Luke's Gold (9 page)

“They musta moved out before daylight,” Curly said, “else I'da seen 'em.”

“Hell, you were most likely asleep,” Snider snarled, no longer angry now that he knew the two had not given him the slip. “Let's get movin'. I wanna get close enough to keep an eye on 'em.”

Back at the base of the ridge, Bob Dawson was just in the process of freshening the fire in preparation for making some breakfast. He looked up in surprise when both of his partners came down the slope. He jerked his hand away just in time to keep from getting struck by Snider's foot as Lem kicked dirt on his fresh flame. “What the hell's wrong with you?” Dawson demanded.

“We're movin',” Snider, ordered. “Let's get saddled up.”

“What was the shootin'?” Dawson wanted to know. Snider told him that he was pretty sure Tucker and his friend had just shot at some antelope. Dawson considered that for a moment. “Well then, they most likely ain't goin' nowhere for a while if they're gonna be skinnin' and butcherin' an antelope. So what's the hurry? I'm hungry, and I say let's fix somethin' to eat first.”

One of these days I'm gonna have to settle with you,
Snider thought. Of his two partners, Bob Dawson was the more contrary, and the one more likely to argue. A dark, humorless man, Dawson's face was dry and leathery, etched with deep frown lines. Unlike Curly, Bob figured he had as much to say about things as Snider. Curly, on the other hand, was not very bright and he knew it, accepting Snider's domination without question. He wore a battered Montana Peak hat to protect his shiny, hairless dome from the sun. His prominent feature in an otherwise blank face was an abundance of hair protruding from each nostril. The two men served a purpose for Snider, and as soon as their value to him diminished, he would be quick to discard them.

“Dammit,” Snider said, “it don't matter what you say, Bob, we're movin' up closer.” When Dawson looked like he was about to get his back up, Snider softened his tone a bit. “We don't know for sure that they killed any game. I'm just tellin' you that's what it looks like. Now, we need to get closer so we can see for sure what they're up to. You can fix somethin' to eat then.”

Dawson fixed his partner with a wary eye, and was about to retort when Curly interrupted. “I wish we had some of that fresh antelope to eat. Why don't we see if we can get a shot at one of them antelopes, Lem?”

Both Dawson and Snider cast disparaging gazes at their bald companion. Dawson explained, “Think about it, dummy. If we shot at an antelope, they'd likely hear the shots.”

Curly considered that for a moment before his face lit up with understanding. “Right. I didn't think about that.” He nodded his head several times as he digested his enlightenment. Then another thought entered his head. “But, hell, we heard
their
shots.”

Snider looked at Dawson and slowly shook his head, the near argument over authority between them temporarily forgotten. To Curly, he suggested, “Why don't you think on that while you saddle your horse? We need to get ourselves up where we can see Tucker and that other feller.”

Curly looked from one face to the other. “I said somethin' dumb again, didn't I?”

“You sure as hell did,” Snider snorted. “Now get a saddle on that horse.”

“You big damn dummy,” Bob Dawson remarked as he passed Curly to fetch his saddle.

“How'd you like it if I slit your throat one night?” Curly threatened and drew the long skinning knife from his belt.

Quick as a flash, Dawson whipped out his pistol and stuck the muzzle hard against Curly's forehead. “How'd you like it if I blow your brains out?”

“We're wastin' time,” Snider complained, impatient with the badgering that was common between the two. If he didn't think he needed their guns, he'd have already shot both of them. As it was, however, he figured that after they killed Tucker and his partner, then he'd goad one of them into shooting the other, and he would finish whoever was left standing. If what he suspected was right, there should be plenty in those gold pouches for three men, but why split it when it was his idea to follow Tucker? He figured he had a right to the gold. He was there at the time it was lost, and had ridden in the detachment sent to retrieve the bodies. Ever since leaving the army, he had looked for that one big score. Feeling that this was finally it, there was no reason in his mind to share it with two no-accounts like Bob and Curly. He had killed men for a whole lot less.

