Kill or Die

Book 3: Flintlock

by William W. Johnstone, J.A. Johnstone

Genres: Westerns

Synopsis

The Greatest Western Writer of the 21st Century

One man. One rifle. One way to take on the most vicious outlaws on the frontier...

In the acclaimed new series by William and J. A. Johnstone, the bounty hunter known as Flintlock brings his trusty muzzleloader and a motherlode of courage into the most bitter and vicious battle he's ever had to fight.

Blood in the Bayou

Brewster Ritter had a warning for Flintlock: Do not cross the Sabine River. Ritter, the so-called Baron of the Bayou, is a vicious crime king still seething because Flintlock killed one of his gunmen in a Texas dustup. But Flintlock has his own powerful reasons for crossing into the nightmarish swamp country from East Texas. Now, in an eerie land of mysterious mists, haunting cypress trees, snakes, gators, and black-hearted, trigger-happy war hogs, Ritter is waiting for Flintlock with enough men and guns to kill him 10 times over. Flintlock knows what he's getting into, though, and losing is not an option. Because what's at stake is not just lives or Ritter's criminal kingdom but the future of the very soul and survival of this land.

Release date: September 1, 2015

Publisher: Pinnacle Books

Print pages: 336

Sample

A Mexican Mona Lisa with a come-hither smile was Sam Flintlock’s undoing. In fact she damn near got him killed, a source of irritation that would trouble him for days.

The girl held open the blanket that served as a door to the cantina, stood to one side and beckoned to him. Now a man of Flintlock’s experience should have heeded the warning signs. A woman who wore a red, clinging dress, yes, cut up to there, that barely covered her breasts, a tightly laced corset and high-heeled ankle boots was obviously up to no good. But the beautiful femme fatale wore an eye patch of scarlet leather adorned with a thin pocket watch . . . and Flintlock was fascinated.

How readily he ignored the two expensive horses standing hipshot at the hitching rail, one of them bearing an elaborately engraved silver saddle with the initials AP on the back of the cantle. A man of the West like Flintlock should have wondered if those initials could possibly be those of Alphonse Plume, the Nacogdoches draw fighter.

But the smiling seductress showed a deal of tanned thigh under fishnet stockings and black garters and Flintlock threw caution to the winds. He advanced on the girl with a smile on his homely face and a song in his heart.

It was a bad move and one he’d very soon regret.

After the heat and searing brightness of the southeast Texas day the cantina was cool and dark, lit by oil lamps. The odor of peppers and ancient human sweat hung in the air. The girl took Flintlock’s hand in hers and led the way to a table. Her one good eye stared into Sam’s pair of good ones, flicking between the two, and she said, “Buy poor little Conchita a drink, big boy?” She smelled musky, like desert flowers.

“Sure,” Flintlock said. “Name your pizen, little gal.”

Conchita lifted her head and yelled, in a now brassy voice, “Carlos. Tequila.”

Carlos, a fat, oily little cuss who looked like he’d put the grease in greaser, brought a bottle and two glasses. He gave Flintlock a pitying glance and said, “Are you hungry, señor? I have hard-boiled eggs and cheese. Do you like cheese?”

“He’s not hungry, Carlos,” Conchita said. “At least not for food.” She smiled and rested her little chin on the palm of her hand, and the dozen or so silver bracelets on her arm chimed. “You’re very handsome, señor,” she said. “We will enjoy ourselves tonight, I think.”

Flintlock knew he was anything but handsome, and the thunderbird tattooed across his throat added nothing to his appearance, but he still didn’t smell a rat. Even when one of the two Americanos who sat back in the gloom got up and crossed the floor, his big-roweled Texas spurs jingling, he didn’t notice, or care. The man opened the curtain, glanced outside and then returned. He whispered something to his companion and the man nodded.

