by Lyle Brandt
Slade chewed a mouthful of potato, letting Naylor take the bait. “I knew a kid like that, one time,” Luke said. “He damn near bit my little finger off. Still got the scar.”
Berringer eyed Naylor’s upraised finger with a fine disdain, saying, “Of course, the danger from a tribe of full-grown savages, no matter how childlike in mind, is that they won’t be satisfied with simply gnawing on your finger. If their heathen impulses are not constrained…well, who knows what may happen in the way of tragedy?”
“Your school helps out with that, I guess,” said Slade.
“To some extent,” the agent granted. “Though I must admit, we aren’t producing any scholars here. The brighter ones can learn to read and write, if they apply themselves sufficiently, but this peculiar talk of higher education for the red man I’ve been hearing? I mean, really. What’s the point?”
“Never got past the seventh grade, myself,” said Naylor. “Guess I’ve done all right.”
“And that’s the key,” said Berringer. “An individual must recognize his limitations. Why encourage hopeless fantasies when they are just a waste of time and energy for all concerned?”
The soup was gone, and Berringer summoned their waiter with a little silver bell. The Cherokee cleared off their bowls and soupspoons, coming back after a moment with their main meal for the evening. It looked like venison, with sweet potatoes and some green beans on the side.
“We’re living off the land here, as you see,” said Berringer. “The Cherokee have learned to farm, after a fashion, and they’re still proficient hunters. Don’t believe the gossip that you hear about privation, gentlemen.”
Slade would have bet a month’s pay that no Cherokee was dining from a menu such as Berringer’s tonight, but he kept the opinion to himself. Instead, he said, “I wonder if you could arrange, before we leave, for me to see my friend.”
Berringer looked up from his meal and frowned. “Your friend, Marshal?”
Slade held the agent’s gaze and answered, “Little Wolf.”
“Ah, yes. Well, I’m afraid that won’t be possible.”
“Why’s that?” Slade asked.
“Because we haven’t seen him for…oh, what? Three weeks now, I would say. Perhaps a little more.”
“You’re saying that he’s disappeared?”
“I wouldn’t state it so dramatically,” said Berringer. “He’s what I’d call a restless sort. It’s not the first time he’s been absent without leave, as you may be aware.”
“You wouldn’t be referring to the time he helped me track those fugitives to Texas,” Slade replied, not making it a question. Neither did he mention that the chase had taken Little Wolf and him across the border into Mexico without official sanction from the governments on either side.
“No, no,” said Berringer. “But I’m advised there was at least one prior occasion when he left the reservation for some reason of his own, never explained.”
“That rings a bell,” Slade said. “In fact, it was the first time that he saved my life. And helped me bag the Bender family.”
Berringer blinked at that. “The Benders? Out of Kansas?”
“Out of anywhere they chose to go, until we stopped them. Me and Little Wolf.”
Berringer sipped his wine, then said, “I had not heard that part of it.”
“Don’t worry,” Slade replied. “It wouldn’t be the first time files were incomplete.”
“Indeed, sir. At the risk of bearing tales, my predecessor’s record-keeping skills left much to be desired.”
Slade brought the conversation back on track. “I’d be disturbed to learn that Little Wolf had come to any harm through no fault of his own.”
“I have no reason to believe that is the case,” said Berringer. “Of course, once he’s beyond the reservation’s boundaries, there’s nothing I can do to find or help him.”
“There were no incidents before you lost track of him?” Slade inquired. “I’m thinking of that trouble that he had before our trip to Texas, with the other fellow’s family.”
“You’d be referring to the death of Mayank, also known as Moon,” Berringer said.
“I don’t recall getting the name,” Slade said.
“I likely didn’t mention it,” the agent granted. “Little Wolf was serving sixty days before he joined you in your manhunt. Is that proper terminology?”
“It’s close enough,” said Slade.
“Is he a tracker?” Naylor asked. “This Little Wolf?”
