Dreams of Eagles (20 page)

“You rotten son of a bitch!” Howard's brother called. “My back is broke. My kin will avenge me, damn your black heart. You'll not get clear of this.”

If he had to stay out in the wilderness for the next two years, he would, by God, reach every bounty hunter after Ian and read some Scriptures to the men. Or over them, didn't make a damn bit of difference to Jamie which one it was . . .

Below him, men were both cursing and praying. It was a very strange mixture.

He was going to end this hunt for his son. And if he had to wade through blood to do it, that was fine with him.

“MacCallister! Is you gonna hep us, or no?”

“No,” Jamie called down the slope, then walked back to Horse and rode out.

Ravenswood was just as lovely as it had been described by Cort. His parents, both elderly, were immediately taken in by Anne and Ross LeBeau . . . why not? They both were skilled actors.

Both the mother and father were glad that some female had finally taken an interest in their only son. Cort was a good boy but a bit on the foppish side. He was not a good horseman, nor did he like blood sports, never going with the other young men on hunts. But Cort was an excellent businessman, having graduated with honors from the University.

A gala ball was planned and held, and naturally Anne and Ross put on a small performance and both sang; both had excellent voices and both were talented with piano, violin, and guitar. The gentry just loved them both.

Two weeks after arriving at Ravenswood, Cort, ever the gentleman and steeped in tradition, got down on one knee and proposed marriage to Anne LeBeau. She blushed and flustered and accepted.

“Oh, Anne!” Cort said. “You've made me the happiest man on earth.”

Anne smiled and kissed him gently. But her eyes were as cold as the depths of the sea.

* * *

Ian rode in late, well past midnight and, as was his habit, came into the settlement without being noticed. He was amazed at how much the village had grown. Why, it was a regular town.

Like his father, Ian had a way with nearly any animal, and he was quick to make friends with and silence the barking dogs in the settlement who had come to see about this stranger. He stabled his horse and walked the short distance to the cabin his pa and friends had built for Ian and Linda. But he could not bear to enter it just yet. He walked silently to the cemetery, all the dogs padding quietly along all around him, and stood for a moment at Linda's grave.

He thought about spending the night in the cabin but felt the cabin would be dusty and in need of a good cleaning. He went back to the barn and settled down in the hay loft for a few hours of rest. He was asleep in minutes.

Ian was sitting on the long porch of his parents' cabin when Kate stepped outside for a breath of cold morning air, a mug of coffee in one hand.

Ian turned his head, stood up, and smiled at her. “Hello, Man.”

Kate stood for a moment, staring at her oldest. For a moment, she thought it was Jamie. Before the happy tears blinded her eyes, she set the coffee cup on the railing and opened her arms and the bulk of the man filled them.

Her wandering boy was home.

 

 

 

Jamie pushed open the door of the huge trading post and stepped inside. He was big and woolly and uncurried and unshaven. He looked mean as hell and he was. For two weeks he had been on the trail of a couple of bounty hunters who had made their brags about Jamie and Ian. Jamie had trailed them here. Now the men were going to back up those brags . . . or die.

The post was filled with men, men who fell silent and turned and looked at the man who had to duck his head to step through the door. Jamie walked to a table and tossed his saddlebags into an empty chair.

“A plate of food and a pot of coffee,” he said, then took off his battered hat and hung it on the back of the chair. “And after I've eaten, they'll probably be a killin'. Anybody who don't care to witness that had best leave now.”

No one left. But two men sitting at a table across the room suddenly became very uncomfortable.

“Fine,” Jamie said, savoring the rich smell of the huge bowl of stew placed before him.

“I ain't seen the old Silver Wolf in a few years, MacCallister,” an aging trapper said. “How he be?”

“He's dead.” Jamie chewed for a moment, then swallowed, washing it all down with a large swig of hot, black coffee, sweetened with generous spoonfuls of sugar. “I buried him up in the high country.”

“I'm right sorry to hear that. Mac was a damn good man.”

“Yes, he was,” Jamie agreed. “A hell of a lot better than the scum who've been sent out looking for me and my boy. As a matter of fact, they're about the lowest sons of bitches to walk the face of the earth.”

“Now, look here, MacCallister,” one of the men Jamie had been trailing protested, standing up. “Your boy is a wanted man. Legal and all that. Me and my partner here ain't said nothin' about you. But your boy is a killer and the law has papers to back that up.”

