Turnback Creek (Widowmaker) (4 page)

W
hen they got outside, Molly led Locke around to the back of the building, where there was a corral and a stable. Cooper and Crowell were in the corral, looking over several horses. Both turned when they heard Molly and Locke coming.

“What do you think, John?” Cooper asked. “The gelding and the bay?”

Locke took a moment, then said, “I’d go with both the geldings.”

“That one’s about ten years old,” Cooper said, pointing. “The other one half that.”

“That’s okay,” Locke said. “There’s something to be said for experience, don’t you think?”

“I definitely agree,” Molly said.

“So do I,” George Crowell said.

“Fine,” Cooper said. “Let’s take a look at the buck-board.”

“It’s in the stable,” Crowell said.

“You take a look, Coop,” Locke said. “I’ll look these horses over a little more closely.”

Cooper followed Crowell into the stable.

“The geldings are the two best horses,” she said. “They work the best as a team.”

Locke ran his hand over one of the geldings and said, “I figured.”

“You didn’t go into the stable—you’re trying to boost his confidence?” she asked.

He turned to face her. “I don’t have to boost anything,” he said. “Dale Cooper was a great man—a great lawman.”

“Once,” she said. “I know a drunk when I see one, Mr. Locke. I was married to one.”

“Then why would you hire him in the first place?”

“Two reasons,” she replied. “First is, he has the experience for this kind of job.”

“And the second?”

“I knew he was going to bring someone else in on it,” she said. “I was hoping it would be someone from his past, someone with a reputation, someone—well—like you.”

“So you have faith in the judgment of a drunk?”

Now she got angry. “There’s no one else for the job,” she said. “I lost two men when the last payroll was hit—two good men.”

“All right,” he said. “All right. Reasons aside, Dale and I are here, and we’ve taken the job. Tell me, how long will it take us to get up the mountain to your mine?”

“With the buckboard?” she asked. “Two days, maybe. I need you to get up there as quickly as possible.”

“Why?”

“Rain,” she said. “It’s been raining harder in the mountains than it has here. That’s why our streets are soaked, from the runoff. We built the town far enough away from the mountain to keep from getting flooded. But there’s still one major storm coming, and we’ve got to beat that up the mountain.”

“Is it pretty far up?”

“Yes, and it’s a rough road to get there,” she said. “Not much road at all, in some spots. I’ve given the marshal two or three different routes.”

“You got your mining equipment up there.”

“Yes, and lost some men to accidents doing that.”

“Wait a minute,” Locke said, mentally kicking himself. He was so concerned about Cooper that he was missing some obvious questions. “Why do we even need a buckboard?” he asked. “What’s the amount of the payroll?”

Molly Shillstone bit her lip and said, “Eighty thousand.”

“Eighty?” Locke was surprised, but still … “Even for that much, we shouldn’t need a buckboard.”

“Marshal Cooper didn’t tell you?” she asked.

Locke closed his eyes for a minute. There was a surprise coming, and he hated surprises. “Tell me what, Mrs. Shillstone?”

“My miners are nervous and distrustful,” she said. “They want their money in gold.”

Shit,
he thought.

“And it’s Molly.”

“W
hy didn’t you tell me this payroll was in gold?”

Locke asked Cooper later in the café. Cooper “ had wanted to go to the saloon, but Locke vetoed the idea. Now they were seated over cups of coffee instead of glasses of whiskey or mugs of beer.

“I didn’t think of it,” Cooper said. “I didn’t think it would be a problem—do you?”

“Not a problem?” Locke asked. “Do you have any idea what eighty thousand dollars in gold weighs?”

“No.”

“Well, neither do I,” Locke said, “but it probably is going to take a buckboard to get it up there. That adds a day or more to the trip from Kingdom Junction, and who knows how many days going up the mountain. There’s no telling how many times we’ll have to turn back to find another way up when we’re blocked.”

“They’ll give us different routes,” Cooper said.

“It’s a mountain, Coop,” Locke said. “Rocks shift and block routes all the time.”

“Maybe we can load the gold onto a packhorse,” the ex-marshal suggested. “Or two.”

“Maybe,” Locke said. “We’ll just have to wait and see.”

“John,” Cooper said, “we’re getting paid enough to deal with the problems, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know, Coop,” Locke said. “I’ll let you know after we’ve encountered all the problems.”

Leaving the café, they parted company. Locke was going to the general store to stock up on ammunition and to purchase other items for the ride, including a good blanket and a slicker. The weather looked as if it was going to continue to rain—another damn problem to overcome.

