A Dangerous Man (8 page)

Tam Sullivan walked down the rise toward the street. The buildings looked like a fleet of old wooden men o' war adrift in a sea of mud. The landscape, in somber shades of tan, gray, and olive green, stretched away on all sides of him and even the branches of the pines cresting the surrounding hills were thin and sparse and brown.

Winter was cracking down hard and the north wind, flecked with snow, bit deep.

In the course of practicing his profession, Sullivan had acquired the highly-strung instincts of a lobo wolf. Someone, or something, was watching him.

He turned and looked back toward the house, in time to see a hulking figure at a second floor window. The man—judging by his bulk that's what Sullivan figured it was—vanished almost instantly and the concealing curtain twitched into place again.

He'd only caught a fleeting glance of the man but registered what he saw with shock—a bald head and an almost featureless face, as though the skin had melted to the skull, leaving only holes for the eyes and mouth. It was the kind of sight that could come back to a man in his sleep and make him wake in a sweat, fear spiking at him as he reached for his gun in the scarlet campfire glow.

Tam Sullivan would not soon forget the face, or the fact that the man was lurking in the house the whole time he spoke with Lady Wainright.

Who was the man and why was he there?

Sullivan had no answers for that question as he regained the boardwalk and saw a dozen men gathered outside the saloon, the lean, scowling, malevolent figure of Bill Longley among them.

Tom Archer nodded to Sullivan as he approached. “Do you want to get your horse and join us?”

“To do what?” Sullivan said.

“We're mounting a punitive expedition against the Utes, teach them that they can't kill white men with impunity.”

“Ride with us, Sullivan,” Longley said. “It will be a lark.”

“Seems to me that anything that involves killing blacks and Indians is a lark to you, Bill,” Sullivan said.

“Yeah, and rightly so. But don't forget Mexicans. I ain't too fond of greasers either.”

Booker Tate laughed. “You tell him, Bill.”

Sullivan ignored that and said to Archer, “How come you've made a deal with the devil?”

The storeowner's eyes flickered, moved to Longley, then back to Sullivan. He seemed uncomfortable. “We need guns. Indian fighters.”

Sullivan glanced around the gathered men, young faces, old faces, faces in between. A few of them, like Eddie Lewis, had been in the war, but Utes and Apaches didn't stand in line and fight under banners.

The group in front of the saloon would be up against a very different kind of enemy.

“You sweet-talked these men into joining you, Archer?” Sullivan asked.

“No sweet-talking was needed. These fine men are all volunteers. And they are determined to punish the savages.”

A ragged cheer greeted those words. Emboldened, the storeowner said, “Well, Sullivan, will you join us?”

“The Apaches are out,” Sullivan said. “You know that.”

“Yes, we do, and we'll sweep them aside,” Archer said. “It's the Ute murderers we want.”

“Apaches don't sweep aside worth a damn,” Sullivan pointed out.

“That's because they ain't met men like me and Booker Tate before,” Longley butted in.

Sullivan's smile was neither warm nor friendly. “Bill, Apache warriors are not scared, unarmed Negroes and Mexicans. They shoot back.”

“So you say, Sullivan,” Tate said. “They'll take one look at me and Bill an' run like rabbits.”

Archer had had enough talking. “Mount up, men. Let's quit the gabbing and go get us some scalps.”

“You're making a big mistake, Archer,” Sullivan said.

“Mister, if you ain't got the belly for it, step aside,” the storekeeper said. “Mount up, boys.”

Sullivan caught the flash of Longley's triumphant grin.

And then he knew.

Longley and Tate had no intention of fighting Indians.

At the first sign of trouble, they'd scamper and leave Archer and the rest to their fate. Longley intended to take over the town and empty its bank. For that he needed to kill off the gutsiest fighting men first.

All he had to do was step aside and let the Utes and Apaches do it for him . . . at no risk of harm to himself.

Sullivan watched Longley swing into the saddle. “Hey, Bill, I almost forgot. Lady Clotilde Wainright sends her regards.”

The color drained from Longley's face. “She's here? In Comanche Crossing?”

“As ever was, Bill,” Sullivan said, puzzled by the gunman's reaction. “Big house on the hill back yonder.”

Longley surprised everyone. He savagely put spurs to his horse, and the big buckskin reared then galloped along the street, great gobs of glutinous mud pelting from its pounding hooves.

Archer's baffled posse followed at a walk, and Sullivan hurriedly retraced his steps along the boardwalk.

By the time he reached the end of the boards, Bill Longley had already drawn rein about twenty feet from the house. His words carried in the wind, all tangled up with blowing snow. “You don't scare me, Clotilde!” he yelled. “Don't call in favors! You hear me? We're not going back to what we used to be. I'm done with it.”

