The revolver roared, and the cowboy doubled over as if he had been kicked in the belly by a mule. The gun in his hand exploded one last time as his finger clenched convulsively on the trigger. The slug smacked into the boards at his feet. The man fell to the side, rolling off the boardwalk and falling into the street. He was still curled up around the spot where the marshal's bullet had bored into his body.
Cole surged to his feet and ran the rest of the way to the door of the saloon, well aware that the gun in his hand was empty now but unwilling to give up the pursuit. He paused a second at the entrance, just long enough for his gaze to flick around the big room.
The shooting had caused everyone in the Pronghorn to dive under the tables or behind the bar for cover. The only people still on their feet were the remaining gunman and one of the percentage girls, who had been too slow about getting out of his way.
The cowboy had one arm wrapped around her waist, holding her tightly to him, and his other hand held a gun with the barrel pressed against the young woman's head. He maneuvered both himself and his terrified hostage back against the bar.
"You better back off, Marshal!" the gunman shouted shakily as he spotted Cole at the entrance. "I'll kill this here calico cat if you don't!"
"Take it easy, mister," Cole said, trying to sound calmer than he felt. He kept the gun in his hand leveled and ready, just as if it were still loaded. The gunman didn't have to know that it wasn't. "You haven't killed anybody yet. No call to make this into a hanging matter."
"You want me to surrender?" The cowboy laughed, the sound like the rasp of a dull saw against hardwood. "I'll be damned if I'll do that."
"How about a trade?" suggested Cole. "Tell me who hired you to beat up Judson Kent, and things'll go a lot easier for you."
For an instant Cole thought he saw a flicker of hope in the man's eyes. He was ready to make a deal. Cole sensed that.
But then Hank Parker rose from behind the bar, a sawed-off shotgun gripped tightly in his hand, and said, "Hey!" as he thrust out the weapon.
The gunman twisted his head involuntarily, and the barrel of the pistol in his hand wavered away from the percentage girl. Cole could have shot him then—if his gun had been loaded, and if he had wanted the man dead, which he didn't.
Hank Parker's greener was loaded, though, and the muzzles of the twin barrels were about three inches away from the startled face of the cowboy. Cole opened his mouth to shout "No!" but before the word could leave his mouth, Parker had tripped both of the shotgun's triggers.
The roar of the greener was deafening. The gunman's head practically disappeared in a grisly spray of blood, bone, and brain matter as he took the double charge of buckshot point-blank in the face.
The young woman began shrieking in a raw, ragged voice as she was pelted by the crimson gore, but she was otherwise unhurt. The gunman's body flopped away from her, falling on the sawdust-littered floor to twitch grotesquely.
Cole slowly lowered his gun, swallowing the sour taste that rose in his throat. He had seen some awful things in his life, but this was one of the worst. He looked across the bar at Parker and said angrily, "What the hell did you do that for?"
"Why, to save your life and the life of my girl here," Parker replied in a surprised voice. "Why else would I have done it?"
"Oh, I don't know . . . to keep that cowboy from admitting that you hired him and his partner to beat up Judson Kent?"
"Something happened to Kent?" asked Parker, still sounding surprised. "I didn't know a thing about it, Marshal."
The percentage girl had screamed herself hoarse, so that the only sound she could make now was a pathetic little squeak. She did that a time or two, then her eyes rolled up in her head and she collapsed, fainting dead away.
Some of the other women who worked in the saloon were starting to emerge from underneath the tables now that the shooting was over, and they went to her side to help her. They stepped carefully around the pool of blood spreading from the dead man's body as they did so.
Cole reloaded five of the six chambers in his revolver, letting the hammer rest on the empty chamber as he holstered the weapon. He stepped across the room, studying Parker's face as he came closer to the bar. Parker was wearing what he intended to be an innocent expression, but Cole didn't believe it for a second.
Parker broke the scattergun open and shucked the empty shells from it. He reached underneath the bar for fresh loads and replaced the weapon on the shelf down there. "Are you all right, Marshal? I heard more shooting outside."
