Return to Massacre Mesa - Edge Series 5 (13 page)

She hooked the bag over the saddle horn, unhitched the reins and swung 86

awkwardly astride the piebald. Then she either sensed she was being watched or knew the location of the window of the room where she had gone in vain to seek help. For whatever reason she peered up at where Edge stood, towelling water off his thickly bristled face. But she gave no sign that she saw him beyond the curtain in the darkened room before she tugged on the reins, backed the horse way from the clump of scrub and turned the animal. Dug in her heels to command a canter and bounced stiffly in the saddle, clearly not an experienced rider. Soon she rode from sight between two buildings near the planned mid-town intersection that had never come to be.

Mildly intrigued by the inconclusive exchange with Lucy Russell, Edge buckled on his gunbelt, donned his hat and went out of the room. Moments later at the balcony end of the short passage he once again almost collided with Dolores Jiminez, the statuesque whore who had propositioned him this morning. The once pretty but already life-wearied face of the twenty-five years old woman wore a cunning grin when she drawled:

‘Well now,
hombre:
I guess it ain’t no use me coming on strong to you tonight, uh?’

He was sure she had been waiting at the corner of the balcony and the passage for him to emerge from his room so she could engineer the meeting. ‘Or anytime, lady.’

She abandoned the grin and proved for certain that her sudden appearance was not by chance when she muttered sourly: ‘Not after the cook has been giving away for free what I need to make the charge for, uh? I do not think
Senor
Tree and
Senorita
Abigail Cross would like to hear of what’s been going on.’ She started to move off, directing a scowl over her shoulder. ‘Neither would her
padre
who still thinks of that woman like she is the
chica,
the
muchacha,
uh?’

She went down the stairway her hips rolling and Edge followed her, the both of them ignored by the scattering of quietly talking early evening customers in the saloon. Dolores strolled with less body motion to where three other whores were eating at a 87

corner table and said something that caused them to look toward Edge as he made for the counter.

Sam Tree waited for him to get close and announced apologetically: ‘All we got for supper is what’s left over from earlier, Mr Edge.’ The neatly dressed, solidly built, square featured man directed a surreptitious glower toward the doorway behind the angle of the bar counter. ‘Lucy wanted the night off and Abby sure ain’t no great shakes at cooking anything except burnt ham and busted eggs you have to chew to get down.’

‘Just a beer for now.’

‘Sure.’ He filled a glass, set it on the bartop and accepted payment, all the time glowering toward the group of whores as they began to interrupt their low toned talk with gusts of laughter. ‘What the hell has got into them females, acting like a bunch of giggling school kids?’

Edge ignored the rhetorical query and asked a direct question. ‘Have you been in this town long, feller?

‘Longer than most, that’s for sure. Seen it grow from the army post and a couple of stores and this place when it was no more than a cantina to what it all is today. Best part of twenty years or more: I didn’t keep count.’

‘So you lived here when the rumours got started about a small fortune in stolen government money being stashed not too far away from this town?’

Dolores said something to trigger a further burst of shrill laughter from the other women that distracted Tree who already seemed disinterested in what Edge was saying. Then the voice of a man upstairs was louder when he yelled:

‘Hey, Maria! Get that cute little greaser’s ass of yours up here damn quick! I got a big something for you, baby!’

The youngest and best looking of the whores pulled a scornful face and rasped something to the others that erupted more guffaws as she shuffled disconsolately 88

toward the foot of the stairs.

Tree murmured with a slow shake of his head: ‘That Chester Conners guy sure does have one hell of an appetite for women.’

Then he became earnest. ‘It never was just a rumour, Mr Edge. Not all of it. It’s always been a certain fact that the government in Washington and some army brass tried to make a deal with the Comanche about fifteen years ago. The plan was to buy the Indians’ promise of peace for twenty-five thousand bucks. And it’s also a fact that a couple of troopers who shouldn’t have known about the secret shipment did know about it: and that pair of bastards stole the money.’

‘I’m pretty sure all of that is true, feller,’ Edge said. ‘The rumour I need to know has some truth in it is the one that claims the money’s still hid someplace out in the mountains not too far from Lakewood. Maybe along with the body an officer who some say had a hand in stealing it? You give that story any credence?’

