Clay Nash 6

by Brett Waring

  “You believe ’em?” Nash asked.

  “No.”

  “Well, it could be they’re speakin’ gospel,” Nash said slowly. “The passengers said there were only three or four stayed behind to stuff them into the stage and then make your father climb up into the driving seat. One of the passengers, the cowboy, thought it was Nolan in the lead.”

  “It does not matter!” the girl snapped. She gestured to the rancher. “He was there to start with. They were his men. He is responsible for them!”

  Nash nodded and looked levelly at the rancher. “She’s right about that, Hansen,” he said.

  Hansen looked uncomfortable. “Hell, Nash. I tried to explain it just kinda got out of hand. Nolan and his pards took it further than we meant it to go. I don’t want any trouble. I didn’t know what had happened until Link told me. I’ve been thinking all the way in. We were in the wrong, I guess, no gettin’ away from that ...”

  “No, señor!” Merida agreed tightly.

  The rancher swallowed and nodded jerkily at the girl and then continued. “Suppose I offered to pay for the damage to the stage? I mean, I’ve already returned what was in the strongbox. I just want to do what I can to make things right, Nash. Believe me.”

  “You cannot buy your way out of murder!” the girl gritted.

  “Well, ma’am, it weren’t murder. It was an accident, and I never had anythin’ to do with that part,” Hansen replied quietly. “Like Link said, all the fellers that had anythin’ to do with the actual crash and your father’s death are dead themselves. I’m willin’ to compensate Wells Fargo for wreckin’ the stage and so on, and far as I can see, that ought to be the end to it.”

  “You fool! Do you think—do you really believe, that money can make this right?” Merida snapped.

  “Easy, Merida!” warned Nash.

  “Ma’am, I’m tryin’ to tell you that if it’s vengeance you’re wantin’, the men who caused your father’s death are dead themselves! Can’t you savvy that? There’s no one else to blame whose still livin’! I’m just tryin’ to square away with Wells Fargo. Way I see it, that’s all that’s left to do. What do you say, Nash?”

  Nash mulled it over and he saw the tension increasing in the girl.

  “Well, Señor Nash? Why do you hesitate? Why do you not immediately reject his offer?”

  Nash looked at her steadily. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, reasoning. “It’s not as simple as that, Merida. Fact is, it’s not up to me at all.”

  Her frown deepened and he saw puzzlement in her dark eyes, with the smoldering anger burning in them too.

  “Hansen’s made an offer that I’ve got no authority to either accept or reject.”

  “Aaah!” she exploded in disgust, for a moment speechless and Nash went on before she could start her tirade.

  “You’ve got to realize, Merida, Wells Fargo won’t stand by and see their passengers rousted, robbed or raped, or even humiliated like these folk were, but they’re a company, and while Hansen might have to answer some charge for the death of your father, if he wants to make reparation to the company, I’ve just got to pass his offer along to my boss and he’ll take it from there. I’m bound to stick by whatever decision he makes.” The girl’s face was pale, the skin seeming to be drawn tightly over her high cheekbones, the full, passionate lips for the moment almost bloodless. Her gaze was steady on his face.

  “So, it is just another job with you?”

  Nash moved uncomfortably. “Well, it’s a little more than that, I guess, Merida. You did save my life and I owe you plenty, but, like Hansen said, if all the fellers who caused your father’s death are dead, there’s not much point in makin’ this a real slaughter trail. And I did get it from the passengers that most of the bunch rode off and went over a ridge so they couldn’t have known what the others were up to.”

  She thrust a trembling forearm out towards Hansen, her right index finger seeming to stab at him like a knife blade. “He allowed it to happen! He caused it! He’s the one who should pay!”

  “Now wait up, señorita!” protested Hansen. “Hell, how many times do I have to say that I—”

  “Shut up, Hansen!” cut in Nash. “I can savvy Merida’s feelings. It ain’t gonna be easy for her to accept that it could end right here, and I’m only goin’ along with it because it’s company policy to negotiate rather than stir up a mess of unnecessary violence. Left to me, and I’d shoot you like the snake you are ...” He flicked his eyes to Somers. “And you’re hardly worth wastin’ the lead on it’d take to blow you to hell. If you’d done your job in the first place, none of it would’ve happened!”

