CHAPTER 14
Rogers caught his breath as he looked down at the badge in Denny Jensen’s hand. He wasn’t sure how it had slipped out of its pocket on the back of his belt, but the way he had been tumbling head over heels down the ridge, he supposed anything was possible.
But why did it have to wind up where this crazy young woman would find it?
For a second he thought about denying that it was his, but he realized she probably wouldn’t believe him. The way he had been pawing at his belt made it obvious he was looking for something, and it would be too much of a coincidence for the lost object to be anything else.
He started to take it from her, but she quickly closed her hand around it and drew it back. “Wait just a minute. You haven’t told me this belongs to you.”
“It does. And I’d appreciate it if you’d hand it over.”
“You’re a deputy U.S. marshal.”
She didn’t make it sound like a question, but he answered it like one anyway. “That’s right, and I’d be mighty grateful to you, Miss Jensen, if you could keep that to yourself.”
“Does my father know?” she asked sharply.
“No, he doesn’t.” Might as well spill the whole thing, he decided. Denny was stubborn enough to keep after him until he did. “The only one around here who knows is Sheriff Carson. I had to tell him who I am.”
“Professional courtesy, you’d call it.”
“Something like that.”
She still had her hand closed around the badge. That was better than waving it around out in the open, he thought. There was no telling who might be watching. After all, she had said that someone was spying on her earlier. But what he really wanted was to have it snugged away in that hidden pocket where it belonged.
“My boss, the chief marshal, sent me out here from Denver,” Rogers went on. “He assigned me to look into the rustling that’s been going on in this area. I assume I can trust you, Miss Jensen, otherwise I wouldn’t be telling you about official government business.”
“You’re wasting your time,” she said. “My father’s already taken care of that gang of rustlers.”
“He eliminated some of them. We don’t know if he got rid of the whole bunch.”
“What business is it of the federal government if some cattle are stolen?”
She was pretty sharp, he thought. That was the same question Sheriff Carson had asked.
“The rustling jeopardizes beef contracts with the army. Anyway, the marshal’s office has a stake in maintaining law and order in general.”
“My brother knows a lot about such things. Maybe I should ask him about any jurisdictional questions.”
“I’d really rather you didn’t say anything to anybody,” Rogers began quickly but stopped when Denny laughed.
She stuck her hand out. “Here. Take your blasted old badge. I don’t care what you poke your nose into. I guess you had a good reason for being out here, instead of just spying on me.”
He took the badge from her. “I wasn’t spying—”
She held up a hand to stop him. “Forget it. You can go on searching for clues or whatever you were doing, and I’ll get back to my father. I don’t want him to come along and find us like this, looking like we’ve been rolling around together in the creek.”
As he slid the badge back into its hiding place, he said, “We were rolling around together in the creek.”
“Don’t remind me. Anyway, we were both in the creek at the same time. That doesn’t mean we were together.” Denny turned toward the ridge and studied it for a second, found some handholds she liked the looks of, and started to climb. She had lifted herself only a few feet when she slipped a little.
Without thinking, he raised a hand to brace her, but she caught herself before he could touch her. He realized the palm of his hand was positioned only a few inches away from the curve of her denim-clad bottom.
“Don’t you dare,” she said coldly as she looked back over her shoulder and down at him.
He backed off a step. “Wouldn’t think of it. You can fall down and bust your . . . whatever you land on.” With that, he moved over a few yards, found another spot to climb, and started up.
Going up the ridge took a lot longer than coming down had, and despite the fact that the day wasn’t very warm, Rogers was sweaty when he pulled himself over the edge and rolled onto the pine needles. He had passed Denny on the way up—the route she had chosen proving to be more difficult—so he got to his feet, went over to kneel at the brink, and called to her, “I’ll give you a hand when you get close enough for me to reach.”
“I don’t want a hand!” she said.
“There’s no point in being stubborn about it.”
“I’m not stubborn! I’m determined.”
“All right. Suit yourself. Be careful, though. We both managed not to break any bones when we tumbled down, but there’s no point in pushing your luck.” He looked around and found his hat. Hers was lying nearby, too. He picked it up and dusted pine needles off of it.
“That’s . . . mine,” she panted as she reached the top and saw him holding the hat.
He held it out to her. “You’re welcome.”
She snatched it away and crammed it on her head.
As disheveled and bedraggled as she was, he had to admit that she still looked pretty good. He was sure she wouldn’t want to hear that, so he kept the opinion to himself and said, “You claimed you found some tracks left by the hombre who was watching you. How about showing them to me?”
“Why?”
“I’m a lawman. Sounds like this fella was a suspicious character. Sort of my job to check it out.”
“What I found isn’t going to tell you much,” she said with a shrug, “but I reckon I can show you if you’re interested.”
It took her a few minutes to locate the rough footprints she had seen before. He knelt next to them and studied them, but Denny was right. Other than proving that someone had been there, the tracks didn’t mean a thing.
“His horse was tied back there,” she said, pointing through the trees. “I can show you the droppings if you want.”
“I can find them.”
“You’re really going to look?”
He rubbed his chin. “I’m a halfway decent tracker. I might be able to follow and see where he came from.”
“I was thinking about doing that myself. In fact, I was going to get my horse when I heard you rustling around in the brush and figured the varmint had come back.”
“I didn’t think I made that much noise.”
She snorted. “Enough for me to hear. And I’ve lived in England for years.”
