New Mexico Madman (9781101612644)

by Sharpe, Jon

  “All right, old warhorse,” he said softly, squeezing the Ovaro with his knees, “once more into the breach.”

  * * *

  Spider and Cleo watched their leader quickly wend his way back through the trees to their position.

  “Fargo’s coming,” he announced. “But he’s horsed.”

  “Shit,” Spider said. “That means Cleo has got to score with his first shot. That stallion of his runs like his pa’s name is Going and his ma’s name is Fast. What’s his pace?”

  “Just a slow trot. He’s deliberately making himself a target. That tells me he don’t plan on skedaddling. Spider’s right, Cleo—you got to pop Fargo over with your first shot.”

  “Why’n’t we just kill his horse with the first shot?” Spider tossed in. “Bigger target.”

  “Nix on that. Fargo will come at us then, with blood in his eyes—you can take that to the bank. He wasn’t born in the woods to be scairt by an owl. He don’t sleep in rented rooms, boys—we’re on his terrain now. Cleo, quit scratching your ass and snap in! He’ll be showing in that little clearing in about two minutes. You’ll have maybe ten seconds to get on bead and squeeze one off. Don’t bollix it, boy.”

  Cleo dropped into a kneeling offhand position and swung the butt of his Sharps securely into his shoulder socket. Soon all three men heard it—the faint, muted thud of shod hooves moving slow over dirt.

  Moments later Cleo spotted horse and rider. He drew his hammer from half cock to full with a faint, metallic click. He slipped his finger inside the trigger guard and inhaled a long breath. He expelled it slowly while he relaxed his muscles.

  Squeeze, he reminded himself as he dropped the bead just under the brim of Fargo’s white hat—only a head shot could guarantee a one-bullet kill.

  Just squeeze . . . the slightest bucking of the trigger would throw off his aim.

  His trigger finger took up the slack in one long, continuous pull.

  * * *

  Sweat beaded and trickled out from Fargo’s hair, tickling his forehead. As he rode deeper into the bosque he could feel his enemy’s eyes on him. It was useless, in this dense growth, to hope he could actually spot them. Nor could he even make a smart guess as to which stretch of the trail made for a good ambush spot. He felt like a bedbug on a clean sheet—easy to see and nowhere to hide.

  The Ovaro, too, was nervous in this dim tunnel and constantly snuffed the ground. Fargo didn’t pull his head up, knowing that smelling the ground settled a horse in unfamiliar surroundings.

  Fargo had already sheathed his Henry. Only fifty yards into the trees he had realized the long-barreled gun would be useless here. He knew that—assuming he wasn’t blasted out of the saddle—it would not be enough to simply toss some lead and hope the killers fled.

  He had to make it hot for them—so hot they got scared and cleared out. That meant “Booger’s Law” again—attack the attackers, and a long-barreled gun would only hinder him in these close-packed trees.

  You never hear the shot that kills you.

  Fargo willed himself calm and attentive, trying to hear above the pounding of his heart in his ears.

  The readiness is all. . . .

  The moment was coming, he sensed that, believed in it the way a Baptist believed in Jesus. It would be brief, crucial to his existence—that one little clue that most men missed or couldn’t read. A change in the insect hum, perhaps, or that sixth-sense sudden warning in the air, when it felt charged like it sometimes did before a massive crack of lightning.

  Or when the Ovaro’s ears suddenly pricked forward as they had just now.

  Here was the fandango, and Fargo did not pause to think—with the instincts honed from long survival in a harsh land, he simply reacted from reflex, slumping hard to the right side only an eyeblink before a slug thwacked into the tree right beside him. Almost simultaneously he heard the precision crack of a rifle.

  Fargo still held the reins and tugged the Ovaro into the cover of the trees as a withering hail of bullets chunked in around them. He quickly wrapped the reins around a weak branch—if he were killed, the Ovaro could easily break free and avoid the fate of becoming an outlaw horse, for no sane man would kill such a mount.

  Fargo had six beans in the wheel of his Colt, six more in the spare cylinder in his possibles bag. Hooking left to get out of the line of fire, he sprinted across the trail, letting his experienced ears give him a good idea where the shooters were. Moving quickly and with instinctive dexterity, he leapfrogged from tree to tree, firing as he moved, run and gun.

