Authors: Ellen O'Connell
“Back from where?”
“Finding what buffalo hunters call a stand.”
“You know I can’t shoot well enough to hit anything.”
“Never admit it. Point it at them and look mean.”
The land was frustratingly flat. He had to ride more than five miles from home to find enough of a hill for cover, but in the end he found an ideal spot. The road curved away from the creek here, and anyone riding south would be coming straight at the hill where Cal set up the tripod for the Sharps.
He counted on Preston riding to the farm over the same route he’d taken when Cal had been with him last winter. A man like Preston wouldn’t ride around even if he suspected Cal knew he was coming. With six or more men behind him, Preston wouldn’t get cautious until he was close to the farm.
Satisfied with what he’d found, Cal headed home. If he guessed wrong about Preston, at least Norah would be safe at Carburys’. He wondered if Archie knew he had invited Early and the horses too.
F
RUSTRATED AND IMPATIENT,
Cal had to play mind games to stay quietly in place on the third day. Lying in wait from sunup to sundown was tedious, and Norah would insist on coming home soon no matter what he said. If she did that, he’d have to set up at the house, and the results were bound to be worse, bad even.
All those considerations combined to have Cal fighting a strong urge to hunt Preston down instead of waiting. One more day. Just one more day.
Slight movement in the distance caught his eye. Farmers could be coming from town along the road. He pulled out the field glasses, grunting with satisfaction as Preston and half a dozen others came into focus. Stretching out behind the rifle, he aligned his sights on the spot he’d chosen days ago and waited.
Time slowed. The scene below sharpened. The riders came around the curve exactly as he’d imagined, moving steadily in a way that enlarged men and horses as they rode closer. He squeezed the trigger. Asa Preston flew back out of his saddle and over his horse’s tail.
Ejecting the cartridge and reloading with practiced speed, Cal targeted a second gunman before any of them reacted to the first shot. The second man slumped sideways, fell. For long seconds the others milled in confusion.
Just like buffalo, and folks think they’re dumb animals.
His third shot knocked another rider sideways, and then they scattered, spurring and whipping back around the deadly curve.
The world reverted to normal. Cal shoved the tripod, Sharps, and glasses in the case and moved to his secondary location. If the V Bar C men stopped running and came hunting, he didn’t want to be found.
Silence descended. Two of the three riderless horses had run with the others. One was held by reins trapped under the body of its rider. It moved restlessly, the only thing down there alive to move. One advantage to the .50 caliber bullets in the buffalo gun, a man hit by one wasn’t going to cause trouble after.
Cal stretched on his belly, waiting again. An hour passed. Two. He wouldn’t mind tying Preston’s body on that horse and using it for another message to Van Cleve, but he wasn’t going down there before dark.
A wagon bumped across the prairie, heading right for the killing field. Cal yanked out the field glasses and scanned below in disbelief. Archie Carbury, one of his boys, and a neighbor whose name Cal couldn’t remember were rolling along down there as if on their way to a church picnic.
Unable to spot signs of anyone targeting the men below, Cal picked up his rifle and jogged down to join them.
“The hills around here give someone a good place to set up and shoot us down like fish in a barrel,” he said when he got to the wagon.
Archie looked up from examining a body and grinned. “Do tell. Johnson here says everyone who’d want to shoot us rode by his place this morning heading east and a couple hours ago heading west. Everyone minus three.”
“Did you count noses?” Cal said to Johnson.
“Can’t say I did,” the bearded man answered, looking around nervously.
“Then let’s load them up and get out of here.”
“Load them up? What do we want with bodies?” Archie’s son said.
“I’ll tell you later. Right now get back on the wagon seat and get ready to move.”
The boy started to argue. Archie pulled him aside, said a few words and gave him a swat on the bottom. Ignoring the exchange between father and son, Cal grabbed the nearest body by the belt, heaved, and threw it in the wagon. Johnson helped with the second.
“Keep hold of that horse, will you?” Cal said to Archie as he and Johnson hefted the last body.
In minutes they drove out of the target area at a fast clip, three bodies bouncing in the wagon bed and the saddle horse snorting unhappily behind.
