Tombstone / The Spoilers

by Matt Braun

  “So that’s it,” he concluded. “To pull it off, I’ll have to produce the hundred thousand no later than noon today.”

  A thick silence settled over the room. Crocker, obviously disgruntled, gazed at Starbuck for a long, speculative moment. Then he shook his head in stern disapproval.

  “I’m afraid you’ve overstepped the bounds of your assignment. I retained you to catch a band of train robbers, not organize a civic crusade. Your zeal is to be commended, Mr. Starbuck. But my only interest is in halting the robberies, nothing more.”

  “Why settle for half a loaf?” Starbuck gave him a hard, wise look. “We can capture Red Ned Adair, then offer him immunity to turn state’s evidence against O’Brien. After that, we take it step by step, playing them off one against the other. When we’re through, we’ll have Buckley and most of his stooges behind bars. It’s a perfect setup, made to order.”

  “No, thank you,” Crocker said with an unpleasant grunt. “Your instructions are to eliminate Adair and his gang of robbers. The assignment begins and ends there. Do I make myself clear?”

  All at once the truth came home to Starbuck. A practicing cynic, and something of an iconoclast, he had always viewed the world as a place of dupes and rogues. The dupes, in the natural course of things, were preyed upon by the rogues. Yet, in his absorption with the case, he’d forgotten that Charles Crocker, one of the great robber barons of the era, was essentially a rogue. Since rogues seldom locked horns with other rogues, Crocker quite naturally had no interest in exposing Christopher Buckley. The premise gained even more credence when politics were involved. A can of worms, once opened, might lead anywhere. Perhaps to the Central Pacific, and Charles Crocker himself.

  “Here’s the deal,” Starbuck said stonily. “You have the money delivered to my hotel room before noon. I’ll follow the plan I’ve just laid out and push it to the limit.” He paused, took a long draw on his cigar. “Now, maybe you don’t like the idea, but you’d like the alternative even less. Turn me down and I’ll take the story to the newspapers. I’ve got a hunch your name would end up in big, bold headlines.”

  “Confound you!” Crocker’s eyes were angry, reproachful. “I won’t be dictated to, and I damn well won’t allow you to bullyrag me. Take heed, Mr. Starbuck!”

  “Save your breath,” Starbuck said with a clenched smile. “When I accepted the assignment, I told you how I work. I don’t take orders and I don’t quit till the job’s done. Buckley’s a spoiler, the worst kind, and I figure he deserves to get axed. One way or another, I aim to see that it happens.”

  Crocker’s features colored dark with blood. He rose and moved to the fireplace. Hands clasped behind his back, he stood for a long time staring into the flames. At last, he took a deep breath, blew it out heavily. When he turned around, his face was pale and there was a look of resignation in his eyes.

  “Very well,” he murmured in assent. “I’ll go along with your request. But I warn you, Mr. Starbuck. Under no circumstances is my name to be connected with Christopher Buckley! Defy me on that and I will personally hound you out of the detective business.”

  “Why, hell’s fire!” Starbuck laughed, a sudden harsh sound in the still room. “You just leave it to me, Mr. Crocker. I’ll make you a hero! Goddamn if I won’t.”

  “Yes, I agree.” Crocker nodded gravely. “You are truly damned if you don’t, Mr. Starbuck.”

  “Aren’t we all?” Starbuck said with a cynical grin. “Have a seat, and let me tell you what I’ve got in mind.”

  Crocker walked to his chair and sat down. His expression was solemn and his mood attentive. Starbuck waited a moment, puffing quietly on his cigar. Then, with obvious relish, he began talking.

  The first step, he explained, was the capture of Red Ned Adair.

  CHAPTER 13

  Shortly before dawn, two days later, Starbuck left the Palace Hotel by a side entrance. Once outside, he crossed the street and ducked into an alleyway. He waited several moments, until he was certain he wasn’t being tailed. Then he turned and walked swiftly toward the Central Pacific train yard.

