Cowboy PI (24 page)

It wasn’t surprising that her attention should be drawn to the saddlebag at Roark’s feet. Since it was his saddlebag and she remembered watching him close it last night before turning in, its present condition was immediately no
ticeable. The leather flap was unbuckled and lifted, the bag gaping open, as if it had been invaded in haste.

Roark’s eyes were still closed, his good-looking face shadowed with an early morning beard when she crouched down and placed a hand on his lean length. He was instantly awake and alert, his deep blue gaze searching her face.

“What is it?” he asked, his voice raspy from sleep.

“Have you been inside your saddlebag since last night?”

“No.”

“Well, someone has.”

In seconds he was out of his sleeping bag and hunkered down beside his saddlebag to swiftly investigate its contents.

“They’re gone,” he reported.

Samantha didn’t need to ask what he meant. She knew he referred to the three books on the subject of ancient Native American habitats and their rare artifacts. When Roark had bought the volumes back in Edgerton, intending them as bait to smoke out the enemy, she had privately regarded his plan as ineffective. Why, she had thought, would a smart culprit risk his identity by snatching those books? And he
had
resisted the temptation. Until now.

The books were missing. Proof that Roark’s trap had not been so unlikely, after all.

“But it doesn’t tell us who took them,” she said.

“No,” he agreed, “but it does tell us I must be on the right track about the worth of those caves back at the Walking W. Someone is worried about that. Worried enough, I think, to try to keep me from gaining a knowledge about relics that could be dangerous to him.”

“That still doesn’t tell us who stole the—”

She broke off. Roark wasn’t looking at her. His gaze, narrow eyed now, was focused on something behind her. Samantha swung around. Ernie Chacon was standing nearby eyeing them uneasily.

Roark got slowly to his feet. “You hear all that, Ernie?”

The stocky young man frowned, his mouth turned down in the familiar surly expression. “I dunno what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do, Ernie.” Roark approached him. “Did you help yourself to the books in my saddlebag?”

“I ain’t touched your damn things.”

“You did once before, Ernie. Remember the photographs you snatched?”

“That don’t make me guilty this time.”

“He’s right, Roark.” Alex, a towel slung around his neck, had come around the side of the cook truck in time to witness the whole exchange.

Samantha was surprised to hear Alex on the side of his rival. But Ernie didn’t seem to appreciate Alex’s defense. He rounded on him angrily. “I don’t need you standing up for me, college boy.”

Alex shrugged. “I’m not doing you any favors. I’m just trying to be fair about it, that’s all.”

Roark regarded him thoughtfully. “You seem pretty certain that Ernie was nowhere near my saddlebag. Does that mean you saw someone else messing with the bag?”

Alex was silent.

“It does, doesn’t it?” Roark pressed him.

“I don’t like to say,” Alex mumbled, looking increasingly uncomfortable, as if he wished he’d never become involved.

“You’d better tell me.”

“I’m not sure. I only had a glimpse, and I was still half-asleep in my bag.”

“When?”

“Just as it was starting to get light. He was coming away carrying something from the place where your saddlebag is. Only, I guess I didn’t think much about it at the time. Nothing like theft, anyway. Not
him.
”

“Who, Alex?”

Alex hesitated. “Shep,” he muttered unhappily.

Samantha remembered the grim look on the trail boss’s face the night Roark had announced his purchase of the books. Was it true then? Had Shep learned those caves contained treasures he would go to any lengths to keep secret until he had the opportunity to excavate them? Including the prevention of Roark’s knowledge on the subject of relics, a knowledge that might raise his suspicion.

“If Shep was back here in camp before sunup,” Roark said, “that means he left his shift.”

Samantha looked around. “He must have gone back to the herd because he isn’t here now.”

“No, but his belongings are.”

His jaw tightening with determination, Roark strode in the direction of Shep’s sleeping bag. A nervous Alex hurried after him.

“You’re not going to search his stuff?” Alex objected. “I mean, it’s Shep. He wouldn’t have done anything wrong.”