  The enemy fire abated and he heard a man shout, “Pull foot, boys!” Fargo homed in on that voice, pressing forward and changing cylinders as he moved. Firing a round every five seconds or so, he heard the frantic rustle of branches as his attackers panicked.

  Even when his twelfth shot was fired Fargo didn’t give up. He paused only long enough to thumb reloads into his Colt, then resumed his run-and-gun pursuit. He had to frazzle their nerves enough that they would lack the fighting fettle for another ambush attempt in the bosque.

  Then, just before he reached the Rio Grande, he heard hooves pounding toward the north in the three-beat drumming of a gallop. They were escaping along the grassy bank of the river, and more foot pursuit was folly.

  Fargo heaved a sigh and leaned against a cottonwood for a moment, his legs trembling now that it was over—at least for now. The shootout and the pursuit were piddling and he had faced no grave danger. But the suspense leading up to that first shot, and the narrow miss, had taken its delayed toll on his nerves.

  “Fargo,” he muttered as he recruited his strength for the return to his horse, “maybe you could stand a little of that punkin-butter monotony.”

  * * *

  The El Paso to Santa Fe stagecoach cleared Bosque Grande without further incident. The valley opened up again and Fargo breathed easier. By late afternoon they reached the swing station at Luna Bluff and acquired a fresh relay team.

  “All them gunshots back in them trees,” Trixie remarked to Fargo as the passengers stretched their legs at the swing station. “Didja kill anybody, Skye?”

  “Pah!” Booger interceded, ogling her pulchritude. “The man admits he spent damn near eighteen cartridges and shot nothing but trees. Up in Dakota he once tried to take a scalp and it made him puke. And can he drink Indian burner like a man?”

  The preacher overheard this. He stared at Booger, the corners of his mouth turning down in a frown. “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?”

  “Ahh, go blow your horn, Gabriel. I’ll credit no man who claims a virgin can have a baby. And I s’pose oysters can walk up stairs?”

  Pastor Brandenburg clutched his Bible like a drowning man clinging to a log. “Satan, get behind me!”

  “Aye, you’d like that, eh? Buggered by Beelzebub. That would leave you slouching toward Bethlehem.”

  “Whack the cork,” Fargo snapped. “He’s a preacher and you’re a blasphemer. How do you expect him to act?”

  “Blasphemy, is it? Old Booger knows shit from apple butter,” Booger groused as he walked away to help the swingman with the traces.

  “Mr. Fargo,” Kathleen said, “do you expect those men to attack again?”

  “Sure as sun in the morning. I’d say Zack Lomax went to a mort of trouble to get vengeance on you.”

  “Is the man a Capricorn?” Malachi Feldman interceded. “A man born under the influence of Mars is bellicose, certainly. But even worse is a Capricorn. They—”

  “Miss Barton has no interest in your inane prattle,” Lansford Ashton cut in harshly. “Nor do the rest of us. I prefer an honest pickpocket to your ilk.”

  Kathleen ignored all of this, still watching Fargo. “It has occurred to me, Mr. Fargo, that you are facing great danger to protect me. I hope you realize I’m grateful.”

/>   Her tone implied that she was praising a servant for getting the carpet extra clean.

  “I’m getting good wages for it,” Fargo replied. “It’s just a job.”

  He grinned when he saw scarlet points suddenly appear on her finely sculpted cheeks. She stiffened, then abruptly returned to the coach.

  Interesting, Fargo thought.

  The Concord swift wagon resumed its trek toward the station at Los Pinos. Booger tipped his flask now and then and belted out bawdy verses while Fargo kept a close eye on the surrounding valley. Booger suddenly burst out laughing, slapping his tree-trunk thigh.

  “Oh, Skye, Her Nibs will likely have a catfit when we get to Los Pinos. You know the place?”

  Fargo shook his head. “Why? What about it?”

  But Booger only smiled mysteriously. “Why, you’ll see. I’m not the boy to ruin a surprise.”

  “You’re mighty rough on that gal. Why’n’t you ease off a bit?”

  “I, rough on the Quality? That’s a libel on me, long-shanks. Why, she’s a reg’lar peach of a woman. I’m merely having a bit of sport with her.”

