Sharpshooter

by Dusty Richards

  “Oh!” Adam said as if taken aback. “They died in here, too. Stay over there, Renny. Piles of skeletons.”

  “Put me in there,” Rocky said.

  “Two is enough for now. We need to chisel out a door around here someplace,” Chet said.

  “What did you find?” Lisa asked, out of breath, catching up to them.

  “More Spanish treasure.”

  “Really? Where are the kids?”

  “Don’t fall in there. They are on the room floor where the trunks are at.”

  She jerked back. “Are they safe?”

  “It hasn’t bit them so far. Everyone, get back up here. We need a usable entry cut into this mountain.”

  Both kids were pulled up dusty, and came out shaking their heads.

  “Whew. It was hard to breathe down there,” Adam complained.

  “Did you see a crown for a king or queen?” Renny asked. “I didn’t.”

  Adam shook his head.

  Anxious to get the cavern opened up, they worked into the night until Lisa finally made them quit. Earlier, Jesus had ridden back to camp and he, Eddie, and the wrangler loaded everything to bring it all up to the buttes.

  Since there was no road, they had to go around dry washes and tall rocks. It was slow, but when they learned why they were hauling so much, the two helpers could not believe that more treasure than the last time had been found.

  Chet and the boys met them with lanterns. “You didn’t have to kill yourselves getting here. No one has the wagon power to haul this away.”

  Later in their bedroll, Lisa snuggled to him. “What will we do with all this?”

  Amused at her words, he chuckled. “Ranch until the cows come home.”

  “I guess so. Did you ever expect to find so much?”

  “No. That doesn’t happen in dreams, even. Twice is unheard of.”

  “Can you get it out of here?”

  “I will, or my name is not Chet Byrnes.”

  * * *

  It was predawn before he knew it. In the soft darkness, he pulled on his pants under the covers, then he put on his boots, seated on top of the bedroll. Out of nowhere he heard an iron shoe strike a rock.

  “Don’t shoot,” a familiar voice shouted.

  “Salty?”

  “It’s the three of us plus two. Why in hell are you clear up here?”

  “We found Columbus’s ships.”

  “What ships?”

  “The ones he sailed to the U.S. to find us.”

  “You found even more treasure?” Salty shouted with his horse reined up.

  “Yes, a real serious amount, too,” Lisa said.

  “Holy cow, girl, you awake?”

  “I am now. You won’t believe it.”

  “Oh hell, I can’t believe you did that,” Cody said. “We brought you two guys, too. They’ve got plenty to tell you.”

  The whole camp was awake by then and that must have spooked the neighboring coyotes. They were howling from all over. Lisa, in her bathrobe, scurried to the kitchen area. Renny, already dressed, helped her. Tad joined them. Both the boys and Eddie were washing dishes left undone from the night before.

  Salty and Cody set their two prisoners on the ground, on their butts, back to back, and chained them that way. Salty said, “More about them later. I want to see the treasure of the other world.”

  “Grab a lamp,” Chet said, shaking their hands. “This mountain was tied somehow to a ruby find some guy made years ago. Billy Bob made a deal with him for a map. He’s a cripple and could never come back up here. Billy Bob found a small opening. It looks like, a long time ago, the front of the cave collapsed. That’s why we searched for a way in from the back. Some drilling and blasting got a hole the kids could slip through and we found the main portion of the cave.”

  Salty held the lamp in the widened opening. Chet caught his sleeve. “There is a good ten-foot drop.”

  “Yeah, I can see it. Is it all full of loot?”

  “Adam and Renny say it is. They were the first to see it.”

  Cody looked in next. “My heavens, Chet, there is a fortune in here.”

  “Easily. Now, getting it out of there and back to Preskitt and staying alive is what will count.”

  A smile swept Salty’s face as the sun began to rise behind their backs. “I bet you have a plan.”

  “Twenty wagons. A couple water wagons. There is not enough water around if we get that many horses and men up here. There must have been more water when the Spaniards were in operation here.”

