The Loner: Trail Of Blood

by J. A. Johnstone

  Flame spouted from the muzzle of Mundy’s gun. The Kid fired at the same time. He felt the wind-rip of Mundy’s slug as it sizzled through the air next to his ear. Mundy staggered. His gun hand drooped. When he tried to bring it back up, The Kid shot him again.

  Mundy folded up. His face hit the platform, but he was past feeling it.

  That left Elam. The Kid expected him to surrender, but was surprised when the man pulled a pistol from under his coat and started firing as he broke into a run toward the far end of the platform. The Kid squeezed off a shot that clipped Elam’s thigh. Dropping the carpetbag and the gun, he flung his arms in the air, and cried out in pain as he fell. He clutched at his wounded leg and rolled over.

  The Kid leaped forward, calling, “Elam, look out—”

  Elam rolled right off the edge of the platform and landed across the tracks as the train rumbled into the station. The Kid heard him scream, even over all the racket, but the scream didn’t last long before it was cut short.

  Arturo and Tom Kellogg burst through the doors from the depot lobby, followed by several more townsmen. Kellogg said, “Mr. Morgan! I know you told us to wait, but we had to find out what happened.”

  “You got your town back, that’s what happened,” The Kid said as he started to reload the Colt.

  Since the orphanage was shot full of holes, Theresa moved into a suite at the Elam Hotel … or as it would soon be known, the Powderhorn Hotel, which was its original name. She would stay there until the damage done to her house could be repaired. The children would stay with the various families that had taken them in. The Kid figured there was a good chance some of them wouldn’t want to give up the kids when the time came and would welcome them permanently into their homes. He hoped that was the way it turned out.

  The next morning, Theresa and Tom Kellogg had breakfast with The Kid and Arturo in Theresa’s suite. She said, “I’m not sure how I’m going to pay for all this.”

  “It’s taken care of,” The Kid assured her. “Just like the repairs to your house will be.”

  “What about all the property Elam owned?” Kellogg asked. “He bought most of it legally, even though the sales were forced on the previous owners by threatening their lives.”

  The Kid sipped his coffee. “I’ve already got my lawyers working on that. They’ll straighten it all out and figure out who should own what. Eventually things will settle back down.”

  Theresa looked at him and shook her head. “You have all these lawyers working for you and a seemingly limitless amount of money. Who are you, Kid Morgan?”

  He smiled. “Well … I suppose I can trust a preacher and a lady who runs an orphanage. My real name is Conrad Browning. I’d appreciate it if you’d keep that to yourselves, though.”

  Kellogg frowned, still baffled, but Theresa looked surprised. “Browning,” she repeated. “I know that name, from when my husband worked for the railroad. Someone named Browning owned part of the railroad.”

  “My mother,” The Kid said. “Now I do.”

  The minister leaned forward in his chair. “Then what are you doing going around like a … a …”

  “Gunfighter?” The Kid asked with a smile. “Sometimes it takes us a long time to find out who we really are. I suppose maybe I’m still learning.”

  “But that story about the two missing children,” Theresa said. “That was true?”

  “Every word of it.”

  She reached across the table and rested her hand on his for a moment. “Then I’m sorry you haven’t found them. You’re going to keep looking?”

  “Of course.” The Kid drank the rest of his coffee. “In fact, we’ve already replenished our supplies, the team is hitched up to the buckboard, and my horse is saddled. Arturo and I are ready to go.”

  “And even though you have a lovely town,” Arturo said, “I won’t be sad to leave.”

  Kellogg laughed. “I don’t blame you. But we’ll be sorry to see you go, after everything the two of you have done for us and everybody else in Powderhorn. You saved the settlement in more ways than one.”

  Theresa added, “I don’t know how we can ever repay you.”

  “Just keeping making it a good place to live,” The Kid said. “That’ll be payment enough.”

  A short time later, they stood on the hotel porch and waved farewell as the rider and the buckboard left Powderhorn, heading west again. Kellogg reached over and took Theresa’s right hand in his left as they continued to wave.

  “Do you think he’ll ever find them?” Theresa asked.

