River of Blood

by William W. Johnstone

  Breckinridge Wallace said, “I know he’s here. I want to see him.”

  Ophelia stammered, “You . . . you can’t—”

  Breckinridge stepped into the foyer, brushing her aside easily but being careful not to get too rough about it. He smelled the smoke from a pipe and moved into the entrance to the lamp-lit parlor.

  Aylesworth sat smoking in an armchair near the fireplace, with a snifter of brandy on a small table beside him. He had a leather-bound book open in his lap. He gave every appearance of being a fine young gentleman enjoying a peaceful evening at home.

  He didn’t look like the monster he was.

  Nor was he alone in the parlor. Maureen sat on a divan across the room, needlework in her lap. She gaped at Breckinridge, apparently as astounded by his arrival as her maid had been.

  “Wallace,” Aylesworth grated. His jaw had clenched tightly at the sight of the big, redheaded young man.

  “Didn’t expect to see me alive, did you?” Breckinridge asked. “Not after you hired Harry Sykes to round up a bunch of men, track me down, and kill me.”

  Aylesworth’s lips thinned even more. He said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I reckon you do. So does the law, since Sykes told all about it to try to save his hide.”

  That was a lie, but Aylesworth didn’t have to know that. Not yet, anyway.

  “Richard, what . . . what is this?” Maureen asked anxiously as she leaned forward. “Did you really send someone to hurt Breckinridge?”

  “Wallace is insane,” Aylesworth snapped. “He always has been. You know that, Maureen.”

  Breckinridge shook his head and said, “I ain’t the crazy one. I’m not the one who fired off a pistol in here and nearly killed my own wife. You couldn’t stand knowin’ what really happened, could you, Aylesworth? And you couldn’t take the rightful blame for it yourself, so you twisted things around and made it all my fault, at least in your head. You figured if I was dead, that’d put an end to it.” Breck’s voice hardened even more. “But it won’t. The four of us here”—he gestured to indicate himself, Maureen, Aylesworth, and Ophelia—“we know the truth and we always will.”

  Aylesworth flung the book aside and surged up out of the chair. He took a step toward Breckinridge and raged, “You bastard! You should have died that night, not my child! You were the one I was aiming at, not Maureen—”

  Aylesworth stopped short as three more men appeared in the foyer, just outside the parlor. One was the stolid lawman, Sheriff Parley Johnson, who had tried more than once to arrest Breckinridge for things he hadn’t done. Just behind him were Morgan Baxter and the lawyer Morgan had hired, using some of the considerable estate he had inherited from his late father. The three of them had come in while Breck was distracting Aylesworth, and the ploy had worked. They had heard Aylesworth’s declaration that he was the one who had wounded Maureen and caused her to lose the baby, not Breckinridge Wallace.

  Sheriff Johnson, convinced of Breckinridge’s guilt because of Aylesworth’s false testimony, hadn’t wanted to go along with the plan at first, but Morgan and the lawyer had talked him into it. Now the lawman stepped into the room, his face dark with anger, and said, “You lied to me, Mr. Aylesworth. All of you did. You let me go after an innocent man.”

  Aylesworth stared wildly around the room, looking a little like a trapped animal now. He struggled to find his voice, then said, “Wallace isn’t innocent! He . . . he caused the whole thing. He came to see my wife—”

  “Breckinridge was saying good-bye, Richard,” Maureen said. “It was your own jealousy that caused . . . that caused . . .”

  She couldn’t go on. She lifted her hands, put them over her face, and sobbed.

  With a visible effort, Aylesworth regained some of his usual arrogant bravado. His jaw jutted out defiantly as he asked, “Are you going to arrest me, Sheriff?”

  “For lying to me?” Johnson shrugged. “Maybe I should, but we all know the judge’d just throw it out. For shooting your wife? Well, as bad as that might be, I reckon it really was an accident.”

  “How about for hirin’ somebody to kill me?” Breckinridge asked.

  “Since Sykes is dead, that’s your word against Aylesworth’s. Can’t prove it either way.”

  Aylesworth glared at Breckinridge and said, “You told me Sykes was alive!”

