by Brett Waring
Clay Nash pulled on his cigarette. “He’s after you—and you want protection. That it?”
Farrell scowled. “No, that ain’t it.” His voice was beginning to tremble with emotion as he continued. “Largo Brewster hit my ranch, killed six of my men, wounded three others and burned my house to the ground ... He also abducted my only daughter, Mary Lee ...”
Farrell stopped then heaved a heavy sigh.
“He left this for me.”
The rancher handed Nash the creased note that Brewster had nailed to the hitching post in the Diamond F yard.
Nash carefully read the crudely printed message.
“100,000 bucks in gold. By the 25th. We’ll tell you where later. For every day past the 25th we don’t get the gold, I’ll send back one of the gal’s fingers. After ten days, I start on her ears. After that ...”
There was no signature.
“How d’you know it was Brewster?” Nash said.
Farrell scowled. “My cook survived. He described Brewster to a T. So’d my boss-wrangler.”
“We’ve had reports that Brewster’s back in Wyoming, operating with a very wild bunch, Clay,” Hume said. “One of his men was killed, Clint Marsh. He was known to be ridin’ with Brewster.”
Nash nodded. “Okay, we take it as read, then. Brewster’s behind it.” He swiveled bleak eyes to Farrell. “You’ve got very little chance of seeing your daughter alive again.”
Farrell’s lips drew back tautly from his teeth as he nodded. “I ain’t kiddin’ myself. Brewster’s loco. Maybe that hangman done it, I dunno. But he’s mad with hate for me. I sent a messenger to him to say that I’d surrender myself if he’d release Mary Lee. He sent my messenger back with his throat cut and—and a hank of Mary Lee’s hair stuffed in his mouth.”
“Christ,” breathed Nash.
“So I am fully aware that the man I’m dealing with may well not keep any part of the bargain, Nash,” Farrell continued grimly. “I may sweat blood raising that hundred thousand in gold and have it delivered, following every single instruction he gives—and find that all I get in return is my daughter’s corpse.”
Nash was silent. Hume took a cigar from the humidor on his desk and lit it.
Farrell flicked his gaze from one man to the other.
“That’s why I’m only delivering a load of lead ingots covered in gold paint.”
Nash sat up straight in his chair and Hume froze.
“Well, that ought to guarantee that your daughter’s killed, Farrell,” Nash said, a steel edge to his voice.
The rancher’s mouth moved in a faint, crooked smile. “I thought we’d just established that she’d be killed whether I delivered the gold or not.”
“Yes, but, hell, man,” exploded Jim Hume, “you’re taking one almighty risk this way. I mean, sure, there’s every chance a bastard like Brewster’s goin’ to kill Mary Lee no matter what, but if you dump a load of lead on him instead of the gold bullion he’s expecting, well, like Clay says: you’re signing Mary Lee’s death warrant.”
“Murderin’ her,” Nash said tightly.
Farrell’s face seemed to crumble.
“I’ve given the matter a helluva lot of thought, Hume. It’s a week since the raid took place—or will be tomorrow. I’ve started selling my herds and land, trying to raise the hundred thousand. I guess I’ll make it, all right. Might be a few thousand to spare, but that’s all. Don’t you see, Brewster’s out to ruin me as well as make me suffer over Mary Lee? He’s already killed six of my men and burned my home to the ground.” His voice took on a hard edge. “I don’t aim to pay the son of a bitch a red cent for doin’ things like that.”
“Then pay him for other things. Like your daughter’s life,” Nash told him curtly.
“Why? She’s as good as dead. You’ve admitted that. All I’d be doin’ is handin’ Brewster a hundred thousand in gold.” Farrell shook his head. “Nope. I don’t aim to do that. He’s getting nothing more out of me.”
There was a deep silence in the office for a long time, then Nash asked Hume quietly:
“How do I fit into this?”
Hume flicked his gaze towards Farrell. “Mr. Farrell wanted you to deliver the ransom. He’s used his influence and authority as a major shareholder to get his way. The instructions came directly from Mr. Fargo himself, Clay. You’re assigned to the case.” Then he frowned. “But if there’s only gold-painted lead being delivered, I’m not so sure you’re obligated to take it on.”
