ROBERT J. RANDISI
The Lawman
To Gordon Shirreffs.
LUCKY SHOT
“Señor, I am sure you have taken the wrong attitude. We are not bandidos, we are just a little bit down on our luck. We would appreciate it if you could help us out.”
“No.”
Gold Tooth’s face went from amiable to stern.
“Señor, please, you are being insulting.”
“Not yet,” Decker said, “but I’ll be getting there soon if you and your friend don’t ride…now!”
“Ay-yay-yay-yay,” Gold Tooth said, shaking his head at the gringo’s folly.
His compadre was obviously watching Gold Tooth closely, for when the leader made his move for his gun, so did the other man.
Decker never even pulled his sawed-off, cut-down shotgun from its holster. He simply swiveled his holster up and fired that way. The cloud of double-o came out and spread just enough to catch both men. Had they remained side by side he might have missed one, but in moving back the second man had positioned himself not perfectly, but certainly more helpfully, giving the shot pattern time to spread. At the proper distance, a shotgun is simply a devastating weapon that not only kills, but disfigures and dismembers as well.
Prologue I
Pemberton, Colorado Territory
Johnny “Red” Moran woke to a warm presence next to him. A warm, naked presence.
He frowned, trying to remember who it was without looking. Finally, he had to give up, turn over and take a look.
Hell, that didn’t help. She was naked and blonde, but he couldn’t remember her name.
“Wake up!” he said, slapping her on the ass.
“Hey!”
The girl’s head snapped up and she looked around. Red got a good look at her face then, but the name still didn’t come to him.
“Good morning, honey,” she said, smiling.
She shouldn’t have smiled. She had a decent body, though a little heavy in the breasts and flanks, but her teeth were bad. She really shouldn’t have smiled.
“Time for you to get moving,” he said.
“Now?” she asked. “It’s early.”
“It’s gettin’ later all the time.”
She frowned at him, then said, “You don’t remember my name, do you?”
“No, I don’t. Get out.”
She sat up so he could see her breasts. They were large and beginning to sag. From behind she looked like a girl, but from the front he could see that she was creeping up on thirty pretty quick.
“You ready to give me a wakerupper?”
“I’m always ready, honey.”
He slid his hand down over her fleshy belly to her thigh, where he pinched her flesh between his fingers.
“Oh—” she said, closing her eyes and biting her bottom lip in pain. “Hey—”
“I told you to get out,” he said, “and I meant it.” He let her go and snapped, “Now get dressed and get out.”
“Okay, okay” she said, her eyes wet with pain.
She stood up and he watched her as she hurriedly dressed. If she was the best this town had to offer him after two months, then it was time to move on.
When she was dressed she rushed to the door and opened it, then stopped and turned.
“Mandy” she said.
“What?”
“My name is Mandy,” she said, and then burst into tears and ran from the room.
“Jesus,” he said, shaking his head.
Moran got dressed, strapped on his gun, chucked some belongings into his saddlebags and carried them downstairs with him.
“Goin’ someplace, Sheriff?” the desk clerk asked.
“No place in particular, Jed.”
He left the hotel and walked over to the livery stable.
“Would you mind saddling my horse, Arnold?” he asked the towheaded sixteen-year-old who worked there.
“Sure, Sheriff. Goin’ someplace?”
“No place special, son.”
When his horse was saddled, Red Moran, sheriff of Pemberton, rode him over to the bank. He sat tall in the saddle, tall and wide shouldered. No one knew why Moran called himself “Red.” It certainly wasn’t because he had red hair. He had hair so blond that it sometimes seemed as if he had no hair at all. Still, when asked what people should call him, he always answered, “Call me Red.”
And so they did.
Sheriff Red Moran.
Moran had been sheriff of six different towns in the last eight months, towns that had been looking for lawmen. When he got tired of a town he moved on, and he usually got tired within two or three months.
Before he moved on, though, there was something he had to do—something he always did.
He went to the bank.
He left his horse outside and walked into the bank. It was early, and there were only two customers. He asked the teller to get the bank manager, Mr. Hampton.
“Sure, Sheriff.”
When Hampton came out he said, “What can I do for you, Sheriff?”
“I’m taking a trip, Mr. Hampton, and I need to make a withdrawal.”
Orville Hampton frowned.
“I wasn’t aware that you had an account with the bank, Sheriff,” the older man said. He was in his late fifties, at least fifteen years older than Moran, a stocky man who wore three-piece suits.
“I don’t,” Moran said, “but I’m making a withdrawal anyway.”
“You mean you want a loan?” Hampton said in an effort to understand what the sheriff was driving at.
“No, I mean I’m making a withdrawal.”
“I don’t understand,” Hampton said, confused. “How much—”
“Just take a sack and fill it up, Mr. Hampton,” Moran said. He drew his gun, pointed it at the bank manager and added, “Now.”
“W–what—what are you doing?”
“I just told you. I’m making a withdrawal.”
“B–but you can’t. You’re the sheriff!”
“Not anymore. I got bored, and I need some travelling money.”
“This town has treated you good, man! How can you do this?”
“This makes it easy,” Moran said, waving his gun. “Now tell your teller here to fill up a sack. The rest of you just stand easy.”
The customers, a middle-aged woman and an older man, watched in shock as their sheriff robbed the bank.
“I won’t,” Hampton said.
“Mr. Hampton—” the teller said.
“This is outrageous!”
“Mr. Hampton—”
“Don’t make this hard, Mr. Hampton. It’s a simple transaction.”
“I won’t do it!” Hampton said firmly.
Moran took two steps forward and smacked the barrel of his pistol against the bank manager’s head. Hampton slumped to the floor, barely breathing.
“What about you, sonny?” Moran asked the teller.
“I’m filling a sack, Sheriff, I’m filling a sack.”
“Good boy.”
When the canvas sack was filled the teller handed it to Moran, who backed towards the door.
“I’d advise you people to stay inside for a while after I leave.”
He went out the door, mounted his horse and rode out.
Heading for the next town that badly needed a sheriff.
The people in the bank were all thinking the same thing. Their bank had been robbed, the bank manager pistol-whipped, and what they would normally do in that instance would be to send for the sheriff, who would then get up a posse.
Only their sheriff had just robbed their bank. Once, Red Moran had been an honest sheriff in a Wyoming town, but eventually he had gotten tired of having the townspeople look down on him. For the most part they considered him their elected servant, and they treated him as such. He got a free meal here and a free drink there, and when things went right everybody was happy, but let just one thing go wrong, and they were ready to kick him out of office.