Free Six Gun Justice by David Cross

keeping his eye on the window, but no one showed again.
    Suddenly the door of the bunkhouse flew open and two men made a dash for the darkness outside, running for the tree line. He quickly drew a bead on one of the black shapes, and fired. The shadow stumbled, a scream reaching Jake’s ears from the valley floor, as he pitched forward to blend with the ground far below. He quickly reloaded, taking aim at the open door, waiting for another man to exit the door, but they were hesitant after one of their comrades had been shot in his attempted escape. Then, just as he was about to give up, another man dashed toward freedom, and he cut him down before he could make two steps. This time there was no scream.
    The message he had sent would give the men working for Murdock a thought of how safe it was to work for him. Some of the real hard cases would stick it out, wanting to reap the harvest of the extra money they would demand from the him, but most of the weaker ones, the regular ranch hands would think twice about it. These would pack up their bedrolls, draw their time, and move on. They would figure—and rightly so—that their wasn’t much future in working on a ranch that could be their last day alive.
    Nodding to himself with satisfaction, he ejected the last spent shell, placed the rifle in its saddle holster, carefully placed the telescope in the saddlebag, and swung into the saddle. He would pay them another visit tomorrow, when they were about their daily chores. He would teach them the folly of underestimating their enemy, and give them a taste of what it felt like to be on the receiving end of an ambush. He rode back the way he had come, turning off just before he reached the break in his fence, heading for the rim, near where Drago and Marvin had drygulched him.
    He made a dry camp near the rim, rolling into his sugan, thinking over his next move. He knew they would find where he had been shooting from, and would track him to where he was now, but he had a couple of surprises for them. He smiled as he drifted into a light sleep, his ears tuned to the sounds around him.
    First light found him up, brushing the tracks from the area to the edge of the cliff, where he had fallen earlier. Here the ledge was of rock, impossible to track across. This would be his final push to break the men working for Murdock. He would have to put the fear of God into the hard cases, make them nervous, and scared, so they would be off their guard.
    He led his mount along the ledge, checking to be sure he left no telltale sign behind them. He had traveled for about a mile before he turned away from the rim, circling around to come within a quarter mile of his fence line. Here, he found a small cedar brake and set up a position behind one of the more bushy evergreen, placing six cartridges for the Spencer on his neckerchief, close at hand. He adjusted the sights of the big rifle to the distance he would be shooting and sat down to wait.
    He didn’t think of hunger, only the adrenaline kept his hunger at bay, along with the anticipation of the ensuing battle that would either turn the tide or turn into a fiasco. He watched the fence line intently, taking care to listen to the birds, and watch the small animals nearby. They would give warning of the approach of riders, even before they were in sight. Two chipmunks scampered about in a small clearing near the fence, with two jays scolded one another from the pines above them, while a woodpecker worked on one of the fence posts, and a cardinal sought its morning meal nearby.
    All was peaceful for about an hour, and then things quieted. The jays stopped squabbling, the chipmunks sat at attention, and the cardinal flitted to the tops of the pines. Only the woodpecker kept up his hammering for a few minutes, seemingly undisturbed by its surroundings. The suddenly it too stopped its drilling for a heartbeat, its head cocked to one side, as though listening for some sound that was inaudible to the