Reaper's Fee

by Marcus Galloway

  “But…we were…”

  “Only told about two of us coming?” Barrett asked as a way to finish the manager’s question. “Things change. Now get that money before I start making more noise.”

  The manager did what he was told; emptying the contents of the safe into another couple of bags as if he was in a daze.

  Barrett took the bags, fitted them under his arms and then closed his coat over them. “Keep quiet until someone comes to get you,” he told the two behind the cage. “My other partner outside’s got an itchy trigger finger.” With that, Barrett turned his back on the cage and walked out the front door. By the time he stepped outside, his gun was tucked away and a panicked look was on his face.

  “Good Lord,” exclaimed a local man who was kneeling next to the body of the masked man lying in the street.

  Barrett and several other locals gathered around the body as the man kneeling beside it pulled the robber’s mask off. When the face of the drunkard deputy was revealed, Barrett let out a relieved sigh. As the locals got a look for themselves and started nervously chattering, Barrett was able to slip away and walk down the street to the horse waiting for him there.

  It was well past nightfall and there was still no trace of Nick. Barrett sat huddled in the shack they’d claimed as their own, rubbing his arms and watching the steam curl upward every time he let out a breath. The cold had been gnawing at him for hours and had chewed all the way down to the marrow in his bones.

  Outside, a few hearty animals scampered through the snow. The wind wasn’t as fierce as it had been earlier, but there was still a trickle of air seeping in through the walls. Barrett focused his eyes upon a spot on the floor just in front of his boots. As much as he wanted to go outside and watch for Nick, he knew he’d only last a matter of moments before his ears began to ache and his fingers went numb.

  Instead of giving his eyes something to do, Barrett closed them and focused on what he could hear.

  Barrett could never figure why, but winter nights always seemed to be especially quiet. Because of that, every footstep was a crash and every snowflake’s landing was like a pebble knocking against a tin roof.

  When he heard the sound of heavy steps crunching in the snow, Barrett’s eyes snapped open and he jumped to his feet. Since he hadn’t stretched his legs for a while, every joint in his body ignited with pain. Barrett simply gritted his teeth and drew his pistol.

  There was someone outside.

  Whoever it was, they were most definitely on a horse.

  The lighter steps could just be heard scattered among the heavier ones, but as hard as Barrett tried, he couldn’t decipher how many were out there.

  The more he strained his ears listening, the louder each step got. Finally, he knew he had to take a look outside for himself. If it was a posse approaching the shack instead of Nick, showing himself now wouldn’t make much difference anyway.

  Barrett tightened his grip on his gun and steeled himself to look out through the shack’s crooked window. Despite all the possible outcomes racing through his mind, Barrett kept going back to the one that ended with him catching a bullet in his face the moment he showed it to some approaching lawmen.

  Letting out the breath he’d been holding, Barrett leaned to the side, looked out the window and found himself less than an inch away from Nick’s smiling face.

  “Jesus Christ,” Barrett said as his finger clamped reflexively around his trigger and sent a bullet through the door.

  Nick jumped away from the window and drew his own gun without even thinking about it. “What the hell?” he said as he took a quick look behind him and then around to either side.

  Barrett charged outside, still holding his gun. “You scared the shit out of me, Nick. What the fuck were you thinking?”

  “And that’s coming from someone who’s always telling me to watch my cussing?”

  “Where the hell have you been?”

  Nick didn’t answer right away. Instead, he cocked his head to one side and held up a finger like an overly dramatic actor playing to his audience. “You hear that?”

  “My ears are still ringing.”

  “The posse’s on its way.”

  “You’re not getting me twice,” Barrett said.

  As if on cue, the sounds of more hooves pounding against the snow could be heard rumbling through the air.

  “You led them back here?!” Barrett said.

  “I lost ’em a while ago, but they’re combing this whole mountain. I thought I’d swing by here and get you out of here. I didn’t think you’d fire a shot to let ’em know we’re here, though.”

  There were plenty of things Barrett wanted to say and not one of them was of the friendly variety. As he quickly gathered his few possessions and saddled his horse, Barrett felt his heart slamming against the inside of his ribs as if it was trying to escape his chest.

  “You got the money?” Nick asked.

  “Yes, now let’s get the hell out of here!”

  Nick snapped his reins and got his horse moving past the shack toward a smaller trail he’d found the night before. As he rode down the narrow strip of dirt, which occasionally disappeared beneath the snow, he was smiling wide enough for his teeth to freeze. With the wind stirring again and the horses making their way down the narrow pass, Nick couldn’t hear much of anything else. He still knew the posse was coming after him, though. Lawmen all put the same stench into the air, just as much as the one lying face up in the street when Nick had ridden away from that bank.

  The path down the mountain may have been narrow, but it wasn’t exactly treacherous. It led them down to a winding pass that would eventually link up with the trail leading to Denver. It had become second nature for Nick to avoid the main trails, so he turned away from that one and kept riding until he found a spot that suited him.

  Barrett followed, but couldn’t keep from squirming. Between trying to steer his horse through the darkness and shifting to get a look behind or around him, he rarely sat still long enough to allow his eyes to focus. He saw Nick’s horse slow to a stop, so Barrett followed suit and climbed from his saddle as soon as he was able.

