“What do I do if I see him?”
“Oh, it’s not if, White-Eye. It’s when. He’s due in town any day, now. When you see him, tell him who you are and bring him out here to the camp.”
White-Eye nodded with a shrug and shuffled off to the horses.
Flossy, who had been busying herself about the camp but remaining within earshot of Falcone, came up behind him and began to knead tension from his shoulders.
“I couldn’t help but overhear,” she said. “Sounds like you might have been describing Two-Finger Walker.”
“Why, Flossy,” Falcone removed the cigar from his teeth, closing his eyes as Flossy’s fingers dug into his shoulders. “I do believe you’re paying attention.”
“Never met the man. Heard of him, though. I used to work a saloon down Texas way. Is that what we’re here for? To meet up with him?”
Falcone nodded.
She said, “I’ve heard he’s not a man you want to deal with.”
“True. But then, he might be uniquely qualified for the job I have in mind. You see, my dear, he might be the only man alive who can handle Johnny McCabe in a fight to the death, and I know of no one else who is more motivated to kill McCabe than he is.”
Flossy decided to pursue it no further. Vic Falcone was not a man who liked to answer questions.
Falcone sat in silence with his eyes shut as Flossy continued to work on his shoulders.
Jubal Kincaid stood outside his office leaning his back against the wall. In one hand was a hand-rolled cigarette. He watched a rider approaching from down the street.
The man rode down the center of the street, a black flat-brimmed hat covering his head. Long, stringy hair fell to his shoulders. He wore a long black jacket, which was held open on the right side by a pistol that was holstered at his belt, the handle of the gun facing out.
He sat tall, with wide shoulders. A black patch covered one eye, and he rode with a scatter gun lying across the front of his saddle.
The man gave the rein a slight tug and his horse came to a complete stop. With his one eye, the man looked to the marshal. “Jubal Kincaid?”
Kincaid nodded. “How do, Walker. Been a long time.”
Walker’s lips spread in a grimace that might have been a smile. “Not long enough. I see you’re wearing a badge.”
Kincaid nodded again, taking a draw from his cigarette. “A man’s gotta work.”
“So they say.”
“What are you doing in town, Walker?”
“I ain’t in the habit of answering questions.”
“Fair enough. But I’m not in the habit of tolerating trouble.”
“You threatening me?”
“Warning you. And you get one warning, only.”
Walker sat in the saddle a moment, his one eye fixed on Kincaid, sizing up the man and the situation.
Then, he said, “I’m here to meet a man. That’s all.”
“Then, why don’t you get to it?”
Walker nodded. “Good day. Marshal.”
And he continued along.
Kincaid stood, watching as Two-Finger Walker continued along the wide street, keeping his horse to a walk.
He dismounted in front of the saloon and stepped in.
Another horse approached from down the street. Jack McCabe.
The boy swung out of the saddle. “Good afternoon, Marshal.”
“You here to fetch that trunk?”
“Well, I was hoping to ask you for another favor.”
Kincaid looked at him with a grin. “Let me guess. You want to store it in my office for a while.”
“Well, it’s just that none of the farmers have room for it in their wagons, and I really can’t be prepared for trouble if I have a cumbersome trunk tied to the back of my saddle.”
“Cumbersome, huh?” Kincaid was still grinning. “Ain’t heard a ten-dollar word like that in a while.”
Jack returned the grin. “That’s what college will get you.”
Kincaid let his gaze drift back to the saloon down the street, and the horse tethered outside.
“I’m thinking on spending the night out at the wagons,” Jack said. “It might be easier to be right there come morning. We’re planning on an early start.”
Kincaid nodded. “Makes sense. Yeah, I’ll keep that trunk for you. What’s in it, anyhow?”
“Clothes. The kind of stuff you wear when you’re sitting in lecture halls or libraries. Nothing I think I’ll be needing again. If ever.”
Kincaid grew silent, staring down toward the saloon. He took a final drag of the cigarette and tossed the stub out onto the dusty street.
