Arkansas Smith (11 page)

Will insisted on going with Arkansas. He’d been fine during the battle of only moments ago and, he pointed out; he’d had worse injuries than this gut wound which had all but healed in any case. Rycot, on the other hand, insisted on riding back into town and passing on the news of the sheriff’s murder. He’d then get up a group of the town’s men and bring them out to Lance’s place to assist in the arrest of the varmint.

Arkansas, in no mood to argue with either man, simply nodded.

They had then rounded up one of the dead men’s horses and Will had groaned as he mounted it, but he managed to do so without any assistance. He clutched his stomach and took several deep breaths.

‘I’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘Ain’t nothing more than a dull ache.’

‘Come on then,’ Arkansas said and turned the sorrel. He looked back over his shoulder at Rycot who was standing beside the sheriff’s body. ‘Take his weapons back into town. Let folk know what
happened and start looking for a new sheriff.’

Rycot nodded. He was eager to get going, having experienced enough action for one day.

One entire lifetime, for that matter.

‘You ready now?’ Will asked. ‘At this rate Lance will have died of old age before we get to him.’

‘Sure,’ Arkansas said, and slid his Spencer into the saddle boot.

‘Just like old times,’ Will said with a smile, and then, as he had so many times in the past, he brought a hand down hard on his horse’s rump and yelled, ‘Rangers ride!’

‘Like old times.’ Arkansas agreed and spurred the sorrel into a gallop.

As soon as they reached his ranch John Lance had ordered Jake, his foreman, to get every man who could shoot armed up with a rifle and six-gun, and ready for Arkansas Smith when he came riding in.

He wanted the man dead.

Whatever else happened he wanted that man dead.

Then he had gone straight into the house where Rebecca confronted him. He hadn’t seen much of her since the incident with Jim. She’d run to her room and refused to speak to him and at the time that had pretty much suited him. She didn’t understand what had to be done in business. There were men who would trample a weak man and take everything he owned. This was a savage land and the only way to prosper was to constantly expand, and building respect from fear did that.

Rebecca looked at him and from his agitated manner she could see that he was troubled.

‘What have you done now?’ she asked.

‘Leave it,’ he commanded and made to go past her but she stood defiant and blocked his way.

‘I won’t,’ she said. ‘Last night a man was killed in this house, murdered at your orders. Now what have you done?’

‘Daughter, I am telling you to stand aside.’

‘No,’ Rebecca said. Last night things had changed between them and they would never be the same again. In fact she had already made up her mind. She was leaving, turning her back on her father and the past. She would never return.

‘Move.’ Firm. Lance looked at his daughter in a way he never had before.

She shook her head.

Lance brought up a hand and slapped his daughter so hard that she was knocked off her feet. He grabbed her by the back of her hair and pulled her, protesting all the way, up the stairs and across the landing to her room. He kicked the door open and then threw her, sobbing, onto the bed.

‘I’ll speak to you later,’ he said and closed and locked the door.

Lance ran back down the stairs and went into the large dining-room at the rear of the ranch house. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the cabinet and tore the cork stopper free. He took a large gulp straight from the bottle and took it with him back into the small room that served as his home office.

He went to the window and looked out to see that Jake had gathered together over a dozen men. He counted thirteen in all. He took another huge gulp from the whiskey and then stumbled out into the hall. Once there he paused to take down his Sharps carbine from the wall and then went outside.

‘Men,’ he yelled and swayed on his feet. ‘I’ll give a one hundred-dollar bonus to the man who kills Arkansas Smith.’

‘We’ll get him, Mister Lance,’ Jake said. ‘Don’t you worry none about that.’

‘I won’t worry,’ Lance said. He was starting to slur his words and he had to hold onto the doorframe to stop himself from falling. He took yet another drink of the whiskey and then wiped his lips on the back of the sleeve.

‘I want that bastard dead!’ he yelled.

‘We’ll get him,’ Jake repeated and then raised his hands for the men to cheer in support. They had to get Lance inside. Like this, he would be a liability when a fight started and more likely to kill himself than anyone else.

‘Good,’ Lance said, and punched the air. For a moment it looked as if he was going to fall over but then he squinted his eyes and pointed. ‘Look, here they come.’

Jake looked over his shoulder and sure enough he saw the men coming. They were riding at speed across the flatlands that led up to Lance’s ranch.

There were only two of them: they were vastly outnumbered.

