Utah Deadly Double (9781101558867) (5 page)

“It'd be a pleasure,” Deets said, swinging down and leading the pinto into the juniper thicket. “I've been pounding a saddle since sunup and I'm famished.”

Louise dished him up a heaping plate of food and poured him a cup of coffee. Deets sat on a small boulder and tied into the piping hot food.

“Say,” Mitt remarked, “we read in the last newspaper we saw that you was working for the Pony Express out here.”

Deets swallowed and nodded, watching the shapely wife. “That's right. But me and my pard, Old Billy, had a little set-to west of here with road agents. Billy's caught a bullet in his leg and it's too deep for me to dig out. So I'm headed to Fort Bridger. They got a sawbones there.”

Mitt looked surprised. “Your partner is wounded? Maybe we shouldn't've delayed you.”

Deets waved this off with one hand. “Aw, he's fine. I got the bleeding under control.”

Mitt and his wife exchanged an uneasy glance. This cavalier attitude didn't seem consistent with their notion of the Trailsman.

“I bought a nickel novel about you,” Mitt admitted sheepishly. “The writer claimed it was all gospel, but of course it was colored up some.”

“They all are,” Deets said with his mouth full. “Most of these writers never set foot outside the States.”

“This one was about you corralling some gang in Arkansas. There was this Choctaw Indian siding you—a comical fellow who collected white man's writing. Said there was medicine in the letters.”

“Oh, yeah,” Deets said vaguely. “I recall all that.”

“The hell was that Indian's name?” Mitt added. “I always forget.”

“Oh, that was Swift Canoe.”

A cloud passed over Mitt's strong, square face. “No, I recall now—he was called Cranky Man.”

Deets didn't look up from his plate. “That was just his book name. It sounds more colorful than Swift Canoe.”

Louise studied the new arrival's face. “It's curious. The newspapers and magazines can't mention often enough your ‘light blue eyes the color of a mountain lake.' But your eyes are dark blue—almost slate gray.”

Deets set his plate down and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Ahh, those scribblers are all frustrated novelists. They make it up as they go along. Some even give me a wife and kids.”

Deets realized they were both suspicious, and Mitt's hand was creeping toward his sidearm. Time to show his hole card, Deets decided.

“Well, Mitt,” he remarked casually, “you picked a lonely grave.”

It took less than two seconds to shuck out his Colt and spray Mitt's blood and brains all over the rocks behind him. The body flopped forward, toes scratching the dirt a few times. Deets swung the still-smoking muzzle toward Louise. She had frozen in place, still lifting the coffeepot off the flames. She was too shocked to scream, staring at her husband's body in horrified disbelief.

“Set that pot down, beauty,” he told her in a voice that brooked no defiance. “Then shuck out of them clothes. You're about to meet Skye Fargo in the flesh.”

 

By early afternoon the glaring sun beat down ferociously on Fargo and Old Billy. Fargo had already selected locations for two more line stations and plotted them on his map. They were bearing toward Echo Canyon along the freight road, both men vigilant. Dust rose swirling around their horses' hooves, then settled to powder the roadside brush.

“Looks like nobody back at Fort Bridger decided to light out after us,” Old Billy remarked after searching their back trail yet again for dust puffs. “That's mighty wise of 'em, too. Them doughbellies don't even want to get into a shooting affray with Billy Williams.”

“Don't underrate the Mormon soldiers,” Fargo cautioned. “They took on the best of the Mexican lancers and mowed'em down like hay.”

“Oh, them sons of bitches can fight,” his companion allowed. “But they ain't gonna get their pennies in a bunch over a gentile woman. If this Skye Fargo look-alike, or whatever the hell he is, drifts on out of the territory, yestiddy should be the end to it.”

“I'm thinking he won't,” Fargo opined. “The odds are too damn long against some jasper not only looking like me, but being rigged out like me. This is a thought-out plan, and we've only seen the opening skirmish in a nasty campaign to come.”

Billy, busy cleaning his teeth with a matchstick, shook his head. “You are one cheerful bastard, Fargo. I s'pose we're both going to die of the drizzling shits, too?”

