Gun Law Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  PART 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  PART 2

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  PART 3

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Teaser chapter

  SHOOTING GALLERY

  Dahl saw Kern getting up from the dirt at the bottom of the steep stairway. He saw him stagger back and forth like a drunk, ranting, screaming curses toward the open door high above him. Half of the handrail had been torn away from the stairs by Kern’s fall. Miraculously, through it all, he’d managed to hang on to his Colt.

  Kern took careful aim, at arm’s length. But Dahl swung the dun hard to the left and hurled himself from the saddle in the opposite direction. He heard the first bullet slice through the air dangerously close to his head as he left the saddle. When he hit the ground, he went into a roll with bullet after bullet kicking up dirt behind him.

  When he stopped rolling, he landed prone on his stomach, both elbows supporting him. His Colt bucked once in his right hand. . . .

  SIGNET

  Published by New American Library, a division of

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  First published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  First Printing, April 2011

  Copyright © Ralph Cotton, 2011

  eISBN : 978-1-101-51359-0

  All rights reserved

  REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  For Mary Lynn . . . of course.

  PART 1

  Chapter 1

  Kindred, New Mexico Territory

  Neither of the two men standing at the bar saw Sherman Dahl ride into town. They tipped shot glasses at each other, throwing back mouthfuls of fiery rye. Sliding their empty glasses away, they raised heavy mugs of beer and drank through an inch of cold silky foam.

  “Ahhh . . . Damn, this is living,” said one to the other.

  The other man grinned and replied through a foamfrosted mustache, “You’re by-God right it is.”

  Outside, Dahl stepped down from his tan dun and spun its reins to a wooden hitch rail out in front of a tack and saddle shop next door to the Lucky Devil Saloon. He pulled a Winchester repeater from its saddle boot. The tack shop owner wiped his hands on his leather apron when he saw Dahl step onto the boardwalk, but he looked on in disappointment as Dahl walked past his open door to the saloon.

  Dahl levered a round into his rifle chamber and stepped back for a second while two cattle buyers walked out through the saloon’s batwing doors. The buyers looked him up and down and moved on. One took a cigar from his lips and gave a curious nod.

  “It doesn’t look good for somebody,” he said, noting the serious look on Dahl’s face.

  The two walked on.

  At the bar, one of the drinkers, a former Montana range detective named Curtis Hicks, grinned and wiped the back of his hand across his foamy lips.

  “Tell the truth,” he said to his companion, Ernie Newman, “if it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t be standing right here today, would you?” He poked a stiff wet finger up and down on the bar top as he spoke.

  “I don’t deny it,” said Newman. “You were right about this place.”

  “Damn right I was right!” said Hicks. He took another deep swig of beer.

  “I’m obliged,” said Newman.

  “Yeah? Just how obliged?” Hicks asked bluntly.

  “As obliged as I should be,” said Newman. He gave Hicks a guarded look. “But I ain’t kissing nothing that belongs to you.”

  “You know what I mean . . . ,” Hicks said. He rubbed his thumb and fingertips together in the universal sign of greed. “Every act is worth its balance.”

  “I don’t know what that means.” Newman shook his head, sipped his beer. “The fact is, you was asked to bring a good man or two with you. So I might just have done you a favor standing here today.”

  “That ain’t how I see it,” said Hicks.

  “See it how it suits you.” Newman shrugged. “I’ll do the same.”

  “You son of a bitch!” Hicks growled.

  “Say it again. I dare you!” Newman’s hand went to his holstered gun butt.

  Both men heard the rustle and scuffle of boots as men cleared away on either side of the bar from them. The saloon owner ducked down behind the bar, crawling away in a hurry.

  But before either man could make a move, Dahl’s Winchester exploded from where he’d stepped inside the swinging batwing doors.

  Dahl’s first shot nailed Newman in the heart.

  Hicks watched as the impact of the bullet flung Newman up onto the bar. He swung around toward Dahl, snatching his Remington from its holster. But the gun never cleared leather. It fell from his hand back down into a tooled slim-jim holster as Dahl’s next shot hammered him backward against the bar and dropped him dead on the floor.

  “Good Lord Almighty!” the saloon owner cried out, pulling himself up from the floor at the far end of the bar. Bullets had shattered the mirror behind him. Blood had sp
lattered the wall. “Somebody’s gonna pay for this!”

  He’d jerked a sawed-off shotgun from under the bar and held it in his shaking hand, but when Dahl swung his rifle barrel toward him, the saloon owner turned the shotgun loose as if it were hot and let it fall to the floor.