  “I know he will,” Kellogg said. “No matter how long it takes. And when he does, God willing, Kid Morgan won’t be alone anymore.”

  Turn the page for an exciting preview of

  MATT JENSEN, THE LAST

  MOUNTAIN MAN:

  DAKOTA AMBUSH

  by

  William Johnstone

  with J. A. Johnstone

  Coming in February 2011

  Wherever Pinnacle Books are sold.

  Chapter 1

  When Matt Jensen rode into Swan, Wyoming, few who knew him would have recognized him. He had a heavy beard, his hair was uncommonly long, and he looked every bit the part of a man who had not been under a roof for two months. He had said good-bye to Smoke Jensen in Fort Collins, Colorado, arranging to meet him in Swan eight weeks later. Not since then had Matt seen civilization, having spent the entire two months in the mountains prospecting for gold.

  The success of Matt’s two months of isolation was manifested by a canvas bag he had hanging from the saddle horn. The bag was full of color-showing ore. Prospecting wasn’t new to Matt. He had learned the trade under the tutelage of his mentor, Smoke Jensen, so he knew the color in the ore was genuine. But exactly how successful he had been would depend upon the assayer’s report.

  Swan was a fly-blown little settlement, not served by any railroad, though there was stagecoach service to Rawlings where one could connect with the Union Pacific. The town had a single street that was lined on both sides by unpainted, rip-sawed, false-fronted buildings. It could have been any of several hundred towns in a dozen western states. As Matt rode down the street, a couple of scantily dressed soiled doves stood on a balcony and called down to him.

  “Hey, cowboy, you’re new to town, ain’t you?” one of them shouted.

  “You gotta be new ’cause I don’t know you,” the other one added. “And I reckon I know just about ever’ man in town if you get my drift,” she added in a ribald tone of voice.

  Matt smiled, nodded, and touched the brim of his hat by way of returning their greeting.

  “Come on up and keep us company. We’ll give you a good welcome,” the first one shouted down to him.

  “Ladies, until I get a bath, I’m not even fit company for my horse,” Matt called up to the two women as he rode underneath the overhanging balcony where the two women were standing.

  The second soiled dove pinched her nose and, exaggerating, made a waving motion with her hand. “Oh, honey, you’ve got that right,” she teased.

  Laughing, Matt rode on down the street until he reached a small building at the far end. A sign in front of the building read, J.A. MONTGOMERY, ASSAYER.

  Matt swung down from his saddle and tied his horse at the hitching rail. Hefting the canvas bag over one shoulder, he stepped inside where he was greeted by a small, thin man.

  “Can I help you?” the little man asked.

  “Are you the assayer?”

  “I am.”

  Matt set the canvas bag on the counter, then took out a handful of rocks and laid them alongside the bag.

  “I need you to take a look at this,” Matt said.

  Montgomery chuckled. “You want me to tell you if it is gold or pyrite, right?”

  “No, mister,” Matt said. “I know it’s gold. What I want you to do is tell me how much money all this is worth.”

  The assayer picked up a couple of rocks and looked at them casually, before putting them back down. Th
en, taking a second look at one of them, he picked it up again, and he examined it through a magnifying glass.

  “What do you think?” Matt asked.

  “You’re right,” Montgomery said. “It is gold.”

  “You have any idea as to the value?”

  “Do all the rocks have this much color?”

  “I wouldn’t have bothered carrying them in if they didn’t,” Matt replied.

  “Well, then I would say you have two or three hundred dollars here. In fact, I’ll give you three hundred dollars for the entire bag, right now.”

  Matt put the rocks back in the bag. “Would you now?”

  “In cash,” Montgomery said.

  “You always cheat your customers like that?” Matt asked.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “What I have here is worth two thousand dollars if it is worth a cent,” he said. “Thank you, Mr. Montgomery, but I believe I’ll take my business somewhere else.”

  “I’m the only assayer in town.”

  “Perhaps. But Swan isn’t the only town,” Matt said as he left the office.

  Up the street from the assayer’s office Matt saw a sign that read HAIRCUTS, SHAVES, BATHS.

