by Lou Cameron
CHAPTER
FIVE
*
Just where the High Plains of Wyoming met the official foothills of the Laramie Mountains was a matter of opinion. The crossroads hamlet of Iron Mountain lay in what could be called low foothills or mighty rolling prairie, depending on who was calling the shots. Stringer hadn’t made his mind up, yet. The wagon trace he was following on a roan livery gelding was undulating up and down across over-grazed and summer-dried shortgrass. But from time to time he passed an outcrop of bare rock, mostly sandstone, and some of the draws were choked with mountain aspen as well as the usual crack willow, chokecherry and cottonwood official to prairie draws.
He’d stayed at Pat’s place in Cheyenne a mite longer than he’d intended, so it was a mite cooler than his denim jacket called for when the evening breezes caught him topping a rise. He was just commencing to worry about getting caught by sundown in the middle of nowhere when he topped another rise and spied rooftops and chimney smoke ahead. It had to be Iron Mountain because he’d ridden about five hours and it was about time he got to anyplace.
He rode into town, what there was of it, and dismounted in front of the one combined saloon and general store. As he did so his tired mount tried to inhale all the water in the trough out front at once. He patted its lathered neck. “I’m sorry about that, Red. I tried to tell her I had a long way to ride before that summer sun went down, but would she listen?”
Then he tethered the reins to a handy post and stiff-legged up the plank steps and through the open doorway. At this hour a modest crowd of townees and, judging from their outfits, some hands off surrounding spreads, had gathered to celebrate the end of another hard day’s work. There was a hard-eyed but good-looking gal of about twenty-five sitting at a corner table, playing cards with herself. Everyone else was standing at the bar, paying her no mind. From the way she was dressed in that low-cut purple satin outfit, it seemed obvious she wasn’t exactly there to play cards. Her black hair was sort of purple at the ends, too. He wondered what color hair she really had. But, like the others, he bellied up to the bar and said he sure could use a boilermaker if they refused to serve him a barrel of ice water.
The friendly fat barkeep laughed, said it was late in summer for ice in those parts, and filled a shot glass and beer mug as he added, “You do look like someone drug you through the keyhole backwards, stranger. How long have you been on the trail?”
Stringer swallowed the contents of the shot glass and half the beer before he gasped, “Oh, that felt good. I just rode up from Cheyenne, faster than I’d planned. Walking my mount up the slopes and loping him down. I’m going to have to oat him and rub him down some before it gets any cooler up this way. Do you sell oats?”
“Right next door,” the barkeep said. “Tell my wife I sent you and she won’t sell you chicken feed. Are you planning on riding on or staying, stranger?”
“I’ll be in town at least overnight,” Stringer said, “if I can find shelter for me and a mighty deserving mount. Since I can see I’ve aroused your curiosity, gents, I’d best tell you I’m called Stringer MacKail and that I write stories for the San Francisco Sun. They sent me to these parts to cover the Frontier Days in Cheyenne.”
A morose-looking cuss in a black satin shirt and gunbarrel chaps growled, “How come you’re here, then?”
“I thought as long as I was in the neighborhood, I’d ride up here and see if there was anything new on that killing you had in Iron Mountain a year or so back,” Stringer told them.
It got sort of quiet—fast. The fat barkeep politely put a new head on Stringer’s beer as he said in a less jolly tone, “Folk in these parts have been trying to forget that old feud, son. Like you said, it was long ago, and they got the man who murdered Willie Nickell.”
A cowhand further down muttered, “Or so they say.” Then the one in the gunbarrel chaps snapped, “Shut up, Casey. You don’t know nothing about it. None of us know nothing about it.”
There was an almost ominous growl of agreement the length of the bar. Stringer swallowed some more beer, left his change on the mahogany, and said he might be back after he saw to his mount. As he was leaving, the one in gunbarrel chaps advised him nobody would worry about him if he failed to return.
The motherly woman in the attached general store was much more friendly. So he decided not to mention any local murders to her. She said she’d be proud to sell him a sack of oats and when he asked if there was a livery in town she said, “No, but the blacksmith catty-corner across the way boards horses. I think he asks a dime a day, with you providing feed, I mean.”
