A Grave for Lassiter (2 page)

“Not quite, Farrell,” Lassiter said, halting his horse and pack animal on the busy street.

Farrell pointed at Lassiter's belt. “I hear a sheriff down south wasted county funds buying you that silver belt buckle.”

“In appreciation for helping him rid the county of scum,” was Lassiter's rejoinder. “I see some of it's drifted up this way.”

Their voices crackled in the late afternoon. Men and women on the crowded walk looked at them in surprise.

Lassiter, his face darkened from years of sun and wind, grew taut. “You living here, Farrell, or just passing through?”

“I'm establishing myself.” A light brown hat was set at a jaunty angle on Farrell's thick dark red hair. “How about you? Passing through, I trust.”

“Not quite.” Lassiter could see the heelplates of a revolver under Farrell's well-tailored light brown coat. He could read hatred in the cold green eyes. “Let's go, Vance,” he said, giving Vanderson a nod of the head.

They moved off down the street. Vanderson swung alongside Lassiter's weary black horse; his own chestnut was in worse shape.

“You were downright insulting to that gentleman,” Vanderson said with lifted brows.

“That
gentleman
and I go back a few years.”

“Obviously you hate each other.”

“I've put my bootheels down on a few of his schemes. He hasn't forgotten.”

They rode past a bank, a milinery shop, a large building that was the Bluegate Mercantile. To the north, a notch in a purple barrier of mountains was Northguard Pass.

The town was larger than Lassiter remembered from some years before. That time he had ridden with Herm Falconer, who had just sold a cattle ranch and wanted to visit his brother Josh. They stayed around for a spell, helping Josh try to locate an elusive vein of silver in a mine tunnel. In addition to mining, Josh Falconer also ran the Northguard Freight Company, the first building of which Lassiter was now passing. He whistled at the magnificence of the stable, more than triple the size of the former one where the company mules were kept. Beyond that was a huge building of new and unpainted pine. Northguard Warehouse, so a sign proclaimed.

“Josh must've stumbled over a pot of gold,” Lassiter said to Vance Vanderson.

“Josh was always rich, so Herm claimed. Just stingy.”

Lassiter noticed that whenever Vanderson spoke of his step relatives, father or uncle, there always seemed to be a note of resentment in his voice. He was the son of Herm's second wife, who had died some years back. Lassiter had first seen Vanderson when the kid was twelve. Even then he had thought that Herm's wife had made a career out of spoiling her offspring. When Herm took over, he tried to straighten the boy out and sometimes almost seemed to succeed.

Passing through town most recently, Lassiter had stopped by to see Herm. The stepson had given him the usual surly greeting, but Herm was overjoyed to see Lassiter. He had just received a letter from his brother Josh up at Bluegate. Josh needed financial help with his freight line.

“It'll give me somethin' to sink my teeth in, Lassiter,” Herm had said, his eyes shining. “Why don't you come in with me?”

Lassiter hesitated but when he learned that Josh was in very bad shape, he agreed. Lassiter had just quit a ramrod job he hated, but he had cash and decided it might be a challenge to help get a freight line back on a sound basis.

The first hitch developed when Herm said, “I want Vance to come along. Workin' with us'll put starch in his backbone.”

“But I thought he had a job as segundo out at XY?”

“He quit.”

As Lassiter debated whether to back out or go ahead with it, a tearful second letter arrived from Josh, saying that he was about to go under. Josh, the old reprobate, needed a hand with his freight company. Lassiter couldn't refuse.

There was more to Josh's letter that Herm discussed with Lassiter. “The girl's come out to live with Josh. Alice died last July.”

“Who's the girl?” Lassiter asked.

“Our sister Alice's offspring.”

Then Lassiter remembered.

“Our sister got treated shameful by me an' Josh,” Herm went on dolefully. “On account of her runnin' off an'marryin' with that fella Ralph. We told her not to but she went ahead an' done it anyway. Reckon Alice was as pigheaded as me an' Josh.”

Lassiter recalled meeting Alice one time when she came south from Denver and stopped in to say howdy to Josh. Alice had brought her daughter with her on the visit. A shy child, built like a trimmed cottonwood pole, he remembered somebody saying about the girl.

