It took him nearly three weeks.
During that time he worked as a teamster for the military at Fort Larned — some of the older soldiers still called it Camp Alert, the name the post had been given before the War Between the States. They gave him a bed in the loft above the sutler’s store, a big sandstone building with a Dutch barn roof that stood on the edge of the perimeter, right-angled to the line of officers’ quarters. Larned was a big establishment, bustling day and night with activity as the soldiers moved in and out on patrol, and civilians came and went with supplies. Over the weeks, Angel met most of the local farmers and ranchers, and always asked them the same question. About three men looking for a horse ranch.
They would shake their heads, scratch their ears, screw up their eyes reflectively. They would go back to their wagons sometimes and ask their womenfolk. Kids would come around and chant nursery rhymes as he waited outside ranch houses where he was making some kind of delivery, and he would ask hired hands, cowboys he met on the open country. Nobody remembered them.
Then the third week, he got a break.
He was hauling some Michigan pine that had been shipped in by rail as far as Kansas City and then teamed down the Santa Fe Trail to Fort Dodge. He picked it up at the depot and headed on north up towards the Heimberger place on Buckner Creek.
Heimberger was a sharp-featured, blond-haired man of about forty, well built and burned dark brown from the years he had spent in the open. He had three sons and the five of them made pretty short work of unloading the pine, which Heimberger was using to build an extra room on to his three-room shack.
‘Is getting rather zmall,’ he said, ‘for us so a lot.’
‘Erwin!’ called his wife. ‘You bring that young man inside for some lemonade when you’re finished out there, y’hear?’
‘That wife of mine,’ Heimberger smiled, shaking his head. ‘Fifteen years we are married together, still she calls me like a zmall boy.’
Angel grinned. He reckoned the rancher didn’t mind it all that much. They trooped into the house, welcoming the shade after the hard heat of the open yard. Mrs. Heimberger was a slender woman, as blonde as her husband, with a face just short of prettiness. She asked Angel where he was from and he told her, ‘You worked for Chon Gibbons? Heimberger asked, his eyebrows going up. ‘Ve heard at the Fort about what happened there. It was you who … ?’
‘Yessir, it was me,’ Angel replied. ‘I got to be getting along.’
He had had a lot of that. When he asked his questions they always put it together and then they wanted to know the details. He did not think he would ever tell anyone the details.
‘I feel very … very … ’ Heimberger snapped his fingers in exasperation when the word would not come.
‘Guilty, you mean?’ his wife supplied.
‘Ja, guiltig— guilty,’ he said. ‘I think I sent those men there.’ He looked up into Frank Angel’s eyes and fell back from the blazing light in them. His own eyes widened, and flickered nervously towards the rifle hanging over the mantelpiece.
‘I know nothing of them then,’ he said, holding up a hand as though to ward off a psychic attack. Angel sat motionless in the chair, his eyes fixed on the German.
‘We had some men come by the house asking for directions to a horse ranch,’ Mrs. Heimberger explained. ‘We took no real notice of it then. Only afterwards: we wondered. That was all, we just wondered.’
‘Did they give you any names? Frank Angel asked.
Heimberger shook his head.
‘No,’ he said. ‘They were chust riding through. They did not stop, even, for coffee.’
‘Can you recall what any of them looked like?’ Angel persisted.
Heimberger frowned. Then his frown lifted and his face brightened.
‘Ja, I can remember somethings. That one who talked — you remember it, schatz, the one with the shoulders so.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Mrs. Heimberger said. ‘The leader — at least I’d reckon he was. He was a big man across. Big-chested, heavy set. Black hair and a beard coming along. Very soft spoken, he was.’
‘Cravetts,’ Angel said.
‘What is that Cravatts?’ Heimberger said.
‘That was his name,’ the younger man replied. ‘Cravetts.’
‘You know their names?
‘Three of them. Cravetts. Monsher. And one with an Italian-sounding name. Barelli, or Tiratti.’
‘But the soldiers … ’ Heimbreger said.
‘Sure, they know,’ Angel replied. ‘But they aren’t about to tell me. Army business, they say.’
‘But you are thinking not,’ Heimberger probed.
‘I am thinking not,’ Angel said.
