“It’s been increasingly obvious for some time,” he said, “that the men who invaded our town and valley are violent, merciless vermin. That they represent an allegedly respectable businessman like Parker Dixon makes no difference. It’s equally clear that, under the surface, he must be from the same loathsome species—as is his son. In other words, any belief that even a morsel of decency or trustworthiness exists anywhere within that entire group of thieves and killers would be nothing short of lunacy.”
“For Christ’s sake, Jonathan,” grumbled Clarence Copley, formerly the town’s highly skilled but cantankerous old cabinet maker, “stow that highfalutin talk and speak plain. You’re a leather-stitcher, not a dad-blasted lawyer.”
“What my Jonathan is saying, quite plainly enough if you ask me,” said Edna Wray, working beside her husband, “is that anyone who thinks those villains can be trusted to uphold any deal they claim to make, is a fool.”
Copley tossed up his hands in a frustrated gesture. “Anybody with half a brain knows that. Why didn’t you just say it that way, Jonathan?”
Mary Hobart, the widowed mother of Davy Eagle’s young friend LeRoy, looked stricken. “Wait a minute. Am I hearing right? Are some of you actually suggesting that we not negotiate with those men? They have the children. That’s a fact, a terrible one, that we can’t ignore.”
Still wrapped in the embrace of her husband’s arm, Jane Eagle said in a somewhat dulled tone, “Trust me, Mary, no one is ignoring that fact. But the other hard, painful fact is that meeting the demands of the men holding them is no guarantee Belinda and Heath will be released. In fact, if there is any guarantee, it is just the opposite.”
“What’s more,” said Neal Vickers, the badly overweight former barber who’d long had deep but unspoken feelings for Mary Hobart, “if Tom and Mr. Jensen willingly gave themselves up and the gang proves untrustworthy, then everyone will be worse off. Without those two, our chances to defend ourselves and survive would be greatly diminished.”
“But what about the promise of safe passage if we cooperate?” Mary wailed.
“That’s an even bigger lie than the claim they’d release the kids,” said Tom Eagle, speaking for the first time since concluding his report on Ferris’s demands. His voice containing an uncharacteristically harsh edge, he added, “If Parker Dixon wants to continue havin’ his way, he can no longer afford for any of us to live.”
“But hold on,” said Howard MacGregor, frowning. “Dixon has let families leave safely in the past.”
“That was in the beginnin’,” Eagle replied, “when Dixon had those lawyer types paradin’ around, tryin’ to make it all look like business propositions. When that didn’t root folks out fast enough, what came next? The killin’ and burnin’, right? That’s what drove all of us here, to this last holdout. And now that he took things that far, Dixon can’t ease up and let a couple dozen respectable folks wander away to start talkin’ about the things his coyote pack has done.”
Now it was Ben Pettigrew who joined in. Propping himself up on one elbow, he said, “Eagle paints a grim picture, but he’s telling it straight. I got a firsthand taste of those snakes and I can tell you they’re as cold and heartless as exactly that—a nest of snakes. Most of you from around town know that the history of things between me and my son ain’t been very good. Something I lay here now mighty ashamed of. I hope it ain’t too late to try and make amends for the way I treated him and I’d lay down my life if it meant a way to get him away from Ferris’s bunch. But giving in to the demands they’re making—that ain’t the answer.”
His wife Lucille, standing close to where he lay, reached out and placed her hand in his, silently signifying her agreement.
“What is the answer then?” Isobel, one of the spinster Byerly sisters, wanted to know.
When no one else responded right away, Dinah Mercer settled her penetrating gaze on Luke and said, “We haven’t heard anything from Mr. Jensen yet. Since he figures prominently in this—one way or another—I think we should find out what he has to say.”
Chapter 32
“Do you really think you can put together a plan that will work?”
Luke smiled tolerantly at Dinah’s question. “I think there’s a reasonable chance, yes, or I wouldn’t have suggested it. Contrary to how it might seem from time to time, I’m not suicidal. But whether or not our attempt will succeed, no one can say until it plays out. There’s always the risk of something unexpected cropping up, something no amount of advance planning manages to take into consideration.”
