The Crimson Trail

by Eric Red

  Standing by the window, Marshal Bess thoughtfully watched the three husbands amble off down the street, wildly gesticulating in commiseration as they entered a saloon. She felt Deputy Sweet at her side. “So who the hell is Puzzleface?” she asked him.

  “It’s a long story. I’m getting ready to tell you, just trying to figure where to start.”

  “Start at the beginning and end it by telling me what the hell Puzzleface is doing with three married women who ran off on their husbands.”

  “It ain’t what you think,” Deputy Nate Sweet said as he grabbed the bottle of Idaho whiskey from his desk drawer and poured some into two shot glasses that he set down on Marshal Bess’s desk.

  Then he sat down across from her and told her the whole story.

  Well, almost.

  CHAPTER 12

  “We got company.”

  Joe Noose walked up to Laura Holdridge as she fetched herself a cup of coffee from the steaming pot on the stove. The outfit had broken for lunch, and the rovers were gathered around the chuck wagon. The herd stood grazing a hundred yards to the east, stretching as far as the eye could see.

  The bounty hunter was pointing to the northwest, the way they had come, and as his gloved finger drew the cattlewoman’s gaze, she saw the horses and riders approaching a half mile away.

  “Trouble?” Joe asked her, watching her narrow squint.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Want me to give the outfit the heads-up?”

  “I’d be obliged.”

  Laura stood with her arms crossed, hair blown about her face in the wind as she squinted impassively at the men and horses growing ever larger as they came on at an unthreatening but unwavering pace.

  Walking a few paces to the chow line, Noose clapped his hands to get the rovers’ attention and gestured with his arm for them to follow. “Men and horses coming, men. Bring your weapons. But we don’t know if it’s trouble or not, so no quick trigger fingers.” The wranglers all put down their plates, grabbing rifles from their saddle scabbards and checking the loads on their revolvers as they fell in behind the bounty hunter, who returned to the cattlewoman’s side to see that the posse had nearly reached camp.

  At fifty yards, fifteen men pulled up their horses and two wagons and the man who rode in the vanguard dismounted.

  The leader of the posse was dressed like an English gentleman in a black suit, silk vest, and bowler hat beneath a weathered leather duster. A gold pocket watch on a fob glinted in his vest pocket. The tall man was in his forties, fit and very groomed, with dashing features behind a waxed blond handlebar mustache, and sideburns. He advanced with a confident, aristocratic stride on costly British riding boots that reached the knees of his fancy riding breeches, attired like a robber baron. Beside the pocket watch, a brace of Colt Dragoon revolvers came into view strapped to his gold-buckled belt. The gentleman stranger walked up to Laura Holdridge, doffed his bowler hat, and extended his gloved hand. “My name is Cole Starborough,” the man said with an East Coast upper-crust American accent. “Do I have the pleasure of speaking to Mrs. Laura Holdridge of the Bar H Ranch, ma’am?”

  Joe Noose instantly hated this man on sight, with every fiber of his being. Why, he wasn’t sure, not at first.

  Laura Holdridge did not shake Cole Starborough’s hand, so he withdrew it. “I am she,” the cattlewoman replied, crossing her arms while holding his gaze. “You know who I am but I’ve never seen you before in my life. State your business.”

  “You heard the lady,” added Joe Noose, his unblinking gaze locked on Cole Starborough.

  The gentleman smiled, revealing white teeth below his waxed handlebar mustache that looked sharp, like they had been filed to points. “I represent the Bar T Ranch, and these men are my operatives. Your drivers can stand at ease, Mrs. Holdridge. We mean no harm.”

  “Maybe, maybe not, Mrs. Holdridge,” Joe Noose said, standing right behind his employer, hand poised over the butt of his holstered Colt Peacemaker. “But this ain’t no chance encounter. These boys have been shadowing us the last fifty or so miles.”

  Starborough’s gaze met the bounty hunter’s and held it a few seconds too long.

  “State your business or move on, mister,” Laura said.

