by Jon Sharpe
“What happened to your face?” Rebecca asked. “You look as if you suffered a terrible beating.”
Gerty squealed in delight and clapped her hands. “Oh, I hope he did! It would serve him right for being so mean to me.”
“Hush,” Rebecca snapped. “That was rude.”
“Did you hear her, Father?” Gerty squealed. “Did you hear the tone she used with me?”
“I’m your mother,” Rebecca said. “I can use whatever tone I like.”
“You’re not my real mother. My real mother wouldn’t treat me the way you do. My real mother would be nice.”
Fargo shocked them by growling, “Shut the hell up, you little brat.”
Owen slapped his leg and cackled. “That’s telling her! Better yet, take her over your knee and whale the living daylights out of the hellion.”
“Enough!” Senator Keever declared. “I won’t have you or anyone else show such blatant disrespect for my family.”
“We have something more important to talk about,” Fargo enlightened him. “Whether you want to leave now or wait until first light?”
“I beg your pardon?”
Fargo took another sip. “You’re being played for a jackass, Senator. Little Face isn’t interested in a peace treaty. I’ve just come from his village. I was outside his lodge when you were inside talking to him.”
Keever gave a start as if he had been pricked with a pin. “You were? What did you hear?”
“Not much. But that doesn’t matter. What does is that he has no interest in peace. He wants to count coup on a chief of the whites. Guess who that is?”
“Preposterous. This meeting was his idea. He got word to Mr. Owen and Mr. Owen got word to me. Little Face wouldn’t go to all this bother just to kill me.”
“A Sioux warrior lives to count coup. The more coup he counts, the more brave deeds he does, the more he is looked up to, and respected. If Little Face counts coup on you, a great white chief, he will stand high in Lakota councils.”
The senator waved his hand as if dismissing the very idea. “If he wanted to kill me he could easily have done it tonight when I paid him a visit.”
“Get it through your head. He’s the cat and you’re the mouse.” Fargo forgot how stubborn Keever could be. “And he asked you to bring your wife and daughter with you tomorrow, didn’t he?”
“What?” Rebecca said.
Keever bobbed his chin. “As a show of good faith. For his part, he’s invited leaders of all the bands. It’s most fortuitous they have gathered to celebrate the white buffalo.”
“What is this about taking Gerty and me?” Rebecca demanded. “You never said anything to me.”
“Come now, my dear. It’s no different than a dinner engagement back in Washington. Only we will be dining with uncouth red savages and not the elite of society.”
Fargo said, “You’re not dining with anyone.”
“I’m afraid that’s not your decision to make. You are in my employ, not the other way around. And there’s another factor to be considered.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Senator Keever smiled. “You needn’t concern yourself about it. I have matters well in hand.”
Fargo was fast losing his temper. There was just no reasoning with some people. “Like hell you do. I can’t let you go. I can’t let your own stupidity get your wife and the brat killed, too.”
Gerty snapped, “Take that back.”
“Thank you,” Rebecca said.
Keever looked bored. “How considerate. But when I say I have matters in hand, I truly do. That pathetic heathen only thinks he’s outwitted me, when the truth is, I’ve outwitted him.”
“I’ll ask you one more time,” Fargo said harshly. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Owen cleared his throat. “You know, Senator, maybe now is the time. I know we haven’t heard yet, but why run the risk of him spoiling things after you’ve gone to so much bother?”
“An excellent point,” Senator Keever said. “Very well. Do what must be done.”
To Fargo, none of this was making any sense. It made even less sense when Owen drew his six-shooter and pointed it at him. A second later Lichen did the same. “What the hell?”
Keever chuckled. “I’m afraid you must undo your gun belt and hand it over or these gentlemen have my permission to—what is the quaint expression? Ah, yes. They have my permission to fill you with lead.”
Rebecca put a hand to her throat. “Fulton! What on earth has gotten into you?”
“All in good time, my dear,” Keever said airily. He jabbed a finger at Fargo. “Well? What will it be? Hand over your Colt, or die. The decision is yours.”
