‘Now what?’ Cody Hawk muttered.
‘Now we clear out of this country,’ Charlie Tuttle said. For as the horse drew nearer they could see for certain that it was Lonnie Stanton on the plow horse’s back, riding with no saddle, with her Winchester rifle across the shaggy animal’s withers.
‘I don’t know what happened to you earlier, Cody, but it’s time we recover that gold and line out of here.’
‘We’ve got to talk to the girl first, to see what she wants.’
‘You talk to her,’ Charlie said, grabbing the pitchfork, ‘I’ve had my fill of talking to Stantons.’
‘All right,’ Cody agreed. It was only right to see what she wanted. The girl had ridden all this way at some risk to herself. And she had obviously already recognized them.
He slipped from the hay wagon, tugged free the slipknot securing the reins of the gray and led the horse forward to meet Lonnie. Halfway to her he halted and waited for her to approach on the slow-moving plow horse. She was wearing a blue skirt, blue blouse and white straw hat, which Cody took to be her best wear. The face of the small woman was determined, her eyes set.
‘I’m more than a little surprised to see you, Lonnie,’ Cody said as she halted the horse. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘I come for my money,’ the girl said forcefully.
‘I don’t think I understand.’
‘Oh, I think you do – or you should. I come for my fortune, Uncle Morris’s gold! I want it.’ Her small chin trembled as she said this. The girl was excited, overly so. Cody noticed that she kept turning her head, looking behind her as if expecting someone to arrive.
‘Let’s find another place to talk,’ Cody said, mounting the gray. ‘You never can tell who might come along. You are on Triangle land, you know.’
‘’Course I know! What do you take me for?’
A very frightened young woman, was the answer to that, but Cody did not say so. Instead he suggested, ‘I know a hidden place. Let me just tell my friend.’
‘If you think you’re going to take me off somewhere and kill me, remember I’ve still got my rifle and I know how to use it.’
‘I know you do,’ was Cody’s reply. He inclined his head and started the gray horse on its way. He had noticed a canyon, really no more than a notch in the low ridge running parallel to the valley floor, and he guided the gray in that direction, turning his head now and then to make sure that Lonnie was following. She was, her expression as bright as a person being led to execution.
Inside the stony notch there was some poor grass and a thicket of sumac, little else, except for a range steer which had somehow found its way there and now watched them with dull eyes as it tugged at the yellow grass.
Cody swung down near a scramble of fallen rocks and seated himself, inviting Lonnie to join him. The girl’s eyes were wary, the rifle firmly in her grip as she slipped from the white horse’s back and joined him.
‘Now, then,’ Cody began, ‘what is it that you want from me?’
‘I’ve told you. My fortune, the one my Uncle Morris intended for me. You’ve stolen it.’
‘I’ve never even laid eyes on your Uncle Morris,’ Cody said. Not while he was alive. His voice sounded oddly uncertain to his own ears. Lonnie Stanton must have heard the lack of conviction in his words as well. The girl, sitting on a rock with her legs tucked under her blue skirt, rifle across her knees, frowned even more heavily.
Would she shoot? Had it been a terrible mistake to bring her to this secluded place?
He tried again. ‘Tell me about this missing treasure and why you think I would know anything about it.’
‘All right,’ she agreed. She had removed her wide straw hat and the breeze was strong enough to drift and twist her long hair even in this sheltered place. That was not a good sign; Cody glanced northward to see dark storm clouds beginning to gather over the mountains. It would snow again and soon. ‘I will tell you what happened,’ Lonnie said after a thoughtful moment of silence. Cody noticed that her rough mountain accent had faded.
‘This may take a while,’ Lonnie said. Cody nodded in response and waited. The steer had moved over to graze nearly in front of them like some curious eavesdropper. The two horses shared the meager grass with the cow. Lonnie took a deep, slow breath and told Cody:
‘A couple of years ago we were digging in for a long, cold winter. I got to thinking about my Uncle Morris, who was alone in the far high mountains. He knew how to survive harsh weather, that was certain, but he lived mostly off wild meat and gather.’
