Hog laughed. “I thought that was what we was wantin’ to do, to get the hell away from here, the farther the better. I know I ain’t gonna stop at four days. I’m damn tired of this part of the territory. I’m ready to get back to where there’s some people and somethin’ goin’ on. We came up here after robbin’ that bank, but I expect they’ve give up lookin’ for us back down that way by now.”
“Lizzie Malone!” Red startled them. “That was her name.” When they both responded with blank expressions, he said, “The bucktoothed gal at the Big Timber.”
“Right . . .” Dubose responded, drawing the word out while he recalled. “Lizzie Malone. For a little woman, she was some kinda spunky.”
“Look at him, Red,” Hog japed. “He’s really pining away for his wife, ain’t he?”
Red laughed. “Yeah. About another day and he’ll be askin’, What was the name of that woman I married? Won’t he?”
“You go to hell,” Dubose said, “both of you. I ain’t through with that woman till I fix her good for what she done.”
CHAPTER 6
Trotter’s directions were accurate—Hawk found Hound Creek with no trouble. The task now was to find Dubose’s shack. There were several cabins near the creek’s confluence with the river, none of which attracted Hawk’s interest. They were obviously homes built by settlers, as witnessed by the plowed fields and the presence of small children playing near the creek. The place Hawk looked for would stand alone, a good distance from any other structures, no doubt tucked into the trees to avoid being conspicuous. It was a good mile and a half before he came to a bend in the creek with a dense growth of trees on both sides. Instinct prompted him to be cautious in approaching the bend, for it was not possible to tell if there was a dwelling there or not. So he turned Rascal away from the bank with the intention of circling around the trees to approach the bend using them for cover.
It was well hidden, for he didn’t see it until he had ridden into the trees. When he did, he immediately pulled his rifle and dismounted. Tying the horses on a laurel bush, he made his way from there on foot until reaching a point behind a large cottonwood that allowed him an unrestricted view of a small shack built of logs and the tiny clearing it occupied. He waited there for a few minutes to be sure. There were no animals about and no sign of life from the cabin, so he decided it was empty. He walked out from behind the tree and walked directly to the door, noticing as he walked the many hoofprints close about the shack. They were recent prints, enough to have been left by maybe half a dozen horses, which would account for three men with a packhorse each. He had found Dubose’s shack, there was no doubt about that, and he and his two partners had already gone.
The door was closed, but there was no lock on the chain holding it so. Bowing his head to keep from bumping it, he stepped inside and stood for a few moments looking around. He couldn’t help wondering how Blossom could have thought she might be happy under such rustic conditions. His attention was attracted to the hole in the middle of the floor with the loose boards lying beside it. It was a definite message, along with no lock on the door, that the occupants were not coming back. Further evidence were the few empty cartridge boxes, discarded carelessly about. No need to waste any more time here, he thought, and turned and went out the door.
Now it had turned into a job of tracking, a job he was damn good at, and the main reason he was always assured of employment by the army. He looked around the small yard briefly before going back for his horses, hoping to find something unusual in one or more of the hoofprints. It always helped if there was a nick or mark of some sort to identify a horse in the event its tracks became mixed with others. It was of no importance at this point in the chase, but it might be later on if they joined with others on a common road. He found one print after only a few minutes that showed a V-shaped notch in the shoe that looked to have been done by a file. “That’ll do,” he announced, then knelt down to examine droppings that were fresh enough to have been left that morning. They didn’t tell him exactly how much lead the outlaws had on him, maybe half a day, maybe more, he was not really sure.
Leading his horses, he walked along the creek until the many tracks came together to form a definite trail away from the shack. When he was certain this was his trail, he stood looking in the direction it was leading, a path across a wide, rolling prairie that would appear to be heading toward Judith Gap. It made sense to him because it was a direction that would take them toward the Yellowstone River, a journey of at least four days, with nothing in between here and there. He climbed up into the saddle and gave the buckskin a pat on the neck. “Let’s get started, Rascal.”