The women and the older Carbury boys hurried out of the house as soon as the wagon turned in the yard. Cal jumped down in time to catch Norah when she threw herself at him, did that checking for wounds thing, and hugged him hard.
“We heard the shots. I knew it was the buffalo gun, but even so. Are you all right?”
Cal hugged back without thinking, caught Archie’s speculative look, his sons’ smirks, and stepped back a little. “Don’t worry. I’m fine. Everything went easy.”
Mabel got a good look in the wagon before her husband pulled her away. “Not many would say three dead men were easy. I suppose you’re going to decorate the V Bar C like an Indian showing off scalps.” Her tone and expression didn’t match the disapproving words.
“Take your mother and Mrs. Sutton inside,” Archie said to his boys.
To Cal’s surprise, Norah took Mabel’s arm and went inside without argument.
“I got to get home,” Johnson said, discomfort plain on his face.
Cal nodded. Archie threw an arm around the man’s shoulders and walked him to where a saddled plow horse waited.
“I’m not sure he’d know which end of a gun to point at an enemy,” Archie said, returning.
“But you do.”
“Spent the war learning things like that. Fourth Kentucky, CSA infantry.” He leaned against the side of the wagon, a dark haired man of middling height who seemed ordinary until you saw how he handled three unexpected bodies.
“You and Norah seem to be getting along pretty good,” Archie said, the humor in his gray eyes saying more.
“She deserves better.”
“So does Mabel, but she’s got me, so I do the best I can and count myself lucky.”
“Your wife didn’t have a Joe Hawkins first.”
“No. That would make it easier.”
Before Cal could ask what that remark meant, the boys charged back out of the house.
“What are you going to do with those bodies, Mr. Sutton?” the young one asked.
Ben they called him, Cal remembered. As tall as his father, the boy could keep his voice man-deep most of the time, but it broke with boyish excitement now.
“I’m going to take them back to the V Bar C so they can bury them.”
“You going to hang them from the ranch sign like last time?”
“No. Unless Van Cleve is stupider than I think he is, he’ll have sharpshooters hidden by the ranch sign. These need to go somewhere else.”
“And do you have a particular place in mind?” Archie asked.
“The house has balconies sticking out of the second floor. One of them is right over the room they eat in, I think.”
Archie whistled. “Sneaking three bodies onto the ranch and getting them up there.... Maybe Ben and I ought to help.”
Cal had been going to settle for hanging Preston somewhere prominent and dumping the other two nearby. Displaying all three would pretty much tell anyone Cal had help, allies. The thought of it tempted him to trust Archie and his son.
“The only way to do it is quiet as death. No talking and no questions.” He gave the boy a hard look.
Archie looped an arm around his son. “It’s time he learned. We’ll have a talk beforehand. You want quiet, you’ll get quiet.”
The V Bar C dogs accepted the two new friends Cal introduced them to without suspicion, more interested in the bodies. Two helpers made the whole operation easier than Cal had believed possible, and whatever Archie had said to his son kept the boy speechless the entire night. They left the bodies hanging from the balcony, the horse tied to some stone statue of a fat, naked boy in the yard.
Cal hoped no one would remark on the empty rifle scabbard on that horse or a missing gun belt on a body. The Winchester that had been in the scabbard was a good one, nothing burned into the stock, and no distinctive scratches on the metal. The gun belt had a nice thirty-eight in the holster. Norah needed guns of her own.
The three of them made it back to the Carburys’ house before midnight. Cal made an exception to his rule about not letting anyone get hold of his gun hand and shook first Archie’s and then Ben’s hand.
“What’s next?” Ben asked.
Cal shrugged. “We’ll have to wait and see.”
But he knew. Van Cleve had sent his men charging in the open, counting on numbers, and failed. What he’d try next would be more like what Cal himself would do, something lowdown and sneaky.
C
ALEB HAD BEEN
right about the advantages of a ramada, Norah thought, as she kneaded bread dough vigorously on the table they’d dragged outside.
Dragging the bed outside too would make for easier sleeping on these hot nights. She smiled to herself at the thought of sleeping outside. Caleb would never agree to it of course. Darkness brought danger. He still wouldn’t let Early go outside alone at night.
