As they approached the ranch house, a man walked around the corner, his head down, not seeing the lawmen. Tilghman recognized him as Little Bill Raidler, a longtime member of the Doolin gang.
“Halt, Raidler. This is Bill Tilghman talkin’,” Tilghman called out, jacking a shell into his Winchester.
When he heard the lawman’s voice, Little Bill whirled around and drew, firing his gun. The slug passed within inches of Tilghman’s head and he returned fire, striking Raidler in the right wrist and shattering the bone as the gun whirled away in the sunlight.
They doctored Raidler up as well as they could and took him to Guthrie, where he was placed under arrest. He would say nothing about the whereabouts of Bill Doolin.
After a few more unsuccessful attempts to locate Doolin, Tilghman was about to give up when he got word Doolin’s wife was in Winfield. Tilghman went to the Winfield post office to see if there’d been any mail delivered to her from her husband. The postmaster told Tilghman that Mr. Doolin was in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. He said the outlaw had gone there to visit the hot springs to ease his rheumatism.
Tilghman was on a stage the next day, headed for Eureka Springs. The coach he was riding pulled into Eureka Springs on December 5th. Tilghman went directly to the Basin Hotel. He checked in and left his rifle and baggage there to go in search of Bill Doolin.
As he walked through the lobby, Tilghman saw Doolin calmly sitting on a couch, reading a newspaper. When Doolin glanced up to see who was walking by, Tilghman turned his head and moved away.
Then he stopped for a moment, wondering if he should approach the wanted man in the crowded lobby, fearing innocent people would get shot if there were gunplay.
What the hell, he finally thought, I been chasin’ him all over creation. Can’t let him get outta my sight now.
Tilghman pulled his Colt and walked back to stand directly in front of Bill Doolin.
“Bill Doolin, you are under arrest,” Tilghman said.
Doolin assumed an innocent look, glancing around at the people in the lobby, who had stopped to see what was going on.
“What’s the meaning of this?” he asked, spreading his hands as if he had nothing to hide.
“I’m Deputy Marshal Tilghman,” Bill said.
Doolin stood on hearing Bill’s name and reached into his coat, trying to get to one of the pistols he wore in shoulder holsters under his coat.
Tilghman grabbed his arms and the two began to wrestle in the lobby, Bill knowing if Doolin got a gun out, there would be lead flying everywhere.
One of the hotel clerks came running up.
“What’s going on here?” he asked.
As they struggled, Tilghman gasped out, “Get his guns out from under his coat while I hold him. I’m a marshal.”
The clerk stepped gingerly around the wrestling men, trying to get at the guns under Doolin’s coat. He managed to get the coat open, but Doolin growled, “I’m gonna kill you, kid!”
The clerk turned and ran from the room without a backward glance.
This put Tilghman at a disadvantage. Now that Doolin’s coat was open, he was more likely to get to his guns sooner or later.
Tilghman gritted his teeth, released Doolin, and stepped back, whipping his Colt out of his holster before Doolin could draw.
“I’ll shoot you, Bill, if you go for that gun!” Tilghman said, his voice low and hard and mean.
Doolin hesitated, as if figuring out whether he had a chance or not, then finally relaxed. His shoulders slumped and he hung his head as Tilghman leaned forward and removed two pistols from shoulder holsters under his coat.
The next day, Tilghman and Doolin boarded a train headed back to Oklahoma Territory.
* * *
With the arrest of Doolin in his dreams, the images faded and Bill Tilghman finally sank into a deep and dreamless sleep.
29
The next morning, after they all ate a breakfast of day-old biscuits and fried chicken, topped off with canned peaches that Sally had brought along on the train, the card game resumed among Louis, Cal, and Pearlie, while Monte joined Smoke and Sally and Bill Tilghman for another round of stories.
With the details fresh in his mind from his dreams of the night before, Bill was persuaded to tell the tale of his wrestling match with the famous outlaw Bill Doolin.
When he’d finished, he glanced at Smoke. “I hear tell you’ve had some righteous adventures yourself, Smoke. Ever wrestled a bad man to the end?”
Smoke smiled. “There were a few times,” he said modestly.
