Dead Trouble

by Jake Douglas

  ‘Sounds like someone’s got something to hide.’

  Jimmy poked at the fire, spilled coffee as he made to refill his cup. He didn’t look at Deke.

  ‘You still a Ranger? That’s what everyone thinks, you know.’

  ‘Well, they’re wrong, Jimmy. I quit the Rangers and came here to run the ranch with Durango as my pardner. But there seems to be a lot going on that I don’t know about. I thought Spain had some kind of deal with Flash Bill Danton and his crew, letting them use trails across Shoestring when they rustled cattle from the settlers. He convinced me he had a damn good reason for doing that and I went along with him. But I’ve found out since that he lied, made a fool of me. That there could be a lot more than a few widelooped steers involved.’

  Jimmy said nothing and Deke let him think about it as he poked aimlessly at the fire.

  ‘Why you want to know anythin’ if you’re not still a Ranger, Deke?’

  ‘Guess I’ve been enforcing the law for so long it comes as second nature now. Can’t bear to see it broken. But Durango took care of me for a lot of years in the Rangers and I can’t stand by and see him walk into trouble when I reckon I can help him out.’

  Taggart nodded, but he was in a quandary: mostly afraid of Jno and the others, and certainly Durango Spain himself, but recalling how Deke had stood up for him with Jno and beat the bully for the first time that Taggart knew of.

  ‘I know where they hold some rustled cows, couple of canyons, not far from here, matter of fact. One’s on Shoestring, the other just across the river in the Territory, near Cockrel Falls.’

  Cutler nodded.

  ‘Well, that’s handy to know, Jimmy, and a week ago I’d’ve been really interested, but since then I’ve talked with Captain Bannister at Fort Montague – which I’d be obliged if you didn’t mention to anyone. Now I’d be more interested in, say, a cave, or a hidden clearing in a thickly wooded area that was hard to get to, but where someone could hide a few wagons – or even a big pile of goods.’

  He saw the tightening of Jimmy’s eyes and mouth in the flicker of the flames and threw some more wood on the fire. Jimmy looked away, then turned back suddenly, as if reaching a decision.

  ‘There is a place I saw – and there’s somethin’ there, a big pile of somethin’ covered with tarps. Looks like a lot of boxes. I know there’s dynamite in some but I ain’t sure about the others. I only …’

  Deke Cutler leaned forward eagerly.

  Then a rifle crashed somewhere out there in the darkness and Jimmy Taggart grunted as the bullet took him and flung him back out of the firelight, a loosely tumbling shadow to add to the other shadows.

  CHAPTER 12

  NIGHT KILLER

  Deke Cutler threw himself backwards out of the circle of light as another bullet slammed into the camp, scattering the fire in an explosion of embers and burning twigs.

  Deke’s gun was in his hand as he rolled on to his belly, triggering twice. He had caught a glimpse of something bright up there in the timber behind the rocks: it could have been part of the muzzle flash of the killer’s rifle seen through bushes. He didn’t know if Jimmy was alive or dead but this was no time to go look.

  A bullet whined off the rocks up there in the darkness and when the bushwhacker fired next, it was from way over on the left. Deke figured he would shoot and shift position immediately. Ducking another bullet, he waited, and a few moments later a short volley raked the blackness where he lay. Dirt erupted around his body, stung his face with gravel, but he stayed put. Tensed like a coiled spring, he waited until he saw the next muzzle flash – still moving left, which was what he wanted to know.

  Immediately he frog-jumped right and hit the dirt with arms and legs spread, flattening his body. Two bullets zipped into the ground and then there was silence and he knew the man would be reloading. Marking the last position, he hastily thumbed two cartridges into the Colt’s cylinder, replacing the two he had fired, then rolled swiftly away from the campsite. He fell with a grunt of surprise into an eroded channel coming down from the freshwater spring that they used for the camp. It was wide enough to take his body. There was only a bare trickle but he cursed as he felt the wetness soak through his trousers. Trying to move carefully, he was just in the process of reaching for the far side of the channel when a surge of cold water hit him as if someone had thrown a bucketful at him. It soaked him and reached down his shirtfront, up his neck and along his jaw. He gasped with its chill and started to pull himself up on to the low bank.