 

After moving the horses up to the point where they had last seen Cade and Luke's first camp, Snider left the other two to make a small fire, and proceeded on foot. He had an idea where Luke and Cade might have set up their second camp, so he cautiously made his way along the riverbank, using the gullies and sparse patches of willows as cover. After walking a few hundred yards farther, he came upon the still warm ashes of a campfire, and knew that he had to be getting pretty close. Seeing a stand of cottonwoods near the river, he headed for them, using them for cover as he made his way along the banks. About to leave the trees to cross an open area, he glanced down to discover fresh horse droppings, telling him that they had left their horses here while they stalked the antelope. A slow grin crept across his whiskered face as he thought about how surprised Luke Tucker was going to be when he found out he'd been followed. Moving to the edge of the trees, he pulled up when he caught sight of the hunters down close to the water's edge.
Just like I figured,
he thought. Each man was busy butchering a carcass. Snider settled back on one knee and watched for a while as Cade and Luke carved up the two antelope. The aroma of roasting meat drifted by his nostrils as he watched Cade cutting up strips of meat to dry over the fire. Satisfied that his prey would not be leaving any time soon, Snider backed carefully away and retraced his path.

When he rejoined his partners, he found them sitting next to a small fire waiting for a coffeepot to boil. “We ain't goin' nowhere today,” he said. “They're fixin' to dry some of that meat. They'll be doin' that all day.”

“Why don't we just go on up there and jump 'em where they stand?” Dawson demanded. “Then, by God, I bet I get that hidin' place out of 'em. I know how to pry a man's tongue loose so he'll be tellin' things he didn't even know he knew.”

“Now, see,” Snider replied, “that's the reason I'm runnin' this show. If we did it your way, they could tell you anything. We wouldn't have no way of knowin' it was the truth or not. They'd just send us off on a wild-goose chase.” He glared hard at one and then the other to make sure they knew that he was calling the shots. “We'll wait 'em out, and let 'em lead us to that gold, just like we've been doin'.”

“I reckon you're right,” Dawson gruffly admitted. He knew he was wrong, but he was getting restless and anxious to take some kind of action, even if it was wrong. He stewed over it in his mind for a few moments before suggesting, “Hell, we ain't a half a day's ride shy of Big Timber. Why don't we circle around 'em and get on their trail again when they come through town? I could use a drink.”

“Me, too,” Curly piped up.

Snider favored his partners with a look of disgust. “All right, you two go ahead and do that if you want to,” he said. “I'm stayin' right here where I can keep an eye on 'em. Maybe I'll see you again, and maybe I won't. There ain't no tellin' where they'll head from here.” He knew it was just talk. Dawson just had to have something to complain about.

 

“You look like you've done that before,” Luke commented as he watched Cade hang thin strips of flesh on a limb he had suspended over the fire.

“Well, I ain't,” Cade replied. “I just know that Indians smoke meat to keep, so I figured I'd try it.”

“How long do you have to let it dry?”

“I don't have any idea. Till all the water's out of it, I guess. I figured I'd leave it till dark at least. What do you think?”

“I don't know, either,” Luke said. “That's probably long enough. Hell, if it spoils, we'll just throw it away.”

They filled their bellies with fresh roasted meat, then turned in for a contented night's sleep, with no suspicions of the danger barely a quarter of a mile away. On their way again early the next morning, they made Big Timber before the sun climbed directly overhead. With only a brief stop in the little settlement between the Yellowstone and the Boulder to rest the horses and ask about Indian activity in the area, they decided to ride on until nightfall. Informed that the only Indians in substantial numbers were Crow, they anticipated no trouble from that quarter.

A little before dusk, they came upon a peaceful meadow where a healthy stream emptied into the Yellowstone. There was no discussion necessary. Both men knew this was the place to camp. After the horses were taken care of, Cade walked a few yards up to the top of a little rise in the prairie, and stood gazing around him in every direction. He felt as if he had seen the place before in spite of the fact that this was the first time he had set foot in this part of the country. It was the vision of Montana he had seen in his dreams.

