Hunters

by James Reasoner

  But that wasn’t fair, he told himself. It was pure chance he had been with Captain Stone and the rest of the cavalrymen when the hunting party encountered those Pawnee youngsters. He could never be absolutely certain what he would have done if he had been there, too. He might think that he knew…but he couldn’t be sure.

  “They’re letting us stay here,” Costigan said instead. “They could have turned us away. I reckon we owe them some help for that.”

  “They wanted us here. We’re thirty more guns to help them if there’s trouble. Ain’t that enough?”

  Costigan shrugged again. “Suit yourself,” he said as he turned away.

  McGinty muttered a curse, then said, “Wait a minute, wait a minute. I never said I wouldn’t pitch in. Lemme finish my coffee, and then I’ll saddle my horse.”

  “Thanks, Dave,” Costigan said. “I’m going to see if I can round up another couple of boys to help.”

  While he was walking through the camp, he spotted Bledsoe coming toward him. The colonel looked weary and harried, as he had for the past several days, and Costigan thought again that Bledsoe probably hadn’t really had all the combat experience during the war that he claimed.

  Bledsoe took hold of Costigan’s arm and said in a low, urgent voice, “I’ve got to talk to you.”

  Costigan looked down at Bledsoe’s sausage-fingered hand clutching his arm, then raised his cold gaze to the man’s face.

  “Speak your piece, Colonel.”

  “Not here.” Bledsoe let go of Costigan. “Let’s go over by the wagons.”

  Costigan started to tell Bledsoe that he was too busy for this, but he decided he had better hear the colonel out. If Bledsoe was thinking about doing something crazy, it would be better to know about it.

  “All right,” he said, “but make it fast.”

  They walked along the line of wagons until they reached a spot where no one was close by. When they stopped, Bledsoe took off his derby and ran his hand over his bald dome. He looked scared.

  “Did you say anything to that marshal about…what happened out there?”

  “You mean those youngsters you massacred?” Costigan didn’t care enough about Bledsoe to worry about hurting his feelings.

  The colonel stiffened. “Damn it, man, I say again that you have no right—”

  “I didn’t tell anybody about it, Colonel,” Costigan broke in, not wanting to listen to the man’s false bravado. “Anyway, some small-town marshal doesn’t have any jurisdiction over what happened a long way west of here.”

  “Maybe not, but he could tell tell somebody else. He could send a wire to the army.”

  Costigan shook his head. “No telegraph here. I already looked for lines coming into town.”

  “That doesn’t mean he can’t write a letter or take a ride to Dodge or send word some other way.”

  Bledsoe had a point. Costigan had seen enough of Bill Harvey to know that the marshal was the sort who tried to do the right thing, to do his duty as a lawman. He might have a little trouble figuring out exactly what the right course of action was, since he was still a young man, but he would do his best.

  “If that’s all you’re worried about, Colonel, you might as well rest easy. I don’t intend to say anything to the marshal or anybody else. It wouldn’t change what’s already been done, would it?”

  “No. No, it wouldn’t,” Bledsoe said quickly. “Not at all.”

  “But you can make it easier for me to keep quiet,” Costigan went on, smiling faintly.

  Suspicion instantly leaped to life in Bledsoe’s eyes. “What do you want?” he asked.

  “We’re going to do everything we can to help these people,” Costigan said, and the firm strength of his voice, despite his exhaustion, made it clear that he wasn’t going to put up with any argument. It no longer mattered that Colonel Bledsoe was his employer. “We’re going to pitch in to defend Redemption any way we can, and right now I need some men to volunteer as outriders.”

  “Fine. You want me to pick out a couple?”

  “They might take it better coming from you than me. McGinty’s going to help, but he’s my friend.”

  Bledsoe rubbed his jaw in thought for a second. “You can take Stennis and Rawley. How’s that?”

  They were both sharp-eyed men and good shots. Costigan nodded.

  “That’ll do.”

