by Ralph Cotton
Shenlin and Kane nodded in agreement. ‘‘Let’s get it done and get out of this wind,’’ Kane growled.
‘‘Uh-uh,’’ said Price, shaking his head. ‘‘I won’t lead you in to him if you’re going to kill him.’’
‘‘Won’t?’’ Frisco said calmly. Stepping in close, he quickly reached out, jerked Price’s Colt from his holster, smacked him across the side of his head with the barrel and stepped back. Price’s legs buckled; he dropped to his knees. He held his throbbing head.
‘‘Get up, Dep,’’ said Frisco. ‘‘You weak piece of sow meat!’’ He grabbed Price and dragged him staggering to his feet. ‘‘Shoot this fool,’’ he ordered Kane and Shenlin. ‘‘I’m tired of his mouth.’’
Kane and Shenlin drew their pistols, cocked them and pointed them at Price’s chest.
‘‘Wait! Please!’’ said Price. He could see that this was no bluff, that these two were going to leave him lying dead on the sandy ground. ‘‘I’m not saying I won’t ride down there with you!’’
‘‘It sure sounded like it to me.’’ Frisco gave him a look. ‘‘What about it, pards?’’
‘‘Yep, I coulda swore that was what he said,’’ Kane replied, gun in hand.
‘‘His very words,’’ said Shenlin. The two stared coldly at Price, who looked back and forth wild-eyed.
‘‘What I meant was, I didn’t want to kill him. He doesn’t know anything! But I’ll lead us down there—of course I will. I’m a part of this as much as the rest of yas! Don’t shoot!’’ he pleaded.
Frisco raised a hand toward Shenlin and Kane. ‘‘All right, pards, once again our deputy here has had a change of heart.’’ He glared at Price as he backed away, shoving Price’s gun down in his belt for safe-keeping. He lifted the feed sack of money from behind his saddle and carried it over and dropped it on the ground, not wanting the sheriff to see it. ‘‘Get your saddle under you, Dep,’’ he said. ‘‘Don’t ever again tell me what you won’t do. I’ll pistol-whip you like you’re a woman.’’
Chapter 9
The wind had died down some by the time Sheriff Thorn had dragged Teddy Ware from the driver’s seat of the stagecoach and pulled him inside with the other two. He’d taken his canteen from his saddle horn, uncapped it and had a long swallow of tepid water when he caught sight of the four riders atop the same low rise where he’d first seen the stage.
‘‘Easy, Jim,’’ he whispered to his horse, although the animal had shown no sign of wariness, other than pricking its ears toward the strange horses. Thorn slipped his rifle from its saddle boot, levered a round into the chamber and led the horse around to the corner of the stage.
Seeing the sheriff take a defensive position, Price called out from twenty yards away, ‘‘Sheriff Thorn, it’s me, Claude Price. Your deputy.’’ He swung an arm back and forth above his head.
Recognizing Price, Thorn took a breath of relief. But he kept himself at the edge of the coach instead of stepping out away from any cover. ‘‘Price, who’s that riding with you?’’ he called out. He let the riders see his rifle come up against his shoulder.
‘‘We’re a posse, Sheriff,’’ Price called out. ‘‘Judge Bass sent us out searching for Texas Bob Krey.’’
‘‘You don’t say,’’ said Thorn, seeming unmoved by the mention of the territorial judge. He cocked the rifle hammer, seeing the four continue to ride closer. ‘‘Why don’t all of you stop right there. Introduce us, Deputy.’’
‘‘Slow down, pards,’’ Frisco said quietly, seeing that he had underestimated the sheriff.
‘‘This is what I was afraid of,’’ Price said, barely above a whisper.
‘‘Get us in there, Dep, damn it!’’ Price growled, jerking his horse into a short circle and not letting it stop long enough for the sheriff to get a tight aim on him. But it was a move the seasoned old lawman saw through right away.
‘‘Hold your horses still, all of you,’’ Price warned in a low voice. ‘‘Thorn is no fool.’’
The four settled their horses, but it was too late. Thorn had already drawn an impression of the men.
‘‘Sheriff,’’ Price called out, ‘‘this is Phil Page, Mr. Kane and Mr. Shenlin. Like I said, Judge Bass sent us looking for Texas Bob. There’s been a lot happen while you were gone.’’ He shook his head. ‘‘We had a terrible shooting. Texas Bob went on a wild killing spree. He even burnt down a saloon.’’
