by Logan, Jake
Marianne found herself so angry she paced, then wanted to scream. Carstairs had taken it into his head that he could have her anytime he wanted because she sold herself. Not many of the girls in the cribs in Silver City wanted anything to do with Les Carstairs. He had a reputation of beating up whoever he was with, and rumors had it more than one girl had disappeared, probably murdered at his hand and buried up in the mountains, never to be found.
“How am I going to fix that door?” She stopped and stared at the broken wood, then decided she might as well clean up now and worry on it in the morning.
She had a powerful lot to worry on. The mortgage payment on the house was due in another week, and she was still four dollars shy. What she would have gotten from Clem would have helped, but she was afraid she’d have to ask the banker for more time. He wasn’t likely to give it since houses, like any building in Silver City, were in short supply. He could foreclose and sell it for ten times what Marianne had paid for it only a year earlier. There hadn’t been the silver find then and not more than a hundred people had made Silver City their home.
Now that many came in a week, seeking their fortunes.
She dropped the shotgun onto what remained of the fainting couch, then went to the small kitchen to fetch a broom and dust pan. Cleaning up the debris was about all she was capable of doing at the moment. As she rummaged in the small closet to get the broom out, she heard a muffled voice coming from the front of the house.
“Randolph, get on in here. We need to talk.”
She returned to the front room, intending to have him help her clean up. But her son wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Marianne started to tug open the front door when the window to her right broke. Her mouth dropped open as she saw the whiskey bottle with the flaming rag stuck into the neck.
Then the bomb exploded, sending broken glass and fire straight at her.
2
John Slocum cursed as the heavily loaded wagon hit a rock and sent him flying up off the hard wooden bench. He landed askew on the edge and almost tumbled to the ground. Only by dint of will did he stay in the driver’s box. The leather reins turned slippery in his grip, but he drove his boot heels into the wagon’s side and recovered.
The mules brayed in protest at the steep climb. He had been whipping them along for the past four days to keep his cargo intact. A quick glance over his shoulder made him curse anew. Sawdust had leaked out from under the canvas covering large blocks of ice enclosed in wood crates. Moving the ice from Santa Fe, New Mexico, down to Tombstone in Arizona Territory was one of the most lucrative cargoes possible. The miners paid top dollar for a sliver of ice in their drinks. All he had to do was get the heavy load there before it melted.
“Shaddup,” he bellowed to the mules. They ignored him, continuing their noisy protests at such abuse. With a quick spin, he secured the reins around the wheel brake and vaulted to the ground.
Legs a bit shaky from driving so long, he braced himself against the side of the wagon as he went to the rear. As he had feared, one crate had cracked open from too much jostling along the rough road. He was a hundred miles outside of Tombstone, still on the New Mexico side of the Continental Divide. All he had to do was reach the southern pass.
Pulling back the heavy canvas protecting the crate from the sun, Slocum tugged at the loose board. A new river of soggy sawdust dribbled out.
Replacing the sawdust as insulation wasn’t going to happen, but he might stuff in dirt or leaves to replace what had leaked out. Looking around, he decided pine needles were his best chance of keeping the ice from melting and ruining this freight run.
He grabbed a hammer and whacked at the loose nails, securing the crate. The holes in the top of the crate would let him stuff in pine needles or whatever else he could find. He wasn’t exactly sure where he was but close to Steeple Rock assured him there wouldn’t be much more of this mountain road to traverse. From Steeple Rock he would turn west through the broad pass and into the Sonoran Desert until he reached Tombstone.
As he gathered brittle pine needles by the handful, he hesitated. Slocum put his hand down flat against the rocky ground and felt vibration. The pine needles fluttered down as he slid his Colt Navy from his cross-draw holster and stood. A rider came mighty fast on his back trail. With the grade this steep, there was no cause to kill a horse by galloping unless circumstances warranted it.
Dire circumstances.
