“Oh!” Mary Ellen said, startled at seeing the gun pointed toward her.
“If he does not come to town within two hours, I will kill this girl,” Shamrock said.
“What? Have you gone crazy?”
“And if I see the sheriff come through the front door, the girl dies.”
“Oh, Miss Parker!” Mary Ellen said in a choked voice.
Meagan held out her hand. “Don’t do anything,” she said. “I’ll get Duff.”
Shamrock looked, pointedly, toward the grandfather clock that stood against the wall.
“Now you have only one hour and fifty-nine minutes. You’d better get started.”
“I’ll be back, Mary Ellen. I promise you, I’ll be back,” Meagan said as she headed for the door.
* * *
Elmer was the first one to see Meagan as she came riding up the road at a gallop. When he stepped out to meet her, he saw that the horse was covered in sweat.
“Here, girl, what’s wrong? Why would you come galloping in like that?” Elmer asked.
“Oh, Elmer, get Duff. He has to come to town!” Meagan said, the tone of her voice reflecting her distress.
Elmer didn’t have to go for Duff, he had just noticed her and was coming to greet her, but when he saw the condition of the horse, and the expression on her face, his smile faded.
“Meagan! What is it, lass?”
“Oh, Duff, Captain Harris is holding Mary Ellen! They say if you aren’t in town by three o’clock, they’ll kill her.”
“They?”
“Lucien Bodine is with him.”
Duff nodded. “I wondered when he might show up. What I don’t understand is his connection to Harris.”
“Duff, I . . .” Meagan started. “You know he wants to kill you. I would say don’t go, but . . .”
“I understand. The lass is in danger. Of course I’ll go.”
“Wang and I will go with you,” Elmer said.
“Not with, ahead of me,” Duff said. “I dinnae want us to be seen riding in together. You and Wang go in alone and . . .”
“I know,” Elmer said. “Take a look around.”
“Aye.”
“I’m going back with you,” Meagan said.
“There is nae need for you to go back. ’Twould be much safer for you here.”
“I promised Mary Ellen that I would be back. I’ll not be going back on that promise.”
Duff nodded. “Aye, Meagan, I understand.”
Duff and Meagan gave Elmer and Wang a fifteen-minute head start, then they started out as well.
* * *
“Here he comes,” Shamrock said, looking through the front window of the dress emporium. “That’s him, the tall feller ridin’ alongside the woman.”
* * *
Duff stopped in front of the leather goods store, which was at the far end of the street Meagan’s Dress Emporium was on. Dismounting, he tied off both his and Meagan’s horses.
“I want you to stay here until this is finished,” he said.
Duke Rudd came out of his leather goods store, and the druggist, Harry White, came out of the apothecary that was next door.
“What’s goin’ on?” Rudd asked.
Duff held his hand out. “Best you stay out of the street,” he said as he loosened the pistol in his holster, stepped out into the middle of the street, and started walking toward the dress emporium.
“Bodine!” he called. “Bodine, I’m the man who killed your brother. If you have an argument, take it up with me and turn the young lass free.”
Duff’s shout alerted several of the citizens of the town who were going about their business on Clay Street, which was Duff’s intention. They hurried off the street, which was his purpose.
“Bodine!” Duff called again.
From the front of Meagan’s store, a rather short, narrow-faced, hollow-cheeked man with a large, hooked nose came outside. He stepped out into the middle of the street.
* * *
Shamrock was watching through the front window of the dress shop, smiling that he had put into motion the event that would kill his brother’s principal enemy. After this, Brad would have to make him a partner in the ranch.
Because he was watching the street, he was no longer paying any attention to the young woman in his charge. Mary Ellen sneaked out through the back door, then locked it behind her to keep him from coming out after her. Once out of the building, she ran down the alley.
* * *
“My brother wasn’t much of a man,” Bodine said in a harsh, raspy voice. “If you hadn’ kilt him, I prob’ly would have gotten aroun’ to it m’ ownself someday. But you done it first, so now I’m goin’ to have to kill you.”
“’N would ye be for tellin’ me, then, Mr. Bodine, if ye had no love for your brother, why ’tis you would be wanting to kill me?”
“It just wouldn’t look good, I mean, me lettin’ you get away with killin’ my own blood like that.”
“Are you sure you’re nae doing this for the bidding of Brad Houser?” Duff asked.
Bodine shook his head. “I ain’t never heard of anyone named Brad Houser.”
“What about Paul Harris?”
“Ain’t never heard o’ him, either. Did you come to talk? Or did you come to settle this thing that’s between us?”
“I came to . . .” That was as far as Duff got before he saw Bodine’s hand start toward his pistol.
For just a split second, Duff wasn’t watching a hand dip toward a pistol, he was seeing Wang’s palm close around a pebble.
The Enfield Mark I revolver seemed to leap into Duff’s hand of its own accord and was spitting flame as Bodine was still in the midst of his draw. Duff saw a little spray of blood from the hole his bullet had put in the middle of Bodine’s chest.
Bodine dropped his gun, slapped his hand over the hole, then looked down with shock and disbelief as the blood streamed between his spread fingers. He sat down, and Duff moved up quickly, to kick the pistol away.
“You beat me,” Bodine said, almost as if fascinated by the fact that it could be done. “I didn’t think anyone could beat me but you . . . you . . .”
He took one final gasping breath, then fell
