Clay Nash 9

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  CONTENTS

  About the Book

  Copyright Page

  Editor’s Note

  One – Escape from Julesburg

  Two – Bound For Texas

  Three – Red Rapids

  Four—First News

  Five – Bounty Hunter

  Six – Wrath of a Town

  Seven – The Third Man

  Eight – Hunt the Man Down

  Nine – Tangled Trails

  Ten – To Die Free …

  About the Author

  The Clash Nash Series Page

  The Piccadilly Publishing Page

  Ben Garrett was serving time in the Julesburg Pen for a robbery he’d played no part in. And when a signed confession that could have freed him was stolen from Wells Fargo, it seemed to Ben that his last chance to clear his name had been stolen right along with it. So Ben threw in with a pair of hardcases and together made a desperate bid for freedom. Behind them they left two dead men.

  What Ben didn’t know was that his feisty sister, Liz, and Wells Fargo’s top troubleshooter, Clay Nash, were even then working on a way to prove his innocence.

  So it became a race against time – to save Ben from the outlaws he’d joined up with, to save him from a crooked lawman with a guilty secret … and just maybe to save him from himself!

  CLAY NASH 9: RIDE FOR TEXAS

  By Brett Waring

  First Published by The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd

  Copyright © Cleveland Publishing Co. Pty Ltd, New South Wales, Australia

  First Smashwords Edition: April 2018

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Series Editor: Ben Bridges

  Text © Piccadilly Publishing

  Published by Arrangement with The Cleveland Publishing Pty Ltd.

  Editor’s Note

  Although Ride for Texas can be read as a stand-alone adventure in the Clay Nash series, it concludes the story begun in the previous Clay Nash western, The Fargo Code.

  One – Escape from Julesburg

  Ben Garrett decided to break out of Julesburg State Penitentiary the same day that he received a letter from his sister, Liz. It carried the very worst news.

  He was in prison for life: serving time for another man’s crime—all because of a vindictive woman who had named him as one of the bandits in a bank robbery. There had been three of them: two, Vin Carney and Lonnie Emerson, now worked beside Ben on the prison rock pile. They knew he was innocent but had refused to speak up on his behalf. They believed that as long as the third man was still free, they stood a chance of getting out.

  Resigned to serving his thirty years, Ben had fallen into a pit of dejection, living out each day like some kind of robot, uncaring, performing his chores without complaint.

  But his hopes for release had been raised in recent weeks. The woman who had falsely accused him had died—but not before she had written a letter to prove Ben’s innocence. The letter had been posted to Ben’s sister, but had been lost—stolen with others in a mailbag after a robbery at the Wells Fargo depot in Red Rapids.

  Now, all Ben’s hopes of being released were dashed—even though his sister had written to say that Wells Fargo’s top operative, a tough hombre called Clay Nash, was working on the case with her and that she had every confidence the mail would be recovered.

  Ben knew different. One thing prison had taught him was the ways of outlaws. And he knew that they invariably dumped anything that they couldn’t change readily into hard cash. The mailbag containing that letter would be lost forever now. It was probably rotting at the bottom of a cleft in a brush-choked arroyo, or weighted with rocks and sunk in a swamp or some stream in a remote canyon. But it was gone—and, with it, his last chance of proving his innocence.

  That was when he decided he had had enough. Why should he be imprisoned for the rest of his life for a crime he didn’t commit? He was branded outlaw and thief and about the only other thing they could do to him now was to hang him; and that might well be preferable to growing old on the rock pile.

  The day after he received the bad news from Liz, Ben Garrett was swinging a heavy sledge hammer when he stumbled and fell to one knee beside the big, muscle-corded frame of vicious Vin Carney.

  The killer turned bleak eyes on the young convict, said nothing, but casually drove a boot into his ribs; he hadn’t had much time for Ben since he had refused to join in a breakout.

