by Jon Sharpe
“You’ve got it all figured out.”
“I sure do.”
“Except for the killer. You’re worried he’ll come back on you and you don’t know what to do about it.”
“We’re done here, mister. Now I’m goin’ back inside and Samson’s gonna sit right where he is. I give him the order, he’ll tear you apart. You understand?”
She was true to her word. She did an about-face and stalked back to her soddie. Samson stayed in place.
She was right, Fargo thought. They were done here.
Less than a minute later he was in his saddle and headed out.
5
Karen Byrnes came home to the small frame house on the edge of the creek and put herself to work. Her mother had not been able to sleep all night. She’d sat in her rocker crying endlessly about her dead son. Now, exhausted, she slept.
Karen wanted to find the killer. She knew that Skye Fargo was working with Tom Cain but she assumed that she could help Fargo by talking to some of her friends. Her grief would come later.
Once home, she changed from her gingham dress into her Levi’s and green woolen sweater. She needed to start making candles today, not her favorite task but they were running low. She wanted to work in the large garden she’d planted. She’d been putting up vegetables for the coming winter for three months. But right now candles had to come first.
She set herself up and began the tedious process of hand-dipping. The problem was that if you topped the candle it would get too hard and would snap in two.
Somebody knocked on the door.
“Come in.” She spoke softly, not wanting to wake her mother. She didn’t mean to be unkind but she needed a rest from her mother’s sobbing.
Ingrid Haller was a typical frontier woman. Many men were open about wanting to marry stout women because they were like having a second horse. Some women found that sentiment amusing. The slender Karen wasn’t one of them and she resented the fact that men thought of women that way. Karen’s outspokenness had frequently caused her trouble.
Karen put a finger to her lips. Ingrid, square-shaped in a man’s red-and-black-checkered shirt and jeans, nodded her understanding and walked over on tiptoe.
“My mother’s sleeping. She had a terrible night.” She nodded to the blanket strung across the rope. The two beds were on the other side.
“I’m still having a lot of terrible nights myself.” Ingrid’s son Michael had been the first victim of the killer.
Ingrid knew not to interrupt Karen’s work. She drew up a thatched chair so she could sit close enough to talk without raising her voice. Karen continued to work.
“There’s something we need to talk about, Karen.”
“Oh?”
“The others don’t want to talk about it and neither did I, but now I don’t have any choice and neither do you.”
Her bluntness surprised Karen. She had a feeling that Ingrid was going to tell her something terrible.
“It’s what everybody’s talking about—behind our backs.”
“You’re being very mysterious, Ingrid.”
“You’ve had the same thoughts I’ve had but you’ve been afraid to admit them.” The woman had a wide, pleasant, freckled face. “I don’t like to think about them, either.”
“Are you ever going to tell me what you’re talking about?”
“I’m talking about the stagecoach robbery about a month ago. I saw my son get mad about everything right before it happened. He only acted that way when he was worried about something. I think he was worried about the robbery.”
“He could’ve been worried about a lot of things.” She kept on dipping the thin pole holding the wicks into the hot tallow.
“I don’t think you’re facing facts. Three of them dead right after the robbery.”
“Who’d kill them?”
“Two men died in that holdup. Maybe one of their kin.”
“I don’t see how that could be the case. Most people would have a hard time killing three people.”
Ingrid leaned back in her chair. Shook her head. “You need to be honest with yourself.”
“I’m trying to be.” A deep sigh. “I’ve thought about it, too, Ingrid.”
“I figured you had. Same with Maddie about her boy. She brought it up to me. She was the one who put the idea in my head. I didn’t want to believe it, either. But here we have her son, your brother and my son dead following a stagecoach robbery. And we all know how nervous they were beforehand.”
“So who killed them and where’s the money?”
“I don’t care about the money.”
“Neither do I.”
“I just want whoever killed them punished.”
“The worst thing is thinking about those men dying in the robbery.”
