The Backstabbers

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

“Anse, did Ben have an heir?” Sloan said.

  The foreman shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of. He told me once he hadn’t written a will because too many hopeful people would want him dead.” Dryden smiled slightly. “He was making a funny joke.”

  “This is no funny joke,” Sloan said. “Anse, as far as I’m concerned, you’re the new boss of the Rafter-K.” He gave a series of short, dense coughs and then said to the hands, “How do you boys see it?”

  The young puncher, a tough kid named Pete Harker, said, “I can only speak for myself, but I say Mr. Dryden is the new boss of this ranch. He served his time.”

  That brought a murmur of agreement from the rest of the hands.

  Sloan said, “You heard them, Anse. Now you call the shots around here.”

  Suddenly Dryden seemed angry. “Look at us. The boss isn’t even cold yet and you want me to take his place. It ain’t right.” He kneeled and put his hand on Kane’s bloody forehead. “Hell, Ben, you were the one always gave the orders. Give me one now. What do I do?”

  “He can’t talk to you,” Sloan said. “He can’t say anything to you. Ben Kane’s time for giving orders is over.”

  “Dave, I’ve worked for wages all my life,” Dryden said. “I don’t know how to be a ranch owner.”

  “You make one decision at a time,” Sloan said. “That’s how it’s done. Ben’s dead, but the Rathmores are still aboveground, and that ain’t right. Come dawn, we were to attack their nest and wipe them off the face of the earth. Do we still do it? Or do we sit back and do nothing? That’s your first decision, Anse.”

  Dryden ignored that and said, “You men get shovels. We’ll bury Ben beside Martha and we’ll do it now. I don’t want to see him laid out in his parlor like a side of beef. Does anybody know the words?”

  An older hand with a canvas patch over his left eye, partly covering a deep knife scar, said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.”

  “How do you know that, Cogan?” Dryden said.

  “I heard it said often enough. Ben Kane must’ve said it a score of times. A stickler for the proprieties, was Ben.”

  Dryden nodded. “Then you’ll say that at his grave.” He turned to Sloan. “Give me until an hour before sunup to study on things, Dave.”

  “A man’s got that right,” Sloan said. “Now we got a burying to do.”

  When the others filed out, the puncher with the eyepatch said to Dryden, “Anse, is this the end of the Rafter-K? I fit Comanches with Ben and I fit Apaches and I fit rustlers and I fit the Rathmores. Do all that go for nothing, like a hill of beans?”

  “I don’t know,” Dryden said. “I haven’t even seen the books yet. Hell, maybe Ben was broke. Maybe he wasn’t. We’ll know soon enough.”

  “Tell me when you got it figured all out,” Cogan said. “Man gets to my age and all he’s ever known is cowboying, he has to make plans. The boss dying like this, well, it brung all that to mind.”

  “We all got to make plans, Cogan,” Dryden said. “After today, we’ll talk on it.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  “Do we have a plan yet?” Arman Brossard said.

  Luna Talbot smiled. “You can’t sleep either, huh?”

  “Worrying about Ryan and Muldoon. I told them I’d come back for them. I plan to keep my word.”

  “And so you will,” Luna said.

  “But are they still alive? Will they know I kept my word?” Broussard said. “Those are questions that vex me considerably.”

  “As I said before, there is no clever plan. Johnny Teague knows that.”

  “Johnny doesn’t want to get burned again. Losing those men . . . their ghosts are in his head.”

  “If he’ll ride with us, we can overwhelm the Rathmores real quick. Take the fight out of them so there’s less killing to be done.”

  “Well, that’s a plan. Of a sort,” Broussard said.

  Luna looked at the sky. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many stars.”

  “They’re always that way before a fight,” Broussard said. “Real bright. Brighter than you ever seen them before.”

  Luna looked at him. “Really? Why is that, I wonder?”

  “I don’t know why. Maybe the possibility of dying sharpens a man’s senses.” Broussard smiled. “Or a woman’s.”

  “You know that from experience?” Luna said.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “I’ll bore you. I think sometimes I bore people with my talk.”

  Luna smiled. “Maybe it’ll help me sleep.”

