Utah Deadly Double (9781101558867) (20 page)

Fargo skipped the road and broke out across the open desert, realizing his plan had turned into disaster. True, he could now tell Salt Lake law officers where to find the Landry gang. But by the time he could safely sneak back into town and leave word it would be too late—with Perry dead, Butch and Orrin would have to dust their hocks to a new location.

And what about Old Billy, Fargo wondered. Did he manage to save his own bacon when the shooting commenced?

“Dammitall to hell anyway,” Fargo muttered to the black velvet folds of darkness surrounding him. “Can't ride my horse, can't show my Henry, can't even wear my own clothes or beard—there's a reckoning coming, and it better be damn soon.”

 

The only witness who could say for certain exactly what had happened in the outlander camp still lay sprawled on his face where Fargo had buffaloed him, unconscious. Butch Landry and Orrin Trapp quickly realized that no one was paying any attention to them, having rushed to the opposite end of camp to capture the man who had escaped.

“You think it was Fargo?” Trapp asked his boss, keeping his furtive, larval face averted from the mutilated corpse of Harlan Perry.

Butch was rapidly pacing in front of the dying fire, eyes smoky with rage. “I dunno. It ain't Fargo's way to kill a man from ambush. And hell-fire, man, just glom Harlan's skull—it's half gone. I never knowed of Fargo to carry artillery capable of doing that.”

“Me neither,” Orrin said. “But Deets has forced him to disguise himself, and might be he ain't using his Henry. Whatever done for Harlan sounded like a Big Fifty or an old Hawken gun.”

“Never mind all that now,” Landry said impatiently, his bull neck again craning around to look at the slumped corpse of their partner. “If it was Fargo, his plan is to get us railroaded to the gallows—he knows there's dodgers on us all over the West. Mormon law dogs will soon be crawling like lice all over this camp. It's time to cut loose from these here diggings.”

“What about Harlan?”

“What about him? He'll soon be cold as a wagon wheel.”

“Ain't we gonna at least bury him?”

Butch swore impatiently. “Orrin, you ain't got the brains God gave a piss-ant!
Bury
him? Where, for crissakes? This ain't the high lonesome where you just plant a man where he drops. 'Sides, them Mormon badge-toters had to hear that shootout—they'll be here quicker than an Indian going to crap.”

Both men began to hurriedly collect their saddles and gear.

“It ain't just Mormon law,” Butch added. “It's Fargo law, too, and that's the one we got to worry about most. Don't you savvy that? Orrin, if this was Fargo that tossed lead at us tonight
that means he's figured out our plan.
Worse, that top-drawer tracker has
found
us. Mister, our bacon is in the fire. We have to go parlay with Deets—
now
. All three of us are going over the range like Harlan unless we can somehow cut Fargo off at the legs.”

Fargo expected some hell-bent-for-leather pursuers to give chase as he escaped from the camp, and sure enough he soon heard hooves pounding behind him. He rated Mica's coal black at an open gallop, and while the steed was no Ovaro it stretched itself out with admirable stamina.

Fargo doubted that any of the reckless nickel-chasers behind him could read sign in the darkness, a daunting task even for a veteran frontiersman. Orienting to the polestar, he swung north and ate up the landscape for several miles, then used the cover of a low ridge to swing southwest. When he was satisfied that his pursuers had continued due north, he walked the lathered black for a half mile or so to cool him out. Then he hit leather and, orienting to the Dog Star this time, headed at a canter toward the desert shack.

At first he thought he had missed it in the cloud-draped moonlight. Then the sky overhead cleared in a strong gust and Fargo spotted the tatterdemalion structure. Relief washed over him when he spotted Old Billy's blood bay tethered out back, stripped down to the neck leather.

“Hallo, the shack!” he called out, knowing Old Billy was no man to sneak up on. “Fargo riding in!”

“Ride a cat's tail, you reckless pup! I had you figured for a dead'un by now!”

Fargo lit down, tethered the gelding, and stripped off his saddle and bridle. The horse was still dry, thanks to the easier pace and desert air, so he only watered it from his hat. Old Billy came outside cradling his Greener.

“Fargo, I oughter knock you into next Sunday!”

“Why?” Fargo said innocently, knowing a blast was coming.

“Why?” Billy sputtered. “You must be the joker in this deck. Prac'ly the minute I slipped into that camp, I spotted all three of them lily-livered mange pots. Trouble was, I couldn't get close enough to get the number of their camp. I was creepin' in slowlike, dang close to reading it, when you blew a tunnel through that big lummox's head. I thought you said no wet work tonight.”

“You're the lummox,” Fargo replied after drinking warm water from his canteen. “Can't you tell a buffalo gun from an army carbine?”

Old Billy stood silent in the ivory moonlight, letting this point sink in. “Why, that's so, ain't it? My carbine makes a sharp cracking noise. This gun was a boomer.”

“Big Fifty,” Fargo said, explaining about the man he had buffaloed.

“Well, we carried out our big plan,” Old Billy carped. “And for what? For mince pie, that's what. You always say a man wants the element of surprise in a fight, eh? And we lost it tonight. Now them three lubbers know we're on to 'em.”

“Two,” Fargo replied, “unless you're counting their hired jobber who looks like me.”

“Why the hell not count him? Him and the other two are feeding at the same trough, ain't they?”

“Sure, but the element of surprise doesn't count with him—he knows damn well we're after him since that first shooting affray at Mormon Station. As for the other two—I been thinking on it. This botched job tonight might be just the tonic for what ails us.”

Old Billy farted with his lips. “Trailsman, I won't swallow your bunk like some will. You're just taking shit and trying to turn it into strawberries.”