"I'm fine," Cole grunted, knowing that Parker didn't really give a damn about his health. "The other fella's outside in the street."
"Dead?" asked Parker.
"I'd say so. That's what I figured to do." With only one shot left, Cole had known he couldn't take chances. That was why he had gone for the man's belly. Even if the bullet hadn't killed the cowboy right away, the shock of the wound had been sure to knock him out. Chances were the man was dead now, either way. Cole jerked a thumb at the corpse in here and asked, "Did you ever see this gent before?"
Parker shook his head. "Never saw him in my life. All I know is that he came running in here, and there were shots right outside. Everybody hit the floor. I grabbed that greener and waited for the right time."
Maybe in more ways than one, Cole thought. Parker might have waited until he could no longer afford the risk of the gunman double-crossing him.
And yet there was no way to prove that. Everybody in the saloon had seen what happened. Parker could stick by his story about trying to help Cole from now until doomsday, and no one could claim otherwise.
"I guess I ought to be grateful," Cole said tightly.
Parker shrugged. "Doesn't matter to me either way, Marshal. The main thing I wanted to do was save Lettie there. She's one of my best girls."
Cole turned as somebody slapped the batwings open behind him. Billy Casebolt strode into the saloon, his Griswold & Gunnison revolver gripped in his hand, ready for use. "You all right, Marshal?" he asked.
"I'm fine," Cole told him. "What about that feller in the street outside? Did you check his body?"
Casebolt nodded. "Sure did, but there wasn't any need. He's sure enough dead. I already sent word to the undertaker." The deputy looked at the body on the floor and made a face. "See you got another 'un in here."
"Yeah. What about Judson?"
"The doc looks like he's going to be all right. He's beat up pretty bad, but nothing serious."
Cole turned back to the saloonkeeper. "Guess this plan didn't work, either, Parker. Maybe you'd better just give up."
Parker shook his head and said blandly, "I don't know what you're talking about, Tyler, but I'll tell you one thing: Hank Parker doesn't give up when he wants something, no matter what."
"We'll see," Cole snapped. "Tomorrow's Election Day. The people of Wind River are going to have the final word."
"And that's tine with me. I'll abide by the will of the people. All I want to do is serve."
Cole frowned. Parker was the only man he knew of who could stand there with a dead man at his feet and make a campaign speech out of it. He shook his head in disgust, turned to Casebolt, and said, "Get some of the boys to haul this carcass out of here. I need some fresh air, but I don't reckon I'll get it in here."
* * *
From the window of her suite on the second floor of the Territorial House, Simone McKay had heard the gunshots. Such noises didn't disturb the tranquility of Wind River as much now as they had during the early days of the settlement, but they still occurred all too often for Simone's taste.
She wondered if anyone had gotten killed tonight.
Turning away from the window, Simone went to a comfortable armchair and sank down into it. She sighed. While this suite in the hotel was much more comfortable than that jail cell, of course, she was still very aware that she was a prisoner.
She didn't like the feeling, either. It was bad enough to be locked up, but to be locked up for s
omething she hadn't even done . . .
Some instinct made her look up, and her breath caught in her throat. He was there, standing on the other side of the room next to the large four-poster bed. Once again he wore that solemn expression on his face as he stood there silently staring at her.
The shock Simone had felt the first time she saw her husband's ghost had faded considerably over the past few days. She was still somewhat surprised to see Andrew standing there in her hotel room, but more than anything else, she was annoyed.
"What are you doing here, Andrew?" she snapped. "You haven't come to whine about me finding your killer again, have you? In case you haven't noticed, I have some problems of my own. I've been accused of murder, for God's sake!" Simone's eyes narrowed. She went on, "And it's your fault, Andrew. If you hadn't been carrying on with that whore, none of this would have happened. She never would have come back here to blackmail me, and I never would have been accused of killing her. It's your fault!"
