Showdown by William W. Johnstone

Author:William W. Johnstone [Johnstone, William W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington
Published: 2016-08-10T04:00:00+00:00

Twenty

Frank’s hand closed around a chunk of wood he’d picked up. Jones opened the door to the outhouse and set the lantern inside, on the floor. Frank quickly and silently moved up behind the man and smacked the outlaw on the head. He caught him before he could tumble to the ground. Stretching the outlaw on the ground, he jerked Jones’s six-gun from leather, stuck it behind his own gunbelt, then quickly pulled the man’s belt from his britches and secured his hands behind his back. He closed the door, then dragged Jones a dozen yards behind the outhouse and left him. He didn’t know if he’d fractured Jones’s skull and if the man might be dying . . . and he didn’t care. Kidnappers and rapists and murderers were among those who deserved no mercy, and Frank sure as hell wasn’t going to give them any.

One down, Frank thought. Thirty or so to go.

He figured he had maybe fifteen minutes at the most before somebody would get curious about Jones and come outside to check on him.

Frank once more slipped up to the boarded-up window and looked through the crack. He could see four guards, widely separated, one on each side of the large room. There was no way he could shoot them all and get the women into the timber. The other gunhands in the town would be all over him before he could accomplish that.

Frank was stymied as to what to do next.

He listened as the bootsteps of several men struck the wood of the old boardwalk, then faded as the men stepped off the boardwalk. He could faintly hear the sounds of talking. Then the conversation grew louder. The men were approaching the church.

Damn! Frank thought. Now what?

He slipped back into the darkness, circled around to the far side of the church, crouched beneath another boarded-up window, and waited and listened. He heard the front door open.

“Everything all right here, Woolsey?” a man asked.

“Okay,” Woolsey replied.

“Where’s Jones?”

“In the crapper. Did y’all find the monster?”

Brief cussing followed that, then a moment of laughter. “There ain’t no monsters, Woolsey. But a few boys damn shore believe it. They’re talkin’ ’bout pullin’ out come mornin’. Sonny’s tryin’ to talk some sense into ’em now.”

“How’s Claude and Jeff?”

“Claude is all right. Looks like Jeff ain’t gonna make it. His head is all busted and swole up. He’s talkin’ crazy stuff.”

“No creature did that to them boys.”

“No. Sonny figures it’s Morgan.”

“Morgan! Here?”

“Yeah.”

“That ain’t good news,” another man said. “Morgan ain’t afraid to tackle a tornader.”

“He can’t fight thirty of us. Sonny’s thinkin’ up a plan now if he tries it.”

“If that is Morgan out there slippin’ around, he ain’t tryin’ it, Brownie, he’s doin’ it!”

“Relax, Davis. Just take it easy . . .”

“Easy, hell!” Davis came right back. “I don’t like the idea of Frank Morgan slippin’ around in the dark. I’d rather it was a monster.”

“None of you will get away with this,” a woman said, her voice firm and strong.

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