Red River Showdown (2 page)

Hearing that, one of the drunks at the bar lifted his head and asked, “There gonna be a poker tournament?”

Rick didn't even bother answering the drunk's question. All he had to do was wait another few seconds and the man's head drooped forward once more. “Sorry I wasted your time,” Rick said to Clint. “If I'd known what was in that envelope, I wouldn't have made such a fuss.”

After waiting a few seconds, Clint said, “You know, a man who owned a saloon could get a lot of business if more gamblers knew about his place.” He fanned himself with the invitation and nodded as if he was simply talking to himself. “Gamblers on a boat like that might even drop enough money at a nice enough place to make the owner rich.”

“What's your angle, Adams?” Rick asked sternly.

“If a certain saloon owner could put up half my stake, I might just talk his place up to make sure at least a few of them headed that way after the
Misty Morning
docked again. The Red River landing isn't too far of a ride from here, after all.”

“You got the gambling itch, huh?”

“Things have been a bit slow for me, also. There aren't even enough prospects around to make it worth getting my old tools and wagon out of the livery right now. A healthy win or two would go a long way to keep my finances stable.”

“And what about the finances of a potential partner who doesn't have lots of money to risk staking a lousy gambler?” Rick asked.

Clint smirked and replied, “Staking a lousy gambler would be stupid.”

Slowly, Rick started to nod. “You got a point. You also got yer partner. Hell, it'll be worth the money just to get you out of my place for a while.”

The
Misty Morning
was supposed to be docked at a spot along the Red River that was fifty miles southeast of Amarillo. Clint covered the first twenty-five of those miles without seeing more than a few other riders along the way. Although he was in good spirits, Clint was carrying a hefty amount of Rick Hartman's money, so he greeted those other riders with a friendly tip of his hat and moved on.

After covering mile number thirty, Clint spotted another horse a little ways in front of him. The horse was moving at a steady pace and had kept its back to Eclipse the entire time. Without much else to look at, Clint watched that horse run in front of him the way he would watch the sun slowly set in a few hours.

The show got a little more interesting as three other riders approached from the south, split up and closed in on the first rider from three different angles. Clint recognized the way the other riders approached as though he could see the hungry look in their eyes. Reflexively, Clint snapped Eclipse's reins to get the Darley Arabian moving at something closer to running speed. He didn't know if those other three had spotted him yet, so Clint wasn't anxious to make noise or kick up dust to draw attention to himself.

Since the three riders weren't too concerned about keeping quiet, it wasn't long before the one who'd been there originally noticed the others closing in. That first rider twisted in the saddle and looked around to pick out each of the other three.

Clint spotted the glint of sunlight off of iron and knew that one of the three riders had drawn a gun. He touched his heels to Eclipse's sides and hung on as the stallion burst into a full gallop and thundered over the dry Texas soil.

By this time, the first rider had drawn a gun as well. In fact, that rider even got off the first shot. The sound was lost amid the pounding in Clint's ears, but he could see the smoke easily enough from where he was. Even though the modified Colt had been drawn from the holster at his hip, Clint kept from pulling his trigger until he got a little closer.

The gunfire cracked through the air like a Fourth of July celebration as all three riders opened fire and the first one answered right back. The four horses didn't seem to be rattled by the commotion, but they were moving fast enough to make it difficult for the riders to hit their targets. That didn't keep the three from firing again and again as the first one turned back around to pay closer attention to the trail ahead.

Clint felt like he'd been shot from a cannon. Eclipse covered the distance between him and the nearest of the three riders in no time at all. Even as he closed to within pistol range, Clint held off on firing until he got a better look at the man in front of him.

The rider wore a blue bandanna wrapped around the lower half of his face. As soon as he turned around to look at Clint with wide, surprised eyes, he aimed quickly and sent a bullet in Clint's direction.

It was Clint's impulse to duck low, but that wasn't necessary to dodge the incoming lead. The shot had been taken quickly and from the back of a running horse, which meant it had little to no chance of hitting anything but open air. Just to be safe, Clint pulled Eclipse's reins to the left and steered between two of the three riders.

The next rider's face was also mostly covered by a bandanna. Now that Clint was close enough, he could see that the third wore a bandanna as well. He was also close enough to see that the slender shape in the first horse's saddle was much too attractive to belong to a man.

Having watched the first rider for several miles, Clint had suspected it might be a woman. None of that came from her riding style, however, since she handled her horse better than most men. Her shoulders and waist were just a little too narrow, which had made Clint wonder about her ever since he'd first spotted that horse in front of him.

As much as Clint wanted to lend a hand, he realized that he didn't even know who any of these people were. For all he knew, those three men were a posse closing in on a wanted murderer. The woman could just as well be in the right, but there was no way for Clint to know for certain.

It did help sway his thinking when the closest of the three masked riders looked to the other two and shouted, “Shoot this son of a bitch!”

Suddenly, lead filled the air around Clint's head. Shots blazed all around him and drew closer with every pull of the trigger. Clint fired back as well, but he was too busy steering Eclipse and hanging onto the stallion's neck to take very careful aim.

Rather than waste ammunition with wild shooting, Clint pulled on Eclipse's reins and sent the Darley Arabian into a sharp turn that pointed his nose directly at one of the masked riders. Any other animal might have fought the command or simply ignored it, but Eclipse kept his faith in Clint and charged.

Fortunately, Eclipse was fast enough to put a scare into the other horse as he rushed toward it. The other horse didn't rear, but it turned in the opposite direction its masked rider had wanted to go. The masked man went from agitated to downright panicked when a few shots aimed at Clint hissed dangerously close to his own head.