What they didn’t know was that there was another problem keeping an eye on them at the moment.

Robert Bailey huddled in his chosen doorway and watched the two men separate. He left the doorway then and headed for the saloon, where he found two men waiting for him.

When Bailey entered the saloon Hoke Benson and Eli Jordan both looked up from their two-handed game of stud poker. In the middle of the table, at their pot, was a pile of lucifer matchsticks. At each of their elbows was a full mug of beer.

Bailey stopped at the bar to get himself a beer before joining them. “Deal me in.”

He took a handful of matches from his vest pocket.

“Well?” Hoke asked.

“Cooper’s got John Locke to help him.”

Eli gathered up the cards and shuffled them. “That’s for sure?” he asked, dealing out three hands of draw poker. They knew that Locke had arrived in town, but they didn’t know why.

“Yeah,” Bailey said. “I heard ’em talkin’ in the café.”

“Did they see you?” Eli asked.

“No,” Bailey said. “I got across the street before they come out. I bet two.”

He tossed in two matchsticks, and both Eli and Hoke called his bet.

“How many cards?” Eli asked.

“Two,” Bailey said.

Hoke took three, and so did the dealer.

“So, what do we do?” Bailey asked. “It ain’t just a washed-up marshal anymore.”

Hoke had a matchstick in his mouth, which he kept shifting from corner to corner. All three men were in their thirties and from behind, according to height and build, might have been related. It was only when you looked at their faces—Hoke handsome, Eli homely, and Robert downright ugly—that you realized they weren’t.

“Locke’s a little past it, dontcha think?” Hoke asked.

“I heard somethin’ about him and Doc Holliday in South Texas,” Eli said, “afore Doc died.”

“Well,” Hoke said, “he ain’t got Doc Holliday now, has he?”

“I bet five,” Bailey said.

“Still,” Eli said. “Hoke?”

“I raise five.”

“I call,” Eli said.

“Call,” Bailey said.

Hoke showed his cards. Three queens.

“Shit,” Bailey said, dropping the three tens he’d been dealt onto the table.

“Damn,” Eli said, tossing his two pair.

Hoke raked in his matchsticks, took the wet one from his mouth, dropped it onto the floor, and replaced it with one of the new ones.

“We’re gonna run outta matchsticks you keep doin’ that,” Eli said to him.

“We’ll have plenty of money to get more when this is all over,” Hoke said.

“We got money now,” Bailey groused.

“We can’t touch it yet,” Hoke said. “I told you when we took that first payroll that there would be more.”

“I still think it’s crazy to stay around and try again,” Bailey said.

“You’re free to take off, Bob,” Eli said.

“Yeah, without my cut of the first job,” Bailey said. “You’d like that. You get my cut of the first one and the second one.”

“If you’re not gonna leave, shut yer mouth and deal,” Hoke said.

Bailey shuffled and dealt out cards. “But what’re we gonna do about Locke?” he asked without picking up his cards.

Hoke let his cards lie, too. “Look,” he said, “the second payroll’s gonna be two or three times the size of the first one, maybe more. There’s enough money to go around.”

“Meanin’ what?” Eli asked.

“Meanin’ we can get a couple of more men if you fellas are afraid of a washed-up lawman and an over-the-hill gunman.”

“Over the hill or not,” Eli said, “he’s still the Widow-maker.”

Bailey frowned. “I thought the gun was called the Widowmaker.”

“Either way,” Eli said, “don’t make much difference. It’s still him.” He looked at Hoke. “I say we get at least two more men.”

Hoke looked at Bailey. “What about you?”

“Sounds like a good idea to me.”

Hoke picked up his cards and looked at them, then folded them into a pile in his hands. Bailey looked at his, followed by Eli.

“I open for two,” Eli said.

“I raise five,” Hoke said.

“Yer bluffin’,” Bailey said. “I call the seven.”

“I call, too,” Eli said.

“How many cards, Eli?” Bailey asked.

“Just one,” Eli said. “Got me a good hand.”

Bailey dealt Eli his cards, then looked at Hoke.

“I’ll play these.”

“A pat hand?” Bailey asked.

“That’s what I’ve got,” Hoke said. He had no expression on his face for the other two men to read.

“Damn,” Bailey said. “I’ll take three.”

“I check to the raiser,” Eli said.

“Thought you had a good hand?” Hoke asked.

“Not as good as a pat hand.”

“He’s bluffin’,” Bailey said.

