Sheriff Pres Alton glanced up from the papers on his desk irritably, as the shadow darkened the doorway of his office. He straightened his face, though there was no welcoming smile, as he saw that his visitor was a woman. She stood silhouetted against the sunlight from the street, a kind of halo around her head, and he knew she was a stranger.
There was no woman in Howard who wore a flat-crowned, narrow-brimmed hat like that. And this woman—girl, for she seemed to be only in her early twenties—sported a calfskin vest over white cotton shirt, and a split, fringed buckskin riding skirt that almost completely covered the dusty half boots she wore. A plaited quirt dangled from her left wrist. There was a gunbelt around her waist. A Smith and Wesson .32 caliber revolver sat neatly in a polished holster with a button-down strap over the trigger guard to keep the gun snug in leather.
He stood up slowly, knowing this was no ordinary woman confronting him. Alton nodded civilly.
“Mornin’, ma’am. Can I do something for you?”
“You can,” she said briskly, slapping the quirt lightly against her skirted leg. “My name’s Liz Garrett and I’m trying to find my brother, Ben.” Her eyes and voice hardened as she added swiftly, “Before some trigger-happy posse shoots him down.”
Alton stared at her, face bone hard, impassive. He nodded to the visitor’s chair and sat down himself after Liz had taken a seat.
“Huntin’ escaped prisoners is the law’s job, Miss Garrett, though I appreciate your concern for your brother’s safety. Fact remains, he’s a convicted bank robber and he broke out of jail—in the company of a couple of cold-blooded killers.”
Liz leaned forward. “That concerns me also, sheriff. Ben is in the company of cold-blooded killers as you say. I know he wouldn’t be involved in their—murders, but the fact that he is with them automatically labels him as being the same type. I can understand why no posse man is willing to take a chance; if he comes across Ben he’s going to shoot first and talk later. And that’s what I want to prevent.”
He looked at her soberly. “You got no business gettin’ in the way,” he told her bluntly. “Like I said, it’s a job for the law.”
“And like I said, Sheriff Alton, Ben is my brother. I hear you and your posse almost caught up with him and the other two in some canyon a few nights back.”
Alton’s face tightened. “Correct,” he said shortly.
“There was gunplay. An ambush, I was given to understand. You could have shot Ben down along with the others.”
He sighed. “You gotta see our point of view, too. Hell, two prison guards were killed when they escaped. Far as anyone knows, your brother had every bit as much to do with that as Carney or Emerson. We dunno any different. And posse members are ordinary folk—family men, lots of ’em. They ain’t used to tradin’ lead with experienced killers. They got to shorten the odds and the only sure way to do that is to get the jump on ’em. Cold-deck ’em.”
“Murder them, you mean!”
“Ma’am, the reward dodger says ‘dead or alive’.”
Liz glared at him. “I want my brother back alive, sheriff. I have papers that will prove he had nothing to do with that bank robbery. He’s innocent.”
Alton frowned. “That’s as mebbe, Miss Garrett, but, right now, he’s an escaped convict and he’s on the run with two known killers and that’s all any lawman is goin’ to be concerned with. Your brother don’t know about this so-called proof, I take it?”
“No, he doesn’t. That’s why I have to find him before—something—happens to him.” She controlled her emotion with difficulty and stopped speaking, dragging down a deep breath, clutching at the quirt that now lay in her lap. “Can’t you see that, sheriff?”
“Sure I can. What I can’t see is what you want me to do? I mean, we lost ’em in the canyon country to the north and there ain’t a man who knows that territory better than Vin Carney. Take an army to flush him out. You could never find your way in there.”
“You allow me to judge what I am or am not capable of, if you please. Can you give me a map of the area you mentioned? Or take me there?”
His eyes narrowed and he shook his head quickly. “No, I can’t. It’ll be plumb loco for you to try to go in there alone. You’d get lost and starve to death before you could find your way out.” He shook his head again. “My conscience wouldn’t rest easy if that happened, ma’am. Best thing you can do is go back to Julesburg or wherever you’re from and let the law track your brother down.”
