by JR Roberts
He went back up the hill, where the man was still lying at the crest, watching. He decided to approach him and hope he wouldn’t do anything stupid. They wanted to talk to him, not kill him.
He thought of several ways to start, then decided to go with, “”Just lie still and don’t move!”
Thirty-Two
The man froze, then slowly began to reach out for his rifle.
“Not a good idea,” Clint said. “Don’t touch the rifle or the gun on your hip.”
“What’s this about?”
“Just lie very still,” Clint said. “I’m going to come closer and take your guns and then we’re going to talk. But if you try anything, I’ll have to kill you. Understand?”
“Yeah, I understand.”
Clint moved up closer to the man, leaned over to pick up the rifle, then plucked the man’s pistol from his gunbelt and backed away.
“All right,” he said, “you can turn over, even sit up, if you want.”
Slowly, the man did both. He looked to be in his late twenties or so, a pleasant enough face that was now drawn into worry lines.
“What’s this about?”
“It’s about you,” Clint said, “watching that house down there.”
“I’m not—”
“No point lying about it,” Clint said. “What else would you be doing up here?”
“Well, I saw the house yesterday,” the man said, “and I saw some pretty girls. So I camped nearby, then came up here this mornin’ to have another look.”
“Is that a fact?” Clint asked. “Where’s your camp?”
“Not far,” the man said.
“Maybe we should go and have a look at it, then,” Clint said. “Or you could just tell me what you’re really doing here.”
“I—I don’t know what you mean.”
“I think you’re here watching the house for Frank Lomax,” Clint said.
“What? I don’t even know—w-who’s Frank Lomax?”
“Your boss, that’s who.”
“My boss? Mister, I think you got the wrong guy. I just wanted to look at some pretty girls.”
“Well then,” Clint said, “why don’t we go down to the house so you can get a closer look.”
“What? Down there?”
“Sure,” Clint said. “That is, after you show me your camp. Can we walk?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“Let’s go.” He covered the man with his own gun, holding the rifle in his left.
The man stood up and they started walking toward to the horse.
“Stop there.”
The man stopped. Clint slid the rifle into the scabbard on the saddle.
“All right, show me your camp.”
“It’s that way,” the man pointed.
“Lead the way.”
~*~
They walked for half an hour. Each time the man thought he’d found the camp, it turned out to be the wrong place.
“All right,” Clint said, “that’s enough.”
“No,” the younger man said, “it’s there—”
“There’s no camp,” Clint said. “You’ve been lying. So why don’t you just tell me about Lomax.”
“Lomax again?” the man said. “I told you, I don’t know—”
“Yeah, you do,” Clint said. “What’s your name?”
“Pierce.”
“Well, Mr. Pierce, you have two choices,” Clint said. “Tell me about Lomax and his gang, and I’ll let you go.”
“Or?”
“I’ll take you down to the house to see the women.”
Pierce smirked.
“That’s a threat?”
“It should be,” Clint said, “considering they killed all three of Frank Lomax’s brothers. What do you think they’ll do to you?”
Pierce frowned.
“You’re jokin’.”
“No, I’m not.”
Pierce did some quick thinking.
“If I talk, you’ll let me go?”
“I will.”
“You swear?”
“You have my word.”
“You—you’re the Gunsmith, right?”
“That’s right.”
He did some more thinking.
“Okay,” he said, “whataya wanna know?”
~*~
Clint came to the back of the house, saw Belinda feeding the chickens. She spotted him and ran over.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.”
“Did you find out anything?”
“I did,” he said. “Let’s go inside so I can tell you all at the same time.”
Thirty-Three
Loretta and Teresa were both in the kitchen as they entered. Loretta was peeling potatoes, and Teresa was washing her hands, probably having just come in from her outside chores.
“Good, you’re all here,” he said.
“You’re all right?” Teresa asked.
“I’m fine.”
“Were we bein’ watched?” Loretta asked, wiping her hands on her apron.
“Oh yeah, we were. I found a man up on the bluff. I got the drop on him and he told me a few things.”
“Just like that?” Loretta asked.
“No,” Clint said, “not just like that. It took some convincing, but I threatened him with you three.”
“Us?” Belinda asked.
“I told him if you killed Lomax’s brothers, what did he think you’d do to him.”
Belinda giggled and said, “He was afraid of us?”
“Oh yeah,” Clint said. “he talked.”
“What did he say?”
“Lomax has over twenty men,” Clint said.
“Oh God,” Teresa said.
“They’re in a camp not far from here, where there’s an old line shack that Lomax is using.”
“I know where that is,” Loretta said.
“Good, because I want to ride over there and take a look.”
“I can show you.”
“You can just tell me where it is.”
“It ain’t easy to find, which is probably why he’s usin’ it,” she said. “It’ll be better if I show you.”
“All right,” Clint said, rather than argue with her.
“Where’s the man you caught?” Teresa asked.
