Crossing Fire River

by Ralph Cotton

  “We’ll give you a few minutes’ lead so you can get out of sight before the shooting starts,” said Dawson. Shaw only raised a hand in acknowledgment and rode on.

  Turning to Jane, Dawson said, “If you want to turn back or wait here, we’ll all understand. It’s your choice. This is not your fight.”

  “Well, thank you for telling me that,” Jane said a little sarcastically. “What do you suppose I’ve been thinking about all the way here? What color dress I should wear to the next town dance?”

  “I just thought I ought to say something,” Dawson replied, realizing he’d made a mistake.

  Jane made sure Caldwell had his reins in his good hand; then she swung up atop her horse and gave Dawson a hard stare. “Are you through, then?” she asked.

  Dawson only nodded.

  Jane said to Caldwell, “Come on, Undertaker, you stick with me. You might need somebody to reload for you once we get across this river and all hell breaks loose.”

  The group waited until Shaw had crossed the river and ridden out of sight. Then Dawson and Lupo led the others across the cool, flowing water and bore right of where Shaw had disappeared into a narrow valley filled with scrub piñon and juniper bush.

  They had ridden only a few hundred yards when they ran into a hail of gunfire coming from a higher trail alongside them. From the other side of the valley, Shaw heard the gunfire in the distance behind him, but he stuck to his task and rode on. Keeping deep in the cover of brush, deadfall and bracken, he didn’t stop until he saw the woman’s dress lying beneath a cottonwood tree.

  When he nudged his horse forward he saw the body of Eddie Sheves lying facedown in the dirt, wearing only a pair of ragged long-john underwear. “Well, well,” he said to himself, recalling Lupo had mentioned the man and a young woman riding ahead of them. “It looks like somebody found themselves a way in.” He looked down at the fresh tracks on the ground for a moment, then nudged his horse along, following them.

  At the trail where Dawson and the others had met the first round of gunfire, six riflemen had taken position behind the cover of rock on the hillsides. But after being pinned down for over a half hour, Dawson and Lupo refused to stay and fight them any longer. Instead, the two led Caldwell, Jane and the group of bounty bunters away at a hard run, feigning a retreat.

  “We’ve got them running scared! Ride them down and kill them,” a rifleman shouted, reaching his horse and throwing himself into the saddle.

  But only a mile farther down the trail, Dawson, Lupo and the others slid to a halt, dropped from their saddles and sent Jane and Caldwell leading the horses to cover among the rocks.

  Emboldened by the retreat, the riflemen gave chase, wanting to kill the intruders before they managed to reach the hacienda. They didn’t realize they were riding into a trap until it was too late.

  Dawson and the others lay low until the thunder of hooves was almost atop them. Then Juan Lupo rose and shouted, “Fire!” and the battle began anew.

  Less than an hour later, Shaw lay atop a rise and looked down onto the hacienda sitting three hundred yards away. He had gained ground while the lawmen and bounty hunters fought it out across the hillsides. Behind him he had heard the renewed gun battle rage off and on as he’d ridden closer to Hewes’ hacienda. Now, on the land below him, he saw two mounted gunmen racing away from the hillsides and he knew Dawson and the men had fought their way through Hewes’ men.

  They would be coming soon, he told himself, scooting back from the edge and standing up. From the hillsides he heard rifle fire start again and decided it was Dawson and the others chasing the gunmen back to their lair. He’d seen no sign of Hewes. In the front yard he’d seen the overturned wagons and riflemen scattered and positioned everywhere. But no Hewes, he said to himself, thinking it odd.

  His job for now was not to confront the situation below, but rather get past the gunmen and find out if the gold was still at the barn.

  Back to work, he told himself. He stepped up into the saddle and rode on, circling wide around the hillside before riding toward the hacienda from behind.

  Jake Goshen had walked most of the way back to the hacienda when he spotted the lone rider moving stealthily down a game trail on the steep pine-covered hillside. “It’s about damn time something came my way,” he growled to himself, crouching down and taking cover behind a sun-bleached log alongside the trail. Pain pounded in his bullet-creased head.

