Rattlesnake Wells, Wyoming

by William W. Johnstone

  “My whole purpose in bringing up that damn marshal,” Modello continued, “was to drive home the point that we can’t afford to take him lightly . . . like I think we did when we hit his town. Even his fat deputy, who showed up first at the bank and killed Benny, turned out to be more than we reckoned on. When we go in again, I repeat, it needs to be double hard and merciless. All guns blazin’.”

  “I’m with you all the way, Reese,” said Salt River Jackson, a soft-spoken Southerner with a mean glint in his pale blue eyes that, for anyone paying attention, deserved to be measured against his slow drawl and generally mild-mannered outward demeanor. He was also the second oldest member of the gang, not too far behind Ainsley.

  Where the years and hardships had taken their toll on Bad Luck Chuck and often made him seem as much a burden as a benefit, on Salt River they had bestowed a layer of leathery toughness and accumulated wisdom, to which the others showed a fair amount of respect. Everyone paid attention when he continued. “Here’s something more I think we need to consider. True, we need to go in harder and stronger than we did last time . . . but we also need to go in smarter.”

  Modello nodded. “Well, yeah. Sure, Salt River. That goes without sayin’, don’t it? What are you drivin’ at?”

  Jackson shrugged. “Smarter is smarter. We know for sure the town is there and we know the bank is there. Do we know with the same certainty that Arlo is in the jail?”

  “Where else would he be?”

  “Nowhere else, if he’s still alive.”

  “I saw him get hit and grab his shoulder. As he went down he hollered for me and Pete to keep goin’, to save ourselves.” Modello frowned at the memory. “He went down, but he wasn’t hurt that bad. Not bad enough where he would’ve died from it. Ain’t that the way you saw it, Pete?”

  Pete Stuben gave a nod, keeping his tone matter-of-fact. “Sure is. I saw him grab his shoulder and blood running out between his fingers. Arlo’s too tough to die from a shoulder wound like that.” A trim, dark-complexioned gent, Stuben was a former gambler, with handsome facial features except for cold, lifeless eyes.

  Back in his card-playing days, his eyes had conveyed no emotion or clue of what he was holding and had made him a very successful gambler, a trade he’d still be following if he hadn’t foolishly gotten into a fight over a loose woman and killed another of her admirers—a young lout who happened to be the son of a very powerful politician who saw to it a high-profile murder charge was slapped on Stuben’s head, making him an outlaw on the run ever since.

  “I’m not questioning any of that,” Jackson said. “But what none of us knows for certain is that they didn’t shoot him again later. Or beat him to death—or maybe even hung him by now.”

  “Jesus, Salt River, you’re awful bent on paintin’ a dreadful fate for ol’ Arlo, ain’t you?” Ace Greer was another tall, rawboned, lantern-jawed sort, cut along lines very similar to Modello, but without the flintiness in his eyes. His, under a shelf of thick, black brows, had an intensity of their own and were conveying a mixture of anxiety bordering on anger. “You almost sound like you want something like that to have happened.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Jackson snapped. “All I’m trying to drive home is that robbin’ a bank or bustin’ somebody out of jail are pretty ambitious undertakings strictly on their own. Combine ’em together, on top of tearin’ up the town on our way in and out, and you can see we’re gonna have a mighty full plate for only seven men to chew through. If we hit the jail and it turns out that—for whatever reason—Arlo ain’t in there, we will have wasted a lot of precious time and put ourselves at extra risk for nothing.”

  Modello eyed him. “So by goin’ in smarter, you’re sayin’ we need to make sure what the situation is with Arlo.”

  “That’s part of it. The biggest part. In general, though, it also wouldn’t hurt to have some idea about the mood of the town. Are they expecting another try on the bank? Or on tryin’ to break Arlo out of jail, if that’s where he is? Are they makin’ preparations for any of that? If so, what kind? . . . See what I mean?”

  “I see, yeah,” said Modello, making a sour face. “But how the hell are we supposed to find out any of that? We’ve been on the run or hidin’ out ever since we hightailed it out of there amidst flyin’ bullets early this mornin’.”