From where he stood, the tall, sweet grass of the prairie ebbed and flowed with the gentle evening breezes, giving the impression of a green, living sea, tipped here and there with obscure plumes of white, like ocean foam. The vast sea of grass swept away to the north to touch the base of a distant rugged mountain range of silvery peaks standing against the deep evening sky. Luke told him they were the Crazy Mountains. Behind him, to the south of the Yellowstone, rose the mighty heights of the Absarokas, the home, Luke said, of most any kind of game a man could imagine.
Why, then,
Cade asked himself,
would anyone want to wander farther?
This was the place to breed his horses. He could feel the pull of the country on his soul.

He turned to find Luke gazing at him quizzically. “What's ailin' you?” Luke asked. “I called your name three times. You look like you got buck fever or somethin'.”

“Nothin',” Cade replied, “I was just thinkin', I guess.”

“Well, maybe you oughtn't to do it if it freezes your brain like that,” Luke said with a chuckle. “Whaddaya say we have us a little supper?”

Once again, the two partners filled their bellies with the fresh meat and washed it down with hot coffee. “I'm gonna bust if I take another bite,” Luke finally admitted and leaned back against the side of the gully. He relaxed there a while, content with his world. After a few minutes of reflecting, he asked, “What you gonna do with your share of that gold, Cade?”

Cade shrugged. “I don't know—set myself up in the horse-wranglin' business I reckon. I ain't thought much about it.” His answer was truthful. He had not spent any time speculating on the prospects of being wealthy. There were still too many
if
s to interfere with their plans. He told himself he'd wait until he had it in his hands.

“Well, I've thought about it,” Luke said. “I just might set myself up in a hotel somewhere, one that's got a big porch with rockin' chairs—maybe find me a woman like Belle back there in Coulson to keep me warm at night. Prop my feet up on the porch rail in the daytime, and on the bed board at night.”

Cade laughed. “Hell, you're too young for that. You'd get tired of that in six months' time. Then you could come help me raise horses.”
And you'd be welcome,
he thought as he watched the lanky cowpuncher chuckling over his remark. Cade realized at that moment that Luke was a good friend. He had never really had a close friend before, and the idea gave him a feeling of peace, a feeling that he was not strictly a loner as he had been all his life up to now. It was a good feeling.

 

Unable to go any farther without the risk of being seen by the two they trailed, Lem Snider knelt at the top of a grassy rise, a pair of field glasses in his hand. After a while, he rose and descended the rise. “They're making camp, so I reckon we can, too.”

“I wish to hell we had stopped back there in Big Timber long enough to find somethin' to eat besides this damn moldy bacon,” Bob Dawson complained.

“We couldn't take a chance on losin' 'em,” Snider said.

“Ain't much chance of losin' 'em,” Dawson replied. “They're just followin' the river west. We coulda caught up with 'em anytime we wanted to.” Snider didn't bother to grace the comment with a reply.

“I reckon they'll be fillin' their bellies with some more of that fresh pronghorn,” Curly said, rubbing his stomach. “I can almost smell it from here.”

“Don't surprise me none,” Dawson scoffed, “you're part coyote. Too bad you got a coyote nose, and none of the brain.”

Curly frowned, his eyes in an angry squint while he tried to think of a reply. “I got enough brains to skin a two-legged coyote,” he said, and drew his long skinning knife. Waving it back and forth, switching it from hand to hand, he said, “Lem, tell him how I skinned that Injun woman down on the Big Horn.” When Snider didn't bother to answer, Curly made a gesture like he was slitting his throat. “I could carve you up real pretty, Dawson.”

“I just might shove that damn knife up your ass,” Dawson retorted.

Curly's frown faded into a malicious grin, and he gestured with his fingers. “Come on, then.”

Dawson drew his six-shooter, and leveled it at Curly, but once again Snider stepped between them. “Damn you two. Bob, put that damn gun away. You want them to know we're right behind 'em?” When neither man made a move to back down, he railed, “Dammit, we're in for a big payday if you two can just leave each other alone. After we find that gold, you can kill each other. Matter of fact, I hope to hell you do.”