Honor Of The Mountain Man - New 601479

Book 20: Mountain Man

by William W. Johnstone

Genres: Westerns

Synopsis

Johnstone Country. Where the Good Die Young. The Bad Die Sooner. A SHORT RIDE TO HELL Outlaw Joe Wales has a score to settle in Pueblo: find Jacob Murdock and the band of vaqueros who attacked his wife and drown them in their own stinking blood. But when Wales’s hunting party is ambushed, the only gunfighter he can count on for cover is Smoke Jensen, the trigger-ready legend of the High Lonesome. Jensen’s more than willing to strap on a brace of .45s to help out his friend—especially if it involves nailing some dirty renegades to the wall. Things are tougher than Jensen imagined. Murdock and his men aren’t just hiding out in Pueblo—they’ve taken it over. Outnumbered in a town of desperadoes, Smoke is numero uno on Murdock’s most-wanted list. But even with a price on his head, Smoke can still dole out his own unforgiving brand of justice. And when the sun goes down, he’s going to take them on one by one, and blow each and every hide back to hell. Live Free. Read Hard.

Release date: July 31, 2018

Publisher: Pinnacle Books

Print pages: 255

Sample

Three days later Joey rode his big roan stallion, Red, into Bracketville. It was a small cattle town twenty-five miles northwest of Del Rio, and a gathering place where ranchers from nearby spreads bought and sold stock of all kinds.

Joey was loaded for bear. He wore a brace of Colt .44s tied down low on his thighs, a shoulder holster with a Navy. 36 under his left arm, his Arkansas Toothpick at his back, and he carried a Henry repeating rifle across his saddle horn and a Greener ten-gauge sawed-off shotgun in a saddle boot.

As he rode down the main street, his eyes flicked back and forth, covering his approach on both sides, including rooftops. It was a habit learned young, when after the Civil War he spent two years hunting and killing Kansas Redlegs until there were none left.

The war and its aftermath had turned young Joey Wells into a vicious killing machine, until he met Betty and tried to change his life. Now he was back on the trail, hunting nature’s most deadly animals, other men.

He cut a corner off a slab of Bull Durham and stuck it in his mouth. He felt the familiar surge of adrenaline—a quickening of the heart, a dryness of the mouth, a quiver of muscles ready to act on a moment’s notice. A minute later he leaned to the side and spit, thinking, “God help me, but I’ve missed this,” as his mind drifted back to 1858....

It didn’t take Joey Wells long to discover who had burned his cabin and killed his wife and son, and why. There had been raids along the Missouri-Kansas border since 1854, but the burning of Wells’s cabin had been the first incursion of the Kansas Redleg raids to hit Sutton County. The Redlegs were becoming infamous, leading raiders and killers and rapists into Missouri. Their leaders were infamous as well—Doc Jamison, Johnny Sutter, and a colonel named Waters. These men and the thugs they commanded hid behind a “cause,” but they really cared only about killing and looting and burning.

After burying his family, Joey took to the bush, where he found others like himself—men who had been burned out, families either killed or driven off, men who had lost everything except the need for vengeance.

By the time the actual War Between the States began, these men, and Joey, were seasoned guerrilla fighters, men as at home on horseback or lying covered in leaves and bushes in thick timber as they were around a campfire. They could live for weeks on berries and squirrels and birds, and could sneak up to a man and steal his dinner from his plate without being seen. They were also mean and deadly as snakes, and just as quick to kill.

To these warriors there were no rules, no lines of battle, no command structure. It was simply kill or be killed, but be damned sure to take some with you when you shot your final load.

Finally, Union General Ewing made his biggest mistake of the war. He issued an order to arrest womenfolk, burn their homes, and kill everyone along the Missouri-Kansas border. This caused hundreds, even thousands, to join the guerrilla ranks of the Missouri Volunteers. Names began to be carved into history and legend, names written in the blood of hundreds of Union soldiers and sympathizers. Quantrill, Bloody Bill Anderson, Dave Johanson, George Tilden, Joey Wells; mere mention of these men could make grown men blanch and pale, and women grab their children and run for cover.

