Red River Revenge (Remington Book 1) (4 page)

“We’ve still got plenty left. Thanks.”

“If you’re gonna stick around town, I’d suggest you stay at the hotel,” Mike said. “A dollar a night and you get clean sheets.”

“Thanks,” Remington said. “After sleeping on the hard ground for a week, my weary bones could use a comfortable bed.”

“My brother owns the hotel. Tell him I sent you.”

“We’ll do that, Mike.”

The cook walked to the nearby table and collected the money from the big man who had just pushed his plate away and taken a last swill of beer. After the fellow left, Mike started to clear the table.

Remington watched the big man stroll across the street and enter the tavern. He stopped Madonna as the cook walked by with a load of dirty dishes.

“Do you know that fellow who was sitting there?” Ned nodded toward the cleared table.

Madonna glanced back at the table. “Harvey? Yeah, I know him. He eats here a coupla times a week.”

“Is he a dock worker?”

“Sometimes. When the fish aren’t biting.”

“Oh, he’s a fisherman?”

“Most of the time. If the weather’s bad, he does odd jobs around town.”

“Do you buy your fish from him?” Tom Beck said.

“Oh, no. My two sons catch all the fish I use,” Mike answered proudly. “Harvey sells his fish to the folks downstream from here.”

“Just curious,” Remington said.

“I suppose it’s the nature of your job,” Mike said as he nodded and walked away with the dirty dishes.

Remington finished eating what was on his plate and when Frank Shaw passed him the platter of fish, he waved it away.

“No, thanks. I’m full,” he said. He took a final drink of coffee, stood up and fished a five-dollar bill out of his pocket and slid it across the table to Tom Beck. “Pay Mike when you’re through eating.” He picked up his rifle.

“Where are you going?” Beck asked.

“I’m going to check on the horses. You two take your time.”

“You aren’t getting fidgety, are you, Ned?” Shaw asked.

Remington smiled. “No. We’ve been in the saddle so long, I just need to stretch my legs for a while. Go ahead and finish your meal.”

He walked around the side of the cafe. Yes, he was getting fidgety. He knew it and so did his men. He didn’t like leaving the horses and their gear unattended. Besides the extra ammunition, they didn’t carry anything of much value in their saddlebags. Food, cooking utensils, extra food, field glasses, knives, things like that. But he didn’t like the thought of anyone going through their things.

He felt relieved when he walked around back and saw all three horses back in the shade of the trees. He checked the buckets and saw that the animals had eaten their fill.

“Hello, boy,” he said as he walked up to his Missouri trotter. “Did you get enough to eat?” He patted the horse on the neck.

He saw the movement out of the corner of his eyes. Just above the saddle. He whirled his head around and saw the pistol come up over the saddle. At the same instant, the man holding the pistol popped up from behind Ned’s horse.

Remington’s heart skipped a beat. His muscles tautened.

“Are you the one who’s looking for Charlie Killbuck?” the stranger asked as he aimed the pistol at Remington’s head.

S
tartled by the ambusher
, Ned Remington froze in place. He caught his breath and felt his knees go weak. His heart pounded wildly in his chest, but on the outside, he appeared calm. There was no look of surprise on his face as he faced his attacker. There was no trembling in his hand when he removed it from his horse’s neck and held it shoulder high, fingers loosely spread. His rifle, still clutched in his left hand, was pointed toward the ground and he knew it would be awkward to swing it up and aim it at the man who had been hiding behind his horse.

The chief deputy marshal had half-way expected to find Paco Gaton or Haskins, or one of their henchmen, messing with the horses. But this stranger was an Indian, and that surprised Ned almost as much as the fact that he was there in the first place. He could only see the ambusher from the shoulders up, but it was enough for Ned to know that he was Indian, even though he was not bare-chested as the others had been. This man wore a tan shirt, open at the collar, and a wide-brimmed hat, pulled low, so that Ned could just barely see his dark eyes, the high cheekbones, the bronze color of his face and neck, the dark skin of the hand that held the pistol.

