"Excellent." A show of false enthusiasm if he'd ever seen one. "I'll just note that in the register."
"Nobody's left you any word about those missing miners, I suppose."
"The Mormons? Sorry, no."
"Well, nothing ventured."
From the Grand Hotel, he walked down to the livery. The hostler looked surprised to see him for a second time that day. "Takin' another ride?" he asked.
"Seems like I can't sit still."
"Well, I'll just get him saddled up for you."
Riding out of Tartarus, westbound, Rockwell thought it was even money that he would be ambushed either on the road, or at the Silver Beauty mine. If so, he'd know the order came from Beardsley, in collaboration with the claim's other investors. And from there ... what?
If he collected solid evidence of claim-jumping and murder, Rockwell had authority to round up those responsible and take them back for trial in Salt Lake City's federal court. In fact, however, that might not be feasible, considering the fact that his prime suspects were the leading citizens of Tartarus, with an uncertain number of supporters to defend them. Realistically, he'd need a good-sized posse to begin making arrests, and by the time he organized a raiding party, Beardsley and the others might be long gone into California, Oregon, New Mexico—wherever.
Or, they might dig in and make a fight of it, in which case Rockwell stood to lose his posse and his life. But if they only had to deal with one man, working on his own, the other side might start to make mistakes.
Like taking it for granted that he'd be an easy kill.
They'd muffed that once, already. Maybe twice, if one-eyed Seamus Hannigan was doing Beardsley's bidding with his bungled badger game. The three drunks with the Chinese girl were on their own, he thought. No way for them to know when he'd be passing by their alley, if at all, or whether he'd concern himself with their shenanigans.
Whatever else they had in mind, he took for granted that the claim's investors still had shooters left to throw at him. He hoped so, anyway.
It made what he was planning easier—assuming he survived.
The road leading him west from Tartarus was little different from the one he'd followed northward to the Murphy claim, that morning. Steeper, it was, rising higher into the Independence Range, but otherwise the scenery was more or less identical, winding across the Owyhee Desert with its sage, cactus, and Joshua trees, volcanic rock unyielding to the Appaloosa's hooves. Above Rockwell, the hills and buttes supported scattered whitebark pines, the tallest of them standing sixty feet or so. The wind was cold over a light dusting of snow, which meant no rattlesnakes to watch for, but he wasn't worried about reptiles.
Not the scaly kind, at least.
It would be difficult—maybe impossible—for Beardsley to alert buddy Jacobs that a visitor was coming, in the time since Rockwell had stopped by the Lucky Strike. That did not mean they hadn't worked it out beforehand, though. Call it a hedge against the failure of their first attempt to kill him, earlier that day.
An ace up Beardsley's sleeve, in case he needed one.
Rockwell had never played a hand of poker in his life, but he knew about betting the limit—in this case, his life. And there was one thing Beardsley should have guessed.
He didn't bluff.
* * *
Rance Fowler was uneasy on his ride out to the Murphy claim. He didn't like the thought of running into Rockwell outside town, although he thought the odds of that were slim, since Paul had pointed him toward Emil Jacobs, west of Tartarus. Aside from that, the open country made him nervous. Cougars in the hills, and hostile Indians to boot.
As if the Murphy boys alone weren't bad enough.
Why Beardsley had selected them as front men for the Mormon claim was anybody's guess. Fowler had never asked him, didn't care to know. That was the least of his concerns, if word of what had happened to the so-called Saints got back to Brigham Young in Salt Lake City. There'd be hell to pay, and as the man who was supposed to be the law in Tartarus, Fowler would be the first one up to answer for it. Beardsley damn sure wouldn't hang around to share the blame, or Walton. They could pull up stakes at any time, with all the loot they had accumulated; same for Jacobs, if he felt like cutting loose his Silver Beauty claim.
Not me, thought Fowler. I don't have a pot to—
"Chief!" a voice cut through his sour reverie. "What brings you out this way?"
Fowler looked up to see Brett Murphy looming over him, a Colt revolving rifle braced against his hip. He had the same sneer on his face as usual, mistaking arrogance for courage.
