The Road to Ratchet Creek (10 page)

“Aw, you're not all
that
old, Calamity,” John assured her. “Is she, marshal?”

“Being a truthful man, I'd have to say ‘No' to that,” Cole answered. “But she'd a real smart gal and don't you ever forget it, Johnny boy.”

“I sure won't!” John assured him, then yawned in a too casual manner. “Reckon I'll be getting back and hunting up my bed.”

“And me,” Cole said.

“That's all right for the passengers,” Calamity growled. “But us drivers've work to do. I'll go take a look at my team for the morning.”

“Why don't you go along, marshal?” John inquired. “There might be somebody sneaking around.”

“There just might at that,” grinned Cole. “And it's my duly sworn duty to protect the lives and property of the law-abiding folks of the Territory.”

Watching John saunter back toward the main building, with a jaunty swagger and general air of one who finds growing up to be better than he imagined, Calamity let out a gentle sigh.

“He's a real swell kid, Solly.”

“And smart too. I heard what you said to him, Calam. You handled him good.”

“Thanks. I figured it'd be best if I set him straight afore he pulled another fool game like with the drummers to impress me.”

“You've done it, as smooth and easy as it could've been done.”

“Just how long've you been on hand?” demanded Calamity.

“Long enough to hear what you told him. I'd've gone back if you'd been planning to show him—the golden horseshoe nail.”

“What in hell sort of gal do you think I am?” Calamity yelped indignantly. “Why Johnny's only a kid.”

“And you're rising twenty,” grinned Cole. “That's a hell of a rise—and it's the first time I've ever heard a woman lie about her age that way.”

“Yah! If you're so smart, how is it that you never proved to me that the bits do stick out different on some of us?” Calamity said.

“You mean we
haven't
proved it?”

“Not to me,” Calamity replied.

“All right then,” Cole told her. “As soon as you've seen to your hosses, we'll go find out.”

“M
ORNING
, J
OHNNY,” GREETED
C
ALAMITY, COMING
from the room in which she had spent at least some of the night.

“Hi, Calam,” he replied.

For a young man suffering from the effects of his first love affair fizzling out, Johnny appeared to do remarkably well in the eating line. Three eggs and a pile of bacon heaped the plate before him, while a crumb-dotted empty dish showed that the events of the previous night had failed to rob him of his appetite.

Grinning a little, Calamity sat at John's table. Janowska's daughter looked out of the kitchen, ducked back inside and came out soon after carrying Calamity's breakfast on a tray.

“She looks a nice lil gal,” Calamity commented as the girl walked away after smiling at John.

“Sure,” he replied, trying to sound nonchalant, but blushing.

The appearance of Marshal Cole saved John from further embarrassment. Joining Calamity and the boy, he took a seat. After remarking on the weather, Calamity asked if Cole intended to go through with making a call on Ehart's trading post.

“Yep,” the marshal agreed. “Then I'll cut across country to Ratchet Creek. May even meet you on the trail.”

“Aren't you coming the rest of the way with us, marshal?” asked John, sounding disappointed.

“Nope. Got to go and see a feller.”

“That Ehart's a bad one, my pappy allus says,” John warned. “He come to see us one time, wanted pappy to repair a load of old muzzle-loading guns. Most of 'em were dead mules, as pappy calls anything that's not worth mending, and he told old Ehart so. Only Ehart said it didn't matter as long as they worked a mite.”

“Did your pappy do it?” asked Cole.

“Nope. He reckoned that they might wind up in the wrong hands and that it wouldn't be right to sic unsafe guns on to even Injuns.”

“Smart thinking.”

“We heard tell plenty about Ehart after that, marshal,” John went on. “Folk say he trades guns and drink to the Injuns and works in with owlhoots.”

“You don't want to believe all you hear,” Cole remarked. “Or believe it, but don't go around talking to other folks about it until you're sure.”

“And not even then unless you're sure you can lick the other feller,” Calamity put in.

Monique's arrival caused the subject to be dropped. Yawning and complaining that it was still the middle of the night, although the sun just showed above the eastern horizon, she flopped into a chair at Calamity's side. The talk turned to general subjects while they ate a sizeable and well-cooked breakfast. Much as John wanted to learn of the marshal's business with Ehart, the chance did not arise.

After finishing her breakfast, Calamity paid a visit to Pizen Joe. Although asleep, the fever appeared to have left him and his breathing came more naturally. Calamity knew that sleep would help his recovery and so she left the room without waking the old timer. Leaving the main building, she headed for the corral and found Cultus already supervising the harnessing of the team.

“These aren't the hosses we used yesterday,” she remarked.

“Nope,” the guard replied. “We change teams here and again at Shadloe.”

