Trail of the Mountain Man (9 page)

Leaving Pearlie with Sally, Smoke escorted Bob back to his home. For the first time since arriving in the area, Smoke saw both Wilbur Mason and Colby armed with short guns and rifles. Dismounting, Smoke ground-reined Drifter and faced the farmer-ranchers.

“Seen any of the others?” Smoke asked.

“Nolan rode by yesterday evenin',” Colby said. “He's scared and admitted it.”

“Ray and Betty sent word that they're with us all the way,” Mason said.

“How about Peyton?”

Both men shrugged.

“I think he'll stand,” Smoke said. “Way he talked to me the other day, he'll stick. How's your food supply?”

“Plenty. The old woman canned enough last summer to last us for a good long time. Potato bin's half full. What's your plans, Smoke?”

Smoke brought them both up to date. Then he said, “I'm staying close to home. Shifting my cattle to a different graze. But if I need something in the way of supplies, nothing or nobody will keep me out of Fontana.”

“When you decide to go in,” Colby said, “I'll take my wagon and go in with you. The two of us can get supplies for everybody.”

“Sounds good. We don't want to leave the whole area without menfolks. I'm going to talk with the others today. Get a better idea of where they stand. I'll see you both later on.”

Velvet came out of the house and walked to the well. Smoke's eyes followed her. She was a young girl, but built up like a grown woman. And that worried Smoke. Tilden was ruthless, might do anything. And some of the gunslicks riding for the TF brand were nothing more than pure white trash. They'd do anything Tilden ordered. While most Western men would not bother a good woman, there were always exceptions.

Colby had followed Smoke's eyes. “I still think you're wrong, Smoke. She's just a child.”

“Tilden Franklin is a sorry son of a bitch,” Smoke told the men. “Don't put anything past him.” He swung into the saddle. “See you boys later.”

 

 

Smoke rode hard that day, stopping in to see all the small outfits he thought might throw in with him and the others. And he had been correct in his thinking. Steve and Mike and Nolan and Ray all agreed to toss in, forming an alliance among all the small spreads. If one got hit, the others would respond.

Their lives and money were sunk deep into this land, and with many, some of their blood as well. They were not going to run.

“What's this talk about Charlie Starr, Smoke?” Nolan asked.

“So far as I know, just that — talk.” He told the man what he knew about Starr. “I think, if he is in this area, he's here to kill Tilden Franklin. Lots of bad blood between those two. Goes back years, so the story goes. I'm going to try to pin the rumor down. When I do, I'll get back with you. Stay loose, Nolan, and keep an eye on your womenfolk. I have no way of knowing exactly what Tilden has in mind, but whatever it is, it's bad news for us, that's for sure.”

“I'm not going to put up with these miners tearing up my land, Smoke,” the rancher said. “If I have to shoot two or three of them, I will.”

“Check your land title, Nolan. You might not have mineral rights. Ever think about that?”

The farmer-rancher cursed. “I never thought about that. Could someone buy those rights without my permission?”

“I think so. The law is still kind of raw out here, you know that. I checked on my title last night. I own the mineral rights to my land.”

“I just didn't think about it. I'll do just that. See you, Smoke.”

 

 

Smoke spent a week staying close to home. He received no news about what might be happening in Fontana. Then, on a fine, clear, late spring day, Smoke decided to ride his valley. He found several miners' camps high up, and told the men to clear out — right then.

“And if we don't?” one bearded man challenged him.

“I'll kill you,” Smoke told him, ice in the words.

“You talk big, mister,” another miner said. “But I'm wonderin' if you got the sand to back up your words.”

“My name is Smoke Jensen.”

The miners cleared out within the hour.

With the sun directly over his head, Smoke decided to stop in a stand of timber and eat the lunch that Sally had prepared for him. He was just stepping down from the saddle when the smell of wood smoke reached him.

He swung back into the saddle and followed the invisible trail. It took him the better part of an hour to find the well-concealed camp, and when he found it, he knew he had come face to face with one of the most feared men in all the West.

Charlie Starr.

“Mind some company?” Smoke asked, raising his voice to be heard over the hundred yards or so that separated the men.

“Is this your land?” the man called.

“Sure is.”

“Light and sit then. You welcome to share what I got.”

“Thanks,” Smoke said, riding in and dismounting. “My wife fixed me a bait of food.”

Charlie Starr looked hard at Smoke. “Ain't I seen you afores?”

