Range War in Whiskey Hill

He followed the north ridge for a mile and a half, on the lookout for strays before reaching the little stream that marked the corner of his uncle’s ranch. He had always called it Crooked Branch when he was a boy because of the many turns it made at the bottom of the ridge, and it eventually flowed into Crooked Creek. He didn’t know the real name, if there was one. Maybe the Cheyenne Indians had a name for it. Beyond the stream was most likely Drummond land now, since there was very little range on this side of the railroad that didn’t belong to Drummond. He decided that Crooked Branch was as good a place as any to camp for the night.

He pulled the saddle off his horse and hobbled the buckskin to graze while he looked for firewood among the cottonwood trees. Soon he had a fire going and coffee working up a boil. His uncle had supplied him with everything he would require, including .44 cartridges for the Winchester his father had left him. Thinking of the rifle, he propped the coffeepot on two smoldering sticks in the edge of the fire, and drew the weapon from the saddle sling to inspect it. It was a fine rifle, a Winchester ’73, and his uncle had told him how much his father admired it. I can see why, Colt thought as he turned the rifle over in his hands as if examining it for the first time. He ran his fingers over the wooden stock, remembering how smoothly the lever action had operated when he had taken target practice to become familiar with the weapon. Satisfied that he and the Winchester would work well together, he laid it across his saddle and returned his attention to the coffeepot in the embers.

Finished with his coffee, supplemented by some cold biscuits Rena had given him, he washed the pot in the stream and packed it away. Alone, under a clear night sky, he felt at peace with himself, forgetting for the moment the bitterness that was never far beneath the surface of his mind. But those moments were few and short-lived for Colt McCrae, and soon replaced by memories of the years of silent angry brooding—of the soul-killing confinement of prison life when the frustration of his wrongful incarceration would drive him to the point where he would hammer his fists against the wall of his cell. It had been hard, but he had learned to deal with the harsh and unfair realities of his life. Looking back, he felt that he owed a lot to Bob Witcher’s interest in him for the patience he eventually acquired. When black thoughts of revenge had finally faded with time, they were replaced by dreams of leaving Kansas and Wyoming behind him. It would have been easy to climb in the saddle in the morning and ride away from a town that didn’t want him, but things had changed with the murder of his father. There were some things that needed fixing. So I reckon I’ll hang around until I get ’em fixed, he thought. Before long, it was fully dark and time to turn in.

Brownie Brooks snickered softly. “I reckon so. He’ll be wishin’ he was back in prison pretty soon.” Drummond’s two henchmen continued to lie there at the brow of the ridge for a few moments longer, both men savoring the fun about to begin. “We could just shoot the bastard from here. How far did Mr. Drummond say we was supposed to go with this jasper?”

“He didn’t say,” Lon replied, his eyes never leaving the motionless form close by the fire. “He just said to take care of him.” He considered Brownie’s suggestion for a few moments before deciding. “Hell, shootin’ him wouldn’t be that much fun. Whaddaya say we tie his ass up, hook a rope behind his saddle, and let that big horse drag him all the way back to the Broken-M?”

Eager for the fun to begin, they left their horses on the ridge and made their way as quietly as possible down the slope toward the unsuspecting camp. Lon took the lead, his pistol drawn, and Brownie followed close behind holding a coil of rope. “You be quick with that rope when I jump him,” Lon whispered.

Moving with great caution, the two assailants inched closer to the sleeping figure by the fire. Lon stopped and held up his hand when Colt’s horse snorted and blew. He watched closely for signs of movement, but there was no indication that the horse had awakened the sleeping figure. After a moment, he waved Brownie on and continued his silent stalk of their intended victim.

Reaching a point about fifteen feet away, Lon nodded to Brownie. When Brownie returned the signal, Lon suddenly split the stillness of the night, yelling at the top of his voice. “Git up from there, sleepyhead!” and pumping two shots from his pistol into their victim. Without giving time for the prone figure to respond, both assailants dived upon the body, only to find they had attacked a blanket wrapped around a saddle.