That meant, as Calamity knew, she must become acquainted with the ways of six new horses. However they had the look of a trained team and the task should not be too difficult, especially as
she now had the feel of the coach. With the team harnessed to her satisfaction, Calamity swung on to the box. She soon found her judgment of the horses correct, for they responded in a coordinated group, not as individuals, when she drove them to the front of the main building. Already her two passengers and their baggage waited on the porch. Jumping down, Calamity walked to where John stood with the agent.

“I'm sorry I couldn't put your money into the ‘treasure chest,' John,” Janowska was saying. “But it's a through box and I don't have a key.”

“That's all right, sir,” John answered. “It'll be safe enough on the trip and I'm putting it into the safe tonight in Shadloe.”

“All aboard,” Calamity said. “Take my carbine in with you, Johnny.”

“Reckon I'll need it?” the boy grinned.

“I sure hope not,” she answered. “How about letting us have the box and mail so we can get rolling, Curly?”

“Damned if you're not starting to sound like ole Joe now,” Janowska replied.

“All stage drivers get that way,” Cultus commented and stepped on to the porch after walking up from the corral. “Who's going to sign the receipt book, you or me, Calam?”

“It'd save us both some questions and paperwork from the Company if you do it, Cultus,” Janowska put in hurriedly.

“You could be right at that,” drawled the guard.

Leaving the routine details to Cultus, Calamity watched Cole stroll from the building and approach her.

“Changed your mind about coming along, Solly?” she inquired hopefully.

“I wish I'd enough good sense to do it,” he replied. “I'm just going to take my pick of the remuda.”

“Take care then,” Calamity told him. “I'll be looking for you in Ratchet Creek, unless you catch up with me.”

“I'll be there,” Cole promised.

Starting the coach and handling the new team commanded all Calamity's attention at first. By the time she felt that she might relax without endangering the coach or its passengers, the way station lay too far behind for her to make out the people outside it.

“Damn it to hell,” she muttered. “Why's he have to be so all-fired stubborn and bull-headed?”

“Huh?” grunted Cultus, looking at her and she realized that she must have spoken her thoughts aloud.

“I was talking to me!” she snapped.

However the thought continued to pound at her. She wondered what drove Cole to act in such a manner. Of course any decent, honest lawman would want to stamp out the sale of liquor to the Indians; but Cole appeared to be driven into rash
ness by his desire to do so. As a trained peace officer he ought to know better than go busting single-handed into a fuss with a bunch of whiskey-pedlars. Damn it to hell, he ought to be taking a well-armed posse along to back his play when he confronted Ehart—

“Calam!” Cultus barked urgently.

Jerking from her reverie, she saw that the trail made a curve ahead and concentrated on controlling the team instead of worrying about Cole. If he did not know what he was doing, he had no right to be wearing a U.S. marshal's badge. So she settled back and gave her full attention to the work on hand.

The journey went on without incident, covered at a good speed behind the fresh team. Conditions proved so conducive to rapid travel that the sun had not set when they approached the small town of Shadloe. Clearly the arrival of the twice weekly stagecoach headed West rated as an event of importance in the town and most of its citizens stood along the main, in fact only, street to watch. The inevitable crowd of loafers gathered before the Wells Fargo building, prominent among them a soldier and a civilian sporting a cheap version of professional gambler's attire. Both smoked large cigars and looked to have been celebrating some event.

Seeing Calamity seated on the box, instead of Pizen Joe or one of the other regular drivers,
caused some comment among the people. The weather had been warm and she had discarded her jacket. Snug-fitting, her shirt did little to hide what lay beneath, while its rolled-up sleeves showed her tanned, strong arms.

Always inclined to grandstand a mite in the presence of an audience, Calamity swung the coach adroitly to a halt before the Wells Fargo office. Then she vaulted from the box, landing on the sidewalk before the agent, with her whip hanging negligently over her right shoulder.

“Where's Pizen Joe?” the agent asked, staring as if he did not believe the evidence of his eyes.

“Got his fool self shot by Arapahoes at the dip out beyond Coon Hollow,” the girl replied. “I'm driving until one of your boys can do it.”

“There's not one here,” the agent told her. “Maybe you'll find one at Ratchet Creek; that's where the runs cross each other and they've a bigger staff than down here.”

“Whooee, Fred,” whooped the soldier. “Just take a look at how she fills them pants, will you?”

“You should look so good, Wendel,” the other man replied. “I bet you got nothing like that in the Army.”

“If we have, I've never seen it,” Wendel admitted. “I'll bet——.”

The nature of his wager would never be discovered. Calamity felt neither guilt nor shame at her choice of clothing. Handling a six-horse wagon in
a dress would be next to impossible, to say nothing of all the other tasks her work presented when on the trail. However she objected to being made a laughing-stock by a pair of half-drunk small town loafers; one was a cheap tinhorn and the other's pants legs bore the crimson stripe showing him to be an ordnance corporal, a desk-warmer, not a fighting man, and probably on furlough. Experience had taught her that allowing their kind to take liberties in a small way only led them to greater excesses.

