Black Hills (9781101559116) (40 page)

“Not now. I was plannin' on it; I had the invitation. But I didn't know what the job was. Johnny there on the floor just said it was in Colorado, and since I was kinda partial to him and never been up to Colorado, I decided it was a good chance to go see it. I heard they got themselves some real mountains up there, and I didn't have anything else more excitin' to do in Deadwood, what with Bill Hickok bein' dead and all. But now you told us what's goin' on, I'll pass. Who might you be?”

“Mack Lynch. You can call me Mack.”

“Damn!” The one who said he didn't know who Cormac was did then. “You mean to tell me I been in a shoot-out with Mack Lynch and lived?”

Cormac turned his head slowly to look at the speaker. He was having a little fun with the being-slow idea.

“Well now, you weren't really in the shoot-out, and you didn't have a gun in your hand, did you? . . . And, I haven't left yet, have I?”

The man swallowed hard and shook his head.

Cormac continued. “I'm going to trust that y'all understand me,” he said as he put the sack down to get a better grip. “I'm going to run off your horses, but they probably won't go far. With a little walkin' you should be able to round up most of them, and the walkin' will give you time to think about what I told you. I'll leave your guns about a mile up the road.”

With the rifles under his arm, totin' the gunnysack full of hardware while keeping them covered was quite a trick, but Cormac pulled it off and made it to the door.

He glared at each of them in turn one more time for effect, and then put on what he hoped was a threatening face.

“Remember,” he said gruffly before he closed the door. “Don't be damn fools! Stay out of Colorado!” Would he shoot them if he saw them? Who the hell knew? It would depend on the circumstances . . . he might.

“Good day, Martha Jane Cannary Burke from Missoura by way of Montana,” he said to her with a smile as he tipped his hat with one gun-filled hand and backed out of the door. Her face lit up, and she returned the smile.

“Good day to you, sir,” she called. With a smile to brighten her face, a young Calamity Jane was more than a little attractive.

Stopping that bunch would buy some time to get there. Lambert was waiting for someone to come that wasn't coming, but he wouldn't wait forever. Now Cormac had to get there. He pointed Lop Ear's nose northwest and urged him up to an all-day-runnin', ground-eatin' kinda lope. Dodge City would just have to get along without Cormac Lynch and company.

Alternating between Lop Ear and Horse, they made good time. They had covered approximately two hundred and fifty miles in four days with few stops but to change horses. He stocked up on supplies in Roosterville; a town started, like many others, by accident, he learned from an old man chair-sittin' on the walk in front of the barbershop.

“It was named,” the old man had said, in a raspy voice, “after its founder—a man answering to the name of Rooster. You want to hear about it?”

“You bet I do, old-timer,” Cormac answered, wanting to learn about the area and about what was going on there.

On the way to the meeting at the old Carob Place, John had told him that the L-Bar N was northwest of Roosterville and another traveler, with whom he shared his smoking tobacco, had given him directions on how to get to Roosterville. Now he needed information, and anything he could learn would be helpful. He still held the idea of sneaking in and taking care of whoever was giving Lainey a bad time and then getting gone again without having to face her.

The old man's face brightened; he hadn't expected that. He'd been expectant of Cormac walking on by, as most folks probably did, but Cormac was wishful of learning about the area, and this old man was wishful of someone with whom to talk.

“Well, sir,” he began happily, wriggling himself a little deeper into his chair, getting more comfortable. Cormac smiled. The old man reminded him a little of his pa sittin' around the cracker barrel in the general store in town with some of his friends, getting wound up to tell one of his stories. This was lookin' like it might take a while. Pushing his hat back on his head, Cormac stepped around an old dog sleeping in the sun, and into the street, seating himself on the edge of the walk and leaning back against a post that was supporting the roof. The dog opened his eyes and looked at Cormac, made a feeble attempt to wag his tail, thought better of it, and went back to sleep.

“Well, sir,” the old man began, “story goes that, after wandering for a lot of years, this Rooster fella camped late one night on the east bank of the Sweet River, which by the way, gets its name for the taste of the water where it originally runs out of the ground way up on that mountain, there. It's crisp, cold, and almighty pure.”

The old man stretched a crooked arm and pointed at a peak rising in the mountain range, taller than those surrounding it. The motion pulled up his sleeve, exposing two bullet scars. There was probably a story for that, too, but Cormac didn't want to pry. If the old man wanted him to know about it, he'd tell him.

“When Rooster got up the next morning, he had been overwhelmed by the natural beauty surrounding him—that's what it says in the town history book the barber is writin'. He used to work for a newspaper back east somewhere and writes real pretty. I've read it and heard it read so many times, I practically know the whole thing by heart.”

Yep, this was going to take a while. Cormac took out his bag of makin's and rolled a quirlie with one hand while reaching for a match with the other. Striking the wooden match on the wood of the walkway, he lit it while his eyes caught sight of an advertisement in the barbershop window behind the old man.

