A Grave for Lassiter

by Loren Zane Grey

  “I’m through with him, Lassiter.” Her jaw was set in a firm line, the wet eyes bright with anger. “When he told me what Farrell had planned for you, I just couldn’t believe it.”

  “Let’s go see him.” He gave her a hand up behind him on the black horse. “I’ve got some personal business to settle with him. I’ll start the hunt for him at Farrell’s.”

  “But you’re in no shape, Lassiter. You have no idea how awful you look. Your hands are swollen and your poor face . . .” She shuddered. “Please don’t go to Farrell’s.”

  “Need my guns.”

  “Dad Hornbeck will loan you his.”

  “No.”

  “Farrell might be there.”

  He jerked a thumb at the crowd that had disobeyed his request not to follow him and were exuberantly trailing along. “Those boys won’t let Farrell pull any fancy stunts. I’ll meet him face up . . .”

  “Oh, Lassiter . . .”

  He could feel her tears against his bare back.

  Farrell’s front door was ajar. Lassiter dismounted, teeth clenched with the pain. He managed to climb the veranda steps.

  “Vance!” he called from the veranda. “Farrell?”

  There was no sound from the big house.

  Melody, at the foot of the veranda steps, had both fists at her mouth. Then as Lassiter started for the door, she ran up the steps to be at his side.

  “Get away,” he warned. “There may be trouble.”

  “I intend to share that trouble . . . with you.” She was defiant. “And don’t try to stop me.”

  A small smile flickered across his misshapen mouth. “Stay out here.”

  Already the sun had changed so that the parlor was mostly in shadow. Ropes that had bound Melody lay over the arm of the sofa. The only sound was a scrape of bootheels when he shifted his feet. It took him a moment to realize, in his foggy state, that he had produced the sound himself.

  As he looked numbly around the ornate furnishings, the heavy Spanish furniture, several oil paintings, for the first time in his life he had to restrain a savage impulse to smash everything in sight.

  He got his weapons from the mantel where Farrell had placed them. Somehow he buckled on his gunbelt, even though his knuckles were so swollen he could barely move them.

  He reached up and pulled down his belt with the silver buckle. He handed it to Melody, who had followed him inside. “Take care of it,” he said thickly.

  As time passed it had come to him that despite the urge to settle everything here and now, he was in no condition even to face up to Vanderson. Let alone Kane Farrell. At long last his mind was clearing so that he could accept reality.

  By the time they were five miles out of Bluegate, riding double, they changed positions. Melody rode in the saddle and Lassiter straddled the horse’s rump. He clung to her, a bruised cheek resting on her shoulder. At times he dozed.

  They were in that position when entering Aspen Creek. Word quickly spread when Lassiter’s swollen features were seen. A crowd gathered.

  Oliver and Hornbeck helped Lassiter from the back of the horse and led him limping into the office. Melody insisted he take the bed, but he refused. He’d sleep on the floor because she insisted on being within call should he need her during the night.

  It took a combination of arnica plus laudanum to smooth out the world for Lassiter. Pain was minimized by the opium derivative and his cleansed wounds no longer throbbed as strongly as before.

  Bert Olvier got a zinc tub from the back porch and Melody heated pan after pan of water on the stove. So as not to be embarassed by his nudity, she retired to the bedroom.

  The warm water and suds was so relaxing he almost fell asleep in the tub. Melody had loaned him a jar of her French soap.

  “I’ll smell like a Paris whore,” Lassiter told Oliver with a wink.

  Oliver and Hornbeck straddled chairs. “Farrell’s got to be trimmed down to size,” Hornbeck said with a wag of his graying head. “This time he’s gone too damned far.”

  Oliver agreed. “That stunt he pulled on you today is worse’n anything he’s done so far. An’that’s been plenty. Usin’ his cooked cards to trim old man Borodenker outa the Twin Horn ranch. Not to mention the five thousand he euchered me out of.” Oliver swore.

  “You don’t know the half of what he’s done,” Lassiter said. It hurt him to speak because of the lacerated lips.

