Cheyenne Cowboy Read online

  ‘Ma’am,’ he said respectfully. His grin and flashing eyes stopped the female in her tracks. She pulled the cigarette from her red lips and fluttered her eyelashes at the gambler.

  ‘Well howdy, stranger,’ she purred and stepped closer to O’Hara. ‘I ain’t seen you before.’

  Lucky O’Hara checked the wad of notes he had just won in a private game of stud poker and then slid them between the leather leaves of his wallet.

  ‘You ain’t bin looking in the right places, ma’am,’ he said before returning his wallet to his inside jacket pocket.

  She moved closer to him. So close he could not fail to stare down into her cavernous cleavage. ‘Are you lonesome, stranger?’

  ‘Not now, dear lady,’ O’Hara sighed as her perfume filled his flared nostrils and glanced around the crowded street. ‘I’d ask you if you might care to spend the rest of this fine night in my company but it looks as though you’re in a hurry.’

  Mae dismissed all thoughts of continuing after the lawyer as she pressed her satin covered thigh against the gambler’s tailored pants. Her eyes sparkled in the amber light.

  ‘I’m in no hurry, handsome,’ she said as her long fingernails stroked his coat lapel. ‘I’ve got all the time in the world to keep you company and I know that you’ve got the money.’

  ‘I don’t normally do this sort of thing, ma’am,’ O’Hara lied.

  ‘Neither do I,’ Mae grinned. ‘This is my night to go Bible reading but too much reading can put a strain on a gal’s eyes.’

  Lucky O’Hara held out his arm. Montana Mae slid her naked arm around his elbow and they both started to stroll back toward her place of business.

  Back in the dark, narrow side street the door of the marshal’s office swung open. Light washed across the two men sprawled upon the sand. A pool of blood had united the cowboys as it spread from their wounds.

  Marshal Cole Grey was first to emerge from the confines of the small structure. He held a scattergun across his middle as he glanced around the dark buildings that flanked them. He then stared at the two motionless cowboys on the sand.

  ‘Get out here, Ben,’ he ordered from the corner of his mouth to his eager deputy. ‘Check them cowpunchers.’

  The deputy moved around the shoulders of his superior with a .45 in his right hand. He cautiously moved through the amber light to where both McGee and Hammer lay.

  Grey stepped to the edge of the boardwalk and curled his finger around the triggers of his massive shotgun. His eyes continued to dart from one shadow to the next in search of the unknown gunman who had left the bleeding cowboys like discarded trash outside his small office.

  Graff knelt between Hammer and McGee. His head swung until he was looking at the burly marshal.

  ‘We met these critters before, Marshal,’ he announced before returning his eyes to the bleeding men. ‘This is the trail boss and this is the critter the newspapers call the Cheyenne cowboy.’

  Marshal Grey stepped down from the boardwalk and approached his deputy. His eyes still searched the shadows that surrounded them.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Grey asked without looking down at the men before him.

  ‘Yep. I’m gonna get some water,’ Graff nodded, got to his feet and rushed to the office. He returned within seconds with a canteen and dropped on to his knees between the men.

  ‘Are they dead?’ Grey asked dryly.

  ‘I ain’t sure, Marshal,’ the deputy answered as he raised the head of the younger man and carefully poured water into his mouth. The words had only just left Graff’s lips when Hammer spluttered and coughed as he regained consciousness.

  Marshal Grey watched as his deputy then moved to the body of the older cowboy. The marshal moved around the cowboys at his feet with his long double-barrelled weapon aimed at the darkness.

  Graff looked up at his boss. ‘This one ain’t bin so lucky, Marshal. He’s got a bullet in the middle of his back. I reckon it went straight through his heart.’

  Cole Grey looked down at the lifeless form of Tom McGee and the bullet hole in his wide back. The lamplight from his office illuminated the pool of blood which covered the leather vest of the trail boss.

  ‘Damn it all,’ the marshal cursed. ‘Who’d wanna kill old Tom McGee? It don’t make any sense.’

  The deputy used the canteen water to wash the blood from the gash on Hammer’s forehead. The cowboy was groggy and as helpless as a kitten.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Hammer muttered.

  ‘You’ll be OK, Cheyenne,’ Graff said as he pushed the stopper back into the neck of the canteen.

