Ralph Compton the Evil Men Do (16 page)

The moment, at long last, came.

After supper they sat in the parlor making small talk. Marshal Hitch did most of the talking. He brought up the celebration for statehood, the railroad, even how ladies didn't wear bonnets as often as they used to. That last, Tyree figured, was for Ethel's benefit.

Tyree hardly said a word. Aces wasn't very gabby either.

By the grandfather clock in the corner, it was pushing ten o'clock when Ethel announced that she must excuse herself. She was so tired she could hardly keep her eyes open. She added, pointedly, that she hoped their guests didn't keep her husband up much longer, as he needed his rest too.

“We'll be going soon, ma'am,” Fred assured her.

Tucker rose, tenderly clasped her hand, and guided her to the hall. “Off you go, my dear. I'll be up shortly.”

“I'm so sorry,” Ethel said.

“Nonsense. You gave us a fine meal and fine company.” Tucker kissed her on the cheek. “Now please. I shouldn't be more than half an hour. I promise.”

“Very well,” Ethel said, not sounding happy about it. She glanced nervously at Tyree. “Good night to you, Mr. Larn. I do hope that burr is gone.”

“Pleasant dreams,” Tyree forced himself to say.

Tucker kissed her other cheek and Ethel made for the stairs. He waited as she climbed.

“Half an hour, no more,” Ethel called down.

Tucker smiled and nodded and slowly returned to the settee, moving as might a man walking to the gallows. Taking a seat, he folded his hands in his lap. “I reckon we should get on with it.”

“About damn time,” Tyree said. Sitting out supper had been bad enough. Listening to their gab had tested his patience to its limits, and he was simmering. “No more delays, you hear? I want to know about my ma and my pa, and I want to know
now
.”

“First I have to ask,” Tucker said, “how did Moses know where I am?”

“He's here in Cheyenne,” Fred said. “He saw you at the store.”

“How did you find him?”

Tyree held up a hand to stop the lawman from answering. “Didn't you hear me, mister? Forget that old bastard. He's an outlaw, like you, and doesn't count for anything.”

“Like I was, you mean,” Tucker said. “I gave up the wild life a long time ago. The day I met Ethel, in fact. She—”

“I swear,” Tyree said.

Aces had been quiet a long while, but now he stirred. “Mr. Tucker, you'd be right smart to get to it. You can see how much it means to him.”

“We know that a couple of gents named Dunn and Lute were involved,” Fred said, “but that's all we know.”

“Dunn and Lute,” Tucker said, and shuddered. “As evil a pair as ever drew breath. I'm not exaggeratin' either. They are evil through and through. Some folks like to say there's no such thing as evil, but I've rode with it and talked to it and seen it with my very own eyes.” He looked at Tyree. “It was evil that killed your folks, and that evil is still alive.”

“Start with them,” Tyree said. “Start with why.”

“Why else?” Tuckered said. “For the valuables. The law was after Dunn and Lute and they needed travelin' money. So they went around robbin' most everyone they came across. That night it was your pa's farm. He invited us to supper, and . . .” Tucker stopped.

“I want it all,” Tyree said.

“I rode some with Dunn and Lute in those days,” Tucker said. “I didn't like either, but I was scared not to. I was afraid they'd kill me if I crossed them. That's how evil they are.”

“Enough about the evil,” Tyree said.

“If I'd had more gumption, I wouldn't have been with them that night. As it was, what happened at your pa's place gave me the gumption I needed to mend my ways. You see—”

“You've strayed again,” Tyree said. “My pa and my ma and me.”

“Oh. As I just told you, we rode up and your pa asked us to supper. He had no idea who we were. He was just being friendly. But Dunn didn't like it when your folks wouldn't let Lute in, and that might be what set him off.”

“Back up,” Tyree said. “Why not?”

“They didn't want a black man at their table. Somethin' to do with the War Between the States, and how it would upset your ma.”

Tyree vaguely recollected his uncle telling him that their family fought for the South and lost some of their menfolk to Yankee bullets.

