Deserter (21 page)

The lookout, standing on a knoll a hundred yards away as Jake drove past, took off his hat and held it over his heart until the wagon lumbered by his post.

There was a large hay wagon backed up to the front of the barn as Jake drove in. Three boys, all blond and dressed pretty much alike in denim pants and flannel shirts, ripped around the corner of the house yipping like Indians on the warpath. The oldest looked to be seven or eight years old, the other two a year or so younger. Jake's gelding started a bit as the youngsters raced past and then he settled down. A girl of twelve stood by alternately watching the boys and eying Sinclair. Jake tipped his hat to her. The girl blushed prettily and smiled at him. When she turned away to rush after
the boys he noticed that her auburn hair was tied into a neat braid that reached below her waist.

Jake guided his wagon to the back of the barn. He was about to leave the driver's seat to slide open the door when one of the Riders—a fellow named Zeb—pulled it open from the inside. “I seen you coming, Jake,” he said. “I cleared out some space in the tack room for Archie an' Todd till Ike gets here. Pull the wagon right on in.” Three blond heads peeked around the edge of the barn. “Get outta here, ya whelps, or I'll take a switch to ya!” Zeb hollered. “Ain't notin' to concern you boys here. Go on, now!” The heads disappeared. “Grandkids,” Zeb explained.

“Nice-looking boys,” Jake said, simply for something to say.

“Damned if they don't get into everything, though,” Zeb said, the pride in his voice obvious. “Good boys, though. That's their sister out front—the girl with the braid. She's supposed to be keepin' watch on her brothers.”

“Looks like a big job.” Jake eased the gelding and wagon through the door and Zeb closed it behind him. Jake wrapped the reins around the brake handle and stepped down. Zeb nodded toward a doorway. “Right in there,” he said. “I guess we'll have to put 'em on the floor, but I swept it out real good.” They carried the corpses one at a time into the tack room and covered them, once again, with the tarp. “Hell of a thing,” Zeb observed. “I'm sorry you had to go out alone to fetch 'em in, Jake. I didn't know you'd left till you was gone. I'da come along and give you a hand.”

“Not necessary, Zeb. Thanks anyway.” Jake backed the wagon out of the barn, pleased with the good training
of the gelding. Some—many—farm horses knew as much about backing a cart or wagon as they did about Egyptian history. Zeb pulled the sliding door shut. Sinclair drove around to the side of the barn, parked the wagon, set the brake, and freed the gelding from the reins and tack. He took the horse into a stall, gave him half a bucket of water, and rubbed him down. The gelding grunted with pleasure as Jake worked on him, bringing a small smile to the man's face. Jake left the horse with a thick flake of hay and a stroke of thanks on his neck.

Jake watched the activity at the front of the barn. Another freighter-sized wagon had pulled in, the four draft horses that had pulled it snorting, sniffing the air, catching the scent of other horses. The wagon was apparently a two-family venture; a pair of women ordered a herd of children of various ages about while two men unloaded barrels of salted pork, flour, and dried beans. The aroma of brewing coffee drew Sinclair to the Galvin kitchen. He was surprised only for a moment when he found four women in the kitchen, a large pot simmering over a hot fire on the stove, and a vat of eggs cooking in a large black spider next to it. A chuck wagon–sized coffeepot rested on the warming grate of the stove. He stood, hat in hands, watching the activity. One of the women, a stout, pretty lady of about forty, glanced over at him, a smile beginning on her face. “Help you with somethin'?” she asked.

Jake nodded at the coffee. “May I?” he asked.

The woman laughed. “
May
I? Last time I heard a man say the word
may
, it was old Doc Richards jus' before he lowered my drawers to check my plumbing, when
my Calvin was about to be birthed. I swear that man had fingers as big as tree trunks. Jammed one up my little back passage and I near hit the ceiling.”

“Rosey,” another of the women said, “you're gonna scare this poor fella talkin' like that. Lookit him—he's blushin' already.”

Jake forced a smile, feeling heat in his face. “I . . . uhh . . .” he stuttered.

“Git your coffee an' clear out,” Rosey ordered. “We got people to feed an' no time to admire a stud horse jus'now.” The women tittered at Jake's discomfort as he poured himself a mug of coffee and carried it back to the door. “Thank you, ladies,” he said. For some reason that phrase brought on more laughter. He was glad to put the kitchen behind him.

His sleepless night and the somber task this morning began to catch up with Sinclair as he stood in the sun sipping his coffee. His eyes were gritty and a sort of general fatigue, like a weighty blanket, settled over him. Lou approached from behind and Jake started as Galvin greeted him.

