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    Ambush at Blood Canyon: a western novel
    Ambush at Blood Canyon: a western novel
    Ambush at Blood Canyon: a western novel
    Ebook111 pages2 hours

    Ambush at Blood Canyon: a western novel

    By Robert B. McNeill

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    Ambush at Blood Canyon

    Kansas, 1874: Jack Carter and Tom Ramirez ride south into Indian Territory on the trail of a man who has stolen Carter’s most treasured possession — an item he is determined to recover at all costs. 

    But Carter and Ramirez’s journey is difficult and fraught with danger; the Nations harbor any number of fugitives from the law. Overcoming a gang of petty desperadoes, their trail leads to a man engaged in larceny on a far grander scale. Salt Fork Indian agent Willard Armstrong is selling supplies intended for the Comanches in his charge, forcing hundreds of Indian women and children to face starvation.

    Carter and Ramirez are determined to expose Armstrong, but he and his hired killers are equally determined to see they don’t.

    Can Carter and Ramirez bring Armstrong to justice? And will Carter be able to find the man who has taken the thing he prizes almost as much as life itself?

    Ambush at Blood Canyon is an exciting, action-filled western that grips from the first page to the last.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPalomino Publishing
    Release dateSep 20, 2015
    ISBN9781516382330
    Ambush at Blood Canyon: a western novel

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      Book preview

      Ambush at Blood Canyon - Robert B. McNeill

      Chapter One

      I met Jack Carter the day the Thomsons rode into Brimstone looking for trouble. They had a sidekick with them called Zeke Parker, and had been drinking whiskey and beer chasers since they arrived at Doolan’s sometime before twelve.

      I was helping out at Sam Bridger’s store, as I did every other Wednesday. A rancher by the name of Jeremiah Todd called by at midday to pick up forty bags of grain, each of which weighed fifty pounds. It took the better part of an hour to load his wagon and by the time I’d finished my shirt was heavy with sweat.

      Bridger came out to the boardwalk as I shouldered the last sack onto Todd’s rig. ‘Thanks, Tom,’ he said. ‘Reckon that’ll do for the day.’ He gave me five dollars, then took his pipe from his waistcoat pocket and lit it. He puffed for a moment, and added, ‘See you in two weeks?’

      ‘Sure thing, Mr Bridger,’ I replied.

      Bridger’s brow furrowed as he noticed my shirt. ‘Say, young fella, you look parched,’ he said. ‘Let me fetch you a glass of lemonade.’

      He saw me glance in the direction of the Doolan’s Saloon then and smiled. ‘Aha,’ he said. ‘But maybe you’d prefer to break one of them dollars and buy yourself a beer?’

      I licked my lips in anticipation. ‘Thanks, Mister Bridger. I appreciate your offer but, yeah, I favor the second option.’

      Bridger laughed. ‘Thought you might. Enjoy your beer, Tom. You’ve earned it.’

      ‘Thanks, Mr Bridger, I will,’ I replied.

      The old storekeeper waved with the stem of his pipe, then turned and went back inside.

      Of course if I’d known the Thomsons were at Doolan’s I’d have accepted Bridger’s lemonade and steered clear. I’d seen them around town from time to time, and on one occasion had been the object of their abuse.

      Because I’m part Mexican (father), part Cherokee (mother), some folks use the terms ‘breed’ or ‘half-breed’ to describe me. Truth to tell, though, my skin ain’t that far from white. (Not that I’m ashamed of who I am, I hasten to add. I hold both my parents in great regard. My mother was a fine woman who raised four of us — two brothers and two sisters — on her own in the most difficult of circumstances after my father was shot and killed during the battle of Palmito Ranch in the Civil War.)

      I first ran across the Thomsons, though, when I almost bumped into them coming out of Bridger’s store. Parker was with them on that occasion, too. He was crossing the boardwalk toward the store behind Toby, the older Thomson, when I exited carrying a box with the intention of loading it onto a customer’s wagon. As the door swung out, Toby pulled up and forced the others to do likewise. Toby’s younger brother, Doug, who was bringing up the rear, wasn’t looking where he was going and walked into Parker, near causing him to stumble.

      Toby was in his late twenties, dark complected, and wore a pencil mustache. He was around twenty pounds heavier than his brother who, although almost as tall (around six feet), was clean-shaven and much paler skinned. (Zeke Parker was a good ten years older and four inches shorter than his cohorts. He was a great deal thicker through the waist, too, and had a noticeable scar on his chin.) 