The rider came around a bend in the road and slowed when he spotted Slocum holding his six-shooter. Then he drew rein, stood in the stirrups, and waved.
“You John Slocum? Holst sent me.”
Slocum lowered his six-shooter to his side and motioned with his left hand for the rider to approach. It didn’t make a lick of sense that his boss would send a rider out since there was nothing Holst needed to tell him. He didn’t give two hoots and a holler if Slocum died on the trail as long as he delivered every cold cubic inch of ice to Arizona. Loss of profit, loss of the wagon and team—those mattered to Holst, and he had no reason to think anything jeopardized them. Slocum had driven this route three times in the past two months without any trouble.
The rider came closer, keeping his hands in sight.
“Glad I caught up with you. Holst sent me to give you a hand. Looks like you’re needin’ it. Break down?”
“Crate broke open,” Slocum said, not giving anything away. With the canvas pulled back and sawdust all over the wagon bed, any fool could see what had happened.
“Damn. You expose the ice?”
“Holst is a cheap bastard. He told me over and over how this route didn’t need but one driver. What does he expect you to do?”
“Prices are way up over in Arizona. He reckons to sell this load for ten times what he has before. Been burnin’ up the telegraph lines to make it happen.”
Slocum said nothing. He sized up the rider. Short, slender, red hair, and fair complexion. He wore his six-gun high on his right hip, where it would be hard to draw astride the horse and damned near impossible to draw with any speed even if he stood with both boots on the ground. This wasn’t a gunfighter. From his clothing, he might be a miner rather than a freighter.
“You want me to help?” The man rode closer, then dismounted when Slocum remained quiet. “I’ve worked as a carpenter, and looks like you was stuffin’ leaves and shit into the box to keep the ice from meltin’ any more. It melted much?” His bright blue eyes worked to see if the wagon bed was wet from vanishing ice.
“Not much gone. The crate only busted open a mile or two back, at the foot of this hill.”
“Do you think pine needles will work better than leaves?”
“There’re more of ’em around here,” Slocum said, glancing at the ponderosa all around. It was early enough in the spring that the oak, aspen, and other trees that shed their leaves every fall still clung to their new bright greenery. Winter snow had rotted last autumn’s crop of leaves, but the pine needles were eternal.
“Good point,” the man said, dropping to his knees and sweeping the needles up the way Slocum had before being interrupted.
“You my assistant? You’re not my boss.”
The redhead laughed easily and said, “From what Holst says, you don’t even look at him as your boss and he pays you, tells you what to do. You’re free as the wind, that’s what Holst said ’fore he sent me along.”
Slocum stepped away as the man jumped into the wagon, examined the crates for sturdiness, then began stuffing stacks of the dead brown pine needles into the holes. For all his industry, the man seemed distracted. Slocum knew it might be that he hadn’t holstered his six-shooter, but the man’s interest focused more on the ice. The notion that a single man would steal the cargo entered Slocum’s mind.
“You got a name?”
The redhead looked up, pushed his hat up to expose a pale forehead, then grinned. Slocum figured that smile melted the
ladies’ hearts. It did not affect him.
“Frank’s the name.”
“You supposed to ride with me all the way to Tombstone?”
“That’s what Holst told me.”
“You finish replacing the insulation, then mount up, ride back to Santa Fe, and tell Holst I don’t need help.”
“I don’t get paid.”
“Then go over to Silver City. It’s not more ’n ten miles to the east. Find a saloon and drink until it seems about time for me to drive back. You can tell Holst you did what he said, and I won’t gainsay that.”
“But I can help! There’s no point in coolin’ my heels. I’m an honest fellow. I don’t get paid for work I don’t do.”
That argument appealed to Slocum since he felt the same way, but something about Frank didn’t set well with him. The youngster was open and was quick with his smile, maybe too quick. He was personable and no gunman from the way he wore his pistol. If he went for that smoke wagon, it’d be a week from Thursday before he hauled it free of the holster.
