by Wesley Ellis
Ki and Jessie both had the same idea. They had to get the money and Billy and roll on toward Candelaria. If Billy was hurt badly, they could get him a doctor in the next town. But this one was unhealthy, and if Ki never saw Pine Grove again, it would be all too soon.
“Here, let me help you harness that team, Ki.”
Ki looked up to see Austin Higby. “Do you have any idea where this strap goes?”
“Right here,” the man said, taking it from Ki and attaching it to the traces. “This stuff is pretty tangled up. Somebody must have yanked it off the last team in a hurry.”
Ki straightened up. He had rigged the harness together as fast as he could, knowing that some of it was attached incorrectly. Ki did not greatly concern himself about that fact. As long as the main pieces of harness were in place and the tongue of the Concord was running down the middle, Ki figured that these horses could pull the stage without difficulty. Now, he watched with interest as Higby quickly reset straps and buckles. Ki was pleased to see that he had made very few errors. It took Higby less than five minutes to get the lead team in place and the reins running up to the driver’s seat.
“Where’d you learn all about this?”
Higby smiled. “Been living out West all my life. A man without an honest trade will try anything to keep his belly full. I was once a hostler for Wells Fargo. Drove a little, too.”
“If you are asking to take a turn, I wouldn’t mind some help. Billy is hurt. He got his head cracked open and I think his ribs are also busted.”
Higby nodded. “How many thieves did you have to kill?”
“Four. There are that many more still inside and disarmed. They’ll be coming around soon enough. Rather than strike them again or go to the trouble of tying them up, Jessie and I would just as soon leave.”
“Aren’t you worried about them riding after you?”
Ki thought about how he had struck each man. “They won’t be able to go anywhere this day,” he said. “And by tomorrow, we will be in Candelaria.”
Higby shook his head. “You really must be something with a gun.”
Ki said nothing. It was against the samurai code to brag or in any way reveal his fighting secrets. All he said was, “Jessie and Miss Bonaday did their share, too.”
Higby nodded. “I’ll drive,” he decided out loud. “But I expect to get a refund on my stage fare.”
Ki had to work not to smile. “I think that sounds very reasonable, Mr. Higby. I’m sure we can arrange to refund your money.”
“Good. Then let’s get rolling before those birds inside come flying out of the barn or some of their friends decide to up the ante.”
Ki nodded. “All aboard,” he said, opening the door and helping the women lift Billy inside the coach and lay him out on the front seat.
“Put the strongbox in here with us,” Jessie said.
“Sure,” Ki answered, carrying it to the coach to place it on the floor. “They broke the padlock.”
“So I see.” Jessie reloaded her gun. “If they try for it again, they’ll have us to contend with. And Roxy here is a much better shot than she gives herself credit for.”
Roxy blushed. “You just take care of yourself up there, Ki.”
Her hand lingered on his forearm and he felt her fingers tremble. They were eager for each other in lovemaking and Ki hoped they had the opportunity to sleep together for a night in Candelaria.
“Roxy, Mr. Higby is willing to drive us on to Candelaria if we refund his fare.”
“Did you tell him we are in grave danger?” Jessie asked.
“He knows the situation.”
Roxy reached into her purse and extracted the money that Higby had paid her before he boarded at Mormon Station. “I guess I’m the only one able to authorize Mr. Higby’s refund. Here, give the man his money and express our appreciation.”
Ki took the money and then climbed up onto the driver’s seat beside Higby, who had the lines and was clearly ready to go. “Here’s your seventeen dollars.”
Higby stuffed it into his coat pocket without a word and cracked his whip with authority. The fresh team of horses threw themselves into the traces and the coach jolted forward, gathered speed, and raced out of Pine Grove.
Ki twisted around and looked back at the little mining town. Beyond it and to the north the way they had come was a growing dust cloud on the horizon. Was it Lee Ford and his army of outlaws?
