the Quick and the Dead (1983) Read Online Free PDF Page A

was somebody else. You look at the tracks around that camp, Purdy?"
    "For what? We already knew where they was. I'd no call to go scoutin' around."
    "Gold," Ike Mantle said, "supposin' there is gold?"
    Nobody spoke for a few minutes. "You all do what you're of a mind to," Red Hyle said, "I'm follerin'. That there's a woman. I ain't seen anythin' like her since those fancy rich women from up on the hill at Natchez."
    "We lost nothin' here," Doc agreed. "I'm ready to get shut of this place. Leave it for the next outfit, just like we found it."
    Red Hyle got to his feet and walked out. For a moment there was silence, and then Purdy said, "He's really got woman on his mind."
    "Did you see her?" Doc said.
    "I saw her. But I wouldn't get myself killed for her. Not me."
    Purdy Mantle was the last one to leave, finishing off the bottle, then throwing it into a corner where it shattered to bits. He followed the others outside, leaning against the wall and thinking. Lenny Shabbitt was dead, and he was no loss, but it had been passed over that he was wearing Ike's hat. Maybe whoever killed Lenny had wanted to kill Ike ... and there were a lot who would take pleasure in it.
    Purdy looked down at his scuffed boots. He ought to get away from them. He should get shut of them now and go his own way.
    Ike, too. Ike was as bad as the worst of them, because Ike was mean ... downright mean. Brother he might be, but he was a mean, cruel man. He felt no love for his younger brother, nor did Ike feel any for him. They'd been born to the same parents but they were far apart in everything else.
    Now they were going to follow after that tenderfoot and his family. Purdy hitched up his gun. He was better with a gun than any of them, unless it was Red Hyle. He'd often wondered about that.
    He had seen Hyle shoot, and he had seen only one man he thought was as good ... just one. He'd seen Con Vallian down in the Bald Knob country that time, and Con was quick. He was almighty quick at a time when a man was either quick or he was dead.
    Ike came up, leading their horses. "Saddled up for you." He squinted at him. "You draggin' your feet, Purd?"
    "Lazy," Purdy said, "lazy in the sun."
    "You think too much. Thinkin' never got a man any place. You start to study on things and all you get is mixed up."
    "I was thinkin' about Red Hyle."
    Ike shot him a quick look. "Wonderin' was you as slick as him? Don't you try it, Purd. What if you was? You'd get yourself shot up for no good reason. He gives you trouble, just shoot him ... or I will. Don't call him out."
    There were eight of them when they rode out of the settlement bound west. Doc Shabbitt, who thought he was the leader and the brains. Red Hyle, who rode with them but was not one of them, Ike and Purdy Mantle, Johnny Dobbs who was a wanted man somewhere back east, Booster McCutcheon, who was in no shape to ride but had no choice but ride or be left, Boston Pangman, and the Huron.
    Nobody knew whether the Huron was really a Huron or not. Somehow or other he had drifted in with them and somebody called him Huron. He wore white man's clothes and talked a poor white man's tongue, but he was dark enough to be an Indian. He was a good man in the woods, and could handle a canoe or boat. What else he could do they did not know ... or care.
    The sun was high when they started west, but they were in no hurry. The plains were wide and long. A wagon with four mules and a heavy load does not move very fast, so they'd take their own time. Besides, the deeper into prairie country they were the less chance of their crime being discovered or revealed.
    In camp the firelight flickered. Out upon the prairie the grass was a white sea under the high, pale moon. There was a smell of sun-ripened grass and cooling water. There was a smell of wood-smoke and bacon frying, and beside the fire three people bound westward.
    "It has been three days," Susanna said. "I think he has left us."
    "Well? Why not? What duty has he to us?"
    He had