Elbow Creek Magazine

Killing Trail
Charles A.  Gramlich
 

KILLING  TRAIL
Part 1

  Under a false  dawn they dumped the girl in my yard.  The shout of thudding hooves jerked  me from sleep, Spencer to hand, and I made it out the door in time to see a  shadowy clot of riders melt away up the hill above my ranch.  The hooves had  made me think rustlers, but a glance at the corral showed all three of my  horses milling about.
 

Then I saw the pile of gingham lying on the dirt by  the gate of the corral, and within the pile I found the girl.  She  looked dead, her face a mask of blood and with some savage wound in  her chest, just below the heart, that had rusted the whole front of her  dress.  But when I got down beside her I could hear the faint whisper of her  breathing and see the thin, pale steam of it in the morning chill.  Dropping the Spencer, I got her up in my arms and rushed her
into the house  to my cot.  Lighting a lamp showed me the damage, and it was bad.  The blood  on her face was from a cut scalp and split lip, but the wound to her chest  had been made by a bullet, with the gun pressed flush against her body when  the trigger was pulled.  The powder-burned gingham of her dress was part of  her now, and though the bleeding had stopped for the moment it  would surely start again if I tried to clean the wound.  The nearest  town was Broken Axle, maybe ten miles away.  But they had no doctor there.   Stopover was another fifteen miles
further on, and, though they had a doc, I  figured it would take more hours than this girl had left to get there by  buckboard. She was going to die and all I could do was try to ease  her passing.

Warming some water and wetting a rag, I started laving  the girl's face clean of crusted blood.  She had red hair, very
pretty,  and as I cleaned and looked I felt a sudden, sharp sickness roil in my  stomach.   "Laura," I said.  "No, no.  Please no."

The pleading  didn't help.  It was Laura Cody lying there.  I hadn't seen her since  Cheyenne, Wyoming, almost five years ago. She'd been fifteen and I a year  older and full of mad at the world for taking my ma so young.  Laura had  liked me and I'd liked her.  But her father had made it clear he wouldn't  allow it, and when my own pa disappeared on a drunk I'd lit out  further west for the Salt River Range to make my fortune--in one thing  or another.  I had no idea why Laura would have come here now.

"Laura."  I called her name, hoping to cut through the fog of her stupor, to  bring her around enough to find out who'd shot her, and hoping somehow that  she wasn't as hurt as I thought.

"Laura!"

She stirred, moaned,  then opened the shocking green eyes that had been her most dazzling feature  as a kid.  They still were, though the years had wrought other changes, had  remade her completely into a woman of exceptional beauty.  Even with  her mangled lips she smiled when she recognized me, and that smile made  something in my chest not work right.

"Boone Holland," she said.  "I was  coming...to see you.  They--"

She coughed, and I got my arms under her  shoulders and lifted a bit so she wouldn't choke on the blood that spilled  over her chin.  That blood was bright, frothy--the kind that comes out  of torn lungs.

"It's all right," I said, trying to keep despair out of  my voice.  "Don't talk.  I'm going to get you to a doctor."
 

Laura gave  a tiny shake of her head.   "No.  I'll not make it.  And you have to  hear."

"Hear what?" I asked, hoping she wouldn't see what holding her  like this was doing to my eyes.

"Hear...about.  Royal Flynn.  And  dad."

"Flynn!  What the hell?"

I'd known Flynn in Cheyenne too.   He was a gambler and occasional gunfighter who worked the saloons where my  father drank.  I'd never liked him; his jokes had been too cruel.   And he'd beat my pa to a pulp once, for no reason I could see.

A few  years back Flynn had moved into the Salt River Range and taken up the  pretence of being a rancher.  He'd put together some cattle and some smaller  farms, most of which he'd won at cards, and he thought he was on the way to  making an empire for himself.  He wanted my stead, because it had a regular  water supply and because it butted up against two of his other places. But  I didn't play cards, and I'd refused the sell when he'd made an offer.  Once  he'd found out I was Tasker Holland's son, he'd stopped asking.

Laura  took a breath then, to earn air for more talk, and though she winced with the  pain of it she got out a rush of
words.