He wasn’t sure what she meant by that. “I’ll see what I can find out, and if it’s anything important, I’ll let you know.”
“I could come with you . . .” He was about to veto that idea when she went on. “But my father’s probably wondering by now where I’ve gotten off to. I’d better go see if I can find him and let him know I’m all right.”
“Maybe your clothes will be dry by then.”
“You let me worry about that. Don’t worry, I won’t compromise your reputation. And . . . I won’t say anything about you being a deputy marshal.”
“Thanks.”
“I really think you’re wasting your time, though. After what happened a few nights ago, there’s probably not a rustler within a hundred miles of here.”
* * *
The sun had almost set and shadows were already thick when Muddy Malone rode up to the canyon mouth.
One of the guards stepped out from behind the rocks, rifle leveled, then relaxed and lowered the weapon. “Oh, it’s just you.”
“Just me?” Muddy said with a snort. “What do you mean by that, Wilkins?”
“Means I don’t have to shoot you. Go on in, Malone. You got news for the boss?”
“If I do, it’s him I’ll be tellin’ it to.”
“Don’t get a burr under your saddle just because I’m doin’ my job. Go on now.”
Muddy snorted again but rode on through the entrance. He followed the narrow, twisting canyon past the other guard posts. Those men hailed him, too, but didn’t challenge him since they knew no intruder could have gotten that far without gunplay to alert them.
Muddy reached the basin a few minutes later. Cook fires were already burning, and lamplight glowed from the windows of Nick Creighton’s cabin.
Off to one side, invisible in the gloom, was the grave where Blue Creighton had been laid to rest. Several of the men, acting under Nick Creighton’s orders, had wrestled a big slab of rock from the canyon wall and rolled it into place to mark the grave. Nick claimed he was going to chisel Blue’s name into the stone, when he got around to it.
Muddy rode over to the rope corral where the gang kept their mounts.
Turk met him there and reached for the reins. “I’ll take care of your horse for you. Nick’s been waitin’ for you. You’d better go see him right away.”
Muddy dismounted. “What sort of mood is he in?”
Turk made a face. “It’s been less than forty-eight hours since his little brother died. What sort of mood do you think he’s in?”
Muddy sighed. He didn’t have much to report. His steps were reluctant as he approached the cabin, but he knew he needed to get it over with. He knocked on the door, which had been repaired when the gang moved in. It no longer hung askew on its thick leather hinges. He waited, hoping that Nick wouldn’t be mad and take the anger out on him.
After a moment, the door swung back and Molly stood there. “Come on in. He’s been waiting for you.”
Respectfully, Muddy took off his battered old hat as he entered the cabin. Nick Creighton was sitting at the rough-hewn table, legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankles. His right elbow rested on the table, and he had a glass of whiskey in that hand. A half-full bottle sat on the table beside him. He scowled as he looked up at the newcomer. The look made Muddy’s gut tighten.
“Muddy,” Creighton said. “What’s going on down at Jensen’s place?”
“Not a lot, boss,” Muddy reported. “His hands are out ridin’ the range and doin’ their chores as usual. They’re all carryin’ rifles and packin’ irons on their hips, though. From the looks of it, Jensen’s told them not to let their guard down, so I reckon he ain’t convinced he’s in the clear yet.”
Creighton tossed back the whiskey in the glass, then nodded slowly. “We’ll let him stew a while longer. We’ve done all right with the cattle we’ve lifted from there so far, so we’re not short of money. There’s no rush.”
Muddy hesitated. Creighton had accepted what he had to say without losing his temper, so the smart thing to do would be to get out while the gettin’ was good. But he didn’t want to fail to report everything he had seen. That might come back to cause him trouble later. “There’s one more thing, Nick. I saw a girl.”
Creighton frowned as he glanced up from pouring himself another drink. “A girl?” he repeated.
“Yeah. A, uh, really pretty girl. Lots of curly blond hair. She was dressed like a man and she rode like a man, but she was a gal, all right, there was no mistakin’ that.”
Molly laughed softly. “You sound a little smitten, Muddy.”
“No, ma’am,” he said, shaking his head. “I just hadn’t seen her there before and figured Nick might want to know about her.”
“Seems like I’ve heard that Jensen has a daughter,” Creighton mused. “Maybe that was her you saw.”
“Could’ve been, Nick. She was ridin’ around like she owned the place, sure enough. I watched her for a while, but then I spied somebody else comin’ and lit a shuck. You told me not to get caught on the Sugarloaf, so I figured I’d better be careful.”
“Was it Jensen?”
“The fella who was comin’?” Muddy shook his head. “I don’t know for sure. Never got a good look at him. But I don’t think so. Even if it had been, I know you don’t want him bushwhacked.”
Creighton took a sip of the liquor. “That’s right. When the time comes to kill Smoke Jensen, it’s going to be my finger that pulls the trigger while I look him in the eye and make sure he knows why he’s dying. That’s the only way Blue will be avenged. Although”—Creighton stroked his chin—“if that was Jensen’s daughter you saw, that makes me think of some other ways he could be made to suffer before I put him out of his miser y.”
Molly frowned. “You wouldn’t hurt a woman, would you, Nick?”
Creighton’s hand tightened on the glass as he said, “I’d hurt anybody if it caused Smoke Jensen pain. He’s going to pay for happened to Blue . . . pay in blood!”