by Jon Sharpe
Fargo doubted that would stop a seasoned tracker. It sure wouldn’t throw him off. “How did Moon and you hook up?”
“Not me, silly. James had Roy ask around in some of San Francisco’s more disreputable dives. Roy was very discreet. He merely said he wanted to hire someone who didn’t care about which side of the law they worked on. The one name that cropped up again and again was Moon’s.”
“And then you went and dragged Gretchen into it.”
Esther’s tone became flinty. “How much do you know, exactly? It sounds to me as if someone has been talking out of school.”
Fargo had blundered. He covered his mistake by saying, “I heard you and Serilda talking back there.”
“Is that her name? She never said. I guess you’ve put two and two together and think you have everything worked out. But you’re wrong. I didn’t drag Gretchen into this. She offered to come to help protect me.”
“You could have told her not to.”
“Why would I do that? She’s my dearest friend in all the world.”
The section of tunnel they were in was inches thick with dust. The wall, when Fargo touched it, crumpled to the lightest touch. He realized he hadn’t seen any support beams in a while. “We better go easy. A loud noise could bring the roof down.”
“I saw a rat earlier. And there was a spiderweb big enough for a spider the size of a dinner plate.”
The tunnel floor was littered with clogs of dirt and rocks, the tunnel roof pockmarked with the holes they fell from.
“God, I hope we get out soon,” Esther whispered.
Fargo spotted something flush with the right wall. He reached out and felt rungs. “A ladder,” he informed her. He put his foot on the bottom rung and it broke with a loud crunch.
“No!” Esther bleated. “Not when we’re so close.”
Fargo tested the next rung. It held, and he gingerly applied his boot to the third. It creaked but it held, too. The same with the rest. He climbed until his hat bumped an obstruction. It was another trapdoor. He pushed but it wouldn’t budge. He put his shoulder to it and pushed harder. It barely moved.
“Hurry up, will you?”
“It’s stuck.”
“Hit it with your pistol.”
“The hell I will.”
“I’ll hand up your rifle and you can hit it with that.”
“The hell you will.”
“Are you worried about damaging them? Staying alive is more important than your silly guns.”
“My guns keep me alive,” Fargo set her straight.
Fargo braced himself and tried again. He was worried the rungs would break but they didn’t. This time the trapdoor moved a fraction, causing dust to rain down.
“James would have had it open by now.”
“James can’t open his fly without help.”
“Why do you keep belittling him? He’s as fine a man as ever drew breath. And he knows to chew with his mouth closed.”
“You care about how he eats?”
“It’s a sign of breeding. Certainly I care. A woman can’t marry just any bumpkin off the street.”
“To some gals chewing isn’t important.”
“It is if she wants a happy marriage. A woman must look for qualities that please her.” Esther paused. “Take me, for instance. I wanted a gentleman. I wanted someone who waited on me hand and foot and would do whatever I asked of him.”
“You’d make a great bullwhacker.”
“Aren’t they those men who handle teams of oxen? Are you saying my James is an ox?”
“I’m saying if you two marry, you’ll wear the britches.”
Esther sniffed. “I should be offended but I’m not. Do you know why? Because I will wear the pants. I’ve always gotten my way in this world and I don’t intend to stop just because some man has taken it into his head he can’t live without me.”
“So much for true love.”
“Oh, please. Just because a woman is in love doesn’t mean she must stop using common sense. Marrying the wrong man can make a woman miserable for life.”
“So can marrying the wrong woman.”
“Are you going to talk or get us out of here?”
Fargo put both hands flat against the door and tried a third time. The door rose a couple of inches. Through the gap poured a torrent of dirt, getting into his face and down his neck.
“Did you hear that?” Esther breathlessly asked.
Fargo listened. All he heard was the dry hiss of dirt and the patter of a few stones. “Don’t distract me.”
“There’s something in this tunnel with us, I tell you. An animal, I think.”
