The Killing at Circle C Read online

  ‘Now it is,’ Jake Cree said. ‘We let a good man ride into danger like he was settin’ off to a barn dance – no mention of how he’d get in touch, what signals we should expect; what to do if none came – so you’d best speak out now or we’ll still be here at Christmas.’

  It was late evening, the shadows long, the embers in the smoke-blackened rocks glowing bright then dark in a shifting pattern of colour before the warm and gentle breeze. All three men were close to the fire and the sweet smell of burning logs, lying in an ungainly sprawl, hunkered awkwardly, rolling yet another cigarette, gazing off into the gathering dusk, poking idly at the embers with a stick – evincing all the restless mannerisms of men who had been too long idle yet were uncertain how to break away. And always, for each of them, there was the looming menace of the high purple cliffs set against the fiery western skies with the notch leading into Hole In The Wall cut into them like the sharp V of a rifle’s rear sight.

  Nothing had moved.

  They had heard no sound.

  ‘What I don’t understand,’ Dave Lee Nelson said, ‘is why Daniel rode under that weird Cold Hand name, and how he kept that and his outlaw past under his hat for so long.’

  Nelson, like Will earlier in the day, was sitting away from the fire. He had ridden in on a lathered horse not too long after Daniel Sagger had headed back to the Hole, the badge on his vest glittering in the rays of the westering sun. Quickly, he had off-saddled and brought the men up to date on the happenings back at Ten Mile – eliciting a grin of pride from Cree when he was told of his wife’s part in the affair. Nelson mentioned his elevation to deputy marshal with a wary glance at Slim Gillo – who nodded approval – while McClure’s swift decision to send Nelson out to intercept the men chasing Daniel Sagger sent an already admired marshal’s reputation soaring.

  ‘Cold Hand,’ Gillo said, in answer to his question, ‘because there never was a man could hold a six shooter steadier than Daniel. How he kept it under his hat? Well, I guess he lost himself in the world of small-time ranching, and when he did that he lost everybody else, too.’

  ‘Until Cajun Pride got sick and ambitious and decided to hunt him down,’ Jake Cree said bitterly. For a few moments there was silence as all four of them reflected on what was, and what might have been. Then Cree said, ‘You were about to say, Slim?’

  ‘They’ll stop the train tonight, I’ve said that and I’m sure of it,’ Slim Gillo said at last, his joints cracking like distant gunfire as he eased closer to the fire. ‘That deadline means they’re already short of time; they’ll be looking at somewhere real close. So, stickin’ my neck out, I say they’ll hit the Overland Flyer about ten miles after it pulls out of Casper.’

  ‘And stopping it’s their first problem,’ Jake said, eyes narrowed in thought. ‘You reckon what, Slim? A barrier of some kind, a pile of rocks or timber?’

  ‘Lantern,’ the deputy said. ‘Faster and easier to wave them down with a red light. Ain’t a train driver around wouldn’t at least slow down out of curiosity – and when he does that, they’ve got him.’

  Watching the two older men, listening to their talk, Will Sagger was gingerly moving his shoulder to prevent it stiffening while finding it difficult to reconcile the father he knew of old with this new man who was at home with a band of outlaws. And despite knowing he had been dragged into it, despite his pa’s reassurance that it would be over quickly, Will couldn’t rid his mind of the awful conviction that those words had been for his benefit and had hidden Daniel Sagger’s deep uncertainty and misgivings.

  Cajun Pride, the Utah Kid. Was he likely to walk away from a spectacular train robbery just because a man he had hounded asks him to? Could Daniel Sagger even risk making that request when surrounded by lawless gunslingers eager for the next fast dollar? In Will’s opinion, if his pa did manage to put his question to the Utah Kid, it would be treated with disbelief, and brushed aside – hell, in Pride’s estimation Will’s pa was cut from the same cloth, had gained his reputation as Daniel ‘Cold Hand’ Sagger, partner and equal of the infamous Utah Kid.

  Fame beckoned. Pride could envisage two ageing gunslingers rekindling the flames of youth and going out with an almighty bang. For a dying man, that made some warped kind of sense, but for a man who still had everything to live for . . .