“The law? What about the bounty hunters. Do you think they will give him a chance. They’ll shoot him in the back just for the fun of it—let alone their blood money!”
Alton sighed. “Miss Garrett, you’ve got to see the authorities if you really have proof that your brother wasn’t in on that bank robbery. They’ll make it known and give it some publicity. If he gets to hear of it, he ought to have enough sense to cut away from the other two and give himself up.”
“If he has a chance to hear about it.”
He shrugged. “You—er—carryin’ this proof with you?”
“Why?” she asked suspiciously.
“Well, I was thinkin’, maybe I could get it to the U.S. Marshal at Corset City and he could act on it for you. Less you want to take it up yourself.”
She stared at him levelly. “I’m not carrying it with me. It’s in the hands of Wells Fargo’s chief of detectives in Denver. He’ll arrange the publicity. But I still want to find Ben myself and convince him that it’s not just a trick to get him to give himself up.” She stood up abruptly. “Is there a land agency in town?”
Alton got wearily to his feet, shaking his head slowly. “I see you’re still determined to find your way into those canyons.”
“That’s where he was last seen, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah. Look, I’ll show you on the map and draw you a sketch of how to get there. But you’ll never find him. If my posse couldn’t, you sure won’t.”
“But I’ll be trying,” she told him.
“Okay. Come look at this wall map.”
About twenty minutes later, Liz Garrett left Alton’s office. The sheriff stood in the doorway, watching her swing away down the boardwalk, heading in the direction of the livery stables. He scrubbed a hand thoughtfully over his jaw and pursed his lips. Then he gave a half smile and turned back into the office.
Neither the sheriff nor Liz Garrett noticed the dusty, bearded man with the twin low-slung guns, who pushed off the awning post outside the general store opposite and started down the walk—pacing the girl and watching her every movement.
Clay Nash pulled the rawhide thongs tight on his warbag and shouldered it, reaching down to the hotel bed to lift his rifle in the leather saddle scabbard in his other hand.
Jim Hume, standing by the door of the small room, puffed on his cigarillo and looked up at the tall operative.
“Appreciate it if you could cut down your leave as much as possible, Clay,” he said quietly. “I’ve left the time open but it’s up to you. You’re due four weeks.”
“Oughtn’t be that long, Jim. Won’t be able to say till I catch up with Liz Garrett. Last I heard, she was headed for Howard.”
“They won’t hang around anywhere they’ve been spotted,” Hume said. “They were damn lucky that posse didn’t nail ’em. Might’ve been all over for young Ben.” He paused with his cigarillo almost to his mouth, squinting through the smoke haze at Nash. “I ought to have my head read lettin’ you go on this deal, Clay.”
Nash seemed genuinely surprised at the admission. “How so?”
“I could lose my best man,” Hume told him grimly. “You’re goin’ up against a couple of professional killers.”
Nash smiled wryly. “I’ve met their kind before.”
“Sure. On behalf of Wells Fargo. I’d hate to lose you at all, Clay, but most of all I’d hate to lose you on a job that had nothin’ to do with the company.”
Nash laughed briefly. “I guess that’s kind of left-handed and cockeyed, Jim, but I reckon I savvy what you mean. Don’t worry. I’ll keep my head down just as I would if I was after some road agent with one of our payrolls.”
“I want to see you back in head office in Denver, in one piece, Clay. Remember that.”
Nash nodded, placed the rifle under his other arm and thrust out his right hand. He and Hume gripped firmly and Nash walked out with a casual ‘so long’.
Hume watched him go, then closed the door of the room quietly.
He sure as hell hoped he would see Clay Nash again—and soon. Despite the awkward way he had put it, if anything happened to Nash, he would be losing more than just his top agent. He would be losing a damn fine friend.
Liz Garrett decided to camp by a shallow creek that ran through the canyon country. She did not know that it was nowhere near the area where the posse had jumped the fugitives, but she had a strong suspicion that, for some reason, Pres Alton had given her a bum steer.
