Deserter (22 page)

Jake stopped next to a rock protruding through the soil and worked the wire catch on the canning jar. He tipped some of the sluggishly flowing whitewash onto the face of the rock and walked on. He noticed that his hand was trembling as he poured. He didn't like that at all. He walked on a hundred yards, stepping around
other rocks that would make good targets, until he stopped next to one that showed a few inches of a narrow face above the surface of the ground and dabbed some whitewash on it, using the cloth this time. He picked his way through brush and scrub that was becoming thicker and higher and poured the rest of his whitewash on the face of a foot-high rock. Then he balanced the empty jar on top of the rock and started back to where he'd decided to fire from, where he'd be able to sight in the Sharps with the targets he'd created.

Jake fed a cartridge into the rifle and eased the bolt forward, the quiet
snick
of the operation an indication of the craftsmanship that was a part of everything Christian Sharps and his partner William Hawkins made in Hartford, Connecticut. He brought the butt of the weapon to his shoulder and tucked his cheek against the stock. His finger at first reached for the second trigger he'd become accustomed to, and then settled against the sole trigger of the 1859 model. The pull required was heavier than Jake would have liked, but the action—the progression of the trigger as he squeezed it home—was smooth. The rock Jake had dumped whitewash on disappeared into a mist of dust and tiny chips before the bass thunder of the report even began to carry away from where he stood. There was a nub of rock left when the air cleared, pointing straight up toward the sky, no more than an inch or so wide and a couple of inches high. Jake loaded and fired again. A geyser of dirt leaped out of the ground an inch to the right of the little stone spire.
Wind? Nah—there's no wind at all. Either my poor shooting or this brand-new rifle needs a tad of sight adjustment.
He reloaded, found a target in a tiny blue wildflower a
foot from where the rock had been, corrected his aim the slightest bit, and fired. The stalk didn't move at all, but the little flower was suddenly gone. Jake drew a breath and then exhaled, not quite aware that he was smiling.

The second target, out another two hundred yards beyond the first one, shattered in a most satisfying fashion. The third target he estimated to be out at over a quarter of a mile. It wasn't a terribly long reach for a Sharps, Jake knew. He loaded the rifle and brought the butt to his shoulder. It felt like it belonged there. He eased the trigger back. The slug trimmed off the top two inches of the boulder. He ejected the spent cartridge and sat down, cradling the rifle in his lap. He touched the barrel at midpoint between the rear and front sights. It was barely warmer than the sun had made it as he carried the weapon over his shoulder.

There was a very slight rise a half mile outside Fairplay, Jake recalled, that would give him a clear line of fire to the front of the saloon closest to the end of Main Street. It wouldn't be a hard shot—he'd dropped Union officers at twice the distance under conditions he had to accept, regardless of what they were.

This time around, he could choose the day he'd kill Jason Mott—and if that one didn't work out, there was always the next.

Jake was finishing rubbing down Mare when one of the blond boys he'd seen playing earlier rushed up to him in the barn. “I'm a courier,” he said quite seriously, standing at attention outside Mare's stall. Jake swallowed his smile. “I can see that,” he said. “What's your message, son?”

“Mr. Galvin's in the kitchen with Rip Daniels. Mr. Galvin, he says for you to come on over to talk with Rip. He also said he shagged the women outta the kitchen for a few minutes. An' that's the end of my message.” The boy saluted but didn't make a move to leave.

“OK, son. Thanks.”

The boy held his salute. Sinclair looked at him quizzically. “You're supposeda dismiss me,” he said.

“Oh. Sorry. You're dismissed, courier. Good job.”

The courier grinned proudly at Jake. “It's a right good thing for them Rebs I ain't old enough to go off an'
fight. I'd have them slavers and see-sessionists runnin' home or dyin' like the dogs they are on the battlefield.”

Sinclair's smile disappeared. “Maybe so.” When the boy looked like he was going to speak again, Jake said a little more forcefully, “Dismissed, soldier.” The boy picked up on Jake's tone of voice and scurried to the front of the barn. The boy's words hit him like a dark blanket being dropped over him. “
Slavers and seesessionists dyin' like the dogs . . .”
I saw enough of the dying. And I caused enough of it.
He stood silently in the stall for a minute, staring into a jumble of battle scenes, hearing the unrestrained roar of cannonades, the sharp pops of muskets and rifles, the screams of men hit with bullets, with shrapnel—and those being run through by bayonets. They screamed the loudest. It took another minute to get rid of the images and the thoughts.

