Blood Kin, page 5
Laura tossed her hair. ‘I’m no relation. I’m just interested in how it feels to put two bullets into a boy who doesn’t stand a chance.’
Hawk banged the flat of his right hand hard on to the table, making the plate and the utensils on it jump. ‘Lady, if you’d take the time to speak with someone who was in here last night you’d know that I did everythin’ I could not to draw on that fool kid. An’ he only got himself shot after he took a shot at me an’ was all fixed to take another.’
‘I already asked.’
‘Then you know how it was. What would you have me do? Stand there an’ let him put a slug in me?’
Laura shook her head. ‘No, not that.’
‘What then?’
She shrugged, apparently uncertain for the first time. ‘I don’t know.’
‘That’s fine. ’Cause neither did I.’
For a moment, Laura looked at her hands. Hawk noticed the plain gold band on her wedding finger. The words took a long time coming but when they did they were clear and strong. ‘I want to hire you to come north to Rising Star. Maybe to kill a man.’
Hawk narrowed his eyes and looked at the woman hard. There was sweat and travel dirt staining her blouse, even though she’d likely washed it through; tiredness grazed her face around her eyes. But the eyes themselves were alert and engaged his stare: there was no doubting she meant what she’d just said.
Hawk used the sole of his boot to push the chair opposite away from the table. ‘There’s coffee comin’,’ he said. ‘Why don’t you sit down and we can talk? It sounds as if we should.’
Laura nodded and pulled the chair back clear. The marshal came through the saloon door, glanced around, exchanged a few quick words with the bartender and went out again.
‘He told me,’ Laura said. ‘The marshal there. He told me how it was. Last night.’
‘Then why all the aggravation?’
‘I don’t know. I think I wanted to see for myself what you thought about it. What you felt, if anything.’
‘And?’
She touched the curling ends of her hair briefly with her fingers. ‘I still don’t know what you feel. But I do think you would have avoided it if you could.’
The cripple kid came towards the table, carrying a coffee pot that was blackened around the base and the bottom edges.
‘Lo, Aaron.’
Aaron blushed and stammered hello.
‘I think the lady’d like some coffee, too.’
Aaron blushed some more and mumbled something, setting down the pot and then limping away to fetch another cup. Laura didn’t speak until he’d returned and both cups were shakily filled. Then she told Hawk the reasons for wanting him in Rising Star. Hawk listened without comment, nodding his head once or twice, drinking the hot, slightly bitter coffee, waiting.
‘Uh-huh,’ he said when she’d finished, ‘an’ why d’you come here?’
‘I thought I’d find a man like you.’
He looked at her keenly: ‘Sure that’s what you want?’
‘What?’
‘A man like me.’
For the first time she evaded his eyes. ‘It’s what I … what the town needs.’ She turned back to him. ‘We don’t like it. Carey and me. We don’t like it one bit. Vowed we’d never stoop to hiring a gunman to do our work for us.’
‘And now?’
She sighed. ‘Now there doesn’t seem to be any choice.’
‘No,’ said Hawk and finished off his coffee in a swallow. ‘That’s the trouble, ain’t it? Ideas is fine only things happen and you can’t step around them. When it’s like that ideas don’t help. You have to do something.’
Laura moved her fingers around the sides of her wide cup, looking towards the saloon door, the lighter sky patched over the top. ‘We don’t have a great deal of money,’ she said.
‘How much?’
‘Two hundred dollars. Two hundred and fifty.’
‘Which?’
Laura’s head swung back sharply. ‘You want to leave us nothing?’
‘You want to be left nothing?’
‘All right.’ She dipped her head. ‘Two hundred and fifty.’
‘An’ for that you want me to clean up this little town of yours and get rid of this Hunter?’
‘Yes.’
‘Kill him.’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘Lady, I know you didn’t say it. But why else’ve you ridden all this way to get yourself a hired gun, less’n you reckon it’s going to come to that?’
Laura brushed her hands along the tops of her thighs, smoothing her skirt. ‘We’ll make you a peace officer, town marshal …’
‘We?’
