“Not quite, but enough that everyone in these parts knows who we are. And they’re always on the lookout for us. That makes it harder for us to pull a job without bein’ caught.”
“We’ve done all right,” Bert Varrow said.
“Until now,” Cestus said. “Until we lost Larner and McGivern and Cockeye. I wouldn’t call that all right. I’d call that an omen.”
“An omen how?” the Attica Kid said.
“An omen in that maybe our luck here has run out. An omen in that maybe we should think about movin’ to greener pastures.” Cestus held up a hand when Toomis went to speak. “I’m not done, Ira. We’ve robbed almost all the banks for fifty miles around. What are we goin’ to do? Rob them again? The stages have shotgun messengers ridin’ along now. And every time we go into a town for supplies, we have to be mighty careful not to be recognized.”
“That’s true,” Bert Varrow said. “Things have gotten a lot harder.”
“Why not change that?” Cestus said. “Go somewhere we’re not known. Where the banks and the stages will be easy again.”
“You bring up a good point,” Toomis said.
“Always thinkin’ ahead,” the Attica Kid said. “That’s our Cestus.”
“Yours, maybe,” Mad Dog said. “What does any of that have to do with the Wilson woman?”
Cestus sat back. He had a trump card to play in his effort to persuade them, and now was the time to play it. “What’s the one thing that makes a man madder than anything else?”
“Bein’ kicked in the crotch,” Ira Toomis said.
“Bein’ spit on,” Mad Dog said.
“No, you lunkheads. The one thing is havin’ a man’s filly messed with. Say the wrong thing, act the wrong way, and a man in love will get mad quicker than you can blink.”
“What is this?” Mad Dog said. “A lesson in love?”
“How soon they forget,” Cestus said, and shook his head. “The marshal is smitten with her, remember?”
“Good for him,” Mad Dog said. “She’s too old for my taste.”
Ira Toomis got it first. “Oh hell.”
“That’s right,” Cestus said. “The marshal and her have been courtin’. And it’s gotten serious.” He paused. “In other words, for those of you with rocks between your ears, Marshal Cooper is in love with her.”
“Good for him,” Mad Dog said.
“You dang idiot,” Toomis said.
A look of great concern had come over Bert Varrow. “We took the woman the marshal is in love with?”
“Afraid so,” Cestus said.
“All we have is bad luck anymore,” Varrow said. “This cinches it. Ask any gambler and he’ll tell you that when the cards turn cold, there’s nothin’ for it but to quit the game and try your luck at another. Cestus is right. We should find somewhere else to do our robbin’.”
Toomis stared at their captive. “We have to be shed of her first. That law dog won’t give up this side of the grave unless we do.”
“I agree,” Bert Varrow said.
“I do and I don’t,” Cestus said, and pressed on. “I agree that Marshal Cooper would follow us clear to Canada to save the gal he’s sweet on. Most any man would. By the same token, he’s not likely to jump us so long as we have her and risk her takin’ a stray slug.”
“What are you proposin’?” Toomis asked.
“That we head for greener pastures and take her along,” Cestus said, and again held up a hand so they wouldn’t interrupt. “Only part of the way. As insurance, you might say, to keep the posse at bay until we’re clear of these parts.”
“We’re not goin’ to get clear with the posse doggin’ our steps because of her,” Ira Toomis said.
“They won’t be,” Cestus said. “We use her to bargain with. Strike a deal with the marshal. In return for him and the posse turnin’ around and lettin’ us go, we’ll let her go the first town we come to.”
“He’ll never go for a thing like that,” Toomis said.
“It can’t hurt to try,” Cestus said. “It depends on how much he cares for her on whether it will work or not. If he’s in love with her, he’ll back off.”
“How do we get word to him?” Bert Varrow asked. “Do we leave a message in a stick for them to find?”
“Do you have any paper to write on?” Cestus said. “Or anything to write with? I sure don’t. The surest way is for one of us to ride up to them and give them our terms.”
“And be shot out of the saddle before we get close,” Toomis said.
