Flint (1960) (16 page)

With surprise he realized he had not spat blood for a week, and he felt better. It was time he went back to the hideout.

Yet he was worried. It was not like Baldwin to back down. Nor had he left the country. He had sold off some cattle, but he was holding the rest on Nugent range.

And then Gaddis rode in. "Nugent's dead," he said. "He was found in his own ranch yard, shot through the heart."

"Buckdun," Rockley said.

"Maybe," Gaddis said, looking over at Flint. "And maybe not."

Nancy caught the glance, and realized what it meant. Flint had said he could bring an end to it, and now Nugent was dead. There could be, she assured herself, no possible connection. Her eyes strayed to the high-powered rifle that Flint was never without these days.

Flint looked up to find their eyes on him. Slowly he looked from one to the other. "What's the matter?" he said.

"The way I look at it," Gaddis said, "it ain't reasonable that Port Baldwin would back up like he has done, with or without that injunction. Not unless there was something he wanted done first."

"What does that mean?"

"Nugent is dead."

"So?"

"If the boss should be killed he would have a free hand, wouldn't he?"

Flint waited a full minute without speaking. The idea was one that he had never expected, never dreamed of. They believed he had killed Nugent. They believed that he intended to kill Nancy Kerrigan.

Carefully he got to his feet, rifle in hand. "What would I have to gain?" he asked them quietly. "Where could I gain anything?"

"You have a name," Gaddis said. "A name that stands for something."

Flint!

"It is not an uncommon name," he replied quietly.

"I should know," Gaddis said.

Flint was puzzled. "Look," he said, "how do you suppose that injunction was granted? It was I who went to Judge Hatfield."

"Was it?" Gaddis had faced squarely toward him now. "Flint, I say you're a liar!"

He was ready to draw, but Flint did not move. "I wouldn't try that if I were you, Gaddis. I don't want to kill you."

"Or do you mean you don't want to try when it would be a fair shooting? Your kind pick your own spots. Well, you don't pick this one! Draw!"

"No!"Nancy spoke sharply. "Pete, stop that. There will be no gunfight here."

She turned to Flint. "I suggest you ride out of here."

He merely looked at her. "All right," he said, and walked to his horse.

Nobody spoke while he saddled up, then Gaddis said, "Ma'am, you're doing the wrong thing. I tell you he killed Nugent. It had to be him. And he's gunning for you.

"Look at it straight. When did he get here? Right after Baldwin did. Where does he go when he pulls out? Where did he get his horses? Ain't he the one had the run-in with Nugent? Tried to get him into a fight then. You heard the story."

Nancy looked across the fire at Flint's back. It was impossible, and yet she had no argument against it.

"How do we know he didn't shoot Ed himself? How do we know he didn't lead the party that attacked the ranch, and just come on in to find out where we'd go and what we'd do."

"I got a rope," Scott said.

"Hold it," Rockley said quietly, "you're going off half-cocked, Pete. We don't know any of this here. Seems to me you've got something in your craw."

Flint turned deliberately and got into his saddle. "I shouldn't have expected better of any of you," he said quietly. "The only thing I'm guilty of is making a damned fool of myself."

"Gaddis," he said, "I liked you. But you've got something in your craw, as Rockley said it. What's wrong?"

"Flint! -- that's what's wrong! Everybody knows that name! Known it for years! Why, we figured we had you at The Crossing -- !"

"You were there?" Flint asked mildly.

"You're damned right I was there! I was riding segundo for the Three-X! You killed our boss! Leyden spotted you in the saloon that night."

Flint was facing them all now, sitting the saddle. "And how many shots were fired into Flint while his arms were held?"

Gaddis flushed. "I -- "

"His arms were held by two brave men," Flint said, "while the others shot into his body. It wasn't enough to make it nine to one, you had to hold him, too!"

Rockley was looking at Gaddis. "I never heard that part of it," he said.

"I wasn't for that," Gaddis protested angrily. "I wasn't for that, at all. Anyway, he was a drygulcher. He was an ambush killer."

"You shot into him how many times, Gaddis?" Flint repeated.

"How should I know? Nine or ten times ... maybe more."

Flint reached up and, taking his shirt by the collar, ripped it from his body with one jerk. "All right, damn you," he said bitterly, "how many bullet scars do you count?"

His bare chest was white, dead white, but there were no scars, not one.

"I think, Gaddis, you've talked too damned much," he said. His eyes crossed the fire toward Nancy. "Believe me, ma'am, I only tried to help."

He swung the red stallion and rode swiftly away.

So he had been a fool. Now he would go back to the hideout and stay there.

If he was going to die, it should be soon.

Chapter
12

When Lottie Kettleman stepped down from the train to the platform at Alamitos she was no more prepared for the town than the town was for her.

Beautiful women were rare in Alamitos, and beautiful women dressed in the the very latest Paris fashions were unheard of. And Lottie's worst enemy would not deny that she was truly beautiful.

She had red-gold hair with almost violet eyes and the clear, creamy skin that one occasionally sees in truly beautiful red-haired women. Fashion had swung from the hooped skirt to dresses that moulded the figure, and Lottie Kettleman had a figure which appreciated the new styles.

Moreover, she was perfectly aware that she was entering upon a field of battle where allies were to be won and enemies defeated by what weapons she could muster, and she proposed to leave no one in doubt as to the weapons she brought to the field.

Her dress was of jersey, the new elastic cashmere fabric which offered elegance of shape and finish as well as freedom of movement. Her skirt was much narrower than anything Alamitos had seen, or for that matter, Philadelphia or San Francisco, and the polonaise of flowered material was startling.

