“You all through flappin’ your mouth, Jensen?” Cord asked.
“No. I want all the cattle belonging to Fae and Parnell Jensen rounded up and returned. I’m not saying that your hands ran them all off. I’m sure Hanks and his boys had a hand in it, too. And I’ll be paying him a visit shortly. Get them rounded up and back on Box T range.”
“And if I don’t—not saying I have them, mind you?”
Smoke’s smile was not pretty. “You ever heard of Louis Longmont, McCorkle?”
“Of course, I have! What’s he have to do with any of this?”
“He’s an old friend of mine, Cord. We stood shoulder to shoulder several years back and cleaned up Fontana. Then last year, he rode with me to New Hampshire . . . you probably read about that.”
Cord nodded his head curtly.
“He’s one of the wealthiest men west of the Mississippi, Cord. And he loves a good fight. He wouldn’t blink an eye to spend a couple of hundred thousand putting together an army to come in here and wipe your nose on a porcupine’s backside.”
From in the house, Smoke heard a young woman’s laughter and an older woman telling her to shush!
The truth was, Louis was in Europe on an extended vacation and Smoke knew it. But sometimes a good bluff wins the pot.
Cord had money, but nothing to compare with Louis Longmont . . . and he also knew that Smoke had married into a great deal of money and was wealthy in his own right. He sighed heavily.
“I can’t speak for Hanks, Jensen. You’ll have to face him yourself. But as for me and mine . . . OK, we’ll leave the Box T alone. I don’t have their cattle. I’m not a rustler. My boys just scattered them. But I’m damned if I’ll help you round them up. You can come on my range and look; any wearing the Box T brand, take them.”
Smoke nodded and stuck out his hand. Cord looked startled for a few seconds, then a very grudging smile cut his face. He took the hand and gripped it briefly.
Smoke turned and mounted up. “See you.”
Beans and Smoke swung around and rode slowly away from the ranch house.
“My back is itchy,” Beans said.
“So is mine. But I think he’s a man of his word. I don’t think he’ll go back on his word. Least I’m a poor judge of character if he does.”
They rode on. Beans said, “My goodness me. I plumb forgot to give them boys their guns back.”
“Well, shame on you, Beans. I hate to see them go to waste. We’ll just take them back to Fae and she can keep them in reserve. Never know when she might need them. You can swap them for some bear-sign.”
“What about hands?”
“We got to hire some, that’s for sure. Fae’s got to sell off some cattle for working capital. She told me so. So we’ve got to hire some boys.”
“Durned if I know where. And there’s still the matter of Dooley Hanks.”
Fae would hire some hands, sooner than Smoke thought. But they would be about fifty years from boyhood.
SIX
They made camp early that day, after rounding up about fifty head of Box T cattle they found on Cord’s place. They put them in a coulee and blocked the entrance with brush. They would push them closer to home in the morning.
They suppered on the food Fae had fixed for them and were rolled up in their blankets just after dark.
Smoke was the first one up, several hours before dawn. He coaxed life back into the coals by adding dry grass and twigs, and Beans sat up when the smell of coffee got too much for him to take. Beans threw off his blankets, put on his hat, pulled on his boots, and buckled on his gun belt. He squatted by the fire beside Smoke, warming his hands and waiting for the cowboy coffee to boil.
“Town life’s done spoiled me,” Beans griped. “Man gets used to shavin’ and bathin’ every day, and puttin’ on clean clothes every mornin’. It ain’t natural.”
Smoke grinned and handed him a small sack.
“What’s in here?”
“Bear-sign I hid from you yesterday.”
Beans quit his grousing and went to eating while Smoke sliced the bacon and cut up some potatoes, adding a bit of wild onion for flavor.
“The problem of hands has got me worried,” Beans admitted, slurping on a cup of coffee. “Ain’t no cowboy in his right mind gonna go to work for the Box T with all this trouble starin’ him in the face.”
“I know.” Smoke ladled out the food onto tin plates. “But I think I know one who just might do it, for thirty and found, just for the pure hell of it. I’ll talk to him this afternoon if I can. First we have to see Hanks.”
