“Okay, but first I gotta say one thing. I gotta tell you how sorry I am for ditching you in that Colorado mining town the way I done. I thought about it a lot afterwards . . . after it was too late. It sickened me to have to face what a lowdown thing I done. I . . . I hated to think it, but I didn’t even know if you’d survived. Seeing you now, I thank God that you did. I still don’t know how, but—”
“That’s enough, Arlo,” Libby cut him off. “It wasn’t easy, and I can tell you that God didn’t have a whole lot to do with it. But I don’t want to go back over it now. I spent a long time getting past it and taking part of the blame on myself... I managed. That’s all that counts.”
“Yes. Yes, you did,” said Sanders, half-sobbing. “You managed, you survived. And now you’re here. You came to me in my hour of need.”
“You realize I can’t do much for you but offer some words of comfort and tell you that . . . well, I never stopped loving you.”
“It’s hard to believe how you could . . . but it’s soothing to hear.”
“Oh, you can bet there was a long spell where I told myself I hated you. It never really took, not down deep. And, like I said, I saw where I had to shoulder part of the blame myself.”
“Not as much as me. Never close. I was the dirty dog who ran out and left you.”
“Well, I don’t intend to run out on you,” Libby assured him. “Not now. Not until . . . well, until this is over. I’ll be here in town. I’ve got a room at the Shirley House Hotel. I’ll come see you every day.” She turned her head and looked at Bob. “Will that be all right, Marshal?”
“I suppose,” Bob said somewhat reluctantly. “As long as you keep your visits short and don’t stir up any trouble. That goes for you, too, Sanders. You give me or my deputies trouble over anything, I’ll put a stop on the visits in a hurry.”
“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind, Marshal,” Sanders said.
Bob thought he caught a trace of sarcasm in the tone. He pushed away from his leaning position against the wall and said to Libby, “I think that’s enough for now, Mrs. Sanders, if for no other reason than—from the way it sounds outside—that storm’s gonna hit any minute and you’d best be back at your hotel before it does.”
For a moment she looked like she wanted to argue the point, then gave Sanders a quick kiss through the bars. “I’ll see you tomorrow, hon.” Turning away from his cell, she fell in step behind Bob and they went on out into the office area, closing the heavy door behind them.
Sanders sat down on the cot and waited a full five minutes, making sure no one was going to pop back in, before he carefully opened the tightly folded piece of paper Libby had slipped into his right fist the very first moment she’d placed her hands over his. In tiny letters, a message was printed that read Be ready. We’re coming to get you out later tonight.
Sanders read the message through twice and then sat there for a long time, not moving, his mouth curved in a wide, thin wolf’s smile.
Chapter 29
Fred and Peter returned from making their rounds just as the front edge of the storm reached the town.
“Whooee!” exclaimed Fred as he hurried into the office with thin rivulets of rain running off the brim of his hat. “It is turning nasty out there!”
Entering behind him, slamming the door hard against the howling gusts of wind, Peter added, “Turning nasty now, with worse yet on the way. You oughta see the lightning show off to the west—poppin’ and sizzlin’ out of the sky like the Fourth of July.”
In accordance with the instructions Bob had given Fred, Peter had on a new rain slicker, already shiny wet. He had a second such garment, neatly folded, under one arm. This he tossed to his brother, saying, “Here. You’re gonna need this if you go out on the next set of rounds.”
“Apart from the weather, how is it out there?” said Bob. “What kind of activity is taking place around town?”
“Awful quiet,” replied Fred, shrugging out of his own bulky slicker and carrying it over to hang it on a peg next to where Bob had hung his earlier. “The storm’s got everybody sort of hunkered in close and tight. Only a handful of customers in Bullock’s, nothing like it usually would be. Little livelier up in New Town. You know how those miners are hell-bent on having their fun, no matter what, when they get down out of the hills. But even there, in the saloons and gambling dens, it’s a little slower than normal. And all those tents up and down Gold Avenue? Boy, are they flapping and shivering and shuddering in this wind. Wouldn’t be surprised if some of them don’t tear loose and end up over in Nebraska somewhere before this is over.”
