The big gundown by J.A. Johnstone

Author:J.A. Johnstone [Johnstone, J.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Train robberies, Western stories, Westerns, Fiction
ISBN: 9780786022779
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
Published: 2010-11-15T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

By nightfall, the whole town was buzzing about the exploits of the Cannon Gang, as the citizens of Titusville had dubbed the outlaws who had attacked the train. Thirsty passengers and members of the train crew had hit the saloons and spread the story, including the way that the stranger called Kid Morgan had almost single-handedly foiled the daring holdup attempt.

After the violent incident in the general store, Glory Sheffield had lost her enthusiasm for looking around the town with Morgan. She had asked him if he would walk her back to the hotel, which he did. She said her good-byes there, none too warmly. Obviously, she had given up on him as a source of diversion. She probably would have switched her attentions to Phil Bateman, Morgan thought, if Bateman and a large group of men hadn’t ridden out of Titusville in the early afternoon, heading to the site of the attack on the train in an attempt to pick up the trail of the outlaws.

The Kid spent the afternoon looking over the town. Titusville appeared to be a prosperous settlement, which meant the Gloriana Mine was successful. All of it represented a steady stream of profits flowing into the pockets of Edward Sheffield. It was easy to see why Sheffield would be a tempting target for outlaws.

Was that all there was to it, though? An uneasy feeling stirred inside Morgan. He sensed there was something he didn’t know yet about the situation.

He took a room in the hotel and made arrangements at the local livery stable for the buckskin. After eating supper at what the hotel clerk told him was the best restaurant in Titusville, Morgan walked along the street to one of the saloons, a place called the Birdcage. He wasn’t sure why the saloon had been dubbed that. He didn’t see a bird or a birdcage anywhere in the big, smoky, crowded room.

Nursing a beer at the bar, Morgan listened to the conversations around him. Not surprisingly, most of them were about the attack on the train by the Cannon Gang. He thought he might pick up some information that could prove useful to him in tracking down the outlaws, but that didn’t seem to be the case. None of the men in the saloon knew who the bandits were, or if they did, they weren’t admitting it.

After a while, Morgan drifted over to a table where a poker game was going on. When a player dropped out and a chair opened up, the dealer gestured toward it, looked at Morgan, and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. Morgan thought Why not? and sat down to take a hand.

His mind wasn’t really on the game, but he played skillfully enough that he won a few hands, staying about even. After a while, one of the other players, a miner by the looks of him, threw in his cards and said, “That’s enough for me. I’m leavin’ while I still got enough money for a drink of whiskey and a woman.

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