Avery Simpson watched as Peck brought paper and pen to the table. Slowly, carefully, he wrote as Reilly dictated, and when he was finished with the last letter, Will Reilly said, “There is one more thing. As you did not know me, and have no reason for wishing me dead, I take it that you have been acting for someone else? Am I right?”
Simpson nodded.
“I want the name of that person. And I want it now.”
Some of Simpson’s courage was returning. During the process of writing the dictated letters he had been slowly growing more angry. Now, suddenly, the anger burst out. “I’ll be damned if I will!”
Almost casually, Will Reilly backhanded him across the mouth. In that room only Val and Simpson knew the jolting force of that blow, Val because he had seen it used before, on other occasions. A slow trickle of blood started from Simpson’s mouth.
“The name, Mr. Simpson.”
Avery Simpson looked wildly about the room, but those present either seemed to be ignoring what was happening, or they looked at him with cold, unfriendly eyes. The men who hired their killing done were not respected men in Colorado.
“Prince Pavel Pavelovitch.”
It was Will Reilly who was surprised. “Him? After all this time?”
“You horsewhipped him. He still carries the scars, and the story follows him wherever he goes. Or so I have been told.”
“What else were you told?”
“That the Princess Louise will no longer have anything to do with him.”
“She is married?”
“I do not believe so.”
Will Reilly was silent, then after a pause he said, “You will leave in the morning, Mr. Simpson, and keep going until you reach wherever you came from.”
Deliberately, he stood up and walked back to his table. After a moment, Avery Simpson got up and left the room. Val watched him go, wondering what the man must be thinking.
Will Reilly seemed uninterested in his food. Slowly he took a cigar from his case and bit off the end, and then sat for several minutes holding the cigar in his fingers and staring into space.
“She isn’t married,” Val said.
“We don’t know … but I could find out. She’s a well-known person.”
“You would be going where he is.”
Will gestured impatiently, as one brushes away a fly. “It doesn’t matter.” He put the cigar in his teeth, and lit it. “I am thinking of her.” He looked at Val. “I am a gambler, Val, and a gambler is not simply a nobody, he is worse.”
“Many of the people she knows gamble.”
“Of course. But there is a difference between a man who gambles and a gambler. I have never quite been able to persuade myself of the difference but others have … long since.”
“She loved you.”
He looked at Val. “Did she? I wonder.”
“You don’t have to gamble. You could invest some money. Right now,” Val lowered his voice—“you have money, and you own mining stock. You could—”
Will Reilly got up suddenly, almost overturning his chair. “We will, Val. We will go in the morning. I will speak to them at the stable about having our horses ready.”
Filled with his plans, he opened the front door and stepped out.
They must have been afraid of him, for they used shotguns—at any rate two of them did. The other used a Spencer .56 that fires a slug as big as a man’s thumb.
He stepped out the door and it swung to behind him and he had no warning. Even so, in his reflex he cleared his gun from its holster.
The blasting roar of the shotguns shook the room. Val left his chair running, and burst out the door.
There were three of them leaving, and one looked back over his shoulder. It was Henry Sonnenberg.
Chapter Eight
Will Reilly had drilled Val in the procedure so many times that he acted now without even thinking. He glanced once at Will; he had seen dead men before, and he knew that Will could never have known what hit him.
He went back inside and up the stairs to their room. He was not thinking, he was as yet only feeling the terrible shock, but he did what Will had taught him to do. He went to Will’s trunk and got out their stake money. It was a considerable sum.
Unbuttoning his shirt, he stuffed the gold coins into the money belt with those already there. Then he got out the three letters that had been delivered by hand from Louise to Will, back in Innsbruck, and he put them in his pocket. Only then did he go back downstairs.
He was shaking now, and he was suddenly afraid. Already the sense of loss was beginning. Will was gone, and Will Reilly had been his world. He had been father, uncle, brother, friend, all these in one; he had been his partner against the world, and it was considering that which made Val Darrant realize that he was suddenly without anyone—he was all alone.
Valentine Darrant was nearly fifteen, and he had been traveling most of his life. Not only that, but he had often made all the arrangements himself for both of them. Will might be in a game where it was unsafe to win; a signal to Val, and Val would make the arrangements. And so he made them now.
People were still gathered on the hotel steps, talking, when he went to the livery stable. He saddled their horses and led them out back of the corral, where he tied them in a concealed place. Then he went back to the hotel.
“Mr. Peck,” he said when he found him, “I want a decent burial for my uncle.” He produced two gold pieces. “Will you see to it? They will pay attention to you.”
“Of course, son, but you don’t need to think of that now. You’re welcome to stay right here at the hotel until everything is settled. Everything will have to be impounded until we find his next of kin.”
“He was an orphan,” Val said. “He had no kinfolk, except me.”
“Well, we will have to see about that. In the meantime, don’t you worry. We will attend to everything.”
They had taken Will to a dark shed that housed the materials for coffins, a place where bodies were kept until buried. The burial would be the following morning.
Val went to the shed and talked to the man at the door, a pleasant, middle-aged man who had two boys of his own. “May I see him?” Val asked.
