Cutthroat Gulch

by Richard S. Wheeler

  “I don’t know a jig from a jag,” Blue muttered.

  “Well, it’s a gait some of them eastern nags got.”

  “You get a name for me tomorrow. And find out if he was with anyone, especially a woman who maybe wore a hat like this. Send what you know to Carl Barlow. I may not be back right away.”

  “Blue, that’s a tough road at night. There’s three, four creeks to ford and some slopes.”

  Blue just shook his head. He was going to his daughter’s ranch, and that was that, and he could only hope he was faster than Trouble.

  “Why do you think anyone’s after your daughter, Blue?”

  “Not my daughter—me. I’ve got a few enemies. I’ve put away a few behind bars.”

  “Revenge?”

  Blue broke open the shell of a hardboiled egg, peeled away the rest of it, and salted the rubbery whiteness. “Anything. I don’t know yet. But in all my years of lawing, I’ve worried abut my family. Anyone wants to hurt me, they know how. Anyone wants to get something out of me, they know how.”

  “Like what?”

  “Kidnap my daughter and tell me to release the punk in my jail or she dies.”

  Zeke nodded. “Me, I ain’t so lucky I got to worry about that.”

  “It’s a worry.”

  The spicy beans, the eggs, and the beer made Blue sleepy.

  Zeke saw it. “Blue, you go fetch some sleep. I’ll wake you whenever you want.”

  “Gotta go, Zeke.”

  Blue stood and dug into his britches for the couple of greenbacks he usually had in his pocket, found some change, and paid.

  Zeke walked him down the slope to the livery barn. It was full dark now, and overcast. “I sure don’t know how you’re going to make your way,” he said.

  Blue didn’t either, but he was damned if he’d sit still while a killer stalked him. It had come to that. He was being stalked by someone. He’d started out on a manhunt, and found himself the hunted.

  The barn was dark as ink, but out of the night came a voice.

  “Evening, Zeke, sheriff.”

  “Fetch the horse, Billy,” Zeke said.

  “Sure enough.”

  Blue could scarcely imagine how the hostler knew where to go in that cavern, but he did, and soon enough he emerged in the muddy street, leading the bay horse.

  “He et up his oats and some good timothy too. This here’s a fine animal, sheriff. Don’t know how good he is in the mountains, seeing as he’s a flatland horse.”

  “The fellow say where he was from, Billy?”

  “New Jersey.”

  “And what he was doing?”

  “No, he didn’t say nothing much. ‘Take care of the horse, best feed you’ve got, rub him down.’ Like that. He didn’t even ask a price. Said he’d be back soon.”

  “Long way from home. You think of anything he said about his business, you tell Zeke pronto, okay? Think hard!”

  “Sure. Now, the oats was four bits and the hay two bits and the stall two bits. I rubbed him, too, and checked his feet.”

  Blue found a greenback and handed it to the hostler. “That’s what I like to hear. You’re a good man, Billy.”

  “You could leave me a tip, sheriff.”

  Blue laughed. “Might just,” he said, finding a dime. “Buy you a drink, anyway.”

  Blue checked the saddle in the dim light; his shotgun rested in its sheath, his yellow slicker was rolled up behind the cantle, tied tight with saddle strings. He climbed up and swung a leg over, finding the stirrup with the toe of his boot, and then tied down Tammy’s hat, using the pink ribbons.

  “Zeke, you mind leading me to the edge of town and starting me on that road?”

  “Wish you’d just bunk till dawn, Blue.”

  But Zeke had taken hold of the bridle, and was slowly walking Blue’s horse uptown, and then down a mud lane heading south, as far as Blue could tell.

  “All right, then, Blue,” Zeke said. “You’re a man who won’t listen to no when you’ve got a yes to answer to.”

  “Bullheaded is what you mean,” Blue said.

  “That, too.”

  He started the bay, and gave it its head, and let it pick its way in the dark. A horse could do that better than any mortal could. Funny thing, that tired-out bay acted like he was enjoying the excursion, and started off at a fine clip.

  “I guess that’s a jig,” Blue said aloud. It would eat up the miles, if the bay held out.

