Sipping Whiskey in a Shallow Grave (2 page)

“Where's my hat? It's quite cold and there's snow in my hair.”

“Long gone, amigo.”

Their horses slowly plodded on. The light was fading fast now and it was getting hard to see through the trees very far.

“My head hurts,” Bill went on.

“I'm not surprised none,” Emerson replied. “Buffaloed you square on.”

“You tied me to a godforsaken mule — that's thoughtless.”

“Don't know how salty that mule is,” Emerson said without much conviction. “Hope she don't roll.”

Bill twisted again to throw a look up at him but could still only make out the tapadero.

“Damn you. Rather inhumane, I'd say,” Bill muttered. He relaxed and hung his head tiredly. He was not lying — his head was hurting. In fact, Emerson had hit him with the barrel of his .45 so hard it split the skin and knocked Bill's lights out.

Emerson leaned over and pressed his finger into Bill's torn scalp. Bill winced and jerked around violently but the knots were well-tied and he didn't go anywhere.

“Curse me ag'in, and I'll crack your skull ag'in.”

“Best to just lay there and make do,” Griff suggested.

  

Chapter 2

Beaver Creek

South of Estes Park

Colorado

 

A few of the cows were just starting to stir in the dim morning light. They rose up and started to root through the snow to get at the cold grass, but most were still bedded down.

Casey Pruitt rode slowly around the herd. He had given up trying to whistle a long time ago — his lips were too cracked. He was huddled inside an old yellow slicker with two sweaters layered up underneath for added warmth. Casey reached up and pulled his wide-brim hat even lower onto his head. It was frosted over. Then he readjusted a knit scarf that was wrapped around his ears and chin. It had been a long night, and he was more than ready for the sun to come up over the ridge.

Up and down the valley, patches of spring grass had managed to poke up through the white crust. It wasn't much yet but it was coming in. The season had begun.

“High summer graze,” Casey muttered. “And I'm freezing my cantle.”

The valley bottom was a mountain meadow blanketed with snow and walled in on both sides with bare-branch aspen and ponderosa pine. Winding right through the middle of it all, willow bushes sprouting up on both sides, was Beaver Creek. The creek was barely a foot across at its widest point, except the beaver pond, and was glassed over with thin ice from the night's lows. Casey could hear it trickling below the ice whenever he rode by. He knew it was just a brittle layer and would shatter pretty easy when the cows stepped on it. They could water that way — he didn't need to get down and break it.

It was a mixed herd: steers and mommas, yearlings, and even a couple babies out of season. It was mainly Polangus, but some Durham, too. Til, the ranch boss, bought them in Dallas and shipped them by rail up to Denver just the week before. Casey received them from the stockyards himself.

As he made his way slowly around the herd, Casey's dog limped over to the creek and sniffed the ice. The dog was close to a hundred pounds and had a coat so thick the winter air didn't get through. Casey called him Hopper — he had a busted leg from several years back but it never healed up quite right.

“Hope there's slap-jacks.”

The big dog cocked his head to one side.

“I could do with just a hot cup of coffee. Although the way Emmanuel makes it, it'll just burn up my insides.”

Catching some movement from the corner of his eye, Casey glanced up. Someone was heading his way, riding alongside the willows. That would be Edwin — taking his sweet time. He walked his horse, just ambling along. At one point he angled away from the willows to get around the beaver pond. The sound of hoofsteps in the crusty snow carried up the valley.

It had been another bitter night. It was April in the Rockies so that was no surprise. Casey shook his head impatiently. It was chilly, and his night shift was over and all he wanted to do was ride into camp. He was flat out tired. Also, his horse needed to be grained, and the bay knew what time it was, too.

Edwin rode past the pond and finally kicked it up to a trot. Casey watched him jostle about in the saddle, his white hat bobbing like a ghost in the dim light. Edwin was just a kid in his late teens, maybe. He had only hired onto the B-Cross the week before.

“Hey ya, Case. It's damn freezin' cold to be riding nighthawk — your pecker snap off yet?”

Edwin's grin was lopsided and his breath came puffing out in clouds.

