Skull Moon

by Tim Curran

  The reverend couldn't allow that.

  There were only two possible choices: Either get out of Wolf Creek and give up all he had worked to build for so long or get rid of the man who had done this to him.

  Kill Lauters?

  It was unthinkable, yet it was exactly what he was thinking-kill the bastard. But how? How in God's name could he kill a man who was both handy with a gun and his fists?

  The reverend wasn't sure. But it had to be done.

  31

  Longtree caught up with Lauters at the livery.

  "I'd like a word with you, Sheriff," he said.

  Lauters grumbled. "I ain't got nothing to say to you, Marshal. Just get out of my way."

  But Longtree wasn't moving. He was blocking the door. "I wanna talk about the rustling ring. The Gang of Ten."

  Lauters wiped his mouth with the back of his fist. "That's a local problem," he said calmly. "It's none of your damn business. You came to stop these killings, so get to it and keep your nose out of the rest."

  Longtree hadn't expected cooperation. It was the farthest thing from his mind. The only reason he'd tracked down Lauters was to put him on the spot, to hammer him with questions about the ring and the lynching and their possible connection. And see just what kind of reaction he would get.

  "I'm thinking, Sheriff, that these murders and the ring are connected."

  Lauters licked his lips. "If you think that you're just a damn stupid breed like I thought all along."

  "I wanna know about the Gang of Ten."

  Lauters' colorless face was touched with red now. "About all you're going to know is a bullet in the belly if you don't get out of my way."

  Longtree ignored him. "I've been hearing talk that these rustlers might be mixed up in a lynching a year back."

  "Out of my way, you sonofabitch." Lauters' eyes were bulging now.

  "Folks are saying you might know more than you're telling."

  Lauters' hand was on the butt of his gun. "You little-"

  "Why'd you send your deputy away that night?"

  Lauters was trembling. "Shut up! Shut up or I'll kill you! I swear to God I will!"

  Longtree had to suppress a grin now. Not because he liked any of this, but because he was pushing Lauters' buttons and the man was reacting accordingly. Longtree had been a lawman for too long not to see that the sheriff was hiding a few things.

  Then the ultimate question: "Were you involved with the rustlers?"

  Lauters took one step forward. "You're a dead man, Longtree…"

  Longtree pulled his coat aside so the pistol on his right hip was exposed. It wasn't a threat…just a warning. "If you're planning to shoot me, Sheriff, you'd best think again."

  Lauters glared at him. There was a tic now in his lower lip. His huge hand was shaking on the butt of his Colt.

  Longtree stood his ground. "Go ahead, Sheriff, slap that leather. If this is how you deal with your problems, then I guess all my questions have been answered, haven't they?"

  Lauters made to turn away, then he launched himself at the marshal. Longtree was caught off guard. Lauters' fist caught him upside the head and he went down.

  "Big mistake," Longtree said.

  Lauters yelled something and reached down for Longtree. Longtree went back on his elbows and thrust out with his leg, catching the sheriff in the stomach with his boot. Lauters staggered back, but didn't go down. It was enough of a diversion to allow Longtree to get to his feet.

  The sheriff came at him, spit running down his chin. "I'm going to kill you, breed! With my bare hands!"

  Lauters swung roundhouse and Longtree dodged both blows, coming back instantly with two straight jabs to the face. Lauters fell back, looking shocked, blood running from his nose. With a war cry, he came on again, his punches wild. Longtree kneed him in the midsection, blocked a punch with his left and took another fist on the ear, spilling him sideways.

  "All right, you injun bastard, now you're going to get yours," Lauters said, wading in again.

  Longtree ducked two more roundhouse blows and smashed Lauters in the face with three lightning quick left jabs, followed by an upper cut that snapped the sheriff's face skyward and sent his hat pinwheeling through the air. Longtree kicked him in the stomach and spun around delivering an elbow to the bleeding wreck of his nose. Lauters went down on one knee, coughing and gasping, arms cradling his belly.

  "You want some more?" Longtree asked him.

  Lauters shook his head slowly and then drew his gun.

  Longtree saw it coming, but there was no time to draw his own weapon. He threw himself sideways just as Lauters' Colt barked. The bullet ripped across Longtree's ribs with a raw and real explosion of pain that made black dots dance before his eyes. He hit the ground, clenching his teeth, unable to draw.