“I don’t know as I’d take the chance,” Bert Varrow said.
“I’m not askin’ any of you to,” Cestus said. “I’ll do it myself.”
“No,” the Attica Kid said.
“It has to be me. Cooper leads the posse and I lead you. It should be the two leaders, man to man.”
“What’s to keep him from clappin’ leg irons on you and demandin’ we turn his woman over to them or he blows your brains out?” the Attica Kid said.
“You.”
“Me?”
“Will you or will you not shoot her if I ask you to?”
“Say it right now and I’ll show you,” the Kid said.
Cestus smiled. “The marshal knows your reputation. I’ll tell him that if he lays a finger on me, you’ve promised to splatter her brains. That should keep me safe so him and me can parley.”
“You hope,” Ira Toomis said.
Chapter 26
More than half the morning had gone by and Boyd was debating whether he’d insist they push on if Harvey Dale didn’t strike sign by noon, when the old scout came galloping back as if a horde of hostiles were after his hide. Hollering for the posse to halt, Boyd placed his hand on his six-shooter.
Vogel was riding beside him, and slid the Maynard rifle out. “Must be trouble ahead.”
Sherm Bonner and Lefty gigged their mounts up on the other side of the blacksmith and Lefty said, “Look at that old buzzard, ridin’ like a bat out of hell. He’s liable to break his fool neck if his horse takes a spill.”
Harvey Dale brought his zebra dun to a sliding stop and didn’t bother greeting them. “There’s a hill yonder,” he announced excitedly, “and someone is waitin’ for us on top of it, holdin’ a white flag.”
“A what?” Lefty said.
“You heard me,” Dale replied. “A piece of white towel or somethin’. A flag of truce. He’s sittin’ there as calm as you please, and when I yelled up to ask what he was up to, he said he wanted to talk to the marshal.”
“Who is it?” Sherm Bonner asked the pertinent question.
Dale hadn’t taken his eyes off Boyd. “Cestus Calloway.”
“No foolin’?” Lefty said.
“Well, I’ll be,” Vogel said in amazement. “He’s got his nerve.”
“What do you think of it, Marshal?” Sherm Bonner asked.
Boyd didn’t know what to think. It was the last thing he’d expected. The outlaws had made good their escape. Why would Calloway show himself, and under a flag of truce, no less? “Maybe it’s a trick,” he speculated. “Maybe the rest are lyin’ in wait to ambush us when we ride up.”
“I did a quick sniff around before I lit a shuck back here,” Dale said. “I didn’t see hide nor hair of any of the others.”
“Well, this is peculiar,” Vogel said.
“Let’s go find out what he wants,” Boyd said. “Lead the way, Harve.”
A trot bought them to a flat stretch of mostly grass, and there, in the middle, rose a low hill. Silhouetted against the sky, his white flag waving in the breeze, was none other than Cestus Calloway, leaning on his saddle horn and smiling. He raised his other hand and gave a little wave.
“Don’t that beat all?” Lefty said in admiration.
“The gent has grit,” Sherm Bonner said. “We hav
e to give him that.”
Malcolm and some of the other townsmen were bewildered by the turn of events, and not a little afraid. They’d shucked their rifles or drawn their revolvers and were glancing anxiously about in fear of imminent attack.
“What’s going on?” one of them kept saying.
“I don’t like it,” another exclaimed.
“Calm down, all of you,” Boyd commanded. “Keep your eyes peeled. Harve and me will ride up there and see what Calloway wants.”
“Take Sherm instead of the scout,” Lefty said. “He’s quicker on the shoot.”
“I want your pard here with the rest of you in case it is a trick and the outlaws attack,” Boyd said. Bonner was the only gun shark among them, and the one most apt to hold his own should lead begin to fly.
Boyd nodded at Dale and they started toward the hill, but their animals had only taken a couple of steps when Cestus Calloway cupped a hand to his mouth and hollered down, “Just you, law dog. No one else.”
Boyd and Dale drew rein.
“What’s he up to?” Dale wondered. “Why only you?”
