Flintlock (10 page)

Captain Owen Shaw looked out the window of his quarters and was horrified at what he saw.

Drawn by four mules, the pay wagon had just rolled into Fort Defiance . . . but it was escorted by sixteen buffalo soldiers of the 10th Cavalry, fighting men who would not take a step back from anything or anybody.

Shaw cursed under his breath as officer's call sounded.

Like the idiot Grove's escort, the 10th were tough Indian fighters who'd stand their ground and be no bargain in any kind of fight.

Damn, Geronimo and his hostiles were the cause of this, all the damned soldiers riding into the fort.

He needed to talk to Pagg and hear the man's reassurances. They would make him feel better.

Damn, was his murder of Major Ashton all for naught?

Despite his wound, Shaw was expected to attend officers' meetings. He dressed quickly, strapped on his Colt and hurried in the direction of the headquarters building.

The sun was full up in the sky and the day was already stinking hot. Shaw's boots kicked up puffs of dust as he walked along the edge of the parade ground where the flag hung listlessly in still air and the framing sky was the color of burnished copper.

Asa Pagg stood outside the mess hall, a cup in one hand, his first cigar of the day in the other.

He watched the buffalo soldiers obey their sergeant's order to dismount and like Shaw, he knew he was in a world of trouble.

He stared at the captain as he passed, but Shaw either deliberately ignored him or was too caught up in his own worries to notice.

First Lieutenant Frank Hedley, hungover and unshaven, met Shaw at the door to the commandant's office. He decided to pass on a “good morning,” and instead said, “What the hell?”

“Something to do with the pay wagon, I guess,” Shaw said. He stared at Hedley and said, “Stand closer to the razor next time you report for duty, Lieutenant. And for God's sake suck on a mint. You reek of whiskey.”

Without waiting to hear what Hedley had to say, Shaw opened the door and stepped inside.

The corporal on duty waved in the direction of the door to Major Grove's office. “They're waiting for you, Captain,” he said.

“Ah, Captain Shaw,” Grove said as Shaw entered with Hedley close behind him. He waved to a young, red-haired major who sat near the desk. “This is Major Karl Jaeger of the 10th Cavalry. Major, allow me to introduce Captain Shaw and First Lieutenant Hedley.”

Grove's disapproving eyes lingered on Hedley's stubbly, bloated face as he said, “Major Jaeger is in command of the pay wagon.”

The major rose, smiled, and shook hands with both officers. He was a tall man, lean and slightly stooped, with the rakish, devil-may-care look of the fighting frontier cavalryman. He wore a fringed buckskin jacket, decorated by beadwork in the abstract, floral design of the Kiowa, a loosely knotted yellow bandana around his neck and on his head a wide-brimmed straw hat. Jaeger's eyes were navy blue in color and he spoke with a distinct German accent. He looked to be about forty years old, but could've been older.

Jaeger had fought with distinction in the Franco-Prussian War and, after some youthful indiscretions, had later served four years in the French Foreign Legion where he won a medal for gallantry, pinned onto his tunic personally by the great French soldier and patriot Marshal Patrice Mac-Mahon.

Shaw knew none of these things, but he'd pegged Jaeger as a first-rate fighting man and that did not bode well for his schemes.

For his part, Major Jaeger noticed that Shaw was disturbed but he took the wrong tack when he said, “Perhaps you're concerned that there is no paymaster present, Captain?”

Shaw played the game. “Yes, I did think it unusual, Major.”

Jaeger smiled. “Orders. Somebody higher up decided that only fighting soldiers should accompany the pay wagon because of the Apache trouble.”

Grove said, “Probably just as well. There's a hundred and twenty thousand dollars in gold and silver coin on the wagon.”

“Indeed, Major,” Jaeger said. Then, his tone joking, “If the word gets out to the lawless element I could have hell on wheels on my hands.”

That drew a laugh from Grove and Hedley, but none from Shaw.

A hundred and twenty thousand was more than he'd expected.

But how to get at it? Once he thought it would be easy, but it was getting harder all the time.

Shaw forced himself to breathe easy again. Asa Pagg would have the answer. After all, robbing and killing was his line of work. He was the expert.

But even so, stealing the pay wagon was still a tall order.

Grove was talking again. “Where do you want to park the wagon, Major Jaeger?”

“Right outside where it is at the moment,” Jaeger said. “I'll mount a twenty-four-hour guard. Have you any idea when the troops will start to bring in the Apaches? I reckon I'll pay out as the opportunity arises.”

