The Cassidy Posse (26 page)

As he worked his other hand loose and undid the rope on his bootstraps, he watched the two cowboys who had him in tow. The one riding slightly ahead looked as though he had just fallen out of a haystack. The other one who had the reins to his horse looked more self-assured. He was definitely better dressed and impressively armed. He carried two handsome looking ivory-handled Colts in a hand-tooled gun belt. Neither had looked back at him for several minutes. They were hauling him around as if he were a sack of grain. He would make that their fatal mistake. Kid Del Rio was not someone to be ignored.

After he had freed himself, he still kept the rope wrapped around his wrists as if he were tied to the saddle horn. He wanted to keep the appearance of captivity until he had time to size up the situation and make his move. The bunch that had picked him up the previous day was now strung out on a road going somewhere. In the lead was a group of five lead by a cocky, red-headed cowboy. A little behind them was another group of four riders. One was a well-dressed fellow with a droopy mustache. He wore a high-peaked hat preferred by Montana men. The cowboy riding next to him was taller and dressed in practical ranch gear. The other two were shorter and huskier. It would be difficult to tell them apart at a distance. Luckily for him, the Chicago Detective was still wearing his fancy Derby hat. If it wasn’t for that, he wouldn’t know which one to kill. Maybe he should kill them both just to be safe, he thought. After Little Jake and Slim double-crossed him, he was learning not to leave things to chance. He would have to look them up before he headed back to Texas just to set his mind at ease.

As he watched, the three men ahead of him spurred their horses and quickly closed the gap between themselves and the group of five men. The cocky redheaded guy had dismounted and the guy in the Derby started talking to him. This had to be his opportunity, thought Billy. It was time for Kid Del Rio to spring into action. He eased his horse up alongside the cowboy with the two ivory-handled Colts. Billy figured he could jerk the gun out of the left holster and shoot him with it in one quick motion.

As Billy was launching himself out of the saddle, his horse brushed against the skittish black stallion the two-gunned cowboy was riding. It suddenly moved right leaving his well-timed leap short of the mark. He was able to get his hand on the gun, but he was stretched between the two horses momentarily. The well-dressed cowboy was surprised and instinctively drew the other Colt. For a moment Billy was looking down a gun barrel at eternity.

Their desperate eyes locked briefly, the hunter and the hunted, and then the moment passed. The startled stallion reared backwards, and the two-gunned cowboy was thrown to the ground. Billy was tossed aside by the frightened horse but still managed to hold on to the ivory-handled revolver. He moved quickly towards the fallen cowboy to seize the other ivory-handled beauty and add it to his arsenal. It was next to the cowboy who was lying motionlessly on the ground. He picked the gun up gratefully and was about to use it on its owner when he heard a horse behind him. He whirled around to see the hayseed kid riding back towards him trying desperately to pull a long barreled buffalo gun from it scabbard. The intensity of the situation was making it an impossible task for the inexperienced farm boy. Kid Del Rio leveled both of the ivory-handed Colts on Luke and fired simultaneously. Both bullets found their mark knocking Luke off his skinny horse. He was dead before he hit the ground, his chest a spreading wave of crimson blood.

As Red Alvins and his gang crested the hill, a stray bullet kicked up the dirt a few feet in front of his horse. The animal reared backwards, and Red cuffed it a few times in an effort to give it more courage under fire. He dismounted the skittish horse so he could survey the situation a few hundred yards away in the valley. He saw a group of men straining mightily to move what appeared to be a log wall on wheels towards a ranch house. While some pushed, others fired through gunports cut through the moving breastworks. Throughout the surrounding hills there were men dug into the hillside also pouring down murderous fire on the ranch house. From a small fort that had been hastily constructed by the regulators on a high point next to the ranch house, the invaders returned fire to the men in the hills. The new smokeless powder was not yet readily available on the frontier, and the whole valley was filled with smoke. Individual targets were difficult to distinguish, so the volume of firepower was the only measure of success.

Before Red could remount his horse, Butch and Elzy rode up on either side of him. Butch leaned over and through the incessant noise of rifle fire said “Red, we got to talk.”

“I know what you’re thinkin’,” Red shouted, waving his arms around with the reins still in his right hand. “I’m gonna find this Mr. Snyder before we get into this mess and see if there’s gonna be any money in it for us.”

“That’s not what we’re thinking,” said Elzy.

“We need to take one of your boys with us,” Butch said flatly.

Red considered for a moment his gang of misfits. Riley the troublemaking drunk, Simon the pickpocket, Ticks the would-be jewel thief, and Sean the lost soul. Had he missed something? Was there some sought-after talent among them of which he was not aware? For years he had done everything short of filling out an application to run with the Wild Bunch and now they wanted one of these losers.

“You mean to help you pull a job?” he asked bewildered.

“No,” said Butch. “We need him to go back and to uh, well, stand trial.” The words did not come easy for him. In fact, he couldn’t believe they were coming out of his mouth.

“You mean you’re arresting him?” Red asked even more bewildered. He looked at the mysterious guy with the hat pulled down over his face next to the Sundance Kid. They both had their hands nonchalantly on their gun butts ready for action. It was now apparent why the guy never quite fit. He remembered Riley’s warning that he had seen him before. He should have smelled the law on him. He had come for Sean. He knew he should have gotten rid of that kid. Now he had brought trouble down on them.

