Live by the West, Die by the West

by William W. Johnstone

It was only a matter of time—maybe minutes or even seconds—before Dagger caught the scent of other horses and let his presence be known. Then whatever element of surprise Smoke had working for him would be gone.

  There were few options left for him. He could backtrack and saddle up, hoping Dagger didn’t give his position away, and try to ride out. But he knew in his heart that was grabbing at straws.

  His other option was to fight.

  But he was body and soul sick of fighting. If he could ride out peacefully and go home and hang up his guns and never strap them on again he would be content. God, but that would be wonderful.

  The next statement from the mouth of a outlaw drifted to him, and Smoke knew this fight had to be ended right here and now.

  “They tell me that Jensen’s wife is a real looker. When we kill him, let’s ride on down to Colorado. I’d like to have me a taste of Sally Jensen. I like it when they fight.” Then he said some other things he’d like to do to Sally. The filth rolled in a steady stream from his mouth, burning deep into Smoke’s brain. Finally he stood up, the verbal disgust fouling the pure clean mountain air.

  Smoke lifted his Winchester and shot the man in the belly.

  Smoke shifted position immediately, darting swiftly away. He was dressed in earth colors, and had left his hat back at the corral. He knew he would be nearly impossible to spot. And after hearing the agreeing and ugly laughter of the outlaws at the gut-shot man’s filthy, disgustingly perverted suggestions, Smoke was white-hot angry and on the warpath.

  He knelt behind a thick fallen log, all grown around with brush, and waited, his Winchester at the ready, hammer eared back.

  Movement to his right caught his eyes. He fired and a wild shriek of pain cut the air. “My elbow’s ruint!” a man wailed.

  Smoke fired again into the same spot. The man with the ruined elbow stood up in shock and pain as the second bullet slammed into him. He fell forward onto his face.

  As the lead started flying around him, thudding into the fallen logs and still-standing trees, Smoke crawled away, working his way around the outlaws’ position, steadily climbing uphill.

  He swung wide around them, moving through the wilderness just as Ol’ Preacher had taught him, silently flitting from cover to cover, seething mad clear through; but his brain was clear and cold and thinking dark primal thoughts that would have made a grizzly back up and give him room.

  In the West, a man just didn’t bother a good woman—or even a bad woman for that matter. Or even say aloud the things the now-dead outlaw had mouthed. Molest a woman, and most western men would track that man for days and either shoot him or hang him on the spot.

  Smoke caught a glimpse of color that did not fit into this terrain. He paused, oak-tree still, and waited. The man’s impatience got the better of whatever judgment he possessed, and he started to shift positions.

  Smoke lifted his rifle and drilled the outlaw, the bullet entering his right side and blowing out the left side.

  Smoke thought the man’s name was Sweeney; one of Cat Jennings’s crud.

  Lead splattered bark from a tree and Smoke felt the sting of it. He dropped to one knee and fired just under the puff of gunsmoke drifting up from the outlaw’s position, working the lever just as fast as he could, filling the cool air with lead.

  A crashing body followed the spray of bullets.

  “He ain’t but one man!” a harsh voice shouted. “Come on, let’s rush him.”

  “You rush him, Woody” was the reply. “If you so all-fired anxious to get kilt.”

  “I’m gonna kill you, Jensen!” Woody hollered. “Then drag your stinkin’ carcass till they ain’t nothing left for even the varmits to eat.”

  Smoke remained still, listening to the braggard make his claims.

  “I’ll take him,” a high thin voice was added to the brags.

  Danny Rouge.

  The only thing that moved was Smoke’s eyes. He knew he couldn’t let Danny live, couldn’t let Danny get him in gunsights, for the punk’s aim was deadly true.

  There, Smoke’s eyes settled on a spot. That’s where the voice came from. But was the back-shooter still there? Smoke doubted it. Danny was too good to speak and then remain in the same spot. But which direction did he take?

  There was only one direction that was logical, at least to Smoke’s mind. Up the rise.

  Smoke sank to the cool moist earth that lay under the pile of storm-torn and -tossed logs. As silent as a stalking snake he inched his way under a huge pile of logs and paused, waiting.

