Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
EPILOGUE
USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR
THE TRAILSMAN
CARDS ON THE TABLE—READ ’EM AND WEEP
There were few men in the West that Nathan Stone would trust enough to speak his heart and mind to, and know he’d get the honest truth in return, without frills or fancy talk. Texas Ranger Captain Sage Jennings was one of them. This grizzled veteran of a hundred battles against outlaws, and countless brushes with death, knew the score and shot straight.
“There’s no end to it, Cap,” Nathan told him. “One damn fool after another, they pull their guns, and I have to shoot them to keep them from shooting me. Hell, I’m ready to stop the world and get off. How do I escape this reputation I don’t want, never wanted?”
“You don’t,” Jennings said. “This is the killing season, and the only law is a fast gun. You, my friend, are living under a blessing and a curse. The blessing is your fast gun that’s keeping you alive. The downside is the curse—your name and fame.”
It was a hell of a hand that Nathan Stone had to play ... a lone hand ... a gun hand ... with both hands trained to draw like lightning and shoot like the angel of death ... and a long trail winding through the most breathtakingly beautiful, superbly free, and savagely lawless wilderness on earth. With danger at every twist and turn and no end in sight....
SIGNET
Published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
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First published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Printing, June
Copyright @ Ralph Compton, 1996
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This work is respectfully dedicated to Loretto Academy of Our Lady of Light—home of Loretto Chapel—in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Special Thanks To
John Ed Willoughby, a Birmingham, Alabama, radio personality, who first told me about Loretto Chapel and “The Inexplicable Stairs.”
Richard Lindsley, of Loretto Chapel, who was kind enough to send me the story in its entirety. Mr. Lindsley took the time to supply me with the names of all those at Loretto at the time the famous spiral stairs were built. With the exception of Nathan Stone, all the persons referred to are authentic.
Rev. Hugh Feiss, OSB, library director/archivist, Mount Angel Abbey Library, St. Benedict, Oregon. The Rev. Feiss granted me the use of “The Inexplicable Stairs,” which is copyrighted material.
PROLOGUE
Newton, Texas. March 5, 1873
Astride a grulla and leading a packhorse, Nathan Stone rode in a little more than an hour before sundown. His hound, Cotton Blossom, trotted alongside. The procession passed several saloons, and that alone was enough to draw attention. Few men just off a long trail would pass up the first saloon, and it was enough of a curiosity to tempt some of the patrons away from the bar to have a look. Seemingly unaware of the spectators, Nathan reined up before the mercantile. Dismounting, he looped the reins of the grulla and the lead rope of the packhorse around the hitch rail. He then paused, as though allowing the men from the saloons an opportunity to size him up before he entered the store. While he didn’t wish to be recognized, he dared not seem fearful.
Just a few weeks past his twenty-sixth birthday, his dark hair was well laced with gray. A dusty gray Stetson was tilted over his cold blue eyes. His polished black boots with pointed toes and undershot heels would have been the envy of any cowboy, but the buscadero belt with its pair of tied-down Colts said this hombre didn’t earn his bacon and beans wrassling cows. His trousers were black with pin-stripes, while his shirt was almost the gray of his Stetson. There was but little to liken him to a man of the range except the red bandanna around his neck and the unmistakable effect of sun and wind on his hands and face. A long sheepskin coat tied behind the cantle of his saddle suggested he might have come from the high country. Stone entered the mercantile, and without command, the dog remained with the horses.
Nathan Stone preferred larger towns where he was less likely to be recognized, stopping only in the villages to replenish his supplies or to buy needed grain for his horses. When he left the mercantile, he purposely carried only a sack of grain under his left arm, for it was a situation he had come to expect. Men from the saloons had congregated across the dusty street, and one of them stepped forward. His right thumb was hooked under the butt of his Colt. He wasn’t drunk, but he’d had enough to respond to the taunts of his comrades. He spoke.
“Ain’t you Nathan Stone, the killer?”
; “I am Nathan Stone,” Nathan said coldly.
“Well, I’m Vern Tilton, an’ I think I can take you. Draw.”
“Tilton,” said Nathan, just as he had tried in vain to reason with other foolish challengers. “I have no argument with you and I have no reason to draw. Now back off.”
“By God, Vern,” one of the onlookers shouted, “he’s scairt of you.”
“Damn you,” Tilton bawled, “you ain’t a-gonna cheat me out of provin’ I’m faster’n you. Pull your iron.”
He emphasized his angry words by jerking out his Colt. He was clumsy, painfully slow, and Nathan waited until the last possible second. He finally drew his right-hand Colt as Tilton was raising his weapon to fire. Tilton’s Colt roared, blasting lead into the ground, as Nathan’s slug ripped into his right shoulder. Tilton stumbled back and would have fallen, if one of his companions hadn’t caught him.
