by Jake Logan
Kiefer noticed the powder mark on the blind right away, and the open window, but Townsend said nothing.
“Man would have had to be mighty quick for me not to see him,” Slocum said. Took me maybe five seconds to get in here after I heard the shot.”
Kiefer nodded but kept silent. Slocum could practically hear the gears in his head whirling. He hoped they were headed in the direction that he’d already arrived at.
They did.
Kiefer wheeled, saying, “Charlie . . .”
But Charlie Townsend wasn’t there anymore. They heard the front door slam, and suddenly, they were both racing down the hall, Slocum in the lead and Kiefer pushing him from the rear.
Behind him, Slocum heard Lil shout, “What’s happening?!” but he paid it no mind.
He and Kiefer reached the front door and skidded to a halt. “He could be out there,” Kiefer said.
“Likely is,” said Slocum and reached for the knob.
“Hold it,” Kiefer insisted.
Reluctantly, Slocum dropped his hand. “You know that fella I saw down to the livery the other day? The one just sittin’ out there, watching from the crest of the rise?”
“Yeah?” replied Kiefer, distracted.
“You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?”
“If you mean, was he the one who took that shot at Chandler later on, yeah,” Kiefer said.
“And he was Charlie Townsend,” added Slocum.
Kiefer nodded curtly. “Makes sense to me.” He pulled aside the curtains on one side of the door and snuck a slanted look outside. “Don’t see him.”
“Probably went to the barn, or back to his house,” said Slocum. He moved to the window on the other side and peeked out the curtains. “I don’t see him, either.”
“Don’t mean he isn’t sitting out there somewhere, with his rifle across his knees.”
“Well, let’s just hope he keeps it across his knees,” said Slocum, and with a rebel yell, swung open the front door.
Lil jumped at Slocum’s wild holler and clung to the doorway, peeking around the edge. All she saw was Kiefer’s back as the two men plunged outside.
She was scared, as scared as she had ever been. She knew her life was actually in grave danger, and almost worse, that Slocum’s was. Not that she’d perish if Slocum were to be killed, but it would surely break her heart. For at least a week or two.
She looked around for a place to hide and finally scooted beneath the bed, along with the dust balls and cobwebs. She held her breath.
Kiefer headed for the barn, and Slocum headed for the foreman’s house, shoving aside cowhands wakened by the noise. They told everybody to get back to the bunkhouse, but if they saw Charlie, to detain him.
Slocum added that he was armed and dangerous, and belatedly, Kiefer did, too.
Before Slocum made it to the first step, a shot rang through Townsend’s front window, and Slocum hit the dirt, rolling. And he realized, as he did, that Townsend had clipped his shoulder. Pain radiated from it, but as far as he could tell, nothing was broken.
He began to crawl along the side of the house.
Kiefer did an about-face and ran, crouching, in his direction. Slocum signaled him to go to the other side of Townsend’s house, which he did.
Once Kiefer was in the clear, Slocum crawled back farther, until he reached the second window. Then slowly, his shoulder burning like the wrong end of a branding iron, he pulled himself up the side of the house until he could peek over the sill.
Townsend was in there, all right, and he had a rifle in his hands. He was pacing like a chained dog. Gone was the final doubt that he was the killer. Maybe he hadn’t killed David Chandler, but he’d shot at him the day before, and he’d shot at Lil, and now Slocum. That made him plenty dangerous.
It made him fair game.
Slocum brought up his gun and leveled it at Townsend’s pacing figure. Or rather, his shadow. There were no lights lit in the room, and the only illumination came through the drawn curtains. Weak, at best.
Still, Slocum could make out his form. He squeezed the trigger.
And was heartily surprised when an answering blast, almost simultaneous, ripped through the wall boards, slicing a hole in his side.
He fell to the ground again, groaning, and heard Kiefer’s “Holy shit!” coming from the other side of the abode.
Another rifle shot split the air, and then Slocum heard something hit the ground, which he assumed was Kiefer.