Remington considered his chances of going for his own pistol, but he had no idea how good this Indian was with a gun.

“What do you want?” the lawman asked, his voice calm, even. He let his arm drop slowly, then eased his hand down toward his holstered pistol.

“Do not try it, marshal,” the Indian warned.

Remington’s hand hovered above the butt of his pistol, but he didn’t move it any closer. He stood perfectly still and looked at the ambusher.

“Are you looking for Killbuck?” the Indian asked, his voice low and demanding.

“Yes, but we mean him no harm,” Remington said. He squinted his eyes against the blinding spot of sunlight that glinted and danced off the barrel of the man’s pistol, and found himself staring down the dark, ominous hole that was aimed between his eyes. He didn’t move a muscle.

“I know,” the Indian said.

Ned was confused. Why was this man here if he knew that Remington meant no harm to any of his people?

“We want to help the girl who is with Killbuck,” he said, not taking his eyes off the pistol that rested on top of his saddle, not more than four feet away.

“I am Charlie Killbuck,” the Indian said in a hushed voice. He slowly withdrew the pistol and slid it down, out of sight.

“You’re Killbuck?” Ned said.

“Yes. My people tell me you are looking for me.”

“We came to help Lina Miller.” The pounding in Remington’s chest slowed and he felt his breathing return to almost normal. Still, he did not move.

“I know,” said Killbuck. He looked around nervously, his head twisting back and forth, his dark brown eyes shifting in their sockets.

Charlie Killbuck eased around the back end of Remington’s horse and Ned saw that the Cherokee wore dark trousers and boots that were common to the white man. He finally let his arm drop to his side and began to relax as the Indian came around and stood a few feet away, facing him.

“That is why I came to find you before you went away,” Killbuck said in a whispered voice. “I have much to tell you about Van Hook and the murdering thieves who work for him.”

“What about Lina?” Ned asked. “Is she all right?”

Killbuck glanced in both directions. “We cannot talk here,” he whispered. “I will ride back to my village now. You and your men come.”

“With you?” Remington asked.

“No. You wait. Someone might see us if we ride together. You come after I am there.”

“Where will we find you?” Ned asked.

Killbuck stepped closer. “I will be at my adobe. It is near the road. I will see you when you come.”

“Is Lina there?”

“I must go now. You come:” Killbuck turned and quickly went around behind Ned’s horse. He darted in among the trees and soon disappeared through the thick foliage.

Ned stood there for a minute and took a deep breath. He thought he heard the pounding of hoof- beats as they faded away, but he couldn’t quite distinguish the sound from the other noises of the busy

riverfront town. He thought about going around front to tell his partners of the news, but he decided against it. Frank and Tom would be there soon enough and if they were being watched, the less activity, the better.

He slipped his rifle back in the sheath that hung from his saddlehorn, then checked all three horses, tightened the cinches of the saddles where they needed it. He made sure that all of the saddlebags were still secure. He untied his horse from the long tether and was sitting atop his saddle when the other two deputies came around back.

“You ready to go?” Shaw asked.

“Whenever you are,” Remington said.

“Are we going to do some more checking here in town?” Tom Beck asked.

“Not now.”

“Are we going to head across the river?” Shaw asked.

“Not now,” Ned said again.

The two deputies looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders. They sheathed their rifles, checked their horses, untied the animals from the tethers, then climbed up in their saddles.

“You lead the way, Ned,” Shaw said as he took the reins in his hand.

Remington glanced over at the tavern as he and his men rode around to the front of the cafe. He wished the curtains at the tavern windows were open so he could look inside as they rode by. It looked like a place where he could get some information if the barkeep was willing to talk. He’d save it for later. Right now, he had more important things to do.

As they rode back through the small riverfront town, he once again studied the faces of the people he saw. And again, he got the impression that nobody was particularly impressed or bothered by the fact that three lawmen were in their town.

