asked. “I’m a-feared to look.”
“Bad,” Raven told him. “You’re hard hit.”
“I’m I gonna die?”
“Let’s just say if I were you, I wouldn’t be worried about lunch today.”
“Oh, Lord!” Utah Slim hollered.
“You want me to get a minister for you?” Raven asked.
“What the hell good would he do?” Slim questioned.
“He could pray for your soul.”
“The preacher is stuck on the other side of the slides,” a local said. “Might get Sister Clarabelle to call on the Good Lord for him.”
“Clarabelle wouldn’t set her feet in a saloon,” another local said. “She don’t hold with drinkin’.”
“Well, so much for that,” Raven said, standing up.
“Do somethin’, Doc!” Slim yelled weakly.
“Nothing I can do. Make your own peace with God.” He looked at the bartender. “Pour me a cup of coffee, Phil.”
“Comin’ right up, Doc.”
Raven joined Frank at the bar.
“You a sorry excuse for a doctor, you are,” Slim said.
Raven looked at the gunfighter. “You’re gut-shot and lung-shot, boy. There is nothing I can do.”
“I hear the angels’ chariots comin’ for me!” Slim said.
“Naw,” a gunslinger told him. “That’s just the rain comin’ down.”
“I can hear the beatin’ of heavenly wings!” Slim insisted.
“That’s the sounds of Sam pokin’ one of the bar women in the back room,” another gunslick said. “She’s gruntin’ like a hog.”
Frank had reloaded his Peacemaker, and Phil had poured another cup of coffee for him. He leaned against the bar, saying nothing.
“Hi, Mama!” Utah Slim suddenly yelled. He closed his eyes and died.
“Some of you men tote him over to the undertaker’s,” Rave
n said. “It’ll be a couple of days before he can be buried, unless you want to plant him as is.”
“I ain’t diggin’ no damn hole in the rain,” a man said.
“Throw him in a ditch at the edge of town,” another suggested.
“So much for the brotherhood of the gun,” Raven muttered.
“Yee-haw!” the soiled dove servicing Sam in the back room yelled.
“Lucille ought to give Sam ten dollars for that pokin’,” Phil said to Frank and Doc Raven.
Eleven
Bob came in with Doc’s medical bag. He looked at Utah Slim and shrugged his shoulders. “You want me to take this back to your office, Doc?”
“No, Bob. But thank you. Bring it over to me. Hell, I might need it yet.”
Bob walked over to his friends, carefully stepping over the body of Utah Slim, and waved for Phil to bring him some coffee. He leaned close to Frank and Doc Raven. “Something mighty queer goin’ on in town, boys. Seems them hoity-toity Easterners all of a sudden got into a sweat about pullin’ out.”
“What do you mean?” Frank asked.
“Seems like they sent a man out to the Lassiter Ranch to buy a bunch of horses and to see about a guide to take them over the mountains out of here. And everything is supposed to be on the hush-hush.”
“How’d you hear about it?” Raven asked.
“The schoolboy who does some work for me down at the livery—Able Stover—overheered them talkin’ early this mornin’. He just now told me ’bout it.”
“Well, now, it’s slowly coming into place,” Raven said. “My suspicions were quite correct, I’m thinking.”
“What suspicions?” Bob asked.
Doc Raven shook his head. “Let me prowl around some. I want to talk with Maxwell about this. For some reason, he’s been avoiding me since they got here. It might be on account of Wilma. But I’ll force a conversation with him.”
“Maybe then you’ll get around to telling me what this is all about,” Frank said, a sarcastic edge to his voice.
“Oh, I will, Frank,” Doc Raven said with a smile. “You can be assured of that.”
“Thanks so much, Doc.”
“You’re certainly welcome.” He picked up his cup and took a sip. “Good coffee.”
“I like it a mite stronger than this,” Bob said.
“I’m gettin’ damn tarred of steppin’ over Slim,” a man said. “Come on, some of you boys give me a hand and we’ll toss him out the back.”
“Oh, hell, I’ll hep you,” another gunny said. “We can’t leave him there for long. He’ll commence to stinkin’. You grab one end, I’ll git the other. One of you boys open the back door for us, will you?”
“What lovely people,” Doc Raven muttered.
“In a different way, them damn rich Easterners ain’t no better,” Bob opined.
“I have to concur with that,” Doc Raven said. “In fact, I’ll add they’re worse. Maxwell and his friends all have fine educations that, in the end, seem to have been wasted.”
“We got some families here in town that’s moving out for the time bein’,” Bob said. “They’re goin’ to visit friends in the country till this mess in town is straightened out.”
“To hell with you, Nichols!” a gunslick yelled, silencing the conversation in the saloon. “I’ve had your damn smart mouth!”
“Then do something ’bout it, Jake!” Nichols yelled back, pushing back his chair and standing up. “Git up and fill your hand.”
“Settle down, boys,” another gunhand said. “This damn waitin’ is gettin’ to us all.”
“You go right straight to hell, Quinn,” Jake said.
“Don’t tell me to go to hell, you two-bit horse thief,” Quinn responded.
“Take it easy, boys,” Dolan said from a table in the rear of the saloon. “All of you. We didn’t come here to shoot each other.”
“Well, shootin’ Morgan seems to be out of the question,” another gun-handler piped up. “I ain’t gonna be the one to put lead in no damn federal marshal. So what do we do now?”
