He didn’t know that in the room right next to him four men were counting money out onto a poker table.
Shaye opened the door to the room as quietly as he could and stepped out. He was on a balcony overlooking the saloon. There were easily a dozen men or more downstairs. He couldn’t get a clear count. He hoped the entire gang was all there.
He waited for the first move to be made.
James cracked the door to the office open and peered out. He also could see many men, but could not count. No one had any way of knowing if all the men were present.
He and Will waited.
Matthew and Ray peered through the curtain. They could see plenty of men with guns, but could not get a count. They waited impatiently to make their move.
The first move was to come from Thomas and Sheriff Holcomb. They had relieved the two men of their guns, and now they turned them to face the bat-wing doors. They intended to use their prisoners as cover as they entered the saloon.
“If one of you fellas moves wrong,” Holcomb said, “we’ll put a bullet in both your backs? Got it?”
“We got it,” one of them said, “but you’re gonna be sorry. There’s a lot of men with guns in there.”
“How many men?” Holcomb asked.
“You’ll find out.”
“If they open fire, you’ll be the first to go,” Thomas said.
Holcomb looked at Thomas, who nodded and said, “Let’s do this.”
53
Holcomb and Thomas each pushed their man through the bat-wing doors, then entered right behind them.
“This is the sheriff!” Holcomb shouted. “Keep your hands away from your guns.”
The thirteen men in the room froze momentarily. The four men they would have taken orders from were not there. As a result, they had to make their own individual decisions.
At the sound of Holcomb’s voice, the others made their moves.
James and Deputy Strunk opened the office door and stepped out, guns in their hands. James’s heart was pounding, and he tried to ignore it.
Matthew and Deputy Winston stepped through the curtained doorway with their guns out. Matthew’s mouth was dry. He still wasn’t sure that he was with his father and brothers on what they were going to do, but this seemed okay to him. After all, they were acting with the local law.
Shaye stood up straight and pointed his gun at the men on the first floor.
“Play it smart and lay down your guns,” he called out. “You’re surrounded!”
Red Hackett looked up and saw Shaye looking down on them with his gun out. He didn’t recognize the man, or any of the others, but he knew two things—they were lawmen, and he and his compadres outnumbered them.
“Surrounded, my ass!” he shouted, and went for his gun.
That was all the others needed. They all went for their weapons, and the shooting started….
“What the hell!” Ethan said.
He started for the door with Ben Branch in tow. Morales looked at Aaron, who shook his head. From the sounds outside the room, all hell had broken loose.
“Ethan, wait!” Aaron shouted.
“What for?”
“The law’s made their move.”
“But there was only supposed to be three of them.”
“Sounds like a lot more than that to me,” Aaron said, “and if they got the drop on our men, it’s gonna be bad.”
“So what do we do?” Ethan asked.
Aaron waved his arm at the stacks of money on the table. “We pack this money up and go out that window,” he said. “There’s a roof out there. We can make it to the street and get our horses from the livery.”
“But—”
“There’s a lot of money here,” Aaron said, “and a lot more if it’s only split four ways.”
Ethan hesitated.
“What do we do, Ethan?” Branch asked.
Morales was ready to draw his gun to back Aaron Langer’s play. He’d leave Ethan to his own brother, and he would take out Branch, if it came to that.
“Ethan,” Aaron said. “What do we do?”
The shooting in the saloon was getting impossibly loud. It sounded like a war.
“Pack it up, Aaron,” Ethan finally said, “and let’s get the hell out of here.”
54
The lawmen were outnumbered, but they had the outlaws outgunned. Holcomb, Strunk, and Winston all let loose with their shotguns, both barrels, and then put their pistols to use. Men cried out and blood splashed onto the bar, the floor, and the walls.
Shaye picked off several men from the balcony with his Winchester—levering and firing, levering and firing—before they knew what hit them.
Matthew and James put their rifles to use from the floor level, then pressed their handguns into action. There was no hesitation from either of them. This was clearly a kill or be killed situation.
Thomas, preferring his handgun to his rifle, used that weapon first, and didn’t switch to the rifle until his hammer fell on an empty chamber. Like his brothers, he never hesitated, but unlike them, he was calm, which surprised him. Not only was he calm, but he was deadly accurate, and every bullet he fired slammed into somebody’s flesh.
The outlaws were confused, unsure where to shoot first. With no direction, they were easy pickings, even though there were more of them. A couple jumped behind the bar, where the poor bartender was cowering, but they were visible from the balcony and Shaye took care of them.
From his vantage point, Shaye could see his sons in action. As proud of them as he was, he was actually watching to make sure they didn’t get hurt. He knew he was making a mistake—possibly a deadly one. In watching out for his sons, he was leaving himself open, but this was the first time they had been involved in a gun-fight. If one of them panicked, he wanted to be able to help them.
He saw a bullet strike Will Strunk, who was standing next to James, and the deputy went down. To James’s credit, he just kept on shooting.
As Shaye had taught them, his sons went to one knee, or to cover, in order to reload.
In Thomas’s case, he upturned a table and ducked behind it.
James dropped to a knee, as did Matthew, but Matthew was still a big target.
Shaye did his best to protect his sons with his rifle, and then with his pistol, until the room filled with so much gun smoke that he couldn’t see them.
He was about to rush to the stairs when the shooting abruptly stopped.
His trained ear picked up the sounds of men moaning, empty shells striking the floor as some reloaded, rifle levers being worked and shotguns being broken over to reload.
He didn’t wait for the smoke to clear, but headed for the stairs. Halfway down, he was able to see again. He anxiously sought out his sons.
Thomas was standing up behind the table he’d overturned, calmly reloading.
James was crouched over the fallen deputy.
Matthew was still down on one knee, but he held his gun at the ready. Next to him, Deputy Winston was holding his hand over a wound he’d sustained to his arm.
Sheriff Holcomb was moving among the fallen outlaws. There didn’t seem to be any left standing, but from the sound they were making, quite a few of them were still alive.
“Pa,” Thomas said, still calm, “you’re hit.”
“What?” Shaye looked down at himself and saw blood on his side. He hadn’t felt it, but a bullet had plowed a furrow in his left side and kept on going. He probed it with his fingers, then looked up at Thomas.
“It’s not bad,” he said. “The bullet’s not there. You boys all right?”
“I’m, fine, Pa,” James said, “but the deputy’s dead.”