“Yes,” Smoke told him, unwrapping the waxed paper Sally had used to secure his lunch. “Long time ago, up in Wyoming. I was with a Mountain Man called Preacher.”

“Well, I'll just be damned if that ain't the truth! You've growed a mite, boy.”

There was a twinkle in his eyes as he said it. And Smoke knew that Charlie Starr knew all about him.

Charlie's eyes flicked to Smoke's guns. “No notches. That's good. Only a tinhorn cuts his kills, and half of them are lies.”

Smoke thought of Colby's boy, Adam. “I told that to a boy just the other day. I don't think he believed me.”

“He might not live to be a man, thinking like that.” Charlie's eyes lit up as he spotted the bearsign in Smoke's sack. “Say, now!”

Smoke halved his doughnuts and Charlie put them aside for dessert. “Much obliged, Smoke. Have some coffee.”

Smoke filled his battered tin cup and settled back to enjoy his lunch among the mountains flowers and trees and cool but pleasant breezes.

“You wonderin' why I'm squatted on your range?” Charlie asked.

“Stay as long as you're friendly, Charlie.” Smoke spoke around a mouthful of beef and bread.

Charlie laughed. “And you'd brace me too, wouldn't you, young man?”

Younger eyes met older eyes. Both sets were flint hard and knowing.

“I'd try you, Charlie.”

Charlie chuckled and said, “I killed my first man 'fore you was even a glint in your daddy's eyes, Smoke. Way before. How old do you think I am, Smoke?”

“You ain't no young rooster.”

Again, the gunfighter laughed. “You shore right about that. I'm fifty-eight years old. I killed my first man when I was fourteen, I think it was. That's be, uh, back in '36, I reckon.”

“I was fourteen when I killed an Indian. I think we were in Kansas.”

“You don't say? I'm be damned. Some folks would say that an Injun don't count, but I ain't one of them folks. Injuns is just like us ... but different.”

Smoke stopped chewing and thought about that. He had to smile. “You don't look your age, Charlie.”

“Thank you. But on cold mornin's I shore feel it. Seen me a bunch of boomers headin' this way. They made it to No-Name yet?”

“No-Name is now Fontana. Oh, yeah, the boomers made it and are still coming in.”

“Fontana,” Charlie said softly. “Right pretty name.” His voice had changed, becoming low-pitched and deadly. “Fontana. Now what do you think about that.”

Smoke said nothing. Preacher had told him the story about Charlie's girl, Rosa Fontana, and about Tilden Franklin killing the girl and dragging Charlie.

The men ate in silence for a time, silently enjoying each other's company. While they ate, they eyeballed each other when one thought the other wasn't looking.

Smoke took in Charlie's lean frame. The man's waist was so thin he looked like he'd have to eat a dozen bearsign just to hold his britches up. Like most cowboys, his main strength lay in his shoulders and arms. The man's wrists were thick, the hands big and scarred and callused. His face was tanned and rugged-looking. Charlie Starr looked like a man who would be hard to handle in any kind of fight.

Then Smoke had an idea; an idea that, if Charlie was agreeable, would send Tilden Franklin right through the roof of his mansion in fits of rage.

“You always sit around a far grinnin', boy?” Charlie asked.

“No.” Smoke had not realized he was grinning. “But I just had me an idea.”

“Must have been a good'un.”

“You lookin' for work, Charlie?”

“Not so's you'd notice, I ain't.”

“My wife is one of the best cooks in the state.”

“Keep talkin.' ” He picked up a doughnut and nibbled at it. Then he stuffed the whole thing in his mouth.

“Wouldn't be a whole lot to do. I got one hand. Name's Pearlie.”

“Rat good with a gun, is he?”

“He'll do to ride the river with. Some of Tilden's boys hung a rope on him last week and dragged him a piece.” Smoke kept his voice bland, not wanting Charlie to know that he knew about the bad blood between Starr and Franklin. Or why. “Then they shot him in the head. Pearlie managed to live and get lead in two of them. He's back working a full day now.”

Charlie grunted. “Sounds like he'll do, all rat. What is he, half 'gator?”

“He's tough. I'll pay you thirty and found.”

“Don't need no job. But ...”

Smoke waited.

“Your wife make these here bearsign now and then, does she?”

“Once a week.”

“I come and go as I please long as my work's caught up?”

“Sure. But I have to warn you ... they'll probably be some shooting involved, and ... well, with you getting along in years and all, I wouldn't blame you if you turned it down.”

