Those Jensen Boys!

by William W. Johnstone

  Emily broke the kiss. “Yes, let’s see how the hand plays out.”

  They put their guns away and she gripped his hand, leading him onto a narrow ledge that twisted upward, higher on the mountain. Behind them, Kaiser continued his blustery shouts until he finally ordered the men with him to charge the hideout again.

  Guns roaring and muzzle flashes ripping through the blackness, they advanced, but it was too late.

  Chance and Emily were gone.

  It looked like every building in Palisade was lit up. Fires burned in smudge barrels in the street as if the town was expecting an attack by an army.

  He was only one man, Ace thought as he studied the situation from a vantage point in the trees up the slope from the settlement, but he hoped to bring down the boss of Palisade anyway. He watched rifle-toting guards patrol the streets. He had no doubt they were Eagleton’s men.

  Several were posted in front of the hotel, which wasn’t really a problem. Ace had no interest in going there. Several more had taken up positions in front of the stage line office and barn, and that presented a problem. He needed to get to Bess so he could give her the message to take to the telegraph office in Bleak Creek. He didn’t see any way he could do that without being caught.

  Unless . . .

  He studied the barn. The back of the barn had no windows, and the doors were closed and probably barred on the inside. A tree grew near the building, its branches reaching out toward the high roof but falling several feet short.

  As far as he could tell from where he was, no guards were behind the barn—probably because it had no easy entrance. Not much of the light from the street reached back there, either.

  It was his only avenue of approach, he decided. He didn’t know if it was possible, but when everything else was impossible . . .

  He dismounted, noticing grass on the hill, and patted the chestnut on the shoulder. “I’ll come back and get you later if I can, fella. If I can’t . . . you’ve been a mighty good trail partner, and I’ll miss you.” With that said, he stole down the slope toward the settlement. The chestnut could graze for a while, and if Ace didn’t come back someone would find the horse sooner or later. Still, it wasn’t easy leaving the animal.

  Using every bit of cover he could find, Ace made his way toward the back of the barn. Reaching the tree growing behind it, he saw that it was an aspen, which wasn’t his first choice for what he had to do. Climbing it would make the branches and leaves shake, causing noise as they brushed together.

  It couldn’t be helped. It was his only option.

  Growing up mostly in saloons, Ace and Chance hadn’t had many opportunities to climb trees. The urge to do so seemed to be in the blood of every boy, however, so on those rare occasions when they were around trees, they’d shinnied up the trunks like boys instinctively do.

  Ace hadn’t forgotten those childhood lessons. He hugged the aspen’s trunk and worked his way up slowly but surely until he could reach up and grasp one of the lower branches. After that, it got easier. He climbed slowly and carefully, making as little noise as he could, until he was level with the top of the barn next to the stage line office.

  Things got even riskier. He located the thickest, sturdiest looking branch and crawled out onto it. Close to the trunk, it didn’t sag under his weight, but the farther out he went, it began to bend.

  He looked to the end of the branch about four feet from the edge of the roof. Holding his breath, he reached above him, got hold of another branch, and used it to brace himself as he worked his feet under him and stood up gingerly. He slid his boot soles along the branch an inch or two at a time, one hand gripping the higher branch while his other arm stuck out at his side to balance him. With each step, the branch he was standing on bounced slightly as it bent more and more.

  Finally, he had to let go of the higher branch and balance precariously as he moved out the last few inches. He had never felt quite so unsteady in all his life.

  Light came over the building from the street, making the back edge of the barn roof fairly easy to see. He fixed his eyes on that goal and took a deep breath. If he dared lean forward, he could almost reach out and touch it, but the branch would bend too much and he would plummet to the ground.

  Instead, he leaped.

  His pulse hammered wildly in his head and his breath froze in his throat as he seemed to hang in midair for a split second that was infinitely longer. Then his reaching hands slapped the rough wood shingles on the barn roof and caught hold. Ace desperately tightened his grip as his body swung down against the barn, the impact making his fingers slip. He dug in harder with them.