Ki turned back around and looked ahead to the south. A man could drive himself crazy thinking it was all sorts of things. When he was a boy living in Japan under the old ronin, Hirata, Ki had learned the value of not worrying about things over which he had no influence or control. Lee Ford and his men would come as surely as this day’s sunset. And when they did, Ki would then be called upon to protect Jessie, Roxy, and even this stranger beside him willing to risk his life for seventeen dollars.
But until that time, it was pointless to worry. So Ki just made sure that his bow and arrows were ready, the shotgun was loaded, and the surushin rope with its small leather-covered steel balls at each end were tied neatly around his waist. He knew that Jessie would be thinking about every possible avenue of attack and defense. With fresh horses, they might actually be able to outrun any pursuit. In that case, trouble wouldn’t arrive until the return trip to Reno. Ki smiled. That was at least two days from now. A lifetime if used properly.
Lee Ford and his body of fifteen proven gunmen arrived in Pine Grove just in time to see the doctor and the mortician attending their new clients. Lee dismounted heavily, then handed the reins of his lathered mount to one of his riders.
He stepped into the murky darkness of the livery barn and stared in disbelief at the sight of his men lying dead and wounded. J. C. Long had been his best gunmen, but he was finished for good this time. Some of the other men were strangers to Ford, but he knew that they had been first-rate, or they would not have been chosen and paid for by the three major owners of their stage line who lived in Sacramento.
He walked over to one of the injured and knelt beside the man. “Frank, I want to know exactly why you failed,” he rumbled. “No goddamn excuses, just the facts.”
The man was still in agony with crushed testicles that were the result of Ki’s sweep-lotus kick. Speaking between clenched teeth, he described the events to Lee Ford as clearly as he remembered and ended by saying, “I never saw anything like that Chinaman, Lee. His hands were tied behind his back and he still swept through us like a sickle blade.”
“But the women were the ones that shot the others?”
“Yeah. Billy was ours when they burst inside here. Roxy Bonaday killed Everett first shot she took. Bob Hoyt was next. About the time we got our guns out, the other woman was firing from the front door. Between being caught in their cross fire and that sonofabitchin’ Chinese killer, we didn’t have a chance. We thought trappin’ Billy was going to make the rest easy. You shoulda told us what the other three could do.”
Lee Ford scrubbed his face and asked the question that had been troubling him most of all. “What about Austin Higby? Where was he when all this fun was going on?”
“Damned if I know. That yellow coward stayed out of the fight, damn his hide! Why, he even drove the Bonaday stage out of here!”
Lee Ford stood up and, for the first time, he allowed himself a thin smile. “Higby is the only one of you who has any brains. They think he’s their friend now. He’s going to set everything up for us in Candelaria. Higby is the key to the surprise I have in store for them. He’s going to make it possible to have it all.”
“You mean the Jumbo Mine payroll and the bullion?”
Lee Ford nodded. “If we can get there before they do and set it up right. But either way, we’ll finish this and come out rich and without a single competitor.”
The man grinned weakly. “I’d sure like to see that, Lee. Honest I would, but with each of my balls swollen up the size of apples, I can’t ride a horse.”
“You don’t need t
o. Coming along right behind us is a Sierra coach. You and nine other men will intercept the Bonaday stagecoach after it starts back north with its load of bullion.”
“Damn, that’s a hell of an idea! No one would think to look inside for us after we steal that much gold. But I thought you said—”
Lee Ford cut him off with a contemptuous snarl. “Don’t think, Frank. That’s always been your problem. Just be ready when our stage comes along later this afternoon. And next time, no mistakes. Not unless you want to join J. C. and the other boys in Boot Hill.”
Frank licked his lips and cradled his balls. He tried to smile, but his heart wasn’t in it. He tried to think who was more dangerous, the Chinaman or Lee Ford. Ford, he decided. The Chinaman had won because he had surprised them with whatever kind of fighting he’d done. But kicks and such were no match for a single bullet. And that was what the Chinaman, or whatever he was, would get next time. The man was as good as buried already.
