Die Trying, page 1
BERKLEY
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Copyright © 2021 by The Estate of Ralph Compton
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Ebook ISBN: 9780593333921
First Edition: December 2021
Cover design by Steve Meditz
Book design by George Towne, adapted for ebook by Estelle Malmed
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
The Immortal Cowboy
Prologue
Part One: Montezuma’s Gold
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Part Two: On the Rails . . .
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Part Three: . . . and Off the Rails
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Part Four: Ghost Town
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
For my parents, Michael and Beverley Healey
THE IMMORTAL COWBOY
This is respectfully dedicated to the “American Cowboy.” His was the saga sparked by the turmoil that followed the Civil War, and the passing of more than a century has by no means diminished the flame.
True, the old days and the old ways are but treasured memories, and the old trails have grown dim with the ravages of time, but the spirit of the cowboy lives on.
In my travels—to Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Arizona—I always find something that reminds me of the Old West. While I am walking these plains and mountains for the first time, there is this feeling that a part of me is eternal, that I have known these old trails before. I believe it is the undying spirit of the frontier calling me, through the mind’s eye, to step back into time. What is the appeal of the Old West of the American frontier?
It has been epitomized by some as the dark and bloody period in American history. Its heroes—Crockett, Bowie, Hickok, Earp—have been reviled and criticized. Yet the Old West lives on, larger than life.
It has become a symbol of freedom, when there was always another mountain to climb and another river to cross; when a dispute between two men was settled not with expensive lawyers, but with fists, knives, or guns. Barbaric? Maybe. But some things never change. When the cowboy rode into the pages of American history, he left behind a legacy that lives within the hearts of us all.
—Ralph Compton
PROLOGUE
Thirty Years Ago
The town of New Kingston baked beneath the blazing-hot sun.
Nathaniel Burr, Billy Lee McBride and Pat Nilson checked the coast was clear before pulling their face coverings up over their noses. They stood out of sight around the corner from the Harlan National Bank and waited in the shade it afforded. You could say this was not Nate’s first rodeo; you could also say that hitting the bank in New Kingston was a little too close to home for him and that he was probably mad to do so. He lived just ten miles away, on a farm with his wife and young son. But his saving grace was that he was not a regular in the town. Nobody would know his voice and put a name to it, most likely. Even so, the heightened risk of this job was not lost on him. His face covering could slip and his identity could be made known to the townsfolk. He could end up shot and killed by the law or by a local with delusions of heroism.
But needs must. That was how Nate reconciled the risk to himself: if he didn’t hit the bank with Billy Lee and Pat first, the bank was going to hit him and take everything. The house, the farm, all of it torn from his grasp. It wasn’t a threat Harlan National Bank made idly. They’d take away everything he had if he let them, all in the name of settling the debt that had accumulated over time like so much soot in a fire grate.
He would rob the bank and use their own money to pay off his debt. There was a kind of poetic justice to it, when he thought about it. The sheer lunacy of the plan, the nerve of it, made him want to laugh like a madman. For Billy Lee and Pat, it was just another robbery with a third share of the loot up for grabs. There would be other robberies later, just as there had been other robberies before. Unless they were all shot to hell and killed, in which case it would be the last robbery they ever pulled—either way, it was just work for Billy Lee and Pat. Another score.
But as far as Nate was concerned, the robbery of the Harlan National Bank in New Kingston would decide his fate and that of his family. When he thought of the bank claiming his land, he felt a cord of existential dread twist inside him. He could either let his fear drag him down, or he could fight it. Keep his head above water, even if it meant putting his life on the line.
He chose to fight.
“We gonna do this or not?” Billy Lee asked, adjusting his mask.
Only his eyes showed above the fabric covering—hard gray flints set within a weather-beaten, wrinkled face. He looked to be about fifty years of age, when in fact he’d barely hit thirty. Hard living has its way in the end; all the sun, liquor and women catch up with a man. It makes even the best-looking specimens appear washed-up and over the hill by the time they cross the threshold of being one score and ten. Billy Lee looked antsy, ready to get to work.
“Longer we wait, more chance we’ll be spotted.”
“Agreed,” Pat said.
He was more heavyset, with a disfigured nose whose crooked topography detailed how it had been broken at various points in his life. It was the thickness of a forefinger and buckled up like a warped question mark. Pat favored a repeater rifle over a pistol—preferring the heft of the weapon in his hands and the stopping power it possessed. He wore a red bandanna over his face, leaving just the top of his busted nose and his piercing blue eyes uncovered.
