Twilight of the Coyote

by Ron Schwab

Chapter 30

  TREY

  After helping Stretch bury Galahad, I returned to the game lodge. I was surprised to find the president sitting in a leather-covered, stuffed chair reading Scott Fitzgerald’s, The Great Gatsby. It was several hours past the president’s customary bedtime, and, although he was an avid reader of non-fiction, I had never seen a novel in his hands before. He looked up, and his tortured expression revealed the depth of his concern.

  “Sit down, Trey.” He pointed to a chair on the opposite side of the thick, oak coffee table that separated us. “Tell me about Kate. Is she okay?”

  “She’s not okay, Mister President, but I think she is alive. For the moment, anyway.” I told him about everything we had discovered that evening and the requests I had made of the sheriff’s office.

  “What can I do? Should I call in troops to help with a search?”

  “I don’t think that would be wise, sir. I suspect these are the same people who tried to either abduct or assassinate you. And they likely committed the murders of the Sioux girls Gabe Riley and I were sent here to investigate. Not necessarily the same men, but the same organization.”

  “Are you suggesting the mafia is involved?”

  “No. We wouldn’t be sitting here together if the mafia were behind this. And Kate would have died the day she came upon a stranger fishing for trout. These men may have Chicago mafia customers, but they appear to be a clumsy imitation as near as I can tell.”

  “Chicago customers? I don’t understand.”

  “I didn’t have the opportunity to explain about Cleo Yellow Bird.”

  “The Indian girl who was sent to your grandparents? I was told she was an important witness, that’s all. I assumed she had information about the case you are investigating, and I had no reason to inquire further.”

  “She escaped from a Chicago bordello.”

  The president’s eyebrows lifted, and, for an instant, his stoic face betrayed rare surprise. “I see.” He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “No, I do not see.”

  I gave him a quick synopsis of Cleo’s capture, her experience at the chick coop, and delivery to Chicago. His eyes widened as the tale unfolded.

  “Are you suggesting these men plan to sell Kate into white slavery?”

  “That seems far-fetched. Too many risks with somebody of her sophistication. But I fear she will not live to see Chicago.”

  “If they were going to kill her, wouldn’t they have done so when they found her at her father’s ranch?”

  “It does seem strange. These clowns might even be thinking ransom. Regardless, I’m guessing somebody doesn’t want her death to be that simple.”

  “Not torture?”

  “Of a sort. Via rape and beatings, perhaps.”

  “My heavens. We can’t let that happen. We must find her. They are doing this because she interfered with their plans for me, aren’t they?”

  “It’s certainly possible. I can’t figure out why they would have picked her out otherwise.”

  “And you really think there is a connection between Kate’s abduction and the Sioux girls?”

  “At BI training camp, a speaker talked about modus operandi, the methods of criminal activity that form a pattern and indicate the same person is committing a series of crimes.”

  “I recall the concept from my lawyering days.”

  “The leader of this gang, or whatever you want to call it, seems to be fixated on capturing people before he makes disposition of them. I don’t know if he planned to kill you or hold you for ransom, but I don’t think he had a simple assassination in mind.”

  “Trey, this young woman is the daughter I never had, and she’s in trouble . . . perhaps already dead . . . because she saved my life. Find her. Tell me what you want me to do.”

  I was initially uneasy about giving instructions to the President of the United States, but this was for Kate. “Call Director Hoover and order him to divert five or six Chicago agents here immediately.” I decided I could get used to issuing orders to J. Edgar. “I suppose it will take a few days for BI agents to get here. They should report to a local deputy sheriff, Bing Compton. I will leave instructions with him.”

  “You’re not going to be here?”

  “I’m going to be searching for the chick coop.”

  “Trey, there is something you should know.”

  “Yes?”

  “As soon as I returned from the barbeque and was told about Kate, I had the Secret Service ring up your grandmother. I spoke with her briefly, and she was horrified, of course. She informed me your grandfather wants to talk to you about something important.”

  “It will have to wait.”