‘The decent folk of the town. It may not be necessary to get to killing. Hunter might see we mean business, that we don’t want him there. He might up and leave.’
Hawk leaned quickly forward and the fingers of his right hand rested on the bare skin of her forearm. ‘You don’t believe that, do you? You know that isn’t the way it’s going to be?’
When she moved her arm away she could still feel the pressure of his touch.
There were more than a handful of folk out on the street to see them ride out of town, Hawk and the woman. Tom Porter leaned against his crutches and glowered a good riddance; Marshal Litterick stood in the doorway of his office and felt much the same, the thumb of his right hand hooked inside his belt, arm pressing against his spreading stomach. Men who’d seen what Hawk had done in the saloon, women who’d heard about it, all watched and exchanged words about where they reckoned the pair of them were going and what lay ahead. A couple of kids, no more than seven or eight, ran in front of the two horses and pointed their index fingers up at Hawk and made noises in their throats like guns exploding.
For Hawk it was nothing new; it was what he’d come to expect. Laura reacted differently, not used to being stared at, not in that way, unaccustomed to the strange mixture of fear and hostility and grudging respect that the man alongside her occasioned. She sneaked a glance at Hawk’s face but he was staring ahead, the smooth, tanned features giving away nothing, his mouth set in a firm line, jaw set.
At last the children tired of their game and the last buildings of Eagle Pass drew towards them. Most of the watching men and women had turned away to other things; the marshal had gone back inside to where he had papers to look through, a drunk to feed, coffee on the stove. Tom Porter adjusted his crutches under his arms and swung away, back to the store that was his business.
‘Got you!’ called one of the young kids now playing by themselves. ‘Bang! Bang! Got you! You’re dead!’
A tousle-haired boy grabbed at his chest and closed his eyes, pitching suddenly forwards then to one side, rolling over and over in the dirt. He stopped on his back, head lolling over, right leg twitching wildly before becoming still. Then, because it was just a game, he opened his eyes and jumped up, running off after his friend.
The west was a muted red, fading to purple-black at the edges. For a time the wind had stilled. Creatures rustled between the trees clumped to the north of the hollow where they’d camped. One of the horses lifted its head and nickered and Hawk’s hand dipped towards the Colt holstered at his side. Laura looked at him and read his sudden apprehension; she listened as he listened, finally relaxed as he relaxed.
She got to her feet and rinsed the tin plates with what was left of the water in the pan. Hawk stepped over to where the horses were tethered and ran the palm of his hand along the head of the bay that Laura was riding. When he glanced back towards the glowing embers of the fire, Laura was bending across its light and the sheen of her skin shone, her eyes burned. Hawk’s right hand patted the animal’s warm neck and it swung its head round to nuzzle him.
Laura was stretching out her blanket, several feet back from the fire. She paused and straightened as Hawk walked over towards her.
‘It’s goin’ to be a cold night,’ said Hawk. ‘Likely the wind’ll freshen.’
She nodded a little too hastily. ‘Maybe.’ She turned back to her blanket.
Almost half an hour later, Hawk was still sitting close by the remains of the fire, squatting really, motionless. Laura Friedman saw his outline from above the edge of the rough wool of her blanket. A dark silhouette that merged with the lesser dark of the background. The wind was stronger now but everything else was still. Without willing it, Laura’s eyes closed. When they opened again she had no idea how long she had been asleep. Hawk’s shape was no more to be seen and she presumed he was sleeping also. For the second time her eyes closed and they wouldn’t reopen until morning.
Chapter Six
THE RIM OF the tin mug was still tinged with cold, despite the hot, black coffee inside it. Laura held it in both hands, cupping them around it for the warmth. The sky was lightening to the east but the sun had yet to show.
‘Tell me about him.’
‘Who?’ Laura asked, sleep still there in her voice.
‘The man you want me to kill.’
‘Only if it has to come to that.’
Hawk ignored that remark and waited for an answer to his question.