Unlike his brothers-in-arms, Nate preferred a derby hat to a typical Stetson or flop hat. He always had. Just like Billy Lee, Nate carried two pistols, but unlike him, Nate only ever shot one at a time—he’d never seen the point of using two guns at once when one could be used to carry out the same job, though he understood the need to carry two. When you’re in the thick of it, there’s little time to reload a pistol that’s been shot empty. Better to holster the spent pistol and free its twin from your gun belt. One thing Nate had learned was that your enemy counts your shots, so they know when all the chambers are empty and you’re going to need to reload. A man who has to stop to refill his gun with bullets makes himself vulnerable. Remove that need and you gain a few precious seconds, giving you a significant advantage over your opponent. The margin deciding who lived and who died—who walked away from a gunfight to return to their family and who died in the dirt with the sun in their eyes—was so fine, it was barely a margin at all.
Nate edged to the corner of the building, where he looked up and down the main drag. The street was quiet and deserted, thanks to the blazing afternoon heat that kept most townsfolk too drowsy to leave the coolness of their homes. He knew from living in the area that when it got really hot, it was sometimes all you could do to nap through the worst of it. The Mexicans called it a siesta and Nate had to agree there was sense in the idea. A bank robbery became a whole lot easier when half the potential witnesses were dozing indoors.
“Don’t seem to be a soul around,” Nate said, his voice clipped. He turned to the other two. “I think if we’re gonna do it, we gotta do it now.”
Billy Lee checked his twin pistols, one hanging from each hip. “That old geezer come out yet?”
“No, he’s still in there,” Nate said.
Billy Lee narrowed his eyes. “So we got one old coot don’t know when he’s outstayed his welcome, one puddin’-belly guard, two lady tellers and a manager.”
“Straightforward as it can be, I reckon,” Pat said. “Like we wanted it. No complications.”
“So long as nobody plays hero,” Billy Lee growled.
Nate’s hand flexed on his gun, feeling the adrenaline in his blood now. He could deny it all he wanted, but there was a thrill to being bad, to doing something that coul
“Let’s move,” Nate said, heading out to the street.
The three of them swept unceremoniously inside the bank. There was a counter with two teller’s stations, thick bars running from the countertop to the ceiling. A locked gate stood to the right. A lump of a guard sat on a chair just inside the entrance, arms folded, chin and neck rolls resting on his chest as he snored. Before the guard had time to open his eyes and turn his head to take them in, Pat had jammed the business end of his repeater into the man’s bulbous belly.
“What the—” the guard said, alarmed.
Pat pushed his repeater in hard, pinning the man to his chair. “How’s about you stay right where you are, huh?”
The guard stared back at him with wide, petrified eyes. “Y-y-yessir,” he stammered. “I-I-I don’t want no trouble.”
An old man whom Nate had watched wander into the bank nearly an hour before was still propping up the counter, chatting away to one of the lady tellers. She shrieked at the sight of the masked men and the old man turned to watch Pat take care of the guard. If he’d been younger, he might’ve reached for his sidearm in that moment and caused them a world of trouble. As it was, he just looked dumbstruck by what happened to be unfolding around him, bushy white eyebrows raised in surprise. Nate knew how slow the reflexes of the old-timers could be sometimes, like they were experiencing everything at half speed.
“What in the hell d’you boys think you’re doing?”
“Move!” Nate ushered him off to the side, one hand on the old man’s shoulder, the other holding his gun against his spine. “Easy does it now,” he warned him.
The man shuffled along. “I ain’t no trouble to nobody,” he protested in a shaky voice. “Don’t push me. It ain’t like my legs work as well as they used to.”
“I’m not pushing you, old-timer. I’m guidin’ you to where you gotta be so you don’t get no ideas about going where we don’t want ya. And I’ll take that pistol, too,” Nate told him.
“Aw, hell,” the man said, handing Nate the pistol from his hip with a thin shaking hand.
Nate tucked it into his waistband. “Thank you kindly. Now sit in that there chair and don’t you make trouble for us. D’you hear?”
“Yeah, yeah,” the old man said, taking a seat. “You fellas sin how you like. Retribution’s gonna be waitin’ for ya sooner than later. You can count on that, sure as day is day. Mark my words.”
“Uh-huh,” Nate said disinterestedly.
Meanwhile, Billy Lee had jammed one pistol between the bars so that it pointed at the teller on the left, a woman with dark, curly hair and wonky glasses. He trained his other pistol on the teller to his right.
“Call for your manager,” Billy Lee told her.
The teller on the right, an older woman, with gray-blond hair pulled back from her face, made to get up.
