Deadly Manhunt (A Tony Masero Western)

by Tony Masero

  ‘One other thing,’ said Garrett. ‘You lay off the drink from now on. I’m not against a fellow having a glass or two but in our business it’s no good turning up with a sore head. Got me?’

  Jack nodded.

  ‘These are tricky times up in Lincoln,’ Garrett went on. ‘Lot of factions involved and I don’t want my men getting killed or killing innocent bystanders because they’re three sheets to the wind.’

  ‘It’s okay, Pat. You have it, it’s way beyond time I took the pledge and this here is it.’

  Jack upended his glass and put it decisively head down on the table.

  Chapter Two

  There were only two other passengers on the stage when it arrived later that afternoon. Two women. Quite pretty girls, Jack observed. One, a tall, darkly copper haired girl with aquiline features and fascinating dark eyes. Her companion was the opposite in height and coloring, fair with cornflower blue eyes that appeared open and innocent. Both women were dressed from head to toe in mourning black.

  Garrett swept off his hat as he entered the carriage and saw the two black bedecked young women looking at him curiously.

  ‘Ladies,’ he said boldly. ‘Afternoon to you. Marshal Pat Garrett at your service. And this here is my deputy-to-be, Mister Jack Slade.’

  Jack, ever conscious of his scruffy appearance, removed his hat and brushed at his hair with a thin embarrassed smile.

  ‘Why, please come in Marshal,’ said the fair-haired girl and the two of them pulled aside their bustling dresses to allow them entrance. ‘There’s little room I’m afraid.’

  It was true, it was tight inside on the narrow seats and their knees almost touched as the men sat down.

  ‘May I ask your destination ladies?’ Garrett asked.

  ‘We’re on our way back east,’ the fair-haired one obliged with a tight little sorrowful smile.

  ‘Suffered a recent loss I see,’ Garrett observed somberly.

  The fair-haired girl lowered her head quickly her eyes filling at the memory. Her companion looked at her with a slight, almost irritated shake of her head.

  ‘Yes sir,’ the copper head said brusquely. ‘Sadly, we both lost our husbands by way of an attack by the hostiles.’

  ‘Condolences. Sorry to hear that.’

  ‘I’m Mrs. Jane Lowry and this here is, Mrs. Pamela Brown. Our boys were both with the cavalry at Fort Bayard and they fell whilst doing their duty against the Apache. Now we’re out on our ear without a by your leave if you please. Damnable military!’ she whispered the last through clenched teeth and with a certain amount of bitterness.

  Pamela Brown began to weep sorrowfully.

  ‘My, my,’ said Garrett as he took out a clean handkerchief and passed it to the girl. ‘There, there, Missy. There’s no doubt that Apache devil Vittorio has certainly caused a heap of grief in the present conflict.’

  ‘Don’t you fret none, Marshal,’ said Jane, who was obviously made of sterner stuff. ‘She goes on like that all the time.’

  ‘I can’t help it,’ sobbed the fair-haired girl. ‘I’ll never get to see my dear Teddy again. I can’t yet believe he’s gone for good.’

  ‘Best toughen up, Pam,’ said Jane, looking up at the window as the driver noisily lowered the leather dust blinds in preparation to leave. ‘Everybody loses something along the way. It’s a fact of life. You’ve just got to get on with it.’

  ‘Perhaps a little harshly put,’ agreed Garrett. ‘But true all the same, Mrs. Brown. Sad though your loss is, it is best to look forward and press on I believe.’

  Pam looked at him tearfully and offered a weak smile. ‘Thank you, sir. You are most considerate.’

  Jack was silently amused at how Garrett deftly played the two ladies, with his southern style there was no doubt he would do just fine amongst genteel society when they arrived in Lincoln. The sad little scene was then interrupted as the driver called down that the new team was hitched and they were ready to leave.

  Once they set off the noisy rumble of the carriage and the pounding of the team restricted conversation as they settled in for the uncomfortable ride through to Lincoln. Garrett sat opposite Pam and leant forward now and again to offer some words of reassurance to her, she would smile demurely at his approach and look down coyly at the folded and gloved hands lying passively on her lap. It gave Jack some chance to study the feisty Mrs. Jane Lowry in front of him, difficult to avoid, as their faces were no more than four feet apart. Whenever their eyes met, hers would glaze over without an ounce of charity in them and he was sure she saw him only as a raggedy-assed gunman not worth bothering with. She however, attracted him. He liked her spirit and guessed she would have survived the frontier life in an army fort far better than Pam Brown ever could.