  “Tell you what, Spirit, you’ve had to put up with my stink long enough,” Matt said, speaking to his horse. “I think I’ll get myself cleaned up before I go looking for Smoke.”

  Dismounting in front of the building, Matt lifted his bag of ore from the horse, then went inside. Fifteen minutes later he was sitting in a tub of warm water, scrubbing himself with a big piece of lye soap.

  “Don’t know if there is enough lye soap in all of Wyoming to get that carcass clean,” a voice teased.

  “Smoke!” Matt said, a big smile spreading across his face. He started to stand.

  “No, no need to stand,” Smoke said, holding his hand out, palm forward, to stop him. “You think I want to see that?”

  Matt laughed. “How did you know I was in here?”

  “We did say we were going to meet in Swan today, didn’t we?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I saw Spirit tied up out front. Did you think I wouldn’t recognize him? He used to be my horse, remember?”

  “I remember,” Matt said.

  “How did you do?” Smoke asked.

  “See that bag there? It’s full of ore. At least two thousand dollars worth, I would guess.”

  Smoke whistled. “That is good,” he said.

  “Tell you what, I’ll be finished here in a bit. What do you say we go get us a beer? I haven’t had a beer in two months.”

  “Sounds good to me. I’ll go get us a table, and I’ll even let you buy the beer, seein’ as you had such a good outing,” Smoke said.

  A few minutes after Smoke left, Matt was out of the tub, had his shirt and trousers on, and had just strapped on his gun belt when three men burst, unexpectedly, into the room. All three had pistols in their hands.

  “We’ll take that bag of ore, mister,” one of them shouted.

  “Who are you?” Matt asked.

  “We’re the folks you’re goin’ to give that bag of ore to,” one of the three said, and they all laughed.

  While the three men were laughing, Matt was drawing his pistol, and while they were reacting to him drawing his pistol, Matt was shooting.

  The pistol shots sounded exceptionally loud in the closed room as Matt and the three men exchanged gunfire. When the shooting stopped Matt had not a scratch, but the three would-be robbers lay dead on the floor.

  Matt was examining the bodies when four more men came bursting into the room. Three of them were carrying sawed-off shotguns. They were also wearing badges.

  The fourth man with them was the assayer.

  “There he is, Sheriff! He is the one who stole the bag of ore!” Montgomery shouted, pointing at Matt.

  “What?” Matt asked. “What are you talking about? I didn’t steal any ore from you!”

  “He come into the office a little while ago,” Montgomery said. “He had a bag of worthless rocks, usin’ it as a way o’ getting my attention. While I was looking at his rocks, he stole a bag of genuine ore. I didn’t have no choice but to send my brother and two cousins to get the ore back. Didn’t know it would come to this, though.”

  Montgomery looked down at the three dead bodies, then shook his head sadly. “If I had known they was goin’ to be murdered like this, I never woulda sent ’em over here. A bag plumb full of gold nuggets isn’t worth getting three good men killed.”

  “Come along, mister,” the sheriff said, waving his shotgun menacingly at Matt. “You are about to learn that folks don’t come into my town to steal and murder and get away with it.”

  “Sheriff, this man is lying,” Matt said. “I brought some ore in for him to assay. He tried to cheat me out of it so I told him I would go somewhere else. You think I would stop to take a bath if I stole anything in this town?”

  “I don’t know what you would do, mister,” the sheriff said. “But the thing is, I know Montgomery and I don’t know you. So I reckon we’ll let the judge sort it all out.”

  Matt looked at the three shotguns leveled at him. He was holding a pistol and he had a notion, but declined. He might be able to kill the sheriff and both his deputies before they realized what was happening, but then, he might not, either. They were carrying shotguns, which gave them an advantage. It would also mean killing innocent men and he couldn’t bring himself to do that.

  Matt turned the pistol around and handed it, handle first, to the sheriff.

  “You are making a mistake, Sheriff,” Matt said.

  “You let me worry about that.”

  Montgomery reached for the sack of gold ore.

