The Sharpshooters (A Fargo Western Book 9)

by John Benteen

  “Ye’re on trial hyar.”

  Jess’s head swiveled, as a kind of murmur ran through the room. “On trial?” he blurted. “Fer whut?”

  “Fer shootin’ men before they crossed our deadline. Two of Steed’s riders; wuss than thet, a Texas Ranger. Ye plugged ’em without warnin’ while ye was up on guard, outside the pass.” The old man looked exhausted, depressed, his eyes full of grief. “Ye disobeyed my orders thet ever’ man was to be challenged and turned around, if possible; thet nobody was to be feared at unless they crossed the deadline after bein’ warned. And now yer disobedience has put us all in trouble along with ye. Ye know the rules, ye got to be tried fer hit, and yer punishment must be decided by the fambly.” His voice sharpened. “So ye do whut I say. Ye take off them guns.”

  “I ain’t takin’ off anythin’!” Jess’s face was pale, his eyes furious. “And I ain’t standin’ no trial, neither! Thet was weeks ago and you never—”

  “I told ye then, ye might have to. Ye disobeyed my orders and ye know the penalty fer thet. I let it slip by, but hit cain’t be put off no longer. The future of the whole fambly depends on hit. Now ye take them guns off, or I’ll take ’em off ye myself.”

  Jess’s lips peeled back from his teeth. He slipped into a crouch, Henry in his left hand, right dangling near his Colt. “Don’t ye try it, Pappy. Don’t anybody try it. Ye hear?” Then his eyes flashed, suddenly his hand went for his pistol.

  Roaring Tom’s arm was a blur, faster than Jess’s draw. His open hand made a loud, sodden sound as, once again, he backhanded Jess. The young man’s head snapped around; Tom hit him again with the other hand, at the same time seizing Jess’s wrist. The Colt, half-drawn from leather, fell back into its holster and Jess howled with pain. Then Tom had snatched the Henry and jerked loose the pistol. Jess was weaponless. He stood there, face twisted in a snarl, staring at the bristling muzzles of guns that had come up to cover him.

  Tom’s voice was like flint on steel. “Thet’s twicet ye made me hit ye, son, fer disobeyin’ orders. One more time, no matter which way this comes out, ye ain’t a Canfield anymore and ye leave this valley on yer own and take yer chances outside.” Then he turned to Rafe. “Git some rope and tie his hands, so I don’t have to whup him again.”

  Rafe sprang up, took obvious pleasure in binding his half brother’s wrists. The eyes of the other Canfields were cold while this was going on; no sympathy for Jess showed in any of them. His own gaze shuttled back and forth defiantly. His attitude was that of an enraged, cornered animal.

  “Okay,” Roaring Tom said. He cleared his throat. Standing beside Jess, he went on: “This hyar’s a fambly trial of Jess Canfield fer disobeyin’ clan orders, murderin’ men. against who we had no declared blood feud, and bringin’ down bad trouble on the Canfield fambly. I’m gonna tell ye whut Fargo hyar has told me. Then we’ll take a vote. We’ll ... decide whut punishment Jess is to git.” His voice trembled, then steadied. “Now, this hyar’s the sit-cheration....”

  He talked for a long time. He told them about the Texas Rangers. He told them about Steed’s riders. And he told them of Fargo’s offer to take them to the Sierra Madre. He had Fargo stand up to repeat his description of the valley.

  “Steed’s men I ain’t skeered of,” he said. “If they come atter us with guns, we got a right to shoot back, and nobody can fault us fer thet. But the Rangers is a different case. They are the law. We come out hyar because we couldn’t fight the law back home. Now Jess has fixed it so we got to fight it hyar. But he is the one they want. If they git him, they won’t bother the rest of usns.”

  He broke off. It had grown late by now; the light pouring in through the unshuttered windows was low and slanting. “So hit comes down to this,” he said. “We got to decide two things. Fust, whut’s to be done with Jess. Second, whether we want to move outa here into them mountains down yonder, thet air more like the ones we left back home.” He paused. “Fargo hyar’s come fer Jess. If we turn Jess over to him, he’ll haul him outa hyar for trial and likely they’ll hang him. But the Rangers won’t bother us after thet. And Fargo will lead us to the Sierra Madre and settle us down thar. Er we can punish Jess on our own, the way we usually do. Banish him from the clan, er take away his guns and put him at hard labor. Er we can acquit him, let him remain a member in good standin’, and ifn the Rangers come—well, then, we’ll fight ’em long as we got a man can shoot.”

