Brazos Guns

ONE

He rode into Clayton City out of a black night swept by a wind as hot and dry as a blast from Hell, swaying in the saddle, the back of his torn shirt caked with dried blood.

A drunk staggering down the board steps from the Lonesome Traveller saloon was brushed to one side by the weary, lathered roan, muttered slurred curses while noting the stained grey stetson pulled low over the rider’s black hair, the lean, unshaven face, white and racked with exhaustion and pain, the empty holster dangling from the broad gunbelt.

Across the dusty street Deputy Sam Hoskins strode along the plankwalk, part blinded by the light flooding from the marshal’s office, still smarting from the full-blooded slap his girl had planted on his lugubrious countenance in the shadows behind the livery stables. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the rider, instinctively smelled trouble and flicked a searching glance in his direction. Then a thunderous bellow from Marshal Ben Soames issued from the open doorway and with a shake of his head Hoskins turned on his heel to enter the office.

In the front room of the town’s only hotel a match was applied to a wick, an oil lamp flared into yellow light, and Kitty Rawlins tiredly kicked off her shoes. She yawned, pulled a dismayed face as she caught sight of her drawn, white features in the cracked, oval mirror, and told herself for the hundredth time that serving chuck to a bunch of rowdy punchers in the Silver Spoon café was giving her blonde beauty a fearsome hammering. What she needed, she vowed, was a good man – but, sweet irony, the only man she’d settle for was a convicted killer.

Kitty raised her hands and unpinned her hair, then turned quickly at the beat of a horse’s hooves. From the window she could see out across the plankwalk to the wide expanse of dusty street still faintly lighted by the glow from the distant saloon.

Across that pool of light came a dark man on a big roan. He was slumped in the saddle, swaying from side to side with the horse’s weary gait. As they drew level with the boarding-house a scrawny dog tore from an alley, barking and snapping at the horse’s heels. The big roan tossed its head and plunged towards the plankwalk and the man jerked erect, wrenching on the reins. As he did so the pale light from the oil lamp caught the hard planes of the unshaven face, the glittering black eyes set in dark, hollow sockets.

In the room, Kitty Rawlins drew a quick, shocked breath and took a step backwards into the shadows. Recognition hit her like a solid blow, and she felt the skin at the nape of her neck prickle with excitement.

‘Jim Banner,’ she breathed, automatically reaching for a comb and running it through her long blonde hair. ‘Well, there’s the man you wanted, Kitty my girl – but surely Jim Banner mired in deep trouble is more than even you can handle.’

From behind the big, scarred desk Marshal Ben Soames demanded, ‘Who was that hombre just rode in?’

‘Ben, you yelled at the wrong time, how in hell should I know!’

‘Because you’re paid to know!’ Soames roared, letting his booted feet slam to the boards.

Tall and beefy, with thinning black hair flecked with grey, a ragged moustache and blunt hands that could drag an iron with the best, Ben Soames had been marshal of Clayton City for as long as any old-timer could remember. During those long, tough years he’d ruled with a fierce tongue and a brace of fearsome Navy Colts, driving away any brash gunslinger foolish enough to stray into his town yet still making the time to see old ladies safely across the street.

‘Don’t pay me that darn much,’ Sam Hoskins mumbled now, wishing fervently that he was back of the livery stable getting slapped good and hard.

‘And don’t get much in return,’ Soames said scathingly. He took a sack of Bull Durham from his top pocket and with blunt fingers commenced to roll a cigarette. ‘You got sense enough to remember Jim Banner?’

Sam Hoskins scowled, and rubbed his lantern jaw. ‘Best thing ever happened to this town was when Nate Banner got big Jim druv off his spread and clear across the Brazos.’

‘Yeah, well, a lot of folk would argue about that – though not to Nat Banner’s face. Anyhow, word’s just in Jim Banner gun-whipped the escort taking him to the Texas State Pen, and escaped. Stole a big blue roan.’

‘Hell fire! An’ you reckon he’d be fool enough to head back this way?’

‘Makes sense,’ Soames declared. ‘Nate not only ruined his younger brother’s reputation and got him a life sentence, he robbed him of his share of the family spread, then up and stole his girl.’

‘Yeah,’ Sam Hoskins said, wondering what he’d do if someone came along and stole the fiery girl with raven-black hair who’d let him go so far, then delivered a stinging left hook.

‘Anyhow,’ the marshal went on, ‘word is one of the escort come to his senses as Banner was relievin’ him of his gunbelt, grabbed his own handgun in a fierce struggle and managed to get off a couple of shots. That was two days ago and chances are Jim Banner’s bad in need of a doc. Also, the Lazy B’s five miles on the far side of town and if he’s got the intentions of gettin’ even with Nate, he’s forced to ride through. And then there’s the girl—’

‘Kitty Rawlins!’ Sam Hoskins blurted.