After Union raiders killed a mother and her young son in one of their many raids, her other two sons joined the ranks of the Missouri Volunteers, to ride with Bloody Bill Anderson. They were Frank and Jesse James.

These Volunteers perfected the art of guerrilla warfare. They used pistols mostly. Riding with reins in their teeth, guiding their mounts with their knees, a Colt pistol in each hand, they charged forces superior in numbers and weaponry time and again, to defeat them by sheer raw courage and fearlessness.

Joey reined Red in before a saloon with a sign over the front entrance lettered THE BULL AND COW. He flipped the reins around a hitching rail, slung his Henry over his shoulder, and stepped through the batwings. He stood just inside for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the smoky gloom, checking right and left, evaluating whether there was any immediate danger. He saw no group of men who could be the ones he was trailing and relaxed slightly, ambling to the bar, putting his Henry in front of him, its hammer back.

“Whiskey,” he growled, watching other patrons behind his back in a big mirror over the bar. None seemed to be taking any great notice of him.

The barman placed a bottle in front of him and a glass so dirty he couldn’t see through it. Joey fixed him with a stare, eyes narrow. “You want me ta clean thet glass on yore shirt?”

The bartender blanched and hastily replaced the glass with a clean one. “An’ gimme a bottle with a label on it, I don’t want none o’ this hoss piss here.”

The man nodded rapidly. “Yessir, Old Kentucky okay?”

Joey didn’t answer. He took the bottle and poured a tumblerful, drinking it down in one swallow. “Leave the jug.”

“Yessir.” The bartender took a rag and began wiping down the far end of the bar, as far away from Joey as he could get, head down, eyes averted, as if he could smell danger on him.

Joey took the bottle and walked to an empty table in a corner of the saloon, one where he had his back to a wall, and he sat facing the other tables, drinking slowly, watching and waiting.

At midnight a door slammed on the second story of the saloon and a very drunk, fat Mexican staggered down the stairs, an almost empty bottle of tequila in one hand and his sweat-stained sombrero in the other. He wore a Mexican Rurale uniform still covered with trail dust. At the bottom of the stairs he upended the bottle and drank the last of its contents, then let out a loud belch and stumbled toward the bar.

Joey called softly, “Amigo, over here, por favor.”

The drunk looked through bloodshot, bleary eyes toward Joey as he walked toward him. “What you want, mister?”

Joey inclined his head toward his bottle. “I got this here whiskey an’ I don’t like ta drink alone.”

The man glared suspiciously at him. Evidently he wasn’t used to Anglo strangers offering him free drinks. Joey whispered, “An’ I’d like ta know ’bout the girls here. They worth a couple o’ dollars?”

A grin spread across the Mexican’s face, and he plopped down in a chair across from Joey. “Si, señor. They not so young, but what you do in town this small?”

Joey signaled the barman for another glass and poured it full when it arrived. The fat man drank half of it down in one gulp, then hiccupped and laughed. “Not so much fire as tequila, but . . .” He shrugged.

Joey grinned. “Yeah, I know what you mean. Still, it’ll git the job done, all right.”

“My name is Tomás. Tomás Rodriguez.” He nodded at Joey and drank the rest of the bourbon without pausing.

Joey sipped his, watching through slitted eyes. “I’m headin’ on down Del Rio way. You ever been there?”

He nodded drunkenly. “Sí. Much better cantina in Del Rio. Muchas señoritas, muchas tequila. ”

“I’m lookin’ ta buy some longhorns. You know anybody down that way might have some ta sell?”

Rodriguez shook his head. “You want longhorns? Too bad. Mi compadres just sold ours two days before.”

Joey smiled again. “You mean those cattle Vasquez sold here?”

The man looked up quickly, suspicion in his pig eyes. “You know Vasquez?”

Joey shrugged. “Sure, old friend of mine. Used ta call ’im El Machete back when I knowed him.”

Rodriguez smiled broadly, showing several missing teeth. “Oh, you been to Chihuahua?”

“Yeah, once or twice.”