She had followed his map and it had led her into rugged, broken country that wouldn’t hold a track if a herd of stampeding buffalo passed through it. She could only move by instinct and hunches and so far none of them had paid off. She had ridden round and off at a tangent, climbed ridges, walked ahead of her mount, thrusting a way through heavy brush, and even searched some caves she found in a wall of a canyon that was not marked on the map Alton had given her.
But there was nothing; no signs whatever of the fugitives, or even of the place where the posse had ambushed them. In desperation, she had climbed to the top of a high cliff and had cupped her hands around her mouth and called Ben’s name, over and over. Her voice had echoed back at her from all the canyons and clefts and rocky walls. Then, when the name had died away, she had identified herself and called out that she had the papers to prove his innocence. She had no real hope that her words would reach him, but she was desperate enough to try.
For she had reached the conclusion that, despite the map—or maybe because of it—she was lost.
At least she had water and she guessed if she followed the creek she would come out of this canyon country sooner or later. Or maybe the creek would simply disappear underground, as many streams did in country like this. That was a chance she had to take and she resented having to spend her energies now on her own survival, rather than on the location of Ben.
When—and if—she got out of this, she would have a few harsh words to say to Sheriff Pres Alton for getting her into this predicament. The man must be an idiot, to draw a map so far off. Either that, or for some reason known only to himself, he had deliberately sent her in here on a false trail so that she would get lost.
She paused as she built up the campfire, frowning at the thought. She shook her head and reached for her grub sack to prepare the evening meal. Her food was running low and she would have to ration what she had; she could hunt all right and had no qualms about gutting and quartering an animal, but there had been no game worth mentioning since she started her search.
Once again she paused as she sliced some very thin and tough sowbelly. There was just no reason why Alton would deliberately send her on a wrong trail. There couldn’t be. But the thought nagged at her as she brewed up the coffee beans in the battered pot and cooked the sowbelly.
It was kind of spooky in the canyon, especially for a lone woman. The night wind howled mournfully through the rocks and the horse was uneasy; reluctant to stray far from the campsite. She trusted its instincts more than her own. Liz Garrett took her rifle under the blankets with her and unbuttoned the strap that held the Smith and Wesson snug in the holster. She slept fully clothed—when she slept at all. She kept waking, starting up at sounds, always annoyed with herself when her heart pounded and the blood sang in her ears.
Then came that one time when she knew it was not a false alarm.
Strangely enough, this was the time when she didn’t jerk up in the blankets, clutching the rifle tightly with her heart hammering. Her eyes seemed to open of their own accord and she lay very still, staring up at the stars wheeling in the dark sky high above the rearing canyon wall. The sweat started out in a cold prickling sensation on her face and neck and a chill wave coursed down her body to her toes.
The wind gusted across the campsite and blew a handful of dust into her face. She stifled the cough that rose in her throat and strained her ears; hands aching where they gripped the rifle. Then she stiffened as she heard the noise again. There was no mistaking the sound. It was not caused by the wind.
There was a rider somewhere out there, circling her camp, walking the horse easily, reconnoitering. She glanced towards her own ground-hitched mount and saw the silhouette of its head against the stars, ears pricked. Even as she looked, it gave a low whinny of greeting. She rolled out of the blankets on the side away from the fire and into the shadows, levering a shell into the rifle as she did so. She lay there in the dark, listening, trying to gauge the position of the mystery rider. She couldn’t hear the horse and thought he must have stopped. But then it started up again, having been momentarily muffled by the wind. Liz swung her rifle in the direction of the sound. She tensed, ready to do battle.
She ran her tongue across her lips as the direction of the horse changed. It was coming straight into camp now. Her mount whinnied again and this time there was an answering sound, but it sounded to her as if it had been swiftly muffled. Then she brought the rifle up as she saw movement across the far side of the camp, where there was a ridge of sandstone she had hoped would protect her from the night wind. Something dark broke the silhouette of the rim, moving against the background of the pale canyon wall.
Liz settled the rifle butt into her shoulder and took aim down the barrel. She could see the horse’s head now as it climbed up over the ridge. When the rider came into view she intended to call one warning—and receive a prompt reply or someone was going to have a hole in his head.