Lichen took deliberate aim. “I hope he gives us an excuse. I’ve wanted to buck this son of a bitch out for weeks now. Always acting better than us and bossing us around.”
Owen didn’t say anything. He just stood there and smirked.
Fargo undid his belt buckle. It wasn’t as if he had a choice with them covering him.
The other men looked on in amazement. Clymer found his voice first and asked, “What’s going on, Senator? We didn’t sign on for anything like this.”
“Everything will be explained to you shortly,” Keever assured him. “For now it is enough that you know I was sent by the government to work out a peace treaty with the Sioux and this man intends to stop me.”
Clymer scratched his head. “Why would Fargo do a thing like that?”
“Ask him yourself after we’ve cut his claws.” Keever held out his hand. “The Colt, sir, and don’t try my patience.”
Boiling with anger, Fargo handed his gun belt over.
“Thank you.” Keever stepped back. “Now, Mr. Owen, if you please, would you and Mr. Lichen escort Mr. Fargo to my tent and see to it that he can’t interfere with my plans?”
Lichen slipped around behind Fargo and jabbed him in the back. “You heard the man. Keep your hands where I can see them or I’ll blow a hole clean through you.”
The confusion on the faces of Clymer and Harris and some of the others was mirrored by Fargo’s own. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what Senator Keever was up to.
Owen parted the tent flap and Lichen prodded Fargo and told him to get down on his knees with his hands behind his back. Then Lichen put the muzzle to his head.
“Be back in a minute,” Owen said, and went out.
Lichen snickered. “You lived with the Sioux once, I hear tell.”
“For a while,” Fargo admitted, thinking the weasel might reveal what this was all about.
“They must have put a lot of trust in you. But they won’t after the senator is done. No sir. They’ll want to stake you out and skin you. Or maybe make you run one of those gauntlets I’ve heard about, where they stand in two rows with knives and tomahawks and you have to run between them.”
“They only do that to their worst enemies.”
“Which is exactly what you’ll be.” Lichen gouged the muzzle hard into Fargo’s skin. “They’ll hate you more than they’ve ever hated anyone. And they won’t be the only ones. Likely as not, the Cheyenne and the Arapahos and other tribes will want to carve on you, too.”
“Why?”
The flap opened and in came Owen carrying a rope. He set to work tying Fargo’s wrists.
“Well, look at this. Someone beat me to it. You’ve been rubbed raw.” Owen deliberately scraped the rope against Fargo’s open flesh hard enough to draw blood, then looped it tight and tied a knot. “If that hurts, let me know and I’ll tie it tighter.”
His jaw muscles twitching, Fargo endured the pain. His ankles were bound, and he was shoved onto his side.
Lichen hiked a boot to stomp him in the face.
“No,” Owen said.
“Why not? He’s as good as dead anyway, once the Sioux find him.”
“You heard me.”
The flap parted again. Wearing an oily smile, Senator Keever came over. “How pathet
ic. You have no idea what I’m about, do you? Not the faintest suspicion?”
“I figure you’re after gold,” Fargo admitted.
“Oh, please. As rich as I am? I wouldn’t waste my time.” Keever moved to a cot and sat. “Permit me to enlighten you.”
“Just don’t talk me to death.”
“Very well. First off, I’m not here on behalf of the United States government. They didn’t send me to arrange a peace treaty. My business in the Black Hills is strictly personal.”
“What business?”
Keever adopted a condescending tone. “Can’t you guess yet? What’s the one thing I love to do more than anything else in all the world?” He chuckled. “I’ll give you a hint. Remember the trophy room I’m so proud of?”
An explosion went off in Fargo’s head. In a burst of insight he divined the truth. “God, no. You can’t mean—?”
“But I can, and I do. I’m here for one reason and one reason only. To kill the white buffalo.”
18
Skye Fargo had seen and done a lot in his time. It was rare that anything shocked him. But this did. He gaped in stunned bewilderment at Senator Fulton Keever and then blurted his uppermost thought. “You’re loco.”
