Herne and Charlie rode past the sign that told them they were entering Drummond territory and scarcely gave it a second glance. Ever since leaving town they had hardly spoken, each one taken up with his own thoughts. So far they had been successful. Drummond’s army of twenty men had been whittled down to three. Nate himself, a squat-looking near-Mex known as Pecos and Cole – and Cole was still likely to be nursing a wounded gun arm. The odds didn’t seem so bad now.
Yet neither man thought their task was going to be easy. There was something brooding about the day that flat-tended their spirits. The sky was low and gray without a trace of sun. The wind sailed over the flat land down by the Powder River and cut into them as they rode north. Earlier that day when Herne had looked at the hills beyond Powderville, in the direction of Medicine Rocks and Chalk Buttes, he had thought he’d seen white on the highest peaks. It could have been a trick of the light: or it could have been the first falls of snow.
‘Remember what I said, Charlie?’ Herne’s voice was as flat and dull as the sky.
‘Sure. You told me enough times. Leave Nate alone. An’ Drummond. They’re yours. I got it.’
Charlie was on edge, anxious. Something nagged away at the back of his brain, tugging at his attention. He wasn’t any way sure what it was.
The first sight of the Drummond place was the same as ever. One minute all that a man could see in front of him was fold after fold of range and the next there were the tops of brick chimneys and the tower with its iron frame and flag fluttering eastwards in the wind.
Herne drew breath, hawked from the back of his throat, spat. A hundred yards on he reined in the horse he was riding and unbuttoned the top coat that Rachel had taken from her husband’s wardrobe.
‘Unless you wear this,’ she had said, ‘you’re like to freeze to death before you get there. It’s good and heavy even if it doesn’t look much.’
He’d taken it and put it on, thanking her. At the door she had touched his arm, her fingers gripping him through the thick wool.
‘Take care,’ she had whispered.
Herne had looked down at her face and seen the traces of fear in the green of her eyes. He’d wanted her to smile, wanted to see the dimple appear, as if by magic. But there was nothing in Rachel that morning to make her smile. The grip on Herne’s arm had tightened and he had known she wanted him to kiss her before leaving.
Instead he had moved away and she had loosed her grasp, letting him go. When he’d glanced back half way down the street, she had still been standing outside the house, looking after him.
Now Herne took off the coat and tied it behind his saddle. From here on in the cold wasn’t going to matter, but anything that inhibited his freedom of action would.
He slipped the Remington from its holster and checked the load, seeing that Charlie was doing the same with his double-action Starr and his Winchester.
Herne nodded. ‘Make ’em count, Charlie. Just make ’em count.’
Charlie didn’t reply, just pushed the rifle back down under his saddle and nudged his horse forwards. Time enough for talking when it was all over.
They reached the perimeter of the corral. Herne easily picked out his big bay amongst the others. The L-shaped bunkhouse off to the right looked deserted, but neither could he see anyone at the windows of the massive square house.
He didn’t believe the place was deserted. Far from it. If Mrs. Drummond had delivered his message, and he was sure that she had, then the rancher wouldn’t be taking any chances. He would have kept whatever men remained close about him.
There was a small wagon at the side of the house, Mrs. Drummond’s buckboard behind it. Herne didn’t recognize the wagon and thought it possible that Drummond had company.
‘What d’you reckon?’ asked Charlie quietly.
‘I don’t know. They’re around somewhere. Maybe we’d best ride on in and draw out.’
‘Okay. You’re callin’ the shots.’
Herne licked his dry lips, chapped raw by the cold and the wind which was ruffling the sleeves of his shirt.
‘You ride a few yards back of me. Best get that Winchester out where you can use it.’
‘Hold up a minute.’
Charlie pulled a thin cigar from out of his top pocket and stuck it in his mouth; he bit off the end and spat it out. Then he found a match and struck it against the butt of his gun. He lit the cigar and drew hard on it.
‘Anythin’ happens to me—’ he began.
Herne glanced sideways: ‘Nothin’s goin’ to happen to you. Just keep your eyes skinned.’
‘Yeah.’
Charlie levered the Winchester and looked about him. Nothing Herne could say or do could get rid of the pestering at the back of Charlie’s mind, like some dark, furry creature burrowing into his brain with its claws.
‘Let’s go!’
The two men rode slowly in towards the house, passing the corral fence on their left. A few of the horses moved, jostling against one another, but apart from that their advance didn’t cause any discernible movement.
‘You reckon the bunkhouse?’ asked Charlie, pointing the barrel of his rifle.
‘Could be.’
‘You want me to check it out?’