“Anyway, Dunn shot your pa, Lute shot your ma, and that left you, a swaddlin' infant. Dunn said since they'd killed the others, it was my turn. He wanted me to kill you right there in front of him.”

“The hell you say,” Fred said. “And Tyree a baby.”

“I felt the same,” Tucker said. He closed his eyes and put his fingers to them. “It haunts me. I see it when I'm awake. I dream it when I'm asleep. I see the blood, and feel it on my hands. I feel the same fear. But I had to do it, or they'd have shot me.”

“You mentioned tryin' to save him,” Fred said.

Tyree wished the lawman would shut up.

Tucker lowered his hand and nodded bleakly. He looked Tyree in the eye, his own eyes misting again. “Dunn wanted me to shoot you. One shot to the head and it would have been over. But I said no, I'd rather just slit your throat.”

“Awful kind of you,” Tyree said.

“Hear me out,” Tucker said. “I was thinkin' fast, faster than I've ever thought in my life. Rackin' my brain for some way to spare you. You were a baby, for Pete's sake. I didn't want that on my conscience.”

“I think I see where this is going,” Fred said.

Tyree didn't. “How was slittin' my throat any different from shootin' me in the head?”

“I couldn't fake the shootin',” Tucker said. “I'd have to point the gun at you and squeeze the trigger and they'd see the slug splatter your brains. But with a knife there was a chance I could fool them.” He paused, and a tear trickled down a cheek. “What I did was I drew my clasp knife and opened it. When I hesitated, Dunn said he knew I didn't have it in me, that I was a weak sister, and he had half a mind to do me and the baby both. So I held you close to me”—and Tucker imitated how he had held Tyree close to his chest—“but turned some, so Dunn didn't have a good look at your face and neck. And I cut you, quicklike.”

“You miserable buzzard.”

“I saved your life,” Tucker declared, and uttered a low sob. “I cut you along your jawbone instead of across your throat. Cut you deep so there was a lot of blood. So much of it Dunn couldn't tell if I had or I hadn't. The shock made you pass out, so when I showed you to him, it looked as if I'd done the deed.”

“That was damn clever,” Fred said.

“And dangerous,” Aces said.

Tyree let the revelation sink in. All these years, he'd
thought the killers had botched killing him. Now he learned that it had been botched on purpose to save him.

“I set you on the floor and suggested we get the hell out of there,” Tucker related. “That if we were caught with a dead baby, we'd be strung up faster than Dunn could blink.” He swallowed, hard. “I was afraid he'd take a look at you and see that I had tried to trick them.”

“You rode off and left a baby lyin' in its own blood,” Tyree said in undisguised disgust.

“If I hadn't, I'd have been lyin' there with you.” Tucker pressed his hands together as if he were about to pray. “Don't you see, boy? If I hadn't done anything, Dunn or Lute or both would have killed you and me. That's how evil they are.”

“We're back to that again.”

“We never left it. Evil is real. And there are evil people in this world. People like Dunn and Lute. They have no regard for anyone. They murder and they steal and to them it's nothin'. It's just what they do.”

“I feel sorry for what those two put you through,” Fred said.

“I brought it on myself,” Tucker said. “I should have refused to ride with them. Or left Missouri. But Dunn was right. I was a weak sister. I didn't have the gumption. Not until he made me cut the baby.” He wrung his hands. “I couldn't take it anymore. I had to be shed of them. So when we reached St. Louis, I slipped away one night and headed west on my own. I gave up the owl-hoot trail once and for good.”

“From outlaw to clerk,” Tyree said.

“It doesn't pay much, but it's good, honest work and we get by, Ethel and me. She helps by sewin' and knittin'. Truth is, she's everything to me. I wouldn't want to live without her.”

“You said that already,” Tyree said.

“Cut that out,” Fred scolded him. “He came clean with you, didn't he? Show some respect.”

“For the man who gave me this?” Tyree touched his scar.

