The Reckoning Page 3

  “She? Who’s that, Pinshaw? Your wife? ’Cause that’s the only woman who’d have anything to do with a weasel like you.”

  The insult had the desired effect. “It don’t have to be my wife; there’s other women that’s interested in me too. I get around with them plenty.” Beads of sweat appeared on his brow.

  “You must mean that little slip of a shop girl at The Sew Pretty. I heard you were sweet on her. What’s her name? Sue?” He drew her name out. “Why, no self-respecting pretty young thing would have nothin’ to do with a skunk like you.” Kelly egged Pinshaw on. “Now would she? She wouldn’t have nothin’ to do with you ’tall. Surely you ain’t too dumb to know that, are you?”

  Pinshaw took the bait and stiffened. “I guess she would want to be with me. I’m an important man around here. I’m almost a deputy, and I help out at the saloon and The Sew Pretty too, and if I don’t get back to town soon, there’s a bunch there that’ll come ridin’ on out here just like that.” He snapped his fingers weakly.

  Kelly grunted, then sat thinking for a moment. “…Now I get it. Your wife and the shop girl don’t even know where you are, do they? You didn’t tell neither of them you were comin’ out here, did you? Or who you were gonna meet. Did you? Because you thought you were gonna get some big money and didn’t want nobody else to know. Right? You didn’t tell nobody!”

  It was too much for Pinshaw. He needed there to be someone else who knew where he was and why. “I did too. I told Sue!” He thrust his chin out as soon as he said it, suddenly aware he might have just signed his own death warrant and hers. His eyes widened, and he looked at Kelly with false bravado.

  “Thanks, that’s exactly what I needed to know. In fact, that’s all I needed to know. I believe that’s the first thing you said since you got here that ain’t a lie.”

  Kelly said it in such a hard way it sent a shiver up Pinshaw’s spine. He couldn’t help himself and blurted, “She’s sweet on me too, Sue is.” His heart leaped. Would Kelly believe him? He wiped at his brow again and reached down for his ridiculous hat.

  Kelly got up from the fire ring and dusted his pants off with his dirty Stetson.

  Pinshaw jumped to his feet and backed away from his tormentor. “Forget about the money. Just forget that I even asked about it. Okay?” When Kelly didn’t reply, Pinshaw said, “Why, Margaret and me will just up and leave town, and no one’s the wiser, right? That’s the way I’ll play it; we’ll just skedaddle somewhere where nobody knows us and we don’t know nobody. So your secret’s safe with us.”

  Silence.

  Pinshaw continued digging a black hole. “But if you did want to give me a little money though, so’s we could leave, I could meet you back out here again tomorrow.” Silence. “But only if you want.” Pinshaw twisted the rim of the bowler in his hands. The large cottonwood behind him stopped his halting retreat.

  Kelly’s face broke into a small grin. “That’s one thing you can count on, Pinshaw—that you’ll be here tomorrow. But then, I doubt they’ll even find your body that soon.” He quick-drew his Colt and put two holes in Pinshaw’s chest. Pinshaw had also drawn his gun and got off a late shot, which dug into the dirt harmlessly at Kelly’s feet. Blinding pain tore through Pinshaw’s chest. He staggered backward and crumpled against the tree, dropped his pistol, and collapsed to the ground.

  Kelly doused the firepit with water he carried from the stream in Pinshaw’s bowler. Steam and ashes rose high in the sky.

  The last thing Pinshaw heard was Kelly’s laugh. “Shop girl’s next.”

  Chapter Three

  It was another couple of months before the sheriff rode out to the McAlister farm again. The lawman stopped by at lunchtime, labored off his horse, and plopped down in what had become his regular kitchen chair. Butler fanned himself with the chipped plate Ike put in front of him.

  Ike brought the cast iron pot over and ladled some runny stew on Butler’s dish. “It don’t have any meat, Will.”

  “That’s okay, Ike. I thank you for what you’ve shared.” He forked up a mouthful. “Say, how’s Sue?”

  Ike looked up from his plate. “She’s fine. Writes me every month, regular. But we both know you didn’t ride all the way out here just to ask about her.” Even the sight of Butler still rankled him.

  “Well, that reminds me. I wondered if you and Rob had ever visited Emporia. I hear it’s nice in the summertime. Might be some things there that you’d find interesting.”