  Jackson arched a brow. “That’s kinda my whole point. We don’t know a damn thing about what we left behind. Before we go tearin’ back in, we oughta find out.”

  “Which brings us right back to how,” said Greer.

  “By holdin’ off long enough for one of us to go back and do some sniffin’ around. See what the mood is, what the talk is,” Pete pointed out.

  In response to Stuben’s remark, Greer said, “And just which one of us would go waltzin’ back in there and do all this sniffin’? Whoever did would not only be takin’ one hell of a risk for himself but would also risk queerin’ the whole deal for the rest of us.”

  “Not necessarily,” said Jackson. “Ironically, not only does Stuben have the right idea, I think he is probably the best candidate for pulling it off.”

  “How so?” said Modello.

  Jackson grinned somewhat whimsically. “Just look at him. Yeah, he’s a bit of a handsome rascal—not as handsome as he thinks he is, mind you, and not so much that it makes him stand out to the point of it bein’ a problem. Otherwise, he’s about as average as you can get. Average height, average build, and so on. The way we were spurrin’ our horses back and forth during the raid this morning, especially after the gun smoke started gatherin’ so thick it was like a murky haze, I don’t believe anything about him would’ve stuck in anybody’s mind enough for him to be recognized if he showed up in Rattlesnake Wells again. So he goes to a saloon gaming table, does his gamblin’ thing—makin’ sure not to draw attention by bein’ a big winner—and in the course of listenin’ and observin’ he should be able to get a pretty good handle on the things it would be good for us to know.”

  Modello had begun nodding his head even before Jackson was finished talking. “I gotta admit I wasn’t so sure at first, but I like the sound of it. It seems like something that would work and would provide us some important details we can’t be sure of otherwise. You up for bein’ the one who goes in, Stuben?”

  The former gambler didn’t need a lot of time to come back with his answer. “Sure. I think it’s a good idea, too. Plus, from my standpoint, it’ll be kinda nice to sit down at a card table again, even if it’s only for a little while.”

  “What about those wanted papers on your head,” said Ainsley. “Don’t you risk bein’ spotted on account of them?”

  Stuben smiled wryly. “Lotta time and hard miles between then and now, Ernie. I’ve changed. Besides, this is a boomtown we’re talkin’ about, remember? So many new faces passing through that mine—even in spite of my dashing good looks—won’t draw a second glance. Except from the ladies, of course.”

  “Just remember what got you on those wanted posters in the first place,” Jackson said.

  “Don’t worry, I’m not likely to forget that.”

  “Good. See to it you don’t,” said Modello. “Otherwise, it’s a done deal. You head in at first light. The rest of us will be waitin’ here, anxiouslike, to hear your report when you get back.”

  Even Johnny Three Ponies, the only gang member who hadn’t spoken during any part of the discussion—which wasn’t necessarily unusual since he seldom spoke more than a dozen words on any given day—gave a final nod of approval and muttered, “It is a good idea.”

  Chapter 15

  Bob Hatfield slept considerably better on the cot in the cramped storeroom off one end of the cell block than he’d expected. Most surprising, thoughts of those long-ago events in Texas that had haunted the corners of his mind all day did not pay any visits to his dreams. In fact, as far as he could remember, he hadn’t dreamed at all. That, in itself, wasn’t especially unusual. Sometimes he dreamed, sometimes he didn’t; it se
emed to go in streaks. He was particularly glad he hadn’t—at least, not the Texas dreams he’d more or less anticipated.

  Like always, he rose with the sun. Since he hadn’t bothered to undress for a turn on the lumpy cot, all he had to do was pull his boots on before making his way into the office area. Once he had some coffee brewing, he went back into the cell block to clean up for the day. The washstand was shared with prisoners, at least the ones who weren’t so far removed from soap and water that using the facility would have been too distasteful to contemplate, for all parties concerned.

