Her female sensitivities had ruined Sullivan’s plans.
Reluctant to wade across the street into Longley’s gun, he turned and went back for his horse.
And missed the action across the street.
Lisa slowed down as she recognized the man in the long coat. “It’s you,” Her face registered shock and fear.
Tall and terrible amid a shifting coil of snow, Longley grinned. “And who did you expect?”
The furred hood of the girl’s cloak blew off in the gusting wind and flakes of snow studded her hair. “What about my father?”
“Worry about your ownself, girlie.” Longley lunged for her.
Lisa took a step back and eluded the gunman’s grasp. Her hand dived inside her cloak and she reached into the pocket of her woolen dress. Her derringer came up fast and she fired.
Longley yelped as the bullet burned across the meat of his left bicep. But he recovered quickly and backhanded the girl across the face.
She dropped like a stone.
“Leave her alone, Bill,” Tate yelled. Furious, he stepped between Longley and the girl. “You’ve hurt her. Don’t slap Miss Pretty again.”
The shot would bring the curious, Longley knew, but he had no time to waste. He reached inside his coat, drew, and fired.
Hit hard, Tate staggered back, sudden blood staining the chest of his mackinaw. “Bill?” Hurt and wonder filled his eyes. “Why . . .”
“Git the hell away from me,” Longley snarled. He pushed Tate hard and the big man crashed onto his back on the boardwalk.
Effortlessly, Longley picked up the unconscious girl and carried her into the waste ground where his horse was waiting.
“Damn you, Longley!” Tam Sullivan yelled, urging his horse through the fetlock-high mud of the street. “Leave that girl be!”
A voice came from the darkness. “Keep away, Sullivan or I’ll scatter her brains!”
Two shots followed. One plucked at the turned up collar of Sullivan’s coat. The next sang its death song close to his ear.
He drew rein, shaken. Damn, Longley was good.
At a distance of twenty-five yards in almost pitch blackness both balls had come within inches of ending the life and times of Tam Sullivan.
“That was close,” he told himself. “Way too close.” Warily, he urged his high-stepping horse across the street.
Booker Tate was up on one elbow, staring at him, his face a tangle of emotions.
His Navy Colt leveled at Tate, Sullivan said, “I can kill you from here.”
“You can’t kill a dead man, Sullivan. I’m done for.”
“Where is Longley taking Lisa York?” Sullivan demanded.
Full of blood, Tate’s mouth oozed dark scarlet in the gloom, stringing pink saliva. “Tell Miss Pretty I love her.”
“Damn you, Tate. Where?” Sullivan cried. “Dead man or no, I’ll put a ball into you.”
“South . . . Black . . . Mesa . . .” His fading eyes already dead, Tate managed three more words, “Oh my God,” and was gone.
“Sullivan, git off that hoss or I’ll blow you off it.”
The bounty hunter looked into the cold, close-set stare of Buck Bowman’s scattergun. “Longley took Lisa York. I’m going after her.”
Bowman motioned with the shogun. “Him?”
“Longley done for him. Not me.”
A deliberate-thinking man, the sheriff said nothing. Footfalls sounded on the boardwalk behind him. John York, his wife, and several other people were running toward him.
“Buck, guard Clotilde Wainright’s house,” Sullivan said. “Don’t let her or anyone else leave. I’ll explain it later.”
“Wait. I’m still thinking about killing you, Sullivan,” Bowman said.
John York was within shouting distance. Sullivan said, urgently, “For God’s sake, Buck, do as I told you. Give me the road or I’ll lose Longley in the snow. The girl’s life is in danger.”
“Damn you fer a smooth-talking scoundrel, Sullivan. Get the hell out of here and bring back Lisa York alive,” Bowman shouted.
Polly York heard that and screamed.
“Don’t forget what I told you, Buck.” Sullivan kneed his horse into motion.
Then he was gone, galloping into the murk of the merciless night.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
Storm of Lead
Sullivan’s American stud was a much better horse than the one Bill Longley rode. It was strong and would run all night and into the next day without tiring, but the darkness of the night, scoured by wind and snow, forced the bounty hunter to slow down and walk the horse in places where there was no visible trail.