  When he was dressed and Oliver and Hornbeck had dragged the tub outside and emptied it in the yard, Melody came to stand in the doorway with Lassiter. “I want you to do something for me,” she said, including them all.

  “Name it,” Hornbeck said, and Oliver nodded.

  “If my husband even tries to get near this building, run him off.”

  “You’re through with him, I hope,” Hornbeck said.

  “Definitely. I’m divorcing him. And then . . .” Turning, she looked up into Lassiter’s battered features with a smile.

  He was instantly on his guard. Was she considering a switch of affections from her no-account husband to him? Not that he thought he was much of a catch for one so young. But maybe she thought so. There was no denying a special look in her gray eyes since he had survived Farrell’s double trap at the warehouse. And he remembered snatches of whispered words on the long ride out from town.

  But it was time he moved along, he well knew. Already he had spent over six months in the interests of Northguard, including his long convalescence. It was time that Herm Falconer put away the bottle and got his bootheels anchored on Mother Earth. Herm wasn’t the first man in history to have lost a leg.

  He considered sending Bert Oliver down to Rimrock in a wagon to bring Herm back. Providing the man would come. There was always a chance Herm would get his back bowed and refuse to stir. Both he and his late brother Josh were noted for their mule blood. Despite their stubbornness, both men were likeable and Lassiter had been drawn to them for some years. Now all he wanted was to end the threat of Kane Farrell so that Melody could operate her freight line without fear. There was no denying that there were hazards enough, the natural kind, in trying to make such a venture pay off. Heavy snows and avalanches and wrecked wagons and mule teams stricken with one ailment or another. Having someone like Farrell adding to her troubles made it that much more difficult to achieve success.

  No, he’d get things settled up, one way or another, then head out. Herm could take over and send him the money he had invested in the company, whenever he got his hands on some. And if he never got paid back, what of it? To Lassiter, all he cared about was to put a hand in his pocket and feel enough gold coins to get him through a few more days. He had no desire for riches, to be the biggest cowman on the range or the most prosperous merchant in a frontier town. He remembered his own father, always striving, scheming. And when he died his estate consisted of a horse and a new pair of boots. And even the boots were a size too small for Lassiter’s feet.

  Wherever he moved about the West he made friends. Most friendships lasting, as with the Falconer brothers. He’d known them well over ten years and there was never any hesitation to offer assistance if one of them was in trouble. And they would do likewise. Now Josh was gone, all because he had gone soft in the head and traded his life for a softly scented body and a dazzling smile, so everyone said. And even behind Josh’s demise was the shadow of Farrell. It was Farrell’s child Josh’s wife had been carrying. And that flung in his face by the vindictive woman was what had beaten Josh to his knees, as if by a leaden whip.

  That evening, the day after the fight, Melody insisted on a special supper for Lassiter. Dad Hornbeck rode out of town with a rifle and a pack mule and returned with a fine buck deer.

  Lassiter sat in the sun, on a bench, a bottle of whiskey in his lap as he watched Hornbeck expertly butcher the deer. By then the old man’s wound was completely healed. His wounding only another mark against Farrell, Lassiter thought grimly as the bloodied knife peeled back the deer skin.

  Dad Hornbeck cou
ld look after Melody, Lassiter was musing, after the old man had left the yard. But first there was the matter of Farrell. He took another generous gulp of the whiskey Bert Oliver had provided. It slid easily down his throat and acted as balm for his numerous hurts. But he wouldn’t allow the whiskey to fog his brain. If ever he needed a clear head, it was now.

  Farrell wouldn’t back off from another defeat at the hands of his old enemy, Lassiter. Not only had he lost money but prestige as well, when the Roman carnival turned out so badly for him. Not to mention the other times over the years they had tangled. Each time Lassiter had been fortunate enough to thwart Farrell’s grand plans for sudden wealth.

  But Lassiter was realist enough to know that one day the coin was going to come down tails instead of heads. That would be the day of reckoning, but he would be ready for it. He prayed only that the day could be postponed until his knuckles returned to normal size and the left side of his rib cage didn’t cause him pain every time he twisted suddenly.

