The Shadow of a Noose

by Ralph Compton

  “You bastard,” Danielle cursed him in a whisper, trying to sound like she meant it.

  But Mather winked, seeing that her heart wasn’t in it. “If I’m wrong, may lightning strike me dead on the spot. But there’s some things a beautiful woman just can’t hide. And even if you could, there’s some men you just can’t hide it from.” He then added in an even lower tone, “Don’t worry, Mysterious Dave knows how to keep a secret like nobody’s business. I won’t tell if you won’t.”

  On the bays behind her, Tim and Jed Strange lowered their hat brims and chuckled to themselves. Bill Longley stood to the side with the two horses’ reins hanging from his hand, his mouth agape at what he’d just witnessed. He stared at Dave Mather as Mather walked over nonchalantly and took a set of reins from his hands. “Come on, Bill, thought you was in a hurry to leave,” Mather said as he swung up into the saddle.

  “God almighty, Dave!” Longley said, still staring in disbelief as he struggled into the saddle, taking care not to further aggravate his wound, “What the hell is the matter with you?”

  “Let’s just say I got caught up in the moment.” Dave Mather chuckled, tasting his lips.

  “Caught up in the moment?” Longley said, having to shake his head in order to clear it. “I’ll be dipped and dragged! That’s the damnedest thing I ever saw you do! Am I going to be all right riding with you?”

  Mather looked back at Danielle, who still stood in silence, watching him tap his horse forward. He tipped his dusty hat brim to her, then turned to Bill Longley, saying, “Yeah, Bill, you mud-ugly yard goat . . . you don’t have a thing to worry about.”

  Rufe Gaddis, Saul Delmano, Jack Pitch, Max Dupre, Billy Joe Earls, and Blade Hogue followed Tanner around the last turn along the trail into the encampment. Coming in from the west, where they’d spent the night, they now spread out single file, riding the last quarter of a mile through a narrow rocky pass that opened into a stretch of rolling flatlands. On the other end of the flatland, the top of Lulu’s tent stood visible above a rise of clump grass and scrub cedar. In the distance beyond the encampment a rise of dust stood high, drifting sidelong in the air. It was the plumes of dust that prompted Rufe Gaddis to pull back on his reins and cause his horse to rear slightly as it came to a halt.

  “What is it, Rufe?” Jack Pitch asked, his own horse spinning in place as Pitch reined it down harshly. The other men bunched up behind them.

  “I don’t know,” said Gaddis, “but I sure don’t like the looks of it. The last time I saw that much dust that high in the air, it turned out to be a whole company of Yankee cavalry, come to clean up our gun smuggling down along the border.” He backed his horse up a step.

  “Think the law got word of Newt’s contest?” asked Blade Hogue, moving in between Gaddis and Pitch. “Figured this was a good place to round up a bunch of us at once?”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me,” said Gaddis. “Newt didn’t mind letting the word out.”

  “What do you think, Rufe?” asked Pitch. “Want to ride on in, take our chances?”

  Gaddis gave him a sarcastic look. “You really are itching to use that new Remington, ain’t you, Jack?”

  “Tanner said Newt Grago needs our help,” Pitch responded, red-faced, “that’s all I was getting at. I don’t want to be looked at as ducking out on trouble.”

  “Just shut up, Jack, before I wear that shiny new Remington out over your head,” Rufe Gaddis snapped at him.

  “Rufe,” said Blade Hogue, hoping to divert Gaddis and Pitch from locking horns, “maybe a couple of us oughta swing around and—”

  “Quiet, Hogue!” Rufe Gaddis said, listening closely with his head cocked toward the flats. “Did you hear that?”

  “Yeah,” said Saul Delmano, stepping his horse forward through the others, “that was rifle fire.” As they all sat focused toward the distance, the sound of gunfire resounded in a long, hard volley. The men looked at one another with wary eyes.

  “It damn sure is rifle fire,” Rufe Gaddis said. Then he turned to Tanner and asked, “How many men was Newt talking about killing?”

  Tanner stared wide-eyed at the distant explosions, saying, “Just three that he told me about. There’s that gunslinger Danny Duggin, then there’s Bill Longley, and Dave Mather, if’n he got in the way, is what Newt said.”

  “Well, that’s not the sound of three rifles,” Saul Delmano said, moving his horse in beside Jack Pitch.