  ‘From what you’ve told me,’ Dave Nelson said, cutting pertinently through Will’s thoughts after another lengthy silence, ‘there’s still an unexplained gunshot, a possibility that Daniel’s no longer in the game.’ He looked across at Will. ‘I guess that’s a blunt way of putting it, feller, but it’s something we’ve got to face.’

  ‘Possible, but not likely,’ Will said, knowing there was little on which to base such optimism, yet convinced nevertheless that his pa was still alive. ‘When they do come riding out of the Hole’ – he grinned crookedly – ‘this Cold Hand Sagger’ll be right there with them.’

  ‘And we’ll be right behind,’ Jake said, ‘ready to pull him out if things get rough.’

  ‘We will,’ Slim Gillo said, and Nelson nodded his head in agreement.

  ‘If we know where they’re headed,’ Jake Cree said, ‘if your guess is good and they are planning on hitting the train this side of Casper – then we can stay well back, not risk being spotted.’

  ‘That was no guess,’ Gillo said. ‘It’s a prediction I’ll stake my reputation on.’

  ‘You ain’t got one to stake,’ Cree said, the tension easing for an instant as he grinned, ‘but when this night’s out that could all change.’

  ‘Deputy leads raid that foils daring train robbery,’ Will quoted. ‘You’ll snatch the headlines off the Utah Kid, Slim, come election time you’ll get more votes than Cliff McClure.’

  ‘Shucks,’ Gillo said, ‘all of a sudden my goddamn hat’s too tight.’

  And then Will Sagger said softly, but with such intense urgency that his words quickened the pulse of each man around that fire, ‘I hear hoofbeats; there’s a bunch of riders comin’ down from Hole In The Wall.’

  The seven men came down from the notch in a rowdy, winding column and hit the flat land at a gallop. Cajun Pride had chosen this grandiose manner of descent as a statement to whoever might be watching that he and his men were unstoppable. And he had insisted that Daniel Sagger ride immediately behind him and, when they were out of the Hole and the pace moderated, come alongside him, partners riding stirrup as they led their men into that final, glorious battle.

  Listening to all this, Sagger was of the opinion that his old friend’s bodily sickness had mentally unbalanced him, but he had no option other than to comply. And so he was behind Pride when his horse came tumbling down from the pass, drew alongside him as they headed east across the ridged grassland and, in the natural way of a man on the lookout for enemies, let his eyes wander as he rode to pick up any sign of the three men who were awaiting his signal.

  There was no sign, and that gave him considerable satisfaction. They were staying back, keeping under cover and, because they had no time to make the ride to Ten Mile Halt to alert the authorities, they would certainly follow the outlaw band.

  With those two stalwarts and my own son alongside me, Sagger thought, we’ll defeat these bastards. And if he did allow anything to trouble him, it came from his uncomfortable musings on the ultimate fate of Cajun Pride, the Utah Kid.

  ‘Brooding?’

  Pride’s voice cut through his thoughts and the thunder of racing hoofs.

  ‘Cogitating on what lies ahead. Wondering if you’ve had second thoughts.’

  ‘If I have,’ Pride said, ‘they’ve everything to do with how we conduct this raid, damn all to do with quitting.’

  ‘Then that’s your loss, my friend.’

  ‘Loss?’ Pride laughed gaily. ‘Come on, nobody’s a loser in this one, Daniel, and if you ride away from it hating my guts, you’ll ride away a rich man.’

  ‘You figured on a foolproof way of doing this?’

  ‘Nothing’s foolproof. We
use a lantern to halt the train, we board her, we persuade the messenger to give us the money.’ He glanced across at Sagger. ‘Step at a time, Daniel. You and me, we’ll pull it off.’

  The two men lapsed into silence. Time passed; as the group pushed on hard the terrain changed to become hillier, and with the sun well down the land was lost in darkness that would only be relieved with the coming of the moon.

  Fifteen miles on, the horses blowing, the moon still not in evidence, Pride turned in the saddle, looked back across the following riders and called a halt. They had reached an area of low hills and, to Sagger, it seemed that Pride had chosen his stopping place carefully: they had just taken a right fork, and a high bluff was blocking any view of their back-trail. There, the group came together, milling for a few moments, then settling as the horses dropped their heads to sniff out the available grass. O’Brien fumbled in his pocket, came up with a rolled cigarette, reached for a match.

  ‘Yeah,’ Pride said with approval, as the match flared. ‘I reckon the more light we show, the more noise we make, then the more natural it looks and sounds.’