  Ben grunted with the kick and saw that one of the warders was headed his way. He started to get to his feet and, keeping his chin tucked low into his chest, he spoke out of the corner of his mouth—a habit swiftly learned in prison.

  “If you still aim to break out, Vin, I’m with you.”

  Carney snapped his head up, his eyes pinching down. He, too, saw the warder, nodded very slightly, then turned his back.

  “At chow,” he muttered.

  Ben staggered upright, dusted himself down and looked at the red weal against his ribs. He grinned as the warder approached.

  “What’s going on?” the man asked.

  “Fell over my own big feet, sir,” Ben said. Calling the warders ‘sir’ was another lesson that new inmates learned very fast in Julesburg—or they found themselves with missing teeth and extra duties.

  The warder’s name was Harrow, a tall, well-built man in his twenties, and he had taken a liking to Ben Garrett, for Ben was a good-looking young man and seemed much younger than his twenty-five years. His skin was smooth and almost hairless; his hair straw-colored and waved naturally. He wasn’t what anyone would call effeminate, but he was handsome—in fact, he came as close to being ‘beautiful’ as any real man could. But there weren’t many who would use that term to describe him—not within his hearing anyway. At a very early age, Ben Garrett had had to learn to stick up for himself when other kids teased him because of his good looks.

  Women mostly swooned over him but, while he was a man who liked to dally with the opposite sex, he had little interest in women who threw themselves at him. Which was the cause of his present troubles; if he had taken up the offer made to him by the female he had met on the train to Denver, instead of rebuffing her, she would not have claimed he had been one of the bank robbers ...

  The State Penitentiary was a place without women—for anyone. Since coming here, Ben had had to fight off many advances by the long-term inmates. Carney and Emerson had protected him once when a gang of four men had waylaid him in the wash-house. But they had soon lost interest when he had refused to listen to their plans for a breakout. Why they needed him for their plot he didn’t know. But now, as he smiled at Warder Harrow, a man who had inexplicably given Ben protection on several occasions, he began to wonder. He had heard stories of Harrow’s preference for young men over women but, apart from placing his hand on his arm a few times or, once slipping an arm about his shoulders, the man had made no overt advances towards Ben. But now, alert to every nuance and mood, taking real notice of things for the first time in many weeks, Ben saw the way the guard was looking at him … at the sweat sheening his smooth, rippling skin.

  Ben felt his mouth start to tighten, then deliberately forced his grin back. “Guess I’m just plain clumsy, sir. This pile of rock is kinda steeper than I been used to. I been down on lower levels t
ill this week. Don’t suppose there’s any chance of me goin’ back down there?”

  Harrow looked at him steadily, his mind racing. Ben continued to smile in a friendly manner. Carney and Emerson paused in their work, watching Harrow’s reaction.

  The warder shook his head suddenly. “No. You better stay up here if this is where you were put.”

  Ben shrugged, but looked disappointed. “Yes. sir. Just hope I don’t fall and bust an arm. I never was one for heights. Who would I have to see about goin’ back down onto the flats, Warder Harrow? The chief warder?”

  Harrow allowed himself a thin smile. “I wouldn’t try to see the chief about a little thing like that, if I was you, Garrett.”

  “Then who, sir?”

  Harrow looked at him steadily as Ben shifted the sledge from one hand to the other. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said.

  “Thanks, Mr. Harrow. I’d be—much obliged.”

  Harrow’s pale eyes bored into Ben’s grimy face. “You’d want to be,” he said shortly, then gestured to the granite blocks with his rifle barrel. “Meantime, start swingin’ that sledge.”

  Ben nodded, put down the sledge and spat into his palms, rubbing them briskly together before picking up the heavy hammer and swinging it down onto the rock. Sparks flew. A handful of rock pulverized and dust spurted. The muscles rippled and corded and bunched on his back and neck and arms. Harrow moved away slowly, turning to watch every few steps.

  Ben saw that Carney was grinning.

  “You’re a sharp one, kid. Keep it up. He’s our ticket out of here.”

