by John Benteen
“I didn’t think so.” She unfastened the skirt, let it drop. The silken undergarments beneath it followed, and she was naked. “I understand the nights get cold up here, Fargo. You’ll need somebody to ... help you keep warm.” Her pink tongue moved across her lips and she came to him and pressed against him, and her hand went boldly and wantonly to his belt and unlatched the buckle.
Then they were on the bed, the softness of her rising to meet and engulf him. She moaned deep in her throat, and her sharp nails dug into his back. Their first coupling was quick, almost ferocious, animal. The second was slower, more voluptuous, and she had a chance to display her skills ... And when that was over, she lay cradled in Fargo’s arms. “I won’t be any trouble to you,” she said. “I’m as good at everything else as I am at that. Did you buy me a gun?”
“Not yet.”
“I want a Smith Wesson .32 revolver, if you can get one here, and a Winchester .30-30 carbine. I’ve used both of them before. You couldn’t hire a man to side you, Fargo, who’d be a better shot than I am.”
“It’s one thing to shoot,” Fargo said. “It’s another to kill a man.”
Jane sighed and stretched lazily. “I’ve done that, too.”
Fargo sat up quickly. “What? Where? How?”
“The studio hushed it up. I’m not going to go into details with you, except to say that I had to do it to save my life. He was drunk, and if I hadn’t had a gun in my vanity drawer—anyhow, I found out, Fargo. I can do it. Don’t worry about that. If I have to, I can do it.”
Fargo looked down at her. “Damn,” he said. “I don’t think I ever met a woman like you before.”
She smiled faintly. “You never will, either.” And she pulled him down to her again and he came willingly.
So he had brought her with him after all, and now they were in Circle City. And she wore the pistol under her parka, cinched high around her waist, butt forward so it came easily out from beneath the loose garment. Fargo had seen her draw, and her speed was incredible. “I had to learn for a picture I was in,” she told him. “So I went to Wyatt Earp and he taught me.”
It took some time to get the mountainous pile of supplies off-loaded from the river steamer, Fargo checking everything meticulously, keeping an especially watchful eye on his trunk. As soon as it was ashore, he unlocked it, took out the double-barreled shotgun and a bandolier of shells, threw the bandolier across his chest and slung the shotgun muzzles down on his right shoulder, behind his back. He felt better with it on, the Batangas knife already sheathed at his hip; he had been wearing the Colt on a cartridge belt around his waist ever since they’d left Nome and he’d had to don a parka. Jane looked at him with a mixture of curiosity and awe as he carefully relocked the trunk. “You’re a walking arsenal.”
“As bad as it was in Nome, it’s liable to be downright hairy here. Come on. We’ll go see about finding a place to stay.”
She motioned to the supplies. “What about these?”
“They’ll be all right. That’s one thing you don’t have to worry about in the North. It’s a hanging offense to steal another man’s goods or break into his cache. Dogs are all we have to worry about, and it’s up high enough so they won’t bother it.”
She fell in beside him, and they left the dock, where more supplies were being unloaded from a barge towed up behind the river boat. There was a range of hills beyond the town, and Fargo knew that they hid Birch Creek, about six miles away, where the original strike that had given birth to this place had been made. The wind that came off it was cold, and Fargo sniffed it like an animal. The trip upriver had taken a long time, and the early freeze-up the Indians were predicting was not far off. He could smell it in the wind. The Yukon Queen had one more trip scheduled, but Fargo had a hunch she’d not make it, certainly not this far north. In another week, unless he missed his guess, there’d be ice in the river, nearly a month before the usual time.
The main street was wide, muddy, the buildings that lined it mostly of logs. They passed the shuttered theaters, a general store that was closed. Three Indians sat on its porch, watching a savage fight between two Malamutes, great shaggy brutes of dogs that were locked in snarling combat. Fargo and Jane walked wide around them. Then Fargo halted, cocking his head. He heard music.
It was the tinny sound of a piano, and it came from a building on the other side of the street. Dance Hall and Bar. Fargo’s brows went up. “Sounds like there’s still life in Circle City.” They went on, passed another store. This one, larger than the first, was open; as they went by, two men came out of it and halted, staring at the woman, and at the man beside her hung with weapons. Fargo sized them up, and again his brows arched a little. They did not look quite like miners. There was a subtle difference, not the least of which was the fact that both wore Colts strapped around their waists. Their eyes raked over him, over Jane, and suddenly they turned and went back into the store. Fargo read the sign over its door: Whetstone General Mercantile & Trading.