‘His name’s Hunter. James Hunter. He’s still a young man …’ She broke off and looked at Hawk. ‘… I’d say around the same age as yourself. Dresses smart all the time. Wears a mustache and beard that he’s always getting the barber to trim. Always smoking cigars. Everywhere he goes, this dog goes with him. Huge. Beautiful. An Irish wolfhound.’
Hawk nodded. ‘A gun. Does he carry a gun?’
Laura’s eyes shifted away from Hawk towards the trees as a bird took off from one of the branches with a flutter of wings. ‘I don’t know. I mean, I assume he does, only I’ve never seen one. He has others to do his shooting for him.’
‘Uh-huh.’ Hawk nodded again. ‘Tell me about them.’
Laura told him about the tall and lean Link, with his beaked nose and thinning hair; the sandy-haired, round-faced Artie; Putnam with his long, fair hair and thin, nervous lips. She could see Hawk turning the descriptions round in his mind, trying to fit them to faces and guns that he met in small towns and bars over the south-west.
‘You know any of them?’
‘I don’t think so. Can’t be certain.’
‘You know Hunter?’
Hawk pursed his lips; shook his head. ‘No.’
Ten minutes later they were in the saddle and passing the clump of trees, heading for the trail north. The sun still hadn’t shown itself clearly, but was shrouded in early morning mist. The eastern sky was a bleached yellow. Hawk pulled at the collar of his shirt and buttoned his vest. Laura wore a grey wool coat over her blouse. They let the horses find their own pace, not hurrying, no sense in that now that the man had been chosen, the contract agreed, the bargain sealed.
When Laura glanced at Hawk she still felt a twinge of doubt, more than that even, but she knew it was too late. She had made her decision when she had spoken to him as he finished his breakfast in the barroom back in Eagle Pass. Now she would have to stick by it.
Always it had been like that for Laura … once her mind had been made up, once her word had been given, then there was no stepping aside from the consequences, whatever they might be. When Carey had asked her to be his wife she had thought about it so long that he nearly lost heart. But she had weighed the issues in her head rather than her own heart and she’d gone to him and said, yes, she would accept him and gladly and she would love him and look out for him. The only thing was, she couldn’t promise to obey him, at least, not blindly, not like some dumb creature that didn’t have a mind or a will of its own.
Carey had grinned and said, didn’t he know that and what did she think he was asking her to marry him for anyway.
No: she hadn’t stepped aside from her marriage.
There’d been times when she and Carey had rowed and even fought, physically fought, but she never turned her back or threatened to walk out and neither had he. There had been temptations too, for both of them she guessed and she hadn’t fallen and neither—and here she was guessing again—had Carey. Temptations. She glanced again at Hawk, just fractionally, and remembered the previous night by the dying fire. There would be at least one more such night to come before they arrived back in Rising Star and then there would be Carey and Carey’s arms and it would be all right.
‘Hold up.’ Hawk’s voice was hushed but there was no mistaking the command in it.
She hauled on the reins of the bay, tugging more than she should and causing it to shy and stammer sideways.
Hawk was still in the saddle, head inclined towards the ridge of land that lay a quarter of a mile to the east. Uneven, broken here and there with solitary trees. Between there were patches of deep green scrub and cactus. Beyond and on all sides the land folded away, vast. Laura felt insignificant, vulnerable. A worm of fear quivered at the curve of her belly.
‘What …’ she began too loud. ‘What is it?’ Almost whispered.
Hawk gave a sideways shake of the head and for the present that was all the answer Laura was going to get. Her own eyes ran the length of the ridge and back again: nothing seemed to move, nothing was out of place. She could tell by the set of Hawk’s back that he wasn’t satisfied.
His gloved hand held the reins, the other was close by his saddle gun. He seemed to be staring at one point now, maybe two hundred yards along the ridge from opposite where they were. Laura followed his gaze but it yielded nothing.
Then he was flicking the reins and mouthing, ‘Okay’, over his shoulder and they were going forward again, still at the same walking pace.
