Bowdrie's Law (Ss) (1983) by Louis L'amour Read Free Book Online Page B

and Nebraska? Four big jobs, four clean jobs, except for one thing. The gent that saw you on the platform at the railroad station in Dodge City.
    "It just happened that a little fat drummer was standin' [here who had known you in Memphis. Big Tom Caughter, the smartest crook of them all, the man who never left a witness and always got away with the loot. Ferd Cassidy was Lonnie Webb, a Kansas boy with a gift for picking locks, other people's locks."
    Katch was thinking. Bowdrie could almost see his mind working, and this was a shrewd, dangerous man. Always before he had gotten away with it. No trail, no witnesses, no evidence. Four big jobs, and this was to be the fifth.
    Katch shrugged. "Well, I guess a man can't win 'em all. With the money I've got cached I can be out in a couple of years."
    "Sounds easy, doesn't it?" Bowdrie said. "But what about the killings?"
    "You mean Zaparo? You can't prove I was there. As a matter of fact, I wasn't. Anyway, no jury is going to hang me for killing a few Mexican outlaws."
    "I wasn't thinking of Zaparo. I was thinking of Ferd Cassidy. That was a cold-blooded killing. I saw it."
    "Oh? So that's the way it is?" Katch eyed him with a steady, assured gaze. "Then we don't need a witness. When you die, who else will know?"
    "The Rangers are outside waitin' for my signal," Bowdrie said. "Your boys are already rounded up, and without a shot fired. I was waiting to hear, but there never was a one. Now I'll take you."
    Katch flashed a hand for his gun, incredibly fast, only Bowdrie was already shooting,a Coker stepped into the door. "Get 'em all?" Chick asked. "Yeah." He looked at the bodies. "Both of them yours?" "Only the big one." He looked at Katch and shook his head. "Rip, that man had brains, some education, and nerve. Why can't they ever realize they can't beat the law?"
    *

Bowdrie's Law (ss) (1983)

    CASE CLOSED-NO PRISONERS
    On the third day after the robbery, Sheriff Walt Borrow gave up and wired Austin.
    On the fifth day, late in the afternoon, a rider swung down at the hitch-rail in front of the saloon. Leaving the roan standing three-legged at the rail, he passed the saloon and went into the sheriff's office next door.
    The rider was a young man, lean, and broad in the shoulders. Watchers glimpsed a hard brown face, wide at the cheekbones, a firm straight mouth, and a trong jaw.
    But it was the rider's eyes that stopped those who sw him face-on. They were intensely black, their gaze level and measuring. There was something about his eyes that made men uneasy, with a tendency to look quickly away.
    "Looks like an Indian," Bishop commented. "Reminds me of Victorio, the Apache. I seen him once."
    "I know him," Hardy Young said. "By sight, anyway. He's a Ranger from the Guadalupes."
    Within the hour everybody within a radius of five miles knew that Ranger Chick Bowdrie was in town. What they did not know was that the saddle tramp who loafed in the Longhorn Saloon was Rip Coker, also a Texas Ranger.
    Coker had drifted into town the day before, a grim, blond ' y oung man looking down-at-heel and broke. He let it be known that he was down to his last few dollars and ready for anything. With his horse for a stake he sat in a poker game and won enough for eating money. Most of the time he was just around, drinking a beer now and again and keeping his eyes and ears open.
    The story of the robbery was being told around. Outlaws had hit the Bank of Kimble just before daylight to the tune of forty thousand dollars, and as Hardy Young commented to John Bishop, "That's a nice tune!"
    Awakening as they did each morning, the townspeople had no idea what had taken place until Mary Phillips stopped Sheriff Borrow as he passed the Phillips home en route to breakfast and asked him to look for Josh.
    "Ain't he to home, ma'am?" Borrow was mildly surprised. He had no idea that bankers got up so early.
    "Somebody came to the door just before daylight and Josh answered it. He called back to me that he would