Damn!
Slocum gingerly felt his side. There was a lot of blood, but he was fairly sure that Townsend had hit nothing but meat. Considering the circumstances, it didn’t much matter one way or the other.
He had to take Townsend out.
Kiefer gritted his teeth against the pain emanating from his head. He thought he’d lost consciousness for a minute or two, but how many minutes, really? One? Two? Five? Ten?
There was no way of knowing.
For the second time, he wiped the flood of blood from his brow and looked around for his hat, which he finally spied twenty feet out, in the weeds.
Well, that would have to wait.
Slocum was counting on him. And more importantly, the entire town of Poleaxe was counting on him. Kiefer took his job seriously, and it would take more than getting his skull grazed to change that.
He began to crawl forward, toward the front of the house again, keeping his moves as silent as possible. Townsend was aiming at sounds, now. And he realized, just then, that Townsend had probably known just exactly who he was shooting when Messenger was killed.
Which meant that Messenger, for whatever reason, was more than likely the galoot who’d slain David Chambers.
Kiefer didn’t claim to understand it. He just figured it was up to him to stop it—hopefully, with Slocum.
But he’d do it alone if he had to.
26
Charlie figured to be sitting in the catbird seat.
He’d wounded both of them. It was just a matter of time.
He didn’t think about “his” ranch. He didn’t think about anything except those two men out there, the ones he was killing, a little bit at a time.
It was like the war. He’d always been his best at wartime.
He listened carefully, hardly daring to breathe. Kiefer was making his way back toward the front of the house, he was fairly certain. Slocum was a little noisier, since he fell from time to time, and was going back, along the side of the house toward the rear.
He must be hit worse than Kiefer. He was inching.
Townsend decided to take out Slocum first. The man was a legend, but even legends could be killed, he thought with a smile.
He tiptoed down the short hall to the next window from which Slocum might strike.
Slocum bypassed the next window and went around to the rear of the house, keeping his balance—and his feet beneath him. For a change.
But he’d been wrong. There was no rear door, only a high, single-paned window.
He grimaced. He’d have to make do.
He slowly pulled himself fully upright, just at the side of the window, his gun ready. He chanced a glance inside.
He saw darkness, and in that darkness, the shadow of a man just disappearing through a side door in the hallway.
Damn!
Despite the pain, he held his position, the blood from his side and shoulder flowing down the side of the house in slow rivulets.
Miles Kiefer had crept silently to the front of the house. And waited, listening for the slightest sound from inside. If Townsend could aim at sounds, he figured he could, too. Maybe he wouldn’t hit much of anything, but he could try.
But he hadn’t heard a peep, and now he was considering crawling up on the porch. Except that Charlie’s porch squeaked in spots, if he remembered right. Shit.
His head dropped to the ground, giving him a quick and painful reminder of his wound, and he jerked it back up. The far side of the house, then. Maybe Slocum was still there. Maybe he�
��d have an idea.
He started crawling again.
Slocum wavered in and out of consciousness, but somehow he remained standing, propped up by the side of the house. He knew he was losing too much blood to keep upright much longer, but there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it, not without making a sound, not without alerting Townsend to his presence.
And then he had an idea. It was a desperate one, but it was the only one he had handy.
He fired through the window, breaking the glass, and immediately threw himself to the side. When Townsend returned fire, he emptied his gun into the clapboards, toward the sound, then quickly reloaded.
And Kiefer was on the ball. When Slocum stopped to reload, he began to fire, getting off his last shot just as Slocum was ready to start again.
This time, Slocum sprayed his slugs farther apart. There was no answering gunfire.
But Townsend was tricky. He knew that. So he reloaded and waited.
It seemed that the sheriff was waiting, too. A moment later, Kiefer poked his head around the corner of the building and waved to get Slocum’s attention. He’d been shot in the head—or scalp, more like, and blood covered his face and ear. He gestured, as if to ask what the hell was going on, and Slocum could only shrug. The pain of movement reminded him of his shoulder, and he turned away, listening intently.
