by John Benteen
Striding warily toward the boarding house, he told himself that he had underrated Dart. Whatever else he might be, he lived up to his reputation as a gunman and then some. Sundance had never seen a faster draw, nor a man cooler in a gunfight. Tulso Dart was not someone to be taken lightly.
~*~
“Mr. Sundance.”
He had just closed the boarding house door behind him and started for the stairs when the woman’s voice halted him, a door opening, light spilling from a room. Martha Fenian’s tall figure was silhouetted in the doorway of what appeared to be an office. “I heard shooting,” she said. “What happened?”
Briefly, Sundance told her. “Oh,” she said disgustedly. “Those Cables ... ”
Martha Fenian hesitated. Then, standing aside, she gestured. “Maybe you’d like to come in for a nightcap. There are probably a lot of things you ought to know about Coffin City, including the Cables.”
“I can use all the information I can get. But Mr. Fenian—”
“There is no Mr. Fenian,” she said tautly. “The Garfield gang killed him in a stage hold-up nearly a year ago.”
“Oh,” Sundance said. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. He didn’t amount to much. I was looking for a big man, one that could handle me. He was big, all right, but only on the outside. There wasn’t much to him on the inside. Come on in.”
Sundance entered the room. Once inside, he saw that it was equipped not only as an office, it served also as a bedroom. It held the spice of a woman’s presence, the perfume.
Martha Fenian sat down in a chair by a roll top desk, motioned him to take the other. There was a bottle already open on the desk, a half-full glass. From a drawer, she took another glass and filled it. Sundance accepted it, knowing he’d had a lot by his standards today, first with Rawlings, then in his room, then the saloon. But most of it had burned out of him. Settling back, he was not surprised when Martha Fenian rolled herself an expert cigarette, put it in her mouth and lit it, savoring the smoke. Then she raised her glass. “To your health.”
“And yours.” They both drank. Then Sundance said, “The Cables.”
“Yes. Well, they drifted in from Texas two years ago, about the time Coffin City started to boom, with a herd of longhorns—the old man and his three sons, Ash, Mort, and Phil. Got run out of Texas, the story goes; anyhow, they’re as mean a bunch of snakes as you’ll find. But this town needs meat, and they’re the ones that furnish it—they set up a big ranch in the north end of the county. I don’t know how many men it takes to run maybe a thousand head of cattle but there are never less than thirty or more out there at the C-Bar, people say. They say it’s a way-station, too, for every drifting gunfighter and outlaw that comes through. In fact, there’s rumors that the Garfield gang used it as a base before Dart cleaned ’em out.”
She drained her glass, helped herself to more. Sundance shook his head when she offered him a refill. “Anyhow,” she said, “this town’s split into two factions. One’s headed by Sheriff Whitfield, who’s a politician pure and simple, never was a lawman, never has been, and he’s got the backing of Cable and his cowboys and a lot of other politicians here in town. The other’s headed by Dart, with the backing of the Rawlings brothers and some other businessmen who want to see the town tamed down, crime stamped out. And they’re deadly enemies—there’s nothing Cable would like to do more than see the Dart brothers and Doc Ramsey killed, and the Darts are just itching to wipe out the Cables.”
She laughed harshly. “Not that the Darts are angels. What it really boils down to is a fight over graft and rake-offs. Sheriff Whitfield gets the lion’s share of that right now and the Cables have the guns to back him up. The Darts and Ramsey want to bring him down so they can have a free hand at the gravy bowl. But, having to choose, I’d choose the Darts.
“Anyhow,” she added, “there’s going to be a hell of a showdown here in Coffin City between the Darts and the Cables one of these days. How and when it’ll come, no man knows. But if Dart can ever get any evidence at all against the Cables that’ll allow him to use his Federal authority, you can be damned sure he’ll bring it on as quick as possible. If I were you, I’d stand clear of both sides, try not to get caught in the middle.”
“The advice,” Sundance said, “is appreciated. Dart’s already suggested I get the hell out of town.”
“You’d be smart to,” said Martha Fenian. Then her eyes met his. “But I hope you don’t.”
