by Ralph Hayes
Latham sighed. ‘Don’t you see? That’s what I like about it. The spice that gives it. She’s a feisty little bitch, and I like that. There will be bedtime like I’ve never had before.’
Sloan grunted. ‘She makes the rest of us hungry, and that’s not good. Look at Weeks. His tongue is hanging out for her.’
‘Hey!’ Weeks protested. ‘I’ve seen you look at her, too.’
‘That’s just the point,’ Sloan said. ‘That can cause trouble. Among us.’ He looked over at Latham, and spoke carefully. ‘You seem just a little obsessed with her, Duke.’
Latham fixed a brittle look on him. ‘I never get obsessed on anything, Ira, and don’t you forget that. I’ll keep her around as long as she behaves herself. And I won’t brook any opposition to my having her. Unless you think you’d like to take over this little outfit of ours.’ In a menacing tone.
‘Of course not,’ Sloan said quietly.
‘Then I don’t want to hear about it again,’ Latham added. ‘Now. Are we finished with this?’
‘Absolutely,’ Weeks spoke up quickly.
Sloan let out a deep breath. ‘Whatever you say, Duke.’
Latham gave them a tight smile. ‘Then let’s talk about that Old Fort bank some more,’ he told them.
CHAPTER SIX
As he had recounted to Marshal Provost on their first meeting, it had been a series of fortuitous occurrences that had led Wesley Sumner into hunting other men for the rewards on them. When he had emerged from a Texas prison in his early twenties, he had befriended a young man with a lovely sister who liked Sumner on first sight, despite his background. When Sumner and the new friend had gone looking for work in the Territory, they had been falsely arrested by federal marshals, who beat Sumner’s friend to death. After his release for lack of evidence before a hanging judge, Sumner had vowed to visit justice on the marshals himself. And he did, when they turned lawless themselves, and they each had bounties on their heads, and Sumner had been persuaded to accept the money even though that had not been his motive. Then he returned to the sister, expecting to marry her and help her run her farm – but by that time she had already married. With a vacuous future confronting him, and no real training in any occupation, he happened upon a wanted poster on a building wall, studied it for a long while, then stuffed it into a pocket. And he had begun a new career, one that seemed to fit his acquired skill with his Peacemaker. With the hatred inside him for all killers because of what had happened to his friend, he took his first sought bounty and never looked back.
Now, on that warm afternoon the day following the wedding dress incident at Latham’s headquarters, Sumner rode into Pawnee Junction with an earned reputation in his chosen line of work.
As he rode slowly down the dusty street, he looked around with distaste. He had bad feelings about this whole area, because of his early experience there. That had been south of here, in open, arid country, and then at Fort Sill. But this had the feel of the Territory, despite its small size. Hot. Dry. Primitive. No law anywhere in sight.
He rode slowly down the only street. A saloon, a store, and a scattering of houses along a desolate stretch of so-called civilization. The only reason any man would come to such a place from elsewhere was, Sumner knew, because it was the end of the world. Safe from the law, and justice.
Sumner reined in at the saloon and dismounted. The building fronts looked dusty and unkempt. He walked down the street a short distance to the store, and went in. A tall, lean clerk stood behind a counter. There were stacks of canned goods and textiles on shelves around the room. Under the counter in a display case were arranged several kinds of sidearm.
The clerk looked Sumner over carefully. ‘New in town, stranger?’
Sumner gave him a look. ‘Do you have a box of .45 cartridges back there somewhere?’
The clerk eyed the Colt on Sumner’s hip. ‘Sure, I can fix you up, mister. Would that be for your Peacemaker?’
‘Just get the cartridges,’ Sumner told him.
‘Just making conversation, mister. We don’t get much chance at it here in Pawnee Junction. I just sold three boxes of .45s to another man yesterday. But he wanted them for a Schofield.’
Sumner took notice. That was not a usual gun used in backwoods areas. ‘What did this man look like?’