  Merida’s eyes sparkled, her face brightening. “Kill them now, Nash! Kill them!”

  He shook off her hand on his arm and stepped back so that he could make sure Hansen and Somers weren’t going to make a try for their guns and, at the same time, he was out of reach of the girl. In her emotional state, she could either precipitate a violent showdown or get in the way should Somers or Hansen try to start anything. He kept the rifle barrel hovering between the two men, looked at the fast-breathing girl.

  “Merida, those are my personal feelings. I’ve got a job to do, rules to follow, and like it or not, I’ve got to wire my boss about Hansen’s offer.”

  Her bosom rose and fell rapidly with her emotion as she slitted her eyes and bored her gaze into Nash. Then she turned it to Hansen and finally onto Somers. She glanced once more at Nash and then pushed past him and stormed out of the store, slamming the double doors after her.

  Hansen blew out his cheeks and released a long breath. “Women! For a moment there I thought she was gonna slit my throat!”

  Nash looked at him unsmilingly. “For a moment I was tempted to let her.”

  Hansen’s face straightened and Somers tensed. Nash jerked the rifle barrel towards the door. “Get out, right out of town and back to Triangle H. I’ll wire my boss and let you know what he says. If he rejects your offer and says to bring you in, Hansen, then that’s what I’ll do, make no mistake about it.”

  Hansen met and held his hard gaze. “You’ll have to get past Link.”

  Somers flushed. “Any time, Nash!” he grated. “Any time! I ain’t forgot what you done to me!”

  “You’re not intended to,” Nash told him, then rammed the rifle barrel into his back and shoved him roughly towards the door. “And take your coyotes with you, Hansen. All of ’em.” Hansen paused at the door. “They were just an added precaution, I’m a cautious man, Nash, most times. You tell your boss that. And tell him I don’t want no trouble. Just keep it goin’ nice and easy and everyone’ll be happy.”

  “Except Merida Hernandes,” Nash told him and the smile dropped from Hansen’s face as he stepped out onto the boardwalk and signaled to his men to come out of hiding, that they were heading back for the ranch.

  Link Somers threw Nash one final cold look and went out, slamming the door after him.

  Nash lowered the hammer on the rifle and turned towards McDonald who was coming out of his storeroom, looking around anxiously to make sure nothing had been broken or disturbed.

  “Thanks, Mr. McDonald. If you can just send a wire for me on your telegraph, likely this is the last time I’ll be troubling you.”

  “Then I’ll be thankin’ the good Lord for that!” McDonald said fervently, reaching for notepad and pencil.

  Eight – Square the Debt

  The Triangle H bunch were just clearing the edge of town when Nash came out of McDonald’s store. He watched as they rode out and he counted seven men, which meant that Hansen had had five planted around the roofs and alleys before he had showed himself with Somers. Like he had said, he was a cautious man.

  It galled Nash that he was bound by the company rules in this, but that was the way it went and he had had other jobs in the past that were just as frustrating. He had little doubt that the company would accept Hansen’s offer. They would want to get the matter settled and whether the law wanted to press ch
arges against the rancher and his remaining men for manslaughter was outside of his scope. There were still the actions for compensation from the other passengers, but he figured Wells Fargo would consider making settlements out-of-court. They would do that, as it had been Somers’ fault, as guard, for not protecting the passengers or at least making some sort of token resistance.

  The thing was, he would never get Merida to understand any of this. All she could see was that her father had died because of a drunken prank and she wanted the men who did it nailed to a wall. She would never be satisfied with Hansen’s story that all those who had stayed behind to make the old Mexican drive the stage were now dead. She wanted the death of every man who had been there at all.

  It was going to be one hell of a job convincing her that if she went after Hansen and his crew, then she was acting outside the law. And even if she was lucky enough to get them, without getting herself killed in the meantime, she would be facing a charge of murder.