“If it bites you, tell me.” Fargo applied his shoulder to the trapdoor yet again, exerting every sinew in his body. He was rewarded with the rasp of hinges and a new cascade of dirt. A rock the size of an apple struck him on the arm. Five, six, seven inches the trapdoor rose—and wouldn’t go any higher.
Esther was coughing and swatting at the dust. “Must you get it all over me?”
Fargo climbed one more rung and put his entire back to the trapdoor. His hands against the tunnel wall, he heaved. More dirt and stones fell over and around him. Suddenly there was a crack and the trapdoor gave way, flying up so fast he nearly lost his balance. Cool night air washed over him and he gazed up at a star-filled sky.
“You did it!” Esther squealed.
Fargo started to climb out.
“Where are you going? You’re going to leave me down here by myself with that madman on the loose?”
Fargo sighed and went down. As he stepped off the ladder she shoved the Henry at him. Hopping onto the second rung, she scampered up with surprising agility. Near the top she stopped.
“Did you hear that?”
“I didn’t hear a damn thing.”
“Over that way,” Esther said, pointing down the tunnel.
Fargo turned. There was nothing, nothing at all. He turned back to tell her and was sent staggering by a blow to the head. A rock as big as a melon thudded to the earth at his feet. His sense reeling, he sagged against the wall and rasped, “Watch what the hell you’re doing.”
“I’m watching just fine.”
Fargo glanced up. She was on her knees above the trapdoor, holding another huge rock.
“Thanks for your help,” Esther said, and let go.
Fargo dived flat. The rock hit him on the shoulder, lancing pain clear down to his hips. He rolled and swung the Henry toward the opening just as more dirt showered down. He couldn’t see for all the dust. Shaking his head to clear it, he made it to his knees.
Above him, the trapdoor slammed shut.
Fargo clutched at the ladder and pulled himself to his feet. Blood was trickling down his face from a gash over his temple. He was lucky she hadn’t crushed his skull.
Fargo went up the ladder. He pressed with all his might but the trapdoor wouldn’t move. Scritching and scratching noises puzzled him until he realized she was piling rocks and dirt on top of it. She had sealed him in.
Fargo swore. She had played him for a jackass. It wasn’t hard to guess why. He knew too much. She wanted to get rid of him so he couldn’t report her to the law. Not that he would but she didn’t know that.
Left with no choice, Fargo climbed down. The bleeding was worse so he untied his bandanna and mopped at the blood. From overhead came mocking laughter.
“Can you hear me down there? I want to thank you for making it so easy. I suppose I could have shot you but I like this way better. Now you and that monster can kill each other off.” Esther’s laughter trailed off into the night.
Fargo continued on. There were more trapdoors and he would find one.
It wasn’t long before he came to another junction. The new tunnel, if his sense of direction wasn’t off, led toward Kill Creek. He took it.
No sounds reached him, either from ahead or behind. For the moment he was safe.
Fargo never had liked being taken advantage of, and he wasn’t one to turn
the other cheek. He didn’t do unto others as he wanted them to do to him. Hurt him once and he never forgot and never forgave. He had several scores to settle now, and he wasn’t leaving Kill Creek until he did.
Deep in thought, Fargo almost missed an opening in the left wall.
It was another chamber. He entered and felt along the wall and nearly yipped with glee when his questing fingers found a lantern on a peg. He lit it and raised it over his head.
The walls were solid rock laced with quartz. Someone had been at the quartz with a pick and left large piles. Flashes of yellow drew Fargo to the nearest. He picked up a chunk and held it to the lantern. He wasn’t an expert but he was willing to bet the yellow was fool’s gold. Whoever did the chipping had gone to a lot of trouble for nothing.
Fargo moved on. He was tired of being underground. He wasn’t one of those who couldn’t abide tight spaces but he wasn’t a mole, either. He walked faster now that he had light, alert for another ladder.
The tunnel forked. He took the right branch but it went only sixty feet and ended at a dirt wall. He turned to go back.
At the limit of the light, something moved.
Instantly, Fargo raised the Henry.
Whatever or whoever it was didn’t come closer.