  After a moment, he realized he wasn’t falling. The muscles in his arms, shoulders, and back bunched as he began pulling himself up. The strain on his fingers was terrific, but he withstood the pain until he was high enough that he could swing a leg up and hook it over the edge of the roof.

  Rolling onto the top of the barn a few seconds later, he was safe . . . at least for a while. He lay just below the roof’s peak for a minute or two with his muscles trembling.

  Funny how he never had realized he was afraid of heights, he thought, but a leap like that was enough to make anybody scared of falling.

  Gathering his wits and his breath, he rolled over onto his hands and knees and crawled along the peak until he neared the front of the barn. On his belly, he wriggled the last foot or so, until he could see down into the street.

  The guards were still in front of the barn and the office and living quarters next door. They weren’t looking up, of course—they didn’t expect any threats to come from above—but if he tried to swing down into the opening for the hayloft, which was right below him, they would probably hear him.

  He crawled backward to the rear of the barn again, felt around until he found a partially loose shingle, and wrenched it free. The nails squealed a little, but he didn’t think the sound was likely to be heard in the street. He took the shingle with him and crawled back to the front of the barn.

  Twisting around, he flung the shingle into the darkness. It landed with a clatter behind the stage line office. The guards heard it, called to each other, and hurried around the barn to see what had caused the noise.

  Quickly, Ace turned, slid off the roof, hung by his hands again, and kicked his legs to start himself swinging. After a couple times back and forth, he let go and landed just inside the open hayloft door.

  He grabbed the edge of the opening to keep from toppling backward out of it and pulled himself forward, landing on his hands and knees again. The darkness inside the barn swallowed him up.

  He had made it, confident Eagleton’s guards at the stage line property hadn’t seen him, but it was possible others along the street had. Ace scrambled quickly toward the ladder leading down from the loft, easily finding it in the dark, since he and Chance had spent a couple nights up there.

  A minute later, his boots hit the hard-packed dirt inside the barn, and it felt mighty good.

  He cat-footed across the aisle toward Nate’s sleeping quarters next to the tack room. Pausing outside the door, Ace called in a whisper, “Nate! Nate, are you in there?”

  The door jerked open and he heard a startled voice gasp, “Ace?” Arms wrapped around his neck and a trembling body pressed against him.

  As Ace instinctively wrapped his own arms around that slender but shapely form, he knew good and well he wasn’t hugging the old, stove-up former jehu turned hostler.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Buckhorn sat in a wing chair with his right ankle cocked on his left knee, wondering if Rose was going to show up, or if Eagleton had sent word for her not to come to the hotel seeing as he was well on his way to being drunk, having guzzled down the brandy at a pretty rapid pace.

  The gunslinger shook his head just slightly. He couldn’t very well ask the boss, he thought, not without possibly making his boss wonder why he was so interested in Rose’s plans.

  Eagleton was still muttering about the Jensens a
nd the Corcorans as he paced, drank, and smoked. He stopped short when a knock sounded on the door.

  Rose, Buckhorn thought, then realized the knock was curt and peremptory, not feminine at all. He was already getting to his feet when Eagleton jerked his head toward the door.

  Buckhorn put his left hand on the butt of his gun, then realized that with his right arm in the sling, he couldn’t hold the gun with one hand and open the door with the other. He asked harshly through the panel, “Who is it?”

  The answer came back, “Jacob Tanner.”

  Buckhorn turned his head to look at Eagleton and raised an eyebrow inquiringly. Eagleton made a curt gesture indicating that the gunfighter should open the door.

  He holstered his gun and did so, stepping back so the railroad man could come in.

  Tanner brushed past him with barely a glance and confronted Eagleton, asking with a glare, “What the hell is going on over here in Palisade, Sam?”

  Buckhorn quietly shut the door behind the railroad man.

  “What do you mean?” Eagleton responded with a menacing rasp in his voice.