  He didn’t think it would matter much to her as long as she got the men concerned, but he couldn’t stand by and let her throw her life away.

  Nash went to the hotel where they had intended to stay the night if Hansen and his men hadn’t shown up by sundown. He climbed the stairs and knocked on the door of her room. There was no answer. He knocked again, an ear against the panel, listening for some kind of movement inside.

  “Merida?” he called. Still no reply. He tried the handle and it turned under his grasp. Nash cocked back the hammer on his rifle and used the barrel to ease the door open. He flattened himself against the wall as it swung into the gloomy room.

  “You okay, Merida?” he called.

  Nothing. No sound after the dull thud of the door hitting the wall. Frowning, Nash went in crouching, rifle held in such a way that he could swing the barrel in any direction, but there was no need. The room was empty. Really empty. Her things that she had left there earlier were gone, too.

  Cursing, Nash hurried downstairs to the foyer and called the clerk over. The man was a little nervous as he saw the rifle in Nash’s hand.

  “Señorita Hernandes,” Nash snapped. “You know where she is?”

  The man shook his head swiftly. “No, Mr. Nash ... I’ve just come on for the evening shift. The afternoon man left only five minutes back. He said he was going to the saloon. You might catch him if you hurry.”

  “Balding hombre, in his forties, big waistline, that the one?”

  “Yessir, that’s him. Name of Burton.”

  Nash was already heading for the door. He ran along the darkening walks, looking ahead at the pedestrians, trying to pick out the hotel clerk. He almost cannoned into a man coming out of the doctor’s office and he skidded to a halt to dodge around him. He saw that it was Laramie, the one with the bandaged hand, who had tried to help Kid Regan. The ’breed now had a professional-looking bandage on his hand and he pressed back against the wall warily when he recognized Nash.

  Clay figured he must have stayed behind in town to have the doctor attend to his injured hand. But he had no time for the ’breed now and stepped around him fast, hurrying at an angle across the street towards the saloon. Laramie watched him go and then moved on at a fast pace towards the open doors of the livery.

  Inside the saloon, the barkeep was just lighting the lamps for the night and Nash waited inside the batwings until the man had finished and then looked around the big room at the drinkers. He spotted the fat hotel clerk just sitting down at a corner table where a poker game was starting up. Nash shoved his way through the others and rapped the table with his rifle barrel, startling the men seated there. They looked up at him apprehensively. The fat clerk paled when Nash put his gaze onto him.

  “Señorita Hernandes,” the Wells Fargo man snapped. “Where is she?”

  The clerk swallowed, licked his lips, looked around at his companions who were relaxing now that Nash didn’t want them for anything.

  “Come on, man!” Nash snapped impatiently.

  “Er—I dunno, Mr. Nash, honest,” the clerk stammered. “She went up to her room and I was busy getting ready to change shifts—and, far as I know, she’s still there.”

  Nash shook his head irritably. “Room’s empty. All her things are gone, too. Could she have come down while you were busy and you didn’t see her?”

  “It’s possible, I guess,” the man allowed. “Of course, if she came down the stairs and turned sharp right at the bottom, she could’ve gone out the back way and I sure wouldn’t have seen her.”

  Nash’s lips were clamped tightly together. “She said nothing about leavin’? Didn’t ask to settle the bill or anything?”

  “No sir, nothing at all. Anyway, there was no bill. You only wanted your room and hers for the night, and you paid in advance, if you recollect.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Nash said absently, his mind busy with other things. Then he nodded to the fat clerk. “Okay, thanks for your help.” He glanced around at the others. “Sorry to interrupt your game, gents.”

  He went out of the saloon fast and the men at the poker table wiped their faces with kerchiefs. Burton, the clerk, shook his head slowly.

  “Man, I’m sure glad he wasn’t mad at me! You see how he downed Kid Regan this afternoon? And I hear he handled Matt Hansen and that new gunfighter of his in McDonald’s store like they was a couple of school kids. That feller is one tough hombre and I’m sure glad I never crossed him.”

  The others agreed briefly and then one of them growled that time was getting on and they hadn’t played a single hand of poker yet so how about someone dealing the cards?