“Boy, your mama musta had a pantry full of soap. Can you even taste anything but lye?”

Edwin let out a sarcastic, high-pitched hoot.

“Makes them beans go down. And that's what's waiting for you back at the cookfire.”

Casey pulled off his rawhide gloves and rubbed his hands together to get the blood moving. His skin was so dry his knuckles were about to split.

“Kidding me? That same batch has been sitting in the Dutch oven for three full days.”

He shook his head.

“Last time I ate 3-day beans,” Casey went on, “I was belly-aching for three days beyond.”

“Well there's paper in the shitter this time.”

“What happened to your eye?”

Edwin's smile faltered. He reached up and touched his eye very carefully.

“Roped a bronc from the remuda, crack of dawn. It was that cranky ol' sorrel of LG's. Belly full of bedsprings.”

Casey looked down to see which mount the boy was riding. It was not LG's cranky sorrel. It was a soft-eyed paint called Sugar.

“Ought be condemned!” Edwin added ruefully.

“LG can ride anything with hair on it. And his string's nothing but mean,” Casey told him. “Likes it that way, I guess. Certainly makes a statement.”

Casey walked his horse a few steps while he tried to work his gloves back on. They were frozen stiff and just too cold to make it worth the effort. So he gave up and tucked them in his belt. Behind him, he could hear Edwin mumbling to himself.

“Cows. Piss-stinkin' cows.”

Casey pointed his bay back up the mountain valley. Hopper ran after him.  The dog's limp turned into a smooth lope as he picked up speed. Casey glanced down at him. Ever since he got his leg squished, that poor dog always did better at a run than a walk.

 
 
 

Chapter 3

Grand Lake

Colorado

 

The blood had clotted and was clumped up in Bill's hair. He tried to run his fingers through it, but they got snagged and made his eyesight flash white.

“Your brainpan is all rattled. Just sit tight — ain't going nowhere.”

Bill looked up and glared through the iron bars, but Emerson was not moved by it. At that moment, Griff came walking down the hallway and into the backroom where the jail cell was. Behind him was Ben Leavick, who owned and ran the Leavick Mercantile.

“Hoo-ee,” Ben said and whistled. “Get the gold back, too?”

“No, I did not,” Emerson told him.

“Let's go get it then.”

“When is a man so privileged as to eat around here?” Bill inquired sullenly.

“Got your horse ready?” Emerson asked Ben.

“Yessir.”

“Don't know how many are out there,” Griff pointed out. “This one won't say.”

Once more Bill picked at the dried blood in his hair but only made himself wince. He looked at his hand. He must have pulled the scabbing loose that time since there was fresh blood on his fingertips.

“Probably ain't nowhere about anyhow,” Ben commented.

“Griff, you stay here,” Emerson said. “Me and Ben will head on out, although I am not confident we'll catch up to them today, or at all.”

Griff nodded. He already knew the chances were slim. This was more a formality than anything, which was why he wasn't too disappointed Emerson asked him to stay behind and watch over their prisoner — or too disappointed he would not be eating salted elk and cold beans tonight.

“Those tracks were angling right back toward Kinsey City and straight as an arrow, too.”

“We'll head out that way and see,” Emerson said. “Maybe Kare Kremmling has heard tell by now.”

“Hell, maybe he's got ‘em locked up for us,” Griff suggested. “Or strung up.”

Stepping over to the cell door, Ben Leavick smirked at Bill.

“Your compadres left you for the wolves. How's that make you feel?”

“You ain't no wolves,” Bill replied with an easy smile.

 “Kare's still mad at them Kinsey brothers,” the sheriff went on.

“What for?” Ben asked him.

“One day they tell everyone the place is called Kinsey City. Just a couple alfalfa farmers, but it was Kare's store bringing everybody in.”

“He was hot over that,” Griff mentioned. “Still is.”

“Hey,” Bill said. “When a man is incarcerated, he is supposed to be fed rightly.”

In the backroom of the courthouse, there was only one window. It was small and set up high in the wall. The morning sky was getting brighter outside, but with such a small window hardly any light got in. The room was dim and chilly. Bill got up and grabbed the cold bars.