  All the preparations necessary to his plan had been completed. Yesterday, at the stroke of noon, a package had been delivered to his hotel room. Inside were several packets of bills, large-denomination notes totaling $100,000, and a terse message from Charles Crocker. According to instructions, Crocker had quietly issued two orders. The first concerned today’s morning train to Los Angeles: there were to be no extra guards on the express car. Crocker had announced the measure as a new gambit to deceive the robbers into believing there was nothing of value in today’s shipment. At the same time, he directed that a major transfer from the San Francisco mint be put aboard the train. Starbuck had every confidence that the gang’s inside man—the Judas—would leak word of this unusual operation. Red Ned Adair was virtually certain to rob the morning southbound.

  Crocker’s second order had been carried out in absolute secrecy. A trusted aide, less than an hour ago, had awakened Captain Tom Kelly, Chief of Security for the Central Pacific. The aide, under firm instructions never to leave Kelly’s side, had then accompanied the security chief while he routed seven express guards from their beds. The men were quickly collected in the chill predawn darkness and bundled aboard waiting carriages. Once assembled, they were driven to a warehouse on the edge of the Central Pacific train yard. There, they were issued rifles and sidearms, then told to wait. Kelly’s instructions, delivered by the aide, were specific and purposely vague. A man named Starbuck would arrive at the warehouse shortly before sunrise. All details regarding the mission would be explained at that time. Kelly was to follow his orders explicitly and without question.

  Hurrying toward the train yard, Starbuck was satisfied that everything was now in place. Yesterday afternoon, following a meeting with Buckley, he had deposited the $100,000 in a bank selected by the political kingpin. The ploy, much as he’d expected, bought him time and got Denny O’Brien out of his hair. Within the hour, the second phase of his plan would swing into operation. Accompanied by the security force, he would travel southward from the city. Not long after their departure, the morning train, with an unguarded express car, would roll toward Los Angeles. The bait was laid and the trap would be sprung somewhere around noontime. All that remained was to ambush Red Ned Adair.

  A few minutes before dawn, Starbuck stepped through the door of the warehouse. A group of men, jammed together in a stench of sweating bodies, were gathered around a potbellied stove. Their faces were grim, and most of them, still half-asleep, were holding steaming mugs of coffee. Conversation stopped, replaced by watchful silence, as he closed the door and moved forward. The only sound was a coffeepot, hissing and rattling on top the stove.

  Starbuck, approaching closer, sensed the tension. Yet nothing in his tone or manner revealed the slightest trace of concern. He spoke with authority, iron sureness.

  “Captain Kelly?”

  “That’s me.”

  A man of formidable size, tall and massively built, separated from the group. His hands were large and gnarled, and his voice was a stilled rumble. There was a heavy-lidded, lizard-like alertness to his eyes.

  “I’m Luke Starbuck.”

  Kelly accepted his handshake, frowning. “Pleased to meet you.”

  “Has anyone left this room since you were brought here?”

  “No,” Kelly acknowledged stiffly. “We’ve not been here more than a few minutes ourselves.”

  “Good,” Starbuck nodded. “Ask your men to finish their coffee and get ready to go.”

  “Go where?” Kelly raised an uncertain eyebrow. “I was given to understand you’d fill us in on the particulars.”

  “I will,” Starbuck said evenly, “when the time’s right.”

  Kelly’s eyes became veiled. “Well, now, maybe you wouldn’t mind explaining what all the mystery’s about. We’re more than a little curious, as you might well appreciate.”

  “Sorry,” Starbuck said with an odd sm
ile. “Where we’re going—and what we’ve been assigned to do—will have to wait till we get there.”

  “Is that so?” Kelly demanded churlishly. “Then maybe you could at least tell us why we were rousted out in the middle of the night? Without so much as a by-your-leave!”

  Starbuck gave him a swift, appraising glance. “Captain Kelly, you’ve got your orders and I’ve got mine. Suppose we let it go at that and get on with the job?”

  “By the sweet Jesus!” Kelly said loudly. “I’m responsible for these men, and I’ll not take them off to God knows where until I’ve had an explanation.”

  “For the moment, you’ve had all the explanation you need. We’re on official business, and at the proper time, I’ll lay it out for you in black and white. That’s twice I’ve said it, so don’t make me repeat myself again.”

