The Third Western Megapack. Johnston McCulley

said about him.”

      “No, Joey, your Pa wasn’t a good man, but he wasn’t as bad as most and was better than some, but mostly he loved you and your sister, even though I’m sure you don’t believe me when I tell you that.”

      I smiled, confident now, then I said, “Sure, I believe you when you tell me that. Pa.”

      There was a stillness so powerful it was like the day the Bible says when damnation has finally arrived.

      Black Jack Slade stopped cold in his tracks, slowly turned back around and looked at me head on. His face was a mask. Not cold, just barren, unreadable. The gunfighter’s face that had been called out to draw.

      “You’ve got that all wrong, son, if you think I’m your father.”

      “So you’re just doing all this for a friend. Right?”

      “That’s it. I’m just making a delivery, seeing to it you get what’s yours. As your Pa wished. Now I got other business to attend to.”

      I didn’t say anything more about it and neither did he. The subject was closed. Tight. I saw he was making ready to board the stage. I had to say something.

      “Well, then, goodbye, Mr. Slade. I thank you and wish you well.”

      As he got into the stage he replied, “And I wish you well, Joey. I know your Pa is proud as hell of you – where ever he might be right now.”

      “I know.”

      “And Joey,” I heard him say just as the stage pulled out, “some people will tell you that there ain’t no men in heaven, but maybe, someday, when you’re a man yourself, you’ll understand that your Pa tried his best to get there.”

      And I said, “I think I understand.”

      And he just smiled and then was gone as the stage pulled out.

      And under my breath I said, “It’s okay, Pa.”

      But of course, he never heard me.

      MUSTANG BREED, by Alan LeMay

      The Triangle R’s new hand was catching a horse.

      Leisurely, whistling through his teeth, “Doughfoot” Wilson scratched his head and looked over the small herd that slowly shuffled itself about the corral. An ordinary-looking bay with no markings appeared to be the nearest thing.

      Doughfoot deftly shook out the loop of his lariat and shot it along the ground with an easy motion. The horse leaped ahead; the rope bounced into the air, the noose closing about the wiry forelegs. The horse stopped instantly.

      “’Pears to be a quiet sort of goat,” said Doughfoot Wilson to himself.

      He approached the animal, recoiling his rope as he reeled it in, and fashioned a makeshift halter of the free end of the lariat. Next he tied the horse’s head short to a post and very circumspectly applied the saddle.

      The horse sawed back and forth uneasily, and swung about as Doughfoot tied the cinch, but this was a matter so commonplace that Wilson thought nothing of it. Nor did it bother him that the animal was head-shy and attempted to rear away from the bit. He was still whistling through his teeth as he cast loose the horse’s head and stuck a foot into the near stirrup.

      In the next fraction of a second the whistling stopped.

      A whirl and a jump—and the horse was off. Doughfoot would have been off too, before he was on, but his right hand had grabbed the cantle of the saddle. The reins whistled through the fingers of the hand that gripped the pommel, taking the skin with them.

      Doughfoot managed to get his other leg over the animal’s loin back of the saddle, but another spinning buck jerked it loose again. Yet, somehow, he managed to get into the saddle and got his foot into the lashing off-stirrup.

      Settling down into plain, honest bucking, the horse progressed around the corral in short, hunching bounds, coming down on stiff forelegs in violent jolts. Doughfoot wished that he had picked some other horse, or hadn’t got on at all.

      Abruptly the animal changed its tactics and reared backward into the air. Doughfoot Wilson had enough; he had no desire to feel nine hundred pounds of horse jab the pommel of the saddle into his prostrate stomach. He swung himself clear and slid off.

      Doughfoot looked around the corral to see if any one had seen this conservative feat of horsemanship.

      Darn it! Sure enough, there was a booted, broad-hatted figure seated on the top rail of the corral. Casually, with a foolish grin, Wilson strolled toward the watcher on the fence.

      Then he hesitated, and his mouth fell open as he received a shock. The watcher was a girl.

      “G’mornin’,” said Doughfoot

      “It’s afternoon.”

      “Guess that’s right.”

      An awkward silence followed, during which Doughfoot, for want of a better thought, whistled through his teeth, and with elaborate nonchalance climbed to a seat near her on the top rail. He cast a studious eye at the heavens.

      “Looks like it might snow a little,” he offered.

      “Might.”

      Another silence.

      “Guess you’re Old Ben Rutherford’s girl,” said Doughfoot.

      She did not deny that she was.

      “Well, me, I’m Doughfoot Wilson. The new hand.”

      “That so?”

      “Yep.”

      She made no comment on this, and Doughfoot felt embarrassed. After some thought he tried one more conversational sally.

      “This here cow country ain’t what it used to be, what with fences and the like.”

      She slowly turned her head and surveyed him with gray eyes as keen as any man’s.

      “Neither are the riders,” Madge Rutherford remarked coolly.

      Doughfoot flushed.

      “Ain’t no sense in leavin’ a cayuse fall over on top of you,” he contended.

      “Didn’t see any horse fall over,” she said.

      “Well, he looked like he was goin’ to, didn’t he?”

      “Oh, yes. He looked like he might possibly, under certain conditions, begin to think about startin’ to rare up a little, if he should happen to get around to it,” she conceded.

      Doughfoot squirmed.

      “Gosh,” he said, “ain’t you satisfied less’n somebody gets kilt every minnit?”

      “Oh, I wouldn’t want you takin’ any risks,” answered Madge. She added, “Mebbe I could help you out, now, by takin’ the edge offen him for you.”

      Doughfoot had not earned his name by any outstanding nimbleness of wit. He considered her offer innocently.

      “Nope,” he decided. “’Twouldn’t be anyways right.”

      “Great suffering coyotes,” said Madge Rutherford in a choked voice.

      She hastily climbed down from the rail and made off.

      As Doughfoot stared after her in amazement, he heard her break into peal upon peal of uncontrollable laughter. An angry glint came into his mild blue eyes. One eyebrow lifted menacingly as he shook a fist at the saddled bay, now standing at the far side of the corral. He spat viciously.

      “Why, you ornery, cow-colored, six-legged, pop-eyed pelican!” he apostrophized the animal. “Go to work an’ make a monkey out of me, will you? Why—why—”

      Words failed him. He jumped down from the rail and strode across the corral with a purposefulness such as his oldest friends had never seen.