  Cody nodded. “I wondered about that myself. Pretty dry country.”

  “Sounds like they have breakfast ready. We can talk more after that.”

  Salty caught his sleeve. “Those two guys were all we found. They say they found the Meadows family’s bodies and told us what they did about it. You are going to be shocked if it is the truth.”

  “I want to hear it, but let’s eat first.”

  With a stern warning that any wrong move and they’d be dead, Salty unchained the prisoners. They quickly agreed. One looked to be forty, with gray hair and whiskers, Salty called him Frank Mayes. The other one was red-faced, younger, plus had a nasty look to his bloodshot eyes.

  He went by Lucifer Krye.

  After breakfast, Lisa and the kids took off riding and exploring.

  Salty told the two to tell their story.

  Mayes began, explaining his part. “We went over to see the Meadowses about something and found them all dead. Right off, talking among ourselves, we decided if we buried them then everyone would think we killed them. It was a sickening sight. I never saw the like in my life.”

  “Who do you think killed them?”

  “Why, Injuns, of course. They scalped them.”

  “No one told us that.” Chet couldn’t believe the man’s words.

  Mayes shook his head. “You know why?”

  “No. You making that up?”

  “No, I am not. You ever hear about the slaughter of the Fancher wagon train?”

  “Yeah. What’s that got to do with this?”

  “Well, if it was Indians kilt the Meadows family, they’d be liable to send the army down here and they might have some of those warrants left from the Fancher train massacre.”

  “That happened a real long time ago.”

  “They don’t throw murder warrants away.”

  “And you think the LDS people hid the fact they were scalped from the authorities?”

  “They never mentioned it, did they?”

  “You’re right,” Chet said, and looked across the table at Jamie Meadows, silent all this time and probably in agony hearing all of this.

  “Where is the tough guy that used to lead all of you?”

  “Fallen?”

  “I never caught his real name.”

  “Floyd Fallen was what I heard was his real name. Vigilantes hung him and two more over in Nevada last winter. They were riding the wrong horses.”

  “You both wanted?” Chet asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Me, too,” Krye finally spoke.

  “What are the crimes?”

  Mayes nodded. “Killing a guy who raped my wife back East. They said I couldn’t prove he did it. Hellfire, she told me he did it to her before she died. I warrant them damn Injuns raped Mrs. Meadows, too.”

  “The bastard I kilt raped my teenage sister. They said, when I chopped him to small pieces with an ax, that it was murder.”

  “That’s all that is left of the gang?”

  Cody gave a head toss toward them. “There’s four women in their camp. Three kids.”

  “They have food?”

  “Cody and I shot them a deer before we left.”

  “All right. You two men are on my payroll. It is all secret. But you do it right I’ll pay you for your work and beyond. That all right?”

  “Damn right!” Mayes said. “Neither of us kilt them. Injuns did.”

  “Remember, I can kill you in the blink of an eye.�
�

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Eat.”

  Chet stood up and he walked away from the table with his men. “Now, how do we get the treasure out of that hole?”

  “We need some track and ties—wait, there is a mine cart up at the Joseph Lake store. I saw it lying on its side,” Jesus said.

  “Where would we find track?” Cody asked.

  “We can make wooden tracks. Fifty trips won’t wear out wood that fast.”

  “There has to be a sawmill somewhere up here.”

  Everyone agreed.

  “Now, we send a wire to Tom at Camp Verde to send us forty wagons, two water wagons, armed men, and plenty of supplies.”

  “We can meet them at Joseph Lake as soon as they can get there.”

  “Where do we wire him from?”

  “I’d say Kanab up in Utah. We need to bring some wagons here while we wait. A water wagon would be nice, if we can find one. Put on your trading hats. Salty, were you with Cole last time?”

  “No. I was on my honeymoon, but I do recall that they didn’t have a water wagon at the store. We bought it in Kanab, Utah.”