“Tell him ’bout the time with the Sundance Kid an’ his gang, up in the mountains,” Monte urged, having been told the story by Smoke’s old mountain man friend Puma Buck.
“Well . . .” Smoke hesitated, clearly embarrassed.
“Go on, dear,” Sally said. “We’d all like to hear it to help pass the time away.”
“The Sundance Kid was this young man who thought he was a bad hombre,” Smoke started. “During a fight a year before, I’d cut his left ear off to make a point, hoping to save his life by getting him out of the gunfighting business.”
“I take it the lesson didn’t work,” Tilghman said, smiling.
Smoke shook his head. “No, in fact it just made matters worse. Humiliated by the experience, the young man went down to Mexico and recruited a gang of toughs to come back up to Colorado and teach me a lesson. One thing led to another, and before long we were all up in the high lonesome in a fight to the death . . .”
* * *
Smoke was loaded for bear. He had his two Colt .44 pistols, a knife in his scabbard, a tomahawk in his belt against the small of his back, a Henry repeating rifle in one saddle boot, and a heavy Greener ten-gauge shotgun on a rawhide thong over his shoulder. He was ready to hunt, and to kill anything that got in his way.
He rode through thick ponderosa pines, making no sound that could be heard from more than a few feet away. By late afternoon he’d located the party of gunmen looking for him. Unused to traveling in the mountains, they were making so much noise they were easy to find.
Smoke stepped out of his saddle, leaving his horse ground-reined for a quick getaway should it be necessary, and slipped down a snowy slope toward a ribbon of trail the gang was following.
As the last man in line came abreast of his hiding place, Smoke took a running jump and leapt on the rider’s horse behind him. Before the startled man could make a sound, Smoke slit his throat with his knife. Smoke pulled the dying man’s gun from its holster and a knife hidden beneath the man’s mackinaw as the outlaw slumped over his horse’s withers.
He pushed the dead body out of the saddle, and threw the knife at the next rider in line. The blade buried itself in the gunman’s back, causing him to arch forward, screaming in pain.
Smoke thumbed back the Colt’s hammer and began to fire. Two more of Sundance’s hired killers were mortally wounded before any had time to clear leather.
Smoke whirled the dead man’s horse in a tight circle and galloped into the brush, leaning over the saddle to avoid low-hanging branches and limbs.
Sundance’s gang jerked their reins and tried to turn around to give chase, but the trail was narrow and all they managed to do was to get in each other’s way. Two men were knocked from their mounts, one sustaining a broken arm in the process.
Only minutes after the attack began, Smoke had disappeared and the gun hawks counted four dead and one injured, while not a shot had been fired at the mountain man.
Sundance was furious as he rode among his followers. “Goddamnit! You worthless bastards didn’t fire a single round!” He leaned to the side and spat on one of the bodies lying in the dirt. “Hell, I thought I was ridin’ with some tough gun slicks.” He shook his head in disgust. “I might as well have hired schoolmarms, for all the help you galoots have been.”
“Fuck it!” yelled Curly Bill Cartwright. “I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch!” He filled his hand with iron and spurred his horse into the brush a
fter Smoke.
Three other men pulled guns and started to follow Cartwright.
“Hold on there,” yelled Sundance. “That’s just what Jensen wants us to do.” He waved the gang toward him. “Circle up and get ready in case he comes back. We’ll stay here and see what happens. Maybe Cartwright’ll get lucky.”
Lightning Jack chuckled. “I doubt that, Boss. He’s goin’ into Jensen’s territory now, an’ I’ll bet a double eagle he don’t come out.”
A loud double explosion came from the forest, startling the outlaws’ mounts, causing one of the Mexicans to begin shooting wildly toward the noise while shouting curses in Spanish.
The gang waited expectantly, every gun trained on the spot where Smoke and then Cartwright had entered a stand of dense trees. After a few moments the sound of a horse moving through brush could be heard.
The men cocked pistols and rifles as a horse walked out of the trees onto the trail. In its saddle was the decapitated body of Curly Bill Cartwright. His head and upper shoulders had been blown off by a double load of ten-gauge buckshot. A tree branch had been stuck down the back of his shirt and his feet were tied together under the animal’s belly to keep him upright in his saddle.