Herne thought, shook his head. ‘No sense in walkin’ smack into ’em. Don’t want to let anyone in there get an angle on our backs, neither.’
Herne prodded his horse forward another few paces, then reined it to a halt. He put his left hand to his mouth and hollered: ‘Nate! Nate! Stop skulkin’ behind closed doors an’ get out here like a man!’
A couple of chickens squawked and scrabbled in the dirt over by the bunk house. Somewhere out of sight a cock crowed loudly, as if taking on Herne’s threatening voice.
‘Nate! You yeller bastard!’
Charlie puffed at the cigar, small wafts of dark smoke moving up into the cold air. Herne could smell the acrid aroma of cheap tobacco.
‘You comin’ out or d’you want burnin’ out? Like you done to that old woman you murdered.’
Back of the bunk house and out of sight a door swung on noisy hinges and slammed against a wall. Charlie lifted his rifle to his shoulder; Herne’s right hand moved down to the top of his holster.
It could have been nothing; could have been the wind.
‘Nate! You yeller scum!’
Something moved at the far end of the bunk house and this time it wasn’t the wind for sure. Both men saw the dull color of gun metal, the blue of a shirt, flesh color of a hand. A second later there was a solid thump as one of the heavy doors underneath the terrace of the house was flung back.
‘Now, Charlie!’
Herne drew the Remington fast and squinted at the open doorway. He saw a shape move inside the cellar darkness and fired fast. The shape continued to move and with a spurt of flame a rifle cracked out, the shot going wide to his left.
Behind him, Charlie had fired twice, each time tearing away pieces of board. Whoever was behind the wall hadn’t got off a shot himself.
‘I’m goin’ in closer!’
Herne touched his heels to the horse’s sides, putting most of its body between himself and the cellar door. As he got nearer a couple of shots winged over his head and he could see the outline of the man more clearly. He angled his arm and fired for the center of the shadowed figure.
As his mount sped towards the bottom fence of the corral he saw the man pitch forward and topple out into the light. It wasn’t Nate.
Charlie had followed him, keeping his body turned in the saddle, the Winchester covering the area of the bunk-house where one of Drummond’s men had been.
He wasn’t there any longer. Herne saw a movement at the other end and Cole came round the edge of the wall, leaning against it, gun held in his left hand, unsteady.
‘Charlie!’
At the same instant that Herne shouted out, Cole fired. With his left hand instead of his right, he was way off target. Not so Charlie. It wasn’t as good a shot as the one he’d put through the back of the man’s head as he ran out of the saloon back in Powderville, but it was pretty good, nonetheless.
It struck the board inches away from Cole’s body and deflected at an angle so that it drove downwards through the right side of his chest, wrenching fibers apart and bursting blood vessels till it exited through the solid flesh above his buttocks.
Cole stared out at Charlie, sitting astride his horse, rifle still at his shoulder, the dark little cigar clamped tight between his lips. He swayed outwards, reaching sideways at the bunkhouse wall and trying to find something to cling onto. There was nothing: not any more.
He hit the ground and pitched over onto his back. Eyes open, he looked up at the grayness of the forbidding sky while pain lanced through him in spasm after spasm.
He was to lie there for some while, slowly dying, ignored.
Herne dropped from the saddle and holstered his gun. He shooed the horse towards the corral and started to walk towards the broad wooden steps which led up to the front of the house.
Charlie was still riding carefully in the same direction, Winchester resting now on the neck of his mount.
Again a door swung open and shut but this time it was in the big house itself. Nate had come out onto the terrace at the right hand side and was walking slowly along it, passing behind the leafless saplings.
Charlie saw him first and signaled to Herne who stopped walking and stood his ground.
A moment later Nate came into sight at the corner of the terrace. He was wearing black pants, white shirt and a black waistcoat. No sign today of the long coat or the Montana peak hat that usually marked him out. Today he was his own man, about to make a play for his own life.
Nate’s Colt, a short-barreled Peacemaker, was holstered by his right leg. Another Colt, which Herne instantly recognized as his own, was tucked into his belt on the left, angled towards that hip.
Nate stood quite still, then leaned insolently against the wooden pillar which supported the upper floor. His white face showed the twin patches of red as clear as if they were spots of blood.
Nate’s eyes flicked from Herne to Charlie and back again.
‘What about him?’ he said, nodding towards Charlie.
‘He’s out of it,’ replied Herne. ‘It’s just you an’ me.’
‘He’s still got that gun, ain’t he? I don’t want to get shot by no Winchester the moment I hit leather.
Without taking his eyes off Nate, Herne said: ‘Put the rifle up, Charlie. Only keep watchin’ them windows up there.’
