Gun Law

A warm morning wind rippled across the brittle tops of brush standing in low stretch of rocky ground at Kindred’s edge. As the wide street narrowed into a trail, the wary marshal fanned out his deputies with a wave of his gloved hand.

“He’ll be waiting to ambush us in the brush before we even get to the shack,” he said in a lowered voice.

Whitesides stared at Kern and jacked a round into his rifle as he asked, “How do you know so damn much about what he’s going to do?”

“Trust me,” Kern said grimly. He gave another wave of his hand and said, “Everybody spread out now. Comb the brush. Run him out and kill him.”

On Kern’s other side, Bender and Cooper moved away, circling wide of the others and stepping down into the wind-whipped brush. Kern, Jason Catlo and Whitesides spread out a few feet and walked straight ahead, down into the brush, seeing Cooper and Bender covering the left flank. On their right, the Sloane cousins and Odell Trent walked slowly, circling the brushy lowland on their way toward the run-down house.

A hundred yards away from both the widow’s shack and the low-lying stretch of brush and rock, Sherman Dahl lay prone behind a rock so small it barely offered him the cover he needed. But that was all right, he told himself. If this went well he wouldn’t need the cover for long.

Then it wouldn’t matter, he thought as he adjusted his rifle sights and looked down the barrel toward the gunmen spread across the swaying brush.

Out of habit and experience, he had repositioned himself as soon as the townsmen left. In most cases, a surprise position was only good once. Then a wise fighter picked up his guns and his billet and moved on—find the next surprise, he’d reminded himself.

He lay silently watching and listening while the ten gunmen searched for him through the brush and rock. Ten to one were not good odds and his immediate objective was to change the odds as quickly as possible. There were only three men he wanted to kill. But these other seven became his targets the minute they stepped into the street with the Catlos and Jennings.

So be it. . . . He slipped his finger inside the trigger guard and settled down with the butt of the cocked Winchester resting in the pocket of his shoulder—prepared for his shot the very second it presented itself.

In the brush, Jennings and Philbert Catlo stopped searching and looked over at the others who were still moving forward, thirty yards away. Kern and Whitesides walked along ten feet apart.

“How does he know this Teacher fellow isn’t waiting for us inside the shack?” Jennings asked Philbert.

“You get no argument from me,” Philbert said. “I haven’t seen him be right about anything since we met up with him.”

“What if Jason is wrong too, about the woman not being there?” Jennings questioned.

“Watch your language, Buck the Mule,” Philbert cautioned him. “That’s my brother you’re getting ready to talk about.”

“I’m not speaking ill of him,” said Jennings. “What if he’s wrong? What if that woman is there inside the shack, getting better and better every day?”

“Just biding her time?” Philbert finished for him. “Waiting for her chance to slip a noose around our necks?”

Philbert thought about it for a second. He looked back and forth across the stretch of brush. Then he directed his gaze at the front of the shack just ahead of them, dust stirring on the breeze in its barren front yard.

“I hate to say this, Buck the Mule, but you might be right.” He chuckled under his breath and gestured toward the trail above the low-lying brush. “Follow me,” he said quietly.

“Oh boy!” Jennings said, his voice almost childlike. “If she is there, I get to kill her!” He hurried, trying to pass Philbert on the narrow rocky path.

“Hold up, Buck the Mule! Damn it!” Philbert exclaimed as the two crested the edge of the trail. He grabbed the big gunman by his shoulder.

“Uuumphh . . . ,” Jennings grunted aloud, stopping abruptly, moving up onto his tiptoes.

Philbert felt the hot spray of blood fly out of the big gunman’s back and splatter him in the face. At the same second he heard another rifle shot explode and echo off along the distant hills.

The big gunman twisted full circle and crashed down onto Philbert just in time to keep Dahl’s next shot from hitting him full in his chest. The two rolled back down as one into the brush. When they came to a halt, Jennings’ heavy limp body lay atop Philbert, pinning him to the ground.

“He’s out on the dirt flats!” Kern shouted, diving to the rocky ground inside the brush. He returned a quick wild rifle shot in Dahl’s direction.

“He’s killed Philbert and the idiot!” shouted Bender, he and Cooper both dropping to the ground themselves. They also fired toward the resounding rifle shot.

“I can’t say I’m real sorry to hear that,” Whitesides said to Kern, crawling up beside him. He held his fire, looking all around through the brush. “This sneaking sumbitch has us where we can’t get a look without topping that edge like a bunch of turkeys.”

“Yeah, turkeys at a turkey shoot,” Kern replied angrily. He parted the brush with his rifle barrel and stared as best he could toward the edge of the trail lying above them.

Another shot exploded from Dahl’s rifle, then another. As soon as he fired the second shot, he hurried off to a new spot behind another small rock.

“I’m all right, brother . . . but I’m stuck under Buck the Mule!” Philbert called back to him. “He’s dead and he’s bleeding all over me!”

Kern returned four shots blindly, then called out to the brush, “Cooper, Bender, you’re the nearest to him. Go get him onto his feet.”

Another rifle bullet ripped through the air, this time coming from closer to the widow’s shack.

Cooper and Bender stood into a crouch and hurried through the brush. When they came upon Jennings’ bloodly body lying atop Philbert, they dragged the dead gunman off him and watched Philbert gasp for breath in the blood-soaked dirt.

“Let’s get out of here,” Tribold Cooper said, still crouched, dragging Philbert to his feet.

“I’m ready!” said Philbert, his face, clothes and hands coated thickly with Jennings’ blood.

“Wait for us!” said Cooper, seeing Philbert running upward to the edge of the trail.

