Sudden--Troubleshooter (A Sudden Western) #5 (18 page)

Cameron’s hand relaxed and
the revolver slid back into its ornate scabbard, while every breath
in the saloon was expelled in a gusty sigh.

‘My Gawd! did yu see that?’
gasped the man who had earlier identified Green.

‘Damned if I did,’ his
table companion told him. ‘I never even seen him move!’

Sudden stepped back, covering Cameron. He
surveyed the gunman coldly.

‘Killin’s too good for a
polecat like yu,’ he grated. ‘Shuck yore belt.’

A faint gleam, half
puzzlement, half triumph, appeared in Cameron’s eyes. He unbuckled
the heavy, stitched belt, which fell to the sanded floor with a
thump. At Sudden’s command he stepped away from it. Still keeping
Cameron covered, Sudden kicked the gun belt across the floor away
from the gunman. He then took two steps backwards, holstering the
gun he had drawn so unbelievably swiftly. His hands reached for the
buckle of his own gun belt.

‘Killin’ yu’d be too easy,’
he said. ‘I reckon yu got to be shown the hard way that all farmers
ain’t such easy marks.’

He handed the gun belt to
the bartender, who accepted it open-mouthed, then faced Cameron
once more.

‘Yu reckon we’re even
matched now, Cameron? Or is hittin’ defenseless young girls more in
yore line o’ country?’

Cameron had watched his
opponent’s actions with disbelief, hardly able to comprehend his
good fortune. He was well versed in the dirtier forms of saloon
brawling, and the murderous tactics employed to maim, blind, or
cripple an opponent in a fist fight. This fool with the incredible
draw had played right into his hands! Instead of his reputation
being destroyed, the gunman could recoup his ascendancy with no
real loss of face. He had weighed the build of the nester, and knew
that he had the advantage of weight and reach, although Green was
taller. These thoughts flashed through his head as the dark-haired
cowboy turned to face him, and with a cry of inarticulate rage
Cameron threw himself upon his enemy.

Sudden, however, had seen
the move coming and moved lightly aside, allowing Cameron’s
blundering body to pass him between the bar and his left side.
As
the gunman’s head dropped, Green laced
his hands together and dealt Cameron a sickening blow over the ear
which chopped the man to the floor, splitting his lips open.
Cameron rose, spitting sand and blood from his mouth, and from the
crouch leaped once more at Sudden. Once again the cowboy moved back
and to the side, and once more the brutal chopping blow stretched
Cameron face down on the floor.

Everyone in the saloon was on his feet now
and forming a close-packed, jostling ring about the two fighting
men. Yells of encouragement, criticism, and advice spewed from the
men as Cameron got to his feet, more slowly this time, and eyed
Sudden more warily. He shook his head, pulled his body upright, and
once more charged at the slim form before him, ready this time for
the evasive movement he expected Sudden to make. The puncher made
no such move, but instead his left arm came out as straight as a
ramrod, with all the force of his supple body behind it. Cameron
ran right into the punch and reeled sideways into the arms of the
crowd.

‘Give ’em more room!’
somebody yelled.

‘Yeah, Cameron’s got
nowhere to fall down!’ was the rejoinder, one which brought the
blood to Cameron’s face and sent him circling forward, more
cautiously this time, changing the form of his attack. This time it
was Sudden who stepped forward, almost into the enveloping bear-hug
that Cameron tried to use. Faster than the eye could follow,
Sudden’s fists thudded into the gunman’s face, drawing a gout of
blood from the man’s nose.

‘Stan’ still an’ fight,
damn yore eyes!’ Cameron cursed, but his unmarked opponent merely
grinned coldly and then, light on his feet, buried a further flurry
of blows in the gunman’s middle. Cameron folded slightly, his
breath heavier.

‘Hell,’ cried one disgusted
spectator, ‘this ain’t a fight, it’s a massacree.’

‘Yu want to step in here
an’ try?’ ground out Cameron, hearing the insult.

‘Couldn’t do much worse,’
was the contemptuous reply.

