Longarm and the Sins of Laughing Lyle (9781101612101) (11 page)

Chapter 19

As smoke puffed from windows on either side of the cabin's closed front door, Longarm sprinted, bobbing and weaving, before he stopped suddenly and fired his Winchester. His bullet sailed through the window right of the door, evoking a howl from Bethany, who pulled her head back in as her hat tumbled off her shoulder.

Longarm took off running, bobbing, and weaving once more, Laughing Lyle's bullets screeching around him, blowing up sage shrubs and rocks, one slicing a hot line across the lawman's neck just below his left ear.

Again, Longarm stopped, aimed quickly, and fired. His bullet crashed against Laughing Lyle's rifle barrel, and the killer screeched and dropped the rifle out the window. It clattered into the yard at the base of the cabin. Longarm ejected the spent cartridge and fired three more times, lifting a staccato rhythm, the shots echoing around the ridges. He heard his first shot hit something soft and fleshy, evoking a hoarse scream and a bellowing curse.

“Lyle!” cried Bethany, her voice muffled.

Longarm ran straight toward the cabin, quickly punching fresh ammo through the smoking Winchester's loading gate. The door was constructed of what appeared to be halved log timbers, too stout to bust through without a battering ram, so Longarm headed for Bethany's window, to the door's right.

He racked a fresh round into the Winchester's chamber and stretched his strides, snarling and growling through gritted teeth as he ran, pumping his arms and legs, remembering the dead people in Stoneville, his friend Case Morgan, and Preacher Todd—not to mention the multiple ruses Laughing Lyle and Bethany had pulled on Longarm himself.

When he was five feet from the window—there was no glass in it and the shutter was open—he lofted himself into the air. He dove straight on through and into the cabin, twisting his airborne body in the air and firing the Winchester twice toward his left a half-second before he hit the floor with a loud grunt. He caught a glimpse of two shadowy figures on that side of the cabin, the blond-headed one scrambling back into the cabin's depths, screaming, while Laughing Lyle fell back against the far wall. His blood pumped from a shoulder wound, and there was a bloody line across his left cheek just beneath his eye. His previous wounds had also opened up, and all the blood had turned his hickory shirt bright red.

He had a pistol in each hand, and he threw his head back, laughing, as he raised both six-shoters toward Longarm, who, propped on a hip, fired the Winchester, quickly jacking the cocking lever. All three slugs hammered Laughing Lyle's chest, one after another, making him jerk as though struck by lightning, as he triggered his pistols into the floor around his feet.

He was still laughing bizzarely as he continued to trigger the pistols, while trying to raise them, though they appeared to have become chunks of lead in his hands. A gun blasted to Longarm's right, shattering a lantern on a low table beside a rocking chair.

Longarm swung around to see Bethany stumbling back against a rear door in the kitchen portion of the cabin, triggering a pistol toward Longarm, who fired twice and then watched as the girl got the door open and stumbled through it and into the cabin's backyard.

Longarm gained his feet quickly, wincing at the throbbing pain in his shoulder that had hit the floor hard, and turned to Laughing Lyle, who knelt in front of the window on the far side of the cabin, laughing hysterically, mouth forming a horseshoe, eyes brightly insane. He held both pistols straight down by his sides. Both blasted loudly into the floor, then dropped from his hands.

Blood ran down his ugly face and pumped from the fresh holes in his chest.

Suddenly, he quit laughing and stared at Longarm blankly, pain and horror gradually leeching into his gaze.

“Ah, shit,” he said.

He fell forward. With a solid thud he hit the floor, padded with a faded, blood-splattered burgundy rug. Laughing Lyle jerked a few times and lay still.

Longarm swung around and headed for the half-open back door, catching a glimpse of the saddlebags he'd been seeking slung over a cracked leather sofa, several piles of greenbacks sitting neatly on one of the stuffed cushions. Apparently, Laughing Lyle and Bethany had been counting the loot earlier, while Mr. May groaned in misery, watching them helplessly, most likely.

Longarm strode past the couch and out the back door. Beyond, he could see Bethany staggering away from the cabin through the brush and stunt cedars. Longarm walked out along the well-worn path that led to the privy and continued on past it through a ragged stand of pines and junipers.

When he'd pushed through the brush, he saw Bethany about twenty yards ahead, staggering across a narrow, shallow stream that ran along the base of the forested northern ridge. She swung around uncertainly. Blood spotted her right side. It smeared her forehead. Her teeth were a white line between drawn back lips, and her green eyes were hard and cougar-mean.

“Drop it, Bethany,” Longarm said, holding his rifle barrel-down at his side.

“You ruined everything!” she screamed. “Lyle and I were going to be rich! What's more—we were gonna be out of
Nowhere!
”

She raised her pistol. Longarm got his Winchester leveled first. It leaped and roared. The bullet took her in the dead center of her chest, between the comely lumps of her breasts. She gave a gasp as it lifted her up and hurled her back until she hit the water with a thump and a splash.

Blood pumped from her chest to soak her shirt and show inky red in the water. Her blond hair floated around her. A crow cawed raucously in the thick forest climbing the ridge beyond her. Longarm thought it sounded like a demon calling the girl back to hell. Along with Laughing Lyle, most likely.

Longarm turned around and walked wearily back toward the cabin. He emerged from the fragrant brush and stopped, tensing.

Town Marshal Roscoe Butter stood before him, holding a cocked Remington revolver. The gun was aimed at Longarm's brisket. Butter looked hard but uncertain. He had the saddlebags of Stoneville loot draped over his left shoulder.

He didn't say anything. He just stared at Longarm. The Remington shook ever-so-slightly in his fist, his knuckles showing white.