“No, they don't,” Jamie said, after chewing and swallowing another huge mouthful of stew. “And you're a liar. You boasted to Gene Morton what you were going to do to me. Gene thought he was man enough to do it. He wasn't. I killed him last week, down on the McKenzie.”

“You're a lyin' bastard!” the man said and reached for the gun in his belt.

Jamie lifted the pistol he'd been holding in his left hand and drilled the man-hunter in the chest, knocking the man backward tangling him up in his own boots as he fell to the floor, dead.

The old trapper who had inquired about Jamie's Grandpa grunted and said, “Clumsy sod, ain't he?”

The recently departed man's partner placed both hands on the rough table. His face was very pale. “I'm out of this, MacCallister! You hear me? I say I'm out of it. Leave me be, man!”

Jamie laid his empty pistol on the table and pulled out a fully charged pistol. Those sitting in the line of fire quickly moved out of the way. The man across the room started shaking and sweating.

“I told you I want no part of this, MacCallister. Good Lord, man. Can't you hear?”

“Who is the western agent for Evans?” Jamie asked. “And don't tell me you know nothing about either man. If you lie to me I'll kill you.”

“A lawyer in St. Louis name of Laurin,” the badly shaken man blurted. “He's commissioned to handle all of Mr. Evans's holdin's east of the Mississippi. That's all I know about it. I swear to you it is.”

Jamie reached inside his jacket and pulled out a small bag. He tossed the bag to the man. It landed on the table with a clink. “That's money. Far more than you're worth. I want you to ride and spread the word.”

“What word?”

“As of right now, this hunt for me and my son is over. Stopped. Ended. Finished. Through. I'll give you one month to get the word spread, and if you tell enough people, they'll do the rest. Then you ride to St. Louis and you tell this Laurin person that the hunt is over. I'll give him until springtime to get word to Evans in New York City. That's about five months away. Plenty of time. After that, all bets are off. Any man who comes after me or my son, I kill on sight. Without a word being exchanged. And I'll know, mister. I'll know. The Indians will tell me, trappers will tell me, old mountain men will tell me, and I have friends back east who will tell me. Now you ride, mister. And don't ever let me see you again. If I do, I'll kill you. Ride now. Move, goddamn you!”

The man grabbed up the sack of gold coins and was out of there like the hounds of Hell were nipping at his heels. He didn't even chance a second look at his dead friend or bother to close the door behind him. Within seconds, the sounds of a galloping horse reached the inside of the trading post.

“I know some about Maurice Evans,” a man spoke. “He's worth millions. He set some store by that sorry son of hisn. He'll not take kindly to your threats, Jamie MacCallister.”

Jamie's smile chilled those hard rough men in the room. It was as if they had been touched by the hand of death. Jamie said, “If he's smart he will.”

* * *

 

Jamie Ian and Caroline hit it off right from the first. The entire community noticed it and to a person were pleased. And it was Caroline who told Jamie about the trouble she'd had with her pa. She left nothing out. To Ian's eyes, that made her a bigger person. He told her so and she wept for a time on his shoulder, both of them sitting under a tree in a meadow away from the settlement.

“I put flowers on your wife's grave every week, Ian,” Caroline told him. “And on my dead baby's grave. The people think I don't know where the baby is buried, but I do. Tobias Goldman told me one day. He didn't mean to and made me swear to never let on that I knew or that it was him that told me, and I swore I wouldn't.”

“It's safe with me.”

“I know it is. Ian, when is your pa comin' back home?”

“Only the wind knows that, Caroline.” Sparks had stopped by for supplies and had coffee with Kate and Ian. The scout told them both about Jamie's quest and looked at Ian and added, “You stand clear now, boy. This is the way your pa wants it. I heard the words from his own mouth not a month ago up on the North Fork.”

“The hunt, Sparks,” Kate asked. “What about the hunt?”

“Seems this Maurice Evans is a mighty uppity man. He don't cotton to people tellin' him what to do. He pulled the ante off of Ian's head and laid it all on your man's back.”

“Then God have mercy on his soul,” Kate said.

“On Jamie, ma'am?” Sparks asked.

“No,” Kate said with a thin smile. “On Maurice Evans and any man who comes after Jamie.”

