The Wildcatters

by John Benteen

“Does that include us?” Tess Kendall appeared in the doorway from the front room. She had combed her hair, washed away the blood on her mouth; except for one puffy eye, she bore no marks of trouble. She came into the kitchen, sat down at the table. “Maggie and I can help.”

  “You and Maggie are goin to Tulsa,” Fargo said firmly.

  “Listen. I got unfinished business with that bastard, Brasher. He owes me a lot of things, including some hard cash. I’ll never collect in any way except helpin’ you bring in this well. At least I can get back at him a little bit that way. You’re gonna have drillers here, and they won’t be able to go into Golconda for anything. They—”

  “No, Tess” Fargo said “You’re not setting up shop out here,”

  She grinned. “You’re a dirty-minded cuss. I was about to say that somebody has to cook and wash for this crowd. Lily can’t do it all by herself. That’s something me and Maggie can do.”

  Uncle John looked at her thoughtfully. “She’s right, Fargo. The happier we can keep our crew, the quicker we drill, the more money we save. You know roughnecks; they got to have their blast on payday. But if we got somebody to make sure they got good chow anytime they want it, see to it they have their comforts, it’ll be a lot easier to keep ’em out of Golconda. The other part of it—”

  He looked at Tess, grinned. “Well, that ain’t none of my business.”

  “What about it, Fargo? Let us stay for a while, anyhow.”

  Fargo drummed his fingers on the table. “It’s gonna get rough. Brasher told me—he’ll do anything to keep Curt from drillin’ on this property. We’re not gonna bring in that well without havin a fight.”

  “It can’t get any rougher than it was tonight.”

  “I think we need ’em, Fargo.” Uncle John said it bluntly.

  Fargo considered a couple of seconds longer, then shrugged. “Okay, Uncle John. You’re the boss.” He stood up. “From now on, we got to run a guard around the clock. I want everybody to sleep with his guns within reach, and I’ll take first watch. After four hours, I’ll wake you, Curt.”

  “Right,” Curt said. He also rose, stretched. “I’m gonna hit my blankets. Come on, Uncle John.”

  ~*~

  Fargo’s four hours passed uneventfully. He had not really expected an attack tonight; things would be in too much confusion in Golconda. Probably, word hadn’t yet filtered to Brasher that Uncle John had hit town; and that he was out here with Russell. Anyhow, between the liquor and the gun whipping, Brasher was probably in no condition to give orders right now. The time of maximum danger would come when their rig was built, plain for everybody to see. Brasher could then destroy everything, and put them out of business in one stroke. Nevertheless, Fargo took nothing for granted, and never let down his guard. That was the difference between the professional and the amateur—and he was the thorough professional.

  Later, Russell awakened and moved out beyond the outbuildings where there was a clear view of the perimeter. Fargo spread his blankets on the porch. Using his saddle for a pillow, his whole arsenal of weapons close at hand, he removed his boots, lay down, lit a final cigar, and let the tensions of the night unwind. Carefully, he thought about nothing at all; and yet something within him remained alert, on edge. He heard footsteps in the front room even before the door opened; and yet the footsteps and the opening of the door were both stealthy, almost soundless. Then, in the darkness, came the whisper of a woman’s voice: “Fargo.”

  He looked up at Tess as she stood over him in a robe borrowed from Lily. “Fargo, I couldn’t sleep.”

  “Umm …”

  She bent, moved the top blanket. Instinctively, Fargo made room.

  Then she was in beside him, the robe open. He rolled over, and his hard hand closed over soft, round flesh. Despite his fatigue, despite the soreness of the whiplashes on his torso, desire was immediate and strong within him. He felt her fingers unbutton his shirt, her hand move in to caress the solid muscles of chest and shoulders and back. “I owe you thanks for tonight,” Tess whispered, her breath warm in his ear. “I always pay my debts.” Then her mouth was on his, her hand moved lower....

  After a moment she shrugged out of the robe entirely. He felt her naked flesh against his, her thigh, warm, soft, heavy, thrown across his body. Her breasts, hard-pointed, rubbed against his chest. “Fargo,” and it was a moan this time that his lips and tongue sealed off. His fingers dug cruelly into the yielding curve of her buttocks as his body found and fitted itself to hers. Then, for many minutes, he forgot Brasher, he forgot Friday, he forgot everything....

