Medicine Creek (Wind River Book 4)

by James Reasoner

  Frenchy and Fisk could fight over which one of them would accompany Alexandra, Cole thought with a ghost of a smile. He was too tired to grin.

  The Union Pacific station came into view. "I'm going over to the depot," Cole said. "Frenchy, you take the livery stables and see if those two have gotten their hands on fresh horses. Fisk, why don't you check some of the hotels and find out if they've been hanging around there?"

  "All right," Fisk said grudgingly. "I suppose that makes the most sense. Alexandra, you come with—Alexandra, what is it?"

  Cole reined in at Fisk's startled question. So did Fisk and Frenchy. Alexandra had already brought her horse to an abrupt stop and was staring up the street toward the Union Pacific depot. "Look," she said as she pointed a shaking finger. "Just going into the train station."

  The three men looked where she was pointing, and Cole saw sunlight flash on blond hair. A man and a woman were just going into the building, and as the door swung shut behind them, Fisk said, "My God, that looked like Catherine!"

  "Come on," Cole said, heeling Ulysses into a trot. Maybe luck had been with them after all.

  Or maybe not, a small voice warned in the back of his head.

  Moments later, after tying their horses outside, the four pursuers strode into the big, high-ceilinged depot. A glance at the schedule chalked onto a board over the ticket windows told Cole that an eastbound train was due at one o'clock. It had to be almost that time now, he thought.

  "I don't see them," Fisk said as he looked around the lobby, panic creeping into his voice. "They're not here."

  "Let's check the platform," Cole suggested. He walked quickly toward the big double doors on the other side of the room.

  His bootheels rang on the planks as he stepped out onto the long covered platform built alongside the tracks. There were quite a few people waiting there for the east-bound, but not so many that Cole couldn't spot who he was looking for right away.

  At the far end of the platform, Catherine Fisk stood next to Wilt Paxton. Catherine was wearing a dress now, and Paxton's clothes were fresh, too.

  They had had time since arriving in Cheyenne to wash off the trail dust from their long ride and buy tickets on that eastbound train, Cole thought. He started to reach out, intending to hold back Fisk and Alexandra.

  It was too late. Fisk shouted, "Catherine!" and broke into a run across the platform toward them. Alexandra was right behind him.

  "Watch out!" Cole rapped to Frenchy. He veered to his left, spreading out and motioning to Frenchy to go the other way. Cole reached for his gun.

  Catherine and Paxton turned sharply, and in the split-second before Paxton drew, Cole saw the horror and hatred on the young woman's face, the surprised sneer on Paxton's. Then Paxton's gun was out of its holster and coming up with blinding speed. A woman nearby saw it and screamed.

  "Get down, Fisk!" Cole shouted as he palmed out his own revolver.

  Fisk came to a startled halt and reached out to grab Alexandra as she started past him. Paxton's gun boomed. Someone else screamed as the bullet hit the platform and whined off down the tracks. Fisk threw himself down, taking Alexandra with him.

  Out of instinct, Frenchy had drawn his gun, too, and he and Cole fired at the same time, the roars of the pistols blending into one. Paxton snarled and triggered again and then again. All over the platform, passengers waiting for the eastbound went diving for cover. Cole slammed another shot at Paxton, only to see Catherine Fisk slump back with a cry of pain.

  One of Paxton's slugs chewed splinters from the platform at Cole's feet. Cole squeezed off two more shots, and Frenchy fired again as well. Paxton spun half-around, red flowers blooming on the breast of the white shirt he wore.

  His pistol slipped from his fingers to thud to the platform. He went to his knees, swayed there for a second, then pitched forward onto his face.

  Catherine pushed herself up with her left arm. The right sleeve of her dress was stained with blood, and that arm hung useless at her side. She let out a gut-wrenching wail and threw herself on Paxton's body, clutching it with her good arm as great wracking sobs shuddered through her. Several yards away on the platform, Fisk and Alexandra were slowly getting to their feet, their faces etched with sorrow and confusion. Neither of them appeared to be wounded.