* * *
“You got a lot of damn nerve, Jensen,” the foreman of the D-H spread told him. “Mister Hanks don’t wanna see you.”
“You tell him I’m here and I’ll wait just as long as it takes.”
Gage stared into the cold eyes of the most respected and feared gunfighter in all the West. He sighed, shook his head, and finally said, “All right, mister. I’ll tell him you insist on seein’ him. But I ain’t givin’ no guarantees.”
Hanks and McCorkle could pass for brothers, Smoke thought, as he squatted under the shade of a tree and watched as Dooley left the house and walked toward him. Both of them square-built men. Solid. Both of them in their early to mid forties.
Dooley did not offer to shake hands. “Speak your piece, Jensen.”
Smoke repeated what he’d told Cord, almost word for word, including the bit about Louis Longmont. Grim-faced, Hanks stood and took it. He didn’t like it, but he took it.
“Maybe I’ll just wait you out, Jensen.”
“Maybe. But I doubt it. You’re paying fighting wages, Dooley. To a lot of people. You’re like most cattlemen, Dooley: you’re worth a lot of money, but most of it is standing on four hooves. Ready scratch is hard to come up with.”
Dooley grunted. Man knew what he was talking about, all right. “You won’t get between me and McCorkle?”
“I don’t care what you two do to each other. The area would probably be better off if you’d kill each other.”
“Plainspoken man, ain’t you?”
“I see no reason to dance around it, Dooley. What’d you say?”
Something evil moved behind Dooley Hanks’s eyes. And Smoke didn’t miss it. He did not trust this man; there was no honor to be found in Dooley Hanks.
“I didn’t rustle no Box T cattle, Jensen. We just scattered them all to hell and gone. You’re free to work my range. You find any Box T cattle, take them. You won’t be bothered, and neither will Miss Fae or any punchers she hires.” He grinned, and it was not a pleasant curving of the lips. He also had bad breath. “If she can find anyone stupid enough to work for her. Now get out of my face. I’m sick of lookin at you.”
“The feeling is quite mutual, Hanks.” Smoke mounted up and rode away.
“I don’t trust that hombre,” Beans said. “He’s got more twists and turns than a snake.”
“I got the same feeling. See if you can find some of Fae’s beef and start pushing them toward Box T graze. I’m going into Gibson.”
* * *
“You’re serious?”
“Oh, yes,” Smoke told him. “Thirty and found, and you’ll work just like any other cowboy.”
The man threw back his head and laughed; his teeth were very white against his deeply tanned face. He tossed his hat onto the table in Hans’s café.
“All right,” he said suddenly. “All right, Smoke, you have a deal. I was a vaquero before I turned to the gun. I will ride for the Box T.”
Smoke and Lujan shook hands. Smoke had always heard how unpredictable the man was, but once he gave his word, he would die keeping it.
Lujan packed up his gear and pulled out moments later, riding for the Box T. Smoke chatted with Hans and Olga and Hilda for a few moments—Hilda, as it turned out, was quite taken with Ring—and then he decided he’d like a beer. Smoke was not much of a drinker, but did enjoy a beer or a drink of whiskey every now and then.
Which s
aloon to enter? He stood in front of the café and pondered that for a moment. Both of the saloons were filled up with gunhands. “Foolish of me,” he muttered. But a cool beer sounded good. He slipped the leather thongs from the hammers of his guns and walked over to the Pussycat and pushed open the batwings, stepping into the semi-gloom of the beery-smelling saloon.
All conversation stopped.
Smoke walked to the bar and ordered a beer. The barkeep suddenly got very nervous. Smoke sipped his beer and it was good, hitting the spot.
“Jack Waters was a friend of mine,” a man spoke, the voice coming from the gloom of the far end of the saloon.
Smoke turned, his beer mug in his left hand.
His right thumb was hooked behind his big silver belt buckle, his fingers only a few inches from his cross-draw .44.
He stood saying nothing, sipping at his beer. He paid for the brew, damned if he wasn’t going to try to finish as much of it as possible before he had to deal with this loudmouth.