“I don’t rightly know,” Boyd said, “but for now we’ll play along. He has Miss Wilson, remember?”
“I’m not likely to forget,” Dale said.
Boyd clucked to his horse and kept his hand on his six-shooter. It wasn’t until he was almost to the top that he saw that Cestus Calloway wasn’t wearing a gun belt and the outlaw’s saddle scabbard was empty. “Forget your hardware?” he asked as he drew rein.
“Needed you to know I’m harmless,” Cestus answered, “so you’d hear me out.”
Boyd scanned the other side of the hill and the forest about fifty yards away. “Where’s the rest of your bunch?”
“Nowhere near here.”
Struggling to keep his voice even, Boyd said, “What about Miss Cecelia Wilson? Is she still breathin’?”
“She was right fine when last I saw her,” Cestus said. “Whether she stays that way depends on you.”
“You’d kill an innocent woman?” Boyd said in undisguised disgust.
“Not me,” Cestus said, putting a hand to his chest. “I was the one who brought her from the farmhouse in order to save her when she was accidentally shot.”
“You expect me to believe that? How do I know she’s even still alive?”
Cestus grinned. “I reckoned you’d bring that up. So I let her know I was comin’ to talk to you about freein’ her. I told her I needed somethin’ to prove she’s still breathin’, somethin’ only she and you would know. And she gave me a question to ask you.”
Boyd held his breath without being conscious of doing so.
“Your sweetheart acted embarrassed about it, but she said I should ask you what took you so long to ask her out.”
Boyd gave a start. No one except Cecelia and Sam knew about that, and Sam was dead.
“Took a while to get up the nerve, did you?” Cestus Calloway said, and grinned.
“Go to hell,” Boyd said. He’d be damned if he’d let the outlaw talk about his personal life.
“Fair enough,” Cestus said, his grin widening. “But you’ll agree I couldn’t have known that on my own? I had to get it from her, which means she’s still alive and will stay alive so long as you do as I want.”
“You bastard,” Boyd said.
“Save the name-callin’,” Cestus said. “I already told you I wouldn’t harm a hair on her head. But there’s someone who rides with me who would.”
“Mad Dog Hanks.”
Cestus, oddly enough, acted surprised. Then he laughed and said, “Why, yes, sure, why not him? I tend to forget he has his uses.”
“How’s that again?”
“All that keeps Mad Dog from killin’ her is me,” Cestus said. “Somethin’ to keep in mind if you start gettin’ ideas.”
Boyd’s temper was fraying. He thought of Mitch and Sam, and it was all he could do not to jerk his pistol and put a slug in Calloway’s chest. “Is this why you were waitin’ for us? To rub my nose in what Mad Dog might do?”
“Not exactly, no,” Cestus said. “It was to give you some good news and some not so good news.”
“Do I get to pick which I hear first?”
“The good news is that this neck of the country has become too hot for my boys and me,” Cestus informed him. “We have a hankerin’ to find safer pastures, so we’re packin’ our war bags and leavin’.”
“And Cecelia? Turn her over to us first, and I give you my word I’ll give you half-a-day head start before we come after you.”
“You’re awful generous,” Cestus said drily, “only I have a better idea. You don’t follow us at all, and I’ll set your gal free at the first settlement or town we come to.”
“No,” Boyd said.
“I wasn’t offerin’ you a choice.”
“It’s still no.”
“You’re forgettin’ Mad Dog Hanks.”
Boyd couldn’t believe the outlaw’s nerve. To sit there and threaten the woman he cared for. It was insult piled on injury. “Let me make myself clear. There’s no way in hell I’ll trust you not to harm her. You’ll keep her alive only as long as it suits you. Once you’ve gotten clean away, you’ll do her in and bury her body where it’ll never be found.”
Cestus Calloway frowned. “You have an awful low opinion of me.”
“You’re a damn outlaw, for God’s sake,” Boyd snapped. “What do you expect?”
“Have you ever heard tell of me shootin’ anyone?” Cestus asked. “Man or woman?”
