Sidewinders

by William W. Johnstone

  As they started up Deadwood Gulch, Scratch dug the sack of bear sign out of his saddlebags and took one of the doughnuts from it. He passed the sack to Bo and Chloride in turn. Chloride smacked his lips with pleasure as he ate.

  “That’s mighty good bear sign. Helps lift a man’s spirits,” he declared.

  “You mean you ain’t worried about gettin’ shot tomorrow?” Scratch asked.

  “I didn’t say that. But a man could die a mite happier with a belly full of this bear sign.”

  “Maybe we’d better save some for the trip back tomorrow,” Bo suggested.

  “That’s a good idea,” Chloride agreed.

  The Golden Queen was about eight miles up Deadwood Gulch, he explained as they followed the trail alongside the creek. The mine wasn’t actually located in the gulch, but rather up a side canyon that branched off to the southwest. A smaller stream flowed through the canyon and merged with Deadwood Creek.

  “Where’s the Argosy?” Bo asked.

  “About a mile on up the gulch from where that canyon veers off,” Chloride answered.

  “What’s Nicholson going to do for drivers and guards now? Has he been having the same sort of trouble getting men to work for him that Miss Sutton has?”

  Chloride shook his head. “Not exactly. The Argosy can afford to pay more, so there are more fellas willin’ to run the risk. Of course, it don’t take very big wages to add up to more than the gal can pay right now, since she ain’t payin’ nothin’.”

  “She’s promised to make up all those back wages,” Scratch pointed out.

  “Promisin’ is easier than doin’,” Chloride said.

  Bo couldn’t argue with that. The men who were still working for Martha Sutton were betting that eventually she would be able to pay them what she owed them. But like all bets, this one ran the risk of not paying off.

  “And you got to remember,” Chloride went on, “until a couple o’ days ago, the Argosy shipments hadn’t been hit. Reese Bardwell kept puttin’ more guards on the wagons because of what’s been happenin’ to the other mines, so we all hoped the road agents would leave the Argosy alone. Shame it didn’t work out that way.”

  “You’d probably still have a job if it had,” Bo said.

  “Maybe. To tell you the truth, though, Bardwell never much liked me, and Nicholson gen’rally does whatever that big galoot wants. They’d have found some excuse to get rid of me sooner or later.”

  Over the past four years, the hooves of countless horses and mules and the wheels of hundreds of wagons had worn a decent trail alongside the creek. The three riders had no trouble following it. They didn’t push their mounts but instead ambled along, taking their time. When they passed the site of the ambush from the day before, Bo took a good look around, but he didn’t see anything he hadn’t already seen in the wake of the fight. There was nothing here to give them a lead to the Devils.

  They rode on, and late in the morning they came to the mouth of the side canyon where the Golden Queen was located. As they reined in to rest the horses and Chloride’s mule for a few minutes, Bo studied the steep, narrow, and rocky ridge that separated the side canyon from Deadwood Gulch itself.

  “Somebody comin’,” Scratch said, distracting Bo from his thoughts.

  Bo looked up Deadwood Gulch and saw several riders approaching. The man in the lead was familiar, and as the group drew closer, Bo recognized him as Reese Bardwell, the Argosy’s chief engineer and superintendent. Bardwell didn’t look very comfortable on horseback. It took a pretty big horse to carry him, too, in this case a gray that looked more like a draft animal than a saddle mount.

  “Who are the men with Bardwell?” Bo asked Chloride quietly.

  The old-timer grimaced and shook his head. “They must be new guards. I don’t recognize ’em. They don’t look like hard-rock men.”

  Scratch grunted and said, “More like hardcases.” It was true. The three men with Bardwell wore range clothes and Stetsons, and each had a handgun belted on, as well as a Winchester in a saddle boot. Their eyes had the narrow look of constant vigilance that became second nature to men who lived by the gun.

  The Texans and Chloride stayed where they were, standing next to their mounts, as Bardwell and the other men rode up. Bardwell reined in. His companions followed suit. The engineer had a dark scowl on his face as he demanded, “What are you three doin’ out here?”

  “That’s our business,” Bo said. “We could ask the same of you fellas.”

