BEAR CREEK (SAGE COUNTRY Book 1) Read online

  When he saw my face he amended his statement.

  “…Just for a drink, perhaps.”

  He pulled out one of the extra chairs and sat down, looking smug.

  I sat down again as well.

  “You know, Bob; we have a city ordinance against the carrying of handguns inside the city limits,” I said, while signaling the waiter.

  Bob was carrying his Colt .45 in a cross draw holster, the same way I do, for the same reason. I knew he also had a hideout gun on him somewhere.

  “I noticed you aren’t bothered by such trivialities,” he replied.

  “Good evening, Sheriff. We are delighted to have you with us this evening. May I suggest a wine?” The maitre de asked. “Bring a bottle of the Cabernet Sauvignon ’85 to the table,” he said to the waiter. “Compliments of the house,” he said to me, with a little bow.

  Bob was watching all this with a wry expression. He sat with his fingertips together.

  “Why, John…I had no idea.”

  I opened my jacket and showed him my gold badge, where it was pinned to my vest.

  “Are you planning to relieve me of my firearm?”

  I shook my head.

  “No, Bob. That’s a matter for the police. I’m the County Sheriff. I could take it from you, but we both know how complicated that might get.”

  I was aware of the way Lora was watching us.

  “That’s a relief. I might need it to defend this ladies honor against such a disarming gentleman as you,” he smiled.

  I bowed.

  “Besides, I am not the only other person in this establishment who is armed.”

  “Probably not.”

  “Most certainly not. Do you see the man sitting alone over there?” he indicated with his eyes.

  “I do.”

  “Do you know who he is?”

  “I don’t.”

  “He’s Tom Horn. He works for the Pinkerton Agency, my line of work. You might say he’s the competition.”

  The waiter arrived with the wine bottle. For some reason, he showed me the label. When he uncorked it, he tried to hand me the cork. I shook my head and he set the bottle down with a thump, and walked away. When the waiter left, I swear he seemed annoyed.

  “Tom Horn, huh? I’ve heard the name somewhere.”

  “I should smile you have. He’s a famous rodeo bronc fighter, and they say he helped capture Geronimo.”

  “I thought he was down in Arizona. You have some business with him?”

  “No, Sheriff, none at all. As I mentioned, he’s quite good at riding rough stock. I expect he’s here for the rodeo. Do you see the couple over there?”

  I nodded.

  “You can be sure that gentleman is armed. You probably know him.”

  I shook my head.

  “That’s Wyatt Earp and the attractive lady with him, is his wife, Josie.”

  “Why are you here, Bob?”

  He looked over at Lora.

  “May I pour you a glass of wine?”

  She smiled and extended her glass. Bob poured wine for all of us. I didn’t want wine. I wanted a cold beer.

  The orchestra started playing on the stage at the end of the room.

  “Bob, I asked you what your business is, here in Bear Creek.”

  “Oh, yes of course, John. Sorry. I have no business in Bear Creek. By the way, if you really did have a run in with Jack Sloan, you are lucky to have survived it. I think there’s paper on him. I believe he is wanted for a murder in Idaho. Jack Sloan is not his real name; he goes by a number of aliases…”

  “Bob…”

  “All right, no need to be tiresome. I am here at the request of a friend of the Governor.” He said, picking up a menu.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “It seems you have a rustling problem in the area and the Governor has asked me to look into it, on behalf of this rancher, and others. He asked me to come here more than a week ago, but until today I was tied up elsewhere. I arrived here on the train about an hour ago.”

  “Tell me who it is, Bob. Who hired you?”

  I could see Lora was anxious and tense.

  Bob sighed and put down the menu. He put his finger tips together again.

  “You can be very bothersome and stubborn when you put your mind to it, John. I honestly don’t know what this lady sees in you.”

  I looked him in the eye.

  He sighed again

  “OK, I’m supposed to work for a man named William Courtney, owner of the Bar C Ranch. Do you know him?”