“You say you don't like to be called a boy,” Marshal Hitch said. “Fine. Act like a man, then. And a man would forgive Tucker for what he did.”

“A man would, pard,” Aces said.

Tyree didn't know what to say, so he said nothing. He'd held on to his hate for so long, he couldn't just shed it the way he shed his socks.

Tucker wasn't paying attention to them. He said quietly, “I got a scare about three years ago. I found out Dunn and Lute were in Wyoming Territory. For a while I thought they might be after me, but I haven't seen hide nor hair of them. They've left me be, thank goodness.”

“Where are they?” Fred asked.

“Up in the Teton country,” Tucker said. “They have their own gang. They raid a lot up in Montana and over in Utah and always come back to Robbers Roost, as it's called. A town of nothin' but robbers and killers.”

“Where is the law in all this?” Aces asked.

“I've heard where federal marshals go into the Roost from time to time, but those who are wanted always scatter before the marshals get there and come back after the marshals are gone.”

“Now that Wyoming is a state, maybe the government will form a company of rangers like they have down to Texas,” Fred said.

“That wouldn't stop or scare Dunn and Lute,” Tucker said.

Tyree was making up his mind about something. All these years, he'd longed to put a slug into the man who'd cut him. He'd imagined it countless times, daydreamed about how fine it would feel. Here the man sat. All he had to do was pull a Colt and shoot. But now that he'd learned the truth, he couldn't bring himself to do it. “I am mightily confused,” he said out loud.

“About what?” Fred asked.

Not wanting to admit his weakness, Tyree said to Tucker, “Tell me more about this Robbers Roost.”

“It's way back in the Tetons,” Tucker replied. “I've never been there, but from what I gather, it's high up near the snow line, with secret ways in and out. Cabins and shacks, mostly, and a saloon.”

“I've heard of it,” Aces mentioned. “No self-respectin' cowhand ever goes there. It's said that if you ride in with a full poke, you might make it out but the poke won't.”

“That's where I have to go,” Tyree said.

Tucker went to put a hand on Tyree's arm but caught himself. “I was afraid you might say that. Listen, youngster. You go in there after Dunn and Lute, it'll be the last anybody sees of you.”

“You're positive that's where they are?”

“As sure as I'm sittin' here.”

“Then I have no choice,” Tyree said, and his own words hit him like a sack of rocks.
He had no choice
. Just as Tucker had no choice fifteen years ago. Either murder a baby . . . or pretend to.

“You don't understand,” Tucker was saying. “It won't be only Dunn and Lute. They have a gang. Men as evil as they are. Men who will do you in if Dunn or Lute so much as snaps his fingers.”

“What else would you have me do? Twiddle my thumbs until they die of old age?”

“Why does it have to be you? A lawman might plant them toes up someday. Or they could be shot on one of their raids. Or they could go up against a gun hand as good as they are. You never know what could happen.”

“Could, could, and could,” Tyree said, and shook his head. “That won't do. They have to pay for my ma and my pa. By my own hand. So I see them die with my own eyes, and I can spit in their faces.”

“Oh, Tyree,” Fred said.

“I'm going to Robbers Roost,” Tyree announced. “I'm going to find Dunn and Lute and bed them down permanent.”

“Ask a federal marshal to go with you,” Tucker suggested. “If you explain things, he'll be happy to.”

“Who are you tryin' to kid?” Tyree replied. “A marshal would try to stop me. No, I'll go it alone if I have to.”

“You don't,” Aces said. “You have a pard now, remember?”

“I wish the both of you wouldn't,” Tucker said.

“The three of us,” Fred said. “I've come this far, I might as well see it all the way through.”

“Your badge won't do you any good there,” Aces said. “They find out you're a law dog, they're liable to string you up.”

“Then we won't tell them,” Fred said, grinning. He turned to Tyree and his expression became somber. “Since I took up with you, I've been shot at and hit and taken an arrow. Anyone with any sense would be shed of you. But I never claimed to have all that much in the way of brains, and besides, you and me are friends now, and while a friend ain't the same as a pard, it's enough that I'll go along and try to keep you out of trouble. What do you say?”