“I can’t believe that any of them would’ve done it on purpose. It had to be some kind of accident.” Tears gleamed in Ingrid’s blue eyes. “My son wouldn’t kill anybody. I know that for sure.”
Damned candles, Karen thought. She wanted to stop and relax. Confront the suspicion she’d had for several days. But they needed the candles. The winds from the mountains told of any early winter.
“What do you think about this Fargo man?” Ingrid said.
“I met him. I liked him. And I trust him.”
“Tell him this. Rex Connor saw somebody talking to the three boys down by the bridge just before the first murder. At night. He was fishing when he saw them. You’re a good friend of Rex.”
“I sure am. I bake bread for him.” Then: “People are going to turn against our kin, Ingrid.”
“Let them. My boy’s dead. All I care about is finding his killer. If any of those boys killed the driver and the Englishman, it had to be a mistake. They weren’t killers.”
“No,” Karen said gently, “no, they weren’t.”
Karen liked the woman. A good, honest woman. And it was more and more likely that they shared a dark secret.
Ingrid reached out and the women gripped their hands together. “You talk to this Fargo. Tell him about Rex.”
“I’ll do that, Ingrid. Thanks.”
Karen sat thinking of how strange and terrible life had become.
Fargo was walking back from the livery when he heard a bourbon-raspy voice say, “I’m afraid I was a little rude last night. At least from what I can remember, Mr. Fargo.”
The voice couldn’t possibly belong to anybody else in this town except for one man named O’Malley. Fargo wondered wryly if he’d ever met the man walking toward him. Now, as last night, O’Malley crept up behind him.
From what he could remember, Fargo reasoned that the man was still in the same clothes. He’d shaved but his ruddy face was a crosshatch of nicks and cuts. The eyes were as red as a matador’s cape. That he was upright and ambulatory was amazing. That he spoke clearly—as if he hadn’t had a drink in days—was even more startling.
“You weren’t rude, O’Malley. You were just a little full of yourself. And full of a lot of rotgut whiskey, I assume.”
“In my better days I drank only the best,” O’Malley the leprechaun said wistfully. “But alas too much of that for my editors. They didn’t understand that there is truth in the bottle.”
“You mentioned that last night. A couple of times in fact. Now what can I do for you?”
People streamed around them on the wide dusty street. The way a few of the passersby winked at each other when they saw O’Malley told Fargo a lot about how the town regarded him. The town drunk, the town clown. He didn’t want to feel sorry for the little bastard but he did.
“I believe I turned down your offer of cooperation.”
“You did.”
“Well, when I woke up this morning I thought I might think it over.”
“Why’s that?”
O’Malley tapped three pudgy fingers to his forehead. “As far as I can remember, when I pulled the sheets back on the bed in my dingy little hotel room there was a rattlesnake in it.”
“Drunks see all sorts of things, O’Malley. Dancing girls, pink elephants—”
“If you’d care to ask the night clerk at the Excelsior hotel he’ll bear out what I said. I have a distinct memory of him trapping the thing and carrying it outside. He seemed to be very dexterous with rattlesnakes. I recall being quite impressed.”
Fargo studied the pudgy face. For all his grandiosity O’Malley was an intelligent man who, despite his whiskey-soaked mind, still managed to function. The story he’d told was easily enough checked. There’d be no point in lying about it. “If it’s the killer he’ll try again.”
“And if it’s the killer, I’ll be waiting for him. I plan to sit up all night in my room. And I won’t just have my derringer either. I own a six-gun and I know how to use it.”
“Sounds like you want the killer to come at you again.”
“Of course. Wouldn’t you? What could be a better story than a reporter who traps a killer and gets a confession out of him?”
A dapper man in a blue suit and white shirt and red cravat came up behind O’Malley. He wore a dark Vandyke beard and a sneer. “Let me apologize to you, Mr. Fargo. My name is Amos Parrish and I’m sorry that my reporter here is no doubt wasting your time—as he wastes everybody’s time in this town.”
