by Abe Dancer
Reaching a building, he pressed up alongside a broken-framed window, sliding close enough to hear the clear drift of voices. It didn’t look or sound like it was the first time the place had been used as a clandestine meeting place, and it didn’t take long for him to establish that four men were inside. Morton Pegg, Hockton Marney, and two others named Chester and Bunce. Both these names were familiar to him. Chester was the purported government agent with funds to purchase Whistler and its hinterland. Benedict Bunce was an executive of the Gulf Railroad Company.
The get-together was expressive and noisy. Pegg, Marney and Bunce were pressing Chester to force closure on the deal with Gaston Savoy. Chester protested that Savoy might spook and get suspicious.
‘We’ve got to get it signed an’ sealed, goddamnit,’ said the voice, which Jack now recognized as Benedict Bunce’s. ‘Every hour we delay, the greater risk o’ the truth gettin’ out. If that redneck somehow hits on our branch line through the middle o’ Whistler we’re finished. We’ve all sunk too much into this venture to have it not happen.’
Now the land surrounding Lis Etang had been stripped bare, the only cost-effective way for Morton Pegg and his investors to get their hands on a new timber supply was by hauling into the empty Whistler township and onto the railroad’s flat-bed wagons. There was no other way of hauling big timber further north.
‘Yeah, you’ve got to hasten things up, Chester,’ Pegg added. ‘For what it’s worth, I don’t think you’ll be warning him off. He’s got other interests to sidetrack him in Blackwater besides his people.’
There were then a few moments of awkward, telling silence. Before listening to Marney’s reaction to Pegg’s insinuation, Jack had heard enough. He’d come to Lis Etang thinking there’d be answers and he’d found them. And he’d wager that the murder of Winge Tedder and the attack on him were tangled up in the deal.
He was considering retracing his route back to the creek when a man armed with a rifle appeared at the corner of the building. Before he turned to look in Jack’s direction, Jack had backed quickly into the taller grass. But you could see where he’d been standing, listening.
The man gave a warning yell. He’d seen the dark stain beneath the window where creek water had dripped, pooling thin on a broken flagstone.
Jack waited until Grice had responded to the outcry, then he ran fast back the way he’d come, but this time along the bank.
A door opened as Jack rushed to the tethered horses. Harry Grice let out a holler as the horses lunged away, and Jack threw himself at the neck of a sturdy buckskin. A gun roared and bullets thumped close. Jack swung into the saddle, kicking his heels and shouting for the horse to run.
Within seconds, riders were racing to try to cut him off, hoping they knew the treacherous ground better than Jack did. One man he sighted was an employee of Morton Pegg, but another was Homer Lamb.
‘So that’s who the horses were waiting for,’ he muttered. ‘And I should have recognized your voice, you son-of-a-bitch.’
If his cartridge charges were damp from his wading in the creek water, Jack knew he’d be in big trouble as he swung his Colt around and fired a defensive shot at Lamb. But the shot was too hasty and it was the horse that buckled, the rider falling, then rolling clear.
Jack cursed and heeled his mount forward. But now the Pegg gunman was quickly gaining on him, and he cursed again. ‘Run,’ he shouted. ‘Go join the herd. It must be a goddamn liberty day somewhere.’
Jack wasn’t far off the wagon road between Blackwater and Lis Etang, more than halfway to Whistler. ‘There’s one coming to take your place,’ he thought, watching the horse raise its head and sniff before running off. He settled behind the stump of an old uprooted tupelo, drew his Colt and rested the barrel on his left arm.
The rider appeared on cue, didn’t have time to sense the lurking danger before he was hit.
There was no slip-up from Jack this time and taking careful aim he fired twice. ‘No more paydays for you, feller. Let’s hope Pegg honours your kin,’ he rasped quietly. He ran straight to the man’s horse without taking another look at the rider, scooped the reins and swung into the saddle.
After running the horse for ten minutes Jack knew he’d make it to Whistler. The chasing riders were still in pursuit and they weren’t going to ride off, but he had just enough of an advantage.
Jack barely made it to the safety of the outlying Whistler shacks and cabins when Harry Grice brought his men racing through the trees, raising their firearms and firing indiscriminately.
