Border Lords and Armstrong's War

by Lee Pierce

  As the violent thunderstorm intensified, Mort Quarry thought he was having a nightmare from which he couldn’t awaken. He felt like he was in the middle of a raging tornado. His house began to vibrate; a plate glass window in the front living room shuddered and popped out of its frame like an overripe boil, shooting shards of glass in every direction. One of the flying shards hit Mort in the face, tearing a jagged three-inch hole in his right cheek. Raising his hand to the gash in his face, he realized this was no bad dream.

  Mort sprinted to the door just in time to see a thousand-pound steer run headfirst into one of the thick oak columns that held up the massive balcony. The column held and the steer went down, disappearing beneath an enraged mass of hide and hoofs. Abject alarm masked the man’s features as he realized that his cattle were stampeding through the Rancho Bonito compound. He knelt by the blown-out window and watched in awe as the livestock rushed by his home.

  As soon as the last bawling cow passed, Mort Quarry ran to his barn and saddled his horse. His world was unraveling, and if he didn’t do something quick to stop the decay, all of his hard-earned gains would crumble around his feet.

  “Hack! Shank! I found him!” hollered Rusty. The little puncher had dropped to his knees and was digging like an armadillo, trying to extract Jim Butler out from beneath a thick pile of rubble. “Oh, my Lord,” he said, “I think he’s still alive.”

  Both men jumped down and began to help with the excavation. Struggling, they pulled Jim from his hidey hole. Hack had grabbed his canteen as he dismounted and as Shank elevated Jim’s head, he poured a tiny amount of clean water into Jim’s mouth.

  Jim sputtered and choked on the liquid. He shook his head and squinted his eyes, staring up at his rescuers. “You boys tryin’ to drown me?” he said.

  Tears ran down Rusty’s cheeks, balling up in the dirt that caked his face, forming tiny streaks of mud.

  Shank looked over at his old saddle mate and grimaced. “Dang it, Rusty, I think you would bawl at your own funeral. Can you walk, Badger?”

  “Yeah, I think I’m okay.” With Hack and Rusty’s assistance, Jim struggled to his feet. He was covered in dirt and cow manure from head to toe, but every­thing seemed to be working okay. He was hurting, but he figured that came from being scrunched up under the fallen tree for too long.

  “Shank,” said Jim, “you and Rusty better hightail it on back to the ­Double-A-Slash before you’re missed. I’m goin’ to the hotel and get a bath. Hack, you ride into town and camp out at the saloon. Keep your ears open and your mind clear.”

  “No whiskey?” Hack screwed his face up like he had just bitten into a sour apple.

  “No more than two beers, either, Hack. We’ve all got be on the alert and ready for anything.”

  The massive gunfighter shrugged his shoulders and stepped into the saddle. He dug heels into his horse and was gone.

  The drovers found Jim’s horse wandering not too far from where they had dug their friend out from under the lightning-scarred tree. Rusty handed the mare’s reins to Jim, and he and Shank headed for the Double-A-Slash.

  Jim rode down to the Rancho Bonito complex to check out the results of the stampede. All of the outbuildings were damaged but still standing. The front windows had been blown out of the main ranch house and manure covered almost everything. Half a dozen dead cows lay about, trampled during the mad rush.

  Jim searched the bunkhouse and the ranch house but found no sign of human injury. Satisfied that no one was hurt during the stampede, Jim turned the mare toward town. He was anxious to get out of his nasty clothes and into a tub full of hot, soapy water.

  Chapter 20

  Jim arrived at the hotel and headed around back to the public bath house. In a flash he was stripped and into a tub of clean, hot water. It took a second tub of water before Jim got all of the dirt and manure scrubbed off of his body. Finally, dressed in clean clothes and revived from his ordeal, Jim felt pretty good as he started toward the bank.

  He was in the middle of the street when he heard a man call out his name. He looked up to see a rider making a mad dash in his direction. Jim loosened the thong over his six-gun and crouched in anticipation. Relieved to see it was Cormac McCafferty, he relaxed and waited for his friend to reach him.

  “Jim, you’ve got to get down to the doc’s office.” The Irish Kid had a grave look on his face.

