Manhunter / Deadwood

by Matt Braun

  “Well, now, I might have something that’ll interest you! Yessir, I surely might!”

  “Winchester?”

  “No, sir.” The clerk pulled a rifle from the rack and held it out. “A Colt Lightning! It’s new, not even in production yet. The factory released a few prototype models—just to test the market.”

  “I thought Colt was strictly pistols.”

  “Apparently they’re after some of Winchester’s business. Here, try it on for size! I guarantee you, it’s a humdinger!”

  Starbuck hefted the rifle. The balance and workmanship were superb. A pump-action repeater, the stock and foregrip were dark-grained walnut, and the octagon barrel was twenty-six inches long. A tubular cartridge magazine extended beneath the barrel; a backward stroke of the foregrip ejected the spent shell and a forward stroke chambered a fresh round. The sights were quick to the eye, with a buckhorn rear sight and a gold-beaded front sight.

  Stepping away from the counter, Starbuck tested the sights and found the pickup amazingly swift. He jacked the slide-action several times, and discovered operation was a shade faster than a lever-action. He swung the rifle in an arc—sighting on a tin of peaches—and squeezed the trigger. The let-off was crisp and light to the touch. He smiled, and turned back to the clerk.

  “Got a nice feel.”

  “My sentiments exactly.” The clerk lowered his voice. “Most of our customers were weaned on lever-actions, and won’t even take a second look. I can see you’re a man who’s not stuck in a rut.”

  Starbuck inspected the rifle closer. “What caliber?”

  “50-95!” The clerk grinned as though sharing a secret. “It packs a real wallop!”

  “I’d say so,” Starbuck observed quietly. “How many rounds does it hold?”

  “Ten.”

  The clerk took a box of cartridges off the shelf. He opened it and held up a shell. The massive fifty-caliber slug was seated in a brass casing almost as long as his finger. He slowly shook his head.

  “I’d hate to get hit with that.”

  “You and me both,” Starbuck agreed. “How is it on accuracy?”

  “According to the factory, it’s a sizzler clean out to five hundred yards.”

  “I suppose that’s far enough.”

  “Yessir, it’s a rare shot at that range!”

  Starbuck laid the rifle on the counter. “I’ll take it.”

  “I believe you’ve made a wise choice, Mr.—?”

  “Farnum,” Starbuck replied. “How are you fixed for cartridges?”

  “We have three boxes in stock.”

  “I’ll take those, too. And a saddle boot for the rifle.”

  “Very well, Mr. Farnum,” the clerk said pleasantly. “Now, could I interest you in a pistol? We have an excellent selection.”

  “With that rifle”—Starbuck mugged, hands out-stretched—“who needs a pistol?”

  “Who indeed, Mr. Farnum? Yessir, who indeed!”

  Starbuck again paid in cash. Then he asked the clerk to package everything and have it delivered to the hotel. On his way out the door he checked his watch and saw it was approaching the noon hour. Outside, he turned upstreet and went looking for a café.

  To Starbuck, food in itself was unimportant. He appreciated—and distinguished between—good cooking and poor cooking. He much preferred tender beefsteak, properly juicy and rare, to a piece of meat charred rawhide tough. Yet, in the overall scheme of things, the culinary fixings were of no great consequence. For him, eating was simply a bodily function, much like a bowel movement. He ate because his body demanded sustenance, and no elaborate ritual was attached to the eating. A minute after shoving his plate away, the meal was forgotten. Good, bad, or indifferent … food was food.

  Halfway up the block Starbuck spotted a greasy spoon. Walking toward it, he suddenly pulled up short when the bat-wing doors of a saloon burst open. A cowhand lurched outside and stepped directly into his path. The man was tall and burly, dressed in faded range clothes, and to all appearances stumbling drunk. His features were set in a quarrelsome scowl.

  Before Starbuck could step aside, the cowhand bulled into him. The force of the collision knocked him upside the wall of the saloon. With a violent oath, the cowhand turned on him.

  “Who you shovin’?”

  “Sorry.” Starbuck wanted no trouble, and tried to ease past. “No harm intended.”

  “The hell you say! Think you own the gawddamn sidewalk?”

  “Look, friend—”

  “Friend!” the cowhand bellowed. “Who you callin’ friend, you pansy sonovabitch!”

