Cougar's Prey (9781101544846) (5 page)

“And you claim that's when the trouble with Feders started?”

Josiah nodded. “Pete told me, himself, that he stepped into the vacuum left by Langdon, protecting the gang and its chief operator, Liam O'Reilly. Pete directed the company of Rangers away from the crimes O'Reilly, eventually known to the world as the Badger, committed. It was a smart cover for Pete. I thought Liam O'Reilly was the worst outlaw on the loose, set on taking his place as one of Texas's most notorious, but I was mistaken once again. O'Reilly was only the brawn. Pete was the brain of the outfit.”

“That's a tall accusation, Wolfe,” McNelly said. “Accusing a captain of the Texas Rangers of being a traitor. A murderer, no less, especially when he is not alive to defend himself. You killed the man you're accusing, Wolfe, don't you think that's suspect?”

“I shot him straight on because I had no other choice.”

Steele had settled back to let McNelly join the interrogation.

“It's only your word, Ranger, and I'm not convinced enough of the caliber of your character to know that you're telling me the truth,” McNelly said.

“Ranger Elliot can back up my claim, Captain McNelly,” Josiah said. “He heard Pete admit to it, too. I would also suggest that there's a bank account somewhere close in Pete Feders's name that contains a large sum of money. Money that came from the bank robbery in Comanche, along with others. That account will have more money than a captain of the Rangers would be able to accumulate on a simple salary that the man has carried over the years.”

“Have no fear, we will look into all of Captain Feders's affairs. We will also be speaking to Ranger Elliot as soon as this meeting with you is concluded,” Steele said.

Jones jumped into the fray next. “This makes no sense, Wolfe. Why on earth would Peter Feders join up with an outlaw gang when he had achieved one of the highest, most honorable positions that a man of his stature could hope for? He was a Texas Ranger captain. The respect of the rank in itself was of a great value.”

Josiah drew in a deep breath. “It was not enough, as you well know, Major Jones, for Pete. The prize Pete Feders was after was a grand gem. It is very expensive to even be in her presence. It is Pearl Fikes I speak of. Rank and position seem of little value to her.”

“Ah, a fine beauty, that woman,” Jones said.

“Exactly,” Josiah said. “A beauty that rebuffed Pete's advances more than once.”

“I, myself, have felt that sting,” Jones admitted out loud.

“I may be speaking out of turn,” Josiah said. “But, my life is at stake here. After the death of Captain Fikes, the financial status of his wife, the Widow Fikes, changed dramatically. I don't know the particulars, it may well be a result of poor investments, like many people suffered in the Panic of '73, but her need for money is said to be great. Very simply, Pete Feders was accumulating money and connections to be able to buy Pearl's presence and love from her mother. Robbing banks and rustling cattle was the quickest, easiest way for that to occur. Pete was running out of time, and he knew it.”

“Why is that?” Steele asked.

“Because Pearl was becoming defiant. She rebuffed him publicly, embarrassing him and her mother. The papers carried it. You know of it.”

“Why did that happen, Wolfe?” Major Jones asked in a tone that suggested that he knew the answer to his own question.

“Because Pearl didn't love Pete Feders, and she swore she would never let him touch her, regardless of her mother's intentions to marry her off. I don't know if she is aware of her mother's dire straits, her need to save the estate with the money Pete professed to possess and willingly infuse into her bank account.”

“And that's the only reason?” Jones pushed forward, and stood up. “There was no other reason?” he demanded.

“I believe I am that other reason, Major Jones. Pearl Fikes has made no secret of her feelings for me.”

“So, let me get this straight,” Steele said. “You were a hundred miles from nowhere, and it was Pete Feders, you, and Ranger Elliot, and you, sir, have a motive yourself to kill Pete Feders, to get him out of your way . . . and Feders ends up dead? Can you see the problem we have here, Wolfe?”

The intensity of Steele's question and his change from friendly to angry took Josiah aback.

“Yes, sir, I can. But I promise you, I only fired my weapon when I feared for my own life, for Elliot's life.”

William Steele stood up, joining Jones. McNelly remained seated, his attention solely focused on Josiah.

“That'll be all, Wolfe. I would suggest you wait until the crowd has dispersed before you leave. We will be in touch,” Steele said, gathering up the papers in front of him. “Oh, one other thing, do not leave town under any circumstances. If you run, I will be under the assumption that you have lied to us all, that you are guilty, and I will have you hunted down like an animal. Is that clear?”

Fellow Ranger Scrap Elliot was standing in the hall, waiting to go in next to face the trio of men. Scrap was the only witness to the killing of Pete Feders, and Josiah had expected all along that they both would be called in to account for the incident.

“Wolfe.” Scrap nodded sheepishly. “How'd it go in there?”

Josiah stopped, a slight smile crossing his face. Scrap, too, had dressed in his finest clothes: black pants, a white shirt similar to Steele's, in serious need of the touch of an iron, and a dark brown jacket that rode up his wrists about two inches.

“What are you smilin' at? These are the best britches I got since I spend most of my time on the trail. No need for nothin' fancy as far as I'm concerned,” Scrap said.

“I appreciate the effort, Elliot, I'm not laughing at you.”

“Oh.” Scrap flashed a smile back, then let it fade away quickly. He was slightly shorter than Josiah, with a head full of solid black hair and eyes that never stopped searching. From a distance, Elliot could look bony, but his muscles were tight, and he was rangy, a quick-handed fighter, too, which was where his nickname most likely originated. He and Josiah had never discussed the origin of the name. Josiah thought it was fitting and had just accepted Scrap as being Scrap.