  Then he paused. The water had dropped to a trickle again. Now what the hell kind of a spring was it that surged up in a minor flood – then dropped back to the usual trickle?

  No! Not the spring itself but something that blocked the flow of the trickle briefly, gave it time to build up a little, so that when the obstruction was removed, a couple of gallons were released down the course of the channel….

  He smiled to himself.

  ‘Mister, you rolled into that channel, didn’t you, moving left as you were. Lay there long enough to stuff some shells into the rifle, figuring it would give you a little protection, water building up against you, then pulled yourself out – still going left!’

  Well, that last was only a hope, really, but it was logical and Cutler didn’t give it any more thought. He slid on to the channel’s right bank – the left one for Jno – and moved upwards slowly. The rifle crashed but while he didn’t see the stab of the muzzle flash, he saw its brief illumination lighting up the area allowing him to recognize the big man hunched over the weapon, raking the camp once more.

  ‘Save your ammo, Jno!’ Deke said. The big man gasped and almost fell in his hurry to swing around towards the voice, rifle lever working.

  Deke triggered three fast shots, the would-be killer cried out and there was a sliding sound. The rifle came skittering down the slope first, followed by Jno’s tumbling body. Deke rolled out of the way and Jno hung up on a rock, hands trailing into the springwater in the shallow channel.

  Deke grabbed the man’s shirt collar and dragged him into camp, dumped him near the remains of the fire and kicked together some of the still burning sticks and embers. As it flared enough to see, he saw that Jno was finished, blood dribbling from his mouth, gut-shot and lung-shot. Cutler moved around carefully, looking for Jimmy Taggart.

  He found the kid huddled behind a rock, face twisted in pain, one arm dangling, his shoulder shattered by the bullet. Deke got him back into the light, ripped the neckerchief off the dying Jno and bound up Jimmy’s wound. He gave the kid some water. Jimmy coughed, spluttered, drank some more slowly, looking at the bloody man opposite.

  ‘Mighta knowed … Jno’d stick around … aimin’ to get you, Deke. He don’t like bein’ beat, only beatin’-up on someone else.’

  Cutler merely nodded: he knew Jno had had plenty of time to ride back to Shoestring and then come back again to pick them both off. Thing was, did he do it of his own accord? Or was he obeying orders?

  Deke moved to Jno but there was little he could do for the man. He checked his pockets, found more money than he expected, including a gold fifty-dollar piece. He brewed coffee for himself and Jimmy Taggart as they listend to Jno slowly dying. Jimmy was very white, couldn’t take his eyes off the man who had tried to kill him.

  ‘What we gonna do, Deke?’

  ‘I’ll strap up your arm. Then we’ll go back to the ranch and get you into town to see a sawbones.’

  ‘Reckon it’ll be … safe to go back to Shoestring?’ Jimmy looked away quickly, as if embarrassed.

  ‘What d’you mean, “safe”, Jim?’

  ‘Well, if Jno did ride back to the ranch, then come back here … He shot at me first, Deke! I’ve just figured … Maybe someone told him to – kill us – both …’

  ‘Could be. We’ll be safe enough going back to Shoestring. But there’s something I want you to do for me first, Jim.’

  Taggart swallowed and then nodded.

  ‘I know. Tell you where I f
ound that cache of dynamite and whatever else was there.’

  Cutler nodded, waiting.

  ‘It happened when I was lookin’ for mustangs. I found some tracks, but I knew they wasn’t just hosses, looked like some mules were with ’em. Someone’d tried to wipe out the sign and I reckoned that was queer. There was four, five mules and the tracks were deep, so they were carryin’ heavy loads.’ He paused and grimaced, holding his wounded shoulder gently. ‘They led me to that clearin’. It was a helluva job gettin’ in there. I found some boxes marked “dynamite”, and started to look at the rest, but I thought I heard somethin’, like a horse comin’, and – well, I was plenty jumpy, Deke, by that time – so I run. Ain’t been back since.’

  ‘But you could find it again?’

  ‘I … could tell you how to find it. I got no hankerin’ to go back.’

  ‘That’s all I want, Jim.’