Her jaws ached from being clamped so tightly together and her face was sore from the pressure of the rifle against her flesh. Her trigger finger felt cramped. Sweat beaded her forehead and her eye began to water from staring so intently down the rifle barrel. Damn! The rider must be lying along the horse’s back instead of sitting upright in the saddle. Her finger tightened around the trigger—only to ease up the pressure and lift her head slightly.
The rider wasn’t lying low along the mount’s back—there was no rider at all, just the horse.
At the same time as she realized this, there was a slight sound behind her and she spun, bringing the rifle around swiftly. But a hard fist struck the barrel aside and the gun exploded deafeningly into the air, the sound echoing and re-echoing through the canyon. In the brief powder flash, she caught a glimpse of the narrow bearded face of a man she had never seen before. His teeth were bared as he bore her over backwards. There was a gun in his right hand but he was making no attempt to use it right now.
He was trying to straddle her, pin her down—one hand holding the rifle well out from their bodies. He crushed her hand against the rifle’s metal and her fingers reluctantly opened. He shook her savagely until the weapon clattered to the ground. Then she snapped up a knee into his belly and heard him grunt but he did not slacken his grip. If anything, he tightened it and fought rougher. He lowered his body, pinning her, spreading her arms out as he leaned forward. Liz waited until his face was above hers, and then she snapped her head up, smashing her forehead into his nose. He gasped and she felt the warm splash of blood on her cheek. This time his grip loosened and she squirmed out from under him, kicking him in the chest, threw a handful of sand into his face, and spun away, lunging towards the rifle.
Cursing wildly, he flung himself after her, grabbing her lower legs and wrapping an arm tightly around them, hugging them to his chest so she couldn’t kick. Gasping, she strained to reach forward and get her hands on the rifle. Her fingers slipped off the polished butt as he dragged her back six inches. She bent her legs as far as she could and cried out in a wrenching effort as she lunged for the gun. This time she got her hands around the stock. She was unable to reach the trigger but she twisted her body awkwardly and swept the rifle around in a wide arc. The barrel scattered the fire’s embers and sent the coffee pot flying, upending the skillet, then thudded into the man’s side. He grunted in pain and she made a violent effort to change her grip so she could reach the lever.
But he released her legs abruptly, reared up and threw himself forward. His weight pinned her and her right hand grabbed the rifle and wrenched it violently from her grip She heard the gun clatter among the rocks where he threw it—then a fist cracked against her jaw and lights exploded behind her eyes. Her head snapped back and she felt consciousness slipping from her fast. She tried to hold up, reached up in blind instinct, clawing her fingers and raking downwards. The man cried out in pain as her nails raked long furrows down his cheeks. Then he hit her again and this time it felt as if her jaw and neck and skull were all broken at once as she plunged into oblivion.
When she came to, tasting the metallic saltiness of blood, she was lying exactly where she had fallen. She moaned a little as she opened her eyes and stared up at the stars. They didn’t seem so bright this time. It took her a little while to realize that it wasn’t because they had faded, but rather because the campfire was burning brightly across her vision, killing some of her night sight. Very slowly she turned her head, feeling the dragging, swollen muscles in her jaw and neck as she moved. She squinted against the brightness of the flames and could only just make out the man squatting on the far side, sipping a cup of coffee. She was sure she had never seen him before; even hunkering down as he was he looked tall, and there were crossed gunbelts about his lean waist, the guns tied down to each thigh. His hat was pushed back and she could see a wide band of white hair running through otherwise black strands. His face looked hard and mean and his nose bad crusts of half-dried blood at the nostrils which told her she hadn’t been out too long.
“Want some coffee?” he rasped, having spotted her movement.
Liz didn’t answer. She sat up gingerly, still groggy, rubbing first her jaw, then the side of her neck. He had certainly hit her hard enough.
“Who are you?” Her words were slurred and she felt the inside of her cheek with her tongue; it was swollen and cut.