  “Are they gone?” Barrett asked.

  Nick swung off of his horse’s back and strutted up to him so he could clap his friend on the back. “There’s no way in hell them laws are gonna find us. Now let’s see that money.”

  “We should wait until morning, or maybe until we’re far enough away to—”

  “To hell with all of that,” Nick cut in. “I went through all this trouble, so I want to see the money.”

  Knowing better than to argue with him, Barrett fished out one of the two bags he’d been given by the bank manager and handed it over to Nick. “There’s another just like it, but I’m not getting that one out until we can split it up.”

  Nick pulled open the bag and stuffed his hand inside like a kid reaching for the last cookie in the jar. When he took his hand back out, his fingers were wrapped tightly around a fat wad of cash. “Now this is what I call a perfect job.”

  “Perfect?” Barrett asked. “I wanted to buy off that crooked drunk so he could make sure there weren’t any law around that bank. Instead, you went ahead and approached the deputy I specifically told you could be trouble.”

  Nick shook his head and slowly flipped through the money. “That was a small town, Barrett. The law was gonna be there no matter what. This way, we cut their numbers down by one and drew everyone out so you could waltz right out of there with the money. Perfect.”

  Even though Barrett was still more than a little aggravated, it was difficult for him to be angry with Nick. “It did turn out pretty well,” he admitted.

  “Did you have any trouble getting out of there?”

  “No.”

  “And what about that deputy I left behind?” Nick asked.

  “Dead.”

  “Serves him right. You know what it took to get him over to my way of thinking?”

  Barrett shrugged.

>   “A few bottles of whiskey and a twenty-dollar advance on what we’d take away from that bank.” Producing a folded bill from his shirt pocket, Nick added, “The dumb shit was too drunk to even ask for the twenty dollars up front. I’m surprised the law came at all, considering the chowder heads they got working for them.”

  “The only thing that surprises me is that you got away without forking over that bribe,” Barrett said quietly. “Most men would sell out their own kin if the price was right. Men with badges ain’t nothing more than assholes with the authority to shove someone around.”

  “Well that asshole won’t be shovin’ anyone around anymore.”

  Barrett winced slightly as he said, “That might bump up the price on our heads. He was still a lawman, after all, and you did shoot that woman.”

  “I didn’t do nothing more than scratch her,” Nick said confidently. “And that was just to let folks think I was serious. Besides, what’s the problem? It worked, didn’t it?”

  “Yeah. It worked.”

  SEVEN

  Ocean, California

  1885

  Switchback Gil sat in a chair on the boardwalk with his legs propped up on a hitching rail. One hand was draped lazily across his belly as the other reached down for a cup of water on the ground beside him. From where he sat, he could look directly across the street at the gun shop, or up and down the street in any direction to see who was coming.

  Gil strained his arm a bit more to reach his cup of water. When he still couldn’t find it, he turned his head to look and see if he’d accidentally spilled it. What he found was a large figure standing beside and somewhat behind him. All he could make out was a leg and the flap of a dark coat. Before he could pull his legs down from the rail, the figure extended his arm.

  “Here you go,” the scratchy voice said as he handed Gil the cup of water.

  When Gil looked down, he didn’t pay much attention to the dented cup being handed to him. Instead, he focused on the gnarled, whittled-down fingers holding it. Gil got his legs down, but wasn’t able to stand up before the cup was tossed away and he was hauled up by the front of his shirt.

  Nick lifted Gil from his chair and set him right back down again. Although Gil’s legs were a bit wobbly at first, he adjusted soon enough.

  “You’re Nick Graves,” Gil announced.

  “That’s the rumor.”

  “I wanted to talk to you.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m here. You want to spill it while we’re young or would you rather dance around some more?”

  Chuckling uneasily and brushing himself off, Gil kept his hand upon the gun holstered at his side. Hooking his thumb toward the street, he asked, “You want to take a walk? I’d rather not do my talking where anyone can overhear.”

  Nick glanced at the street and couldn’t find any strangers waiting for them. In fact, he couldn’t see much of anyone else in the area. “Sure.” Just to be safe, Nick stepped into the street and started walking in the opposite direction to where Gil had pointed.

  Gil scrambled to his feet and followed him. “I wanted to ask about your friend, Barrett Cobb,” he said quickly.

  Stopping in his tracks, Nick turned to him and said, “Barrett’s dead.”

  “I…uh…I know. At least, that’s what I heard.” Gil wrung his hands as he started walking again.

  This time, Nick was the one who had to do the catching up. He did so with long, powerful strides and easily overtook the smaller man.

  “I heard them boys in Montana got to you,” Gil said, motioning toward Nick’s hand. “Guess that rumor was true, too.”

  “You asked about Barrett. What the hell do you want to know about him?” Nick growled.

  Glancing around nervously, Gil hooked his thumb toward an alley. “It’d be best if we talked in pri—”

  “We’ll talk right here,” Nick said in a tone that made Gil flinch. “Say what you came to say and do it quick.”