  As the speckled barb stepped off the hillside onto the rocky ground, Shaw caught a glimpse of the man crouched down out of sight. He stopped the barb but made no effort toward drawing his Colt. His Winchester lay across his lap. Yet, instead of picking the rifle up, he crossed his wrists on his saddle horn and remained that way as Goshen sprang up facing him, his Colt aimed and cocked.

  “Got ya!” Goshen said. “Don’t make a move.” He took a step sideways from behind the log and said, “Throw the rifle down.”

  Without moving his hands from the saddle horn, Shaw gave a nudge of his thigh and caused the rifle to slide off his lap and land at his horse’s hooves. “Who are you, anyway?” Goshen asked, noting Shaw’s calm manner in the face of a cocked gun aimed at his chest.

  “You first,” Shaw said in a mild tone.

  Goshen gave him a bemused look, surprised at the attitude. With the drop on the man, Goshen had nothing to fear. Nothing he said would ever leave this spot. He could pull the trigger anytime. “I’m Jake Goshen. Your turn.”

  “I’m Shaw,” he said, almost grudgingly, on the outside chance that Goshen might have heard the name Lawrence mentioned in connection with everything that had gone on. As he spoke, gunshots began to erupt in the distance, out in front of the hacienda. Shaw gave a nod of his head toward the sounds. “Shouldn’t you be back there, watching over the gold?”

  “You’re a cool hand, Shaw,” Goshen said. “How come I’ve never seen you among Hewes’ men?”

  “Was you really looking for me?” Shaw shrugged, going along with whatever the man said, hoping to find out what he could about the gold.

  Goshen gave a short, dark chuckle. “No, come to think of it.” He touched a hand to his throbbing head. “The fact is I’m chasing after the gold right now.” He gestured down at the wagon wheel tracks and hoofprints. “I’m going to need your horse to catch up to it.” He wagged his gun barrel toward the ground. “Now jump down.”

  “Catch up to it?” Shaw made no effort to get down from the barb’s saddle. “You mean you’ve managed to lose all that gold?”

  “Son of a bitch!” Goshen’s mood darkened fast. “I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to kill you,” he said. “But now I see that’s not going to be the case.” He raised his gun out at arm’s length, almost leisurely, and had started to pull the trigger.

  Shaw’s Colt came out in a streak and fired. The shot hit Goshen high in his right shoulder and spun him backward to the ground. His gun flew from his hand. Shaw holstered his Colt, stepped down from his saddle and picked his Winchester up from the dirt. Taking his time, he looked the rifle over. Then he walked over to where Goshen had managed to right himself and sit up in the dirt. The wounded gunman was leaning back on his left hand. His right arm hung limp and bloody at his side.

  “Shaw . . . ,” Goshen said as if having given the name some thought. “I . . . get it,” he said, his voice sounding strained and weak. “You’re . . . Lawrence Shaw, aren’t you? You’re the drifter . . . who found Doc’s body.”

  “Yep,” Shaw nodded. “You’re probably wondering why I didn’t kill you just now.”

  “You want to know . . . about the gold . . . I figure,” Goshen said, leaning forward off his left hand and grasping his bleeding shoulder with it. “I was taking it . . . to the widow’s house. This trail leads right past there . . . back across the river.”

  “What about Hewes?” Shaw asked, getting an idea why he hadn’t seen Hewes back at the hacienda.

  “He cut out . . . on horseback, right after I . . . left with the wagon,” said Goshen.
“He’ll be there . . . waiting for me.”

  “What happened to the wagon?” Shaw asked.

  “The fact is, some whore from Banton . . . and Wilbur Wallick bushwhacked us . . . took it away from us.” He shook his bowed head. “Can you . . . believe that?”

  “Tough break,” Shaw said.

  “I . . . I don’t suppose I can talk . . . you out of killing me, huh?” Goshen said, looking up at him with sad eyes.

  “I don’t think so,” Shaw said. “Like as not you’re going to bleed to death in a few minutes anyway.” He gave Goshen a searching stare. “Besides, do you really want to go back and face everybody, tell them what happened out here?”

  “Naw, hell no,” said Goshen. “Go on, get it over with.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Shaw said, stepping back, cocking his rifle hammer. . . .

