Cotton's Devil (9781101618523) (12 page)

Thorn groaned and tried to move.

“Lie still, Thorn, or you'll open those wounds.”

He mumbled something unintelligible. She leaned down to try to understand, and heard only the weakest attempt at a whisper—no words came out.

S
itting at the breakfast table, Emily sipped from a cup of tea, which she daintily held in both hands, while glaring across the table at Cotton. He had as yet not been forthcoming about his suspicions regarding the presence of James Lee Hogg in Apache Springs, and any possible explanation of why she might have been a target, even though he knew he owed it to her to come clean. Cotton merely fidgeted in his chair, taking an occasional bite of a plate of eggs. His eyes wandered around, taking in the floor, ceiling, and various pieces of furniture, as Emily remained quiet and patient, blowing on her cup between swallows. Her stoicism told him she would willingly die where she sat waiting until he was forthcoming.

“Haven't you ever done anything in your life that made you ashamed of spilling the beans?” Cotton finally said without looking her in the eye.

“I have. When I was seven, I pushed my little brother off a fence. He broke his arm. At first, I claimed he fell because he was teasing me and not paying attention to what he was
doing. I allowed he shouldn't have been climbing the fence in the first place. After a couple of days, my guilt took over and I confessed, expecting the worst. It never came. No recrimination, no anger, no punishment. My mother just hugged me. My brother wasn't even all that mad, although he was pretty uncomfortable until the arm healed.”

“I'm not talking about things you did as a child. I'm talking about serious, life-altering things. Life-and-death things.”

“How many people have you had to kill, Cotton? Ten, twenty, more?”

“What difference does it make? Probably more than I'd like to remember. And I'm not particularly proud of any of 'em.”

“Well, I know that not one was done for anything other than a righteous reason. You're a legally elected lawman, not a murderer. Of that I am certain.”

Cotton stiffened at her mention of murder. That was exactly what he considered himself to be. A murderer.
And yet, I'd do it again in payment for the life of my sister
. He wiped his mouth with a napkin, then scooted his chair back and walked to the window. He parted the curtain and stared out on the street. Jack was just entering the jail.

“I get the feeling you know why that man tried to shoot me. Am I right, Cotton?”

“I don't rightly know. I have an idea, a mere suspicion, that's all. I'll know more when I can see him face-to-face.”

“So what's your idea?”

“It's got nothing to do with you. It's me he's after. Of that I am certain.”

“Something that happened recently?”

“Nope.”

“So, he's someone from your past.”

“Yep.”

“But why me?”

“He knows you're important to me. That's why.”

“Then this is about revenge?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Why does he want you dead?”

“Payback, money—both, likely.”

“Are you saying he's a hired killer?”

“That's my guess.”

“People don't hire killers for no good reason, do they?”

“Nope.”

“Is that reason what you can't seem to bring yourself to tell me?”

“Likely.”

Emily knew she had only succeeded in chasing the goat around the barn and still hadn't caught it. She sighed and took another sip of tea. She sat silently as he continued his gazing out the window. If she was hoping he would relent, he was just as rigid in his intention not to tell her the whole story. After several minutes, he returned to the table, picked up his own cup, gulped the rest of his coffee, which had cooled sufficiently to allow such a daring act, and started for the door.

“I'm going to the livery to rent a buckboard to go fetch Thorn McCann and Delilah Jones. I'll be back in a few days.”

“Wait! If you don't mind my staying with Henry until he's able to travel, why don't you take my buckboard? No sense in it sitting here for no purpose. If I need to go out to the ranch, I can ride your mare. You won't be needing her, I presume.”

“All right. That is a good plan. I'll tie Mr. Hardin's horses to the back. They'll be needin' them as soon as the stage line gets its schedule back to normal.”

Emily stood and walked up to Cotton. She put her hands on his chest and looked up. He leaned over and kissed her, then opened the door and walked out. He went around back to hook Emily's two horses up to the buckboard. That finished, he tossed his saddlebags and a blanket in the back, climbed into the seat, slapped the reins on the horses' rumps, and the conveyance rumbled into the street. Emily watched from the porch as he stopped briefly at the jail, hollering to Jack through the open door. After asking Jack
to make sure nothing happened to Emily while he was gone, he waved and started off again.

As soon as Cotton was about to pass the stage line office, he pulled up and called out to the young shotgun guard, Jimmy Culp.

“Hey, Jimmy, you in there?”

Jimmy appeared from the side of the building. He walked up to the sheriff with a questioning look.

“What can I do for you, Sheriff?”

“I'm on my way to the livery to pick up the Hardins' horses. I need to get them back out to the relay station and pick up the two passengers we left out there. I don't know if Thorn will be any help in case of trouble, but if you've gotten some rest and a belly full, you and your shotgun would ease my mind a bit. How about comin' along?”

“Might as well. Until the company gets a crew out to where the stagecoach is lyin' all busted up, we're out of business on that route anyway. Nothin' to do but service the coaches from the two other lines that come through here. And none of them need a guard. Wait till I get my Greener and some supplies.” The kid took off at a dead run back around the building from where he'd appeared. He returned in minutes with two boxes of shells, the short-barreled shotgun, and a gunnysack with who knew what stuffed inside. He climbed up next to Cotton with a possum-eating grin.