  He took another drink. Hearing a step, he turned and saw Melody come out of the office. She joined him on the bench and leaned back against the office wall. Taking one of his swollen hands in both of hers, she drew it to her mouth and kissed it. The warmth and softness of her lips was like a jolt of lightning through his healing body. But he decided not to let it show. Now was not the time for a deeper involvement.

  So intent was he on ways to try and get Melody to look on him less romantically, that he didn’t realize he was being observed from a stand of pines some fifty feet across the yard.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  A pair of fierce black eyes in the shadowed trees took in the scene on the bench in front of the Northguard Freight Company office. Her Lassiter, sharing a bench with that honey-headed girl. Oh, the girl was pretty enough, Roma supposed. But she hated her with all the passion of her Romany heritage.

  At her elbow, Rex said softly, “Well, now you know. So let’s get back to town and be on our way to new fields.”

  Roma mounted her horse and spurred it in the direction of Bluegate, her hair streaming out behind like black silk. Only when she finally slowed the sweated mount was Rex able to catch up to her.

  “I warned you long ago not to let your affections for that Lassiter get to the boiling point,” Rex said, mopping his aristocratic features with a handkerchief.

  “It is why he came back here. Because of that female. It is why he refused to let me come with him. Because of her. I see it all now.”

  “Doc says we might work our way East. Possibly clear to the big river. It will do you good to get away from memories of Lassiter. Perhaps at long last you might look on me with favor.” He gave a wry smile and she laughed outright. He looked hurt.

  When they finally arrived back in town, she told Doc that she was staying behind. He and Rex would have to go ahead without her. Both men were surprised and disappointed. But she was adamant.

  She was remembering the handsome man with dark red hair who had told her in so many words that he was Lassiter’s sworn enemy.

  “Two sworn enemies are better than one.”

  Rex looked at her in surprise and Doc, who was smoking a cheroot beside the wagon, said, “What did you say about sworn enemies?”

  “It’s from an old gypsy poem,” Roma snapped, not wishing to discuss the matter. Her emotions were too obvious; she had spoken of enemies without even realizing it.

  Well, Lassiter would one day soon learn that he couldn’t put his bootheel in Roma’s face and not expect her to show her claws. She smiled into the darkness. The town was quieting down after the big day. Many wagons were still rumbling out of town.

  Farrell also often thought of the girl he had seen in the crowd at the warehouse on the day of the fight.

  He remembered standing by one of the warehouse walls, his mouth dry as he saw Lassiter riding out of town, sharing a horse with Melody Vanderson. How he longed to put a bullet into that insufferable black-haired bastard and knock him out of the saddle. Do the job that Blackshear and Marsh had bungled. But there were too many witnesses, men shouting Lassiter’s name as the black horse stepped along the road to Aspen City. A look of awe on many faces as if Lassiter might have been a Greek god. The damn fools.

  No, he couldn’t risk a bullet in the face of such idolatry. In his present mood, every nerve raw, he might by mistake hit the girl.

  When he let a long-held breath slowly out of his lungs, he realized a girl standing nearby was also shouting Lassiter’s name. But in a different way than the others, who were cheering him. She seemed almost anguished in an attempt to get him to notice her.

  When Lassiter failed to respond, he recalled the anger in her black eyes, the way the attractive mouth tightened and her back arched. Even then he had thought her pretty and seeing her later, his assessment deepened. She was truly beautiful, with a proud carriage that revealed every swell and dip of her splendid figure. She wore a pair of boy’s Levis and a shirt, the ends knotted about her slim waist, the material so tight across her breasts he could see the nipples. Sight of her stirred a volcanic heat that soon encompassed every centimeter of his body.

  He decided to be blunt, so he caught up with her and said, “You dislike him.”

  Her head snapped around and she peered up with those incredible black eyes. “What did you say?”

  Her voice rang cool and clear. Somehow it stirred him even more. “Lassiter, I mean. You hate him.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “There’s enough fire in your eyes to singe a mountain.”