Fargo shook his head. “You are the most contrary man I know. Think about it. Landry and Trapp dare not stay in that camp—in fact, they're long gone. The Mormon constabulary does not abide gunplay—I'd wager they had that camp cordoned off fifteen minutes after the fracas. Landry and Trapp are owlhoots—they can't afford to be questioned by the law.”

“That rings right, but so what? Now we don't know where they are.”

“Yeah, but now they have to hole up somewhere or ride out of this area. Either way, we stand a good chance of crossing their trail. And since the dirt worker's job is done—”

“Done?” Old Billy cut in. “How you figure that? He didn't sink his blade into that Mormon gal—not to mention his pecker.”

“Billy, were you mule-kicked in the head as a child? An outlander attacked a Mormon woman and tried to rape and maybe kill her. The fact that he was chased off doesn't amount to a hill of beans. The outrage against Skye Fargo is at a fever pitch and will stay that way until Fargo is captured.”

“All right, done and done,” Old Billy went along. “I'd chuck all of it for a hot biscuit. Happens you wander near a point, feel free to make it.”

Fargo paused to listen to the night, making sure no riders were approaching.

“You know me,” he continued. “Given my druthers, I like to play things like the cat who sits near the gopher hole and bides his time. But sometimes you have to bend with the breeze or you break. If we try to wait any longer we'll just be sticking our heads into a noose. So we hunt down all three of these sons of bitches right damn quick.”

“Fight or show yellow, huh?”

Billy rubbed his jaw, thinking. “Hell, that's what this hoss favored all along. You was the one argued agin dousing their lights—said we'd kill the proof.”

“Oh, I still believe that,” Fargo assured him. “Once they're jugged, they'll turn on each other to try and save their own necks. C'mon, let's grab a few hours shut-eye. Then we're going to see if we can cut sign on Landry and Trapp.”

“Ain't you forgetting something?” Old Billy said. “Just tonight we was questioned by a Mormon roundsman. We give him the names Neal Bryce and Del Baptiste, said you was a coz to that soldier boy, what's-his-name. Then a war breaks out in the camp. You think the Mormons are too stupid to visit that soldier's wife and ask was we by to say howdy? Hell, she won't even recognize the names.”

“So what?” Fargo said as he unbuckled his gun belt. “Did you plan on living forever?”

With dawn still several hours away, Fargo and Old Billy rigged their mounts and headed back across the desert toward Salt Lake City. Desert nights were chilly and they could see their breath forming wraiths of vapor in the silver moonlight. The sky had cleared, showing an explosion of diamond-bright stars and revealing the bleak landscape in a hazy, bluish tint. Stark mountains cut dark silhouettes in the far distance.

“Fargo,” Old Billy said, picking up a conversational thread from earlier, “I'm afraid your wick is flickering. After that catawampus you caused in town last night, guards will be swarming that camp like fleas on a hound. And the campers will likely have their own guard set up. We can't just waltz in there, bold as a fat man's ass, and commence to reading sign.”

“We don't have to actually enter the town,” Fargo replied.

“Then how the hell do we cut sign on them two owlhoots ?”

“Billy, you are a huckleberry above a persimmon when it comes to fretting. Didn't you just say, a few days ago, that I'm good at thinking like a criminal?”

Old Billy snorted. “Aye, but you needn't sound proud of it.”

“Well, here's some criminal thinking: Landry and Trapp had to dust their hocks out of there damn quick, right? It don't seem likely they had a fallback position in Salt Lake City—not being gentiles and wanted men. That means they had to bust out across the desert.”

“That rings right so far. But, Fargo, you of all hombres know how hard it is to pick up a trail even when you got an idea where to look. Crissakes, them two mighta pulled foot from anyplace.”

“That won't spend,” Fargo gainsaid. “Unless they haven't got more brains than a rabbit, they sure as hell didn't ride north through the middle of the city. And they wouldn't head west—I headed that way with a passel of armed heel-flies after me. That means they most likely went east or south.”

“Uh-huh. And east would take them right back to Echo Canyon where they was. A good hidey-hole for criminals—no law.”

“Yeah, but could their Fargo impersonator go back there?”

Old Billy mulled that. “'Course not. He'd avoid it like the mouth of hell. He was Doc Jacoby when he was there. And Jacoby lit out right after that Louise what's-her-name pulled her own plug—or so he said.”

“Now you're whistling. And I'm after believing that wherever Landry and Trapp go, the dirt worker will have to be there too. That leaves due south. You know this territory—what's located halfway between Salt Lake City and Utah Lake?”

“Why, Bingham Canyon. It's just a whoop and a holler from here.”

“The way you say,” Fargo agreed. “We'll find the most likely beeline between town and the canyon and look for tracks.”

“That's casting a mighty wide net,” Old Billy said, “when a feller's lookin' for something as small as horseshoe tracks in the Salt Desert. But you're a top hand in that line, Fargo, and leastways it'll keep us out of the city.”

A grin eased Fargo's lips apart. “Well, after we scour for prints we
will
be heading back into the city.”

Old Billy suddenly reined in. Fargo tugged rein and met his partner's eyes, the grin spreading into a smile.

“Fargo, don't blow smoke up my ass! Happens we set foot among that Mormon tribe, they'll baste our bacon! The hell you got planned?”

“You do want your horse back, don't you?” Fargo demanded.

“Not just this minute! You yourself said these horses of Mica's is good animals.”

“Sure, they're good stable horses, like all of Mica's. But we're headed across the Great Salt, and these mounts have been stall-fed too long. The army is out there looking for our dust, Old Billy, and I'd rather have my Ovaro under me. And your Appaloosa is damn near as reliable.”

“Horse apples! I'm dead-set against it,” Old Billy insisted. “The plan was to hide our horses until we gut-hook this gang. Happens we ride into that town now, after the ruckus in the camp, we're both gone beavers.”