  Bardwell sneered. “Last I heard, we had honest jobs. You’re just a couple of saddle tramps from Texas and an old man who can’t be trusted.”

  Chloride’s beard bristled belligerently as he exclaimed, “Why, you goldurn—”

  Bo put out a hand to stop him as the old-timer took a step forward. “Take it easy, Chloride,” he said. To Bardwell, he went on, “I reckon you haven’t heard. We’ve got jobs. We’re working for Miss Martha Sutton at the Golden Queen.”

  Bardwell frowned in surprise. “Marty? Why would she—Wait a minute. She didn’t hire the three of you to get her gold to town, did she?”

  “That’s right,” Bo said. Bardwell probably would have heard that news in Deadwood anyway, and Bo was interested in the man’s reaction.

  “I knew she was getting desperate, but I didn’t know she had turned into a fool,” Bardwell snapped. “It’s all over this part of the country about how Coleman’s tied in with the Devils, and for all anybody knows, you two are part of the gang yourselves!”

  Chloride shook a gnarled fist at him. “By jingo, if I was twenty years younger, I’d hand you your needin’s, you overgrowed varmint! I never had no truck with outlaws, and that’s more’n you can say!”

  Bardwell’s face darkened again as he said, “What’re you talkin’ about, you old pelican?”

  “You know dang good an’ well what I’m talkin’ about! That no-good brother of yours!”

  Fury mottled Bardwell’s face. His hands clenched into massive fists for a second before he started to swing down from his horse. But before he could dismount, one of the men with him edged his horse up alongside and said, “Probably ought to forget it, boss. Mr. Nicholson’s expecting you, and he won’t like it if you’re late.”

  Bardwell eased back into his saddle. “I suppose you’re right,” he rumbled. He pointed a thick, blunt finger at Chloride. “But you just watch your mouth, old man. Keep runnin’ it and you’re liable to be sorry.”

  Chloride just snorted in contempt.

  Bardwell and the men with him rode past and headed on down the gulch toward the settlement. Bardwell glanced back one last time to glare at the Texans and Chloride. The other men didn’t pay any more attention to them, which reinforced Bo’s hunch that they were hired guns. Men like that didn’t care about anything unless they were paid to.

  Chloride swiped the back of a hand across his mouth. “Sorry about that, boys,” he said. “Almost talked my way into a ruckus, didn’t I?”

  “We couldn’t have stopped Bardwell if he’d gone after you,” Bo pointed out. “Not with our fists, anyway. That means guns would have had to be involved, and then those other hombres would have taken a hand.”

  “Could’ve been bullets flyin’ everywhere, Chloride,” Scratch added.

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” the old-timer said. “I’m a mite too touchy. Always have been. Bardwell just rubs me the wrong way, though.”

  “I understand the feeling,” Bo said as he put his foot in the stirrup. He swung up and went on, “Let’s get going.”

  They forded the creek and headed up the narrow, twisting side canyon toward the Golden Queen. As they rode, Bo asked, “What was that about Bardwell’s brother?”

  “There was a rumor goin’ around the camp that he had a brother who was an owlhoot down Kansas way. Nobody would ask him about it to his face—”

  “I reckon not,” Scratch said. “That hombre’s fists are big enough he could knock down a door with ’em.”

  “Anyway,” Chlori
de continued, “some folks said that the law finally caught up to Bardwell’s brother and hanged him, whilst others claimed him and his gang got away and disappeared. I don’t know which is true, or if Bardwell even had an owlhoot brother to start with. I was just tryin’ to stick a burr under his saddle.”

  Bo nodded. “I saw the look on his face when you brought up his brother. I’d say you succeeded, Chloride. And I’d say there must be something to the story, too, otherwise it wouldn’t have bothered him so much.”

  “I reckon you’re right. If it was a lie, he wouldn’t have got so durned mad.”

  “That’s sort of interestin’,” Scratch mused.

  “You mean the way a gang of outlaws shows up and starts raising hell in the same area where Bardwell’s working as a mine superintendent?” Bo asked. “Yeah, interesting is the word for it, all right.” He looked over at Chloride as they rode along the canyon. “How come you didn’t say anything about Bardwell’s brother before now?”

  The old-timer grunted. “Nobody asked me, now did they?”