“Soon, I hope,” Grove said. “I'm ordered to accompany the hostiles to Fort Grant and that can't come fast enough. My lady wife hates this godforsaken post and I don't blame her.”

“Sorry to hear that, Major,” Jaeger said. “Frontier outposts like this one are no place for women of gentle upbringing and refinement.”

“You'll meet Winnifred at dinner tonight,” Grove said. “I'm sure she'll be thrilled to hear of your exploits with the fighting 10th.”

“Then I'll be delighted to entertain her,” Jaeger said. “And I have tales from North Africa that never fail to enthrall the ladies.”

“I'm sure Winnifred will add a piquant sauce to my poor table,” Grove said. “Salt beef, boiled potatoes and onions followed by plum duff is hardly a fitting meal for a cavalry hero like yourself.”

“Hardly a hero,” Jaeger said. “And
meine Soldaten
. . . sorry, my soldiers . . . and I have been living on bacon and biscuit for weeks. Beef, even salt beef, will come as a welcome change.”

Grove rose to his feet and inserted his monocle. “Then, until this evening, Major Jaeger. First Lieutenant Hedley will show you around the post and help with the disposition of your nigras and their horses.”

“My
soldiers
,” Jaeger said, with heavy emphasis on the second word, “are experts at making do and will fend for themselves.”

“As you wish, then,” Grove, an insensitive man, said. “Just remember that we have two white women at Fort Defiance, Major, so keep your darkies in line.”

Despite everything, Shaw was at heart a soldier, and a cavalryman at that. “I'm sure Major Jaeger's troopers will behave in an exemplary manner, as the 10th always does.”

“Perhaps,” Grove said, “but I just don't trust blacks not to sniff around my wife.”

Jaeger and Shaw exchanged glances, the contempt, disgust and anger in their eyes mirror images.

After Shaw and Jaeger stepped outside, the major's face was still stamped with anger and his eyes, normally good-humored, were dark.

“I'm sorry about all that,” Shaw said.

“I suppose I should get used to it, but I never do,” Jaeger said.

“Grove is an idiot,” Shaw said. “I wouldn't let him trouble you.”

A disciplined soldier, Jaeger would not allow himself to belittle a fellow officer. He let his face go blank and said nothing.

“Lieutenant Hedley will show you around and help get your men settled,” Shaw said. “Your quarters will be next to mine, Major.”

Jaeger nodded his thanks, his eyes idly moving over his men, who were leading their horses toward the stables under the stern gaze of a graying sergeant whose skin had the color and sheen of polished ebony.

The troopers' mounts kicked up gray dust that a hot wind drove across the parade ground like mist, filming the rusty old cannon that stood on guard under the flagpole.

“May I have your permission to attend to my duties, Major?” Shaw said.

“Yes, of course, Captain.”

Shaw's right arm angled a snappy salute and he turned and walked back to his quarters. As he knew he would, Asa Pagg followed him.

 

 

“A hundred and twenty thousand dollars for the taking,” Owen Shaw said. He was silent for a moment, fuming, and then spat out, “Only we can't take it.”

“Who says we can't take it?” Asa Pagg said.

“Come again?”

“You heard me, Captain,” Asa Pagg said. “And in case you didn't, I'll say it again. Who says we can't take it?”

“Did you see the size of the escort? Those are fighting soldiers and the man in charge is no fool,” Shaw said. “How can we beat odds like that?”

“Geronimo.”

The captain sank into a chair. “What the hell are you talking about?”

Pagg reached inside his coat and came up with a cigar. He bit off the end, spat it onto the floor and thumbed a match into flame. Holding the burning match in his fingers, he said, “We talk to Geronimo and ask for his help.”

“And ask for his help? Asa, are you out of your damned mind?”

Pagg took time to light the cigar, then said through a cloud of blue smoke, “I'm talking massacree. The death of everybody in Fort Defiance, including them nigras that have you showing your yellow streak again.”

“You're talking nonsense,” Shaw said. “I mean, utter nonsense.”

“Well, how about you shut your trap and listen, soldier boy,” Pagg said. “We know the Apaches are in this neck of the woods, on account of how they done for Lieutenant Howard and we done for a passel o' them. Right?”

Shaw looked into Pagg's face, his eyes confused.

“Right?” Pagg said again.

“Yes, I guess that's right,” Shaw said. “So what's your drift?”

