steam, he saw Cynthia standing alone.
“Mr. Jensen, oh, how wonderful, you did come to tell us good-bye,” Cynthia said. “I knew you would.”
“Where is Ken?”
“He’s with Mr. Prufrock,” Cynthia said. “We have had Jay embalmed. We are taking him back to New York.”
“Here he comes,” Matt said.
Hendel came up to join them then and, unabashedly, he put his arm around Cynthia.
“Is everything taken care of, darling?” Cynthia asked.
“Yes, Mr. Prufrock has been invaluable,” Hendel said. “He has made arrangements to ship the body all the way through back to New York.”
“I see that there has been a change in your relationship,” Matt said, indicating the fact that they were standing together with Hendel’s arm around Cynthia.
“A change in the relationship,” Hendel said, “but not a change in the way we feel about each other. It turns out that my love for Cynthia was not unrequited.”
“I felt trapped in the marriage with Jay,” Cynthia said. “I was only able to survive by knowing that Ken was always there by my side. I feel just awful about poor Jay getting killed, but—”
“Life must go on,” Matt said.
Ken nodded. “Yes, life must go on,” he said. “We will wait a respectable length of time. Then we will be married.”
“Board!” the conductor shouted.
“We must go,” Cynthia said. She turned toward the train, then turned back and hugged Matt. “Thank you, Mr. Jensen,” she said. “I don’t know what would have become of us if it hadn’t been for you. If you are ever in New York, please know that you will be welcome.”
“Thanks,” Matt said. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Board!” the conductor called again, and Ken and Cynthia stepped up onto the train. Ken glanced back one more time and waved at Matt.
Matt waited in the station until the train left. Then he mounted Spirit and headed north. He had no particular destination in mind, but it was late fall, and he wanted to get on the trail before an early winter snow closed the passes.
Cotton Pickens Is Back!
The reluctant hero of William W. Johnstone’s classic
SIX WAYS FROM SUNDAY
by William W. Johnstone with J. A. Johnstone Coming in May 2009
Be sure to look for these other upcoming Johnstone Westerns:
THE LAST GUNFIGHTER: SLAUGHTER Coming in March 2009!
BLOOD BOND: DEADLY ROAD TO Y UMA Coming in April 2009!
Chapter One
Them shots across the mountain valley kind of interested me. There was a crackle of shots, and then an answering boom from some heavier artillery. But that boom wasn’t on the breeze much, compared to all that crackle and snap.
Curiosity got the best of me. That’s my weakness. I turned Critter, my ornery nag, toward the ruckus, thinking I’d at least find out who’s shooting at what. Me, I’m a sucker for that stuff and I didn’t have much to do. Maybe I’d get to drill a few rounds myself.
But I sort of doubted it. I was thinkin’ it was another claim-jumping. This here valley had seen some pretty fancy claim-jumping last few months. That was all anyone talked about at Swamp Creek, the little mining town maybe fifty miles south of Butte that was the heart of this gold mining district.
“Critter,” I says, “that’s a bunch of lead flying around, and it sounds like a dozen’s ganged up on one, from the way the noise is coming at me.”
Critter, he farted. He never did give me much credit for being smart.
I sort of wrestled with myself as I headed that direction. What was some cowboy doing getting into a mining war? But I hadn’t been practicing cowmanship for a while now, and thought maybe there might be a job ahead, forty dollars and found, so I proceeded. It was a right peaceful valley, full of sunlight and pine scent on the wind. These here were the Pioneer Mountains, and there were more little gold mines being sunk in the rock hereabouts than I could count. Swamp Creek, the town, sort of mushroomed into a canvas-and-rough plank place overnight, and now all sorts of entertaining types were digging in there, mostly to mine the miners.
The valley was drained by Swamp Creek, which was named for a big old swamp about a mile above town. It was like that creek got constipated for a mile or two there, and spread out every which way. It was said there was no bottom to it, just black muck and more muck in there, and a person would sink in and keep on sinking until the muck closed over his head. It sure was the only swamp around. I steered Critter toward a rocky gray slope that had