Lightning Jack spoke quietly. “You think maybe Jensen’s sending us a message, Boss?”
Sundance said, “Shit! I want to kill that bastard so bad I can taste it!”
Perro Muerte walked his horse over to Sundance. “What now, jefe? We go into trees, or stay on trail?”
Sundance said, “Stay on the trail. If we can locate his camp we can keep him from gettin’ to his supplies and ammunition. Sooner or later, he’ll run low and then we can take him.” He pointed to Jeremiah Gray Wolf. “Take the point, Gray Wolf, and see if ’n you can find some tracks or sign showing which way his camp might be.”
Moses Washburn spoke in a low voice to Bull. “I don’t like this, Bull. I don’t like it one bit.”
Bull shook his head. “Me either, partner, me either.”
Jeremiah Gray Wolf leaned over his saddle and began to walk his pony up the trail, followed twenty yards back by the rest of the group.
After a quarter of a mile, he held up his hand and called over his shoulder, “I’ve found some tracks. Let’s go.”
The Indian straightened in his saddle and spurred his mount into a trot, disappearing around a bend in the trail. The others drew weapons and followed him from a distance.
Sundance rounded the bend and stopped short when he saw Gray Wolf’s pony standing riderless by the side of the trail, grazing on the short grass partially hidden by melting snow. “Shit,” he whispered under his breath. He hadn’t heard a sound, not even a call for help.
When the rest of his men rode up to him, Sundance slowly urged his horse forward, scanning trees and brush on either side for a sign of Gray Wolf.
From behind him, Sundance heard a sharp intake of breath, and the words “Madre de Dios,” spoken in a hoarse whisper. He turned to see Perro Muerte crossing himself and staring up at a nearby tree.
He followed Perro Muerte’s gaze, and found Jeremiah Gray Wolf hanging from a limb, a rope around his neck, his legs still kicking, quivering in death throes. The half-breed’s bowels had let loose and the stench was overpowering.
Sundance held his bandanna across his nose and rode over to examine the area under the body. Horse tracks showed that Smoke had probably roped the man while hiding in the tree, then dropped to his horse, pulling Gray Wolf out of his saddle by a rope he’d looped over the branch.
Bull said, “He never knew what hit him.”
“Shut up!” yelled Sundance. “Come on, Jensen can’t be more’n a few hundred feet away. Let’s go!”
The group cocked their weapons and started to follow Sundance up a steep slope past the tree with the body hanging from it. It was a steep grade, covered with loose gravel and small stones, and they were only about halfway up the incline when a gunshot from above caught their attention.
They looked up to see Smoke standing next to a large pile of boulders, grinning, holding something in one hand and a smoking cigar in the other. He cried, “Howdy, gents,” and put his cigar against the object in his other hand. As a fuse began to sputter and sparkle, he dropped the bundle amongst the rocks and ducked out of sight.
“Holy shit, it’s dynamite,” yelled Moses Washburn as he jerked his reins and tried to turn his horse around. The men all panicked and reined their horses to turn in different directions, running into each other, knocking men and animals to the ground.
The explosion was strangely muffled and it didn’t sound very loud, yet the pile of boulders shifted. Slowly at first, then with gathering speed, huge rocks rolled and tumbled, racing down the slope, bounding as they descended toward the trapped riders milling about on the trail.
A huge dust cloud enveloped the area, covering screaming men and horses as rocks crushed bones and flattened bodies and ended lives.
When dust had settled, the only men left alive were Sundance, Lightning Jack, Bull, and Perro Muerte. The slide had killed four Texas gunfighters and Moses Washburn, who could only be identified by a black hand showing from beneath a huge boulder. Nothing but his hand was visible.
In the sudden quiet of dusk, the remaining men could hear the sounds of Jensen’s horse in the distance galloping up the mountain.
“Moses,” Bull said through gritted teeth, “I’m gonna kill him for you.”
Sundance took a deep breath, looking around at all that was left of his band. “Okay, boys. He’s headed straight up the mountain. There ain’t much cover up there, an’ there ain’t nowhere to run to once he gits to the top.”