  “Well, dammit, boy!” Woody’s voice cut the stillness, broken only by someone’s hard moaning, probably the gut-shot outlaw. “What are you waitin’ on, Christmas?”

  But Danny was too good at his sneaky work to give away his location with a reply.

  Smoke lay still, waiting.

  Someone stepped on a dry branch and it popped. Smoke’s eyes found the source and he could have easily killed the man. He chose to wait. He had the patience of an Indian and knew that his cat-and-mouse game was working on the nerves of the outlaws.

  “To hell with you people!” a man spoke. “I’m gone. Jensen ain’t no human person.”

  “You git back here, Carlson!” Lanny shouted.

  Carlson told Lanny, in very blunt and profane language, where to go and how to get there.

  That would be very painful, Smoke thought, allowing himself a thin smile.

  He heard the sound of horses’ hooves. The sound gradually faded.

  Rifle fire slammed the air. A man cursed painfully. “Dammit, Dalton, you done me in.”

  A rifle clattered onto wood and fell to the earth with a dull thud. The outlaw mistakenly shot by one of his own men fell heavily to the earth. He died cursing Dalton.

  Still Smoke did not move.

  “Smoke? Smoke Jensen? It’s me, Jonas. I’m gone, man. Pullin’ out. Just let me get to my hoss and you’ll never see me agin.”

  “Jonas, you yeller rabbit!” Lanny yelled. “Git back here.”

  But the fight had gone out of Jonas. He found his tired horse and mounted up. He was gone, thinking that Smoke Jensen was a devil, worser than any damn Apache that ever lived.

  Smoke sensed more than heard movement behind him. But he knew that he could not be spotted under the pile of tangled logs, and he had carefully entered, not disturbing the brush that grew around and over the narrow entrance.

  For a long minute the man, Danny, Smoke felt sure, did not move. Then to Smoke’s surprise, boots appeared just inches from his eyes. Danny had moved, and done so with the stealth of a ghost.

  He was good, Smoke conceded. Very good. Maybe too good for his own good.

  Very carefully, Smoke lifted the muzzle of his rifle, lining it up about three feet above the boots. The muzzle followed the boots as they moved silently around the pile of logs, then stopped.

  Smoke caught a glimpse of a belt buckle, lifted the muzzle an inch above it, and pulled the trigger.

  Danny Rouge screamed as the bullet tore into his innards. Smoke fired again, for insurance, and Danny was down, kicking and squalling and crying.

  “I’m the bes’,” he hollered in his high, thin voice. “I’m the bes’ they is.”

  Wild shooting drowned out whatever else Danny was saying. But none of the bullets came anywhere near to Smoke’s location. None of the outlaws even dreamed that Smoke had shot the back-shooter from almost point-blank range.

  Danny turned his head and his eyes met those of Smoke, just a couple of yards away, under the pile of logs.

  “Damn you!” Danny whispered, his lips wet with blood. “Damn you to hell!” He closed his eyes and shivered as death took him.

  Smoke waited until the back-shooter had died, then took a thick pole and shoved the body downhill. It must have landed near, or perhaps on, an outlaw, for the man yelped in fright.

  “Lanny, let’s get out of here,” a man called. “We ain’t gonna get Jensen. The man’s a devil.”

  “He’s one
man, dammit!” Lanny yelled. “Just one man, that’s all.”

  “Then you take him, Lanny.” The outlaw’s voice had a note of finality in it. “’Cause I’m gone.”

  Lanny cursed the man.

  “Jensen, I’m hauling my freight,” Hayes called. “I hope I don’t never seen you no more. Not that I’ve seen you this day,” he added wearily.

  Another horse’s hooves were added to those already riding down the trail, away from this devil some called the last mountain man.

  Smoke remained in his position as Lanny, Woody, and a few more wasted a lot of ammunition, knocking holes in trees and burning the air.

  Smoke calmly chewed on a piece of jerky and waited.

  THIRTY-THREE

  Smoke had carefully noted the positions of those left. Five of them. He had heard their names called out. Woody, Dalton, Lodi, Sutton, and Lanny Ball.

  The outlaws had tried to bait Smoke, cursing him, voicing what they were going to do to his wife and kids. Filthy things, inhuman things. Smoke lay under the jumble of logs and kept his thoughts to himself. If he had even whispered them, the white-hot fury might have set the logs blazing.