  “I only—”

  The cowhand launched a looping roundhouse. Starbuck’s countermove was one of sheer reflex. He slipped inside the haymaker and exploded a left hook to the jaw. The punch rocked the cowhand and he reeled backward off the boardwalk. A streetside hitch rack saved him from falling, and he seemed to shake off the effects of the blow. Then, too quick for the eye, a gun appeared from inside his jacket. He snapped off a lightning shot.

  Starbuck got lucky. He was a beat behind, but the cowhand hurried the shot. The slug tore through the sleeve of Starbuck’s coat and thunked into the wall. He pulled the Colt, thumbing the hammer in the same motion, and fired. A bright red dot blossomed on the cowhand’s shirtfront. The impact of the blunt-nosed slug slammed him into the hitch rack. He hung there a moment, then his legs buckled and his sphincter voided in death. He slumped to the ground without a sound.

  A wisp of smoke curled from the barrel of Starbuck’s pistol. He was aware of voices and people crowding the street. Yet his gaze was on the dead man, and in some dim corner of his mind a question slowly took shape. The man was uncommonly sudden with a gun, too sudden.

  He wondered how a ragtail cowhand got so fast.

  “You say you never saw him before?”

  “Never.”

  “So he jumped you out of the clear blue?”

  “It would appear that way.”

  Amos Rodman, town marshal of Cheyenne, sat across the desk from Starbuck. Summoned to the scene of the shooting, he had questioned several eyewitnesses and ordered the body removed to a funeral parlor. Then he’d taken Starbuck into custody and marched him back to the city jail. Now, with a cigar wedged in the corner of his mouth, he tilted back in his chair. His expression was one of puzzlement.

  “Why would he do that—jump a stranger?”

  Starbuck warned himself to go slow. The interrogation was something more than mere formality. He was still posing as an easterner, and that fact clearly troubled the marshal. He lifted his hands in a shrug.

  “The man was drunk and belligerent. I can only surmise he was spoiling for a fight.”

  “Funny thing,” Rodman said lazily. “The barkeep in that saloon said he never even had a drink. Walked in off the street, and a couple of minutes later he walks right out again. How do you explain that?”

  “I wouldn’t try.” Starbuck gave him a weak smile. “Who knows what prompts men to violence?”

  “Good question,” Rodman remarked. “Suppose you tell me. If it wasn’t liquor … what was it?”

  “I’m afraid I have no answer to that, Marshal.”

  Rodman lowered his chair and leaned forward. He took Starbuck’s Colt off the desktop and slowly examined it. His brow wrinkled in a frown.

  “That’s a mighty fancy gun for a pilgrim.”

  Starbuck played dumb. “Pilgrim?”

  “You told me you’re a reporter.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “An eastern reporter!”

  “I fail to see the connection.”

  “Do you?” Rodman scoffed. “You’ve got a hair-trigger pistol and a slicker’n-grease crossdraw holster. Wouldn’t you say that’s a pretty peculiar rig for a reporter?”

  “Not necessarily.” Starbuck hesitated, chose his words with care. “A man versed in weapons should carry the best.”

  “You’re versed, all right!” Rodman growled. “Too damn versed! U
nless maybe you’re not what you claim.”

  Starbuck looked bewildered. “I beg your pardon?”

  “Maybe you’re a gambler or a bunco artist. You could’ve gigged that fellow in some other trail town and he just accidentally happened across you today. It’s got all the earmarks of somebody settlin’ a personal score.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  “Folks don’t generally go around pullin’ guns on a stranger.”

  “Well, I assure you he was a stranger to me.”

  “Yeah?” Rodman inquired skeptically. “Then how come he tied into you so fast?”

  “I have no idea,” Starbuck said lamely. “After all, he picked the fight … not me.”

  “You ended it, though! That’s what we’re talkin’ about here.”

  “I merely defended myself, Marshal.”

  “So you keep sayin’.”

  “Good Lord!” Starbuck said indignantly. “Any number of people substantiated my story! You have eyewitness accounts of everything that transpired. What more do you want?”

  “For one thing,” Rodman countered, “I want to know considerable more about you.”

  “Then I suggest you check with Nathaniel Boswell. I came here to interview him, and he found my credentials perfectly satisfactory. I’m quite confident Mr. Boswell will vouch for me.”