“He’s tied up in the barn,” Clint said. “I considered letting him go, but then I thought instead of riding off, he might go back to Lomax, tell him what happened and hope he didn’t kill him.”
“That’d be stupid,” Belinda said.
“I know,” Clint said. “I told him I’d let him go if he left the county, but he just didn’t agree fast enough.”
“So what are we supposed to do with him?” Loretta asked.
“Nothing,” Clint said. “We’ll just hold him for a while.”
“How long is a while?” Loretta asked.
“Not long,” Clint said, “he’s due to be relieved in a couple of hours.”
“They’ll see he’s gone,” Belinda said.
“Right.”
“You should’ve killed him.”
“You’re probably right, but I didn’t, so we have to move before that happens,” Clint said.
“I’ll get my horse,” Loretta said.
“Don’t talk to the man in the barn,” Clint told her.
“I won’t.”
“And don’t kill him!” he shouted as she went out the door.
~*~
Clint instructed Teresa and Belinda to stay inside until he and Loretta returned, then went to the barn to saddle Eclipse. He heard voices as he approached, then realized it was only one voice, Pierce’s.
“ ... let me go and I guarantee I can keep you safe from Lomax,” he was saying. “You just have to cut me free.”
As Clint entered, Loretta was not even looking at the man.
“You can save your breath, Lomax,” he said. “You’re not going to convince her to help you.”
Lomax glared at Clint.
> “You can’t keep me here! I’ll stave.”
“You won’t be here that long,” Clint said. “When they come to relieve you and see you’re not there, they’ll realize they have to move.”
“And then you’ll all be dead,” Pierce said.
“That should suit you,” Clint said, saddling Eclipse. “That is, unless they start by burning the barn.”
“What?”
“Yeah,” Clint said, “they might decide just to burn the place down. Usually when somebody does that they start with the barn.”
“T-then you can’t leave me in here!” Pierce said, his face going pale.
“Don’t worry,” Clint said, as he and Loretta led their horses out of the barn. “The smoke will probably kill you before the flames get to you.”
“Hey!”
~*~
Belinda and Teresa watched from the window as Clint and Loretta came out of the barn with their horses.
“Teresa?” Belinda said.
“Yeah?”
“What’re we gonna do if they don’t come back?”
“Don’t worry, Belinda,” Teresa said, with more confidence than she was feeling, “they’ll be back.”
~*~
Outside, as they mounted up, Loretta said, “Do you really think Frank will burn us out?”
“Probably not,” Clint said. “If he was that type, he would have burned the town to the ground.”
Thirty-Four
Clint quickly saw what Loretta meant when she said the line shack would be hard to find. There were a couple of times he saw that he would have taken a trail only to end in a box canyon. Before long, though, she held up her hand for them to stop.
“It’ll be just up ahead,” she said, keeping her voice low.
“Okay,” Clint said. “You wait here with the horses—”
“I want to come with you!” she said. “I have this and I can use it.” She took her pistol from the back of her belt.
Clint looked at her intently, wanting to get his point home the first time.
“I need you here with the horses, to keep them quiet. Also I don’t know how experienced you are moving through the brush quietly. One false move, snapping a dry branch beneath your foot, and we’ve had it. Okay?”
Grudgingly, she said, “Okay.”
“But keep that gun handy,” he said. “You might have to use it, if only to signal me.”
“Right.”
“And if you hear shots,” he added, “get back to the house as fast as you can.”
“But you—”
“I’ll be in trouble,” he said. “Remember, if you hear shots, don’t wait.”
He dismounted and began moving through the brush in the direction she’d indicated.
~*~
As he continued to move forward he started to hear voices—a lot of them. They were men, and they weren’t being careful to keep their voices down. It sounded like men trading barbs at a campfire. When he came within sight of the camp he saw that it was a lot of men trading barbs at many campfires.
He found a good spot from where to watch, saw that the fires pretty much formed a line leading up to the line shack at the end of the camp.
There were a few women moving about and by the way the men grabbed at them Clint knew they were working women, only in camp for the pleasures of the men. He tried counting men, but he couldn’t be sure how many were in the shack, how many were off gathering firewood, or getting water, or even hunting. But he could pretty much make out that Pierce hadn’t lied to him. There were easily twenty men in the camp.
He and the Perkins women had a big problem.
~*~
“When he got back to Loretta she almost shot him.
“You scared me!” she complained.
“Sorry,” he said, mounting up. “Come on, we have to let back.”
“What did you see?”
“A camp with a lot of men in it, that’s what I saw!” he said.
“Did you see Frank?” she asked, as they rode away.
“I don’t know,” Clint said. “I don’t know what he looks like. I assume there were some men in the shack.”
“I should have described him to you,” she said. “If you saw him you coulda shot him.”
“And then have twenty men on my ass, no thank you,” he said. “When we get out of this brush I want to double time it back to the house. We won’t have long before they miss Pierce.”
