Sunset Trail (17 page)

XXIV

Matt Dugan had hesitated about taking the money to the house for the simple reason that it was something he didn’t want to
do, so he put it off. Once the outlaws had it, the chance of getting it back was pretty slim. The dam project would be finished.
Done for. He had known it all the time, of course, but it hit him harder than ever now that the moment was here. It was like
burying a cherished dream.

He couldn’t do it. Pete Fisher had told him it was just an excuse, that the three outlaws had come to Amity to kill the governor,
not to rob the bank. So the seconds dragged out, with Matt looking at his watch every minute until it was fifteen after twelve.

He could not delay any longer. Maybe the $10,000 was only the frosting on the cake, but Jean and Bud were prisoners, he had
been ordered to bring the money, and suddenly he felt guilty for not doing it.

Matt opened a desk drawer, took out the .45 he kept there, checked it quickly and saw that there were five shells in the cylinder,
then slipped it under his waistband on his left side, with the butt to the front. He buttoned his coat and, carrying the satchel
that contained the money in his left hand, hurried out of the bank.

The customers had finally cleared out. Fred Fol-lett had locked the front door and was working in the teller’s cage. He glanced
curiously at Matt as he strode past, but asked no questions. Matt unlocked the front door, called to Follett-“Lock it after
me!”-and stepped outside.

He wasn’t sure that Follett knew what was in the satchel, but it didn’t make any difference. It would all come out soon enough.
He hurried along Main Street toward his house, half running now that he was late because he had lingered so long in his office
and he was afraid they would harm Jean because of his tardiness. But there was one good thing about his having wasted those
fifteen minutes. Jerry Corrigan had been given time to stop Dick Miles and get back to town and be in the barn.

Matt still didn’t know how it would work. Jerry might have been right in saying Matt would get himself killed, but at this
particular moment Matt didn’t much care if he could take the outlaws with him. That was going to take some doing.

He slipped his right hand under his coat, wrapped his fingers around the butt of the revolver, and pulled it out from under
the waistband, then slipped it back. He had never been one to practice his draw, so he wasn’t a gunman, proud of his speed.
Still, he was a good shot, and, if it worked out so Jerry could get into the fight, there was an excellent chance they could
take the three men.

Matt hoped he could see Jean and know she was all right before he opened up. He was a little sick when his thoughts jumped
from Jean to Bud because he had no way of knowing what would happen to the boy if the outlaws failed to show up on schedule.

Bud’s life might be sacrificed just as Matt’s might and possibly even Jean’s, and then for some reason that eluded him he
thought of the Bible story about Abraham who had been told to sacrifice his son Isaac. He began to run, anger boiling up in
him until he was filled with an unreasoning rage.

He raced up the path to his front door, yanked the screen open, and plunged into the hall. That was when he heard the
crack
of the rifle from upstairs. He stopped, stunned, as he heard boots pound along the hall above him and down the stairs; he saw
Sammy Bean jump up from the couch and run out of the house through the kitchen.

All that Matt could think of was that Governor Wyatt had not stayed out of town in spite of Jerry Corrigan’s warning, and,
because he had been too stubborn to take the warning, he had been killed. Ross Hart rushed past him toward the back door, Smith
jerked the satchel out of his hand and warned him not to follow them, and ran after Hart.

Matt came out of it then, thinking he had not seen Jean. She might be alive, or they might have killed or raped her, but they
weren’t taking her with them. He drew his gun as he ran through the kitchen. When he reached the back door, he glimpsed Corrigan
step out of the barn, with Sammy Bean only a few feet from him; he saw the burst of powder flame from the muzzle of Corrigan’s
gun and he saw Bean go down.

In that moment Matt Dugan felt a burst of exultation. They had the outlaws; they had them in a crossfire from which there
was no escape. Ross Hart and John Smith were caught between the house and the barn, but they were closer to the house and
both wheeled to rush back into the house.

Even as Hart made the turn, he must have realized he was being stupid. He couldn’t outrun Corrigan’s bullet, so he whirled
back and fired with his rifle that he held at his hip. Corrigan took a shot at him. Both missed, and then Matt, standing in
the back door, pulled the trigger of his .45. He shot Hart in the back as coldly and with as little remorse as he would have
gunned down a mad dog.