“I checked on ours while we were in the area,” Peter reported to his brother. “It seemed staked down good and tight. I think it’ll be okay.”
“I hope so,” said Vern. “Hate to have to go all the way back to Nebraska to chase it down.”
Turning back from hanging up his slicker, Fred pulled a couple folded sheets of paper out of his shirt pocket and handed them to Bob. “Feeney hailed me when we were going by and asked me to bring these to you. One of them telegraphs is about your friend Marshal Brock, the other’s about a prison break at the federal pen outside Laramie. Sounds like they’re having their own share of excitement down that way.”
Bob took the damp-edged papers and gave them a quick read-through. “Well, well. This one concerning Brock is in response to a wire I sent out early this morning. Turns out the things Sanders told me about him and my own hunch that he seemed fishy somehow were solid. According to this, Brock hasn’t had the legal standing to pack that U.S. marshal’s badge for more than a year now. For reasons of ‘misrepresentation, ’ it says.”
“The way he’s been flashing it under everybody’s nose ever since he hit town, is a continuation of the very same,” said Fred. “Making it illegal, right?”
“Yup.”
“So we gonna arrest him for it?”
Bob said, “Since the thing Brock seems to want most of all is to get his hands on Sanders, slapping him into a cell right next door could amount to playing right into his hands, don’t you think?”
Fred scowled. “Yeah, I guess it would.”
“So, unless he pushes it too far, I think we’ll hold off on taking any action against him.”
“Mind cluing us in on who and what you’re talkin’ about?” said Vern.
Bob gave the brothers a quick rundown on the phony marshal, concluding with, “Although Sanders won’t say what, he did something in the past that left Brock with a deep, long-simmering grudge that he’s driven to try and settle—even if he has to step outside the boundaries of the law to get it done.”
“Yeah, that’s the way with those fellas named Vern or Vernon,” said Peter, throwing a friendly dig into his brother. “They can be as stubborn and single-minded as a mule . . . and usually not much better lookin’.”
Vern calmly reached out and flipped up the shoulder flap of the slicker Peter still had on, causing some of the accumulated rainwater to splash over the back of Peter’s neck and down inside his shirt collar. Peter danced away, howling as the cold water trickled down his spine.
“Go ahead and enjoy some horseplay now if you want,” Bob told them, “but if you run across this Vernon Brock, don’t take him lightly. He’s shifty and he’s been on Sanders’s trail for quite a spell. Means he’s not the type to give up easy.”
“You sure he’s even still in town?” said Fred. “I haven’t seen him around all day.”
“He’s around,” Bob said. “He’s staying at the Shirley House Hotel and was hanging out in the bar there earlier this afternoon.”
“Don’t worry, Marshal. We’ll keep our eyes peeled and we’ll take it mighty serious if we run across him,” said a suddenly somber Vern.
Fred frowned. “What about those escaped convicts? I said that was excitement for down Laramie way but, when you stop and think about it, that ain’t all that far from us. You don’t think there’s any chance they could show up around here, do you?”
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“It’s not impossible, I suppose,” said Bob, “but I’d say it’s pretty unlikely. Make more sense that they’d head for the tall and uncut off to the west.”
“Yeah, I reckon. If this storm is reaching down that far, they’re probably holed up somewhere and not on the move at all.”
Speaking of the storm, it was howling with steadily increasing ferocity outside. Through the seams of the jail building’s shuttered windows, brilliant flashes of lightning could be seen. And the low, almost constant grumble of thunder was frequently emphasized with resoundingly loud booms.
“Comes to being on the move in this storm,” said Peter, “how do you expect it might figure in the plans of the Sanders gang? Think they might still try something with it ragin’ outside like it is? Or are they more likely to hold off?”
“That’s a good question. One I’ve been wondering about myself,” said Bob. “Was me, I’m thinking I might try to use this storm to my advantage . . . with the whole town hunkered in tight and the thunder and rain hiding the sound of any movement. Be a bear to be out in, but for rugged, desperate men, it could suit their intentions just fine.”