Chapter 15
They rolled into Candelaria late in the afternoon, and Jessie figured she had never seen a more desolate-looking town. It possessed nothing whatsoever of beauty except for its name, which meant “candle mass” in Spanish. Given that name, a newcomer might think that here, at long last, was a mining town with some spiritual awareness. That same visitor would have searched in vain for a single church of any denomination. Conversely, Jessie counted no less than twenty-five saloons, and every one of them was packed by miners either going on a shift or coming off one. Situated in a barren valley and surrounded by black lava mountains, Candelaria was a testimony to the willingness of men to live anywhere there was gold or silver waiting to be rooted out of the earth.
The streets were wide and filled with ore wagons and foot traffic. As the Bonaday coach rolled in, men waved from the porches of saloons and businesses and followed them to the livery, where Roxy opened a big sackful of mail she had collected and began calling out names. Next to whiskey, mail from home was the biggest attraction in town.
When the mail was distributed and the crowds moseyed on back to the saloons, Ki helped unhitch the team of horses while Jessie bargained with the liveryman for a fresh team to be ready to go first thing in the morning.
“A hundred dollars a horse seems like robbery to me,” Jessie fumed.
The liveryman smiled, showing missing teeth. “Hell, I’m giving you fifty each for your horses, so you’re only paying three hundred dollars’ out-of-pocket expenses altogether. Something tells me you can well afford that, miss.”
Jessie knew when she was bested. The liveryman was going to make a huge profit off her and there was no help for that. It was a long road back and trouble was coming. Besides, the horses she was bargaining for were superior to those she was trading in.
“All right,” she said. “But I’ll expect to have them ready at dawn.”
“What about passengers? You ain’t going to get any at that hour. They’ll wait for the Sierra stage that is due in tomorrow morning.”
“We don’t need passengers,” Jessie said, paying the man and hurrying after Ki, Roxy, and Billy.
Billy was hurting. He complained of severe headaches and there was little doubt in Jessie’s mind that at least two of his ribs were broken. Jessie stepped in beside him and said, “Here, throw your other arm over my shoulder and Roxy and I can almost carry you to a bed.”
“The devil with that! We’re getting rid of this damn payroll as fast as we can. Just down the street a ways is the Jumbo Mining Company offices, and the sooner we turn their twelve thousand dollars over to them and get a receipt, the better I’ll feel.”
“But that’s only half the job. We have to deliver the gold back to Reno.”
“I know,” Billy said. “And I been thinking about that. The gold might be worth a lot more than twelve thousand dollars. Could be that Lee Ford and his men have decided to wait for us and strike somewhere on the return trip.”
“I’d be willing to bet they have,” Jessie said as they entered the Jumbo Mining Company offices right as the manager was closing.
Jessie introduced herself and, when Ki placed the strongbox full of payroll money down, she said, “We’ll want a receipt, of course.”
“Of course,” the manager said. He was a round-faced man in his thirties who wore a wedding band and a broad smile. “Just as soon as I have a chance to count it.”
“Will that take long?” Billy groaned. “My ribs are on fire and we all wanted to send a telegram off this evening.”
The man looked at his pocket watch. “I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until eight o‘clock tomorrow morning. Telegraph office closes same time I do.”
Jessie frowned. “We’d like to leave with the bullion at dawn.”
“I can have it ready,” the man said. “Tell me what time you need it.”
“Five o‘clock.”
The manager sighed. He was no longer smiling. “All right. Do you want the receipt then too, or do you want to wait for it now?”
“We’ll get it in the morning along with the bullion,” Jessie decided, taking one look at the pain etched across Billy’s face. It was clear that he was in need of rest and a doctor’s attention.
“Very well. Please lock the door on your way out. This is a lot of money and I’ll take no chances.”
“Thanks,” Jessie said, “for helping us get an early start tomorrow morning. I know it will be quite an inconvenience.”
“Never mind that. We are a full week late in meeting our payroll, and if something had happened to this money we’d have had a miners’ riot on our hands and a strike as well. I’m just grateful that you weren’t robbed.”