  “All right, here goes . . . I first realized how a man sees, hears, and tastes things with a heightened sense of appreciation years ago when I first became a professional gambler,” Broussard said. “I was . . . what? . . . twenty-two years old at the time.”

  “Young,” Luna said. “Young to be a gambling man.”

  “Yes, very young. I was playing poker in the Number Seven saloon in Abilene when a lumberman by the name of Archie Kirk called me out. He’d been losing big all night and claimed I was cheating.”

  “And were you?” Luna said.

  “No. I don’t cheat. I’m a good poker player.”

  “I’m sure you are. So what happened?”

  “Well, the bartender and a couple of bouncers knew Kirk’s reputation as a troublemaker and took his gun away from him. It seems that he’d killed a man a few months before over the affections of a fallen woman and was a bad hombre to cross.

  “About an hour later a man came in with a message for me. It was from Kirk, telling me to leave Abilene because he intended to shoot me on sight.” Broussard was silent, remembering. “I wasn’t about to let Kirk, a bully and a blowhard, put the crawl on me and knew I was facing a gunfight come morning. That night the stars were brighter than I’d ever seen them before and the whiskey in my glass was like . . . I don’t know, nectar, I guess.”

  “Because you thought you were about to die,” Luna said.

  “I figured there was a good chance that I might. Kirk had a reputation as a shootist and boasted that he’d killed five men. Looking back, I really didn’t believe his claim, but I didn’t disbelieve it either.”

  “Had you killed a man before?” Luna said.

  “No, I had not. I never even had to draw my gun before. After I got the message from Kirk, the bartender offered to saddle my horse and bring it out front, so I could make a clean getaway.”

  “Where was the city marshal?” Luna said.

  “Hickok was out of town serving a warrant, and his deputy was nowhere to be found.”

  A mesquite limb dropped in the fire and sent up a shower of sparks. A man mumbled in his sleep, rolled over and was silent.

  “To make a long story short, Archie Kirk saw me again next morning outside Murphy’s Grain and Feed Store on Walnut Street. He said something like, ‘Now I’ve got ye,’ and he went for his gun.” Broussard shook his head. “The gun had been returned to him that morning by Hickok’s deputy, for God’s sake.”

  “You’re still here, so obviously he didn’t kill you,” Luna said.

  “An astute observation, Mrs. Talbot. No, he didn’t kill me, and for the first time in my life, I was aware that I was fast on the draw and shoot.”

  “You killed him?”

  “I dropped Kirk with my second shot. He joined his shadow in the dirt and didn’t shoot back. I heard later that my bullet had severed his spine and he died six months later. It was self-defense, but I knew Wild Bill Hickok might not see it that way, so I got out of town in a hurry. In those days Bill’s method of keeping the peace was Bang! Bang! Bang! ‘Now what seems to be the problem here?’”

  Luna smiled. “So I’ve heard.” She stretched her arms and said, “There’s still a few hours until sunup. I think I’ll try for some sleep.”

  “Me too,” Brossard said. “All this storytelling has worn me out.�
�

  * * *

  Arman Broussard managed to drop off but dreamed of a pair of dancing skeletons in a cobwebbed mine shaft. He woke with a start, his heart thumping and his eyes wild.

  * * *

  Ben Kane was laid to rest by lantern light, and Len Cogan said the words.

  “He and Martha are together now,” Anse Dryden said. “I think that’s what he always wanted.”

  His eyes glittering, Dave Sloan looked across the grave at the foreman. “That, and an end to the Rath-mores.”

  “I hear you, Dave,” Dryden said. “That was an obsession. In the end, I think it killed him. Made him not right in the head.”

  Milt Barnett said, “Jake Wise always said that afore the Rathmores killed and skun him.”

  “Jake said what?” Dryden said.

  “That Mr. Kane wasn’t right in the head about the Rathmores.”

  “How would he know?” Cogan said. “Jake wasn’t right in the head either.”

  “How come you never told Jake that to his face, Len?” Barnett said.

  “Quit that, both of you,” Dryden said. “I won’t have squabbling over Ben’s grave. All of you, go see to your guns and saddle up. We ride out at dawn.”

  “Made up your mind, Anse, huh?” Sloan studied the big foreman for a few moments and then said, “You’re doing the right thing.”

