Free Stamping Ground by Loren D. Estleman Page B

jaw. I went over backwards, chair and all, and hit the floor hard. I bounced up quicker than he expected and cocked my own left.
    â€œPage.”
    Jac spoke warningly. I shifted my gaze, followed his, and got a spectacular view of the inside of the old trooper’s Army Colt pointed at my breast. I lowered my arm.
    At a nod from Harms the gun was returned to leather. Cutting loose had calmed him somewhat. His color was closer to normal, but the silver flecks in his eyes swam and glittered in the light of the one lamp left burning.
    â€œWhat did you gain by that?” He addressed himself to Hudspeth.
    â€œWe’re expensive pets to keep,” I replied, making him face me. “We just wanted to show you how expensive we can be.”
    â€œIs that a threat? Because if it is I can throw you in the guardhouse and be done with it.”
    â€œYou did that with Ghost Shirt.”
    â€œWe’ve learned a bit since then.”
    â€œLike what?” Hudspeth put in. “Doubling the guard? You can’t spare that many men with things like they are. You said yourself you’re short-handed.”
    â€œThe fact of it is, Major,” I went on, “we’re more trouble than we’re worth. You can take away our guns and our matches, tie us up and throw us in a deep hole, and we’ll still make it hot for you and your men. You can weather it, but why should you have to? You’ve enough to worry about with all hell breaking loose outside.”
    While I had been speaking, patches of color had appeared on his cheeks, glowing as if from fever, and I braced myself to meet another blow. But he held himself in check. When he spoke, the strain showed in his voice, raising it from its normal moderate level to a quivering tenor.
    â€œ ‘Just whose side are you on, Murdock?”
    â€œThat’s easy. Mine.”
    This time I was sure he was going to make a move, but he fooled me again. For an hour, or maybe it was just ten seconds, he stood there staring at me without seeing me. Then, without turning, he spoke to the old trooper.
    â€œSee that their mounts are saddled and their pack horse loaded and ready to go. They’re leaving tonight.”
    â€œTomorrow morning’s soon enough,” I said magnanimously. “We promise not to burn down any buildings before then.”
    â€œI wasn’t offering you a choice. It’s tonight or never.” The glint in his cow eyes was as steely as it got. “I’ll read Scripture over your grave, Murdock.”
    Half the stars in the sky were blotted out behind a black overcast as we saddled up (never trust that job to anyone else, least of all a trooper who hates your guts), and by the time we were ready to move out they were all gone and thunder was belching faintly in the distance.
    Our guns were returned to us in the livery by the old trooper who had been our guard. I slid my Winchester into its scabbard, inspected the Deane-Adams to make sure it was still loaded, and caught the horse soldier’s eye over the cylinder. He avoided my gaze.
    He was old enough to be a general, but his faded blue sleeves bore a single stripe. Most likely he’d risen in rank and been busted back down more than once, probably for brawling. The scar tissue over his eyes and fistlike, many-times-broken nose gave me that much. Those eyes were deep in their sockets and shadowed beneath shaggy white brows. They wouldn’t blacken noticeably no matter how many times they were hit, nor how hard. He wore his handlebar a third longer than Hudspeth’s. Also white, it was stained yellow at the fringe—chewing tobacco—and at the moment its ends were being gnawed by a set of mail-order teeth that buzzed when he spoke, which he hadn’t done for some time. Unlike Blackthorne, he appeared not to mind wearing them. His complexion was breadcrust-brown and cracked all over like a riverbed gone dry. The sagging flesh beneath his chin was