  “I am here to make you a business proposition.” The gentleman presented an embossed business card in his expensive black-leather-gloved fingers. The writing on it was in fancy script. She took it and her face visibly darkened as she read it. Her eyes were bullets when her gaze lifted from the card and drilled into Starborough’s unblinking gaze. “You’re one of Crispin Calhoun’s men.”

  “I am Mr. Calhoun’s junior partner at the Bar T Ranch, here on official business as Mr. Calhoun’s representative, sent at the personal request of Mr. Calhoun himself.”

  “What business would that be, Mr. Starborough?”

  “I’m here to buy your cattle.”

  Laura laughed.

  “Take every last head off your hands.”

  She laughed harder.

  “Cash on the barrelhead, Mrs. Holdridge.” Cole snapped his fingers and a husky, well-dressed operative in a Stetson reached into his saddlebag.

  Noose’s hand dropped to the handle of his revolver, ready to draw, fire, and blow the man clean off his horse, but the only thing the man withdrew from his saddlebag was a leather satchel that he tossed to Starborough. Joe kept his hand on his gun until the unflappable leader of Calhoun’s men unsnapped the gold clasps and opened the bag.

  It contained piles of hundred-dollar bills wrapped in bundles. The satchel was heavy with cold, hard cash.

  Behind Noose and Laura, the six wranglers had taken a few steps forward to eye the money in the open case Starborough held before their trail boss.

  “How much is in there?” the cattlewoman asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “Four thousand dollars, Mrs. Holdridge.”

  “I have five hundred head of cattle, Mr. Starborough, but you probably already know that. You’re offering me eight dollars a head. Those are Texas prices and this is Wyoming. In Cheyenne, my prime steers are going to auction at thirty to forty dollars a head. In other words, the money is an insult, but you probably already know that, too.”

  Cole Starborough chuckled and smoothed his waxed blond mustache. “With all due respect, ma’am, you’ll never make it to Cheyenne. We both know that. Not in time to deliver your herd before the cattlemen’s auction ends in less than three weeks. Cheyenne is two hundred and fifty miles from here, through the bowels of Wyoming. Nobody could drive a herd that far across that kind of terrain, even if they weren’t shorthanded in their crew, as you appear to be.”

  At the last, Laura’s eyes turned steely and suspicious.

  “Respectfully, Mr. Calhoun is offering you a good price for your entire herd of livestock, in cash. Right here in this satchel. Take it. Then you can turn these steers over to my operatives and myself, we’ll drive them the rest of the way, and you and your outfit can take it easy, turn around, and get back to the Bar H. Because respectfully, Mrs. Holdridge, eight dollars a head is better than nothing at all, and nothing is what you’re gonna have when you get to Cheyenne weeks after the auction has closed, when you will have to turn around and drive these cows all the way back, assuming you still have any rovers left to drive them.”

  “The lady just gave you her answer,” Noose snarled, baring his teeth.

  “I was asking your boss, not you.” Starborough bared his own, which looked like fangs, sharp as they were.

  “You asked me and my answer is no. But before you ride that cash back to Calhoun, there is one thing I want to know from you, Mr. Starborough.”

  “And that would be what, ma’am?”

  “Are you the one who’s been killing my men?”

  The gentleman henchman looked like he’d been slapped, the color leeching out of his cheeks on a face that turned the color of curdled milk. “Did you just accuse me of being a murderer?” he whispered, aghast.

  �
�You’re Crispin Calhoun’s man, aincha? I wouldn’t put anything past Calhoun, who’ll do anything to see I don’t get my stock to Cheyenne, because he don’t like the competition, especially when it’s a woman. You work for the bastard, so I’ll ask you one last time if you’ve been killing my crew following his orders.”

  Starborough stiffened and his eyes went flat as he screwed his bowler hat onto his head. “I won’t dignify that with an answer.” Then he smiled courteously. “So regarding Mr. Calhoun’s offer to purchase your cattle, I take it I’m to tell my employer your answer is no.”

  “Tell your boss this.” The cattlewoman leaned forward and got nose to nose with the henchman. “We’re going to Cheyenne and when we get there, I’m gonna shove five hundred head of cattle all the way up Crispin Calhoun’s ass, and you’ll be sitting on the horns, you snake oil son of a bitch.”

  Joe needed all his willpower to bite back a grin.