Both men stared at the rancher, waiting for his answer. He met their gazes unflinchingly.
“Lead is what I’m sending, and Nash is who I want to deliver it,” he said flatly. “And bring back Mary Lee if there’s a chance.”
Hume frowned and turned to his top gun. “I guess it’s up to you, Clay.”
“Where’s it to go?” Nash asked.
“No word yet, but there will be over the next couple of days, I reckon,” the rancher replied. “The 25th’s only a little over a week away. Brewster figured it’d take me a couple weeks to raise the money to buy the gold.”
Nash stood and walked across to the window, looking down into the main street of Cheyenne with its bustling traffic. He saw two young girls in gingham laughing as they came out of a store, licking peppermint candy sticks. They were about sixteen or seventeen, Mary Lee Farrell’s age ...
She should be down there, he thought, or in some other town, having fun, laughing with a friend, sharing a candy bar, and feeling the warmth of the sun against her flesh.
Instead, she was in the brutal hands of a killer who was almost insane with hatred for her father. And she was the one who was suffering. Sure, Luke Farrell was suffering some, too. It was pure hell and anguish for him knowing his daughter was Largo Brewster’s prisoner—and he’d lost something he’d worked for all his life—but Nash was thinking of the terror that young girl must be suffering, the mental anguish and fear driving her out of her mind ...
He rounded abruptly on Luke Farrell.
“All right, Farrell,” he snapped. “I’ll do it. I’ll deliver your load of gold-painted lead or whatever you want, but you savvy this: I’m not doing it for you.” He walked across and stood directly in front of the rancher. “I’m doin’ it because of Mary Lee. I don’t know her. But she’s young and she sure as hell is in danger and all she ever did was get herself born with you for a father. Well, mister, I aim to see that fake ransom delivered according to Brewster’s instructions and I aim to do everything I can to get that little gal free. And if anythin’ really bad has happened to her because you didn’t send the gold, then I’ll come after you, mister, and you’ll wish you’d never heard of me.”
“Clay,” Jim Hume snapped warningly.
But Nash kept looking hard at Farrell who’d suddenly turned white.
“I mean it, Farrell. If anything happens to that gal because of you trying to pull a smart one on Brewster, I’ll kill you.”
Luke Farrell slowly stood and studied the rock-faced Wells Fargo man for a long spell. Then he nodded.
“I’ll accept you on those terms,” he said raspingly. “But I have this to add, Nash: you get my daughter back for me alive—and I’ll give you ten thousand in gold.” He thrust out his right hand. “We got a deal?”
Nash gave him one final hard look, then turned and crossed to the door. He paused with his hand on the knob.
“I’ll be in my hotel room, Jim,” he said and went out without looking at Luke Farrell.
The big rancher clamped his lips together angrily and slowly sat in his chair again.
“He’d better be as good as Wells Fargo claims, Hume.”
Jim Hume nodded. “He is. Maybe better. And he’s a man who keeps his word, Mr. Farrell.”
The rancher frowned, just a trifle uncertainly.
Three – The Only Way
It was Brick Sawtell who delivered the note containing directions for payment of the ransom.
He rode confidently into Cheyenne, sure that he woul
dn’t be apprehended or hindered in any way. Folk on the street, not knowing him from Adam, paid no never mind to him as he rode his mount down Main, but as he approached the local law office, Sawtell tilted his hat over his eyes and tended to keep his bearded chin tucked into his shoulder. It was an instinctive reaction for a man who’d been riding outside the law as long as Sawtell had.
But the sheriff was out of town with a posse, trailing rustlers who’d cut loose a couple of days earlier and, in their escape, had stampeded the stolen cattle through a round-up camp, killing four men and maiming two others. Only one deputy remained in Cheyenne, and he was working part-time.
Since being recalled from the Utah assignment, Clay Nash had been studying every piece of information he could lay his hands on in connection with Largo Brewster and his bunch. The man seemed to have a different bunch of men to operate with for each new scheme he got into. It seemed that over the past six years, Brewster had been involved with nine different groups of men, operating as rustler, raider, bank robber, train robber and just plain murderer.