Rodriguez leaned across the table and put his finger to his lips as if he were about to tell a secret. “Vasquez not in Chihuahua no more.” He shook his head. “He goin’ to Colorado, and I join him there.”

“Colorado, huh? Why’s ol’ Machete goin’ all the way ta Colorado?”

“Big jefe in Pueblo named Murdock going to hire us. Need vaqueros good with pistolas. ”Rodriguez held up the empty bottle. “You got more whiskey?”

“Sure, it’s across the street at the hotel, in my room. Come on and I’ll get us another bottle.”

Joey threw his arm around the drunk’s shoulders and they stepped through the batwings, the Mexican singing some folksong in Spanish that Joey had never heard before. He walked him around a corner of the saloon and into the darkness of an alley. As the man realized something was wrong and straightened, pulling away, Joey pulled out his Arkansas Toothpick and held the point under Rodriguez’s chin.

The fat man slowly raised his hands. “Why for you do this, gringo?”

“The only reason I ain’t killin’ ya right now, bastardo, is I don’t want the U.S. law on my trail while I track down an’ kill yore murderin’ friends.” The knife flashed and severed all four of the fingers on Rodriguez’s right hand, then, with a backhanded swipe, Joey hit him dead in the middle of his forehead with the butt of the knife, knocking him instantly unconscious before he had time to scream. He dropped like a stone, blood pouring from his ruined hand.

After wiping his knife on the man’s shirt, Joey walked around the corner to get on Red and head toward Pueblo, Colorado. As he stepped into the saddle, a voice came from the door of the saloon.

“I thought that was you the barman described, Wells.”

Joey’s hand was on his pistol butt before he saw who was talking to him. It was Louis Carbone, and standing next to him was his friend and constant companion, Al Martine.

Joey shook his head and grinned. “Looks like they’ll let any ol’ trash come up to Texas.”

Carbone smiled. “You got time for to wet your whistle, killer?”

Joey looked to his left at the entrance to the alley. “Well, maybe just one, then I gotta be on my way.”

Martine raised an eyebrow when he saw Joey’s eyes flicker toward the alley. “Yore hurry wouldn’t have nothin’ to do with that hombre you escorted outta here, would it?”

Joey shook hands with the two men and they went back into the saloon. They showed him to their table, where there was a bottle of bourbon, half empty, and two mugs of beer. “Wanna beer?” Carbone asked.

“Naw, like I said, I gotta git goin’ here ’fore too long. Whiskey’ll do me just fine.”

After they all downed a drink, Joey asked, “What’re you two doin’ all the way up here? Last I heared, you was stuck down there in Chihuahua, entertainin’ all the señoritas.”

“We came to buy some longhorns from Texas and run ’em back down to Mexico. Those Mexican crossbred cattle ain’t worth spit.”

“Say,” Joey asked, “you boys know anything ‘bout a galoot named Murdock ranchin’ up Colorado way?”

The two looked at each other and grinned. “Yeah, and I hope the fact that you’re askin’ about him means he’s gonna die real soon,” Martine said.

“Oh?”

Carbone chuckled. “Yeah, Al’s got a hard-on for the guy. ’Bout a year back, when we was last up here buying cattle, he got in a poker game with Murdock and lost half the money we had for cattle.”

Martine scowled. “Later, I heard he ran a crooked game. He cleaned some ol’ boy outta everything he had, includin’ the deed to a ranch somewhere up in the mountain country. Coulda been Colorado, I guess.”

“Last news we had was the Rangers tole him to git his butt outta Texas or they’d make ’im wished he had,” Carbone added.

Joey’s face turned hard. “Don’t worry none ‘bout gittin’ any revenge, Al. I’m headed up that way ta have a talk with Murdock and some men he’s hired.” Joey went on to tell the two about how the marauders had shot Betty and Tom.

Carbone put his hand on Joey’s arm. “Don’t worry none ’bout your family, compadre, Al and I will stay here and make sure they are well cared for while you take care of Vasquez and his men. But watch your ass. I hear Vasquez is crooked as a snake’s trail, and twice as dangerous with that long knife of his.”

