“Tarbuck,” she choked out. “Libby is traveling to Tarbuck with a wagon train from Chad City.”
“Smart girl, Bonnie. What’s in Tarbuck for her?”
“A feller name of Shad Winslow ... a gunfighter. He’s been after her a long time. She ... she figured she’d need him after you broke jail.”
“She was right,” came the soft reply. The killer walked to the doors and glanced back. His eyes looked yellow in that soft light. “This is just between you and me, Bonnie. I’ve got things to do and I don’t want nobody hammerin’ after me. She’s dead already, and nothin’ can change that. But I don’t want to have to mosey back here and cut your heart out after I’m through with her, so ...”
He put his finger to his lips in the age-old gesture that indicated silence, then was gone.
Bonnie waited a long time before slipping off the bed and going to the doors. A light breeze blew the thin stuff of her gown against her body and she shivered. Then she heard the fading beat of hoofs and a gray mist seemed to come before her. She sank slowly to the floor, sobbing.
Chapter Six – Shadow of the Desert
KEEF HURBLE MUTTERED in his sleep as something slender and hard angled through his wagon flap and poked his shoulder.
“Arf ... urrgh!” the wagon master muttered. Rolling onto his side, he tried to go back to sleep.
This time the rifle barrel jabbed into his back, hard.
“Did you want to be up at first light or didn’t you, Keef?”
It was Brazos’ voice. Keef Hurble swore and tried to drag the blanket over his head. Then he remembered. He had decided on an early start to beat the heat.
Rising and dressing quickly, Hurble soon had the train aroused with sunrise still only a pink promise on the horizon. But it was immediately after a hasty breakfast that the wagon master came up hard against a grim fact of life, which was womankind’s inborn and unassailable right to do her laundry.
The campsite was on the bank of a small stream. They had been too weary to worry about washing last night. Now they decided to attend to it before setting out.
Hurble fought hard and might have won had he not been stabbed in the back. Mrs. Agatha Hurble, as formidable a matron as might be found east or west of the Mississippi, broke in on her husband’s exhortations that this was no time to be fooling with washboards, to instruct him to get out of his filthy shirt so she could wash it. Thoroughly crushed by such base treachery, Hurble divested himself of the shirt and then retired to the company of the men gathered around Smiley Dunn’s wagon. There he sat smoking, sulking and waiting until the women were good and ready to leave.
The sun came up clear and bright and it was a pleasant sight to see the women by the little stream with the beams dappling through the Joshua trees, the sound of birds, the friendly chatter as they worked. Resigned to the delay now, Hurble couldn’t figure out why Brazos and Benedict, instead of taking the opportunity to relax a little, had ridden out to scout.
“Ain’t been no Injun sign, has there?” he asked Mick Potter.
“Nobody said nothin’ to me about it if there was,” Potter replied, looking uneasy.
“Relax,” drawled little Smiley Dunn. “Those two are just the restless breed.” He patted his little pot belly. “Used to be that way myself until I got smart.”
“Well, one thing is for sure,” put in Herbie Pitt. “The desert will slow ’em down. They won’t be so anxious to go ridin’ about when she gets really hot.”
“Benedict might slow up,” Hambone said in his cranky way. “But not that other one. Granite, that Texan is. Tain’t natcherl for any man to be that healthy.”
The conversation droned on, until finally, satisfied with their work, the women announced they were ready to move on.
The first few miles took them into higher country, most of it level mesa timbered with greasewood, peppercorn and the occasional dusty cottonwood.
Grass and timber began to thin out around them during the afternoon when they made the long, gradual descent out of the mesa country towards the broad plains. Ahead, in the shimmering distance, they caught their first glimpse of the yellow, sun-seared stretches that bore the ominous name, Dead Horse Desert. Reaching the deep flats, they passed through a vast field of sunflowers, some of them as high as the Conestoga wheels.
They crossed an ancient river bed, a curving silver scar on the brown face of the plains. The heat grew uncomfortable as the afternoon wore on, and in the dry heat of the desert fringe no other living thing seemed to stir.
