The Floating Outfit 17 Page 7

  Being unarmed was unlikely to produce repercussions, regardless of his unfriendly attitude towards the man he had had brought to see him, as the rancher was not alone in the study.

  ‘Cousin Slats and Salar weren’t so drunk they didn’t know you was pumping them last night,’ the other occupant of the study asserted. ‘So Mr. Stewart passed the word to have you fetched out here should you try it on with any of the other boys tonight.’

  Lounging at the right side of the desk, occupying a chair deliberately selected as being somewhat smaller and not quite so comfortable as the one used by his employer, Wilson ‘Leftie’ Scanlan was subjecting the visitor to an equally disdainful scrutiny while speaking. Just past thirty, black haired, tall, lean and wiry, with a heavily mustached face which seemed carved from old leather, he was segundo of the Standing DMS—the letters being positioned one above another on the branding iron—ranch. His tidy and expensive cowhand style clothing notwithstanding, he was just as much a ‘warrior’ as any other member of the crew and more competent than the rest. Before starting to work for Stewart, he had acquired a reputation for earning a very good living by the skill with which he could handle the brace of ivory handled Remington New Army Model of 1863 revolvers in the fast draw holsters of his buscadero gunbelt.

  ‘Well,’ the rancher said, his accent New England. ‘What’s it all about?’

  ‘Mort Lewis,’ replied Dennis “Waxie” Corovan, having changed his clothes for those of the no more cleanly attire of a professional gambler. He showed no sign of being put out, either in having been compelled to come to the ranch house, or in the less than friendly attitudes of the two men confronting him.

  ‘What about Mort Lewis?’ Stewart demanded.

  ‘You’re wanting his spread,’ the renegade stated. ‘And old Dexter Chass’s place.’

  ‘Now what makes you think a thing like that?’ Stewart asked, sounding disinterested in spite of the glance he exchanged with his segundo.

  ‘Big rancher like you allus needs to grow bigger,’ Corovan explained. ‘Your range’s already holding all the stock it can take without you getting more water, and you can only get that hereabouts by taking over the VL and Chass’s Hanging C. Trouble being, ain’t neither of ’em likely to sell out no matter how much good cash money you put up afore ’em.’

  ‘Go on,’ the rancher prompted, without offering to either confirm or deny what he was being told.

  ‘What I know about Mort Lewis,’ the renegade obliged. ‘You’ll have to kill him afore you’ll get his spread. Same’ll apply to that ornery ole son-of-a-bitch, Dex Chass, ’cepting he’ll be some easier than that part-Kweharehnuh god damned half-breed to take out.’

  ‘And you figure you can kill Mort Lewis for me?’ Stewart suggested dryly, the words being echoed by a derisive sniff from Scanlan.

  ‘Hell, no!’ Corovan denied emphatically. ‘I know I’m not nowheres near’s good’s some of your boys, much less Leftie here. So I couldn’t take him out in what’d pass as a fair fight. Which, with a feller like Jerome Dickson being sheriff and Lewis having so many bueno amigos among the officers of the Second Cavalry, you’d need to have it made look that way. Wasn’t for needing that, you’d’ve had him made wolf bait long afore now.’

  ‘I’m not admitting anything, one way or another, mind,’ Stewart warned, concluding his unkempt and unprepossessing visitor was more shrewd than appeared on the surface. ‘But you’ve got something more on your mind than just telling me that.’

  ‘Sure,’ Corovan admitted. ‘I’ve come up with a way you can have both of them took out, so’s it’ll look like Mort Lewis got put under all legal and proper—Or, at least, so’s it won’t look like you personal had nothing to do with him getting made wolf bait.’

  ‘And how much is it going to cost me?’ the rancher inquired, as the renegade stopped speaking with the air of one who had much more to offer.

  ‘I reckon we can settle on what you’ll call a fair price,’ Corovan replied.

  ‘I always pay a fair price,’ Stewart claimed. ‘But I’ve got to be given my money’s worth before I hand it over.’

  ‘I reckon you’ll figure you’ve got that,’ the renegade stated.

  ‘Then let’s hear what you have so I can decide on it,’ the rancher commanded.

