“That’s right. I—”
Barnabas giggled. “You’re locked up. Now you know how I f-felt, locked up in that wagon.”
“You have to come into the marshal’s office, find the keys, and let us out of here.”
“Like you let me out last night when I…I asked you to?” Barnabas shook his head. “You s-said I had to st-stay locked up. Now you have to.”
“You don’t understand, Barnabas,” Sam insisted. “Something bad is about to happen—”
“Damn right it is,” Barnabas interrupted. “It’s fixin’ to storm, jus’ like I told you. Big ol’ storm cloud comin’ up from the southwest.” A breeze suddenly swirled dust and litter in the alley. “See? The wind’s pickin’ up.”
“I’m not talking about a storm. Some bad men are going to do something here in Cottonwood—”
Again Sam was interrupted, this time by heavy footsteps from the office. The cell block door swung open. He turned away from the window, not wanting to draw attention to Barnabas.
Linus Grady strode into the cell block, followed by Cimarron Kane, Ambrose Porter, and Calvin Bickford. Sam’s breath hissed between his teeth at the sight of the four men together. His rudimentary theory about there being a connection between the four of them had just been confirmed.
Bickford grinned smugly at Sam. “I’ll bet you thought you’d never see me again, you damn half-breed,” he said. “Bet you didn’t know my mother’s maiden name was Kane, either.”
Sam shook his head. “So you’re all working together.”
“It didn’t start out that way. Ambrose and I had our own deal. But then you ruined that, so when I got away, I headed for Cimarron’s place. I knew it was close by here. I knew he’d been trying to put the competition out of business and take over the moonshining around here, too, so I suggested we throw in together. Once everybody’s dead who knows what was going on before, Ambrose and I will carry on as special marshals and make sure that nobody ever interferes with Cimarron’s business.”
“And I’ll run the end of the operation here in town,” Grady said. “Cimarron and I already had a deal concerning that. All we have to do is get rid of Ike Loomis and that dumb son of his, and I’ll take over the saloon.”
Those details fit right in with the picture that had begun to form in Sam’s mind. These four men were in an alliance of evil and would stop at nothing to get what they wanted, even wholesale murder if it came to that.
“There’s just one loose end,” Grady went on. “That gunhawk friend of yours. Bodine. He’s out there somewhere. We’ll need to deal with him, and once he’s dead, we can dispose of you.”
“You’ll never catch Matt,” Sam said. “Anyway, he’s nowhere near here.”
Cimarron Kane spoke up, rasping, “That’s where you’re wrong, ’breed. He’s gonna come to us, because we got somethin’ he wants.”
“What are you talking about?” Sam asked tensely.
“That Harlow slut,” Kane replied. “We got her down at the doc’s place, too, along with the marshal’s gal and the Loomises. Soon as we get our hands on Bodine, we’ll have everybody we need.” A savage grin tugged at the outlaw’s mouth as he added, “And then the killin’ can commence.”
Chapter 36
Matt took more than an hour to work his way into Cottonwood, utilizing every trick of stealth he had learned from Sam and Medicine Horse, not to mention his own experiences. By the time he reached the back alley that ran behind the buildings along the south side of Main Street, the dark clouds had moved in and could no longer be ignored, although the air itself remained still and heavy for the most part. It had a hot, breathless quality that made the hair stand up on the back of Matt’s neck as he pressed himself against the rear wall of the hotel.
He made his way to the corner and then along the side of the building until he could see some of the street. An atmosphere of tense foreboding that had nothing to do with the weather hung over the settlement. The street was deserted, and the only men he saw along the boardwalks were some of the Kane bunch. Matt stiffened in surprise as he recognized Wiley, Nelse, and Dud Kane, the three brothers Marshal Coleman had arrested a few days earlier.
Matt knew that Coleman wouldn’t have released those prisoners. The fact that they were walking around not only free but also heavily armed told Matt that Cimarron Kane must have released them from the jail. That meant Coleman was either dead or a prisoner himself.
Fear for Sam’s safety went through Matt like a cold chill. He knew that his blood brother was well capable of taking care of himself, but the odds would have been mighty high against Sam when the Kanes rode in to take over the town. Clearly, that was exactly what had happened, and Sam might be dead, too, although Matt hadn’t heard any shots as he was sneaking into the settlement.
He needed to reach the jail, Matt decided. If Sam and Coleman were still alive, maybe that was where they were. As for Frankie Harlow, Matt had no idea where she might be, but the first order of business was to find out if Sam was still alive and join forces with him if he was.
Matt was about to slip back down the narrow passage beside the hotel to the rear alley when another gun- hung hombre walking along the opposite boardwalk caught his attention. He recognized the man as one of the special deputies. Since Bickford had ridden in with Cimarron Kane, that came as no surprise. Kane must have let those prisoners out of jail, too, probably including Ambrose Porter.
Things had really gone to hell here in Cottonwood, Matt thought bleakly, and he would be facing an uphill battle to put them right again.
The Good Lord hadn’t included any backup in Matt Bodine, though, so he would fight to the bitter end. He went back to the alley and started making his way along it.
He had just stepped around the rear corner of the hotel when he almost ran into one of the Kanes. The man must have been sent back here to patrol the alley. His mouth opened to raise a shout of alarm, but before any sounds could come out, Matt struck with blinding swiftness. His fist crashed into the man’s face with stunning power, sending him staggering backward. Matt leaped after him, palming out his left-hand Colt and slamming the barrel against the side of the man’s head. The savage blow did the job. The man went down hard. He was out cold
