The five of them met secretly in rolling hill country sliced by gullies washed red with eroded soil: Gil Brennan, his chief henchmen Sandy Urbanski and Rick Collins, and two soldiers newly arrived in the Black Hills from Fort Bridger, Sergeant John Saville and Corporal Dan Appling. The soldiers had been detached for temporary duty and were under orders to wear civilian disguises.
“You’ve no doubt whatsoever,” Brennan repeated, “that Leland hired Hickok?”
John Saville shook his head adamantly. He was pallid and stout, posing as a preacher; he wore clergy black with a starched white collar.
“Durant didn’t tell us that, Mr. Brennan, no. But Danny here is the company clerk for our regiment. He heard General Durant’s aide-de-camp mention it.”
Gil Brennan nodded, his long aristocratic face more thoughtful than troubled. He wore a vermilion ranch suit and an expensive alpaca coat.
“It makes perfect sense,” he conceded. “Hickok used to drive for the Midland Line’s New Mexico Division. His passengers, I’ve been told, never lost a dollar in a holdup. Before that, he rode Pony Express and never lost a piece of mail.”
“Don’tcha think, boss,” Rick Collins suggested, “we best let this coach go?”
Collins was a stupid man, and usually Brennan had low tolerance for stupidity. But he had once witnessed it with his own eyes when Rick picked a blacksmith’s anvil up two feet off the ground to win a strong-man contest in nearby Belle Fourche. He might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but such strength made him useful in a pinch. He was also an excellent shot with a rifle.
“Let not your hearts be troubled, gentlemen,” he assured them. “J. B. Hickok is a formidable man, yes. And no doubt he’ll select a likewise formidable shotgun rider. But they won’t be expecting trouble from in their very midst.”
He nodded at the two soldiers, both of whom would be posing as passengers on Hickok’s coach. Saville’s companion, Corporal Dan Appling, would be disguised as a toupee salesman. He was a rabbit-faced man wearing a straw boater and a cheap broadcloth suit. Even now he carried his straw sample case. But in reality, both men were among the U.S. Army’s top pistol marksmen and competed annually in tournaments.
Urbanski snorted his contempt for all this. He was his usual sullen and apathetic self. He considered “meetings” strictly for women.
“Way I see it,” he told his employer, “bribing these two target-poppers onto our side just means less swag for the rest of us. So I’m goin’ up agin’ Hickok for a smaller share. Why not let this stage get through to Denver? There’ll be others.”
Anger at Urbanski made Brennan’s eyebrows arch, and his thin-lipped mouth set itself hard. He figured the man who paid the piper should also call the tunes. But he reminded himself this bunch weren’t musicians, they were ice-cold killers, especially Urbanski. Discretion was the better part of valor.
“Sandy, are you forgetting the extra ten thousand dollars? The open bounty on Hickok?”
Urbanski’s surly face came alive with sudden interest. “What bounty?”
“Hickok killed a rowdy cowboy while he was the starman in Abilene, Kansas. It was a fair fight, they say, but the cowboy’s old man is a rich cattle baron in Texas. He’ll pay ten thousand, no questions asked, to any man who brings him Hickok’s head in a sack.”
Urbanski’s lips cleared his teeth in a wolf grin. “Now you’re whistlin’, boss. I mean to beat these soldier boys out for that money.”
Brennan knew he could do it, too. Urbanski constantly practiced drawing and shooting. He had killed at least eight men in fair fights and shot twice that many in the back.
“That’s fine by me,” Brennan assured him. “So long as you remember the main goal is to get that gold. With Wild Bill Hickok in charge, they’ll likely increase the gold shipment. The bigger the pie, the bigger the slices.”
It was the size and number of those “slices” that forced Brennan’s hand. This gold-heist ring involved not just himself and the actual holdup men, but an extensive ring of informers and accomplices, including some within the military. The only way to keep all these cutthroats from killing him was to go equal shares on each heist.