  I thought about that. Bob was, for all intents and purposes, a gun thug. Why had Bill Courtney hired a gun thug? I had been gone to Capitol City at the time. The Bar C only had a handful of cowboys and none of them were skilled at dealing with desperados. They had been turned back when they had gone to retrieve the lost cattle in Chaparral County. What was Bill Courtney thinking?

  “Of course we know Bill and his wife, Annabelle…” Lora started.

  “Bill Courtney was shot on his ranch, the day before yesterday,” I interrupted.

  “What? Does the Governor know?” Bob sputtered.

  “I expect he does. It’s been in all the papers.”

  “Who did it? Was he killed?”

  “Bill was ambushed. He is gravely wounded. We don’t know who did it, or why…yet.”

  Bob considered the new information for a moment.

  “This changes things. I’ll have to contact the Governor. Can Mr. Courtney still direct his affairs? He was to be my meal ticket, if you follow my meaning.”

  I told Bob as much as I wanted him to know. Then, I offered him a job.

  “Thank you, John. It means a lot to me that you would consider me for such a position. You understand of course, I’ll have to consider my options. I have become accustomed to my freedom and a certain amount of luxury, afforded me by the significant income from my business ventures,”

  “I expect I know better, Bob. You do make good money, when you get hired and if you don’t get killed. Between jobs you have to conserve or starve. How often do you find yourself on the wrong side of the law?”

  Bob frowned. He looked over at Lora.

  “I see how he was able to talk you into marrying him. He’s all charm and kindness.”

  Lora laughed.

  “Come see me in the morning at my office in the courthouse. We’ll talk about all this some more. I’m done talking business tonight.” I looked at Lora.

  “Ah, yes of course. Well then, if you will excuse me.” Bob stood up and bowed to Lora.

  “Until we meet again, mon chere…” He turned and left.

  “Oh, my! He is quite the ladies’ man, isn’t he?” Lora asked.

  “Don’t be deceived. He’s a very dangerous man.”

  She smiled sadly.

  “Yes, he reminds me of you.”

  28.

  Bob Logan wandered into my office in mid-morning. I figured that was early for him.

  I introduced him to Buckskin Charlie. They had never met.

  “John, I wired the Governor first thing this morning. It took a couple of hours for him to get back to me, but he indicated I should defer to your judgment. I need to be lawful in my participation. I might consider your offer, under certain conditions.” Bob said.

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “I need to have the freedom to take an occasional job away from Alta Vista County.”

  “I think we can arrange that.”

  “I might need to operate under cover. It would be best if I didn’t identify myself as a deputy…..no badge. If I operate outside this county the badge won’t mean anything anyway.”

  I thought about that. There could be advantages to having a plainclothes detective. There had been a couple of times when I didn’t show the badge, until I had a handle on the situation. On occasion, I had passed myself off as an outlaw, to get close to wanted men.

  “It might work. Though if you are going to be on the County payroll, some people out
side this office are going to know you’re a deputy. You’ll need to have a badge, but you don’t have to wear it.”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “This is the deal breaker though. If you work for me, you do what I say, when I say. I’m the boss. That is non-negotiable.”

  “I understand. You have to be able to trust me.”

  I nodded.

  “Can you handle that?”

  He held out his hand

  “I can, if you can.”

  We shook on it.

  “Good,” he said, “this way I will be able to see more of Lora.”

  He winked.

  I said something colorful, but not at all inappropriate.

  I filled him in on the circumstances surrounding the theft of the cattle from the Bar C. We discussed what our approach needed to be.

  “The Governor told me there have been a lot of settlers moving onto any available land and homesteading, all over the state. These are mostly farmers and small ranchers. That’s a good thing for the State. County land offices are recording deeds left and right as well. Every new landowner is another tax payer.” Bob said.

  “Yep. We have it happening right here in this building. We also have real estate offices opening. Some of the original homesteaders have land to sell and there are people practically standing in line to buy it,” Buckskin Charlie added.