The man studied him a moment. “I reckon so, boy. You an’ him seemed mighty close.”
“We hadn’t anybody else.”
“How come they killed him? Gambling fight?”
So Val told it to him there by the door, very briefly but clearly, about Will and Louise, and the horsewhipping Will had given Prince Pavel.
“Served him right,” the man said. “I’d like to have seen that. You go ahead on in there, boy, an’ take your time.”
So Val went in.
A lantern was standing on a table and it shone on Will, who was lying there as if he were asleep.
Val stood beside him, knowing what he had to do, but dreading it. This, too, had been a part of it, and from the time Val was six years old, Will had drilled it into him.
“Remember, Val, these home guards are mostly good folks … but there’s larceny in some of them. You know where I carry my money—in that secret pocket inside my vest. No matter what happens, you get it. And get the money hidden in the hotel, and then you get out.
“You’ve been around enough—stay in the best hotels if you can. Tell them you’re expecting to meet your uncle, or any story they can believe, Val. Don’t let anybody know you’ve got more than a few dollars, but money can be your friend, and your best protection.”
Val hesitated a moment now, and then put his hand on Will’s body, felt for the vest buttons. They were caked with dried blood, but he unbuttoned them. Sure enough, it was there, a small packet of greenbacks, and something else … a locket, it felt like, and a small square of paper.
Quickly he put them into his pocket, buttoned up the vest, and rearranged the blanket.
“Thanks, Will,” he said softly. There was a lump in his throat and he could feel the tears coming, and fought
to keep them back. “Thanks for everything. I … I guess you know how it was … you an’ me. I love you, Will, and I never had anybody else, and may never have again.
“I’m going to get out, Will. I’m going to take off the way you said I should, but I’ll see that you’re buried, with a marker and all. Then I’ll come back, you can count on it. And that isn’t all. One of these days I’ll find them, Henry Sonnenberg and the others, and when I do, I’ll make them remember you, Will.”
He went outside, and the man at the door put his hand on his shoulder. “That’s a good boy. I know how you feel.”
“He was all I had. We were all either one of us had.”
“Sure, now.” The man’s voice was husky. “Boy, if you’re of a mind to, you can come out to our place. We ain’t got much, but you’re welcome.”
“Thanks. Will Reilly told me what to do if this ever happened.”
Val walked away in the darkness and back to the hotel. There were people standing in the parlor talking about what had happened, but they stopped talking when he came up.
“Mr. Peck, can I speak to you?” Val said.
When they had gone into another room, Val took the small packet of money from his pocket. “Uncle Will always told me you were honest, and this here is mine. I don’t know what is going to happen, but I wish you would be my banker. Take this, keep it for me, or invest it … whatever you think best.”
Peck hesitated, studying the boy. “Where did you get this, son?”
“It’s mine. He wanted me to have everything he had, but he always left this money with me in case we were separated. You know, sometimes folks did not take kindly to his winning.”
“I guess not.” Peck took the money. “All right, boy. I’ll take care of it. I haven’t had much luck with money these past years, but it has been the times. I’ll care for it like you were my own son.”
“He wanted a round stone,” Val said, “like a rolling stone. All he wanted on it were the dates, and the words, Here’s where Will Reilly stopped last.”
Val went up to the room, and closed the door behind him. He looked at Will’s clothes … all those handsome, beautiful clothes.
He worked quickly, making a small pack of his own belongings, including the six-shooter Will had bought for him. He took down Will’s Winchester, checked the load, and placed it ready on the bed, changed into range garb, and went to the window.
After a quick look around he slipped out, went down the slanting roof and dropped his stuff to the ground, then lowered himself to arm’s length and dropped. Gathering up his gear he went through the alley and across a dark vacant lot to the back of the corral where the horses waited. There he stopped long enough to belt on the six-shooter.
Somewhere, not too far away, was Henry Sonnenberg. Val considered that. He was good with a gun. Will had seen to that. He had been shooting alongside Will for almost ten years, but he did not think he was ready for Henry. Nor for the others … but there was time. Will had always advised patience.
He mounted his horse, and with Will’s horse on a lead rope, he took the trail out of town. He rode at an easy lope for a short time, and then walked his horse. Just short of daybreak he stopped and rested the horses; after that he mounted Will’s horse and rode on.
He kept to the back country, riding west and south. He avoided people, sometimes by turning off the trail, returning to it only when the people had gone by. He knew where he was headed.
It was a small remote log cabin, high in the mountains north of Durango. On two occasions, when drifting through the country, Will and he had spent the night there, and one other time they had stayed a week. At that time they had done some work on the cabin and had explored the country around.
The cabin stood at the edge of a grove of aspens. A spring was nearby, and there were a few acres of meadow for grazing. There were fish in a nearby stream, and plenty of game.
Riding the wild country gives a man time to think, and Will Reilly had encouraged thinking. “You have to be objective, Val,” he had said. “That is the first thing a gambler learns. Each problem must be taken by itself, and you have to leave emotion out of it. Be stern with yourself. Don’t pamper yourself.”