"You'n Clem are wanted back in town," said Fowler.
"Oh? Says who?"
"The mayor. You wanna snub him, I'll be happy to inform him."
"Hey, I never said that!"
"Then collect your brother and get moving."
Fowler was already turning from the youngster, on his grullo mare, when Murphy called down to him, "This about that marshal? What's his name, again?"
"Rockwell. The mayor will tell you anything you need to know."
"What'sa matter, Chief? He got you in the dark?"
"Right where I wanna be," Fowler replied, "when this one sticks his nose in."
"Me'n Clem ain't skeert of him."
"Keep sayin' that," Fowler called back over his shoulder. "Maybe you'll believe it when you need to."
Murphy cursed him, then retreated. Fowler heard the hothead's boots scrabbling on stone, going to fetch his brother for the trip to town. He wondered which of them would ride their mule, or whether they'd take turns. If they kept Beardsley waiting too long, it would mean a scolding, nothing they'd enjoy. Not Fowler's problem, though he wouldn't mind watching Beardsley deliver that tongue-lashing, bring the brothers down a peg or two.
Feed them to Rockwell, and how long would either of them last? Not long, in Fowler's estimation, but you never knew. A green kid could get lucky, every now and then. Fowler imagined that the mayor meant to hold them in reserve, together with the hard men from his several saloons, in case Rockwell got past the Jacobs bunch.
Not likely, he imagined, then he thought about the havoc that the Mormon marshal had already wreaked in Tartarus, and Fowler wasn't quite so sure. Jacobs had six or seven men out at the Silver Beauty mine, all fairly decent hands with guns. Taken together, that should be enough to bed down any man.
But Porter Rockwell wasn't any man. He might have tried to kill a governor, for pity's sake, and rumor had it that he stacked up ordinary men like cord wood. Three so far, in Tarturus, with one more dying slow while Milton Crowder tried to keep him comfy. The only one to walk away from him so far—well, limp away—was Seamus Hannigan, and you could say his dancing days were over.
It was a cold ride back to town, but Fowler had one consolation, anyway. The Murphy brothers weren't along to goad him with their smart mouths all the way. He thought about them standing up to Rockwell, going down together, and it almost made him smile.
Almost.
Until he thought about the Mormon marshal coming after him.
* * *
The map Fowler had drawn for Rockwell wasn't what you'd call precise. It gave a sense of scale and distance, with a fair take on direction, and he thought that he was getting closer, but he couldn't say if it would be another thirty minutes or an hour, maybe more. Still not a long ride, by his normal standards, but he wanted to be done with it.
Get down to business.
Rockwell knew what had become of Lehi and the other Saints who'd come with him to Tartarus. He couldn't say where they were planted and might never know, but they were dead, all right. Paul Beardsley and his partners were responsible, although he doubted they had personally joined in any of the bloodletting. The only question nagging at him now was who else knew about the murders. Who participated in the killings? Who covered them up? Who all had profited in any way from the annihilation of nine men and women, none of whom had posed a threat of any kind to Tartarus?
The whole town, m
aybe. In which case, he just might have to wipe it off the map.
Paul Beardsley's lead to Emil Jacobs smelled like what it likely was: a trap. That didn't worry Rockwell, in itself. He was used to taking risks, weighing the odds whenever possible, but forging on regardless if his cause was just. With any luck, he might learn something from the owner of the Silver Beauty mine—or from his men, at least, if Jacobs liked to keep his own hands clean.
Talk first, if possible, before the shooting started.
Then again, what if he had it wrong? What if Mayor Beardsley hadn't tipped his partner off to Rockwell stopping by? Maybe the man in charge of Tartarus was setting Jacobs up to be his straw man, or a sacrificial goat to clear the rest of them. Let Jacobs bear the brunt of Rockwell's wrath, then claim he tricked his partners into buying shares after the dirty deed was done without their knowledge.
Rockwell couldn't swallow that, but it was something that a jury might accept if fancy lawyers pled the case and got them tangled up in legal jargon, while their clients looked contrite and wept crocodile tears.
