West of Tombstone

by Paul Lederer

  ‘I see,’ Slyke said. He still had the marks of his fight with Cameron on his bald head. Now he lay back and stared upward into the night skies. Cameron moved to him, holstering his gun. Slyke was no longer a threat to anyone.

  ‘You want me to try getting that arrow out of you, Slyke?’

  ‘It’s too late,’ the gunman said, rolling his head from side to side. ‘I’m awful thirsty, though.’

  ‘I don’t have any water, Slyke. I’m sorry.’

  ‘I believe you are,’ the bald man said. There was a silence between them for a long while. Cameron kept his eyes raised to the distances. If the Jicarillas had followed Slyke across the desert, there could be more trouble than he could handle coming at any minute.

  A sudden thought occurred to Cameron. ‘Slyke,’ he said, shaking the bald man’s shoulder. Slyke had closed his eyes as pain began to dominate him. Now he opened them halfway. His vision was clouded, but he seemed at least partly alert.

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Was Willie with you when you started after us?’

  ‘No,’ Slyke said, rolling his head. ‘His mind was still fuzzy and he wasn’t moving too well. You rang his bell pretty good.’

  ‘He’ll be coming along?’

  ‘No, not old double-ugly,’ Slyke said, with a laugh that broke into a blood-frothed cough. ‘I told him I knew where you were going, that Stony and I could take back the gold easy from a greenhorn like you. Told him we’d meet him in Mexico, little town we use all the time to hide out in between jobs. ‘Course I was never going to Mexico if I got my hands on the gold. I was going to cross old scarface Willie. But he trusted my talk and him and fat Emily said they’d start for the border.’

  ‘Emily!’

  ‘Sure. One thing that sister of hers, that Carmalita, never understood: Emily likes this kind of life. The danger excites them, it seems. Some men seem born to follow the outlaw trail … and more than a few women.’

  ‘What happened in the house, after I left?’ Cameron wanted to know.

  ‘All sorts of screaming and hair-pulling and the like. Emily’s a lot bigger though and she fought that little Carmalita off and told her what she meant to do. The old woman … well, I’m sorry but she got so upset by the excitement that she had some kind of a stroke or heart attack. Last I seen ’em Emily was going to find Willie and the young one was sitting at her mother’s bedside, crying with her head in her hands. You know, Cameron if …’ Then there were no more ‘ifs’. There would be no more ‘ifs’ for Slyke. He had died in the middle of the sentence and Cameron sat staring at the dead man, wondering just what it was that Slyke had meant to say and if it could have made any difference anyway.

  Working in the darkness Cameron drew Slyke up against the side of the bluff and caved in some of it to make a crude cairn for the outlaw. Then, heavily, he saddled his horse and with dawn beginning to creep into the eastern skies, he started on toward Tucson to seek a finish to all of this.

  Clarence Morton flung open the drapes that covered the windows of his upstairs office and with his thumbs hooked into the armholes of his vest, surveyed the morning scene as the residents of Tucson began to return to the day’s life after the death of night. He ducked his head slightly to peer past the gilt lettering which spread across both windows in ornate script and read: ‘Wells Fargo and Co.’ Seeing the heavy lettering always gave him a feeling of substance and on this bright morning as he watched the early shoppers and lounging old-timers, the rolling hay wagons and businessmen in their high, stiff collars, he felt quite pleased with his position in the world. He rubbed idly at the widening bald circle on the crown of his head, frowned and then shrugged. It didn’t matter – a man pays his price for his passage through life. A little less hair, a few wrinkles, an expanding belly. These are the unhappy residue of time expended pursuing success.

  The sound of clomping boots in the outer office was immediately followed by the exclamation of Morton’s secretary – his wife’s young nephew. He turned around sharply, glowering as the door was booted open and a roughly dressed young man with the dust of the desert on him entered his office without bothering to knock.

  ‘See here!’ Morton’s secretary complained, but it was clear that the slender young man wanted little part of the sunburned, whiskered intruder.

  ‘That’s all right, David,’ Morton said, as the visitor walked across the broad room, carrying a rifle in one hand, a heavy pair of saddle-bags slung over his shoulder.

  ‘I’ve brought your gold back,’ Cameron Black said, heaving the heavy leather bags onto Morton’s desk where its impact sent several neatly stacked papers fluttering to the floor. The secretary in the doorway still watched, goggle-eyed, but Morton nodded at him again and he eased out of the room, drawing the door closed quietly.

  ‘Hello, Mr Black. I didn’t think I would ever be seeing you again.’

  ‘Is your man off to call the law?’ Cameron asked.

  ‘David? No, sir, he does nothing unless I request it.’ He paused, ‘And then only half the time. Sit down, Mr Black.’

  Cameron did. After leaning his rifle against the wall, he sprawled in a green leather chair across the desk from Morton who placed himself delicately in a sprung chair and folded his white hands together.

  ‘The obvious question is why are you here?’ the Wells Fargo agent said.