Jack wandered down to Cotton's house, where Emily stood staring after her buckboard and the dusty trail it left. She had crossed her arms, looking wistfully after her departed love.

“Emily, Cotton asked me to keep an eye on you while he's gone. Reckon that's a good idea since you already had one close call from that hombre James Lee Hogg. Anything I can do for you?”

“Thanks, Jack, but right now the only thing I want is
some straight talk from your boss. But it doesn't appear I'll get that anytime soon.”

“I don't understand. Far as I know, he confides in you more'n anyone I know. Sure as hell more'n me.”

“He's got something in his past that's eating him up, but he can't bring himself to share that with me. Must be terribly painful for him.”

“I don't figure I know exactly what you're talkin' about, but if I was to venture a guess, I'd have to say it
is
something painful. Damned painful. Probably be best if you let 'er lie until he's ready. But that's just my humble opinion.”

“I appreciate you opinions, Jack. But if we're ever goin' to make a home for the two of us, there has to be absolute openness about our pasts. I draw the line at secrets.”

She spun around and stomped back inside. The door slammed closed behind her, leaving Jack to talk to a slab of pine with a handle and a lock.

“Yes, ma'am,” he muttered as he began the trek back to the jail.

A
distraught Delilah Jones met Cotton and Jimmy at the Hardins' front door. Her face was tired, devoid of its usual radiance, and dark circles ringed her pretty eyes. As soon as Cotton stepped inside, it became obvious that something terrible had happened during his absence. The smell of death lingered in the air like a musty blanket. He figured Thorn hadn't made it through, even after the heroic efforts of Mrs. Hardin. But when Thorn eased gingerly through the curtains dividing the front room from the sleeping quarters, it became obvious that something far worse had occurred.

“Hey, Cotton. Glad you could get back to us,” Thorn said with a voice as weak as a child. He grabbed hold of a chair just within reach and dropped into it with a groan. Pain was obviously a constant companion, and his left arm appeared useless as it lay across his lap like a piece of cordwood.

“You look better than when I left, old pard, but still not the confident pistolero I once knew.”

“He-he gets more of his strength back each day, Sheriff, but I'm even more worried about Mrs. Hardin,” Delilah said.

“What happened, Delilah? Where is Mrs. Hardin?”

“She took to her bed and I can hardly rouse her to get her to eat a bite. Says she just wants to be left alone. A couple Indians shot and killed Jeremiah when he refused them whiskey. If it hadn't been for Thorn, we'd probably all be dead. He got both of them.”

Cotton chewed on his lip as he mulled a way out of this new dilemma. For certain he couldn't leave Mrs. Hardin to fend for herself in the middle of the desert. But he was unsure whether he could come up with sufficient incentive to convince her to come back to Apache Springs with him. He'd known women who'd decided to lie down and die after losing their husbands. He hoped that wasn't what he was dealing with here. He began to pace the length of the long, narrow room. Down and back, down and back. Delilah's lovely lips were pinched. Jimmy Culp was getting fidgety, as if he were uncomfortable with all that had been happening. He opened the door as quietly as possible and slipped outside. Seeing this, Cotton called out for him to look around for signs of anything amiss.

Jimmy began his exploration of the Hardin place at the stable. He figured that since there had been such horror visited on Mr. and Mrs. Hardin over the past three days, he'd best make sure any horses that might be in the stalls had food and water. He wandered across a barren yard, opened a swinging gate that drooped from its own weight and rusted hinges, and stopped at a water tank that looked to have the beginnings of some scum on top.
There haven't been any horses drinking out of this for a while
, he thought. As he approached the barn, he saw that the wide swinging doors were closed and latched with a linchpin. He undid the latch and pulled. It took most of his strength to get the massive door over the dust and dirt blown in front of it by recent
winds and a dust storm. As one door creaked open, Jimmy was met with the terrible stench of death. He jumped back, not certain whether he could keep down what little food he'd had that morning.

“Sheriff, you best come look. You ain't gonna like what you see,” Jimmy yelled at the top of his lungs.

The urgency in his voice brought Cotton rushing out the door. He hurried to the barn, where Jimmy leaned on a railing, looking wan. The boy turned slightly and pointed to the open barn door, clearly unwilling to accompany the sheriff inside. Cotton stopped short, catching a first whiff of the death emanating from inside like a wandering plague. He quickly pulled his kerchief from around his neck, went back to the watering trough, and dipped the kerchief in the water. He wrung it out and, holding it over his nose and mouth, entered the barn. There, stretched out in front of him were three bodies; two were Indians, and the third was Jeremiah Hardin. Four horses stood in the farthest stall toward the back, obviously skittish about the smell they had been forced to endure.

Cotton came out with a scowl on his face.

“What is it, Sheriff? What's dead in there?”

“Mr. Hardin and the two Indians that killed him.”

“How'd they get in there?”

“Someone must have dragged the bodies in there, and there's little doubt who.”

Jimmy kept looking back over his shoulder as if he expected a ghost to arise and follow him into the house. He quickened his step to keep up with the sheriff.