Hawk 13, page 1
We hope you enjoy this book – if you did we would really appreciate it if you can write a short review. Your ratings really make a difference for the authors, helping the books you like reach more people.
You can rate this book at your preferred retailer.
A dedication for the dedicated:
Mike Stotter
Chapter One
NOTHING MUCH WAS moving in Santa Rosa. The sun seemed to hang motionless in the vivid blue Arizona sky, pinning the town under a burden of heat that left it too breathless for any activity. A few horses stood wearily patient outside the two saloons, their tails flicking at the flies clustering around their withers; a lean, gray mongrel crouched beneath the boardwalk fronting the stores, not even bothering to chew on the bone set between its paws. High up, where the sun dazzled the blue into silver, three vultures circled lazily around the sky. Below, shaded by the overhang of the stoop, four old men slumped in creaky chairs, ignoring the cards set on the barrel between them. They exchanged an occasional word, the sentences coming out slow, with long pauses before the answer as though the heat dried their tongues and made talking difficult. Mostly they just looked.
Mostly they looked at the man seated on the far side of Main Street.
He was young by their standards, not yet thirty, but with eyes that suggested more experience than his years. Cool, calm eyes that scanned the dusty street with the innate alertness of a man long accustomed to watching his back. They were set in a suntanned face that a woman might find handsome and a man call dangerous: the kind of face that was never completely at ease, never fully off-guard. Black hair curled over the collar of a white shirt from under a flat-brimmed black Stetson, the color complementing his tight black pants and dusty boots. His right hand held a mug of tepid beer that he sipped with a disinterest that suggested he was killing time rather than doing any serious drinking. His left hand was covered by a black leather glove, the fingers oddly stiff, as though impaired by some old injury. Around his waist he wore a black leather gun belt; oiled and polished and professional-looking. The holster tied down on his right thigh was cut away to expose the hammer and trigger guard of the Colt’s .45 Frontier model nestled snug in the scabbard, riveted in place so that the muzzle of the Colt angled slightly forwards, the butt canting back for a fast draw. On the left side of the belt there was a second holster, a purpose-built sheath of smooth leather that held a single-barrel 10-gauge Meteor shotgun, the tube of the barrel cut down to no more than twelve inches, the stock cut away and rounded off to form a pistol grip. It was an ugly weapon, menacing in its potential for devastation.
Menacing as the man himself, for he had about him a kind of aura that spoke of danger. It was in his eyes and the alert set of his body; in the way he watched the street without seeming to pay it much attention; in the way his right hand—even though holding the mug of beer—never strayed far from the pistol.
The four old men had him marked down as a pistoleer, a gunfighter.
They were right: his name was Jared Hawk, and he lived by the gun.
He was in Santa Rosa for no particular reason other than a vague desire to return to the yucca country of the Southwest after his brush with a man called Jack Shade. He had no contract; was not looking for anyone, or working for anyone. He was just waiting over a few days before pushing on to Tucson, where he thought he might find his kind of work. Santa Rosa was as good a place as any to waste a spell resting up. A deal smaller than Tucson, it was larger than most of the scattered Arizona settlements: a place a man could find more than one flyblown cantina, and girls better than the wrong end of a mule. It had two saloons and a two-story hotel; a regular bank and a spread of stores; a livery stable and a stage depot; a marshal’s office.
Hawk had been there one night and half a day. He was expecting the marshal to show any time now: that was the way things were when a gunhawk drifted in.
His lips curled in a faint smile as he saw the door of the lawman’s office swing open and a man with a badge pinned to the front of his gray shirt come sauntering, deceptively casual, along the sidewalk. The peace officer looked to be in his mid-thirties, tall and neat, with vest and pants and hat matching the shade of his shirt. A trim mustache covered his upper lip, brown like his eyes. He wore a Remington Army model in .44 caliber cross-hung on the left side of his belt. He halted a pace clear of Hawk’s chair and nodded, smiling.
‘Name’s Whittaker. Abel Whittaker. I’m the law around here.’
