One Man's Shadow (The McCabes Book 2)

by Brad Dennison

  This man had seemed so debonair when she first met him. So eloquent. But since Jessica had left her family, Falcone had descended into what he now was. He was sullen and quick tempered, and often simply wanted to be left alone. He sat with his bottle of whiskey, staring away into nothingness. Sometimes he would sit outside on a hand-cut bench by the door and look off at a distant ridge. Sometimes Jessica thought he was a little scary, and sometimes just plain sad.

  Jessica stood now, broom in hand, trying to decide if she should continue to attempt to clean this floor or just give up. She would steal an occasional glance at Vic. He simply stared. Then he brought both hands up and through his hair, and leaned forward on both elbows and buried his face in his hands. He sat like that for a moment or two, then reached for the whiskey bottle and took a pull.

  The blanket hanging in the doorway was swept aside and Flossy came in carrying a heavy bucket of water with one hand. She had been down to the creek. If they needed water for any reason, it meant a walk down to the creek. And it usually meant a walk for one of the women. Jessica didn’t notice any of the men doing a whole lot of work around here.

  Flossy’s hair was tied behind her head in a bun, but it was as dirty as Jessica’s. Flossy wore the same low-cut dress she had back outside of Cheyenne, and sweat was glistening against her neck and collarbone and down to her cleavage. Daytime could turn off hot here in the mountains this time of year, and it was a long walk down to the creek and an even longer one back carrying a full bucket of water. Streaks of dirt worked their way up her neck and onto her face.

  She sat the bucket down on the table heavily and stood for a moment catching her breath.

  None of them were eating well. Often no more than one meal a day. Some rabbit, and once in a while maybe an elk. But that involved the men actually doing something productive like hunting, but they seemed more interested in sitting around with a bottle of whiskey, or wasting ammunition doing some target practice by shooting at tree branches. The only time Cade seemed to have any energy at all was when he was in bed with Jessica.

  The thought of such activities in a room shared by others would have horrified Jessica at one time. And it indeed had, the first few times. But you get used to that sort of thing. Funny how easily your civilized tendencies can fall away, if you let them.

  She thought of her mother and father once in a while. And of Age. Her brother. But she didn’t really miss them. The life she had now could not really be called living, but neither could the life she had. The drudgery of the day-to-day labor on a farm. All she had to look forward to was going from the status of farmer’s daughter to farmer’s wife, once she found a sod buster willing to take her on. The life she had now was really no better. She had gone away with these men seeking danger and excitement, and wanting to see the world. All she really succeeded in doing was exchanging one sort of hell for another.

  Flossy looked at Vic. She said, “Vic? I just brought up some water. You want some coffee?”

  His face was buried in his hands again. He didn’t respond. It was like he hadn’t heard her at all.

  She tossed a concerned glance to Jessica, then said, “Vic? Honey?”

  He said through his hands, “I heard you.”

  “Would you like me to make some coffee?”

  “I don’t truly care what you do.”

  Flossy tossed another glance at Jessica, who answered with a shrug of her shoulders.

  Jessica said, “I’ll take a cup. And a fire might take some of the dampness out of this place.”

  Flossy nodded. “Come help me get some firewood.”

  25

  Two-Finger walker sat on an old stump, his gaze drifting toward the cabin. He had his bowie knife in his hand and was whittling at a piece of wood. Though he wasn’t really doing all that much whittling. He was mostly just sitting with his knife in his hand, thinking about how insanely bored he was.

  He looked down at the piece of wood. It was pine, soft enough that he might be able to carve it into something. When he had been a kid back in Minnesota, he had carved dogs and horses and such.

  He had learned to hold the wood with his bad hand, gripping it with his thumb and his index finger, the only finger remaining.

  White-Eye walked over. He had a rifle in one hand.

  “Gonna do some huntin’?” Walker said.

  White-Eye nodded. He was the only one never slept in the cabin. There weren’t enough bunks, and he said he would rather sleep outdoors anyway. He usually made a small fire off a ways from the cabin and unrolled his blankets there. Between the three of them – White-Eye, Cade and Falcone – White-Eye was the only one Walker thought had any sand at all and would hold up in a fight. Walker was beginning to wonder why he ever signed on with this outfit.