He pulled his pistol and checked his loads. “Let’s go git him!”
* * *
The moon had risen and, in a cloudless sky, it made the area as bright as day. Smoke was hidden in his natural fortress, leaning over the edge, peering below through his binoculars, waiting for Sundance and his men. It was time to end it, and he was ready.
There was movement below, and Smoke could see Bull and Perro Muerte crawling on hands and knees off to his right. They were going to try to inch up the slope, using small logs and rocks on that side for cover. Smoke grinned, remembering tricks Cal had devised for just that eventuality.
Smoke waited until they were halfway up the incline. Bull, panting heavily in thin air, motioned for Perro Muerte to stop so he could catch his breath.
Smoke worked the lever on his Henry and sighted down the barrel. “Hey, Bull!” he cried.
The big man squinted in semidarkness, trying to see where Jensen’s voice was coming from, hoping to get off a lucky shot. “Yeah, whatta ya want, Jensen? You wanna know how I’m gonna kill you?”
Smoke grinned. “No, I was just wondering if you’d noticed all those gourds and pumpkins down there.”
Bull and Perro Muerte glanced around them, and saw for the first time a number of small squash and pumpkins resting on the ground. Bull looked up the slope. “Yeah, what about it? You hungry?”
Smoke laughed out loud, his voice echoing off surrounding ridges. “Did you ever wonder, you ignorant bastard, how gourds could grow on bare rock?”
Bull’s eyes widened in horror and he opened his mouth to scream as he realized the trap they had fallen into.
Smoke squeezed his trigger, firing into the pumpkin directly in front of Bull and the Mexican. Molten lead entered the gourd, igniting black powder. The object exploded, blasting hundreds of small stones hurtling outward. Bull and Perro Muerte’s bodies were riddled, shredded, blown to pieces. They died instantly.
Below, Sundance sleeved sweat off his forehead and turned to Lightning Jack. “Maybe we ought’a head down the mountain and come back later, with more men.”
Lightning Jack looked at the gunfighter with disgust. “You low-down coward. You got over thirty good men killed lookin’ fer yore vengeance. You ain’t backin’ out now.”
Sundance dropped his hand to his Colt, but froze when a voice behin
d them said, “Hold it right there, gents.”
Lightning Jack and Sundance turned to see a small, wiry man in buckskins pointing a shotgun at their heads. “Ease them irons outta those holsters and grab some sky.”
As they dropped their pistols to the ground, Puma called out, “Hey, Smoke. I got me a couple of polecats in my sights. What do you want me to do with ’em?”
“Bring ’em up here.”
Puma pointed up the hill with his scattergun. “Git.”
As the outlaws struggled uphill, the mountain man, more than twice their age, walked nimbly up the slope with never a misstep, nor was he breathing hard when they reached the top.
Smoke stood there, hands on hips, shaking his head at Puma. “It’s easier to tree a grizzly than to keep you ornery old-timers out of a good fight.”
Puma nodded. “Yeah, I’d rather bed down with a skunk than miss a good fracas.” He cut his eyes over at Smoke. “You want me to dust ’em now, or just stake ’em out over an anthill?”
Sundance’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t do that . . . would you, you son of a bitch?”
Smoke pursed his lips, rubbing his chin. “Well, I’m feelin’ real generous tonight. How about you boys picking your own way to die? Guns, knives, fists, or boots, it makes no difference to me.”
Lightning Jack grinned, flexing his muscles while clenching his fists. “You man enough to take me on hand to hand?” He inclined his head toward Puma. “Winner goes free?”
Smoke removed belt and holsters, took a pair of padded black gloves out of his pants, and began to pull them on. “Puma, if this loudmouth beats me, take his left ear as a souvenir and let him go.”
Puma grunted and spat on the ground. “How ’bout I take his topknot instead?”
“Wait a minute . . .” began Lightning Jack, until Puma jacked back the hammers on his shotgun, shutting his mouth for now.
Smoke stepped into the middle of a level area at the top of the plateau. He bowed slightly and said, “Let’s dance!”
Lightning Jack worked his shoulders, loosening up. “Any rules?”
Justice of the Mountain Man Page 19