With Mindy dead, his hold on Mandy without showing her a pile of gold was shaky.
“There’s nothing in town for you,” Cooley said. “Your future’s got gold in it if you come with me.”
The woman looked at him. He caught his breath. Her expression fed his fears about the two of them ever being together.
“Don’t worry your head, John. I’m not going to bolt.” But she looked at the trail leading to Oasis. “There’s nothing for me back there anymore.”
Her words said one thing, but she leaned just a tad toward Oasis, as if she intended to gallop away.
“We can make the cabin in an hour if we don’t stop.” Cooley and Mandy rode side by side, letting England Dan ride ahead.
“Your partner’s not too excited about me getting a cut of your new mine.” Mandy stared straight ahead. Cooley worried this was only part of her objection to throwing in with him, but what it’d take to bind her wasn’t in him. Not yet.
“That’s Dan. He’s never excited about much of anything. It’s got something to do with coming from England. The way he tells it, the air’s so thick there, you can cut it with a knife. Everyone coughs up blood, and the whole lot of them go around wheezing like lungers.”
“I’d like to see it. London. It’s supposed to be so . . . civilized.”
“There’re places in this country that’re better. We’ll see them, I promise. You and me, when the mine starts giving up its glitter.”
“This map to the Irish Lord—the Lost Banshee Mine,” she said thoughtfully. “Why’d the owner abandon it? And why’s there a map to it? If he died, there’s no call to put it down on paper, and if he didn’t kick the bucket, he’d know where his own claim was situated.”
“I’m guessing,” Cooley said, “that he found himself hurt or real sick. As he was dying, he wanted to let somebody know how to find the mine. Everybody says it’s the richest in the entire Superstition Mountains.”
“So if the owner drew this map on his deathbed, how’d he get the map to whoever he wanted to work the claim?”
“It’s a secret location,” Cooley said. “The map’s been stolen from whoever was supposed to get it. I bought it off the cowboy back in Oasis. He’s the one that took it from the man who was supposed to work the mine.”
“What if he shows up? The real owner?”
“Dead,” Cooley said, exasperated now. “Don’t worry your head none over this, Mandy. I got it all squared away.”
“But . . .”
“Hold up!” England Dan held up his hand as if he were the commander of a cavalry patrol. “There’s been somebody nosing around since we’ve been gone.”
“How do you know?” Cooley looked up and got a fat, cold raindrop in the eye for his effort. “Any trace ought to have been washed away.”
“The rocks. See?” England Dan pointed to a few rocks scattered around on the trail. “I set them up as a marker, and they’re knocked over.”
“That’s not much of a warning,” Mandy said. “Or was it set as a trigger for a trap?”
“A marker,” Cooley said, beginning to worry. His partner was right, as he usually was. “We used it to leave each other messages. Depending on the stones all stacked up, it told the other one when we’d be back.”
“Why not write a message in your cabin?” The girl looked at him, realization dawning on her. “Oh, you can’t read or write, can you?”
Cooley rode ahead to avoid answering. Being illiterate usually wasn’t a bother, but admitting it to Mandy felt like a failure. Everything he did and said had to be about perfect, or she’d ride off and he’d never see her again.
“What are we going to do about intruders?” Cooley tried to figure out what marks on the trail weren’t supposed to be there. Then it hit him. All the hoofprints were left by whoever had knocked over the stone cairn. “They rode up there within the last few hours.” He stared at the sky again, this time putting up a hand to shield his face from the errant raindrops.
“Tracks go up, none back.” England Dan touched his six-shooter, then drew his knife. “You stay with the girl. I’ll see if they decided to squat in our cabin.”
“I can help.”
“Stay,” England Dan said firmly, as if ordering a dog to heel.
Cooley’s anger flared, then settled back to a smolder. Being talked to like that hurt his pride, but he got the mule spun around and headed back down to where Mandy waited impatiently.
“He’s going to see if we’re in for any trouble. If there is, he’ll call me.”