The statement begged an answer. Hawk gave it.
‘Jared Hawk. I’m just passing through.’
Whittaker’s eyes took in the unusual gun belt, the ugly-looking scattergun.
‘To where?’
‘Tucson,’ Hawk replied.
‘Working?’ the marshal asked. ‘Or looking?’
‘Looking.’ The smile stayed around the corners of Hawk’s mouth. ‘Not here.’
‘That’s good.’ Whittaker nodded, seeming to relax slightly. ‘This is a quiet town. We don’t get much trouble an’ I like to keep it that way. You remember that an’ we got no cause to tangle.’
‘Sure.’ Hawk stared back at the marshal. ‘I’ll remember.’
Whittaker stood silent for a moment, as though he felt there was something more needed saying but couldn’t find the words. Finally he grunted and turned on his heel, walking back down the sidewalk. Hawk watched him go, not feeling anything. It was a standard warning, milder than some: gunfighters made peace officers nervous. They made most folks nervous; weren’t really welcomed many places. Not until someone needed them. He uncoiled from the chair and spilled the tepid dregs of his beer into the dust. Across the street the old men watched him as he went into the saloon.
Inside it was no cooler than the street. Smoke hung in lifeless swirls on the heavy air, there was the smell of food frying mixing in with the sour odor of sweat. A handful of cowboys and storekeepers were propped against the bar and two girls with dark patches of moisture staining their gaudy dresses were turning cards at a table off to one side. They looked at Hawk, the beginnings of smiles distorting the paint on their faces, then fading back into boredom as he turned away. He put his mug down on the bar and waited for the ’keep to fill it. It was too damn’ hot to eat. Too damn’ hot to do much except drink and get bored enough he felt it was time to move on. He picked up the mug and went back outside, canting the chair so that the thing rested against the wall of the saloon and he could set his heels on the rail fronting the sidewalk. The sun didn’t seem to have moved much across the sky; even the vultures seemed to be in the same positions; and the four old men looked frozen into place by the heat.
The approach of the three riders was the most exciting event in Santa Rosa all day, and they were just walking their ponies lazily down Main Street like a trio of drifting cowboys with nothing better to do. Hawk watched them with casual interest, more from habit than any other motive.
They were dusty, as if they had spent a long time riding open range, dressed in faded work clothes with wide-brimmed hats shading their faces. Two carried Colts on their belts, the third a big LeMat. The gun was unusual enough to catch Hawk’s interest, an oddity in a time of jacketed cartridges. It was a combination of revolver and shotgun, a cap and ball weapon with nine chambers holding slugs in .42 or .36 caliber and an underslung shotgun barrel capable of firing 18 gauge. The LeMat had been used by Confederate Cavalry during the Civil War, but its weight and the advent of more efficient handguns had relegated it to little more than a curiosity in the day of the Colt.
The owner saw Hawk watching him and favored the gunfighter with a cold-eyed stare, right hand brushing the rounded grip of the big pistol in a movement close to a challenge. Hawk answered the stare evenly, lifting the beer mug to his mouth as the riders passed by and the man turned his face away. His eyes followed them down the street, instinct telling him they were something more than just wandering cowpokes as they passed the saloons and the stores and reined in outside the bank.
He set his mug down as they went in, gloved left hand lifting to wipe froth from his lips. Apart from the four old men, he was the only one to see them go inside. He swung his feet down from the rail and straightened his back as he waited.
It did not surprise him when the muffled blast of the LeMat’s shotgun barrel disturbed the heavy stillness of the afternoon. Less so when the trio came out of the bank with sacks slung across their shoulders. A clerk with blood staining the left sleeve of his striped shirt followed them out. He was shouting and waving a short-barreled storekeeper’s Colt too violently to fire accurately. His shots blew wild, gouging splinters from the porch on the far side of Main Street. Then the two Colts fired in unison and the clerk was hurled back inside the bank with a dark crimson patch blossoming over the front of his shirt.