  “Oh, I’ll check around.” Rodman paused, gave him a dull stare. “Meantime, I wouldn’t want you to plan on leavin’ town.”

  “May I ask why?”

  “Suppose we just say something smells fishy.”

  “How long will I be detained?”

  “All depends,” Rodman said evasively. “I’ll let you know.”

  “Very well.” Starbuck rose, stood fidgeting with a hangdog look. “Since I’m not under arrest, I would appreciate the return of my gun.”

  “Help yourself,” Rodman said, motioning toward the pistol. “Course, I ought to warn you. We’ve got a city ordinance against carryin’ concealed weapons.”

  “Someone should have informed the dead man.”

  “I’m informing you and that’s enough!”

  “And in the event he has some friends who also ignore your ordinance? What would you suggest then, Marshal?”

  “I’d suggest you stick to your hotel room.”

  “How comforting.”

  Starbuck holstered the Colt and walked to the door. With his hand on the knob, he turned and looked back over his shoulder. “One last question.”

  “Shoot.”

  “The deceased—” Starbuck made an empty gesture. “Were you able to identify him?”

  “Nope,” Rodman said without inflection. “There were no papers on the body, and no one recalled seein’ him before today.”

  “Perhaps he worked for one of the cattle outfits.”

  “Possible,” Rodman conceded. “Or he could’ve been a drifter.”

  “In which case, we’ll never know.”

  “I wouldn’t bet it either way, Mr. Farnum.”

  The comment gave Starbuck all the clue he needed. Outside, walking toward the hotel, he told himself the bet was a lead-pipe cinch. Marshal Amos Rodman would have a wire off to the Police Gazette within the hour. Then he would start nosing around town, asking questions. By tomorrow, maybe sooner, he would discover that an easterner wearing glasses had bought a horse, along with outdoors gear and a rifle. All that, added to a reply from the Police Gazette , would lead to more questions. Questions Starbuck couldn’t afford to have asked, or answered. Which meant nightfall was the deadline.

  By then, he had to be long gone from Cheyenne.

  Chapter Six

  Starbuck rode north toward Fort Laramie. He used the stars for a compass and he rode straight through the night. He left behind nothing of Edward Farnum.

  Earlier, in his hotel room, Starbuck had laid the reporter to rest. The glasses and eastern clothing, along with the specially built shoes, were stowed in his valise. His new disguise was less elaborate, but no less effective. From the valise, he took a masterwork of dental handicraft. On the order of a false tooth, it was actually an enameled sleeve, colored a dark nut brown. Custom-fitted, it slipped over his left front tooth and was secured much like a partial bridge. To all appearances a dead tooth, it was yet another exercise in misdirection, and an immediate eye-stopper. People saw the blackened tooth and were distracted from the man.

  The balance of his disguise relied on clothing and whiskery stubble. His beard, which grew rapidly, would alter the set of his features. By the time he arrived at Hole-in-the-Wall, he would have sprouted a mustache and a full growth along his chin and jawline. The conchas belt, added to the range clothes and vest, would complete the transformation. A dead tooth, nestled in a coppery beard, would erase any vestige of Luke Starbuck. What emerged would be a whiskery, rough-garbed hardcase. An outlaw who called himself Arapahoe Smith.

  Starbuck’s departure from Cheyenne had gone smoothly. Shortly after dark, he left money on the washstand for his hotel bill. Then he knotted bedsheets into a rope and went out the window of his second-floor room. The valise, which contained the remnants of Edward Farnum, was dumped in an alley trash heap. Sticking to back streets, he then made his way to the livery stable. The blood bay gelding was saddled without awakening the night hostler. All his gear was crammed into saddlebags; then the rifle scabbard and bedroll were lashed down securely. Once outside, he mounted and circled west of town. There, he fixed on the North Star and booted the horse into a steady lope. No trace of him or the direction he rode remained behind. He vanished, unseen, into the night.

  By sundown of the second day Starbuck sighted Fort Laramie. The army post was situated at the juncture of the Laramie and North Platte rivers. Originally built by fur traders, it was taken over by the military when emigrant trains began the westward migration. Thereafter it served as a shakedown point for those traveling the Oregon Trail. The Bozeman Trail, mapped out when gold was discovered in Montana, also passed through Fort Laramie. Stretching north and west, a chain of forts was then constructed to combat the Sioux and other hostile tribes. Yet, for all their number, these forts were merely outposts in the wilderness. Fort Laramie remained the crossroads of the western plains.