After they passed the last building on the short street, Ned tugged the reins to the right and turned on to the road that would take them back to the Indian village.

“Where are we going?” Beck asked.

Remington glanced back at Tom. “I’ll tell you later.”

The big man sat at a table at the front of the tavern, next to one of the windows. He peered out through the flimsy material of the curtains and saw the three lawmen ride around to the street from the back of the cafe. He’d been sipping at a beer and watching out the window ever since he’d come in here, right after he’d finished eating his fish and potatoes.

He saw the tallest of the deputies glance over at the tavern, but he knew the lawman couldn’t see through the curtains. Not even enough to see his big shadow sitting there by the window. It was bright outside that afternoon and, with the curtains closed, the tavern was dark and gloomy.

After the lawmen rode on down the street, the big man got up from the table and walked out the batwing doors. He paused for a minute, and let his eyes adjust to the bright sunlight, then strolled out far enough so he could see the backs of the three deputies as they rode away from him.

Those stupid bastards are incompetent, or inexperienced, he thought as he watched them go. They didn’t even stop anywhere else in town to ask questions, and they sure as hell hadn’t learned anything new from Mike Madonna. Mike didn’t know anything. Hell, if he were in their shoes, the first place he’d stop and ask questions in any town would be the tavern or the saloon. Barkeeps were notorious for knowing a lot of facts about a lot of folks and from his own experience, he knew that most barkeeps would spill their guts for a price.

When the lawmen turned right at the end of the street, he wondered where they were going. Probably back to the Cherokee village to look for the half-breed girl, he figured. Well, they wouldn’t find her. They were too dumb.

He’d been watching for two weeks now for some sign of the half-breed girl and Charlie Killbuck, or any lawman who came to town. The two outlaws had told him they’d pay him for such information, and he considered himself lucky that he’d been eating at the fish place when the deputies stopped there. It was a coincidence, he knew, and he took it as a sign that his luck was finally changing for the better. He considered himself even more fortunate that he’d been sitting close enough to listen in on the conversation when the marshals were questioning Mike.

He thought about following the lawmen, but decided against it. He had enough information for now and he was in a hurry. Besides, the deputies would be staying at the River Front Hotel that night. He had heard them tell Madonna as much, and he would pass that information along.

He faced an hour’s ride down the river in his fishing boat to the small harbor where the two outlaws were staying, and it was a trip he was looking forward to. When he got there, he would be paid handsomely when he delivered the information he had to Paco Graton and Norville Haskins.

Harvey Cardin just wished that the cook had been able to supply the lawmen with Killbuck’s whereabouts. He wanted to know, too. That would have been the capper he needed to prove to Gaton and Haskins that he was not a loser. But the two outlaws would be happy with what he told them and he would do anything he could to help them.

Harvey swelled his chest out. Nobody could call him dumb anymore. He knew where the easy money was, and he intended to get all of it he could.

N
ed Remington
almost missed seeing Charlie Killbuck. The Cherokee stood just inside the doorway of his adobe, where it was dark and shadowy. Ned had already explained to his two deputies about his encounter with Killbuck and all three of the lawmen had been studying the huts they passed for some sign of the Indian who had promised to talk to them.

Charlie Killbuck stepped out of the shadows when the lawmen slowed near his adobe. He came out of his hut cautiously and scanned the long, deserted road that stretched back to the river front. The short Cherokee Indian still wore the tan shirt and dark trousers and the wide-brimmed hat he’d worn in town. His pistol was snugged into the holster that rode high on his leg, within easy reach.

“You were not followed here, were you?” he asked nervously.

“No,” said Remington. He glanced back at the road and realized that it was later in the day than he’d thought. Long shadows from the few trees along the way now stretched ominously across the road. “Nobody seemed to pay much attention to us in town, and I certainly wouldn’t have risked coming here if we were being tailed. I checked our back trail often enough to know that we weren’t followed.”

“Good. I knew you would be careful.”