      As Toby drew to a halt he glared at me and his face twisted in rage. ‘Why don’t you watch where you’re going, you stupid sonovabitch?’ he said.

      I shifted the weight of the box to my left arm and tipped the brim of my hat with my right. ‘Sorry, sir,’ I said, ‘didn't see you there.’

      Toby straightened to his full height. ‘Don’t see how the hell you could miss me.’ He turned to Parker and said, ‘I look invisible to you, Zeke?’

      ‘Maybe the breed saw you comin’,’ Parker replied. ‘Decided to make you wait.’

      Toby pushed back his Stetson and nodded slowly. ‘Yeah, maybe he did.’

      ‘Don’t seem very respectful,’ Parker said.

      ‘No, it don’t, do it?’ Toby said. He turned back to face me, then stuck his forefinger into my chest. ‘Ain’t you got any manners, boy?’

      ‘Sorry, sir. Like I say, it wasn’t deliberate.’

      Doug piped up from the back. ‘Maybe you should teach the breed some manners, Toby.’

      ‘Yeah, maybe I will at that,’ Toby replied. He shifted his gaze to the box in my arms. ‘What’s in the box, boy?’

      ‘Groceries,’ I replied, and nodded to the buckboard out front. ‘It’s a customer’s order. I’m about to put it on that wagon.’

      ‘What’s inside?’

      ‘Flour, sugar, tea, eggs and such.’

      ‘They wrapped?’

      ‘Yes, in paper bags.’

      Toby stroked his chin and a sly look flitted across his face. ‘Say you dropped the box, it would cause a right old mess, wouldn’t it? Why, them bags would probably bust and spill their contents. Chance them eggs would break, too.’

      Realizing what he intended, I began to remonstrate. ‘Please, don’t. Any spillages are taken out of my wages.’

      ‘He looks kinda clumsy to me, Toby,’ Parker said with a grin. ‘Way he came outta that door without lookin’ and all. Highly likely to crash into somebody sooner or later.’

      No sooner had Parker spoken when Toby reached for his holster. He grabbed his pistol, spun it, and used the butt end to deal me a blow to the wrist. A sharp pain shot through my arm, forcing me to let the box go. It crashed to the boardwalk, scattering its contents.

      As you might imagine, most of the bags split on impact. Tea, flour, coffee and sugar came together in a unified mix. Worse, the bag with the eggs landed on top. Every one cracked open and the white of the eggs ran, turning the entire mishmash into a gooey mess.

      As I fell to my knees and began to clean up the spill, Toby surveyed his handiwork and grunted in satisfaction. ‘Looks like your wages are gonna be a little light this week,’ he said. ‘You’ll need to be a little more careful who you bump into, boy.’

      He and the others began laughing, then all three walked around me and went into the store.

      Fortunately, Sam Bridger didn’t dock my wages. He’d been fetching a bolt of cloth from the window display, and had witnessed the entire thing.

      ‘The Thomson brothers ain’t nothing but trouble, Tom,’ he said later. ‘Steer well clear of them.’

      I took his advice and, from that day forth, every time they came into town I made it my business to keep out of their way ... and so far I’d been successful.

      Until today.

      I didn’t see or hear Parker or the Thomsons as I entered the saloon. It wasn’t long, though, before I discovered they were seated in an alcove at the far end of the room.

      In fact, I saw only one customer when I went in; a tall man who had a beer on the counter in front of him. My eyes adjusted to the dimness, and I realized it was Jack Carter, a local homesteader.

      As I mentioned earlier, I’d never met Carter until that day. I knew him, of course, as I was in the store once or twice when he came in to pick up supplies. On those occasions, he’d been served by Sam Bridger.

      My sister and I were homesteaders, too; albeit in a small way. We had a small, one-hundred acre plot five miles south of Brimstone. It was mainly bottom land, however, and not that productive. Jacinta and I planted maize the year we took up the claim, and only just managed to survive on the proceeds of our crop (which was bought by Sam Bridger).

      Things got worse the following year when, like many, we lost a large part of our harvest due to a plague of grasshoppers. In the last year (1874), we’d gotten by with what maize we managed to grow, and the generosity of Sam Bridger who, in addition to paying a fair rate for

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