  Later, like a huge, utterly contented cat, she lay cradled on his arm as they both smoked her cigarettes. Still, Fargo was not quite ready for sleep. Something had begun to nag at him, something he could not quite grasp. He asked: “Tess, how long has Maggie been with you?”

  “Maggie? Not long, few weeks. Since just before I left Texas.”

  “You didn’t go East and get her; she came to you; right?”

  “Right.”

  “How much do you really know about her?” They were so close together that their conversation was in almost inaudible whispers.

  “What are you driving at?”

  “Nothing, maybe. Answer my question.”

  Tess thought for a moment. “Well, I know only what she told me. I’d never laid eyes on her until she came to El Paso. I hadn’t been home in a long time, you see. I—wasn’t really welcome there. But my sister died and I got the letter from Maggie and sent her money to come to me; that’s all.”

  “She never suggested that she work for you? Like the other girls?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Fargo!” Tess propped herself up on an elbow. “You are a dirty-minded bastard!”

  “Shhh. Keep it down.”

  “You think I’d put my own flesh and blood, my own sister’s daughter, to work in a dirty racket like this? Of course, she never—and I never even thought about it. You can look at her and tell that she’s a nice girl, got the makings of a lady.” Her nails dug into his arm. “Now, you tell me what you’re driving at.”

  “Nothing. She’s the only one in this deal I knew nothing about, that’s all. And Brasher in her room—”

  “He broke in.”

  “I don’t doubt it. Ease off, Tess.”

  “All right. But the girl’s square. I’ll vouch for her.”

  “That’s good enough for me.” Then, as Tess started to throw aside the blanket, Fargo stopped her with an arm around her. He grinned. “Don’t go away mad.” And he pulled her mouth down to his.

  For a moment, her lips resisted him. Then they opened and he felt her tongue. After a long while, she raised her head and sighed. “I have no intention of going away mad,” she whispered and slid back under the cover, her body tightly against his, moving....

  Chapter Six

  The rain came down in torrents. The sky hung low above the plains, gray, sagging, and the water poured out as if somebody had slit the clouds. In his yellow slicker Fargo rode ahead of the cavalcade from Tulsa. His well-oiled shotgun was tilted muzzles down across his saddle pommel, protected from the weather by the extra slack of the raincoat draped over the horn. Delicately, the sorrel picked its way through mud over its fetlocks; and, strung out behind, the mules strained to pull more than a dozen heavily loaded wagons through the mire. Those wagons contained everything needed to start an oil well. In the lead wagon nine men, all experienced, huddled under the cover and sobered up from their final blowout in the big town.

  What they hauled now would get the well started, Fargo thought, but this was not the last trip they’d have to make to Tulsa. These wagons contained the rig Uncle John had shipped up from Texas: the match-marked derrick pieces, the crown block sheaves and traveling block sheaves, hook, swivel, cables, hose, standpipe, engines, pumps, drill bits and drill pipe, casing sections, cement, chemicals for the drilling “mud” Uncle John would mix himself, to his own secret specifications. There was also a turntable and six-sided “kelly
” that would supply the twist and torque to send the drill-bit biting deep into the Oklahoma soil; valves and pipe for the “Christmas tree” which could be used to cap off the well when it came in, and countless other components necessary for a successful wildcat drilling operation. A rotary rig was complicated and expensive, requiring a lot more gear than the cable-tool rig that simply hammered the bit into the ground. But it would double the feet per day a cable tool rig could drill and bite through strata the other rig could not handle. All well and good; but they would, eventually, need more pipe, more “mud” to be forced down into the wellbore. What they had already bought had made quite a dent in Fargo’s twenty thousand dollars. Less than fourteen remained in the saddlebags behind his cantle, and that would have to pay for the workers’ sky-high wages and miscellaneous expenses until the well came in.

  If it ever did, Fargo thought.

  A wildcat oil well was always a gamble. Despite Curt Russell’s geologic knowledge, despite Uncle John’s knack for tasting dirt, there was nothing guaranteed about this whole business. Sure, oil was beneath Lily Erickson’s property; probably millions of dollars worth like two oilmen estimated. That didn’t change the fact that they had to tap it on the first try. And twenty feet too far, one way or the other, a bad break in the strata, an obstruction, and they could drill forever and never see a drop. Even in the best, the richest field, not every well produced; dry holes still outnumbered gushers. And they had only one shot at it; no more. They had to be right the first time.