  “He wants to speak with you personally. He left for Rapid City early this afternoon. If he makes all his connections on time, his train will arrive tomorrow morning.” The president plucked his pocket watch from his vest pocket and opened the case. “I should say, this morning. It’s half-past two o’clock now.”

  I did not respond. I could not think of anything I wanted to discuss with Gramps right now. I just wanted to get about the business of finding Kate. Why didn’t he just ring me up on the telephone?

  “You don’t seem very enthused about the news.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr, President. My focus is on finding Kate, and I don’t welcome the distraction by my grandfather.”

  “Keep an open mind, son. Ethan Ramsey might be a good man to have nearby just now. You go about your business. I will arrange for one of the agents to meet your grandfather at the station and bring him here. If nothing else, I will enjoy his company and counsel.”

  I sighed and nodded approval, not that Calvin Coolidge required my assent.

  Chapter 31

  KATE

  After regaining her faculties, Kate sensed that the truck was moving up a steep incline, and she felt her barrel-prison start to tip just before the vehicle stopped. Soon, the lid popped open and she was unceremoniously dumped on the truck bed and drug to an automobile before she blacked out again.

  Now, Kate was rendered blind by the hood her captors had tugged over her head as soon as the car pulled away from the abandoned truck. Her wrists were bound snuggly behind her back with what felt like rawhide strings that cut painfully into her flesh. One ankle was anchored to an immovable object under the front seat of the vehicle. She guessed it was some metal piece where the seat was bolted to the floor, but it didn’t matter. She was no risk for leaping from the car.

  There had been a brief stop near Rapid City, where they had dropped off the big man they called Bull. He had moaned and cried during the entire journey, and she was glad to be rid of him. Another man, who the others addressed as “Boss,” had come to the car and verbally attacked the abductors for their incompetence. He was particularly angry they had come to his residence. George had asked, “What in the hell did you want us to do with this stupid shit? Dog ate half his hand. We couldn’t take him out to the coop with us in that shape.”

  Boss did not reply, and she had sensed he was examining her. This was confirmed when she felt the pain of fingers sharply pinching her nipples. A hand then inched its way down her abdomen, ending between her thighs, where it lingered a bit, before the man stepped away and said, “This is a choice piece of calico. Tell the boys at the coop nobody takes her till I’ve had her. I’ll be out in a few days before the bus to Chicago arrives.”

  “You’re not fool enough to send her there, are you?” George said. “She’s seen Willy and Bull and me.”

  “No. We’re not sending her to Chicago. She’s either good for ransom money or buzzard bait,” the man called Boss said.

  “But if we get ransom money and release her, she’ll talk. She knows too much. We’d just as well turn ourselves in.”

  “I didn’t say we were going to release her. I said we were going to collect ransom. After I get my poke. You get the little lady settled in to her accommodations. Then, about this time tomorrow, one of you drive in and pick up Bull. I can’t have him
hanging around here with a search going on.”

  Kate took those words as her death sentence, but she had figured out already they couldn’t let her live. All she could do was cope and survive until she escaped or was rescued.

  The road had turned bumpy, and Kate nearly tumbled over several times as the car crept along, making abrupt turns, and barely straightening out before hitting another twist in the rough trail. Cleo Yellow Bird had provided an excellent description of the trail to the chick coop, but Kate had never expected to travel it. The car stopped, and the rear door opened. A rough hand clasped her bound ankle, and she could feel the bonds loosen, as someone untied the rawhide strips or rope that held her there. Then the hand grabbed her arm and dragged her from the seat and out onto the ground. Her hands remained tied, but she savored the feeling of having her legs free. If she could only see, she would have taken a chance and run.

  To Kate’s surprise, she felt a loop of a rope slip over her head and settle around her neck, before it tightened. “Your leash,” George said, “in case you get any ideas. Willy here’s going to lead you. You try to take off, you could drop a thousand feet. So, pay attention. Willy, you ain’t been here before, so you follow me.”