"Mom died last year and a  month ago dad decided to move us to Stopover.  He said this land was growing  fast.  Needed a good lawyer."  She smiled again a little.  "I wanted to come  myself. But I didn't know dad had been gambling, too.  That he'd lost  to Flynn in Cheyenne and had some deal about coming here to pay what he  owed.  We were on our way when..."

She swallowed, then choked again,  coughing up blood that spattered like daubs of liquid red wax over my shirt.   I wiped her mouth, told her once more not to talk, not to struggle.   She didn't listen.

"Flynn wanted...me too.  Not just dad's knowledge.   I thought so.  But didn't...know.  Until.  Last night.  At his  cabin.  Somewhere.  Close."

She clutched my wrist tight, though how she  had the strength I couldn't guess.

"He still has dad, Boone.  There.   You have to help...him."

  "I will, Laura.  I promise."

  I leaned to  kiss her forehead then.

"Why'd he bring you here, Laura?  To my  place?"  "He knew."

  Her eyes were too green as she watched me.  I  frowned.  "He asked me last night to love him.  I told him I  couldn't.  That I loved another."  She licked paling lips.  "He  doesn't--"

She choked a third time; I was sure it was the last.  But  she found life from somewhere to say:  "Nobody rejects Royal Flynn.  He  said that.  Before he...Before he--."

"Don't, Laura," I protested.   "Don't say it."

"No!"  Her breath burbled.  "No rape.  He tried.  I  fought.  He beat...me.  But I got his gun.  Shot..."

She touched her  chest, her own wound.  Her last words sighed away and she passed.  I think I  cried.  It didn't do any good.

Part 2

 I buried Laura out back of the barn, up on the hill at a place the  wildflowers would carpet come spring.  Then I stoked my rage, buckled on my  Colts, and picked up my Spencer from where it still lay near the  corral.   I saddled Ace, my best horse, and left the gate open so  the other two could range.  They, and the few head of cattle I had,
would  survive for a few days until I returned.  I wasn't going to worry about not  returning.

By midmorning I'd saddlebagged some coffee and grub and  was ready to ride, jacketed against the autumn cold.  I looked  around once.  Four years ago I'd stopped to bum a meal from the old  man who owned this place.  I'd ended up staying, and when the fellow died  eight months later he left it to me free and clear.  It had been a gift,  better than the riches I'd thought I wanted at seventeen.  And by now I'd  worked it till it was mine.  But it wasn't much when I stacked it against the  life of a beautiful woman who was dead moments after letting me know she  loved me.
 

"Let's go," I said to Ace.  And we went.  We went high.   Into the mountains.  I knew the cabin Laura had to have been talking about.   On Widow Fork Creek.  I'd hunted all around it.  The story was that Flynn had  picked it up for a song from a broke cowboy.

As I rode I was thinking  about Flynn's reasons for dumping Laura on my property.  I figured there was  more to it than jealousy because she preferred me to him.  Flynn knew me,  from Cheyenne, from trying to buy my ranch, from other times when  I'd showed him less respect than he thought he deserved because he cut a  big swath with women, money, and guns.  He didn't like me, but he knew me,  knew I'd be coming for him myself because there was no way to prove him  guilty by law.  If he killed me, he'd surely find a way to take my land.  And  I was about to give him
an excuse for the killing by going after him with a  Colt.

 There was only one problem for his plan.  I was sure he'd have  men waiting to ambush me along the trails to his cabin.  But a man who hunts  to supplement a table fare of beans and hardtack learns well how to stalk his  prey.  Flynn was a collector who never really saw what he collected, and I  knew the area around his cabin better than he did.

Two trails led into  the valley of the Widow Fork.  Trails for horses, that is.  I took neither.   Instead, I drop-reined Ace at a place where the grass grew tasty and took off  cross-country on foot.  By trail it was nearly twelve miles to the cabin  from where I left Ace.  Straight through on a hike it was about four, a  fair slab of it vertical down the face of Cane Bluff to the banks of Widow  Fork Creek.  It was a climb I'd made before and by early evening I was  nestled up against a fallen oak at the edge of the creek, watching Flynn's  place and waiting for full dark. Soon enough, it came.

