Free Longhorn Empire by Bradford Scott Page B

many miles he had galloped.
     After eating Brant rode on. The stars were shining brightly when he at last sighted the lights of Doran’s Crossing.
    “A little helpin’ of chuck and a drink, and then I hope I can get a decent bunk to sleep on in that shebang,” he told Smoke.
     “I’ll just rack you outside till I get the lowdown on what’s what. Ought not to be any trouble tieing onto a nosebag for you.”
    Tethering the moros at a convenient hitchrack, he entered the Deadfall. The big room was less crowded than on his former visits,
     and quieter. He recognized several Texans with whom he had a passing acquaintance and nodded to them. Standing at the far
     end of the bar, per usual, were massive, black-bearded Phil Doran and his wizened, ice-eyed partner, Pink Hanson. Brant nodded
     to them, and they nodded back. He saw the partners’ heads draw together. As they talked, they shot glances in his direction.
    Brant was discussing his drink when Doran left the end of the bar and came sauntering in his direction. The Deadfall owner
     paused, and looked Brant up and down.
    “See you met up with poor Cort Porter out on the prairie, Brant,” he remarked casually.
    Brant stared at Doran in astonishment. Under the circumstances of his meeting with Porter, it was the last thing he would
     have expected of Doran, to admit knowledge of Porter’s activities north of the Cimarron.
    “Yes, I met up with him,” he replied.
    “Uh-huh, so I figgered,” Doran said. “Wasn’t a very nice thing to do, Brant, even if you did have a run-in with him here—to
     shoot a poor jigger in the back.”
    Brant stared again. His eyes narrowed slightly. He did not at the moment reply to Doran’s astounding charge.
    “Uh-huh,” Doran repeated, “not a very nice thing to do. The boys found him, or what was left of him, out there by the canyon
     mouth.”
    Brant spoke. “If the boys, whoever they were,found him, they know damn well he wasn’t shot in the back, and they know, too, how he come to get shot,” he replied quietly,
     his gaze hard on Doran’s florid face.
    “Porter was my bunky,” Doran went on, as if not even hearing Brant’s statement. “And I’m tellin’ you, Brant, I’m out to even
     up the score for him.”
    Instinctively, Brant’s thumbs hooked over his cartridge belts. The significance of the gesture was not lost on Doran. He shook
     his bristling head.
    “Nope, not that way,” he said. “I know I wouldn’t have any more chance with you at gun slingin’ than a rabbit would have in
     a houndawg’s mouth. I know you’re a quick-draw man, and I know that’s what you rely on to get you by. Feller always uses an
     ace-in-the-hole to back up a yaller streak. But if you weren’t packin’ them irons, I’d put a head on you you wouldn’t forget
     for a spell, you low-down hyderphobia skunk!”
    Brant’s face went a little white. He was boiling with anger but he kept a grip on himself.
    “I figger you must have been drinking your own snake juice, Doran,” he said. “Either that or you’ve gone plumb loco, but I
     reckon in either case I’ll have to ram your words down your throat.”
    He turned, glanced about. Swiftly unbuckling his belts he handed them to a big Texas cowboy he knew slightly.
    “Hold ’em,” he said. “Have ’em ready for me if I should happen to need ’em,” he added significantly.
    The Texan took the belts. “I’ll hold ’em,” he promised, adding with grim emphasis, “and I’ll use ’em, too, if necessary.”
     He swept the gathering crowd with hard eyes. “No interferin’, gents,’ he warned, “or things will get lively.”
    Brant faced the bulky Deadfall owner. “Okay, Doran, you’re called,” he said. He cast a quick glance toward Pink Hanson, who
     was standing back of Doran and a little to one side. In Hanson’s pale eyes was a peculiar look of malicious satisfaction,
     the look of one whose well-thought-out plans are coming to fruition. It puzzled