  “Why? What’s the matter Cormac?”

  “Hop on behind me, Jim. There’s someone there who can explain it better than me.”

  Jim grabbed the Kid’s arm and swung up behind him. Before he could ask Cormac any more, the Kid jerked his horse around and took off in the direction of Doc Wither’s place.

  Mordecai Burns had taken the dead outlaws’ bodies to the mortuary, and the saloon swamper had just finished cleaning the blood off of the floor. The doctor was in the back room with Stretch Cassidy when Jim came rushing in the front door. Seeing Jim, both men walked into the front room. Hack and Melissa Quarry were already in the room.

  “Melissa?” said Jim. “What are you doing here?”

  “Oh, Jim,” she cried as she rushed into his arms. “Darling, I am so sorry. I have been a blind fool.”

  Jim looked down at the young woman, dismay masking his features. “What are you talking about, Melissa?”

  She told him about overhearing the conversation between her father and Dude Miller. When she finished, Cormac filled Jim in with the details of the previous night’s gun trouble. Jim listened in silence, his placid features failing to reveal the tempest tearing at his heart.

  When Cormac was done, Jim turned and stared out the window for a long time. Suddenly a voice appeared in his head. He felt it rather than heard it, but somehow he knew it was real. The voice told him to get off of his backside and start acting like the man he was, Bale Armstrong, Jr.

  Jim shook his head and looked around to see if anyone else had heard the voice. Hack was talking and the others were listening to him.

  “I’m Bale Armstrong, Jr.,” Jim said.

  “Why, sure you are,” said the Irish Kid. “Who says different?”

  Jim ignored the Kid’s response. He stood up and stretched his sore, aching body. The physical pain he had been enduring just moments before was forgotten. It had been pushed away to some remote part of Jim’s brain, stored away until the job he was compelled to do was finished. Walking over to Melissa, Jim bent down and kissed her cheek.

  Turning back to face his friends, a look of total determination cloaked his face. “Boys,” he said, “Jim Butler died in a cattle stampede last night. He lived a rough life and he’s gone. Bale Arm­strong, Jr., is back to stay, and I’m here to protect my birthright. Anyone who gets in my way will go down.”

  Badger looked at his friends, and his lips parted into a thin, mirthless smile.

  Mort Quarry had arrived at his office before sunup and locked himself inside. He sat in the darkness and drank Scotch whiskey straight from the bottle. The fiery pale liquid helped to soothe his nerves and calm down the torrent of self-doubt that churned inside him.

  Rancho Bonita, his shrine to his late wife, had almost been destroyed. Sheer dumb luck had caused him to escape death. Someone had to pay, and pay they would. He would get Dude Miller to round up all of his gun hands and blow Deaf Smith County apart if that’s what it took. He would put out a bounty on Jim Butler, Hack Bonner, Bale Armstrong and the whole ­­Double-A-Slash crew, even that Mexican witch. Soon, all of Deaf Smith County, Texas would belong to him.

  He had sat alone in his office and drank half of the bottle, when he heard someone come in the front. My Melissa, he thought. Always on time.

  He reached over and clicked on his lamp. “Come in, Melissa,” he said. “I am in the back room. I worked all night on the Double-A-Slash proposition.”

  “Boss, it’s me. Dude Miller. Are you okay?”

  “Oh
, uh, Dude. Why, of course I’m okay. Why shouldn’t I be?”

  “You sounded strange and you were calling me Melissa like you thought she was comin’ in the door. You knew she was over at the doc’s, didn’t you?”

  “Good Lord, Dude, are you sure about that? I saw her just this morning, and she was fine.” The alcohol clouded Mort’s mind and caused his thoughts to be sluggish. “No, I guess it was yesterday when I last saw my daughter.” He hesitated as he spoke.

  “She ain’t the only one at the doc’s, boss. Butler, Stretch Cassidy, Bonner and the Irish Kid are there, too.”

  “I thought we sent the Irish Kid to kill the doctor?”

  “Yeah, we did, but he double-crossed us and killed some of the boys.”

  Dude told Mort Quarry the story of the gun battle as he had heard it third hand from Mordecai Burns. Quarry showed no emotion as he listened to the bad news.