From the time Josiah joined up with the Frontier Battalion, it seemed as if the two of them were being paired together. Never by choice, but always by duty or fate. It was an unlikely partnership.

Scrap, whose real name was Robert Earl Elliot, was young—hardly twenty years old—impetuous, immature, and one of the best rifle shots Josiah had ever come across. The boy was a damn fine horseman, too.

Scrap's parents were killed in a Comanche raid when the boy was young. He and his younger sister, Myra Lynn, had survived the attack. Myra Lynn had joined a convent in Dallas and lived as an Ursuline nun. Scrap fueled his anger with the hope of becoming an Indian hunter with the Rangers. That same anger almost got Josiah killed in Lost Valley a few months back, when the Rangers had their first violent encounter with a band of Comanche and Kiowa—the same conflict Jones led and spoke of during the interrogation.

Trust and understanding were hard enough for Josiah to endow a stranger with—but especially a boy who had put Josiah's life at risk. He would carry the Lost Valley scar for the rest of his life. Still, Scrap had earned a bit of the treasure of friendship that Josiah doled out sparingly, and some respect, as well. But none of that meant that Josiah liked how Scrap acted sometimes, or agreed with the things that came unbidden out of the boy's mouth.

Josiah could barely hide the nervousness he felt, knowing Scrap was going to face a kind of pressure from the three men inside the small room like he'd never faced before.

“What you want me to tell them, Wolfe?”

“Just the truth, Elliot. You do that, and everything will turn out all right.”

The door opened, and Captain McNelly glared at Josiah. “Ranger Elliot, we're ready for you.”

Josiah nodded at Scrap, telling him silently to go on.

Scrap walked inside the room, pushing past McNelly as gently as he could.

“Remember what Steele said, Wolfe, don't plan on going anywhere until we've made our decision.”

“I'll be waiting at my home, Captain, you can count on that,” Josiah said, turning to walk down the long, empty hall, feeling more alone than he'd felt in a long time.

 

 

There was no easy way out of the building.

Josiah could barely stand the idea of sneaking around like an outlaw, but he'd seen, firsthand, the viciousness and rage that a group of vigilantes could impose on any man of their choosing.

When John Wesley Hardin killed a deputy, Charlie Webb, in Comanche, a gang had formed and dragged Hardin's kin, who'd been put in the jail for safekeeping, out into the dark night and hung three of them unmercifully, their toes dangling near the ground, their death slow and painful. Hardin escaped unharmed, but the destruction he left behind still haunted the town to this day.

Not that Josiah thought that he was in danger of being hanged, but the newspaper had been pretty hard on him. He was certain that the Widow Fikes was behind the stories, pushing for him to leave town, or be tried in a court of law for the killing of Pete Feders. She had promised to make Josiah's life miserable, promised that he would never see Pearl Fikes again, or be allowed on the Fikes' property. So far, the angry old woman had kept her promise.

The Widow Fikes had wanted nothing more than for Pete to marry Pearl and rescue her from the financial trouble that had befallen the estate. She blamed Josiah for her losses, her troubles, and the rift that now existed between her and her daughter.

It was difficult to take, knowing someone was out to destroy you. That was a position Josiah had never found himself in before. Hunted down, yes. The object of revenge, yes. But to experience the hate of a whole city, to be driven out of his own home, or at least to not feel comfortable, or welcome, well, that was a new experience, and not one that Josiah wanted to ever have again. He could become enraged if he let himself, but that would be a mistake, and he knew it. Losing control would result in terrible consequences, more than he was already standing in account for.

Josiah was certainly not going to walk out the front door and into the crowd of chanting demonstrators. It was hard telling what would happen if he did.

He made his way down the stairs to the back of the building.

There was no gun on his hip. There was no need to carry a weapon into the capitol building, or at least he hadn't thought so when he'd left the house.

The only weapon he carried now was a small knife in his boot, not that it would do him any good in the event of an attack.

The capitol building was quiet, with most people aware of what was happening. Still, once Josiah made it to the first floor, there were several people milling about in the hallway, waiting for something or someone to arrive.

One man he recognized right away was the reporter for the
Austin Statesman
, Paul Hoagland.

Hoagland, a short, mousy man, who wore a bowler, wireframe glasses, and usually had an unlit cigar dangling from his pale lips, saw Josiah about the same time Josiah saw him.

“Wolfe!” Hoagland shouted, running toward him, drawing a pad of paper from his hip pocket and grabbing a pencil from behind his ear at the same time. “Wait!”

Josiah picked up his pace, nearly breaking into a run. So far, he had been able to avoid meeting with the reporter face-to-face. But unless he could come up with a grand escape plan, it looked like his luck was about to run out.

Maybe
, he thought,
it's time to face this nasty little man and make this all go away
.

Josiah planted his feet and spun around, coming to a sudden stop. “What?”

The look on the reporter's face was one of surprise, almost shock. He almost couldn't stop in time, almost ran straight into Josiah.

“I have a few questions for you,” Hoagland said, taking the cigar out of his mouth, trying to catch his breath.

The man smelled of smoke and liquor, like he'd spent the better part of the day in the saloon across from the capitol building, which was probably the case.

“I've already answered all of the questions I'm going to, now why don't you leave me alone?”

Hoagland chuckled. “You're the big story, Ranger Wolfe. Until the next big story comes along, you might as well take some satisfaction from being the object of everybody's attention, if not their affection.”

“I don't like that idea much,” Josiah said, looking beyond the reporter as a crowd grew, coming into the building from outside.