The area around  the cabin had once been clear-cut, but Flynn hadn't bothered to keep it clear  and there was considerable scrub brush.  I went through that scrub, on my  belly, moving a foot or two at a time.  It took the better part of an hour to  make it to a window where I could lift my head to scan the inside. Even through the heat-misted glass I could see three men seated at a table  playing poker.  With a clench of fists around the Spencer I recognized  Flynn's flat-brimmed hat, though his face was turned down to look at his  cards.  I didn't see Laura's father, Hutton Cody.

From somewhere else  in the room came a voice that had a grating, whiny edge to it.  I couldn't  make out the words but Flynn apparently didn't like them.  He glanced up  quickly from the cards he'd been dealt, and irritation was written across  his usually handsome features.

"Leave him alone, Boren.  You're  supposed to be watching out front anyway."

"Aw, Boss," the whiny voice  said.  "I was just funnin'."

Flynn came half way out of his chair, his  right hand a claw hovering over the butt of his pistol.

"I said!   Leave him alone!"

The gambler was drawn as tight as wet leather dried in  the sun.  He was sweating; his cheek twitched.  I'd never seen Flynn look  anything but calm.  I had to think his tenseness had to do with Laura, with  the fact that she'd preferred a bullet to him.

I hoped so anyway.

"Sure, sure, Boss," the man called Boren said.  "Whatever you say."

 Flynn tapped one of the other players on the shoulder.  "Keep an eye," he  ordered.   The man got up promptly, grabbed a shotgun from against  the wall behind him and went toward the front of the cabin.  Boren came to  the table then, looking as much like a weasel as he had sounded.  He was  carrying a folding knife, which he closed and
slipped into his pocket.   Clearly shaken, he sat down and was dealt a hand.  It was only a moment more  before Flynn snorted and slapped his cards down open on the table.

 Boren laughed.  "Hell, you win again, Boss.  Ain't no beatin' you  tonight."  Flynn only grunted, and as he raked in the pot and  prepared to deal again I shifted position at the window to see more of  the cabin's interior.  Some past owner had cut a big cross in the front  door for shooting through and the man with the shotgun stood looking out of  it.  I shivered a bit.  If Boren had been doing his job and watching that  window he might have seen me crawling up on the cabin.

Then I saw  Hutton Cody and forgot the might-have-beens.  Cody was tied to a chair and  gagged, with a shallow cut across his cheek that I figured had been made by  Boren's knife but which I'd chalk up against Flynn anyway.
  Laura's  father was in his early fifties, about the same age my pa should have been,  and when I'd known him before he'd been as straight and tall and thin as an  aspen, but with the air of a dignified oak.  Now his eyes, the color and  brilliance of which he'd given to Laura, were dull and sick and his face  looked hammered.  Worse than the blood and abrasions, though, was  the emptiness of his expression.

It looked like Cody knew about his  daughter.  I wondered if he blamed himself, for ever having dealt with the  likes of Royal Flynn.  I sort of felt like he SHOULD blame himself, but  maybe there was still a little anger in me from having been told once upon  a time that I wasn't good enough to mix my blood with his. I pushed those  thoughts away.  If I didn't try to help Cody now I'd be proving him right for  those prejudices of long ago.   While I was pulling at ideas like weeds as  to what to do next, one of the outlaws, a big man with hair going silver  over the ears, shoved back from the table and threw down his cards.    "Cleans me out!"

Flynn chuckled.  "There'll be more, Wagoner.  Once we  get Boone Holland's ranch."

I had no idea what Flynn was talking  about.  My ranch wasn't worth much in cash.  But I didn't have time to think  on it.

Wagoner strode to the door.  "I'm gonna walk up on the rim, see  if I can find Smoke or Hicks.  See if they've had any sign of Holland.   You're so sure he'll come."

"Don't worry about that," Flynn said.  "Soon  as he figures out who the girl is, he'll come.  We left plenty of tracks  for
him."

My mind started clicking.  They'd expected me to trail  'em, not for Laura to tell me about them.  That meant, I hoped, that I was  here earlier than they figured I would be.

Wagoner slipped into his coat  and paused to roll and light a cigarette.

"I'll be back," he  said.