  “Nope, that’s just what you figured.” Breckinridge looked at the sheriff. “You heard him admit that he knew Sykes.”

  “No crime in knowing somebody,” Johnson said. “You better be satisfied with what you got, Wallace. I’ll see to it that all the charges against you are dropped. Your name is clear again.”

  Breckinridge thought about it, but only for a second. Then he nodded and said, “All right. I guess I got what I came for, anyway.” He looked at the woman crying on the divan. “I’m sorry, Maureen, I truly am. Sorry for the way it all worked out for you more than anything else. I hope you’ll be happy someday, one way or another.”

  “Breckinridge!” she said brokenly as he turned to leave.

  “Good-bye, Maureen,” he told her without looking back. He strode out of the house. Morgan, the lawyer, and Sheriff Johnson followed him.

  Johnson said, “Everybody’s going to know what really happened that night, Wallace. The gossip’s gonna be mighty hard on that poor woman.”

  Morgan said, “It seems to me she made her own bed, Sheriff. You can’t expect Breck or anyone else to feel sorry for her.”

  “Everybody makes decisions they wish they hadn’t,” Breckinridge said. “Nothin’ they can do except carry that with ’em for the rest of their lives and hope they can do enough good to balance out some of the mistakes.” He sighed and shook his head, then turned and shook hands with the lawyer, thanking him. Then he took Morgan’s hand and pulled the smaller man into a bear hug, slapping him on the back. “See you in St. Louis in a couple months?”

  “I’ll be there,” Morgan promised. “I’ll have an outfit waiting and ready for us to head back to the mountains.”

  “That’ll be a good day,” Breckinridge said. “Right now, though, I got to head on out to the farm. Got somebody I need to introduce to the folks.”

  With a smile on his face, he walked toward the wagon where Dulcy waited on the seat, holding herself a little stiffly because she was still recuperating from the deep graze in her side. The joy that had filled him when he realized she was wounded but still alive remained just as strong in him as ever.

  Dulcy was well enough to travel and had insisted on coming with him back to Knoxville. She returned his smile as he climbed onto the seat beside her and took up the reins.

  “Did everything go like you wanted it to?” she asked.

  “Went as well as could be expected,” Breckinridge replied. “Lot of pain in that house, though. Reckon there always will be.”

  He flicked the reins and got the team moving.

  As it rolled along the street, Dulcy asked, “Are you sure you want to take me home with you?”

  “I want you to meet my folks and my brothers,” Breckinridge answered without hesitation. “It’s only fittin’ that they all get to know you before the weddin’. But the farm’s not my home anymore.”

  She linked her arm with his and leaned her head against his shoulder.

  “My home . . . our home . . . is in the mountains,” Breckinridge said.

  Turn the page for a special excerpt of the next adventure in the bestselling Duff MacCallister series.

  DAY OF RECKONING

  A Duff MacCallister Western

  by NATIONAL BESTSELLING AUTHORS

  WILLIAM W. JOHNSTONE

  with J. A. Johnstone

  The legendary MacCallister clan brought 500 years of Highlander tradition, honor, and fighting courage to the American frontier. In an astounding new novel from the national bestselling Johnstones, Duff MacCallister rides into the Colorado mountains with a young girl at his side—and a gang of stone-cold killers eagerly waitin
g for them . . .

  DAY OF RECKONING

  When Duff MacCallister sees smoke rising from his neighbor’s ranch, he knows that something is very wrong. But he isn’t prepared for what he finds: smoldering buildings, a rancher and his wife brutally slaughtered, and a 14-year-old survivor who could not save her parents. Now Duff is going after the killers—and his only companion is the headstrong girl who refuses to be left behind.

  Duff and his new companion head into the towering Gore Range. Up ahead are two convicted murderers who were about to be hung in Cheyenne, and the killers who broke them lose. Duff doesn’t have a plan—or a prayer. But the girl will be more help than he can know, and when the day of reckoning comes, bullets and blood will prove who is the bravest and fiercest fighter of all . . .

  Available now, wherever Pinnacle Books are sold.

