Utah Deadly Double (9781101558867) (10 page)

“It belonged to a Crow Indian up near Powder River,” Billy spat out. “I killed the red son and kept his horse. Case you don't know it, Injuns never cut their horses.”

“Hell, my grammaw knows that.”

“Then it ain't no big freak, is it, to see a white man riding a stallion?”

“'Cept that this one,” put in Lantern Jaw, “fits the exact description of Skye Fargo's hoss.”

Fargo laughed. “Is that what this roadblock is all about—Skye Fargo? Then you gents need to study up—it's common knowledge that Fargo's Ovaro is trained to buck off any rider except him. That's how come his horse has never been stolen.”

This was pure hogwash but Fargo doubted these flea-bitten rubes would know that. Wreath Beard turned to the third man, a skinny little runt with a pockmarked face. “Harney, you're the one reads up on Fargo. That true about his horse?”

Harney rubbed his chin, mulling it. “I don't rightly recall. It
could
be true. It sounds like something Fargo would do. His pinto is highly prized.”

The three men stepped back a few paces and conferred quietly. They stepped forward again.

“You, Scully,” Wreath Beard said to Fargo. “You claim as how you're a hunter. But you're armed with a carbine. A hunter uses a long rifle like a Henry. How can you bring down game with such a short barrel?”

“This Spencer is accurate out to two hundred yards. I drop most of my game well under that. And the .56 caliber slug is a helluva knockdown bullet.”

“You know, with a square-cut beard you'd look just like Fargo. Everybody knows he's a dead shot with the Henry. Let's see can you shoot that Spencer like you claim.”

Wreath Beard searched the sky until he spotted a redtailed hawk swooping in circles over the canyon. “Bring down that hawk, Scully.”

Old Billy exploded. “The hell you want, egg in your beer? Scully don't shoot targets that small—he pops over deer and antelope and such. 'Sides, that hawk is priddy near threehunnert yards off.”

“Stow it, stain face. He claims to be a hunter that uses a carbine. Here's his chance to prove it.”

Fargo shrugged and slid the Spencer from the scabbard of Old Billy's saddle. In fact he had fired a Spencer before in skirmishes with Indians, but this seemed an impossible shot—such a small target in motion would be difficult even with his Henry at this range.

Fargo levered a round into the chamber, settled the butt-plate into his shoulder socket and took up the trigger slack in a slow pull. He dropped the notch sight square on the bird, then edged slightly to the right to lead it. The gun bucked into his shoulder, a few feathers went floating off, and the hawk plummeted straight to the ground.

“By the Lord Harry!” Lantern Jaw exclaimed.

Wreath Beard looked astounded. He turned to the third man, evidently the resident scholar on the subject of Skye Fargo. “Harney, could Fargo ever make that shot with a carbine ?”

“Are you loco? He couldn't make it with his Henry.”

All three men lowered their muzzles. “All right, boys,” Wreath Beard said. “You're free to go. Good hunting in California.”

Both men followed the creek up to the high ground. With Old Billy watching their back trail, Fargo retrieved his rifle and knife from the rock cache.

“You know, Fargo,” Old Billy finally said, “that shot you made just now will become back-country lore. I never seen the like.”

“It was some pumpkins,” Fargo admitted. “But truth to tell, it was luck. I couldn't do it again in a hundred years.”

“Mebbe, but you're on to something with that wit and wile business. That was a stroke of genius when you told that stretcher about how the Ovaro would buck any rider but you. That got 'em to doubting.”

“It was only partly a stretcher.”

Billy frowned. “Well here I am, sittin' on his back like the King of Persia on his throne.”

Fargo inserted two fingers into his mouth and loosed a piercing whistle. Instantly, the Ovaro jackknifed and Old Billy sailed off into the dust of the trail, landing in an ungainly heap.

Fargo laughed so hard he had to squat on his heels. Old Billy loosed a string of vile curses that would have been outlawed in hell. But Fargo's laughter was contagious and soon both men were wracked by spasms of mirth.

“Fargo,” Old Billy finally said as he climbed to his feet, “life around you never gets tedious—you break out a new surprise every day.”

Billy mounted the Ovaro and added, “Leastways you better or both of us will soon be carrion bait.”