“Not at all.”
“Do you have any idea how much blood will be shed if the Sioux find out a white man shot it?”
“Do you have any idea how little I care?” Keever smiled. “I’m a hunter, Mr. Fargo. Not of typical game, either. I hunt the biggest, the rarest, the most dangerous. They are the only trophies worth having. And I think you’ll have to agree with me that hanging the head of a white buffalo on my wall will be the crowning achievement of a lifetime.”
Fargo’s initial shock had passed and he thought of something. “You don’t know where it is so how can you shoot it?”
“Mr. Owen has offered a young warrior a shiny new rifle and all the ammunition the warrior can carry for that very information. He’s due here any time now. Once he tells us, Mr. Owen and Mr. Lichen and I will slip away. It will be the greatest hunt of my life.”
“As for the Sioux blaming a white man,” Owen said, “we want them to. We even have a particular white man in mind.”
Keever leaned back and laughed. “That look on your face is priceless, Mr. Fargo. You must have a million questions. So ask away. I have time to spare until the buck gets here.”
The hell of it was, Fargo did have a lot of questions. He started with the obvious. “When did this harebrained idea come to you?”
“When Mr. Owen contacted me to tell me of Little Face’s peace proposal. He happened to mention how excited the savages were over the birth of a white buffalo. It got me to thinking. No one, anywhere, has a white buffalo head on their wall. I’d be the first. It would make me the talk of Washington.”
“So you sent word to Little Face that you’d meet with him but you only came to shoot the buff?”
“An accurate assessment. I’ve used him. But remember, Little Face has been using me, as well. He never intended to sign a peace treaty. By your own admission he brought me here to kill me.” Keever chuckled. “Turn about is fair play, yes? By tomorrow night I’ll have my trophy and be on my way out of the Black Hills.”
“You took a gamble going to see him tonight.”
“Not really. I don’t trust any of these red heathens any further than I can throw that bear we killed. I had a derringer up my sleeve, and Mr. Owen and Mr. Lichen were armed.”
“Kill the white buff and the Sioux will be outraged. They’ll comb these hills from end to end. They’ll find you and your trophy before you can hope to get away and do things to you that would curl your hair.”
“That they would, yes,” Keever agreed, “if they thought I was to blame. But you see, that’s the beauty of my plan. I have a scapegoat. Actually, an excess of scapegoats. There’s you, and Rebecca, and all the men in camp.”
“What?”
“Oh, yes. You see, the warrior who is coming to tell us where to find the white buffalo will go back to his village and say that he saw you and a bunch of other whites chasing it. I would imagine the Sioux will be terribly incensed. So much so, they will undoubtedly swoop down on this camp and wipe out everyone in it without giving any of you a chance to speak in your defense.”
“You miserable bastard.”
“Please. Spare me the flattery. But I do have it planned out to the smallest detail, if I say so myself.”
“Why did you pick me out of all the scouts?”
Keever winked at Owen. “That was his doing. I confided in Mr. Owen from the very beginning. When I suggested we needed someone to divert the Sioux from us, he mentioned you. It seems he and you have never gotten along all that well, and this is his way of paying you back.”
Owen nodded. “The other reason I suggested you is because you’ve lived with the Lakotas. They trust you. If you brought the senator in, they’d figure he was really here to talk peace.”
Without any warning, Lichen rapped Fargo’s head hard with the revolver. “How does it feel to be so stupid? You’re going to die and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”
Fargo grimaced with the pain. He had to stall. But the only thing he could think of to say was, “Why kill Rebecca? What did she ever do?”
Keever placed his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands. “To be frank, I weary of her. Our marriage has always ever been one of convenience, and the convenience has worn thin.” He let out a sigh. “She’s never really loved me, you know. She did it for the money. Not that I minded. I married her so my constituents would think I’m an upstanding pillar of the community. But the truth is, I like to have a different woman every other night.” He leaned toward Fargo. “Just as she likes a different man. You’re but the latest in a long string. Did she feed you that line about not having sex? She uses it a lot.”