  He looked at Jess a moment, and his loud voice dropped. Now it was soft and husky. “He’s my youngest boy. But he’s jest tried to draw a gun on me. I... I can’t take no part in this, nohow. Whutever y’all decide to do, I’ll abide by. But I … cain’t vote in this. Mac, I reckon ye’ll hafta take it from hyar. I ... I’m goin’ outside and set until ye’ve decided whut Jess’s fate will be.”

  The oldest of the brothers arose, nodding, compassion on his face. “Shore, Tom. Ye’ve laid it before us fa’r and squar’. Ye go ahead. Take Fargo with ye. This is no place fer outsiders now.”

  Tom nodded. He drew his Colt, held it loosely at his side. “All right, Fargo. Come on.”

  Fargo arose, and Tom followed him out the door, closing it behind them. They moved across the settlement, and the patriarch motioned Fargo to a split-log bench in the shade of another cabin. Holding the gun steady, he sat down beside him.

  “I done some hard things in my time,” he said breathily, “but this is the hardest I ever done. My own son, my baby boy ...” Then his face firmed. “But ... there’s somethin’ wrong with thet younker. I don’t know whut it is. There always been somethin’ wrong with him. I recollect when he was little, I ketched him in the hen house one day. He had an ax in one hand, was choppin’ off the heads of chickens, had done kilt half a dozen. I asked him whut the hell he was up to, he said he liked to see the way they flopped when their heads was gone.” He spat into the dust. “Maybe I shoulda knowed then. Thet was ... onnatural. Maybe I did, but I closed my eyes ...”

  They were silent for a while, after that. Then Fargo said, “If they vote to keep Jess in the clan, what happens to me?”

  “Ye ride out through thet pass,” Tom said. “When ye reach yon side, ye git yer guns back. Atter thet, ye’d better never be caught in Black Valley again. If y’are, it’ll be presumed ye’re huntin’ Jess, and ye’ll be shot on sight.”

  Fargo’s lips thinned. That would, of course, be the next step unless—

  Then the door of the big cabin swung open. The Canfield called Mac appeared there, shorter than Roaring Tom, but wide-shouldered, his beard reaching almost to his belt. “All right, Tom,” he said quietly. “Ye, too, Fargo. Ye can come in now.”

  Roaring Tom arose as if he were stiff and sore. Heretofore, he had moved, despite his age, with a pantherish lightness, but now his shuffle was that of an old man as he crossed the dusty way between the cabins, Fargo stalking alongside. Mac stepped back to let them in.

  The room was very silent, all eyes of the Canfields on Roaring Tom. Jess, hands still tied behind his back, stood straight, eyes glittering as they met Fargo’s. His mouth curled in a strange, confident grimace that could only be called a sneer.

  Mac Canfield shut the door behind them. He moved to the center of the room. “Tom, we voted. And the vote was a hunderd per cent. And this is whut we’ve decided.” He cleared his throat “Fust of all, thet valley down in Mexico sounds mighty good to us. This ain’t never been like home hyar. Not enough timber, too damned hot, cactus instid of laurel and rhododendron. All of us, we’re homesick fer some real, man-sized mountains. We have voted unanimously, thet we’d like to pull out fer Mexico.”

  Tom let out a long breath, realizing that he had just heard a death sentence pronounced on his son.

  Mac raised his hand before the old man could speak. “Jess,” he said, “has jest about forfeited all right to be a Canfield. Bushwhackin’ a Whipple’s one thing; drawin’ down on a stranger and shootin’ him through the back’s another. Thet’s murder. But—” His blue eyes lanced toward Farg
o. “But the Canfields have never turned none of their kin over to the law to go to jail, and they ain’t gonna do hit now. No Canfield’s gonna be locked in no cage and then hanged like a rabbit in a snare. So we decided thet Fargo cain’t take him outa here to put him in no jailhouse.”

  “Thank God,” whispered Roaring Tom.

  “So hit’s up to Fargo,” Mac said. “If he wants Jess, he’s got to take him, man-to-man. They kin fight, anyway they please—trial by combat, like we used to call hit. Jess gits to choose the weapons. This fight will be to the death ...”

  “Oh,” Tom said gustily. He looked at Fargo.

  “If Fargo’s man enough to take him, he can have him. If Jess takes Fargo, he rides clear of us Canfields and never comes back. If Fargo kills Jess, he’s got to take us to the Sierra Madre. If Jess kills him, we’ll tough hit out here as best we kin. Thet’s the way we got hit figgered; thet’s the way hit’s gonna be. Unless Fargo don’t want to fight. In thet case, he rides out now and never comes back. After which, tomorrow, Jess rides out the same way. Either one of ’em try to return he’ll be shot on sight.”