* * *
The trail left by six horses was not difficult to follow, for they were the only tracks he saw across the expanse of rolling terrain before him. Judging by droppings left occasionally by their horses, he couldn’t see that he was closing any of the distance between the three and himself. There had been no rain for some time, so water opportunities, other than a couple of almost-dry streams, were rare. It had been quite a while since he had traveled this plain, but he remembered that Wolf Creek was about a day’s ride from Great Falls. He had gotten a late start because of the time lost on Doc Sumner, but he still planned to make Wolf Creek in one day and maybe catch the outlaws in camp. It would be a long day for his horses, but he could give them a rest and good water there.
It was already after dark when he caught sight of the trees outlining the curves of the creek as it cut through the prairie. The three gunmen were not there, but near the bank of the creek, he found the ashes of their fire. They had stopped there, but evidently decided to push on, most likely planning to camp for the night at the Judith River. That was only about twenty miles farther, but it might as well be a thousand, for he couldn’t push his weary horses any farther on this night. Dubose and his two friends were pushing their horses as hard as he was pushing his, running as if someone was chasing them. Having to camp here overnight resulted in putting him a full day behind. He thought about leaving Rascal’s saddle on him and riding through the night, but scolded himself right away. The big buckskin had never failed him. He could not in good conscience run him to death. Besides, he told himself, I’d have to leave my packhorse behind. Frustrated, he pulled the saddle off the horse and left him to graze while he pulled out his coffeepot and a half-dozen slices of sowbelly. He went to his bedroll determined to rise before sunrise the next morning.
True to his intentions, he was awake and up before first light the next day, planning to rest the horses and eat breakfast by the Judith, twenty miles distant. With still no rain, he had an easy trail to follow east of the Little Belt Mountains, rising off to his right. When he reached the Judith, that trail led him straight to their campsite of the night before. From there, the trail followed the Judith for six or seven miles before leaving it to head straight south toward Judith Gap.
He made camp that night beside the Mussel-shell River at a point where two creeks formed a Y before joining the river. It was a camping spot used by Sioux and Crow hunting parties alike and one that he had camped at before while scouting for a cavalry patrol looking for one of those Sioux parties. He remembered the names of the creeks, Jawbone Creek and Antelope Creek, but he couldn’t recall now which was which. As he built his fire on the ashes of the one the gunmen had built, he recalled another occasion when he had ridden with a cavalry patrol a day south of there on the Yellowstone. That patrol had nothing to do with Indians. It was a search for three white men who had robbed the bank in Bozeman. They never caught the robbers, even though Hawk had led the patrol right up to the door of a hangout for any manner of riffraff. It was known by all the soldiers as the Big Timber Hog Ranch, but it was not a place where soldiers were welcome. They definitely catered to those on the wrong side of the law. Rather than one building, the Hog Ranch was a compound of four cabins surrounding the main saloon, built like a fort, but with no wall around it. Lieutenant Meade had commanded that patrol and he decided H
awk had led them off on the wrong trail. Hawk was of the opinion at the time, and still was today, that Meade was concerned with breaking into a civilian business—that plus having been more than twenty days in the field with provisions for fifteen. He simply wanted to go home, as did his soldiers. Meade ordered the search but the three outlaws were not found. Hawk remembered telling him he was a damn fool for giving up the search. Meade never assigned him as a scout on patrols he commanded after that, which was fine with Hawk. As he sat there on this night some two years later, he tried to recall the name of the man who owned the complex. “Jacobs,” he recalled, sure of it then. “Oscar Jacobs, that was the man’s name.” Bringing all that back to mind caused him to think of something that might be no more than coincidence. But if these three he was tracking now continued in the same direction, they might strike the Yellowstone near the same saloon where Lieutenant Meade gave up the police action—where the Boulder River joined the Yellowstone. “Helluva coincidence,” he allowed. The more he thought about it, the more interesting it became. Three men robbed that bank, he thought, and now I’m trailing three men again. And so far, it looks like they’re heading to the same place I lost them last time. “Helluva coincidence,” he repeated. He would know for sure if that’s all it was by that time tomorrow because it was one day’s ride to that hog ranch.