Charlie took the cigar from his mouth and tugged at a few stray ends of dark tobacco with his teeth. He spat them away and then turned the Winchester round and slid it down into the scabbard.
Nate stood away from the pillar. ‘What’s it to be?’
‘You just go for your gun any time you’ve a mind.’
‘An’ if I don’t?’
‘Then I’ll shoot your legs from under you!’
Nate threw back his head and let out the high-pitched squeal of a laugh. As his head came back down he went for the gun at his right.
He dropped into a crouch as he did so, thin body moving fast as a whip. Fast but not as fast as Herne, whose speed was edged on by the driving need of his revenge.
Herne’s gun came up a fraction of a second ahead of Nate’s and he squeezed back the trigger faster still. He aimed for Nate’s right arm, deep in the flesh below the shoulder, not wanting to kill him straight off.
Nate’s shell cut past his left arm close enough that Herne imagined he could feel its passing; already grazed in that arm once he didn’t take to being hit there a second time.
He thumbed back the hammer for a fresh shot, watching Nate like a hawk. The white-faced man clung onto the pillar, holding himself erect. His right arm hung by his side, shattered and useless.
Herne started to walk slowly towards him. As he got closer he saw the red spots fade on Nate’s face; the gun fell from numb fingers, bounced twice on the edge of the terrace and rolled off onto the ground below. Nate bent at the knees, going down, turning in on himself; his left hand started to slide down the wood of the pillar and as his head came right forward Herne heard a ghost of his laugh.
Almost on the boards, Nate’s body whipped back, the left hand no longer supporting it but dragging Herne’s own Colt from his belt. The speed of it nearly caught Herne by surprise.
He moved fast to his left and brought up the Remington. Angled it at Nate’s left arm and sent a shell ripping through the forearm, immediately below the elbow. He heard the brutal cracking of bone and a shrill whine as the bullet ricocheted away.
Nate stared at the already welling blood as Herne vaulted up onto the terrace and stood less than three feet in front of him. He reached forward and took the Colt .45 from Nate’s failing fingers, reversing it and switching it with the Remington, which he pushed down into his own belt.
With exaggerated precision he pulled back the hammer, enjoying the balance of his own pistol once more. Nate looked at him and his mouth opened: the laugh was muted by the splash and splatter of bright red blood.
Herne took three steps back and stared at him in disgust.
‘For God’s sake! You crippled me already, get it over with!’
Herne shook his head. ‘That’d be too easy. I want you to have some time to think. Think about lynchin’ Taylor and gettin’ his wife raped. Think about stringin’ up that old woman. Think about gunnin’ down a man called Fairfax. You think good about ’em all!’
Herne took another step back and brought up the gun. Nate, seeing where it was aimed, made a final piercing scream for mercy. Herne laughed in his face and shot him low in the belly: the last laugh. Nate would hear it echoing on, all the long agonized time he was lying there dying.
‘Come on, Charlie! Let’s go get Drummond!’
For an instant, one foot on the bottom step, Charlie hesitated. ‘Do we have to, Jed? Ain’t that enough?’
‘Enough, Hell! His greed’s got to answer!’
Herne headed for the front door fast, Charlie moving up close behind him. They stood in the hallway, looking at the staircase, the closed doors; listening to the quiet.
‘I’ll take down here. You try upstairs.’
Herne wrenched open the door to Drummond’s office. It was exactly the same as before except that this time it was empty. He saw a bundle of keys hanging from a peg and pocketed them, not wanting to leave without securing his Sharps from the armory.
The next room he tried was a sitting room; leather armchairs decorated with gold studs, more shelves of leather-bound books, a portrait of Drummond’s wife in oils above the fireplace. By the window a polished rosewood table and on either side of it a pair of high-back rosewood chairs with green leather seats.
Herne turned to leave and then heard a slight noise from the curtained recess past the fire. The Colt was in his hand in a flash, aiming at the center of the curtain.
‘Come out! Slow an’ easy!’
The green velvet material shifted slowly to one side and a frightened face with a bulbous nose and bushy eyebrows over tremulous brown eyes poked round it.
‘Get out here! With your hands up an’ empty.’
The Scotsman did as he was told. Inside his expensive tweed clothes he was trembling fit to fall apart.
‘Where is he?’
The involuntary movement of Fullerton’s eyes provided him with the answer. Herne spun round and raced for the door. Upstairs on the first floor, Charlie had just beaten him to it.
The door to the billiard room had been ajar and Charlie had pushed it back with his foot, stepping quickly inside, pistol drawn. Drummond was standing at the far end of the green billiard table facing him. There were three balls on the table, two reds and a white. A billiard cue rested on the green baize.