Charlie fixed him with a look that would have withered a cactus. Needles and all.

“Boy, are you out of your gawddamned mind or just born slow?”

“Well, no, Charlie ... but they're gonna be broncs to bust, and with your age and all, I was just ...”

Charlie threw his battered hat on the ground. “Gawddamn, boy, I ain't ready for no old folks' home just yet!”

“Now, don't get worked up, Charlie. You're liable to have a heart attack, and I don't know nothing about treating heart attacks.”

Charlie turned blue around the mouth and his eyes bugged out. Then he began to relax and chuckle. He wiped his eyes and said, “Shore tell Preacher had a hand in your up-bringin', Smoke.” He stuck a hard, rough hand across the hat-sized fire. “You got you a man that'll ride the river with you, Smoke Jensen.”

Smoke took the hand and a new friendship was born.

On the slow ride back to the ranch, Smoke discovered that Charlie and Preacher shared one common bond. They both liked to bitch.

And like Preacher's had been, Charlie's complaints were numerous ... and mostly made up.

“I stayed in a hospital a week one time,” Charlie informed him. “Them doctors found more wrong with me than a human body ought to have to suffer. I swear, if I'd stayed in there another week, I'd have probably died. They told me that no human bein' could be shot twenty-two times and still live. I told them I wasn't shot no twenty-two times, it was twenty-five times, but three of them holes was in a place they wasn't about to look at.

“Boy, was I wrong!”

Smoke was laughing so hard he had to wipe his eyes with a bandana.

“Nurse come in that first day. That was the homeliest-lookin' female I ever did see. Looked like a buffalo. Told me to hike up that gown they had me in. I told her that her and no two others like her was big enough to make me do that.

“I was wrong agin.

“I want to warn you now, Smoke. Don't never get around me with no rubber tubin.' Don't do it. I'm liable to go plumb bee-serk. Them hospitals, boy, they got a thing about flushin' out a man's system. Stay away from hospitals, boy, they'll kill you!”

Pearlie was clearly in awe. Not only was he working for Smoke Jensen, but now Smoke had done gone and hired Charlie Starr.

“Shut your mouth, boy,” Charlie told him. “Afore you swaller a bug.”

Pearlie closed his mouth.

Charlie was clearly taken aback when Sally came out of the cabin to meet him ... dressed in men's jeans. With a pistol belted around her tiny waist.

Wimmin just didn't have no business a-runnin' around in men's pants. They'd be smokin' cigarette's ‘fore long.

But he forgot all about that when she said, “Fresh apple pie for dessert, Mister Starr.”

“Charlie, ma'am. Just Charlie.”

The sun was just settling over the Sugarloaf when Sally called them in for dinner. Steaks, beans, potatoes, fresh-baked bread, and apple pie.

Smoke and Sally both noted that, for such a spare fellow, Charlie could certainly eat.

After Charlie had sampled his plate and pleased his palate, he said, “Bring me up to date, Smoke.”

Smoke told him what he knew, and then what he guessed. Including Tilden's desires for Sally.

“That's his way, all right,” Charlie said. Then he leveled with them, speaking slowly, telling them about Rosa. “Way I hear it, Tilden fancied that she was comin' up on him. But that was her job, hostess at a saloon. Rosa had part of the action, owned about twenty-five percent of it. When I come to in the hospital, after Tilden's boys drug me, Louis told me what really happened.”

Smoke glanced at the man. “Louis!”

Charlie grinned grimly. “Louis Longmont. It was one of his places. And you know Louis don't tolerate no pleasure ladies workin' for him. That's more Big Mamma O'Neil's style. Louis was considerable younger then, and so was I. Louis said one of his bouncers saw it all ... well, most of it. Tilden was so drunk he got it all wrong. And when Rosa tried to break a-loose from him, he started slappin' her around. Bad. The bouncers come runnin', but Tilden's hands held them at bay whilst he took Rosa in the back room and ...” He paused, looking at Sally. “... had his way with her. Then he killed her. Broke her neck with his bare hands. You see, one of them doctors in that damnable hospital told me, once I got to trust the feller, that Tilden ain't quite right in the head. He's got the ability to twist things all around, and make the bad look good and so forth. He shapes things the way he wants them to be in his mind. I disremember the exact word the doc used. That buffler-faced nurse come by ‘bout that time with some rubber tubin' in her hands and things kinda went hazy on me.”