Now they had reached the part of the street lined with dwellings. Most were rude log cabins, chinked with moss and clay. What surprised Fargo was the number of them that were inhabited; smoke curled from their chimneys, or, instead of hanging open in vacancy, their doors were shut, locked. He frowned. Circle City, it seemed, was coming back to life; and that didn’t make sense. There had been no word of any new strike in this area, and generally that was the only thing that would revive a ghost town. And—why were so many of the cabins lived in and yet the streets apparently so empty? He felt again the same sort of prickle of the short hair that had warned him of Denny that foggy night; something was out of kilter here. And he adjusted the shotgun’s sling, to make sure the weapon rode exactly right.
Only when they reached the very end of the street, near a patch of woods, did they find a vacant house. It was bigger than most of the others, though far from being imposing, and it seemed well made except that the chinking was in bad condition, which probably accounted for its emptiness. Fargo pushed the half-open door the rest of the way and they went inside. The place smelled musty, and there was the scurry of a rat or a squirrel. But its window panes were intact, and it had a floor of neatly fitted split logs. There were also two bunks built in against the walls.
“Gee,” Jane Deering said. “It’s not much, is it?”
“I’ve slept in lots worse. We can try the other streets, but I’ve a hunch this is as good as we’ll find. We can hire some Indians to fix the chinking tomorrow. Far as I’m concerned, this one will do. Anyhow, we can get the gear under cover here and if we need to, we can pick out another one later.”
“Whatever you say,” she murmured. “This is one time when the woman has no voice in house hunting. Anyway, there’s no rent to pay.”
Then a deep, masculine voice behind them said: “Sorry, ma’am. That’s where you’re wrong.”
Jane and Fargo turned, and Fargo’s eyes narrowed at the sight of the man standing there with a thumb hooked in the cartridge belt cinched around his waist. And at the sight, too, of the pair of armed men he had seen at the store, standing behind him.
Then the man who had spoken came forward a step. He wore a caribou-hide parka with the hood thrown back; he was about Fargo’s age, and he was strikingly handsome, with blond hair and a pair of the coldest blue eyes Fargo had ever seen. They raked over Jane Deering like hands feeling and caressing her, glinting with appreciation and desire. Then they came to Fargo, and suddenly they were like ice.
Fargo returned the gaze steadily. “Who’re you?”
The blond man smiled faintly. “My name’s Jason Whetstone. I own this place.”
Fargo frowned. “This house?”
“That’s right,” Whetstone said. His smile widened, but there wasn’t much humor in it. “And for that matter—the whole damned town.” He took another step forward, and Fargo saw that the gun on his hip was a .44 Colt. “So you don’t stay here—not in this house, not in Circle City—unless I say you can.”
Fargo was the one who smiled now, if the wolfish pulling away of his lips from his teeth could be called a smile. “You’re taking a lot on yourself, Mr. Whetstone.” He had one thumb latched in the sling of the shotgun. “I never heard of Circle City being a closed town before. Never heard of one man owning it, either.”
“But I do. All legal. Every time somebody moved out, I bought his place. And when a fellow like you—lugging enough hardware to fight a war—shows up, I want to know who he is and where he’s from.”
“That’s something nobody else in the North ever asked me,” Fargo said quietly. “Never.”
“The North’s changed, maybe.”
“No,” Fargo said. “Not that much. When I take a notion to tell you, I’ll tell you. But not before.” He didn’t like Whetstone; he didn’t like Whetstone at all, and he didn’t feel like trying to conceal that fact. Besides, he had been cooped up on the boat for so long that he could feel the need for action stirring within him like an uncaged animal.
Whetstone chuckled softly. “You are a tough ‘un, aren’t you? Just as tough as that little lady there with you’s pretty. You her husband? You wouldn’t want her to be left a lone, lorn widow in a place like this, would you? Of course, she wouldn’t be lone and lorn very long; I’d guarantee that.” Then his smile vanished, and so did all the ease in his manner. “I want to know who you are and what you’re doin’ here. And you’d better damned well tell me before that boat leaves—because if I don’t like havin’ you here, you’ll be goin’ back out on it.”
