Massacre at Powder River Read online

  The room was dark when he woke up. For a moment, he didn’t know where he was. Then he remembered that he had taken a room over the saloon. At that same moment, he realized that he was awake because something had awakened him, though he didn’t know what it was.

  The doorknob rattled quietly, and all confusion and hesitancy were gone. Matt was out of bed, on his feet instantly. Pulling his pistol from the holster that hung on the head of the bed, he moved as quietly as a stalking cat to the wall next to the door. He cocked his pistol, pulling back the hammer as slowly and quietly as he could to silence the engaging sear. With the pistol cocked and loaded, he held it at the ready.

  The night breeze pushing through the window cooled his skin, reminding him that he was naked. Damn! He was about to get into a gunfight, and he was naked! How would the paper write that up if he was killed? He could feel the texture of the boards under his feet. He was intensely alert, ready for anything.

  He heard whoever was trying to break into his room breathing on the other side of the door. The hall lanterns were lit, and a sliver of light shot in under the door. From the saloon below, he could hear the nighttime revelry, a playing piano, and someone laughing.

  Matt waited.

  Whoever was coming into his room wasn’t breaking into it. They had a key! The doorknob turned again and the door began to swing open, spilling an ever-widening arc of light into the room.

  Matt watched the door ease open, away from him. As it did, the arc of light turned into a bar of light that splashed all the way across to the foot of the bed. A shadow filled the door, gliding in through the opening, backlit by the lantern on the wall in the hall beyond.

  What the hell?” Matt whispered in surprise, letting his breath escape in a rush. The person trying to get into his room was a woman!

  Matt grabbed the woman’s arm and pulled her inside. He closed the door quickly behind her, the motion pulling her against him. She let out a cry of alarm.

  “Who are you?” Matt asked, backing away from her.

  “My name is Lily,” the woman answered in a frightened voice. “Lily Langtry.”

  “Lily Langtry? I’ve heard of you,” Matt said, lowering his pistol. “The next question is, what are you doing in my room?”

  “I might ask you the same thing,” Lily replied. “This is my room. I’ve been staying here for two weeks.”

  “What?”

  “I’m a friend of Moreton Frewen,” Lily said. She chuckled. “However, I am not a friend of his wife, Clara. So when I come to visit, I have to make other arrangements. This room is my other arrangement, and has been for the last two weeks.”

  “I, uh, don’t know what to say,” Matt said. “I rented a room, and this is the room the bartender gave me.”

  “Wait a minute, I think I know what must have happened,” Lily said. “I was in Room Three, but I asked to be changed to this room. There is some construction going on down the street, and when they get started in the morning, the hammering and sawing awakens me. I complained about it to Johnny this morning, and he gave me a key to this room. He must not have told Harry. I’ll go back across to Room Three. I really didn’t expect to see you in here.” She paused for a moment, and Matt saw a twinkling of humor in her eyes. “And I especially didn’t expect to see so much of you.”

  Matt felt his cheeks burning, and he was glad that it was too dark for her to see that. He stepped back into the shadow to restore some modesty, if not dignity.

  “You don’t have to keep looking, you know,” he said.

  Lily laughed, a low, throaty laugh. “I see your point,” she said. “I’ll just step back across the hall now. I do apologize for disturbing you. Good night, now.”

  A slight morning breeze filled the muslin curtains and lifted them out over the wide-planked floor. Matt, clean from his bath the night before and wearing his new clothes, moved to the window to look out over the town, which was just beginning to awaken. From the laundry, he could hear the chattering of the Chinese employees as they built the fires to heat the water. Boxes were being stacked behind the grocery store as a team of four big horses pulled a fully loaded freight wagon down the main street.

  A stagecoach was sitting at the coach depot, and one man was on top of the coach receiving luggage from another man who was passing it up to him. The door of the coach was open, and passengers were just now getting onboard.

