Trail of the Mountain Man (21 page)

Hardrock, Moody, and Sunset were sent around to the far end of town, stationed there with rifles to pick off any TF gunhand who might try to slip out, either to run off or try and angle around behind Smoke and his party for a box-in.

The others split up into groups of twos and threes and rode hunched over, low in the saddle, to present a smaller target for the riflemen they had spotted lying in wait on the rooftops in Fontana. And they rode in a zig-zagging fashion, making themselves or their horses even harder to hit. But even with that precaution, two men were hit before they reached the town limits. Beaconfield was knocked from the saddle by rifle fire. The one-time Tilden Franklin supporter wrapped a bandana around a bloody arm, climbed back in the saddle, and, cursing, continued onward. Hurt, but a hell of a long way from being out.

The old gunfighter Linch was hit just as he reached the town. A rifle bullet hit him in the stomach and slapped him out of the saddle. The aging gunhand, pistols in his hands, crawled to the edge of a building and began laying down a withering line of fire, directed at the rooftops. He managed to knock out three snipers before a second bullet ended his life.

Leo Wood, seeing his long-time buddy die, screamed his outrage and stepped into what had once been a dress shop, pulled out both Remington Frontier .44's, and let 'em bang.

Leo cleared the dress shop of all TF riders before a single shot from a Peacemaker .45 ended his long and violent life.

Pearlie settled down by the corner of a building and with his Winchester .44-40 began picking his shots. At ranges up to two hundred yards, the .44-40 could punch right through the walls of the deserted buildings of Fontana. Pearlie killed half a dozen TF gunhawks without even seeing his targets.

A few of Tilden's hired guns, less hardy than they thought, tried to slip out the rear of the town. They went down under the rifle fire of Moody, Hardrock, and Sunset.

Bill Foley, throwing caution to the wind, like most of his friends having absolutely no desire to spend his twilight years in any old folks' home, stepped into an alley where he knew half a dozen TF gunnies were waiting and opened fire. Laughing, the old gunfighter took his time and picked his shots while his body was soaking up lead from the badly shaken TF men. Foley's old body had soaked up a lot of lead in its time, and he knew he could take three or four shots and still stay upright in his boots. Bill Foley, who had helped tame more towns than most people had ever been in, died with his boots on, his back to a wall, and his guns spitting out death. He killed all six of the TF gunslicks.

Toot Tooner, his hands full of Colts, calmly walked into what was left of the Blue Dog Saloon, through the back door, and said, “I declare this here game of poker open. Call or fold, boys.”

Then he opened fire.

His first shots ended the brief but bloody careers of two cattle rustlers from New Mexico who had signed on with the TF spread in search of what Tilden had promised would be easy money. They died without having the opportunity to fire a shot.

Toot took a .45 slug in the side and it spun him around. Lifting his pistol, he shot the man who had shot him between the eyes just as he felt a hammer-blow in his back, left side. The gunshot knocked him to his knees and he tasted blood in his mouth.

Toot dropped his empty Colts and pulled out two Remington .44's from behind his gunbelt. Hard hit, dying; Toot laughed at death and began cocking and firing as the light before his eyes began to fade.

“Somebody kill the old son of a bitch!” a TF gunhand shouted.

Toot laughed at the dim figure and swung his guns. A slug took him in the gut and set him back on his butt. But Toot's last shots cleared the Blue Dog of hired guns. He died with a very faint smile on his face.

Louis Longmont met several TF gunhands in an alley. The gambler never stopped walking as his Colts spat and sang a death song. Reloading, he stepped over the sprawled bloody bodies and walked on up the alley. A bullet tugged at the sleeve of his coat and the gambler dropped to one knee, raised both guns, and shot the rifleman off the roof of the bank building. A bullet knocked Louis to one side and his left arm grew numb. Hooking the thumb of his left hand behind his gunbelt, the gambler rose and triggered off a round, sending another one of Tilden Franklin's gunslicks to hell.

Louis then removed a white linen handkerchief from an inside breast pocket of his tailored jacket. He plugged the hole in his shoulder and continued on his hunt.

The Reverend Ralph Morrow stepped into what had been the saloon of Big Mama and the bidding place of her soiled doves and began working the lever on his Henry .44. The boxer-turned-preacher-turned-farmer-turned-gunfighter muttered a short prayer for God to forgive him and began blasting the hell out of any TF gunhand he could find.

His Henry empty, Ralph jerked out a pair of .45's and began smoking. A lousy pistol shot, and that is being kind, Ralph succeeded in filling the beery air with a lot of hot lead. He didn't hit a damn thing with the pistols, but he did manage to scare the hell out of those gunhands left standing after his good shooting with the rifle. They ran out the front of the saloon and directly into the guns of Pistol Le Roux and Dan Greentree.

Ralph reloaded his rifle and stepped to the front of the building. “Exhilarating!” he exclaimed. Then he hit the floor as a hard burst of gunfire from a rooftop across the street tore through the canvas and wood of the deserted whorehouse.

“Shithead!” Ralph muttered, lifting his rifle and sighting the gunman in. Ralph pulled the trigger and knocked the TF gunman off the roof.