“Ever’body talks about how bad you are, Jensen,” the bigmouth cranked his tongue up again. “But I ain’t never seen none of your graveyards.”
“I have,” the voice came quietly from Smoke’s left. He did not know the voice and did not turn his head to put a face to it.
“Far as I’m concerned,” the bigmouth stuck it in gear again, “I think Smoke Jensen is about as bad as a dried-up cow pile.”
“You know my name,” Smoke’s words were softly offered. “What’s your name?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Wouldn’t be right to put a man in the ground without his name on his grave marker.”
The loudmouth cursed Smoke.
Smoke took a swallow of beer and waited. He watched as the man pushed his chair back and stood up. Men on both sides of him stood up and backed away, getting out of the line of fire.
“My name’s John Cheave, Jensen. I been lookin’ for you for nearabouts two years.”
“Why?” Smoke was almost to the bottom of his beer mug.
“My brother was killed at Fontana. By you.”
“Too bad. He should have picked better company to run with. But I don’t recall any Cheave. What was he, some two-bit thief who had to change his name?”
John Cheave again cursed Smoke.
Smoke finished his beer and set the mug down on the edge of the bar. He slipped his thumb from behind his belt buckle and let his right hand dangle by the butt of his .44.
John Cheave called Smoke a son of a bitch.
Smoke’s eyes narrowed. “You could have cussed me all day and not said that. Make your grab, Cheave.”
Cheave’s hands dipped and touched the butts of his guns. Two shots thundered, the reports so close together they sounded as one. Smoke had drawn both guns and fired, rolling his left-hand .44. It was a move that many tried, but few ever perfected; and more than a few ended up shooting themselves in the belly trying.
John Cheave had not cleared leather. He sat down in the chair he had just stood up out of and leaned his head back, his wide, staring eyes looking up at the ceiling of the saloon. There were two bloody holes in the center of his chest. Cheave opened his mouth a couple of times, but no words came out.
His boots drummed on the floor for a few seconds and then he died, his eyes wide open, staring at and meeting death.
“I seen it, but I don’t believe it,” a man said, standing up. He tossed a couple of dollars on the table. “Cheave come out of California. Some say he was as fast as John Wesley Hardin. Count me out of this game, boys. I’m ridin’.”
He walked out of the saloon, being very careful to avoid getting too close to Smoke.
The sounds of his horse’s hooves faded before anyone else spoke.
“The barber doubles as the undertaker,” Pooch Matthews said.
Smoke nodded his head. “Fine.”
The bartender yelled for his swamper to fetch the undertaker.
“Impressive,” a gunhawk named Hazzard said. “I have to say it: you’re about the best I’ve ever seen. Except for one.”
“Oh?”
Hazzard smiled. “Yeah. Me.”
Smoke returned the smile and turned his back to the man, knowing the move would infuriate the gunhawk.
“Another beer, Mister Smoke?” the barkeep asked.
“No.”
The barkeep did not push the issue.
Smoke studied the bottom of the empty beer mug, wondering how many more would fall under his guns. Although he knew this showdown would have come, sooner or later, one part of him said that he should not have come into the saloon, while another part of him said that he had a right to go wherever he damned well pleased. As long as it was a public place.
It was an old struggle within the man.
The barber came in and he and the swamper dragged the body out to the barber’s wagon and chunked him in. The thud of the body falling against the bed of the wagon could be heard inside the saloon.
“I believe I will have that beer,” Smoke said. While the barkeep filled his mug, Smoke rolled one of his rare cigarettes and lit up.
The saloon remained very quiet.
The barkeep’s hand trembled just slightly as he set the foamy mug in front of Smoke.
Several horses pulled up outside the place. McCorkle and Jason Bright and several of Cord’s hands came in. They walked to a table and sat down, ordering beer.
“What happened?” Smoke heard Cord ask.
“Cheave started it with Jensen. He didn’t even clear leather.”
“I thought you was going to stay out of this game, Jensen?” McCorkle directed the question to Smoke’s back.
Smoke slowly turned, holding the beer mug in his left hand. “Cheave pushed me, Cord. I only came in here for a beer.”
