Sidewinders

by William W. Johnstone

  Keefer grunted. “There’s a difference. You Texas lads caught the Mexicans sleeping, as I recall. The Devils of Deadwood Gulch will be ready for trouble. They’ll be bringing it with them, in fact.”

  “We’ll just have to get the jump on them somehow,” Bo said. “In the meantime, Miss Sutton seemed to think you’d have enough gold on hand to make up a shipment right away.”

  Keefer nodded. “That’s true. I have a few bags of dust in the safe, and we’ve milled enough ore to make up two loads. Better not try to get it all to town at once, though. I don’t want to risk everything.”

  “That’s good. One wagon at a time is plenty. Maybe you can get the shipment loaded this afternoon, and we can start for Deadwood first thing in the morning.”

  “Sounds fine to me,” Keefer said. He stood up and extended his hand to each of them in turn. “There are a few empty bunks in the bunkhouse, and you’ll eat in the mess hall with the rest of the men. Welcome to the Golden Queen. We’re glad to have you with us, gentlemen . . .” He paused and added pointedly, “Even though it might not be for very long, if those blasted Devils have anything to say about it!”

  Chloride was in his element here. He supervised the loading of the gold wagon during the afternoon. The raw ore had already been run through the stamp mill to break it up and then processed with mercury to free the gold from the quartz in which it was embedded. The resulting ore, even though it would be refined more later on, was mostly gold and was formed into rough bars by melting and casting it. Workers at the mine stacked those bars into crates, and then the crates were loaded into the wagon. The heavy canvas bags of gold dust from the placer operation were stowed away in a locked compartment under the wagon seat.

  Keefer picked some of his most trustworthy men to stand guard over the wagon during the night. Everyone who worked at the Golden Queen was pretty reliable, he explained to the Texans and Chloride, otherwise they would have deserted Martha Sutton, but a wagon full of gold was a tempting thing even for the most honest man.

  Bo agreed, and for that reason he and Scratch took turns checking on the wagon from time to time during the night. They got plenty of sleep, though—the mine’s bunkhouse was as comfortable as the bunkhouses they had stayed in on numerous ranches—and were rested and ready to go the next morning after a hearty breakfast in the mess hall.

  Chloride hitched up the team himself, checking every bit of harness. “Worn leather’s fouled up many a man in times of trouble,” he explained.

  Bo and Scratch saddled their horses. Instead of riding in the wagon, they would be mounted so they could move quicker if the need arose. They were armed with their usual weapons, and they borrowed a couple of shotguns from the rack in Keefer’s office and placed them in the wagon.

  When the wagon was ready to roll, Keefer came outside to say so long. A number of the miners had emerged from the shaft and the mill to watch, too. Their livelihoods were riding on that wagon. If Bo, Scratch, and Chloride could get the gold safely into the bank in Deadwood, eventually some of the value from it would find its way back to the miners in the form of the wages they were owed. That was everybody’s hope, anyway.

  Chloride climbed onto the wagon seat and grasped the reins. Bo and Scratch swung up into their saddles. Resting a hand on one of the front wheels, Keefer said, “Good luck be with you, men.” He added, “It’s not too late to send a couple of fellows with you as extra guards.”

  Bo shook his head. “No offense, Mr. Keefer, but then we’d have to look out for them, too, as well as the gold. And from the looks of it, your crew here is a mite thin. You probably need every man you’ve got just to keep the operation going.”

  “That’s true,” Keefer said with a nod. “Some of the men quit when Miss Sutton starting having trouble paying them. Can’t blame them, really, but it’s left us shorthanded.”

  “We’ll be back tomorrow,” Bo said as he lifted his reins.

  “Good Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise,” Scratch added with a smile.

  “It’s not the creek I’m worried about,” Keefer said as he stepped back and raised a hand in farewell. Chloride slapped the lines against the backs of the team, and with the rattle of bit chains and the creaking of wheels, the wagon lurched into motion. Bo and Scratch returned Keefer’s wave and rode after the vehicle. Their Winchesters rested across the saddles in front of them, rather than in the sheaths strapped to the horses. If they needed the rifles, chances were they would need them in a hurry.