For a moment, there was silence in the room as she looked at him steadily, with a significance in her gaze that could not be mistaken. Then she turned her face away, set down her glass. “Maybe I drink a little too much,” she said. “Maybe talk too much, too. It comes from being lonesome.”
“In a boarding house?”
“Lonesome for a man, dammit,” Martha Fenian said. “Don’t you ever get lonesome for a woman?” She stood up, towering over his seated figure. “Look at me. Tall, big. And all around me,” she said contemptuously, “little men. Big on the outside, like my husband, maybe, but little on the inside. It ever occur to you how much trouble a woman like me might have in finding a man that’s a match for her, that she can ... look up to? They don’t come along very often. And when I find one, I guess I ... Well, I can tell it and something happens inside of me. And maybe then I sort of ... lose control.” She drew in a breath that made her breasts rise. “But I guess you’ve already got a woman.”
“Yes,” Sundance said. He thought of Barbara Colfax, felt a surge of longing.
“Indian or white?”
“White. She’s in Washington, D.C., right now.”
“Washington? Then it’s been a long time since you’ve seen her.”
“Four months,” Sundance said.
“A long time,” Martha said. “A damned long time.”
“Yes,” Sundance said, the whiskey burning in him. He arose. “I think I’d better go to bed right now.” He turned.
“Sundance.” Her voice halted him. Once more he faced her.
She was unbuttoning the taut gingham dress. Her eyes fixed his. “There’s no need to climb the stairs,” she said. And now the top of the dress was down. He saw the upper mounds of white breasts above the camisole she wore, and then as she reached behind herself, unsnapped something, the top of that fell down and her breasts leaped free, like animals just released from a cage. They were huge, yet firm and high, their nipples the size of silver dollars, the points of them erect. Her lips were parted. “You’ll have to help me out of the rest of it,” she said.
“Yes,” Sundance said. “I’ll do that.” And he went to her, a lust to match her own flaring in him, knowing that taking her would not be something that touched what he felt for his own woman so far away—and knowing that if he did not take her he would make an enemy he could ill afford in Coffin City.
Chapter Five
The perfume of her body still lingered in his nostrils as he strode down Rucker Street next morning, carrying his rifle, his weapons belt cinched around his waist. She had been right, he thought; it took a man to handle her. At first making love to her had been almost combat, a test of strength. Only when she knew for certain that he could overpower her had she suddenly turned soft, yielding, avid of him, body opening to receive him. After that, moaning softly, she was as feminine, as gentle, and as loving as any woman could have been. And she had brought him breakfast in the room, taking pleasure in waiting on him. “You won’t be leaving?” Her voice was soft, imploring.
“I’ll know by ten o’clock,” he told her, and tried not to see how she bit her lip in anxiety.
Now it was not quite nine, and Coffin City was a different place, the miners long since hard at work, the cowboys gone or sleeping off their binge, the decent element about its business. He passed the Occidental, its doors wide open but the crowd inside very thin, and the office of the local newspaper, ironically named The Coffin Nail. It was exactly nine when he reached the entrance to the stage line waiting room. Warily, he entered.
“He and Mr. Yance are waiting for you in the office.”
“Yance, too?” Instinctively, Sundance loosened the Colt in its holster as he went on to the office.
“Come in,” Art Rawlings called when he knocked. He was behind his desk when Sundance entered—and his brother Yance, face a mass of bruises, leaned against the enormous safe, glowering at the half-breed.
“You’re right on time,” Art said. “Sit down.” As Sundance, never taking his eyes from Yance, did so, Art laughed. “All right. You can relax. Yance and I’ve had it out. He’ll go along with whatever I decide.”
“Within reason,” Yance growled. “Okay, Sundance, this is business. But someday when it’s over—”
“We’ll worry about that later,” Sundance said. “Exactly,” said Art. “Well, have you considered my proposition?”
“No,” Sundance said. “But I’ve considered the one I’m gonna make to you.”
Art raised his head, eyes turning cold. “Oh?” He toyed with a pencil. “And what is that?”