  From somewhere in town, Matt could smell bacon frying and his stomach growled, reminding him that he was hungry. He splashed some water in the basin, washed his face and hands, then put on his hat and went downstairs. It was too early for the normal clientele, but there were a couple of people already here and they were sitting at separate tables, staring silently into their breakfast beer. Neither of them paid any attention to Matt as he walked through the saloon. The bartender was not the same one who had been on duty the previous night.

  The morning sun was bright, but not yet hot. The sky was clear and the air was crisp. As he walked toward the café he heard sounds of commerce: the ring of a blacksmith’s hammer, a carpenter’s saw, and the squeak and rattle of the departing stagecoach. He knew that the hammering and sawing must be the construction that Lily Langtry mentioned last night.

  Matt smiled as he thought about his encounter with the famous actress. It had been an embarrassing moment, but he had to admit that it was also funny.

  Fifteen minutes later, as Matt was enjoying a breakfast of coffee, bacon, eggs, fried potatoes, biscuits and gravy, Lily Langtry came in. Seeing Matt at one of the tables, she smiled and crossed the room to him. Matt stood up.

  “Good morning, Mr. Jensen.”

  “You know my name, Miss Langtry?”

  “Of course I do,” Lily said. “Would you mind if I joined you?” she asked.

  “No, not at all. I would be pleased with the company,” he said, pulling out a chair for her.

  “My, that’s quite a breakfast,” Lily said. “How long has it been since you have eaten?”

  “It’s been quite a while. Not since supper last night,” Matt said.

  Lilly laughed, then, as he held the chair, took her seat. She ordered a cup of hot tea and toast with butter and marmalade.

  “You expect something like that to hold you till dinner?” Matt asked.

  “No, I’ll probably eat a light lunch.”

  Matt smiled. “I forgot that sophisticated people call supper ‘dinner.’”

  “Is that what you think I am, Mr. Jensen? Sophisticated?”

  “Well, yes, ma’am, being as you are English and famous and all,” Matt said.

  “Evidently I’m not the only famous one in this conversation,” Lilly said. “You seemed surprised that I knew your name. But after your—shall we call it deadly encounter? You are the person everyone is talking about this morning.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” Matt said.

  “You shouldn’t be sorry you killed him. From what everyone is saying, you had no choice. It was either him or you.”

  “I’m not sorry I killed him, I’m just sorry that it has become the talk of the town.”

  “I’m also told, however, that the name Matt Jensen is not just known here in Sussex but quite well known, not only in the West, but throughout the country. You are that Matt Jensen, are you not?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Oh for heaven’s sake, Mr. Jensen, quit calling me ma’am. You make me feel like an old spinster.”

  “Sorry, Ma’—that is, Miss Langtry. I’m just trying to be polite, is all.”

  “I think calling me Lily would be very polite.”

  “All right, Lily it is, then,” Matt said.

  “Matt, if I may ask, what are you doing in Sussex? This seems like a small and very out-of-the-way town, even for the far West.”

  “I’m here because I received a letter from Moreton Frewen, asking me to come.”

  “My,” Lily said. “I am impressed that Moreton could crook his finger and bring someone like you to do his biddin
g.”

  “He did a bit more than crook his finger,” Matt said.

  “What did he do?”

  “He included a bank draft for five thousand dollars,” Matt said.

  “Oh, dear. Moreton spends so freely, and the bad thing is, the money he spends isn’t his own.”

  “Not his own money?”

  “Well, I suppose it is, in a way. At least, he has control of it. You see, Moreton is very good about getting others to invest in his ideas. He has long had the idea of coming to America and building a huge cattle ranch, an empire, really. The Powder River Cattle Company is the fruition of that idea, and though ostensibly he is the owner, there are so many people invested in the ranch that I fear he is little more than a figurehead. And since his ranch is losing money so badly, I’m not sure how much longer he will be able to hang on.”

  “I understand that the cattle rustling is very bad here. If you lose too many cows to rustlers, it is hard to turn a profit,” Matt said.

