The Last Shootist (14 page)

“Just tryin' to warm up my hands.”

“Just remembe',” offered Gene, “you' playin' with three pounds of steel a foot in front of you' face. Dangerous doesn't begin to describe those tricks.”

“Gettin' shot hurts like a sumbitch, too. Like someone stuck you with a hot poker,” added Sam. Reloaded, their bank robber friend got to his feet. He laid his big Colt flat in the palm of his hand, barrel forward. “Ever see the border roll?”

Sam suddenly dropped the pistol down, caught his forefinger in the trigger guard, and flipped the weapon into normal position in his hand, cocking with his thumb and thrusting the gun forward to fire. All in the blink of an eye.

“Or, you can hand it over butt first.” He offered Gillom the gun butt first, who reached to take it, but Sam instantly rolled and reversed the revolver in his hand.

“Wes Hardin pulled that trick on Wild Bill Hickok in Abilene back in the 1870s. Move's become all the rage in Texas.”

Gillom tried the road agent's spin both ways and after several awkward fumbles, once even dropping his revolver to the grass, seemed to get the hang of the quick maneuver.

“Road agent's spin is mostly useful when you're getting arrested, 'cept most Laws now know that trick.”

Tired of gun tossing, Gillom took his stance, drew, and cocked and fired at the playing card in the tree maybe twenty feet away, then pinwheeled the revolver in his right hand, thumb-cocked and fired again, then pinwheeled a second time to fire. He hit a black king with his second shot.

“
Damn!
Gotta work on my aim.”

Gene nodded. “All those tricks are sure flashy, but if you can't hit much, what's the point of going around heeled?”

Sam answered, “This is a Colt Bisley Flattop Model built for target shooting. Perfect balance. Bigger grip for a better feel in my hand and improved accuracy with these special sights. Best revolving pistol ever made. And my 4
¾
" barrel is shorter than your 5
½
", easier to draw. Know the first shootist to use these shorter barrels?”

Gillom shook his head.

“Bat Masterson. Marshal of Dodge City. Ordered 'em special from the Colt factory. Many imitators followed.”

“Books's sweetened Remingtons have only a two-pound pull, J. B. said. Hair trigger.”

Sam Graham nodded, impressed. He crouched, drew cross-handed, cocked, fired, fanned his second shot, did a Texas rollover of one spin forward and cocked and fired a third round. He hit the jack of diamonds twice, all in a few seconds.

“Beats me.” Gillom shook his head as he strode off to change targets. They were using smokeless cartridges, so no powder lingered in the air to obscure their vision.

“Nice shootin', Sam.” Mr. Rhodes nodded.

Gillom plodded back but Graham stopped him as he started to reload. Reaching, he turned the youth's pistol around butt forward in his right-hand holster.

“You show up to a gunfight with your gun butts forward, you'll intimidate 'em before they even start shootin'.”

Gillom tried the different draw several times, starting his wrist backward, then snapping it outward, while they watched.

“It's just a flashier draw, not faster?” he questioned.

“Exactly. Just somethin' different to practice, that they may not have seen before. You distract 'em with a flashy trick, then kill 'em with your sharp aim.”

Gillom suddenly drew both guns, cocked, and blasted away at the card targets, hitting them both.

“Shoot to kill with both hands!” he exulted.

“Head shot's the deadly one,” offered Graham. “But tougher to make. Wes Hardin was a head-shooter. But you hit a man in his bigger target, his stomach, that lead bullet's such a shock to his body, he's paralyzed and will have a more difficult time returning fire. That's where the Apaches always tried to shoot their poisoned arrows, right in a man's wide gut.”

At all this talk of killing, the horse wrangler roused himself.

“You boys blast away all you want. Scare off the game for miles around while I start supper.”

“One more thing,” said Sam to his protégé. “If you have only one shot, take it between your two heartbeats as you surprise the trigger.” The master gunman raised his target pistol at arm's length, squinted, listened to his own blood pulsing and then triggered his short-barreled Bisley. A smokeless slug ripped into the queen of hearts twenty-five feet distant.

Young Gillom was open-mouthed again at his instructor's accuracy. The fast gunmen smiled at each other as Gene Rhodes lumbered back down the mountainside, holding his sore ass. They didn't hear him whimpering.