  “I want it done,” Dryden said. “I want the damned thing over with. It’s gone on too long.”

  The punchers walked away from the grave, and only Sloan and Dryden remained. The two men stood in the gloom, measuring each other. Sloan was dying. He was dying fast.

  Dryden considered what Sloan had said—“You’re doing the right thing.” Didn’t dying men always tell the truth? In Sloan’s mind at least, making war on the Rathmores was the right thing to do. Dying men don’t lie.

  As though he’d read Dryden’s mind, Sloan said, “Anse, Ben is dead and now you got it to do. You wouldn’t tolerate sheep on your range, and the Rathmores are worse than any sheep. By their very presence, they’ll eventually destroy the Rafter-K. They have to be stopped before it’s too late.”

  “You don’t need to lecture me, Dave. I know what’s at stake here. The boys are saddling up and the die is cast,” Dryden said. “By suppertime tonight, there won’t be a single Rathmore left alive in Texas.”

  “And Rafter-K cows will graze in the Cornudas,” Sloan said. “That’s how God intended it to be.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Papa Mace rolled off Ella Rathmore, sated. Free of the pressure of his great bulk, the girl managed to breathe again, taking in great gulps of air that Mace mistook for passion.

  He smiled. “Don’t worry, my dear. Soon you’ll have me all to yourself.”

  “I . . . so . . . look . . . forward . . . to . . . that.” Fighting for each breath, she spoke with little conviction.

  But Papa Mace didn’t notice, wrapped up as he was in his future plans. “I think my speech tonight was received very well.”

  “Yes . . . everyone believed that you’ve had another great vision about the promised land,” Ella said, breathing easier. A swig from Mace’s whiskey bottle helped.

  “Did Malachi?”

  “Yes. My husband most of all. He even believed the part about you breeding with a younger woman to produce another leader when you retire.” She smiled. “He’s very excited about it, and that’s why I’m here.”

  Papa Mace grinned. “And the bit about us riding into the wasteland to have the second part of the vision, the location of a new gold mine?”

  “Hook, line, and sinker,” Ella said, her face hard-planed in the firelight. “Malachi don’t know his butt from a watering hole.”

  “He’s a whore’s spawn. What do you expect?”

  “How did you get in tow with all them whores, Papa?” Ella said.

  “It took a few years,” Mace said. “I’ve always been partial to whores. Then I decided to keep the sons and get rid of the rest. I had a vision of my future. Instead of a small-time conman, I saw myself as the leader of a clan, my own blood, with me as master.”

  “But, Papa, you got that right here,” Ella said.

  “No, I don’t,” Mace said. “At first I had enough gold from the mine to pay for the hired hands who did the digging, but Ben Kane hung some of them and the rest were ready to quit.”

  “Malachi told me the miners were hung for rustling,” Ella said.

  “Yeah, it was my intention to take Kane’s cattle and then his ranch, but he was too tough for me,” Mace said. “I skun a couple of his cowboys, figuring to scare him off, but all I did was start a feud. I lost all my remaining hands and then there was a standoff. Kane wasn’t strong enough to attack me, and I wasn’t strong enough to attack his ranch, so we’ve been sniping at each other ever since.” Mace grimaced. “And now the gold seam has run dry and so have all my hopes for this place.”

  Ella snuggled against Mace’s naked, sweating body. “Well, now you got me, Papa. Tell how it’s gonna be, Papa.”

  “I already told you all about it.”

  “Tell me again.”

  “Well, I’ve hoarded enough gold to last me and you quite a few years,” Mace said. “So we’ll head for Fort Smith and stay in the best hotels, eat in the best restaurants, and live pretty damned high. You’ll have new clothes—”

  “And a pink parasol.”

  “And a pink parasol, and we’ll never walk anywhere. We’ll ride in a carriage that will take us wherever we want to go. For a while at least, we’ll be gentry, you and me.”

  “And what happens when the money runs out?” Ella said, frowning.

  “It won’t run out, Ella. You can do some whoring on the side, and I’ll be working a con or two. Before I ended up here, I was one of the best bunco artists around.”

  Ella smiled and snuggled closer. “Papa, I’ll be so glad to get away from this dump.”

