Die with the Outlaws

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

  * * *

  “What did you find out about Jensen?” DuPont asked when Isaac and McCoy returned to the Purgatory Pass headquarters.

  “Hell, he ain’t nothin’ to worry about,” McCoy said. “He don’t have no idea what’s goin’ on.”

  “Newton, do you agree with McCoy?”

  “Not exactly,” Isaac said. “I think Jensen could mean trouble for us.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “He is going to be working with Conway, and because he is a deputy, he will have the authority of the law on his side. It might be a good idea to suspend our horse acquisition operations for a while.”

  DuPont shook his head. “I don’t agree. If we can run Conway out of business, Kennedy ’n O’Neil can take over his ranch. And those horses would pay more than any of the other jobs we have done.”

  “But to whose benefit? Would the profits accrue to the Regulators or to Mr. Kennedy and Mr. O’Neil?” Isaac asked.

  “That is not for you to worry about,” DuPont said. “Besides, if Jensen is going to be a problem like you say, then we’re goin’ to have to deal with him before we go any further.”

  “Deal with him how?”

  “Deal with him permanently.”

  “Mr. DuPont, there is a most ominous connotation to that remark. You may want to rethink it.”

  “Why would I want to do that?”

  DuPont’s response was provocative enough to cause Isaac to withdraw his objection. “No reason,” he said, not wanting to get into a confrontation with DuPont. Isaac smiled. “You might just say I was making conversation.”

  “Yeah, well, you can make all the conversation you want, so long as you know I’m the one that makes the decisions.”

  “Of course you are, and I would never suggest otherwise.”

  * * *

  “Hello, Matt. Won’t you come in?” Lisa invited, stepping out onto the front porch as Matt rode up to the Spur and Latigo ranch house. “I just made a pot of coffee.”

  “Thanks, that sounds good,” he said as he dismounted and wrapped the reins around the hitching post. “Where’s Hugh?”

  “He’s out in the bunkhouse talking to the new hands.”

  “New hands?”

  Lisa smiled. “Yes, thanks to the loan from my sister we were able to hire two more men. Hugh says they’ll be able to help us move the horses to Bitter Creek.”

  “I’m sure they will. Maybe I should go out—” Matt started toward the bunkhouse.

  Lisa called out to him. “There’s no need. He’s coming right back. Why, he’s the one who asked me to put on a pot of coffee in the first place.”

  “All right,” Matt agreed.

  Stepping inside, he could smell the aroma of Arbuckles’ with a hint of cinnamon. Although there was a large dining room with a great table, there was also a very small table in the kitchen that had only two chairs.

  Lisa made a motion toward it. “We can sit here for our coffee,” she suggested.

  Matt was sure that this was where Hugh and Lisa took their meals when they were alone, and he felt uneasy about invading that private space.

  “Are you telling me that you don’t trust me to take my coffee in the keeping room?” Matt asked, making a joke of his declining the offer. “Are you afraid I will spill my coffee on your furniture?”

  Lisa laughed. “No, of course not. Go on in, and I’ll bring it to you in a moment. How do you like it?”

  “Black.”

  “Yes, I would have guessed as much.”

  Matt stepped into the keeping room and had a look around. A highly polished baby grand piano stood in the room, and a large oil painting of Hugh wearing tails and striped pants hung from the wall. The sofa was leather covered, but the three chairs were all of fabric.

  “Here’s your coffee,” Lisa said, coming into the room carrying two cups.

  “I didn’t know you played the piano,” Matt said.

  “I don’t. Hugh does.”

  “Hugh?”

  “Hugh was a concert pianist before we were married. He has played in London, Paris, Vienna, and Rome, as well as New York, St. Louis, and San Francisco.”

  “I don’t understand. If he has done all that, how did he wind up on a horse ranch?”

  “Because I got tired of spending so much of my time on ships and in trains,” Hugh replied.

  Matt turned to see him standing in the arch of the doorway, holding a cup of coffee.

  Chapter Eleven

  “Hello, Matt. I saw your horse tied up out front,” Hugh said as he came on into the room. “Is there a problem?”

