Read Last Train to Bannock [Clayburn 02] for Free Online Page B

another big fist like a club and swung it full force at Clayburn's face. With the bruiser's weight pinning him down, and the other two men holding his arms and tangling his legs inside theirs, all Clayburn could do was twist his head away from the blow. He twisted it, but not far enough. Heavy knuckles caught him behind the ear. His head seemed to swell up like a balloon.
        The fist went up again, came down.
        And again.
        Darkness swallowed him.
        

FIVE
        
        Clayburn opened his eyes. The left one did not open all the way. But he could see out of both of them. Above him was a heavy-timbered ceiling. He gazed up at it thoughtfully. After a time he raised his hand and felt the area around his left eye. It was puffed, and very tender. His fingertips moved downward, traced the length of a strip of plaster on his cheek, and explored his nose. It was still in one piece. The fingertips went on to his mouth. His lips were swollen and torn. Some of the front teeth were loose, but none were missing. That surprised him. He let his hand fall back on the hard cot and wondered about it.
        Finally he rolled his head and looked to his right. There were iron bars running from floor to ceiling where a wall would have been. He was in the Parrish jailhouse, in one of the two cells formed by the bars behind the office.
        In the other cell a man was pacing back and forth as though trying to work off some of his excess energy. He looked like he had a lot to work off. He was very tall, more than a head taller than Clayburn, with a powerful, lanky build topped by the widest shoulders Clayburn had ever seen. His straight hair was pitch black, and his face might have been stolen from an Aztec statue carved out of dark granite.
        For a while, Clayburn just lay there watching the giant Aztec pace the confined limits of his cell. Gradually, strength and feeling seeped back into him. With it came the awareness that his entire body hurt and his head ached horribly. The man in the other cell came to a halt at his locked door. His great hands seized the bars and for a second he seemed to be considering tearing them open. Instead, he shut his eyes, leaned his forehead against a bar, and stayed that way.
        Clayburn turned his head toward the door to his own cell. It hung open. He tried to sit up, found that his abdomen muscles were too sore to help. Rolling on one side he got an arm under him, eased his legs off the cot, and forced himself to a sitting position. He got it done, but it tore a groan out of him.
        The man in the next cell turned his face slightly and looked his way. Then he raised his head and shouted through the bars, "Hey, marshal! Your guest just woke up!"
        He had a faint touch of Mexican accent.
        The rear door of the office opened and Marshal Kavanaugh came through and into Clayburn's cell. He regarded Clayburn clinically. "How do you feel?"
        "How do I look?"
        The marshal shrugged. "I've seen worse."
        "Then I guess I've felt worse. It's just that I can't remember when."
        Marshal Kavanaugh's smile flickered on, and off. "Doctor looked you over. Couldn't find anything broken; no permanent damage. But I admit you don't look the man you used to."
        Clayburn leaned back against the wall, exhausted by the effort of sitting. "How'd I get here?"
        "Your friends carried you."
        "Friends?"
        "The three that were beating up on you."
        Clayburn's eyes were dull. But in their depths something smoldered. "Nice of them," he whispered.
        "Not very. I was walking behind them all the way, with my hand on my gun."
        "You always manage to be in the right place at the right time?"
        Kavanaugh shrugged. "Sooner or later. Man passing by heard yelling in the alley, looked in and came running for me. I went over and called 'em off you. They said it was just a little fist fight, but I didn't