Without even realizing what she was doing, Simone came up out of the chair and strode toward the apparition, which didn't budge from its place beside the bed.
"Why did you do it, Andrew?" she hissed. "Why did you go from my bed to hers? Wasn't I good enough for you? I was good enough to give you advice about your business, but you preferred to take your pleasure with some pathetic little drab! How do you think that made me feel, Andrew?"
She stopped suddenly as she realized she was practically shouting. The ghost still said nothing, but it lifted an arm and extended a hand toward her, becoming more insubstantial in the process. Simone jerked back and turned away, lifting her own hands to her face. She wasn't sure if she was laughing or crying or a little of both as her shoulders shook.
A featherlight touch brushed against her, sending an icy chill all the way through her body.
She let out a strangled cry and flinched away from that touch. As she did she heard a man's voice shout, "Simone! Simone, are you all right?" There was the sound of a key in the lock of the door to the suite.
Simone turned toward the door in time to see it swing open. There was no sign of Andrew anywhere in the room. He must have vanished in an instant this time, instead of fading away slowly. A flesh-and-blood Cole Tyler was there, however, rushing into the room with an alarmed expression on his face.
The marshal put his hands on her shoulders and said urgently, "What is it? I heard you cry out when I was coming down the hall."
"I . . . I'm all right," Simone managed to gasp out. "I was sitting in the chair, and I. . . I must have dozed off. I was dreaming . . ." The lie was easier than telling him the truth.
But then, lies had always been easier, hadn't they?
Simone took a deep breath and tried to pull herself together as Cole said, "I reckon if anybody around here has a right to a nightmare or two, it's you, Simone."
"Perhaps. But I'm all right now." She forced a smile onto her face, then grew more serious as she asked, "I heard some shooting earlier. Was anybody hurt?"
Cole nodded grimly. "There's been some trouble. Judson Kent was beaten up earlier by a couple of men who decoyed him out of his office."
"Oh, no! Is he all right?"
"He will be," Cole said. "He's got plenty of bumps and bruises, but that appears to be all. I took a hand in the game before it went any further. Chased the men down to the Pronghorn and had to kill one of them. Parker got the other one."
"Parker?" repeated Simone, surprised that the saloonkeeper would help Cole under any circumstances these days. She frowned and continued, "And why would the men who attacked Judson go to the Pronghorn?"
"Good questions, and I reckon the answers are all tied together. I figure Parker hired them, and when things didn't go the way they had planned, they ran back to him for help. One of them didn't quite get there, though, and the one who did made a fatal mistake. He put himself where Parker could get rid of him, rather than having him testify."
Simone nodded slowly, her keen brain following Cole's reasoning. "He killed the man so he couldn't admit that he'd been hired by Parker."
"That's the way I see it. Unfortunately, there's no way to prove it. Both of the hombres who jumped Judson are dead."
Simone sat down in her chair again. "My God, will there never be an end to all this? It seemed like such a simple idea to have an election."
"Politics is never simple," Cole said, "and it seems to me that it brings out the worst in most people. But it will be over soon. By this time tomorrow, Wind River will have a mayor."
"Yes, but will it be Judson or Parker?"
Cole shook his head. "I reckon we'll just have to wait and see, like everybody else."
Chapter 17
Election Day dawned bright and clear in Wind River. There was no breeze, and the warmth that was already in the air promised a sultry heat before the day was over.
One of the vacant buildings had been set up as the polling place. Three citizens had been chosen as election judges: Nathan Smollett, the manager of the bank; Abel Warfield, a clerk at the Union Pacific depot; and Ben Calhoun, a bartender at one of the smaller saloons.
As Cole watched the three men take their places at the table that had been set up inside the building, he thought it was a pretty fair selection. Smollett, Warfield, and Calhoun were a good cross section of the citizens of Wind River. On the table in front of them were stacks of paper ballots, dozens of pencils from the general store, and the locked metal box with a slot cut in its top where the ballots would be deposited once they had been marked. Cole had one of the keys to that box, and he was looking for somebody neutral to hold the other one.