  Bo had to chuckle. He said, “No, I reckon not.”

  They rode on, and a few minutes later Bo began to hear the steady, pounding thump of a donkey engine. “That’s coming from the mine?” he asked Chloride.

  “Yeah, they’re probably usin’ it to haul ore cars outta the shaft. All the mines in these parts started out as placer outfits, since the first prospectors panned for gold in the creeks just like the fellas did in the California rivers back in forty-nine. The bigger operators come in, bought up claims, and built flumes and long toms to wash more gravel from the stream beds. But at the same time, they were startin’ to dig into the slopes, too, hopin’ to find the quartz lodes those flecks o’ gold in the creeks came from.”

  Bo nodded. “That’s the usual pattern when there’s a gold strike, all right.”

  “But the lodes here in the Black Hills ain’t like the ones anywheres else,” Chloride said. “Most places, if you find a pocket of gold-bearin’ ore, you can make a pretty good guess which way it’s gonna run. Not around here. A pocket or a ledge can run any which- a-way around here, which is why you got tunnels branchin’ ever’ which way underground. The placer gold’s just about played out now. There’s just enough left so that most of the outfits keep a sluice goin’ to get as much dust as they can, but mostly they’re after ore now.”

  “And it takes a big company to do that effectively,” Bo said. “A lone miner with a shovel and a pickax can’t dig out enough gold to make the effort worth his while.”

  “Yeah, it didn’t take long for all the little fellas to get crowded out,” Chloride agreed. “A lot of ’em wound up sellin’ their claims for little or nothin’, then stayin’ on to work for wages from the big outfits.”

  “We saw the same thing happen in California and Nevada,” Scratch said, “and when we moseyed up here to Deadwood a few years back, we could tell it was gonna be the same story all over again. That’s why we didn’t bother stayin’ around and breakin’ our backs lookin’ for gold.”

  They rode around a bend and saw the mine buildings up ahead on their right. The bunkhouse, cook shack, and mess hall were on the fairly level ground at the bottom of the canyon, along with a sturdy log structure that housed the superintendent’s quarters. The mill was built on the slope, at the head of the main shaft sunk into the ridge. A few smaller storage buildings were scattered around, and Bo spotted a squat building made of thick logs a hundred yards up the canyon. That would be where the supply of blasting powder was kept. A while back, he and Scratch had worked at a mine down in Mexico, a long way from here but a setup that had been remarkably similar in some ways.

  Bo saw a corral with a dozen mules in it, and a couple of empty wagons were parked next to the enclosure. He pointed them out to Scratch and Chloride and said, “I guess we’ll be using one of those to haul the gold.”

  “Can you handle a wagon like that, old-timer?” Scratch asked.

  “There you go with that old-timer business again!” Chloride sputtered. “You ain’t no spring chicken! And I can handle anything with four wheels and mules hitched to it!”

  Bo grinned as he turned his horse toward the superintendent’s house. “We’d better find Andrew Keefer and give him Miss Sutton’s letter before he starts wondering who we are and gets nervous,” he said.

  However, it was too late for that. As they rode up to the house, the door opened and a stocky, balding man with bushy, rust-colored side-whiskers stepped out with a shotgun in his hands. He pointed the Greener at the newcomers and bellowed, “If you’ve come to rob us, you damned Devils, I’ll blow you right out of your saddles!”

  CHAPTER 10

  Bo and Scratch were experienced enough to keep their hands well away from their guns in a situation like this. Bo could only hope that Chloride would do the same thing. The man on the porch was already spooked, and it wouldn’t take much to make him pull the triggers on that scattergun.

  “Take it easy, mister,” Bo said in a calm, steady voice, just like he was trying to settle down a skittish horse. “We’re not here to rob anybody, and we’re sure not members of the Deadwood Devils. Are you Andrew Keefer?”

  The question seemed to take the man by surprise, but it got through to him. He lowered the shotgun slightly as he frowned. “I’m Keefer,” he admitted. “Who in blazes are you?”

  Bo nodded toward his companions. “This is Scratch Morton and Chloride Coleman. My name’s Bo Creel. Miss Sutton sent us out here from Deadwood to pick up a shipment of ore and take it back to the bank.”

