The big gundown (3 page)

To The Kid’s relief, the men didn’t come back. Laid up as he was, he wasn’t sure if he would have been able to handle them, even with help from Sean and the four vaqueros. The rancher and his men were tough, sure. They had to be in order to survive out there.

But those men with Colonel Black were killers. Stone-cold killers.

Sean called his vaqueros into the house when they rode in a short time later and told them what had happened. He gave orders for them to set up guard shifts so that someone would be awake and keeping an eye on the place all night. That was a smart move, The Kid thought, and he hadn’t even had to suggest it to the rancher. Sean seemed to be a pretty canny young man.

The stew tasted as good as it smelled, and as The Kid ate, he felt strength flowing back into him. It would take a while, but he was confident that he was on the mend.

He slept soundly that night, a good honest sleep instead of the unconsciousness that had gripped him before. The rest revitalized him, so that when he awoke the next morning, he was actually anxious to get out of bed and try his legs again.

Frannie wouldn’t hear of that, however, and The Kid sensed that she was so strong willed that arguing wouldn’t do any good. So he didn’t bother. He just lay there and rested and let her fill him full of good food for a couple more days. While that was going on, he checked frequently with Sean to find out if he or any of the ranch hands had seen any sign of Colonel Black and his men. Sean reported that they hadn’t.

On the third day after he regained consciousness, The Kid was too restless to stay in bed any longer. Frannie brought him a heavy hickory cane with a carved wolf’s head for a grip.

“This cane belonged to my grandfather,” she told him. “Be careful when you use it.”

“I’ll take good care of it while I’m borrowing it,” The Kid promised.

“I’m not worried about the cane. I don’t want you falling down and hurting yourself even worse.”

“That’s not going to happen.” The Kid grinned at Cyrus, who stood nearby watching with a rapt expression on his face. “I’ll have Cyrus close by to give me a hand if I need one, won’t I, son?”

“You bet, Mr. Morgan!” the boy replied.

The Kid talked Frannie into turning around while he pulled his clothes on. Cyrus helped him with his boots. Then The Kid got a good grip on the cane and pushed himself to his feet. He felt a twinge of pain in his wounded leg, but it didn’t buckle. He took a tentative step, then another and another, keeping as much of his weight off the injured leg as he could.

Suddenly he swayed a little, but Cyrus was right there so that The Kid was able to rest his free hand on the boy’s shoulder and balance himself. “Ma…” Cyrus said.

Frannie turned around and fixed The Kid with a stern stare. “I think that’s enough for now, Mr. Morgan.”

“I’m going to the door and back,” The Kid said. He knew he was being stubborn, but he didn’t care. He wanted to push himself, to find out just how much he could do.

“All right, but take it slow and easy,” Frannie said with obvious reluctance.

With the cane in one hand and the other hand on Cyrus’s shoulder, The Kid walked slowly to the door. By the time he got there, his heart was pounding and he felt dizzy. He stood there looking out and catching his breath for a moment and then turned to make his way back to the bed. Frannie was there to take his arm and help him lie down again.

“You tried to do too much, didn’t you?”

The Kid answered without hesitation. “No. A man’s got to push himself. If he’s satisfied with what’s easy, that’ll never be enough.”

She smiled down at him. “You’re talking to a woman who married a man determined to start a ranch in the middle of nowhere. I know all about a man pushing himself.”

The Kid tried to keep his eyes open, but the lids sagged closed anyway. Next time he would walk farther and do more. And the time after that, and the time after that…

He dozed off with that thought in his head.

By the time three more days had gone by, the pain in The Kid’s leg was almost gone. Using the wolf’s-head cane, he could get around everywhere in the ranch house and in the yard outside. With Cyrus keeping an eye on him and helping him if necessary, he walked over to the barn to check on his horse and was glad to see that the buckskin was being well cared for. He hadn’t expected anything less from Sean and the ranch hands, but it was good to see that with his own eyes.

Cyrus never went far from his side, and the boy was full of questions. One thing he wanted to know was where The Kid was from.

“Oh, here and there,” The Kid told him.

