Bounty Hunter (9781101611975) Read Online Free PDF

into a perfunctory scowl—made her quite attractive.
    The Blaine home was guarded by a man with a rifle whom Hannah knew. It was not so much that anyone expected the Porter gang to return to finish her off, rather he was there to give Mrs. Blaine the assurance of security. Hannah instructed Cole to wait outside while she went in to inquire as to whether Mrs. Blaine was up to a visit from the bounty hunter hired to avenge her husband’s death.
    While she went inside, Bladen made conversation with the man with the rifle. Asked about the four perpetrators, he echoed Hannah’s opinion, though his description of Gideon Porter’s evilness, and Enoch’s atrocious way with small domestic animals, was a good deal more graphic.
    Finally, Hannah called from the front door and Bladen climbed the steps. He made a point of removing his hat and wiping his feet, something that had become his second nature growing up in Virginia, where a man was measured by his politeness.
    â€œI want you to
get
that Gideon Porter once and for all!” Leticia Blaine exclaimed without the formality of an introduction.
    She was seated in a large, overstuffed chair in a small room opposite the parlor. He figured that she was avoiding the parlor, and understood that she had good reason. Another woman about her age, probably a friend, was hovering nearby. The side of Mrs. Blaine’s face was deeply black-and-blue, and she had a long cut in her lower lip that had been stitched.
    â€œYes, ma’am,” Cole said.
    â€œI want that Gideon Porter six feet under.”
    â€œYes, ma’am,” Cole repeated. “He’s the one who done this to you?”
    â€œDarn tootin’ he is,” the spunky widow confirmed.
    â€œAnd shot your husband?”
    â€œYes sir,” she affirmed angrily. “He is a
madman
. John rose to my defense and lost his life for it!”
    â€œMa’am, if you don’t mind me asking, do y’all have any idea
why
they did this? Why they came to your home to shoot people?”
    â€œMy husband fired that cur six months ago, and he had to have his revenge, of course.”
    â€œWhy do you reckon that he waited so long?”
    â€œHow should I know?”
    â€œHe just came here asking after your husband?”
    â€œThat’s right. I answered that door right there and . . . they barged through . . .”
    â€œInto the parlor here?” Cole asked, stepping into the other room. The bloodstains on the rich oriental-style carpets, now turned dark and all the more deathly, painted a vivid picture of the place where each victim had stood. In the room beyond, the dinner dishes from that night still had not been cleared.
    â€œThat’s right,” she shouted, remaining in her chair as Cole left the room. “My husband was in the dining room with Virgil Stocker and Dawson Phillips. They all came into the parlor when they heard the commotion. Porter shot John, then his brother murdered Dawson and then Mary . . . it was
terrible!
”
    On this note, Leticia Blaine dissolved into tearful sobbing, and her friend moved in to comfort her. Bladen Cole thanked her for her time and expressed his sympathies, as he and Hannah Ransdell retreated out the front door.
    â€œAny chance I could go talk to this man, Virgil Stocker?” Cole asked as he put on his Stetson.
    â€œI suppose we could do that,” Hannah said. She was kind of interested in the bounty hunter’s “investigating,” and she certainly didn’t mind being seen around town with a handsome stranger. Nor did she mind taking an occasional glance at the whiskers that studded his face. His were a bit on the shorter side for her tastes, but she did have a fondness for a younger man with a beard.
    â€œYou been long in the Territory, Mr. Cole?” she said as they walked.
    â€œNo, ma’am. I passed through a couple years back and was headed back up north to do a