Bowie's Knife

by Jon Sharpe

  “Oh, posh,” Dandy was saying. “The only danger I was in was from Mr. Fargo, here.” She laughed merrily.

  Fargo didn’t find it nearly as humorous. Neither did her bodyguards.

  “How’s that again, Miss Caventry?” Bronack said.

  “Did he do something he shouldn’t have?” Waxler asked.

  “I was joshing.” Dandy poked her brother with an elbow and said, “Come on, Les. I’d like some more of those crackers before we turn in.”

  “I just want this whole nonsense to be over,” Lester complained, trailing after her.

  Fargo took a step but Bronack and Waxler moved to block his path.

  “What was that about you and her?” Bronack said.

  “We wouldn’t want you to overstep yourself,” Waxler mentioned.

  “Is that a fact?” It riled Fargo that the pair were butting in where they had no business butting.

  “Mr. Caventry made it quite plain about you,” Bronack said. “We were hired not just to protect his son and daughter from bandits and the like. He also instructed us to protect her from you.”

  “That’s right,” Waxler said. “Mr. Caventry told us you have a reputation where the ladies are concerned.”

  “His exact words,” Bronack said, “were that you ‘like to fuck anything in skirts.’”

  “Hell,” Fargo said.

  “Consider this a friendly warning,” Waxler said.

  “If that’s how Caventry thinks,” Fargo said, “why did he hire me?”

  Bronack said, “The army considers you the finest scout on the frontier.”

  “And you have more bark on you than a redwood, as Mr. Caventry put it,” Waxler said.

  Fargo didn’t know whether to be insulted or flattered. He decided to drop it for the time being. “Out of my way. I have coffee to finish.”

  The pair parted. They weren’t mad at him; they were simply men doing the job they’d been hired to do.

  Fargo didn’t object when they fell in on either side of him.

  “I have a question,” Bronack said.

  “So long as it’s not about Dandy.”

  “It’s about the bandits,” Bronack said.

  “They were stupid as stumps,” Fargo said. “But most bandits are.”

  “You mentioned them not picking us off,” Waxler brought up. “Were you suggesting they might want to get their hands on Miss Caventry?”

  “Makes sense,” Fargo said.

  “We were wondering,” Bronack said.

  “Perhaps they had another reason,” his partner chimed in.

  “Like what?”

  “Who’s to say?” Bronack said.

  Fargo was puzzled. What in hell could the pair be getting at? Since they were being so talkative, he asked, “What can you tell me about this knife the Caventrys are after?”

  “Nothing,” Bronack said.

  “You don’t know a thing about it?”

  “We know a lot,” Waxler said. “We’re just not supposed to tell you.”

  “Mr. Caventry’s orders,” Bronack said.

  “Wonderful,” Fargo said. The more he learned, the less he realized Caventry trusted him.

  “It’s nothing personal,” Bronack said.

  “For me it is.”

  Waxler said, “Mr. Caventry told us because we needed to know how valuable it is.”

  “Or might be,” Bronack added.

  “A knife?” Fargo said.

  “There are knives and then there are knives,” Bronack said.

  Dandelion and her brother were at the fire, Dandy sipping tea and eating a cracker and beaming in contentment, Lester frowning at the world and everyone in it.

  Bronack made Fargo grin by saying under his breath, “Makes you wonder if they have the same father.”

  Fargo refilled his battered tin cup with hot coffee and sat across from Dandy so he could take up where he’d left off and admire her body. This time when he peered over the rim, her eyes met his and her cheeks became pink. But she smiled.

  Lester cleared his throat. “So you say we’ll reach the town of San Gabriel sometime tomorrow?”

  “By noon,” Fargo confirmed. “Although it’s not really a town.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “A gob of spit on the Texas side of the Rio Grande.” Fargo had ridden through it once.

  “I don’t care how big it is,” Lester said. “All I want is to inspect the damn knife and get this over with.”

  “Les,” Dandy said, as if scolding him.