Fargo grinned. “You want cheerful, move back east to the land of steady habits and open a store. Out here it's best to face the facts before they face you.”

Billy grunted. “Brother, you're right as rain on that. But who could be behind this scheme—just one man or a gang? You got any enemies?”

At that last question, Fargo glanced over at Billy and thumbed his hat back. Both men started laughing so hard they had to grab their saddle horns.

“That's right,” Billy said. “Have I lost my buttons? The women of the West love you, but plenty of the men would love to air you out. Me, I always try to kill my enemies so they won't come skulking after me.”

“So do I. But you can't kill all their kin and close friends.”

“It's like a damn furnace out here,” Old Billy carped. “Wait until we start across the Salt. We'll be dried to jerky.”

Fargo was riding with his head hanging along the right side of the Ovaro. He suddenly drew rein.

Old Billy watched him stare into a juniper thicket and pulled his carbine from its boot. “What's on the spit, Fargo?”

“Those wagon tracks we been following turn in there.”

“So? They also come out again, see there? Headed for Echo Canyon.”

Fargo knocked the rawhide riding thong off the hammer of his Colt. Then he swung down and tossed the reins forward to hold the Ovaro in place. “Damn, eagle eyes, don't you see the other set of tracks? A lone rider turned in here, too, and then rode out to the west.”

“How's it any of our mix? We're drawing wages to scout, not track pilgrims.”

Fargo pushed his hat back and performed a deep kneebend, studying the tracks of the lone rider. “The rear offside shoe is loose—
that's
our mix.”

“Shit, piss, and corruption,” Billy swore. “My easy wages are slipping plumb away from me.”

Fargo drew his Colt and led the way into the thicket.

“Christ on a mule!” Billy exclaimed. “Somebody sure left in a puffin' hurry. There sits a coffeepot and a damn good frying pan, and look at them plates scattered around. It's like a polecat scattered them in the middle of a meal.”

“It was a polecat, all right.” Fargo's face looked grim as he pointed at a tumble of small boulders. “There's why somebody cut loose in a hurry.”

Old Billy stared at the tacky blood and curdles of brain sprayed on the rocks. Ants were crawling all over it. “A head shot. But no corpse. Looks like your dead ringer has returned.”

They spotted the shallow, newly dug grave only about ten feet away. There was no marker. The two men piled stones on the mound of dirt to discourage predators.

“You sure it's the same man that bulled Ginny?” Old Billy pressed as they looked around the small clearing.

Fargo mulled that one. “Most horses put more pressure on the rear offside shoe than any other, so it's hardly uncommon to find one a little loose. I have to tighten mine all the time. So, no, I can't be sure.”

“Them brains and blood—mayhap somebody just butchered out a small animal for their meal.”

Fargo walked over to the pan and glanced into it. “Nah. It's some kind of hash or scrapple—I see potato and salt meat, nothing fresh-killed.”

“Besides,” Old Billy corrected himself, “if it was all hunky-dory, who would just waltz off and leave that fine pan and coffeepot ? Hell, truck like that is gold this far west.”

“You were right the first time, Billy. My dead ringer is back. And you notice it looks like he only killed one. If you took it in your head to rob pilgrims, would you kill just one?”

The veteran Indian fighter shook his white-streaked head. “It's plumb loco. You kill none or you kill the whole caboodle. Why leave a witness and risk facing the hemp committee ?”

Fargo nodded. “At least one survivor was left to spread the word that Skye Fargo is on a rape-and-murder spree.”

Old Billy loosed a low, slow whistle. “God's garters, Fargo, some snake-bit coyote is out to get you shot.”

“I wonder.” Fargo removed his hat and wiped his forehead on one sleeve. “If it's that simple, why not just plug me from ambush? This is good terrain for it.”

“Hell, I can't read no sign on a murderer's breast. Could be he just wants somebody to do his dirty work. You ain't the easiest man in the world to kill, Fargo.”

Fargo led the way back out onto the trail. “Billy, I calculate that a man riding at a canter can make Echo Canyon in about an hour—you agree?”

