Curse of Skull Canyon

by Peter Brandvold

  “No!” Lonnie wanted to shout at the tops of his lungs. But it was like shouting in a dream. He couldn’t seem to get the words out. It was as though a large, wet rag had been shoved into his mouth.

  “Gonna take him back to town, Sheriff?” Brocius asked.

  “Oh, yeah,” Halliday said, scowling down at Lonnie, slowly nodding his head.

  Lonnie glanced around. Kinch, Engstrom, and Marshal Appleyard lay belly down over the backs of their horses. The horses stood around Lonnie and the three men now. The General stood nearby, head down, staring at Lonnie skeptically, switching his tail nervously.

  “Oh, yeah.” Halliday shook his head. “I don’t care how young he is. That feral pup is gonna stand trial for murder.”

  “If he lives,” Madsen said, chuckling. “That’s a nasty crease on his temple there.” He raised his voice as he gazed down at Lonnie. “Hey, kid, you hear me?”

  Then all went dark again. When Lonnie awoke, he was riding slumped forward in his saddle. His wrists were tied to his saddle horn. His boots were tied to the stirrups. Halliday was leading the General by his bridle reins. The two Pinkertons rode to either side of the sheriff.

  The men were talking and chuckling like old pals as they rode, easing down out of the mountains. Lonnie looked around to get a fix on where they were, but then a big, black hand closed over his face, and when he woke again, he was in a jail cell.

  He lifted his head, wincing against the throbbing pain slicing deep into his skull from his temple and setting all his nerves on fire. The cell wobbled around him.

  Though his vision was fuzzy, he recognized the sheriff’s office in Arapaho Creek. He’d been in this very cell roughly a year ago, when he’d been arrested for the murder of one of the two deputies who’d mistaken him for one of Dupree’s gang.

  Well, here he was again . . .

  He squinted his eyes to see a man sitting at the rolltop desk against the jailhouse’s front stone wall, to the left of a window through which buttery mountain light angled. The man at the desk had his back to Lonnie. It was a broad back clad in a dark-brown wool vest over a pinstriped cream shirt. A white bandage was wrapped around the top of the man’s head. Brown hair streaked with gray fell out from beneath it to curl onto his shirt collar.

  Smoke curled up from the pipe the man was smoking as he crouched over the desk, writing on a notepad.

  Lonnie looked more closely around his cell to see that a hide-bottom chair angled up beside his cot. A light, fawn-colored leather jacket hung from the back of the chair. He could smell a familiar, subtle, flowery fragrance. Casey was standing to his right, staring out the barred window. She was partly silhouetted against the bright sunlight, but her blonde hair sparkled like liquid gold.

  She turned her head toward Lonnie and jerked with a little start.

  “You’re awake.” Casey sat in the chair. She crouched forward, gazing at Lonnie, eyes bright with concern. “This is probably a silly question, but how do you feel?”

  “Reckon I’ve felt some better,” Lonnie said, pushing himself up a little higher on the cot, which hung out from the cell wall on iron chains.

  There was a small, wooden table to his right. A basin sat on the table. Casey reached over to the basin, plucked a cloth out of the water, and wrung it out.

  “That’s a nasty cut on your head, Lonnie. You’re lucky you didn’t bleed to death. Doc Hagen said he got you stitched up just in time. He’ll be around soon to change your bandage.”

  Hearing the two of them talking, Halliday turned in his chair. “Well, well,” the sheriff said. “You’re still kicking, huh, kid?”

  Both his eyes were discolored and slightly swollen, the right one more than the left one.

  “No thanks to you,” Lonnie said. He’d spoken too loudly. The noise clanged inside his head, battering his tender brain plate.

  “Lonnie, that’s enough,” Casey said, stretching the damp cloth across his forehead, which he now realized had a bandage wrapped around it, same as Halliday. “Don’t you think you’re in enough trouble?”

  Halliday chuckled, shaking his head. His chair squawked as he turned back around to face his desk and his paperwork.

  Lonnie had a feeling he knew the answer to the question, but he asked, anyway: “What kind of trouble am I in, Casey? What did Halliday say I did, exactly?”

