Bloody Season

Bloody Season Read Online Free PDF Page B

Book: Bloody Season Read Online Free PDF
Author: Loren D. Estleman
Tags: historical western
swept in along with a draft of early-evening cold, took the door from her, and set the latch behind him. He still had on his mackinaw but his vest was unbuttoned and under it his white shirt, sweat through, clung like wet tissue to his chest.
    “What are they saying?” Virgil let the hammer down gently.
    “Johnny has put in for warrants on all of us,” Wyatt said.
    “Shit.”
    Morgan said, “He will see us lynched.”
    “Or shot resisting,” Wyatt said.
    Virgil said, “Well, I mean to resist.”
    Allie said, “Johnny Behan?”
    “Stay out of it,” snapped Wyatt. “Virge, that was not Fred White’s ghost lobbing shots at us from Fly’s.”
    “Johnny seen his chance and bit on it,” Virgil said. “Or Wes Fuller or Billy the Kid. Either way it is the same, for Johnny was there and could have stopped it.”
    “Or Billy Allen,” Morgan said. “I seen him in the gallery when Claiborne hauled his freight inside.”
    “How are you, Morg?”
    “Dandy. I am thinking of leaving the holes open so I have a place to carry my studs.”
    Virgil said, “My leg hurts like hell. Thank you kindly for asking.”
    Wyatt smiled for the first time that day. “That Billy Clanton had him some sand, all right.”
    “The bastard.”
    “How’s Doc?” asked Morgan.
    “Dealing faro at the Alhambra and doctoring a wounded pistol scabbard. His luck is holding and I would not want to be Johnny and go to arrest him while he is riding the tiger.”
    Morgan said, “I hope to hell he tries. I want to be there and see it.”
    “You will stay in bed,” said Lou. She was still sitting at the machine with a yard of broadcloth in her hands.
    Wyatt looked at Allie for the first time, his thumb on the door latch. He had a smudge of spent powder on his right cheek. “Don’t let anybody in but me or Jim or Doc. I don’t trust Clum’s storekeepers not to fall asleep.”
    “Mattie?” she asked.
    His ice-blue eyes fogged over, and she knew that he had not thought about his woman until that moment. “Mattie stays inside, same as always.” He left.
    Morgan said, “Al.”
    She glanced at Lou, then fixed the latch and went over, carrying the laudanum and spoon. But when she proffered the yellow-tinted liquid he jerked his head negatively. One blue eye watched her with his fair hair down in his face.
    “If they come, Al, you will know they got Wyatt. Take my six-shooter and kill me and Virge before they get us. We’ll not be strung up like geese.”
    Lou helped Allie stack furniture against the door and the remaining windows. They took turns sleeping in chairs and standing guard with Morgan’s pistol between them. Allen Street ran wide open that night with all the miners in town and eyewitnesses reliving the fight in saloons and on street corners for those who would claim to be eyewitnesses later. Whenever glass shattered or a door banged in that direction the two women jumped.

Chapter Three
    “P lease state your name, current place of residence, and occupation at present.” “John Harris Behan. I reside currently in the City of Tombstone, County of Cochise, Arizona Territory. I am sheriff of Cochise County and I own a half-interest in the Dexter Livery and Feed on Allen Street.”
    Dr. Harry M. Matthews winked. He had on the salt-and pepper tweed he wore to funerals and inquests, and with his hands folded atop the bench in the adobe courthouse on Fremont he seemed not as bent as he did when he was standing. The witness, in a black morning coat and bow tie, sat with his hands on his knees and sunlight glistening on his advancing forehead. His moustaches were waxed lightly. The room smelled of dried mud and sawdust and of mesquite burning in the parlor stove opposite the gilt-framed portrait of Governor Fremont.
    Someone in the jury box coughed, a dry-stick sound in the silence following the sheriff’s formal statement. The ten jurors, Tombstone businessmen all, were wrapped in dark wool and wore softly shining cravats tucked into
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