Free Guns of the Canyonlands by Ralph Compton

appearance, but not a man.
    He was about to say so, when Boyd interrupted him. The rancher slapped his hands together and grinned. “Well, I don’t know about the rest of you folks, but I’m getting real hungry for supper.” He turned to Lorena. “What are we having, daughter?”
    Later, as Lorena busied herself at the stove and Owen and Luke talked and smoked their pipes outside, Tyree stepped beside the girl and lightly touched her shoulder. “Lorena, I’ve got something to say to you. The first is yes, I’ve ridden a few owl-hoot trails in my life, but I’m no rustler and neither is Owen Fowler. The second is that someday I plan to make you forget all about Quirt Laytham and take you as my wife.”
    The woman’s back stiffened; then she slowly turned to face him. “Mr. Tyree,” she said, her beautiful eyes blazing, “I certainly wouldn’t count on that if I was you.”

Chapter 7
    A week drifted by and Tyree’s strength grew as his wounds began to heal. He moved his gear into the bunkhouse, no longer wishing to crowd Lorena and her father in the cabin.
    Lorena still bathed and bandaged him every day. She even washed and mended his shirt, but she was frosty and distant, polite to a fault, the looming shadow of Quirt Laytham lying between them.
    Tyree was yet to tell Lorena that he planned on destroying Laytham, wiping out even his memory from the canyonlands. He would have to let her know soon, but he feared how she would react. There was a distinct probability she’d run into Laytham’s arms and he would lose her forever.
    His frustration growing, Tyree considered another possibility—he could step away from his showdown with Laytham and ask Lorena to leave with him. But even as he mulled over this option, he soon dismissed it. A devil was driving him and it would not let up until justice was done. He had been a stranger passing through, but Crooked Creek lawmen, men Laytham kept in his pocket, had seen fit to hang him. There could be no going back from that. Tyree was a man who measured things only in the light of his own experience, a seasoning he had gained among tough, uncompromising men. He had no other yardstick. He knew he had been badly wronged and for that, there must be a reckoning. It was a principle as old as the Bible—an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Even his growing love for Lorena, coldly distant as she was, would not sidetrack him from his purpose.
    On the morning of the eighth day of his stay at Luke’s ranch, Tyree stepped out of the bunkhouse door after breakfast and saw the old rancher and Fowler saddling their horses in the barn.
    He strolled over and Boyd answered his unasked question. “It’s high time I made a tally of my herd, Chance. I’ve been prospecting some this past three months and during that time they’ve scattered to hell and gone, them that haven’t been rustled. I’ll drive them out of the canyons toward the creek and count them there.”
    Interested, Tyree asked, “You planning on making a drive, Luke?”
    The old rancher nodded. “I figure come spring I’ll hire me a couple of men and push a herd to the Union Pacific railhead at Salt Lake City.” He shrugged. “Money’s been tight for a spell, and I want Lorena to be able to afford some nice things, women’s fixin’s and the like.”
    “I was once pretty handy with a rope,” Tyree said. “Mind if I tag along today?”
    “You up for it, boy?” Luke asked. “That bullet wound in your side has some healing to do yet and you still look a mite peaked.”
    “I’ll be all right,” Tyree said. “I’ll need a good cutting horse, though.”
    Luke thought the younger man’s offer through for a few moments, then said, “We could sure use another hand. Glad to have you along.” He nodded toward the corral. “Throw a saddle on that steeldust. He’ll buck a time or two just to keep you honest, but after that he’ll settle down. He’s a first-rate cow pony.”
    The old rancher’s eyes moved