  ‘Help Cheyenne up and take him to the office, Ben,’ Grey mumbled at his deputy as he crouched and pushed his fingertips into the neck of McGee in search of a pulse. He gritted his teeth and then stood back up as his deputy’s assumption was confirmed. ‘He’s dead OK.’

  Both lawmen assisted the dazed cowboy into the bright office and helped him to a hard-back chair. Hammer sat and stared blankly at his surroundings as his head slowly cleared.

  Graff looked at the gash across the cowboy’s temple.

  ‘Hell, you sure are lucky, Cheyenne,’ he stated as he checked the graze and dabbed more water over the unsightly wound. ‘You could have had your head split wide open if that bullet had bin an inch to the left.’

  The cold water awoke the cowboy from the delirium which had smothered his thoughts. He suddenly began to recall why he and his pal had been heading to the marshal’s office.

  ‘I came to tell you that there are six varmints in Dodge, Marshal,’ he sighed heavily as Grey placed his scattergun on to his untidy desk. ‘One of them is the dude I had my ruckus with a few months back.’

  ‘I read about that, Cheyenne,’ Graff nodded.

  ‘Who is he?’ Grey asked the cowboy.

  Hammer shook his head. ‘Damned if I know but I killed some of his gang back then. He’s rustled himself up a new bunch and they’re here, Marshal. I got me a gut feeling that they’re planning something big.’

  The deputy looked excited. ‘You figure they’re here to rob the bank or something, Cheyenne?’

  ‘Damned if I know,’ Hammer answered as he nursed his throbbing head. ‘All I can tell you is that the hombre has five fresh gun-toting followers with him. A man like that don’t herd a bunch of gunmen together coz he’s lonesome.’

  Graff looked to the marshal. ‘Cheyenne’s right.’

  Marshal Grey shook his head and moved to his coffee pot on the top of his pot-belly stove. He filled a tin cup and blew at the steam.

  ‘I ain’t seen any strangers in town, Cheyenne,’ he said dismissively.

  ‘Me neither,’ the deputy agreed. ‘But Dodge is a mighty big place. A man could hide a small army in town if he’s a mind to do so.’

  Grey shrugged. ‘I guess so but I still ain’t seen any strangers.’

  Hammer nursed his pounding skull in the palms of his hands as he tried to gather his thoughts. He then looked up at both the lawmen.

  ‘Where’s Tom?’ he asked.

  Grey and Graff glanced at one another and then the marshal placed a hand on the shoulder of the seated cowboy. He inhaled deeply.

  ‘Tom’s dead, Cheyenne,’ he informed him.

  Hammer could not believe the words that he had just heard. He got back to his feet and brushed both star packers aside as he walked to the open doorway.

  He stared open-mouthed at the horrific sight on the sand outside the office. The lifeless body of McGee lay upon the lamplit sand. The blood which covered his friend’s body sparkled like rubies.

  The cowboy turned his head and looked at both lawmen.

  ‘He’s dead?’ he stammered.

  Grey nodded and sipped his black beverage. ‘I’m afraid so, Cheyenne. I reckon he must have bin dead before he hit the ground, boy. Go get the doc, Ben,’ the marshal ordered. ‘Cheyenne’s hurt as well.’

  ‘I don’t need no sawbones, Marshal,’ Hammer said quietly as he returned to the chair and sat down.

/>   ‘I’m real sorry, Cheyenne,’ Marshal Grey said as he rested a hip on the desk and stared through the steam of his coffee at the youngster. ‘I know you and Tom have bin pals for a real long time.’

  Hammer looked up at the lawman. ‘Don’t that prove that my suspicions are right, Marshal? We were coming here to tell you about that galoot I tangled with a few months back and suddenly somebody uses us for target practice.’

  ‘It could be a coincidence, Cheyenne,’ Grey sighed. ‘Dodge is full of back-shooters at the best of times.’

  ‘No, it weren’t no back-shooter.’ Hammer shook his head. ‘I figure that someone tried to silence us before we had a chance to tell you about that varmint, Marshal.’

  ‘It’s a pity you don’t know his name,’ the marshal sighed. ‘If we had a name there might be a chance of his image being on one of my circulars.’

