It wasn't long before he had turned around and headed back to the canyon after he had managed to calm down and think rationally. There was no guarantee for sure she had seen him and now that he'd taken a shot at her and she had gotten away unscathed, folks were going to know there was a shooter in Black Rock Pass. Things were going to get stirred up anyway, and he still wanted to get paid the bonus he was to get for subtracting one more driver from the freight hauler's payroll. As the long term plan he was part of had unfolded to date, the rash of accidents had already spooked one driver into quitting, and with another dead, Markham would have a hard time finding anyone willing to brave the route to the Pepper Hill mines.
Returning to the sniper's nest, wary of the ants and any more scorpions, he had shot Belfry, but even that had been jinxed. The man had moved at the last second, and he'd only struck him in the shoulder. He had always preferred headshots, but with so many things going sour about this job, he'd scrambled to make a second shot striking him in his chest. Good enough, he had thought, and fled the pass before anything else went wrong. Once night fell, he, along with a partner, would return to the pass and carry out the second part of the plan.
Now they were there, and he’d expected for them to roll up on the abandoned wagon and set it ablaze, destroying the shipment. They’d even brought along some Indian arrows to scatter about to make it look like the work of a red man perhaps angered about his people being driven from their ancestral homes. When he’d been briefed on this plan, he had been given no reason to believe anyone would be stationed at the wagon. He spat at the ground in anger and turned to look at the square-faced man crouched down next to him that was dipping the head of a torch into a small keg of kerosene they had brought with them when they had approached from the far side of the canyon that headed in the direction of Pepper Hill.
“We still gonna do this?”
"If we wanna see a fistful of banknotes in our pockets, then we damn well better."
“I don’t like this,” his companion said, grinding his teeth together. Hell, I don’t either, thought the bearded man, but there wasn’t a blasted thing they could do about it but follow through.
"Buck up and listen!" he hissed, "This is how it's going to go down. I'll make a run down the canyon and start blasting holes in the side of that wagon. You stay behind a little bit. Gunfire is gonna draw out whatever hombre Markham is paying to stand watch over that rattle trap. Even with that full moon up there they're gonna have a hard time trying to get a bead on me, but thanks to their campfire I won't have the same problem. I'll draw them out into a firefight and while they is busy with me, you scatter them arrows and torch the wagon. Any questions?" the man asked as he watched the other man slip on the quiver of arrows he had brought along. When his partner shook his head, the bearded man flipped open the cylinder to his revolver, making a final check he was fully loaded. Satisfied he rose from where they crouched by the boulder and the two figures headed for their horses, melting into the night.
CHAPTER 20
DALTON’S CREEK
Inside the church at his pulpit, the Reverend Johann Beckett had the undivided attention of the numerous men and handful of women assembled. They all leaned forward in the pews as he gripped the lectern.
“I’ll say it again! Mob rule has no place in Dalton’s Creek!”
As they had earlier, the crowd erupted with cheers of solidarity and waited for him to continue.
"Now just today for those of you who didn't have the good fortune to witness it, there came a man! A stranger with a woman at his side, his sister, I am told! Right out on that street, those two stood up to Dalton's head ‘Peace Officers' and gave them a humbling they will long remember!"
“Mercy! Even the woman too?” a lady in a deep ebony dress with a yellow bonnet called out from the first row of pews leaving the Reverend to nod.
“That’s right, Mrs. Carmondy, the woman, too! What they did was laugh in the face of mob rule! Dalton and Crockett tried to railroad them as punishment, but I and several others that are among us tonight wouldn’t let that happen! Sending them strangers was God’s way of giving us a helping push towards our first step to independence-”
A deafening explosion boomed from behind the church rattling the stained-glass windows setting off a cacophony of screams and shouts reverberating around the church at the same moment a thoroughly soaked Callie Beckett burst through the door to the church. People leaped to their feet in a confused jumble as Johann cut his way through them having spied Callie leaning on the door she had clutched when the blast had shaken the building.
