CHAPTER NINE
sillouette of two guns
This is 'bout the first time I ever saw so many witnesses and so few of them willing to step up and tell what happened." Marshal Denny cleared his throat and spat. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve. "Fact is, I saw it myself. Your boss set me up real good with a front-row seat."
"It was an accident," Leif Gunnarson said. He stared at Harding's body stretched out in the middle of the arena. Clumps of grass had been cut up all around as riders came over and let their horses paw the ground. Dozens of others had tromped down the entire area, trying to get a better look.
"Can't dispute that, Mr. Gunnarson, no siree. Cannot say that it wasn't." Denny squinted just a little as he studied Leif like a flea on a hot griddle. "Is that the way you saw it? Being part of the shoot-out and all?"
"He never said a word after I shot him." Leif felt a smidgen of regret, not for ending the man's life but for not finding out if Harding knew the first thing about Luther Simkins's whereabouts.
"You exchanged an insult or two before the match? No? You wouldn't do a thing like that, would you, not after he took this from you a couple days ago?" The lawman picked up the Peacemaker on the ground from where it had fallen beside Harding. He spun it around, opened it, and checked the cylinder. "All fired." Denny knocked out the brass onto the ground, closed the gate, and ran his finger along the barrel. "A nice six-gun." He held it out for Leif. "Go on; take it. That was the bet, wasn't it? You won."
Leif took the Peacemaker matching the one resting in his left holster. He tossed it back and forth between his hands, stopped when it fit nicely in his right hand, then spun it around into the holster that had been irritatingly empty since he'd first shot against Harding. It felt better than normal. It felt good.
"From what Wyoming Bob says, your show's moving on right away. If you'll take a bit of advice . . ." Marshal Denny squinted at Leif again with his intent, studious gaze. "My advice is for you to be out front of all the wagons, leading the way to wherever the show's going. I don't want to see you around Newell Bluff again. I won't have you gunning down anyone just to please a payin' crowd."
Marshal Denny spat again, turned, and sauntered off, waving to people who had remained to see whatever remained of the show. A couple cowboys engaged the lawman, and they left the arena together. Leif stared back at Harding stretched out on the ground.
"You cheated me. You knew something about Simkins, and you died before you told me."
"Hey, mister, you want to get out of the way?" The undertaker and an assistant rolled up with a handcart. Leif stepped back to let them turn over Harding's corpse onto a filthy blanket, then hoist him to the cart. The assistant took the handles and grunted as he began pulling. The undertaker marched alongside, a constant flood of invective gushing out about his do-nothing assistant.
Alone in the middle of the field, Leif began reloading both his six-shooters. As the last cartridge slid into its chamber, Wyoming Bob came riding up.
"Get your gear packed. The marshal's made it clear we're not welcome here anymore. The ingrate." Wyoming Bob mumbled a bit and then complained, "After I gave him ten percent of the gate. I can't stand a crook who won't stay bought." He made a sweeping gesture with his arm, snorted, and then wheeled about and rode away.
Once more, Leif stood alone in the middle of the field that had been an arena of death.
He tried to convince himself that Harding had been a member of the Simkins gang and that he'd done the world a service. Somehow, that wasn't good enough.
With slow steps he returned to the wagon with the box holding his belongings. Two roustabouts worked on the axle, greasing it down with lard and grumbling. Nobody in the show was happy with being kicked out of a town. After the work setting up everything and getting the animals settled, they should have had another two or three performances before rolling on.
"Don't know why he brung us to this forsaken town in the first place," one man half-hidden under the wagon groused. "We'd a' been better off in Denver or even down in Texas. Heard tell of San Antone bein' as close to a gold mine for people like us there as anywhere."
Leif had wondered about Wyoming Bob's return to the state. Ten years earlier, he had joined the Wild West Show. Not once in that decade had the owner even hinted at wanting to return to his namesake territory. And there wasn't any call to come to Newell Bluff when more people, richer folks, populated Cheyenne or Laramie. Leif looked around the empty field one last time. Still, they had done well. He touched the handles of both six-guns. The show had done well because of him.
He changed out of his show costume and put on sturdier trail gear. The buckskin coat hung from a hook inside, mocking him. It was ruined. If he'd stayed in Newell Bluff a week or two longer, he might have found a seamstress to whip up a new coat or, less likely, discovered someone able to do a miracle cleaning. The hide might be bleached white again and the tears patched.
He closed and locked the door on the box. Those were chores to take on when they reached their next stop, wherever that was.
"Has anyone seen the stable boy? I want to be sure my horse is ready to travel."
