Killing Halfbreed (18 page)

"Why don't you come in and get us, greenhorn?"

"I'd rather stand out here and fight like a man.  Y’all yeller, or what?!"

I heard some low cussing and a spurt of sharp laughter.  I made sure the leather straps were loosed from my holsters for a quick draw if needed...and I thought I very well might need it.

After what seemed an eternity, the Talon brothers and Charlie Pugh emerged from the saloon.  John strode confidently to the edge of the steps leading down from the boardwalk to the street and stopped short, facing me.  Jim followed and placed himself to John’s right.  He wore a green bandanna today, I noted.

Pugh stood to the left of both of them, bearing a crazy, malicious grin.  His fingers twitched as they hovered over his guns.  Pugh would have come out guns blazing if it hadn't been for the restraint imposed on him by the other two.  His eyes flicked back and forth, anxious for action.

The brothers were both dangerous as snakes, but I thought John was the more dangerous of the two, so I kept my eyes glued to his hands.  One of the most common fatal mistakes made by greenhorns was where they focused their eyes in a fight.  Watching a man's face for emotion was the natural instinct, but it was too unreliable and had gotten many young upstarts killed before their time.  Logic and experience told me the place to watch was the hands, for that's where the danger lay.

"I remember you, Talbot.”

“Name’s Halfbreed.”

“Hey, I like that better.”  John Talon smiled condescendingly.  “What brought you up this way? You ain’t seriously hunting us, are you?” 

"I am."

The less we talked the better.  All the while, I kept my eyes glued to those hands.

"Heard you yerself was running from the law.  Yet here you are, chasing
us
?  What are you gonna do, take us in?  Why, I bet they'd arrest you too.  Maybe
we
ought to take
him
in, boys.  Whatcha think?"

Charlie's grin spread wider, and then drooped in disappointment as he realized that meant there might not be any gunplay.

Talon's words hit too close to home.  To my reckoning, we were both outlaws, but if I ever wanted to escape my accusers, I had to redeem myself somehow, and this seemed like just as good a way as any.  Catch the rustlers and bring them to justice.

An easy smile crept onto John’s face.  He turned slightly toward Pugh.  "Don't worry, Charlie, I ain't gonna let this go without some shootin'...."  He whipped back swiftly, drawing both Colts as he turned to gun me down.

Man, he was fast.

Still, I’d been ready.  I'd seen those hands start movin' before Talon had even finished his sentence.  I'd drawn just as quick, and thankfully, a little faster.

My first bullet hit him in the right arm, spinning him violently and rendering that arm useless.  The pistol it had born flew across the boardwalk.  His other gun was momentarily unthreatening in his newly unbalanced position.

Simultaneously, I aimed my second gun at Jim.  Pugh was the slowest of the three outlaws, not by much, but enough to make a difference.  Jim, however, was an unknown.  My second shot hit him in the leg, driving it backwards and causing his bullet to strike the dirt in front of me.  That Talon brother had cleared leather.  It had been close.

My third, fourth, and fifth shots were all intended for Charlie Pugh.  I desperately needed to keep that insane devil on the defensive.  Charlie abandoned his draw and dove for cover behind a watering trough.  None of my shots hit their mark because of his quick agility.

I ran for cover in the shadows of the covered boardwalk.  The three killers spilled into the street.

Bullets kicked up dust in front of me from Pugh's weapon, and another slammed into a post behind me.  Seeing that, I dove for ground.  A fourth man, one I hadn't been expecting, had snuck onto the rooftop and was firing down at me with a rifle.

Will shot once from the boardwalk.

The unseen assailant cried out and tumbled to the street below, but there were still the three gunslingers in front of us to worry about.  John and Jim fired well-spaced shots, intending to keep me plastered to the ground as they backed toward their horses.  Their wounds had put them at a disadvantage, and Will’s presence had surprised them.  They obviously didn't care to try their hand in a battle where they weren't holding all the cards.  Nothing new there.

