Rattlesnake Wells, Wyoming Read online

  Peterson’s eyes went to the row of horses lined up at the hitch rail. “That blue roan? But Bob, he ain’t kickin’ up no fuss.”

  Bob expelled an impatient breath. “I know that and you know that, Joe. But the fella I’m hoping to flush out from inside don’t know that.”

  Peterson’s expression changed, indicating he was starting to get the picture. “Is he some kind of varmint?”

  “That he is. I’ll find out for sure once I get him out here, but for right now you’re gonna have to take my word.”

  “That’s good enough for me, Marshal.”

  “Once you make your announcement, stand back out of the way.”

  “Don’t worry about that.” Peterson squared his shoulders, swallowed hard, then turned and marched back through the batwing doors.

  Bob stepped up on the boardwalk and edged over to one side of the doorway, poised, ready.

  He didn’t have to wait long. The batwings popped back open only about half a minute after Peterson had gone through them and an average-sized man wearing an anxious expression came hurrying out.

  Bob took a step toward him and said in a clear, commanding tone, “Hold it right there, mister. My name’s Hatfield, and I’m the marshal here in town. You stay real still and keep your hands out away from your body.”

  “What the hell, Marshal?” said the man in a tense voice. “What’s this all about?”

  “We’ll be getting to that,” Bob told him. “Let’s start by you telling me who you are. What’s your name?”

  “It’s Stu—Stewart. Paul Stewart.”

  Bob knew he’d just been told a lie. “Where you from, Stewart?”

  “Nebraska, before comin’ here.” His voice was smoother, the lies coming easier. “I was punchin’ cattle for a rancher in the Sandhills.”

  “How long you been in town?”

  “Just got in this morning. Camped last night only a short ways off to the southwest.”

  “What brings you to these parts?”

  The man who called himself Stewart showed a smug grin. “Same as everybody else. Came for my share of the gold.”

  “Uh-huh. And you came all the way from Nebraska on that roan?”

  “You bet. He’s a keeper.”

  “Yeah, I can see he’s a good-looking animal. Real pretty, what with that unusual white streaking in his mane.”

  The man went tense all over. Not just his voice, his whole body, too. He tried another grin, but it had a nervous twitch to it. “Yeah, he cuts a mighty handsome figure with that mane. And don’t think he don’t know it, the way he struts his stuff around the fillies.” The phony Stewart cleared his throat. “But I don’t know about that marking being so unusual. I’ve seen plenty of other—”

  “You got any papers or anything to back up who you say you are or that you’re fresh out of Nebraska?”

  The man hesitated. “I, uh . . . Yeah, I got some personal stuff in my saddlebags.”

  “I’d like to have a look.”

  “Listen, I don’t think I deserve—”

  “You’ll get what you deserve, good or bad,” Bob said, cutting him off again. “But I’ll be the one to decide it. And the best chance for you to come out on the good side is to do like I ask.”

  “All right. Whatever you say.”

  The man started down off the boardwalk to where the roan was tied. So focused was Bob on the suspect’s every move that he barely noticed how the display they were putting on had sent ripples of tense awareness up and down the street, causing folks going about their regular business to swing wide around them or hold back altogether.

  Taking note of the gun holstered on the suspect’s right hip, Bob said, “Reach up in those saddlebags with your left hand only. Keep your right out where I can see it.”

  The man made no reply, just reached up with his left hand and began fumbling rather awkwardly with the saddlebag’s tie thongs. As he leaned into the task, he turned his body, as if inadvertently, and for just a moment his right hand was blocked from Bob’s view. In that moment, the hand slipped up the front of the man’s body and darted inside his jacket to grasp the over-under .44 caliber derringer Pete Stuben always wore in a spring-loaded shoulder holster whenever he sat in on a poker game.

  Even though he could still see the man’s sidearm, Bob could tell by the hunching of his shoulders that the suspect was up to something no good. When the damn fool whirled around and started to extend his arm with the derringer clenched in his fist, Bob was ready. With an eyeblink-fast draw, he had his own gun in his fist and was triggering a shot before the man ever got turned all the way. The round took the hat off the suspect’s head and sent it sailing into the street. The hat’s owner instantly froze, knowing he’d been beat, knowing he had no chance to succeed with the derringer.