  Cole Starborough considered Laura a long moment, then smiled with sharp teeth, tipping his hat. “Safe journey, Mrs. Holdridge.” Closing the satchel, he tossed it up to his other operative, who dropped it back in his saddlebag, then turned his back and walked away toward one of the wagons.

  “He didn’t deny killing your drivers,” Noose said.

  “No, but he looked mortified at the accusation, didn’t you think?”

  “Reckon I’m gonna have me a word with that man.”

  “Joe—”

  But Joe Noose had already strode off after Cole Starborough.

  * * *

  “When a man’s been in prison, he can never wash out the smell, no matter how hard he scrubs.” The hard look Joe Noose gave Cole Starborough told the stranger Joe saw right through him, and all those expensive clothes and fancy grooming didn’t fool Noose, who knew Cole came from dirt just like he did.

  Starborough lifted his leg and put his boot on the upper spoke of a supply-wagon wheel. There was a vague insult to the gesture, a display of casual disregard, as if he owned his wagon and the herd it belonged to, but like a lot Joe sensed about this smooth customer, it was nothing he could be called out on. The English riding boot was of the finest leather Joe had ever seen before. Noticing Noose looking at the boot, Cole took a handkerchief out of his vest, spat on it, and cleaned the trail dust off the toe and heel of his boot. “Imported from London. Custom made,” he said. “Fifty dollars a pair.” Still slowly wiping his boot, without moving his head, the henchman swiveled his eye to meet the bounty hunter’s gaze with a surprising force, demonstrating Starborough was tougher than he looked and not to be trifled with. A tincture of mocking in his voice, he asked, “How much did your boots cost?”

  Noose didn’t react. Both of them knew Joe’s old cowboy boots had seen far too many miles, the stitching attesting to a lot of mending.

  After a beat, Starborough rolled down his trousers over his boot. “Looks like you can use a new pair, sir.” He stood up, faced Joe Noose, looked him square in the eye, and tipped his bowler hat. “Hope we can do business. By that I mean, your boss lady and me.”

  The dapper gentleman turned to walk back to his horse but halted after two steps, as if he had an itch he had forgotten to scratch, then looked back over his shoulder with a grin Joe wanted to punch off his face and said, “A snake sheds its skin four times a year, it don’t need to scrub.” With a tip of his bowler hat, Cole Starborough’s parting words were, “Ave tenebris Dominus.”

  “Up yours,” Joe replied to the henchman’s back as he departed.

  The bounty hunter leaned against the wagon, crossed his arms and considered the conversation he’d just had. Joe now believed Cole Starborough to be a dangerous man. He hated him the minute he laid eyes on him, and after their encounter hated his guts even more. The bastard was going to be trouble. But Noose knew how this would end.

  He was not a superstitious man, but a few times in his life he’d had premonitions and gotten a glimpse of what lay ahead. Mostly what he had seen came to pass. Now, watching Calhoun’s hatchet man gallop off with his men, Joe Noose had one of his premonitions, knowing for a true fact Cole Starborough was a man he was going to kill.

  * * *

  “Before this thing is done I’m going to have to kill that man,” Cole Starborough muttered, lowering his solid gold-plated steel spyglass with a gloved hand and handing it off to his subordinate.

  “Which man?” Earl Moore’s brow furrowed as he hefted the heavy unwieldy telescope extended to its full three-foot length, peering through the eyepiece. Aiming the field glass at the procession of cattle stretching clear across the horizon, he saw they were on the move.

  “The big stud riding point,” Cole said, pointing. Moore focused the lens on the front of the wagon train, where Joe Noose was riding lookout on the cattle drive a mile away.

  “Why you gonna kill him for?”

  “Because if I don’t he’s going to kill me.”

  “What did you ever do to him?”

  “I was born.”

  “You been reading too many books, Cole. Instead of spouting philosophy to me, save those flowery words for Mrs. Holdridge, blow sunshine in her ear and sweet-talk her into selling that herd.”

  “She won’t sell. Any fool can see it ain’t about the money for that stubborn woman, Earl.”

