Montana Revenge Read online

  He studied the graying eastern sky. The sun wasn’t far behind it. He ducked his head, entered the cabin, and found himself grateful for the warmth from the fireplace replacing the overnight chill outside.

  “Morning,” Jarrow said, seated on the bed that occupied the far half of the room, busy pulling on his boots.

  “Morning. I’d like you to refresh my memory about what Ford looks like,” he said to Jarrow as he took the cup of hot coffee from Minnie. The metal warmed his hands as he held it.

  “He’s about five-six. Black hair. Sharp nose and gray eyes like a bad wolf. I seen one once had gray eyes. Mean sumbitch. He could pull down full-grown cows.”

  “I think someone mentioned a scar.”

  “Yeah. Right side of his face. He said it was from an ax. Dented in his cheek on the side.”

  “Shame,” Minnie said, using both hands to set biscuits on the table, “that they didn’t chop his damn head off while they were at it.” Stepping back, she wiped her wet forehead with her sleeve. “Gravy, butter, and chokecherry syrup coming next.”

  “This Christmas?” Jarrow asked with a wink at Herschel.

  “Same as. I’m rewarding the sheriff for getting that no-account Ford.”

  “Hell, woman, he ain’t got him yet.”

  After she put the butter and a mason jar of bloodred syrup on the table, she placed both palms on the surface, leaned forward, and looked close into Jarrow’s eyes. “He is going to get him.”

  “You heard that?” Jarrow asked, laughing aloud, busy lathering a golden-brown biscuit with butter. “That woman makes up her mind, you better believe her.”

  She nodded and went for the gravy. “I have him convinced.”

  “Me, too.” Herschel took his first bite of her bread. Not bad. He sure hoped she knew about Ford’s arrest for a fact.

  Close to noontime, he rode off a ridge several miles southeast of their outfit and spotted a rider and dun horse. The sight of the familiar hat made him smile. He settled easier in the saddle, convinced he had caught up with his deputy. In a short while, he rode up to Barley, who was stopped on the flats.

  “We still on the right tracks?” he asked, sticking his hand out to Barley’s. After they shook hands, they rode on stirrup to stirrup.

  “Near as I can tell.”

  “A rancher I spent last night with thinks he’s headed for Nebraska. Wasn’t sure of the town where he was headed, but Ford had mentioned a man named Knowles, and this fella told how Ford showed up at his place with a Clover-brand horse.”

  “Clover Cattle Company,” Barley said, and made a small whistle as if impressed. “Big outfit down there north of Ogallala. It’s a wonder they hadn’t sent a man after him to nail his hide to the shit-house wall. Tough bunch when I knew them, and they sure don’t mess with thieves.”

  “Ford brought some horses up there, including this Clover horse. Left them for this man to winter, then come and got them when he was gone. Ford beat up his wife, I guess, when she complained about him not paying for them.”

  “He’s a hard case. Powder River Cattle hired him up home for that purpose. To run off the small outfits. Ford sent some of them packing; then the company pulled in their horns after your election and laid off all their hired gun toughs.”

  “Good. My lands.” Herschel laughed, amused, and shook his head in disbelief. “I really must have struck fear in their hearts.”

  “You did. That wagonload of cronies you sent to Deer Lodge Prison made them all realize their running roughshod over the little outfits was over.”

  “Shame the Herald don’t know that.”

  “They’re living in the past, too. One more winter like the last one and these cattle barons with those corrientas they’re importing from the tropics, and they’ll all be gone.”

  “I bet so. How far ahead are they?” Herschel motioned toward the southeast.

  “Half a day’d be my guess. I figure they’ve rode most of the night. If they have any horses stashed ahead, or more than likely ones to steal, they’ll press on.”

  “Ogallala?” Herschel asked as two blue grouse thundered out of the sage and spooked Cob into bolting sideways. When the horse was under control and back on the well-worn game trail they were following, he looked to Barley for an answer.

  “Down in that country somewheres, I’d guess, unless he burned his bridges by stealing the Clover horse.”

