Vengeance Trail (6 page)

“Well, Ben, you know I will if that’s what you’ve decided.”

“Don’t let this job fool you, son. Travelling over most of the country you’ll have to cross can be dangerous at best, carrying
along two prisoners makes it even more so. Most of that land is desolate, without water. It’s a bad country all around. There’s
still some
renegade bands of Comanche roaming around out there and hardcases the law ain’t caught up with yet. Any one of them can kill
you and will if given the chance.”

“I’ll stay cautious, Cap’n. When should I prepare to leave?”

“As soon as I get word back from Ft. Smith. You go ahead and get your possibles ready, go down to the livery and pick out
a pair of riding horses and a pack mule to carry your provisions with. Get supplied over to the trading post—I figure two
weeks worth ought to do it. Be ready when I get word.”

Pete Winter adjusted his sweat-stained Stetson so that it touched the tops of his ears and drank the last dregs of his coffee
cup.

“I’ll get ’er done, Cap’n, you just yell out when you’re ready for me to start.”

Ben Goodlow watched his protege step through the door, cross the street, and head for the livery. The boy was chock full of
belief in himself, exactly what the older lawman knew he would need for such a journey.

Having worn the badge for as long as he had, Ben Goodlow knew that whenever a job enforcing the law looked easy, it usually
wasn’t—too many good lawman had died believing otherwise.

He thought briefly about assigning another ranger to the escort, but let the thought pass without giving much credence to
it. If the boy was big enough to wear the badge, he was big enough to do the job.

Eli Stagg dismounted his mule in front of the U.S. Marshal’s office in Ft. Smith, Arkansas.

The lawman at the desk lifted his gaze in time to
see the grizzled countenance of a man who smelled like campfire smoke and grease glaring down at him. The effect was unnerving.

“Some way I can help you, mister?”

The hunter reached inside his shirt and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper.

“I seed this poster over in Mud Bottom,” he said, spreading it atop the deputy’s desk, tapping a thick finger down on it.

“It’s for them two that killed that politician. I aim to claim it.”

“You’re too late, mister. They’ve already been captured. I got word in this morning.”

The big man grunted his seemingly disappointment.

“Where?”

“Over in Texas. It’s where they all head to sooner or later.”

“Well then, I reckon I done made myself a trip fer nothin’.”

“I reckon so.”

The lawman watched the big man shift the weight of the Creed-more rifle in his hand.

“Texas, you say?”

Caleb Drew nodded his head.

“Well, reckon I’m just wastin’ good time standin’ here.” Then, he turned and walked out of the office.

Joe Duty, a deputy who had been sitting at another desk with his right foot bandaged and propped on a chair, leaned and spat
tobacco juice into a tin can.

“Big as a damn tree that son of a gun was, Caleb. Smelled like a sackful of dead squirrels.”

“Takes all kinds, I guess.”

“Bounty hunter?”

“Looks as though he was.”

“What’re you planning on doing about those folks the rangers are holding?”

It was a good question. He was short on men and long on assignments. Crime had gotten to be a popular thing, and Judge Parker
was holding court every day and still, nobody could seem to keep up. Right at the moment, aside from himself, he had two deputies:
Joe Duty, who had been shot in the foot the previous week by a drunken whore, and Al Freemont.

“Well, unless you figure you can ride with that foot of yours, the only man I have left is Al Freemont.”

“Reckon ol’ Al ain’t going to be too happy about that,” said Joe Duty, lining up the can to spit again.

“Al’s getting long in the tooth and as grumpy as an old maid, that’s for certain.”

The old lawman had been around for years, complained about his arthritis every time he climbed down out of the saddle, complained
about the gout in his big toe whenever it rained, complained about his eyesight. Caleb Drew had been patient with him, out
of respect for the ser vice he had given the U.S. Marshal’s office over the years. Besides, he had been a personal favorite
of Judge Parker’s.

“Well, I guess you don’t have much choice, Caleb. But I’m glad it’s you telling him and not me.”

Caleb Drew rose from his chair, lifted his low-crowned hat from a peg and said, “Watch the store.”

He walked the three blocks to the telegraph office. Hiram Bisby was swatting flies when he entered. He handed the clerk a
note and said, “Send it.”