  Lauters took aim, his face smeared with blood, his eyes rolling in their red-rimmed sockets.

  "Sheriff!" Bowes screamed from the door. "Drop it!"

  Lauters looked like some wild, insane thing. One of his eyes was swollen nearly closed and his face was painted up with streaks of red. He was puffy and red and panting. He looked from Bowes to Longtree, muttering under his breath.

  "For the love of Christ, Sheriff!" Bowes said, pulling his own iron. "Drop it! Drop it now! You can't shoot a man who hasn't drawn…it's murder!"

  Lauters grimaced. "I'm gonna kill that redskin bastard!"

  Bowes had his pistol on Lauters. "Please, Sheriff… Bill, for goddsake drop it! I don't wanna shoot you!"

  "Injun…just a goddamn half-breed-"

  "He's a deputy United States Marshal, Sheriff! You'll hang!"

  Lauters cursed and spat, dropping his gun. "Look what he did to me, goddammit!" Lauters cried. "Look what he did!"

  Longtree moaned and sat up. "I came…to ask him questions…he attacked me…I only defended myself…"

  Bowes helped him up. "All right, the both of you, we're going to see the doc. And I don't want any trouble."

  "Your time's coming, breed," Lauters said, marching ahead of them.

  Longtree swore at him.

  "Shut up," Bowes said through clenched teeth. "The both of you."

  32

  Later, in the jailhouse, Bowes looked disgusted. "It ain't safe to have you two in the same town together," he said. "I stopped it today, Marshal, but tomorrow…"

  Longtree took a drag from his cigarette. "He's out of control and you know it."

  "Don't you tell me what I know!" Bowes slapped a hand flat on the desk and ground his teeth together. "I can't have this, Longtree, you know I can't. Goddamn, I've got enough trouble without nursemaiding the two of you. This fucking town is like one big cauldron of shit cooking up hot and filthy. It's gonna boil over, goddammit. See if it don't."

  Longtree sighed and placed a hand lightly against his ribs. They hurt considerably, but the wound wasn't serious. Lauters' bullet had cut a trench there, but did no real damage. Longtree had been shot before and knew from experience that flesh wounds were often no less painful than taking a bullet in the belly.

  "I'd get the hell out of here if I could," Longtree told him, "but it's not that simple. Not now."

  "What are you getting at?"

  "Do you really want to know?"

  Bowes stared at him. "I wouldn't ask if I didn't."

  Longtree butted his smoke and rested his hands in his lap. "All right, I'll tell you. Lauters flew into a rage when I asked him about the rustlers, about the lynching-"

  "Do you blame him, man? He took a lot of heat about that." Bowes shook his head. "This town went crazy. It's something we'd all soon as forget."

  Longtree nodded. "I understand that, Deputy. But why did he fly off the handle about the rustlers?"

  "Same reason," Bowes said as if it was all too evident. "He's taken heat about that, too. He's never been able to stop the Gang of Ten."

  "Do you think that's the reason?"

  "I do."

  Longtree said nothing. Bowes was unflinchingly loy
al. You had to respect that in a man even when the loyalty in question was extended to a rat like Lauters.

  "Those rustlers have always been a sore spot with the sheriff." Bowes looked unhappy as he said this. "He's did his damnedest to bring them in."

  "Has he?"

  Bowes lifted an eyebrow. "What do you mean by that?"

  "You know damn well what I mean. Lauters is one of them."

  "Bullshit!" Bowes cried. "Are you drunk, Marshal? He's a good…was a good lawman."

  Longtree showed no emotion. "Even the best of us get corrupted."

  "I don't wanna hear that crap, Mister, I just don't. The sheriff is not mixed up with the Gang of Ten."

  "Or should you say Gang of Two?"

  Bowes just stared across the desk, drumming his fingers.

  "Yes, Gang of Two, Deputy. Because I think eight of their number have already been killed off. There's only two left."

  Bowes stood up, getting himself a cup of coffee. "You think that all you want, Marshal, but I don't wanna hear it. Understand? If word gets around, Lauters will kill you. And I got enough trouble without the killing of a federal officer and the arrest of a man I've known for years."