  Six miles ahead, at the top of the trail where the river had gone underground fifty yards up beneath a flat plateau of stone, Myra and Wallick had heard the distant sound of a single rifle shot. “What do you suppose that was?” Wallick asked.

  More questions . . . Myra smiled and remained patient with him. She looked to their left, where the river roared back into sight from beneath the plateau and winded quickly away down the hillside. “They’ll all be killing one another the rest of the day, I expect,” she said. “We’re lucky. All we’ve got to do is find us a good hiding place for this wagon and figure out how much gold to tote and how much to hide for later.”

  “Have you thought any about that sheep ranch I was talking about?” Wallick asked, driving the wagon slowly while Myra rode alongside on the horse.

  She gazed ahead for a moment, seeing where this thin winding back trail turned onto the larger easier trail leading toward the Edelman place and the deep valleys and endless hills beyond. “Stop the wagon!” she said suddenly, her eyes fixed on the turn ahead.

  “What’s wrong?” Wallick asked, halting the horses, searching the turn for any sign of what had caught her attention.

  “Set the brake!” Myra said, still staring straight ahead intently. “Get down out of the wagon!”

  “Lord, woman, what is it?” Wallick jerked back on the brake handle, spun the traces around it and jumped down from the seat atop the large flat rock surface beneath them. As he turned quickly to face Myra, the last thing he saw was the blast of smoke and fire from the tip of her rifle barrel.

  “Sheep ranch your ass, idiot,” she said. Stepping down from her saddle she levered a fresh round into the rifle and uncocked it before shoving it down into the saddle boot. She walked over to where Wallick was staring straight up, his mouth agape, a bullet hole in the center of his forehead. “You just can’t know how much you were getting on my nerves,” she said.

  Myra was not concerned about leaving the body lying where it fell, but she did wonder how it would look bobbing and floating along the swift winding river. Bending, she dragged and rolled Wallick’s warm corpse until a final shove sent it flopping off the rock edge into the rushing water.

  “This is not so much,” she said to herself, watching, letting out a disappointed breath. She put a hand on her hip and watched anyway as Wallick tumbled and rolled and bobbed and bounced along until he floated out of sight around a bend. “I don’t even know why I thought it would be.” She shrugged and walked back to the waiting horse and wagon.

  When she had hitched the horse to the rear of the wagon, she walked to the side by the driver’s seat and climbed up. Still standing, she reached out and unwrapped the traces from the brake handle. Then a rifle shot hit her center chest, picked her up and slung her backward onto the hard lumpy load that lay covered by a canvas tarpaulin.

  Her eyes opened a moment later when she heard footsteps climb up onto the wagon and step over the driver’s seat and stand over her. “I thought it was Eddie Sheves,” said Hewes. “She’s wearing his clothes.” The tall Montana-crown hat lay on its overturned side, splattered by blood.

  “Who . . . ? What . . . ?” Myra’s voice had turned into a weak gasp.

  “Never mind who I am,” said Lori Edelman, staring down at her. Hewes’ rifle was in her hands, the barrel still curling smoke. “Who do you think you are, bleeding all over my gold?”

  Myra had no answer, but it didn’t matter. Lori and Hewes both reached down, pulled her up enough to lift her over the wagon’s side and drop her face-first onto the stone plateau. “Shall I shoot her again, Bo?” Lori asked, adjusting the rifle in her hands.

  “No, let’s get going,” Hewes said, warily searching the trail back toward his hacienda. “I wonder how the hell this happened. We come out here to ambush Goshen, damned if we don’t catch Mean Myra with the gold.”

  “Mean Myra, is it?” Lori said coolly. “I take it you two are acquainted?”

  “Hell”—Hewes chuckled innocently—“everybody around Banton knows Mean Myra Blount. Killing her, you probably saved half the territory’s cowhands from catching some terrible social malady.” He stepped over into the driver’s seat.

  “Oh really?” Lori managed to return his smile as she stepped over and sat on the seat beside him. “Well, good health is always high on my concerns.” Hewes slapped the traces to the horses’ backs and drove the wagon on across the stone plateau.