“But what are we gonna do?”
“I’m still thinking about it!”
~*~
When they got back to the house they put their horses back in the barn, once again ignoring Pierce’s pleas to be set free. As they headed for the house he shouted, “At least have somebody bring me some water!”
They mounted the porch and entered through the front door. Belinda and Teresa were right there, eyeing them frantically.
“My God,” Belinda said, “I thought you’d never come back!”
“Settle down,” Loretta said. “Clint’s got somethin’ to tell us.”
They all turned their eyes to him.
“I think we should pack up and leave,” he said.
“What?” Loretta snapped. “That’s your plan?”
“Best one I can come up with on short notice,” Clint said. “That camp has twenty men in it, maybe more. And they’re going to be here in hours.”
“We’re not leavin’ our home!” Loretta said.
“She’s right, Clint,” Teresa said. “We can’t leave. We’ve fought to keep this place. Killed to keep it. We can’t give it up now.”
“Maybe ...” Belinda said.
They all looked at her.
“Maybe he’s right,” she said.
“What?” Loretta said.
“If we stay here we’ll be killed, Loretta!” Belinda said.
“Okay, I tell you what,” Loretta said. “Clint, you go and take Belinda with you. Teresa and me, we’ll stay.”
“I can’t leave you here,” he said.
“We’ve got guns, and we’ve got ... other ways to get men to do what we want.”
“Not these men,” Clint said. “Not Lomax, not after you killed his brothers.”
“He still can’t prove we did it,” Teresa said.
“He doesn’t have to,” Clint said. “There’s no more law around here. “He saw to that.”
“Then if you won’t leave,” Loretta said, “you better come up with another plan, a better plan, and fast!”
Thirty-Five
To start with, Clint had Belinda go out and give Pierce some water.
“Don’t talk with him,” he said, “just give him a drink and come on back.”
With Belinda out of the house Clint said to Loretta and Teresa, “You should at least send her away. Put her on a horse and head her North.”
“She won’t go,” Teresa said. “Not without us.”
“And besides,” Loretta said, “this is all her doing.”
“That’s not fair,” Clint said.
“It’s true and she knows it,” Loretta said. “If she hadn’t killed her husband we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“What was she supposed to do,” Clint asked, “let him rape her?”
“I’m not sayin’ she was wrong,” Loretta replied, “I’m sayin’ she’s responsible. There’s a difference. Believe me, I woulda done the same thing if my man had tried to force me.”
“The point is,” Teresa said, “we’re all stayin’.”
“How many guns do you have in the house?”
“A few,” Loretta said. “We have—”
“Get them!” Clint said. “Bring them all in here.”
Loretta started for another part of the house, and Teresa started up the stairs.
“My rifle is in my room,” Clint said to Teresa. “Get it, too. And there’s a small hand gun in my saddlebags.”
“Got it!” she said.
As Loretta and Teresa were collecting all the guns Belinda came back into the
house.
“I’m going to ask you once to get on a horse and ride out of here,” Clint said. “You could even go for help.”
“Who would help us?” she asked. “The nearest town is twenty miles away. By the time I get there and back it’ll be over. No, I’m not leavin’.”
“Okay,” Clint said, “I just had to ask.”
“What can I do?”
“The girls are gathering all the guns in the house,” Clint said. “We’ll also need all the ammunition.”
“Okay.”
Clint waited, staring out the front window.
~*~
Holby rode to the bluff to relieve Pierce, frowned when the man wasn’t there, and neither was his horse. He dismounted, ascended to the crest of the bluff and looked down. He saw the young sister run back to the house and go inside, but that was it. He didn’t see any other movement down there.
Where the hell was Pierce? And what should he do now?”
~*~
Clint saw the man on the bluff, and now the clock was ticking. How long would it take him to decide to ride back to camp and report on Pierce’s disappearance?
“What is it?” Loretta asked.
“There’s another man up on the bluff.”
“One man?”
He nodded, turning to look at her.
“He’s confused, doesn’t know whether he should look for Pierce, stay there and watch, or go back to camp. He’ll make up his mind soon, though.”
Teresa came down the stairs. Between the two girls they had three handguns, three rifles, and a shotgun. One pistol and rifle were Clint’s.
“Okay, set them all down here,” he said, clearing the table underneath the window.
He examined each weapon, and found them remarkably clean and in perfect working order.
“I’m impressed,” he said to them. “You obviously know how to care for your weapons.”
“We have to,” Loretta said. “We have to defend ourselves.”
“Well, so far you’ve done a fine job,” Clint said. “But this is different.”
“Don’t start again about leaving,” she said. “The walls of this house are solid. We can keep them out.”
“Until you run out of ammo,” Clint said. “And how long would that take?”
Belinda came in carrying two heavy boxes in her arms. Clint ran over and took them from her. He set them down and opened them. There were bullets for every gun they had.