Latigo 3, page 7
Aspen was smiling at something Gattling had said. Gattling then lightly touched a breast outlined so perfectly under the yellow satin. Aspen brushed his hand away. Bishop felt blood heat up the back of his neck. He’d been lucky to even touch one of her fingers, let alone a breast.
“I’d like a job, Sam,” Aspen said, as if suddenly making up her mind. “Same terms as before,” she added, looking him in the eye.
Aspen knew from his hesitation what was going through his mind. She was no prude, but she’d be damned if she’d include her body in the terms for employment. But even so, she liked Bishop and she knew without question that he liked her. One thing she had learned on this wild and uncertain frontier, a woman alone needed friends.
“You got a job, Aspen,” Bishop said.
“Thank you, Sam.” She swirled her drink; then, trying to be casual, said, “What’s Cole Cantrell doing these days?”
“Runnin’ the stage line for Martin Gale.”
“So he went back to work for Gale. Well, well. He come to New Sodom often?”
“He does, but it’s risky. This is a railroad town now.”
“I thought that silly business between Cole and the railroad would be over by now.”
“Ain’t silly business so far as the railroad is concerned. Big banquet for Claudius Max over at the Princess. Got stuck for some fifty-dollar tickets. You want to go, I’ll give you a couple.”
She shook her head; Cole didn’t like Max—in fact hated him. “I don’t think Cole Cantrell would want me to honor Max.”
Rego Gattling smiled coldly. “Cantrell, now, that’s an expensive piece of human flesh.”
Aspen was startled, wondering if she had heard correctly above the hubbub in the big saloon, men’s loud voices, laughter, chime of spurs. And outside, the noise of teams and wagons and of course the new and unfamiliar sounds in New Sodom produced by couplings banging together, hoot of locomotive whistles, bells.
“Did you say Cole was an expensive piece of flesh?” Aspen looked angrily up into the handsome smiling face.
Gattling shrugged. “Only meant that some fellas have a small price on their heads. Some got big ones.”
“Cole Cantrell is no outlaw,” Aspen snapped.
But Gattling only grinned and left the saloon with a jaunty wave of the hand.
Aspen turned to Sam Bishop and asked what Gattling had really meant by saying Cole was an expensive piece of human flesh.
“Ain’t no secret there’s more’n one hombre in these mountains would pay to see him dead.”
“Oh, Sam, what a terrible thing to say!”
“Fact.”
“Cole has never done anything to make men want to ... pay somebody to kill him.”
“Depends on what side of the creek you’re wadin’ in. Seems to me Cantrell’s the kind to always bring trouble. Like a dead mule brings flies.”
An isolated community such as New Sodom welcomed any diversion; there was so little to do. That same day word swept the saloons that Sheriff Cady Dolan had received a wire from the telegraph station at Alder Summit to the effect that Cole Cantrell was bringing in the bodies of two dead outlaws who had murdered a prominent rancher. With him was the rancher’s widow. They were due to arrive in New Sodom on train 79.
Aspen was back on the job by then, wearing a spangled dress, pale hair pinned up, face properly powdered. She was dancing with a miner, on the polished floor at the west end of the saloon, when someone shouted the news.
She beamed until she heard the part about his traveling companion.
“I hope the widow’s ugly as sin,” she said under her breath. “But likely she won’t be. Cole’s too lucky for that.”
“What ... what’d you say, sweetheart?” her bearded dancing companion asked in surprise. Those were the first words she’d uttered since he paid fifty cents for the privilege of holding a female in his arms. Only one Saturday a month could he afford to visit Mamie’s, where the price was five dollars. Unless you were rich and could afford the girl from Marseilles.
A man in a checkered vest, near the door, turned to a knot of men watching a high-stakes poker game. “You hear that, boys? Cantrell ridin’ a C-P train! An’ with the mogul hisself in town! Better stand back so’s you don’t get licked by the fire. Hell’s front door’s about to be blowed off its hinges!”
This was followed by a roar of laughter.
Aspen clenched her teeth to keep emotions from spilling over. Cole, why do you take chances? Why do you!