  Ike’s stomach jumped and he stared at Butler. “Thanks, Sheriff, we’ll look into it.” He was used to getting vague tips from Butler. The lawman couldn’t come right out and say “Please do my job for me.” “Anything else?”

  “No…” But Butler hesitated and scrunched his eyebrows.

  Ike cocked his head toward the lawman. “Sheriff?”

  “Well, I was just wondering if Sue mighta run across anybody out there in Colorado yet that I can scratch off my list of wanted men here. Like that devil Manning. You heard anything from her along those lines?”

  Ike maintained steady eye contact with the portly lawman. “Nope. I have not, and I wouldn’t tell you if I had. What good would it do you to know about killers that’s already left your territory?”

  “Maybe you’re right, Ike, but I just like to know what I’m up against around here, and what I’m not.”

  “Fair enough.” Ike studied the man’s face as they ate. Butler wasn’t likely to ever go up against anyone again. Not as old and lame as he was. When they’d finished, Ike rose stiff-legged out of his chair. He and Rob moved toward the front door, forcing the sheriff to get up and do the same. Outside, Butler was barely able to get his boot high enough for the stirrup. After two tries, and a helping hand from Rob, the lawman was mounted up.

  “You be sure and let me know what you find out from Sue, okay, Ike?”

  Ike tipped his hat. “Sheriff.”

  As Butler rode away, Ike turned and headed toward the barn. There was preparing to do.

  ****

  “That’s two more, Ike, and we got out without a scratch this time.” Rob looked pleased as he said it.

  Ike stared straight ahead. “But they wasn’t Manning or any of his boys. Dunno—just a feelin’—but I’m thinkin’ more and more that Sue’s on the right track out in Colorado.” The two brothers rode back to the McAlister farm. Ike said, “I’d say we were pretty lucky, since we didn’t know exactly how many was in that Emporia saloon when we walked in. But luck has a way of comin’ and goin’. And lately, it’s startin’ to feel like we’re pushin’ ours.” He brought his horse to a halt at the barn door and struggled to dismount. “Good thing they didn’t know us by sight, or we’d have been hard up against it.”

  Ike leaned toward Ally’s neck as a first step in disengaging himself from the horse. Finally, he was down, and as he led Ally to the filmy water trough, he looked around at the ramshackle McAlister spread. “We’re gonna need some of that luck to keep this ranch goin’. It’s lookin’ more and more like it ain’t never gonna provide for us.”

  Ike swirled a hand in the still trough, then pulled Ally away. “Keep the horses away from this until we empty and refill it. No tellin’ what’s crawled into this water and died in the last two weeks.”

  Rob picked up a stone and heaved it at the barn.

  “What’s eatin’ you, brother?”

  “It’s all this waitin’, Ike. When we gonna stop chasin’ our tails here and head out to Colorado? Those Emporia boys weren’t who we were lookin’ for.”

  “Waitin’ here is exactly what we need to be doin’ ’til we hear somethin’ positive from Sue. If she says it looks like Manning’s out there, we go.”

  The two of them cobbled together a warm meal of beans and stale bread that night before turning in, exhausted. In the morning, Ike mounted up for a short ride into Lawrence to check mail. Rob lifted a cup of weak coffee up to him.

  “Let me know what’s goin’ on in town, will ya?”

  Ike touch
ed a hand to his hat and was off. Toward evening, he returned and unsaddled Ally in the barn.

  Rob met Ike outside as he was coming back to the house. “What’s the word from Sue?”

  “Well, her letter says she thinks she might be on to somethin’. Seems there’s a rancher out of Denver a ways that’s been runnin’ a cattle spread for a few years.”

  “So what?”

  “She says the rumor is he was a raider, even though he says he came from back east. She’s left Denver for some small town called Cottonwood, close by the ranch this fella’s got, tryin’ to learn more about him and his men.”

  “Sounds promising. Hope we hear somethin’ more soon. I’m gettin’ itchy to be out of here.”

  ****

  A month later, the mercantile owner in Lawrence handed Ike Sue’s latest letter. He tore it open.

