Bury the Hatchet Read online

  “And what of Trammel?”

  “Untouched, near as I can figure, but without anyone but a couple of aging storekeepers to back him against you, I’d say there are enough of you to apprehend him. Or kill him, should you choose. Makes little difference to me.”

  “As long as Hagen’s dead,” Alcott concluded.

  “A deed which should prove to be easy enough for a man of your talents and experience. Surely you and your men should have no problem getting rid of a half-dead cripple and an outgunned sheriff. As impressive as Trammel may be, he’s still only one man.”

  Clay watched Alcott absently massage his jaw. He wondered if that was the spot where Trammel had slugged him.

  “Yes,” Alcott said. “I believe you’re right.” He looked at Lucien Clay. “I think we’ll work quite well together, Mr. Clay.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Adam Hagen woke, staring at the ceiling of his bedroom. He knew it was his bedroom, because he remembered the jagged crack in the plaster that ran from just over his bed to behind the wallpaper to his left. He knew the crack well, for he had spent countless hours staring at it since returning to Blackstone as he planned his next moves to secure his place in the territory.

  As he stared at the crack, his thoughts turned again to worries. Can Lucien Clay be trusted? Are the Celestials holding back money from their opium trade? Is Judge Stack’s latest crooked ruling recorded in the ledger? Where is the ledger? Is it safe?

  He gave a short nod. Yes, of course it is. Worry about something else.

  Okay. How far can Father be pushed before he bans his men from going to town? What still needs to be done to finally pull King Charles off his throne?

  He frowned. What about Buck? How far can he be pushed before he treats me like every other criminal in Blackstone?

  These thoughts and dozens more flew through his mind several times on any given night before a fitful sleep finally took him. He often woke slowly, groggy, the next day, his head usually sore from too much whiskey and not enough food. Whatever female companionship he had procured the previous evening was usually still with him, for the girl was allowed to sleep later if she had been requested by the boss.

  And Adam Hagen was the boss. He most certainly was.

  Boss or not, at that particular moment, Hagen could not recall how he had gotten to his room the previous night. He usually kept his wits about him, even when he drank heavily.

  Why can’t I remember what happened last night? Surely whoever is with me will know.

  He patted the left side of the bed and found it cold and empty.

  Strange. I never go to bed alone.

  He raised his head to look around and the stabbing pain that flashed through his entire body in one blinding moment reminded him of everything that had happened.

  The gunfight outside the jailhouse. The fire in his right arm. The man across the street that he had shot through the head. Trammel dragging him backward along the boardwalk, followed by the deepest blackness he had ever known. The sweet smell of ether and the metallic smell that could only be blood. His blood. Voices, too. Hushed and gentle at first, then harsh and demanding. Fever dreams? Nightmares? There was no way to know for certain.

  The only certainty was the cracked plaster ceiling and his intolerable pain.

  He felt a heavy pressure on his chest, as if a large hand was pushing him down on the bed. He fought off the pain enough to dare open his eyes and found it was, indeed, a large hand pushing him down.

  A hand belonging to Buck Trammel. “Take it easy, Adam. Don’t move too much.”

  Hagen blinked away the tears that had come not from emotion, but from the pain. “If you’re here,” he whispered, “I must be in hell.”

  “Nope. You’re still in Blackstone.” Trammel removed his hand. “And just barely at that.”

  Hagen turned his head, slowly, and saw his entire left arm wrapped in thick white bandages. “What happened?”

  “You caught a healthy dose of buckshot in your right side,” Trammel told him. “High enough to take a chunk out of your shoulder.”

  Hagen had been a soldier and knew the severity of shoulder wounds. Cheap novels made them out to be little more than paper cuts, but he knew better. “How bad is it?”

  He heard the hesitation in Trammel’s voice. “I’ll get Emily to come in and explain it to you.”

  Hagen grabbed for him with his left arm, but the renewed pain made him immediately regret it. “Damn it, Buck,” he said through clenched teeth. “Will I keep the arm?”