  Booger cracked his blacksnake over the leaders. “Gee up, you lazy animules! Get up! Hi yi! Fargo, straight arrow now: Do you b’lieve this Ashton yack works for Lomax?”

  “I think he’s shiftier than a creased buck, and I’d never leave my horse with him. I ain’t so sure he’s with Lomax, though. He can’t be unless Lomax knew which coach Kathleen was taking.”

  “Fargo, is your brain any bigger than your pee hole? First the bomb, then the attack today—ain’t it obvious as a third tit that Lomax knows the very coach she’s on?”

  “Now he does, sure. But recall that gunslick at the Vado station—he coulda been there as a spotter. The real poser is—did Lomax know before the coach pulled out of El Paso? That’s the only way he could plant a man on it.”

  Booger said, “Look here, catfish—Lomax is s’pose to be deader than a dried herring. What if it ain’t him behind all this?”

  “He’s the only one that fits the known facts. There’s no proof he’s dead, either.”

  Fargo was silent for a minute, thinking. “Could your boss—Addison Steele—be bought?” he finally asked. “Paid off to tell Lomax what stage she was taking? It was in the newspapers that she was coming to Santa Fe from El Paso.”

  “Yes, he could be bought like most men, but not in any plan to kill a woman. And this woman? Addison owns stock in Overland—why, if anything happens to America’s Sweetheart on an Overland run, it could sink the company. And Steele would be cashiered, for a surety.”

  Fargo nodded. “That rings right. But he’s not the only one Lomax could bribe, is he?”

  “Naw. Overland is packed up the wazoo with pus-guts and board walkers—assistant managers, clerks and such. The green eyeshades, I calls ’em. Why, I’d say it’s an even bet Lomax knew in time to put a curly wolf on the passenger list. And Ashton—I like him for it.”

  “Mm. If so, it’s not his job to kill the actress. Seems like Lomax wants that pleasure for himself. Most likely, it’s Ashton’s job to kill me if the others come a cropper.”

  “Happens that’s so, why, he’ll have to kill old Booger, too.”

  “Well, he’s got a pepperbox in his valise—six bullets fired at one time would drop even an ox like you. Then he could just steal my horse and abduct Kathleen.”

  Booger looked over at him, his moon face set in a frown. “It could play out that way right enough. We best watch that bastard, Skye—watch him like two cats on a rat.”

  9

  Three hours after Fargo lit the four night-running lamps, Booger reined in at Los Pinos.

  The place was hardly more than a dilapidated shack caving in on itself. In the silver-white moonlight it reminded Fargo of deserted hovels he had seen in depleted mining camps. No smoke curled from the stovepipe chimney, and no light showed through the flyspecked, oiled paper serving as windows. An open-fronted stock shed stood empty and Booger had already informed him that Los Pinos could offer no fresh relay because of manpower shortages.

  “This place looks abandoned,” Fargo said as he prepared to swing off the box. “Maybe there’s been trouble.”

  Booger was unable to stifle a giggle. “Oh, there is trouble, catfish, count on it,” he said, volunteering no more.

  Fargo swung the step into place and helped the weary ladies out. Kathleen Barton gaped in astonishment. “This is a station? Mr. McTeague, you gave me to understand there were bathing facilities here!”

  “Why, yes, Your Nibs. There’s a pump around back, and as you can plainly see, a water trough. When the horses have finished drink—”

  “I shall protest this outrage!” she enunciated crisply. “I will have your job for this!”

  By now Booger was shaking with mirth. “Why, cottontail, you may have it for the asking—I’ll not deprive you.”

  Fargo stifled a laugh, lifting the latchstring and stepping inside. The place was as dark as the inside of a boot and filled with the stench of whiskey and boiled cabbage. Even fouler, however, was the stink of antiquated fish-oil lamps. Somebody farther inside the room was snoring with enough racket to wake snakes.

  Fargo found one of the old lamps hanging by the door. He snapped a phosphor to life with his thumbnail and fired up the wick. Dirty yellow light filled the room, pushing shadows back into the corners.

  “My God!” Kathleen said in a shocked whisper, peering around Fargo.

  The light annoyed a rat, which ambled back to its nest in a back corner filled with rubbish. Several empty whiskey bottles dotted the rammed-earth floor, and the only “furnishings” were empty nail kegs and a table made from a door nailed to a pair of sawhorses.