O’Malley’s eyes showed embarrassment and shame as Parrish put a hand on the Irishman’s shoulder.
“We were having an interesting conversation as a matter of fact,” Fargo said.
“Oh, don’t stick up for him. Or God knows feel sorry for him. That’s his main weapon. He rooks you in and makes you become his protector. I only keep him on because every once in a while he comes up with something. But most of the time he just stumbles around town here and bores people to death with his so-called secrets. His latest secret seems to be the identity of the man who killed all three of those young men who were involved in the bank robbery. I think everybody else pretty much knows who that is but no, not O’Mal ley here. He knows better than everybody. He knows the ‘secret.’ Usually I don’t interrupt him this way but I’m well aware of your reputation, Mr. Fargo, and I’m delighted that you were honorable enough to stop on your journey and bring Byrnes’ body in. I’m just sorry you have to endure poor O’Malley here.” He finally removed his hand from the Irishman’s shoulder. “Why don’t you go get yourself your morning drinks, O’Malley, and stop bothering Mr. Fargo here?”
Fargo was surprised by how quickly O’Malley turned and hurried away. His face had been scarlet with humiliation. He was a beaten man and he walked slumped over, as if he might pitch forward.
“He didn’t have that coming.”
“Oh, my Lord, Mr. Fargo. You weren’t taken in by him, were you?”
Fargo could tell that the dapper Mr. Parrish had decided that the Trailsman might not be as impressive as he’d always heard. Skye Fargo being taken in by a drunken reporter who was on his last legs?
“I don’t know that I was taken in. But you didn’t need to treat him like a dog you wanted to get rid of.”
The man put a fine hand on the lapel of his suit coat as if he were addressing an audience. “On my own behalf let me say that I’m his last resort. Nobody else would hire him let alone pay him for the little actual work he gets done. And I don’t appreciate being called to task for how I deal with one of my employees, especially by somebody who apparently doesn’t understand the circumstances. Good day to you, sir.”
He stormed away. He’d be one hell of a man to work for. And once more Fargo felt a little sorry for O’Malley.
6
“Is Bob Thomas here?”
The mannish middle-aged woman in the flannel shirt raised her wide face to consider Fargo’s question. She didn’t appear to be taken with him at all. “Who’s asking?”
“Name’s Fargo.”
“Oh. Heard about you. Why’re you looking for Bob?”
“Need to ask him some questions.”
“About what?”
The one-room office of The River Shipping Company was contained in a long crude structure made of logs. There was no back wall as such. Instead there was a loading dock. That was now piled high with boxes and crates of various sizes. From down near the shore Fargo could hear the voices of men talking and laughing as they loaded cargo.
“That would be between Thomas and me, ma’am.”
“You know who I am?”
“Can’t say that I do.”
“I’m his mother.”
“I see.”
“I hired him after Lenihan fired him. My boy never stole anything.”
“I need to talk to him directly, ma’am.”
“If you’re here about the night when he smashed the stage line window—well, that’s something he shouldn’t have done, even if Lenihan did fire him just because he was jealous.”
“Jealous?”
“Sure. My boy Bob, all the ladies like him. Young, old, don’t matter. He told me she was makin’ eyes at him. And he didn’t start that fire, neither, in the back room after he was fired.”
“I didn’t hear about the fire.”
“Well, he didn’t do it.”
Sure he didn’t, Fargo thought. The little son of a bitch is a regular angel. “I need to talk to him.”
The Thomas woman pushed up from her desk and said, “He’s tired of people suspecting him of things.” Then she walked to the dock and bellowed, “Bobby, honey, come up here, please. Man wants to talk to you.”
She trundled back in, resumed her position behind her desk. “Cain probably sent you.”
“I’m helping him. But he didn’t send me.”
“You a Pinkerton?”