Had Flintlock’s head not been filled with the glorious scent of Conchita and his mind dwelling on mattress time he might have put two and two together and realized that the man had looked outside to check on Flintlock’s horse, to see if it was worth killing him for. It was a brown horse and Sam had paid a hundred dollars for it. On the frontier a man’s life was worth a whole lot less than that.

Conchita set down her glass of tequila, bade Flintlock to drink up, then waved a hand in front of her face. “I’m so hot,” she said. The lashes of her good eye fluttered and she smiled. “You’ll have to help me out of my corset tonight . . . what is your name?”

“Flintlock, but you can call me Sam.”

“Sam is such a beautiful name,” Conchita said.

“Yeah, I’m right partial to it my ownself. How does that there corset work?”

“It laces up the back. See?”

“Oh yeah, I see it. I’ll have that off’n you in a trice, little lady.”

“Bad boy,” Conchita said, smiling. “We’ll have fun, huh?”

Flintlock drained his glass. “Depend on it.”

Then a man’s voice, loud, commanding and belligerent.

“There’s a woman in this here cantina cheating on me,” he said. “I won’t mention any names, but if she don’t get up and come over here quick I’ll take my fist and close her other eye.”

Conchita’s anger flared. She jumped to her feet, flipped her eye patch onto her forehead and placed her little fists on her hips. “Alphonse Plume, you don’t own me!” she said. “I can entertain any gentleman I want.”

Flintlock saw that Conchita’s eye under the patch was every bit as healthy as the other, but that didn’t bother him much. Women wore some strange fashions. But the name Alphonse Plume did. He was a top-name hired gun and a man to be reckoned with.

Plume rose to his feet, grinning. Even in the broadcloth and frilled-shirt finery of the frontier gambler/gunman he looked half man, half gorilla. He was a foot taller than Flintlock and at least fifty pounds heavier. Plume had mean eyes and the talk was he’d killed eight men in gunfights. Looking at him and the two ivory-handled Colts on his hips Flintlock had no reason to doubt that figure. The man next to him was also in broadcloth, not quite as brawny as Plume, but he looked just as mean.

Plume crossed the floor, grabbed Conchita by the arm and said, “Get to your room and wait for me there.”

“I will not,” the girl said, her generous breasts heaving. “I don’t need to do anything you tell me.”

“You always have when I’ve been paying you,” Plume said. He had big teeth. Yellowish white, like walrus ivory. “Now do as you’re told.”

“I will not,” Conchita said, breaking free of his hand. His grip left red welts on her arm. “You don’t own me.”

“Yeah,” Plume said, “you told me that already.” He grabbed the girl again and cocked his fist. “You want to wear two eye patches?”

Flintlock got to his feet. His Colt was shoved into his waistband, his usual mode of carry. “Let the girl be,” he said. “She wants nothing to do with you, at least for today.”

Plume was surprised. He looked Flintlock over from the crown of his battered hat, his sweat-stained buckskin shirt, shabby pants and scuffed boots. His gaze lingered on the Colt for just a moment, then he said, “What the hell are you?”

“Nobody. A peace-loving man is what I am. Flintlock’s the name and I always say, Flintlock by name, Flintlock by nature.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Plume said.

“I have no idea,” Flintlock said. He reached into his pants pocket and palmed a silver dollar.

Plume pushed the girl away from him and she fell heavily against a table.

“I want no trouble,” Carlos said. “I run a respectable establishment here.”

“You run a damned brothel,” Plume said. “So shut your trap.” He glared at Flintlock. “Some men need cut down to size, mister, and you’re one of them.”

“Like the man said, I want no shooting scrape,” Flintlock said.

“Maybe so,” Plume said. “But you got one.”

“You’re hunting trouble,” Flintlock said.

“No kidding,” Plume said. “But you’re not going to give me much trouble, saddle tramp. It’s just been a while since I killed a man and I’m overdue.” He nodded to Conchita. “And I enjoy a woman after I kill somebody. So you see how it is with me.”