  “I suppose that is true, but Sir William doesn’t seem to be losing money as badly as poor Moreton. In fact, Sir William has offered to buy Moreton’s ranch.”

  “Sir William?”

  “That would be William Teasdale,” Lily said.

  “Like Moreton, Sir William is a subject of the Crown. And like Moreton, he has the dream of establishing a cattle empire in the American West. Unlike Moreton, however, Sir William seems to be succeeding.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Out at Thistledown Ranch, William Teasdale, the subject of Lily Langtry’s discussion, was in the ranch office, talking to Reed.

  “I thought Kyle Houston was supposed to be the best money could buy,” Teasdale said.

  “He is damn good,” Reed said. “The best I ever saw.” Reed scratched at his brown beard, pulled something out, examined it on the end of his finger, then flicked it away.

  “You mean he was damn good, don’t you?” Teasdale asked. “Now he is damn dead.”

  “Yes, sir, I reckon he is. So, what are we goin’ to do about this Jensen fella now?”

  Teasdale knew that he wouldn’t be able to carry off his cattle rustling—though he preferred to call it his ranch enlargement—scheme unless he had the support of his foreman. He had left it up to Reed to hire the cowboys, men he could trust, men who knew of the arrangement Teasdale had with Sam Logan and the Yellow Kerchief Gang.

  “For the time being, we will just play defensive chess.”

  “Say what?”

  “We will monitor, closely, the moves made by Frewen and Mr. Jensen,” Teasdale said.

  News of the gunfight between Matt Jensen and Kyle Houston had reached Frewen Castle almost as quickly as it reached Thistledown.

  “I am wondering, Mr. Morrison, If I have opened Pandora’s box?”

  “What do you mean?” Morrison asked.

  “This man Matt Jensen,” Frewen said. “I haven’t said anything to anyone about him, but he is here because I sent for him. And what is the first thing he does when he arrives? He gets into a gunfight.”

  “Yes, sir, but from what everyone is saying, Houston is the one who provoked the fight. And, from what I understand, he claimed that he had been hired to kill Jensen.”

  “Heavens, do you suppose Jensen has made so many enemies that there are actually people who will pay to have him killed?”

  “That, or ...” Morrison started, but he let the sentence hang.

  “Or what?”

  “Or it is somebody local. It could be that someone found out that you hired him and decided to take care of him.”

  “You mean somebody like Sam Logan?”

  “That would be my guess,” Morrison said. “He is the head of the Yellow Kerchief Gang. I could see how he might not want someone like Matt Jensen poking around out there.”

  “But Logan is a desperado himself,” Frewen said. “Why would he hire someone else to oppose Mr. Jensen?”

  “Because he runs with a gang,” Morrison said. “And ultimately, people who run with gangs are cowards.”

  “That might be so,” Frewen said. He looked up at the clock. “Heavens, it is nearly tea time. I had best join Mrs. Frewen. You will excuse me?”

  “Yes, sir,” Morrison said. “I’ve got some things to take care of anyway.” Morrison hastened his withdrawal. So far he had never been invited to “tea time” and he hoped that he never would.

  “I’m sorry I’m late, dear,” Frewen said a moment later, when he stepped into the crimson drawing room where Clara Frewen was already waiting. He drew his own tea from a silver tea server, then selected a “biscuit,” though the cowboys would have called it a cookie, and took a seat on the opposite side of the table from Clara.

  “What is that woman doing here?” Clara asked.

  “What woman would that be, dear?” Frewen asked as he took a sip of tea.

  “You know very well what woman,” Clara replied. “I’m talking about Lily Langtry. She is in town. Though, I’m sure that is not a revelation to you.”

  “Miss Langtry is a singer, actress, and lecturer of no small renown,” Frewen said. She is performing at theaters all over America.”

  “There is no theater in Sussex,” Clara said pointedly.