  Chapter 26

  When Shaw rode up onto the spot where Myra lay dead and bloody on the broad flat stone, he stepped down only long enough to look around at the wagon wheel marks and hoof scrapings leading away from Myra’s body. He followed the smear of blood where Myra had dragged Wallick across the plateau and rolled him into the water. Wallick’s body was long gone downstream, but Shaw got the picture. He stared down into the roaring water for a moment, then turned, stepped back into his saddle and rode on.

  He followed the wagon tracks to where they cut over onto the wider, better trail. Once upon the trail it dawned on him where the wagon was headed. He quickened the barb’s pace. In the distance behind him, the sound of fighting had diminished from hard, steady rifle fire to a few random shots now and then. That was good, he told himself. Now for the gold.

  He rode on . . .

  At the Edelman hacienda, the Widow Edelman carried the last of her travel bags out onto the front porch. She stepped away from the travel bags and looked at the big house while Bowden Hewes hurriedly wrestled with a larger steamer trunk until he managed to drag it out across the yard and heave it up onto the wagon.

  “I could say I’m going to miss this place, but I would be lying,” Lori said. “This house, my life with Jonathan . . . our medical practice. What a worthless waste of time it has all been.”

  “We don’t have time for reminiscing. We need to get a move on,” Hewes called out to her from the wagon, adjusting the large trunk into place. “The fighting is all over by now. Either the law, or whatever’s left of my men, will be showing here before long.”

  “I’m coming,” Lori replied. “I just thought of one more thing.” She stepped inside the door, took out a two-inch-long derringer and made sure it was loaded. Then she stood for a moment, calming and collecting herself in preparation for what she knew she had to do. All right . . .

  Out front, Hewes stepped down from the wagon. He stopped and stood in reflection, gazing first at his stepbrother’s grave, then at the house, then back at the heavily loaded wagon. He grinned and wiped a handkerchief across his forehead. “I’ve got to hand it to Mean Myra.” He chuckled aloud. “I don’t know what she did with Jake, but she had to have killed him to get the gold away from him. . . .”

  Inside the door, Lori tucked the derringer up inside her blouse sleeve, smoothed the sleeve over it and walked out onto the porch. “Perhaps you should give me our travel itinerary, for safekeeping,” she said, smiling as she closed the door behind her and stood pulling on a pair of white lace gloves.

  But suddenly she froze; her smile withered as she watched Shaw step out from behind the weathered cottonwood tree and walk closer to Bowden Hewes. “They say talking to yourself is sign
of going crazy, Hewes,” Shaw said, stopping fifteen feet away.

  “What the . . . ?” Hewes looked all around, making sure there was only one man to contend with. His right hand had already snapped tight around the butt of a big Remington in his waistband. “Jesus, drifter! What is it going to take to get shed of you?”

  Shaw nodded at the big freight wagon. “A wagonload of gold,” he said calmly.

  “Gold?” Hewes almost sighed in relief. “Hell, why didn’t you say so in the first place?” He made a sweeping gesture with his left hand toward the wagon. “Be my guest. Take all you can carry. Only hurry it up. Goshen could be topping the trail any minute now.”

  “Goshen’s dead,” said Shaw. “I killed him, after he told me where to find you.”

  “Damn, Jake spilled the beans, eh?” said Hewes in disappointment. “You can’t trust anybody these days . . . not when it comes to gold anyway.” His hand still lay wrapped around the butt of the big Remington. “Well, anyway, hurry up, I expect the law, or somebody, is going to show up.”

  “The law just did,” Shaw said.

  “What, you? You’re trying to say you’re the law?” Hewes stifled a laugh. “How much peyote have you been eating?”

  “Watch him, Bo, he’s fast,” Lori warned him.

  Shaw didn’t look toward her. He kept his eyes on Hewes.

  “If you really were the law, so what, drifter?” Hewes asked. “Would you arrest me, right here, right now? Wouldn’t you still be willing to take enough gold to settle any grievances between us—let Lori and me get on our way? Let us all wind up happy?”

  “No,” Shaw said. “Forget the gold. You’ve got to settle up for Raul.”

  “For a dead Mexican? You’d turn all this down for one dead vaquero who was going to die sooner or later anyway? That’s what this is about?”

  “No, forget Raul. Forget the law too,” Shaw said, a strange dark gleam coming into his eyes. “I just want to kill you. How’s that?”