  “I’ll go tell them to get their horses saddled.” Bledsoe started toward the men, then stopped and looked back. “I know you blame me for all this, Costigan. But sometimes things happen that aren’t anybody’s fault. They’re just bad luck, all the way around.”

  “Sure, Colonel,” Costigan said.

  If the man wanted to try to make himself believe that, it was none of Costigan’s business.

  But the stain of innocent blood would always be there, whether Bledsoe wanted to admit it or not. The colonel would see it every time he looked at his hands.

  Costigan knew that from experience. He had tried to wash it off his own hands often enough…and always failed.

  Men like Jacob Fraker, Luther Macauley, and Oscar Kipp seldom saw the morning sun when they were in a settlement. Drinking, gambling, and whoring were best done at night, so they usually didn’t get up until midday, sometimes even later.

  This time Fraker was awake by midmorning, however. His nerves wouldn’t let him sleep any longer.

  He had taken one of Smoot’s girls upstairs with him when he got back to the saloon. Killing that boy and then sneaking back into the settlement had him all keyed up, and he’d needed something to take the edge off.

  The soiled dove hadn’t done a very good job of that. She was a little long in the tooth and probably hadn’t had much real enthusiasm for her work since the boys came marching back from the war.

  But Fraker’s time with her had relieved enough of his tension that he was able to drop off to sleep.

  Now he pushed himself up on an elbow as sunlight slanted in through the gauzy curtain over the room’s single window. The woman still lay beside him with her gray-streaked hair spread out on the dingy pillow. She snored and wheezed.

  Fraker found his hand clenching into a fist. He wanted to wallop the woman a couple of times and chase her out of the room.

  He forced his hand to unclench and settled for giving her a sharp slap on the rump through the sheet. The blow made her jerk away and exclaim, “Oh! What the hell?”

  “Get out,” Fraker told her.

  The angry look on her face went away and was replaced by a coy expression. She slid closer to him.

  “Aw, now, honey, that ain’t no way to wake up. There’s no hurry. I can show you some things—”

  “Nothing I want to see right now.” Fraker’s voice was flat and hard. “Go on. Out.”

  She sniffed, rolled out of bed, and tried to give him a haughty look. That was pretty much impossible to pull off since her hair was tangled like one of those Medusas Fraker had seen in a book sometime and other things were sagging every which way. He put his back to her and ignored her, not getting out of bed until she slammed the door behind her on her way out of the room.

  Macauley and Kipp were sharing the next room. That offended the fastidious Macauley’s sensitivities, but Fraker didn’t give a damn. He pounded on the wall to wake them, then pulled his clothes on.

  Macauley was up and dressed by the time Fraker knocked on the door, but Kipp was still in bed, moaning.

  “What’s the matter with him?”

  “What do you think?” Macauley asked. “He guzzled down too much rotgut whiskey last night. I had to listen to him puke into the thunder mug a while ago.”

  Fraker sniffed the air and could smell the vomit. “Yeah. Come on.”

  “Gladly,” Macauley said.

  The two of them went downstairs. Fraker expected to find a commotion going on. Saloons usually weren’t very busy at this time of day, but he thought more men might be drinking this morning since everyone in town would be upset about the “Indians” killing
that outrider.

  Instead, the tables were empty except for one where Fred Smoot sat in his wheelchair, drinking coffee and looking at an old newspaper. No one was at the bar. The place was as dead as it could be.

  Smoot looked up at Fraker and Macauley and frowned. “Lorrie’s not happy with you,” he said to Fraker. “She says you slapped her.”

  “I gave her a swat on that butt of hers, which has got enough meat on it I’m surprised she even felt it,” Fraker said. “Did she tell you that?”

  Smoot shrugged.

  “I told her to get out, and she was too slow about it. That’s not my fault.”

  “Just forget it,” Smoot said.

  Macauley put his hands in his pockets, rocked forward and back on his toes, and said, “Quiet morning.”

  “Yeah.” Smoot went back to his coffee and paper.

  “No trouble last night after those buffalo hunters showed up?” Fraker asked.

  “Not that I’m aware of.”