There wasn’t anything to worry on about Frank, other than nothing he’d said about Holst and why the owner of the freight company would have sent him made any sense.
“Go on and hammer in the last of the nails,” Slocum said, still watching Frank like a hawk.
The man held the hammer, considered the job, then set to driving the nails back in with a vengeance. He dropped the hammer, pulled up the canvas, and snugged it under the edges of the crate before jumping to the ground.
“See? I’m real handy to have around.”
“You got a newspaper?”
“What’s that?” Frank looked hard at Slocum, then nodded. “I got one in Santa Fe a couple days ago.” He went to his saddlebags and fumbled around.
Slocum held his six-shooter ready in case the stranger came out with a hideout pistol, but Frank turned and held out the Santa Fe New Mexican, the leading northern New Mexico newspaper.
A quick glance at the date convinced Slocum that Frank was telling the truth about being in Santa Fe when he said, but that proved nothing about his claim that Holst had sent him. Slocum took the front page of the paper.
“Be right back. You watch the wagon.”
“As if anyone out here’d steal it,” Frank said. Something in his words rang hollow.
Slocum headed for the bushes as if seeking privacy to do his business, found a thick-boled oak, and stepped behind it. He waited a few seconds, about as long as it would take to drop his pants, then peered around to spy on Frank. The man had climbed back into the wagon and leaned against the crate as if he wanted the cold ice to chill him. What came next startled Slocum.
Frank went to the driver’s bench and dropped down, reaching for the reins wrapped around the brake. Slocum’s hand went to his six-gun, then he froze. Tipping his head to one side, he heard riders approaching fast and hard.
The redhead yanked the reins off the brake and snapped them, but the mules were too stubborn to obey another driver. It had taken Slocum several hours to get them to obey him, and he couldn’t say they trusted him one little bit. He had simply shown them not obeying him was worse than pulling the heavy ice-laden wagon up the steep mountain grades. Frank didn’t have time enough to establish that kind of bond.
The riders struggled up the slope both Slocum and Frank had conquered already. Two had six-shooters out and a third galloped forward, his horse’s flanks lathered from the exertion.
“You can’t have the wagon!” Frank cried. He started to draw his six-gun.
Slocum had been right about the man’s ability to use the pistol. Frank stood, got his hand way up to the butt, and fought to get the barrel clear of the holster. The rider on the lathered horse never slowed. As he raced by Frank, he grabbed out. His hand slipped from Frank’s shirt, but the impact on his chest sent Frank falling from the driver’s box, tumbling ass over teakettle.
The other two riders came up on either side of the wagon, guns pointed at Frank. The redhead struggled on the ground. The blow had stunned him. The fall had knocked the air from his lungs. He made tiny gasping sounds and kicked feebly like a newborn baby. It would take him long minutes to recover.
“Kill him?”
“Naw, don’t waste the bullet,” answered another road agent. “We got what we want. You drive this rig, Jericho?”
The one called Jericho had knocked Frank out. He trotted back, studying the mule team, and nodded brusquely.
Slocum tried to get a better look at the trio. They wore dusters with the back flaps pulled up to hide their faces from anything other than a direct look. With them clustered around the wagon studying it, Slocum had no chance to identify the outlaws.
The one named Jericho stepped off his horse and over into the driver’s box. It took him a bit of fishing to capture the reins Frank had dropped, then he snapped them and convinced the balky mules to pull. Slocum stepped out, intending to bushwhack the thieves, but Jericho was a better driver than he had any right to be and already had the wagon over the summit and on its way down the far side of the hill. The other two flanked him. Slocum might have made a superb shot and winged one. There wasn’t any way in hell he could have shot all three to stop the robbery.
From the way they had ridden and the way they’d talked, they weren’t likely to give up their icy loot easily.
Slocum went to where Frank still made tiny mewling noises. There wasn’t anything he could do but wait for the man’s lungs to work right again. He sat on a stump and looked after the road agents.
