Chapter 6

When I woke up the next morning, we had hardly moved from the position of our last kiss. Janet was still asleep, but I couldn't resist and kissed her lightly on the nose. Her eyes snapped open at that, and she giggled. "What? Do you want more, already? Well, I'll have to tell you that I am too sore to do anything like that for a while. However, I expect to be back in operating condition by tonight!"

We both laughed and struggled to get disentangled without knocking the tent down. We slipped our clothes back on and crawled out of the tent. The rain had stopped sometime during the night and we faced a bright and clear morning. We both relieved ourselves and Janet proceeded to fix breakfast. It was done quickly, since she had laid out what she would need last night before going to bed. We had bacon, grits, and some beans left over from last night. Of course, we also had coffee. I had taken care of the animals while she was fixing breakfast, so we were ready to strike the camp and leave in less time than I would have needed if I had done everything myself. Janet had just proved the value of having a woman in camp. I'll have to remember that.

I dug out a spare pistol from the pack mule and asked Janet if she knew how to shoot it. She said she did, so we stepped away from the animals, and I had her demonstrate. This was a .36 caliber Navy Colt, so it did not have the recoil of my larger .44s. Janet had no trouble shooting it, and her accuracy was quite good. She also knew how to load and clean the weapon, so I gave it to her to keep as her own. She tucked it in the waist band of her trousers and we were ready to go.

I helped her onto the horse. I had rigged a couple of extra blankets in the pad she was forced to use as a saddle as a concession to her sore pussy. She leaned over and kissed me as she thanked me for my thoughtfulness. She said that there was a town four or five miles southwest of us, so that was where we headed. I wanted to get her a saddle as soon as possible.

That's when it dawned on me—I was acting as if I expected her to stay with me on a permanent basis. I realized that I really cared for the woman and wanter her for my wife! What I didn't know was how she felt about me. Last night was great, but a life together should be based on more that great sex. We needed to discuss the situation. Tonight, I would ask her to marry me.

Dammit, there was another problem. Would she be willing to travel with me as I roamed the West. I had realized that I was not ready to settle down, and quickly would be miserable if I had to stay in one place indefinitely. I would take a job like I had done in Wichita to make enough money to live or to have a good place to wait out a bad situation, but I didn't want to put down roots. I was going to have to find a way to earn enough money to live, yet not have to stay in one place. I was sure that such a job existed, I just had to find it.

We came to the town after about two hours of riding. We went to the first livery stable we saw and I looked at the horses for sale, as well as the saddles. If Janet traveled with me, we were going to need spare horses for both of us, so I had to buy two more. This stable had only one horse that fit my requirements, so we went to the other livery stable in town. This one also only had only one horse to meet my requirements, so we bought it. This place also had a better selection of saddles, and we found one for Janet. I paid a dollar for a belt and holster for Janet's pistol, it wasn't much in the way of a holster, but it was good enough until we found a permanent pistol for her and could get her a cross draw rig like mine. I wanted her to be able to draw while sitting as a safety measure—I had a feeling that she would need the ability.

We went back to the other livery stable and bought the other horse. By this time, it was time for lunch, so we went to the only place recommended by the man at the livery stable. This happened to be a saloon, but the town was so small that there was little choice.

Janet was somewhat nervous about going into a saloon. Normally, the only women in a saloon were whores, and she didn't want to be mistaken for one of them at this time. I convinced her to come along, since I would be along to protect her from unwanted advances. We went in and ordered a beef sandwich and two Mexican beers. I had heard of the Mexican beer, and I was anxious to try it out.

We had just finished eating and were about to stand up from our table when four men walked in. One look told me that they were trouble. They were thugs and bullies, I could tell by the way the other people in the saloon acted when they came in.

They headed for the bar, but one of them happen to spot Janet sitting at the table. Without a pause, he headed our way and stopped beside her. He reached down and grabbed her left arm to pull her to a standing position. He was out of my reach, so I could not do anything short of shooting him. I was reluctant to do that, but I was close to it, anyway.

The bully said, "Come on with me, whore. Let me show you what a real man can do to make your pussy sing with pleasure."

Janet didn't say anything. Instead, she grabbed the empty beer bottle by its larger diameter and jammed the neck of the bottle with all of her strength into the bully's solar plexus. Naturally, he collapsed on the floor, trying to get his breath back.

His friends saw the beer bottle hit him and came storming over to the table to exact some form of revenge. When they got close, I said, "The first one of you galoots who touches my wife is a dead man." Janet's eyes got very wide at that, but she didn't say anything. My statement was heard all over the saloon, so the bullies could not back down without losing considerable face.

One of them had more macho guts than sense, because he immediately moved to draw his gun. I reacted by drawing my gun with my right hand and fired, all in one smooth motion. Of course, I hit him in the chest and down he went. The other two were even more stupid than I had thought, because they both went for their guns. I had no choice but to shoot them, too.

Meanwhile, the man who had started it all had recovered his breath enough to try to draw his gun, but Janet drew and shot him. She had not been as careful in her bullet placement, and she hit the fool in the gut. He was dead, all right, it was just going to take from several hours to several days for it to happen. He knew as well as we did that he was in for a very painful death, so he slowly raised his gun and shot himself in the head. Maybe he was not as dumb as I had thought.

This was Janet's first kill, so she was as upset as one would expect. She even vomited in her distress. I called for the swamper to clean up the mess, but the bartender said that we would have to wait, since he had sent the swamper to fetch the town marshal.

The marshal came in a few minutes later and looked the situation over. Janet and I were still seated at our table, and the four bullies were lying on the floor. Three of them had the one bullet in them and the fourth had the two bullets. The marshal asked the bartender for the story, and the bartender told him what had happened. The marshal looked at me and asked, "Do you agree with that?"

I agreed, so the marshal said, "OK, I call it self defense. And I want to thank you two for ridding the county of some very vile and dangerous garbage. Do you know who you have killed?"

We said no, so the marshal continued, "The one, there, in the full beard is Henry Page. The other one of interest is Jack Emery. Both of them have prices on their heads. You have just made yourselves $55 in reward money. Come with me to my office and I will give you a receipt for each one. You can turn the receipt in at the county courthouse and collect your money."