Matagorda/The First Fast Draw: Two Novels in One Volume - Softcover

L'Amour, Louis

 
9780553591804: Matagorda/The First Fast Draw: Two Novels in One Volume
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0553591800 ISBN 13: 9780553591804
Verlag: Random House Publishing Group, 2008

Inhaltsangabe

Matagorda

Tap Duvarney lost his innocence in the War Between the States, then tested his skills in the frontier army. Now he’s settled on the Texas coast, working a ranch as the partner of his old friend Tom Kittery—and finding himself in the middle of a feud between Kittery and a neighboring family. But the danger from outside is nothing compared to the threat within, as Duvarney suspects Kittery’s woman isn’t all she appears to be. Tap may have to go to war again. But this time will it be with his closest friend?

The First Fast Draw

East Texas wasn’t much of a home for Cullen Baker. Few liked him, and some even tried to kill him. Yet after three years of wandering, he’s back to farm the land that is rightfully his. But Cullen’s neighbors have long memories, and his worst adversary has teamed up with a vicious outlaw. With enemies closing in on all sides and threatening the woman he loves, Cullen will have to be faster than lightning—and twice as deadly—just to survive.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Louis L’Amour is undoubtedly the bestselling frontier novelist of all time. He is the only American-born author in history to receive both the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Congressional Gold Medal in honor of his life's work. He has published ninety novels; twenty-seven short-story collections; two works of nonfiction; a memoir, Education of a Wandering Man; and a volume of poetry, Smoke from This Altar. There are more than 300 million copies of his books in print worldwide.

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Chapter One


MAJOR TAPPAN DUVARNEY rested his hands on the rail and stared toward the low sandy shore. It was not what he had expected of Texas, but whatever lay ahead represented his last chance. He had to make it here or nowhere.

He listened to the rhythmic pound and splash of the paddle wheels and looked bleakly into the future. Behind him lay the War Between the States and several years of Indian fighting with the frontier army; before him only the lonely years at some sunbaked, windswept frontier post, with nothing to look forward to but retirement.

When the war had broken out he was a young man with an assured future. Aside from the family plantation in Virginia, his father owned a shipping line trading to the West Indies and Gulf ports—four schooners and a barkentine, and good vessels all.

Tap Duvarney had made two trips before the mast on the barkentine, had taken examinations for his ticket, and had made two trips as third mate, one aboard a schooner, the other on the barkentine. His father wanted him to know the sea and its business from every aspect, and Tap liked the sea. He had taken to the rough and rowdy life in Caribbean ports as if born to it.

The war changed all that. His sympathies and those of his family were with the Union. He had gone north and joined up. Renegades had burned the plantation buildings and run off the stock; one schooner had been lost in a hurricane off this very coast, two others had been confiscated by the Confederacy and sunk by Union gunboats. The barkentine had disappeared into that mysterious triangle south of Bermuda and left nothing behind but the memory. The last schooner, beat and bedraggled, had burned alongside the dock when the war came to Charleston. Tap Duvarney returned from the war saddled with debts, his father dead, his home destroyed.

There seemed only one thing to do, and he did it. He went back to the army and a series of frontier posts. During the nine years following the war he fought Indians from the Dakotas to Arizona. He managed to keep his hair, but picked up three scars, one from a knife, two from bullet wounds.

Finally, his father's estate had been settled and he emerged from the shambles with a bit more than seven thousand dollars.

It was then he heard from Tom Kittery.
***

CAPTAIN WILKES STOPPED beside him now on his way to the pilot house. Duvarney knew that Wilkes was worried about him, and genuinely wished to help. The captain was a good man who had served on one of his father's ships.

"You'll find Texas a fast country, Major. Do you have friends here?"

"One . . . so far as I know. I met him during the war."

"You haven't seen him since? That's quite a while, Major. Is that the man you've gone into partnership with?"

Duvarney thought he detected a doubtful note in Wilkes's voice, and he was not surprised. He was a bit doubtful himself from time to time.

"I know the man, Captain. Whatever else he may be, he's honest . . . and he's got guts. I go along with that."