Steve Matlock, Ray Johnson, Nolan, Mike Garrett, and Beaconfield were keeping a dozen or more TF gunslicks pinned down in Beeker's general store.

Charlie Starr had cleared a small saloon of half a dozen hired guns and now sat at a table, having a bottle of sweetened soda water. He would have much preferred a glass of beer, but the sweet water beat nothing. Seeing a flash of movement across the street, Charlie put down the bottle and picked up a cocked .45 from the table. He sighted the TF gunhand in and pulled the trigger. The slug struck the man in the shoulder and spun him around. Charlie shot him again in the belly and that ended it.

“Now leave me alone and let me finish my sodie water,” Charlie muttered.

The Silver Dollar Kid came face to face with Silver Jim. The old gunfighter grinned at the punk. Both men had their guns in leather.

“All right, kid,” Silver Jim said. “You been lookin' for a rep. Here's your chance.”

The Silver Dollar Kid grabbed for his guns.

He never cleared leather. Silver Jim's guns roared and bucked in his callused hands. The Kid felt twin hammer blows in his stomach. He sat down in the alley and began hollering for his mother.

Silver Jim stepped around the punk and continued his prowling. The Kid's hollering faded as life ebbed from him.

Smoke met Luis Chamba behind the stable. The Mexican gunfighter grinned at him. “Now, Smoke, we see just how good you really are.”

Smoke lifted his sawed-off shotgun and almost blew the gunfighter in two. “I already know how good I am,” Smoke said. “I don't give a damn how good you ... were.”

Smoke reloaded the 10-gauge sawed-off and stepped into the stable. He heard a rustling above him and lifted the twin muzzles. Pulling the triggers, blowing a hole the size of a bucket in the boards, Smoke watched as a man, or what was left of a man, hurled out the loft door to come splatting onto the shit-littered ground.

Smoke let the shotgun fall to the straw as the gunfighter Valentine faced him.

“I'm better,” Valentine said, his hands over the butts of his guns.

“I doubt it,” Smoke said, then shot the famed gunfighter twice in the belly and chest.

With blood streaking his mouth, Valentine looked up from the floor at Smoke. “I ... didn't even clear leather.”

“You sure didn't,” the young man said. “We all got to meet him, Valentine, and you just did.”

“I reckon.” Then he died.

Listening, Smoke cocked his head. Something was very wrong. Then it came to him. No gunfire.

Cautiously, Smoke stepped to the stable door and looked out. Gunsmoke lay over the town like a shroud. The dusty streets were littered with bodies, not all of them TF gunhands.

Smoke was conscious of his friends looking at him, standing silently.

Louis pointed with the muzzle of his pistol.

Smoke looked far up the street. He could make out the shape of Tilden Franklin. Smoke stepped out into the street and faced the man.

Tilden began walking toward him. As the man came closer, Smoke said, “It's over, Tilden.”

“Not yet,” the big man said. “I gotta kill you, then it's over.”

“Make your play,” Smoke said.

Tilden grabbed for his guns. Both men fired at almost the same time. Smoke felt a shock in his left side. He kept earing back the hammers and pulling the triggers. Dust flew from Tilden's chest as the slugs slammed into his body. The big man took another step, staggered, and then slumped to his knees in the center of the street.

Blood leaking from his wounded side, Smoke walked up to the man who would be king.

“You had everything a man could ask for, Tilden. Why weren't you satisfied?

Tilden tried to reply. But blood filled his mouth. He looked at Smoke, and still the hate was in his eyes. He fell forward on his face, in the dust, his guns slipping from his dead fingers.

It was over.

Almost.

They all heard the single shot and whirled around. Luke Nations lay crumpled on the boardwalk, a large hole in the center of his back.

Lester Morgan, a.k.a. Sundance, stepped out of a building, a pistol in his hand. He looked up and grinned.

“I did it!” he hollered. “Me. Sundance. I kilt Luke Nations!”

“You goddamned backshootin' punk!” Charlie Starr said, lifting his pistol.

“No!” Smoke's voice stopped him. “Don't, Charlie.” Smoke walked over to Lester, one hand holding his bleeding side. He backhanded the dandy, knocking him sprawling. Lester-Sundance landed on his butt in the street. His mouth was busted, blood leaking from one corner. He looked up at Smoke, raw fear in his wide eyes.

“You gonna kill me, ain't you?” he hissed.

The smile on Smoke's lips was not pleasant. “What's your name, punk?”

“Les ... Sundance. That's me, Sundance!”

“Well,
Sundance.”
Smoke put enough dirt on the name to make it very ugly. “You wanna live, do you?”

“Yeah!”

“And you wanna be known as a top gunhand, right, Sundance?”

“Yeah!”

Smoke kicked Lester in the mouth. The punk rolled on the ground, moaning.

“What's your last name, craphead?”

“M ... Morgan!”

“All right Les Sundance Morgan. I'll let you live. And Les, I'm going to have your name spread all over the West. Les Sundance Morgan. The man with one ear. He's the man who killed the famed gunfighter Luke Nations.”

“I got both ears!”

Before his words could fade from sound, Smoke had drawn and fired, the bullet clipping off Lester's left ear. The action forever branded the dandy.