*   *   *

They had a peaceful night's sleep since Sam had finally run out of liquor. They assembled in front of the stone house after breakfast. Gene had saddled the easiest of the four horses they'd taken turns breaking and was going to drive the other three broncs in the cavvy ahead of them down to the Bar Cross Ranch on their way to Engle. Gillom had saddled the black gelding, with the smaller bay mare he'd taken from the Mexican cousins packing his personals. He left the last of his food supplies at Gene's since the horse wrangler had refused any payment for Gillom's stay.

Sam Graham idled near the front door while the other two tightened cinches and pack ties.

“You ever come up against a man who covers his pistol with his hat, watch out. 'Cause he's probably drawing his gun beneath it or from behind his back while he's talking to you.” The train robber demonstrated with a sly smile.

Gillom matched his grin and shook the outlaw's hand after he'd reholstered.

“I'll watch out for that, Mister Graham. Sorry our trails never crossed, but it's been my pleasure.”

Sam stretched to his full six feet as his pale blues watched the teenager mount.

“You're a real whizbang with those
pistolas,
kid. Your calling cards. Hope they're not your funeral.”

Gene Rhodes whistled and shook his lasso at the three loose horses.

“
Hi-ya!
Git along, horses! I'll be back up from Engle late tomorrow, Sam, with more grub. Can I get you anything else?”

“You know my taste for barbed-wire extract, boss.” The tough outlaw waved. “So long, you saddle-bumpers! You run across any old ladies or dogs need kickin', send 'em along to
me
!”

 

Eighteen

 

The long ride on the wagon road Rhodes had laid down from his high valley to the Bar Cross Ranch was uneventful, with only short stops to change saddles among the six horses, especially the four green broncs Gene was still training to work the roundups. Not many bucksnorts did either man endure as they schooled these rank horses to a riding saddle. Gene did have to put the Fish to one bangtail when it started acting up, chousing it around the neck with his Fish brand rain slicker, hazing the nervous horse until it settled down, worn out, most of the fear of its new rider exhausted.

They rode across the southern fringe of the notorious Jornada del Muerto, the Day's Journey of the Dead Man. Here sand dunes rose occasionally from broad swales where yuccas grew in groves and alkali flats dipped across the desert prairie, where even scrub greasewood barely held its own. The yuccas, man-high and sinister at a distance in the morning light, deceived Gillom's sharp eyesight at first.
If I got stuck out here, fighting Apaches, I'd be a goner,
he thought.

Working together they were able to chase the three half-wild horses into a smaller corral next to a large one full of horses behind the big ranch house above Engle they arrived at in the late afternoon. The cowboys were still off working, but a short, stocky man came out of the barn to greet the two wranglers.

“Gene Rhodes! Whaddya know?”

“Less and less, Cole.” Gene dismounted and nodded to Gillom to do the same. The two wranglers shook hands. “This here's Johnny Jones, Mister Railston. From El Paso. Johnny stayed with me, helped break these broncs. He's a natural.”

Gillom smiled. “I was happy to lend him a hand and a hard seat for a few days for a roof over my head.”

“You're learning horse breaking from a master. You want to continue your education, we can probably use another hand around the Bar Cross, at least through fall roundup.”

Gillom pulled his refreshed mounts out of the trough, as they shook and blew water from their nostrils.

“Thanks, Mister Railston, but I'll be movin' along.”

“Johnny's takin' the train tonight to Bisbee. Gonna get a job as a bank guard, so he can get paid to play with his pistols.”

Mr. Railston eyed Gillom's matched revolvers.

“Uh-huh. Not much call for gunwork on a cattle ranch. Nothin' much to do here but stretchin' wire and movin' cattle around to fresh grass. Not enough excitement for Gene either, huh pardner?” The foreman slapped his compadre on the back.

“No si'. I'd rathe' be a horse wrangle' than a cattle prodde'.”

“Okay. Here's sixty dollars for breaking these three. You goin' to town?”

Gene nodded. “Need supplies. I'll stay ove' in Engle tonight.”

“Stop in on your way back up the mountain. Got a couple more outlaw horses here. If they're too wild to finish for saddle broncs, maybe you can get 'em to pull harness.”

“Okay, Cole, I'll give 'em a try. Thanks.” Gene pocketed his sawbucks.