  Graff looked at the cowboy. ‘You might not know his name but I bet he knows yours, Cheyenne.’

  The cowboy looked at the deputy.

  ‘How’d you figure that?’ Hammer pressed a thumb knuckle into his pounding brow.

  ‘Everyone who read about that incident knows your name, Cheyenne,’ the deputy added. ‘You’re the Cheyenne cowboy. Hell, you’re famous.’

  Hammer stared at Grey. ‘The deputy could be right. It seems that ever since we brought that herd to the railhead every man, woman and child has bin calling me Cheyenne.’

  ‘Just like the newspaper story,’ Graff nodded. ‘I bet he knows that you’re here in Dodge and that’s why you were shot at. I reckon you’re right, Cheyenne. It all figures.’

  Marshal Grey took another sip of his strong coffee. ‘It could still be just a coincidence.’

  ‘I don’t believe in coincidences, Marshal,’ Hammer said through gritted teeth. ‘We were deliberately shot at to try and stop us alerting you. Something big is gonna happen in Dodge. Mark my words.’

  Grey was just about reply when the sound of a horse being ridden hard echoed around the building. All three men looked at the open doorway as a rider dragged rein outside the open doorway and dismounted.

  ‘That’s one of the telegraph linesmen, Marshal,’ the deputy said as the rider dropped from his mount and hurried into the office.

  The dust-caked linesman was exhausted. He staggered into the office and tried to catch his breath. The marshal lowered his cup from his lips.

  ‘What’s wrong, boy?’ Grey asked the excited rider.

  ‘We got mighty big trouble, Marshal,’ the linesman panted and pointed at the dark street.

  Grey frowned as he studied the figure.

  ‘What kinda trouble?’ he asked.

  The man moved closer to all three of his observers. ‘I was sent by the telegraph operator to check the wires. He wanted me to find out why his keys went dead earlier. I found out why OK. Some galoot has shot down every damn wire in the canyon and it’s gonna take a couple of days to fix. But that ain’t the worst of it.’

  ‘It ain’t?’ The marshal stared at the lineman.

  ‘Nope, it sure ain’t,’ the trembling linesman nodded frantically. ‘Whoever cut the wires also killed the telegraph operator at the water station. Shot the poor critter dead in his office, Marshal.’

  The deputy moved closer to the marshal; Grey stared into his black beverage as the realization of what was happening suddenly began to dawn on him.

  ‘Another killing?’ Grey said in disbelief.

  ‘With the telegraph wires down we can’t send or receive any messages, Marshal,’ Graff said nervously. ‘Dodge City is all on its lonesome. We’re on our lonesome.’

  Hammer looked at the marshal.

  ‘He’s right. Now do you think I’m fretting over nothing? Now do you understand why I think that galoot I tussled with a few months ago is here in Dodge to do something real bad, Marshal?’

  Marshal Grey stared at Hammer and began to nod at the cowboy. ‘You might be right, Cheyenne. Maybe there ain’t no such things as coincidences after all.’

  ‘What we gonna do, Marshal?’ the deputy asked.

  ‘First you’re gonna go to the funeral parlour and tell him to come and get Tom’s body off the sand,’ Grey said before pointing at the linesman. ‘And you rustle up a team of boys and try and get them wires fixed as fast as you can.’

  ‘What about the old man up in the station box?’ the linesman asked.

  Grey looked at the telegraph worker. ‘Don’t go fretting, son. I’ll tell the undertaker to head on up there when he comes to collect Tom.’

  Hammer scratched his jaw.

  ‘What are we gonna do, Marshal?’ he wondered.

  ‘We’re gonna start hunting the bastards who’ve bin killing folks around here, Cheyenne,’ the weathered lawman replied as he donned his hat, grabbed his scattergun and headed for the street. ‘I don’t like folks getting gunned down in my town. It kinda riles me.’

  Hammer quickly reloaded his .45 and then slid it into his holster. He watched as the marshal paused on the boardwalk outside his office and stared at the lifeless body of Tom McGee. He curled his finger at Hammer.

  ‘C’mon,’ he said.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Walt Kitter had done many jobs over the years before being given the job of caretaker to the Cattleman Club. The job had proven to be easy money until this eventful night. Death had come swiftly and caught the old timer by surprise when he had made the mistake of confronting Emmett Holt.