“Ease up, god dammit!” the masked rider shouted as Clint passed alongside of him. Before he could say or do anything else, the rider felt Clint's elbow catch him square in the chest. The blow didn't do much damage, but it knocked the rider over the side of his horse, where he dangled less than an inch from the ground thanks to one stubborn foot caught in a stirrup.

Clint steered in another direction as he tried to think of a way to get everyone stopped so he could decide if he'd just made a big mistake. The masked men were thinking along those same lines, but took less time to decide on a course of action.

After a few hand signals passed between the two masked men still in their saddles, both of them turned their guns on the woman and opened fire. She did a fine job of clinging to her horse and giving the men a smaller target, but there was nowhere for the horse to hide.

Bullets slapped into the animal's flesh, tore through muscle and bone and then brought the horse screaming to its knees.

Clint gritted his teeth at the sight of the animal dropping to the ground. Despite the wounds it had been given, the horse still fought to remain upright, as if to give its rider as big a chance as possible to jump clear. She did exactly that and landed in a ball well away from the fallen horse.

Her landing knocked the wind from her lungs and rattled her pretty badly, but she still managed to get to her feet. She hadn't been able to hold onto her gun and started running the moment she realized that both of her hands were now empty. By the time she looked up from those hands, the woman was being picked off her feet and swept away.

“Good Lord!” she shouted as she instinctively grabbed onto the arm that was wrapped around her waist.

Clint held onto her and swung her onto the saddle in front of him. It was a little awkward steering Eclipse that way, but all he needed to do was bring the stallion to a halt. “Just a moment,” Clint said as he straightened his arm and sighted along the barrel of his Colt. “We'll get this cleared up soon.”

After saying that, Clint squeezed his trigger and sent a round toward the head of the closest masked man's horse. Unlike the shots that had brought the woman's animal down, Clint's bullet was perfectly aimed and not fatal. It buzzed past the horse's head so closely, that it burned away the last of the animal's composure.

Just as the masked man was about to fire, his horse reared up and nearly threw him off its back.

The third masked man saw Clint aiming his Colt at him next. Rather than try his own luck where the other two had failed, he lowered his gun and pulled back on his reins.

“This ain't none of your business, mister,” the third man said from behind his bandanna.

“That's why I thought we could take a breath before anyone got killed.”

The horse with the man dangling from its stirrup had slowed to a halt and now moved in a slow circle as its rider struggled to pull himself free. When he finally did get his foot loose, he dropped onto his back with a pained grunt.

The second rider's horse was still fussing and resisting the reins, leaving the third to do most of the talking.

As soon as Eclipse came to a stop, the woman jumped down and ran toward her own fallen animal. By the time she got to its side, it was barely moving.

Clint saw two of the riders eyeing her as if she was the last piece of steak on an otherwise empty plate. Feeling those men's anxiousness as if it was a wave of heat in the air, he positioned himself between them and her. “What's going on here?” he asked. “Why'd you open fire on her?”

None of the men were answering, although they were all now back in their saddles.

“Explain how I've overstepped my bounds and I'll be glad to leave,” Clint told the masked men.

The three men didn't speak with words. Instead, they swapped a few quick glances and then acted as one.

Lifting their arms, two of them aimed at the woman while one aimed at Clint.

Clint's reaction was quick and instinctual as he picked out one target and fired. His bullet went right where he'd wanted it to go and drilled a messy hole through one rider's shoulder. His second shot was intended to knock another rider from his saddle, but missed since that man was already on the move.

Clint's finger was relaxed upon his trigger as the third rider prepared to fire another shot. Just then, a gunshot blasted from Clint's right. He turned to find the woman standing beside her horse with a smoking pistol in her hands.

Her bullet caught the third rider in the chest.

The other two masked men rode away as if their tails were on fire.

Clint could have chased those two men down.

With Eclipse warmed up and raring to go, Clint knew he wouldn't have had any trouble catching up to those men and running a few circles around them before figuring out what to do next. But even a fleeting glimpse of those men's eyes told Clint all he needed to know. They meant to get the hell away from there, and they would do anything to cover themselves along the way.

A cornered animal was never something to fool with, so Clint let them go and shifted his attention back to the ones who were left behind.

When he'd heard the shot, his hand immediately brought up the Colt. Clint lowered the pistol back into its holster when he saw the woman standing over her horse.

She still held her own gun in hand as she looked into the animal's eyes before they glazed over. “God damm it,” she said as tears rolled down her cheek.

“You didn't have a choice,” Clint told her. Reaching out with one hand, he pushed her hand down so she was no longer pointing the gun at the wounded horse's head.

When she turned her eyes to him, the fire in them was unmistakable. “I know I didn't have a choice,” she snapped. “Thanks to those cowardly assholes.”

“Who were they?” Clint asked. “Then again, you could also tell me who you are. Start with either one, but be quick about it.”

“Why? Are you going to try and rob me, too?”

“Actually, I'm still not sure if I let the wrong ones go.”

The fire in the woman's eyes flared up a bit, but then quickly died away. She looked at her own hand as if she'd forgotten about the gun she was holding. “Sorry about that,” she told him in a softer voice. “After I found this pistol, I should have helped you follow them. I just couldn't bear to see Harriet in so much pain.”

“I'm not talking about that. I'd like to know how things could go to hell so damn fast. I've had you in my sight for miles and those men rode up on you from out of nowhere.”

“You were following me?” she asked.

Clint shook his head as he walked over to the body of the rider who'd been shot in the chest. Just to make sure, he checked the man's shirt and vest. There wasn't a badge pinned anywhere, so that put his mind a bit more at ease.