  “Yeah, it’s a dump, all right.” Mace sat up, lit a cigar with a brand from the fire, and then lay on his back again, exhaling blue smoke. “Like I said, things didn’t work out the way I planned. The mine playing out and the trouble we’ve had with Ben Kane and his ruffians spoiled everything. The best of my sons are dead, and them that are left don’t amount to much, so I won’t regret running out on them.”

  “And their ugly women and kids.”

  “Yeah, them too,” Mace said.

  Ella’s frown deepened. “Papa, I don’t want to be a two-dollar whore again. I’ve had enough of that. It’s no kind of life for me.”

  Mace shook his head. “You won’t be. Ella. You’ve got class. Your clientele will be fine gentlemen with deep pockets and dutiful little wives waiting for them at home. I mean, clean gentlemen, nothing but the best. I’ll see to that.”

  “You’ll be so good to me, won’t you, Papa?”

  “You’ll want for nothing. Fine clothes, jewelry, it will all be yours.” Mace said. “Pass the bottle, will ya? We’re going on a visit.”

  “Visit who?” Ella said.

  “Them two in the mine shaft. Time to tease them again.”

  Ella smiled. “I thought they’d be dead by this time.” “Probably close, one of them at least. The shotgun guard with the red hair is on his last legs, damn him,” Mace said. “They call the other feller Muldoon. He bit my leg, the dirty rat, and he’s paying for it now.” He tied on his loincloth and donned his sandals as Ella hurried into her clothes.

  “Now let’s go have some fun,” Mace said.

  * * *

  “Buttons, I’m thirsty,” Red Ryan said, his voice a husky whisper. “So thirsty. Where’s the water?”

  “We’ll have some soon, Red,” Buttons Muldoon said. “It’s on the way. Just you rest for a while.”

  Red was quiet for a few moments and then he said, “Buttons, give it to me straight.” His words were weak.

  Buttons strained to hear him. “Give you what straight?”

  “Am I dying? It feels like I’m dying. I’m kin
da numb all over.”

  “No, you’re not dying,” Buttons said. “I won’t let you die. You’re the best shotgun guard I ever had. And as for feeling numb all over, why, that’s because you’re all trussed up. By and by, once the ropes are loosened you’ll be as fine as dollar cotton.”

  “They hurt me bad, didn’t they? Then Rathmores.”

  “No, not too bad,” Buttons said. “You’re tough, Red, mighty tough.”

  “Bad enough though, huh?” Red said.

  “Yeah, maybe that,” Buttons said. “They hurt you bad enough.”

  Red whispered, “God, I’m thirsty.”

  “Soon,” Buttons said. “We’ll have water soon.” He saw that Red’s lips were white and cracked, his green eyes feverish. “You rest now.”

  But there was to be no rest for Red Ryan that night.

  Papa Mace and Ella Rathmore, half-drunk, mean, and grinning, burst into the mine shaft arm in arm, the whiskey bottle in the man’s hand. Ella carried a lantern that spread a fitful light.

  “Is he still alive?” Mace said, eyeing Red.

  “He’s alive, and he’ll stay alive long enough to see me kill you,” Buttons said, scowling.

  “And that ain’t never gonna happen,” Mace said. “You’ve lost, driving man. You tried to take what was mine and you couldn’t do it. You lost . . . lost. Let it sink in . . . you lost.”

  “Trash, I haven’t lost yet. I said I’ll kill you, and I will,” Buttons said.

  “Papa, why don’t you just shoot him?” Ella said. “You shouldn’t let him talk to you like that.”

  “Too quick, my dear. He’s got a lot of suffering still to do.” Mace stepped to Red, took in the cracked lips and ashen face, and grinned, “Look, Ella, the redhead needs a drink. I’ll give him one.” Mace tipped the bottle and splashed whiskey into Red’s face. He was delighted when Red desperately attempted to lick the bourbon as it trickled down his cheeks and over his mouth. “There,” Mace said, smiling like a devil. “I reckon that will make him even thirstier.”

  Buttons’s killing rage exploded. He snarled like a trapped animal as he tried to get to his feet, a movement that earned him a kick from Mace that knocked him flat on his back again.