CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Who’s going to do the burying?” Poke Farrell said. “I’m shorthanded here.”
Red Ryan forked up the last piece of his breakfast salt pork, chewed for a few moments, then said, “You are the undertaker, Farrell. You get to keep their horses and traps. That’s enough reward for a little spadework.”
Farrell scowled across the table at Red. “Them boys were riding mustangs. I wouldn’t give you a hundred dollars for all four of them.”
Buttons Muldoon said, “A mustang will keep going miles after your big American stud has pulled up lame. He knows where his feet are, and that makes him a surefooted mountain hoss. And he’s as savvy as a bunkhouse rat. He can scent trouble in the wind and give a warning better than any lobo wolf and that’s why outlaws ride them.”
“If mustangs are so great, why the hell ain’t they hauling your stage?” Farrell said.
“Because the mustang is too light and he don’t take well to the traces,” Muldoon said. “Now, even a big mule weighs only about a thousand pounds, but he works well as part of a team. A mustang just ain’t that way inclined.”
“I’ve never had much truck with mustangs,” Red said. “But now they’re yours, Farrell.”
“I bet there’s a big reward out for Hamp Becker,” Seth Roper said, speaking for the first time since he sat down to breakfast. “Farrell, before you plant him, cut off his head and keep it somewhere cool. Next time a Ranger comes along, show him the head and claim your money. I reckon the reward could go as high as five, six thousand dollars.”
“Must we talk about cutting off heads at breakfast?” Lucian Carter said, dropping his fork onto his plate.
“Man’s got to show proof, and the head is the best,” Roper said. He grinned. “At least that’s been my experience.”
Carter got to his feet. “Ryan, it’s been daylight for an hour. High time we were moving.”
Buttons grinned. “Fort Bliss, here we come. The team is hitched and we’re ready to go.” He looked over at the army wives. “At your convenience, ladies. And you too, Mrs. Morgan.”
If Stella took that as a slight, she didn’t let it show. “I’m ready,” is all she said.
Red Ryan thought the woman seemed preoccupied, as though her thoughts were elsewhere, perhaps with her husband waiting at the fort . . . but he doubted it.
“Hey, don’t leave yet. What about me?” Poke Farrell said.
“What about you?” Ryan said.
“I got four dead men laid out on my front porch,” Farrell said.
“Then bury them decent, Farrell,” Lucian Carter said. “You’ve got their horse and guns.”
“I told you, I’m shorthanded,” Farrell said, his voice a high whine.
Roper, seemed slightly angry, a man at the end of his patience. “You got yourself, two strong whores, and a Chinee in the kitchen. That’s enough to dig a hole someplace.”
“Damn you, it ain’t near enough and—”
Suddenly Roper shoved the muzzle of his Colt into Farrell’s belly and pulled the trigger. The gun roared, and Farrell stood upright for a moment, his face shocked, unable to believe that he’d been killed, and then slumped to the floor.
“I can’t stand a complaining man,” Roper said, looking down at Farrell’s writhing body. He holstered his gun, turned on his heel, stepped into the kitchen. Roper returned, pushing ahead of him a small, terrified Chinese man by the scruff of the neck. He shook the little man like a terrier with a rat and said, “You speakee American?”
The Chinese nodded.
“Good. You see the man on the floor? He’ll be dead soon and you’re the new proprietor—you know what proprietor means? You do? Good. Then you’re the new proprietor of this establishment. Under-standee?”
“I understand,” the Chinese said.
“What’s your name?” Roper said.
“Huan.”
“All right, Huan, a damned heathen name if you ask me, when Farrell dies, you’ll have five men to bury. Can you do that?”
The little man nodded. “Yes, I take them far, far away from here.”
“I don’t give a damn where you take them. Some folks here want them buried, understand?”
“Mr. Farrell not dead yet,” Huan said. He put his fingers in his ears and said, “He making big row.”
“Yeah, he is, ain’t he?” Roper said. He drew his gun and fired a shot into Farrell’s head, and the man’s pained shrieks stopped. “Now he’s dead.”
“Damn you, Roper, you murdered that man,” Red Ryan said.
“You care, Ryan? He wasn’t a Patterson employee, just a saloonkeeper and pimp.”
The army wives were sitting in stunned silence, their eyes as round as coins. Lucian Carter had an arm around Stella’s shoulders as though to comfort her. She looked like she didn’t need comforting, her speculative gaze fixed on Roper.
“The man was unarmed,” Red said.
“That was Farrell’s problem, not mine,” Roper said. “He should’ve armed himself.”
“When we reach El Paso, I’ll press a murder charge,” Red said.
“And I’ll deny it, and nobody in El Paso will lose any sleep over the death of a two-bit pimp who turned up his toes at the ass-end of nowhere.”
Stella Morgan said, “It looked to me that Farrell was going for a hideout gun. I’d swear that on a stack of Bibles.”
“Carter, what about you?” Roper said.
The man hesitated for a moment, and then Stella whispered something to him, and he nodded and said, “The pimp had a sneaky gun on him. I’m sure of that.”
Roper grinned. “You still going to press charges, Ryan?”
“I will, and I’ll make them stick,” Red said. “What I saw was cold-blooded murder.”
Suddenly Roper was tense and a hollow silence descended on the room . . . waiting to be filled by whatever came next.
“Since I’m an accused murderer, maybe you want to take my gun away from me, Ryan,” Roper said. He was primed . . . ready for the draw.
Red had been there before, and he knew how fast he was, quicker with the gun than most. “I reckon I will,” he said.
“No!”
Stella Morgan leaped from her chair and got between the two men.
“Let’s settle this in El Paso,” she said. “Mr. Muldoon, how far to Fort Bliss?”
“We’re two days out,” Buttons said.
“Two days out, and there’s still Apaches around,” Stella said. “You fools, this is no time to be killing one another.”
Edna Powell had the same idea because she rushed to Red’s side as fast as her dumpy legs would carry her. “Oh, Mr. Ryan, please don’t fight.” She glared at Roper. “Mr. Roper, you’re a dreadful, violent man. I thought you very brave when you fought the savages, and I still do, but now I’m very disappointed in you.”
“And that goes for me too,” Rhoda Carr said. “You can rest assured that Corporal Carr will hear of this.”
Roper grinned, swept off his hat, and made a leg. “Ladies,” he said. He brushed past Ryan and walked out of the room.
Buttons took Red aside and whispered, “Sooner or later, you’re gonna have to kill that man.”
“I reckon I’ll let the law do that,” Red said.
Buttons shook his head. “No, that’s not how it will happen. The law won’t act, and it will be down to you.”
Red smiled. “You have a crystal ball, Buttons?”
“Nope, I don’t need no crystal ball. I have something better.”
“What’s that?”
“The Irish gift, Red . . . the Irish gift.”