“Actually,” Jack said, pulling an envelope from his vest. “One more thing. A letter I was hoping maybe you could put on the next stage bound for McCabe Gap for me.”
Kincaid took the letter and tucked it into his own vest. “Consider it done.”
“Much obliged.”
Kincaid returned his gaze to the far end of the street.
Jack said, “What’re you watching?”
Before Kincaid could answer, Walker stepped out of the saloon with another man. They each mounted up and began riding away, each keeping his horse to a walk.
“That man,” Kincaid said. “The one with the long hair. His name’s Walker. I never did know his first name, but they call him Two-Finger.”
“Two-Finger Walker. Yeah, I think I’ve heard the name mentioned around a campfire or two.”
“He got that name because, back in the day, down around the Texas border, he was a young gunhawk. They say he was good with a gun, but he was young and didn’t have the common sense to pick his fights. A little liquored-up, he challenged another young gunhawk by the name of Johnny McCabe.”
“Pa?” Jack knew his father had roamed the border country for a short time, before he met Ma.
“One and the same. Your Pa is about as good with a gun as I’ve ever seen. He actually shot the gun out of Walker’s hand. Even though I think it was an accident, because no man is that good, your Pa had the presence of mind to say, without even hesitating, for Walker to consider himself lucky. Your Pa said the next one would be between the eyes.”
Jack chuckled. “Pa has style.”
“I was standing there on the boardwalk. Never actually met your Pa face-to-face, but we found ourselves in the same saloon a couple times back then. Walker stood there, hanging onto his wounded hand, blood dripping to the dirt, looking at your Pa with more hate than I thought it was possible for one man to muster. Your Pa’s bullet shot that man’s hand apart. He lost three fingers, blown right off as he stood there in the street. All he’s got is a thumb and his first finger. That ended his days of being dangerous with a gun.
“But it didn’t stop Walker from being dangerous. About six months later, he came across your Pa in another saloon. I wasn’t there this time, but I heard about it. He pulled a knife on your Pa, and they fought hard. It ended with Walker catching his own knife in the eye.
“He’s probably the only man who can say he fought your Pa to the death twice and lived to tell about it.”
Jack had seen his father with his shirt off more than once, and Pa had a scar across his chest, and another thin line of a scar across his shoulder. He asked his Pa one time what they were from, thinking they looked like knife wounds. Pa simply said, “Oh, just reminders of when I was young and foolish.”
Jack wondered now if those scars came from the knife of Two-Finger Walker.
“So,” Jack said. “What do you suppose he’s doing here in town?”
“There might not be any man alive who hates your father as much as Two-Finger. And that man he just rode away with, he rides for Falcone. His name’s White-Eye. Had his name on a reward poster in New Mexico Territory, at one time. Son, I think you might be in even more trouble than we thought.”
8
Jack awoke with the sky still dark. Stars silently flickered overhead, but the eastern sky was beginning to show a faint light. Predawn, his Pa
called it.
His horse stood fifty feet to one side, its head hanging lazily in the unique way a horse had of resting, almost sleeping, while it was on its feet.
Jack had learned horseflesh from Pa, and this horse had sand. It was the same horse he had borrowed from the livery. The afternoon before he had bought it and the saddle from the livery attendant. The old man had included a scabbard that was now tied to the saddle, and in it was the Winchester Marshal Kincaid had given him.
He had also bought a few supplies from the general store, including the blankets he was now wrapped in. He climbed out of the blankets and reached for his boots. He held each upside down and gave it a good shake to dislodge anything that might have crawled in during the night, then pulled them on snugly over his feet.
He stacked some kindling and wood to build a small fire, and then filled a kettle from a canteen. A little morning coffee to start the day.
He buckled his gunbelt about his hips and tied the gun down to his leg, and then stood before the fire, enjoying the wind in his hair. The ever-present wind of the plains.