  ‘For that.’ Cameron nodded at the gold-filled saddle-bags. ‘That isn’t mine and I don’t want to be hunted for it. You, I have reluctantly decided, are the only man of standing with anything approaching ethical straightness.’

  ‘I see,’ Morton answered. ‘You mean that there are others among the “powers-that-be” you do not find trustworthy?’

  ‘What do you think?’ Cameron said harshly. ‘Look, you might not be at the sorry level Warden Traylor, Hogan or Sheriff Yount are at. You seem to have some sort of moral courage. I think your willingness to go along with such a bunch of greedy bastards is that you are sincere in your attempt to protect your employer’s assets.’

  ‘That’s what you think, is it?’ Morton asked carefully. The morning sun grew warm on the back of his balding skull.

  ‘That’s what I think, yes.’

  ‘Well, Mr Black,’ Morton said with a sigh, as he leaned forward to place folded hands on his desk, one finger toying with a buckle on the saddlebags, ‘you are right in your conjecture.’ He held up a hand as Cameron started to blurt out a hasty answer. ‘In your shoes I would be harsh in my judgement of me as well.

  ‘But, Mr. Black. I am in a position of watching over all shipments which our company guarantees. This is a lawless and a dangerous land as you know. At times,’ he said, rubbing the bridge of his nose, ‘I have taken extreme measures to try protecting the company, which, after all, is my job. I have used informers and even strong-arm tactics. I am proud of none of this, but were you in my shoes you would understand why it has been done.… I see you don’t like my explanation.

  ‘Yuma Prison is run by thugs and brigands, Mr Black, as you have discovered. I have no choice but work with the rougher elements.’

  Cameron held up a weary hand and said to the Wells Fargo man, ‘Listen, Morton, I don’t care to know how you salve your conscience. I should be feeling hostile toward you, but I’m not. Anymore. I am too tired of all of this to even care. All I want from you is two things.’

  ‘Yes?’ Morton said, now eager to please. ‘A reward, of course.’

  ‘No reward,’ Cameron said, squinting into the bright sunlight which angled through the office windows and formed shadows of their lettering against the walls and floor. ‘I want, first of all, a receipt for the gold. And I want something on the Wells Fargo stationery completely exonerating me and thanking me for my co-operation.’

  ‘That’s all?’ Morton asked with some surprise.

  ‘That’s all. I just want to continue with my life.’

  ‘I see … yes. How much of the shipment is here, Mr Black?’

  ‘I have no idea. I haven’t ev
en glanced at it. I suggest you have your secretary or someone else count it and put it in that letter I requested.’

  ‘It started out as a fifty-thousand dollar shipment,’ Morton said doubtfully, returning to his old practices.

  ‘Yes, I understand that,’ Cameron told him, leaning forward now to place his own forearms on Morton’s desk, his hat thumbed far back. ‘This is my understanding of what happened – the scrip was virtually worthless off an army post and so Stony Harte burned the lot. The silver is still in a strongbox somewhere along your line. If your witness can show you where the robbery occurred a dozen men with shovels might eventually find it. Stony buried it because he was riding alone and by the pound it wasn’t worth enough to make it worth his trouble. Any missing gold was handed around to the rest of his gang to buy drink and women with.’

  ‘I see.’ Morton looked down and then seemed to brighten a little. ‘The scrip, of course is unimportant. The army can print that tissue up in any amount they like, so long as we assure them that this batch has been irretrievably lost. The silver … as you say, there is still a chance that it can be recovered.

  ‘How much gold did you say was missing, Mr Black?’

  ‘I told you I never looked at it, let alone counted it.’

  ‘Then you’ll want to be here when the banker, my secretary and I count it.’

  ‘Why in hell would I even care?’ Cameron Black asked coldly. ‘Just see that those letters are drafted before I leave this room.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Morton said, now seeming greatly relieved. ‘Still Wells Fargo would like you to have some small reward.’

  ‘I never want to touch that money. I’ve seen what it can do.’ Pondering silently for a minute as his head drooped slowly with exhaustion he finally murmured, ‘There is one thing I would like – if you can see to it.’

  ‘Anything.’

  ‘At Yuma Prison. In the stables there is a gray mare with a white mane and tail. Her owner’s deceased. I’d kind of like her for my own if you could tether her behind one of your stages and lead her up that spur line to Tombstone.’

  Morton smiled with relief. He had had no idea what Cameron was going to ask for. He made himself a note on a fresh sheet of paper. ‘That we can do for you, Mr Black. Tombstone? That’s where you’re going, is it? Have you ever been there before?’

  ‘No, sir,’ Cameron Black answered. ‘That’s why I’m going.’

  Cameron was virtually walking in his sleep as Morton summoned his nephew to go find the local banker so that they could tally up the gold, and he just managed to get the pinto horse stabled up and to check in at the hotel where he fell asleep without undressing, happy in the knowledge that he would at least have Dolly with him if he were ever forced to ride that lonesome desert west of Tombstone again.

  ELEVEN

  ‘Not today Mr Black, sorry.’