The light was fading as Jake crossed between the barn and the house. Several of the women he'd seen earlier in the kitchen were clustered about a long table, serving supper to men and boys seated there. There was no sign yet of a siege mentality. Laughter rolled around the table and spirits seemed high. Jake noticed one fellow at the table surreptitiously pour from a pocket flask into his coffee cup. The scent of the food—beef stew, from the savory smell of it—reached Sinclair as he opened the kitchen door.

Lou Galvin and Rip Daniels both swung their eyes to Jake as he came in. The two men were seated at the table, glasses in front of them and an empty glass in front of a vacant chair, a bottle center-table. Galvin nodded toward the empty place. “Sit down, Jake—but
first, shake hands with Rip Daniels. He's a good man and one I'd trust like I'd trust my own son.” Jake stepped toward Daniels and extended his hand. Daniels stood and they shook, silently appraising one another. Daniels was a man of average height, with that whipcord-lean look that farmers and ranchers tend to have. His skin was deeply tanned, his dark hair, obviously cut by someone other than a barber, long, covering his ears and his collar in the back. His eyes were chestnut, a compelling, attention-demanding glint to them. He looked like a man who would laugh easily.

Sinclair pulled up a chair and Galvin poured two inches of whiskey into the glass in front of Jake. “How'd that buffalo gun work out, Jake?” he asked.

“It's a good weapon. Reaches way out there.”

“Buffalo gun?” Daniels asked.

“Moe sent the gun along to Jake today,” Lou said. “Thought maybe he could use it.”

“Can you?” Daniels asked.

“Maybe,” Jake said. “Thing is, for close fighting it isn't much good 'cause it's a single shot. Uses cartridges, but still, loading up takes time. Powerful, though.” He looked over at Daniels. “What did you find out in town?” he asked.

“Well, not a whole lot. I drank some beer at the saloon and listened to what was going on. Mott came in after I did. He ran his mouth about hanging the Night Riders one at a time—those he couldn't gun down. His boys liked that.”

“Was there much talk about our raid?”

“Yeah—you bet. Mott's crazy mad about the damned jail being blown up again. Seems like they're
all hot to saddle up, but there doesn't seem to be any plan yet. Some of them were grousin' about that but shut up when Mott came in.” He drank from his glass and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Most of those outlaws couldn't find their asses usin' both hands if it wasn't for Mott. I'd say that killing him would be like chopping a rattler's head off—what's left can't do anybody harm.”

“Most them are pretty hard cases,” Galvin said. “I'm not real sure they'd slink away if Mott went down. Jake? What do you think?”

“Hard to say,” Sinclair answered noncommittally. “Could go either way, I suppose. I tend to agree with Rip, though—unless there's one or two within the gang who're looking to take over from Mott, maybe even plotting against him. If that's the case, killing Mott wouldn't accomplish anything but putting another killer in command.”

“Jason Mott would be dead, though,” Lou pointed out. “There's a lot of good done right there.”

“I can't argue with that,” Jake said. He looked again at Daniels. “Did you get any feel for where Mott is staying now that the jail is wrecked again?”

“Yeah. He's got a couple of rooms at the saloon down the street—on the other side from the one where I was today. He's had whores in the rooms for some time. I guess he just had a couple of them double up. He goes back an' forth during the day, one saloon to the other.”

“He walks?”

“Sure. Not worth climbin' on a horse for that little bit of distance.” Daniels grinned. “Anyway, you took his horse. He was carrying on about that.”

“Oh?”

“Yessir. He said he's goin' to take you down himself. Kind of promised that to the whole gang.”

Sinclair considered for a moment. “You say Mott goes back and forth between the two saloons, right?”

“Yessir. Least he did a few times when I was there. I can't swear he does it every day.”

“What about the rest of them? What do they do all day? Are there assigned duties, anything like that?”