Flynn waved him out.  Boren tittered, started to  say something.

"Shut up, Boren," Flynn said, not looking away from  his cards.  "And fetch us some coffee."

Wagoner tossed his burned  match on the floor and picked up his rifle before stepping out on the front  porch of the cabin into the darkness.  I waited until he closed the door,  then crept from the window to watch him as he stood for a moment,  smoking his cigarette to the butt before flicking it away.  Big as he was,  his face looked gaunt, his eyes hollow.  I wondered if there were any guilt  in him over what had happened to Laura.  Probably not, though from what I'd  heard he was the best of a bad lot.  As the man moved away from the cabin  I followed him on a
hunter's silent feet.  He paused beside the corral, empty  at the moment with all the horses tucked away in the barn for the  night.

"For two bits I'd saddle up and ride," Wagoner said.

He  spoke aloud to the night, but it wasn't the night that answered, or that  eared back the hammer on a Spencer behind him.

"That'd be the smartest  thing you've done since you came west, Wagoner.  Lose the rifle."

Wagoner froze, his hand lifting a little, holding the rifle out and away from  his body before dropping it to earth.
"I'm guessing that you're Holland,"  he said.  "But how do you know MY name?"

"I've been watching you boys  slap cards for the last hour.  I know each of your names.  I even know what  hands you've been playing."  This wasn't strictly true but I could see no  harm in adding to his nervousness.  "And yes, I'm Boone Holland."

He  was silent.  He knew why I was here.

"Yeah," I continued.  "I'm a friend  of the girl you boys killed."

"You got it wrong there, Holland.  I'd  nothing to do with that."

"You were there."

"No."  He shook his  head.  And his next words were rushed.

"I admit to helping bring her here.   And her pa.  But Flynn had me running errands into Broken Axle when  everything happened.  Go feel my horse's back.  Where the saddle was.  It's  gotta be still warm.  I couldn't of been here half an hour before you got  here."

"Turn around, Wagoner."

The big man turned slowly to face  me, hands away from his sides, his holster buttoned under his coat.

 "Give me a chance, Holland.  I'll ride."

"Why should I?"

"You  ain't got a reason, and I can't think one up this fast, but I guess just  because I'm asking."

I gave a very small chuckle, took a few steps toward  him so he could see my eyes better.

"Unbuckle your gunbelt," I  said.

With one hand he unbuttoned the lower half of his coat  and stripped off his belt and pistol, letting them join his rifle in
the  dirt.

"I'm going to give you a chance, Wagoner.  One chance.   Not because I like you or believe you, but because I don't have any rope  to tie you up with and a shot would bring attention.  Get your horse and go.   Leave your guns here and ride hard and fast.  Ride a long way.  And if you  ever see me again...  Well, let's just say, don't."

Wagoner looked at  me a second, then turned on his heels for the barn.  He took two steps and  stopped.
  "Even if you don't believe me, Holland, I wasn't there  when Flynn...when he hurt the girl."  He hesitated again.  It  seemed important for him to have me believe him.  "I don't know what  I would have done.  But I like to think I wouldn't of stood for it."  His  words trailed off and he walked on.

I slipped my way back to the cabin's  window.  I did believe Wagoner.  Not that it mattered now.

Ten minutes  passed and I began to wonder if I'd misjudged the big man.  I had his guns  with me but he could have had a spare in the barn.  I was considering naming  myself a fool when the sudden pound of hooves broke sharp across the still  night.  I was watching through the window as Flynn came out of his  seat, eyes quick and dangerous.

"It's Wagoner!  The son of a bitch is  running!"

Palming a pistol, Flynn bolted from the cabin.  The man  with the shotgun followed.  But Boren hesitated at the door.  I had  no choice now.  I'd not get another such chance.  I shoved up the  window and swung quickly through into the
room, the Spencer in my hands,  barrel stabbed toward the door.  Boren looked behind him at the noise, eyes  going wide with surprise.  He dropped his hand for the pistol at his side.   I worked the rifle twice and the slugs smashed him back against the cabin  wall, smashed him back and down, tearing splinters from the oak logs where  the lead ripped through flesh.

