by Scott Connor
Nathan waited until his footsteps receded before he spoke up.
‘We’re sorry, Quincy, but we won’t implicate you,’ he said.
‘Obliged, but Decker will release me soon.’ He sighed. ‘Although only after he’s made me sign the kind of deal that’ll near bankrupt me.’
‘We’re sorry about that, too.’
‘You will be,’ Quincy said, shaking an admonishing finger at them. ‘If you avoid that firing-squad, I’ll find unpaid work for you until you’ve not only paid for that broken wagon, but for everything I’ll lose.’
Nathan winced. Then he headed across the cell to sit beside Jeff.
‘Have you worked out why that prisoner wasn’t Frank Reed?’ he asked.
‘We’ve ruined everything we’ve interfered in so far,’ Jeff said. ‘So I reckon we misunderstood Nancy Reed when she showed no interest in Decker’s plans. Someone, perhaps a Bar T ranch hand, volunteered to be that prisoner so that Frank could remain free.’
‘And so defy Decker and register in his office before three tomorrow?’
‘I guess that was the plan. Except now we’ve exposed it and Decker will be waiting for him to show.’
Nathan sighed, lowering his head in acknowledgement of Jeff’s version of events.
‘So tomorrow, because of us, Frank Reed will lose the Bar T, after all.’
‘Perhaps we won’t have to see that happen.’ Jeff snorted with grim humor. ‘If we’re lucky, Decker will put us up before that firing-squad before then.’
Chapter Sixteen
The day of the Bar T ranch auction broke clear and warm, but locked in the jailhouse Nathan and Jeff could only contemplate their failure.
Their remorse was so great that they didn’t talk about their predicament throughout the morning. As the day dragged on each event that they became aware of further proved that their interference had removed Frank’s only chance to keep the Bar T.
The clock on the wall by the desk was showing ten when Nathan heard Decker deploy his guards outside the door to the tower.
At noon, Decker came down and talked with Buckthorn, even patting him on the back and smiling.
‘How long are you planning to detain Quincy?’ he asked, his tone not condescending as he treated Buckthorn as an equal for the first time Nathan had seen.
‘I see no reason to keep him,’ Buckthorn said. ‘I reckon he was unlucky to have those outlaws steal his wagon.’
When Decker nodded, Buckthorn shuffled from foot to foot. He had been sober and grumbling last night and Nathan didn’t expect him to keep quiet about the non-arrival of the promised whiskey.
But he flexed his hands and gritted his teeth, perhaps as he fought down the urge to request it, then headed off to release Quincy, while Decker approached Nathan’s cell.
‘Don’t expect the same treatment,’ he said, smirking.
‘What are you going to do with us?’ Nathan asked.
Decker glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the plaza.
‘It depends how generous I’m feeling this afternoon.’
Without further comment, he walked past Nathan’s cell to stand by Quincy’s cell door. When Quincy emerged, he draped a friendly arm around his shoulders and led him to the door. He didn’t look at Nathan and Jeff again.
‘I reckon before you go, Quincy, you can distract me with talking business,’ he said.
Quincy sighed and slipped out from Decker’s arm to leave the jailhouse. He glanced at Nathan and provided a resigned shake of the head in acknowledgement of the disastrous business deal Decker was about to extract from him.
‘You reckon Decker’s comment meant what I reckoned it meant?’ Nathan asked Jeff when they’d left.
‘Yeah. If Decker secures the land, he’ll be in a good enough mood to just run us out of town. If he doesn’t . . .’ Jeff glanced towards the plaza and frowned.
Nathan set his jaw firmly and refused to let Decker’s threat worry him, but with nothing else to occupy his mind, his gaze kept returning to the clock.
The early afternoon passed slowly until, shortly after two, Decker returned to the jailhouse and drew Buckthorn to the barred windows.
‘A whole heap of ranch hands have just ridden into the fort,’ he said, his voice loud enough to imply that he wanted Nathan and Jeff to hear him. He pointed through the bars. ‘Which one is Frank Reed?’