  “If they don’t have a working telegraph in Kanab, you will need to go down to the Little Colorado Crossing and maybe even Flagstaff.”

  “Can you hold this place down with the both of us gone?” Salty asked.

  “Jesus, Billy Bob, Tad, and I can. Few know we have this much treasure, but word will get out fast.”

  “What about that mine cart?”

  “A couple of us may ride out with you two and trade for it. Haul it back here. On something. What a damn mess.” Chet had dropped his head laughing.

  They soon were all laughing at how unhandy it all would be.

  When Lisa and the kids came back, he told her the plan. She told them good luck and the four rode to Joseph Lake.

  It was farther than Chet thought, to Joseph Lake. Rory gave them the mine cart. They loaded it onto a hauler’s wagon. Billy Bob and the kids led him westward. The store man said the telegraph in Kanab, Utah, was working. Chet sent Cody and Salty up there to make arrangements and to stay there until Tom wired back he knew what they wanted. Then they were to look for a water wagon or a wagon filled with watertight barrels and a supply wagon.

  Rory knew a man who needed work and would haul the water out to them. Plus, the guy who left with the cart would haul whatever they needed from the store to their site.

  Things were going too good. They didn’t get back to the site before sundown. Chet guessed the kids spent the day ahead of him, getting the wagon hauling the heavy cart unstuck from the loose, sandy dry washes they had to cross a hundred times on the route.

  The driver Jasper Andrews could not believe they were Chet’s children. “Why, them scudders bailed in every time like beavers building a dam to get me going.”

  He smiled and thanked them. Rocky shook his head like it was nothing. “We got him moving every time. No big deal.”

  “Do you think those other two got a wire off?” Renny asked.

  “If that line worked I bet Tom already knows.”

  “Good. I thought Preskitt was a bad place to have to live.” She looked around the desert camp. “This one beats all of them.”

  “Why, Renny, you don’t like this place?”

  “Chet, I have so much sand behind my molars I may never get it all out.”

  They laughed.

  Before they turned in, Chet spoke to Jasper Andrews about going after a wagonload of lumber next.

  “Mr. Byrnes, they’ll charge you a fortune for it.”

  “No matter. Tomorrow, I will give you the list of what we need. But I will need those boards.”

  “Anyone look at that cart?”

  “What fur?” Adam asked.

  “Not fur but for. Those heavy iron boxes weigh a ton. We need a flatcar to haul them out on.”

  “You getting boards to make a box?”

  “Are you enough of a carpenter to do that?”

  “Me and Rocky, with a hammer and cold chisel, can get it off.”

  Rocky, seated beside him, nodded.

  “Good. One less thing for me to worry about.”

  “You planning a railroad to get them out of that hole?”

  “Tad, I don’t want to blast too much more. The roof may fall in.”

  “I saw that front and you were right. It collapsed.”

  “We can pack those trunks and containers onto a flatcar, then pull it up and out that back door and into the wagons for removal to our ranch.”

  “Those boys going to strip the body off the mine cart?”

  “They may need some help but we have time before the wagons get here, even if they hurry.”

  Billy Bob smiled and agreed. “I’ll help if they need it.”

  “Thanks. I want them to do all they can. It builds confidence in them.”

  “Right. My dad would say, ‘Try it, son.’ That’s how I learned.”

  “That’s sure the right way to learn.” He saw Lisa was coming over with Renny.

  “Can we get in the mountain and see some of the treasures?”

  “We have a ladder, and you will need some lights. Be watchful of snakes. We have not seen any so far but they may crawl in there in the heat of the day.”

  “We can avoid snakes.”

  Renny nodded. “I’ll go get us two lamps.”

  “That will be great.” Lisa turned to him. “With this heat, Renny says she can appreciate Preskitt’s climate much better.”

  He wiped his sweaty face on his kerchief. “I agree.”