The second man was on the porch and turned  at the gunshots. He carried an old Greener 10-gauge, started to drag its  barrel up.  I shot him through the throat and he dropped like a sack  of wet feed.

A quick glance showed me Hutton Cody.  His eyes were open  but full of void.  He didn't look at me, and didn't even flinch when a  bullet came skipping through the door to tear up splinters by my  boots.

Not wanting to be trapped inside, I took a dive back  through the window, rolling across brush into the shallow cover of  some rocks that had once been gathered for a wall.  I saw Flynn running  for the barn and pumped two bullets his way.  One of them knocked him  sprawling, but he lurched to his feet again in an instant and dove through  the dark mouth of the barn door.   I reloaded, breathing hard.

As I  started to think I had Flynn trapped, there came a splintering sound from  behind the barn and I knew the outlaw had found a way out.  Cursing, I took  off running, reached the corral as the shadows of a horse and rider burst  through a jagged opening at the back of the barn and took off up the main  trail leading out of the valley.   I raised the Spencer to my shoulder.   But just then two other horsemen appeared on the trail above, no doubt the  killers Flynn
had left earlier as a welcoming party for me.  The shooting  must have brought them, and now one of them fired toward the  cabin, clearly not seeing me in the darkness by the corral.  I  returned fire as Flynn reached them, scattering the black knot of  them with four quick bullets.  One shot drew a yelp of pain, and then the  outlaws were gone up the hill, hoofbeats fading quickly.

I lowered the  rifle, doubting that my enemies would be back any time soon.  I'd fired at  Flynn from the cabin and then from the outside only moments later.  I figured  he'd run because he thought there was more than one of me.
  Walking to  the front of the barn I looked at the place where one of my shots had knocked  Flynn down.  The heel of his boot was lying there all by itself in the dust.   I picked it up with a curse and turned back toward the  cabin.

 

Part 3
 

 Two days after I'd shot  it out with Flynn and his cronies I drove a wagon down the main street of  Stopover.  It was the Cody family wagon and Hutton Cody was lying in the back  covered with blankets against the chill.  He hadn't said a word, though  I'd managed to get him to drink a little water and broth at our stops.  I  was worried about him.  His skin was sallow, his face drawn gaunt.  Whatever  anger I'd felt for him had melted away in the face of what his daughter's  loss had done to him.

After I saw Cody to bed in the local doctor's  office I headed immediately across the street to the mercantile to pick up  shells and grub and cold weather traveling gear.  I was going  after Flynn.  He had Laura to pay for.  And her dad.  And maybe even my pa  from years back.  Flynn had land here and if I waited long enough he'd  probably return.  But I'd never been a man full of patience and I didn't want  him to be able to plough the farm to his own liking for our showdown.

There were a few things I had to do before I left, though. First, I went down  to the stage station and sent a package off to Cheyenne, Wyoming.  A note was  attached, addressed to Flynn, who I had a feeling might head back to his old  stomping grounds once he left the Salt River Range.   The note was  short.  It read: Royal,

I'll be coming for you now.  The package is  just a reminder of how close we've  become.  Boone Holland

In  the package I put the boot heel I'd shot off him at Widow Fork.  There was a  nice big tear in the leather from a bullet that could have taken off his foot  if it had been an inch higher.  Of course, I couldn't be sure he'd ever get  the package, but knowing the west I figured word would get around to him  eventually.  And besides making him mad, it might make him wonder just how  crazy I was anyway.  I figured leaving Flynn wondering was a good  idea.   The second thing I did was get a few day's rest and feed upAce  on some corn so he'd have the strength for hard riding.  It
was a killing  trail I was headed out on, and it likely wouldn't be a short one.  I hired a  boy to look after my cattle and horses while I was gone.

On the  morning that I saddled Ace for the ride I stopped by the doctor's office for  a last look-see at Hutton Cody.  He was sitting propped up in bed and I  thought his color was a little better in the few places where he didn't have  bruises.  The doc said he'd been eating some, but he still wouldn't meet my  eyes.   I stood by the older man's bed and explained to him how I  was going to hunt Flynn down and see the bastard hanged or dead.  I told  him I'd be back when it was over and take him to see Laura's grave, and would  put up a headstone.  I told him quite a few
things, and when I finished I  turned to go.

