by Short, Luke;
“I won’t draw a gun on you, Will,” Milt said quietly. “Go ahead.”
It was this that almost changed Will’s mind. The bleak look in his eyes altered for a moment, letting pity edge in. And then it came back, and his face was hard as iron.
“It won’t do any good, Milt,” he said in a far-off, distant voice. “You’ve worked that for the last time.”
His hand fell to his gun. Milt exploded into action. He turned the table over in one sweeping heave. It caught Will on his game leg, and he went down. Pres dodged for the back of the room, and Charlie’s gun lashed out at him. Charlie hit him, knocking him into the tables. Milt stepped out from behind the table. He wasn’t going to run. His face was twisted with the hatred a man holds for another man whom he has sold out.
Back against the wall, Milt’s gun swung up, and he shot. The slug whistled past Will’s head, and it brought the bar glasses down in a metallic jangle.
Will’s gun arced out and he fought to his feet. Again Milt shot wildly, savagely, hastily, stabbing his gun as if it were a knife. Will’s gun swung up, and when Milt’s shirt pocket lay between the sights he fired.
The slug knocked Milt back against the wall. His chin came up, a wild grimace contorted his face. He stayed that way, every muscle straining, and then he sagged. His filmed eyes looked bitterly at Will, and he reached out for the table that wasn’t there. He fell then, on his face, sprawling across an overturned chair, one hand dangling in the rungs.
Will dropped his gun. Charlie was kneeling by Pres. His one shot had caught Pres under the armpit, ranging through his ribs to his heart. Will wiped his palm across his eyes, as if to get this sight forever out of his mind, and then tramped through the door.
Waiting outside the door was Becky. She came into his arms, a low moaning cry escaping her. She hugged him tightly, her head against his chest.
“Oh, Will! Are you all right?”
Will didn’t answer, stroking her hair, holding her to him. Charlie Sommers passed him on the run, heading for the sheriff’s office.
Afterward Becky led Will over to the hotel lobby, and the doctor came. While he was bandaging the leg, Charlie Sommers, Sheriff Phipps, and Mary Norman came into the lobby.
Mary, her face stony and bleak, came up to Will and stood before him.
“I don’t blame you,” she said softly, bitterly. “But damn you, Will Danning! Damn you, damn you!”
She turned and fled across the lobby and up the stairs, sobbing into the sleeve of her coat.
Phipps came up with the note, after the doctor had stepped away. “If this is his writin’, Danning, then I got nothin’ on you for Hale’s murder.” He turned to Charlie. “And if it’s like he says it is, that he let you out to get Broome, then I got nothin’ on him.”
Will looked at Charlie Sommers. There was a great pity in the marshal’s eyes as he looked at Will, and Will was grateful.
“He let me out to get him, Phipps,” he said in a toneless voice. “I got him.”
Sommers motioned Phipps aside. The doctor picked up his kit, said, “Get to bed as soon as you can, young fellow,” and left.
Becky slipped down beside him and looked up at him.
“Will, I’ll make up for all this. The world isn’t like this. You can’t believe it is!”
Will stroked her hair and said, “No, I know that, Becky. Remember what I told you that night out at the Nine X? All the fightin’ and the killin’ that stood between us is gone now. And I mean it more than ever.”
“I know you do, Will. I’ll make up for it all.”
Later, Becky lifted her head from Will’s shoulder and said, “Will.”
“What?”
“Do you know what Murray and Pres and Dad were after, there on your place?”
“No. Do you?”
“No. Let’s don’t ever try to find out! Let’s leave it! We have everything we want now, haven’t we?”
Will smiled into the darkness and nodded.
About the Author
Luke Short is the pen name of Frederick Dilley Glidden (1908–1975), the bestselling, award-winning author of over fifty classic western novels and hundreds of short stories. Renowned for their action-packed story lines, multidimensional characters, and vibrant dialogue, Glidden’s novels sold over thirty million copies. Ten of his novels, including Blood on the Moon, Coroner Creek, and Ramrod, were adapted for the screen. Glidden was the winner of a special Western Heritage Trustees Award and the Levi Strauss Golden Saddleman Award from the Western Writers of America.
Born in Kewanee, Illinois, Glidden graduated in 1930 from the University of Missouri where he studied journalism. After working for several newspapers, he became a trapper in Canada and, later, an archaeologist’s assistant in New Mexico. His first story, “Six-Gun Lawyer,” was published in Cowboy Stories magazine in 1935 under the name F. D. Glidden. At the suggestion of his publisher, he used the pseudonym Luke Short, not realizing it was the name of a real gunman and gambler who was a friend of Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp. In addition to his prolific writing career, Glidden worked for the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. He moved to Aspen, Colorado, in 1946, and became an active member of the Aspen Town Council, where he initiated the zoning laws that helped preserve the town.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This story was first published in Western Story Magazine under the title “Gunsmoke Graze.”
Copyright © 1940, 1968 by Frederick D. Glidden
Cover design by Andy Ross
ISBN: 978-1-5040-4089-1
This edition published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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