 

A mile west of Echo Canyon a huge tumble of boulders rose on the left side of the freight road. It was behind this excellent cover that Butch Landry's gang waited impatiently for James “Deets” Gramlich. He finally rode by around midmorning on his fine-looking pinto stallion.

“Deets!” Butch called out.

The man who had recently pawned himself off as Dr. Jacoby reacted with the reflexes of a man half his apparent age. In a mere heartbeat he produced a Colt revolver from beneath his frock coat.

“Leather that shooter,” Butch said. “It's me, Butch Landry. Ride behind the boulders and hobble your pinto.”

“I told you we'd rendezvous outside Salt Lake City.”

“Yeah, but we'll make this worth your while. Won't take but a few minutes.”

“Only gold will make it worth my while.”

“I ain't talking about goober peas.”

Gramlich reined off the trail and swung down, hobbling his horse foreleg to rear.

“So what is it?” he demanded, glancing at all three men in turn. “You're steamed, right, because Fargo is still on the loose?”

“Steamed?” Butch repeated. “In a pig's ass! You're doing great work, Deets. Won't be long before Skye Fargo is rotting in a Mormon prison.”

“But how's come,” Orrin put in, “you're still disguised like Doc Jacoby?”

“Yeah,” said Harlan, “ain't you s'posed to be Fargo now?”

Gramlich snorted and shook his head as if to suggest that such stupidity ought to be bottled. “Use your noodles. Fargo has become the most wanted man in the Utah Territory. If I disguise myself as him all the time, I'll be gone beaver. It didn't matter when I first started, but now I have to save the Fargo disguise just for committing new crimes.”

“Hell, that shines,” Butch said. “See, what we wondered—”

“Plank your gold first,” Gramlich cut in, extending his right hand. “We didn't agree on extra meetings. I'm taking a mountain of risks for you gentlemen.”

Butch reached into a possibles bag on his belt and produced a chamois pouch, handing it over. “This oughter balance the ledger.”

Gramlich opened the pouch and spilled five double-eagle gold pieces into his palm. He loosed an appreciative whistle. “Liberty heads! One hundred dollars worth. It's true, isn't it, Butch? Fargo rounded you three up and even killed your brother, but they never got the payroll gold.”

“You keep your secrets,” Butch said, “and we'll keep ours. What I—”

Harlan cut in. “Mr. Gramlich, how do you make that white beard stick to your face?”

“Spirit gum. For making my hair white I use axle grease and powdered alum. When I'm Fargo I have to dye it. My saddlebags are stuffed full of beards and wigs and such—I can even make myself into a woman.”

Harlan looked fascinated and opened his mouth to ask more questions. But Butch feared the big, slow-witted man might mention Deets' past as an actor.

“Never mind, Harlan,” Butch snapped. “Deets ain't here to set up school. What I'm wondering is if you noticed them two riders that come in after dark last night. Right off I suspicioned that they was Fargo and that Indian fighter, Old Billy Williams.”

This announcement made Gramlich start, his face going almost as pale as his beard. “Fargo? In Echo Canyon?”

“I ain't certain-sure, mind you. If it's him, he shaved his beard off.”

“Christ! If it was Fargo, he must have come to talk with the Tipton woman. That's what he did up at Fort Bridger with the young girl.”

“Yeah, but you foxed him this time,” Orrin said. “A man can't get much information from a corpse.”

“If I killed her in time,” Gramlich fretted. “Butch, did you see Fargo's horse?”

“I think so, but his pard was riding it. Fargo had him a white Appaloosa—”

“Shit!” Gramlich cut in. “That was Fargo, all right. He switched mounts with Old Billy. But how in Sam Hill did they get past those three regulators this morning?”

“Fargo could bamboozle the devil in hell. For some reason the regulators made him take a shot at a hawk circling a couple hunnert yards over the canyon. He dropped that son of a bitch plumb using a Spencer carbine.”

“He didn't use his Henry?”

Butch shook his head. “Didn't have it with him—nor the Arkansas toothpick he carries in his boot.”

Gramlich tugged at his fake beard. “Must've hidden them. Jesus Christ and various saints! I spent the night in the same canyon he did.”

“Why does that boil your guts?” Orrin asked. “Ain't it better to know where he is?”

“If I know where he is, there's a rotten chance he knows where I am.”