  Fraker and Macauley glanced at each other. Fraker had told his partners about his successful mission. Now it appeared that it hadn’t been so successful after all.

  But that kid had to be dead, Fraker thought. There was no doubt about that in his mind. Maybe the body just hadn’t been found yet, although that seemed unlikely to him. One of the other outriders should have come across it by now.

  “Seen the marshal this morning?”

  Smoot didn’t look up this time. “Nope. You need him?”

  Fraker shook his head. “No, just wondering, that’s all. And still no sign of the Pawnee?”

  “No, and I’m starting to think they’re not going to show up.” Smoot took a sip of his coffee. “A man can hope, anyway.”

  Fraker scratched his jaw. “Yeah. A man can hope.”

  And he could wonder what the hell had gone wrong, too.

  Chapter 22

  Costigan was gone already by the time Bill reached the buffalo hunters’ camp, but Colonel Bledsoe, the leader of the party, informed him that Costigan and three other men had left to ride wide circuits around Redemption.

  “I’m mighty obliged to you and your men for the help, Colonel.”

  “Glad to do it, glad to do it,” Bledsoe had said. “We’re, uh, all in this together, aren’t we, Marshal?”

  “I reckon so. We’re all here in Redemption, anyway.”

  Something about Bledsoe’s attitude struck Bill as odd. The man was nervous, of course, but so was everybody else in town. It was more than that.

  Bill didn’t have time to ponder the question, nor was he really inclined to. He spent the next couple of hours going around town, talking to everyone, trying to reassure the really frightened ones, and making sure sentries were in place on the rooftops.

  From the sound of it, Costigan and some of the other buffalo hunters had the outrider jobs covered for now.

  By the late morning, though, Bill found himself wanting to make sure of that, so he went to the livery stable to get his horse.

  Josiah Hartnett greeted him by asking, “Did you get any sleep, Marshal?”

  Bill smiled. “I dozed off for a while, waiting for Eden to fix breakfast.”

  “You can’t keep pushing yourself like you have been. You’ve got to have some rest.”

  “I’m young,” Bill said. “And remember, I was a cowboy. I’m used to stayin’ in the saddle for a long time. Speakin’ of which, I’m gonna ride out and see how Mr. Costigan and those other buffalo hunters are doing.”

  “Yeah, I heard they were handling the outrider chores. Why don’t you sit down in the office? I’ll go throw your saddle on your horse.”

  “I can do it,” Bill said, but Hartnett pointed sternly at the door leading into the small office built onto the side of the livery barn. “I think you’re forgettin’ who’s the marshal here.”

  “You still ought to respect your elders,” Hartnett said with a grin.

  Bill gave up, shook his head, and went into the office.

  Hartnett found him there a few minutes later, asleep in the chair.

  “Hate to disturb you, Bill,” he said, “but I’ve got your horse ready to go.”

  Bill’s head jerked up. “What?” He looked around for a second as if he didn’t know where he was or what he was doing here. His surroundings soaked in on him and brought with them memories of what was going on. He rubbed a hand over his face. “Yeah. Thanks, Josiah.”

  “I’ve got a cot in the tack room, if you want to stretch out,” Hartnett offered.

  Bill stood up and shook his head. “Thanks, but I’ve got things to do.”

  He climbed into the saddle and rode out of the livery barn with a wave of farewell for Hartnett.

  Despite the fact that it was the middle of the day, Redemption’s Main Street wasn’t very busy. A few people were going in and out of the stores, but not many. Men holding rifles or shotguns stood here and there, watching. Bill glanced up and saw more armed men on the roofs.

  The air of tension that had gripped the town for days was just as strong as ever. But the guards were at their posts, and Bill felt a little better for knowing that he had done what he could to get the citizens ready for trouble.

  He waved to some of the men on the rooftops as he rode out of the settlement. He headed west, thinking that he would be likely to intercept at least one of the outriders that way.

  A mile west of town, a grassy knob rose from the plains around it. The knob wasn’t very high, but out here on these flats, it didn’t take much height to let a man see a long way.