‘Kill the bastards,’ John Lance yelled, and then disappeared back into the ranch house.

Lance’s ranch house was a large grand-looking structure, built with a mixture of Spanish and English influences. The lower section of the wall was made from adobe blocks but the upper sections were constructed from local lumber. There was a sloping roof on the main ranch house but the outbuildings, although sharing the same basic style, were flat-roofed.

It was not the best place meet an enemy since there were too many places where a man could remain concealed. Arkansas knew this from his previous visit and he slowed his horse almost to a halt just before he got into rifle range.

He motioned for Will to do likewise.

‘How many men do you think we’re up against?’ Will asked.

Arkansas squinted against the sun glare and stared at the sprawling ranch house and its surrounding buildings. It looked quiet – deserted, but he knew that would not be the case. No doubt Lance’s men were
concealed, waiting to catch them in a deadly crossfire as they rode in.

‘Your guess is as good as mine.’

‘It’s a shame we ain’t got more men,’ Will said, and then took the makings from his shirt and rolled and lit a quirly. He blew a thick stream of smoke out between his teeth before asking, ‘How do you want to play this?’

‘Can I have some of that Durham?’ Arkansas asked, ignoring the question, and leaned across and took the leather pouch from his friend. He skilfully constructed a smoke and took a sulphur match to it.

For a few moments they sat there, smoking and watching the Lance place. Still there was no movement. The place shimmered in the late morning sunshine and could very well have been a painting for all the movement evident. Even the landscape surrounding it seemed to be as still as an artist’s impression.

‘Remember that time we went up against Jack Giles’s gang?’ Arkansas asked.

‘Sure do.’ Will nodded and flicked the remains of his quirly away. ‘Down in Lincoln.’

‘Well, there were nine of them and we’re still here. They ain’t.’

Jack Giles and his gang had been terrorizing folk along the Santa Fe Trail, robbing and murdering with seeming impunity from the law. There had been nine of them that night in Lincoln when the two Texas Rangers rode in in search of one of the gang members who was wanted back in Texas for the murder of a
sheriff. As Arkansas had said it had been nine against two and yet when the dust had settled and the cordite cleared from the air it was only the two Rangers who remained standing.

‘And you want to handle this the same way?’

‘Pretty much,’ Arkansas said. ‘We’ll take the fight to them. They won’t be expecting that. Then we get down behind cover as soon as possible. Then we’ve got a chance of spotting who we’re up against.’

‘You ain’t forgot your Ranger training,’ Will said, with a wry smile. He had that old feeling that preempted a battle, that mix of adrenaline and fear. It made him feel alive.

‘Once a Ranger,’ Arkansas said with a grin, ‘always a Ranger.’

Without another word they moved off at a slow trot towards the ranch house. They were both ready to set their horses off in opposite directions should a shot ring out. Each knew what the other would be thinking and they operated as a single entity, joined by their shared experiences of all the times they had faced certain death together and triumphed. They were each an extension of the other and both moved like the well-oiled workings of a revolver.

‘After three,’ Arkansas said.

They each slid their rifles from their respective saddle boots and took the reins of their horses tight in one hand.

‘One.’

The two men looked at each other for a moment and nodded their understanding.

‘Two.’

They led their horses apart so that although side-by-side, they had in fact increased the space between them.

‘Three …’ Arkansas said, let off a shot and, taking the reins in his teeth, filled his free hand with a Colt and started galloping in a zigzag fashion towards Lance’s place.

Will did likewise and between them they kept the hot lead flying.

Fire was returned, but both Arkansas and Will made difficult targets as they jostled back and forth on their horses. It was Arkansas who reached the gates to the stockade first and he brought the sorrel into a jump that easily cleared the fence. Will came in directly behind him but his horse clipped the fence and the beast landed awkwardly, sending him crashing to the hard ground.

Arkansas brought his horse to a sudden halt and let off several shots towards one of the barns and jumped from his horse and ran to his friend. Dust spat up around him as each bullet got that little bit closer than the one before. He saw movement out of the corner of his eye and he turned and shot, just in time to see one of Lance’s men scream and fall forward from the roof of the ranch house.

First blood.

Arkansas reached Will and grabbed him beneath the arm. Together they ran across the courtyard and dived for cover behind the privy.

‘We’re in the shit now,’ Will said, and Arkansas was
glad to see his friend had not lost his sense of humour.

‘Never did get used to your jokes.’