Symbolically, he felt like this day was somehow a new beginning. Like yesterday had been the last day of something old, and now he was starting something new. A new direction. A new life, even.
He had studied symbolism in school. Shakespeare’s writing, the old Greek plays. Enough poetry to choke the proverbial horse. He thought it was all little more than nonsense, trying to find something profound in a play or a poem so you could feel scholarly.
And yet, he thought of the trunk he had left at Kincaid’s office. It was filled with clothes he had worn at school. Jackets and trousers of finely milled wood or tweed. White shirts with stiff collars. Various ties. The trappings of a university man. A man of letters. A man who had gotten a classical education and was beginning medical school.
Now, as he stood in his boots and his levis, with a Colt strapped down to his right leg, standing not in a lecture hall but on the open grasslands with a campfire before him and a pot of coffee beginning to boil, he was leaving behind the university man. He was once again a man of the west.
And though he didn’t know how he would ever break this to Aunt Ginny and he dreaded the look of disappointment in Pa’s eye, Harvard was behind him.
He took a deep breath of the crisp, fresh air.
Some would think him a fool, he was sure. He had the intellectual capacity to excel at studies to the point that he had finished his second year of medical school when most young men his age were still working on their undergraduate degrees. But they simply didn’t understand. Apparently even Pa and Aunt Ginny didn’t fully understand. But as he stood by the fire, the wind in his hair, he felt like he was truly where he belonged.
Soon, the farmers were awake. Starting cook fires and fixing breakfast. Rolling tents and packing them into wagons. Harnassing teams of oxen.
As the sun slowly made its way over the eastern horizon, teams were hitched to wagons and Jack was saddling his horse.
Jubal Kincaid rode out to see them off.
“Marshal,” Jack said, stepping into the saddle.
“I just wanted to say good-bye. And good luck.”
“If a man is careful and good at what he does, he doesn’t need luck.”
Kincaid grinned. “You’ve had a good teacher. One of the best.”
Jack nudged his horse over to Kincaid’s, and extended a hand which Kincaid shook.
“Thanks for everything,” Jack said.
With his hat pulled down tightly over his temples, the winds of the grasslands now fully in his face, Jack looked down to Brewster. The man was standing beside his team of oxen. His wife and Jessica were sitting on the front seat. The Brewsters had two wagons, and Brewster’s son was standing by the second team.
“Well, Mister Brewster,” Jack said, “I suppose we should be on our way.”
Kincaid watched as Brewster urged his team forward and the wagon lurched into motion. Brewster’s son did the same, and his wagon fell into place behind his father’s. The Harding wagon came next, and then the fourth wagon, Kincaid believed their name was Ford, took its place behind the Hardings. Ford, with a drooping gray hat and an equally drooping mustache, threw a wave at Kincaid, who returned it.
Kincaid sat and watched a moment, then turned his horse back toward town.
Kincaid regretted that he couldn’t do more to help young Jack McCabe. The boy seemed to have spine and integrity. Yet, to simply ride along and desert this town was not an option. The townspeople had hired him to do a job and they needed the job done.
He dismounted in front of his office, leaving his horse tethered to a hitching rail. He would take the horse to the livery later.
With his scatter gun cradled in one arm, he began to walk his rounds, which meant strolling about the town, up one boardwalk and down another. Stopping in sporadically at various businesses to sort of make his presence felt. Folks simply felt safer knowing the law was easily accessible.
He stopped in at the saloon, chatted with the bartender for a few minutes. Then, he stepped into the general store and visited with the proprietor, a man who had been a farmer in Ohio but whose father had once operated a feed and grain store. The man had come west to start a new life, and was doing so not behind a plow but as his father had, but behind a counter.
As Kincaid walked along, a stagecoach rolled onto the town’s main street, its horses lathered from a long haul. The passengers would deboard and take a meal at the restaurant while the hostler replaced the team with a fresh one.
“Okay, folks,” the stage driver said. “You got about an hour, then we’ll be continuing on.”