"It's Dalton!" she gasped. "He's trying to blow up the meeting!" she grabbed his hand and tugged him out the door and down the steps. Racing down the narrow alley between the buildings Callie caught a brief glance at several kegs of gunpowder stacked up and rising slightly above the window sill. Running out in the back area behind the church and the gun shop, her heart surged into her throat as by the river bank, she saw a form lying inert.
“Nash!”
Blinking his eyes once and then twice, Nash looked up at the star-filled curtain that made up the heavens. Then in the light of the full moon, he suddenly saw Callie’s concerned face peering down at him. It took him several moments to re-orientate himself as she called his name repeatedly, even as another face, that of her brother’s emerged next to hers. The pair helped him up into a seated position.
When the keg had exploded, he had been knocked flat on his back and blacked out. Now sitting up, he saw there was blood spattered all over his clothes and it took him a moment to realize that it was not his blood.
“Help me up, please.”
Each of the Beckett siblings gripped an arm and assisted him to his feet even as more of the people from the church had rushed in to join them. Unsteadily, he made his way to the bank and looked down to the water’s edge. Even with the limited light, he could make out the carnage from the blast with bits and pieces strewn about, a limb here and a limb there, and a completely ruined torso laid half in and half out of the water. As they watched in silence the current tugged at it and it floated away into the darkness, perhaps to join the man’s head that unknown to the assembled had been torn from his shoulders and rocketed into the swiftly flowing waters at the moment of the explosion.
“Are you all right, Mr. Riker?” Reverend Beckett asked anxiously.
“I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me.”
“Callie said something about Dalton trying to kill us. What’s going on? What happened to cause this?”
“Just what she said … Dalton.” Riker turned his eyes to the crowd and scanned the people that were clustered nearby. “Has anyone got a weapon on them?”
Only two men stepped forward and drew back their dusters to show their side arms. Riker then ordered the men to split up. One was to stand post at the back door to the gun shop and the other to the front door to avoid any repeat of the narrowly averted strike against the rebellious townsfolk.
“The rest of you back into the church!” he called out, putting on a determined look and hiding just how much the exploding black powder had hit a little too close to home. It was like an echo of the day of Pickett’s Charge when he had been laid low and nearly escorted across the Great Divide.
Amid a buzz of confusion and unanswered questions, the throng followed Riker back inside where he took his place at the podium with each of the Becketts on either side as the doors closed. He looked out at the residents of Dalton's Creek with a grave expression, his hazel eyes dark and serious. At the entrance to the church, the door momentarily reopened as barber Bill Jefferies slipped in and took a place next to Crewson the blacksmith. Satisfied that no one else would interrupt, Riker began speaking.
“Dalton has upped the ante in his bid to control your town. That shattered corpse down by the river bank was meant to be all of you here!” a wave of questions mixed with consternation rose into the air, but the Reverend motioned downward with his hands, stilling the crowd.
<
br /> “Running you off or freezing you out doesn’t seem to be enough for him and his sidewinders anymore. Earlier several Peace Officers showed up at the Beckett ranch inciting a stampede. It was a distraction to keep me at the ranch while one of his men exploded a cluster of gunpowder kegs next door. As said, the intention was to kill every one of you in what would be passed off as an accident.”
This time the uproar was so loud that it took several moments for Johann to quiet them down once more with his gestures, and then Riker continued as his gaze swept over the people assembled in the pews.
"Dalton didn't want me to die with you. He figured that if word of so many deaths aroused any authorities from afar, he wanted a patsy to take the fall for it. I was to be arrested for accidentally setting off the explosion while breaking into the gun shop trying to get back the money used to pay my so-called fine."
“How do you know all this, Mister?” Jeffries cried out and several others murmured, echoing the same question.
"Farley Spencer ate my lead and with his dying breath told me everything because he thought I'd never get to the town to stop the blast. He didn't count on the skill and bravery of this woman at my side, helping get me here on Dalton's Creek itself."