Laura drew alongside. ‘What did you see?’
‘I don’t know for certain. Maybe nothing. Or …’ Hawk let his words drift off into the wind.
‘But somebody?’ persisted Laura. ‘Someone.’
Hawk looked at her and didn’t reply. They rode the next three, four miles in silence. The land to the west flattened out and seemed to become more arid; scarcely anything grew there, the sandy earth dull in the gathering light of the sun. Laura looped the reins around the saddle pommel and slipped off her coat, folding it under the straps that held her saddle bags. Hawk had some time past unbuttoned his vest. The wind had dropped again. A pair of large-winged black birds circled high overhead.
‘This Hunter,’ Hawk began slowly. ‘He know you was ridin’ out?’
‘I guess so. He seems to know most things that go on in Rising Star.’
‘He know where you was headed and why?’
‘No.’
‘You sure of that?’
‘Yes. I mean, he might have guessed, but …’
‘It ain’t somethin’ you make a habit of, leavin’ town without your man for days at a time?’
‘No.’
‘Then he’ll have noticed and figured you’re up to something.’ He looked sideways at her. ‘You think Hunter would have noticed you not being around town?’
Without being sure why, Laura flushed. ‘He … he might.’
‘Uh-huh.’ And Hawk’s eyes moved out again to scan the land off to the north and east.
‘You think that might be his men out there? Whoever it was you saw?’
‘I never said I did see anybody.’
‘But if you did?’
Laura stared at him. ‘Could be. Who’s to say?’
Hawk moved his horse into a brisk trot and Laura let him get seventy or so yards in front before she increased the stride of the bay and closed the gap that had grown between them.
There was another period of silence, the thoughts of both of them nagged at by the possibility that they were being watched and that at any point on the trail whoever was watching might decide to act.
Melville’s Trading Post was close by the Bitter Snake Creek, the only place for fifty miles in any direction where a man might buy food and supplies, hope to renew his ammunition belt, get his horse reshod, the shafts of his wagon mended, even—at certain more prosperous months in Melville’s life—buy himself a woman for an hour or so’s comfort.
Melville himself was a giant of a man, four or five inches clear of six foot and so wide he had to go through most doors with a sideways shuffle. He had a long beard, a drooping mustache that almost covered his mouth entirely, long hair that fell in thick waves to the nape of his neck. The total effect was of a face lost in the midst of a brown and grey nest.
He had been a sailor, twenty years he’d crossed and recrossed both oceans, the Atlantic and the Pacific, in search of whales. He’d begun as the lowest of swab hands on deck, graduated through harpooner to being first mate. No higher. When the third boat in as many weeks was wrecked in the wake of one particular whale, Melville had read the signs. He was no man to risk the enmity of God for too long and without good reason. He figured that the Lord was trying to tell him something and he’d best listen.
When the ship docked at Nantucket, Melville handed in his papers, collected his back pay and spent it on loading up a wagon and buying a team of mules to drag it west. West and south.
Watering at Bitter Snake Creek, an Apache put an arrow through the eye of his last two mules and the other one just lay down and died. Melville lay between the two dead mules and shot three of the Apaches dead with his rifle, taking another one in the back of the leg when the rest of the bunch rode off. Melville lumbered after the wounded Indian and caught up with him inside a hundred yards. He picked him up and held him above his head, turned him round a few times and finally brought him down on his outstretched knee. The crack of the man’s back echoed over the land like a rifle shot.
Melville had looked round at his wagon and the dead mules and figured the Good Lord was trying to get a message through to him again, so he’d decided his destination was reached.
He had built the trading post mostly out of adobe, though he’d used wood for the shutter and the door, wood too thick for arrows or even most bullets to penetrate. He’d sold what he had left of his own stock to the first travelers who came by and used that money to buy more goods. Melville had built himself a forge without ever having used one before and he’d learned to handle it almost as well as a trained blacksmith. He was as close to a fully self-sufficient man as you could find and in the south-west he stood up against a lot of competition.