  An old man who looked to be straight out of Genesis and sprung in the knees was fast asleep on a tatty buffalo robe. His face was as wrinkled as a whore’s bedsheet, and a tobacco-stained beard covered most of his caved-in chest. He wore frayed canvas trousers—gone through at the knees—and a shirt sewn from old sacking.

  “Roust out, Methuselah!” Fargo sang out.

  The old codger woke with a violent start, shading his eyes from the light.

  “Katy Christ, mister,” he croaked, struggling to his feet with a loud cracking of stiff joints. “Scare the bejabbers out of a fellow, why’n’cha?”

  “Don’t tell me you’re the station master?”

  “Why not tell you, it’s God’s honest truth. My name’s Pow—that’s bobtail for Powhatan. ’Bout damn time you folks got here—I waited up long as I could.”

  Kathleen, Trixie, Malachi, Ashton and the preacher all stood crowded outside the door, perhaps daunted by the hellish stench. They stared with paralyzed stupefaction.

  “Well, don’t stand there gawking like chawbacons at a county fair,” he admonished from a sullen deadpan. “C’mon inside—you’re lettin’ flies in.”

  “I’d wager they’re trying to escape,” Fargo remarked, casting his eye around the rubbish-strewn room. Booger was unhitching the team out in the yard, and Fargo heard him roaring with laughter.

  “Shall I draw your bath now, Miss Barton?” he barely managed before more laughter choked him. Fargo laughed, too, and shook his head.

  “Mr. Fargo, it’s not humorous!” Kathleen shot at him, stamping her foot in frustration. “Perhaps you and—and ‘Booger’ are used to such abominable conditions, but I am not!”

  “Hear, hear,” the preacher said. “It’s not fit for pigs much less ladies.”

  “How can Overland treat its passengers this way?” Kathleen demanded. “By contract we are promised hot food, clean accommodations, and the opportunity for at least one hot bath. And where are we to sleep—on this filthy floor?”

  Pow got his first good size-up of the actress, squinting in the lamplight as if gnats were swa
rming his eyes. He loosed a whistle. “Pretty as four aces and brash as a rented mule. You’ll have your eats, Little Miss Pink Cheeks.”

  He winked at Fargo. “Jest today I got in a fresh load of fat, sugar-cured Salt Lake grasshoppers. Them’s good fixin’s.”

  Methuselah picked up a quirt from the crude table and snapped it at a fly, squashing it dead. “Got two that time,” he boasted. “Must be mating season.”

  “I will not eat grasshoppers,” Kathleen flung at him.

  He grinned at her, yellow nubbins of teeth visible through his beard. “Look who’s feelin’ a mite scratchy tonight. You two pretty gals may sleep on my buff robe.”

  “And catch fleas? I will pass on that wondrous opportunity. The stench in here is unbearable.”

  Pow winked at Fargo. “Oh, thissen’s silk, all right. Pure silk.”

  “And when was the last time,” Kathleen steamed on, “you laundered your clothing?”

  “Well, I ain’t got no Sunday-go-to-meetin’ togs like concho belt there, Your Bitchiness.”

  Fargo was enjoying all this but now it was time to intercede. Kathleen had every right to be angry. But Fargo was dog tired and so was everyone else.

  “Miss Barton,” he said mildly, “why push if a thing won’t move? You still have plenty of eats in your hamper. Far as sleeping arrangements, I’m not bedding down inside this rattrap, either. I suggest you and Trixie sleep in the coach, and the rest of us will bed down in the stock shed.”

  “You folks oughter keep a weather eye out while you head north,” Pow warned. “They was an express rider through here today. Says ’Paches is raiding up that way. The station house at Polvadera was burnt down. They kilt the station master and his woman but spared the children. Sons-a-bitches also raided the swing station at Lemitar and killed the relays. It was that bunch under the renegade Red Sash.”

  This news doubly alarmed Fargo. Polvadera was the next scheduled station before La Joya, and with the swing station at Lemitar down, this team would be dangerously overworked.

  “Yeah, I’ve seen Red Sash’s handwork,” Fargo remarked. “His bunch left nine men dead at the silver mines of the Santa Rita over in Arizona.”