“They’re not . . . Forsythe’s men. They stood up to Mike Bruza and his flunky.”
Bernie looked hard at his sister, then nodded to the men. “I’m obliged. I’d shake your hand, but . . . well, you can see how it is. I’m Bernie Gates. You’ve met my sister.”
“Name’s Stark. This young buck is my sidekick.”
The young man he mentioned still stood. He nodded to Bernie and picked up his coffee cup to drain it. He was tall and slim with a shock of light sun-bleached hair, clear blue eyes and a noticeable dent in his chin.
Bernie sank wearily down in a chair and mopped his brow with a handkerchief. When his sister brought him a dipper of water, he drank it thirstily. Tandy came from the kitchen with a mop and a rag to clean the mess made by the thrown pot. He straightened his bent back to look up at the tall Texan.
“I ain’t much good now. But in my day, I’d a not stood by while a good woman like Miss Bonnie was put upon by the likes of Mike Bruza. And I ain’t thinkin’ the railroaders would’a hung back long if ya hadn’t spoke up. We was glad ya was here, mister.”
“Stark.” The Texan held out his hand, and Tandy shook it vigorously.
“Things ’round here ain’t been good fer quite a spell, Mr. Stark. Not since that land man come to town.” Tandy picked up the plate from the table. “Young feller, I’ll cook ya up another batch of flapjacks seein’ how yores got all coffee-splattered.”
“Thanks, but I’ve had plenty. I was kinda makin’ a hog of myself anyhow.”
Some of the men had sat back down to finish their breakfasts. Others were preparing to leave when heavy bootheels sounded on the boardwalk, and the door was pulled open with such force it hit the wall and bounced back. The man who stepped into the restaurant had a big tin star on his chest and a shotgun in his hand. Another man crowded into the room behind him.
“Back against the wall,” he said to those paying for their meal. “The rest of you stand up and show yore hands.”
The barked command came as a surprise. No one moved until the end of the shotgun swung in an arc around the room. All the men at the table got to their feet, except Bernie. The marshal stepped over and tapped him on the shoulder with the gun barrel.
“You! Get up.”
Bonnie flew at him. “Get away from him . . . you fat . . . slob! Can’t you see he’s been hurt.”
Marshal Lyster raised his forearm to hold her away. “Get this she-cat and hold her.”
He flung the words over his shoulder to an ugly young man with feral features. He was thin and narrow-shouldered. When he made to grab Bonnie with long, bony fingers, the knife she had picked up on her trip to the kitchen appeared as if by magic in her hand.
“Touch me and I’ll cut you.”
“Well, well, this proves what Mike said.”
“And what was that?” Bernie had struggled to his feet.
“Said your sister attacked him with a pot of hot coffee. He’s at the doc’s gettin’ fixed up.” Lyster’s gaze settled on the two strangers. “Who’er you?”
“Name’s Stark.”
“Yo’re the gunman that drew down on Mike when he tried to protect himself. Drop your guns. You, too.” He jerked his head toward the younger man.
“I don’t think so.” Stark’s voice was level and cold. He crossed his arms over his chest.
“What?” The marshal’s face went blank with surprise, then livid with fury, his lips baring his big, uneven teeth. “Drop your guns or I’ll open up with this shotgun.”
“I don’t think so,” the Texan said again. “You might get off a shot, but it’ll go into the ceiling as you’re slammed into the wall. My friend will put a bullet right between your eyes while your brain is sending word to your finger to pull the trigger.”
Marshal Lyster’s jowls began to quiver. To be faced down in front of so many was humiliating, but not enough to challenge this calm, confident stranger.
“I asked you who you was.”
“I told you.”
“Get out of my town.”
“You own it?”
“I’m the law here.”
“Lawman!” Bonnie snorted. “He’s one of Forsythe’s bootlickers! Ever’body knows that.”
“Bonnie! Hush!” Bernie tugged on his sister’s arm.
“I’m here to keep the peace.” Lyster turned on Bonnie. “You’ll go before the circuit judge—”
“Why not just take me to Forsythe? The judge is in his pocket, too.”