When neither of the men under the wagon answered, Leif spun and started to find the youngster responsible for tending the horses. He stopped dead in his tracks. Marta Esquivel blocked his way. In her hand lay White Lightning's reins. The stallion snorted and tugged but made no real effort to break free.
"You have a way with him," Leif said. "He doesn't cotton much to strangers leading him around."
"I've got a way with animals," she said.
Leif started to take the reins, but she pulled away. His anger rose. Playing silly games after the time he'd had only made him madder.
"The show is leaving. Give me the reins." He held out his hand. She still refused. With a movement faster than a striking rattler, he caught her wrist and pulled her off-balance, causing her to release the reins. He snared them with his left, but to his further irritation, White Lightning took her side and backed away.
"He said something. I saw him talking with a man, and I was able to find out what they talked about. Harding bragged about how he knew the notorious Luther Simkins and his woman."
"How did you find this out?"
"He was drunk. It was easy to get him to talk." Marta blocked his attempt to mount. "He bragged he knew Simkins and the woman he called his pet. Maybe if we can find her, we can get to him."
Leif stared deep into Marta's eyes. Her limpid brown pools showed no hint of deceit. Whatever she had overheard she believed to be true.
"Harding said she is a lovely woman except for the scar."
Leif stopped trying to mount. "What scar is that?" His heart sped up. His sister Petunia had a scar, but it was too incredible to believe she had ridden with the outlaws for all these years—that she was even alive. She would have escaped or, more likely, fallen prey to their savage desires and been left for dead.
"Your expression," Marta said, concerned. "You turned pale. Do you know this woman, Simkins's woman?"
"It's been ten years. I can't believe it's my sister, but it might be. Petunia was always a wild one, but to join Simkins like that after all that happened? I can't believe it."
"The name? Yours is different. He spoke of Sally. How can it be her?" Marta looked open and honest in her question.
"Outlaws use summer names. But I've never seen a wanted poster for a woman outlaw, especially one riding with Simkins."
"What will you do?"
Leif tried to deny his feelings. This was pure chance, and the woman could not be his sister. But it did not matter who she was if she rode with Luther Simkins.
"Who is this man that told you all of this? Was it anyone special or just someone hanging out at the saloon?" He saw the two roustabouts slide from under the wagon and wipe their filthy hands on their overalls. They exchanged a few words, then went in different directions.
The wagon was repaired, and the team would be hitched up soon enough. The show was almost ready to hit the road.
Leif tried to move, but his feet might as well have been stuck in buckets. Since coming to Newell Bluff, he had killed for the first time and found no pleasure in it. The dead outlaws were scum. Even if they weren't Simkins's henchmen, he had done society a favor, but he had spent ten years telling himself what he would do if—when—he found Simkins. He saw now it had been false bravado. Skill with a six-shooter meant nothing when facing a gunman. Skill and determination to take a life were different. The gunfights had happened fast and had given no time to think about what drawing back on the trigger, a man's heart in the sights, meant.
Cutting down Harding had been another kill-or-be-killed situation, but it only now began to eat away at his gut. Luther Simkins might kill from cruelty and the joy of watching another suffer, but Leif Gunnarson wasn't cut from that cloth.
He looked at the wagon as it rattled off. The gaily painted box fastened to the rear with all his belongings bobbed, bounced about, and then vanished from sight as the driver took a bend in the road. Leaving his life during the past decade was not as easy as letting the wagon drive on without him.
"You turn paler yet," Marta said. "What is wrong?"
Leif wished his decision were as simple as everything had been for him before reaching this town. Line up targets, draw, and fire. Watch the lead rip through paper targets or glass balls filled with bright feathers explode and slowly flutter down. Then wait for the hushed crowd to erupt in applause. While the memory of his murdered family had been a constant thorn in his conscience, he had come to discount what he could do.
Coming to Newell Bluff had changed that. He had killed his first man—and had felt he was an avenging angel doing what the law had not over the years.
"Who was that man, Marta?" Leif felt a chill settle on him. He glanced down the road. The wagon and the rest of the Wild West Show were gone, the dust from their departure already settled. It was as if they had never been to town.
"Some cowboy," Marta said. "In a saloon. He wore a black hat with a rattlesnake hatband. The rattles sounded as he moved about. They were fastened to the brim at the back of the hat." She touched the back of her head, then motioned vaguely in the direction of a trio of saloons. "I went to many. I don't know which of the saloons since they all look alike. No decent woman goes into a cantina like those." She lowered her eyes. "I had never been in one before. Papa forbade even coming to this part of town."