  It was down to just the four of them, now. They had left Lane behind. With the wrist of his gunhand broken, he would no longer be of any good to them. Not that Walker thought he was much good to begin with.

  White-Eye said, “I’m gettin’ tired of eatin’ rabbit. And there’s only two cans of beans left.”

  “I’m tired of eatin’ beans, anyway.”

  White-eye nodded.

  Walker said, “Is this all there is to riding with Vic Falcone? Hiding out in this old, two-bit cabin? What the hell are we waitin’ for?”

  White-Eye shrugged. “Didn’t use to be this way. Used to be a lot of us. You ever hear of Kiowa Haynes?”

  Walker nodded. He looked up at White-Eye, squinting in the sun. “Yeah, I heard a Kiowa.”

  “He used to ride with us. He was killed by the brother of that McCabe boy. Last summer. We used to have a big cabin and a good-sized bunkhouse in a canyon. Maybe a week’s ride from here. Maybe more. Right near a little town. We had all the women and whiskey we could want.”

  White-Eye looked toward the log wall of the dugout. “This here cabin we found last fall, after we had to abandon the canyon. Made by an old prospector or a mountain man, I suppose. Don’t rightly know. It was empty when we found it. Got through the winter here.”

  “What happened at the canyon?”

  “Most of our men got killed. Started up in Montana, really. We was gonna raid a couple of ranches, and get some horses and supplies. Maybe even a woman, if we was lucky. But we rode down on the McCabe ranch. A couple of us spoke against it. Kiowa did, and me. And a gunhawk named Logan. McCabe has a reputation. It seemed riding down on his spread might not be the smartest thing to do, especially when there were smaller ranches in the area, with less men. Ranches that weren’t run by Johnny McCabe and a small army of gunfighters. But old Vic – he wouldn’t listen to reason.”

  “Doesn’t seem like Vic listens to reason very much.”

  White-Eye shook his head, and spit a wad of tobacco juice into the grass. “Trying to be too much like Sam Patterson, I guess. Sam never listened to no one, but he didn’t need to. Sam had instincts like a mountain lion when it came to survivin’. Just tag on along behind him, and you’d be all right.”

  “What ever happened to Patterson, anyway?”

  White-eye shrugged his shoulders. “Just rode out one day. Said he’d had enough. That left Vic in charge. Vic tries to be like old Sam, but he just ain’t cut from the same cloth.”

  White-Eye squatted down on his haunches. “Now, old Sam, he took in this orphan boy, one day. Back in Missouri. Back durin’ the War. We was shootin’ up this old farm. Burnin’ the place. The farmer was a Union sympathizer, and we was told to burn him out. We did with a passion. Old Sam – he never did nothin’ second-rate. But he saw this little whelp just lookin’ up at him. The farm was burnin’ and women screamin’ and we was shooting guns off into the night. But the boy just stood and stared at Sam. So Sam – he just scoops the boy up and brung him with us. Said he always intended to find a good home for him, but somehow never found the time to. Sam ended up raisin’ him like he was his own.”

  Walker shook his head. “Not the smartest thing to do, totin’ around a kid.”

&nb
sp; “Nope. But Sam, he somehow made it work.”

  Walker was too bored with the chunk of pine to bother anymore. The stump he was sitting on had an exposed root that stretched out past his foot. He threw the knife at the root, and it landed tip first and stood there.

  White-Eye said, “When the boy was maybe fifteen, Sam told him to make his choice. Either join us, or ride on. The boy chose to ride on.”

  Walker reached over and pulled the knife of the root, then sat back and threw the knife again. This time the tip of the knife hit at a slightly wrong angle, and the knife bounced off the root and landed in the grass.

  White-Eye said, “Thing is, that boy turned out to be the bastard son of Johnny McCabe.”

  Now White-Eye had Walker’s full attention. Walker said, “You serious?”