  The game got underway.

  Outside, Nash stood by the hitch rail in front of the saloon and looked around the now dark street of Signal. There were few folk abroad now as it was the supper hour and, anyway, there weren’t many places he could look for the girl. His biggest fear was that she wasn’t in town at all and he hurried across to the livery stable and found the stable hand filling the feed bins.

  He nodded to Nash as he recognized him.

  “Won’t keep you a minute. You’ll be wantin’ the black, I guess. The señorita said you’d be along for him.”

  Nash frowned and walked down to the man. “The black? You mean her horse? The one with the lame foreleg?”

  The stable hand frowned and nodded, setting down the sack of oats and coughing a little in the dust cloud rising out of the bin.

  “Yeah, sure, the one you and she brought in with your claybank today.”

  Nash looked around swiftly and then turned back to the man, his face grim. “And where is my claybank?”

  The stable hand blinked. “Why the señorita took it. She said it was okay! I mean, you came in here together and—well, hell, mister, I thought it was all right to let her have it! She said you’d be taking her black but she had to go someplace in a hurry and so you’d decided to swap horses.”

  Nash sighed and stifled the curse that rose to his lips. He waved a hand at the stable hand. “Relax, it’s okay. You did right; no worries there.”

  The man visibly relaxed.

  “How long since she left?” Nash asked casually.

  “Before I started fillin’ these here bins and I’ve done more than half of ’em, so must’ve been a good hour back.” About the time she had stormed out of the store, Nash thought to himself. He had been a damn fool. She had collected her things while he was still talking with Hansen and Somers, taken his horse, and then ridden out of town along the trail she had seen Hansen come in on. Likely she had holed-up somewhere beside it and was now following them back to Triangle H. He didn’t think she would be loco enough to try bushwhacking Hansen from the side of the road when he was surrounded by his men.

  But, once she knew where Triangle H was, she would likely hole-up someplace and start picking off his men one at a time. She wouldn’t know which ones had accompanied him on the trail drive and which ones hadn’t, but that wouldn’t matter to Merida. If they rode for Hansen, in her book, that would
automatically make them guilty. And she would nail them one by one. Until they caught her.

  And he had no illusions about how Matt Hansen would treat her. She would die and it would likely be made to look like an accident, or she would simply disappear off the face of the earth and never be seen again: maybe in a few months or years someone might stumble across her bones in some hidden canyon near Triangle H.

  “Listen, Mr. Nash, I’m sorry if I’ve fouled you up somehow, but she ...”

  The stable hand’s apology broke in on Nash’s thoughts. “No, it’s okay,” he said. “There’s nothin’ wrong. Nothin’ you could’ve done anything about, leastways. Guess you know the way to Triangle H?”

  The man blinked. “Sure, but …”

  “How do I get there?”

  “Too bad you didn’t come along a few minutes earlier. Laramie, the ’breed horse wrangler, just pulled out. Hurt his hand on some chore and had been to the sawbones to have it seen to.”

  “I saw him. Just tell me how to get there.”

  The stable hand nodded. “I can do that, all right, but you’ll never find it at night.”

  Nash frowned. “About half moon, if I recollect. That might help.”

  The man still looked very dubious. “Wouldn’t risk that trail myself at night, and I guess I know it about as well as anyone in town. Be no trouble to Hansen and his crew, but you could ride clear off some of them bends where it crosses the hills.”

  Nash swore.

  “That’s gospel, Mr. Nash. It’s mighty dangerous. You’d either come to grief of you’d have to give up and camp on the trail till daylight, anyway. You’d be better off stayin’ over in town here and startin’ out at first light. Much safer and quicker too.” Nash thought about it. He figured the girl couldn’t do much tonight. She would follow Hansen’s bunch and find somewhere to hole-up and then start her sniping when they started moving around after sunup. He just hoped she didn’t walk the claybank off one of those bends the stable hand was talking about.

  “Yeah, okay, I guess it makes sense. You draw me a map while I cancel my room at the hotel. I’ll sleep in your loft if you have no objections.”