by Jon Sharpe
Fargo waited to be good and sure the bear was gone, then let down the Henry’s hammer, slid the rifle into the scabbard, and gigged the Ovaro up next to Thompson. “You will get yourself killed one day pulling that stunt.”
“We all end up in a grave.”
“So?” Fargo said.
“So when my time comes, I would rather it was quick than slow. One Ear is better than lying abed for a month of Sundays, wasting away.”
Fargo had to admit the old man had a point but he still said, “A bear can be messy. A bullet to the brain would not hurt as much.”
“Shoot myself? Hell, boy, if I could, I would. But I don’t have the sand. If I did, Martha and Simon would still be breathing.” Thaddeus resumed walking, his head hung low.
“You keep bringing them up,” Fargo mentioned. “What happened, if you don’t mind telling?”
“It was Martha,” Thaddeus said. “She wouldn’t keep quiet. She wasn’t one of those who look down their nose at Indians just because they are different from us.”
“You have lost me.”
“Don’t your ears work? Martha was heartbroke at how the Indians were being treated. Some of our best friends are red, and it tore her apart to see them abused, and to hear all the talk of wiping them out.”
“Who would want to wipe out the Indians?”
“Who else?” Thaddeus retorted. “Big Mike Durn, as they call him. He hates Indians. He thinks the only good one is a dead one.” He stopped and stabbed a finger at Fargo. “How about you, mister? Are you a red-hater?”
“I have lived with the Sioux and other tribes,” Fargo revealed. “They are not the evil many whites make them out to be. They are people, like us.”
Thaddeus showed his yellow teeth again. “A man after my own heart. Maybe I will ride with you, after all.”
Fargo almost regretted his offer. The old man had not taken a bath in a coon’s age, and to say he stunk was being charitable. Fargo breathed shallow and held his breath when he turned his head to say something. And now that they were friends, Thaddeus was in a talkative mood.
“A word to the wise: When we get to Polson, keep your feelings about Indians to yourself.”
“Why?”
“Durn and his men do not take kindly to anyone who speaks well of the red man. Remember my wife? Why, just last week they beat someone for saying as how the Indians had been here first and had as much right to the land as anybody.” Thaddeus swore luridly. “That Mike Durn is the meanest cuss who ever drew breath.”
“Why doesn’t someone do something?”
“It would take a heap of doing. Durn has pretty near twenty tough characters working for him, and they are not shy about getting their way.”
“Outlaws?”
“Not strictly, no. But they are as bad a bunch as I ever saw. They will beat a man as soon as look at him.”
The situation sounded worse than Fargo had been told. “What about Polson’s law-abiding citizens? Why don’t they drive him out if it is as bad as you say?”
“Hell, mister. Most are married, and some have kids. Sally Brook stood up to Durn a month ago at the general store. Let him have a piece of her mind, she did, and for that, she was pushed around a bit by Tork and Grunge.”
“I have met Tork,” Fargo said, and briefly related his run-in.
“He is one of the worst of the bunch, a weasel of a back-shooter who only picks on those weaker than him. The other one you met, Kutler, is what you might call Durn’s second-in-command.”
“And Grunge?” Fargo asked.
“A freak of nature, is what he is. Grunge is not much bigger than you but he has hands the size of hams. He can break a door with one punch, or cave in a man’s face.”
Fargo was mentally filing the information. He had learned a lot but there was a lot more yet to uncover. “Old-timer, mind if I ask you a question?”
“I thought that was what you have been doing.”
“It is about your wife and brother—”
“About how they died?” Thaddeus broke in. “I would rather not talk about it. But this once I will make an exception.” He drew a deep breath. “Durn dropped a tree on them.”
“What?”
“Are you hard of hearing? A week after Martha gave Durn a piece of her mind, I went off to hunt. Simon was chopping a tree for firewood. He waved as I rode off. That was the last I saw him or my Martha alive.”
“But what makes you think Durn was involved?”