Cameron shook his head to
clear it. Although Green’s blows had been punishing, they had not
hurt him as
much as he was trying to make
it appear. If he could get this smiling devil to drop his guard for
a moment … Without warning he dived forward at Sudden, landing a
heavy blow on the puncher’s temple. Sudden, momentarily stunned by
the blow, was unable to evade the groping grip of the gunman, whose
knee came up wickedly, dropping Sudden gasping to the floor. Sudden
managed to roll desperately aside as Cameron’s spurred boot came
stamping down upon the ground where a second before his head had
been. A cold rage flooded into Sudden’s body, and in a smooth
movement he rolled over and up on to his feet. Gone now was any
pretense of avoiding Cameron’s rushes. He disregarded the gunman’s
attempts at self-defense and attack and went after the man, trading
blow for sickening blow, taking whatever Cameron threw at him and
hurling his own blood-spattered fists at the leering
visage.

The sweat-stained, battered
principles, encircled by the brutal faces of the onlookers eager to
see every moment, every blow struck; the flat sound of bone on
flesh, the wounded grunts when body blows went home; these, under
the flaring lights grayed by the fog of smoke, dulled by the curses
of the crowd, created a picture which would have defied the
descriptive powers of a Dante.

Sudden knew that it was madness to fight
like this, but the primitive urge to destroy this man with his bare
fists had, for once, overcome his patience. Dominated by his
intention to beat this killer into the dust he took blow upon blow
that might have been avoided, for the satisfaction of once more
battering his own fists into the torn face of his opponent.

It had to end. No two men
could go on with such brutal punishment and stand. A chance blow
from Cameron sent Sudden reeling backwards against the bar, and
before he could straighten, Cameron was upon him, twisting,
thrashing, trying desperately to hold the puncher there. Sudden was
conscious of the hand clawing his face, the seeking thumb searching
to blind him. A surge of fury possessed him and he smashed his fist
blindly forward. It caught Cameron just below the chin, in his
corded neck. Gasping, clawing at his throat, trying
desperately to breathe, Cameron fell backwards,
momentarily paralyzed.

‘Yu got him, mister!’
yelled one of the onlookers. ‘Whale the hell out’n him!’

Sudden shook his head; weak and dizzy, he
stood waiting for Cameron to regain his feet. He knew that the
shouted advice had been eminently sensible, and fully in accord
with what Cameron would have done had the situation been reversed.
But he did not fight that way. Cameron was recovering. His breath
rasped in his throat as he climbed once more to his feet.

‘That was a sucker play,’
he croaked. ‘Now I’m gonna kill yu!’

His head dropped, and he
rushed in, all science gone, his arm shooting forward to deliver a
blow, which, had it landed, would have ended the contest then and
there. But Sudden had been ready for just such a move, and acting
too swiftly for those watching to follow, he grasped the descending
wrist and, using Cameron’s own force and weight, twisted around
like a pivot. Pulled forward by Sudden’s unexpected move, Cameron
hit the puncher’s thigh and went up into the air. Sudden released
his grip and Cameron shot forward to land with a crash full length
at the end of the bar where he had originally stood. For some
moments he lay there, supine, senseless, only the heaving chest
showing that he still lived. Slowly, one eye opened, then the
other. The realization that he had been bested by the slim,
battered man who stood watching him warily flooded into him, and in
that same moment a flash of recognition came to him.

‘My Gawd!’ he gasped. ‘Now
I know yu! Yo’re that Texas outlaw! Yo’re – Sudden!’

Sudden! This stunning revelation brought a
gasp from the onlookers, and the unbelievable wizardry they had
witnessed was in one word fully explained to them. So this was
Sudden, the daredevil whose name was legend throughout the
Southwest! No wonder he had outdrawn Wes Cameron! Probably no other
man could have!

Cameron levered himself up
on to one elbow. A fury of hatred shook him, and he shot a glance
sideways. His
gun and belt lay within arm’s
length.

‘Yu lose, Sudden!’ he
screamed.

In one rolling movement
Cameron had reached his gun, and his hand was clawing at the butt
when a shot roared out and Sudden, who stood unarmed and helpless,
his own guns behind Tyler’s bar, whirled to see Tom Appleby
standing just inside the batwing doors, smoke dribbling from the
muzzle of his forty-five.

Cameron fell backwards, a look of shock and
malevolence upon his face. He half rose again upon his elbow, a
quivering hand trying to line the gun-barrel on Appleby.