In his suite on the top floor of the Peerless Hotel, on busy Centurion Street, Claudius Max, the mogul, summoned his harassed flunky.
“Lackman, find out who is in charge of train seventy-nine.” Max slammed a ponderous fist onto a pile of papers on the flat-topped desk.
Lackman squirmed in his tight collar and black suit. “Yes ... yes, Mr. Max,” he responded, and tried to hide the apprehension always present whenever the great man used what was known around Python as his “Caesar voice.”
“When I do find out who is in charge, what ... what do you wish me to do, Mr. Max?”
Max overflowed a chair behind the desk. He swiveled his large head with its dew-laps bulging at his chins, the steel-blue eyes biting into Lackman’s terrified face. “Fire him!” Max roared.
“But ... but I must have a reason. Or ... or do I need a reason...” Lackman’s thin features were contorted as if he suffered acute pain.
“Did Caesar need a reason to send his legions after the Germanic tribes?” Max thundered. “I need no reason for my actions. Nor do you, Lackman.”
“Y—y—yes, sir.”
“By the way, I expect you to put in a full day Sunday. To make up for the time you have cost me, whining about your wife and offspring. If they’re so short of money, set her to cleaning floors for a living. There are plenty of those in Manhattan. It will ease the financial burden of your fertility. Send your older children to the mills...”
“The oldest is only ten, sir ...”
“Five might be too young for work in the mills, but at ten any illiterate child is an adult!”
Lackman, trembling, hurried to the room used as an outer office. He longed to slam the door so it rattled on its hinges, but didn’t dare. “Oh, Sophie,” he moaned after he had quietly closed the door, “what have I done to deserve this slavery?” Thinking of his dear wife half a continent away made him limp. He looked up the C-P schedule, saw that train 79 was not due to arrive for an hour. He was trying to compose himself, when he heard a woman’s step in the hall, a soft knock on the outer door.
Before he could get up from the desk, Theodora Max swept in, a stunning dark-haired woman whose perfume always made Lackman giddy and filled his mind with forbidden thoughts. The long absence from his wife had strung his nerves to the point of shredding. Several times he had been on the verge of patronizing one of the establishments in the many frontier towns Max dragged him to. But always he lost his nerve. Once he had actually discussed price, and when it was named, his hand shook so upon removing silver dollars from his pocket that he dropped them on the floor. The girl laughed, and he fled in embarrassment.
“I was just downstairs and saw the preparations for the banquet,” Theodora said. “People are paying as high as fifty dollars. My.” With a rustle of silk, a warm smile, Theodora swept past Lackman’s desk, then turned to look at him, the green eyes questioning. “You seem upset.”
“I ... I have been ordered to discharge a man,” he blurted. “And given no reason for it ... and it is something I hate to do in these times...” He stared in horror at the exotic creature. “Oh, please, Mrs. Max, don’t mention this to your husband. I ... I had no business to burden you with my troubles ... but they’re not really troubles,” he added hastily, sweat dripping down his pale cheeks and off the tip of a bony nose. “Of course Mr. Max is always right in everything he does...”
She looked out the window at the forested slopes beyond the town and said softly, “Yes. Always right.” Then she extended a delicate hand and patted Lackman’s cheek, the palm so soft and scented he had an urge to kiss each fingertip. “I’ll say nothing to Mr. Max,” she said. “Don’t worry.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Max,” he said, lowering his gaze to the piles of unfinished work on the desk the hotel had hastily supplied. She walked regally toward the inner door of the suite. As usual he wondered how such an intelligent young lady could stand to be married to a grossly overweight tyrant.
There were some things, he supposed, a woman like Mrs. Max needed more than a romantic marriage. Power. And who could deny that Claudius Max during the Civil War and afterward had become one of the most influential men of the age?
Lackman had once heard him address New York bankers, saying that a man never went broke taking a profit. This he had done during the late hostilities, selling much needed materiel, the transactions handled either through his representatives in Richmond or in Washington, depending on which of the combatants offered the best price.
