He stowed them away in one of his saddlebags and mounted up again. He stuck to the alleys as he made his way out of Tombstone and maintained a slow, careful pace until he put the town behind him.
It was impossible to know which direction Dallin had gone when he left Tombstone, so Stonewall played his hunch and headed for the McCabe ranch. He heeled his horse into a ground-eating lope toward the northeast. If he discovered that the fugitive hadn’t been there, he would have wasted time and would have to start over, but he didn’t see any other way to proceed.
As he rode, Stonewall kept an eye on his back trail out of habit, and after he had gone a couple miles he thought he spotted something moving behind him. Reining in, he waited to see if he could get a better look.
A moment later, a rider came into view, cresting a rise about half a mile behind him. Stonewall’s keen young eyes had been right. Somebody was trailing him.
The rider went out of sight again as he followed the rolling, semi-arid terrain. Stonewall figured that Sheriff Slaughter had somehow found out what he was doing and had sent somebody after him. Slaughter might have even come himself, intending to rein in his impulsive brother-in-law.
Stonewall didn’t intend to let that happen. He wasn’t going to be swayed from his goal. He decided he might as well wait and have the confrontation, rather than postponing it.
He looked around, saw some good-sized rocks alongside the trail up ahead, and decided he would conceal himself there until his follower caught up to him. He heeled his horse into motion again and rode behind the boulders.
His nerves grew tense as he waited. What would he do if the man on his trail was the sheriff? Could he disobey a direct order to return to Tombstone? If he did, Slaughter might fire him, brother-in-law or no brother-in-law.
If it was another deputy following him, Stonewall might get away with ignoring any such orders, but only for the time being. Sooner or later, he would have to face Slaughter’s wrath.
He heard hoofbeats approaching the boulders and knew that he wouldn’t have to wait much longer to find out which one it was going to be.
Another thought occurred to him. Maybe the rider had nothing to do with him. That was always possible. He hung on to that hope until the man on horseback had almost reached the rocks then he urged his mount out into the open to block the trail.
The other man let out a startled exclamation and hauled back on the reins to bring his horse to a stop before the two animals could collide.
“Roy! What in blazes are you doin’ following me?”
Roy Corbett struggled to bring his mount under control. The clerk and would-be lawyer had traded his apron for a leather vest and donned a dark-brown, flat-crowned hat. He wore a holstered six-gun and had a rifle in a saddle boot.
“Son of a gun, Stonewall, you scared me. What’s the idea of ambushing me like this?”
“I wouldn’t call this an ambush. Where are you headed, Roy? How come you’re not working in the store back in town?”
Corbett didn’t answer. The questions made him uncomfortable.
“Dadgum it, you’re followin’ me, aren’t you?” Stonewall demanded.
“I got to thinking after you left the store. You wouldn’t be stocking up on cartridges if you didn’t think there might be trouble of some sort. When I saw you ride out, I thought you might be going after Dallin Williams. But the sheriff didn’t send you, did he, Stonewall?”
Stonewall frowned. “How do you figure that?”
“You wouldn’t be sneaking around like you were if you were just following Sheriff Slaughter’s orders.” Excitement crept into Corbett’s voice as he went on. “You figured out where Williams went, didn’t you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Stonewall insisted. “This is just loco. I’m . . . I’m . . .” He couldn’t think of a plausible excuse for being out there, headed in the direction he was headed.
It didn’t really matter. Whatever he might have said, Corbett probably wouldn’t have believed it.
“You’re riding out to the McCabe ranch, aren’t you? You think Williams has gone out there.” A look of worry appeared on Corbett’s face. “You think he’d hurt the McCabe girl? Without her to testify in court, there’s no real case against him.”
“Oh, there’s a case against him,” Stonewall said. “He busted out of jail, and I’ve got a lump on my head to prove it. So does my cousin Tommy. Whether he did what Jessie McCabe accused him of or not, breaking out of jail and assaulting a couple deputies is a crime. That’s a danged good case as far as I’m concerned.”