After Sparks had provisioned up and pulled out, Ian said, “I ought to go to Pa, Mama.”

“No. Absolutely not, Ian. You heard Sparks. This is your Pa's show now. And he'll brook no interference.”

“Ma ... don't you worry about Pa?”

Kate smiled. “Of course, I worry about him. Every day. But I know your pa well. Better than any person alive. He'll be back, Ian. Probably come the spring. You'll see.”

“And if he doesn't come in the spring?”

“Then he'll come in the summer or the fall.” Kate turned and walked from the porch back into the cabin.

* * *

“They're hard after you, lad,” Big Jim Williams said to Jamie. “Word I get is that Mister High-Up Muckity-Muck Evans got all pissed off when that lawyer man told him what you said.”

Jamie smiled, poured another cup of coffee from the blackened pot, and leaned back against his saddle. “How many men, Jim?”

“Don't know about the regular riff-raff bounty hunters, Jamie. They come and go. But the word I get is that he's hired professional man-hunters.”

Jamie's smile widened. “Professional man-hunters from where, Jim?”

Big Jim chuckled. “I see what you mean, lad. But wherever they come from, don't sell them short.”

“Oh, I would never do that. Which way you headin', Jim?”

“South. I plan on stoppin' in your valley for some of Kate's good cookin'. You got airy message?”

Jamie handed him a folded piece of paper and Jim tucked it safely away in his parfleche. “I'll see she gets it. Jamie? Me and some boys could end this thing afore it ever gets started good—you know we'd do that, don't you?”

“Yes. But what was it that Preacher told me long ago, back in Arkansas? Yeah. Out here, a man saddles his own horses and stomps on his own snakes.”

“Well, that sounds good in the tellin', but if you find yourself knee deep in snakes, only a fool wouldn't give a holler for some help.”

“I'll sure keep that in mind, Jim. And that's a promise.”

“Oh, they's something else, too. I nearabout forgot. Them two that run off from your settlement some time back, the brother and sister what done good on the stage back east?”

“Yes.”

“I read in the papers a couple of months ago that the girl she done married up with the richest man in all of Virginny. Quite a to-do it was, accordin' to the paper. Her brother's done tooken over the opry company there in Richmond and the girl she's settled down to be the wife of gentry. Things do work out for the best, don't they?”

“I hope so, Jim.” Just don't have children, Anne.

 

 

 

Jamie squatted down on the ridge, behind scant cover and watched the men ride toward the pass. He had no way of knowing for sure who they were, but he had him a mighty good idea. Trouble was, he didn't want to shoot someone who wasn't out here to shoot him. Come the dark, he'd pay their camp a visit. And they would be reining in for the night before long . . . if they had any sense. Jamie smiled at that thought. If they had any sense they wouldn't be chasing him deep in the heart of Indian country.

Jamie watched the men until the canyon walls had swallowed them and walked back to Horse. He rode to the other side of the ridge and swung down from the saddle, watching the men find the creek with good water and graze all around. He saw what appeared to be the leader raise his arm, military style, and the men slowed, reined up, and dismounted.

Jamie sat high above, chewed on a piece of jerky and watched the crowd of men begin to make camp, again in military fashion—tents all in nice neat rows. There was no danger of sunlight reflecting off glass, so he took his spy glass and brought the camp in closer. Twenty-eight men with lots of pack horses and spare mounts. Their equipment was all new and looked to be the finest money could buy—Maurice Evans's money, he was sure. And he smiled at what else they had—a damn cannon! Looked to be a four pounder from where he sat . . . a cannon. They had really brought a cannon with them.

After watching for a time, Jamie felt sure the men below were all ex-military men, and from the way some sat their saddles, not all were Americans. But he could be wrong about that. Some easterners rode like they had a corn cob stuck up their butt and didn't know how to get it out.

Jamie wished he knew for certain whether they were hunting him.

Jamie faded back from the ridge and saw to Horse and his pack animal's needs, then sat down and ate some cold pan bread, washing it down with water. He had hoped Fancy-Pants Evans would take his warning to heed and stop this foolishness. But he'd known in his heart all along that was not to be. Some rich folks thought that because they had all the money in the world, they could just push other folks around in any direction they wanted them to go. But they usually hired it done, not wanting to get their own lily-white hands dirty.