Since cessation of hostilities, the tragic death of Lincoln and the turmoil that followed, Max had personally managed his ever-expanding empire. The only weak spot was in the West. Max was determined to correct this weakness, no matter the cost in money or blood. But he was wise enough to move carefully. There was public opinion, and the West did have its heroes.
Lackman watched Theodora slip through the door to the room where Max sat glowering. “What a testimonial they are giving you at the banquet, my dear,” Theodora said. “Tomorrow will be a great day...”
“Horseshit!”
“Why, what’s the matter?”
“Cantrell!”
“Him again?”
“For Christ’s sake, close the door!”
Chapter Nine
AFTER TRAIN 79 rolled to a steaming halt at the end of track, Sheriff Cady Dolan made a perfunctory examination of the two bodies Cole showed him. Cole spoke of the other Latchey, Willy, whose body was being taken back to Tracy Junction.
“Who’d they kill?” Dolan asked in his fat-man’s wheeze.
Cole nodded at Amanda. In a calm voice she related the details to Dolan. He accepted her story, saying he’d already heard about the Latcheys, who had been kicked out of Denver. Cole showed him the money sack that had cost so many lives.
“Man shouldn’t carry that much cash around with him,” the sheriff admonished. “’Specially on a lonely road. Beggin’ your pardon, Mrs. Cutler, but it was kinda foolish of your husband.”
“I thought so, but ...” She didn’t finish it.
Dolan said he’d see that Trooper and the other three horses were taken from the boxcar to a stable.
He had just arranged for the Latcheys to be taken to the town’s undertaking parlor, when he saw a bony, harassed-looking man hurrying along the tracks. Dolan knew he worked for Claudius Max so decided it best to greet him heartily. “Mr. Lackman, anything I can do for you?”
“I’m looking for a conductor named Roy Collins.”
“I’m Collins,” spoke up the conductor, in a heavy coat, who held a sheaf of bills of lading. “You’re with Python, ain’t you?”
Lackman ran a finger around his tight collar. “I have the unpleasant duty to inform you that you are ... fired!”
Collins was stunned, and even the sheriff looked at Lackman in surprise. “Fired!” Collins cried. “But why?”
“By orders of Claudius Max, of Python, which controls C-P ...” Lackman bit his lips and plunged on. “I ... I assure you I have nothing to do with it and deplore the assignment, but there is nothing I can do but obey.” Lackman seemed close to tears.
Lackman started back along the tracks into a cloud of steam from a locomotive. Collins leaped after him. “You can’t fire me!” he cried, shaking the bills of lading into the agonized features of the Python underling. “I quit a good job with Union Pacific to work for C-P. Damn it, I’ve got a right to know!”
Angry railroad men crowded around, muttering agreement. “Tell me why!” Collins shouted.
“It ... it is because you allowed Cole Cantrell to ride on your train. It is strictly forbidden. One of Mr. Max’s cardinal rules, which I am sorry to say you broke.”
An outraged Amanda shook a finger at Lackman. “That is the most ridiculous excuse I ever heard!” Cole tried to silence her, but she strode to Lackman, who backed away in the face of her wrath.
“Not my doings, ma’am,” Lackman wailed.
“Mr. Cantrell hunted down the men who murdered my husband. And because we were on a mountaintop and subjected to blizzards which could have frozen us to death, we were to be denied passage on a train? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”
“Not you,” Lackman protested, drawing out of reach. “Only Mr. Cantrell. The enmity between Cantrell and Mr. Max has simmered for a long time ...”
A temper brought on by little sleep and days of tension almost unlocked Cole’s lips. But it wasn’t the time to bring up the bloody past.
Amanda wasn’t through with Lackman. “Where is this Mr. Max? I demand that you take me to him ...”
And as Cole tried to steer her away from the knot of angry men, a suave voice said, “At your service, madam.” Every head turned as Claudius Max waddled up the tracks, gold headed walking stick in hand. A beaver hat canted on his round head gave him an almost jaunty look. A heavy black coat with fur collar accentuated his formidable girth. Removing his hat, he bowed low to Amanda in front of the growing crowd. Only a hissing locomotive broke the silence.