  He also appreciated her beauty. It was not the kind that was obvious in features, more an aspect of character that drew him. An erect, slender woman, with the copper hair under her stylish little hat, the hair cut in a fringe across her brow and left to hang lustrous and long down her back. She had thick dark eyebrows above those raking eyes that drew Jack in so effectively, her eyes slanted up slightly at the corners in an impish manner although now they looked at Jack with total indifference. Both the women must have been stifled in the enclosed carriage and Jack was sure that the formal looking Pam probably wore a corset under her bustled widow’s weeds whilst Jane was more sensibly clothed in looser fitting garments. As they bumped and swayed on their journey Jack gave himself over to fantasies of allowing that long penny colored hair to play through his fingers as he let it down.

  They stopped over for a brief team change at a midway swing station and were bound in to Lincoln on their final run. All of them were pleased to be leaving the rough trip behind when Jack finally got up the courage to speak to Jane Lowry. He also possibly saved her life in that instant. She leant forward, one eyebrow raised derisively, to better hear what he had to say, when Pam Brown’s head exploded. At least one part of it did. Suddenly the pretty girl was transformed into a half headed bloody mess as blood and bones were sluiced across the carriage and all over Jane’s neck and shoulders.

  The bullet hole that plunked through the tight leather curtain covering the window-space let a tube of sunlight play through the fine dust hanging in the interior. Then another. Three bullets in all hit the carriage. The first one, which had first glanced off the bone in Pam’s shoulder, had tumbled up to enter her head under the chin, the flattened lead exiting on the far side had taken a sizeable part of her skull and fair hair with it. It was this that had spattered the leaning Jane so horribly. The second shot passed between all parties and Jack felt it’s warmth as it buzzed close by his nose. The third struck the window frame next to Garrett’s head, splintering the wood.

  It took a brief second of shock to take in what had happened. Jack saw Jane look at the mess covering her hands as Pam’s shattered body fell against her and he heard her gasp a soft, ‘Fuck me!’ Which gave him a moment of surprised pause before he gathered himself and dragged her down low, pulling out his sidearm as he did so.

  The stage lurched forward as the driver lashed new speed into the team and they were all thrown in a tumble as he did so.

  ‘Hell’s Teeth!’ cried Garrett, clambering to his knees and drawing a pistol from the shoulder holster under his jacket. He fought the bucking coach and ripped away the leather window flap to see a jerking view of yellow dust clouds populated by a shadowy group of riders firing wildly.

  ‘Road agents?’ shouted Jack from where he covered a compressed Jane lying down between his legs, a position he was beginning to rather enjoy despite the obvious present danger.

  Garrett ignored the question and roughly pushed aside the flopping body of Pam Brown, which rolled loosely and splayed blood all around the carriage. The Marshal began firing at their attackers and Jack decided he had best do the same, so he pulled aside the curtain nearest to him.

  It was impossible of course, for both parties. The stage rocked and jumped as it leapt
over the potholed road at top speed and the attacking riders bounced equally unsteadily on their racing horses. If anybody hit anything it was pure luck. Not another shot struck the stage and only a lot of lead was wasted flying through empty space. The shotgun guard riding on top was spread uncomfortably across the baggage tied to the stage roof; he was firing a Henry rifle as best he could whilst being continually lifted bodily from his prone position as the stage’s leather springs tossed the carriage. The driver, leaning dangerously forward, screamed loud, awe inspiring invectives and lashed at the poor team as they raced ahead in terror.

  At the approach to the town, the attackers found they were outrun and as their attack petered out they pulled up to turn disconsolately away and finally disappear into the trail dust running behind the reprieved stage.

  ‘Not before time,’ said Garrett, peering out of the window at the approaching suburbs. ‘Good job, driver,’ he called up to the driving box above. ‘If you had pulled over back there we’d all have been done for.’