“I'm expecting a fine breakfast this morning.”

Emerson ignored him, but Griff was starting to get irritated.

“You eat when I say you eat.”

“The hour's getting long,” Emerson said to Ben. “We need to get on with it.”

They both turned around and headed back into the hallway. Griff waved his hand at Bill to let him know he didn't care about his breakfast expectations and followed the other two men. Since it was early on a Sunday, the courthouse was empty. Their footsteps echoed on the hardwood floors as they crossed the room.

“Why don't you get that woodstove going in here?” Ben Leavick said smartly to Griff. “Keep your nose all warm while I help Em do your job for you.”

“You
this
desperate for company, Emerson?” Griff asked.
 

“I'm that desperate for another pair of eyes and another working Winchester.”

“Well, then. While you're making your way on salted elk, I'll head on over to the Grand Placer and see what's on the menu,” Griff told them pleasantly. “Be thinking of you, Ben, with that moose-steak and potato plate on my lap.”

Outside, the morning air was bitter and dry and there were no clouds in the sky yet. It was too early and too cold for anyone to really be out. Main Street was empty. Ben Leavick had hitched his horse right outside the courthouse, but Emerson's was all the way down at the livery.

“Caroline stayed up late and baked us up a big batch of her famous Cajun tomato bread,” Emerson confided. “So we may not be suffering as much as you think.”

The town of Grand Lake was white with a layer of fresh overnight snow. It seemed like every chimney on every building and home was pitching out smoke. They could smell it in the air, along with the scent of lakewater even though the lake itself was still frozen over for the most part.

Leading his horse by the reins, Ben walked with Emerson down to the livery stable to get his horse tacked up.

 

Watching
them through a spyglass, Vincent smiled thoughtfully.

“That them?” Granger asked.

“Yeah, that's them,” Vincent said, and kept watching. Granger held his hand out but realized after a minute that Vincent had no intention of passing the spyglass over. Granger gave up and stomped his feet in the snow a few times to get the circulation going in his toes. The town was straight across the lake. The four of them were camped in a thick stand of pine. The winter snow had drifted up pretty deep in places but they had managed to dig out a little area to watch from. Granger's toes never warmed up properly and they hadn't dared to light a fire overnight since they were so close to town. It had only been one night without a fire, but it was a hard night since Granger's boots were thin.

The two Mexicans, Poqito and Caverango, quietly observed Granger stomping around in the snow. Neither of them liked the gringo. It was clear Granger wasn't fond of the Mexicans either and let them know it whenever he could. Poqito wished they had not split off from the rest of the group the day before. Vincent made them both come along, otherwise they would have kept riding with Ned, Will Wyllis, and Lem — who were busy leaving a nice set of horse tracks for the sheriff to follow.

“They're at the livery now,” Vincent told them, still looking through the spyglass.

The sun was coming up but it would be a couple hours before it was high enough to get above the mountains and actually shine on Grand Lake.

“Maybe we could light a fire now,” Granger suggested.

“Don't waste your time.”

“Why not… my toes are about froze.”

Vincent lowered the spyglass and glared back at Granger impatiently.

“Soon as that sheriff rides out, I'll go get Bill. So saddle your horse and double check the cinch. That whole town'll be riding hard after us once they realize.”

He pointed at Granger for emphasis.

“No fire. If you get cold, just rub your teeth together.”

That, of course, was a reference to Granger's front teeth which contained a sizable gap. Granger's face tightened up. He did not like it when Vincent spoke down to him. Since Bill had gotten captured, Vincent's condescension seemed to recognize no boundaries. Of course Granger didn't care for Bill much either — but at least when Bill was around Vincent was less prone to goading remarks.

The gold and the gold dust they pulled from the Kinsey City bank were right there, in their saddle bags. Granger privately wondered why they were spending the effort to get Bill out of prison. What did they need Bill for, really? That was one less person to split it with. But Granger knew Vincent would not go for that kind of talk, as the two of them had been compadres for many years. But Granger also knew that, if it had been himself in that courthouse cell, Ned wouldn't be out leaving a false track and Vincent wouldn't be circling around to bust
him
out.