Darkness finally halted them. Camp that night was a quiet affair, with most too exhausted to talk, and many too weary even to eat.
It was Benedict’s turn to stand first watch that night. He took up a post on a rocky shelf a hundred yards from the wagon circle, lit a cheroot and relaxed with his back against a boulder. He had been there alone for half an hour in the starry, pre-moon darkness when he heard footsteps approaching from the direction of camp.
“Reb?” he called, seeing the figure moving towards him through the gloom.
“No, it isn’t Duke,” the voice came back, and Benedict felt a tingle in his wrists. He got to his feet as Libby Blue came over the ledge rim with starlight glinting in her chestnut hair.
“I thought you might be lonely,” she smiled as he guided her to his rock shelf where he had stretched a doubled-up blanket.
“You were totally right, of course, lovely lady,” he said, his perfect teeth gleaming in the darkness. “But not any longer. Tell me, how are you standing up to the journey?”
“Quite well.” She linked her arms around her knees and looked down at the dimly visible wagon circle. “I’m very much stronger than I look, you know.”
Benedict nodded, strangely thoughtful now. Strangely, for when he found himself alone in the company of a lovely woman, he was anything but thoughtful. But he had observed her closely during the two days of travel, and he had seen the quick, lithe way with which she clambered onto the wagons and walked around the campsites.
And with his thoughts following these lines, it was inevitable that they should dovetail into the enigma of Libby Blue’s relationship with Kain Ketchell.
“You are looking at me very curiously, Duke,” she said with a smile.
“I am?” He leaned back against his rock and took out his silver cigar case. “Well, perhaps I was. I think I was trying to understand how a girl with all you have to offer hasn’t been swept off her feet and deposited safely behind a wedding ring and a wrought-iron fence.”
“Fishing, Duke?”
“You could call it that. Hasn’t there ever been anybody, Libby? I mean somebody special?”
“There was once.”
“But you don’t want to talk about it?”
She smiled crookedly. The moonglow was spreading over the wild country now and her features were emerging more clearly from the shimmering frame of her hair.
“You must know about Kain from the way you’re talking.”
“I do.”
“And you’re shocked that any supposedly nice girl would be associated with a man like that?”
“I’m hard to shock; curious would be closer to it.”
She shrugged. “Until I met Kain Ketchell, I had known only weaklings. Pretty boys, frightened men, eunuchs. Kain was a man, whatever else he might not have been. Unfortunately, he was also evil, something I didn’t find out until it was almost too late. I thought it was over and done with forever ... but now he is free ...”
“Then you know ...?”
“Of course.”
“Aren’t you afraid?”
“Naturally. That’s why I am traveling to Tarbuck. You see, I have a friend there, Duke, who’s a man as much as Kane is. He’s the only person I feel is capable of protecting me ...” Her voice faded and she stared at him with a peculiar intensity. “Or perhaps he was the only real man I felt I could turn to ...”
She swayed closer until she was almost touching him. Benedict’s arms went around
her and suddenly her soft, sweet lips were against his. Her nails dug into his back and she whispered his name. And then a cheery voice came from close by;
“Howdy there, Yank. Ain’t interruptin’ anything, am I?”
Benedict cursed as Libby broke away and got quickly to her feet. Moments later the all-too familiar silhouette of Hank Brazos loomed over the ledge rim and Duke Benedict would have paid good money to have seen him trip over his fool dog and break a hip.
“Miss Libby,” Brazos murmured, tipping his battered hat: “Never knew you was up here.” He glanced at the tight-lipped Benedict. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“A little restless, Hank,” Libby replied, giving him a winning smile. “But I’m sure I shall be able to sleep now.” She darted a bright, confidential look at Benedict that made him even more acutely aware of how shockingly inopportune the Texan’s intrusion had been. Then she squeezed Brazos’ big hand in a way that Benedict found quite irritating before she ran down the slope towards the wagons. She ran like a young girl.
Brazos chuckled deep in his barrel chest as he watched her. The harmonica he wore slung around his muscular neck glinted silver in the strengthening light.