Whirling around at once, Lon tried to get a shot off, but he was not fast enough to counter the .44 slug that shattered his sternum and sent him over on his back. Screaming in pain, he dropped his pistol and rolled over on his elbows and knees. With no threat from him for the next few seconds, Colt turned his rifle on Brownie, who had dropped the rope and was fumbling with his revolver in an attempt to draw it from his belt. The front sight of the pistol had snarled in his shirt, holding it fast. Colt waited, his rifle aimed squarely at Brownie’s chest, watching with bemused patience while Brownie struggled to free his weapon from his shirt. Noticing that Lon was now up on his hands and knees, and struggling to get to the pistol he had dropped in the sand, Colt, with one quick motion, sent the fatal bullet into Lon’s body. Lon collapsed heavily. Back to Brownie again, Colt cranked another cartridge into the Winchester’s chamber. Still struggling unsuccessfully to free the front sight of his pistol, Brownie saw the futility of his efforts, and promptly decided to run for his life. Colt unhurriedly raised his rifle and stopped the terrified man with a bullet in his leg. Brownie tumbled in the sand on the stream bank, holding his leg and wailing in pain.

Colt casually walked over to the fallen man and stood over him for a long moment before speaking. “Shut up your crying. I ain’t gonna finish you off just yet.” Fearing for his life, and uncertain what the stoic rifleman had in store for him, Brownie could do nothing but cower at the tall man’s feet. “Get on your feet,” Colt ordered.

Colt reached down and picked up the rope Brownie had dropped. Following the wounded man to the tree, he ordered him to put his hands behind his back. In response, Brownie made one more desperate attempt to jerk the pistol from his belt. Colt casually cracked him on the side of his head with the barrel of the Winchester. Yelping with the pain, Brownie meekly obeyed Colt’s orders. Once Brownie’s hands were securely tied around the tree at his back, Colt took the rest of the rope and bound him head and foot to the tree. Then he grabbed the stubborn pistol by the handle and yanked it from Brownie’s belt, ripping the shirt in the process. Satisfied that Brownie would be there waiting for him, he then climbed the slope to fetch the horses they had left there.

After a few minutes, he was back. He released Brownie from the tree and untied his hands. Prodding him in the back with his rifle barrel, he shoved him toward Lon’s body. “Drag him over here,” he ordered. Limping heavily, Brownie took a few steps toward his late partner, then suddenly made a move to get to his horse. Before he could take two steps, Colt was right behind him and tripped him with a kick of his foot. Brownie fell on the ground. He tried to break his fall, but landed face-first in the sand.

“You don’t learn very fast, do you?” Colt said, as he grabbed him by the back of his collar and jerked him to his feet. “Now drag him over here,” he said. When Brownie balked, and stood sullenly staring at the rifle leveled at his midsection, Colt said, “The only reason you ain’t dead is because I want you to tell your boss that I mean business. Now, if you don’t drag him over, like I told you, I’m gonna shoot you and be done with it.”

Realizing only then that Colt was not planning to finish him off, Brownie became eager to obey. He grabbed his late partner by the ankles and dragged him over to his horse. At Colt’s order, he lifted Lon’s body up to lay across the saddle. Once the body was resting across the saddle, Colt instructed Brownie to mount up and take Lon back to the Rocking-D. After pulling both rifles from their saddles, Colt said, “When you get across the creek on Rocking-D land, you might wanna tie his hands and feet together to keep him from sliding off of that saddle. You tell your boss this is the price he’ll pay for slaughtered McCrae cattle. Next time I catch you on Bar-M or Broken-M, I ain’t likely to be in such a generous mood.” He stepped back then and watched as the would-be assassin splashed across the stream leading Lon Branch’s horse behind him.

Standing now in the cold darkness of the November night, Colt felt a chilling sensation run the length of his spine, a feeling that had nothing to do with the temperature. He had just killed a man. It had all happened so fast that there had been no time for conscious thought, but now as the sound of Brownie’s hoofbeats faded in the gloom, the sober realization struck him. He had taken a man’s life. The fact that it was a life that needed taking did little to minimize the impact it would forever have on his life. What choice did I have? he asked himself. They came to kill me.

