Torture of the Mountain Man Read online

  Smoke went into the freight dispatcher’s office.

  “I’m sure that you made payment when you secured the cars. Have you a receipt for your payment?” the dispatcher asked. “If not, I can telegraph back to the point of origin and get a validation of your payment.”

  “That won’t be necessary, I have the receipt,” Smoke replied, producing the document.

  “Yes, very good. Let me just put my stamp on it, and you can begin unloading.”

  Smoke walked over to the counter and waited as Brewer affixed his stamp to the receipt.

  Brewer handed the stamped receipt to Smoke. “There you go, Mr. Jensen, the cattle are yours.”

  “How long will I be able to keep them in your holding pens before I have to pay an additional fee?” Smoke asked.

  “You have twenty-four hours, which is included in the fee you paid for the cattle cars,” Brewer said. “After that, you will be charged two hundred dollars a day.”

  “Oh, well then, there will be no problem, because we plan to have them out of here this very afternoon, as soon as we get them all off the cars,” Smoke said.

  “We appreciate your patronage, Mr. Jensen, and hope you will choose to do business with us again,” Brewer said.

  “I’m sure I will,” Smoke said.

  Smoke left the dispatcher’s office and started out to the holding pen.

  CHAPTER THREE

  As Smoke was arranging to off-load his one thousand head of cattle, seventy-five miles north of Ft. Worth, four riders stopped on a small rise and looked down at the little town of Pella, Texas. Having grown up to serve the cotton farmers of the area, the small town of Pella was hot, dry, and dusty, and it sat baking in the sun like a lizard. One of the riders had a scar that started above his right eyebrow and cut through the eye, squeezing it down to a permanent squint. The purple welt continued on down to his mouth, where the end of his lips had been cut away, leaving only an ugly puff of scar tissue.

  This was Clete Lanagan, who was the recognized leader of the group. Lanagan raised the canteen to his mouth and took a drink. The water was tepid, but his tongue was dry and swollen. He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, then recorked the canteen and hung it back on his saddle.

  “There’s a creek down at the bottom of this hill. Before we take care of our business, maybe we ought to refill our canteens,” Lanagan told the others. “We won’t have time to stop . . . after. And this water’s beginnin’ to taste like horse piss.”

  “Ha,” a rider named Varney said with a chuckle. “You know what horse piss tastes like, do you, Clete?”

  “It tastes like the water in this canteen,” Lanagan replied.

  “We take the time to fill up our canteens, someone’s liable to see us, then the next thing you know everyone’s goin’ to have a good description of us,” one of the other riders said.

  “Hell, Loomis, you think they ain’t goin to have a good description of us anyway, the moment we rob that there bank of their’n?” The speaker, whose name was Claymore, hawked up a spit. “Look there,” he added. “I ain’t ain’t hardly got enough wet to spit. ’N Clete’s right, when we leave town, we ain’t goin’ to be able to take the time to fill our canteens. We need to do it now.”

  “What we ought to do is get us a proper drink, over to the saloon,” Varney suggested.

  “Good idea, Varney,” Claymore replied. “Only, why don’t we rob the bank first, then go over to the saloon for a nice drink?”

  “Damn, Claymore, that don’t make no sense a’tall,” Varney said.

  “Neither does going into the saloon before we hit the bank. Look, if we do this like we talked about, we’ll walk into that bank, take the money, then be out of here again afore anyone in this town knows what hit ’em. Then when we reach the next town, why, we can ride in in style. We’ll have enough money to swim in beer if we want to, with enough left over for women, hotels, restaurants, and even some gamblin’ money. Hell, we can do anything we want.”

  “How you goin’ to spend your money, Varney?” Loomis asked.

  “I don’t know. On women I guess. Say, have any of you ever knowed anyone to get hisself two whores at the same time?”

  “Ha! What do you think about that, Claymore? Varney wants two whores at the same time,” Loomis said.

  Claymore laughed. “Two whores? Hell, Varney, you ain’t never had one yet, have you?”

  “Why, sure I have, lots of times,” Varney said. “Whenever I got the money, that is, which, most of the time, I don’t have.”

