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Short Stories & Tall Tales by Cole Burgett


An established author by age 14 and speaker by age 16, Cole grew up on a healthy dose of both classic literature and cheap pulps, all of which have influenced his love of writing. Described as having a soul straight out of the Old West, two of his favorite western writers are Elmore Leonard and Louis L’Amour, both of whom he grew up reading. Having published a variety of works including speculative fiction and horror, he considers the western genre to be his niche, where he is most at home. He was weaned on a wide range of western films that have influenced his take on the genre, from American classics like Rio Bravo to Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns and even modern films such as 3:10 to Yuma. He views writing westerns as a way of harkening back to simpler times as well as a means of exploring the modern world while offering up a dish of good ol’ fashioned pulp-style fun.

Born in the hills of eastern Kentucky, he has lived in Williamson, West Virginia and Kingsport, Tennessee, and currently resides in Knoxville with plans on moving to Chicago to continue his time as a student at Moody Bible Institute. He intends to work in the ministry after his schooling is complete, while continuing to sharpen his skill with the written word.



Gutterson’s Notch
Cole Burgett

The man they call Gutterson came swaggering through the saloon doors and it was at that moment I knew someone was going to die. See, a rider came through the day before and stopped in for a drink. I was sitting in my usual spota table with one chair over against the back wallfacing the door when the rider walked in and ordered a drink. He struck up a conversation that I couldn’t help but overhear and heard him say something about Lorne Gutterson and Ricochet. Now, being that Lorne Gutterson was a wanted man who everybody knew was a wanted man and the town I just so happened to be indefinitely reigned in at was called Ricochet, it didn’t take a man from back east to know that Gutterson was on his way here. That, and a man from back east couldn’t have known that the sheriff of Ricochet, a man by the name of Surrey, had been killed only three days before the rider came in by a bullet that…well, that ricocheted. The day after the sheriff had had it out with a local mountain gang and had bounced a bullet off the side of the jail and killed himself, the only deputy in the town flipped his badge at the mayor and lit out on a gold mare.

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The Killers of Crazy Man
Jack Drummond

There was something strange about the way the man lay on the sun-scorched earth, all dead and shot to doll rags.

Judging by the tracks around him and the blood splatter some ways back down the trail, I could tell just by looking that somebody had plugged him while he was passing through on horseback. He’d made it just a couple of feet, then had come out of the saddle. He’d crawled some feet, but the gunman had come up on him and had become his killer while up close and personal.

It wasn’t just a killing. It was overkill.

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Strokes of Red
Jack Drummond

The sand-blasted earth was baked with blood. It started in a pool, spilled in a dotted trail for a few feet, and pooled once more.

He followed it.

From the second pool, the traces of blood moved off in another random pattern, dotting its way along the sand for a few more feet. Then it trailed around the side of a large rock rooted deeply in the hard earthen clay.

He knew what he would find on the other side of that rock.

And because he knew exactly what he would find, because he was so confident, it might have come as a shock to him when he craned his neck to see around the rock and the slug tore into his skull. It might have come as a shock, had he been given enough time to react.

But there was only a muzzle flash, a split-second’s pain, and then darkness.

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PROSPERITY
Jack Drummond


There was no law in that town.

Only the law of the gun.

Prosperity was ruled by two types of men. The men that did the killing, and the men that did the dying.

Terry Mulqueen was one of those men who did the killing. Not the actual killing, rather, but one who put out the bounties and ordered specific individuals to do the dying at the hands of other, more experienced killers.

He was a big, bulky man, barrel-chested and burly. His face was chiseled and mean-looking, and Terry Mulqueen had the look of a tough man about him. And he was tough, a tough card to shuffle when the hand was already in play.

And somehow, when his card was played, it was always by a sleight of hand.

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HUSH
Jack Drummond


He rode into that little town somewhere in the Powder River Country on an old appaloosa dappled with gray.

He picketed the appaloosa in front of the saloon, and slowly made his way inside.

Jonah Hush was an old man.

His hoary posture and the worn-out spring in his nearly crippled step made the fact all the more obvious. Nonetheless, he wore a six-gun tied down on his hip, doubtful that, should he ever have to draw his gun, he would walk away from the encounter. But it was his gun that he wore with pride, a symbol of his vanity; the only thing he had left to boast about in his fifty-eight years of age.

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ON A STRANGE TIDE WEST
Jack Drummond

“Pa,” came his son’s voice from the other side of the campfire when they were somewhere up Montana way, “ain’t you ever gonna show me how to shoot a gun?”

Colburn Pike looked up and across the campfire and smiled at the twinkle in his son’s eyes. “Not jus’ yet, Ty. But I will. I will.”