‘‘So I heard,’’ said Thorn, keeping his eyes on Frisco and the other two. ‘‘Phil Page, huh?’’ He looked Frisco up and down. ‘‘I’ve seen you slinging whiskey at the Rambling Dutchman.’’
‘‘I was—That is, I am a bartender there, it’s true,’’ said Frisco. ‘‘The judge asked for my help and I felt it my civil du—’’
‘‘Make up your mind, Phil Page,’’ the sheriff said, cutting him off. ‘‘Are you still a bartender, or has something else caught your interest?’’
‘‘This is as close as we’re going to get,’’ Frisco whispered under his breath. ‘‘He’s going to be a hardhead about this. I can see that already.’’ He gigged his horse into another short circle. Jerking his big Colt from his holster as he nailed his spurs to the animal’s sides, he shouted, ‘‘Kill him, pards!’’
The men charged the sheriff’s position, pistols firing. ‘‘You too, Dep!’’ Frisco shouted, slapping Price’s horse on the rump to make sure Price stayed with them.
But as the riders made their attack, Thorn’s rifle went to work. His first shot sliced through Kane’s upper arm, almost knocking him from his saddle. His second missed, but lifted Shenlin’s hat from his head and sent it spinning away. Riding beside Price, Frisco saw the two veer their horses away and flee for cover. ‘‘Cowards!’’ he screamed. But before the word had left his mouth, a bullet ripped through the air an inch from his ear and caused him to duck low in his saddle as he and Price turned and fled behind Kane and Shenlin.
Thirty yards away, over a sheltering low rise of sand, Frisco and Price slid their horses to a halt as another rifle shot whined through the air behind them. ‘‘I’ve never seen a man fire a rifle that fast!’’ Frisco said, jumping from his saddle.
Price sat silent, knowing that anything he had to say wouldn’t be welcome. As far as he was concerned, now that Thorn had seen him, he had to make sure the lawman never made it back to Sibley alive. This was where his envy of Texas Bob had brought him, he told himself, looking at his unsavory companions.
‘‘I’m shot!’’ Kane said, unwrapping his hand from his upper arm, revealing the rip Thorn’s bullet had made in his bloody shirtsleeve.
‘‘It’s just a flesh wound,’’ said Frisco, trying to dismiss the matter.
‘‘Hell yes, it’s a flesh wound,’’ said Kane, glaring at him, ‘‘but that’s because it’s my flesh! What would it be if it was yours?’’
‘‘Take it easy, pard. This is no time to argue,’’ said Frisco. He turned a heated stare on Price. ‘‘Why didn’t you warn us this sheriff would put up such a fight?’’
Price stared at him. ‘‘You’re right. This is no time to argue. We’ve got to kill him and get out of here before somebody shows up.’’
‘‘Kill him how?’’ said Shenlin, the hair on his bare head standing sidelong on the wind. ‘‘The man’s a crack shot!’’
‘‘If he was a crack shot, you’d both be dead!’’ Frisco growled. ‘‘Dep is right. We’ve got to kill him, else everything we’ve done is going to hang right around our necks.’’ He looked at Price. ‘‘What have you got in mind, Dep?’’
Price couldn’t believe he stood there talking about murdering the lawman he worked for, the man who had held the Bible he’d sworn an oath on to uphold the law. He took a breath and said, ‘‘There’s four of us. We’ve got to split up and hit him from all four directions at once.’’
‘‘I’m wounded!’’ Kane shouted, holding up his bloody hand. ‘‘Or maybe you didn’t hear!’’
‘‘I’m near wounded myself,’’ sa
id Shenlin, running a hand back over his bare head. ‘‘I say we surround him and wait him out.’’
‘‘Wait him out?’’ Frisco gave him an angry look. ‘‘What does that mean—wait him out?’’
Shenlin replied, ‘‘It means that sooner or later he’ll run out of food and water and have to—’’
‘‘So would we, Shenlin,’’ Price said, cutting him off with a tone of disgust.
‘‘Not if yas held him pinned down while I rode somewhere and brought back enough food and—’’
‘‘Shut up,’’ said Frisco, his Colt coming up cocked and pointed at Shenlin’s chest. ‘‘Get on your horses, both of you! You heard Dep. We’ve got to get this thing done and get out of here!’’