‘I liked my Uncle Morris. He never harmed anyone. Mostly he just wanted to be left alone. When I was little he used to bring me things like a fox’s tail or a rabbit skin …’ Lonnie’s eyes drifted briefly away, perhaps he was remembering the pleasure those small gifts had given her. She sat up rigidly, still not meeting Cody’s eyes. She wiped strands of wind-drifted hair from her eyes.
‘Anyway, I decided on my own to visit my Uncle Morris before the snows got any worse. I took items from our larder – I would have gotten in trouble over that. But we had plenty that year. I took two burlap bags and loaded them with sugar, coffee, corn meal, beans and wheat flour – a few other things I can’t recall – and I loaded them onto Daisy’s back. That’s the burro’s name,’ she said at Cody’s questioning look.
‘The weather was mild when I started out, but by the time I reached Rios Canyon it had begun to snow again. I could see that it had fallen heavily earlier. I had to put on my snow shoes to make it the last mile or so to Uncle Morris’s cabin.
‘He was surprised and happy to see me, but there was a worried look on his face. He asked me if I had passed anybody on the way up. I hadn’t seen a soul. He muttered, “I wonder if the bastard’s still around, then?”
‘I asked him who he meant, but he just shook his head. Then he began to try to hurry me away instead of having a little visit. He said it was going to snow again and he didn’t want me trapped up there, but that wasn’t it, I knew. He was worried that whoever he was talking about might come back.
‘That’s when he told me about the fortune. Uncle Morris said he would see that it got to me soon so that I could go off and have the sort of life a young girl needs. But I was not to tell Emil or even my mother about it.’
‘Did he say how he could have come by a fortune way up there?’ Cody asked.
‘No. He was very mysterious about that, almost frightened to tell me, it seemed. But Uncle Morris was not a liar, and if he said he had a fortune, he had it.’
‘I wonder why he didn’t want you to tell the rest of your family?’
‘Because they would take it away from me and use it for other things. Uncle Morris wanted me to be able to go away somewhere.’
‘Is Emil Stanton your father?’ Cody asked.
Lonnie shook her head, gave a little sigh and repositioned her legs. ‘No. He took me in along with Mother. As for the boys, I get along well enough with Luke. He and I more or less grew up together. But Amos and Daltry …’ She shuddered and it was not because the wind had grown cooler. ‘Ever since I was little, they have been looking at me, or trying to.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Cody told her.
‘Use your imagination,’ Lonnie snapped.
‘Oh,’ Cody said, feeling like a fool.
‘Uncle Morris knew all about that – I’d told him. He was the only one I trusted.’
‘Your mother …’
‘Every time I told her anything she’d run to Emil and tell him. She fears him and is afraid of losing him, both. She doesn’t know how she’d survive if something happened to Emil.’
‘I see,’ Cody said, believing that he did. ‘But to get back to the point: what makes you think I have Uncle Morris’s fortune?’
‘That bullet I spanked off your friend’s saddle-bags for one thing!’ Lonnie said with some excitement. ‘That was on purpose, of course – I’m not that bad a shot, and I wouldn’t be trying to injure a horse. And the way he – the one with the mustache …’
‘Wayne,’ Cody supplied.
‘The way Wayne carried those saddle-bags and sheltered them around the house. I’ve never seen a man so concerned about his camp utensils, which is what he told us were in the bags.’
Cody had warned Wayne Tucker about that, but Wayne had been more interested in protecting the gold than what the Stantons might think of him.
‘Wayne might have been carrying something valuable,’ Cody admitted, ‘but what makes you think it was your Uncle Morris’s treasure?’
‘Where were you three riding in from? There’s only one way to travel down those mountains to Rios Canyon. Did you happen by a cabin on your way?’
‘If we did …’ Cody began, but stopped before he trapped himself.
‘I knew it,’ Lonnie said with triumph. ‘You found what Amos and Daltry never could.’
‘How could they even know about it?’
‘I let it slip one day when I was angry. I said that when I got my Uncle Morris’s fortune, they’d all be sorry.’ Lonnie waved a hand in the air. ‘I hate anger. It can make a person say and do the stupidest things!’
Cody had to agree. ‘What about the boys – Amos and Daltry – won’t they be following you now, thinking you’ll lead them to the treasure?’