So Calamity turned smoothly toward the pair, measuring the distance with her eye ready to teach them the error of their ways. Swinging her whip free, she sent its lash snaking out in the gambler's direction. Few things in the world were so disconcerting than to have the tip of a bull-whip's lash strike a cigar clenched between the teeth. In addition to the crack of the whip, tobacco sprayed up as if a charge of dynamite had been touched off inside it. Letting out a startled yelp, which also served to spit away the shattered remains of the cigar, the gambler staggered backward. He caught his balance and started to reach for his gun.

Knowing something of the man's reputation of vicious temper, the crowd around him scattered hurriedly. Cultus rose on the box, his shotgun swinging up to hip level and aiming in the man's direction as he drew back the twin hammers. Two clicks sounded, ominously loud despite their lack
of volume, and reached the gambler's ears. Any place west of the Mississippi River that particular noise carried a certain significance. Only back in the civilized East was the shotgun regarded as a toy for the rich sportsman who wished to shoot rapidly-flying birds. Out West the shotgun ranked with the Colt and Winchester as a mighty efficient kind of weapon, a fighting man's implement unequalled in its particular field. Swivelling his eyes upward, the gambler found that the muzzles of Cultus' ten-gauge appeared far larger than their .784 caliber. He also refrained from closing his fingers around the butt of the revolver holstered at his side.

“Don't act any more stupid than you have to, feller,” the guard warned. “You're tangling with Calamity Jane.”

When most of the crowd had scattered to avoid the possible discharge of the shotgun, they had left exposed to view two men, one of whom would much have preferred to remain in the background and concealed behind the assembled people. Dressed in trail-dirty range clothes, the tall, lean man looked little different from hundreds of others who roamed the western plains. He had a bearded face and his right eye-lid drooped slightly. The second man attracted slightly more attention, wearing a brace of low hanging Colts, as opposed to his companion's one, dressed in a buckskin shirt, U.S. cavalry pants and boots and
with shoulder long hair trailing from under a wide-brimmed Stetson hat.

Possibly if the pair had remained still, they might have escaped Cultus's notice. However when the crowd moved, the taller spoke to his companion in a soft but urgent manner. Immediately the second man started to turn from the hitching rail where he had been leaning.

Alert for trouble or hostile action, Cultus caught the movement out of the corner of his eye. Darting a quick glance to check on who had attracted his attention, the guard looked straight at the lean man. Recognition came immediately and, as their eyes met, the lean drifter sent his right hand flying toward the butt of his Colt. Maybe he could not rank among the top class, but he showed better than average ability in the matter of drawing a gun. Out licked his Colt, hammer sliding back under his thumb and finger starting to depress the trigger as the barrel cleared leather.

Fast as the man undoubtedly was, but he had to draw his gun and Cultus already gripped a weapon ready to shoot. Nor did the guard hesitate in acting. Every Wells Fargo messenger could claim to be a fighting man from soda-to-hock, skilled in the use of firearms. Nor did the Company place any restrictions on how its employees acted in defense of their lives or property entrusted in their care. Knowing the man intended to kill him, and why, Cultus acted fast.

Swinging the shotgun away from the gambler, Cultus lined it toward a new mark and squeezed the forward trigger. Flame belched from the left side barrel and nine buckshot balls fanned out. At middle ranges—between where a revolver could make a hit sighted by instinctive alignment and the distance at which a sensible man took a rifle if possible—the shotgun reigned as the ideal weapon. Its balls spread just enough to ensure that most of them struck their mark, without the need to take excessive time in aiming, yet would not separate sufficiently for the individual balls of its pattern to pass harmlessly around the enemy's body. The lean man stood within the ideal distance; but not for long.

Even as his Colt came clear and started to line, seven of the nine balls tore into his chest. He shot backward the width of the sidewalk, cannoned off the wall of the nearest building and went down, the gun clattering from his hand.

For all that he wore two guns, the second man did not stop and make a fight. As soon as Cultus cut loose with the ten gauge, the man deserted his companion by turning to run. Calamity did not know what had sparked off the trouble and wasted no time in asking. Springing forward, she swung her right arm and the whip lash leapt after the fleeing man. Leather coiled around his neck, clamping hold like an anaconda catching its prey. Calamity felt the lash grip and heaved back on the
handle. Caught in mid-stride, the man's feet continued moving while the upper section of his torso came to an abrupt halt. With a strangled yell of surprise, he landed flat on his back. When he tried to sit up, Calamity tugged at the whip and flattened him once again.