“You sound like you do this sort of thing frequently.”
Luke replied, “If you mean a rescue raid, no, that’s not a common thing for me. But if you mean finding myself crossways of unpleasant individuals who, for one reason or other, are bent on doing me harm—then, yeah, I guess that does happen with a fair amount of frequency.”
“I have a feeling you wouldn’t have it any other way,” said Dinah Mercer. “After all, that’s your trade—seeking out unpleasant individuals.”
“I seek them out to put them behind bars,” Luke told her. “It’s up to them how troublesome they want to make being taken into custody. It’d suit me just fine if all of them came along peaceably.”
“Well, judging by the scars you’ve accumulated,” Dinah observed, “that appears not to happen very often.”
The two of them had repaired again to Dinah’s tent where she was once more cleaning and re-dressing Luke’s cuts and abrasions from his first meeting with the Ferris gang and then his subsequent encounter with Ol’ Rip. He sat with his shirt off, she leaning close to administer the necessary care. Lanterns with their wicks turned up brightly were positioned near on either side.
Outside the tent, full darkness had settled and the movements of others in the encampment could be heard as they went about their business following the breakup of the meeting under the main canopy.
That meeting had ended after Luke, upon being prompted by Dinah, stated his belief that the only chance for Belinda and Heath to ever re-join their families would be if they were forcibly taken from their captors. Eagle, Pettigrew, and Barlow had instantly agreed. An intense general discussion involving all present had ensued until, with full sanction from the families of the captive youngsters, the majority also came to favor the idea of Eagle and Jensen putting together a plan for a rescue raid.
But first, both men—along with Barlow and Pettigrew, once the Wrays were done treating the latter—required some time to get themselves collected and cleaned up following their ordeal in the badlands. They arranged to get together again an hour before midnight in order to finalize preparations.
In response to Dinah’s comment about the scars decorating his torso and to a somewhat lesser extent his face, Luke said, “In certain European societies, a scar is considered a badge of honor. It marks the character of a man.”
Leaning still closer to apply a fresh dab of salve to Luke’s shrapnel-pitted cheek, and with the trace of an impish glint showing in her deep brown eyes, Dinah replied, “That being the case, I guess you’d be considered quite the honorable character in those circles.”
Luke was increasingly aware of her nearness. The fresh, soapy, all-over woman scent of her filled his nostrils, overriding even the tang of the salve she was applying.
“I’d like to think I conduct myself with a degree of honor wherever I’m at,” he said. Then, a huskiness edging into his voice, he added, “Which leads me to warn you that spending too much time alone with you like this is starting to give me inclinations I fear are not strictly honorable.”
Dinah stopped dabbing on the salve and the palm of her hand came to rest softly on his cheek. Her eyes boldly meeting his, she said, “Whether or not such inclinations are dishonorable would depend on how they are met, wouldn’t you say?”
The touch of her hand sent a warmth coursing through Luke. Still, he protested, “You have a standing, a status, with the people surrounding us. No matter how this
situation we’re caught up in works out, I’ll be moving on, one way or another. But you need to consider having to face the consequences of a reckless, impulsive decision you may regret.”
“The people who count, already know and respect me,” Dinah said firmly. “Anyone else, I don’t give a hang about. I’m an adult woman, a widow, who’s had to be strong and on my own for several years now. That means I’m quite capable of making decisions and standing by them. What’s more, we both know that before it’s over, there’s the chance none of us may come out of this thing alive. The only regret I can see myself having is to let this moment pass, to not give in to the impulse, even if—”
Luke didn’t let her finish. He brushed away the tin of salve Dinah held in one hand, letting it drop to the floor, and pulled her into his arms. Their lips met and held for a long, passionate kiss. Soon the lanterns were turned down to a soft glow and then, entwined once more in an embrace, their lips continuing to urgently, hungrily seek each other’s, they sank back together into the deepened shadows . . .
Chapter 33
Hacksaw Ferris lowered the bottle of whiskey from his mouth and emitted a satisfied sigh.