"The cattle business is good," Wilkes said. "Indianola has been the biggest cattle-shipping port in Texas for a good long time, so I've had a good deal to do with it. I may know your partner."

"Kittery . . . Tom Kittery. Old Texas family."

"Kittery, is it? Yes, he has guts, all right. There isn't a man in Texas would deny that. And he's honest. But speaking as a friend, I'd never leave the ship, if I were you. Come on back to New Orleans. You're a good man, and you know the sea. We'll find something for you there."

"What's wrong with Kittery?"

"With him? Nothing . . . nothing at all." Wilkes glanced at Duvarney. "I take it you haven't heard about the feud?"

Wilkes paused, then went on. "You're walking right into the middle of a shooting war . . . the Munson-Kittery feud. It has been going on since 1840 or thereabouts, and from the moment it is discovered that you are associated with Kittery you'll be a prime target."

"I know nothing about any feud."

"You say you knew Kittery during the war? He may have thought the feud was a thing of the past because it seemed to be over. Until the Kittery boys left for the war there hadn't been any shooting for several years.

"In the years before the war the Kittery faction numbered some of the toughest, ablest fighting men in Texas; so the Munsons laid low and played their music soft. And when the Kittery boys went off to war, the Munsons stayed home.

"Even so, they kept quiet until Ben was killed at Shiloh. That started them stirring around a bit, but it wasn't until Tom was captured—reported dead, in fact—that they began to cut loose.

"They ran off a bunch of Kittery cattle, then burned a barn. Old Alec, Tom's uncle, rode out after the Munsons and they ambushed him and killed him. After that they really cut loose. They killed two Negro hands who had worked for the Kitterys for years, and burned the old home—one of the oldest houses on the coast.

"Cattle were beginning to be worth money, and the Munsons thought they were rich on Kittery beef. Only somebody stampeded the biggest herd one night and ran them into the Big Thicket. Well, you don't know the Thicket, but finding cattle in there is like hunting ghosts. The Munsons never were much on hard work, and rousting those steers from the Thicket would be the hardest kind of work. So the steers, and a lot of other cattle, are still in there."

"Maybe those are the cattle I bought," Duvarney commented ironically. "It's my luck."

"Are you wearing a gun?" Wilkes asked.

"I have one." As a matter of fact, he had two guns. "From what you've said, I should be wearing one."

"You should." Wilkes straightened up. "I'm going up to take her in, but my advice to you is: stay on the ship. . . . If you do leave her, be ready for trouble. They laid for Johnny Lubec, and they laid for Tom. They were waiting for him when the boat docked . . . my boat."

"Tom?"

Wilkes smiled grimly. "Tom was no fool. I told him what had happened to Johnny, so he left the ship as we were going past the island, entering the bay.

"The fog was thick that morning, and he lowered himself over the side on a raft we'd built for him, and paddled ashore. He slipped ashore on Matagorda Island, and nobody knows the island better than Tom. It's long, but so narrow you wouldn't think a man could hide there, but he managed it. Anyway, he was still alive the last time we were here, and I hope he still is."

"You mentioned Johnny Something-or-other?"

"Lubec. Johnny wasn't a Kittery, just an orphan kid they took in and treated like one of the family. Folks said that Johnny's pa was one of the Jean Lafitte pirates . . . they had a hideout on Matagorda themselves and used to careen their ships on the landward beaches.

"Anyway, Johnny grew up with the Kitterys, so when he came home the Munsons were laying for him. They shot him down and left him for dead, then went off to have a drink, and Johnny crawled away. He got to the house of an old Indian who lives on Black Jack Point, and the Indian cared for him.

"The Munsons were fit to be tied when Tom gave them the slip. If they'd known Tom was alive they would never have reopened the fight, not even with Jackson Huddy or the Harts around to help. At that, they almost got Tom."

"What happened?"

"Tom rode over to his old home. Nobody had told him the place was burned out, and I guess he figured some of his people might be there. He rode home and the...

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Verlag
Random House Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2008
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0553591800
ISBN 13 
9780553591804
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
385
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