“I see how it is with you, but I’m not buying into it,” Flintlock said. He flipped the dollar at Plume. The gunman reacted for just a split second, his eyes flicking to the coin. It was all the edge Flintlock needed. He drew from the waistband and fired. Hit hard at a range of less than five feet, Plume went down.

The second gunman was much faster than Flintlock on the draw and shoot. His right hand blurred as he went for his gun. But Flintlock’s Colt was in his fist and he had the drop. He fired before the man cleared leather. The gunman staggered back a step, his revolver coming up. Flintlock shot again, a hit. His second bullet missed, but it wasn’t needed. The gunman crashed onto his back and lay still.

His ears ringing, gun smoke drifting around him, Sam Flintlock looked down at the havoc he’d wrought. Two young men dead in the time it took for the watch in his pocket to tick off five seconds.

Conchita was the first to recover. She let out a wail of anguish, flung herself on Plume’s bloody body and covered his face in kisses. Then, her pretty face twisted in a mask of fury, she turned to Flintlock and said, “You murdered him, you no-good son of a bitch.”

The man called Carlos was at Flintlock’s shoulder. “You better run, señor,” he said.

Deafened by the roar of his guns, Flintlock said, “Huh?”

Carlos raised his voice. “They were Brewster Ritter’s hired men. He’ll come after you.”

“You’re already a walking dead man,” Conchita said. “Get out of here and die somewhere else.”

“They didn’t give me much choice,” Flintlock said.

“Brewster Ritter isn’t going to give a damn about that,” Carlos said. “He’s a hard-driven man, señor, and nobody kills two of his men and gets away with it.”

Conchita’s anger mangled her accent. “You feelthy peeg, Reeter will keel you so slowly you’ll scream for days.”

Flintlock shoved his gun back into his waistband. “I guess I’m not wanted around here, huh?” he said.

Carlos shook his head. “No, señor, stay if you wish and drink tequila. But where there are two of Ritter’s pistoleros ten more will be close by.”

Flintlock, not liking what he heard, thought it through. Then he said, “How much for the drinks?”

“On the house, señor. Now leave before it’s too late.”

The writing was on the wall and Flintlock saw it clear. A single chair stood under a window opposite and above it in black paint were scrawled the words:


Flintlock, all his attention focused on Conchita, had not noticed the writing before. Now he took it as a bad omen. “Well, I’m outta here,” he said.

“A very wise choice, señor,” Carlos said.

As he walked to the door Flintlock heard Conchita spit in his direction.

Sam Flintlock rode in the direction of the cypress swamps that bordered the Sabine River, his horse plodding without sound across yielding, sandy soil. Piney woods lay to the north but around Flintlock was a land of gulf prairies and saltwater marshes that attracted birds of all kinds. He saw gulls, terns, sandpiper and snipe and woodcock, but none of the alligators that he’d been warned about. The day was hot and humid and draped over Flintlock like a blanket soaked in warm water.

Old Barnabas sat on a lightning-blasted tree trunk. A great iron gearwheel as wide across as he was tall stood between his feet. The old mountain man, dead these twenty years, glared at Flintlock and said, “I never reckoned on raising up an idiot, but I surely did.”

“What are you doing here, Barnabas?” Flintlock said, drawing rein. “I don’t need you around.”

“You got to start thinking with your brain, boy, instead of that thing that hangs below your navel,” Barnabas said. “Why did you follow the girl into the cantina and almost get yourself shot?”

“Like you said, I didn’t let my brain do the thinking.”

“That’s because you’re an idiot. I raised up an idiot.”

“What you doing with the big wheel?” Flintlock said.

“Cleaning it up for you-know-who. He says it’s time Hell joined the industrial age and now we got iron foundries all over the place, great roaring, sooty, scarlet places they are too. There’s always molten iron and steel splashing and sparking out of cauldrons as big around as train tunnels and tens of thousands of the sweating damned shoveling coal, tending to the furnaces and the steam engines. Clanking, clanking and hissing goes on all the time, deafening everybody.” Barnabas slapped the huge wheel. “This is for a steam crane.”