  “No, no problem,” Matt replied. “I met a couple of DuPont’s men, and I just wanted to know if you knew them.”

  “I know all of them,” Hugh said. “Who did you meet?”

  “Luke McCoy and Isaac Newton.”

  “Ah yes,” Hugh said. “I know them both. Isaac Newton is a particularly interesting man, surprisingly articulate.”

  “I had the same impression,” Matt said. “But the real reason I came out here was to tell you about this.”

  Matt reached into his pocket and pulled out a star to show to Hugh.

  “What is that?” Hugh asked.

  “Sheriff Clark has hired me as his deputy. Well, he hasn’t actually hired me since he doesn’t have the money to pay me. But I am a duly authorized deputy sheriff.”

  “Why did you do that?” Hugh asked. “I don’t understand.”

  “Hugh, I’m quite sure that we won’t be able to get your horses to market without some conflict, and it could be that the conflict will lead to someone getting shot. And since I don’t intend to be the one getting shot, it stands to reason that I will be the one doing the shooting. If I’m going to shoot someone, I would like the cover of being a deputy sheriff.”

  “But aren’t all the Regulators deputy sheriffs as well? Won’t they have as much legal justification as you?”

  Matt smiled. “Only DuPont has been officially designated as a deputy. The others have no more authority than someone who has been temporarily appointed as a posse member.”

  “But they aren’t temporary. The Regulators have been around for several months now,” Hugh said.

  “They may still be around, but according to Sheriff Clark, their actual appointments as deputies expired thirty days after DuPont issued them. They have no legal authority anymore.”

  “But won’t DuPont get them all reappointed once he finds out that the appointments have expired? What will keep him from just renewing them?”

  Matt shook his head. “He can’t renew them. Only the sheriff can. The last time DuPont issued the appointments, he did so with Sheriff Clark’s authorization. The sheriff has no intention of authorizing them again.”

  “I thought Sheriff Clark was in DuPont’s hip pocket,” Hugh said.

  “That was a matter of interpretation. No, it was more a matter of intimidation. But Sheriff Clark is no longer intimidated.”

  “I’ll be. Well, I’m glad to see that the sheriff has gotten a backbone, even if he is borrowing it from you.”

  “Hugh, won’t you play something for us?” Lisa asked.

  “Yes, Hugh, please play,” Matt invited.

  “I, uh, was always pretty much of a perfectionist when I was on tour,” Hugh replied. “I took myself to task if I didn’t play the very best, and I practiced every day. I no longer maintain the schedule it takes for perfection, so if I play, I must apologize in advance, because I’m sure it won’t be a polished performance.”

  “It will be beautiful, Hugh, as it always is,” Lisa insisted.

  “All right,” Hugh agreed. He walked over to the piano and ran his hand across the smooth, ebonized rosewood. Pulling the bench out, he sat down between the carved cabriole legs, then lifted the lid and supported it with the fretwork music rack.

  He hit a few keys and was rewarded with a rich, mellow tone. Then he tilted his head and paused for a long moment. At first Matt wondered if Hugh might
not be having second thoughts about playing. Then he realized that Hugh had just transported himself to another time and another place.

  Fifteen hundred people filled the Crystal Palace in London, England, to hear the latest musical sensation from America. When the curtain opened, the audience applauded as Hugh Conway walked out onto the stage, flipped the tails back from his swallowtail coat, then took his seat at the piano.

  The auditorium grew quiet and Mr. Conway began to play Beethoven’s Concerto no. 5 in E-flat Major. The music filled the concert hall and caressed the collective soul of the audience.

  One review read, “It was something magical. The brilliant young American pianist managed, with his playing, to resurrect the genius of the composer so that, to the listening audience, Hugh Conway and Ludwig Beethoven were one and the same.”

  Matt’s music appreciation was pretty much limited to a cowboy or cowboys who sang, sometimes to the accompaniment of a mellow guitar. He had also heard a few city bands and, of course, the ubiquitous saloon piano. But he felt himself caught up in the music, and when he glanced over at Lisa he saw that she was looking at him with such intensity that he couldn’t look away. Then he saw a tear sliding down her cheek.