Cody spoke then, three words, though still he never looked  at me.

"Be careful, Boone," he  said.

Part 4
 

  Royal Flynn rode a black  horse with a white tail that stood nearly eighteen hands high.  It had a  distinctive hoof print, and when I missed Flynn in Cheyenne and half a dozen  other places I started asking questions about the horse as well as the  man. Seemed to me it might be harder to disguise the former than  the latter.   Everywhere I went I left word: Boone Holland is hunting  Royal Flynn.  Soon, the story of the hunt and the boot-heel-package  had spread like ripples over a pond.  Yet, Flynn didn't stop.  He rode  fast and rumors said he rode with two bad men beside him.  I
couldn't believe  he was scared of me, but I added that to the word I sent out, in hopes he  would turn to face me.  He didn't.

 Then I heard whispers of the black  horse and found his tracks outside a shanty town called Bold Acre.  With a  hot trail under me, I picked up the pace.  Winter was swelling fast over the  land and the creeks were full of ice in the mornings, but Ace and I kept  coming.

Once we were ambushed and Ace saved me.  He smelled them,  or saw a glint that shouldn't have been there, and he shied off the trail  so quick that the bullet meant for me tore up dirt instead. I had my Spencer  out and was hunkered down behind a boulder for a fight when I heard the sound  of fleeing hooves and knew I'd have to take up the trail again.

Yes,  it was hard to believe Flynn was scared of me.  I had no rep as a gunman.   I'd had one fight at a trading post down in the Sierra Madres and had shot  two men in it who were supposed to be salty.  But no one knew I'd been  involved.  And though I'd killed a couple of Flynn's boys on Widow Fork Creek  and shot him out of his boot, that hardly seemed enough to send a fellow like  Flynn running.  He'd killed five or six men it was said, several of them  face to face.

I remembered the day Flynn had beaten my father with  his fists.  Ma, in the last year of her life then--though none of us knew  it--had sent me to the saloon to fetch pa for supper.  I was twelve, short  for my age, and I'd come through the doors into the Bucket of Blood just as  Flynn knocked dad down for the sixth time.  I had an old penknife for  whittling and I went after Flynn with it.  He was in his mid-twenties then,  big enough to collar me and slap me around as I lunged and lunged at  him.

I remembered how an old buffalo hider who was supposed to be part  Indian had said to Flynn:  "That'un 'll kill you one day." I began to wonder  if Flynn had taken that old comment seriously. It seemed silly to me and I  knew I was grasping at straws to explain the outlaw's behavior.  But  gunfighters are notoriously a superstitious breed.

Afraid or not, I  expected Flynn to fight when I caught him.

No gunfighter who backed water  would last long in this country.  But first I had to catch him.  At the  border of Montana the tracks of the three I was chasing divided.  The black  and another horse kept on to the
north.  The third rider turned south.  I  followed the trail of Flynn's mount, catching up a bit every day until I rode  into a town with no name and found the black and another horse hitched to  the rail in front of a saloon, their hides still damp from being  ridden.

I tied off Ace and stepped through the door into a place  that was warm with sweat and smoke and booze.  Holsters were buckled to my  hips and the right hand gun was in my fist.  Two men stood at the bar and  they turned to look, then straightened up so fast that one knocked over his  beer.

"Where's Flynn?" I asked.

  One man was nervous enough to  talk.  The other seemed sullen nd ready to fight.  But I had the  drop.  "He ain't here," the talking one said.  "He took off."   "That's his horse out there.  The black."

"Yeah.  Was.  But he traded it  to Hicks here.  Said he was tired of the damn big thing."

I chuckled.   "Not bad.  I fell for it.  He knew I was following the trail by the black's  prints.  He's still running
and he used you two to buy him some time.  You  boys must feel awfully dumb for getting taken that way.  Might as well tell  me where he's gone."

The talking one wasn't completely stupid.  I  could see his mouth working as the truth took hold.  Hicks, of the sullen  face, just compounded his mistakes.

"You wouldn't be yapping so big if  you didn't have that gun in your hand."

I don't know what made me do  it.  Frustration at a long trail, maybe, or anger at the thought that these  men had been
part of the bunch who'd dumped Laura Cody on my doorstep.