  Casey pressed the cloth against his forehead. She stared down at him sadly, lips pursed. “You just rest up, Lonnie. No need to hear about it just yet. Later, when you’re stronger.”

  Lonnie placed his hand on hers. “Tell me.”

  Casey drew a deep breath. She glanced over her shoulder at Halliday, who had his back to them again. She turned to Lonnie.

  “Well, Lonnie Gentry, you’re really in the soup this time. You’ve been charged with the cold-blooded murder of three men, including a deputy United States marshal. Your trial is due to take place just as soon as you can walk.”

  CHAPTER 36

  “Casey,” Lonnie said, squeezing her wrist. “You gotta listen to me. You’re the only one I can trust.”

  He glanced at the sheriff who was still hunkered over his paperwork, filling the office with the aromatic smell of pipe tobacco. The sheriff didn’t appear to be listening to the conversation in the cell, but Lonnie knew he was. He was trying to catch every word.

  That’s why Lonnie kept his voice low.

  “Casey, I didn’t kill nobody,” he whispered, staring at the girl with desperation. “It was him—Halliday. He shot Kinch and his old prison pal, Engstrom after he shot the marshal.”

  Casey glanced over her shoulder at Halliday. “Why would he do that, Lonnie?”

  “Why do you think? Because he wanted to take the gold for himself. Kinch showed me where it was. I dug it up. But then Halliday and Marshal Appleyard rode up on us. That’s when Halliday shot all three of ’em. He had me rebury the money. Now, if we can get someone to ride out to that canyon and . . .”

  Lonnie stared at Casey, who regarded him with a weird expression. “Casey,” he said, “you believe me, don’t you?”

  His head was suddenly aching even more than before.

  His stomach felt tight and raw.

  “Casey,” he urged, squeezing her wrist. “Answer me.”

  “Sure, Lonnie,” she said, regarding him as though he were a strange language she was trying to interpret. She pulled her wrist free of his grip and ran both hands down her face, shaking her hair back from her cheeks. “Of course, I do. It’s just . . .”

  “Just what?”

  “It’s just . . . that . . . why would Halliday think he could get away with taking all that gold? I mean, there are so many men after it. The US Army is after it! How far would he think he could get?”

  “That’s why he had me rebury it after I dug it up for Kinch,” Lonnie said, leaning far toward her.

  Keeping his voice low was a hard feat, for he desperately wanted . . . needed . . . to convince Casey of the truth.

  “He wants to let some time pass before he goes after it. So no one gets suspicious. Now, with Kinch dead, everybody . . . includin’ the army . . . will likely give up on that gold. It’ll go back to bein’ just one more legend in the Never Summers. Halliday intends to resign his job here in a few months and ride out and dig up the loot and live high on the hog in San Francisco!”

  Casey just stared at him, confused.

  “Casey, for god’s sake—you have to believe me, of all people!”

  The girl brushed befuddled fingers across her forehead. “Lonnie, I want to believe you. But you have to admit, that sounds a little far-fetched.”

  “Sure, it does. But that’s the story. Halliday told me what he was going to do. Gold will make folks do desperate things.”

  “Yes, it will.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Casey glanced once more at Halliday and then turned back to Lonnie, gazing at him with renewed gravity. “Lonnie, why did you really want to ride back to that canyon yesterday? Was it rea
lly to find the body of Cade McLory?”

  Lonnie studied her. He felt the chinking in his own armor begin to grow brittle.

  “Yes,” he said, finally, after studying his hands for a time. “Yes, it was. But I gotta admit I was sort of wanting to see about finding the gold my own self.”

  Casey pursed her lips, her cheeks dimpling.

  “But I had no intention of keeping it for myself, Casey. I promise. I was only wanting the reward for turning it in!”

  Tears began veiling Casey’s eyes as she now began to study Lonnie with a vague sort of sadness. She canted her head to one side. And then, with a sharp stab of mental agony, he knew what she was thinking about.

  Last year, during their trek over the mountains with Dupree’s loot, they were helped by a cynical, old, ex-Confederate soldier, Wilbur Calhoun. Calhoun had lived alone with his dog in the mountains for years, having run away from the nearly destroyed South and his own dark past in the years after the war. For a brief time, Calhoun had half-convinced Lonnie that he and Casey should take the stolen money for themselves.