“What nurse?” Sally asked.

“I'll tell you later,” Smoke said.

Charlie said, “Me and Rosa was gonna get married in the spring. I was unconscious for several days; didn't even get to go to her buryin'.” He sighed deeply. “Course, by the time I got on my feet, Tilden and his bunch was long gone. I lost track of him for a time, but by then the fires inside me had burned low. I still hated the man, but I had to make a livin' and didn't have no idea where he might be. I been knowin' he was in this area for some years. I've drifted in and out half a dozen times, stayin' low, watching that low-life build his little kingdom. Then I had me an idea. I'd wait until he got real big, real powerful, real sure of himself. And then I'd kill him ... slow.”

Charlie laid down his knife and fork, pushed his empty plate from him, and stood up. “Bes' grub I've had in many a moon, ma‘am. I thank you. Reckon I'll turn in now. Tomorrow I wanna roam the range for a couple of days, learn all the twists and turns and ways in and out. I seen me a cookstove in the bunkhouse. I'll fix me a poke before I pull out in the mornin'. Night, folks.”

After the door had closed softly and the sounds of Charlie's jingling spurs had faded, Pearlie said, “I think Tilden Franklin's string has just about run out.”

“That hombre who just walked out the door,” Smoke said, “I believe means every word he said.

“Story goes that Charlie's folks was kilt by Injuns when he was just a little boy. He was raised by the Cheyenne. If Charlie says he's gonna kill Tilden Franklin slow, that is exactly what he means.”

 

 

For two days, Charlie prowled the Sugarloaf, getting his bearings and inspecting the cattle and horses that Smoke and Sally were raising.

“You want it known that you're working for me?” Smoke asked him upon his return to the ranch house.

“Don't make no difference to me, Smoke,” the gunfighter said. “My bein' here ain't gonna make Tilden backpaddle none. Man sets out to be king, only thing that's gonna stop him is dyin'.”

Smoke nodded his agreement. “I'll be gone for several days, Charlie. You and Pearlie stay close to the house, all right?”

“Will do.”

Smoke pulled out early the next morning, riding Drifter. It was not like Tilden to wait, once his intentions became known; Smoke wanted to find out what the kingpin had up his sleeve.

As he rode, the sounds of drilling and hammers against rocks and occasional blasting came to him. The miners were in full swing. And they were paying no attention to the No Trespassing signs the farmer-ranchers had posted around their property. Bad trouble was building; the smell of it was in the air.

Smoke figured he'd better check in with Lawyer Brook as soon as he hit town.

 

 

“Smoke,” the lawyer informed him, “there is nothing your friends can do, not legally.”

“But it's their land!”

“But they don't hold the mineral rights to it. The holder of those rights has given the miners permission to mine. The miners get fifty percent, the holder of the rights gets fifty percent.”

Smoke leaned back in his chair and built one of his rare cigarettes from the cloth pouch he carried in his vest pocket. He licked the tube and smoothed it, lighting and inhaling before speaking.

“Let me guess,” Smoke said. “Tilden Franklin bought all the mineral rights.”

“Well ... if you don't hear it from me, you'll hear it from somebody else. Yes, that is correct.”

“It's legal stealing, Hunt.”

“I wouldn't phrase it quite like that,” the lawyer said stiffly.

“I just did,” Smoke told him. He walked out of the lawyer's new offices.

The long building containing the offices of the lawyer, the doctor, and the newspaper had been put up in hurry, but it was well built nonetheless. Across the street, the big store of Ed Jackson was in business and doing quite well, Smoke observed, eyeballing the many heavily loaded wagons lined up behind it, waiting to be unloaded. And, surprisingly enough, Ralph Morrow's church was up — nearly completed. He walked across the small field to the church and located the minister.

“You do all this yourself, Ralph?” Smoke asked.

“Oh, no! Mister Franklin donated the money for the church and paid the workmen to build it. He's really a very fine man, Smoke. I think you're wrong about him.”

Slick, Smoke thought. Very slick on Tilden's part. “Well, I'm happy about your church, Ralph. I wish you a great deal of success.”

“Thank you, Smoke.” The minister beamed.

Smoke rode to the stable and located Billy. “Take care of him, Billy. Lots of corn and rub him down.”

“Yes, sir!”

Smoke walked over to Louis's place and stepped inside. The gambler was sitting at a table, having breakfast. He waved Smoke over.