Gunfire seemed to come from all directions and sections of the privy wall suddenly disappeared. Arkansas said a silent prayer and then came out of concealment and fired the Colt in the direction he thought the firing was coming from. He caught sight of a man as he peered out from behind the smallest of the three barns to his left and he fired. His shot was true and the man suddenly threw his arms up as the back of his head exploded onto the wall behind him.

Arkansas dived for the relative safety of the privy.

‘I got another one.’

‘We need to get behind them,’ Will said. ‘See that fence? Should be able to see a target from there.’ He pointed to the corral fence that ran alongside the barn. Beyond it there was an area of greenery where someone had started a garden.

Arkansas nodded. ‘You cover me.’

Will nodded. ‘Go,’ he yelled and emerged from cover himself. He worked the action of the Spencer like the old pro he was and he was only vaguely aware of his friend running behind him. He let off the last of the rifle’s seven and dived back for cover just as a bullet came so close that it took out the heel of one of his boots. He quickly reloaded.

‘Not bad for an old-timer,’ Arkansas shouted back with a cheeky grin and fired off a shot at a man who moments ago had been concealed from view but was now visible besides the porch of the house. The man didn’t even know what hit him and he fell down dead,
a hole straight between the eyes.

Arkansas had to hug the ground when fire came at him from the roof of the barn. Holding a hand over his head he chanced a look upwards and he saw the large man who had been at Will’s place with Lance earlier. He noticed Will take down another man who had run out of cover and was trying to rush the old Ranger, but he just wasn’t quick enough.

The man on the roof started running, vanishing from Arkansas’s view for a moment. But Arkansas preempted the man’s plan. And as soon as he appeared at the other side of the barn, directly above him, and popped his head out for a shot Arkansas blew it clean off.

John Lance suddenly appeared in the doorway of the ranch house and took a startled look around. He had a rifle in one hand and a half-drunk bottle of whiskey in the other. He pulled the trigger of the rifle and sent a bullet up through his porch.

‘Kill the bastards,’ he yelled, slurring his words. He downed another mouthful of the whiskey and then threw the bottle across the yard. He lifted the rifle and fired wildly at nothing in particular and then vanished back inside the house.

‘Hold your fire,’ someone shouted and then emerged from behind the barn, his arms held high. He was followed by another man, then another and.…

Silence fell.

It was over.

Now all that remained was to get John Lance.

Arkansas and Will had disarmed the remaining five men, but there was no need; they weren’t going to fight further. Whatever this war was about, they had decided they wanted no further part in it. Jake was dead and they’d just seen their boss acting like a lunatic. There was no reason to fight on.

Will held his rifle trained on the men who, as instructed, were seated, hands under their rumps, against the barn.

Suddenly the peace was ripped apart when all the windows in lower storey of the ranch house exploded and orange flames followed to lick angrily at the air outside.

‘Mr Lance is in there,’ someone shouted.

‘Let the skunk burn,’ Will said. ‘He’s responsible for all this. It’s no more than he deserves and will save the town the cost of a trial.’

Arkansas looked at the ranch house. The flames had completely taken hold and the fire engulfed the lower floors. He wasn’t sure how it had started –
perhaps a stray bullet had struck an oil lamp inside the house causing the fire to start and spread rapidly. He thought of John Lance, trapped, consumed by the fire. The suddenly he thought of Rebecca. With everything that had been going on he hadn’t given her much thought.

Was she in there?

‘I’m going in,’ he said and threw down his own rifle. He ran across the courtyard and struck the ranch house door hard with a shoulder. The door gave and when he got to his feet it was as if he could have entered the gates of hell itself.

The room to his left was completely engulfed and he felt his eyes sear as he looked into the raging inferno. Everything else was shrouded in a dense cloud of smoke and he had to cover his mouth with the back of his hand and breathe as little as possible.

He could just make out the stairs in front of him and he ran for them. He reached them and had just started up when he felt someone come at him from behind and before he could do anything about it he was pushed to the floor. He hit hard, the wind pushing from his lungs. He felt his attacker’s hands going for his throat and he brought up his own to break the grasp.

It was John Lance and Arkansas could see madness in his eyes as he tried to push him off. At that moment he realized the man was insane and that he had set this fire himself. He intended to burn along with his empire.

He heard screaming from one of the bedrooms.

Rebecca.

Wherever she was she was unable to get out.