“Hey! I said to call him. You get up and move away from this here counter, I’m gonna plug this one in the face. Then it’ll be your turn. Don’t you dare think I’ll so much as hesitate, because I won’t. I killed all kinds before. Women. Children. Cats and dogs, too. Ain’t that right, boys?”
“Aw, hell yeah,” Pat said. “He’s a regular cold-blooded killer this one.”
“That’s right. I’ve been told I got ice water for blood and a heart black as coal, so you’d best listen to him because he’s tellin’ you the truth.”
“Okay, mister,” the older woman croaked. She swallowed and nodded obediently. “I’ll just stay here.”
“Good call,” Billy Lee said. “How’s about your names?”
The teller closest to him with the dark hair trembled with fear, finding it impossible to shift her gaze from the end of Billy Lee’s gun. “Carla,” she gasped.
“Good to meet you, Carla,” Billy Lee said. He looked over at the other teller. “How about you, trouble? Got a name?”
“Olive.”
“Nice name. Now, Olive, will you call through for your manager? Loud and clear so he can hear you, thatta girl.”
She cleared her throat and half turned in her seat. “Mr. Trout? Can you come here a moment? Mr. Trout?”
A door opened. A rotund gentleman ambled out, pulling up his braces. It seemed that like the rest of the town, he’d taken himself off for a rest to get away from the interminable heat. He looked hot and bothered, with droopy eyes encrusted with the remnants of sleep. He grumbled under his breath at the inconvenience of being forced to rise from a sedentary position and then froze as he took in the scene before him. The masked gunmen holding his tellers at gunpoint. The guard pinned to his chair with a rifle. The bewildered old man sitting in the corner, looking like a lost sheep.
“You the manager?” Billy Lee asked.
The man nodded, visibly afraid.
“Trout, is it?”
The man nodded.
“Right, listen here, Fish Man. You’d better open that gate before I kill these two women, unless you value money over them living. Then that’s fair by me.”
“Of course not.” The manager didn’t need any further encouragement. He fumbled with a set of keys hanging from his belt, but took several seconds to find the right one. “It’s one of these . . . ,” he said in a panicked voice, hands trembling.
“Come on, come on,” Billy Lee urged him. “No games!”
“I’m not playing any games with you, sir, I swear. I’m just having some jitters is all.” Finally, the manager slid the right key into the lock, turned it until there was a big heavy click and pulled the gate open.
Nate shared a glance with Pat, both of them watching over their prisoners as Billy Lee forced the manager to take him to the safe. Nate backed up from the old man, off to the side where he was afforded a good view of everyone in the room.
“Get in there and help him. I got this” he said to Pat.
Pat ducked behind the counter with Billy Lee. Together, they escorted the bank manager to the safe. There was a room partitioned off with bars from floor to ceiling and behind that barrier stood a big safe. Nate’s attention flitted from the guard to the old man, to the two women behind the counter.
“Ain’t no reason why you folks won’t see tomorrow,” Nate said slowly, clearly, trying to temper any aspirations toward impulsive heroics. “Nobody needs to be on the receiving end of a bullet today.”
“Except you,” the old man grumbled.
Nate looked at him. “What did you say?”
The old man raised his voice. “I said, ‘Except you.’ ”
“Just can it,” Nate told him, shaking his head. “Your squawking ain’t helpin’ none.”
The old man pushed himself up from the chair, his arms shaking a little as he did so. “If I were younger, I’d teach you a lesson or two, sonny. Wouldn’t have had any of this nonsense when I was in my prime.”
“Your prime was a long time ago, Grandpa. Sit back down and behave yourself.”
Either the old man didn’t hear him, or he was ignoring Nate. Whichever happened to be the case, he proceeded to walk slowly toward Nate, regardless of the pistol trained on him.
“Cryin’ shame you took that pistol off me,” he said, his voice rising in pitch. “I tell ya, the youth of today . . . Ever since my Mabel passed, the only thing has kept me sane is comin’ in here, talkin’ to Carla and Olive. Chewin’ the fat with people got the time to listen. I’ll be damned if I’m gonna let some banditos take that away. Ain’t got nothin’ else goin’ for me.”
“Sit back down.”
Was he going to fight an old man? Was he really willing to do that? Even he had his limits, boundaries he would not cross. He was no monster. He drew the line at hurting a woman or a child . . . but an old man? Nate supposed that if it came down to it, he just might have to.
“I said sit! Last warning!”
The old man closed the distance between them. The guard and the tellers watched from the sidelines, mouths agape at what they were seeing.
“I ain’t doin’ what you tell me to do, sonny. I do whatever the hell I like!”