  “Leave it,” the sheriff said.

  “Why should I leave it, Sheriff? This is the selfsame sack of ore he stole.”

  “Leave it,” the sheriff said again. “We’ll let the judge decide whether or not that gold ore is yours.”

  Montgomery glared at the sheriff, then looked over at Matt. “I’ll be standin’ in the crowd, watch-in’ you hang,” Montgomery said.

  “Let’s go, mister,” the sheriff said to Matt with a wave of his shotgun. “I got a nice jail cell for you until the judge gets here.”

  Matt had been in jail for three days awaiting the arrival of the circuit judge so he could be tried. Smoke sat outside his cell visiting with him.

  “I shouldn’t have left you,” Smoke said.

  “Why not? If you had stayed, you would be in jail with me right now,” Matt said. “What good would that do?”

  “I guess you have a point. I couldn’t help you any if I were in there with you. At least, by being out here, if you can’t convince the judge you are innocent, I’ll take matters into my own hands. I’ll get you out of here, no matter what I have to do.”

  Matt was about to answer when he looked up to see the sheriff coming into the jailhouse, leading Montgomery. Montgomery was in shackles.

  “What is it?” Matt asked. “What is going on?”

  “You’re free to go,” the sheriff said as he opened the door to the cell. “Mr. Montgomery here will be taking your place.”

  “Sheriff, I have to hand it to you for doing your job,” Matt said. “You’ve had a good three days of investigating.”

  “It wasn’t me,” the sheriff said. “It was John Bryce.”

  “Who?”

  “John Bryce,” the sheriff repeated. “Mr. Bryce is a newspaper writer for the Swan Journal, and he has been doing some, he calls it, investigative journalism. Here, read this,” he said, handing Matt a newspaper.

  An Innocent Man in Jail!

  J. A. MONTGOMERY A CROOK

  SHOULD BE CALLED TO ACCOUNT

  We are under obligation to report to the public in general and to Sheriff Daniels in particular, the criminal activities of J. A. Montgomery who has set himself up in Swan as an assayer. Montgomery is no such thing. Although he has hanging on the wall of his office a degree fr
om Colorado School of Mines, this newspaper is in receipt of a letter from that institution claiming that no such person as J. A. Montgomery graduated, nor was ever a student there.

  Further investigation has disclosed that Montgomery is wanted by the sheriff of Madison County, Montana where, also fraudulently passing himself off as an assayer, he murdered and robbed a prospector. The circumstances of that event are so similar to the recent event between J. A. Montgomery, his brother Clyde, two cousins, Drake and Birch, and a recent visitor to our town, Matt Jensen, that this newspaper believes Mr. Jensen, who is currently incarcerated, is innocent.

  Should Matt Jensen be any longer detained, it would be a gross miscarriage of justice. Subjecting the county to a trial to establish his innocence would be a waste of time and taxpayers’ money. The writer of this piece, John Bryce, is willing to stake his reputation upon the accuracy of this report, and urges Sheriff Daniels to act quickly to correct this error.

  “After the paper come out I sent a telegram to the sheriff of Madison County, Montana, and he answered that Montgomery was wanted for murder, just like the newspaper article said. I went over to talk to Montgomery and found that he was tryin’ to leave town.”

  “So I am free to go?” Matt asked.

  “Yes, sir, you are free as a bird.”

  “Is this fella, John Bryce in town?” Matt asked.

  “Yes, sir, he’s over at the newspaper office right now,” Sheriff Daniels said.

  “I think I’ll go look him up.”

  “Do you own this paper?” Matt asked when he and Smoke found John Bryce hard at work in the newspaper office.

  “Oh, heaven’s no. It takes a lot of money to own and operate your own newspaper,” John said. “I just work here for Mr. Peabody as one of his journalists. Someday I expect to own my own paper, though,” he said.

  Matt, who had had the ore returned to him, reached down into his canvas bag and pulled out four pretty good sized rocks. “Here,” Matt said, handing the rocks to the newspaper man. “Cash these in and you may have your paper sooner than you realize. If there is ever anything I can do for you, just let me know.”