But he had a sinking feeling it was too damn late for Bury.
“Shut up, Rogers,” he said. He looked at his other deputies, Weathers and Payton. “You men check them shotguns and rifles. Git over to the store and stock up on shells. I don’t know why, but something tells me everything that’s happenin’ is the fault of that Buck West. Damn his eyes!”
“So we is gonna do what?” Payton asked. Like Rogers, Payton was no mental giant.
“I think the bosses is gonna tell us to kill him.”
Potter turned from the second-floor window of the PSR offices to look at Stratton. “You feel it?” he asked.
“Yes,” Stratton said with a sigh. “Whatever it is.”
“I had the territorial governorship in the palm of my hand,” Potter said. “And suddenly, for no reason, I lose it. Why? A seemingly intelligent, reasonable young woman, a very capable school teacher, suddenly falls for a gunslick. Why? And now I discover that Buck West—or whatever his name is—is buddy-buddy with Sam, and Sam is sharing the blankets with a squatter. What’s happening around here?”
“Don’t forget the mountain men gathering up in the deep timber.”
“That’s right.”
The two men looked at each other and suddenly their brains began to click and hum in unison.
“Mountain men helped raise Kirby Jensen,” Stratton said.
“We’ve all heard the rumors that Preacher wasn’t killed,” Potter said.
“All our troubles started when Buck West arrived in town.”
The men sent a flunky for Sheriff Dan Reese.
“Anybody have any idee whatever happened to old Maurice Leduc?” Deadlead asked.
The mountain men were camped openly and brazenly about two miles outside of Bury. They knew their reputation had preceded them, and they likewise knew that none of the Big Three’s gunhands were about to attack the camp. For one thing, they held the vantage point—the crest of a low hill. For another, no twenty-five cowboys-turned-gunhands were about to attack a dozen old hardbitten mountain men; especially not the most notorious bunch of mountain men to ever prowl the high lonesome. No matter that none of the mountain men would ever see seventy years of age again. That had nothing to do with it. Even at seventy, most of them could still outshoot and outfight men half their age.
Lobo said, “Last I heard, ol’ Leduc come back up to near Bent’s fort and built hisself a cabin; him and a teenage Mex gal. Took up gardenin’.” That was said very contemptuously.
“Hale’s far!” Powder Pete said. “That was back in ’58.”
“Wal, what year is this here we’re in?” Dupre asked.
“Oh…about ’75, I reckon,” Tenneysee said.
“You don’t say,” Greybull said. “My, time does git away from a man, don’t it?”
“If that is the case,” Audie said. “And I will admit that I don’t even know what year it is, not really, I was born seventy-one years ago.”
“And got uglier every year,” Preacher said.
“You should talk. You’re so ugly you could pose for totem poles.”
“I ’member the furst time I seen one of the things,” Phew said. “Up in Washington Territory. Like to have plumb scared me out of my ’skins.”
“That’d probably been a good thing for all concerned,” Matt said. “Least you’da took a bath then. You ain’t been out of them skins in fifty year.”
“I wish Smoke would git things a-smokin’ down yonder,” Beartooth said. “I’m a-cravin’ a mite of action.”
“He’ll start stirrin’ it up in a day or three,” Preacher opined. “And then we’ll all have all the action we can handle. Bet on it.”
“Reckon whut he’s a-doin’ down there?” Lobo asked.
“Probably tryin’ to spark that schoolmarm,” Preacher said. “He’s shore stuck on her.”
“What do you mean, I can’t come in?” Buck said, standing on the front porch of the Pink House.
“Buck,” Sally’s voice came through the closed door. “You’d better get out of town. Little Ben just slipped up to the back door and told us Sheriff Reese and his deputies are looking for you. Word just drifted into town that you’re Smoke Jensen.”
So the cat was out of the bag. Fine. He was getting tired of being Buck West. “You…ladies have plenty of food and water?”
“Enough for a month-long siege. Go on, Buck.”
“Call me Smoke.”
15
Smoke slipped around the side of the Pink House and into the weed-grown alley in the rear. He carefully picked his way toward the rear of the stable. He felt sure the front of the stable would be watched.
For the first time since he had arrived in Bury, the town was silent. No wagons rattled up and down the streets. No riders moving in and out of town. No foot traffic to be seen in Bury. A tiny dust devil spun madly up the main street, picking up bits of paper as it whirled away.
Smoke slipped from outhouse to outhouse, both hammer thongs off his .44s.
Reese and his deputies apparently believed Smoke would not take to the alleys, but instead stroll right down the center of the main street, spurs jingling, like some tinhorn kid who fancied himself a gunhand. But Smoke had been properly schooled by Preacher, whose philosophy was thus: if you’re outnumbered, circle around ’hind ’em and ambush the hell out of ’em. Ain’t no such thang as a fair fight, boy. Just a winner and a loser.
Smoke didn’t want to open the dance just yet. He was in a very bad position, being on foot and armed with only his short guns.
And he was still about a block and a half from the stable. His eyes picked up the shape of a small boy, frantically and silently waving his arms. Little Ben. Smoke returned the wave. Ben disappeared into the stable and returned seconds later, leading a saddled and ride-ready Drifter. Smoke grinned. Drifter must have taken a liking to Little Ben, for had he not, the stallion would have stomped the boy to death.
“Jensen!” The harshly spoken word came from his right, from the shadows of an alley.
Out of the corner of his eye, Smoke could see the young man had not drawn his pistol. The cowboy was a PSR rider, but Smoke did not know his name.
Smoke slowly turned, facing the young rider. “Back away, cowboy,” Smoke stated softly. “Just walk back up the alley and no one will ever have to know. If you draw on me, I’ll kill you. Turn around and you’ll live. How about it?”
“That thirty thousand dollars looks almighty good to me, Jensen,” the puncher replied, his hands hovering over his low-tied guns. “Start me up a spread with that.”
“You’ll never live to work it,” Smoke warned him.
Ben was slowly leading Drifter up the alley.
“Says you!” the cowboy sneered.
“What’s your name, puncher?”
“Jeff Siddons. Why?”
“So I’ll know what to put on your grave marker.”
Jeff flushed. “You gonna draw or talk?”
“I’d rather not draw at all,” Smoke again tried to ease out of the fight.
“You yellow scum!” Jeff said. “Draw!” His hands dipped downward.
Jeff’s hands had just touched the wooden handles of his guns when he felt a terrible crushing double blow to his chest. The young cowboy staggered backward, falling heavily against the side of the building. Smoke was already turning away from the dying cowboy as light faded in Jeff’s eyes. “Ain’t no human man that fast!” Jeff spoke his last words, sitting in his own dusty blood.
Smoke looked back at the dying cowboy. “Just remember to tell Saint Peter this wasn’t my idea.”
But he was talking to a dead man.
He heard the drum of bootheels on the boardwalk, all running in his direction. He turned just as a voice called out, “Hold it, Jensen!”