 I dropped the Colt in its holster.  The talking one took half a dozen steps  to the left and put his hands on the bar.

"I don't want any part of it,"  he said.   Hicks looked around at his partner, looked back at me,  licked his lips, and grabbed for his gun.  I wasn't there when they buried  him.

I glanced at the other one.

"He went to Nevada.  To the  silver mines at Comstock.”

We left out of there, Ace and I, riding east  at first to reach the mountain passes before snow closed them for the  winter. I gave Ace his head and the bronze stallion gave me his heart. It  was near thing, but we made it.  If we hadn't, Royal Flynn would have been  safe until spring because in the dead of winter no one crosses the  Rockies.

Freezing and thawing, fording streams made deadly by  ice, struggling through drifts of early snow that would have  broken another horse's spirit, we made it through.  White as ghosts  we came down out of the hills in the midst of a blizzard and rode into  town.  Only our eyes were alive, and both of us had spots of frostbite.  In  spite of what I'd try to do, the actions of the Colts were frozen solid, and  if Flynn had been in that town he could have killed us with an ice pick.  But  he wasn't there and

we warmed and recovered, the horse, myself, my  guns.   When the blizzard broke we rode on.  The people watched us  go and called us fools, but we went.  A week later, on a night clear and  bitter but with the wind still, I walked Ace across a frozen creek into a  town called Beebee.  Moonlight danced off the snow, carving the land with  strange shadows, but behind the windows were lights and warmth, laughter and  the fog of conversations.

I stabled Ace, forked some hay for him, then  warmed my hands over the wood stove in the livery man's office.  I unwrapped  my guns from the woolen cloth in which they had ridden under my coat next  to my skin.  This time the hammers clicked smoothly and the cylinders spun  with a wicked music.  In the light from the stove the cartridges gleamed a  buttery yellow.

I knew where Royal Flynn was.  I'd caught his  silhouette against the window of the Rolling Rock saloon as I'd ridden  past. Holstering the pistols, I made that forty yard walk, pushing back my  sheepskin coat as I stepped inside with snow flakes melting on my hat and  shoulders.

Flynn was there, back to me, big against a faro table.   A girl hung under his left arm, pretty at first glance but worn
down by  rough handling when you looked a little closer.  From her laughter, I knew  Flynn was winning.

I stepped around the table.  Flynn saw me and his  hands and face went still.  From there the quiet spread, freezing voices  in mid-sentence, drawing gazes toward us.  I was twenty-one today.

 "New boots, Royal?" I asked.  "What happened to your other pair?"

 Flynn looked good, black, flat-brimmed hat, broadcloth suit, ruffled shirt  and a silk string tie.  But there was a bruised darkness under his eyes that  hadn't been there before, and tension lines carved deep around his mouth.   Only his Peacemaker .45s looked the same.

Yes, he was big.  And I'd  thinned out over the last few weeks.  My torn shirt was too loose and my  jeans were patched.

But, like his, my guns were the same.

"I didn't  think I was gonna catch you, Royal," I said.  "Why that trick of trading your  horse with one of your partners was pure genius.  Hoped they'd kill me,  didn't you?  Guess you ought to pick your friends more carefully.  They were  oh so anxious to talk once I explained how you'd made fools of them."

 "Shut up, boy," Flynn said.  "I haven't the faintest idea what you're  chattering about."

"Who is this man, Royal?" the girl asked.

Flynn's eyes never lost their lock on mine.  "Just a saddle tramp who's been  trying to trouble me," he answered.  "A coward from what I've heard.  I  didn't think he'd be foolish enough to show his face to me."

"Why,  Royal," I said.  "You call me a coward when I've been chasing you over half  the west?  I bet even some of these folks here have heard that I'm hunting  you."

A gray-haired man wearing spectacles and a derby hat spoke.

 "You Boone Holland?"

"That I be," I said.

"Some trouble over a  woman, wasn't it?" the man continued.

"Yeah.  The wrong woman for Royal.   He kidnapped someone I loved.  She shot herself rather than let him  touch--"
  "That is enough!" Flynn roared, startling the people  standing around him.  He took a couple of steps out of the crowd.