Arkansas tried to break free of Lance but the rancher was a powerful man, doubly so in his mania and Arkansas felt light-headed from the lack of clean air. He was weak and feared that at any moment he’d pass out and burn alongside this madman. He could hear the commotion outside, as everyone had joined together to fight the fire.

They would fight in vain, though. The fire had more than a foothold.

It had a free rein.

Rebecca screamed again, frantic, sheer panic.

Arkansas found a small reserve of strength from somewhere and he managed to lift his knees and use his legs to break Lance’s grip. He kicked out suddenly and Lance fell backwards, down the stairs, into the flames.

Arkansas got to his feet and ran up the remainder of the stairs and took them three at the time. The air was slightly better at the top and he took a quick gulp and ran across the landing towards the screaming.

He found the door and he tried it, but it was locked.

Lance had locked her, his own daughter, in the bedroom and then torched the place.

If ever there had been any doubt of his madness then it had long gone: the man was nothing short of a stark raving lunatic.

Arkansas went at the door with his shoulder. At first it refused to give and he pounded it three more times before the wood splintered and he was able to kick the panels in.

Rebecca came out of the room, coughing, spluttering and fell into his arms.

‘Hold it.’

Arkansas turned and saw John Lance standing besides them. He had a shotgun pointed dead centre of them. Behind him the flames had followed him up the stairs and were now licking at the upper ceiling.

‘Don’t be a fool,’ Arkansas said. ‘We’ll all burn to death. Is that what you want? Do you want your own daughter to die? Come on, man.’

Lance started to laugh, great bellowing guffaws. He threw his head back and roared from deep within his stomach. The shotgun waved about perilously in his hand.

At that moment Arkansas knew that he was looking into the eyes of the devil himself. Lance’s brain had snapped.

There was to be no reasoning with him.

‘Daddy,’ Rebecca whimpered and buried her face into Arkansas’s chest.

‘Lance’ Arkansas snapped, ‘put the gun down. We’ll all get out of the bedroom window. Now, before it’s too late.’

For one awful moment Arkansas thought Lance was going to pull the trigger, but then they were all engulfed in a shower of sparks as the ceiling above them gave in. Arkansas couldn’t be positive but moments before entering the bedroom he thought he saw the floor beneath John Lance suddenly give way and swallow the man. The rancher had fallen into the heart of the flames, consumed by an inferno of his own doing.

Arkansas dragged Rebecca across the bedroom he’d only moments ago released her from. He moved as quickly as possible to the window and kicked the glass out. It was some thirty feet to the ground below but he had no time to take care with their fall.

The air was becoming so hot that he could feel his skin blistering and Rebecca was like a rag doll in his arms. They wouldn’t survive more than another few seconds before the smoke claimed them and left them for the hungry flames that would not rest until everything within its path had been consumed.

‘Come on,’ Arkansas said and he pulled her up onto the window ledge. ‘We’ve got to jump.’ But she was no longer hearing him. She went limp in his arms. She had fainted clean away and for the second time Arkansas held the unconscious girl in his arms.

Behind him the flames grew stronger and even hotter still. Smoke piled into the room, the broken window providing ventilation and sucking the noxious fumes out into the afternoon sky.

Arkansas held Rebecca to him and together they leapt out of the window.

That was it: it was all over.

Arkansas allowed Will to help him to his feet just in time to see one of Lance’s men lead Rebecca off to one of the outbuildings. He made to go after her but Will held him back.

‘They’re going to take her into town,’ Will said. ‘With her pa gone she pretty much owns half of Red Rock now. I had no idea she was John Lance’s daughter.’

Arkansas smiled and turned back to look at what was left of the ranch house. The structure had now all but succumbed to the greedy flames and, as he watched, the roof caved in and sent a shower of sparks floating into the sky. The building was totally gutted by the fire and for a moment he thought of John Lance trapped within the inferno. He’d be dead by now – no one could have survived in there.

‘Can you ride?’ Will asked.

Arkansas didn’t think he’d picked up any major injuries in the leap from the window; just a few cuts and bruises. His left shoulder ached, but he didn’t think it was broken. And he could feel swelling forming around his eyes. He coughed and gulped in the clean air.

‘I’ll be fine.’

‘Then let’s saddle up,’ Will said. ‘Ain’t nothing more we can do here. And I suppose you can say justice has been served.’

‘Of a sort,’ Arkansas said. ‘Of a sort.’