Billy Casebolt ambled up and pulled a fat turnip watch from his pocket. He Hipped open the case and studied the hands of the timepiece. "Almost eight o'clock," he commented.
Cole nodded. "It's just about that time, all right." He looked along the street. There were a lot of folks out and about on Grenville Avenue, and many of them were drifting toward the building where the election would take place. The polls would be open from eight in the morning until four o'clock in the afternoon, to give everyone plenty of time to vote. Then the counting of the ballots would begin, and Cole figured the results would be official by nightfall.
"Reckon there's goin' to be any trouble?" Casebolt asked quietly.
"You mean from Parker and his supporters?" Cole shook his head. "I don't know. He's tried every underhanded trick you could think of so far to influence this election. Maybe he realizes it's too late now to do anything except sit back and wait to see what the people want."
"Hope you're right," said Casebolt, "but I ain't goin' to count on it."
"Neither am I, Billy," Cole said. "Neither am I."
The two lawmen stood on the boardwalk, waiting for the last few minutes to pass before the polls opened. After a moment, Casebolt nudged Cole with an elbow and said, "Would you look at that? I didn't 'spect to see them today."
Cole looked in the direction the deputy had indicated with a nod and saw a group of riders coming down the street. In the lead was an impressive-looking, white-haired, middle-aged man dressed in black range clothes. The dozen or so men with him were all cowboys. Cole frowned.
"What are they doing here? The Diamond S isn't within the town limits. Sawyer and his boys can't vote."
Kermit Sawyer, the Texas cattleman who had come up the trail from the Lone Star State with a herd of longhorns to establish the Diamond S, swung his mount toward the hitch rack in front of a nearby saloon. He was flanked by his foreman, Frenchy LeDoux, and young Lon Rogers, both of whom followed his example. All of the Diamond S riders dismounted and tied their horses to the rail. Sawyer stepped up onto the boardwalk and strode toward Cole, trailed by his men.
Cole stepped out to meet him. "Morning, Sawyer," he said tightly. The marshal and the cattleman had never gotten along very well, despite the grudging mutual respect they held for each other. "Hope you and your boys haven't come to vote. You're not eligible."
Sawyer hooked h
is thumbs in his gunbelt. "Hell, no," he grunted. "You townies can elect anybody you damned well please. We just came in to watch the show. Ain't that right, boys?"
Frenchy grinned. "Down in Texas we ain't had an election in a long time that didn't have at least a little gunplay involved. Thought this one might be just as interestin'."
"I wouldn't count on it," Cole said sharply. "Everything's going to be done nice and legal-like."
That brought a few hoots of laughter from the Texans. Cole's jaw tightened, but he didn't say anything else.
"1 reckon we'll see," Sawyer said. "Anyway, that's why we're here, just to watch the goin's on. When do the polls open?"
Casebolt consulted his watch again. "In about three minutes."
Sawyer nodded. "Good enough. We'll get us some coffee in one of these saloons and watch from the porch."
"All right, just don't try to horn in," Cole warned. An idea occurred to him, and he went on. "How'd you like to give me a hand in something, Sawyer?"
The cattleman looked surprised that Cole would ask for his help in anything, and to tell the truth, it was an uncommon situation. Sawyer's curiosity must have gotten the best of him, because he said, "All right. What is it, Marshal?"
Cole withdrew a key from the pocket of his denim pants. "This is one of the keys to the ballot box. I've got the other one. I want you to hang on to this one for me, Sawyer. You don't have any stake in this election, so nobody figures you'd try anything funny with the ballots."
For a moment Sawyer made no reply; then he nodded and put out his hand for the key. "Sure, I'll hold it for you. Nobody else will get their hands on it."
"That's what I figured," Cole said. He gave Sawyer the key and watched the Texan tuck it away in the breast pocket of his black shirt.
Judgement Day (Wind River Book 6) Page 17