The Lawmen (16 page)

On the sidewalk, the Kid was coming more slowly. Holding his two pistols, he was having trouble stuffing a last wad of money into the already full saddlebags.

A bullet whistled by Swede’s ear. He squeezed a shot into the open doorway behind them, “Forget the money. Kid! Come on!”

Beside the bank was a general store. From its doorway stepped a pudgy bald man with thick eyeglasses. The pudgy man carried a shotgun. Somewhat uncertainly, he pointed the shotgun at the Kid.

Swede yelled, “Look out!”

The Kid turned. The pudgy man fired.

The blast slammed the Kid into the bank wall, knocking off his sombrero. The pudgy man waved the second barrel toward Swede. With a cry, Swede shot the man in the chest, and he toppled onto his back.

The Arkansas Kid leaned against the wall, staring at the gaping wound in his side. Blood was pouring out of it and onto his expensive clothes. “I don’t believe it,” he said stupidly. “I don’t believe it.”

Pumping another shot at the bank guards, Swede started forward, but the Kid raised a weak hand. “I’m dead. Swede. Get out of here.” He tossed the saddlebags to Swede; then he sank to the sidewalk, leaving a wide smear of blood on the brick wall.

Swede saw the Kid was telling the truth. He vaulted onto his horse and jerked the reins hard. “So long, Kid!”

“So long, Sw . . . Sw . . .” The Kid vomited blood and slumped over, dead.

As the unhurt guard ran from the bank and fired two shots after him, Swede thundered down the deserted street, keeping low on his horse’s neck. “Go, Dancer, go!”

* * *

In Swede’s wake, the street was as still as a churchyard. Then the wounded guard emerged from the bank, holding his bloody shoulder. People ventured from cover. They crossed the street, crowding and pushing to see the slain outlaw’s body, admiring his silver spurs. A doctor examined the pudgy bald man and shook his head. Everybody was shouting and talking at once.

Marshal Frank Ryan came running around the comer, steadying his top hat with one hand, carrying a sawed-off shotgun in the other.

Over the uproar, the unwounded guard shouted, “It was Swede Burdette, Marshal! I’d recognize his black horse, Dancer, anywhere.” The guard was shaking from the experience. “They’d have been away clean, but Jerry here was late for work, and he surprised ’em.”

Ryan stopped, panting. Sweat trickled down his heavy, unshaven jowls. “Swede Burdette?”

The marshal shouldered his way through the crowd and peered at the robber’s body. “If that was Swede Burdette, this here must be the Arkansas Kid.”

Excitement buzzed through the crowd. Ryan grew animated, banging a fist on his ample thigh. “Jesus Christ and General Jackson! Think of it, boys—the Arkansas Kid dead on the streets of Temperance. Who’s for finishing his partner, as well?”

“I’ll go!” someone shouted. “Me too! And me!” They scattered for horses and weapons.

“Take any horse you find,” Ryan yelled. “Commandeer ’em if you have to. There’s no time to lose.”

A dark, slender youth of sixteen, wearing a white apron, grabbed the marshal’s sleeve. “Can I go with you, Marshal?”

Ryan backed off. “No, Harry, you’re too young. Your ma’d skin me alive.”

“Please, Marshal. All the money from Momma’s restaurant was in that bank.”

The dark-haired boy was determined. Ryan gave in. “Oh, all right. Get mounted.”

“Thanks, Marshal!” Harry yanked off the apron and sprinted away.

The posse was ready in minutes. Besides Harry Ferrante, there were a trio of clerks, a straw-hatted farmer, a Mexican, and Schwartz, the butcher. The air in front of the bank filled with dust as their horses pranced and wheeled.

Marshal Ryan rode up, crying, “There’s no time for an oath—you’re all deputized.” He waved his shotgun. “Come on!”

He galloped out of town, followed by his new deputies.

* * *

As the posse was riding out of Temperance, the telegraph began chattering at the State’s Attorney’s office in Agua Verde, forty-five miles up the railroad line. The men in the paneled office—all of whom wore rolled-up shirt sleeves because of the heat—stopped what they were doing and looked .up.

These men were investigators for the state, and they knew Morse code. They deciphered the message even as the young telegrapher jumped into his chair and began scribbling it down. “Westland Bank in Temperance has been robbed! By Swede Burdette and the Arkansas Kid! The Kid’s dead—but Burdette got away with the money!”

Everyone was on their feet now. The office was alive. “Westland,” said a pale young man in an ill-fitting collar. “Trust Swede Burdette to hit the railroad’s bank.”

From an inner office strode two men, and the investigators quieted. The first man was the bushy-bearded State’s Attorney Gideon Seward. The second was a captain of Texas Rangers named John Kirby—lean, bespectacled, with a fierce mustache.

“What’s this?” asked Seward in his clipped eastern accent. “Swede Burdette in Temperance?” He smacked his fat fist into his palm. “That’s only an hour away by train. This is the best chance we’ll ever have to catch that unreconstructed rebel.”

Seward scanned the duty roster on the wall, and his ponderous glee dissipated. “Bradshaw, it’s your turn, I believe."

There were moans as Seward looked at the pale young man in the ill-fitting collar. The young man turned even paler. “Yes, sir.”

John Kirby removed his glasses. He spoke in a low voice that commanded attention. “Beg your pardon, Gideon. I know I’ve just come out of the field, but I’d like this case.” Kirby was forty-two, with thick fair hair combed straight back. He looked crisp and cool in his linen suit, but there was a furious intensity in his narrowed eyes.

Seward hesitated. “Well, you are my best man, Kirby, but this is a big opportunity for young Bradshaw. I can’t force him to—”

“Oh, it’s all right with me, sir,” Bradshaw interjected hastily.

Seward looked relieved. “Then the job’s yours, Kirby. Will you take your Rangers?”

Kirby hurried back to his desk and began putting the report he’d been writing into a folder. “I’ve dismissed them. It would take half a day to find them. I’ll pick up some deputies in Temperance.”

Seward remembered something he’d heard when he first came to Texas after the war. “Say—you know Swede Burdette, don’t you?”

Kirby straightened. His chiseled features were as rigid as an ax blade. “He was my best friend. I haven’t seen him in nine years.”

“Your best friend?” said Seward. “Then why in God’s name do you—”

“For me, it’s all the more reason. There was a bond between Swede and me. Swede broke that bond when he broke the law.”

Kirby adjusted a framed daguerreotype of his wife and two children, and he sighed. “Gideon, I’d appreciate it if you’d inform Sarah I won’t be home for a few days. Don’t tell her about Swede.” He picked up his bowler hat from the rack. “Telegraph Temperance. Tell Marshal Ryan I’ll be on the ten-thirty work train. Tell him to raise some men and get two good horses for each of them.”

Kirby started for the office door. The bushy-bearded State’s Attorney took a step after him, hand raised. “Kirby!”

Kirby stopped and turned.

“Try to bring this one in alive. It looks better.”

Kirby’s green eyes narrowed even further than usual. “Swede Burdette will never come in alive. You know that.”

He clapped his bowler hat on his head and strode out the door.