  White-Eye nodded. “We never saw him again until last summer. Maybe five years had gone by. We was perched on a ridge watching the ranch house with a spy glass, and we seen the boy there. His name was Dusty. Well, old Vic always hated the boy. Kiowa did, too. They both felt the boy ate their supplies but never give nothing back. Didn’t carry his own weight. But they was both too scared of Sam to say anything. Kiowa did say something once. Tried to scare the boy. I thought Sam was gonna gut Kiowa right there. He would’a, if Kiowa wasn’t such a good scout.

  “So, Vic sees Dusty down there at the ranch, and now all he wants is to ride down there and attack the place. Maybe kill Dusty in the process. I told him no. Made no sense. Logan said so. Even Kiowa. As much as he hated Dusty, to ride down on the McCabe place was suicide. But Vic wouldn’t listen to reason.

  “So, one night we rode in. All of us. Only half of us rode away. Then, Dusty takes to following us. Him and his brother. ‘Cept we didn’t know Dusty was McCabe’s son, and we didn’t know the other one was, either. They followed us to the canyon. Dusty killed Kiowa in a knife fight, and they had men positioned at the top of the canyon. Got Logan. I was positioned at the other end of the canyon as a guard, so I got away. And Vic and Flossy managed to get away with their hides intact. But that was it. Just the two of us. Vic ain’t never really been the same. It’s all been downhill since then.”

  “Where’d you find Cade?”

  “In a saloon, down Colorado way.”

  “Should’a left him there.”

  White-Eye snickered. “Vic was desperate to find men who would ride with him. Cade was all that was available. Vic wouldn’t listen to reason.”

  Motion at the cabin drew Walker’s attention. The girls were stepping out through the blanket. Flossy, and the young one. Jessica.

  Walker said, “Now that does bring a complaint of mine to the surface.”

  “What does?”

  “Them women. We got two right here. But Vic gets one, and that useless good-for-nothin’ Cade gets the other one.”

  White-eye nodded. “That’s the way Vic does things. She wants to be with Cade, for whatever reason.”

  “Maybe it’s time some things were done different around here.”

  “Like what?”

  Walker retrieved his knife from the grass and got to his feet and tucked the knife into a sheath in the side of his boot. “Maybe it’s time I had a little talk with Vic.”

  White-Eye had also risen to his feet. He shook his head. “Won’t listen. Never does.”

  Walker nodded with a smile. “Oh, he’ll listen to me. But before I do, I gotta ask. If it comes down to it, which side will you be on?”

  White-Eye shrugged. “The side that works out best for me.”

  Walker nodded. Good answer.

  White-Eye said, “I will admit, I am gettin' a little tired of waitin’ here at this little cabin. Another winter here ain’t what I have in mind.”

  Walker said. “Then, things are about to change around here.”

  And Walker started toward the cabin. White-Eye sat on the stump and laid his rifle across his lap, and watched.

  26

  Walker stopped maybe thirty feet from the blanket. He called out, “Vic! Come out here! We gotta talk.”

  He waited. It then occurred to him this might not be the best position, from a tactical point of view. There were no windows in the cabin, but there was a vertical slit cut at one side of the door, and another one at the other. Just big enough to fit a gun barrel through. Vic could shoot him where he stood, and Walker didn’t think it wise to assume such a thing was beyond Vic.

  There was no response from the cabin anyway, so he said the hell with it and strode toward the cabin and pushed aside the blanket. One of the nails holding the blanket in place popped free and landed on the dirt floor.

  Vic was sitting at the table, a half-full bottle of whiskey in front of him. The women had come back into the cabin and were at the stove, getting ready to build a fire.

  “Vic,” Walker said. “I want to talk with you.”

  Vic looked at him wearily. “What about?”

  “About this.” Walker glanced about him, indicating with his eyes the cabin itself. “This place. What we’re doin’ here.”

  “What we’re doing here is my business. You’re on the payroll. You do what you’re told.”

  “What payroll? I don’t recall any money comin’ our way since I signed on with you.”

  Vic nodded. “It will. You just have to be patient.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Vic. I don’t have to be nothin’.”

