THE DODGE CITY MASSACRE (A Jess Williams Novel.) by Robert J. Thomas Page A

shooting wildly at me and the sheriff and his two deputies. I took the Winchester that the man used to shoot the sheriff and plugged him in the back and he fell off his horse,” replied Jess.
                  “I got that part, but what was the last shot for?”
                  “Well, he wasn’t exactly dead yet, but it was only a matter of time, so I put him out of his misery,” said Jess.
                  “You mean to tell me that first you shot the man in the back and then you just killed him in the middle of the street?”
                  “I might have shot him in the back, but he was shooting at me when I did it. Besides, I wasn’t going to let him get out of town and then come back and shoot one of us in the back while were eating lunch or something. Besides, I did him a favor. I’m pretty sure he was going to die anyway.”
                  “Pretty sure?”
                  “Yeah, pretty sure,” replied Jess.
                  “Damn, you do go about things a little differently.”
                  They rode the rest of the way in silence and found a nice place by a fast running river that ran through the hills. They picked a nice spot close to the river where there was a heavy stand of trees and a rocky ledge that would provide protection as well as some good cover if they were ambushed. Jess climbed up to the rocky ledge and placed several boxes of cartridges for the Winchesters, pistols, shotguns and his Sharps rifle in a leather bag just in case they had to rush up there at a moment’s notice. He also placed the two extra Winchesters that he usually kept on his packhorse up there, already loaded. Then, he proceeded to place the cans with rocks in them around their perimeter. John watched all of this as he collected enough firewood to last them for a few days.
                  “You are a careful man, I have to say,” John stated.
                  “The way I see it, you can’t be too careful. If I do get shot, I don’t want it to happen to me when I’m sleeping,” replied Jess.
                  Bodine caught several nice fish out of the river and cooked them up along with some beans and salt pork. They had a nice meal, drank some fine whiskey and retired for the night.
     
    CHAPTER EIGHT
     
                  They woke at daylight, had breakfast and spent an hour practicing. Then, they rode into Dodge City and stopped at the sheriff’s office to inquire about the sherifff’s condition. The deputies said he was in pretty good shape, but that he would be laid up for at least two weeks. They thanked the deputies and walked down to Dottie’ Eats and ordered some lunch and a pot of coffee. Everyone in the little café seemed nervous about the fact that they were in there. A few customers hurried up and finished their lunch and left. The waitress, Mattie Womack, brought them their lunch plates and placed them on their table.
                  “You two gents have started to cost the owner of this establishment some business. It seems that whenever you two come in to eat, some of the other regulars refuse to come in,” said Mattie.
                  Jess put down his coffee cup. “What is your name?”
                  “My name is Mattie Womack and the cook in the back is the owner, Dottie Brown.”
                  “Mattie, do me a favor and ask Dottie to come out so I can speak with her?”
                  “I’ll ask, but she is mighty afraid of you two.”
                  “Tell her she has nothing to fear from the two of us,” replied Jess.
                  Mattie went into the back to speak with Dottie. A few minutes later, a large woman who was wiping her hands more out of nervousness than attempting to clean them walked out and over to the table where Jess and Bodine