  After more than two hours, Sutton called, “I think he’s gone, Lanny. I think he suckered us and pulled out and set up a new position.”

  “I think he’s right, Lanny,” Woody yelled. “You know his temper; all them things we been sayin’ about his wife would have brought him out like a bear.”

  Sutton abruptly stood up for a few seconds, then dropped to the ground. Lodi did the same, followed by the rest of them, and cautiously, tentatively, the outlaws stood up and began walking toward each other. Lanny was the last one to stand up.

  He began cursing the rotten luck, the country, the gods of fate, and most of all, he cussed Smoke Jensen.

  Smoke emptied his rifle into Lodi, Sutton, Dalton, and Woody, knocking them spinning and screaming to the littered earth.

  Lanny hit the ground.

  Smoke had dragged Danny’s fancy rifle to him with a stick. Dropping his empty Winchester, Smoke ended any life that might have been left in the quartet of scum, then backed out of his hiding place and stretched his cramped muscles, protected by the huge pile of logs.

  Smoke carefully checked his Colts, wiping them free of dirt with a bandanna. “All right, Lanny!” he called. “You made your brags back in Gibson. Let’s end this madness right here and now. Let’s see if you’ve got the guts to face a man. You sure have been real brave telling me what you planned to do with my wife.”

  “You know I wouldn’t do that to no good woman, Jensen. That was just to make you mad.”

  “You succeeded, Lanny.”

  “Let’s call it off, Smoke. I’ll ride away and you won’t see me no more.”

  “All right, Lanny. You just do that little thing.”

  “You mean it?”

  “I’m tired of this killing, Lanny. Mount up and get gone.”

  “You’ll back-shoot me, Jensen!” There was real fear in the outlaw’s voice.

  “No, Lanny. I’ll leave that to punks like you.”

  Lanny cursed him.

  “I’m steppin’ out, Lanny.” This was to be no fast-draw encounter. Smoke knew Lanny was going to try to kill him any way he could. Smoke’s hands were full of Colts, the hammers eared back.

  At the edge of the piled-up logs, Smoke started running. Lanny fired, missed, and fired again, the bullet burning Smoke’s side. He turned and began pulling and cocking, a thunderous roar in the savage blowdown.

  Lanny took half a dozen rounds in his upper torso, the force of the striking slugs driving him back against a huge old stump. He tried to lift his guns. He could not. His strength was gone. Smoke walked over to him, reloading as he walked.

  “You ain’t human,” Lanny coughed up the words. “You a devil.”

  “You got any kin you want me to write?”

  “You go to hell!”

  Smoke turned his back to the man and walked away.

  “You ain’t gonna leave me to die alone, is you?” Lanny called feebly.

  Smoke stopped. With a sigh, he turned around and walked back to the outlaw’s side. Lanny looked up as the light in his eyes began to dim. Smoke rolled a cigarette, lit it, and stuck it between Lanny’s lips.

  “Thanks.”

  Smoke waited. The cigarette fell out of Lanny’s lips. Smoke picked it up and ground it out under the heel of his boot.

  “Least I can go out knowin’ it wasn’t no two-bit tinhorn who done me in,” were Lanny’s last words.

  * * *

  Smoke returned to the natural corral and saddled up. He wanted no more of this blown-down place of death. And from Dagger’s actions, the big horse didn’t either. Smoke rode out of the Medicine Bow Range and took the easy way south. He crossed the Laramie River and made camp on the shores of Lake Hattie.

  He crossed over into Colorado the next morning and felt he was in home territory, even though he had many, many hard miles yet to go.

  He followed the Laramie down into the Medicine Bow Mountains, riding easy, but still with the smell of sudden and violent death seeming to cling to him. He wanted no more of it. As he rode he toyed with the idea of selling out and pulling out.

  He rejected that almost as quickly as the thought sprang into his brain.

  The Sugarloaf belonged to Smoke and Sally Jensen. Fast gun he might be, but he wasn’t going to let his unwanted reputation drive him away. If there were punks and crud in the world who felt they just had to try him . . . well, that was their problem. He had never sought the name of Gunfighter; but damned if he was going to back down, either.