  “I mean, you were supposed to have everything under control. This is your town, isn’t it? You said you wouldn’t have any trouble taking over the stagecoach line and getting that right-of-way, but Corcoran’s still holding out and causing trouble.”

  Eagleton glanced at Buckhorn as if he thought Tanner was saying too much for the gunfighter to overhear.

  Buckhorn kept his face bland and expressionless as if Tanner’s angry words meant nothing to him. Inside, though, Buckhorn was thinking that the Jensen kid’s wild story was true . . . or at least had some basis in fact. Eagleton wanted the stage line because of the right-of-way along the road across the valley. He wouldn’t need that unless he planned to continue operating the line himself . . . or shut it down and build a railroad spur.

  “Everything is under control,” Eagleton assured Tanner. “Corcoran’s only stagecoach is in Bleak Creek, so he can’t make the next mail run. I have connections in Washington ready to move and strip him of the contract as soon as he fails to deliver the mail in a timely manner. In a couple days, Corcoran will be ruined and will have no choice but to sign over the line to me for whatever he can get.” A vicious smile touched Eagleton’s lips. “It’ll be a pittance, I can assure you of that.”

  Tanner took out a thin black cigarillo, clamped it between his teeth, and grated out, “Maybe you should have just had him killed.” He waved a hand at Buckhorn. “The Indian could have handled it.”

  Buckhorn stiffened. Eagleton caught his eye and gave a tiny shake of his head. Buckhorn forced himself to relax, but his dislike for Tanner wasn’t disappearing anytime soon.

  “Outright violence is dangerous,” Eagleton said. “I still have to live here, and in the new town, as well. I’ve tried to make it appear that any moves I’ve made against the Corcorans were accidents.” An edge crept into his voice as he went on. “I’m not the one who tried to bushwhack the Jensen brothers in Shoshone Gap. Really, Jacob, you should have known better. You’re a businessman, a builder, not a killer.”

  Tanner chewed on the unlit cigarillo. “I know. I lost my head when I saw the stagecoach coming after you’d promised it would be wrecked. I didn’t know who the Jensens were then, but I knew I didn’t want Corcoran getting any more help.” He sighed. “I came close to ending our problems with them right then and there, before they ever really got started.”

  Buckhorn couldn’t contain himself. “Close doesn’t count for much in an ambush.”

  Tanner glared at him and looked surprised that Buckhorn would speak up.

  Eagleton said smoothly, “All right. Let’s not worry about what’s already happened. Where do we stand going forward?”

  “Marshals Kaiser and Wheeler are still up on the mountain with the posse, searching for the Jensens and Emily Corcoran.” Tanner’s lip curled in a disdainful sneer. “I don’t have a lot of confidence in those two, but at least they’re keeping the Jensens busy. They can’t cause any more trouble for us as long as they’re dodging the law. Bess Corcoran and her father are still here in town, but I don’t see what they can do to hurt us. Like you said, they don’t even have a stagecoach anymore.”

  Buckhorn asked, “What if they deliver the mail by horseback?”

  Eagleton and Tanner turned to stare at him.

  The mining magnate frowned. “What are you talking about, Joe?”

  “They brought the mail back from Bleak Creek by horseback last time.” As he put the idea that had just sprung into his head into words, Buckhorn saw that it made sense. “There’s nothing stopping Bess from riding over there tomorrow, taking the mail from here with her, and bringing back whatever’s at the depot. That would fulfill the terms of the mail contract, wouldn’t it? It probably doesn’t say anything about how they have to deliver the mail.”

  Tanner took the cigarillo out of his mouth and used the other hand to scrub his face wearily. “My God. Does this travesty ever end? Every time we think we’ve got Corcoran backed into a corner, he finds some way out.”

  “We don’t know that’s what they’ll do,” Eagleton stalled.

  “Nothing else makes sense.” Buckhorn enjoyed the way those two self-styled titans of industry were listening to him, a lowly half-breed gunfighter.