‘They have no horses. I took the only one.’ She frowned thoughtfully. ‘Although they were talking about ambushing some Triangle riders for their ponies.’
And that would start a range war. Cody knew that both Walt Donovan and Ned Pierce – who particularly hated the Stantons – were on the western range, rounding up Triangle strays. Things had gotten snarled up wildly, and it seemed matters could only get worse. He was certain now that Charlie was right. The two of them had to leave Triangle while they still could.
He glanced skyward again. The sky was an inky blue; the wind continued to build, as did the gathering storm clouds up along Rios Canyon. Of course the weather was not going to cooperate either. Muttering, Cody rose to his feet.
‘Look, Lonnie,’ Cody said seriously, ‘it seems obvious that you can’t go home and don’t want to. You certainly can’t stay around Triangle.’ He thought briefly of Jewel Frazier. ‘What do you intend to do, then?’
Lonnie Stanton rose and brushed her skirt with one hand. The other held firm to the Winchester.
‘If you would have given me my fortune, I was planning on making my way to Baxter. Now …’ she shook her head. ‘I just don’t know. That was as far as my thinking went.’
Her eyes were downcast. There was something so pitiful about this lost child-woman that Cody was prompted to make a gesture. He reached into his pocket where he had placed some of the stolen money in case of an emergency. Well, this was an emergency, if not his.
‘I saved a little money while I was working for Domino,’ Cody lied. Another lie; was it getting easier for him? He had told more of them recently than he had in his entire life. He placed three bright ten-dollar gold pieces in Lonnie’s palm. She eyed them and Cody dubiously. ‘Go on to Baxter before this storm settles in. Find a room for rent or check in at the hotel. Later maybe you can find work as a cook, a maid – who knows? You’ll be better off than you were at Emil Stanton’s place.’
Lonnie shrugged an answer and pocketed the coins. She didn’t believe Cody’s explanation as to their origin, he thought.
‘I guess that’s all there is to do,’ she said as she walked toward her shaggy white horse.
Alongside her, Cody asked, ‘Are you sure Amos and Daltry aren’t following you?’
‘I’m sure,’ Lonnie said, swinging up on the plow horse’s back. ‘But you know, Cody Hawk, someone else might have been. I couldn’t make him out; he kept his distance. Or maybe I was imagining things. Who else could it have been, deliberately following me?’
Who else, indeed, except the mysterious, shadowy man whom Cody had noticed on more than one occasion, following him?
‘Will I see you in Baxter?’ Lonnie asked from her mounted position.
‘What makes you think I’m going anywhere?’ he demanded with faint truculence.
‘Well, Cody Hawk, I think it’s like this: you can no longer stay around this part of the country without something terrible happening to you, anymore than I can.’
Cody would have argued with the girl, but there was no point to argue. Her conclusion was, unfortunately, quite accurate. He watched her ride away on the shaggy horse. She did not turn to wave, did not call a word of farewell. With no other business to occupy him at that moment, he mounted the gray horse and hied the feeding steer out of the notch to rejoin the herd.
‘Your picnic over so soon?’ a red-faced Charlie Tuttle greeted him.
Cody was scowling. ‘Shut up. I’ll tell you about it later, Charlie,’ he said as the gray side stepped and turned as some of the cattle got too near its flanks. ‘It’s time to go.’
‘That’s what you were saying,’ Charlie replied, mopping at his face with a blue bandanna.
‘I mean now! We’ve got to be going, Charlie, while we’ve the chance.’
If they still had one at all.
‘All right,’ Charlie agreed, rightly reading the anxiety on Cody’s face. He glanced at the skies. ‘I’ll tell anyone who asks that it was getting too bitter cold out here for a wounded man.’
‘No one’s going to say a thing to you. We won’t be here. Turn the wagon and bring it in.’
‘If we’re leaving we’ll need another horse.’
‘Joe won’t care if we saddle another horse, though I’d rather not take an animal with a Triangle brand. If need be, I’ll buy one.’
‘You be careful, Cody,’ Charlie warned him. ‘You be very careful about flashing any of that gold around. It could be a death warrant.’
