White Lightning (31 page)

He was fast—but not quite fast enough. His adversary had arrived with gun in hand, no time at all wasted on drawing, and his bullet ripped into the sniper’s shoulder, spinning him around to crumple on all fours.

Make that all
threes
, since his right arm was numb and useless, pain just starting to send signals from the epicenter of his mangled shoulder. He could see the Colt revolver where he’d dropped it, but his right hand wouldn’t answer orders from his brain. Behind him, cautiously approaching, his opponent warned, “Stay down!”

“Yes, sir!” the gunman answered, grinning fiercely through the pain. And as he spoke, his left hand slid inside his jacket, fingers seeking out the Borchardt C-93 in its snug shoulder holster. It was an awkward kind of draw, backward and upside down, but he’d rehearsed it, knowing you could never tell what might occur when there was gun work to be done.

The pistol had a safety lever on the left side of its frame, a hedge against an accidental discharge, and it took some fumbling to release it with his left hand, but the shooter got it done. He covered the procedure with a groan he didn’t have to fake, slumped forward to disguise the twisting movement of his one good arm, and eased the Borchardt free of clinging leather.

Footsteps told him that his enemy was drawing closer. Perfect. It would spare him aiming. He could drop the lawman, climb aboard his horse, and get the hell away from there before he bled out in the dust.

And then what?

One thing at a time.

Rising, turning with a snarl of pain and rage, the gunman sprayed his target with a burst of rapid fire—or would have, if the lawman had been standing where he’d been a moment earlier. He’d moved, though, ducking to the left and crouching low, six-gun extended in a steady grip. Before the shooter could correct his aim and swing the Borchardt pistol leftward, the marshal fired again—to kill, this time.

His bullet drilled the gunman’s chest, lifted him off his knees, and tossed him over on his back. It should have hurt, but didn’t, numbness gripping him, the semiautomatic weapon slipping from his hand. Impossibly, the sky revolved above him, clouds spinning for him alone like soapy water swirling down a drainpipe.

This is how it ends?
he asked himself.

And died.

“We don’t know who he was,” Slade told Judge Dennison. “No papers on him. Nothing in his saddle bags but ammunition and provisions for the trail.”

“And money?” asked the judge.

“A hundred dollars, more or less. Not much, to sacrifice himself that way.”

“I’m guessing he was promised more,” said Dennison. “I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a bank account somewhere, considerably fatter than it was before he took the job.”

“I don’t see how we’ll ever find that, either, when we’ve got no name to start with,” Slade replied.

“Sounds damn near hopeless,” Dennison acknowledged.

“And the people Berringer gave up? What happens now, to them?” Slade asked.

“They’ll have attorneys standing by to challenge the indictments. I suspect they’ll win, under the confrontation clause.”

“How’s that?” asked Slade.

“The Sixth Amendment to the Constitution,” Dennison explained. “Anyone accused of a crime has the absolute right to confront and cross-examine his accusers. It’s fundamental.”

“Even when they have him murdered?”

“That’s the rub,” said Dennison. “We don’t know who the
killer
is—or was—much less who hired him. Lacking evidence, it’s just a heap of speculation.”

“I’d have called it common sense,” Slade said.

“Which isn’t evidence. We can’t go into court with an opinion, unsupported by a single solid fact.”

“So it was all for nothing?”

“On the contrary. You cracked the moonshine ring and found Bill Tanner’s killers. You cleaned out a nest of filth at Fort Supply, for which the army may or may not thank you, and you’ve helped the Cherokees.”

Too late for Little Wolf,
Slade thought. “It doesn’t feel like much,” he said.

“Look on the bright side,” Dennison suggested. “If they’d killed you on their first try, Rafferty would still be riding high. His friends would still be looking forward to their payday.”

“As it is, they just go on about their business, looking for another way to steal,” Slade said.

“Don’t be so sure. The BIA will likely fire Berringer’s boss, for the appearance that it’s cleaning house, if nothing else.”

“There’s still the senator,” said Slade.

“Who’s up for reelection in another year. Maybe the people will remember and decide to clean their own house.”

“Will they even know about the charges?” Slade inquired.

Dennison smiled. “As luck would have it, I have friends in Little Rock. One of them manages the
Arkansas Gazette
. I wouldn’t be surprised if he could get a feature out of this. Maybe a series.”

“That’s something, anyway.”

“You need some rest, Jack. Take a couple days and let yourself unwind. If anything comes up—”

“You know where to find me,” Slade said, already on his feet and moving toward the door.

“I do, indeed.”

The desk clerk back at Slade’s hotel looked like a man with something on his mind, but if there was, he kept it to himself. Slade put it down to gun-smoke syndrome, the
attraction some folks felt toward killing even though the act itself repulsed them. You could see it on the faces of spectators at a shooting, morbid curiosity that verged on sick excitement. Or, he may have just had gas from eating too much barbecue at Colter’s Café, down the street.

Slade climbed the stairs, fatigue weighting his feet, wondering whether Lo Ming’s laundry could could cleanse his shirt and vest of Berringer’s bloodstains. Something to think about, but not this afternoon. He reached the second-story landing, turned down toward his room, and stopped dead in his tracks at sight of Faith Connover, standing in the hallway by his numbered door.

Slade felt his mouth go dry, his mind go blank. His legs felt wooden as he moved along the corridor, trying to think if he remembered how to smile.

“Clerk didn’t tell me I had company,” he said.

“I asked him not to warn you,” Faith replied.

“Afraid I’d come up shooting?” Slade’s pulse hammered as the stupid joke fell flat.

“More like afraid you’d turn around and run,” she said.

“Not likely.”

“Jack, we need to talk.”

“Okay. You know—”

“Me first,” she interrupted him. “I’m pregnant.”