  O’Brien lit the cigarette, flicked the match away and said, ‘How come?’

  ‘We’re being followed.’

  Sagger snapped his head around, saw Pride watching him.

  ‘I heard nothing.’

  Pride shrugged. ‘I guess a man near death has sharpened senses. They’ve been with us since the Hole. And now we fix them.’

  The cold-eyed killer, Harry Tracy, eased his horse over. ‘How many?’

  ‘Four.’ Pride shook his head. ‘Don’t matter anyhow. A small bunch, that I do know.’

  ‘Enough of us here to take them.’

  ‘Except we’ve got other, more important work to do.’ Pride nodded to O’Brien. ‘Fergel, when we move off I want you and Karl to remain here. Leave your horses now, take your rifles up on to that bluff. We’ll give you time to get settled – ten minutes should do it.’

  O’Brien grinned. ‘Got it.’

  He went to his horse, moved it off the trail and tethered it to a low tree, then slipped his rifle from its boot. While the outlaw stood by waiting for Karl Weiss to do the same, Sagger looked at Cajun Pride, his yellow shirt a beacon in the gloom.

  ‘Why don’t I stop behind with them? Could be a posse, and an ambush like that needs a feller with experience—’

  Harry Tracy cut him off with a low laugh. ‘Experience in what, back-shootin’? Hell, there’s only one reason you want to stay behind and that’s to stop O’Brien and Weiss and warn your friends.’

  ‘Is that right, Daniel?’

  ‘I gave you my reason.’ Sagger turned away from Pride, watched O’Brien and Weiss leave their horses and fade away into the darkness and shook his head. ‘Please yourself. I don’t know who’s following us – or even if there is anyone back there – but if you’re banking on hardbitten riders being stopped by a couple of greenhorns. . . .’

  Feigning utter disgust he went across to his horse, made a great show of checking its rig. Short of walking out on Cajun Pride and showing his hand, there was nothing more he could do to help Will, Cree and Gillo. Three men. Yet Pride had said four, and he was rarely wrong. For a moment Sagger pondered on the identity of the fourth rider, then pushed him into the background. It didn’t matter. Three or four, their only hope was to stay wide awake, be constantly aware that discovery was always likely, ride with their eyes skinned for a possible ambush. And, even as the thoughts raced through his mind, Sagger’s confidence received a boost as the rising moon drifted from behind low clouds. All right, that might help the two drygulchers – but Gillo was a good deputy carrying with him the wisdom of Cliff McClure and, if he’d taken charge and kept the others in the shadows, the two on top of the bluff would be exposed and who could predict the outcome?

  The only certainty was that Sagger needed them. He could ride along with Cajun Pride, keep hammering away at him, weakening his resolve; trying to convince him that the right way to everlasting peace of mind was the law-abiding way; but if came down to one man stopping a train robbery when up against the likes of Tracy, Johnson and Lant – well, he’d been out of the game for far too long.

  ‘That’s it, time’s up,’ Pride said. ‘Let’s move on out.’

  With a jingle of bridles, the soft snorts of the horses and the squeak of leather, the five remaining riders pulled away and, moving stealthily across the lusher grass up against the slopes, they slipped away into the darkness.

  ‘Still talking, I guess,’ Nelson said.

  They’d almost stumbled on the resting outlaws; would have done so but for Slim Gillo’s insistence that periodically they should rein in, keep perfectly still – and listen.

  That listening had paid off. In the hilly country they had entered, sound didn’t carry well, and the faint whispers that reached them were almost drowned by the drumming of their horses’ hooves reflected back from the steep slopes. But they’d stopped in time, pulled back. Now they were a quarter-mile on the other side of a high bluff, the men standing as they rested their horses off the trail, watched the thin moon rise, and waited.

  ‘How much further?’

  Gillo looked at Cree. ‘Ten miles. An hour’s riding?’

  ‘And the train comes through when?’

  ‘Christ, leave that to them,’ Gillo said. ‘All we do is tag along, figure out how to get between them and the Overland Flyer.’

  ‘Only one way,’ Nelson said, ‘and it ain’t easy.’ He rubbed his horse’s neck absently, said, ‘Anybody count those fellers as they came down from the Hole?’

