Westward the Tide (1950) (19 page)

He thought of telling Herman Reutz about Jacquine's comments on Ryder and Boyne, then decided against it. No use giving such a story more importance than it had. Yet it was a story sure to be repeated. Odd, how such a preposterous story could get started, but when it came to that was the story so preposterous? How much did he know about the men in his own wagon train? Of them all, the only ones he had known before, were Ban Hardy and Buffalo Murphy. Stark, a hard bitten man, came from the country of the Natchez Trace, or not far from it. Lute Harless ... well, under that bluff, amiable exterior he might be a lot of things. And he knew nothing of young Tolliver or of Bill Shedd. Nor, and here he might be striking the right note, of Ernie Braden or Bunker.

Space was cleared for dancing that night, and many of the men from the three companies stationed at the Fort came over for the festivities. Buffalo Murphy and Ban Hardy routed out their best and so did the others. Brian Coyle, accompanied by Jacquine and Barney, came over, followed in a few minutes by Clive Massey, handsome and distinguished in a black broadcloth suit and a white ruffled shirt. His black hat pulled low upon his brow, he looked everything the southern gentleman should be.

Bat Hammer was there, loitering with Buckskin Johnson and several more of the toughs from the Massey wagons. Logan Deane, silent and alone, leaned on a wagon wheel off by himself in the half darkness. There was plenty of food, and from somewhere came a barrel of liquor, and in a matter of a few minutes the camp was roaring with laughter. Murphy, in fine fettle, started a song and everyone joined in.

Thoughtful and watchful, Matt loitered on the edge of things. When the dancing started, he saw Jacquine move out into the circle with Clive Massey. They made a handsome couple and he felt a pang of actual physical pain as they moved together.

He smoked thoughtfully, staring across the firelight at the moving figures. A dozen couples were dancing now, and he noticed Lieutenant Powell move in and claim Jacquine for a dance.

Jacquine puzzled him, and he puzzled himself. Usually, he talked easily and fluently when with women, but when with Jacquine he always seemed to be saying things he had not wanted nor planned to say. They had talked little enough, but what he had said on those occasions was never what he wanted to say or should have said. He felt drawn to her as to no other woman he had ever met, but it irritated and angered him that she could like Clive Massey so much. At the same time, he could see that the man was attractive, yet she seemed unable to sense what he felt about Massey, that the man was evil, dangerous and definitely cruel.

He turned impatiently away from the fire and strode off into the darkness, swearing to himself. He wanted to ask her to dance but how would she receive him? If she refused, and well she might, he knew it would hurt like the very devil. Besides, he had no wish to be laughed at by the ruffians that hung around with Hammer.

Thinking of that, something occurred to himself suddenly that he had not considered before. What had been in the mind of that sergeant today when he suddenly told Lieutenant Powell who he was? Were they looking for him, too? Was something wrong? The sergeant was a stranger, and so was Powell. The Lieutenant had said he would find friends here ... who?

He paced back and forth, smoking and thinking, trying to find his way into the mind of Massey that he might ferret out the plans for the wagon train. This would be their last contact with civilization. Going should be good for awhile, and in a couple of days forty or fifty miles would separate them from Fort Reno, and each day would move them further and further away.

Yet he held to his original view. If there was to be an attack, it would come when they were in the Basin, or at the north end of the Big Horns. That would be the logical place. Fort C. F. Smith would not be too far away, yet probably no one on the wagon train knew its exact location. And it would be too far away to do any good. It was, he believed, abandoned and in ruins, anyway.

He turned and walked back to the fire. Jacquine was standing across it, in conversation with Clive Massey. He had his hat off, and his patrician features looked clean and hard in the firelight. He was staring at Jacquine, and saying something. Then she laughed, and he caught her arm and laughed too. Fury bubbled up in Matt's brain and he hurled his cigarette down.

He knew he was being a fool, but ... he turned abruptly and walked around the fire. The fiddles were tuning for another dance. Matt started for Jacquine, walking swiftly. Suddenly a hand caught his arm. "Sir? The Captain would like to speak to you."

