Free Feud On The Mesa by Lauran Paine

the scout hastily ducked into an out-house until he saw whether they were Lodgepole men or Texans. Unfortunately for Caleb, the out-house turned out to be occupied by another hiding fighter. With an alarmed oath, the man fired his gun as Caleb spun away as far as the tight confines of the building would allow. The bullet scored a thin, hot scratch under Doom’s ribs. He felt it as he fired back and the tiny shack rocked on its hollowed-out foundations. The door fell on its hinges as Caleb’s body went against it and he fell outside in the slippery mud. The two men farther down turned white-faced at the eruption of the two shots. With an oath, one of them fired and missed. The word—“Squawman!”— split the air and Doom rolled as fast as he could in the muck, finally getting to one knee.
    The Texans were the brace of horse guards he had seen in front of the saloon. The older one was firing with frantic haste and no attempt at accuracy. Caleb ran as he crouched, his gun spitting fire. The older man went down, and the younger jumped and fled. A rifle crashed behind him and Caleb went down into the mud as he whirled. Standing, spraddle-legged, a Winchester carbine held waist high in both hands, the big, florid-looking Texan levered and fired again. Caleb threw two quick shots at the man,jumped to his feet, and ran zigzag for the dark interior of the livery barn. It was shadowy and dark in-side, but the sour smell of powder smoke rode the atmosphere like a warning.
    Jack Britt could hear Marshal Holt cursing in an embittered monologue and a little wry smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. Nothing could be quite so annoying to one of the marshal’s fire-eating propensities as to be bottled up inside his own office when a gunfight was going on in town. He hugged the wall of the Lincoln House closer as a rifle flamed off toward the livery stable. There were two muffled pistol shots from behind the barn and down a little way, and Jack wondered who had gotten caught back there. He soon forgot, however, when a Lodge-pole cowboy fell soddenly onto the overhang in front of the general store from the roof above. The body didn’t roll and Jack’s squinted eyes looked for the killer. A wisp of a black hat showed down the deserted street from him, on his side of the road. He cocked his pistol and waited. The black hat’s curled edges came out a trifle, and Jack carefully brought his gun up. A rash of sudden firing in the neighbor-hood of the Longhorn drove the gunman back to cover again. Jack waited patiently until the hat came into view again. This time there was enough for a target. He fired methodically and the hat went sailing off into space like a frightened bird and its own-er looked down the road at Jack for one startled second and disappeared. Jack moved, too.
    Inside the livery stable, Caleb took a breather be-hind a jag of aromatic mountain hay. The cut along his ribs had bled profusely but the mud caking hehad acquired while rolling around in the alley had pretty well staunched it. His fringed shirt was a wreck. Grimly he wiped his .44 off as best he could and reloaded it. Suddenly he heard a board creak lightly, too lightly to be moved by any of the softly snorting, excited horses in the stalls. He tensed un-consciously and let his eyes roam familiarly through the eerie gloom of the building. Again he heard it and flattened out on his stomach, poking his head around one ragged corner of the haystack. A big Texan was quietly stalking through the barn looking for him. Smiling bitterly, Caleb’s pistol came up slowly, steadied, and fired with a thunderous explosion. The Texan’s rifle went off unpredictably as Caleb’s slug tore its stock into a gust of splinters. The big man staggered forward as the gun was wrenched out of his hands. He roared in pain and insane fury and hurled himself toward the haystack. Caleb cocked his gun again, but the big man, de-spite his bulk, was upon him before he could squeeze off the