“These are my two deputies,” Ned said. “Tom Beck and Frank Shaw. Beck is the one who rode to Osage, Arkansas, and talked to Lina after her father and her uncle were murdered.”

“Yes, Frank Twokill was my brother.” Killbuck looked up at the deputy who was part Cherokee. “I am glad you are here. Lina said you would come and help us find those bastards who killed Frank and Woody, then stole their cattle.”

“Where is Lina?” Beck asked as he peered at the doorway of the darkened adobe.

“First, we talk,” Killbuck said. “Come. Follow me.” He gestured with a wave of his arm. “We put your horses in the shed out back where they cannot be seen. We talk out there.”

Charlie Killbuck walked around to the back of his adobe hut. As Ned and his deputies followed on horseback, Ned looked out at the small flock of sheep in the pasture, which was some fifty yards beyond the shed and the other outbuildings. A young shepherd boy, dressed in dark trousers and shirt and wearing a hat like Killbuck’s, stood in the midst of the white sheep. The boy was dressed like the other shepherds they’d seen and some of the other Cherokees besides Killbuck had been dressed in the white man’s clothes, as well. Ned noticed that the shepherd boy was watching them.

“Are those your sheep out there?” Remington asked with a nod of his head.

“Yes,” Killbuck said. “I do not have as many sheep as I had before, but I will build my flock back up after Paco Gaton and Haskins are brought to justice.”

“Is that your son out there tending the sheep?” Ned asked.

“No.” Killbuck shook his head sadly. “I have no son. I have no family of my own. Only Lina and my dead brother’s wife and her two small children. My own wife died many moons ago and the great spirit above took our unborn child with her.”

“I’m sorry,” Ned said.

Killbuck looked up at the cloudless sky and held his open palm out. “If the rain does not come soon, the grasses will die and that will be bad for the sheep,” he said, as if to change the subject. “It will be bad for all of the people in Tishomingo.” He walked on into the crude stable and motioned for the others to follow.

Remington smelled the heavy stench of horse droppings as he approached the stable. He ducked his head as he rode through the archway of the open door, even though the opening was plenty tall enough to accommodate a man on horseback. The other end of the shed was open, too, and once he was inside, it took no time at all for Remington’s eyes to adjust to the dimmer light of the small stable. He noticed the two Indian ponies in separate stalls and hoped one of them belonged to Lina Miller.

Both of the spotted ponies cocked their ears, raised their heads, at the sound of the intruding men. Their rubbery nostrils flared as they caught the scent of the strange horses.

“Tie your horses here,” Killbuck said, tapping the short rail in the middle of the stable. “We go outside to talk, where we can watch the trail.”

The three lawmen dismounted and tied their horses to the hitchrail, then followed Killbuck outside, where the Indian once again checked the road to town.

“What can you tell us about Paco Gaton and Norville Haskins?” Remington asked.

“They have bad spirits,” Killbuck said. He spit on the ground with disgust. “They steal many, many cattle. They kill many ranchers. When I learned of the trouble at Woody Miller’s ranch, I ride to Osage. I talk to many people. I tracked the stolen cattle back down to the stockyard at the Red River Station across the border in Texas. The man who runs the stockyard, Rupert Smith, he tells me the cattle belong to Mr. Peter Van Hook, but I know better.”

“Five hundred head are a lot of beeves to take across the Red by ferry,” Frank Shaw said.

“No, they do not take by ferry.” Killbuck looked over at the gray-haired deputy. “The cattle ford the Arkansas River and the Red at places where the water is not so wide.”

“Do you know where Van Hook lives?” Remington asked.

“No, but I think near the Red River Station. Lina wants to go down there and kill all of them. I tell her it is too dangerous, but she does not care. She wants revenge. Eye for an eye.”

“Killbuck, I want to send Lina back to Galena,” Remington said. “Tom Beck will take her back and see to her safety.”

“I want that, too, but Lina will not go.” Killbuck shook his head. “She will not leave until her father’s murderers are brought to justice.”

“But it’s too dangerous for her to be here so close to the border,” Remington said.