  Through the partly opened batwing doors of Bullock’s Saloon, two more shots thundered out, so close together it sounded almost like a single blast. The slugs pounded into the chest of the man holding the derringer and sent him staggering wildly backwards into the street, where he toppled heavily to the ground. The derringer slipped from dead fingers and was painted bright scarlet a moment later by one of two arcs of blood gushing up from the fallen man’s chest.

  Bob whirled about, turning to face the saloon doorway and the tall, walrus-mustached man who stood there holding a smoking .45 caliber Colt. The two men’s eyes locked and held over the muzzles of their drawn guns.

  “Take it easy, Marshal,” said the man with the mustache in a calm, level voice. “I’m on your side.”

  It was then that Bob’s gaze dropped down and took note of the U.S. marshal’s badge pinned to the man’s shirt, prominently displayed by the way the lapel of his frock coat was pushed back.

  “Mister,” Bob said through clenched teeth, “I don’t know who the hell you are or what you think you were doing, but you just interfered in a serious piece of business and cost me a valuable lead to something I wanted real bad.”

  The federal marshal frowned. “That’s a mighty poor showing of gratitude, pal. The way I see it, I just saved your life. Your shot missed and that hombre was—”

  “My shot didn’t miss, damn it,” snapped Bob. “I hit what I was aiming at and succeeded in stopping that jackass from finishing his fool attempt with the derringer. I needed him alive, not shot full of holes!”

  “That’s too damn bad, then,” said the federal man. “Because when I shoot to stop a man, I aim to stop ’em permanentlike.”

  Chapter 18

  Shoving his iron disgustedly back into its holster, Bob stepped off the boardwalk and went out to the fallen man. Squatting down, it didn’t require a very close examination to confirm the man was sure as hell dead.

  He straightened up as the federal lawman came out and stood next to him. “So what the hell is your story?” Bob wanted to know. “Who are you?”

  “Because we’re in your town and standing in front of your people, I’m going to cut you some slack for a little while longer,” came the low-voiced reply, “but you’d better lose that tone and show me some respect or—”

  “I asked you a question,” Bob cut him off. “A man gets my respect when he earns it, not because he’s got a fancy piece of tin on his shirt. So far, you’re falling a mite short of getting the job done.”

  Again the two men locked eyes.

  After several beats, the federal man’s glare lost some—but not all—of its heat. “My name’s Brock. Vernon Brock. I operate out of the Kansas U.S. marshals headquarters but was up in Laramie yesterday when word came in about your trouble with the Arlo Sanders gang and how you’d taken Sanders himself into custody. So happens I’ve got papers on him for past crimes, federal ones, down from where I hail, so I rode here to take him off your hands.”

  A crowd was starting to gather by that point—people up and down the street who’d been holding back and shying away as Bob confronted the suspect, others edging out of the shops and other businesses, men boiling out of Bullock’s where
the whole thing, in a manner of speaking, had started.

  One of the latter was Titus O’Malley, the town undertaker, looking every bit the part, as he habitually did, dressed in a black top hat, black suit, and bright red cravat. Elbowing his way to the front of the Bullock’s pack, he cleared his throat and inquired, “Is that another customer for me, Marshal Hatfield?”

  Bob gave him a wry look. “Can’t see him keeping an appointment anywhere else, Titus. Get your wagon and get him off the street as soon as you can, okay?”

  The marshal swung his gaze in a full circle around him. “The rest of you folks go on about your business. Nothing more here to see or hear about until I get some additional things figured out.”

  As the crowd started to disperse, Joe Peterson walked up. “Did I do okay, Marshal? I guess I did, but . . . Jeez, I didn’t figure I was sendin’ a fella out to meet his maker.”

  “Wasn’t exactly the way I had it planned, either, Joe,” said Bob, tossing Brock a sidelong glance. “He brought it on himself, I reckon, going for his gun the way he did.”

  Mike Bullock joined them. “What was behind this? Who was this character?”