  Jane was looking at the limp body of Pam Brown rocking from side to side across the seat. ‘Poor kid,’ she muttered.

  ‘Least it was quick,’ said Jack. ‘She knew nothing.’

  ‘I guess you’re right,’ sighed Jane. ‘Damned shame though. She loved that boy of hers too hard. Leastways, they’re together now.’

  Both suddenly realized they were still locked together on the carriage floor and with a moment of embarrassment disentangled themselves.

  ‘Thank you, Mister Slade. For....’ she indicated the floor, in way of showing she appreciated his quick action.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ he said, pleased that she had noticed him with other than chagrin at last.

  ‘I seen him,’ Garrett was growling, seated again and busily reloading his pistol. ‘I seen him plain as day. Charlie Bowdre. Sitting up there slinging shot our way. Damn his eyes.’

  ‘It was the Kid’s gang?’ Slade asked.

  ‘Sure it was,’ said Garrett. ‘He came to nail my hide, the bastard. Oh, pardon me ma’am.’

  Jane shook her head, ‘No matter, but what are we to do with this poor thing lying here?’

  ‘Give her to an undertaker, I guess,’ answered Garrett in a practical manner. ‘Don’t worry; I’ll get it done. But you’d best get yourself cleaned up. Jack, will you see the lady to the hotel when we get in. Tell them to put Mrs. Lowry’s room on my account.’

  Jane dabbed at her spattered neck distastefully with a small lace handkerchief, ‘Civil of you Marshal. I thank you.’

  Chapter Three

  ‘Listen, Mrs. Lowry,’ Slade said as they stood in the lobby of the Wortley Hotel after he had arranged single rooms for the woman and himself. ‘I’m about to spruce myself up. Get some new duds and have a shave. I’d like to offer you supper if I may, after we’re both cleaned up.’

  He had been impressed with her calm response to their recent dangerous escapade and wanted to learn more of this enigmatic woman. She looked his shabby clothing up and down critically. ‘Well, that sounds like a mighty big improvement right enough. Sure, why not? I’ll be here.’

  ‘Around eight okay?’

  She nodded briefly and turned to the desk clerk. ‘You have a bath house here?’ she asked, ignoring Slade further.

  Slade knew something of the history of the town and as he watched Jane Lowry depart he considered what he knew.

  Thirty years before when the area had first been settled it had been a calmer place. La Placitas de Rio Bonito, the Spanish settlers had called it. Then came the American Anglos and Lincoln County was finally created four years after the end of the Civil War with the town named for the revered and then so recently assassinated President.

  But Slade now knew, from what Garret had told him earlier, that Lincoln was still recovering from a different hard fought war. The small town with its population of four hundred and fifty souls had lived alongside an extended struggle that had raged on for months. The main protagonists being cattle ranchers and town traders, all of them either now dead or bankrupt and all that remained in the aftermath they had created were the gangs of killers the conflict had spawned. The Territory was plagued with these bandits who plundered cattle and horse and left a trail of death wherever they went.

  It was not a pretty place to look at as town’s go, a rough and ready wide open main street with large scale structures built alongside to accommodate the many supplies required by local ranches and mining camps. The public Pecos Valley grasslands to the east were home to vast herds of cattle and gold had been discovered at White Oaks only the year before. However, although on the surface it appeared to be a bustling place, thanks to the ravages of the pernicious County War it was a town sucked dry and slowly heading into decline.

  But trade still thrived in the town on this approaching night and as Slade stepped out from the hotel, he looked upon a lively scene as the saloons and bawdy houses prepared for the regular night’s entertainment. Flat bed wagons and accompanying riders filled the street as they brought in the miners and bands of cowboys from out of town. Carpenters labored and blacksmiths hammered, the noise of their work beating a tattoo of sound into the already noisy evening. The warm air was rich with the scent of wood smoke. Beefsteak and chicken were being grilled in back yards as the eating-houses prepared to open their doors. A light breeze had sprung up blowing from the south and laid a fresh, river water taste from the Rio Bonito across the town. Slade took a deep pleasurable breath and went to search out a general store.