  It was, Fargo thought, like having one round in your rifle when a grizzly bear charged you. Grizzlies were hard to stop. If you placed that single bullet on target, you were okay; if you pulled a little to the right or left, the animal would keep on coming and eat you alive. As simple as that; it all depended on your aim.

  Then, dripping water, Uncle John pulled up alongside Fargo on his mule. His beard was sodden, matted into points; he looked like a bloated, drowned animal. “How much farther?” He almost had to yell to be heard above the drum of rain.

  “Ten miles, maybe twelve.”

  “Jesus. At this rate, it’ll be dark before we get there.”

  Fargo nodded. He twisted in the saddle. “I’m not worried about the freight wagons. It’s that damn nitro wagon that worries me.”

  “Nothing to do about it. Got to travel slow.”

  “Sure,” Fargo said. He squinted through the rain. Far to the rear, behind the wagon train, a single wagon was a dot on the horizon. Its laggardness was by design; it had to stay a good six or eight hundred yards behind the rest of the cavalcade. Carefully packed in its specially sprung box rode a half dozen flasks of nitroglycerin; there was nothing in the world more dangerous than that liquid explosive. Nitro had a temperament far worse and more unpredictable than that of a jealous woman. As long as the flasks were full and the contents remained absolutely liquid, it could be handled. But let it get old or frozen, let it crystallize, and the least impact could set off an explosion that would obliterate wagon, mules, and driver. For that matter, any hard jar or abrupt impact might set off the liquid nitro; none of it was so pure as to be without deadly crystals. The man who drove that wagon, Fargo thought, had guts. Even though the fellow was a specialist at packing and handling the stuff and drew as much pay for this trip as all the other freighters combined, he never knew which breath might be his last. The only thing in his favor was that, if the nitro blew, he would never know what hit him. One second he would be there; the next, he would cease to exist. Fargo shivered and turned forward again. He knew the nitro was necessary; Uncle John had insisted on it. “Look,” the old man had said. “We strike oil, sometimes it don’t want to come. Then you got to blast it out. You set off a charge of nitro in the well, that’ll break the rock and open up the strata, and the oil, she flows. If you got a gusher and somethin’ happens, a spark, a cigar or cigarette—or, hell, one of Brasher’s men with a flamin’ arrow like the Injuns used to use. Then you got a well fire. There again, only way to put it out is shoot it with nitro. Get some nitro down in the bore, plug the well, cut off the oxygen, put out the fire. Maybe we’ll never need the damn stuff. But if we do need it, we’ll need it in a hurry. And we won’t be able to get it from Golconda. Better to have it on hand.”

  At his own trade, the old man was a top professional, and Fargo respected his judgment All the same, it made him nervous. Brasher and Friday had been lying low; so far there had been no trouble. But if they were going to strike, now was the time. In one blow, they could demolish rig, financing, and the men who were determined to bring in oil. Should there be fighting, a single bullet in that nitro wagon would do a hell of a lot of damage. It was like traveling with a fused and ticking time bomb.

  Restless, Fargo cocked his heels, ready to spur the sorrel. “I’m gonna ride on ahead, scout.”

  “Do that. You see anything, need help, I’ll come a-running.”

  “No,” Fargo said. “You stay with the wagons. The fighting’s my department.”

  He touched the sorrel, and the animal loped ahead through the mud.

  As he drew away from the train, Fargo put himself in Friday’s shoes. Right now, they were passing through open, level country: no cover for an ambush. But the road ahead—Fargo had scouted it thoroughly on the way out to Tulsa and it was imprinted in his brain, every foot of the terrain. A mile on was the point of maximum danger. There the road dropped between two bluffs, each within rifle shot of it on opposite sides. Four or five men on each bluff could make short work of the freight train: drop the mules in harness, pick off the men, blow the nitro. Then, close enough to Golconda to be sure of Brasher’s protection, without the threat of outside interference, Friday’s men could take their time about disposing of the evidence.