  “It’s always about the money. Calhoun is being penny-wise and pound-foolish. Can’t we offer her a few bucks more a head and put paid on it?”

  “She won’t take it.”

  “If it ain’t about the money, what does she want?”

  “What I think?” Starborough chuckled. “I think that women wants to do exactly what she told me: drive her five hundred steers all the way up Crispin Calhoun’s ass, horns first.”

  Earl Moore laughed. “Fair enough. But where does that leave us? It was our job to carry out Calhoun’s orders to buy that herd, and he’s a man who don’t take no for an answer.”

  “Calhoun gave us one order,” Cole sharply retorted, holding up one black-leather-gloved finger in front of Moore’s nose. “The order is Laura Holdridge’s herd must not reach Cheyenne. The cattle drive must be stopped by any means necessary.” His black eyes fierce behind his curled waxed mustache sometimes made Starborough resemble a villain in a Victorian melodrama when his blood was up. Now that he had his subordinate’s attention, he lowered his voice. “That is our order.”

  “And we failed.”

  “Don’t be a fool, Earl.” Starborough looked at Moore like he was an idiot. “Calhoun made me his junior partner at the Bar T Ranch and put me in charge of this operation for a reason. Tell me, why is that?”

  “Because you kill people for him.”

  “Wrong.”

  “Because you do all his dirty work.”

  “A great man like Calhoun never gets his hands dirty. He has people for that, and I’m just one of them. That isn’t why he put me in charge.”

  “Hellfire, Cole. I don’t know what the heck you’re talking about half the time.”

  Cole leaned in so close he was nose to nose with Moore. “Calhoun made me his right hand and put me in charge because I use this”—Starborough tapped his own temple with his gloved forefinger—“before I use this.” Cole tapped the handle of his holstered Colt revolver.

  “We all know how smart you say you think you are, Cole.”

  Starborough drew his revolver lightning fast and the barrel was between Moore’s eyes before he had time to flinch, and by the time he did flinch, Cole was spinning the pistol around his trigger finger back into his holster in one smooth deadly move that took under a second. His face broke out in a dashing grin and he laughed contemptuously as browbeaten Moore’s head seemed to shrink into his shoulders.

  “Follow along, Moore. I’ll walk you through it again. Listen and learn. What have I told you is the most important part of any plan?”

  “Have a plan B.”

  “Right. Plan A was buy the lady out, but she didn’t want to sell, which means plan A failed and now we go to . . .
”

  When Moore looked up he had the look of a beat dog. “P-plan B,” he stuttered.

  “Didn’t hear you.”

  “Plan B.”

  “Exactly.” Cole nodded condescendingly like he was speaking to a child. “We go to plan B. Subterfuge and sabotage. Buy off her crew. Disable her wagons. Whatever it takes. And I have my spy.”

  “What spy?”

  “I have a man inside Laura Holdridge’s outfit.” Starborough smiled, very pleased with himself.

  “You didn’t tell me that.”

  “I don’t tell you a lot of things. Now you know. One of her wranglers is on the Calhoun payroll, not hers. He’s been my eyes and ears since they hit the trail, sending me reports. And he’ll do more than that if I need him to.”

  “What if plan B fails?”

  “We have plan C. Take the herd by force. It’s our contingency plan. The last resort. If we have to kill the outfit and steal those cattle, we do it in the canyons before Cheyenne, where it’s a hundred miles of nothing but badlands without another living soul. They call that part of Wyoming ‘the Big Empty.’ Nobody will ever find the bodies because the Big Empty tells no tales.”

  “I hope it don’t come to that.”

  “You got a problem if it does?”

  Moore threw a look to the other thirteen operatives cleaning their guns a few hundred yards away. “I knew what I signed up for. The rest of these boys Calhoun hired are triggermen and I reckoned gunwork was going to be involved. It ain’t my first rodeo. I just hope it ain’t my last.” His gaze lingered on a formidable freighter wagon the posse had nicknamed, the war wagon.

  “You worry too much. You need to trust me.” Starborough said.

  “Because you got it all figured out.”

  “Yes, I best believe I do.”

  “For all our sakes, you better hope so. If that herd gets to Cheyenne, Calhoun will murder us.”