“Why the hell would they go to all that effort to steal a block of ice, even if it’s worth ten times what Holst told me?”
“S-Slocum, stop them. You can’t let ’em get away.”
“I’m not getting killed over a wagon loaded with ice,” he said. “Did Holst really send you?”
He hoped the unexpected question would give an answer different from the one the red-haired man had made before. Slocum had waited too late—or Frank hadn’t lied.
Recovering, Frank sat up and clutched his ribs.
“Nothing’s broken,” he said at length. He had pretty well covered when he said, “Of course Holst sent me. Who else?”
Slocum looked at the empty air where the wagon had been parked. He had no doubt his cargo was ice from the way it had begun to melt. It wasn’t as if Holst had spare gold he wanted to ship secretly to Tombstone. The money flowed in the other direction, from Arizona to Santa Fe. The ice was valuable, at ten times the going rate or not, but the trio of robbers had worked together well. They could have robbed a stagecoach or a bank and gotten actual specie or greenbacks that wouldn’t melt on them.
“You reckon they have a buyer for that ice?”
“We got to get it back, Slocum. Where’s my horse?”
Slocum jerked his thumb over his shoulder at a grassy patch where the horse contentedly nibbled at the spring grass. If he moved fast enough, he could be on the horse chasing down the road agents rather than Frank. Again, Slocum waited too long.
Frank fetched his six-shooter and held it so that he could lift and fire before Slocum could get his own Colt into action.
“I’m goin’ after ’em,” the redhead declared.
“You against the three of them didn’t play out too well before. Can your horse take the pair of us on its back?” Slocum deciphered the unspoken curse. Frank’s plans didn’t include the legitimate employee of the New Mexico Ice and Coal Company. Then it was the redhead’s turn to be a tad too slow on the uptake. Slocum had his pistol out and moving to center on the man’s chest.
“We can ride double,” Frank said, bowing to the inevitable.
Slocum let Frank drag his horse away from the tempting, juicy grass and mount. He caught the cantle and pulled himself into an uncomfortable spot behind.
“Let’s ride. They can’t travel too fast without wrecki
ng the wagon,” Slocum said.
“That’s not goin’ to stop ’em,” Frank said.
“What’s so all fired important about a block of ice that they’d steal it?” Slocum felt Frank tense at the question.
“I told you what Holst told me. Prices have gone through the roof. They ought to get more for that ice than if they robbed a train.”
Slocum doubted that, and the road agents had been veteran thieves. They worked well together and instinctively hid their faces, as if they had experience. Having both Frank and a gang of robbers show up at the same time to steal the ice made him mighty suspicious. What else had Holst slipped into the cargo? Knowing the ice magnate as he did, Slocum couldn’t guess. Holst was a sharp businessman, but the Panic of ’73 had left its scars even though more than a year had passed. Ice and coal were necessities, but Holst was hardly the only one able to furnish those commodities.
“Think Holst has some competition that wants to drive him out of business?” Slocum asked, thinking aloud and not expecting Frank to answer.
“Could be, yeah, could be. Good reason to send me out to be sure the shipment arrived.”
“Slow down,” Slocum said sharply. He pointed off the road—hardly more than twin ruts through this stretch of mountains—where the road agents had driven the wagon. “We want to take them by surprise. That’s the only way to get the ice back.”
In a small meadow two men worked on the crate, trying to pry off a side of the crate holding the ice block. Slocum shifted to draw his pistol when Frank swung about and landed a heavy elbow to his chest. Lifted away from the horse by the blow, Slocum landed hard, then scrambled to keep the horse from kicking him with his rear hooves.
Frank pulled out his six-shooter and charged. He got off two shots before the road agents noticed they weren’t alone. One dropped to his knee and pulled up a rifle he’d laid in the wagon bed. The other went for his six-gun with a well-oiled speed and ease that convinced Slocum they were true desperadoes.