“The fellow I sent to Fairplay with the message should be back before long, Jake. I told him to stop in and drink a beer at the saloon—see what the talk was about, try to get a feeling for what's going on with Mott.” He looked more closely at Sinclair's face. “You look like you need sleep,” he said.

“Yeah—I do. I'm going to my room. Would you send somebody for me as soon as the rider gets in? I want to talk with him as soon as he gets here. Same thing applies if the undertaker pulls in, too. OK?”

“I'll see to it, Jake. It's Rip Daniels I sent. He's a sensible
fellow—a good friend of my Billy, and about Billy's age. Rip will learn what he can without being obvious. You go on and get some shut-eye.”

The room Jake had been using was small and sunny. He stretched out on the bed, listening to the corn shucks complaining under his weight. He didn't expect deep sleep; instead, he planned to doze for an hour—perhaps two at the outside—and then to go down and await both the message carrier and Isaac Wells, the undertaker. If the messenger had gotten to Moe Terpin at the mercantile as Jake planned it, the undertaker would be hauling a pair of coffins in his hearse to Lou's place very soon. Jake closed his eyes. The fall sunlight streaming through the window was like a loving mother's touch on his face. It was mid-afternoon when Lou Galvin touched Sinclair's shoulder, bringing him instantly awake.

“Jake? Ike Wells is here. I sent him around to the back of the barn, told him where the bodies are. You wanted to talk to him, right?”

Jake swung his legs off the bed and stood.“Yeah, I do. Thanks, Lou. Maybe you should come along, too.”They hurried down the stairs and through the kitchen to the barn. Wells had pulled into the barn through the back door, and his hearse now stood outside the tack room.

Ike Wells didn't look like any undertaker Jake had ever seen. Wells was portly, dressed in a good business suit that looked tailored to his rather rotund form, and he was ruddy cheeked and smiling as he extended his hand to Sinclair. His gray hair was neatly parted in the middle and pomaded to the contours of his skull. His eyes, a deep chestnut, looked like he was coming to a birthday party rather than to haul off two unjustly
hanged men. Jake took his hand. The grasp was firm, warm, and dry. Wells's smile broadened.

“You look a little incredulous, Jake,” he said. His voice was pleasant, masculine, without the darkly somber tones undertakers tended to employ. “I'm apparently not at all what you expected?”

“That's for sure, Mr. Wells,” Jake admitted. “No disrespect, but you don't fit the image of your profession.”

Wells laughed delightedly. “I hope not, young man. Because I tend to the dead doesn't mean I'm in constant mourning—and call me Ike.”

A cluster of three or four Night Riders opened the back door and started toward the hearse. Wells stepped forward to meet them. “Gentlemen,” he said, “out of respect for Archie and Todd, I'm going to have to insist that only Jake and Lou here assist me. You'll soon see your friends after I've done my work. I'd appreciate it if you'd keep the others out, too.”

Jake nodded as the men shuffled back out and pulled the door shut after themselves. “Thanks for that, Ike,” he said. “Moe reached you?”

“Oh yes. He sure did. Shall we unload?”

The coffins, constructed of pine and stained black, rested on the floor of the hearse side by side, their brass fittings catching the light. Jake hopped into the hearse and shoved at the rear of a coffin; Ike stood at the back gate and took the weight as Jake eased the box and himself out of the hearse. Galvin raised his eyebrows, a grin starting on his face. “Sure seems to be a heavy coffin,” he observed. “'Specially since it's empty an' all.” They placed the first coffin on the floor of the tack room and the second next to it. Ike took a narrow, flat tool from the hearse and used it to pop the
four nails holding each of the coffin tops in place. He and Jake lifted the first top and set it against the wall. Lou looked inside the box and whistled. Four small wooden cases—each labeled

DANGER
MASTERS & THOMAS EXPLOSIVES, INC.
WARREN, NEW JERSEY
MINING LOAD DYNAMITE—60 STICKS
DANGER

rested in a snug line inside. The second coffin contained four similar cases, along with a long parcel wrapped in several turns of oilcloth. “Moe sent this along,” Ike said, grabbing the parcel. “Said he'd had the damned thing for over a year with not a single customer showing the least bit of interest in buying it.” He handed the package to Jake.

