Showdown at Hole-In-the-Wall (Ranger Sam Burrack Western) - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Ralph Cotton has been an ironworker, second mate on a commercial barge, a teamster, a horse trainer, and a lay minister with the Lutheran church. He’s written six historical novels in the critically-acclaimed Jetson Nash series, one of which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. He lives in Corydon, Illinois.

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Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

PART 1

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

PART 2

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

PART 3

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

PART 4

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

UNNATURAL BORN KILLER

“You won’t be going anywhere, old man,” the robber said, grabbing Glick’s lapel. “You’ll be dea—”

His words stopped short as Glick’s hands moved in a blur. The robber felt the Dutchman’s thin arm wrap around his like a serpent, and suddenly Glick was behind him. The robber felt his back pressed against the foul-smelling old man, and the sharp tip of the dagger pressed against his ear. He smelled sour breath as Glick spoke, “There now, aren’t you ashamed, drawing an Arkansas toothpick on an elderly gentleman?”

The robber rose onto his tiptoes to keep the blade from going into his skull with his own hand still holding the dagger. The Dutchman had his arm entwined in such a manner that it would cause the robber to bring about his own death. He was locked in a death hold, held there by strength the likes of which he’d never encountered.

He felt as if he had stumbled upon something inhuman. . . .

SIGNET
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First published by Signet, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

First Printing, March 2009

Copyright © Ralph Cotton, 2009

All rights reserved

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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eISBN : 978-1-101-01471-4

For Mary Lynn . . . of course

PART 1

Chapter 1

Utah Territory

Time to go . . .

Arizona Ranger Sam Burrack stood at the window of his second-floor room. He had wintered as long as he could afford to in the river valley lands south of Cedar Ridge. Most of the damage from the gunshot wound in his lower back had healed. He wasn’t as good as new, but he’d been off his feet long enough, he told himself.

With his gun belt draped over his shoulder, he lowered the hammer on his freshly cleaned Colt and slipped it loosely into its Slim Jim holster. He gazed out the window. The rocky passes in the distance had shed their thick blankets of snow. The stretches of a rocky trail had begun to reveal themselves, the trail snaking upward into the mountains toward Wyoming Territory. That’s where he’d been headed before a dry gulcher’s bullet had stopped him short.

But he was healed now, and it was time to load the pack mule, saddle the big brown and white paint horse awaiting him at the livery barn and ride on. “And that’s that,” he said as he pondered the street below.

“And you are quite certain I can’t talk you out of leaving us, Ranger Burrack?” the Englishwoman, Beatrice Prine, asked quietly. She stood beside him, a tall, stately woman dressed in a clean-scented plaid gingham dress.

She’d watched him check the big Colt and put it away. She shook her head slightly and gazed with him out across the wide basin, where only patches of snow still clung along the edges of rock and brittle, dry grassland. The tops of cedar and pine trees swayed in the raw morning wind.

“I’m certain,” the ranger replied after a long moment of silence. “I won’t feel right until I get up to Hole-in-the-wall and get my stallion back.”

She sighed. “You’re fresh over a gunshot wound in the back, yet you insist on riding through a country filled with outlaws just for a horse?”

Sam gave a thin, wry smile. “Not for just any horse, I wouldn’t,” he replied. “But for my stallion, you bet I will.” He paused, then added quietly, “I should have been there long before now. Like I told you, the animal was banged up bad in a dynamite blast.”

“Yes, so you said. . . .” Beatrice Prine considered what she knew of the ranger’s situation. He had told her his story over the long winter nights he’d spent with her. “You told me you entrusted Memphis Warren Beck to take care of the stallion for you until you could make your way to Hole-in-the-wall and reclaim the animal. I expect the rest of the gang had a hard time understanding that one.”

“Like I told you, I had no other choice,” Sam said, noting the doubtful tone of her voice. “Beck gave me his word. I never thought I’d say this about a man like Memphis Beck, but he’s proven himself to be good for his word.”

“I could have told you that about Memphis Beck,” said Beatrice Prine. “I dare say I’ve known him a good while longer than you have. His word has always stood well with me.”

“He’s still an outlaw, but I have to say he’s a cut above the rest,” Sam said grudgingly, recalling how Memphis Beck had saved his life in Mexico when a madman and his cult of murderers had tried to kill him. Shadow Valley . . . , Sam thought to himself, recalling the incident all too clearly.

“That being the case, what is your hurry?” Beatrice Prine asked. “A few more...