Lone Star 05 (22 page)

Thomas Starbuck buckled over, hit in the abdomen by McKittrick's first round, but he stayed on his feet and made a run for it.

Fagan dove for his gun and filled his fist with iron, firing as he rolled away from Jessie. She crabbed to one side, returning the close-range fire. Her luck held. She blasted three quick rounds, the third of which pierced his right eye. Blood gushed from the darkened socket as he collapsed and died.

Cynthia, in her tattered dress, hugged the ground, afraid to lift her head to witness even more bloodshed.

Thad, momentarily turning his attention from Mueller, pumped lead after the escaping bounty hunter. McKittrick answered, clipping Thad in the right arm and knocking the pistol from his hand. He was prevented from finishing Thad off by Ki's
ho-tachi.
McKittrick, feeling a hard blow and a sharp pain, looked down to see the samurai's knife protruding from his thigh.

Thad had fallen, hitting his head on a rock, and was now lying on the ground, stunned. Jessie reached his side and picked up his dropped gun to replace her own, which was now empty. She squeezed off a shot at McKittrick, who, confused and in pain, turned and limped off, crashing through the brush that surrounded the camp.

She shifted her aim to cover Mueller, but the Prussian was gone.

Panic seized her. “Ki!” she called. The samurai, now armed with a Colt .36-caliber revolving rifle he had picked up from Fagan's bedroll, appeared at her side. “Mueller's taken off,” she said. “Find him. I'll go after McKittrick and the boy.” She checked the load of the rifle she had, a standard Winchester. It held at least ten rounds—enough for now, she hoped. Picking her way carefully through the rocks and scrub outside the camp, she followed McKittrick's trail. Ahead, she heard the horses whickering. She ran in that direction—in time to see the injured bounty hunter, Ki's knife still planted in his thigh, attempting to mount one of the animals.

“Hold it!” she shouted. But the hardcase turned and fired, sending a bullet snapping past her shoulder. The young woman brought the strange rifle to her shoulder and took aim at the man's midsection. She fired twice. Both slugs took McKittrick right where it hurt, sending him in a heap to the ground.

With him out of the way, she went on, trying to locate Thomas Starbuck, who had taken a bullet in his gut and couldn't be too far away. She found him several minutes later, lying in a clump of brush, breathing heavily. He had lost a great amount of blood, and by the feeble moonlight she could see that his face had lost all its color. His hands were soaked with blood as he held them to his stomach. It was no use, though, he could not stop the deadly flow.

“Oh, Thomas—why? Why didn't you trust me? Why did you try to run?” She knelt down beside him, cradling his head in her hands.

It took him a long time to respond. When he finally opened his eyes there was little life there. His killing career was over—and he knew it.

“Jessie—I—” He coughed, spitting out globs of blood and phlegm. “I don't want to die,” he croaked. “Don't let me die, Jessie.”

“I won‘t, I won't,” she said, trying to reassure him. “Just lie still.” She found her anger mingling with tears. What a waste! But whose fault was it, if not the kid's himself. He had chosen the killing life, and now he was paying for it. Before he was gone, though, she had to know his reasons for playing the charade.

“Thomas,” she said, “tell me the truth. Why did you lie about being Alex Starbuck's son? I must know.”

The kid struggled to raise his head. It was a hopeless battle, but he fought on. Finally he lifted it so that it was above the rest of his blood-soaked body and he could look down on his wounds. Horror and fear opened his eyes wide as he saw the seriousness of his injuries. An icy chill possessed him. The specter of death reared its black form and he saw the end of his life. All the towns, all the men he had killed, all the money and time he had squandered—the vision gripped his soul and he saw the tragedy, the futility of it all.

“What have I done?” he gulped. It was eerie, unsettling to hear him talk like this. His past, his “rep,” pounced on him all at once and sank its claws into his heart. “What have I done?” he repeated.

“Please, Thomas,” Jessie pleaded, shaking him from his deathly reverie. “Come back. Tell me. Tell me the truth.”

“Mexican Hat—” he said, with difficulty. “Mueller—that's where he was. He found me—”

“Mexican Hat? What happened there? How did Mueller find you?”

The kid did not respond. He had passed out from loss of blood. She listened for his heartbeat. He clung to life by a thin thread. If she could stop the bleeding for a while, he might have enough time left to tell her what she had to know. Summoning all her strength, she half lifted, half dragged his bullet-riddled body back to camp.

Cynthia, who had just finished treating Thad, helped Jessie tie the heavy cloth around the kid's gaping bullet wounds, staunching the blood flow for the time being. Jessie propped him up against a saddle, covering him with a blanket. At first the kid seemed to revive. He opened his eyes fully and looked at Jessie. He even managed a weak smile, the first friendly signal she'd had from him. But she knew enough not to fall under his spell; she had to keep in mind the fact that he was a skilled liar.

His breath came with great difficulty. His face was white and hollow, the cheeks sunken on the bones. “You didn't have to help me,” he whispered.

“Thomas, I want to know the truth. You said something about Mexcian Hat. That's the town where you killed a man, a gambler, isn't it?”

The kid nodded, his pale face contorted with pain. “Mueller was there. He knew who I was. He wanted me to—” He wheezed, a string of blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. Jessie wiped it away with a torn cloth.

“What did he want you to do, Thomas?”

“To say I was—your brother. He told me all about Alex Starbuck—came up with the story about—about how I was born. Wanted me to shout it all over the place—that I was Starbuck's son.”

“Did he tell you why?”

“Provo,” Thomas Starbuck breathed. “He said something about Prove—paid me my money—told me never to say—” He gasped for air. “Told me to do what he wanted and he'd get me out of any scrape I got into. Then I went to Skyler—” The kid's eyes rolled back in their sockets. The pain was getting to him now. He clutched at his wound and gave out a retching sound. “God, it hurts so much.”