  "Hold it right there, mister!" a voice yelled from behind Cole. "Drop that gun! What the hell's going on here?"

  Cole glanced over his shoulder and saw a heavy-set man with a badge pinned to his vest pointing a scattergun at him. Two more badge-toters, probably deputies of the town marshal covering Cole, had converged on Frenchy LeDoux and were disarming him.

  Moving slowly so as not to spook the man with the shotgun, Cole bent down and placed his revolver on the platform. As he straightened, he glanced at Fisk and Alexandra, who were still staring uncomprehendingly at the body of Paxton and the quivering form of Catherine Fisk.

  "Take it easy, Marshal," Cole told the lawman. "It's all over, and I can explain it. I don't like it—but I can explain it."

  "You'd damn well better!" the local star packer snapped. His eyes widened as he spotted the badge on Cole's shirt. "Say! You're a lawman, too."

  "Yep," Cole admitted. "And this is one of those times when I sort of wish I wasn't."

  Chapter 30

  "Howdy, Marshal," Billy Casebolt greeted Cole enthusiastically as Cole reined to a halt in front of the office. "Good to see you again. Ever catch up to them rustlers?"

  Cole stepped down from the saddle, flipped the reins over the hitch rail, and patted Ulysses on the shoulder. "We found them in Cheyenne," he said to Casebolt.

  The deputy's lean face was solemn as he asked, "Did they tell you what they done with Paxton and that gal?"

  Cole stepped up on the boardwalk and said, "They were Paxton and Catherine Fisk."

  Casebolt frowned in confusion and scratched his beard-stubbled jaw. "Don't reckon I follow you, Marshal."

  Cole rolled his shoulders, trying to get some of the weariness from the long ride out of his muscles. "Catherine Fisk planned the whole thing," he said. "She never wanted to come out here to Wyoming, so she decided to get enough money to go back east and live her own life. She got Wilt Paxton to fall in love with her and roped him into a scheme to rustle cattle from her pa's spread as well as the Diamond S and get Fisk and Sawyer to blaming each other for it. They were never prisoners of the rustlers at all. They planned all along for that last raid on Latch Hook to be the final one. That's why they cut and ran when we caught up to the herd. Catherine couldn't face going back to her father, not after everything she'd done to get away from him."

  A low whistle came from Casebolt. "That's just about the most low-down . . . why, I never heard of nothin' like that, Marshal! You sure about all of it?"

  Cole nodded. "Catherine explained it all herself after we caught up to them in Cheyenne and Paxton went for his gun."

  "What happened?"

  "We left Paxton there . . . in the cemetery. Catherine was wounded in the shoot-out, but one of the local doctors patched her up." Cole inclined his head toward the north. "She's back out at Latch Hook now. Fisk brought her home with him. He wouldn't press charges against her, and since everybody who actually took part in the raids is dead—" Cole shrugged.

  "Damn!" Casebolt breathed. "He took her right back into his house?"

  Cole nodded. "I hope he's not making a bad mistake. He's liable to wake up some morning with his throat cut and Catherine gone again. But not if Alexandra has anything to say about it. I reckon she'll keep a pretty close eye on her sister from now on—when she's not being courted by Frenchy LeDoux."

  "Well, I'll swan!" Casebolt said with a chuckle. "I bet ol' Sawyer'll have a fit if he finds out his segundo is courtin' that gal."

  "He already knows," Cole said, summoning up a smile himself. He changed the subject by asking, "You get those cattle back where they belonged?"

  "No problem," Casebolt said. "Once I got back here, though, I found out there'd
been a little ruckus while we was gone."

  Cole suppressed a groan. "More trouble? What's happened now?"

  "There's Michael," Casebolt said, pointing down the boardwalk. "He can tell you all about it, seein' as it was him what done most of it."

  Cole looked down the boardwalk and saw the young newspaper editor coming toward them. He hailed Michael, then strode down the walk to meet him. Michael said, "I'm glad to see you're back, Marshal. Have you got a story for me about those last two rustlers?"