Amanda gestured at the stricken conductor. “I demand that you rehire this poor man!”
“Madam, I couldn’t help but overhear that your husband was murdered. My sympathy you have. But it does not give you the right to tell me how to run my railroad.”
“And speaking of rights! Because you have built a railroad into these mountains does not give you the right to walk roughshod over fellow humans.”
“Bravo, bravo,” shouted someone back in the crowd.
Max ignored the outburst. “It does give me that right, madam. Because if for any reason I saw fit no longer to offer this town the services of my railroad, it would wither and die.” Gasps of astonishment broke from many onlookers, and fear crowded the eyes. In the sudden silence, Max turned with a flourish and looked at the many faces. “Am I right, gentlemen?”
“Right!” shouted some of Max’s C-P officials, whom he had mainly ignored since arriving in town. Pete Urbannis, owner of the Peerless Hotel, whose checkered vest pockets were weighted with derringer and gold watch, said, “Your railroad pumps vital blood into New Sodom, Mr. Max. We sure can’t live without it.”
Other businessmen quickly nodded assent, as did their employees, who happened to be in the crowd strung out along the siding.
“I ask you to reconsider, Mr. Max.” Amanda’s deep voice was now under control. “And not fire the conductor. I think it’s shameful if you do.”
“My decision is made.” He started away, the walking stick punching dots in the snow at each step. Collins hurried after him.
“Give me another chance, Mr. Max ...”
“No.”
As Collins blanched, Amanda lifted coat and skirts from the snowy mud and got away from Cole. She caught Max alone near some empty boxcars.
“How can you be so despicable!” she demanded.
“I’m used to that description,” he said with a cold smile.
“Listen to me,” she hissed at him.
“No, you listen to me.” Max rudely pulled her close so that his lips were against her ear. “One day I may have you brought to me, and you will beg me to do whatever I wish...”
“I’d kill you first.” As she twisted away, the tip of her elbow caught his full lips, breaking the skin. A drop of blood darkened the multiple chins. He did not lose his cold smile.
Cole reached Amanda as Max was plodding away on his stumpy legs. A white handkerchief used on his lips was tossed carelessly into the mud, a square of expensive silk stained with his blood.
“I could have told you to save your breath trying to beg him,” Cole said.
“Why in the world is there so much enmity between you?”
“Hell with it. I don’t want to talk about it. Main thing now is to get this money of yours to the bank.” When this was done he got Amanda a room at the Grant, not as luxurious as the Peerless, but he didn’t want her under the same roof with Max.
Amanda had quieted down. She hugged Cole’s arm. “I couldn’t have had a more perfect honeymoon, even if it was in a boxcar. Tonight will be another.”
In the late afternoon he quietly told her why it couldn’t take place. In the first place he needed sleep. And for the sake of her reputation they shouldn’t share a hotel room in town. She argued, but he was adamant.
“I figure to sleep till noon. Don’t wake me. I’m about done in ...”
He broke off as an Intermountain Stage thundered into town, Al Grubb, buttoned up in a greatcoat, looming on the box. Grubb drove his team roughshod along the busy main street, nearly plowing into some people trying to dodge traffic. They did not see the coach bearing down, and Grubb made no attempt to hit the brake or rein in his team. But luckily they scrambled out of the way. As the coach was swinging past Cole, he glimpsed Martin Gale in the coach, head back, sound asleep. Then the coach pulled in behind the stage station, swaying dangerously.
Cole was fuming. He saw Amanda to her room and told her again not to expect him until noon the next day. Reluctantly she agreed. She kissed him and closed the door to her hotel room.
Cole got himself a room at the New Sodom, where he usually stayed when in town. Then he went to the stage office. Martin Gale wasn’t there, but Grubb was, in a tipped-back chair, reading a week-old copy of a Basin City paper. He looked up and muttered a surly greeting.
Cole was too weary to beat around the bush and said he had been in Tracy Junction for one reason. “I got sidetracked by the killings. You no longer work for Intermountain.”
“Yeah? Well, I brung Gale in with me, an’ I’ll just see what he’s gotta say.”