“Thereabouts. But not if he's scouting for line-station locations.”

Fargo dismissed that with a wave of his hand. “The job will have to wait. If we don't put the kibosh on this killer, we stand to lose more than our job.”

“Well, on that score, might be politic to give Echo Canyon the go-by. Old son, that hole has got killers packed in like maggots in cheese. Happens they've got word about Killer Fargo burning down a pilgrim, they'll powder-burn you before you get off your horse.”

“I'm not going just yet. You are. Think they've got a mercantile there?”

“They did last time I rode through. It's just a big army tent, and the prices make the gold camps look reasonable.”

Fargo fished a double eagle from his pocket. “Lay in some reach-me-downs for me. Pants, shirt, and get me a hat—white or gray, not black. And break out your shaving gear for me before you ride out.”

Old Billy gaped as if Fargo had announced he was flying to the moon. “The Trailsman is gonna scrape off his whiskers and shuck his buckskins?”

“Ain't that a better idea than painting a target on my back?”

Old Billy thought about it and nodded. “I reckon it is, at that. Your beard and buckskins is how everybody describes you. But why not just avoid the place?”

“Because whoever survived this attack today is almost surely there, and I need to find out what happened. Besides, we need to sniff the wind and hear what people are saying.”

“Say, what about the Ovaro?”

Fargo grinned. “You got you a new horse, chumley.”

“Me! I'll be shot out from under my hat.”

“Pee doodles. You don't look a damn thing like me, and a black-and-white pinto is as common as the coyote dun. Hell, I can close my eyes and I can't tell you the exact markings on my horse. A paint is a paint.”

“Fargo, you hog reeve, that animal is a stallion.”

“So are you, Indian fighter. Nobody is surprised to see a man of your leather riding an uncut horse.”

That last bit of calculated flattery worked. Old Billy huffed out his chest. “That's right, ain't it? 'Sides, I always wanted to fork that horse and put the wind in my hair. Say, he won't buck me?”

“Nah. He's friendly once he knows a man's smell. You might as well ride him into the canyon this first trip. We'll be going back together, anyhow, so let people see you on him alone first.”

Fargo stayed Old Billy's hand when he started to pull the saddle off his Appaloosa. “Don't bother. Neither one of us has a saddle worth noticing, and a horse fights a saddle that isn't curved to its own back. Just switch out the rifles—you don't need that brass-framed Henry drawing notice.”

The Ovaro swung his head around when Billy tugged the Henry from its sheath, trying to nip him. “Fargo, this stallion has got larceny in his eyes. You're
sure
he ain't a man-killer?”

“Get to the sewing lodge, Gertrude. That horse is easy-natured. But
don't
sink spurs into him, or he'll chin the moon. Just control him with your knees. If you need to ride full-bore, thump him a bit with your boot heels.”

“Easy-natured? Sounds like I'll be straddling dynamite.”

Still muttering, Old Billy rummaged in a saddle pocket and removed a straight razor and a bar of shaving soap, handing them to Fargo. “I should be back well before sundown unless they shoot me for my boots in the canyon.”

He stepped up into leather and gigged the Ovaro forward. Fargo led the Appaloosa back into the shade of the thicket. He scoured out the abandoned frying pan with a handful of leaves and poured water into it from his canteen. Fargo was about to lather his beard when something white caught the corner of one eye.

He glanced toward a nearby boulder and saw a folded piece of paper weighted down with a stone. With a queasy churning of digestive gears Fargo walked over and picked it up, unfolding it.

The five words goaded him with the force of pointed sticks:

Fargo's first thought, after reading the mysterious message, was that the killer's sights might be notched on him right now. His second thought was that he would already be dead if that were the case.

And if this unknown enemy merely wanted him dead, why the elaborate plan to frame him? No, this was a malevolent plot to destroy his reputation and eventually get him shot down like a rabid dog—or hauled to the gallows. Whoever was behind it almost surely knew he was scouting for the proposed Pony Express, and they had waited until he reached the Utah Territory to spring the trap.