“I know. I tell Lina that, but she does not listen. I told her to stay in Osage and let the law take care of the murderers. But she says that Gaton and Haskins saw her and that it is more dangerous for her to stay in Osage where they can find her.”

“But we want to take her to Galena, where she’ll be safe,” Remington explained.

“You talk to her,” Killbuck said. “Maybe she will listen to you.”

“Where is she?” Remington asked.

Killbuck nodded toward the pasture. “She is the shepherd tending my flock.”

“That’s Lina?” Remington said, the surprise showing in his voice.

“Yes. She stays out there all day where she can watch the trail. You men go outside my adobe house. Go in the back door and wait in the parlor. I will bring Lina in.”

As Charlie Killbuck headed out to the pasture, the three lawmen entered his small adobe hut. They walked through the kitchen and past two tiny bedrooms before they found the neat, sparsely furnished parlor. When they walked into the room, Ned smelled the delicate aroma of a woman’s perfume, the hint of woodsmoke from an old fire in the fireplace. The curtains at the windows were open and the room was bright with the late afternoon sunlight.

A tattered sofa sat in the middle of the room. Facing the sofa were two equally tattered, upholstered chairs, and in between the sofa and the chairs was a low table. Bookcases, fashioned from wooden crates, lined one wall. A straight chair and a dressing table, also made from crates, sat in one corner of the room. A brush, comb, hand mirror and several small bottles and jars were neatly arranged on the dressing table, and above the table, a framed mirror hung on the wall. A worn carpet covered most of the dirt floor. Beyond the parlor was the entry hall where Killbuck had waited in the shadows of the doorway for their arrival.

Frank Shaw sat down on the sofa. “Feels good to be out of the saddle,” he said as he removed his hat and ran his fingers through his gray locks of hair.

“I agree,” Tom Beck said. He flexed weary muscles before he plunked down next to Shaw.

Remington strolled around the room and looked at the Indian artifacts, then paused at the bookshelves. He pulled out a cloth-bound book on the Cherokee Nations and thumbed through it. “It looks like Charlie Killbuck is an educated man,” he said.

He was still browsing through the books a few minutes later when he heard the back door open and close. He put the book he was holding back on the bookshelf, then walked to the middle of the room. He took his hat off just as Killbuck and the girl entered the room.

“This is my niece, Lina Miller,” Killbuck announced.

“Hello, Lina,” Tom Beck said as he stood up and removed his hat. Shaw stood, too.

“Hello, Marshal Beck,” Lina said in a soft voice. “Thank you for coming.”

With hat in hand, Ned stepped forward. “I’m Ned Remington, U.S. Deputy Marshal,” he said. “You already know Tom Beck, and the other fellow over there is Deputy Frank Shaw.”

“Hello,” Lina said as she nodded to each man. “I saw you ride through the village earlier today.”

When the girl looked up at him with her deep blue eyes, Ned saw that she was indeed, as Judge Barnstall had said, very beautiful.

“We’re very sorry about your father and your uncle, Lina,” he said gently.

“So am I,” she said, her lips tight. She reached up and jerked her wide-brimmed hat off, a silent gesture of her anger. Her raven-dark hair tumbled free and fell nearly to her waist.

With her dark skin and deep blue eyes, her high cheekbones, the half-breed girl was a startling beauty and Ned couldn’t help but stare at her. The baggy men’s clothes she wore concealed her figure, but it couldn’t hide her femininity.

“We’ve come to help you, Lina,” he said.

Lina looked directly at Ned, an expression of vindictive challenge in her eyes. “The only way you can help me, Mr. Remington, is to find those awful men who murdered my father and Uncle Frank,” she said, a harsh, brittle edge to her voice.

Remington saw the flash of hatred in her bright blue eyes. “We’ll find them, miss.”

“If you don’t, I will,” Lina said, a defiant challenge in her voice. “I’ll never forget their ugly faces as long as I live. You don’t know how much I hate those cold-hearted murderers.”

