Wild Bills Last Trail

Wild Bill's Last Trail, by Ned
Buntline

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Title: Wild Bill's Last Trail
Author: Ned Buntline
Release Date: April 16, 2007 [EBook #21113]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILD
BILL'S LAST TRAIL ***

Produced by Richard Halsey

Wild Bill's Last Trail.
By NED BUNTLINE, Author of "Harry Bluff, The Reefer," "Navigator
Ned," etc.

CHAPTER I.
THE AVENGER.
"Bill! Wild Bill! Is this you, or your ghost? What, in great Creation's
name, are you doing here?"
"Gettin' toward sunset, old pard--gettin' toward sunset, before I pass in
my checks!"
The first speaker was an old scout and plainsman, Sam Chichester by
name, and he spoke to a passenger who had just left the
west-ward-bound express train at Laramie, on the U.P.R.R.
That passenger was none other than J. B. Hickok, or "Wild Bill," one of
the most noted shots, and certainly the most desperate man of his age
and day west of the Mississippi River.
"What do you mean, Bill, when you talk of passing in your checks?
You're in the very prime of life, man, and---"
"Hush! Talk low! There are listening ears everywhere, Sam! I don't
know why, but there is a chill at my heart, and I know my time has
about run out. I've been on East with Buffalo Bill and Texas Jack,
trying to show people what our plains life is. But I wasn't at home there.
There were crowds on crowds that came to see us, and I couldn't stir on
the streets of their big cities without having an army at my heels, and I
got sick of it. But that wasn't all. There was a woman that fell in love
with me, and made up her mind to marry me. I told her that I was no
sort of a man to tie to--that I was likely to be wiped out any day 'twixt
sunrise and sunset, for I had more enemies than a candidate for
President; but she wouldn't listen to sense, and so--we buckled! Thank
Heaven, I've coaxed her to stay East with friends while I've come out
here; for, Sam, she'll be a widow inside of six weeks!"
"Bill, you've been hitting benzine heavy of late haven't you?
"No; I never drank lighter in my life than I have for a year past. But

there's a shadow cold as ice on my soul! I've never felt right since I
pulled on that red-haired Texan at Abilene, in Kansas. You remember,
for you was there. It was kill or get killed, you know, and when I let
him have his ticket for a six-foot lot of ground he gave one shriek--it
rings in my ears yet. He spoke but one word--'Sister!' Yet that word has
never left my ears, sleeping or waking, from that time to this. I had a
sister once myself, Sam, and I loved her a thousand times more than I
did life. In fact I never loved life after I lost her. And I can't tell you all
about her--I'd choke if I tried. It is enough that she died, and the cause
of her death died soon after, and I wasn't far away when--when he went
under. But that isn't here nor there, Sam--let's go and warm up. Where
do you hang out?"
"I'm in camp close by. I'm heading a party that is bound in for the
Black Hills. Captain Jack Crawford is along. You know him. And
California Joe, too."
"Good! It is the first streak of luck I've had in a year. I'll join your
crowd, Sam, if you'll let me. Captain Jack and Joe are as good friends
as I ever had--always barring one."
"And that is?"
"My old six-shooter here. Truth-Teller I call it. It never speaks without
saying something. But come, old boy--I see a sign ahead. I must take in
a little benzine to wash the car-dust out of my throat."
Bill pointed to a saloon near at hand, and the two old scouts and
companions moved toward it.
As they did so, a young man, roughly dressed, with a face fair and
smooth, though shadowed as if by exposure to sun and and wind,
stepped from behind a shade tree, where he had stood while these two
talked, listening with breathless interest to every word. His hair, a deep,
rich auburn, hung in curling masses clear to his shoulders, and his blue
eyes seemed