"I'm  gonna kill you, Holland," he said, and dropped his hands for his guns.

 My own hands were moving.  But already his pistols were coming up and a  single thought was racing through my mind--"take the hits, keep  shooting."

Then my own Colts were hammering, an instant before  his. Twin crimson spots flashed on his white shirt, to either side of his  tie.  I saw flame in my eyes--muzzle flash.  And my left arm went numb.   Glass tinkled behind me and a lamp went black.

I stepped to one side.  My  left hand hung limp but the right thumbed back the hammer on that Colt and  the weapon bucked again. I thought Flynn was striding toward me.  Only after  I shot did I realize he was falling.  The third bullet caught him high,  under the soft spot where his throat and chest joined.  His own last shots  went into the floor as he crashed down in an explosion of dust.

I  walked/stumbled over to the bar and laid the right side Colt down.  My left  arm wouldn't work so I reached over with my right hand and holstered that  gun.  Then I thumbed shells, one handed, into the other pistol, standing  there at the bar with a dead man bleeding into the sawdust a few feet  away.

Someone poured me a whiskey and I downed it, though I'd  never been one to drink.  I heard someone else say they were going after  the doc, and wondered why.

"He's dead," I said.  "Better call an  undertaker."

"Yeah, he's dead," the bartender said.  "But you ain't."   He poured me another drink and I downed that one too.

By the time the doctor arrived I was sitting on the floor with the bottle.  Someone had  helped me off with my coat and as the doc cut my shirt to look at the hole in  my outside, left shoulder I offered him a drink.  He turned me down, and  didn't even crack a smile when I tried to pour some whiskey over  the wound.

No sense of humor, that  doc.

Part 5
 

When spring cleared the  passes I threw the saddle across Ace, cinched it up, and headed for home.  I  was anxious to see my own grass again, and Laura's grave.  My arm had  mended well and we held a hard pace, cutting across country as often as not  to save time.  But it was a beautiful land and I stopped on occasion to  sightsee.

When I came down the last hill to see my cabin before  me, there was lazy smoke drifting from the chimney.  I drew the Spencer  from the saddle boot and walked Ace in slowly.  Then the door opened and  Hutton Cody stood there.  He looked all right, though the marks of hard times  were on his face and in the way his shoulders curved.

"Welcome back,"  he said as I dismounted.  "Figured I'd...take over looking after the place  for you.

His gaze went beyond me, toward where his daughter's  grave stood.  I nodded, stepped past him into the house and hung up my  hat.

As I leaned the Spencer in a corner he poured some coffee and brought  me a cup to the table.  I sat, sipped.

"I'm glad you're better," I said  then.

"Much better," he said, sitting across from me.  "I...  I want  to thank you for all you did.  For me.  For...Laura.”

"For Laura," I  agreed.

He leaned back in his chair, hands dropping to his lap.   He nodded slightly, as if to himself.  There was some kind of  ledger sitting on the table and he reached and pushed it toward me.

 "Sign that," he said.  "And you'll be a wealthy man."

I frowned.  "What  is it?"

"Flynn knew some things.  The railroad wants to put a  line through this country.  They want to build a station.  Right  where we're sitting.  They'll pay well."

  I didn't reach for the  papers.

"That would be the main reason he wanted my land," I said.

 "Yes.  And one reason he wanted me in his debt.  He knew you'd inherited this  place from an old man who left no formal will.  He figured a good lawyer could take it away from you."

"I see."

"When I found out what the  situation was.  Who was involved.I refused.  He started on Laura after  that.  Courting her first.  Then..."

He looked away from me.

"He  won't ever be starting on anyone else," I said.

"I figured."

My  look was a question.

"You're here," he said by way of an answer.

I  pushed the papers back across the table toward him.

"Don't think I'll be  selling.  I like the place as it is."

"I think Laura would have liked it  too," he said.

"I believe she does like it."

He nodded, picked up  the papers and stood.

"I should be going.  Let you settle in."

He  moved toward the door and I half turned in my chair.

"Stay for supper," I  said.  "Tell me about Laura these last five years."

He smiled.  "I'd  like that," he said.  "Very much."