  Kate estimated it was more than an hour before they stopped. She heard the murmur of male voices ahead of her, almost drowning out the sobbing of a young girl. The pungent smell of a wood fire struck her nostrils, and under other circumstances she would have savored it. She assumed darkness had settled in by now, and, when someone slipped her hood off, she confirmed it.

  As her eyes adjusted to regain sight, she searched her surroundings through a fog. But as they cleared, she saw she stood on a wide ledge jutting from a granite cliff that seemed to reach into the clouds. Then the soft moonlight glow revealed the chick coop, a large, dark hole bored into the cliff’s face, the mouth blocked by a gate fashioned of steel rods, appearing almost like jail bars. She could see eerie, shadowy movement behind the gate, but that was all.

  Three men sat around a fire on the other side, where the ledge sloped off and gradually widened until it disappeared into more level terrain. Kate wondered if that was a back way exit from the ledge, where someone could make her way to the creek valley that snaked between the surrounding mountains. Then one of the men got up from the fire and walked toward them.

  “George. You trapped the prize kitten, I see.”

  There was something about the man that looked familiar, and as he came nearer, she recognized him. The man in Carrie’s drawing. Dark—Italian, perhaps. Fine features, pencil-thin moustache. He was dressed like a cowhand, but he looked out of place in dusty, beat-up clothes and boots. And now that he stood in front of her, she was struck by his narrow eyes. Black as coal. Cold as ice.

  George said, “We’re to hold the girl here, Solly, till Boss decides what he wants to do with her. He’s thinking ransom.”

  “Ransom?” Solly said. “I’m sure she’d bring a price. She’d sell good in Chicago, too.”

  “That’s up to Boss. But I doubt if she’s going to Chicago.”

  “He can’t let her loose if she’s ransomed. She’s seen too much, knows too much.”

  “He won’t turn her loose.”

  “Want me to get her ready for the coop?”

  “Go ahead. But Boss has got first dibs on her. You’re a dead man if you hump her before he does.”

  “Boss is a pig.”

  “Boss is boss. And you don’t want to risk his bad temper. I’m going to see if Spud and Henry can spare a cup of coffee.” Many Knives turned to Willy. ”You help him, and then come to the fire.”

  Solly said, “The rabbit’s all gone, but they got a pot of beans and maybe a few biscuits left. Eat the beans before Spud gets any more. His farts are already burning my nose and making my eyes water.”

  “I’ll try to sit upwind.”

  Kate’s stomach rolled and rumbled, but it wasn’t hunger eating at her right now. It was raw fear.

  “Okay, broad, sit down. Willy here’s going to pull your boots off,” Solly said.

  “I can’t with my hands behind my back.”

  “You can’t?” He walked around behind her. Suddenly a blow slammed into the tender flesh behind her knee, and her leg gave way and she came down hard on her rear. “See, you didn’t need your hands untied. Take her boots off, Willy.”

  “Yes, sir.” Willy knelt in front of her. He was obviously nervous. The implications of his involvement with what she had heard the men refer to as the “gang” were probably just starting to sink in. He reached for a foot with trembling hands and began tugging on a boot.

  When both boots were tossed aside, Willy started to get up but was abruptly stopped. “Now her britches,” Solly said.

  “Her britches? What for?”

  “Because she goes in the coop with her feathers plucked, jingle-brain. Now get her britches and underpants off. Then I’ll have to untie her to take off her shirt.”

  Willy obeyed, and in moments her bare butt was resting on the cold granite. Solly untied her hands, and, although she knew there was no path to safety yet, she felt less helpless, as if she were moving to some control over her fate. Solly clutched her arm, digging his fingernails into her flesh, and yanked her off the ground. She stood trying to maintain her balance as jolts of pain ran down her lower left leg. She could bend her knee only a bit because of the blow from what she assumed was his booted foot.

  He clutched her shirt front and tore it open, ripping off the buttons. She wore a man’s undershirt underneath, and he tore that off next, exposing her breasts.

  “I got bigger bubs than you, babe.” His fingers pinched her nipple and twisted.