Charlie Pugh, however, had no such idea.  His eyes blazed with a crazy light.  He stood in the center of the street shooting wildly, unable to hit me only because the angle was wrong and because Will had also turned his guns on Charlie.  Even then, two shooters didn't seem to daunt him much.  He fired alternately at me and Will.

The Talon brothers made it to their mounts and yelled at Charlie to get his crazy rear up on his.  Charlie, unfazed, kept firing.  He remained unscathed himself. 
Man, if this guy had any accuracy, we'd be in trouble
.

One of Pugh's wild bullets tore through the sleeve of Will's shirt.  Will let out an odd shriek of pain, but stood his ground without falling.

I tried to get a bead on Pugh, but couldn't without fully exposing myself.  I decided to heck with it and ran into the open just as Pugh's guns clicked on empty.  Realization and calm finally settled into the man’s eyes.  Seeing his partners had ridden off and his own guns were empty, Pugh turned and made a mad dash for his horse too.  I squeezed a couple of rounds off, but only managed to burn him before he'd ridden around the corner of a building and out of sight.

Unbelieving, I examined my own body, surprised by the apparent lack of bullet holes.  Adrenaline still surged through my veins though the battle was over.  I holstered my weapons and took a deep breath.

"My, oh my, oh my.  I don't believe I've ever seen so many bullets fly without somebody biting the dust!"

The cool, sarcastic voice froze me in my tracks.  From the saloon, Luke Phillips slipped out, his frigid eyes like icy splinters, the complete opposite of Charlie Pugh.

"I do stand in awe of you gentlemen."  He looked back and forth between Will and me.  "What a battle!  I do think everything in town has a new hole in it except for the two of you."  He stared at me coolly.

My guns were holstered.  I wasn't sure if I dared draw against Luke Phillips.  The rumors about him were the stuff of legends.  Deadly fast and deadly accurate.  It felt like cowardice, but I couldn't bring myself to draw against him — it seemed like certain death.  I hoped I was just being prudent.

"I see what you're contemplating, Talbot, but I wouldn't if I were you.  It's just not worth the risk to find out, is it?"

Phillips glanced back at Will who was nursing his shoulder.  He turned his back on both of us and walked slowly to his horse.

The arrogance of the man!  He'd been sure we wouldn't shoot him in the back, and of course, we wouldn't, but why didn't Phillips pick a fight?  Surely, he figured he would win.  For that matter, why hadn't he taken any pot-shots from inside the saloon while we’d been distracted with the Talons and Pugh?

Those questions went unasked and unanswered as Luke Phillips rode off to join his compatriots.  I went to see to Will's shoulder.

***

After the fight, pandemonium reigned in the streets.  Luckily, no one had been hurt by any stray bullets.  Now that my hot temper had cooled, I chastised myself for having provoked the fight in such a public place.

Will was pale and looked as if he might pass out any minute, so I wrapped his good arm around my neck and helped him to a room in the back of the saloon.  The bartender emerged from his hiding place long enough to direct me toward it.  The simple accommodation contained nothing more than a ratty cot and a stained wash bin.

Will sunk down on the cot gingerly, wincing with pain.  He’d only been hit in the shoulder, but it was bleeding a lot.  He saw the concern in my eyes, and his own narrowed sharply.

"It ain't nothing to worry about, Jake.  I'm just gonna lay down here a while and rest.  That's all I need, rest."

"We’d better take a look at that wound and clean it first."

"No!  Just leave me alone!  I need to rest, that’s all."

His anger shut me up, but I knew we couldn't leave the gunshot to heal itself.  We might need to take the bullet out and the risk of infection and blood loss was high.

There was no arguing with him about it though, so I let him alone and asked the saloon keeper to send for the town doctor.