  “Everything used to be open range land and there was more than enough land for everybody. The Indians objected to us taking it from them, of course, because it was their ancestral homeland. We’ve all seen what’s happened to them. I’ve had occasion to kill a few myself, Indians I mean, just trying to keep my hair. Still, not long ago if you could take the land and hold it against Indians and renegades, it was yours. Now there is more demand and less land available.”

  “That’s exactly the issue in this case. The Thorndykes claim land they don’t have rightful title to. They’ve tried to steal that section from the Courtney ranch. Add to that the fact some of the settlers have helped themselves to cattle without brands, cattle that may have belonged to the big ranches, and it all adds up to bad news. Worse, some of those ‘settlers’ really are rustlers. They steal cattle and change the brands as a way of life. The big ranches have formed a Stockman’s Association. The Thorndykes hold the reins, and control too much of the country. That’s why the Governor wanted me to look into the Courtney’s claim.” Bob concluded.

  “Alright then, it seems to me all of this is interconnected. There’s a good chance Bill Courtney was shot because he wouldn’t stand by and let the Thorndykes steal his land or his cattle. We don’t know who shot him, but we may know why.”

  Both Bob and Buckskin Charlie nodded.

  “The problem is, the shooting took place in Alta Vista County, but the trail leads to Chaparral County. I’ll go to Joe Holden, the Sheriff of Chaparral County, in my official capacity and request his help.”

  “Good luck with that,” Bob said.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “Joe Holden works for whoever pays him. He’s the County Sheriff, and the Thorndykes own the county. He knows which side his bread is buttered on. Therein lays the rub.” Bob observed.

  “Do you know Joe Holden?”

  “No, but I know of him. He and I are in the same line of work, or we were until he put on the badge. He was a killer for hire.”

  “I would remind you that you’ve put on the badge, yourself,” I said.

  “Oh! Good point.”

  “But Holden doesn’t know that.” I pointed out.

  A wolfish grin slowly spread across Bob’s face.

  It was nearly sixty miles to the town of Thorndyke, the county seat of Chaparral County. It would take a full two days to get there by stagecoach. The stage stopped for the night at Waller and had stops for mail delivery and passenger comfort. Riding across country would shave a few miles off and some hours as well.

  We decided in the morning, Bob and I would ride out together, but enter the town separately.

  That afternoon Glen Corbet came into the office. He looked very worried.

  “Howdy, Glen, how’s Bill doing?”

  “He’s awake and able to eat and drink a little. Doc says he thinks he’ll pull through. He’s weak as a kitten and sleeps a lot. He wants to see you.”

  “I’m going to be gone for a few days, I’m leaving at daylight, but I have to go right past the Bar C on the way. Can I stop by in the morning?”

  “I expect that will be fine. I have some bad news though.”

  “OK…?”

  “There’s been another shooting, this time a man was killed.”

  “When and where?”

  “It was this morning. It happened on that section of land over east of the main ranch, in Chaparral county.”

  “Who was shot?”

  “A surveyor, there were two men working over there the last couple of days. Before he was shot, Bill wanted to get the boundaries clarified with metes and bounds descriptions as well as the section, township and range descriptions. He wants to be certain we know exactly where the lines are before we rebuild the fence. He’ll have the survey filed of record, in the land records of both Chaparral County and Alta Vista County.”

  “That’s expensive, but a really good idea. Any idea as to who the shooter might be?”

  He shook his head.

  “John, the thing is, it looks like it could be the same shooter. I know you told me to keep the boys close to the headquarters, but we have a lot of cattle and a lot of fence. We have to get some things done. I send out one pair of riders at a time. Donny and Jim were over on the east side when they heard the shot. I’ll say this, they didn’t run away. They pulled their rifles and high tailed it toward the sound of gunfire. They found the other surveyor hiding under the survey wagon. He told them where he thought the shot came from. Donny and Jim eased up there and found the same set up as before. They also found this.”