Callie’s face took on a look of pride and embarrassment all at the same moment. For a heartbeat in time, he held her gaze and then looked back to the people. “The time has come to act.”
“What can we do, Mister Riker? Dalton controls this town with an iron grip and he’s got a small army of hired guns, backing him up.” Johann asked from his left.
A silence hung in the air over the pews as everyone looked at him expectantly. It reminded him of his days in the Union Army before he was cut down at Gettysburg. On one mission, Confederates had surrounded him and several of his unit, and they were looking up to him to find some way to get them to safety. In the end, he'd done it by ordering a retreat through a narrow gorge, but not all of the men had made it. He hoped none of the people before him would have to forfeit their lives for what he was about to suggest, but there wasn't any choice.
“Then it’s time to break that grip by fighting fire with fire by uniting as a vigilante army. I know you lost some people who tried to stand up to them on their own, and I’ll be frank. You’ll be running that risk again, but this is going to be different. This is going to be organized, well thought out, and powerful, thanks to strength in numbers! The bottom line here is it’s six-guns or surrender!”
A silence fell over the room until Crewson stood up and raised his hat in the air and cheered, "Riker's right! It's time to take a stand!" Another man shot up shouting, "We'll arm ourselves to the teeth and stamp out Dalton's mob rule!" Like a dam breaking everyone was on their feet shouting support. Broad smiles of confidence were everywhere except on the face of the Reverend Beckett, a fact that didn't go unnoticed by Riker and Callie.
"Now I know most of you probably own guns, but that doesn't mean you've got the skills. But you're going to learn under my guidance. I was an officer during the war, and I'm going to give you some training!" he called out, omitting the fact that as part of Lincoln's Military Marshal program he still held the rank of Major in the Grand Army of the Republic. At that moment, Luther Beckett slipped into the church, having just completed his mad dash into town.
“Just the man I wanted to see! Luther, I was about to instruct these people to assemble on one of your pastures at noon tomorrow. I’m hoping to use it as a drilling ground for an opposition force against the Peace Officers!”
“Absolutely, and may I say I am relieved to find the church still standing and everyone safe!”
At that moment the crowd pushed forward and began to surround Riker at the lectern peppering him with cheers of goodwill as they began to talk animatedly amongst themselves feeling emboldened. Callie pulled Johann off to the side, but despite all the voices directed at him, Riker managed to tune them out to hear what the Becketts were saying.
“What’s wrong, brother?”
"I was hoping that we could find a way to stand up to Dalton without resorting to violence ourselves. Perhaps an organized peaceful protest march to the town hall led by Riker here demanding Dalton capitulate to our demands to end this mob rule. If we employ violence ourselves, it's not something the Lord will look too kindly on."
Turning his head to them, Riker sighed, "With all due respect, Reverend, I think you're talking about the New Testament God. The Old Testament version as far as I can tell, had no problem smiting folks who needed a good smiting. I think that God, we could count among our ranks."
As his voice trailed off, just for a moment, Riker looked up at the ceiling of the church and took in his surroundings. His step-mother Abbie Maria was a very devout woman and had encouraged him and McKenna to worship and respect the Lord. He'd never had any problem with the notion, not until that day, that dark, terrible day when he had received the word. How could the Lord have turned His back on the great man who had freed the slaves, preserved the Union, and let him fall to a cowardly assassin's bullet? It had been a blow to his faith he'd never recovered from.
When he returned his gaze to Johann, the man still hadn't answered, so he turned his eyes away to look straight ahead just in time to see the door to the church close. Someone had just slipped out. But who? Scanning the crowd was useless as he didn't truly know any of these people outside of the Becketts, so he couldn't account for who was missing. Perhaps it was someone who didn't wish to participate out of fear of death and be branded a coward. Riker wouldn't blame anyone for having such concerns, a man would be damn foolish not to.
Before he could think more on it, a portly man with a walrus mustache wearing the clothes of a dandy stepped up before him, quickly introducing himself as Lars Jorgenson, owner of the only hotel in Dalton’s Creek.
