“Because it’s so much easier to hit what you aim for at close range.”
Trent couldn’t hide his nervousness. “Marshal, please don’t mention this conversation to Esther. If she knew what we were talking about, she’d become hysterical.”
“I understand.”
“I’d appreciate it if you’d help me pick out a derringer and shotgun in Durango.”
“There’s a real fine gunsmith that I know there and he’ll give us a good deal. Don’t worry,” Longarm said, “I’m sure that you’ll never have to defend yourself, but it’s wise to be prepared for the worst.”
“I’m starting to think that we should have stayed in Denver where it’s more civilized,” Trent fretted.
“Give it a chance,” Longarm suggested. “If you are honest and not trying to print lies, I’m sure that you will do just fine.”
“They never told me that this kind of thing happened when I was studying journalism.”
“I’m sure that they didn’t,” Longarm said, “but it does happen in the Wild West.”
Longarm offered Trent more instructions on how to handle a six-shooter. Actually, the kid was surprisingly good for someone who had never even fired a pistol. “If you practice you’ll soon be better than most,” Longarm told the young Easterner. “You’ve plenty of natural ability.”
“Don’t tell that to my wife,” Trent replied. “I guarantee you that she will not be reassured.”
“All right.”
The closer they got to Durango, the more nervous everyone on the stage became. On their last stop, they stayed in a stone house that had been built by an early ranching family that had been massacred by the Ute Indians over twenty years before. The couple who were running the station were Mr. and Mrs. Bert and Adele Trabert, an elderly couple who were neither gracious nor friendly. They set a poor table, and Charley bawled them out for being stingy.
“You folks get paid every month by the stage company just to keep up a hospitable stage station! And here you are skimpin’ on everything from the bread to the potatoes! We’re hungry, dammit! Now, I want a huge breakfast waiting for us all at daybreak or there is going to be hell to pay!”
The next morning, they did have a good breakfast, but Charley was still irritated. “You folks had damn sure better start changin’ the sheets and airin’ out them old mattresses. They’re loaded with ticks and fleas!”
The couple nodded submissively, and although Longarm was scratching like a dog and bitten in a dozen places, he almost felt sorry for them.
“Charley, you were pretty hard on those old folks,” he said before they rolled out of the station.
“Well, they were hard on us,” Charley complained. “And if I’m going to get killed today, I want it to happen on a full stomach. Is that so much to ask?”
“No,” Longarm said, taking his rifle and climbing up beside the driver, “I guess it isn’t.”
“The thing of it is,” Charley said, “I ain’t afraid of dying, but I’d rather be counted among the living.”
“I guess most everyone would agree on that.”
“I’m sixty-three years old,” Charley confided in him, “and I’ve had my share of troubles, but all in all, it’s been a good and an interesting life. Why, I remember-“
The rifle shot exploded from the rocks about fifty yards off to their left, and Charley reached up and slapped his forehead as if he were swatting a mosquito. His eyes rolled up into his head and he pitched forward with blood pouring from the hole in his skull.
Longarm dove for the reins, but he was too late, and the excited team of horses began to run. Drawing his gun, he looked in vain for a target. He could hear Miranda, Trent, and Esther shouting down in the coach.
A volley of rifle shots sent Longarm ducking for cover as the stage accelerated down the mountain road. Longarm took a deep breath, then pushed the dead driver out of the way and made a grab for the lines, but they were far out of his reach. He glanced back and saw five horsemen appear from the rocks and take up chase.
“Miranda! Trent!” Longarm shouted. “They’re coming after us, so get ready to shoot!”
Longarm looked up ahead, and saw that the road bent to the right and then disappeared down a Mountainside. He couldn’t see what lay ahead past that, but he didn’t think it looked very good. Most likely, they were going to overturn.
He heard gunfire from the coach, and wished he could join them, but he had to get the lines dragging on the ground. Longarm jumped down on the tongue of the stage and held on for dear life. The road was rough, and every time he started to make a grab for the lines, he nearly fell, almost being run over by the coach.
Damn! What a mess!
Longarm knew that he wasn’t going to be able to grab the lines, and he doubted that he could leap on the back of the nearest horse and try to pull it to a stop, but there didn’t seem to be any choice but to try.
Here goes, he thought, jumping.
Somehow, he did land on the back of the wheel horse, and then he grabbed the lines and started wrenching on them. The stage began to slow, but not before they careened into that sharp right turn. Longarm decided that the coach was not going to make it. He could feel the coach lean precariously toward the steep drop-off into a canyon, and he bellowed, “It’s going over! Jump!”
And then, because he was a firm believer in taking his own good advice, Longarm also jumped.
Chapter 6
Longarm didn’t remember hitting the steep shale-covered Mountainside. But he did recall being airborne, and then tumbling for what seemed like forever, until he smashed into a pine tree at the bottom of the gorge. He must have lost consciousness for several minutes, because he was awakened by Miranda’s pleas.
“Custis! Wake up, Custis!”
He didn’t want to wake up or even open his eyes. His entire body throbbed with pain. And yet Miranda’s voice was so urgent, he had little choice but to open his eyes and try to gather his wits.
“Custis, Esther is unconscious! She might be dying!”
He roused himself a little. “What … what about her husband?”
“He was knocked out too, but seems to be coming around. The ambushers are searching for us! What are we going to do!”
“Help me up.”
Miranda got her arm around his waist, and she managed to help get him to his feet, where Longarm swayed unsteadily, trying his best to focus. He was about to say something when a rifle bullet clipped a nearby rock and sent both him and Miranda spilling sideways into the deep stream that flowed along the bottom of this gorge.
“They’re going to kill us!” Miranda cried as she and Longarm sought cover among the rocks.
The icy shock of the mountain water did a lot to clear Longarm’s mind and focus his vision. He reached for his side arm, only to discover that it was missing, no doubt lost during his long tumble down the mountainside.
“Miranda, do you have a gun?”
“No, but I saw that old Navy Colt of Trent’s lying on the rocks just up the slope.”
Longarm peered out from behind the rocks. He was beginning to shiver, for the air was cold in the shadowy gorge and they were wet. It was then that he saw the wreckage of the stage about two hundred yards upriver. Two of the four horses were alive and thrashing in their traces. One, a sorrel, kept slamming its head down against the rocks as if trying to commit suicide.
“Are they going to come down and try to finish us off?” Miranda asked.
“I expect so,” Longarm said. “They’ll want to loot the stagecoach, and once they’ve come that far, I figure they’ll decide to come down here and pick over our bodies.”
“But they saw us and know we are alive!”
“They’re going to guess that we’re hurt and not much of a problem,” Longarm said. “What I’ve got to do is to reach that Navy Colt and then see if I can hunt up anything else that will shoot.”
“What about your pocket derringer?”
Longarm reached into his vest pocket. The crystal of his Ingersoll watch was shattered, but there was nothing wrong with his deadly little two-shot derringer. “Yeah,” he said, “this will help, but what I wouldn’t give for a rifle!”