Before Smoke Jensen could react, Rankin’s weapon barked. The slug cracked loudly past Smoke’s head an instant before Smoke obliged Rankin with a slug in the brain. Rankin went down in a rubber-limbed heap. Half a heartbeat later, the wide-eyed, badly shaken conductor arrived.
“Oh m’god, what happened here?”
“These three tried to kill me,” Smoke answered.
Crouched by the corpse of Rankin, the conductor gaped up at Smoke. “But, why?”
“They figured to rob me.”
Indignation rang in the supervisor’s voice. “Not on my train.”
Smoke lifted the corners of his mouth in a fleeting smile. “That’s how I saw it, too.”
“This is terrible, simply terrible. All this mess. And the passengers. What will we do about them?”
“Well, we could spare them the awful sight.”
“How’s that?”
“We could simply dump this garbage off the train.”
The round eyes went wider. “Oh, no, we could never do that. There will have to be an inquiry into the shooting,” the conductor insisted.
Right then, Billy ceased his groans and gasps. With a little shudder, he stopped writhing. The trainman eyed the newly made corpse and the other, and the wailing youth with the bloody shoulder. Then he looked back at Smoke and correctly read the steely gray eyes. He swallowed hard to get his words past the hard lump in his throat.
“Well,” he said meekly, “if Mr. Smoke Jensen will say nothing about the incident, I certainly won’t.” To his surprise, Smoke frowned and pointed at the wounded Teddy.
“One’s still alive.”
“D-do you want that taken care of?”
“Noo,” Smoke drawled. “We’ll stop off at the county seat and have that little inquiry.”
Relieved, the conductor sighed deeply. “I’ll go make arrangements to have the bodies wrapped up and moved to the baggage car.”
* * *
Early morning reached San Francisco in a pink haze. Starlings twittered in the cornices of the public buildings off Market Street. Pigeons cooed indignantly at this invasion by their smaller, sleek cousins. On the wide front porch of his splendid home on Nob Hill, Cyrus Murchison gave his wife a buss on her peaches-and-cream cheek.
“I’ll be late tonight, Agatha, my dear.”
“Oh, Cyrus, you’ve been working so hard lately. Can’t anyone else run that railroad of yours?”
“Yes. And there are a lot of them doing that day and night,” the portly Murchison assured her. “This is . . . other business.”
Agatha frowned. “You’re seeing Titus and Gaylord again” —came out as a statement.
Abashed, Murchison sputtered his reply. “But they’re my friends. They are also my only peers in commerce and industry.”
“Empire building, you mean,” Agatha charged pettishly.
Murchison brushed vacantly at the thick gold watch chain that hung in twin loops from the pockets of his dark navy pinstriped vest. Grown portly from good living, he had the florid face to go with the rich diet and ample spirits he consumed. In his early fifties, he had a layer of fat right under his skin that gave him the youthful appearance of a man ten years his junior. Often hailed in the pages of the San Francisco Chronicle as a “captain of industry,” Murchison had reached the pinnacle of his enterprise through hard, if often dishonest, effort. His sole weakness was his relationship with his wife.
Put frankly, Agatha terrified him. One of her looks, a gesture, or a soft, deprecating word could swiftly unman him. While he was a tyrant to every subordinate and lived life like an autocrat, Cyrus Murchison quailed at the mildest rebuke from the woman he adored above all things save power. Now he shot a quick look over his shoulder. His carriage, complete with liveried driver, waited to take him to his office.
“Be that as it may, my dear. But this meeting is important. Tell cook not to hold supper.”
He bent to give her another quick peck, then put his hat firmly on his head and turned to negotiate the steps. He strolled briskly down the flagstone walk to a gate in the white-painted, wrought-iron picket fence. The driver opened the carriage door and touched fingers to the brim of his hat.
Seated in the brougham, Cyrus Murchison mentally reviewed the events of the past few days. Gaylord Huntley was a fool to believe they could use those people and get out of it unaffected; they’d invented the squeeze. He sighed heavily. But they need them. Not all of the employees in their various enterprises could be corrupted. Another thing rankled even more. So they let that sourdough run them off, eh? One man against three, and not a one had had forethought or fortitude enough to force him to sign? Next time, it might be well to have Tyrone Beal take charge of gaining that mining property.