“Let me finish. I got back about sundown and found both of them lying under the tree Simon had been chopping. They were crushed to bits.”
“The tree might have fallen on them.” Fargo had heard of similar mishaps in his travels.
“That is what Durn wants everyone to believe. But I know better. I found a bump on the back of Martha’s head.”
Fargo shifted in the saddle, and forgot to hold his breath. “You just said a tree fell on her. There were bound to be bumps.”
“The tree didn’t fall on her head. It fell on her chest. After someone knocked her out and laid her and my brother right where the tree would land on top of them.”
“Did your brother have a bump on his head?”
Thaddeus took exception. “Are you trying to rile me? No, he did not, but I am willing to bet my bottom dollar he was stabbed.”
“You saw a knife wound?”
“I think there was one,” Thaddeus said uncertainly. “It was hard to tell. The tree made a mess of him.”
Fargo was skeptical. It seemed to him that the old man was blaming Durn for what might have been a simple accident. He made a remark to that effect.
“That is how Durn does it. He kills quietly, and smartly, so he isn’t ever blamed.”
“I don’t know,” Fargo said. In his capacity as an investigator for the army, it was important he stick to the facts and not make the mistake of believing others without proof.
“So much for us being friends,” Thaddeus grumbled. “Mike Durn has you hoodwinked, and you haven’t even met him yet.”
“I will soon enough.”
Thaddeus fell silent, leaving Fargo to his thoughts. Although he did not mind helping the army out, it was not his usual line of work. But Colonel Travis was a friend, and he would do what he could.
The situation was compounded by the fact that Polson was so far removed from civilization. Normally, the town marshal or county sheriff would handle things, but Polson did not have a marshal and was not in an established county. For that matter, Polson was not part of a state, either. It was in Nebraska Territory, which stretched from the Canadian border to the north clear down to Kansas Territory in the south.
Not that the legal niceties mattered all that much. Since the federal government was trying to set up an Indian reservation, and rumors had filtered back of an organized effort to prevent it by driving the Indians out, the problem was clearly under federal jurisdiction.
So Colonel Travis decided to send in a special investigator.
Enter Fargo.
The sun relinquished its reign to the gathering twilight.
As Fargo had reckoned, by then he was within sight of Polson and the south shore of Flathead Lake.
“I hate coming here,” Thaddeus Thompson remarked. “It makes me think of Martha, and how she met her end.”
“Did anyone take a look at the bodies besides you?” Fargo asked.
“I never thought to ask. I dug the remains out from under the tree and buried them. Then I came here and accused Mike Durn to his face.”
“What did he do?”
“He called me a loon, and most folks believed him.”
“Most?”
“A few still have their backbones. Sally Brook took my side but she is only one gal and there is not much she can do.”
“How would I go about finding her?”
“Sally runs a shop for ladies. She sells dresses and hats and such. You can find her there most any hour of the day.”
As they neared the li
ghts of Polson, Fargo recollected more of the local geography. The settlement had been built in a sort of natural amphitheater at the south end of the lake, which fed into the nearby Flathead River. To the west towered the Mission Mountains.
The last time Fargo was here, the nights were quiet and peaceful, the few residents, homebodies who turned in early so they could be up at the crack of dawn. Those days, and nights, were gone.
Now, Polson had the trappings of a boomtown. Nearly every building was ablaze with light. Piano music wafted on the breeze, punctuated by loud voices and laughter. Every hitch rail was filled. Coarse men in dirty clothes prowled the street, admiring women in tight dresses who sashayed about advertising their wares.
“I’ll be damned,” Fargo said.
“Not what you expected, huh?” Thaddeus said glumly. “Every cutthroat and no-account in the territory has heard Polson is a haven for their kind. This is only the beginning.”
Fargo was going to ask what he meant but just then a drunk came stumbling out of the shadows and nearly collided with the Ovaro.
“I know him!” Thaddeus declared, and awkwardly slid off, nearly tripping over his own feet. “Fred! It’s me!”
“Thaddeus?”