  “Nice rosebuds, though.” He grinned, displaying wolf-like teeth, until she spit in his face. He slapped her viciously and she staggered and stumbled backward, landing on the rock again.

  “Willy, get the broad off her ass and follow me to the coop.”

  She was still reeling and only half aware as Willy guided her to the cave. She heard the creak of the hinges as the gate opened, and she felt Solly jerk her from Willy’s grip before he shoved her through the opening, where once again her body collapsed, and her head crashed against unyielding stone.

  Chapter 32

  THE RAPID CITY OUTFIT

  Boss Bullock looked with disdain at his older brother, who was dripping blood all over the new couch. The big boob had been his cross to bear for as long as he could remember, and although Boss felt nothing for Bull, the pull of blood still counted, and he could not abandon him—not yet, anyway.

  Taking Bull to the hospital was unthinkable—too risky. Darkness was not far away, and Kathleen Connolly’s disappearance would be discovered soon, if it had not been already. It seemed likely that no one else would be aware that one of the abductors suffered an injury, but that could not be taken for granted. And a mess like Bull’s hand would not go unnoticed.

  He decided that his only option was to ring up Doc Kerrigan. He had been a competent surgeon when he wasn’t smoked. The drunken sot had lost his medical license, but he still earned booze money providing discreet medical services for folks who had reason to avoid the customary sources. He also had a reputation for being the best horse doctor in the county. He ought to be more than good enough for Bull.

  Clarence Kerrigan, M.D. arrived in his 1918 Model T less than a half hour after Boss spoke to him. He smelled like stale rotgut, but Boss judged he was close to sober and showed him into the parlor, where Bull still moaned in agony. Kerrigan, a short man on the brink of obesity, had seen fifty-five years but looked seventy-five as he limped into the room. He stood above Bull, who stared up with glazed eyes.

  “Hold up your paw,” Kerrigan ordered.

  Bull weakly lifted his injured hand.

  “Good God, man, you stick your hand in a meat grinder? Where’s your pinky finger?”

  Boss intervened. “Doc, no questions. We called you to patch him up. Get to it.”

  “He ought to go t
o the hospital.”

  “He can’t. Now do what you’ve got to do.”

  “Take him out to the kitchen table so I can get a better look.”

  The doctor removed his coat and dropped it on a chair before he carried his scuffed, dirty black bag to the kitchen. Boss helped his brother to his feet, and with his brother’s assistance, Bull staggered to the kitchen and sunk down in a chair by the wooden table.

  “Do you have a table cloth to put on this?” the doctor asked.

  Boss obliged. “Can you knock him out?”

  “That’s why I said he should go to the hospital. I don’t carry chloroform or anesthetics.” He stretched Bull’s arm out on the table. “Hardly know where to start.”

  “Listen, you damn quack.” Bull stammered between sobs. “Start fixing me, or your brains are going to get splattered on the floor.”

  The doctor shrugged. “Very well. Claud, do you have any whiskey on the premises, perchance?”

  Boss retrieved a whiskey bottle, and when he returned, Kerrigan had several scalpels, curved needles, and suture containers spread out on the table. He handed the physician the bottle. The doctor removed the cork and took a swig of the contents. And then another. And another. Finally, he set the bottle down.

  “What in the hell are you doing?” Boss asked. “I thought that was for Bull.”

  “No. Find him a stick to bite on.”

  “Are you serious? That sounds like something out of a cowboy movie.”

  “As a matter of fact, that’s where I learned the technique.”

  Boss looked at Kerrigan incredulously. Was the man joking? He didn’t seem to be. He searched the cabinet drawers and found a wooden-handled spatula and gave it to Bull. “Your anesthetic.”

  “I’m supposed to bite on this?”

  “That’s what the doctor ordered. Stick it up your ass, if it will help.” Boss was getting fed up with the process and was about to tear into the doctor when he saw that Kerrigan was twisting a tourniquet on his brother’s arm—the wrong one.