Texas Bob had come upon the wagon tracks earlier and followed them for over a mile, veering away only when he’d first heard the sound of gunfire and had ridden to higher ground for a better look. But the shooting had stopped by the time he reached the low rise where Frisco had left the feed sack full of stolen stage money. Seeing the feed bag lying in the dirt, Bob slipped from his saddle, opened it and looked inside. Then he looked down at the stagecoach, recognizing Thorn and seeing the sheriff hastily pulling small packages and wooden crates out from the rear freight hold of the coach and stacking them in front of himself and his big black and white paint horse for protection.
‘‘Just the man I’m looking for,’’ said Texas Bob, closing the feed sack and standing up with it in his hand. ‘‘What have you gotten yourself into, Sheriff?’’ Bob asked himself quietly, seeing the four riders slip out across the sand in four directions. Hurrying, he walked away with the bag of money toward the lip of a flat rock lying on the sandy ground.
At the stagecoach, Sheriff Thorn knew he didn’t have much time before the men made another run at him. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind what Price and his newfound friends intended to do. Price couldn’t allow him to make it to Sibley alive. Price was not a hard case, certainly no cold-blooded killer. In fact Thorn doubted the blacksmith had ever even shot at a man, let alone killed one.
But it made no difference now. Price had been up to no good with these men. Whatever he and his three accomplices had done—he’d bet they were the ones who’d robbed the stage and killed Block and Ware—now that Thorn had seen him, he knew his part-time deputy was desperate to cover his tracks.
‘‘It looks like we’re fixin’ to get on with it, ole hoss,’’ Thorn said to the paint, seeing the dust of the four riders as they slipped along just out of sight over the low, rolling terrain. ‘‘I wish you was smart enough to keep your head down.’’
As he spoke he checked his rifle, took out his Colt and a small-caliber hideaway gun and laid them side by side on one of the wooden crates. ‘‘I expect an old lawman like me can’t ask for much better than this.’’
He looked at the horse and grinned. ‘‘Think of what a story it’ll make if I get through this and leave all four of them hanging out to dry.’’
No sooner had he spoken than a shot rang out and a bullet thumped into a wooden crate. He ducked down and came up with his rifle to his shoulder, scanning back and forth for a target through a renewed swirl of dusty wind. Before he took tight aim toward the distant rider far to his left, a shot came from the rider to his right.
Splinters from a crate stung the side of his face. He fired, but his shot fell short, raising a spray of dirt and pieces of an exploding barrel cactus. Crouching down beneath the coach, he looked all around, then dropped onto his belly, seeing the riders advance from all four directions, their guns firing. He shouted as he fired from under the coach, ‘‘Come get me, you sonsabit—!’’ His words stopped short as he heard round after round of powerful rifle shots resound above the cacophony of six-shooters.
‘‘Who in blazes is out there?’’ he said aloud to himself, noting that the pistol fire began to wane under the heavy pounding of a repeating rifle. Levering another round into his rifle, he got off a quick shot at the outline of the rider to his left before the man turned his horse sharply and raced away into the thick billowing dust. A rifle shot from out in the dusty wind produced a painful-sounding scream from one of the unseen gunmen.
‘‘Whoever you are out there, thank God for you!’’ the sheriff said, feeling relieved now the odds had been evened a bit. He fired to his right and levered another round, searching the dusty wind for a target. From the direction of the mysterious rifle fire he saw the grainy outline of a lone rider coming toward him from within the dusty swirl. ‘‘Thorn! It’s me, Bob Krey!’’ a familiar voice called out. ‘‘Don’t shoot. I’m coming in!’’
‘‘Texas Bob?’’ Thorn cried out. ‘‘Lord, yes, man! Get on in here, while these rats are running for their holes!’’ He shouted in a louder tone, hoping Price and his three partners could hear him.
A moment later Texas Bob slid his horse to a halt, jumped down from his saddle and hurried in behind the stage cargo. ‘‘Are you all right, Sheriff?’’ he asked, rifle up as he scanned back and forth, watching the wind subside enough to give him a better view of the barren rolling land.
‘‘I’ve been better,’’ Thorn said, crawling up from beneath the coach. ‘‘But it’s good to see a friendly face out here, things being as they are.’’ He also scanned back and forth with his rifle. ‘‘Now that I’ve got an extra gun, maybe we ought to tie off these horses behind the stage and ride it out of here fast as it’ll carry us, before these owlhoots get their courage up and come back at us again.’’