‘Oh, he was a stout, tough-looking fellow. Had a scar under his right eye, and wore his gun on his left hip. Paid in small silver. Probably holds to his cash like the cholera to a Kiowa.’
‘Sloan,’ Sumner said to himself.
‘Oh. I hope he ain’t your friend. I was just palavering.’
‘The cartridges,’ Sumner said flatly.
When the clerk returned and Sumner had paid for the ammunition, he spoke to the man again. ‘This fellow yesterday. Do you know if he’s living hereabouts?’
‘No idea. But he wasn’t just passing through. I saw him walk past here a few days ago, on his way to the saloon down the street.’
Sumner nodded. ‘Much obliged.’
He walked down to the dirty little saloon where Weeks had sat drinking not long ago with the now deceased Seger. He stood outside for a couple of minutes, listening to the muted talking of patrons inside, then pushed through the double slatted doors.
He stood just inside the entrance, looking around. Looking physical and dangerous. Very slowly patrons stopped talking and stared at Sumner warily. He walked over to the mahogany bar, his riding spurs puncturing the new silence in staccato rhythm.
‘A Planter’s Rye,’ he told the slovenly bartender. ‘And don’t water it.’
‘We got the best whiskey this side of Stillwater,’ the barkeep replied.
‘Like I said.’ Sumner insisted.
The bartender brought the drink, and then swatted a fly on the bar with an ancient fly-swatter. Sumner glanced above his head and saw two strips of yellow fly-paper dotted heavily with black corpses. He swigged the drink while the bartender watched.
‘I’m looking for some men,’ he said then. He placed a gold coin on the bar, which greatly overpaid for the drink. ‘A man named Latham. And he has two friends.’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘Dresses like he’s going to a Grange Hall dance. Hangs around with a man with one ear.’
‘Hmm. There was a man in here, I think, with one ear.’
‘That was last week,’ a voice came from behind Sumner. He turned to a table of card players. It was a lanky cowpoke who had spoken. ‘He was drinking with another man. Name of Seger. They left together, and I hear Seger ain’t been seen in here since.’
‘Where did they go?’ Sumner asked.
A second man at the table spoke up. ‘I think One Ear mentioned a house out on the main road north. The only one I can think of is the old Sutter place about a mile out of town. It’s been for rent.’
‘You’ve been a big help,’ Sumner said with satisfaction.
‘Friends of yours?’ the first man asked.
‘Something like that.’ He threw more coins on to the bar. ‘Drinks all around at that table,’ he told the bartender.
Then he left, with the scattered patrons staring after him curiously.
Almost at that same moment at the Latham house, Latham and Sloan were preparing to leave for several hours. Latham wanted to take Sloan to Old Fort to take a look at the interior of the bank there with him. Latham was planning to hit the place within the next week. And he intended to be married by that time. The two of them were still strapping on their gunbelts when Sumner reined up a hundred yards away in a small clump of cottonwoods.
Sumner dismounted and looked the scene over carefully. Latham’s and Sloan’s mounts were saddled up outside at a short hitching rail, and as he had approached, he had seen Weeks’ horse in a small corral behind the house. It was obvious that two of the men were leaving soon, and apparently leaving one behind, possibly to watch over Dulcie.
Sumner faced a problem choice. He could wait for the two to leave and retrieving Dulcie should b
e considerably easier, and more certain. But he would lose two potential bounties that way, and bounties were what had brought him here. If he went on in now, confronting all three but reducing his chances of survival, he had the potential of three bounties, but placed Dulcie in a much riskier situation, one where she might never see Provost or Nebraska again.
He decided that Dulcie was more important than the bounties. And a moment later the choice was taken from him, anyway. Latham and Sloan emerged from the house. He was too far away to challenge them, and dismounted. He watched them mount up and ride off on a small road between Sumner and them. In a moment they were out of sight.
He realized he could wait, and come back when they were all there. But he had already made his choice. Also, assuming the girl was in the house somewhere, a shoot-out with three men might put her in danger.
‘Oh hell,’ he said to himself. Maybe there would be a chance at Latham later.
