Crossroads (A Piccadilly Publishing Western Book 8)

by Logan Winters

  That left K. John Landis—dumb, down-at-the-heels cowboy that he was—the only holdout. Was it because he was smarter than the rest of them, could see where this must lead, or because he had lost the fire and recklessness of his youth? He glanced again at Flower and walked away, brooding.

  It was a stupid notion attacking the Double O, and could not work ...

  ~*~

  They started on their way shortly before sundown, after a long conference. K. John insisted that they needed more help and suggested that someone be sent to Barbara Casey’s ranch to try to enlist her and whichever of her crew might be willing to accompany her to the Double O. There was no certainty, of course, that Barbara, now free of Willit, would wish to take a hand in punishing the saloon-owner. K. John nominated Flower to make the ride there, she being the only other one of them who knew Barbara. The young, hot-blooded Eric Styles, who wanted to marry Barbara, was capable of shooting K. John on sight, having warned him off the ranch in a jealous rage. Looking back, he was almost certain that it was Styles who had followed him nearly all the way to Crossroads, just to make sure that K. John was really leaving the ranch.

  K. John’s mood was dark as they approached the outskirts of Crossroads at the sundown hour when the sky showed as an orange backdrop to a few dark, wispy clouds. They had decided to wait in Tremaine’s hotel room until Flower could reach them with word from Barbara Casey. K. John held no conviction that an extra five or six men were enough to overpower Clyde Willit’s forces in his own citadel, the Double O Saloon, but they would be much better off with additional men than they were now.

  If any of her men could be convinced to join the fight at all, that is.

  Barbara obviously could not order her riders to storm Crossroads, but K. John was hoping the men would have enough sympathy for Barbara’s recent travails and what others might be going through under Willit. Would they consider, imagining other women—perhaps their sisters or old school-friends who could be roped into Willit’s stable of young women?

  He could only hope. He had seen other cowboys boldly rush in when a woman was threatened. It was certain that Eric Styles would come along if Barbara decided to. Would that young firebrand be more of a help or a hindrance to the plan? Of course, this was assuming that Barbara Casey herself was willing to leave the safety of her ranch and again enter Crossroads, which was far from certain. K. John did not regret his decision to send Flower to talk to Barbara and her crew. Flower’s words would carry more weight than his own.

  A heavy unease settled around them when they finally reached Warren Tremaine’s room. K. John was eager for Flower’s return, watchful for any of the Willit men who might approach the hotel room. He paced from the window where he peered out frequently to the open door to look up and down the empty hallway. Justine was simply too spoiled, too willful to be confined to a small place, inactive when she had already made up her own mind what she must do, and seemed to be clinging firmly to her murderous thoughts. She had brought a Winchester repeater from her father’s house and now sat at the foot of the bed, rifle propped up beside her.

  Warren Tremaine, his eyes dull, sat in the corner, occasionally licking his dry lips. Now and then his gaze would drift around the room, search the walls and settle on the table where he had formerly kept a bottle of whiskey. K. John could almost hear Tremaine’s mind working.

  ‘It won’t be long,’ he said to Tremaine. ‘You’re showing Flower a lot more strength this way.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Tremaine said, a little roughly. But he knew all right—the need for drink was reflected in his eyes.

  Tremaine was silent for a minute or two and then said a little too loudly, ‘I’m a man who should never come near a town. I think after this is all over, I never will again.’ Neither K. John nor Justine replied.

  Peering out the window once again, K. John felt himself stiffen. In the alleyway below and beyond he saw a group of horsemen dragging their way up past the hotel. Flower with Barbara and her crew? It could be more hired Willit men, or simply a group of local cowboys out for an evening’s entertainment. At this distance, with heavy shadows all around, there could be no certainty.

  ‘She might be back,’ he announced nevertheless. It was necessary to bar Tremaine’s rush toward the window. ‘There’s nothing to see,’ K. John told him and the old man fixed bitter eyes on him.

  Cooling, a disgusted Tremaine returned to his chair. He muttered, ‘This is a hell of a way to go about things. I’d walk right over there and just shoot him. Get it over with.’

  ‘I’d go with you,’ Justine said, chipping in her two-cents’-worth.