That question settled in the brains of all the men in the saloon. Quinn, Jake, and Nichols looked sheepishly at each other and sat down. Dolan stood up and walked over to stand at the bar beside Morgan.
“How do you want to play this, Morgan?” he asked.
“I don’t think it’s up to me to decide that,” Frank replied. “That’s a decision you men will have to make.”
“I think this was a mess from the git-go,” Dolan said. “I thought about it long and hard ’fore I saddled up for the ride.”
“You think you should have stayed at home?”
“I do, for a fact.”
“But now you believe it’s too late?”
“I didn’t say that, Morgan. But I’ll tell you this. That badge you’re wearin’ don’t mean squat to me. If that thousands of dollars of bounty money is really up for your head, I’ll take my chances on collectin’ it.”
“But you have doubts about it being real?”
“I’m beginnin’ to, yeah. Somethin’ smells funny about this deal. And I just flat don’t like them damn Easterners.”
“They seem to be laying low, don’t they?”
“Yeah, that’s for sure. I’m gonna nose around and find out ’bout this thing, Morgan. And if it’s on the up and up, I’m comin’ for you.”
“I’ll be here, Dolan. You got any kin you want me to notify after we plant you?”
Dolan’s smile was hard, devoid of any humor. “You can’t outdraw me, Morgan. I’ve had too many people tell me that.”
“You’ll be betting your life on it.”
“So I will. See you around, Morgan.”
The gunfighter walked away, out the front door of the saloon.
“Can he take you, Frank?” Bob asked.
“He’s fast,” Frank conceded. And that was all he had to say about it.
* * *
Frank stood on the boardwalk as night wrapped her dark arms around the countryside. It was a wet darkness, for the rain continued without any signs of abating. Frank had seen nothing of the Easterners that day, and had no idea where they were or what they might be doing. Neither had he seen Doc Raven since the shooting in the saloon. There were lamps on in the doctor’s office, but Frank didn’t want to disturb him, figuring he might be busy with patients.
Just as Frank started to pop a match into flame, to light a fresh-rolled cigarette, he caught a glint of light off something in the alley across the muddy street . . . something that appeared to be about shoulder high. Frank quickly stepped back into the shadows and stuck the unlit cigarette and match into his jacket pocket.
He silently made his way down the boardwalk, keeping close to the buildings. He stepped off and ducked into an alley, then made his way behind a couple of buildings and dashed across the street, working his way up to the rear of the alley where he’d seen the flash of light off of metal. He cautiously looked around the corner of the building, and could just make out the dark shape of a man standing near the mouth of the alley, facing the street.
The man was holding a rifle.
Frank eased his way up the alley, the rain covering any small sound he might make. When he was close enough to the man to touch him, Frank said, “You looking for me?”
The man spun around, the muzzle of the rifle coming up. Frank hit him on the side of the jaw with a gloved right fist, and the man dropped to the littered ground. Frank dragged him out of the alley and up onto the boardwalk, then dragged him to the marshal’s office and unlocked the door, using the key Doc Raven had given him earlier in the day. Frank had spent some time in the office that afternoon, sweeping it out and building a fire in the potbellied stove. There were living quarters in the jail, and Frank had moved his gear into the small room. Dog came out of the living quarters and sniffed suspiciously at the unconscious man.
Frank slapped the man awake and stood over him. He did not think he had ever seen the man before. “Do I know you?” he a
sked.
“Hell with you, Morgan.”
“Well, obviously you know me. I hate to tell you but the hunt hasn’t started yet. It’s doubtful it ever will.”
“Damn the hunt! I didn’t come here to collect no money. I been looking for you for months. I aim to kill you.”
“Why?”
“ ’Cause you killed a buddy of mine, that’s why.”
“You sure I did it?”
“Damn right.”
“Where and when and why?”
“Huh?”
Frank sighed. “The man’s name and where did it happen and why did it happen.”
“Barney Hampton was his name. It happened in Missouri and you called him out into the street and gunned him down.”
“Wrong on all counts, partner. You’ve been tracking the wrong man.”
“You say!”
“That’s right. I say. Now, if I turn you loose, what are you going to do?”
“Git me another rifle and shoot you.”
Frank walked over to the stove, poured a cup of coffee, and sat down in a wooden swivel chair at the battered old desk. He stared at the man sitting on the floor. “That’s unacceptable, partner.”
“Then you’re gonna put me in jail?”
“I don’t see where I have a choice.”
“I’ll kill you when I get out.”
Frank sighed, wondering how in the world he had allowed his life to become so complicated. He pointed toward a row of cells in the back. “Get in that front cell and close the door. I’ve got to lock you up until I can decide what to do with you.”
“You gonna feed me supper?”
“Get in the damn cell and be quiet!”
Surprisingly, the man obliged without another word. Frank locked the door, and went back into the office and stood for a moment. He put the man’s rifle in a rack and his gunbelt and pistol in a desk drawer. Then he shook his head in disgust and walked out into the rainy night. “Incredible,” he muttered. “This is the damnest situation I believe I have ever been in. Fifty people wanting to kill me for bounty money and more showing up trying to avenge a killing I didn’t do ...”
“Who are you talking to, Frank?” Doc Raven asked, walking up and breaking into his thoughts.
“Myself, Doc.” He quickly and briefly brought the doctor up to date.
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