  Avoiding the fort, Starbuck rode on a few miles and pitched camp. The next morning he struck out along the Oregon Trail, which followed the North Platte in a westerly direction. He would have made better time overland, for the trail twisted and turned in concert with the winding river. But he was on unfamiliar ground, and dared not overshoot a vital landmark, known generally as the Upper Crossing. There, on a dogleg in the river, the Oregon Trail intersected the old Bridger Trail. Little traveled, the trail had been blazed many years before by the mountain man and scout Jim Bridger. Angling northwest from the river, it meandered through the Big Horn Basin and ultimately linked up with the Bozeman Trail. Along the way, it also skirted the only known entrance to Hole-in-the-Wall.

  Three days out of Fort Laramie, Starbuck turned onto the Bridger Trail. Ahead lay the foothills of the Big Horn Range and an ocean of grassland. The basin, with distant mountains on either side, stretched endlessly to the horizon. The landscape evoked a sense of something lost forever. Nothing moved as far as the eye could see, and hardly a bush or a tree was visible in the vast emptiness sweeping northward. Earth and sky were mixed with deafening silence, almost as though, in some ancient age, the plains had frozen motionless for all time. A gentle breeze, like the wispy breath of a ghost, rippled over the tall grass, disturbing nothing. It was a land of sun and solitude, a lonesome land. A land where man somehow seemed the intruder.

  Only a few years ago it had been the land of the Sioux. From the North Platte in Wyoming to the Rosebud in Montana, a swath of grassland over a hundred miles long teemed with buffalo. The vast seas of bluestem and needlegrass were the natural rangeland of a herd numbering in the millions. Then, in quick succession, gold and the lure of free land brought a flood tide of emigrants. Not far behind were the hide h
unters, openly encouraged by the army, whose leaders sanctioned the slaughter. Within a decade, the great buffalo herds—the Indians’ commissary—were no more. Nor were the Sioux themselves any longer in evidence. Custer’s defeat at the Little Big Horn proved a pyrrhic victory for the red man. By early 1877 the Sioux and Cheyenne had been removed to reservations. Not quite a year past, Sitting Bull and his band had returned from their exile in Canada and surrendered to the army. The last of the hostiles were pacified, and the land itself opened to settlement. Most homesteaders, however, continued to pass through on their way to Oregon. The solitude and distance of the High Plains were somehow ominous. A place where few cared to try their luck.

  Late the next afternoon, Starbuck topped a rise overlooking the South Fork of the Powder River. The earth shimmered under the brassy dome of the sky, and the sun seemed fixed forever on the horizon. Off in the distance the Big Horns thrust awesomely from the basin floor. A day’s ride due north, deep in the foothills, lay Buffalo Creek. And somewhere beyond that, his destination. Hole-in-the-Wall.

  Starbuck reined to a halt. He sat for a moment studying on the last leg of his journey. According to Nat Boswell, the ranch of Ed Houk was south of Buffalo Creek Canyon. He had no idea whether Houk was an honest man or in league with the outlaws. Either way, the rancher most certainly possessed knowledge about Hole-in-the-Wall. Any man who lived that close to the stronghold—and survived—was a man worth knowing. A man who might be persuaded to talk. The approach would require discretion and craft; otherwise Starbuck would risk tipping his hand before he got started. Yet the odds dictated he try, for one likelihood stood out above all else. The secrets of Hole-in-the-Wall were no secret to Ed Houk.

  The bay gelding suddenly alerted. He stood, nostrils flared, like an ebony statue bronzed by the sun. His hide rippled, and he nervously stamped the ground as he tested the wind. His eyes were fixed on a stand of trees bordering the river.

  A visceral instinct told Starbuck to move. He never questioned such instincts; he obeyed. Too many times before some intermittent sixth sense had warned him of danger, and thereby allowed him to live awhile longer. All thought suspended, he jerked his rifle and swung down out of the saddle. A shot cracked, and in the same instant a slug fried the air around his ears. He saw a puff of smoke billow from a thicket on the riverbank.