A sign at the end of the warehouse said OFFICE.

There were two bookkeepers, their pens scratching away in ledgers. Through the windows Lassiter could see two men rolling barrels onto a loading platform.

A pale-haired girl sat beside a large table that was being used as a desk. It was piled high with papers. Faint shadows were visible beneath her light gray eyes. She smoothed out a frown so that her delicate features seemed to relax.

“Can I help you gentlemen?”

Lassiter had heard that a few females had moved into the male province of secretary but he hadn't expected it of Josh, the traditionalist.

“I'm Lassiter. . . .”

“Oh, yes, there's a letter around here someplace from Uncle Herm. He mentioned you. . . .”

“Then you must be their niece.”

“I am.”

“I took you for a secretary.”

“I'm that and more. I . . . I am trying to operate this freight line.” She peered around Lassiter who was standing so he could keep one eye on the pack horse that carried the precious gold. “Where is Uncle Herm?”

Lassiter told her.

She slumped back in her chair and murmured, “My God, what next?”

Tears filled her eyes and she put her head down. Lassiter gently pressed a clean handkerchief into her hand. She nodded her thanks and used it to wipe her eyes.

“Where's Josh?” Lassiter asked, looking beyond the office into the vast warehouse with its scattering of crates and boxes.

“He . . . he's dead.”

Lassiter gave a deep sigh. He leaned both hands on the table. “How did it happen?”

“He . . . he just up and died.” She wiped her eyes again.

“You must be Melody,” Vanderson said. “Herm has a daguerr of you. Of course you don't look the same. Now you're kind of . . . well, rounded out.” He gave her his boyish smile. His hazel eyes acquired a glow of excitement. He rubbed slender hands together. “That means the freight line is yours, now that Josh is no longer among the living. . . .”

“It will belong to Uncle Herm, of course,” she said, straightening up in her chair. “And the sooner he gets here . . .”

“And he just might not,”Vanderson stated wryly.

Her head came up, the damp handkerchief clutched in one hand. “Surely he's not that badly wounded.”

“He might lose a leg.”

Lassiter gave him a hard look. “Herm'll be all right.”

Lassiter noticed Vanderson's eyes locked on the shapely breasts outlined by the thin material of Melody's white dress, with its decoration of small yellow flowers. Vanderson irritated him.

“Your Uncle Josh's death must have been sudden,” Lassiter said. “Herm got a letter from him about two weeks ago.”

“It was because of a . . . a woman.” Taking a deep breath, Melody Hale told of her late uncle and Marcina. A sorry tale of an older man infatuated by a beauty who had drifted into Bluegate. He had tried to impress her by building a new stable, a warehouse, and an office, topping his reckless expenditures with a fine house at the north end of town. Although he tried to get her to marry him, she hesitated.

“By then he had taken all his money out of the bank to put up the buildings, so Uncle Josh told me,” Melody whispered. “She demanded to see a profit from the freight line before she'd let him put a ring on her finger. He had neglected business terribly because of her.”

“Go on, Melody,” Lassiter urged.

“They . . . they got married. And she was with child. She and the baby died. Uncle Josh . . . well, he wrote for me to come live with him. By the time I got here he was in terrible shape.”

“We're here to help you, Melody.”

“If it's not too late. So much has happened since Uncle Josh died,” Melody said in despair.

“Tell me about it?”

“There's a man. He's been giving me all kinds of trouble.” She wiped her eyes again, but her firm chin came up. “I'm still trying to fight him, but . . .”

“His name?”

“Kane Farrell.”

Lassiter's lips tightened at the mention of a man who had been his enemy for so long. Seeing him today in Bluegate had revived old hatreds. And now their paths were interlocking once again. . . .

Chapter Two

Melody's gray eyes began to fill again. Lassiter reached across the cluttered desk to grip her hands and told her about the money, eleven thousand from Uncle Herm, seven from him, hoping to make her feel better.

“That'll keep things going,” he assured her. “And Herm'll be here as soon as his leg heals. . . . Vance and I will help get the company rolling again. Won't we, Vance?”

But Vanderson seemed too bewitched by the girl's figure to listen. When Lassiter repeated it, he lifted his head. “Yeah . . . sure we'll help.” He beamed at her.