  ‘Run across Lewis taking a dude and gal hunting in the Kweharehnuh country,’ Corovan said, being too wise to try to discuss terms of payment first and sticking to what was basically the truth. ‘I reckon you knowed he was doing it?’

  ‘I knew,’ Stewart confirmed noncommittally.

  ‘Seemed the dude’d hurt his arm some way,’ Corovan continued. ‘So Lewis’s took him to let the medicine man at the Antelope village ’tend his hurt. Just then, he sent his chuck wagon off and’s likely figuring to catch it up at Sanchez Riley’s, or somewhere else along the way. Whichever, they’ll call by at Riley’s and I’ve fixed it so he’ll be give word that ole Dex Chass’s causing fuss on his land when he gets there. ’Less I’m mistook about him, he’ll be headed here as fast’s that big claybank gelding of his can tote him.’

  ‘And how does that help me?’ the rancher asked, glancing at the calendar on his desk and estimating how much time remained of Morton Lewis’s hunting trip.

  ‘Suppose he found his place burned down and those two hands of his’n dead when he got there,’ the renegade replied. ‘With signs leading straight to the Hanging C?’

  ‘He’d go on over with head down and horns a-hooking,’ Scanlan guessed, also concluding his employer was finding what was said by Corovan interesting. ‘Which’d see to ole Chass and his son, but neither of them are close to good enough to take him ’long of them comes gun play.’

  ‘And nobody would blame him for going after them, the reason he could give,’ Stewart supplemented.

  ‘There’s some in Holbrock’d want to lay blame,’ Corovan contradicted. ‘Like that fancy-talking, lard-gutted banker, Humboldt. Way I heard it, he’s not over-tooken with the notion of a half-breed wanting to be his son-in-law and’d be the first to stay pushing for what he’d call getting justice done.’

  ‘Humboldt’s a real big man in Holbrock,’ the rancher conceded pensively and with just a trace of animosity. ‘But Jerome Dickson isn’t under his thumb, or anybody else’s. Comes what may, he’ll go by the way the evidence shows it happened.’

  ‘Even Dickson won’t be able to call it self-defense should Dex Chass ’n’ his boy be found shot in the back,’ Corovan pointed out. ‘And, should he bring Lewis in for trial, I reckon there’ll be those who’ll start yelling “hang-rope” ’stead of waiting for it.’

  ‘Dickson would stop anybody who tried lynching a man he was holding prisoner,’ Stewart stated. ‘I know him well enough to be sure of that.’

  ‘Likely, only I’ve heard tell of sheriffs’s got killed trying to stop a lynching,’ the renegade countered, looking pointedly from the rancher to his segundo and back. ‘Which, should it happen, I don’t figure there’d be too all fired much trouble finding somebody to take his place.’

  ‘Aren’t you forgetting something real important?’ Stewart challenged, having no intention of admitting he would be only too willing to have his segundo—or another more compliant, peace officer—appointed sheriff of Holbrock County. ‘What’d that be?’ Corovan asked, genuinely puzzled. ‘Wolf Runner!’ the rancher said coldly. ‘From what I’ve told, he feels real strongly about his grandson and is certain to come looking for revenge on whoever had Lewis killed.’

  ‘That’ll be the folks in town, not you,’ the renegade replied, deciding he was up against a much more shrewd man than he had envisaged. ‘Lewis reckons you’re his amigo, so it’ll be them’s Wolf Runner goes after, not you. Which being, the folks’s come through it aren’t likely to show too much grief, nor kind thoughts, about Lewis seeing’s what his granddaddy’s done to them.’

  ‘You’ve put some thought into this,’ Stewart commended dryly. ‘So what’s Lewis done to you?’

&nb
sp; ‘He got my brother ’n’ some good amigos killed by those Yankee blue bellies’ he rode scout for,’ the renegade answered, which again was true as far as it went. He did not explain how he had only just escaped with his life, or how the activities he and the victims were engaged upon warranted the stringent measures taken against them. ‘And I’m a man who allus looks for evens.’

  ‘’Specially should you figure to get somebody else to do it for you,’ the segundo put in, eyeing the visitor with cold contempt. ‘And look to make money out of it at the same time.’