  He looked at Fargo. “Whut do you say, man? You want Jess bad enough to fight him to git him?”

  Fargo turned toward Jess. He saw the grin on the bound man’s countenance, the utter surety, the confidence. “Yeah,” he said. “I want him that bad.”

  Mac turned to Jess. “Ye?”

  “After I kill him, I go,” Jess said. “And the rest of ye, all of ye, can go to hell.” His eyes shuttled to Roaring Tom. “Ye too, old man, damn ye.”

  Tom let out that gusty breath again. He drew himself up. “So be it,” he said. “Cut him loose and let him choose his weapons.”

  Jess’s gaze met Fargo’s again; and in that instant it flashed into Fargo’s mind what weapons Jess would choose. He had beaten Jess with his fists and, this morning, at shooting. He was not surprised when, Jess, hands freed, rubbed his wrists and said, tersely, “Knives.” Then he reached out and whisked the huge Bowie off his father’s hip.

  Chapter Seven

  “All right,” Fargo said. “I want my own knife.”

  “Git it fer him,” Tom said heavily.

  Fargo’s weapons were still in the corner, where Tom had piled them the night before. Mac went to them, brought back the Batangas knife. Jess made passes, with the heavy Bowie. His lip curled at the sight of the blade from the Philippines, two inches shorter and much lighter than his weapon, as Fargo snapped back the folded handles.

  “You aim to come up against me with thet knittin’ needle?” He sliced the air with the big Bowie blade.

  “I figure on it,” Fargo said, and made a couple of limbering passes.

  “Outside,” Mac said. “Past the settlement. Out in the open, whar thar’s plenty room.” He tilted up the muzzle of a Sharps. “Nobody tries to cut until I give the word. Fust one to take unfa’r advantage, he gits a rifle ball.”

  They stalked out, Jess in the lead, still flexing his wrists. Fargo followed, doing the same. Roaring Tom was the last in line. They crossed the settlement, reached the open ground beyond. There was another hour of light, Fargo figured. Before the sun went down, either he or Jess would be dead.

  On a flat tufted with grama grass, the Canfields made a spacious ring around them. The children had come up to watch too, fascinated and wide-eyed. Fargo and Jess stood inside the ring, stripped to the waist, knives down, facing one another. The evening light glinted off of bronzed, muscular torsos.

  Jess’s face was confident. “Three y’ars ago,” he said thinly, “afore we left the Smokies, two Whipples come at me with knives. I gutted both of ’em and they never laid an edge on me.”

  “Good for you,” said Fargo quietly.

  “Enough talk,” Mac said. “Ye two ready?”

  Fargo looked around the ring. Roaring Tom was nowhere to be seen.

  “I’m ready,” he said.

  “Me, too,” Jess said.

  “Then cut loose your wolves,” said Mac. “Go to hit.”

  The blades came up, glinting in the slanting light.

  The two men moved cautiously toward one another, circling, appraising, each getting the measure of his opponent. Fargo was not thinking now; thinking was fatal in a knife-fight. A knife-fight was all speed and reflex. Once you were in it, your body, your nerves and muscles, had to take over. Brain was a handicap. It made you guess what the other man would do, and if you were wrong, you were finished. Better to depend on skill, instinct.

  Instinct told Fargo now that he was up against a man with a natural talent, maybe even genius, as a knife-fighter, and plenty of acquired skill on top of that. Jess’s movements were sleek and easy and free-flowing as those of a panther as he circled Fargo, sizing up the older man’s guard. He was not one whit less coldblooded or determined than his opponent. This was, perhaps, going to be as tough a fight with blades as Fargo had ever been in. Suddenly he made up his mind to carry the fight to Jess and went in quickly—crouched, shoulder out, shielding heart and gut with that and his folded left arm, his blade darting like a snake’s tongue.

  It rang on the steel of the heavy Bowie, as Jess parried deftly, and slid aside under the big knife’s weight. Then, as Fargo whirled, Jess thrust, and only Fargo’s quick, instinctive turn kept him from being split. The Bowie’s long, glittering blade thrust between his arm and body, ripping skin on his flank as it touched him when Jess pulled back. Then they circled one another again, each seeking an opening.