“The best I’ve seen,” Slade said.
“Too bad he isn’t here, eh? We might need the help before we’re done.”
“Too bad,” Slade echoed. “But there’s nothing to be done about it, I suppose.”
Their waiter came to clear away the plates and wineglasses, returning shortly with another liquor bottle and some smaller glasses on a silver tray.
“Brandy,” said Berringer. “The perfect end to almost any meal.”
“Another first for me,” said Naylor. “Fill ’er up.”
The waiter poured while Berringer pressed on. “I trust you’ll stay the night with us,” he said. “To start for Stateline now…well, you’d be forced to camp before you’ve gone five miles.”
“Sounds good to me,” Naylor replied. “I’ll take a roof over my head when I can get it.”
Nodding, Slade said, “Thank you for your hospitality.”
“Nonsense,” said Berringer. “You’re helping me—and all of us—by following this liquor business to its end. And finding justice for your friend, of course.”
“Well, if you’ve got a cabin not in use…”
“No, Marshal Slade. I wouldn’t hear of it,” said Berringer. “I have spare rooms made up for visitors. The odd inspector from the bureau, military officers, that sort of thing.”
“Well, if it’s good enough for them,” said Naylor, “we’ll get by all right.”
“I’ll have Rupali show you to your rooms.” Berringer rang his little bell again, a double chime this time. “Her name translates as ‘Beautiful,’ I’m told, but you can judge that for yourselves.”
The young woman who stepped into the dining room a moment later was, in fact, quite pretty in her starched maid’s uniform. Slade wondered if her duties were confined to cleaning and conveying visitors to vacant rooms, but there was no good way to ask—and no point riling Berringer.
Rising as Naylor did, Slade bade their host good night and trailed Rupali to his bedroom for the night.
It was a smaller room than the one Slade had at the hotel in Enid, but its furnishings had obviously cost a good deal more. Taxpayers’ money, Slade supposed, since Berringer was no innkeeper with a capital investment in the place. He’d want to make a good impression on the bigwigs sent from Washington to check his operation—maybe check his bookkeeping—and make his job secure.
That thought turned Slade’s mind back to Berringer’s young maid. He wondered if the dignitaries passing through would find some comfort there, or with some other comely woman under Berringer’s control. There was no reason to assume it, but he hadn’t liked the agent’s last remark about Rupali. Something in the tone of it had set his teeth on edge.
Forget it, he decided. Focus on the job.
So far, they had gained nothing in their search for evidence or information that would lead them to the bootleggers and Tanner’s killers. Slade still couldn’t say if Tanner had been slain by Indians or white men, though it was a safe bet that the whiskey cookers would be white. No reservation could conceal a moonshine operation—not unless the supervising agent was involved in some kind of conspiracy. And Berringer, for all his faults, did not strike Slade as someone who would deign to tend a still.
As for Little Wolf’s disappearance, there was nothing Slade could do about it at the moment—or at all, unless he had some kind of lead to where the Cherokee had gone, what had become of him. He was the kind to roam about at will, Slade knew, if it was feasible. And once he crossed the reservat
ion’s boundary, anything might happen. Little Wolf might have encountered roaming gunmen or a farmer who shot first at Indians and thought of asking questions later, if at all. He might be locked up in some rural jail for nothing more than having bronze skin in a white man’s town.
Or maybe he had ridden off and just kept going, Slade surmised. Maybe the ride to Mexico and back had given Little Wolf ideas. A taste of freedom that he wanted to recapture and try to make permanent—or anyway, to last as long as possible, on his own.
And why not, if he had the chance? Slade saw no reason to begrudge him that, though many others whom he met along the way might disagree.