  “Well, you fellas do what I tell you to do today and you’ll have all the money you need . . . even enough for two whores at the same time if you think you can handle that,” Lanagan said. “Now, fill up your canteens, ’n let’s get on with it.”

  The four riders dismounted and dipped their canteens into the creek. Once all the canteens were filled and corked, they remounted.

  “You boys check your pistols,” Lanagan ordered.

  All four pulled their pistols and checked the cylinders to see that all the chambers were properly charged. Then they slipped their guns back into their holsters.

  “Ready?” Lanagan asked.

  “Ready,” the others replied.

  “All right, let’s go get us some money.”

  The four men rode into town, then pulled up in front of the small bank. Lanagan, Claymore, and Varney dismounted and handed their reins to Loomis. Loomis remained in the saddle and kept his eyes open on the street out front. Lanagan and the other two looked up and down the street once, then they pulled their kerchiefs up over the bottom half of their faces and, with their guns drawn, pushed open the door.

  There were three men and two women inside the bank. One of the men was the teller behind the counter; the other two men, and the woman, were customers. One of the men customers saw Lanagan, Claymore, and Varney coming in, masked, and holding guns, and knew immediately what was happening.

  “It’s a bank holdup!” the customer shouted.

  “Ain’t he the smart one though?” Lanagan said.

  “You,” he said to the man behind the counter. He handed him a bag. “Start fillin’ up this bag.”

  The teller began scooping money up from the drawer, then, suddenly, a gun appeared in his hand.

  “Damn you!” Lanagan shouted, and he pulled the trigger. The teller, with a bullet hole between his eyes, fell back, the money bag in one hand and the unfired pistol in the other.

  Lanagan leapt over the counter and grabbed the bag, then he finished emptying the cash drawer.

  * * *

  Across the street from the bank, Russel Jeeves, who owned a gun store, had seen the four men approach the bank. When he saw three of them dismount and hand the reins to a fourth man, rather than loop them around the hitching rail, he became curious, and he continued to stare at the bank.

  Then he heard the gunshot, and his suspicion was confirmed.

  Grabbing a gun, Jeeves ran outside. “Damn! The bank is being robbed,” he shouted to some men who were on the boardwalk in front of his store. “Get your guns, boys! They’re robbing the bank!”

  Loomis, who was waiting in front of the bank, heard the shout and, pulling his pistol, fired at Jeeves but missed. One of the townspeople fired back, and Loomis took a slug through the shoulder.

  The exchange of gunfire grew more intense, and of the three horses Loomis was holding, one was shot and he went down.

  “Lanagan, get out here now!” Loomis shouted, returning fire. Not sure he had been heard, he ran to the bank door again and yelled inside. “The whole damn town has turned out. Come on, Lanagan, we have to go!”

  As they were leaving the bank, Lanagan saw that one of the bank customers had pulled a pistol and was aiming it at Varney.

  The customer pulled the trigger, and blood, brains, and bone detritus exploded from the side of Varney’s head. Lanagan shot the armed bank customer.

  “We’ve got to get out of here!” Lanagan shouted.

  �
��What about Varney?” Claymore asked.

  “He’s dead! What about ’im?”

  The two emerged from the bank.

  “My horse!” Claymore shouted, seeing his mount lying dead.

  “Take Varney’s. He sure as hell won’t be a-needin’ it!” Lanagan said. “Let’s go!”

  As Lanagan and Claymore mounted, Loomis, who had remounted, was shot from the saddle, and he fell hard to the ground.

  “Wait, don’t leave me!” Loomis shouted. “Help me onto my horse!”

  “Sorry, we ain’t got time to wait on you, ’n we can’t leave you,” Lanagan said. He aimed his pistol at Loomis’s head.

  “What? No! Lanagan, what are you do . . .” That was as far as he got before his shout was cut off by a bullet.

  At that moment, someone from across the street fired at Lanagan and Claymore with a heavy-gauge shotgun. The charge of double-aught buckshot missed the robbers, but it did hit the front window of the bank, bringing it down with a loud crash.

  Claymore shot back and though he missed the man with the shotgun, he at least drove him back inside. He and Lanagan started, at a gallop, down the street.

  There had been several citizens out on the street and the sidewalks when the shooting erupted, and now they stood there watching in openmouthed shock as the men who had just robbed their bank were getting away.