‘Right,’ Ben Soames said. ‘Jim Banner and Kitty were always real close, would’ve been closer, I reckon, only she was married to that waddie was crippled in a stampede. But he died some months back, and with Shelagh shacked up with Nate there ain’t nothin’ stoppin’ Jim and Kitty gettin’ together. So you get yourself over there, see iffen she’s actin’ a mite jumpy, then head on round and warn Doc Prior – if it’s not too late.

‘Oh, and Sam,’ he added as the deputy clumped towards the door, ‘Don’t take no short cuts past the livery stable.…’

So, how much will the spread fetch,’ Nate Banner asked, ‘and how soon can you clinch the deal?’

The big room at the Lazy B was a fug of blue cigar smoke. Thick buffalo skins covered the stone floor. The walls were raw logs, smoothed slick with the passage of long years. Oil lamps cast a yellow glow on the row of gleaming Winchesters and Sharps carbines standing in the mahogany cabinet against one wall, on the rich wood of the Spanish dresser displaying decorative plates and hand-thrown Mexican pots. Sagging easy-chairs draped with colourful, hand-woven blankets looked as comfortable as well-worn moccasins. A long, once-elegant colonial table was littered with the remains of a substantial meal.

Banner was a florid, burly figure standing with his back to the huge, empty fireplace. One of his heavy hands was tucked into his elegant vest. The other flicked ash off a fat cigar. For appearances’ sake he liked to cultivate the air of a prosperous rancher, but the days of a flourishing Lazy B had long gone. Rare visitors saw dilapidation in the disused line shacks, smelled decay in the drooping poles of the corral, in the deserted bunkhouse and the warped boards on the broad gallery of the big house.

And if they happened to be even casual students of human nature they would look into Nate Banner’s glistening black eyes and understand that here was a man who’d carefully created the image of a Texas rancher, but who cared little for fat, well-fed cattle and a whole lot more for his own well-padded wallet.

Brad Carter, Clayton City’s only lawyer, turned away from the window. A thoughtful frown creased his thin face. ‘Nate, you don’t need me to tell you how much this spread is worth. Hell, you sell up the buyers’ll own land bordered to the east by the Brazos and stretching north and south as far as the best puncher could ride in three whole days.’

Carter glanced uneasily across at the flame-haired young woman sitting silent and tense in one of the big chairs. He was acutely aware that the subject he was about to raise would rub salt in raw wounds. Turning again to Banner, he said, ‘But before I can clinch any damn deal, Nate, I need sight of that will. I need to know for sure that with your brother Jim serving life in the State Pen, the partnership’s at an end – legally.’

Nate Banner’s laugh was harsh and humourless. Sparks flew as he tossed his cigar butt into the fireplace and glared at the thin lawyer. ‘I always get what I want, Carter, with or without the law.’ He crossed to a heavy roll-top bureau, dragged open one of the drawers and sifted through loose papers. ‘But I also realize that it’s in my interests to do this one by the book.’ He grunted, straightened, and held out an official-looking document of thick parchment. ‘This is what you need. You’ll find in there the clause Luke Banner insisted on, clearing the way for the sale of the Lazy B.’

Carter rubbed the palms of soft hands on his black jacket, took the creased document Banner extended to him and skimmed through it, then glanced up with a bleak smile of acceptance. ‘The language is blunt, Nate, and straight to the point. Either one of you steps out of line, ownership of the spread bequeathed to you both as partners by your late father, Luke Banner, devolves on the non-guilty party.…’

‘That what he said?’ Nate Banner raised a bushy eyebrow, winked at the girl. ‘Clean forgot – but I like it: the non-guilty party. Sounds like me, eh, Shelagh?’

The girl’s voice was brittle. ‘Stop bragging, Nate, and let Carter get on with it.’

‘Yes, well.…’ Carter shrugged nervously. ‘All that’s left now is for me to head back to town. Tomorrow I’ll prepare a bill of sale, approach likely buyers, let them know you’re selling. Then—’

‘Then, my friend,’ Nate Banner cut in softly, ‘this sweet little girl and me, we get the hell out of this God-forsaken hole. Twenty years I’ve struggled, on a ranch that’s taken its toll in sweat and blood. Brother Jim did me a favour when he raped and murdered the Danver girl. For years I’ve been pushing him to sell. Now, thanks only to his viciousness and lust, I’m a free man.’

‘They took him away a week ago,’ Carter recollected, and he looked speculatively at Nate Banner. ‘But you took away from him everything he had in life. Guilty or not, he’ll blame you, Nate. Knowing the man’s fierce temper, his single-mindedness, you reckon they can hold him?’

Banner glared. ‘He’s guilty all right – and he’ll be locked up behind bars for the rest of his life.’

As Brad Carter picked his way across the yard to his horse, mounted up and rode away into thick darkness broken