One of Northguard's current problems, Lassiter learned, was a shortage of rolling stock. A wagon had been wrecked, another had a broken tongue and a missing wheel. The only serviceable one was mired in mud, five miles above the town of Aspen Creek.

“And I have freight to move and I don't know what to do,” she said, spreading her hands in a gesture of defeat.

“Vance, let's go get that wagon out of the mud,” Lassiter said.

“The very thing I was going to suggest.” Vanderson flashed his boyish smile again, his eyes merry.

But first there was the business of depositing the money. They all went down to the bank where the two sacks of gold coins were removed from the pack animal that Lassiter had led along the tree-bordered street.

The banker, Donald Edgerton, bald and pompous in a tight black suit, supervised the deposit. Melody and Lassiter affixed their signatures, then signed as witnesses under Herman Falconer's name.

Edgerton revealed small teeth smiling at Melody. “My dear, now you have fresh blood in your organization. Too bad your Uncle Josh couldn't have lived to see this glorious day. Ah, well, the good die young, as the saying goes.”

Lassiter speculated on the lack of sincerity in the banker's voice.

When they were outside, Vanderson spoke to Lassiter in a low, tight voice. “Seems to me, I'm part of the family, yet I didn't get my name on anything.”

Melody had gone ahead to make a purchase at the Bluegate Mercantile. The walks were crowded with ranchers and townsmen. On the streets were buggies and buckboards, farm wagons, and a stagecoach just leaving for Montclair, many miles to the north.

“You're Herm's stepson,” Lassiter pointed out. “Herm will take care of you.”

“I'm as much family as Melody and she gets to put her name on the bank account. . . .”

Lassiter turned on him. “Don't go building big dreams in that head of yours. Could be bad for the digestion.”

When Lassiter said he and Vanderson would stay at the hotel, Melody insisted they take the spare bedrooms at the big house her Uncle Josh had built.

Staying under the same roof with a young, pretty, and unmarried female, Lassiter pointed out with a smile, might give the local gossips something to chew on.

Melody laughed, saying she had retained her uncle's housekeeper. The presence of another woman should make the arrangement acceptable, she said. Over the passing hours, she seemed to have shed her mantle of gloom, Lassiter noticed.

The next morning he and Vanderson got ready to leave for the mountains. Melody offered to draw a map of the area, but Lassiter knew it well. “I guess you've forgotten that I tried to help Josh hunt a vein of silver in his mine,” he finished.

Her cheeks colored and she lowered her eyes. She needed no reminder, for young as she had been, Lassiter had fascinated her. The dark man of mystery, Uncle Josh had said with a smile, who would show up all of a sudden and then not be seen for some years. “I haven't forgotten,” she said. “But it was a long time ago. . . .”

“We'll get your wagon out of the mud,” Lassiter promised.

She was so confident that he would succeed where her men had failed that she suggested he pick up a team of mules at Aspen City.

Vanderson cleared his throat. “You go do the job, Lassiter. I'll stay here and keep an eye on Melody. . . .”

“We're both going to do the job. Because I've got a hunch we're the only ones Melody can trust.”

“You and Dad Hornbeck,” Melody cut in. “He runs the office at Aspen City. He worked for my Uncle Josh.”

When they were ready to ride, Vanderson was still grumbling. “She's got men working for her and I don't see why they can't help you while I stay here and . . .”

“Too much has gone wrong. Her men couldn't get the wagon out of the mud. We will.”

They left Bluegate on a bright fall day. Lassiter wondered how Herm, down in Rimrock, was making out. He hoped to God the doctor didn't have to take off his leg. There was no telling what Herm's reaction would be. Lassiter ground his teeth. He wanted to be moving on before he got mired down in the affairs of Northguard. With Vanderson a dead weight, if something happened to Herm, and with Josh dead, things didn't look too promising. But he had given his word to Herm and he would do his damnedest to save something for the niece, Melody Hale. . . .

On the same hour they had made the bank deposit the day before, Farrell came along the boardwalk, two large men flanking him. At the sight of Lassiter down the block, he grabbed both men by the arms and brought them to a halt.