  "You first," Cole said. "What happened while I was gone?" An inspiration struck him. "There wasn't more trouble with that medicine show, was there?"

  Michael flushed and said, "Well, now that you mention it . . ."

  During the next five minutes, Michael explained about the swindle that had been perpetrated by Professor Munroe, Dr. Carter, and their partners in larceny. The story concluded with the death of Chief Laughing Fox, the wreck of the wagon, and the explosion and fire that had consumed it.

  "Luckily, all the money they had taken from the townspeople was in the other wagon," Michael said, "so it didn't burn up. Everybody got back what the professor had cheated them out of."

  "Where are Munroe and the others now?" Cole asked.

  "They, ah, left in a hurry once people started talking about tar and feathers. There was even some mention of a lynching. But Jeremiah said that as long as they paid back all the money, he wouldn't arrest them."

  "You could have had them held for trying to kill you," Cole pointed out.

  Michael shook his head. "I thought it would be better if we just put the whole thing behind us."

  "Well, that's probably wise. And that's what we're going to do with that rustling business, too."

  "Wait a minute, Marshal!" Michael protested. "You promised me the story."

  "Nope, I just said for you to go first." Cole held up a hand. "Now, don't push me on this, Michael. Otherwise I might just ask you what you were doing around that medicine show so late at night in the first place."

  Michael flushed, stammered a little, then turned and headed back toward the newspaper office. Casebolt chuckled again.

  Cole looked at his deputy. "He hasn't said what he was doing there, has he?"

  "The boy's bein' mighty close-mouthed 'bout that part of the story," Casebolt said with a grin. "Him and that wife of his'n seem to've made up, though, so I reckon it's best all around to just let things lay."

  Cole nodded in agreement.

  * * *

  He was in the office by himself, about an hour later, when Dr. Judson Kent stopped by. After greeting Cole, Kent asked, "How are those bullet wounds of yours healing?"

  "They're not bothering me anymore," Cole said with a shrug. "To tell you the truth, I've been too busy to worry about them. Guess I didn't need any of Professor Munroe's tonic, after all. Billy kept trying to get me to take it."

  "Well, it wouldn't have done much good, but it might have made you feel better. It was mostly alcohol, you know."

  "No, I didn't," Cole said. "But I'm not surprised. I guess folks will leave Medicine Creek alone now and stop bothering the Shoshones."

  Kent reached inside his jacket and brought out a small glass bottle. He placed it on the desk in front of Cole and said, "This is what's left from the sample that so-called doctor took from the creek. He claimed it was plain water. It's not."

  Cole looked up sharply. "What do you mean, Doctor?"

  "I did some more analysis of the water myself after those charlatans had fled from town. It does have a very high mineral content, just as Munroe said. High enough that it could very well have some therapeutic effect, especially combined with those high temperatures."

  "Then you figure—"

  "That being immersed in that pool really did make Deputy Casebolt's rheumatism improve dramatically. Further treatments might help it even more, might even get rid of it."

  "But what about that fever Billy had?" Cole wanted to know.

  "There's a French fellow named Pasteur who has theorized that many illnesses are caused by tiny organisms which invade the human body."

  "Little . . . varmints of some kind?" Cole asked, trying to follow what Kent was saying.

  "You could say that. Pasteur has further speculated that heat can kill those organisms."

  "Then that hot water was too hot for whatever was making Billy sick!"

  Kent nodded. "It's only a theory, of course. Perhaps . . . it really was magic."

  Cole leaned back in his chair. "Well, I'd appreciate it if you'd just keep those notions to yourself, Doctor. I don't want anybody starting another run on Medicine Creek."

  "That was my thought exactly." Kent gestured at the bottle of water. "I'll leave that with you."

  "What do you want me to do with it?"

  "Whatever you deem appropriate, Marshal." With a casual wave, Kent left the office.

