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the river pirate’s head. Before the man had hit the deck his companion had been dealt with in a similar fashion.
    ‘Do you have some rope in here?’ Aaron addressed the pilot.
    ‘Yes, sir,’ the nervous pilot spoke in respectful awe, ‘You’ll find some in the locker right by where you were hiding. If you need a knife, there’s one on the shelf just here.’
    As Aaron moved off towards the locker, the pilot added, admiringly, ‘Jesus, mister! They never knew what hit ’em.’
    Ignoring the pilot, Aaron located the rope and pulled it from the locker, saying to Wes, ‘You tie one and I’ll deal with the other. Stuff a gag in his mouth, too. We don’t want either of ’em shouting out to warn the others.’
    Under instruction from Aaron, Wes bound and gagged his man, putting his arms behind his back, bending his knees and securing wrists to ankles. By the time he had done, Wes’s prisoner was conscious, but there had been no movement from the man Aaron had bound.
    It was fully light outside now and the pilot asked, nervously, ‘The landing’s about a mile ahead, what do you want me to do?’
    ‘No more than you would normally,’ Aaron replied, ‘Go in bow first – but take it nice and easy. Ira’s men will have taken the captain prisoner and they’ll make him give the order to lower the gangplank. Keep the boat far enough offshore so that the gangplank is the only way they can board the Missouri Belle . It’s long and it’s narrow. Once they’re on it there’s nowhere for them to go. We just don’t want them jumping on board anywhere else.’
    ‘I can see something that might just throw your plans offline,’ Wes said, at the same time pointing to where a boat lay off the river bank with half-a-dozen men on board, making a pretence of fishing.
    ‘Oh hell!’ Aaron ejaculated, ‘I was hoping they’d have all their men onshore. Those in that boat have only to bump against the side of the Missouri Belle and they can step on board and be behind our own men. You and me will have todeal with them, Wes, using rifles.’
    Wes nodded his acceptance of the situation. Sensing his uncertainty, Aaron said, ‘I know you’ve never had to kill a man, Wes, but detach yourself from thinking about it – and do it right now. When things start happening men are going to die. If we don’t make sure it’s them, it will be us – that means you, me, and the men with Schuster. I won’t go into what will happen to Lola and the women and girls on board. Keep what I’ve said firmly in mind. When the time comes, don’t think about anything – just shoot! More men have died from thinking than from recklessness or stupidity.’
    ‘I’ll be all right.’
    Wes spoke with far more confidence than he was feeling, but he knew that Aaron was speaking from experience. He would try not to let the US Marshal down.
    The ‘fishermen’ in the small boat made no move until the riverboat began nosing in to the bank and the stage plank was being lowered – then it seemed to Wes that everything happened at once.
    As the end of the narrow gangway landed heavily on the river bank an alarming number of armed men broke from the cover of the nearby trees and ran towards the steamboat. At the same time the men on board the fishing boat threw their rods into the Mississippi River and rowed in excited disorder towards the Missouri Belle , making for a spot just forward of the paddle-wheel, where the vessel was lowest in the water.
    As they drew closer, some of the occupants exchanged their oars for rifles and began firing indiscriminately at anyone they saw moving on board the riverboat.
    Aaron had left the pilot house and was kneeling by the guard rail, overlooking the river. As the first ‘fisherman’ set foot on the Missouri Belle , he was knocked backwards by a shot fired from Aaron’s rifle – and so too was a second of the river pirates.
    Meanwhile, as Wes was leaving the pilot-house, one of the men in the small boat fired a