“Not today,” Philbert called out over his shoulder. He chuckled. “It’s every man for himself before he gets settled in and reload—”

He never got the words out of his mouth. As he topped the edge of the trail, a bullet from Dahl’s Winchester thumped into his left shoulder, just above his heart. The impact flung him down the short sloop and back into the brush.

Tribold Cooper, who had been right behind him, dropped to the dirt and stuck his rifle above the trail’s edge. He fired repeatedly, as fast as he could lever new rounds into the chamber.

“Damn it all, Bender, is he singling out the Catlos brothers?” Cooper called down behind him to where Bender knelt over Philbert, stuffing a bandanna into the gaping high shoulder wound.

“It looks that way to me,” Bender said, working fast, seeing Philbert struggle to hold on to consciousness.

From a flat spot behind a low stand of barrel cactus, Dahl turned over onto his back and began reloading his rifle.

Two down, one to go . . . he told himself. After that, the fight was over, as far as he was concerned. That is, unless Marshal Emerson Kern and the rest of his men wanted to pursue the matter further.

Stage guards Bert Frost and Art Sealy both sat upright atop the big Studebaker stagecoach when the gunshots began exploding outside Kindred less than two miles away. The two gave a curious look toward the distant gunfire and sat with their shotguns across their laps.

“Pull her down some, Oates,” Frost called out to the driver, above the squeak, groan and rattle of the big heavy rig. “Let’s figure out what this shooting is all about before we ride smack into something.”

The stage had bounced, bucked and swayed along the dusty trail since daylight. But upon hearing the guard’s order, the driver, Calvin Oates, pulled back on the traces and slowed the six-horse rig down to an easy pace.

“You fellows will have to tell me what you want to do,” said the driver. “I’m paid to drive, not to figure out gunfire.”

The guards didn’t reply. They continued looking in the direction of the shots ahead and to their left. Art Sealy stood up and balanced himself unsteadily, as if standing would afford him a better view.

“For a town that’s no longer armed, they sure are raising lots of hell. They’ve got a new town marshal too, I’ve heard.”

“Sit down, Art,” said Frost, “before you break your danged neck.” He continued to stare and listen. “Maybe they all got together for one last hoopla and shoot up all their bullets. Maybe it’s the new marshal doing all the shooting.”

“That makes no sense,” said Sealy, rocking back and forth, almost losing his footing as the stage rolled on at its slower speed.

“That was a joke, Art,” said Frost. “Now sit down before I knock you down. All you’re doing is aggravating me.”

“Do you suppose it’s got anything to do with this?” he said, pointing down with a gloved finger at the inside of the coach beneath them. The big rig housed three large, leather-trimmed canvas bags filled with banded stacks of dollars and assorted gold coins. The tops of the bags were each drawn tight and fastened with a padlock.

Frost turned sharply to the driver and shouted, “Calvin, dang it! Will you please slow this rig down! Give us time to think this thing out.”

Oates pulled back harder on the traces and called out to the horses, “Whoooa, boys, you heard the man.”

The stage slowed almost to a halt. Then the driver gave the traces enough slack to keep the rig moving.

“That’s more like it,” said Frost. He rose onto his knees and stared long and hard in the direction of the shooting. The stage rolled along an upward grade, affording a better view of Kindred and the small shack that stood on its edge.

“It looks like the shooting’s all coming from that brush field,” said Sealy, also up on his knees, the wind licking at the fringe of his buckskin coat. “We can easily keep clear of it.”

“All right, Art,” said Frost, “let’s get down inside where we belong.” To the driver he said, “Oates, soon as we get inside, you pour it on these horses, get ‘em flying, and keep ‘em flying.” He leaned forward and put a gloved hand on the diver’s shoulder. “Don’t slow us down until we’re on the street. Understand?”

“Hell yes, I understand,” said Oates without looking around. “Slow down . . . speed up. You don’t know what the hell you want.” He listened until he heard the two climb inside and slam the door behind them. Then he slapped the traces to the horses’ backs and put them up into a run.

From the low-lying brush field, Kern saw the big stagecoach come up into view far to his left, running hard toward Kindred at the head of a long stream of rising trail dust.

“Yep, just like I told you it would be,” said Whitesides, who was positioned near him. “We best hope all this shooting didn’t scare them off.”

“They heard it, for sure,” said Kern, keeping low, lest a rifle shot reach out and nail him the way it did Philbert and Jennings. “That’s why it’s running to town like its wheels are on fire.”

“No, Harry,” said Kern. “It’s too far to any place else. They’ve got to stop here. But all this gunfire will have the guards up on their toes.”

The two looked off in the direction of Dahl’s last shoots. “I’d hate to come this far and have this gunman scare all that money away,” Whitesides said in an ominous tone.

“We’re not taking a chance on that happening,” said Kern. He raised his head up a little and called out to the others spread out through the brush, “All of you, pull back. We’ve got business to attend to.”

From his position behind a low rock less than thirty yards from the widow’s shack, Dahl lay with his rifle leveled and ready. He’d heard Kern call out to the deputies. He watched closely as the men slipped back through the brush toward town, staying low in a crouch. Denton Bender rose clearly into Dahl’s gun sights for a few seconds, but Dahl didn’t take the shot. He wanted Jason Catlo—no one else, he reminded himself.

He rose a bit and gazed off at the looming trail dust left behind the speeding coach. It had already ridden out of sight, onto the main street in Kindred.

He stared toward the street, wondering just what that business might be. He waited until he saw the last of the deputies move back into town. Then he stood and dusted his knees and elbows. Unbuttoning the corduroy duster, he fanned the lapels to let in some air. Then he turned and walked back toward the widow’s shack.