As Slade prepared for sleep, he turned his thoughts back to the job at hand. There was a chance, he realized—although a slim one—that Bill Tanner’s murder might be unrelated to the moonshine ring he’d been investigating. It would stretch coincidence beyond the breaking point, but it was possible he’d stumbled into renegades while working on the case and had been taken by surprise. If hostile tribesmen were to blame, it scuttled any link to Stateline or the ’shiners. Suspects could be drawn from any of the tribes confined on Oklahoma reservations—or, in theory, a band just passing through from Texas, maybe all the way from Mexico.
That was unlikely, granted. Unless something came along to prove that angle, Slade would work the murder as a part of his ongoing whiskey case. It made more sense, but also complicated matters. When they got to Stateline, he and Naylor, there’d be no one they could absolutely trust. Not local law, the mayor, or anybody else.
What else was new?
How often had he ridden into strange towns, wondering if he would find a friend among the people there when it came time to do his job? Would they support the law or find excuses to be elsewhere, not give a damn?
At least this time he wasn’t going in alone. Luke Naylor had a few rough edges, but on balance he seemed competent enough. Slade hadn’t worked with him before but had no fear Naylor would let him down. Whether he’d go the distance…well, that was another question altogether. One Slade couldn’t answer at the outset of a job.
They had arranged to be up early in the morning, off straight after breakfast on their way to Stateline. Even so, they would be camped out overnight before they reached their destination sometime Friday. That was more time for the killers to make tracks, if they were running—or to finalize their preparations for a showdown if they figured other marshals would be following along in Tanner’s tracks.
Trouble for Slade, whichever way it went.
But he would find them, even if it meant he had to ride to Hell and back.
Hadn’t he done that, more or less, already?
Turning down his bedside lamp, Slade let his thoughts stray from the job. He needed sleep, and in those moments prior to dropping off, his mind still turned toward Faith. He wondered whether she had finished packing up her things, if there’d been any offers on her ranch, if she had finalized the details of her getaway from him and all the ugly memories that haunted her.
Slade wished her luck with that, though personal experience had taught him running didn’t help much. You could leave a place behind, never return, and maybe even block it from your waking mind, but there were always dreams—or nightmares—to recall what set you running in the first place. Slade, while he was drifting, had become an expert at departing, but he’d hear a snatch of music sometimes, catch an old familiar scent, or see a stranger on the street who brought another face to mind, and it would be as if he’d never left.
He wished Faith luck forgetting him, if that was what she needed to be whole and lead a life that brought her joy. Slade didn’t want to think that happiness might lie beyond her grasp forever after what she’d been through with his brother, then with him. That pained him more than losing her—which he supposed was proof of love, for what that might be worth.
Nothing. Not now.
Whatever Faith had felt for him was lost to pain and gun smoke, images of dead and dying strangers, enemies, some of her better friends. If he could turn the clock back, do it all again, Slade thought he would’ve handed in his badge after his brother was avenged and kept on going, back to drifting and the poker tables where he might lose money but no one had ever laid a finger on his heart.
All second-guessing now.
Whatever he decided, there was still one job to finish. Bill Tanner deserved whatever Slade could do for him, for justice of a sort, although it wouldn’t bring the fair-haired marshal back.
They could send his killers on to join him, with a rope or with a bullet, if they didn’t care to wait around for trial.
It wasn’t much, but it was something, and Slade took it with him into sleep.
5
Slade woke before dawn on Thursday, spent a hazy moment trying to recall his fractured dreams, then gave it up and used the water closet down the hallway from his room. Returning, he stopped briefly outside Naylor’s door, listened for any sounds of movement, then passed on without knocking
Give him time. A little more, at least.
Cold water had to do for washing up and shaving, but it fit with Slade’s normal routine and helped clear out the final cobwebs from his drowsy brain. He thought about the ride to Stateline, calculating how far they could go before they had to camp at dusk, and figured they should reach the border town midmorning Friday, if they met no obstacles along the way.
And once they got to Stateline, they would have to watch each step, each word, while they determined who was trustworthy and who was not. Assuming it was even possible to tell.