There were indications that he was showing more and more signs of being loco. There were more killings involved with his more recent jobs, and many of them seemed totally unnecessary: simply Largo or his men cutting loose when their escape was already assured, killing for fun.
Largo was the most dangerous kind of man to go up against, Nash knew that. Especially when he held captive the daughter of his sworn enemy.
He had also delved as deeply as possible into Luke Farrell’s past, and had come up with pretty much the story that Farrell had told him in Hume’s office. Farrell had skipped a lot, though. He was land greedy or just plain greedy, it seemed. Farrell had fought with and forced out everyone who had tried to homestead on range that was anywhere near the Diamond F line. Fact was, he had extended his ranch considerably, swallowing up what had been free range by allowing his own men to homestead until the land was proved. After which, it was absorbed into the Diamond F—and making it an outlying line camp for round-up.
In a couple of cases, it seemed to Nash, Farrell had taken the attitude that if he couldn’t have the range, then no one else would. There had been a couple of mysterious forest fires that had wiped out thousands of acres of pasture and timber where some homesteaders had grouped together to make the beginnings of a town.
There was enough information about his financial dealings to know that Luke Farrell dealt under the table where he figured it was necessary. He had ruined some men and had, apparently, lost little or no sleep over it.
“He’s a real dyed-in-the-wool son of a bitch, Jim,” Nash told Hume after studying the files on Farrell. “He might be rich and powerful now, but he didn’t get there by being a straight-shooter.”
Hume made a helpless gesture with his hands.
“That’s not our concern, Clay,” he said quietly, boring his hard eyes into Nash. “We’ve been instructed by the company to help him out, and we either do just that—or we start looking for other jobs.”
Nash nodded. “I like my work, but I sure as hell resent havin’ to lend my talents to someone like Farrell. But I’m damned if I’m gonna resign and quit just because of someone like him. Besides, I wouldn’t rest easy now if I didn’t do somethin’ to help that little gal, Mary Lee.” He sighed. “I seen a tintype of her in the file. She’s a nice-lookin’ kid, don’t look at all mean like her old man. Even if she did, she wouldn’t deserve to be kidnapped by a loco curly wolf like Brewster. Even after readin’ all those files on Farrell, I still can’t savvy how he could risk her neck the way he is.”
“A man like Farrell don’t think the way we do, Clay. He don’t have the same standards. He figures it’s too late to save her, so why throw that gold away? It’s as simple as that for someone like Farrell …”
Nash agreed without hesitation.
He had changed hotel rooms, soon after his talk with Hume, and had booked into a corner front suite that gave him a view of Cheyenne’s main drag. He could see clear down the street, either way, to the edge of town.
One of the buildings lining Main, of course, was the Wyoming Palace, the lush, fancy, gingerbread-fronted hotel where Luke Farrell had a whole floor to himself.
Nash sat in the window seat, a pair of army field-glasses beside him, tobacco and papers laid out and some books and files. He had left instructions for the Indian kid who ran errands in the hotel to call in regularly, every hour on the hour, and, unless otherwise instructed, to bring a pot of coffee.
He was on his third pot and his fourth file regarding operations in the various States where it was thought Largo Brewster had been responsible for crimes. He had been alarmed to find three instances when the Brewster bunch had raped and mutilated the wives and daughters of ranchers they had raided.
One of the men known to be riding with Brewster at that time was a red-haired killer named Brick Sawtell. There was a line drawing of him taken from a Wanted dodger in South Dakota and Nash looked up from studying the face in time to see the man dismounting in front of the Palace. He snatched the field-glasses and stiffened as he confirmed the man to be Sawtell. He adjusted the focus as fine as it would go and watched while the man dusted himself down a little and checked his shirt pocket. There was a flash of white which could have been the corner of a folded square of paper.
As Brick Sawtell started into the hotel, Nash set down the glasses, grabbed his hat and gunrig and hurried from his room ...
Luke Farrell regarded Brick Sawtell with hard, murderous eyes as the man came into the suite of rooms in the Palace and dropped into a plush leather chair. He swung spurred boots onto a polished tabletop, leaned back, and clasped his hands behind his greasy head.