He had to admit that he had prepared himself to kill. Leaving prison, he had promised his dead father that his death would be avenged. He wondered now if Lon Branch had been the man who shot his father. Would he ever know who murdered his father? Well, there’s no turning back now, he thought as he returned to his camp to pack up. There’s gonna be a war. His thoughts went to Vance and his uncle. How could he confine the war to himself and Drummond, and not endanger their families? He decided, by letting Brownie go, Drummond might see that the war was with him, not his uncle, and not Vance. I’ve started it, so be it. Let the devil get ready for visitors.

It was almost daylight by the time Brownie urged a tired horse into a gallop to cover the final fifty yards from the gate to Drummond’s front porch. He jumped down from the saddle, wincing as he landed on his wounded leg, and staggered up the steps, forgetting the customary respect usually shown his boss’ front door. After repeatedly banging on the door, he suddenly found himself facing an irate Alice Flynn, who had been stoking the kitchen stove in preparation for cooking breakfast.

Drummond didn’t say more for a moment. He glanced down at Brownie’s bloody leg, then shifted his gaze to the body lying across the saddle, his anger growing rapidly. Turning to his housekeeper, he said, “Alice, go on back to the kitchen and fix breakfast.” When she had left them, grousing to herself about the riffraff her employer hired, he turned back to Brownie. “What in the hell happened? I sent you two over there to take care of that convict, and you come back here like a dog with your tail between your legs?”

“Nothin’ we could do, Mr. Drummond. He was waitin’ for us. We never had a chance.” Brownie groaned to draw attention to his wound. “Poor ol’ Lon—that bastard cut him down before he could get off a shot.” He remembered then the message he was told to deliver. “He said to tell you that anybody else ridin’ on McCrae range would get the same.”

“Oh, he did, did he?” Drummond responded, his face twisted in an obvious display of his growing anger. This was not the way Frank Drummond wanted to start his day, by hearing of the incompetence of the two he sent to do what he considered to be a simple job. At the moment, his anger was more a product of Lon and Brownie’s failure than the threat of one ex-convict. Feeling no sympathy for the wounded man standing chastised before him, he glowered at Brownie while he considered the next course of action. “Get on back to the bunkhouse before you get blood all over my front porch,” he finally said. “Take Lon with you. Pete will have to have somebody dig a hole for him, I guess. Tell Pete to patch you up if he can.” Then he paused, thinking of a better plan. “No, tell him to take you in to see the doctor.” It wouldn’t hurt to let the sheriff know that this ex-convict was on a shooting rampage. Drummond could build on his justification for killing Colt McCrae, and maybe his brother and uncle, too, if they got in the way. From the talk he had heard, the whole town of Whiskey Hill would like to be rid of Colt McCrae. “Tell Pete to come see me before he goes,” he said, dismissing the wounded man.

When Pete Tyler, the foreman of the Rocking-D, pulled a buckboard up before the house, Drummond came out to meet him. Ignoring the silent suffering man on the seat beside him, he gave Tyler instructions. “When you take Brownie into town, make sure everybody sees him. As soon as I get my breakfast, I’m going into town to see the sheriff. But here’s what I want you to do first. Pick a couple of the men you trust, and send them on out to find that damn McCrae jailbird, and take care of him. Understand?”

Pete nodded. He understood. “I’ll take care of it,” he said. Lon and Brownie had always been the boss’ choice for doing any dirty little jobs that needed doing. But Pete had a crew of eight more men, and in his opinion, any one of them would have been a better choice than those two saddle tramps. He climbed up on the buckboard, turned the horse around, and headed back to the barn where two of his men were loading wire on a wagon.

“Well, make damn sure you get the job done. Mr. Drummond already sent Brownie and Lon to take care of it. Lon came back across his saddle and Brownie, here, shot up, and the job ain’t done yet.” He looked back at Brownie seated on the buckboard and added, “And Mr. Drummond ain’t too happy about it.”