  "That's fine, Deputy," Longtree said. "Since we're on the subject, I got some more trouble for you."

  Bowes sighed. "Yeah, I need that, Longtree. You're just a prize package, ain't you?"

  "That bounty the sheriff posted," Longtree said, "it's drawn in someone. A fellow by the name of Jacko Gantz. Bounty hunter. I had a little talk with him earlier. He's camped outside town."

  "I don't see that as trouble."

  "Ten years ago I was a bounty hunter, Deputy. I took Gantz in. He spent a stretch in prison. He holds a grudge against me." Longtree explained the rest and what had happened in Gantz' camp that afternoon.

  "Well, you just got friends everywhere, don't you?"

  Longtree smiled thinly. "The point being, Deputy, that if I was to turn up missing, you know where to start looking."

  Bowes laughed. "You're wrong there, Marshal. Lots of men want you dead."

  Longtree couldn't argue with that. He had a way of making serious enemies whichever way he turned. But Lauters…Christ, he topped the list. Tom Rivers had said he was an ignorant, violent bastard, but that didn't even begin to tell the story. Longtree figured if he somehow managed to get his scrawny ass out of this particular mousetrap, he was going to have something to say to Tom Rivers. And most of it would be of the four-letter variety.

  "I'm just making you aware of what could happen," Longtree said. "Gantz is a killer and he's gonna try for me. Believe that."

  Bowes looked disgusted. "And let me guess, you're gonna sit on your ass and wait for him."

  Longtree smiled.

  And outside, Lauters slipped away, his ear cold from being pressed against the seam of the window.

  He knew all he needed to know.

  33

  It was night by the time Lauters made it out to Jacko Gantz' encampment. He saw much the same things Longtree had-the wagon, the traps and pelts, the rifles, the army tent. There was a smell of coffee and roasted meat in the air. Lauters tethered his horse to the wagon and went to the fire.

  "Anyone about?" he called out.

  He closed his eyes and winced. Talking above a whisper made him wince. Longtree had put the boot in on him but good. He was sore everywhere. His nose was bandaged. It had been broken and Doc Perry had to twist it back into shape. Lauters had never known such pain. Once, he'd tracked a Cheyenne horse thief up into the Tobacco Root Mountains and had gotten a bullet in his belly out of the deal. He'd had to dig the bullet out with his knife and even that hadn't been quite so painful.

  Goddamn Longtree.

  Goddamn half-breed sonofabitch.

  "Who're you?" a voice called from the darkness.

  Lauters didn't turn. "Lauters. Sheriff of Wolf Creek."

  "What the hell do you want? I ain't done nothing."

  "I know. I just wanna talk a spell with you. That's all."

  Gantz sat across from him at the fire. He was a big, bearded man with dark eyes. "There was another lawman here," Gantz spat.

  "Longtree?"

  Gantz nodded.

  "Well, he ain't the law around here-I am. Don't you pay no mind to what that breed says, Gantz."

  Gantz smiled. "You know my name?"

  "Word travels fast. I heard Longtree talking to my deputy about you."

  Gantz spat a stream of tobacco juice into the fire. It sizzled. "Yeah, well, I was just minding my own business, Sheriff. That bastard hit me with his gun for no good reason."

  "I don't doubt it a bit. What's the story between you two?"

  Gantz, sensing he had an ally here, told the sheriff in detail. His version was a bit different than the one Lauters had heard Longtree tell. "He's a sadistic bastard, Sheriff. I wasn't exactly a law abiding citizen…but he didn't have to shoot me."

  Lauters touched his nose. "I know what he's like, just like I know he hides behind that badge and the U.S. Government."

  "He do that to you, Sheriff?"

  Lauters nodded. "He did."

  Gantz' eyes narrowed. "He's a rough one, that Longtree. How well I know that. He's fast with an iron and faster with his fists. He was a scout for the army, you know that?"

  Lauters shook his head.

  "Pretty good one from what I hear. Not surprising with that Crow blood in him. I heard tell he was a fighter out in San Fran before turning bounty hunter and lawman."

  Lauters didn't doubt this. There were few men he couldn't lick, but Longtree fought like a possessed man. "A professional, eh?"