‘They were hard ones,’ the rancher pointed out. ‘Not ordinary ranch hands. Thieves. Guerillas, perhaps, from the War days. You were in the War?’
‘In a way,’ Angel said. He did not elaborate.
‘Seven of them,’ Mrs. Heimberger said. ‘I remember thinking, John Gibbons would be pleased if he could sell seven horses.’
‘Can you remember anything else about them?’ pleaded the younger man. ‘Anything at all?’
‘Well … ’ The woman frowned, throwing her thoughts back. ‘It was late in the afternoon. None of them spoke, you see. Only the leader — Cravetts, you said his name was?’ Angel nodded. ‘There was one with glasses, I remember that. Wait, now. He called him something. Denny! That was it. Denny, the one with glasses. Short, a bit on the flabby side. With glasses. Thick lips. Denny.’
‘Denny,’ Angel said. ‘Is that all you can remember?’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘They really didn’t say much, you see.’
‘We would help more if we could,’ her husband added.
‘Pa,’ one of the boys said. The rancher held up his hand. His sons had been listening to the whole conversation spellbound. When the eldest one spoke, his father made the standard parental ‘don’t interrupt’ sign. ‘But Pa,’ the boy said.
‘Not now, Chris,’ he said.
‘They said they hadn’t had a drink since Abilene, Pa, I heard them!’ burst out the boy. ‘The one with the squinty eyes.’
Angel swung around to face the boy. ‘Tell me,’ he said.
‘I heard them a-talkin’, the one with the squinty eyes and the red-haired one.’
‘You have not said about this before to me,’ Heimberger growled.
‘We never done talked none about it, Pa,’ Chris said.
‘Talk now,’ Heimberger commanded. ‘Tell it all.’
‘Well, like I said, I was in the barn. Steve and Paul was milkin’, an’ I heard them fellers ride up. I sorta sneaked behind the door an’ watched. This squinty-eyed one, on the sorrel, he was talkin’ to the red-headed one like I told you. The red-headed one says “I sure could use a drink,” and the squinty-eyed one says “Yeah, Dick sure is pushin’ us along. We ain’t had a drink since Abilene”.’
‘He used the name Dick?’ Angel said. ‘That would be the boss?’
‘Guess so,’ the youngster said.
‘Anything else?’
‘Well, nothin’ much, really ... ’ the boy fidgeted.
‘You can say it,’ Heimberger said.
‘Uh ... well ...’
‘They was talkin’ ’bout women,’ interjected the youngest of the trio, Paul. He was about eight. ‘Chris told Steve an’ I heard him!’
‘Paul, I’ll larrup you!’ shouted Chris, his face crimson.
‘Is too late arguing,’ Heimberger said. ‘Mutti, better now you leave us a moment.’
‘Erwin Heimberger, if you think … ’ Her lips set in a firm thin line as she saw her husband’s head dip, bull-like. ‘Very well!’ She marched into her kitchen and they heard the furious rattle of pans.
‘Better now you tell me everything,’ Heimberger said.
‘He said — the squinty-eyed one — he said he was gettin’ horny.’
‘Horny? What is this horny?’
‘You know, Pa, like the bull,’ little Paul supplied helpfully. Heimberger eyed his youngest son balefully. The boy shrank back behind his older brother, lips trembling halfway between fear and laughter.
‘Go on,’ Angel prompted. ‘It’s okay.’
‘The red-headed one said “Milt, if you’re horny after all the pussy you had in Abilene, I swear to God they ain’t never goin’ to make enough.” I didn’t understand that bit, but then the squinty-eyed one said “Little Rosie sure could love a man”. I knew what he meant then.’
‘He called the man with the squint Milt?’
‘That’s right, mister.’
‘You hear anything else? Any other names? Anything at all?’
‘No sir, that’s all I heard, honest.’
‘Enough, I think,’ Heimberger said, heavily. But there was a light in his eyes and the boys could read it and they grinned. Angel felt the tug of their affection for each other. It made him lonely for a moment. Then he got up from the table and drained the lemonade glass.
‘Mr. Heimberger, I don’t know how I’m going to thank you and your family. But I thank you.’
‘That is nothing,’ Heimberger said. ‘You will tell all this to the Army people?’
‘I expect so,’ Angel said noncommittally. ‘I better be moving on.’