* * *
Unaware of the avenging scout, still one day behind them, the three men he trailed were sitting down to a hot meal, having arrived just thirty minutes before. Oscar Jacobs sat down to join them. “It’s been a long time since you boys have showed up here,” Oscar said. “I’d damn near forgot about you, figured you’d done got yourselves hung, or you were doin’ time somewhere.” He paused to signal his cook. “Pearl, bring me a cup of coffee when you come back from the kitchen.”
“Got you a new cook since we was here last,” Dubose commented.
“I reckon that’s right,” Oscar said. “I expect old Myra Beatty was doin’ the cookin’ last time you were here. Myra died, so I had to get me another cook. And this one’s a good one. You tell me, how’s that stew?”
“Just barely fit to eat,” Hog replied with a wide grin on his face. “I don’t expect I’ll want more’n another plate or two.”
Oscar laughed with him. “I’m gonna have to charge you double. How long you boys gonna be here? I’ve got a room ain’t nobody in right now, make you a good rate on it.”
“Not long,” Dubose answered. “At least, I ain’t. Red and Hog can decide for themselves.”
That was good news to Oscar because he was at that moment recalling the last time the three of them had come to visit. A full cavalry patrol had followed, looking for them. Oscar’s people had managed to hide the three of them, but only because the officer in command of the patrol didn’t seem to want to thoroughly search the compound. “Who’s chasin’ you this time?” Oscar asked.
“Hell, what makes you think anybody is?” Dubose answered. “We’re just relocatin’ ourselves and as long as we were passin’ this close, we thought you’d like our business. Like I said, I’ll be movin’ on in the mornin’.”
“You boys splittin’ up?” Oscar asked, visibly surprised. He nodded at Pearl when she set a cup of coffee before him. “You three have been runnin’ together for a long time, ain’t you?”
“That’s a fact,” Dubose replied. “And I expect we’ll get back together again sometime. We just think it’s a good idea to split up for a while.”
Oscar understood at once. “You’ve got the law on your tail again. I swear, Dubose, the last time you boys were here I had soldiers turnin’ the place upside down lookin’ for you. Scared the hell outta my whores and sent more’n a few of my customers runnin’.”
“Now, hold on, Oscar,” Dubose said. “I told you, ain’t nobody chasin’ us, and for damn sure there ain’t no soldiers after us. We’re just taking precautions in case there was somebody after us, just bein’ smart, that’s all. Besides, that one time you’re talkin’ about, nobody found us, so you didn’t get in any trouble with the army. And accordin’ to my memory, I recollect that you got a mighty generous bonus for hidin’ us.”
Oscar calmed down a little at that. “I have to be a little more careful these days,” he said. “There are so many more settlers movin’ into this section of the Yellowstone that the army is even more particular about businesses like mine. And there’s too many people that know about this place, more’n when you were here before.”
“Well, you done a good job hidin’ us that one time,” Hog said. “That’s why we came back this time, instead of takin’ our business somewhere else. So we’ll take that room tonight.” He flashed Oscar a wide grin. “You still got that hole under the floor in your smokehouse?”
“Yeah,” Oscar replied. “It’s still there and we’ve had to use it a time or two.”
The thought of it made Hog laugh. “Soldiers lookin’ under every bed and behind every door, and we were settin’ there right under their feet.”
“It was mighty damn crowded, though, as I recollect,” Dubose commented, “especially with you takin’ up half the room.”
“Is Lizzie Malone still workin’ for ya?” Red asked. “If she is, I might wanna stay a couple more days. How ’bout you, Hog?”
“Reckon not,” Hog replied. “I’m gonna head out in the mornin’, too. I’m thinkin’ I ain’t seen my wife in a couple of years, not since we hit that bank. I think I’ll see how she’s doin’.”
