Free .45-Caliber Deathtrap by Peter Brandvold Page A

broke open the shotgun, plucked out the spent wads, and fished two more out of the breast pocket of his worn flannel shirt, nudging aside a suspender strap.
    Cuno squinted one eye and grunted, “You’re going where I’m going.”
    â€œI’m goin’ after those killers, same as you,” the old man said, shoving the fresh wads into both shotgun barrels. “I didn’t do right by ole Wade. I froze up. Damnit, I peed my pants!” He stopped, pursed his lips. A tear rolled down from his right eye. “I just stood there inside my saloon and watched through the doors while they looted his wagon and shot him like a damn dog on the boardwalk.”
    He looked up at Cuno, both eyes shiny now, his gaunt, bearded face crimson with rage. “I’m goin’ after ’em, same as you, and I’m gonna give ’em my two cents’ worth.” He closed the gun with a metallic snap. “For Wade.”
    Cuno held his gaze. “How far were you going to ride in the back?”
    â€œTill we were far enough from Columbine you wouldn’t send me back afoot.”
    Cuno turned, set his rifle on the open tailgate, and walked around the right side of the wagon, scrutinizing the wheels that stood nearly as tall as he. The back one looked all right, but the right front would need its rim reshaped when he found a blacksmith. The felloe might be cracked, but he’d worry about that when it gave out. He hoped it didn’t give out on the down side of a steep hill, but he could have thrown a wheel and busted an axle pin and lost a day making repairs.
    The old man stood beside the trail, cradling his shotgun in his arms with a defiant expression. Cuno dragged Webber and Zorn across the trail, and kicked them both into the ravine, their bodies rolling down and splashing water at the edge of the stream. When he’d disposed of the other two bodies, he settled the mules down with handfuls of cracked corn, then backed them slowly out of the rocks and onto the trail.
    The back wheel turned smoothly. The front one gave a slight thump as the bent rim hit the ground, but the felloe held.
    Cuno checked the straps and buckles, then grabbed his shotgun and climbed into the driver’s box. He released the brake and looked over his left shoulder. The old man stood regarding him from the shade of the cottonwoods, his defiant expression tempered with wariness.
    â€œWell?” Cuno said.
    The old man pursed his lips, adjusted his suspenders with a shrug of his shoulders, then walked around behind the wagon and slid his shotgun onto the floor of the driver’s box. He gingerly climbed the wheel, and sat in the seat beside Cuno.
    He stared straight ahead. “How come you ain’t balkin’?”
    â€œâ€™Cause it’s too damn far from Columbine to turn out an old fool.” Cuno clucked to the mules, shook the reins.
    The mules leaned into their collars. The wagon rolled forward.

8
    LATE THAT SAME day, when the sun had fallen over the Front Range and cold shadows bled down from the high peaks, “The Committee” rode into the little river-crossing settlement of Danger Ford.
    Danger Ford Creek was far from dangerous this time of the year, long after the spring rains that often made it so. And the piano clattering in the sprawling whorehouse called Heaven’s Bane, atop a bluff on the creek’s south side, cast a downright gay ambience over the steep-walled canyon.
    The chill air, bespeaking fall, was perfumed with pine smoke from the whorehouse, the miners’ shacks and tents sheathing the creek, and the mountain diggings up and down the gorge. There was also the usual mining-camp fetor of trash heaps, privies, and butchered deer and elk carcasses.
    As The Committee crossed the broad plank bridge over the rushing creek, the horses’ shod hooves clattering like cannon blasts, two young boys, fishing along the creek, jerked their worms from the water and,