They came to the door and stood there together as he swung aboard the wagon and gigged the horses into movement. When he was a long way from the house he looked back. He thought he could see them all standing in the yard waving. He turned round and set his face towards the empty land.
By nightfall he was back at Fort Larned. Next day he told the teamster boss he was quitting and drew his pay.
It was the most money he had ever had in his life.
He went into the post trader’s store and waited until the proprietor finished serving a sergeant who was buying some twine.
‘Howdy, son,’ the storekeeper said. ‘What can I do for you?’
He was a swarthy man, with a walrus moustache and liquid brown eyes. A cigarette dangled from his lips.
‘I want to buy a gun,’ Frank Angel said. ‘What can I get for twenty dollars?’
The man looked at him for a moment, squinting through the cigarette smoke. Then he laughed, a short sound like a dog barking.
‘Damn all, I’d say,’ he said. ‘Damn all.’
‘Haven’t you got anything? Angel asked. ‘It doesn’t have to be new.’
‘You’re meanin’ a handgun, I reckon?’ the storekeeper said.
Frank Angel nodded. ‘How much is a six-gun?’
The storekeeper made his barking noise again.
‘More’n you got, sonny,’ he said. ‘More’n you got.’
The younger man’s face set. ‘You want to sell me a gun or don’t you?’ he snapped. ‘This isn’t the only trading post in Kansas.’
The storekeeper raised his arms in mock alarm. ‘Hey, easy there, pardner,’ he said wheezily. ‘I was just havin’ a little fun.’
‘We’ll say you’ve had it,’ Angel said. ‘Now: you got a gun or not?’
‘Wait a minnit,’ the man said. He went into the storeroom in back of the building, and Angel heard him rummaging about in there, wheezing, coughing regularly. After about five minutes the man came out. He had a wooden box in his hands and he opened it and laid it on the counter.
‘There’s this,’ he offered. ‘Needs a little attention, here an’ there. But it’s a nice handgun.’
Angel lifted the gun out of the box, where it lay wrapped in an oil-damp rag. It was an 1860 .44 Army Colt. One of the wooden grips on the butt was badly cracked and loose to the touch. The 8" barrel was pitted a little, but not badly. Angel tried the hammer, which slicked back smoothly, and checking the sights – the nock in the top of the hammer and the foresight — he found them well-aligned. The gun had been hard-used but not ruined. He pushed out the retaining lug and let the chamber slip into his hand, then squinted up the barrel. It looked clean and unscarred.
‘Fair,’ he said.
‘You’re an expert,’ the storekeeper said. There was deep sarcasm in his voice. Angel ignored it.
‘How much?’
‘Twenty dollars,’ the man said.
‘You throw in some powder an’ caps, some tools and moulds, and a holster, you’ve got a deal,’ Angel said.
‘Maybe you’d like a horse as well,’ said the storekeeper. ‘What you think this is, some kind o’ charity organization?’
‘I think it’s a place where a crook like you would try to sell a ten dollar gun to a kid he thought didn’t know any better,’ Frank Angel said flatly. ‘Am I right?’
‘Now, see here … ’ blustered the man. ‘I got half a mind … ’
‘An’ it shows,’ Angel snapped. ‘Stop trying to run a sandy on me, mister. Get the rest of the stuff or take your damned gun and shove it up your ass.’ He banged the revolver down on the counter and the storekeeper jumped. There was something in the cold eyes of this youngster that made him nervous about pushing his sarcasm one step further. A man who ran a store this far west saw a lot of hard cases, young and old, and learned one thing if nothing else. Sell them what they wanted and get them out of the place as fast as possible. He proceeded to do just that and Angel left ten minutes later with the Army Colt strapped to his hip in a flap-top cavalry holster. The cartridge cases and powder he put into his saddle-bags together with the flask and the bullet mould. The percussion caps he slipped into a shirt pocket. Then he went to get his horse from the stable on the southern edge of the rectangle made by the Fort. He looked around Larned one last time as he mounted up: the sandstone buildings with their white-framed windows, the neat-porched officers’ quarters, the slender flagpole in the centre of the square, the rows of saplings clinging desperately to life in the relentless sun. He put the river on his right and turned the horse towards the Great Bend. Three days later he was in Abilene.