Tyree was feeling warm inside, in a good way. First Aces, now Fred. Smiling, he said, “I say you jabber worse than a biddy, but you're welcome to come get killed like Aces and me.”

“Thank you,” Fred said.

The Teton Range, it was sometimes said, was one of God's gifts to creation.

A spectacular display of nature at its grandest, many of the towering peaks rose more than two miles into the sky. The Shoshones called them “the mountains of high pinnacles.” The early French, more amorously inclined, called them “the three breasts,” after the highest in the range.

Everyone else called them magnificent.

Part of that was due to a geological feature rarely found anywhere in the world. The Teton Mountains lacked foothills. Seeing them for the first time was often a shock; they rose so stark and clear they took the breath away.

Located south of the geyser country, a wonderment in itself, the Tetons were as remote as any range on the continent. Few whites had ever beheld them. Trappers, in the early days. Then the mountain men. Now ranchers had moved in, but the ranches were few and far between. Several small towns had sprung up along the edge of the range but not in the range itself. Robbers Roost was a notorious exception. To reach it was a challenge.

Marshal Fred Hitch was of the opinion they should follow the Gros Ventre River into the southern extremity of the range, then head north by northwest until they
reached the Roost. His reasoning was that it would be easier on their horses and they wouldn't want for water or game.

Aces consulted a map with the lawman, and agreed.

Tyree didn't care how they got there so long as they did. He burned with his desire to hunt down Dunn and Lute and repay them for what they had done to his folks. It was all he thought about.

Them, and George Tucker.

Tyree had surprised himself considerably by letting Tucker live. After he'd heard the former outlaw's account, which he didn't doubt was genuine, Tyree's resolve to shoot him faded. The man had actually saved him. Scarred him for life, but saved him. For years he'd hankered to shoot the man who had done that to him—but he'd be shooting someone who risked his hide to spare his.

“Now, there's irony for you,” Marshal Hitch had commented.

It sure as hell was.

Tyree consoled himself with the thought that with Dunn and Lute it would be different. According to Tucker, they were pure evil, as vile and vicious as human beings could be. Shooting them would be no problem at all. Tyree relished the prospect, and cleaned his Colts every other night even though they didn't need it.

The Gros Ventre proved to be a scenic waterway. Bordered by lush flatland with low banks, the rapids were few, the river not all that deep, and the fishing, so everyone claimed, excellent.

Not that Tyree had any interest in fish. He barely noticed the buffalo they came on either, or the eagles that winged high in the air, or the elk and deer that made the region a hunter's paradise.

Each night after supper they sat around their fire relaxing after their long hours in the saddle. Aces and Fred did most of the talking. Tyree had one thing and one thing only on his mind, and had to be drawn into their conversations.

It got so that one night Fred peered across the crackling flames at Tyree and cleared his throat. He'd grown to like the boy a lot over the past few weeks, and had to say what was on his mind. “You worry me, son. You truly do.”

“What is it now?” Tyree asked.

“You're obsessed,” Fred said. “You're sittin' here with Aces and me, but you're not really here. You're off in the Tetons, killin' Dunn and Lute.”

“Nicely put,” Aces said. He was concerned too but had held off saying anything. His new pard might see it as pestering.

“Call it whatever you want,” Tyree said. “If you were me, you'd feel the same.”

“Likely I would,” Fred conceded. “But I'd like to think I'd take some time to smell the roses.”

“Roses?” Tyree repeated. “What do flowers have to do with it?”

“You're so caught up in your vengeance you don't notice the world around you.” Fred gestured. “There's so much beauty here.”

“Says the gent who likes to hide in his office all day.”

Fred laughed. “You've got me there. Maybe that's why I admire all this so much. I haven't gotten out into the world in a coon's age, so I appreciate it that much more.”