He looked impatiently at the tall redheaded soldier. "Damn it, Man! There's a dance on!"

"Sorry, sir!" The soldier grinned. "I know what you mean, but it's urgent, sir."

"All right!" He turned abruptly and walked away after the soldier. He did not see Jacquine's eyes following him.

Captain Gordon Sharp stood behind a small fire at one side of the camp. There were no other soldiers around. The orderly led Bardoul to him, then saluted. "Mr. Bardoul, sir!"

"All right, thanks, Graves. You may go."

Sharp was a short, compact man who carried himself erect, and had a square good-looking face. He might have been forty, but was probably a year or two younger. He thrust out a hand. "Bardoul? Sit down, will you? I've been wanting to have a talk with you."

"With me, sir?"

"Yes. As you may know, we have the job on our hands of keeping some kind of order in a side section of territory. It is a pretty thankless job, and you can imagine. My men are nearly all recruits, just out from the east, and few of them have any idea of working with Indians. Also, we suffer from a division of sentiment.

Certain interests want the Indians driven still further west, others consider them noble redmen who can do no wrong and are badly abused. We naturally try to strike a middle course that we imagine is somewhere near the right one.

"We've an added problem now. Partly due to some vigilante efforts in the mining camps to the north and west, we are getting an influx of bad men. White men who are out for their own ends. They have been causing us just as much trouble as the Indians. Knowing the Sioux, you understand our problem. They strike here, then there, and we can never seem to catch up with them or pin down any certain bunch as the offenders. The result is that my men are riding themselves and their horses ragged, and not doing much good."

Matt nodded. "I know how you feel. Unless you know the country, you wouldn't have a chance."

"There's something else, too." Captain Sharp picked a blazing twig from the fire and lit his pipe. "Ever hear of Sun Boyne?"

Bardoul chuckled. "Never knew much about him, but the last few days I've been hearing a lot!"

Sharp looked at him with quick, hard eyes. "You mean, you've run into him? Or met someone who has?"

"No, not that. Just talk. We've got a man along who came from Natchez and another from up at the north end of the Trace. They were both telling stories about him."

"I see." Sharp smoked thoughtfully. "Bardoul, we've got some pretty good authority that says both Ryder and Boyne are headed out this way or already here. According to the story, they have an idea of organizing some sort of an independent power out here in the west. It sounds fantastic, I agree, yet it could create a lot of trouble. Murrell had the idea, you know, and before him, Aaron Burr had it. You'll still find a lot of people who swore by Murrell's fantastic secret organisation. However, whether that's the idea or not, Boyne and Ryder are both dangerous men, and they are believed to have come west.

"We've word from several places that a lot of bad men are headed this way, and it looks like something big may be afoot. We've heard that they intend to ride in and take over Bannock and some of the mining towns, completely clean up and then leave. We've heard all sorts of fantastic stories. This is 1877, and you'd think people would stop dreaming, but apparently some of the best of them do."

"You mean, you have orders to look into such things? That it is considered so serious the Army is putting troops to work on it?"

Sharp laughed. "You make it sound fairly silly. No, as a matter of fact, it is just talk. And I have no orders along that line at all, just some talk with higher ranking officers. Of course, you know what the Army is, always seeing wars around every mountain and behind every treaty. Maybe it isn't a bad thing: somebody should be on the alert.

"No, as a matter of fact, this isn't my job. It's yours."

"Mine?"

"That's right," Captain Sharp reached into his dispatch case. "I have a commission for you as Deputy United States Marshal for the area; it's a special appointment. They made an attempt to catch you in Cheyenne, but you had already gone on to Deadwood Gulch. And they failed to get you there, so this was sent to me to deliver to you when you passed here."

Matt Bardoul stared at the document. He remembered vaguely some talk in Cheyenne about this, but he had supposed it to be only talk. He had been footloose and fancy free, and when asked if he would accept such an appointment he had said that he would, but at the time he had not dreamed O'Connor was serious.

"Just what," he asked, "does this mean? What am I supposed to do?"