  He held her gaze until the last note of music drifted away.

  Lisa sniffed, wiped her eyes, and smiled. “That piece of music always makes me cry.”

  “Why did you quit the concert stage?” Matt asked again. “And don’t say it’s because you got tired of traveling.”

  Hugh closed the piano and sat there for a moment, then got up and moved to the sofa to sit beside Lisa. He was still quiet, but deep in thought. Finally, he spoke. “I had my reasons.”

  “Good enough,” Matt said without pressing him for any further explanation.

  As if forcing a mood change on himself, Hugh smiled, then stood. “Come, I would like you to meet the two new men I hired. I was able to do that thanks to you.”

  “You mean thanks to Meagan, don’t you?”

  “Yes, but in truth, it is thanks to both of you. You’re the one who brought the money.”

  When Matt and Hugh stepped into the bunkhouse, Ed Sanders had the two new men standing at attention as he was giving them instructions.

  “Ed used to be a first sergeant,” Hugh said with a little chuckle.

  “No sir, I didn’t used to be a first sergeant. I still am,” Sanders replied. “Once a first sergeant, always a first sergeant.”

  “I thought you two new men might like to meet Matt Jensen,” Hugh said.

  “Wow! You’re Matt Jensen? Really?” the younger of the two asked.

  “This is him, all right,” Sanders said. “Introduce yourselves.”

  “My name is Jake Haverkost,” the younger one said, extending his hand.

  “I’m LeRoy Patterson,” the other said.

  Matt shook hands with both of them. “Have you two boys ever worked with horses before?”

  “Horses, cows, sheep, you name it, I’ve worked with ’em,” Patterson said.

  “That’s quite a background for someone your age,” Matt said.

  “Yes, sir, I s’pose it is, but I didn’t have no choice, seein’ as I’ve been on my own since I was twelve years old ’n had to work to eat.”

  “I joined up with LeRoy last year,” Jake said. “And ever since then where he’s gone, why, I been. ’N me bein’ a orphan, too, why you might say me ’n him is most like brothers.”

  Matt knew what it was like to be on his own early in life, and he related quickly to the two young men. He turned to Sanders. “Have you told them about DuPont?”

  “Are you talkin’ about that group of outlaws that calls themselves the Regulators?” Patterson inquired.

  “You call them outlaws?” Matt asked.

  “Them Mason brothers is outlaws, ’n I know that for a fact, on account of me ’n them oncet—” he stopped in midsentence, then realized everyone was waiting for him to complete his sentence—“uh, me ’n them oncet held us up a grocery store. Onliest thang is, I didn’t know what we was goin’ to do was actual go in ’n hold it up. I thought we was just goin’ to break in after they closed ’n steal some whiskey. But John ’n Lem, what they done was hold a gun on them two old people what was runnin’ the store ’n stole all their money. After that, I didn’t want nothin’ no more to do with ’em.

  “Anyway, that’s how come I know them to be real outlaws.”

  Matt nodded, then looked over at Hugh. “I’m just guessing, of course, but I’d be willing to bet that these two young men are going to make you a couple of fine hands.”

  “Yeah,” Sanders said with a smile. “They’ll be just fine as long as they listen to me so’s I can get ’em shaped up.”

  “Suppose we start now,” Hugh suggested. “Let’s take them around the ranch and show them the pastureland and horses.”

  “All right. I’ll get your horse saddled for you, Mr. Conway, ’n give you a call when we’re ready.”

  Hugh chuckled. “I can get my own horse saddled. Matt, do you want to come along with us?”

  “I’d like to, but being as I’m a new deputy, I really think I should get back to town. I want to establish my position with everyone, and I particularly want them to know that I have nothing to do with the Regulators.”

  Hugh nodded. “Yes, that’s probably a pretty good idea.”

  Matt waited around, talking and joking with Hugh and the others until they rode away. Then he started back to the hitching post in front of the house, where Spirit had been waiting patiently.

  “Matt?” Lisa said, stepping out onto the porch as he started to unhitch his horse.

  “Yes?”

