On the Great Plains by Paul Lederer

Author:Paul Lederer
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781480488427
Publisher: Open Road Media

SIX

Ned Whittaker was suffering though a gloomy drunk that morning. Carl and Barstow were no help. Ned wished that their youngest brother, Walt were still alive. Or Deuce. Or Jacob. They were the more reliable of all of the brothers. Deuce and Jacob had stayed on managing the old ranch while the rest of them wandered the plains looking for a quick score. Their last effort had gotten young Walt shot down outside a Bismarck bank and the rest of them had fled empty-handed. It was a tough life, and they had little to show for trying to run shortcuts.

Ned was thinking that it was time to quit riding the outlaw trail. Carl and Barstow might be convinced that their time had passed. Ned had talked them into the wild living, he should be able to talk them out of it.

Nearing fifty, his beard now more gray than black, Ned had just about had enough.

He knew about the shootout on the old ranch, not all of it, but enough to know that Deuce and Jacob had been gunned down. The talk was that the army had done it – why they were involved was not clear to Ned who had been in Colorado at the time. But it was said also that the man who had done the actual shooting was an old prairie wolf named Calvin Mercer and his partner, a Texas gunnie named Rincon. Why this had come about, Ned did not know and never would learn now that both Deuce and Jacob were dead, but one day his path would cross that of those who had done the killing, and the reasons would not matter. The Whittaker family took care of itself, and blood would pay for blood.

‘What are you doing, Ned?’ Barstow Whittaker asked, rising from the bed he had been sharing with his brother, Carl. He rubbed his shaggy head and walked to the table where their morning whiskey sat.

‘Thinking about staying home,’ Ned Whittaker answered. ‘Maybe Deuce and Jacob had the right idea all along. Clean up the old ranch and stick to the place. I, myself, am tired of running from the law, sleeping on rocky ground and eating whatever we happen to run across.’

‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’ Barstow responded, sagging into a chair to drink whiskey from the bottle. ‘You mean you’re ready to go straight?’

‘What’s all of our rambling gotten us, Barstow?’ Ned responded in a booming voice. ‘I don’t know – maybe it was seeing Walt get shot to pieces in that Bismarck job … something. But I’m suddenly tired, Brother.’

‘Maybe you just need some time to rest up,’ Barstow answered, again tilting the bottle.

‘Maybe,’ Ned said wearily. ‘Maybe that’s it. Either way I mean to go back to the ranch for awhile. Like we used to do.’

‘Didn’t you hear?’ Barstow asked, corking the bottle. ‘That fellow told us last night that some nester had taken the place over.’

‘I heard,’ Ned growled. ‘You tell me if that sounds right. Some

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