“Name’s Silver.” He pointed up to the white hair with a thumb. “That’s why.”
“I’m only interested in why you attacked me. What is it you want?” Her heart was hammering and her fingers dug hard into the sand, but she managed to meet and hold his cold gaze and to keep her voice steady. Outwardly, she seemed totally unafraid. Inwardly, she was like a jelly and hoped she wouldn’t start to shake.
Silver sipped at his coffee and drained the cup. He poured another before answering.
“I want you, Liz Garrett.”
She stiffened and the breath hissed through her pinched nostrils. She was unable to keep the slight tremor out of her voice this time when she spoke.
“How—did you know my—name?”
“I got ways of findin’ out what I want to know,” he told her unsmilingly.
Liz swallowed. “What—what do you want with—me?”
He sipped silently at the cup for so long that she asked the question again. This time, he set the cup down carefully in the sand and commenced to roll a cigarette. He didn’t even look up as she started to ease over towards the end of her blankets where she saw he had tossed her rifle and pistol.
“Don’t do that,” he said quietly, seeming to concentrate on the tobacco in the creased paper. She froze and he finished rolling the cigarette and lit it before speaking again. “I don’t want much from you—and you got no worries about your virtue. I simply ain’t interested in that part.”
Her automatic sigh of relief was audible over the crackling of the fire and some of the tension drained out of her. “Well …what? I don’t know you.”
“You sure don’t. Figured you just might’ve heard of me, but I ain’t surprised that you haven’t. I don’t make a habit of advertisin’ my name. Or profession.”
Liz frowned. “Your profession? What do you mean?”
He bored his chilling eyes into her and she shuddered a little at the way the flames were reflecting in the pupils. It was as if two burning coals were set in his bearded face, trying to scorch his flesh with their intensity.
“I’m a bounty hunter,” he told her.
Liz frowned, her lips parting in surprise. She shook her head slowly, not understanding. And then she sat bolt upright, ignoring the pain in her neck and at the base of her skull.
“You’re after Ben?” she said.
“And Carney and Emerson,” he added.
Her lip curled. “Blood money!”
He shrugged. “Nine, ten thousand bucks. Worth spilling a little blood for, I reckon.”
“I hope it’s yours that’s spilled!”
“Some day, mebbe. Not this time, though.”
“Well, you’ve wasted your time if you’ve been following me. I have no idea where Ben or the others are.”
“Hell, I know that. You been ridin’ all over this country like a drunken cowpoke tryin’ to find his way home after a Saturday night in town.”
Liz frowned. “Then why—why did you attack me? What use can I be to you?”
He smoked for a while. “Mebbe a lot, mebbe none. I’ll take that chance.”
“I don’t see how I—”
“The kid’s your brother, ain’t he?” Silver cut in and Liz tensed, nodding slowly. “Okay. I’ll track ’em down, sooner or later. I’m a patient man. I can bargain if I’ve got you along. The kid won’t want anythin’ to happen to you.”
She made a derisive sound. “Do you think the others would let him bargain with you? I mean nothing to them. They’d let you kill me, and they’d kill Ben, too, if he tried to surrender just to save me.”
“Could be. But there’ll be one hell of an argument between ’em all when I tell ’em about the trade. That’s when I’ll move in. You’ll be tied up in plain view. While they’re fussin’ about what’s to be done and what ain’t, I’ll move around and get the drop on ’em.”
“You’re mad! That’s one hell of a gamble, mister.”
“I’m used to playin’ longshots. I’ll risk it. And it’ll work, don’t fret none about that. It has before. Now shut up and go to sleep. We’re movin’ out before sunup.”
Liz just sat there, staring across the fire at this chilling man as he smoked silently, his arms dangling on his bent knees and fire-red eyes boring into her.
She felt sick; for she knew this Silver would make no attempt to bring in Ben or the others alive. He would kill them all, coldly, and not miss a puff on his cigarette. Or even move a muscle on his narrow face, most likely. Slowly, she lay back on the cool sand and stared up at the stars, her teeth biting hard into her lower lip.