“Fancy seein' you out here, Roscoe.”

“Shut up, Longarm. This ain't easy for me.”

“Nah, I s'pose not. The ruse in town must have been pretty damn hard, too.”

“It was!” The Nowhere town marshal glanced past Longarm toward where Bethany lay dead in the stream. “I didn't know about her, though. I didn't know him and her was playin' a double-cross, the bastard.”

Longarm smiled mildly. “What'd he do? Promise if you and the doc went along with his play-acting, pretending his wounds were about to kill him, he'd share the loot with you?”

Butter raised the pistol higher. His craggy cheeks flushed. “I told you to shut up, Longarm, or I'll shoot you right now!”

“Well, it looks like you're gonna shoot me, anyway. Might as well let me go to my grave with the satisfaction of knowin' how it was all cut up. I suppose it was you who put the wolfer Dave Ross on my trail—the one whose wick I snuffed in the Nowhere Saloon? He was gonna get a cut, too, I take it?”

Butter shook his head slightly and narrowed an eye as he stared down the barrel of the quivering Remy. “I'm sorry, Longarm. A coupla years ago, I never woulda considered fallin' in with such a scheme. Aligning myself with the likes of Laughin' Lyle. Bell wouldn't have done it, either. But, goddamnit, the railroad abandoned us, and that damn town is dyin', and we got desperate. I got two women and a kid to raise, goddamnit, Longarm!”

“There's plenty of men in worse positions than you, Butter. You have no reason to squawl. You have even less reason to do what you've done and what you're about to do. You ever hear of
honor
and
dignity?
”

The Nowhere marshal flinched as though slapped. Then he bunched his lips angrily. His brown eyes glowed yellow in the midday sunlight. “Turn around. I'll make it quick. You won't know what hit you.”

“Forget it,” Longarm said, broadening his smile. “You're gonna have to shoot me right here.” He tapped his chest.

A familiar voice sounded from the right. “D-drop it, Marshal.”

Both Longarm and Butter turned to see Benji Vickers step out from behind the privy. He was aiming a Spencer rifle at Butter. Longarm recognized it as Butter's own carbine.

“Benji, goddamnit,” the town marshal barked, “I told you to stay in town!”

Benji shifted his feet, squared his heavy sloping shoulders, and licked his lips. “I c-can't let you do it, Marshal. It ain't right, what you and Doc Bell did. I never thought it was right. And I ain't gonna let you kill Marshal Long.”

He worked his throat, sniffed, and licked his lips again. “Now, you drop that pistol an' them saddlebags. You don't . . .” He squinted down the Spencer's barrel as he drew the heavy hammer back. “I'll shoot you. Sure as you're standin' there with all that money that don't belong to you.”

Butter said tightly, “Benji, as your employer, I'm ordering you to drop that rifle, now!”

“Nope. I won't. I appreciate what you done for me, givin' me the badge an' all. But you never thought much of me; you thought I was too stupid to carry a gun, but I'm here to show you that you made a mistake. With your own gun, Marshal. Now, you drop that pistol or I'll shoot you with this rifle, Marshal.”

“You don't even know how to shoot that thing.”

Benji quirked his lips in a faint, knowing smile but said nothing more.

Longarm lurched forward, swinging his Winchester's rear stock up. It smacked against Butter's hand. His Remington discharged with a loud crack and went sailing out of his grip.

“Ach!” the town marshal cried, buckling to his knees and grabbing his injured hand, eyes spitting sparks at Longarm.

Longarm smashed his right fist against Butter's right jaw. A second later, Butter was flat on his back on the well-tramped privy path. His chest and potbelly rose and fell sharply as he breathed, half-sobbing and half-cursing.

Longarm stared down at him as Benji lowered the rifle and walked slowly over. “Damn, I just didn't take you for that big a fool, Roscoe.” Longarm reached down, removed the town marshal's badge from the man's grubby wool vest, and gave it to Benji.

“Here you go, Marshal,” he told the big man. “Best haul your prisoner back to town.”

Benji switched his uncertain gaze from the badge to Longarm. His lower jaw fell in shock, but his eyes spoke, pleased. Longarm reached down and picked up the saddlebags. He glanced at the bullet burn across his thigh. It wasn't much. He'd tend it with the sundry other ones later.

He slung the saddlebags over his left shoulder and then headed back through the cabin, past the dead and still-staring Laughing Lyle, who did not look like he had much laughter left in him, and out the front door.

Jenny was helping her father toward the cabin, both of them arm-in-arm and walking along the near corral. They were speaking to each other in low, reassuring tones.

“You two all right?” Longarm asked.

They stopped, stared at the tall federal lawman.

Hy May narrowed his eyes angrily. “That devil-spawn of mine dead?”

“He is.”

“Then we're just fine.” May glanced at his daughter. “Come on, girl, let's get us inside. Me? I could use a drink!”

Jenny kept her eyes on Longarm until she'd helped her father through the door and into the cabin. Longarm adjusted the heavy saddlebags on his shoulder and dug a half-smoked cheroot from his coat pocket. He fired the cigar and puffed until he had a good smoke going.

He gave another sigh and leaned his head back against the cabin wall, smoking. Thinking back through it all, he chuckled darkly and shook his head, blowing smoke into the sunny mountain air.

Watch for

LONGARM AND THE BANKER'S DAUGHTER

the 409
^th
novel in the exciting LONGARM series from Jove

Coming in December!

And don't miss

LONGARM DOUBLE #4: LEGEND WITH A SIX-GUN

Longarm Double Edition

Available from Jove in December!