  Ben grunted as he continued to swing the hammer.

  Four days later, Ben Garrett was shifted from the towering pile of broken granite that had been blasted from the cliff-face, down to the flats where the huge blocks had been smashed up into more manageable proportions. While he struggled to stack the smaller blocks, Harrow came up to him and stood watching. Ben straightened his aching back and wiped a hand across his sweating face as he caught the warder’s eye.

  “Like it better here?” Harrow asked.

  Ben forced a grin. “Just fine. Muchas gracias, Mr. Harrow.”

  The warder’s eyes narrowed. “Settling-up time, kid. Pretty soon now.”

  Ben felt his face stiffen but he nodded slowly. “I savvy,” he said tightly.

  Harrow took a fast step forward and abruptly drove the butt of his rifle into Ben’s midriff. The young convict gagged, fell to his knees, then toppled over onto his side, writhing and staring up through his pain in surprise as Harrow towered over him.

  “You savvy, ‘sir’!” he snapped.

  Ben nodded, swallowed, tried to get a breath, fought some air successfully down into his lungs and finally stammered, “I savvy—sir.”

  Harrow nodded, deadpan. “You don’t get no special privileges in the way you talk to me. Leastways, not yet.”

  Ben nodded again slowly and Harrow turned and walked away across the yard. As he staggered to his feet, Ben saw Carney and Emerson watching him from the top of the granite pile. Carney lifted a hand encouragingly. Ben swore bitterly as he went back to work under the curious gazes of the other convicts.

  There was no moon two nights later. Just as well, thought Ben Garrett as he lay awake on the hard bunk in his cell, for he had managed to stall Harrow for about as long as he could. But tonight was settling-up time and the guard had left no doubt in his mind that things had better go smoothly or Ben Garrett could expect a month in solitary—and a dose of sheer hell when he finally came out.

  Garrett was surprised to hear the gentle snores of Carney and Emerson in their bunks across the dark cell. How the hell they could sleep at a time like this ...

  But there was a lot he didn’t understand about those two.

  Such as how they had managed to get him transferred into their cell the very next day after he had agreed to help them escape. The order had come—apparently—from the chief warder himself. And not only had Ben been transferred into Carney’s cell, but the man who had been there before him had been transferred out. The fourth bunk had remained empty. He had thought when he had been put in with Carney and Emerson that he would make the fourth man in the cell; but, it seemed that the other inmate hadn’t been invited to participate in the breakout and Carney had somehow had him removed.

  The plan was simple enough—but dangerous. It all hinged on Ben’s relationship with Harrow. Carney had been impressed with the way Ben had been astute enough to guess this much that day up on the granite pile. So far, it seemed to be working and Ben knew that tonight Harrow would come to his cell after lights out and, on some pretext, take him out for the ‘settling-up’.

  To do that, of course, he had to unlock the cell door.

  Ben stiffened as he heard the heavy boots echoing down the stone-flagged passage outside the cell. There were two men coming by the sounds of things; Harrow and the block guard, most likely.

  “Carney!” he hissed. “Emerson! I think he’s comin’.”

  But there was no acknowledgement from the other two convicts and their gentle snores continued. Ben, sweating with tension now, belly knotted up, sat up and started to swing his legs over the side of the bunk, aiming to drop down to the floor and waken the others. But he was too late; the yellow glow of the lantern was growing in intensity and the footsteps were coming closer. Swearing, he lay back swiftly as two men stopped at the cell door. Through the barred window in the heavy-timbered door, he recognized Harrow’s taut face as the man held up the lantern and peered in. Then the guard said something to the block warder and there was the rattle of keys, the clash of the lock opening, and then the door swung back. Lamplight washed into the cells.

  Harrow came straight to Ben’s upper bunk, holding the lantern aloft, keeping the light from touching the other sleeping convicts so as not to awaken them.