Now John Smith, his face twisted by the terrifying knowledge that he was a dead man, must have realized he was caught here
in the open between two men who had nothing but contempt and hate for him. He tried desperately to bring his gun into play,
but time had run out for him.

Matt and Jerry fired in the same second. Smith’s gun, half lifted, drove a slug into one of the steps below the back door.
With one bullet in his chest and another smashing through his spine from the back, he was dead before he hit the ground, his
lifeless body falling across the satchel of money that he had dropped when he had clawed wildly for his gun.

For just a moment Matt stood there, with powder smoke forming a cloud in the back yard, then it drifted slowly away as the
final echoes of the gunshots died. He saw Bud come out of the barn and for an instant he felt the weakness of relief that
swept over him, then the thought came to him that this must be a crazy nightmare that suddenly was turning out all right.
Jean was beside him a moment later, an arm going around him.

“I’m fine,” she said. “I hid in the pantry and locked the door when I heard the shot. I didn’t know what was happening, but
I was afraid they’d take me with them when they left and I had an idea they’d pull out right after that first shot. When I
heard them run out of the house, I knew I was right.”

Bud came walking across the yard toward Matt who stepped to the ground and laid a hand on the boy’s shoulder. He said hoarsely:
“Thank God you’re alive.” Tears rolled down his cheeks as he shoved his gun under his waistband and put his other arm around
Jean. Jerry Corrigan was there then, and Matt let him have Jean.

He tried to smile at Bud, but the smile wouldn’t come. All he could say was: “It must have been bad, wasn’t it, boy?”

And Bud said: “It wasn’t any fun and that’s a fact.”

Matt picked up the satchel and they went inside. Corrigan asked: “Who do you suppose they shot? I stopped Miles and told them
what was going on. Wyatt promised to wait a while. He wouldn’t say how long.”

“We’d better see,” Matt said.

“I’ll stay here,” Jean said, white-faced. “I got through the morning, but I’m at the end of the line. I think I’ll have a good
cry. Just go away and leave me.”

Matt tossed the satchel on the couch and went outside, jerking his head at Corrigan and Bud to follow him. They met Nora who
was running to the house from the Methodist church. Matt said:“They’re all right, both of them.” She stopped to hug Bud, then
hurried on into the house.

“She’ll have a good cry, too,” Matt said. “It’ll make both of them feel better.”

Corrigan said-“Yeah.”-as if he might indulge in the same. Suddenly Matt felt like laughing and wondered if he was hysterical.
He looked at Bud and shook his head. The boy had come through it the best of any of them.

When they reached the crowd, Corrigan took the lead, shouldering through the mass of people with Matt and Bud close behind.
Corrigan kept saying: “It’s the sheriff. Let me through. It’s the sheriff.”

When they reached the platform, they found Cole Talbot and Jim Long and several others standing beside a body that was covered
by a canvas. A hush had fallen over the crowd and no one understood what had happened or seemed to know what to do. It was
just as well that people didn’t know the whole story, Matt thought.

The dead man was Uncle Pete Fisher. When Matt lifted the canvas to look at the body, he saw that Fisher had been hit dead
center in the chest. Blood had spread across his shirt from the bullet hole.

“Did he say anything after he was shot?” Matt asked.

Talbot shook his head. “Not a word. He had just jumped up on the platform and held up his hands as if he wanted to say something,
but he didn’t have a chance. We moved him off the platform to the ground. Doc was right here, but there wasn’t anything he
could do.”

“Cole, you and Jerry move the body to the coroner’s office,” Matt said. “The governor’s going to be here any minute. Jim,
you introduce him when he gets here and tell the people that Jerry nailed the men who killed Uncle Pete.”

“What about those other shots that came later?” Talbot asked.

“That was when we nailed the men who got Uncle Pete,” Corrigan said. “All right, Cole. Let’s get this body out of here before
the governor sees it.”