  “Damn right it’s not,” said Gaddis. He jerked his horse around and forced it into the other riders, making them part for him. “Come on, boys, we’re going to sit this one out for a while, see what that’s all about.” He gigged his horse forward into the narrow rock pass.

  Jack Pitch called out to Gaddis, “Maybe that’s all of Newt’s boys firing at those three men. Did you stop to think of that?”

  “No, I didn’t, Jack,” Rufe Gaddis called back over his shoulder to Jack Pitch as the others turned their horses and fell in behind him, “but why don’t you go check it all out for us. You seem to be the one so interested in finding out.” He spurred his horse into a trot before Jack Pitch could answer. Beside Jack Pitch, Saul Delmano stepped down from his horse and lifted its right front hoof, inspecting it closely.

  “Ain’t you coming?” Jack Pitch asked Delmano.

  “I’ll be right along,” Delmano replied, “soon as I see why this horse is favoring its hoof.” He watched as Jack Pitch shook his head and kicked his horse forward. As soon as Pitch caught up to the others, Delmano dropped the horse’s hoof, swung up into his saddle, and rode off in the opposite direction. With a posse coming, he wasn’t about to get caught riding with Rufe Gaddis, Blade Hogue, and the rest of them. Delmano had had a bad feeling all night about riding in and killing this Danny Duggin, especially after Gaddis said Duggin was riding with Bill Longley and Dave Mather. Delmano decided he’d rather take his chances slipping around the posse on his own.

  A hundred yards back into the narrow rock pass, Rufe Gaddis stopped his horse again, this time at the sight of the single rider atop the chestnut mare sitting sideways across his path. “Now what do we have here?” Gaddis said to Tanner, who reined down beside him. Tanner’s hand went to the butt of the rifle in his saddle boot as the other riders stopped behind him.

  “Something we can do for you, mister?” Rufe Gaddis called out to Danielle from thirty feet away, already having a pretty good idea what was about to happen. Gaddis was only talking to give the men behind him a chance to spread out as much as possible in the tight space of the pass. He knew it was no coincidence that this rider met them at this spot. Above them on either side, rock walls rose up fifty feet, providing for a perfect ambush.

  Danielle raised her hand, and in it was the worn list of names she’d been carrying so long. Not having to look at the list, she recited the names from memory. In a flat tone, she said, “Blade Hogue, Rufe Gaddis, Saul Delmano.”

  “Yep,” said Rufe Gaddis, “that’s us, all right.” He could tell where this was going. His hand drifted to his pistol butt.

  ’‘You know why I’m here,” Danielle called out. “If the rest of you want to live, back your horses and get out of here.”

  A couple of the men stifled a short laugh at the thought of one rider sounding to sure of himself in the face of these odds. But Rufe Gaddis didn’t laugh. Neither did Blade Hogue. As Gaddis replied, Hogue ventured a glance along the rising rock to their left and right.

  “You’re that gunslinger from last summer, ain’t ya?” said Gaddis.

  “Yep,” Danielle replied. And that was all she said.

  “You’re name’s not Danny Duggin though, is it?” Gaddis asked, hoping the men behind him were ready for what was coming.

  “Nope,” Danielle said. Then she fell silent again.

  “I heard somewhere that this is all about somebody killing your pa, and leaving him hanging from a tree,” Gaddis said.

  As Gaddis spoke, Danielle stepped down slowly from her saddle and pushed Sundown on t
he rump, sending the mare out of harm’s way. “You heard, right,” Danielle said, stepping forward slowly, fanning her riding duster back behind her holsters.

  “What if I told you me and these boys had nothing to do with it?” Rufe Gaddis asked, his right hand poised near his pistol butt.

  Danielle ignored his question. “Let’s get to it,” she said, coming closer yet.

  Rufe Gaddis offered a tight, edgy smile, not sure if he should step down from his saddle or not. Uncertain how many men were atop the rock with rifles pointed down at him, he said, “I’m no fool. You think I don’t know an ambush when I see one. Who’s up there? Longley? Mather?” He allowed himself to turn his eyes from Danielle just enough to call up along the rock ledges, “Is this your style? Come on down and face us like men!” His words echoed along the narrow pass.