Jack knew the men were now acting on orders. They were to clear the settlement, leave nothing behind – make the area safe for their paymasters to begin their voracious schemes. The profits from the vast tracts of timber were so great they would worry about the consequences later.
The once peaceful and still bayous were now suddenly riven by the sounds of gunfire. Jack sensed he’d really got himself between a rock and a hard place.
15
Gaston Savoy showed a haggard face when he looked up from his wounded son, Eliot. ‘You brought the hounds of hell back with you,’ he accused.
‘Believe me, Savoy, they were coming for you one way or another,’ Jack replied sharply. ‘I had some things wrong … not all of it. I’ll be taking what’s mine and heading away from this stricken place. If I don’t return, you and yours are old enough, certainly ugly enough, to sort yourselves out. Remember, none of this is my doing.’
‘You remember, I still got those thousand dollars,’ Savoy said. ‘If you want to know what snake pit it’s hidden in, you’ll be back. Besides, you’ll never make it anywhere now.’
‘On the sorrel I will,’ Jack insisted, flinching as a speculative rifle bullet smashed through a side window. ‘Not that there’s a choice. This old place of yours might keep outsiders out, but it also keeps insiders in.’
‘How the hell do they figure they can get away with it?’ Savoy raged.
‘Most likely the same reason they had before they made a deal with you,’ Jack snapped back. ‘But things have changed. Of a sudden they’re desperate … figure they’re going to lose everything they’ve been dreaming of,’ Jack continued. ‘They’ll probably say you were reneging on their lawful acquisition of the land. If they testify you attacked them here, who’ll be around to say otherwise? You’ll all be with Winge Tedder, sleeping underwater.’
Jack eased back the cabin door on its heavy hinges, looked across the empty, flattened grass of the settlement’s compound. ‘If I do make it back to town, with any luck there’ll be a posse here about nine o’clock. With or without me. Knowing every goddamn rat and snake hole like you do, take advantage of them. Even with a couple of slingshots you should be able to hold out till then.’
Jack was considering his move across to the corral, when Melba suddenly pushed through the narrow back door.
Jack turned. ‘What’s this? A charm?’ he said, not unkindly.
‘Sort of,’ Melba replied quietly. ‘It’s made from coney bones. I’ve used it to bring me all sorts of luck. Try it out.’
‘Thank you, I will. You folk are something else,’ Jack said with a smile and a shake of his head as he left the cabin.
In the failing light he had no trouble getting to the corral. ‘It’s a long story,’ he told the single guard. ‘But if I was you, I’d find somewhere safe and keep my head down for the next couple of hours. It’s the only way you’re going to stay alive,’ he added brusquely.
Jack saddled his big mare, gave reassuring words. It seemed much darker within the closeness of the tupelos and cypress, their ghostly tendrils of Spanish moss. Waiting for full dark, he hoped the attackers would think twice before moving through such an eerie and treacherous place.
‘It’s a poor set of legs that’ll stand around to get hurt. Let’s show the sons-of-bitches how to run,’ he said with a new confidence.
In the main street of Blackwater Jack stood rubbing the sorrel’s forehead, feeding it a plug of sugar cane.
There were raised voices and much confusion. Angry men mounted up and checked their handguns, waiting for Sheriff Buckmaster to lead them out.
‘Never thought we’d be ridin’ to help them swampers,’ one of them shouted.
‘You’re not,’ returned another. ‘You’re helpin’ fellow citizens.’
Jack was both impressed and bewildered. He had been afraid the townsfolk would refuse to rally to the aid of the bayou clans, despite the fact most of them were now virtually neighbours. Jack thought their willingness to create a posse had something to do with their futures being controlled by one or two opportunists. Of those Whistler men who’d recently moved to town, most were eager to take a gun to simply help family and friends. Watching them get together, Jack felt a hollow kind of relief. He was hopeful they’d get there in time to deal with Pegg and Grice; before hired guns caused more harm.
‘We’ve done our bit,’ he muttered to the sorrel. ‘I’ve done just about everything man or beast could. I’ve been robbed, shot at, wounded and chased through wildernesses that are infested with all kinds of poisonous critters. And from a bunch of throwbacks who held you hostage while I was unarmed and hog-tied. Goddamnit, now I’m back here getting them help.’