  “Seems like it for now,” Trammel said. “Emily operated on you right after it happened. She stopped the bleeding and saved your life. Your father brought up a couple of doctors from Laramie who took over from there. Even they had to admit she did a hell of a job.”

  The news made him almost raise his head, but he remembered the pain it might cause and thought better of it. “Father did that?”

  “I was surprised, too,” Trammel admitted. “They worked on you some more and it looks like you’ll keep your arm. They said it might even be back to normal eventually.”

  Hagen’s empty stomach ran cold. He knew what loaded phrases like that meant to a man in his predicament. “What do you mean by eventually?”

  Trammel didn’t answer right away. “Emily or one of the doctors would be better able to answer that than me, Adam.”

  “Unless you’ve become a reckless man since I’ve been unconscious,” Hagen snapped, “you always choose your words carefully. If you said eventually, you said it for a reason. Why?” He saw Trammel grit his teeth.

  That big lantern jaw of his was set on edge as he clearly wrestled with what he should say. He had already said too much.

  Hagen lost patience. “Damn it, Buck. Just tell me!”

  So Trammel did. “You almost lost your arm, Adam. Hell, you were close to gangrene setting in even after the second doctor got here. But they used an old Indian trick and fought the infection, so you got to keep your arm. But the damage is bad. I heard them tell your father you won’t have much use of it for the better part of a year, if ever.” Trammel pawed at his mouth. “The doctors could explain it a hell of a lot better than I can, but that’s the gist of it. You pushed me to tell you, so there it is.”

  By instinct, Hagen tried to ball his hands into fists. The left one did. The right one did not move. In fact, he couldn’t feel anything in it at all. “You mean I’m paralyzed?”

  “They splinted your arm and wrapped it good and tight so you can’t move it,” Trammel told him. “It’s going to have to be that way for a while. And don’t ask me how long, because I don’t know. They said it has to be that way to make sure you don’t tear anything while it heals. I remember they said in a month or so, they’ll be able to know for sure.”

  “But right now, as we sit here in this room, I’m a cripple.” The words hit him harder than Trammel’s big hand on his chest. “A cripple.”

  “Knock that off right now. You’re laid up, just like you would be if you had a busted leg or a bad case of the flu. Like that spy”—Trammel spit out the word—” Somerset we have over in the jail. We won’t know if you’re a cripple for some time, but if it’s any consolation, the doctors said they would’ve taken the arm if they didn’t think you could use it. As for how much you’ll be able to use it, there’s no way of knowing yet.”

  Hagen shut his eyes as the words and the pain mixed together in a terrifying brew. For the time being, he would not be the man he was. The man he had become and still planned on being. And there was an excellent chance he may never be the same again. People had already grown to resent him as a boss in the territory. As a cripple, they would not hesitate to pick him apart piece by piece. Not even the contents of the ledger would be enough to save him.

  Besides, how could a one-armed man be expected to make entries, much less protect it? He opened his eyes when he heard Trammel stand.

  “I know this is a lot to take in, Adam. I’ll send Emily in to look at you. Sh
e’ll be happy you’re awake. A lot of people will be. We’ve been worried about you.”

  “How long have I been out?”

  “A week, give or take,” Trammel said.

  Hagen looked at him. “You can’t be serious. That long?”

  “I’m afraid so. You mumbled a lot of nonsense, but nothing to be embarrassed about. Well, nothing you should be embarrassed about, anyway.”

  But Hagen was concerned about other things. The fever dreams. The harsh words jumbled with the soothing words. The voices of men, not Emily. “Who was with me? Did I say anything about the ledger?”

  Trammel shook his head. “After all of this, after all you’ve been through, you’re still worried about that damned ledger of yours?”

  “Until I can find a way to defend myself,” Hagen said, “that damned ledger of mine is the only thing keeping me alive. Now tell me who was here with me. Please!”