“Thanks, Louis.”

The men walked outside to stand next to their horses at the hitching rail.

Al narrowed his eyes. “If you happen to get up near Big Rock, Colorado, there’s someone I’d like you to look up for us.”

“Who’d that be?”

“Man name of Smoke Jensen. He did Louis and me a big favor a couple of years back, and I’d like you to take him a present from us.”

“Smoke Jensen? Smoke Jensen the pistoleer?”

Martine said, “Come on over to my horse. I have something in my saddlebags for you to take with you.”

Smoke and Pearlie and Cal rode three abreast across the lush meadows of Sugarloaf, Smoke’s ranch, keeping their horses at an easy canter. The fields were full of wildflowers, riotous colors not yet muted by the early frost, and the air was crisp and cold with a gunmetal smell of snow on the breezes. The sun was bright in a cloudless sky but brought little warmth.

They were riding the pastures and fields to make sure the spring calving hadn’t left any cows down, their calves to starve. Spring rains had knocked some fences down, and Pearlie and Cal were checking to see which ones needed fixing first, so Pearlie could send the punchers out to repair the damage.

Out of the corner of his eye Smoke saw Cal flexing and swinging his left arm, a grimace of pain on his face. “How’s the arm, Cal?”

The boy straightened in his saddle, wiping pain from his face. “Oh, it’s fine, Smoke, no problem at all.”

Pearlie gave Smoke a wink. “Yeah, it’s fine, ‘ceptin’ I reckon ol’ Cal’ll be able to tell us when a storm’s comin’, from the aching in that wound of his.”

Cal had only recently recovered from a bullet he took in his chest while helping Smoke in his fight against the man who called himself Sundance. Smoke sobered, his grin fading as he remembered how Cal and Pearlie had saved his life....

Smoke planned to cover the north part of the trail himself and to slow down, or eliminate that bunch of paid assassins. He directed Cal and Pearlie farther down the mountain to harass and attack a second bunch headed up the mountain along a winding deer trail through tall timber.

By the time Cal and Pearlie made their way down the slopes to locate the gunmen’s campfire, it was past ten o’clock at night. The snow had stopped falling, and the dark skies were beginning to clear.

Cal and Pearlie lay just outside the circle of light from the fire and listened to the outlaws as they prepared to turn in for the night.

One-Eye Jordan, his hand wrapped around a whiskey bottle and his speech slightly slurred, said, “Black Jack, I’ll lay a side wager that I’m the one puts lead in Smoke Jensen first.”

Black Jack Warner looked up from checking his Colt’s loads, spun the cylinder, and answered, “You’re on, One-Eye. I’ve got two double-eagle gold pieces that say I’ll not only drill Jensen first, but that I’ll be the one who kills him.”

The Mexican and two Anglos who were watching from the other side of the fire chuckled and shook their heads. They apparently did not think much of their leader’s wager, or were simply tired and wanted them to quit jawing so they could turn in and get some rest.

Finally, when One-Eye finished his bottle and tossed it in the flames, the men quit talking and rolled up in their blankets under a dusting of light snow.

Pearlie and Cal waited until the gunnies were snoring loudly, and then they stood, stretching muscles cramped from lying on the snow-covered ground. Being careful not to make too much noise, they circled the camp, noting the location and number of horses, the layout of surrounding terrain. They crept up on the group of sleeping gun hawks, moving slowly while counting bedrolls to make sure all of Sundance’s men were accounted for.

Pearlie leaned over and cupped his hand around Cal’s ear, whispering, “I count five bodies. That matches the number of horses.”

Cal nodded, holding up five fingers to show he agreed. He took two sticks of dynamite from his pack and held them up so Pearlie could see, then he pointed to Pearlie and made a circular motion with his hand to indicate he wanted Pearlie to go around to the other side of camp and cover him.

Pearlie nodded and slipped a twelve-gauge shotgun off his shoulder. He broke it open and made sure both chambers were loaded, then snapped it shut gently so as not to make a sound. He gave Cal a wink as he slipped quietly into the darkness.