  “Said his name was Paul Stewart,” Bob answered. “But I don’t think I believe that. I made him for—”

  “His real name was Pete Stuben,” Brock interjected. “He rode with the Arlo Sanders gang.”

  “What? What the hell brought him back into town?” Bullock blurted. Then, as an afterthought, he swiveled his bullet head suddenly, looking up and down the street.

  “Take it easy, Mike,” said Bob. “I don’t think there’s any more of ’em around. I never would have spotted this one—in fact, I couldn’t have spotted him. I’d never have been able to recognize him on his own—if not for his horse. On the night of the raid, I got a good look at a blue roan with white streaks in its mane.” The marshal tipped his head toward the roan at the nearby hitch rail. “When I was coming down the street a minute ago and noticed that fella there . . . well, it’s too uncommon a marking to shrug off as just a coincidence.”

  “So that was the whole business about havin’ me go in and raise a false alarm about the horse,” said Peterson. “You couldn’t identify the varmint unless he revealed himself by showin’ interest in the roan.”

  “That took a pretty sharp eye to notice the horse in the first place,” said Brock. “And a clever plan for flushing out Stuben.”

  “Reason I wanted so bad to take him alive,” Bob said, “was to find out what he was up to back in town and get him to tell me where the rest of the gang is holed up.”

  “Damn. I wrecked the hell out of that by reading everything wrong, didn’t I?” said Brock, climbing down off his high horse a little and finally showing a trace of remorse. “I never noticed Stuben when I first went inside. He was playing cards at a table off in one corner. When the fella came in hollering about the feisty roan outside and Stuben jumped up in response to that is when I recognized him and followed him to the door. When I saw him go for the hideaway gun and you only blew his hat off . . . Well, I already told you the way I saw it and why I did what I did.”

  “So my question still stands,” said Bullock gruffly. “What was he—this Stewart or Stuben or whatever the hell his name was—up to back in town?”

  Bob sighed. “I don’t know the answer to that, Mike. Not yet, anyway. But I do know that the best way to talk about it and try to figure it out ain’t standing here in the middle of the street. Me and Marshal Brock here are gonna go on down to my office and see if we can’t iron some things out.” He clapped one hand on Bullock’s shoulder. “You’d probably best go on back in and take care of your customers. You can do me a big favor when you get in there—get me the names of the men Stuben was playing cards with and tell them I might be coming around to talk to them a little later. I’ll want to find out what they were talking about, what he might’ve showed any interest in, things like that. Will you do that for me?”

  “Sure. Sure, of course I will.”

  “Good. I’ll see you after awhile, then.”

  “What about me, Marshal? You done with me?” asked Peterson.

  “Joe, you’ve done plenty and I really appreciate it. Tell you what, though. You can take that blue roan off the street and on down to your place. Okay? I’ll come around later and we can decide what to do with him.”

  “You got it, Marshal.”

  As Peterson went to unhitch the roan, Bob turned his attention to Brock. “Seems like that leaves you and me to conduct some business probably best taken care of in my office.”

  “Seems like. Lead the way.”

  * * *

  Fred was waiting when they got back to the jail, standing outside the front door with a scattergun cradled in one arm. “I heard the shooting, so I grabbed this baby and started in that direction. When I saw you two standing up there and everything looked okay, I decided it’d be best for me to stick right here close. You know, in case it was another one of those diversionary tricks to draw us all away from the jail.”

  “That was good thinking, Fred,” Bob told him. “Right here watching over the prisoner is exactly where I wanted you to stay.”

  They all three went inside.

  “So what happened?” Fred asked. “What was that all about?”

  “That, we haven’t quite figured out yet.”

  “Who was the fella I saw laying on the ground?”

  Bob gestured as he sank into his chair behind the desk. “According to Marshal Brock, his name was Pete Stuben. According to the way the fella told it, his name was something else. I’ll let you guess which one I believe, but by whatever name, he was a member of the Arlo Sanders gang.”

  Fred’s mouth gaped into a wide circle for a moment before he clapped it shut for a moment. “No foolin’? He was bold enough to show up in town so soon after what they tried to pull? What was he up to?”