“Take him,” Nathan said quietly, “and get the hell out of here. I could have killed him. I had every right, and next time, I will.”
They backed away but they didn’t leave, for though it was nothing more than a village, there was a sheriff, and he arrived on the run. Taking just one look at the bleeding, swearing Tilton, he turned on Nathan.
“I’m Howard Esty, sheriff of this county. Now you shuck them guns.”
“No,” said Nathan. “I only defended myself, and any man that disputes me is lying.”
“Speak up, damn it,” Esty said, turning his attention to the townsmen who had begun edging away. “Who started this?”
“Vern pulled iron first,” one of his companions said grudgingly.
“Then take him to the doc and git him patched up,” said Esty. “And you,” he said, pointing to the injured Vern, “be thankin’ your lucky stars you’re still alive.”
They drifted away, some of them casting sour looks at Nathan and Esty. The sheriff was showing his years, gray hair poking through a hole in the crown of his Stetson. He was lean, his hands, face, and neck as leathery and weather-beaten as an old saddle. When Vern and his disgruntled friends were well beyond hearing, he spoke.
“There’ll be no charges, an’ I’m thankin’ you for not saltin’ Vern down for keeps. You’d of been within your rights. I’d not want you takin’ this personal, but I’d be obliged if you’d finish your business at the store and ride on.”
“I aim to,” Nathan said.
He loaded the sack of grain on the packhorse, and returning to the store, brought out the rest of his purchases. He tied the neck of the sack, divided its weight behind his saddle, mounted, and rode out. Sheriff Esty watched him out of sight, sighing with relief. Nathan rode warily, for he didn’t know where the bunch had gone who had prodded Vern Tilton into drawing. It was a town he wished to leave behind, and Cotton Blossom felt the same, for he had forged on ahead. Nathan rode a good ten miles before finding a decent place to make camp for the night. There was water from a seep that had pooled at the foot of a ridge, concealed by a heavy growth of willows. First Nathan unsaddled his grulla and unloaded the packhorse, allowing the weary animals to roll. He then quickly gathered wood, knowing it would be dark before he could boil coffee and broil his bacon, but he needed the food and hot coffee. Whatever the reason, a fire after dark—in Comanche country—could be the death of a man. Nathan chose a low place in the ground, kept the blaze small, and doused it when the coffee was hot and his rashers of bacon ready. He shared the bacon with Cotton Blossom and drank the coffee from the pot. There was little else to do except turn in for the night, so Nathan rolled in his blankets, his head on his saddle, a Colt near to his hand. He could count on Cotton Blossom alerting him to any approaching danger, but weary as he was, sleep wouldn’t come. His mind drifted back to the afternoon shooting, to Vern Tilton, and he recalled something Wild Bill Hickok had once told him.
“When a man pulls a gun on you, always shoot to kill. Let him live, and the first chance he gets, he’ll show his gratitude by shootin’ you in the back.”
“Bill was right, Cotton Blossom,” Nathan said. “Even if he fails to bushwhack me, he can always claim that my hand wasn’t steady or that I was afraid of him ...”
As he had done so often, Nathan allowed his mind to wander back over the years, to that bleak day in January 1866. Ragged, hungry, afoot, he had returned to his fire-ravaged home near Charlottesville, Virginia, following two long years in Libby Prison in Richmond. Old Malachi, an aged Negro, had lived long enough to describe and name the seven renegades who had murdered Nathan’s mother, father, and sister. Swearing a vow of vengeance on his father’s grave, Nathan had taken the trail of the killers, following it west. His constant companion had been Cotton Blossom, the only living reminder of a past that had been lost to him forever. Reaching St. Louis, Nathan had become involved with young Molly Tremayne, only to lose her when he had again taken up the vengeance trail. While he had never gotten over Molly, he had never tried to reclaim her, for their parting had been bitter. So he had never learned that pretty Molly had died less than a year after his leaving, having given birth to his son....
In a little Missouri town, Nathan had found and had killed the first of the seven men on his death list. In Waco, Texas, dealing faro, he had found himself in an uncomfortable position when the three unwed daughters of the saloon owner had set out to trap him. He had escaped, only to find himself pursued by Eulie, the eldest of the trio. Unable to rid himself of her, he had made the best of it. Eulie had dressed as a man, had called herself Eli, and had proven her ability to ride, rope, and shoot. Nathan’s manhunt had led him to New Orleans, and there Eulie had so impressed Barnaby McQueen with her horse savvy that McQueen had persuaded her to remain at his ranch, gentling a horse. Nathan had begun spending his time in New Orleans saloons, seeking some word of the men on his death list.