  ‘Seven,’ Will said. He had squinted into the sun’s waning light from the shelter of the stunted trees, watching the descent from Hole In The Wall with the gleaming Winchester in the crook of his arm. The outlaws had come tumbling fast and raucously from their lair in single file, then pulled a plume of dust across the grassland as they rode by in a rough arrowhead formation with two men at the front.

  ‘Pa was there,’ he said, ‘alongside a feller in a yellow shirt, black hat.’

  ‘That’d be Cajun Pride,’ Slim Gillo said. ‘His manner of dressing was on his dodger. Always did like to make himself the centre of attention, so this valedictory fling with his old pard along to cast admiring glances at him should’ve been expected.’

  ‘Valedictory,’ Jake Cree said, and shook his head.

  ‘An educated lawman,’ Dave Lee Nelson said.

  ‘Horseshit,’ Slim Gillo said, and spat into the grass.

  ‘They’re moving!’

  Even as he snapped the words Will, at great risk to his wounded shoulder, had run to his horse and was leaping recklessly into the saddle. The others paused for a moment to listen. Clearly, from the other side of the bluff, hoofbeats could be heard rattling away into the distance. Tripping over their own feet, they rushed to follow Will’s lead, flung themselves into the saddle and spurred out on to the trail.

  Gangling Slim Gillo had the fastest horse. Perhaps, also, Will thought as they raced towards the bluff, he was keen to confirm his position as senior lawman, put Dave Lee Nelson in his place. Certainly he swiftly hit the front, whipping the loose ends of his reins back and forth in front of him as he urged his straining mount to greater speed.

  Those reins were still lashing from side to side when the horse’s legs went from under it and Slim went flying from the saddle to bite the dust. The crack of the rifle that had downed the deputy was followed by a second. Will grunted, hearing the dull thump, sensing the terrible shock of the bullet. His horse jerked under him, threw its head high and went down, sliding gallantly on haunches and stiff forelegs before buckling and rolling limply sideways as Will leaped clear.

  His eyes, screwed up against the settling dust and the pain of his jarred shoulder, were everywhere as he rolled. Slim was flat on his face, as still as a felled tree. Jake and Dave Lee Nelson had been taking up the rear; when the shots came they had swung hard off the trail. Now bright muzzle flashes lit up t
he night like summer lightning as they blazed away at the bluff.

  Wincing, Will staggered to his feet and ran to join them. He dropped to his knees alongside Cree, said, ‘You got them spotted?’

  ‘Saw the flashes clear as day. Damn fools are together – and I think Dave got one.’

  ‘If they’re fools,’ Will said, ‘what does that make us?’

  ‘Double damned for stupidity,’ Dave Lee Nelson said scathingly. ‘Listen, you two lay down covering fire, I’m going up the hill.’

  ‘Listen to the man,’ Cree said, flashing Will a grin. ‘Off you go then, Deputy – but take care!’

  The moon was drifting in and out of the high clouds. Brush crackled as Nelson drifted away into the gloom. Will drew his six-gun and, with Cree matching him bullet for bullet, began drilling measured shots into the crown of the bluff.

  ‘Slim?’ Cree said through his teeth.

  ‘Down, not moving.’

  ‘You hurt?’

  ‘No more than I was – but Pa’s rifle’s out there . . .’

  Cree chuckled drily. ‘You realize we’re playin’ that same damn fool game, settin’ so close together one shot could kill the both of us?’

  ‘I guess you’ve forgotten everything you were taught when you were Johnny Reb fighting for the glory of the South,’ Will said – then ducked instinctively as a volley of shots rang out from high above.

  ‘Hold your fire,’ Cree said, and tilted his six-gun. ‘He’s in amongst them.’

  ‘I’ll get Pa’s rifle, check on Slim.’

  ‘No—’

  But Will was not listening. Pouching his six-gun, conscious that the crackle of gunfire up above had ceased, he ran to his downed horse, dragged the Winchester from its boot then raced to where Slim Gillo had fallen.

  He was no longer there, and his horse had climbed to its feet and was standing at the far side of the trail.

  The moon slid from behind a cloud, revealing scuff marks in the dust. They led to the side of the trail, and when Will followed them he found the lanky deputy sitting up against a boulder, long legs stretched out in front of him as he clamped a rolled bandanna against the spreading wet stain under his arm, and cursed under his breath.