  A sharp night wind iced out of the mountains and Blue pulled his collar up. He hoped he could sleep. Some cowboys could sleep in the saddle; Blue couldn’t, but he could sometimes let himself sink into a loose heaviness, riding like a sack of potatoes. He rode that way for some indeterminate time until the bay stopped. Blue came alert, heard the rush of water, and edged the bay toward a creek. He couldn’t tell how deep it was or how wide. He’d been on this trace once or twice, and didn’t remember any big streams.

  “Looks like we’re going to wade,” he said. “You just go slow now.”

  The bay stepped carefully, skidding once on slippery river cobbles, and then lunged easily up the far bank. Blue dismounted, let the horse stretch and rest, and then he walked a while, leading the horse. There was moon enough behind the clouds to give a faint light. But Tammy and Steve’s ranch was a long way away, and Blue wished he hadn’t been so bullheaded.

  That damned killer could read Blue’s mind, and that made him testy.

  Chapter 8

  Blue and dawn arrived at the Cooper ranch at the same time. He rode the tired bay into the yard, admiring the whole lash-up once again. Night mist hugged the green fields. The silvered river oxbowed through the valley, flanked by gentle foothills and blurred black pine forest, while hazy peaks caught the first light. A great quietness enclosed this place.

  Steve Cooper’s horses stared at Blue from the catch pen. He rode toward the snug whitewashed ranch house where his daughter lay asleep, along with her little ones and husband. It seemed strange to be the harbinger of danger, bringing worry to this paradise. And yet he must. The battered hat with its pink ribbon dangled from his saddle, urging him on.

  He paused before the silent house, seeing no smoke rising from the kitchen chimney. Danger seemed far away. He hesitated. He thought of dismounting and knocking, but chose instead to

  call through those open sash windows, which admitted the gentle night air and brought swift sleep to those within. He saw no smoke rising from the bunkhouse, either, and doubted anyone was in it. Steve and Tammy hired line riders when they needed them at roundup and calving and haying, and got along by themselves the rest of the time. Still, an ancient instinct honed by decades of lawing cautioned him to study a place before making his presence known. He peered into the quickening light, discovering no reason to take alarm. “Steve! Tammy! It’s Blue,” he bellowed.

  It took a second and third summoning before he spotted Tammy, peering out the upstairs window.

  “Dad! What are you doing here?” she cried.

  “You could start a pot of coffee while I put up the horse, and I’ll tell you.”

  “That’s not Hector. What horse is that?”

  “I’ll tell that to you, too.”

  He put the coppery bay into the catch-pen, unsaddled it and rubbed it swiftly. It trotted off to the hay crib and began tearing at the hay there. He picked up his saddle and hoisted it to a rail, and untied Tammy’s hat.

  Tammy opened the door, and he saw she was wearing a blue wrapper around her skinny frame. A white cotton night dress peeped through. She was built like her mother. He was glad to see her; very glad. Steve, standing behind her, had stuffed his nightshirt into trousers.

  “Blue! I can’t believe it.”

  “It’s a long story,” Blue said. “Riding all night.”

  They gathered around the battered kitchen table, where Blue sank heavily into a chair. “It’ll take a while,” Tammy said, stuffing kindling into the stove’s cold firebox, and then some coal oil to hasten the flame
along. A whoosh announced the ignition, and Tammy began grinding roasted beans and fetching water.

  “This your hat?” he asked, when at last she had started the coffee perking.

  She stared, surprised. “Yes, pa.”

  “Want to tell me when you lost it?”

  “What is this, Blue?” Steve asked. “Why are you here?”

  “Lawing,” he said. “Been a murder. At my fishing hole, too. And this hat was there, lying in the field.”

  They stared at him, somberly. He sank into the chair, more tired than he had thought, knowing he owed them an explanation. “It’ll take some palavering,” he said. “Let me get some coffee into me first. Just tell me about this hat, Tammy.”

  “We went shopping a few days ago in the spring wagon, and I left it in the wagon, and it vanished. That’s all I know, dad.”

  “Centerville?”