Suddenly, Curly was standing there, as if he’d come from nowhere, and he asked, in a loud voice, “Ain’t you gonna go in and take a look-see?”
At which point, another shot came from the house, and Curly toppled to the ground.
He wasn’t dead, but he was moaning. Kiefer crawled over to silence him, but Slocum emptied his gun, once more, into the house’s walls.
A slug burst through the siding, and Slocum felt a whoosh of air as it passed by, but he was untouched.
He reloaded and fired again. This time, he heard a heavy thud. A body, hitting the floor.
He kept listening, waiting to hear Townsend crawling or trying to right himself, but he heard nothing. It seemed that Townsend was either dead or at least out cold. He had to act fast.
He pushed himself to his feet and started back around, toward the front, bypassing Kiefer who still knelt over Curly.
“He’s down,” he whispered as he passed by.
“Be careful,” Kiefer whispered in reply.
The words weren’t wasted on Slocum, although they weren’t really necessary. He moved around to the porch, peeked into the front window, and saw nothing.
He opened the front door. Still, no retaliation.
He lit a candle and held it in his left hand, far out in front of him. His gun was in his right, and ready.
He and Kiefer had done a good bit of damage to the inside of Townsend’s house, all right. Moonlight seeped in through various holes in the walls, and the furniture was peppered with slugs. Some of the wooden stuff, including an old rocker, was splintered.
Slocum made his way down the hall. He was still barefoot, so his steps were silent. He just hoped that if Townsend was down there, waiting for him, he’d shoot for the candlelight.
Still, no sign. He could see the little window he’d broken with his first shot, and the doorway he’d seen Townsend disappear into. This was it.
Holding the candle ahead of his body, Slocum stepped into the doorway, gun ready.
What he found was Townsend, sprawled on the floor of the kitchen. He’d been hit several times, and if he wasn’t dead, he was close to it.
Slocum kicked the gun from his hand and shouted, “It’s clear, Kiefer!”
He heard Kiefer shouting to one of the other hands to come and help Curly, and then the sheriff’s footsteps as they rounded the house and came across the front porch and into the parlor.
“Back here,” Slocum said.
“Right.”
And then Kiefer stood beside him, over Charlie Townsend’s body. “Dead?” asked Kiefer.
“Or near to it.”
Kiefer took the candle, then knelt to the body, turning it over.
“Seven slugs in him, all told. And the son of a bitch is still breathing.”
“Sometimes there’s just no figurin’ on the Lord’s will,” Slocum said softly. “How’s Curly?”
“He’ll live.”
“Good.”
“Wanna help haul him to the parlor?”
Slocum grunted, then picked up Townsend’s feet. Between them, they just managed to get Townsend down the hall and to the parlor floor. They were both still bleeding quite a bit, and Slocum slumped down on the old divan.
“We’d best go do something about these wounds,” Kiefer said as he wiped the blood out of his eyes. Again. “I’ll send for Cookie to watch him.”
Slocum nodded. “Fine by me.” He struggled to stand up again, and started out the front door while Kiefer shouted for Cookie to come, and on the double.
Slocum stumbled, at long last, into the main house and called for Lil. At least, he thought he did.
The last thing he truly recalled was opening the front door and falling into the house, face-first.
When Kiefer came in a few minutes later, he nearly tripped over Slocum. He wasn’t feeling any too well himself, and he got to a chair before he hollered, “Miz Chandler! We could use some help out here!”
A moment later, he heard rustling, and a moment after that, heard her bare feet pad up the hall.
She entered the parlor, took one look at Slocum’s fallen form, and without sparing a glance for the sheriff, went straight to his side, murmuring, “Slocum, Slocum, no!”
Kiefer closed his eyes at last. He figured she’d get to him.
Eventually.