“Well, sure, but maybe he figures he’d get off easier for that than he would for raping Jessie.”
“Actually, I’m thinkin’ that he might have some crazy idea about talking Jessie into changing her story. If she said he was really innocent, a jury might not be too hard on him for breaking out of jail to prove it.”
“That makes sense,” Corbett agreed. “I think it’s worth us riding out there to find out.”
“Us?”
“I’m going to go with you and give you a hand.”
Stonewall shook his head. “You can’t do that, Roy. I’m a duly authorized peace officer. You’re not.”
“Sheriff Slaughter lets civilians go along on posses. He chased those bandits all the way down into Mexico with a posse of townspeople.”
Stonewall had to admit that was true, but there had been special circumstances involved in that case. “Why do you want to come along, anyway?”
“I told you, I’m going to be an attorney someday. The more experience I have with the law, the better.”
That seemed like pretty shaky reasoning to Stonewall, but he didn’t know anything about lawyering or how somebody went about preparing to be one. And he was wasting time sitting there arguing.
“If you want to come along, I reckon I can’t stop you. There’s no law against you or anybody else ridin’ out to the McCabe ranch.” Stonewall paused and then added sternly, “But don’t interfere with me carryin’ out my official duties or I’ll have to arrest you.”
“I just want to help if I can, not get in the way,” Corbett said.
Stonewall lifted his reins and jerked his head toward the trail. “Come on, then.”
They had ridden side by side for about half a mile when Stonewall spotted a column of dust rising ahead of them.
Corbett saw it, too “Looks like somebody’s coming this way in a hurry.”
“Yeah, and that ain’t good,” Stonewall muttered. “Nobody hurries in heat like this unless there’s real trouble.”
It didn’t take long for the gap between them to close. Stonewall and Corbett reined in as the rider galloped toward them. When the man was close enough that he couldn’t miss seeing them, Stonewall held up his left hand in a signal to stop.
At first he thought the rider was going to gallop right past them, but the man slowed his mount and gradually brought the horse to a halt. He looked at Stonewall. “Thank the Lord it’s you, Deputy. I was on my way to town to fetch the law.”
Stonewall recognized the man as one of Little Ed McCabe’s cowboys. “What’s wrong, Tom? Trouble at the ranch?”
“Damned right there’s trouble! Dallin Williams showed up there.”
Stonewall couldn’t help but feel a little satisfaction because his hunch had turned out to be right.
But that feeling vanished the next moment when the Bar EM puncher continued. “He kidnapped Miss Jessie!”
“What!” Corbett cried.
If the cowboy was curious what a store clerk was doing with Stonewall, he didn’t show it. “Yeah, Williams got in a fight with Little Ed, threw Miss Jessie on his horse, and rode off with her.”
“Was anybody hurt?” Stonewall asked.
The cowboy shook his head. “I don’t reckon so.”
That was a little surprising, considering that the man had said Dallin got in a fight with McCabe. Stonewall would have figured that Little Ed would bust Dallin in half. “Y
ou said Little Ed sent you to town?”
Tom nodded. “Yeah, he told me to let the sheriff know what happened.”
“And what’s he doing?”
“What do you think? Him and some of the boys lit a shuck after that varmint. They’re gonna catch Williams, get Miss Jessie away from him, and string him up!”
That was exactly the answer Stonewall expected, although it wasn’t what he wanted to hear. He wanted Dallin behind bars again, where he could answer to the law, not to hangrope justice.
Tom went on. “Now that I’ve told you, Deputy, I reckon I don’t have to go all the way on into Tombstone—”
“Yeah, you do,” Stonewall broke in. “I’m out here on a job of my own. I can’t turn around and go back to report this. You go ahead and find Sheriff Slaughter and tell him what happened.”
“Dadgummit! I hoped I could catch up to Little Ed and the rest of the boys. I don’t want to miss what’s gonna happen when they get their hands on Williams.”