  The West was changing rapidly. Oh, there would be a few more wild and woolly years, but probably no more than a decade before law and order settled in. Law and order was changing everything and everybody west of the Mississippi. Jesse James was dead, killed in 1882. Clell Miller had been dead for years. Clay Allison had died a very ignoble death back in ’77. Sam Bass was gone. Curley Bill Brocius had been killed by Wyatt Earp in Tombstone in ’82. John Wesley Hardin was in a Texas prison. Rowdy Joe Lowe had met his end in Denver, killed in a gunfight over his wife. Mysterious Dave Mather had vanished about a year back and no one knew where he was.

  Smoke doubted Dave would ever resurface. Probably changed his name and was living respectable.

  Smoke rode the old trails, alive with the ghosts of mountain men who had come and gone years back, blazing the very trails he now rode. He thought of all the gunfighters and outlaws that were gone.

  Charlie Storms was dead—and not too many folks mourned his passing. Charlie had been sitting at the table in Deadwood back in ’76 when Cross-Eyed Jack McCall walked up behind Wild Bill and blew his brains out. Charlie tried to brace Luke Short in Tombstone back in ’81. He rolled twelve.

  I’ve known them all, Smoke mused. The good and the bad and that curious combination of both.

  Dallas Stoudenmire finally saw the elephant back in ’82.

  Ben Thompson had been killed just the year back, Smoke recalled, down in San Antonio. Killed while watching a play.

  The list was a long one, and getting longer.

  And me? Smoke reflected. How many men have gone down under my guns?

  He really didn’t know. But he knew the count was awesomely high. He knew that he was rated as the number-one gunfighter in all the West; knew that he had killed a hundred men—or more. Probably more.

  He shook those thoughts out of his head. There was no point in dwelling on them, and no point in trying to even think that he could live without his guns. There was no telling how many tinhorn punks and would-be gunslicks would be coming after him after the news of Gibson hit the campfires and the saloons of the West.

  He stopped at a small four-store town and bought himself a couple of sacks of tobacco and rolling papers. He cut himself a wedge of cheese and got him a pickle from the barrel and a sackful of crackers. He went outside to sit on the porch of the store to have his late-afternoon sna
ck.

  “That there’s Smoke Jensen.” The words came to him from inside the store.

  “No!”

  “Yeah. He’s killed a thousand men. Young, ain’t he?”

  “A thousand men?”

  “Yeah. ’Course, that ain’t countin’ Indians.”

  Small children came to stand by the edge of the store to stare at him through wide eyes. Smoke knew how a freak in a carnival must feel. But he couldn’t blame the kids. He’d been written about so much in the penny dreadfuls and other books of the time that the kids didn’t know what to think of him.

  Or the adults, either, for that matter.

  Damn! but he was tired. Tired both physically and mentally.

  Once he got back to Sally and the Sugarloaf, he didn’t think he’d ever leave her side until she got a broom and ran him off.

  He offered a cracker to a shy little girl and she slowly took it.

  “Jeanne!” her mother squalled from a house across the dusty street. “You get away from him!”

  Jeanne smiled at Smoke, grabbed the cracker and took off.

  Smoke looked up at the sounds of horses walking toward him. He sighed heavily. The two-bit punk who called himself Larado and that pair of no-goods, Johnny and Brett, were heading his way.

  He slipped the thongs off his hammers and called over his shoulder, “Shopkeep! Get these kids out of here—right now!”

  Within half a minute, the street was deserted.

  Smoke stood up as the trio dismounted and began walking toward him.

  “Back off, boys!” Smoke called. “This doesn’t have to be.”

  Larado snorted. “What’s the matter, Jensen? You done turned yeller on us?”

  “Don’t be a fool!” Smoke’s words were hard. “I’m tryin’ to make you see that there is no point to this.”

  “The point is, Mister Big-Shot,” Johnny said, and Smoke could smell the whiskey from all them even at this distance, “we gonna kill you.”

  Smoke shook his head. “No, you’re not, boys. If you drag iron, you’re dead. All of you.” He started walking toward them.

  Bret’s eyes widened in fear. Johnny and Larado wore looks of indecision on their young faces.

  “Well!” Smoke snapped, closing the distance. “At this range we’re all going to die, you know that, don’t you, boys?”