Smoke stepped outside and faced the Lightning crew. “This town is off-limits to you and to anyone who works for Red Malone—including Red. I am officially banning any and all of you from Barlow. Take the word back to Red.”
“Big talk, Jensen,” the hand sneered at him. “I’ll see your hide nailed to the wall afore this is over.”
Smoke reached up and took off his badge, handing it to Marbly. “You want to try it now, cowboy? Guns or fists, it makes no difference to me.”
The cowboy, who was going by the name of Dan since he was wanted in several states for cattle rustling and armed robbery, among other things, hesitated.
Smoke smiled, knowing he was giving the man no way out. It was the way of the West that when challenged, you had but two options: fight or be branded a coward. Smoke did not like the code but, in this case, felt he was justified in invoking it.
Dan took off his gunbelt and handed it to a Lightning puncher. He flexed his arms and looked back at Smoke. “You mind if I warm up a little first?”
“I don’t care if you do the Virginia reel,” Smoke told him, and that got a laugh from the gathering crowd, both men and women. “You probably can’t dance any better than you can fight.”
The crowd roared with laughter and Dan flushed in anger.
“I think I’ll just clean your clock,” Dan said.
“Then come on, cowboy.”
Dan tried a sucker punch that brought no response from Smoke. He hooked a left that Smoke blocked and tried to follow through with a right that Smoke flicked away.
Smoke jumped lightly off the boardwalk and waved Dan down to join him.
“Stand still and fight, damn you!” Dan yelled.
“Oh!” Smoke said. “I see. That’s what you want. I thought you were still warming up.”
The crowd loved it and roared their approval.
Dan didn’t think it was a bit funny and stepped in close. Smoke rattled his teeth with a left and put a knot on his head with a right. Dan backed up, shaking his head and spitting out blood.
“I’m waiting to fight,” Smoke taunted him.
Dan charged him with a shout of defiance, and Smoke stuck out a boot and tripped the man, sending him sprawling into the dirt of the street.
The Lightning cook sat his seat on the wagon and shook his head. Dan was gonna get the crap beat out of him for sure, and just as soon as that was over and done with and they got back to the ranch, Cookie was packin’ up his kit and gettin’ the hell gone from the Lightning brand. His oldest boy had been forever trying to get him over into Idaho to help on his horse ranch. This time, by God, he was going. Hadn’t oughtta a stayed this long with this pack of screwballs.
That thought had just crossed his mind when Dan got up from the dirt and went charging and yelling toward Smoke Jensen. The cook grimaced as Smoke poleaxed the puncher with a solid right fist that turned Dan around and sent him stumbling out into the street.
As a matter of fact, the cook thought, there ain’t no reason to go back to the ranch. I just got paid, I got my best clothes on, I’m wearin’ my gun, and I ain’t got nothin’ back there no good for anything no how.
The dull smack of Smoke Jensen’s fist again connecting with Dan’s jaw prompted Cookie to climb down from the wagon seat and walk up toward the stage office. He had more than enough money in his pockets to get a room at the Grand and buy his ticket over to Idaho. Hell with Red Malone and his foolish boy and the whole damn crazy bunch out at Lightning.
Cookie turned in time to see Dan whip out a knife. “Stupid, Dan,” he muttered. “Now Smoke’s gonna kill you.”
“I’ll gut you, Jensen,” Dan screamed his rage and frustration. He stepped closer.
Smoke reached behind his right hand .44 and pulled out a long-bladed Bowie knife. “You sure this is the way you want it?” Smoke asked him.
Dan moved closer, working the blade from side to side. He tried to fake Smoke but Jensen wasn’t falling for it.
“Don’t do this, Dan!” one of the Lightning crew yelled. “It ain’t worth it.”
Dan pressed on, curses rolling off his tongue. He swung the blade and Smoke parried it, the metal clanking as the razor-sharp knives met.
Smoke stepped in and cut Dan from earlobe to point of jaw. “Drop the knife,” he warned the puncher. “Mountain men raised me. I’ve been knife-fighting since I was sixteen.”
“Hell with you!” Dan said as the blood dripped from the cut on his face.
“I don’t want to kill you, boy,”Smoke told him. “Give this up.”
Dan moved in and Smoke cut his knife arm, opening him up from elbow down to hand. Dan screamed as the knife dropped from his numbed and useless hand.
“Get Dr. Turner,” Smoke said to the crowd. “See what he can do with this fool.”
Smoke wiped the blood from his blade and sheathed it. Turning to the Lightning punchers, he said, “You have one minute to get clear of this town. And don’t ever come back.”
Cookie watched from the boardwalk as the bleeding Dan was led to the doctor’s office. “Told you so, boy,” he muttered. “I learned fifty years ago to give mountain men a wide berth.”