If things were different, he would just let that stage driven by Hickok get through safely. But the timing was against him. Gil Brennan needed at least another fifty thousand dollars, and quick, if he meant to go legitimate. He had an opportunity to buy up controlling interest in the Exposition Bank in San Francisco, his hometown. Once he did that, he would virtually own the city. But he had to move quick before foreign investors beat him to the bid.
“Hickok hasn’t met you boys yet?” Brennan asked the soldiers.
“We were sent on ahead so nobody could connect us to him. By now he’s met with Durant to work out their plan. He knows how we’ll be disguised—that’s how he’ll know who we are.”
Brennan mulled this for a minute. “Last time,” he said, meaning the coach Sandy and Rick had just knocked off, “they tried an express-messenger coach with no passengers. Before that it was a military escort. Now they’ve brought in a hired gun. I guess they figure if they can’t raise the bridge, they’ll lower the river. It means the government is getting desperate.”
Urbanski snorted. “They can bring in Geronimo if they want. Won’t be long, and Hickok will be walking with his ancestors.”
Brennan sent him a warning glance. “There’s a long list of dead men, Sandy, who’ve set out to plant him. He was taken prisoner three times during the War Between the States, but they couldn’t hold him. The man even survived a grizzly bear attack in the Raton Pass. Don’t sell him short, or you won’t live to regret it.”
Brennan addressed all of them now. As he spoke, one fist beat the palm of his other hand to underscore his points.
“This thing won’t be done slapdash. Personally, I’m hoping John and Danny here get a good chance to sucker-shoot him. But if I rate Hickok accurately, he won’t completely trust anybody but his shotgun rider. So before we even make a play for that gold, we’re going to throw him off, get Hickok to lower his guard.
“How?” Urbanski demanded.
Brennan smiled. “That’s easier than you think. Don’t forget he’s walking into a stacked deck, and we’re holding all the aces.”
~*~
“While you were on your way up here, Jimmy,” Wild Bill explained, “Gil Brennan’s gang struck again. It happened just southwest of Rapid City. The driver and two guards murdered. The exact value of the gold wasn’t mentioned in the story.”
“And you’re sure it was an inside job?” asked Jimmy Davis.
Hickok nodded, his vigilant eyes in motion as the three of them hoofed it toward the Denver railroad depot.
“Had to be. The cast-iron strongbox wasn’t broken or blown open, it was unlocked. Only a fairly high-level employee of the stage line—or a former employee—would have access to the master key.”
“And Leland Langford’s convinced that employee is Gil Brennan?”
“Convinced, yeah. Able to prove it, no. Which leaves him neither up the well nor down. It’s our job to change all that.”
It was not quite 8 a.m. The sun was bright, but the air still cold. Each time a breeze stirred, Joshua could feel it stinging his fresh-shaven cheeks.
Almost a week had passed since Leland had met with Bill. Much of that time was spent tracking down Jimmy, who, Bill finally discovered, was wrangling horses for a cattleman down in the Live Oak country deep in south Texas.
“What about these soldiers?” Jimmy said. “The two sharpshooters. They gonna be on the train with us?”
Bill’s eyes watched every doorway, scanned the overhead windows. He shook his head.
“I rode out to Fort Bridger while I was waiting for you,” he replied. “I had a parley with this General Durant. He’s already sent the soldiers on ahead to Rapid City. That way nobody connects them with us.”
“You said this Brennan’s pockets are deep,” Jimmy reminded him. “Deep enough to corrupt General Durant?”
Hickok considered that one in silence for a minute. In fact, Durant turned out to be one of the few military leaders who disliked Wild Bill. Bill saw more and more of that type out west now as the new “professional officer” class, West Point graduates with little or no battle experience, replaced the Old Corps men like Custer, Sheridan, and Hancock—highly individualistic leaders who had little use for regimental parades and flashy uniforms, men who admired trailblazers like Kit Carson and Davy Crockett and Wild Bill Hickok.
“He’s not our kind of general, Jimmy,” he finally replied. “One of these spit-and-polish fellows who rose through the ranks of the Quartermaster Corps back east. He gave me the usual twaddle-and-bunkum about respect for the chain of command. But my gut hunch tells me he’s straight goods. A little stupid, maybe, but honest. On the other hand ... ”
Wild Bill touched the brim of his broad black hat as an elderly lady in a muslin bonnet passed them.