By the time they reached the barn the skies were roofed over with blue-black clouds. These trembled before the rising wind as if eager to have their strength unleashed. The long grass was flattened, the trees shuddered in anticipation as the few leaves remaining on their branches tumbled away.
Cody helped Charlie put the hay wagon in its shed after unharnessing the horses. As they walked to the barn a few stray snowflakes hit their shoulders and hats. It was not going to be a good night for riding.
‘Just let me get my gear from the bunkhouse,’ Charlie said, ‘and we’ll be on our way.’
‘How much does that gear mean to you?’ Cody asked. ‘With the weather turning like it is, the boys from the range will be coming in. That means Donovan will be back. And Ned Pierce. I don’t think we should stop for anything we don’t need.’
Joe Rowland was not really surprised to see them come in so early, the weather being what it was. Cody told him what they needed. Explaining why they needed another saddle horse might have been difficult, but Joe was not there to ask questions. When a man needed a horse on Triangle, he was given one.
‘How about the little pinto?’ Joe suggested. ‘Ned had it out already today, but that was only for a few hours while I was shoeing his sorrel.’
Cody told Joe that the little pinto would do fine. Cody switched his saddle to the pinto, since they had agreed beforehand that Charlie would ride Wayne Tucker’s big gray horse.
Then, without further preparations, they exited the barn in time to see the range patrol riding in from the west. These were only shadows in the snow now. Probably, Cody thought, with the weather turning as it was they should have found a way to delay their departure, but doing so might have run them into some quite deadly problems.
Before leaving, Cody took one minute to pause and tell Joe:
‘The burro’s name is Daisy.’ Then they were gone, riding into the thick of the storm, away from Triangle and its riders.
It was not difficult to recover the stolen gold. Snow had lightly dusted the jumble of rocks, but not enough to conceal the small cleft where Cody had placed the saddle-bags. These were passed to Charlie to strap on behind his saddle, which he did with an expression of relief on his round face, even as he was looking around him with some anxiety in his eyes. They were so near to making their escape; they could not be discovered now.
As they rode out of the valley in the direction of Baxter town, following a trail Charlie knew from earlier years, the snow began to fall in earnest. A soft, enclosing blanket of white built around them. It would make travel more difficult, but it would also conceal them from any following men.
Once across the first row of low, flanking hills, the road ahead of them flattened out and lay in a generally straight line southward. Once, at the top of a rise, Charlie reined in and waited for Cody, who was trailing on the pinto.
‘Ten miles,’ Charlie said, lifting a gloved hand to point. ‘If it weren’t for the weather this would be a picnic.’
‘We’ll be in Baxter before full dark, then.’
‘We should be, easily. If the storm lets us; if we don’t run into any trouble. Cody,’ the older man said, ‘do you realize how many people are going to be on our heels?’
There were the Stanton brothers, possibly with Emil accompanying them, if they had managed to steal some Triangle horses, as Lonnie had told him was what they had in mind. Of course if Ned Pierce had further suspicions, stoked by the fact that the two had ridden out unannounced, he would be on their trail. With Jewel Frazier at his side? Who knew – the wild-eyed Jewel seemed capable of almost anything. Any number of Triangle men might follow along if Ned and Jewel accused the pair of stealing Triangle horses, especially if the Stantons had already angered them by descending to horse-stealing.
There was yet another man, though Cody had no idea who it could be: the mysterious man who had been following them down Rios Canyon on their way out of the mountains. The same man who had been trailing Lonnie? Whoever he was – if he was not only some product of their imaginations – he had not yet tried to take a shot at any of them, but that meant nothing. He might only have been waiting for the right moment.
‘A few,’ Cody answered Charlie after a long minute’s reflection.
‘I suppose we’ll be all right once we get to Baxter and deposit the money in the bank.’
‘At least we’re off Triangle, and we have the money!’ Cody said above the wind.
As the snow fell harder, Charlie said, Just tell me that we’re not doing all of this for the sake of a girl, Cody.’
Cody laughed as they started on their way again. Charlie’s remark was ridiculous.
Wasn’t it?
The snow fell, the sky darkened still more and the wind pushed heavily at their backs as the horses plodded on across the miles of wasteland toward the small town in the unseen distance.
Where Lonnie Stanton waited.