“We meet with Geronimo and tell him we'll help him take Fort Defiance. All we want in return is the pay wagon. The Apaches don't set store by American money, so Geronimo won't give a damn about the wagon.”

Shaw flinched, as though he felt a sudden pain.

“You mean . . . you mean we'll help savages murder everyone in the fort?”

Pagg smiled. “Yup, that's what the man said. Hell, do you care? All we'll kill is a bunch of folks you don't even like.”

Shaw let his head drop into his cupped hands. His voice muffled, he said, “I'm an officer in the United States Army and I took an oath to protect our nation from all enemies, foreign or domestic. I can't break my oath and help a savage like Geronimo kill Americans.”

“Hell, you broke that oath when you decided to steal the pay wagon and shot your commanding officer,” Pagg said. “Don't sit there crying on my shoulder, Owen, boy. You're in all the way and your only way out is with me.”

Shaw suddenly looked twenty years older. “There's got to be another way,” he said. “We must find another way.”

“There is no other way.”

“Then we walk away from it, Asa. Let's just shake hands and part company. Maybe we'll have better luck next time.”

“Like I told you, you're already in this thing too far to back out now. Hell, did you even think of your damned oath when you shot Major Ashton, huh?”

“Geronimo won't talk to us,” Shaw said. “He shoots white men on sight.”

“We go in under a flag of truce. Geronimo has fought Mexicans long enough to know what a white flag means.”

“He'll never go for it, Asa. We'll end up hanging upside down over a slow fire, dying by inches.”

“He'll go for it. Hell, look what's in it for him . . . horses, guns, ammunition and the end of a fort that's been a pain in the Apache butt for years.”

“He could be anywhere. We'll never find him.”

“Yeah, you're right. He'll find us.”

Shaw was silent for a few moments, then said, “It's thin, Asa. I think it's way too thin to work.”

“Well, it's all we got.”

“You don't even speak Apache.”

“You soldier boys taught the Apaches to speak American pretty damn quick. We can get along.”

Shaw said nothing, his head bent, a man being torn apart.

“Well?” Pagg said. “Is it a go?”

The captain nodded slowly and sighed, like a Judas in blue agreeing to the thirty pieces of silver.

“It's a go,” he said finally.

“Hard times comin' down, Owen,” Pagg said. “Just be ready.”

Without looking up, Shaw nodded again.

Outside, brassy in the afternoon, the bugler sounded mess call.

Jack Coffin led the way across Buffalo Pass and then dropped down into the sandstone butte country at the southern end of the Red Rock Valley.

He turned in the saddle and said to Flintlock, “There is a trading post a mile ahead. We can get grub there and a place to sleep. And we need to rest the pack mules.”

“Hell, Jack, there's a couple of hours of daylight left,” Abe Roper said. “I say we press on. The mules are only carrying sledgehammers and pickaxes. It ain't a heavy load.”

Coffin lifted his nose to the high mountain wind. “More rain coming. Best we take shelter soon.”

“There ain't a cloud in the sky,” Roper said. “It ain't gonna rain, trust me.”

The breed ignored that and said, “We will find shelter at Gauley's trading post, and food.”

“Sam'l, what do you reckon?” Roper said.

Flintlock answered that with a question of his own. “Jack, how far are we from the cave?”

“I don't know. Not far if the map is right. If the map is wrong, then who knows?”

“It's right,” Roper said. “I'd stake my life on the map being right.”

“Tomorrow, then,” Coffin said. “We'll find the cave tomorrow.”

Flintlock calmed his restive horse, then said to Roper, “Makes sense to hole up for the night, Abe. And the mules are getting tired.”

“How's the whiskey an' the grub at . . . what the hell's her name?” Roper said.

“Chastity Gauley. The grub is good but I don't know about the whiskey.”

“Girls?” Roper said.

“Sometimes.”

“What about Chastity herself?” Roper said. “I've always liked that name for a woman, even though I never believed it.”

“Chastity must dress out at around four hundred pounds,” Coffin said. “He's a sight to see, even for an Indian.”

“He? You mean a man who calls himself Chastity?”

“You'll find out, Roper,” Coffin said.

“Ah well, if the grub's good, let's take Sammy's advice an' give her . . . damnit . . . his place a whirl,” Roper said.

“Just don't order the rabbit stew,” Coffin said.

“How come?” Roper said.

“It ain't rabbit.”

Coffin smiled and kneed his horse forward, and behind him, Roper said, “Anything else you feel the need to tell me?”