Stubborn man, that Raymond Wagner. A German, and blockheaded. Titus Hobson simply had no idea of how to properly delegate authority. He made his way to the top in the goldfields by himself, and never learned how to rely on the judgment and performance of other men. On the other hand, Murchison mused, he had learned that lesson early in the building of his California Central railroad empire. He would have some hot words for his companions that evening. Something he felt certain they would not like to hear.
* * *
An early riser by habit from his time in the goldfields of Central California, Titus Hobson already sat at his desk. Although he was a good five years older than Cyrus Murchison, he retained powerful shoulders and arms from his years of working at mining and prospecting. Every bit as rich as Murchison, he remained a bit rough around the edges. His clothes might be of the best cloth and perfectly fitted, but they lost their luster on his burly frame. He eased himself forward in the leatherbound swivel chair to gaze down on San Francisco from his office on the fourth floor of the Flatiron Building. His eyes settled on the oddly peaked roofs of Chinatown. A smile played across his craggy face and set his bushy brows to waggling.
This thing with the Chinese—he liked it. Yes, let those little yellow devils take the lumps, if indeed any were to be handed out. But would they take orders from a white man? They should; thousands of them had labored on Cyrus’s railroad. They would settle the Chinese question tonight. Cyrus still had to be brought around. Gaylord had convinced him yesterday. It was up to the two of them to sway Cyrus. He smacked a hard hand on the glowing mahogany desktop.
“Hell, we should be able to handle this ourselves,” he said aloud, startling himself. To cover speaking to an empty room, he called out to his male secretary, “Alex, bring me a cup of coffee.”
“Right away, Mr. Hobson.”
Hobson picked up the report once more. Neat rows of numbers ran down the page in columns. Looking at them irritated him. He could read and write; he’d taught himself after he’d made that big strike on Rush’s Mountain. He could do his figures right enough, too. Only, this many numbers tended to blend together into a single indecipherable mass. If this accountant of Cyrus’s was right, they were all going to become a whole lot richer than their wildest dreams. That comforting thought made his belly rumble. He always had a little snack at mid-morning. Why not a little early?
“Oh, and Alex, bring me a piece of that cream cake.”
* * *
Gaylord Huntley stepped catfooted up to the bullnecked bruiser who stood defiantly in the gateway of pier 7. The gigantic longshoreman held a cargo hook in one huge fist and a wicked filleting knife in the other. He seemed not the least intimidated by the presence of the overlord of all San Francisco dockworkers.
“When I say you don’t work these docks,” Huntley growled, “I mean you are out, even in times of emergency. Now, get your butt out of my sight.”
“You’re not throwing me out, Huntley. I come to work, and I aim to finish it.”
Lightning fast, Huntley’s ham fist flashed from his side and cracked into the center of the longshoreman’s chest. The dockworker’s eyes crossed and air gushed out of him. Huntley followed up with a left to the jaw, then reversed to backhand the hook out of his
way. Half a dozen onlookers remained frozen in place.
To them it appeared Huntley had forgotten the knife. He hadn’t. As it flashed forward, his right hand filled with the parrot-bill grip of a .44 Colt Lightning, which he snapped free of a high hip holster and squeezed through the double-action trigger to send a round square into the belligerent longshoreman’s heart. He fell dead at Huntley’s feet.
“Dump this trash in the bay,” he commanded his other workers.
“Yes, sir, Mr. Huntley,” one blurted.
All of them had long ago been intimidated by this ferret-faced man with the bulging shoulders and arms of their trade. Gaylord Huntley’s oily black hair, slicked straight back on his elongated head, added to the ratlike visage created by black, close-set eyes and protruding yellowed teeth. Seen from behind, Huntley’s stature was laughable.
