Those Jensen Boys! (17 page)

The last time Buckhorn had seen Tanner was when the man was leaving Eagleton's hotel suite a couple weeks earlier. Could be a mighty interesting development.

Claude Wheeler emerged from his office before Kaiser could even dismount. The chunky, fair-haired marshal of Palisade looked up at his counterpart from Bleak Creek. “Why, howdy, Jed. What brings you all the way over here?”

“I'm looking for three fugitives from justice,” Kaiser snapped as he settled back in his saddle.

“I don't doubt that you could find some lawbreakers here. You don't really have any jurisdiction outside the town limits of Bleak Creek, though, do you?”

“Don't get high and mighty about the law with me,” Kaiser said, unable to control the anger that had been simmering inside him during the ride all the way to Palisade. “You wear a star, Claude, but you're not even an employee of the town. You draw your wages from the Golden Dome Mining Corporation.”

The casual set of Wheeler's shoulders stiffened. “The Golden Dome Mining Corporation
is
the town. What's your point, Marshal?”

“I came to ask for your assistance as a fellow lawman, and I'm entitled to get it. I could have just ridden in and taken the fugitives I wanted, but I'm trying to show you some respect.”

“Then quit muddying up the waters with a bunch of talk about who pays my wages,” Wheeler suggested as he hooked his thumbs in his gyn belt. “Who are you looking for?”

“Emily Corcoran and those two ne'er-do-well saddle tramps named Jensen.”

A surprised frown creased Wheeler's forehead as he repeated, “Emily Corcoran? She can be a little on the feisty side, Marshal, but she never struck me as being an owlhoot.”

“She never helped bust a prisoner out of my jail before, either,” Kaiser said. “But that's exactly what she did last night. And that was
after
she shot up my town yesterday afternoon and helped the other Jensen boy escape before I could even take him into custody.”

“Well, that's pretty wild, even for Emily,” Wheeler admitted. “I can see why you'd want to at least question her.”

“Question, hell,” Kaiser barked. “I'm taking her back and throwing her in jail like the common outlaw she is.”

Wheeler stiffened again. “Now hold on. I don't care what you do to the Jensens, but the Corcoran family has friends here in Palisade.”

“Enemies, too,” Kaiser sniffed.

“That's as may be, but I still won't stand for any young woman being mistreated and manhandled, no matter who she is. I'm coming with you over to the stage line office, and we'll get to the bottom of this.”

“That's all I asked for in the first place,” Kaiser pointed out.

Wheeler stepped down from the porch in front of his office and pointed the way. “Come on.”

Kaiser reined his horse around, and the other members of the posse followed suit. Wheeler remained on foot, striding diagonally along the street toward the headquarters of the Corcoran Stage Line.

When they reached the office, Kaiser hipped around in his saddle and told his deputies and the members of the posse, “Spread out and surround the place. The barn and the corral, too. If the Jensens and the Corcoran girl see us coming, they'll probably try to hide. Don't let them get away.”

Deputy Andy Belmont asked, “If they give us trouble, Marshal, do we shoot 'em?”

Kaiser glanced at Claude Wheeler. “Well . . . be careful of the girl, of course. But do whatever you have to do to take the Jensen brothers into custody.” He had just declared open season on Ace and Chance Jensen. He knew it and didn't care.

Whatever happened to those two, they had it coming.

Kaiser dismounted and started for the door, but Wheeler beat him to it.

He held up a hand. “I'm cooperating with you, Jed, but this is still my town. Let me talk to whoever is in here.”

Anger welled up inside Kaiser again, but he tamped it down and jerked his head in a curt nod. “Very well. You know what you need to do.”

“That'll depend on what we find,” Wheeler said mildly. He opened the door and strode into the stage line office with Kaiser close at his heels.

Bess Corcoran sat at one of the desks in the office with what looked like a stagecoach schedule spread out in front of her. She looked up, appeared to be surprised to see the two lawmen crowding each other a little as they came into the room, and put a smile on her face. “Marshal Wheeler. And Marshal Kaiser. Well, this is something you don't see every day. What can I do for you gentlemen? Do you need to book seats on one of our trips to Bleak Creek?”

“Why would I need to do that?” Kaiser burst out. “I'm not even from here! I live in Bleak Creek!”

Wheeler gave his fellow lawman a reproving glance, then turned to Bess. “Sorry to bother you, Miss Corcoran, but we're looking for your sister Emily and for those two young fellas who've gone to work for your father.”

“You mean Ace and Chance Jensen?”

“That's right.”

Bess shook her head. “I haven't seen any of them for a while today. They might be out in the barn, though. Have you checked out there?”

“We have men looking there right now,” Kaiser said.

“Is there some sort of problem?” Bess asked, looking confused.

Once again, Kaiser couldn't control himself. He took a step forward. “You know good and well there is, young woman! Those Jensens are outlaws! Fugitives! And so is your sister for helping them escape from the law!”

“Take it easy, Marshal. Yelling isn't going to help anything.” Wheeler looked at Bess again. “You're sure you don't know where they are? This is the law asking, Bess. You don't want to lie to the law.”

“I wouldn't. I give you my word, Marshal Wheeler. I really and truly don't have any idea where Emily, Ace, and Chance are right now.”

 

 

The brothers followed Emily as she led the way up the steep, winding mountain trail.

It was a good thing Kaiser and Wheeler had stood around arguing for a few minutes, Ace thought as he climbed.

Nate had stood just inside the partially open barn door and kept an eye on the lawmen. As it was, the three of them had barely had time to throw saddles on their horses and lead the mounts out the back of the barn before it was too late.

Emily had taken them on a twisting path through the settlement's back alleys until they reached the outskirts of Palisade and started up the rocky slope.