  Bill rode to the top of the knob and reined in. He turned his head and shifted in the saddle as well, trying to see as much around him as he could. When he looked back over his shoulder at the town, he could see the roofs of the buildings and the steeple on top of the Methodist Church.

  From this distance, Redemption looked like a peaceful little place, the sort of community where a fella could settle down and raise a family, and be content with the knowledge that he was making the world a better place.

  It didn’t look like a town plagued by murder and gun battles, and yet that was exactly what recent months had brought.

  Now Redemption was facing danger again, Bill thought. And it was up to him to do what he could to head it off.

  A moment later he spotted a rider heading in his direction from the north. Bill waited until the man was closer, then took off his hat and waved it over his head to get the rider’s attention. The man turned his horse a little, angling directly toward the knob as Bill rode down the slope to meet him.

  The rider wasn’t Ward Costigan. He was a shorter, stockier man with dark hair and a close-cropped beard. As he and Bill reined in, he gave the young lawman a curt nod.

  “Howdy, Marshal,” he said. “Come out to check on us?”

  “That’s right. We haven’t met. I’m Bill Harvey.”

  “Dave McGinty.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you, Mr. McGinty. Wish it was under better circumstances.”

  McGinty grunted. “You and me both, Marshal.”

  “So, have you seen anything out of the ordinary?”

  “Not a thing,” McGinty replied. “Haven’t seen anything at all besides a few prairie chickens and a snake.”

  Bill turned his head again and let his gaze sweep over the western horizon.

  “Do you think they’re out there, Mr. McGinty? The Pawnee, I mean.”

  For a moment, McGinty didn’t answer. When he did, his voice had a harsh edge to it.

  “I know damn well they are. I can feel ’em, same way as I could always feel where a herd of buffalo was.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Bill said. “I was hopin’ maybe the hostiles would pass us by.”

  “I wouldn’t count on it,” McGinty said. “I’d better get movin’, Marshal.”

  Bill nodded. “I won’t keep you. Thanks for your help. I was mighty glad to see you and the rest of your party last night.”

  McGinty just grunted again. Bill didn’t
know what provoked that reaction or why the man seemed so surly, but he didn’t say anything else, just lifted his hand in farewell as McGinty rode off.

  The buffalo hunter didn’t return the wave.

  Bill didn’t wait to see if any of the other outriders showed up. If they had run into bad trouble, shots would have been fired, and the way sound traveled out here on the plains, the other outriders probably would have heard the gunfire. Even the people in town might have heard it.

  Instead Bill rode back to the settlement, confident that the outrider duties were in good hands for the moment. He thought he would get some lunch, and then maybe…just maybe…he could catch a few winks.

  Shame it didn’t work out that way.

  When Oscar Kipp stumbled down the stairs in the saloon not long after noon, Fraker knew there was going to be trouble.

  Kipp wasn’t really a mean drunk, but he was a bear when he was hungover, as he was now. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs and hanging on to the banister as if he were still dizzy, the big man glared around the room.

  Looking for a fight, Fraker thought. Kipp wanted to hit somebody, and the more damage he could deal out, the better.

  “Uh-oh,” Macauley said from the chair where he sat at a table with Fraker.

  “You see it, too, eh?”

  “We should get him out of here. Maybe take him back down to that whorehouse.”

  “So he can start a ruckus there?” Fraker shook his head. “We’ll stay here. If we can get some more rotgut in him, maybe that’ll calm him down enough to keep him from raising hell. Go get him.”

  “Me? Why don’t you go get him?”

  “He’s less likely to throw a punch at you.”

  “I don’t know how you figure that,” Macauley said. “He doesn’t like me any more than he does you.”

  “Well, one of us had better—” Fraker sat up straighter. “Oh, hell!”

  The soiled dove he had slapped on the rump and kicked out of his room earlier that morning—Lorrie, that was what Smoot had called her—was on her way over to Kipp. She had put on a dress and combed her hair, but she still looked like what she was: a worn-out whore in a squalid frontier saloon.