  Vic looked at him a long moment. “You’re free to ride on anytime. There’s nothing holding you here.”

  “Yeah, there is. It’s called money owed. You owe me for all the weeks I been followin’ you around and waitin’ here at this sad excuse for a cabin. You got the money to pay me?”

  Vic shook his head. “Not yet.”

  Vic hadn’t had enough whiskey to make his words slur, but his eyes looked a little glazed as he stared at Walker. His gun was still on the table beside him.

  “Look,” Flossy said to Walker. “We don’t want trouble.”

  “Ain’t talkin’ to you, woman.”

  Jessica was truly scared. She had always been a little scared of Walker. She reached over to Flossy and took her hand.

  “Now,” Walker said, directing his gaze back to Falcone. “I signed on in the first place to have another crack at Johnny McCabe. When do I get that?”

  Vic shrugged. “That opportunity has passed. Without having his son as a hostage, to just ride onto his ranch would be suicide.”

  “You sayin’ you’re afraid?”

  “I’m saying I’m smart. Like I said, you’re free to ride on any time.”

  “Just how do you figure on payin’ me?”

  “I have no money right now, but we’re going to make some. You hang with me a little longer, and you’ll see. There are gold fields up in Montana. We’ll grab some money there. Sometimes a smaller group of men like we have here can be more effective than a large party.”

  “When we gonna do this, Vic?”

  “In a while. You just need to be patient.”

  “I think I’m done bein’ patient.”

  Walker suddenly sprang at Falcone. Falcone reached for his gun, but there was too much whiskey in him and his reaction time was a little too slow, and Walker was on top of him. Grabbing his hand and pulling it away from the gun. Walker then gave Vic a backhanded slap to the face, strong enough to send Vic falling backward in the chair.

  Walker didn’t wait for Vic to get to his feet. With one hand he grabbed the table and sent it rolling sideways. Flossy screamed. Jessica gripped Flossy’s hand tighter.

  Walker grabbed Vic by the suspenders and pulled him to his feet. Blood was streaming from Vic’s nose and he was blinking his eyes. Your eyes tend to water when you get hit in the nose, and all the whiskey was making it worse.

  Vic looked like he wasn’t sure what was happening. Two-Finger didn’t wait for him to figure it out. With his good hand, he drove a fist into Vic’s stomach. Vic doubled over, all the way to the floor and lost much of the whiskey he had
consumed. That which hadn’t made its way into his system yet.

  Walker then kicked him in the ribs and Vic flopped over sideways.

  “Stop it!” Flossy screamed.

  Walker grabbed Vic by the suspenders and pulled him to his feet again. The bunk beds were immediately behind Vic, and Walker placed a hand on Vic’s forehead and drove his head back and into the wooden bunks. Once. Again. Vic’s knees buckled.

  Walker hauled Vic to his feet one more time. Vic was no longer fully conscious. His eyes were fluttering and his legs were wobbly. Walker dragged him out through the blanket and threw him on the ground.

  Cade was standing there. He had been walking up to the cabin when Walker and Vic burst out through the hanging blanket. He now stood staring, a little shocked.

  Walker said to Cade, sort of growling through his teeth, “Go get his horse.”

  Cade stood, staring.

  “I said, get his horse. Fergit the saddle. Just the horse.”

  Cade hurried away.

  Vic coughed and spit. Blood was still streaming out of his nose. He tried to wipe some away with his sleeve, then looked at the crimson color on his sleeve with surprise. As though his battered and whiskey-addled mind was just realizing he was bleeding.

  He blinked his eyes and sucked in breath. His eyes found focus. He rose to his knees, and tried to fully stand but fell back to the ground, and rose to his knees again. One arm was folded in front of his ribs where Walker had punched him. He reached the other hand out to the ground to steady himself.

  He looked over to where White-Eye sat on the stump. The rifle was still on White-Eye’s lap. He was sitting contentedly, as though he were at the theater watching a show.

  Jessica and Flossy stepped out through the hanging blanket. Jessica still had hold of Flossy’s hand. With Flossy’s free hand, she was covering her own mouth and looking with shock at Vic.