Getting his horse and then his money back would go some way to Jack overlooking the treatment meted out by Gaston Savoy. ‘I never was much on leaving a game without some profit,’ he said. ‘So let’s go and get those dollars back.’
Jack heeled the big sorrel into an easy, powerful lope, taking them past the High Chair Saloon and out of town, back towards the wagon road. He was heading off to the west, in the direction of Whistler when he noticed the dark sky above the tops of the heavy stands of timber. ‘That’s smoke, not cloud,’ he muttered. ‘But there’s nothing to burn like that out here,’ he added, pulling the sorrel to a halt. ‘Except the goddamn cabins. Those sons-of-bitches want the bayou trees so bad, they’ll burn ’em down in desperation.’ Then he caught the first whiff of smoke carried by the night breeze, and his blood chilled.
There were still some youngsters out at Whistler. For one reason or another, they and their families hadn’t yet removed to Blackwater. And they weren’t the only ones. Jack raised his hand to his shirt pocket, felt the bone ornament given to him by Melba. ‘You can’t ignore ’em,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘So, let’s go and help ’em.’
The attackers had first overrun the two empty Boudro cabins on the eastern perimeter of the compound. Harry Grice and his gunmen stormed from one cabin to the next, lashing out at anything that caught their eye. But Hockton Marney stayed behind. Among the remains of what had been abandoned he’d spotted a jar of moonshine standing beside a pot-belly stove. He gasped uneasily, felt he’d never needed a drink more in his life.
What was happening now at the old Whistler settlement wasn’t Marney’s style – not this close-up stuff where you got dirty, did your own killing. The mayor was a back-room schemer, always had been. He had wanted to pull out when Chester and Bunce had refused to chase after Jack Rogan. But Morton Pegg had forced him to join them. Now the lumber merchant was arguing they had the chance to wipe out the entire Whistler contingent. ‘It’ll look like a bitter family rivalry got the better of ’em,’ he’d suggested. ‘It’s nothin’ your regular, God-fearin’ townsfolk won’t accept.’
Realizing Pegg’s mind had gone beyond reason, Marney wanted out. His nerves were shredded and he was trembling with fear. ‘Maybe a slug of this stuff,’ he said. ‘Just something for the nerves.’
As both his hands closed around the neck of the jar, a window exploded with a crash. A bullet smashed low into his belly, another into his chest. He fell against the stove, gasping with misery, his eyes closing as the liquor fell from his clutching fingers.
‘They never said anythin’ about burnin’,’ Homer Lamb seethed as he ran stumbling towards the settlement. With one hand he gripped his Walker Colt, with the other he brushed aside tendrils of trailing moss and peered at the scene ahead. He shook his head in ignorance, couldn’t figure just how he’d come to find himself in this position. He was fighting his own people, watching his old home go up in flames. He vaguely knew it had started with his resentment of Gaston Savoy, an irrational need to overthrow the old guard. But it had got out of hand when Jack Rogan arrived. Now it looked like the only way out was by aligning himself with Harry Grice and a corrupt business scheme.
He approached Pegg and Grice, who were holed up in the cookshack. ‘It’s just not goin’ to get us what we want. There’s got to be some other way,’ he said, his voice near to desperation. ‘If anyone gets wind of what’s happenin’ … starts puttin’ two an’ two together, they’ll send for US marshals.’
‘That’s just what we need,’ Pegg sneered back. ‘Someone who’s decided to put friends an’ family an’ a few tumble-down shacks before a heap o’ cash money. Well it’s too late to start shiverin’ in your boots now, feller.’
Gripping the butt of his Colt, Lamb shook his head. ‘I never agreed to burn down family folk,’ he protested. ‘An’ fire’s goin’ to eat up every stick of timber south of Lis Etang. Where’s that heap o’ cash money comin’ from if there’s nothin’ left?’
‘Some o’ you crackers are even dumber than you look,’ Harry Grice contributed, pushing fresh cartridges into the chamber of his gun. ‘All the fire’s takin’ out is your abandoned, stinkin’ camp an’ a few acres o’ dry timber. So how about thinkin’ on your prospects an’ finishin’ off these wretched troublemakers.’
