Chapter 3 - The Outlaw Honey Moses and

THE ONE BAD HABIT OF REX RAMSEY

          Former U. S. Marshal Rex Ramsey finished pulling on his boots and he went out into the hallway of the Whisper Glory.  Honey Moses was down the hall talking with Kate Grody.  Rex went on downstairs and outside to his horse.

          He mounted up and sat there for a moment.  Pulling on his boots had made him recall the shaman woman Chonkusha.  Rex closed his eyes and waited for an omen.  A shadow fell upon his face and he opened his eyes.  He watched the hawk spiraling beside the sun.  The hawk then flew away to the southern hills.  Rex nudged his horse in that direction and he rode out of Bad Weather.

          When he had been a U. S. Marshal he had tracked the shaman woman Chonkusha.  The government wanted her for riling up the tribes.  Rex Ramsey was a sharp-shooter and a tracker and they had put him in charge of three Deputy Marshals -  Jubilee Dunbar, Clifford Austin, and Deuce Taylor - with orders to stop Chonkusha.  Chonkusha knew like Rex knew that animals are hunted by their habits.  Chonkusha eluded him and his Deputy Marshals for months.

          Still watching the hawk, Rex Ramsey rode and he would not stop until he found an auspicious campsite for the night.  He judiciously avoided habits.  He had enemies and that was one sure thing.  He owned the Whisper Glory with me and that was the second sure thing about him.  Otherwise he lived like a coyote – well, that isn’t true because a coyote has a home – he lived like the wind I suppose you might say.  He came from a direction and he went in a direction.

          Anyway, he found the shaman woman Chonkusha one day by the damnedest wisp of what we would call luck.  He saw a single glint of sunlight from some distant hills.  He ordered his deputies to stay put while he rode around those hills and then up the backside.  When he got near where he had seen the glint of sunlight he tied up his horse and he took off his boots and he walked.  Some would say he surprised Chonkusha in that cave, but not Rex Ramsey.  The way he tells it she was sitting there as calm as you please and smiled at him saying only, “Welcome, my Death”.  She gave him no fight.  And she was a fighter.

          Well, his deputies had disobeyed him and they hadn’t stayed put and they showed up soon enough.  They held their guns drawn on Chonkusha who said nothing but kept looking over at Rex.  They found her horse and they put her up on it with only her wrists tied.  On the way out Rex Ramsey rode in front with Chonkusha behind him and the three deputies behind her.

          Rex heard the pace of one of the deputy's horses pick up and he turned to look just as Dunbar whipped the hind end of Chonkusha’s horse and made it bolt.  Austin and Taylor already had their guns drawn and shouted “Stop!  We’ll shoot!”.  Rex swears that Chonkusha was grinning as her horse fled past him.  And the deputies shot Chonkusha in the back.

          They told Rex that they had separate Presidential orders to make sure that Chonkusha would never be a problem again.  And they said the President knew that Rex Ramsey had a reputation for not shooting fugitives even if he was the best at tracking them.  When Rex confirmed those separate Presidential orders he quit the U. S. Marshals.

          Now, I knew Rex Ramsey near as well as anybody and I knew he had only one bad habit: he was in love with Honey Moses.

Chapter 1 - A TOWN CALLED BAD WEATHER

 Chapter 2 - THE INDISCRETIONS OF KATE GRODY

CONTINUED: 

THE DUNBAR, AUSTIN, & TAYLOR SECURITY COMPANY

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