  “Now you’re back to the part we haven’t figured out yet,” Brock answered.

  As Fred turned from putting the scattergun back on its pegs in the wall-mounted gun rack, Bob said, “Is there any coffee left in the pot?”

  “Yeah, there is. About half.” Fred poured a cup and handed it to Bob then turned to the federal man. “Marshal Brock?”

  Brock shook his head. “No, I’m good. I had a beer and a monstrous thick sandwich at Bullock’s, like you recommended. I need to let that settle.”

  Fred grinned. “Was it as good as I said?”

  “Every bit.”

  “Speaking of eats,” Bob said, “Consuela will be coming by with lunch for the prisoner in a little bit. She’ll no doubt bring something for you too, Fred, but in the meantime you could stand a snack of your own at Bullock’s, couldn’t you?”

  Fred frowned. “Well, yeah. You know I can most always make room for a snack. You’re usually the one telling me to cut back some, so what are you getting at?”

  “The thing is,” Bob explained, “that hombre Stuben was playing cards with some fellas there in Bullock’s before I flushed him out. I told Mike to get the names of who he was playing with and that I’d be around to talk to them, see what he talked about and acted like during the time he sat in with ’em. You know, hoping maybe he let something slip that would give us a clue what he was up to. The sooner somebody hits ’em with some questions, the fresher their memories are gonna be. Since I’m likely to be tied up here with Marshal Brock for a while, it strikes me that maybe you could go question them and grab a bite of lunch at the same time.”

  Fred’s expression brightened. “Why, sure. I could do that.”

  “Knew you could. Don’t be afraid to lean on them boys a little, make ’em think about everything Stuben said. Might be a long shot, but it’s worth a try.”

  “I’ll find out everything they got.” Halfway out the door, Fred paused and looked back over his shoulder. “Those telegrams you’ve been expecting came in, Marshal, they’re there on the desk . . . and, er, if Consuela does bring me something for lunch, just ha
ng onto it for me, okay?”

  Chapter 19

  After Fred was out the door, Brock settled into a chair in front of Bob’s desk. “He could fool a person with his slow, pudgy look, but I’m thinking you’ve got a pretty good deputy there.”

  Bob nodded. “You’d be thinking right. He’s been known to fool one or two hombres plumb to death.”

  “Uh-huh. I been thinking something else, too.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Just speculation, but I think I’ve got a pretty good idea what Stuben might’ve been doing in town all by himself.”

  Bob took a drink of his coffee. “I’m listenin’.”

  “Reconnoitering.”

  Bob made no reply, waiting for Brock to do some building on his single-word answer.

  “Stop and think,” Brock continued. “If things went the way I’ve been told, the Sanders gang took off from here knowing only a limited number of things for certain: They knew they’d failed at getting any money out of the bank, and they knew they’d left some men behind, one of them being Arlo himself. What they didn’t know was if their men were dead or behind bars, if you were working up a posse to give chase, or what preparations the town was making—if any—to be ready for another try on the bank or to bust Arlo out of jail, if that’s where he was.”

  “You think they’re planning another hit on us?”

  “I sure wouldn’t discount it as a possibility.”

  “On the bank or to get Arlo out?”

  Brock spread his hands. “That I can’t even guess. Depends on how tight the gang is these days, how loyal the other members feel toward Arlo. Last I knew, he still had a few old-timers with him—Stuben, Salt River Jackson, Reese Modello. Fellas like that who’ve run with Arlo for quite a while I expect would make a try to save him if they knew he was still alive.”

  “And you think the overall situation is what Stuben came to find out.”

  “Speculation, like I said. He was a pretty average-looking fella, right? Not too big, not too small, not likely to stick out in a crowd. A skilled card player who could sit in on any kind of action and shoot the breeze comfortably while he was playing, take his time working in a question here and there to find out what he wanted to know . . .” Brock let his words trail off and replaced them with a wry grin. “If only he hadn’t been careless riding in on a blue roan with odd markings that a certain sharp-eyed marshal had etched in his memory.”