“Now there’s some decent corn squeezin’s,” he declared. “I generally favor rye, but I’m in such a good mood this evenin’ that I’m willin’ to be more accommodatin’.” He set his gaze on the man seated across the table from him. “Sorry we ain’t got none of that fancy stuff you got a taste for, Boss. But I’d sure be honored if you’d reconsider and have a touch with us all the same. You know, to sort of celebrate the good fortune that’s come our way.”
Roland Dixon’s return gaze was impassive. “Thanks, but I’ll pass on having a drink just now,” he said. “And as for the celebrating, I—being a bird in the hand type—suggest it might be a bit premature for that, anyway.”
Ferris squinted. “I’ve got where I can most of the time wrangle out the meanin’ in those big words you use, Boss. But every once in a while you still manage to stump me when you string a bunch of ’em together. What’s havin’ a bird in the hand or anywhere else got to do with anything? And what do you mean by a celebration bein’ ‘pre-mitcher’?”
“Premature,” said Paul Grimsby, the third man sitting at the table. “Means too soon—like counting on something to turn out a certain way before it has time to play out on its own.”
“And surely,” added Roland, “you’ve heard the old saying about a bird in the hand being better than two in the bush.”
Ferris scowled. “So you’re sayin’ I’m puttin’ too much stock in those brats we got stashed in a room upstairs bein’ able to fetch Jensen and that pesky half-breed. Is that it? And you figure Jensen amounted to a ‘bird in the hand’ when I was tradin’ lead with him back there in the badlands—that I shoulda stuck with that instead of switchin’ tactics the way I did after Grimsby showed up with the kids. That what you’re sayin’?”
“By your own account,” Roland reminded him, “Jensen was within twenty or thirty yards of your grasp.”
“And you think that meant he was gonna hold nice and still while I waltzed up and glommed onto him, eh?” Ferris bared his teeth in a sneer. “Did you forget the part where I also told you he’d just got done killin’ three of my men—one of’em bein’ Dog DeMarist, my best man?”
“You know I never held DeMarist in as high a regard as you, though I’m naturally sorry for the loss of him and the others,” Roland said. “But their misfortune doesn’t equate to Jensen being some kind of phantom too elusive for anyone to capture—especially when Grimsby had just shown up with five more men. I have to question why, in lieu of giving up the pursuit of Jensen for the sake of using the children as hostages, you didn’t take those added men and swarm the area where you knew your quarry to be.”
His lips curling with disdain, Ferris said, “You ever been out in those badlands, Mister Dixon? You ever even seen ’em?”
“Of course I’ve seen them.”
“Then did you happen to notice how they stretch for miles and miles? Nothing but baked, barren rocks and gullies and ragged peaks over which a man can’t be tracked—and a thousand cracks and crevices where he can hide, sometimes where another man could pass within three or four feet and never spot him.” Ferris’s sneer stayed in place. “Did any of that register with you? Because that’s how it is out there. And if I’d taken Grimsby and his boys back out there with me, it would have been like chasin’ a phantom.”
“You managed to find him the first time,” Roland pointed out.
“Purely by accident,” Ferris grunted. “We was aimin’ to flank around on the shooters up front. We wasn’t expectin’ to run into Jensen and neither was he expectin’ us. Once we locked horns, and us bein’ hamstrung by our orders to take him alive, it turned lopsided in a hurry even though we started out havin’ him outnumbered. He was shootin’ to kill, we was returnin’ fire only to wound or try to flush him into the open. If I’d gone back in with Grimsby and his boys under those same orders—even if we could’ve managed to find Jensen again—not a lot of reason to expect it wouldn’t have turned into more of the same.”
“I’m getting awfully tired of hearing that same old excuse about how you’re hampered by the requirement to take Jensen alive,” Roland said petulantly.
“And I’m gettin’ awful tired of losin’ men on account of it!” Ferris barked back.