  Taggart studied Deke’s face in the firelight, seeing all the planes and hollows highlighted and shadowed in turn. Cutler looked mighty tough, he thought.

  Jimmy remained silent and frowning, impatient, Deke said:

  ‘Kid…?’

  Jimmy stirred.

  ‘Yeah, sure. I’ll explain on the way back to the ranch. OK?’

  Durango listened to Cutler’s story in silence while Karen worked gently on Jimmy’s shoulder. Spain had poured a couple of big glasses of whiskey into him and he was out to it now, only crying out or groaning when something that Karen did hurt and the pain reached through his oblivion.

  ‘There’s a lot of splintered bone,’ Karen said anxiously, looking at her husband. ‘I’m afraid to dig too deep in case I set it bleeding again. He needs a proper doctor.’

  Spain frowned.

  ‘Can’t you fix him?’ He sounded annoyed and looked angry when she shook her head.

  ‘This is beyond my talents, Durango. That bullet’s shattered the bone. He might even have to have the arm amputated.’

  ‘Hell almighty! What the blazes got into Jno?’ He glared at Deke suddenly. ‘Likely it was you beatin’-up on him, Deke! He sure ain’t used to anyone besting him.’

  ‘Why did he bother riding back here first then?’ Cutler countered slowly, his gaze holding to Spain’s cold eyes. ‘If he was riled, all he had to do was hang around and pick us off.’

  Durango nodded.

  ‘Yeah, well, he did ride in here. But he didn’t show up for supper and I thought he’d just turned in early after the fight with you.’

  Karen was still looking at him, still frowning. Deke shrugged.

  ‘Well, for whatever reason, he was aiming to kill us both. Karen, if you take Jimmy into town, you’d better tell the sheriff about Jno.’

  ‘No need for that,’ Durango said quickly. ‘I don’t want that damn sheriff out here wasting my time asking questions. You go in with Karen and take Jno’s body and make your statement, Deke. And make it fast. We’re short-handed now. Ringo’s still not riding too well yet.’

  Deke nodded, appearing to be satisfied.

  ‘So you want me to ride into town with Karen and Jimmy?’

  ‘Dont want you to, but it’ll be simplest, I guess.’

  A buckboard was prepared and Cutler changed his mare for the rested grey and collected an extra box of shells from Spain, who handed them over deadpan.

  ‘Expecting a war?’

  ‘I never know what to expect since I came here, Durango, and that’s a fact.’

  Spain watched them ride out, Karen driving, Jimmy in the back of the buckboard with Jno’s tarp-wrapped corpse. Cutler rode his big grey alongside. Spain knew he could convince the sheriff in Wichita Falls that Jno had acted out of spite and revenge if he had to, so he wasn’t worried on that account.

  But Deke was still a problem. For some reason he made Spain edgy. Durango was sure his story about dying from cancer had brought Deke around so there would be little or no trouble. But after he went with that Samburu and Dutch Pete fought the bear – well, something else must have happened while he was out there.

  Since he had returned, he had been cool to Spain and seemed ready for a fight, almost. What the hell, it could be he had no idea and it riled the hell out of him.

  To make sure things went smoothly, he had to be in control along the Red River. If he wasn’t, there was every chance that Flash Danton and his hardcases would kill him, take over and run amok, with the help from the Indian alliance.

  Well, if the sheriff delayed Deke long enough in town – and he was a finicky old bastard – with any luck the whole deal would be finished, signed, sealed and delivered, by the time Cutler got back.

  And by then it would be too late.

  Way, way too late.

  Well clear of the ranch, the sun still low enough to make them squint, Cutler tied the grey on to the tailgate and settled in the seat beside Karen at the reins.

  They drove a short distance, then she turned to him, looking worried.

  ‘Deke,’ she said quietly, ‘Jno did come back to the ranch as Durango said – and I saw Durango give him some money.’ She sounded reluctant to part with the information.

  Deke fumbled in his pocket and brought out the fifty-dollar gold piece. ‘Found this in Jno’s pocket.’

  He heard her suck in a sharp breath.

  ‘I didn’t see how much,’ she almost whispered, ‘but – but whatever it was glinted quite … brightly.’

  Deke nodded. ‘Yeah. Looks like Jno was paid to hit our camp.’