“No, ma’am. But Cain seems to think I am.” His humor was wasted on her.
For somebody who was loading cargo, Bob Thomas looked damned clean and shiny. He wore a fancy blue shirt, fancy blue trousers and fancy soft leather boots into which he’d tucked his fancy trousers. He had curly black hair, angry blue eyes and the kind of face some women like and all men want to damage as quickly as possible.
“Bobby’s the foreman. Every job they put him on in this town they make him work like some kind of Mex or something. But I’m using him the way he should be used.”
“Who the hell is this guy, Ma?”
“Now, Bobby, he just wants to ask you a few questions.”
“Well, maybe I don’t want to answer a few questions.”
“Now, Bobby.”
“I bet Cain sent you.”
“Could be,” Fargo said. “But you’re making this a lot more difficult than it needs to be.”
“Wait a minute,” Thomas said. “I heard about you. You’re the Trailsman or some damned name like that.”
“Names don’t matter. I just want to know why you were seen a couple of nights before the robbery talking to the three boys who stuck up the stage.”
“That’s a damn lie!”
“I’ve got two witnesses who’ll swear to it in court.”
For the first time Bobby looked to his mother for help. Fargo figured she’d probably been helping him out of situations like this all his spoiled life. “I want to get back to work, Ma.”
“Mr. Fargo, if Bobby here says it’s a lie—”
“Excuse us a minute, ma’am.” In a single motion Fargo grabbed a handful of Thomas’ fancy blue shirt and shoved him out the door. “Bobby and I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
The air was cooler coming off the river. The birdsong was different, too. Down on the cargo ship men moved back and forth like ants carrying their loads. Fargo pushed Thomas off the dock so that he fell two feet and landed on his bottom. He tried to scramble up but Fargo was already beside him. “Now you’re going to answer my questions, sonny boy, or I’m going to break a few bones and then your ma will really have to start taking care of you.”
Thomas glared up from where he still sat on his bottom. “You don’t have any right—”
“What about the two witnesses who saw you with—”
/> Thomas snapped, “I told you that’s a lie! Two nights before the robbery I wasn’t even in town!”
Thomas was right. It was a lie. The Pinkertons Fargo had helped showed him how accusing somebody of something false could sometimes trick them into admitting something true.
“Then it was some other night.”
He didn’t need to say anything, Bobby Thomas. It was right there on his face. So he had gotten together with the three boys.
“What night was it?”
“No night. I told you.”
“Get up.”
“What?”
“Get up.”
“What’re you going to do?”
“Get up and find out.”
“You’re going to hit me, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, and I’m going to keep on hitting you until you tell the truth. There are three boys dead. Plus an Englishman and a stagecoach driver. And maybe you know something about it.”
“You don’t hurt him!” Ma Thomas was now on the dock above them.
“She’s got a shotgun, Fargo, and she knows how to use it.”
“Well, she’d better start shooting then. Now get up!”
“Oh, shit,” Thomas said. He frowned and shook his head. “I saw them one night. Two nights in fact. But I didn’t have anything to do with the robbery.”
“Why’d you see them?”
“The fire. I wanted them to help me.” He made a face. “Can I get up now?”
“Get up.”
“And you won’t hit me?”
“Not if you’re telling the truth.”
Thomas wasn’t nimble. He had to thrash around to get up. When he was upright he said, “Well, that’s damn nice. Look at my pants!” He started brushing them.
His ma shouted again, “Don’t you hurt him!”
“Tell her to shut up.”
“She’s my ma.”
“Tell her.” Fargo made it as menacing as possible.
“Shut up, Ma, and go back inside!”
“Well that’s a fine howdy-do! You tell your own ma to shut up! See if I fix you squash the way you like it again anytime soon!”
Fargo was surprised that Thomas—who had to be twenty-five or so—didn’t look embarrassed by any of this. A regular lady-killer tied tight to his mother’s apron strings.