Of course, Longley faced the same difficulties and he was riding two-up on a Texas-bred mare with no liking for brutal cold.
Sullivan rode into flat country tufted with coarse grass. Here and there, dark junipers shivered in the wind. The darkness was all encompassing, raked with freezing sleet, and the only sound was the wail of the wind.
Ahead of him, he saw no sign of Longley and the girl.
Despite the conditions, now and then a horse track showed in the muddy ground and Sullivan was assured that he was headed in the right direction. He was certain Longley knew he was being shadowed, and an ambush was an ever present danger.
After thirty minutes of watchful misery, Sullivan caught a break. From somewhere ahead of him, he heard the thin whinny of a horse and wondered, had the gray mare caught the scent of his stud?
He drew rein and his frost-rimmed eyes searched into the ragged distance of the shredding night. About sixty yards away, barely visible in the gloom, was a limestone ridge about as tall as a man on a horse. The south face of the rise went straight up from the flat as though it had been sliced by a knife and it ran west to east, providing shelter from the wind.
Its head erect, ears pricked, Sullivan’s horse snorted and tossed its head, the bit jangling.
The big bounty hunter slid the Henry from the boot under his knee. He’d never been great shakes with a long gun, but in the dark at middle distance the rifle held the edge over his revolvers.
A moment later, Bill Longley surprised the hell out of him. “Sullivan!”
“Yeah, it’s me, Bill.” Sullivan swung out of the saddle and yelled, “What can I do for you, Bill?”
“A feller who hunts men for a living should never ride a stud. But then, you ain’t too bright, are you, Sullivan?”
“Bright enough to kill you, Bill, unless you let Lisa York go.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll keep coming after you, Bill.”
“You’re low down,” Longley called, a voice in the darkness.
“Seems like,” Sullivan answered. “Now, give me the girl.”
“Come and take her, Sullivan.”
“You got your rifle, Bill?”
“Sure do. Right here in my hands.”
“Then step out where I can see you and we’ll settle this de hombre a hombre.”
“Ain’t my style, Sullivan. I ain’t gunfighting in a damned blizzard.”
Sullivan stepped away from his horse. “Then I’m coming after you, Bill.” His rifle ready at waist level, the bounty hunter stepped toward the ridge, sleet raking him with icy spurs and cutting his visibility to ten yards.
If it hadn’t been for the girl he would have dusted a few shots into the shadows where Longley lurked. But he couldn’t take the chance of hitting Lisa.
Then Longley cut loose, firing a shot from under the ridge.
Sullivan dived for the muddy ground just as the gunman rode from the darkness at a gallop.
Longley fired a couple of shots that kept Sullivan’s head down. Then he screamed, “Damn you, Sullivan. Take her. She’s all yours!”
Sullivan scrambled to his feet and fired at the fast, fleeting shadow that was the departing Bill Longley. Fired again. And a third time.
But Tam Sullivan knew he’d scored no hits. He was not a rifleman and on his best day, he couldn’t make such
a shot.
Half-blinded by muzzle flare, he gathered up the reins of his horse and called, “Miss York, are you all right?”
No answer.
Was the girl still unconscious?
Torn between riding after Longley or checking on Lisa York, Sullivan chose the latter. He told himself that the girl’s welfare came first, but he knew in his heart that was only an excuse. The truth was he didn’t want to ride into Longley’s rifle. Unlike himself, the man was real good with a Henry.
“Miss York,” Sullivan called again as he led his horse toward the ridge. “You can come out now. Longley’s gone.”
The north wind mourned noisily among the pines and the frigid air was thick with splinters of slicing sleet.
Sullivan stepped into the lee of the ridge, spotting a dark mound at the bottom of the wall. Something flapped around it.
Stepping closer, he made out the still form of Lisa York, her cloak lifting in the wind. “Are you all right, Miss York?”
His words fell on dead ears. The girl had been shot once in the chest and the blood around the wound looked like a scarlet corsage.
