P. D. cast a cold eye in his direction. “We’ll settle up when we leave. We might decide to stay a while longer.”
“Fine, fine,” Clyde replied at once. “What suits you, suits me just fine.” He went straightaway to the corral to fetch the horses. As soon as he had led them all inside the stable, he started walking slowly toward the front. “I expect I’d better see if there’s any more feed outside,” he mumbled, unable to think of a better excuse. He made an effort to keep his steps leisurely until reaching the open end of the stable. Then, as soon as he was out of their sight, he broke into a sprint, running with abandon to the marshal’s office.
“He lit out runnin’, Ma,” Bo said, having followed behind the frightened stable owner to the open door. He raised his rifle and sighted down on the fleeing man. “Should I shoot him?”
“No, son,” P. D. replied patiently. “Let him be.” Disappointed, Bo lowered his rifle.
Unaware that he had been held squarely in the sights of a Winchester 66 rifle, Clyde Newton ran as hard as a man his age could. Already gasping for air, he turned to see if anyone followed him. Seeing no one running after him, he started to slow down to catch his breath just a split second before crashing into a solid wall of hard muscle and buckskin. The old man would have gone over backward onto the ground had not Matt grabbed his arm to stop him.
“You!” Clyde forced through panting lungs. Unable to move, he gasped, “I don’t want no trouble.”
“Where are they?” Matt asked.
“Them three?” Clyde replied, immediately relieved that he was of no interest to the buckskinned mountain man. “They’re in my stable.” Matt released his arm.
Still watching Clyde’s frantic escape from the stable, Bo chuckled when he saw the running man collide with someone on the street. A moment later, when Clyde collected himself and ran on, Bo’s laughter caught in his throat, and he took a harder look at the cause of Clyde’s stumble. There was something ominous about the imposing figure standing solidly in the middle of the street. With the sun setting below the mountains to the west of the town, there remained a few stranded rays of light that traced the outline of a buckskin shirt and danced off the brass receiver plate of the rifle in his hand. Slaughter! Bo knew it to be him even without benefit of a closer look.
Bo’s reaction was automatic. He raised his rifle again and fired, but in his excitement, his shot was wide left, barely causing the buckskin fringe on Matt’s shirt to flutter at the bullet’s passing. Focusing instantly on the muzzle blast, Matt dropped to one knee and systematically cranked out a deadly pattern of four rounds that walked across the startled Bo’s chest.
Stunned by the sudden burst of rifle fire, both P. D. and Arlo stood frozen for a brief few seconds when Bo staggered backward from the doorway. The mortally wounded man turned to look at them, and attempted to speak. He died before the words would come, collapsing in a heap in the open doorway of the stable.
“Bo!” P. D. screamed, and rushed to his side. “Arlo!” she yelled, pointing at the wide door of the stable.
Understanding, Arlo sprang forward to the doorway, his rifle ready to return fire. He scanned the street to left and right. There was no one in sight. “I don’t see nobody, Ma.”
“Keep lookin’, dammit!” she raged. “He’s out there somewhere.” Frantic now, she cradled Bo’s head and shoulders in her arms, rocking gently back and forth. “Bo . . . Bo,” she moaned desperately. “Don’t leave me, son. You was always my brightest, even if you was the orneriest.” She paused long enough to yell, “Arlo!”
“Don’t see a thing, Ma,” Arlo replied, still squinting to pick up some movement on either side of the street. Bo’s killer had vanished into thin air.
“It’s him. It’s Slaughter,” P. D. moaned in gut-wrenching agony. “I know it’s him. I can feel him.” Like a mama wolf whose cubs have been slain, she poured out her hatred for this one man who had killed two of her babies. Arlo stood stupefied by the hellish howling coming forth from his mother’s throat. She carefully lowered Bo’s head, and turned to glare at her eldest. “Don’t just stand there, dammit! I want him dead. Find him!”
