Benedict and Brazos 29 by E. Jefferson Clay

Author:E. Jefferson Clay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: louis lamour, colt 45, western action, action heroes, piccadilly publishing, old west fiction, best westerns ebook, terry w johnston
Publisher: Piccadilly

Chapter Seven – Chiplin Breaks Out

NEWS OF THE blockade of Rebel River spread swiftly through Fortitude Valley with far-reaching results.

The company had staked everything on the cheap and rapid method of transporting its cut timber down the waterway which linked the valley with the outside world.

Persons unknown had, with the use of dynamite, dealt the timber outfit a crippling blow. Other ranchers who had been contemplating offers for their timber by the company, now decided the lumber business was doomed and sought to patch up relations with their friends of the Cattlemen’s Association, who had been regarding them as potential traitors.

In Medicine Lodge, the big question next day was, “Is the Lumber Company finally washed up?”

Other rumors drifted in during the day. Benedict and Brazos had been sighted combing the lofty slopes and ridges of the Skyline Mountains above the Rebel River. It was suggested the company might be seeking more evidence of sabotage.

More fuel was added to the gossips’ fire when Coe Chiplin rode into town alone in the late afternoon in search of Solway Booth. But Booth, who’d been busy all day long was suddenly nowhere to be found, and Chiplin finally left to the accompaniment of relieved sighs all round. The towering parolee had looked and acted like a man with murder on his mind.

“Where is Solway Booth?” everybody wanted to know after Chiplin had gone. “Why did he go to ground thataway?”

Nobody seemed to know. But Solway Booth stayed well and truly out of sight until just on dusk when the stage from the south rolled in and Booth emerged, seemingly from nowhere, to welcome its solitary passenger.

More gossip. The stranger who stepped down to shake Booth’s hand with a steely grip, brought with him the chilly breath of the graveyard. Dressed in dusty black, with a sunken, cadaverous face and feverish eyes, he wore double Peacemakers and carried a rifle in the crook of his arm.

The stranger had gunman written all over him, and when a harried Sheriff Shepherd attempted to check out the new arrival’s credentials, he was given the name Slade Dobson and had to be content with that.

The arrival of Dobson rounded out a bad day for Jim Shepherd. The sheriff had spent the entire day on the go, examining the log-jam site, questioning cattlemen, shouldering criticism and a leavening of abuse from lumber company people when he visited the Whetstone. Just about everybody, the sheriff included, believed that the cattlemen were responsible for the Alkali Cliff avalanche. But whoever had done it had covered his tracks well. Shepherd had interrogated East Mesa boss, Harley Jones, at length, but had come away convinced that the man had had nothing to do with the log-jam, though obviously well pleased with the result.

And Jim Shepherd’s working day wasn’t over yet.

Tension stalked the streets of Medicine Lodge that night. Cattlemen were everywhere and were in abrasively high spirits as they discussed what they regarded as the death-knell for the Fortitude Valley Lumber Company. Conflicting with

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