  When Dude finished, Mort Quarry erupted in a torrent of profanity, slamming a beefy fist on his desk top. “No doubt Melissa has told the doctor and her new friends that I was the one who ordered the Armstrong boy’s death. So be it. Dude, I want you to round up as many of the men as you can find and meet me here. We ride in one hour. Bale Armstrong and anyone else who gets in my way are dead.”

  Badger Armstrong stepped out of the relative comfort of the doctor’s office into the blistering Texas heat. He did not feel the sun burning his skin, nor the sweat that soaked his clothing. He felt only one thing. Rage. Not wild, ­unrestrained, seething fury, but rigid controlled anger.

  One man was responsible for the way Badger felt. Mort Quarry had tried to take everything from Badger that he cared about. Now, he was going to take away all that Quarry held dear.

  The Double-A-Slash ranch had belonged to the Armstrong family ever since Bale Armstrong, Shank Halsey, and a hand­ful of other pioneers had ridden into Deaf Smith County and made the land theirs. Badger intended to keep what was his.

  He looked up and down the main street of Two Bucks City and read the name of each business: Quarry Land and Cattle Company, Deaf Smith County Bank, proprietor, Mort Quarry, Two Bucks Mercantile, Mort Quarry, owner. The names on the signs made Badger’s skin crawl. His shoulder muscles bunched up like knotted rope, and he moved his head in a circular motion, trying to relieve some of the tension in his neck. Badger planned to end Mort Quarry’s stranglehold on Deaf Smith County and, by all that was sacred, he swore he would end it today.

  Chapter 21

  Against the protests of Doc Withers, Stretch Cassidy left the doctor’s office and walked over to check on his business. The Golden Ace was half full, a considerable-sized crowd for the time of day. Most of the Rancho Bonito cowboys were in the place. Half a dozen of Quarry’s gun hands were there, too, lounging around at tables, playing cards, and drinking. Stretch walked behind the counter and felt around under the bar top. A smile traversed his features as his hand found the back-up shotgun he always kept there.

  Stretch spoke to his bartender, Max O’Hara, and the man left the saloon in a hurry. Stretch settled in behind the bar. As he began to wipe down the bar top, he noticed a stranger at the far end.

  The stranger stood with his back to the crowd; whiskey, the good stuff, and a shot glass stood before him. He had an unkempt look about him. His clothes were dusty and ragged, and his hat was pulled down low in front, hiding his eyes. His right arm hung limp at his side. He wore a .36 Navy revolver belted horizontal, handle to the left, across his middle, and a .45 Colt Peacemaker slung low on his left side. When he took a drink, he would fill the shot glass, set the bottle down, and gulp the whiskey all in one swift movement.

  Hack Bonner and the Irish Kid decided to stop at the Golden Ace to wet their whistles before Hack rode to the ranch to round up the Armstrong hands and bring them to town. They stepped through the swinging doors and looked around. The place turned quiet as a mausoleum. Hack cursed under his breath.

  The Kid smiled and whispered to his compadre. “Well, it’s sure been nice knowin’ you, boyo.”

  Hack Bonner answered the Kid in a voice loud enough for all in the saloon to hear. “I’ll most likely die someday with my boots on, Kid, but today ain’t that day.” He strode up to Stretch and ordered a cold beer.

  Cormac McCafferty snickered and sauntered up beside his trail mate. The noise in the place began to grow in bits and pieces, and you could have bet money on the subject every conversation had turned to. Hack glanced at the man at the other end of the bar. There was a hint of recognition in his eyes.

  “Kid,” said Hack, “Put an eye on that dried-up lookin’ hombre down yonder at the end of the bar. You ever seen him before?”

  The Irish Kid looked up from his beer and stared at the stranger, who stared right back at him. “I don’t recognize that bone bag directly, but I seen him plenty of times before.”

  “How’s that, Kid?”

  “Not him, but his kind. He’s got the mark of Cain on him. He’s walkin’ around, but he’s more dead than alive. He’s lookin’ for somebody in particular to kill.”

  “Look at him, Kid, see how he don’t use but one arm. By gosh, that’s Ott Carlyle.”

  “Dang, Hack, do you think so?”