“What do you do with all that iron and steel?” Flintlock said, interested despite himself.

“You’re an idiot, boy. What did I tell you afore? You remember nothing.”

“I recollect you told me that the walls around Hell are a thousand feet tall and glow white,” Flintlock said.

“That’s right and they’re white because they’re white hot. You any idea how many times walls like that need repair? Plenty of times, I can tell you that. In the olden days Ol’ Scratch tossed melted iron against a damaged wall and hoped it stuck. Now we use boilerplate that’s riveted in place. It’s a great advance in engineering.”

“And what do you do, Barnabas?” Flintlock said.

“I’m a trusty, so I drive a steam crane. Good job if you can keep the gears and cogwheels free of soot. And the tears of the damned can cause rust. That’s always a problem.”

“What’s with the getup you’re wearing?” Flintlock said.

Barnabas wore a black top hat with a pair of goggles parked at the bottom of the crown and a black leather coat done up with a dozen straps and brass buckles. A huge pocket watch on an iron chain hung from his neck.

“This is a crane driver’s outfit,” he said. For a moment Barnabas’s eyes glowed red, then he said, “Now you get into the swamp, boy, and find your ma. Tell her you want her to give you your real name. Flintlock ain’t any kind of name for a white man. Where’s the Injun?”

“O’Hara? He’s around. He comes and goes as he pleases.”

“A breed, ain’t he?” Barnabas said.

“Yeah, half Irish and half something else.”

“He’s only half the idiot you are. Now find your ma. Whoever he was, you should have your pa’s name.”

“I’m headed that way now,” Flintlock said. His mustang jerked up its head in alarm as a siren wailed in the distance.

“Break time is over,” Barnabas said. He lifted the gearwheel above his head. Flintlock guessed it weighed half a ton. “I remember the olden days when we were summoned back by a blast on a hunting horn. Times change, I guess.”

Then he was gone. A marsh wren landed on the trunk where Barnabas had sat, ruffled its feathers and fluttered away in alarm.

That night Flintlock camped on a patch of cropland that had been used before, maybe by the old Atakapan Indians, called the Man-eaters since they were rumored to be cannibals, who’d once ruled the swamps. Whoever it was, they’d left a supply of firewood and Flintlock soon had a fire going. Coffee was on the boil and bacon sputtered in the pan when the darkness parted and O’Hara stepped into the circle of firelight.

“I wondered when you’d show up,” Flintlock said. “I could have used you today.”

“I heard,” O’Hara said. He squatted by the fire, grabbed the tin cup that Flintlock had set out for his own use, and poured coffee. He stared over the steaming rim at Flintlock and said, “Alphonse Plume. A tad out of your class, huh? Did you shoot him in the back?”

Flintlock refused to show his anger. “No. I shot him in the front. And the other one.”

“Dave Storm. He was no bargain either.”

“I got lucky,” Flintlock said.

“No, you didn’t. The word in the swamp is that Brewster Ritter plans to hang you first chance he gets. Or throw you to his monster.”

“Monster?”

“I spoke to Maggie Heron, a Cajun swamp witch and—”

“How the hell do you know her?” Flintlock said, moving around the bacon with his knife.

“I know a lot of people, Sammy. You’d be surprised. I’m half Injun, remember.”

“What’s that got to do with it?” Flintlock said, irritated.

“Indians know stuff that white folks don’t. May I finish?”

“Yeah, go ahead. You spoke to a swamp witch, whatever the hell that is, and . . .”

“And she told me that Ritter plans to drain bayous and swamps this side of the Sabine and start a logging operation. There’s big money at stake and Maggie says Ritter has a monster with huge staring eyes under his control and it has already killed seven people and driven others out.”