  Tanner said, “He’s right. We need to get hold of Corcoran and his daughter and bring them here so they can’t do that.”

  A worried frown creased Eagleton’s forehead. “That would be kidnapping. I told you, I’ve been trying to avoid acting in the open.”

  “Bring them in the back, keep them up here until it’s too late for them to carry that mail to Bleak Creek, and it’ll be your word against theirs,” Tanner argued. “Who do you think people are going to believe? The disgruntled owner of a failed business and his spiteful daughter, or the man who holds the future of this entire area in the palm of his hand?”

  Buckhorn saw acceptance appear in Eagleton’s eyes. The boss might not like Tanner’s plan all that much, but he was willing to go along with it.

  Eagleton nodded. “All right.” He turned to Buckhorn and went on. “Take two men with you. Go over to Corcoran’s and bring him and the girl back here. Bring them in the back, though, and be sure you’re not seen.”

  With his arm hurting as bad as it was, Buckhorn would have preferred taking some more laudanum, going to bed, and sleeping for a couple days. But maybe if he did what Eagleton said, it would put an end to the standoff, he thought. “All right, boss. I’ll get ’em.” He opened the door once again and left the suite.

  Ace stepped back and rested his hands on her shoulders. “Bess.”

  She came up on her toes and pressed her mouth to his for a long moment. When she broke the kiss, she whispered, “I was afraid I’d never see you again, Ace.” She looked around in the shadowy barn illuminated only by light from the street seeping in through the cracks around the double doors. “Where are Emily and Chance? They came back with you, didn’t they?”

  Ace hesitated, which caused Bess to gasp.

  “They’re not—”

  “They’re still up on the mountain. They were fine the last time I saw them. They’re hiding from that posse, but I came back down to find you.” He frowned in the darkness. “What are you doing out here in the barn?”

  “I was worried, and it makes me feel better to be around the horses. It always has. Nate’s sleeping on the sofa in the stage line office.”

  “That’s good. I expected to find him in here, but I was going to get him to carry a message to you.” Ace slipped the paper from his pocket and pressed it into her hand. “It’s a telegram. You need to send it to the home office of the railroad when you carry the mail to Bleak Creek tomorrow.”

  “The railroad . . . I don’t understand.”

  His hands still resting on her shoulders felt good as he explained the theory he had come up with concerning Samuel Eagleton’s true motive for trying to take over the stagecoach li
ne.

  Bess nodded. “That all makes sense, I suppose. Do you think it’ll do any good, alerting the railroad to what Eagleton and Tanner are doing?”

  “I don’t know,” Ace replied honestly. “Railroads have been known to bend a few rules to get what they want. They may prefer to look the other way about the whole thing. But it seems to be the only chance we have.”

  “All right.” Bess slipped the paper into her own pocket. “I’ll take this with me. Do you think Eagleton will let me get through to Bleak Creek?”

  “I reckon so. If the posse doesn’t catch Emily and Chance tonight, I think Kaiser and Wheeler will be watching you tomorrow, to make sure we don’t try to rendezvous with you somewhere in the valley. I’m not sure Eagleton would risk sending gunmen after you under those circumstances.”

  She laughed, but it had a slightly hollow sound to it. “You sure do know how to make a girl feel confident, Ace. What are you going to do?”

  “I thought I’d slip back out of town and wait somewhere close by. If the posse comes back down, I’ll head up the mountain to find Chance and Emily. We’ll have to keep dodging the law until we find out whether or not that telegram is going to do any good.”

  “That’s awfully risky,” Bess said as she slid her hand up his arm. “Marshal Kaiser is a little crazy where you and Chance are concerned. He’s not going to give up looking for you.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to steer clear of him—” He stopped short as they heard loud, angry words coming from somewhere nearby.

  Eagleton had told him to take two men with him, so Buckhorn went over to the saloon, found Starkey and Byers playing poker, and told them to come with him.

  Both men thought about arguing, but they could tell from the look in his eyes that he was in no mood for it. They threw in their cards and stood up.