  Casey was remembering that momentary weakening in Lonnie’s character. He could see it in the girl’s heartbroken gaze.

  A single tear dribbled down her cheek.

  Staring at Lonnie, she sniffed, brushed the tear from her cheek with the back of her hand, and said, “Sheriff Halliday, I think I’d like to go, now, please.”

  Halliday rose from his chair. He grabbed a key ring hanging from a ceiling support post, and unlocked the door. He regarded Casey with phony sympathy. “I don’t blame you a bit, Miss Stoveville. Kind of hard to take, ain’t it? Seein’ a boy with his whole future ahead of him ruin everything out of plum meanness and greed . . .”

  Casey slipped into her jacket. She turned once more to Lonnie, who stared at her in shock. How could she could believe Halliday? But, then, he supposed it was understandable, given that he’d actually entertained the notion of running off with the loot from the Golden bank. He had only himself to blame for that.

  “Casey, don’t believe him,” Lonnie urged. “He’s a killer. In two, three months, he’ll leave town—you can bet the bank on that. He’s gonna go dig up the gold and hightail it!”

  Halliday opened the door. As Casey stepped out, sniffing, Halliday scowled at Lonnie, shaking his head in phony disappointment. “How he does go on. I’m sorry, Miss Stoveville.” He closed the door, turned the key in the lock. “In the boy’s defense, he grew up hard. Livin’ out in them mountains will drive full-grown men crazy. Here, he’s only fourteen. He lost his pa. Now he’s livin’ with his ma who is, as I reckon you know, less than . . . well, less than what you’d call a perfect mother. Raisin’ that killer Dupree’s child . . .”

  “I know,” Casey said quietly, closing her upper teeth over her bottom lip as she gazed up at the sheriff. “I did expect more from him, though. After all we’d been through together, I’d thought he’d grown, matured.”

  She turned her disenchanted gaze at Lonnie. It was like a cold, hard slap across Lonnie’s face.

  “But, like you said, he’s had it tough out there.” Casey returned her gaze to the sheriff. “Sheriff Halliday, what . . . what do you think will happen . . . if the judge finds him guilty, I mean? He’s only fourteen years old. Surely his age must be considered.”

  “I don’t know,” Halliday said. “I for one am going to ask the judge to go as easy as he can on him. But . . . you know, there is the problem of his killing that deputy last year.”

  “That was in self-defense!” Lonnie yelled, sitting up now on the edge of his cot. He winced at the brutal assault his yell dealt his battered head. “And it was an accident besides!”

  Quietly, reasonably, Casey said, “The judge must take into consideration that Lonnie was responsible for returning the stolen bank money to Golden.”

  “Oh, I’ll make sure he knows all about that. The problem is, Miss Stoveville, we both probably know that if you, the sheriff’s daughter, hadn’t been such a good influence on him—well, who knows where he might have taken that money?”

  Halliday turned his dark, accusing look at Lonnie. Anyone else would probably have only seen the dark side of that look. The phony side. But Lonnie saw the mockery deep in the man’s eyes, as well, and it caused rage to boil up in him.

  “You bastard, Halliday,” Lonnie said. “You no-good rotten bastard!”

  CHAPTER 37

  “Lonnie,” Casey said, stomping her foot down. “Cursing the sheriff isn’t going to help your situation one bit!”

  “Please, Miss Stoveville,” Halliday said, taking the girl by her shoulders and steering her toward the office’s front door. “You’d best go. You don’t need to hear any more of what that criminal has to say. You’re a fine young lady, and you shouldn’t mix with the likes of that . . . that . . . kill—!”

  Halliday cut himself off when a knock sounded on the door. The door opened and none other that Casey’s fancy Dan poked his head into the office.

  Seeing Casey, fancy Dan’s eyes widened. He smiled and removed his hat. “Ah, Casey, there you are. Mister Hendrickson said I’d find you over here. I just stopped by to see if I could take you to lunch.”

  He glanced past Casey and the sheriff, and scowled at Lonnie, as though he were scrutinizing dog dung on his boots.

  “That’s sweet of you, Niles, thank you,” Casey said, giving the fancy Dan a weak smile.

  She glanced once more at Lonnie, a little sheepishly, and walked over to where her suitor waited by the door.