Could anything along those lines be true?
Rockwell believed himself a fairly decent judge of character, and he had pegged Paul Beardsley as a liar from the moment that they met. He looked and smelled like a confidence man, maybe raised as a nipper, a man with no scruples beyond looking out for himself. His bright smile was an oily counterfeit. Rockwell would lose no sleep over eliminating him, as long as he made sure he had the right of it.
Another mile, he thought. Even the bumbling chief who rarely left his small-town jurisdiction couldn't be much farther off than that.
He would be ready with his Sharps on the approach, and with his Colts—his Bowie and the tomahawk as well, if it came down to that. A newspaper reporter in Missouri had described him as a savage once, and Rockwell wouldn't quarrel with that when he was fighting for his life. The only rule in gunfighting, or combat hand to hand, was to survive. Whatever was required to come out of the fray alive, was justified.
And much the same, he thought, for settling accounts.
His nephew and the others had been slaughtered out of hand, as Rockwell saw it, for their silver. That was murder, robbery, and an affront to God's own congregation. One way he could look at it was standing back, letting Paul Beardsley and the others sow their oats and profit from their crimes until the Lord called them before His judgment seat some years or decades hence.
But Rockwell didn't have that kind of patience. What he had was an assignment, and a duty—to the dead, the governor, and to himself—to put things right. Balance the scales on earth, and leave the afterlife to Someone else.
A reckoning.
First, he would meet with Emil Jacobs, listen to the chairman of the Miners' League and find out where that took him. Whatever happened after that was down to Rockwell's adversaries. They could always choose surrender, travel back to Salt Lake City with him, take their chances in a courtroom.
But he didn't think they would.
And that—why not admit it to himself, at least?—would suit him fine.
Chapter 10
Emil Jacobs cut a short plug of tobacco, wedged it into his left cheek, then returned the rest to its pouch and the pouch to his pocket. Facing east, toward Tartarus, he saw a solitary rider drawing closer, not in any hurry from his pace, but clearly headed for the Plata Belleza digs.
Silver Beauty.
There wasn't much beauty to mining, but Jacobs did admire the ore his workers pried out of the ground. More than its luster, he enjoyed the wealth it brought to him, a simple farmer's son who had decided scratching at the ground to raise a crop was foolish, if the same amount of work could get him precious ore. These days, he didn't even have to do the work himself.
Was this a great country, or what?
But now he and his partners had a situation on their hands. It was a problem of their own creation, granted, but they'd given in to greed and that was done, no way to take it back. Jacobs had made his choice, along with Beardsley, Walton, and the rest. He had to live with it, and living was exactly what he meant to do. He didn't plan on climbing any scaffold, praying that he wouldn't soil himself in front of strangers when the trap sprang open and he plummeted through space, a noose around his neck.
This had to be the marshal coming, Porter Rockwell, said to be the meanest Danite in the private army Brigham Young had organized to deal with enemies of his religion. Jacobs didn't care much what a man believed, as long as he was smart enough to live and let live, without trying to impose his creed on anybody else.
The problem with this Rockwell was the U.S. badge he wore, and what it symbolized. If he was killed, or simply disappeared, Jacobs knew other marshals would eventually come to find out what became of him. That was a problem for another day, however. He could only deal with trouble as it came and do his best to make it go away.
He walked back to the mine shaft's entrance, shouting down into the darkness, "Boys! I need you topside, pronto!"
In another moment, Jacobs heard them scrabbling toward him, following the lead man with his lamp, like trolls emerging from their cave. The first man out, Vic Tunney, was his foreman, asking, "What's the scramble, Boss?"
"Company's coming," Jacobs said. "A lawman, out from town."
"Who, Fowler?" one of them inquired.
"A U.S. marshal, in from Salt Lake City. Nosin' into business with the combination."
"What's the play?" asked Tunney.
"Wait and see what happens. If he's easy, we do nothin'. Have your irons handy, in case I give the word."
They ran to fetch their weapons, mostly coming back with pistols, though he also saw a shotgun and a musket in the mix. Eight guns, including his, and Jacobs reckoned that should be enough to do for any man, Mormon or otherwise.