The saloonkeeper shrugged. ‘Not so much as the men who’ve had a mind to go looking for Uncle Sam’s lost cash, Mr Edge. And there was a lot of that kind early on. Soon after it got to be common knowledge about the massacre of them officers by the Comanche and how a bundle of cash went missing.’

‘Pretty soon after the end of the war?’ Edge said as Tree’s attention again wandered to the table where the whores were now eating in relative silence.

‘That’s when it happened: in the year of eighteen hundred and sixty six in the month of August,’ the still indifferent Tree replied. ‘Over at Mesa Desolado, between the foothills of the Cedars and Dead Man’s Desert.’

‘The army would have gone to a lot of trouble to try to get the money back and find those who stole it, I guess?’

‘You bet they did. Drafted in whole regiments of men to Fort Chance it seemed like. And had them scour damn near every square inch of the country around the mesa for a lot of miles in all directions. But they never did find one single silver dollar or bill.’

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Edge prompted: ‘Neither did they find the troopers who deserted from the fort a couple of days before the massacre – the fellers the army figured stole the money?’

Tree nodded, his square featured face expressing scorn. ‘Couple of no-accounts named Crabbe and Farmer. They deserted for sure. And it was certain that the money sent from Washington reached the post here. That was checked good - according to Lieutenant Glenn Montgomery, anyway.’

‘Montgomery was the cavalryman suspected of stealing the money, right?’

‘I’d say you’ve been talking with Lucy Russell, Mr Edge?’ The powerfully built man shook his head ruefully and shrugged again. ‘It was suspicious, that much has got to be admitted. The way the detail that was sent out to look for Colonel McCall and his men found things at the scene of the massacre. And brought back all the bodies except for that of the young lieutenant who was courting Lucy at the time.’

He sighed. ‘So it was natural Montgomery should be suspected of having had a hand in stealing the money. But after so many years, there ain’t too many left around here to give much of a damn one way or the other. Except for Billy Russell’s daughter, who’s always had her mind set on finding the man’s remains and bringing them back to be buried here in the town cemetery.’

‘She told me that’s what she wants to do.’

‘Lucy’s determined to prove Montgomery was badly wounded and crawled off someplace to die and his corpse was never found. You must’ve noticed the way that woman dresses in black all the time? She ain’t never stopped mourning for him.’

Edge drank some beer. ‘Did you or anyone else who lived here in town back then ever go looking for the money after the army didn’t find it?’

Tree reached a hand inside his shirt, scratched his broad chest and shook his head reflectively. ‘No, not me or anyone else hereabouts: not after we all saw how many soldiers were sent out to search. We figured if that many men covering that much territory couldn’t locate the money, there was no chance for anyone else.’

90

He showed a knowing grin. ‘But it seems to me you’re thinking of doing some treasure hunting of your own, Mr Edge?’

‘If I did, I wouldn’t be the first feller to chance his luck?’

‘Nah, not by a long way. There haven’t been so many of them recently. But for quite a while after the word spread about what happened, it seemed like half the nation and his brother came down here and headed off into the hills or out over the desert.’

He grinned more broadly. ‘Which was mighty good for business here at the Wild Dog for a while. Those guys used to patronise my place on their way out when they were filled with high spirits and higher hopes. Then again on their way back when they needed to drown their sorrows.’ He sighed and nodded. ‘Personally, I reckon it’s worth having a crack at trying to find the money – if a man has time on his hands and the inclinations of a gambler?’

Edge said pensively: ‘A twenty-five thousand to nothing shot of finding it - if it’s still there? Or ever was?’

Tree countered: ‘If it ever was there, it still is, I’m certain of that, Mr Edge. And a twenty-five thousand to one chance of a man keeping it if he finds it. But if he’s an honest man and turns it over to the army, the odds come down to two and a half thousand to nothing. That’s the ten per cent reward Uncle Sam put up for the finder. You mind telling a nosy bartender something, Mr Edge?’

‘What?’