But Lisa York was not going to the ball.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Sullivan Calls the Shots
Tam Sullivan rode into Comanche Crossing holding the dead girl in his arms. His horse stepped fastidiously through the mud of the street toward the gathering of people who stood on the boardwalk outside the town hall.
The clock struck ten and did its best to cover Polly York’s screams.
He drew rein and passed Lisa’s body into the outstretched arms of her father.
“She’s dead,” John York said. “Oh my God, my daughter is dead.”
Mrs. York screamed and screamed, her tears falling on Lisa’s white, upturned face.
Clem Weaver was among the crowd and Sullivan said to him, “Bill Longley.”
Weaver’s weathered face was shocked. He managed only one word. “Why?”
“I don’t know why,” Sullivan said. “I can’t think like Longley thinks.”
Drawn by the screams of Mrs. York and other women, more people showed up, among them Dr. Harvey.
Polly saw him and shrieked, “Doctor, save my child! Save her!”
The physician’s practiced eye told him the girl was dead. With a question on his face, he stared up at Sullivan who was still mounted.
“Bill Longley,” Sullivan answered the unspoken question.
“Doctor!” Polly York shrieked.
Harvey put his arm around the woman’s trembling shoulders. “She’s gone, Polly.”
In a state of profound shock, John York held his daughter in his arms and said nothing. But Mrs. York gave way to profound grief.
Amid the hysterical woman’s wails and shrieks, Harvey said, “John, let’s get them inside.”
Stiff-legged, walking like an automaton, John York let the doctor usher him along the boardwalk, followed by his wife and a group of sobbing women.
Sullivan’s throat worked as he swallowed hard. “Damn.” Seeing the grief of parents over the death of their beautiful child was hard to take. He stepped out of the saddle onto the walk and tossed the reins to Weaver. “You know what to do, Clem. Where is Buck Bowman?”
“I talked to him just after Longley killed Booker Tate an’ took pots at you. He said he was headed for the Wainright place,” Weaver said. “I heard shootin’ from up that way and decided to march right into the saloon and stay there.”
“Anybody else head up the hill?” Sullivan asked.
“There was some talk about it, but everybody decided to let the sheriff handle it. Buck Bowman was a Ranger, you know.”
The few men remaining on the boardwalk listened to what Weaver said.
“You going up there?” one of them asked Sullivan. “If you want company, you can count me in.”
“Yeah, I’m going up there, but I’ll do it alone.”
The man persisted. He wanted to do something, anything. “Should we organize a posse, go after Longley?”
Sullivan raised his eyebrows. “In this weather?” He shook his head. “You’ll never find him.”
“Then Longley goes free?”
“No, he doesn’t go free. One day I’ll find him and I’ll kill him.” The bounty hunter felt empathy for the young man eager to avenge Lisa York’s murder. It was an emotion new to him.
Talking to all three of the men who stood watching him, Sullivan said, “If you boys hear a heap of shooting going on up at the Wainright house, grab your rifles and come a-running. It means I’m in trouble and so is Sheriff Bowman.”
“We got you covered.” The earnest young man turned to his companions. “Let’s get our guns and meet back here.” He turned back to Sullivan. “At the first sign of trouble, we’ll be right behind you . . . Mr. Sullivan, isn’t it?”
“You can call me Tam. And you are?”
“Hank. Hank Lively.”
Sullivan put his hand on the young man’s shoulder. “I know I can count on you.” He felt something strange slam inside him—like a kicked open door. Had he really said that?
I know I can count on you.
The old Tam Sullivan didn’t count on anybody. He didn’t need anybody. Even in bed with a woman, he took refuge behind an impenetrable wall and always felt the better for it.
As he watched Lively leave with his friends, Sullivan shook his head. “Ebenezer, what the hell have you done to me?”
He left the boardwalk and took to the dubious path that led up the hill to the Wainright house. The place was lit up, its windows glowing gold through the ashy mass of the riven night. The dragon wind vane hissed in the north wind and the air was thick with ice crystals.
Ahead of him, lying across the walk, sprawled an enormous carcass.
