The Man From Laramie Read online

  “It fits,” said Kate stubbornly. “And this ain’t the first ideas I’ve had that way, either. Dave’s death put Barbara closer to inheriting Barb. Alec’s death would have given her Barb almost as soon as she was married. Who’d like that to happen?”

  “Kate,” Seldon warned quietly, “you’re talking too much.”

  “Someone better start talkin’. Where was Frank Darrah when Dave was killed? Where was he when Alec was hurt?”

  “Would Darrah,” Will asked, “have been able to brand those Barb calves in your iron?”

  “The devil,” said Kate flatly, “ain’t one-armed. If his right hand didn’t do it, maybe his left hand did. Go ask Barbara what she knows.”

  “Barbara will decide what she knows.”

  “Ain’t you interested?”

  Will shrugged, and saw with faint amusement that it baffled Kate, exasperated her. The uncertain waiting which followed was hardest, Will presently decided. That tall old man lay ominously still under the shading tarp, and only he could tell what had happened.

  Kate sat quietly beside the pallet of bedrolls on an upended box, deceptively calm. Will had the odd suspicion that fierce emotion deep in the big, rough-featured woman was beating through the mists where Waggoman lingered, and was holding him, calling him.

  Barbara had walked out of sight. A buggy arrived from Coronado with friends of Kate. More visitors began to arrive, and Will remained in the background. Only when Jubal Kirby’s weathered buckboard appeared did Will’s long strides cross the yard.

  Jubal stopped under a great cottonwood at the edge of the yard and stepped down and asked his sober questions. “ ’Tis bad,” was Jubal’s quiet opinion.

  “Is Darrah coming?”

  Jubal’s oblique glance was probing. “Later. Two of his crew at the salt lakes came in. Smoke signals had them worried about an Indian raid.” Jubal’s gaze was searching the yard. “Where’s Barbara?”

  Will indicated the first slopes beyond the stripped corral posts, and Jubal walked that way.

  Then, finally, from halfway across the yard, Will saw Doctor Seldon go to his knees beside the pallet and bend low over Waggoman’s face. Seldon got to his feet, saw Will coming, and hurried to meet him.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Anger had molded an aggressive bristle behind Seldon’s graying Van Dyke. But the man’s first words were professionally routine.

  “I think Alec is better. His mind seems to be functioning. He mumbled a few words just then.”

  Alert now, Will demanded, “Can he help us?”

  “He has helped,” Seldon said in tight-lipped anger, emphatically. “I will take oath in court that Alec mumbled, ‘Vic, you’re crowding me off the trail!’ ”

  Will stared. “That simple a trick,” he said softly. “Caught up with him and waited, and crowded him off the trail. An accident that couldn’t be helped, no doubt, so long as Waggoman couldn’t refute it.”

  Seldon’s contemptuous snort answered the idea of an accident. Will put his own contempt into words. “Hansbro is as stupid as he is treacherous. He should have gone on down into the canyon and made certain.”

  “Tom Quigby, the deputy, should be notified,” Seldon urged.

  “I’ll send a man,” Will said, and when Seldon turned back to his patient, Will went for Brodie Keenan. He told Keenan to saddle two horses. When that was done, Kate was at Waggoman’s side again, and Barbara and her father had not returned.

  Will’s final order to Brodie Keenan was terse. “Don’t talk to anyone about Waggoman. If Quigby isn’t in Coronado, ride to Roxton Springs after him.”

  He watched Keenan ride off, and then hauled up on the second horse and skirted the yard and burned buildings at an unobtrusive walk. On the ranch road, Will eased the horse through a trot into a hard run toward Barb. The misery on Barbara’s face had promised there would be more to learn from Vic Hansbro.

  In Coronado this was another day of clear sunshine. A bracing day, with the promise of more good fortune, was Frank Darrah’s pleasant thought as he walked toward Kitty’s Café. His furtive glance slanted complacently at his reflection in the window of Nordoff’s Harness Shop as he passed. The morning razor had smoothed his pinkish face to a healthy glow. In the neat salt-and-pepper suit, he looked precisely what he was, a solid, prosperous young man of business, liked and respected, Frank saw with satisfaction.

  Business returned to his thoughts. Yesterday Alec Waggoman had burned Kate Canaday’s ranch buildings. The town and range were abuzz with the news. Frank’s reflective smile lingered. With that old feud finally erupting, it might be possible now to pick up control of Half-Moon at a bargain.