  “Yeah, it’s him all right. I heard Jimmy speak of him plenty of times. The man wants one thing, and that’s to kill Jim Butler.”

  “I believe I’ll waltz on down there and put the fear of God into him, Hack.” The Irish Kid finished his beer and hitched up his gun belt.

  “Wait a minute,” said Hack. “I got an idea. Stay here and back my play. We might just get out of here today in one piece, yet.” He stepped away from the bar and moseyed down in the direction of Ott Carlyle.

  “Howdy, Carlyle,” said Hack.

  Ott Carlyle’s good hand dropped like a guillotine blade to rest on his Peacemaker. Without looking at Hack he spoke, his voice a rasping monotone.

  “You seem to know me. How is it that I don’t know you?” His head swiveled to meet Hack, eye to eye. Dark bloodshot orbs peered from under half-closed eyelids.

  “We’ve never met, but I know you by reputation. My name’s Hack Bonner and I ride with Jim Butler.”

  Ott Carlyle turned his attention to his whiskey. “I suppose you intend to kill me, Mr. Bonner. If you know my story, then you know I can’t be killed. Least ways, not by the likes of you.” He turned to face Hack again and took a long step backwards, his hand resting easy on the butt of the .45.

  “That day may well come, Carlyle, but today I have a proposition for you.” Ott Carlyle took in a long, slow lungful of air, like a man swigging water after a hard day’s work. He pursed his gray, cracked lips and nodded one time.

  “Practically all of these hombres in here work for Mort Quarry. Now Quarry don’t like Jim Butler or anybody who rides with him. Most of these fellers are cowboys who ain’t interested in a fight, but six or eight of ’em are hardcases on Quarry’s payroll. Me and my friend over there,” Hack leaned his head in the direction of the Irish Kid, “when we get ready to leave this saloon, those men are gonna call us out. If you throw in with us when we get ready to go, we just all might make it out of here alive.”

  “What if I just stand over here and let all you bad men shoot each other to dog meat?”

  “Well, Mr. Carlyle. Then my friend and I will have to kill you, and you won’t ever get that chance at Jim Butler. You might shoot me, but my compadre there is the Irish Kid, and you ain’t got a worm’s chance on a fish hook of killin’ him.”

  Ott Carlyle shook his head and looked up at Hack Bonner. “You boys about ready to vacate this place?”

  “Yeah,” said Hack. “I think our business is finished here.” He turned and started walking back to where Cormac McCafferty stood.

  Ott Carlyle corked the bottle of whiskey and stuck it in his vest pocket. He scowled and fell into step behind Hack. When the two men reached the Irish
Kid, all three of them spread out a few feet apart and turned to face the Quarry crew.

  A hard expression swathed Hack’s features as he glared at the group of men. “My name’s Hack Bonner and I ride for the Armstrong brand.” His voice carried the entire length of the saloon. All eyes turned to him. “I reckon most of you boys know who this ring-tailed wampus cat on my left is, since he done killed some of your best gunnies.”

  “Howdy, y’all,” said the Irish Kid, grinning like a kid skinny dipping in the old swimming hole.

  “This pile of bones and skin on my right is Ott Carlyle, and he says he can’t be killed. Now, I know most of you boys ain’t gun handy; you just punch cows and ride for the brand. Well, if any of you got a hankerin’ to head for healthier pastures, I believe this is the time to fork your bronc and ride.”

  For a long moment nothing hap­pened. A few heads began turning, followed by a smattering of nods. All at once, men started jumping up and a grand exodus of cowboys took place. Within seconds the Quarry outfit was down to eight men.

  Charley Pratt was one of the Quarry bunch that was still around. He whispered in the ear of the man next to him. “I’m goin’ for Dude. You fellers hold ’em off ’til I get back.”

  Hack drew a long, black cigar from his shirt pocket. He rolled it around on his tongue, and then stuck it in his mouth. Digging a quirly from his vest, he thumb-struck the fire stick and, with cupped hands, lit the cigar. Hack held the match upside down out in front of him, letting the fire lick at his fingertips. The match burned upwards, engulfing his fingers in flame. Hack never looked at the match. The stick burned into black ash and fell to the floor.