“Wait right here,” Lathum said.
“Wait for what?”
“Let’s put a bullet in his head, just to make sure.”
Matt heard the hammers come back on the two pistols, and he waited but an instant before he suddenly threw himself into a roll to his right.
His timing had been perfect—both Lathum and Pugh fired at the same instant he had rolled. The two bullets plowed into the rocky ground where he had been but an instant before. Matt fired twice, the shots coming so close together that it sounded as if there had been only one shot.
Lathum and Pugh went down, both of them dead before they hit the ground.
“Matt!” Cynthia called out, relieved to see that he had not been killed.
“Cynthia, stay where you are!” Matt shouted back. He hoped to get a shot at the third assailant, but the sound of retreating hoofbeats told him that whoever it was was running away.
The sun was setting and the shadows were long when Matt and Cynthia rode down Central Street in Phoenix. They were recognized as soon as they rode into town, and by the time they reached the hotel, nearly one hundred people had turned out to welcome her back.
Bixby and Hendel were standing in front of the hotel, and the expressions on their faces could not have possibly been further apart. Hendel’s expression was of absolute joy. Bixby wore an expression of disgust.
“I hope you don’t think you are going to get a reward for this,” Bixby said. He smiled, a humorless smile. “Remember, you are the one who asked me to withdraw the reward.”
“I did not bring her back for the reward,” Matt replied.
“Why did you bring her back at all?”
“What? Bixby, what are you saying?” Hendel gasped.
“Look at her, dressed like an Indian and filthy,” Bixby said. “She is soiled goods. If she had any sense of self- respect, she would have killed herself before she let those filthy Indians touch her.”
Matt was about to tell Bixby that the Indians didn’t touch her, but Cynthia held her hand out to stop him. “Is that what you truly think, Jay?” she asked. “Do you think that just because I was with the Indians, I am soiled goods?”
“Indeed I do,” Bixby said coldly. “I want nothing more to do with you. When we return to New York, I will have my lawyer draw up a bill of divorcement.”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Mr. Bixby,” Ken Hendel said in a calm and resolute voice.
“Oh? And why not?”
“I would remind you, Mr. Bixby, that the money you have been so freely spending is in fact Cynthia’s money.”
“Cynthia’s money?” Bixby replied. He chuckled. “For an accountant, you have a lot to learn. Once we were married, the money became mine.”
Hendel shook his head. “I am afraid you are wrong, sir. By arrangement with her late father, I constructed the estate in such a way as to fully protect Mrs. Bixby. If you divorce her, you will lose everything.”
“Well, I didn’t really mean to divorce her, I was just expressing my displeasure over—” Bixby started to say, but he was unable to finish the sentence because a dark hole suddenly appeared in his forehead and he fell back, dead from a bullet to his brain.
“Jensen, you son of a bitch!” Pogue Willis shouted from the far end of the street. “That was meant for you!”
“Cynthia, Hendel, get down!” Matt shouted, drawing his pistol.
Hendel pushed Cynthia down, then lay on top of her, protecting her body with his as more bullets flew by.
Cynthia and Hendel weren’t the only ones to get out of danger. Those who had gathered on the street to welcome Cynthia back from the Indians suddenly found themselves in the middle of a gun battle, and with curses and screams, they hurried to either side of the street to get out of the way.
Once the street was cleared, only Matt and Willis remained, and they found themselves facing each other about twenty-five yards apart. Both had their pistols in their hands, but Willis held up his left hand.
“Put your gun in your holster, Jensen,” Willis said. “If we’re goin’ to do this, let’s do it right. I know damn well I can beat you.” Willis holstered his own gun.
“What good would it do you if you do beat me?” Matt asked, putting his pistol in his holster. “The entire town just saw you murder Bixby. I’m either going to kill you, or you’re going to hang, one or the other.”
“Yeah, that’s just it,” Willis said. “I ain’t goin’ to hang.” Without a call, Willis dipped his hand toward his pistol. Because he hadn’t called it, he had a moment’s advantage over Matt, and his gun was in his hand as quickly as was Matt’s.
They fired simultaneously.
Willis allowed a satisfied smile to play across his face. “You weren’t all that fast,” he said.
The smile left his face, to be replaced by an expression of pain. Then he fell forward, facedown in the dirt.
“No, but I was more accurate,” Matt said as he slipped the pistol back into the holster.
The westbound train was sitting at the Maricopa depot, venting steam. As Matt walked through a cloud of