“Who’s there?” Fargo demanded. He wasn’t expecting an answer but he got one in the form of a growl. Only the growl didn’t sound as if it came from a mastiff or some other animal. The throat that made it was human.
Fargo sighted down the barrel. He took a few steps and the shape retreated. “You’re Maxine’s pa, aren’t you?”
Another growl was the answer.
“I don’t scare easy,” Fargo said. When he still got no reply, he angrily snapped, “Talk to me, you son of a bitch.”
“Thief,” the shape rumbled.
“What?”
“You try take treasure.”
“What treasure? That fool’s gold?”
“You the fool,” the shape said, and melted away.
Fargo broke into a run, his boots slapping the earth. Up ahead, other boots did the same. He ran faster, the lantern swinging wildly. He caught sight of the brown robe or frock or whatever it was. “Stop!”
His quarry was a two-legged antelope.
Fargo was so intent on catching up that he didn’t look down. He didn’t notice that the dirt had been disturbed, or that a part of the tunnel floor wasn’t dirt at all. It was canvas covered with dirt. Only when he took another stride and the canvas gave way did he awaken to his peril. He tried to fling himself back but his momentum did him in. Down he pitched, headlong to the bottom. The impact knocked the breath from his lungs. The lantern crashed and broke and he was mired in ink.
He had blundered again but his other blunders were nothing compared to this one.
He had fallen into a pit.
14
Fargo’s shoulder and side throbbed. He propped himself on his other arm and flexed his shoulder and raised and lowered his arm a few times to see if anything was broken. In the pitch-black it was impossible to tell how deep the pit was. He guessed about ten feet. Sitting up, he felt the ground around him for the Henry. A sharp sting in his middle finger caused him to jerk his hand back. He had cut himself on a piece of broken glass from the lantern.
More carefully now, Fargo ran both hands over the bottom. He found the Henry, and stood. Backing against the pit wall, he placed one boot in front of the other until he came to the other end. The pit was twelve feet long. He did the same from side to side and measured the same.
From above came a guttural laugh.
Fargo glanced up. Crouched on the lip was a hulking form. “Come back to gloat?”
A voice that brought to mind the rumbling of a bear answered with, “Brom trick you.”
“That’s your name? Brom?”
“Bromley. Everybody call me Brom.”
“You’re Maxine’s and Serilda’s pa.”
“Brom’s girls. Good girls. But Serilda not always listen. She too nice, that one.”
Fargo wasn’t the only one who had blundered. He started to raise the Henry to his sore shoulder.
“Don’t,” Brom warned. “Make Brom mad, Brom kill quick.”
Fargo was taken aback. “You can see in the dark?”
“Brom like cat. Live down here many years. See good.”
“Why the hell do you talk like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like you’re two years old.” Fargo was stalling. He needed to learn as much as he could. Maybe, just maybe, he could talk his way out.
“You poke fun at Brom?”
“I just want to know.”
The hulk was quiet a bit, then rumbled, “Brom show you. Brom be back.” His silhouette vanished.
Fargo roved the pit walls. He jumped up a few times but couldn’t reach the top. He had completed a circuit and was back where he started when without any sound whatsoever, his captor was back.
“Put rifle on ground.”
Fargo did as he was bid.
“Pistol too.”
“Why?”
“Brom not stupid. You want answer, you put pistol on ground with rifle.”
Fargo reckoned he had nothing to lose. He slicked the Colt out and set it down, then held his hands out from his sides. “Happy now? Suppose you tell me what this is all about.”
“First show,” Brom said.
Light flared. Fargo blinked against the glare and squinted up. “What is it you want to show me?”
Brom was holding a lantern in a gnarled hand. He placed it next to him, reached up, and pulled back his hood.
Fargo couldn’t help himself; he recoiled a step.
“Brom handsome, yes?”