  “We better lope these ponies. We’re a long ways from there.”

  “A far piece.” Barley put spurs to his dun and they galloped off.

  That evening, they crossed sagebrush-bunchgrass flats and found a farm beside a small stream lined with cottonwoods and a new patch of alfalfa. When they rode up, an attractive young woman in a blue-checkered calico dress came to the door and looked them over. Two small children close by her side peered past her at them.

  Herschel removed his hat. “Ma’am, I’m the sheriff of Yellowstone County. This is my deputy. We’re tracking three men robbed a store and would like to buy a meal. We’re no threat to your young’uns or you. We’d simply like to buy a meal.”

  “Dorothy Quin.” Her eyes narrowed as if she was looking them over. “I have food. Get down. You can wash up here at the stoop.” She patted the heads of the two small children who swung on her skirts.

  “Herschel Baker and he’s Barley Benton. We’d be grateful.” Herschel replaced his hat, stepped off Cob, and went to loosening the girths when she disappeared inside the doorway.

  “Polygamist,” Barley whispered to him.

  Herschel nodded. The back hills were full of the “other wives” of Mormon men since the U.S. marshals were so busy rounding their husbands up. Set off on small ranches and farms in remote areas to escape detection, women like Dorothy lived alone and worked the places between infrequent visits by their “man.”

  “You can put your horses in the corral,” she said as she came outside and poured steaming water in the wash pan on the stand outside the cabin door. “There’s hay in the manger for them.”

  “Thanks.” Herschel finished loosening both girths and dropped the stirrup and fender.

  “I’ll put them up,” Barley said, gathering reins. “You go ask her if Ford’s been by here.”

  Herschel put his hat on a wall peg and rolled up his sleeves. “I don’t guess you get many visitors?”

  “No.” She stood in the doorway as if overseeing his washing.

  “Three men ride by here earlier?” With the bar of lye soap in his hand, he looked her in the eye.

  “Those were the men you are after?” she asked, squeezing her narrow chin, her blue eyes drilling a hole in him.

  “Yes, ma’am. One is a man calls himself Casey Ford, an older cowboy named Chub Travis, and the third man I don’t know.”

  She nodded. “His name is Brigham Smith.”

  “You know him?” Despite the too-hot water, he began to wash his hands.

  “He’s some relation to my husband.”

  Herschel nodded. “They mention anything?”

  “Like what?” She frowned at his ginger use of the hot water. “I can get some cold to put in that if you need it.”

  Herschel dismissed her concern with a headshake and continued to lather his hands. “Where were they going?”

  “I think Nebraska. They said they were going to buy horses.”

  “Or steal them.” He rinsed his hands off and took the feed-sack towel she handed him.

  “That’s why you’re after them?”

  “No, ma’am.” After drying his hands, he mopped his face on the towel and met her gaze. “They murdered a man and woman in a store robbery.”

  “Oh, my. Why, I’ve known Brigham since he was a little boy. I can’t believe they did that.”

  “He’s tied himself in with Ford, I’m afraid, and Ford’s a hardened criminal.”

  “Oh, that is terrible.” She looked ready to cry. “And that nice old man—Chub?”

  “They were with him when the crime took place.�
�

  She hugged her arms and trembled. “And those three were here in my house last night with my children. Why, I can’t hardly believe it—”

  “I hated to be the bearer of such bad news. But anything you can tell me would help. Describe Brigham Smith, too.”

  “He’s tall like you are. Broad shoulders, never tans, has a red face all the time. His hair is close to red.”

  “Anything else?” He turned to Barley, who was coming from putting the horses up. “They slept here last night.”

  “But I had no idea that they had—murdered anyone,” she said to Barley.

  “Bad news,” Barley said, and put his hat on the cabin wall beside Herschel’s.

  “Very bad news. I know that Hubert will be shocked to hear his cousin was involved in such a crime. Hubert’s my husband. He’ll be back in a day, went to take care of some business.”

  Herschel nodded to make it easy on her, full well knowing she was lying. Why, she’d be lucky to see him once a month when he made a circuit of his scattered wives.