He didn’t mention that once he had been an Eastern-born-and-raised businessman named Conrad Browning. Nor did he say anything about his real father being Frank Morgan, the notorious gunfighter known as The Drifter, or explain that he had once been married to a beautiful young woman named Rebel, who had been taken from him tragically because of greed and a lust for vengeance. All those things had gone into shaping the man who was now known only as Kid Morgan, who had developed a reputation of his own as a gunfighter. Only a handful of people knew the truth, knew that he had turned his back on a whole other life, and that was the way The Kid wanted it. He was content to drift, a loner who wasn’t headed anywhere in particular.

But even a loner could not live totally isolated. He had to run into people from time to time, just as he had come across this ranch, and where there were people, there was trouble. The Kid knew that, and he felt a nagging curiosity about the man called Colonel Gideon Black. It was none of his business, of course, but he wondered why an ex-army man would team up with a bunch of gun-wolves like the men who had accompanied him the other day…not to mention the ones now buried in that arroyo, who had planned to meet the colonel in Bisbee.

A youngster like Cyrus wouldn’t understand any of that, so The Kid didn’t try to explain it to him. He just gave noncommittal answers to Cyrus’s questions about who he was and where he had come from.

There was the time Cyrus asked, “Can you teach me how to use a gun like you, Mr. Morgan?”

They were standing by the corral fence, watching one of the vaqueros work with a balky horse, trying to get it used to wearing a saddle. The Kid looked down at the boy and said, “It ought to be your pa’s job to teach you to shoot, Cyrus.”

“Yeah, but Pa can’t shoot like you do, Mr. Morgan. I never saw anything like it when you killed those four men! That’s what I want to do.”

The Kid shook his head. “You don’t want to kill anybody, Cyrus. Not unless you have to, to protect your life or the life of someone you love.”

“Well, then, I want to be able to do that.”

It was certainly a worthwhile ability to have, The Kid reflected. Even though civilization had made a lot of inroads and people liked to talk about how the turn of the century would mark the beginning of a new, kinder and gentler era, The Kid knew that was a bunch of bullshit. Life was still harsh and dangerous, especially out here on the frontier, and that wasn’t likely to change any time soon. In many ways, so-called civilization just meant surrendering to the wolves and hoping that they wouldn’t devour you. That never worked.

As his father had once told him, “The meek aren’t going to inherit anything west of the Mississippi.”

“Maybe you should start by learning how to shoot a rifle,” The Kid told Cyrus. “Have you ever used one before?”

“Nope. Ma says I’m too little.”

“What’s your pa say?”

“Whatever Ma says.” Cyrus grinned. “Whenever she’s around, anyway.”

The Kid chuckled. “I’ll have a talk with him. Can’t hurt.”

“Thanks, Mr. Morgan! I really would like to learn how to draw and shoot a handgun like you, though.”

“I hope you never have to,” The Kid said softly as he watched the half-wild horse trotting around the corral, trying to avoid the vaquero.

That evening, when Sean Williams went outside to have a last look around the place after supper, The Kid followed him. The Kid didn’t take the wolf’s-head cane with him since he didn’t need it anymore. He felt a little twinge of pain in his leg from time to time, but the wound had healed and his leg was strong again.

“Cyrus told me he wants to learn how to shoot,” The Kid said as he and Sean walked toward the corral. An arch of reddish-gold in the western sky marked the place where the sun had set.

Sean glanced over at him. “I intend on getting around to teaching him one of these days.”

“I figured as much. The thing is, he wants to learn how to shoot like I do.”

A frown creased Sean’s forehead. “No offense, Mr. Morgan…you know how much we appreciate what you did for us…but I’m not sure I’d ever want Cyrus learning how to be a, well, a…”

“Gunfighter,” The Kid finished for him as Sean’s voice trailed off.

“To be honest, yes. I thought your name sounded familiar, so I asked the hands if any of them had ever heard of you. Pablo said he thought you were the man who killed Jack Trace over in New Mexico Territory a while back.”

The Kid nodded slowly. “That was me, all right. Didn’t have much choice in the matter.”

“I never said you did. But I know how trouble seems to follow a man like you.”

“Not always. Sometimes I walk into it,” The Kid said pointedly.

Sean grimaced. “I know, what I’m saying sounds bad. Sounds like we’re not obliged to you for saving our lives—”

The Kid raised a hand to stop him. “One thing doesn’t have anything to do with the other. I saved your lives, but you and your wife saved mine. We’re even on that score.”