Stringer said that sounded fair, paid her more than he should have for the oats, then went out to untether his roan and lead it the short way to the open front of the smitty across the way. He found the smith about to close down for the night. But they cut an easy deal and it was still fairly light out by the time his roan was rubbed down and stalled, his saddle tacked, and so on. The smith said he had no idea where Stringer might or might not find a room for himself. He explained he had to share the one bed he had with a lady he meant to marry up with any day now.
So once he found himself alone on the dusty and only street again, Stringer rolled a smoke as he pondered his next move. As a seasoned newspaper man, he’d learned that folks came in just two species: those willing to be interviewed, and those that were possibly dangerous if a stranger kept pestering them. From what he could see of the tiny town in the rapidly fading light of gloaming, it was an even smaller and more tightly knit community than he’d expected. He knew from his earlier reading at the newspaper morgue in Cheyenne that there seemed to be at least two factions, sheep and cow, in these parts, and that things had been mighty tense at the time the son of Kell Nickell, a leader of the sheep men, had been murdered. He could see why the obvious cow men across the street might not want anyone even hinting that an outsider, such as Tom Horn, might not have done the deed. But even if he couldn’t get anyone to talk to him, he still needed a place to bed down, damnit, so he lit his smoke and headed toward the lamp light of the saloon again.
But as he did so a female voice hissed, “Don’t go back there. Not if you know what’s good for you.” He spun around to see that, sure enough, the fancy gal he’d seen there before had snuck out to join him.
He smiled down at her curiously and said, “To tell the truth I did detect a certain lack of warmth over yonder, ma’am. But I just hate to spend nights standing out in the cold like this and I can’t say any of the boys treated me downright mean.”
“A lot you know,” she said sarcastically, “if your name is Stringer and you’re a newspaperman. If it was, another stranger was in town not two hours ago, asking for you by name and chosen trade.”
“Do tell? I wonder how come none of those boys saw fit to tell me a thing like that?”
“I was wondering the same thing. That’s why I ducked out to tip you off. Unlike some I know in these parts, I don’t like noise. The man who was asking for you earlier struck me as a hired gun.”
“Tall gent, in a frock coat and a brace of ivory-gripped guns in a cross-draw rig?” Stringer asked.
She shook her head. “One gun, black grips, worn low and tie-down. He smiled a lot. But I could tell he even had Sweet Violets scared skinny.”
He smiled thinly. “Who on earth is Sweet Violets, and by the way, who might you be, ma’am?”
“You can call me Cherokee,” she said. “You were talking to Sweet Violets Vance before. He was right next to you in skinny chaps and a Harrington Richardson .44.”
“Right. What makes you think they’re all in on it, if that other gent was a stranger in town as well?”
“They’re not with him. They’re not with you. They’re just waiting to see who wins so they can root for the winner. I think old Fats, behind the bar, may have sent for the law. He’s got more sense than your average cowhand. Meanwhile the nearest deputy lives a good ways out of town and it’s an even bet who might get here first. That gu
nslick never said whether he was leaving for good or just scouting about for his old pal Stringer MacKail. If I were you, I’d be mounted up and going lickety-split about now.”
“You ain’t me, Cherokee, and my mount is too jaded to go lickety-anything right now,” Stringer shrugged.
“All right,” she relented, a little too easily. “What say you hole up with me for the night, then?”
He raised an eyebrow and said, “I sure hope you won’t take this personal, ma’am. But while I have to say your approach is original as hell, I’m just too romantic by nature to pay my way into any gal’s bed.”
She gasped. “Oh, you brute, is that any way to talk to a lady?”
“Nope,” he replied politely. “But ain’t you sort of stretching the definition a mite, Miss Cherokee?”
“You idiot, I’m a card shark, not a whore, and I was only suggesting you’d be safer on my sofa than in that saloon across the way!”
“Sure you were,” he retorted, tipping his hat. “It’s been nice talking to you, Miss Cherokee. But it didn’t work. And now, with your permission, I’ll go see if old Fats and his wife purvey any creature comforts besides grain and the spirits derived therefrom.”