  Bo and Scratch split up and flanked the wagon. The trail was wide enough for this escort arrangement in many places, although at times they would have to ride one in front and one behind the wagon where the path narrowed down.

  “I hope you fellas are plannin’ on keepin’ your eyes open,” Chloride said as they left the Golden Queen behind them. “Our best chance of gettin’ through alive is if you spot them Devils before they open fire on us.”

  “You ain’t tellin’ us anything we don’t already know,” Scratch said.

  “If there’s any shooting, don’t whip up the team and try to outrun the trouble,” Bo suggested. “You couldn’t do it with an empty wagon, and you sure can’t with one loaded down heavy like this one. You’ll be better off stopping and taking cover under the wagon instead.”

  “What’ll the two of you be doin’ while I’m hunkerin’ down?” Chloride wanted to know.

  “That depends on the situation,” Bo said.

  “But you can figure we’ll be tryin’ to kill as many of those varmints as we can,” Scratch added.

  Chloride nodded and fell silent. Bo could tell from the tense look on his leathery face that the old-timer was worried. Under the circumstances, only a fool wouldn’t be a mite nervous. There were dozens of places where some owlhoot with a pair of field glasses could be hidden, watching the Golden Queen to see when the wagon left. It was possible somebody was riding to carry word of the shipment to the rest of the gang right now.

  To take Chloride’s mind off the situation as they reached the end of the canyon and started down the gulch toward Deadwood, Bo asked him questions about his life and got the old-timer talking about all the places he had been and the things he had done. Chloride had been to see the elephant, no doubt about that. He had been part of the California Gold Rush and had chased after bonanzas in Nevada and Montana Territory. Much like the Texans, he’d had a host of other jobs over the years but had been too fiddle-footed to stay with any of them for very long.

  There were hundreds, if not thousands, of men just like him scattered across the frontier, men who had never been able to settle down and live the sort of lives that most hombres did, men filled with a restlessness that denied them peace and stability and demanded freedom to roam. Sometimes the price of that freedom was loneliness, and when their time came to cross the divide, it would be on some freezing mountaintop or under a burning desert sun, with a bullet in their guts or a knife in their back or a sickness wasting them away from the inside out. They wouldn’t die in bed, with their loving families gathered around them, and maybe there were times when they regretted that, but deep down they knew it was the way things had to be.

  Bo and Scratch had lived that same sort of life, so they knew what Chloride was talking about and recognized the wistful tone that crept into the old-timer’s voice now and then as he spun his yarns. The years rolled by in their bittersweet way for men such as them.

  Even as those thoughts filled his mind, a large part of Bo’s brain was alert for trouble, and his eyes, keen despite his age, never stopped moving. His gaze roamed over the thickly wooded walls of the gulch, watching for the sun’s split-second reflection on metal, or movement where everything should be still, or any other indication that things were not as they should be.

  Early that morning, as they were getting ready to go, their breath had fogged thickly in front of their faces in the cold air. By now the sun had risen high enough that the temperature had warmed a little, especially here in the middle of the
gulch next to the creek. Up ahead on the left, a tall, rocky outcropping loomed up and cast a thick shadow over a brushy area at the base of the slope. The sun didn’t penetrate there.

  Bo’s eyes narrowed as he spotted what looked like a tiny puff of smoke drifting over that brush. It wasn’t smoke at all, he realized. It was somebody’s breath fogging up because the air under that big slab of rock was a little colder, just cold enough to cause that telltale sign.

  And there was no reason for anybody to be hiding in there unless they were up to no good.

  Softly, Bo called across to his old friend. “Scratch. Up ahead on the left, under that big rock.”

  “I see it,” Scratch replied, equally softly. “Chloride, get ready to move.”

  The old-timer stiffened on the seat. “What in blazes—” he began.

  Then the brush trembled a little, and Bo caught a glimpse of a rifle barrel poking between branches. There was no time for anything but action. He yanked his horse to the side, shouted, “Chloride, get down!” and snapped the Winchester to his shoulder. Shots roared out as he worked the rifle’s lever as fast as he could and sent a steady stream of lead into that brush.