“I'll appreciate it once Dunn and Lute are dead.”

“I wonder,” Fred said.

“What
will
you do, pard, once it's over?” Aces asked.

Tyree hadn't thought that far ahead. “How would I know? I take things one day at a time.”

“Here's a notion,” Aces said. “You can become a cowhand like me. I'll teach you all you need to know. It's not the most exciting work in the world, but it beats sittin' behind a desk.”

“Thanks heaps,” Fred said.

“We'll find a ranch where the cook is a marvel and a boss who pays well and cowboy for as long as our bodies hold out.”

“That would do, I suppose.” Tyree couldn't think of anything else he wanted to do with his life anyway.

The next day, at the river's edge, they came on the tracks of unshod ponies.

“Injuns,” Aces announced. “They could be Shoshones, who are friendly. Or the Blackfeet, who aren't.”

They stayed on their guard after that.

Not two days later they struck more sign. Only this time it was wagon tracks, miles from any trail.

“Who could be so foolish as to come in this far with wagons?” Fred marveled. It never ceased to amaze him, the things people did.

“There are three altogether,” Aces deduced. “They came in from the south and are headin' for the Tetons. Pilgrims from the Oregon Trail, would be my guess.”

“Are they lost?” Fred wondered.

“We'll find out soon enough,” Aces said. “They're not that far ahead.”

“I wouldn't mind the company for a night,” Fred remarked. He missed town life. The one part of his job he liked the most was helping other people.

Were it up to Tyree, they'd avoid contact. For that matter, were it up to him, they wouldn't stop until they reached Robbers Roost. “One night won't hurt,” he said. But no more, he vowed.

Evening was approaching when glimmers of firelight appeared in the distance.

“There they are,” Aces said. He found himself hoping there were women, preferably unattached, whom he could strike up an acquaintance with. He enjoyed females, unlike some cowpokes he knew. Women were strange, but they could be a delight.

Fred took off his hat and slapped at his shirt and his sleeves.

“What are you doing?” Tyree asked.

“Sprucin' up.”

“It would serve you right if you spooked your horse and fell and broke your neck.”

“A joke?” Fred said. “There's hope for you yet.”

The wagons were in a circle on a flat by the river. Conestogas, with canvas tops, the kind emigrants used. The teams had been picketed outside the circle and tripods had been set up in it. Large black pots hung from hooks over the cook fires.

Aces counted thirteen people. Drawing rein in the dark beyond the firelight, he hallooed them with “Hello the camp! There are three of us and we're friendly and we'd be obliged if we could come on in.”

The chaos it caused was almost comical. The men scrambled for their rifles; the women grabbed their young ones and scooted to a wagon on the opposite side.

Five men then advanced, three of them young and wearing homespun and workers' boots. Everything about them said
farmers
.

The other two were different. One wore buckskins and a beaver hat, the other a wool shirt more fitting for winter than summer, and a short-brimmed hat that looked to be fairly new.

“Be careful with those long guns,” Aces said, his hand on his Colt.

A farmer with hair the color of corn motioned with his shotgun. “Come out where we can see you, mister. For all we know you could be owl-hoots.”

Fred gigged his bay past Aces, saying, “Let me.” He thrust out his chest so his badge caught the firelight and plastered a friendly smile on his face. “Marshal Fred Hitch, gentlemen,” he declared. “We mean you no harm.”

The sight of his tin star had an immediate effect. The three farmers lowered their weapons.

But not the other two.

The man in buckskins trained a Sharps on Fred. “What are you doing here, law dog? Are you federal?”

“I'm from Sweetwater,” Fred revealed. “On the trail of outlaws.”

Aces came up beside him. “Lower that buffalo gun,” he commanded.

“The hell I will,” the man in buckskins replied.

“Mr. Creech, please,” the farmer with the shotgun said.

“We can't take no chances,” Creech said.

“They are officers of the law.”