The silent house stared at him with blank eyes.

“Come after me, damn you!” he shrieked. “Bring your dead man if you want and I'll kill him all over again!” Longley laughed an I-don't-give-a-damn burst of hysteria. “I know how to destroy you! I know, Clotilde!”

A moment's silence, then the only sound was the soft sigh of the sloughing wind.

A scream erupted, echoing from the house, a piercing, venomous cry . . . godless inhuman rage distilled to its essence.

Terrified, Longley's horse got up on its hind legs, white arcs showing in its eyes, turned and dashed down the rise. The gunman battled the horse and finally managed to draw rein when he reached the street.

“What the hell was that?” Tom Archer cried.

“Bobcat,” Longley answered quickly. “Let's go kill some Redskins.” His face was still white as bone and he coughed continually as though his throat had gone dry.

Sullivan watched the posse leave, Longley in the lead, smiling as he talked with Tate as though nothing strange had happened.

Like any man who has spread his blankets in the woods, Sullivan had heard the screech of a bobcat. The sound that had come out of the house was louder, harsher, almost demonic.

He stared at the house, saw only shadowed windows and shook his head. “Longley, what kind of enemy have you made? And what kind of woman”—he almost said
creature—
“was Lady Clotilde Wainright?”

By the time Tom Archer and his posse reached Angel Fire Peak their enthusiasm for Indian fighting had seriously waned. The three-hour ride across wild, broken country had tired the men and horses.

The day had grown colder and the snow fell thicker. The land lay bleak and lonely under a leaden sky, streaked here and there with snow and ice that gathered in every crack and fold of the frozen ground.

Five miles to the west, the gray bulk of the Cimarron Mountains, banded by pines that marked the timberline, stood cold and aloof.

Archer turned in the saddle and said to Bill Longley, “Where the hell are the hostiles?” He pointed at the peaks. “Up there in a canyon or a hanging valley?” The storeowner's mustache and beard were crusted with white and snowflakes rimmed his eyelashes.

“They're holed up somewhere, I reckon, but real close.” Longley said. “I thought I caught a whiff of smoke, maybe a mile back.” That last was a lie, but Archer accepted it as truth.

As his riders crowded around him, he said, “Boys, we'll backtrack a mile, see if we can pick up the scent again.”

Longley felt danger in the air, and even his horse sensed it, holding its head high, ears pricked. “Keep a sharp watch, Archer. Like I said, the Utes are mighty close so be on your guard.”

Archer's face frowned into a question.

Longley answered it. “Me and Booker will head west and take a scout around the Cimarron foothills. If we spot the savages, I'll keep watch and send Booker back for you.”

“I thought you said you smelled smoke south of us,” a man said.

“Maybe I did,” Longley said. “I'm not sure. The wind is blowing from the north, so the smoke could've come from the Cimarrons.”

The posse was almost done. Frozen stiff, their heads bent against the icy wind, they seemed all used up.

Concealing his outlaw contempt for small town rubes, Longley pretended to be concerned for their welfare. “Archer, if you and your boys see no sign of hostiles, head back for Comanche Crossing. We don't want to be caught out here come nightfall.”

Archer was surprised. “What about you and Tate?”

“We'll scout east like I told you. If we see no Indian sign, we'll rejoin you.”

“And if you do see the Utes?” Archer said.

“I'll fire three shots, and that means come like hell.”

Archer nodded. Suddenly he looked old. Worn out. “All right boys. We'll head back down the trail.”

Longley watched the posse leave . . . ten tired men slumped in the saddles, wishing that they'd never left home. “Let them boys put some git between us and them, then we'll do what has to be done.”

“Ain't we gonna scout the Cimarron foothills?” Tate asked.

“No, you idiot. Hell, I don't want to bump into Utes or Apaches. Man can get himself killed that way.”

Tate's brutal, thick-lipped face revealed his confusion. “So what are we gonna do, Bill? Tell me.”

“We passed a limestone ridge about half a mile back that overlooks the trail. It's got timber along the crest where a couple of men can take cover.” His thin lips curled into a smile. “You catching my drift, Booker?”

Tate shook his head and said nothing.

A heavy snow flurry gusted over the two riders and for a moment they were hidden from view. The pines shook and sent down small avalanches from their branches. Tate shivered in his thin mackinaw.

The air was as hard as iron.

“We got a chance to thin 'em out, see,” Longley said. “The rubes in the posse are the best Comanche Crossing has got. I say we can cut them in half real easy. And then—”

“We take over the town.” Tate's ugly grin was quick as though he saw everything crystal clear. “I wed and bed the little York gal and then we empty the bank and go on our way rejoicing.”