Some few had made the mistake of laughing. His oversized upper torso dwindled rapidly to a narrow waist and short legs planted on small feet. It gave him the appearance of a soaked wharf rat. Those who had sniggered at that sight had paid for it . . . painfully. Not a few had paid with their lives. Huntley did not waste time on watching the disposal. He reholstered his Colt and turned from the dock. His mind went at once to the meeting with Cyrus and Titus.
Over dinner, they would settle the idea of using the Chinese instead of his longshoremen or Cyrus’s railroad detectives to enforce their will. It had been his idea. He considered himself to be a remarkable judge of the abilities and the reliability of other men. He found Xiang Lee to be capable and trustworthy, if a little full of himself. He believed he had sold Titus on it the previous day. Only Murchison objected strongly. Perhaps that could be changed. He smiled in anticipation as he entered his office.
“Ah, my dear Millie,” he greeted the young woman seated in a comfortable chair beside a large potted palm. “Won’t you come in, please? I have need of your special talents.” Killing always made him hunger for a woman’s charms.
3
At Rock Springs, the county seat of Sweetwater County, Wyoming, the train pulled to its scheduled stop and Smoke Jensen readied himself for the inevitable questions he had encountered so many times before. The conductor, a man named Ames, had arranged for the sheriff and the doctor who served as coroner to come aboard the train to conduct their inquiry.
That gave Smoke a little more confidence. The railroad would back him. Unfortunately, some bogus Wanted posters might still circulate in Wyoming. That harkened back to the time when dark forces had combined to have him marked as a man wanted for murder. It had brought him literally years of grief. He looked up now as the trainman and the law returned to the baggage car.
“I know you,” the sheriff growled, his eyes narrowing as he entered.
“I don’t know you,” Smoke quipped back.
“Sheriff Harvey Lane. You’re a wanted man, Smoke Jensen.”
Smoke answered simply, “No, I’m not.”
“I have a wanted flyer . . .” Lane began, to be cut off by a raised hand and a sharp bark from Smoke.
“It’s all crap, Sheriff. You should know that by now. Those were fraudulent when they were printed and they were recalled a month after being issued. Let’s get on to this shooting.”
“Why did you kill them?” Lane quickly changed gears.
“Like I told Mr. Ames here, they were trying to kill me.”
Lane spoke dryly. “Of course there could be no possible reason for that?”
“I had just finished nearly cleaning them out at poker. The punk kids turned out to be part of a rustling gang. The whole gang, I suspect.”
“You have any proof of that?”
“Ask our boy Teddy. He’s locked up in the strong room,” Smoke snapped.
Sheriff Lane cut a sharp eye to the conductor, who nodded. “Yep. Once I got him away from Smoke—er—Mr. Jensen, he wouldn’t stop babbling. Confessed to all sorts of things. Claimed the dead boy, Billy, forced him to participate. Said they’d rustled cattle in five states.”
“Well, well,” Lane mused aloud. “There anyone else I can ask?”
“The other players in the poker game,” Smoke suggested.
Wrath darkened the lawman’s hawklike visage. “Now I got a gunfighter and killer tellin’ me my business.”
Tired from the fight the previous day and strained to the limit by the attempt on his life, Smoke Jensen had absorbed all of this he could. “No,” Smoke countered as he produced his wallet and badge. “You have a deputy U.S. marshal telling you your business.”
Lane’s jaw sagged. “Well, I’ll . . . be . . . damned. You working on somethin’ now, Marshal Jensen?”
Amazing, how his tone changed, Smoke mused. “If I am, it does not involve your jurisdiction. I’m sure Mr. Ames has told you I am ticketed through to San Francisco.”
“I think I am beginning to see. Well, then, I’m off to talk to those players and this yonker rustler. Enjoy your journey, Marshal Jensen.”
After the sheriff left the car, Ames looked blankly at Smoke. “What was that all about?”
“I ask you,” Smoke shot back.
* * *
Three men met the eleven o’clock local of the California Central when it rolled into Parkerville, California. Their leader, the bandy-legged one who had confronted Ray Wagner, wore a surly expression and spoke with false bravado.
“Whoever the boss is sending had better be in the mood to take orders.”