  Dear Ike,

  I hope you and Rob are well. I’m fine here in Cottonwood. I’m working at a nice dress shop called The Sew Pretty. This is a good little town that gets pretty riled up on Saturday nights, just like some of the towns you visited back in Kansas. You should come out and visit this one too. Rock by the side of the stable.

  Love, Sue

  Ike put the letter down on the kitchen table. “That’s it, Rob. What we been waitin’ for. She thinks it’s Manning. I’m gonna ride out to Colorado and locate Cottonwood. I’ll get on at that ranch if I can and see what I can turn up. You stay here and—”

  Rob jumped in. “Whoa there, brother. You ain’t goin’ to Colorado, I am. Your leg ain’t full healed yet, and somebody’s gotta stay here to keep this sorry spread runnin’. ’Sides, no self-respecting rancher would hire a lamer like you. They’d pick me over you any day.”

  Ike felt a flush spread over his face.

  “You know I’m right, so don’t be sputterin’ back at me, and don’t give me none of your hard stares. I’m goin’, and you’re stayin’ here, at least ’til I find somethin’ out. You know I’m right about this.”

  Ike shook his head. “You’re as mule-headed as that sister of yours.”

  Rob countered. “She’s your sister too, and we both know where the muleheadedness comes from in this family, and it ain’t from me.” Rob stared at Ike. “And what the heck does that last line of hers mean? What’s ‘Rock by the stables’ have to do with anything?”

  “It’s code. Remember her letter last month? She said she’d let me know where she’s gonna leave messages if I came out to Cottonwood, only she doesn’t know it’s gonna be you and not me. And you can’t be seen talkin’ to her out there. Take a different last name. If that’s Manning out there, we don’t want to tip him off before we have to.” Ike looked out the farmhouse window to the west, where a light green landscape greeted his steady gaze.

  ****

  The next month, Ike got letters from both Rob and Sue. Rob had hired on as a hand at a place called the Emerald Valley Ranch outside of Cottonwood, the same ranch Sue mentioned in a previous letter. He said some of the ranch hands told him they’d come from Kansas several years ago. They bragged about some of their exploits there, but no one mentioned the raid on Lawrence directly.

  Sue’s letter said she was happy to get a secret message from Rob, who was working at the ranch under an alias, so no one would know he was her brother. There was nothing new about whether the rancher was Manning or not. Ike only had the sketchiest description of what he looked like.

  Ike pursed his lips hard. Time was running out. How long could they keep chasing dead ends? Ike folded the letters back up in his pocket and headed out of Lawrence for the farm. When he reached the barn, he was struck by how deserted it looked with only him still there. But then, he wasn’t really there anymore. He gazed to the west as he rubbed Ally down. A faint hope rose in his heart. Maybe they were finally getting closer to finding the bastard.

  Chapter Four

  The grayed wooden buckboard seat bounced Sue McAlister around as she rode the well-traveled main dirt road between Cottonwood and Emerald Valley Ranch. She smiled as the horse trotted, because the trip gave her an opportunity to see more of the stunning mountain countryside she’d surrounded herself with since leaving Kansas. She had two hats for Emerald Tompkins, the rancher’s wife, from Margaret Pinshaw, who owned the shop where Sue worked. Sue had written Ike that she’d taken Johnson as her last name, in Billy’s honor. She also told Ike that she’d keep her ear to the ground, and a visit to Emerald Valley would likely help her do that. It might be Manning’s spread.

  The hillsides showcased large forests of tall aspen whose leaves were on the verge of turning golden. The foliage on the white-barked trees made a light green mosaic from afar. The aspen mixed with dark green evergreens to produce a multi-colored patchwork, capped by a blanket of white that lay softly on the distant mountaintops. The morning frost had given way to a damp cold that still lay over the mountain valley, and Sue drew her bulky coat closer around her shoulders. Colorado fall mornings brought a chill that enveloped everything until the sun woke up and drove the cold back in uneven patterns.

  When Sue pulled up in front of the ranch house, Dan Kelly was busy hurling a large knife at the weathered barn again and again. She put the wagon brake on, and he turned to the sound. Sue tried to hide her face as Kelly stared at her for a moment, then turned back to the barn, retrieved his knife, and jammed it back in its sheath. She hurried down from the buckboard, grabbed the two hatboxes from the wagon bed, and snuck a glance back at him before disappearing into the ranch house.