Hawk rose to his feet as Abel Whittaker came running from his office. The lawman had the Remington in his hand and his mouth wide open as he bellowed a warning. He loosed off a shot as he got within range, hitting one bank robber in the shoulder so that the man swung round, falling away from his horse. One other lifted into the saddle, snatching up the loose reins as he yelled for the wounded man to mount. The man with the LeMat brought the pistol up in both hands and fired back at Whittaker. He had reloaded the shotgun barrel and this time the detonation was massive in the warm air. Like a thunderclap that spat a long tongue of fire in Whittaker’s direction. The marshal screamed as the full force of the blast took him in the chest. His gray shirt disappeared in tatters into the hole, fragments of white bone and curling entrails visible as he
Suddenly the street was filled with people. They gaped, shouting as the bandits mounted their horses and heeled the animals to a charge. A woman screamed, ducking back as a bullet dusted her face with splinters. No one returned the raiders’ fire. No one attempted to halt their getaway.
No one save Hawk.
He acted oh pure instinct. Not thinking about it. Not feeling any particular compassion for Whittaker or the dead clerk. Not thinking about the people of Santa Rosa or their money. Just reacting.
He snatched the Meteor clear of the holster in a single fluid movement that had the scattergun cocked and aiming as the three riders drew level with his position. The cut-down barrel was held firm between the thumb and stiffened fingers of his left hand, his right steady on the pistol grip as he squeezed the trigger and felt the shotgun buck. Its roar was louder than the LeMat’s, its double-aught buckshot spreading over a wider area. The closest rider was picked up on a wash of flame that lifted him clear of his saddle as his right arm and half his face was torn apart. The curves of his jaw and cheekbone were briefly visible before the blood gushing from his shattered temple hid them behind a curtain of red. His sleeve, no longer bulked by the solidity of his arm, fluttered raggedly as he cannoned against the wounded man. The wounded man’s horse screamed in panic and turned aside, plunging up onto the sidewalk as Hawk dropped the Meteor and fisted the Colt.
The man with the LeMat shouted something that got lost under the blast of his pistol as he spun his horse and began to fire in Hawk’s direction. His mount was fighting his control, eyes rolling as the gunfire and the stink of black powder confused it, sending it into panic. Hawk went down on one knee, right arm thrusting out as he triggered the Colt. Once. Twice. The first shot took the man with the LeMat in the chest, splintering his breastbone and glancing away into his shoulder. His face went pale under the dust and his eyes bulged in a mixture of pain and fear and rage. Blood spread across his shirtfront and he struggled to stay in the saddle. The second bullet plowed into his stomach, tearing deep into the softness of his belly so that he doubled over, the LeMat blowing holes in the dirt of Main Street. His horse began to buck, and he was tossed from the saddle, right foot catching in the stirrup so that he was dragged round in a circle as the panic-stricken pony tried to shake off the dead weight.
Hawk shifted his aim to cover the wounded man. He had dropped the money sacks and was urging his mount down from the sidewalk, steering the animal with his damaged arm as he fired blind with his right. His Colt clicked on an empty cylinder as Hawk fired, and for the instant before the .45 slug hit there was an expression of disbelief on his grimed face. Then all expression got lost under the implosion of his features as the bullet struck the bridge of his nose and drove on into the skull. His eyes and nostrils and cheeks were torn into the hole, a gaping crimson opening staring sightlessly at the gunfighter as the back of his head blew loose, fountaining blood and pulped brain matter in a great wash behind him. His head wobbled from side to side, sending arcing droplets of blood over his shoulders and chest. Then, still clutching the empty Colt, he fell clear of the saddle.
Hawk stood up slowly, cold eyes taking in the devastation spread before him. He lowered the Colt’s hammer and dropped the pistol into the holster. Then he picked up the shotgun and fed a fresh cartridge into the Meteor before sliding the weapon into its sheath. He stepped down off the sidewalk and grabbed the reins of the panicked horse, fighting it to a standstill so that he was able to free the dead man’s foot. The animal’s terror-struck stamping had thudded its hooves all over the dead man’s body, breaking ribs and mangling the face to an unrecognizable pulp. Hawk walked it over to a hitching rail as the sudden silence that had followed the blast of gunfire erupted into a storm of voices. Townsfolk came running from the saloons and stores, staring at the corpses, staring at Hawk. Some cowboys grabbed the two loose animals and hitched them alongside the other. People began clapping the gunfighter on the back, babbling their admiration. Three old men stood up, and a hoarse voice cut through the sound of the crowd.