The normally slow-witted Arlo was at last aware of the urgency of the moment. He had never before seen his mother lose her self-control in such an explosive manner. It was enough to send him charging out of the stable into the fading light, roaring like a bull. He was halfway across the street, searching frantically from side to side, before his momentum slowed to a walk. He stopped, uncertain where to look, when he heard a soft voice behind him.
“His name was Zeb Benson. Hers was Singing Woman.”
Arlo spun around, pulling the trigger as he did. His shot was wild, glancing sharply off the roof of the stable. His head was suddenly thrown backward by the force of the .44 slug that slammed under his chin and tore into his brain, extinguishing forever the tiny flame that had flickered in the simple organ. Like a mighty oak felled by the woodsman’s ax, Arlo crashed to the ground and lay still. Matt cocked the Henry; there was one to go.
Inside the stable, P. D. heard the exchange of shots. She hesitated. With no shots following the first two, she had to assume that one of them must have hit the target. Frantic to know which one, she called out, “Arlo!” There was no response to her call. “Arlo, dammit! . . . Answer me!”
“Arlo can’t answer,” a calm and steady voice came back.
Panic-stricken, P. D. started to run to the back of the stalls. Seeing the horses saddled and ready to ride, she made a quick decision. Unwilling to be trapped inside the stable, she untied Bo’s and Arlo’s. She slapped one on the rump and discharged her pistol into the dirt floor behind the other one. Her own horse jerked frantically at the reins in an attempt to follow the two stampeding out of the stable. Straining against the frightened stallion, P. D. untied the reins and managed to get a foot in the stirrup before the crazed animal took off after the others.
Outside the open end of the stable, Matt heard the shot and jumped back just in time to avoid the galloping horses in flight. There was no time to get off a shot, but he realized in that instant that both saddles were empty. Immediately alert that another horse followed, he set himself to receive it. In another instant, it was upon him. This one carried a rider, but Matt was forced to dive behind the stable door because P. D. came out with her six-gun blazing away. As soon as her firing pin clicked on an empty cylinder. Matt rose to one knee and took careful aim on the rider galloping away. His bullet slammed into P. D.’s back, knocking her over onto the horse’s neck, but she managed to hang on.
The horse came to a stop several yards farther up the street, and P. D. appeared to reseat herself in the saddle. Matt watched, puzzled by the rider’s actions. He kept his rifle aimed at P. D. while she seemed to be making a decision. Finally, she prodded the horse back toward the stable while trying to pull her rifle from the saddle sling. Matt continued to hold his fire, fascinated by the rider weaving drunkenly in the saddle as her horse came closer. The rifle was almost free of the sling when it fell from her hand and dropped to the ground. A few steps closer and the rider slumped over to one side and slid off the horse.
With the feeling of a heavy shroud draped across his shoulders, Matt walked slowly over to stand looking down upon the last of the gang of murderers that had brought such sorrow into his life. In the faint twilight, he gazed down at the stocky figure lying in the muddy street. Then, almost stunned, he recognized the dying man as the same man who had gone over the cliff back on the mountain below his cabin. “How many times am I gonna have to kill you?” he said, raising his rifle again to finish it.
P. D.’s eyelids fluttered open, and she looked up at her executioner. “Don’t kill me,” she pleaded. “I’m a woman. You wouldn’t shoot a woman, would you?”
Surprised, he squinted hard in an effort to get a better look. There was nothing feminine about her that he could see. She raised a feeble hand and fumbled with the buttons on her coat in a desperate attempt to prove to him that
she was, indeed, female. Knowing the vile murderer he was dealing with, Matt simply assumed she was going for a hidden weapon. He aimed the muzzle of the Henry rifle at her forehead and ended her struggle. “No, I probably wouldn’t shoot a woman, but I don’t have a problem with a coyote bitch.”
Feeling suddenly weary, he remained standing over the body lying sprawled in the muddy street. For several long moments he stared down at the last of those who had hunted him, wondering if, indeed, she were the last—or would there be others? How long would he be hunted for a crime he did not commit? He thought of the many people who had suffered simply because they befriended him—most recently Zeb and Singing Woman. Then he thought of Molly, sweet innocent Molly. Maybe it would be better for her if he simply rode out of her life. Now would be the time, with no long good-byes. The great north country was out there, waiting to be explored.