Fargo was speechless. No wonder Esther had called him a monster. Bromley’s head was a misshapen ruin. The left half was normal except for the left eye, which bulged obscenely. It was the right half that was hideous. Nearly bald save for scraggily tufts, the skull had partially caved in and the ear was split in half. The right cheek was twice the size of the left, and the right eye bulged even more than its counterpart. As if that weren’t enough, the corner of the man’s mouth drooped and oozed drool. His neck, thick as a bull’s and corded with muscle, was oddly bent so he couldn’t hold his head straight.
“Brom handsome, yes?”
“What happened to you?”
Brom touched his misshapen face. “Beam fall on Brom. Brom nearly die. When Brom better, he look like this. Now Brom ugly. No one like to look at him. Not even own girls. Brom scare them.”
“That’s why you wear the robe and hood.”
Brom plucked at the folds. “This belong to priest once. Him like you, a thief. He wanted Brom’s treasure. Brom not let him have it.”
“You killed him?”
“Wring his neck like this.” Brom mimicked strangling someone and then ripping their head from their shoulders. “Priest flop like chicken. Brom take robe so not scare girls.”
“What was that about treasure?”
“You saw. You know. It is why you here.”
“That’s fool’s gold. It’s worthless.”
“You try fool Brom. It not work.”
“I’m not after your gold or anything else,” Fargo sought to set him straight.
“Liar!” Brom roared, his ravaged features coloring red. “You the same as everybody else. You want what is Brom’s.”
“Listen to me . . .” Fargo said, but the ravaged madman paid him no mind.
“This place Brom’s. Treasure Brom’s. Brom not let you have it. Brom not let others have it. Brom kill you all. Even one who say he wanted Brom’s help.”
“Who was that?”
Brom smiled a lopsided smile. “That all Brom tell.” He pulled his hood up, and stood. “You die slow, thief. No food. No water. Take days, maybe.”
“I’ll give you one last chance,” Fargo said. “Get me out of this and let me take the blond woman with me and you can do whatever the hell you want
to the others.”
“You like blond woman, yes?”
“She’s a friend. So what do you say?”
Brom leaned down and with vicious spite declared, “Brom say he bring her to you. Brom say you and her die together.” With that, he strode off.
Fargo lunged for the Colt. As quick as he was, he had no one to shoot. Mocking mirth filled the tunnel. Fargo shoved the Colt into his holster and picked up the Henry. He had learned enough to know that he was dealing with a lunatic. The accident had done something to the man’s mind. Warped it, twisted it as the beam had twisted Brom’s face.
A shadow flitted across the pit.
Fargo looked up, thinking Brom had come back but it was only a moth fluttering about the lantern. The madman hadn’t bothered to take it with him. Another blunder on Brom’s part.
Fargo inspected the pit walls. They were sheer and hard packed. He sprang for the rim but fell short.
Holding the Henry by the barrel and the stock, Fargo threw it up and beyond the lantern, an easy toss that shouldn’t damage it any. Then he backed to the far end and crouched. Coiling his legs, he exploded into motion. Three bounds carried him the entire length. He launched himself into the air, his arms extended. His fingers caught the edge but he couldn’t hold on. With an oath he fell to the bottom, alighting on the balls of his feet.
“Damn.”
Fargo drew the Arkansas toothpick. At waist height he dug a foothold wide enough for the toe of his boot to fit. Wiping the blade clean on his buckskins, he slid the toothpick into his ankle sheath and once again moved to the other end. Once again he crouched. Once again he coiled. He must time it just right. If he missed, or if his boot wedged too tight, he might break a toe or his ankle or even his leg.
Three bounds, and Fargo sprang. He jammed his boot into the foothold and levered higher, his arms as far over his head as he could reach. The extra boost did the trick. His forearms shot over the rim. Digging his elbows in, he held fast and pumped his legs. His knee bumped the lantern and it started to go over the side but he caught hold of the handle.
Fargo grinned. He had done it. He gazed down into the pit and noticed something he hadn’t noticed earlier. It explained how Brom had made it past the pit without falling in. On the left the pit was flush with the tunnel wall but on the right there was a lip just wide enough for a man to cross if he was careful.