  “What? I called it a knife, nothing more. And if you ask me, it will be as ordinary as wax. This is a waste of our time.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I know Father didn’t need to send me along,” Lester griped. “You’re the expert, not me.”

  “Expert?” Fargo prompted, thinking he might learn a little more.

  “On antiquities,” Dandy said. “I’ve loved old things since I was little. My grandfather’s watch, my grandmother’s silverware and the like fascinated me. They inspired me to collect other old things, and later to become one of the foremost antiquities dealers in Texas.”

  “What we’re after isn’t all that old,” Lester said as spitefully as he said most everything else. “And what do you know about knives, anyhow?”

  “I know enough to be able to determine if it’s from the right time period,” Dandy said. “Beyond that—” She shrugged.

  “Marvelous,” Lester grumped. “We might end up paying for a fake.”

  “It’s Father’s money to spend as he wants,” Dandy told him.

  “No,” Lester said heatedly. “It’s our money. Money he’d leave us in his will if he doesn’t spend it on his pet obsession.”

  “I wouldn’t call it that,” Dandy said defensively.

  “Oh, really?” Lester turned to Fargo. “I leave it to you, sir. What do you call it when someone spends every waking moment thinking and reading and talking about one thing only? What do you call it when that person is willing to spend every dollar they have on it?”

  “A lot of people have hobbies,” Dandy said.

  “Hobbies?” Lester spat. “The Alamo isn’t a hobby to him, it’s—” He caught himself, and stopped.

  “Consarn you,” Dandy said.

  “The Alamo?” Fargo said. They’d passed through San Antonio along the way, and Dandy had insisted they stop for the night and then spent hours strolling about the famous site, which the army was using as a quartermaster’s depot, of all things.

  Dandy glared at her brother. “Thank you for letting the cat out of the bag.”

  Lester didn’t respond.

  “My father,” Dandy turned to Fargo, “is a Texan through and through. He loves this state more than anything—”

  “Sometimes I suspect he loves it more than us,” Lester interrupted.

  “—and he’s a great admirer of those who fought for Texas independence. In particular, at the Alamo. He has a whole room devoted to items of historical importance. For instance, he has a shaving kit that belonged to Travis and a powder horn that might have belonged to Davy Crockett.” She paused. “Now word has reached him that someone has something that would be far and away the most important find ever, short of Crockett’s rifle, Betsy.”

  “A knife?” Fargo said, and then it hit him. His amazement must have shown.

  “Yes, that knife,” Dandy said. “The knife that belonged to Jim Bowie.”

  3

  Jim Bowie. The man was a legend. “Big Jim Bowie” they’d called him. He’d wielded a knife like few others, a big knife to fit the hand of a big man. A knife some say he invented, or his brother did, or a blacksmith. Whichever the case, legend had it that he had it with him at the Alamo, and when the makeshift fortress fell, the famous knife disapp
eared.

  “You’re serious?” Fargo said.

  “Never more so,” Dandelion replied. “Now you can see why we’ve kept it a secret.”

  No, Fargo couldn’t. Sure, it was a famous knife. But he couldn’t see why they were being so tight-lipped about it. “Maybe you better explain it to me.”

  “Don’t you see? If it’s genuine the knife is priceless. My father isn’t the only one who would like to get his hands on it. To say nothing of the Texas government.” Dandy paused and a worried look came over her. “Certain unscrupulous individuals, if they got wind that it exists, wouldn’t be above trying to steal it out from under us.”

  “How much can it be worth?” Fargo asked skeptically.

  “Again, if it’s truly Bowie’s, I daresay it would be appraised at half a million dollars or more.”

  Fargo was genuinely startled. “You have to be joshing me.”

  “It’s Jim Bowie’s knife,” Dandy stressed.

  “I say let someone else have it,” Lester said.

  “Ignore him,” Dandy told Fargo. “As you’ve no doubt noticed, he resents our father spending large sums of money. Money that could one day be ours.”