The dough achieved a satiny feel. She formed it into a ball and placed it in the greased bowl under a towel. On a day this hot, it would rise here in the shade. Norah picked up the extra flour to return to the bin, then paused at the sound of distant barking.
Scanning the horizon, she caught sight of three specks on the far side of the creek growing steadily larger as they came on fast. Her new rifle hung on the wall just below the pegs for Caleb’s. She lifted it down and gave it an experimental heft, liking the weight and the scent of gun oil. From far enough inside the house to be lost in shadows, she watched the approaching men through the open door and waited.
Caleb reached her before the riders. “You stay inside with Early. Bar the door, and stay inside until they’re gone, no matter what happens.”
Arguing would only take time they didn’t have. She closed the door and dropped the bar in place.
Cal sat on the table under the ramada, watching the riders come toward him. They made such spectacular, clear targets, but could he take out all three? Sun glinted from spots of metal on their chests.
Unless he could make all three disappear, killing any would be futile. Closer now, features were distinguishable under hat brims — Sheriff Ludlow and both his deputies. It didn’t take much imagination to figure their purpose.
He should have taken the chance. This close his odds were much worse, and they meant business. Bad business. He kept his rifle trained on the sheriff, who seemed to think that piece of tin on his chest was a shield.
“Put that rifle down, unbuckle the gun belt, and let it drop,” the sheriff said as soon as he had his horse stopped. “You’re under arrest, Sutton.”
“Arrest for what?”
“You know damn well. You killed Asa Preston and two of his men, you backshooting coward.”
“Shot in the back, were they?”
“Not this time, not that it makes any difference.”
“I’d say it does make a difference, so would witnesses. Are there witnesses?”
“I don’t need a witness. All three of them were shot with that cannon of yours.”
“I don’t think mine is the only buffalo gun in the county.”
“I don’t care what you think. You’re under arrest and you’re coming with us.”
“No. I’m not.”
“Yes. You are.” Cal stiffened in surprise at the sound of the voice behind him and cursed his own carelessness. He should have known. He should have expected.
“Speaking of backshooters, is that what you’ve turned into, Ike?”
“No, but I ought to after what you done to Preston and the others. Don’t try to turn. Put the rifle down, drop the gun belt, and you can stay alive long enough to hang.”
“You’re not taking my husband anywhere.”
Hearing Norah’s voice, knowing she must be behind Ike, almost made Cal do something stupid. Just in time, he jerked his attention back to business.
Surprised by unexpected interference, the sheriff and deputies looked toward Norah. Cal had his pistol out before they recognized their mistake. His heart raced as he angled until he could see Norah in his peripheral vision.
She had her rifle pressed against Ike Kerr’s kidneys, and Ike still held a drawn Colt.
“Let the hammer down easy and put that on the ground,” Cal said.
Ike did as told and moved to join the sheriff’s men at a gesture. Norah started forward with him.
“Norah.” Cal’s voice came out as a croak. He had to get hold of himself or someone would notice his knees shaking. She changed directions and moved to his side, doing a halfway decent job of looking mean.
The sheriff leaned forward in the saddle as far as his big belly would allow. “Mrs. Hawkins....”
“Mrs. Sutton,” Cal said, anger steadying his voice.
The sheriff threw him an annoyed look. “Mrs. Sutton. Three men have been murdered with a gun like your husband’s. I have to take him in. You know that.”
“I know that when Joe Hawkins was murdered, you said you had no jurisdiction out here. You said you couldn’t even investigate, and it was an accident anyway. If you changed your mind about investigating murders, Joe was killed five miles closer to town. Start there. It happened first, and after you arrest Mr. Van Cleve, come back and talk about Caleb.”
“You know I can’t do that.”
“That would be the smart thing to do,” Cal said. “Sometimes men disappear out here. Indians maybe.”
“Don’t you threaten me, you....” Glancing Norah’s way again, the sheriff lowered his voice. “You haven’t heard the last of this. We’ll be back.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
Ike swung up behind one of the deputies. “My horse is about a half-mile south,” he said sullenly.