  “You and Hugh left before I was able to offer you any of the cake I baked this morning. Would you like to come in and have a piece now?”

  From the tone in her voice and the way she held Matt with her eyes, he got the distinct impression that there was more to the invitation than a piece of cake. “I, uh, had better not.”

  “You feel it too, don’t you, Matt?”

  There. It was out in the open, and by her words Matt knew that this wasn’t something he was just imagining. “Lisa, I . . .”

  Lisa shook her head and held up her hand, palm toward Matt. “No!” she said resolutely. “Oh, Matt, please forgive me, and forget that I even said such a thing. I-I don’t know what has gotten into me.”

  “Perhaps it would be better if I didn’t come around anymore,” he said.

  “No, please, don’t do that. Hugh is counting on you. I am counting on you to help us get through this trouble we’re facing. If you would suddenly disappear, Hugh would wonder why, and he would start asking questions. Matt, I’m not sure I could deal with that.”

  “But can you . . . can we, deal with this, this thing that is trying to come up?”

  Lisa shook her head. “It won’t happen again. We can deal with it. We must deal with it. And I promise, I’ll never say another word that will make you feel uncomfortable.”

  Matt swung into the saddle, then looked at Lisa for a long moment. “Good-bye.”

  “Matt, you’ll come back?” Lisa asked in a pleading voice.

  He nodded. “I’ll come back.”

  As Matt rode away from the Spur and Latigo, he fought hard to push back the thoughts he was having. Lisa was a beautiful woman, yes, though he couldn’t say that she was the most beautiful he had ever seen. But there was something else about her, some visceral attraction that he couldn’t deny. Even as he realized that, he promised himself he would deny it. He had no other choice.

  Chapter Twelve

  Ed Sanders and Jake Haverkost found four Spur and Latigo horses confined in a hastily constructed corral on Soda Creek about five miles northeast of the ranch.

  “Well, look here,” Sanders said with a broad smile. “Mr. Conway is going to be happy to get these critters back.”

  “It’s funny them just bein’ left out here like this,” Haverkost said cautiously. “It’s almost like
they wanted us to find them.”

  “Whoever it was that stole ’em prob’ly just put ’em here till they could get ’em sold somewhere,” Sanders said. “Only they ain’t a-goin’ to be sellin’ these horses, ’cause we’re goin’ to take ’em back. You keep a lookout while I go down there ’n get ’em.”

  “All right,” Haverkost said, standing in his stirrups as if by increasing his height by six inches he would have a better view.

  * * *

  “Hey, Moe, do you see what I see?” Walter Toone asked as he pointed toward the single rider. “Looks like Sanders has found our horses.”

  “He ain’t only found ’em. Looks to me like he’s fixin’ to take ’em back,” Moe Greene replied.

  Toone, Greene, and Asa Carter had been keeping an eye on the corralled horses.

  “You mean he’s goin’ to try ’n take ’em back.” Carter pulled his rifle from the saddle holster. “We can take care o’ that right now.”

  “No,” Toone said, holding up his hand. “Don’t shoot ’im.”

  “Why not? We’re deputies, ain’t we? ’N he’s stealin’ horses, ain’t he?” Carter laughed. “Even if it’s horses we done already stoled first.”

  “No, shootin’ ’im is too good,” Toone said. “Me ’n Moe owe him somethin’.”

  “What do we owe ’im?” Moe asked, confused by Toone’s comment.”

  “Maybe you don’t ’member how he beat us both up while Jensen was a-holdin’ his gun on us so we couldn’t fight back,” Toone said, using the story he and Greene had told the others to explain the beating they had taken from the foreman of Spur and Latigo.

  “Oh yeah,” Greene said. “Yeah, I remember that.”

  “What you got in mind, Walt?” Carter asked.

  “What do they generally do with horse thieves?” Toone replied.

  Carter smiled cynically. “They hang ’em.”

  “Yep. ’N that’s just what we’re a-goin’ to do.”

  “How we goin’ to hang ’im?” Greene asked. “They ain’t no trees ’round here.”

  “We’ll take ’im back to DuPont,” Toone said easily. “Then we’ll find us a good tree.”