pounded after the wagon.
Ike had been scared plenty of times in his life, including earlier today. But he had never been as flat-out terrified as he was when bullets started whining through the air near his head. His heart was racing so hard, he felt like it was about to climb right up his throat and burst out of his mouth.
At the same time, he wasn’t just frightened for himself. He was scared for Maggie and Caleb, too. He glanced over at Marshal Thorpe, who was saying, “Whip that team up harder, Winslow! Damn it, make ’em run!”
Ike bit back a groan of despair. He knew what he was supposed to do. As Thorpe twisted around on the seat beside him and leveled the shotgun back over the top of the wagon, Ike knew he could slip the gun out of the holster on his hip, raise the weapon, and put a bullet in the marshal’s head before Thorpe could stop him.
If he did that, the other deputies might give up the fight and run for their lives, rather than face the outlaws. Joshua Shade would be free, and maybe…just maybe…he would spare Ike’s life, and the lives of Ike’s wife and child.
On the other hand, Shade was too loco to predict what he might do. He could have all three of them tortured to death just to amuse himself.
The other problem was that Ike had never even shot at another human being, let alone killed anybody. He had thought that he could do it when he believed that his family’s safety depended on him being a killer, but when the time had come, he had frozen just as he started to reach for his gun.
Then Thorpe started yelling at him to whip up the team, and instinctively Ike had obeyed. Now the chase was on, with the outlaws closing in from the right, a huge dust cloud boiling up from the hooves of their galloping horses.
The outriders had swung around so that all of them were now between the wagon and the outlaws who were closing in from the west. Their rifles barked and cracked as they returned the gang’s fire.
To Ike’s horror, one of the deputies suddenly flung his arms in the air, throwing his rifle away, and toppled out of the saddle. Ike caught a glimpse of blood spurting from the man’s throat where a bullet had torn it open, but then the grisly sight was lost in the dust.
Ike suddenly wondered what the outlaws had done with Maggie and Caleb. Had they brought the two of them along, so that they were in danger from the bullets buzzing through the air like lethal bees, or were they somewhere behind the gang in relative safety? Ike wished he could see them again, just one more time, but he hoped they were well out of the line of fire, even if it meant he would never lay eyes on them again in this lifetime.
“Keep those mules moving!” Thorpe yelled at him over the rolling thunder of hoofbeats. The marshal got his knees up on the seat and started crawling out onto the top of the enclosed wagon bed.
What the hell was he doing? Ike glanced over his shoulder and saw that Thorpe had flattened out and drawn his pistol, although he still had the shotgun at his side. Thorpe edged over to the side so that he could reach down to one of the little windows that let light and air into the wagon.
He was going to kill Shade!
That thought sprang into Ike’s head. If the outlaws closed in and looked like they were about to stop the wagon, Thorpe planned to shoot through the window and kill the prisoner rather than allow him to be freed.
With Shade dead, the gang would have no reason at all to spare the lives of Maggie and Caleb. Ike couldn’t let that happen. He knew now what he had to do. He twisted on the seat and dragged the Colt out of its holster. Thorpe wasn’t even looking at him. It would be a simple matter to shoot the marshal.
But as Ike turned, holding the gun in his right hand, the reins slipped out of his left. He made a grab for them, but missed as they fell to the floorboard of the driver’s box. The mules were running flat out now, and if the reins slid off the box, Ike would have no way of stopping the team. He lunged after the lines.
At that moment, the wagon hit a rough spot in the trail, jolting heavily as it bounced. Ike was already off balance as he reached for the trailing reins. He felt himself thrown from the seat, and something crashed into his head with stunning force. The pain filled his entire being, washing everything else away, and swept him along with it into oblivion.
Chapter 23
Matt and Sam pulled their rifles from the saddle boots as they raced toward the wagon, closing in from the east as the outlaws closed in from the west. They still had to deal with the owlhoots who were pursuing them, however, and that problem became more pressing as a bullet tugged at the sleeve of Matt’s shirt.
“We ought to do something about those varmints behind us!” he called across to Sam as they galloped side by side. “Some of those slugs are comin’ a mite too close for comfort!”
Sam nodded. “I was thinking the same thing! On three?”
“One, two, three!” Matt shouted.
The blood brothers hauled back on the reins as the same time, pulling their mounts around in sharp turns that would have sent most horses tumbling out of control. Matt and Sam had trained their animals for this very maneuver, though, and they stayed upright, coming to a dead stop with Matt and Sam facing back toward their pursuers.
Winchesters came up as if synchronized, socketing themselves against the shoulders of the blood brothers. The outlaws realized they were charging right into the barrels of those rifles and tried to react, but they were too late.
The whipcracks of sound erupted so close together, they might have been mistaken for one shot. Flame spurted from the muzzles of the Winchesters as Matt and Sam fired.
And both outlaws went backward off their horses, punched out of the saddles by the .44-40 slugs that smashed into their chests.
“That takes care of those two,” Matt said as he lowered his rifle.