“Lie back. It'll be all right.” Provo? What did Provo have to do with all this? What interest did Mueller have in Provo? Unless ... It dawned on her then: the Starbuck Metals & Mining Company, of course!

The kid spoke with great effort: “I know I'm a dead man. That's why—I'm telling you all this. I want you to know. I—I—nobody ever cared for me. I—I wish you was my sister.”

“You're not going to die,” she reassured him. “Tell me all you know, but take your time.”

He nodded weakly. Cynthia brought Jessie a canteen, from which she drank thirstily. The boy eyed the water. His own throat was burning, as was his gut. But to drink would only increase the pain tenfold. He knew enough not to ask for the water, but he craved it nonetheless, and it showed in his wild, red-rimmed eyes. To cover his thirst, he kept talking.

“It was all kind of a game for a while. Then they caught me in Skyler. Locked me up—God, I couldn't stand it. Mueller kept promising he'd get me out. Never did. Then you came to town. I—wanted to kill you first time I saw you. But you got me out of that stinking jail—and—I gave you nothing but trouble.” His eyes were clearer now than she had ever seen them, free of madness. His breath was labored, and he spit more blood as he spoke.

Jessie rested her hand on his shoulder. It was futile to try to comfort him now.

Thad Hill, who had stood by listening, his right arm supported in a makeshift sling, lit a cheroot. As the match flared, he looked at the dying boy's face, and the hatred he had built up inside himself subsided some. The little bastard had finally gotten his, and it wasn't a pleasant sight to behold.

His glazed eyes trying to focus on Thad, the kid groaned, “Sorry I made you—made you mad. Shouldn't have gone and done that. Can I have—a—smoke?”

Thad put the small cigar between the kid's lips. Starbuck took a puff. The smoke seared his injured lungs and he coughed violently, more blood spilling crimson out of his mouth. Jessie patiently dabbed it away as Thad dropped the cheroot and ground it out with his boot. He moved away, leaving Jessie to converse with the young outlaw in private.

Jessie said, “Mueller never told you why he wanted me to come to Skyler? That he was a member of a group of businessmen—?”

The kid shook his head. Even that movement brought on a spasm of pain. It wracked his entire body now as the life fluid seeped out of him. He was becoming delirious. “Ma!” he called. “Jesus—Ma!”

Wiping the feverish perspiration from his forehead, Jessie tried to quiet him. But he cried out again and again. “God, it hurts! Help me, help me ...” His eyes closed. He kept breathing, though, struggling against death. Then the eyes fluttered open.

“Be quiet, Thomas,” she said. “Don't try to talk anymore.”

“Where's my ma? I gotta find her. There's a man here—wants to see her. Oh, God—my guts are burning. Gimme a drink—please. I don't want to die!”

A spasm passed through Thomas Starbuck's body that left him shrunken and barely breathing. His eyes closed tightly; his chest lifted and fell flutteringly, almost imperceptibly. He was ghostly white, the eyes sunken in his chalky face. Then he gasped once and the breathing ceased. In another minute, Thomas Starbuck, the curse of four territories, the boy outlaw, lay dead.

Jessie took his head in her arms and held it gently. She stayed with him, not wanting to move. More killing, more blood. It disgusted Jessie beyond her power to express it. Ever since she had first received word about Thomas Starbuck, it had been a long, grotesque nightmare, an endless stream of killing. Would Alex Starbuck, even at his most vengeful, condone the destruction she had wrought, this harvest of violence? Looking at this dead boy—calculating the cost of his life—she found it difficult to justify the proposition that man was essentially good. But she must continue her struggle to wipe out the destructive cartel—starting with Mueller. That much she did not doubt.

Jessie thought she had no more tears to shed over the kid, over Ulysses Scott, over the other dead, over Thad's wound. She worried now about Ki, who had not yet come back. Had he caught up with Mueller yet? Or had Mueller turned the tables?

“Jessie.” Ki's soft voice startled her. She rose and went to him, hugging him. He held her as, finally, the tears
did
come.

“Ki,” she sobbed, “I thought you might never—that Mueller might kill you. God, I'm sorry I put you through all this.”

He stroked her lustrous hair. “I do my duty. I serve you, Jessie. We both serve the memory of your father. It is what we must do.”

“Where's Mueller? Did you find him?”

Ki described how he had found Mueller leading his horse away from the others. He had mounted up, turned, and pinned Ki back with gunfire. In the process he frightened the other horses away, cutting off Ki's pursuit. Mueller rode east, leaving Ki to round up the stray animals.

“So he got away. He's a clever man, Jessie. An evil man.”

“Thomas told me all about him. Ki, the boy admitted it was all a lie. He said Mueller paid him to claim he was my half-brother, to lure me to Skyler. And there's something else—something about Provo. I don't think even he knew what was going on, but Mueller mentioned something to him.” She ran out of breath in an effort to get it all at once, and moisture shone in her emerald eyes. A deep anger welled up within her.

“We'll find this man Mueller, and we'll make him pay for what he has done,” Ki told her.

“All right, Ki.” She wiped her eyes. “No sense acting like a woman about it, I suppose.” Then she smiled. “Let's try to get some sleep.”

First, Ki saw to the kid's body, wrapping it in a blanket and preparing it for the remainder of the trip. When he returned to the camp, he saw Jessie snuggled up against Thad Hill, the injured bounty hunter snoring lightly and the woman sound asleep. He took his own bedroll, retrieved from his recaptured horse, and set it down several yards away beneath a stunted pine tree.

Provo. He wasn't surprised to learn that Mueller's plot might hinge there. All along he had harbored suspicions about what was going on at the Starbuck office there. The Prussian had somehow subverted the operation there ...