  And then, a few minutes later in Kitty’s place, Frank heard of Alec Waggoman’s serious accident.

  Shaken, Frank forgot food. He partially gulped a mug of black coffee and hurried out. His thoughts were in a wild roil as he walked aimlessly toward the lower end of town. At this moment, Alec Waggoman might be dead—

  Frank realized his strides were pounding faster on the walk planks. His face had flushed. He was breathing harder. Natural caution took command. His pace slowed. Now, if ever, he needed to be sober, regretful.

  Calm now, Frank walked back to his store and let the day’s routine take over. When two men from the salt lakes came in for their pay, Frank was sarcastic at their ideas that smoke signals meant an Indian raid on the salt crew.

  When Jubal Kirby appeared and said he was driving to Half-Moon, Frank said a little impatiently he would have to follow later. He wanted to be alone with his thoughts. And, speculating on Vic Hansbro’s possible part in Waggoman’s injury, Frank decided righteously to discharge Hansbro as soon as possible. One could never trust that huge, ruthless brute.

  Finally, giving McGuire curt instructions for the day, Frank walked to the Sierra Corrals. He rode out of town with the exciting thought that even now he might be the nominal owner of Barb. And recalling his arrival in this ratty frontier town, and what he had accomplished in a few short years, Frank marveled.

  At the brawling Chinaman Creek ford, he thought of the rifle shipment from New Orleans, cached near by in the powder house. That profitable trade with the Apaches was finished. But Frank had the uneasy feeling he would worry until the stranger Lockhart moved on. His face darkened at the thought of Lockhart.

  On the narrow ranch road to Barb and Half-Moon, Frank studied the piling mountains ahead. On that high summer graze, Barb cattle were thick—and even now he might own the cattle and all the range, too. The heady excitement came back.

  The narrow road was twisting through the foothills where green junipers and taller piñon pines covered the slopes. Silver-gray chamisa bushes massed along the road, and Frank was mildly startled when, without warning, a gray horse carrying Hansbro moved out of the chamisa into the road ahead.

  “You surprised me,” Frank said shortly when he reached the man. He was annoyed by Hansbro’s stare. Anger came with a rush when Hansbro said, “You’re the man I want. I need five thousand, quick.”

  “If I had five thousand, you’d not get it!” Frank snapped.

  “Ain’t a loan. They’ve found Alec Waggoman.” A kind of muddy malice darkened Hansbro’s stare. “I crowded Alec off that trail, an’ like a fool didn’t make sure. Now Alec’s talking. And I’m leaving while there’s a chance. I’m broke. I need money.”

  “So you tried to kill Waggoman?” A shaking frustration put harshness into Frank’s sneering threat. “You’d better get going fast. You’ll get no help from me. I should send word to the sheriff.”

  Hansbro’s spurred horse jumped close before Frank realized what was intended. Hansbro’s thick-fingered hand grabbed out and caught Frank’s neck. A yank dragged Frank off balance. The powerful hand shook him by the throat.

  Frank gasped and began to gag helplessly. The great callused fingers were shutting off his wind—

  Dizzily he heard Hansbro cursing him. In frantic fear he clawed at the hand and thick wrist. And then
the unbelievable happened. Hansbro’s other hand swung in great brutal slaps which stung, hurt, and beat Frank’s head back and forth.

  “I’ll swear you paid me to kill Alec!” Hansbro promised viciously. “I’ll tell about those cattle you bought on the side. An’ the kickbacks I got for paying you high prices when Alec was away. Your clerk McGuire ain’t a fool. He’s guessed how you squeezed Barb on prices an’ kicked back to me.”

  A contemptuous shove put Frank upright again, and Hansbro’s promise was malevolent. “That’ll fix you on marryin’ the Kirby girl! And Alec’ll make damn’ sure your crooked fists don’t get into any part of Barb.”

  Frank was gasping and near tears of pain and humiliation as he straightened his hat. He was dizzy from the terrible palm clouts. He could taste the hot, metallic parch of fear in his aching throat. In one terrible crescendo of fright, he’d thought this bearded brute would snap his neck.

  He choked, “All right—five thousand.”

  “And another six-gun an’ belt an’ cartridges,” Hansbro growled. “How quick can you get back?”

  “I’ll have to borrow at the bank.”