  “Coleman,” Keefer repeated as he studied the old-timer. “I know you. You drive for the Argosy.”

  “Drove,” Chloride corrected. “I don’t work for Nicholson no more.”

  “What happened?”

  “You haven’t heard about the Argosy gold wagon being held up a couple of days ago?” Bo asked.

  “Nobody from out here has been to town and back the past few days,” Keefer said. “No reason to go. Nobody’s got any money to spend.” The shotgun’s twin barrels rose again. “How do I know you’re who you say you are?”

  “Miss Sutton sent a letter with us,” Bo said. “If you’ll let me reach inside my coat without your trigger finger getting too itchy, I’ll get it for you.”

  Keefer nodded. “Go ahead. But be careful now,” he warned.

  Slowly, Bo reached inside his coat and drew Martha’s letter from the pocket. He brought his horse closer to the porch and held out the paper. Keefer lowered the shotgun again and stepped up to take it. He moved back quickly, just in case this was some sort of trick, Bo suspected.

  Keefer grunted as he looked at the wax seal, no doubt recognizing it. He tucked the scattergun under his arm, broke the seal, and unfolded the letter. His eyes scanned it quickly, and as he read, Bo saw him relax a little.

  “It appears you’re who you say you are,” Keefer said as he folded the letter and stuck it in a pocket in his brown corduroy trousers. He also wore work boots, a gray wool shirt, and a brown vest. He was so short and stocky that he appeared to be almost as wide as he was tall, but there was an air of strength about him. He wasn’t fat, but rather thick with muscle instead. Bo would have been willing to bet that Andrew Keefer had swung a pickax in many a mine shaft before he ever became a superintendent.

  Keefer went on. “Come on inside. You can put your horses and that mule in the corral later.”

  The three men dismounted, tied their reins to porch posts, and followed Keefer into the sturdy log building. A fire crackled in the fireplace, combating the November chill that seeped in from outside. Keefer had a fire going in a cast-iron stove, too, with a coffeepot sitting on top of it.

  “Coffee?” he asked. “That was probably a pretty cold ride from town.”

  “It was,” Bo admitted. “Coffee sounds good.”

  This front room was an office, with a desk cluttered with maps, diagrams, ledger books, and assorted paperwork. There was an armchair in front of the d
esk and a sofa against the wall opposite the fireplace. When Keefer had filled tin cups for all of them, he went behind the desk and waved for his visitors to have a seat. Bo took the armchair, while Scratch and Chloride sat on the sofa.

  “Tell me about what happened to the Argosy gold wagon,” Keefer said.

  Chloride told the story of the holdup, then Bo took up the tale of their efforts the previous day to follow the trail of the road agents, including the ambush attempt. Keefer listened with rapt attention, and when Bo was finished, he said, “It sounds to me like you fellows were mighty lucky not to wind up with pitchforks carved on your foreheads.”

  “I thought the same thing,” Chloride said.

  “I have to admit, I’m a little surprised the Argosy got hit,” Keefer went on. “I was beginning to think the Devils wouldn’t go after it. But I suppose it was just a matter of time.”

  “Maybe,” Bo said, but he didn’t elaborate. Instead, he continued. “We’re hoping we’ll have another crack at the varmints.”

  Keefer leaned forward in his chair and clasped his hands together on the desk. “Wait just a blessed minute,” he said. “You’re not telling me that you plan to use our gold wagon as bait for a trap, are you? I won’t stand for that.”

  Bo shook his head. “No, sir. That’s not what I meant. Scratch and Chloride and I will do our dead-level best to get Miss Sutton’s gold to town, just like we signed on to do. But considering how many times the shipments from the Golden Queen have been hit already, it seems likely the Devils will come after us again. Maybe not on this run, but sooner or later they will.”

  “And when they do, we’re gonna give ’em a hot lead welcome, you can count on that,” Scratch added.

  “I see what you mean,” Keefer said, slowly nodding. “But what makes you think the three of you can stop the Devils from stealing the gold when nobody else has been able to?”

  Scratch grinned and said, “We stopped ol’ Santa Anna from runnin’ roughshod over Texas, and the odds were against us and the rest of Sam Houston’s boys. I reckon we can handle a bunch of no-account owlhoots.”