Rip grinned. “Don't seem like it. They drink, play cards, jump on a whore, argue with each other 'bout who's faster with a gun or better with his fists, an' that's about it. 'Cept for the lookouts they have posted—maybe four or five of them, it's hard to tell—it doesn't seem like they do much of anything.”

“Any idea where the lookouts are posted?” Jake asked.

“There's one at each end of the street. I seen both of them. The others, I don't know. They're not out real far from town, though. They changed shifts about noon or so and it wasn't five, maybe ten minutes before the men coming off were lined up at the bar.”

Jake thought for a moment. “They didn't bother you? Didn't they know you and Billy Galvin were tight friends?”

“I suppose they knew. Thing is, Billy had lots of friends. They had no reason to get after me. I sat there an' drank my beer, is all. They figured I was just another sodbuster gettin' drunk rather than following a mule's ass.”

Sinclair stood. “OK. Good, Rip.” He extended his hand. “I'd like you to oversee our lookouts—make sure
they're out there and wide awake, decide who you want in what position, all that. Will you do it?”

Rip Daniels stood and shook Jake's hand. “Yeah, I'll do it,” he said. “'Course I'll do it. You can count on me.”

“I know I can. That's why I gave you the job. Thanks, Rip.” He nodded to Galvin. “I've got some things to do. Let's get together later and talk, Lou.” He turned back to Daniels. “Let your men know I'll be going out a couple of hours before dawn tomorrow, Rip. Tell 'em not to use me for a target.”

“Yessir. I'll do that. Which way you goin' out?”

“I'll be headed for Fairplay,” Sinclair said. “Be back maybe midday or so.”

Jake left the kitchen and headed for the main barn and the blacksmith's enclosure adjacent to it. The ringing of a hammer against steel indicated that the smith, the man called Bull, was at work. Sinclair stopped under the large oak near the house, watching the activity around him. A woman stood before a churn, pumping away at it, her almost waist-length auburn hair floating up and down on her back in rhythm with her arms as she worked the plunger. A toddler sat on the ground off to the side a couple of feet, playing with a rag doll almost as large as the child herself. Several other women stood together in any angry cluster, glaring at the kitchen Jake had just left, their postures and the quick motions of their hands as they spoke indicating that they'd not again be shagged out of their rightful territory. A man on a strong-looking bay gelding rode in, a rifle over his shoulder. He nodded to Jake and continued on to the corral at the side of the barn, his horse's hooves snapping up smartly, almost before
they touched ground, with each stride. It was a good, peaceful country scene and it took Jake, for a few moments, back to his home. There, the women and children would have been black, but that made no difference. The sounds were the same—the
chunk-swish
of the churn, the quiet thunk of the hooves, the clear, melodic note of struck steel, were the same. Only the rifle over the fellow's shoulder was discordant. Firearms were a part of life on Jake's plantation, but his father didn't allow them to be flaunted, to be carried so brazenly. At home the rifle would have been in a saddle scabbard, readily at hand, but not blatantly exposed. Sinclair sighed and walked out of the shade to the smith's anvil and forge where the big man worked.

Bull, bare-chested, with a leather apron tied at his waist, set aside his hammer to shake hands. His grip, Jake noticed, was dry, although his face was running sweat, and the pelt of fur across his chest and abdomen was dripping wet.

“I've got a little piece of work for you,” Jake said. “It shouldn't take you long. Here's what I need.” He crouched, brushed the dirt smooth with his hand, and scribed the project. “These two,” he said, “want to be two and a half feet. This one needs to be three feet because it sticks out here. . . .”

Jake had never needed reveille in the army. He and his father both had the unusual—and inexplicable—skill of waking exactly when they'd desired to when they went to sleep. This morning Jake awoke at three hours past midnight. He'd slept in his clothes on top of the covers. He stretched, yawned, and picked up
his boots, carrying them down the stairs and through the kitchen to the outside to avoid waking the others who slept in the Galvin house. He carried the Sharps in his right hand. He took a lantern from the counter in the kitchen under the window and lit it as he stood outside the kitchen. The moon was full, impossibly huge, close enough for a tall man to reach up and touch. It was almost light enough to read a newspaper without other illumination, but Jake knew the darkness would be thicker and more pervasive inside the barn.