“Boy, there’s an unpleasant thought,” said a sour-faced Fred.
“That’s why we’re forted up here,” Bob reminded him sternly. “Let ’em try what they will. We’ll be ready for ’em.”
* * *
On the bed in Vernon Brock’s hotel room, Brock and Libby Sanders lay partially covered by a thin, badly wrinkled sheet. Brock lay on his back, breathing evenly now, a few beads of sweat still gleaming in the mat of dark hair across his chest. Libby was nestled quietly, contentedly against his side—until, abruptly, she pushed herself up on one elbow, the sheet slipping from her bare shoulders as she reached out to seize the nearly empty bottle of tequila from where it stood on the nightstand.
“Hey. Better start takin’ it easy on that stuff,” Brock advised as she tipped the bottle high and took a long pull.
“Why?” said Libby after lowering the bottle. “We can always get more.”
“It’s not running out of that rotgut I’m worried about,” Brock replied. “You need to stay sharp, keep your wits about you for the business we’ve got ahead of us before much longer.”
Libby replaced the bottle on the stand and resumed her nestling against Brock. “Don’t worry. I can handle my tequila. I took care of business pretty good just a little while ago, didn’t I?”
Brock grinned lewdly. “Yeah, you sure did, but I think that was as much to spite your old man as it was to please me.”
“What difference does it make? You got pleased, didn’t you? Ain’t that the main thing?”
Brock’s grin went away and his mouth compressed into a thin, straight line. “No, it’s not,” he said tightly. “The main thing is gettin’ Arlo out of that jail . . . Then the fun can really begin.”
* * *
On the front range of the Shirley Mountains, in a narrow, steep-walled crevice overhung with pine boughs and rock ledges that shielded most of the pouring rain, five men huddled in a ragged cluster. Their faces were starkly etched by bright flashes of lightning that seemed to sizzle endlessly across the turbulent sky. Their expressions were grim.
“This storm is a bad omen if I ever saw one,” grumbled Bad Luck Chuck Ainsley. “Nothing good can come of tryin’ to pull a job on a night like this.”
“Shut up, Ainsley,” Reese Modello told him. “Nothing good ever comes from your constant bitchin’ and bellyachin’, either, but that never stops you from spoutin’ a steady stream of it.”
“Storm is good,” said Johnny Three Ponies. “Give us extra cover when we go in, wash away our tracks when we go out.”
Ace Greer emitted a raspy chuckle. “Everybody hear that? Johnny don’t say but about ten words a day, but when he does speak, you can bet he knows what he’s talkin’ about. In other words, this is a fine night to pull a bank job . . . providin’ we don’t all drown first.”
“Long as we keep our powder—and, above all, that dynamite—dry,” said Salt River Jackson, “a little rain ain’t gonna hurt us. Matter of fact, for the overripe among us who ain’t partial to soap and water under any other circumstances, it might do some much-needed good.”
Ainsley scowled. “You talkin’ about me, you old mossy horn? I don’t see no swarms of honeybees buzzin’ around you on account of your sweet smell, neither.”
“Don’t start, you two,” warned Modello. “Once we get that bank vault cleaned out, you’ll each have a gob of money in your pocket that will cure any question about lack of soap or overripeness or anything else. Nothing works magic like money. It can make the stinkiest old fart smell fresh as a daisy, or the homeliest mug look handsome as Prince Charming.”
Salt River huffed. “In some cases, I’d say you’re talkin’ more like needin’ a wheelbarrow full of money, not just a pocketful.”
“See?” lamented Ainsley. “He won’t let up.”
“Seems to me,” spoke up Greer, “that before we fret too much over the magical benefits of havin’ money, we’d better first concentrate on what it’s gonna take to get some.”
“Ace is right,” agreed Modello. “We’ve got near two hours until midnight, when we’ll ride out of here and make for town. It wouldn’t hurt to go over one more time the part each of us is gonna play once we reach the bank.”
“Seems unnecessary to me,” grumbled Salt River. “But what the hell, I guess we got nothing better to do.”