“Seems like a big windy to me,” Flintlock said.

“Seven people burned to cinders is real enough,” O’Hara said.

“What about the law?” Flintlock said.

“In Louisiana they call Ritter the Baron of the Bayous. He is the law in the swamps and his hired guns enforce it.” Suddenly O’Hara threw down his cup, rose to his feet and vanished into the darkness.

Flintlock shook his head. O’Hara was as good as Barnabas at disappearing. But a few minutes later, as Flintlock chewed on the last of his bacon, the reason for the breed’s flight became clear.

Two men wearing dusters and carrying Greeners stepped out of the night. The muzzles of one of the shotguns shoved against the middle of Flintlock’s forehead and its owner said, “Even blink, mister, and I’ll scatter your brains.”

The other man said, “He ain’t too bright, is he, Harry?”

“I’d say a man who commits murder, leaves a clear trail and builds a fire in the middle of a swamp has a lot to learn,” Harry said.

“I didn’t murder anybody,” Flintlock said. “And get that damned scattergun out of my face before I shove it up your ass.”

“Sure, buddy,” Harry said. He reversed the shotgun and slammed the butt into the side of Flintlock’s head. For a moment Flintlock felt pain and then the ground rushed up to meet him and he felt nothing at all.

“Cypress, Mr. Luke,” banker Mathias Cobb said. “Dare I say that that very soon it will be the root of wealth, both yours and mine?”

“Indeed you may, sir,” Simon Luke said. “I intend to inform Mr. Ritter that I will buy all the cypress lumber he can sell me. It’s in great demand for our great nation’s burgeoning shipbuilding and construction industries and prices have never been higher.”

Cobb touched a forefinger to the side of his nose. “A word to the wise, Mr. Luke. I have considerable capital invested in this venture and I’ve begun to doubt Mr. Ritter’s methods.”

A freight wagon, piled high with beer barrels, rumbled noisily past Cobb’s office window and he was silent until it moved on and then said, “He’s talking about draining the swamp to force out the inhabitants. An impossibility, I say. And he’s putting a lot of faith in his damned flying balloon. There’s only one method of dealing with the lower classes, talk to them in a language they understand. Use the whip, the sap and the billy club and, yes, the gun if necessary and send them on their merry way to whatever hell they choose.” He looked at the tall, angular man who had his back against the wall by the door. “What’s your opinion on that, Mr. Lilly?”

Sebastian Lilly, a skilled pistol fighter out of the Arizona Territory, said, “Ritter would need to drain all of east Texas and the entire state of Louisiana. You’re right, banker Cobb, use the gun and kill all them swamp rats, man, woman and child.”

Luke, almost a mirror image of Cobb, a heavyset man with a thick gold watch chain across his huge round belly and a diamond ring on the little finger of his left hand, was alarmed.

“My dear, sir,” he said to Cobb, “that is harsh treatment indeed. Suppose you’re found out?”

“We won’t be, Mr. Luke,” the banker said. “No one cares about the trash living in the swamps, and if they did, we have ways of silencing them. Is that not right, Mr. Lilly?”

The gunman’s smile was both rare and cold. “You mean I have ways of silencing them.”

“Indeed, Mr. Lilly. As always, you are the voice of reason,” Cobb said. “I will have a word with Mr. Ritter and tell him what we have decided. Ah, here is the pie at last. You may leave us now, Mr. Lilly.”

The tall gunman grinned, shrugged himself off the wall and, his spurs ringing, stepped around one of Cobb’s tellers and walked out the door. The teller carried a huge domed pie in both hands and laid it down on the space Cobb had cleared on his desk.

“Ahhh . . . smell the aroma, Mr. Luke,” Cobb said, sniffing, his huge jowls aglow. “There’s nothing like steak and kidney pie when the first nip of fall is in the air, I always say.”

His eyes big, Luke gleefully tucked his napkin into his celluloi. . .