  Slade was not a man to ponder unduly over his sudden change of circumstances. This morning he had awoken to find himself laying next to a momentous whore in her stink-pit crib with only lost nights of drunkenness behind him and now here he was set on a new career with money in his pocket. He had no complaints. Such was life. His jingling pockets were a sure remedy to any despair he might have felt as he glanced in that whore’s bedroom mirror. He felt renewed already and as he purchased new shirt and suit, vest and hat, his optimism grew. The added prospect of dining with the attractive Jane Lowry filled his cup to overflowing as he carried his string tied bundle of fresh clothes down to the bathhouse.

  He parted with his shabby clothes as easily as he had shed off the old skin of despair, throwing them in a rubbish fire out back of the barber shop where he had his hair trimmed and pomaded and his moustache returned to its military cut. The taste of liquor tempted him momentarily as he passed a saloon door but checking his new bought pocket watch he saw he had no time. Jane Lowry would be waiting.

  ‘Why! Don’t you look the dandy?’ said Jane, as they seated themselves in an eating-house at the back of a saloon near the hotel.

  ‘Its an improvement,’ he agreed with a soft smile.

  ‘You can say that again.’ There was a different look in her eye now as she viewed him. Still calculating but with a kinder sort of appraisal he felt. She spoke plainly for a lady but he liked her forthrightness, it allowed him to feel he could speak to her on equal terms instead of vying through a barrier of polite social inconsequentials.

  ‘So,’ he said, after they had ordered. ‘What’re your plans now? You still heading back east?’

  She sighed. ‘I don’t know as yet. My trip’s paid for, at least the military managed that, but I’m not sure I want to go back. I came out here to make a new life and leave the old one behind. Don’t think I yearn for those yesterdays any more.’

  ‘Well,’ he said looking around the crowded room. ‘There’s plenty going on here. You’ll find something to earn your keep easily enough I’m sure.’

  ‘Maybe...’ she said vaguely. ‘Anyway, I’m alright for the moment. They sold off my husband’s gear and his company boys at the fort did right by me. Its common practice, a thing they do for army widows otherwise we’d be truly left on our uppers. What about you? You always been a lawman?’

  Slade shook his head. ‘Tried a lot of things before this. Buffalo hunter for a time. Did some ranching a while back.’

  �
�A rolling stone perhaps?’ She tilted her head fetchingly, a sparkle lighting her eyes.

  ‘Just a force of nature, Mrs. Lowry,’ he joked. ‘Like tumbleweed.’

  ‘Do you enjoy that, the keeping of the law?’

  He flicked her a look thinking she might be teasing, ‘It's a serious business. Don’t ever think its not. Trouble is you need someone wise in the way of thieves to catch a thief and most lawmen end up as half bad as the fellows they’re catching. There’s that... and the violence, of course. To a few, most likely the lawmen who survive the longest, that comes as natural as breathing.’

  ‘It sounds like you’ve had some experience.’

  ‘Some,’ he said. Slade wanted to change the subject; it was not a road he wanted to go down so he called a waiter over. ‘Say,’ he asked when the man arrived. ‘D’you have some sort of wine here. Something a lady can drink?’

  ‘We have,’ the man answered. ‘French. Just come in on the supply wagon, you want a bottle?’

  Slade nodded and the waiter scurried off.

  ‘Pushing the boat out?’ smiled Jane.

  ‘I got paid,’ he smiled back. ‘Its better spent on you than wasted on whiskey and cards. I’m trying to straighten up and be respectable for my new employer.’

  She laughed, brightly and honestly. ‘You have a way to go then, Mister Slade.’

  ‘That’s a fact and.... please.... call me Jack.’

  She nodded her ascent and the waiter returned with the wine and a couple of glasses. Not wine glasses but close enough to do no harm.

  ‘Here’s to you, Jack,’ she said when he had poured.

  As they clinked glasses he asked her, ‘What’s your story, Mrs. Lowry?’

  ‘My story? And if we’re going first names here, you know mine. My story,’ she sighed. ‘Lord, I doubt you want to hear that, Jack. Nothing much to write home about until I married that army boy. Dumb really. I just wanted out of where I was, I guess. He was bright, young, keen and handsome. Why not, I thought. In all honesty I can’t say it was a love match but he treated me well and we got along fine. He managed to make lieutenant before the Apache put a bullet through him.’