  The bearded old man was seated against a wall in a pool of his own blood with a stiletto in his chest just behind the double doors of the side entrance of the club. Holt ushered Jones and Collins out into the dark alley for the final time with the metal coffin between them. As they loaded the third and last coffin on to the flatbed buckboard with the assistance of the others, Holt walked back into the club and stared down at his handiwork. Kitter still wore the same shocked expression on his face, but now it was nothing more than a death mask.

  The aged caretaker had not stood a chance against the thin-bladed dagger that Holt had thrust into his bony chest. The stiletto’s long blade had punctured the old timer’s heart before emerging out of his back.

  Emmett Holt seldom used the knife but when he did it was with force and expert accuracy. Few men who had stood toe-to-toe with the infamous gunman had lived to tell the tale. He leaned down and gripped the silver handle of the weapon and pulled it from the caretaker’s chest with ease. Holt glared at the lifeless eyes of the old man and chuckled to himself as he wiped the gore from its razor-sharp blade on Kitter’s shirt.

  ‘We’ve loaded the last one of them coffins, Emmett,’ Gibbs said from behind Holt’s wide shoulders as he slid the dagger back into its hiding place.

  ‘I’m finished here too, Bart,’ Holt said. ‘I just had to extract my pig sticker.’

  Gibbs glanced down at the body propped against the interior wall of the club. ‘Is he dead, Emmett?’

  ‘He’s dead OK,’ Holt replied.

  Holt swung on his heels and walked out into the alley. He closed the doors behind them and watched as Dante secured the buckboard’s tailgate with metal pins. He waved his hands at the lethal bunch.

  ‘Get on board, boys,’ he hissed like a devilish sidewinder as he pushed his dust coat tails over his holstered gun grips and walked along the heavily laden vehicle. ‘We’re gonna take it nice and easy. We don’t wanna draw any attention to ourselves until we’ve loaded these three coffins on the train.’

  The five men clambered on to the buckboard as Holt climbed up on to its driver’s board beside Gibbs. His deadly eyes flashed in the eerie light as Gibbs.

  ‘Nice and easy, Bart,’ he growled as he bit the end off a cigar and spat it from their high perch. ‘Take it nice and easy.’

  Gibbs nodded back at Holt, released the brake pole and then cracked the reins across the backs of both horses. The large vehicle began to move slowly through the shadows on its way to the awaiting locomotive.

  The lantern-lit streets of Dodge cont
inued to defy the night and were steadily getting busier as the town’s clocks slowly headed toward midnight. The scent of stale perfume hung along its boardwalks as the ladies of the night started to appear in nearly every vacant doorway. Yet no matter how crowded the gambling halls, brothels and saloons became it meant nothing to the odd pair of tall men as they strolled into the very heart of the famed cattle town.

  Both the cowboy and the marshal had only one thing on their minds. The mutual thought that somewhere in Dodge there were six heavily armed men, who they suspected were responsible for the growing death toll, gnawed at their craws.

  Gat Hammer walked shoulder-to-shoulder beside the troubled Cole Grey in search of their elusive prey. There was a slim chance that the half-dozen men in their long dust coats had nothing to do with the brutal murders, but neither the cowboy nor the lawman believed in coincidences.

  Grey looked at Hammer and then pointed across the wide street to the bank. As they strode toward the building they could see the construction workers busily adding a stone outer layer to its wooden fabric.

  Grey paused and rubbed his thick neck muscles.

  ‘Don’t reckon this is their target, Cheyenne,’ the lawman said drily as his eyes surveyed the brightly illuminated structure. ‘They’d have to be loco if they tried to rob this bank with all these stonemasons around.’

  The Cheyenne cowboy agreed with his newly found friend as he rested a boot on the boardwalk and watched as the highly skilled masons went about their duties reinforcing the bank.

  ‘You’re right, Marshal,’ he said. ‘This ain’t it. There must be someplace else around here that has enough money to have tempted them hombres into Dodge.’

  ‘Yeah, but what?’ Grey spat at the sand and turned to stare at the line of buildings opposite them. The Cattleman Club was closed and shuttered for the night. His eyes passed its dim façade without giving it a second thought. ‘There’s another bank around the corner. Maybe that’s their target.’