Hiram read the note before sitting down to his telegrapher’s key.

The clerk looked up through his thick wirerimmed glasses.

“You sending Al Freemont all the way to the Indian Nations?”

“I didn’t come here to seek your counsel on what my job should be, Hiram, just send the damn telegram.”

“Yes sir, marshal, you say so.”

The man standing across the street, a Creedmore rifle cradled in his arms, was unnoticed.

Al Freemont wasn’t feeling so good when U.S. Marshal Caleb Drew found him in his room at the Ozark Hotel.

“I need you to ride to the Nations, Al. Need you to meet a Texas Ranger there and take charge of two prisoners and escort
them back to Ft. Smith.” The message was straightforward and simple, but Al Freemont looked at his boss as if he were talking
donkey talk.

“That’s a ride and then some, Caleb.” Al Freemont had the thinness of a man suffering from the consumption: his rheumy-eyed
face was lined with creases and possessed the sad, long look of a hound.

“I know how far the Nations are. You’re the only man available, Al. I wouldn’t send you if you wasn’t.” Caleb Drew could see
it was not going to be easy. The old lawman laying on his bed crosswise had once been a good man, but age and booze had dulled
him.

“I…I don’t know if I can,” pleaded the deputy. “The gout’s pulling on my big toe like a beaver chewing it off.”

“It’s what you get paid to do, Al. Things like this is your job.”

The old lawman cradled his head in his hands, the marshal could smell the stale breath of booze.

“Look at yourself, Al. Look what you’ve let yourself become. Hell, you used to be one of the finest lawmen anywhere.”

Al Freemont simply looked up at him. Caleb Drew could see that this wasn’t going to work, could see that the old man wasn’t
up to the task. He felt badly that he had even come to ask.

“Ah, to hell with it, Al. Go on back to your rest. I’m sorry I bothered you.” He reached for the door knob.

The deputy coughed hard, struggled upright. “Hold on, Caleb. I’ll go. Just give me a little time…you know, to sorta get
my sand packed down.”

“Sure, Al. You come around to see me when you’re ready,” said the lawman, unsure as to whether he had made the right choice.

“Caleb?”

“What, Al?”

“I don’t know what happened to me, except I got old and things started breaking down on the inside. Maybe the ride will do
me good.”

Drew made a weak effort at a smile.

The old lawman coughed again and wiped the side of his mouth with the back of his hand as though waiting for a reprieve.

“You don’t need to prove anything to me, Al.”

“It ain’t for you,” said the deputy. “It’s for me.”

Ben Goodlow received the telegram from U.S. Marshal Caleb Drew of Fort Smith while he was eating his breakfast. The telegram
stated that a deputy U.S. marshal by the name of Al Freemont would meet
the ranger and his prisoners at Ardmore in the Indian Nations, that it was the extent of what the Federal lawman could offer
in the way of assistance. It was more than Ben Goodlow had expected. He’d take it. He summoned Pete Winter.

“How close are you to being ready, Pete?”

“Well sir, I’m waiting for my order to be filled over at the outpost, and the riding horses to be shod. I’d say within the
next hour or two.”

“I’ll draw some funds for travelling money from the bank for you, son. You meet me at the office when you are prepared to
go.”

By ten that morning, Pete Winter led two riding horses and a pack mule full of supplies up to the Ranger Headquarters and
tied them to the hitch rail.

Stepping inside, he placed a package wrapped in brown paper on the captain’s desk: “Riding clothes for Miss Swensen,” he said.

Ben Goodlow took the package back to the cells and left them with the woman to get dressed in; he brought Johnny Montana forth
to the office while she did so.

While they were waiting for Katie Swensen to change, the captain turned to Pete and said, “Don’t let your guard down out there,
son. There’s a thousand things that could go wrong.”

The young ranger grinned embarrassedly. “I will, Cap’n.”

“Here’s a map of the territory from here to the Nations,” said the older lawman, handing Pete a rolled parchment.

“Thanks, Cap’n,” said Pete, tucking the map into the saddlebags he carried. “I’ve been up that way a
time or two before, I’ve marked where I believe water holes to be.”