Well, he no longer had Will to guide him, but he had what Will had taught him, and that teaching had been of a kind to give him strength within himself. Will rarely had positive answers, but he always offered the means to arrive at answers.
Val Darrant considered what lay before him. Henry Sonnenberg must not go unpunished. The law would hardly try very hard to find the killer of a dead gambler, and the law in the West was, in most places, still merely local law. If Henry Sonnenberg was to pay for his crime, it was Val’s job to see that he did.
Three men had been involved, and Val knew their first effort would be to find Avery Simpson and collect their blood money. With Will Reilly dead, Simpson’s misson was accomplished, but some rendezvous must have been arranged for the payoff.
But what was to prevent Simpson returning east by the fastest means possible, and keeping all the money for himself?
Many men had a streak of larceny in their makeup, and it was unlikely that Avery Simpson was free of it. He might simply return to his usual habitat. But he was a shrewd man, and would be cautious, so he would start in the direction of the rendezvous, wherever it had been.
Hickok had seen him in Wichita, but he had left for Hays … it was likely that contact had been made there, and that might be the rendezvous point. In any event, he had nothing else to go on.
That night, after he made camp, Val practiced his draw, then fixed himself something to eat, and practiced again. He had a natural speed of hand and eye, developed over the years by handling cards and guns, and by juggling several small balls, a practice started by Will. Each night he practiced drawing, but he did no firing, for he was not anxious to attract attention to himself, and had no idea who might be in that part of the country.
In Durango he got a newspaper and found the item Will had made Simpson write. Val himself mailed those letters the first morning after the killing. He smiled at the thought of Henry Sonnenberg meeting Simpson after seeing that item.
Val folded the paper and placed it on the table beside his plate. Then he reached in his pocket for money, and found he had none there. But there was gold in his money belt—in both money belts, for he was carrying several thousand dollars.
He hesitated a moment, then took up the paper and opened it. Using it as a shield, he slipped a hand inside his shirt and took out three gold coins. As he started to place them in his pocket one slipped from his fingers and rolled on the floor.
Several heads turned. Embarrassed, Val got up to retrieve the coin, which had stopped rolling near a heavy boot, stained with red earth. As Val reached for it, the boot moved and came down hard on the coin.
Val stepped back and straightened up, his heart pounding. He had seen Will Reilly face such situations, but he had never faced one himself.
There were three men at the bar, and the foot of the man on the end was on the coin.
“You’ve got your foot on my money,” Val said. “Would you move it, please?”
The man made no move, but he glanced at the others, chuckling. “Listen to that talk. Real gent, ain’t he? Now look here, boy. That coin dropped out of my pocket. It ain’t yours, it’s mine.”
A dozen men were watching, their eyes on Val. He was only a boy, but he was wearing a gun, and any man who carries a gun must be prepared to use it.
“There’s a twenty-dollar gold piece on the floor, and it belongs to me,” Val tried to keep his voice from shaking. “Take your foot off it.”
“It ain’t yourn,” the man said, “but if you can get it, you can have it.”
Deliberately, he moved his foot and Val stepped forward to pick up the coin. Instantly, he saw his mistake. As he bent over he saw the man’s boot swing for a kick, only inches from his face.
His reaction was instantaneous, from long training. He stru
ck the boot aside even as it swung toward him, and the slap threw the man at the bar off balance and he started to fall, catching himself by his right hand on the bar just in time.
Val stepped back quickly, gun in hand. “Pick it up mister,” he said quietly, “and put it on my table.”
Slowly the man pulled himself up. The other two had spread out a little. “Put that gun up, kid. We were only funnin’.”
“Pick up the money and put it on my table.” Val’s voice was suddenly cold and steady. He did not want to kill, but he didn’t believe he would have to. These were bad men, but dangerous only when the odds were with them. “I’m not funnin’,” he added.
The big man stooped for the coin, and then he lunged in a long dive. Val did a boxer’s near side-step and brought the barrel of the Smith & Wesson down on the back of the man’s head. He went to the floor, out cold.
Without removing his eyes from the others, Val picked up the coin and backed off. Then he went to the bar and paid for his meal. He took up his change and pocketed it.
“You won’t get away with this, kid,” one of the other men said. “He’ll kill you.”
Val knew what a good bluff could do. He bolstered his gun and faced them. “How about you? You want to try?”
The gesture worked, for the man very carefully put both hands on the bar, away from his gun. “It ain’t my fight,” he said hoarsely. “I’m just with him.”
Val backed to the door, aware of the quiet-faced man at a table near his own, who had sat watching him. Had he seen that man before? Who was he?
Val stepped out and let the doors swing to. His horses were right down the street. He turned and walked swiftly toward them.
When he glanced back the man with the quiet face was standing outside the saloon, lighting a cigar. Val mounted, and swung his horse.
He reached the cabin on the mountain near dusk, and drawing his horses into the shadow of the aspens, he watched it for some time. There was no smoke from the chimney, no sign of life. When half an hour had passed and it was nearly dark, he rode forward.
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