  “Get out and come with me.” Harrow whispered hoarsely, grabbing Ben’s ankle and shaking his leg roughly.

  Ben sat up, blinking, then groped for his trousers. He was aware of the block guard leering behind Harrow as he dressed.

  He glanced towards Carney and Emerson. Carney grunted and turned his face to the wall. Emerson snored on. Shaking now, Ben fumbled and dropped a boot. Harrow cuffed him lightly on the ear and hissed at him to be quiet.

  Then, legs quivering, Ben stood up and looked at the slit eyed warder. “Wh—where’re we goin’?” he asked hoarsely.

  “Just move!” Harrow growled and grabbed his shoulder, thrusting him roughly out of the cell. The other guard gave a brief laugh as Ben stumbled and then Harrow turned to follow him out. That was when Carney and Emerson came to life.

  Carney swung away from the wall on his top bunk, using the motion to carry his already booted feet out of the blankets to crash against the back, of Harrow’s head. The warder grunted and staggered violently into the frame around the cell door. The other block guard swore and started to come back in, swinging up his rifle. Emerson came off his lower bunk like a cat, coming in low under the man’s gun-arm. Something glittered in his hand. The guard rose to his toes, giving a strangled cry that was swiftly smothered by Emerson’s hand clamping over his mouth. Ben, startled by the suddenness of the violence, instinctively grabbed at the guard’s rifle as it fell, catching it before it could clatter on the stone flags. Emerson’s hand rose and fell again and the guard gurgled then jerked, as blood spurted. Ben saw the home-made knife that had been fashioned from a broken file. Emerson dropped the guard on the floor of the cell, just as Harrow started to his feet.

  Carney moved in on Harrow, snapped a knee up into the man’s groin. The warder moaned and fell to his knees, hugging himself. Emerson and Carney moved swiftly while Ben stood there holding the rifle. The two convicts grabbed the guns from the guards’ belts. Carney swiftly unloaded Harrow’s pistol and rammed it back into his holster. Emerson thrust the dead guard’s revolver into his waistband inside his loose denim shirt and shucked a handful of cartridges from the man’s bullet belt then dro
pped them into his pocket. Carney stood up, snatched the rifle from Ben and worked the lever swiftly, ejecting the shells onto his bunk. He snatched them up and put them into his pocket. Then he grabbed Harrow by the shirt front and hauled him roughly to his feet, slamming him back violently against the cell wall. He shook the man until his teeth rattled and the pain made his eyes come alert. Carney pushed the rifle barrel up under the man’s chin and spoke between his teeth.

  “Listen and listen good, you son of a bitch! You’re gonna march us out of here and you’re gonna do it right. You’ll carry this empty rifle. Your revolver’s empty, too. When you march us past the other guards, they’ll figure the guns are loaded and you’ve got us under control. Savvy?”

  Harrow nodded, flicking his eyes sideways and catching a glimpse of Ben. Carney stomped a heavy work boot down onto Harrow’s instep.

  “Savvy?” he snapped again, slamming the warder into the wall.

  Harrow nodded, and his eyes widened as he saw the guard’s body for the first time. Emerson held up the bloodstained knife.

  “In case you get froggy, Harrow,” he said quietly. Then he pulled up his shirt and showed the guard the revolver in his waistband. “And this one is loaded, amigo.”

  Harrow seemed to wilt. “What do you want me to do?”

  “March us out into the compound first, like you’re takin’ us across to the chief warden’s quarters.”

  “At this time of night?” Harrow said.

  Carney slammed him hard. “Yeah, at this time of night!” he gritted. “You’d have had some excuse already figured out to explain your takin’ Garrett out. You just multiply it by three, right?”

  “I—I dunno if they—the other guards’ll believe me.”

  “Don’t matter much, does it?” Carney snarled. “You’re officer of the guard this week. It’s why you waited to get your hands on Ben. More—convenient. Now it’s convenient for us, too. So move, you lousy queer, before I tell Emerson to geld you!”