“When, pa?”

“Soon, son. Soon.”

Ty Pike looked mighty thoughtful for a long moment. “I hear’d some men talkin’ ‘bout guns in the last town we stopped at. They was sayin’ all you gotta do is point it an’ shoot it.”

Pike smiled at his 8-year-old son. “Well, it ain’t as simple as that.

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The Man in the Red Vest
Jack Drummond

There were two of them.

Big, ugly men.

They rode into Deadwood at dusk, and they had a third horse with them.

The first man was the biggest, and he wore two guns tied down. The second man had only one gun, and he had two fingers missing from his gun hand.

When they came swaggering into the saloon, the thongs were already loosed from the hammers of their shooting irons.

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With A Fair Hand
Jack Drummond

“Alright, boys,” Bucky Garland said, “show yer hands.”

Orn Bisby glanced over at Jim Tucker, who shot him a nasty look.

“You heard him, Bisby,” Tucker said quietly. “Show ‘em.”

Bisby tossed his cards nonchalantly onto the surface of the table.

Tucker looked at them, and the smug look on his face turned into an expression of utter astonishment. “They ain’t no way!” he exclaimed. “You cheated!”

“Easy, Jim,” Hal Mercer said from his seat on Bisby’s left. “He played that hand fair an’ you know’t!”

Tucker stood so quickly that his chair toppled over backward and clattered to the floor. The saloon they were playing in fell silent, and an invisible thread of tension fell upon the place. Tucker’s hand hovered over his shooting iron, but Bisby stared at him calmly from the other end of the table.


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Skyliner
Jack Drummond

Milt Grable looked out over the vast plains and studied the terrain.

More than two hundred head of cattle had been driven over that piece of land. On the skyline of a distant plain, he could see the outline of the cattle.

His cattle.

He sat a little straighter in the saddle and tugged his Winchester from its sheath. He checked the cartridges loaded into the rifle and returned it to the sheath. He did the same with the Colt that was nestled in the holster tied down on his hip.

Somewhere in the distance, lightning flashed, and thunder rumbled.

There was going to be a storm on the plains.

He holstered the Colt and looked back out at the distant herd of cattle that had been driven from his land by a half dozen cattle rustlers. His black gelding shifted beneath him.

“I know,” he uttered under his breath. “I don’t like the looks of it either.”

Ace Graeme led the outfit that was rustling his cattle.

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Contention
Jack Drummond

He came riding into Contention with the chill of the desert night.

A cold, hard-looking man up in his years and down on his luck. The deep lines in his face were worn and aggravated, much like his demeanor as he swung down from the saddle and picketed his horse at the hitch-rail across the street from the saloon. His horse looked equally as old and worn out, and offered no struggle when he tied the reins to the rail and left the horse there when he started for the saloon.

As he walked, he glanced either way down the street. As far as he could tell, no one had seen him ride into town.

With luck, he thought, he could keep a low profile long enough to grab a warm meal for himself and restock on supplies.


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The Walking Man
Jack Drummond

He didn’t look like a western man, yet at the same time, he did.

Ange Letterman was standing on her front porch the first time she saw him. He was coming down the way from the dead hills on the other side of nowhere, and Ange just wasn’t quite sure what to make of him. He didn’t have the heavy swagger that Ange was accustomed to seeing with western men, but he had instead the deliberate foot-fall and posture of a man from back east.

It was odd, she thought, that he should not come from the direction of town, or follow any known roadway along the beaten path. Yet there he was, coming down through the long grass toward her home. He was without a horse, yet he seemed to be in no particular rush.

It was a surreal occurrence.

He drew nearer, and by then Ange was sure he had spotted her. He stopped just short of the front porch, and Ange looked him over.

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Morrow's Grove
Jack Drummond

Con Sunderland was sitting in the rocker within the shade of his front porch when he first saw the dust cloud in the distance. He rose slowly, squinting past the mirage reflecting off the surface of the sun-blasted sand dunes. For a moment he stood there on his porch, staring out beyond the dunes at the dust cloud growing closer to his homestead. When the four riders topped the dune nearest his home, he turned and went inside.

Alice looked up from the bread she was making as he came through the open doorway. He glanced at her, but said nothing. She caught the look in his eye, and as he moved to the opposite wall, she looked through the doorway at the riders coming down the dune toward their home.

“Con,” he heard her say sharply from somewhere behind him as he took up the Spencer rifle resting against the wall.

“I know,” he said softly, cocking the Spencer. He turned and started past her. “It’s Latham’s boys.”

She caught him by the arm as he passed. “What’re you gonna do?” she asked.

“Their not gonna run us off our land, Alice. I’m takin’ a stand.”

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