Authors: J. T. Edson
Running Irons (16 page)
“Well, that’s the end of it, Calam, gal,” Danny said as he and the girl rode side by side out of Caspar County. “It’s a pity we couldn’t stay on for Tommy and Mousey’s wedding. At least the folks
raised a collection that’ll give them a good start, for Tommy’s part in ending the cow stealing.”
“Sure,” agreed Calamity. “There’s times I wonder what it’d be like to marry and settle down.”
“Why not try it and see?”
“I’d never marry anybody who’d be fool enough to marry a gal like me,” grinned Calamity. “Look at all the fun I’d miss. Say, I feel a mite sorry for Ella Watson. She was a dead game gal, even if her tracks ran crooked. And she gave me a danged good whirl. Wonder if she learned her lesson?”
Years later word reached Calamity of another cow stealing gang operating in Wyoming and following the Caspar County methods of using saloon-girls to ensnare the cowhands into the stealing. Then came news that the irate ranchers had caught and hung the man and woman involved. People called her Cattle Kate; but Calamity knew better, reckoning that Ella Watson had failed to change her ways and so met a cow thief’s end.
J.T. EDSON
brings to life the fierce and often bloody struggles of the untamed West. His colorful characters are linked by the binding power of the spirit of adventure—and hard work—that eventually won the West. J.T. Edson has proven to be one of the finest craftsmen of Western storytelling of our time.
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This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
RUNNING IRONS
. Copyright © 1965 by Brown Watson, Ltd. Copyright © 1968 by Transworld Publishers. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Adobe Digital Edition April 2009 ISBN 978-0-06-193223-6
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Saint: Cow thief’
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Told in
Trail Boss
by J. T. Edson.
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Told in
The Fastest Gun in Texas
by J. T. Edson.