As he moved on she tagged along, insisting, “You have to believe me. I’ve been laying in wait here for the Frontier Days in the city to break up. I don’t exactly cheat at blackjack but the odds are always with the dealer, and it’s my sincere hope some of the hands passing through will have won big at that rodeo, see?”
Stringer said, “A man who’d leap off a pony at a steer would likely bet against a lady with purple hair and it’s a free country. But you’re just wasting your temptations on me, ma’am.”
She called him a total fool and dropped back as he got closer to the lamp light. He entered the saloon to announce, “I’m sure sorry to disappoint you, boys. But I said I might be back.”
Nobody who’d been there earlier answered. But a gent sporting a red silk shirt and a smile almost as flashy stepped away from the bar to ask, “Would you be Stringer MacKail, little darling?”
Thanks to Cherokee’s warning about a holster worn low and tie-down, Stringer beat him to the draw by a split second, and thanks to the black powder shells Rimfire Rowena had given Stringer, the galoot staggered back with three balls in his chest and his fancy shirt on fire.
He landed face up in the sawdust, still smiling and still on fire. The hand called Casey emptied a beer schooner on the dead man’s chest and said laconically, “That’s ten dollars you owe me, Sweet Violets. I told you a man who goes to so much trouble with his gun rig could be uncertain about the subject.”
Sweet Violets growled, “It’s the accepted custom to answer a man afore you slap leather on him.”
Stringer finished reloading, put his .38 back in its holster, and turned to face Sweet Violets as he inquired mildly, “Did you say something, Sonny?”
Sweet Violets didn’t answer. Another hand laughed jeeringly and said, “Say something to the man, Sonny.”
“Aw, shut up,” Sweet Violets said. “It ain’t my fight and the law is already going to have a lot to say about the one man down already.”
As if to prove his words, an older gent covered with trail dust burst through the doorway with the young hand Fats had sent to fetch him legging right behind. They both had their guns out. The older one stared morosely down at the smouldering cadaver on the floor and said, “Well, I tried to get here in time. What’s this all about, Fats?”
“The dead man was in earlier, looking for that stranger in blue denim,” the barkeep said. “When they finally met just now, the results was what you see, Deputy.”
The lawman didn’t exactly point his Dragoon .45 at Stringer. But he didn’t put it away either as he asked, “Which one was first to go for his gun, Fats?”
The barkeep answered, “Hard to say. From where I stood it looked like a meeting of the minds. The dead man did call MacKail first, and he’d been sort of hinting at death and destruction earlier.”
Casey said, “I was closer. The dead man’s mouth and gun hand was moving at the same time. Stringer, there, beat him to the draw fair and square.”
The old deputy nodded at Stringer. “Your turn, son.”
Stringer said, “I don’t have much to add. I never saw the man before. But since it’s obvious he was laying for me here, he must have thought he was following me up from Cheyenne and got here sooner. I left Cheyenne a little later than I’d planned this afternoon. I’m still working on who could have told him I meant to come up here at all.”
The local law asked, “Why did you come here in the first place?”
So Stringer said, “With your permission, I mean to reach under this jacket for some papers that may explain me better to you.”
As Stringer did so Sweet Violets said, “Watch him, Jim. He moves quick as a cat.” But the old-timer was already covering Stringer pretty good as he hauled out the papers Pat Morrison had given him that afternoon with a fond farewell kiss.
The deputy moved over to spread them atop the bar under the better light there as the young hand who’d fetched him continued to smile politely or perhaps bemusingly at Stringer, gun in hand. The old-timer read everything twice before he decided, “Well, I savvy this permit to pack a gun in Wyoming, even though I never knew you needed one. I don’t understand this court order telling the Cheyenne P.D. to stop pestering you, though. Was that man you just gunned a Cheyenne copper badge? He don’t look like one.”
“I don’t know who he was,” Stringer insisted. “Read the writ appointing me a friend of the court and authorizing me to look into the murder of Willie Nickell.”
Some of the others sucked in their breath and one said softly, “Oh, shit, not that again!”