  ‘There’s no call for that attitude, Mr. Scanlan,’ Stewart declared, with what might have been reproof. His tone became gentler as he went on, ‘You’ve made some real good sense, Mr. Corovan, but I’ll need time to think about it. Have you eaten?’

  ‘Not recent’,’ the renegade lied, never being one to miss the chance of obtaining a free meal.

  ‘Then tell my butler to take you to the kitchen and see what the cook can find for you,’ the rancher authorized. ‘By the time you’re through, I’ll have decided whether to do what you suggest—and how much you deserve for doing it.’

  ‘A man couldn’t ask for no more than that,’ Corovan declared, exuding blatant sycophancy. ‘I know I can count on you to do right by me.’

  ‘There’s a whole heap to what he says, boss,’ Scanlan claimed, after the renegade had left the study.

  ‘He’s got the basic idea, all right,’ Stewart admitted. ‘But there’s a better way to make it happen. I’m leaving for Austin in the morning and this is what I want you to have done.’ Although the rancher was convinced he would be able to use Corovan for his own ends, as he was giving the instructions to his segundo, he failed to realize that by adopting even his revised version of the scheme he was being manipulated. While he had guessed correctly what the response would be from Wolf Runner to the killing of Mort Lewis, neither he nor Scanlan possessed sufficient knowledge to appreciate all the ramifications. Being far better informed, the renegade was aware that the news of what happened would encourage restless braves of the other Comanche bands and various nations to quit the reservations and ride similar war trails. When this happened, he was confident he could earn a far greater sum of money than he was likely to receive from Stewart.

  ~*~

  The Ysabel Kid woke up knowing he had just received a message. Yet, had he felt the need to look, he would have discovered only he of the fifteen men who were sleeping around the camp fire had been disturbed. Originating from something over a quarter of a mile away, he could hear not only the few movements of the three thousand or so head of longhorn cattle which constituted the bedded down trail herd of the OD Connected ranch but also the slowly stepping hooves of the horses ridden by whichever pair of cowhands were keeping watch over them. Closer at hand, the night hawk was performing a similar duty with the at present unused mounts in the remuda. 22 Apart from them, nobody else was awake. Not even the night horses for the rest of the crew, which were sleeping on their feet saddled and ready for use along the picket line between the chuck and bed wagons. Nor had the Kid expected to find otherwise!

  While he had been informed where to go, and that his presence was required urgently on a matter of great importance, the Kid was aware the message was not delivered verbally. Nor had it come by any conventional means. It had been sent to him with the aid of what the people of his maternal grandfather called ‘medicine’.

  Despite having been raised as a Pehnane Comanche, attaining the status of a fully-fledged warrior in the band’s Dog Soldier war lodge, 23 the only knowledge the Kid had of ‘medicine’ was that it worked!

  Every member of the Nemenuh accepted ‘medicine’ as a proven fact, but its secrets were the sole province of those select few who had been initiated into its age-old mysteries. Invariably, although a younger person who lacked the qualities necessary to become a warrior could start to acquire the knowledge, the medicine men were mostly older people. Having won the man-name, Cuchilo—the Knife—by virtue of his superlative skill at wielding one and through his general competence in the fighting line, the Kid most certainly had not come into such a pacific category. Rather the opposite, in fact. However, despite having spent the majority of his life among white folks, this was not the first occasion he had been brought into contact with and profited from the mysterious powers of ‘medicine’. 24

  Sitting up, the Kid flipped open the upper half of the seven by eighteen feet of waterproofed Number 8 white ‘ducking’ tarpaulin which had been wrapped around his bedding and shoved away the blanket and thick suggan quilt. He came to his feet in a lithe movement, but did not reach for the low heeled black riding boots standing near his bed. Instead, after taking a swift glance around, he opened the neck of the warbag he had been using as a pillow. Taking out the pair of Comanche moccasins which were the uppermost items, he donned them. However, although his Winchester Model of 1866 rifle and black leather gunbelt—with a Colt Second Model Dragon revolver butt forward in the low cavalry twist draw holster on the right and a massive ivory handled James Black bowie knife sheathed at the left—were within reaching distance, he did not attempt to take up any of them.