Lester rolled on the dirt, screaming and hollering.

“Top gun, huh, punk?” Smoke said. “Right, that's you, Sundance.” He looked toward Johnny North. “Get some whiskey and fix his ear, will you, Johnny?”

Lester really started hollering when the raw booze hit where his ear had been. He passed out from the pain. Ralph took that time to bandage the ugly wound.

Then Smoke kicked him awake. Lester lay on the blood-and whiskey-soaked ground, looking up at Smoke.

“What for you do this to me?” he croaked.

“So everybody, no matter where you go, can know who you are, punk. The man who killed Luke Nations. Now, you listen to me, you son of a bitch! You want to know how it feels to be top gun? Well, just look around you, ask anybody.”

Lester's eyes found Charlie Starr. “You're Charlie Starr. You're more famouser than Luke Nations. But I'm gonna be famous too, ain't I?”

Charlie rolled a cigarette and stuck it between Lester's lips. He held the match while Lester puffed. Charlie straightened up and smiled sadly at Lester.

“How is it, punk? Oh, well, it's a real grand time, punk. You can't sit with your back to no empty space, always to a wall. Lots of backshooters out there. You don't never make your fire, cook, and then sleep in the same spot. You always move before you bed down, ‘cause somebody is always lookin' to gun you down ... for a reputation.

“You ain't never gonna marry, punk. ‘Cause if you do, it won't last. You got to stay on the move, all the time. 'Cause you're the man who kilt Luke Nations, punk. And there's gonna be a thousand punks just like you lookin' for you.

“You drift, boy. You drift all the time, and you might near always ride alone, lessen you can find a pard that you know you can trust not to shoot you when you're in your blankets.

“And a lot of towns won't want you, punk. The marshal and the townspeople will meet you with rifles and shotguns and point you the way out. 'Cause they don't want no gunfighter in their town.

“And after a time, if you live, you'll do damn near anything so's people won't know who you are. But they always seem to find out. Then you'll change your name agin. And agin. Just lookin' for a little peace and quiet.

“But you ain't never gonna find it.

“You might git good enough to live for a long time, punk. I hope you do. I hope you ride ten thousand lonely miles, you backshootin' bastard. Ten thousand miles of lookin' over your back. Ten thousand towns that you'll ride in and out of in the dead of night. Eatin' your meals just at closin' time ... if you can find a eatin' place that'll serve you.

“A million hours that you'll wish you could somehow change your life ... but you cain't, punk. You cain't change, 'cause
they
won't let you.

“Only job you'll be able to find is one with the gun, punk. ‘Cause you're the man who kilt Luke Nations. You got your rep, punk. You wanted it so damned bad, you got 'er.” He glanced at Johnny North.

Johnny said, “I had me a good woman one time. We married and I hung up my guns, sonny-boy. Some goddamned bounty-hunters shot into my cabin one night. Killed my wife. I'd never broke no law until then. But I tracked them so-called lawmen down and hung 'em, one by one. I was on the hoot-owl trail for years after that. I had both the law and the reputation-hunters after me. Sounds like a real fine life, don't it, punk? I hope you enjoy it.”

Smoke kicked Lester Sundance Morgan to his boots. “Get your horse and ride, punk! 'Fore one of us here takes a notion to brace the man who killed Luke Nations.”

Crying, Lester stumbled from the street and found his horse, back of the building that once housed a gun shop.

“It ain't like that!” the gunfighters, the gambler, the ranchers, and the minister heard Lester holler as he rode off. “It ain't none at all like what you say it was. I'll have wimmin a-throwin' themselves at me. I'll have money and I'll have .. .”

His horse's hooves drummed out the rest of what Lester Sundance Morgan thought his reputation would bring him.

“Poor, sad, silly son of a bitch;” Ralph Morrow said.

Charlie Starr looked at the minister. “I couldn't have said 'er no better myself, preacher.”

 

 

The bodies of the gunfighters and Tilden Franklin were dragged to a lone building just at the edge of what was left of the boom town named Fontana. The building was doused with kerosene and torched just as a very gentle rain began falling.

“Lots of folks comin', Smoke,” Charlie said, pointing toward the road leading to the high lonesome.

It was Sally and Belle and Bountiful and nearly all of those the men had left behind.

Sally embraced and kissed her man, getting blood all over her blouse as she did so. “How'd you folks know it was done with?” Smoke asked her.

“Hook Nose's people set up relay points with runners,” she said. “They were watching from the hills over there.” She pointed.

“What a story this will make,” Haywood Arden said, his eyes wide as he looked at the bullet-pocked buildings and empty shell-casings on the ground.

“Yeah,” Smoke said wearily. “You be sure and write it, Haywood. And be sure you spell one name right.”

“Who is that?” the newspaperman asked.

“Lester Morgan, known as Sundance.”

“What'd he do?” Haywood was writing on a tablet as fast as he could write.

Smoke described Lester, ending with, “And he ain't got but one ear. That'll make him easy to spot.”

“But what did this Lester Sundance Morgan
do?”

“Why ... he's the gunfighter who killed Luke Nations.”