"Evans, Tabor - Longarm 204 - Longarm and the Arizona Ambush" - читать интересную книгу автора (Evans Tabor)

the reasons he wanted to get a look behind the cabin and see the number of
horses there. Of course that might not necessarily tell him anything. There
might be five horses behind the cabin, but that didn't mean there'd be five
men in the cabin. In fact Longarm felt pretty sure there wasn't but one. But
if it was the one he thought it was, then one was more than a handful.

He reckoned it to be Jack Shaw. And he half hoped it would be, while
another part of him hoped that it wouldn't be.

Jack Shaw was a former law officer gone bad. Longarm had known him for
at least fifteen years, back when he, Longarm, was just getting comfortably
settled into his role as a federal marshal and Jack Shaw was a man who
specialized in pinning on a badge and cleaning up border towns. He'd become a
legend, making things warm for outlaws in towns from Brownsville, Texas, clear
on across New Mexico and up the border to Nogales, Arizona Territory, and on
to Calixico, California. As far as Longarm was concerned, the Mexican border
territory was about as bad as it got and to go in there as a town-tamer was
seriously dangerous work. You had to be a hell of a hombre just to stay alive
under such circumstances, much less hang and jail as many bandits as Jack Shaw
had. Longarm had always wondered why a man would choose to work under such
trying conditions. Jack Shaw had always said he simply liked it and it really
wasn't as dangerous as it appeared. But then had come faint rumors about this
prisoner escaping or that outlaw vanishing from a jail, and about Jack Shaw
having more money to spend than seemed right. Finally, after nine years on
the job, Jack Shaw had shown his true colors. He'd robbed a bank in Del Rio,
Texas, in the very town where he was marshal, and had escaped with better than
twenty thousand dollars. After that had come a succession of robberies in
towns where Jack had worked as a sheriff or town marshal. In some cases he
had been identified; in others it had only been speculation that he had been
involved. He was tough, he was daring, and he knew the ins and outs of both
sides of the law. All in all he made a formidable adversary. Longarm could
think of any number of men he'd rather go up against if the objective was to
get out alive.

He could feel his horse shudder under him, and he knew he couldn't stay
put any longer. He wanted to get closer to the cabin and at the same time
work around to the back. He urged his mount forward, feeling the pull of the
packhorse behind. He rode obliquely, nearing the cabin but making one yard
sideways for every yard forward. Finally he had the angle of the side and
front wall facing him, and was just starting to see the posts of the corral
behind the shack. He pressed forward. The distance between him and the cabin
shortened. It came down from two hundred yards to one hundred, and then began
to diminish so that he could see the scarred and weatherbeaten details of the
shack. It had several windows, but they were small and not paned with glass.
One or two had outside shutters, but they hung loose and askew, swaying just
slightly with the very light breeze. There was a windmill just behind the
cabin.

At a distance of about seventy-five yards Longarm was ready to conclude
that the cabin was empty. He was able to see about half the corral, but he