Footsteps approached the flap. Lichen jammed his revolver against Fargo and put a finger to his lips.
Outside the flap, Harris said, “Senator Keever, sir? Is Owen in there? There’s a Sioux here to see him. He doesn’t speak good English but he says Owen is expecting him.”
Owen answered, “Tell him I’ll be right there.”
“What perfect timing!” Keever exclaimed, and rose. “Mr. Lichen, gag our friend, if you please.”
“What do you want me to gag him with?”
Senator Keever took a handkerchief from a jacket pocket. “How about this? I only used it once to blow my nose.”
Fargo’s stomach did a flip-flop. “Try it and I’ll bite your fingers off.”
In a twinkling, Owen had a knife out and pressed the edge to Fargo’s throat. “Be a good little scout and sit real still. There’s no reason you have to be alive when the Sioux show up.”
“Don’t you think they’ll wonder about me being tied?”
“They’ll be so mad, they won’t much care. My guess is they’ll start in on you the minute they find you.” Owen smiled. “I’d love to be here to hear you scream.”
Lichen gripped Fargo’s chin. Fargo resisted, but only until Owen pressed harder with the knife. The handkerchief tasted of sweat, and worse.
“There!” Lichen said when he had tied Fargo’s own bandanna over Fargo’s mouth to keep the gag in. He stepped back. “That should do.”
“A lamb for the slaughter,” Senator Keever crowed. “Let’s hurry, gentlemen. We shouldn’t keep our visitor waiting any longer than we have to.”
The three men filed out.
Fargo told himself it could be worse. They had been careless, and that carelessness would cost them. Twisting, he looked down at his boot. By bending as far back as he could, he was able to hike his pant leg and slide his fingers into his boot to palm the Arkansas toothpick.
A slight sound caused Fargo to look up. A shadow was silhouetted against the flap. Quickly letting go of the knife, he moved his bound hands away from his boot.
In crept Rebecca. “I knew it!” she said in horror. She bent and p
ried at the knots. “I saw them walk off. We might not have long.”
Fargo grunted and wagged his head, trying to get her to remove the gag, but she went on prying.
“Be still. I’ll get you free. I don’t know what this is about but my husband has no right to do this.” Rebecca moved to a corner of the tent where several packs were piled. “There’s a hunting knife around here somewhere.”
Fargo rubbed his mouth against the ground in an effort to loosen the bandanna. He was still rubbing when the flap opened again and in walked Senator Keever, holding a derringer.
“Well, well. What are you up to, my dear?”
Rebecca froze, her hand in one of the packs. “Fulton! I thought I saw you go off toward the horses with Mr. Owen.”
“You did. But unfortunately for you, I looked back and saw you sneaking in here.”
“Don’t be absurd. Why would I sneak into my own tent?”
“Because you were worried about your latest lover.” Keever wagged the derringer at Fargo.
“I’m sure I have no idea what you are blathering about.” Rebecca got off her knees, and turned.
Keever trained the derringer on her. “That will be far enough, my dear. I’m afraid I’ve reached the limits of my patience with you and your betrayals.”
“Me?” Rebecca flushed red and balled her fists. “What about you? What about all the nights I’ve slept alone while you’ve been off with other women?”
“I have a weakness. I admit it. But I’ve paid you well, haven’t I? And it’s not as if I didn’t explain the conditions of our relationship when I asked you to be my wife.”
“Wife!” Rebecca scornfully barked. “In name alone. The only reason you took me as yours was to hide your indiscretions, and like a fool I’ve kept quiet all these years.”
“Recriminations, my dear, get us nowhere.”
“Stop calling me that.” Rebecca took another step but stopped when the derringer’s hammer clicked. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“On the contrary. I’ve had Mr. Owen spread talk among the men about how unhappy you are with me. I didn’t have him say why but he gave the impression you were tired of being married and would do just about anything to be on your own. Anything at all.”