‘‘Bad news, Sheriff,’’ said Bob. ‘‘The lead stage horse is dead in his harness. I saw him down when I rode in. I can crawl out there and cut him loose if you really want to make a run for it.’’
Thorn thought about it, realizing the shooting had stopped altogether, for the time being at least. ‘‘Let’s wait and see what they’ve got up their sleeves. One of them is my deputy, Claude Price, so I’m not expecting anything too smart from them.’’
‘‘Claude Price is trying to kill you?’’ Bob said, surprised.
‘‘Yep,’’ said Thorn. ‘‘He rode in saying him and the other three were carrying out Judge Bass’s orders, hunting you down.’’
‘‘I’m not surprised, Sheriff,’’ said Bob. ‘‘He gave me a bad time in Sibley. I left town because of him. I expect you heard all about the shooting over there.’’
‘‘Heard it. Didn’t believe it,’’ said Thorn. He glanced sidelong at Bob without lowering his rifle. ‘‘Leastwise, I didn’t believe you gunned everybody down and burnt the saloon on your way out of town.’’
‘‘That’s what the story has grown into?’’
‘‘Yep,’’ said Thorn. ‘‘That’s the grapevine talking. I figured I best find you and hear what really happened.’’ He turned his face toward Bob long enough to look him up and down. ‘‘What had you planned to do, run and hide from the law?’’ Thorn asked.
‘‘No,’’ said Bob. ‘‘Believe it or not, you’re the man I was searching for when I found this ambushed stage and ran into these knuckleheads.’’
‘‘What did happen?’’ the sheriff asked. ‘‘Tell me everything.’’
‘‘Gladly, Sheriff,’’ said Bob, still searching all around for the vanished riders. ‘‘First of all, how’s Lady Lucky doing?’’
‘‘I can’t tell you, Bob,’’ said Thorn. ‘‘I haven’t made it back to Sibley yet. I got under way soon as I heard everything from a Croatian miner from over near Jerome. He said he was there. He’s got a burnt arm to prove it. He says you carried him out of there, saved his life.’’
‘‘He was on my way,’’ Bob said, playing it down. He offered a tight grin. ‘‘I hope you’ll believe me when I tell you the shooting was in self-defense.’’
‘‘I’ve never known you to lie, and I’ve never known you to start a fight, Bob,’’ said Thorn. ‘‘Now, out with it, so I can say I’ve heard your side when we get to Sibley.’’
‘‘Here goes,’’ said Bob. Without lowering his rifle, h
e told the sheriff about that fateful night in Sibley when he shot the judge’s brother.
Chapter 10
At the same windblown rise from which the four riders had first charged down at Thorn, Frisco Phil stomped back and forth in the dirt, his fists clenched tight at his sides, the rising wind licking at his duster tails.
‘‘Are we going back, Frisco?’’ Shenlin asked above the wind, wiping the sweat from his forehead with a bandanna.
‘‘No, we’re not going back,’’ said Frisco. ‘‘We’re not fool enough to ride into two rifles.’’ He jerked his dusty hat from his head and slapped it against his leg in anger. ‘‘Of all damned people to show up—Texas Bob Krey himself! I can’t believe this kind of rotten luck!’’ He kicked the yellow-flowered tip off of a low barrel cactus.
Hurrying back from a few yards away, where Frisco had laid the feed bag of money, Price said, ‘‘You want to hear bad luck? The money is gone!’’
‘‘Gone?’’ Frisco stared at him. ‘‘What do you mean, it’s gone? How can it be gone?’’
Price pointed at the single set of hoofprints left by Texas Bob’s horse, the wind having all but covered them from sight. ‘‘It’s gone because Texas Bob took it! That’s my guess.’’
‘‘That’s my guess too,’’ Frisco said, settling himself, staring through the dusty wind in the direction of the stagecoach. ‘‘All right, Texas Bob. You’ve got our money, but let’s see how long you can keep it.’’ He spat onto the ground.
Shenlin and Kane looked at each another; both of them seemed worried. ‘‘You said we wasn’t foolish enough to go riding up against two rifles, Frisco,’’ Shenlin said in a fearful tone.
‘‘Don’t soil yourself, Shenlin,’’ Frisco said with contempt. ‘‘We’re not going to ride in like bats out of hell, if that’s what you think.’’ He held down his hat brim against a hard surge of wind. ‘‘We’re going to ride on ahead and set a trap for them.’’