William Johnstone - Texas Bloodshed

The sheriff nodded.

“There were a couple of customers who didn’t get hit when the bullets started flying, and the other teller, Fred Reeves, was all right, too. They all hit the dirt, or the floor, rather, when the shooting started. Seems the outlaw who was still inside the bank tried to molest Mrs. Harris. Mitch Byrd had a Colt Lightning on the shelf under his counter. He grabbed it and shot the owlhoot, but that set off the others. I reckon it’s only pure luck that it wasn’t an even bigger massacre in there.”

Smoke shook his head regretfully.

“It’s too bad we weren’t able to save more of the citizens,” he said. “But at least the gang didn’t get away.”

“Did you recognize any of the bank robbers, Monte?” Matt asked.

“A couple of them looked familiar to me,” the lawman said. “I must’ve seen their pictures on reward dodgers. I’ve got a big pile of those posters in the desk. I’ll go through them later and see if I can match up any names with the faces. Could be you and Preacher have some rewards coming, Smoke.”

The old mountain man snorted disdainfully.

“I don’t care about no dadblamed ree-ward,” he said. “I’ve had fortunes come an’ go through my fingers so many times over the years, money don’t mean nothin’ to me as long as I’ve got enough for a meal and a snort o’ whiskey now and then.”

“And Sugarloaf’s doing just fine,” Smoke put in, “turning a profit every year, and I expect that to keep up as long as we don’t have a bad drought. Maybe Matt should claim the rewards.”

“Me?” Matt exclaimed. “I didn’t do anything except wallop one of them.”

“Those wanted posters all say dead or alive,” Monte pointed out. “You ought to at least get paid for the one you laid out, Matt. I’ll look into it.”

“All right,” Matt said, “but I didn’t do it for the money. I was just trying to save Preacher’s scrawny old hide.”

“I told you, I knowed he was back there—”

Smoke cut in on the old-timer’s protest.

“Come on, let’s get something to eat, and then we’ll head for the ranch.”

They were about to leave the sheriff’s office when the door opened and Dr. Simpson came in.

Smoke paused long enough to ask, “How’s Miz Harris doing, Doc?”

“I think there’s a good chance she’ll pull through,” Simpson replied. “She was wounded in the arm and the hip. The arm wound should heal cleanly. The injury to her hip may result in her having a permanent limp. It’s too soon to say. She’s been taken down to my house, and my nurse is looking after her.” The sawbones turned to Monte Carson. “I was told you have a wounded prisoner here, Sheriff.”

“Sure do,” Monte agreed. “I’ll take you back to his cell.” He raised a hand in farewell to Smoke, Matt, and Preacher. “See you boys later.”

When they were on the boardwalk outside, Matt chuckled and said, “Sheriff Carson must be having trouble with his eyes if he called you a boy, Preacher.”

“I reckon so,” the old mountain man agreed, “since he didn’t notice you was a snot-nosed, wet-behind-the-ears kid, neither.”

Smoke grinned and said, “Come on, you two. You can continue this squabble after we’ve had a surroundin’.”

They walked across the street to the café. A crowd was still gathered around the bank. Smoke supposed that the surviving teller was running things for now.

The café was doing a brisk business since it was the middle of the day, and most of the people in there were talking excitedly about the attempted bank robbery and the resulting shoot-out.

Smoke ignored the curious looks the townspeople cast at him and his companions. He had long since gotten used to being gawked at, especially when some trouble had broken out and he’d been in the middle of it.

The three of them sat at a table covered with a blue-checked cloth and ordered meals consisting of roast beef, potatoes, greens, biscuits, and deep dish apple pie.

“And keep the coffee comin’,” Preacher told the smiling waitress, who promised to do so.

“How’s Sally doing?” Matt asked while they were waiting for their food.

“She’s fine,” Smoke said. “Anxious to see you fellas again, I expect.”

Preacher said, “How about them hands of your’n?”

“Cal and Pearlie?” Smoke grinned. “As quarrelsome as ever. They wouldn’t know what to do if they weren’t squabbling.”

In that respect, Smoke’s foreman Pearlie and the young ranch hand Calvin Woods reminded him of a couple of other hombres, namely Preacher and Matt.

“We saw something interesting while we were riding up here,” Matt said. “Did you know there’s a wagon train headed in this direction, Smoke?”

The grin on Smoke’s face was replaced by a puzzled expression.

“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” he said.

“I saw dozens of wagon trains when I was a younger man,” Preacher said. “Maybe a hundred or more. Traveled with a few of’em, too. Them pilgrims wasn’t always the smartest folks when it came to gettin’ along on the frontier, but they was determined to build new lives for themselves, I’ll give ’em that much. Shoot, I guess ever’body was a greenhorn once.”

Matt said, “I thought you didn’t like all the immigrants who moved west. You said they civilized places too much and changed everything from the way it was back in the Shining Times.”

“Well, that’s true,” Preacher said. “They did, and I ain’t overfond of that so-called civilization they brung with ’em. But you can’t stop things from changin’. It’ll happen while you ain’t even lookin’.”

Smoke asked, “You didn’t talk to the people with the wagon train, did you?”

“Nope,” Preacher said. “We just waved at ’em and went on our way.”

Matt said, “Why do you ask, Smoke?”

With a shrug, Smoke replied, “I was just curious where they’re bound, that’s all. I’m not aware of any land around here being opened recently for settlement.”

Some of the Sugarloaf stock grazed on open range, but Smoke knew that concept was dying out in the West. More and more land was being claimed officially, instead of just being there for anybody who wanted to use it. The day was coming, he knew, when cattlemen would have to file claims for the range they were using and fence it in. He didn’t like the thought of it, but like Preacher said, things changed whether a fella wanted them to or not.

“I wouldn’t worry about that wagon train,” Matt said. “Chances are it’s headed for somewhere north of here. Wyoming, maybe, or even Montana.”

“You’re probably right,” Smoke said. He saw the waitress carrying a tray loaded down with food toward their table and put the subject out of his thoughts with the casual comment, “Anyway, those immigrants don’t have anything to do with us.”

PINNACLE BOOKS are published by

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Copyright © 2012 William W. Johnstone

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

PUBLISHER’S NOTE

Following the death of William W. Johnstone, the Johnstone family is working with a carefully selected writer to organize and complete Mr. Johnstone’s outlines and many unfinished manuscripts to create additional novels in all of his series like The Last Gunfighter, Mountain Man, and Eagles, among others. This novel was inspired by Mr. Johnstone’s superb storytelling.

If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”