Grice misjudged Lamb’s frame of mind, even his next move. But Morton Pegg didn’t. Standing back from the two men, the timber merchant saw Lamb’s eyes flash, saw the man’s hand draw his broad-bladed knife from the sheath looped around his shoulder.
Grice had already turned away. Lamb had taken half a step forward, was lunging for the kill when Pegg fired.
Grice whirled, cursing venomously as Lamb collapsed at his feet. He pointed his Colt down at the big man’s body, then at Pegg. ‘Right now you need me more than him, I guess,’ he said. ‘But thanks anyway.’
Pegg nodded. ‘I won’t make a habit of it, if you don’t,’ he replied dourly.
‘One less to divvy with.’ Grice looked out across the flat, empty compound. ‘What’s Savoy up to, I wonder,’ he said. ‘He might have age, but he’s still as slippery as one o’ them goddamn eels they’re so fond of.’
‘Yeah. Do you reckon our boys’ll have turned for town by now?’ Pegg asked him.
‘Depends. It don’t sound like they’re out there anymore. An’ none of ’em are givin’ up on a chase. Rogan’s head is where their full pay is. I got a gut feelin’ it was him that Homer went after. An’ where the hell’s our goddamn mayor?’
‘He’s stayed behind for some reason. Something must be keeping him.’
‘I can only guess what,’ Grice decided. ‘If he talks after fillin’ his gut with whatever juice he’s found, it’s the beginnin’ of the end for us.’
Harry Grice’s instinct for survival kicked in. He listened for a moment, considering the options. ‘I’ll find him. If one of Savoy’s lot hasn’t got to him, I will,’ he warned. ‘You’ll have to take care o’ you.’
Grice ran straight from the cookshack, cursing and ducking as two bullets whined past his head. ‘If they decided against huntin’ ducks, I’d be a dead man,’ he wheezed.
Grice was standing in the doorway of the Boudro cabin, a humourless grin on his spare features.
Inside, Jack was kneeling beside Marney’s body. Instinct made him turn and look up. I should have reloaded, was his immediate and depressing thought. Talk to the son-of-a-bitch, was his second. It doesn’t matter about what.
‘Tell me, Grice,’ he started. ‘How’s anyone going to believe that a man who manages to live with a horse turd for a brain, gets involved in a high-priced business deal? Mercenary killings, yes. But a business deal?’
Grice was struck with indecision. Finding Jack Rogan wasn’t what he was expecting. The hi
red gunman should have shot, but his sudden challenge was to reply. ‘I’m guessin’ our unlucky mayor didn’t have time to tell you much, before you shot him,’ he said.
Not wanting to make eye contact with Grice, Jack looked back down at Marney’s face. On the hard-packed dirt floor of the cabin were scraps of grass matting, and he grasped a piece the size of a dinner plate. In one fast, smooth movement he launched it across the room in a spinning cloud of dirty, acrid dust. He sprang sideways from his crouched position, saw Grice push one hand to his face and bring the Colt down and across towards him.
Grice fired, and Jack felt a breath-like sensation as the first bullet thumped past his left ear, crashing through the wooden shuttering behind him. He cursed, realizing he had meant to grab the gun while the man was rubbing his eyes. He took a frantic lunge forward, swerving from the weapon as Grice clawed at the debris stinging his eyeballs.
Jack changed his mind and leaped back across the room. Grice fired blindly, and one bullet ripped into the wood close to his elbow. He grabbed at and wrenched out a brace from beside the doorway. Hampered by its awkwardness, he jumped from the steps of the cabin, thrusting and dragging it across the planked landing into the damp, gleaming eel grass. He looked back long enough to see that Grice, although half blinded, was charging towards him. There was no chance of getting to his sorrel, not enough time. He could hear Grice’s enraged thrashing as he followed, now less than thirty feet behind.
Jack’s breath came in long rasping spasms, as he sickeningly realized how defenceless he was. Working his way through discarded eel traps, ropes and nets, he wouldn’t even make it to the tree cover ahead of him.
The dense bankside reeds offered immediate cover and, still running, he plunged headlong through them and into the dark bayou water. Spitting and taking desperate breaths, he struggled for balance, ramming the post into the tall reeds for support.
Seconds later, Grice appeared on the bank, lurching, then stiffening as his eyes squinted into the darkness, sighting Jack below him.