Approaching any town for the first time, a lawman never knew what he would find. In some, the people shared a common goal or desire and showed the outside world a firm united front. Others were scarred by deep, bitter divisions, and a wily man could play one side against another if it suited him. Maybe one element tried lording it over the rest, and all the underdogs required was someone to encourage them, give them a little push toward mutiny.
Stateline’s division—half in Kansas, half in Oklahoma Territory—hinted at a world of possibilities that wouldn’t be revealed until Slade saw the place and judged it for himself. And if somebody tried to take him down while he was doing that, at least he’d know that someone in the town had secrets to conceal.
Secrets worth killing for.
A thump from Naylor’s room next door told Slade the other deputy was up and moving. Slipping his boots on, he heard Naylor’s door open and close, footsteps receding toward the water closet, coming back again while Slade was strapping on his pistol belt. He’d take the long guns and his saddlebags downstairs to breakfast, maybe leave them in the entry hall for easy access once they’d finished and were on their way.
Five minutes more, and he was out. Naylor emerged, sniffing the air, and asked, “That ham I smell?”
“Let’s go find out.”
Berringer beat them to the dining table, seated at his normal place with coffee steaming in a mug as Slade and Naylor entered. “Gentlemen,” he said, smiling. “I trust you both slept well?”
“Wish I could take that bed along with me,” Naylor replied.
“You’d need a wagon, I’m afraid,” the agent said.
It had been ham that Naylor smelled, along with fried eggs and potatoes, thick rye toast, and strong black coffee, served by the same waiter from last night. Since there was only one course to the meal, Berringer left his little bell alone, told anecdotes about the Cherokee that passed for jokes, and cleaned his breakfast plate.
Outside, in pale daylight, they found their saddled horses waiting for them, guarded by the same youths who had taken them away the previous evening. It seemed that Berringer had certain members of the tribe picked out to serve him, although whether they were privileged thereby or simply drew the low card, Slade could not have said.
He checked the bridle on his roan, made sure the saddle cinches wouldn’t chafe her, then stowed his long guns and turned back to Berringer. The agent wore a little smile, half q
uizzical, and said, “My boys are fully capable of saddling a horse, Marshal.”
“Looks like it,” Slade replied. And to the blank-faced Cherokees: “No slight intended. When it’s my butt on the line, I don’t take anything for granted.”
Naylor took a moment, eyed his riding tackle cautiously, then mounted up. When Slade was in his saddle, reins in hand, he turned to Berringer a final time and said, “If you hear anything we ought to know, contact Judge Dennison in Enid. He can get a wire to Stateline with the message.”
“Certainly. I wish you luck. Godspeed.”
When they were out of earshot, Naylor said, “Godspeed? I would’ve thought that man’s religion was himself.”
“You never know,” Slade said. “He thinks the Cherokees need saving, but I have to wonder if that just means turning them as white as possible.”
“Good luck with that.”
“Scrape off the paint, it’s all political,” said Slade. “Things change in Washington, friend Berringer may find himself out of a job.”
“He knows that, too,” said Naylor. “Hell, they all do. Did you ever know a bureau agent in your life who wasn’t cashing in some way?”
“I’ve only known this one,” Slade answered. “I keep hoping that he’s not the rule of thumb.”
“Better than some of them, I’d say. We had one down in Texas who was leasing out Apaches to pick cotton, pocketing the cash. Another one I heard about kept the allotment set aside for beef and fed the Injuns horse meat, sometimes dog. Those two got booted out after a while, but nothing ever happened to ’em, otherwise.”
“Way of the world,” Slade said. “We’ve got our hands full with another part of it.”
They had a hundred miles to cover, from the agency to Stateline. Call it thirteen, maybe fourteen hours at a steady trot, but Slade didn’t intend to wear the horses out to reach their destination after nightfall. Even with the urgency he felt toward solving Tanner’s homicide, it wasn’t worth leaving themselves afoot on unfamiliar ground, where they might need mobility to stay alive.