When he woke, the dawn was just breaking, and his head was bandaged. Mrs. Chandler’s beautiful face looked down upon him.
“About time, Sheriff,” she said.
“What happened while I was out?”
“I stitched you up and cleaned you up, and got you bandaged. I put some salve on that cut, too. You’re lucky it didn’t do more than crease your skull.”
“Thanks,” he said. “But I meant, what happened with Slocum? And Charlie Townsend?”
“Don’t worry about it. Slocum’s going to be just fine, and that vile Charlie Townsend died during the night,” she said. “Honestly, I don’t know what gets into men sometimes! Why do you think he did it, Sheriff?”
“You’ve got me there, ma’am,” he said, and it was the truth. He still didn’t understand it.
But at least the case was closed. To his satisfaction, anyhow. He’d take a few slugs for Poleaxe, but enough was enough.
“What’d they do with Townsend’s body?” he asked, and groaned when he sat up.
“Put it in the wagon with that other poor unfortunate, I’d suppose,” she replied. She looked like an angel, and for a moment, he forgot what Slocum had told him about her past.
“I’d best go see to them,” he said. “Best be getting back to town, too.”
“Wait and have some breakfast,” she said. “Some coffee, at least. Slocum’s awake, and he’ll be out in a minute.”
“Maybe just some coffee . . .” Kiefer said grudgingly and stood up.
Mrs. Chandler took his arm and helped him to the table, sat him down, and brought him a fresh cup of coffee and a plate of fried eggs. “I’m sorry I’m not a better cook, Sheriff.”
Around a mouthful of eggs he hadn’t thought he wanted, he said, “Mighty fine, ma’am, mighty fine.”
Slocum stumbled down the hall at about the same time the sheriff finished his breakfast. He was still without his shirt—although he’d put his boots back on—and his shoulder was bandaged, as well as his side. Blood and fluid had seeped through the bandages on his side, soaking it.
Using the backs of chairs for balance, he made his way to the table and sat down at its head. “Mornin’, Kiefer,” he muttered hoarsely. “Lil?”
She poked her head out of the kitchen. “Be right there, Slocum.”
She was, with
another plate of eggs and another cup of coffee. This time, she went back into the kitchen and fetched the pot.
Which she did not offer to Kiefer.
He shrugged it off, then stood and pushed his chair back in. “I’m off, then. Want to thank you folks for a real interesting night.”
Slocum gave a halfhearted laugh. “Any time, Kiefer.”
And with that, he left to ferry the dead back to town.
27
Once the sheriff had driven the wagon out of the yard, Slocum said, “You knew that man, didn’t you, Lil?”
Her face all innocence, she said, “What man is that, Slocum?”
“The man that was killed first. Messenger.”
“What makes you think—?”
“Come off it, Lil. He fit the description of the man behind me in the lobby. The one who shot Chandler. And who was probably aiming at you. Was he one of your marks, Lily?”
She looked down, tracing the pattern in the tablecloth with a finger. “All right. You guessed it, Slocum. I was married to him.”
Slocum closed his eyes. Lil was like a beloved dog you couldn’t bring yourself to put down or give away, no matter how many chickens she killed, no matter how many pairs of britches she tore up, no matter how many boots she chewed on.
“But it was a long time ago, Slocum,” she added lamely.
“Don’t matter how long ago it was, Lil,” he said. “The point is, he came after you. You don’t know how many others there are out there, just waitin’ for a chance.” He took a long, thoughtful drink of his coffee. It wasn’t bad, considering that Lil had made it.
“Here’s the deal, Lil darlin’,” he said. “You’ve got to cut it out. You’ve got to know when enough is enough. Otherwise, it’s gonna get somebody else on your track, and I won’t be around to save your bacon.”
She just stared at him.
He stared back for a time, as if to ram home his point, but when he didn’t get any reaction, he turned his attention to his breakfast. Fine, let her get herself killed. He just hoped she wouldn’t take too many other people with her.