  Chapter One

  Archer, Wyoming Territory

  The first rider came into town from the north, stopping in front of Mrs. Steinberg’s Boarding House. He tied his horse off at the hitching post, then went inside. He was a large man who had once been a prizefighter, and that occupation had left him with two distinguishing features. His nose had been broken so that the bridge of it lay closer to his face than normal, and he had a cauliflower left ear. He signed his name, Clay Callahan, with tobacco-stained fingers.

  “Will you be staying with us for an extended period of time, Mister . . .” Bella Steinberg paused to read the name, “Callahan? The reason I ask is, anyone who stays longer than a month gets a special rate.”

  “No,” Callahan replied. “Just for a few days.”

  “Oh? Well don’t get me wrong, I am most happy to have you, but generally people who stay less than a month take their lodging at the hotel.”

  Callahan smiled. “I like the homey atmosphere of a boardinghouse,” he said.

  “Yes,” Mrs. Steinberg replied. “All of our residents regard this as their home, and as you will see when you dine with us, it is as if we are one big family.”

  “That’s exactly the way I like it.”

  Zeke Manning rode into town two days later, checking in to the Adam’s Hotel. Manning and Callahan weren’t in the same room at the same time until the next evening after Manning arrived. Manning went to the Cock o’ the Walk Saloon, where Callahan, who had already been in town for three days, was joking and laughing with the new friends he had made. And though Callahan saw Manning come in, the two men maintained a separation.

  In a town as small as Archer, any new visitor was noticed, and several of the saloon patrons commented on getting two new people coming to town within just a few days.

  It created even more attention when two more strangers arrived later that same evening. The two men were laughing and talking loudly as they stepped up to the bar.

  “Barkeep!” one of them called. “A beer for me ’n my brother.”

  The bartender filled two mugs and set them before the brothers. One of the two turned away from the bar and looked out over the ten tables, all of them occupied by from one to four men. A couple of bar girls were hopping from table to table.

  “Hello to all here. My name is Dan LaFarge. This is my brother, Don. Anyone here from Texas?”

  “Yeah, I’m from Texas,” a rather large man said.

  “I’m from Texas, too. What about it?”

  “We’re from Texas, too. Barkeep, give our Texas friends a drink on me ’n my brother.”

  Dan and Don flirted outrageously with the bar girls and went from table to table, laughing and talking with the other saloon patrons.

  * * *

  Archer was a railroad town, five miles east of Cheyenne, and it was here that the holding and feeding pens were located for shipping cattle. Earlier that day, Duff MacCallister, Elmer Gleason, and Wang Chow had brought cattle here to be shipped out.

  “Here you go, Mr. MacCallister, a receipt for the rail shipment of two hundred Black Angus cattle to the McCord Beef Processing Plant in Kansas City. Your beeves will be there in two days,” Bull Blackwell said.

  Blackwell was the shipping agent for the Union Pacific Railroad in Archer. He got the name “Bull” because he was a big man, with broad shoulders and a somewhat oversized head that seemed to sit directly on those shoulders, without benefit of a neck.

  “Thank you, Bull,” Duff replied.

  “You know, Mr. MacCallister, you have become one of our largest cattle shippers. You are, by far, the largest shipper of Black Angus, and while I would have to examine all the documents to be certain, I can tell you without equivocation that you are in the top five for all of Wyoming.”

  “Aye, coming to Wyoming was a good thing for me,” Duff replied. “’N I can say, ’tis lucky I have been in introducing the Angus cattle to the American market.”

  “Luck hasn’t had anything to do with it, the way I’ve heard it told,” Blackwell said. “You come to Wyoming and started raising all these black cows that many of the other ranchers teased you about.” Blackwell chuckled. “I’d be willing to bet a dollar to a cow turd that nobody is teasing you now.”

  Duff laughed. “Sure ’n ye meet a lot of people who are willing to bet a cow turd do ye? ’N would be for tellin’ me, Bull, what you would do with the cow turd once you won it?”

  “Well, I don’t really want a cow turd, you understand, it’s just . . .” Blackwell stopped in mid-sentence when he saw the twinkle in Duff’s eye. “You’re funnin’ me, aren’t you? ’N here I didn’t think you Scotsmen had a sense of humor.”