  “Oh, repeat yourself, is it?” Kelly said with a sudden glare. “Well, mister-whoever-the-hell-you-are, I don’t know you from Paddy’s pig! You could talk yourself blue in the face and I’ll not move from this spot unless I hear the reason why.”

  A vague disquiet settled over Starbuck. Something told him there was more to Kelly’s objections than met the eye. Aside from resentment, which was natural enough at being reduced to second-in-command, there was some darker element just below the surface. The man was too antagonistic, too intractable, far more so than the situation dictated. Yet Starbuck hadn’t the time nor the inclination to pursue it further. Sunrise was the deadline for their departure, and faint shafts of light were already streaming through the windows. He decided to force the issue.

  “Captain Kelly,” he said flatly, “the only thing you need to know is that I speak for Charles Crocker. Your instructions were to follow my orders to the letter. If that puts your nose out of joint, that’s your problem. Take it up with Crocker when we get back.”

  “Instructions!” Kelly roared. “I’ve had no instructions, except from Crocker’s flunky. Considering your high-handed manner, that won’t do. Not for Tom Kelly, it won’t!”

  “Like it or lump it,” Starbuck said roughly. “You’re under my orders, and that’s that.”

  “Says you.” Kelly’s nostrils flared. “I’ll just have myself a talk with Crocker and see who’s giving the orders around here. I’ve a strong notion there’s a nigger-in-the-woodpile somewhere.”

  Starbuck fixed him with a pale stare. “I can’t allow that.”

  “Blood of Christ!” Kelly said furiously. “I wasn’t asking your permission. You can go or stay as you please! I mean to have a word with Charlie Crocker.”

  “No.” Starbuck’s face took on a hard cast. “You’re not going anywhere except where I tell you to go.”

  “Out of my way!”

  Kelly brushed past him and started toward the door. Starbuck struck out in a shadowy movement. He buried his fist in the big man’s kidney, and Kelly’s mouth opened in a great whoosh of breath. Shifting slightly, Starbuck spun him around and exploded two splintering punches flush on the jaw. Kelly went down like a pole-axed steer. He lay still a moment, then groaned and rolled heavily to his knees. He tried to rise, but his face twisted in a grimace of pain and he remained kneeling. Starbuck, scarcely winded, stood over him.

  “Enough?”

  “Enough,” Kelly bobbed his head. “I think you busted something inside.”

  “You’ll live.”

  There was a gruff buzz from the other men, and Starbuck turned. His brow seamed, and he eyed them with a steady, uncompromising gaze. When he spoke, his voice was scratchy, abrasive.

  “Only one man gives the orders, and that’s me. Anybody sees it otherwise, now’s the time to step forward.”

  No one stepped forward. He waited several moments, then turned once more to face Kelly. The big man climbed slowly to his feet, and stood with a hand clutched tightly to his kidney. Starbuck gestured toward the door.

  “I want everybody outside and in those carriages … now.”

  Kelly looked dazed, punchy. He stared down at the floor, tightlipped, his teeth locked against the pain. At length, he drew a deep breath and glanced up at his men.

  “Let’s go,” he rasped hoarsely. “Everybody in the carriages.”

  Starbuck led the way through the door. Outside, he split the men into two groups, indicating Kelly was to ride in the lead carriage. When everyone was settled, he climbed aboard and took a seat beside the security chief. He ordered the driver to head south, and as they rolled out of the train yard the sky lightened into perfect cloudless blue. He glanced back and a slow smile creased his mouth.

  The morning train stood chuffing smoke outside the terminal.

  A mile or so north of the farmhouse Starbuck ordered the carriages off the road. Several hundred yards to the east, the wooded creek meandered southward. Following his directions, the carriages were driven across a grassy field and halted beneath the trees.

  There he left Kelly and the men, and struck off on foot downcreek. His recollection of the gang’s hideout was fairly accurate. Still, some time had passed since he’d trailed Adair and the band of robbers to the farmhouse. Leaving nothing to chance, he thought it wiser to personally scout the terrain. Today there was no margin for error.

  Some while later he spotted the farmhouse through the trees. Quiet as a drifting hawk, he approached to within fifty yards, then went belly down on the ground. He crawled forward and stopped under the shelterbelt of woods. Hidden by shadow, he removed his hat and slowly scanned the layout.