“You wouldn’t have gotten hurt if not for us.”

The Kid shook his head. “I already had this conversation with Mrs. Williams. Look, Sean, don’t worry about it. I don’t want to teach Cyrus how to be a gunfighter, either. In fact, I’m thinking it might be a good idea for me to pull out early in the morning, before he gets up.”

“He’d be really disappointed if he didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to you.”

“And that might not be such a bad thing,” The Kid said.

This part of Arizona Territory, not far from the Mexican border, could be blistering hot during the day, but at night the dry air cooled quickly and by morning, there was often a little chill lurking around the edges of dawn.

That was the way it was the next morning when The Kid slipped out of the house and went to the barn while the sky was still just gray in the east. His breath even fogged a little in front of his face.

Sean and Frannie would be glad to get their bed back, he thought. They had put a corn-shuck mattress on the floor next to Cyrus’s bed in the part of the room where the boy slept, that was closed off by a blanket hung from a rope. After the first couple of nights, The Kid had offered to bunk in with the youngster, but Frannie wouldn’t hear of it. He would recuperate better in a real bed, she had declared, and as usual, there was no arguing with Frannie.

The buckskin tossed his head in greeting when The Kid walked into the barn and came up to the stall. “You’re ready to get back on the trail again, aren’t you, old boy?” The Kid asked. “So am I.”

Sean hadn’t tried to argue him out of leaving this morning. Although The Kid hadn’t spelled it out, they both knew that it wasn’t a good idea for Cyrus to be idolizing The Kid just because he was particularly good at killing. If leaving like this made Cyrus angry at him, that was fine. Cyrus didn’t need to grow up wanting to be like Kid Morgan. He’d do better to follow in the footsteps of his father.

The Kid had the buckskin saddled and ready to ride when a soft footstep made him turn swiftly toward the double doors of the barn. His hand moved with blinding speed to the butt of the gun on his hip. The reaction was all instinct, no conscious thought at all.

“Whoa!” Sean took a step back. “Easy, Kid. It’s just me.”

The rancher had a cup of coffee in one hand and a canvas bag in the other. The Kid felt a little foolish when he saw that. He took his hand away from his gun and forced himself to relax.

“Sorry, Sean. I didn’t think anybody else was up and around yet.”

“You can’t do anything in that house without Frannie knowing about it.” Sean smiled as he came closer and offered the coffee to The Kid, who took the cup and sipped the strong black brew gratefully. “She thought you might want some food to take with you.” He hefted the bag. “It’s just some biscuits left over from last night.”

“Your wife’s biscuits are mighty good.”

“And a couple of fried apple pies.”

The Kid smiled. “Even better.” He paused. “You told her I was leaving this morning?”

“No, but she figured it out pretty quick when you got up and slipped out. I never told her what Cyrus said yesterday. Didn’t want to worry her. But if she knew, I figure she’d be grateful to you for what you’re doing, Kid.”

The Kid shrugged. “I had to be moving on sometime. Today’s as good a time as any.”

“Well, we both appreciate it. I thought I’d give you a hand saddling up, but I see you’ve already done it. How’s your leg?”

“It’s fine.”

“You know, most men would’ve been laid up for at least twice that long with a bullet hole in their leg.”

“I don’t like to stay in one place for too long.”

“Because of the chance that trouble might catch up to you?”

“Something like that,” The Kid said.

“Don’t you get, well, lonely, always drifting by yourself like that?”

It wouldn’t do any good to tell Sean that he was never really alone, The Kid thought. A beautiful blond ghost rode with him everywhere he went, always at his side even when he wished she wasn’t.

So he just shook his head and said, “Not to speak of.”

“Well, I would. Once you’ve got a family, I don’t reckon you’d ever feel right being alone again.”

The Kid turned toward the buckskin. The shadows were still thick in the barn, but they might not be thick enough to conceal the look of pain and loss that he felt come over his face. He didn’t want Sean to see that. Nobody could see it.

It was his, and his alone.

He drank the last of the coffee, handed the empty cup to Sean. Then he took the bag of food and said, “I’m much obliged to you and Mrs. Williams. For this, and for everything else.”

“You reckon you’ll ever come back this way again, Kid?”

The Kid shrugged. “
Quien sabe?
I never know where the trails will take me.”