Roark ignored the young man. Crouching at the foot of the bag, he reached for a bulky canvas satchel that contained Shep’s possessions. Samantha knelt beside him, watching intently as he dumped the contents on the cover of the bag. The missing books were not among them. Nor did Roark discover them when he patted the sleeping bag for any telltale lumps.

“He must have them with him in his saddlebags,” he said. “Either that or he’s destroyed them.”

Alex, hovering over them, was still unable to believe his trail boss was guilty of any misdeed. “Or he never took them in the first place. I could have been wrong about what I saw. I probably was.”

“No,” Samantha said slowly, reaching for a slip of paper tucked among the articles that Roark had removed from the satchel, “he took the books all right. Look.”

She handed the slip to Roark for his inspection. “The receipt from the store where I bought the books,” he said.

Something occurred to Samantha. “Leaving this behind is a bit obvious, isn’t it?”

“Or careless. He could have been just that if he’d been drinking again.”

“This is crazy,” Alex said. “He probably just borrowed the books. And, anyway, what does it matter? They were just books.”

“Hey,” an aggrieved voice hailed them, “have you guys forgotten about me? Somebody was supposed to have relieved me a half hour ago.”

They looked up to see Dick Brewster riding into camp from the direction of the hollow. Alex was immediately contrite.

“That would be me and Cappy. Sorry, Dick. We got occupied here and I forgot it was our shift.” He started for his horse. “I don’t know where Cappy got to. Any of you see him, tell him I’m already on my way to the herd.”

Roark and Samantha, on their feet now, approached the weary horse wrangler as he dismounted. “Where’s Shep?” Roark asked him. “You leave him with the longhorns?”

“Hell, no. I sent him back to camp and told him to stay put. He looked so miserable with that hangover he was suffering, and what with the cows so peaceful, I told him I could manage fine on my own.” Dick looked around, puzzled. “You mean he’s not here?”

Roark and Samantha exchanged looks of concern. Had Shep Thomas run out on them? Alex, hearing their conversation, turned back.

“What’s wrong? Is Shep missing?”

Roark shook his head, indicating he didn’t know. Ernie, having lost interest in the scene once he’d been vindicated of any theft, had drifted away. They could hear him talking to his mother at the back of the cook truck where Ramona was rattling pans as she busied herself with breakfast preparations. Roark called to them.

“Either of you two seen Shep?”

They poked their heads around the side of the truck, their blank expressions signifying they hadn’t.

Alex looked anxious. “He must be somewhere nearby. We should spread out and search for him.”

“No call for that,” Cappy said.

They turned to see the old man lumbering into camp from the direction of the canyon below the hill.

“You know where he is?” Roark asked him.

“Yeah, I do,” Cappy informed them matter-of-factly. “He’s lying at the bottom of the canyon, and don’t look like he’s in any state to get up and walk out of there.
Ever.”

Chapter Eleven

Samantha stood on the rim of the canyon, gazing anxiously at the ghastly scene below her. Roark, together with Dick and Alex, had found a trail that had taken them into the bottom of the canyon. They were there now on its boulder-strewn floor, the two younger men hovering over Roark as he crouched down to examine the trail boss’s broken body.

Emotions that collided with one another chased through Samantha’s mind as she waited for Roark’s verdict. Hope that he would find some evidence Shep was still alive. Horror over the sight of that spread-eagled body. And fear that came with the memory of last night when she had almost plunged into the canyon herself from this very spot.

That could be her down there, her body limp and lifeless. Instead—and ironically as well if it had been the trail boss who had pursued her through the fog—it was Shep. How had it happened? Why?

Roark looked up, met her desperate eyes and slowly shook his head. He had obviously found no life signs. Shep was beyond their help. Ramona, Ernie and Cappy had been waiting with her on the rim for Roark’s judgment. She heard now the cook’s sharp intake of breath and the old man’s grunt. From Ernie there was only a silence.

Sickened by the sad finality of the whole thing, Samantha had started to turn away when she saw Roark lean over one of the books by Shep’s outstretched arm. Without
touching it, he looked at it closely. She knew it had to be one of those missing volumes. A second book, standing on its spine between two rocks, was nearby.

The third book wasn’t there, but they all knew by now what had become of it. Its pages had been shredded, ripped from their binding, and strewn along a path from the brow of the hill to the rim of the canyon. It was this trail that a mystified Cappy had followed, leading him to the discovery of Shep’s body.