  ‘Oh, Deke! I feel rotten talking about Durango like this but, well, I’m sure he’s involved in something. Not just something on the edge of the law, but something quite big.’ He waited and she took another deep breath and added: ‘He’s had Hal Tripp and Ringo and a couple of others getting ready for a long ride. Or if not a long one, one that’ll keep them away from the ranch for a while. I asked him and he just snapped at me, said they were going after mavericks and he didn’t know how long it would take.’ She turned to study his face. ‘But we’ve got more mavericks than we can handle already. There just isn’t enough graze for any more.’

  ‘Stop the buckboard, Karen.’ He was climbing down in the dust cloud the vehicle had raised before it slid to a complete stop. ‘There’s something brewing – and it’s coming to a head. Can you get a message to Lieutenant Craig at Fort Montague? A short wire’ll do: say ‘Cockrel Falls, NNW three miles. Going in.’ And sign my name.’

  Her eyes were wide.

  ‘Those falls are in the Indian Territory!’

  Deke was in the grey’s saddle now and he nodded curtly. ‘It’s mighty important, Karen! If I’m right, it’ll affect everyone along the Red River.’

  ‘And if you’re wrong?’

  ‘Then I’ll ride out and sign over my share in Shoestring to Durango.

  ‘This thing you suspect – does it involve Durango?’ she asked, a tremor in her voice.

  ‘Very much so, Karen. Very much so! Adios!’

  He spun the grey and rowelled away towards the foothills. She stared after him, unmoving, watching him swing down to the river trail that skirted the rise.

  Deke didn’t look back, concentrating on riding hard. She stood in the seat and called his name once, but he didn’t hear. Then Jimmy Taggart in the back moaned and started to thrash a little. Biting her lip, she sat down, whipped up the team and raised a long dust cloud on the road into town.

  CHAPTER 13

  ONCE A RANGER

  Finding the patch of heavy timber where Jimmy Taggart said the cache of boxes was took some doing. Deke located the particular mountain, and the sound of falling water drew him to the Cockrel Falls. He approached on the high trail that overlooked the ribbon falls as they plunged in twin strips of lacy water a hundred feet into a pool. Dark lines around the pool’s edges showed how much the level had gone down without rain.

  Deke’s gaze was restless, probing the hollows and shadows amongst the rocks. About half-way up, he saw Ringo, settled in the midst of some boulders that clung to the ste
ep side of the slope, watching the lower trail.

  Cutler dismounted, leaving the grey inside the line of trees. He left his hat and spurs behind, slid over the edge, spray wetting him, and began to climb down. Twice he slipped, boots skidding across wet rocks, but he didn’t dislodge anything and Ringo didn’t look up: he even set his rifle to one side and began to make a cigarette. Deke could hear him humming some range ditty.

  It all helped to cover Deke’s approach and when he was about eight feet above Ringo, trying to figure out where to place his boots next, the projecting rock he was standing on one-footed, gave way. It pulled out of the damp soil with a slight sucking sound that made Ringo start and look up, dropping his makings. And then Deke was hurtling down to land almost on top of the man.

  He jarred down with a grunt and instinctively grabbed at something for support. The something was Ringo, and the hardcase swore, shoved him away and dived for his rifle. Deke got his balance fast enough to pluck a handful of mud from the steep earthen wall and he flung it savagely. It took Ringo in the face and the man staggered into a boulder. The rifle fell and Deke heard it splash into the pool, then Ringo was lifting his hands, half-crouched.

  ‘Easy! I – I ain’t in any shape to fight you, Cutler!’

  The man winced and pressed an elbow into his left side. Deke guessed this was where he had been wounded. And while his gaze was momentarily distracted to that part of Ringo’s body, the man’s right hand flew up to the back of his neck and Deke’s mind screamed a warning: the blacksmith had said Ringo favoured knives….

  Deke dived left and the blade flashed past his face, thunked into the wet earth. Ringo swore and went for his six-gun but Deke didn’t want gunfire now. He ripped the knife free and lunged at Ringo. The man’s scream as the knife pierced his heart was muffled by Deke’s free hand clamping across his mouth. Deke let him fall, and he tumbled down to crash on the rocks at the edge of the pool.