“See you at poker tonight? So I can win that hard-earned money back?” inquired the older cowboy with the twinkling eyes.

“You neve' know. Gotta help Johnny sell his horses and tack first.”

The ranch foreman grinned as the cowboys remounted and jigged the reins to urge their tired animals on.

“You bet. Goodbye, boys!”

As they rode away from the Bar Cross, Gillom had a question.

“You gonna break two more broncs all by yourself? Sam doesn't like to ride 'em.”

“Oh, he'll help. Especially if I was to get bunged up. Sam's only workin' fo' whiskey an' food and a place to hide while this stink about his brothe' dies away. Sam swears he's reformed, no longe' robbin', but he's still wanted for a long list of crimes. So keep you' word, Gillom, and don't tell anyone you met him, ah trouble will surely follow.”

“I owe you for your hospitality, Mister Rhodes. So I never met Mister Graham, or you, either.”

“I'm okay to talk about, just forget you've been to my high camp. I already got a sullied reputation for sheltering outlaws in the San Andres. But I gotta have somebody up there to feed those horses while I'm down with May and her boy in Tularosa. That horse ranch is my livelihood.”

*   *   *

Gene told him Engle was half the size of Tularosa, all oriented toward shipping cattle on the railroad from the ranches spread about the edges of the desolate Jornada del Muerto, many of them nearer the water of the Rio Grande running along the western side of the Fra Cristobal Range to the north and the higher Caballo Mountains to the south. A mercantile, several restaurants and saloons, a small bank, post office, blacksmith and stable, besides the stock pens near the depot of the El Paso and North Eastern railroad, made up all of Engle's business district that Gillom could see. Few families cared to take up residence in this barren burg unless commerce called.

They stopped first at Slim's, which must have been a joke on the pudgy hostler who waddled out to greet them. Slim was another friend of Gene's, and all these tough men were used to his lisp and high-pitched voice and didn't kid him about it. Slim led their three horses inside a corral next to his barn.

“Gene, Gene. You gonna leave a little long green on our poker tables?”

“Might do that, Slim. Feelin' lucky tonight. And my friend Johnny here, from El Paso, would like to offe' you a chance at purchasing these two fine horses, the black and the bay, and the tack that goes with them. Am I correct, Johnny?”

“Yes, sir.”

They unsaddled the horses so the hostler could get a good look at the gear as the men hoisted Books's forty-pound saddle and six-pound Navajo blanket onto a top railing to dry.

“Well sir, I have enough horses here now to meet occasional demand, but come fall, roundup cowboys'll need extra. Good saddle like this double rig, though, is always appreciated.” The fat stableman patted Books's padded saddle seat with its dual leather cinches hanging below. Gillom didn't point out J. B. Books's name branded onto the leather skirt but covered by the back jockey, even though being owned by such a famous gunfighter would have made it worth much more. The teenager didn't wish to be traced back to that El Paso bloodletting.

“I've got this one good saddle and the black gelding that goes with it, and I could ship both out if I don't get a fair price. The mare's a gentler horse for a woman or child, with that other saddle. I'll take three hundred dollars for both horses and gear.”

“Whoa,”
said Chubby. “Not much call for saddle mares for the few ladies in this town. Mexican saddle's pretty much used up. Give you two hundred dollars for the lot.”

“No chance!” The kid looked exasperated, but was bargaining like a man. “That good saddle alone is worth a hundred dollars. And this black beauty is fit and fast.”

“He is, Slim. I've seen him run,” lied Gene.

“Two-twenty.”

“Two seventy-five.”

“Two-forty is my final offer.”

“Two-sixty and they're yours.”

Rhodes was hungry. “Ahh, split the difference at two-fifty and let's go have some dinne'.” The two horse traders reluctantly shook hands.

Gillom lifted two sets of saddlebags to each shoulder, as Slim went to dig his money out from somewhere he'd hidden it.

“Tired of steak,” said Gene. “Let's eat at Lupita's.”

Gillom received his money and Rhodes's horse was led off to be attended to, so they decided on a farewell dinner of spicy tamales and stringy beef enchiladas at the only Mexican joint in Engle. Liquor wasn't sold in this small, fly-specked family place and Gene didn't drink anyway, so the teenager contented himself with a warm sarsaparilla, even though he'd thought back in El Paso his sarsaparilla days were over.