  ‘You two simmer down,’ K. John snapped at them. ‘It’s going to be more difficult than that, and you know it.’

  ‘But with Willit out of the way,’ Tremaine continued, ‘someone would take his place. Hammond? Judge Baxter?’

  ‘The Double O is raking in too much money for everyone to just slink away and forget about matters. Clyde Willit has to be taken care of, but that won’t do much toward closing the Double O down or freeing the girls.’

  Apropos of nothing, Tremaine suddenly blurted out, ‘Are you going to marry my daughter?’

  ‘The subject has never come up. Why would you ask me that?’

  ‘She’s already got you pretty well molded, doing everything she asks you to.’

  ‘We were partners on a job,’ K. John said, defensively.

  ‘Watching the Oxhead!’ Justine added, with a laugh. ‘And what has this caper you have planned have to do with that job?’

  K. John declined to reply; he had no answer. He returned the doorway to keep watch for approaching visitors, hoping beyond hope that he would see Flower and not half a dozen of Clyde Willit’s gun-hands.

  He became aware of a series of soft steps coming up the stairway followed by a group of heavier clomps. Looking that way, tensing, he saw Flower’s head appear and then that of Barbara Casey. As these two reached the landing K. John saw the grim face of Eric Styles, who was following Barbara closely. Behind them were three rough-looking, unfamiliar men. Flower waved at K. John as he stepped out into the hall and the visitors approached in a group.

  ‘Hello again, K. John,’ Barbara said. ‘Can’t get out of Crossroads?’

  ‘Hello, Barbara,’ K. John answered, seeing the scowling Eric Styles, his eyes fixed on him. ‘Let’s go into the room, all right?’

  ‘Of course,’ Barbara Casey said. ‘Should I leave a couple of the boys out here to watch, just in case?’

  ‘Maybe you’d better,’ K. John nodded, after a thoughtful moment. ‘Is this your whole crowd?’

  ‘More men wanted to come,’ Flower said, ‘but Barbara said she didn’t want to leave her ranch unprotected.’

  ‘No, I did not!’ Barbara agreed, hotly, crossing the threshold. ‘Who knows what Clyde Willit might get up to next?’

  K. John made introductions all around, pausing for Barbara’s second ranch-hand to provide his name. Arnie Brewster was a tall man with a bent nose and a long scar down his cheek. Going by looks alone, K. John judged Brewster to be a man who had seen his share of fighting.

  ‘Now, then, K. John,’ Barbara began, sitting on the bed near Justine, ‘why don’t you tell us what the plan is? Flower acted as if she didn’t know much about it.’

  ‘The plan,’ Justine Masters interrupted, wildly, ‘is to kill Clyde Willit!’

  Chapter Eleven

  The harshness of Justine’s words was not unexpected, but it was a little unnerving. Warren Tremaine, his rifle propped between his knees, sat in the corner, nodding in apparent agreement.

  Barbara smiled hesitantly. ‘That’s it? That’s your only plan—to kill Clyde Willit?’ She looked at K. John.

  ‘No, and it’s not my plan although I wouldn’t shed any tears at Clyde Willit’s funeral. Justine is still a little overwrought.’

  ‘Oh, that’s right,’ Barbara said, ‘Flower told me that today was to have been her wedding da
y.’

  ‘Yeah—she’s just a little peeved at the way things worked out.’

  ‘“Peeved”?’ Justine snorted. ‘I’m mad as hell! Let me go first. I’ll walk right into the skunk’s office and shoot him dead.’

  ‘And I’d go with you,’ the vengeful Tremaine said, meaning every word.

  K. John decided it was time to take charge of matters. ‘We’re not here to plan a murder,’ he said, deliberately. ‘We’re here to put an end to Clyde Willit’s way of doing business. After all, if Willit were to be killed, things would go on the same as before in the Double O, with someone like Hammond or possibly Judge Baxter in charge. Things wouldn’t change a bit for the girls there.’

  ‘So, what do you mean to do?’ Barbara asked.

  ‘Get the girls away from the saloon,’ Flower said.

  ‘And you have that all planned out?’

  ‘Pretty much so,’ Flower answered, ‘or, at least, we hope we do.’