“What do you say to sharing that bottle?”
Fred beamed and clapped Thaddeus on the back, and the pair melted into the shadows.
Fargo rode on down the street. The most noise came from the largest and newest building. A sign out front proclaimed that he had found the Whiskey Mill. Since there was no room at the hitch rail, he drew up at a corner of the overhang and tied the reins to the post.
Sliding the Henry from the scabbard, Fargo stepped to the batwings. A blast of sound and odors hit him: curses, squeals, mirth, the tinkle of poker chips, the rattle of a roulette wheel, the smell of beer and whiskey mixed with cigar smoke and perfume.
Fargo breathed deep, and pushed on in. The saloon was bursting at the seams. Every table was filled. The bar was lined from end to end. Women flitted about, being as friendly as they could be.
With a start, Fargo realized that few of the females were white. Most were Flatheads, but a few were from other tribes. He went to skirt a table when suddenly a man in a chair pushed back and stepped directly into his path. They bumped shoulders, hard.
“Watch where you are going, damn you,” the man complained.
Fargo went on by, saying, “You walked into me, lunkhead.” He was brought up short by a hand on his arm.
“What did you just call me?” The man was compact and muscular and had the shoulders of a bull.
“Want me to spell it?” Fargo tore loose and took another step, only to have his arm grabbed a second time. He turned, just as a fist arced at his face.
3
Fargo sidestepped and the fist missed his cheek by a whisker. Before the man could recover his balance, Fargo slammed the Henry’s stock against his head. It rocked the man onto his boot heels but he did not go down. With a bellow that drew the attention of those around them, he drove a fist at Fargo’s gut. Again Fargo used the Henry, flicking it so that the man’s fist connected with the barrel and not his body. The man howled and shook his hand, then feinted with his other fist while kicking at Fargo’s groin. Twisting, Fargo took the kick on the outside of his thigh.
The man was red with rage and drink, and Fargo was mad, himself. Stepping back, he struck the Henry against the man’s left knee. That brought a roar of pain and the man doubled over, clutching his leg and exposing the back of his head. Fargo brought the stock sweeping down and the man groaned and pitched to the floor, unconscious.
Fargo slowly lowered the Henry. He had half a mind to kick the bastard’s ribs in. Instead, he turned and found himself the center of attention. The saloon had gone quiet and nearly everyone was staring at him. Ignoring them, he strode on. People scampered aside to let him pass. Those at the bar parted to give him space.
The hothead had done Fargo a favor. Now he was someone to be reckoned with. Word would spread, and be exaggerated in the telling, and by tomorrow everyone in Polson would take him for a bad man. That could work to his advantage.
No sooner did the thought cross his mind than all those around him were giving him even more room. Not because of what he had done but because a knot of four men were coming toward him from the back. Fargo watched them in the mirror while saying to the bartender, “A bottle of your best. And if you have watered it down, God help you.”
Two of the four men Fargo had already met: Kutler and Tork. The third had to be the man called Grunge. He was about Fargo’s size but his hands were incredibly huge, three times as big as normal hands would be, and his knuckles were walnuts.
The fourth man had to be Big Mike Durn. He stood head and shoulders above everyone else. His chest was immense. From what Fargo had heard, he expected Durn to be an unkempt river rat. But Durn was clean-shaven and freshly scrubbed, his suit immaculate. He did not wear a hat. Nor, to Fargo’s surprise, did he wear a revolver—that Fargo could see. Durn’s eyes were a steely gray, and when he smiled, as he did now, the smile did not touch them. “That was nicely done, Mr. Fargo.”
Fargo arched an eyebrow.
“Kutler told me about running into you,” Big Mike said. “You are everything the gossips claim.”
“A man shouldn’t listen to biddy hens,” Fargo said.
Durn leaned an elbow on the bar. “Welcome to my saloon. To my town. To what will one day be my territory.”
Fargo glanced at him, and damn if the man wasn’t serious. “I seem to recollect that Polson was here long before you showed up.”