“All right,” Fargo said quietly. “You feel that way about it, then I’d better—” his thumb simply twitched the sling. Suddenly the twin barrels of the shotgun swung up, their muzzles pointing from under his right arm directly at Whetstone and his two men, while Fargo’s left hand, incredibly swift, cut across his body to the triggers. In that position, the gun was upside down, but that made no difference, none at all. Fargo said: “Don’t move. This thing’s loaded with eighteen buckshot and it’ll chop all three of you before you can blink an eye.”
It had all been so terrifically fast that the three of them stood frozen. Whetstone’s face paled, but he kept his hand away from his gun. He was smart enough to realize that Fargo meant exactly what he said, and that the riot gun would spray so much lead that it would be impossible for Fargo to miss.
Then Fargo said: “Now that you’re not in a position to ask me, I’ll tell you who I am. My name is Fargo.”
Whetstone’s nostrils flared, his eyes narrowed. “Fargo. There was a Fargo in Dawson City five years ago. The Mounties ran him out ... back across the line. And ... yeah. Yeah, now I remember. He carried a shotgun with him everywhere he went.” Suddenly he seemed to relax, even seemed to be oddly pleased. “Hell, Fargo, you’re welcome here, you and your woman; more than welcome. You’re just the kind of man I want here. But first I had to make sure you weren’t a territorial Marshal.”
At that moment, there was a deep blast of a ship’s whistle from the direction of the dock. “That’s the Yukon Queen.” Whetstone added. “She’s pulling out now. So you might as well put away that hardware. You can’t fight the whole town. And the whole town will be out in full swing again as soon as that boat’s gone. A truce, Fargo, because you can kill me, but I’ve got plenty of men here who’d kill you if you did.”
Fargo stared at him. Then he nodded slowly and took his left hand away from the triggers. He let the shotgun drop back into position behind his shoulder, but he kept his hand on the sling, watching Whetstone.
Whetstone spoke impatiently to the men behind him. “Holt, Case, the two of you go on. I don’t need you anymore. And you can spread the word to the others; it’s safe to come out now. There wasn’t any law aboard that boat. Only Fargo here, and he’s wanted in Canada like the rest.” Then he grinned at Fargo. “You and your woman come on up to my store and I’ll buy you a drink and have some Indians fetch your goods and store ’em in this cabin. We had a bad start, but maybe we’ll have a good ending. And I’ve got a woman of my own. She can help yours get settled.”
Fargo’s mind worked rapidly. Something was going on here he didn’t fathom, but whatever it was, he and Jane had walked into a worse hornet’s nest than he’d expected. For the moment, there was nothing to do but play along with Jason Whetstone, try to size up the situation, and watch the man like a hawk. “Okay,” he said.
Whetstone sidled out of the cabin, never quite turning his back on Fargo. He was, Fargo read in that crablike motion, an experienced fighting man, and in another moment his mind had dredged up some information about him, for real fighting men were a small, elite class and usually known to one another by reputation. That was how Whetstone had heard of the trouble in Dawson: Fargo had indeed killed a man there in a gunfight, but the Mounties had ruled it a case of self-defense. Nevertheless, the man had had friends, and inevitably there would have had to be more killing. The Mounties had suggested to Fargo that he leave Canada before that happened; and if there was one outfit you didn’t argue with, it was the Northwest Mounted Police.
Whetstone had built his own rep years before, as a very young man, in cattle country. Even at the turn of the century, there was still rustling, still friction between cattlemen and settlers. Whetstone, like the famous Tom Horn, had hired out as a range detective, in the employ of the big cattle companies. And it was said that, like Tom Horn, Whetstone had disposed of more than one offender without the formality of bringing him to trial. A hiding place in the brush, a good rifle, a squeezed-off shot at an unsuspecting victim. They had hanged Tom Horn for such assassination, but Whetstone had gotten away with it. Nevertheless, the country had got too hot for him and he’d headed north. Since he’d come over the Chilkoot Pass, there had been brawls, other shootings, but nothing that could be pinned on him as murder, out-and-out. Now he claimed to be running Circle City. Fargo watched him carefully as he and Jane followed Whetstone into the street.