Chance had said, “Wait a minute. Isn't this the way to Eagleton's mine?”

“Can you think of anywhere less likely for them to expect to find us?” Emily had asked.

She was right about that, but Ace was still worried. He looked around. Not much vegetation to use as cover. The nearby pass was called Timberline for a good reason. Some trees grew around the town, but they didn't have to go very far up the mountainside before the only growth consisted of small, scrubby bushes, which wouldn't offer any concealment if anybody happened to look up and see the three of them fleeing from the posse.

Emily didn't follow the main trail to the mine for very long. She veered off onto a smaller path that branched and grew still smaller as it weaved through giant slabs of rock that had tumbled down in ages past. When Ace looked down the slope behind them, he couldn't see the town anymore—which meant that anyone in Palisade couldn't see
them
, either.

Nor did he hear shouting or gunshots or any other sounds of pursuit, and noises like that would have carried in the thin, clear air. All he heard were the horses' hooves striking the rocky slope as he and his brother and Emily climbed higher.

Finally she called a halt at the base of a sheer bluff that jutted out from the side of the mountain. Some bushes grew there, watered by a tiny spring that bubbled out of the rock and formed a pool less than six feet across. It was enough for the horses to drink and for them to fill their canteens. When Ace hunkered on his heels and scooped up some of the water to taste, he found it to be so cold it seemed to numb his mouth.

“Rocky Mountain spring water,” Emily said. “You won't find any better. I've camped here several times when I came up here to hunt.”

“Does Bess know about this place?” Ace asked.

“She does.”

“Kaiser and Wheeler may try to force her to talk,” Chance said.

“Ha.” Emily shook her head. “I like to josh with her, but nobody's tougher or more stubborn than my sister when she wants to be. Anyway, they can't get too rough with her. The townspeople wouldn't stand for it.”

“I thought most of the townspeople were under Eagleton's thumb,” Ace said.

“They are, but no matter how much money a person has, folks won't stand for a woman being mistreated.”

Ace and Chance knew that was true. On the frontier, a decent woman was safe under almost any circumstances.

A man, on the other hand . . .

“They might try to force her to talk by going after your father,” Ace said.

Emily looked like that suggestion worried her. “That's true,” she admitted. “And Bess would cooperate with them if they threatened to hurt Pa, or even old Nate. She wouldn't be able to stand that.”

“Kaiser's liable to bring his posse up here to search for us, even if Bess doesn't talk,” Chance said.

“Let him. I can dodge a posse.”

“You talk like Jesse James or Billy the Kid.”

Emily tossed her head. “Maybe that's what I'll be—an outlaw. But if I am, they drove me to it. Men like Sam Eagleton who think they can run roughshod over everybody else. Somebody's got to stand up and fight them.”

“You're doing a good job of it,” Ace told her. “Is this where we're going to stay?”

“It's as good a place as any to wait and see what's going to happen,” Emily said. “It'll get a little cold tonight, but I reckon we can stand that.”

“Better than a jail cell,” Chance said.

It didn't take long for word to get around town that the posse from Bleak Creek was looking for Emily Corcoran and the Jensen boys. Buckhorn lounged on the hotel porch and watched the commotion with a sardonic smile tugging at his lips.

He had no use for Claude Wheeler, and from what he knew of Jed Kaiser, the Bleak Creek lawman was even worse. He wasn't cheerfully corrupt, like Wheeler was, but he was arrogant, stiff-necked, and full of himself . . . just the sort of star-packer who liked to make life miserable for a half-breed kid growing up. Buckhorn probably could have tracked down the Jensens himself if he'd wanted to, but he didn't give a damn if the lawmen succeeded in catching them.

He still had a grudge against young Ace and Chance, but he could bide his time and wait to settle it. Patience was a virtue in his line of work.

While the posse spread out to search everywhere in Palisade, Buckhorn lit a cigar and went into the hotel. He sauntered over to the desk and asked the slick-haired clerk, “The boss rung for his breakfast yet?”

“About ten minutes ago,” the man said.

Buckhorn nodded in satisfaction. He hadn't had to disturb Eagleton's sleep after all, but it was time that his employer knew what was going on in town—including the fact that Jacob Tanner was in Palisade.

Buckhorn climbed the stairs to the second floor and went into the suite's sitting room without knocking.

The mining magnate glanced up from the table where he was eating scrambled eggs and ham from fine china on a silver tray. “Did I hear something going on outside?”

“Marshal Kaiser from Bleak Creek is in town with a posse.” Buckhorn tapped ash from his cigar into a fancy ashtray. “He and Marshal Wheeler are looking for Emily Corcoran and those Jensen boys.”

Eagleton frowned. “Kaiser was supposed to arrest the Jensens when they showed up in Bleak Creek with the stagecoach yesterday. I had it all arranged.”

“With your partner Tanner? He rode in with Kaiser and the others.”

“Leave him out of this,” Eagleton snapped. “My business arrangements are really none of your affair, Buckhorn.”

“You're right, boss,” Buckhorn said easily. “Unfortunately, those plans you had for the Jensens must not have worked out, because they rode back into town late last night along with Emily Corcoran. But no stagecoach.”

“What happened to the stagecoach?”

“No idea,” the gunfighter replied with a shrug. “I reckon it's still in Bleak Creek for some reason. The important thing is that they brought the mail pouch back with them, so the delivery was made on schedule. Ahead of time, actually.”

Eagleton's fork rang against the tray as he threw it down. “Damn and blast!” he exclaimed. “Those Jensens are turning out to be harder to get rid of than cockroaches. Brian Corcoran would have given up a week ago if it weren't for them.”