“No.”
“Have you ever even heard of me hurtin’ anybody at all?”
“Not that I can recollect,” Boyd was forced to admit. “Folks say you’re the friendliest cuss who ever rode the owl-hoot trail.”
“There you go,” Cestus said. “I’m givin’ you my word that I won’t let Mad Dog or anyone else do anything to your lady. All I want in return is for you to take your posse back to Alpine and wait for her to get word to you that she’s all right.”
“She’d never forgive me if I run out on her.”
“She will once I explain,” Cestus argued. “She knows I came to see you, but I didn’t tell her why.”
“You ask too much.”
“Would you rather that Mad Dog got his hands on her? You had him in your jail. You know how he is. Is there any man alive you’d trust less with her than him? I sure as hell wouldn’t.”
“Yet he rides with you.”
“I can’t be that choosy about who does. Outlaws ain’t the cream of the crop, if you take my meanin’.”
Boyd was set to argue until doomsday that he’d never, ever leave Cecelia in their clutches. It went against everything he believed, against how much he cared for her, against the badge pinned to his shirt. Then a brainstorm sprang full-blown into his head, an idea that could turn the tables and save her at the same time.
Calloway must have sensed something because he said, “What?”
“I’m wonderin’ if I’ve been hasty,” Boyd said. “If maybe it wouldn’t be best to go along with what you want.”
“Now you’re talkin’ sense,” Cestus said. “It shouldn’t be more than a week to ten days and we’ll drop her off somewhere and the two of you will be reunited.”
Boyd believed Calloway was sincere. That it wasn’t a ruse to shake the posse off, which the outlaws had already done and didn’t know it. It had occurred to him that he could use that against them with a ruse of his own. “You harm her, I’ll see to it that you’re the guest of honor at a hemp social.”
“How many times do I have to say she won’t be?” Cestus thrust out a hand. “Let’s shake on it and I’ll be on my way.”
Boyd would just as soon shoot him, but he shook. “I’ll be waitin’ to hear word of her.”
�
�You’re doin’ the smart thing,” Cestus assured him. Casting the stick and the white flag to the ground, he reined his mount around and shifted in the saddle. “Listen. I know you’ll worry. I would too, in your boots. But I don’t ever hurt women or kids. It goes against my grain.”
“So you keep sayin’.”
“I have a ma and a younger sister, just like ordinary folks. And I don’t do to others what I wouldn’t want done to me.”
“You rob banks and stages.”
“Banks and stages ain’t people. We can do anything to them.”
Boyd didn’t bother to point out that the money most banks had on hand was placed there by their depositors, so that when Cestus and his fellow outlaws relieved a bank of its assets, they were relieving the people who had put the funds on deposit. As for stagecoaches, their strongboxes usually contained money being transported for one company or another, payrolls for workers. But the outlaws didn’t stop there. They relieved the passengers of their money too.
Cestus Calloway touched his hat brim. “We’ll be out of your territory by sundown tomorrow, and you can rest easy.”
“Not until Cecelia Wilson is safe.”
Calloway was trotting off and might not have heard. He looked back when he reached the forest, and waved.
The moment the outlaw was out of sight, Boyd wheeled the chestnut and galloped to the waiting posse. They were bound to badger him with questions, but he nipped that in the bud by drawing rein and saying, “Dale! Swing around that hill and into the woods to the west and then circle to the north and pick up Calloway’s trail. This time try not to lose it. He’ll lead you right to their hideout. And blaze the trail so we can follow.”
Harvey nodded and was off like a shot.
“What’s goin’ on, Marshal?” Lefty asked. “What was all that jawin’ about?”
“Tell you later,” Boyd said. “Right now check your guns, revolvers and rifles both. I expect to be at the outlaws’ hideout before this day is done. A lot of blood will be spilled, and I don’t want any of it to be ours.”
“We don’t have to spill any if we take them alive,” Malcolm the grocer said.
A couple of others nodded.
Ralph Compton the Law and the Lawless Page 19