William Johnstone - A Good Day to Die

“It was you I was worried about, darling.”

Mrs. Frye stood beside Damon. He looked surprised; she was level-eyed, her mouth quirked in a cynical, knowing twist. Arm in arm, Clay and Francine went to them.

“Something you want to tell us, Francine?” Mrs. Frye said, her tone lightly mocking.

Clay spoke. “It happened when Pa sent me as a go-between to buy off Francine to leave Bliss alone. Turned out I had things upside down. She didn’t have her hooks into him, it was he who wouldn’t leave her alone. That’s when I learned what a fine girl Francine is. I couldn’t help it, I fell in love with her. I only hope she feels the same about me.”

“You know I do, Clay. I love you!” Francine said.

“I mean to make her my wife, if she’ll have me,” said Clay, with a show of sincerity.

Francine squealed with delight. “Of course I will, darling!”

“I hope that meets with the approval of you two,” Clay said guardedly.

Damon Bolt and Mrs. Frye exchanged glances.

“Miss Hayes is a free agent, as are all the ladies in the employ of the Golden Spur. As long as your intentions are honorable, sir, you have my blessing,” Damon said.

“I want to marry this woman,” Clay declared. Francine squealed some more.

“I’ll send for Pastor Fulton,” Mrs. Frye said, adding, “before you change your mind.”

“No worry about that, ma’am!” Clay said quickly. Francine kept a tight hold on his arm anyway.

“Now come along, Damon. I’ll patch up that arm while you’ve still got some blood in you,” Mrs. Frye said.

She and Damon went into the Golden Spur. A runner was sent out to fetch the pastor. Francine stuck close to Clay, showing every sign of staying glued to him until she was safely wed as Mrs. Clay Stafford.

Standing nearby were Sam Heller and Johnny Cross. Johnny said, “Now don’t that beat all? Women! Who can understand them?”

“Not me,” Sam said. “I reckon Clay found something he liked filling his hand with better than a gun.”

Johnny made a sound of disgust.

They left the center of the street and went to the Big Corral. A knot of onlookers clustered around Red Hand’s corpse, gawking.

“Is that him? The big chief?” somebody asked.

“Sure,” another said, “you can tell by the war paint. That’s him all right!”

A third sneered, “Huh! He don’t look so big now!”

Johnny had heard enough. “You should’ve seen him coming at you, charging with that lance. He looked big enough then.”

TWENTY-SIX

The Comanches fled north, most of them. A cavalry force from Fort Pardee eventually set off in pursuit, accomplishing little.

Two days later, Sam Heller took Latigo’s body to Rancho Grande. He wanted to bring back Lydia Fisher, and, no less important, get Dusty, his horse. Pastor Fulton had found a home for Lydia with one of the families in his church.

Johnny Cross went with Sam. “I liked Latigo. He had sand.”

Johnny had borrowed a wagon to take the body back. Nobody would lend a wagon to the Yankee. Latigo was laid out in a handsome coffin of dark, shining wood fashioned by master artisan and carver Joe Delagoa. The box was secured to the wagon bed.

Riding north out of Hangtown, they crossed green prairie under blue skies. The ranch’s white adobe walls shone in the sun. Closer, the ramparts showed signs of battle. Ironbound, old oaken gates showed scorch marks where unsuccessful attempts had been made to burn them down.

The portals opened for the wagon to enter. Sam pulled up inside the courtyard. He and Johnny climbed down from the wagon.

They were greeted by the foreman, the segundo, big, bluff, swaggering Hector Vasquez. “Hey, gringo! I knew you would come through all of this. You must have had an easy time of it in town while we men were doing the real fighting here, no?”

“No,” Sam said.

“And you, the young hawk, the young falcon with the quick gun! Still fast as ever?”

“Faster,” Johnny said.

“No need to prove it. For once even Vasquez has had his share of fighting. And ... Latigo?”

Sam indicated the back of the wagon with a tilt of his head. Vasquez looked inside, saw the coffin.

“I thought as much, when I did not see him riding with you, yet I hoped he was but wounded,” Vasquez said.

“He was a brave man. He killed many enemies,” Sam said.

“He was an hombre,” the segundo agreed, sighing.

“Was it bad here?” Johnny asked.

“The Comanche bravos lost their taste for fight after a few cannon balls,” Vasquez said, smiling at a memory of epic destruction.

Two figures came out of the front entrance of the hacienda, crossing the tiled plaza. Lydia Fisher hurried into the courtyard, Lorena Castillo following at a more measured pace.

“Hey, Sam! I knew you was just too plumb ornery to kill!”

“That’s what I figured about you. Lydia, I want you to meet a friend of mine, Johnny Cross. Johnny, this is Lydia Fisher, one of the bravest gals I’ve ever known ... and she can shoot, too!”

“Glad to know you, miss,” Johnny said, taking off his hat and sweeping it before him in a kind of courtly bow.

Lydia blushed, suddenly shy and withdrawn, demure. “Uh ... howdy, mister,” she said, small voiced.

“Call me Johnny.” His big, friendly grin made her face light up.

They grow up fast, Sam thought. His eyes were on Lorena, making her way toward them. Her hair was a magnificent mane, her eyes were bold, and her red lips were curved at the corners.

Sam politely touched the tip of his hat. “ Buenas dias, señora .”

“ Buenas dias, hombre ,” she said, smiling radiantly. “A good day, no?”

“Yes, a good day.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

They hanged Red Hand. No matter that he was dead, dead as they come. They hanged him anyway, as a kind of object lesson, stringing him up on a limb of the Hanging Tree.

Noose around the neck, he hung with moccasined feet head-high above the ground, swaying slightly, pendulum-like, according to the whim of the winds. The taut hempen rope creaked under his weight.

A three-man guard was posted to watch the body at night, for the Comanches were ever-bold, unlikely to be chastened by their recent stinging defeat.

The crows first pecked out Red Hand’s eyes. The crows were always first on the scene after a hanging and the eyes were always the first to go. Later, bigger birds arrived. Buzzards, battening on to the corpse, tearing it apart bit by bit, bite by bite. It wasn’t pretty. After a few days under the hot Texas sun, the aroma got pretty ripe.

Four days and three nights had passed since the riotously happy folk of Hangtown had hoisted the corpse. The night guards kept their distance, sitting around under a mesquite tree, smoking and passing around a bottle of redeye. A blurred horned moon floated in and out of high, thin, hazy clouds.

“He’s gone to rot and ruin. Ought to take him down and bury him. It ain’t Christian,” a guard said.

“Neither was he,” said another.

“What’re they gonna do, leave him up till he’s nothing but bones?”

“I reckon.”

The guards were being watched by hidden lurkers, nearby, but unseen. Arrows came whizzing out of the darkness, striking the guards, slaying them. They fell in a heap, bodies bristled with feathered shafts.

A small band of Comanches rode up Boot Hill, leading a riderless horse. A brave cut the hempen rope, dropping Red Hand’s corpse into the arms of the others reaching up for him. Wrapping the body in a blanket, they threw it across the back of the horse, binding it in place.

The dead guards were plundered of weapons and personal belongings, their hair lifted by scalping knives. Their horses were taken away on a lead rope.