  Bob made no special effort to be quiet as he performed his morning ablutions, yet there were no signs that his moving about in any way disturbed Sanders. On the other side of the bars, the prisoner lay on his back on his cot, forearm over his eyes, and continued to snore peacefully. Through the storeroom door he’d left open a crack, Bob had heard that same snoring buzz on the couple occasions he’d wakened during the night. It occurred to him that, for somebody who boasted so boldly about jail not being able to hold him, Sanders sure seemed at ease while he was penned up.

  Returning to the office area, Bob unlocked the front door, poured himself a cup of coffee, and sat down at his desk. He regretted not being home for his standard morning treat of adding milk and sugar. He regretted not being home for a lot of other reasons, too, but the sacrifices a lawman sometimes had to make included more than the risks and danger that came with the job.

  Thinking of those things and the excitement others tended to see in them caused Bob to recall the excitement displayed by his son Bucky when the boy had gotten out of school yesterday and came rushing to hear the details of the raid and the bank robbery attempt. A smile played across the marshal’s lips as he recalled the pride Bucky had displayed for the role his dad had played in ruining the plans of “the bad guys.” A father always wants his son to be proud of him. The flip side of that, unfortunately, was the devastation that would hit Bucky if anything ever happened to his father. The boy had already been forced to endure the loss of one parent.

  Thinking about the danger element, Bob’s mouth formed a thin, tight line. Although he found a great deal of satisfaction in being the marshal of Rattlesnake Wells, now and then he considered seeking another line of work—finding a job that would cut down the chances of anything happening to him, not so much for his own sake, but for Bucky’s.

  Bob took another drink of his bitter coffee and shook off the unpleasant turn his thoughts had taken. The best way not to let anything happen to him, he told himself, was to stay prepared and alert and keep from getting distracted by negativity. The same held true for Fred and the new deputies he hoped to bring aboard. Bob felt fairly confident he could convince Bullock and McTeague and their respective council members to go along with hiring the Macy brothers. He just needed to meet with them, pitch his case, and get the matter settled—which he would proceed with as soon as Fred showed up to relieve him.

  Expecting it would take most of the morning to get the matter resolved, he hoped to have some responses to the telegrams he’d sent out to various jurisdictions in order to determine who had the most convincing claim to Arlo Sanders.

  Although he hadn’t said so to anyone else, the marshal couldn’t help thinking there was about a fifty-fifty chance the members of Sanders’s gang still on the loose might return to Rattlesnake Wells in order to make another try on the bank. If their captured leader was still behind bars, that would only increase the odds of them showing up and attempting to break him out at the same time.

  All the more reason for getting some added deputies hired and getting Sanders transferred somewhere else as soon as possible.

  The gold boom had brought enough activity to Rattlesnake Wells to warrant the building of a spur railroad line that fed off the main Union Pacific tracks to the south. Trains traveled the spur line twice a week, sometimes more for a special reason, like the quick run that had come and gone to transport the Bar Double J horses for the Army. The next regularly scheduled train in was due the next day.

  It was probably too much to hope for, but if Bob could get a definitive answer on where to transfer Sanders, then he might be able to get the prisoner shipped off when that train pulled out again. Otherwise it would be three or four more days before he’d have another such opportunity, even if the question of proper claim was resolved.

  That was the potential good news about the next scheduled train.

  The bad news was that riding the same iron horse would be the newspaper reporter and photographer Abe Starbuck had summoned. Bob was looking forward to them about as much as coming down with a case of shingles. The thought of the pending newspaper coverage soured his mood all over again.

  His spirits were lifted only a short time later, however, when the front door opened and Bucky marched in, followed by Consuela bearing another of her straw baskets, a larger one than before. Bob had stopped home after finishing his rounds and checking to make sure the wagons containing the banished pimps and their women had left town, but Bucky was already in bed asleep. Bob had missed tucking him in and saying their evening prayers together, a routine they’d begun when Priscilla was still alive and had maintained ever since her passing.

  He was happy to see his son off to school and knew he had Consuela to thank for arranging it.

  “G’ morning, Pa. We got up early so we could come down and have breakfast with you,” Bucky announced, confirming Bob’s thoughts.