“I’ve said it afore and I’ll say it again, Yank—I always did figure the Lone Star bred the purtiest fillies in the old U.S. of A. until I clapped eyes on—”
“Liar!”
Brazos broke off, staring at Benedict in puzzlement? “Huh?”
“That bushwa about not knowing Libby was up here, mister,” Benedict snapped, the breeze fluttering his four-in-hand tie as he stepped threateningly towards the bigger man. “That was nothing but a damned dirty lie. You knew she was up here with me and you deliberately came along to stick your snout into something that didn’t concern you.”
He prodded Brazos hard in the chest—so hard in fact that Bullpup was moved to growl a warning. The growl drew a curse from Benedict who aimed a kick at the hound’s battle-scarred head. Bullpup leaped back, then lunged at the well-tailored leg with a snarl, but his master’s sharp voice held him.
“Hold, damn it! Now what are you gettin’ so riled up about, Yank? I told you I never knew Libby was here and that’s the truth.”
Benedict slowly took his hand from his gun butt. Had Bullpup drawn an inch closer, he would have been ready to protect himself in the way he did best. And considering the unvarying hate-hate relationship he shared with the Texan’s dog, he almost regretted now that Brazos had called the hound off. His face was cold and his clipped Eastern voice thin as he spoke:
“I still say you knew. What other reason would you have had for coming up here right now? You knew I was keeping watch and you told me you’d be taking a nap immediately after supper to ensure that you would be sharp for the dead watch. You had no good reason to come stomping up here unless it was to—”
“Will you stop flappin’ that fancy mouth of yours and let me get a word in edgewise?”
“Make it good!”
“Well, I’ll do my best. How does this sound?—I reckon somebody’s doggin’ us.”
The anger left Benedict’s face. “What?”
“Want me to go on? Or would you rather start shootin’ from the hip again?”
“Of course I want you to go on, damn it. What happened? Did you come across some sign?”
“Nope,” Brazos grunted, turning to face the east. He lifted his heavy arm and pointed at a mesa about half a mile distant. “But I reckon if I was to mosey over there I’d find some sign—right up there on the rim hard by that yeller-colored outcroppin’ to be exact.”
Benedict’s eyes were wide now. “You mean you saw somebody?”
“Sure enough. It was just as the moon was comin’ up, Yank. I was takin’ a last squint around afore gettin’ my head down when I saw somethin’ move up there. I figured it was mebbe a lobo or a coyote at first, but then I reckon I made out the shape of a Stetson. My guess is that somebody was up there watchin’ us from the dark and he shifted off after the moon rose.”
It seemed to Duke Benedict that the night had grown quite chill as he stared off at the distant blue mesa. He felt not even a moment’s suspicion that Brazos might not be telling the truth, for though their infighting could get a little dirty at times neither would ever lie or joke about anything as serious as this.
“I’m ... I’m sorry I called you what I did,” he finally got out reluctantly, for apologies came hard to a man of his arrogant nature. Brazos nodded his big head silently in acknowledgement and Benedict added, “Ketchell ...?”
“No tellin’, Yank. If it was a feller—and I’m close to certain it was—then it could have been anybody. There’s always the odd desert rat to be found in country like this, and Deputy Womack told me that a few old prospectors still work this country. Then again it coulda been a Cheyenne scout wearin’ a hat, or mebbe some miner from Tarbuck headin’ back for the bright lights,”
“You’d sound more convincing to somebody who doesn’t know you as well as I do, Texan.”
“Huh?”
Benedict tapped a cigar on the silver case. “You believe it was Ketchell, don’t you?”
Brazos’ scowl held a moment, then gave way to a grin. “Sometimes you’re almost too smart, Yank, for a dude.” Then he sobered and nodded. “Yeah, I reckon that if I was bettin’ money I’d say it was Ketchell. Seems to me that if this here game we’re playin’ is gonna draw that slaughterman at all, then he should be scentin’ close around now.”