  Dahl lowered the rifle barrel, having levered a fresh round into the chamber. “Where’s Ned Carver and Cordell Garrant?” It was a question for anyone listening.

  “Cordell Garrant is dead,” said a voice from a corner table. “He died a week ago from the fever.”

  Dahl swung around to face the voice as a man wearing a long swallowtail suit coat and a battered derby hat rose slowly from a chair, his hands chest high.

  “Ned Carver left town three nights ago,” the man said quietly. “Must’ve known somebody was coming for him.”

  “Nice try, Ned,” said Dahl. The rifle exploded again. The shot flung the man backward from the table. His long coat flew open, revealing the sawed-off shotgun he never got the chance to draw.

  “Holy Jumping Moses . . . !” shouted the saloon owner, seeing more blood splatter on the wall as customers once again ducked away and scrambled out of range.

  Dahl noticed one man look past him, wide-eyed in fear, and realized there was a gun pointed somewhere behind him. He levered his own gun and swung in a fast full circle.

  But he wasn’t fast enough. He saw the big Russian pistol pointed toward him at arm’s reach; he saw it buck; he saw the streak of blue-orange fire. He felt the bullet hit him high in the chest—heart level. A second bullet hit him no more than an inch from the first, and he flew backward, broken and limp, like some rag doll.

  Dahl’s rifle flew from his hand; he hit the floor ten feet back from where he’d stood.

  “I’m Cordell Garrant,” the gunman said.

  He stepped across the floor toward Dahl, who lay struggling to catch his breath, his right hand clutching his chest over the two bullet holes. He cocked the smoking Smith & Wesson Russian revolver in his hand and started to raise it for a third shot.

  “Guess what. Ned was lying,” he said with a flat grin. “I ain’t dead.”

  Dahl managed to roll an inch sideways. His right hand dropped from his chest and reached inside his corduroy riding jacket. “No, he, wasn’t. . . .” His voice was strained, but he made his move quick, swinging out a .36-caliber Navy Colt and firing.

  “Damn it to hell!” the saloon owner shouted, seeing the bullet bore through Garrant’s right eye and string a ribbon of blood and gore out the back of his head.

  Garrant hit the floor, dead. Blood pooled in the sawdust beneath him.

  Dahl let the Navy Colt slump to the floor beside him. He released a tense breath and felt the room tip sideways and darken around him. The pain in his chest seemed to crush him down into the floor.

  Huddled in a corner of the saloon, a young dove named Sara Cayes stood up warily and ventured forward. Around her the stunned drinkers came slowly back to life.

  “Oh my, he’s alive!” she gasped, looking down at Dahl, seeing his chest rise and fall with labored breathing.

  “He won’t be for long,” the enraged saloon owner said. He snatched the shotgun up from the floor, shook sawdust from it and walked forward, raising it toward Dahl.

  “You stay away from him, Jellico,” Sara Cayes said, hurriedly stooping down over Dahl, protecting him. “Can’t you see the shape he’s in?”

  “Get out of my way, whore,” said the saloon owner, trying to wave her aside with the shotgun barrel. “All I see is the shape my place is in.”

  “He’s unarmed, Jellico!” the dove cried out, huddling down even closer over Dahl.

  “Suits me,” he said, cocking both hammers on the shotgun. “Now get back away from him, else you’ll never raise your ankles in this place again.”

  “She said leave him alone, Jellico,” said a booming voice from the batwing doors. “While you’re at it, empty your hand. Shotguns make me cross, especially when they’re pointed at me.”

  The saloon owner, his customers and the dove all turned and faced the newly appointed town marshal, Emerson Kern. The lawman stood with a hip slightly cocked, his left hand holding open one of the batwing doors. His right hand lay poised around the bone handle of a big Colt .45, holstered on his hip.

  Jellico’s eyes met the marshal’s, and he immediately lowered the shotgun barrel straight down toward the floor, but he deliberately didn’t put it aside. Sara Cayes rose a little over Dahl but remained in position in case the saloon owner tried anything.

  “Marshal Kern, look what this murdering dog did to my place!” said Jake Jellico. He swung a nod around the blood-splattered saloon.

  But the marshal was still interested in the saloon owner’s shotgun, and the fact that it hadn’t left his hand. He raised his revolver from its holster and cocked it toward Jake Jellico.

  “If you don’t drop the gun, I bet I stick a tunnel through your forehead,” he said.