“Well, if you do, be sure and stop in for a visit, you hear?” Sean stuck out his hand. “Best of luck to you.”

“Thanks.” The Kid shook hands with the young rancher, then took hold of the buckskin’s reins, put a foot in the stirrup, and swung up into the saddle. He looped the cord attached to the bag of food around the saddlehorn.

Sean stepped back to let The Kid ride out of the barn. The Kid looked around in the doorway and lifted a hand in farewell. He didn’t look back again, as he rode away.

And he pretended he didn’t hear the sudden banging of a door and the plaintive sound of a little boy’s voice somewhere behind him.

There was an old saying about the dawn coming up like thunder. That’s the way it was out there. One minute the sun was still below the horizon. The next it was a brilliant orange-red ball floating in the sky and flooding the landscape with light.

The Kid kept the buckskin moving at an easy pace toward the San Pedro River. He was only a couple of miles from the Williams spread, but already he had put the place behind him. It was a part of his past, a part that he would remember fondly in some respects but not in others.

Out of habit, he kept a close eye on the landscape around him, alert for any sign of trouble. It was pretty dry country, but there were small grassy valleys here and there, where the ranchers in the area grazed their stock. Ranges of low hills framed the valleys. Miles to the north lay the grayish-blue peaks of the Dragoon Mountains. The Kid had never been through those parts before, but he had talked to people who had, including Sean Williams. Up ahead were the towns of Sierra Vista, right on the river, and Bisbee a few miles beyond it. He wasn’t sure he wanted to visit either place, although it might not hurt to replenish his supplies.

Because he was watching everything around him, he spotted the buzzards circling in the air to his left. The Kid reined in and studied them for a moment as they wheeled through the blue sky and then dropped toward the earth, one after the other. Whatever was down there, the buzzards had decided that it was already dead, not just dying.

As The Kid studied the terrain from under the broad brim of his brown hat, his eyes suddenly narrowed. He saw a line meandering in a jagged path across a broad flat and recognized it as a dry wash, a common feature in that part of the country. There was nothing unusual about it.

Frannie Williams had said that her husband Sean had taken the bodies of the four gunmen to an arroyo about two miles from the ranch house and buried them by caving in the bank. The Kid whipped around in the saddle and gazed back toward the Williams spread. He had come about two miles.

And there were more buzzards arriving in the vicinity, even as he sat there.

“Son of a bitch,” The Kid muttered under his breath. He tugged on the reins and turned the buckskin toward the arroyo. His boot heels prodded the horse’s flanks and sent it forward at a fast trot.

When he reached the arroyo, The Kid dismounted and hauled his Winchester from the sheath strapped to the saddle. On the other side of the saddle, an old Sharps rode in a similar sheath, but he used it for long-distance work. He was more likely to need the repeater.

The Kid stepped to the edge of the wash and looked down, grimacing as the stench reached him. Somebody had been digging down there, and now more than a dozen buzzards were clustered around what had been unearthed, their bald, ugly heads dipping and darting as their sharp beaks ripped strips of rotting flesh off the four corpses. The Kid couldn’t have recognized the men. Their tattered clothing was the only thing that still marked them as human since the skeletons hadn’t been fully exposed yet. The way the carrion-eating birds were working on them, it wouldn’t be true much longer.

A bitter, sour taste of revulsion welled up The Kid’s throat and filled his mouth. He pointed the Winchester at the sky and cranked off three fast rounds, yelling as the shots blasted out. The racket sent the flock of buzzards soaring into the sky with angry cries and the flapping of leathery wings. The Kid lowered the rifle and wiped the back of one hand across his mouth. It didn’t make the bad taste go away.

This was a waste of time and bullets, he told himself as the echoes of the shots rolled away over the Arizona landscape. He wasn’t going to bury those bastards. Might as well let the buzzards have them. Buzzards had to eat, too, The Kid supposed.

The question was, who had come along and uncovered the bodies?

One obvious answer suggested itself, and The Kid didn’t like it at all.

He liked it even less a moment later as his head jerked up and he realized that the shots he was hearing weren’t the echoes of the ones he had fired to chase off the buzzards. They were a fresh burst of gunfire, followed by some sort of heavy boom, and they seemed to originate in the direction he had come from.

The direction of the Williams ranch.