  With the bloody sun dying in the west, he followed her inside. Scurrying around, she began to dip them out bowls of stew from a kettle on her range. Then she sliced a fresh-looking loaf of whole wheat bread with a long knife, telling them about her two children and her husband’s plans for the place. He wanted twenty more acres cleared of the sagebrush, leveled to irrigate, and planted in alfalfa.

  She put butter in a bowl on the table and then a jar of honey. “Comes from our bees.”

  “I need to get a few hives for my wife,” Herschel said, taking the chair she showed him.

  The children sat on a nearby bench and swung their legs. Obviously trained in the old verse, better seen than heard.

  “Has Ford ever been here before?” Herschel asked between bites of the stew.

  “No, I’d never seen him or the older man before last night. I think Brigham brought them by here since he knew I was up here. Actually, he helped Hubert fence, clear, and plant that field last year.”

  “So he’s familiar with this area?” Barley asked, looking over at Herschel with his spoon held ready for another refill.

  “Yes, he knows the area.”

  “You think he might quit Ford then and stay around here?” Barley asked.

  “Well, there are several sisters and brothers around here.”

  Barley looked up from his stew. “You mean Mormons?”

  “Yes. We call each other that.”

  “I know. This Smith, he have any lady friend he might want to visit?”

  By this time, Herschel understood what his deputy was getting at. If Smith wanted to separate himself from Ford and Chub, he might drop off and stay in this area. Secondly, these were his people and the kinship of Mormons for one another was well known—clannish was the word most people used. He listened closely as he savored the honey-sweet butter and bread. He only regretted the absence of a cup of hot coffee. Latter-Day Saints didn’t drink coffee.

  “Mable Green. He worked for her. She has a young daughter, Abby.” She frowned as if in deep thought. “I think they’re engaged.”

  “Where does Mrs. Green live?” Herschel asked.

  “Oh, a couple miles south on this stream.”

  “Could I ask a question?” Herschel said to Barley. “Why do you figure he would stop overnight here and stay with Dorothy if he had any interest down there?”

  “Would you take two killers to your mother-in-law-to-be’s house?” Barley looked mildly across the table at him.

  “I see your point. Food was good. What do we owe you?” Herschel asked, turning to her.

  “Outside of your bad news, I have enjoyed both of your company so much I am not charging you.”

  “Thanks, we’ll be on our way in the morning.”

  “Breakfast at sunup?” she asked looking from one to the other for an answer.

  “We don’t aim to be any trouble.”

  She raised her palms to silence his concern. “I’ll ring my triangle when I get the food started cooking if you aren’t up.”

  Later, in his bedroll in the grass beyond the corrals, Herschel raised up and asked his deputy, “How did you figure out he might stay close here?”

  “If he’d stay anywhere, it’d be around other Mormons, so I went on a hunch.”

  “Good idea. Not to change the subject, but what’s your hunch on who killed Billy Hanks?”

  “Ralstons and Mannons are your two best suspects.”

  “Yes, but proving it, we need someone to talk.”

  “You know that gets harder and harder by the day. Somehow, things get buried deeper with the passage of time.”

  “You’re right. Good night.” He shook his head in grim resolve and rolled over on his side. Buried deeper meant harder for him to find out who did it.

  EIGHTEEN

  HATLESS, the two lawmen were bellied down in the waving bunchgrass. Barley held a brass scope up to his eye as he scanned the headquarters of Mrs. Green’s place. Some lodgepole pens held a milk cow that a girl had come out earlier and milked. A couple of Shanghai roosters landed on the top rail and crowed at the sunup. They tried to outdo each other.

  “No sign of him?” Herschel chewed on a long grass stem and studied the place.

  “Nothing yet. But he may be sleeping in.”

  “Can you see any of the horses in the pens?”

  Barley shook his head. “They’re around in front of the shed. We don’t know his pony anyway.”

  “We saw one all tuckered out, we’d know.”

  “Right. You reckon we better slip down there and look closer?”