Matt’s eyes locked with Corrigan’s. They were thinking the same thing, he told himself, that Pete Fisher, remorseful over
his part in the murder plot, had jumped up on the platform, knowing that the killer who was waiting for Ben Wyatt to appear
would see his white beard and mistake him for Wyatt.

“I’ve got to make an explanation to these people,” Long said worriedly.

Some of it has to be told
, Matt thought. He nodded, and said: “There was a plot to murder the governor and the killer made the mistake of taking Uncle
Pete for the governor.”

Matt turned away as Dick Miles’s rig appeared around the corner. The band had started to play again, ragged music but better
than no music at all. Matt asked several men to move the bodies of the dead outlaws to the coroner’s office. He made no explanation
to the men who went to the house with him beyond saying that the dead outlaws were the ones who had shot Uncle Pete Fisher.

As soon as the men left with the bodies, Matt stepped into the house and picked up the satchel. He found Nora and Jean sitting
on the couch, white-faced and dry-eyed.

The tears will come later
, he thought. He lingered only long enough to say: “Pete Fisher is the man they shot. They must have mistaken him for the
governor.”

He went out through the front door and walked rapidly toward the bank, wanting to lock up the money in the safe as soon as
he could. The whole story would come out in time, but right now he didn’t feel like making an explanation to anyone. He wasn’t
sure he had done right. All he knew was that everything had turned out better than he had hoped an hour ago.

Now, walking along the side of the courthouse square, he heard the governor’s booming voice: “You people are to be congratulated
for this fine accomplishment. Republicans, Democrats, and Populists would agree on one thing. As long as men and women in
our great state of Colorado have the initiative that it takes to raise enough money to carry through a fine project like this.
. . .”

Matt hurried on to the bank. He would lock the Matt hurried on to the bank. He would lock the money in the safe and get back
to the courthouse in time to hear the end of the speech. He would shake the governor’s hand and thank him for coming to Amity;
they would have lunch and the band would play some more and later there would be dancing in the Masonic Temple.

Then Matt took a long breath. He thought:
My children
have not been hurt. The governor is alive. We still
have the money to finish the dam.

He could ask for nothing more.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Wayne D. Overholser
won three Spur Awards from the Western Writers of America and has a long list of fine Western titles to his credit. He was
born in Pomeroy, Washington, and attended the University of Montana, University of Oregon, and the University of Southern
California before becoming a public schoolteacher and principal in various Oregon communities. He began writing for Western
pulp magazines in 1936 and within a couple of years was a regular contributor to Street & Smith’s
Western Story
Magazine
and Fiction House’s
Lariat Story Magazine.
Buckaroo’s Code
(1947) was his first Western novel and remains one of his best. In the 1950s and 1960s, having retired from academic work
to concentrate on writing, he would publish as many as four books a year under his own name or a pseudonym, most prominently
as Joseph Wayne.
The Violent Land
(1954),
The Lone Deputy
(1957),
The Bitter Night
(1961), and
Riders of the Sundowns
(1997) are among the finest of the Overholser titles.
The Sweet and
Bitter Land
(1950),
Bunch Grass
(1955), and
Land of
Promises
(1962) are among the best Joseph Wayne titles, and
Law Man
(1953) is a most rewarding novel under the Lee Leighton pseudonym. Overholser’s Western novels, whatever the byline, are based
on a solid knowledge of the history and customs of the 19th-century West, particularly when set in his two favorite Western
states, Oregon and Colorado. Many of his novels are first-person narratives, a technique that tends to bring an added dimension
of vividness to the frontier experiences of his narrators and frequently, as in
Cast a Long Shadow
(1957), the female characters one encounters are among the most memorable. He wrote his numerous novels with a consistent
skill and an uncommon sensitivity to the depths of human character. Almost invariably, his stories weave a spell of their
own with their scenes and images of social and economic forces often in conflict and the diverse ways of life and personalities
that made the American Western frontier so unique a time and place in human history.

OTHER
LEISURE
BOOKS BY WAYNE D. OVERHOLSER:

BITTER WIND

RAINBOW RIDER

WHEELS ROLL WEST

WILD HORSE RIVER

THE LAW AT MILES CITY

TWIN ROCKS