"Your orders are there, folded in with your commission. I think, however, you are simply to enforce law in Wyoming, and particularly that area in the Big Horn range country. What they really want is the scalps of Sun Boyne, Dick Ryder, and a few scattered members of the Plummer gang. There have also been some renegades around. I know there are warrants out for Abel Bain."

Matt looked up. "Bain is dead." Briefly, he explained. Then he said, "What about this Rosanna Cole affair? Lieutenant Powell was looking for her this morning."

"Yes, we have been asked to keep our eyes open. She was a youngster, scarcely more than a girl, married to a very wealthy man in St. Louis. Well, she shot him and killed him, and not much that anybody knows about it except that he was found dead with a bullet through his body, and she was gone.

"Some say her lover did it, others maintain she didn't have any lover. Our only job is to ship her back to St. Louis if we find her. Frankly, I don't like the job, and am not much interested. It isn't the Army's business and but for some political bigwig, it wouldn't be of interest to us. To you, however, as deputy marshal, it would be."

"Do you have a description of her?"

Sharp smiled. "Only a very poor one, brown hair and blue eyes, five feet three inches, weight about one hundred and ten. That is all we have, and that could fit a lot of women."

Matt slapped the paper thoughtfully into his palm. This could be both good and bad. He looked up at Captain Sharp. "I'll take this, but I don't want it. I never really expected it would come through. For your information, I am not looking for Rosanna Cole ... as for Boyne and Ryder, I'll bring them in if I can find them.

"In the meanwhile, how many know about this appointment?"

"We two only. It was the business of nobody else."

"Good!" Matt smiled. "Then mention it to no one. I'll put this is my pocket and go on with that wagon train. I've an idea that's just where a Deputy United States Marshal will be needed." He turned away, but Captain Sharp's voice stopped him. "By the way ... you have, Lieutenant Powell said, a Colonel Orvis Pearson in command of your wagon train?"

"Yes, we have. An Army officer."

Sharp glanced up. "Aformer Army officer. You might tell him, just this and no more, that Arch Schandler is dead."

"That Arch Schandler is dead?"

"Yes, that's enough. He will understand thoroughly." Sharp grinned suddenly. "Say, Powell tells me you've got an uncommonly pretty girl along. Could I meet her?"

"Huh!" Matt smiled wryly. "You and the whole United States Army!"

Jacquine was standing by the fire again, talking to Sarah Stark. She looked up as he approached, then glanced from Captain Sharp to Matt.

Matt bowed very formally. "Miss Coyle, the Captain is very eager to meet you and I thought it best he have his chance." He put his hand on Sharp's arm. "Captain Gordon Sharp ... Miss Coyle." Matt stepped back and started to move away.

"Well!" Jacquine said. "Are you going to leave just like that? Have you forgotten our dance? I was waiting for you!"

Humour glinted in his eyes. "Forgotten?" he said gallantly. "How could I possibly forget? But with Captain Sharp and Lieutenant Powell, I didn't think you would remember."

They moved out over the grass, dancing. She looked up at him. "I don't believe you were even going to ask me!"

He smiled. "I wasn't. It seemed the situation was well taken care of, and far be it from me to step on Clive Massey's toes!"

"You're not stepping on his toes!" Jacquine's eyes flashed at him. "Just because I've talked to him a few times ...." Her voice trailed away and she felt her pulse quicken as his arm went around her waist. She looked up at him, half frightened by the expression in his eyes. It was an expression that was half tenderness and half ... well, something no nice girl should even think about. But it was something that made her feet falter suddenly ... and she wondered afterwards why they should falter right there, at the darkest side of the circle.

Almost before she realized what had happened, he swung her swiftly into the darkness behind one of the wagons, and almost before she stopped moving he bent his head and their lips met. There seemed to be a roaring in her ears and her muscles seemed to melt and her body folded against his, caught in the onsweeping tide of passion. He held her close and their lips clung together and she felt her breast heaving against his chest and her head was back and his lips were on her neck, her ears ... she tore herself free and stood there, staring wildly at him.