Buckthorn craned his neck. ‘I can’t see him. I wonder if he’s hiding until closer to three.’
‘I’ll do the wondering, Buckthorn. You just go out and find him.’
Buckthorn swung round to face Decker, standing tall for once.
‘Why should I? It isn’t my concern if he wants to come to your office. My duty is to stop trouble happening, and until Frank Reed makes that there trouble, I won’t help you.’
Decker glared at Buckthorn, but then gave a sly smile.
‘I still haven’t given you enough whiskey for you to drink yourself to death with yet, have I?’
Buckthorn licked his lips, grinning despite the insult, but then his shoulders slumped.
‘I guess you haven’t,’ he said, his voice shaking, perhaps with delight although Nathan detected disappointment.
‘I’ll have a bottle sent down right away. While you’re enjoying it, think about who your friends are.’ Decker headed to the door, but he stopped in front of it. ‘Tell me the moment you see Frank Reed.’
Decker left without waiting for a response and shortly afterwards a guard returned with a whiskey bottle. Buckthorn wasted no time in upending it and poured a quarter of its contents into his mouth. Then he sighed with delight and wiped his mouth.
Nathan contemplated him through the bars.
‘Hey, Buckthorn, you shouldn’t have taken Decker’s whiskey,’ he said. ‘Decker’s the reason you drink, but you were starting to get yourself some dignity by standing up for yourself. Now, you’ll lose it.’
Buckthorn paused in the midst of raising the bottle again.
‘Be quiet.’ Buckthorn took a swig.
‘I won’t. Fort Benton needs a strong sheriff to stand up to Decker and if you’re not that man, he’ll just get more powerful until nobody can stop him.’
‘I deal with Decker in my own way.’ Buckthorn tapped the side of his nose and winked.
‘All I saw was you taking his whiskey and following his orders.’
Buckthorn snorted and paced across the jailhouse to stand before the cells. Nathan flashed a glance at Jeff to be on his guard in case he could entice him to come close enough for them to grab him and Jeff shuffled a pace nearer the bars.
‘You don’t know nothing,’ Buckthorn said, hefting the bottle and swirling the contents.
‘You don’t nothing but whiskey. Throw that bottle away and stand up to Decker.’
‘Throw it away!’ Buckthorn roared.
His eyes flared. His face suffused with a deep redness that was beyond the reaction Nathan thought he’d receive. Then he hurled the bottle at the bars, the glass and whiskey spraying everywhere.
Nathan ducked away as Buckthorn stared at the pool of spilt liquor on the cell floor, then snuffled and scurried outside.
‘You reckon he’s gone for more whiskey?’ Jeff asked, batting a glass shard from his sleeve.
‘Yeah,’ Nathan said. He glanced at the clock and confirmed they now had less than half an hour before the deadline. ‘And it’ll be harder to get him close to the bars next time.’
Nathan paced back and forth, searching for an idea that would get them out of the cells. As he swirled round, his jacket brushed against the bars and a hollow clunk reminded him that he still had the key in his pocket.
Buckthorn had confiscated their guns, but his search hadn’t been thorough and he’d not noticed the key, useless though it was to them in here.
Nathan removed it then pressed it against the keyhole; the key was still too large for the lock.
‘That won’t work,’ Jeff said. ‘Stop hoping for a miracle and wor
k out how we can create one.’
‘I’ve got an idea. Wait for the opportunity when it comes.’
Nathan continued to tap the key against the lock for the next ten minutes until Buckthorn returned. Then he withdrew his arm and thrust the key behind his back, but not so quickly that Buckthorn wouldn’t be able to see it.
Buckthorn had a replacement whiskey bottle and Nathan’s sudden movement intrigued him enough to place the bottle on his desk, then head over to the cell.
‘What have you got there?’ he demanded.
‘Nothing,’ Nathan said, with an obvious movement of his arms to thrust the key under his jacket behind his back.
‘You’ve got something.’ Buckthorn looked aloft while he considered. ‘It looked like a key . . .’