Aces didn't correct the farmer's mistake. He was watching the one in the wool shirt, who had a thick beard and a hooked nose, and a Spencer he was raising to his shoulder. Aces drew, flicking his Colt up and out. “You raise that any higher and I'll splatter your brains.”

“Hold on, there,” the farmer who appeared to be in charge said. “There's no need for that.”

Tyree came out of the dark, his hands on his Colts. “What's the matter with you people? We said we were friendly.”

“Why, it's a boy,” a beefy farmer said.

“I'm not neither,” Tyree said. He was so sick of being called that he could scream. “Put down those damn rifles,” he snapped at the pair who hadn't done so.

“Tyree,” Fred said. He was afraid the youngster would provoke them into shooting. Smiling at the man in buckskins, he said, “But I'd do as he says. You shoot a lawman and there will be hell to pay.”

“That boy's no lawman,” the man said, but he jerked his Sharps down and nodded at the man in the wool shirt, who did the same with his Spencer.

Dismounting, Fred offered his hand to the farmer with the shotgun. “Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Same here,” the farmer said, shaking. “I'm Luther Hays. We're out of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. This here is my brother, Thad, and my cousin, Orpheus.”

Fred shook hands all around. The farmers returned his smile and were friendly, but the other two gave him hard stares, as if they resented his being there. That struck him as peculiar. Men didn't resent the law unless they had cause.

Aces slid his Colt into his holster and alighted. He didn't shake. He wanted his gun hand free.

The women timidly came forward with their young ones clustered at their legs like young chicks to mother hens. They stopped at the tripods.

Tyree had no interest in any of it. Not the farmers or their families or their food. He had one thing and one thing only on his mind: Robbers Roost.

“We never expected to run into a lawman way out here,” Luther Hays was saying. “Our guides told us there aren't any settlements for a hundred miles.”

“Guides?” Fred said.

Hays pointed. “Mr. Creech and Mr. Sterns here. They know this country like the backs of their hands. We were fortunate they came across us. We were on our way to Oregon, but they've convinced us there is better land to be had a lot nearer.”

“You don't say,” Fred said.

Creech cradled his Sharps and scowled. “You don't need to tell them everything, Mr. Hays.”

“He's a lawman,” Hays said.

“Out here that doesn't mean much,” Sterns said with a sneer.

“It does to us,” Hays said. “We are law-abiding folk, and I'll thank you to show a little more respect.” He motioned at Fred. “Would you like to meet our families, Marshal Hitch? We have soup on, and there's plenty for everyone.”

“By heaven, you're a kind soul,” Fred said. “We'd be delighted.” As hungry as he was, he took the liberty of speaking for Aces and Tyree.

Aces strolled after them, leading his palomino. He noticed that Creech and Sterns moved off and huddled together. The pair raised his hackles, and he'd learned to trust his instincts.

Tyree dismounted near the cook fires. Putting a hand on the small of his back, he arched it to relieve a kink.

Hays was making introductions. The wives were reserved, their young ones curious but timid.

Fred accepted a china cup brimming with coffee. “You
folks are the salt of the earth,” he complimented them. “To your health,” he said, and swallowed.

“So, who is it you and your posse are after, Marshal, if you don't mind my asking?” Frank Hays said.

“We're not exactly a posse,” Fred said. “But we're bound for a place where outlaws are as thick as fleas on a hound dog. It's called Robbers Roost.”

Aces had turned sideways so he could keep one eye on Creech and Stern. He was the only one who saw them whip around and regard Fred Hitch as if he were a gnat they'd like to swat.

“Where exactly is this better land you're bound for, if you don't mind
my
askin'?” Fred had gone on.

“North a ways.” Hays gestured in the direction of the Tetons. “Up in those mountains. There's a valley, Mr. Creech says, ten miles long and five miles wide, and the earth so fertile our crops won't hardly need tending.”

Aces had never been to the Tetons, but he had heard a lot about them, and one of the things he'd learned was that if these pilgrims were after farmland, they'd be better off farming on the moon.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

And there was only one thing for Aces to do.