Edge: Apache Death

Edge went to the pile of bedclothes, picked up his Colt and tossed the small double-barreled gun to the Englishman. Then he went to the window, picked up the Spencer and stepped through the shattered pane on to the balcony.

"You have a thing about roofs?" the Englishman asked as he fitted his gun back in the spring loaded gun holster.

"High ground's always best," Edge answered, climbing on to the balcony rail and hoisting himself up to the sloping roof.

"Fallowfield, this is Wyatt Drucker. You killed my son."

"Oh dear!" The Englishman said with a sigh as he followed Edge up on to the roof. "It appears the only Gospel to reach this continent is that according to St. Matthew."

"How's that?" Edge asked as he crawled up the slant of the roof, the Englishman beside him.

"Five, thirty-eight," came the reply. "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth."

"Not so," Edge returned. "They know the Ten Commandments. Thou shalt not kill. But they only apply it to the other feller."

They had reached the apex of the roof and could look down the opposite slope into the street where they saw three mounted riders staring at the front of the building.

"My fight," the Englishman whispered. 

"You won't get close enough to Use your peashooter," Edge pointed out. "And you've only got two shots anyway. I'll sell you my rifle."

"Fallowfield, come out here you yellow skunk," Wyatt Drucker yelled.

"Impatient cove," the Englishman said, eyeing Edge speculatively. "How much?"

"Fifty per cent of whatever's at the place marked with a cross."

"You set a high price," the Englishman said with a smile.

Edge shrugged his shoulders. "It's a seller's market."

"Chap who had the stomach ache has two guns downstairs," the Englishman pointed out.

Edge shook his head. "No good. You need two of those guys out before you hit the street. Never do it with a revolver at this range."

The Englishman thought about it for several moments, then nodded. "Throw in your gunbelt and it's a deal"

"Minus the knife?"

"All right."

Edge rolled on to his back and unbuckled and untied his belt, withdrawing the knife from its sheath before allowing the Englishman to pull the belt from his back as he rolled over once more.

"Fallowfield, we're coming in!" Drucker called, but neither he nor his men made a move as the Englishman buckled the belt at his hips, then tied down the holster.

"Talk, talk, talk," the Englishman said with a sigh. "Bloody Yankees all over." Then he pulled himself into position astride the ridge member of the roof and raised the Spencer to his shoulder. "Drucker!"

As the name was shouted aloud the three men in the street turned their faces skyward and went for their guns. The rifle cracked twice, a split second and a slight movement of the muzzle separating the two shots. But the men flanking Drucker toppled from their horses at the same moment, ugly red stains spreading across their shirt fronts. Before their bodies had hit the ground a third shot exploded in the night air and Drucker's hat skimmed from his head. The rancher withdrew his hand from his gun as if the butt had been red hot.

"Fancy—like your clothes," Edge said with derision as he began to scrape at his nails with the point of the knife, removing pieces of the Englishman's skin. "That fast, you could have plugged Drucker too."

 The Englishman swung one leg over the roof apex and  began to inch down the slope on his backside, carefully keeping the rifle trained on Drucker.

"Talk, and no sense of honor," he murmured.

"But a better sense of priorities," Edge replied, glancing along the street and seeing that the fires had been put out: that the three shots had drawn attention toward the Pot of Gold. "Self preservation comes first."

The Englishman dropped from sight, down on to the balcony, but from Drucker's expression of half hate and half fear, Edge knew the Spencer was still aimed at a target.

"Get off your horse, Mr. Drucker," the Englishman instructed as Edge began to slide down the roof slope. By the time the rancher had complied and the Englishman had moved out into the center of the street, facing his adversary over a distance of some twenty feet, Edge was on the balcony, leaning casually on the rail as a detached spectator with a grandstand view.

Drucker was a tall man, and broad, but he realized the disadvantage of such bulk in a showdown and turned sideways-on to the Englishman, reducing the size of the target. And now that both men were facing each other with Edge obviously taking no part in the fight, the rancher had regained his courage. He even smiled when the Englishman lowered the rifle butt to the ground and then let the weapon fall into the dust.

"Careful with that rifle," Edge called as Drucker began to move sideways and the Englishman stepped in the opposite direction.

"I'll clean it for you," the Englishman answered, not taking his eyes off Drucker's still smiling face as the two men completed a quarter circle.

"You ain't gonna be alive to do anything," Drucker chided.