* * *
As darkness descended upon the town, the normal quiet of that far end of the muddy main street of Virginia City returned. Rising over the ridge behind the stables, a pale half moon, the kind Zeb Benson often referred to as a Vengeance Moon, began its journey across Alder Gulch. Up the street, toward the center of town where the saloons were located, the noisy nightlife began, only vaguely aware of the shots fired near the stable. A good portion of the town was not yet aware of the hotel massacre, the undertaker having gathered the bodies as soon as the shooting stopped. Prospectors hitting the town after working their claims all day would scarcely believe that their appointed deputy marshal was locked inside his jail, peeking through the wooden shutters of his window.
Two partners on their way to a night of drinking at the Lucky Strike approached a lone rider at the north end of the gulch. He was a formidable man, outfitted entirely in animal skins and riding a paint pony. “Evenin’,” one of the prospectors greeted the rider.
“Evenin’,” the stranger replied.
“You’re a-headin’ the wrong way if you’re lookin’ fer a drink of likker,” the other prospector said in passing.
“Reckon so,” Matt replied, without slowing the paint’s pace.
“He’s a friendly cuss, ain’t he?” the first prospector said when the stranger was out of earshot.
“He’s one of them wild ones from the look of ’em. Most likely laid around outside a saloon till the marshal run ’im outta town.”
* * *
Broken Hand stood near the edge of his village watching the slight young white girl working with a bone awl on a deer hide. She was down near the water’s edge, and every once in a while she would pause to look down the river for a few minutes before returning her attention to the deer hide. After a short period Broken Hand walked down to the river’s edge to speak to her.
“How are you getting along in Singing Woman’s tipi?” Broken Hand asked.
Molly looked up and smiled, then made the sign for good. The Crow chief noted that, even though she smiled a lot, they always seemed to be sad smiles. All traces of happiness had left her face. He thought this was not a good thing for one so young. Slaughter had been gone a long time. He might never return. Who could say? “I have been thinking,” he said. “I think it would be good if you take Singing Woman’s tipi for your own. I think Singing Woman would like that.” She smiled again, pleased by his generosity. Broken Hand went on, “I think maybe you should know that Slaughter might not come back.”
She shook her head at once and signed, He will come back.
Broken Hand nodded slowly. “I know he will try to come back, but you must realize that he may not be able to. Just know that you will always have a place in our village.”
I thank you, she signed. He nodded and, having said his piece, turned to retrace his steps. She thought about what he had said as a tear threatened to start. Turning her gaze once again to focus on the pines on the far side of the river, where the trail led from the north, she could almost imagine an image of her tall rider. On so many late afternoons she had imagined a misty image approaching the water’s edge. As on those many occasions, her tearful eyes created that familiar image, just now appearing from the pine trees. She closed her eyes for a second, heartbroken by the vision that seemed to want to torment her. When she opened her eyes again, the vision was still there, as he cleared the pines and started across the river. Afraid she was losing her mind, she dared not move lest she drive it away. He spotted her then, and raised his arm. Her heart fairly exploded with joy, and on legs suddenly feeling incapable of supporting her, she ran to meet him, pushing through the crystal-clear water up to her breast. He reached down and, with one powerful arm, swept her from the water and up behind him on the paint pony. She clung to him so tightly he could barely breathe.
Once across the river, he dismounted and then lifted her off the horse. Holding her close in his arms, he scolded her softly, “Look at you—you’re soakin’ wet.” She looked up at him and smiled, a happy smile, as the rest of the village hurried down to greet him.
CHARLES G. WEST lives in Marietta, Georgia, and was the proprietor of a commercial typesetting and printing business. He now devotes his full time to writing historical novels. Visit his Web site at www.CharlesGWest.com.
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