“I bet twenty,” Hoke said, pushing twenty lucifers into the pot.

Bailey bit his lip, looked at his cards, and said, “I’ll call.”

“Me, too,” Eli said. “Let’s see ’em.”

Hoke put down four deuces, and an ace.

“Four of a kind?” Bailey said. “Shee-it.” He tossed his cards onto the table, facedown.

“Why didn’t you take one card?” Eli asked, dropping his two pair facedown.

“How would that improve my hand?” Hoke asked, raking in his sticks. “I didn’t need another card.”

“Okay,” he said. “We’ll bring in two more men, but they don’t get any cut from the first job.”

“That’s fair,” Eli said.

“Maybe we shouldn’t even tell them anything about the first job,” Bailey said.

“Everybody knows the first payroll was hit,” Hoke said.

“They don’t know it was us, though,” Eli said.

“That’s true,” Hoke said, shuffling the cards, “but anybody we bring in is gonna figure us for the first one.”

“So, what do we do?” Bailey asked.

“We let ’em figure what they want,” Hoke said, “and we don’t tell ’em nothin’.” He dealt out the cards. “We just keep our mouths shut about the first job. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” Eli said.

“Bob?”

Bailey looked up from his cards and said, “Huh? Oh, yeah, I agree.” Nervously, he picked up five matchsticks and tossed them into the pot. “I bet five.”

Eli looked at Hoke, and both men said, “I fold.”

L
ocke made sure that Cooper was sober and clean when they walked to Molly Shillstone’s house for dinner. He had bought them each a slicker so they’d be dry for dinner. It was still drizzling when they made their walk, and Molly took their slickers when she answered the door.

They had passed some homes along the way, and Molly’s was easily the largest in town—two stories and built with good, new lumber rather than reused wood, like many of the others. In other words, she had an honest-to God house, not a shack.

“Somethin’ smells good,” Cooper said as they entered.

“I’m a good cook as well as a good businesswoman,” Molly told them. “Please, come into the living room.”

They followed her into a sparsely furnished room with bare floors. George Crowell was seated on a sofa, holding a glass of brandy.

“I had the furniture brought in from St. Louis,” she said. “There’s not much of it, but I’m not finished.”

“You must plan on being here awhile,” Locke observed.

“I don’t anticipate my mine playing out for quite some time,” she said.

She had poured two brandies and carried them to the two men. Before Locke could stop him, Cooper had accepted. He didn’t think Molly knew what she was doing.

“I have to check on dinner,” she said. “I’m sure George will keep you entertained.”

As she left the room, Locke and Cooper looked at George Crowell. He was duded up in a suit and tie, while Locke and Cooper simply had their best trail clothes on.

“Don’t have a suit with me,” Cooper said lamely.

“That’s all right,” Crowell said.

“She seems to be a remarkable woman,” Locke commented.

“She’s more than that,” Crowell said. “She’s amazing.”

“Have you worked for her long?”

“I worked for her father. I’ve been with her for years now,” he said. “We came here to Turnback Creek together.”

“Is there one?” Locke asked.

“One what?” Crowell asked.

“Creek.”

“Yes,” the man said. “You’ll cross it on your way to the mine.”

Locke knew the question had been inane, but this was not where he was at his best. He’d accepted the invitation because he wanted to get to know Molly Shillstone and her manager a little better if he was going to risk his life taking their payroll up the mountain for five hundred dollars.

Cooper walked over to an overstuffed chair and sat down. For Locke’s money, the man was paying entirely too much attention to his drink. Also, sitting in that chair put him closer to the decanter the brandy had come out of.

Locke remained standing. “Mr. Crowell,” he said, “why don’t you tell us what you know about the first payroll that got hit?”

“There’s not much to tell,” the man replied. “It didn’t arrive at the mine so they sent some men out to look for it. They found the two men who were delivering it dead along the way, and the payroll was gone.”

“How were they killed?”

“Shot.”

“Where?” Locke asked.

“Um, out in the open.”

“I mean, in the back? Front?”

“Oh, I see,” Crowell said. “I’m not sure, but I don’t remember anything about them being shot in the back.”

“I’ll check with the sheriff tomorrow,” Locke said, “or the undertaker. You do have an undertaker, don’t you?”

“Oh, uh, yes, of course we do,” Crowell said. “I’m sure he’ll be able to help you with that.”

At that point, Molly came out of the kitchen and announced, “If you’ll all come to the dining room, dinner is served.”

Locke made sure he got between Cooper and the brandy decanter on the way.