Chapter 12: "The duel"

The unjustified torture of Hank Blossom required my immediate response. Of coarse, there was no way that I would be able to catch the wagon before it reached the Upton ranch, but I had to do something.

I was sure that the ranch hands had not thought up this treatment of Hank by themselves. It had to be instigated by one of the Upton men. Therefore, I figured that an attack on a ranch hand would not do anything to halt the war. I had to concentrate my efforts on the two Upton's who were the cause of this mess.

Hank was carried into the bunkhouse, and I left the two women to take care of his injuries. Naturally, the first thing they did was to give him a dose of laudanum. Once the pain moderated, they began to clean his wounds, first with water and then with cheap whiskey.

I sent the hands back to their jobs and saddled my horse for a trip to the Upton ranch. I took with me my four Starr DA revolvers, my Henry rifle, and a shotgun. I had no immediate plans for the shotgun, but it seemed a good idea at the time.

I hurried, so it took me only about an hour to reach the ranch house. That was when I decided what to do with the shotgun! I stopped at the front door, but did not announce my presence. I quickly went up the two steps to the veranda and made my way to the front door. There was a screen door that was latched, but the wooden door was standing open for ventilation.

I held the shotgun in my right hand so that my finger was near the trigger and the safety was "off." I grabbed the door handle with my left hand and jerked it hard enough to tear the latch loose and pull the door from its hinges. A Mexican woman came running to investigate the clatter, and I pointed the shotgun at her. I demanded, "Where are the Upton men?"

"They are in Señor Upton's office. His office is down that hall."

"Think you, Ma'am. Now, you had best run out the back door because there is going to be gunfire in the next few minutes. I would hate for a stray bullet to hit you." She ran toward the back of the house.

I turned down the hallway and stopped at the first closed door I came to. It was only a few steps, but I figured they must know I was coming. I stood so that I was not directly in front of the closed door, and used to my left hand to turn the doorknob. Bullets came flying through the door before it was even opened. I do not know if it was nerves or simply disregard for human life that caused the shooting to start like that.

Whatever the reason might of been, I threw the door all the way open and aimed the shotgun at the man sitting behind the desk. I pulled the first trigger and a full load of buckshot caught the sitting man full in the face. His head simply disappeared. At the time, I had no idea who I had shot, but I was convinced that it had to be one of the Upton men.

I could see another man standing beside the desk at its left and, and I chose him for my next target. This time, I aimed for his gut and pulled the trigger. Again, I was so close to the man when I shot that every one of the buckshot entered his body. My aim had been a shade off so that the buckshot hit him a little higher than I had intended. As a result, there was a gaping hole in his body just below his ribs, and I thought one or two of the buckshot had penetrated a lung. Since I did not know exactly what the Upton men looked like, I could not be sure who it was that I had killed.

Nevertheless, I figured that it was time to leave before I wound up fighting more men that I wanted to face inside the house. I ran through the front door and mounted my horse. I had been moving fast enough so that I was out of range by the time the first pistol shots were fired in my direction. A glance back told me that nobody was carrying a rifle, so I relaxed a little bit. Nevertheless, I did not slow down as I rushed home.

"Home?" Now why did I think of the Forester ranch house as home? I guess that I was becoming more attached to the people and place than I had realized. Well, I could not argue with the fact that I was relieved when I reached the ranch house.

I told Mrs. Forester and Mary what I had done. They were both appalled and relieved. They were appalled that I had just killed two men and did not seem affected by it. They were relieved that I had come back to them safely. I concentrated on the second feeling and let the first feeling they had slide over me.

I told them that I could not be certain that both of the men that I had killed were Uptons, but I was sure that at least one of them was. The next day, I received a visit from the town marshal. He was outside his jurisdiction of course, but he was a friend of the Uptons and wanted to know what had happened. I gave him the whole story, including the way they had treated Hank Blossom. He was appalled at that, but still asked why I had shot the two men in Upton's office.

I asked, "Have you been to the ranch and seen the damage done to the office door?"

He admitted that he had seen the bullet holes in the door.

I said, "The fact that there were bullet holes in the door shows that they shot at me first. They sure as hell could not have shot at me with head and guts filled with buckshot!"

The marshal admitted that he had to agree with me on that. There was one unsettling bit of news, though: I had only killed the older Upton man. The other man I shot was simply a ranch hand. The younger Upton was now after my head! Well, we would have at least one day of grace while they had the funeral for the older Upton.

The crazy thing was that we didn't hear anything for over a week. We had sense enough not to let down our guard, but we certainly wondered what was going on in the mind of the last remaining Upton. We certainly were not on pins and needles waiting for the other shoe to drop, but we knew that the war was not over, and we would eventually hear something unpleasant from the Upton side of the conflict. Meanwhile, we just carried on as best we could.

I was probably the least worried of anybody at the ranch simply because I was used to being shot at, and it was a rare feeling for everybody else. I could tell the strain was beginning to wear on both of the Forester women, and I asked them if they would like for me to see what I could do about killing that last Upton man. They were both horrified at the thought of me setting out to assassinate him, but I began to think that might be the best way to handle the situation if nothing changed in the next few days.

Well, something changed. Damned if I did not hear of a challenge issued by a galoot calling himself The Missouri Kid. Some guy I never saw before showed up at the ranch one day with a message from town. The essence of the message was that The Missouri Kid was challenging me to meet him for a duel on the main street at noon, two days hence. Number one, I had never heard of The Missouri Kid, and number two, I never heard of anybody fighting this kind of duel.