He mounted the stallion and rode on up to the house, openly. It was completely quiet inside. He left the horse at the hitching rail and walked up to the front door. He tried it, and it was unlocked. Very carefully he turned the knob, and pushed the door wide open.
He was facing the wide parlour, and there was nobody in sight. He stepped inside and quietly closed the door behind him. There was a doorway across the room, leading to the kitchen, and he heard a small noise come from there. A moment later Weeks came through the doorway into the parlour, chewing a bit of food and holding a cup in his right hand. He stopped dead when he saw Sumner.
‘What the hell!’ he exclaimed past the mouthful. He quickly swallowed it, then very slowly set the cup down on a small table near him.
‘Eli Weeks, I presume,’ Sumner said calmly.
‘How do you know that?’ His gunhand now out over his Wells Fargo.
‘Where is she?’ Sumner said.
‘The Provost girl? Why do you care?’
‘Is she in the house?’
Weeks hesitated. ‘I think she’s upstairs in her room. If that’s any of your business. Are you a new friend of Duke?’
‘Not exactly;’ Sumner said. ‘Actually, I came here to kill you.’
Weeks was not intimidated. ‘I don’t see no marshal’s badge.’ His eyes widened. ‘By Jesus! Provost sent you!’
‘The man wins a cigar.’
‘And you’re here to take the girl back.’
‘Double hit.’
Weeks relaxed into a confrontation stance. ‘Where did they find you? In some gambling hall? Well, this is your unlucky day, Dandy. I’m the fastest gun of us all. I never been beat. And if you want the girl you have to come past me. If you think you can kill me, here I am. Give it your best.’ A hard grin.
‘Why don’t you show me how?’ Sumner said in a flat voice.
In the next moment Weeks went for the Wells Fargo in a blindingly fast draw. But Sumner had read his eyes and beat him by a half-second. Both guns roared loudly in the room, making glass rattle in windows and a tin ceiling tremble above their heads. Sumner felt a hot burning on his right side, but his lead struck Weeks over the heart and punched him back against the door jamb behind him, where he hung for a moment with a look of abject surprise on his narrow face, then slid slowly to the floor.
In the next moment Dulcie came out on to the stairway at the end of the room, and stopped part-way down it. She was in her underclothes. She looked at Sumner, then stared hard at Weeks.
‘Oh, my God!’
Sumner slid the big gun into its holster as if nothing had happened. He felt of his side, and found that the hit was just a shallow grazing one. His hand came away with a smear of blood on it. He looked towards Dulcie and stared for a moment at her.
‘You’re only sixteen?’
She self-consciously covered her cleavage. She was well clothed, though. ‘Is he dead?’
‘That would be my guess,’ he answered, still looking her over. ‘You must be Dulcie.’
She nodded absently. ‘Who are you?’
‘The name is Sumner. Your daddy sent me.’
Dulcie’s face blossomed into a beautiful, wide smile. ‘You’re from Papa?’ she cried out. ‘I knew it, deep down! That he would find me!’ She came down the stairs and threw herself at Sumner, hugging herself to him.
He grimaced with the pain in his side, but she didn’t notice. She looked into his face. ‘You’re heaven-sent!’ she exclaimed happily. She kissed him on his cheek.
Sumner separated them gently. ‘Let’s hold off on that judgment till I get you back home. When do you expect the others back?’
‘Not for a few hours.’
‘Go get some riding clothes on. I’ll saddle Weeks’ mount up and you can ride that. And hurry. We don’t really know how much time we have.’
Dulcie couldn’t quit smiling. But there were tears of joy, too. ‘You came all the way down here! I don’t know how to thank you!’
‘Your daddy is taking care of that,’ he said. ‘Now go. Get dressed.’
Dulcie walked past the lifeless Weeks, whose eyes were still staring, unseeing, across the room. ‘Take that, damn you!’ she muttered as she went past him.
Sumner smiled slightly.