  “The wagon man Jasper Andrews has gone back for lumber?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  The three started, via the ladder, into the cavern. When Lisa got down he lowered her a lit lamp, then one for Renny. He came down in a hurry. A little polish on a coin he picked up from the top of the bin and the features popped out on the face like it’d been freshly minted.

  “This is amazing. They have been here for two hundred years and polish up easier than a new one.” His teen companion shook her head and raised the lamp to inspect another.

  “Renny, any gold or silver is amazing.”

  “But this is mostly coins. How did they make so many coins this far from a mint?”

  “Good question, Renny. I never thought about that. Why, we couldn’t melt gold alone out here, much less make coins.”

  Lisa laughed. “Or even have a place to spend it. Lots of this is spending money. Not near as much of the first batch you found in the canyon was money. Why so?”

  “Lisa, these folks have been dead for over two hundred years. They can’t tell us, and unless we find their account books we may never know.”

  “Nice of them to leave it for us.”

  He hugged and kissed her. “I agree.”

  “May I ask you a question?” Renny asked.

  “Sure. What is it?”

  “I am sorry to have to ask, but I never lived in a house before, where the two people who were married kiss as often as you two do. I don’t mind. In fact, I think it is sweet, but I wondered why and maybe how it would happen.”

  “You have a good answer for her?”

  “Well—I am not sure. We both had happy lives and lost someone we loved. So, I guess we consider ourselves lucky to have someone again and we show our affection to this pairing.”

  “That sums it up,” he said.

  “If I ever find a mate I hope it works out this well. You two don’t argue. You are thoughtful and good to each other, and to me, too.”

  “Oh, I bet you’ll find someone grateful for you being yourself.”

  “I don’t consider myself wild, but I appreciate the opportunity to be myself. I would never have been allowed to ride that horse at the fairgrounds in my past life. After it happened I knew I made a step up in my life and you two gave me that boost because you trusted me. I am very grateful for the chance. And those boys could have said No she is a girl, she doesn’t need to ride. I neve
r had any brothers or sisters. I was concerned they’d be mad about me sharing their time. But instead they were my boosters and never put me down.”

  “Renny, I’d say that you were as big a treat to both of us as finding this king’s ransom.”

  “And I feel the same way,” Renny said. “You are making me cry. This money is nice, but being a part of your family has lifted me up so high into the clouds we have at home. And to think I felt locked in a prison having to live in Preskitt, before you two came and got me.”

  “Lisa and I are proud of the boys and how they treat you. Both of them have lived with foster parents as only children because of my busy life.”

  “They are enjoying this trip so much. You can hear them banging on that miner’s car. You will have a flatcar by dark. Both of them think they are you, Chet.”

  Renny hugged him and then pulled him down and pecked on his cheek. “I am going to do that, too.”

  No one needed to tell Lisa—Renny had found one of Lisa’s traits to follow. She gave Chet the lamp and used her kerchief to dry her eyes before going up the ladder.

  CHAPTER 33

  Andrews brought the first load of lumber and showed him how much they’d overcharged him for the load.

  Price wouldn’t matter if they could get all the loads out. “They cutting the rest?”

  “Damn right. I’ll have the second load here day after tomorrow. They’ll have it to load at daylight.”

  “Don’t you figure that is worth something?”

  “Whatcha mean?”

  “I mean, they are cutting it fast.”

  “Yeah, but the price they’re charging you is too high.”

  “Eat supper with us. You’ll have time to get back.”

  “Aw, you don’t have time to feed me.”

  Lisa took his arm by the elbow. “I do. Now, if you could find me a tall post, a large sheet of canvas, and a fat yearling steer, my boys would butcher it and I could keep meat fresh for four days. So when my other men get here, I’d have food on hand.”

  “I can get two posts and a crossbeam on the next load and the canvas at the store. I’d have to bring the steer on the next day.”

  “Andrews, you are a genius.”

  “I been called lots of things, missus, but never that.” He snatched off his weather-beaten, old felt hat. “I am proud to be a part of this operation.”