Journey into Violence Read Online Free Page B

Lowery said. “Like you, I’m riding for the brand.”
    â€œHead back to the ranch, Lowery,” Frank said. “If we meet up with those four gunmen, you’d only be a liability and maybe get me or Les killed.”
    â€œI could draw some of their fire,” Lowery said. “There’s always that, huh?”
    â€œI told you to go back to the ranch.” Frank’s handsome face was stiff with anger. “Maybe you reckon you’ve already killed more than your fair share or maybe you’re yellow and have always been. Either way, I don’t want you around.”
    Hank Lowery looked as though he’d just been slapped. “That’s a hell of a thing to say to a man.” He turned, mounted his horse, and rode away at a canter. Soon, he was lost in the rippling heat haze.
    Bowes used his fingers to wipe the sweatband of his hat and settled it back on his graying head. “I never seen a man turn coward right before my eyes before. You ride for the brand, you fight for it.”
    â€œDespite what I said, I don’t think he’s a coward, Les,” Frank said.
    â€œThen what the hell is he?” Bowes said.
    Frank shook his head. “I don’t know.”

C HAPTER S IX
    Frank Cobb and Les Bowes rode north into the southern edge of the timber country. Frank rode with a wary eye on the terrain around him. The notion that he was riding into gun trouble piled up inside him like thunderheads before a storm. Bowes was unnaturally silent for a talking man and the only sounds were the creak of saddle leather and the soft footfalls of their horses.
    â€œI know this country,” Bowes said finally. “Tobias Briggs’s place is about a mile ahead of us.”
    â€œI’ve never been north this far,” Frank said. “It’s a ways off my home range. Who’s Tobias Briggs?”
    â€œFrom what folks around here say, Briggs got his start as a slave trader in New Orleans but killed a man and lit a shuck for Texas just ahead of a hanging posse. He worked as an Indian agent for a spell and opened up a trading post. Now that the Apaches are all but gone, he’s turned his place into a hog farm and saloon. You want a woman and rotgut whiskey, Tobias Briggs is your man. They say he also sells opium the Chinese bring in from Fort Worth, but I don’t know about that.”
    â€œYou think those four killers might have stopped there?” Frank said.
    â€œYeah, if they have money to spend. Most times them Mexican peons have a gold peso or two stashed away somewhere.”
    â€œIt’s thin,” Frank said. “I want to know why they scattered the Kerrigan cattle and on whose order. Why would they ride so far off our range?”
    â€œI told you, Frank. For women and whiskey. Chances are they’ll head out again tomorrow morning and do some more mischief.”
    Frank drew rein and glanced at the sky. “Be dark soon, Les, and we’re needed at the ranch. I don’t think those riders headed this far. I reckon we should get back.”
    Bowles disagreed. “We can take a look at the Briggs place and still be eating Kate’s beans by nightfall. Call it what you want, but I got a feeling in my water that right now them boys are whooping it up.”
    â€œA mile you say?”
    â€œYeah. We’ll come up on a clearing in the pines and Briggs’s place is right in the middle of it.”
    â€œI think you’re leading me on a wild-goose chase, but I guess it won’t hurt to take a look.”
    Bowes drew his Colt and thumbed a round into the empty chamber that was under the hammer. “We’ll find them there. Four horses leave a wide track and the hog farm is right where they’re headed.”
    â€œHell, I didn’t see any tracks,” Frank said.
    Bowes smiled. “Mr. Cobb, that’s because you don’t know how to look.”
    * * *
    The Briggs place consisted of a long, low timber