Cal waited five minutes to give Pearlie time to get into position. Taking a deep breath, he drew his Navy Colt with his right hand and held the dynamite in his left. He slowly made his way among the sleeping outlaws, being careful not to step on anything that might cause noise. When he was near the fire, he tossed both sticks of dynamite into the dying flames and quickly stepped out of camp. He ducked behind a thick ponderosa pine just as the dynamite exploded with an ear-splitting roar, blowing chunks of bark off the other side of the tree.

The screaming began before echoes from the explosion stopped reverberating off the mountainside. Flaming pieces of wood spiraled through the darkness, hissing when they fell into drifts of snow.

Cal swung around his tree, both hands full of iron. One of the outlaws, his hair and shirt on fire, ran toward him, yelling and shooting his pistol wildly.

Cal fired both Colts, thumbing back hammers, pulling triggers so quickly the roaring gunshots seemed like a single blast. Pistols jumped and bucked in his hands, belching flame and smoke toward the running gunnie.

The bandit, shot in his chest and stomach, was thrown backward to land like a discarded rag doll on his back, smoke curling lazily from his flaming scalp.

One-Eye Jordan threw his smoldering blanket aside and stood, dazed and confused. His eye patch had been blown off, along with most of the left side of his face. He staggered a few steps, then pulled his pistol and aimed it at Cal, moving as if in slow motion.

Twin explosions erupted from Pearlie’s scattergun, taking Jordan low in the back, splitting his torso with molten pieces of lead. His lifeless body flew across the clearing, where it landed atop another outlaw who had been killed in the dynamite blast.

One of the Mexican bandidos, shrieking curses in Spanish, crawled away from the fire on hands and knees. Scrabbling like a wounded crab toward the shelter of darkness, he looked over his shoulder to find Pearlie staring at him across the sights of a Colt .44.

“Aiyee ... no . . .” he yelled, holding his hands in front of him as if they could stop the inevitable bullets. Pearlie shot him, the hot lead passing through his hand and entering the bandit’s left eye, exploding his skull and sending brains and blood spurting into the air.

Black Jack Warner, who was thrown twenty feet in the air into a deep snowdrift, struggled to his feet. As he drew his pistol, he saw Pearlie shoot his compadre. Pearlie was turned away from Warner and did not see the stunned outlaw creep slowly toward him, drawing a bead on his back with a hogleg.

Cal glanced up, checking on bodies for signs of life. He saw Warner with his arm extended, about to shoot Pearlie in the back.

With no thought for his own safety, Cal yelled as he stood up, drawing his Navy Colt, triggering off a hasty shot.

Warner heard the shout and whirled, catching a bullet in his neck as he wheeled around. A death spasm curled his trigger finger, and his pistol fired as he fell.

Cal felt like a mule had kicked him in the chest as he was thrown backward. He lay in the snow, gasping for breath, staring at stars. In shock, he felt little pain—that would come much later. He knew he was hit hard and wondered briefly if he was going to die. His right arm was numb and wouldn’t move, and his vision began to dim, as if snow clouds were again covering the stars.

Suddenly Pearlie’s face appeared above him, tears streaming down his cheeks. “Hey, pardner, you saved my life,” he said, worry pinching his forehead.

Cal gasped, trying to breathe. He felt as if the mule that had kicked him was now sitting on his chest. “Pearlie,” he said in a hoarse whisper rasping through parched lips, “how’re you doin’?”

Pearlie pulled Cal’s shirt open and examined a blood-splattered hole in the right side of his ribs. He choked back a sob, then he muttered, “I’m fine, cowboy. How about you? You havin’ much pain?”

Cal winced when, suddenly, his wound began to throb. “I feel like someone’s tryin’ to put a brand on my chest, an’ it hurts like hell.”

Pearlie rolled him to the side, looking for an exit wound. The bullet had struck his fourth rib, shattering it, and traveled around the chest just underneath the skin, causing a deep, bloody furrow, then exited from the side, just under Cal’s right arm. The wound was oozing blood, but there was none of the spurting that would signify artery damage, and it looked as if the slug had not entere. . .