‘They shot Lincoln.’
Hawk looked at the sidewalk. Three chairs stood unoccupied around a rocker. The chair was moving slowly backwards and forwards, creaking on the boards. The fourth old man was still seated. His arms hung limp by his sides and his mouth was open, oozing a thread of spittle and chewing tobacco. His eyes were wide open, not looking at anything. There was a hole in his shirt just over the heart, ringed by a dark circle of blood.
Someone said, ‘Jesus Christ!’
One of the old men said, ‘He always did want to die with his boots on.’
Hawk turned away, pushing through the crowd in the direction of the saloon as someone asked, ‘Who were they? Anyone can put a name to the faces?’
No one answered and the speaker turned towards Hawk.
‘You know who they were, mister?’
‘Never saw them before.’ The gunfighter shook his head, glancing down at the bloody wreckage that was all that was left of the raiders’ features. ‘I just figured it was time someone faced them down.’
Chapter Two
A CURIOUS ATMOSPHERE pervaded the saloon. The citizens of Santa Rosa crowded around the bar, vying to buy Hawk drinks, to tell him how good he was, to tell him how grateful they were to have their money saved. Yet their admiration and their gratitude was tinged with fear. He was a gunfighter. He had just taken three armed men single-handed. That made him dangerous, so even as they bought him drinks there remained a feeling that none of them would be sorry to see him ride on. Hawk sipped a beer and mostly ignored them: he was as used to the sudden rush of adulation as to the animosity hidden beneath the surface. He had seen it all before. The awe that followed a display of gun skill, gradually fading as the memory of danger passed to be replaced by the wondering. Why would a man live that way? Was he really much different to the men he had killed? Might he not turn bad?
It didn’t matter much to him. He wasn’t planning on staying longer than another day or two in Santa Rosa. And he didn’t give a damn what people thought of him, good or ill.
Then the crowd fell silent and began to drift away as a big Negro came into the saloon. He moved like a man accustomed to parting crowds, with an easy assurance and a faintly contemptuous smile on his thick lips. He was a good head taller than Hawk’s six feet, with heavy muscles that seemed only to emphasize the lazy grace of his movements. He was wearing a dark suit, the right side dragged back over the butt of a pearl-handled Colt’s Peacemaker. His flat-crowned Stetson was decorated with a circle of bright silver conchos, matching the silver threading of his fancy vest. The cuffs of his shirt were lavishly ruffled and the neck was fastened with a shiny silk bow tie. On any other man the rig would have looked ridiculous, but somehow it fitted the black like a statement of his confidence in himself.
He walked up to the bar and took the whiskey the barkeep had waiting for him. The barkeep nodded without speaking and set the bottle down before easing away to the far end.
The Negro took a drink. Poured a fresh glass, and turned to Hawk.
‘They call me Ace.’ His voice was deep and rich, lazy as his manner. ‘On account of my color.’
Hawk was aware of the space that had cleared around them. Sensed that this man had some kind of hold over the townsfolk that was nothing to do with his color or whatever talent he might have with the pearl-handled Colt.
‘Hawk,’ he said. ‘Jared Hawk.’
Ace nodded, filling a glass that he pushed in Hawk’s direction.
‘You did good out there.’ There was no particular awe in his voice, nor any fear. It was just a statement of fact: one professional to another. ‘I saw it from the hotel.’
‘Lot of people saw it,’ Hawk murmured. ‘Not many wanted to do anything about it.’
Ace chuckled. ‘They’re scared. They got too much to lose. Besides, they’d know there wasn’t no one gonna ride off with Mr. Sweeney’s money an’ get away with it.’