  One of the bank customers came outside then.

  “They kilt Boyce ’n Woodward!” the bank customer shouted. “Woodward kilt one of them before he was kilt.”

  “Who was they? Did anyone recognize ’em?”

  “That one there,” Jeeves said, pointing to the dead outlaw in front of the bank, “I don’t know who he is, but he called one of the others Lanagan.”

  “Clete Lanagan!” the city marshal said.

  “You know this Lanagan, do you, Jim?” Jeeves asked.

  “I don’t know ’im, but I know of ’im. I’ve got paper on ’im in my office.”

  “Did they get any money?”

  “Looks like they got just what was in Boyce’s drawer,” the bank customer said. “I don’t know how much that was.”

  * * *

  “Fifteen hunnert ’n forty-seven dollars,” Lanagan said. “I was hopin’ for more.” He smiled at Claymore. “But, seein’ as there is only the two of us that’ll be dividin’ it up, it ain’t turnin’ out all that bad.”

  “Yeah, I was hopin’ for more too,” Claymore said. “But, seven hunnert ’n what? Seventy-five? Dollars ain’t too bad.”

  “Seven hunnert ’n seventy three dollars,” Lanagan said after he counted out the money. “With a dollar left over.”

  “We’ll find a place to drink up that dollar,” Claymore said with a chuckle. “Tell me, Clete, what’s the most money you ever got?”

  “Me ’n the MacMurtry brothers, Cutter ’n Hatchett, held up a stagecoach ’n got near two thousand dollars oncet.” Lanagan chuckled. “Cutter lost near ever’ penny of it by gamblin’. He didn’t keep the money no more ’n a week, ’n he went back to cowboyin’.”

  “Is he doin’ that now?”

  “No, they was a reward of five thousand dollars out on ’im, ’n some feller that was workin’ at the same ranch seen a reward poster on ’im, ’n he turned ’im in.”

  “Five thousand dollars? Damn, that’s a big reward just for holdin’ up a stagecoach, ain’t it?”

  “Yeah, well, after we held up the stagecoach, ole Cutter, he kilt a preacher ’n his whole family. That’s what the reward was for, ’cause it got folks pretty riled.”

  “What about his brother?”

  “They say that Cutter escaped just before they was a-fixin’ to hang ’im. ’N though there don’t no one know for sure, ever’ body seems to think that it was Hatchett that broke ’im out. Don’t nobody know where neither one of ’em is now.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Back in Ft. Worth and totally unmindful of the events that had just happened in the small town of Pella, Smoke stood at the fence that surrounded the holding pen with his right foot on the bottom rail and his arms folded across the top rail. Resting his chin on his forearms, he watched the cattle being off-loaded from the cattle cars.

  “I’ll bet ya, that it was lot easier bringin’ ’em here by railroad, than when we druv them cows down from Dodge City, warn’t it, Mr. Jensen?”

  The man who spoke was a stockyard hand. He was medium height, with white hair and a bushy, sweeping mustache, and he had been part of the initial drive when Smoke and Matt Jensen, as well as Duff MacAllister, brought down the first herd of Angus to ever be in Tarrant County.

  “You miss the drives, do you, Sam?”

  “Yes sir, I have to confess that I do. Oh, the time out on the trail was hard enough . . . but the trail towns . . . Dodge . . . Abilene . . . ahh . . . them was some of the finest times I ever had in my life.”

  “The relief of the drive being over was as welcome as what the town had to offer though, wasn’t it?” Smoke asked.

  Sam chuckled. “You know, bein’ as you are an owner, ’n I never was naught but a drover, it could be that maybe, me ’n you has different memories o’ them days.”

  “Could be,” Smoke said, chuckling in agreement.

  “These cows is for Live Oaks Ranch, are they?” Sam asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I thought they must be. I seen Clay Ramsey talkin’ with your two men, Pearlie and Cal. ’N Ramsey, why, he was workin’ for the colonel ’a fore I ever come to work at Live Oaks, ’n he’s still workin’ there. He’s been there for a long time, now.”