“I’ll guarantee to end all Apache raids against your line,” Sundance said. “But I have a free hand to do it my own way. And my price is twenty thousand dollars, half in advance, half when you’re satisfied that your stages can run without any more trouble from the Indians.”
“Twenty thousand dollars?” Art blurted and dropped the pencil. “Goddlemighty!” Yance rasped. “Who the hell you think you are?”
“You already know who I am. And the decision’s yours. Either way it goes, it suits me well enough. Anyhow, there it is. You can take a chance on me or go on the way you’ve been going.” His eyes met Yance’s. “Which, judgin’ by yesterday, isn’t very damned effective.” He drew from his pocket two folded sheets of paper. “There you are, a contract, one copy for you, one for me. Read it and sign it or not as you please. It guarantees you won’t lose another dollar or another passenger to Indians. You do, I give back the ten thousand. On the other hand, when all danger of raids is passed—let’s say when you’ve transported half a million dollars in bullion or currency without a loss or run for sixty days without one, whichever takes longest, you pay me the next ten.”
“This is highway robbery!” Yance snapped.
“Be quiet,” Art said. He glanced at the contract, raised his head. “You a lawyer on top of everything else?”
“I’ve learned to write a contract. And I don’t work without one. Sometimes white men get a little careless about paying off to a half-breed after he’s done his job. But that’ll stand up in court, if it comes down to that. Not that I don’t trust you, but it’s a matter of policy.”
“I see,” Art answered thinly. He read for a moment. “Hell, this even gives you authority over Yance.”
“It gives me authority over all your operations,” Sundance said. “The security end, anyhow, Yance can handle the day-to-day stuff. But if I say a coach doesn’t run, or we want a dozen outriders or none at all, that stands.”
“Goddammit—” Yance began, but Art held up a hand. Having read the contract, he said, “You’re biting off a big chew if you live up to this. How you aim to pull it off?”
“That’s my business,” Sundance said. “But if I do, it’ll cost you less than you’ll lose in one shipment like yesterday’s.”
Art was silent for a moment. “That’s gospel,” he said. Suddenly taking pen from inkwell, he signed both contracts.
Yance straightened up. “Wait a minute—”
“We agreed,” Art said. “I make the deals.” Blotting his signatures, he handed Sundance one copy of the contract. “All right, there it is. Now suppose you tell me and Yance what you aim to do?”
“The first thing’s to ride shotgun over the whole route between here and Lordsburg and back. I’ll be the messenger on the coach that pulls out at ten this morning. You got any passengers, you can tell them that the schedule’s changed. The coach will be running slow, may take a day longer to make the trip.”
Yance’s mouth twisted. “After yesterday? There won’t be no passengers. We haven’t sold a ticket.”
“Okay. Long as we don’t have them to worry about, we won’t need outriders or extra guards. What’s the distance between stations?”
“Fifteen miles. Sometimes a little more. There’s one stretch as long as thirty—absolutely no water for the stock, and we had to space the stations according to that. They haven’t raided any of the stations yet, but we expect that any time.”
“Okay. Now, these presents you agreed to leave along your route. Have you kept on putting them out even since the raids started?”
“Yeah. Tom Evans said we ought to. Up till now, Evans has been our expert on the Apaches. You see, they captured him when he was a kid, he lived with ’em, too, for quite a while. Then they traded him off to some Mexicans, and he got back among Americans during the Mexican War. So he knows their ways pretty good.”
“All right. Your driver today will know the places to leave presents?”
“Sure, We put ’em out headed towards Lordsburg, and generally they’re picked up, most of ’em, by the time the stage comes back.”
“Well, have a load of that kind of stuff on the stage and I’ll add a little something of my own. Now, let me get my horse and I’ll be ready to go when the coach pulls out at ten.” He tucked away the contract. “I’ll take my down payment now, gentlemen. In cash.”
The two men looked at him for a moment, Yance glowering through swollen eyes. Then, as Art turned toward the safe, Yance said, “You know, I’m goin’ too.”
“I’d as soon you didn’t. I told you, I want a free hand.”