A humorless smile worked across Benedict’s lips. “A little nerve-snapping, isn’t it? I mean, to think he could be out there, watching and waiting, biding his time.” He lit his cigar and drew deeply. “Well, what do you suggest, Reb? Should we check out that mesa or wait until he comes to us?”
“Reckon you recall good battle tactics as well as I do, Yank. Always does best to let the enemy come to you.” Brazos hunkered down and patted his dog’s head. “Reckon I’ll be forgettin’ about that nap.”
Duke Benedict nodded. There would be no sleep for either of them this night.
With the rising sun warming his back, Kain Ketchell lay full-length on a high rock slab and adjusted the settings of the field glasses. The glasses were old and battered, but they still worked, well enough. As he turned the screws, the wagon train far below jumped closer, blurred briefly, then settled into clear focus.
He studied the lead rider first, a towering figure in a faded purple shirt and battered hat astride an appaloosa. The blue of the horse’s chest and forequarters were more roan looking than blue, and the spots on the white rump were large and haphazard. To a man who knew horses as did Ketchell, this was an animal beyond price. With luck he might get his hands on the animal—after he killed the rider.
That the giant in the purple shirt would have to die had been apparent to the killer ever since he’d come within sight of the Tarbuck train at dusk the previous night. Assessing the strength of the train had been Ketchell’s first chore after establishing that Libby Blue was present. It had become quickly obvious that the males on the train were standard, unexceptional types, with the notable exceptions of Purple Shirt and the dude in the black suit and bed-of-flowers vest.
A frown creased the motionless figure’s brows as the third wagon moved into the area covered by his glasses and he found himself again studying the dude driver.
Last night, in the uncertain light, this fellow had simply looked formidable. Now, in the bright light of day, he looked downright dangerous.
Kain Ketchell had long had a theory about men who sported twin guns, a theory hammered out of hard experience. And that experience had taught him that twin-gun toters invariably belonged to one of two breeds—tenth-raters trying to look better than they were, or true gun kings who knew that two guns were better than one.
At a distance of a mile, and with nothing more than appearance to go on, Ketchell was in no doubt that the dude belonged to the second category.
That made it one overgrown scout and one two-gun dandy as the o
nly real barriers between Kain Ketchell and vengeance. The others didn’t count. They were sheep, and he was a big lobo wolf. He smiled. But the cruel grin faded when he sighted Libby Blue with three other girls behind the driver’s seat of the fourth wagon.
“Bitch!” he spat out.
It didn’t matter that his vicious excesses and cruelties had been too much for steel-tough Libby Blue and had driven her to plot with Wainright and the others to have him dragged away like a chained, snarling beast. All that held weight in the sick depths of the killer’s mind was that she had done him wrong. In his mind’s eye he saw her naked, her lovely body alabaster white, drained of her last drop of blood, his thirsty blade dripping in his hand as he stood over her. It was a vision that had helped sustain him during the nightmare days and weeks of solitary confinement in Starkwater Penitentiary. It acted on him now like a drug that brought sweat jumping from his pores and made his hands shake so violently that he was forced to lower the glasses.
“Bitch!” he repeated. Then, rolling onto his back, he shielded his eyes with a powerful forearm and waited for the sick madness to pass.
By the time he had flipped back onto his hands and knees like a heavy-muscled cat, the train was past the butte cluster that concealed his lookout position. Now it was moving through sagebrush sweeps and would soon be in the sands of Dead Horse Desert.
Ketchell came up on his haunches and rested his hands on the muzzle of the Winchester which he held vertically, the polished butt on the stone. Not watching the train now, he let his hawk gaze play over the shimmering wastes of the desert country while he made his plans.
Only for Purple Shirt and the dude, she would almost certainly be dead by this time, leaving him free to head for Capital City and his appointment with the governor. Though murderously reckless when he chose to be, Ketchell wasn’t about to take any unnecessary risks with those two. He would kill Libby of course, and her bodyguards. But the shoulders of the giant and the twin guns of the dandy told him that caution, cleverness and skill must be employed to ensure that he walked away from this job as triumphantly unscathed as at Chimney Cliff.
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