  CHAPTER 11

  Bo went one way and Scratch went the other so the outlaws hidden in the bushes would have a harder time killing both of them. At the same time, Chloride yanked the team to a stop, grabbed one of the loaded shotguns from the floorboard, and slid off the seat. He ducked under the wagon and crouched there as bullets began to thud into the thick planks of the vehicle’s sideboards and whine off the iron-rimmed wheels.

  Bo sent his horse at a run toward some trees. He felt the heat of a bullet as it passed close by his face. Powder smoke floated over the brush now instead of the fogging of some owlhoot’s breath. That had been a small thing, just enough to give away the gang’s hiding place before they could spring their ambush.

  As the horse reached the trees, Bo kicked his feet free of the stirrups and went out of the saddle. He landed running and managed to stay upright without crashing into one of the tree trunks. A slug sent bark flying into the air as Bo ducked into cover.

  He glanced around, looking for Scratch, and saw that the silver-haired Texan had splashed across the creek and gone to ground in a cluster of rocks that were big enough to offer some decent shelter. Scratch’s rifle spoke from over there, blasting bullets toward the brush where the Devils were hidden.

  Bo had no doubt that it was the Deadwood Devils in there. This holdup wasn’t going the way the Devils were used to, though. Bo thrust his rifle around the tree trunk and opened fire, joining Scratch in peppering the gang’s hiding place with lead. From under the wagon, the shotgun boomed and then Chloride’s old cap-and-ball revolver began to roar as he got in on the action as well.

  A grim smile touched Bo’s lips. The outlaws were accustomed to their victims trying to flee. This time they were putting up a fight instead. The thicket waved back and forth as the Texans sent lead scything through the branches from two different angles. Even though the Devils outnumbered their enemies, judging by the shots coming from the brush, they had chosen their position for concealment, not to defend. By spotting them first and not running, the Texans had turned the tables neatly on the bushwhackers.

  One of the outlaws lost his nerve and made a break for it. Bo spotted him as the man lunged out of the brush and tried to duck around the rocky shoulder. Letting instinct guide his aim, Bo snapped a shot at the fleeing man and was rewarded by a howl of pain and the sight of the outlaw staggering as he clutched at a bullet-shattered shoulder. The man made it around the rocks, but he was out of the fight.

  A burst of renewed firing came from the brush and forced both of the Texans to duck. The outlaws used that to cover their retreat. Some of them kept shooting while the rest of the gang dashed for cover. Bo and Scratch had to keep their heads down and managed only a couple of shots to send the men hurrying on their way.

  The gang’s horses must have been hidden just around the bend in the trail. Bo heard hoofbeats pound as some of the men galloped down the gulch toward Deadwood. The ones left in the brush broke from cover and ran toward the bend, firing rifles and handguns as they went. Bo got a good enough look at them to see that they had their bandanas pulled up to mask their faces. A couple of the men staggered as the Texans’ bullets found them, but they stayed on their feet and kept running, ducking out of sight around the bend in the trail. More hoofbeats sounded a moment later as the attackers reached their horses and lit a shuck away from there.

  Chloride let out a whoop from under the wagon. “We done it!” he yelled. “We fought ’em off!”

  “Stay where you are,” Bo called as he saw the old-timer start to crawl out from under the wagon. “We want to make sure they’re all gone before we show ourselves.”

  They waited until all the hoofbeats had faded away into the distance, then waited a while after that. Chloride grew impatient and muttered oaths, but the Texans stoically used the time to reload their rifles.

  Finally, Bo emerged from the trees and whistled for his horse. As the animal trotted up, Chloride called, “Can I come out now, blast it?”

  “Come ahead,” Bo told him. “Just keep your gun handy until Scratch and I have a chance to do a little scouting around.”

  Scratch left the rocks on the other side of the creek, called his horse, and rode back across the fast-flowing stream. He said, “I think I winged a couple of those varmints, Bo.”

  “Yeah, me, too,” Bo said with a nod. “We’re whittling them down.”