  “We already have,” said the voice behind them. Gaddis and the others jerked around in their saddles and saw the two figures standing afoot in the trail behind them. Tim and Jed Strange stood five feet apart, their gun hands poised, their eyes level and determined.

  Jack Pitch grinned. “Ragged-assed farm boys, wearing guns too big for them,” Pitch murmured. But nobody seemed to hear him as he sized the brothers up. These two are mine, he thought to himself. All that practice with his new Remington wasn’t going to waste, after all. He sat staring at Tim and Jed as Rufe Gaddis turned his attention back to Danielle.

  Now that Gaddis had some idea of what he was facing, he swung down slowly from his saddle. Had there been men covering them from above, he would have been better off staying mounted, maybe being able to make a run for it once the rifle fire got too hot and heavy. But this was no ambush. These three wanted it face-to-face. So be it, he thought, getting some solid earth beneath his boots. This was going to work out fine. Didn’t these fools realize they would be shooting into one another in a cross fire like this? He smiled again and spread his feet a shoulder-width apart, facing Danielle, knowing Hogue and the others would take care of the two men behind them.

  “All right, boys,” Gaddis said over his shoulder without taking his eyes off Danielle, “Let’s hurry up and get this over with. We ain’t got all—”

  Danielle’s first shot tore Rufe Gaddis’s words from his chest and sent him reeling backward. Her next shot slammed into Tanner, who had drawn his rifle from its boot but seemed confused as to which way to point it. Behind him, Tim and Jed’s pistols exploded, taking Blade Hogue from his saddle as his horse reared high with him. Tanner’s horse reared as well. Danielle’s shot flung him from his saddle into Max Dupre. A loud curse came from Dupre as Tanner’s blood splashed on his face. Before he could raise a hand and wipe his eyes, two shots hit him front and rear. He spun from his saddle into a tangle of frightened hooves and falling bodies.

  Jack Pitch had gotten off three shots from his new Remington before a bullet from Jed’s big Colt went through Billy Joe Earls’s neck and sliced through Pitch’s shoulder. Jack Pitch dove from his horse and rolled away from the heart of the melee to where he could find room to rise up onto his knees and use his new pistol to its best advantage. He raised the Remington, taking his time even as the battle raged. Getting a perfect aim on Tim Strange’s chest, Pitch said to himself, “Got ya!” and pulled the trigger. But the hammer didn’t fall. Wild-eyed, Pitch shook the gun, then slapped it against his palm, desperately trying to dislodge the dirt inside the open hammer that had been scraped up as he’d rolled across the ground.

  “Damn it! Wait!” Jack Pitch screamed at Tim and Jed, seeing both of their pistols swing around toward him, trailing smoke. He shook the Remington again as if to show them that his pistol wasn’t working. But neither of them seemed to care, he thought, feeling the hard blasts of .45 slugs pound into his chest.

  In seconds it was over. Silence moved in beneath the drifting echoes and settled onto the narrow trail. With the smell of burnt gunpowder heavy around her, Danielle poked out the spent cartridges from her smoking Colt and replaced them. Doing so, she kept an eye on Rufe Gaddis, who lay writhing back and forth on the ground, his hands clasped to his bleeding chest. His right hand still held his pistol. “Tim, Jed!” she called out across the fleeing horses through a swirl of dust. “Are you okay?”

  “We’re all right,” Tim answered, sidestepping the frightened animals as they pounded away along the trail. “Jed got a bullet through his shirt, but he’s fine. What about you?”

  “I’ll do,” Danielle said, feeling the warm blood seep down her side. She looked back at Rufe Gaddis, who had managed to squirm upward onto one knee, his blood-slick hand grasping his pistol tighter, trying to raise it.

  “I’ll . . . kill you,” Gaddis rasped, “you lousy . . . good-for-nothing . . . gunslinger.”

  “Come on,” Danielle said, stepping toward him, “you can do it. Raise that pistol. Come on! Raise it!” she bellowed.

  Gaddis struggled, using all his waning strength. “Damn you . . . to hell!”

  Danielle’s Colt hung in her hand at her side. She raised the barrel just enough to send a fatal slug between Rufe Gaddis’d eyes. His pistol flew from his hand and he pitched backward in the dirt.

