A rock hit the back of Johnny Cato’s head just as he started to clamber to his feet. He fell flat on his face with a grunt, dazed, semi-conscious, bleeding from a wound behind his ear.
Disoriented, half-blinded, Yancey lurched to his feet and doubled over. Clamping his left arm against his wounded side, he staggered out of the swirling smoke and saw that no one else was on his feet. A few terrified horses reared up and then ran off, whickering. There was a smoking hole where the powder store had been.
“Bannerman!”
Morgan’s voice was thin with the hysteria of uncontrollable fury. Yancey turned and staggered on weak legs, aware that he still held the Colt at his side. He blinked and wiped a hand across his singed eyes. Then he saw Morgan Satterlee, grimy, clothes tattered, standing in the open doorway of his ruined cabin.
Morgan’s gun was in his holster and his right hand was clawed out in the classic gunfighter’s pose. There was no need for words.
Yancey dropped the Colt back into its holster. The Enforcer swayed, fighting waves of dizziness.
Satterlee smiled thinly, but his dark eyes had the shine of death in them. Suddenly his right hand flashed down and the claw-like fingers closed around his gun butt and lifted.
Yancey reacted instinctively. His reflexes, honed to a fine edge by the fighting, took over and the Colt was in his hand as though by magic. Three times it thundered, spitting flame and smoke and death.
Yancey squinted through the gun smoke and saw Morgan Satterlee do a crazy backwards dance. The outlaw boss’ gun exploded and Yancey felt the wind of the bullet on his cheek. Then Satterlee fell against the cabin wall, pitched forward and fell to his face, dead.
Yancey, feeling weak, his head ringing, let the Colt fall from his fingers as he knelt beside Cato who was moaning as he slowly began to regain consciousness.
Despite the hell around him, Yancey grinned. It would be good to ride again with his old sidekick—and to get back to Kate in Austin. Mighty good.
He didn’t want this kind of assignment again.
About the Author
Keith Hetherington
aka Kirk Hamilton, Brett Waring and Hank J. Kirby
Australian writer Keith has worked as television scriptwriter on such Australian TV shows as Homicide, Matlock Police, Division 4, Solo One, The Box, The Spoiler and Chopper Squad.
“I always liked writing little vignettes, trying to describe the action sequences I saw in a film or the Saturday Afternoon Serial at local cinemas,” remembers Keith Hetherington, better known to Piccadilly Publishing readers as Hank J. Kirby, author of the Bronco Madigan series.
Keith went on to pen hundreds of westerns (the figure varies between 600 and 1000) under the names Kirk Hamilton (including the legendary Bannerman the Enforcer series) and Clay Nash as Brett Waring. Keith also worked as a journalist for the Queensland Health Education Council, writing weekly articles for newspapers on health subjects and radio plays dramatizing same.
More on Keith Hetherington
The Bannerman Series by Kirk Hamilton
The Enforcer
Ride the Lawless Land
Guns of Texas
A Gun for the Governor
Rogue Gun
Trail Wolves
Dead Shot
A Man Called Sundance
Mad Dog Hallam
Shadow Mesa
Day of the Wolf
Tejano
The Guilty Guns
The Toughest Man in Texas
Manstopper
Tall Man’s Mission
Day of the Lawless
Gauntlet
Vengeance Rides Tall
Backtrack
Barbary Guns
The Bannerman Way
Yesterday’s Guns
Viking With a Gun
Deathwatch
Rio Renegade
Bullet for Bannerman
Trail to Purgatory
The Lash
Gun Mission
Hellfire
Seven Guns to Moonlight
The 12:10 from San Antone
Only the Swift
Die for Texas
Dealer in Death
Long Trail to Texas
The Rawhiders
Brace Yargo
The Buckskinners
Tame the Tall Hombre
Texas Empire
King Iron
Death Rides Tall
… And more to come every month!