  “Easy, Marshal,” said Jellico. He stooped and laid the shotgun down on the floor. “You can’t blame me for wanting to kill him, armed or unarmed.”

  With the shotgun out of play, the marshal lowered his Colt and walked over to Dahl. The young dove eased back and allowed him a better view of Dahl’s face and the bullet holes in the front of his shirt.

  “Not a big bleeder, is he?” said Kern.

  “He’s not bleeding at all,” said a man among the drinkers who gathered around closer.

  Sara Cayes gasped slightly, noting for the first time bullet holes, but no blood.

  “Step back, sweetheart,” said Kern, touching the toe of his boot gently to the young woman’s shoulder, pushing her aside the way he would a cat or dog.

  Sara moved back grudgingly, yet she stayed stooped down near the unconscious gunman. Dahl lolled his head back and forth in the sawdust and murmured something under his breath. Even with him knocked out and helpless on the floor, Sara thought him to be the most handsome man she’d ever seen. Too handsome for this place. . . .

  “What—what does this mean, Marshal?” she asked in a halting voice, staring at the bloodless bullet holes.

  “What does this mean . . . ?” Kern echoed, squatting down beside her. He poked a probing finger down into a bullet hole and shook his head. “I’ll tell you what it means.” He stood up and looked around at the gathered crowd. “I’ll tell all of you what it means.” He gestured a hand around at the bloody aftermath of the gunfight. “It means the town of Kindred is going to have to get busy gathering up the guns if we’re ever going to a respectable, upstanding community.”

  “Here we go,” a voice whispered in the crowd.

  “What’s that?” Kern asked, taking a step forward toward the man who made the remark. “You got something you want to say, Dandy?”

  “No, Marshal,” said Ed Dandly, owner and manager of the Kindred Star Weekly News. He backed away as the marshal moved forward. “But it’s Dandly, not Dandy,” he corrected.

  Kern ignored him. “What I’m saying, gentlemen”—he settled back in place beside the unconscious Dahl—“is that this sort of thing is going to just keep happening so long as we continue allowing guns to be carried on the streets of this town.”

  “The marshal’s right,” said a voice.

  Kern raised a boot and rested it on Dahl’s shoulder. Sara tried to shove the boot away, but a cold look from the marshal halted her.

  “I might not know what this was about,” Kern said for all to hear. “But I can tell you straight up that it would not have happened if these men’s guns had all been hanging on pegs in my office instead of hanging on their hips.”

  “For the record, is this where you’re going to tell us that as soon as our new mayor takes office, this sort of thing is going to stop?” Ed Dandly asked. He whipped out a pencil and a small leather-bound writing pad.

  “Yeah, I’ll say that,” said Kern. “I’ll say it, because it’s the truth.” Again, he took a threatening step toward the newsman. “T
he people voted Coakley into office to clean this town up, and by thunder, that’s what he’s going to do!”

  But this time the newsman stood his ground, knowing he was doing his job.

  “No need to come closer, Marshal. I can hear you just fine from there,” Dandly said, scribbling as he spoke.

  The marshal stopped, realizing that whatever he said or did now would be in the next edition of Dandly’s weekly newspaper.

  “So long as there are guns carried, there will be guns fired,” Kern said stiffly. “There will be gunfights just like this, and people will die. Some of them will be innocent bystanders like all of you.” He looked around the saloon from face to face. “Thank goodness, Mayor Coakley and I will be changing all this. That’s what I’m saying.”

  Sherman Dahl moaned beneath the marshal’s boot.

  “Marshal, we need to get him some help,” Sara Cayes said.

  “You go do that, Sara,” the marshal said. He looked around at the gathered townsmen and said, “Some of you drag these bodies out into the street, so Jake can get this place cleaned up and get to serving you again.”

  “I’m sticking with Sara and this man,” said Ed Dandly, scribbling on the pad. “If he lives, I’ll find out what this was all about.”

  “You do that, Dandy,” said Kern. He gave the newsman a cold stare. “Maybe you’ll find out what I said is true, if you’ll look at it with your eyes open.”

  “I can assure you, Marshal Kern, my eyes are always open,” said Dandly. “If men can’t carry guns, what’s to keep them safe?”

  “Safe from what?” said Kern.

  “Why, safe from the wilds, Marshal—safe from savages, safe from one another.”

  “That’s the law’s job,” Kern said, tapping a thumb against the badge on his chest. “It’s my job to keep all of you safe. That’s what I was appointed to do, and that’s what I will do.”