“If all goes according to plan. We’re going to take the wagon and make the mob think that we’re headed for Bowtie Canyon so we can stop the train and get on there.”
“But the wagon will be empty,” Thorpe guessed.
Sam nodded. “That’s right. Matt and I will bust out of here with guns blazing and head east, drawing the mob after us. That’s when you and Everett will take Shade the other way on horseback. We’ll rendezvous with you later at that water stop west of here.”
“If you don’t get shot full of holes,” Thorpe said.
“Well, yeah, there’s that chance,” Sam admitted with a shrug. “But there are no guarantees in life, are there?”
“Just that we’ll wind up gettin’ shot at too damn often,” Matt said, but the reckless grin on his face belied the words.
Thorpe thought it over for a few moments and then nodded. “All right. We’ll give it a try. For the life of me, I don’t see anything else we can do. When will we get started?”
Matt looked toward the front doors as the murmur of loud, angry, excited voices in the distance began to grow. “Like the saloon girl said to the padre,” he noted, “it won’t be long now.”
Maggie Winslow had heard Garth plotting with Jeffries and Gonzalez earlier in the day when she visited the outlaw camp, so she knew what was going on now as she watched from the lobby of the hotel, peering anxiously past the curtain she had pulled back from the window.
Men walked out of the saloon and began to congregate in the street, talking loudly among themselves. They looked toward the livery stable as their discussion grew more animated.
Maggie thought about Matt Bodine, his friend Sam Two Wolves, and the two lawmen who were in there along with their prisoner, Joshua Shade. They had to know what was going on, because the talk was all over town about how the outlaws had placed a bounty on their heads.
They were probably aware as well that the local lawman, Marshal Lopez, had ridden out of town earlier, leaving Bodine and the others on their own like a craven coward.
Lopez had claimed that he was just trying to do what was best for his family. Maggie could certainly understand that. She had been spying for the gang for the past twenty-four hours now. It made her feel dirty, as if she were an outlaw herself. But she had no choice except to cooperate if she wanted to protect Ike and Caleb.
Maggie suspected that Garth and the others were somewhere close by now, waiting in the darkness just outside town for the roar of gunshots that would tell them the attack on the barn had started. Would they wait until the shooting stopped to rush in and set Shade free?
The proprietor of the hotel stood behind the desk. He said nervously, “I’d get away from that window if I was you, ma’am. It might not be safe in a few more minutes.”
She knew what he meant. It might not be safe to stand by the window once the bullets started flying.
Her fingers clutched the curtain tighter. She was thinking about what would happen once the mob attacked the jail. The wild young cowboys who had spent the past few hours drinking thought that they would be earning themselves a reward as well as getting their revenge on Matt Bodine.
But it wouldn’t work that way, Maggie suddenly realized. They were fools to trust anybody in Shade’s gang. The outlaws wouldn’t pay off on the bounty Garth had promised.
Instead, it was much more likely they would turn on the town, looting and killing wantonly, as they had done in so many other places. A lot of people would die here tonight, Maggie thought as her heart began to pound harder in her chest. Innocent men, women, and even children…
And weighed against that was the safety of Ike and Caleb, one innocent man and one innocent—oh, so innocent!—child. To save her own family, could she allow the people of Pancake Flats to be duped into participating in their own massacre?
It was the most horrible question she had ever been forced to ask herself.
But she didn’t have to answer it, because at that moment someone yelled, and guns began to roar.
With no time to waste, Matt and Sam had gone over to the wagon as soon as they decided on the plan with Thorpe and Everett. They stood behind the wagon with their rifles trained on the door as the marshal unlocked it.
“Come out of there, Shade,” Thorpe ordered harshly as he swung the door open.
Shade came out, all right. Like a mountain lion springing on an unsuspecting deer, the outlaw burst from the wagon like a shot. Mouthing obscenities, Shade slammed into Thorpe and knocked him over backward. He landed on top of Thorpe and clawed at the lawman’s throat.
Shade got his fingers fastened around Thorpe’s windpipe, but he didn’t have time to tighten them into a choke hold. Matt stepped up and brought the butt of his Winchester crashing down on Shade’s head. Shade went limp, collapsing on top of Thorpe.
“Get this crazy, foul-smelling bastard off me!” Thorpe yelled.
Shade smelled bad, all right. They had stopped often to let him relieve himself, and he had a bucket inside the wagon for that purpose, too. Evidently, though, he had stopped using it.
Matt and Sam both wrinkled their noses in disgust as they grasped Shade’s arms and hauled him off Thorpe. They dumped the unconscious man on the hard-packed dirt floor of the stable, and didn’t worry about being gentle in how they did it.
“He’s like a wild animal that’s been caged,” Thorpe said as he got up and brushed himself off. “I’d almost feel sorry for him if he wasn’t responsible for the deaths of probably a hundred innocent people, maybe more.” Thorpe shook his head. “Get him on a horse.”
Matt and Sam lifted Shade into the saddle of one of the extra horses they had gotten ready to ride earlier. Then Everett held the unconscious man in place while Matt and Sam tied him.