  “Yes, Centerville. I didn’t even notice it until we were on the road back, late afternoon, and I thought the wind had blown it away.”

  “It was took. And made use of. And maybe you’re in danger, maybe not, but I figured to come and tell you.”

  “Oh, dad, we’re just going along as we always have. If I lost a hat, so what?”

  “Well, something’s strange, and I haven’t got a handle on it yet.”

  “I guess if you rode all night, it’s something to worry about,” Steve said. “It is that.”

  It wasn’t until Blue got a half a cup of good Arbuckle’s coffee into him that he felt up to talking. And then, sipping and talking, he laid out the story that began when he found the stranger.

  “That’s his horse I rode here. Coppery bay, maybe thoroughbred, a good flatland walker anyway. It jigs. Every heard of a horse that does that? Darndest gait I ever sat.”

  “Tell us about Hector.”

  “Dead, one clean shot through the heart, and almost broke my leg when he went down. My knee still howls.”

  “How? Where?”

  Blue described the encounter at the pass: one moment riding his old horse and leading the mule, the next moment both animals dead and Blue’s leg caught under his horse, and then waiting for the killer to finish him off.

  Steve Cooper shook his head.

  “What about my hat?” Tammy asked, finally sitting down with her men. “I first saw it in the field at my fishing hole. I left it at the pass after my horses got shot. Later it got tied around that bay’s neck during a rainy night while I slept. How it got there I don’t know. Someone’s making sport of me, or warning me, or threatening you. Zeke Dombrowski recognized it; I didn’t.”

  “Pa, you wouldn’t know one woman’s hat from another, not even the one mom’s worn for ten years,” Tammy said.

  Blue grunted. Sassy girl. “You got to be careful now. I don’t know what this is about. But it’s your hat, and someone knows it, and that someone’s a killer, and there’s a message in it somewheres.”

  “How do you know that?” Steve asked. “How do you know you’re following the killer’s trail? Maybe the two don’t connect at all, Tammy’s hat and this murder.”

  “I’ve got a hunch is all. You better be careful. Hire some hand you know and trust to help keep guard. If anything happens to anyone here, I’d never forgive myself.”

  Tammy reached across that old table and pressed her hand on Blue’s. “We’ll watch out,” she said. “And we can fort up here. This house has some loopholes in it, from the early times.”

  It was still early times as far as Blue was concerned. “Well see that you do, dammit,” he said. “And watch for the children too. They’re all right?”

  “Still sleeping. Sarah needs a lot of sleep.”

  “Tammy, understand this: there’s some out there who’d like to strike at me, lots of reasons because I wear the star. One way to do it is to threaten my family. A man holding a gun to Olivia’s head, man holding a gun to you, man got your kids off somewheres for a ransom or a deal, that’s a man that thinks he’s got power over me. I’ve spent a lifetime worrying it, and I’m still worrying it.”

  She nodded somberly. His coffee was cold, and he stood abruptly, headed for the speckled blue pot on the stove, and poured angrily.

  “This is a big country, takes big people to get along in it,” he said, wishing he could use better words. “That was Absalom’s trouble. Never was big enough.”

  “Pa—”

  He knew he should just shut up. His son disappointed him. Didn’t take to anything in the Territory, fishing, hunting, ranching, teamstering, not anything at all, and fled to the city and a soft life. An artist. Left bitterly too, blaming Blue for everything that went sour in his life, severing his ties with his parents once and for all, or so he said. That was the end of it. Blue never heard from him again. He thought maybe Olivia did, but if so, Blue never heard about it. Once in a while he got a little news filtering in from Denver. The boy had some ability, if sketching stuff counted for something, and he was making his way. But mostly Blue tried to ignore Absalom and bury his disappointment down in the bowels of his mind.

  “All right, all right,” Blue said, closing off an impending confrontation. Tammy and Olivia were a lot more friendly to the boy than they should be. The hot coffee bit his tongue.

  “He’s coming here,” Tammy said. “To visit me.”

  “Here? You?”

  “I shouldn’t have told you. He didn’t want me to. We’ve been writing. He’s been planning this for a long time. He’s going to spend a month here and paint and sketch...and some other things.”