  “Not fast enough to suit me,” Chloride said as he stood beside the wagon gripping his old revolver.

  The Texans rode up to the bend in the trail and took a look. Nobody shot at them. “Stay here to keep an eye on Chloride and the gold,” Scratch said. “I’ll mosey a ways down the gulch.”

  Bo nodded his agreement and waited there while Scratch scouted their route. The silver-haired Texan soon was out of sight. Bo waited tensely for his friend to return . . . or for shots to break out.

  His hands tightened a little on the Winchester when he heard a horse coming. Scratch rode into view a moment later and waved his rifle above his head to let Bo know that everything was all right. Bo turned in the saddle and waved to Chloride.

  “Come on! The trail is clear!”

  Chloride got the wagon moving again. Bo waited for him to catch up, and then they both went on down the trail to join up with Scratch.

  “See anything of those owlhoots?” Bo asked.

  Scratch shook his head. “Nary hide nor hair. That’s twice we’ve fought ’em off. I reckon they must’ve had things their own way around here for so long they don’t know what to make of it when somebody fights back. Seems like they spook pretty easy.”

  “They won’t again,” Bo predicted. “They know what they’re up against now. They’ll be better prepared next time.”

  On that cautionary note, Bo, Scratch, and Chloride proceeded on down the gulch toward Deadwood. The wagon couldn’t move very fast. Noon came and went, and a short time after that, they stopped to rest the mule team and eat the food they had brought with them from the mine. The Golden Queen’s cook had prepared them a lunch of thick slices of bread, bacon, and canned tomatoes.

  The rest of the trip was surprisingly uneventful. Bo knew the Devils could have prepared another ambush, but evidently that morning’s fight had shaken them enough to make them think twice about that. Around midafternoon, they spotted the smoke rising from Deadwood’s chimneys, and a short time after that, the settlement itself came into view.

  People on the boardwalks gawked as the wagon rolled down Main Street, flanked by the two Texans. The vehicle was obviously loaded with gold and bound for the bank. Someone must have run ahead to carry the word because when Chloride brought the wagon to a stop in front of the building, the bank manager, Jerome Davenport, had already stepped out onto the boardwalk to greet them.

  Davenport hooked his thumbs in his vest and said, “I heard
a rumor that you were working for the Golden Queen now, Coleman. Is that true? Do you really have a shipment of Miss Sutton’s gold in that wagon?”

  “What do you think?” Chloride replied as he wrapped the reins around the brake lever. “What do you reckon I did, loaded this here wagon with plain ol’ rocks and brought them in?”

  “It’s gold,” Bo said. “We’ll be depositing it, and we’ll want a receipt.”

  Davenport nodded curtly. “Of course. I must say, I’m surprised you were able to bring it into town without the Devils trying to hold you up.”

  “Nobody said that’s what happened,” Scratch drawled.

  The banker frowned in thought as he tried to figure out what Scratch meant. Then Davenport’s eyes widened in surprise as the realization came to him.

  “You mean you were attacked by the Devils?” he demanded.

  Bo dismounted. He looped his horse’s reins around the hitch rail in front of the bank and said, “That’s right. But as you can see for yourself, we’re still alive and the gold is still in the wagon. Now, how about getting some of those clerks of yours to come out here and start unloading the shipment? The sooner that gold’s safely locked up in the vault, the better.”

  “Of course, of course,” Davenport muttered. “I just . . . You really mean to say that you fought them off?”

  “See for yourself, dagnab it,” Chloride said. “You’re a banker. You ought to recognize gold when you see it.”

  A crowd had gathered around the wagon, and at the news that the Devils had tried to steal the gold, only to fail, several people hurried off to spread the word. As Bo glanced down the street, he saw several men calling out the news to their friends. Obviously, it was a big day in Deadwood. This was the first time the Devils had gone after something and not gotten it.

  Davenport stepped back into the bank while Bo and Scratch stood by with their Winchesters tucked under their arms, intent on not letting the precious stuff out of their sight until it was locked in the vault. Chloride watched over it, too.