Katie Swensen made her appearance from the cell area. She was dressed in a dark blue woolen shirt, corduroy pants, and low-heeled
boots.

“Young lady,” said the lawman, “If you promise not to cause this officer a fuss during your journey, I’ll forego the handcuffs
at this time for your comfort.”

“Thank you,” she said, her voice barely audible.

“You are welcome, but I’m instructing Pete, here, to let you wear iron all the way to the Nations if necessary. He won’t tolerate
any misbehavior on your part, do you understand?”

She nodded her head.

“You wire in when you get there, Pete,” were the last instructions he knew to give.

He watched the trio ride out, taking the north road. Another time, another place, they could have been simply three young
folks riding out for a picnic.

Something uncertain nagged at his gut. He would have felt less troubled had Henry Dollar been the one running the show. But
then, he told himself, his uneasiness was more a personal matter than a practical one: Pete was like his own son.

Al Freemont had been a day’s ride out of Ft. Smith, had crossed over into the Indian Nations, and had the deep sense that
someone was dogging his trail. He stopped several times and waited, spelling his mount and his sore backside, but no one came
up the trail behind him.

It was a hard business, riding all day; a business better suited for younger men.

The sipping whiskey he nibbled at every few miles seemed to take some of the ache out, but not enough to keep him from being
miserable.

Damned if he knew why he had let Caleb Drew shame him into taking this journey.
Foolish pride,
he told himself.
A man shouldn’t have more pride than he can carry.

He let his mind drift back to other times, earlier times, in order to ignore his present discomfort. He remembered the glory
days when the law was less complicated than it was now. If a man threw down on you, you shot him, and that was the end of
it. Now, you was expected to bring a man in for trial, for judges and attorneys and juries to decide. All a lawman was, it
seemed to Al Freemont as he rode along the uneven trail, was some sort of escort, a paper server.

The whiskey eased his pain but not his mind.
Sure in hell there was somebody back there.

New Orleans proved to be hot and humid with the warm moist winds blowing up from the Gulf. Things moved slow: people, horses,
stray dogs, time.

Lowell Biggs spent most of his ride down the main street, into a section called the French Quarter, swiveling his head in
an effort to take in all the sights. The traffic of carriages and wagons and riders on horse back was heavy, the sidewalks
full of pedestrians.

From wrought-iron balconies, coffee-colored women shouted to them in French and blew kisses down on them. Dark-eyed men stood
in doorways or leaned against lampposts and studied their movement.

“Damn,” said Lowell Biggs to his brother. “You ever seen such a place as this?”

“I don’t need to have seen it to know what it is,” said Carter, keeping his gaze directly ahead of him.

“What do you suppose those gals up there are saying to us?”

“Mind to our own business, Lowell. They’re just whores that have a funny way of speaking is all. We don’t have time for consortin’.
Texas is still a long way off and that’s where we aim to be.”

“Well maybe they are whores, Carter. But, I ain’t never seen any women in Autauga County to compare with them—not by a damn
sight, I ain’t.”

“Keep your eyes stuck in your head, little brother,” ordered Carter. “The onliest thing we need in this town are supplies.
It’s so hot and muggy it feels like someone dropped a warsh cloth over my face!”

A shrill whistle from above, from one of the balconies, drew Lowell’s attention. The woman that leaned over the railing smiled
broadly and swished her hips.

Unlike most of the others, this one’s skin was the color of milk, her hair black as a raven’s feathers.

“Allo mon doux, hello my sweet. Come and visit Danielle, eh. I show you a good time, yes?”

He was struck with her exotic beauty. She was wearing very little, and she leaned forward across the railing in order to show
him even more of herself.

He removed his hat from his head and held it over his heart. She wiggled a finger at him to come.

“Venir chere, come my darling, I will give you much plaisir, mon doux.”

Carter’s face twisted grim the minute he realized that Lowell had halted his progress, had been engaged by one of the whores.
He wheeled his dun around and walked it back to where his little brother sat in the middle of the street looking up at the
balcony tart.

“Lowell! I warned you, we ain’t got time for this!”

“Why the hell not?” said Lowell, irritated at his brother for having broken the spell she had been casting upon him.