  “Well he could have told me.”

  Tammy shook her heard. “No, he couldn’t have told you. There are things you won’t hear, especially from him.”

  The whole business of Absalom put Blue in a bad mood to start with, and his secret trip to see his sister filled Blue with brimstone and smoke. Blue was damned if he would tell the boy’s mother and have her mooning about the boy for a month.

  Blue had wanted to start a family dynasty, lots of sheriffs, fathers and sons, strong men all, honored in the Territory. But the boy never took to it and just burrowed his nose into books and sketchpads and neglected his chores. Blue took him fishing, and the boy felt sorry for the fish. Blue had piled on the chores, too, trying to put some sense in the boy. Cut wood, take care of the horses, prune the lilacs, clean the stove and spread the wood ash for fertilizer, hoe and weed the vegetables, lime the privy, butcher some beef, drive the carriage horse, take the rifle and bring in some meat.

  The boy never made meat, and hated to shoot anything, and didn’t like to step on an ant. He wouldn’t shoot a broken-legged horse to put it out of its misery. He would just set down the rifle and walk away. How the hell did he, Blue, raise a boy like that, anyway?

  Things just went from bad to worse, with Absalom recoiling every time Blue told him he needed to make a man out of himself and stop all that soft stuff. It sure wasn’t his Smith blood in the boy; who the hell knew about Olivia’s Carter blood?

  Blue sat there, nursing coffee, remembering. And now the boy was sneaking back to see his sister. Sneaking was the word for it; too cowardly to let his folks know, too scared to face up to his old man. “Here’s what I want you to do,” he said. “Tammy, you see any stranger lurking around, you get Steve at once and send word to me. You keep a fowling piece around, full of buckshot, and be ready to use it.”

  “I can’t keep a loaded gun around with the children,” she said.

  Blue growled. “I still don’t know why the hat’s so important. It’s just a prank,” Steve said.

  “Some prank. A stranger with no name so far is murdered at my fishing hole, and there’s that hat and my horses get shot and the hat keeps showing up.”

  Tammy stopped her breakfast toil at the stove, and turned to her father.

  “There is something,” she said. “Jack Castle is out. I saw him in town. I’m sure I did.”

  Jack Castle, Blue thought. At last.

  Chapter 9

  Blue bolted
right out of his chair, spilled coffee, and reached for his revolver.

  “Jack Castle when?”

  Tammy stopped stirring the eggs and stared. “A week ago today,” she said quietly.

  “And you didn’t tell me.”

  Tammy didn’t reply; Blue whirled to the windows, studied the serene valley, and then slumped.

  “Does Zeke know?”

  “You can ask him when you see him,” she said. She stirred the scrambled eggs furiously.

  “No one told me,” Blue said. “The warden didn’t say one damned word. Not even a wire to anyone.”

  “I didn’t know either,” Steve said. “Should I have known?”

  Blue stared at his son-in-law unhappily. The less he knew about Jack Castle, the better, and Tammy wasn’t talking.

  “In for eleven years, released after seven,” Blue said. “Should have been put away for life.” He glared sourly at his daughter. “You pack up and come stay in Blankenship with Olivia,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on you. You too, Steve. Get someone to run this place.”

  “Blue, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

  “Well, it’s best you don’t.”

  Steve laughed. “Well, in that case, I’ll get to work.”

  Blue relented. He hated to tell anyone this Smith family stuff, especially since it involved Tammy. Tammy stood whitely, her lips compressed, fussing with her wrapper, tucking it under her chin, not liking what was coming. “Jack Castle is a Blankenship boy, gone bad,” Blue said. “Tammy was sweet on him.”

  “Oh, I was not.”

  “He sure as hell thought so,” Blue replied. “Steve, this was before you even came into this country.”

  “I’m glad of that, I guess. Or should I be?”

  “Hell, he didn’t go bad, he was always bad,” Blue said. “Young, walked like a cat, made the girls smile, big green eyes, always happiest when he was in a little trouble. He had eyes for Tammy, though. Came sniffing around all the time.”