“But didn’t the telegram from San Francisco say he was to be in charge?” one of his henchmen asked ingenuously.
“Button that lip, Quint. I’m the boss around here. And this sissy city dude had better know it.”
With a final hiss, screech, and groan, the train came to a stop. The first to bound down the folding iron steps was a huge, burly man with flame-red hair and a big walrus mustache that drooped around thick, tobacco-stained lips. He had a saddle slung over one massive shoulder that made the rig look tiny. It became obvious he could not be someone for whom any of the delicate women and small children waited. He made a quick study of those on the platform and walked directly to the trio.
“You must be Spencer. I’m Beal. Get me a horse,” he commanded the erstwhile leader.
Swallowing with difficulty, the bowlegged hard case surrendered his captaincy and responded humbly. “Yes, sir. Right away.”
Tyrone Beal had arrived.
Cyrus Murchison had chosen well. Beal led a company of twenty-five railroad detectives, under the direct order of his boss, Hector Grange, Chief of Railroad Police for the California Central. Always big for his age, Beal had killed his first man at the age of thirteen, beaten him to death with his fists. The man was his stepfather, a brute and drunk who alternately beat his stepchildren and his wife. The authorities sent Tyrone Beal to a school for errant boys for six months while the family moved to another county, and then Beal was released.
Since that time, he had never let anyone back him down. Never. No two-bit gold chaser was about to be the first. He had heard of the failure of Spencer and his underlings. They should have taken ax handles to the stupid German and beaten some sense into him. He privately gave himself ten minutes to convince Wagner. He dismissed this as he studied the two henchmen who accompanied Spencer.
“Can either of you count to twenty without taking off your boots?” he growled.
They exchanged puzzled glances. “Uh—what’s that mean?” one asked.
Beal gave them a contemptuous sneer. “I gather that means no. Now, get this straight, I don’t like to repeat myself. You are going to take me out to this Wagner claim and we are going to get his signature. There will be no failure. Clear?”
They nodded their heads dumbly. Spencer returned then and took in the display. Anger rose again. He stomped over and put his face up in that of Tyrone Beal. “Those are my men. They take their orders from me.”
Beal’s answer came back heavy with menace. “Not . . . any . . . more. Now, saddle my horse and let’s head for that claim.”
The humiliation of that was more than Spencer could bear. “You can go to hell. C’mon, boys, we’re out of this. Let the big man handle it himself.”
Beal’s right ham fist came up with a blur of speed. He mushed Spencer’s mouth and knocked the smaller man on his butt. “When I give an order, it is obeyed.”
He turned on one heel and started for the tie-rail at one end of the station. Spencer’s underlings followed him, gaping.
* * *
Sally Jensen stood in the shade of the porch roof. Small fists on hips, she looked across the yard at the hands gathered near the breaking corral. Young Bobby had crowded in among them. Ordinarily, that would not trouble her. But of late, the boy had taken to the newcomers as his idols. It wasn’t often that Sally questioned the judgment of her husband.
In his life of enforced caution, Smoke sometimes made bad judgments about people. Sally had recently begun to hold a mild distrust toward the drifters Smoke had sent with that note. At least, he would be in San Francisco the next day and she would know where to contact him. Only thing, would she pass on her distress to worry him? He would think her taken with old maidish vapors, she scoffed at herself. A loud shout drew her attention closer to the ranch hands.
At the urging of Buck Jarvis and Jason Rucker, the new hands, Bobby Jensen had climbed over the top rail and made for a particularly fractious young stallion who stood splay-legged at the tie-rail. Foam flecked its black lips and hung in strings nearly to the ground. Its buckskin hide glistened with sweat and its bellows chest heaved from exertion. So far he had dumped three hands. A sharp pang of concern shot through Sally and she hoisted her skirts to make room for her boots to fly faster.
Running brokenly, Sally streaked toward the corral. “Bobby!” she yelled. “Bobby, don’t you dare get on that horse.”
Most of the hands, the old-timers, turned to look and said nothing. Buck and Jase sneered and Buck turned his head to shout encouragement to the boy. “Go on, Bobby. You know you can do it.
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