  “You were his friend. Cobb’s, I mean.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Word is that you may be the one who gave him the Reaper’s Fee.”

  Nick’s brow furrowed as he drilled straight through Gil’s skull with his eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, unable to recall Barrett ever using that term.

  Leaning forward on the balls of his feet, Gil said, “You buried him with the money that was stolen on his last job. Some folks say you helped him steal it. Some say you were the one to bury him, since there weren’t nobody alive who’d care enough about Cobb to…well…to go through all that trouble.”

  “You talk like you know an awful lot.”

  Gil nodded and grinned as if he was about to reach around and pat himself on the back.

  “What’s this ‘Reaper’s Fee’?” Nick asked.

  “It’s just the name someone came up with for what’s supposed to be in that coffin with Barrett Cobb. You know…like the money he’d pay to the Reaper when he came a-callin’.”

  Nick’s face might as well have been carved out of stone. His expression was a cold slap that knocked Gil’s grin right off his face.

  “Even though I don’t believe you had anything to do with that robbery,” Gil said as he glanced down at the gun hanging from Nick’s battered holster, “my bet is that you’d know something about it. I hear you were the only man Cobb called his friend…although there are some folks who say you might have been the one to kill him.”

  “Barrett was like my brother,” Nick said.

  “Hell, I’d like to kill my brother every now and then. Ain’t nothing wrong with that.”

  Despite everything running through Nick’s mind at that moment, he couldn’t help but look at Gil with outright confusion. “Just who the hell are you, and where the hell did you hear all of this?”

  “Didn’t the lady tell you? I’m Switchback Gil.”

  Nick recognized the tone in Gil’s voice, as well as the arrogant posture that meant that Gil fully expected his name to strike a chord with anyone who heard it. Seeing that proud display made Nick feel as if he were looking at a faded picture of himself, back when he was young and full of his own brand of hellfire.

  “That name don’t mean shit to me, boy,” Nick said. “Now tell me who filled your head with all of those rumors.”

  “Word’s been getting around about that stash you buried. The company that owned them jewels has been out looking for them and they say you were wrapped up in the robbery.”

  “Folks say I’m wrapped up in plenty of things.”

  “Are they all lying?” Gil asked.

  Nick didn’t respond to that right away. As the memories flooded through his mind, Nick had to stand there and let them run their course before he said, “Not all of them.”

  “Then you know what I’m talking about. But that was in the past,” Gil quickly added. “A blind man could see you ain’t in any condition to be a threat no more. That’s what I was trying to tell the folks that came around talking about them jewels.”

  “How thoughtful of you,” Nick said dryly.

  “There ain’t many men as thoughtful as me. Most are just chasing off after the tales that are being spread without doing any scouting ahead. I hear there’s been graves dug up all the way from here to the Dakotas and everywhere in between.”

  “That’s not a very wise way to go about things. Not with so many Indians in those parts.”

  Gil smirked and snapped his fingers. “That’s exactly what I thought.”

  “Are you going to tell me why you came out here to waste so much of my time?” Nick asked.

  To Nick’s surprise, Gil actually stepped up to him and looked him squarely in the eyes. “I want you to tell me where I can find that grave. After that, I’ll be on my way and you can have all the time you need to think about how lucky you were that I found you instead of some of them others that are out there looking.”

  “What others?”

  “There’s a price on your head, old man. Didn’t you know that?” />
  Nick found himself grinning at the sound of that. Although he knew there were some gray strands in his hair and a few silvery whiskers in his beard, he hadn’t exactly thought of himself as old just yet. Then again, he could recall pinning that same moniker on men younger than himself when he’d been around Gil’s age.

  If Gil had been concerned with privacy before, his own confidence had wiped that worry away. Now he stood in the street and glared directly into Nick’s eyes, bowing his shoulders like the proverbial cock of the walk. “You may have been a real bad man all them years ago,” he said. “But that was all them years ago. I’ve heard about some of the things you done from a cousin that lives up in Montana. He knows some real good stories about Nicolai Graves.”

  “I barely ever hear people call me by my given name anymore. Most folks just say Nick. That’s good to hear.”

  “Glad you like it,” Gil said with a smug grin. “From what my cousin tells me, you were shot up, ran out of Virginia City and left for dead by the vigilantes up there.”

  “I wasn’t the only one.”

  “Not by a stretch, but you’re one of the most famous ones.”

  “There was a time,” Nick said fondly, “when it would have done me good to hear that.”

  Gil nodded and then took a step back so he could square his shoulders to Nick. “Yeah? Well you can look back on the old days all you want after you tell me where to find that grave.”

  “Barrett was my friend. Why would I tell you something like that?”

  “Because it’d be real bad for you if you didn’t.” As he said that, Gil pressed the palm of his hand against his holstered gun as the muscles in his jaw flexed beneath the skin of his face.

  Nick kept his head down and his eyes on Gil. He could hear a few people walking along the street to his right, but he didn’t bother looking in that direction. It was too late to be concerned with appearances. As Nick’s hand brushed aside his coat to give him better access to his gun, he asked, “You sure you want to do it this way, boy?”