This increasingly heated exchange was taking place in what had, until a couple months earlier, been the main room of the Elkhorn Saloon in downtown Hard Rock. It was located on the main street, diagonally across from the one-time more ornate High Plains Palace, the saloon Luke Jensen, strictly by happenstance, had chosen for his fiery confrontation with Ferris’s men after he first arrived in town. Prior to that, once they’d run off all the honest Hard Rock citizens, Ferris and his curly wolves had claimed the Elkhorn as their hangout while they finished mopping up the rest of the valley.
They’d long since stripped the Palace of all or most of its liquor and other trappings that had any appeal and hauled them over to the Elkhorn, resulting in no real remorse when Jensen left the Palace in flames. General consensus among the gang in the wake of that act, however, was that if their place had received such treatment, then there’d be no corner of Montana remote enough for Jensen to hide.
“What’s done is done,” said Paul Grimsby in a calm, level voice aimed at cutting through the rising tension between Ferris and Roland Dixon. “The thing to remember is that having these two kids as hostages—especially when we know the girl is Tom Eagle’s daughter—does give us an awful strong bargaining chip, Mr. Dixon. It might prove the best chance we’ve had yet, especially for taking the men alive.”
Roland glared at Ferris, still smarting at having a subordinate talk back to him in a raised voice. Glancing around the room, however—a space filled with lounging, heavily armed men who were putting on a show of acting indifferent while clearly straining to hear every word—it registered with him that this force was made up of men used to backing Ferris. Men accustomed to doing what they were told to do and taking what they were told to take and looking to Ferris to see they got paid for it. And while the pay for their current work originated as Dixon money, that was no assurance they would give any consideration to this fact when it came to where their loyalty lay.
“Very well,” Roland said stiffly. “What is done is done, indeed. It appears I have little choice but to join you gentlemen in your fervent belief that using these children as bargaining chips will accomplish the desired results.” His gaze lifted to the stairway that led up to a row of doors on the second floor. “You say you have them in a room up there?”
“Uh-huh. That’s right.”
“I trust you have them adequately secured.”
Ferris chuckled throatily. “Secure? Them brats are locked down safer than a gold shipment from your mine—one of the regular ones, I mean, not one of the ones we phonied up to look like it got robbed by Tom Eagle.” Then he chuckl
ed some more.
Roland pushed back from the table and stood up. “Very well,” he said again. “I need to get back to my quarters at the Gold Button. I’ll return here in time for the exchange tomorrow. Noon, correct?”
“That’s the way we set it up.”
“Let’s hope all goes according to plan,” Roland said. Then, offhandedly, he added, “Especially so the capture of Jensen can be completed by the time my father arrives later in the day.”
This drew a startled reaction from both Ferris and Grimsby, both men jerking suddenly upright in their chairs.
“What’s that?” Ferris demanded. “You sayin’ your old man is gonna be here tomorrow?”
Roland made little attempt to hide the smugness he felt for having so obviously rattled the gang leader who’d been displaying a belligerent streak just moments earlier. Much as he personally loathed his father, Roland nevertheless marveled at—and didn’t hesitate to use, when it suited his purpose—the power conveyed by the mere mention of his name.
“Oh,” the younger Dixon said now, his attempt at an innocent tone fully transparent, “I guess in all the excitement upon hearing about your hostages and all, I was distracted from mentioning that development before. Be that as it may, as soon as the telegraph line was once again repaired earlier today, I received notice that Father was on his way. It seems he left Helena not long after sending Jensen—apparently displaying some premature confidence of his own that the man would be promptly apprehended on his arrival here.”
“Didn’t you notify him otherwise?” asked Grimsby.
“I just told you, the telegraph line was down,” Roland replied.
“How about after it got to workin’ again? Did you send word about all the trouble we ran into with that devil?” Ferris wanted to know.
Roland spread his hands. “How could I? Father was already on the trail. Where would I send any such notification in hopes of it reaching him?” He paused, continuing to adopt the innocent veneer. “But luckily it turns out to be a moot point, right? Providing, that is, this hostage swap you’re so certain of works out like you’ve been assuring me it would.”
Hired Guns Page 19