The trading post was an adobe building with a sod roof and a ramshackle porch out front with a painted, weathered sign that read:

The cabin was built like a fortress, with firing slits cut into its four walls, and the adobe was pockmarked with bullet holes, the calling cards of many Apache attacks. Behind the cabin was a smokehouse, chicken coop and what looked to be a two-holer outhouse, unheard of luxury on the frontier. There was also a pole corral with a lean-to shelter, a well, and a hundred yards farther back a small graveyard with a dozen crosses tilted over at all angles.

Roper drew rein, stared at the place for a few moments, then said, “Well, it's homey, I guess.”

“The coffee smells good,” Charlie Fong said.

“Coffee always smells good, it's how it tastes that counts,” Roper said.

“Then let's go make a trial of it,” Flintlock said.

He held the Hawken high, swung out of the saddle and led his horse toward the hitching rail. The others followed him.

To the north the sky was gray with rain clouds and leaves blew out of the aspen groves and tossed like scraps of paper in the wind.

Flintlock opened the door of the post and stepped inside from light to the gloom of oil lamp and tobacco smoke.

But even in the semidarkness he knew he was in a heap of trouble.

 

 

A man often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it, and Sam Flintlock should never have run into Hiram Elliot . . . not then, not there, not ever.

Committed to stepping inside, getting pushed from behind by the impatient Roper, Flintlock walked into the cabin.

A gunfighter takes in a room at a glance and any potential dangers stand out like diamonds in a coal scuttle.

That day Hiram Elliot, small, thin and fast with the iron, was the brightest diamond of all.

The man sitting at a table with him was a weasel by the name of Dark Alley Jim Cole, a blade artist who'd cut more throats than an abattoir slaughterer.

Elliot once had a brother, now greatly missed. Josh was his name, a killer and rapist, and Flintlock had put him six feet under after he'd tried to skip town to avoid arrest.

That Josh had made the serious mistake of skinning iron on Flintlock was neither here nor there to Hiram Elliot. A native of the Ozarks, he lived by the feud and the code of an eye for an eye.

There would be no back-up in him. Not that day or any other.

Flintlock knew a killing was on the cards and he'd no way of avoiding it.

Roper bellied up to the rough pine bar with Charlie Fong, and Flintlock joined them. He realized full well that the trouble wouldn't go away, but for now he chose to ignore it. The Colt in his waistband was tight and snug, its cold cheek pressed reassuringly against his skin, and he propped up the Hawken where it would be handy.

“Can we get service here?” Roper said, thumping on the bar.

Out of the corner of his eye Flintlock saw that Cole's hand was on Elliot's forearm and he was talking earnestly to him, his mouth close to the other man's ear. Elliot's eyes were fixed on Flintlock's back, his mouth a tight, scissored gash.

Flintlock knew it was coming down. The only question was
when
.

A curtain rattled open on its rings and a . . . vision of ugliness . . . stepped behind the bar.

“What'll it be, gents?” Chastity Gauley said.

Flintlock, Roper and Charlie Fong didn't answer, but their jaws dropped to their belt buckles.

How else to react to a man who stood eight inches over six feet, sported a huge, black dragoon mustache and had eyebrows like hairbrushes . . . yet wore a woman's pink afternoon dress in the latest fashion, complete with bustle and heavily boned waist. A tiny hat, decorated with a faux millinery bird, perched on a scraggly blond wig and Gauley's thick lips were painted bright carmine, his cheeks rouged the same color.

Piling horror on top of horror, Gauley was enormously fat and he was sweating like a hog butcher after a frost.

Roper, more used to the vagaries of brothels and their denizens, was the first to recover.

“Three whiskeys,” he said. Then, “You must be Chastity.”

“Yes, indeed,” Gauley said, his hairy fingers clenched around a whiskey bottle. “Chastity by name but not by nature. Afore I became a lady, my name was Charles.”

“Hey, that's my name,” Fong said. “I'm called Charlie.”

“How wonderful for you,” Gauley said, dry as dust.

He stared at Flintlock. “You have a bird on your throat.”

“I know.”

“It's . . . how should I say? Becoming?”

“Thank you.”

“Spoils your looks though. It's just as well you weren't very handsome to begin with.”

“Thank you,” Flintlock said.