“Even though we figure the sidewalks are gonna be rolled up and the town shut down for the night—especially with this storm,” Modello began, “we still want to move fast and precise. In and out, quick as can be.”
“What if the storm has blown on through by the time we get to town?” asked Ainsley.
Modello shook his head. “Won’t really matter. We never figured on it to begin with. Right?”
“Storm will still be there,” said Three Ponies confidently. “It is slow moving, squatting over us now for several more hours.”
“Either way,” Modello went on, “our aim is the same. A quick in and out. You three shooters scramble into place—Three Ponies up on the roof, Ainsley on the edge of the street at the rear, Salt River in the alley at the front—to be ready for dealing with the law dogs and citizens when they come pouring out. While you’re getting in position, Ace and me will be setting the dynamite. As soon as everybody’s ready, we blow the back wall of the building and on through the rear of the safe. You shooters cover us while we’re hauling out the money, then we all ride the hell clear of there.”
“Sounds slick as snot on a pump handle,” declared Greer. “Smash and grab—it’s always the best way.”
Salt River nodded. “I agree with that much. My only concern, and I’m not saying it’s a big one, mind you, is how much we’re counting on rupturing the back panel of the safe when you blast through the wall.”
“It’s worked that way for us in the past,” pointed out Modello. “Plus we’re taking along pry bars and picks. All we need is a rupture, a split, and we can force the opening some more if we have to. Enough for either me or Ace to slip in and start handing money out to the other.”
“Yes, yes. Like you said, that way has worked for us in the past,” Salt River said. “I just wish we had a little more dynamite, that’s all.”
“Now who’s bellyaching and complaining,” muttered Ainsley.
Modello ignored him and said, “Yeah, I wish we had a little more of a lot of things. But we don’t. We lost men and part of our dynamite the other night during our first crack at that damn joint. All we’ve got is what we got. I think it’s plenty to do the job. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t recommend us stickin’ our necks out to try it again.”
Nobody spoke for a minute or so. Lightning sizzled in the sky, thunder cracked.
Finally, Greer said, “Well, by damn, that’s good enough for me. When it’s time, Reese, you say the word . . . we’ll all be ridin’ in there right beside you to
bust that sumbitch wide open.”
Chapter 30
For supper, Fred fixed a pot of beans and chopped ham served with warmed-over sourdough biscuits purchased earlier in the day from the Blue Bird Café just up the street. It was a tasty and filling meal, a good choice for the stormy night. The only potential drawback, as wryly pointed out by Peter—who was proving himself to be a frequent source of good-natured ribbing—was the questionable wisdom of serving beans as the main dish to five men who would be spending the night cooped up together.
Bob, showing his own touch of wry humor, responded, “You fellas have got way more to worry about than me. Fred and Sanders will be together in the cell block; Peter and Vern will be together here in the office area. Me, I’m back in the storeroom by myself and I can close the door.”
* * *
A little before ten, Bob and Vern went out to make the late rounds.
No one could call it a quiet night, not with the storm kicking up the way it was. As far as people activity, things were about as subdued as Bob could ever remember. Even along Gold Avenue not much was going on. Usually, when the miners and prospectors came down out of the lonely hills determined to spend their wages or scrapings of color and let the wolf howl throughout as many nights as it took until they were tapped out again, it was loud and raucous. The most excitement the two lawmen encountered—in a version of what Fred and Peter had described from their earlier outing—was watching three drunks frantically trying to keep their sleeping tent from blowing away in the fierce wind.
In Old Town, not even Bullock’s was drawing much of a crowd. In fact, it was down to one table of five die-hard gamblers trying to make it a profitable night with rounds of five-card stud. A single hostess, either out of a dedicated interest in the game or in hopes of increasing her own night’s profit, was looking on while somewhat wearily attempting to maintain a slinky, tempting presence.
Seated on stools at the bar, Maudie Sartain and Mike Bullock were trying hard not to appear bored but not pulling it off very well.
Rattlesnake Wells, Wyoming Page 17