Which now was, startlingly, swarming with people. It was as if the Yukon Queen’s departure had been a signal for them to come out of hiding. And as they walked toward Whetstone’s store, Fargo, Jane, and the blond man, a warning bell rang in Fargo’s brain. These were no ordinary sourdoughs—miners, prospectors, trappers. From long experience, Fargo tagged them instantly. These were the sweepings of the North, the vultures who preyed on and lived off honest men. They all wore weapons, and they were marked with the stamp of violence. They looked at Fargo with curiosity and careful appraisal, and at Jane Deering with unabashed lust. Fargo shifted the ten-gauge to his left shoulder. He could use it with that hand as well, and that freed his right to handle the .38 Colt.
As if he could read Fargo’s mind, Whetstone chuckled softly. “Ornery-looking bunch, huh? You ought to feel right at home here, Fargo.”
“Where’d they all come from?”
“Tell you in a few minutes.” They had reached the store now, and Whetstone led them into it, still never quite turning his back on Fargo.
The place was large, crammed with merchandise, and Indians were bringing in more from the dock. Whetstone spoke to them in dialect—they were of the tribe the white men called “Sticks”, once great hunters and trappers, now corrupted by town and illegal whiskey. One of them nodded, answered, and three of them went out. Whetstone said: “They’ll take care of your stuff. I’ll guarantee its safety.” Then he led them into a back room.
It contained a stove, a table, some chairs. As they entered, Whetstone said, “Belle. We got company.”
The woman wore a red dress and she was as blonde as Whetstone, not over twenty-three or -four, and as strikingly pretty as Whetstone was handsome. She looked at Fargo and Jane with surprise in her violet eyes, and her red-painted mouth curved. “Thank God,” she said. “Another woman young enough not to need a walking stick. You from outside, honey?”
“Yes,” Jane said.
“Then we got a lot to talk about. What they wearing back in the States these days? Sit down, sit down, I’ll ge
t something to drink.” She went to a cabinet, brought out a bottle of whiskey and four glasses.
“This is Belle Dalton,” Whetstone said. “My private property.” He looked at Fargo significantly. “Belle, this is Fargo. Neal Fargo, if I remember right. And—”
“My name is Jane,” she said.
Whetstone looked amused. “Just Jane?”
“Just Jane. I travel with Fargo.”
Whetstone’s eyes ran over her. “Fargo travels first-class,” he said. Then he motioned them to chairs, poured drinks, and sat down himself, with Belle beside him. She was voluptuously built, painted like a dance hall floozy, and yet it seemed to Fargo that beneath that outer layer of hardness, there was a peculiar innocence, a quality he could not quite define, as if she were pretending to be something she wasn’t. She drank like a man, but she made a face at the taste of the whiskey.
Whetstone tossed off his own drink, sighed, reached for another. “Okay, Fargo. I won’t ask you any more questions. I’ll tell you the deal here. Then maybe you’ll tell me why you came.” He took out a cigar, thrust it between perfect teeth, lit it. “You ask me where all those wolves out there came from. Well, most of ’em from Canada. Like you—they crossed the border one jump ahead of the Mounties. They’ve been cracking down lately, cleaning out the Klondike with a fine-toothed comb. These people had to have a place to winter. I’m giving ’em that.” He grinned. “Or, rather, I’m selling it to ’em.”
He poured more drinks. “Like I said, this town was dying on its feet. Fast as people moved out, I took over their property, paid ’em a few dollars for whatever holdings they had, made my ownership legal. I brought in plenty of supplies. Then I passed the word—we had everything the owlhooters from Canada needed. Houses, grub, whiskey—and women. I’ve hired a lot of Indian squaws—these bucks around here have got to the point where they’d sell even their own women for a drink of booze. So the town’s filling up again. Before the freeze, I’ll have every hard case the Mounties have run out of Canada here in Circle City. Of course, it costs ’em—it costs like hell. But they’ve got the money. The Mounties can’t touch ’em here, and most of ’em aren’t wanted for anything in Alaska—or if they are, it’s none of my business. It don’t matter; when freeze-up comes, and it’ll be early this year, this place’ll be as far away from everything as the moon and they ain’t gonna be bothered.”