“Miss Bonnie did what she had to, to protect herself.” The black-bearded railroad worker spoke up.
“You goin’ ag’in’ the law?” Lyster glared at the man. “Watch yorself, or you’ll be outta a job.”
“What’s right’s right,” the brakeman shot back.
“If you’re so hell-bent on holding up the law”—Bonnie made the word sound so nasty she was in a hurry to get it out of her mouth—“why aren’t you out trying to catch the one that killed Cletus?”
“Hee, hee, hee.” Old Tandy laughed, then said with disgust, “He couldn’t catch the clap in a whorehouse.”
“You’re gettin’ a mite lippy, Tandy. Old men ort to mind their own business.”
“Did Cletus get lippy?” The words burst from Bonnie with bitter sarcasm. “Is that why you or your so-called peace-keepers beat him to death?”
“Old man Fuller was killed by a thievin’ Indian or a railroad bum.”
“An Indian would cut a man’s throat, not beat him to death,” Stark said quietly.
“No one asked you to stick your bill in,” Lyster snarled.
“Cletus is dead?” Bernie was visibly shaken. “Oh, my God! They killed him!”
Lyster’s beady eyes continued to study Stark.
“I ain’t through with you. I’ll not put up with saddle bums comin’ into my town and tryin’ to take over. Is that understood?”
Stark ignored the question and asked one of his own. “How does a man get to be marshal around here?”
“By vote of the people. I was legally elected, not that it’s any business of yours.”
“The way I heard it every man that tried to run against you came up missing, or if they found him, he had a busted head or a broken leg.” Bonnie continued to talk even with her brother trying to shush her. She turned to the Texans. “That’s how he got the job.”
“Somebody’s goin’ to have to take you in hand, gal. Yo’re runnin’ off at the mouth.”
“My name is Miss Gates to you. Go back and tell the man who owns you that my brother and I are getting tired of being pushed around by his hired thugs. The next one that comes in here and lays a hand on me or my brother will get a belly full of buckshot.”
When the marshal chuckled, his fat belly moved in an up and down motion.
“Does that go for Del Gomer, too?”
“It may surprise you to know that Del Gomer has never laid a hand on me, or been as insulting as others I could mention.” She looked pointedly at the lawman. “Whatever else he is, he’s been a gentleman when in my company.”
“Is that so? How about on them walks from the church on Wednesday nights . . . in the dark?” he asked with an insinuating leer.
“Yes. Even then. But with your nasty mind you’d find that hard to believe, wouldn’t you?”
“I shore would, honey. And I find it hard to believe he stands outside lookin’ at yore window ’cause he thinks ya might fall outta it.”
“Del will be interested to know that the town marshal is spying on him,” Bonnie said sarcastically. “You may have to say that to his face.”
“I ain’t having no trouble with Del.”
“Not yet. But you will after he hears you’re so interested in his affairs that you follow him.”
The marshal, wishing he had kept his mouth shut about the meetings at the church, screwed his hat down tighter on his near bald head and turned to the men.
“I’ll let this go for now. But I’m keepin’ my eye on all of ya. One wrong move and
yo’re goin’ to jail. And that goes for you too, Bonnie. Break the law again, and you go to jail just as any man’d do.”
“Ya’d put a woman in jail?” Tandy shook his head in disbelief.
“If she broke the law.”
“Folks’d not stand fer it less ya had a damn good reason. ’Specially a woman like Miss Gates.” The black-bearded railroader slapped a coin down on the counter.
“This is some town you got here, marshal,” Stark said drily. “Never heard of it bein’ against the law for a woman to defend herself.”
“My advice to you is, keep your nose out of things that ain’t yore business and get out of town.”
“Where can I find Forsythe?”
The town marshal paused at the door and looked back at the Texan.
“What’d ya want him for?”
“That’s my business.”
“Then find him yourself.”
Chapter Fourteen
The two men stood on the edge of the boardwalk and looked up the dusty street toward the swinging sign that said LAND OFFICE. They had been in towns such as this one many times. Dillon liked to refer to them as jackass towns. One main street and one jackass, like the marshal they had just met, trying to run things.