  "Yep. Back in the early sixties. They called him Kid Crow out there. He barefisted with some of the best, made a roll of cash I heard. Went ten rounds with Jimmy Elliot, I'm told. Got his plow cleaned pretty good, but he held up."

  Lauters took this all in. "He's trouble, Gantz. We gotta get rid of him."

  "A federal marshal?"

  "Don't matter," Lauters explained. "Like I said, I'm the law around here. If a man was to say, shoot him in the back, there'd be no questions asked. And there might be some money to be had for the man who did it."

  "Keep talking, Sheriff, you interest me…"

  34

  "Strange him not being around, wouldn't you say, Bill?"

  Lauters was at Dr. Perry's house. After he struck his deal with the devil, he rode back into town and stopped by Perry's for some dinner and conversation. The dinner was good-smoked ham, roasted potatoes, apple pie-but the conversation was lacking.

  "Everything about Claussen is strange to me," Lauters said, lighting one of the doctor's cigars. "If he ran off it suits me fine."

  Perry stroked his mustache. "But did he? That's the question."

  "What're you getting at, Doc?"

  Perry licked his lips, thinking it out carefully before speaking. "You rushed out of here this afternoon saying you were going to take care of him. Remember? And now no one can find him. Claussen's not one to miss services. He takes his religion a might serious, if you know what I mean."

  "Are you saying I had something to do with it?"

  "Did you?"

  Lauters frowned. "Goddammit, Doc, what do you think I did, kill him?"

  Perry sat back in his chair, staring at the darkness outside the window. "I hope not, Bill, I truly do. But when you left here today you looked, well, like a man capable of just about anything."

  "I didn't kill him," Lauters maintained.

  Perry looked at him with steely eyes. "Then what did you do?"

  35

  Longtree and Bowes rode up into the hills at an almost leisurely pace. They moved quietly, trying to stay in the shadows. To be caught on Blackfeet lands like this would not have been good. They paused in a thicket to make sure they were alone.

  "What in Christ made you come out here on a dare?" Longtree said.

  Bowes just shook his head. "I don't know…young…stupid…who can say?"

  "What ha
ppened?"

  Bowes' face looked to be cut from bloodless stone in the wan moonlight. But you could see his eyes and they were wide and unblinking. "I was ten years old at the time. Couple of the local kids talked me into and I felt I had to prove myself. Now, you know Crazytail-he's not a bad sort, you can deal with him, anyway. But his old man? Shit, he was a real spook. They called him Ghost Hand and the name fit. He was a big shot Blackfoot medicine man and folks around here, both white and red, were scared of him. He was our local bogeyman. You grew up around these parts, you were spoon-fed stories about him. Crazy stuff, sure. They said he once put himself in a trance that lasted for six weeks. That he did it another time for twice that long and they even buried him and one night he came walking back into Wolf Creek like Lazarus, thin as a skeleton, his face all white like death and his eyes like silver moons, dirt and roots still clinging to him. Our local minister at the time was the first to see him. He screamed, they said, fell right off his horse and broke his leg. The whole town thought Ghost Hand had come back from the dead and, who knows, maybe he did.

  "They said he could pull down the stars and create storms and winds with a single thought. That he could blight your crops and call up devils to tear your head off if he didn't like you. All sorts of crazy shit like that, you know, like pulling rattlesnakes from his sleeves and conjuring up spirit warriors. That he spoke with wolves and hawks. Folks around here used to go see him when kin were sick and he'd brew up some herbs and weeds and crap and more often than not, the cure would work. He could sort through the innards of a buffalo calf and tell you if the hunt would be successful, if your cattle would get screw worm, if your crops were gonna die. They said he told a miner the day he would die and how…and it happened.

  "You get the idea. I only saw him in the flesh once. He came into town with Crazytail and a few of the others to buy some provisions. He sat in the back of the wagon and I tried not to look at him, but I felt his eyes crawling over me like spiders. I turned and he was staring holes through me and those eyes, damn, like steel balls, like glass mirroring the sun. Those eyes caught and held you and they told you things, Marshal, showed you things. Told you that Ghost Hand knew all there was to know about you-all those things you didn't confess to nobody but yourself. He knew your nightmares and dreams, exactly what scared you. And all your dirty little secrets? Yeah, he was privy to them, too.