“Well he don't,” Butch said, “or you'd a woke up dead this morning.”

Gramlich stuffed the gold in his pocket. “You three aren't exactly safe as sassafras, either. Fargo is well informed for a man who inhabits the back forty, and I'd guess he knows by now that you busted out of prison.”

“That's one reason for this meeting,” Butch said. “You've done slick work, Deets, but trying to catch Fargo is like trying to nail smoke to the wall. Thanks to you every swinging dick in Utah is after him. But the manhunt has to grow wider, and fast, before Fargo notches his sights on us. That means pulling in the Mormon soldiers—every last one of them.”

“You mean I should attack a Mormon girl, right?”

Butch nodded. “You do it all disguised as Fargo. So far it's mostly gentiles that are riled up on account you only killed outsiders. We need to get old Brigham himself so pissed off that he climbs off them nineteen wives of his and puts out the order to arrest the Trailsman.”

“You favor that plan,” Gramlich countered, “because you're obsessed with making sure Fargo gets arrested, imprisoned for a couple years, and then hanged. It's revenge for your brother, and I don't begrudge you that. But there comes a point where every gambler has to cut his losses—it might be wiser if the four of us teamed up to kill Fargo.”

Butch stubbornly shook his head. “He'll be in Salt Lake City inside of two, three days. You can ride faster on account you ain't plotting out line stations for the Pony. Once you jump that Mormon—a young gal, and rape and slice her—Skye Fargo has reached the end of his trail. And you collect the balance of your gold.”

Gramlich mulled all this for a full minute. “It just might be the best plan, at that. Mormons have a persecution mindset, and a crime like that by an outlander would rile the hive. Fargo can dupe ragtag vigilantes, but Mormon soldiers are no boys to mess with. All right, one more attack and this time it'll be a sockdolager.”

The day was hot, the air so funereally still that it seemed to ring. Overhead, vultures wheeled like merchants of death, ever vigilant. Following the predetermined route of the soonto-be-launched Pony Express, Skye Fargo and Old Billy bore southwest toward Salt Lake City.

Old Billy slewed around in the saddle so often to check their back trail that it finally got on Fargo's nerves.

“Damn it, old son, will you quit craning your neck like a nervous bird? A veteran Indian fighter like you needn't be so skittish.”

“It ain't Indians what got me nerve-frazzled,” Billy shot back. “It's hemp committees. Crissakes, you was in Echo Canyon when that Tipton woman done herself in. You heard that rabble talking up what they got planned for you. And since me and you is joined at the hip these days, ain't too likely they mean to feed me and send me on my way.”

“Oh, sure as cats fighting they plan to kill you too,” Fargo said cheerfully. “You're riding my horse, ain't you? And you gave me yours. That's what the Philadelphia lawyers call complicity. Yessir, William, you'll swing in the breeze right alongside me.”

Old Billy scowled and made a fist. “I'll sink you, son. Sink you six feet closer to hell.” He spat, just missing the Ovaro's ear.

Fargo grinned. “You best adjust that aim, Billy. If that nasty shit hits him, you'll be breathing cloud.”

“He's better-natured than you, Trailsman. Least he don't make no jokes about his friends swinging in the breeze.”

“You need to go to school, Old Billy. First of all, like I told you last night, Louise Tipton didn't kill herself. That graveyard rat Dr. Jacoby—who
ain't
no damn doctor—killed her. He's the same son of a bitch who killed her husband. She was s'posed to ride in hollering how Skye Fargo done for her man. But she upset the applecart when she started saying how she wasn't sure it was me.”

“Fargo, when it comes to evidence to prove all that, you ain't got spider leavings. But all right, you got a good think-piece on you, you've gone wide upon the world like me, and just mebbe you're right. Could be that Jacoby is who you say he is. But so damn what? Them ignunt pilgrims don't give a frog's fat ass what the facts is—they been reading penny dreadfuls and they're all het up to throw a necktie party.”

Fargo pulled down his hat against the swirling grit and glaring sun, then shrugged one shoulder. “Like you just said, so damn what? Do you really believe that a bunch of clabber-lipped greenhorns who don't know gee from haw are going to run
us
to ground? The Trailsman and the best damn Indian fighter since Dan'l Boone?”