  ****

  Kelly rubbed a hand over his dirty whiskers and walked into the barn. Scratchy was adding extra wood to the potbellied iron stove that served as a makeshift blacksmith’s forge.

  “Hi, Dan! You got anything else for me to do after I finish hammerin’ out this wheel rim?”

  Kelly walked by without a word and went straight to the stall where he kept his horse. The shop girl was making it easy for him. He draped a thin blanket over the stallion’s back, then threw a saddle over him and cinched it tight. He drew his Winchester out of its scabbard, pump-chambered a cartridge, and shoved it back in the leather sleeve. A quick feel at his side for his knife, then he reflexively put a hand to his holster. He led the horse out of the barn and walked toward the log bunkhouse.

  Scratchy followed him out. “Where you off to?”

  “Just takin’ care of some business that don’t concern you none. Some business that I got an idea is your fault to begin with.” Payment was due from more than just Sue. Kelly disappeared into the bunkhouse in search of his long winter coat. He donned it and threw some cold beef jerky into a homespun cloth bag. Once his blood was up, a killing usually followed. Outside, he boosted his left boot up into the stirrup, swung his right leg over his horse’s broad back, and settled into the saddle. He looked down at Scratchy. “I probably ain’t gonna be back tonight, so take care of things around here.” He jerked his horse away, stared at Sue’s wagon as he rode past it, and trotted down the main road back to town. The next time he looked back the ranch was out of sight.

  ****

  Sue knocked rapidly on the carved mahogany ranch house door, after looking back toward the barn, hoping to get inside quickly. Emerald Tompkins herself answered it and invited her in for tea. Sue demurred, but Emerald insisted and almost pulled her visitor into the foyer by an arm. Sue wanted nothing more than to deliver the hats and leave. She’d always felt uncomfortable around Tompkins’ cowboys in town, but she didn’t know how to turn Emerald’s excited invitation down.

  Sue sat quietly with her hostess in the great room adorned with original oil paintings in gold gilt frames. An enormous portrait of Emerald resplendent in a flowing light green gown hung prominently above the fireplace mantel. Her dress set off her coiffed blonde hair perfectly and drew attention to her green eyes as well. Emerald’s gaze traveled to the image several times as she talked. “I don’t care for that painting very much. I think it makes my mouth look small and my neck too long. What do you think?�
��

  Sue’s eyes fastened on the portrait. Truth be told, she didn’t care for it either. “It’s a wonderful likeness, and I don’t think your mouth is too small at all.” She looked back to Emerald who still stared at the oil. A small Mexican woman brought in a tray of pastries and tea and held the platter out to Emerald.

  “Oh, I couldn’t possibly eat those. Just one of them would likely put five pounds on my hips, and we couldn’t have that, now could we?” She smiled at Sue, then waved a hand in the air as if to say, “Oh all right,” and plucked the biggest roll off the plate. Her eyes fastened on the painting again.

  “I don’t get many visitors out this way, you see. May I call you Sue? That is your name, isn’t it?” She polished off the pastry in two bites and grabbed a second one. “Have one, won’t you?” Without stopping, she said, “Why, I declare I have never seen anyone as pretty as you. You must have young gents trailing after you all the time.” Emerald smiled broadly, then lowered her gaze to Sue’s dress. “And I’m certain that Mrs. Pinshaw can help you pick out some more appropriate dresses as well. She would be glad to help you with your wardrobe, I’m sure.” An owlish smile spread over her face.

  A self-absorbed Emerald monopolized the conversation for several hours before Sue could extricate herself and start back to Cottonwood. She guided the wagon around the wide turn in the road, and the ranch disappeared. She heaved a sigh of relief. Darkness came early to the mountains in the fall, and Sue snapped the reins so the horses would pick up their pace. She hadn’t been on the road for more than half an hour when a lone rider appeared almost out of nowhere, riding crazily toward her as he raced down from the upslope off to her right. He galloped his horse straight at the wagon’s team, blocking them, then grabbed the reins and brought them to a halt.

  Sue screamed and jumped up from the wagon seat. “What are you doing! You could have killed me!” It was Kelly, there was no mistaking it. Margaret Pinshaw had gone into great detail about him when she’d asked.