Louis LAmour - Sackett: The Sackett Series, Book 9

Their story is the story of the American frontier, an unforgettable saga of young men and women who tamed a young land, transforming a wilderness into a nation with their dreams and their courage.

Created by master storyteller Louis LAmour, the Sackett saga brings to life the spirit and adventures of generations of pioneers. Fiercely independent and determined to face any and all challenges, they discovered their destiny in settling a great and wild land.

Each Sackett novel is a complete, exciting historical adventure. Read as a group, they tell the thrilling epic tale of a country unlike any the world has ever known. And no one writes more powerfully about the frontier than Louis LAmour, who has walked and ridden down the same trails as the Sackett family he has immortalized. The Sackett novels represent LAmour at his most entertaining and are one of the widely beloved achievements of a truly legendary career.

SACKETTS LAND
circa 1600

TO THE FAR BLUE MOUNTAINS
circa 16001620

THE WARRIORS PATH
circa 1620s

JUBAL SACKETT
circa 1620s

RIDE THE RIVER
circa 1840s1850s (before Civil War)

THE DAYBREAKERS
circa 18701872

LANDO
circa 18731875

SACKETT
circa 18741875

MOJAVE CROSSING
circa 18751879

THE SACKETT BRAND
circa 18751879

THE SKY-LINERS
circa 18751879

THE LONELY MEN
circa 18751879

MUSTANG MAN
circa 18751879

GALLOWAY
circa 18751879

TREASURE MOUNTAIN
circa 18751879

RIDE THE DARK TRAIL
circa 18751879

LONELY ON THE MOUNTAIN
circa 18751879

Sackett is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

2010 Bantam Books Mass Market Edition

Copyright 1961 by the Louis & Katherine LAmour Trust

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Bantam Books,
an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group,
a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

B ANTAM B OOKS and the rooster colophon
are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Originally published in paperback in the United States
by Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc., in 1961.

eISBN: 978-0-553-89970-2

Photograph of Louis LAmour by John HamiltonGlobe Photos, Inc.
Map by Alan McKnight

www.bantamdell.com

v3.1

CHAPTER 1

It wasnt as if he hadnt been warned. He got it straight, with no beating around the mesquite.

Mister, I said, if you aint any slicker with that pistol than you were with that bottom deal, youd better not have at it.

Trouble was, he wouldnt be content with one mistake, he had to make two; so he had at it, and they buried him out west of town where men were buried who die by the gun.

And me, William Tell Sackett, who came to Uvalde a stranger and alone, I found myself a talked-about man.

We Sacketts had begun carrying rifles as soon as we stood tall enough to keep both ends off the ground. When I was shy of nine I fetched my first cougar caught him getting at our pigs. At thirteen I nicked the scalp of a Higgins who was drawing a bead on Pa we had us a fighting feud going with the Higginses.

Pa used to say a gun was a responsibility, not a toy, and if he ever caught any of us playing fancy with a gun hed have our hide off with a bullwhip. None of us ever lost any hide.

A gun was to be used for hunting, or when a man had a difficulty, but only a tenderfoot fired a gun unless there was need. At hunting time Pa doled out the catridges and of an evening he would check our game, and for every catridge hed given us we had to show game or a mighty good reason for missing. Pa wasnt one to waste a bullet. He had trapped the western lands with Kit Carson and Old Bill Williams, and knew the value of ammunition.

General Grant never counted catridges on me, but he was a man who noticed. One time he stopped close by when I was keeping three Rebel guns out of action, picking off gunners like a possum picking hazelnuts, and he stood by, a-watching.

Sackett, he said finally, how does it happen that a boy from Tennessee is fighting for the Union?

Well, sir, I said, my country is a thing to love, and I set store by being an American. My great-grandpa was one of Dearborns riflemen at the second battle of Saratoga, and Grandpa sailed the seas with Decatur and Bainbridge.

Grandpa was one of the boatmen who went in under the guns of the Barbary pirates to burn the Philadelphia. My folks built blood into the foundations of this country and I dont aim to see them torn down for no reason whatsoever.

Another Rebel was fixing to load that cannon, so I drew a bead on him, and the man who followed him in the chow line could move up one place.

Come fighting time, General, I said, therell always be a Sackett ready to bear arms for his country, although we are peaceful folks, unless riled.

And that was still true, but when they buried that gambling man out west of Uvalde it marked me as a bad man.

In those days what they called a bad man was one who was a bad man to have trouble with, and a lot of mighty good men were known as bad men. The name was one I hadnt hankered for, but Wes Bigelow left me no choice.

Fact of the matter was, if it hadnt been me it would have been somebody else, because Bigelows bottom deal was nothing like so good as Id seen on the riverboats.

Nevertheless, I had got a reputation in Uvalde, and this seemed a good time to become a wandering man. Only I was fed up with drifting ever since the war, and wanted a place to light.

Outside of town I fell in with a cow outfit. North from Texas we rode, driving a herd to Montana grass, with never a thought of anything but grief while riding the Bozeman Trail.

North of the Crazy Woman three men rode into camp hunting beef to buy. The boss was not selling but they stayed on, and when my name was mentioned one of them looked at me.

Are you the Sackett who killed Bigelow?

He wasnt much good with a bottom deal.

Nor with a gun, I guess.

He was advised.

Unless youre fit to handle his two brothers, youd best not ride into Montana. They come up by steamboat and theyre waiting for you.

I wasnt planning on staying around, I said, but if they find me before I leave, theyre welcome.

Somebody was wondering if you were kin to Tyrel Sackett, the Mora gunfighter.

Tyrel Sackett is my brother, but this is the first Ive heard of him gunfighting. Only, if he was put to it, he could.

He cleaned up Mora. Hes talked about in the same breath with Hickok and Hardin.

Hes a hand with any kind of shooting iron. Back to home he used to outshoot me sometimes.