“What do you think, Cleve?”
“Think Buck had it spelled out about right. I want to find out more about the old man that was beaten to death. After we see Forsythe we’ll slip back in and have a talk with the girl and her brother.”
“I’m not sure I want to see the son of a bitch.”
“Change yore mind? It’s a long way to come to change your mind, Dillon.”
“I haven’t changed it.”
Cleve Stark dropped his cigarette butt on the porch and smashed it with the toe of his boot. His hand rested for a moment on the shoulder of his young friend.
“Then it’s best we find out if yo’re goin’ to be able to stomach him. I’m thinkin’ we’re in for a long haul before we can report back to that judge in Bozeman.”
They went down the walk and at the end of the street turned the corner and headed for the livery.
“The first thing we’d better do is buy us a couple of good horses.”
They had come up from New Mexico on the stage, stopped in Timbertown, Wyoming Territory, to visit Dillon’s foster brother Colin Tallman and their friend T.C. Kilkenny, then had come on to Bozeman where they met Garrick Rowe, a lumberman friend of Colin’s and T.C.’s. Rowe had taken them to see Judge James Williams. After telling the judge about the letter Stark had received from Buck Lenning, they took the train to Big Timber.
Arriving in Big Timber at dusk, they had looked over the town with experienced eyes before they checked into an old frame hotel near the rail station. It was shabby, but clean. The owner had assured them the place was as free of bedbugs as he could make it. The smell of kerosene was in the air, and they believed him.
At the livery, an old man sat in a chair tilted back against the side of the building. When the two men approached, he tipped forward and the two front legs of the chair struck the ground. He stood as they neared and nervously moved back away from the door. Two well-armed strangers could mean only one thing—Forsythe had hired more gunmen.
“Howdy,” Cleve said. “Fine mornin’.”
“It is.”
“Got any horses for sale?”
“A few.”
“We’re in need of a couple.”
“What I’ve got’s in the pen yonder.” The man motioned toward the pole corral attached to the livery barn.
“Mind if we take a look?”
“Help yourselves.”
Cleve and Dillon ducked under the poles and entered the corral. Fifteen minutes later they came out leading a buckskin and a sorrel, both big horses and the best of the lot. The liveryman stood where they had left him. They tied the horses to the hitching rail.
“Got saddles?”
“Inside.”
They followed the short, bowlegged man as he limped into the barn. A peeled log set on crossbars held a row of saddles.
“Take yore pick. Comes with the horse. Warn ya, them horses come high.”
“Expected it.” Dillon shouldered an almost new double-cinched saddle. “This’ll do for me.”
“I’ll take this one with the high back.” Cleve pulled the saddle from the pole, carried it out and threw it on the back of the sorrel.
“Mind if we give them a try?”
“Couldn’t do nothin’ about it if I did.”
The liveryman eyed them guardedly. He lifted his shoulders in a gesture of helplessness. His action told Cleve the man expected them to ride off and not return.
“How much?”
“Forty each.”
First Cleve and then Dillon counted out the money and put it in the surprised man’s hand.
“We’ll be back in thirty minutes for a bill of sale or a refund.”
“Fair enough.”
The two men walked the horses to the edge of town, then trotted them to a road past the timber.
“H’yaw!” Dillon slapped the buckskin on the rump. “Let’s see what you can do.” The horse’s muscles bunched. He sprang forward in a leap that left the sorrel behind. “H’yaw!” The big horse moved out, running hard and free on the hard-packed road. Dillon looked over his shoulder to see the sorrel a length behind. He leaned over the saddle horn. “Go, boy! Go!” he urged. The powerful legs stretched, and a minute later they were more than ten lengths ahead of the sorrel. Dillon let go with a whoop of youthful laughter.
The men pulled the horses to a trot, turned and walked them back to town.
“By golly, Cleve, we lucked out.”
“That buckskin likes to run.”
“Danged if he don’t! He wasn’t even winded when I pulled him up.”