  “You were by yourself a good bit of the time,” Trammel told him. “I checked in on you when I could, and so did Hawkeye. Emily saw you several times a day. Otherwise, your door was locked.”

  “What about my father?”

  Trammel’s eyes narrowed. “What about him?”

  “Was he here with me? When I was delirious, I mean?” He wasn’t sure Trammel knew what delirious meant, so he added, “When I was babbling, I mean.”

  “He was only here the night you got shot and the day after when the doctors came up from Laramie. The room was pretty crowded with the doctors and your father, so I wasn’t here then. Why?”

  Hagen’s clearing mind was too flooded with questions to provide any answers. “Did the Pinkerton men ever come to town?”

  “No sign of them,” Trammel told him. “I haven’t heard anything about them being in Laramie, either, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there. They could already be back in Chicago for all we know.” After a pause, he continued, “You’re going to need to settle down or you’re going to pull out some of Emily’s fine stitch work.”

  “This is not the time for settling down.” The fog of the last few days confused him as he tried to find a way to push the right words out. “I need you to do something for me. Something for the both of us, really.”

  “You’re breaking into a sweat. Now you either take it easy or I’m not doing anything for you.”

  Hagen felt the room begin to spin. Trammel was right. He was no good to anyone if he passed out again. There was too much that needed to be done. “I need you to listen very carefully to what I’m about to say. My father wasn’t here out of any paternal concern. He didn’t bring those doctors here from Laramie to save my life. He brought them here because he was trying to get me to tell him where I hid the ledger.”

  Trammel sat in the chair next to the bed. “That’s a pretty low thing to accuse him of, Adam. I don’t like the man any more than you do, but he came by the jail the night you were shot. I could tell he was genuinely worried about you.”

  “Worried, perhaps, but not about me. It was about what might happen to the ledger if I died before telling him where it was.”

  The more he spoke, the more he could feel his mind begin to clear. But with clarity came a growing pain from his shoulder. He spoke through it. “I know you and I haven’t been on good terms lately, Buck. I know you disapprove of my opium business and feeding laudanum to my customers, but I never force anyone to do anything they aren’t willing to do and pay handsomely to do. I don’t have hawkers pulling people in, and the customers have to ask for laudanum. That’s why I’ve been able to keep the reprobates from getting out of hand in town. I would make a lot more money if I actively sought out new customers.”

  Trammel crossed his arms across his chest. “Yeah, I know. That’s why I’ve allowed you to keep up that side of your business. But what does that have to do with your father or the ledger?”

  “The contents of the ledger will give him the power I’m beginning to build. If I died without telling him, he might never find it. Yes, the threat I pose would go away, as it would if I’m just a cripple. But if he has the ledger, he can control the entire territory and what happens to me doesn’t matter.”

  The expression on Trammel’s face changed. “Adam, he asked you about where you hid it, didn’t he?”

  “I think so.” Hagen shut his eyes and tried to remember, but all he could hear was an echo of mumbled voices seeming to blend into one. The voice of Charles Hagen. “I think I told him I kept it in my office at the Pot of Gold.”

  Trammel ran his hand across his broad jaw. “You really think he’d sink that low? To question you about it while you were on your deathbed?”

  “Of course.” Hagen managed a smile. “The closer we are to death, the closer we are to the truth. What better time to get me to open up than while I’m in a stupor—at my weakest?”

  The look on Trammel’s face showed that he wasn’t so sure.

  Hagen could feel the desperation beginning to build in his chest, which only served to feed the pain. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe it was just nightmares. But maybe it was real. I can’t be sure, and since I’m in no condition to walk over to the saloon and check my office for myself, I need you to do it for me. See if he went there looking for the ledger himself.”

  Trammel seemed to think it over. “You realize you’re asking me to help you find the one thing that’s keeping your criminal enterprise going.”

  “I’m asking you to make sure it’s safe. It’s the only thing keeping the wolves from devouring both of us. That ledger is the only reason why Clay pulled his men off you last spring in Laramie. It’s the reason why I keep him and the rest of the officials in this territory from pulling me down and this town along with it. Your exploits have made as many enemies in Laramie as my opium trade. The entries I’ve kept making in that ledger are our best insurance policy against our demise.”