“Is it the kid you want?” Red asked, testing his theory.

Butch nodded affirmatively.

“What about the rest of us? Does he want to take us all back?”

Before Butch could answer, Riley nosed his horse in between them to see what was going on.

“This ain’t a healthy spot to be lolly-gagging around,” Riley advised. “What’s the hold up?”

“Butch here’s turned lawman,” sneered Red. “Wants us to give up that snivellin’ little shit Sean.”

“You’re a posse?” said Riley loudly in surprise, pulling his horse back. When Ticks, Simon and Sean heard the dreaded word, the tautness of hunted animals shot through their bodies. Before Red could assure them that the matter was currently being negotiated, two shots rang out behind them. All turned to see poor Luke being blown out of the saddle by Kid Del Rio. Reactions overruled reason. Ticks made a move for his gun. Whether it was a conscious effort or one of the muscle spasms for which he got his name would never be known. The Sundance Kid put one bullet through the center of his heart and there was no more Ticks.

Riley tried to wheel his horse around and draw his gun at the same time. He would have done better to focus on one task. Elzy and Mike both fired simultaneously. One of the rounds caught him in the side of the head and he dropped lifelessly to the ground. After watching Riley fall, Simon the pickpocket reacted in a more astute manner befitting his English heritage. He politely raised his delicate, talented hands over his head.

Red was stunned at first but his mind quickly turned to rage as he saw the gang he had assembled being cut down before his eyes. He picked Butch for his target because of his double-crossing treachery. Although he was just a few feet away, he hurried the shot that passed harmlessly over Butch’s head. The difference between real gunmen and those that would be was always the ability to shoot accurately under pressure. It was not in Red to be what he had always wanted to be. He would never be in the league of a Wild Bill Hickock who could calmly pick out a target and fire while bullets whizzed all about him. Red failed the ultimate test. Butch shot him in the arm so he didn’t have a second chance.

Hurt, frightened and enraged with both Butch and himself, Red turned and began running down into the valley, his limp arm still holding a gun he could not raise. He ran past the first ring of rifle pits and the men cowering inside rose up and cheered him on. Bullets began to kick up dirt on either side of him. He knew he should stop, but he had picked up too much momentum. In an effort to keep from falling, his legs carried him forward. The frustrated regulators in the fort on the hill and inside the ranch house had not had a legitimate target to shoot at in hours. Tired of firing into the moving wooden wall to no avail, they all concentrated their efforts on the solitary man charging down the hill. Old Rap Brown, the field leader of the rustlers and citizens, began beating his men on the head extolling them to push the log wall faster to keep up with the lone hero’s brave charge. They all screamed encouragement from the shelter of their rifle pits and from behind the wooden “Ark of Safety.” When a bullet hit Red in the chest and he slowed his headlong charge, they chanted him on until a rifle slug tore off the top of his head. The stalemated battle now had a martyr. The level of activity picked up all across the battlefield as lead and vengeful epitaphs were furiously poured down upon the arrogant regulators. Mr. Synder was watching the amazing feat through a pair of binoculars from a distance hill. He asked the hero’s body be brought to him when safety permitted, so they could honor their champion with a fitting funeral. His coffin would be carried with cheers through the streets of Buffalo, and for decades later toasts in bars throughout the territory would be made in his honor. Red was part of Wyoming history.

Never sensing that his rider had control, Sean’s horse bolted at the first gunshots. He headed west away from the noise and confusion before Riley’s and Ticks’ lifeless bodies had even hit the ground. His sudden movement had jerked the left rein out of Sean’s inexperienced hand, and the misplaced city boy leaned forward, desperately clinging to the frightened animal’s mane, as he struggled to regain control of the whipping leather strap.

“Sean’s getten away,” shouted Mike, turning his horse around and bumping it into Simon’s, who was still standing tall in the stirrups with his hands up. The collision of the two animals knocked the bewildered Simon off his horse. He landed in a heap on the cold ground.

“Get the hell out ov me way,” Mike demanded as he whipped the reins against his horse’s rump.

“Don’t you want to arrest me, Governor?” asked Simon as Mike rode by him.

Elzy and Sundance were temporarily mesmerized by Red Alvins’ headlong plunge into the valley of death. It was as though they wanted to absorb every detail of the heroic charge because they knew it was going to be a hell of a good story; one that they would tell over and over. Butch tore himself away from the compelling scene when he saw the trouble Mike was having trying to apprehend his fleeing fugitive. He had given Mike a mature and gentle mare that fit his rusty skills of horsemanship. Butch realized unless he intervened, Mike might never catch Sean Daugherty. He hopped upon his long-legged buckskin filly to join the chase.

“Would you boys mind seeing what happen to our two young deputies back there?” he asked before leaving.

“Be right there,” said Sundance. He and Elzy were still following Red Alvins’ descent into history.

“Why am I always the nursemaid,” he muttered as he turned the filly west and she broke into a gallop.

Sean had just disappeared over the top of the hill, still not in control of the runaway horse. Mike was only a couple of hundred yards behind, but he was not making much progress at closing the distance between them. Butch’s filly seemed to sense the urgency of the chase, and her legs became a blur of motion beneath him. Butch had been wondering whether he had made the right decision trading his familiar black mare for her. Now he knew he had made a good choice.