  About six foot in height, the Kid had a slender build which was anything but puny. Rather it was suggestive of a wiry and tireless strength, a speed of movement and an agility well beyond average. His hair, black as a raven’s wing was more wavy than that of a pure Comanche, indicative of the white side of his birthright. Indian dark and seeming younger than his actual age, his handsome features appeared to express an almost babyish innocence in repose. However, when danger threatened, or in moments of stress, they could become more in keeping with the red hazel eyes which alone gave a warning of his true nature in times of peace. Like the boots—their low heels a sign that his duties might require more walking than would those of a cowhand—and gunbelt, his tight rolled bandana, open necked shirt, trousers and the low crowned, wide brimmed hat swinging by its barbiquejo chinstrap from the horn of his saddle were all black.

  ‘Dusty!’ the Kid said, stepping to the nearest sleeping shape on his right.

  Quietly though the word was spoken, the man to whom it had been addressed woke instantly. Even sitting up, it was obvious he was not tall. Beyond him, a much larger figure stirred and rose from its bed.

  ‘Yes?’ asked Captain Dustine Edward Marsden “Dusty” Fog.

  Although the trail boss and segundo of the great OD Connected ranch, 25 the speaker was young and not more than five foot six inches in height. For all that, there was a width to his shoulders, tapering to a lean waist and powerful legs, suggestive of strength beyond average. Yet, expensive though they were, he contrived to make his cowhand style clothing look like the cast offs of a much better favored person and they tended to detract from his appearance. Under shortish dusty blond hair! tanned by the elements, his face was handsome without being eye-catching. There was, nevertheless, an intelligence and power in its lines if one took the trouble to look. Something in his gray eyes and mouth, which smiled easily, would inform the discerning he had the indefinable presence of a born leader regardless of his size or age.

  ‘I’ve just got word from Raccoon Talker,’ the Kid announced, squatting on his heels alongside the small Texan and holding his pleasant tenor drawl low to avoid disturbing the rest of the trail crew. She’s wanting me to help.’

  ‘Where is she?’ Dusty inquired, his voice equally indicative of origins in the Lone State State, although he had had a better formal education.

  The small Texan knew the person to whom his companion was referring to be the senior medicine woman of the Pehnane Comanche, but he was equally aware that she was unlikely to be in the immediate vicinity of the trail herd. For all that, he had no need to be told how she was able to deliver the message. He had often heard of the mysterious powers possessed by Indian medicine men and women. What was more, he realized the matter must be one of especial urgency and importance for Raccoon Talker to have used her ‘medicine’ techniq
ues to contact his black dressed amigo.

  ‘On the reservation,’ the Kid replied.

  ‘Does she need you to go there?’

  ‘Nope. Allows there could come bad trouble in the Kweharehnuh country and you ’n’ me’re the best suited to stop it.’

  ‘The Kweharehnuh, huh?’

  ‘Wolf Runner’s village,’ the Kid elaborated. ‘Happen I recall it right, they range some south of the main band.’

  ‘That would be down Holbrock County way, wouldn’t it?’ Dusty guessed.

  ‘Thereabout.’

  ‘Well I’ll be damned,’ the small Texan breathed. ‘If you read something like it in a book, you’d never believe it. Uncle Devil told me to call at Holbrock on the way back from delivering the herd to Fort Sumner and look in on a feller who’s put up a business deal to him.’

  ‘This won’t wait until we’ve done that,’ the Kid warned. ‘Best see it doesn’t have to then,’ the small Texan replied and looked at the exceptionally handsome, golden blond haired young giant who was listening to the conversation. ‘Take the herd, Mark and, happen you haven’t heard anything from me before, head up to Holbrock with the boys when you’re through.’

  ‘You figure it’ll come bad enough to need us, Lon?’ Mark Counter asked. 26

  ‘If it isn’t bad enough, Racoon Talker calling me that way, it’ll do ’til something bad comes around,’ the Kid answered somberly. ‘I’m just hoping Dusty and me can get there in time to take cards.’

  Eight

  Arrest Him for Murder

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned!’ Sheriff Jerome Dickson ejaculated, lifting his gaze from the report he was writing at his desk to find out who had entered his office. ‘I was figuring on coming to look for you when I’d finished this.’