They were well inside the office now, and the air inside was greasy with smoke. Flames crept in on all sides. Grissom held his head high as if he was taking in a cool, sunny day. “Mr. Weeks don’t make idle threats. Anyone with half a brain would have known better than to embarrass him the way you did.”
Pulling in one more painful breath, Doc straightened his back and tore himself out of Grissom’s grasp. He lashed out with a fist aimed for Grissom’s chin, but caught only air as Grissom deftly moved away.
“Normally, folks tend to run for the door right about now,” Grissom said. “This ought to be fun.”
Doc didn’t hear a word Grissom said. He was too busy lunging forward to take another swing.
Grissom sidestepped that punch as well and bumped into a wall that was already covered with a growing sheet of flame. His shoulder and left arm dipped into the fire, but he only winced slightly in reaction to it. Letting out a low whistle, he pulled his arm back and looked at the blackened skin.
Compared to his face and a good deal more of his body, the fresh burns didn’t even stand out. He flexed his fingers and breathed excitedly at the pain that caused. “You got sand, Holliday,” Grissom said as he reached down to draw a hunting knife, using his burned hand. “But you still ain’t gonna make it out of here.”
The moment Doc saw the knife in Grissom’s hand, his mind cleared of everything else. His lungs were filled with pain, but he was used to that. His mouth was full of blood, and every move he made hurt like hell. He was very likely stumbling right into the jaws of death.
He was used to that, too.
Ignoring the wild look in Grissom’s eyes and the long blade in his hand, Doc reached down and plucked his father’s Colt from its holster. The draw was smooth and just quick enough to get the job done. Keeping his eye on his target, Doc shifted his hips and bent his arm just as he’d practiced.
The Colt barked once and tore a hole clean through Grissom’s side.
Fire raged around them like a storm. Smoke filled the air; creeping into nostrils and crawling into lungs as if it had a mind of its own. Now, with the gunshot still rattling through the burning office, fresh blood was dripping onto the floor.
Grissom had yet to move from his spot.
“I been burned too many times to feel much pain anymore,” Grissom said as he tossed his knife with a quick snap of his wrist. “Let’s see how well you do once the heat fries the flesh off yer bones.”
Doc turned sharply to one side so the blade could whirl past him. When he turned around, he saw Grissom draw his own pistol and calmly thumb back the hammer. Suddenly, footsteps dropped like hammers against the floor behind Doc. He’d sucked down too much smoke to tell how many were coming up behind him, and even the sight of the man in front of him was starting to get blurred and smeared by water streaming from his eyes.
Doc gritted his teeth and decided to fill his final moments with as much sound and fury as possible. Aiming at the only target he could see, Doc fired again and again. His hands went through their practiced motions even as his legs started to weaken.
As each of Doc’s bullets punched through him, Grissom jerked and danced like a fish on a hook. His own gun went off once or twice, but those rounds merely hissed into the crumbling walls. When he fell back to land in a pool of flame, Grissom still wore his twisted smile.
But Doc couldn’t see any of that. Dizziness was overtaking him, and the smoke covered his eyes with a dark fog.
Heat from the fire bit into his arms and legs.
When his back slammed against the floor, he didn’t even feel it.
There wasn’t even enough air in his lungs for any to be driven out on impact.
Silence wrapped its arms around Doc’s shoulders and lifted him upward.
He’d always wondered what it would feel like when the Reaper finally arrived to cart him off.
Actually . . .
... all things considered . . .
... it wasn’t so bad.
[31]
The fire brigade didn’t have much trouble snuffing the flames in and on the Busted Flush. Considering the blaze that now consumed the entire block shared by Thompson’s Varieties and Dr. Seegar’s office, the fire at Caleb’s saloon wasn’t much more than a sputtering nuisance. Once it was out, Caleb hightailed it down Main Street to see if there was anything he could do to help.
“Gunshots!” someone shouted from the line of bucket carriers. “I heard gunshots!”
Caleb had heard them as well. The shots weren’t much more than a few pops within the fire’s consuming roar, but they jumped into Caleb’s ears as if they were meant for him alone.
Running down Market Street, Caleb felt his senses melt away like most of the nearby buildings. Between the acrid smoke and flurry of hot cinders biting into his face, and arms, it was all he could do to focus on the gunshots that still rattled through the air.
“Aw Jesus,” Caleb growled, knowing in his gut that Doc was on one end of those bullets.
Even though there were flames licking out from every window and smoke hanging over the entire block like a shroud, Caleb charged straight toward the drugstore. In his mind, he was already climbing up the stairs to get to the dentist’s office on the second floor.
He didn’t have time to think about the heat or the dangers that could drop on him from any angle. After coming this far, Caleb wasn’t about to stop now. Just as he was about to slam his shoulder into the front door, Caleb saw that same door swing open.
Through the smoke, a large man could be seen hunching over as he ran outside. Once he was outside, it became clear that the man wasn’t actually that large. Instead, he was carrying someone else over one shoulder.
“Move aside!” Dr. Seegar shouted as he rushed down the stairs. “This man needs some fresh air.”
Seeing that Doc was the man over Seegar’s shoulder, Caleb helped the older dentist lower Doc to the ground. The moment he’d set Doc down, Seegar wobbled and started to fall. Caleb took one of the man’s arms and eased him the rest of the way down.
Seegar’s eyes were full of panic as he looked around. Once he saw he was in the street and away from the burning building, he let out a haggard breath.
“Is he dead?” Caleb asked.
Seegar looked down at Doc and shook his head,. “I don’t think so, but how that’s possible I have no idea.”
“What happened in there? I heard shots.”
“I was treating a patient,” Seegar said amid a few rough coughs to clear his throat. “I heard someone come into the office. I smelled kerosene, and the next thing I knew, I could smell smoke. My patient went out to see, but . . . he . . .” Seegar’s voice trailed off as if the weight of what had happened was just now descending on him. “He burned up. I lost my bearings and didn’t know what to do, so . . . I hid.
“I must have passed out, but I woke to the sound of loud voices and gunfire. I don’t know who the other one was, but I recognized Henry’s voice. All I could think of was to get out and carry him with me.” Just then, Seegar looked at the rest of the block, which was almost completely ablaze. “Good Lord.”
“What about Doc?” Caleb asked. “What happened to him?”
Seegar snapped himself away from the fire and looked down at Doc. The pale, slender man was just starting to stir upon the ground. “I don’t know. I think he came in to check on me, but there was another man in the office with him. He and Henry had guns in their hands.”
“Was Doc hit?”
“No,” Seegar replied with no small amount of disbelief. “At least I know that much.” Seegar’s face was haunted as he replayed the scene in his mind. After a few quick blinks, he looked down at Doc and then up to Caleb. “I carried him out of there as best I could. It was the longest walk of my life.”