  “That’s a pretty big stretch, Adam.”

  “The people who shot at us were desperate men in over their heads, looking for money. If Clay or my father get their hands on that ledger, they get the power that comes along with it, and they can do with us what they will. And that’s not good for either of us.”

  Trammel stood up and walked over to the window. Hagen was not sure what he was looking at, since the window only looked out on a narrow alley. Maybe he was thinking. Hagen hoped he was thinking the right way.

  Trammel turned back to Hagen. “Since you put it that way, I’ll walk over to the Pot of Gold and look for it. But say I don’t find it. Where else should I look?”

  Hagen laughed, and the pain that shot through his body made him immediately regret it. “Nice try, Sheriff. I didn’t say I actually kept it there. I said I think I told Father I kept it there. Just look at my office and see if it looks like anyone has rifled through it. You know how neat I am, so you should be able to see if anyone has been careless.”

  “And if they haven’t?”

  “Then all of this has been nothing more than the fever dreams of a cripple,” Hagen said. “But if I’m right, you and I have to keep a closer eye on Father than ever before.”

  Trammel stepped away from the window and stood over Hagen’s bed. “You don’t keep the ledger there, do you?”

  Hagen trusted him, but only so far. “Check the office, Buck. For both of our sakes, especially since your Pinkerton friends may still have a role to play in all of this.”

  Trammel moved to the door. “I’ll take a look and let you know if I find anything. Is it open or do I need a key?”

  “Check the top drawer of the dresser there,” Hagen said. “You’ll find a key in there.”

  Trammel checked in the drawer and, indeed, found a key, which he took. “In the meantime, I’ll let Emily know you’re awake. She’ll probably check in on you in a while.”

  “But do not tell Father,” Hagen warned. “Not under any circumstance. I know he will find out eventually, but let that happen on its own. I don’t want him knowing until he has to.”

  The sheriff
opened the door. “You’re not a trusting man, Adam.”

  “Knowing who to trust and who to suspect has kept me alive this long.” He smiled. “I trusted you and look at where that got me.”

  “Rest. I’ll be back in a while.”

  Before heading up the street to Hagen’s office at the Pot of Gold, Trammel stopped by the jail to check in on a couple other people in town.

  Emily was back in the cells taking care of Somerset’s injuries, while poor Hawkeye sat with his head on the desk. He still had not recovered from the head wound he had received during the shoot-out the week before.

  Emily had originally thought his only wounds were from the cuts and the splinters, but as time had shown, he had rattled his brain when he hit the chair. He was still dizzy, and his vision went double every so often. Emily had told him bed rest was the best medicine for him, Trammel had even gone as far as to order him to stay in bed, but the young man was stubborn. Although he was not steady enough on his feet to go on patrol, he insisted on staying in the jail to keep an eye on the prisoner.

  Trammel hoped the kid got better soon. He was a tough young man, and the sheriff was confident that he might become a hell of a lawman someday if he lived long enough. He just hoped the boy’s brain healed quickly. He had known plenty of men who were never right after a hard knock to the head. He did not peg Hawkeye as the type who could live with that kind of infirmity.

  Just like he did not think Hagen could live with being a cripple.

  “Morning, Sheriff.” Hawkeye tried to stand when Trammel walked into the jailhouse, but quickly sat down again as another bout of dizziness took him.

  “What did I tell you about getting up?” Trammel checked the bucket Hawkeye kept by the desk for the moments when the dizziness upset his stomach. For the first time in days, it was empty. “How are you feeling?”

  The young deputy put on the bravest face he could. “Haven’t gotten sick once today, Sheriff. I’d call that progress.”

  Trammel knew head injuries could take a long time to clear, if ever, but he took a clean bucket as a sign of progress. “Keep up the good work. Is Miss Emily seeing to the prisoner?”