As they rode toward the livery barn they saw the proprietor with his back to the building and two men standing rather close to him. One of them was the hawk-nosed man who had been in the eatery with Mike Bruza.
Cleve and Dillon pulled the horses to a stop behind them.
“Give ’em the money back,” the hawk-nosed man demanded, and jerked his head toward Cleve and Dillon. “We had our sights on them horses. Told ya we’d be back.”
“They bought ’em, fair and square—”
“I ain’t carin’ ’bout fair and sqaure, ya old crippled-up pile a shit.” He took a fistful of the liveryman’s shirt and shoved him against the barn.
“Whoa now!” Dillon stepped down from his horse. “Let go of him. He had horses to sell. We bought ’em. You got a thing to say, say it to me.”
The man ignored him and spoke sharply to the old man, emphasizing his words with a slam against the wall.
“Give back the money or I’ll wring yore scrawny neck.”
“Maybe your ears are plugged up.” Dillon’s voice was equally sharp. “I said back off.”
The man spun around in a crouched position. His face resembled that of a snarling wolverine. His hand hovered over the gun on his thigh. He only had to bend his elbow to grasp the butt.
“Ya stickin’ yore nose in, boy?”
“You might say that, shithead.”
“Ya know who I am?”
“Reckon I do. Just now figured it out. You’re a two-bit gunslinger named Greg Meader. Seen that ugly face of yours on a poster down in Oklahoma Territory not more than a week or two ago.”
“You wantin’ to try me, boy?”
“No, but reckon you’re itchin’ to try me. So make your move.”
Meader bent his elbow. Before his hand grasped his gun butt he was looking into the business end of Dillon’s gun. He choked with surprise and fear. He stared blindly at the tall, light-haired man and waited for the bullet that was sure to come. It was beyond belief how fast he had drawn the gun. Meader had outdrawn every man he had ever challenged—until now.
“You got a horse here?” Dillon asked calmly.
Meader nodded, his mouth so dry he couldn
’t speak. He didn’t dare take his eyes off Dillon.
“Get on it before I change my mind. I don’t like your face and I don’t like you. You’re nothing but a cocky little bully who picks on a smaller, weaker man. Ride out, or I’ll kill you and collect the reward.”
“What’s . . . what’s stopping ya?”
“The crooked marshal, Lyster. The money would go in his pocket unless I hang around for a month or two to collect it. And I’m not doing him any favors.”
“Get the horses,” Meader said over his shoulder to the other man.
“Do they owe you for board?” With his eyes still on Meader, Dillon spoke to the liveryman.
“Two bits.”
“Pay up.”
Meader tossed a coin into the dirt at the man’s feet.
Cleve and Dillon watched the two men mount tired, underfed horses.
“I ain’t forgettin’ you.” Meader’s eyes glowed with pure hatred.
“You’d better not if you want to live. I’ll be coming to collect that reward.”
“What’s yore name?”
“Bertha Mae Sutton.”
“Bertha Mae Sut—? That’s a woman’s name.”
“Yeah. I’m a woman dressed up like a man. Ain’t that a lark? You’ve been outdrawed by a woman. I’ll spread the word that Bertha Mae backed down Greg Meader. You’ll be the laughing-stock in every saloon in the West.”
Spitting on the ground at Dillon’s feet, Meader put his heels to his horse’s flanks and gigged him cruelly. The tortured animal squealed in protest, then took off at a run.
The liveryman’s eyes went from the stubble of whiskers on Dillon’s chin down his six-foot, muscular, rock-hard frame. Then the old man began to chuckle.
“Ah . . . shoot!” He slapped his hat against his thigh.
Dillon grinned. “Throws ’em off every time.”
Cleve removed his hat, wiped the sweat from his brow with his sleeve and slapped it back on his head.
“I’m getting too old for this, Dillon. I just got a couple hundred more gray hairs.”
“You hadn’t ort to a worried. He was just a show-off.” Dillon laughed, then said, “A man with two guns is usually a lefty. His left holster was more worn than the right. I was watchin’ his left hand.”
Larkspur Page 17