  K. John listened as intently as the others. Flower had mentioned nothing to him of a plan to release the women. It must have been something she had dreamed up along the trail.

  ‘Here’s what I’m thinking,’ Flower said, perching on the other corner of the bed. Justine looked uninterested; everyone else watched Flower expectantly. There was a small sound of movement out in the hall, but one of Barbara’s men looked in and shook his head to indicate that it was nothing to worry about.

  Flower continued. ‘The main reason I’m in this now is to rescue the girls living at the Double O.’

  ‘They don’t want to be rescued,’ Justine said, as if that put her in a different class from the others.

  ‘Some may not,’ Barbara admitted. ‘We’ll let them make the choice for themselves. The second reason for the raid of the Double O is to break Clyde Willit’s back—right?’

  ‘To break the scoundrel’s neck is more like it,’ Warren Tremaine muttered, and Justine nodded her agreement. The unlikely pair shared a common thirst for vengeance.

  Barbara Casey brought the conversation back to the relevant. ‘Go on,’ she urged Flower, ‘tell us exactly what it is you want us to do.’

  Flower took a deep breath and looked around the room. ‘The first thing, Barbara, is we need your men to go into the Double O, drink for a little while and then start a ruckus. At some point I want them to break out their weapons and fire a few rounds into the ceiling.

  ‘The girls will already have their instruction to rush upstairs to their rooms as if frightened by the fighting—your boys will have to get pretty rowdy.’

  ‘Don’t worry about them as far as that goes,’ Barbara said, with a little tightness in her voice.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ the scarred Arnie Brewster said. ‘How’s that supposed to help get those girls out of there?’

  ‘Oh, it will,’ Flower said, with confidence. ‘By the time they’ve calmed you boys down, probably thrown you out of the Double O, the girls will be on their way.’

  ‘I don’t understand you,’ Barbara Casey said.

  ‘I think I do,’ K. John said. ‘There’s a way out upstairs—a fire-ladder. I think that’s what Flower has in mind.’

  ‘It is exactly,’ Flower said, wearing a bright expression as if she were proud of herself. ‘By the time the uproar downstairs is ended, the girls upstairs will be down the ladder and free of the Double O.’

  ‘Where you going to put them while they figure things out?’ Tremaine asked. That question had been on K. John’s mind as well.

  ‘We’ll gather them all together someplace and explain what’s happening. Any of them who feels that she has a better chance sticking with Clyde Willit will be given the option to leave.’

  ‘I asked where that was going to be,’ Tremaine said, his mood growing no better. ‘I don’t like plunging into this with everything up in the air.’

  ‘She means to gather them all like cattle in a holding-pen,’ Eric Styles said, drawing a scathing look from Barbara.

  ‘I know just the place,’ Barbara Casey contributed, ‘the old schoolhouse.’

  ‘What schoolhouse?’ Eric asked. ‘I lived around this area for a long time; there ain’t a schoolhouse.’

  ‘Yes, there is,’ Barbara insisted to her rash ranch foreman. Watching Styles, K. John wondered if he knew what sort of impression he was making on Barbara, the woman he hoped to marry. Styles seemed to have forgotten that Barbara had friends among the Double O girls as well. ‘It’s quite near, too. They began building it and then determined that they didn’t want to spend the money on it and that there weren’t enough kids in Crossroads to make it worth their time.’

  ‘I never seen it,’ Styles grumbled.

  ‘It’s just past Nazareth Road,’ Barbara said. ‘Easy walking distance. We could all meet there and start working out the details for the girls who want to leave, who have a place to go.’

  ‘Y’all seem to be forgetting that this Willit is not going to be willing to just let these girls walk away,’ Arnie Brewster said. ‘What do we do if he decides to come after them, guns blazing?’

  ‘Blaze back,’ Tremaine said, sullenly.

  ‘He won’t be alive by then,’ Justine Masters said, deliberately. ‘Here’s my part of the plan—when the ruckus starts in the Double O, Clyde Willit will be off his guard, distracted. That’s when I’m going to march in and kill him.’