“Man’s got a right to have a drink,” Cord grudgingly conceded. “I seen some Box T cattle coming in, Jensen. They was grazin’ on range ’bout five, six miles out of town. On the west side of the Smith.”
“Thanks.” And with a straight face, he added, “I’ll have Lujan and a couple of others push them back to Box T range.”
“Lujan!” Jason Bright almost hollered the word.
“Yes. He went to work for the Box T a couple of hours ago.”
A gunslick that Smoke knew from the old days, when he and Preacher were roaming the land, got up and walked toward the table where Cord was sitting. “I figure I got half a month’s wages comin’ to me, Mister McCorkle. If you’ve a mind to pay me now, I’d appreciate it.”
With a look of wry amusement on his face, Cord reached into his pocket and counted out fifty dollars, handing it to the man. “You ridin’, Jim?”
“Yes, sir. I figure I can catch up with Red. He hauled his ashes a few minutes ago.”
Cord counted out another fifty. “Give this to Red. He earned it.”
“Yes, sir. Much obliged.” He looked around the saloon.
“See you boys on another trail. This one’s gettin’ crowded.” He walked through the batwings.
“Yellow,” Hazzard said disgustedly, his eyes on the swinging and squeaking batwings. “Just plain yellow is all he is.”
Cord cut his eyes. “Jim Kay is anything but yellow, Hazzard. I’ve known him for ten years. There is a hell of a lot of difference between being yellow and bettin’ your life on a busted flush.” He looked at Smoke. “There bad blood between you and Jim Kay?”
Smoke shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of. I’ve known him since I was just a kid. He’s a friend of Preacher.”
Cord smiled. “Preacher pulled my bacon out of the fire long years back. Only time I ever met him. I owe him. I often wonder what happened to him.”
“He’s alive. But getting on in years.”
Cord nodded his head, then his eyes swept the room. “I’ll say it now, boys; we leave the Box T alone. Our fight is with Dooley Hanks. Box T riders can cross our range and be safe doin’ it. They’ll be comin’ through lookin’ for the cattle we scattered. You don�
��t have to help them, just leave them alone.”
A few of the gunslicks exchanged furtive glances. Cord missed the eye movement. Smoke did not. The gunfighters that Smoke would have trusted had left the area, such as Jim Kay and Red and a few others. What was left was the dregs, and there was not an ounce of honor in the lot.
Smoke finished his beer. “See you, Cord.”
The rancher nodded his head and Smoke walked out the door. Riding toward the Box T, Smoke thought: You better be careful, McCorkle, ’cause you’ve surrounded yourself with a bunch of rattlesnakes, and I don’t think you know just how dangerous they are.
SEVEN
The days drifted on, filled with hard honest work and the deep dreamless sleep of the exhausted. Smoke had hired two more hands, boys really, in their late teens. Bobby and Hatfield. They had left the drudgery of a hardscrabble farm in Wisconsin and drifted west, with dreams of the romantic West and being cowboys. And they both had lost all illusions about the romantic life of a cowboy very quickly. It was brutally hard work, but at least much of it could be done from the back of a horse.
True to his word, Lujan not only did his share, but took up some slack as well. He was a skilled cowboy, working with no wasted motion, and he was one of the finest horsemen Smoke had ever seen.
One hot afternoon, Smoke looked up to see young Hatfield come a-foggin’ toward him, lathering his horse.
“Mister Smoke! Mister Smoke!” he yelled. “I ain’t believing this. You got to come quick to the house.”
He reined up in a cloud of dust and Smoke had to wait until the dust settled before he could even see the young man to talk to him.
“Whoa, boy! Who put a burr under your blanket?”
“Mister Smoke, my daddy read stories about them men up to Miss Fae’s house when he was a boy. I thought they was all dead and buried in the grave!”
“Slow down, boy. What men?”
“Them old gunfighters up yonder. Come on.” He wheeled his horse around and was gone at a gallop.
Lujan pulled up. “What’s going on, amigo?”
“I don’t know. Come on, let’s find out.”
Fae was entertaining them on the front porch when Smoke and Lujan rode up. Smoke laughed when he saw them.
Live by the West, Die by the West Page 5