They locked the door on their way out and headed for the best hotel in town. They would need adjoining rooms, preferably with a connecting door between them so that, in case of trouble, they could fight together. And there was also the matter of Roxy and Ki to consider. They might want to get together sometime in the deep of the night. Jessie smiled. If that happened, she could play nurse to Billy Bonaday in order to distract the young man should he awaken.
Jessie awoke just before dawn and then awakened Ki and the others. She had heard Roxy leave her room in the night and then return just a short time earlier. But there was no evidence they had made love from the way they both prepared for the day ahead. Roxy seemed a little flushed in the cheeks, but Ki showed no signs of fatigue from the night he had enjoyed making love.
“How are you feeling, Billy?”
“Better,” he said. “I’ll stretch out in the coach and keep a shotgun and my sixgun loaded and ready. If anyone should stop us, when they open the door they’ll wish they had never got out of their bedroll this morning.”
Jessie nodded. “Ki, you’ll have to drive. I’ll ride shotgun. There isn’t any choice.”
“I should ride shotgun,” Roxy said.
“I’m sorry, but I’m a better shot than you are and I want to take care of Ki.”
Roxy wasn’t pleased. “Well, so do I!”
“I knew him first,” Jessie said, ending the discussion. “Let’s get out of here. Ki, you and Billy go get the coach while Roxy and I are taking care of business at the Jumbo Mining Company offices. When the bullion is ready to be loaded, I’ll step outside to see that everything looks clear. If it does, I’ll take my hat off and wave it. That will be the signal for you to drive the coach on down and stop by the door. It ought not to take more than two or three minutes to load the bullion. We’ll be out of here before the sun has left the horizon.”
And that was how it went. Within forty minutes, Jessie was waving her hat and Ki was helping Billy into the coach with his shotgun cocked and ready. If Lee Ford and his men were in town, this might be their best chance to strike.
Ki started to climb up into the driver’s seat, but Austin Higby’s voice stopped him. “I had a hunch you folks would be leaving mighty damned early,” he said. “If you give me free passage back to Carson City, I’ll do the driving.”
Ki hesi
tated. “Maybe it would be better if you took the Sierra stage back. This could be rough.”
“In that case, you’ll need a real reinsman up there in the driver’s box. A man who can handle the lines with a woman’s delicate touch and use a whip like Satan himself. No offense, Ki, but if things get dicey out there and you have to make a run for it, one little mistake and you could roll this Concord. Kill everyone in or on top of it. Why take the chance?”
Ki nodded. “All right. It’s your neck, and you’ve been warned. I’m sure we can do better than give you a free fare back.”
“We can talk about that later,” Higby said, climbing up to the driver’s seat. “Get on up here and keep your eyes peeled for ambushers.”
Ki swung the door closed behind Billy and climbed up in the box. He watched Austin Higby take the reins expertly and start the coach down the street toward the Jumbo Mining Company. Ki could feel his heartbeat quicken. It seemed to him that, if there was going to be an attack, it might very well come the moment that they started to load the gold into the coach.
The coach stopped right outside the office, and Jessie emerged carrying a small but obviously heavy crate. Roxy was right behind her, and next came the mining-company manager. Ki jumped down and helped them. He half expected the roar of an outlaw’s gun.
“If you see anything moving in the shadows,” he called softly up to Higby, “anything at all, let me know.”
“I sure as the devil will!”
In minutes they had the boxes of bullion packed on the stagecoach floor. Roxy jumped in beside her brother and slammed the door. Ki helped Jessie up onto the driver’s seat and then he nimbly climbed up onto the roof. There was a Winchester rifle beside him, but it was his bow and arrow that he took into his hands as Higby snapped the whip and the stage shot out of Candelaria. Only then did Ki breathe easily again. Their coach barreled up and over a ridge just as the sun was topping the horizon. It glowed blood-red and the earth seemed hushed as if waiting for a calamity.