  “My dear, you know that Miss Langtry and I are old friends of long standing,” Frewen said. “It does not seem that unusual to me that she would call upon us if she found herself in the area.”

  “In the area? And just what area would that be, Moreton? Clara said. “The closest railroad is in Medicine Bow and that is two hundred miles away. The stagecoach from Medicine Bow only arrives three times per week, and it is a very long and difficult journey.”

  Clara was a beautiful woman, dainty, blonde, with her hair worn in the close ringlet fashion of the day. Despite her American heritage, Clara had grown up in Paris, and was often a guest of Napoleon III. Clara and her even more beautiful sister Jennie had been the toast of Paris society. That she would be jealous of Lily Langtry, a much older and not nearly as attractive a woman, seemed ludicrous to all who knew the couple. And indeed, those who knew Clara well knew, also, that she wasn’t really jealous, but used this merely as a means of keeping Moreton Frewen wary of any dalliances.

  “I only call on her in town because you seem to find her company so objectionable,” Frewen said. “And I have no wish to upset you.”

  “Invite her out for dinner,” Clara suggested.

  “What? But I thought you didn’t like her.”

  “I don’t like her, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be civil around her. And I would much rather have her come here for a visit than to have you go into town, alone, to visit her. Somehow, that seems so very sordid.”

  Frewen smiled. “Very well, I shall invite her,” he said.

  Spirit kicked up sheets of silver spray as he splashed through the stream. Matt would have paused to give his horse an opportunity to drink if he wanted to, but Spirit gave no indication that he was thirsty.

  Once across the stream, Matt turned back around to pay attention to where he was going. For some time now, he had been aware that two men were dogging him, riding parallel with him, and for the most part staying out of sight.

  He was pretty sure they were some of Moreton Frewen’s men, because he had been on Powder River Cattle Company land for some time now. He had picked them up the moment they started shadowing him.

  Matt rode on for a couple more miles, all the while keeping his eye on them until finally he decided to do something about it. He waited until the trail led in between two parallel rows of hills. Once into the defile, he cut off the trail and, using the ridge line to conceal his movement, rode ahead about two hundred yards. He went over to the gully his two tails were using, dismounted, then pulled his rifle from the saddle scabbard and climbed onto a rocky ledge to wait for them. He jacked a round into the chamber.

  Matt watched and waited. He saw them come around a bend in the gully and knew that not only had they not seen him, they hadn’t even missed him. He
waited until they were right on him, then he suddenly stood up.

  “Hold it!” he shouted.

  “What the hell?” one of the riders yelled. He had to fight to stay on his horse, for the horse had been so startled that it reared. The other rider started for his gun.

  “Don’t do it!” Matt said, raising his rifle to his shoulder.

  “Johnny, keep your hand away from your gun!” the first rider said, just now regaining control of his horse. “There didn’t nobody say nothin’ ’bout shootin’ anybody.”

  “How did you get here on Powder River Cattle Company land?” Johnny asked.

  “You ought to know,” Matt replied. “You’ve been dogging my tail for the last two miles.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Don’t insult my intelligence, Johnny,” Matt said. “That makes me mad.”

  “What do we do now, Ian?” Johnny asked.

  “All right, Mister, we’ve been dogging you,” Ian admitted.

  “Why?”

  “Because you are on Powder River Cattle Company land, that’s why.”

  “That’s good to know, seeing as I intend to be there,” Matt said.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m just here to pay the ranch a friendly visit, is all,” Matt said.

  Ian shook his head. “Huh, uh,” he said. “We ain’t friendly and we don’t like visitors.”

  “Shouldn’t you let Mr. Frewen decide that?”

  “Our job is to keep people away from him, keep ’em for botherin’ him so he don’t have to decide whether or not to see saddle bums like you,” Johnny said.

  “Saddle bum?” Matt held out his arm and examined his newly bought shirt. “Now you are hurting my feelings. And here I thought I had gone and gotten all dressed up to meet Mr. Frewen.”