“The tracks don’t show the rider came back down.” Mandy pursed her lips as she considered what this meant. “Dan’s riding into trouble, unless whoever left those tracks passed the cabin by and kept riding toward the meadow to the east. That’s the only way through the mountains to get over to New Mexico.”
“That’s the way I read it,” Cooley said. When Mandy sorted it all out, it made sense. England Dan wasn’t too likely to find squatters. There hadn’t been anything left in the cabin to steal. All they wanted themselves in the cabin was a roof over their head while they studied the map before moving on.
Reinforcing the need for shelter, a few more raindrops splattered on the brim of Cooley’s hat. If they waited much longer, they’d be drenched.
“Let’s go to the cabin. He’s not signaled there’s anything to worry over.”
“Are you sure, John? If we barge in while Dan’s sneaking up on somebody, we might start a fight. And if we don’t, it would still rile up your partner because he didn’t tell us the coast was clear.”
“I don’t take orders from him. We’re equal partners. Even steven, like he says.”
Mandy reluctantly rode a few yards behind Cooley as he kept Mabel moving toward the cabin. Rounding a bend in the trail, he came to a fork. Uphill led to the mine. Farther around the curve of the hill lay their cabin. Cooley reared back and stopped Mabel when he saw that England Dan had dismounted to scout the cabin on foot. Cooley slid from the saddle and drew his gun, knowing its only value lay in bluffing.
His approach was noisy. England Dan popped out from the back of the cabin, brandishing his knife. His disgust was obvious when he saw it was only his clumsy partner. He motioned for Cooley to stay where he was.
Shifting nervously from foot to foot, Cooley waited for Rutledge to go to the door and ease it open. The creaking noise sounded like nails pulled from wood. A quick look inside and then he disappeared through the door. Cooley rushed forward.
“Empty,” England Dan said. He sheathed his knife. “The hoofprints go on past the shed.”
“The rider went to the meadow.” Cooley tried to sound as if he wasn’t relieved. He wasn’t sure how successful he was.
“We got in just in time. The rain’s starting again.” England Dan stepped away from a leak in the roof. Water puddled on the dirt floor, turning it to mud.
Cooley hurried to grab a pot and put it under the leak. If the floor turned into a swamp, there would be hardly any difference between standing outside in the rain and being indoors. He put their frying pan under a second leak, then said, “I’ll get Mandy.”
He ducked back out and went around the trail in time to see her riding away. Cooley started to call to her, but she was leaving of her own accord. If she didn’t see how good she had it with him, to hell with her, but her silent departure still festered inside him. Cooley squared his shoulders and returned to the cabin.
England Dan looked up from where he sat across the table. The map was spread out in front of him. “Well? Where is she?”
Cooley cleared his throat, lifted his chin and said, “I sent her back to town. Hunting for the mine’s going to get real dangerous, and I didn’t want to risk her life.”
“Get more dangerous?” England Dan snorted. “I must have missed folks getting shot and killed and Indians trying to fill us full of ar
rows.”
“The banshee,” Cooley said. “The banshee howled. One of us is going to die. I didn’t want it to be Mandy.”
“I keep telling you, it was me making the howling noises to scare away Big Ear.”
Cooley saw a cloud pass behind his partner’s eyes. Another worry had come to him, but he didn’t put it into words. As far as he was concerned, the banshee was trouble enough to give up the search and get back to working the Trafalgar Mine. But if he did that, he’d lose Mandy for sure. Whatever promise he made to her had to be golden.
“You have any idea where to start hunting for the Lost Banshee Mine?” Cooley took pleasure in how he had renamed the mine they sought. It irked his partner, and that made him feel a little satisfaction.
He had to feel like he’d won somewhere. The memory of Mandy riding away was going to haunt him for a long time, unless he got a pile of gold and lured her back.
“Let’s turn in. I’m dead tired, and we’ve got a long way to ride ahead.” Cooley yawned widely, then rubbed his eyes.