“Saw you ride in just as I was getting up. Care for a late breakfast?”

“Sounds good.”

The gambler called for his cook and ordered breakfast for Smoke. Looking at Smoke, he asked, “Have you spoken to the minister yet?”

Smoke's smile gave him his silent reply.

“Nice move on Franklin's part, don't you think?”

“Very Christian of the man.”

Louis enjoyed a laugh at the sarcasm in Smoke's voice. “Slick on his part about the mineral rights.”

“I'll tell you the same thing I told Lawyer Brook — it's nothing but legal stealing.”

“Oh, I agree with you, Smoke. But it is legal. Were I you, I'd advise the others to walk lightly and don't start any shooting.”

“It's their land, Louis. They have a right to protect their herds.”

Louis chewed for a moment, a thoughtful look on his face. “Yes, they do,” he finally spoke. He took a sip of coffee out of one of the fanciest cups Smoke had ever seen. One thing about Louis Longmont. When he traveled, he went first class all the way, carrying a cook, a valet, and a huge bodyguard with him at all times. The bodyguard usually acted as bouncer in Louis's place, and was rarely seen — except when there was trouble. And then he was seen by the troublemaker only very briefly ... seconds before the troublemaker died in Mike's bare hands. Providing Louis didn't shoot the troublemaker outright.

Louis buttered a piece of toasted bread and then spread preserves on top of that. The preserves, Smoke was sure, were imported. “Smoke, you know, or I hope you do, that I will back you to the hilt ... in whatever you do. Regardless of whether I think you are right or wrong. Preacher saved my life a number of times, and besides that, you are a very good young man. But whether our newly elected law is worth a tinker's damn or not, in this mineral rights matter Tilden Franklin is legal. And the law is on his side. Smoke, the land can be repaired. Another hole in the ground is not worth a shooting or a hanging. Your herds? Well, that is quite another matter.” He glanced at Smoke, a twinkle in his hard eyes. “There is no law out here that says a man can't hang or shoot a rustler or a horse thief — if you get my drift.”

Smoke got it. And he would pass the word to the other small farmer-ranchers. Then they would ride out and advise the miners that there would be no trouble, providing the herds of cattle and horses were left alone. But trample over someone's garden, stampede one herd, cut out one beeve, or steal one horse, and someone was going to die.

And then, if any or all those things happened, they would have to have the raw nerve to carry the threat through.

The French chef placed a plate before Smoke. Smoke looked at the food on the plate. Damned if he knew what it was. He said as much.

Then the chef reached down with a lighted match, set fire to the stuff, and Smoke jumped out of his chair.

Louis had a good laugh out of that. “Sit down, Smoke. Enjoy your breakfast.”

“Hell, I can't eat
fire
!”

The flames abated and the chef departed, chuckling. Louis smiled. “Those are
crepes suzette,
my young friend. This dish.” He tapped another plate with a knife blade. “Is an
au jambon.”

“Do tell?”

“An omelette, with bits of ham,” Louis explained. “Now eat and enjoy.”

Them crap susies was a tad too sweet for Smoke's taste, but the omelette was tasty. He made a mental note to tell Sally about what he had had for a late breakfast. Maybe she'd heard of them; damned if he ever had.

“Either way,” Smoke said, “I think we're all looking at a lot of trouble just up the road.”

“I share your feelings, Smoke. But why not postpone it as long as possible. You know this strike is not going to last. In six months it will have seen its heyday.”

“I can't figure you, Louis. I never ...” He bit off the words just at the last possible second.

The gambler-gunfighter did not take umbrage at what he suspected Smoke had been about to say. Instead, he smiled and finished it for him. “Never knew me to back off from trouble, Smoke?”

“I apologize for thinking it, Louis.”

Louis smiled and shook his head. “No need for any of that — not between friends.” He sighed. “But you're right, Smoke. I am trying to avoid trouble. Not for my sake,” he was quick to add. “But for yours.”

Smoke laid down his fork. “My sake?”

“Listen to me, my young friend. How many guns do you have? A dozen? Maybe fifteen at the most? Tilden has seventy-five hardcases right now and can pull in two hundred more anytime he wishes, and will. Talk is that Luis Chamba is on his way here. And where Luis goes, Sanderson and Kane go with him. Think about it.”

Smoke thought about it, and the more he thought about it the madder he got. Louis saw his expression change and tried to calm the young man down.