  “’Tis thankin’ ye I am, Bull, for handling the shipping for me. I’ll see you next time I come this way.”

  “You going back home today?” Blackwell asked.

  “Nae, I think I’ll ride over to Cheyenne before I go back. Cheyenne is only five miles, and ’tis so infrequently that I am this close that I plan to stay for a day or two ’n enjoy all the benefits of a big city.”

  To anyone from one of the bigger cities back east, such as St. Louis, Chicago, Philadelphia, or New York, Duff’s reference to Cheyenne as a “big” city might sound laughable. But compared to where Duff called home, Cheyenne was a metropolis.

  Home, for Duff, was Sky Meadow, a very large ranch that was located about eight miles south of Chugwater. He did his banking there, he shopped there, he had very good friends there, most notably Biff Johnson who owned Fiddler’s Green.

  Biff Johnson was a retired army first sergeant who had served with General Custer. Indeed, Biff had made that last scout with Custer, though he was spared the ultimate disaster because when Custer divided his regiment, Biff was with Captain Benteen.

  Biff’s saloon, Fiddler’s Green, got its name from an old cavalry legend. The legend claimed that any trooper who had ever heard the sound of “Boots and Saddles” would, when they die, go to a broad, inviting meadow, surrounded by shade trees and bounded by a sparkling brook. Then all the old cavalrymen there gathered would have all they wanted to eat and drink, they would enjoy the music of “Garryowen” and “The Girl I Left Behind Me,” and sit around telling drunken war tales until the last day.

  Fiddler’s Green wasn’t just a saloon for men, it was more on the order of what the English called a pub, and thus was of the character that decent women did not have to feel out of place while visiting. One woman who was a patron of the saloon was Meagan Parker. Meagan owned a dress emporium in Chugwater, and she and Duff had what could be referred to as a “special” friendship.

  Meagan was also Duff’s business partner. She had been an early believer in his idea of introducing a new breed of cattle to the area and had loaned him money at a time when he needed it. Duff, long ago, had gathered the wherewithal to repay Meagan, but she didn’t want to be repaid. She preferred, instead, to be a part owner of the cattle, and the nature of their relationship was such that Duff found her interest and participation in his ranch to be agreeable enough that he made no effort to disentangle himself for her involvement.

  Though he didn’t share the information with Bul
l Blackwell, one of the reasons Duff wanted to go to Cheyenne was because Meagan would be there on a buying trip for her store. They had already planned their rendezvous.

  As Duff left the cattle holding lot, he had absolutely no idea of the drama that was occurring at this very moment just down the street in the Cattlemen’s Bank and Trust of Archer. There, Callahan, Manning, and the two LaFarge brothers were about to play out the real reason they had come to Archer, for though the four men had arrived in town separately, that had been a subterfuge. They were about to come together to carry out the nefarious scheme they had planned two days earlier.

  It was Callahan who went into the bank first to break a fifty-dollar bill, requesting five and one-dollar bills. Counting out the money, kept the teller preoccupied. Because of that, he paid no attention to Manning who came into the bank shortly thereafter and stepped over to a table, where he began to fill out a bank draft.

  A moment later the two LaFarge brothers stepped into the bank as well. It wasn’t until then that the teller noticed, with some surprise, that there were so many people in the bank at the same time. But what was even more surprising than the number of customers was the fact that he didn’t recognize any of them. And, in his position as bank teller, he knew almost everyone in town.

  The two LaFarge brothers raised their guns.

  “This is a holdup!” one of them shouted.

  “Oh, I’ll be damned!” the teller said to Callahan. “I believe they intend to rob the bank!”

  “Oh, we not only intend to rob the bank, we are going to do it,” Callahan said.

  “You are a part of this?” the bank teller asked.

  “We all four are,” Manning said from the table where he had, ostensibly, been filling out a bank draft. Manning, like the two LaFarge brothers, was holding a pistol in his hand.

  Callahan handed the teller the pillowcase he had taken from his bed in the boardinghouse.