“On the other hand,” he continued, “even though he swears by these two soldiers, I don’t trust them. Every man has his price.”
“Especially enlisted men,” Jimmy tossed in.
“A dollar a day don’t stretch too far.”
Bill nodded. “They might be honest, or they might be sailing under false colors. Don’t take your eyes off ’em, James. You either, kid,” he added, looking at Joshua. “You toting iron like I told you?”
Joshua nodded. “It’s in my underarm holster.”
When he had first begun side-kicking with Bill, the famous gunman had given Josh a beautiful old French six-shot pinfire revolver. Taught him to use it, too. That gun had already saved Bill’s life.
As for Jimmy, his faded corduroy coat concealed a heavy dragoon pistol. The buckskin sheath he carried in his left hand held a brand-new Winchester ’73. A cross-chest bandolier in his poke held a generous supply of two-hundred-grain bullets.
“You best take this rifle for me, Bill,” Jimmy suggested. “I been gettin’ some stares. White folks get nervous-like when they see us coloreds with guns.”
“Let ’em stare,” Bill suggested. “I ain’t sensitive.”
Jimmy was a highly decorated former Union soldier who had served with other black volunteers in the 107th U.S. Colored Troops, the first Negro unit to receive a presidential unit citation for bravery in combat.
Like so many other veterans, black and white, who faced starvation after the war, he had drifted west and become a cowboy for various Texas cattle ranchers. But even with one in every four cowboys now a black man, they were not allowed to bear arms except out on the open range.
The railroad station hove into view, its stones grimed by soot.
“How’s your eyes holding up, Jimmy?” Bill inquired. “Still as sharp as when you were a sniper?”
“Sharper,” he boasted. “I can still shoot the eyes out of a turkey buzzard at five hundred yards.”
“That’s good,” Bill replied quietly. “Real good. Because mine are failing me, Jimmy. Don’t spread that around. I’m going to need yours, old campaigner.”
Joshua forgot to breathe, he was so shocked by Bill’s admission. Indeed, no greater calamity could afflict a gunman of his legendary stature. The youth had suspected it for some time. Hickok had begun to squint horribly and make obvious excuses why he couldn’t see things at long distances.
“How bad, Bill?” Jimmy asked.
“Well, I’m still fine at close range and up into the middle distances. But everything starts to blur at about two hundred yards. Makes me practically useless as a scout. I can cut sign just fine, but I can’t read the skyline like I used to.”
“And naturally,” Jimmy added, not making it a question, “you don’t dare wear specs.”
Bill snorted. “’Member what happened to Jack Stubbs when word got out he was wearing specs? It was like throwing a weak buffalo to wolves.”
Bill tossed an arm over Joshua’s shoulders. “The Philadelphia Kid here has known it for some time. But he’s kept it out of his newspaper stories—just about the only thing he hasn’t mentioned. Thought I didn’t know he was protecting me, the little turd.”
“What, there’s some problem with your eyes?” Josh said with feigned innocence, and all three men laughed.
The northbound 8:15 express arrived right on schedule, venting its boilers in a huge billow of steam. The three men had their tickets punched by an elderly conductor with an ermine-white mustache and a choleric face.
“Sorry, gents—no coloreds allowed in the Pullman cars,” he objected as Jimmy started to board. “Third-class coach only.”
“He’s my servant,” Bill explained.
“Yes, sir, but it’s rules.”
“Even for Wild Bill Hickok?” Jimmy tossed in, and that cinched it. Hickok had spent two years protecting railroad crews from Indians, and was one of the heroes of the railroad men.
“By the Lord Harry, it is Wild Bill! Touch you for luck, Bill?”
“My pleasure.” Bill gave the man a hearty grip. “No objections to my servant?”
“Objections?” the conductor repeated. “Anybody that doesn’t like it can move to another car. All aboard, gentlemen!”