The old deputy said, “I already read it. Like I said, it’s all mighty confusing. But if a county judge says it’s all right for you to snoop about I don’t see how the sheriff’s department can stop you. I don’t see nothing here giving you the right to shoot nobody in my jurisdiction, though.”
Stringer said, “I thought anybody had the right to defend himself. The jasper came after me. I never went after him.”
The older man handed the papers back to Stringer, glanced down at the dead man again, then said, “It appears to me he might not have known exactly what he was looking for. For openers, I’d best see if I can find out who in thunder he might have been. Meanwhile, you wasn’t planning on leaving town in the near future, was you, Mister MacKail?”
Stringer said, “Well, I meant to spend at least tonight and the better part of tomorrow poking about in these parts. I have to be back in Cheyenne before that rodeo winds down, though.”
The old deputy shook his head wearily and said, “I’m not so sure about that. I’ll take your word you gunned that other gent in self-defense. I’d have to lock you up if I didn’t. But even when a man has witnesses, we do things tidy here in Iron Mountain. Our assistant county coroner is surely going to want you to appear afore his panel, and with the weekend coming up and Doc Marvin out of town in any case, there’s just no saying when they’ll be able to get around to it.”
Stringer swore softly and asked, “Why can’t you report it to the county coroner, direct, so I can appear before him down in Cheyenne?”
The old man moved past him to hunker over the corpse as he told Stringer, “I could. I don’t aim to. Doc Marvin would never forgive me if I was to spoil his chances to hold a proper hearing. Doc takes his position serious and we hardly ever get such an interesting death for him to investigate.”
The old lawman spit on his palm to pat out some threads still smouldering on the dead man’s chest as he muttered, “Must be that fake silk they make outten cotton and lye water. Do you reckon he come to Cheyenne to ride in the rodeo and then got sidetracked?”
“That should be easy to check by wire, if you have a telegraph office here,” Stringer said. “I know a judge who’s with the rodeo committee.”
Old Jim said,
“We can do better than Western Union. We got us a telephone line to Cheyenne now. I told you we do things right here in Iron Mountain. But first we got to figure out who the poor son of a bitch was.”
He rolled the cadaver over to go through its hip pockets and sure enough produced a wallet. He opened it, slid out a voter’s registration card, and announced, “Winfield Scott Rutherford from Hayes, Kansas, it says here. Have any of you boys ever heard tell of such a gent?”
Nobody had. Casey opined, “It’s likely a fake I.D. I knowed he was somebody sinister the moment he first walked through the door.”
Old Jim shrugged and said, “At least it’s a name to start with. There’s no sense pestering folk in other parts about him before morning. Everyone who knows his ass from his elbow will have gone home by this hour. He ought to keep overnight if we can find him a cool root cellar. I want you to meet me here right after breakfast, Mister MacKail. Where will you be if I should need you any sooner?”
Stringer said, “That’s a good question.” Then he turned to Fats to explain, “I came back here to ask if you had a spare room, or knew of one I could hire. What happened then was that other gent’s idea.”
The fat barkeep looked away and said, “I fear I can’t help you with that one, son. Maybe if you asked around town.”
Stringer didn’t press it. He shrugged and said, “Well, if push comes to shove I reckon I can spread my bedroll on the prairie. I’d best start by picking up said bedroll from the tack room across the way.”
Nobody argued. But as he stepped out to the street the friendly hand called Casey caught up with him, moved him out of line from the inside lights, and said, “It ain’t that we’re usually so unkind to strangers, MacKail. You just never should have mentioned you was interested in that Nickell killing, see?”
Stringer nodded. “I did get the impression it’s not a favorite topic of conversation in these parts. But since I rode all this way to talk about it, that’s the way it has to be. Which side are you on, Casey?”
The cowhand said flatly, “The living, if I can manage to stay among them. To do that, it’s best to stay on good terms with both the Nickells and the Millers. That ain’t easy as it sounds. They’re both still mighty proddy about the way their feud ended with that child’s death. Some say it never really ended it. So it ain’t too smart to ask either side, see?”