On a New Orleans street, Nathan had gone to the aid of a stranger, and as a result, had gunned down two killers employed by Hargis Gavin, owner of a New Orleans gambling empire. Byron Silver, the stranger whom Nathan had befriended, had been associated with French Stumberg, owner of his own gambling houses and archenemy of Gavin. Stumberg, from what Nathan had learned, harbored two of the killers on Nathan’s death list, so when Byron Silver had persuaded Stumberg to hire Nathan, Nathan had taken the job. But Nathan quickly learned three things. The first and most disturbing had been Stumberg’s involvement in white slavery, the selling of young women in Mexico. Second, Nathan had found Stumberg intended to win a horse race—a race in which Eulie was determined to ride a McQueen horse—by ambushing certain riders. Finally, Nathan had learned Byron Silver was an undercover agent from Washington, seeking to trap French Stumberg. The day of the horse race, Eulie had been shot out of the saddle and had died. Byron Silver had been wounded, leaving only Nathan to prevent the escape of Stumberg and his killers, and Nathan had accomplished that by blowing up Stumberg’s steamboat, with the gambler and his killers aboard.
Nathan had left New Orleans, having learned that one of the killers he had believed was with Stumberg was riding with the notorious Cullen Baker. Baker and his gang had been reported in Arkansas, and Nathan had ridden to Fort Smith. Offered the badge of a deputy U.S. marshal, Nathan had accepted it, awaiting Baker’s next foray into Arkansas. Eventually he had confronted the Baker gang, killing two of the outlaws. One of them was a killer from Nathan’s death list.
Returning to Texas, five men still to be found, Nathan had paused in Lexington, where he had become friends with Viola Hayden and her father, Jesse. Viola had been set to ride Daybreak, her big gray, in a race with odds against him of twenty-to-one. On impulse, Nathan had bet five hundred dollars on the horse, but after collecting his winnings—ten thousand dollars-had been forced to shoot his way out of an ambush. While in Lexington, Nathan had met Texas Ranger Captain Sage Jennings. From the ranger, Nathan had learned that two of the killers he sought had left Texas, apparently bound for Indian Territory. Following, Nathan had gunned one of the men down, taking from him a young girl, Lacy Mayfi
eld. From Lacy Nathan had learned that the man he had killed had been on his way to Colorado. Nathan, taking the girl with him, had ridden to Colorado. Reaching Denver, he found that the killers he sought had ridden south to Ciudad de Oro, a mining town. Leaving Lacy at a Denver boardinghouse, Nathan had ridden south, finding and gunning down one of the killers on his death list. There, however, Nathan had been given a false lead that had taken him to Austin, Texas, while the killer he sought had gone to Fort Dodge and eventually to Denver.
Reaching Austin, Nathan had found Viola Hayden working in a saloon, destitute, her father dead at the hands of the man who had lost ten thousand dollars to Nathan just a few months before. Despite Nathan’s efforts to save the girl, she had shot the man who she believed had killed her father and had then shot herself. Returning to Colorado, Nathan had found Lacy Mayfield involved with the owner of a saloon, a man Nathan had learned was one of the killers on his death list. In the fight that followed, Lacy had been gunned down by the outlaw when she had come between him and Nathan’s gun. Thus it had been a bitter victory, the killing of this fifth man, for he had taken Lacy with him. While in Denver, Nathan had become friends with Wild Bill Hickok, and when Hickok had ridden east to Hays, Kansas, Nathan had ridden with him. Nathan had spent a few days with Hickok, until he had been elected sheriff. Nathan had then ridden to Kansas City, uncertain as to how and where he would find the last two men on his death list.
In a Kansas City newspaper, Nathan had seen a reward dodger that had been widely circulated by the Pinkertons on Frank and Jesse James. Among the names of men who had ridden with the infamous outlaws, Nathan had found the name of one of the killers he sought. Following a bank robbery by the James gang, Nathan had found the hideout of the outlaws and had led a sheriffs posse to it. While Frank and Jesse had escaped, Nathan had confronted the man he had sworn to kill and had forced a shootout. At loose ends, not knowing where he might find the seventh man, Nathan answered an advertisement in a Kansas City newspaper and took a position with the Kansas-Pacific Railroad between Kansas City and Hays. It had been his duty to repair telephone lines torn down by Indians or outlaws and to warn train crews of damaged track. After serving with distinction for a few months, Nathan had resigned because he had seen nor heard nothing of the seventh and last man he had sworn to kill. Riding south into Indian Territory, he had been taken prisoner by the ruthless El Gato and his band of thieves and killers.
The Killing Season Page 1