  Flower and K. John glanced at each other. They had not come this far, done so much just to have Emerson Masters come home and find his daughter a killer. ‘You’ll have to re-think that part of the plan, Justine,’ K. John told her.

  Flower had what she considered another bright plan. ‘K. John and I will be upstairs at the Double O; you obviously can’t be a part of the crew making trouble downstairs—either one of you,’ she added, directing her words to her father. ‘And I don’t want either of you shot.’

  Justine asked, ‘Are you telling me not to go along?’

  ‘It would be the best idea,’ Flower answered, ‘but if you feel that you have to be around, it would be better if you two stick together. I don’t want to lose either one of you. I think it makes more sense to have Father keep an eye on you and make sure you don’t attempt anything hasty that might wreck the escape plan.’

  Both Warren Tremaine and Justine scowled at Flower. They had their own plan and both were determined to give it a try. Flower walked to where Warren Tremaine sat slumped in his chair and hovered over him for a minute. When he was forced to glance up, she said, ‘I’m counting on you, Father, to protect the lady—and keep her out of the way!’

  Warren looked at Justine and then slowly, heavily, nodded his head. ‘I’ll do it although my sympathies are with her,’ he answered.

  ‘I know they are,’ Flower snapped back, ‘but you’ll have to control yourself—and her. I don’t intend to end this night’s work with a single fewer person than it began.’

  ‘You’re an ambitious lady,’ the gloomy Arnie Brewster commented. ‘For myself, with us busting into the man’s own place trying to strip him of all he owns, I’d be surprised if a bunch of us don’t get shot. He won’t stop just because we’ve shown him that we have a few guns. How many men has he got?’

  ‘A small army,’ K. John replied.

  ‘And us with a herd of his prime heifers.’

  None of the women looked happy about that characterization, but none of them answered back. It was no time for hurt feelings or petty differences. K. John announced:

  ‘It’s time we were going, folks.’ Speaking to Arnie Braxton and not to Eric Styles, who seemed to consider that a snub, K. John said, ‘We’ll need a good half of an hour to get in position and get word to the Double O girls.’

  ‘All right then,’ Braxton answered. ‘The boys and I get to go drinking and raising a ruckus—best work assignment we’ve had for a while.’

  ‘Arnie,’ Barbara Casey cautioned, ‘don’t let any of the boys play their parts too well.’

  ‘No, I’ll tell them that it’s only ac
ting drunk that we’re interested in.’

  ‘One other thing,’ K. John told the scarred man. ‘I wouldn’t let anything slip about you working for Barbara Casey. Someone will catch on and remember that she and Willit still have matters between them that aren’t settled.’

  ‘Half an hour. We’ll take care of things,’ Eric Styles said to Barbara, as if trying to regain ascendancy in her eyes. With a sour look at K. John Landis, he stalked out the door, Arnie Brewster on his heels. K. John let his eyes flicker toward Barbara, whose own expression was one that said ‘I know.’ K. John had no idea of how far things had gone between Barbara and her foreman, nor was it his business, but the man hadn’t done his cause any good on this night.

  ‘All right, K. John,’ Flower announced as the cowboys trooped away, ‘we’d better get going too.’

  ‘Do you want me to come along?’ Barbara asked.

  ‘I think not. Perhaps you could make sure that your men’s horses are where they expect them to be when they come out of the Double O, and then ride out to the schoolhouse ahead of us just to make sure there won’t be a problem there.’

  Instead of looking as if she felt left out of things, Barbara appeared slightly relieved. This was not so for others in the room.

  ‘What are we supposed to do?’ Justine demanded.

  ‘Stay out of our way for the next half-hour,’ Flower said. ‘And try to stay out of trouble.’ She looked at her father with a firm expression. ‘You’ll see to that, won’t you?’

  ‘I’ll see to it,’ Warren Tremaine answered in a mumbling voice. ‘Whether I like it or not.’

  Flower looked like she had more to say, but time was pressing now, and K. John took her elbow and steered her toward the door. Once downstairs they started working their way on foot toward the Double O. The alleys were dark, empty and still. They passed not so much as a dog, saddle-tramp or derelict drunk. The heavy, sultry calm remained as they neared Clyde Willit’s place of business. It was as if the town was mourning its own demise.