‘Yu … double … cr—’
Appleby’s gun blazed again, and Cameron was slammed backwards, his
face still fixed in a scowl of hatred. One of the watchers bent
over the prostrate form, then straightened, shaking his
head.

‘Cashed,’ he announced to
all and sundry. ‘An’ good riddance!’

‘Amen to that!’ seconded
Tyler. ‘Tom, yu arrove just in time.’

‘Ain’t so shore,’ said
Appleby coldly. ‘How did it start?’

Eager voices supplied him
with the details of what had passed, losing nothing in the telling.
While the patrons of the bar clamored around the lawman to add to
his knowledge their own story, their own opinions, Appleby’s cold
eyes never left Sudden. Nodding, he shouldered his way through the
knot of men surrounding him and came across to the bar, where
Sudden was buckling on his gun belt once more.

‘So yo’re Sudden,’ he said.
‘Mebbe I’d a’ done this town a service if I’d let Cameron kill yu.
Then I could o’ hung him an’ rid the world o’ two o’
yu.’

Sudden faced the lawman calmly, his face
unreadable.

‘Yu just saved my life,
Appleby,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m overlookin’ what yu
said.’

‘Don’t,’ Appleby said
shortly. ‘Yo’re one o’ the lawless breed an’ yu ain’t wanted in
Yavapai!’

He turned and faced the crowd in the saloon.
Holding up his arms for silence, he addressed them in grave
tones.

‘Afore yu all start tellin’
me I’ve gone loco, lissen to me: there’s worse news tonight than
one rat killin’ another.’ He glanced malevolently over his shoulder
at
Sudden. ‘Mebbe this jasper knows about
it, too. I just come in from the Saber. Randy Gunnison’s old man’s
hoss came in this afternoon with blood on the saddle.’

A roar of excited speculation greeted this
announcement. One man stepped forward with a question.

‘Yu got any idee where
Gunnison was headin’ when he left Saber, Tom?’

‘Randy sez he was ridin’ up
into the Mesquites,’ the lawman told him.

‘He rode up thar alone?’
asked a puzzled bystander.

‘So I’m told,’ Appleby
said. ‘He told Randy that he aimed to have a man-to-man talk with
Jake Harris afore things got too far out o’ hand in the valley.
Knowed if he rode up there with his crew the nesters’d reckon it
was a war party an’ commence firin’. So he went in
alone.’

‘Yu reckon someone’s
bushwhacked ol’ Lafe?’ asked Tyler, his eyes wide.

‘I’m hopin’ not,’ Appleby
said coldly. ‘Or this jasper an’ his friends up in the Mesquites is
goin’ to have some explainin’ to do.’

All eyes swung to fix upon Sudden, who had
listened to this news with as much surprise as any man in the
place. Sudden fixed Appleby with a flat stare.

‘Yu aimin’ to make arrests
or preside at a lynchin’?’ he snapped.

‘Neither – yet!’ was the
sneering reply. ‘Tomorrow mornin’, however, I’m goin’ to comb the
Mesquites with a posse. If we find out that anythin’ has happened
to Lafe Gunnison we’ll be asking yu an’ yore friends a few leadin’
questions, an’ yu can bet yore last cent on that!’

An ugly murmur among the crowd convinced
Green that the lawman had the sentiment of the townspeople behind
him. Gunnison was a big man to these people, more important to
their lives than any of the homesteaders or, indeed, all of
them.

‘I aim to collect Johnstone
an’ Newley’s bodies,’ he told the men who, instinct with menace,
half circled about him. His voice was mild and devoid of emphasis.
‘Then I’m takin’ them out to the Mesquites. That’s where I’ll be if
anyone wants me.’ He said this last looking directly at Appleby,
whose eyes fell before Sudden’s. The onlookers watched this silent
exchange, and when the
puncher moved
towards the door, fell back. Their faces were sullen, but they had
no stomach for any trouble with this hard-eyed, acid-tongued
individual who had already proven his mettle before their
astonished eyes.

As the batwing doors
flapped behind him a hubbub of speculation began. The onlookers
bellied up to Tyler’s bar, and the comments flew thick and
fast.

‘Sudden, huh? He’s a
killer, shore enough,’ said one man.

‘Shore he is,’ scoffed
Tyler. ‘That’s why he beefed Cameron when he had ’im dead to
rights. If that boy’s a killer I’m a Dutchman.’