Confronting him suddenly Charlie was stopped in his tracks. Something about Drummond’s presence froze his muscles, his brain. The aura of power that Drummond had so successfully cultivated held Charlie in awe.
Drummond moved his right hand up from behind the table and showed Charlie the short-barreled double-action Smith and Wesson .32 pistol he had had specially fitted with ivory-plated handles. Then he shot him with it. Twice, the two shots beautifully placed within a couple of inches of one another through Charlie’s heart.
Charlie pitched forward, his own gun unfired. His head slammed against the heavy wooden frame of the billiard table, his knees gave way and he sank to the floor. He was dead before he reached it, too quickly even to hear the scrabbling in his brain accelerate till it burst through the core.
Herne took the stairs three at a time, saw the open doorway and jumped through it. The first thing he saw was Charlie’s body, bending forward, head between his legs, his blood beginning to stain the thick pile of the carpet.
The next thing was a noise to his right and a glimpse of something flashing down through the air. The billiard cue smashed against the top of his right shoulder and left it momentarily numb. Drummond crashed into him on his way out of the door, almost tripping over one of Charlie’s legs as he went.
Herne gritted his teeth and went after him. He got to the top of the stairs by the time Drummond was half way down. Called his name and Drummond turned fast, catching hold of the banister rail. The rancher fired twice more, just as quickly but less accurately.
Herne saw the gun arm come up and dived flat, skidding along the polished floor and stopping himself against the post at the head of the stairs. Both shots had carved the space above his falling body.
He winced and felt for his Colt.
‘Drummond! There’s no way you’re gettin’ out of this. All your hired guns have gone. The only one you got left’s the one in your hand. The one you killed Charlie with.’
Herne jumped up into a crouch and Drummond fired but too fast. The .32 shell splintered one of the wooden railings to Herne’s right.
‘And now you fired your last shot!’
Herne stood up, the Colt pointing at Drummond’s chest, below the bow tie, at the point where the top of the waistcoat met over the freshly laundered white shirt.
The pale gray, nearly colorless eyes looked up at the lank-haired man wearing borrowed clothes and he sneered. ‘You think I believe that?’
‘Seems to me that little thing takes five shells. Now you reckon up how many you fired an’ do your damndest!’
Behind the expressionless eyes Drummond’s mind fought to remember. He lifted the gun and pointed it at Herne.
Exactly as the truth slipped into place he squeezed the trigger. Herne heard the dull click and fired the Colt. Twice. Once for himself and one time for Charlie. Drummond was lifted off the stairs and then hurled backwards, hitting the bottom with a sickening thud.
Across the top of the stair well another door opened and Mrs. Drummond came out. She looked so elegant that it flashed through Herne’s mind that she had been combing her hair, getting herself ready. She had on a black dress, tight at neck and wrists. In place of her pendant a gold cross hung from her neck.
‘If you want your husband,’ Herne said, ‘he’s downstairs.’
He holstered the gun and left her there. When he reached Drummond’s body he knelt beside it and fished out his wallet, taking from the fold of dollar bills enough to cover two months’ pay. One month for himself and one for Charlie. He figured Charlie wouldn’t mind. He dropped the wallet down onto the body but as an afterthought picked it up again, the soft leather already smeared with blood. A hundred dollars would help Taylor’s wife to feed her kid through the winter up in Fort Keogh.
Herne collected his Sharps from the armory below the house, taking a good supply of ammunition while he was about it. He figured he’d used a lot of shells on Drummond’s account, one way or another.
When he found the Scotsman, Fullerton was sitting in the middle of the room Herne had left him in, drinking brandy from a bottle, swallow after swallow. Herne took five dollars from his pocket and pushed them into the man’s hand.
There’s a man upstairs. Bearded. Wearing a yellow waistcoat. Take him into town on that wagon of yours and see that he’s buried proper. You got that?’
Fullerton moved the bottle away from his mouth and nodded.
‘I find out you forgot, I’ll likely be back!’
The Scotsman gulped and hastily swallowed down some more brandy. Herne left the room, left the house. Outside, he could hear the moans of Nate as he got on with the slow business of dying.
Mounted up on his bay horse, Herne could still hear them. It wasn’t a sound he disliked. He rode half a mile back towards town and then stopped. It was snow he could see on those hills. Another few weeks in Powderville and he’d be trapped there all winter. Whereas if he went north he’d likely find work in one of the rail towns the Northern Pacific had opened up.
Herne turned his horse and began to ride north.