  He held up a single 44-40 shell case.

  “It was sitting straight up on a rock.”

  I didn’t like it at all. The first thought I had was that Glen was automatically a suspect. Both shootings were on the Bar C. It could mean someone from the Bar C was the shooter. Glen had been the one to find Bill after he was shot. Then again, Glen had been with the others by the branding fire, when Bill was shot. Had he been at the headquarters when the second shooting happened? What about Donny and Jim, or Jose and Junior. Actually, all I had to go on was what Glen had told me. And, there was the set of tracks I had followed.

  I reminded myself that at this stage in an investigation it was important not to draw any conclusions, but to continue to gather information.

  “How long was it from the time they heard the shot, until they found the rifle shell?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t think to ask them that.”

  “OK. I’ll want to talk to them in the morning.”

  “We’ll be watching for you,” He said, as he turned to the door. He stopped.

  “Sorry, John, under the circumstances, that didn’t sound right.”

  I shook my head.

  “No, it didn’t.”

  29.

  A couple of hours after daybreak Bob and I rode onto the Bar C. I introduced Bob to Glen, but didn’t mention why we were traveling together. I didn’t have to.

  “Aren’t you the… uh…range detective, Bill said the Governor had recommended?” Glen asked, tactfully.

  Bob looked at me and raised his eyebrows.

  “Glen, when we talked a couple of days ago. You didn’t mention Bill had hired a gun hand. Why is that?”

  Glen looked away.

  “Ah… John, I didn’t know whether Bill had actually done it, or not. It was at least a couple of weeks ago when we talked about it, and nobody ever showed up.” He shrugged and studied the ground.

  I could understand his not having said anything. Hiring a gunman wasn’t the sort of thing people talked about.

  “Let�
�s go talk to Bill, I said. “Then, I want to talk to those cowboys.”

  “Hang on a minute,” Glen said. “Mrs. Courtney and Lacey don’t know anything about this. Bill wouldn’t want them to know he had hired a…

  “…Bob, my name is Bob, Glen. Don’t worry; we won’t reveal the true nature of my occupation. The usual explanation is that I am assisting in the investigation of some reported criminal activity. Nothing further need be said.” He smiled a mirthless smile. “Besides, technically Mr. Courtney hasn’t hired me. We haven’t even met, yet.”

  Glen looked relieved.

  Up at the big house, Fred the butler answered the door with his usual aplomb, and also as usual, he left us standing in the foyer. Today he went upstairs. He returned directly, followed shortly by Annabelle Courtney.

  After the introductions were made, Annabelle informed us Bill was awake and would see me. She suggested the other gentlemen should wait in the sitting room. She took me up the stairs and into their bedroom. It was sumptuously appointed.

  Bill was lying in a giant canopy bed. The heavy curtains had been opened and light flooded the room. There was a large upholstered chair drawn up right next to the bed.

  Annabelle went and leaned over the bed; she spoke quietly with Bill for a moment, and then beckoned me forward.

  “I’ll leave you alone for a few minutes, while I see to the comfort of our guests. John, he’s very weak and can’t talk long. Please be brief.” She chewed on her lip a little. “Ring this bell if you need anything.” She left the room, closing the door quietly.

  “Sit down, John,” Bill croaked. He attempted to clear his throat, but it was little more than a weak cough. I could see the effort was torturous. He lay flat in the bed with his head on a pillow. The covers were pulled up over his chest, but his arms were on top of the bed clothes. After a moment he regained his composure.

  “Bill, don’t talk, just listen for a moment. If you disagree with anything I say, just shake your head. I’ll ask some questions and you can just nod ‘yes’ or ‘no’. OK?”

  He looked at me and smiled weakly. He nodded.

  “You’ve had some trouble with the Thorndyke outfit. They tore down your fence on the quarter section of the Bar C that’s over in Chaparral County. Yes?”