  The pale Arizona skies were streaked with only the faintest of cloud haze drifting over Tombstone on a quiet and bright morning. Cameron Black had not yet eaten, but he was eagerly awaiting Dolly’s arrival and his nights had not been calm since the trials of the desert. He awoke at midnight and stared out at the beautifully primitive landscape beyond the rough town and could not fall back to sleep.

  ‘I told you,’ the Wells Fargo agent said, his elbows resting on the scarred station counter. ‘That Yuma spur, they don’t run it but every other day. So by the time they change at Tucson to switch teams, another day’s lost. Soonest your horse can be in is tomorrow morning. I already told your wife there the same thing twice.’

  ‘My …’ Cameron blinked and turned uncertainly. In the corner of the office where dust motes danced in the morning sunlight stood Carmalita.

  She took a hesitant step forward. The office manager asked, ‘Did I speak out of turn?’ but neither answered him.

  Cameron felt as if his boots had been nailed to the floor. He lifted a hand and then took one step. Carmalita threw herself into his arms impetuously and then stepped back, turning her face away with embarrassment.

  ‘I can’t …’ she began.

  ‘Let’s step outside,’ Cameron said, holding her hand as they walked to the door, the station agent musing.

  Outside it was relatively cool, no more than eighty degrees in the shade of the buildings. They walked a little way down the avenue on the boardwalk, waited for a freight wagon to pass and then went to the small dusty park in the center of town where they seated themselves, Carmalita uncertainly smoothing the skirt of the black dress she wore. Mourning clothes.

  ‘Your mother?’ Cameron asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Carmalita said.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘You did not cause it,’ Carmalita said.

  ‘No? Maybe I had a hand in it, though.’

  ‘It was evil men and their gold,’ Carmalita said, and he did not answer, because she was right.

  ‘My sister has gone away,’ she said sadly. ‘I will not see her ever again.’

  ‘You tried to prevent it,’ he replied, taking her hand.

  ‘Yes, but maybe I was wrong to interfere in her affairs; maybe it is always a mistake to try to guide people in a different direction from the one they have chosen.’

  Again Cameron didn’t answer. Maybe Carmalita was right at that, but her heart had been in the right place.

  ‘Mother did not live to see the morning,’ Carmalita said speaking to the ground. A mockingbird with white-banded wings and cocky expression landed nearly at her feet, looking up as if expecting a treat and then angrily sped away. ‘We buried her in the little cemetery in the pueblo. I realized I had no place to go. No! I lie, Cameron – I knew there was one place I wanted to go above all others. I knew that you wanted to come to Tombstone if you could survive the desert once more.

  ‘And so,’ she said in a small voice. ‘I came here first.’

  ‘I’m glad.…’ Words failed him. ‘How did you know about Dolly?’

  ‘Who? Oh, the horse. I knew if you were successful in your battle that Wells Fargo would have to be involved in some way and so I became friendly with the little man you met in the office. He told me that, yes, he knew your name because the district supervisor had telegraphed him to make certain that your horse was delivered to you here without delay.’

  ‘Morton.’

  ‘I do not know. But that made my heart beat faster because I knew you had reached Tucson. I knew you were coming here. Why else would your horse Dolly be coming? Each morning I asked the man about your horse and the man in the office explained matters to me. I—’ She turned her face down again, ‘I lied and I told him that I was your wife, Cameron, so he would not think I was a crazy woman!’

  ‘I see,’ he said, and then he leaned her head against his shoulder with a strong, gentle hand.

  ‘Cameron?’ she asked, looking up with those liquid brown eyes. ‘Have you had luck here?’

  He laughed. ‘It depends on what you call luck! I am going to work as a muleteer next Tuesday.’

  ‘That does not pay much money, does it, Cameron?’

  ‘Not a whole lot. I’ll work my way up into something.’

  ‘I know you will. Cameron?’ She pushed away from him enough to search his eyes thoroughly. ‘A mule-skinner man, whatever you call them … he must be away from home often.’

  ‘Now and then.’

  ‘I thought so,’ Carmalita said. ‘And the work – is it dangerous?’

  ‘Sometimes, they tell me.’

  ‘I thought all of this was so,’ she said. ‘Then I would be in your way, Cameron, is that not true? A crazy woman standing behind you somewhere on the trail, wanting you to come home?’

  He laughed again, freely, and held her tight. ‘My Carmalita – that’s all any man works to have!’

  About the Author

  Paul Lederer spent much of his childhood and young adult life in Texas. He worked for years in Asia and the Middle East for a military intelligence arm. Under his own name, he is best known for Tecumseh and the I
ndian Heritage Series, which focuses on American Indian life. He believes that the finest Westerns reflect ordinary people caught in unusual and dangerous circumstances, trying their best to act with honor.

  All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2006 by Owen G. Irons

  Cover design by Michel Vrana

  ISBN: 978-1-4804-8792-5

  This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

  345 Hudson Street

  New York, NY 10014

  www.openroadmedia.com

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