  “Hah! Real fire you have not seen.”

  “Burn him! Maybe the two of us . . .”

  But she turned on her heel and lost herself on the crowded walk. He saw her later, her walk stately, the long black hair hanging below her waist and swaying at each step. The march of her hips in the blue canvas skin of the Levis prodded his heartbeat.

  In her he sensed a spark that could lead to a conflageration.

  Sight of the brawny Shanagan on the walk stirred up other emotions in him. He stalked over to where the saloonman was talking with Loland of the Mercantile and Bishop of the saddle shop.

  The two merchants, facing Farrell, saw the fury on his face and backed away. Shanagan turned to see who was coming and the merchants lost themselves in the crowd.

  Farrell said, “I thought you claimed Blackshear and Marsh were top men.”

  “It was you picked ’em, Farrell,” Shanagan said levelly.

  The response caught Farrell by surprise. He had expected the saloonman to fawn and make excuses. Don’t go off half-cocked, he warned himself, just because of today’s disaster.

  Somehow he forced a smile. “Well, I guess it was a time of mistakes all around.”

  “Lassiter’s been jumped by more’n one man before today. He knows how to take on a pair of roughnecks.”

  “So it would seem,” Farrell said.

  “I didn’t like you tryin’ to lay the blame on me.”

  Careful, Farrell warned himself again when he wiped the moist palm of his right hand across a vest and let his fingers slide toward the gun worn under his coat. He stilled the hand, withdrew it. Shanagan wore a tight smile, as if guessing.

  And right there Farrell vowed that one day soon there would be a new sign above the saloon door, his name instead of Shanagan’s.

  Shanagan watched him lift both hands to his hat as if it seemed suddenly important to have it set straight on his head. He made the adjustment, then lowered his arms. The danger point was past. Farrell had himself under control once again.

  Later, Farrell saw the mystery girl again. She was talking to an English-looking dude and an older man. The two men walked toward the center of town, leaving her alone at a small camp.

  Farrell walked over. Removing his hat, he introduced himself. “May I buy a bottle of that elixir?” He pointed at a box of bottles.

  “Doc isn’t here,” she said, turning to study him.

  “You can sell me one,”
he said with an easy smile.

  “It’s mostly whiskey. It’ll make you feel good and forget whatever is troubling you.”

  “Nothing troubles me . . . except the burr in my blanket in the person of a man known as Lassiter.”

  He saw with satisfaction that mention of the name caused her to jump as if he had jabbed her with a pin. He thought that perhaps she was over her anger. But not so.

  “What about Lassiter?” she demanded. Her voice was softly accented, but for the life of him he couldn’t decide what her primary language might be.

  “He’s my enemy. As he seems to be yours.”

  “You a mind reader? How do you know so much?”

  He reminded her of the crowd at the warehouse the day before. “I saw you call to him. I saw the way he ignored you.”

  A faint flush began to spread across her high cheekbones, while the ends of her generous mouth curled, and lightning seemed to flicker in her black eyes. “You see too damn much,” she snapped.

  Farrell laughed, then grew serious. “Between the two of us we might bring him down.”

  She suddenly seemed indifferent, but he sensed it was just a pose. “I don’t want to bring him down,” she said. “I just don’t want to hear his name.”

  “Not jealous of that fetching blonde?”

  Roma’s lip curled. “Pale women have no fire. He’ll find that out soon enough.” She was staring across the flats where a team and wagon were rumbling out of town. “No doubt he has already found out.”

  “May I buy you some supper?”

  Her head swiveled around, the eyes narrowed. “I am not hungry.”

  “But you must eat. In order to keep your health. And not lose that splendid figure.”

  “You notice that I look splendid, eh? Apparently he does not.”

  “He’s got the blonde on his mind,” Farrell said, playing his cards carefully. Don’t move too fast, he cautioned himself. “She’s Melody Vanderson.”

  “He’s known her for . . . for how long you think?”

  “Since she was a kid. That’s what they say around here.”