Jake had handled such parcels before. That it was a rifle was no surprise. But as he felt the weight of it, he drew a breath. When he broke the twine holding the oilcloth and unwrapped the weapon, he drew another breath. “Holy God,” he said quietly. “An 1859 Berdan Sharps .54-caliber carbine.” His voice was reverent, as if he held a sacred icon. The cherry wood of the stock and forepiece was rich and polished and without blemish, smooth to the touch, but not featureless, like glass. Rather, the wood was warm, almost like the flesh of a living creature, a natural feel to it. The blued barrel, breech, and trigger guard were coated with thick shipping grease that smelled a bit like lantern fuel.

“You've seen one of these before,” Galvin said. It was a statement, not a question.

Jake nodded, not taking his eyes from the rifle he held in his hands. It wasn't exactly the weapon he was used to, the one he'd carried and used up until Gettysburg. That Sharps was the 1862 model, with the dual trigger system. This 1859 version was a bit more basic, but it was the same stunningly powerful caliber: .54. And, like the '62, it was completely capable of firing a thumb-sized slug that would carry unerringly to its point of kill for a mile.

“Moe sent along a sack of ammunition for that buffalo gun, too,” Lou said. “It was tucked next to a dynamite case.” He hefted the cloth bag. “Feels like a sack of rocks,” he said. “I guess you need a hell of a load to take down an animal that big.” He paused for a moment. “Jake? Jake? What's . . . you OK? You look—”

“Yeah. I'm OK,” Sinclair said, rewrapping the rifle. He tied the twine over the oilcloth carefully and set the Sharps outside the tack room, on a stack of bales of hay. “Let's get the men into the coffins and onto the hearse. No offense, Ike, but the sooner the bodies are off the place and headed for town and your parlor, the better the morale around here will be.”

The bodies had gone past the stiff, unyielding rigor state and were now flaccid, loose jointed. Ike and Sinclair completed their grim task quickly and the undertaker placed the tops on the coffins. “No need to nail them down till after the viewing in town,” he said. “I'm not carrying anything but dead men this next trip.”

Lou and Jake watched as the undertaker wheeled away from the barn. The men unloading wagons in the yard paused and put their hats over their hearts, watching the hearse until it followed a curve in the trail and was out of sight.

“Well,” Galvin said, replacing his hat, “I'm real ready for a drink. Join me, Jake?”

“No—no, thanks, Lou. I'll take you up on that offer a little later. I'm going to go out for a ride, maybe put a few rounds through that rifle Moe sent. Kinda see what it'll do.”

Lou took a half step, putting himself in front of Sinclair. Their eyes met and locked. “Something tells me you already know what a Sharps can do, Jake. The way you reacted to that weapon—well—it was strange, my friend. But look, it's none of my business. I won't mention it again, to you or anyone else.”

“I appreciate that, Lou. If you'll let the others know to expect hearing some gunfire in a little while, I'll go saddle my horse. Catch you for that drink when I get back.”

Galvin watched Jake as he strode back to the barn. After a moment, he went to a group of Night Riders to tell them to expect some shooting out beyond the guards, and to spread the word to the other men.

The light was still strong, the sky cloudless, as Jake, wrapped rifle over his shoulder, pointed Mare to the periphery of the forest at a jog. When the ground became level and relatively clear, he extended her gait to a lope. When he reined to a stop he was about five miles from the Galvin Ranch, in a broad, sweeping field that was broken here and there with bouldersized and smaller rocks. He tied Mare to a low branch of an oak, took a piece of cloth and a canning jar of whitewash Lou had found for him from his saddlebag, unwrapped the rifle, tied the sack of ammunition to his belt, and began walking. The butt of the Sharps felt
good in the palm of his right hand, and the forged steel of the barrel over his shoulder warmed quickly in the sun. He'd wiped the metal parts of the weapon clean of the protective grease before rewrapping the rifle. The warmth of the direct sun would take care of the rest of the slightly oily feel to the metal.

The sound of boots in the dirt and low brush and the heft of the Sharps took Sinclair back to the battlegrounds he'd seen since he signed on with the Confederacy. The sense of his partner and spotter, Uriah Toole, walking next to him, was all but palpable. He shook the image of Gettysburg away before he had to relive Uriah's death during the final charge.
Here I am again in another war with another Sharps rifle. When I left the army I never thought I'd be in this position again—but here I am.
The thought depressed him.
But this is different,
he told himself.
This isn't a political war controlled by bureaucrats and profiteers on both sides. This is good against bad—it's that damned simple. Jason Mott has no more right to do what he's been doing than a rattlesnake has to attend church services.
Mott pulled the lever on Billy Galvin again in Sinclair's mind, and this was a memory he couldn't shake away, chase away, by concentrating on something else.
I'm doing the right thing by stopping Mott. Without someone who knows something about fighting, those Night Riders would be easy prey for Mott and his killers.