When they were all arranged, lolling about as if they didn't have a job of work to do, Jacobs resumed his vantage point and saw the lawman had advanced to something like a hundred yards from shouting range. Spitting a stream of brown tobacco juice, Jacobs reached back to check the Smith & Wesson Model 1 tucked under his belt, against his spine. It was a tip-up model, just a .22, but loaded seven rimfire cartridges and could be deadly at close range.
Rockwell was closer now. Jacobs could see his long hair underneath a wide-brimmed hat, the matching beard, his buckskin shirt and trousers. Big Sharps rifle propped across his saddle, two Colt Navy pistols—and was that a tomahawk stuck through his belt?
"Marshal," he called out, when his enemy had closed to thirty yards. "What can I do for you?"
* * *
"Just some questions that I need to ask you," Rockwell answered, as he moved in closer, counting seven other men behind the one he took for Emil Jacobs. Maybe they were done with digging for the day, but was it likely all of them would carry guns into the mine?
"What kinda questions?" Jacobs wondered.
Rockwell had already cocked the Sharps, and had his index finger on its trigger as he answered back, "About the Murphy brothers' claim."
"Murphy?"
"Your mayor says you're the man to see."
"Did he." Not making it a question.
"Seemed to think you could enlighten me about whatever happened to the former owners."
"Those would be the Mormons."
"Would be. Yes."
"And Beardsley sent you here."
"Since you and he are both investors in the mine."
"Uh-huh."
"So, what about it?"
"Don't know what to tell ya, Marshal. Paul's the one who tipped me they were sellin' out. I put some money in the pot, along with him and Isaac Walton. Mormons left, Murphys moved in."
"My question would be where they went."
Jacobs leaned forward, spat tobacco juice, then straightened up again, his right hand drifting slowly back behind his hip. A gun back there, Rockwell assumed, watching the others tensing up.
"I couldn't say exac'ly where they are, right now, but if you wanna meet 'em—
"
Rockwell drilled him with the Sharps, dead-center, just as Jacobs reached his hideout gun, then dropped the rifle, rolling through a dismount on the Appaloosa's right-hand side and clearing both his Colts, before he landed in a crouch, swinging the pistol in his left hand to propel the horse out of his way.
The miners had not been prepared to see their boss cut down, turning the snow red where he fell. And they weren't ready for what happened next, either. Rockwell fired twice, one Colt and then the other, taking down the adversaries who were holding long guns, still in shock from seeing Jacobs drop. He hit one in the upper chest, the other just above his belt buckle. The first one dropped his musket as he toppled over, but the other fired a shotgun blast that cut a third man's legs from under him and left him thrashing on the ground.
A bonus.
The four still on their feet were breaking off to either side of Rockwell, clawing six-guns from their belts, no holsters. Rockwell swiveled to his right and clipped one on the run, blood spurting from the miner's neck to mark the point of impact. With a pivot to the left, he caught another of the miners lining up a shot and beat him to it, point and squeeze, not focusing on the result as long as there were others left to face.
The last two had their guns in hand, firing at Rockwell without taking time to aim. The fear of dying made them sloppy and became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Rockwell steadied his right-hand Colt and plugged a bullet through the nearest shooter's rib cage, spinning him around to fall facedown with arms outflung.
The last one bolted for the mine shaft, firing blindly back over his shoulder. Rockwell saw him disappear into the darkness there and thought about pursuing him, then spied an open case of dynamite resting beside the tunnel's mouth. He walked across to it, retrieved a stick already fitted with a fuse, and struck a match to set it sputtering. When half its length had burned away, he pitched it down into the shaft and backed off, waiting for the blast, the sound of falling rock, and the eruption of a choking dust cloud from the mine.
Surveying what was left, he found two of the miners still alive, if only just. Rockwell picked up their guns and tossed them out of reach before he went to fetch his Sharps, then whistled up his Appaloosa for the ride back into Tartarus.
West of the Big River: Boxed Set of Eight Western Novels Page 17