  “Make it fast. And don’t forget five thousand is cheap to make sure you get Barb.”

  Pain surged in Frank’s bruised head. Helplessness clogged his aching throat. He was stripped of dignity; he was despised by even this ignorant brute, and he tried wildly to think.

  “Another thousand,” he gasped thickly, “if I hear Lockhart is dead.”

  Hansbro cursed him again. “Do your own dirt!

  I’m gettin’ out!”

  Frank wrenched his horse around and lashed wildly with the rein ends. Not until he was back at the Chinaman Creek ford did he ease the furiously whipped gallop. The wild frustration, the sick fear and humiliation still gripped him. But he was thinking again. Five thousand was cheap enough to buy Hansbro’s silence. But there must be a way to block the bearded brute. In venomous concentration, Frank rode on to Coronado.

  At about the same time, Will Lockhart sat his sweating horse near the Barb bunk house and listened to Fitz’s bland statement. Six more of the crew were gathering, and their hostility had dwindled, Will saw as his hard gaze searched their faces.

  “When Hansbro heard the Old Man had been found,” Fitz was saying, “he said call off the search. When we got back, Hansbro was gone. How’s the Old Man?”

  “Talking,” said Will curtly. “Hansbro crowded him off that trail. Left him for dead.” By their astounded, bewildered expressions, he saw they knew nothing of this. “Where would Hansbro be apt to ride if he thought Waggoman had started you men after him?” Will asked.

  Fitz’s grin grew relishing. “Straight up, if he could make it.”

  A drawling man back of Fitz said, “Joie, the cook, says Hansbro rode to the cookshack door an’ said something about going to Half-Moon.”

  “They’d like to see him at Half-Moon,” said Will dryly. He told these men, “You know about Hans-bro now. He’s worth five hundred to me personally. Alive.”

  Fitz made an impudent guess.

  “He’ll be worth a damn’ sight more dead when the Old Man lays a bounty on him.” Then incomprehension laid a puzzled look on Fitz’s thin, sallow face. “Why’n hell did Hansbro try to kill Waggoman?”

  “Ask Hansbro,” Will advised.

  He rode across the yard to the cookshack. Here where horses rarely came, shod marks were visible on the hard-packed earth. Will followed the tracks back across the yard, wishing keenly for that master tracker, Charley Yuill, who was still watching Darrah’s powder house near the Chinaman Creek ford.

  When the hoofprints lengthened out and drove deeper into the road dirt, the story was plain. Hansbro had spurred to a gallop, and not toward Half-Moon—

  The wire-taut tension of the hunt built in Will as he followed. It crossed his mind that this time he had all the proof needed. And if he sighted Hans-bro, one of them would surely die. Perhaps both of them.

  At Half-Moon, they had said Will Lockhart had gone to Coronado with Brodie Keenan, after the sheriff. Barbara’s panicky thought had been otherwise. Lockhart must have gone after Frank Darrah—

  Already Barbara had decided she must see Frank. Jubal, kindly and understanding father, had agreed, had seemed relieved at her decision, had offered to drive her in the buckboard. Barbara rode her horse, and the insidious nightmare of Frank Darrah went with her.

  Frank had known how Dave Waggoman had crippled Will Lockhart’s hand. And Doctor Matt hadn’t told Frank.

  Barbara was unaware she passed the narrowed scrutiny of Vic Hansbro, waiting in cover near the road. She was surprised when two men in sky-blue cavalry uniforms appeared ahead of her. They pulled their horses to a halt. When Barbara checked her blowing horse by them, dusty black field hats with gold cord came off gallantly.

  Barbara’s surprise increased as she recognized the older man’s fierce tufted eyebrows and careless, graying mustache. He was Colonel Lake, of Fort Roxton, and his question was polite.

  “Is this the road to Half-Moon Ranch?”

  “It is,” Barbara said. “Have you seen the sheriff or his deputy?”

  “I spoke with them in Roxton Springs, on my way out,” the colonel informed her. “Sheriff Johnson is having trouble gathering a posse to beard Alec Waggoman and his Barb crew.”

  “That trouble is settled,” Barbara said. “Only one man now needs to be arrested.”

  “Waggoman?”

  “His foreman,” Barbara said. “Vic Hansbro tried to kill Alec Waggoman.”