  If he were Friday, Fargo thought, that was how he’d do it. On the other hand, if he were Friday and knew Fargo was with the wagon train, he’d expect Fargo to guess that there’d be an ambush there. And he’d expect Fargo to ride on ahead, but wide around, and scout for it.

  Which presented a sticky problem. One fighting man trying to outguess another. As the sorrel loped on, Fargo thought hard. Then a wolf grin split his face. He had it; he knew exactly what he’d do if he were Friday trying to outguess Fargo.

  If the wagon train passed between the bluffs unharmed, everyone would let down his guard. Then Friday would strike.

  Thoughtfully, Fargo surveyed the map of the terrain etched in his mind. If there really were an ambush—and Fargo could not believe that Brasher would let them get to the Erickson place without a fight—it would have to be between the bluffs and the turn-off to Lily’s house a few miles farther on. As if he were watching a moving picture, Fargo let that strip of road reel through his mind. Then he made a sound in his throat, nodded. He had it, now.

  ~*~

  Nevertheless, taking nothing for granted, he carefully scouted the bluffs on either side. They were as he had expected, clean. Then he turned the sorrel, rode it hard in a wide arc to the right. He had plenty of time; the wagon train was moving at a snail’s pace. When he turned back toward the road, he slowed the horse. After a quarter of a mile he dismounted and tied it to a stunted blackjack oak. He got rid of his slicker, tying it behind the saddle; its shining yellow made too good a target. He drew the Winchester from its scabbard. With the shotgun slung and the rifle in his hands, a round in the chamber, he ran forward through the driving rain crouched low.

  Then he dropped to his hands and knees; with the Winchester cradled to keep the mud off, he went all the way down. He began to crawl, pulling himself along with his elbows.

  It was a hard, slow, mean way to travel. Only a man who had the patience to spend an hour playing snail, a man who would go to any length to get an edge over his enemies, would stay alive as a fighter. Fargo had learned long ago that, in his business, living meant going through a lot of trouble. Time, discomfort, and effort were nothing when balanced against survival.

  He went on tortuously, steadily. His clot
hes, water soaked and muddy, blended with the terrain. He utilized every scrap of cover, and his head moved constantly from side to side, though his eyes remained fixed. That was how one reconnoitered, how one spotted his enemy’s movements in the distance.

  Fargo plastered his face with mud, and there was no gleam of wet white flesh to betray him.

  Then he had reached his objective. Below, the road bridged a streambed. Normally dry, it now swelled with swirling rainwater. The stream was usually a narrow seam in the ground, hardly more than a shallow gully. But on this side of the bridge it widened, and there was a heavy growth of willow along its edges passing through a brushy hollow. The hollow itself was not large, maybe twenty yards across and thirty yards long. The creek which emerged from it dwindled to hardly more than a line in the sand. But for fighting men who knew how to conceal themselves, that small brushy dip provided ample concealment. They had not been on the bluffs, and that was the only place they could wait. Coming up from behind, Fargo froze on the edge of the hollow. The ground began to slope, and he peered patiently through the curtain of rain.

  For a while he thought the place was vacant. But gradually, in the screen of willows, behind an oak clump, and in the tall grass, he picked out the forms of men. The main thing was to scrutinize what was really there, not to let one’s imagination run wild. An angularity here, a curve there; a gleam of wet slicker somewhere else; a brief, restless movement. It took time and patience to discern them all. Besides, Friday knew his trade, and he had hidden them well. Although they lacked the advantage of the high ground on the bluffs, they had the better one of surprise. They were placed so that they could riddle the entire wagon train with a quick, deadly, surprise volley.

  Fargo grinned like a wolf finding a stray calf. He counted seven men. He saw one man shift, scratch his rump; another was tensely picking his nose. They all had their eyes fastened on the road, their backs to Fargo. He could not tell which one was Friday. It was, in fact, likely that Friday was not even with them. He would have placed them, given them instructions, and then headed back to Golconda to be in the clear no matter how the thing came out. He was, after all, a lawman; though Brasher ruled the area, a successful mass murder could well bring in U.S. Marshals. If that occurred, both Friday and Brasher would want to be in the clear. Likely, the gunmen below had orders to wreak as much havoc as possible, then disperse when the battle was over.