  “It’s not right,” Lester said.

  “Who has this knife?” Fargo asked.

  “That must remain our secret a while yet,” Dandy said. “We’ll reveal who it is when we get there and not before.”

  “Afraid I’ll tell my horse?”

  Dandy grinned. “I’m sorry. This is how it must be. It’s not just the money involved. For a true son or daughter of Texas, the knife holds a historical value beyond measure.”

  Fargo supposed so. Brave men had died for the cause of Texas liberty, and the Alamo was enshrined in Texas hearts. “Remember the Alamo” had been the battle cry that brought about the defeat of Santa Anna and put Texas on the road to where it was today.

  “I don’t expect you to fully understand,” Dandy said. “You’re not a Texan, after all.”

  Lester fidgeted in anger. “I’m a Texan. But no one asks my opinion.”

  “You’ll never let it drop, will you?” Dandy said.

  “Do you want to hear my side of our argument?” Lester asked Fargo.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t give a damn.”

  Lester imitated a beet fresh out of the ground. “I resent that.”

  “I don’t give a good damn what you resent, either.”

  “You can’t talk to me like that,” Lester said indignantly. “My father hired you, I can fire you.”

  “No, Les, you can’t,” Dandy said. “Father wouldn’t want you to. And besides, what good would firing him do? Father paid him in advance. Or have you forgotten?”

  “I don’t like being treated as if I’m a no-account,” Lester snapped.

  “Then be a man and grow a pair,” Fargo said.

  Lester turned to their bodyguards. “Once again you two sit there and do nothing. You’re next to worthless, the pair of you.”

  “If he tries to shoot you, we’ll protect you,” Bronack said.

  “We can’t protect you from words,” Waxler said.

  “He’s insulting me,” Lester almost screamed. “At the very least you should make him shut up.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Caventry,” Bronack said. “Last I heard this was a free country.”

  “A man can speak his piece however he wants,” Waxler said.

  Lester pushed to his feet. “To hell with all of you.” Wheeling, he scooped up his bedroll and went a dozen feet from the fire and knelt to spread it out.

  “You must excuse him,” Dandy said.

  “Like hell,” Fargo said. He didn’t care for adults who never shed their diapers, and her brother was a ten-year-old in a man’s body.

  “Please don’t hold it against him. For my sake, if for no other reason. I’d be grateful.”

  Fargo grinned. “How grateful?”

  “You, sir, sink your teeth into a bone and never let go.”

  “I’d like to sink my teeth into something,” Fargo said.

  Dandy chuckled, then rose. “I suppose I better turn in too. We have a busy day ahead of us tomorrow.”

  “I’ll take first watch,” Fargo offered.

  “No need,” Bronack said, and motioned at Waxler. “We’ll divide it up and wake you if there’s cause.”

  Fargo let them. He’d offered before to help stand guard and they always said it wasn’t necessary. It was what they were being paid for.

  Rising, Fargo walked over to the Ovaro. He spread out his own blankets, and with his saddle for a pillow, lay on his back and gazed at the stars.

  The night was warm and uncommonly quiet. The coyotes weren’t yipping, for once.

  Fargo wasn’t fooled, though. Comanches could be out there. Apaches, too. Then there were the bandits, who might take it into their heads to return.

  Presently, he dozed off. He slept lightly. When a fox barked, he stirred. When the throaty cough of a large cat broke the stillness, he sat up.

  Waxler was at the fire. “A cougar, you reckon?”

  “Jaguar,” Fargo said. There was no mistaking the sound, which was more like a roar. They were rare this far north but they did stray up time to time. He stayed awake long enough to be sure it wasn’t stalking their horses.

  Dawn broke cool and humid.

  Fargo was up before the Caventrys and put coffee on. He needed two or three cups to start his day. He also liked to end his days with two or three glasses of whiskey but he’d been bone-dry in that regard since Austin and sorely wanted to wet his throat with red-eye. He recollected San Gabriel had a cantina, thank God.