When I came back, Will had passed out.  I knew I had to take a look at that wound to see how serious it was.  To heck with his sensitivities.  I took out my Bowie knife and cut away a piece of his shirt to expose the wounded arm.  Oddly, he had some thick white bandages wrapped around his chest and shoulders.  I didn’t know what they were for, but if I was going to get at the wound, I’d have to cut through those too, so I did.

Stunned, I quickly covered him back up again.  I was speechless.  Will was not Will.

Will was a girl
!

I sat shocked on a bar stool for several hours.  The man I'd ridden the trail with for months, built my ranch with, and confronted the Talons with, was actually a woman.  There are times in life when a revelation is just too enormous for your mind to handle.

I wondered what his... what
her
real name was.

Thinking back, I should have realized the truth a long time ago.  Will's slight frame, his higher than average voice.  Now that I thought back on it, I hadn't ever really seen him shave.  He seemed to always stay stubble-free naturally.  I'd never seen him undress either.  Just never really paid attention to those things before.

He could shoot like a sharpshooter, though.  And rope cattle too.  I mean she.  This didn't make sense. Why would a woman do that?  Why had this woman chosen to ride with me and hide her gender?  Did she hide it from everyone, or just me?  Was she some kind of a loon?  Made no sense at all.

The bartender came up from the back of the saloon.

"Doc's looked your friend over, and
she's
going to be fine," he smirked.  "Said it's just a flesh wound.  He put some medicine on it to prevent infection.  She's awake if you want to go in."

I didn't know what I was going to say to her.  I didn't know what I could say.  The look on the bartender's face told me this story would be all over town within hours, but what did I care?

I walked back to the small room.  Once I’d paid the doctor, he gave some final advice for protecting the wound from infection, and scurried off.

My former friend sat upright on the cot, her back braced against the dingy wall.  Long tresses of shining, jet-black hair hung loose around her shoulders.  In that moment, I realized I'd never seen her without a hat before either.  She glared at me with open hostility, which was funny, considering she was the one who had deceived me.  I cleared my throat to speak, but she began before I could.

"So, now you know."  She spat the words at me vehemently.  I was taken aback by her anger.

"What’s your real name?" I asked.

"Elizabeth."

"Elizabeth...?"  Bells went off in my head like a four-alarm fire.

"That's right, Elizabeth Miller.  The sister of Joshua Miller.  My brother.”

“Wha….”  I shook my head in confusion.

“I begged and pleaded with him not to be so foolish as to give up his life for the likes of you.  My brother was a good man.  A
good
man, you hear?  And you're not.  You're scum, a no-good murderer.  At least I don't have to hide my hatred anymore.”  She sighed greatly as if expelling a ton of tense air held inside until it’d grown stale.  She clenched her fists and leaned forward aggressively, eyes blazing.  “I hate you, Jake Halfbreed.  I hate you with everything I have inside, and I always will!"

Her eyes proved it.

***

Now that I saw Will/Elizabeth as a woman, I realized that she was quite beautiful.  Her words, on the other hand, were vicious and soul-rending.  I'd stood there stunned for several minutes while she tore into me with her abuse.  My former friend was a woman, and now my friend was my enemy and the sister of the mysterious man who'd died for me.  That was enough to knock the wind out of anyone.

As I listened, I found out that she had been the mysterious gunman who'd saved me on separate occasions after the hanging.

She hated me for having taken her brother from her.  She had not stayed to watch her brother die, couldn't bear to see it.  However, she'd heard about the posse being formed in town soon afterward and very quickly realized that if I were killed, her brother's death would have been for nothing.

So, in spite of the hatred raging inside her, she’d set out to follow me, vowing to do whatever she had to in order to keep me alive.  Her family had grown up on the range, and she and Joshua had learned to hunt and shoot from an early age, so surviving in the open was no problem.  She was an excellent marksman too.

She'd been determined to keep me alive even if she had to shoot the sheriff himself in cold blood.  There was no way on God’s green earth she was going to let her brother's life go to waste.  Not as long as she still lived, breathed, and had something to say about it.