‘I’m certain you didn’t come to this town with the idea of doing any treasure hunting?’

‘I didn’t.’

‘So somebody in Lakewood has put that proposition to you, maybe?’

Edge drank some more beer. ‘Yeah.’

‘Somebody who couldn’t tell you any of this stuff you’re asking me about? Or you 91

could be just double checking?’

‘There wasn’t the time then and I didn’t have the inclination, feller. But if there’s a hope in hell of being able to find a solid lead to - ‘

‘Hey, Sam, you seen anything of my Lucy tonight?’

As had happened earlier, Billy Russell drew all attention to himself when he appeared at the batwinged entrance of the Wild Dog, leaning heavily on his cane as he glared across the room that now was lit by evenly burning oil lamps.

‘Sure, Billy,’ Tree replied evenly to the lawman who appeared held between anger and anxiety. ‘After she went out of this place with you this afternoon Lucy stopped by to ask for some time off. She said she didn’t feel up to cooking chow tonight.’

Russell asked anxiously: ‘She didn’t say she was going to do anything that would take her longer than just tonight, Sam?’

‘No, Billy, that girl of yours never said anything to me about why she wanted time off. What’s wrong, old friend? You look more worried than you usually are over her.’

‘I got good reason, Sam,’ Russell said tautly. ‘It looks like Lucy’s finally up and taken off from me.’

His distress deepened and he realised he could no longer contain his self-control if this exchange continued. Then he groaned, made a dismissive gesture with his free hand, swung unsteadily around and shuffled away from the saloon entrance, muttering incoherently. The batwings flapped noisily and there was another burst of cackling laughter from the table where the whores sat. Both Edge and Tree looked toward them and saw Dolores Jiminez did not join in the mirth. Instead she peered fixedly at Edge with a vindictive glint in her dark eyes.

Edge raised his glass, swallowed half of the beer that was left in it and saw the saloonkeeper watched him as pointedly as the whore but with puzzled curiosity rather than rancour.

‘Yeah, Sam!’ the woman rasped acidly. ‘I reckon that
hombre
can help out your 92

friend the sheriff. Seeing as how Lucy Russell spent so much time in his room this afternoon. And it sure wasn’t chow that woman was feeding to him on a plate.’

The revelation heightened the atmosphere of tension that had filled the sparsely populated saloon in the wake of the lawman’s brief visit. And all the inquisitive suspicious attention was fastened upon Edge who froze in the act of tilting his glass higher to drain it of beer. Then Tree said firmly:

‘Mister, it’s my belief that you and me ought to go see Billy Russell.’

Edge directed his impassive gaze at the saloonkeeper as Tree stepped back a pace, jerked up a shotgun from beneath the counter and aimed it at the centre of his chest. Edge carefully set the glass down on the bartop and growled through gritted teeth: ‘Sure, feller, it’s my belief you’ve got a powerful argument for me to do what you want.’

‘See, my way of taking care of trouble is to stop it before it gets started. And if it’s true you’ve been fooling around with Lucy Russell in your room upstairs and word reaches her pa in the wrong way, that’ll be big trouble it’ll be too late for me to stop. So best you and me go talk with Billy right now. Before Dolores gets the chance to – ‘

‘I saw it with my own eyes, Sam,’ the whore insisted, suddenly nervous. ‘The sheriff’s daughter was coming out of that
hombre’s
room and – ‘

Russell had not limped far enough away from the saloon entrance to be out of earshot of the raised voices inside. And now he crashed in through the batwings and snarled: ‘You bastard, Edge! How’d you sweet talk my little girl into running off from me?’

The arthritic man hurled down his cane and teetered, splayed his legs wide to steady himself: then he took a step forward and clawed the Colt from his holster. Tree changed the aim of the shotgun and said coldly: ‘Billy, don’t be such a damn old fool, man! We can talk this through and – ‘

The plea for reason was cut off by the blast of Russell’s revolver. The bullet smashed a bottle on the shelf behind the counter, far to the side of where and Tree 93

stood and shards of glass shattered other bottles. A pungent smell of spilled liquor merged with the acrid taint of black powder smoke.