After Gauley poured the drinks and picked up Roper's silver dollar from the bar, he said, “When you feel like it, go through the curtain to the dry goods department. I have a wide selection of clothing and footwear for sale, including a consignment of gents' button-up ankle boots to be sold at cost. They were shipped to me from Denver and when they're gone, they're gone.”

Flintlock heard a chair scrape behind him and he locked eyes with Hiram Elliot in the mirror behind the bar. The gunfighter hadn't moved but his stare met Flintlock's and promised hell.

Above the mirror hung a sign that read:

And to the right of that a railroad clock with a yellowed face ticked slow seconds into the room.

Gauley had a big, booming voice, like a blacksmith talking over the din of his forge, and he said, “You boys passing through?”

“Headin' north,” Roper said. “We got a lot of country to see.”

“Well, if you're passing this way again, I have a couple of young ladies come in on Thursday nights.” He hesitated, then made a face as he said, “If you're interested in that kind of thing.”

“Oh yes, we are, very much so,” Charlie Fong said, the words tumbling out quickly.

“Pity,” Gauley said. He winked at Fong, who suddenly found something of great interest at the bottom of his glass.

“Where's Coffin?” Flintlock said, raising his voice for the first time since he'd entered the post.

“Don't know,” Roper said. “Probably outside scalping some poor sumbitch.” He held up his glass. “Same again, Chas.”

The sound of Flintlock's voice provided the catalyst that fanned the flames of Hiram Elliot's hatred and set him in motion.

He scraped back his chair, deliberately noisy, and got to his feet. Cole, a careful man, remained sitting, but he grinned like an ape.

Flintlock, knowing the time had come, set down his untouched whiskey and turned, his back against the bar.

Elliot wore his Colt high on his right side, in the horseman's fashion, its seven-and-a-half-inch barrel a potent reminder of his origins in the Ozarks.

“You be Sam Flintlock,” Elliot said.

“You know it,” Flintlock said.

“I been hunting you, Flintlock. A man with a bird on his throat who carries an old Hawken ain't too hard to track down.”

“I got no beef agin you, Elliot.”

“No dodger on me, you mean.”

“I seen one. Had a good likeness of you on it. Said you was wanted for murder and rape, dead or alive.”

“So you plan to kill me just like you did Josh. Only you ain't shooting me in the back like you done him.”

“He'd been notified but he still drew down on me. It was his mistake.”

Elliot's hand moved closer to his gun. “No, it was your mistake.”

The door swung open, letting in a blast of scorching air, and two dusty, bearded miners stepped into the room. Gauley, dropping all pretense to manhood, screeched, “Oh, Luke and Baldy, just in time. Please, take my mirror down.” He pulled a scrap of lacy handkerchief from the pocket of his dress and fanned his face. “Ooh, this is terrible. There's going to be a gunfight.”

The miners sized up the situation and one of them said, “That would kinda put us in the line of fire, Chastity.”

“Ooh, men! I'll do it myself.”

Gauley flounced to the mirror, which was large and heavy, and unhooked it from the wall as easily as a woman would take down a tintype of Mother. He hurried through the curtain again and before it swung back in place he started to sob.

Roper said, “Want me to take a hand, Sam'l? Hell, I'll gun him for you if'n you want.”

“No. I guess I'll call my own play when I see how the cards fall.”

“When you feel my bullet hit, remember that it's for Josh,” Elliot said.

“Are you trying to talk me to death, Elliot?” Flintlock said. “Make your play and get your work in.”

“Josh got it in the belly,” Elliot said. “And so will you, Flintlock.” His eyes glittered. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”

He made his move. Smooth. Practiced. Fast.

But not fast enough. Not even close.

Only one man in a thousand, perhaps in ten thousand, has the genetic potential and coordination between brain and hand to be lightning quick and deadly accurate on the draw and shoot.

Sam Flintlock was of that rare breed.

Elliot's long-barreled Colt was leveling when Flintlock's first bullet hit him.

The shot took the little gunman high in the chest, a severe wound that was enough to make him take a step back before he gritted his teeth and again got his revolver in play.

Elliot fired, but his bullet went wild as strength sapped out of him.

Flintlock, his Colt now held at arm's length, used the front sight and fired again. And again. Two hits, one to the center of Elliot's chest, the second, lower and to the right, plowed a furrow across the gunman's ribs, smashing bone.

Elliot went down on his knees, coughing blood. He stared hard at Flintlock and tried to lift his Colt. But he was done.

Dark Alley Jim Cole then made the last and worst mistake of his miserable existence.