Yance’s mouth twisted. “Yeah. But while there ain’t any passengers outward bound, there’s other freight—bullion from the mines. You don’t git a free hand with that, not this trip. Just you and the driver alone out there, it would be damn-easy for you to hijack that shipment yourself and that’d be the last we’d see of you and the gold, too. That gold’s got to get through. It don’t, the mines may start shippin’ it themselves, and then we’d be plumb broke.”
Sundance hesitated, staring at the big man. It would also, he thought, be damned easy for Yance, once they were alone out there on the stage road, to take his revenge for the beating he’d been handed last night. And there’d be trouble enough scouting for Indians without having to watch Yance behind him. Under the contract, he could veto Yance’s presence—but he read in the big man’s face that that would only lead to another fight. Besides, he could not rightly blame Rawlings. He had a right, at least this once, to protect his own interests. Slowly the half-breed nodded. “Suit yourself.”
Yance visibly relaxed, though the hostility lingered in his eyes. Art turned from the safe, holding out a packet of bills. “There’s your cash, Sundance. The rest is up to you.”
He tucked the money in a pocket, grinning slightly. “I’ll hold up my end. Now, get your coach ready while I take a pasear down to the general store and see if they got what I need.”
~*~
Made by the Abbot-Downing Company of Concord, New Hampshire, the stagecoach that rolled up before the station was the latest model, bright red, capable of carrying nine passengers, weighing just over a ton and lined inside with leather, with a damask overhead and side-curtains. There was a big boot, or compartment, at the rear for freight and baggage, another smaller one under the driver’s seat. Armed guards watched as steel strongboxes—holding, Sundance knew, ingots of pure smelted gold—were loaded in both boots, to equalize the weight on the wheels. If those boxes were full, this coach was a rolling treasure-house. And he, the driver, and Yance Rawlings, all on top of it, would be lovely targets for anybody who wanted that treas
ure.
Now the six-horse team was in its traces, snorting and pawing, all strong animals, a mixture of hot-blooded Spanish strains and dogged big Percheron, especially bred for this sort of hauling, with maybe a dash of mustang thrown in for extra toughness. Eagle, saddled and bridled, reins looped over the horn, stood quietly by the coach, obedient to Sundance’s orders, but looking questioningly as his master climbed up to the driver’s seat, lugging the long pannier as well as his Henry rifle. There was, also, on board there already, a fine ten-gauge Greener shotgun. The driver took his place beside Sundance, a weather-beaten harsh-featured man named Bushrod Adams and, judging from the smell of him, unbathed since the last time he’d been caught in a rainstorm—and they were few and far between out here. Yance Rawlings, also armed with rifle and shotgun, took position on the coach’s top, too, behind them, where he could watch the sides and rear.
A sparse crowd had gathered. Tulso Dart and a posse, guided by Tom Evans, had ridden out at daybreak to try to pick up Apache sign at the scene of yesterday’s tragedy—an effort Sundance knew was hopeless, but which Dart had to make.
Bushrod gathered up the lines, spouted the first of what was to be a stream of unending profanity at the team. On the sidewalk, Art Rawlings yelled: “Last call—eastbound stage to Lordsburg, New Mexico, connecting at Lordsburg with transportation to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad and all points east! All aboard!”
When no one moved, he shrugged, looked up. “Okay, Bushrod! Move out!”
Bushrod uncoiled a blacksnake whip, popped it above the team’s backs with a sound like a rifle shot. “Hiii-yahh! Git up, you spavined crow-baits!” Instantly the horses put their weight against the traces, broke into a steady, distance-devouring trot, and, with Eagle keeping pace, the stagecoach began its two hundred and fifty mile round trip through the homeland of the Apaches, quickly leaving the town behind.
~*~
It was, Sundance soon learned, brutal work, this business of riding shotgun on a stagecoach. The team raised an unending roil of dust, blowing back on driver and on guards. The sun beat down mercilessly, and they had only their hats for shade. The coach jolted, lurched, and swayed over a road barely deserving of the name, wash boarded and gullied by the occasional rains, then hardened to a bricklike surface by the heat. Add to all that the unending tension of constant vigilance, and stage-coaching was a man’s job, all right.