  Tim and Jed had stepped forward through the swirl of hoof dust and looked down at Gaddis, then over at Danielle. “You’re hit,” Tim said to her. Both of them rushed forward, but Danielle stayed them back with a raised hand.

  “I’m all right.” She nodded toward the distant sound of rifle fire, noting that it had moved closer across the flatlands. “We need to make tracks. That posse is heading this way.”

  “But we ain’t outlaws,” Jed offered. “We’ve got nothing to worry about.”

  “They don’t know what we are,” Danielle said. “Anyway, we’ve got no time for their questions. If Newt Grago’s still alive, I want him. He’s the last of Pa’s killers.” She pressed her hand to her wounded side and limped toward Sundown, who stood off to one side of the narrow trail. “Get your horses. Let’s go.”

  Tim and Jed looked at one another, then Jed called out to Danielle, “At least let us take a look at your side first, Danielle. You can’t go around bleeding like that.”

  “It’ll dry,” she said, picking up Sundown’s reins. “Grago’s not getting away from us.”

  “Danielle, for God sakes,” Jed started to plead.

  But Danielle cut him short, saying, “Listen, there’s horses coming! Now get ready!”

  As soon as she said it, two horses rounded the pass into sight. “Whoa!” Morgan Goss shouted to his horse, which slid almost down onto its haunches in stopping. He looked around at the bodies on the ground, then at Tim and Jed, who stood on either side of the trail. His hands went up in surrender. Behind him came Cincinnati Carver lying low in his saddle and staring back at the trail behind him. When Carver turned forward and saw Goss’s hands in the air, he reined his horse down and flung his shotgun away.

  “Don’t shoot! You’ve got us!” Cincinnati Carver shouted, still not recognizing them from the encampment.

  “Settle down, Cincinnati,” Danielle said, stepping into better view, flipping her Colt back into its holster, which caused Carver and Goss to breathe a little easier. “It’s me, Danny Duggin.”

  “Duggin?” Cincinnati Carver looked surprised. He looked at the bodies on the ground, then back to Danielle. “What’s going on here? Who shot Gaddis and these boys?”

  “I did, Cincinnati,” Danielle replied.

  “Damn it, you’re the law,” said Morgan Goss,

  “and to think I trusted you, even drank with you . . . bet my money on you!”

  “I’m not the law, Goss. I just had something to settle with Newt Grago and this bunch.”

  Goss lowered his hands as Danielle stepped forward and picked up his shotgun from the dirt, dusting it off against her leg. “Danny Duggin, you’re shot there,” Goss said, nodding at the blood on Danielle’s side.

  “I’m all right,” she said. “How far back is that posse?”

  “Not far enough,” said
Cincinnati Carver. “They’re sweeping through here like a hay sickle any minute. Me and Goss decided we best get down to Mejico, where folks have better manners. You’re welcome to come, all three of yas.”

  “Naw, we’re not wanted by the law,” Danielle said, handing Carver’s shotgun up to him. “Is Newt Grago dead?”

  “Humph,” said Cincinnati Carver, “not unless he fell off his running horse and broke his neck. The snake cleared out of there first thing. Left all of us to face that posse alone.” He looked back along the trail as he spoke. “Don’t mean to appear rude, Danny, but we best get our shanks in the wind. They’re awfully close.”

  “Which way did Newt Grago head?” Danielle asked.

  “Hell, the same way he always heads when things get too hot for him. He’s got a woman named Bertha Stillwell he always runs to. She’s opened a saloon in that whistle-stop town they just named Newton. She’s got lots of connections there with men from the Atchison, Topeka & Sante Fe Railroad. Newt says they just named the town after him. Says it’ll bring him luck. The damned fool—the town’s really named after a place in Massachusetts! Are you going to kill Newt too when you find him? Because if you are, tell him I said good riddance before he dies, the no-good yellow bastard.”

  Danielle didn’t answer. Hearing the rifle fire moving closer, she stepped back and said, “Good luck down in Mexico, boys,” then slapped Morgan Goss’s horse on its rump. The two outlaws wasted no more time. They bolted off along the trail, leaving a wake of dust behind them.

  When they were out of sight, Tim asked, “Do you think they’re telling the truth about Grago?”

  “Yep, I think so. If not, we’ll find out in Newton.” She stepped toward Sundown without another word, swinging up into her saddle and heeling the mare forward.