  “Indeed?” said the colonel with diminishing interest. He asked no questions about the incident. His question was thoughtful. “Will we find a young man on Half-Moon named Lockhart?”

  Caution caught at Barbara. “I hadn’t heard that Will Lockhart had connections with the fort,” she said vaguely.

  The colonel’s gaze lighted with a hint of reserved humor. He said politely, “I’m Colonel Lake, from the fort, young lady. This is Lieutenant Braswell.”

  “I’m Barbara Kirby.”

  “A pleasure, Miss Kirby.” The dryness came back into Colonel Lake’s tone. “It has been suggested that this Lockhart, at Half-Moon, is a Captain Lockhart, of whom I am somewhat acquainted.”

  All that Barbara knew of Will Lockhart came vividly into her startled thoughts—his way of assuming cool, instinctive command—the mystery of his background—Of course, Barbara thought with a flare of perverse indignation. From the first he was deceitful. Captain Will Lockhart, pretending to be a wagon freighter! Barbara was unable to resist the question she tried to ask indifferently. “Is your Captain Lockhart married?”

  Stronger humor entered Lake’s gaze. “I haven’t heard so, Miss Kirby. But one never knows. These young rascals skirmish like fiends, and then cave to the first pretty face.” The colonel’s counterquestion was dryly quizzical. “Is your Will Lockhart married?”

  “He is not ‘my Lockhart,’ ” Barbara said emphatically. The flush she felt was vexing. “A wife,” she said aloofly, “hasn’t been mentioned.”

  Lake’s grave humor was appraising her denim riding-outfit, her gray hat with leather chin cord back on gleaming chestnut hair. Pretty and flustered, passed through Lake’s mind with new interest and mild amusement. A girl like this would brighten the grinding routine of any officers’ row. Casually Lake tried again.

  “Could it be possible this man is my Captain Lockhart?”

  Barbara was remembering Will Lockhart’s arrest in Roxton Springs and his savage fight with Vic Hansbro in Coronado. And this was the commanding colonel at Fort Roxton questioning her—

  “I can’t tell you,” Barbara said with more vagueness.

  The colonel’s “Indeed?” suggested dry understanding of her evasion. “Will we find the man at Half-Moon, Miss Kirby?”

  “He was there this morning.” Barbara smiled at the two officers. A flick of her braided leather quirt sent her horse on.

  Lieutenant Braswell’s admiring gaze
followed her, and swung hastily, deferentially to Lake’s curt order.

  “You will not mention this, Mister Braswell.” Lake’s gaze also was following Barbara, and he mused, “Possibly we’ve not wasted the day.” Lake pointed his tall black gelding toward Half-Moon again and his remark was resigned. “Quite possibly, also, Lockhart isn’t at the ranch now. And if not, I suspect our charming young lady knows it.”

  In the Coronado bank, George Freall had been slightly reluctant and plainly curious as he made the quick cash loan. The canvas money sack holding good double eagles and greenbacks was not conspicuous as Frank Darrah carried it across the street to his store. His head still ached. The frustrating rage still churned. But in the plan he had made, Frank found a vicious, comforting satisfaction.

  He stopped at the gun counter in his store and selected a black-leather holster belt and two boxes of cartridges. Alone at his office desk he hastily thumbed cartridges into the belt’s leather loops.

  Then from the tall iron safe Frank took out a revolver wrapped in newspaper. He held the gun in momentary fascination, hearing again the loud, echoing reports at Dave Waggoman’s back. Frank moistened his lips and swallowed; memory was vivid of Dave sagging off his horse. Then satisfaction over his foresight in keeping this gun wiped out the momentary unpleasantness.

  The crude L, for Lockhart, burned into the smooth cedar grip, was widely known now as men looked for this gun. It had last been seen in Dave’s possession. If found on Vic Hansbro’s body, who would doubt that Hansbro had killed Dave? No one, Frank thought malevolently. And Hansbro had forced this.

  Frank shoved the gun into the belt holster and stepped out into the store again.

  McGuire was occupied with a customer at the front, but Frank had the feeling the small, prying clerk was covertly watching him. McGuire had been openly curious at the unexpected return. Scowling as he thought of McGuire, Frank took a small two-barrel derringer of large caliber, and shells to load it, from the gun case.

  It was a deadly little weapon, Frank thought with satisfaction as he returned to the office and loaded both barrels. Opening the money sack, he nested the little gun among the greenbacks.