Guns of the Canyonlands Read Online Free PDF Page A

Daley was wearing a fancy buckskin coat, Apache maybe—”
    “Kiowa. It was my coat.”
    “Well, anyhoo, it seemed to me them two had been up to no good, so I came looking and that’s when I found you. And just in time, I reckon. Another couple of minutes and you’d have been dead as hell in a parson’s parlor.”
    “I’m beholden to you,” Tyree said. “You saved my life.”
    Fowler waved away his thanks. “Think nothing of it. Glad I was close by.”
    “I’m betting it was Len Dawson who shot me,” Tyree managed, the words coming slow in a weak whisper. “I guess he wanted to put me out of my misery, but his hands were shaking so bad, he made a mess of it.”
    “Oh, he didn’t mess up too badly,” Fowler said, his voice matter-of-fact. “His bullet hit just above your belt on the left side and exited out your back an inch higher. I don’t think any vital organs were hit, but I’m not a doctor so I can’t tell for sure.”
    Fowler was silent for a few moments, then said, “Dawson has killed his share, but he’s not the worst of them. Daley now, he’s poison mean and good with a gun and his fists. The talk is that he’s killed seven men, and I believe it.”
    Tyree tried to rise again, and Fowler helped him sit up, propping his back against a cottonwood trunk.
    After he recovered from the pain caused by the shift of position, Tyree rasped, “Those two said they were acting on orders from a man named Quirt Laytham.”
    The skin suddenly tightened around Fowler’s eyes. “Laytham is the man whose lying testimony got me sentenced to twenty-five years behind bars for murder. He swaggers a wide path around here, owns the biggest ranch for a hundred miles in all directions and is hungry for more, mine included. There are maybe two, three hundred cows on my grass right now, and all of them belong to Quirt Laytham.”
    “Him and me have a score to settle,” Tyree said. He touched the rope burn on his neck. “For this. The two who hung me were acting on Laytham’s orders.”
    “Best you rest your voice for a while,” Fowler said. “Keep talking and you may lose it altogether.”
    Fowler rose and poured coffee into a tin cup. He kneeled behind Tyree and held the cup to his lips. “Careful,” he said. “It’s hot, but it will do you good.”
    “I can manage,” Tyree said. He took the cup from Fowler and drank. The coffee was strong and bitter, the way he liked it, and it seemed to give him strength.
    Fowler watched Tyree drink, then bit his lip as he thought for a few moments. Finally he said, “Mister, I don’t know who you are but—”
    “Name’s Chance Tyree.”
    Fowler nodded, his eyes suddenly guarded. “Heard of you, prison talk mostly.” He was silent for a while, then said, “You being a named Texas gunfighter won’t help you none in Crooked Creek. Go against Laytham and his riders and you’ll be bucking a stacked deck. Quirt is fast with a gun, but there are two working for him who are even faster. One is a breed, a natural born killer who calls himself the Arapaho Kid. And the other is Luther Darcy.”
    If Fowler expected a reaction from Tyree he was disappointed. “There will be a reckoning between Laytham and me,” Chance croaked. “Depend on it.”
    “The name Luther Darcy doesn’t mean anything to you?”
    Tyree shook his head, a gesture that made pain flare in his throat. “No. Why should it?”
    “Then you’d better learn up on him right quick,” Fowler said. “There are them who say Darcy is the fastest gun west of the Mississippi and there are others who claim he’s the fastest who ever lived, or will ever live, come to that. He killed a named man up in the Montana Territory a while back, then another in Crooked Creek just a few days ago.”
    Tyree managed a weak smile. “I’ve come up against a few with that kind of reputation before and I’m still here.”
    His eyes bleak in his long, melancholy face, Fowler said, “Maybe you’re still here on account