Kincaid was about to pull out of his vest pocket the letter Jack had given him, but then he got an idea.
He walked up to the stage. The driver was a man he knew as Ned, with a deeply lined face and a thick graying beard, and a floppy hat the color of dirt.
“Morning, Ned,” Kincaid called out.
“Marshal,” Ned said, dropping down from his seat atop the front of the stage to the dusty earth of the street.
“Ned, I have a question for you. Do you pass directly through McCabe Gap?”
“Nope. Not me, at least. I’ll take the passengers as far as Bozeman. There is a stage that goes through there once a week, though.”
“If I write you a letter, addressed to someone in McCabe Gap, can you make sure it gets delivered?”
“Well,” he shrugged, “we ain’t the mail service, but I don’t see why we can’t. Is it official business?”
“Sort of. There’ll be two letters, actually. And I’d consider it a personal favor.”
Kincaid went to his office and pulled open a desk drawer where he kept a bottle of ink and a quill pen.
Kincaid knew how to read and write, though he had met many who could not. He was hoping the man he was about to address this letter to was literate, or at the very least, there was someone in his life who could read. Since Jack’s letter was addressed to the very same man, Kincaid figured there was a good chance there was.
Kincaid wrote his letter using the back of an old reward poster for stationary. His office was an extremely low-budget operation. Then, he stuffed the letter into an envelope, and across the front, wrote, Johnny McCabe. McCabe Gap, Montana.
Outside, he found the stage with a fresh team hitched. Ned was once again atop, checking some luggage he had tied down.
“Ned,” Kincaid said. “Here they are.”
Ned took the envelopes and tucked them into a vest pocket. “I know the gent who’ll be running the route that goes through McCabe Gap. I’ll see that it’s delivered.”
Kincaid nodded. He only hoped it wouldn’t arrive too late.
9
Jack McCabe and the covered wagons were following the main trail that led out of town, and north. The trail that was identified on most maps as the Bozeman Trail.
These grassy flat lands were not as flat as they appeared from the window of a train. The land was a
ctually a series of countless low, rolling hills. At the crest of one of these hills, you could see for miles in any direction, but some of the depressions between hills were deceptively deep. A rider could be hidden from view at the lowest point between some of them.
The grass, Jack knew, would become a dry brown as the summer wore on. But at the moment it was a luxuriant green. The ever-present winds of the plains passed along, causing the grass to ripple like a sea of green.
Wild flowers grew sporadically, bobbing their heads in the wind as though they were bowing to the settlers passing by.
The noon stage, the one that would have been carrying Jack had he held to his original plans, approached from behind.
Unlike in dime novels, in which stages charged along with their horses moving at a full gallop, this team was kept to a light trot. After all, there were a lot of miles to cover and a galloping team would quickly become exhausted.
The farmers pulled their wagons aside to let the stage pass. The driver nodded to Jack, who nodded back, and then the stage was gone.
Jack sat in his saddle, watching the stage move along.
Brewster urged his team of oxen along, to get the wagon moving once again. He saw Jack sitting in the saddle, staring toward the stage.
“What are you thinking, McCabe?” Brewster asked, walking alongside the oxen.
Jack said, “I’m thinking that I feel like a sitting duck, out here in the open like this.”
“You think those men back there are coming for us, don’t you?”
“I have a bad feeling, that’s all.”
They pushed the wagons along, moving until the sun drooped low in the sky. Jack recommended stopping while there was still enough daylight to gather wood and set up tents.
On three sides of their camp was open grassland stretching in long, low hills into the distance. However, on the fourth was a small creek, with some oak and willow.
Green wood, of course, won’t burn well, but they found some deadfalls and a few dead branches lying on the ground. Axes and hatchets were put to use, and the settlers had enough wood for three small cook fires. Each wagon had a small load of firewood tucked in a corner, but Jack had recommended they save that wood until they really needed it.
One Man's Shadow (The McCabes Book 2) Page 6