  Cole sighed. He would never know as much as Judson Kent, would never be as intelligent or well educated. To him, a varmint was something big enough to shoot at, not something so tiny that it could get inside a fella's body and make him sick.

  But there were all sorts of things under heaven that he had no idea about, Cole supposed. And he would just have to live with that.

  He frowned at the bottle of water on the desk. For a long moment, he glared at it, then he reached out, picked it up, and pulled the cork from its neck. There was one sure-fire way to get rid of the stuff—and Kent had said it might be good for folks.

  Cole lifted the bottle to his mouth, drank down the contents, and put the empty bottle on the desk with a grimace.

  It still tasted God-awful. Maybe he needed some Chippewa Tonic to chase it with.

  Or at least a beer down at the Pronghorn . . .

  WIND RIVER SERIES:

  The compelling frontier saga of a Wyoming town at the crossroads of destiny!

  #1 WIND RIVER

  No sooner does the very first train roll into Wind River than mayhem erupts, and a prominent citizen lies dead on the platform. Marshal Cole Tyler finds himself facing a ruthless killer as Wind River becomes a town with its own brand of justice.

  # 2 THUNDER WAGON

  Trouble is brewing in Wind River. The Irish and Chinese are up in arms, and the friendly Shoshone stand accused of stealing cattle. Marshal Cole Tyler sets out to track down the saboteurs-lighting a fuse that will set off a bloody massacre.

  #3 WOLF SHADOW

  A stranger brings a blizzard of trouble to Wind River. Two men are dead, and hell freezes over as Cole Tyler investigates the case. But as the bullets fly, Tyler learns it is one thing to stop the slaughter—and another to learn the truth.

  #4 MEDICINE CREEK

  Things don't stay peaceful for long in Wind River as an ancient Shoshone legend sparks a deadly rivalry. Cattlemen face off against each other—and the mysterious powers of Medicine Creek.

  #5 DARK TRAIL

  No one is laying out the welcome mat for the latest visitors to Wind River. These revenge-seeking New Orleans natives send bullets flying in a deadly showdown that could change the face of Wind River forever.

  #6 JUDGMENT DAY

  Not everyone is glad to see the railroad coming to Wind River. Caught in the middle of those for and those against, Marshal Cole Tyler must keep the peace even as events force him to choose sides in the battle for the future of the town.

  About the Authors

  A lifelong Texans, James Reasoner and L.J. Washburn have been husband and wife, and professional writers for more than thirty years. In that time, they have authored several hundred novels and short stories in numerous genres.

  James is best known for his Westerns, historical novels, and war novels, he is also the author of two mystery novels that have achieved cult classic status, TEXAS WIND and DUST DEVILS. Writing under his own name and various pseudonyms, his novels have garnered praise from Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and the Los Angeles Times, as well as appearing on the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists. His w
ebsite is www.jamesreasoner.com

  Livia J. (L.J.) Washburn has been writing professionally for over 30 years. Washburn received the Private Eye Writers of America award and the American Mystery award for the first Lucas Hallam mystery, WILD NIGHT. Her website is www.liviawashburn.com

  They live in the small Texas town they grew up in.

  Other EBooks By James Reasoner

  THE HUNTED

  COSSACK THREE PONIES

  THE WILDERNESS ROAD

  UNDER OUTLAW FLAGS

  REDEMPTION: KANSAS

  RANCHO DIABLO:HANGROPE LAW as by Colby Jackson

  DRAW: THE GREATEST GUNFIGHTS OF THE AMERICAN WEST

  TEXAS WIND

  DIAMONDBACK

  DUST DEVILS

  DEATH HEAD CROSSING

  Other EBooks By Livia J. (L.J) Washburn

  HALLAM

  WILD NIGHT

  DEAD-STICK

  DOG HEAVIES

  GHOST RIVER

  WITCH GOT YOUR TONGUE

  TWICE AS DEADLY

  Other EBooks By Livia Reasoner

  MENDING FENCES

  SPIRIT CATCHER

  ALURA’S WISH

  YESTERDAY’S FLAME