“My boy, I insist that you have the best room in the house. I’ll put you on the second floor where there are private baths and the finest mattresses. It’s the least I can do for someone who is bringing some much-needed hope to this town!”
Riker looked down at himself for a moment and found the offer tempting. He was a mess, caked with dried mud from his brawl on the river bank as well as smudges of blood when the Peace Officer's body was blasted apart. Soaking in a nice bath would be grand, but he knew he shouldn't accept as he had already been offered hospitality.
“I appreciate that, sir, as a hot bath sounds like a slice of paradise right now, but the truth is, Mister Beckett has already extended me home and hearth for the night at his ranch.”
Luther stepped up just then. “Nonsense. Don’t worry about offending me, stay the night here. Take advantage of Lar’s hospitality.”
“I shall have your clothes laundered and everything! Please, sir. I haven’t had a guest in a week since Dalton’s Peace Officers have been turning people away and discouraging them from coming into town with his patrols. He’s hoping any of us business people with mortgages from Crockett’s bank won’t be able to meet our payments without customer’s money. It’s insidious!”
This news of patrols caught Riker's attention as his thoughts rolled back to earlier in the day. It seemed as he and McKenna having been riding across country before cutting down onto the road just before it entered the town, they had missed encountering any of these watches. His mind returned to the present as next to him, a smiling Beckett again encouraged him to take the offer. Finally, he accepted to the delight of the hotel man.
As Jorgenson once more began to extol the virtues of his hotel, he was no longer listening. Instead, he turned his gaze back towards the entrance to the church as one question alone ran through is mind.
What would Dalton do when he found out his scheme had failed?
CHAPTER 21
BLACK ROCK PASS
In the dim flickering light from the small fire, McKenna admired her sketch of the mountain. Its craggy slopes and vertical cliffs had a visual appeal that stoked her desire to put it to canvas as soon as possible. Her zeal to b
ring it to life with all the vibrant colors on her pallet of oil paints made her yearn to be back on the deck jutting off from one side of their small home in Santa Barbara. Depending on how she felt, she would roll out the easel that Nash had long ago affixed with castors. She would then choose between putting it either on the front of the deck where her view was the lush curving coastline that made up the crescent Santa Barbara was tucked away in or the back facing the majestic Santa Ynez mountains.
McKenna shook her head as there was no use fantasizing about being home. As she had thought before, it was uncertain when they would be back that way again. Still, thoughts of being on the deck with a gentle breeze wafting off the Pacific was preferable to the reality of huddling around the small fire that did little in the way of warding off the chill of the evening. She could have made it bigger and more robust, of course, but she had her reasons—reasons that were only moments away from being borne out.
She set her sketchbook aside, straightened up, and stretched her arms as she yawned. Perhaps it was time to untie the small coffee pot she had tethered to her saddle and brew herself up a cup. No matter how much time she and her brother spent camped out in the wilderness on their patrols, a good cup of coffee always seemed like a tether to civilization that she much enjoyed.
McKenna took one step in the direction of where Cain was tied alongside the wagon when somewhere in the blackness of the night, she caught a faint sound. A second later, her warning system, inspired by the bell above the door at the telegraph office, proved it worth the money she had spent on it at the general store. The tingling of the little bells she had tied to a length of string spanning the trail through the center of the pass jangled out their alarm before the string snapped as the sturdy legs of the rider's mount swept through it.
Immediately she spun around to make a dash for the front of the wagon to spring her trap. Reaching down, she snatched the end of the rope where it lay in the dust. Unfortunately, as her hands yanked the rope, her grip on it was less than tenuous. It started to slip out of her hand, and in the split second she struggled to regain her hold, gunfire lanced the night air as a rider swept by peppering the side of the wagon. Her face flushed as she was livid that she was a split second too late as she drew back, yanking the rope off the ground.
Six-Guns Or Surrender (Lincoln's Lawman Book 1) Page 13