  “You two kids have a good time, now!” Halliday called after them.

  The fancy Dan, the banker’s son, pinched his hat brim to the sheriff, glanced once more, distastefully, at Lonnie, and followed Casey out of the office. When he’d closed the door behind him, Halliday strode over to Lonnie, laughing, kicking his boots out happily, planting his fists on his hips.

  “Now, see that—you’re just a disappointment all the way around! Oh, well—don’t worry about Miss Stoveville. Looks like the banker’s son will keep her distracted.” Halliday whistled. “That girl sure is purty—ain’t she? A shame you made her so unhappy. Maybe she’ll feel a little better about it all, once the judge decides to play cat’s cradle with your head.” The sheriff laughed.

  A red haze of fury dropped down over Lonnie’s eyes. He bounded up off the cot and ran to the cell door, wrapping his hands around the bars and bellowing, “I’m gonna kill you, Halliday! If it’s the last thing I do, I’m gonna kill you!”

  Just then the office door opened and a pudgy, little man in a slouch hat and cream-colored suit with a red foulard tie walked into the office. He scowled warily at Lonnie, tapping ashes from the dynamite-sized cigar he held in his pale, pudgy fist. He wore a gold ring on his little finger.

  “Good lord—is that the little miscreant there?”

  Halliday swung around to the man. He switched demeanors as quickly as changing hats. Turning his mouth corners down and wagging his head, he sighed and said, “Judge Peabody, meet Lonnie Gentry. Full of vim an’ vinegar even with that notch I carved across his wooden head.”

  Gritting his teeth against the pain in his temple, Lonnie swung slowly around, more crestfallen than he’d ever been, and dropped back down on the edge of his cot. He leaned forward and took his head in his hands.

  “Listen here, young man,” Peabody said, striding up to the door of Lonnie’s cell and glowering at the boy inside. “It would do you to be on your very best behavior. And I would not consider threatening the county sheriff before you’re due to go on trial for murder very good behavior at all!”

  Lonnie merely sighed and shook his head, staring at the floor.

  The judge turned to Halliday. “I see he’s conscious now, anyway.”

  “That he is, Judge. That he is. Oh, and, uh . . . just so you know—that was good behavior for him.”

  The judge shook his head.

  “Why don’t we go ahead and try him tomorrow, then? I have to be in Denver by
the end of the week for a meeting with the governor.” Peabody turned to Lonnie, and snarled like a bobcat caught in a leg trap. “The governor is making sure that we judges and law enforcement officers are tightening the reins on the criminal element all across this great territory of ours. We’ve had enough crime. We must bring civilization to the frontier. A peaceful, harmonious future is ours only if we haze the rats into their holes!”

  He turned back to Halliday. “I’m having my gallows wheeled up to Arapaho Creek. Should be squawkin’ through the mountains right now. They’re pulling it up from Benson, where I hung three claim jumpers only yesterday.”

  Lonnie jerked his head up. “You can’t hang me. I’m only fourteen years old!”

  “They’ll set it up out on Main Street,” the judge continued to Halliday. He looked at Lonnie and poked his cigar into his mouth. “Just in case, mind you. Just in case . . .”

  Lonnie was flabbergasted. “I’m only fourteen years old!”

  “The kid has a point, Judge. He’s only fourteen years old. You can’t hang a boy so young!” The sheriff was a darn good actor. He sounded like he really meant it, though the boy also knew that the sheriff was resisting the tremendous urge to cast Lonnie a furtive wink. “Keep in mind his home life has been less than, well, stable. His mother is somewhat of, uh . . . Jane-about-the-mountains.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard about his home life,” Peabody said, blowing more smoke. “Too bad, too bad. Of course, I’ll take that into consideration.”

  “Thanks, Judge. There might be a chance of turning the little killer around . . . however slim,” Halliday said.

  Lonnie glared at the sheriff.

  “I can only consider the evidence, Sheriff.” Peabody gave a caustic chuff as he turned again to Lonnie. “In the meantime, I suggest you refrain from threatening the sheriff here with bodily harm. That is not a good testament to your character!”

  The judge poked the cigar back into his little, round, pink mouth, and waddled out of the office.