  Jess charged next. He came in with the blade swooping, swirling, darting, menacing, seeking to pull Fargo’s away and make an opening. Fargo gave him none, and when the Bowie slashed for his belly he fended it with all the strength in his right arm. Steel chimed on steel, slid off, and they backed away once more. Then Fargo moved in.

  The long, thin blade of the Batangas knife winked out, sheered off the Bowie, drew back. Jess took that instant when Fargo was slightly off balance and ran in, not thrusting but hacking, seeking with the chopping weight of the big weapon to sever the tendons in Fargo’s wrist. Fargo jerked his body, dropped his right arm as his knife winked in the air. He caught the knife in his left—the equivalent of the border shift quick transfer as it was performed with a sixgun—and came in from the other flank.

  This was a tactic he’d often used, taking advantage of being ambidextrous, but this time he’d miscalculated. Jess had not forgotten how Fargo had shifted balance in the fistfight at Fort Davis, and had been waiting for the move. He took advantage of the opening, slashed in, and suddenly blood coursed hot and streaming down Fargo’s flank; the grate of steel on bone sounded in his ear. Only the rib the Bowie’s edge encountered saved Fargo. But now Fargo knew his time was running out. This slice would bleed a lot and weaken him; he had no more than three or four minutes left before his strength would begin to fade.

  Fargo bared his teeth in a wolfish snarl. He forgot all science, all calculation. A kind of red mist swirled before his eyes as he felt blood flowing down his waist, his leg. Suddenly he blurred in, light on his feet, using boxer’s footwork, and the Batangas knife chopped and thrust and chopped and thrust and chopped again. Jess parried deftly, coolly, but the raging ferocity of Fargo’s attack drove him back and around the circle and still Fargo came on, thrusting, chopping, seeking an opening. In the slanting light, the evening hush, the blades shone and rang, chiming like bells, again and again; and Fargo pressed on mercilessly. He was not thinking about himself now, not thinking about defense; all he wanted to do was get past Jess’s guard one time, only once, and kill the man. In that instant there was no more reason or humanity in him than a charging bull, and not much more caution.

  One way or the other, this had to be ended quickly; he had to kill Jess within the next two minutes or become vulnerable from loss of blood and die himself.

  The sudden change in attitude from coolness to ferocity dismayed Canfield. He swung, tried to get distance between them, but Fargo would not let him and came on savagely, working i
n ever closer. Through sweat that veiled his own eyes, Fargo saw perspiration running down Jess’s face as the man parried every thrust. Jess’s face was almost bloodless now, too; he must never have met a man who came in so viciously, with such skill and yet with such disregard for his own safety. There was something awesome, frightening, about Fargo’s fury and desperation. It shook Jess up; and suddenly he lost his self-possession and his coolness. He began to flail and parry more wildly, more desperately, as he saw the madness in Fargo’s eye. He began to back more swiftly; now he was on the run. Red and slippery with blood, Fargo came in relentlessly, as remorseless as death itself. His blade was never still, always flicking, darting, hacking, seeking an opening through which he could deliver a killing stab.

  For all his skill, for all his genius, this was what Jess lacked: the ability to forget himself and his safety to embrace death if, in dying, he could bring down his opponent. In this instant, he must have seen in Fargo the Grim Reaper embodied, using a foreign knife instead of a scythe, and it broke his nerve. Fargo heard his stertorous breathing, saw fear and dismay in his eyes. Now he knew that panic had seeped into Jess and would make him over-react; and if he were to win, Fargo had to make that panic grow, that awed fear at facing an opponent who was not a human being so much as a force of nature. Fargo’s lips peeled back from his teeth in a snarl totally feral, and without thinking of his own safety, he bore in even harder. Jess tried to back-pedal, tossing his head to clear his eyes of sweat and down-falling locks of tow-colored hair. Then, in a crucial peak of panic, he sought to gamble all on one last chance and came back at Fargo almost blindly, no longer thrusting but hacking madly with the heavy Bowie, determined to use it to knock Fargo’s lighter knife aside and chop Fargo to shreds with it.

  That was what Fargo wanted. He did not calculate; all his moves were rage-born and instinctive, but Jess’s response and new tactics gave him his chance. Fargo lowered his guard, presented himself almost naked to Jess’s charge. Jess came in with the Bowie raised for a blow that would cut Fargo’s throat. There was fear and determination in his racked, grim expression. The Bowie whistled down and sideways. Fargo fell, ducked, heard the knife rush through the short white hair that clad his scalp. He then came up from a half-kneeling posture inside Jess’s guard and caught Jess below the navel, thrust in and ripped upward even as he shoved forward.