The sign displayed a picture of a little white round tag on a yellow string dangling from a white bag of Bull Durham smoking tobacco with a package of cigarette papers glued to its side just like his, sticking partially out of a cowhand's shirt pocket just like his, with the message proudly stating the nickel treat to be the “Cheapest Luxury in the World.”

Not far wrong,
Cormac thought as he exhaled the smoke from his first drag.
Not far wrong.

“According to Curly's book,” the old man was saying, “it had been in the fall with the mountains rising majestically in the distance, the lower portion of which was still covered with Golden Rod flowers and Aspen trees with their wind-sculpted peaks hidden under a new snowy blanket. Grassy slopes and millions of tall pine trees were filling the expanse between them and the Sweet River. Rooster had never seen a sight more beautiful and decided right then and there his wandering days were over. After many years of searching, without knowing what he had been searching for, he had finally found it. He set himself up a camp and began building a cabin. Before he had it finished, some other folks traveling through bought the hindquarter of a fresh-killed deer and some jerky from him, along with some wild onions.” The old man paused to spit a tobacco stream at a lizard that had just crawled out from under the porch to lie in the sun. He missed close.

“The location,” the old man went on, “turned out to be on a well-used route, and Rooster began selling and trading meat, onions, and some nuts from a tree he had found to others. After trading for some seeds and books—books that he later traded for a plowshare—he planted a garden, and it wasn't long till his cabin had a sign in front that read ROOSTER'S TRADING POST—GOOD EATIN AVAILABLE.

“It seems he had learned to cook some during his knockin'-around years. A passing blacksmith looking for a home opened a shop nearby and, within a month, they had been joined by a whiskey maker from Kentucky selling whiskey from the back of his wagon while he set up a still and began building a saloon.

“One by one,” the old man rattled on, “others stayed, and the community grew happily until rowdy travelers became more frequent, and folks agreed they needed a peace keeper. They got together and decided to formally become a town and start paying taxes to give them the money to hire a Sheriff. It was suggested by the saloon keeper, voted on, and approved, that the name should be Roosterville.”

As if to punctuate his sentence, he spit again at the lizard; this time his effort met with success. Unexcited, the lizard looked around, moved a couple feet farther away, did a couple push-ups, and went back to sleep. The old man refused the drink that Cormac offered him, and after thanking him for the story, Cormac went into the saloon to see if he could pick up any helpful information. The old man's story had been interesting, but held nothing of any use.

Slowly, Cormac sipped a couple of drinks to give him time to pick up more information; hopefully, he would hear something that would apply to Lainey. Local watering holes were a melting pot of information; people coming together generated conversations on most goings-on in any locality. Much of the talk was of no importance to anyone not living in the area: someone should fix the hole in the road coming into town, the sheriff was getting too lazy to be effective, the weather was sure nice for this time of the year, and Tammie Jenkins got caught trying to steal a piece of candy from the store. But his time turned out to be well spent when he overheard that a gunfighter named J.B. Sanderson had been seen riding through town and was guessed to be on his way to do something for Lambert. “Lambert” was said with a sneer.

Cormac stayed the night in Roosterville, and while riding away at sun-up the next morning, found it easy to see what had enticed them all to stay. It was quite a sight with the mountains and all, but there were many such beautiful sights in this part of the country. He still couldn't figure how Lainey ended up here, but she had located well, other than for Lambert and Sanderson, and Cormac Lynch figured to do something about them.

The sun was just peaking over the horizon when Lainey Nayle walked out onto the front porch of the L-Bar with her morning coffee and stood looking around in a melancholy mood. It was such a beautiful ranch. A great deal of the surrounding mountainsides were blanketed with the brilliancy, radiance, and splendor of Colorado aspens and golden rod that bloomed from spring until Indian summer. The first snow of the year would cause the golden rod to wither and die, returning to the soil that had given them birth, only to repeat the brilliant display again the following spring.

Several streams coming out of the mountains wandered irregularly across the ranch, most being tributaries of the Sweet River, providing a natural irrigation system for the lush grasslands. The mountains provided barriers on the sides and rear that kept the cattle from roaming, leaving only the front of the ranch needing watching and herding, which could be done very efficiently with only a few hands.

She thought about the events that had transpired to put her here after all she'd been through, losing her parents, being kidnapped, and then rescued by Cormie.

Lainey sighed and shook her head. If only she had not reacted so stupidly when Cormac had rescued the girl, he might well be standing with her right now, and they would not be having the problem with Lambert. A smile warmed her face as she remembered pretending to be too weak to stop him from kissing her while wrestling in the snowbank, and getting herself naked and ready for bed and realizing Cormie was using a mirror to peek under the blanket dividing the room they had shared.

How very slowly she had unfolded her nightgown and unbuttoned the neck, taking time to brush off several pieces of nonexistent lint, and she remembered holding it and her arms high above her head to let the gown settle ever so slowly downward around her body. And she remembered a wagon ride to town when she had pretended to fall asleep with her head on his shoulder and the deep feelings that had ensued. And, she remembered sadly moping around for weeks after he had left.