Less than a half-hour later Dulcie was dressed in her riding pants and a frilly blouse that replaced the blue one she had torn. She also wore a narrow-brim hat found earlier in a closet trunk. By the time she appeared outside, Sumner had saddled Weeks’ horse. Sumner was impressed by the way she mounted and handled her mount.
‘Ready?’ he asked her.
‘I’ve been ready since they took me at Wolf Creek.’
A couple of moments later the house had disappeared from view behind them. But Dulcie never looked back.
Everything she had so desperately wished for now lay ahead of her.
CHAPTER SEVEN
It was three hours later when Latham and Sloan returned from Old Fort and its bank. They both now had a good idea of what to expect inside when they returned there within the week to rob it of its gold and silver. Latham was very excited about the prospect. And he expected to be married when that happened.
The two men took their mounts to the corral behind the house, and immediately saw that Weeks’ horse wasn’t there.
‘What the hell!’ Latham growled. ‘If that little bastard went into town again, I’ll put one in him! I mean it, Ira!’
‘Maybe there was some emergency,’ Sloan suggested.
They quickly unsaddled their horses, and walked to the front of the house and entered, Latham fuming. The first thing they saw was Weeks’ corpse lying on the floor over by the kitchen doorway.
They both stood frozen in place for a moment. Then Sloan spoke first. ‘Good Jesus!’ he muttered quietly.
Latham went over to Weeks and bent over him.
‘Is he dead?’ Sloan asked from behind him.
Latham nodded. ‘He’s shot. Right through the heart.’ He stood up and faced the stairway. A clammy fist in his chest. ‘Dulcie!’ he yelled out.
Complete silence answered him. In the next moment he was running up the stairs, while Sloan waited below still staring at Weeks. Then Latham was coming back down, his aquiline face looking haggard. He came and sat down heavily on a chair. ‘She’s gone!’ Talking to himself.
Sloan sat down on the sofa facing him. ‘Somebody came for her. And Weeks got in the way.’ He glanced over at the dead body with its staring eyes.
‘Who the hell even knew we were here?’ Latham wondered.
‘Provost sent somebody to find us,’ Sloan guessed. ‘And he did.’
‘That doesn’t seem possible,’ Latham said dully. ‘We didn’t leave a trace. Maybe it’s somebody from town. Hears about the girl out here and decided to steal her from us.’
‘I think it’s Provost.’ Sloan said.
Latham looked over at him. ‘I hate to admit it, but you must be right. But who would he hire that could find us down here? A rogue Territory marshal?’
‘A bounty hunter,’ Sloan
surmised. ‘Some of them are pretty good at tracking people down.’
‘We don’t have worthwhile bounties on us.’
‘Provost could put that right,’ Sloan insisted.
‘Damn, you’re right. Of course you are,’ Latham said, sitting forward tensely and kneading his fists. ‘Some sonofabitch rode all the way from Nebraska, killed Weeks, and grabbed Dulcie.’
‘Let him have her, Duke. You made your point with Provost. You’re better off without her.’
Latham looked over at him. ‘I’m going after her, Ira.’
Sloan frowned heavily, turned away from him and swore. ‘Goddam it, Duke. You have to get this female out of your system. This obsession could wreck the rest of your life if you let it.’
‘You can call it what you want.’ Latham said deliberately. ‘But she isn’t Provost’s any more, Ira. She’s mine, and always will be. I still intend to put a gold ring on her finger. Here, or somewhere else. I’d track her to the South Pole if I had to.’
Sloan was shaking his head. ‘They have a half-day’s ride on you. You’d have to ride hard to catch them.’
‘I intend to start now. I’ll find them in two or three days, I promise you. I’ll ride day and night if I have to. And I want you with me.’
Sloan shook his head again. ‘I don’t want no part of it. I didn’t like it from the very beginning. You should have gone after Provost, not his daughter.’
‘Don’t you see how much better this is than just killing that pea-brain rancher? You kill him and it’s over in a minute. This way he has his whole life to suffer. No, this is much better.’
‘Well, I’m not going,’ Sloan said harshly.