He swirled round and looked for the ring of keys that should be over his desk. Nathan had noted earlier that Buckthorn had placed them in his desk and in Buckthorn’s agitated state this must have passed from his mind because he swirled round and hurried to the cell door.
He unlocked and pushed open the cell, then advanced on Nathan, so Nathan whipped out the key and moved to throw it into Jeff’s cell. His movement was only a feint, but Buckthorn followed the potential path of the key and lunged, throwing himself into the cell bars.
That was the only chance Jeff required. He had already tiptoed up to the bars. Now he thrust a long arm through the bars and looped it around Buckthorn’s neck. A few seconds of pressure from his thick arm made Buckthorn go limp in his grip.
Then, in short order, Nathan had the unconscious Buckthorn locked in the cell while Jeff reclaimed their guns.
‘This key has got us into plenty of trouble,’ Nathan said, holding it aloft. ‘I guess it was time it got us out of some.’
Chapter Seventeen
Jeff considered the comatose Buckthorn.
‘I suppose it was lucky for us he hasn’t got the guts to stand up to Decker,’ he said. ‘It took no effort to subdue him. He just fell into the bars.’
‘He did, didn’t he?’ Nathan mused. ‘And he didn’t confiscate our key. Perhaps he isn’t as incompetent as he appears to be and perhaps he does stand up to Decker in his own way.’
Jeff narrowed his eyes. ‘Are you saying he deliberately let us subdue him and escape just to annoy Decker?’
‘That and something else.’ Nathan rolled his shoulders. ‘If you’re with me, I’d like to back that hunch.’
Jeff snorted. ‘Your hunches haven’t been successful recently.’
Nathan sighed. ‘Yeah, but look at it this way – one of them has to come off some day soon.’
Jeff provided a skeptical and resigned nod. Then they both looked at the clock. It showed fifteen minutes to the hour.
They collected their guns, including the initialed one, then headed to the door leading into the plaza. They slipped out.
At the tunnel to the doorway they glanced around the corner to see that the guards were all looking at the stables. So they hurried past the tunnel entrance, over to the steps to the tower, then up to the mayor’s office.
As the door was closed and the area outside was deserted, they headed to a window to survey the activity outside. Down below, the situation was much as Decker had alluded to earlier.
Seven guards were at the doorway, the only way up to the mayor’s office. By the stables around twenty men were eyeing them.
Nathan recognized several of them as being ranch hands from the Bar T. Behind them in the stable doorway was Nancy Reed.
He couldn’t see anyone who appeared to be in charge, and so would therefore be Frank Reed; everyone was acting casually and showing no sign of launching an assault yet.
‘So how will that hunch of yours help Frank?’ Jeff said.
Nathan pointed at the holes in the top of the wall. The prisoner who, according to Buckthorn, was masquerading as Frank was now a prisoner again behind this wall.
‘Because I reckon Buckthorn has been standing up to Decker and because Frank is leaving it mighty late to make that move. And most of all because we’d forgotten what we were told when we heard about all of this.’
Jeff considered, then shrugged. ‘We were given the initialed gun and a key.’
‘We were, and now is the time we use them as they were intended.’
Jeff started to request more details, but with time pressing, Nathan silenced him with a raised hand.
Two minutes later he and Jeff were ready to make their entrance into the mayor’s office. They had less than ten minutes before the deadline.
Nathan kicked open the doorway then pressed himself flat to the wall in case of gunfire. When none came, he slipped his gun round the door, then side-stepped in with Jeff at his shoulder.
Decker sat at his desk, four guards stood around the room, and a thin and sweating man with a leather case clutched to his chest sat on the other side of the desk. Nathan took this man to be the lawyer in charge of the proceedings.
‘Nathan, I should have known you’d interfere,’ Decker said. ‘How did you get away from Buckthorn, again?’
Nathan smiled. ‘It wasn’t difficult.’
Decker acknowledged this fact with a curt nod then removed a watch from his pocket and set it on the desk before him.
‘Frank Reed has nine minutes to show and register his title, then the Bar T goes to auction. Are you here for that auction?’