  Off to one side of the house, the woman was hanging a wash on a clothesline. Her husband was puttering around in a shed near the barn. The corral stood empty and the barn doors were closed. All of which confirmed his judgment about Red Ned Adair. The gang had ridden out earlier on the saddlehorses, leaving their carriages concealed in the barn. The holdup, in all likelihood, had already occurred. Without extra guards, the Central Pacific southbound was a pushover, and the express-car messenger would have offered only token resistance. Even now, the robbers were probably following the same twisting route back to the farmhouse.

  Starbuck turned and studied the high ground across the creek. From the top of the knoll, he recalled, there was a clear view of the farmhouse and the barn and the fields beyond. Outlaws were creatures of habit, and he thought it reasonable to assume they would again approach the hideout by way of the wooded knoll. The time to strike was when they dismounted outside the corral. Flushed with success, saddlebags stuffed with loot, their defenses would be at a low ebb. Further, with the barn doors closed, they would be caught in the open with nowhere to run. All that, combined with the element of surprise, should turn the trick very nicely. Barring mishap, the robbers would never know what hit them.

  Worming back to the creek, Starbuck rose and took off at a dogtrot upstream. Several minutes later he reached the carriages and found the men sprawled on the ground, smoking and talking quietly amongst themselves. Kelly stood off to one side, propped against the base of a tree. His expression was sullen and withdrawn.

  The men scrambled to their feet as Starbuck halted near the lead carriage. He signaled them to gather around and waited while Kelly ambled over to join the group. Then he went straight to the point.

  “You’re all aware of the train holdups that have taken place over the past year. I was hired by the Central Pacific to catch the robbers, and I’ve located their hideout. It’s a farmhouse, about a mile downstream, on the west side of the creek. Today, we’re going to lay an ambush and put an end to those holdups.”

  A murmur of excitement swept over the men. Starbuck hesitated a moment, then silenced them with upraised palms. “Here’s the way it’ll work. Once we get downstream, I’ll assign you to positions and point out the best fields of fire. Then we wait till the gang rides in and dismounts at the corral. That’s when we hit ’em.”

  “A question.” Kelly nailed him with a corrosive stare. “Who’s their leader, and how many are there in the gang?”

  “Glad you asked,” Starbuck re
marked. “Altogether, there’ll be seven men. The leader’s a gent by the name of Red Ned Adair. He’s easy to spot because he’s a carrot-head, bright red hair.” He paused, glancing around the group. “Adair is not—I repeat—he is not to be killed. I want him taken alive.”

  “Are you saying,” Kelly asked bluntly, “that you want the others killed?”

  “When you shoot a man,” Starbuck replied calmly, “I’ve always found it’s best to kill him. Otherwise, you’re liable to make him mad and then he’ll kill you.”

  Kelly gave him a long, searching stare. “What about this fellow Adair? He’ll more than likely be shooting back at us. Are you saying we’re not to return his fire?”

  “Nobody,” Starbuck underscored the word with heavy emphasis, “will fire at Adair but me. I’ll either cripple him or keep him pinned down till the fight’s over. So if you catch red hair in your sights, shift to another target. That’s a direct order.”

  Kelly offered an elaborate shrug and said no more. The other men obediently bobbed their heads in affirmation. When there were no further questions, Starbuck dropped to one knee on the ground. He took a twig and sketched a crude map in the dirt.

  “Here’s the lay of the land. We’ll go downstream and then …”

  A brassy noonday sun stood high overhead. Squatted behind a tree, Starbuck watched as Red Ned Adair led his gang down the knoll and forded the creek. The robbers were laughing and exchanging wisecracks, clearly in high spirits. The holdup, quite obviously, had come off without a hitch.

  Standing, Starbuck quickly surveyed the wooded terrain. Kelly and four men were posted across the stream, on the forward slope of the knoll. Concealed by undergrowth, they were all but invisible beneath the dim shadows of the trees. The three remaining guards were flanked directly to his right, spread out along the west bank of the creek. He had assigned himself the point position, nearest the farmhouse. His shot would be the signal to open fire.