“Which way did he go when he rode off with Jessie McCabe?” Stonewall asked.
“Northwest toward the Santa Catalinas.”
Stonewall nodded. The terrain in that direction was pretty rugged. There were a lot of places where a man could hole up or maybe give his pursuers the slip. Stonewall had hunted some up there and knew the country.
Dallin Williams knew it, too, quite possibly better than he did.
One thing was certain. Williams wouldn’t live very long if Little Ed and the rest of the Bar EM bunch caught him. Guilty or innocent, he would hang.
Stonewall was bound and determined to prevent that. Every moment he sat there jawing increased the odds against success. “You go on to Tombstone like I told you,” he said to the McCabe puncher, then pulled his horse’s head around.
No point in riding to the ranch. Dallin had already been there and gone. Stonewall headed northwest toward the distant gray humps of the Santa Catalina Mountains.
Roy Corbett fell in beside him, pushing his horse to keep up.
“Still plan to come with me, do you?” Stonewall asked.
“I’ve made up my mind. I’m in this to the end.”
Stonewall didn’t say anything. He just hoped it didn’t end with Dallin Williams dangling at the end of a rope.
Chapter 18
After they had eaten breakfast, Drake escorted Arabella back to the Top-Notch. She was tired and wanted to get some sleep, so she said her goodbyes downstairs and went up to her room.
She hadn’t seen Morris Upton when they came in, and when she reached her room she heard snores coming through the wall from the adjoining room. Obviously, Upton had turned in, too.
She checked the door between the rooms to make sure it was locked. She didn’t want to take a chance on Upton deciding to pay her a visit if he woke up in an amorous mood.
With that precaution taken care of, Arabella pulled the curtains securely to keep out as much of the light as possible, took off her dress, stretched out on the bed in her underclothes, and dropped off to sleep almost immediately.
She had never been one to dream much, and today was no exception. She slept soundly for several hours and woke up feeling rested.
When she pulled back the curtain and looked through the window, the intensity of the light outside told her it was probably early afternoon.
She didn’t hear the snoring coming from next door anymore, so she supposed Upton was awake, too.
After freshening up and getting dressed, she went downstairs. Upton stood at the bar nursing a drink, while a number of the players from the tournament sat around a big table in the back, talking animatedly.
He beckoned to her, but Arabella pretended not to see the gesture and went over to the table where the other players were. As she approached, she could tell that some of them were upset about something.
“There you are, Lady Winthrop,” Wade Cunningham said. “We were a bit worried about you.”
Arabella smiled. “Why would you be worried about me?”
“You haven’t heard, have you?” Donald Lockard asked.
“Heard what?”
With a solemn look on his narrow face, Cunningham told her, “Angelo Castro was murdered early this morning, sometime soon after the games broke up.”
Arabella’s eyes widened in shock at the news. Her breath seemed to freeze in her throat for a second. She hadn’t considered the Italian to be a friend of hers, and they certainly hadn’t known each other well, but she had always gotten along with him and felt no animosity toward him.
“What happened?” she asked as she took one of the empty chairs at the table.
“Someone stabbed him in an alley and stole his stake, along with what he won last night,” Cunningham explained.
“The killer got away?”
“That’s right,” Lockard said. “The sheriff questioned some of us, but I don’t think he has any idea who killed Castro.”
“Do any of you?” Arabella asked.
The men around the table murmured negatives or shook their heads.
Cunningham said, “We’ve been doing a head count of the players in the tournament, trying to see who’s already back here ready for the games to start up again.”
“Because you think the murderer might be . . . one of us?”
“That . . . and we were sort of worried that there might be some other bodies out there that haven’t been found yet.”
Arabella leaned back in her chair as Cunningham’s words soaked in. The lanky gambler was right. The murderer who had stalked and killed Angelo Castro might have targeted some of the other players from the tournament as well.
Worry for her old friend’s safety sprang up inside her. “Has anyone seen Steve Drake?”
The men around the table shook their heads again.