  Smoke saw Clay Ramsey coming toward him. The foreman of Live Oaks Ranch was forty years old, with brown hair, a well-trimmed mustache, and blue eyes. About five feet ten, he was wiry and, according to one of the cowboys who worked for him, as tough as a piece of rawhide.

  “You have brought us a good-looking bunch of cows,” Clay said.

  Smoke laughed. “That’s not what you said the first time you saw Angus cattle. I believe you said that they looked like a herd of milk cows.”

  “Yes sir, well I was pretty much used to Longhorns, so you can’t rightly hold that against me now.”

  “I suppose not. How’s Big Ben doing?”

  “You know the colonel, he don’t never change. He’s fit as a fiddle,” Clay replied.

  “Good. And Dalton?”

  “Dalton? Well sir, he’s left the ranch.”

  “Oh? Why? Is there bad blood between Dalton and Big Ben? I know Dalton started out a bit troublesome, but I thought he and his dad had pretty much gotten things straight between them.”

  “Oh, no sir, there ain’t no bad blood between them. It’s just that Dalton has taken on the job of deputy sheriff for Sheriff Peabody up in Audubon.”

  “Dalton is working as a sheriff’s deputy?”

  “Yes, sir, I know it sounds a mite strange, bein’ as how Dalton’s pa is one of the richest men in Texas ’n all. But Dalton figured he ought to go out on his own for a while ’n do some,’growin’ up.’ And by the way, growin’ up? Well, those are Dalton’s own words.”

  “How did Big Ben take that?”

  “Well sir, he took it just fine. I heard ’im tell Mrs. Conyers that he was proud of Dalton, and you know yourself, that hasn’t always been the way the Colonel has spoke of Dalton.”

  “That’s true,” Smoke agreed. “By the way, how are Maria and Emanuel?”

  “We’re callin’ ’im Manny,” Clay said. “Wait until you see him.”

  Smoke felt a close connection to Clay, Maria, and their child, Manny. The boy had been born at the stroke of midnight on Christmas Eve, during the cattle drive down from Dodge City when Smoke brought Big Ben his first herd of Black Angus cattle. It had been a very difficult birth, and the mother and baby would have died, had it not been for Tom Whitman, who, at the time, Smoke had thought was just one of the trail cowboys. As it turned out, though, Tom Whitman was harboring a secret. He was actually a well-known and very skilled surgeon who
had become a cowboy in an attempt to escape the personal demons that were plaguing him.

  Pearlie approached Smoke.

  “No need for you to hang around, Smoke, we’ve only got about five more cars to unload, and Cal and I can handle that. Then we can move them on out to Live Oaks.”

  “All right,” Smoke said. “I guess I’ll go find Sally and Tamara.”

  Pearlie chuckled. “I heard Sally say that she and Tamara were goin’ to do some shopping. You’d better go find them before they spend all your money.”

  “Well, thanks to the Colonel, she’ll have quite a bit of money to spend,” Smoke said.

  Five minutes later Smoke found Sally in Falkoff’s Dry Goods Store. Tamara was looking down at the shoes she was wearing. Sally looked up and smiled when she saw Smoke.

  “Smoke, what do you think of these shoes for Tamara?”

  “I think she has chosen a fine-looking pair of shoes,” Smoke said.

  “Why in heaven’s name would you think she has chosen these shoes?” Sally asked.

  “I don’t know, maybe because she is wearing them?”

  “But these are only the second pair she has tried. Why on earth would she want to choose only the second pair of shoes that she has tried on?”

  “Why indeed?” Smoke replied with a chuckle.

  “Pearlie tells me we’ve about got the cattle unloaded, so we’ll be taking them out to Live Oaks soon.”

  “When you’re ready, you know where to find us,” Sally said as Tamara took off the shoes and reached for another pair.

  “I think I’ll go have a beer,” Smoke replied.

  * * *

  When Smoke pushed through the batwing doors of the Purple Crackle Saloon a few minutes later, he stepped to one side of the door and put his back to the wall as he looked out across the room, studying the occupants. He wasn’t looking for anyone in particular; this was just his routine way of entering any saloon.

  Perceiving a lot of curiosity but no immediate danger, Smoke crossed over to the bar. Earlier, he had made a wire transfer of most of the money to the Bank of Big Rock, but kept back one thousand dollars for travel and expenses.