“That it was,” Mike Durn said. “But there was no one in charge. No top dog, if you will.”
“And there is now?”
“You are looking at him.”
“I admire your modesty,” Fargo said as the bartender placed a bottle and a glass in front of him.
Durn laughed, but the laughter was as cold as his smile. “Modesty is for the weak, for those too timid to reach out and take what they want from life. I am not timid.”
Fargo opened the bottle and filled his glass. “Care to wet your throat?” he asked.
“Don’t mind if I do,” Durn said. All he had to do was crook a finger at the bartender, and a glass was in front of him. He smiled as Fargo poured. “I am obliged. Usually I limit myself to two drinks a night, but for you I will make an exception.”
“You never get drunk?” Fargo had never met a riverman who did not like to drown himself in liquor.
“Not anymore, no. A man in my position cannot afford to be weak when there are those who would tear him down.”
“You seem fond of that word,” Fargo noted. “Weak.”
Big Mike Durn tipped the glass to his mouth but took only a sip. “There are two kinds of people in this world. The strong and the weak. The wolves and the sheep. Most people are sheep. They do what they are told and abide by the law from the cradle to the grave. They are nobodies while they live, and no one remembers them after they die.” He set down the glass. “That is not for me. I am a wolf. I take what I want when I want. I wrest what I need from those that have it, and bury them if they get in my way. I have taken over this town, and in another couple of years I will take over the entire territory.”
Fargo smothered a smirk. The man sure was fond of himself. “The United States government might have a say about that,” he remarked.
“Oh, I have no doubt they will try to stop me,” Durn said somberly. “It would not surprise me if reports have already reached them, and they have sent someone to check on those reports.” He paused. “Say you, for instance.”
It took every iota of self-control Fargo had not to betray his surprise. Whatever else Big Mike Durn might be, he was not stupid. “I work for the army from time to time,” he admitted. “But as a scout, nothing more.”
“So I have heard,” Durn said. “But I wonder. Some might call it a coincidence, you showing up here, but I am not a big believer in coincidence. C
onvince me I am wrong and I will allow you to stay.”
Fargo had a sharp retort on the tip of his tongue, but he did not say it. He suddenly noticed that the other three had spread out and were ringing him, Kutler with his hand on his bowie, Tork with the Sharps casually pointed in his general direction, and Grunge with those enormous fists of his balled. “How do I go about doing that?”
“I leave that to you,” Durn said. “But I will grant you one night in Polson. Entertain yourself as you see fit, and if you want to stay longer, come see me in the morning and persuade me to let you stay.”
“I do not like being told what to do.”
“That makes two of us.” Durn smiled, and was about to walk off when a shout rose to the rafters.
“You, there! The son of a bitch who bloodied me!”
Fargo looked in the mirror. He had forgotten about the jackass who took a swing at him. The man was on his feet, swaying slightly, blood trickling down his cheek, his teeth bared in a snarl. “Go bother someone else,” Fargo said.
“Like hell!” The man was poised to draw, his fingers inches above his revolver. “Turn and face me! Or so help me, I will shoot you in the back.”
Big Mike Durn sighed. “That will be enough out of you, Everett. Be smart for once and go sleep it off.”
“Stay out of this!” Everett snapped. “You saw what he did to me. I have the right to repay the favor.”
“You have whatever rights I say you have,” Durn said quietly. “One of the rights you do not have is the right not to do whatever I tell you to do. I will say it one more time. Go sleep the booze off. In the morning look me up and apologize.”
By now the saloon had gone quiet again, with all present waiting to see the outcome.
Everett gestured, but not with his gun arm. “I swear. The airs you put on. You might have the rest of these yacks afraid but not me. I will do as I please, and it pleases me to kill this son of a bitch.”
Tork had shifted and was pointing the Sharps at Everett. “Let me take care of this peckerwood, Mr. Durn.”
“No. That buffalo gun of yours would splatter his brains all over,” Big Mike said.
