Ghosts of the Green Swamp. Lee Gramling

dark he’d be as likely to fill me full of lead as one of my enemies, when and if the shootin’ got started again.

      Since I couldn’t think of nothin’ else to do, I was right on the verge of takin’ a powerful gamble and callin’ out to Ole Roan — when I felt this nudge in my back what like to made me jump clean out of my skin.

      It took everthing I had to swaller a yelp about then. I jumped forward and spun round in a crouch, earin’ back the hammer of my six-shooter and comin’ just half a inch from lettin’ the lead fly before I realized what it was had give me that push.

      It was Ole Roan. I guess he decided not to leave the findin’ in the dark to no weak-sensed critter like me, but just went ahead and took matters into his own hands. I grinned a mite to myself when I realized what had happened, and bent down to gather up his reins.

      Which I reckon plumb saved my life. ’Cause a instant later they was two big booms that I recognized as comin’ from my old Dragoon Colt, aimin’ right square at the spot where I’d been standin’ when I turned and clicked back that hammer. I hit the dirt and sort of clenched up my shoulder muscles without thinking about it, waitin’ for Purv’s shotgun blast what I expected to come pretty close on the heels of them two pistol shots.

      But when I did hear a shotgun speak, it was a good forty yards away in the direction of the clearing. A second later I could make out Monk’s voice shoutin’ over the echoes.