  Waxler stretched and yawned. “I’ll be glad to get this over with. I’m a city man at heart.”

  Not Fargo. Give him the wide-open spaces. The mountains, the plains, the wild places, they were his home. He could take only so much city life. A week or two at the most, and he became so restless he was fit to burst.

  Waxler glanced at the sleeping forms of Dandy and Lester, and leaned toward him. “Just so you know. Their father thinks others might have heard about the knife and try to stop us from getting it or try to take it from us if we do.”

  Fargo appreciated the warning. “How far will these others go to get their hands on it?”

  “Mr. Caventry thinks they’d kill. Which is another reason he sent Bronack and me. He’d come himself if not for his legs.”

  “He should have warned me,” Fargo said.

  “I wanted to but he said it was best to keep you in the dark. I don’t know why, unless he was worried you’d want the knife for yourself.”

  “I have one,” Fargo said. He didn’t mention that it was an Arkansas toothpick in an ankle sheath in his boot.

  “It’s why Bronack and me wondered about those bandits,” Waxler went on. “It could be they weren’t bandits at all.”

  Fargo mulled that as he poured his first cup of coffee.

  A golden arch blazed the eastern rim of the world. Soon the sun would be up and they could get under way.

  Standing, Fargo stepped around to Dandy and nudged her with his boot. “Rise and shine, beautiful.”

  Dandy slowly raised her head and cracked those lovely eyes of hers. “Morning already?”

  “Afraid so.” Fargo moved to Lester and did the same, only this time he said, “Rise and shine, Nancy boy.”

  Lester poked his head out, his hair disheveled. “What did you call me?”

  Instead of answering, Fargo reclaimed his seat.

  “I thought I asked you to leave him be,” Dandy said. “He can’t help being how he is.”

  “Sure he can,” Fargo said. “But he doesn’t want to.”

  “I’m right here listening,” Lester declared.

  �
�One of us doesn’t care,” Fargo said.

  Dandy let out a sigh. “This is no way to start the day.”

  “Tell me about it,” Lester said. “God, I hate being here.”

  On that cheerful note they ate breakfast, eggs and bacon courtesy of Dandy. Their packhorse carried enough grub to last them a month.

  Fargo was eager to be under way. After what Waxler had confided, he was more concerned than ever that the bandits or whoever the hell they were might come back.

  As usual, Dandy and her brother took their sweet time eating. Breakfast was a ritual with them. They ate and talked. It was one of the few times during the day—any day—that Lester was halfway nice. Probably because he wasn’t fully awake yet.

  Fargo rarely ate breakfast, himself, when he was on the trail. Too much food made him sluggish, and in the wilds the last thing a man wanted was to be a shade slow on the draw or to not be alert in hostile country.

  When Dandy offered him some eggs, though, he accepted. She had a way with a frying pan. She also rode well and never once complained, unlike her brother. For a rich gal, she was a bundle of self-reliance.

  Fargo liked that in a woman. He liked how she filled out her riding outfit even more. It had been a couple of weeks since he’d been with a female, and a familiar urge was growing. Maybe that cantina would have a dove or two willing to give him a tumble.

  Dandy offered eggs to the bodyguards, as well. Bronack accepted a plate and sat back down.

  Waxler came over and held out his hand. “We’re obliged, Miss Caventry,” he said as she spooned a heaping portion out of the pan.

  “How many times have I asked you to call me by my first name?” Dandy said good-naturedly. She picked up a fork. “Would you care for some bacon, too? There’s plenty to go around.”

  Before Waxler could answer her, his face exploded.

  4

  The boom of the shot was nearly simultaneous with the burst of blood and brains from Waxler’s head. Dead instantly, he pitched forward.

  Fargo threw himself at Dandy and shoved her to the ground, covering her with his own body. Twisting, he drew his Colt and blasted a shot at the sombrero-topped man who had shot Waxler. He didn’t miss.

  Three other bandits materialized and more shots thundered.