Those torn pages were still there, fluttering in the breeze on the side of the hill. It was a sight that shocked Samantha. The pointless destruction of the book was an act that must have been generated by a terrible rage.

She and the others were waiting back at camp when the three men returned from the canyon minutes later. No one questioned Roark’s swift instructions. They were all ready to have him take charge, looking to him for direction.

“Dick, take your fastest horse and ride into Donovan. Since it’s the county seat, there should be a sheriff there. Cappy and Alex, you’d better get out to the longhorns before they start wandering on us. Whatever happens, the herd is still our responsibility. And, all of you—” he paused to look grimly around the circle “—be prepared to answer questions, because when the sheriff arrives he’ll have them.”

“But it was an accident,” Alex said. “Shep’s death had to be an accident. Didn’t it?”

No one answered him. It was then that Samantha noticed Ramona and Ernie. Mother and son were exchanging glances of some shared understanding.

When the others had moved off, Samantha anxiously sought Roark’s opinion. “It
was
an accident, wasn’t it?”

“No, Samantha, I don’t think so. I think it was murder.”

S
HERIFF
H
ARVEY
W
ILKINS LOOKED
more like an academic on some Ivy League campus than a Western lawman. Sa
mantha thought this was because of his carefully manicured beard and the horn-rims he wore.

Choosing not to question them separately, he’d collected the entire outfit on the rise above the hollow. The position permitted Alex and Cappy to be included in the meeting while maintaining their watch on the herd. Samantha could understand that. Unfortunately, the elevation also offered them a clear view of Shep’s removal from the canyon. The sight of the black body bag being loaded into a van that would bear his remains to the medical examiner was not a sight she wanted to remember.

“So,” the sheriff said, reviewing the information they had given him, “let’s see if I’ve got all of this straight. Your trail boss was depressed over debts he owed.”

“Gambling debts, we think,” Roark specified.

“Right. And as a result, he’d been drinking.”

“Not like him,” Cappy said, “but he was boozing it up pretty good, I’d say.”

“And in this state,” the sheriff continued, “he wandered off from camp sometime before sunup. We don’t know exactly when, because none of you saw him leave. Is that correct?” Satisfied by their nods, he glanced down at the open notebook in his hand. “But you’re fairly certain the fog had rolled in again.”

“Thick enough to lose your way in it,” Dick added. “At least it was out here where I was on duty with the herd.”

“Uh-huh. The man was distraught, drinking, and allegedly angry about—” Sheriff Wilkins looked up from his notebook and surveyed the circle of faces “—these books he’d taken. Funny thing for him to be mad about. Yeah, I know. You explained how it upset him to think this Walking W Ranch could be violated, but to go and destroy books just because…” He adjusted his glasses and looked thoughtful. “Still, if a man is drinking like that, anything is possible.”

The sheriff was silent then. They waited for his decision.

“It seems fairly evident to me,” he finally concluded, closing his notebook. “This was an accident. He was liquored up, there was the fog. Easy enough for a man in those circumstances to miss his way and fall into the canyon. I’m not ruling out suicide either, not if he’d been as depressed as you say he was. Nothing is for sure until I get the medical examiner’s report.”

“How long do you think that will take?” Roark asked him.

“Maybe by the end of the day, if I ask for a rush on it. In the meantime,” he instructed them, his expression severe as he looked again around the circle, “you all stay put. I can appreciate your time line on this cattle drive, but until I release you, you don’t move.”

“Understood,” Roark assured him.

Finished with this portion of his investigation, the sheriff started to turn away and then paused as something else occurred to him. “There is the matter of informing his next of kin.”

“That would be his wife,” Samantha said, “and that’s already been taken care of.”

While they’d waited for the arrival of the sheriff and his team, Ramona had volunteered to phone a friend of Mrs. Thomas back in Texas. The woman had agreed to break the news of Shep’s death to her.

Roark and Samantha followed the sheriff back to his car after the others, looking strained and uneasy, had drifted away. “Something bothering you, son?” Sheriff Wilkins asked Roark.