Sullivan stopped and drew his Colt from the holster. He walked on slowly, warily, afraid that the great beast was sleeping . . . or worse, wounded and enraged.
But the massive dog was dead.
A shotgun blast had torn great holes in its shaggy coat just under the high shoulder hump formed by a mass of powerful muscles that had driven the animal’s front legs. Its great yellow fangs were bared in death, black eyes open, glittering as though it was still alive.
Sullivan shuddered and stepped around the creature . . . and his boot hit an even greater horror . . . a round thing that rolled.
Buck Bowman’s body lay close to its severed head, stiff and ungainly in death.
The sheriff’s face was upturned, crusted sleet on his hair, eyebrows, and mustache giving him the look of an old man. He had no serenity in his expression, only transfixed horror at the manner of his death . . . frozen during the split second before his brain had ceased to function.
Bowman’s death didn’t affect Sullivan as deeply as the murder of Lisa York. The man was a lawman and had taken his chances. But it had been Sullivan who’d sent Bowman to his death.
And it wasn’t a peace officer’s death. Beheading was foreign, vile, unnatural—savage in the extreme.
Bowman’s soul must be crying out for revenge.
Sullivan stared at the house, shining brightly in the night as though for a Christmas imagined by Mr. Dickens. He used the back of his gloved gun hand to wipe sleet from his eyes, his gaze fixed on the house door where the restless dead beckoned to him.
Ebenezer Posey . . . Lisa York . . . Buck Bowman . . . big Frank Harm . . . and all the others . . . each demanding justice, standing in the light of Clotilde Wainright’s windows, each dead face as white as a skull.
Rage beyond rage ravaged Tam Sullivan. He roared his terrible fury and ran for the door, its polished brass gleaming in the light. He roared still as the door splintered and crashed open under his kick. Still roaring, he charged inside.
CHAPTER FIFTY
The Reckoning
His gun up and ready, Tam Sullivan’s reception was not what he’d anticipated—the hallway was empty. Recalling that the parlor lay to his right, he stepped quietly . .
. and warily . . . to the open doorway that allowed a rectangle of light into the hall.
Lady Clotilde sat in a leather chair by the fire, licking blood from the blade of a great curved scimitar. Her mouth scarlet, she said, “Ah, Mr. Sullivan, how nice to see you again.”
Sullivan stood fixed in place, overcome by horror.
The fire crackled in the hearth and the close air smelled of incense and burning pine.
“Surprised?” Clotilde said. “You shouldn’t be. Fresh blood is good for a woman.” She smiled, raised the blade, and her pink tongue slid along its gory edge, making her mouth bloodier.
Sullivan found his voice. “Lisa York is dead.”
“Really? How unfortunate. But hers was such a little life it hardly matters.”
“It mattered to Lisa,” Sullivan said.
Clotilde laid the sword at her feet and dabbed her mouth with a dainty lace handkerchief that turned red. “How remiss of me. May I fetch you a brandy?”
“Where are Cheng and Hong-li?”
“Dr. Cheng is probably in his office, and I’m sure that Hong-li is fast asleep. Because of his infirmities, he goes to bed early, you see.”
“Did you order him to kill Ebenezer Posey and Hogan Strike?”
“Who?”
“The two men Hong-li murdered at the undertaker’s office.”
“Oh that. I can’t recall, nor do I care. Does the butcher remember all the rabbits he ever hung in his shop window?”
“Ebenezer was my friend.” Sullivan’s anger was cold as steel.
Clotilde rose to her feet, her face twisted. “He was nothing, a nonentity who stood in the way of a great man.”
“You mean your husband?”
“Yes. I mean Dr. Cheng, the surgeon who will one day remove cancerous tumors and leave the host brain intact. He will pass his knowledge on to others, and tens of thousands of lives will be saved . . . because of him.” Clotilde’s expression changed to one of pure hatred. “And you, you uneducated dancehall lout, won’t stand in his way, either. Do you think I care a fig for that little slut Lisa York? Medical science needed her carcass and now its been wasted.”
A Dangerous Man Page 20