Longarm and the Colorado gundown

_{Longarm’s hand swept the Colt into his fist. But he had no target, dammit. Looking into the shadows of the woodshed was like peering into a coal bin at midnight. He knew there was something there, someone there, but he couldn’t see who or where.}

_{He himself, he knew, was silhouetted against the gray background of the night sky and the town lights.}

_{But he still had no target.}

_{He also had no time to think about it, dammit.}

_{He dropped to one knee an instant before a gun barrel discharged.}

_{A sheet of flame the size and shape of a cast net illuminated the shed for half a heartbeat of time. For that quick eyeblink of time he could see by the light of the muzzle flash.}

_{Two men! There were two of them, dammit. Crouched. Staring. Wide-eyed. He hadn’t time to think about whether he recognized either of them. Both held something. Dark, elongated objects. Shotguns, he thought.}

_{Before he’d had time to assimilate the information the flash of light was gone.}

_{A charge of heavy shot whistled through the air where Longarm’s head had been a moment earlier.}

_{He responded with his own answering fire so quickly that the sound of the shotgun’s roar merged with the crisper, lighter report of his .44.}

_{He was so close to the man the time of bullet travel was too short for him to be able to separate out the sound of his bullet striking flesh, but he heard a grunting cough that told him someone was hit. And likely hit in the body at that. The sound was that of breath being driven out of someone.}

_{There were two of them, though. Two of them. By now the other one would be. ...}

_{Longarm threw himself to his right.}

_{Even as he moved there was another muzzle flash not ten feet in front of him. Buckshot whipped and tore through the air, once again seeming to fly head high. An amateur then. He hadn’t the knowledge or perhaps the nerve to place his shots with care.}

_{Still, he’d had knowledge and nerve enough to get his shot off. There had been a second lightning sheet of fire and another rush of smoke.}

_{Another half-seen, half-sensed image had burned onto the retinas of Longarm’s eyes.}

_{Two men still, but this time one of them kneeling. Falling? The image Longarm saw had been frozen in time. In the light of the muzzle blast a tableau had been displayed, colorless but in full dimension like a stereopticon view made life-size. Longarm’s impression was that the one man, the one who was kneeling, was going down. The other was standing, in much the same posture he’d been in when the first blast had lighted up the shed.}