Cooley stretched out on his bunk, listening to the drip-drip-drip of rain coming through the roof and splattering in the pots and pans scattered about. It wasn’t long before England Dan’s snores drowned out the gentle rain, and Cooley slipped into a fitful sleep, dreaming of Mandy and Mindy and hearing Big Owl.
He slept late the next day; the sun was already up and drying out the cabin. Stretching, he sat up. His partner still sawed wood. Cooley looked from Dan to the map on the table. He had cut and run once. The mistake he’d made then was not taking the map. Now he had a chance to go find the Lost Banshee Mine on his own. After all, he knew the key: Mule Springs.
“We don’t have to go to Mule Springs,” England Dan said. He lay on his side. His eyes were wide-open and intent.
Cooley felt a guilty pang for even thinking about taking the map. “What do you mean?”
“I slept on the matter that came to me back in the canyon. Knowing where the mine is from Mule Springs gives me an idea how to approach it from this side. It’d save us a couple days’ travel.”
“That’s a good idea,” Cooley said, nodding. “Not blistering my butt astride that mule is worthwhile.”
“What we need are some tools from the mine,” England Dan said. “That way we’ll be ready to do some assay on the spot to make certain we’re not wasting our time on the wrong mine.”
“We’d better hurry. We done slept until the afternoon. If we don’t get on the trail soon, we’ll never get there.”
“The rain’s threatening another downpour,” England Dan said. “I say rest up until early tomorrow. The horse and the mule need to be taken care of. Let them rest and then hit the trail all refreshed and ready to whip our weight in wildcats.”
Talking Cooley into a few more hours’ sleep wasn’t hard. It still bothered him when his partner shook him awake. For some reason Dan held a rubber hose.
“What’re you doing with that?”
“Mabel ate a burlap bag and is all clogged up. We need to pour mineral oil down her gullet before we get on the trail.”
England Dan took another look at the map, stabbed down on the X with his finger, then laughed. “After all we’ve been through, this had better make us as rich as the queen.”
They walked the muddy trail to the shed to take care of Mabel. It was messy, and the mule belched continuously, but two quarts of mineral oil began to work. They hastily left to avoid the stink and returned to the cabin to find the door standing open and the map gone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
IT FELT GOOD lazing in the sun. Lars Jensen pulled his hat brim down farther to shield his eyes from the setting sun. It had been rainy most of the day, but the storms had passed, leaving an Arizona sky so intensely brilliant, it hurt the eyes to stare at it. He stirred and moved, so his chest caught the full rays of the sun. It eased the ache he felt from the gunshot. If he faced the other way, the sun might give its healing rays to his back, where the bullet had entered. But in a vague, distant way, Jensen decided that wasn’t important. It felt too good this way.
His belly was full, and the sun let him drift toward sleep. A doctor years back had told him to eat a thick beefsteak after getting shot. It would help build his blood, the sawbones had said. It had worked then. Whether it would work now was a matter of conjecture since the meat had been tough and gristly. The best beef went to Bisbee, along with half the population of Oasis. No flow of yellow metal, no miners, no reason to bring in the best fodder for the losers staying on Oasis.
Jensen’s mind drifted. He had lost more blood than he wanted to admit, and it had left him as weak as a kitten. He had knocked back a shot of the tarantula juice served at the Thirsty Camel, and it had made him sick to his stomach. Not being able to hold his liquor was a flaw Poke would exploit. Best to lounge outside the livery on the bales of straw and recuperate. His brother was going to return anytime now from wherever he’d gotten off to and demand to know why his worthless younger brother hadn’t found the map.
“The map. Always the damned map.” Jensen drifted deeper to sleep. A dream began churning about, or was it a deep thought bubbling to the surface? Why let Poke boss him around? He’d had nothing to do with robbing the cavalry payroll. Poke would claim he wasn’t deserving of a cut when he tracked it down since he hadn’t risked his neck to steal it. Beeman had paid the price already, dying. At least Beeman had handed the map off to somebody willing to get it to Poke.