“You'll be a respectable married man after all that, Booker,” Longley said.

Tate's mouth widened. “Well at least fer a spell until I've had enough of her. Then we can sell her down Old Mexico way for a pile of money.”

“Sounds like a proposition. We'll head for the ridge and make like Injuns. When I fire the three warning shots, them rubes will come a-hootin' and a-hollerin' and we pick 'em off like ducks in a shooting gallery.”

“Bill, damn it all, you're a genius,” Booker said, his eyes shining.

“Don't I know it.”

 

 

The limestone ridge was shaped like the prow of a steamship, its crest covered by a mix of aspen and ponderosa pine. At its highest point, the rise stood fifty feet above the flat. To the south, it ended in a sharp drop, but on the northern side a gradual, pine covered gradient sloped down to the trail.

Longley and Tate rode up the slope, dismounted, then stashed their horses in the trees. They bellied down with their rifles at the top of the ridge overlooking the trail. Longley grinned at Booker. “You ready?”

“Damn right I am,” Tate said. “I bet you ten dollars I knock down five of them plowboys.”

“It's a bet, Booker.” Longley turned on his back, levered off three shots, and reloaded his rifle. “Now the fun begins.”

The rate of fire of the .44 Henry was twenty-eight shots a minute. In the hands of expert riflemen like Longley and Tate, it was a devastating weapon. Each man's rifle was fully loaded with sixteen rounds in their tube magazines and one in the chamber.

Tom Archer didn't know it yet, but his punitive expedition faced slaughter.

After a couple of minutes ticked past, Tate turned his head to Longley and whispered, “Where the hell are they?”

“They'll be here,” Longley said. “It's a hard trail. Just be patient.”

Poor advice from an impatient man.

The snow fell, lying thick on the backs of the prone riflemen. More time passed . . . three minutes . . . four . . . five . . .

Tate voiced Longley's own thought. “They ain't comin'. Damn it, Bill. They'd be here by now.”

“I don't believe it. Archer ignored my shots.” Longley shook his head as though trying to clear the wonderment of it all.

“The damned traitorous swine sold us down the river. They left us here to die like dogs.”

“Scum,” Tate said. “That's what they are, Bill. Just yellow-bellied scum and lowdown.”

A bullet, ranging upward, missed Longley's face by inches and punched a hole in his hat brim. He yelped. “What the hell!”

Apaches!” Tate's voice was clamoring like an alarm bell.

“Where?”

“Every-damn-where!”

His eyes wild, Longley sprang to his feet. “Hold them off, Booker. I'll go get help.” The gunman sprinted to his horse and swung into the saddle.

“Wait! Wait for me, Bill!” Tate yelled.

But Longley ignored the man. He was already at the top of the rise. He spurred his horse onto the slope.

Then he spotted the Apaches.

Six . . . no seven . . . fifty yards off, sitting their horses on the flat.

He swung south and winced as a bullet burned across his left shoulder. Then he felt his horse stagger. The big buckskin pecked, but Longley hauled on the reins and kept the animal's head up, using bloody spurs in brutal, raking sweeps.

Behind him, he heard Tate yell something that was swallowed by the wind and the pound of hooves on muddy ground.

Scared, Longley pushed his faltering horse. The buckskin kept running, but its pace slowed and blood and foam flew back from its mouth, the bit stained scarlet.

Shots racketed behind him, then a rider drew level with him and his eyes widened in fear. But it was Tate. He held his Henry like a revolver, shooting behind him without turning.

“Get them off me!” Longley shrieked.

“Bill, they ain't after us. They gave it up.”

Longley spared a glance over his shoulder. He saw no Apaches, only the lacy curtain of the falling snow and the steely sheen of ice that covered every tree and rock. Slowing his wounded horse to walk, he said, “I thought Apaches were great warriors. Damned cowards. They were afraid to face us.”

Tate said nothing, his face empty but for a trace of the wound Longley had inflicted on him.

“I killed three of the savages,” Longley said.

Tate looked surprised. “You did?”

“Yeah, I dropped three before I hit the flat. Damn it, man, didn't you see?”

“Sure, Bill, sure. I seen them savages fall with my own two eyes.”

“They got lead into me, though.” Longley showed Tate the tear in the shoulder of his coat. There was a smear of blood on the fur. “That's why I didn't hold up for you, Booker. I mean, me being wounded like that. And the hostiles put a bullet into my hoss.”

“Will he last until we reach town?”

“I'll make him last.” Longley thought for a moment, then smiled. “Keep a sharp eye out for blanket Indians or Mexicans, Booker. Maybe we can go back to Comanche Crossing with scalps.”