Lockard said, “Drake’s staying down at the American Hotel. Maybe somebody should go check on him.”
“I’ll do that.” Arabella scraped her chair back. She stood up and headed for the saloon’s entrance.
Morris Upton wasn’t going to be ignored any longer. He got in her way and said, “I need to talk to you, Arabella.”
“I’m in a bit of a hurry—”
“I just want to make sure you’re all right. I’m sure you’ve heard by now about Castro—”
“I have, and that’s why I’m in a hurry. I want to go find Steve.”
Upton made a face. “That’s right. The two of you are old friends, aren’t you?”
“That’s right. I’m sorry, Morris. I’ll be back before the tournament starts again.” She paused despite her anxiety over Drake. “You are going to continue with the tournament?”
“What? Of course. The tournament will go on as planned. We can’t end it because of the unfortunate death of one of the players.”
“We don’t know yet that Angelo was the killer’s only victim. There may be others who haven’t been found yet.”
Upton frowned and looked like he hadn’t considered that possibility.
While he was distracted by that new worry, Arabella made it past him and out the door onto the boardwalk. She knew where the American Hotel was. She hurried toward it, trying not to think about the possibility that something had happened to Steve.
There was no reason to believe that it had, she told herself. After leaving her at the Top-Notch, he had probably gone back to the hotel to get some sleep himself.
The oppressive heat still lay over Tombstone. By the time she reached the hotel, her face glowed with a fine sheen of perspiration. She went inside and crossed the lobby to the desk. “Steve Drake’s room.”
The clerk hesitated and glanced at the board where room keys hung before he said, “I’m pretty sure Mr. Drake is here, ma’am, but I don’t know if he wants to be disturbed.”
“He won’t mind,” Arabella assured him. “Just tell me his room number.”
The clerk couldn’t hold out in the face of her forceful insistence. “Mr. Drake is in Room 27, ma’am.”
“Thank you.” Even in a state of anxiety, Arabella was gracious. She turned toward the stairs.
The clerk called after her, “I’d be glad to send someone up to summon Mr. Drake.”
Arabella ignored him and kept going.
Room 27 was on the second floor. She had no trouble finding it. She paused in front of the door in the carpet-runnered hallway with its potted plants and sand-filled ashtrays and took a deep breath before she knocked on the panel.
“Steve?” she called. “Steve, are you there?”
At first there was no response. Then Arabella heard a footstep on the other side of the door. “Arabella? Is that you?”
A tide of relief went through her at the sound of his voice. She sighed. “Thank God. I was worried that something had happened to you.”
“I’m fine, Bella.”
“Then open the door and let me in. Something has happened, and we need to talk.”
She frowned slightly as seconds ticked past and there was no response from him.
Finally he suggested, “Why don’t you meet me downstairs in the dining room in a few minutes? I’ll get dressed—”
“Steve, what’s wrong? There’s no need for false modesty between us.”
The doorknob rattled and the door swung open, but only a few inches. Drake looked out at her through the gap with his usual grin. He appeared to be dressed only in the bottom half of a pair of long underwear. “It’s just that the room’s rather messy and I don’t see any need to offend your sensibilities, Bella—”
“You don’t want to offend her, but you don’t seem to be worried about me!” a new voice broke in.
Arabella’s carefully curved eyebrows shot up. She recognized that voice. “Copper?” she said in a disbelieving tone. “Copper Farris?”
Drake’s grin disappeared as he winced. “Arabella, I didn’t mean to upset you. That’s why I suggested that we meet downstairs.”
“It’s all right, Steve,” she forced herself to say. “We have no claim on each other.”
Someone jerked the door out of Drake’s hand and threw it open the rest of the way. Arabella found herself facing Copper Farris, who was undeniably spectacular in a short, thin shift that hugged the contours of her heavy breasts. Her mass of red hair was tousled from sleep . . . and other activities that had gone on in the sheet-tangled bed visible behind her.
Deadly Day in Tombstone Page 14