  “We better. I hate to sneak up on two women that could be alone, but we won’t know that until it’s too late.”

  Barley agreed. “A man that’s been in on one murder can be a desperate sort, too.”

  “You mean he ain’t got much to lose?”

  Barley collapsed the scope and nodded, chewing on his thin sun-scarred lower lip. “Which way do you want to go? Right or left?”

  “I’ll go left of the shed. You come around the pens.”

  “Herschel?”

  “Yes?”

  “Be damn careful, anything can happen, and might under the circumstances.”

  “I will. Did I tell you we’re expecting a young’un next year?”

  Barley’s look brightened and he grinned. “That’s great. What do the girls think?”

  “Hell, they can’t wait.”

  Herschel eased back out of sight from below, got on his feet, and went for the rifle and his hat. The sun’s glare was blinding him without the Stetson on his head. He eased a shell in the chamber of the .44/40 and then set the hammer on safety. Barley was already headed down the sagebrushstudded hillside.

  Herschel went off the steep slope. Nothing moved or looked out of place, and he soon reached the base. Moving through some head-high box elders, he heard voices and stopped to listen.

  “He up yet?” a woman asked in a coarse voice.

  “I told you no.”

  “He going to sleep all day?”

  “He might. Told us hadn’t sleep in two weeks.”

  “Go out there and wake him up. He can eat this oatmeal.”

  Herschel stopped. If they were talking about Smith, he must be sleeping in one of the sheds—not the main low-roofed structure Herschel considered the cabin, which was twenty feet from him. Which shed was he in? One was a chicken house with open doors and glass-bottle windows facing the south. Not likely. The big shed had an open front and was for hay and horses. Likely. The last one looked like a toolshed, and from the back he couldn’t see the door.

  He wondered about Barley coming from his right and the far side of the pens. Had he heard the voices? No, it was doubtful. Through the box elder leaves, Herschel could see a woman with her skirts in her hands coming around from the house to wake the man in the shed. With a swipe to dry his right hand on his pants, he moved to be close to the side of the shed.

  “Brigham, wake
up,” she said.

  Herschel held up his hand to stay Barley, who was coming bent-down close to the corral. With his thumb, he indicated the shed.

  “What’s wrong?” a sleep-soaked voice asked.

  “Oh, she’s worried about feeding some oatmeal she has left to the pigs.”

  “Oh, baby—I’m so glad to be with you—”

  “Not now. Besides, she’s on a tear.”

  “About me being here?”

  “She don’t need a reason. I’ll be so glad when we can leave here.”

  “Soon, baby. Real soon.”

  The red-faced man was seated on the cot putting on his boots when he blinked in disbelief at the sight of Herschel and his rifle blocking the door’s opening. For an instant, he looked ready to spring up, but that passed and he settled down with a look of surrender on his face.

  The girl screamed. Hands to her mouth, she about fell backward getting out of the way.

  “Don’t go for the gun,” Herschel said, reading Smith’s glance at the gun belt hooked on the wall above the cot.

  “What’s going on out there?” the woman at the house shouted.

  “Law business,” Barley said. “Stay there.”

  “What kind of law business?” she demanded, and Herschel could hear her coming.

  “I’m arresting you, Brigham Smith, for the murder and robbery of Mike and Sara Melloncamp. Now get on those boots.”

  “Tell him you didn’t murder anyone!” the girl screamed.

  “Where you the law from?” Smith asked, getting ready to pull on another boot.

  “Yellowstone County.”

  “Montana?” He strained to pull the boot on and then sat with his hands in his lap.

  “Yes. Put these on.” Herschel handed him the handcuffs.

  “You ain’t got no authority here.” Smith looked at him, grinning and shaking his head. “This is Wyoming.”

  Herschel used the rifle muzzle to punctuate his words. “I don’t give a damn if it’s Fort Worth. Get those cuffs on. I’m taking you back for murder.”

  “Wait, you can’t—” The girl started to move in.

  “Ma’am, you don’t get back, I’ll take you in for harboring a criminal.”

  “But you have no authority—”