None of this was Lars Jensen’s concern. He had troubles of his own.
“I killed him. I shot him dead.” He moaned as he stirred from his half-asleep dream. Alberto Gonzales had no call being alive. He should be dead and so should the miners who had the map. “Kill ’em all.”
But his wish dream rolled and bucked around him. He wasn’t beholden to his brother. Clear out. Leave Arizona. California was supposed to be cooler than the furnace of the Arizona desert. Or Denver. The Front Range was filthy with gold and silver mines. That meant wealth to be taken by a clever man. A clever Lars Jensen. Leave here and be done with his brother and his hair-trigger temper.
He had only to wake up, get on his horse and start riding. The sun was soothing. Ride west. To the Colorado and cross at Yuma.
He snapped awake. Yuma. Where Poke had been locked up. Jensen looked around, wild-eyed. It took a few seconds to realize his dream wasn’t the cause of this enforced alertness.
“If I’d known it’d be this easy to find her, I’d have staked out the livery stables a long time back.” He sat up, using a hay bale as support. Riding slowly toward him, eyes downcast, was none other than the whore who’d been with Cooley.
He slipped his six-shooter from his holster. The way his hand shook bothered him. Pointing it at the girl wasn’t going to cow her, especially since she’d had the sand before to shoot him. If anything, she’d laugh at how feeble he seemed. Jensen replaced it and lounged back on the bale. She drew rein a few feet away and dropped off. Looking as if she was as exhausted as he felt, she started into the livery, leading the horse.
“We got good rates for special people like you.”
She jumped a foot. She hadn’t seen him sprawled out on the hay. A quick yank on the horse’s bridle turned its face. Mandy intended to mount and gallop off. Jensen summoned up the strength to stand and lunge forward. His arms wrapped around the horse’s neck, keeping it from obeying her.
Mandy dropped the reins and started to run.
“Don’t you go make me shoot you in the back. Somebody done that to me, and it hurt like hell. I wonder who that was.” His taunt made her start to shake. He was glad to see he still intimidated her. “I’m healed up enough to kill you.” Jensen laughed when she skidded to a halt and raised her hands.
“Don’t shoot me. There’s no call to.”
“You’re telling me you don’t have the map. That may be true, but you know where
it is.”
“You’ll kill me if I tell you.”
“That’s not too farfetched a notion,” Jensen said. “But I might not kill you since I’ve taken a shine to you. If you don’t say anything, you know you’ll be drawing flies out there in the sun before you can take another breath.”
“How do you know I won’t lie?”
Jensen considered this for a moment. His legs turned to jelly under him. If he carried on much longer, he’d likely pass out.
“If you lie, you know I’ll track you down to the ends of the earth and make you pay. Me collecting that debt’s not anything you want to experience.”
Jensen saw her begin to shake even harder. Her hands lowered a little, then rose once more. A smile came to his lips. He knew what this meant.
“I don’t owe them anything. They almost got me killed. And . . . and they’re both running from Big Owl. That map’s not going to do them a bit of good.”
“Big Owl? That Injun stalking around up there?”
“That’s Big Ear. This is the banshee.”
Jensen had no idea what she was talking about, but from the quaver in her voice, he didn’t have to. It scared her just enough to be useful.
“Maybe me and Big Owl are in cahoots. That’d make it all the more certain that I’ll find you if you lie.”
“He’s not the man I thought he was.”
“Big Owl?” Jensen saw that he’d guessed wrong. She half turned toward him. He caught the expression on her face. “Or that worthless snake you took up with? Cooley.”
“Cooley and his partner are at their cabin. The Trafalgar Mine. It’s up at—”
“I know where it is. Why’re they there?”
“We were almost ambushed by Big Ear. And England Dan spun a yarn about imitating the banshee. Riding through the storm, not having enough food, it was more’n I could take. They went to their cabin to rest up before following the map.”
“They know what’s buried?”
“Gold. They think there’s a mountain of gold in the mine. The Lost Banshee Mine, Cooley calls it.”
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