“Get me a whisky, Farrell,” he ordered.
“You go to hell,” the rancher snapped. “And get your goddamn spurs off the table.”
Brick grinned and deliberately dragged the rowels across the highly-polished surface, gouging it severely. He looked steadily at the pale-faced Farrell. “That whisky coming yet?” he asked, preparing to gouge the wood some more.
“All right,” Farrell snapped, moving to the sideboy. “Have your fun, whoever you are.” He splashed whisky from a decanter into a large glass and handed it to the outlaw.
Sawtell saluted him and drank, smacking his lips.
“Mighty fine likker, Farrell, yessir. With a little luck, oughtn’t be long before I can afford the same sort of stuff.”
“If you’ve got a message for me, for God’s sake deliver it and get out.”
Brick Sawtell smiled crookedly, reached into his shirt pocket and flicked a folded square of greasy paper in the rancher’s direction. Farrell fumbled, dropped it and hurriedly picked it up, unfolding it and reading quickly. Sawtell got up and helped himself to another large glass of whisky.
Farrell glanced up. “This seems straight forward enough. ‘Bring the gold to Tomahawk Canyon by noon, 25th.’ Fine. But where in hell’s Tomahawk Canyon?”
Sawtell’s crooked grin widened. “Well, we ain’t complete fools, you know, Farrell. We give you the rendezvous too soon and you’re likely to mebbe get smart and try to rig an ambush with a posse ...”
“No, no, I wouldn’t be so foolish,” protested Farrell.
Sawtell merely looked at him, downed the rest of his drink. “Sure you wouldn’t. But we got no education like you or your uppity daughter, Farrell, so we just don’t trust you, savvy? So, I tell you what we’re gonna do, see: we’re gonna set you on the trail in the general direction of Tomahawk—it don’t appear on any maps, by the by; it’s one of our own holes-in-the-wall. Somewhere along the way, you’ll either be contacted and guided in, or there’ll be directions left for you. Get it?”
Farrell nodded tightly. “How do I know my daughter is safe?”
“Why, hell, Farrell, you got my word for it,” Sawtell told him with a grin. Then slowly the grin faded and he added in a cold voice: “And that’s all you get. So the sooner you get that gold together and on the way
to Tomahawk, the sooner you’ll see her again.”
“I demand some proof!”
Sawtell’s gun suddenly appeared in his hand and Farrell stiffened but he didn’t back off. The red-bearded outlaw moved in close and rammed the gun muzzle hard against the rancher’s chest.
“You ain’t in any position to demand anythin’, mister. All you gotta do is what you’re told. And things’ll work out.” He moved the gun barrel in a short, jarring arc and it cracked against the rancher’s temple, knocking him halfway across the room. He cannoned off the sideboy and the decanter and two glasses crashed to the floor and shattered. Farrell hung there, dazed and bleeding. “That was special delivery from Largo. He can’t wait to see you out at Tomahawk.”
Farrell straightened slowly, taking a handkerchief carefully from his pocket and dabbing at the oozing cut. “Well, now, that’s a pleasure Largo Brewster’s gonna have to forgo, mister. ’Cause I’m not deliverin’ that gold in person.”
Sawtell stiffened, his eyes pinching down. “You’re what?”
“You heard me. I’m no fool, either. I know I wouldn’t live past a couple of breaths beyond the time it took Largo to make sure all the bullion was there. So I’m having the gold delivered on my behalf ... Now, you hold up, mister. There was nothin’ said I had to take it in person. And I’m tellin’ you this and you damn well make sure Brewster gets it right: a man named Clay Nash is takin’ the gold to wherever Brewster wants. He’s been hired to do it for me and how he does it is his concern, but he’ll have it at this Tomahawk Canyon by noon on the 25th. And he won’t turn it over until Mary Lee’s proved to be safe and well.”
“Now, you listen, Farrell,” grated Sawtell but the big, fearless rancher straightened and shook his head.
“No. I’m through listenin’ to sonsabitches like you, Sawtell. Brewster gets the gold, but it’s delivered my way or he don’t get it at all.”