‘If there is one, I am, and I might be interested in bidding myself.’
Decker narrowed his eyes in irritation before regaining his composure and smiling.
‘Then you’ll have to compete with me.’ Decker gestured at his steely-eyed guards. ‘For a man who’s facing a firing-squad if I’m displeased with the result of that auction, that isn’t wise. Either way, you’ll face formidable opposition. I’ve already bid one dollar.’
‘In that case, I’ll bid four—’
Jeff nudged him then whispered that they’d spent some of the money Quincy had given them on food yesterday.
‘I’m sorry,’ Nathan said. ‘My bid will be two dollars.’
The lawyer snorted. ‘You cannot compete with Mr. Decker. He has substantial resources and—’
‘Now, now,’ Decker said, cutting him off. ‘Nathan has made a bid that’s far too high for me. If nobody else bids, you’ll have bought yourself a ranch – provided you live to claim it.’
‘I intend to do just that.’
Nathan couldn’t see a clock and he was too far away to discern the time on Decker’s watch, but he judged that around seven minutes had passed when Decker reached out and cupped the watch.
He gestured to a guard who leaned back to peer out the window, then darted back to confirm that the hands outside weren’t acting yet. Decker fingered the papers on his desk, then pushed them towards Nathan.
‘Are you able to pay up?’ Decker said, his tone sneering. ‘Mr. Timson here needs to be sure you have the funds to match your bid.’
Nathan withdrew two dollar bills from his pocket, then held them high.
‘I believe cash will suffice.’
‘I believe it will. Place the money on the table and if Frank doesn’t show in . . .’ Decker glanced at his watch. ‘. . . fifty-five seconds, the land will be yours.’
Nathan paced to the table and slapped the money down.
Decker eyed the bills, smiling, then leaned back in his chair to watch the final seconds tick away. In each corner of the room, Decker’s guards straightened, fingers twitched, and hands drifted towards holsters.
‘How long?’ Nathan couldn’t help but ask, as the guard behind him cracked his knuckles.
‘Another twenty seconds before you get what’s coming to you.’ Decker glanced at the door, then picked up the papers and held them out. ‘Take them to end your life, or withdraw that bid in the next ten seconds.’
Nathan glanced around the room, committing the position of each guard to memory, while Decker held out his other hand. Then Decker counted down the remaining seconds by lowering
one finger at a time.
Nathan waited until he was lowering the fourth finger before speaking.
‘I can’t do—’
‘Wait!’ a voice demanded from the corner, accompanied by a slam of the door.
Decker swirled round to see that the prisoner was now free and had kicked open the door. He stood with the gun Jeff had slotted in through the hole in the wall outside trained on him.
‘What’s it got to do with you?’ Decker demanded.
‘Everything,’ the man said. ‘You see, I am Frank Reed and I’m here to register my title.’
Chapter Eighteen
Decker snorted as he considered his former prisoner.
‘You’re not Frank . . .’ Decker winced then kneaded his brow. ‘But then again, you are Frank Reed, and I should never have trusted the word of my no-good sheriff.’
‘You shouldn’t,’ Frank said. ‘And now my land is still mine.’
‘Like I told Nathan, you won’t live to see it. Registering was only half the battle. Now you have to get out of my fort.’
Nathan snorted. ‘We’ve done it before.’
Frank headed across the room and patted Nathan’s back.
‘And you’ll do it again.’ He hefted his gun. ‘It’s just a pity you didn’t get the gun and key to me straight away like you were supposed to do.’
‘It’d have helped if someone had told us what we were supposed to do with them.’
With Decker and the guards watching their every move, Frank signed then took the papers from the desk. Then they backed away to the door.
Jeff slipped out first, followed by Nathan, with Frank leaving last and swinging the door closed. From within Nathan heard Decker grunting orders to his guards but they continued to back away from the door with Jeff covering their rear and the others watching for anyone risking coming out.
They backed almost to the steps without anyone emerging. Then Decker shouted out the window, ordering his guards to retreat down the tunnel and trap them up here.