Ned thought of his own daughter, Katy, and what the traumatic experience of seeing her mother killed had done to her. “I do know, Lina,” he said.

“No, you don’t,” Lina said. “Nobody knows how much I hate them.” Her voice quavered as she fought back the tears.

Charlie Killbuck put his hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Lina, you have to let the; law handle this now,” he said gently. “Since the murderers saw you and know you can identify them, we all think it’s too dangerous for you to be here in Tishomingo, so close to the border. These deputies want to take you to Galena, Missouri, where you’ll be safe.”

“I won’t go, Uncle Charlie,” Lina protested. “Not until those evil men are in their graves. With bullet holes in their backs, like Papa and Uncle Frank had.” She marched over to the dressing table and slammed her hat down. She sat down on the straight-back chair, scooted it forward, then grabbed the brush and ran it through her long, dark hair.

Remington strolled over to the dressing table and looked down at the girl. “Lina, your uncle’s right. It’s too dangerous for you here. Tom Beck will escort you to Galena.”

“I won’t go,” she said stubbornly. She glanced up at him with fire in her eyes, then looked in the mirror and brushed her long locks.

As he studied Lina’s reflection in the mirror, Ned thought about his own beautiful daughter sitting in her rocking chair, rocking back and forth, mindless because of the tragedy she had witnessed, her eyes vacant of any emotion. He wondered if Katy would have reacted the same way Lina was acting now if Katy hadn’t lost her mind because of the shocking horror of the tragic incident.

“Lina, I’ve got warrants for Paco Gaton and Norville Haskins and we won’t give up until we find them,” Ned said, shaking the thoughts of Katy from his mind. “When we bring them in, we need you there in Galena to testify in court against these terrible men. That’s the only way you can help to make sure that your father’s murderers are brought to justice.”

“Brought to justice?” Lina cried out as she looked up at Ned, the hairbrush poised in her hand like a dagger.

“Yes, Lina,” said Ned calmly. “And with Judge Samuel P. Barnstall presiding over their trial, you can be assured that Gaton and Haskins will receive swift and just punishment.”

“Swift and just punishment,” Lina snarled, mocking his words. “That’s not what I want, Mr. Remington. I want those evil men dead. Right now.”

“With your testimony, Gaton and Haskins will hang,” Remington assured her.

“You don’t understand anything. None of you do,” Lina accused. “I want those cruel, heartless men dead now. They don’t deserve a trial.”

“Everyone’s entitled to a fair trial,” Remington said calmly. “It’s the law.”

“Well, I don’t like your stinkin’ laws, marshal,” she snapped. “My father didn’t get a fair trial, did he?”

“That’s why we’re here,” Ned said. “That’s ...”

“No. My father didn’t get a fair trial,” she ranted on, shaking her brush violently. “Those murdering thieves killed my father and Uncle Frank in cold blood and I want those dirty outlaws to suffer the same kind of cruel treatment.”

“The courts will arrange proper punishment for the criminals,” Remington said, knowing full well that the girl was not listening to him.

“Yes. Punish. Punish,” Lina cried, her eyes glazed over as if she’d been suddenly stricken with madness. “I want to see the looks on their ugly faces when they realize they’re going to die for their brutal crimes.”

“Lina, please listen to me,” Remington pleaded in a gentle voice.

He put his hand on her shoulder, but she jerked away and stared up at him as if he were the enemy. She lashed out at him with the hairbrush. Ned grabbed her wrist and warded off the blow.

“I’ll kill them myself if I have to,” she snarled like a wild animal. “Yes, that’s what I’m going to do. Kill. Kill.”

Charlie Killbuck and the two deputies stood dumbfounded as they watched the crazed girl.

“Lina, listen to me!” Remington barked harshly. “Stop this nonsense right now.” He cuffed her under the chin and roughly tilted her head up so that she was forced to look at him.

Her shoulders slumped and the glazed look faded from her eyes as she snapped out of her hysterical tantrum.