Followed by an embarrassed young man in a dark suit who had offered to carry her bags, Lottie crossed the street to the Grand Hotel, pausing a moment to look about her.

Alamitos had little to offer, and that little could all be seen, a few shabby buildings, the cottonwoods for which the town was named, the loafing cowhands.

What startled her was the sky. It was enormous and blue, more blue than any sky she had seen, the vast sweep of it something she could scarcely grasp.

Women stood frozen, watching her, fascinated by clothing they had seen only in Godey"s Lady's Book or Harper's Bazaar, and the men were scarcely aware of the dress at all, seeing only the girl.

Lottie Kettleman swept into the lobby of the Grand and the clerk hastily swung the register toward her. "I am Mrs. Kettleman," she said. "You have a reservation, I believe?"

Within the hour she was sitting opposite Porter Baldwin in the dining room. "Where is he, Port?" she demanded.

"I wish I knew," Baldwin said irritably. "I have men looking for him, but we've had no description. I never saw him, and the telegraph operator at McCartys couldn't or wouldn't give us any adequate description."

"That's ridiculous! How many men are there in this town? If you ever see Jim Kettleman you won't forget him." She paused, debating whether to say what she had in mind, then decided against it.

Apparently nobody but the doctor and Jim knew that he was dying of cancer, and she was not planning to tell, not yet. She was sure the information would be of use.

Without seeming to do so, she studied Port Baldwin. He was a handsome man in his own brutal fashion, but uncouth. She had never cared for him.

"Leave it to me," she said, "I'll find him. Or he will find me."

She sipped her tea. "Port," she said, almost whispering, "he knows we tried to have him killed."

Baldwin was astonished. "How could he know?"

"That fool, that gambler you sent to Father. He must have talked before he died. Anyway, Jim had the Pinkertons investigating. I don't know how much he knows."

"It doesn't matter." He paused. "There's no reason why he should go back East at all. There are a lot of strange gunmen in town, and there have been half a dozen killings,"

Lottie made no reply. She did not trust Port Baldwin, and whatever was done she meant to do herself.

She listened while Baldwin told her what had happened in Alamitos and of the sudden telegrams sent from McCartys by a man who signed himself Kettleman.

"When I first heard it, I didn't believe it, then I saw the paper reporting his disappearance."

"I can't understand it." Lottie was puzzled. "He is not the sort of man you pass by in a crowd. He's almost as tall as you are, and dark."

Alone in her room she sat down in the rocker near the window and tried to think out her problem. More than three months had now gone by since Jim Kettleman disappeared. Until Epperman had located the doctor and learned his diagnosis, she could think of no reason why he should disappear.

He was a strange man. Somehow he had always defeated her, even in this. She had been frightened when she realized he had discovered her complicity in the attempt to kill him. She had waited, wondering what he would do.

It was not until he had gone that she realized how much it had meant to her to be Mrs. James T. Kettleman. For the first time in her life she was somebody, she had position and money. Before that she had pretended, she had struggled to keep up appearances, she had connived and cheated.

Surprisingly, she discovered Jim Kettleman was a well-liked man. He had been aloof, in business he had been utterly ruthless, but at the same time he had been responsible for many little kindnesses of which she had known nothing.

Why had she come West? She found the question difficult to answer. If she was Jim Kettleman's widow, and inherited his money, she would be an extremely wealthy woman. But would she inherit? Burroughs had not seen the will, but he assured her that, judging by his actions, Kettleman had no intention of leaving her anything and it was highly probable that she would get little or nothing. In any event, if he disappeared, the estate could not be settled for seven years.

Disturbed, she went to the mirror and began touching up her hair. She always thought best while working on her hair.

Another woman.

The thought came to her as a shock. Somehow, she had not thought of that, for though Jim had admired women he had never shown any inclination to seek their company.

But no. The fact that he was dying was enough reason for him to disappear. What she had to do was find him, care for him, get back in his good graces, and get him to change his will. That was reason enough for coming West.

Yet somehow she was not satisfied with this conclusion. There was something else ... something more.

She was standing on the walk by the hotel in the late afternoon when she saw the rider on the big red horse. She was staring at him when Port Baldwin came up behind her.

"There comes that Flint," he said to her. "He has more lives than a cat, and he has caused me a lot of trouble."

"I can understand that, Port," she said. "That is James T. Kettleman!"

Porter Baldwin had believed he was beyond astonishment. Despite her words, the thought refused to register. "That's Jim Flint," he said. "He's a gunfighter."

The man on the red horse was almost up to where they stood, and he had seen her. "Hello, Jim," she said.

He walked his horse over to them. "Hello, Lottie," he said. "You're a long way from home."

"Is that all you have to say to me?"

He smiled. "Why, Lottie, I don't remember that we ever bad much to say to each other." He glanced at Baldwin, amusement in his eyes. "I never saw two people who deserved each other more."

And he walked the red stallion off down the street.

"So that's Jim Kettleman ... it isn't reasonable."

"He looks well, doesn't he?" Lottie commented. "I mean, those clothes suit him."

He did look well. Not like a dying man.

"Where do you suppose he's going?" she asked.

Port Baldwin took the cigar from his teeth. "Why, he's probably going to see that Kerrigan woman. She owns a ranch out south of here. She's a fine-looking girl." He relished the remark. "Real quality. Old Virginia family. Her father and uncle migrated West a long time back."

Lottie Kettleman abruptly walked away, her heels clicking on the boardwalk. Baldwin looked after her and chuckled, but he did not feel like chuckling. He went to his room, sat down on the bed with the pillows propped behind him, eased his sleeve garters, and studied the situation anew. If Kettleman and Flint were one and the same...