  “I hope it is okay,” said Consuela. “This early, I didn’t think you would be too busy to have a little time.”

  “Of course not,” Bob assured her. “No better way to start a day than with my two favorite people.”

  Consuela smiled. “I’ve got boiled eggs and fresh baked biscuits with honey. And I brought a little jar with some sugar and milk stirred together inside it for your coffee.”

  “You hear that, Bucky?” Bob said. “There is a woman who thinks of everything.”

  As Consuela was spreading out the contents of her basket on Bob’s desk, Bucky was pulling up chairs for them to sit on.

  “I also brought food for the prisoner,” said Consuela.

  “He can wait,” Bob told her.

  Once they’d begun eating, Consuela prodded Bucky. “Don’t you have something you wanted to tell your father?”

  “Oh, yeah. In all the excitement yesterday, I forgot to tell you the good news, Pa—I passed my geography test.” He paused, scowling earnestly. “It wasn’t real great, I only got a C minus. But that’s passing. And Mr. Fettleford said if I keep workin’ as hard as I did these past couple weeks he knows I can bring it up even higher.”

  Bob grinned. “I know you can, too. I also know how hard you worked to get it that far, so I’m darn proud of you.”

  “And there’s more. I looked and looked but I couldn’t find no country that started with the letter Q. So I finally asked Mr. Fettleford, like you said I could, and you know what? He couldn’t think of one, either. He had to dig and dig through practically every geography book he has before he finally found one. Even then he said it kinda didn’t count as a real country. He called it a monarchy. Said it’s a peninsula—whatever that is—somewhere over in Arabia, called Qatar. It’s pronounced like Cutter he says, but it’s spelled Q-A-T-A-R.”

  “Well,” said Bob, twisting his mouth ruefully, “I don’t have much choice but to take his word for it. The spelling, the way it’s pronounced, and the whole ball of wax. Reason being, after I sicced you on it, I was dogged if I could come up with anything myself.”

  Consuela arched a brow somewhat chidingly. “Maybe next time you will think twice before challenging the boy with a puzzle you cannot solve.”

  “Maybe,” Bob said. “Or maybe next time I just won’t admit it.”

  * * *

  Fred Ordway arrived, reporting for duty, just as Consuela and Bucky were leaving. When he heard Consuela had brought breakfast, the fear that he’d missed out made him look crestfallen. Only upon learning some b
iscuits and honey had been set aside for him was he able to heave a big sigh of relief.

  The morning was Bucky’s first chance to get a look at Fred’s blackened eyes. The colorization was in full bloom—a deep, purplish, almost black hue—making them quite a sight to behold. For a few minutes, Bucky seemed almost as awestruck just looking at the display as he was by hearing another telling of how Fred got the shiners.

  Shortly after Consuela and Bucky were gone, Bob ran the idea of hiring the Macy brothers as added deputies past Fred. Although he hadn’t yet met Peter or Vern, Fred was perfectly comfortable with Bob’s judgment. As long as he was assured that he would be considered the chief deputy, he more than welcomed the thought of having some added help in keeping the peace around town.

  Shortly thereafter, Bob headed out to call on Bullock and McTeague and other necessary council members in order to make his pitch.

  Like he had anticipated, it took most of the morning to get full authorization for the hiring. It wasn’t that the idea met with any strong resistance, it just took time to contact all the necessary folks and get their buy-in. Some had reluctance when it came to the proposal of hiring two new deputies, but Abe Starbuck, who logically was the treasurer for the Old Town council, helped overcome that when he made the offer for the bank to put up part of the second deputy’s salary on the proviso that said individual would spend at least half of his time serving as an on-site guard for the bank. Bob had no trouble agreeing. He found it a very sensible idea.

  Part of the morning was also taken up by matters involving the young woman he had rescued from the tent wreckage the previous night. He stopped by Dr. Tibbs’s office to check on her, and found her very much awake and very frightened. She was proving quite a handful for the doctor when it came to preventing her from running away. The fact that she didn’t understand a word being spoken to her—and vice versa—didn’t help the situation any.