“Lizzie’s still here,” Oscar said. “She had a baby about five months ago.” He chuckled. “Might be yours, only I don’t reckon so, ’cause it ain’t got red hair, and you’ve been gone longer’n that. She ain’t been back but a month or two. She’s livin’ in the house with the red door, her and her young’un. She’s a little bigger’n when you saw her.”
“She wasn’t much bigger’n a hickory switch last time I saw her,” Red recalled. “Can she still eat corn on the cob through a picket fence?”
Oscar laughed. “Yeah, she’s still got all her teeth, at least all her front teeth.”
“Well, I’ll stay with you for a day or two more,” Red decided. He looked at Hog, still stuffing stew in his mouth as fast as he could. “I didn’t know you was married. You ain’t never said anythin’ about havin’ a wife.”
“I ain’t never said nothin’ about a lot of things,” he stated, and returned his attention to the almost-empty plate. There was a given amount of safety when riding with two other gunmen, but he had been thinking about their little partnership and the fact that they were forced to run again. They used to move around unnoticed, but now that they had killed a lawman, he feared they would begin to catch the interest of the federal marshals. That would mean there would be increased efforts to run them to ground. And if that happened, he liked his chances better apart from the other two. He wasn’t sure if it would be of help to him if he did get caught, but he was hoping his ace in the hole was the fact that he didn’t kill anyone in Helena. Red shot the sheriff and Dubose shot the girl, JoJo. It had been almost two years since he had seen his wife. Now might be a good time to go back to see how she was doing, that is, if she was still living in that humble little cabin on Stinking Creek outside Coulson. There wasn’t much chance anybody would be looking for him there.
“Well, boys,” Oscar announced, “sounds to me like you’ve been doin’ some hard ridin’ and you could use some relaxation. And you’ve sure as hell come to the right place for that. I got four houses out behind the saloon with three ladies in two of ’em, two ladies in one of ’em, and just one lady in the other one. That’s the cabin with the red door, that’s where Lizzie stays.” He winked at Red. “Just don’t get too rambunctious, or you’ll get the baby to cryin’, and that young’un can howl like a coyote.” Turning to the others, he said, “Dubose, you and Hog can take a chance on the other cabins. Take a look. If you don’t see nothin’ that appeals to you, try one of the other cabins. Just like it was before, you pay your money, you g
et one ride. If you want all night, she’ll tell you the price, ’cause it’s a different price for different ones. I know I don’t need to tell you boys this, but I’ve got a man that sees the ladies don’t get treated too rough. That’s him over there at the end of the bar.” He nodded toward a mountain of a man, leaning against the bar, casually nursing a glass of beer. “His name’s Ned, and he can throw a horse. So enjoy your stay, the saloon stays open all night.”
“We plan to,” Hog said while eyeing Ned. He had already speculated on the brawny, bull-necked giant stoically watching the crowd in the barroom. “Will he come runnin’ if any of the women get rough on us?”
Oscar enjoyed a chuckle at that. “Yep, it’s been known to happen.”
* * *
Despite doing most of the talking the night before, Hog was the only one of the three who slept in the room they rented. Content with the huge supper and a few drinks of whiskey afterward, he walked up the stairs to the room, planning to get a good night’s sleep, so he would be ready to get started early. The kitchen was open early, so he was among the few early risers to the breakfast table the next morning. He had almost finished when he saw Red walk in the door. “Red!” he called out when Red didn’t appear to notice him.
“You already et?” he asked Hog when he came over to the table.
“Yeah, I’m fixin’ to get on my way. It’s a two-day ride to Coulson from here.”
“Have you seen Dubose this mornin’?” Red asked. When Hog said he hadn’t, he seemed surprised. “Was you fixin’ to ride off without sayin’ squat to anybody?”
“Tell you the truth, I didn’t think I’d see either one of you this early, since neither one of you made it back to the room last night. And like I said, Coulson’s a two-day ride. I didn’t wanna get started too late.” Eager to change the subject, he asked, “Did you tie up with that little bucktoothed gal?”
No Justice in Hell Page 8